6160/Far From Shore

Far From Shore
Date of Scene:	08 December 2018
Location:	Great Ocean
Synopsis:	Parting somewhat peacefully previously, the Raider Demon returns in an inexplicable rage. Who could be responsible for this?
Cast of Characters:	Midway, Shigure, 571, 6730, 591, 6384, Leyanne Mace, Kotone Yamakawa, 6804

---

Midway has posed:
    Flotilla 18.1 is a large, escorted cargo fleet consisting of ships from multiple nations. Nine massive container ships flanked by military escorts, a group that has had success in the Raider-infested seas south of Africa numerous times. Today is an exception. One of the great container ships burns, broken in half and scattering its bulky cargo containers in the water around it. Sluggishly, the other great container vessels have begun to turn southward, chugging along at the highest speeds their laden hulls can manage.

    Some distance past the burning Yucatan, a modern navy frigate has partially capsized, holes burned through its visible sides. And on that hull is the Raider Demon. A shell from one of the remaining frigates careens past her, and she responds by lifting her cannon-laden arm. Guns discharge in sequence, a rapid staccato of six heavy shells fired in return.

    Her helmet is gone. A metal plate appears to have been welded over the left side of an otherwise human face, with a socketed lens fitted into it that glows blue. The grit of her teeth could be rage. Has she suddenly snapped?

    Unlike previous encounters, the Demon's entourage of Abyssal destroyers is completely absent. Though a trio of Abyssal scout planes is already circling overhead at a respectable distance.

    There's no ambiguity this time.

Shigure has posed:
    The Fifth Strike Squadron, mostly in land-fitout, ride on Kuma, the fastest of the four in her Ocean Fitout. The Light Cruiser bounds across the waves at flank bell, spewing thick smoke as she runs her engine hot. "Okay, gameplan will be for the three of us to disperse and protect the cargo ships. Yamashiro, I trust you to engage and distract the Demon long enough for us to get them clear. If not the ships, then the crews at least." says Shigure, standing on Kuma's foredeck and looking at the taller black-haired woman, and the blonde with the red eyes. <Kuma will do her best, kuma~.> "Understood, Flagship." "I've, like, got it~."

    Once the Cruiser is in range, the other three bail overboard, spread formation then split up, moving through the ships and trying to assist where they can. Meanwhile, Yamashiro herself moves to close on the berserked Raider Demon, making herself as big a target as she can without opening fire just yet.

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    Orders or no, Maaka's here to do her job no matter what some jumped up park ranger says. She skates across the water with her ocean kit, speedily headed towards the battle with a massive cannon strapped to her arm. The big bore repeater goes off with a thunderous report every shot, aimed for the scout planes mostly for the moment.

    For the time being, Maaka remains close by the flotilla under attack, trying to protect the vessels as she engages and opens fire.

Android 17 (6730) has posed:
    Seventeen heard the radio, frowning. That's weird, she wasn't THIS aggressive, especially with her stated goals. Attacking things like this would just downright be terrible, especially with the understanding they had seem to build...and worse, if it was despiration...she had the ability to contact him. Infact, he had quite evenly handedly said 'hey if you have trouble, gimme a hollar.' But now...?

    Seventeen would appear in the air, but not quite so far away from the battle. Infact, he would simply appear (because of speed bursts' near the planes. "Hi." he says, immediately shooting two of the planes with a shot from each hand, before looking at the last one. "I don't know who you are, but I'm not a fan of vouyers. If you want to get involved, come yourself." A final blast towards the third plane. Scattering or destroying, either worked for him, before he started flying towards Raider demon and the fighting...

    Over the radio, he tried to get her attention. "Hey, you're uh...making quite the scene. Captain boat-murder is getting pretty aggressive. So care to let us in what this is about before they uh...get nasty? If you're in trouble you know you can ask for help, right? But you're gona need to stop this, because this time you don't seem to be uh...not hurting the people like you were before."

Aoko Aozaki (591) has posed:
    ROUGHLY FIFTEEN YEARS AGO

    "That's absurd, Aoko." Alice says with a flat, disapproving tone, an expression so dour her black clothes look brighter for it.
    "No, no, come on, bear with me here! My lasers. Have recoil," a young Aoko argues with her peer, hair still brown and soul untainted.
    "No. Absolutely not. That is not what attack spells are for," Alice says, shaking her head.
    "BUT WHAT IF. I DID IT ANYWAY!" Aoko grins.
    "Aoko no. You're grounded and you're not leaving my workshop until you've copied your basic incantations down a hundred times," Alice snaps.
    "Alice! I'm talking about /flying/. With /lasers/." Aoko insists, still grinning.
    "One thousand times." Alice delivers.
    "Aww," Aoko says.

    NOW

    "AHAHAHA! There's no one to tell me nooooo!" shouts Aoko gleefully, as she rockets overhead. There is an immense trail of blue light behind her - not the plume of a jet engine, but the fact she's factually flying on the recoil of a maintained beam attack gushing out of her feet.

    "Now all I have to do is nail the landing!"

    Beams blast of her hands. Her feet stop firing lasers. She spins in the air, attempts to line herself up and--

    Splashes in the water next to Raider Demon. Her head pops back out, laughing. "Ahaha, missed. That's too bad. Hellooooooo!"

Orchid (6384) has posed:
     Among those on board Kuma is Orchid. She's in line for a set of rigging, but the details and scheduling haven't been working in her favor. Her objectives here are first to preserve the lives of those on the damaged ships, and to find out where those abyssal scout planes came from, sending some robot bats in their direction. These have little guns, equipped with special ammo...

     As for Orchid herself, she is soon rocketing over the surface of the water on her rocket surfboard., several large boxes on her back. She's got a plan, and hopefully it won't involve being in the drink for several hours. Again.

Leyanne Mace has posed:
Leeroy bounces across the surface of the water next to Shigure, his crew going through the last minute checks to their guns and calling out their ready status. At the helm, Leyanne gives a satisfued nod at each ready she hears.

And then Kotone has an idea. She nods, pushing the throttles full forward and spinning the wheel. The ugraded PT boat rises up further into its plane, kicking up a great roostertail of water behind himself as the gas turbine engines crank up to speed. "Do you need us to pull alongside, or just get you close?" She asks Ko, adjusting her helmet so it doesn't squish her antennae so much.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa is riding on the leeroy at the moment thanks to Leanne and points out she cargo ships and makes a request to get her on board one, She can give them some support there and she needs to speak to Nagato about her own Ocean fit she muses.

"Just get me close enough to jump and we should be good."

Now isn't the time for that though. She'll spring off Leyanne's ship the moment she gets close enough. Kotone leaps off the Leeroy and will air jump her way up with one heck of a large double jump to get onboard the vessel, while she might be able to help Leyanne fight? She'd be better suited to helping the cargo ships.

Then Aoko arrives? WTF is going on with that lady? She has no idea, and just hopes she won't have to fight her..

<<This is Kotone Yamakawa of the Paladins I'm here to help>>

Should any planes be coming at the vessel she's on any of the ones she could shoot at she'll take to using her assault rifle to try and shoot them down out of the air.

Thor (6804) has posed:
Standing on Kuma's deck is an incredibly muscular blonde with shoulder-length hair in strange armor, holding a one-handed hammer engraved with some sort of runes. Thor Odinson has come to assist. "Well, then...spirit boats are not something I'm familiar with, but it seems we're about to get to know each other."

As As the radio banter goes on, Thor starts spinning his hammer, floating into the air as they get close enough to the Raider Demon. Thor knows exactly what he's going to do already...

Because seeing that Raider Demon is actually opening fire, he has no time to stop and try and urge peace. He moves to fly straight at her and try and shoulderslam her with his powerful strength, trying to knock her off firing course and stop her assault. "They call you a demon! Well, they call /me/ Thor Odinson, and I suggest you cease your attack."

Midway has posed:
    The distant frigate turns, sporting several fires along its forward decks and, after that salvo, a great big hole blown through its bridge structure. It is, at least, still afloat and men charge across the decks to contend with the fires. The single automated gun turret, however, has been destroyed. And the Demon is too small of a target for cruise missiles to really work.

    She draws her cannons back, ejecting smoke from the barrels and engaging her reload cycle.

    Two of the recon squadron's trio are destroyed immediately. The remaining plane immediately dives into a spiral, reversing its direction in an Immelmann turn. As it accelerates, his beam clips the spheroid aircraft. It continues to retreat, trailing smoke while 17 turns his attention to the Demon.

    With Aoko splashing down nearby, and 17 addressing her directly, the Demon hauls her guns up into a safe position. Her exposed, half-remodeled face shoots between the two of them, her expression uncertain. After some internal deliberation, she thrusts her clawed gauntlet aside, "Go. Away. You were. Kind. To me--"

    A horrific metallic screeching sound sounds off from her rigging somewhere, and the demon recoils. Her normally proportioned hand lifts, covering the bare side of her face.

    DESTROY THEM. DESTROY THEM NOW.

    "I..!" The sound subsides as she speaks, arms dropping to her sides in defeat, "...I will. Obey." Her tail lashes up into an arc, discharging torpedoes with bursts of steam into the water around Aoko. In the same instant, she kicks off, lunging straight for Android 17 with her clawed gauntlet. This is where Thor comes charging in, knocking the Demon off course and right off the frigate's hull. When she hits the water, she bounces, then lands on all fours, skitting to a stop across the water's surface with her teeth bared.

    With the Demon distracted by 17 and Aoko (and surprise Thor), however, there is no immediate threat to the fleeing freighters. Dealing with her directly is probably more beneficial than shepherding the ships.

    Possibly in response to the threat to the scout planes, however, anyone with long range air radar is going to notice a large airgroup approaching. Did 17 make someone angry?

Android 17 (6730) has posed:
    Seventeen braces for the sudden assault, not expecting the viciousness at what she was coming at him, only to have Thor shoulder check her out of the way. Looking towards the large Asgardian for a moment, he shakes his head with a smirk. "Thanks for the save, but the one who needs it more is the lady there." Pointing at Raider. Hearing some important information...and of course, hearing the oncoming array of planes in the dsitance (thanks enhanced hearing), what he wanted happened. The main player decided to move, playing their hand perhaps too early. Still...

    He didn't care about them, he cared about Raider Demon. "Hey now, you remember me right? Android Seventeen?" he says, a hand out, ready to both defend, but also to try and place on her hand, aiming to try and lower the claw. "I don't know what they did to you, but I know what you're going through. Something in your head telling you to do things over and over. You have to fight it...think back to what YOU want. What you decided to do with your own will. This isn't it. It isn't about THEM, it is about you." He says, calmly, with no trace of fear, only deep worry.

Orchid (6384) has posed:
     So Orchid is headed away from the main action. She's going over to the sinking ships, and will be dropping those boxes from her back, activating them as she does so. Each pops out into a large life-raft. Let's hear it for the wonders of inflatable technology.

     But there's something else Orchid can do, and that is to release more of her flying drones. These are about half bats, half tiny V-22 planes. They're going up into the air, bats in front, to get an idea where the incoming flock of aircraft is coming from, and their alignment.

Shigure has posed:
    Kuma chuckles at Thor, then gives a surprised sound as he rockets off. "So cool, kuma!"

    Yamashiro continues to approach, kicking into a higher gear as the Raider starts her attack. The battleship brings her starboard turrets around in a defensive fashion, in case Raider fires at her while she closes, then proceeds to pounce onto the Demon and attempts to grapple and begin disabling weapons.

    Shigure turns away from the convoy, lifting her cannon turrets to high elevations and loading flak-shells to engage the incoming air threat. Kuma and Yuudachi similarly begin to turn, but at slower off the mark, just in case people need a lift back to the action. Their secondary arrays lifting to defensive ready in case any planes come their way.

Aoko Aozaki (591) has posed:
    Suddenly, missiles.

    Aoko did NOT expect this, and more importantly, did not ever train to fight in water. In retrospect, that was stupid and reckless.

    Then again, that's normal for Aoko.

    "Whoa, hey, hang on, I came to help!"

    Clearly, it's too late for that. Aoko can't make impressive barriers like Seventeen can, and so she has to defend herself with superior offense instead. Beams of blue light pierce the water, forming in the air like a complex grid of death around Aoko. They intercept some - not all - of the inbound torpedoes, but the explosions do well enough to send Aoko up into the air that she's momentarily safe from further harm. She blasts downwards with her hands, stabilizing herself above the water, barely.

    Tony Stark was more graceful than she is on his first attempt at doing just that, let's be honest.

    "How vexing!"

    Aoko does not counterattack.

    "Hey, Seventeen, can you pick me up, I can't fly or walk on water!" Kind of an issue. Any excuse to be swept around by a pretty man, besides!

    Her eyes do linger on the Demon, though.

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    Holy shit, it's Thor, actual God of Thunder.

    Maaka avoids getting too distracted by the Norse Deity and Asskicker Supreme, seeing as how things are a bit busy at the moment. She continues opening fire, trying to gauge the distance and angle with her cybernetic targeting systems before she opens fire once more, blasting away at the planes to knock them right out of the sky.

    She sees Raider engaging 17, Aoko, AND ALSO THOR, and Maaka decides she'll join in on that. The cyborg skates across the ocean once more, swiftly opens fire on Raider this time. Disable first is best, she thinks.

Leyanne Mace has posed:
Leyanne pulls up to one of the transports to allow Kotone to jump off, and then once again Leeroy pulls up into a plane again. Leyanne turns the bow towards the Raider, bringing the radar set online. "Exocets coming online." She reports. "All guns, hold fire until she actually strikes. Let's give the dude a chance to talk If she strikes home, shoot to disable, get ready the harpoons incase we need to stop her sinking."

THe mice on board nod and take aim, the two ogrelike rodents at the exocets giving a thumbs-up.

There's a laugh from the bow. "Do you think that's a bit of a... Thor point?" someone says in relation to Maaka's comment, and it's followed by the sound of a soda can bouncing off a helmet, and generalized cussing.

At the back of the boat, the Bofors swings up and opens fire on any aircraft that gets too close.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone has seen the ships are getting away at this point she remained on board long enough to make sure they are clearly seeing they are well on their way she calls to the Crew.

"Keep going we'll make sure to deal with the attacker."

She mutters about something not being right there with the Abyssal. She has been aware this one seemed not entirely lost in their pain. Something isn't right as she breaks into a run on the deck leaps and double jumps trying to make it on to Shigure's deck, she'll end up rolling across the deck a bit and then rises up to her feet.

"Sorry about the deck Shigure."

Kotone calls out, she does have some heavy weapons she can make use of hell she might be able to do some repairs through the tech base of this form is ... quite old to her world and she'll have to rely on some basic work on analog tech in restorations.

She pulls her she pauses as Thor shows up wait what show? Given the state of this fight? She's going to use her Matter Mani0plator to change weapons and deploy her MEK issue minigun. It looks kinda strange such a small woman carrying such a big gun, as she'll move to find a good spot on the deck to shoot from for the moment.

"Just let me know where you need me."

she will spray fire at any aircraft coming for Shigure as she closes...

Thor (6804) has posed:
Thor can see what's going on. The supposed 'demon' that he tackles is...apparently a victim, according to 17 and Aoko? Confusion dawns upon his face, but he decides to defer to them, since they know what they're doing, and others are starting to agree. So, when Aoko calls for help...

Thor continues spinning the hammer, swooping down to grab her with his free arm and lift her. He's careful not to hurt her while doing so, as he moves to bring her towards the nearest surface. Letting her go safely, he stops spinning the hammer and lands next to her. Planes are coming.

The others are intending to deal with them, but there might be too many. So while he doesn't strike yet, Mjolnir starts to crackle with lightning. The hammer basically buzzes as it crackles, ready to fire bolts when necessary. He doesn't move to engage the Raider Demon - that'd be harmful to 17's plan, and Yamashiro is already interfering with it.

Midway has posed:
    "I. Remember." Raider responds to Seventeen. She hauls herself up to her feet, brandishing her claws and cannons once more, "No. Choice. Now." With her cannons leveled, she opens fire on the Android with one turret's worth of guns before Yamashiro bodys her. The second turret's shot goes wide, sailing up harmlessly in an arc away from the battle. The Demon lets out a snarl as she goes down, one of her turrets being torn off before she gets her claws into the battleship's equipment. Wrenching, she reverses the situation with a rolling maneuver, before she releases and slides backwards.

    As the Demon skates back, bullets digging into her, she hisses. Her tail swings forward under her damaged cannon arm, ejecting a trio of torpedoes into Maaka's current path.

    Meanwhile, the first vanguard to encounter the approaching airstrike would be Orchid's drones. And it truly is something to behold. Like someone just dumped out the contents of an angry beehive, insulted its mother, and then kicked it a few times. A great swarm of white spheres with teeth, trailing crimson smoke. The first wave are fighters, banking into the formation of bat-like drones with machine guns blazing. They use advanced dogfighting techniques as well, diving in and dashing away using the accumulated speed, always working in pairs.

    And while the fighters contend with the present air power, swooping in beneath the dogfight are similarly shaped but differently equipped aircraft moving in groups of four. As they get closer, these in turn split up-- Some going high and then dive-bombing, while others go low and drop torpedoes in the water before banking up and away. It's a full on air strike, and everyone but the Raider Demon and those in her IMMEDIATE vicinity is a target.

Orchid (6384) has posed:
     So there's a new plan, involving Orchid Boosting a signal. It even feels like it could work. But for best results, she'll need to be closer to the source, closer to where the jamming will be needed. So Orchid has gotten back on her rocket surfboard, and is heading towards the main action... But with the bombs coming in...

     No. She doesn't slow. She doesn't want to die, but the prospect of saving one helpess life, to bring back Graf Spee back from being a monster. The fear of failure is greater.

     Thankfully, Orchid's hands are projecting a pair of forcefields, that she will use for at least partial cover.

     Back in the air... Orchid's drones are not prepared for this kind of Air Power. First the bats, then the V-22s, nearly all of them will be destroyed. But they won't go down alone. The bats first shoot their tracking darts, then small bolts of plasma. Then they, and the V-22s, will be spending their bodies against the incoming abyssal aircraft, and if they crash they will explode the abyssal. But it is likely that the net effect will be is to slow them down, slightly.

     Hopefully, with Orchid's warning, it'll be enough time for her friends to get to cover.

Android 17 (6730) has posed:
    Android 17 pulls his shield up as the turrent empties into him. He did not get out of it unscathed, his brow was bleeding and there was enough damaged clothing to indicate that something got through, but...that should have easily killed just a 'normal' Park Ranger. The dust clears, and Seventeen remains standing, though the barrier is gone.

    "Maybe," he admits, "If someone took that choice from you, then I'll help you get it back." he says, looking towards Tamashiro. Who also saved him from a follow up from the Raider Demon.

    "She's in your hands." He says towards Tamashiro with a tone. That TONE, that is somehow flat, but also communicates a high amount of anger. While in Demon's immediate area, he was not targeted by the planes. Thor grabs Aoko, who has a plan, that's fine.

    He can leave that to Aoko, it's time to draw the attention of the person whoever is causing this trouble.

    "Hey, Vouyer." he says, again, with that same tone. His hand comes out, pointing the palm of it towards the genera direction of the planes as they rise up from their bombing.

    A large blast of energy erupts form his hand, aiming to stream out in a barrage of smaller streams, aiming to try and catch the planes. Even if he doesn't shoot them down, it will not feel good, and will put their focus on him...or try to.

    "Consider this your on notice warning. She's not yours, she is her own person. The last person that tried to tell me that they owned someone did not survive long enough to make that mistake again."

Shigure has posed:
    Yamashiro's port-side turrets get wrecked, one falling off its mounting and plunking into the water. The other turret dangles on the wrecked gimbal. She then kicks forward again, aiming to grab at the lighter ship again. "Where are you looking? I'm your opponent!" she taunts, ducking to sweep the legs out from under Raider, then attempting to grab that claw-arm and pull it out behind the Raider, out of position to use again. "We're trying to help you... just fight against her for a little longer." she attempts to soothe.

    Shigure turns, and as the dive bombers come in, her guns open up, filling the air with flak explosions and tracer fire from her secondary batteries. "Yamakawa, try and destroy the bombs before they impact!" she says, echoing through the metal of her ship-form, while attempting to dodge through the barrage of bombs falling around her.

    Yuudachi opens up much the same, covering for the less able Kuma as the pair move to interpose between the oncoming onslaught and the group around Raider. "We're, like, getting overwhelmed here!" calls Yuudachi over radio, a bomb striking her superstructure and blasting a hole in the side of the bridge deck. "KYAH!"

Aoko Aozaki (591) has posed:
    Caught by Thor and deposited onto the overturned warship, Aoko grins, giving the Asgardian a thumb up. "Thaaaaanks handsome!"

    Of course, there's still the problem of the air strike, but... with everyone flying about and attacking the planes, at least it's a bit easier to handle. Barely.

    Beams of blue light shine into being again, trying to intercept any incoming shells before they can bomb Aoko or her makeship ground out from under her feet.

    She spreads her arms wide and looks up, feeling out the land. "Hm. It's not the most magical of places, but it'll have to do. Well, let's get to work! DEPLOY!"

    A massive circle of magical writing and runes appears underneath Aoko, spreading out into the water. The circle begins siphoning mana from the sea, but also from Aoko, who is evidently producing absurd amounts of it.

    Enough so that her body is making noises not entirely unlike a jet engine as her Magic Circuits rotate, and rotate, and rotate.

    It's gonna take a while to have quite enough magic on-hand, though. She'll need cover!

Leyanne Mace has posed:
Even as the dive bombers and torpedo bombers engage the agile PT boat, its own guns return fire. First the 40mm, strings of fat shells bursting in the air around the incoming drones, followed by the 20mm and 50-cal guns. Leyanne ducks behind the cover of her armoured wheelhouse, dragging the wheel left and right erattically to prove a difficult target.

Aerial bombardment, it seems, is not the way to deal with a PT boat. As the boat carves unpredictable curves in the water, it proves nearly impossible to target. What damage Leeroy recieves seems to be from luck, at least so far as the dive bombers go. The torpedo bombers fare a little better, one of the torpedoes detonating just aft of the PT boat and briefly lifting his stern from the water. The boat slams down with a crunch of stressed wood. "Asshats!" Leyanne growls. "Priority target, those torpedo bombers. Divebombers we can dodge but if they get a good lineup on us at close range we're buggered."

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Dive Bombers? Kotone has done enough time helping out the Fleet as a light carrier top know what's coming next even as Shigure gives the order to intercept she's raising her weapon and opening fire the minigun opens up, and Ktoone is making a weaving field of fire to intercept and detonate the bombs before they land with pure volume of fire here.

"Aye, I'm on it Shigure!"

Brass rains on the deck even as Kotone fires she does not sit still she keeps moving, aiming to intercept the bombs as they fall to the deck and there's a real danger she might end up getting caught in one of the blasts as she's quite intent from keeping Shigure from harm from these as much as possible.

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    Explosions fuel the immediate area, as turret rounds and bombs are thrown about. She sees Aoko, and begins to skid towards the sorceress. "I got your back, gingerbread!" She calls out, opening fire upon the enemy aircraft. Aircraft open fire upon Maaka, leaving holes in her skin and uniform while punching marks in her ocean rig. "Fuckin' get off!" She roars, opening fire again as she draws a light-machine gun from her Matter Manipulator's inventory, blazing away with the SAW in her off-hand. Normally she can evade hostile fire easily, but trying to protect Aoko makes this a bit more complex for the moment.

    Blood and mech fluid can be seen pooling at Maaka's feet as she zips back and forth, her injuries growing messier by the minute, even if she can still fight.

Thor (6804) has posed:
As Thor drops off Aoko onto the overturned airship, there's an airstrike, torpedoes and divebombs. Thor is blasted and impacted by these attacks, not bothering to dodge - the blasts send him skidding back and bruise him and his armor, but the God of Thunder is fine - he's incredibly sturdy. "Hah! Good try, planes, but you'll have to do better than that."

Positioning himself between Aoko and the explosions (because he can tank them), the lightning swirls from the hammer, and then blasts out. It moves for any nearby torpedo-launchers, crackling white bolts flying forth and moving to fry them. It's strong, and Thor's not even at full power. To that might be a hinder for his enemies. He turns his over his shoulder to Aoko. "Whatever you are doing, make sure it works. I'll protect you."

Midway has posed:
    Absolute Goddamn Chaos is a common result when an air strike occurs. Fighters and drones fight a pitched battle in the sky, while bombers unleash their payloads and swing around into retreat. Seventeen's beam incinerates several retreating bombers, while others are clipped by the beam. Others are damaged or shot down by accumulated anti-air fire from the destroyers and cruiser. The remaining frigates from the escort lend their firepower as well, the chatter of autocannons mixed with the buzzing of CWIS. The problem is the number of bombers involved.

    While that chaos reigns in the backdrop, Raider Demon grapples with Yamashiro. She lets out a shout when her legs are knocked out from under her, and her claw gauntlet emits a strained groan of fatigued steel when pinned behind her back. Like most people, she's mostly helpless like this. Her tail thrashes, lacking the mass to dislodge the battleship. Her struggles cease, the Demon muttering, "I belong. To nobody."

    YOU BELONG TO ME.

    Her equipment starts that godawful screeching again. Raider Demon's struggling renews, with more vigor and an agonized scream. As she struggles, her remaining turret rotates, the barrels elevated for a point blank shot.

    Defenses begin focusing around Aoko and her giant, obvious magical circle. Whoever is directing the air attacks refocuses their efforts here. Torpedo bombers start running attacks on the ship Aoko is standing on, while dive bombers drop their explosives from above. When bombers stop getting through lightning and gunfire from Thor and Maaka and Kotone and the two destroyers, the fighters begin strafing the overturned hull with machine gun fire, diving on the magus in pairs.

Android 17 (6730) has posed:
    Seventeen noted that there was something...satisfying in launching that beam. He prepares a second one, because it appears they were not FOCUSED enough on him...but that was because, to his realization, they were focused on Aoko. "Damnation." he says, uncharacteristically bothered. It also seemed that Raider was fighting...good.

    Seventeen uses that stupid speed to avoid direct combat, even as some tired to fire at him. Rolling around, he flashed again, this time appearing near Aoko. His barrier expands, aiming to protect her from the oncoming damage...

    By taking it all himself.

Shigure has posed:
    "That's right, you belong only to yourself." says Yamashiro, grunting as those struggles renew. Red eyes widen as the remaining turret swivels around to blast her point blank, and she chooses to sacrifice the rest of her main battery to tank the shots, bringing her starboard turrets around to absorb the shells. At that range, no matter how well she angles, they're going to punch clean through the armour, detonating inside and sending the turret caps careening off into the water, spreading black scorch marks across Yamashiro's body, and cutting gashes that leak black oil-like blood. "Gonna have to try... a little harder than that." she grunts, painedly, balling her free fist to smash the cannon turret so it can't refire again.

    Shigure can't dodge every bomb, and Kotone can't take them all out either. Explosions ripple across the destroyer, rending holes and setting fires in her superstructure and leaving portions of her deck an impassable mess. "Gnnn, that one got through... engine power dropping. Repair teams, lay to the engine room!"

    Yuudachi and Kuma continue their own barrage of AA fire, but are similarly being worn down. Yuudachi starts to list heavily to starboard, and then a set of fairies pin up a large white sheet between her bridge tower and main funnel, forming a makeshift sail. "I'll keep on fighting, using a hammock for a sail if I must!"

Leyanne Mace has posed:
That screeching even has the mice wincing in pain, while they continue to defend the little PT boat, which starts circling around Kuuma and Yuudachi to add his weight of AA defense to theirs, trying to keep them from going down.

"Ready rescue equipment." Leyanne comments. "Just in case."

Aoko Aozaki (591) has posed:
    Wow that's a LOT of aggro.

    Aoko is going to trust her entourage knows what it's doing and can handle both defense and anti-plane tactics at the same time.

    "Geez I hope once they've got one of those planes to take apart they can do this easier, I'm so not down to do this every time!" It's dangerous! In ways she's not especially inclined to repeat often. She prefers to shoot back, not charge up a solution.

    Granted by all definitions the solution is a shot.
    Shut up.

    "Just a bit longer guys, sorry, sorry!"

    Several more circles appear overhead, shaped like a funnel drawing in air towards the red-haired magus. Oh, it takes her back.

    Last time it was a moon and a comet.
    Now it's just thin air.

    "Barrel, expand!" They grow.
    "Expand!" They grow.
    "I said expand dangit!" They GROW.

    "Switching to alternating current."

    The spell circles bloom, almost like flowers.

Orchid (6384) has posed:
     "You'd think I'd learn that I hate these field jobs," Orchid mutters to herself, landing on the deck near Aoko. With her drones gone, she can reconfigure her transceiver systems to be ready to amplify the signal Aoko has promised... if they're still ALIVE when they get to that point.

     Still, time must be bought. While others aim for the aircraft, Orchid has morphed one hand to a blaster, and is shooting pellets of plasma not into the air, but into the water. She's aiming for the torpedoes, and while her aim is poor, her rate of fire is high, tiny pellets kicking up water in explosions.

Thor (6804) has posed:
As Android 17 handles the vast majority of the aggro, Thor determines he needs to take out the fighters to give the man a break. He spins the hammer again, but he doesn't fly. No, in the end of that spin, Thor throws Mjolnir.

The hammer goes flying through the air, at an incredibly precise angle, thrown like it was a frisbee. It courses up into whatever fighters it can hit, trying to smash through them with all of the hammer's might, before returning to Thor's hand afterwards. "Maiden! We'll deal with them, hurry with your craft!" If they survive the first throw, Thor does it again. They need to take these fighters out.

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    More machine gun fire is released from Maaka, and is returned in interest. She feels several rounds dig through her chest, leaving the cyborg in excruciating pain fueled only by adrenaline. She has no idea who it is people are talking about over the radio, might be a good thing to ask later when this settles. Assuming it settles.

    She shifts fire at the bombers, trying to shoot them down before they reach Aoko as she lifts and aims the SAW more accurately now. It's way easier to shoot this way, rather than use the awkward turret gun.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa has certainly lessened the amount of fire Shigure has taken. She also has got caught in the edge of several blasts to ones she got at the last moment, Kotone clearly has been hurt and she's got a few bits of fragment impaled in her armour and body and she's clearly hurt. She pulls one of the worst offenders out and calls out to Shigure.

"They don't seem to be done with us yet, Shigure!"

She could help with the repairs but she's not a naval mechanic, she could help with fire suppression but they need more guns on deck so she'll keep to the deck and turn her weapons attention to the fighters that are coming in.

"What's happened to her Shigure?!"

she calls out as she keeps up the AA barrage.

Midway has posed:
    Bombers and fighters buzz around Aoko's location as the magus ramps up her spell. Attacks are being interfered with by gunfire a lignting hammer and Seventeen's quick interceptions. After some considerable harassment efforts, however, the aircraft suddenly ascend into the cloud layer. The damaged cruiser and destroyers are left alone at this point, and they'd already given up on making attacks on the PT boat.

    The signal itself has also stopped, and with it the Raider Demon has gone still beneath Yamashiro. She rests there, single eye closed, breath coming in ragged gasps against the rolling surface of the sea. Softly, the Abyssal murmurs, "...I don't."

    A gentle glow builds up around her and Yamashiro, as the Demon speaks, "...I don't. Want. To do this. Anymore." She then loses consciousness, pieces of black metal falling away that had previously been attached to her. It's an entirely different person under Yamashiro after a few minutes have passed. Silver-haired, with a red streak on one side, in a black uniform dress soaked through with seawater.

Shigure has posed:
    Yamashiro loosens her grip as Graf Spee stops struggling. As she loses consciousness, the Battleship dismounts, and scoops the girl up into her arms, cradling her like one might a child. "We will take her to a safe harbour. Not Hikari, so she can rest, and our colleagues can visit her." she transmits, skating over towards the others. Shigure's engine kicks back to life and she turns, wounded, to the group, while Yuudachi remains stranded, dead in the water.

    Kuma fires grapple lines over to the destroyer, and starts to haul her along, both ships streaming smoke from various battle damage scars. <Mooooh... for Kuma to get in such a state, such a disgrace, kuma.>

Aoko Aozaki (591) has posed:
    Midway is a benevolent overlord, apparently, or at least generous enough to withdraw and not cause a further mess for the time being.

    Or maybe luck favors the party, for once.

    But with all that taken care of, Aoko is left with an absurd quantity of magical energy that she has nothing to do with. She could shoot the planes, but that's a waste of a perfectly viable death beam.

    She could shoot at the sky but that's even worse!

    Nevermind shooting at the bottom of the sea.

    And so Aoko settles... on bottling all that mana up into the depths. It's where she pulled some of it from anyway, and she's PRETTY SURE the sea can handle being hypermagical until someone or something draws upon it. Probably her, later. Hopefully her?

    Honestly she doesn't care right now.
    And/or isn't even thinking about that.

    With a great footstomp, Aoko banishes all of her spell circles to the bottom of the ocean, where their glow fades out eventually. Then she puts her hands in her pockets and whistles, as if nothing had happened.

    "So, that went well! Still can't fly though, so I need a ride."

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa weapon ticks sown running dry of ammo in the current hopper, she pauses lowering the weapon, Midway was active again an she felt a mix of horror and fear from her Ghost. Midway was the very idea of what her world was often mindlessly running into 'improving' the human race without thinking much about the results. Her whole experience with the Fleet and Abyssals left her feeling odd. They were machines becoming people and she was a person who had become a machine.

"Wait she's ..."

She watches taking a good look s the Abyssal changes armour flakes away and her real self finally reveals itself she banishes her empty weapon back into storage space.

"We should get moving Shigure...and give anyone else who needs a lift."

Orchid (6384) has posed:
     This... was not what Orchid was expecting. But she'll take it. Heck, she would have taken it even if Graf Spee had stayed in her abyssal form, if she had just stopped lashing out at people. Orchid reconfigures her transceivers so that she won't blow them out in the amplification, and walks over to Yamashiro. "Well, that's a win," she says, looking down at the Graf Spee. "Get better soon, I want to see who you become." She turns back to Aozaki. "We'll give you a ride, no worries."

Android 17 (6730) has posed:
    Seventeen was mad...he was something beyond mad. He was /absolutely livid/...but...with the person who is the source of this retreating...he swallows it. He burries it down, because he'll need it again. The man only stares at the retreating things...and then turning towards Aoko.

    "I heard you need a ride," he says, calmly, aiming to give her a hand to fly towards the port they were going. Of courses, he was seeing what was happening...for all of that, he was at least happy. Raider chose her path, and for that...well...

    In that he was happy.