3883/Operation Rei-Go! E-1

Operation Rei-Go! E-1
Date of Scene:	05 March 2016
Location:	Great Ocean - Southern Loop
Synopsis:	The start of a major operation, Nagato wants to eliminate the Abyssal Threat.
Cast of Characters:	Kotone Yamakawa, 385, 410, Wo, 675, Nagato, 691, Sanary Rondel, 739, 754, Gaonoir, 901, 939

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Nagato has posed:
    Dawn of the first operation. Nagato is out on the ocean already but not in her normal human form. Out on the ocean is the mighty battleship Nagato, the full sized ship. Also, this is much better to make an inspiring speech when you have one of the pride and joy battleships making it... as a battleship.

    When the entire fleet she's taking is gathered, she makes a small noise over her shipboard radio, echoing out along the sea. "We stand here today on the cusp of an era where Kanmusu and Humans once again join forces to rid the seas of the major threat to us all, the Abyssal Fleet. We have been assaulted, looked down upon and had our lives nearly taken from us by these traitors to peace and today we start turning the tide upon these Abyssal threats and their allies!"

    Nagato lets that sink in for a moment before she continues, "You all have been chosen to assist in the first of many sorties in Operation Rei-Go. There will be blood shed, oil spilt and it's possible some of us will not come back but in the quest for peace, this cannot be a hinderance to us at all! For some of you, this is your first real sortie, and for others, your five hundredth, but we will all stand united, under the Hikari Combined Fleet's flag... to eliminate the threat to the ocean and to peace!"

    The waves start to pick up around the battleship, "Let's find victory on the dawn's horizon, everyone! Operation Rei-Go, Sortie!"

Wo has posed:
    It hasn't escaped notice, either. The coast on the horizon is within known Abyssal operating territory. The sight of land had been an inviting and welcome sight for generations of sailors and castaways, but they might steer their raft clear this time: Settled against high, sea-worn cliffs, there is what might have at one point been a sleepy coastal village, trading post and refueling depot for tankers. Yet, even from this extreme distance, there is something distinctly 'wrong' about it. While there is motion within it, indicating it is inhabited, it is in visibly poor upkeep. Worse, the normal structures seem inundated and covered by thick machinery, belching glowing, noxious vapors into the air. If it weren't obviously pipes and cables, it would almost look overgrown with vines. A dark cloud, literally, hangs over the expanse, making it all the more ominous, and the muted glow of the techno-organic structures more obvious.

    As long range radar contact is made, while it isn't within audible range of most Elites, pained klaxons begin to sound across the structure to bring it to battle readiness. Several defensive batteries pivot into place, almost as though the entire base is one large Abyssal. They don't have a firing solution at this range, but they are obviously on alert. Within, a pair of black gloved hands rests a helmet on their owner's side-ponytailed head, as she opens two vibrantly glowing eyes. "...so, the enemy has come." A gargling and buzzing rises and echoes within the corridors of the facility, almost as though in answer. "Yes -- we have no choice, but to meet them. Send the distress signal ahead." Their network wasn't as well established as that of the other Abyssals, and it risks gaining the wrong kind of attention...but they will deal with that as it comes. For the moment, while indistinct, a few distant returns appear on radar of the perimeter of the waters around the base.

    Meanwhile, further along the thin penninsula that the facility is perched upon, a warp gate. It might not have been the best place for a BASE OF EVIL, but convenience has its own advantages. It will also make it easy for any Elites to respond to their defense, whether they can walk, fly or float.

Sanary Rondel has posed:
     Although it takes Sanary some time to get all her assorted gear together, she does eventually manage to make sure she's brought all her combat gear by the time she steps out of the warp gate nearby the Abyssal facility. Glancing back at the warp gate once, her ears are naturally drawn to the alarms ringing about the base, and the heavily armored healer takes a few stomping steps towards the edge of the peninsula proper to try and catch a glimpse of just what it is that set them off in the first place.

     "Captain Rondel here. What's the situation?" As she speaks into the radio, Sanary is already getting her shields ready while making sure her blade and Physic staff are ready, switching between the two on her waist a few times to remind herself that they are indeed there. "Got any IDs on where these threats are, or any... Uh... Pings?"

     Those are probably the right words to use, right? She's really hoping it's not gibberish, at least.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
Similarly, Yari steps out of the warp gate alongside Sanary, dressed in a wetsuit and with various ninja equipment strapped to her. She has an extra snorkel and oxygen tank, just in case. She frowns almost immediately, even as she uses her gauntlet to start scanning for any enemy signatures. Paranoia, you are a ninja.

"Ensign Takane here, beginning preliminary scans for hostiles. Please send coordinates." She adds on the radio just after Sanary, pausing to throw her superior officer a salute. Her tail already flicks out a kunai, spinning it. Her eyes scan the water, and she's already floating atop it as she takes a few steps. If an Abyssal base is being attacked, chances are, it'll come from the sea.

HK-47 (754) has posed:
     A distress signal, sent out on wide-band Confederate frequencies. A move that one typically only made when they either had no reinforcement or had no way to call on them expediently enough for it to matter.

     Either way... the timing of such a disturbance seemed to point towards a potential incursion on Abyssal territory - and HK-47 was now moving to reach that precipice of possible conflict, a small military-class shuttle speeding toward the source. It flew close to the sea's surface so as to try and avoid premature detection, approaching the technoformed island on a straight intercept vector and pulling alongside the border of where the machinery meets with the ocean.

     Then, with a sharp hissing of pressurized hydraulics, the loading ramp descents - and a squadron of seven machines quickly deploy, each wearing camouflage-cloaks so as to try and blend in with their surroundings. But the tell-tale glow from beneath their cowls easily identifies their true nature for those close to them.

     In quick order, a leader soon establishes himself among the units, raising a rust-red limb from beneath the cloak in a generalized 'halt' order. "Statement - Initiate weapons' check!"

     In unison, the squadron of hunter-killer units brandished their disruptor carbines and checked the power-cells, their rifles emitting a low whirr as their chambers were primed. Armor clacked open as their forearm-units pealed away to soft-test their integrated weapons, and equipment belts were re-adjusted as the grenade count was double-checked. It could almost be called a frightening display, seeing assassin droids gearing up for what they obviously expected to be war.

     The again, it seemed HK units /always/ expected conflict.

     "Command - Disperse and take up defensive positions! Secure against possible counter-insurgency!"

     The droids quickly separate to seek out defensible cover, staying in sight of each-other as they take up preliminary position and ready their weapons. HK-47 himself approaches the forms of Sanary and Yari, pausing for only the barest moment as he reminds himself of Confederate Chain-of-Command. "Greeting - It is a... pleasure to see you Captain Rondel, Ensign Takane. Status - HK-47 is ready to serve." He's even being courteous, now.

     Who said you couldn't teach an old Kath Hound new tricks?

Wo has posed:
    Over the alarm sirens, the sounds of old turbines firing up. Abyssals of various descriptions; mostly the sleek, black profiles of their shark- and whale-like Destroyers, but also a few more humanoid Cruiser and even a Battleship or two, come practically pouring out onto the water. They seem almost machine-like in their mannerisms -- those that had operated with them would notice that they seem to have even less expression than usual. They don't even turn to meet the ones that will presumably be assisting them, instead heading towards where the radar return was. It's more like a swarm than a fleet, at this point, even as they begin forming up into distinct groups. A voice comes over the intercoms, then. Female, perhaps teenaged, but gruff and forceful: "I don't know who you are, but if you're somehow here to help, I'll link you with our radar." A signal begins to be emitted to multiversal standards, a bit more modern than the usual Abyssal affair. It would show the obvious radar return that alerted them in the first place.

Hoshi Amakasu (901) has posed:
    It'd been some time since Hoshi had last undertaken an operation with the Hikari Fleet... What a way to come back, too. So, she was feeling a little tense as they all went to their designated launching pads, armored up, and went out into the big blue. Still, she works to keep it under control, her expression set into determination.

    As they went, though, she did do a couple weapon checks... and slips her locket from under her uniform. Her sword is currently in her hair, holding it up. Plus the torpedoes and the guns. She's about as ready as she can be.

    She comes to a stop immediately once they find Nagato, and a big grin breaks through on the teen's face at the magnificence. She was so small, in comparison. There's even an awesome rousing pre-battle speech to get them all hyped and ready. It's almost enough to convince her to let out a cheer, but a quick look arond quickly debases her of that notion.

    "Okay, guys," She tells her equipment fairies. "You guys are my samurai, right? Let's try to work real close for this one." She gives a firm nod, and immediately once the command goes out, Hoshi starts blasting off. "Whoo! Let's do it!"

    There. She got her cheer.

    She couldn't really see anyone in particular from this far... but that's okay. Instead, Hoshi focuses, tensing her fingers as she feels Rosamond inside of her mind.

Gaonoir has posed:
    Gaonoir is aboard the grand battleship Nagato, so he's essentially got a front row seat for her inspiring speech as they set sail for the inevitable conflict. She was good at those speeches, got the point and the encouragement across without being long winded about it. Which is as much appreciated as the point of the speech itself.

    If anything personal was still nagging him it was shoved aside, stuffed down and away for the night so it wouldn't get in the way. This is what he was here for, to fight for, to defend. For tonight this greater good was more important than whatever personal issues with old connections back home he was having. A soldier has to do his duty and worry about other things later.

    A flick of fingers slides his aviator visor back down over his eyes, followed by the metallic ring as his battle gauntlets manifested over his fists as he got into position with the Nagato's launch rail. A light toss to get his bomber scarf over his shoulder so it's out of the way, and his engine narcelles extended into place as he crouched down at the launcher like a sprinter at the starting line. "Air superiority unit Gaonoir, ready to deploy at your command, Admiral." Might as well give himself an appropriate designation while at it, right?

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa had by a chain of unlikely events ended up not only an ally of the Fleet, but also someone they trusted to use fleet Equipment. She was hoping to prove that Nagato's trust in he wasn't miss placed as she made readyt to launch. She'd taken a good bit of time to get used to gear and even to work the bow a bit better. Thankfully it was a means to launch fighters and not to, say shoot at a target directl so she thinks she should be good.

"All right Hoshie let's do this, good hunting Hoshi."

Kotone takes a deep breath, more to get her focus than anything else and then makes her self ready to launch.

"Light Carrier Yamakawa launching."

It does not take long for Kotone to leve the hanger and is soon skating over the surface of the water, keeping pace with the rest of the fleet, well so far.

Graf Zeppelin (939) has posed:
     So it was time, huh?

     Graf Zeppelin made her way to port, having her equipment prepared. With her fitout properly set up, her cold, blue gaze rose to face the sea from the hangar. "Hmn." A moment of contemplation passed, and then she spoke. "Mobilizing." Saying that simply, she launched out into the sea, skating out over the water to bring up the rear.

     With hand cannon in the grasp of one of her hands, the other came up to adjust her hat. "We will see how this operation turns out." It didn't sound like she trusted anyone here. No, she was just going to do her job to the best of her ability.

Suzuya (739) has posed:
As soon as Nagato finishes her speech, Suzuya lifts both arms, firmly planting her fist into an open palm. "All right! Suzuya's gonna make a difference today, and look cool doing it so Kumano can be proud of her big sister!" She scratches a finger at her cheek. "Just hope it goes smoothly. Suzuya's a little nervous, eheh..."

The heavy cruiser adjusts her handbag cannon a bit, tapping fingers on it a few times to make sure the fairies working inside are ready. "Let's get going, guys. We're gonna make everyone proud!" It does help her confidence some to see a fleet carrier at their side, as well as someone who claims to be around for air superiority.

Turrets wiggle along the gun mounts on her arms and legs as she skates out onto the open sea, humming softly. "So, hey!" A little wake kicks up at her heels as she swings over toward the carrier. "We haven't gotten to really meet properly! I'm Suzuya!" It always pays to be friends with the carriers!

Jeannette Thompson (410) has posed:
Jeannette Thompson had to admit to herself certain things as a sailor, and less so as an aviatrix. Chief among them today was, while the massive size of a Fleet Carrier still gave her a flushed sense of the power that only a hundred thousand tons of steal powered by same process as a star could provide, there was something... even more powerful of a large ship, with cannons that one could live in, standing stately on the water ready to unleash simple unbrideled hell on whatever target got in range.

That, and she was a sucker for inspiring speeches. Might be why she was facing away from the rest of those scurrying around, polished shoes just at the edge of the flight deck of the Triancian strike carrier /Resolve/. She could see her escorts of the small flotilla, the big brother heavy cruiser /Kingsford/ next to it's agile little sister destroyer /Kifah Ebrahimi/. The former a long range sniper, the latter a darting knife fighter, and both ships and their crews ready to get into the fight. A pity they wouldn't be as involved as they'd like.

Because this was an island, and this one couldn't be shelled into oblivion. It would have to be stormed.

A quick glance to the rest of the allied Fleet, before she draws her cloak up to her and quickly turns away, moving to walk at a brisk pace across non-skid deck toward the waiting rotocraft. A small flight of them was going up first, the vanguard to the amphibious AFVs and landing craft from /Resolve/'s well deck. It was a duty for a commodore to fight from the ship, certainly, but in a mission like these, she was certainly not going to look impassive at mission control while her Marines did the dying. <<Quick and clean.>> She thinks to the rest of the Triancian's on the net. <<Let's ensure that by the time they know what hit them, we've already won. Possible Elites on the ground. If you hit a roadblock that doesn't look like what you expected, call it in.>>

Cirra Constantine (675) has posed:
    Cirra Constantine boarded the landing craft back at Hikari seaport and rode with Akitsumaru towards the deployment site, where she listens to Nagato's speach.

    She isn't one to be moved by speaches, but she can't fault what's being said. The Abyssals are a major problem for any sea going nation. It may not affect Galandia (yet) but that kind of enemy could easily infiltrate Leviathan at a time when ramuh may need the support. It's best to understand this potential enemy sooner rather then later.

    When the speach finishes, Cirra bangs her fist on the side of the landing craft's hold to signal her readyness, and it ddrives out across the water. But Cirra isn't one to simply hope they make it across.

    The Judge gets up to the front of the landing craft, and switches her Law Blade over to rifle mode and takes aim down the split blade-barrel, ready to snipe her way through.

Yuna Kagurazaka (385) has posed:
Yuna is no stranger to last-second jitters; as an idol singer, she's had to be shepherded through a few cases of stage fright and other forms of anxiety, although she's gotten over much of it and has learned how to deal with the handful of instances where she still winds up with butterflies in her stomach. But then, most of her concerts and other live appearances don't have anything besides her popularity hanging in the balance.

This time - the outset of Operation Rei-Go - is different, very different, and she knows it. While she knows that a kanmusu who's sunk in combat generally returns in the form of an Abyssal - and vice versa - she also knows that not everyone taking part in the operation ahead is a kanmusu, and there's no reason to assume the Confederacy will leave the Abyssals to handle this alone. She also isn't sure what happens to a kanmusu or Abyssal who is, rather than 'sunk,' outright killed without the chance to sink - whether through massive physical trauma or outright physical destruction - and she's hoping not to find out ... well, no. Slight correction there.

She's *praying* not to find out.

The two days since the Hikari Port Hinamatsuri celebration have been busy for Yuna: studies at Beacon, last-minute preparations for Operation Rei-Go, getting further ahead on her homework, even meeting with her manager about a few things ... and before stepping into the launch bays, Yuna ventured out to a hilltop near Hikari Sea Port, not to kneel, but to pray nonetheless. To the guardian deities of the Hikari Fleet's members, to the Shinto sun goddess Amaterasu (because she isn't asleep in *every* world, just Gensokyo), to Buddha, to the Judeo-Christian God whom Yuna also worships, and to the Queen of Light herself. She prays for strength and courage, for compassion and wisdom, and for a pure, clear heart, and the strength for the battles ahead.

All of that was done a while ago; at this point, Yuna is attired and equipped once again as the special light cruiser Kagurazaka, her thoughts solemn but buoyed to optimism by Nagato's words as the fleet prepares for battle. Kagurazaka spares a moment to look around at her companions: many of the Hikari kanmusu, but also a substantial number of Union Elites and their associated forces who've come out to assist in driving back the Abyssals.

She smiles faintly, and looks up - not to heaven per se, but to the tiny dot of light, almost invisible against the sky, which she knows to be Elner; the little robo-faerie is determined to make sure Yuna, at least, comes back alive from the fight ahead.

Kagurazaka's gaze shifts back to the Admiral's ship form, and her smile abates a little. It's time to sail into battle.

Nagato has posed:
    Nagato would nod, but as the ship... she's kinda preoccupied somewhere in the ship's interior. "Alright. Let's move out, fleet." The whirr of the launch rail is made, aiming it's passenger in a very specific direction. Fortunately, the sail to the area they needed to assault wasn't frought with danger, more, it washed unease over the Admiral leading the fleet. "Mm... four splits.." she hmms softly, taking a loud breath. "Okay, we're going to go for a four pronged assault here!"

    "Previous intel states that there's a split in one of the paths, so I need Constantine and Graff Zeppelin heading north and take the north east split. There should be a landing there with supplies that you can assault and take. Suzuya, Yamakawa, you two will head north and take the south east split. Patrol the area and continue on forward to meet up. Gaonoir, Thompson, take the south split, there's another supply depot there that you can assault. Kagurazaka, Amakasu, you two follow me through the middle." and with a launch, she sends Gaonoir into the air towards the south split.

    "Find victory on the dawn's horizon, follow the orders and meet up to make a four pronged attack at the enemy base. I shall call in for a support shelling if we need the additional assistance!"

Wo has posed:
    As the attackers continue their approach, several things become clearer. The first is that the area is by its very nature hazardous to sea traffic: Several rocky juttings thrust up from the sea floor, and while some are marked by poorly maintained buoys, it's best to keep your radar and sonar well trained, if you're approaching on the waves. Perhaps as evidence on what could happen, several ship wrecks have their superstructure jutting out from the shallower portions, though some look to have been deliberately sunken, perhaps as a shield against some long-gone invasive force. The important thing here is, this is likely the nature of Nagato's intelligence, suggesting that multiple attack paths would work best: The areas relatively free of debris are few, and trying to funnel an entire task force through just one corridor would force a disadvantage.

    From the darkest depths of that storm hanging overhead, the Abyssal swarm that had been pouring out from the base become more obvious -- first to radar, then visually. Dozens of sets of glowing eyes pierce the haze, before emerging into the daylight, the starkly contrasted black and white shapes resolving into forms both humanoid and monstrous. A small mercy is that they seem to be channeled into the same encounter paths as the attacking task force. The one that Suzuya and Kotone are directed to, they will see a Ri-class and a Ne-class, both heavy cruisers, as well as two accompanying, late model Ro-class destroyers. From the air, Gaonoir would easily see the vaguely oblate spheroid-shaped body of a Nu-class light carrier, accompanied by a Tsu-class light cruiser and several more of those sleek destroyers, these only having one, glowing eye. Jeannette and the marines might also detect them on their radar...the strengths of the return matching their ship classes, instead of their physical size.

    The force facing the direction Zeppelin and Cirra will be approaching from, features two more of those Nu-class light carriers, another Ri-class heavy cruiser, and predictably, the rest is padded by destroyers, I-class to be precise. They seem to be sticking close to the actual land base, however, perhaps as a last line of defense. The boss, herself, makes no hurries about emerging from the base, but as she finally does so, she regards the Confederate responders coldly and impassively. She looks to be a teenage girl with a sailor top on, and a horned helmet. Her skin is as starkly pale as you might expect of the Abyssal kind, though instead of moving about on legs, she seems to be fixed into some form of hover platform. It's uncertain whether she's kneeling within it, or if she just has no legs below that point. "...hmph," she finally speaks up. "I am the Destroyer Princess. Prove your worth in the defense, and be rewarded." Otherwise...? Well, their boss' of reinforcement is very binary.

    Then she hovers down onto the water, with a Ta-class battleship, He-class light cruiser, and several lesser destroyers as her escorts. She will wait for the front liners to soften them up.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
It's still a little strange to have someone she considers a mere machine to be courteous and talk to her, but Yari is nothing if not professional. She throws a sharp salute in turn.

"Mister HK-47, good luck Sir. May we bring Glory and Honor to the Confederacy! Watch your back, I have a bad feeling." Frown. She nervously spins her kunai around her tail-tip.

Suddenly they're being hailed by the odd, almost machine-like Abyssals that are pouring out from the base. Yari frowns. She doesn't like their look, but scans them anyway. A nod to Sanary. She'll let her handle the communications.

For the moment, she's focusing on taking pictures, and magical scans as far as that will get her. She quickly transmits them over the Confederate channels.

Soon enough, however, Yari drives beneath the waves, falling in with the more submerged Abyssals. She swims along, eyeing her gauntlet every now and then, remaining in constant radio contact. Anything she'll find? She relays over the radio to this unknown Abyssal fleet. For now she's practically a submarine made for scouting, trying to stay low and fast until targets appear.

Sanary Rondel has posed:
     Hearing those familiar voices, Sanary struggles a bit to keep her composure neutral even as she offers both Yari and HK-47 a quick salute. "Good having you both here, Ensign Takane. HK-47." She does grin briefly at the two, though, before turning to the Destroyer Princess as she arrives. Her appearance gets a long look from Sanary before she finally gives her a salute as well.

     "Captain Sanary Rondel of the Confederacy. We're here to assist. We'll back you up as much as yours backs ours... Up." A little awkward sounding, but it sounded better in her head! After relaying some directions to her actual allies here, she hoists her shield over her shoulder before hoofing it towards the northern side of the island.

     Does she trust the Destroyer Princess? Not quite. But as long as Wo's sort-of vouching for her, she'll play ball. The armored healer pumps energy into her anklets to start flying, taking to the air near the northern landing point not too far from where the Nu-classes and Ri-class are waiting. She readies the massive kite shield in front of her while watching for the approaching invaders, her staff-holding hand lingering near the Charge Blade at her waist.

     It's only a matter of time now.

HK-47 (754) has posed:
     The droid pauses to regard Ensign Takane's remark, taking a single moment to brandish his weapon and enter a combat-ready stance. "Assurance - You need not worry. I have learned the hard way never to let one's guard down at any time."

     At the appearance of the so-called 'Destroyer Princess' with a moment of mild contemplation, photoreceptors glinting dimly in something simulating curiosity - and perhaps even weariness. "Statement - If all we need to is exterminate invading meatbags, I believe you shall find us overqualified."

     He made it a habit to never trust meatbags unconditionally - even ones such as these who seemed to have largely converted to non-organic components. But in this instance, until they knew the full extent of what potential threat was encroaching on the Abyssal's borders, they had little choice... though at the first sign of betrayal, the droid wouldn't have any qualms at being ordered to eviscerate her at a moment's notice.

     Besides... he needed to conduct an autopsy on one of these 'Fleet Daughters' sooner or later for anatomical reference. Perhaps today wold be that day.

     As was typical for combat situations, HK-47 made the reluctant, yet necessary, precaution of designating the ranking Confederate official in the field as his Temporary Master for the duration of the mission - Captain Rondel, in this instance. The only person who could potentially supersede her authority for this would be Wo - not because of rank but because of seniority in experience with the Abyssal.

     As they separate to take up defensive positions, HK begins radioing orders to his drones, the HK-51's falling into defensive positions along the south-eastern point to cover any bases not being defended by the Captain or Ensign. Between their metal construction and heavy, hooded cloaks, the droids strive to try and blend into their surroundings for a preemptive strike, seeking out anything that can serve as either good cover or a steady level for their carbines.

     HK himself takes up position at one of the largely-transformed houses, keeping vigil on the sea itself to try and catch sight of the first potential arrivals.

     And they will arrive... for the droid has existed long enough to recognize the calm that precluded battle.

Cirra Constantine (675) has posed:
    Peering over the edge of her boat with her sword-rifle, Cirra Constantine frowns at the relatively large force that has blockaded their path. "I'm going to begin sniping them. Graf Zepplin-" the sword rifle generate a crystal shard between it's prongs that begins to spin. "-Air support would be appreciated."

    *BOOM*

    The weapon fires it's crystal payload with hits the water between the I-class and Ri-class, exploding into a spray of crystal pelting them with slivers.

    Cirra bangs on the hull of the landing craft again and directs the...driver? Fairy? Around a half sunken ship. As soon as they round it, another pair of crystal zip through the air, this time landing squarly on a Ri-Class and an I-Class. "I'll target the carriers on my way past them."

    She points with two fingers again, and the landing craft turns, zigzagging between the hulks in the water. But now the Ri and I class have started returning fire and the smaller landing craft is only just managing to use the hulks of other ships as defense. Gunfire from the Ri's is getting harroingly close.

    Cirra grits her teeth and ducks down as Abyssal planes from Nu class fire at her position. "Well. Hardly time for hesitation." She reaches up and...

    Pulls the lever to drop the ramp while the boat is still speeding along.

    Cirra jumps off the ramp and flips over, coming down directly on top of an I-Class, firing her rifle down into it once before leaping forward again, skipping from one to the next, and comes straight down at the first Ri-class.

    Cirra's legs go around the Ri-Classes neck and shoulder as one hand grabs one of her armored arms, and uses her momentum to swing the paleskinned girl around and face first into the water. And with another leap Cirra comes down at the Nu-class.

    It's bigger and bulkier then the Ri and I-class, but it's better protected at short range as anti-aircraft guns start to blaze up at the Judge as she descends with one arm up to protect her face.

    "THE. BRIAR!"

    The law card activates, crystal vines and thorns growing over the Nu-Classs, halting it's progress and defense. Cirra hits it fist first, tearing a hole into the air and a spray of black fluid before jumping off, and hop skipping stone to the beach to where she stops.

    "Sanary."

Hoshi Amakasu (901) has posed:
    'Good hunting', huh? Almost like they were hunting Shadows. Only, it's been proven that the Abyssals can actually think and feel, unlike those monsters. For a moment, some of Hoshi's enthusiasm evaporates, but she simply nods over to her friend with a small smile. "Er... Good luck, Ms. Yamakawa."

    They've got a strong force at their backs--some that Hoshi didn't actually know. Still, that was the good thing about the Union: everyone could be counted on to have your back. Though she will have to try and introduce herself later... Maybe afterwards.

    With Nagato's orders relayed, Hoshi turns sharply to start a patrol cycle around Nagato's bow as they made their way into the middle channel. As she moves, Hoshi stretches her arm out to wave to Yuna. "Ms. Kagurazaka! Good luck! Let me know if you need me to send Rosamond to support you."

     The closer they got, the clearer their enemies became. And what a place for it, too - a couple times Hoshi has to make some changes to her patrol route because she comes perilously close to hitting ground or tripping. THe sonar is helpful, but still... it's worrying stuff. "This is going to get ugly," she mutters to herself. They have a lot of numbers. "Are we going to go after the leader, Admiral?" Hoshi asks cautiously. It'd make sense, sending the strongest units against each other. Though in this case, she has to wonder why they only brought Yuna and her...

    Doesn't matter. The first shots of the battle are fired somewhere--it's a rather strange sound, too, that crystal gun. The teen raises her arm to point one of her cannons at the opposition... but refrains, for now. "Just give me the order..."

Graf Zeppelin (939) has posed:
     Graf Zeppelin only offers a simple nod. "Understood." And with a brief glance Cirra's way, she pushed off, skating across the water towards the north. "Constantine, on your lead." She stated curtly, not waiting for an answer. Without any further word, the German Carrier proceeded north after the Judge.

     Once they arrived in the rough vicinity of the split, she veered towards the northeast. "There it is." Graf Zeppelin pointed out calmly. There was a landing bay up ahead, along with what looked to be boxes of supplies waiting to be loaded up. ...And there was also a SANARY in sight along with an escort of abyssals. "We have visual on hostiles, proceeding to engage." She slowed her forward charge then, hanging back to let Cirra take further point.

     Reaching into the card pouches on her waist, she removed several, one between each finger. "....." Her flight deck adjusted so that it was past her shoulder, and she slotted those cards into the elevator port. Once they were all in, she turned her gaze forward and directed an arm ahead. "Advance." Several bursts of light followed, those lights coalescing into Bf109 fighter planes. They took flight into the air, speeding around and offering support fire to help cover Cirra's assault.


And then to Sanary, she aims her hand cannon at the shield healer. "...." And with a burst, several shots were fired her way, aiming to impact her shield and throw her own balance.

Jeannette Thompson (410) has posed:
The Triancian ships pick up the incoming attacking force. Visual contact from the drones that were gliding high above the battlefield didn't match the sensor returns the ships were getting... But Jeannette had made sure to offer the right advice. Frusturatingly, those captains, traditional ones who were mostly older than her with less rank, thought she was being alarmist when she warned of the capabilities they might have, but she /had/ convinced them that there would be no problem, if they were so easy to destroy, to engage in a little bit of demonstrive overkill. The rotocraft and ACVs zooming to shore would /not/ be stopping if they could help it.

The heavy cruiser stays in it's position in front of it's charge. Currently, their weren't any aircraft up in the sky for it to start swatting down, but it wasn't going to take any chances, Drone and radar takes are linked together, and it's for and aft turrets, with two guns each, adjust their position. With the current range and power of the weapons, the actual horizon is a concern on hitting targets, so it meant a ballisitc approach. The weapons fire once, then again, projectiles soaring up to the height of a high arc, before they start the second half of the ballistic arc. Terminal gudiance on the shells direct them to a specific, ever shrinking circle of probability as they fall, before impacting the sea with massive kinetic force and explosive charges.

The Cruiser fires once on all batteries, before the capcitors are charged for the next magnetic volley. Then again. Then again, all aimed at the light carrier, attempting to knock the craft that could do the most damage to the vunerable carrier to the rocks that showed so many other shipwrecks before it could launch a plan. FOr the closer threats.... destroyer captains had already been cultivating a reputation in Triancia for being a /little/ wrecklist. A combination of a revived ship class, short range weaponry, and the adage that speed was armor made for a disturbing tendency for their crews to get up close and personal, and the /Ibrahmi/ liked to show some panache. Which is probably why it was almost zooming faster than the cautious roto crafts to shore, a brace of supercavitaion torpedos streaking out from her with the speed of several hundred knots to impact the crusier in front of it, before it's bow thrusters and engines took a hard turn to present it's broadside, lower caliber cannon attempting to shread the cruiser in passing. Which... left a problem.

<<Sir.>> The radio communication comes on a tight beam to the Digimon flying above. <<Commodore Jeannete Thompson, Royal Triancian Navy. A pleasure. One of my destroyers from the look of it is getting a bit eager and thinking it can handle a few destroyers and a cruiser by it's lonesome with the power of torpedos and a can-do attitude. Might you give those destroyers something else to panic over?>>

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa takes a deep breath it's time to get going, Kotone has taken as full of a quicker as she's able to. She's seen some Abyssals before but never so many of the barely or utterly inhuman ones before. She draws back and lets one fly, she's doing this several times as she gets the first flight of fighters and then followed by torpedo bombers up into the sky, with how she's got to worry about. The Heavy crusiers are going to be a trouble, the Torpedo Bombers start out on attack runs towards the RI-Class dropping torpedos and trying to pull away before AA fire becomes too much for them to deal with.

"Suzuya if you need anything else in the air just let me know!"

She's now going to launch a flight of dive bombers to join the attack on the RI-Class, but there's a bit of a warning as she see knows there are other feds about and this might get dicey.

Yuna Kagurazaka (385) has posed:
Nagato gives her orders; Kagurazaka listens closely, and as the division of forces is laid out, she moves to form up with the battleship, readying her turrets and her smaller machine guns for anti-aircraft cover fire. "Thank you!" she calls out in reply to Hoshi; Elner relays Amakasu's movement pattern, and Kagurazaka begins 'orbiting' Nagato in a similar manner. She's not sure if Nagato will be staying in her full-sized warship form - but certainly she'll find the answer to that out as the mission continues.

Of course, the underwater obstacles make that 'orbiting' a little tricky - but it makes sense for both of them to keep alert in different directions. "Elner," the blonde murmurs, "open a channel with Amakasu, see if you can share data with her as well. Even if it's just a matter of conferring over radio, any detail could be useful for both of us to know."

'Understood,' Elner replies, then pings Amakasu's radio - and Nagato's as well. The robo-faerie has little intention of getting *too* thoroughly involved with the Hikari Combined Fleet's operations, but even Elner has to acknowledge that leaving Yuna alone in the middle of a mission like this would be a dereliction of its own duty as part of the Matrix of Light.

It's not that Kagurazaka plans to depend on Elner's support, though. When her sonar picks up underwater obstacles, she steers to avoid them; when her radar detects hostiles, she attempts to get a good look at them for herself, and makes sure that her guns are ready to fire at any moment. She's not taking aim too quickly, but she's not going to leave her guard down while waiting on commands, either.

Nagato has posed:
    Once Gaonoir was let loose from the launch rail, the battleship is no more and leaves Nagato into her full rigging, skating to the sides of Amakasu and Kagurazaka. Once everyone has split off, she gives a brief nod. "They are. People will be injured. I did ask you if you were ready and you gave me your OK." she rests a hand on Amakasu's shoulder. "Be brave."

    Her face goes back to a stoic frown, radar picking up the multiple contacts and Nagato's turrets turn to meet them. "We're going to break through to the leader of this area, I wasn't able to get much intelligence off of it, however, make sure nothing survives this area. Sink. Everything."

    Nagato pauses and looks at the two.. she knew they had trouble with the thought of actually killing things... "If you do not kill them, they may sink me. I... was not a nice woman when I was Abyssal. So do what you can to send them back underwater." with this, Nagato stops for a moment to allow the twin light craft ahead of her, the guns angle up.

    "Abyssal ships on long range radar, bearing... zero four five. All ships, open fire!" with this, Nagato's cannons let out their tell tale signature loud explosion, sending eight shells of standard high explosive over the horizon and into the waiting Abyssals beyond. And it's here a tiny little plane shoots out from the back and rushes forth.. and it links up with the radios and visuals for Amakasu and Kagurazaka, if they were to focus, they'd see what the plane sees.

Gaonoir has posed:
    The launch rail activates at Nagato's command, catapulting Gaonoir from the battleship with a tremendous amount of momentum in short order. Once he's clear of the deck his jet-boosters ignite to keep that speed and the digimon rockets through the air, and other than having to weave past some of the higher reaching outcroppings at little threat from the obstacles in the water. Taking full advantage of his being a lot smaller than an actual fighter plane to keep a low, hard to detect profile.

    Almost as soon as forms start emerging ahead of them in the passage they ping on his digital sensors, flashing little markers on his HUD, and something akin to targetting hairs zooming in on the Nu-Class. Did you think that visor was just for looking cool and badass? Nope, it actually does something.

    It's also his primary communication source, and right about now one such connection beeps at him. It's the same digital signal Magnamon uses to call him, of course it would have to be now of all times she's trying to hail him.

    Gaonoir snorts softly, and taps a finger to the side frame. <<Sorry Magnamon. I'm busy tonight>> And clicks it off again before she can even respond. He has no time for Royal Knight shenannigans tonight, he's got a -real- purpose to fight for.

    Unfortunately with that brief distraction and the Abyssals in his primary focus, he hasn't noticed Yari slipping down into the water like a tiny little speck in comparison.

    The next communication is from his fleetmates and much more relevant. <<Copy that, miss. I know just what to do.>> Gaonoir switchs his attention, shifting to the destroyers instead. Several more targets, but smaller ones relatively speaking. If Jeanette's ship is already spitting torpedos, well, let's make them count.

    The Black Machgaogamon pulls up into the air, a combination of electrical sparks and dark energies arcing along his form. Gaonoir channels as much of his disruptive effect as he can into one go, and then
    "HOOOOWLBACK CANNON!"

Fires off a massive burst of violent energies at the destroyers, certaining destructive but potentially more dangerous in the disruptive disorienting effect the discharges have. If he can distract them from the incoming torpedos, all the better!

Sanary Rondel has posed:
     And the attackers show themselves! Sanary wastes little time in swapping her blade with her staff, directing magical energy into her staff to try and mitigate some of the damage to the Abyssals under her. Whether or not it actually works, the long-range healing does at least congeal in a brief burst of light around the Nu-class. Even if they're not completely confirmed to be on their side, it certainly beats trying to work with whoever's shooting at her!

     Right. Whoever's shooting at her. Before she can direct that Physic staff's healing towards the Ri-class as well, the healer winces as a freaking EXPLOSION impacts directly against that shield and sends her wobbling in midair off course several yards. Even with all that armor and her shield keeping her from becoming a smear, it's hard enough trying to hover in place with that much force hitting her at once!

     "The hell? Who are you?" She calls out to Graf, staring downwards at the Carrier daughter and not-so-subtly channelling energy into her eye. "... Oh, whatever. If you're here to fight, then fine!" Sanary charges up the Fire matrix a bit more before sweeping a heat laser at the carrier, drawing several explosions across the water even before they hit anything!

     She does halt just a bit, however, when she hears a more familiar voice. It's... "... Cirra. You're here, too?" She lowers from the air just a bit, but not all the way while she has her attention divided between the two. "This is your only warning, then. Leave." After directing another burst of healing at the Ri-class, the staff gets swapped out for her Charge Blade. "I don't know what you've got planned tonight, but I'll have to kick your ass if you don't. Understand?"

Wo has posed:
    First off, the group facing the approach vector of ZEPPELIN and CIRRA. The Ri-class, apparently leader of the destroyer escorts for their carriers in this case, get initially pelted by crystal shards. This novel attack, while it does cause visible denting to the destroyers' outer hulls, and scratches and pock-marks on the Ri-class' humanoid form, doesn't seem to do much more than cause them momentary confusion. Their large caliber guns, just like with those accursed devil boats of long ago, aren't really made for tracking a landing craft: While they are aware of it rounding the wreckage, they can't fire back with effectiveness. The I-class takes a massive strike to the side and begins to list, bobbing in the water, while the Ri-class, more heavily armored, is able to raise a gauntleted arm. It still shatters with enough force to cause her skin to crack, as Abyssals seem to do when damaged. Both do indeed return fire, though the destroyer can't aim well, with its propulsion knocked out.

    The other I-classes are still doing their darnedest to track that target, when suddenly Cirra departs it altogether, and seems intent on fighting them in close quarters. Their 5 inch guns, which would really suck to get hit by for the average humanoid, splash wide as they try to readjust. The outer shell of these things, it seems to be half metal plating, with a dense 'hide' over the top of it; the ballistics of her grim work would quite readily reveal, as each blasted I-class throws up both that leathery flesh as well as splinters of weathered steel. It doesn't quite penetrate their hulls, but it crumples enough that they're left listing in the water. That basically leaves the Ri-class, still a bit off balance from the heavy hit earlier, and the Nu-class.

    The Nu-class opens its enormous maw -- even larger than a Wo-class' flight deck, considering its 'body' is its flight deck, but only manages to squeeze out two Abyssal fighters before it gurgles and buzzes in surprise, and frustration, at being suddenly enveloped in thorned vines. Vines made of crystal...that's just not fair! It does attempt to fight back with its one cannon 'eye', as even in this condition it's not completely helpless, but having its movements constrained makes it relatively easy to punch. Its outer shell, much like that of the I-class', crumples, and the outer layer 'oozes' that congealed oil. The pathetic wing of fighters that had managed to escape climb toward the Bf109s, seemingly intent on engaging them even though it's practically suicide to do so. ...regardless, effectively what's left at the moment to stop them is just that one, moderately damaged Ri-class, several foundering I-class, and a Nu-class that is growling as it tries to snap the vines free.

Wo has posed:
    The forces in the way of JEANNETTE and GAONOIR are a bit lighter, but of course, not to be underestimated. They seem intent on trading fire in support of their carrier, and the Tsu-class gargles a command to the quadruplet Ha-class destroyers that are under her immediate command. One bank of turrets rises with a massively gauntleted arm, and the destroyers open their mouths to expose their 5-inch guns within. They shell the Triancian ships' position, though similarly to their counterpart, seem to be focusing on the carrier in the formation with their initial fire. They have no complicated fire control systems -- it's all done the old fashioned way, bracketing and adjusting manually. Still, the multiverse has a way of keeping things surprisingly competitive. This particular Nu-class has more of a chance to launch its fighters than its counterpart, a wave of 5 of the jets taking off, with the low droning screech of their turbines resounding from inside.

    For the most part, they hold their battle group together, staying in a vague double line in front of the Nu-class carrier. One Ha-class takes a near-strike to the stern, which is adequate to cause it to lose speed and fall out of formation, but it isn't stopping the others. They smell blood in the water with that destroyer that has separated itself, and if they were more emotive like standard Abyssals are, they might even take that as a sort of personal challenge. While their main focus is on protecting their carrier, two of the Ha-class destroyers vaguely break off formation to aim their guns, and torpedo launchers, squarely at the Ibrahami. That's when Gaonoir enters the picture. The electrical attack, while it mostly scorches their outer hull, seems to interfere with their radars and other equipment. It's enough so that, by the time the Tsu-class barks a gurgle that probably translates to 'shit, torpedoes in the water!', they don't have time for a good course correction.

    The two destroyers that had gone chasing the enemy get struck solidly in the sides, blowing a large hole and causing them to take on water. The Tsu-class, built of slightly sterner stuff, is able to soak it up a bit better, but loses a good chunk of a leg, exposing dripping oil and a metal frame inside -- gross. The Nu-class, in the middle of all of this, is currently having to dodge increasingly honed-in fire, and while the fighters in the air are able to make strafing runs at both the Triancian ships and their counterparts, they're in no real position to do significant damage without bombers, or to go chasing the Marines aiming to make landfall.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
Jean's fleet with its pure power, and the assortment of both ships and drones being brought to bare against the unknown Abyssals is something Yari certainly can't cull on her own. At least, directly. She'd need to find the officers responsible for it all, and wound or kill them in order to send that portion of this rather large attacking fleet to heel. Worst still, there's a strange being in the sky, not unlike one of her country's own magitek armors adding fire support.

She sends coordinates to the Abyssal fleet as she maintains stealth for the moment, creeping closer and closer to what she can only assume is the flagship even as she tries to use her gauntlet's sensors to keep an eye on the flying cannon-in-the-sky that is Gaonoir! With no other choice, she draws on her inner magic. Up above, one would suddenly see the moon drown out the sky for several seconds and then disappear just as abruptly.

Yari can only cross her fingers that there's no magically sensitive person on board those ships. The four identical ninja break as carnage continues around them. One attempts to local the most important looking vessel of the lot amidst Jean's ships, crawling up the side and trying to stealthily board it. Crewmen and general sailors will have her best effort at a painless knock out. Officers and other higher ups will get knifed in the dark, if they can't react in time. But it's all a sideshow as she makes her way to the Captain's room, ready to find the one piloting the vessel and knock it out of comission.

Another Yari stalks the rest of the fleet, just in case she chose the wrong vessel. Every now and then, some poor sailor too close to the edge of the ship will be threatened with a kunai, or a chian pulling them silently into the water.

The third and fourth concentrate on the flying threat. An inflatable raft grabbed from Confed armory suddenly plops into being, and for a moment, Yari ducks her head out of the water. Then, she puts something to her should she also grabbed from her Confed allies.

In the least sneaky ninja assault ever, she fires off a heat-seeking rocket at Gaonoir, then dives into the water after her attack. Like a shark, the pair of ninja wait to see if that flying creature descends, readying a pincer-attack from beneath the waves!

Wo has posed:
    Facing SUZUYA and KOTONE, a more standard, 'medium' surface fleet than the others. That's still two heavy cruisers staring back at them, though. Against this unfamiliar carrier, that is now launching aircraft in their direction, they seem mostly unswayed from their direct approach. Instead, they angle their cannons upward to thin out the approaching swarm. A few of the planes still make it through, despite the odds; a bomb striking one of the I-class across the back and crumpling the steel and flesh there, and causing a trail of leaking oil behind. The other immediate victim is that Ne-class, somewhat suspected by Fleet intelligence to be an aviation cruiser; the bomb smashing into her deck-like, toothed symbiote, before exploding. It isn't a fatal strike, but it does keep her from launching Abyssal scout planes -- a duty that the mostly unharmed Ri-class is able to pick up the slack on. She turns her vaguely unfocused, red eyes toward HK and his drones' emplaced positions, and then if they are receptive to it, begins beaming back information and artillery spotting data directly to their feedback systems. Taking out that scout is probably a good idea as a next order of business.

HK-47 (754) has posed:
     "Status - Targeting vectors acquired."

     "Status - Optimal accuracy ratio achieved."

     "Status - Ready."

     "Status - Active."

     "Prejudice - Set to Maximum"

     "Status - Charging weapons. This should be fun!"

     All units had reported in... and now their targeting vectors were drawn, their progenitor drawing a line with his own target.

     "Command - Fire."

     The next instant, a volley of disruptor bolts take flight, lancing through the air for any of the torpedo bombers under Kotone's direction, trying to relieve the pressure off the RI-Class vessels. They wait until the ships begin pulling back to avoid anti-air flak, attempting to time it so that the aircraft will not see the attack coming until too late.

     The white streams of energy, capable of disintegrating flesh and destroying electrical systems, could cripple a one-man aircraft with a well-placed hit and send it crashing into oblivion - and seven such shots were sent tearing up into the sky to try and bring down the aerial attacks.

     The weapons have a slow charge, almost like loading artillery - but with seven droids firing, they can ensure that there is at least two shots of the lethal energy being fired every three seconds. A steady bleed of shots meant to assassinate the torpedo bombers at a gradual pace.

     And, hopefully, draw their commander out.

Wo has posed:
    The base itself isn't inactive, either. Those massive guns mentioned before, perched at several points along the cliffs and ramparts, look to be at least a match for the Nagato's secondaries, if not a bit larger. They ponderously pivot around, half-rusted metal creaking to life from months of disuse, before returning the incoming shelling. Even their coastal batteries look corroded and black, with several red glowing elements to them. The Destroyer Princess, for those closeby to them, seems to be directing this by herself, a gloved hand and bracered wrist raised in the direction, causing the slight adjustments. She doesn't flinch at all as the massive caliber shells begin flying vaguely in her direction, one of them crashing into the catwalks and structures of the base above her. Nor does she seem rattled as several large boulders dislodge and smash into the water against her. "...to think -- that 'she' would show herself here," she says, evenly. "Then I'll sink her, myself." A destroyer, even an elevated one, aiming to take down a battleship? "I won't allow anyone to leave alive."

Gaonoir has posed:
    A rocket launcher may not be the most stealthy of choices, but when your target has his focus somewhere else, it's no less effective of a sneak attack. Shooting at him while he's busy scrambling the destroyer's was the best oppritunity Yari could take, Gaonoir doesn't hear the projectile screaming towards him until it's too late to move out of the way. The best he can do is twist around so it doesn't hit his engines, and PUNCH the rocket!

Which still causes it to explode, and produce enough of a shockwave to send him tumbling backwards through the air for several meters before he finally gets enough control to reorient himself properly and a short intensive thruster burn brings him back to a hover. Ignoring the embers and smoke still whisping off his form from the blast Gaonoir swings his head to sweep his sensors across the water below, but the dastardly ninja is already back beneath the water. Hmmm.

<<Watch yourself,>> he tight-beams back to Jeanette. <<There's a stealth attacker in the fight somewhere. Ping me if you spot them.>>

With the destroyers disrupted, there's still other threats to worry about. He can't waste time worrying about an uncertain attacker's location when there's prominate targets to deal with. Certainly the Triancian ships have enough anti-aircraft firepower to keep the air fighters at bay.

    Because much like the predator his form partially emulates, Gaonoir has locked onto the wounded 'prey' as the Tsu 'bleeds'. The mechanical viscera doesn't bother him, he's fought plenty of mechanical and cybernetic foes before as well as alongside such. He just sees injured that needs finishing off.

His enginers burn brightly, but it's not to take flight so much as just launch himself into the air like a jet boosted power jump. Sure enough they stop firing right at the peak, and as he passes the apex Gaonoir flips himself over and twists to aim himself to come hurtling back towards the Tsu-class in a maneuver that wouldn't look out of place in a wrestling ring. Except instead of just doing one or two flips into a body blow his form keeps spinning until its like a speeding black meteor. "MACH MOONSAULT!"

If he hits the angle right it might even slam the Tsu into the side of the Nu. Though it's also bringing him dangerously close to the water that Yari-sharks might be able to take advantage of.

Graf Zeppelin (939) has posed:
     Graf Zeppelin peered up at Sanary and remained silent. "......" She had no words for the enemy. Her response was instead, to strafe across the water, and out of the way of that laser. But the resulting explosions across the surface impacted one of her broadsides, causing smoke to subtly funnel out. At least the fight deck wasn't damaged. That was key.

     In return, the carrier raised her gun again, aiming it directly at Sanary. But she didn't immediately fire. The reason became clear when the fighter planes that she'd sent out previously all converged on the healer from both sides, unloading their artillery right at her armored form. And while the planes fired on Sanary from both sides, Graf Zeppelin pulled the trigger, firing another volley of explosive shots dead center at her opponent.

     Be a good girl, and sink, Sanary. Please? No? Okay.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa seems fairly pleased with her preformace so far she's not been sunk and the fleet as a whole seems to be doing some pretty well dealing with the Abyssals the problem is they are not alone. Worse they have people or is that droids? Like HK-47 backing themn up and this is going to get very ugly at this pouint. Her own fighters will go after what Abyssal ones are in the air but Kotone is focusing on trying to lay on the pressure. She's only really got her air craft as far as weapons go today. So she's going to have to work wit what she has still the fight's going on and she sends another run on the Ri-Class but that's when things start going to heck.

Drone,s a whole lot of drones they are opening fire on her planes, she grimaces as several go down, she draws more from her quiver now she's got to leave what's left on the RI-class but a new wave is going for the HK droids.

"Addtional hostiles HK class droids, engaging in anti air support."

HK's forces have made Kotone divide her air power which could prove to be a mistake. As for the HK units they would find the Dive Bombers coming right for them.

Cirra Constantine (675) has posed:
    "The warning wasn't yours to give, Sanary." Constantine swings around the Law Blade and it snaps closed into its sword form. "This base's position won't be suffered any longer."

    "And frankly, it stinks to high heaven here." She won't have much time to take advantadge of Sanary's split attention before Graf potentially has to deal with the remaining Abyssals. So she takes it right now.

    The Judge steps in - it isn't Flash Step; but the Judge knows how to close distance with as little actual running. The Law Blade swings up and down diagonlly at Sanary's shield. She isnt' trying to get a leathal blow on her, but to turn the shield aside long enough for GRaf's shots to try and hit unfettered.

Hoshi Amakasu (901) has posed:
    Sadly, Hoshi wasn't carrying anything much stronger than her smartphone, tucked into her pocket in a waterproof sleeve. It's connected to a Bluetooth device, so... Radio access is all that she'll be getting, really. "I read you loud and clear," she acknowledges. As they get nearer to contact, Hoshi reaches up to untie her hair, letting it whip out behind her. Her sword, in hairtie form, stays firmly in her hand, ready to be used at any time.

    That was about when the shelling began from the towers up above them. Hoshi has to start getting clever with her rotations, as rounds smack into the water near her and send splashes flying outwards. Those would've probably knocked her over at the start; now she manages to weather them fairly easily. When she manages to possibly line up a clean shot on one of the towers, she quickly raises her arm again.

    "Kambei, fire one! Heihachi, Kyuzo, prepare to fire!" Her left-hand gun fires off a round towards one of the nearer towers... And it seems like Hoshi's had some aiming practice since! It doesn't veer wildly off-target, at least! Though it may impact a bit lower than she was hoping. Arc calculations were /not/ her speciality. "Heihachi, fire two!" She lifts her other arm and fires off a round toward the opposing Abyssals.

    She doesn't want to summon Rosamond yet... It needs to be a surprise, when they're up close in the fight. Hoshi's lips go into a thin line as she starts coaxing more speed out of her motors to prepare for the charge.

Jeannette Thompson (410) has posed:
The shells are well aimed, of course. Despite the offensive power of the two surface ships, the strike carrier was the ship that would be able to support and supply the larger landing party, as well as provide air cover for them. The downside was that a modern Navy like the RTN expected them to be the focal point, which is why the carrier was still riding a very close shotgun. As the shell comes forward, braketed at them, Combat Intelligences perk up the defensive mounts on both warships, aiming them toward the sky. It was... a bit errie, to see it happen. The shells that were braketing them to the rear and front splashed harmlessly in the water; the shells that would actually hit the carriers explode in the air, almost at once, as if there was an invisable, pulsing bubble of a shield around the ships. Of course, when Yari boards the Strike carrier in the center, she can see the Directed Energy Air Defense arrays swiveling on her side, capturing targets and firing invisable streams of energy at them. It's not enough to stop every one; a fast enough rate of fire would over saturate, but the shells that do hit primarily snap aganist the cruiser's armored hull, damaging it but leaving most of her combat capability intact. One shell clips the side of the strike carrier, but it's well out of the way of a critical area of the flight deck, and the fighters getting ready for ground attack are similarly still prepared. Yari can see them acting professionally, with speed and procession... and she would want to stay off the flight deck, most likely. A lot of open space and too many heavy weapons for a proper ninja. She would be able to find access through the open hanger, however. Stuffed with equipment, there were more than enough places to sneak through to the hatches inside the ship.

The other one watching the rest of the fleet could see the reaction to the Abyssal attack. The cruiser's guns are already moving when the destroyers shell, but they twitch back to continue fire on the light carrier; with the way the destroyers were moving, and the /Ibrahmi/ dashing around them, it couldn't risk counter battery fire.

The destroyer takes advantage of the shorted out radars of the destroyers to break contact, a few ASROCs launched from her smaller VLS systems to strike the water and attempt to finish them, before it circles around and attempts to make another run on the cruiser again. The fighters, are... admittedly, a sideshow at best; the destroyer swivels her guns up to the air, and the autocannon shells litterally /curve/ in the air to strike each fighter in turn as them come in to strafe. It seemed the flotilla was keeping it's fighters in reserve to support the the landing.

Of course, there's various sailors running along the deck of the destroyer as it manuevers, gripping onto hand holds and working along to get one system or another ready to fight. In these conditions, it would be easy for a chain to knock one off balance, sending his face down to be torn up with non-skid, or to fall overboard.

Likewise, when the ninja works her way through the carrier, it's people are preoccupied for battle, getting the ship ready, singletons making their way through. They aren't expecting an infiltrator, and sailor after sailor has their head slammed aganist the bulkhead, knocked out. A three man repair party led by a Lieuteant is too far ahead, then confused when they don't seem him pulled aside, gasping from a knife stabbed into his side and left to slowly bleed out. There was a large area on the tower of the ship; it might be the bridge, where it was directed. Then again, she could see ahead of her the fancier blue carpet of what must have been a section for senior officers, and the people she passes seem to be talking a lot about a 'CIC', which seems to be below here. All of them are potentially important targets. It would depend where she would want to go.

Jeannette Thompson (410) has posed:
The problem is, though, that this is a society heavily into the information age. Each sailor is tagged and broadcasting, each blip and change in life signs a piece of meta data noted by quantum computers. First it's a fluke. Then it's a pattern, then it's an alert on a screen of a SysOp, and in Jeannette's ear. "What the hell... they couldn't get anyone aboard." She mutters to herself, looking over the sea to the steadily approching land. "Not with all of this." BUt most of her armored, battle trained Marines were heading to the landing. Which didn't leave much back at base...

<<Turn us around. Yes, /now/.>> Jeannette thinks, anticipating the disbeleiving look the pilot gives her. <<They're doing something smart, I think. They're fighting where we aren't.>>

Nagato has posed:
    "Incoming fire!" she shouts towards Amakasu and Kagurazaka, "Too far out for torpedoes, go for shelling fire." the reloading sound finishes with Nagato and she lets another rapport of eight shells arcing overhead. "Loading type three shells for installation damage. Covering fire is requested Amakasu, Kagurazaka." with this, the machinery she has starts loading some new shells in it.

    It's strange that the assault was going towards an installation, but she wasn't aware of any other installation type Abyssals... "Mmm. Aim slightly higher, Amakasu and speed up, line ahead formation for you both." she gives a bit ofa nod and readies up something. Radar continues to ping ahead and the little scout plane searches ahead, a... new Abyssal type? Looks like a child almost."

    "You two will be faced with a tough decision come soon. Steel yourselves." the shells that were launched from the installation crash around, some of them smashing right into the battleship herself!

Sanary Rondel has posed:
     "But... I just gave you the warning. Before. When I... Gave it to you." Sanary narrows her eye at Cirra, readying her shield again as Graf Zeppelin aims that gun towards her. Although the armor and shields on both her front and back hold strong against the smaller fire, it's clear that her armor is meant more for fighting larger opponents rather than pinpoint strikes as the grimaces is pain from some of the artillery fire hitting their marks against the less-armored joints in her armor.

     "No comment on the smell, though... But still!" Letting her magic flow through her to try and mitigate some of the more serious wounds, Sanary intercepts Cirra's Law Blade with her own ice-infused Charge Blade. That distraction is still enough for Graf's shots strike at her shield and knock her off course yet again, some of the explosion even blowing off a chunk of armor off her leg outright. She's forced to cut off the flow of energy in her anklets to land instead, backing up some more to keep both the Judge and the Carrier within her vision.

     "So..." She pauses for a moment as if making it sound like she's going to come up with something witty, then... Just outright charges at Cirra with her shield, trying to ram into her while swinging her sword in from the side. She's trying to keep close to her in the hopes of keeping Graf and her planes from risking collateral damage!

Yuna Kagurazaka (385) has posed:
The battle is joined; Kagurazaka glances among the cannons which have started shelling her group, angling away from Nagato and Amakasu for just a moment, then jinking back the other way as if hoping to confuse the Abyssal emplacements' aim. She's not sure if her guns have enough range to counteract ... Amakasu doesn't seem too worried about range, but Kagurazaka dares to dart a little further ahead as her turrets elevate and traverse.

Maybe, she wonders as she overhears Amakasu, she should have given her equipment fairies names - or have asked what their existing names are. Nagato's orders cue her to slide back into formation with Amakasu and Nagato, and she concentrates briefly on 'type three shells' ... then opens fire with her own turrets, each cannon going off in sequence, staggered so that after squeezing off her fifth shot, the first turret she fired with is ready again.

Trusting her equipment fairies to know their jobs seems to help; her training and practice certainly can't have been wasted either. She's staying alert for additional threats, though; the stationary emplacements may be the most obvious threat, but Kagurazaka knows better than to assume they're the ONLY threat - and on the third firing cycle, it's only the four side-mounted turrets that fire; Kagurazaka is fiddling with the 'turret' she carries in her hand as if it isn't working right ...

HK-47 (754) has posed:
     The tertiary objective had at least been accomplished. The air-forces had been reduced and the remainder were divided between the Abyssals and the droids themselves now.

     Now to begin dividing and conquering.

     With concise motions, the HK-51's divided up, four of them changing positions while two of them broke cover entirely and took up more obvious frontal positions through the primary advantage of being a droid.

     Namely - a droid was not afraid to be destroyed in battle. Especially to give it's comrades as shot.

     Therefore, the two HK-51's, after making sure the oncoming bombers can see them, proceed to fire straight at the units - and keep the aircraft focused on them while the other four HK-51 units take up flanking positions from new vantage points.

     A crossfire tactic - two droids as obvious targets to focus on and draw the bombers to... while the rest take new positions and fire whilst their opponents are distracted or occupied.

     And in the midst of this, HK-47 himself begins scrying the airways, attempting to seek out the lead unit commanding them, red photoreceptors slowly surveying the area - and eventually catches sight of his target at last, watching the battle unfold - watching which unit seemed to be directing the others.

     "Statement - I have you now, meatbag."

     The rifle is aimed... steadied... and with the flicker of a pinpoint targeting laser, the shot lances out for Kotone's craft, the assassin droid intent on halting the charge by removing the processor that lead it.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
She truly didnt' expect a target rich environment after she descends into the bowels of the ship, but she certainly takes advantage. After her third good knifing of another office, the words 'CIC' catch her ears. Finally deciding to leave the rest of the officers alive, she'll try to find a descend deeper down towards this 'CIC' as stealthily as she can. Just in case, she hides a small explosive tag on what she hopes is the hull of the ship, slapping them down. If nothing else, she can try to sink the thing or at least stall it if things go wrong.

Outside, even as Yari # 2 continues to play 'fish for poor sailors and officer-types' from passing ships, the swimming ninja does much like her counterpart: trying to get below the hull, slap on (waterproof!) explosive tags. A good ten of then in this case. She'll wait until there's sufficient air cover from the battle above, and she finally blows the tags along this particular vessel! For now, both Yari's don't realize the Admiral of the fleet is heading landward, and realizing something's up!

Gao decides to go wrasslin' with Abyssals when he can't track her down, and his tumbling descend is more than an opportunity! Yari number three leaps from the water, her umbrella-sword already drawn, trying to leap upon the flying digimon's back and stab him through the back of the neck! A quick ninjutsu, and that blade is leaking magical lightning that will only make the blade that much sharper and more shocking here out on the waves!

The final Yari remains below, readying shuriken just in case Gao turns his back on the water!

Wo has posed:
NAGATO / HOSHI / YUNA:

    The thing about near misses, is they can still be quite damaging, if they hit the right area. This is especially the case with large shells. Though most of HOSHI's shots fly wide, as a result of a destroyer's caliber of gun fighting at extreme range, one still smashes into a supporting pylon of the tower she was aiming at. It doesn't cause a complete collapse of the structure, but it's enough that the guns mounted atop it now have to operate as a very awkward angle, reducing their effectiveness. The Destroyer Princess' facial expression mostly doesn't change with this, though her mouth does move into a vague hint of a grimace. "How dare they attack us," she continues, even though it's quite likely noone will actually hear her. Her pale, glowing eyes turn meaningfully to the Ta-class next to her, the tall but slim figure of a humanoid seeming to get the message, and beginning to...well, grow.

    The golden glow surrounding the Abyssal battleship becomes a lot more obvious, as she becomes a good quarter of a kilometer tall, at least. The fabled 'Leviathan mode' that the fleet daughters and some of their allies would know well. It makes her a lot more obvious of a target, much like the counterpart Nagato, but it also enables her to do fun things like supplement the long-range shelling in turn. 16 inch mountings sprout from the cape, apparently attached to serpentine appendages coming from her back. She is suddenly, absolutely bristling with guns, and the density of incoming fire intensifies. The He-class, also wreathed in golden flame, remains the same size, and leads the screen of destroyers out ahead. It is still quite a circuitous path, through the mangled wreckage and shoals, but they have to attempt to get out in front, if only slightly. They commence their own shelling, 6 inch and 5 inch respectively. Here's hoping Hoshi and Yuna's training is adequate!

    Other than the structure itself, the group being directly attacked isn't completely unharmed, either. With the expanding in size by the Ta-class battleship, she also makes herself an easier target, even for smaller rounds at range. While her armor absorbs a good amount of it, it still causes that distinctive fracturing of her pale skin, wherever she is struck. One shell from Yuna even goes so far as to strike her on the face -- an insult that the standard Abyssal Ta-class would not tolerate, but in her case her head only tilts for a moment, before it returns to level with a resounding crunch, like a 20,000 ton soda can straightening itself out. The smaller surface ships scatter, but the Destroyer Princess, for good or ill, holds her ground where she is. She seems a bit like the ice queen type.

Graf Zeppelin (939) has posed:
     Graf unloaded all of her ammo into the opening that Cirra had made, capitalizing on it, before her planes needed to return for reloading and refueling. They landed on her flight deck, turning back into cards that were now dull and devoid of color or a pattern. She slipped those into the back of her deck, deftly sliding out a fresh spread of cards. While she did so, she aimed her reloaded gun at Sanary...to find that she in Cirra were on land, locked in close quarters.

     "Tch." They were too close together. She'd blow Cirra away if she fired now. Narrowing her eyes at the situation, Graf Zeppelin instead slotted her cards into her flight deck, sending off a fresh wave of planes. These ones were Ju 87C Dive Bombers. They veered through the air above the deadlock, each carrying a torpedo under. And after circling once as a warning to Cirra, they all released their loads, sending a volley of explosive tubes hurtling through the air atop where the two fighters were.

     An explosive payout would follow soon after. How sturdy was that armor, Sanary? Graf Zeppelin intended to find out.

Suzuya (739) has posed:
"Uggggh, that was so gross!" When the fighting began, Suzuya had pulled away to deal with some of the mid-sized Abyssal cruisers. She'd probably have a hard time taking on a battleship one-on-one, or at least she'd be very likely not to come out unscathed, but light and heavy cruisers she could deal with, especially if there was air support. Battles can be hectic, though, and for some time, the heavy cruiser was nowhere to be seen.

And then suddenly, Suzuya is right -there-, arm outstretched in front of Kotone just before the shot from the assassin droid hits home. The impact tears through Suzuya's sleeve, burning the skin beneath, and adding one more charred hole to her uniform already riddled with gunfire. "NOT SO FAST!" It hurt a lot, and Suzuya takes a moment to shake her arm out. Maybe she should have just pushed Kotone out of the way, but this was less painful in her head. Still, she has to put on that cool big sister face! "You okay, Yamakawa? Sorry I couldn't come sooner, but..." She shifts a bit, bringing her less injured arm up to aim its double complement of cannons right back toward HK-47. Her accuracy might not be anywhere near that of a sniper rifle, but her guns send eight shells arcing through the air toward the droid.

"But big sis Suzuya is here to keep you covered!"

Cirra Constantine (675) has posed:
    Cirra's helmeted head tilts down slightly "Hm." at least Sanary's flight ability gets disabled from Graf's artillery strikes. When Sanary rushes her, Cirra brings the Law Blade around...

    And gets smashed into by the shield, with no attempt to dodge it.

    Yet she seems perfectly self assured even now. "So." she parrots Sanary, and just as the charge blade is coming around, she lifts up her feet and pushes off the shield, using Sanary's own momentum to accelerate her black flip, away from the incoming dive bombers.

    "The. Rampart!" and another law card comes down, creating a wall of spiky crystals to protect Cirra from the explosion.

Sanary Rondel has posed:
     Doing her best to keep track of where Graf is by following those planes, Sanary grins slightly before focusing yet more energy into her eye without firing it off just yet. She still needs to bide her time until she can actually afford to take her eye off Cirra, after all, and with the Judge so close and in a position to stab her in the face? She can't do it just yet. Luckily (or perhaps unluckily), Cirra puts enough distance between them that Sanary's actually able to take the shot! Pouring magic into her eye, she fires another sweeping heat laser at the two, triggering yet more explosions against Cirra's crystal shield wall and some even springing up near where the laser hits the water.

     Quality's not her specialty in this sort of fight, so why not try for quantity instead?

     Sanary readies her eye for another burst before noticing those planes overhead again, bringing up her shield to hunker down behind as the dive bombers rain explosive pain down on the healer. Even with the armor's boost to her defensive abilities, explosions are still explosions. If not for her healing magic, the armor would probably even be sturdier than the healer herself!

     "Clever... Underhanded for a /Judge/, but clever!" Sanary actually manages a laugh despite being pinned down and bleeding visibly from the explosions sending shrapnel and rocks into the uncovered parts of her face and her less-armored inner limbs, although being forced to stay on the defensive there does give her an opportunity to spot just what the Destroyer Princess is up to. Very... Very up, even. "... The hell? Hey, last chance for you to get out of here!" She's still got a brave face on, at least.

Nagato has posed:
    The advantage to the enemy going into Leviathan is that they're easier to hit while in a smaller form. Outweighing her options, it looks like Nagato won't go back into her ocean fit. It's too crowded plus she doesn't want to knock the two escorts underwater with the waves. It's here that she lets the type 3 shells fire off towards the base and she starts to reload to the Type 1's, armor peircing shells.

    At the tip of the arc, the type three shells explode and rain down shrapnel and various other not so nice things down onto the base, hopefully wrecking a lot more than she expected. Once that's done, "Amakasu, Kagurazaka, careful. If you get hit by that, I don't want to see you underwater from it."

    "All guns, fire!" she shouts, the armor peircing shells streak along an arc towards that now bigger Ta-class, the shells attempting to pierce the enemy ship... that's Nagato's focus right now!

Wo has posed:
    There is perhaps a distinctive call, that leads to it, or maybe they realize they're outgunned. The surviving Nu-class light carrier and Tsu-class cruiser, less two screening destroyers that are now dead in the water, are completely inundated by incoming fire. The cruiser basically, at this point, from trying to cover the carrier against all the incoming fire, is down to half of her original complement of weapons; the other massive arm is battered and shattered, covered in scrap metal and slag where once was a torpedo launcher and two turrets. She buzzes to the other remaining member of their group, the destroyer, and continues laying down fire as they begin retreating back toward where the Destroyer Princess, and that now super obvious Ta-class, are. On the way, a glancing strike impacts the flight deck body of the Nu-class, causing a fire to break out, and who knows how much structural damage, from how it's suddenly shrieking.

    The surviving, battered members of the group Cirra and Graf Zeppelin had passed through -- a Ri-class, and scratched up but still operational Nu-class, similarly break off and attempt to reinforce the position of their leaders. Now untethered and unburdened, the carrier launches a wave of dive bombers, aiming to drop them into the backs of the ones that had caused it such embarassment: Graf Zep and Cirra. It is a desperate act, and an unguarded bomber wing is easy prey, but perhaps they will get lucky.

    The ones that had been beaming information back to the HKs similarly begin to pull away. While they are being pursued by Kotone's planes, and having to fend off Suzuya's returned fire on their way out, the Ne-class is maybe just happy that it was only her symbiote, and not the nails she'd just finished before coming out today. ...nah, that's for the other side's Ne-class cruisers.

Yuna Kagurazaka (385) has posed:
And suddenly, their core problem gets a whole lot bigger. Fortunately, the theory and practice of dodging don't change a whole lot even when the scale of an opponent does; if anything, Kagurazaka has a *slightly* better idea of where the Ta-class is aiming thanks to the much larger guns which the Abyssal is sporting in this form. A pity that there are so many of them ...

Well, that's one more thing she can help deal with, right? Kagurazaka starts weaving back and forth as if doing a slalom, relying on a combination of her best judgment and some gut feelings to steer her away from the Abyssals' firepower; she winds up getting rocked by a few close hits, but she's fortunate not to get particularly singed by any of the exploding munitions. She's continuing to bombard the Ta-class with her four 'working' turrets, too - now aiming more actively for the Leviathan's guns, since they're THAT big and juicy and tempting of a target ... and then she brings her hand-borne turret up, aiming at what looks like the bridge tower. "Be at peace, ghosts of the dark sea ..."

She pulls the trigger; *all five* of her turrets go off in unison, the combined recoil actually pushing her backwards for a split second. Then she resumes her zig-zagging advance, because even if - by some stroke of fortune - that was a critical strike on the Abyssal flagship, there are plenty of (read: WAY TOO MANY) other threats on the water hereabouts.

Jeannette Thompson (410) has posed:
With the cruiser and destroyers in their way pulling back to the main... rather huge Destoyer Princess towering sixty stories into the air, the destroyer firing a few parting shots at them before zooming up to the beach. Any coastal postions are wracked with fire, short range missles attempting to pound the beach as the rotocraft start to drop their Marines. AFVs rush up the beach, wheels moving up as the armored infantry start to storm the beach with the training they had. As they do, the cruiser and carrier start to reorient; fighters are launched off the magnetic catapult systems, heading to the large contact as ordered. Anti-ship missiles start leaping out of the cruiser's VLS system, too.

The Yari under the destroyer goes unnoticed... for the most part. The warships were advanced vessels, however, and had a host of threats planned for. Which is why one sysop blinked for a moment as he tapped on a screen. "Huh. That's..." He mutters to himself, before there's another dot. And another. And his breath catches. "Sir. Sir! I'm getting a disruption on the hull. Not the standard places we'd expect. Sensors reporting that... Allah, it might be an explosives." The Officer of the Deck in the destroyers CIC swallows. "I'll let the captain know. We can't stop, can't slow down, to get divers out there." It would break up the attack... Damn it." He says, jogging over to a wired line. <<Bridge, CIC. Sending something to your terminal.>>

There seems to be a reaction to the slow dissappearance of officers on the carrier. She can see a brace of sailors start to move forward, before stopping, a petty officer nodding, and then turning to head the other way. Where she was previously, sailors in hastily donned body armor, pistols out, move to hold on front of a door (what seems to be a computer center. It seemed like the ship had a /lot/ of those, and it would have been hard to figure out what each one was for). When she stops killing officers, however, those data points linking her to their position stop. Cameras are out hunting for her, along with thermal imaging, but a ninja who was looking for them could spot her. Every so often, one might; there's certainly a few sailors heading to places she was, or trying to cut her off.

But she's able to reach the CIC entrance easily enough, and it's only got one marine standing guard at it's entrance. He's aware, but he can be taking out. The door's systems rely on biometrics and an access card, both of which she could pick up....

The room she walks into is... odd. It's larger, almost a stadium like depression, bathed in red combat lighting. Multiple levels of system operators stare at different screens, coordinating a thousand different operations along with the computer. In the middle of the room, the red light was over powered by a large blue lit glass block, projecting a holographic display of the battle space. And on a raised section, there was someone who looked like the Captain, an older man. It's almost errily silent.

When she walks in, she can see a sailor, a senior-rated petty officer by the look at it, heading for the same entrance. Who then stops. And stares. "Who the fuck are you?" He asks, and it's loud enough to crane some heads.

Jeannette's roto craft is already taken the short distance back to the carrier by redlining the engines, and Jeannette doesn't stop to wait for the aircraft to land and the marines to get out. She'd on the deck and running toward the island. She knew warships, modern warships, and she knew where the most important spot was.

Graf Zeppelin (939) has posed:
     Sanary was stubborn. Graf Zeppelin strafed aside, that laser blast striking past her shoulder and hitting her flight deck. Said deck immediately went up in flames. "....!" Well that sucked. She kind of needed that there! Nonetheless, she still had the guns on her broadsides, as well as her hand cannon. She raised it and aimed it at Sanary, who was still bluffing.

     "Stand down. You are clearly at a disadvantage here." She kept her guns aimed right at the healer, ready to fire at a moment's notice. "Lay down your arms and surrender. I can promise at that the Admiral is fair and merciful to those who cooperate." Out of the corner of her eye, the carrier could see the VERY BIG situation happening in the distance. But...well, Nagato told them to try and capture Sanary!

     They'd be fine. And it looks like they had their own issues to deal with here. At Cirra's warning, Graf Zeppelin whirled around to see the incoming bombers. "Tch... Constantine, capture her. I'll deal with this."

     That said, she turned her back on Cirra and Sanary, trusting that situation to resolve itself somehow. Meanwhile, she aimed all of her guns upwards, firing everything she had to knock those bombers out of the sky. Annoying. They were so close, and then here comes an interruption. Like clockwork.

     Such was the way of the universe, no?

Gaonoir has posed:
    The manner if impact causes Gaonoir to recoil backwards from slamming to the Abyssal, coming out of his own spin to drag his heels on the surface of the water and slow down enough to watch his handiwork. The enemy is pummeled and the survivors limping away.

    -This- is the sort of fighting her remembers. The risk, the reward; facing down a powerful enemy regardless of what odds or advantages they might have. This is what it felt like fighting the Demon Lord Army.

    This is what it felt to fight with a -purpose-.

    However the moment of remembering just why he was made for this kind of conflict is interrupted by the Yari-clone leaping onto his back and thrusting her umbrella-sword with impaling force. Fortunately for a digimon getting stabbed through the neck and shoulders isn't instantly lethal... but that doesn't make the follow-up of lightning being discharged through his body any less agonizing. A howling cry of surprise pain rings through the ominous air as current sheers up and down his body. That amount of pain is up there with some of the fiercest he's felt.

    Which reminds him all the more -why- he is fighting this night.

    Even with electricity crackling around him, even with the pained cry in his throat, Gaonoir reachs over his shoulders with both arms, clamps his large metal gauntlets over the clone's head, and squeezes. He just SQUEEZES until her head disintergrates in the pressure, destroying the clone. Form covered in scorch and electric burn marks, he grabs his scarf and wraps it a little tighter around his neck. Said scarf immeadiately turns dark and mottled as the wrap keeps too much of that dark digital material that permates his form from bleeding out.

    And then he turns and takes off, jets flaring up with as much energy to launch him away. In the process of heading towards the now Leviathan-ed battleship Gaonoir diverts a bit, grabbing onto one of the wrecks lodged against the rocks and wrenching it free. Why?

To rise up into the air, using his momentum to spiral up and around a few times to build momentum...

    And then HEAVE the wreckage directly at the giant Abyssal. "TIME TO SINK YOU A SECOND TIME!"

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa can fight but is still not the largest first in the pond, heck she's the smaller size she's just not fish bait anymore. Sadly HK's more like a shark and she's in a good amount of trouble. She'd soon find she's being target and given she's out in the open. Kotone skates across the water attempting to evade and make her self a target but she's dealing with something as lethal as any full end combat cyborg and with far more experience, given HK's up time.

She's however about to take a hit as suddenly Suzyua has appeared at the last moment to intercept the shot.

"Suzuya! I'm okay! I haven't taken a major hit yet, I'm down a few planes but that's it. Don't worry about it! You got a good sense of timing. We'll talk later we need to finish this!"

Kotones planes are doing what they can as they keep up their assault upon the abyssal. Meanwhile even the fighters start to strafe for HK's forces along with the remaining dive bombers.

Hoshi Amakasu (901) has posed:
    Well, hey! Even though it hadn't been a hit, Hoshi's shots were doing something, at least. No real time to celebrate, though, as she skates her way across the waves. "I'll do my best, Admiral," she grunts quietly. The order to take up line ahead has Hoshi moving immediately to take up position, trying to keep her sepentine erratic so that the incoming fire can never find a real purchase. That goes /doubly/ so when the Leviathan mode goes into play. She /really really/ wants to avoid getting hit by those.

    Sadly, it also takes up a lot of her attention--so the smaller munitions coming from the smaller Abyssals manage to find purchase with two, and massively destabilize her when a round explodes just in the water under her feet. "Nngh--Gaaah!" Smoke and flame billow around her... but she pushes through regardless, though it looks like her left cannon is in shambles, and she's got a few burns and punctures on that paint her face with streaks of red.

    A quick chat over the radio gives Hoshi what she needs. Suddenly, the Special Destroyer is zooming through the water as fast as she can, only barely avoiding grounding herself (again) as she went. It honestly looked like a suicidal charge at the Destroyer Queen's guarding complement, all those destroyers and such making their way toward Nagato...

    Suddenly, the locket flapping around on her chest begins to glow with blue energy. As Hoshi closes the gap, she shouts clearly, "PERSONA!"

    Blue mist billows around her and drags itself to her right, forming into a huge woman in a green hooded cloak, wearing a muddy wedding dress. Rosamond reaches behind her and draws out a massive broadsword with a flourish... Before she suddenly flies at breakneck speed directly toward the destroyers and the He-class. As soon as she's in range, the Persona's blade flicks out, trying to smash through any destroyer hulls that are close enough for her to strike. Despite her size, the way she handles the blade is quick enough to make it blur slightly...

    And not far behind came Hoshi, whose hairtie has finally transformed into it's sword form. She raises it in challenge towards the He-class as she zooms in

Cirra Constantine (675) has posed:
    "What exactly, do you think a Judge is?" Cirra asks from behind her barrier as the laser beam cuts into it, severing crystal shards. She looks up as she hears buzzing. "Tch." No choice then.

    Cirra hurdles over the crystal barrier and starts running just as the bombs start dropping behind her. With the explosions just two steps behind her, Cirra has no cover, save for one place.

    The Judge drops on her side when in a full sprint and slides across the sand, propelled by an explosion that tears at the back of her armor...

    Directly under Sanary's shield.

    Once under the cover of the shield, Cirra throws a stright right jab at the fellow Alexander Academy student. "It'd be a wise choice to just come back to Alexander with me right now..!"

Sanary Rondel has posed:
     "Heh... Yeah, like I'm really going to surrender to the Union after all the shit you keep putting us through!" There's venom in Sanary's response to Graf as she keeps her head covered from the remaining explosions, slowly staggering back onto her feet and dripping blood from her arms and her face. Although the healing magic is keeping her standing, she's expended quite a bit in the past few minutes, and it really isn't looking nor sounding all that great from what the healer's hearing.

     "If you wanna try capturing me, then... Then...Well, eat my ass!" Master of witty retorts, she is not. Cirra's sudden burst of explosion-propelled speed catches her off-guard, and she can't bring the shield down in time fast enough to actually stop her. It does impact quite loudly behind the Judge, though. Just how heavy is that thing?!

     "Gguh...! That's what Monday is for!" Buckling somewhat from the force of that jab into her gut, Sanary grits her teeth as she lets go of the shield and drops straight at Cirra to try and take the fist-fight right to the ground!

HK-47 (754) has posed:
     HK-47 pauses in abject annoyance as a new target intercepts his shot, prompting the droid to glare at the Fleet Daughter for long moment.

     The next second though, the droid issues new commands to the HK-51's, giving a single statement toward Suzuya; "Statement - I believe you should focus more on your own safety, meatbag."

     With that, HK-47 promptly takes aim at Suzuya and open fire, aiming for her head. Even for a Fleet Daughter, a disruptor shot - something that left most humans as charred skeletons on it's standard settings - impacting her cranial processor ought to at least be a severe, if not possibly fatal injury.

     The two visible HK-51's, seeing that the bombers apparently did not note most of their number had moved, continue firing straight-on at the incoming aircraft, trying to down as many as they can - resulting in the pair taking multiple impacts to their casings, one of them having his cloak torn away and much of his torso-armor severely cracked. The other is blown back as his rifle is destroyed by the hail of shots, body blackened by the resultant explosion.

     However, this focus on the two visible units was precisely what the other HK-51 units had counted on, their brethren having sacrificed themselves to give the others their chance to flank the divebombing aircraft and catch them in a deadly crossfire. One that comes to life an instant later as streams of disruptor energy take flight from two different directions, trying to snipe out the bombers and fighters mid-dive.

     The droids were nothing if not determined - and they were obviously well-suited to the costs necessary to fight a war. After all, how else could they so easily send their own to destruction simply for victory?

Wo has posed:
    The Type 3 shells are just what the doctor ordered when firing upon an installation. It's not so much the direct damage, which is actually a little pitiful: Shrapnel and other debris peppering the base's structures, but not doing much more than smashing through a few walls and shattering the few windows that had been left un-shattered. But the hot, incindeary slag has another trick up its sleeve. Even though the ones that had built this base used a lot of steel and other alloys in the construction, it's still overlaying that wood from the original coastal village. Wood that's surprisingly dry from being sheltered and left to decay for this long. It doesn't take long for a few pieces catching fire to where large portions of the base begin to rapidly burn. One of the defensive batteries' structure warps from the heat, causing it to heave over beyond its critical angle, and plummet off the cliffs into the sea below.

    It forms a nice backlight for the remaining Abyssals to stand their ground, the gigantic form of the Ta-class with all of those smaller shapes gathered around her, yet still standing in front of that teenage-looking girl, the Destroyer Princess. The latter continues staring with those almost dead-looking, pale glowing eyes. The base is a total loss, she is going to be punished for this, but she still has her pride. "We fight to the last," she says. "Either we disappear, or they do." It's quite a shift from certain other Abyssals, that typically retreat rather than take almost certain total losses, if they have the alternative. With that, the Destroyer Princess gestures forward with a hand, levelling all available guns and bombers at any forces that remain. While she isn't *in particular* targetting any of the Confederate elites that responded and came to their aid, it doesn't seem like she's discriminating that much, either.

    The Ta-class, of course, is the most obvious target. Most shots had been glancing at best, bouncing off of her armor, but the opposition begins to adjust to this. Yuna, for example, goes for something a bit more vulnerable -- those hydra-esque turrets sprouting from her back. Armored, yet vulnerable, the first few salvos don't seem to find much purchase, besides denting the turrets' own armor. But with persistence and a bit of fortune, a misfortune that many ships would remember befalls it -- a magazine explosion. That causes the head of that particular snake, at least, to go away, leaving it lifelessly slumping almost as if it were an organism to itself, all along. The others howl and screech of their own accord, and appear to just slightly raise their rate of fire, almost as though it would make up for the missing one. There are also unconventional attacks, such as Gaonoir hefting up a piece of the wreckage and hurling it at her -- this is normally an asset of theirs, but now her arm crumples and shatters as she braces against it.

    Yet, rather than get angry, herself, she just continues staring blankly. Now that there's a giant one in front of them, the something 'off' is likely more apparent. Like that one encounter before. They seem to behave more like machines than the standard Abyssals, with little expression to them. Rather than recoil, it seems she's intent to continue firing until she is destroyed. Which, with how deeply Nagato's Type 1 shell digs into the side of her abdomen before causing an explosion, might not take as long as one might expect.

    The screen ahead encounters Hoshi. The He-class; a mostly humanoid-seeming Abyssal with a porthole for an eye hole in her armored mask, similarly doesn't seem to respond beyond mechanical instructions and reflexes. One arm has a large torpedo launcher afixed to it, and that is what is raised in her direction, loosing several at high speed in her direction, while continuing to advance toward her at high speed. The Destroyers flanking follow suit. Could it be torpedo girl vs. torpedo girls?

    The Destoyer Princess dodges incoming fire, putting forth as little effort into it as

Wo has posed:
    The Destoyer Princess dodges incoming fire, putting forth as little effort into it as she can, though she's finally personally involved, now that her cool defensive batteries are all smashed up. The hover platform that serves as her legs also grants her high maneuverability, and also as a stable platform for her guns. While they are normal destroyer caliber, these are enhanced with...'wrongness'. It's not quite an infectious agent, thankfully, but it's certainly a bit more than ordinary shells.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
The lifeless body of Yari's clone falls to the water, floating a moment before sinking beneath the waves. Gao will have to wash off his gauntlets, that was no normal clone after all! Plenty of blood splatter.

After several near-misses thanks to those hunting soldiers now actively looking for her, Yari finally gets lucky in bypassing the door, relatively unscathed and undetected! The massive stadium-like war-room has her pausing for only half a second. The odd Captain gets a glance, but then a petty Officer finally rears his head. There's no point in replying. She very simply draws another kunai with her tail, and tries to slash away the man's throat.

Then she turns, an entire fan of kunai in her hand. Leaping into the room, she starts tossing, first at the Captain at the chair and then at the various other operators in the room! She makes several handseals in the air, and each of those kunai multiplies tenfold! A rain of metal slams down upon the personelle within! Nor does she stop there, the ninja leaping along the stadium-like area with ninjaly afterimages trailing her with her inhuman speed, slicing at anyone still alive!

The remaining Yari that isn't otherwise dealing with damaging ships pauses as she watches the suicidal abyssals from under the waves. One quick radio conversation, and she makes a handseal. The clone working on a ship soon dissipates into moonlight magic, and then, the one that had been working on the CIC room similarly fades away. The real Yari, gasping, makes a slow swim towards the warpgate as steathily as she can, using all of this chaos as the Abyssals make their last stand to get away!

Graf Zeppelin (939) has posed:
     Graf Zeppelin, after firing on the bombers and enduring the resulting explosions, came out much worse for the wear. Her uniform was burnen and torn in places, and her fit-out had taken severe damage. The only weapon she had left now, was her hand cannon. But it looked like the situation had passed.

     The rest of them were dealing with the Leviathan out in the distance, which left... Sanary.

     Graf Zeppelin turned around to regard the faceoff between Sanary and Cirra. Once again, here they were rolling on the ground like a pair of schoolgirls having a catfight! ...Wait, they were schoolgirls. Damn it. Either way, the carrier couldn't fire on Sanary like this. And her flight deck was damaged, so she couldn't launch anymore planes. That left her to watch carefully, keeping her cannon trained on the two, but not actually pulling the trigger.

     She was basically insurance.

Hoshi Amakasu (901) has posed:
    Rosamond's blade rose and fell three times as she took on the group of destroyers, puncturing hulls and slicing open vast rents in three of the ships. It's notable that all of these are clearly meant to be fatal, and that despite her graceful motions, Rosamond is utterly brutal in application of her sword. It's enough to make even Hoshi blink for a moment in surprise for what she saw a literal part of herself doing.

    Still, Rosamond has better eyes than Hoshi does; the He-classes torpedoes being fired catches her eye, and is immediately returned to Hoshi. Her face sets grimly as the first one comes in hot--and this close, Hoshi doesn't have much room to dodge. For a second, she lowers herself down, squatting as she rode the water, before grunting to force her feet free of the water. She can't do any fancy spins and twirls, but she can jump, at least. The second one gets intercepted by Rosamond, who slashes through it from above, only to get a spray of water and shrapnel in the face. Hoshi's face twists as the sympathetic pain hits her in response, but she keeps approaching.

    "Kyuzo! Five torpedoes left side, wide spread!" She barks and ducks low, depositing the payload strapped to her thighs into the water. They zoom off immediately. It's really just a blanket fire meant to hit as many as she can in this close proximity. FOr the He-class personally... "Kiyaaaah!" Hoshi cries as she finally gets in close enough. She's going right for the big girl, gripping her katana as tightly as she can as she tries to bring herself right next to the stronger ship... and take off her head. If she's lucky.

    "You won't hurt us any more!"

Gaonoir has posed:
    Turrets explode from cooked off ammo. Shells rip into the body. A ship smashes a limb apart. Who knows what else is being thrown at the ship-giantess admist the chaos of battle.

    But it still keeps coming. Keeps firing. While remaining unflinching, unfeeling. No emotion, just destruction. Not a soldier, or even a monster. Just a weapon.

    Despite his efforts to keep it crammed in the back of his mind to not interfer with the battle Gaonoir can't help but think about how this resembles the Death-X digimon Yggdrassil had created.. Tried to turn some of the Royal Knights into...

    Is that what it tried to do to him?

    But as that spark flashes through his mind, his gauntlets clench into fists so tight you can almost hear the metal grinding against itself even with the cacophony of cannonfire surrounding them. A flash of the sudden wrath barely kept boiling beneath the surface flickered across his visor. He was a soldier. He could handle being a monster, sometimes it took monsters to fight monsters... But he wasn't a weapon! He was a warrior, a fighter that wasn't afraid to walk a darker path when necessary to protect... but not an unfeeling one. Not a weapon. Not a tool.

    Jets roar to light with a sudden fury, the intense blaze launching Gaonoir back into the fight with a resurging directness. Dark Digitron energy starts to building around his clenched fists, hissing and crackling with its own anger almost as the Digimon soars towards the giant Abyssal, dodging cannon fire as he must, to get right up towards her head and that emotionless face. He's little more than an insect in this difference of scale, but being smaller has never stopped him before.

    The dark energy continues to seeth as he rises up and draws back, to the point that the glowing aura makes his fist look much larger than the original gauntlet was. "Hey Gunbitch!" he barks loudly to make sure he's heard over the roar of battle, even if it won't be acknowledge. "You've got something on your face..."

    And swings the massive darkness infused Knuckle Crusher right for the giantess' face!

    "MY FIST!"

Cirra Constantine (675) has posed:
    Well that devolved quickly.

    Sanary jumps on Cirra and punches at her helmet with a *clang* "Guh!" Cirra's head snaps back. "That is not what I meant!" She gets tackled to the ground and tries to grab Sanary's armor and roll over on top of her.

    "Alexander." she punches at Sanary again. "Is." she tips her horened helmet forward to headbutt the girl. "Neutral."

    Unfortunatly this is starting to wear Cirra out, and the damage to the back of her armor is starting to show burns and bleeding.

Jeannette Thompson (410) has posed:
The Marines and destroyer are on their own, then. It has to slow, then stop, it's guns still working to support. Anyone looking could see sailors in hastily equiped scuba gear leaping over the side, crossing arms and moving to get in the water as quickly as possible. If this was a dry dock, it would be a slow, methodical search with specially made underwater rovers, the ship evacuated, all safety assured. BUt this was a war, and the destroyer's captain was obviously throwing people as quickly as he could to clear his hull before the destroyer would join those sunken ships around it.

The carrier... had more to deal with. The petty officer who accosted Yari had his throat slit, clawing at it before going down, as there's yells and shouts of alarm in the previously quiet space, the acoustics making everything sound odd as the kunai fly out from the ninja throwing them, metal slamming aganist consoles, monitors, light fixtures, chairs, and people. The captain must have a reaction time, because he's down on the ground as the kunai go everywhere, breathing heavily as he tries to dig one out of his side. There's the odd report of a pistol from the various sysops who were armed, attempting to shoot at Yari as she turned the site into an abbotior. The only thing that saves the bulk of them is knowledge of the room, crewmen and women dispersing to places that take time to reach, time the ninja doesn't have before she dissapates.

And Jeannette arrives in the CIC, sword drawn, to a room recovering. Staring in shocked silence as the thunder of boots of the marines comes down the stairs behind her. "God..." She breathes. And takes a few moments just to wallow in the fact that she could have stopped this if she didn't decide she needed to be where the action is.

But she was a still an officer. And she whistled to the Marines. "Anyone who's got computer experience, find a station! Get triage up here! Walking wounded, /to your posts/!" She says, verbally, walking up to the captain's position, grabbing a handset and leaning down to assist him. "Flight Ops, This is Squadron. Launch all aircraft with anti-ship armamant. Order /Kingsford/ to launch all anti-ship ordance it can. I want that threat /neutralized/."

The Marines have already started bunkering down, thanks to the withering and indiscriminate fire across the island. They've been shelled before, and most know when to seek cover, and when to hold fast. They're also buttoned up in armor, for the most part. They take less casualties than you would expect, but some.

The aircraft launched by the carrier move on as soon as they're in the air. The beach all but secured, they're heading toward the Leviathan, missiles fired as soon as they're in range, mixed in with the heavy sub-tactical plasma warheads from the cruiser's VLS cells. Everything that the Triancian's had in terms of anti-surface ordance was being sent.

Yuna Kagurazaka (385) has posed:
Taking out turrets is always a good thing, in Kagurazaka's book; the fact that they were shooting at her, and at her friends, is just another reason to take them out of action. (The fact that they're ugly and scary is just icing on the cake, really.) Kagurazaka continues sailing down the Ta-class Leviathan's flank, blasting away at more turrets and watching out for return fire; at this point, she's hoping to be so close that the Abyssal CAN'T shoot back at her - and that the other Abyssals can't really shoot at her either for fear of helping sink their sister.

Unfortunately, Destroyer Princess is starting to not care about collateral damage, and Kagurazaka doesn't want to find out the hard way if that includes her. She deposits a couple of torpedoes in the water as she leaves Ta-class behind her, then launches the rest of her available torpedoes at the Destroyer Princess before circling back to form up once more with Nagato. She hasn't forgotten that the critical part of her job here is to keep Nagato safe; she's watching out for Abyssal aircraft as she maneuvers to rendezvous with the kanmusu Admiral ... and if she sees any, she'll be aiming to shoot the hostile aircraft down no matter who they might be going after.

Suzuya (739) has posed:
That first shot still stings, and Suzuya shakes her arm out a bit more. "What the-- Hey! Suzuya is a shipgirl, not a meatbag! Get it right! Hmph..." She begins muttering to herself as she takes aim again. "Suzuya isn't a bag of anything, stupid roboty thing..."

Before she can fire, though, the fairies on her radar mast begin tugging at her hair. "Huhwha? Oh, that's probably bad..." Suzuya's head is not a place she'd like to be shot today.

It would totally ruin her makeup and/or hair.

Bringing her injured arm up to guard, Suzuya lets out a pained yelp as the disruptor strikes it instead of her head. The shot is strong enough to blast apart the turrets mounted on her arm, as well as blow apart most of the sleeves of both the blazer and shirt she wears on that arm. "Tch... that's two gun mounts down." She tries to lift her arm, but it doesn't seem to want to move, and even attempts at wiggling her fingers fail. "If this leaves a mark, Suzuya is gonna be so angry..." The cruiser glances back over her shoulder, calling out, "Yamakawa, keep me covered! Big Sis Suzuya's got a few clocks to clean!"

Despite her injured arm, Suzuya takes off at a sprint, feet skimming over the waves as she closes the dsitance to HK-47. All the while, her uninjured arm swings up to fire off several volleys, and finally grabs for her handbag, lifting it as well. It has turrets of its own, big ones, and both of those open fire as well, followed by a pair of torpedoes. "Suzuya is coming for you!" Hopefully all that cover fire will prevent him from getting another clean shot as she closes the distance.

Sanary Rondel has posed:
     Grunting as Cirra gets the upper hand, it's Sanary's turn to get her helmeted head whacked back on the ground from Cirra's punch. "Nguh... Then what the hell did you mean?!" Instead of just letting Cirra take control of the situation, though, the healer does the smart thing and meets her headbutt with her own. Helmet versus helmet! Skull against skull! Face to face?

     It's not very smart at all. Groaning from that, the cleric takes a moment to fight off the dizziness before trying to shove the Judge right off of her. Scrambling back to her feet, Sanary barks out a few more orders over her comms and picks up her shield while staring straight at Cirra. "... Well. Good news for you and what's-her-face. Looks like..." She jerks a thumb back at the massive Abyssal, staggering a bit on her feet. "This here? Fuck it. We're leaving. So..." The healer starts backing away slowly as she keeps her eye trained on Cirra and Graf in the distance, picking up the pace when those shots from the remaining Abyssals become louder and closer.

     "You and the... Fleets Daughters can have fun cleaning up this mess that you started here, too." There's no way she's about to risk getting herself or her actual allies killed trying to defend this mess here. She's got a duty to watch out for her real allies, after all, and the healer's more than content to just turn tail and leave for the warp gate. She takes to the air again and moves at a rapid clip, albeit flying at a somewhat unsteady altitude with all the built-up injuries from Graf's cannon fire, Cirra's punching and their combined headbutts likely giving the cleric some concussions to deal with later, all combined with with the weight of her shields to give her quite a bumpy ride back!

Cirra Constantine (675) has posed:
    The double headbutt leaves Cirra reeling. Which is just as well since Sanary couldn't seem to pick up what Cirra was putting down. The Judge rolls off Sanary without any recourse to pursue. She lifts her helmet off her head and drops it in the sand while she nurses her head and neck.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa says "Meatbag! You might want to check your scanner bolt brain!"

Kotone calls back she's staring to skate about she's lost some more bombers, and is quick to start o change their attack runs as HK's minions are moving and she has them track them as she does the best she can, more planes launch now s Kotone draws the bow and fires. This is going to try to give Suzuya some more support in her fight with HK, she's lost a lot of the ones going after his minions but the fresh ones going for HK, the bombers will dive at him trying to unload their payload.

"I'm on it Suzuya! Bombers inbound!"

She calls back as the attacking planes do take care to not catch her ally in their attacks.

HK-47 (754) has posed:
     The retort is regarded wearily by HK-47 - her design was based off the classification of meatbag known as the human-female; same ill-adapted flesh-sac covering, same ill-evolved excuse for an intellect that typically resulted from the often-defective processor core they called a brain.

     How was he to know she was not a stereotypical meatbag? After all, what sane inorganic being would /willingly/ choose such an inefficient form?

     Seeing the incoming shots, HK-47 breaks cover as his position - at this point falling apart from the repeated volleys - is destroyed. Several rounds glance or ricochet off his armor, begging the question of what sort of metal his frame is made of to withstand cannon-fire and coming out with just bad dents.

     However, Suzuya makes the mistake of closing the distance to him, or treating him as a solo opponent - proven as one of the HK-51's breaks away from attacking Kotone's airships and strides for Suzuya, engaging it's flamethrower to try and engulf her in molten fire while HK-47 looks at her with an almost cruel delight visible in his optics.

     "Snide Statement - Meatbag or not, I suppose it doesn't really matter... so long as you /burn/ like one."

     However... HK-47 doesn't stay to see the result himself, Rondel's retreat order prompting to prioritize group-survival over victory... and given that the Abyssal leading these forces had seemingly dismissed them as allies, there was hardly any gain in risking themselves her further.

     Thus, with a hail of flame laid down to cover his escape, HK-47 begins pulling back from the fight as quickly as possible, leaving the HK-51 to continue shooting flames at Suzuya to delay her as best as possible. Likewise, the other HK units change from ambush to open-attack, leaving cover - and taking increasingly-severe damage - as they prioritize shooting the aircraft attacking their progenitor over defending themselves.

     Truly the perfect soldiers - willing to sacrifice themselves without hesitation to ensure their commander's survival. And perfectly willing to die in the Destroyer Princesses' crossfire if they can occupy their opponents long enough for it to destroy them, too. And if crippled instead of destroyed, they would self-destruct so as to ensure no remains were left to be studied - a final series of explosions on the scorched landscape.

     HK-47 thus continues his fallback, ignoring some of the shots that manage to glance or impact his frame from whatever aircraft the HK-51's could not shoot down in time, making a mad-dash for his dropship - and beckoning Captain Rondel to follow him if she can do so; "Statement - It is a distinct pleasure to see you alive, Master! I recommend hasty retreat - the Fleet Daughters and Union forces are obviously declaring war on the Abyssal... and I highly doubt this will satisfy their newfound, fascinatingly-immense bloodlust."

     This statement is perhaps very hypocritical, but as far as the droid is concerned, there is too much aggression displayed here to be anything but a self-righteous crusade akin to the wars between Jedi and Sith... and it was very interesting, and gratifying to see.

     It almost made his core glow with anticipation, as he would spend the shuttle-ride back to safety thinking about the war that would be to come.

Wo has posed:
    Hoshi certainly seems to be keeping the lighter ships occupied -- even if she is outnumbered. The Destroyers, already a bit worn down from the assaults so far, can't really keep up speed enough to put up much of a fight, their shells and torpedoes mostly ineffective. The He-class, on the other hand, seems fully intent to drag this one down with her, with no sense of self-preservation. Two solid torpedo strikes slam into the 'shell' that forms around most of her body, causing it to splinter and fragment to expose flesh beneath. Nonetheless, it's a head-on collision course. Right as the He-class gets into range...well, it's not quite a clean cut; the internal skeleton of Abyssals is made of something far denser than bone. But it's enough to send a huge spray of black, gross oil out, even as the He-class instinctivelly still tries to punch Hoshi with that gauntleted arm. A sickly gurgling, as she then slows down, and collapses into a heap, still bobbing on the waves, and shuddering, but apparently disabled.

    There are certainly some aircraft. But the desparation involved means that their flight patterns are erratic, and they're more circling looking for targets of opportunity than fielding any cohesive attack force. That basically means, it's a turkey shoot. The Ta-class has no aircraft of her own, though she does, despite one of them exploding, still have a lot of guns to bring to bear. A bit like dragons tracking their prey, their maws (why do all of their guns have to have mouths!!) open and belch 'fire' in the form of shells, which even though they miss, still cause crashing explosions and swelling waves. The giant ship even goes so far as to kick at the figure of Yuna flanking about her, in the closest thing approaching emotion that she's shown so far, but with her size it is unlikely to hit -- but again, watch out for those waves, eesh. The torpedoes are a bit more troublesome, as her size also makes it more difficult to evade them, in addition to still recovering her balance from the kick.

    As a result, while she doesn't fall, the force of the explosions do cause her to have to sink to a kneeling posture to regain stability. The symbiotic serpents from her back, at least the ones that still have a head, give out a loud screech, and begin firing at anything and everything. Like the aircraft, any coordination is long since shattered; it's all mechanical reflex now. This presents a somehow even larger profile for the missiles coming in; several slamming into her hull, though one even severs another turret-head, which once again falls limp.

    That passive, frozen face is next assaulted by an incoming Digimon fist. The size relation doesn't seem to matter much -- the sheer impact causes it to jerk aside from the recoil, and it's now almost completely shattered across her entire visage. She raises one massive hand to attempt to swat Gaonoir away, but by then she's already coughing up a massive glob of congealed oil from her mouth. That's when disaster truly strikes, though. An explosion, not from outside, but from within. It'd be a familiar sight to many old ships and naval folk. Sometimes damage control fails, catastrophically. As she heads over completely, her face almost seems to gain a measure of peace, instead of being made of stone. She rasps out, "...finally..." She doesn't quite sink, in this depth of water, but it seems she's not a threat now, as even the snake-guns grow still.

--

    The Destroyer Princess floats in the middle of all the burning wreckage, and now oil slicks. Her face doesn't quite contort into anger -- the smart thing would be to surrender, wouldn't it? To throw herself at their mercy? "...mercy is a lie," she utters, dismissively to those kinds of thoughts. "There is only the winners, and the losers." She reaches a gloved hand to one of her bracered wrists, and then her eyes glow more vibrantly, as she picks up an enormous amount of speed. Streaking over the water, she practically rockets right at Nagato, firing shells as she goes, befo

Wo has posed:
    The Destroyer Princess floats in the middle of all the burning wreckage, and now oil slicks. Her face doesn't quite contort into anger -- the smart thing would be to surrender, wouldn't it? To throw herself at their mercy? "...mercy is a lie," she utters, dismissively to those kinds of thoughts. "There is only the winners, and the losers." She reaches a gloved hand to one of her bracered wrists, and then her eyes glow more vibrantly, as she picks up an enormous amount of speed. Streaking over the water, she practically rockets right at Nagato, firing shells as she goes, before drawing back for one final punch, "Failure is not an option for the likes of me, do you understand!?"

Hoshi Amakasu (901) has posed:
    The challenge was on, accepted by the He-class as a fight to sinking. Without Hoshi explicitly focusing on maintaining Rosamond's form, the Persona's appearance begins to grow hazy.

    At the speed that she's going, Hoshi's sword is jerked from her hands, caught in thick Abyssal bone... and a spray of arterial oil smacks her in the face, getting in her mouth and all over her uniform. The moment she realizes what just happened, Hoshi's eyes open wide in utter horror, and Rosamond vanishes immediately.

    There's a lot of feelings in that one moment. Sorrow, disgust, anger, and grief all slam into her as everything goes still. It's a split-second of utter suffering that brings a wave of nausea over her. If she had the time, she would've probably went over and threw up. But... she doesn't really have the time.

    Time speeds up again as the Abyssal's fist crashes flush against her jaw. She's lucky for one thing; having Rosamond has given her some supernatural endurance. It doesn't, however, stop the He-class from giving her a nice hairline fracture and knocking Hoshi out cold.

    Judging by how she goes down, it's pretty much lights out immediately. She slumps forward to her knees and ends up tumbling in the water for several feet, eventually going under the water. She surfaces after minute or so in a dead man's float... Thankfully she's at least facing skyward so she can breathe.

    With the taste of rancid oil coating her tongue.

Suzuya (739) has posed:
A shipgirl doesn't usually get much say in her appearance, at least in general terms. There's always specialized equipment, but Suzuya is Suzuya! "Thanks, Yamakawa! Just keep an eye out!"

While a heavy cruiser can definitely keep up a good bombardment, there's also something to say about engaging in close, especially against a sniper. Thinking she might be able to take away his advantage, Suzuya closes in... and even when the HK-51 appears, the gun turrets on her legs click into place, preparing to fire a close-range barrage!

That was the intent, at least. After the first shot goes off, though, that flamethrower is pointed her way. Suzuya's eyes go wide, and she lets out an absoltely bloodcurdling SHRIEK as the flames wash over her. The cruiser quickly ducks down, covering her head with her working arm. Gone is that cool big sister facade, as complete and utter panic set in. Her eyes just stare blankly forward at the flames, a reflection of a similar fire showing in them... bombs, flames, explosions...

The sound of creaking metal can be heard as her handbag begins to warp, just an instant before it explodes with enough force to send her flying back, landing on the water and immediately curling up into a ball. "M..my torpedo tubes... n..noo...."

Nagato has posed:
    Nagato's reload is different this time, some new shells being loaded into her turrets as three of them start to turn backwards. With everything that's going on, she gives a brief nod, everyone doing their part to take down the Ta-class, to converge on this Abyssal base and end it... she couldn't be prouder of this fleet. But right now, there's something still in the way, the Destroyer Princess. "Mercy is not a lie." she starts, staring at the Destroyer Princess as she starts sailing closer.

    Picking up speed, Nagato shakes her head, "We would like nothing more than to end this, to bring you back to our side... but with the Destroyer Princess approaching, Nagato pulls something off her back. Her axe.

    "If you do not..." then her words... "If failure is not an option... then sink. Sink to the bottom of the sea and never return!" the rear turrets fire, sending the battleship forward at record speeds for her type! "ADMIRAL NAGATO WILL NOT LET YOU LIVE!" she swings back with her axe and with the one facing forward, it fires blank shells, sending the Admiral on a spin towards the Destroyer princess, the nano-bladed axe courtesy of Staren swings in a wide arc... and hopes it hits its target.

Gaonoir has posed:
Gaonoir boosts backwards from a swat... that never comes fully as the giantess finally succumbs to the complications of her damages and topples down. She's a bit big to sink, but she finds a finale watery resting place all the same. Finally at piece from this existance as an instrument of emotionless war.

He slumps where he's hovering, as the extent of his own wounds starts to sink in. To the point that he gives the wrap around his neck an extra tug, just to make sure that nasty wound Yari left doesn't get worse. He won't be going anywhere for a few days once they're back at base, even if he does need little more than rest and maybe stuffing his face a bit to recover.

He's about to return to the Admiral when she says to keep their distance... The tone of her voice is enough to get the message across, and instead he opts to cruise back to land on one of Jeanette's ships instead.

He still has a fine view of Nagato proving why she's the Admiral though.

Yuna Kagurazaka (385) has posed:
Kagurazaka's job is to protect Nagato, and when the Destroyer Princess comes rocketing at the admiral, her first thought is still to try and help ... at least, up until Nagato orders her and Amakasu to move away from her.

Without that order ... well. Kagurazaka couldn't have taken that attack head-on and expected to stay afloat, and she knows it. She might have attempted to throw a wrench into the Abyssal's last-ditch attack somehow, to divert or destabilize it and increase Nagato's chances, but she couldn't think of *how* to do that. So with Nagato telling her to get clear, Kagurazaka breaks away - right as Amakasu gets walloped. That does kind of give Kagurazaka something to do - namely, to go help Amakasu back up and keep supporting her, so she won't drown or anything while she's unconscious.

Once Amakasu is up, even if not conscious, Kagurazaka turns to see how the fight between the battleship and the destroyer plays itself out - because there's nothing else she can do, except to have faith in Nagato.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa loses more planes as she engages HK-47's minions, but the retreat oder comes. HK-47's minions thro themselves at both of them an she's dancing away trying to recall her planes go down but she also sends in several more bombers to try and finish the HK-51s off as she pulls back she isn't going to press the attack here she knows better than to push her luck.

"No problem Suzuya. I owed you one."

She grimaces tough a how the combat plays out and she'll be moving towards her comrade and likely future friend to lend her a hand. 5R
"Easy! If you need help! I got you!"

Wo has posed:
    It's the kind of thing that you might expect to just be implied off camera, with a splash of oil or two shadowed out figures, at best. As the Destroyer Princess heads into her strike zone, there is sadly one thing clearly not in her favor: Her reach. She might be an elevated Abyssal, but she's still a destroyer at her core, and a teenager in form. Her arms aren't nearly as long as Nagato's are, especially with an axe involved. So while she was hoping to close with extreme speed, Nagato also countered that advantage with a boost of her own. The end result, it doesn't end well for the princess.

    Without too horrid detail, Nagato is likely splattered by more of that familiar oil 'blood' -- a bit fresher than the usual, but composed of much the same stuff. She continues holding there in mid-air, her gloved fist even impacting against Nagato's shoulder -- but there's no force behind it. That's because the bottom of her body, that had the hover platform attached to it, falls away, a small mercy being that the blade cauterized nearly as well as it cuts. She grasps there as best as she can, her glowing eyes fixated on Nagato's, before her fingers begin to lose strength enough to hold on. "...then, that's...that," she says, a slight smile coming to her face, and breaking that ice if only for a moment. And then her form slumps, floating on the surface, while the now-separated hover platform detonates behind her.

Wo has posed:
    Almost simultaneously to the Destroyer Princess' defeat, explosions sound from elsewhere around the facility. Some of them are from the few surviving and disabled Abyssals that were still afloat, almost as though they were rigged to do so, and leave precious little trace in the process.

Jeannette Thompson (410) has posed:
The Marines have the beach. Of all the operations, the tough part seems to have actually been the easiest. For the operation itself, the cruiser had taken some damage. The destroyer was out of action, but would be back up... But it was hard to concentrate on that for Jean. The moans of the wounded still sounded around where she sat, less coordinated shoots and yells across as the ship tried to regain it's rythm of those lost. The captain had already been medevaced to sickbay, the XO was on his way down, and the so called squadron commander just stared forward, looking past the holoblock that displayed in front of her.

A brief moment and she's thinking out to the radio. <<Kingsford, this is Squadron. Friendly is landing on your ship. Render what aid you can.>> A quick switch. <<Bridge, Squadron. Bring us into Hikari Seaport. Back of the island until we're sure we've got all explosives.>>

And then more silence.

Hoshi Amakasu (901) has posed:
    Hoshi's out of the water, but she's certainly not out of her little coma. Yuna's sadly going to have to support Hoshi's dead, wet weight. Not really the best way for her to come out of this, but she's alive.

    Her injuries aren't really life threatening, either. There's the fractured jaw, yes, as well as some burns and shrapnel wounds on her face and scalp, as well as the ruined mess stuck around her probably-bruised arm.

    Someone's going to need some TLC after all this.

Nagato has posed:
    Nagato holds the upper half of the Destroyer Princess in a free arm... a frown is given. "I... wish things were different." she lowers her head and herself down into the water, letting the halves sink into the oceanic depths. "Rest well." she whispers, slipping the axe back onto her rigging. Nagato just holds herself still there. She ended that life, in a really brutal way... but.. was it right.

    Nagato slowly turns to sail away, type three shells loaded in the ones facing backwards... before she fires those off to finish off the land base there... to eradicate it from the ocean. "All units." she calls over the radio. Something was a bit shaky with her voice there. "Fall back to Hikari, double time. This node is over..."

Yuna Kagurazaka (385) has posed:
They have TLC in abundance at the port's bathhouse. Being careful not to jostle Amakasu's injured body further, Kagurazaka settles into formation for the trip back to Hikari.

She could use a good soak too, come to think of it - not necessarily for injuries incurred (she got off lightly, but not entirely unscathed), but for her mind and heart to recover from the stresses of battle.