5441/AOH: Operation Hercules - Harbor Defense Breakthrough Force!

AOH: Operation Hercules - Harbor Defense Breakthrough Force!
Date of Scene:	12 August 2017
Location:	<AOH> Abyssal Pearl Harbor
Synopsis:	The allied operation to re-take Oahu begins!
Cast of Characters:	Midway, Nagato, Gaonoir, Reina Kinney, Leyanne Mace, 385, Kotone Yamakawa
Tinyplot:	Abyssal Operation Hydra

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Midway has posed:
    It's only been a few hours since the elite forces had been gathered on board the USS John C Stennis. The briefing, the details of Operation Hercules, has already been provided. Equipment has been given ample time to prepare. And now it's time to deploy.

    The island of Oahu looms in the distance, surrounded by choppy gray water and covered by thick, black clouds. Even at this range, it's easy to pick out the white spray of Abyssal destroyers passing by on patrol, no doubt having taken notice of the monolithic Nimitz class holding this distant position.

    A squadron of four spherical Abyssal Hellcats soars by overhead, then banks sharply to come around for another pass. Their presence prompts the ship's alarm and the CIWS gatling guns swivel in pursuit, opening fire in short bursts that sound like tearing canvas.

    "Ladies and gentlemen," Admiral Nathan Bridger remarks, tugging his service cap down, "They know we're here. I advice you get to work. The Stennis is to act as a fallback point for any retreating forces, and a rendesvous for your reinforcements. We lost too much in Operation Volcano to support the attack directly. Good luck and Godspeed."

Nagato has posed:
    A /very/ large ship finally makes its way into view from behind the Stennis, sporting its super large guns, the tower and the symbol of the IJN directly on the bow. For those in the know, it's Musashi, finally coming out to join. "USS Stennis, this is Musashi." comes out over the radios. "Admiral Nagato has sent me ahead of her with Atago to assist."

    Atago cheerfully bounces with the arrival of Musashi, moving to where she can launch herself from the carrier. "Heavy Cruiser Atago~! Launching!" she giggles out, kicking out and turning around to get in front of the carrier. "Pan Paka Pan~, Atago is here!" just more of that bubbly enthusiasm there.

    "Ara? Already?" the sound of the CIWS firing catches the cruiser's attention. "Humph, all the fancy new technology." she whispers, turning to look at the incoming planes. "Sanshiki loaded." her guns raise, the barrels moving to get maximum upward angle... and. "PAN PAKA PAN!" the hip wiggle and the guns launch their ordinance at the Hellcats, exploding out into the loving shrapnel and magnesium typical of the ammunition. "Can't let the Carrier have all the fun~"

Gaonoir has posed:
So the carrier isn't going to engage directly into the battle. "Good, that means you can stay here," Gaonoir remarks over his shoulder as he walks out onto the flight deck, already in his Perfect digivolution.

"Gaonoir, you can't keep shoving me to the sidelines!" Erika protests as she rushes out after the Digimon in a huff.

For a moment he actually lowers his wolfish head, but then turns it to look sidelong back at the young woman. "It's not shoving you aside, Erika. It's keeping you at a tactical reserved." He jabs a thumb in the direction of where the Hellcats are circling for another pass. "I'm better suited for this mission, but once there's a clear landing path on the island? It's Ultimate time."

There's a pause, and then a wide-eyed "Oooooh" as Erika realizes what he intends. Keep her safe now because he'll need her and the spirit she provides to evolve farther once they can reach landfall. That perks her mood back up, to where she snaps a hand up in a salute. "Then you better get in the air!"

Gaonoir smirks a bit and gives her a thumbs up, before flipping his visor down into place and clenching both hands into fists to manifest his large battle gauntlets over them. Bomber scarf gives a dramatic flap as his jet narcelles extend and roar to life.

A crewman starts to ask the digimon if he needs a airstrip cleared, only to be interrupted by the plume of smoke and flame blasting back as Gaonoir launchs almost straight up into the air.

Erika just shrugs a little to the seaman afterwards. "He's perfectly capable of VTOLs, thank you."

Who needs Screaming Eagles when you have a Howling Jetdog? As he arcs into the air Gaonoir charges a bit of energy around his gauntlets, and sends the small bursts of darkness flying towards the Hellcats. "Pardon me while I invade your airspace. Dark Gatling!"

Reina Kinney has posed:
During the briefing, Reina was standing at attention, listening intently to what was being said. She did little aside from nod a little to acknolwedge what was being said. Once the briefing was finished, Reina saluted and said, "Thank you, Sir. We will not fail!" She then took off quickly, eager to get her fighter craft ready.

Now, Reina's fighter craft, the Delta Falcon, has been brought out and is all fueled up and ready to go at a moment's notice. It just needs one thing, and that would be the pilot herself, a.k.a. Reina herself. Fortunately, the pilot is standing here watching as her craft is loaded up and fueled up as well. She cracks her knuckles expectantly and rolls her neck around a few times before getting the thumbs up from the crew that her fighter is ready to go. "All right, it's time to lock and load and rock and roll!" She gives a thumbs up back before teleporting into the cockpit of her fighter.

Once she's there, Reina waits for the all-clear sign before igniting the engines (OK, thrusters) on her fighter, before she takes off and heads into the air. "Into the wild-less-blue-than-my-eyes-yonder we go!" Reina says with a chuckle, knowing that her eyes are a deeper blue color than the average sky is.

Once she's fully airborn and gets her weapons system online, she surveys the general area and gets an idea of what's going on where.

Leyanne Mace has posed:
Leyanne Mace salutes the General and then sprints from the briefing room. She's quickly down the rope ladder to Leeroy. As the crew cast off, Leyanne gets into her position at the 40mm bofors. Even before the PT boat has cast away the long-barreled Bofors gun is swinging up and towards the incoming Hellcats. But there are friendly air forces... and friendly flack. Fuckit. She plugs herself into the cannon for quicker communication with the fire control computer, setting the ammunition to timed with secondary impact fused.

    Leeroy adds his smaller but still potent Anglo-Swedish flak to the mix.

    "As soon as the first wave moves in, I want at least one Exocet in the air to support them!" Leyanne orders. Then we're on the second line - just like moto-cav, but we're on the water: Fast, light, hard-hitting. Don't stay still long enough to get targeted!" The last is aimed at her driver.

Yuna Kagurazaka (385) has posed:
Some time earlier ...

"Yuna, are you sure about using El-Line for the assault?"

Yuna blinks, and finishes buttoning her collar while she looks at Elner. "We need to take out the fortifications and those big guns, El-Line is one of our best options for that ... and the Abyssals won't really be expecting it. Why?"

The little robo-faerie gives Yuna its best approximation of a withering look, "You haven't forgotten what you said to the Destroyer Water Demon, I trust."

".... Oh." Yuna falls silent for a moment, sitting down to start pulling her tights on. "No - I was thinking about her again earlier, actually," she admits. "... I'm sort of hoping she'll have sortied to meet the naval assault before we drop in. But ... You can track Abyssal signatures by now, right? You can help me tell where they are, where I shouldn't shoot?"

"It's not a perfect solution. You could still hurt them, badly. Are you sure you want to take that chance?" Elner asks - not to be contrary, but because the robo-faerie remembers how badly the fight with the Chaos Titan left Yuna wounded: not physically, but emotionally, even spiritually.

And Yuna hasn't forgotten that, either - she still has nightmares enough about that battle, even if they no longer wake her up or keep her from trying to sleep. "Whether I want to or not ..." Yuna trails off, then stands up, pulling her tights the rest of the way up, then straightening her skirt once again. Her face looks troubled, but only for a moment. "We still have to do our best, right?"

Now ...

            "LIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT *UP*!!! EL-LINE!!"

Rather than launching from the Stennis, Yuna and the Matrix of Light made their way around to the edge of Oahu by subtler, even sneakier means. But the time for sneaking is past - a pillar of light erupts from Yuna's shout, and within that pillar, the Matrix's members combine to form the Matrix Figure, El-Line: massive, sleek, armor not merely gleaming, but *glowing* in the relative darkness, in stark contrast to the looming stormclouds above.

Ensconced within El-Line's cockpit sits Yuna herself, clad not in her Hikari uniform but in her Light Suit, its design so similar to the arrangement of El-Line's armor, minus the upswept wings. "Elner, scan," she orders curtly; in response, the screen before her is overlaid with an HUD, trying to pinpoint signatures which Elner thinks are Abyssal personnel. There are certainly some places where the Abyssals *aren't* - and those spots are Yuna's first targets ... such as the massive guns themselves - maybe not the magazines and actions, but the barrels to guide projectiles on their way.

Those guns will be the biggest threat to the attacking fleet. And that, in turn, makes them Yuna's highest priority. "LIGHTNING SHOOT!!!" Yuna calls out, the Matrix Figure raising its hands - and crackling bolts of radiant force lance out, aimed to utterly wreck the cannons' barrels, ideally before they can speak.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
The Time had come, Kotone knew what her job was going to be she was to do what she could to give air cover, and clear the skies of Abyssal aircraft as best she could. This also might make her a target for the Abyssals to take out. So she would be on her guard as she deployed on the water and was already making ready. There's no need for scouts, it was time to get fighter wings in the air.

She would draw and fire them off in rapid succession one after the other and was already issuing orders to them to intercept. She was wisely keeping in formation for the moment but not sitting still, sitting still would be asking to get torpedoes but who knows what sort of tactics the enemy has in mind today.

<<Yamakawa deploying first second and third fighter wings.>>

Midway has posed:
    It's only a single flight of four Hellcats, likely a scouting group. The CIWS system clips one down immediately, and the remaining three break formation. One is clipped by Atago's Type 3 ammunition, trailing smoke as it makes for Oahu proper. One of its surviving comrades swings around to engage Gaonoir, loosing a burst of machine gun fire before it's shredded by the Dark Gatling's darkness shots. The remaining undamaged Hellcat dives, adding to its speed, while Leeroy's AA fire and the CIWS of the Stennis finish off the damaged one.

    In the distant, dark waters, several points of red and gold light ignite. The eyes of Abyssal ships turning out to sea. Amongst them, two pairs of violet.

    "They failed already," Destroyer Water Demon snorts, "They're back again? I guess they went and got help this time. Stubborn assholes..!" Raising one huge gauntlet, she thrusts her hand out, fingers spread apart. Behind her, the first of the two shore batteries opens fire with concussive sounds audible even out on the Stennis, targeting El Line itself. The second battery's guns elevate, before El Line's attack lands. Electricity heats the metal and the gun barrels sag. When one fires, the shell catches, exploding inside the liner. Its partner is blown from its mounting, crashing down to the beach.

    The Water Demon bares her teeth in a hiss, sweeping her hand behind herself, "Guard the second battery!" Her gaze shifts back out to sea, "We'll need it to take out that machine..!" Letting out a frustrated noise, Destroyer Water Demon clenches her guantlets into fists and advances.

    Beside and behind her, Heavy Cruiser Water Demon uncoils her tails from around her shoulders, fanning the snake-like parasite out to either side, "We're at a disadvantage. Be careful."

Gaonoir has posed:
A spiralling roll to the side avoids most of the machine gun fire save a few sparking hits along the bionic flightsuit covering Gaonoir's body. Much less severe than a direct hit would be. Even as he rolls the reflection of the surviving Hellcat diving flashes across his visor. The predatory insincts buried within his digital DNA flare sharp and hard, and he spirals into a dive as well to follow the aerial enemy.

"I'll finish this, be ready for the next wave that's sure to come," he comments over local comm channels.

Then twists his body around as he pulls near the diving Hellcat, taking advantage of his speed to transfer the force of momentum into one of his metal feet hurtling at the Hellcat's backside. "Back to the depths of whatever hell spawns your kind with you!" Hopefully it'll be enough to knock the flyer off it's attack course even if it doesn't smash it completely.

Nagato has posed:
    Musashi pulls up, showing her broadside towards the island, all of her beautiful guns aiming towards Ohau. "I shouldn't have to say this but it's a bit ironic we are attacking Hawaii again. This time to save it." comes the voice over the comms as the guns start rising. "Aim... FIRE!" many high explosive shells are launched out of the turrets with a beautiful arc towards the island, the loud noise of turrets reloading as Musashi moves to reposition herself, can't do to leave the fleet battleship broadside at all times!

    Meanwhile, Atago pulls ahead of the carrier, sending more type three shells towards the island, trying to pepper it with an unending rain of shrapnel and magnesium. "PAN PAKA PAAAAN~" as a normal anti air battery lights up, shooting all of it at the incoming aircraft!

Reina Kinney has posed:
Meanwhile, Reina's gotten things squared away, and while she sees there are some aerial targets that have been taken down, more are coming into the picture, and Reina can only smile with an evil tinge to it. "So, you want some too?" She runs a hand through her long ponytail and smirks. "I'll be glad to oblige you, but I must warn you that you will regret this!" As soon as the nearest group of aircraft comes towards her, Reina is more than ready.

"Glad you could join the party! Too bad it's not much for you!" Reina exclaims as she fires off several shots at one of the nearest aircraft, while preparing for whatever the rest might have in store for her.

Leyanne Mace has posed:
Leyanne Mace punches the air as the Hellcat gets taken out. She frowns quietly... this whole Abyssal/Fleet Daughter war seems as messy as the war back home. "If we see the one we shared a beer with, let's try and get a word in first. Let her know that... no hard feelings from us if she kicks our ass, right?" She comments. Her crew seems to agree with the sentiment; having to live with the enemy gives one an interesting view on war.

    The mice manning the forward missile launchers are surprisingly large, hench individuals - it would be hard to broach the subject innoffensively, but at least one of them looks to have rat blood in him. Or maybe rat-ogre blood; he opens a hatch in the floor below his weapon and hauls the large Exocet into position one-handed. "Missile launchers ready, all we need is radar."

    The fragile, agile Elco 80 hangs back behind the first line of the attack, waiting for the right critera to do her cavalry thing - an enemy breakthrough of the line or a gap in the enemy lines to exploit.

    "Reina, bogeys on your six... I got them, do NOT 180" Leyanne's voice is crisp. "Light AA opening up." The Bofors gun on the back tracks aircraft as they breach the first line... with a clearer range, Leyanne switches to gated-prox/impact, rocking in her seat as the AA gun fires. The rounds explode in a controlled pattern beind Reina, or when they hit Abyssal targets, whichever happens first.

Yuna Kagurazaka (385) has posed:
"Kyaaah!!" Yuna lets out a yelp as the first cannonade detonates against El-Line's armor, sending the Matrix Figure staggering - but not falling. El-Line's taken harder hits and more protracted assaults than that in the past ... and honestly, those big guns shooting at El-Line (and at Yuna) is a *good* thing.

It means they aren't shooting at the *fleet*.

With the Matrix Figure righting itself, Yuna calls out, "Shugoseiheki!!" as El-Line raises its left arm - and no sooner has the last syllable left her lips before a massive kite shield, the Wall of the Guardian Star scaled up to suit the mecha's size, flares into existence, radiant light resolving into gleaming metal. That should be enough to help absorb any more shots from the remaining big gun ... not to mention the Abyssals' own barrage. But there's one disadvantage now - El-Line is sized for big operations, like assaulting the Abyssal fortress. If Destroyer Water Demon is attacking at her usual size of a young girl, she can literally run circles around the Matrix Figure - Yuna might not be able to interpose her shield fast enough to ward off the onslaught, and she certainly wouldn't be able to return fire.

Even if she *weren't* worried about any of El-Line's weapons being deadly overkill.

For now, Yuna maintains El-Line's form with a minor application of her will - normally an unconscious process, once she's summoned El-Line; she's just more conscious of it now - and continues launching Lightning Shoot blasts - which are more concussive hard-light rather than truly electrical 'lightning' - at the remaining battery, or at the walls adjacent to it if she can't get a direct shot. "Any Abyssals who don't want to get blown up had better get away from the walls!" Yuna calls out in warning.

Midway has posed:
    Waves of spherical white Abyssal Hellcats pour out from Oahu, now. They seem to be coming over the island, rather than from the harbor, and approach in clusters rather than all at once in one massive swarm. This no doubt is going to give the aerial fighters plenty to do, as grouped in with the Hellcats are the less nimble Avengers and Helldivers-- Bombers, intent on attacking the surface fleet such as Atago, Musashi, and Leyanne's PT boat.

    These planes also make attack runs on El Line, though it's likely going to take a lot of work for them to have a noticeable effect on a super robot, even if they can come at it from angles not covered by the Wall of the Guardian Star. Another salvo from the remaining shore battery slams into that shield, as well, at least proving that it's able to withstand the high caliber guns.

    At the surface level, amidst the destroyers and light cruisers engaging in the defense, Destroyer Water Demon crouches low to the water to minimize her profile, maneuvering. The big guns fielded by Musashi in the distance are a problem. Yuna's giant robot is a problem. The carrier is a problem. She rapidly sorts priorities in her head, and the one which comes up is the one fueled by bitter hate.

    Destroyer Water Demon gestures, then breaks off from Heavy Cruiser's course. Skating across the waves, she hauls up to her full height and thrusts both gauntlets out, discharging her fingers as torpedoes in a spread focused on where El Line's left leg emerges from the sea.

    Heavy Cruiser Water Demon banks off in the opposite direction, her cannons aimed skyward, tracking and opening fire on Reina's fighter with the left pair, and Gaonoir with the right pair, introducing both parties to heavy flak.

    With the sudden eruption of chaos, a clear shot at the gun battery isn't so easy for El Line. But those concussive blasts are clearly having an effect on the concrete casemate housing the second gun battery.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
The Battle was well underway now, Kotone's fighters were already moving into engage some of the abyssal fighters and it was death in the skies as the planes duke it out. Some explode while far more of the Abyssal planes fall to Kotone's own.

She knows the big targets are what she's got to worry about. The Water Deamons were the primary target, she does launch a few torpedo bombers to take down several destroyers who were getting too close but she knows even of there is chaff? It will wear them down rob her of ammo and planes.

Having Musashi and Atago along was good for her moral. Having two veteran ship spirits? Was good for her moral as she kept going towards the island.

<<If anyone needs air support, call it in.>>

With the Hellcats being engaged by her own fighter she's trying to make a push for the Heavy Cruiser. She has bombers up in the air as she pulls more for the quiver and they will join the assault from Reina and Gaonoir. Her torpedo bombers would make their attack runs trying to use Reina drawing fire, hopefully it's made a window to allow this. Or she's just made one heck of a mistake.

Gaonoir has posed:
Gaonoir pulls up from kicking the Hellcat into the ocean depths below and turns his attention back towards the islands and most Hellcats and now other aerials start coming into battle. Eyes narrow a bit behind his visor. -Erika, are you seeing what I'm seeing?-

Back on the carrier Erika has ducked back below decks so she's not in the line of fire or in the way of the naval offers. When the D-PORT beeps at her she clicks the controls and a holographic display showing her Gaonoir's POV from the air flashes into being. She peers at it for a moment. -Gaonoir, can your scanners trace back their flight trajectory?- The display flashes the additional information at her, which makes the girl frown more. -They're coming from past the island, not the harbor.-

-That's what I thought- Gaonoir mutters back. He might of had more to say, but Heavy Cruiser Demon opens fire while he's hovering instead of moving, cutting off the conversation as the fire hits. The flak from HCWD is much more effective than the Hellcats, actually knocking him backwards a bit before he restabilizes himself. -Alert the rest of the fleet. I've got asses to kick.-

As much as he wants to retaliate for the flak fire, he's got a mission in keeping the aerial forces from slowing down the big buns getting after the enemy leaders. Something those bomber craft could easily wreck. So he shakes off from the hits and rockets back into action.

And right for the first bomber craft he can lock sights on. Trying to use his speed to his advantage Gaonoir forgos ranged attacks, instead roaring like a comet at a bomber.

At first it looks like he might just smash it out of the sky, but at the last moment he dips down, aiming instead to fly under the craft, and use his big metal hands to grab the bombs off of it. "Excuse me. Borrowing!"

Because if he succeeds at that not only does he disarm the enemy, he can use their own bombs against the enemy fleet instead.

Leyanne Mace has posed:
Leeroy weaves as the bombers begin to target the little wooden boat. Of course, it's doing a fairly constant 40kts, so it's not the easiest target. Still, though, even if he's moving too fast to get a good bomb hit, it's a lot easier to get a gunsight on target. The gunfire causes his crew to duck behind one of the boat's few pieces of armour - the wheelhouse/flying bridge area. A round slams into the intake for one of his engines, the ingested fragmentation causing the engine to emit grinding noises and a few thin streams of blue-white smoke in protest. Leeroy's driver begins to swerve erratically to try and make the boat a harder target, while Leyanne swings the bofors gun around to thin the Hellcats and Avengers.

    "Under fire... nothing too serious yet." Leyanne reports, opening up again with the big 40mm gun. As the Abyssals swing past, his lighter .50-calbire bow and waist guns join in the assault.

Yuna Kagurazaka (385) has posed:
The guns of the Hellcats are annoying, and given a sufficiently long time they *could* whittle down El-Line's defenses, but they're a low priority as far as Yuna's defensive attention goes. The real problem remains that big gun - and that's where El-Line's shield remains interposed ... giving the Destroyer's torpedoes a chance to home in and detonate.

Once again, El-Line staggers - and this time, a fall is only prevented by hastily driving the kite shield's bottom corner into the watery ground. Within the cockpit, Yuna winces; *she* felt that, and not just in the sense of vibrations from the explosions travelling through the Matrix Figure's frame. She needs to change the dynamics of this fight, and fast.

She does have an option for that ... but it's risky. Then again, so is the battle in general.

Once El-Line has righted itself fully and pulled its shield free from the ground, it just starts running straight towards the remaining cannon - still holding Shugoseiheki up to intercept additional shots. Only when the Matrix Figure gets closer does Yuna finally call out, "LIGHTNING SWORD!!!" and conjure a proportionally large blade, the hilt grasped in El-Line's right hand. If she can't blow the cannon up from a distance, apparently she's going to try cutting it apart instead.

Reina Kinney has posed:
There's a bogey on Reina's six, but then she hears there's AA fire coming to take it out. Reina smirks. "Teamwork's always good." She focuses ahead once again as she readies a missile in her launcher. "I just hope my targeting computer is working." She gets a lock on a nearby bogey and pulls the trigger.

Nothing.

"Oh Falz! Not again!" Reina curses as she pulls the trigger a few more times. Finally, after one desperate pull, the missile launches. "Take this, chump!"

Nagato has posed:
    Once reloads are complete, Musashi finally releases the whole Ocean Kit and drops back to her normal kit, proudly standing there with guns raised. Smaller target, should make it easier for those bombs to miss. She finally kicks up the speed and rounds the Stennis and takes aim.. Heavy Cruiser Water Demon is attacking her Admiral's aircraft and she's not going to have any of it. A quick (for a battleship) aim and shots are fired with high explosive shells. "Hey, you want something worthy, I'm right here!"

    Meanwhile, with Atago, she takes aim at the now exposed Destroyer Water Demon, letting out a few 'warning' shots, some to funnel her in a certain way... towards the Battleship... "Ah ah ah~ not there you don't! Atago has a wonderful surprise for you!" the surprise? Torpedoes. Six of them heading towards the Destroyer, though with some of the fodder in the way, they may not get there.

Midway has posed:
    Aircraft carrier. Heavy Cruiser Water Demon's guns swivel around when she recognizes Kotone's role in the fight. She's caught in the dispersion of bombs from Gaonoir's maneuver, shielding her face with one sleeve, then glowering after the Jetdog with glowing violet eyes. A second volley of flak is unleashed after him, while she swings her second pair of turret-tail-snakes around at last. These four guns are unloaded in Kotone's direction, medium caliber cruiser shells hurled at the SDC light carrier. When high caliber rounds explode around her, and one against her side, the Heavy Cruiser Water Demon staggers, then snaps a glare towards Musashi. Well. Her attention is gained.

    Reina's missile explodes a Hellcat in a fireball large enough to consume the Abyssal aircraft around it as well. Between her actions and Gaonoir, the swarm of fighters start shifting their priorities, pursuing the jet and jetdog just long enough to unload a burst of gunfire, then ascending. They start using crash dives to make up the difference in speed and shift from dogfighting to harassing the two aerial fighters. A similar tactic is adopted by the bombers making runs on Leeroy, though the little speedboat's machine guns make their approaches that much more dangerous.

    Destroyer Water Demon lifts her gauntlets, fresh torpedoes sliding into place, and then flexes them as her new fingers. She throws her arms up defensively when El Line charges past, riding the wave thrown off by the rushdown assault, "--Tch!"

    The battery gets off one more salvo before El Line's sword carves into the casemate. Something explodes inside, filling the view slits with flames before the side of the battery erupts in a geyser of exploding propellant. Amidst the flames, a small figure in black tumbles, then comes to a stop. The only crew of the shore battery was this creature. The Artillery Imp scrambles to its stubby feet and, disarmed, scurries into the jungles of Oahu in the direction of the harbor.

    Destroyer Water Demon tenses her jaw, her teeth bared, "They got both shore batteries..." Turning, she kicks off again, grinding her teeth. Weaving through gunfire from Atago, she thrusts a hand up and snaps an artillery round from the palm of her gauntlet, directed at the speedy Leeroy, while swerving directly towards the Heavy Cruiser herself, "If you want a piece of me..!" She slides between the torpedoes, ignoring when one detonates an I-class destroyer that had tried to join her. Her gauntlet rears back, "--TAKE ALL YOU WANT!" Destroyer Water Demon kicks off the water's surface, making up the height difference in an attempt to straight up punch Atago in the face.

Nagato has posed:
    Attention get. Musashi smirks at this and extends a hand as she starts reloading again. She soon does a beckoning motion towards her target, a 'come and get me' motion. "I think I have her attention now, that should free up a good run to the enemy base. If I have to, I'll enter melee combat with her." she comments over the radio, "While Nagato may have the armor of the Big Seven, I still outshine her when it comes to pure force."

    Atago, however, just gives off this bubbly little grin towards the Destroyer Water Demon, hopping slightly in place "Ah, she's coming for me." she giggles a bit. "Isn't that a bit cute? The little Destroyer wants to play with the cruiser~" then there's a gauntlet into her face, a loud crunch as something gets displaced and the Heavy Cruiser is knocked back.

    Skidding in the water, creating a wave as she holds herself up... there's blood coming from her nose... now within close range to the Destroyer, she scowls... an /ANGRY/ Atago. "PAN PAKA PAKA PAKA PAKA PAAAAAN!" she kicks off the water, guns behind her as she fires, giving her that boost of speed to return one punch with another.

Leyanne Mace has posed:
It's not Leyanne that notices that Destroyer has her palm aimed this way, it's one of the .50-cal gunners on the side. The gunner, a piebald mousegirl wearing a Nam-style helmet with the strap dangling loose, gets a comical look of surprise on her face, a cigarette dropping into the sea before she realises that she should actually be do something about it. "INCOMIIIIIING!" she yells, just as the round leaves the barrel of the gauntlet.

    The driver doesn't even look up. He just wrenches the wheel to one side, wrenching one of the three throttles almost to its idle stop to wrench the bow of the boat around. The maple hull creaks in complaint... but it saves them from a direct hit, at least. Still, there's a bit of a blast off the artillery shell even as it misses, a splintering crunch audible from the boat as it rides the shockwave in the water.

    "That hurt!" Leyanne reports. The stream of smoke from Leeroy is a bit thicker as the boat begins to accellerate again. "Do you think we pissed her off?"

Gaonoir has posed:
Gaonoir is all too happy to use some of their own bombs against the Demon, but the tactic is going to be short-lived. But he got his shots on the giant bitch in, still got other objectives to attend to.

Specially when the aircraft start making sacrifical dive attempts instead of just shooting them. One manages to make an explosive impression, sending the jetdog spiraling away. It does give a nice demonstration at how Digimon occasionally give a big eff to normal physics though, as soon as he hits the surface of the water Gaonoir somehow plants his feet and uses his jets to stabilize and instead skid across the water like one would scrape against pavement instead of crashing and sinking.

Followed by a large rooster-tail of water as he launchs back into the air, ignoring that his exterior layers are showing a bit of cracking and damage from the impact. He weaves through a few more fighters, ignoring the ones trying to harass him in order to line up on the bombers going after the ships instead. For someone that once wasn't a team player, he's taken to the protector role of air superiority rather well.

Again it's not quite what it seems at first, as Gaonoir uses his powerful metal gauntlets to grab onto the bomber instead of smash it, then spin around to elevate both of them farther up into the air.

At the end of the rise Gaonoir spins around one more time, whisps of shadowy energy crackling around his gauntlets as he holds on, arcing towards the bomber's engines to make sure they're disabled.

At the peak of the spiral Gaonoir takes aim at the point beyond the harbor that the aircraft are launching from, and at the end of the last spiral hurtles the aircraft back towards the launch point. "This package is being sent RETURN TO SENDER!"

When he said he was going to try and mark the launch site in a big way for others, he wasn't kidding.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
The Heavy Crusier's guns are now upon her and this is about to be bad, she's got shells comming at her, and she stops launching planes. She nwo goes fully on the evaicve at least she's pulling fire off of her friends. That's what she's twelling herself the salvaos come in and it's not pretty even getyting close to a blast from shells like that is going to hurt hert and is does. She's not able to counter attack but she's managed to not be sunk for the moment.

Her fighters are on their own the Heavy Crusier has managed to stop her from launching more for the moment and kotone's very distated in not ending up sunk.

<<She really doesn't like me!>>

Thank you Carrier Obvious, but hopefully she can put this to some use?

Midway has posed:
    Destroyer Water Demon immediately recovers from her own punch, landing with a splash in a boxer's stance with her gauntlets raised, glowering over the tarnished black metal of her knuckles. A thick white smoke starts leaking from the joints of her equipment, soon obscuring the destroyer and heavy cruiser in a dense cloud that clings to the ocean's surface. Inside, she and Atago are close enough to still see one another, at the very least. Having landed at the ready, she's prepared when Atago rushes right back into her, gloves raising to absorb the punch with her armored gauntlet.

    And then the Destroyer Demon surges in, "How good are you really, up close and personal!?" Her left arm sweeps upward, distractingly, while she brings her right gauntlet around at waist level with all the force that a Demon can produce, "EEYAH!"

    "Sorry, but no," Heavy Cruiser Water Demon admits, "I'm not so stupid as to engage /you/ directly." She pushes her hands out to either side, skating backwards across the sea's surface. Her inner pair of tails arc back, coughing out canisters which burst in midair, creating a cloud of smoke between herself and the battleship. She's not /in/ it, though, and just making it harder to shoot her accurately with those big 46cm cannons.

    Heavy Cruiser wheels around, shifting her gear to keep retreating from Musashi. Guns elevate and she fires them, one at a time, trying to zero in her fire on the speedy Leeroy. While Destroyer's shells were bad news, it's important to remember that Heavy Cruiser's cannons are a larger caliber. This cannot be good, unless she gets interrupted.

    In the air, Gaonoir weaponizes a bomber by hurling it back towards where the waves of Hellcats and Avengers are coming from. It tumbles out of sight, creating a small burst of red flame against the side of Oahu's main volcano. However, Gaonoir and Kotone both will notice something else going on-- As the sun sets and the sky darkens, the swarms of Abyssal aircraft are growing less dense. The Admiral did menion that they don't 'like' to operate at night, so this is probably related to the more restricted sorties. The pressure to maintain air superiority is lessening.

Leyanne Mace has posed:
Leeroy maintains his high-speed, erratic course, neither speed nor direction remaining constant for long. The PT boat isn't much of a threat right now, though it is a tremendous pain in the butt to hit as it swerves and surges, the crew on board holding on for dear life as the shells rain down around.

    "Attack pattern Brave Sir Robin..." Leyanne mutters, holding on tight and simply calling out what directions she can. "Uhh... we are getting straddled pretty hard here it's not gonna be long before we're matchwood if this shelling keeps up."

    Every near miss causes the wooden boat to complain, crunch or for leaks to form in some way. The Deltic backup engine fires into life and adds its black smoke to the trail following the PT boat, water starting to spurt from the bilge pumps as the mice down in the engine room run slap emergency patches onto splits and holes in the hull.

Gaonoir has posed:
Looks like the Admiral's info about the Abyssal aircraft disliking nocturnal ops was nearly spot on.

Gaonoir, on the other hand, loves it. He is the Dark and the Darkness is a part of him. With the aerial forces thinging out as they retreat from the coming night, he can turn his attention else where. Like the Heavy Cruiser still trying to blow up his allies. But now that he's really in his element and has less lighter forces harassing him, he can do something about it.

Darkness flickers across his visor and crackles about his gauntlets as he taps into his dark ability. The shadows were already reaching long as the sun set, but as he puts Shadowplay into work they seems to reach even farther. In fact they reach up from the shadows themselves, tendrils of darkness that lash out at his direction to try and grapple onto the Heavy Cruiser Water Demon, and pull her aim away from bombarding the Leroy and others.

Nagato has posed:
    In the smoke cloud, punch meets gauntlet and there's a nice clang, the Heavy Cruiser winces just slightly at this before smiling at Destroyer Water Demon. "I'm good. Maybe not as good as some other cruisers, but I'm good~" she giggles, Atago gives a bright smile towards Destroyer Demon. "Say, since its just us..." she thinks a moment, "Tell me... why do you fight?" she puts her hands to the side, keeping her smile up towards the Destroyer. "This smoke cloud is pretty good, maybe we can talk. Though, if you want to hurt me..." a sly grin, "I don't think I can hold myself back in hurting a little cutie like you!~"

    Musashi nods, "Good." she comments, aiming her guns towards the new smoke cloud that Heavy Cruiser Water Demon produces. "Hmm, smoke." she aims... and it goes up... and another launch towards the surface, can't hit what you can't see, right? Might as well hit the surface! "Cowards use smoke." wait, something's wrong about that statement.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Things are getting more serious by the moment, there's something odd as the sun set and the Abyssal aircraft seem to be lessening. That will give her a bit of a boost in the air. They are losing their grip on air superiority.

"Their air power seems to be lessening."

With that boosting her spirits even with how things are going.

"Your fleet has shown it's anything but stupid."

She notes to the Heavy Cruiser she's not sure if she can hear her but hey.

The bow is back out now as she moves to launch a few more planes hopefully to boost their own air power. With the Heavy Cruiser being fired on by others? That will let Kotone direct an airstrike. A formation of torpedo bombers and dive bombers are deployed.

Midway has posed:
    With the Leeroy on the retreat, Heavy Cruiser Water Demon returns her attention to Gaonoir. She could already tell how the jetdog's manipulating was throwing off her aim, sparing the renegade torpedo boat. She fixates on the airborne hound, swinging her guns around to open fire on Gaonoir with fragmenting flak shells. It's the best armament she can field against an aerial opponent, with all the aircraft thinning out or straight up retreating.

    In the smoke cloud, Destroyer Water Demon ducks back, keeping her hands raised defensively when Atago tries to talk things out instead. With a tense frown, she keeps her guard up, "I fight because I have to," is her response, "If I fail, I let everyone down. And that disappoints Her." Glowing violet eyes narrow, "I did that once already."

    Her fingers flex, straightening, "And I'm not going to do it again!" Her hand swings down and her fingers jettison into the water, as torpedoes, fired at close range..!

Gaonoir has posed:
Gaonoir succeeds in getting Heavy Cruiser's attention on him, which is both a good and a bad thing. Good because it gives allies the much needed space to back off from the fight. Bad because, well, fragmenting flak hurts like a glitch as the shrapnel digs into his form from the bursting shells. It leaves dark cuts in his form, but not enough to deter the experienced hunter from continuing.

After making a show of pulling some of the fragments out, and flicking them away. "That's annoying." Smirk. "But not annoying enough."

With a roar from his jets Gaonoir launchs himself towards the Heavy Cruiser Water Demon, energy amassing around his clenched gauntlet. "KNUCKLE... CRUSHER!" Combination of physical strength and speed swing the charged metallic fist at Heavy Cruiser. It doesn't really matter where he hits her if he does, the resulting shockwave of that energy releasing is going to be nasty even if he doesn't land a direct blow.

Nagato has posed:
    Atago hmms a bit, "Because you have to? I know you have a mind of your own." she comments, "I've failed to and let Nagato down. It dissapoints her but it's only going to make me perform better." a pause, "Oh, so you did that already? And now you're trying to perform better for your commander? See, we're alike, you and I. You really should join my Admiral. She'll treat you well, she may be a woman of priorities and someone who is strict, but she does it for the love of her fleet. Just like Kagurazaka."

    Oh hey, torpedoes. She's not swift enough to dodge such a close range and there's a massive explosion and water spray from the smoke cloud that envelops the Destroyer and Heavy Cruiser. Musashi quickly turns her head towards the location and starts speeding towards it, "ATAGO!"

Midway has posed:
    Heavy Cruiser Demon swings her tails back, reloading her cannons while keeping her glowing, violet eyes on Gaonoir. When he dives, she swings her arms out to either side to brace herself, her tails already taking aim. In the same instant that Gaonoir slams into her, those guns go off, though the impact causes the shots to go wide in all directions. A blast of violet-tinged crimson light erupts from her chest as she's hurled back, skipping across the waves until she comes to a stop, face-down. Shuddering, she hauls herself up, then collapses again in a spreading pool of black oil.

    After a few moments, Heavy Cruiser Water Demon retreats by submerging completely.

    Meanwhile, Destroyer Water Demon's gauntlet extends a new set of torpedoes into place, and she flexes her newly replenished fingers while shielding her face with her other hand. Eyes dart sidelong at the shouting from outside her smokescreen, then towards Atago. With a frustrated noise, the Water Demon sinks beneath the waves as well.

    Night has fallen. The shore batteries burn on the coastline, and Pearl Harbor is open to safely advance.

Gaonoir has posed:
Gaonoir flexes the metal fingers a few times. "Tough bitch," he murmurs, mostly to himself. "Next time I'll put my fist--"

"GAONOIR" Erika interrupts him over the radio.

It's loud enough he cringes a little, ears splaying back. "--Nevermind. I'll go make sure nothing sneaks back out while we're moving in on the Harbor."

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa braces for things to get worse the Abyssals are fighting very hard she's directing her fightes to go after the Heavy Crusier but iot seems with everyones efforts and Gaos own combat ability she's been driven off with the rest. She slows down a bit and just pauses at Erika correcting him. Woah don't cuss about Erika, is the lesosn she learns. She'll keeps osme planes in the air but recalls most of her suriving ones. This was only the start of things...

Nagato has posed:
    With the Abyssals retreating, Musashi moves to pick up Atago from the dispersing smoke cloud. Atago's floating, face down in the water... "Secretary Ship Atago..." she whispers, hoisting her up a bit... sailing towards the carrier. "Stennis, I'm pulling a wounded aboard. Atago is going to need some care... I'll be getting Akashi to come out for repairs.. and she'll be stationed on your ship to assist your repairs as well." Musashi sighs, looking towards the passed out, wounded cruiser.

    "Atago, not everyone can be convinced..."