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Starbound Flotilla     The airship was clearly put together less for dedicated transport and more for simply having an independent area, one where whatever's aboard could never touch the ground. One assumes this is a matter of safety. For the people aboard? For the people below? That's unclear. It's clear that the Starbound Flotilla is part and parcel of the mad science though; the airships are at least constructed with a lot of their easily recognized materials. And it keeps emitting strange lights, shipping out strange technologies...

    They've been easy to see, with a simple set of binoculars, and access to a Sector 13 rooftop. Getting to them probably needs a little work, but it might be possible to sneak aboard as it passes by one of the many tremendous spires, or get her own sneaky vehicle for making her way aboard. The Zaibatsu members can easily get aboard, of course, and may already be aboard, hard at work on guarding or doing engineering work. The interior is skewed, at the moment; the Domain has been established, with Seft in control; those within, familiar with the way Domain Cores work, will know this by the aesthetic. Heavy castle-style interiors and tremendous, complicated clockwork-driven smithing and engineering equipment. Seft herself is hard at work on the Domain Core itself, using the machines to test various materials engineering configurations for the Domain Generator segment.

    From the outside, all this means is that sections of the airship look especially castle-like, seeming like a floating fortress has somehow crammed a bit into the airship's frame. There are, in fact, actual ramparts exposed in some areas. There's exposed segments at the engine compartment at the back, a guarded landing pad, maintenance access points on the lower side, and other such ways of breaching, but this is a gap in the defenses that may make it an opportune time to ditch stealth and go for a hijack.

    It may be a prudent idea to bring some psionic control modules to wrest control away from the Domain's current commander. These are easily purchased -- mail order, in fact, is entirely viable -- from the Starbound galaxy. They come in all kinds of fashionable forms, from earpieces to chokers to hairbands and everything in between.
Sanary Rondel      Sanary's doing her part on the transport vessel tonight. What's her part? Making sure everything's okay by patrolling the ship, of course! She's wandering the halls of the castle-like interior, checking on the engineers to make sure they're doing... Engineer things. She still hasn't learned how to do whatever it is they do, but she can at least stay on hand in case they happen to need someone to do some heavy lifting.

     Her patrol path is a rather large one, going through almost the perimeter of the entire ship. She's not moving very quickly, though, and it's going to take a while for her to even complete a single loop at the pace she's going even with the fuzzy white armor covering her. Sanary still has her metalbent shield and gunaxe on her, of course, but it's almost as if she's trying something... Different today.

     "Anyone need any drinks? I'm near a vending machine if anyone wants something." She chimes in over the radio, peering over at the landing pad that's not super far from where she's standing.
Kyra Hyral     Kyra has had the pleasure of seeing a domain core work first hand. Prior to this misison, she's shared the footage she recorded the last time they had infiltrated a Zaibatsu ship.

    Since Juno is not on this mission, they've opted for an infiltration from one of the many very tall buildings of Ramuh. She's tracked the airship to the most likely path and staked out the little group atop one of the spires most likely to pass beneath the airship. Armed with some very nice quality grappling hooks, she's waited for just the right time-except for those on the group that might be gifted with various forms of flight.

    Of course, Kyra is not here as herself but as the mysterious 'Rabbit', wearing her completely opaque suit that has a built-in silencer to mask her unique magical signature. The infiltration comes from BELOW.
Xiao Li Yu Xiao Li Yu is here again. On this ship visiting to check in on the Domain Core tech. It's fascinating really. And she was always going to follow up on interesting scientific achievements. As such, she was outside the main room where the Domain Core was being controlled. Like Sanary, she was patrolling a hallway.

     Patrolling, but technically, she was wandering around and taking in the sights. This was a lot different from when she last controlled the core herself. "Hmmm, so they truly do shape themselves to the will of the user. Fascinating." She tapped her cheek with a finger thoughtfully as she walked along. "I do wonder how other, certain individuals would affect the core if they were in control..." Not that they'd find out anytime soon.

     Probably.

     Hearing Sanary over the radio, Xiao spoke up in turn, into her earpiece. "Get me an X-Potion, thank you very much~."

     Another routine night.

     Yep. Nothing gonna go wrong here.
Sakura Haruno     'Willow' is here as well, currently having quite a large number of thoughts that can mostly be boiled down to 'why isn't anything we want to blow up ever on the ground'. Not that she could even extensively use her earth ninjutsu without being identified, but the lack of solid dirt under her feet was something that she quite disliked, even though she was justly not scared of falling.

    It was floating that she was afraid of.

    Her aim with the grappling hook will be true, even if she's somewhat distractedly whining to herself the whole way up. Luckily, she's able to climb the rope with her eyes shut; unluckily, this doesn't actually help her feeling of distaste and fear at all.
Lyria Mason Serpent wer here but she was stilent as she made ready to fllow up with Rabbit, Lyria was ready as she was ever going to be as she moved forward with her partner in crime. She kept her self ready as they moved in, making her own grappling hooks ready.
Starbound Flotilla     The approach from below won't have to deal with, say, the mechanical dangers of the engine section, or the violent dangers of guards on the landing pad. However, she will need to contend with SENSORS. As the sensor expert of the Starbound captains, the vessel's lower exterior displays a large number of SENSORS all around it. The softly glowing lights of their detection zones swirl around the surface as large gear-filled detection systems sweep their vision around. It looks like they might prompt violent response if tripped... But it'll need some ninja daring to evade them enough to breach a hatch. That won't be TOO tough, of course, for those with relevant skills.
Septette Arcubielle      The wind whips viciously around Septette as she drops like a stone through the clouds, her dark purple cloak fluttering noisily in the wind and almost tearing itself off of her shoulders. Too dense to pull herself up from below, and too blatantly obvious on any sort of sensors to infiltrate with the rest of the group anyway, she's opted for a less subtle approach: an orbital jump from her spacecraft.

     The skeletal machine fires her leg-mounted thrusters, adjusting herself from a headfirst to a feetfirst descent as the airship comes into view. At this velocity, punching right through the landing pad might be a real concern, so she strains to decelerate. At the same time, she tucks a small clip into her hair- a psionic control module, acquired for just this purpose. Her eyes glow a bright violet with delight as the landing pad rushes towards her...

     CRUNCH.

     Moments after her presence first lit up the airship's sensors, the yggdroid lands on her feet on the pad, though without any of the grace or lightness that might imply. The platform cracks visibly from the impact, spiderwebbing out from the point of contact. An instant later, a fire enchantment flares to life on her, wreathing her in thick black smoke to obscure her from the guards- though given the fact that the glow of her core is faintly visible through the haze already, it won't last long. Sept uses the time this buys her to gauge their reactions and analyze their weaponry and positioning, her own augmented vision relatively unobscured by the smokescreen.
Starbound Flotilla     From here, Septette can access the cargo area, as well as personal movement corridors. This should let her reach the communications section, the engineering section, or the crew section without trouble. At least, without trouble as soon as she deals with the Spellsword-equipped security forces guarding the landing pad. These individuals all wield an assortment of heavy medieval-style melee weapons with high-tech enhancements, and are within thick power armor that projects armor-like holography shields over its surface, giving them a medieval soldier look that mixes a little with a TRON-like arrangement. They are immediately putting things into alert, or likely would if Sanary doesn't first. She isn't attacked immediately, but she IS immediately menaced by a large number of humming, energized melee weapons, presumably to get her to stand down. They will not hesitate to charge at her if she attacks, and if (rather, more likely, once) she does, it'll be with coordination with SANARY, the nearby elite security member of the Zaibatsu on the field.
Kyra Hyral     From below, Kyra clings to the underside of the airship quite easily, the suit she wears activating built-in magnets to adhere to the surface, an idea taken from the /last/ time they came upon the Domain Core technology in action. She takes a moment to identify the various nearby sensors and frowns within her helmet. That's going to be...difficult to navigate. At least Sakura will have an advantage...but for Kyra...

    She moves slowly. Very slowly. It's the only way she can reliably ninja around the sensors, at least until she pulls out one of her devices, which she sticks on the underside of the airship. It's a variation of her EMP/Thundara device, though it doesn't activate until Kyra has moved far enough away from it. Something of a demi-distraction to draw the sensors while she searches for a good way in with Sakura.
Sanary Rondel      "X-Potion? Got it. Might as well grab one for my-... Self?" Sanary raises an eyebrow slowly as she sticks the X-Potion in her pocket, watching... Something or another obscuring her vision from that vending machine. "Seriously...? We've got heavy smoke by the landing pad. Possible intruder."

     There's the alert. Or at the very least, she's calling it out over the radio. That's the importance of good communication! Sanary wastes little time in heading towards that landing pad, although she does keep herself a few yards away from the smoke itself even as she prepares that shield in front of her. "Troops, stay on your guard, and group up on me if you can. Whoever's in there, identify yourself and stand down. Nobody has to get hurt today!"

     She certainly looks ready to hurt someone, but at least she'll give them the benefit of the doubt first. How polite.
Xiao Li Yu      Xiao plodded through the hallways, speaking into her earpiece at Sanary. "Alright. I'll see you in the common roo- Hm?" Pause. Frown. "Seriously...?" She muttered, mirroring her colleague's words. "Take a look at that, Miss Rondel, not that I need to tell you. I'm going to head for communications. See if I can't get eyes on the rest of the facility."

     That said, she turned and stormed off, headed in the direction of the communications section, and then promptly stepped in. Frrom there, she spoke into the radio at Seft. "Seft, can your domain get eyes into the hallways? Or is it purely sensors? I don't think we can trust the security cameras if it's who I think it is." Damn terrorists. Probably. Unless it's a bunch of hooligans on a joy ride, but that was doubtful.

     "Failing that, we'll send more alert patrols into the halls to serve as vanguard. Report in your status every five minutes, if you fail to do so, someone will come your way to check."
Lyria Mason Lyria Mason is aware they have at least one new ally today and she wonders how this will go, still there's no turning back today and she needs to press ahead. She follows along side Kyra clinging to the hull as she too uses some magnets built into her gear to cling to it, like a certain spider reporter. She follows slowly as she attemps to not make any mistakes here. They can't afford to as they do need to get in she waits as Kyra deploys her distraction hopefully it will help Skura do what she needs to do.
Sakura Haruno     The good news is that Sakura is, in fact, a ninja who has theoretically been trained in stealth, and will sneak along and look for a hatch. The bad news is threefold - she's actually spectacularly bad at stealth, she thinks she's good at stealth, and she's got all the patience of a two year old on a sugar rush being denied a shiny toy.

    As such, rather than try to make her way to a hatch like a normal infiltrating person, she's going to gather chakra to her fist and try to smash a hole through the hull near where they hooked in. Who needs an existing, secured hatch when they can try to make their own? This is probably going to set off a sensor or two, though.
Septette Arcubielle      "I'm afraid someone has to get hurt," replies a soft and calm synthetic voice, "but nobody has to die, if that is any comfort." Slowly, the smoke dissipates. First, that red core resolves into clarity; then a pair of scythe-like blades glowing orange with magical heat. By the time the violet light of her eyes pierces the obscuring cloud, there's no mistaking her- and nor can she mistake Sanary, despite how much the healer has changed since their last meeting. "Sanary Rondel! There will be no surrender. If you value the lives of your subordinates, then face me in single combat!"

     Melodramatic to be sure, but all the better to draw attention to herself. She's bluffing about killing the guards- they're just doing their jobs, after all- but her perfectly controlled expression and voice certainly wouldn't hint at that. A high-pitched whine like the spinning of a flywheel builds, and a trio of drones- red, yellow, and blue- materialize next to her. For all that posturing, she won't make the first move just yet: the longer this distraction holds, the better.
Starbound Flotilla     The ship is on alert now. It's known that there's breaches from below, and breaches at the landing pad, though some of that's a little unclear. But despite it, one can only hit something if one knows the position; Kyra disables several sensors and draws the attention of others, darting past them. She can get in from below, through a heavy maintenance hatch, into the crew segments; these are emptying out fast as crew head upwards to deal with the deck breach, so she -- and the others who are trying to breach from below -- should have a relatively easy time of evading the people. Less so of evading the cameras that are slowly being activated to scan the hallways. They have the appearance of tiny mechanical sentries, and will be alerting Xiao Li Yu to the presence of boarders... Such as Sakura! And perhaps Kyra and Lyria, shortly. But all three have gotten aboard -- or removed the rhetorical board to achieve in the first place -- and can make a break for certain areas. If they want to steal materials, cargo's the way to go, but that's close to the distracting fight. If they want to steal information, engineering's the way to go. If they want to steal, uh, the entire ship, well, there's a lot of power lines heading to the DOMAIN CORE and Kyra will recall where it actually is, specifically.
Starbound Flotilla     Seft calls back to Xiao Li over comms. "Alert. We have at least one breach at the landing pad, and one breach in the lower decks, detected by local cameras. The upper deck intruder is attempting to face Sanary in single combat, the lower deck intruders are unknown in intention and number." She's linking the data-feed to Xiao Li Yu now! She can make her way to deal with the situation as she likes.
Starbound Flotilla     Sanary obviously is the highest ranking sercurity person on-site at the moment, so the Spellsword-equipped security forces here defer to her. They'll keep in a threatening position, albeit VERY cautiously, and will now be under Sanary's command for the rest of this business, it seems. Oddly, though, someone gets an order -- he visibly cocks his head to one side -- and breaks off, taking one or two of the other security guards with him. Looks like someone's recognized the distraction and pushed for a few tactical patrols down below.
Sanary Rondel      Sanary lets out a relieved-ish sigh when she hears that familiar voice, although it's not a complete relief since... Well, it's someone she's worked with before! "Septette...? The hell are you doing here?" There's some suspicion in her eye as she approaches, gesturing at the guards to step back. She's seen Septette fight before, and even if it is a distraction, she'd still rather not risk their lives unnecessarily.

     "Fine. But after we're done here, you're going to tell me who's involved in this, got it?" The carefree tone that Sanary usually speaks with is gone, replaced with a far more grim and determined one. She's actually rather serious about this, isn't she?

     Serious enough to make the first move, even. She dashes in with that shield in tow, fully intending to just ram right into the Yggdroid. The cleric is considerably faster in this armor and without the bulk from having two or three shields on her, but will that work against her?
Kyra Hyral     Crawling along, Kyra works her way into the maintenance shaft and scales it, now able to move much faster without the pressure of sensors weighing down upon her. Unless there are sensors in the shaft-that would just be AWFUL. Maybe even expect at this point. Fortunately, she does have sensors of her own built into her suit at this point-counter-sensors of a sort. It can pick up /some/ things but not everything.

    With a general knowledge of the ship, Kyra knows where to go if she wanted information or if she wanted to risk actually trying to /steal the ship/. For anyone who has made it in with her, such as Lyria, she motions towards engineering and slips a gun out of a holster at her side. It is /not/ a Galiandan gun. In fact, it seems to be of a make of weapons found in galaxies Far Far Away. She's quick to move down the halls, knowing that she's working on borrowed time. It was only a matter of time before cameras started detecting her.
Lyria Mason Lyria Mason knows how risky it is, but they have long been backed into a corner in dealing with this problem. She keeps her self attached to the hull she'll follow but is very much on edge. Souji's people are no slouches and they have off world help to boot as well. this was not going to be a milk run as some people would put it. She's quick to follow after Kyra there's no turning back now. She nods once, knowing the target she needs to take. She starts to move out now knowing time is ticking down.
Sakura Haruno     Sakura's not interested in stealing the entire ship. After all, it has a hole in it. Who would want a ship with a ninja-sized hole in it?

    No, she's going to be mostly serving the role of distraction, because she has no idea where anything is. This is actually going to result in her, more or less at random, heading in the direction of engineering, looking for anyone who might be trying to stop her. She rather clearly stands out at this point, even if she's wearing a mask to hide her face.
Xiao Li Yu      "Three breachers? Seriously?" Xiao hissed and left the communications section, heading right for the core area. "Seft, I think I have a fair idea of what the gameplan may be. I'm heading your way." Another click and then she spoke onto the general security channel. "Security stay on alert and attack on sight! Create a choke point if you can and divert them away from the core."

     She sighed as she stormed through the halls again, adjusting a pair of black gauntlets on her arms. "I swear, never a dull moment here in Ramuh." The scientist muttered, her golden eyes narrowing in irritation, "Let's just hope they're not smart enough to all converge on a single point."

     Because that would be bad. She can't solo three people! Probably.
Septette Arcubielle      "My identity is mine to disclose," Septette replies with a slight smile, "but I cannot in good conscience give you the names of others." Then it's on! The shield charge is unexpected, but the little war machine has already started running predictive analyses on Sanary's next movement before the attack even connects. Rather than dodge or attempt to block the charge, she digs her talons into the ruined deck and grabs the shield's rim with both clawed hands as Sanary plows into her!

     There's a deafening clang, and Sept's 'ribs' deform slightly- but she doesn't budge at all, too dense to be pushed aside by an attack like that. For a brief moment, Septette stares into her opponent's face with something like childish glee... and then she throws her back into twisting the shield counterclockwise with her own disproportionate strength, aiming to injure Sanary's arm or at least wrench her primary defense away.
Sanary Rondel      "Good conscience...? Do you even know the type of people you're even working for?" Sanary grunts as she slams right into Sept, putting her weight into that tackle while glaring straight back at the Yggdroid. There's no such glee on the axe healer's face, instead just showing disappointment and anger at her opponent for tonight.

     "Did they tell you they were going to drop a plate on people? That they're only doing this because of money?" Feeling that twisting pressure coming from the shield itself, Sanary rears back with her gunaxe while releasing the shield, the blade starting to crackle with electricity as she channels her energy into the weapon. She takes a quick step sideways before swinging underneath the shield, trying to take out the Yggdroid's legs.

     Is she actually trying to use... Strategy today? Something really is off.
Starbound Flotilla     Getting over to engineering at least averts most of the defenses. Xiao Li Yu will get a feed of Willow heading that way, and a few flashes of Rabbit and Serpent heading there too. Kyra and Lyria won't have to deal with most of the security forces; most are heading to cut off access to the CORE as per Xiao Li Yu's orders; it seems as though that difficulty may have rejected the possibility of a hijacking so far; it also means that a patrol heads right for Sakura, and that she'll wind up with a sudden rush of aggressive power-armored knight-like security guards wielding spears try to crash into her from the side on her way to engineering.
Septette Arcubielle      "Yes, conscience," Septette replies, slightly more caustically. Her eyes narrow. "I am not beholden to anyone, Ms. Rondel. Nor am I under the delusion that everyone who fights by my side does so for the right reasons." Then the cleric wisely releases the shield- that does force Sept to step back to regain her balance, if only due to her own momentum no longer being opposed. Tracking the flow of magic through the weapon, she immediately notices the electrical charge- and THAT gets her to defend herself almost desperately, swinging the stolen shield towards the incoming axe hard to deflect the blow and hopefully jar it from Sanary's hands.

     The baseball-sized drones, half-forgotten in the heat of the conflict, circle around the two combatants almost lazily. The red one suddenly whirrs to life behind Sanary and crackles ominously as Septette brings up her free hand and makes a strange gesture with her clawlike fingers, and twin fireballs erupt from Sept and her drone in an attempt to light up that flammable-looking armor! "I know better than to think I can convince you! My reasons are my own, too complex to convey in battlefield banter... so have at you! If you really want an explanation, perhaps I could give a gloating monologue after you're defeated."
Starbound Flotilla     The engineering area is where they might have had to come through, and about like you'd expect, right now it's full of medieval-styled clockworks and piping, and it would have been a bitch and a half of a platformer challenge to get through, instead of the stealth challenge it was to get in from below. The halls are somewhat cramped and dense with heavy power cords. Critical engine equipment and other matters, it seems, are quickly being armored up. Part of Seft's DOMAIN is the armoring of subsystems, not just SENSORS! This also includes things like the physical server infrastructure; the section of engineering dedicated to running information services for the ship. There's a server room, but you'd need to breach the heavy reinforcement of the door to it; there's an access console nearby, with obviously less reinforcement, but that might draw Xiao Li Yu's aggro! Worth a shot...?
Sakura Haruno     The armor means that Sakura doesn't have to take things gentle, but it also means that she can't really easily afford to. Something of a double edged sword, all told, since cutting loose risks her identity just a little more. She's going to go all in on using enhanced strength, and try to avoid any other obvious use of powers, attempting to rip the spears out of the hands of the guards and bash them with it. Her technique, even if she gets a spear into her hands, is flawed.

    This is because she's never actually used a spear before. It won't take much for her to give up on that and just try to punch or grapple them into one another, her breathing becoming somewhat obviously strained, her hands starting to bleed, her chakra levels shrinking...
Sanary Rondel      "Good. Then we're on the same page, then." Some of that earlier hostility actually fades somewhat at Septette's response, although the humor still isn't quite back on Sanary's face just yet. No, she still needs a little extra push for that to return. Although she might not have the same raw strength as the Yggdroid or even that of some of the other warriors she's met from other worlds, the cleric still has quite a bit of muscle of her own to work with! Her axe slams right into the metalbent shield, barely even giving an inch before drawing her weapon back with a focused stare.

     "I'll be fine here. Go and assist the others!" She calls out, apparently barking an order at the remaining guards. Does she not think she'll need the assistance, or is she giving Septette the benefit of the doubt? Either way, Sanary apparently doesn't want them to be anywhere near the fight as she draws her gunaxe back again. Hearing that odd crackling noise behind her, though, she turns around just in time to dodge right into one of those fireballs!

     Then comes the howling pain, a moment of agonized rolling as that searing fire blows right through the armor into the healer directly, and the smell of burnt flesh wafting through the air. Can Septette even smell that? Oddly enough, the armor itself doesn't stay on fire for too long despite its obvious weakness to fire, although the damage is definitely done even as the healer focuses her magic into healing that wound instead of going on the offensive again. "I thought this was supposed to be single-combat... Or do those not count now?"

     There's the smirk. Sanary's not doing anything, but at least she's not royally pissed any more.
Kyra Hyral     Kyra notably leaves the power equipment well alone. The last thing she wanted was to bring this airship down over the city of Ramuh-especially if /they were still in it/. Ideally, they'd be leaving with the airship anyway. As they continue navigating in, with Kyra approximating the correct direction to go, Rabbit and Serpent come upon a heavily reinforced door.

    Rabbit puts a hand up, signalling for Serpent to step back so she can take care of this obstacle. Of course, her methods are somewhat predictable-she starts popping some of her specially built devices out of her matter manipulator, adhering them along the edges of the heavily reinforced door. They're not traditional explosives either but very directed ones: the devices emit very, very hot, very directed flames inward, like tiny weilding torches that burn brightly for a few superheated seconds, then fade out as the device desintegrates into ash. The result is that, when placed at the edges of the door, the flames eat it away and leave it structurally unsound enough to simply pull it down.

    Ideally, at least, that is what /should/ happen. It's a lot less noisy than Kyra's usual big, flashy explosives. Her device designs are getting gradually more sophisticated and specialized.
Starbound Flotilla     Xiao Li Yu won't have any issue reaching the core. Seft is still here, and it looks like the lower deck breach has been cut off partially. More Spellsword-equipped security arrived to reinforce the Core; a full hijacking has, albeit partially, been prevented! It looks like some of the rest of the forces are caught up in something else... "Urgent. Xiao Li, you have superior tactical sense. Do you need me to remain here, or shall I head to the area of other breaches? What should our next move be?"
Septette Arcubielle      The scent of burned flesh reaches Septette more quickly, if anything, than it would reach a human. She allows a look of concern- genuine, but deliberate nonetheless- to cross her face, only to return the smirk when she realizes that Sanary is recovering quickly. "Those are puppets- tools- not combatants in their own right. But if you insist..." With a wave of her hand, the yggdroid dismisses her toys to the far corners of the landing pad. Each of them darts around and cuts off an exit, preventing the guards from leaving- the blue one freezes a door shut with supernaturally-hard ice, the red one slags a hatch's inner workings, and the yellow drone appears to spot-weld one of the doors closed.

     "They're safer remaining up here with us than belowdecks," she adds with a little smile. "Besides, I like having an audience." With a flourish, she extends those red-hot blades from her arms again, and lunges towards Sanary with a series of advancing swings. Several of them are aimed wide, only intended to bait her into dodging reflexively or flinching away, but a majority seem to be targeted at her limbs now that she's been robbed of her shield!
Starbound Flotilla     These are HEAVY POWERED SPEARS, which a very normal person would need power armor to use effectively. Lucky break for Sakura: Ninjas get to use a bunch of shit that's way too cumbersome for a rational person. So it works just fine for her. It's on a limited charge, but if she brought a PSIONIC CONTROL UNIT, she can charge it with her own chakra! At the very least, she has enough force to smash one of the combatants into a nearby wall brutally. The remaining trio rush with a more defensive, coordinated series of strikes; they seem to be just trying to keep her attention, because the main threat comes from somewhere else! Very abruptly, there's a flash of motion, and the ninja meets her natural enemy: A samurai.

    "Fourth Sea Hylotl Style: Crashing Typhoon." Those words are the only warning Sakura gets, before Moonfin's form TELEPORTS in -- he must have been hiding around a nearby corner -- and starts swiping at her with controlled, heavy strokes. He's not actually more combat-effective than she is, but he does at least have the element of surprise and a weakened target... Unless Haruno does something strange to even the odds.
Xiao Li Yu      "We have one being stalled by security, another two are on the move... Annoying." Xiao Li Yu muttered as she made her way into the core. "Sanary, keep it up out there. We don't need a forth elite level threat breaching the ship." Seriously. Two was managable. Three was pushing it. Four was NOPE.

     It all would depend on how long those guards could keep Willow occupied. Seft's inquiry is considered at that moment. "Stay here, Seft. Keep up the domain. It's what's keeping them from moving too fast. I'll handle these irritating rats directly. As I'm sure your collegues will too." She answered decisively, stepping out into the main engineering area before hopping upwards and powering on her AANS to take flight.

     "Now where are they?" Her gauntlets flared to life with flame, having remembered how lightning went last time...
Lyria Mason Lyria Mason isn't about to stop moving she's operating on the idea they are likely dectected, so she knows they don't have much time here. So away they go, she'll move to cover her friend and leader. She will cover Kyra while she makes the breach the moment it's done she'll move to follow her but for now she's staying on over watch, and notes this bomb is a lot less flashy and explpsove than Kyra's normal bombs. She's very darn serious from the looks of things.
Starbound Flotilla     "Shit." George declares, as Kyra and Lyria breach the room tactically. Wait, why is George here? The man in the armored-up EVA hardsuit was inside the server room, it looks like! "Shit shit shit. Uh, hey! This stall's occupied!" It does seem that George is here... And it looks like he was pulling data from the servers! No doubt trying to get it hidden or away from Rabbit and Serpent on their way over here, just in case. Unfortunately, the man is isolated and cornered, and the cramped room full of server racks doesn't give him any cover he can hide behind. The heavy external storage device he has is kept under one arm; the opposite hand draws a pistol and starts firing through the busted blast door to keep Kyra and Lyria suppressed, though Lyria may be able to actually shoot him off his feet before he does. If they can STUN him quick enough, they can snag the data storage and steal whatever information was critical enough that George wiped it off their own servers but needed a backup copy!
Starbound Flotilla     Xiao Li Yu heads to engineering regardless of drawing aggro, it seems, but at the very least, she can't interfere remotely with the breaching! The gunfire can draw her attention, and it means she won't have much trouble identifying the server area. If Lyria hasn't fired at George, she might get the chance to slow down Xiao Li... But it's one or the other! Xiao Li has a quick run in some somewhat cramped conditions between her and the source of that gunfire!
Kyra Hyral     Kyra pulls the weakened door down with one hand, revealing George within, already on the servers-backing up data and wiping what's on there, Kyra assumes, based on what she knows and has learned about computers these past few months. She doesn't waist any time in aggressively breaching the room herself, taking a few potshots at George with her already-primed blaster pistol, sharp blasts of red light emitted from the weapon at the EVA-wearing human.

    "Clever. Wiping the data are we?" Rabbit speaks, the synthesized voice from the Silence-to-Speech device embedded at her collar betraying no gender. At the return fire, Rabbit slides sideways into the room, away from the doorway, and away from Lyria, forcing George to choose between targets. Hopefully she'll be the one to draw fire, given that she can be recognized from the video that was posted a week ago.
Sanary Rondel      Green light surrounds that burnt section of Sanary's chest as she clutches a hand to it, although the gesture is largely unneeded. It makes her feel better, though, but she does lower her hand as she focuses on keeping her hands free for the continuation of her duel with Septette. "Puppets, tools, whatever. But they're not involved in our fight, either." She jerks a thumb back at where the guards had gone, glancing back for a moment to make sure she's even gesturing in the right direction.

     "Belowdecks, huh...? So you're planning on doing something down there, then?" Sanary speaks a little too loudly, almost as if she's transmitting that via her radio... Which she is! So subtle. "Got it." Very subtle.

     And then the fight continues! The gunaxe lights up with electricity again as the healer focuses her magic into it once more, backing away from Septette's wider slashes as expected. How's Sanary supposed to even land a hit like this?

     By taking one very carefully. Focusing some of that healing energy into her free right arm pre-emptively, she steps into one of those slashes and howls in pain again as that arm is cut open, the cauterizing effect from the Yggdroid's blade and the healing magic combining to keep too much blood from actually being spilled. It's a calculated move, however, as Sanary uses that to try and take one massive swing in return, trying to use that moment to trade blows with her!
Sakura Haruno     Sakura did not, in fact, bring such a unit! She's stuck just wielding it with brute strength. Which, thankfully, she has in spades times a hundred. It's enough to get through the first one of the power armored quartet, at least, and she's well on her way to working out how to beat another when someone goes and teleports themselves in.

    It's hardly her first time fighting samurai, of course. She'll manage to mostly avoid the first few blows, but between being outnumbered and the unfamiliar terrain, she'll start to give ground, getting backed up towards a wall.

    Her something strange will come at this point, but she's hopeful that it's nothing that would point straight for her. She'll continue backing up, now quite quickly, vertically along the wall, climbing it and then accelerating forward and down, driving at Moonfin with a strike that leaves herself completely open to a counterstroke in exchange for trying to deliver a good solid blow. She's betting on being able to heal what he does, but it's going to probably hurt like hell.
Lyria Mason Lyria Mason is now just bringing up her pistol as Kyra makes her move, she's not going to say anything. She also is firing only a few controlled shots as she'll take severl controlled shots at George without a single word to him, but she's clearly glaring at him even with the black faceplate. She also shifts trying to make a guess at how George might counterattack.
Septette Arcubielle      "Not 'planning to'," Septette replies swiftly, shooting her opponent a grin. "Already have. Thanks for staying up here to keep little old me comfortable, though!" None of the projections she'd made for Sanary placed a high likelyhood on the cleric deliberately taking an attack- sure, she'd been reckless the one time Sept had seen her fight, but then she had excellent reason to be enraged. So it comes as a surprise, again, when Sanary just walks into a slash not even intended to hit her!

     Septette reacts almost instantaneously, beginning to bring up her other blade to parry the incoming strike- but it's simply not quick enough to deflect the attack. Having discarded the stolen shield, she's left with no defense against the blow but her own natural resilience, and even that has its limits. The axe comes down on her head, cracking some of the weaker plating and shearing off one metal ear as it slides down her temple before finally lodging in her collarbone.

     One of Septette's eyes cracks and goes dark immediately from the impact, but more striking is the effect that the electrical discharge has on her: her whole body locks up and her remaining eye flickers before going out as well. Her face freezes in a neutral expression, and if not for her talons being dug into the landing pad, she'd likely collapse.

     But for all that she looks to be deactivated, Septette's consciousness quietly knits itself back together, rebooting and adjusting to the shock. There's no external sign that she's moments from springing back to life, but she certainly won't be happy when she does...
Xiao Li Yu      At that moment, Xiao Li Yu lands right in front of the doorway and behind Lyria, ending in a crouch with a fist pressed against the ground. "Hello, fools. We meet again." She stood and stepped forward in one smooth motion, aiming to send a flaming fist straight into Lyria's back. Or her gut if she turned around.

     "How utterly SURPRISING!" The impact, if made, was an attempt to send Lyria flying straight ahead. Xiao didn't hold anything back this time.
Starbound Flotilla     Kyra gets it in one. George focuses his exchange of bullets on Rabbit, not focusing on Serpent. So while he can almost dodge around Kyra's shots, Serpent lands a solid strike on his torso, taking him off his feet in the middle of a volley fired at Rabbit. "Ahhhh! Fuck! One vee one me, this is shit!" He calls out as he crashes onto the ground. "Hell, can't a guy just do a clever information thing? Jesus you guys and your terrorisms, you know this is /really/ frustrating, right?" George seems to be his same old lovable idiot self, trying to clutch the data to his chest, but it won't be too hard to wrestle away from him! Kyra miiiight have the time to steal one or two of those server racks with her Matter Manipulator too... But that would give away that she has one to begin with.
Sanary Rondel      Sanary's jaw is practically locked in place as the pain continues to lance through the massive gash in her arm, blood still dripping down the parts that somehow haven't been cauterized already. Even with her healing magic, it's not going to heal over properly without real medical care, and she probably won't want to yet with that blade still in there. She shakes lightly as she draws the axe out of the Yggdroid, readying herself to trade blows again when...

     "... Sept?" Sanary watches her with mixed relief and concern, only relaxing when the other eye goes out completely. Her own eye is flickering a bit as well as the healer's forced to divert most of her energy into keeping that arm stabilized, although she does glance over at those guards and drones after a few moments.

     "Get... Get those doors open. I'll keep an eye on her." She manages a very slight smirk at that. Did she really just crack a sight pun there? Either way, she's not in any condition to even move yet, anyway, so might as well keep watch over the Yggdroid while her arm's still crispy.
Septette Arcubielle      As the guards struggle with the doors, a hellishly raspy and staticky noise comes from somewhere nearby. A vaguely feminine but distorted voice whispers, "Keep them here or I break their spines, one by one." Septette's eyes remain dark like empty pits, completing her eerily skeletal look nicely, but she seems to rise from the dead with a crunching, snapping sound. The locked servomotors and frozen hydraulics in her body simply tear and rupture as she strains against them with entirely unnatural strength, forcing her shell into moving again with a surge of animating magical power.

     All of this takes place in the span of a couple of seconds- it takes Septette very little time to go from 'barely animate' back to 'engine of destruction'. If Sanary is still relatively helpless, Septette will hold a blade near the healer's throat in a gesture that requests surrender; otherwise, she'll launch straight into a distressingly quick kick aimed at her opponent's head.
Kyra Hyral     Kyra needs to stifle a laugh. Even while being attacked by an information-stealing TERRORIST, George is still his lovable self. She almost feels bad about having to go up against him like this. Almost. It's not like she's planning on killing him and, honestly, it was just business. George of all people would understand if he knew her identity.

    "No." The electronic voice of Rabbit croaks out before she pounces on him. Although he's bigger, the suit she wears is at least quite dense and heavy-as Xiao would know from the previous headbutt. She's quick to snatch at that hard drive that George was using to pillage the data, knowing full well she has only a small window to snag it, lest George recover. Kyra KNOWS he's pretty skilled in hand to hand combat where she was still learning and trying to overcome the weak physical strength white mages were typically endowed with. Her eyes glance to those servers-they're big, but they could go into a matter manipulator.

    However, George was RIGHT HERE. He'd /immediately/ recognize the Matter Manipulator which would narrow down the pool of people Rabbit could be significantly. That in mind, once she pries away from George, she turns her hand over in a quick gesture that makes it look more like slight of hand is producing the resulting device and /not/ the Matter Manipulator. It's something she's made herself practice since, again, a matter manipulator is a very unique piece of technology.

    A warning is given to Serpent before she drops the device on the floor, which immediately explodes into a blindingly bright flash of light. Those unfortunate enough to be looking at it may find their vision seared away for a few crucial moments. Moments that could either be used to escape-or swipe a whole server while nobody can see it going into a matter manipulator.
Lyria Mason Lyria Mason knew something might go bad but this was not somehing she was expecting the sudden attack, but thankfully with Kyra's warning? She's able to move somewhat and not get cuaght directly she is hit however it's not enough to send her flying but it's clear she got her. She looks up to Xiao and there's nothing said, a weapon is pulled and she opens fire hoping to keep this one off Kyra's back there's not much more she can do and she's trying to evade, XIao now.
Starbound Flotilla     "Second Sea Hylotl sty--" Moonfin starts, trying to come up with a fancy name for it before he blocks. He does not do it in time; the downward strike, with all its ninja force, strikes the flat of his blade as he interposes itself between himself and Haruno. The shockwave actually knocks the other security back! It also SNAPS his katana in half, and tears up his muscles with the strain of the block. The most he can do is try to sink his shattered half-katana into Haruno's gut and do a quick martial-artist-ish style throw to try to get some distance from her. This might be a good chance for Haruno to disengage, if Kyra's planning to evac. Moonfin, himself, sure looks kind of roughed up and exhausteds by the impact; he might not be able to pursue effectively.
Sanary Rondel      Hearing Septette's voice again draws a confused noise from the healer, and Sanary's caught completely off-guard by the time Septette's blade is at her neck. A frustrated grimace crosses her face between that and the threat to the guards' safety, and she eventually sighs before lowering the gunaxe. She's not dropping it, but she's not in any position to start swinging it again. Not with her arm in that condition!

     "... You're lucky it's me and not someone else, you know that?" Sanary grumbles quietly before turning her head a bit to shout at the guards, still keeping her eye on the Yggdroid's blade. "Take a break, guys. We'll... Eh. I'll talk to the boss later." And then her eye's back on Septette!

     "So... What? We're just gonna stand here for the next hour or something? Or do you feel like talking now?" Even in her precarious situation, Sanary's still sounding rather defiant as she keeps some magical energy gathered near her eye, the pupil glinting briefly as she keeps her Fire matrix ready to... Fire. "Because you know you're not gonna be moving from here either, right?"
Xiao Li Yu      Xiao didn't wait. She immediately pressed the advantage and dove right in. "Form Change: Dual Blades." The metal of her gauntlets fragmented off of her arms, and gathered into both hands as medium lenth black swords. And she launched into a flurry of slashes, deflecting some rounds, parrying others, defending against others. Some rounds struck her sides and grazed past her arms, but she kept it going.

     "Firaga!" One blade burst into flame. "Holy!" The other followed, flaring up with an aura of shimmering white light. "Phantom Weapon!" From all around the Spell Fencer, swords of light and sowrds of flame formed, quickly revolving around her in a razor sharp ring of searing light and burning flame.

     Once the last round was cleared, Xiao closed the distance, gripping one blade in reverse. "Grand Stream!" While soaring right towards Lyria, she started to spin, becoming a blur of red, orange, and white, A storm of fire and ghostly weapons, all whirling around and aiming to strike at her fellow student with all the fury she could muster.

     Someone was.....very.....very angry about last time. Weren't they?

     Yes. Yes they were.

     ...Her MP was going to be crying after this.
Septette Arcubielle      "I am perfectly capable of maintaining a standoff until you pass out from sleep deprivation in a couple of days," Septette replies cheerily, her voice returning to something approaching normal. It's a good thing that her arm doesn't waver even slightly, because the cooled blade is distressingly close to Sanary's neck! "Fortunately, that won't be necessary. I only ever needed to stall for time and force the Zaibatsu to divert resources."

     She pauses for a moment, seeming to consider something. "I can give you something to dull the pain, but if you attempt to heal yourself back into fighting condition before I leave, then I will have to respond with force. I'm sorry, but this is how things are." With a gesture, she beckons the three drones over, which then adopt a strict formation around Sanary, implying that they'll blast her if she tries anything. "Correction. It appears I am needed. Make no mistake; I still have my eyes on you."

     At that, she drops the blade from Sanary's neck and turns around. Assuming the healer doesn't attempt to stop her, the yggdroid will slam a fist into the weakened deck, creating a hole large enough for her to jump through while still leaving the rest of the floor intact. She'll create a spiky bed of icicles directly below the hole after landing, threatening any pursuers with impalement, before dashing off in the direction of the other conflict!
Starbound Flotilla     "Mom always said I was gonna go blind if I kept messing around with terrorism and getting shot at every week." George rambles as he sees the flashbang coming out. Then, uh, well, whatever he's saying, it's probably not entirely clear. All that is clear is that Kyra is gonna deal with a little straining, but she can grab up that data. George's blind writhing makes it clear that he can't see what she's doing to snatch up those servers, but he is familiar with flashbangs... Which means he knows a few things to do. He lashes out with one foot, trying to strike at the side of Kyra's knee with intent to break or at least wound her leg BADLY. Despite his joking, he is STILL a vicious fighter. She's got a few seconds before he becomes FAR more dangerous!
Sanary Rondel      "... Right. Gynoid." Another sigh. Sanary'll overcome the limits of her dumb squishy body one day! "I'll have to pass on the painkillers. No offense, but I don't know where yours are from, so." It's a valid concern, at least, considering the attack that she can only assume Septette's a part of. Her gaze flits from drone to drone as they approach, then back at Septette while weighing her options.

     Well, it's not like she could be in that much more pain, right? With that energy already gathered up in her magitech eye, Sanary fires off an explosive heat beam with the Fire matrix contained inside at Septette as strikes the ground. She's not crazy enough to just stand there with the drones around, though, and she ducks down quickly afterwards to swing her gunaxe in a wide arc to try and just bat the things out of the air. It's unlikely she'll even hit any of them in her haste to get down, but...

     Points for trying!
Sakura Haruno     Sakura will take the hit of the blade in return for breaking it, the weapon sinking into her stomach. That's the sort of thing that might be eventually lethal for many; Sakura's not about to just shrug it off, but she's also not going to go down from it. She is, however, going to call her part of the mission a success, and call out to nobody. "Okay! The bombs are planted, let's go!"

    There weren't any bombs that she knew of, but she's going to make a break for the hole in the ship she'd left earlier, planning on leaving a lot quicker than she'd come. That ability to soften a landing is about to come in handy, as she's planning on parachuting on out of this candy stand. Minus one parachute.
Kyra Hyral     Again Kyra fights the urge to giggle at George as she moves to the servers, scooping up one with her Matter Manipulator before she's promptly distracted by other things-other things such as Xiao unloading ALL OF THE MAGIC on Lyria. This was /bad/. That was a terrible onslaught of a lot of high-level magic and she actually had a few doubts as to whether or not Lyria could tank all of that.

    Though more importantly, George has decided to flail like a wild monkey in very precise strikes, one that suddenly snaps into her leg and makes her collapse over for a second, pain shooting up through it despite the ample armoring supplied by the suit that Kyra has come to disguise herself with as 'Rabbit'. "We need to /go/!" she calls out to Serpent, squirming around as she draws another device from her matter manipulator.

    This one seems to be a green, gooey bag, which she throws at George.

    The item, turns out, is a common little toy found on another world entirely called a tanglefoot bag. It explodes into a green, goopy mess that ensnares whatever it touches. Following this, Kyra turns and limps away with her prizes.
Lyria Mason Lyria Mason has a very angry Xiao, oh she can tell Xiao is furious but that only makes things worse. She sees Xiao coming in and that's where she draws her own blade it's a generic looking thing too. She moves trying to prary some of the worst of the attacks, but she's no fencer or knight, still she does a good enough job of not being turned uttly to ashes but from the looks of thing her suit's melted and likely clinging to her actual dkin in a veyr painful way. Lyria on the other hand attempts to snap off a few shots. Lyria is crispy now but thankfully not double extra crispy.

With Kyra running it's time for the horribly mauled Lyria to follow up and get the hell out of here as she also too turns to flee, but not before chucking a flash bang at Xiao.
Septette Arcubielle      In her slowed subjective perception of time, Septette has a good chance to ponder where she went wrong with Sanary. This is clearly someone who does not like to lose, regardless of the pain she has to go through or her personal investment in the battle. The red drone swiftly projects an elemental reflective field to turn some of the fiery beam back on Sanary, but the rest of it strikes her in the back, turning her cloak to ashes and snapping something in the robot's 'spine'.

     As for the drones themselves, the overworked red one doesn't have enough power left to dart out of the way; it explodes in a spray of shrapnel when Sanary hits it. The blue drone quickly freezes the deck under Sanary's feet, trying to rob her of her footing, and the yellow charges itself with electricity and tries to ram into her!

     Septette herself turns around with surprising alacrity, her face frozen in an unreadable mask. "Alright," she says, her tone dripping with something between contempt and exasperation. "You had your chance." This time, she's not aiming to cripple- a merciless series of strikes rain down on Sanary, any one of which could mangle or knock out an ordinary human. Whatever sportsmanship or good cheer there once was in her fighting style is utterly gone.
Sanary Rondel      Sanary doesn't have much time to process that some of that explosive blast is sent back her way as everything seems to happen at once: She's quite literally falling on her ass with that floor getting iced over so quickly, she's getting electrocuted by the yellow drones as it catches her in the gut, and just to make matters worse?

     Septette's right there. "Ggh... Tell your partners they-" Spotting the first of those many strikes, the cleric's only able to get her arm up once before getting the everloving crap beaten out of her, left a twitching heap on the ground. Even if her healing can handle the external injuries, there's no way she's going to be conscious for anything that comes afterwards.

     "They... Suck." At least she can pass out knowing she kept the others from having to deal with four infiltrators at once for a little longer.
Xiao Li Yu      Lyria barely survived that. Tch. Better work harder next time. Despite that, the girl spun around, skidding to a stop. "Not so fast! I'm not done with you yet! Form Change: Gauntlets!" Her dual blades broke into fragments, covering her arms in black metal again, and she dove right at the retreating duo, preparing to unleash another stri-

     FLASHBANG.

     "ARGH-! Seriously?" Xiao groaned, skidding to another stop and covering her eyes. "I swear to Phoenix, this isn't over yet!" Not until she gets for you that shameful dumping into the middle of nowhere, Rabbit!

     Damn you, Ground Zero!
Septette Arcubielle      Propping herself up on one scythe, Septette briefly surveys her handiwork. It doesn't take her long to conclude that Sanary's going to be fine, and she wastes no time limping to the end of the deck. She gives one last look to the guards, and nods to them. "Thanks for not being idiots about this. I appreciate not having to gut you." With that, she steps off the edge of the airship.

     Septette never hits the ground. Reaching into her pack, she pulls out a small golden string and snaps it taut. With that, she starts to dematerialize, before teleporting out less than a moment before she would have smashed into the city streets. The single-use, one-way Warp Wire deposits her in a predetermined location in Etria, where she can lick her wounds and coordinate further with Ground Zero.
Starbound Flotilla     George is immobilized! With rapid headshaking, he does a lot of clearing his eyes, and tries to pull his gun again despite the awful gunk! He tries to fire another bunch of rounds, but then! "Augh! Auuugh! Fuck's sakes! What is it with you guys and flashbangs?!" He shouts. Looks like George won't be pursuing.

    Moonfin is struggling to get after Sakura, but as it turns out, her ruse actually works perfectly! It looks like Moonfin's breaking off and ordering folks to start scouring the ship for bombs. That'll let her out. Seft, for her part, can keep the cameras on people, and keep critical matters armored up -- especially with the bomb threats -- but most of her Domain features aren't related to interfering with an escape. Those in the lower decks should have a straight shot for an exit... Though no way to get to the core now.
Kyra Hyral     Rapidly, Kyra limps out of the server room, reaching to drag Lyra with her with one hand. She doesn't look back as Georgie and Xiao swear against their organization (even if she does feel a little thrill to hear them say that!). Unfortunately for Lyra, she cannot offer anything to help heal her right now so she'd just have to deal with her wounds, like Kyra was dealing with hers, until they both made it to a safe space to medicate. Until then, she hobbles through the halls, cringing with pain every time she brought her injured leg down. Her destination is the same maintenance shaft they snuck in through-but if that didn't work, Kyra had a few ideas involving blowing another hole in the side of the ship and leaping out.

    She has no qualms leaping out either. A glider-like parachute will deploy to give Kyra a safe landing if she needs to do that-an innovation she recommended to all those going on this mission for the purpose of evaucating one of the ships.
Lyria Mason Lyria Mason is dragged lalong by Kyra, she's badly off given the armor she was wearing has melted and likelyu fused with her flehs in places, this is going to be pretty ugly b ut for now she's being dragged awya hopefuly to safety.
Starbound Flotilla     Kyra won't need to go too long. That same hatch remains open -- mostly to make sure she doesn't hijack the ship, most of the security is either trapped on the landing pad or bottlenecking to keep the Core safe. There's that remaining trio, but most of them seem so focused on looking for the bombs that Haruno tricked them with the claim of, they'll be relatively easy to dodge around and evade with a bit of effort. The biggest risk is that George eventually gets loose, and comes after Rabbit and Serpent, firing his weapon, but only after a while; it'll be some time, just a semi-urgent time-limit, but the group ought to be able to make their escape by then, and go to ground. After that, it's just a matter of evading the utterly mundane authorities that swarmed in around the area, likely an easy matter for an experienced rebel.
Starbound Flotilla     As for what Kyra will find on later analysis... One part of the MPC design process! She has found detailing for CASE CONSTRUCTION! It looks like that was what was on this airship due to the current materials engineering efforts. While the innards within aren't known yet, at the very least one section of the design is known! Alongside that, from George's external storage, the servers contained most nof the very basic engineering principles of the Domain Core; perhaps it might be enough for Kyra to do some work with her own large MPC, if she had someone tech-minded to fill in the blanks.