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MPC 49A "World of Steel Titans"
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Post by Alicia Westfield on May 4, 2019 0:58:21 GMT
The scene was a grizzly one for sure. The three Ligers surrounding the mangled form of the Ritter didn’t do anything to hide how the machine was lying on its side. An arm had been sheered off, it’s head section had been punctured, ruining an eye and several other critical sensors. And as a likely statement, the three had taken the time to shatter both of the Ritter’s massive blades. The most heart stopping wound, though, had to be the sheering that indicated the Geno-type’s chest, where it’s cockpit sat, had been run through completely. It was a terrible sight that promised a grim fate for its pilot.
“Well well well, look who’s returned.” The Murasame’s speakers chimed with the same voice as the Mugen’s pilot earlier. ”The little sparky Spiner that bailed out earlier. Come to collect your friend?”
The Mugen Liger lumbered over and reached down, biting the Ritter’s neck and the lifting the limp machine up. With a bit of wind up, the silver Liger threw the battered saurian over, letting it crash down at the Dark Spiner’s feet.
“Well there’s your Queen of Blades. What’s left of her at least. It’s such a pity though. You might’ve been able to see the rest of us coming for her. You know how intense fights can get. Everything else falls by the way side if you’re not expecting anyone else to be there. You could’ve saved her.” The three Ligers growled out softly, their respective blades flicking out into position to strike as a threat display.
“Now all we have to do is run wild through the Empire’s ranks, break their formations, and ultimately drive them back where they belong. Your trump card’s been beaten, and we’re still kicking. Whatever are you going to do now?”
“Don’t you dare talk about her like she’s gone!” Kisara shouted as the Buster Eagle screamed overheard. The avian’s cannons barked with a set of shells flying, only for the Murasame Liger to deftly cut both of them out of the sky with one slice of its sword. The ice maiden growled in frustration and anger, banking the Eagle around. The turn pulled a distressingly high number of Gs from the speed Kisara was flying at, but she wasn’t about to let that stop her. Another salvo of shells went flying, and this time it was the Mugen Liger that swatted down the shells. One last attempt at shooting produced an irritating “ka-chunk” that signaled the cannons were out of ammo. Kisara’s frustrated scream followed shortly after and she pulled out of her attack run, circling overhead ineffectively.
“Well... that was a little bit of excitement.” The Hayate’s Pilot quipped blandly, rolling the red Zoid’s shoulders in a shrug. It was insulting how they brushed off Kisara’s rage at their treatment of Alicia’s machine. But something was odd. The two pilots that spoke had not just similar voices, but the exact same voice. And it got Kisara to thinking. Such a thing couldn’t be possible, but so was their situation.
“Hiroyo... you said the other two appeared all of a sudden, and that they were identical?” Kisara asked over the comms. ”I think I know why. Somehow... all three of these Ligers are identical. Down to the very last nut and bolt. Our enemy ace jumped Alicia with dimensional doppelgängers. And if that’s the case, she might be responsible for the freaky situation Alicia, Sol, and I woke up in today.”
And wasn’t that just a comforting thought.
“Well, Spiner, you want to take a crack at us?” The Mugen’s Pilot asked jokingly, at least confirming that they all had the same voice. “Or are you gonna turn tail again? Just be aware, we’re gonna run you down if you can’t make it home fast enough.”
“... what’s it take for a girl to get a damn nap around here...?”
Everyone froze and locked eyes on the Ritter, from which the aggrieved question came from. The core signature for the Geno suddenly came back to life and with a tired, pained groan the bruised, beaten, but alive Zoid dragged itself back to its feet. It’s injuries sparked all the while, and it slowly turned to regard the three Ligers that had ganged up on it earlier. Shockingly enough, the Zoid actually issued a challenging snarl, even in its battered state. It was as if the Zoid itself was angry with its humiliation.
“Irritating trick you have there and hardly fair, but then that’s war for you. But now I’m more then a little mad.” Alicia shot, eyes narrowed even though she couldn’t be seen at the moment. The three Ligers took a step back, clearly unnerved by their enemy’s abrupt revival.
“H-How!? We made sure you were going to die from that!” Each Liger was roaring and crouching down, ready to pounce. ”Never mind, what are you going to do with your Zoid that badly damaged? You’re just a corpse that doesn’t realize it’s dead now!”
“Am I...?” Alicia asked of the three before her. Then she audibly cracked her knuckles and neck over the speakers. “I think not. As for what I’m going to do? That’s simple.”
Sol roared at that moment from the top of the canyon, before jumping off and turning into a bolt of energy. He aimed for the Ritter and charged.
“I now invoke... my Strongest Steel.” Alicia’s follow up came with a haunting ring of a dragon’s roar, just as Sol merged with the Ritter. It was something that looked a little odd, the wave of energy looked almost... incomplete? Pulsing, but unable to finish for some reason? And that’s when the cables came out and wrapped around the displaced redhead. Releasing the control yokes, she let herself be pulled through as the back of the cockpit briefly became energy for her to pass.
It was when she reached the core as well that the wave of energy pulsed brighter, fully encompassing the Geno Ritter. And shortly there after it was encased in a shimmering shell, a maelstrom of energy whirling about within. When it emerged, the Ritter would be a whole new beast.
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Post by Hiroyo Oda on Jul 6, 2019 11:30:57 GMT
Choices branch in front of Hiroyo like a tree split down the middle. Her options seem clear as day and yet she hesitates, her hands spasming open-close open-close around the controls of the Dark Spiner.
She knows her duty, knows what Isao would do without hesitation. Really he should be here. She's sitting in decision making seat in a place where she never should have been.
Roger's weak growls echoed weakly through the cockpit and she bit her lower lip. He's defiant even as he struggles to hold on to Morgan's core. Another reason to wait, do nothing. Another reason to not invite death's cocky representatives to spear her through. She's familiar with Roger and Morgan but they're only borrowed.
"Dammit!" She slammed her fist on the console behind her. She glared out of the cocpit at the Liger-types, her hands resolutely wrapping around the controls again. It was suicide but she couldn't just run away and leave Alicia alone.
The other girl wasn't a part of this world but she still did her best. She had still comforted Hiroyo and performed her job excellently. Hiroyo glared at the Ligers in front of her. The information about the Ligers' forms was valuable information but Kisara had that as well, if nothing else she could take that back to camp.
Abruptly Alicia's voice cut through and Hiroyo stared transfixed as the Geno moved again. Her eyes flicked once to her sensor readouts to confirm that the core signature was back online and the she stared transfixed as Alicia invoked the transformation.
Hiroyo had heard of Zoid evolution before but it was something that was suppose to take days and was invoked after a battlefield was cleared of danger. No one really knew much about the phenomena, but maybe that was why the wave of energy seemed somehow different than Hiroyo had expected. It envolped the Geno Ritter fully and Hiroyo grinned fiercely. Alicia wasn't done yet.
"I won't run either! Morgan, Roger, please...! We're not finished yet!" She flipped several switches in the Spiner as its roar echoed through the canyon.
Electricity sparked across the back fins as Hiroyo flipped off the override safeties. What started as a few sparks soon turned into an impressive light show as more and more bolts of electricity jumped between the spines until the back of the Spinosaurus type was haloed in lightning.
The Dark Spiner readjusted its posture and opened its mouth in a threatening hiss, before the the electromagnetic charge in its spines released in a sudden pulse.
In Roger's and the Spiner's weakened states it wouldn't disrupt the Ligers' systems for longer than a few seconds but the Zoid Alicia piloted looked like it could do a lot in that time.
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Post by Alicia Westfield on Sept 8, 2019 18:22:56 GMT
Normally Zoid evolution did take days or even weeks. Normally attempting this right in front of an enemy was tactical suicide. But nothing about this situation was normal, now was it? A foe existing in multiple places at once in clear violation of all rule and common sense. A girl displaced across time and space twice over. Ancient spirits brought back after their passing, both temporally and spatially displaced as well. This canyon, at this very moment, was host to a nexus of impossibilities relating to time and space. Thus, what was one more shattering of the rules in the face of so much disregard for Reality’s laws?
Meanwhile, Alicia could feel her awareness expand as she and Sol connected deeper with the battered Geno Ritter. The Zoid had been in terrible shape from its beating at the paws of the trio of Ligers. Honestly, the fact that the saurian had responded to her at all was testament that, like herself, the Zoid was stubborn to the point of absurdity. But she knew as it was it wouldn’t be able to guarantee victory if repaired, even if it was powered up. That’s why she’d opted to go all out. But even she wasn’t sure where they’d get the energy to reconstitute all the lost material and transform the Zoid.
”Worry not Alicia. I’ll gather the power we need. You need merely direct where it goes.” Ah, the voice of her first advisor was ever a comfort to her once she’d adjusted to his presence. With that said, she’d waited for him to do his work.
From both within and without, the energy Sol spoke of welled up or was drawn in. Alicia took hold of it as fast as Sol could pass it off to her, working quickly. Hiroyo sounded like she was getting ready to confront the trio to buy a little more time, so she had to be quick. Wounds were mended, weapons were restored and honed, armor was repaired and strengthened further. All of the Ritter’s systems were overhauled in a hurry as she connected to each of them in turn. It was an oddly familiar sensation, like when she shed her natural form to take on one from the totems Sol and Kisara provided to her. She could work with this, and a few ideas came to mind as to how she could adjust the Geno’s weapon systems.
It was just as the pulse went off that the cocoon of energy started to fade. The Ligers howled as their systems locked up even as the pilots tried to fight through it. ”No way!” one cries out as the new saurian emerged.
As to be expected there were numerous similarities between the new titan and its prior form. It still had the same stance, the blades were still in their place on its back, and it still had its helmet.
But so too were it’s differences many. It traded its usual armor color in for a deep crimson, not unlike the evolution of Genosaurer to Geno Breaker. The helmet now had several teeth-like spikes on its underside almost like an extra jaw, which was now accompanied by a similar yet mirrored addition underneath the Geno’s head to form a full faced helmet. A pair of gun turrets, one on either side, appeared to be mounted on the saurian’s neck as well. Sizable serrations ran along both sides of its twin blades now, promising sharper cuts that were more jagged and destructive to their targets. The arms were longer and propped forward more, a wicked looking stake on the left arm and a cannon on the right with a tube coming from it and threading up back into the arm it was mounted on. Where the Ritter was almost purely a close combat behemoth, it appeared this new machine not only retained that potential but also found room to incorporate strong long-range options as well. This thing was ready to wage a one-Zoid war.
“You are Ritter no more.” Alicia declares firmly as the machine was fully revealed. “Roar... Geno Kriegsherrer!” And roar the great dinosaur did, snarling. It jets ignited as Alicia charged in as the Ligers were recovering.
“Thank you Hiroyo. I’ve got this from here.” Oddly, even though she was addressing her friend, she wasn’t using the comms. “Just sit back and watch the fireworks. This is my kind of fight now!”
She targeted the Murasame first, one of those massive wicked blades singing through the air towards the blue Liger. The opposing Ace managed to recover in time, though, blocking the sword with her own blade. Even so, the Liger promptly shrieked as the force of the collision cratered the ground underneath it. It’s legs sparked from the impact, and the Liger whined under the pressure.
The Kriegsherrer’s turrets promptly trained on the Murasame, followed by the particle converter on its back revving up power. The next second a hail of small particle blasts rained down on the caught Liger, hammering it with shockingly potent blasts for such small weapons comparatively.
”Hang on!” the Hayate’s pilot cried out as the tempest rushed at the saurian from its right. It’s head glanced over as Alicia sighted the red Liger and shifted, bringing its arm cannon up. The converter hummed louder, before a more concentrated blast was spewed out at the oncoming Zoid. It wasn’t the power of a full CPC by far, but it was still potent enough to sheer armor from the speedster’s shoulder and knock it away with the force of the shot. The Hayate’s pilot yelled as the Zoid landed in a heap and tried to regain its bearings.
As that was happening though, the Mugen had closed in and leaped over, aiming to bring its claymores down on the Kriegsherrer from above. Alicia didn’t even bother giving this one the time of day to look at it, just raising its stake-equipped left arm up. With a rough ‘bang!’ the claw and accompanying stake suddenly shot upward on a long ‘rail’ of sorts, driving the stake’s sharp point into the Mugen’s shoulder joint, completely arresting its movement. With a flick of the extended wrist, the Mugen was also tossed away, slamming into the ground like a sack of bricks.
As a final show, Alicia kicked the Murasame Liger away from her and reset back to neutral. The Kriegsherrer rolled its head and shoulders a bit, almost like a person stretching out after a quick warm up. “Still think I’m just a dying corpse?” Alicia quipped curiously, throwing the trinity Ace’s words back at her.
It was telling that they had no words to respond to that question with, and the three Ligers were now in purely defensive postures. All of a sudden Alicia had them on the ropes when just a few minutes earlier they had possessed a commanding advantage. For a little extra taunt, the Kriegsherrer even held up a claw and waved as if to go ‘ah, ah, ah, not so fast.’
”What... what the hell’s going on here...?” Was that fear in the voice of the speaking Ace? What delicious irony, wasn’t it?
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Post by Hiroyo Oda on Oct 15, 2019 23:37:14 GMT
Wild numbers and graph spikes were dancing on Hiroyo's cockpit screen and she dismissed it all with an angry button press. "Morgan, I know you're under a lot of stress but keep recording the data! We have to get this back to base, even if Kisara has it too!"
The real question was how they would get it back to base. The answering growl from the Dark Spiner wasn't as strong as it should have been and it took a cautious step back as the cocoon faded as the pulse ended and the new zoid stepped out. Hiroyo's breath caught for a moment, her eyes widening at the sight. Spikes broke the outline into something as sharp and jagged as the blades it carried, and the gun turrets on the sides of its neck promised pain even at range. It was very clearly meant to dish out damage at whatever ranges the battlefield had to offer.
It was beautiful.
"Geno Kriegsherrer..." Hiroyo whispered under her breath as the saurian mech began its charge. Her eyes widened a little at Alicia's words because something was strange. Even with the top notch comms systems the Dark Spiner had the other red head's voice had never come in so clearly before, without the faint mechanical undertones. It was like the two were talking in the tent again.
The oddness was driven from her mind as the Murasame came under attack. The Dark Spiner took a few more steps back to give the new Geno room to work and to free up the lines of fire. The three in the Dark Spiner were transfixed on the devastating combination of blade and blasts. Hiroyo's hands gripped the the controls as she watched Alicia savage the Liger.
There was a flash of red to the side and Hiroyo remembered where she was.
"Alicia, to your right!" Had the saurian's pilot needed the call? Probably not but it made Hiroyo feel a little more like she had helped. Still, she could do more.
The Dark Spiner turned and ran, swiftly disappearing around a bend in the canyon. The sounds of Alicia's fight richocheted behind the Empire pilot and she shoved her damaged zoid as quickly as she could, sparks dancing not along along the mech's sail but from the wounded spot as well. This wasn't a retreat though, despite how badly damaged the electronic warfare mech had been hit. It rapidly raced up a steep winding path that led it to a higher level on the canyon wall: high enough to put her over the fight and hopefully make her harder to spot from below.
"C'mon, c'mon...we can do this!" An answering rumble met Hiroyo's reassurances as the Empire zoid raced toward the cliff face above the melee fight before it abruptly skidded to a stop not quite overlooking the fight. Hiroyo's breath caught as she surveyed the scene: The three Ligers on the defensive, Alicia clearly in command of the situation. Very carefully the Dark Spiner turned tail and acted as if it had made to run away again while it instead stood just out of sight on the ridge.
A quick reading of the energy sensor displays made the red head hum thoughtfully. The three Ligers were very similiar, what happened if they were nudged out of alignment? A little ding from the Dark Spiner registered a core lock.
"Alright, this is what we do." Hiroyo took a deep breath and brought up the controls for her electronic warfare package. A pleased chittering sound echoed in her cockpit and she smiled. "How about it Roger? Morgan? While Alicia's thrashing them physically, let's see what chaos we can cause."
The pilot flexed her fingers and began to work, reconfiguring and recalibrating the offensive systems while her Zoid and Organoid focused all of their efforts solely on the Mugen. The Spiner's fins shifted into alignment as she threw the normal electronic nuisances at the Mugen: ghost images on the pilot's overlay of Alicia's Geno Saurer phasing out of the Kriegsherrer, of the Dark Spiner attacking at the very edges of the peripheral visions, of other Zoid core signatures approaching from just around the bend of the canyon.
All the while Roger, directed by Hiroyo and Morgan, would work on processing the strange Liger's energy signature, the electricity on the Dark Spiner's fins shifting slowly, carefully, into something with readings similiar but opposing.
Hiroyo knew she couldn't take the Ligers on in a straight fight like Alicia, but she thought she could probably blast them with something nasty enough to disrupt their weird synchronity for at least a moment.
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Post by Alicia Westfield on Oct 16, 2019 17:25:04 GMT
Alicia smiled a bit as Hiroyo still tried to assist as best as she could. Just because she had this fight on lockdown didn’t mean she didn’t appreciate the help. The sooner they were done here the better it would be. Still, unless the Ligers had one last trick up their sleeves this match was as good as finished.
The Mugen started to flinch from the phantom attacks that were never there, drawing the attention of the other two Ligers. Poor girl was clearly rattled badly by the turn around if she was jumping at ghosts. With a grin, the Kriegsherrer engaged once more. She closed on the Mugen Liger and swung, forcing the eternal Zoid into another blade lock while she was distracted.
”Hey, get your head on straight, that Spiner must still be around!” the Murasame’s pilot yelled out. The blue storm and red tempest closed on the Kriegsherrer simultaneously this time but... even they looked shaken up from phantom attacks, even though Hiroyo was only focusing on the Mugen. Not to the same degree of course, but the little flinches could still be noticed.
Alicia growled with a feral glint in her eye, the Geno mimicking in kind as they fired their jets. The Mugen was slammed into the earth and dragged around like a rag doll, the Murasame was swatted by the Geno’s tail, armor visibly cracking and popping off as it flew into a canyon wall, and the Hayate nearly lost its left front leg to the saurian’s head blade. Instead, it managed to escape but only barely... especially as one of its daggers twirled through the air and embedded itself into the ground, having been severed in the twisting motion.
Now Alicia was surrounded on all sides though, but she still seemed unconcerned about the whole thing. She had this fight in the bag, all that was left to it was to execute the final blows on each one. Then the posture of the Liger’s changed. Loosening up like... they were resigned to something? Had they given up?
”... Cut all the limiters. To think she was toying with all of us all this time...”
“We can’t let this monster of a Zoid go, not like this. No matter the cost.”
“Hell of a finale, ain’t it? You showed us everything you got, only right if we do the same.”
What were the three of them going on about? Did they actually have some kind of final card to play?
”Are they absolutely mad!? They have no idea what it is they’re going to unleash!” Sol howled, though only Alicia heard him. She flinched in surprise, but before she could ask anything, the three Liger’s core readings spiked dangerously high. So high that it was far beyond simple ‘red-lining’ of the systems. Such was the height that any normal Zoid would’ve started to self-destruct from spiking that high. But that was the most ‘normal’ part of whatever card they were playing.
All around them the earth, the sky, and everything began to twist and writhe like a creature come to life. A groan flooded the area as reality began to coil upon itself. Time lost meaning, space was bending and snapping. Instrumentation could barely make out anything sensible of the world around the Empire pilot and displaced mercenary anymore, more and more results turning to gibberish as all parameters were warped, twisted, and broken. Core locks faded and were reacquired, almost as if the target was phasing in and out of reality itself. Nothing made sense yet everything was possible. The three Ligers shined with glowing white “after images” imposed over them and trailing a bit behind. Then in an instant they were all together again behind Alicia. It wasn’t quite teleportation, more that they had simply moved and somehow cut out all the intervening steps between where they were and their destination.
Without a word, Alicia turned to face them again, grimly set in her intention to finish what was started. As well, despite herself, she felt some hope at seeing this trump card. If she could triumph over what they had, maybe she could get home and put the person who was supposed to be here back where she belonged. Nothing undone yet everything set right. It’d require victory and claiming the core for herself though, to engineer this on a controlled level, but semantics.
It looked like another three on one showdown, this time with the very ground beneath them betraying them and aiding the Ligers. Until each feline shimmered and... walked into each other? As if they were ghosts to each other now, the three Ligers seemed to merge together. All the blades of each of their forms were bared and ready. Even the severed dagger had been restored through the shattering of Causality. Their armor cycled between the primary colors of each of the Ligers in sequence, and the unified monster roared at the Kriegsherrer.
”Sorry to say, we don’t have a fancy new name for this. No point in naming something we never planned on using.”
“Not like any recording of this form is going to remain, anyways, what with the Zoidcore Overload System given free reign on screwing with the natural laws.”
“Heaven and Hell, Order and Chaos, Life and Death, nothing means anything any more in this Void. Ready to stare into the Abyss with us?”
Alicia smirked. “I’ve already long stared into the Abyss. This is nothing new for me. So come. As long as your Ethereal Liger will last, let’s clash blades one more time. Live or Die by the Sword.”
”Ethereal Liger, huh? I kinda like it...” came a soft, musing whisper. With the Spiner’s lock now shaky and unreliable at best, the Geno and Liger we’re back to a singular, chaotic duel. Still, the Liger’s reading, when available, would show an extremely delicate and vital balance. A clever pilot like Hiroyo just might be able to find a moment to fire that disruptive pulse even through all the interference.
That being said, the duel was on. Geno and Liger charged to meet one another. Claymores clashed with each other. Katana met head blade. Daggers were caught in claws. The two Zoids struggled with absurd power against each other as machinery groaned and sparked. The Liger managed to muscle the Geno over to the side, only to have its opening closed by a return shove that made it skid backward, tearing earth up as it did. A claymore slipped free and the Liger struck. The Kriegsherrer managed to shoulder check the handle of the sword though, erasing all the energy and cutting potential the strike had.
The Geno’s own blade strike, however, was repelled by the absurdly thick armor of the Liger with barely a scratch. “What the hell, it’s even more sturdy then before!?”
”More then enough to combat your Geno Kriegsherrer even now.” came the retort. Alicia answered back by opening fire and pelting the Liger’s head, which did seem to be at least making the opposing ace flinch from the hits. It wasn’t scoring much damage though, not fast enough to claim a decisive strike at least.
All the while the world around them continued to warp and twist. How much longer would this go on?
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Post by Hiroyo Oda on Nov 2, 2019 14:08:36 GMT
The realization hit as Hiroyo watched the other Ligers misstep when she assaulted the one's Zoid. They were all the same person, echoing through time. Of course what she did to one would be echoed among the others. How could they guard against their own reflexes?
It gave Hiroyo hop for her plan to destablize the trio. She watched the circle around Alicia with much less concern than before. The new Geno could handle it, could handle all of them in a fight and Hiroyo could push the fight to end even quicker.
Or maybe she wouldn't need to- she kept the Dark Spiner tracking as the Ligers seemed to slump, seemingly resigned. She chewed on her lower lip as she considered their posture. The enemy's ace pilot didn't seem like the type who would give up so easily so what-
"What, what the hell is this?!" She yelled out as the world itself began to change. Portions of the cliff that weren't there before reappeared and then vanished again. Her systems themselves were flashing wildly and there was a low growl from the Dark Spiner as it fought to maintain its locks. Roger echoed the growl and Hiroyo was soon busy trying to regain the lost core locks while throwing bewildered looks at the internal view of the fight below. The three Ligers hadd stepped into each other? What in the world was happening? She gritted her teeth as her newly established locks were continiously lost and regained, only to lose again. It was a frustatingly impossible situation to work with, the confirmation icon fading colors in and out like a heartbeat.
She scowled as the three began speaking. Her brow furrowed as she considered their words. Dismissing their words as nonsense was her first reflex but she reconsidered immediately. Wasn't she already looking a blatant breakage of the natural law of 'Time'? Considering that impossibility it wasn't strange to think they could do more, even if she had hoped that was the limit.
"Don't name their zoid for them." She groaned in her cockpit, careful not to transmit over the radio. Alicia's voice was still startlingly clear as if her communications system had also evolved along into the next generation. The original ace pilot was notoriously protective about her zoid's secrets, but maybe the current Alicia would let her peek for just a little?
Hiroyo shook her head as blades rang out. Now wasn't the time for drooling over new technology! There was a fight on, several lives on the line, and world itself was disrupted in the energy fields produced by the three-made-one. They moved so smoothly, so fluidily, and Alicia's weapons barely left a scratch.
But Hiroyo didn't despair.
She could hear the thudding of her heart in her ears, could almost feel her pulse in her neck. It went in and out, in and out, just like the land around her disappeared and reappeared.
Just like the locks on the new zoid were lost and regained.
"Like..a...hearbeat." Realization dawned on Hiroyo's face and she burst into flurry of activity. Five stopwatches sprang up on her screens as she moved the Spiner to the very edge of the illusory, disappearing terrain.
"Terrain appears, mark."
The first stopwatch stopped.
"Lock lost, mark."
The second stopwatch stopped.
"Terrain disappears, mark."
The third stopwatch stopped.
"Lock regained, mark."
The fourth stopwatch stopped.
"Terrain reappears, mark."
The fifth stop watch stopped and Hiroyo let out a deep breath as an intrigued noise echoed from the Dark Spiner's core, a short thrill of excitement echoing from the organoid joined there a moment later. Hiroyo began to build her firing solution, timing and numbers beginning to pop up on her screens in yellow as Roger added his imputs.
"Thank you, both of you." She plugged the numbers in and then gripped the controls tightly as the Geno Saurer again matched the energy readings coming off of the Ethereal Liger. Hiroyo held no illusions that the shot would be enough to down the Liger completely but the Dark Spiner didn't need to shine in combat.
Not with the Geno Kriegsherrer ready to pounce.
The blades clashed again and again and Hiroyo watched the new timers that had replaced the old. Watched the countdown as the numbers ticked, her fingers just above the trigger buttons. The timing had to be perfect.
She remembered Isao smiling sadly at her after she had confessed, turning around so she could see his letter of draft in his hands. She remembered swinging from the rope in training, her body slamming against the wooden platform and falling to the ground below as the rope continued to swing higher over her target.
She remembered too the feel of Roger's shell beneath her hand, how comfortable Morgan's seat had always been. As if this was where she was always meant to be. She wasn't alone, and Alicia needed her to do this.
Her eyes hurt from holding them open so long. From keeping so focused on the numbers counting downwards on her screen.
She waited until the number hit zero and pushed down on the triggers, hoping Alicia would be able to end this bizarre fight once and for all.
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Post by Alicia Westfield on Dec 8, 2019 1:12:29 GMT
Alicia couldn’t help but quietly chuckle a bit. She may not have heard Hiroyo chastise her, but she did feel it deep in her heart. It was maybe a bad idea, but it was one she was going to run with anyways. Too late to take things back now anyways. It looked like she might have to pull her last ace in the hole from this new form out though. She just needed to find that key opening though! Without it she’d never be able to finish this. She had to trip the Ethereal Liger up with something, some how.
Unfortunately for her, her best chance at creating such an opening was in a power struggle. That was made a dicey prospect since the Ethereal Liger had just enough strength in its unified form to contest her Kriegsherrer directly. Metal clanged and sparks flew as the two sword machines clashed with one another yet again. Maybe she could buy time for Hiroyo to figure something out? The native redhead was brilliant as far as she was concerned.
Then in an infinitely short moment, the trigger was pulled. Everything came together at once as the pulse found its mark. And the effect was instantaneous, the Ethereal Liger reeled back as if it had been slugged in the face and flailed. Bolts of prismatic energy arced over the machine as it’s delicate balancing act was swept out from underneath it. A trio of identical screams rose from the time duplicated pilot as they lost control of their machine. And as their energy fields went wild, the dimension around them let out it’s own sanity-grating scream. Now even definitely real terrain was beginning to spark and spike and glitch out of existence, and the two Empire pilots had to exercise caution to avoid falling out of reality...
”Hell, whatever she did may have worked as a distraction, but now you have to shut that machine down before this section of reality collapses on us! Annihilate it if you have to, we’ll find another way home! This is why people need to realize they shouldn’t toy with things beyond their understanding...” Sol barked out with frustration and urgency. Alicia grimaced at the sound of that, but this was likely the fastest possible resolution to this clash.
It was a perfect opportunity though, the opposing unit was crippled for the moment, and the Kriegsherrer had been building up stores of charged particles this entire time to keep its arm cannon and turrets warmed up. A full blast would at least do serious damage, if not out right destroy the opponent, right? So Alicia jumped back and locked the foot clamps into place, tail vents snapping open in record time. The tell tale energy gathered on the Geno’s mouth cannon even as it was extended, and the humming generator kicked up to full speed.
“It ends now!” Alicia proclaimed as the Super CPC tore out with shattering force, even driving the Kriegsherrer back a few meters from the recoil even with the foot locks in place. The opposing Liger had recovered only to be able to stare impending doom baring down on it for a second before it was enveloped in the destructive blast. But Alicia didn’t let up, she was pouring on the power as long as the Kriegsherrer could hold it. Making sure this thing was destroyed was top priority.
“AGHGK!?” Pain exploded in the Zoidian’s mind. The all encompassing blast actually left her completely blindsided as a claymore pierced through it and her cannon, stabbing into the Geno’s throat and cutting the stream short. Such a blow was usually fatal against the Geno type and its derivatives, and the Kriegsherrer was not completely immune either. A small chain reaction erupted from the saurian’s damaged maw, blowing out an optic sensor, and down it’s neck, detonating the turrets there, before the Kriegsherrer was able to re-route power to avoid a full catastrophic failure. But the Liger wasn’t unscathed. The katana and daggers it once sported were wiped from existance. It’s entire body was torched black, and segments that weren’t were the tell tale cherry red of metal turning to slag. Those segments were even sagging and dripping visibly with the passing seconds. Grievous injury, certainly, but not yet a finishing strike to prove the sheer tenacity of the rare Liger types and their pilots.
”You’re... falling... first!”, the Liger’s pilot gritted out through pain-labored breaths. There was a hint of desperation in her voice as she jammed the blade deeper, causing sparks to fly from the Geno’s maw. Then Alicia roared back at her counterpart, the saurian’s fangs coming down on the warping blade and shattering it. The pile driver was swung in and blasted; returning the favor of the eye injury, only barely missing the pilot, and driving the Liger back before it could bring another blade to bear on her. With a release of locks, a twist, and a heave the Geno managed to hurl the mangled Liger up into the air, and subsequently activated its jets to jump up after the unit. And all this time that generator was still humming loudly. What else did it have, now that it’s CPC was destroyed...?
A few jets remaining functional on the Liger also fired, orienting the feline properly to strike with it’s one remaining claymore. Then Alicia revealed her last ace. From the serrations on her blades charged particles spilled forth, coating the cutting edge of her weapons in the same power as her most destructive barrage. This was how the Kriegsherrer escaped destruction earlier, the extra power was routed into the still stable blades. This was how Alicia would be able to cut through whatever remaining defense the Ethereal Liger could raise against her. Her foe had only a moment to realize what was coming, evident by a strangled, disbelieving cry of ”Impossible!”
“With this, I sever Fate itself!” The final boast came as the particle-sharpened claymore sheered through the Liger’s final effective weapon. Two more slashes tore the head from the body, and the haunches from the front, leaving the terrifyingly powerful Liger to fall to the ground in three pieces. At last the power was cut to whatever system the Liger was using, and the laws of reality could finally reassert themselves. The world returned to normal at last, as the Geno Kriegsherrer landed behind its felled foe, back turned. With a jerk and a spitting motion, the saurian coughed up the blade it had been forced to eat. Which then faded from existence as the Liger reverted to its base form. That exact form was unrecognizable, though, with all the damage done to it.
Alicia finally turned to find Hiroyo and smiled to herself, holding one of her Zoid’s clawed hands up in an approximation of a fist. The saurian then loosed a roar of victory over its most challenging opponent. It was a dicey battle to say the least, but one well fought and a catastrophe avoided.
“Are-” Alicia had to pause to cough, mentally wincing in pain. “Are you okay up there, Hiroyo...?”
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Post by Hiroyo Oda on Jan 31, 2020 23:16:00 GMT
Battlefields tended to be places of chaos. Hiroyo knew this well be even so nothing she had seen in her (admittedly short) career could have prepared her for what surrounded her.
The ground beneath the remains of one of the Command Wolves from earlier phased out of existance. The Zoid sank into the ethereal dirt and mud at an angle and with horror Hiroyo watched as the ground suddenly phased back into existence.
A whine from distressed metal, a snap, and the unbalanced remains of the Wolf toppled suddenly off balance and twisted as if sheared with a blunt sword. Everything that had been below the ground was gone.
"We need to move, now." Hiroyo said, her voice quiet and then she was winiching, shoving her sweat soaked hands against the sides of her ears as the shrieking, piercing cry of the composite Liger struck a death blow echoed throughout the landscape itself. By the time she pulled her hands away from her ears she had tears gathering at the corners of her eyes.
There was also several new charts on her moniters.
They floated in the blue and yellow of Morgan and Roger working as a team: short and to the point with three columns and two rows. A line extended from each graph to a circle imposed over the landscape and she watched as the previously white background of one chart went to yellow, orange, and red as the ground faded out of existence and then reformed.
She sucked in a deep breath and shook her head to fling the tears away, her hands landing heavily on the controls. A circle popped up on her overlay indicating the area beneath her feet. "Okay! We can't stay here, lets go!"
The Dark Spiner stumbled as the cliff edge in front and beneath it disappeared, a new chart popping up on the screen. With a quick intake of breath Hiroyo shoved everything forward, metaphorically stomping the gas pedal as the Dark Spiner hurtled forward through the sudden gap to the now visible ledge below. The chart flashed orange as the Spiner cleared it, then red as the saurian zoid landed, the cliff phasing into existence above her head.
Ahead of her she could make out the flare of lights, and then shriek of metal through metal as the Liger jammed her blade into the Kriegsherrer's jaws.
"Alicia!" The Dark Spiner roared a warning to the liger but abruptly the Geno was moving again.
Alicia's gambit was revealed and Hiroyo's lips rose in a victorious crin as she joined Roger and Morgan in a wordless victory cry as the Geno Kriegsherrer tore the Liger into pieces.
The glowing slag from the Liger began to fade, as did the details of it's final form and Hiroyo finally let herself lean back in her seat with a loud sigh of relief and close her eyes. Alicia's voice reached her, again with that startling clarity, and Hiroyo opened her eyes and forced herself to sit upright again.
"As long as we don't have to do that again, I'm okay!" The graphs tracking the phasing landscape were gone. The bar tracking Roger's estimated energy levels was empty and she reached out to run her fingers over the console for a moment. A quiet, tired chirp from Roger and a moment later the Dark Spiner and Organoid had seperated, the worm once more taking it's place on the Dark Spiner's back. The saurian sagged immediately after and the Empire pilot turned her attention back to her world-hopping partner, a couple quick taps bringing up the Dark Spiner's scan of the Geno.
"You took a real beating, but you really dished it out in return! I'm getting some weird readings on your armor composition, it looks like things have been...upgraded." She said as reports on the damage of the Liger scrolled over her screen, parts of the Zoid became highlighted in varying warning shades and a smaller screen scrolled through a variety of materials and compounds and technical terms for machinery that Hiroyo couldn't quite keep up with. A warning icon flashed near the chest, a similiar line to the graphs from earlier stretching out to cover where the cockpit should be. Hiroyo felt her breath catch in her lungs at the words that scrolled on her screen. She clicked off her comms and muttered 'run it again' to Morgan who growled uneasily but did as she asked. It wasn't unheard of for pilots to pass away from the strain of a vicious fight, and with all the reality-warping going on now it shouldn't be a surprise that she was getting unusual results.
'That's all it is,' She told herself as she triggered the scan for a third time. She had heard Alicia just now, and while the other pilot, other living, breath person, hadn't sounded good she hadn't sounded dead. Still the words flashed on her screen.
[NO VITAL SIGNATURES DETECTED]
"H-hey Alicia? Can you, you're still alive right? Can you just keep talking?" She asked as she quickly began to move the Dark Spiner back toward the path leading to the canyon floor. "I must have knocked something loose earlier. The Spiner can pick up your vitals, or maybe it was just all that weird warping shit, yeah, that's gotta be it right?"
Her heart thudded in her throat. Her hands were slick on the controls with sweat.
"You're still talking so you're obviously not dead right?"
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Post by Alicia Westfield on Feb 1, 2020 1:17:29 GMT
The displaced red head rolled the Geno’s shoulders and stretched its neck out, sighing in relief at the simulated stress relief from the act. “Yeah... I’m pretty well aware how banged up I am. Was only a step or two away from total system failure followed by the energy backlash rupturing the core. Fortunately with the armor I set up on this thing, I was able to repel the worst of the incoming attacks. I actually got a feel for what the Liger’s armor was so I first duplicated it. Then I tried alloying it with a metal from where I’m from. They went together shockingly well, given the properties of my realm’s metal of choice. So... have fun puzzling that out when we get back? As for the rest, Sol had some very... interesting... blueprints he let me draw from for a fast and dirty overhaul. So I’d be willing to bet this whole machine is a technological goldmine now. You know, once it actually gets to show off it’s one hundred percent condition.”
That revelation, once the panic settled, would likely be quite the bomb drop. The Kriegsherrer had accomplished so much against such a powerful opponent while it was effectively handicapped. The stutter, however, clues Alicia in that Hiroyo was having said panic attack, albeit in a very subdued fashion. With a mental switch, she brought a sensory subsystem online and tuned everything else out. She listened closely to pick out and measure Hiroyo’s heartbeat even from this distance, and it was significantly elevated in her opinion. The Empire pilot’s admirably contained hysteria and the content of her questions erased any doubt that it was from the fight.
“Hiroyo, take a breath. I’m alive. Yes, I currently have no vital signature. I can explain that though. So I again need you to calm down and listen to me. You can’t pick up my signature because I am the Geno Kriegsherrer right now. Just like how Roger was fused with the Dark Spiner. Long story, but it was necessary.” She sighed to herself softly, the Kriegsherrer mimicking her thoughts in action. “And if anyone asks, sword swallowing is not as easy as the stage magicians make it look, heh!”
With any luck, the joke at the end would alleviate some stress. Then Alicia squeaked as the Buster Eagle came in for a landing on her shoulders, stumbling forward a step or two from the unexpected weight.
”ALICIAAAA!” Kisara wailed rather pathetically, practically wrapping the saurian up in her bird’s wings. ”I’m so glad you’re okay! You gave me quite the scare back there you know!? I may have still believed in you but there’s only so much a poor girl’s heart can take!”
“Yes, yes, I hear you Kisara. I’m sorry I scared you but they kind of got the drop on me.” Alicia quipped with a wry smile no one could see, trying to assuage the ice maiden. She didn’t have the heart to buck the Eagle off of her, even though she probably should. Alicia then shook her real head, marching over to the remains of the Liger. “Ah...?”
The cockpit had been blasted open, with drops of blood trailing away from the Zoid’s head. It looked like whoever was running was dragging something heavy with them too. Presumably the enemy ace but what she wanted to retrieve that she risked spending more time in close proximity to enemy combatants Alicia couldn’t fathom. Either way, what she wanted was still there, so she grabbed the chest section of the Liger and picked it up.
“Alright. I dare say that’s mission accomplished, huh Hiroyo? Let’s wrap this up and return to base.” Then a very important question came to mind, something she hadn’t considered immediately. Her normal mental switches for disengaging her Digimon forms were not working, and so she now had a bit of a problem on her hands.
“... Um... Hiroyo? By any chance, beyond all hope, do you have any idea how one might go about ending such a fusion? I’ve never been quite this big before and I’d like to go back to human size before too long...” There was another bomb. She was used to changing sizes and species and everything that entailed. And her only real concern was not being able to change back and forth on demand. “I’m sure I’ll figure something out with Sol’s help if push came to shove, though.”
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Post by Hiroyo Oda on Feb 4, 2020 0:17:38 GMT
Hiroyo was having a bad day.
Well no, she was still alive on what she had at one point thought was a sure-suicide mission so her day should be good.
Keyword: should.
The part before the ace showed up? No big deal! Easy, even, despite her using up all of her ammo before the Liger-piloting Ace showed up.
(Strike two for 'I'm certainly going to die' mindset).
Then Alicia had fought off the Liger, the Liger had split in three, Alicia had evolved her Zoid with a speed Hiroyo had never seen before, the three Ligers had done something funky to the world itself but been beaten anyway and now it was time to head back to the temporary base and report in and Roger was exhausted but she was still alive.
Fine, fine. She could accept that all as just what had happened, it was a stretch to be sure but her relief at being alive could stretch that far. But apparently Alicia had also fused herself into her Zoid and was now in the zoid? Was the zoid?
Whatever the case really was, the point was that Hiroyo was officially past the end of her ability to just Deal With It. She had gone so far past it that as she listened to Alicia talk her jaw was hanging open and her hands wer slack on the controls of the Dark Spiner and she was just, there. She existed.
She did appreciate that Alicia was trying to stop her from panicking or losing it, or, or whatever this weird mood where she didn't know what to do, didn't know how she could ever had hoped to know what to do was but she was pretty sure nothing could help her snap out of it.
"okay." She said finally on the comms line. Then she cleared her throat noisily on the comms line and spoke again at a volume and steadiness that was as firm as a dighy in a whirlpool. "Okay."
She took a breath. She listened to Alicia explain that no, it was totally fine that she didn't have a vital signature because she did! It was her Zoid's core frequency! Everything was fine and dandy and just absolutely screwed up to-
'No.' Hiroyo thought at herself firmly and took another deep breath. While she appreciated the joke what Hiroyo really needed right now was a moment of quiet so she could sweep a lot of things under the big old rug called Denial.
She could have kissed Kisara when the other woman broke into the conversation. Maybe she would kiss Kisara later.
Weirder things had happened today.
A quiet, reassuring rumble from the Dark Spiner helped her take a third deep breath and she patted the console gently. "I'm okay," she said off the commsline. "I can deal with this."
And she could. Mapping out a route home was only mildly difficult due to the collateral damage where cliff had fallen and paths had been destroyed in the fight and subsequent reordering of the world itself but it took her just a little while before she had it up and sent a copy over to Alicia and Kisara. The two possible routes had a couple of places marked in yellow.
"Hey Kisara, can you double check these spots for me please? Make sure they're not collapsed." Whether the other woman agreed or not the Empire pilot took a deep breath and set her mind to Alicia's newly revealed issue. "Okay, so uhm, obviously you're not an Organoid but if you were then you could do it pretty much at will, I think. Or when you're exhausted."
She paused to collect her scattered thoughts as Roger chittered something and Morgan rumbled for a rather prolonged period of time for him. She arced an eyebrow and checked the sensors, completely lost.
Alicia would maybe be able to make actual sense of the mechanical lifeform's words.
"Hah! I bet you liked being a Zoid, huh? Bet you like being soooo much tougher that you got yourself stuck! All you gotta do is stop being a Zoid ya newbie. It might feel like you're one but you're not, so stop pretending to be!"
"A merge is a sharing of strength, but not everything can be shared between the two of you. Find those parts and remember."
One of those might be more helpful then the other. They were both trying to convery the same wisdom but man, was Roger an abrasive worm.
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Post by Alicia Westfield on Feb 4, 2020 4:14:15 GMT
Alicia sighed softly as she was well aware that Hiroyo was not handling things very well. She was handling them, yes, but not well. In her defense Alicia was certain she’d be even more of a wreck if she was in the Empire pilot’s boots right now. How could she expect someone in any position to not freak out from reality having a spazz attack? There were no standard operating procedures for something like this!
She decided to not reply to Hiroyo’s self-assurances, as she noticed the comms had been clicked off.
Kisara, meanwhile, perked up once addressed, and went over the map data. ”Yeah, no problem. I’ll run ahead and check things out.” With a couple wing beats to steady herself, the ice maiden pulled back on the column and pushed to drive the mechanical bird forward. Which was assisted by Alicia making a quick jump to give the Buster Eagle an extra boost to its leap into the sky again. A few more jets from the engines to steady herself and Kisara was soaring off again.
Unsurprisingly, Hiroyo was completely out of her depth with the merging issue and unable to offer much in the way of usable advice. So Alicia was left to try and sort things out herself for the moment, or so she’d first assumed. Hearing comments from unexpected sources made her blink in surprise, as she looked over to focus more. Two distinct voices with their own personalities separate from Hiroyo’s own.
“Hiroyo, don’t mind me for a second. Turns out a merger has let me understand what’s normally beyond us.” Alicia noted to the Empire pilot before she focused on the Organoid. “What the HELL do you think I tried to do you overgrown caterpillar!? And frankly I’d be willing to bet I’ve done my transformations more then the years you’ve been awake for! So if I hear one more peep out of you I’m blasting you off Morgan’s back! I’ve got just enough charge left for an arm cannon shot you know!”
She shook the mentioned weapon for emphasis, before sighing to herself. “As for the sharing bit, that’s what I was worried about. I... had a bit of a mishap in the past back in my world that left me hybridized on a more permanent basis. Makes it a tiny bit more difficult to pull back what’s ‘me’ and-“ Suddenly the world-hopper was cut off by her partner.
”You’re too injured to change back right now, Alicia. So I’m forcing the fusion to be maintained while your normal body heals. Think the Tundra Cave Incident but worse. Also I will be leaving a note to Original Me to thrash you for the better part of an hour, Roger. Your conduct this day was especially atrocious from what I’m reading off the banks. Really, just because you’re away from your chosen partner doesn’t mean you need to act out like a bratty teenager.” Sol commented, before going quiet again just as fast.
“... Oh. Point made...” Whatever the ‘Tundra Cave Incident’ was, it seemed to explain everything for the displaced redhead, who then shook the Geno’s head. “I mean, at least there’s a reason beyond ‘oops sorry your usual tricks don’t work’. Was I really that badly injured though...?”
As if to distract from the further revelations, Hiroyo’s console would ping with a return of map data. One of the routes was completely crossed out with notes of cave ins and new pitfalls making the route nearly impassible, but the other was given the all clear, along with an attached note
’I know Alicia’s a lot to handle but please try to hold it together. With any luck by this time tomorrow you’ll be chatting with your Alicia and this’ll all feel like some hyperactive fever dream. And you still owe me.’
The last line had been ended with a semicolon and parenthesis to make a winking expression. It seemed the whole mess with the Liger had not caused Kisara to forget the joking promise.
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Post by Hiroyo Oda on Feb 25, 2020 3:39:09 GMT
"Uh, okay." Since she herself lacked Alicia's newly found power of translation she was out of it for most of it.
"Do not, his carapace may not hold." Morgan's voice was quiet but firmly disapproving. To Hiroyo it was nothing but a muted rumble echoing from the zoid around her. "I agree his advice is rendered in the most abrasive manner possible, but inciting future violence is unwise."
"Seriously now? How 'm I suppose to know you're some kinda super-'noid person? You're just as cagey as your other self." Roger gave a disapproving sniff and shook his head. Sure he had been a bit condenscending, but to jump straight to violence? Someone certainly was pretyy
"I don't know what he said but that would be a seriously bad idea. Like, don't get me wrong you guys have a lot of credit with the Empire for successful misisons but there's mistrust for not formally signing on." Hiroyo said, her voice more than a little alrmed. Thankfully her console was pinged with the updated map data. A little bead of sweat rolled down her temple but the reminder of the debt cheered her up rather than worried her.
They were alive for now, but if they didnt' get moving it sounded like Alicia's condition was worsening.
With a deft couple of finger flicks and a button press Hiroyo sent the edited map (minus the note) to Alicia's Zoid. Who was really Alicia fused with the zoid. Alicia who had been in the cockpit previously when a sword had been rammed through the previous version.
The Empire pilot sucked in a breath at that thought, holding on to it to remind herself that despite the apparent squabblign going ont he situation was still very fraught with potentional danger.
"Hey, I obviously know nothing about your limits, but will you have enough energy for the run back? I know being fused is a constant drain on regular organoids but, well, you're very much not that." She asked as she pointed Morgan to start moving toward the route out. She was careful to manuever so that Roger would be blocked from ALicia's line of sight by the back spines. Hopefully blocking line of sight would stop the verbal sniping he was doing.
"You alright to carry on while I snooze?"
"Mm. Take your nap already." At the noise of acceptance Roger yawned and stretched out then settled into place with a scraping of carapace on armor that Hiroyo could recognize well enough. She sighed in relief, one less problem she had to deal with.
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Post by Alicia Westfield on Feb 25, 2020 4:50:22 GMT
Alicia sighed softly and shook the Geno’s metallic head. “Sorry, guess I was still a little too hopped up from the big fight. But yeah, not my first rodeo changing to a non-human form to fight. Definitely won’t be my last either. I wind up having to do it nearly all the time back home. More then a few close scrapes. With the kind of fighting I’m used to doing, you learn pretty quickly how to sort everything out in your head as to what goes where. And when you need to just take a step back and listen to instinct.”
That was something that, if Hiroyo deigned to think it over, set her apart from her local counterpart. From the recordings, the local Alicia was methodical, sharp, and seemed to have the speed of thought necessary to plan out every little move she needed to make. She was, fittingly enough, capable of precision the likes of which is normally attributed to a finely tuned machine. Like code running a program with plenty of exceptions and variables that could modify the equation as a battle went on. A honed blade that carefully analyzed and then cut any combat problem before her too pieces with everything that was available.
This Alicia, while still obviously intelligent and thinking things through, had a more... feral vibe to her fighting. Someone who combined human ingenuity with bestial cunning into a terrifyingly deadly dance. And she’d shown the merits of honing instinct as well as the mind today. Just today she’d defended the opening attacks of an enemy moving so fast that tracking them with the naked eye was impossible. But she had done it. She had reacted in time where no one else possibly could have. Her instincts had fired, predicting direction, angle, and other variables before she even knew she was going to be under attack from the Liger.
The local cleanly sliced apart anything that dared to stand against her. The visitor fell upon the same challengers with fangs gleaming and left the resulting carcass a mangled mess. Both mindsets were viable for achieving victory. Each was disquieting in their effectiveness. To some it might beg the question: would the local Alicia have faired better? Worse? And what kind of battle would have occurred in the event of the two meeting and deciding to test each other. A question none would know the answer too.
“Is it?” Alicia asked as she fell in step with Hiroyo. “I either have a lot more power then any Organoid can be reasonably expected to have, am mind-bogglingly efficient with that power, or Sol is cheating things for me. I honestly haven’t felt anything remotely close to a drain yet. And I’ve worked with some pretty power-intensive forms before. Say, Sol, can we get an estimate, if needed?”
”There should be no problems for either of us. The Kriegsherrer, yourself, and I are currently in a harmonic energy resonance. The effects of that are resulting in each of us acting like a tuning fork to one another’s energies, capturing, amplify, and returning projected energy, to an upper limit. Providing one of us doesn’t get violently dislodged from the Zoid Core, this would be infinitely sustainable in theory. In practice it would wind up falling apart when the human element ultimately needs to satisfy bodily needs. Never mind the increased dangers to a pilot what with systems failure capable of causing backlash damage. Not something worth pursuing for application en masse.” the addressed Organoid replied.
“In other words he found a way to cheat.” Alicia noted with an amused tone. “Honestly one of the best partners a girl could ask for.”
”Hey what about me? Aren’t I a good partner? I went out of my way to save you even~!” Kisara chimed over the comms as she returned to escort them from the sky.
“You’re worse then the bug nine times out of ten you bloody ice witch.” Alicia harped back at Kisara. Surprisingly, despite the content of the words, her voice had no heat to it. It was almost... endearing? The following laugh confirmed that this bit of sniping was meant in good spirits. “But I wouldn’t trade you either.”
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Post by Hiroyo Oda on Mar 5, 2020 1:34:09 GMT
"Understandable. He is good at being grating at the best of times."
"Rude Morgan! But well, okay yeah- that's true and I should word things better."
"That's totally okay! It was a hard fight but there's no hard feelings on my end." Hiroyo listened when Alicia spoke more about herself. She could never have imagined it if she hadn't seen it for herself. TUrning into non-human form not being the norm was so weird but she shook off her impending mental trip to 'what the hell'ville and focused instead on how the other pilot described herself.
The differences between the Alicia the Empire pilot had heard of and the one she was talking to didn't escape Hiroyo. Some might have thought of the two fighting each other but she wondered how they would have fared side by side. Would this Alicia have continued to charge in or would her otherworldly self influence her to have a bit more caution? Maybe it would have gone the other way, with the mercenary pilot Hiroyo knew of becoming a more impulsive pilot while the two worked together.
She quirked her lips and shook her head. From what she knew and had heard the two had such strong characters she doubted they would rub off on each other so easily. No, it was far more likely that they would have kept their own styles and still managed to work well together after perhaps a short time of getting use to each other.
"Ah, if both of you were here at once I bet this war would be over in no time." She blushed as she realized she had said that out loud, a quick check at the monitor showed that why yes her wonderfully working mic had picked that up! She scrambled for recovery after that slip up.
"I mean! Both sets of all of you? Like, the three of you you know? ANYWAYS-I wonder if the other you could fuse like you currently are as well or is that more of current-Sol's cheating?" She wondered after Alicia summed it up for her. She could follow what Sol had said...but when people dropped a lot of words like that all at once her brain just tended to wander a bit! She thought she got the gist of it though: the three parts were so in harmony that they could build off each other until the human part needed to meet its human needs. Whatever, she let out a tired sigh and leaned back in her seat.
"I'm just glad you three were there. I honestly thought command sent us out die against the troop we fought at first but, well, they were super easy even when not compared to what hit us after that."
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Post by Alicia Westfield on Mar 5, 2020 5:48:09 GMT
Alicia sighed softly to herself and let the shenanigans regarding the fellow Zoid and Organoid pair end off there. Now that she thought of it, the pair of them almost reminded her of Sol and Kisara. One serious, the other an absolute goofball, getting on each others nerves from time to time. But at the end of the day they were an inseparable duo. Which left Hiroyo as the Alicia of their trio, even though from what she’d been hearing from Sol they weren’t officially a team. Sad, that, as they felt like they knitted together into a complete whole quite nicely.
And then Hiroyo went and made her slip up. “Ahaha, I don’t know if the world could stand having two sets of Alicia, Sol, and Kisara! It might implode from the shenanigan blackhole the twin Queens of Mischief would cause!” Either Alicia didn’t pick up on why Hiroyo was flustered at her own slip up, or the visiting redhead was engaging in an act of mercy by pretending the whole thing was intended. Given how sharp she had been, it was likely mercy talking.
Mercy, it seemed, that Kisara completely lacked. ”Ohohoho, what am I hearing here?” If that didn’t put a pit of dread into Hiroyo’s stomach, the following laughter should, being a dark and sinister thing that promised much teasing. ”Someone’s having a cross dimensional twin fantasy, isn’t she? Come on Hiroyo, you can tell little ol’ me a~all about it.”
“Kisara, please don’t kill my partner with a nose bleed.” Alicia blandly commented, hoping to curtail the ice maiden’s glee. It failed miserably.
”Oh I do wonder. Are you thinking about who would be a better ‘partner’ perhaps? I mean there are certainly merits to both. I’m sure the local is quite skilled with her fingers. She can probably learn all the ‘sweet spots’ in time to play them like a finely tuned harp and draw all the most lovely sounds. Ah! Just the thought must be enough to get the heart pumping in excitement! I think I’m actually a little jealous of my other self!” The ice maiden licked her lips at the thought, unseen as she sighed happily.
“Kisara...” both Alicia and Sol chimed in at once. The former did so with a building annoyance and the latter huffed an exasperated sigh afterwards. Again they were ignored.
”Ah but then again maybe wild passion is more to your taste. She’s not done anything of the sort with anyone yet but I know our Alicia very well. She’d be the type to grab on and hold fast, greedily exploiting every moment. She’d only be satisfied once both are sufficiently lost in the blazing heat of the moment and everything comes crashing down in an absolute and exhausting finish.” That description got quite the hearty chuckle from Kisara as she explained it, grinning wildly.
Miraculously, the Kriegsherrer seemed to spontaneously develop numerous flaps all over it’s metal-plated mug that adjusted ever so slightly to give the impression of expressing mortification. “O-Okay Kisara I think that’s quite enough!” Alicia growled out with a tone that implied embarrassment. But the Queen of Mischief seemed intent on pushing all the metaphorical buttons.
”Oh! Maybe it’s too hard to decide! Isn’t that the basis of a twin fantasy? To be caught between both and experience all the positives of each at the same time? Even to the point of one’s mind going numb from the overload? Ohohoho imagine if I drop this in the mill with a few swapped keywords and less context...” Well that was a terrifying thought that Kisara had just uttered.
”Shut your trap already, you absolute frozen TROLL!” Alicia suddenly yelled, kicking up a rock she’d happened to pass by. Then, with a quick flare of her jets, the Kriegsherrer whipped around and hit the rock up with it’s tail; sending the impromptu projectile screaming through the air. Even under duress the pilot’s aim was true and the rock pinged off the Buster Eagle’s head, sending the bird into a corkscrew dive.
”Waaaaaaaaah! Maydaaay! Maydaaay!” came the following, pitiful wail. However the cry was decidedly lacking anything resembling ‘panic’ or even ‘concern’ and was more just a cry of having her idea be rejected so... forcefully. Seconds later the dive was broken and the Eagle leveled out like nothing ever happened in the first place, minus the rather sharp decline in altitude. ”You’re so mean to me, Aliciaaaaaa!”
”Kisara, please stop tormenting the humans... I realize this is the first time you’ve had a body in what feels like forever but at least try to reign yourself in. That mess being said, the fusion is likely one the local Alicia and Sol could do as well, but not one she’d consider quite as readily as our Alicia did. Records do indicate that it has happened in the distant past among Ancient Zoidians. Whether humans could do it or not is... up for debate, frankly.” Sol finished, trying to regain some semblance of control over the powder keg Kisara had detonated with not but a merry giggle in her mind.
But perhaps that first part of his comment would once more trigger... odd... reactions from Hiroyo.
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