The skies burned and exploded above as Shrike prowled about the downed Carrier. Every few steps brought the Susanoo rifle up, and after a moment of charged deliberance the catastrophic beam of energy would erupt and blaze through a Drone that entered his field of view. The chaos of the battlefield and the prowling nature of his Shell's movements, for a few precious moments, brought him relative peace as he prepared himself for his anticipated close quarters engageme-

Fire rained down as the remaining aerial support forces consolidated their formations. Fire surged along the treeline, his squad's movements became a chaos of telemetry data on the archaic readout interface of his neural-helm, and Shrike was forced to back against the framework of the Carrier and lower his rifle. The left arm rose, the shield blazed to life, and he calmly bided his time as the temperature within his Shell steadily climbed. Torrent after torren of cannon fire rained against the energy barrier as Shrike silently listened to the comms chatter and observed movements. Sweat began to form along his arms, his palms growing moist, his forehead beading with the rising temperatures within the machine. As their strafing runs meandered back into strike positions, eventually the squad managed to eke out enough skyward damage for Shrike to have breathing room again.

As he lowered the barrier and emerged from a Shell-shaped silhouette blasted into the side of the downed carrier, Ijsvogel's advanced recon data hit his sensory overlay and Shrike, as was typical, sent a singular ping of acknowledgement to the data received. It meant there were no other surprises than this group waiting for them. But, alas, Shrike being pinned in position was a fateful situation indeed. Before he could continue circling the Carrier, the [i]Ushi-Oni[/i] emerged unassailed. Shrike witnessed the eruption of that colossal beam on the far side of the ship and began to trigger a boost as Ava's orders came in over the combat channel. In the blink of an eye Shrike's own vengeful wrath was redirected; Ava said to link up with Ijsvogel, and the chain of command is a chain that binds.

"Moving to acquire your weapon, Ijsvogel. Prepare for assault."

The Shrike rounded the carrier, made direct visual contact on the [i]Ushi-Oni[/i]-- and activated his boosters to leap up and over the damn thing and disregard it. He had to trust the others to do what they felt was best; a disarmed Ijsvogel was his duty now. The Susanoo rifle was slung onto his back as both arms locked into their reinforced talons, and when Shrike landed upon the ground it was right as Hachidori, Gizzard, and...Barn Owl collapsed towards it.

He couldn't help but chuckle privately, bitterly, to himself at witnessing Barn Owl's own passions become public.

The rain fell heavy upon the thick smoke of the burning jungle, but Shrike was ever the observant and tactically apprised individual; Following Ijsvogel's tracking data the Shrike plunged across the earth in a frenzied blur of lashing arms, throwing burning trees and massive gouts of earth into the air as the ancient Shell blazed a trail through the hellfire of the jungle until its hand unfuzed and came down upon the mighty machine gun of Ijsvogel. The heat of the flames and the straining of his radiator made him wary about triggering his boosters so frequently, thus the Shrike emerged from the flaming forest with heavy footfalls like a smoke-streaked demon of metal with the lost weapon in its right hand. He began a sprint back towards the carrier, left arm still poised for its lethal and brutal close combat intentions, before throwing the rifle to Ijsvogel when they were close enough to link up.

If all went well, Shrike would open that carrier like a tin can and they would tear through it before the other Shells turned on.