BlasTech

Huntresses of Hybrasil

“I’m a damn good pilot, and when I’m done ripping you up, I’m gonna make you squeal like Jade does until you shout it out for everyone. How do you like that, huh!”

Isabelle doesn't reply immediately. Too much focus is needed on those blades, on keeping them away from her vitals, on minimising the damage, on staying in the fight. Wrist to parry. Catch a hand and redirect. Kick to break away.

No luck, no luck, no luck. The two mechas carve grooves in the sky as they fight. Ksharta always following, never allowing a gap, a moment to recover. They leap from cloudtop to cloudtop, obliterating white mountains with their passage. The pace quickens, a whirlwind of blows and strikes. An attack comes in high and is met with crossed arms. Thrusters flare, countering momentum, and a shockwave ripples out across the blue.

And in that hurricane, Isabelle feels herself tossed like a leaf.

Mother's advice is why I'm here.

She'd expect me to be able to get out of this on my own.

... so why can't I do it?

She sees those daggers coming at her again. At this rate, it's only a matter of time. Her arm is already starting to numb, and one more direct hit might knock it out of action. Hells, enough heavy fighting might do it all on its own. And yes, she has close-combat weapons on her, a sword, the EMP gauntlet, some daggers of her own, but she needs space to deploy them. An opening. A chance.

All she can do right now is make that time stretch as far as possible. Give herself time to keep rolling the dice. And hope that eventually ...

She catches Ksharta's wrist. Twists inside the overconfident strike and brings an elbow hard into the throat of the other mech.

... eventually, her luck might turn.

"You're right, you are a good pilot." she says, as Ksharta reels from the neural feedback. Coughing into her comms. "But I'm not the one who's going to go home tied up."

She raises her hand, revealing a smart cable that snakes from a concealed spool and around the wrist of the Pulsar Cat.

As her opponent staggers forwards, Isabelle ducks under the blow, bringing the rope around and behind. Snagging the other arm by the elbow and pulling a strand across the chest of the other mech. Can you feel your bonds closing in about you Ksharta? Can you feel victory slipping away?

Will you come undone for me, even as the ropes are binding you tighter?

What will you do?

[Isabelle rolls to Fight: 5 + 5 + 2 = 12 - She choses to inflict a condition, take a string and a superior position. She'll immediately spend that string to encourage Ksharta to fall apart. Just as mother intended.]

Huntresses of Hybrasil

Kshartra Talonna

Congratulations!

Your assault is bearing results already. A high-altitude attack vector has gotten you into melee range against an opponent who was clearly not prepared for it. And your strikes are coming fast as the Terenian tries her best to block them with the autocannon she'd brought into the arena.

It's easily enough dealt with: strikes high, low and a swipe sends it spinning away through the clouds. You've got her on the ropes and, soon enough, everyone will see. You're not a joke. You're a serious contender. They'll all see!

How does that make you feel?

-===-

Isabelle

Well, the plan is working. It's working well!

Kshatra is in melee range. She's taken the bait. The autocannon wasn't actually one of your lures, you thought you'd have to fight at range at some point, but that's okay. This is still under control. The reinforced vambraces are doing their job, allowing you to keep up the parries without taking damage anywhere sensitive.

You're riding the edge of the blade, dodging and weaving enough to avoid serious damage. Trying to find a way to make it look like your opponent has the upper hand.

And ... well, she does. She's fast, faster than you give her credit for. And in close combat like this you find yourself on the back foot. A strike hits harder than you'd thought, breaking away at some of the plating you and Asil spent the evening installing. Opportunities you have to fight back are forgone and, sooner than you'd like, they've dried up. It's all you can do to keep yourself in the game..

Okay. The plan is now officially working too well.

[Rolling to defy disaster with grace with her vambraces and autocannon - 1 + 2 + 2 = 5 Well, there goes the need to pretend she's losing!]

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

Of course she remembers! The grin that breaks out when she sees your face tells you that much. If anything, seeing you here is a relief and you don't need to ask her twice before she's running at the mud-spirit, scabbard drawn.

I really need to get a new sword at some point.

Still, the scabbard will do. It worked on Machi and she was way bigger than this thing. Or, at least, much more solid, muscular, taller and okay, this is not the time.

She starts swinging, strong arms and the work at hand drowning out intrusive thoughts. For now, she focuses on skillfully batting away at section of the spirit's belly while ignoring its scandalised roar. Complain all you want about rights, Spirit, but a Knight is involved now and it's her duty to protect the weak, to help those who ask for it. Whereas you, my dear turbid friend, are holding someone helpless against their will.

Some things just get alot clearer when you're swinging a sword.

"It's good to ... umf ... see you ... umf ... Fengye!" she says, between strikes. "I'd hoped ... you'd gotten away ... when I didn't see you ... in Hell ... after Kingeater ... got sucked through."

Suddenly, one chunk of the monster is splatted away, revealing a pale hand sticking from the muck. Kalaya ducks under a brown arm as it swings for her before reaching in.

"Do you still have that ghost horse?" she finishes, as she fishes for the Maid.

As for you Fengye - look at what you've unleashed with your request! The way she moves, the way she ducks and fights on your behalf? Does that pull at you? That this woman will face monsters for you without the need for spells or chains of binding.

Does that count for anything?

[Rolling to defy disaster, putting herself in the line of fight on behalf of Fengye. 2 + 3 + 2 = 7 - Gallant Rescue is at play here, granting a string on Fengye.]

Huntresses of Hybrasil

Isabelle watches the clouds part as she takes to the sky - entering the upper part of the Arena. Lure her in close. Don't let her see your true measure. Don't try your hardest.

You'd think an instruction like that would be easy.

She casts a glance through her rear cameras, watching as the swirling eddies in the white trail behind her. Clear tracks for a huntress to follow.

No. It's easy to fight badly. But it's hard to look like you're fighting badly, while not giving your opponent too much of an opening or spooking them off. She has to make mistakes - and that's already as unintuitive as anything - but she has to make them just right. Expose herself just enough to warrant the attack, but not so much that the huntress lands a killing blow, or realises she's being played. It's balancing on a knife's edge. A blade that might well end up in her as anywhere else.

So ... yeah ... I only need to get stabbed a little bit ... thanks mother.

At least she has Emberlight again. The mech had taken time and effort to get back into fighting shape, but it was worth it just to see the familiar cockpit once more. Her chair. Her neural net. Her space.

If she has to get stabbed. Then this is a good place for it to happen in.

Asil hadn't liked the plan, if her grumbling had been anything to go by, but she'd still helped her graft some additional armour panels onto the arms as well as a shoulder mounted cannon. It was functional, it had to be in order to be a believable threat, but didn't have any additional ammo storage. One of several pieces of bait that she wore like the world's most extreme fisherman.

As she scans the horizon for any sign of her opponent, she activates Emberlight's comms. After all, while she's in the habit of making 'mistakes'.

"So, Ksharta, is it?" she says, feigning ignorance. "I hope you're ready to lose again. After all, I've played with cats far more threatening than yours."

She thumbs it off, waiting for the response. Wondering what her opponent's reaction will be. Will you be easily goaded? Or have you wised up from your last fight?

[Rolling to Figure out a person: 4 + 5 + 2 = 11. What do you hope to get from this fight? How can I get you to feel the glee I need to defeat you? And, since this is combat: What do you fear is your destiny?]

Huntresses of Hybrasil

Isabelle's hand ghosts over where she'd been kissed as she turns to watch Asil leave. Her cheeks flush slightly, a flicker of flame burning through the tiredness, before she heads back to her room with a faint smile on her face.

Her dreams that night are vivid, but over far too quick. She wakes the next morning with a fleeting sense of flying, of having turned wrenches and sailed through space. It's almost enough to make her ignore her alarm and go back to sleep.

Unfortunately, the alarm is also accompanied by a prim, unfamiliar, member of the family staff who seems all too happy to inform her that breakfast is waiting for her.

She pulls up the match info on her computer, reading it as she's walking to the dining room. Kshatra will be an interesting opponent to face. She'd watched the previous match against Dala Hunters and seen how she'd lost to what was essentially a bluff and religious posturing. It was a tactic that was unlikely to work for Isabelle given the difference in their cultures, not to mention that Kshatra probably rewatched the match herself and learned the lessons she needed from it.

Still - the match information would be accompanied by detailed pilot information and "research" from sources that her mother had organised. And that would help her with building a plan of attack. She idly wondered if her mother had any specific instructions for her too. It would be like her to put her thumb on the scale.

After all. If there's anyone who can tear down an opponent's psyche and reduce them to a quivering mess, it's mother.

[Invoking Guidance from Above - don't think it's appropriate to roll the read-a-person here yet, but let me know if otherwise]

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

"Hey, Hey. It's okay. It'll all work out." says Kalaya, signalling the storekeeper to bring another basket of dumplings.

"The Sapphire Mother doesn't abandon her children - I'm pretty sure at least - and as for what to do next, well, you've come to the right place! After all, I've already rescued one priestess from a spider demon in a hell-infested castle, so tracking down your sister and her priestess shouldn't be too hard."

"... buuuuuut ..."

Kalaya rubs her forearm and shrugs awkwardly.

"Look, I'll be honest - I've kind of found myself with a bit of a loooong list of problems to fix. Including saving the Flower Kingdoms from the encroachment of Hell, the Dominion and defeating this rakshasa that is trying to whip up an army in my name."

"... I normally wouldn't ask this - but can we work out some kind of deal here? I'm sort of in the same place as you: not really knowing what to do next about some of this. And needing help with other things."

"For the first; There's another Knight of the Thorn in town, Dima, who needs to placate the local river spirit. We'd thought about summoning something - perhaps a water demon - that we could defeat to regain her favour. I've promised my help to her first, but if there was some way you could intercede or help us with the summoning? Do you know any magic like that?"

"Once her issue is dealt with, I'd be more than happy to accompany you to help you find your lost sibling. Dima and Petony might also come along, so you'd maybe get three knights to help!" she says, trying to sell the idea.

"As for the second thing ... these problems facing the Kingdom are getting bigger than me and my sword and, I'm ... frankly a bit afraid of the consequences of making the wrong choice. So I want to ask the Sapphire Mother for her advice and guidance - that's the sort of thing you priestesses can do right? Request an audience?"

Glancing down, Kalaya shuffles over to give Sagacious a reassuring half-hug.

"There's always going to be these moments where everything feels like it's coming apart. I don't know about you, but when it feels like that I try to remind myself of the things I've sworn to do, and the things I've sworn to protect. It helps ground me - a rock to lean on when everything else feels like sand and petals to the wind."

"You know what I mean?"

[Rolling emotional support - 3 + 5 + 1 - 1 = 8 - If Sagacious opens up to Kalaya, she can pick one from the list. In addition, Lay on Hands activates - she is healed of physical ailments and can choose to either validate Kalaya's Devotion or criticise it - granting an XP or a string.]

Huntresses of Hybrasil

Asil Marina

Your ... girlfriend? (Seriously, what are you two right now?) Is dangling about twenty feet up when you arrive, secured in a welder's harness. She pulls up her goggles to regard you and the silence stretches just long enough for you to take in her features. The brown hair tied up in a bun, the oil stained cheek. It's a different Isabelle from the one that you met up with earlier in her designer's pilot outfit and jacket. She doesn't seem surprised to see you, nor pleased. Nor much of anything really. Just ... bland? Impassive?

For a moment, you worry she's turned cold again - shutting you out like she had before. And you're just about to open your mouth to double down on your demand before she slowly nods. If you're right about how important the mech is to her, which you are, then you know what that little gesture truly means. Taking her eyes off you, she gestures to the workbenches and equipment that line the hangar as if to say "help yourself".

Do you often find yourself using someone else's tools? Or are you the kind of worker that has their own set, prized and kept under lock and key to stop some lazy co-worker from running off with your wrench instead of finding their own? What kind do you think Isabelle is?

Locating things to work with is a surprisingly easy task. Not just because everything is stored and filed away neatly (this is Isabelle we're talking about here) but because the storage placement is incredibly intuitive to an engineer like you. The whole experience is like walking into someone's kitchen for the first time and finding that the knives are right where you'd keep them, were this your place. And of course the cups are up here by the sink, and ... yes! The dishes are over here! And the next thing you know you're fully kitted up in your own set of coveralls and toolbelt.

A few minutes with the hangar controls and you're dangling next to Isabelle at the top of Emberlight, working on your own section of the shoulder and re-laying the high-performance power lines from the CFD to the arm weaponry. Things are quiet beyond the occasional clank from your tools and the crack of the welder. Overall, the energy is very different from earlier - the fires that had burned hot and bright in that office have been replaced with something quieter and ... not cold ... but ... maybe dormant is the word.

The two hours pass quickly. Occasionally you bump into one another, or your hands touch as you pass each other tools. There's no talking beyond the task at hand, something in the atmosphere calls for quiet focus at this time. Just letting your presence and work speak for itself.

For her part, Isabelle lets hers talk plenty:

In the way she silently swings aside to make room for you up there.

In the way she moves over, eyes casting past your shoulder, when you ask her how she wants the circuitry laid out in the left forearm.

In the way her gloves lay over yours when you need the extra strength to pull out a difficult access hatch.

In the way, when the time is up, that she rests her cheek on top of your head and entwines her hand with yours. A soft squeeze before she quietly turns and makes for her quarters.

Do you do anything throughout all this? Say any last words at the end? You can, although you don't need to.

Huntresses of Hybrasil

The day progresses adequately. Her late attendance at fencing is noted, but she's soon moving on - ten points clean - to the next class. The match review is draining, but another coffee helps. Second by second, inch by inch, Isabelle and the review team make it through the replay. The consolidated list of notes is taken to her study for later.

A mandatory 20 minute break for dinner is taken in Quar's room. Again, the Zaldarian signals concern, but Isabelle ignores it in favour of progressing their lessons as much as she can. Food is offered and taken without resistance before she moves to her next training session.

All the while, the memory weave and drive sit in her pocket, nestled up against Asil's projector. She's ... to be honest, the message is just more stress for her. Another variable to consider: keep it hidden? tell her mother? If she were to tell, would Adriana know? The fallout for disrupting her mother's plans could be far worse than her ire at Isabelle keeping it hidden.

In either case, it's too important to leave somewhere or to trust to someone else to deliver - so it sits, safe, in her jacket. Just another stone on the mountain she's carrying around.

Never for a second does she think Adriana actually wants to know the real Isabelle. She only wants to meet the "hidden" one, the one that is different to the public persona, with enough rough edges to feel genuine. Just off-script enough to feel like a valuable secret, one prized only for Adriana's mind. Fuel for the ego. The Isabelle who is a force to be reckoned with on the battlefield and in the boardroom. Who can command companies and prove her capabilities time and time again. The Isabelle whose "dreams" can be easily fit into Adriana's grand plans.

She doesn't want to know the Isabelle that likes storybooks, that builds models or dreams of flying away. The Isabelle who has a thing for short-haired engineers and who would rather spend a day at the library than in the office.

That Isabelle isn't useful.

-===-

It's later, much later, and Isabelle is dangling from a harness in her own private hangar.

She'd finished training just before midnight and had returned to her room long enough to change into work clothes and head back out. Gloves on. Hair tied back in a bun. Breakfast is at 6:30 tomorrow, which meant she has just over 2 hours to start the process of getting Emberlight back into fighting shape.

Goggles in place, she carefully pries the panelling off Emberlight's forearm and looks at the wiring within with mild dismay. Tomas and his team have done a thorough job - unfortunately - which only makes her work all the harder.

Still, it's a job that has to be done ... and she trusts nobody other than herself to do it. So, bolt by bolt, wire by wire. She'll make Emberlight hers again.

Huntresses of Hybrasil

Once, when she'd been younger, she'd built herself a diorama of the known galaxy. Small glass balls for the planets, connected by plastic sprues to represent the known hyperlanes. The nebulae had been made out of cotton floss and strung with miniaturised light filaments. She'd spend hours, tweaking the arrangements, adding new lanes as they became known, imagining herself exploring the far reaches and mapping them out.

Of course, the model had not survived. As a teenager with three siblings, it was only a matter of time before she came back to her room and found it in pieces. Carm had always insisted it was just to get Isabelle out of her study more often - but that had been cold comfort when she'd seen that beautiful galaxy with a scoop torn out of it.

She'd complained to her mother, but the response had simply been to chide her for not better protecting her things.

Staring up at Emberlight, Isabelle could feel the beginnings of those old tears welling in her eyes. No, not again. What had they done to her?

"Ta- take her back to my - my private hanger." she replies, not looking Tomas in the face. She couldn't, not right now. "Until I say otherwise, if any orders come down regarding Emberlight, you are to physically check with me before enacting them. I don't care who they're from, is that clear?"

"I - yes?" replies Tomas, deflating somewhat. "Are you not happy with the work the team has done?"

Isabelle closes her eyes, hands fisting. She can't. Why did you have to. Deep breath - but it hitches halfway. No. Not now. Not in front of him.

"NO!" she snaps, spinning on her heel as she becomes acutely aware of every hair on her arms. Of how hard it is to swallow. "I mean, yes. I ... look I don't care! Just get her back to my hangar now!"

"Ma'am? Are you oka-"

She doesn't wait for him to finish the question, swiftly exiting before any more cracks can show.

---====---

The bathrooms in the hangar complex are spotless - as befits the heart of a Lozano compound. Freshly cleaned, fully restocked, no stains, everything smelling vaguely of flowers - everything gleams. It's a good (if slightly cliché) place to hide from the world.

The shaking has subsided, and her fingers finally relax on her scalp. Everything aches. The model. Emberlight. A child's small painting. Toys. Serving staff who had befriended her. Books deemed "unsuitable". Games. Emberlight.

She knew who had given that order. She knew why. It had been a warning, but also a test. Don't fail again. And protect your things. Because they can and will be taken from you if you are too weak.

Too weak. Too useless. Too much of a failure. The fact her mother had not given the order herself showed that she wasn't yet at the point of outright taking Emberlight away, but it was a reminder that nothing is safe. Nothing and ...

... no-one.

How much did her mother know? She knew the staff passed her reports. She knew she had access to the building's security. But was she watching right now? It must be her imagination, but she can feel that all seeing eye hovering behind her. She could feel the prickling on her neck. The tension in her shoulders. Watched. Waiting. Slip up too much?

Well, she'd slipped up plenty today. With Asil - with Tomas - and now with hiding in a bathroom when she was meant to be at training. So many opportunities, so many justifications her mother might use. What could she do to defend against them?

The sad truth was ... nothing. There was no defence for her. No shield, no protector. Asil would be cast aside in an instant and she had no other friends amongst the staff in the building. No allies.

All she could do is go on. Do what her mother asked. Do it well. So there could be no further charge of laziness. She'd say she was correcting an error in the mech's repair work - that much was true - her mother would know what it meant. Maybe, if she did well enough, she'd be allowed to keep Asil in her life for a while.

Straightening, she calmly washes her hands before checking her face in the mirror. It looks ... bored ... tired.

She dries herself off before heading for the next training lesson. She'd have to be ready for the next fights, the next challenges. No matter what gets in her way.

[It was indeed a big deal and Isabelle staggers from the threat. Ticking off Betrayal, she resets her destiny track and makes progress towards her destiny]

Huntresses of Hybrasil

Getting confused?

Getting confused??

Isabelle's walk had stuttered to a halt after only a few dozen corridors. The nerve! After what she'd ... they'd shared. To go ahead and make
assumptions like that? That Isabelle was somehow completely useless in a relationship and would have had no idea what to do next? Absurd!

She takes a slow sip of the coffee.

Completely absurd.

And the audacity! The sheer, ten-foot-tall-and-throwing-thuderbolts audacity! To demand entrance whenever she simply turned up and asked? No matter what Isabelle was doing or who she was speaking to?? She'd never .... well, okay, she would have let Asil in simply because she couldn't say no to the woman right now ... but that's besides the point! She didn't need to rub it in! After all, Isabelle knew that management playbook already, her mother practically wrote it! The really annoying one where you give orders that you knew that the employee was going to do anyway - simply so they get accustomed to doing what you tell them.

She paused, took a sip, and shuddered. Mentally fencing off any thoughts of her mother from what had just happened.

She'd have to have a proper talk with the engineer when they next met, assuming the other woman let her speak and didn't just pin her to a wall again, silencing her mouth with that tongue and let'snotgetintothinkingaboutthatrightnow .

She chugs the rest of the cup and then looks for a rubbish bin.

Anyway! It was time to get back to work. Training was due to restart soon, but the path to her next exercises took her past the repair bays. It was time to check in with Chief Tomas about what was keeping Emberlight out of action.