(Again, done with the permission of Stern Algorithm)
(Collab between myself and
@FalloutJack)
"I've engaged the enemy NC, backup is not required. Maintain your current objective, but prepare to fall back soon. This is getting hairy for us." Zahra managed to speak calmly into her radio before the beast crashed into her NC. The force was astounding, though despite that, she held her ground, furrowing deep grooves into the ground behind her as she was pushed back a metre and a bit, before the enemy attempted ripping away her axe. Might as well give it to him. She let go in of it in an attempt to throw him off balance, even for a moment, before being hit by the spray of molten 'fire'. She managed to block the last part of the torrent with her wing tips, though the brunt of it seared into her NC's armoured front. This was going to be some fight, she thought silently, as more of her drones spread around the giant bear and opened fire in an effort to score a lucky shot, though most of them did little but scratch the armour.
There wasn't immediately all that much that Ursa could do about these drones taking shots at him. They weren't doing causing much harm, but like all things that dare to even lash out at him, Dread found them irritating, found the enemy mech to be trying what little patience he had. The release of the axe led to Ursa Nova stepping back to keep balance, and for its arms to smash down at the shaft of the weapon to snap it in half. As it released the now-inoperative axe from its mouth, and the chest-emitters ceased, Dread stared angrily at the enemy.
You think you're a clever animal trainer? A beastmaster? No one tames me. Not even the fools who think that FEEDING ME will ever make me tame. I will FEAST upon you all.
He snarled, Ursa was silent, save for its mechanized motions. Unlike the developers of Sahaquiel, the bear-like machine was not there to intimidate. It was there to kill. Dread started it now on a bound forwards, followed by it swiping heated fiery claws - left, right, left right - in an effort to rip and tear the enemy NC's defensives to shreds!There wasn't much Zahra could do but attempt to fend off the arms. She had lost her only weapon, all she had on her was defensive measures, and even those were getting rough housed. She took the first few hits with her shield-limbs, backpaving with every hit, though still remaining in the enemies general vicinity. The combined attacks and previous fire damage took a toll, however, as soon the wings stopped reacting as fast, some even failing to respond altogether. Zahra grunted with effort as she took a particularly hard hit to the side, then jumped backwards in an attempt to get a bit of distance so her drones could reign fire from above. She silently started reciting verses from the Quran, fortifying her for what might very well be her last fight in Hisn-ul-Ghayma. She'd go down fighting, at the very least. She prepared herself, reaching to the side and yanking at some rubble to use as a makeshift rock-like weapon.
A rock? A ROCK? He only played with rocks as a means of extending Ursa's own reach, only they were molten wads of disaster, not the piece of some building thrust like a caveman trying to fend off a tiger. As though that could possibly help here... In response to the curious display, the bear actually stopped long enough to hold one of its palms out to project plasma flames at the implement, heating it up considerably and probably breaking it down most handedly.
"Know despair, you lowly creature..."
This was merely a momentary delay, as he quickly allowed a heat purge from Ursa's systems, followed shortly by the machine lowering to all-fours, main engines opening up, and a quick burst of thrust to leap at the other mech! A good slam should show how futile this really was, followed by a good round of mauling, tooth and claw!"I will do no such thing." Zahra uttered as she moved one of her wing tips to cover her fashioned rock. She was nothing compared to this beast in combat, but she'd give it something to remember her by. There wasn't anything she could do defensively as it closed the distance in one massive burst of movement, so instead she opted to fight rather than try to fend off the attacks. Using her wings as a buffer to the claws; though at this point they were all but ruined, she dashed in and in one final attempt of defiance, tried slamming the rock against the underside of the damnable creature's chin, either to damage it or to just generally annoy it, it didn't matter at this point. Her time was coming soon, she might as well make peace with it while she still had the chance.
Ash-hadu an laa ilaha illa Allah,
wa ash-hadu anna Muhammad-ar-Rasulullah.
(I testify that there is no god but Allah,
and Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah.)What might be her final prayer was silently uttered, before she switched to her squad's radio.
"Pilot Chaplain, Oh-Cee, you have command until further notice. Get them all out of this hellhole."A wild creature, this one was. It was hard to conceive of what sort of person existed in that cockpit to act as such, but it did so. Without true thought beyond the moment, with vicious instinct to kill and revel in its deplorable ways. No quarter would be spared, and no mercy could be found. Only the devilish ways of one who seemed to made of pure evil were here today. Remember? Dread would not remember the latest of his viceral conquests. He would not find any impact in his life by the smoldering wreckage of another NC. He would merely find it good and move on to the next foe waiting to be crushed. And with that, he did not let up in his strikes, and that beating the head with the rock only cause it to come down, breathing fire, as the hand ports and the chest ports all unlocked at once to envelope the whole of Hisn-ul-Ghayma in flames. The heat would be too much for its systems to compensate for, and the intense fire would be damaging in the extreme. One way or the other, this fight was about done. Perhaps well-done.And indeed, the fight was over. Hisn, however tough, couldn't handle the overpowering heat, and fell backwards, smouldering, dented, and partially slagged in places, although the pilot compartment somehow managed to remain in-tact. Zahra herself was thoroughly incapacitated, and Hisn wasn't going to be used for a while, if ever.
As one, the drones that were surveying the battlefield fell to the ground, and with them, the real-time 3D feed of said battlefield. Rip Zahra and Hisn.
The roar of gunfire was momentarily interrupted by the sound of a raging Sahaquiel. Under normal circumstances, every pilot on the field would probably take pause and investigate, but they were under attack. To do so would be to invite death. Oh-Cee and the Red Star NC didn’t take their eyes off each other, and continued their fight, both pledging to investigate further once the other lay dead on the ground.
Oh-Cee continued darting around to the sides of the hostile NC, there wasn’t much else she could do. Whenever she got closer, she’d be pushed back yet again by the shear weight of fire coming towards her. The pilot, while probably not as experienced as either Cassius or Oh-Cee, had the advantage due to complete weight of fire. Bullets impacted against buildings as Oh-Cee moved ahead of the spray by half a second, able to keep her speed higher than the enemies aim by just a margin. She fired her shotguns more at every opportunity, and although each one struck the armour, they were either at such an angle to just bounce off, or just outright fail to penetrate more than the outer layer the NCs armour.
She felt a comms line be linked between the two NCs, and she heard a males voice come through to her.
”For fucks… stand still, you maggot! Fight me, stop running!” He sounded frustrated, at the very least. Frustrated, but aware. He was a pilot first and foremost, he was trained to be professional, even when dealing with extreme emotions. He brought his guns around in a cone in an attempt to catch Oh-Cee, but she was faster still, even with him rotating his mech to go with the guns.
”You sound frustrated, Hostile Pilot. Perhaps you should take a moment to cool yoursel-!” Oh-Cee was interupted by a lucky round ricocheting off the building behind her and taking the top part of her head off, pulling a gasp out of her, and a roar of anger from Cassius as his right eye just stopped working as blood rushed to it from the inside. When he opened it next, it was blood red, and had tears welling up on the inside, inhibiting his vision from it so much that he considered him one-eyed for the time being. Though it did help to sober him up a little.
”Th-tha-a-at was r-r-rude. Puni-punishment is deserv-erv-erved.” Oh-Cee stammered as she attempted rerouting power to stop a complete collapse of her systems after the critical hit, not to mention that half of her sensors were just murdered outright. She was half blind, albeit at a more extreme than Cassius. Pressing the opportunity, the enemy pilot swivelled on his axis, and tried leading Oh-Cee by several seconds, and against normal pilots and NCs, that would have worked, but Oh-Cee was nothing but an outlier.
She dropped to the ground, then almost reversed her speed, and darted backwards so fast, that even with all of the inertial dampeners active in her cockpit, Cassius still felt a crack in his back from the utter jolt of the movement.
The enemy pilot was stunned momentarily. Nothing should move that fast, especially not on the ground, right?
That was all Oh-Cee needed. She closed the distance between the two in the second it took for the pilot to shake himself out of his stupor and redirect his guns, and by then she was well within his effective firing range. That being said, she was fast, not impossible to hit. As his guns retargeted, her previously damaged left arm was torn off as a hail of bullets caught her the moment before she made contact with him, getting another pained gasp of pain from the AI, and another roar of anger from Cassius as blood vessels popped all along his arm from the shock. His arm pulsated with pain, and the tips of his fingers started going purple from the horrendous damage that he took. Oh-Cee fared slightly better, though just barely. She had still lost her arm, after all. She fired the last round in her remaining shotgun at the enemy NCs right arm, and at this range, she all but obliterated the gun, and most of his shoulder. She tossed aside the shotgun, then did a leaping run and punched down on the NCs pilot compartment as she came down, knocking him down to the ground, then fell upon him, oil and other fluids leaking out of Oh-Cee’s ruined shoulder. She punched it a couple more times, then positioned her leg in a way that pinned the remaining minigun to the ground, its rounds connecting with the ground and whatever buildings were in the background harmlessly. Small arms fire sputtered off of her torso as the enemy pilot’s anti-infantry mounted LMGs fired at her in a desperate attempt to get her off him, and although they caused grooves and dents in her armour, there wasn’t enough to properly dissuade or damage her more than what she had already gone through. With one final grunt of effort, Oh-Cee drew her knife, and plunged it into the side of the enemy NC, hearing a shrill shriek of fear and pain, before the pilot was silenced, permanently. She pulled out her knife, slick with blood, and put it back into her holster before picking up her discarded shotgun, and started reloading it one-handedly, which, while quite the feat in itself, was nothing compared to the stuff that just went down for her.
”Pi-Pi-Pilot Chaplain, ho-how are you fee-f-f-feeling?” Oh-Cee managed to stammer as she tried dealing with the error reports flooding her artificial mind. The loss of half of her sensors didn’t help, at all.
”Y’know what’m feeling, Cee.” Cassius looked at his ruined arm, which continued getting redder as more blood swelled to the surface of his skin, and grunted in annoyance and dulled pain. He wouldn’t be using that in the next couple minutes, if he survived that long, that is.
”Not usin’ m’arm anytime soon, same with m’eye. Think you can cover me enough?” ”O-Of course, Pilo-Pilot Ch-Cha-Chaplain. I may need s-some repairs after th-th-this. ”Gettit done. How’s errybody else doin’, darlin’?” ”I will check. One moment.” Oh-Cee allowed herself a moment to lean against a ruined building to go through the backlog of radio chatter since both her and Cassius were both much too busy earlier trying to survive to listen to it properly as it came in, and although she hears everything, she deemed it less than important at the time.
And then she listened to everything that happened.
And let out a distorted sigh.
A loud one too.
”Fucken whoreson, whaddawe do, Cee?” Cassius asked as he nursed his arm, which basically oozed blood out of tiny cuts that had formed from the severing of Oh-Cee’s own arm.
”I will ca-call the retreat. We will r-r-retrieve Pil-Pilot Mazgh-Mazghurri, she i-i-is still a-alive, though uncon-unconscious. Is tha-that acceptab-tab-tab-table, Pilot Chaplain?” She responded as she ran several million calculations, most of which came up as errors. Her servos whirled as she began moving once again, casting a glance down at the fallen NC, before she reached down and shoved her hand through the pilot compartment, further mashing the body in an attempt to get to the NC Core. Two seconds later, she pulled out her hand which dripped with pieces of broken human, and in her palm, the precious, beaten, but still functional core. Cassius opened up the cockpit to receive the package, grumbling under his breath about the bits of bone and brain that were scattered over his trousers, but refrained from anything more.
”Leave no-one be’ind, gettit done, Cee. M’too drunk t’think proper.””Of co-course Pilot Chaplain.” Oh-Cee closed her cockpit once more, before opening up a communication line with the rest of the squad.
”Pi-Pilots, you heard our co-commander. Collect o-our fallen comra-comrades and f-fall ba-ba-ba-back. Pilot Ch-Ch-Chaplain and I will c-c-collect Pilot Maz-Mazghurri.” Oh-Cee sent out the message, before she started making her way towards the fallen pilot. The air around tasted a bit more metallic for a second as she once again disappeared off of radar for the second time in one day.
The overall battle itself was almost at a stalemate. Yes, Haven had taken some losses in terms of NCs and overall ground-based armour, but Red Star, despite trained just as well on top of being more numerous than Haven, had taken more losses. They’d lost almost an entire NC battlegroup, and they’d feel that one long after the battle ended, victory or not.
Despite this, Red Star still held air superiority, while Haven itself was digging its heels into the ground and holding Red Star’s ground forces back, even pushing them back in some places. Of course, with the retreat of the allied NCs, that would change, but not straight away. They would hold for a while without support.
(
@AzenExile@FalloutJack@Landaus Five-One@Metatrooper@Scribe of Thoth@Letter Bee@Selvariabell@Senhara@Neozeon0083@ArmorPlated)
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Heckno12