《Legionnaires》Chapter 17, Don't Need Wings To Fly
Advertisement
©Rosayln Cross / MMOGurl 2020-2022. All Rights Reserved. Do not replicate this intellectual property without obtaining my permission.
Static assaulted her ears before Akihiro's desperate words belted over the speakers.
"MISAKI! ENEMY MECHA BEHIND YOU! ENGAGE!!"
The sudden shrillness of sound and Aki's warning had left her feeling jarred into a momentary standstill. She grasped the situation quickly enough though and continued forward while curving around to her left. Mecha were notoriously difficult to turn on a dime and even the most skilled pilots could only muster a circular pivot towards a new direction.
After what felt like an eternity of shifting to about face, Misaki finally sighted the enemy mecha perched on top of the parking garage. It was too far away for her to have a good shot at it. She needed to move closer in order for her particle beams to hit.
She slammed her foot into the pedal and urged the Kuroma forward as fast as it could go. Centering her targeting reticle over the mecha, she scanned for any information that the computer could provide. It spouted out a laundry list of details with a series of little clicks and beeps as a diagram of the mecha overlaid onto her visor.
It was a Sycader. She recognized it from paperwork she had seen at the old mech production facility she used to work at. It was a new model from the competition, created by Sy Systems. The Sycader boasted a ridiculous amount of thrusters that allowed it to fly through the air for an extended amount of time all while armed with two long range plasma cannons. This made it an extremely dangerous foe for the Kuroma's medium to close range build.
Misaki knew she would have to play it aggressive in order to win this fight and continued dashing towards the Sycader until she was withing firing range. She desperately wanted to keep the fight as far away from the Peregrine dropship as she could to ensure it wouldn't wind up as collateral damage.
As she was closing the distance, the Sycader jumped from it's roosting point on top of the garage to a huge cement pillar just ahead of her. Misaki rotated the upper half of the Kuroma's torso towards her adversary and fired off all six lasers at once in the hopes of landing at least a single shot. Burning hot lasers cut into the left side of the Sycader's armor as two lasers hit spot on. She watched as the shining mecha crouched and lifted off again causing the pillar to crack below it's massive force.
Advertisement
The sun blinded Misaki as she tried to maintain visuals on the target without success. She set a course to turn again, just in time to miss the crumbled hunks of rock falling from the ruined column. It was fortunate that she had never stopped moving during the confrontation or she could have sustained serious damage. She still didn't have the Sycader in her sights though and desperately looked around to locate it.
At last, her sensors found the quick moving foe had touched down on top of an unused loading platform off to the side of the runway. Misaki had no choice but to follow him back to the upper level. She wasn't too far off course to adjust and swiftly took off for the ramp. Immense balls of bright blue electricity discharged through the sky leaving a smouldering crater behind her.
If she didn't keep moving, her Kuroma wouldn't last long against the deadly power of the Sycader's weapon load. She recalled how the Plasmacast in Prophet's Reach had completely ruined Fujimori's mecha right before her eyes with three plasma cannons at once. Instead of fear, she felt nothing but anger at everything the rotten Iron Badgers had done. A frothing rage built inside her chest not just for Midori no Mori and her squad, but for everyone's life they had ever ruined.
I won't let them get away with it! The Kuroma crested the surface of the top level and found her mark out of cover. The pilot slammed on the brakes before jumping into the air and propelling itself to the side in a blur of fiery blue rocket fuel. Before it could get too far away, Misaki unloaded her full arsenal into the Sycader again. The shots fell short, but in an incredible stroke of luck one laser hit a thruster at the mecha's feet. Unbalanced, the Sycader twisted to its side before crashing into the concrete. She had shot the wings off this insect and was now closing in for the kill.
Misaki taunted him over the comms, hoping he was listening, "HOW'D YOU LIKE THAT YOU SHIFTY LITTLE FUCK!?" She was fully aware that she sounded unhinged, but didn't care in the slightest. Right now this Sycader stood for everything wrong that had ever happened and she was committed to its eradication. It was all that stood between her and getting off of this planet with Akihiro alive. Everything else could be decided later, but for now the person piloting that particular mecha needed to die.
Advertisement
The Sycader recovered just as she was approaching, but didn't get away without taking four more lasers in the back. Misaki would have used more, but needed to maintain a steady level of heat within the mecha. Running used a lot of power as it was and charging her lasers even more. She had to limit it or face the potential of not only her Kuroma burning up, but also her own body.
As the Sycader ran down the lot, Misaki was surprised when a smarmy, but strangely intelligent male voice called over the speakers. "When I'm done here, I'll make good use of that smart mouth."
I bet he's one of the guys in charge here. "Oh, let me guess," she replied sarcastically. "Gonna make me a slave?"
"An obedient one," the man confirmed as he ran up to the next loading platform and slid behind the dropship that was docked there.
"Baka! That just sounds like motivation to me!" she said in between laughs as she let loose three more orange beams into the dropship itself.
"ARE YOU CRAZY!?" the man cried sounding terrified.
"No," she said with a now stone cold tone. "I'm perfectly sane when I say you are already dead." As one laser recharged, she shot another single beam up through the center of the vertical spaceship. She saw the flare from the fuel tank and grinned wickedly knowing that he would have no choice but to run out from his shelter.
"One less pirate ship. One less place to hide for a worm like you," she mocked him with a threatening tone just as he shot out from behind the ship. She wasn't expecting him to have enough wherewithal to come out shooting though and had no way to dodge the balls of energy that were now plotting towards her.
Unable to lose the chance, she lined up quick and fired everything she had at the ready on his backside. Misaki saw all five orange blazes cut into his back like molten hot lava before her entire windshield was covered in lightning. The cockpit shuddered all around her, shaking heavily from the impact as her heat sensors soared into the red. She heard the sound of another explosion. It was probably the shuttle's tank catching fire, but she couldn't see a thing.
"ALERT, ALERT. NOW INITIATING AUTOMATIC SHUTDOWN IN 3, 2, 1," the computer's voice warned her as the lights turned off and the Kuroma shut down. It was hot as hell inside the cockpit, but not life threatening. She just hoped she had finished that Sycader off with her final shots though or else she was in for a world of pain.
Misaki squinted out the windshield, trying to see through the smoke and flames that covered the strip of concrete before her. The Sycader wasn't anywhere to be seen which was a good sign, but she wished she could actually get visual confirmation.
She could feel the heat dissipating from the cockpit and decided to use the emergency override. Misaki grasped the big red lever tightly and with all of her might hauled it up to bring the engine back online. The Kuroma came back to life as her instruments lit up and she could see that the heat was now at a much tolerable level. She would have to move much slower, but that was fine if it meant she could know it was over.
Misaki lumbered forward, her Kuroma shaking slightly for the damage it had sustained. After passing through the massive smoke cloud from the burning dropship, she saw the broken corpse of the Sycader at her feet. "Told you, shithead. Already dead," she said to herself out loud. There was no need to call out over the comms.
She turned and moved as quickly as she could back towards the ramp without building too much heat. Misaki hoped that Akihiro was doing alright and that they could finally get off of this planet. No more setbacks! I'm coming! As her systems dipped back into the green, she was finally able to go full speed back to him.
Advertisement
Immersion
A lover of stories, Mono has always preferred reading or writing about characters and their conflicts over dealing with his own. One night, he wakes up to an insane, yet familiar scene from a story he has read: a grey room, a goddess, and a journey to a fantasy-like world. Forced to leave Earth and survive in the other world for a year, Mono explores magic rooted in human perception while he confronts issues both external and internal.
8 230Song of the Unborn
Let me tell you a story A story about a beautiful song And those who sing it Alright, time for the real synopsis: Song of the Unborn takes place in a bleak and dark universe. The world is broken and unbalanced. Dark creatures roam the lands and the order that once existed as a beacon of hope has crumbled. Kalosýni is one of people who live in this cursed world, but thanks to the efforts of his father, he led a sheltered life. However, an unexpected cry on a seemingly normal night leads to a journey that will lead Kalos, his father and a pregnant woman on a journey across the kingdom of Faacri. UPDATE FOR BOOK 2 (Warning!!! Spoilers ahead.) Book 2, or Throne of the Lords kicks off right where we left off. A dark figure is claiming to be the dark lord, one prophesied to be the bringer of the apocalypse has appeared. But is there truth to the prophecy and how will Kalos, Raymond and company react to all this? FINAL UPDATE: The book is over... the part about Kalosýni. I just have a few side chapters to dump on you and boom, done. Hehe, it's been one helluva ride. ANNOUNCEMENT FOR POTENTIAL PATRONS: I think I'm ready to take the next step with this story of mine. Anyone interested in supporting my ambitious endeavours should follow the Patreon link. What will I be doing exactly? I really want Song of the Unborn to exist in as many mediums as possible and so, after publishing the novel on Amazon, I'm planning on creating a graphic novel version and we'll finally be able to see Kalosýni in all his glory. Well, that's my goal anyway.
8 98Daniel Haley and the Immortal Ninja
For thousands of years, the ninja have ruled the world in secret, orchestrating history and protecting humanity from the strange creatures that lurk in the shadows and beings with extraordinary abilities. So far, they’ve done an impeccable job. The humans are convinced that they live in an average world.But all of that is about to change.Our unseen guardians are being overwhelmed and the planet is rapidly succumbing to chaos as the climate changes, the enemies of the ninja grow stronger, and everything the ninja fought to keep hidden threatens to break loose.The ninja have sent Katherine Carvosso to recruit humanity’s best hope for survival—a clumsy and socially dysfunctional seventeen-year-old Daniel Haley.Of course, Daniel figures this must all be the world’s best prank—until he sees Katherine tearing the roofs off of cars with her bare hands, bounding over impossible distances, and somehow having the power to create earthquakes.Daniel has no idea the fate of the world rests on his shoulders. All he wants is to find a way to win over the girl of his dreams.Will he get his head out of the clouds and save us, or will he let the Earth burn chasing after his heart?
8 149I'm Definitely Not an Assassin
Just because I have dark skin doesn't mean I can effortlessly blend in the night,right?Right? The adventure of a black man as an assassin in a shitty world. [There will be more cover art.]
8 158Adobe Flash Player: Saying Goodbye
It's been a long run. After December 2020, Adobe Flash Player, mainly known for the start of browser games/animations, will shut down. Follow along as you read the future of CoolMathGames and MIT Media Lab (Scratch) after the Flash 2020 shutdown. (After Flash shuts down, I'll most likely archive or delete the book)
8 175The Bond of Three
Ash was a - mostly - normal adult who'd spent the last year of her life looking for a job. Then, she unexpectedly experiences what was happening to someone else. It's like this; she gets slapped, the other person feels it. The other person goes to sleep, she can see their dreams in the back of her head. Who is linked to her and how does she find them? Just after everything seems all good and well, she and her link discover something huge.
8 69