[b]Solarel[/b] She raises her arms, wrist shield flashing to life just in time for the shot, but even with that, there’s a sound of crunching metal as the impact presses her back, and for an instant, the combination of heat and pure kinetic force throws the entire Supernova off balance. In a situation like this, you’d typically estimate that the battle would be over. The target vulnerable, unable to respond to its own pilot, ought to be a death knell in a situation like this. You have an easy follow up for subsequent shots. But…there’s a high-pitched humming and crackling noise and suddenly the Supernova is surrounded by coruscating white energy, animating its limbs and letting it move with a suddenness that throws off the follow up shot. It shouldn’t be possible to start moving again that fast. Her shoulder laser, previously fired in a shot-gun style burst, shifts position at the same time and sends a focused, long-range shot back at you, followed by several others. “Not every Hybrasilian wanted to be in those fights, you know. Not all of them wanted to face a demon. You didn’t give them the courtesy of retreat though, did you? Didn’t ask if they wanted to be there, or why they were there. You struck most of them before they even knew you were coming. And now you tried to do the same to me. I didn’t think you needed to do this in the Aeteline. It’s one thing to employ traps and cunning when you know you’re piloting a vastly inferior machine. It’s another to decide you’re not willing to abide by any expectations of how pilots match skill. I wanted this to be a traditional fight! I wanted to see what kind of pilot you were! And you’ve shown me. And now I see that I don’t owe you any respect or reservation, Solarel.” She maintains her altitude as well: the firing angle is better and makes it more difficult if you decide to dodge. It’s not that she’s overwhelming you, you’re still in an advantageous position to trade shots with her, it’s just that she’s fully embraced the style of fight you’ve offered, entirely dropping the standard Hybrasilian close-ranged approach that you’d expect to be more typical. And at least for a moment, this extra energy she’s somehow wielding is giving her a different edge, offering her a speed and unpredictability of airborne movement that can thwart even the Aeteline’s tracking and firepower as you trade blows. [Maelia takes the guilty condition, and also seizes a (different) superior position.] *** [b]Mirror[/b] Mirror, that effort with the sword lights up tail five. Only five, all by itself, adding it to one, two, and seven. The display bar cut itself short, reset. Maybe this is a modification of the program, or maybe it was always set up to have this sort of option? But either way, it feels like tail five wants a turn with the new weapon, and is jumping at the chance to do something. [b]Dolly, and Jade[/b] Jade, or Dolly. Mirror’s made herself visible intentionally. That much is obvious enough. Whichever of you chooses to take physical control, you have this chance where you know her precise location and she does not know yours. She’s practically begging you to throw her your best shot. *** [b]Isabelle[/b] “Oh that was a good one!” comes the shout. There’s an enthusiasm, but also a gravel to it suddenly. You’ve shown your position, after all, and filled her with energy. And she was already moving to boot. Marna grabs the largest piece of debris she can reach and flings it at your deflector that bounced the laser into her at maximum speed, crushing it completely. But there are more deflectors, of course. Many more, full of tactics. But she’s already grabbing another metal boulder as she rushes. Flinging that one around as she banks. In this debris field, with the force she’s outputting, the throws not only strike your equipment as she finds it, but deflect and rebound and send other debris bouncing. The Emberlight is many things, but it’s not the heaviest mecha out there. And what you’ve suddenly facing is the entire battlefield turning into an undulating, chaotic wave shifting towards you. Always towards you. Because Marna, for all her chaos, has your location clocked and she’s tracking you now as you try to move and reposition. Her throws are always with you in mind, building up momentum in the field to make the whole thing a chaotic mess. One block of jagged slag races just past the head of the Emberlight, and you’re forced to burn a shot on another that’s headed straight for you in order to break it up. And as for Marna herself, though she’s rushing about madly, now changing direction, now burning hard and straight, she’s also working her way towards you, riding the wave she created, bearing down on you for an assault, changing to track as you try to flee and ready to intercept if you try to break out from the cover that the debris offers you even as it attacks you. Tactics are all well and good, but you’ll need to do something to counter the overwhelming force being directed at you now. [Marna takes Angry and wrecks the field in new and interesting ways to seize a superior position.] *** [b]Angela[/b] Your plan was amazing. The Jormungar, for all its armor and shielding, does indeed need to do something about missiles. Missiles are dangerous and powerful and even Marcina can’t just eat the whole thing. She has to put energy into defense, has to subtly shift her movement to space out the impacts a little bit, and that gives you a chance. The autocannon fire focuses on the wrist joint, and the combination of the explosive heat and the sustained focus as you close breaks the shields, which can’t be concentrated that narrowly, cutting through the hand and the blade with it. The powerful laser blade blows clear of the tumble as the two of you close. Oh yes, this one will go in the piloting handbooks. Absolute best possible use of resources available concentrated in a narrow time window, perfectly optimized. Nobody could find fault with the efficiency with which you accomplished your goal, and future students will view this maneuver as the archetype on which to base high-technical skill missile combat. No, the problem is that the goal you wanted to accomplish is not what you needed to win. Marcina fires one additional thruster and suddenly the Jormungar is rotating at the same time as it’s charging. The kick hits you so hard and so unexpectedly that the neural mesh doesn’t have time to do the full reduction of energy transfer and you feel a sharp pain that probably means you just cracked a rib. Warning sensors blare, indicating that the pilot’s compartment has been compromised and is exposed to external fire. The blast from her own shoulder missile, fired point-blank, perhaps in a sort of salute to the superiority of your tactics, hits hard enough to send the Owl tumbling head over heels, and the compromised cockpit causes you to feel the heat before you’re pushed away, lightly singeing your hair and eyebrows. Nor does she wait for you to recover and stabilize the fight. The follow up strike from her punch sends you careening into the ground, and then she lands with a foot against your back, pinning you in place (though mercifully, she did not further crush the mecha or cause you any bodily injury. She probably knows her hit could do that and held off just a hair once she had the superior position). This fight is effectively over, though you’ve lost with queenly dignity.