𝙸𝚝 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚕𝚒𝚔𝚎 𝚊 𝚖𝚒𝚛𝚊𝚌𝚕𝚎, 𝙺𝚕𝚎𝚘'𝚜 𝚕𝚒𝚝𝚝𝚕𝚎 𝚖𝚒𝚛𝚊𝚌𝚕𝚎 𝚊𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚖𝚎𝚍𝚒𝚌𝚊𝚕 𝚋𝚊𝚐 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚍𝚎𝚜𝚒𝚐𝚗𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚍 '𝚑𝚞𝚖𝚊𝚗' 𝚖𝚎𝚍𝚒𝚌 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚜𝚕𝚘𝚠𝚕𝚢 𝚙𝚞𝚜𝚑𝚎𝚍 𝚝𝚘𝚠𝚊𝚛𝚍𝚜 𝙰𝚕𝚒𝚌𝚎 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚑𝚎𝚛 𝚝𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚊𝚌𝚕𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚜. 𝙸𝚏 𝚘𝚗𝚕𝚢 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝙰𝚕𝚒𝚎𝚗 𝚠𝚊𝚗𝚝𝚎𝚍 𝚝𝚘 𝚕𝚘𝚘𝚔 𝚊 𝚋𝚒𝚝 𝚍𝚎𝚎𝚙𝚎𝚛, 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝚜𝚑𝚎 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚕𝚎𝚏𝚝 𝚝𝚘 𝚗𝚞𝚛𝚜𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚗𝚘𝚝-𝚍𝚢𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝚜𝚚𝚞𝚒𝚜𝚑𝚢 𝙺𝚕𝚎𝚘 𝙰𝚕𝚟𝚎𝚜 𝚊𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚙𝚊𝚛𝚝-𝚍𝚛𝚘𝚙𝚜𝚑𝚒𝚙 𝙼𝚎𝚍𝚒𝚌 𝚕𝚊𝚒𝚍 𝚍𝚘𝚠𝚗 𝚌𝚘𝚞𝚐𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚠𝚑𝚎𝚎𝚣𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚒𝚗 𝚙𝚊𝚒𝚗. 𝙾𝚑 𝚢𝚎𝚜, 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚙𝚊𝚒𝚗, 𝚒𝚝 𝚠𝚊𝚜𝚗'𝚝 𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚢 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝚜𝚘 𝚠𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚜𝚘 𝚖𝚊𝚗𝚢 𝚘𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚜 𝚒𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚕𝚒𝚏𝚎. 𝚂𝚑𝚎 𝚍𝚒𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚏𝚎𝚎𝚕 𝚜𝚊𝚏𝚎, 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝚒𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚢 𝚌𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍 𝚊𝚟𝚘𝚒𝚍 𝚊 𝚖𝚎𝚍-𝚎𝚟𝚊𝚌 𝚖𝚊𝚢𝚋𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚢 𝚠𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍 𝚘𝚏 𝚊𝚕𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚍𝚢 𝚐𝚘𝚝 𝚑𝚎𝚛 𝚐𝚞𝚗𝚐-𝚑𝚘 𝚊𝚜𝚜 𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚏𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝚊𝚕𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚍𝚢. 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝚊𝚛𝚝𝚒𝚕𝚕𝚎𝚛𝚢 𝚑𝚊𝚍 𝚝𝚘 𝚏𝚒𝚛𝚎 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚊𝚜 𝚕𝚘𝚗𝚐 𝚊𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚠𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚛𝚘𝚋𝚘𝚝𝚜 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝙰𝙸 𝚔𝚒𝚌𝚔𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚊𝚛𝚘𝚞𝚗𝚍 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚓𝚘𝚋 𝚠𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍 𝚋𝚎 𝚍𝚘𝚗𝚎, 𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚑 𝚘𝚛 𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚑𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚑𝚎𝚛.

𝙿𝚞𝚕𝚕𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚊 𝚗𝚒𝚖𝚋𝚕𝚎 𝚌𝚒𝚐𝚊𝚛𝚎𝚝𝚝𝚎 𝚏𝚛𝚘𝚖 𝚑𝚎𝚛 𝚙𝚊𝚌𝚔𝚎𝚝 𝚜𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚕𝚘𝚠𝚕𝚢 𝚕𝚒𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚍𝚊𝚖𝚗𝚎𝚍 𝚝𝚘𝚋𝚊𝚌𝚌𝚘-𝚛𝚒𝚍𝚍𝚎𝚗 𝚙𝚛𝚘𝚍𝚞𝚌𝚝 𝚊𝚜 𝚜𝚑𝚎 𝚒𝚗𝚑𝚊𝚕𝚎𝚍 𝚊 𝚎𝚌𝚜𝚝𝚊𝚜𝚢 𝚘𝚏 𝚜𝚖𝚘𝚔𝚎, 𝚝𝚘𝚋𝚊𝚌𝚌𝚘 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚖𝚘𝚛𝚎 𝚜𝚖𝚘𝚔𝚎. "𝚂𝚘 𝚑𝚊𝚛𝚍 𝚝𝚘 𝚏𝚒𝚗𝚍 𝚐𝚘𝚘𝚍 𝚑𝚎𝚕𝚙.." 𝚂𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚊𝚒𝚍 𝚊𝚜 𝚜𝚑𝚎 𝚔𝚒𝚗𝚍𝚕𝚢 𝚠𝚒𝚜𝚑𝚎𝚍 𝚏𝚘𝚛 𝚊 𝚖𝚘𝚛𝚎 𝚛𝚞𝚐𝚐𝚎𝚍, 𝚖𝚊𝚕𝚎 𝚑𝚞𝚖𝚊𝚗 𝚖𝚎𝚍𝚒𝚌 𝚝𝚘 𝚋𝚎 𝚝𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚑𝚎𝚛 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚗𝚘𝚝 𝙰𝚕𝚒𝚌𝚎 𝚖𝚊𝚢𝚋𝚎 𝚒𝚏 𝚜𝚑𝚎 𝙾𝙳'𝚍 𝚘𝚛 𝚏𝚕𝚊𝚝-𝚕𝚒𝚗𝚎𝚍 𝚑𝚎 𝚠𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍 𝚊𝚙𝚙𝚎𝚊𝚛. 𝙽𝚎𝚡𝚝 𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎, 𝚖𝚊𝚢𝚋𝚎.

Manageable meant manageable. The more severely wounded members of the Envenomed squad were not on the point of shortly bleeding out quite yet, and Ilshar supposed this was well enough. He still found it difficult to gauge how badly off an organism that was capable of bleeding out at all might be, but experience had taught him that if no large chunks were missing, odds were they could make it with someone to carry them to safety.

“Inject her. I doubt any medical point the League might’ve had here survived our attack, or that extraction is at hand yet.” He stepped back, leaving room for Alice and Kleo to clamber onto the helpfully sloped Warform as the eyes looking upward from his shoulders uneasily followed the cannon’s arcing shots. Something whispered to him that the thing was foul in its virulent mechanized channeling, perhaps even blasphemous. By the Nexus’ will it would not be standing much longer if battle broke out again on the hill.

As it seemed it would.

“So we’re doing that.” Ilshar did not address Rasch, or the squad’s handler, as he idly growled over the comms, so much as himself. The suspicion had been with him for some time, and bitterly enough it did not surprise him to see it confirmed. On Enthuur, the Dominion had at least refrained from bombing their presumptive allies, but the Intransigence had no stake in territory, did it? He wasn’t sure of what its interests were, really - keeping a low-intensity conflict going as long as the UCL’s operations were thwarted, he imagined, or something along those lines. He should not have cared much, either; he had only ever fought for his world, and Zanovia was not it. What happened to the ZRF should have been no business of his. And still, the whole thing tasted like poison in his mouth.

No time for recrimination now, however. CivSec and their allies would not be grateful for any incidental aid. His gun in his hands, Ilshar loped back towards the treeline he had used as cover at the very beginning of the assault on the League’s position, placing the dropship’s wreckage between himself and the lower slope. As luck would have it, the ZRF seemed to mostly still be on that side as well, and would perhaps be the first to take the brunt of the approaching new hostile - if they were not too fast to turn their weapons on the Envenomed, that was.

Jubilation had overtaken their allies, raging with the same intensity as the wounds blighting the flesh of realspace. Where the icons of imperial domination once stood was the bleeding pollution of ethereal distortion, tearing metal, foliage, dirt, and implant-ridden flesh alike. A hated enemy reduced to even less than the term should allow; what need did they have to even pay attention to their allies - their means to an end? Yet it had been done with their help; the revolutionaries were dogged and harsh as living under the boot of membranous and pink-fleshed frequently was, but they liked to think of themselves as a different stripe.

"Friends, friends of the Struggle! Now, those who died before us can rest with the footfall of our dancing in their ears, not the rumble of their armor!" The sound of the gealtirocht leader's hand slapping the upper back of Salvator went out with an audible clunk. The tone of stern vitriol had vanished; alien still to ears both human and post-human, but bereft of the tone that felt accusatory even if solely aimed at the occupiers.

"Our mission is finished! No need to bother with this hunk of junk. Why, maybe we can recover it for our own means, at the very least as a trophy!"

He was too focused on interrupting himself, pausing to shout and banter with his surviving friends. Many of them had taken out personal hand-phones - cheap, off-world, and just from a glance unsightly with the various modifications they'd no doubt had their own engineers install. The little clicks of their phone apps going off in sequence could barely be heard above their celebrating, the cameras like a tiny pitter-patter of clapping and applause to the cacophony of their joy.

His eyes were not following the inputting into the control panel of the artillery cannon; the way the weapon shifted and groaned barely garnered attention from the surviving insurrectionists, even as the barrel began to shift. Until, it had shifted too much and Salvator said what he said.

In the brief moment before Salvator vanished from where he once stood, he would not have required the most advanced scanners to know the way the eel-like being's features had twisted.

His comrades had turned, hearing the blink, seeing their allies suddenly falling back, and feeling, hearing, dreading the way the dots had fallen into place.

"You... all along you were-"

The cannon fired and silenced the leader's voice, a wash of ethereal power coming over them. Some had fallen onto their knees, phones dropped, watching as the same wrath that had given them historic victory now stole the taste of victory from the battlefield. The bunker, a fare more diminuitive structure than the mobile command center or repurposed stadium, was not silhouetted against the birth of a wrathful sun. Neither did the support trucks and their convoy; with the same uncaring judgement of the beyond, there was but a near-perfect inverted-dome crater.

There was no time to watch the scurrying of horrified, shocked Front forces; now tasting the same horror inflicted onto their tyrants in a cruel twist. Their weapons would speak.

Near immediately, a rail-cannon swung forth and zeroed in on the largest, heaviest target - the same one that had formed the bulwark of their advance. Rifle fire and grenades flew as readily as howling rage, too incoherent for speech as language and round flew with equal intent. A few rounds glanced the unztadtlige's armor, a few clanging against its bulk - rattling armor, but brusing rather than cracking. Semi-automatic weapons appeared to turn automatic, a torrent of blasts erupting as the traitors fell back.

A crackle over the coms; friendly, but blurred, grainy, unclear doubly so over the retaliatory barrage sent from former allies.

"-Active jamming! We can't track your location, ghost data-"

A sound like a whistle tinged first with a loud thud. Before even enhanced senses and ocular capability could detect it, two human bodies simply vanished; clouds of fizzling mist and squirming innards leaving two torsos standing. Two trees in front of the Envenomed squad's retreat simply lost massive chunks of mass around their middle; bark exploding outwards as if tinder, sending bramble and branches crashing down before them.

"-Unit! I repeat, specialist-"

One of the humans leapt out of the way, rolling away from a torrent of smoke-trails slamming in a v-shaped line. Anti-personnel rounds shred three more survivors - comrades became skeletal remains, tattered centipede-like creatures holding onto bits of bodily mass and armor, the other surviving gealtirocht a pincushion for serrated, whirring shrapnel-saws slowly powering down as if fattened on anguilline meat and juice.

The one who jumped gripped his midsection; the pain of re-attaching to the lower torso was punishing. His aim was shakey - cracking off two spiteful shots at the Envnomed, before he ducked again.

"-Bile! Can't land until-"

One last scream of anger as the same weapon that pulped the first victims fires; this close, it was a piercing report, a firecracker in the lower registers - a deep gavel pound rather than celebratory popping. The gealtirocht's voice vanished as did his body; raw physical shock from a massive automatic rifle-cannon overwhelmed reinforced armor. Turned to a footnote in history before his body even fully became a scattered mess of multicolored, moist matter and electrcuting armor fragments. The hellish spray of gunfire swept over the battlefield and the rest of the ZRF vanished behind it. No silence stilled the battlefield as dirt and debris rained, a counter-rhythm against the pounding, heavy footfalls of an approaching threat.

A shipping container groaned as a mammoth forced knocked over, the jutting tail-fins of the burning gunship swatted away with even less trouble soon after. Through the smoke of its judgement, it stomped through.





What stomped through did so as thruster jets on the back of it shoulders powered down, blue anti-grav pulsations diminishing as wheels on the edge of its boot-like feet retract, stability prioiritized over speed. At 26 feet tall, it was even denser in its bulk than the warform even if its two visible weapons were notably smaller. A preliminary scan revealed missile pods stored in its shoulder but soon, electronic disruption makes such things difficult - something on its body is deliberately targeting them their coms and combat electronics. The former was silenced yet the latter can only struggle.

Given by the muddy-looking smears on its knees and hands, combined with the crude graffiti of a string of triangular, mantis-like heads impaled on a sword with a wingled handle, it's clear it had been very busy even before it was called over.

The heavy duty "machine gun" in its arms locked onto the warform immediately and fired, not just at the Envenomed but through the trees they are putting between themselves. A few rounds slammed into Echo's multipedal body; they did not pierce, glancing hits, but they hit hard enough to stagger the massive warmachine. Its shoulder-mounted cannon swivels around; it points at Ilshar's general direction... but it seemed to avoid aiming at him deliberately. Perhaps it was unable detect his specific location - the camera-pod sitting atop of its shoulder mounted cannon scanned the area. The weapon thudded out its judgement - HE-shells flew as close as within 15 feet of the hidden tarrhaidim, annihilating whatever foliage was behind him, lighting up the woods as the massive machine advanced!

𝙺𝚕𝚎𝚘 𝚏𝚘𝚞𝚗𝚍 𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚜𝚎𝚕𝚏 𝚑𝚊𝚞𝚕𝚎𝚍 𝚒𝚗𝚝𝚘 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚋𝚊𝚌𝚔 𝚘𝚏 𝙴𝚌𝚑𝚘, 𝚜𝚑𝚎 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚒𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚊𝚜𝚜-𝚎𝚗𝚍 𝚘𝚏 𝚊 𝚝𝚊𝚗𝚔. 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝙴𝚌𝚑𝚘, 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚛𝚘𝚋𝚘𝚝 𝚠𝚑𝚘 𝚍𝚒𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚓𝚞𝚍𝚐𝚎 𝚊𝚝 𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚝 𝚜𝚑𝚎 𝚌𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍 𝚑𝚊𝚟𝚎 𝚜𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚛𝚎𝚕𝚒𝚊𝚋𝚒𝚕𝚒𝚝𝚢 𝚠𝚑𝚎𝚗 𝚒𝚝 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚎𝚜 𝚝𝚘 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚊𝚞𝚝𝚘𝚖𝚊𝚝𝚘𝚗𝚜 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚐𝚛𝚘𝚞𝚙. 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚚𝚞𝚒𝚍/𝚊𝚕𝚒𝚎𝚗 𝚕𝚊𝚍𝚢 𝚍𝚛𝚊𝚐𝚐𝚎𝚍 𝚑𝚎𝚛 𝚒𝚗 𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚑 𝚑𝚎𝚛 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚜, 𝚜𝚑𝚎 𝚍𝚒𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚕𝚒𝚔𝚎 𝚋𝚎𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚍𝚛𝚊𝚐𝚐𝚎𝚍 𝚒𝚗𝚝𝚘 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚎𝚊𝚝 𝚠𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚜𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚊𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚕𝚒𝚔𝚎 𝚊 𝚕𝚒𝚖𝚙 𝚏𝚒𝚜𝚑 𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚘𝚏 𝚠𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚛. 𝙰𝚕𝚕 𝚜𝚑𝚎 𝚌𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍 𝚍𝚘 𝚊𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚖𝚘𝚖𝚎𝚗𝚝 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚍𝚛𝚊𝚠 𝚋𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚝𝚑 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚛𝚎𝚏𝚕𝚎𝚌𝚝 𝚘𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚒𝚝𝚞𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚒𝚝 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚊 𝚜𝚑𝚒𝚝𝚝𝚢 𝚜𝚒𝚝𝚞𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗. 𝚂𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚊𝚠 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚊𝚕𝚒𝚎𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚙𝚕𝚊𝚒𝚗 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚜𝚑𝚘𝚠 𝚌𝚘𝚗𝚌𝚎𝚛𝚗 𝚊𝚋𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚑𝚎𝚛 𝚖𝚎𝚍𝚒𝚌𝚊𝚕 𝚜𝚝𝚊𝚝𝚎, 𝚝𝚑𝚘𝚞𝚐𝚑 𝚜𝚑𝚎 𝚍𝚒𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚠𝚊𝚗𝚝 𝚖𝚘𝚛𝚎 𝚜𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚜 𝚘𝚛 𝚒𝚗𝚓𝚎𝚌𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗𝚜. 𝙳𝚢𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚋𝚎𝚌𝚊𝚞𝚜𝚎 𝚜𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚇𝚎𝚗𝚘 𝚍𝚒𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚔𝚗𝚘𝚠 𝚑𝚞𝚖𝚊𝚗 𝚋𝚒𝚘𝚕𝚘𝚐𝚢 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚜𝚑𝚒𝚝𝚝𝚢, 𝚜𝚒𝚝𝚝𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚌𝚘𝚗𝚟𝚞𝚕𝚜𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚍𝚢𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚗 𝚠𝚘𝚛𝚜𝚎.

"𝙽𝚘 𝚖𝚘𝚛𝚎 𝚜𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚜, 𝚎𝚕𝚜𝚎 𝚒𝚝'𝚜 𝚐𝚘𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚒𝚗𝚝𝚘 𝚢𝚘𝚞. 𝙱𝚕𝚘𝚠 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚖𝚎𝚌𝚑'𝚜 𝚌𝚊𝚖 𝚘𝚏𝚏 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚕𝚎𝚝'𝚜 𝚓𝚎𝚝."

The voidhanger emerged from his last warp utterly exhausted and crumpled flat on the ground, albeit in cover. Salvator would have loved nothing more than to have a few breaths to even try to recover, but judging by the comms, that wasn't in the cards. Void Jesus, what an awful day this was. He groaned, forcing himself to reach into one of his pouches and pull out a combat stim, administering it through a port in his armor. Almost immediately, temporary adrenaline flowed through Salvator, and he scrambled up to a crouch, leveling his carbine at the walker from behind cover.

Right. Judging from what the cut-off comms had said, extraction wasn't an option until they'd at least cleared the air, both physically and electronically. Echo's warform was the best option they had against the damn thing, but its machine gun alone was staggering the warform. Damn. They still had wounded inside the warform too. The kid hadn't done much to endear herself to...well, anyone so far. But that didn't mean he was just gonna let her die. First things first.

"Rasch, squad." He tapped back into comms, boosting the signal as much as possible to try to cut through the jamming at close range. "Issuing orders: Echo, pull the warform back. Get that siege cannon of yours warmed up as soon as possible. I'm starting an active scan for weaknesses now." Salvator did as he said, frowning at what he saw. Or was able to, anyway.

"It's got poor visual confirmation. Looks like that camera pod up above it's the only eyes it has." A quick mental stock of the available roster: Kleo was out. Alice was tending to her. Ilshar was pinned down. Echo's warform was commanded to retreat and fire up the cannon. That left the endoform. Salvator scowled to himself as he loaded a fresh AP mag and coated it in ethereal jacketing before he lined up sights on the camera pod. EMP was tempting, but there wasn't a chance in hell the mech wasn't EMP-shielded, especially against bluescreen rounds from small-arms fire.

"Ilshar, I'm going to run interference. Might get lucky and blind it entirely. Soon as it stops firing on you, get to a more defensible position. Echo, send the endoform out here to run backup, we're dangerously low on manpower. Alice, the second Kleo's not in danger of bleeding out, we need you back in the fight. Opening fire!"

He opened up with his carbine, firing several repeated three-round bursts at the camera pod before starting to reposition while behind cover. Couldn't chance more ethereal strain at the moment, otherwise evasion would be far easier.

Acknowledged. Warform falling back. crackled Echo's hollow voice as the Warform began to pull away from the battlefield, it's cargo of wounded crew safely aboard despite the harsh impacts to the hull. In front of them was the battle mech, and behind them were the ZRF, so the Warform began shifting perpendicular, at least relative to their position. Alert. Main cannon damaged. Charging efficacy reduced. Alert. Warform ocular sensor damaged. Targeting efficacy reduced. Recommend. Laser targeting designation.

Had the squad been fresh, the new threat might not have been too difficult for the them to handle, but with the power armor and gunship having worn down their resources and the squad sustaining damage, they weren't in the best position. Still, they outnumbered the mech, and were already far enough away from the ZRF that they might have enough time to focus fire the target down and pull away. Or, at the very least they could disable the machine to a point that they could commit to a breakthrough. Still, with half the squad onboard the Warform, and the other in a compromised position, they still had quite a bit to do.

Acknowledged. Deploying Endoform. The scavenged weaponry from the power armor trooper was unceremoniously dumped into Echo's main hold with Kleo and Alice as the Endoform once again separated from it's main body, Taking one of the autocannons as it's primary armament for the deployment. It was tempting to send out some of the microform as well, as a distraction, but with injured onboard Echo decided keeping as many defensive weapons available to the main body was the appropriate course of action.

Leaping out of the "skull" of the Warform, the Endoform bounded back towards the fight, moving in an opposite arc as Rasch drew its fire. Without waiting for further command, the Endoform planted its feet for a moment before firing a prolonged burst from it's rotary autocannon, showering the mechanized threat with a hail of guided bio-shells at it. Without missing a beat, the Endoform picked up and scooted a few more yards before planting itself down and firing again. While it was possible that enough conctrated fire could bring the mech down, the Envenomed didn't have time for another battle of attrition. Instead of the main body, Echo primarily targeted the enemy weapon systems, seeking to render them useless.

Alert. Extended engagement inadvisable. Recommend. Tactical Retreat.

Almost as suddenly as that, the forest around Ilshar turned into an inferno. What little vengeful fire from the surviving - momentarily - ZRF troops had been directed his way, or at least against those Envenomed other than Echo, went well wide, but the barrage that heralded the arrival of the League walker was another matter entirely. He halted in his tracks as the mechanical giant neatly cut off the squad’s retreat path, crouching low to the ground as thumping autocannon fire shook the earth uncomfortably close by. Extraction seemed out of the question right now, since even without the jamming playing hell with their comms boarding a dropship with this thing loose would have been suicidal, so the walker getting in their way was not so much of a problem. More urgent was finding any way to evade something that clearly and badly outmassed and outgunned them.

Blazing heat washed over him, cannonfire shredding patches of woodland into ashen waste a mere breath away. The Nexus’ spore-breath must have veiled the walker’s lifeless eyes, or else Ilshar’s spirit would already have been on its way to Its many-toothed maw. A miracle was all it could be; few times had he avoided sudden death so narrowly; but miracles would only come to those who fended for themselves. He would not survive if that gun kept on for much longer, Ilshar thought as he tried to steady his aim through the quivering brush, despite the alarming sensations slithering through his inner augmentic web as his battered body fought to dissipate the thermal shock, and the lesser but more concrete annoyance of charred debris pelting over him. That cannon could easily pulp him through a tree trunk, and it was only a matter of fire saturation before a shell caught him. Both exposing himself by trying to rush for better cover and staying put and praying would lead to the same grim end.

Fortunately, the rest of the squad still on their feet were mostly doing better than him.

“Ready to move, if it goes that well. Careful, this thing must have more than just optical.” The Chasm only knew where Rasch was from, but Ilshar couldn’t help but feel a little grateful for the voidhanger’s being able to keep a steady head. “Echo’s right, we can’t hope for better than crippling it. We should make a break for it soon as we can knock out its sensors.”

And that might be too late if he didn’t do his part. A simple look, as far as he dared peek from behind the tree he had taken as cover, confirmed his thoughts. The walker’s only cameras might have been on its shoulder pod, but what passed for the vehicle’s head must have served some purpose, and he was certain enough he had seen at least one antenna protruding from it. The tarrhaidim leaned out a second time, now further and bolder, and fired a burst at the walker’s head before hurriedly stepping backward from the tree. He could not hope to hit an antenna at this range, but if it was part of the ‘mech’s audio-sensor suite or something similar, distracting it with the feedback from some close shots was the best he could currently do while the rest of the Envenomed struck at its vulnerable points.

The warmachine stomped forward not with clumsy lumbering but a deliberate, predatory gait. Every step was measured in a machine-economy of motion but its movements belied a fluidity not often associated with warmachines; human-like in the degree of articulation of every step and the shifting of its digits across its enormous rifle-weapon, fluid and lacking the stutter-stop of a proper robotic construct. There was a living being inside of it and one that appeared supremely confident in its capability for eliminating the retreating Envenomed squad. It did not even turn its body as its shoulder mounted canon fired another salvo, briefly illuminating Ilshar in the dawn-bright blast of its explosive shells. The swiveling camera atop the turret froze and tracked them, the canon itself preparing to line-up a shot.

Noticing its quarry retreating from the League outpost, the machine's pace sped up and one could almost feel the malevolent excitement no doubt welling in the pilot. Yet its immense stature and capability for destruction came with a few caveats. The flames, debris, and dust it kicked up even from missed shots cratering the earth or annihilating vegetation made it difficult to see smaller targets. A voidhanger laying prone was easily mistaken for other bodies broken or crushed beneath its feet and the debris laying about whether artificial or natural.

Salvator's HUD immediately noted a number of distinctive characteristics of the machine, highlighting a dome-like space around its body and the shield-like plating on its right shoulder. The former caused his HUD to blur and distort a few times - some sort of disruptive field, likely electro-magnetic in nature or otherwise with some sort of disruptive capability, presumably working as shielding or target jamming. Yet given by its strength and the particular output, it seemed designed to disrupt weapons fire, presumably just directed energy or beam and similar types, and the armor itself while tough didn't seem indestructible.

The source of this was behind the shield - in the shoulder itself, but connecting to its "shield" which seemed to amplify its effects. Analysis concluded that solid rounds would likely do much better or entirely ignore this barrier; perhaps that is why it was so intent on separating them from the outpost they had previously raided.

It appeared its thrusters were currently cooling down; it had rushed all the way here and might not be able to use them for maybe a minute. There appealed to be wheel-like contraptions within its dense legs; likely to be used in conjunction but as they moved further from the base and towards the slopes they had travelled up, it appeared to be preparing them for usage again. Its balance upon them seemed precarious; they looked almost reverse engineered from certain construction machinery, likely not entirely intended for such a massive machine, even if they clearly worked to a degree for wheeled travel.

While the gun-pod mounted camera was an obvious avenue of sight, it also had its head and two small slits atop its "middle" shoulders - those two had small cameras. Behind them, an antennae connected to likely what was the source of the communications jamming, somewhere within its back. Also of note was its left arm's inner elbow having somewhat softer armor than on its right. The only problem was that when it raised its weapon, the posture of its arm ensured that was well concealed unless one had a higher vantage point.

Salvator's rifle cracked and the to unaugmented eyes invisible barrier around the machine flared like a plasma globe touched by a human hand. Sparks flew as bullets slammed into the camera, interrupting the shoulder-cannon's aim. Armor dented and bent and gouges were torn across the the length of the circular white top, sending out crackling electricity and sparks. The camera swiveled rapidly yet it struggled to see, the canon now forced to rely on the shoulder and cranial cameras to detect the voidhanger.

A luminescent smear remained however, as if someone has spilled glowing paint on some glass dome, awkwardly hovering in the air in front of the camera. It was not entirely blinded but with its visual functions partially impaired and now a near-blind splot from the angle where Salvator had shot, it could not accurately target him with that. Yet that still left its shoulder-cams and head along with whatever sensory equipment it had, trying to home in until it saw the figure breaking from cover.

Yet rather than its machine gun, the sound of shrieking missiles answered, four in total launching vertically from pods located on the top of its square shaped blocky "outer" shoulders. They spun in the air, dancing in intertwining trails before they began to descend. Two slammed into where he had been hiding, reducing the trees to splinters, but the other two shot wide. One erupted 30 or so feet from him, the force of the blast sending a spray of dirt, rock, and wood that blanketed him in the chaos. The final one however swung away and towards where it thought Ilshar was hiding, detonating in the tree tops above roughly 20 feet from him and sending down a shower of shrapnel and burning foliage. While the tarrhaidim was not in the primary blast range, they would have to watch for stray burning metal and vegetation.

Yet it was not the only heavy duty machine in this fight. As it turned its attention back to Echo, it abruptly stopped as a bipedal war machine leaped out of its body. The blink-long pause was all that was needed for the endform to score a nasty volley across its torso and its machine-gun rifle. The machine jerked almost human-like, neuroreactive networks kicking into overdrive yet far from fast enough to dodge Echo's weapon fire. Rounds slammed and shatter against its torso, halting its advance, but the ones that hit its rifle cause its whole right hand to whip back, scarring and gouging the weapon across the length of its receiver-body and where that connects to the long barrel. Exposed metal and firing mechanisms were revealed for a brief moment before it staggered back again, this time from a spray of machine gun fire from Ilshar, raking across its head in a shower of sparking hits and rattling impacts.

Yet rather than directly retaliate, it suddenly bent its legs with the length of its knees now laying parallel to the ground. Scans indicated a rise in temperature coming from behind its hefty shoulders. The previously scanned side-leg mounted wheels unfurled and pressed to the ground as its thrusters roared, sending it forwards directly at the warform. While its machine gun and missiles might not possess the raw power to fully crack the unztadlige's armor, its massive bulky and shield-like shoulder it now was bringing to bear could easily bowl the machine over and send it potentially tumbling down the slopes the Envenomed had previously ventured up.

Great. The warform wasn't at peak capacity, and that was just about their best method of actually putting this thing down. All things considered, the others weren't wrong: best to try to cripple it and call in evac.

On the bright side, close analysis of the first salvo against the mech revealed some weaknesses they could take advantage of: it wasn't as well-protected against kinetic rounds, which most of the squad were using anyway. They were managing to do damage to it, and from the looks of things, to the important bits as well. Evac wasn't a hopeless endeavour after all.

The walker began firing its thrusters, and Salvator used the brief reprieve for himself in getting back behind cover and focusing his semi-powered armor's subsystems fully into scanning it. Data began transmitting across the tacnet to every other member of the Envenomed squad, highlighting the mech's shielding not protecting against ballistic fire, as well as the cameras mounted atop the shoulders and head. Most importantly, he pinpointed the antenna on its back that was the most likely source of the communications blackout.

"Tactical analysis sent, it should be showing up on your HUDs. Taking out the cameras and the gun ought to stop it from being able to shoot down our evac, and if we put enough rounds into the back antenna, we should be able to call that evac in. Take what shots you can against any of those priority targets, but not at risk to yourselves. We're making it out of here alive."

With that said, Salvator crouched down and activated his camo cloak, blending in with the environment around him as he slowly wove his way around the edge of the combat zone to draw a bead on the back of the mech. Acquire the target. Line up a shot. Fire on the antenna. He flicked the fire selector on his carbine to full auto and began firing in controlled bursts, putting as much firepower into the antenna as he could fire accurately.

Acknowledged. Priority targets confirmed. Recommend Evac. Echo's voice crackled as the Endoform lit up the target once again with an extended burst from its autocannon. The threat seemed to have protection from directed energy and beams, but nothing could withstand enough sustained fire for too long. Unlike regular humans, or even power armor clad humans, recoil was less an issue for a being of stone and metal. No matter how hard the weapon bucked, it was as much a part of Echo as its armor was. Add on top of it bioguided shells to make up for any recoil, in lieu of any greater threats, Echo merely held down the trigger until its weapon barrels began to glow a faint cherry red.

Lines of tracers cut across the torso of the mech as Echo guided its weapon towards any of the vulnerable areas in view that Salvator noted. It didn't have the time or thinking capacity to single out a particular system, be it weapon, camera or antenna, instead the Endoform shifted ita focus to whichever subsystem happened to be closest to its current stream of fire. It seemed that Echo's endoform was intent on emptying its magazine before releasing the trigger.

Unfortunately for them, the mech didn't seem to be the type to just sit still.

Alert. Enemy incoming.

The mech was faster than Echo, and Echo's anti-gravity drives were already damaged. Attempting to flee from the mech was an impossibility, the mech would just shift course and intercept them. Instead, Echo turned to face the mech head on and began an offensive advance of its own, taxing its anti-grav drives as it accelerated to ramming speed.

Alert. Initiating counter charge. Brace for impact.

A game of giant robot chicken was surely unexpected. Would a pilot wonder why a machine currently operating anti-grav systems would charge a grounded vehicle? Any bit of confusion helped. If Alice managed to destroy some wheels to disrupt its charge was even better. A vehicle's handling had lag time. Lag between the pilot noticing something, thinking of what to do, inputing commands into its control system, and the machine itself reacing to said system. Echo wasn't a vehicle. Every function within its body- baring any abnormalities- moved at the speed of thought.

In full control of its speed and momentum, at the very least minute, Echo made a sudden strafe to the left and killed its anti-grav system. Wood, stone and earth crunched and crumbled as six multiton legs crashed into the ground, its 'knees' bending as they impacted. An instant later the legs forced the Warform back into the air as they kicked off, sending its hulking mass careening into the side of the charging mech. Echo doubted such a short side tackle would destroy the mech, but drastically changing its course or knocking it off its unstable wheels was a possibility, as was disorienting or injuring the fleshy pilot within the hardened steel.

‘Sprinting away’ was easier said than done, as it turned out. The ‘mech might not have had a bead on Ilshar’s position, but as it had already so clearly proved, it did not need one to keep him pinned. Its parting cannon-blast sent the tarrhaidim on a crouching swerve to the side from behind the tree he was using as cover, while the falling missile, as if possessed by a malign will, extended the swathe of ruination almost directly across the path he had been ready to take in his evasive motion. The indiscriminate inferno had still failed to reach him, but that was a small blessing indeed.

As he laboriously picked his way through the charred hell, trying not to gouge his leg open on a protruding piece of shrapnel while he put some distance between himself and where the League pilot thought he was, Ilshar had at least a moment to review the scan data shared by Rasch. This must have been a frontline beast, if that energy shield meant anything - built to stand up to logistically efficient beam guns, less good against an enemy with the local industrial base to supply solid ammunition. In this case, this meant less protection against his gun too, which was a thing to be thankful for.

“Cameras should take priority,” he spoke into the intercom, several eyes split between his HUD, the ground ahead and the menacing evolutions of the walker, now almost to his side, “It's got more teeth than just the cannon. Blind the beast and it's as good as dead.”

Just then, the ‘mech proceeded to prove how much he'd underestimated those teeth. Nexus’ spiral maw, whoever was driving that wasn't above putting the whole damnably expensive mountain of metal on the line!

A narrow instant's consideration told Ilshar it was not all so bad. From where he stood, the walker’s forward-leaning folded form gave him clear sight of both the jutting back antenna and the camera pod on its retracted shoulder. In the moment he had before the massive machine hurtled past him on its way to collision with Echo, he fired a wide burst at its upper side, sweeping from its shoulder to the back, before hurriedly striding on towards the edge of the burned undergrowth and the refuge of still living trees.

The sleeping and snoozing Kleo Alves pulled herself out of the rut that she was in, the young soldier needed to rack up some kills for the team before it all went to hell. With the retreat - or the offensive that was going on it just made sense for the flesh-ling to do something good for once. She made her way against the advice of Doctor Squidlet to the thing or hatch that would take her to the .50 cal that was attached to Echo. Upon reaching the turret she racked herself in some bullets of love before aiming it towards the general area of the camera on the enemy mech. Pressing down on the triggers she began to send out hot thrashing lead towards it's target ready to turn it into slag just like her enemies before her.

"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

The mass, power behind the thrust, and velocity of the warmachine made it a functionally unstoppable force on the battlefield. Even bereft of missiles and autocannons, that much weight at such speed had no equal amongst the envenomed. Unstoppable however was not a synonym for insusceptible and "unstoppable" did not merely mean external forces forcefully ceasing its motion either.

A convergence of events would demonstrate this in short order.

The first was a volley of needle rounds. A few pinged off of the thick plating of its legs, inches from the wheels where others had scored. Here the metal was not of the same make and density which rendered theme easy pickings for the hyper-accelerated projectiles. The layered materials were meant to take the strain of a massive machine already partially supporting its own weight on ski-like railings, not precision needles peant to pierce the solid-yet-not-metallic mass, rending at first trenches then breaking the underlying supports, joints, and gears that held it together.

The second was a series of long bursts of larger, thicker, far less precise yet sufficiently clustered bullets mere eyeblinks later. These slammed across the back of the machine. A fireworks displays of sparks peppered the boxy bulkhead out of which emerged the antennae yet the thin appendage fared no better. It was a smaller target than the wheels but where it connected to the vehicle was soft enough for rounds to bite and tear into. Sparks sputtered out and comms channels sputtered and coughed back into life, the raw feedback burst a breath of relief and of surprise. A trail of smoke and blinking, popping flakes of light were left in the machine's wake.

The third involved multiple autocannon rounds slamming into its body, accompanied with a generous spray of .50 calibre bullets. The heaviest bullets and shells available to the squad indiscriminately bust, battered, and smashed against the bulk of the enormous war machine. Rifles and machine guns would scratch and maybe dent. Echo's autocannons gnashed and devoured, ripping out bigger and bigger chunks on its nearing approach. Yet it had something even heavier than those: its own mass. Lesser in size and bulk than the enormous frontline titan but with its already sustained damage to critical components, it was in no position to dodge the massive, wounded bulk of Echo slamming against its side.

The fourth was a few hair-raising moments before the critical impact. As if in retaliation for nearly being mulched by antipersonnel missile barrages earlier, the ulvath loudly roared as the targeted components paid the price. Machine gun rounds swarmed hornet-like into blasted camera-pod atop the autocannon, gouging, gutting, and dismembering it into a withered stump. The trail of bullets traveled over shoulder padding and into its back, bursting open the base of its antennae and turning vital systems into a fiery inferno of smashed electronic and jolting arcs of electricity.

In the timespan of under half a minute the enormous threat went from akin to a condensed train barreling towards a notably smaller hexapodal walker to a partially burning effigy belching fire and molten slag. The wheels that would have supported its crouched stance were but parodies of their former stability and integrity, its jamming systems and fearsome shoulder-cannon in similar condition, and its body smashed off course by a short-ranged ram. 45 degrees off from its intended path, a tree in its path practically burst into woodchips as the others that had fallen crumpled and cracked apart as it slid straight through them. Huge clods of dirt split and flew into the air as it slammed down the slope, sliding now on its side as its free hand tried to dig its fingers into the ground rending trenches nearly big enough to lay down prone within.

It was hard to tell where it had stopped. The sound of groaning metal and coughing thrusters was not the angry, ambient roar as before but a now threatening if muted cacophony. Not in the distance yet not near either. Movement could be heard as the weight of the machine worked against its splayed, stunned body. The pilot within was slamming fists into the ground perhaps in rage but by the rising sound of grating gears and whirring servos, likely forcing its body upwards. There was struggle but a struggle spirited and enraged in its alternating tones of crackling whirrs and mechanical growls sounding out over the hissing crackle of its various annihilated components.

In the midst, all comms jamming had vanished. A window had been forced open but already it was beginning to narrow.

What they were doing was working: the mech was taking severe amounts of damage. Good. Even better was that the comms jamming suddenly stopped. Finally. Time to call in extraction, then. No sense in waiting for this thing to be dead. Salvator ducked back further behind cover, dialing his comms to the frequency they'd been given for pickup.

"Reporting, all objectives complete. Requesting evac. Be aware, LZ is hot. I repeat, LZ is hot!" He said over comms, making sure to dial the channel into his helmet cam and get a good shot of the half-slagged mech still stomping away to let their handlers know what the squad was up against. "Need enough firepower to mission kill this mech before we can take off, over."

With his extraction request completed, Salvator switched channels to squad comms again, making sure to update everyone else.

"Extraction's been called, we need to hold out until our pickup gets here!" He leaned out just enough from behind cover to fire a burst off at what remained of the mech's head before repositioning, going from cover to cover. "Keep mobile and focus on not getting killed! We're running the clock out now!"

Acknowledged. Falling back. The Warform crackled as it began lumbering towards the rest of the squad. Small subarms within his carrying compartment began grabbing things and organizing them to the side, the walls of the compartment deploying a set of jump seats. The warform began stomping its way towards Ilshar's location, even as the Endoform made a sprint for the main body itself, leaping into the air and merging with the 'head' of the walker, its weapons reintegrating into the main body of the unztadtlige. Recommend. Boarding vehicle.

Their latest threat was out of sight, but not yet out of mind. The autocannons began to spin up but not yet firing, the head of the warform scanning for targets even as the body itself began to lift onto its anti-grav boosters, making its way towards the dismounted members of the squad. It'd be easier for them to evac if they were all relatively close so one or more of them were not scrambling for evac while the rest waited. Plus, even damaged, Echo's armor was hardier than most of the trees or boulders they'd be able to hide behind here.

The Spiral had been unbroken so far. Danger had passed for now. While it occurred to Ilshar that he should have been more relieved about the ‘mech being at least momentarily put out of commission, it was a far immediately better feeling to finally step out from the blasted zone. The eyes that had been watching for insidious shrapnel in the debris underfoot retracted, which went a long way towards lightening the fragmented impressions of his sight.

They was not destined to stay clear for long as Echo’s huge bulk came humming towards him. Being up close to something that size still made him vaguely uneasy, but he was content to brush that aside for the time being as he crossed the distance to meet the unztadtlige halfway. Sure enough, he would have taken whatever made getting off this planet faster when evac finally showed up.

“Appreciated,” Islhar grunted as he clambered onto the warform’s wide back, keeping a hand over the ulvath’s stock in case some new surprise called for it again. A menacing squelching in the flexile joints of the arm that pulled him up cautioned against more such stunts. Nexus’ teeth, it had been a while since he had gotten punctured this bad.

“Word on where we’re getting picked up? I can’t see anything big touching down here.” Even after a swath of the jungle had been torched in the firefight, it did not make much of a landing pad. But then, if the squad kept moving, they might just as likely have been getting further from where they’d be expected to board. Uncertainty was, annoyingly, not a problem that could be shot at.