@EsailiaMax chuckled, picking up the sight of the Aqua Goddess following behind.
"Bemused reprimands are the best. Beats reprimands they know that you knew exactly what the fuck you were doing." Max chuckled, as he scanned the horizon below, seeing the fire pick up again.
"Shit, more of them there too. Where'd they come from?" Max asked, the lion just annoyed rather than suprised, just frustrated he'd not be putting guns away just yet. But sometimes, that was life. More people needed to be turned into mush, and well, he was too caffinated right now to go that way.
"Keep back and stay in cyberspace, Rishun, I'll handle the reality. If you can pull a number on those ATGMs down there, our grey-haired Captain down there is gonna appreciate it. Maybe even forget any of it. I mean, holy shit, he's going straight in...my sort of fucking character. I'll crack on and follow him, but not before I clip a few more." The lion chuckled, as he headed down into the main facility, the Lion Rampant thudding through the forested undergrowth and out into the airfield environs.
On the edge of the forest, Max could break away from Rishun and give her the ability to hold back, the lion aware he'd have to snipe a bit more. Silver and the rest of the team were in the thick of it, and he had the chance to lay in some sniper rounds from here. The lion had to admit, Silverwind was biting a lot more than he could chew, but Maxwell had no leg to stand on. He'd run underneath a GEAR merely minutes ago and nearly blown himself apart along wtih it. Stupid decisions back then made sense. When you felt the slight tingling of sharp shrapnel scraping against skin, Max was reminded if you're gonna be dumb, better be tough.
@Silverwind BladeThe lion, knowing he was playing the support here switched his comms back on in his helmet back to the team frequency, and patched back into the comms with the Captain. Whilst he did that, he slung an AP magazine back in, aware this was going to be his chance to neutrilise the heavier vehicle targets in Silverwind's ways.
"Copy, Silver. I've got eyes on you and hostiles. AP-I's loaded up, I'll tackle mostly vehicles from here." Max raised his 30mm with a confident pose, and aware the base was all guns blazing on Silverwind and the assault team, engaged his thermals. In the dust and smoke, he could see clear, picking out a couple of technicals. The 30mm roared, the backblast buffetting conifers around him as the lion roared, watching one erupt into flames through the dust. The one next to it followed, and then, the much bigger sight of an improvised GEAR next to it was coming.
"Suck shit, dickhead!" Max yelled, firing another round clean into the GEAR's top, then knee-joint, the 30mm graceful in his hands unlike the 20mils mostly used by the team. The armour-piercing rounds with the accuracy he had to hand made it easy, with another to the core to quickly immobilise and kill the militia mech. Even a militia improvised GEAR could take a lot of punishment, but the 30mm armour-piercing could make short work of all but the thickest armour plates, especially when used right by a marksman like Max.
With the magazine finished, he needed to relocate and so he did, taking a couple of strafe rounds from small arms and an LMG on the far side, telling him clearly to get out of that spot. It pinged, and the warnings flashed, the noise of the rounds heavy on metal, but something Max knew his GEAR could withstand. After all, he was giving it back to them.
Setting up a normal magazine round, the 30mm found it's way in the MG nest firing on both Silver and Max, quickly puncturing the sandbags and blasting apart anyone inside with ease, followed up by the nest of infantry picking off Silverwind. Even if not massive in area of effect, the 30mm round was much more noticable, significant when it hit even, and not leaving anything behind, either alive or dead. The lion continued to pepper, finishing off the magazine and clearing up half a dozen infantry easily with the rounds, though his view of the other side of the facility was obstructed by the last building standing. Silverwind was closing in on it, and with little immediate support, Max knew he could rally up and get closer in.
The rounds out, the lion looked over to the fox's GEAR in the near distance, his own Hargun taking an awful lot of fire from Silver's frontline role. Max had to admit, he'd done it before, and it was never fun. Stressful, as a matter of pure fact. But a necessity, given a GEAR wasn't just an advanced reconaissance platform. It was a warhorse, a titan standing taller than any breathing Arvaran could and with weaponry like the kind an IFV would have. On a platform much more agile, tactile and intuitive. And one Max threw himself into, on his wheels and charging down the concrete, feeling the literal heat that came from the burning wrecks of vehicles and fuel tanks on this part of the airfield, Max aware he'd have to use his 30mm as a close-range bolt action from here on out if he was using his primary. But Max had enough sniping, he thought. It was time to finish this job, maximum aggression. Max did not have a close quarters weapon proper, but he did have a very large axe that would cleave its way through most things, and a rocket grapple that did more or less the same thing.
"Your six is clear, one GEAR neutrilized, two heavy techinicals down, but got no more sightlines from where I've been. I'm moving on you to finish this. I don't want to miss any of the fun." The lion called out to Silverwind, the Lion Rampant back on its feet in the immediate vicnity of the building, Max aware he wasn't going to be of any use as a sniper if he couldn't get a bead on this location. Going around would have been too hard, but the lion knew here he could do some more damage. He let go of a chaff round as he headed through, breaking the lock via line of sight and chaff to reach Silver's position by the building, aware they had to clean it out and get around the building flank to hit the last remaining resistance. With an oddly cool head after his last outburst, the lion was holding control of his GEAR, and focussing on just getting the job done. Like any good Special Forces soldier, Max was not an easy Arvaran to kill, nor did he want to be.
Moving to Silverwind's side, he pushed his 30mm onto his back and drew his 40mm grenade launcher back open on the Lion Rampant's left arm, drawing the axe in his right. A weird akimbo, yes, but one that worked. One hand boom, one hand bang, as he pelted a technical and an infantry squad ahead, quickly eliminating them with a succinct succession of rounds.
"Got eyes on an position onto that building's side...bear with. I'm gonna hit the retract on my rocket grapple amd sort em', we've got a ton of infantry in there, mind lending me some cover and I'll sort it?" Max said rather directly, moving ahead of Silver, even straight into the fire as he punted a few 40mm GL rounds to his side to keep a squad of infantry down.
Turning his shoulder, he tapped away and turned the joystick of the grapple's interface towards the building, the lion quick on his feet to quickly realise how devastating it would be. Better than a point-attack of his sniper or his MGL, the lion thought to himself, as he fired it away, smashing a glass window with it before allowing to retract. With a singular GL that had weakened the entire side of brickwork the floor and walls began to give way, revealing a whole group of infantry rearming, restocking and setting up anti-tank grenades, all opened up for Max to turn his 40mm left arm on them and frame-mounted MGs and let loose. Quickly and effectively, Max didn't leave much of the position, even in spite of the heavy fire on his right flank, where Max knew the Captain and rest of the team were headed, lobbing a couple of smoke grenades forward to give himself room to breathe, and at least cancel out any potential remaining ATGM positions that could lock. They wouldn't have FLIR systems attached, so this would at least hurt their tracking of the Lion Rampant as it rampaged on the frontline.
Pulling back from the building, he cleared a few of the error messages, the GEAR taking heat as he moved back around to the side. In the heat of it, Max did think maybe staying back would have been better for his own health, but same time, that wouldn't have been helpful to the Captain right here. He needed a hand, so here he was, and after all, he was more effective. However, a GEAR all of a sudden was moving on their own flank, and closing in rapidly, going around the corner to try and get the drop on Silver and Max's forward position. Max was too close to switch to his 30mm, so did the only thing he could feasibly think of. Axe now switched to left hand, and the fact that the militia GEAR was only a rudimental weapons platform made this a fight that was clear to Max.
In a normal fight, you ran away when someone had a knife. You ran TOWARD if they had a gun. In these GEARS, same rules applied. So with a certain breed of ferocity, the lion didn't stop and the Lion Rampant, even in spite of the increasing number of bullets and heat it was taking from the militia GEAR's 6mm rounds, was not going to say no for an answer. The GEAR was too close-quarters to properly lay into Max, as he hurled the axe straight into the militia GEAR's top, the arms flailing and attempting to push Max over. The lion had already pelted the axe out, even in spite of taking a direct 20mm round to the Lion Rampant's torso, and slid it straight into the GEAR's shoulder-mount, and then rushed forwards. And this, was the reason he had a Combat Claw.
The claw pierced into the chest of the GEAR, as Max pushed the arm and crushed, the noise like metal being mangled and turned out, as the GEAR in front of him went very quickly lifeless and out of action, the operator inside turned to mulch. It was a right bastard pulling his claw out, the Lion Rampant now certainly feeling the impact of being in the frontline like Silverwind's own Hargun had. But it was why he brought his toys to the play like he did, as he pushed the lifeless GEAR onto the floor, scratched axe still going back on it's scabbard as Max now re-equipped his 30mm.
"One GEAR down on our flank. We've got ourselves quite a firefight here!" Max called out, fully aware of the fact they were definitely pushing hard, harder than they should have, but while they had the momentum Max could understand why Silver was so far forward. They weren't shying away, and shock and awe would be enough to subjegate any militia members ballsy enough to stand their ground.
The lion had to admit, that was an awful lot more intense than even he had bargained for. Quite badass, too. But when the going got tough, he could use his GEAR's uncommon arsenal to deliver a versatile punch, and support the hammer blow that Silverwind had gone and created. He could feel he wasn't going to be able to take a ton more damage, but was still combat capable and able to continue laying down medium-range AT against the remaining vehicles, aiming to pick them out. The lion's attitude seemed to line up nicely with the silver fox's when it came to aggression, yet Max knew that the main reason the Captain had gone for it was knowing they could press their advantage. The lion seemed somewhat detatched from his character, but in the heat of battle, there wasn't any place for ego or mind. Well, not when you were in a GEAR and having to be in control, rather than embrace chaos. It was his place, it was home, far, far from his own. And in the muddy soil outside that large barrack-building, the golden-grey GEAR with a lion at the helm was in a place to do what was needed, even in spite of the minor wounds the Arvaran inside or the metallic mech on the outside had. And that was to clear what was left and secure this point.
"I'm on your six, Silver, let's gut these fucks! Plenty more vehicles and infantry left, but they ain't got anywhere left to go!"