Only Human (Goddess of Victory NIKKE SI)

[Ace of Scarabs]

Joe really needs to stop tempting Murphy to add excitement to his day

 

[Blackhart]

Joe really needs to stop tempting Murphy to add excitement to his day

Click to shrink...

Fr, the amount of times he challenged Murphy in a few paragraphs... Man will have the entire Rapture population in that hemisphere after him.. if he's lucky

 

[Fragment of Serenity]

Maxwell is going to murder someone.

Possibly multiple some-ones.

...certainly her partners and likely Suyen.

And Joe and the rest will absolutely cover for her.

 

[The 17th Immortal]

Maxwell is going to murder someone.

Possibly multiple some-ones.

...certainly her partners and likely Suyen.

And Joe and the rest will absolutely cover for her.

Click to shrink...

Assuming they're not actively participating, of course.

 

[BakaSmurf]

===
Chapter 102 - The Amazing Flying Circus
===

Once everyone was inside the aircraft, it was notable how Emma and Vesti immediately moved as if to fall in alongside Rapi, who momentarily looked uncomfortable before the two women caught the displeased glower Eunhwa shot their way. It took a moment, but it seemed to register to them that Rapi wasn't a member of Absolute anymore, and they were inexplicably formed up alongside Counters. Made even more noticeable by the fact that Rapi had stopped wearing her full Absolute uniform a while ago.

The pair sheepishly moved to instead stand alongside Eunhwa, while Anis and Neon looked somewhat awkward at the situation. To say nothing of how uncomfortable Rapi seemed. It evidently just came naturally to Emma and Vesti to assume formation with the former Goddess. He supposed he could understand why Eunhwa would find that vexing, even after it had presumably been a fair while since Rapi had been a member of the squad.

Man, Joe could already see how this could wind up being an awkward mission. At least Matis seemed immediately distracted by their transport, Drake and Laplace having followed Maxwell into the pilot's cabin while the beleaguered blonde grumbled about her squadmates bothering her with questions about what the Maxwellcopter could do, if Maxwell could pull off barrel rolls or fly through tunnels in it, if it could transform into a jet, robot, or a giant gun, etc.

A giant flying gun would actually probably be useful against the likes of Stormbringer—a Tyrant which was a giant mechnical bird of myth, large enough to rival the Avenger itself. But, that was neither here nor there.

At any rate, the aircraft started up fine, Joe's ear protection kicked in given how incredibly loud helicopters were while running—even while inside of one, which would cause everyone's voices to sound somewhat modulated to him, but they'd still be perfectly descipherable. The hangar elevator started up, and the helicopter ascended before having even achieved lift-off. A few minutes of this eventually resulted in the surface hatch opening, causing daylight to strike the Maxwellcopter for the first time, Christening the wildly yet seemingly non-consensually egotistal aircraft with the sun's rays.

Once the elevator came to a stop, only a few moments passed before the helicopter's propellers kicked into high speed, and the machine lifted off under its own power. With the hatch closing behind them, the Maxwellcopter flew in the open skies of Earth for the first time, like a majestic peacock. Loud, and obnoxious—a perfect fit for Matis given Laplace and Drake's behaviour to that point, to be honest.

Despite the absurd nature of their transport, the flight to Area H was quiet, seemingly largely uneventful. While waiting to reach the drop-off point, Eunhwa spoke up, fixing her attention squarely on Joe. "RoE?" She inquired.

"Return Fire Only," Joe immediately replied, hanging onto one of the transport's standing handles, given that his exoskeleton made sitting down on anything other than a stool kind of awkward. "Our mission is to retrieve the Heretic Fragments, not sweep the region clear in a deranged blitzkrieg. Get in and back out as smoothly as possible. That means avoiding conflict if we can. No unnecessary theatrics that could risk needless injuries or even deaths."

Eunhwa looked surprised when Joe didn't miss a beat as he responded to her, then she looked outright stupefied when he kept going and explained his reasoning with professional ease.

After a moment of stunned silence, it was Emma that spoke up next. "...Eunhwa was just trying to catch the Commander not knowing what 'RoE' means," she started simply enough. "I don't think she was expecting such a well-reasoned justification for his answer too."

While Vesti looked at Joe with wide, wonder-filled eyes, the man in question looked absolutely perplexed for a brief moment, before his neurons connected and with a quick shake of his head, he declared: "I was about to ask how in the fuck I couldn't be expected to know what 'Rules of Engagement' means, but then I remembered that the average Commander is a chimpanzee in a cheap suit with a dented head, and that getting their shoes tied in the morning is an accomplishment for them."

Rolling his eyes, the man let out a sigh as he was forced to ponder for a moment the fact that the Commander Corps was actively shitting all over his and Andersen's legacy. This considering that Joe wasn't even a prideful man in the first place—he could only imagine how severely that pissed off Andersen, peacock that he was.

But, it was what it was. The Commander Corps would be dealt with when it was dealt with; following the downfall of the Central Government. Until then… They'd have to just deal with the knowledge that these morons were wasting lives to maintain their power and keep mankind trapped under their thumb.

But, they were in the here and now, deploying into a battlefield where a Heretic was felled. They didn't know what to expect of the area beyond the environmental hazards that lingered as a consequence of Indivillia's core overloading explosively, or even how Raptures may behave in that location in the wake of the destruction of a Heretic. Focus. Now wasn't the time to get wrapped up in the past and future.

So, Joe refocused, taking a deep, bracing breath, and with his head no longer lost in the clouds… Noticed—Counters all snickering in smug amusement at his brutal dismissal of the Commander Corps aside—Eunhwa giving him an unblinking, askew, uncertain stare, her bright amethyst eyes boring into his face. Given that, attitude aside, Eunhwa was a very pretty woman, being stared at by her nearly gave him pause.

"You ain't gonna do it," the voice of Anis suddenly cut the ongoing beat short. Everyone turned and gave the yellow-bedecked blonde a confused look, even as she herself presented a smug expression Eunhwa's way.

"...What?" Eunhwa's brow furrowed, damn near cocking her head at the seeming non-sequiter.

"You're not gonna make the Commander look bad," Anis asserted, her smug redoubling. "He's too good at his job. In fact, he's the best Commander in the Ark. In fact, he's the best Commander humanity has ever had."

"Yeah!" Neon interjected, pumping her little fists with a proud smile as she agreed with Anis and spoke up. "The Commander's brain is too big to be tricked! Even when a plan fails, he figures it out and we wind up coming up winning anyways! He's the best! He puts the rest of the Commander Corps to shame!"

Eunhwa gave the pair just about the most heavily-lidded stare Joe ever did see. She didn't seem particularly impressed by their assertions, and in fact, rolled her eyes in response. "Oh, I'm sure he's a regular New Hope or Legendary Commander."

Joe did his best to keep his breathing even and pointedly not react to that statement. He'd also made a note to chastise Anis for trying to be cute about who he really was. The last thing they needed was an OPSEC breach about this of all fucking things!

Anis and Neon, regardless, looked somewhat offended at Eunhwa's dismissal, thus, seeking affirmation, the two whipped their faces around to fixate on Rapi, who looked surprised. "Rapi!" Anis started, her girly voice bouncing off the walls of the helicopter as she spoke. "What do you think of the Commander, hmmmm?"

"Yeah!" Neon nodded verily, expectantly looking at the taller blonde. "Tell us about the Commander, Rapi!"

Though there was a delay, with a small smile, Rapi's gaze drifted, becoming unfocused as she said: "...He's amazing. He's kind. He's considerate, brave, focused… Tall… Handsome… Broad chested… Wide shoulders… Big arms… His chest hair… That toned back…" The normally taciturn little woman trailed off, her gaze becoming very unfocused as she started to quietly chuckle to herself, her expression drifting into a blissful reverie.

Joe was doing everything in his power to not acknowledge how Rapi just started drooling over him out in the open like that. How embarrassing. Affirming and confidence-boosting, yes, but still embarrassing! Good Lord, she'd do that back in the day as Red Hood, but… Man, more and more of her old personality really was reasserting itself, huh? The thought of that was both relieving, and worrying, considering how… Well, Red Hood was.

"-Rapi!" Neon stepped forward, sharply poking the taller woman square in the forehead to forcibly bring her back into reality. "You were supposed to add onto how good the Commander is at his job! Not perv on him in public! Go do that when we get back home and you can lock yourselves up in his room with Cinderella again!"

Rapi's face began to burn as red as a stove's heating element, while Anis looked ready to guffaw at her fellow's entirely self-inflicted predicament, and Joe attempted to disassociate.

It certainly didn't help that Absolute looked utterly bushwhacked by Rapi's response. Eunhwa was staring with wide, uncomprehending eyes, Vesti's mouth had become practically unhinged, and Emma looked very much caught off guard for a few moments… Right before her expression shifted into one of damn near predatory anticipation. Joe tried really hard to just ignore that, because whatever the fuck that was, he didn't need that in his life on top of everything else going on.

However, in the midst of all that, Drake suddenly emerged back into the passenger hold, chortling at the top of her lungs most villainously. She kept going. And going. Laughing and laughing for an awkward, uncomfortable amount of time.

Only after things became thoroughly weird did she actually speak up. "I knew it! I knew I had you figured out from day one!" She dramatically pointed at Joe even as she leaned back and settled her free hand over her face, peeking through her splayed-out fingers like a chuuni. "To ensorcell even the mightiest of Nikkes with naught but his masculine charisma… The keen mind of an unstoppable conquering Supervillain! So brilliant as to conquer the Ark- Nay, the whole world in one fell swoop, forming a personal army of the mightiest Nikkes the world has ever seen all the while! A fine addition to the League of Villainy! Bwahahahaha!"

Joe really started trying to disassociate from that, because Jesus fucking Christ, that hit too close to home considering what they were planning to do with the CG, and while the man was sure that Absolute could ultimately be trusted, Ingrid hadn't really talked to him about that yet. And there was no way in Hell they were going to let Matis know anything about fuck all!

"Wrong!" Laplace burst into the passenger cabin after Drake, hands set on her hips as she did her best to do the Superman pose, despite being the tiny little thing that she was. "The Commander is clearly a Hero among Heroes! For even Nikkes to look up to him, he couldn't be anything besides a shining beacon of hope and light and victory and hope! With his direction, the Ark will take one step closer to liberating the surface from the evil Raptures! The Hero's Association is all the stronger with his membership!"

Drake chortled like a cartoon character. "Foolish hero! So blinded by your hopeless optimism, that you cannot identify a true Villain even when one looks you in the eye! A dark lord standing at the head of a dark army rises! Let the world know true fear! Bwahahahaha!"

"Nay!" Laplace interjected, directing her nose skyward as she did so. "A true blue Hero ascends to shine a light upon the world below! A new age of Heroes arises, and all shall be uplifted as the Ark rises to soar through the clouds so that all may look down upon the evil Raptures, as has always been our Heroic right!"

Joe closed his eyes and took a very deep breath. Laplace and Drake were draining to deal with, to say the least. Utterly deranged characters, regardless of how they were supposedly the most powerful Nikkes in the Ark.

Opening his eyes, he noticed that Eunhwa seemed to be having the same reaction as him, though one tinged with more noticeable annoyance, given the light furrowing of her brow.

"Just as annoying as they were the last time we had to work with them…" the Korean beauty noted under her breath, Joe's electronic ear pro working overtime to amplify her voice so he could hear her over the helicopter's roaring engine and spinning blades. "Utterly rediculous…"

Emma turned to face her much shorter fellow, a small smile playing across her features as she did so. "You don't think it's a little amusing though? The way they make everything a big show?"

Laplace and Drake continued bickering in the background, now being soundly ignored as they did so.

Eunhwa's response came flat and pointed. "I hate clowns," she declared simply.

Joe interjected in a similarly dry tone, grimacing slightly. "Shame we seem to have been conscripted into the amazing flying circus, then."

"Indeed," Eunhwa replied with a snort.

Emma, Vesti, and Rapi all looked between Joe and Eunhwa with no small amount of surprise, the three not having expected the two to find any degree of common ground, especially after their introductions had started with such a venomous argument. Professionals, it seemed, tended to find at least something to agree upon when faced with buffoonery, though.

Of course, as soon as they were on flat Earth again, Joe would put his foot down and wouldn't tolerate any bullshit. He had no interest in potentially needing to work around needless problems caused by idiocy. Regardless of how foolhardy Matis was about their capacity to fight, an unnecessary risk was an unnecessary risk. Simple as-

"Maxwell, stop!" Drake suddenly called out, eliciting a moment of surprise from Laplace, who braced at the minimal forewarning.

The aircraft's momentum suddenly shifted, swaying backwards to harshly slow down, if not outright reverse. The heavy exoskeleton combined with his grip on the standing handle kept Joe pretty securely locked in place, but the sudden change was still more than a little worrying. "What's going on?" He demanded of Drake.

"Raptures," Drake replied, lightly rubbing at her chin as she maintained her footing with little to no apparent effort alongside Rapi, while everyone else at least swayed more than a little bit as they maintained their footing. "A lot of them. If we try to fly any closer to Area H, we're gonna get shot down and swarmed."

"Shit," Joe started with a grumble. "Shifty, can you confirm?"

"One moment, Commander," Shifty said before a beat passed, and she replied properly. "I can confirm, there's minimal Alva Particle interference in the area. Scans show even more Raptures than Drake's sensors suggest. I would strongly advise against attempting to fly the rest of the way to the battlefield where Indivilia was destroyed."

"Because of course…" Joe growled, shaking his head as he could make out from the window the copter already dropping towards the ground, "Maxwell, you see anything yourself?"

"No," Matis' squad engineer and sniper replied matter-of-factually. "But Drake's sensors are about as reliable as sensors can be. If she and Shifty say we're about to soar into a Rapture horde, then we're about to soar into a Rapture horde."

"So?" Laplace started, huffing with a small frown. "I'm not afraid of some weak Raptures! Let me at 'em! I'll-"

"You will not engage Raptures without my express permission first!" Joe very pointedly and harshly declared while pointing at the little twintailled blonde for emphasis. "This is a retrieval mission, not a sweep and clear!"

"But we could easily take them all out!" Laplace asserted in a borderline whining tone. "Just Matis alone! With Absolute and Counters along too-!"

"You have infinite energy?" Joe interjected, brow furrowing heavily.

"H-huh?" Laplace looked somewhat taken aback, blinking quite a few times before replying. "N-no, not-"

Joe sharply turned towards Absolute. "You have infinite ammo?" He asked in turn.

"Of course not," Eunhwa replied, seeming annoyed by the question.

Emma set her finger on her plump bottom limp, eyes drifting upwards in consideration. "Well, if I just use my pistol and give my minigun ammo to Eunhwa, she'd probably be able to shoot for a long time, since I've got so much-"

"Of course not," Eunhwa cut Emma off, pointedly repeating herself with no small measure of annoyance. The sniper probably took offense to the idea of loading mass-produced machine gun ammo into her high-speed, low-drag custom elite operator sniper rifle.

Vesti just shook her head to answer the Commander's question.

Thus, he turned back to Laplace, declaring: "We have not been outfitted for a full-on assault against massed Rapture hordes. Even if we could clear out all nearby Raptures without significant risk to our forces, that would be a significant hit to our logistics, and greatly increase the risks associated with just continuing onto our actual objective. Our mission is to get in, retrieve the Heretic Fragments, and get back out. Period."

His point was punctuated by the helicopter touching down, the machine's suspension producing a noticeable bounce before coming to a complete stop. All the while, Laplace looked more than a little displeased, while Drake's attention was elsewhere, likely focusing on tracking nearby Raptures over playing into her typical theatrics.

"Commander," Maxwell spoke up over comms as the aircraft's engine cut off, and the propellers began to wind down. "This is the closest I can safely get us by air. We'll need to continue on foot if we want to avoid major fights."

"Will the helicopter be safe here?" Joe asked, adjusting his tactical vest as he did so.

Maxwell replied matter-of-factually. "I can set the autopilot to backtrack a while and land further away from the nearby Raptures if you want to play it safe. The autopilot trains based on paths already flown by a pilot, so it'll only be able to follow and land along the path we've already taken. We may have to hoof it to reach it if it happens to land in a area of high Alva Particle density and we or Shifty can't connect to it at range, though."

Joe scoffed. "Sounds a lot better than Raptures tearing it apart while we're away and needing to walk the entire way back."

"Agreed," Anis dryly added her opinion on the matter.

"The less we have to walk, the better," Neon agreed with a sagely nod.

"Even though 'she who walks, arrives?'" Anis asked in a bit of a cheeky tone, which inexplicably caused Neon to react as though she'd just heard something profound and deep.

Joe, on the other hand, recognized that Anis just hit Neon with some psuedo-philosophical bullshit, and presented the messy-haired blonde with a heavily lidded look. While she looked a little put-off by the displeased stare, Anis did stop, so credit for that, if nothing else.

"Are we heading out, or not?" Eunhwa inquired, letting her annoyance at the ongoing clown show shine through clearly.

"Yes," Joe replied as he moved for the sliding door, whipping it open and motioning for the girls to all file out. "We'll go over formations and shit once we're all outside again in preperation for the trek."

The Nikkes all complied, though Laplace continued to pout, and Drake villainously chortled for no apparent reason as she hopped out of the helicopter. Maxwell—similarly to Emma—spun on her heel so she could playfully wink at Joe before leaving the aircraft, which produced a huff from Rapi, who left the vehicle just before the Commander did.

Taking a deep breath, Joe allowed himself a moment to brace for what was coming next. Doubtlessly, a series of problems that would be his problem to solve. Starting with an unexpected horde of Raptures hovering around the area where Indivilia had been destroyed, complicating their plan of approach right out of the gate.

Because if it wasn't one thing, it was another. Such was life on this bitch of an Earth.

 

[Fragment of Serenity]

Well, it has become clear how Joe made it to as great a height as he did: he's an expert crazy lady wrangler.

Alright, how big of an explosion is this going to result in? And is the Max-chopper going to make it out in one piece? Place your bets!

 

[Grim Dark Fantasy]

I can get about Joe being too serious for Drake (even though she's great, I dare say she's the GOAT), but I feel like in order to be in tune with Matis you need to be just a little crazy in the head, and Joe doesn't have that in him right now. Still, they are the right sort of people you need when things stop making sense and you have to do something batshit insane and seemingly impossible.

Alright, how big of an explosion is this going to result in?

Click to shrink...

We have several candidates who are into big explosions. And Laplace is just the most obvious one.
I'm saying all of them.

 

[JKD_666]

I can get about Joe being too serious for Drake (even though she's great, I dare say she's the GOAT), but I feel like in order to be in tune with Matis you need to be just a little crazy in the head, and Joe doesn't have that in him right now. Still, they are the right sort of people you need when things stop making sense and you have to do something batshit insane and seemingly impossible.

Click to shrink...

Joe got along with Godnesses just fine, tho. And let's face it, they got up to some serious buffonery, too. I think Joe will be ok.

 

[DeathShade]

Joe got along with Godnesses just fine, tho. And let's face it, they got up to some serious buffonery, too. I think Joe will be ok.

Click to shrink...

Scarlet got a lot more chill once she became an Alcoholic.

Before that she was getting punted through floors and ceilings for challenging Lilith to fights.

Anyway, Maxwell isn't actually sane. She just has the common decency to restrict her particular brand of crazy to in private

 

[WhyBotherEatingSauce]

Wooow. This website format is confusing. You have been publishing on it since 2023! Sheeesh. Well, I am using your fan fiction as a reference for my cross-post (like yours is!). Thanks!

* Edit 12 minutes later: yes! I received approval for public display!

 

[Blackhart]

Yoo, didn't expect such a quick follow-up!
Honestly, I'm just waiting for Joe to go through his psychotic break lmao
Dealing with the Tension between Absolute and Rapi, followed by Drake and Laplace just existing... I feel a bit sorry for him..
TFTC!

 

[BakaSmurf]

===
Chapter 103 - The Best Around
===

Boots hitting the Earth, Joe stepped away from the aircraft, taking in the sights surrounding them. Unlike the Vancouver area surrounding the Ark, Area H and its surroundings were rather… Post-apocalyptic. A veritible wasteland of sand, dirt, and dust. Ruined buildings dotted the horizon, all painting a picture of long-term destruction. Everything was a depressing desaturated beige, though at least the sky was clear and as blue as ever.

Otherwise, it reminded the Commander of the region surrounding the Orbital Elevator; the equatorial landing site of the Initial Rapture Invasion that had been literally flattened and in many places outright glassed by the first Rapture descent.

Joe felt his chest tighten at the reminder of that place for a great many reasons, but, it was what it was. He pushed those thoughts aside and focused on the here and now, the mission to retrieve the pieces of the Heretic Indivilia that were left over after she was destroyed following a battle with Matis and Absolute three months ago.

Eunhwa spoke up as soon as Joe had taken a few steps away from the Maxwellcopter—which looked exceptionally rediculous in this keenly depressing and oppressive environment, to say the least—towards the gathered girls. "You mentioned discussions about formations?" She inquired.

Nodding once, Joe immediately proceeded onto business. "For this operation, it would be best to split troops up into groups of long-ranged units and close-to-medium-range units. Eunhwa, Maxwell, and Rapi with at least one spotter as sniper support, with everyone else comprising a medium-to-close-in combat unit."

"Rapi as sniper support?" Eunhwa started, furrowing a brow as another ascended onto her forehead. "Are you sure about that?"

At that, Joe focused on Eunhwa as he crossed his arms. "Why do you have doubts about having Rapi serving as a sniper?"

"That's an M82A2," Eunhwa started, referring to Rapi's massive .50 cal. "Putting aside the fact that Barretts are anti-materiel rifles, not sniper rifles to begin with, the A2 in particular is a shoulder-mounted weapon. It was not only not designed to be fired prone, it was originally built specifically to be fired skywards at airborne helicopters from a standing position."

The black-clad ravenette continued laying out her reasoning without missing a beat.

"This makes it ideal for use on large Raptures, both aerial and otherwise at most ranges, and while the non-shoulder-mounted variants of the Barrett can reliably serve as sniper rifles if loaded with mission-appropriate ammunition, the shoulder-mounted bullpup model is just not suited for such applications."

Still, she was not yet finished.

"It could potentially be pressed into a particularly destructive designated marksman role, if need be, but it would be best to simply have Rapi serve alongside regular infantry as a close-in anti-materiel specialist. Especially considering she has that thing loaded with Ultra Raufoss rounds. The less chances she has to miss and potentially waste some of the most expensive ammunition produced in the Ark, the better."

That… Actually made perfect sense. Shit, Eunhwa made a really good point. It was kind of inarguable, even. Joe's thought process began and ended at 'long rifle + big bullet + scope = sniper.'

But, all things considered…

"Given that Rapi is also hyper-mobile as a matter of course," the Commander started, rubbing his bearded chin contemplatively for a moment. "Yeah, I have no argument to the contrary. You're right. It would be best for Rapi to just act as she usually does, while also having the capacity to easily bypass the armour of larger Raptures if need be."

He shifted his attention to the red-and-black bedecked blonde momentarily. "You have any thoughts on this matter, Rapi?"

"Not beyond what's already been said, Commander," Rapi replied easily. "My assault rifle and grenade launcher are best suited for mid-to-close range engagements, and Wolf's Bane is best served in an all-range anti-materiel role. And as has been noted: dedicated sniping would not be the best application of my abilities, nor is such my field of expertise to begin with."

Nodding once, Joe declared: "Okay, Eunhwa's right, Rapi will remain with the general infantry as an anti-materiel specialist." Turning to look over everyone else again, he caught sight of Eunhwa… Once more, just staring at him, an openly bushwhacked look of abject shock worn plain on her face.

She really didn't have a high opinion of Commanders. Not that the man could blame her, she had probably expected him to insult her intelligence and double down on having Rapi snipe, and Joe would have probably expected the same out of any other Commander as well.

But this Commander wasn't above taking good advice from the people he worked with, regardless of the state of their interpersonal relationship. He and Eunhwa didn't necessarily have to get along personally to work together effectively on a professional level.

"Commander, Commander!" Laplace's hand shot up to grab attention, as if shouting as she was wouldn't do that job well enough in the first place. "What about Drake and me?"

"You're in the same role as Rapi, Laplace," Joe answered simply. "High-mobility anti-materiel general infantry. That laser cannon of yours serves a similar function as a direct-fire rocket launcher normally and hits like an artillery piece, so you'd be best served running as fast as you can and flanking the enemy while they're distracted alongside Rapi. Drake, you just stick with Emma, Anis, Vesti, and Neon. Emma's our field medic and needs sufficient escort, given that she's our lifeline if any of you are injured out here."

Drake laughed villainously as she replied. "There could be nothing more Villainous than showing my Villainous superiority by demonstrating that nobody else can protect the medic better than I, a nefarious Villain can! Thus forcing everyone to submit to the inarguable superiority of Villainy! I agree to this arrangement which mocks the inferiority of non-Villainy! Bwahahahahaha!" As one might imagine, she leaned back and chortled into the sky like a mad woman, her half-length cape billowing in the wind as she did so.

Maxwell interjected cheerfully. "Remember that my weapon is both a precision sniper rifle and an anti-materiel rifle, so I'm a bit more versatile than you might think. Also, mind if I look at your drone, Cutey?"

Joe blinked, caught somewhat off-guard by the request. "Why do you want to see my drone?" He asked, not noticing Rapi's brow furrowing at hearing Maxwell's affectionate nickname for him.

Maxwell's answer came easily enough. "So I can tweak it to function as our spotter using its range finder, IFF, and multi-spectrum vision systems. Elysion snipers usually use dedicated crawling spotter drones with much more powerful dedicated components, but these little scouters have similar systems in them. Lesser systems, but it'll get the job done with some quick tweaks."

Eunhwa piped up again at that. "The drones I've used keep getting destroyed in the field… But I'll admit that they've been consistently better at spotting than I am alone."

Emma spoke up next. "Vesti or I usually spot for Eunhwa in the absence of a drone, but we won't be able to do that for her if we're on the frontline for this operation."

Maxwell continued. "You also won't need that drone for yourself on this mission, Cutey, since Drake can sense nearby Raptures even without visual contact anyways. She'll ping everyone's IFF systems constantly so you won't need to worry about walking into a horde or anything like that."

"What a bother," Drake declared, a disdainful sneering grimace worn on her features.

"It'll be a big help though, Drake!" Laplace pointedly declared before Joe could reply to the complaint.

"Okay, fine, I'll do it," the self-styled villain replied breezily, with absolutely no resistance whatsoever, as Laplace preened at having accomplished the arduous task of convincing her subordinate to cooperate after a singular, toothless greivance.

Joe just took a moment to take a deep breath before retrieving the drone from its harness, followed by casually tossing it Maxwell's way. The engineer of Matis caught it, and immediately started fiddling with it, deploying a number of sub-arms from her exoskeleton that all had a number of tools and wires attached to them.

As that was being done, Joe brought his hand up to his ear. "Any updates to share, Shifty?"

"Negative Commander," the blue-haired operator replied promptly. "Alva Particle density remains low, and no Raptures have begun to approach your location, suggesting that you're still undetected."

"Excellent," Joe declared as he continued. "Mark this as our primary exfil point and recall the helicopter-"

"Maxwellcopter!" Laplace and Drake both interjected simultaneously even as Maxwell painfully cringed.

"-a few kilometres back the way we came. The less risk of it being found and destroyed by Raptures, the better."

"Understood, Commander," Shifty acknowledged the instruction. "Once you've departed, I'll start it up so you don't get dust and dirt kicked in your faces."

Huh. Joe hadn't even thought of that. Considerate. "Appreciated," he said before redirecting his attention to the squad proper. "Okay, any further comments or suggestions before we head out?"

"U-um…" Vesti started meekly, making a tiny motion as if to nervously raise her hand, though it went no higher than her waist, in contrast to Laplace shooting her appendage up as far as she could extend it in a fraction of a second. "C-can I t-take point?"

Joe blinked, took a moment to parse that request, then recalled the assertion that Vesti fought something like Liliweiss. That sort of aggression didn't manifest and disappear on a whim, the pitifully cute little ashen-haired cloaked woman more than likely actively revelled in open combat.

Perhaps that was the one situation where she felt free to cut loose? Where she actually felt confident? Perhaps even the one time she felt she could de-stress?

Either way, despite the deeply dubious look on the face of Anis, Joe nodded. "Yes, Vesti. Just do not engage without permission or unless you are attacked first. Understood?"

"Y-yes- I-I mean, understood, Commander…!" Vesti looked as relieved as she did anxious. Right proper little anxiety ball this one was.

Looking about, Joe inquired once more: "Anything else?"

"...Onnneee… Moment…" Maxwell gradually piped up, before a wide smile found purchase on her features, jostling the quadroter once as she set her spare hand on her bare midsection so toned that she had faintly visible abs. "Done! Eunhwa, connect to the drone so it can share its IFF with you and spot for us both."

"Done," Eunhwa declared matter-of-factually, her silken jet black hair catching the gentle wind rather photogenically, as if for emphasis. "Though I doubt this will compare to a purpose-built spotter done…"

"It only needs to get the job done well enough for now," Joe declared as Maxwell deployed the device, and it dutifully moved to hover between the ravenette and the blonde with a light buzz of its propellers.

Activating his arm-mounted CombiLink—which was not unlike a Pip-Boy from Fallout, albeit a slimline futuretech one—the device projected onto the Heads-Up-Display of his open-faced helmet's new Augmented Reality visor, and Joe was blasted by the sight of it overwhelming his senses with a whole load of shit, including having every damned vision spectrum active at once. It actually managed to hurt to look at.

Maxwell smirked at the sight of Joe recoiling and retracting his visor to harshly rub at his eyes. "Yeah, maybe don't try to use the drone yourself for now. Nikkes have systems that parse all of that noise into usable information for us and injects it directly into our brains in an orderly manner, while you're just getting blasted with everything being fed into your poor CombiLink unfiltered at once…"

Joe disabled the connection to the drone, instead reflexively switching to the Locally Generated Tacmap function- Blinking, something occurred to him. "Drake, could you push the location of detected Raptures to my CombiLink's LGT as you notice them so I can get an active visual reference on the bastards as we go?"

"Easily!" Drake declared as the wrist-mounted computer prompted him to authorize a connection from the white-haired woman, which he, of course, allowed. "It'll make things a little simpler for me if you track them yourself so I can just focus on Nikke stuff instead of needing to constantly tell everyone where every Rapture is every time myself too."

Recalling how Drake had stopped and made a point to focus on tracking Raptures in the Maxwellcopter, that actually made sense. If she could just automatically ping detections directly to Joe's device without stopping, that'd be one less thing for her to have to juggle. Hell yeah, Joe loved it when methods were found to reduce tactical friction-

"Commander," Rapi spoke up. "If every member of the squad connects to your CombiLink, we can all passively receive the map data and Rapture locations as well, so long as Alva Particle density doesn't rise high enough to disrupt the connection even at short range."

"Oh, shit, Hell yeah," Joe couldn't help but grin at that. "Fuckin' synergy, I love it. Everyone do that, it'll make this entire operation run that much smoother." After a moment, the man authorized the round of connection requests to his CombiLink, and once the girls all confirmed that they had the currently generated height map data produced by Shifty's ongoing local scans, he nodded with a broad smile. "Excellent. Like a well-oiled machine."

There was a beat in which every gathered Nikke just stared at Joe quietly, looks of either various degrees of appraisal, or open pleasure, if not wonder.

"You really are a cut above the average Commander, aren't you?" Emma rhetorically asked, her expression being one of pleased consideration. "No wonder Ingrid pounced on you at the first opportunity and gives you everything you ask for. I'd want to keep you around at all costs too…"

"I've never met such a smart Commander before…" Vesti noted, her big blue eyes all but sparkling as she stared up at Joe like he was a celebrity.

"I told you," Anis declared, a smile broad, smug, outright prideful as she looked Joe's way. "Our Commander's the best."

"Just wait 'till you see him in action!" Neon suggested, setting her hands on her slim hips and pridefully raising her nose into the air. "This is just him warming up!"

Laplace hummed, giving Joe a critical, heretofore uncharacteristically serious stare. When she eventually spoke up, it was with a sharp countenance that seemed to ill-befit the little hero-obsessed loon. "It's no wonder Syuen told us to try to convince the Commander to sign up with Missilis instead… Even though he's just a human, he's already way smarter than the other Commanders we've dealt with before. I don't even feel tempted to tell Drake and Maxwell to ignore his orders and treat him like an object to be protected like we usually do with other Commanders!"

"Yeah, it's crazy," Drake agreed, appraising Joe with her obsidian black, unnaturally beady eyes. "You should join up with Missilis! I bet you'd actually be a good Commander for a change! Especially since you actually listen to Nikkes! Every time we've worked with one before, they've been the stupidest idiots imagineable!"

Maxwell hummed, rapping her fingers atop the frame of her exoskeleton's legs. "Yeah, unless you wind up tripping flat on your face when we get into an actual fight… You actually seem to know what you're doing, Cutey. That's really rare for a Commander. I actually want to listen to you and see if you can keep it up when it really matters. That's never happened before."

"We told you he's the best," Rapi smugly declared, matching the expression Anis and Neon wore together. Seeing Rapi wearing such an expression actually made his heart skip a beat, but given the situation, he kept his head in the game and remained focused. He could gush over Rapi being pretty and having a wonderful, stirring confident grin once they were back at Shangri-La.

Eunhwa was the only one to not immediately speak up, just continuing to stare wordlessly at Joe, her expression unreadable. After a few moments, she finally did say something. "...We should get moving. If we waste too much time here, we may wind up needing to either navigate back out of enemy territory in the dark, or even spend the night in an area of heavy Rapture activity. Even with the active tracking capabilities of Matis, that is a situation we should avoid getting ourselves caught in."

Joe was actually grateful that Eunhwa didn't continue to heap on the glazing, considering he was just displaying basic fucking competence. This was what should have been expected out of every Commander at the bare minimum, not something that made him stand out as an icon of singular hypercompetence.

"Eunhwa's right," the Commander started with a sharp clap of his hands. "Let's stop burning daylight. Arrowhead formation, Vesti at the tip, Rapi and Laplace on her wings, Neon and Anis on the flanks, Emma with myself and Drake at the centre. Eunhwa and Maxwell: follow at the back and be prepared to break off and set up to provide long-range supporting fire if need be."

Everyone complied, and with their weapons readied, the unit started moving into Area H proper, aiming to weave around wandering Raptures as much as was possible.

After a few minutes of walking, the Maxwellcopter started up on Shifty's command in the distance, and looking back over his shoulder, Joe watched it lift off and—holy shit it looked so fucking uncannily goofy flying—turn to head right back the way they'd come.

Thus, the group proceeded on foot to collect fragments of a dead Heretic, hopefully with minimal fuss.

Joe could only hope that life would give him a break and not wind up to kick him in the nuts for once.

Needless to say, he gave it even odds for another random Chatterbox interrupt before the day was done.

 

[Dsaeg]

Bragging continues. Maxwell is either digging a shallow grave for herself or unknowingly is laying a foundation for a threesome to establish a pecking order with Rapi.

 

[Fragment of Serenity]

In order for Joe to be maximally effective, he needs to go one way and the rest go a different direction.

Chatterbox cannot resist following after him. It's an ego thing at this point, lol.

Then, once Chatterbox shows up, they pull the old switcheroo and ambush him.