Chapter 25 - Hunter and Prey
BakaSmurf
Only Human, After All
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Chapter 25 - Hunter and Prey
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The group Chatterbox charged scattered, an extremely colourful array of curses coming from Anis in particular as the gargantuan beast practically punched the ground with each bounding leap forward, comically large fist-craters left in its wake.
The Tyrant rocketed forth, catching a too-slow-to-react Yuni - lifting and flinging the girl like a ragdoll across the courtyard. With a terrible crash, she disappeared into one of the encircling buildings through the solid brick wall.
"Yuni-!" Mihara cried out, raising her rifle to Chatterbox and unloading a magazine into the great beast - which earned her a cartoonishly large backhand. The ravenette crashed through an ancient metal lamp post, practically skipping along the grass and asphalt. Now skidding like a stone, the leather-clad Nikke just kept going.
"Such is the fate of all mewling imposters," Chatterbox chortled, turning to Anis and Neon, who had opened fire on the Rapture the moment Yuni and Mihara were clear of imminent danger close. The grenades exploded against its ebon flesh, leaving ragged meat craters - while the high-velocity scattershot thrown by Neon tore fist-sized chunks from the Rapture's hide, scarcely even eliciting acknowledgement from it. "As ever, the Ark's imposters fail to justify the expense of their creation. I shall-"
Chatterbox's head was knocked aside by an errant grenade - Rapi having remained braced and waiting for an opening to attack. "I said shut up," the black-clad Nikke repeated herself with audible annoyance, already having loaded a fresh shell into her underslung launcher.
The Tyrant exploded skywards, practically soaring for a few seconds before slamming back into the ground a fair ways away, the throaty chuckle escaping from its maw somehow still audible from that great distance. Reaching up, it adjusted its jaw, the natural hinge that had been facing Rapi seeming to have been damaged. "The Goddess, it seems, is not one for conversation-"
"Shut! Up!" Rapi cursed as she readied another grenade shot, visibly agitated by Chatterbox's insistence on… well, chatting. Joe, from his cover behind a busted car, was honestly almost impressed by the stubborn display from the Rapture. Most would take the hint upon nearly getting their jaw blown off. Yet-
"Such domineering disdain!" Chatterbox chortled aloud as the tubes on his back began to gradually glow- "I suppose it would come easily to one so high and mighty as yourself," -pulsing, as if charging- "to look down upon-"
"Shoot the spiked back tubes!" Joe commanded the Nikkes over comms, seeing where this was going.
"It speaks-!" Chatterbox declared in a faux-shocked voice, turning Joe's way in response to his callout- only to eat a pair of grenades from Anis and Rapi to the back, causing a chain-explosion as the ordinance it was evidently preparing to launch at the Nikkes went off still inside of the creature's back.
A burst of ichor and flesh accompanied a wave of burning putrid meat - Chatterbox roared in agony, limbs wavering as it struggled to not fall limp. A stream of black blood dribbled from its toothy maw, a weak cough sputtering out.
"N-no, how is this possible? Such damage, such pain… such tactical genius…! How can this be happening?" the beast whined aloud.
"Ah- W-we're doing it! We're actually killing it!" Anis cried out, no small amount of elated hope finding purchase on her face as she rushed to reload her launcher. "Holy shit! Keep it up! Put it down!"
"One more Tyrant to Counters' name!" Neon declared confidently, topping off the tube of her shotgun. "Face the wrath of superior firepower! Boo-yah!"
"Oh, no, whatever shall I do…?" Chatterbox all but whimpered-
"Commander! Stay in cover!" Rapi, meanwhile, remained firmly at the ready, reloading her rifle as she did so. "There's no way that's all it took-!"
A wretched sound came from the Rapture - like partially liquefied flesh being compressed into a mold with a sickening squelch - and the injuries Chatterbox had sustained nigh-on instantly regenerated on the spot, meat, metal and all. In scarcely a second, there was no evidence that it had taken any sort of damage to begin with. "-Oh, right, that is what I will do," the abomination matter-of-factually declared as it returned to its proper neutral standing position, chuckling lowly at the absolutely mortified expressions that rapidly overtook the previous confidence and hope Neon and Anis were wearing.
"I-it regenerated…" Neon started, quickly starting to panic. "I-it regenerated! It regenerated! Raptures don't regenerate! Raptures don't-"
Chatterbox's laughter instantly became downright explosive. "Oh, did you actually fall for that melodramatic display? You actually, sincerely believed that is all it would take? Because you bested but two so-called 'Tyrants,' off of the back of sheer luck no less, you were so utterly convinced that your victory was assured?" It cackled uproariously, directing its face skywards and projecting its voice aloud for all to hear, shaking the very bones of all in its presence. "The arrogance, such a rapturous display of childish overconfidence! It is downright intoxicating!"
"Commander! We need to retreat! This is beyond what we were prepared for!" Rapi declared, eyes scanning the beast that seemed to be lacking in meaningful weaknesses - could it even be said to have weaknesses when it could regenerate damage so effortlessly and rapidly?
"You don't say!" Joe replied as he scanned for Mihara, spotting her struggling to rise to her feet as she wavered and couldn't seem to focus on Chatterbox. To have taken so much noticeable damage as a Nikke from a single strike… To say nothing of how neutered Joe was without the drone on top of the fight happening out in the open like this. Where in previous battles, he'd been able to make use of the terrain and structure of the power station to their advantage, this courtyard was a flat fucking plane lacking in even hard cover! The fuck was he supposed to do as the Commander of this wombo-combo fucky-wucky shitshow of an operation!? They didn't have any advantages to work with! Chatterbox was just fucking with them!
"Now, let us discard with these theatrics and get down to business," Chatterbox began advancing on Anis in particular, slowly, ambling towards her with a deliberately casual gait. The yellow-clad blonde's eyes widened into panic-ridden saucers, and she looked about ready to cylinder dump at the Tyrant, for all the good it would do her when it would just shrug the damage off and undo it outright again… "I wonder how high of a pitch you will manage to achieve as I gradually pick you apart digit-by-digit, limb-by-limb-"
Then, Chatterbox outright stumbled, mouth parting in apparent shock.
"W-what? What in-"
Joe had to fight the urge to grind his teeth together. The bastard was really so intent on mocking them, wasn't he-?
"...I see- or, just the opposite, rather," Chatterbox growled mirthlessly, face snapping around blindly, in naked confusion. "Even an imposter can have a fancy trick or two hidden up their sleeve. To have my own hubris cast back in my face so quickly… or, no, is this your doing, Goddess?"
At that, Joe actually peeked out of cover in confusion, finding that Rapi looked just as taken aback, and- he spotted Yuni, having dragged herself back out of the building she'd been flung into, keeping herself propped up on her rocket launcher. The diminutive Nikke was pointing dramatically at Chatterbox with a furious rictus chiselled on her otherwise cutesy features, eyes framed in blood streaming from an open gash on her forehead.
The Rapture continued unabated. "I do not know who it is that has taken my vision from me - but know that you will suffer the most for your impertinence. Every limb, I shall take my time popping from your torso like an ant…"
"...Yuni's blinding Chatterbox," Joe noted over comms with eyebrows climbing his forehead, hissing quietly so as not to be overheard by the Tyrant. "She- Nikkes can do that!? How is she doing that!?"
"No, they can't, and I don't know," Rapi just as quietly and pointedly replied, side-stepping with deliberate and careful intent, nowhere near as impeded by her visibly damaged leg as one might expect.
With the Tyrant's declaration of its sudden inflicted blindness to its enemies - which Joe questioned the tactical value of - everyone took the opportunity to unload on the beast while it would apparently be defenceless. Explosions and gunfire rocked the courtyard for a few moments, a dust cloud rapidly built up around Chatterbox, obscuring the Rapture even as every Nikke sans Yuni emptied their weapons into it - or at least in its general direction in Mihara's case.
A pair of bright red lights cut through the dust like a lighthouse's beam through fog - and a pair of actual fucking energy beams screamed out from the Tyrant's position, spinning about it and absolutely cleaving through everything surrounding it. Everyone dropped, Neon not quick enough as one of her arms was shorn clean off, leaving a glowing red hot stump in place of her limb.
The dust cleared, revealing that Chatterbox had a pair of energy projectors embedded in its palms - then, it scooped up another chunk of loose debris, pitching it at Anis as she scrambled to rise to her feet and shouldered her grenade launcher.
Where Rapi's leg only took what looked like surface-level damage from an identical strike, the impact against Anis' knee caused her leg to violently hyper-extend in the wrong direction as it just exploded outright, shattering in a horrifyingly violent display. Joe's heart rocketed up into his throat, seeing the blonde's eyes go wide for just a fraction of an instant before her scream hit his ears and she hit the ground with an excessively loud crash.
The unspoken downside to Nikkes being so seamlessly humanlike was clearly on display here - when one got hurt, it meant that you were looking at an ordinary girl being fucking mutilated, blood and all, and reacting appropriately up until the moment you noticed the steel beneath the flesh - assuming you were in a position to notice at all.
Rolling over from where she'd hit the ground, Yuni pointed at Chatterbox again - the need to dodge the rolling twin beam assault having caused her to break her concentration - and its face, at once, snapped to and focused on her despite having been blinded again. "So it's the pink one, I see!"
Eyes widening sharply, Yuni went to scramble away as Chatterbox launched himself right at her - flailing a great hammer-like fist to flatten her outright. Another black-and-red streak soared to intercept the killing blow, Rapi once again planting a heeled foot in the Rapture's face.
It was enough to knock Chatterbox off-course and surely save Yuni's life - but this time, Rapi was caught by the waist - and Joe felt his stomach drop even harder. As the Rapture hit the ground and smoothly rolled back onto its feet, its grip on the Nikke was unbreaking. Chatterbox then started repeatedly slamming Rapi into the tarmac and concrete with a frenzied snarl. Each impact shook Joe to his core, the sharp g-forces alone would have been enough to kill any unaugmented human outright, to say nothing of the impacts. The sight was nightmarish in the extreme, watching the girl be brutalized so viciously.
The others weren't just sitting by and watching this happen. Mihara struggled to stabilize her rifle - visibly unable to line up a clear shot, still reeling from the backhand she'd taken as she was obviously fucked up. Neon had shouldered her shotgun with her remaining arm, actually taking shots despite the risk of friendly fire, to no apparent effect. On the ground, missing a leg as she was, Anis drew a pistol from under her jacket, the same model as Rapi's, and fired wildly into the Rapture's backside even as tears of pain streamed down her face.
While Yuni gave up on blinding Chatterbox as she focused entirely on hobbling towards Mihara, she was struggling to walk properly - practically dragging her rocket launcher behind her as she limped along. Every one of the Nikkes was taking very visible and rapidly mounting damage, while the Tyrant was at worst very mildly inconvenienced by Yuni's out-of-pocket abstract super ability.
And Joe was just crouching there, partially obscured by the same rusted out car Rapi had previously left him behind. There wasn't a fucking thing he could do, besides come within a hair's breadth of experiencing a panic attack at the sight of these girls being absolutely brutalized in front of him.
After what couldn't have been more than a few seconds, but what felt like hours, Chatterbox tossed Rapi aside - she skipped, skidded, and rolled back towards Joe before coming to a lurching, rolling halt. Despite himself, common sense failed the Commander and he bolted from his position to her side. "Rapi!" he cried out, dropping to his knees as he reached out- "You're-"
"Get back!" the ruby-eyed Nikke screamed, looking at Joe like he was the world's largest idiot. She was… not anywhere near as damaged as she should have been. She hardly even seemed shaken. Despite still being laid out on her side, reaching out and grabbing Joe by the shoulder and moving as if to shove him away. "Take Mihara and run! The rest of us will keep Chatterbox distracted at all costs-!"
"Like fucking Hell am I leaving any of you behind!" Joe snarled right back, reaching across his chest and taking a firm hold of Rapi's outstretched hand, as he did so. "-Don't act like you're disposable-!"
"Goddess!" Chatterbox cried out to Rapi, gesturing towards her and Joe with naked frustration. "You-" Anis dumped a half dozen bullets into the Rapture's face - to which Chatterbox responded by sharply reaching out, wrapping its massive fingers around her gun and her hands, and firmly crushed them like one would an empty soda can in a disgustingly bloody display, not even turning to look at her.
The blonde's agonized screams as she curled up into a ball on the ground, rapidly becoming coated in blood that looked no different from a flesh-and-blood human's would doubtlessly haunt Joe's dreams for weeks to come. Though Chatterbox didn't acknowledge the crying Nikke's wailing - nor Mihara's shots which didn't come anywhere near actually hitting it - simply pointing towards Rapi in particular as it kept talking.
"You mock me, Goddess! You and I both know what your kind are capable of, the heights you can, and have achieved, and you dare hold back as though this were some kind of game!? Do I need to slaughter these imposters before you will cease this chicanery which so ill befits you? You are not-" Chatterbox halted, head tilting as Rapi's heel slipped in the midst of her attempt to stand, nearly pulling Joe down with her as he refused to let go of her despite her ongoing protests. "...No. It is not that you will not. It is that you cannot."
A low growl emanated from the Rapture's throat, displeasure sloughing off of it in palpable waves.
"I see. The Ark's technological failings extend even to one of your calibre. How bitterly disappointing. If you cannot offer me the challenge I had hoped for, a duel with a true Goddess rather than yet another pitiful extermination of yet more of these mewling imposters-" Its point was emphasized by sweeping its cartoonishly muscular arm back, batting a still pitifully crying Anis aside like a piece of annoying trash. Neon caught the blonde, glowering up at the Rapture as she was surrounded by the loose shells she'd failed to manage to load into her shotgun with her single remaining arm. "Then there is little reason for me to not simply crush you all and be done with this shameful charade-!"
The scream of unfiltered, bone-chilling agony that erupted from Chatterbox's maw was every bit as startling and unexpected as the blue-white beam that punched clean through the beast's torso. Knocked over, actually kicking and spasming in pain, everyone was caught off-guard when in an instant, the Tyrant was fucked up by a single, unannounced attack from an unknown assailant.
"Absolute?" Joe wondered aloud as he moved to track the beam back to its source - only to have his theory cut short by a solid impact on the asphalt a scant few metres ahead of himself and Rapi.
"Blasphemous creature," the new woman's voice was steely, low and hateful. Clad in a white poncho held together with crudely-stitched together scraps and a dark metallic visor mounted on her forehead, she emerged from the aether like an avenging angel from on high. Standing starkly against their environment, seeming in all ways to be the diametric opposite of the abomination against which she stood in their defence. On her back was a common-looking, time-worn assault rifle; in her hands, a veritable cannon that looked like it was purpose-built to mangle the largest of Tyrants with single shots. But, more than that, catching a glimpse of her features, even from behind, that distinctive head of snow white hair, that tone of voice, lower, yet familiar… "I will send you back to the darkest pits of Hell where you belong! You, and all your kind-!" Recognition hit Joe like a ton of bricks.
"...Snow?" The Commander voiced his dumbstruck confusion aloud, staring at the apparent newcomer who cut a startlingly familiar figure.
In turn, she pivoted back to face him, brows knitting in confused surprise for an instant, before she locked eyes with Joe, noticing Rapi alongside him.
Those golden eyes, that face, the hair… she was older, visibly matured, but there was not a single, solitary doubt in Joe's mind. It was the Nikke from his dream. It was the 'Snow' that had spoken to him of 'Red Hood.' And- Wait, were those, on her waist… the paracord braidwork on the scabbards he'd done himself… were those his kopis and xiphos!? His fucking swords!? Where in the Hell did-!?
The look on the Nikke's face violently demanded Joe's attention over even the recognition of those blades he had cherished back home over a hundred years ago. The way her eyes became unto saucers, and utter disbelief writ large on her features, and- "Commander…?" her voice actually hitched, coming out as little more than a strained whimper that doubtlessly only he and Rapi could hear… she recognized him too. "...Joe…!?"
She absolutely fucking recognized him.
The white-clad Nikke continued, stammering, "R-R-!?" She recognized Rapi too.
"-I will enjoy turning your legs into a fine paste so that you may understand how powerless you will be to ever escape before I drag you to places the Ark will never be able to tear you from, Commander Pholus!" Chatterbox screamed in a borderline inarticulate rage, clambering back up onto all fours with a hacking cough, clearly not having quite become aware of the new Nikke's presence in its agonized fury. "But even more will I enjoy forcing you watch as I take her head, reduce your stunted Goddess to a quivering brain piece-by-piece as she begs and pleads for a mercy that will never come, up until that intoxicating moment I crush the last, pitiful remnants of her humanity like a wretched pimple upon-"
Chatterbox's rage had been nearly inarticulate.
The snow white Nikke's rage was outright and ruinously inarticulate. The Rapture reacted like a startled dog might when she dove onto it, plunging the barrel of her massive rifle into the monster's rapidly recovering torso as though it were a spear, and firing off round after round inside of it, screaming like a berserking banshee all the while.
Joe had thought Rapi was a terror to behold. This 'Snow,' however, actually forced Chatterbox into a hard retreat even after casting her off its body. Ineffectually scrambling and skittering away as she pressed the attack, striking so hard that it made Rapi's previous kicks look like gentle love taps, the Nikke pressed and pressed and pressed like a woman possessed, granting not a solitary moment of quarter as she dodged, ducked, and leapt over every counterattack Chatterbox attempted to riposte with - even using its massive bladed tail did not avail the beast.
In the midst of this, Joe became suddenly keenly aware of a high-pitched keening squeal - not that of a Nikke crying out in pain, but-
"Commander Pholus," A breathy woman's voice firmly made itself known as comms flared to life, a jet engine Vertical Take Off and Landing aircraft emerging from over the buildings surrounding them, the ramp leading into the rear hanging wide open as the telltale glint of the sunlight hitting a sniper's scope foretold Chatterbox being further assaulted with a marksman's fire from above. "Absolute is here. Status."
"Two-" Rapi all but leaped to her feet despite the beating she'd just received, dead sprinting for Neon and Anis as the VTOL gradually lowered itself to the ground not so far from the Commander. "-One down, four injured! An unknown friendly is engaging the Tyrant Chatterbox! We need immediate evac!"
"Understood, I'll continue to lay down supporting fire," the apparent sniper declared as, true to her word, Chatterbox was pressed yet harder back by the combined assault, giving it no chance to even attempt to respond to the appearance of the aircraft. "Gather your Nikkes and get on board immediately!"
Mihara and Yuni were already limping as quickly as they could to the VTOL, while Rapi had Anis in a fireman's carry and Neon charging alongside her. Joe didn't waste any time himself, rushing to board their escape craft as it got close enough to the ground to jump onto the boarding ramp.
He didn't stop to closely examine the trio of Nikkes that were all at the ready, hefting a high-powered rifle, an honest-to-god minigun, and a rocket launcher. The most he registered was that the three were, indeed, wearing themed outfits that matched with Rapi's - indicating that Rapi was still wearing her old Absolute uniform despite having left the squad a while ago. Otherwise…
Joe latched onto a handhold and stared out the still-open boarding ramp, and watched in dumbstruck awe as Chatterbox… fled from the white-clad Nikke who had responded to the name 'Snow.' She gave the Tyrant no quarter, pursuing with a single-minded rage that had clearly entirely consumed her, just barely, barely falling behind as the Tyrant demonstrated just how terribly fast it could move when it needed to, actually leaping cleanly over multi-story apartment and office buildings with a truly mind-boggling and nightmarish ease.
That thing had utterly bulldozed them. Batted them around like a cat playing with its food, not taking them seriously at all. Even Rapi, who Chatterbox had expected to be a genuine challenge, had been thrown around like a ragdoll. Then, that white-haired Nikke, the one from his dream - from a memory, emerged, seemingly from thin air, and immediately made Chatterbox look like a goddamned punk.
Joe could barely process it, even as the aircraft's boarding ramp closed and it began speeding away, back to the Ark. So much, so damned much all at once…
Letting out a shuddering breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding, Joe knew one thing for absolute goddamned certain, even as Anis' pitiful whimpering brought him back to the present and demanded his attention: he and Andersen were goddamn well going to have a long and informative talk as soon as they were back.
…To say nothing of the fact that Absolute, the Ark's singularly most elite Nikke squad, might well be pretty pissed off that they'd ultimately been on call for so long as a glorified taxi service, given the appearance of 'Snow.'
He'd just hope that their squad leader would turn out to be understanding and reasonable about it.
Chapter 25 - Hunter and Prey
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The group Chatterbox charged scattered, an extremely colourful array of curses coming from Anis in particular as the gargantuan beast practically punched the ground with each bounding leap forward, comically large fist-craters left in its wake.
The Tyrant rocketed forth, catching a too-slow-to-react Yuni - lifting and flinging the girl like a ragdoll across the courtyard. With a terrible crash, she disappeared into one of the encircling buildings through the solid brick wall.
"Yuni-!" Mihara cried out, raising her rifle to Chatterbox and unloading a magazine into the great beast - which earned her a cartoonishly large backhand. The ravenette crashed through an ancient metal lamp post, practically skipping along the grass and asphalt. Now skidding like a stone, the leather-clad Nikke just kept going.
"Such is the fate of all mewling imposters," Chatterbox chortled, turning to Anis and Neon, who had opened fire on the Rapture the moment Yuni and Mihara were clear of imminent danger close. The grenades exploded against its ebon flesh, leaving ragged meat craters - while the high-velocity scattershot thrown by Neon tore fist-sized chunks from the Rapture's hide, scarcely even eliciting acknowledgement from it. "As ever, the Ark's imposters fail to justify the expense of their creation. I shall-"
Chatterbox's head was knocked aside by an errant grenade - Rapi having remained braced and waiting for an opening to attack. "I said shut up," the black-clad Nikke repeated herself with audible annoyance, already having loaded a fresh shell into her underslung launcher.
The Tyrant exploded skywards, practically soaring for a few seconds before slamming back into the ground a fair ways away, the throaty chuckle escaping from its maw somehow still audible from that great distance. Reaching up, it adjusted its jaw, the natural hinge that had been facing Rapi seeming to have been damaged. "The Goddess, it seems, is not one for conversation-"
"Shut! Up!" Rapi cursed as she readied another grenade shot, visibly agitated by Chatterbox's insistence on… well, chatting. Joe, from his cover behind a busted car, was honestly almost impressed by the stubborn display from the Rapture. Most would take the hint upon nearly getting their jaw blown off. Yet-
"Such domineering disdain!" Chatterbox chortled aloud as the tubes on his back began to gradually glow- "I suppose it would come easily to one so high and mighty as yourself," -pulsing, as if charging- "to look down upon-"
"Shoot the spiked back tubes!" Joe commanded the Nikkes over comms, seeing where this was going.
"It speaks-!" Chatterbox declared in a faux-shocked voice, turning Joe's way in response to his callout- only to eat a pair of grenades from Anis and Rapi to the back, causing a chain-explosion as the ordinance it was evidently preparing to launch at the Nikkes went off still inside of the creature's back.
A burst of ichor and flesh accompanied a wave of burning putrid meat - Chatterbox roared in agony, limbs wavering as it struggled to not fall limp. A stream of black blood dribbled from its toothy maw, a weak cough sputtering out.
"N-no, how is this possible? Such damage, such pain… such tactical genius…! How can this be happening?" the beast whined aloud.
"Ah- W-we're doing it! We're actually killing it!" Anis cried out, no small amount of elated hope finding purchase on her face as she rushed to reload her launcher. "Holy shit! Keep it up! Put it down!"
"One more Tyrant to Counters' name!" Neon declared confidently, topping off the tube of her shotgun. "Face the wrath of superior firepower! Boo-yah!"
"Oh, no, whatever shall I do…?" Chatterbox all but whimpered-
"Commander! Stay in cover!" Rapi, meanwhile, remained firmly at the ready, reloading her rifle as she did so. "There's no way that's all it took-!"
A wretched sound came from the Rapture - like partially liquefied flesh being compressed into a mold with a sickening squelch - and the injuries Chatterbox had sustained nigh-on instantly regenerated on the spot, meat, metal and all. In scarcely a second, there was no evidence that it had taken any sort of damage to begin with. "-Oh, right, that is what I will do," the abomination matter-of-factually declared as it returned to its proper neutral standing position, chuckling lowly at the absolutely mortified expressions that rapidly overtook the previous confidence and hope Neon and Anis were wearing.
"I-it regenerated…" Neon started, quickly starting to panic. "I-it regenerated! It regenerated! Raptures don't regenerate! Raptures don't-"
Chatterbox's laughter instantly became downright explosive. "Oh, did you actually fall for that melodramatic display? You actually, sincerely believed that is all it would take? Because you bested but two so-called 'Tyrants,' off of the back of sheer luck no less, you were so utterly convinced that your victory was assured?" It cackled uproariously, directing its face skywards and projecting its voice aloud for all to hear, shaking the very bones of all in its presence. "The arrogance, such a rapturous display of childish overconfidence! It is downright intoxicating!"
"Commander! We need to retreat! This is beyond what we were prepared for!" Rapi declared, eyes scanning the beast that seemed to be lacking in meaningful weaknesses - could it even be said to have weaknesses when it could regenerate damage so effortlessly and rapidly?
"You don't say!" Joe replied as he scanned for Mihara, spotting her struggling to rise to her feet as she wavered and couldn't seem to focus on Chatterbox. To have taken so much noticeable damage as a Nikke from a single strike… To say nothing of how neutered Joe was without the drone on top of the fight happening out in the open like this. Where in previous battles, he'd been able to make use of the terrain and structure of the power station to their advantage, this courtyard was a flat fucking plane lacking in even hard cover! The fuck was he supposed to do as the Commander of this wombo-combo fucky-wucky shitshow of an operation!? They didn't have any advantages to work with! Chatterbox was just fucking with them!
"Now, let us discard with these theatrics and get down to business," Chatterbox began advancing on Anis in particular, slowly, ambling towards her with a deliberately casual gait. The yellow-clad blonde's eyes widened into panic-ridden saucers, and she looked about ready to cylinder dump at the Tyrant, for all the good it would do her when it would just shrug the damage off and undo it outright again… "I wonder how high of a pitch you will manage to achieve as I gradually pick you apart digit-by-digit, limb-by-limb-"
Then, Chatterbox outright stumbled, mouth parting in apparent shock.
"W-what? What in-"
Joe had to fight the urge to grind his teeth together. The bastard was really so intent on mocking them, wasn't he-?
"...I see- or, just the opposite, rather," Chatterbox growled mirthlessly, face snapping around blindly, in naked confusion. "Even an imposter can have a fancy trick or two hidden up their sleeve. To have my own hubris cast back in my face so quickly… or, no, is this your doing, Goddess?"
At that, Joe actually peeked out of cover in confusion, finding that Rapi looked just as taken aback, and- he spotted Yuni, having dragged herself back out of the building she'd been flung into, keeping herself propped up on her rocket launcher. The diminutive Nikke was pointing dramatically at Chatterbox with a furious rictus chiselled on her otherwise cutesy features, eyes framed in blood streaming from an open gash on her forehead.
The Rapture continued unabated. "I do not know who it is that has taken my vision from me - but know that you will suffer the most for your impertinence. Every limb, I shall take my time popping from your torso like an ant…"
"...Yuni's blinding Chatterbox," Joe noted over comms with eyebrows climbing his forehead, hissing quietly so as not to be overheard by the Tyrant. "She- Nikkes can do that!? How is she doing that!?"
"No, they can't, and I don't know," Rapi just as quietly and pointedly replied, side-stepping with deliberate and careful intent, nowhere near as impeded by her visibly damaged leg as one might expect.
With the Tyrant's declaration of its sudden inflicted blindness to its enemies - which Joe questioned the tactical value of - everyone took the opportunity to unload on the beast while it would apparently be defenceless. Explosions and gunfire rocked the courtyard for a few moments, a dust cloud rapidly built up around Chatterbox, obscuring the Rapture even as every Nikke sans Yuni emptied their weapons into it - or at least in its general direction in Mihara's case.
A pair of bright red lights cut through the dust like a lighthouse's beam through fog - and a pair of actual fucking energy beams screamed out from the Tyrant's position, spinning about it and absolutely cleaving through everything surrounding it. Everyone dropped, Neon not quick enough as one of her arms was shorn clean off, leaving a glowing red hot stump in place of her limb.
The dust cleared, revealing that Chatterbox had a pair of energy projectors embedded in its palms - then, it scooped up another chunk of loose debris, pitching it at Anis as she scrambled to rise to her feet and shouldered her grenade launcher.
Where Rapi's leg only took what looked like surface-level damage from an identical strike, the impact against Anis' knee caused her leg to violently hyper-extend in the wrong direction as it just exploded outright, shattering in a horrifyingly violent display. Joe's heart rocketed up into his throat, seeing the blonde's eyes go wide for just a fraction of an instant before her scream hit his ears and she hit the ground with an excessively loud crash.
The unspoken downside to Nikkes being so seamlessly humanlike was clearly on display here - when one got hurt, it meant that you were looking at an ordinary girl being fucking mutilated, blood and all, and reacting appropriately up until the moment you noticed the steel beneath the flesh - assuming you were in a position to notice at all.
Rolling over from where she'd hit the ground, Yuni pointed at Chatterbox again - the need to dodge the rolling twin beam assault having caused her to break her concentration - and its face, at once, snapped to and focused on her despite having been blinded again. "So it's the pink one, I see!"
Eyes widening sharply, Yuni went to scramble away as Chatterbox launched himself right at her - flailing a great hammer-like fist to flatten her outright. Another black-and-red streak soared to intercept the killing blow, Rapi once again planting a heeled foot in the Rapture's face.
It was enough to knock Chatterbox off-course and surely save Yuni's life - but this time, Rapi was caught by the waist - and Joe felt his stomach drop even harder. As the Rapture hit the ground and smoothly rolled back onto its feet, its grip on the Nikke was unbreaking. Chatterbox then started repeatedly slamming Rapi into the tarmac and concrete with a frenzied snarl. Each impact shook Joe to his core, the sharp g-forces alone would have been enough to kill any unaugmented human outright, to say nothing of the impacts. The sight was nightmarish in the extreme, watching the girl be brutalized so viciously.
The others weren't just sitting by and watching this happen. Mihara struggled to stabilize her rifle - visibly unable to line up a clear shot, still reeling from the backhand she'd taken as she was obviously fucked up. Neon had shouldered her shotgun with her remaining arm, actually taking shots despite the risk of friendly fire, to no apparent effect. On the ground, missing a leg as she was, Anis drew a pistol from under her jacket, the same model as Rapi's, and fired wildly into the Rapture's backside even as tears of pain streamed down her face.
While Yuni gave up on blinding Chatterbox as she focused entirely on hobbling towards Mihara, she was struggling to walk properly - practically dragging her rocket launcher behind her as she limped along. Every one of the Nikkes was taking very visible and rapidly mounting damage, while the Tyrant was at worst very mildly inconvenienced by Yuni's out-of-pocket abstract super ability.
And Joe was just crouching there, partially obscured by the same rusted out car Rapi had previously left him behind. There wasn't a fucking thing he could do, besides come within a hair's breadth of experiencing a panic attack at the sight of these girls being absolutely brutalized in front of him.
After what couldn't have been more than a few seconds, but what felt like hours, Chatterbox tossed Rapi aside - she skipped, skidded, and rolled back towards Joe before coming to a lurching, rolling halt. Despite himself, common sense failed the Commander and he bolted from his position to her side. "Rapi!" he cried out, dropping to his knees as he reached out- "You're-"
"Get back!" the ruby-eyed Nikke screamed, looking at Joe like he was the world's largest idiot. She was… not anywhere near as damaged as she should have been. She hardly even seemed shaken. Despite still being laid out on her side, reaching out and grabbing Joe by the shoulder and moving as if to shove him away. "Take Mihara and run! The rest of us will keep Chatterbox distracted at all costs-!"
"Like fucking Hell am I leaving any of you behind!" Joe snarled right back, reaching across his chest and taking a firm hold of Rapi's outstretched hand, as he did so. "-Don't act like you're disposable-!"
"Goddess!" Chatterbox cried out to Rapi, gesturing towards her and Joe with naked frustration. "You-" Anis dumped a half dozen bullets into the Rapture's face - to which Chatterbox responded by sharply reaching out, wrapping its massive fingers around her gun and her hands, and firmly crushed them like one would an empty soda can in a disgustingly bloody display, not even turning to look at her.
The blonde's agonized screams as she curled up into a ball on the ground, rapidly becoming coated in blood that looked no different from a flesh-and-blood human's would doubtlessly haunt Joe's dreams for weeks to come. Though Chatterbox didn't acknowledge the crying Nikke's wailing - nor Mihara's shots which didn't come anywhere near actually hitting it - simply pointing towards Rapi in particular as it kept talking.
"You mock me, Goddess! You and I both know what your kind are capable of, the heights you can, and have achieved, and you dare hold back as though this were some kind of game!? Do I need to slaughter these imposters before you will cease this chicanery which so ill befits you? You are not-" Chatterbox halted, head tilting as Rapi's heel slipped in the midst of her attempt to stand, nearly pulling Joe down with her as he refused to let go of her despite her ongoing protests. "...No. It is not that you will not. It is that you cannot."
A low growl emanated from the Rapture's throat, displeasure sloughing off of it in palpable waves.
"I see. The Ark's technological failings extend even to one of your calibre. How bitterly disappointing. If you cannot offer me the challenge I had hoped for, a duel with a true Goddess rather than yet another pitiful extermination of yet more of these mewling imposters-" Its point was emphasized by sweeping its cartoonishly muscular arm back, batting a still pitifully crying Anis aside like a piece of annoying trash. Neon caught the blonde, glowering up at the Rapture as she was surrounded by the loose shells she'd failed to manage to load into her shotgun with her single remaining arm. "Then there is little reason for me to not simply crush you all and be done with this shameful charade-!"
The scream of unfiltered, bone-chilling agony that erupted from Chatterbox's maw was every bit as startling and unexpected as the blue-white beam that punched clean through the beast's torso. Knocked over, actually kicking and spasming in pain, everyone was caught off-guard when in an instant, the Tyrant was fucked up by a single, unannounced attack from an unknown assailant.
"Absolute?" Joe wondered aloud as he moved to track the beam back to its source - only to have his theory cut short by a solid impact on the asphalt a scant few metres ahead of himself and Rapi.
"Blasphemous creature," the new woman's voice was steely, low and hateful. Clad in a white poncho held together with crudely-stitched together scraps and a dark metallic visor mounted on her forehead, she emerged from the aether like an avenging angel from on high. Standing starkly against their environment, seeming in all ways to be the diametric opposite of the abomination against which she stood in their defence. On her back was a common-looking, time-worn assault rifle; in her hands, a veritable cannon that looked like it was purpose-built to mangle the largest of Tyrants with single shots. But, more than that, catching a glimpse of her features, even from behind, that distinctive head of snow white hair, that tone of voice, lower, yet familiar… "I will send you back to the darkest pits of Hell where you belong! You, and all your kind-!" Recognition hit Joe like a ton of bricks.
"...Snow?" The Commander voiced his dumbstruck confusion aloud, staring at the apparent newcomer who cut a startlingly familiar figure.
In turn, she pivoted back to face him, brows knitting in confused surprise for an instant, before she locked eyes with Joe, noticing Rapi alongside him.
Those golden eyes, that face, the hair… she was older, visibly matured, but there was not a single, solitary doubt in Joe's mind. It was the Nikke from his dream. It was the 'Snow' that had spoken to him of 'Red Hood.' And- Wait, were those, on her waist… the paracord braidwork on the scabbards he'd done himself… were those his kopis and xiphos!? His fucking swords!? Where in the Hell did-!?
The look on the Nikke's face violently demanded Joe's attention over even the recognition of those blades he had cherished back home over a hundred years ago. The way her eyes became unto saucers, and utter disbelief writ large on her features, and- "Commander…?" her voice actually hitched, coming out as little more than a strained whimper that doubtlessly only he and Rapi could hear… she recognized him too. "...Joe…!?"
She absolutely fucking recognized him.
The white-clad Nikke continued, stammering, "R-R-!?" She recognized Rapi too.
"-I will enjoy turning your legs into a fine paste so that you may understand how powerless you will be to ever escape before I drag you to places the Ark will never be able to tear you from, Commander Pholus!" Chatterbox screamed in a borderline inarticulate rage, clambering back up onto all fours with a hacking cough, clearly not having quite become aware of the new Nikke's presence in its agonized fury. "But even more will I enjoy forcing you watch as I take her head, reduce your stunted Goddess to a quivering brain piece-by-piece as she begs and pleads for a mercy that will never come, up until that intoxicating moment I crush the last, pitiful remnants of her humanity like a wretched pimple upon-"
Chatterbox's rage had been nearly inarticulate.
The snow white Nikke's rage was outright and ruinously inarticulate. The Rapture reacted like a startled dog might when she dove onto it, plunging the barrel of her massive rifle into the monster's rapidly recovering torso as though it were a spear, and firing off round after round inside of it, screaming like a berserking banshee all the while.
Joe had thought Rapi was a terror to behold. This 'Snow,' however, actually forced Chatterbox into a hard retreat even after casting her off its body. Ineffectually scrambling and skittering away as she pressed the attack, striking so hard that it made Rapi's previous kicks look like gentle love taps, the Nikke pressed and pressed and pressed like a woman possessed, granting not a solitary moment of quarter as she dodged, ducked, and leapt over every counterattack Chatterbox attempted to riposte with - even using its massive bladed tail did not avail the beast.
In the midst of this, Joe became suddenly keenly aware of a high-pitched keening squeal - not that of a Nikke crying out in pain, but-
"Commander Pholus," A breathy woman's voice firmly made itself known as comms flared to life, a jet engine Vertical Take Off and Landing aircraft emerging from over the buildings surrounding them, the ramp leading into the rear hanging wide open as the telltale glint of the sunlight hitting a sniper's scope foretold Chatterbox being further assaulted with a marksman's fire from above. "Absolute is here. Status."
"Two-" Rapi all but leaped to her feet despite the beating she'd just received, dead sprinting for Neon and Anis as the VTOL gradually lowered itself to the ground not so far from the Commander. "-One down, four injured! An unknown friendly is engaging the Tyrant Chatterbox! We need immediate evac!"
"Understood, I'll continue to lay down supporting fire," the apparent sniper declared as, true to her word, Chatterbox was pressed yet harder back by the combined assault, giving it no chance to even attempt to respond to the appearance of the aircraft. "Gather your Nikkes and get on board immediately!"
Mihara and Yuni were already limping as quickly as they could to the VTOL, while Rapi had Anis in a fireman's carry and Neon charging alongside her. Joe didn't waste any time himself, rushing to board their escape craft as it got close enough to the ground to jump onto the boarding ramp.
He didn't stop to closely examine the trio of Nikkes that were all at the ready, hefting a high-powered rifle, an honest-to-god minigun, and a rocket launcher. The most he registered was that the three were, indeed, wearing themed outfits that matched with Rapi's - indicating that Rapi was still wearing her old Absolute uniform despite having left the squad a while ago. Otherwise…
Joe latched onto a handhold and stared out the still-open boarding ramp, and watched in dumbstruck awe as Chatterbox… fled from the white-clad Nikke who had responded to the name 'Snow.' She gave the Tyrant no quarter, pursuing with a single-minded rage that had clearly entirely consumed her, just barely, barely falling behind as the Tyrant demonstrated just how terribly fast it could move when it needed to, actually leaping cleanly over multi-story apartment and office buildings with a truly mind-boggling and nightmarish ease.
That thing had utterly bulldozed them. Batted them around like a cat playing with its food, not taking them seriously at all. Even Rapi, who Chatterbox had expected to be a genuine challenge, had been thrown around like a ragdoll. Then, that white-haired Nikke, the one from his dream - from a memory, emerged, seemingly from thin air, and immediately made Chatterbox look like a goddamned punk.
Joe could barely process it, even as the aircraft's boarding ramp closed and it began speeding away, back to the Ark. So much, so damned much all at once…
Letting out a shuddering breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding, Joe knew one thing for absolute goddamned certain, even as Anis' pitiful whimpering brought him back to the present and demanded his attention: he and Andersen were goddamn well going to have a long and informative talk as soon as they were back.
…To say nothing of the fact that Absolute, the Ark's singularly most elite Nikke squad, might well be pretty pissed off that they'd ultimately been on call for so long as a glorified taxi service, given the appearance of 'Snow.'
He'd just hope that their squad leader would turn out to be understanding and reasonable about it.
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