Maelstrom of Darkness

Leila's face went white as the ship reverberated as the cannons fired and she gripped the edge of her seat as tightly as she could. Closing her eyes she began to mutter some random stuff under her breath, quiet enough that not even the people next to her would be able to hear her. She then took a deep breath and said outloud, "C-Captain...I-I think I'd do b-better if I flew next to you guys as y-your wingman...M-may I?" Ahe wasn't sure if the captain heard her or not, but she hoped that the woman did.

(I can't remember if Leila's wearing a helmet or not that has a communications device to talk with the captain. XD )

Suddenly, at Lydia's exaggerated movement of the ship's controls, the entire craft lurched sideways heavily, almost turning a full 180 and heading back to Negav, as well as effectively evading the massive energy blast at the last second. The guns themselves didn't do that much.

Kira watched the craft move and facepalmed. "I knew I forgot to mention something. Also, ow." The last part was uttered at the fact she hit herself with her shield handle.

The projectile was barely evaded by the aircraft. At this rate, they were never going to make it.

"Bah! This thing will never make it without getting shot down!"

Mort cursed loudly. It was one thing to die in a battle, but to be shot down with no hope of survival was not what he had in mind for his death. He unfastened his seatbelt and yelled at the pilot.

"Hey! I don't want to die in this piece of junk and I'm sure you don't either! Fly us closer to the ground and I'll provide a diversion so you can get clear. I'll catch up with you later!"

Truth be told, Mort didn't know how he'd catch up to them, but anything was better than dying here.

"Come on! There is no other way! If we take a single shot from that thing down there, we are finished! So unless you have a better fucking idea, fly us closer to the ground!"

"Shut up! Both of you!" Lydia called back into the compartment. "We aren't dead yet, and I'm going to keep us that way, so take your seats!" Kira. That damned Neko had 'optimized' her ship. HER SHIP! Well, to be fair it was the Fists' ship, but Lydia could never help but get attached to anything she flew or drove. She used lighter movements now to compensate for the increased responsiveness, and brought the ship low, hiding it behind the spires and skyscrapers of Negav as she got it turned in the right direction again.
The rear entryway was locked tight, and under Persephone's control now.
"Alright, let's see how fast this bird flies now..." The pilot muttered to herself as she pressed the throttle, back on course for the Fairy Kingdom.

Mort strapped himself back in and scowled towards the cockpit. Fine then. More than anything else, he was frustrated that his life was in the hands of a complete stranger. It wasn't normal for him to just entrust his safety to someone else. Having to depend on someone was extremely unpleasant and he did not want to make a habit of it. All he could do now was wait and see what happened.

Minare was frozen in her seat a very pale shakala now.

Kira watched the ship speed off towards the Fairy Kingdom. Confident that they'd be safe, she turned her attention towards the creature in the city, and decided it about time she got an attack in.

"Let nature's wrath strike from the heavens down to the land below!"

Leila went silent as ordered, though anyone looking at the fairy could easily tell she was scared out of her wits.

In the unnatural blackness, Lydia was relying heavily on the sensors, rather than what little she could see through the cockpit, to fly. The engines WERE rather impressive now, behaving more like a private luxury vessel than the skevol-a-dozen transport it was. She kept low, just skimming over the treetops, rather than fly high and make a target.
"Ok... we'll make better time than previous estimates would have indicated at this rate." The pilot grinned, impressed to see the ship accelerate more and more without any heat warnings coming on. "You didn't do so bad, Neko." She whispered, sending her quiet thanks to Kira.

(We gotta' keep this going, people. Might I suggest a little character interaction in the carrier? ^_^)

Mort crossed his arms and frowned.

"Whatever..." He said with an irritated tone.

At least they appeared to be past the worst part of the journey. Only thing left to do now was sit and wait. Although it turned out that this ship could move much faster then expected, it would still take a while before they reached their destination. He was starting to regret this. Sure, he loved a good fight, but being shot at whilst flying around in a gigantic metal box was not his idea of fun. Especially when he had to entrust his safety to a complete stranger. No, he did not like this at all. One thing was for sure, he wouldn't be coming back on this thing. He'd rather walk.

At first, the gunnery area had been rather like a private sanctuary for Persephone. The creatures on the ground seemed to be a relatively minor threat that the ship's targeting AI could handle easily on its own. The illusion didn't last long, though. When the ship was suddenly piloted into a daredevil hairpin turn and the 20mm autocannon switched on by the pilot, the reality was brought to light that wandering nightmares did, in fact, pose a considerable threat even at range.
Fortunately their pilot's maneuvers took them well out of range before things got any hairier. As it stood, Persephone had taken up this position with confidence that her experience and natural talent would carry her through it, but now she had to reevaluate. Her experience was, after all, with significantly more advanced technology for the most part, and combat at low altitudes in atmosphere was very different from combat in space. She wasn't so sure anymore that if push came to shove her gunnery skills would have been sufficient to save everyone.
However, as circumstances currently stood that bridge wouldn't need to be crossed until later. As they accelerated to a swift cruise, Persephone once again had a moment of respite and decided, after taking a minute to catch her breath, to return to the carrier's main passenger bay and socialize.
"Hi guys, everyone okay?" She hoped nobody would blame her for the recent close call... she wasn't so sure she had an excuse that would save her image.

Minare heard them all being addressed and it took a lot of effort for her to release her grip on her seat. One by one the finger creeked like metal being bent the wrong way until she had her hands free. She took a deep breath and tried to erase any feature on her face that showed she was scared before. Fear does not become a Shakala of Lamina.

"I'm fine." She replied shortly, trying to regain her shattered pride one piece at a time.

Leila nodded silently, her hands still holding the edges of her seat in a death grip. "F-Fairies were not meant to fly this way....ever. I'll take an army of those dark beasts over this, I honestly would. S-still...great flying Lydia. Now if you guys don't mind...I'm going to just take a few deep, calming breaths and try not to dwell on what we're flying in..." She did as she said she would, and began breathing and trying to calm herself.

The large holographic display rising from the table in front of Persephone had been showing the ravaged jungle below for some time, bringing into sharp focus just what had become of the world in so short a time. A small representation of their craft floated a few hundred feet above the canopy, seemingly quite distant from everything with that air between it and the treetops, but they were close enough for the sensors to resolve movement: while out of any range where they could strike at the blisteringly fast interloper, countless dark creatures, local wildlife long since fallen to shadow sneered and howled at the machine as if to bring it down with evil intent alone. They made the treetops seem to undulate, the sensors rendering them as a great blob futilely reaching up with innumerable claws and mouths, snapping and clacking in what would surely be a horrific orchestra, if anyone could hear it.
"Gunner, save your ammo for threats, alright?" Lydia voxed to Persephone. "The swarm will thin out the further we get from Negav."
It seemed the pilot had calmed down from their close encounter, at least.

"That's the plan," answered Persephone with a dryly humorous salute.

As if on cue, from the darkness swarming the desolate forests below came a large figure, scaled down to fit on the hologram inside the ship. What would be seen on that depiction would appear to be the skeleton of some large bird, which sharp bones making up the wings, ribs, and most notably, it's thick beak. As it neared the craft, becoming more visible in the hologram, the bird's bony wings would begin to fill out, becoming covered by thick, viscous darkness which seemed to be pouring out of it's eye holes. It shot towards the craft, as fast as it was, with more than enough speed to equal it.

Leila would watch the display, her expression going from panicked to a sort of grim acceptance. "Great...now we're getting followed by a fast, flying thing. Captain, permission to leave the ship and blast that thing out of the sky...please?" She looked towards the cockpit, her eyes silently pleading Lydia to let her go.

Typical. Just typical. Once again they were being attacked with no way to defend themselves inside this flying metal box. Mort overheard that they were being chased by a giant flying thing. Great. And no doubt it was another darkness creature. He got up and checked out the holo display. Sure enough, it was.

"Damn it! You remember the good old days when harpies and fairies dominated the skies? And not dark bone birds? Although, I suppose we should be lucky it isn't a Wyvvern."

He turned to Leila.

"Assuming she lets you try to blast that thing, I hope you are planning to fling spears of light at it. Because from what I've seen, these things are impervious to most conventional weapons and weak magic. The only thing that seems to be really effective is light magic."

I think I should officially call it - this RP is dead. Personally, I think it started going downhill after TU got his posts ignored. Even though I had high hopes for this RP, at this point it seems like I've made too many mistakes for it to really progress smoothly now. Not to mention the lack of interest (or time online enough to post) from some of the players that's slowed it to a halt. Thank you all for your investment in this one. Until the next thread, RPers! (Because you know I'm totally gonna' come up with another brilliant idea for an RP soon. ;D)

A shame that it died...I had high hopes for this one.

I'll be honest, I had a feeling this wasn't going to last from the beginning. It was a great concept, but awfully ambitious and I feel like it didn't get off to a good start, which only made it harder.
I look forward to the next one though!

This was heavily my fault, at least in my mind. I didn't post promptly, even though I was to play an important role. When it started, I had schoolwork to deal with, and while I liked this as a story, I never could get fully invested in it. The end of school only meant I had to go look for a job and get set with more classes, on top of doing work around the house.
However, I do feel having two DMs can be problematic, and the scope we had intended for this RP was going to be an obstacle in any event, so I'm a little surprised that I'm even doing this:

Lydia's day continued to get worse and worse. Nobody trusted in her flying abilities, always asking to be let out of the ship so they could handle things on their own.
"Fuck that." She growled, toggling the safety on the lower pair of cannons.
The AI already had a target lock, and had merely been waiting for the freedom to use the guns. The floor of the ship vibrated as the staccato chatter of two anti-aircraft guns did what they were meant to do.
Flak rounds screamed at the monster, bursting into brutal shrapnel on impact.
Still, the Captain knew the help of a Fairy might be in order, so with some reluctance, she lowered the rear crew-bay doors. Freezing high-altitude air rushed in, pulling fiercely on anything not buckled down.
"You wanna help, Fairy girl? Get the Hell out there and help!" She screamed over the turbulence. "And for the love of God, gunner, put some lead in that bastard!"

Leila grinned viciously as Lydia relented. "You won't regret this choice." The fairy would unbuckle and let the air yank her outside. She would quickly warp a pair of SMGs into her hands and grow giant sized while falling. Once she was at her full 105 feet, she would turn the fall into a dive and re-angle herself to swoop up. As soon as she was facing the right way, she'd unleash a barrage of bullets into the skeleton-like bird creature. "Hey birdbrain, down here ya skinless freak! Wanna see if you can eat a fairy?"

(If you guys really want to continue, that's great, but I won't post again myself until I see a couple others first, so that I know everyone else is on board, too. :3)