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Starbound Flotilla     THE LINE

    A name for an unusual zone in the multiverse, The Line is a well-defined territory that isn't a result of a unification. Rather, it seems to have been carved long after. It cuts miles-wide but relatively thin territory directly and precisely westward over the whole face of the multiversal superplanet, parallel to sea level, punching through tall mountains and soaring over massive canyons. Out here, many miles from its center, the environment is surreal. Sand-blasted stone, cement, and metal have been irregularly heated by bursts of heat, creating an environment that actually winds up looking like pottery, cooked in a kiln.

    The Flotilla have amassed a heavy, three-story-tall super-tank of some sort, with heavy rocket thrusters at the back. For their Concord allies or for those who don't mind the mercenary option of getting paid to help someone else get a treasure, they've offered a ride and a suite of grappling hooks and hover equipment to avoid getting smashed against the ground and enable some skating about the surface. But moving such a large military platform into this zone has drawn a lot of attention; those who would want to keep a stable status quo that exists for the secret treasure at the center of the Line would certainly be able to bring vehicles in to intercept.

    Who is on which side right now is fairly irrelevant. What matters is this: The Flotilla are accelerating to the pace of the outer zone of the Line, known as First Gear, and merging to join a chaotic fray therein. Scavengers, bandits, raiders, and other disorganized and greedy folk populate it like moss on a rock, trying to take down massive vehicles or creatures that merge from the outside towards Second Gear, a zone of rather much faster vehicles, or to locate chunks of vehicles or pieces of potently enchanted creatures that have been lost in battles among whatever high-speed chaos may occupy Second Gear.
Starbound Flotilla "H'okay guys, all we know is the middle of this has got some big treasure."
"And big cool ssspeedy fassst vehiclesss!"
"Indeed. It appears those deeper in the zones have spectacular feats of engineering at their disposal. Which brings us to the current matter."
"Looking like parts fall out of fights in Second Gear. We need help getting at them, and we need 'em to upgrade the Linerunner enough to hit Second Gear without getting run over."
"Salvage whatever you can. Kill any bandits. Try to hijack any vehicles or mounts that fit you and which might be useful in Second Gear."
"Calculating. FTL won't work here -- the speed precision is too low. We need practical mechanical acceleration. And if you can, try to keep bandits from hurting people in the more civilized inner parts of the Line..."

    They're merging towards it. There's a number of dangerous-looking groups. A band of Floran dragon-riders, atop what looks like diseased and rabies-bearing dragons, are busy trying to tear apart a massive fuel ship that slides over a crushing mass of pottery-like ground, trying to accelerate towards the middle of the Line. Dozens of humans in refitted muscle cars are trying to harpoon what looks like a flying whale that's crushing many of them. A zeerusty-looking rocket charges its way westward, using a comically large magnetic crane to hoover up parts, with what looks like Big Ape glorification art emblazoned on its side. A massive mechanical horse hosts a robotic Glitch man with three crowns, smashing smaller cars with a heavy rocket-powered mace and grabbing engines like he's an american football player. A train laden with coal and lacking tracks barrels towards Second Gear, and a man with glowing skin and cowboy clothes is having a gunfight with several raiders atop it. The messy mass of a rolling battle just stretches for an irrationally long distance west and east, but always moves west, and always keeps dangerously close but not TOO dangerously close to the southern end of Second Gear. Well, at least it's clear how the Starbound Flotilla found it, it looks like it passes directly through their home galaxy at some point and so it's picked up a rather lot of its natives.
Dexter Arkwright The Line sounds like an excellent adventure. A strange environment full of people racing in vehicles searching for a mysterious treasure at the center of the line. Dexter Arkwright is interested in that treasure, to say he helped claim it. He doesn't really need any more wealth, being ridiculously rich already, but he's not going to pass up a fun time.

The blonde is standing on top of the Linerunner, and has just finished pulling up the helmet to his special suit, the Venture Suit, which oddly appears like a high-tech spacesuit with an old-timey fishbowl helmet. He additionally has a bag attached to his waist. It's an orange suit with black accents, and a large pair of thrusters on the back. And it's these thrusters that Dexter's going to use to get around, as he spots his target, pulling his revolver out of his bag and making sure it's loaded. "Alright! I'm gonna go get us started!"

And then, Dexter makes a running jump and straight up leaps off the top of the Linerunner, thrusters kicking off and sending him soaring through the air. His target is the zeerusty space ship, flying rapidly at it and using the Flotilla grappling hook once he sees the door to try and pull himself in further. Instead of just shooting with the revolver, though, he shouts out at the ship. "Hey! Open the door, I just want to talk to you! Or shout back at me. I got an offer you can't refuse!"

For what it's worth, Dexter's voice /does/ sound genuine. It doesn't seem like he's gonna backstab shoot the guy, so he must have a plan.
Riva Banari Riva's here. Why the crap is she here?

Because when she's not on a mission, she's the kind of person who enjoys GOING FAST. And word gets out about a place where people want to GO FAST on this scale. It's crazy, chaotic, and full of insane tricks, like some kind of multiversal BATTLE RACE. It's about this time that a motorcycle ramps over a jagged ledge of rock, Riva waving a big anchor-looking thing in her hand as she cries out, "WOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" The motorcycle launches through the air dramatically...

And comes up a dozen or so feet short of her target. "Oh crap." With a leap, she kicks off of the thing and hurls the anchor at the passing TRAIN, crashing into it with a line of golden light connecting her arm to the anchor. With a grunt, she is pulled forward, slamming into the side of the train, gripping the handle and vaulting onto the back of the strange coal-fired trackless thing, she pries the weapon out of the car she hit, and spins the Ajoran Cross in her hand, charging forward with a grin on her face ass she begins smashing anyone in her way.

As she does so, she notices the LINERUNNER, and blinks. "Hey, is that..." She waves. "HEY, FLOTILLA! FANCY SEEING YOU OUT HERE!" She says as she absently back-anchors a random raider off the train that was sneaking up on her.
Corona Arclite 'Spectacular feats of engineering' was more than enough to get Corona's attention, this was something she had to see for herself. A chance to actually snag a few samples while helping the Flotilla salvage parts is just a sweet, sweet bonus.

"Mechanical acceleration? Y'all invited the right fox then!" Corona waves her hat at the crew on the Linerunner with one hand and lets out a whoop, then puts it back on her head and pulls her goggles down over her eyes. "Better buckle in good, pardner," she remarks to her passanger, "This is gonna be a wonderfully bumpy ride!" Hopalong chitters at her from atop the buggy's rollcage in annoyance. "Oh, shush you. She ain't taken yer seat, ya need to get outside anyways." Which gets a few more mechanical growls from the robo-jackalope but he hunkers down between the rails.

Corona turns the wheel to veer away from the Linerunner and stomps her foot down on the pedal, the Boom Buggy's large wheels kicking up a roostertail of debris behind it as Corona makes a beeline for the pack of modded cars.
Starbound Flotilla     There's a glass segment on around the nose of that rocket that clearly shows its inhabitants. A pair of Apex! One's a massive hulk of an ape-man wearing thick commando armor, and the other's tiny one in a howie-style labcoat, with what looks like a sort of militarized hover-wheelchair. His brain clearly bulging awkwardly. It looks like the chamber they're in is oriented as if the rocket were just standing right side up! The larger Apex turns to look at Dexter and grunts angrily, going back to piloting. The smaller Apex, manning the crane, cries out, "For a /human/?! You're lucky to lay eyes on the works of Big Ape's society! You'd hardly understand a word my mind has for you!" And then he jams a lever to one side, turning the crane around to try to yank Dexter off the rocket with magnetic force, and then fling him away with a sweeping motion of the mechanical arm!
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa had not heard from Corona in forever so she was happy when her old friend was contacting her about this little trip. So here she was and Kotone is buckled in. "Don't worry I reinforced them so I shouldn't snap lose due to the weight of my shell!" Koto grins to her foxy friend, she too pulls down goggles.

"You know this is insane and for some reason I think I need this after everything that went down in New Caledonia!"
Starbound Flotilla     Riva barrels right down the train. The bandits here look to be shouting Apex cultists, wielding heavy mesoamerican-looking spears, and fancy gem-powered stone-like carved guns. They assault her just as readily as they assault the odd glowing cowboy! Swinging and stabbing with ritual daggers and feather-adorned spears, they try to drive her away from the twin-pistol rooftop defender, who they look like they might overwhelm soon. The cowboy himself kicks up a chunk of the coal-like fuel, then fires a blast into it to set off a much larger gush of fire on the combatants between them than ought to come out of coal! He's trying to make an opportunity for Riva to get over to him, it seems, before he's overwhelmed by the raiders that have clambered onto the car in front of him and threaten to take him down.
Starbound Flotilla     "HEY! I THINK I REMEMBER YOU!" George calls out to Riva. "DIDN'T YOU HELP US OUT WITH THE SPACE SHIP AI THING? I THINK I REMEMBER YOU DOING THAT." George shouts at Riva from the top deck of the Linerunner, seemingly stubbornly refusing to go to radios. "YOU JUST HERE FOR FUN OR IS THIS A THING WHERE YOU DON'T WANT US FINDING TREASURE?" Then he seems distracted by something and leans down to listen to someone yelling at him.

    "Are you telling them about the treasure?"
    "What? I mean I guess if they don't know."
    "Are you paying no attention to opsec at all?"
    "Hang on."

    "HEY YOU KNOW ABOUT THE BIG TREASURE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE LINE, RIGHT?" George yells at Riva, popping back up.
Zwei     <<"Jeez. You weren't kidding.">> says Weiss, dressed in her sleek grey, black, and amber instead of real body armour, standing atop the Linerunner with a holographic display ahead of her. <<"Transience folding directly to the target point without an inertial frame would basically be a suicide coinflip, and the velocity we have right now isn't nearly sufficient. I guess that's why nobody has just teleported in.">> she says. The iconography floating around her is indecipherable, and moves around on its own, without any flashy hand movements, prompting the question of what it's even for.

    ||Redundant. If it were possible, I would not be here and having this conversation.||
    <<Hey, gotta make my excuses, right?>>
    ||This is utterly ridiculous enough that no such thing seems necessary.||
    <<Well . . . maybe, yeah.>>

    <<"Well, if you're planning on keeping this thing going for a while, I guess we can build it up to 'close enough'. It's not every day you find an antimatter bomb, and I'd like not to use the whole dang thing up for one straight shot at the center.">> says Weiss, closing her holoscreens. <<"Frankly, just dealing with the wind resistance is going to be a real pain. Slipstream as much as possible is the prevailing understanding, but man these guys sure don't seem like they appreciate tailgaters.">> A violet tint spreads out behind the Linerunner. <<"Too bad for them I guess~">>

    Asche comes accelerating past the side of the giant vehicle. Needing no mount himself, large sections of his upper back and pauldron setup have unfolded to allow an X-shaped blossom of white fire to erupt behind him, clearly propelling him at sufficient speed to engage in First Gear without issue. Tiny embers burning in small ports on his frame are enough to have him peel off from following the Linerunner and swiftly veer northward into the fray, rolling in behind the crowd of dragon riders after the very valuable fuel ship. ||"Move."|| is about all the warning they get, before a swarm of pencil-sized and extremely fast missile contrails streak out from his shoulders, curving to follow the wake of each rider, penetrate deep into diseased flesh, and then explode in such a way as to blow off wings and heads, as well as targeting riders.

    Weiss looks from the Linerunner at the sounds of yelling. <<"Oh hey. Riva. Been a while since I've seen you. What are you doing here of all places?">>
Ryu     Something streaks toward the chaos. A silvery flash, a creature of incredible speed and wings of light. The dragon manages to slowly airbrake, slowing only to investigate the chaos. Ryu strafes through the air, his eyes focusing here and there at the varied sights of vehicles opening fire on each other, of riders on great diseased dragons and incredible landship. The tank draws his attention, and so he banks to get a closer look, only to recognize George popping his head out of it.

    He overhears there's treasure.

    "That's why all of you lunatics are doing this?" he remarks aloud in clear disapproval, to no one in particular. He decides to gain altitude and tries to avoid getting hit in the crossfire, breathing a sigh through his nose. He uses his speed to, for some reason, isolate anyone killed in the middle of all of this and fly them to a single location. He doesn't seem to care about the treasure... he's hear as a third party medic, to reduce the casualty count.
Starbound Flotilla     Corona finds exactly the right place to go. These over-modded vehicles and their whooping and hollering human inhabitants are armored up with what looks like insanely valuable chunks of metal, and boosted with large rockets in the back. They're loaded with fuel, men, and lots and lots of guns of all kinds. They immediately start firing on Corona's buggy with sprays of rifle and shotgun fire, almost as if they just want an excuse to shoot nearly anything. "DEATH TO THE KIIIIIIING!" They're screaming in a mess of various languages. "FOR THE HOLY LIMIIIIIT AND THE ANGEL UNSTOPPABLLLLLE!!" This close, Kotone and Corona can both hear shouting and panicked people atop -- inside? -- the whale.
Dexter Arkwright As Dexter tries to help a pair of apemen, they not only refuse him, but are /rude/ about it. As the crane yanks Dexter's suit off and sends him flying, he panicks a bit in mid-air, hurtling away and facing a painful collision with the ground. Breathe, Dexter, breathe. Right before he impacts, he focuses and gains control of the suit, rapidly picking himself up and missing the ground as he instead flips up and back to face the ship. And then, he turns the thrusters up to maximum.

Suddenly, Dexter's suit is boosting him at high speeds towards the ship, and still holding the revolver, he raises up that fist and moves to slam it straight through that glass segment. "I DIDN'T INSULT YOU FOR BEING APES, DID I? I was going to offer you a whole ton of money, but I think you need to learn who you're dealing with! I'm Dexter Arkwright!"

The impact is probably going to be messy, especially since that punch is boosted by the suit's superhumanity, making it stronger than a normal person's strength for sure. Though, if he BREAKS the rocket, he'll be pretty mad at himself.
Starbound Flotilla     The heavy fuelship -- apparently manned by a Hylotl crew -- are busy trying to slice and stab at the awful Florans. Thankfully, they have a lot less to deal with very fast. Much of the flock are taken down by a massive swarm of missiles -- and soon, scooped up by the Linerunner that dives into place just behind the falling enchanted disease-meats. Presumably a valuable fuel! Unfortunately, the crew's chief seems to refuse to go down. His steed looks to actually be a robotic skeleton with enchanted dragon-meat bolted over it to grant it higher acceleration, and the Floran dives, twists, and does some real Ace Combat shit with entirely unpredictable high-level maneuvers to outpace the auto-guided projectiles, screaming as the necessary g-forces tax their body. They fire back with a nearly impossibly fast spray of arrows fired out of a bow that behaves far more like a high-power railgun in its magnetic acceleration.

    This close, Zwei... Already probably could see with their Robot Eyes, but it's at least more narratively relevant that the ship is flying a flag that looks like a car's steering wheel topped with a crown.
Riva Banari Apex cultists continue to be cultists, which means they're high on zealotry and low on self-preservations.

This doesn't mean spears and gem-guns sure don't sting when she gets shot or stabbed though. The Templar finds hersel wading right in, the repurposed 'holy' symbol whipping about to sweep, hook, and maul things that get near her. Some strikes get through her defenses, leaving long cuts and painful-looking stab wounds, but she just keeps going, making them pay for everything they take from her.

The clever actions of the glowing Neon Cowboy cause her to decide working with him is better than just taking them all out. Abruptly, she switches tactics, reaching into a golden ripple and yanking out a shotgun, which she one-hands. Gold-red light rolls down the barrels, and she unleashes a blast wave of buckshot and Anima energy, combining two great flavors that Apex hate most: Shot and HERETICAL MAGIC. Hopefully, this will help her clear a path, the energy conveniently just washing through his position harmlessly.

As she works, George calls back. "OH CRAP, IS THAT GEORGE?" Riva yells, still just kind of bracing herself in the middle of the chaos on the train. "HEY GEORGE! YEAH, I DID A THING THERE! NICE TO SEE YOU!" Riva, too, seems to have somehow forgotten that she has a radio.

There's a pause at the mention of treasure though. "WHOA, DID YOU SAY THERE'S TREASURE?" A pause. "OH. UH. YEAH. OF COURSE I KNEW! ARE YOU GUYS HERE FOR IT TOO?"
Starbound Flotilla     Already several corpses are piling up. The Flotilla aren't picking up wrecked Floran bodies, nor the Avians assaulting Riva. There's plenty of dying that goes on in this massive rumbling death-race as it rolls over the kiln-blasted landscape. There are, at least, a few convenient spots to place them. No doubt Moonfin or Albert would yell at Ryu if he tried to use the Linerunner as a mobile deck for such things, though. He might have to search out other stable locations if he doesn't want to deal with that feud, but he might not mind too.
Corona Arclite     Even in the hailstorm of bullets and buckshot against the buggy's brimsteel plating Corona's highly accute ears stand at attention from the sides of her hat. And she can be Koto's cyborg senses can hear it too. "Grind m'gears, there's folks on that whale offa thin'!" Suddenly this little adventure has taken on a few more depths.

    Corona hunkers forward, gripping the wheel with one gloved hand tightly while the other reachs down to grab one of the assorted levers on the middle console. "Shoot anyone gettin' in our way," she retorts to Kotone, then pulls back on the lever.

The Boom Buggy deploys it's own boosters, blue-green plumes of exhaust belching out of them to give the vehicle some extra kick forward towards the edge of the muscle car horde, the boring mechanism mounted on the front also revving up to tear into whatever cars are unfortunate enough to not get out of its way!

In response to all the shouting and catcalling she just flips on the stereo, cranks it up to the max and lets something appropriately heavy and dangerous sounding blare to drown them out.
Starbound Flotilla     The rocket doesn't break under Dexter's punch, only the window. He'll suddenly find his own personal gravity adjusted in a disorienting way, though! Suddenly, he's sideways, on the "floor" of the rocket's bridge. "What in the--!! Minion! Save the suit, crush the skull!" The smaller Apex calls out, zooming sideways towards the piloting controls. The larger commando leaps out of the chair, stands to his full seven feet, and begins spraying rapid fire blasts from a raygun that was holstered at his hip. "ARKWRIGHT! I don't care for your name! It will be a footnote to the treasure-taking legacy of DOCTOR VORONOV!" Calls out the smaller Apex man, trying to wobble the ship's trajectory to unsteady Dexter to make him take some shots from the Miniknog enforcer.
Zwei     <<Ew.>>
    ||A dragon.||
    <<Is it really?>>
    ||Fairies are not real.||

    <<"I mean, sort of?">> Weiss says unhelpfully, spreading her hands. <<"I'm here for it in a manner of speaking. It's not like I'm after it because it's treasure though. My goal is mostly to get to it.">> she says, even less helpfully. <<"Really, 'doing this' shouldn't be all that surprising. It's an exercise in mechanical engineering and killing people, and when have I ever consulted anyone's opinion before doing something? It's important that I get to the center, that's all. Excuse me for a second.">> Weiss suddenly cuts off.

    Asche bobs and strafes to evade the chunks of dragon falling back towards him at high speed, scanning through the resulting bloodmist and confirming the detonation of all projectiles. The mechanical signature ahead is a small surprise, but not outside of parameters for the fact that the lead dragon had managed to avoid being hit, clearly outside the limits of the flesh and blood mounts the others had been riding. Since the first salvo hadn't worked, he isn't about to hamfistedly dump a second in that direction. With the rider starting to fire back, he begins concentrating his efforts on evasion. Hits will slow him down and deplete energy, but fully evading every shot would cause him to fall behind, and so he carefully balances the two. Where the Floran fires on him, bright flashes of boosters to his left and ride send him rapidly accelerating in the other direction, strafe dodging the arrows until the line of fire is walked back into him, then dodging the other way, allowing a little bit of the spray to rattle and snap on his sloped armour, scoring the carbon and sending ripples of light through the hexagonal mesh, but resulting the in the solid majority missing without losing speed. He keeps this up for several seconds, until-

    -Weiss squeezes the trigger. The rifle in her hands doesn't kick or flash, but sends its own metallic sliver screaming out at hypersonic speeds. She has to fire far ahead given the wind resistance, but nothing else about the shot is complicated. Asche is keeping the Floran rider busy in an extremely predictable pattern. All she did was aim for the neck and calculate a lead.
Kotone Yamakawa It seems things are going to get interesting here she sees all the various vehicles? Then the shouting and hooting "Something' up with the whale? Wait what is that thing?" Kotone notes and she gets the idea she readies her weapon and keeps up to open fire on anything that tries to get close to them. "This is something out of a movie that my parent saw when they were dating!"

She calls out and welp she'll start taking pot shots as they burn on ahead, one person on the wheel and one on the guns? this should work out pretty well. She'll take shots when she can on those machines that do get in the way as they go.
Starbound Flotilla     Riva forces back a squawking mess of Avians that still stand between her and the cowboy, who calls out an enthusiastically rustic "YEEEHAW!" in celebration. He surges in, sliding low and popping up to open fire on the more distant foes, trying to leave the others to Riva and her shorter-range expertise. "Howdy miss! You one of the King's, or are you just a kinder soul than the company we're usually getting around First Gear? RELOADING!" He ducks low to pistol whip some skulls while yanking speedloaders out of a coat pocket, seeming to be grateful enough for the help that he won't bother guarding against Riva backstabbing him. Also his face is really weird: It's entirely absent, and replaced with what looks like a strange metal brand. George continues shouting. He also continues antagonizing Albert a little. "YEAH! WE DON'T KNOW WHAT IT IS BUT I GUESS IT'S APPARENTLY REALLY IMPORTANT. I BET WE CAN DO A LOT WITH IT, OR GET A TON OF MONEY, OR SOMETHING."

"Stop."
"DID YOU ALSO KNOW IT'S GOING WEST REALLY FAST?"
"Grrrrrrhhhh..."
Dexter Arkwright The change in gravity is /super/ disorienting, as Dexter is pulled inwards and collapses flat on the bridge. He forces himself back up as Doctor Voronov shouts at him, and as the minion stands tall and raises his blaster. "Oh, shoot." And then, the raygun is fired at him. He manages to dodge the first shot just barely, but the wobbling ship causes several more to impact with his suit. At first, one just hits against the suit and sorts of fries it but doesn't outright tear through it, but another actually makes a hole through the suit's side, ripping it open and burning Dexter. He screams in pain, collapsing to his knees from the first time he's ever directly been hit in combat, and in a lucky situation, could be killed outright by the giant apeman, and certainly get hit again.

But, instead of staying in the same position freaking out, Dexter's tantrum takes another turn - one of complete foolishness. Angry at the 'minion', he forces himself back up again, raises his pistol, turns on the thrusters, and moves to fly forward across the deck at him. One hand is balled into a fist and moved to be punched into him if the revolver shots he starts firing at the center of mass don't do the job. "Take this, you STUPID MONKEY! Nobody shoots me and gets away with it! Nobody treats me like a fool! You'll remember my name as the last thing you'll ever hear! Dexter Arkwright! Important, rich, powerful, and your greatest downfall!"
Ryu     Ryu's face is one of bestial disdain at Weiss' words to him. One of his strange eyes briefly close.

    "That's dumb."

    With that insightful retort out of the way, he resumes his process of migrating the dead to a convenient spot out of the way of the violence and speed. He has gotten coated in the blood of various individuals in the midst of this, though none have yet fired upon him so he isn't retaliating against anyone. He follows the flow of traffic enough that he can keep up with it, making quick darts from his designated safe zone and hte chaos that create streaks of silvery light in his path.

    He is very, very fast, and breaks the sound barrier more than once in the middle of this. He's thankful the dead won't care about whiplash, so he can go as fast as he wants while he's doing this.
Starbound Flotilla     The insane danger of a heavy drill rips apart a few of the cars before they learn to steer clear. Several screaming humans are knocked free from their cars, and others are even less lucky than them. Not a lot of seatbelts here. At the front of the pack is what looks like a man in heavy military gear and uniform, shouting orders to the mess of bandits, and he pops up atop some kind of open-top APC that he's got in there. As some of his flanking escorts are blasted off the road by Kotone, the high-speed sky-whale starts to break free from the harpoons and he doesn't like that at all. "I SAID TAKE THE FUEL! MORE HARPOONS ON THE LIFTER! STARVE THE KING AND EAT ANOTHER DAY!" He shouts in a crazy, manic tone. "YOU--! GET OFF MY ROAD!" The commander hefts a large machinegun, firing from the hip in a massive spray of high-caliber weapons fire, full of rage as he tries to take out Corona's buggy and Kotone with it!
Corona Arclite     There's a shower of parts and bodies in various directions as drill and Kotone living up to the original of 'riding shotgun' put several mad drivers out of the frenzy. But then the leader with his own big piece of firepower turns on them. "Aw shit!" Corona slams the brakes with a foot and yanks an emergency brake so hard the lever nearly snaps off, then heaves the wheel in the opposite direction to veer into a skid as the large machinegun opens fire. As the Boom Bugger skids sideways to a stop the hail of gunfire rips into it, punching larger dents and holes in the exterior but fortunately by broadsiding into the assault she minimized damage to anything too important.

    Other than from all the abuse it already took the drill smokes and sputters as it whines to a grinding halt.

    "Dunno what they want with that thin', but they ain't gonna get it." With a growl of 'now it's serious mate' determination Corona disengages the brake, thumps down the throttle and fishtails the buggy to reorient back towards the pack of road warriors and resume the chase. "Keep 'em busy, Koto." Corona hits another switch, activating one of the steampowered launchers.

    Then reachs up between the rollcage bars to grab Hopalong before he can object and shove him into it. "Do somethin' about those tethers," she commands before reaching down to hit the fire button.

    An echoing *THMP* of steam pressure being released rocks the buggy a little as it sends the construct hurtling towards the flying whale. But this boarder isn't here to harass the whale. Hopalong grabs onto what he can, and the chipper built into his mouth revs up just before he chomps down at the nearest harpoon line to try and cut it off.
Riva Banari Riva absolutely works best at short-medium range with this setup. Shotguns are not known to be sniper weapons, but they're great for crowd control. She fires again and again, going back to back with the Novakid. "Oh me? I just heard there was a place people could go stupid fast." A pause. "And something about a treasure. Sounds good. I don't mind a little rivalry, but..." As he ducks to begin reloading, Riva sweeps over his head, taking another cultist high while he goes low with a swing of her hammer, then blasts with the shotgun once more. "I can't abide crazy cultists."

Once she's bought them a few seconds, Riva calls back to George: "CUT ME AND THIS GUY IN AND I'LL GIVE YOU A HAND. DEAL?" Yeah, she likes thrills, but that doesn't mean she has to do it for /free/. Besides, the Watch doesn't pay nearly as well as the Union did. Vigilante justice is not what you would call a profitable career path.

She looks back down to the cowboy and gestures with her shotgun at the Linerunner. "I know the guys in there. They'll deal you straight if you're willing to work with them. Maybe we can get the Treasure together."

A pause. "Also, I've never seen someone like you before. You must have been from some interesting places."
Starbound Flotilla     The metal sliver from Weiss manages to perfectly slice a thin but deadly line directly between the T3 and T4 vertebrae, causing the chief in all his fancy Ace Combat glory to suffer immediate paralysis, get thrown off his dragon, and probably slam to the ground limply. This leaves Zwei between enemies, as swarms of other potential bandits -- a cluster of sociopathic Hylotl in high-tech NASCAR-themed magical girl outfits skating around and killing rival gangs, a bunch of Glitch in barbarian outfits on smaller mechanical horses, etc -- all seem to edge towards the ship, trying to test if Asche is acting as an actual guardian, or was just helping get salvage. The Hylotl aboard the fuel ship seem to be hoping for the former, considering how they nervously cheer at Asche and seemingly hope he isn't about to bring more mysterious and blasting death upon them too.
Starbound Flotilla     << AREA EVENT >>

    During all the chaos, something very unusual happens. There is a phenomenon that has literally no warning, as its source is moving faster than sound, and far faster than light. A white line is cut across the northern horizon so fast the human eye wouldn't know there was motion at all, the only thing that tells one it's moving west is instinct. And then a plume of what Zwei will easily identify as plasma balloons out of it, annihilating the mile or so around it. Milliseconds after, blurring masses of metal zip by, elongated by relativistic effects. The outermost layer -- the Second Gear lane of the Line -- must be going at least a hundred times the speed of those in First Gear. The size of the massive vehicles provides some shielding for the ballooning mass of plasma fire, and its subsequent gush of heat and pressure. Those amid First Gear will find themselves having to deal with a rather abrupt rush of unexpected heat and pressure that emerges from the distant passage of the TREASURE as it moves straight west.
Kotone Yamakawa The adventure continues on this as it seems there is car ahead and wonders do these people even know what seatbelts are? It seems they don't or do not care. Also, the bandit's leader gets her attention. "Your road?! Ya right!"

It's been a long time since Kotone's been on an adventure like this and it draws into her mind? Is she really cut out to be a Paladin? That question will remain unanswered for now.

SHe'll open fire with several more rounds trying to get a shot in on the commander as they go.

DRIVE FASTER!"

She calls out to her friend as she hangs on to the Buggy her own shots stopping due to the manoeuvres her friend is pulling off at this point in time.

"Corona we got a heat spike something's coming!"
Starbound Flotilla     Dexter manages to time his shot perfectly. His freakout may be uncoordinated, but it sure as hell is lucky! As he fires out in the open instead of taking cover, a gush of heat and pressure blasts through the opening he made in the glass, washing over the minion's body, stunning him just long enough to take six shots direct to the chest. Roaring in pain, he's knocked clean off his feet by the boosted punch that Dexter delivers. Dead or downed, he's stunned long enough that Voronov notices the lack of ray-gun fire and slams an autopilot button. "Incompetence! Must I do everything myself?!" He calls out, his hover-wheelchair abruptly unfolding further to form almost a sort of personal mini tank, blasting away at Dexter and scooting around the circular deck of the bridge, occasionally drifting his little war-machine for flanking shots.
Zwei     If the Hyotyl are hoping for help, rather than an immediate, violent raid on their fuel stockpiles, they're in luck. Zwei has a vested interest in a couple of things here that would be unobtainable if Asche blew them sky high.

    For now.

    With the Floran leader thrown limply off his mechadraconic mount, Asche picks up a little speed, elevates himself above the fuel tanker, and then drops back down with a resounding thunk. Powerful electromagnets in his feet latch to the vehicle's hull, anchoring him to the top. He turns during his drop to face backwards from the tanker, so that he lands looking down on the newly encroaching raiders taking the dragon riders' place. ||"Like ants."|| he rumbles in response to seeing the vacancy so quickly filled in by other voracious raiders, before he raises both arms in different directions and his integral wrist weapons cycle out. Expecting there are plenty of bullets to find here, he has them set to ballistics, and begins hammering voluminous streams of machine gun fire into the tailing horde, filling the air with a classical paper ripping noise and drowning competitors in glowing showers of tracers. For good measure, a second salvo of missiles launches from his shoulders, swerving to catch those that dodge the independently aimed streams of fire, until he has thoroughly wiped out the immediate competition.

    Turning back to the Hyotl with two gently smoking forearms, he directly addresses them. ||"One vehicle is not a fellowship that flies its own flag. Whose standard do you bear? Where are they, what is their relevance to this, and what is your relationship to them?"|| Intel gathering is part of the process. It's also extremely unlikely that they'd refuse to answer him after the preceding bit.

    Still many miles out and in atmospheric combat conditions, superluminal detection doesn't reach far enough to catch what streaks by. The propagation of its effects through local gravity are what get both Zwei units to turn their head towards the source, before instantly guessing what comes next before having to see it. Weiss is with the Linerunner, further out and also easy enough for her to take cover inside by hopping below deck. Asche isn't quite as fortunate, as he has to protect the vehicle he's standing atop rather than shelter behind it. A split millisecond of calculations follows, and then the air a significant distance ahead of the transport turns purple, bending in strange and unnatural ways, before several huge slabs of Martian colony shielding, built for solar storms, drop out of hammerspace and slam deep into the baked dirt, timed and spaced just so that the transport will pass behind them right as the plasma blast hits.

    ||"Collecting and stockpiling prefabricated matter tools is becoming increasingly rewarding."|| He commands to nobody.
Starbound Flotilla     It's good to have them in a safe spot, but the heat and pressure that comes out of the center of the Line might disrupt things! Ryu's Corpse Zone may need to get defended, sorted, or otherwise protected in order to keep it from suffering damage from the sudden Line blastwave! While the dragon himself will undoubtedly be fast enough to zip behind some form of cover, keeping some of those damaged bodies from being damaged or lost by the blast will benefit from a lot of clever thinking or maneuvering if he can manage it!
Dexter Arkwright Success! Dexter grins inside his helmet as the big guy goes down, though the pressure and heatwave buffets him. The heat isn't too much of an issue - he's sweating from the puncture in the suit, but overall it's reduced. The pressure, however, staggers him off his feet, straight into a mini-tank blast! The adventurer is sent flying backwards into the wall of the bridge, head slamming back and rattling inside his helmet really hurts, and the tank shots are coming. Dexter feels that if he could get a good ricochet shot, he could take this guy out...but the revolver's out of ammunition. He needs the time to reload!

So, lifting up the Venture Suit's wrist, Dexter fires off a searing red-hot laser, trying to aim for the tank cannon. He's hoping to burn it up a little, damage it, and then duck for cover near a console, where he can speed load his revolver and get exactly what he needs. But Voronov has the advantage over him, so he needs just enough time to pull his plan off...! "You should have gotten better help, pal!"
Ryu     Ryu comes to a halt when he sees something cut across the horizon. And he does see it, briefly, but not enough to identify it. He also sees the damage coming in toward him, and it makes for a problematic hazard if he wants to do anything to revive these fools.

    He extends his claws and moves them in a blur... carving an enormous ditch. Dirt flies behind him in an enormous column as he moves fast enough to make his fingers bleed. Once the ditch is sufficiently deep enough, he quickly transports the corpses a short distance into it, a sort of, err, mass grave for the opposite purpose it is usually used for. Then he climbs onto the surface, and braces himself for the approaching blast wave.

    He beats his wings so hard that they create heat friction in the air around him, pushing the air back. His body likely gets cooked by the two pushing forces slamming into each other, and he's probably lucky he doesn't get his insides liquified by this over-the-top nonsense. All he's doing is trying to make sure the corpses aren't scattered to the four winds, mitigating as much of the oncoming wave as he can.

    All the while thinking: They better be grateful he went to all this effort.
Starbound Flotilla     Cutting through the harpoon lines is working out, at least if Hopalong is able to zip around fast enough. Kotone is definitely keeping them occupied and distracted as their lines snap, but she can only keep so many of them distracted. She definitely does manage to keep the commander distracted, roaring and focusing his fire on the pair and their vehicle instead of noticing Hopalong and blasting them with high-caliber fire. She gets a few shots that blast the armor off, even! But... Then comes the heat wave! THAT gets the commander shouting his men down and taking cover. As they lose visibility, it's an opportunity! If Corona or Kotone can survive and sustain concentration through the destabilizing heat blowout, they can ambush the commander to help out the whaleship!
Starbound Flotilla     "Fella, if you think First Gear is mighty fast, you ought'a keep up while we merge into Second. You said those big rollers over there are with you? The cut's not what I'm chasin' -- but if you'd rather fight bandits than take the Treasure, you'll wanna meet up with the King! As for me, I'm just a Novakid, I'm--" The twin-pistol cowboy calls out, before a cultist nearly skewers him. "GAHHH!!" This one's a whole lot larger than the others, suddenly jumping aboard from a soon-crashing hovercycle, holding two spears like that makes any sense, and he's a sturdy enough bird that the hammer crashes into him at some point and doesn't knock him off, just bruising him badly and stumbling him. Then comes the heavy heatwave! The cowboy has to duck over one side to avoid sizzling out, though Riva could probably survive the pain the way the cultist does.

    "Your heretic king will starve in the Freeway, and your fuel will burn nothing but sacrifices to Kluex! Die, blasphemer!" The beefy eagle-man screeches, slamming one of the spears down hard enough that it shakes the whole train, trying to throw the pair off! Thankfully, he's one of the last of the cultists aboard here.
Corona Arclite     Corona tries to think of the worst possible insult one could shout at a car enthusiast. But before she can get into any more witty diatribe Kotone shouts about the heat spike. "Sunnova--!" The Boom Buggy's exterior is made with brimsteel alloy, designed to take the intense temperatures of the geothermal deserts and sulfuric duststorms back home, so it's not the heat she's worried about. It's the pressure wave that's going to follow any sudden rapid expansion of air from said heat wave.

    Instead of stopping though Corona fires her own grappling lines at the APC, trying to pull in next to it's bulk so they can use the larger and heavier vehicle as additional cover from the pressure shockwave.

    But that doesn't stop her from finally yelling her insult. "YER DADDY WAS A PINTO -- SMALL AND EXPLODES FROM THE REAR!" You can just take that in whatever context you want.

    She also opens the top of the rollcage so Kotone can get the commander while he's trying to keep his much bigger vehicle on the road.

    Hopalong, being a relatively small mechanimal on the side of much huger whale-thing, is already pretty sheltered from the blast. He just hunkers down, hoping the blast wave will help yank loose the cable he's already been chopping at.
Starbound Flotilla     "Thank you, noble warrior! We pledge our ship and fly our flag to the service of the Engine King!" One of them -- a sort of greenish one that looks more influenced by a lungfish -- calls out with gratitude and information, answering Asche's question. "He's the one who seeks out the Finish Line! He brought down the Acceleration Empires and freed their slaves! His magnum opus will open the Fifth Gear and achieve stillness! Also he's honestly treated the Fuel Arks much better than any of the other leaders. We go through them fairly quick, we just supply whichever one has the throne at the moment-- GAH! FLATLINE!" He calls out, moving to take cover inside his ship...

    Oh, thank goodness, nobody's going to die out here. Well, maybe those magical girls. "Thank you again, noble warrior! You were wanting to find out about the Engine King, if you can get us some form of escort we may be able to bring you before one of the King's fiefdoms in Second Gear! I'm sure they've never seen a Hylotl in such wonderful armor before." Oh right, they assume that just because Asche did a really good thing, obviously he's a Hylotl in a mecha. Whoops there went the casual racism again.
Starbound Flotilla     The mini-tank's cannon burns and melts, setting it off-kilter enough that it's hard to align whatever fancy laser suite is involved in actually blasting Dexter. "Insolence!" He calls out, his brain dramatically pulsing in a weird and uncanny way. He sort of screws up his face in a way that's kind of undignified, and shouts, "I'll show you what the true power of Doctor Voronov is! ARKWRIIIIIIGHT!" And while his little wheelchair tank-gun is recalibrating, he tries to blast Dexter's brain with some kind of psychic disorientation attack to keep him from reloading!
Riva Banari Riva isn't sure what the answer is on that, but there sure is another problem to deal with yet. As something roars past her in ways she can't even comprehend yet, a cultist with some serious chops gets on board the same way she did! "WHAT! HEY! THAT'S MY ENTRANCE YOU JERK!" She yells at the zealot-bird. The double-spear setup looks nasty, too. Anyone willing to do something crazy like that has to be up to no good.

A moment later, the Novakid sidles onto the side of the train to let it take the blastwave.

Riva's not so lucky. The massive impact scorches her, threatening to blast her right off as she skids, screaming as things sizzle around her... But the hammer slams down, the woman anchoring to the top of the train. A hexagonal blast shield rises, interrupting the wave of burning pain and kinetic murder and forcing it to flow around her, creating a small space of safety behind her. "Ggggh... This is crazy... /Crazy awesome/." She says as she grits her teeth through the pain.

Unfortunately, there's still a problem: The hulking zealot. The impact tremor passes right under the shield and shakes her, breaking her footing. "Whoa, what, WHOA!" she cries, sending her falling off...

But with a spark, she manages to catch onto the side, using the Ajoran Cross like a grapple! The shotgun is lost, vanishing into a puff of gold as she grips with both hands. "You know what? That guy is RUDE." She asides to the Novakid. "I'd love to meet your King. But first we gotta deal with thie rude bird! I'll go first and set him up, you take him down! 3.. 2.. 1... GO!"

A moment later, she swings back and hoists herself up, flying in the air as relative momentum makes it look like she's sailing at a reasonable speed instead of 'wow fast'. She hits the ground before the zealot, going low as she slides past. She might eat a strike for it, but she's willing to do so in order to hook one side of the Cross under his leg while she skids past, working to break his balance it spins around, the other side coming to hook around its neck and /pull/, trying to lock him against her so the Novakid has a clear shot for vitals.

"Give my regards to the Colonel." She spouts, unable to resist giving a witty one liner despite the hilariously dangerous situation.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa can't get them all but getting few or more distracted will certianly help them out as they make their way on this insane death race, and there is a thrill here. If Kotone is honest she's almost missed this sort of a rush. There's no world on the line which honestly is liberating as well. She keeps up the fire but then the blast wave comes, that's going to be bad and she's going to have to rely on Cronoa for this, her braincase should be able to surive this the rest of her? She's not so sure and she's really worried for Corona at this. Corona pull this ofdf thankfull with some madcap driving, and she's quickl to see just what's up next.

"Oh time to ahve some fun."

She'll pop her harness and then spring up using her double jump system and will come down in an attempt to enage the commander in melee and taser the hell out of him.
Starbound Flotilla     Ryu digs a mass grave for probably the first time in his life. Oddly, this is where the properties of The Line are maybe beneficial in a way. The massive amounts of heat and pressure dumped through it every cycle for years and years on end have given the ground a texture like pottery, and so crashing one's way through layers that are arranged like ceramics without having its strengths isn't difficult. Combined with his high-speed wing-flaps, he manages to brace the corpses he's collected against the rush of fire and pressure, while the ground below him audibly disintegrates with a noise like a million pots being smashed all at once for a dozen agonizing seconds.
Dexter Arkwright As the tank-gun recalibrates, Dexter's trying to reload...and the psychic blast hits him head-on, because he has no preparation for dodging or resisting psychic blasts. He's disoriented, dropping the bullets out of his hand and onto the floor, and his attempts to move have him almost falling once again to the floor, barely catching himself. Dexter spends several moments disoriented, long enough for the tank gun to almost fully recalibrate...but Dexter Arkwright isn't going out this way. His father didn't train him out how to use a gun to go out this way. And he only needs one bullet to make this count.

Scooping up one of the bullets, Dexter quickly loads it into the revolver, right around when the tank-gun would have recalibrated. If this misses, Dexter's probably going to get blasted hard. If he's not fast enough, the same. But there's a gleam inside that helmet. A grin. One of utmost confidence for his victory. "Sorry, Voronovice, but no one's going to remember your name." The revolver is lifted.

Bang! The shot misses...

Or so it appears. It sails right behind Voronov for an angled surface, taking several seconds to travel. While Voronov's likely gloating or about to fire, the bullet will ricochet behind him, hopefully impacting in his back or head and taking him out once and for all.
Starbound Flotilla     Corona manages to pull in CLOSE on that open-top APC, shearing close but not too dangerously close to its many spikes, spinning sawblades, and pointlessly gushing flamethrower exhaust pipes. The act of acceleration alone is stylish and dangerous, slinging with those grappling hooks, but she manages it; the commander pops back over the top, screaming and roaring and already firing at what he soon realizes is nothing at all. That's when he realizes he's being tazed. "AAAAAAARGH!" He cries out, convulsing and already halfway to knocked out before he gets one panicky swing in with the butt of his gun, trying to throw her off. Finish him! Hopalong has almost gotten those harpoons on the other side by now, no doubt!
Corona Arclite     Hopalong grabs onto one of the remaining harpoon lines, but doesn't just bite into this one. Sparks arc up about his antlers like a jacob's ladder as he charges, and sends a powerful electrical current down the line to hopefully fry launcher and vehicle alike.

    Corona has her hands full keeping close enough to APC without getting so close to get caught up in all it's dangerous exterior kibble. It was close enough for Kotone to get on the vehicle and give the commander a shocking greeting though.

    .... Actually ....

    This was crazy and reckless, but so were most of her best ideas.

    At first it just looks like the buggy is loosing speed as it starts to drift back from the side of the APC. But the grapplers are still on it, so when Corona abruptly pulls behind the APC the lines follow, as she's trying to get them tangled up in the machine's wheels so they pull up into all those moving spinning bits to make a big mechanical mess.
Zwei     It's a useful little infodump. For one, Zwei now knows that there are not only two gears, but five, and even then another step towards this 'Finish Line'. If the exponential increase in speed holds, their objective could be traveling well over 100c. That could make things more complicated. Zwei was originally just going to grill them for info and then commandeer the fuel, but then the mention of being freelancers (or serfs) for actual empires that spend their entire time out here at this ridiculous speed catches its interest.

    ||"An escort may be arranged."|| Asche says, not even bothering to correct them. If they want to believe there is a Hylotl here, let them. ||"If you frequently make this run in and out of First Gear, you must have some method of accelerating to match pace. It makes sense that fuel would have to constantly come from somewhere else outside of the Line, and that it could not all come from new contenders, with the ratio of vehicles that are destroyed to captured."||

    <<Soooo . . .>>
    ||Yes. I will have a Hylotl 'pilot'.||
    <<Fun. I'll get some fashion tips from Moonfin.>>
    ||There is no reason as of yet to withhold the information from them.||

    Elsewhere: <<"Hey guys! Good news!">>...
Ryu     When the blast wave clears, Ryu collapses to his hands and knees, his draconic body covered in cuts and burns from what he just did to preserve the future lives of these people that may not appreciate what he's doing. He squints through the pain that screams over his whole body... and breathes in, expending energy to close his wounds and slough off the burnt flesh, snapping his wings a few times as fresh, shimmering scales appear once more. He slaps his cheeks twice, and crouches, launching himself toward the fray to return to his retrieval efforts.

    "How are they going to catch that damn thing?" he wonders, briefly, his voice still hoarse from the atmospheric pummeling.
Starbound Flotilla     The zealot rushes forward a moment after Riva takes back to the top of the train, crushing "coal" underfoot and roaring spear-first, leaving him more than a little vulnerable to being hooked badly, stumbling and flapping wing-arms desperately to hold himself up! This leaves his spears ineffective as Riva pulls in past their convenient reach and yanks him into a grapple! "Wh-- No! BLASPHEMERS! Kluex--!" He screeches, before being cut off.

    Mostly by the gun to his forehead, angled to keep Riva out of it. "Next time around, try a little more prayer," He says. "Damned shame we were the blessed ones day." BOOM. That was kind of a 6/10, maybe a 7/10, but the zealot has a big-ass hole in his head. Alright! Train's clear! "Engineer! Bring us in towards that big roller! We're running with an escort today!" The Novakid calls out towards the engine car, and the train begins to shift. It's not really a train, just more like a train-shaped linked convoy or something? Who knows with Novakid engineering. The cowboy holsters his guns and offers Riva a friendly handshake!
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa take the hit, there'a a crunching sound, and a cry of pain. She does not let go and does not stop with the tasing she's itnending ti put him down for the count.

"Sorry your discharged."

She keeps up if need tand then she'll call to the driver.

"All right funs over, give it up here!"

She's short but damn she's looking menance right now while holding the raider leader.
Starbound Flotilla     The bullet bounces, reflects, and streaks towards Doctor Voronov! And his gun's about to discharge! But suddenly, the minion has leapt between the little wheelchair tankman and the bullet that streaks towards him, suffering the wound with a heavy, pained grunt. Covering his scienceman means he jostles the hover-wheelchair slightly, throwing the blast just off from Dexter, meaning he'll only need to deal with splash damage at worst. The minion's not going to last long, but Voronov probably won't if Dexter gets another bullet on him. "INCOMPETENT BUFFOON! You /dare/?!" Voronov shouts at the enforcer that just saved his life, to which the enforcer replies by hoisting his entire chair and leaping out the window to escape Dexter, landing below on the deck of some kind of hoverskiff and immediately starting to punch the men aboard to death so he can hijack it and zip away. Undoubtedly Voronov will return, but for now, Dexter's managed to take the rocket! Possibly for the Flotilla to use. A good chunk of salvage aboard it too.
Starbound Flotilla     While falling away in the enforcer's hand, Doctor Voronov even screams out, "ARKWRIIIIIIIIGHT!" While shaking an angered fist at the adventurer.
Riva Banari Riva doesn't pay much attention to the zealot as the Novakid handles terminating the final issue. She grunts, letting the body fall over and dispose of itself with PHYSICS. THEY'RE USEFUL.

With a sigh, she dispatches her own weapon, leaving her barehanded as she stretches, taking stock of her wounds and grimacing. "Well, that was a thing." She says, pulling out a lollipop and unwrapping it with a quick motion, sticking it in her mouth. She then reaches out to take the Novakid's hand, shaking it. "Pleasure to meet you. Name's Riva. Riva Banari. Look forward to working with you." Her hand dips into a pocket and pulls out another lollipop (strawberry flavored), offering it to the cowboy.

What, just because he has no face doesn't mean he doesn't eat, right?
Dexter Arkwright The bullet hits...someone else! Dexter is actually frustrated, and wishes he had the time and ammo to shoot again. But the tank blast splash damage knocks him off his feet, allowing Voronov and his enforcer to get away. Dexter forces himself back up, turning towards the window...and just simmers. He'll take out Voronov in the future. No one screws with Dexter Arkwright like that and gets away with it.

Since the rocket was put on auto-pilot, though, Dexter moves to see if there's a seat he can slump into and radio the Flotilla to tell them he has the rocket and where he is, and then fiddle with the controls to see if he could bring it to them.

Mission accomplished, time to lounge in pain!
Starbound Flotilla     Swinging the grapple-cords -- themselves made of high-strength nanotubes and other such fancy science fiction things -- is definitely a good idea. Considering the excess of spikes and the lack of sense in the design of this thing, there's not a lot to keep an effort to /tangle/ from working well. The whole APC is put on a timer of sorts, where one of the wheels is about to utterly give out. This gives Kotone enough time to finish him off with a sudden burst of electrical discharge, blasting the commander into unconsciousness. She may need to leap out though! The driver is too crazy to really care about even his own leader, and the APC is soon to be not carrying much at all. If she can leap aboard Corona's buggy again, she'll be clear when the APC abruptly fully tangles and, with a massive snapping noise, loses its rear right wheel entirely, promptly flipping and rolling over the kiln-blasted landscape, driving the remaining bandits off and seemingly making the whale's... Pilot? Mind? Decide that they were helpful and should be followed, even if there's not a ton of communication. They've got some extra help now to bring back to the Flotilla! Like Zwei and Riva!
Corona Arclite     "Ya might wanna get off now Koto!" Corona tries to warn her friend as the cords pull tight and into the APC's mechanics.

    As the wheel finally snaps off she hits a trigger to release the cables on her end so the buggy doesn't get dragged into the roll-over, and Kotone can jump over. Meanwhile Corona picks up her voxcom and snaps it open. "Hey Hopalong, ya still up there?" There's some affirmative chittering on the other end. "Good." She leans over a little to look in a mirror. "Just hang on fer now, looks like they're moving to follow us." Once Kotone's back aboard she'll head back to the Linerunner. Help is as good of resource as materials, right. Maybe they know more about how this weird chunk of a place works.
Starbound Flotilla     "Howdy, Riva! Name's Hexane, pleased meeting ya." The Novakid takes the candy from her and sort of... Inserts it into his glowing face. It kind of drifts there, visibly 'burning' away over time. His hand is /really/ warm, and his body, at this distance, is clearly a little translucent. This seems to be the settling of things here, for now.
Kotone Yamakawa There's no time to stay, her plan to hi-jack the thing goes bad and she grabs the leader without htinking about it asn leasp away with a full powerd cyborg leap. Followed by a double jump as she'll end up landing back on the buggy with the leader of the bandits, might as well bust his ass right? They did open fire on them first a far as she saw? Either way she's got one out cold crazy on her ride with Corona and she's looking a bit sheepish. "Well I guess we can grill him for info...once I turn him in.."