NPF Avatars 5 - Capitalism Has Made It This Way

[Arhra]

With the fleshy meatbags of the NPF being slow in capitalising on the enormous mechanically augmented crustacean's weakness and in many cases ignoring it entirely, it was up to cold machine logic to save the day.

Of course, seeing the invading forces were largely robotic, it could be argued that cold machine logic was responsible for this whole mess in the first place. But anyone expressing that sort of sentiment deserves to have their organs ground down into lubricant.

Anyway, back to the cold machine logic solution; after Rei's bout of hugging and giggling (the subject of both actions being the double Mauves) she charged up her cannon of doom and blasted away most of the maintenance hatch defenders.

Kayessa, having had to reconfigure her targeting array after being caught in the explosion the crab had released, was finished in time to capitalise on this opening. She rushed forwards, weapon arm shifting again into a third configuration. Pointing it at one of the shock troopers, a lash of energy shot out, hitting the automaton squarely on the chest and latching on.

The missile trooper wasn't much phased by this - the grapple beam was completely harmless... technically. Of course, that argument didnt apply to Kayessa whipping the robot from side to side as she reeled it in while she continued to charge forwards, meaning a collision course with missiles pointed in her direction.

Neither did it didn't apply to her jabbing out with her other hand, fingers together in a tight wedge just as the grapple beam retracted fully. The chisel-like blow pierced through the crippled robot's torso, stabbing deep into its power core. Energy crackling over it, her sensors indicated the power core containment shield would critically fail in moments. Any heavy impact should be enough to make the battle-droid explode, possibly detonating the thing's missile supply too.

But she was in position, directly beneath the crab's maintenance hatch. With the battle-droid's limp form still tethered to her gun arm, she pointed the limb straight upwards and fired, launching the improvised bomb.

* * *

Interrupting me while I'm showboating?! Arhra thought as she flew through the air, right at Rhiya's mouth. Why that's just plain uncivilised! She didn't get nearly enough chances to dance as it was!

"Your witty repartee sucks!" Arhra yelled, flipping around in midair to change the fling into a flying kick. "Dragon Kick!"

She kicked Rhiya right in the snout. "Gnah! By gnose!" the dragon exclaimed, jerking back slightly. Arhra, for her part, tried to hide the pain of kicking something that solid. Slipping down, Arhra scrabbled for purchase, foot landing on Rhiya's lower jaw. Arhra's hand quickly snaked around a tooth on the roof of the dragon's mouth, straining to keep those jaws pried upon.

With the top of Arhra clearly in Rhiya's view, she bent over and began gnawing on Rhiya's snout. It packed quite a punch, seeing Arhra could drain energy through any physical contact. Seeing Arhra going to work as if she was fighting a giant candy dragon was almost more than Rhiya could stand.

Progress was made in other areas too, Arhra's energy drain embrittling the tooth she was hanging on to. "Ahaha!" Arhra shouted, wielding the tip of Rhiya's tooth triumphantly and biting off the weakened section, other arm now taking the strain of keeping Rhiya's jaws apart. Holding the tooth dagger-like, Arhra started stabbing Rhiya with herself. She refrained from a line like, "Stop hitting yourself!"

Even so, this was too much for Rhiya to bear. With a convulsive jerk, Rhiya swung her head up, jaws opening wide, sending Arhra flying upwards. The chaos being just beginning to call up magic to get her out of that predicament, Rhiya's head lunged forwards like a heron snapping some small wriggling thing out of the water. Her jaws closed over the flailing shape, swallowing Arhra whole.

"Ok, don't panic." Arhra told herself as she scrambled for a hold on the slick sides of Rhiya's throat, the pumeling action of peristalsis forcing her down. "Its not like you haven't been in this sort of situation before."

Things took a turn for the worse when Arhra reached the Place Where A Stomach Should Be. Below her, Arhra instead saw a ravening maw of inflowing power that narrowed down to a tiny speck of utter brilliance.

"Oh, a naked singularity. That does explain a lot." Arhra said to herself. She supposed about now was a good time to start putting that Awesome Escape Plan into action. Calling up chaos through her being, Arhra found the power warped, twisting away from her control. Her body jerked, Arhra suddenly aware of corrosion to the integrity of her being, boundaries blurring between herself and the great mass of chaos that made up Rhiya's body. Something was very, very wrong.

Fighting against dissolution, Arhra screeched with anger. She waded forwards into the abyssal maw, unravelling hands seeking to encompass it, letting her own hunger flow out to pull power back into herself. This was going to be messy.