>>25682117
Of course we're fine with following his orders. He's our superior and he knows what he's doing.

>>25682117
Hear him out, but when he's done comment on the fact that the Zedas units are likely remote-controlled. It's been seen before, and it makes sense given that the Zeydra units are X-Rounder exclusives. We might be able to diminish their effectiveness by overwhelming the Zeydras.

That, or I'm completely wrong and the different heads are because they've got some enhanced version of Psychomet that integrates it into the entire suit. It's definitely X-wave related, though. Either a receiver or an amplifier, I don't know which.

>>25682206
That sounds like a plan.

We have Akito and Yurika aboard the Diva, right? Couldn't they pick up if those suits are remotely controlled (no X-Rounder presence) or actually piloted (some X-Rounder presence)?

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>>25682206
>>25682138
>>25682243
“Obright, Max and Arisa will form a defensive line to prevent the enemy from breaking through to the ship. Me, Asemu and Dirk will confront the enemy and draw the focus away from the ship so the Diva can prepare a missile bombardment.” Woolf explains.

“I’m fine with that. However I think those Zedas units are probably being controlled by the Magicians 8. Maybe we should target them and try to overwhelm them; it might affect the performance of the other suits.” You add, trying to make a suggestion.

“Really? Alright then we’ll try to target the Magicians 8, let’s move people!”

What will you do Dirk? Obviously you’re going to follow the plan but how do you want to go about approaching and attacking?

>>25682537
We need to box those fuckers in.
Keep the 8 under constant fire, and try to lure them into the firing range of the Diva. Doesn't matter if they're psychic, they can't avoid all the shots.
Arisa, Max and Obright should defend the Diva and try to keep them in front of the ship, so that we can utilize those heavy cannons to the max.
If we manage to group multiple targets close together open heavy fire using those grenade launchers.

>>25682537
What's the load on our suits?
What are our troops piloting, what weapons and utilities are they equipped with and so on?

>>25682537
Asemu should circle around to the right in Strider mode so he can fire on them and force them up against that asteroid field. Meanwhile, we should fire some EMP bolts from the EM Bullpup set on proximity detonation. It won't actually shut them down, but nearby magnetic disruptions can't be good for their sensors. That way their X-Rounder abilities will be focused more on keeping aware of their surroundings than precognition or controlling the Zedas's. So we should be able to keep them occupied for Woolf to come in and show them that psychic powers are no match for ace skills.

>>25682801
You know, we really should have made some proximity mines or grenades by now.
As for Asemu, I don't think he's yet unreadable to those guys - better not risk him going alone.

How's this:
Team 1 (Arisa, Max, Obright) keep them in front of the Diva, while team 2 (Dirk, Asemu, Woolf) move in from the side and force them up against those asteroids. The Diva should keep firing on them, while Dirk launches some grenades and EMP bolts to disrupt the 8 as much as possible, so that they have to focus on staying alive than controlling those other suits.

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>>25682868
(Once again. EMP Bolts only work if they connect with a mobile suit.)

>>25682717
The Merlin Gundam is currently loaded up with:
1x Beam Vulcans built into the head
2x Beam Sabers stored on hips
2x Heavy Beam Emitters in the knees
1x 90mm Tri-Barreled Gatling Cannon *mounted on Left Forearm
1x 2 Tubed Grenade Launcher Mounted on Right Forearm
1x EM Bullpup with three magazines of AP ammo, one of Explosive and one with EM for disabling purposes.

>>25682626
>>25682801
You fire on the Magicians 8 with everything you have in the hopes of luring them towards you and into the firing range. You are supported by Arisa, Max and Obright who are providing fire support with their now formed defensive line. Woolf and Asemu split up to try and box them in.

However as soon as you fire the formation formation of Zedas swarm and scatter all over the place, with the Magicians 8 hanging back just out of your firing range.

The 4 Zedas attack Woolf, forcing him to dodge and preventing him from getting into melee by using the stray asteroids where he is.

Three Zedas attack you and Asemu each. Asemu seems to be handling himself pretty well until the Magicians 8 begin to circle around through Asemu.

You try to assist him, but the Three Zedas attacking you refuse to budge and are zipping all over the place, wildly dodging your fire.

How will you try to dispatch them Dirk?

>>25683348
"Asemu! Fall back, the 8 are trying to circle around you!"

Those fuckers are grouped closely. Launch a couple of grenades into them, while using the mini-gun for suppressing fire on the guys harassing Woolf and use those heavy emitters against the bastards in front of us.

>>25683348
Let's use the explosive bolts on proximity detonation. We'll get a nice shrapnel spray that should damage their sensors and thrusters. Should slow them enough to rush in and knee them to death with the heavy beam emitters. As an aside, how heavy are they? How does their blade size compare to, say, the Double Bullet's beam emitters?

>>25683412
Also, have Arisa and Max take the left to alleviate Woolf as much as they can. Those guys are pretty focused on him, they won't notice a sneak attack in time.

>>25683455
Our heavy emitters? I assumed that those things function like cannons, not something based on the Titus wear.

>>25683502
>>25683455
No the Heavy Emitters function like the Beam emitters on the Titus, only ours are more focused and stronger. They are shorter then a beam saber but they have much greater penetration.

Swapping out the AP magazine for the Explosive rounds, you plan on using them to blind the Zedas and wipe them out with the Heavy Beam emitters, your grenades should be able to screw up the clustered together Magicians 8 heading for Asemu.

Readying your gun you burst forward and fire...

(Roll vs Pilot Skill. 49 or below will succeed. 50 or higher will fail. 1 is a critical success. 100 is a critical failure. Only the first six rolls will be counted)

Rolled 11

>>25683982
Here goes nothing.

Rolled 30

>>25683982
Dirk Crocker, Engaging!

Rolled 4

>>25683982
Rolling

Rolled 36

>>25683982
Come on Nat 100

Rolled 5

>>25683982
Dirk Crocker, Failing.

Rolled 47

>>25683982
Heh. The Dice like Asemu, it seems.

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>>25684220
You bet they do.

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>>25684008
>>25684052
>>25684118
>>25684150
>>25684207
>>25684220
>47, 5, 36, 4, 30, 11

"Asemu! Watch out those bastards are getting too close!"

Using the proximity setting on the explosive bolts you spray the Zedas with them, turning their sensors into metallic swiss cheese. Apparently the other sensors in the head were damaged as well, causing their movement to become erratic and slow, just long enough for your to knee them to pieces and make your way over to Asemu.

You fire both grenades at the Zedas charging at Asemu, intercepting and blowing them to bits, allowing Asemu to kick back the third Zedas and shred it with his EM Bullpup.

The Magicians 8 fire on you and Asemu, forcing you to take evasive maneuvers. Obright, Max and Arisa fire on the Magicians 8 and scatter most of them, but only draw attention to themselves.

The Magicians 8 has you mostly surrounded save for behind you and they are approaching the ship, however they are too scattered for a missile barrage to work properly, especially since your in the cluster with them now.

Woolf seems to be having issues with the four Zedas, which now seem to have increased in performance with the destruction of the other Zedas.

What do you wish to do?

>>25684911
Don't let them close us in. Fall back with Asemu to the Diva while using the Gatling cannon to suppress those bastards.
Once we're out of dodge, let the Diva blow them to bits.

We dead?

>>25685742
(No, I was waiting to see if anyone had anything else to suggest, I'll go with this one then)

>>25684911
Why exactly are we so set on a missile barrage, again? I doubt the new armor and shielding can stand up to battleship grade beam weapons. Can't we get the anti-aircraft beam cannons out? Much more precise than blanketing the area with explosions, too, so we're not at as much risk if they fire right now.

>>25685946
I suggested that, already.

Maybe the saturation would take them out for sure - they probably could evade a blast from a typical cannon, but not all the explosions otherwise. But yeah, we probably should take out our anti-aircraft cannons.

>>25685946
(The Anti-Air Beam guns are the DODS Gatling Guns so the Magicians 8 will need to be pretty close for them to hit them and considering they are X-Rounders you probably don't want to risk that.)

>>25684998
You spray the Gatling Cannon, keeping the Magicians 8 from getting close to you as you make it back to the ship. You wait for the missile attack from the Diva too come but it never does...

You look back and see the worst thing you could possibly see at this time. A Fa Bose Class ship de-cloaked and is bombarding the side of the Diva, it looks like it's already taken a hit to the side from the massive ships guns and is too busy to provide cover fire.

The Magicians 8 keep hounding you and Asemu, on top of that Woolf still hasn't been able to shoot down the Zedas messing with him in the debris field. Max, Arisa and Obright provide coverfire but the Magicians 8 keep evading trying to lure them away from the ship.

Just when things look like your screwed you look back and see the Fa Bose Class ship just before it's blown in half by some kind of monstrous railgun round. The ship is torn in half and sent hurtling backwards into the black of space as a MASSIVE ship comes into view. It's at least 600 meters long, 200 something meters wide and houses nothing short of an army's worth of turrets and missile launchers scattered across it's hull. You count at least 8 MS hangers.

A voice breaks over the comm channel as the ship thunders into view. "This is the Dagon. LEVIATHAN is here to lend you support!"

Mobile suits begin to deploy in mass and the Magicians 8 stop dead in their tracks. Seeing the massive ship and the destruction of what could have been their mothership, they turn tail and run, scattering the remaining Zedas to cover their retreat.

What do you wish to do Dirk?

>>25685970
>>25685946
(Alright, let me rephrase that. Missiles have a larger area of effect then a beam cannon blast or a spray from a DODS Gatling CIWS turret. Missiles have excellent range and are hard enough to dodge and are strong enough that even an X-Rounder would be hard pressed to dodge a barrage of them)

>>25686024
"Holy. Shit."

Get a status report on everybody.

>>25686024
"Much appreciated, LEVIATHAN. So does this mean that you guys aren't a covert team anymore? You've been getting a lot more blatant in your deployments lately. Not that I can say I mind, right now."

Dagon, huh.

Note to self - ask Akito and Yurika are they sure that the group they're working for isn't really out to conquer the world.
Their naming convention just screams friendly - in fact, Grodek's new ship is probably called the Children Smasher.

>>25686249
You're only saying that because you're thinking of Lovecraft. The name Dagon comes from ancient Mesopotamia. It's no more ominous than naming a ship Enlil or Bahamut or Osiris. A bit arrogant, to name your ship after the king of gods, but not inherently villainous.

>>25686400
It's actually probably just to fit the "Leviathan" naming scheme. I bet all of their ships are named after ancient Middle-Eastern myths associated with water. So they'd have the Dagon, the Bahamut, the Oannes, the Tiamat and so on. Maybe move into other regions' mythology with stuff like the Ao Kuang, the Dakuwaqa, the Kanaloa...

>>25686400
You're probably right.

On a side note, I think the Dagon is bigger than what was described above if it ripped apart a Fa Bose in one shot. I mean, the Fa Bose is about a kilometer in length, and it houses dozens of suits inside. Maybe it ripped apart one of their battleships, but if it destroyed a Fa Bose, this thing is much larger than 600 meters. Maybe it's the size of a small colony or something.

>>25686479
I don't know, if they had a railgun running that whole length they could do some serious damage. A 600 meter linear accelerator can build up some ridiculous speed. Sir Isaac Newton is the deadliest son of a bitch in space, remember? And if they hit the base plate that the escort ships dock to they could probably cause enough spalling that the battleships all fly off. Which would look more or less like the ship being broken in half.

>>25686090
"Wait, I thought LEVITHAN was still a secret..." you ask. watching as the ship turns and approaches the Diva, the Magicians 8 fleeing into the distance as Black Adele units fly past in pursuit.

"We were revealed to the public ahead of schedule, so we no longer have to operate without support of the Federation" Akito explains over the comms.

You check up on everyone. Max, Arisa and Obright are fine, Asemu seems OK and Woolf...

"I'm fine! Jeez you'd swear I was an old man with the way those things bounced around. Ugh, next time I'll dispatch those things without any effort." Woolf is pissed but otherwise unharmed.

Reports on the Diva come in. They took a direct hit to the side of the Diva, thankfully the casualties were low and the section exposed wasn't a tremendously important one. No vital systems were damaged or destroyed.

"Please return to the ship and allow us to secure the area. Our mission is to get you to Big Ring safely. All of you" The operator, or possibly one of the many operators aboard the Dagon considering it's size and possible MS Compliment.

What do you wish to do? Will you return to the ship or insist you assist?

>>25686462
That's actually a pretty neat idea.
Apparently the current-age people don't know much about Earth's ancient history, so Leviathan digging up the past and arriving on ships named after water deities and other mythological beings from the past would give them that flavor of mystery and danger. And it'd probably indicate that they've dug out the old archives and are ready to kick ass using pre-war tech.

>>25686547
If the entire ship was built around a rail gun that was 600 meters long, yes. But this thing has at least 8 MS hangars, a fuckton of turrets, an army of suits and who knows what else inside. You'd need a pretty big generators to fuel all that, bigger warehouses to store all the necessary supplies and so on. It's probably a re-purposed colony.

>>25686595
"Commander Woolf? Your orders, sir?"

We should go help the crew of the Diva and work on repairs.
Let Leviathan take care of securing this area.

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>>25686608
Eh, I don't know. There are ships of equivalent length in the Gundam franchise. The Gwadan and Dogosse Giar were that big, and they weren't re-purposed colonies. And ships being built around their huge guns is a tradition in the series. Hell, we did it when we rebuilt the Armstrong for the Ambat assault.

>>25686739
Huh. Maybe this will be the new type of ship the Feds are going to field in Gen-3 when the Diva-type gets old?
Still seems a bit small to me, but hey, that's just my opinion.

On a side note, a small increase in Dirk's piloting would be in order, don't you think?
Maybe a percent or two, this was nothing major, but it still was his first battle in space.

>>25686608
>>25686739
>>25686608
>>25686785
(It was 800 meters, not 600 meters, god damn typo. It's not a re-purposed colony, just a big ass ship built around a big ass gun. Also, Dirk's piloting skill is now 51%)

>>25686649
"I think we should leave it to these guys. Besides they seems pretty adamant about keeping us safe" Woolf leads everyone back inside the hanger where the engineers get to work on repairs and you all sit down and take a breather.

Akito and Yurika bring you guys some food, it's pretty easy even with an arm in a cast to carry stuff in Zero-G. You and the guys get re-hydrated and you can't help but ask.

"Did you guys know that thing was coming to help us out?"

"No way" Yurika says shaking her head. "I heard Leviathan had a large ship built for their task force, but I had no idea it was that big..."

"It's probably the flag ship and it's quite possible that he might be on it..." Akito taps his chin in thought as you sip the last of your water.

"Who?"

"Grodek. He's the commander of Leviathan. Not officially of course, he's going by some alias but it's obviously him, unless he was cloned or some nonsense like that but that's idiotic besides I wouldn't be surprised if Dad asked him to come here and escort us to Big Ring..." Akito lets out a sigh of what appears to sigh of frustration.

What do you want to do? The Engineers are making minor repairs and checks to your suit and everyone is abuzz about the Dagon. You'll be here a little while longer till the Diva is given the OK to move.

>>25686821
Grodek is going by some ridiculously transparent alias? I hope you have a properly stupid name planned, Crosswire. It might not be as magnificent as "Quatro Bajeena", but it's got to be something silly.

>>25686821
See if we can help with anything, shoot some shit with Akito and Yurika. Maybe talk to Akito on the side about Grodek and all this crap.
You'd bother Asemu, but that ex-fat kid apparently likes hanging around him, and you don't want to risk her wrath.

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>>25686887
>>25686850
You try to get Akito to cough up what his alias is, but he refuses too. Not because it's secret or anything, but because it's too amusing to spoil.

"You have to hear it come out of his mouth, it took every fiber of my being not to laugh." Akito says with a grin.

You talk with Akito and Yurika some more about the rather evil naming conventions of Leviathan and how bloody ominous they are while leaving Asemu alone to talk with Arisa. She's getting pretty friendly with Asemu, huh wonder what Romary would think? Nah it's probably nothing serious.

After a couple of minutes you, Akito, Yurika, and Asemu are called up to the bridge where Captain Millais congratulates you on your good work.

"Minus the fact we were shot in the side by the enemy ship, you guys did a good job, I can't really scold you for not stopping beam cannon blasts with your mind...yet." She actually seems a little amused as she hands the four of you recently printed ID tags.

"The Captain of the Dagon asked for you to come over on the shuttle. He didn't tell me anything besides the fact he wanted to speak with the four of you." Millais explains.

"The shuttle will be prepped in a half an hour, I suggest you get washed up or at least make yourselves look presentable. Dismissed..."

What do you wish do do Dirk?

>>25687134
"Do we at least know what he wants from us?"

>>25687174
After this, get washed, dressed, the whole deal. Possibly screw with Asemu for a while about his new fangirl.

>>25687206
Yes. Asemu's given us enough shit about Yurika and Rena. Now we will mock him.

>>25687240
That sounds like a plan that can backfire fantastically. I'm for it.
> "So. How're things with Arisa?"
> "You know, she seems nice. Did you finally confess to Yurika?"

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>>25687240
>>25687206
>>25687174
"I'm afraid I don't. He just said he wanted to specifically talk to you four." Captain Millais says with an honest shrug.

You leave and take a quick shower. Throwing on a clean uniform you bug Asemu while he's getting ready, teasing him about Arisa and making him more then a little uncomfortable.

"I like talking to her, what's the matter with that?? He asks, scratching the back of his head.

"Oh come on, she was practically all over you. I mean she kicked me square in the balls when I first talked to her."

"Well maybe she likes me because I don't scream she used to be fat at the top of my lungs when I first saw her."

The two of you bicker a bit more before boarding the shuttle with the others, Asemu teasing you about building a 'harem' again, making you cover your face in embarrassment after remembering how upset Rena was about that.

You spend the shuttle ride making small talk with the others until you arrive at the Dagon. The ship is massive. Everything seems to be bigger and better then any ship you've seen before. However you aren't given a whole lot of time to look around. A women runs square into Asemu, practically running him over and goes right on by without saying a word.

Asemu looks back, trying to see the women but doesn't get a chance.

"Asemu? You OK? Looks like you just saw a ghost?" You smile and pat him on the shoulder as your urged along by your escort.

However he doesn't laugh and he doesn't smile. Whatever he saw in that person seemed to remind him of something very upsetting...

Eventually you come to the captain's quarters and see a man with bad-ass side burns and graying hair. He wears sunglasses and is dressed in a black uniform.

"My name is Alan Recto..." Grodek says calmly.

And that's when you proceed to burst out laughing and fall to the floor.

>>25687944
(Well this is a good place to stop things. Back to Jack! I think I might take a day off tomorrow. I need to do some planning to do and I think I might have to work on a patio. Well how have things been so far? I'm not very satisfied myself, did I at least get a good, stupid name for Grodek's shitty alias?)

>>25687958
(Jake God damn it)

>>25687958
I liked the horrible alias. I came here to laugh at you, Alan. You did not disappoint.

>>25687944
Emily?

>>25687958
Fun as always.

>>25688040
(Well as long as you guys are happy. But that doesn't mean I won't try to improve things. I'll use my planning time wisely)

>>25688097
Nice. Can't wait to see what's in store for Jake.
See you next time.

>>25688299

http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/25682117/

Oh I'm very sure you'll like what I have in store...