Crystal pushed the yoke forward one last time and sent the plane into a dive at a terribly steep angle, followed by Nixon sliding forward past her and swinging his broadsword down across the closest control panel. Sparks and fire burst forth at once and followed the path of the slash he made.
He looked out the window to ensure they were on target. Sure enough they were, he then saw a barrage of various planes and other strange hovering crafts begin to pour out of the sides of the base called HOME and fly up towards them.
Crystal was back by Aryu and Sho. She glowered at Nixon. “Was that really necessary? I promise I won’t miss.”
“It’s not yer aim tha' concerns me as much as it is them takin’ remote control of this thing and savin' themselves once they see wha' we’ve got planned. Now it’s a one-way trip.”
Sho, uninterested in the banter, already began the clenching of his hand to start the rotation of the shield’s blades. Aryu could now see that each of his fingers sat in loops, and when pulled forward they cranked some unseen gears inside the weapon to create the spin.
Sho jammed the humming shield and its protective border into the side of the plane, cutting through the thin skin. Aryu followed suit, cutting his own hole, eventually letting it meet up with Sho’s.
With the cut complete, the sheet metal flew off into the rushing air, and the command cockpit was filled with heavy winds and unbearable noise. As Sho stood on the edge of the new impromptu doorway, a serious flaw in the plan came to Aryu. He instantly felt foolish that he’d not thought of it sooner. “Wait!” he called to Sho before he knew what he was doing. “You can’t jump!”
Sho looked at him with his signature placidness. “Why not? We need to go now.”
“I know, but your armor! You’ll sink like a stone!” It was true. The plan involved a freefall into the water with Nixon holding back Sho and taking the brunt of the forceful impact, using miniscule amounts of his own Divine Power to cushion them both while Aryu took Crystal and glided her either to water or a safe landing somewhere on the ship.
The armor of both Nixon and Sho was likely to cause them to sink. Sho would die if they didn’t get rid of it right now.
Sho only looked as he always did, calm and uninterested. “Don’t worry, Aryu.” And with that, the big man gave a push and let himself fall out of the plane, followed quickly by Nixon.
“Our turn!” shouted Crystal. The base was approaching rapidly, and Aryu had no time to worry or argue. He hugged her close, folded in his wings to prevent the initial drag from pushing him into the fuselage and launched himself clear of the unguided missile moments before it made its surprising and unexpected impact straight into the heart of the deep-gray floating command structure known as HOME.
-----------------------
Being so old was bound to have its drawbacks. Hubris was only one of a multitude Tokugawa Izuku possessed. During the re-creation of the Neural Inhibitor drug, he had decided that to someone like himself, an Embracer of the Power and long in years, loss of these abilities would be something akin to torture (indeed, it had been for more than one test subject, he recalled gleefully). The loss of mental strength would cripple one like him, making him unable to think clearly.
He certainly would not have been able to concoct a plan mere hours after the fact. A plan so smooth and effective it could create such a tidal wave of repercussions such as this one seemed to.
Indeed, seconds after he realized they had no intention of running away with the plane, he momentarily believed that maybe, just maybe, the powerful trio of Crystal Kokuou, Nixon of the Great Fire and Ash, and of course his beloved half-brother Tokugawa Sho may be just as dangerous without the Power as they were with it, only for different reasons.
As the initial rumble of the impact rocked the core of HOME, he knew he would never make that mistake again. But first he resigned himself to the fact that he would have a terrible mess to clean up.
HOME was a floating superstructure comprised of a massive hull that was shaped like a monstrous, dark gray ‘V’. It stood as tall as a twenty-story building out of the water, with nearly as much room below the surface. It was not terribly mobile, with most of the defensive and maneuvering capabilities bestowed on the armada that accompanied it everywhere it went. It was the figurehead, the launching point for waves of ground troops by means of fast attack vessels from its wide, opening hull. On top of the High-Yield weapons within its body, it had multitudes of aircraft, from the quick and nimble Peregrine SCRAM reconnaissance jets to the High Heavy Aero Trackers that could take off with ease on HOME’s exposed launch deck. Even the extremely large Bullfrog cargo planes could land with very little hassle, given the space to do so.
This Bullfrog, although given space in expectation of its landing, brought with it more than a ‘little hassle.’
Hitting nose-first on the deck just to the side of the apex of the massive ‘V’ shape, the plane disintegrated on impact. Waves of fire shot outward in every direction, consuming the deck crew without discrimination, followed by pummeling the levels below in equal measure.
A large chunk ripped through to the cargo bay, taking with it numerous crew and vehicles in a blinding fireball. Although most of the crew were mindless automatons, those that were alive (vagabonds and ne’er-do-wells from one walk of life or another who had opted to bet on
