The Strategist, the Hell Raven, and the Starpiece (Option C)

[Clownpiece]

Aadibah...

Utsuho pondered at the name, tears starting to drying up as she gazed semi-blankly at the woman’s outstretched right hand. Her eyes darted for a quick moment to the control rod on her own right arm, returning again to the woman. It probably would be rude to just leave her hanging like that, especially since she just declared them friends of all things.

“Pleased to meet you, Aadibah!” Okuu greeted cheerfully, previous despair nearly forgotten as she raised her control rod up and confidently bumping it against the woman’s hand.

“...Right,” she responded after a moment’s hesitation, dropping her arm back to her side. The sounds of gunfire still filled the air, though now the faint revving of engines could be heard over everything. “We should help eliminate the last of the raiders before they can retreat. Keep them from pulling something like this again.” Aadibah turned away from the hell raven, and began jogging off in the general direction her comrade had gone.

Eliminate.

That was a delightfully strong word. Okuu’s gaze fell to the corpses of the two people she had trusted and, regretfully, led here. One neck twisted fatally to the side, jaw hanging loose, the other now faceless. Rin wouldn’t be coming to collect these corpses any time soon. They wouldn’t be fed into the Hell of Blazing Fires to fuel it. She vaguely wondered what would happen to them. Would they just go to waste? Even if they would though, there were more pressing matters to attend to.

She remembered approximately where one of the jeeps was. If she nuked it, they couldn’t escape in it! Nuclear reactions surged forward as Okuu leapt into the air, wings flaring out. Powerful energy burst out, through her control rod and towards the ground, propelling her in the general direction she had come from earlier. With the help of her nuclear-assisted boost, the hell raven easily cleared the run-down buildings.

Rooftops flew past beneath her parabola, and with a heavy thud and some supernatural balance, she came to a crashing halt on the last one before the vast expanse that was the Savannah, tucking her wings behind her as she stilled. Rusty browns and blacks shone dully in the bright midday sun. One jeep, square in her vision, was her target. Utsuho raised her left hand above her head, pointing skyward as she poured nuclear energy into a spot just above her extended finger. Plasma burned the air around the growing orb fiercely, swelling with every bit of power she put into it, until finally it was ready.

Though her eyes never left her target, she did take note of a few dusty figures, presumably the raiders, slowly backing up to their escape vehicle, discharging their weapons into the city. A cruel grin crept across Okuu’s face. This wouldn’t be a fun surprise for them. She swing her left hand, still pointing, towards the jeep, releasing the plasma ball right towards it. The projectile shot through that distance with incredible speed, humming lightly as it burned up the air it passed.

The plasma ball struck the ground just beneath the front-end of the vehicle. Unstable energy exploded outwards with tremendous blast, forming a massive pillar of plasma that vaporized the entire front of the jeep, and blew away the unfortunate raider nearest to it. Both the man and the massive lump of metal were thrown skyward with the force, flying almost half as high as the pillar itself. The other two raiders that had been trying to beat a hasty retreat whipped around as the explosion occurred, turning only to see a massive, glassy crater in the ground, their getaway vehicle smashing against the dirt after its long fall, half gone, and their comrade burnt up and still.

Utsuho let out an energetic and unintelligible cheer as she jumped off the building she had been perched on, spreading her wings and diving down towards the two remaining raiders. Alerted by all the noise she was making, the two dusty figures twisted around yet again, raising up their weapons to combat the new threat. Neither of them ever got the chance to fire. A single, well-placed plasma bolt shot out from the village out of Okuu’s sight, taking out the one on the left. The moment’s hesitation brought on the remaining raider from that kill-shot provided the hell raven with all the time she needed.

Her corium boot, driven by the momentum of her entire body, slammed into the man’s chest. Ribs shattered beneath the impact, and the raider was driven heavily into the ground. Utsuho’s mouth stretched up into a grin as she dug the boot harder into the man’s ribcage. A small bit of her power surged down that leg and through her foot, setting off a chain reaction of fission energy. Loud, rapid-fire explosions rang through the air, each punctuated by a pulse of light from Okuu’s foot of fission. The nuclear blasts burned at the cloth and flesh beneath, filling the air with a familiar, pungent odor.

Soon, the staccato blasts faded away, leaving only a very beaten-up and burnt corpse beneath her boot. The hell raven carelessly lifted her foot off the carcass and moved to take a step back to the village. Pain jolted up her right leg as it touched the ground, tender from where the detonations had taken place. A pained sigh escaped her mouth as her face contorted into a grimace. Not wanting to take any more steps like that, the young youkai lifted into the air and made her way back to the city, hovering a few inches off the ground.

“Hey you,” a white armoured figure stepped into Okuu’s sight from around a building corner, pointing at her. “Keep the vehicles intact, we can salvage them.”

“Heh, okay...” the hell raven responded with an embarrassed laugh, casting a short glance back towards the wreckage behind her.

“And hurry up, if we’re quick we can get them all.”