The Hydora Campaign

Parino Zairine


Tech crews were already going over Hiro's dead bird by the time she managed to get into the hangar. She had no idea what she was going to say to him, she wasn't sure if she was angry, she didn't feel anger- just worry- but from what she understood she was supposed to be angry because he almost died. Then she decided that anger was the wrong thing to be, just because books made it sound normal. Why should she be angry at him when she was worried?


Hiro was already striding over to her by the time she managed to get out of her FPA. His hug and his words started the process of easing her worries but she too wrapped her arms around his shoulders and just held on. "You worried? Not as much as I was when." She shuddered. "Is past, you're not dead, is okay, you're okay, I'm okay, we're okay. Yes?" She drew away from him to look at him. "You are okay, yes?" And because she decided she needed to check for herself, she did a far more thorough inspection of any possible wounds than he had done. "Hand is bad, we go and have medics check it."
 
<<Hand not bad, two blisters made, no more. I fine, truly. We make our story to boss, go home, yes?>> Hiro wants her to hear that in her language despite his non-fluency. He shows her the hand, which isn't even truly burned, more singed by a stray spark, or arc, or whatever. There had been a bit going on at the moment.


"Zairine, really. I'm fine. Let's get the after-action report out of the way and go home. Cook something. Snuggle in."
 
Safely landed and taxied into a bay, Shogun watches as Cypher talks with the tech crews before heading off to the make-shift crêche aboard ship. He pulled off his helmet and watched mutely as Hiro rushed over to embrace Zairine. He stayed sat in his cockpit, even as the EOD personnel carefully extracted the live warheads from Hiro's mangled Valkyrie and as the deck crews set about all the squadron's fighters, unbolting or ripping off damaged armor plating, delving into the bowels of the complicated spacecraft to determine the cause of Hydra Three's near-fatal series of faults. He finally disembarked as the deck chief demanded him out of the cockpit and wandered aimlessly through the ship. He didn't know how to feel, didn't know what to think. The minute we jump in-system, one of our fleet turns rogue and then Hiro's Valkyrie suddenly develops these problems in all the specific systems that would prevent that ship escaping us. True, the faults started as we attacked the Bioroid carrier, but still.


He looked up from his thoughts and realized he'd walked the full length of the ship on auto-pilot and was now stood in the doorway of what had once been Hydra squad's male bunkroom. A couple of younger pilots peered at him from whatever they were doing at the communal table and, spotting his LT1 bars, hurriedly hopped up to salute him. He distractedly waved them off and turned around without saying a word. His plodding feet took him to the ship's training room, where he stripped off his flight suit and showered. Then, dressed in a set of clean training togs, he began shadow-sparring, going first through karate katas and then through iaido katas. The smooth flow of his limbs and the sword soothed his mind and relieved the tension that he'd not realized had been building up within him.
 
Parino Zairine


She searched her husband's face then nodded. <<Very well, if you're sure you're perfectly fine. >> She threaded her fingers through his good hand. "We go report and then we go home and rest then wait to go out again."


She watched Yoshi climb out of his bird. "Yoshi brother is unhappy. I wonder what is meant by mutiny."
 
Thanks to the skill of the repair teams, the damage to Ghost's Valkyrie will be fixed in a matter of a few days. In the mean time, Hiro is being grilled as to exactly what happened with his missiles. The tech crews are reviewing the cockpit tapes and are examining the remaining missiles that weren't ejected, checking for signs that one or more of them may have been tampered with.


Also, Hiro's cooked hand is quickly taken care of with a trip to Medical and a treatment of synth-skin and a shot of painkillers.
 
Luke is stunned by the accident that happened with Hiro's missles. He was going to talk to the mechanics later.Though right now he was just gonna relax in the bunker he began to head to the bunker.
 
"I'm not sure I can tell you what mutiny means in Zentraedi. So I will use English. Mutiny means some of the crew took over the Rhabwar and were taking her away without orders. They stole the ship, and probably hunted down the officers or at least the captain to do so." Hiro walks with her away from Medical. "It is something humans have done in the past. Not honorable, and very disturbing."


He squeezes her hand and smiles. "I would guess Yoshi is where he goes most often when he's worried or stressed. Would you like to accompany me to the training room? I have a feeling Yoshi's there already. Maybe we could invite him and Sharon and Sakura to our quarters for a meal later?"
 
Parino Zairine


She thought about it. "I'm feel a bit off, I find Sharon-sister and Sakura and you find Yoshi-brother. We have family meal in our quarters. Maybe Sharon-sister need talk? And gives time to speak Zentraedi for Sakura to learn. She learn from cradle." There was a smile on her face as she said it. She leaned forward to give her husband a kiss on the cheek. "Be back in hour, we have food." She smiled at him again and tried the words which were still hard to say in public. "I love you Hiro, now go and make brother happy."


She gave him one last hug and waved goodbye as she sought out Sharon. She spoke to her sister briefly, telling her to bring Sakura for a family meal in the Hiro family quarters when she was ready. She then hurried off home, feeling slightly nauseated by something. Deciding not to cook, she ordered pizza to be delivered. "Yes, meat," she nearly growled into the com at whomever was taking her order. "and pineapple- but on the side, not on the pizza, on the side and cold. I want- never mind. Just the pizza, two larges," there was a pause as the order was repeated. "Yes, two large meat pizza, Hiro quarters, for one hour. Charge to account." She really needed to lie down.


She then called up Hiro on his link. When his face appeared on screen she smiled at him. "I ordered pizza for delivery in hour, bring home cold pineapple, will you? After you and Yoshi-brother are done? I need nap."
 
Hiro hurries down to the training room, and sure enough, Yoshi is there. Yoshi's focus is razor-sharp on the imagined attackers, his sword going through the katas smoothly. Hiro waits for a pause, then calls from the side of the mat, "Would you care for company, Yoshi? I could use a round or two of katas myself. And Zairine is inviting Sharon and Sakura to our quarters for supper. I'm here to invite you." Hiro smiles wryly. "We had a rough day, and I'd enjoy having company for a bit."


Hiro's commlink buzzes. He pulls it out to see Zairine's face, paler than normal. Her request for cold pineapple puzzles him but he nods and says they'll be home soon with it. She looks drawn out, so he lets her go without the questions he might ask otherwise. Returning his gaze to Yoshi he bows and says, "Shall we do katas, then? Or would you prefer to spar?"
 
Parino Zairine


As soon as Hiro disappeared from the link Zairine walked to the bathroom and looked at it. The shower had two different kinds of soap, shampoo, conditioner, there were two different types of towels, two toothbrushes, two tubes of toothpaste, two of everything. She wasn't living alone, and everything was shared. Her laundry was mixed with his and the sheets on that was on their bed had been a set he had used before they got married. The sheets they had gotten as a wedding present were not exactly clean. She blushed at the thought and began to undress.


She turned the shower on, yelping a bit at the cold water that came out. One it was hot she stepped into the shower itself and luxuriated in the heat. She felt cold. And then it hit her. She had never worried about herself, her armor and her speed and her abilities were far superior to anything the humans had, and she was married to a human, a human whose bird had failed him several times. The techs would go over it, figure out what went wrong and she had to trust that they knew what they were doing and wouldn't let him back into a faulty ship. The shower was equipped with a built in seat and she sat on it, needing the support. She almost lost him today. Tears stung her eyes and she wiped them away. It was strange having two of everything but she'd be damned if she'd ever complain about it. The day she had to go from two to one would be the worst day in her life.


She gave herself a good rinse, dried herself off and crawled into bed. His scent was there, on the pillow, on the sheets and even on the blanket they had shared just that morning. She curled up into a fetal position and rested her head on his pillow. His scent and the knowledge that the bedding wouldn't loose it comforted her even as she drifted off into a light doze. She knew Sharon and Sakura would come around but Sharon was more than welcome to just walk in. They were, after all, family.
 
Evangeline Crowley


One needed a natural talent for keeping out of the limelight in order to be a researcher. A type of being neither seen nor heard.


As Hydra lands, Crowley quickly disengages herself, harness and all, from her Veritech. She runs an affectionate hand over the machine before submitting her paperwork and vanishes.


A deck down, Crowley enters medical. A simple comment to the on staff nurse and she enters a darkened urgent care. Recovering a simple test connected before syn skin transplants, she exits and finds her way to the labs.


Nearly an hour later, a clean and rested Crowley strolls the Hydra assigned rooms. Nothing to do now but wait.
 
Hiro's voice draws Yoshi's attention and he pauses in the current kata, nodding to indicate his agreement. He returned to the kata, finishing the final moves and ceremonially sheathing the wooden bokuto into an imaginary sheath on his belt. He then retreated three steps and sank down to kneel at the far end of the mat.


"I'd be grateful to run through a couple of katas with someone. I feel so wound up, I'm sure I blew some of them and didn't notice.", he replied to his wingman's question, then sighed, "I'm really worried, Hiro, with all that's happened today. Our jump in went as planned and we really bloodied the Invid's noses. But everything started going wrong the moment we were engaged by the Bioroids."


He knew he didn't need to go into detail of events that centered around the younger pilot and his malfunctioning Valkyrie, but he still had to say it, "You were incredibly lucky today. If just a couple more of those missiles had of detonated, you'd be walking home. If you weren't..."


He stopped, not wanting to say the words, as images of his mother's horrified face as she received the long-dreaded news about his father's fate. As he remembered her sobbing, her eyes swollen with tears and she held him close to her, he imagined her with blue skin and hair, like Zairine. The image was a chilling one.
 
The pilots of the Valkyries are not the only ones concerned with the troubles suffered by Hydra squadron in this engagement. The tech crews have been crawling over the veritechs from one end to the other, and not just Hiro's damaged bird. Soon, the word comes down the line that all the Valkyries are being grounded due to problems with the electrical system. When questioned about what happened, Chief O'Brien reassures everyone that there is no signs of sabotage, but instead, it seems that the short in the cockpit caused the missiles to arm prematurely, then they locked up and refused to launch. This is not the first time that there have been problems reported by crews operating the Valkyries, and because of the continued troubles, the whole fleet is pulling the new veritechs off the line until a fix can be made. Until the time where they are given a green light, Hydra is going to fall back on the old familiar designs of the Alpha and Beta fighters. Zairine is the only one not having to change, since the FPA has had no troubles at all with its systems.
 
Over the next few hours, mecha retrieval ships transfer the downchecked Valkyries off the Foxhound and replace them with several Alphas and Betas that the tech teams go over and begin to do the system checks to get the veritechs up to speed.


While this is going on, the idea of being able to target a specific location with missiles is moving forward. Normally, a missile strike hits the main body of a mecha sized target. But, with the new guidance systems being worked on, a more accurate missile is in development. By using your onboard laser targeting system to laze the point of impact, the goal is to be able to fire a single missile and have it track on the location designated.


Game crunch, this will allow you to fire a single missile and have it hit a particular spot on a mech. This takes two attacks; one as you launch the missile, and the second is used to target the location, such as the sensor eye of an Invid. The good news is, with this, if one person wants to be the designator, you can have one mecha fire the missile, and the second one makes the hit roll for the aimed shot, splitting up the two attacks between different units.
 
Hiro bows, stepping onto the mat as Yoshi kneels. He kneels as well, face somber. "Yes, I was lucky today. In a sense we all were. Yoshi...this is what we do. We put our lives on the line knowing that any failure of spirit, or of equipment, or even superior technology of an enemy will likely kill us. We cannot focus on that, or it is time to turn in our wings. I...my heart nearly stopped when Zairine fired off that missile salvo. I thought her armor had blown up. She had so much longer to worry about me..." Hiro stops. Zairine seemed to be fine with the aftermath, but was she? Really?


"Let us put the past away. We are alive, we have our family around us. Practice with me?" Hiro stand up and takes the first stance of an intermediate iajitsu kata. He procedes through the kata at half-speed, knowing the difficulty of that will keep him focused.
 
Yoshi nodded. Hiro had certainly changed. In that first few weeks, he'd been self-contained, quiet, almost reclusive, even in squad bunks. He never stepped out of his place, keeping himself to himself and never taking risks. But, over time, his combat experience increased and his personality slowly broke out of the tight walnut shell he'd confined it to. Now he was an outgoing, adventurous, married man and his combat skill owed as much to devilish derring-do as to cool-headed logic.


Yoshi stood beside the younger man and assumed the same ready stance as he recognized the kata. Together they moved in sync, like wingmen should.
 
After a while of performing the katas, you look up to see Sharon standing to one side with little Sakura in her arms. She looks down at the baby and says, "Look honey, its daddy! Wave hi to daddy!" She takes the tiny hand and has the baby wave at Yoshi. "We were missing you, and wanted to come and see you. I hope you don't mind." Sharon walks up and gives her husband a kiss, and a pleasant smile to Hiro. "Have you guys heard about the changes down on the hangar deck? The Valkyries are being downchecked from multiple electrical problems, and we are being given some of the new Shadow Fighters, the first on the Foxhound! I like the idea of being invisible to the Invid; God knows that we need some advantage over the damn bugs. We just need to keep an eye on Zairine, since the Female Power Armor doesn't have the same cloaking system that the Shadow Fighters do. But, she's got the speed advantage over us, even when at full boost on the Beta. If it hits the fan, I'm sure she can get the hell out of dodge well enough."
 
Hiro completes the kata he's in and then stops, bowing to the imagined partner, then to Yoshi, before turning to Sharon.


"It will be interesting to see the new Shadow Fighters in action, though I'm going to miss the Valkeries. Oh, Sharon, did Zairine reach you? We'd love for you to join us for supper. Zairine's already ordered pizza, and wanted cold pineapple with it..." Hiro trails off, puzzled, then shakes his head. "Anyway, we'd enjoy having dinner. Especially after the action out there today."


Hiro steps off the mat, bowing to Yoshi again as he does. "I hope to see you both shortly. I'm going to shower and make sure Zairine's ready for us. Say in 30 minutes?" He waits for their answer before leaving to find Zairine.
 
"Of course we'll join you. But I must say, I'll have to talk to Zairine about her choice of toppings. Everyone knows that the best toppings for a pizza are green peppers, mushrooms and pepperoni." She smiles. "We'll be there in 30."
 
Dr. Evangeline Crowley


"Green Peppers, Mushrooms, and pepperoni..." Appearing from the locker room entrance, Crowley repeats Sharon's words with a smile on her face. Carrying a towel over her shoulder, she is dressed in her workout clothing. Dark shorts compliment the simple sports bra, the only thing out of place is the harness running across her body. Before the harness, Crowley rarely if ever showed much skin but now, her body altered to peak physical condition, was on display.


A vague memory from her teenage years at the jealously she felt in looking at models and athletes and knowing she'd never be able to reach that point had hit her when changing. Now, with little excess fat and improved musculature, she felt like a demi god among mortals.


Reaching the rows of benches, she begins adding weight. Handling a pair of forty five pound discs of iron like it was a copy of the abnormally short scientific findings of Dr. Ralph Kellerman and his thesis on the link between twins and neurological communication, she spoke calmly to the remaining couple.


"Sounds like a night of celebration. The missions went rather well at first did they not? I must say, any other than Hiro and we might have lost a Veritech and a beloved squadmate. He really is quite the pilot..." Her sentence lingers slightly before continuing "I do hope enough food is going to provided, if not, I am more than willing to bring some homemade dishes or pay for more food. What is the dress code for this evening?" Another set of free weights slide on, her attempted weight quickly reaching abhuman levels.
 
Sharon looks over at Dr. Crowley with a friendly smile. "I'm sure that there will be enough for you to join us. After all, you are a part of the Hydra family. It will give you a chance to snuggle with Sakura and give her some love."
 
Hiro nods at the doctor. "Yes, you are welcome, Evangeline. Dress is casual, and we're providing the meal tonight. Perhaps you could host a meal one of these evenings?" With that Hiro leaves and heads for his quarters. Their quarters. As he walks he again sees all the red and amber flashing lights of his Valkerie, hears the alerts and warnings chirping and buzzing and wailing. He stops, one hand on the bulkhead, swallows hard. He's never been in that situation before, watching his death approaching like that. It's always been in the flash and slash of battle, the enemy trying to hit him and the danger over before he's really processed it. Today he'd had plenty of time to see what was happening.


He straightens, and resumes walking to the comissary where he picks up pineapple. He takes it back to his quarters. Zairine's quarters. She will be there getting ready for the meal, he's sure. He enters their quarters calling Zairine's name, but when he sees that she's laying down for a nap he cubes the pineapple after peeling it. The cubes go into the fridge and he goes into their room, curling up next to her.
 
Parino Zairine


She didn't hear her husband when he came home but she felt him come into bed. She turned to face him then opened her eyes. "Did you no decide to spar with Yoshi-brother? Is no bad thing, happy you are home. She touched his face. You are home." She then reached for him, wrapped her limbs around him, just to hold onto him. "I no like fight today, not good fight. But done now. I need moment. Just a moment."
 
As Sharon, Yoshi and Sakura make their way over to the room where the pizza party is waiting for them, Sharon idly talks to her husband. "If you take the front seat on one of the Alphas, are you going to have a problem with me riding with Hiro? Having me in another veritech won't cause a conflict of interest, will it? Especially since its going to be partnering up with your own wingman. I trust Hiro completely, since he'd get himself killed by Zairine-sister if he ever let something happen to me."
 
Hiro looks at Zairine, puzzled. "I did several katas with him, brought home the pineapple and cubed it, then came in here. Have you been sleeping since you called me?" He puts his hand on her forehead. She feels normal, not feverish, so he curls up with her, holding her for a bit. Reluctantly he kisses her and uncurls himself after just a moment.


"Our guests are coming. I extended the invitation to all Hydra. Evangeline is coming as well as Sharon and Yoshi. I haven't heard from Luke or Captain Forrest."
 
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