13712/Brood Invasion: A Last Stand

Brood Invasion: A Last Stand
Date of Scene:	09 August 2021
Location:	Shi'ar Imperium
Synopsis:	The battle of Raken 4 in the Brood-Shi'ar war ends with the planet being turned to ash... but what was left of the population evacuated... and now the battle lines shift in-system to Raken 3
Cast of Characters:	Star-Lord, Gigas, Mon-El, Rocket Raccoon, Kinsey MacKenna
Tinyplot:	Brood Invasion

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Star-Lord has posed:
The Brood are not an enemy anyone sane wants to face... but when you have to, they're an enemy that few in the galaxy will have any problems killing. Drones have been killed in countless numbers since the start of the war weeks ago... and they just keep coming. Raken 4 -a temperate world with some desert to it- has been nearly completely overrun from infected Shi'ar drones. The last city on the planet is being decimated, and the Shi'ar garrison is slowly being pushed back to the starport. The civilians the Imperial war machine are protecting won't have enough time to get off planet before the evacuation shuttles can rotate fast enough to get them out.

With the rest of the planet in Brood hands, the Shi'ar have begun a campaign of mass bombardment; they are literally turning it into a scorched earth wasteland in an effort to buy more time. The planet will likely become a toxic mess for decades, if not centuries.

Gigas has been contacted by the Imperial Guard Smasher with a simple offer; get down to that city... and assist in buying time for the Imperium to finish evacuating the capital. By whatever means necessary.

The planet is going to be nuked into oblivion after he's done. The more drones and material are destroyed... the better. Gigas has literally no reason to hold back from potentially wrecking this planet.

In orbit, a massive Shi'ar fleet fires their massive plasma cannons at the surface, indiscriminately glassing it.

Gigas has posed:
Yikes. Well then. Gigas has been accused of being somewhat detached and lacking in a bit of self awareness and danger sense before. It's as if he doesn't have a proper grasp on things or a sense of grounding but in reality he's actually connected and aware of things beyond the senses of most mortal senses, almost perceiving matters on two fronts at once and just being distracted and laid back during even the worst of times.

This is not one of those times. When the full scale of the damage on the planet is made clear to him, alongsode the threat to the citizenry, let alone beyond should things continue to degenerate as they have, his glowering red eyes gradually widen and his mouth quirks into a pressed-lip look of consternation.

"Maybe I should have charged triple." he rumbles after Smashers briefing is done. But what's set is set.

Soon a drop ship is bringing him towards the battle zone in question and he steps forward towards the edge of the hangar bay as purple-hued cosmic energy crackles about his body as if he were plugging into some sort of invisible source. His already outrageous physique begins to blimp and inflate in size. Sinew piling ontop itself in massive surges that cause those watching to look increasingly disturbed and troubled as Gigas shadow creeps across them and his body fills up the hangar bay of the dropship. IF they want no restraint..they get no restraint.

"Don't be late to come get me, now!" He quips before stepping forward and then dropping like an incoming asteroid for the battle area targetted as being able to effect a large amount of the surging Brood drones before the city. His body continues bulking in mass as his cranks a fist back intending to drive it home into the surface with results that will likely trigger seisometers throughout the a country-wide region.

Star-Lord has posed:
The planet itself is a mess of dust storms and a constant lightshow from the plasma bombardment in an otherwise night sky. A few miles out, a tidal wave of Brood drones is barely being held back by garrison forces. repeaters and Imperial fleet based bombers continue to do bombing runs, but the bombed out buildings have created a /massive/ chaotic battlefield that the intelligent Brood drones use to evade and use for cover... and off in the distance, yet /more/ drones are coming.

From where Gigas is, he can easily estimate there are tens of thousands of drones coming in.... and that's with the bombardment slowing them down.

It's easy to see why the Shi'ar wants his help. With the starport as crowded as it is? They have no chance in hell of getting the rest of the population out without some major assistance, which means tens of thousands more drones.

Gigas is all that is standing between the Shi'ar still on planet and a new wave of drones to press the invasion of Raken 3.

As he lands, a cataclysmic shockwave sounds along the outskirts of the city. Buildings starts to collapse. Shi'ar front lines collapse as they get out of the way of the titanic primordial, and a few thousand drones get sent flying in all directions.

Soon though, their intellligence shows, and they reorganize to surround Gigas.

Then the bombing starts up again, bombs landing around Gigas to take a bit of the pressure off as the wave of drones starts to descend on him...

Gigas has posed:
The shockwaves rolls outward violently, bringing with it the opening of chasms, pieces of entire buildings being shorn loose and hurtling away to ride the shockwave further out and go crashing into the hordes and a whirling dust cloud to join with the roaring storms that rip through the surface of the planet due to the constant bombardbment.

Practically the size of a two story building now, Gigas emerges from the crater caused by his impact zone and presses his monstrous bulk forward through the swirling debris cloud like some sort of monster titan emerging in some sort of cinematic horror. For a moment all that can be seen is his freakish silohuette and the glower of his red eyes and crackling cosmic energy, barely contained by his explosive physique, but soon enough the rest of him becomes visible as the clouds clear and also give his own vision more clarity to see the drones attempting to surge in and surround him.

"Hrmm.." he rumbles while lifting a huge fist up and clenching it, knuckles cracking to produce sounds only slightly quieter then that of the bombs going off..and then he leaps!

The earth gives way from the pressure of his jump, trailing debris behind him as he lunges forward towards the forward group of drones and seeks to bulldoze his way into them. As he jumps, his huge arms spread out and then come crushing inward in massive sweeping gesture to attempt to scoop up as many as he can with his passage into them and then bring them back down with him to slam them for the ground again. The force of his blows carries with them their own shockwaves as well, capable of releasing impact blasts that scatter any around him like leaves from the force of his blows. Of course this also makes it a hazard to fight to close to him if you're an ally but if they want wide scale destruction and attention on him..they're going to get it.

Star-Lord has posed:
The way Gigas is fighting is in itself ironic. He can see the psionic oppressors in their hands. He's seen and felt firsthand how much agony even a graze gives from them... but way he's keeping mobile and disrupting their movements in large groups means they can't effectively hit him with them.

Brute force tactics would work against any other race... but the Brood with those psionic weapons present a unique challenge that he's unintentionally dealing with. For now.

Time will tell if they adapt to Gigas. Right now, that tidal wave is being disrupted, and the Shi'ar artillery starts firing, now that they have clear groups staying still.

Gigas has posed:
Perhaps not as unintentional as observers might think. Gigas well remembers these psionic weapons and indeed..normally he would have the option of simply standing there and allowing city busting assaults to wash over his impervious frame like a gentle breeze..but the sting of those attacks is still fresh in his mind and there's just so. many. of. them.

So using his capability to leap is to his advantage even if some attacks do land home and cause him to grimace and have to refocus. That he makes for a pretty massive target doesn't help either.

But he's also not without his own tricks. A few strikes trigger more city shaking quakes and then he turns, inhaling and swelling his gigantic chest up bigger and bigger...and then out comes a blast of air in a perpetual hurricane force level assault that would do any Kryptonian or Daxamite proud. He turns this fury upon the dust, billowing it up violently into vast pillars and this and the full forth of the hurricane level blast he turns against the drones, swiveling his body and turning his head to send the blasts rolling across the battlefield.

Star-Lord has posed:
Another set of evacuation shuttles launches in the distance... and another set starts to land on the pads. The Shi'ar are efficient about it, at least. That's a few thousand more off planet.

Unfortunately, the Brood are starting to wise up to Gigas and are starting to spread out... and break up. Less to stomp on, and while Gigas is a gigantic target... that means he's easy to spot. He can't be everywhere at once.

Gigas will need to start prioritizing who he himself defends; the military line helping him to keep the invasion back, or the artillery launching plasma blobs and turning hundreds of drones into so much paste with each hit.

Gigas has posed:
"Nnngh.. Yes..I should have charged triple." complains the behemoth as he takes stock of the situation after his elemental assault of wind ceases and the drones are indeed smarter then he first presumed. The behemoth is..powrful but he is not all powerful and his power is focused into very specific areas. There's only so much he can do in one go and indeed..he cannot be everywhere at once.

A leap takes him back towards the military line and upon landing he strides forward through several buildings, collapsing them like sand castles as he presses in to take stock of the situation. If the military line falls then the artillery won't matter, so far as he sees it. If the artillery falls then that just means the military line has to work harder but if it's what's keeping the drones back from the city -and- the artillery..then his choice seems made for him.

Unfortunantely a fully unleashed Gigas in the middle of your military line isn't going to help either and so the behemoth jumps again, this time dropping towards the brood making their push towards what appears to be a more sensitive area of the defensive line.

Upon impact, his colossal strength is brought to bear again as his massive arms plunge into the ground, not just to create another earthquake but to force a canyon to begin to open up as the ground splits asunder beneath him. His gigantic arms dig in even further and begin to press and pull, ripping and gouging the earth upwards in an ever widening crevice that itself begins spider webbing and splintering off wildly in an attempt to rip the terrain into a series of cavernous abyss' to swallow drones and disrupt their charges.

Star-Lord has posed:
As Gigas starts to rip the ground apart, literally, a strange thing happens... the Brood drones all start flying backwards on wings, so they don't drop into the canyon.

Then Gigas can hear the sounds of engines. Lots of engines. Looking in the way of the horizon, dozens of craft come flying down through the atmosphere far away... and start heading right in his direction. a bit further right of them, some more vehicles of some kind start coming over the horizon too. Ground and space-air craft? Certainly seems like it.

Reinforcements diverted to deal with the sudden massive threat. Gigas has the Broods attention. Lucky him.

Another bombing run behind him starts to carpet bomb the horde going for the artillery... but even the massively destructive energy bombs aren't enough as the drones start flying over the fire that the the bombers tried to keep them back from. The crews are already heading to their vehicles as they start retreating... but it's only a matter of time before they're taken down by those oppressors.

It's a desperate battle that just escalated massively. On the plus side, Gigas did break up their formations a bit, and plasma repeaters along the entrenched line on the outskirts are killing them by the scores... but it isn't enough.

Nothing is enough in this planetary battle.

Up above, the hull of a Shi'ar Battleship suddenly starts crashing down through the planets atmosphere... far enough away to not be an issue, but that thing is /massive/, and it's followed by hundreds of Brood fighters making sure it's dead.

Gigas has posed:
Well that was..partially effective. Okay so he forgot they have wings and can fly..nevermind the horde of them that have been flying. He was hoping for a few more to go tumbling to their doom with all the opening chasms and eruptions of stone and debris but..it at least did -something- and got them scattered and moving about and the armed forces are able to take advantage of that. At least at first. It's very clear to even the one track mind of Gigas that this is a losing battle and that even he can't issue enough destruction in one go in the time that is necssary. Not with his vaunted invulnerability not quite as effective as he would like it to be.

Bt he has a job to do. Searing pain and the unusual feeling of fatigue aside. A series of meteoric craters and shockwaves erupt around the behemoth as he brings his hands around, unleashing yet another increased level of his incalculable strength to send a force blast roaring out away from him in a spreading arc for the Brood in order to treat them like leaves got in a gale. These are followed by another and then a series of ground pounding strikes that repeatedly slam into the battlefield in rapid succession such that a full on tantrum throwing Savage Hulk would be proud. It is assuredly still not going to be enough in and of itself but the giant is leaving apocalyptic devestation of his own in its wake as earthquakes and shockwaves that would send seismometers and earthquake monitoring stations screaming in panic are unleashed by the gargantua and his tremendous leaping continues to sail him from one part of hte battle line to another. The time to be restrained is long gone.

Mon-El has posed:
    Raken-4 was on its way to being a total loss, it seemed. The only thing left to do was try to evacuate as many civilians as possible. It was a sad sight, but the call had gone out and Lar was quick to respond, arriving in a Legion vessel and heading down to the surface himself.

    It's not hard to spot Gigas, already tearing the place apart and the Brood with it. He approaches the giant purple mercenary. "Having fun yet?" he remarks dryly.

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    And when it's all going to hell, you can bet your ass that there's going to be trouble inbound soon. In this case, it's trouble on a ballistic trajectory, the gleaming wings of the Milano soaring among a pack of Shi'ar fighters and opening up on the brood ships that are harrying the downed cruiser. Who's at the stick? Well, considering that a moment later the Milano unleashes actual literal hellfire at those Brood ships... probably a certain Raccoon with anger issues.

    Anger issues and one hell of a fine touch on the control sticks, as the ship rolls around the debris of the first few kills and comes screaming out of the fireball to fall onto the hapless survivors of the first barrage. It's like watching a swarm of locusts led by a particularly angry wasp take apart a colony of bees.

    "Quill! It ain't lookin' great up top, but it's still there. Place is coming apart at the seams, time to be getting goin'!"

    *THUMPTHUMPTHUDTHUMPTHUDSPLAT*

    As the Milano pulls out of the dive and feeds power back to the drives to climb up for another pass, it casually flies through a swarm of flying brood with... well, spectacular results.

    "What I hate about flyin' in an atmosphere." Rocket grins as he watches the drones bounce off. "Bugs on the frickin' windshield."

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
Late to the party - or so it seems - came Kinsey. Whereas Quill and the crew were keeping the bulk of the Brood, Kinsey happened to see the artillery crew was in trouble.

Big trouble.

She made a decision then, to let the 'big guys' have the fun, she was going to hold these guys instead. Standing in the foreground, she began to warp some energy into a shield to give the time to evacuate,

Star-Lord has posed:
As Lar sits there in midair, dozens of Brood drones suddenly fly towards him, oppressors at the ready. Easy target!

Gigas, meanwhile, is actually managing to break up their formations even more... which allows the entrenched Shi'ar to aim some of the heavier weapons in that direction: multiple sets of plasma missiles streak across the sky as hundreds of feet in front of Gigas suddenly turns into a bright sun of plasma fire. Hundreds of drones vaporize... but they regroup as the hive mind overrides their fear and sends them forward once again.

The Shi'ar fighter wing around the Milano suddenly breaks away, turning to engage the craft flying for Gigas... and an aerial fighter suddenly begins above his head as Brood and Shi'ar interceptors break off into dozens of duels. Immediately, anti-fighter energy cannons start firing out waves of some sort of blue-green energy that begins to light up the sky as ground forces assist their fighter pilots. One. Three. Four Brood interceptors explode in midair from the energy before the fighter battle veers flies off, the Shi'ar fighters chasing the Brood down above.

Another group of evacuatino transports flies off in the starport: 5000 more gone, a good number remaining still. More shuttles fly down this time, double capacity. It's still a ways to go... but the evacuation is till ongoing.

Kinsey? She barely gets that Hope shield up in time, the oppressors psionic pain not landing on the Shi'ar... but soon, a dozen drones start flying up, trying to get /over/ her shield and at the crew.

The Milano suddenly has a few interceptors on it's tail as they break off from the downed Shi'ar Battleship.... and in the distance, those Brood hovering vehicles continue their journey towards the fighting... only for a sudden /massive/ bombardment to focus on them from space. Seems someone in that entrenched line saw the reinforcements and called in an orbital strike. The horizon lights up as the vehicles begin exploding.

Meanwhile, when Rocket tries to talk to Peter... he gets static. The kind of static that comes from jamming. Seems Peter is in trouble. Again.

Gigas has posed:
It gives Gigas a moment of respite. He doesn't necessarily need to catch his breath, so to speak, as he doesn't really 'breathe' per se..but the constant barrage and fighting can cause disorientation without a moment to reset ones self and take stock of the situation. So as the field infront of him lights up with plasma and the fighters further distract the brook fighters, he takes a moment to grunt and survey the area and at that point notes the arrival of Mon-El.

"Hmm? Come to make yourself useful, mmmm? No weddings to escape from? Hearts to break? Brood to be captured by?"

He turns, grinning despite the situation and sweeping his huge arms to indicate the area, "Help as you see fit. We are trying to hold them back to allow the planet to be evacuated and then, I suspect, destroyed. However..this task is easier said then done, even for ones such as ourselves."

The ground shreds apart as Gigas again plunges his fists into the rubble and then rips and uproots, dislodging a building sized chunk of rubble, the tonnage balancing easily in his hands despite its tremendous size. A new weapon for him to use until its integrity fails it. He takes note of Kinsey's shield in the distance and hmms before rumbling to Mon-El, "Help as you see fit. There is no shortage of despair in need of overturning."

And with that, he leaps once more.. thundering off in an explosion of force and dragging the massive chunk of stone with him to swing in mid flight as a massive bat against any drones in his way.

Mon-El has posed:
    Lar smirks. "I guess I'll take that one as a 'yes'." he comments to Gigas' response. But that's about all he has time for before a bunch of drones come at him with oppressors blazing. But this time, he's totally not going to just let them all hit him. No way is he going through that hell again. So instead he zips this way and that, dodging as many as he can using his superior speed, even though a few of them do graze him and he grunts in pain.

    With all those starfighters getting shot down, he grabs a smoking hunk of debris the size of Gigas and uses it to block a few more of those oppressors, before hurling it straight at the Brood onslaught as hard as he can.

    ...it is nice to be able to cut loose, sometimes.

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    "Every frickin'..." whatever Rocket is going to complain about this time remains unsaid, as the fire from Brood interceptors streaks past the cockpit. So it's time to switch frequencies again, back to the comm channel he's been on for hours. "Razor, Razor, couple o' ticks on Buccaneer, boom an' zoom."

    It's almost as graceful as watching a ballet, if a ballerina could conceivably weigh up to several tons and fly. The Milano pivots about on the port wing as Rocket kicks power around, causing the interceptors to temporarily overshoot. Then a burst of power to the over-rated engines and the Milano surges up and away, towards the cloud of Brood fighters in a duel with the Shi'ar.

    At the same moment, the Shi'ar fighters kill power to their own drives, flip around and come screaming back down in a power dive towards the Milano. The ships slip around each other with at some points less than a whisker to spare, as the larger Milano opens up on the Brood fighters formerly engaged by the Shi'ar, and the Shi'ar atomise the Brood interceptors on Rocket's tail.

    It's a maneuver that's over in a few seconds, leaving only a cloud of debris falling to the ground, and the whole fighter wing clawing their way back up, escorting the next evacuation flight. That kind of coordination? They must have been flying together for a while now.

    "Owe you a beer, Razor. Add it to the tab, ey?"

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
That was different. The psionics.

Kinsey made certain that the shield in front of her was in place, a semi-circle that allowed the artillery to take off to the rear. She had no fear of the drones breaking down the mechanic of her shield, but she did have some concerns about how long it would stand up to the Brood and their psionics.

Could they beat her at her own game? She didn't think so, but she was a fairly new Lantern on her own now.

In other words her hope was about to be tested.

"Get going! If you can, help your friends. Leave the drones to me." She nodded, and smiled grimly as the shield was blasted again. "Your job is getting free of the Brood. You can help me by getting out of here."

She speaks over the intercoms to the ship. <<Hey? Star-Lord? I've got everything in control. As soon as they're off? I'll be ready to get off here too.Oh, hi, by the way. I was a little bit late. But I'm here now.>>

Star-Lord has posed:
As Lar and Gigas start working together to thin out the frontline drones, something strange happens. They start falling back, en masse.

From above, Lar and Rocket both see why.

Rocket will pick it up first on sensors: a pair of large gunships starts coming across the plains from around the mountains the mountains from the west, where the fight has been mostly from the north. Within seconds, both gunships begin to launch a massive salvo of some sort of green organic matter towards the entrenchment... It's a never before seen weapon, but it's slow, and there are a LOT of podlike structures incoming.

Two more ships start falling out of orbit, a Shi'ar destroyer... and a Brood cruiser. Both continue to exchange plasma and bio weapon fire as their ships go down.

Kinsey gets /lookss/ from the Shi'ar, but no complaining as they drive off, leaving her to deal with about a hundred drones beginning to swarm around her.

Still no response from Peter.

Gigas has posed:
His improvised weapon is little more then a rocky shield when Gigas lands and again takes a moment to assess the situation. Though he cannot fly, his leaps are signifigant as they can carry him for miles should he choose..so he can get some ups, so to speak, just not stay up there long enough to get a good view of things because of...well..gravity.

So he remains confused until he actually sees the gunships and then notes their unusual weapons. Considering his luck with the Broods standard armament he seems uninterested in wanting to put his durability to the test against whatever this is. Nigh invulnerability still has that word 'nigh' attached.

"What is this?" He rumbles after landing atop a large jutting outcropping of stone, buckling it slightly but using it as a vantage point to look over the battlefield. "Hey!!" he thunders, bellowing loudly in an attempt to get Mon-El's attention and then pointing at the ships. "We must destroy!"

Mon-El has posed:
    The herd thins, but they seem to be falling back. Lar frowns, not liking it. Something else was in play here...then he sees the gunships. "Wait." he says to Gigas. "I'm going to try to figure out what it is first."

    At that, he tries to get a little closer while doing his best to avoid getting hit by whatever it is, so that he can scan the ships and their ammo using his enhanced vision. Just what is it they're up against this time?

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    Bleak and getting bleaker. And then there's the voice over the comms. "Hey Blue..." Rocket comments to Kinsey, as he weaves the Milano through the evacuation shuttles to move into a defensive position between them and a new wave of interceptors. "Wherever Quill is, he's bein' jammed. An' it's not lookin' great up here, so if you see 'im, tell 'im to get his ass on a shuttle 'cause this planet is officially ..." A moment of static.

    Static caused by the main weapons of the Milano firing and creating a strong electromagnetic field in the mesosphere, already disturbed by the passage of two falling ships still exchanging broadsides.

     "... in a frickin' basket! There's more debris up here than around that junkyard planet Quill's from!" He's never going to let that go. But it's at that moment, while he's twisting the Milano around to finish off a pack of Interceptors gnawing at the heels of the transports that the sensors pick it up. And whenever Rocket goes quiet for a moment, you know something /pretty bad/ is about to pop up.

    "Crap. Blue, get gone. There's a pair of frickin' gunships on the way an'... whatever they're shootin', it's melting through the Shi'ar line. We are officially out of time."

    A quick look around the cockpit, eyes alighting on the stores indicator... hmm. He still has one of those ship-killer torpedoes he cobbled together, and he blots out the fight for a moment while he calculates yields, radii and the advisability of firing off a fusion device /inside/ of an atmosphere. "Less I make time, o'course..."

    One moment the Milano is plowing through the debris field of a previous engagement, the next the sleek ship is coming about again, as Rocket hits the comms for the Shi'ar. "Razor, got a priority one target, gotta scoot for a moment. Keep a few for me, eh?"

    And on his way down, riding the very edge of the thermoaerodynamic envelope, Rocket shakes his head at having to leave the fighter squadron even for a few moments. "Poor bastards. Quill, you better not be on board one of those things..."

    A flick of a switch, and the Rock-A-Blast torpedo swings outwards and down on the pylon, prepping for launch.

    Anyone even passingly familiar with the Milano (and its non-human pilot) can see the ship is on an attack run, and to stand well clear of what is likely to be a spectacular fireworks show.

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
Kinsey was used to some really strange stares. Especially since Kibou was, amongst other things, an universal translator. And probably a bit of the strangeness of a Kree.. wielding.. Hope?!?

Lately she had accepted the truth about her heritage. At 'home' she looked human. Out in space, for some people she looked like a Kree. A pink Kree as a matter of fact.

Out there the drones were attacking her shield in waves. <<I'm almost done with this. I can't leave them alone.. And this isn't Quill is it? Never mind. The last few are nearly gone. I'll be fine."

"All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well. ..you'll see."

Star-Lord has posed:
Lar can easily tell what's inside: some sort of volatile chemical cocktail is inside those pods. Without an actual scanner up close though, he has no way of knowing what it actually does.

What he does know... is there are a LOT of those pods coming in from the side, and the entrenchment is already adjusting to fire at those pods. Those anti-air plasma cannons start firing in that general direction, even... and the pods begin to explode.

Lar and Rocket can see the results on the ground as the chemical land. A massive blaze... and acid strong enough to melt a good dozen feet into the ground.

Those are acidic bioweapons the likes of which are banned by most civilizations in the universe... and the Brood have them as standard on those ships. For Lar, it's like looking at napalm and nerve gas on steroids.

And then, the sky explodes, and the vision of just about everyone goes white as a shockwave rolls through the entire battlefield as that torpedo that Rocket fired turns one of the gunships into nothing. It's just not there anymore.... but the second one is, and it launches another volley of those pods.

Meanwhile, inside the city, one of the large skyscapers suddenly explodes from the bottom up without any visible source. it's not a normal explosion, either... it's sequential, which some of the debris of catches the aerially fight off guard, sending a couple Brood and Shi'ar fighters down for the count.

Gigas? He's got a reprieve for now. Clearly, those drones are more fearful of those pods, than him, as they're keeping at range for now... and the drones in Kinsey do the same after a moment.

Nonetheless, it's clear if those pods land on the military and the city, the Shi'ar are finished.

Gigas has posed:
A thunderous *BOOOM* explodes across the battlefield as Gigas literally shot puts the remains of an entire building into the air towards remaining gunship. He's not wanting to take a hit from one of those things but he expects to do better then the Shi'ar and..well..that's why he's here. BUt he's not going to make it easy for them.

Once the massive missile has left his arms and goes tearing into the skies, the behemoth breaks into a run that gradually picks speed up as he plows after it and then leaps, lunging into the air with another crater forming and earthquake making pressure ripping through the shredded to pieces terrain.

"Heey!" he thunders, attempting to get Mon-El's attention. IF the Daxamite is 'on his game' he'll catch Gigas and the combined strength of the two is sure to make a rather unique missile. If Mon-El misses or otherwise ignores the goliath, Gigas' trajectory will still take him towards the sides of the remaining Gunship where hopefully his impact will do some damage and push it off its course.

Mon-El has posed:
    Lar watches as the acid melts into the ground. Well that definitely doesn't look good. Those pods need to be taken care of, then the ship itself! He focuses his thermal vision on them, aiming to hit them with the lasers and cause them to heat up and vaporize into the atmosphere, where the acid will hopefully dissipate harmlessly. One after another, he tries to get as many as he can as he goes charging toward the remaining gunship just as Gigas is. When he gets there, he'd grab the front of the hull and attempt to -push- it back up and away from the planet.

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    "Whoooo!"

    That is as much a whoop of joy as an expression of sheer frustration, as the Milano is caught in the edge of that blast and is tossed upwards like a toy, temporarily out of control as the thrusters struggle to maintain momentum. Inside the cockpit, Rocket grits his teeth as he fights for control of the ship, experiencing G-forces that would make a human fighter pilot black out. And it's been a long, long day of this kind of nonsense, making the raccoon's vision grey out at the edges. With a gout of black smoke and a burst of plasma, the main thrusters kick the ship forward just enough to escape its upwards momentum, which was rapidly beginning to exceed escape velocity.

    For all the sleek lines and over-built systems, the Milano wallows for a moment before coming back under the pilot's control, having been blasted upwards nearly out of the atmosphere, but starting to dive back down. But there's a sight for sore eyes! Gigas and Mon-El, going for the second gunship! They might pull this out of the fire yet.

    Adjusting course, Rocket angles further towards the periphery of the city and strafes the Brood on the ground, potting a few of the drones attacking Kinsey's shield on the way, spinning around to whack a few out of the sky with the Milano's wings.

    <<I hope you liked that, 'cause I'm down to blasters an' harsh language!>>

    And to himself, in the cockpit "C'mon Quill... you gotta be out there somewhere..."

    As much as Rocket would like to keep blasting drones, he feeds more power to the Milano's engines and starts the ascent back to orbit and re-join the fighter screen.

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
<<Oh.. dear..>>

"Get out of here!!"Just a few stragglers were left. And as Kinsey could see, those pods were an immediate danger. Perhaps even more so than the drones. She was protected for the most part, but those stragglers were not.

Damn it.

<<That was the best you could do? Tsk tsk. I'm out of here in.. five.. four.. three.. What do you know, they took my advice, and hightailed it. Going.>>

Star-Lord has posed:
Most of the pods are taken down by the combined efforts of Gigas, the Shi'ar, and Lar... but a few do manage to get through the defense screen... and the results are horrific at the edge of the entrenched line. A full repeater nest turns into so much goo.

Lar and GIgas have no problems with attacking the gunship, and begin to tear it apart...

Then a voice goes over the comm network to everyone. It's hoarse and in a lot of pain... but there's no mistaking Peter Quill.

"They're-" Coughing, and what sounds like spitting, "-Under.... underground... just blew a building to keep-" Another round of coughs. Yes, that's definitely pain in his voice, "-them down there. Won't hold. Need..."

His voice cuts out.

Gigas has posed:
From his vantage point, gripping tight onto the side of the gunship, Gigas sees the carnage on the ground. He frowns. It's a first true sincere frown of true disgust, boiling rage and frustration born from what seems to be a futile effort in holding these forces back and preventing atrocities from happening. He's usually fairly affable, laid back and relaxed even in the face of mortal danger. Partially due to confidence, over confidence and a sense of detachment born from being an unfinished cosmic force.

But this is beginning to wake up some sense of connectivity to everything and he's not liking it. Not liking it at all.

"Utterly preposterous." he declares, though it's unclear perhaps if he means himself or the war or both. Not that there's anyone here to hold a conversation with but himself. Both of his monstrous arms go plunging down into the sides of the gunship exterior as he braces near the engine housing and attempts to literally rip the ships exterior propulsion systems free from their casings in a feat of destruction that would do a certain jade giant proud.

For now, one has to be content with a blue-purple giant on their side. The explosions may singe and blast him clear but he'll have done his part in taking the ship down for count if successful.

Mon-El has posed:
    Well that gunship is down for the count for sure, as it gets launched back out of the atmosphere with Gigas tearing it apart on the way. But it seems they're not out of the woods yet, as Peter's voice comes over the comms--and it sounds like he's in trouble somewhere underground.

    "Quill...? Quill!" Lar tries to answer him, but the signal cuts off before he can finish. "Grife..." he mutters, as he turns around quickly and heads back down toward the surface in the direction that comm signal came from, at the same time scanning the terrain for any evidence of where Star-Lord may have gone or the destroyed building he's talking about.

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    "Frickin..." Hearing the voice over the comms, Rocket actually twists himself around in the pilot's seat to look over his shoulder. By now the Milano is climbing for orbit at so steep an angle it's nearly inverted, and he can just about glimpse the carnage of the battle field...

    And there it is. The blasted building he'd seen going up earlier, and the utterly unmistakable figure of that reckless human he could happily strangle if he didn't have both his hands busy flying the ship.

    "Quill! As per frickin' usual, I'm up here in a spaceship and you decide to go take a trip underground. How am I s'sposed to get to you?! You know we ain't got no drills on this ship!" Hmmm... there's an idea.

    No, bad Rocket, bad, focus.

    For the moment, he has his hands more than full keeping the Brood interceptors off the evacuation shuttles, and efficient as the Shi'ar fighters might be, this is a war of attrition that's only ever going to go one way. It's hopeless... or, possibly, not quite.

    Time to change frequencies again.

    "Hey, Blue, Lar, Big Guy. Quill's in trouble about half a click south east from your location, by the ruined building. I'd help him myself, but got my hands busy up here..." A burst of static. "Round of drinks to whoever gets the humie outta there, if'n you got time to spare somewhere."

Star-Lord has posed:
That battleship from earlier? It's still going down, and it aims right for the vehicles being bombarded. Whoever is piloting that gigantic thing knows what they're doing.

When it lands, even from the city, the dust storm sticks out like a sore thumb... and somehow, it doesn't explode. yet.

That doesn't stop the drones from visibly swarming back towards it. The few guns still operational aim towards then... and gigantic plasma bolts start raining into them. Most miss, but a few hit their targets through sheer volume.

The gunships are gone, though a good 1/10th of the firing lane is goo now. Still, their firing stops as the drone horde starts rampaging towards the downed battleship.

That's gonna be a hellish fight.

Lar, being just about as fast as Superman, managed to find Peter. He's hurt. Bad, bloody and with his limbs at harsh angles, if he were human, he'd probably be dead already. As it is, some sort of personal shield seems to have protected him from the /entire skyscaper/ dropping on top of him.

What /is/ he?

Up top, Rocket gets back into space... and the frontline on the other side of the planet has collapsed. Both the Shi'ar and the Brood have reinforcements coming in from all over their respective space on an hourly basis... and the balance of forces has shifted to the Brood.

There are over two hundred Brood bio-ships here now, and the Shi'ar only have about fourty battleship sized ships to hold them off. Rocket can easily estimate this planet is going to fall in about an hour... less if they retreat sooner. The evacuation is only halfway done, too.

This is going to be very close.

Gigas has posed:
Like an incoming meteor, Gigas sails back towards the surface, trailing flame and debris from the ruined gunship and a shorn off engine gripped in his massive hands. To push back towards space was a good idea but better to make sure it's not coming back in, after all. Plus a little violence after the virtual war-crime of the acidic assault is a fair trade off.

He impacts, making sure another crater and explosive city block wide shockwave does its job against the swarming forces below and then another leap carries him clear to land within the city outskirts and to slide to a stop creating a massive trench in his wake.

Lars is by far going to be faster and more effective in retrieving Quill so he just grunts, "No fair! Give me a wager I am to be a sure fire win at next time. Like arm wrestling him."

He rolls said arms and shakes them, feeling the burns and aches from the Broods weapon fire while looking over the area for the next place that can best use him.

Mon-El has posed:
    "Already there." Lar informs Rocket. "...it's bad, but not as bad as you might think."

    "No thanks on the drinks though, most of them don't work on me anyway." He adds, as he tosses aside any debris that Peter might be trapped under like a bunch of paper boxes, and pulls him out of the rubble, using his x-ray vision to assess the damage. "Hey, Quill. Quill! Wake up..." he says, even as he pulls out some 31st century medi-gel and starts slapping it onto the Terran, whilst using low-intensity thermal vision to cauterize any open wounds. Or...you know whatever he is. Because a normal Terran definitely wouldn't have survived that, not even with a shield.

    The Daxamite takes stock of the situation, seeing that the evacuation isn't even halfway done and the Shi'ar are already losing. "Damn it..." he mutters. Someone needed to get on one of those ships and figure out where their forward bases were, then destroy them all. Or figure out what was enabling them to come out this far so quickly. It may as well be him. But first...

    He grabs Peter and starts up toward the Milano. "Mon-El to the Milano, permission to come aboard? I've got Star-Lord." he transmits over to Rocket.

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    Once Rocket gets the Milano to orbit, he can finally see how the situation has changed in even the few minutes he's spent in atmosphere. It's a running battle just to stem the tide and keep an evacuation corridor going, and as the rest of Razor flight forms up, he shares a look with the flight leader through the cockpit canopies.

    They know.

    "Buccanneer to Razor..." And for a moment Rocket has to leave off the message, hands gripping the control sticks of the Milano so tightly that they creak. The response comes back before he can finish.

    "Razor to Buccanneer. Best of luck. We'll keep it open as long as we can."

    "An' leave some fer me, y'hear?" Rocket quips back as he spins the ship around, pushing the throttles to the stops and powerdiving down through the atmosphere. "Buccanner to Mercy Flight, I'm joining in. Got room for a dozen in the back if'n they don't mind squeezing in a bit." Yes, the situation is that desperate.

    "Lar? You got Quill?!" Some good news, at last. "I'm coming down, get him to the evac site. There in two ticks."

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
Everything looks to be going tits up. Kinsey has Kibou on to keep an eye on the ship. When she hears about Quill she speaks up, <<If you can get him to the evac site, I can heal him. Wait, did he say underground drones? Get him on the Mi,ano, I'm to see about those drones first.>>

Star-Lord has posed:
Off in the distance, point defense lasers start firing into the horde as the Drones start swarming it. The fight for the crew inside the battleship has begun.

Meanwhile, as Kinsey starts to get closer to that skyscaper that collapses in on itself.... her Power Ring immediate beeps, <<Warning, underground passage detected. Sheer cutting patterns indicate tunneling. Tunnel leads south. Scanning: Tunnel currently has approximately 6089 Brood drones in immediate proximity. Scanning for other tunnels now>>

No wonder Peter was jammed. If those Drones get out into the city, the entire line will collapse. Thousands will die.

Peter, meanwhile, slowly opens his eyes, "Oh. Prince Charming, here to save the day."

The Milano is initially met with some suspicion when it lands... by the military guards. The civilians? They practically rush the Milano. It's a flood of refugees.

Mon-El has posed:
    "Copy that." Lar heads to the evac site on Rocket's request. He smirks when Peter is obviously all right enough to make that quip, then takes him back to his ship.

    "We -really- need to find out where these guys are coming from." he'd remark once inside, presuming Rocket is there. "Cut this invasion off at the source."

Gigas has posed:
"Indicate area." intones Gigas over the comms as the blue giant lands, "And get everyone clear. I have been holding back to some degree given proximity to soldiers but if you give me time I can begin process of collapsing this area, especially if there are..hrm..tunnels down there. I would wager the surface is no longer quite as stable as it once was."

A building shudders as the behemoth lands atop it, fallen skyscraper in sight now along with Kinsey, "Ah, hello again!" he rumbles, cheerful sounding despite the apocalypse unfolding. "Anyway. Where should I strike?"

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
The damn drones.

Kinsey quickly makes certain that the drones only have the one way in. With that she can build a construct to seal them off deep inside the tunnel giving the evacuees the time to retreat.

<<Get as many as you can get out of here. I'll hold them off.>>

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    It's a steep approach, and the Milano seems to ride wings of fire as it descends. Screw the paintjob! Well, for now anyway... besides, Rocket is pretty confident he can gull the Shi'ar quartermasters out of enough spare paint to touch it up later. By the time the ship approaches the evacuation site, the leading edges of the wings and fuselage are sooted black by the violence of the re-entry. Rocket keeps the power up to the engines, making the ship barely touch the ground, practically hovering on its landing struts.

    The first encounter of the guards with the Milano is the sight of the ramp opening and half a dozen crates being thrown out the back, Rocket sacrificing some of their equipment to make space for more refugees in the cargo bay. "It ain't first class but it'll get ya outta here. Load up... an' no shoving!"

    Yeah. Right.

    He can spare Star-Lord only a glance as Lar brings him in, and then rushes back up to the cockpit, slamming the hatch controls to close it up on his way past. The rest? They'll have to wait for the next trip. If there ever is one.

    "Ain't no way that's gonna save this place no more, Lar." And Rocket straps in, feeding more power to the engines and beginning that long climb to orbit anew. "We got less 'n an hour 'fore all this is Brood central. Why else you think I'm running live cargo now?"

Star-Lord has posed:
"Rest of the planet is Brood, Prince charming." Peter mutters, his voice in pain. It's going to be a bit for him to heal from that. "The source is the hive fleet. Good luck taking them down without a lot more Shi'ar support.' Peter coughs. No blood yet... but he's definitely looking worse for wear. "You ever wanted hell, this is it." Peter has no strength to put up a fight as he's transported.

Gigas, meanwhile, can see exactly where Kinsey is corking the hole.

Off in the distance, that dust storm from the battleship finally sweeps over the city, plunging it into zero visibility...

Gigas has posed:
"He is correct." chimes in Gigas over the comms. "I was the first to arrive and the Shi'ar mandate was clear. Evacuate. This planet is lost. Others will follow if we do not do our jobs." He tenses, crouching down and preparing for a massive jump as he surveys the area and sees where Kinsey is going to work. He grunts and frowns while shaking his head. It's to close to the Starport and while he's not a master engineer or mathmatician, he's enough self awareness of his own strength to know that his strike would end up damaging the Starport. So precision and restraint must still be used.

"Hngh. Well then. As they say on Terra.. Plan ..F.." He probably meant 'B' but then again..they've been running through plan after plan and the Drones just keep coming.

An moment later and he's launched towards the area Kinsey is corking. He's mid leap just as the dust storm sweeps over him and he grits his teeth at yet another issue but nevertheless still hurtles down and brings his fist into a tremendous *KATHOOM* upon the earth. It's not nearly what he -wanted- to do but it should do something and it briefly parts the dust clouds around him and Kinsey from the rising shockwave.

Mon-El has posed:
    Lar sighs. "I know. It's clear this planet is a loss, but how many more until there's nothing left of the galaxy to save? The Brood won't stop unless someone stops them." he says, sinking into a seat in the cockpit near Rocket.

    At Peter's comment, he shrugs. "Well, I got in before, didn't I?" he points out. "They couldn't control me last time, doubt it'll be any different if they try again." It's a fair point, but there might be a just a -bit- of overconfidence in there. "The hive fleet--they're controlled by queens, aren't they?"

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    Full power up to orbit, the whole frame of the Milano shaking with the effort to wring more power from the engines, to punch through the unsettled atmosphere and escape to the relative safety of space. Or is that dubious safety by now? On the way, Rocket can't help but noticing debris that's looking suspiciously like what used to be several shi'ar fighters of Razor flight, slowly tumbling back to the planet. But if he's even slightly inclined to introspection, the moment has to wait because now he has to run a veritable gauntlet of debris, Brood interceptors, and the almost indiscriminate bombardment of the Shi'ar warships coming the other way.

    "Hang on t' sumthin'." Grav plating or not, this ride is going to be bumpy.

    Luckily in the back, it's not immediately apparent what kind of crazy maneuvers Rocket is pulling, but considering everything not properly tied down constantly rolls or shift around... yeah. Best not to ask. Hopefully Lar has a cast iron stomach. He's getting he front row view of the whole space battle zooming and rolling past.

    But finally the Milano fights its way into the landing bay of an evacuation ship, yawing fully around before even setting down and opening the ramp.

    "End o' the line, everyone out. Return flight's never, so don't bother bookin' yer ticket."

    And before anyone can object to him launching another sortie, Rocket blasts off again, closing the hatch as he goes, rolling over the second he clears the landing bay doors and diving hard for the deck, trying to see the star port through the dust cloud.

    There!

    "Big guy, I owe ya one!"

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
Forget about the visibility. As long as Kinsey holds the construct there, there will be no escapee drones from the underground point. And being Kree (!?) means she has more stamina and endurance to draw from.

<<Get out. I'll be fine.>> Afterall, she can *blip* through hyperspace if she has to. <<How long will you need?>>

She sees Gigas and nods.

To Lar: <<If that is true, we would be better off hitting the queens. I have an idea, but it will have to wait until this is done.>> If she could cover the Milano they could get in to attack the queen before anyone caught on.

Star-Lord has posed:
The Gigasteor does the job... and the plug that Peter created suddenly collaspses in on itself even more as a good half mile of the city suddenly drops... and the shrieks of hundreds of drones dying fills the air... along with splatters of Brood blood. At least they'll see it as the dust storm flies over and vision returns.

There goes that plan. The ground battle is going relatively well (excepting that battleship to the north, the poor crew)... but as Rocket pops back out to head back down to the starport, a disheartening sight can be seen on the sensors: moving for the 'north' side of the city, another dozen Brood drop pods has just been launched from one of the assault transports. Each of those pods has thousands of drones packed in. Reinforcements, no doubt to help capture the battleship crew and give extra force to a final push to take the city.

Last Stand indeed.

That destroyer and cruiser that were exchanging broadsides? They both get their engines running at nearly the same time... and both start flying over the city from the east as the loud, concussive sounds of starship weapons fire into each other, pummeling the snot out of each other above the city... easily within range of anyone in the team who wants to attack the cruiser.

Gigas has posed:
"They couldn't control you but nevertheless you were captured and needed to be rescued. Will you always have such an ego?" demands Gigas of Lars, deep voice chiming in abruptly over the commlink with the sound of his huge fists impacting against the ground audible in the background, "If we do not do our part here, -these- people will die. We will worry about the other planets when we get there! Get back out here!"

Despite his grousing, GIgas is pleased that his efforts have yielded some results.

"It is fine." he says to Kinsey, "I will remain with you. However I do not think finding these queens will be easy and there are yet other problems to consider.."

The situation with the crashed battleship is not lost on him for example though he doesn't have the vantage point to see the -other- reinforcements in the way. Instead he points in the direction of the ship, "IF the tunnels are promptly dealt with then we should go to the aid of that crew..otherwise their demise may be our own.."

Not waiting for her reply, he leaps, once more clearing a vast distance en route to the crashed ship.

Mon-El has posed:
    "Obviously not because I got out and I'm still here, right?" Lar points out to Gigas, once he has exited the Milano and come up next to the purple giant. It's hard not to have some kind of ego, when you are as strong as he is. Gigas of all people, should understand that better than anyone else here.

    "And I'm not saying we won't do our part here," As if to prove the point, he begins firing his thermal vision at the incoming pods, aiming to blow up as many as he can before they even get a chance to land. "I'm saying these things won't stop unless someone stops them. So we need to go on the offensive instead of defensive, which means we need a plan to put a stop to this invasion and send them packing before the rest of the galaxy ends up just like Raken-4."

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    "An' I'm sayin' that unless someone gets those Shi'ar goons to pull back an' tighten up that cordon to the second defensive line, ain't nobody else getting off this rock after this run." Rocket supplies, being driven to the peak of Rocket Sarcasm. It's been a long day. So many G's pulled, so many hours flying, so many dogfights.

    So. Many. Tactical. Variables.

    Right eye twitching, he sets the Milano down again and opens the hatch, yelling down to the boarding civilians. "Standin' room only t'day. Ya don't like it, ya fly with the competition. An' that means y'get as many of you in there as you can 'fore I pull up outta here. I mean it, don't make me come back there."

    Deep breath.

    The heels of his palms are pressed into his eyes, then stroke back along the fur of his skull, flattening his ears while he blinks his vision clear. "I need a drink."

    With the ship full to capacity (he checked!), Rocket does what he does best and blasts off again, dodging around the other evacuation shuttles on their way down. Sure, he can carry less people, but he can make twice as many runs.

    The grim calculus of necessity.

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
Quickly, Kinsey contacts the down Shi'ar ship. <<Do you want some help to get onto the starport?>> Always in the native tongue of the Shi'ar!

If they say 'yes', Kinsey will help them by putting a shield around them and protecting them (as carefully as she can!). Of course, that puts her right smack in the middle. Helping with getting them out of their broken down spaceship, onto the remaining evacuation.

Star-Lord has posed:
As Lar works on shooting down the pods... he does manage to get a couple opened up mid atmosphere, but those that survive entry manage to start flying... and the rest of the pods start to descend around the battleship. With Lar and Rocket both assisting with the evacuation and defense, Gigas and Kinsey are free to handle the battleship.

When Gigas arrives, hundreds of psionic oppressors start to aim at him... but with the point defense guns of the battleship tearing them apart with supporting fire, their psionic waves generally miss... or barely hit his limbs.

It's hard to aim well when the ground you're on is heavily unstable.

When Kinsey offers a ride, the Shi'ar start pouring out of the top hatches of the battleship over to her. Seems like they don't want to die here, and don't care where that help comes from. Who knew Shi'ar had survival instincts?

Meanwhile, those two ships over the city start ascending again... and so does another set of evacuation shuttles. This time, more shuttles land; apparently the Shi'ar managed to get more resources finally.

Gigas has posed:
Evacuation by Gigas-Lyft is probably not ideal at the moment as he could provide them no cover and no means to not simply fly off of him or any platform he could use to try and leap back to the city. A certain part of him has the feverish idea of trying to move the battleship. That it would collapse under its own bulk and kill everyone well before he got it dislodged and city bound - assuming he was even capable of moving it at all - does manage to work its way into his mind and prevent him from attempting anything catastrophic. But mental fatigue can cause wild ideas to rise up and he is, indeed, mentally fatigued.

The burning pain of the grazing shots of the psionic disrupters is enough to draw his attention and focus where his eforts truly need to be.

"As much cover as you can give..would be appreciated." he rumbles, sounding briefly stoic as his anger at all of..well.this..boils back up.

An instant later and he's turned towards the largest bulk of assailants, his huge body landing with the battleship behind him..and then his arms spreading and coming around again to produce a thunderous *WAAABOOOOOM!!*. A tank hurtling, ground shredding shockwave rippling out away from him in a force wave that tears across the distance for the incoming horde.

Hardly has this happened as his great lungs expanded and another blast of directed, expanding and continuous hurricane force winds burst out from him with increasing intensity, like an eye wall emerging over top the battle field as he turns his head from side to side to sweep the area and send drones hurtling and smashing into one another.

They are repeat tricks but his options are limited since punching and kicking is hardly going to do wide spread damage fast enough.

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
Kinsey does not blame them one bit! And with that, she tries to make them as safe as she can. Still it's far, and there are so many of them. She checks, to be certain that they are all off of the ship, and she makes certain the slowest ones and the injured ones are under the bulk of her shields.

<<How's it going at your end? I've still got plenty omph left, but if we keep up like this, I'll have to recharge before the next charge of battle.>> She expects Rocket or Quill to be listening. <<How are you Gigas? Alright?>>

Star-Lord has posed:
As Kinsey starts to ferry people... hundreds of drones start to turn towards her... and fire their oppressors. Gigas makes them pay for turning away from him though, and the organized attack run on the battleship turns into semi-organized chaos as the drones once again start flying, even as dozens of them die to the sudden tears in the planet.

Meanwhile what's left of the crew keeps the guns going, anniliating yet more drones in a bid to give the current group Kinsey is transporting time.

Gigas has posed:
The cosmic strongman keeps the onslaught going. A benefit of having virtually limitless physical stamina is that those hurricane force winds last for a -looong- time and when he needs to stop to inhale again, the force of the previous winds is still blasting its way across the battlefield and so he simply is adding to the intensity, creating a vast storm of debris and ruinous wind that assaults the drones as he marches back and forth. On earth, such wind can drive straws and boards of wood through trees and shred apart buildings. Here, the opportunity to just make it worse and worse is open to the giant and so he piles it on for as long as he can - away from the battleship though they undoubtly still feel the high winds against Kinsey's shields.

Eventually he ends up having to grab hold of a chunk of the ships hull and he shreds free a piece of the armor to use as a shield against incoming attacks while ducking behind it and allowing some respite from his hurricane assault to answer Kinsey,

"I am as well as can be..however..I believe we should be making a hasty effort to depart this wreckage!"

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
"..or not. I may have bitten off more than I could handle." Kinsey laughs to herself. Still the Sha'ir needed help.

<<All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well..>> She used her mantra, hushing the Shi'ar, quelling the fears. <<Trust me, Gigas, we are leaving this planet as soon as we can!>>

And she hurries as best as she can with the injured.

Star-Lord has posed:
It's a process that will take a while, but the time being bought here means the city isn't being attacked immediately. You can bet those in the tunnels are working on finding a new way up though.

Gigas, meanwhile, has a the half nearest time turn around and start trying to target him again... only for their attacks to hit the armored hull and be utterly ineffective.

Turns out you need nerves to feel pain... and the oppressors aren't designed to go through battleship rated armor plating...

Of course, nothing says they can't spread out and try to flank Gigas, and those drones are very much smart enough to try doing so as they spread out to try to hit him.

Gigas has posed:
"You need to hurry because I am going to have to stop holding back soon so as to not..uh die and become a drone?" offers Gigas which begs the question of..this is holding back? And also..Gigas-Drone? You probably don't want that. BUt it's not an impossiblity. Their weapons can and -have- hurt him and it's only on account of his high endurance and resultant tolerance to pain that he's lasted as long as he has from their hits. IF enough get around him...like now?

The result is him doing the only thing he can do in this situation. Try and by himself more time.

The shield is briefly discarded as both of his massive arms raise upward. His enormous body flexes, seeminglyg rowing in size as muscle ripples and piles sinew ontop of sinew. Cosmic energy crackles like tendrils of purple hued electricity..and then down his fists come.

An impact that triggers earthquake warning systems as far back as the city results. The shockwave would ripple out from him in all directions this time versus a more focused direction like the wind and previous thunderclaps. The earth yields as well. Caving in violently as it ripples like a carpet or table cloth under the control of a performing magician. Devestation all around and probably shaking that ship as well but his options low now.

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    Someone cue the epic music?

    When the Shi'ar finally seem to get their act together and amass enough shuttles to start making a credible attempt at evacuating the city, one particular ship is freed up from convoy and ferry duty. The Milano powerdives once more through the atmosphere, appearing through the smoke and dust like a burning phoenix, its wing nacelles shedding fire and heat on the way down.

    And the Milano is not alone.

    Half a dozen surviving Shi'ar fighters of Razor flight break off and follow the Milano in, forming up on the wings in a tight attack run formation. Visibility is near zero, but these pilots have been flying together for most of the day now, and they've got a few bones to pick.

    Weapons start blaring, opening up at the drones hovering around the downed ship, blasting any and all that aren't quick enough to dodge out of the way. And in one swoop, the combined mass of the Milano and Razor flight smash through the flyers, not even bothering to swerve or even slow. The last thing many a drone sees is the snarling face of Rocket, lips pulled back from his teeth in a rictus of pure anger, feeding more power to the engines, leading the fighters in a high-G turn to flip around and make another run.

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
"Come on, come on.." Of course Kinsey isn't putting it out there, but she's thinking it.

So much destruction. So much carnage. And she knew they were outnumbered. By a lot. Still, she remained cool and calm. <<If you are hurt, go in front of us. We'll take the back and keep you safe! Hurry though.>>

Yes, she would be here till the end, but nothing says their fellow Shi'ar would.

Star-Lord has posed:
The drones were not expecting the return of the Milano and a squadron of Shi'ar fighters, and it shows in the way they become utterly disorganized and spread out, giving Gigas precious breathing room for that slam to work.

Unfortunately, it's a bit too effective with the timing.

The Milano suddenly rocks as the Gigas produced shockwave utterly unbalances the Milano... and almost overloads the shield emitters in the back, allowing just enough energy from the kinetic force to hit the Milano proper, which has everything inside shake. /Hard/. Rocket, despite his position in the front, suddenly feels the controls... just not respond to him briefly. It's a very real shock to the system, for both him and the Milano.

Somehow, it's still flying, but the ship got forcibly knocked off course and is starting to nosedive towards the ground. There's probably enough time to regain control of the overloaded gyros. Probably. The rest of Razor squadron? A few fighters join the fate of the Milano, but they're just thin enough for the shockwave to not have too much of an effect through their armor.

Meanwhile, Kinsey has no issues whatsoever with getting away, though she will definitely feel that shockwave as it flows over her barrier shield. Gigas produced enough force for that shockwave that even Kinsey will strain just a bit to maintain her hold on the energy holding up her passengers.

Gigas? He has utterly ruined the hellscape around himself, and made a /massive/ dent in the battleship behind himself. They probably won't be salvaging it anyway, right?

Right?

it's around this time that Rocket will see something massive... flying?... on the scanners. No, that's not flying, that's leaping.

In the far distance, a massive grey ball like chitinous creature is boucing along like a basketball, speeding it's way over to the warzone...

Somewhere in the back of the Milano, Peter is already knocked out from the shockwave...

Gigas has posed:
Oh. Whoops? Well they didn't contact him because he had a delicate touch and really all of this time, though -pulling- punches isn't exactly accurate as he's been trying to..stay alive.. he's not been able to really cut loose given the fact that there is a component of area of effect to his most powerful assaults and he's been fighting alongside allies and near battlelines with far more fragile individuals and technology. So there was a quick taste of a slightly more unhinted and desperate Gigas.

It is taking note of the rising disruption that his attack creates that keeps him from doing it again and again and again as a certain green skinned sparring partner of his might if pushed into a corner. Fortunantely for those present, he's more restraint and sense then that but it doesn't exactly give him a wide variety of options here.

"Sorry! And I was just about to invoke gratitude for your timely return!"

He does use the opportunity afforded by his assault to make the jump from the ground level up towards the top of the hull of the crashed ship in order to re-assess the battlefield and select another area to attend to which offers him a momentary aerial perspective to note the incoming 'thing'

"Hmm? WHat is....that...?"

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    It is a staple of spaceship lore that, if a system overloads badly enough, something on the bridge or in the cockpit explodes in a shower of sparks. Aboard the Milano, where the shields are stressed to capacity and the gyroscopic stabilizers have decided to have a few moments to themselves, this does not, in fact, happen. Why? Because the Milano has one hell of an engineer who knows the importance of redundancies and the power of the humble circuit breaker. So there is, in fact, a series of harsh clicks down in the engineering section as the excess power is being rerouted and vented through the appropriate channels. Honestly, who rigs a console directly into a power system anyway? Sheesh!

    But alas, the Milano is the victim of the immutable law of physics, and begins a precipitous nose dive towards the planet, which would have made a very interesting study in the nigh infinite friction coefficient of the sky to ground interface versus the limited powers of structure integrity, had Rocket in fact had slower reflexes. And he doesn't, so it didn't. But he does find himself A) swearing loudly while, B) dumping power to the ventral thrusters just before, C) bracing his feet against the console, grabbing hold of the yoke and /PULLING/ until he's literally horizontal and gritting his teeth.

    Oh hey, sensors? The frick...?

    "Frickin' great..." the by now very frustrated and exhausted Rocket practically shouts over the comms "... I think we just got the frickin' Brood queen's attention!"

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
Sure, the shockwave flows over Kinsey, and she keeps it as smooth on she can, but stil it's there, and the Shi'ar were frightened regardless.

<I've got approximately 50 more Shi'ar to be evacuated. Give or take a few.> This was not interpreted for the Shi'ar, only Rock et, and the crew (such as Gigas). <Can you hold on? I'll make it as fast as I can. Give me a ballpark figure? >

The Shi'ar continued the evacuation, even if they were more frightened now. Kinsey kept her voice down, as she told them, <<You are safe. Keep going. Have faith.>> As she says it, she keeps the evacuation up.

Star-Lord has posed:
It doesn't take very far to see it; it's a massive ball of chitin rolling towards the battlefield. It /is/ a bit far off though; a race car it is not.

It is, however, steadily heading right for the city from the east.

Kinsey has no problem dropping off her evacuees... and as she goes for the last ones, the guns on the battleship stop firing as Shi'ar pour onto the 'roof'. Luckily for all involved. Gigas and company have still utterly confused the Drones... who are falling back to the east now...

Rocket, on the other end, has fine tuned the Milano well, and the gyro stabilizers autocorrect after a few seconds, allowing him to stop the imminent destruction of Quill's ship.

Quill is still out... and being thrown about. Poor Peter.

That big chitin ball continues to get closer... and up above, in space, there are three massive explosions in the distance, giving enough light to be an artificial sun even from here through the daylight sun.

Gigas has posed:
"Oy vey." groans Gigas. A Terran expression he heard - or perhaps it translates into an extremely vulgar and expressive swear word in an alien language - either way his annoyance and frustration with this new bit of news is clear as he shakes his head and reaches a massive hand up for his head to pinch his forhead with two enormous fingers.

"All that orbital bombardment and a queen is still around? Tch."

The ship seems safe..enough..and he listens to Kinsey's transmission and nods. There's little more purpose to him being here now.

"Hey!" He waves a hand, as if Rocket can actually see him.

"Give me a ride! If it is a queen..and going towards the city..we should be there mm? TO let the last be able to escape!"

He can leap far and fast but..well..a starship is obviously going to beat that. It doesn't stop him from springing from the downed battleship, landing thunderously onto the ruined landscape and then taking off into a running leap and massive sprint once more with the expectation of Rocket swooping in for the catch. The Milano can handle a few more dents. Right?

If that fails, he's at least heading in the right direction.

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    "Yeah, well, good thing 'bout the Milano..." Rocket grunts as he fights with the controls until the ship is once again under his control, tacitly ignoring the bumps coming from the cabin aft and below. Should he have secured Quill first? Probably. But so much to think of while he was making evacuation flights, and then attack runs... Nah, he'll be fine, that's one tough human. "... we're either flyin' or we ain't. Long as we're flying, we're holdin'." Whew. Yeah. Straight and level... for about three tenths of a second, and then it's back around in a wide loop, keeping his eyes peeled for Razor flight who are, it must be said, showing an unusual amount of delight in engaging the flying brood drones and getting some revenge in. It even makes Rocket grin. "Nice goin' guys, didn't think you had it in ya."

    Then it's dividing his attention between the /thing/ on scanners and avoiding Brood attacks, Gigas attacks, debris, enthusiastic Shi'ar combat pilots in state of the art fighters, and keeping the Milano actually flying while analysing the rapidly changing tactical situation. "Yo, Razor flight. Razor! Sheesh... I'm gonna pick up some stragglers off that battleship, keep the gnats of my back will ya?"

    And yet another steep bank and an approach not approved in any of the pilot text books printed anywhere in the universe, dropping the landing skids on the Milano and lining up for the relatively straight dorsal spine of the battleship. "Room for thirty, if'n y'don't mind a bit of a squeeze. Best offer in town right now, boys." It's probably not the most standard message ever to go out over the Shi'ar frequency, but... eh. Not a standard tactical situation either.

    If anyone ever makes a list of most amazing landings in the universe of all time, this one won't be on it. The Milano sets down hard to avoid fire from quite literally all quarters, shedding the last of its momentum through sheer friction between the skids and the armored hull. Was that close to the Shi'ar assembling on that dorsal spine? You bet it was. Less distance to travel that way.

    And this time, when he drops the boarding ramp, Rocket actually makes his way back fully armed, to make sure the brood drones don't take the opportunity to sneak in.

    "Ey, Big Guy, Sunshine..." yup, on the private frequency, Rocket is even less professional right now, talking to Gigas and Kinsey. "That big ugly thing on scanners? Gonna be here in less'n five minutes. An' you want me to fly you over there with thirty frickin' Shi'ar in the back?" Ugh!! As the boots thump past him, Rocket shakes his head, shrugging his shoulders. "A'right. But that's gonna be a one way trip, big guy, I ain't comin' back after this run."

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
<Going for the last ones now. Do you need a distraction to use?>

The evacuees were the ragtag Shi'ar who had been helping the injured ones get out first. They shouldn't be too much trouble. The real question was how much time would they need to hightail it out of here.

Thank goodness, Kinsey did not need to be in a ship to help out. And she certainly had her own way of using jump points to get out of here *fast*. Not to mention she could *blip* out of sight if she had to.

<We'll make that work.> 'Cause she isn't going to leave anyone behind. And with that last, she finished the evacuation, and found where the hell she was going to put them.

Star-Lord has posed:
The Milano and Kinsey, between them, manage to get the rest of the Shi'ar gone... but not before a comm channel opens to everyone on the ground <<This is Fleet Command, downed battleship north of the capital has been set to self destruct. Detonation in twenty seconds>>

Plenty of time, right? Of course, that's a /BATTLESHIP/, so who knows how far the shockwave will go.

Nonetheless, another round of evac shuttles lands seconds after the last ground touch down. This will be the last group, by all indications, and that giant chitin ball is still rolling toward... As Gigas gets closer, the ball doesn't respond... but this close, he can easily tell the thing is going right for the starport.

Anyone looking at the Megacity outskirts can see shuttles landing to pack up and evacuate the Shi'ar entrenched line, and the soldiers still in the city? They're pulling back to the evac shuttles at the starport.

<<All groundside forces, begin evacuate. the Planet Buster device is being prepped. Anyone left behind will be caught up in the blast.>>

Gigas has posed:
"Hmm..I could be mitaken but I think I overheard 'Planet-Buster'...." muses Gigas after another series of jumps brings him closer to the city. Alarming.

By now, Rocket is incoming and a well timed jump sends the giant up and then landing atop the hurtling Milano with a loud metallic thud and then his fingers desperately reaching down to cling onto the hull for purchase, digging in wildly as Rocket races back towards the city and star port. Silver Surfer and his board...this is not.

Anything he might have tried to say, quip, or yell out in dismay is snatched from him as The Milano wildly careens under Rockets direction and dips into a full on roll that ultimately ends up launching Gigas free - and like a missile - towards the incoming ball of chitin. The Milano continues on its flight path, unerringly but Gigas, meanwhile, draws a massive arm back - fist clenched and at the ready for a swinging attempt to try and blast into the ball. His internal energies crackling visbly once more as another restraint goes and his strength surges violently for the attack and attempt to do something about this things approach.

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    Wait, twenty seconds? That is not a countdown Rocket wants to hear while he's spooling up the engines and taking off. The departure may be even less gentle than he'd been planning, which wasn't very to begin with, and he has to catch up with a certain ballistic Gigas. Okay. So, not a certain. Gigas. The one and only.

    And intercept! Yeah, nothing to it. Just reaching maximum load capacity on these straining engines, ignore the alarms going off, ignore the /looks/ he's getting from the surviving Shi'ar flight officers that he'd invited up to the cockpit for lack of any other square foot of space to put them. Those alarms go off all the time, 's nothing. "Yeah... that's what I heard too, Big Guy. Our pals are full of surprised today."

    Dive, roll, dive bomb! Is Rocket above using Gigas as an improvised weapon? Of course he's not, best thing left in the arsenal right now. Hand delivered on a ballistic trajectory at a good fraction of the speed of sound.

    And that is it for the Milano. Rocket is /not/ sticking around to find out what an angry Gigas can do to a seemingly unstoppable object, especially not with something called a 'planet buster' about to be set off. Nope, not happening, bugging out.

    On the ascent, what remains of Razor flight forms up, wheeling and rolling around the Milano in what may be a salute, or the universe's most complicated aerial ballet just to show off. At this point, who knows? This raccoon is a bad influence on combat pilots.

    One last glance out of the cockpit glass to see the devastation, the destruction, the ruin of what remains of this planet, and Rocket shakes his head again, sighing. "There goes the neighborhood..."

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
Rocket had mentioned the 'queen', and while Kinsey had no personal reason to disbelieve him, she still used her ring to scan it. At best she can answer the question, once and for all, what it was, and possibly get some ideas to destroy, or slow down, whatever it was.

<And how!> Yes, Kinsey had a twisted sense of humour. Blame it on the Projects she had grown up in.

Star-Lord has posed:
As GIgas gets closer... that ball of chitin suddenly moves faster than it looked possible to do. Two gigantic pincers suddenly reach out and swipe at Gigas in the air. They have /long/ reach, and they come out from the side of the chitin mass, razor sharp. Five insectoid legs pop out from that shell to stabilize whatever it is too as the thing lunges for Gigas.

Kinsey, however, learns a few important facts: One, her ring knows what a Brood Queen looks like... and that isn't a Brood Queen. At all. It's more like an oversized lobster slash those droids from star wars... and it is BIG. and STRONG. One phrase comes to mind upon finishing the scan: City Destroyer.

Gigas has posed:
He's in the air. But he can't exactly fly. Still, he's incoming like an impending asteroid impact but reach and timing matters and though he hurtles in, the pinchers slam into his body and send Gigas spinning and spiralling away to go colliding violently into the remains of a long evacuateed but massive building. THe structure splits in two, toppling over as the behemoth cleaves it and then goes sliding backwards along the ground in a surprised daze. His moment of unrestrained triumph ruined.

"..That is not a Brood Queen." he says matter of factly before getting up to dust himself off and gain balance.

Once the world stops spinning, the galactic strongman acts again. A monstrous hulk of a fallen city-building begins to lift as the giant raises the remains of the broken mass upwards, bits and pieces of it falling off to shake the ground violently around him.

"That is -not- a Brood Queen." he repeats as if driving the point home for Rocket. An instant later and a loud *KABOOOM* resounds as he leans forward and violently shot puts the crumbling structure in direction of the incoming war-machine.

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    "So, didn't get a good look. Excuuuuuse me for not checking the genus of the frickin' huge thing rolling towards the frickin' city in the middle of a frickin' brood attack while flying a frickin' space ship." Rocket returns once he's relatively certain Gigas has nothing further to comment, and has fallen behind far enough that he can't jump up and grab the Milano out of the air to throw it at the thing. Lesson one, Rocket isn't always necessarily correct. Lesson two, never argue with the strongest being in the galaxy while they can still reach you. Both of these are lessons learned the hard way.

    "Ey, Sunshine..." yes, that's directed at Kinsey for what Rocket hopes are obvious reasons "... how's that evacuation looking? Did the last shuttles take off yet?" Because he doesn't have the time or the space to make another run... and this crusty, cold-hearted, cynical raccoon needs to know if everyone got away safely.

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
Oh god.. <Gigas get out of there. I swear that is something that will take you down!>

Well, sorta of. Kinsey really isn't sure of how much Gigas can take, but certainly, the city-destroyer was pretty much close to it.

As for Rocket's question, she has an affirmative. <What shall I do, while the rest of you escape? Don't worry about me. I'm covered.>

Star-Lord has posed:
Indeed, the last round of evacuation shuttles is almost filled... if that thing had managed to keep rolling, it would have gotten to the starport no problem. As it is? Those pincers retreat back into it's shell... along with those legs... and it /rolls/ out of the way to the north as the building starts to be thrown. Again, it's quite a bit faster than it was.

Whatever it's actually called, it's actively dodging quite well... and once it's clear of the building, it starts rolling back towards the city... right for Gigas.

<<Fleet Command to Gigas. We have transport getting ready and have you on sensors with whatever that thing is. Keep it busy until evacuation is complete and then get clear.>>

Meanwhile, the north lights up as the entire plains area turns into a fireball. Looks like they weren't kidding with that self-destruct.

Up in space, Rocket can see that the Shi'ar have pulled back from the outer system and most of the frigate and lighter ships are busy keeping the evacuation corridor clear.... he can also see thousands of techno-organic transports are coming up from the surface of Raken 4 to rejoin the Hive Fleet.

The sheer amount of transport Rocket sees coming up from the other side of the planet... the Shi'ar are in for a rough war. This is only a week into the invasion, and they've lost an entire planet already. The Imperium is bringing in their war machine... but the Brood /had/ to have been preparing this Fleet for a while. How did nobody notice?

Gigas has posed:
One of the strongest. Though Gigas would never correct such an thought if voiced in his presence. It sounds good on all advertising material after all. And you probably don't want to goad Gigas into attempting to prove it. Such things are best left to the imagination!

Speaking of not wanting Gigas to prove he is the strongest being in the galaxy--Kinsey's cry of alarm causes the giant to twist his expression into a look of annoyance.

"I would beg to differ. Why I've only been using a fraction of my strength so far to keep you all safe from my efforts!" -- Which is an obvious bit of shameless exagerration and hyperbole where his math is concerned, even if the prior shockwave does hint that worst is indeed yet to come. Still..onc he hears fleet command he purses his lips in thought and then rumbles, "Alright! Just make sure you have a ride ready!"

With that, the giant makes use of another chunk of ruined landscape..uprooting another structure and tipping it over to its side as he braces himself in the path of the rolling Space-Labster.

A roar of exertation later and the giant twists, swinging the crumbling structure around like city block sweeping baseball bat in a attempt to slam it into the rolling monstrosity once it gets near!

Rocket Raccoon has posed:
    Nobody said it was easy being a genius /and/ a bad ass at the same time. Honestly, between that and Rocket's stunning good looks, it's almost painful to be him. It's a struggle, a daily struggle. But it does mean that his mind is keeping track of tactical data, statistics, and above all logistics. He now has a decent idea of the kind of force the Brood are able to bring to bear on a singular planet, along with the number and types of ships, drones and auxiliaries they seem to be favoring in this most recent invasion. These numbers are going to take a while to crunch, especially because he'll be doing most of them inside his own head rather than trust them to actual computers or Shi'ar statisticians, who undoubtedly have their own tallies by now.

    Screw 'em. None of /them/ were down there in the thick of it.

    The harsh light of the firestorm begins to reflect off the instrumentation panels, and Rocket deliberately looks outwards, towards space, rather than spare the destruction of the planet even a singular glance more.

    "Sunshine..." and the voice coming over the comms now is sounding weary, almost sad. "Get out of there. Any way you can, the planet's a loss. You did what you could." Fractional pause. "Big guy, you're the last one standing. An' our friends ain't kidding, this planet is going up. When it does, be elsewhere, y'hear?!"

    "We lost enough good people today." is Rocket's last comment, utterly to himself and the Shi'ar in the cockpit with him as he terminates the transmission.

Kinsey MacKenna has posed:
<I care about you, you big.. well you, Gigas.>

Really she had too much to worry about at this time. And what Rocket says, turns her stomach over in knots. He was right, but Kinsey wasn't happy about it. <I'll try to take the end. At least that's something I can do. I'll watch your back before I have to go.>

<See you on the flip side. Go!> And to Gigas, <You better be right, or I swear I will break my solemn vow and kill you myself.> That is if he was brought into the brood, rather than dying outright.

Star-Lord has posed:
A personnel transport swoops in at the city's edge, opposite of the gigantic city wrecking ball... and just as Gigas is about to get a pincer for his troubles... it, too, starts to retreat backwards.

The Queen controlling this invasion seems to have picked up on what's going on, because the drones are also pulling back, and suddenly large evacuation ships are coming down in the distance to retrieve the drones.

The evacuation itself? Done, the last shuttles are launching... and the Megacity capital is abandoned as much as possible.

Up in space, Rocket will suddenly see the defense fleet of the Shi'ar pulling back from the planet... and one of of the dreadnought sized ships turns... and a /MASSIVE/ energy beam starts to charge, a blue beam of light streaks out of the barrel, lancing into the planet near the equator. Suddenly, there's an explosion of red light from inside the barrel, and that red light flows down the beam of light... right towards the planet.

From space, the resulting firestorm can be seen from space as it engulfs the entire planet, slowly but surely. The surface is being turned into ash.

Raken 4 is dead. Completely... and the Shi'ar starts to pull back <<All ships pull back to Raken 3. We hold the line. For the Majestor and Majestrix!>>

Gigas has posed:
Being able to survive in space means that extraction is as easy as just grabbing hold of a transport without even needing to let them worry about letting him get on ramp. This means that Gigas actually gets a -spectacular- view of the death of Raken 4.

He's been around the block. The force animating him has a long memory and an awareness of the larger workings of the universe but that doesn't mean he's completely and always unflappable despite seemingly being detached from time to time. The death of a planet is no small matter on any cosmic scale...especially under these circumstances.

"Wow..so they really did have to do it." he muses, mostly to himself though his comm link is open.

"...Tragic." The war-cry of the Shi'ar over his comm is heard but the giant just shakes his head and waits to be brought onboard a larger ship. Preferrably the one with his own still docked.