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When the other team left Piotr transformed into his armored form, while the others readied themselves, with Dani pulling up the hood that was part of her current costume. Ororo gestured for the team to gather around her holding hands, and said warningly. "This will feel a little odd, even to those of you who have apparated with Harry before." She began to intone a spell, glancing down at the monitor as she closed her eyes.
A second later they appeared on a runway of Cape Canaveral Florida. Around Ororo the others all fell to their knees for a moment, gasping. "That was not something I want to do again," Ben said, cleaning up what he really had wanted to say quite well. Being smacked by an invisible shield every time he cursed near Franklin had forced him to clean up his mouth quickly.
"Get over it" Ororo said, her eyes locked on their target. "I don't think we want this thing to find what it's looking for."
The Sentry was a giant robot, standing taller than Piotr, who was the tallest of them, by at least two feet. It was made of blue and purple metal with the purple etched on it in such a way as to look like some kind of clothing, complete with gauntlets and helmet. It had small eyes, and wide, thick 'lips'. It was currently simply standing there, it's arms up and pointing away from them, as if using some kind of scanner embedded in them. Ororo could hear it intoning something in its native dialect, which she couldn't understand.
Ben grunted coming to his feet. "Circle around it." he ordered, being the most experienced of the group. "Ghigau, get its attention, then Colossus and I will close in."
Wanting something that would harken to her heritage yet not be too obvious, Ghigau was the name Dani had chosen for her codename. Ghigau could mean either Beloved (Respected) Woman or War Woman. It was the name given to women among the Cherokee who exhibited great courage on the battlefield. Once named, Ghigau had certain powers in the tribe, serving as negotiating with those outside the clan, and determining the fate of captured prisoners. They were also said to have the power of the Great Spirit filling them, giving them odd powers and great insight.
Around the makeshift team people were running towards them, having first fled from what they thought was some kind of aircraft crash landing, now running back to see what the giant metallic creature was. Seeing that, the Thing cursed. "Damnit Colossus you were right we'll have to do something about the bystanders."
"Leave that to me." Ororo said grimly. "Though you'll have to keep the Sentry away from me. I haven't gotten good enough yet to use these spells and fight personally at the same time."
Most of the spells Gaia had been teaching her above and beyond simply manipulating magic itself in various attacks were area-of-control spells. Essentially Ororo used them and the area around her came under her control allowing her various abilities in that area without further incantation. In that area she could conjure or transfigure objects, teleport herself and others without any build up necessary, even summon up magical attacks to come at her opponents from different directions. The size of the area effected depended on her control and power. It would be extremely useful in a fight once she was able to use them and keep moving, but for now, this would help in keeping the people around them safe.
This proved its worth not a second later as the Kree Sentry finished whatever it had been doing and began to stride forward, one hand almost negligently rising to try and vaporize a human, some kind of airport worker, that had gotten too close to it. A vibrant purple beam of power shot out from the palm of the robots hands straight at the man, whose eyes widened in dawning terror.
Ororo had barely finished her first spell, and she reached out quickly with her power. The man found himself suddenly teleported away, landing on top of an airplane nearby with a queasy stomach but still alive.
The beam impacted the ground behind where the man had been, cutting a deep furrow in the asphalt of the runway. The Sentry paused for a moment, then after intoning something in its language once more moved forward again. At that point it's progress was halted when Ghigau's magic arrow impacted its head with the force of a cannon round. "Over here ugly!" she yelled, racing forward, taking an angle on her hover boots that took her away from the majority of civilians that were around, most of whom had the sense to scatter after seeing their fellow attacked a second ago.
Behind her Thing nodded in approval while he and Colossus rumbled forward. The Kree Sentry saw them coming and began to fire at the Thing, which was in its database as an enemy. It ignored Colossus until the Russian slammed into it, barreling the Sentry down to the earth and pummeling it heavily with his armored fists before being blasted away by a blast of that purple beam from the robot's chest.
His blows had however dented the Sentry's hull slightly, and before it could right itself Thing was on it too, pounding away. "Keep driving it away from the civilians!" Ghigau shouted, gesturing behind her to force several men wearing flight suits to back away. She could see a few security vehicles racing towards them, but for now it seemed as if the civilians were not in any immediate danger.
Ororo had hidden herself behind a large wheel of an airplane, her hands pressed together as she concentrated on the area of control spells that she had cast. Magic bolts appeared out of nowhere around the robot, smashing into it and doing more damage than Ben or Piotr's fists had so far, causing it to look around to see where the attacks were coming from. It spoke in its language again, but Ororo, not having run into the Kree before, couldn't figure it out.
She continued her attack, ice forming swiftly around the Sentry's feet, holding it in place as Colossus and Thing closed in from both sides having been thrown away by the robot for a moment. Their fists hammered into it from either side, but it fought back as well as it could, and Colossus staggered away, shaking his head groggily from one particularly strong blow to his head that he hadn't been able to dodge.
The robot then grabbed Ben's arm, hurling him away with a twist of its arms to smash into an airplane sitting halfway down the runway. The plane exploded around the Thing, and Ororo winced hoping that there were no people inside. There were several people however outside of the plane, who had apparently been fueling the plane and going over it or whatever it was airport workers did to planes.
They would have been caught in the explosion if she hadn't grabbed them all and teleported them away. They landed in a jumble, banged and bruised, but it was still better than being caught in an explosion.
By this time the guards had arrived, and were shouting at everyone to raise their hands, not seeing the Thing for the moment, hidden as he was by the explosion. If they had they would have immediately begun to evacuate the area. The Fantastic Four were well known and their adventures had won a tremendous amount of respect from the American people.
When the Sentry ignored them and began to fire blasts at Colossus they opened fire on it with handguns, and Ororo shook her head from where she was hiding. Idiots, she thought caustically, even as she directed more magical bolts at the alien robot. If metal fists like Piotr's can barely dent the thing, why in the world do they think that their little pop guns could?
The Sentry barely glanced in their direction, and from one eye came a beam of laser fire that would've incinerated one of the security guards. Again Ororo used her power to teleport him away, then hammered the alien construct with her pure magic attacks again causing it to look around wildly speaking again its native language while trying to find the threat. Hidden as she was behind the wheel of an airplane however, it could not find Storm, or connect her to the assault on it.
The other security guard retreated quickly, rushing back to his car and swiftly driving away from the conflict. On the way he saw Thing coming out of the smoke and fire from a downed plane, rumbling back into the battle.
By this point Ororo's magic attacks had damaged the Sentry it was badly dented now and had lost several fingers, but it was still fighting Colossus hard, hammering the Russian badly in turn, and Ororo could see that it was slowly healing itself as well.
It looked up, sending another purple beam of power at the charging Thing, but he took it, slamming his fist forward into the beam and charging on. "Hafta do better'n that Blue Boy!"
Jumping up from where she had been hiding Ghigau took careful aim, and letting fly with her arrow. It slammed into the Sentry's head right into one of the android's eyes with all the power of a gauss rifle round. The eye and more than a bit of its face was destroyed in the explosion, but the robot was still on its feet, still fighting, and they could see it begin to repair even that level of damage.
It took a second to try and fire back at Dani, but she was already gone, skating backwards then forwards once more, dodging its attacks easily while Ben finished closing the distance slamming a powerful punch into the Sentry's body. "It's Clobberin' Time!"
The Sentry however emitted some kind of energy field that blocked Ben's punch then flashed over into another attack, this one white in color that sent him flying backwards with a howl of or rage and pain.
Storm frowned, beads of sweat making their way down her face as she teleported Ben away from his landing position several feet to avoid a follow up beam of the same color. At the same time the Sentry turned, slamming a punch into Colossus' side, sending the metal-clad Russian to the ground.
It was about to follow up when Ghigau zoomed in suddenly, having sent her bow back into her bag of holding. She grabbed the construct's arm where it was pointed a palm toward Colossus, flipping herself into the air right in front of the robot's head, shouting, "KNIFE!" The array on her glove activated, porting in an Orihalcum knife. Swiftly she stabbed into the thing's just repaired eye, destroying it further.
Before she could get away, the robot's other hand was in front of her face, about to fire its beam. Suddenly Ghigau found herself elsewhere, falling on her rear for a moment, before she pushed herself shakily to her feet. Her intervention however had worked.
Colossus was once more on his feet, using his greater mobility to stay away from the beams and punches of his opponent, knowing now that he couldn't take much more damage to his head. Several more magic blasts also hammered the Sentry, and the robot was now unable to repair all of its damage.
Still hiding Ororo was now sweating in earnest, pulling back from her latest assault. The alien constructs defenses seemed to hamper her magical attacks better than terrestrial metals would, and she had been unable to she get a grip on it to simply transfigure it. Whether Harry could've done that or not was beyond her, but her attacks did seem to worry it, and she smiled as an idea came to her. When Colossus was once more thrown away from the robot, she took her chance, halting Thing in his attack for just a moment.
Under her will all around the Sentry the temperature dropped dramatically. Storm had conjured up some liquid nitrogen, encasing the Sentry in it for a moment. It didn't last long of course, nor did it, as Ororo had hoped, freeze the robot's armor to the point of brittleness, but it did make it move slower, as if some of its movement actuators hadn't been able to deal with the cold as well as its hull. The repair work on its mangled head also stopped and Ororo grinned triumphantly. Now she released The Thing from the momentary stasis she had struck him with, who rushed forward with Colossus to double team the alien construct.
The battle continued, but it was clear now the Sentry was slowly becoming overmatched. Dents and gouges covered it from Ororo's magical attacks and the fists of Ben and Colossus, it was also moving much less fluidly.
Ororo and the others pressed their advantage. Thing soaked up its desperate attacks returning his own with a fury that was startling to see. After one punch he grabbed the robot's arm and nearly ripped it out of its socket.
Ororo quickly capitalized, aiming her next round of magical attacks at that point. The arm sheared off with a squeal of tortured metal. At the same time, Ghigau, who had recalled her bow, lined up her next shot, slamming another arrow into the robot's already ruptured eye, blowing the armor out along that side of its head. The Sentry tried to fire back, but Colossus slammed his fist into the android's already heavily damaged face, destroying many of its remaining sensors.
Then Storm struck again, conjuring a fireball into the Sentry's sputtering shoulder socket, blowing the arm off. The sentry seemed to pause, its one remaining eye flashing as something inside its chest failed, then Thing hoisted it up by one leg. "Make a wish!" He shouted at Colossus, who got the idea at once. He grabbed the Sentry's one remaining arm, then the two powerful heroes began to pull.
The Sentry's structural integrity had been badly hammered by this point, and it's repair functions were gone now. It still tried to fire it's palm and chest beams, destroying several planes around them, but not hitting its targets. After several minutes of straining, the two superpowered heroes tore the alien construct in two at its waist.
Then Dani rushed forward, her boots sending her flying over the ground, to stop right over the robot's head, firing her last three arrows all at once into the head. When the smoke from the explosion cleared the thing's head had been reduced to bits of twisted and mangled metal.
Ben looked at the half of the Sentry that he was holding up and threw it to the ground. "Well that was fun, though that white beam it hit me with hurt worse than one o' the Hulk's punches. Wonder what that was about, well whatever, the Big Brain'll figure it out I bet."
Dani shook her head looking admiration at Ororo who had just stepped out of cover. She rushed over to the other woman as she gasped falling forward onto her hands and knees after letting go of the spells. "Are you all right Storm?"
"I'm fine." Ororo said shaking her head wearily. "That however took a lot of me."
"Well worth it though." Dani said nodding her head over at the pile of people who had been around the aircraft Thing had slammed into and the dozens of others scattered around who might have died without Ororo's interventions. "Most of them would have died in that explosion, or been horribly burned at the very least, without you here, let alone the others and I."
"True." Ororo said reaching up to Dani's hand and allowing the younger woman to pull her to her feet. "What should we do now?"
Ben scowled a little. "You lot should get out of here, I'll explain you all bein' here as allies of ours, but I don't think you're ready for the spotlight are ya? I'll tell 'em that we were sent because we were we detected somethin' coming through the atmosphere, which even SHIELD won't have an issue with considering they might have detected it too. Then I'll tell them that I have to hurry back just in case there're more."
Ororo nodded wearily. Then she looped one arm over Danny's shoulder as the other woman helped her along. "Cory, could you teleport us back up to High Note please, I'm afraid a little be too exhausted to trust myself to do it."
The popper specialist appeared in 'Mistress Ororo's' shadow, and the second later Dani, Piotr and Ororo had disappeared, along with nearly every bit of the Sentry, save for the arm that Ororo had shorn off earlier with Ben's help.
Shaking his head at how helpful the house-elves were Ben turned with a sigh as he noticed the security men rushing toward him. He sighed, but trudged over to meet them, a grim smile on his craggy face.
OOOOOOO
While the battle was going on in Florida, Harry and the others had moved out from the asteroid, held in a bubble of air that Jean directed and that Harry had filled with air, covered with a series of spells designed to hide them from detection as they closed. Even with Jean telekinetically pushing them along it took them several minutes to close from High Note's former position over California, but they latched onto the outer hull without anyone detecting them.
"All right." Harry said. "I'm going to cut us an opening, we'll rush in and then I'll transfigure it behind us. I don't know if they'll be able to detected or anything, but I would assume they do, so everyone should be ready for combat the moment we get in there.
Paige nodded eagerly, literally hopping up and down the hull for a moment while Jean simply smirked her eyes crackling with kinetic fire. She was going to enjoy this, and then she was going to pull this ship apart to find all of its secrets and how to re-create them. A good day.
Harry however was angry that he hadn't thought of asking one of the house-elves to bring up the newest version of their teams command helmet. With the admittedly mediocre HUD system it would've allowed to him at least monitor Paige and Jean if they got separated. He had never had to take a ship before, but he knew these fights were supposed to be nasty in the extreme, made even worse if you didn't have any idea of the ship's layout. "Do we have any idea of the layout of this thing?"
Reed shook his head. "We've never boarded a Kree warship, so no. I do however know how to read and understand their spoken language, and I bet they have signs inside."
"All right, if we can get in without any combat we'll split into two teams, one to take at the bridge the other to find and take out engineering. I'll lead the ones take at the bridge, Reed will lead the ones to find the engineering room. They'll be Susan, Reed and Paige on one team, with me and Jean on the other."
They all nodded, and Harry knelt to touch the hull with one hand, then began to use his magic to cut into the metal conjuring up a flame almost as hot as Fiendfyre but without the magical component. Soon he had a hole big enough for them all to fit through, and he leapt down, followed quickly by the others. With a wave of his hand Harry then grabbed the chunk of hull and slammed it back in into place before the metal around the edge could cool. He concentrated a bit, welding it shut again.
Alarms however had begun to blare all around the ship which Reed translated. "'Alert decompression, possible boarders detected.' Even if they can't see us, they know something entered the ship."
Then I think the time for disguises past for at least a few of us, Reed, Susan, Paige, take out engineering, I'll leave the spells in place covering you for now, so long as you don't…"
That was as far as the he got before several blue skinned men in body armor appeared at the end of the corridor they were standing in. The men immediately opened fire, causing Harry to wonder if the aliens could see them somehow, or if these people were just that aggressive.
He and the others dodged wildly, not even having enough time to summon up shields in Susan or Harry's case. The blasts from the Kree rifles were a light purple color and didn't seem very powerful judging from the fact they only scorched the walls where they hit, but no one was willing to take hits when they could avoid it, especially after Harry's little speech a few days back.
Paige however simply barreled forward, ignoring the fact that the men were now shouting something into their intercoms, aiming at her now that the spells on her had dissipated under the impact of so many laser beams. She slammed into the four Kree sailors, hurling one into the corridor wall and punching one in the face so hard his body went flying backward, his neck broken.
The last two tried to grapple with her, and she found despite their being the same general body type they were stronger than the human norm, stronger than Piotr was in his normal body. Still they were no match for her metal body's strength or durability, which seemed much closer to human norm than their strength. Within seconds she got them both into head locks, slamming their heads together before dropping their unconscious bodies to the ground. "I think they know we're here boss!"
Reed shook his head. "Agreed, we're going to be able to sneak around, they might be able to detect us in some way that your magic can't hide, or they simply could be too paranoid. We'll have to force our way our through."
OOOOOOO
Captain Yon-Rogg of the Kree Empire was a pure-born Kree, his skin the deep blue tone that denoted him as superior to the baseborn half-bloods with their pink or purple skin, whatever the Supreme Intelligence that ruled the Kree said of the need for new genetic material. He was a veteran of many battles against the lizard scum who called themselves the Skrull, and even the Shi'ar, for all that the Kree only shared a few border systems with that power. He was also ambitious and driven both by his ambitions and his ego, as well as his desires, which centered around one baseborn woman at present.
The mission he and his shipHelion, which was the Kree equivalent of a frigate, had been sent on at the moment was simple. Head to Earth, a planet the Kree were intimately familiar with from both experiments done here long ago and recent setbacks to one of their heroes, Ronan the Accuser. There he was to remain in orbit in support of the Sentry whose task was to find the target, the deserter Captain Mar-vell then if necessary land troops to assist in arresting him.
Yon-rogg and his ship had actually dropped off Mar-vell half a year ago, where he had been sent to spy on the humans, to see how fast they were advancing technologically, and to make certain they did not grow into a threat to the Kree.
The orders said Mar-vell had gone native, ignoring a recall order from the last time, and that he might be plotting to make the humans exactly that sort of a menace. Such an offense was punishable by death, but he would have to be tried first for a full tribunal, then made an example of by Ronan himself.
Yon-Rogg was more than happy to carry this mission out for very personal reasons. Firstly he hated Mar-vell, who was a half-blood male, with a fiery passion. He was named a hero a year ago after running into a new extra-spatial race called the Brood, saving Yon-rogg and a few others who had run into them first. That was not a kindness a man such as Yon-rogg could bare. Moreover, Mar-vell was in a relationship with a woman Yon-rogg had desired for himself for longer than the two had known one another, the medic Una.
Now he scowled angrily as readouts informed him they were being boarded. Despite the knowledge that the Fantastic Four could fight his people on an even footing, Yon-Rogg had not expected to run into any issue while in orbit over the Earth. The ground forces running into trouble, that he could understand, and judging from the Sentry's radio signals had indeed occurred.
The captain could recognize Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman from the sensors before she disappeared into her invisibility, which still baffled Kree scientists. "It appears that our intelligence was correct, Mar-vell has indeed allied with the humans, it is the only explanation for them being ready for us both on the ground and in orbit."
He glanced over to where Una stood, leaning against one of the walls. She was a beautiful woman with an hourglass figure whose features shone through despite her half-blood coloring, with short light brown hair down to her shoulders, wearing one of the Kree military's uniform, which was white in her case to denote her status as a medic. Her eyes were sharp when they met his, sharp with distrust.
Yet his next words were such Una could find no way to disagree with them. "I suggest you get back to the med bay, we will undoubtedly have need of your services soon."
Una nodded, turning to exit the bridge at a run, putting aside her worries at what was really going on for now.
Behind her Yon-Rogg spent a moment looking after her, until that delectable rear of hers disappeared from view when the security doors closed. Then he turned and began to bark orders through the ship's intercom. "All security to their stations, all internal weapons are activated, I went these invaders dead!"
OOOOOOO
"Someone doesn't sound happy to see us?" Harry quipped, after the speech over the intercom finished. "Do you know what that man just said?" After asking that Harry hit them all with a translation spell, kicking himself for not having done so earlier.
"He said he was ordering security to repel us, and that their internal weapons had been activated." Reed said, not looking away from the placard on the wall that they were standing in front of. "This however says something much more helpful. Engineering is aft from here, down that way, I assume then we'd have to take an elevator down or up, I doubt we're lucky enough to be on the correct level for it already. And the…"
He broke off as they came under fire from several guns which had suddenly popped out of the ceiling of the hallway, though this time they were ready for it. Susan and Harry quickly raised shields, and Jean reached out with her telekinetic power. Grabbing the guns she ripped them out of their stations then hurled them at several security guards that had appeared at either side of the corridor so fast there was a small crack of sound in the air from their passage. The man all shouted and went down in broken heaps.
Harry nodded grim approval before looking over at Reed. "All right, if you get into engineering, can you stop the captain from blowing the ship or anything like that?"
"Yes." Reed said seriously. "I won't be able to override all of his controls, but I can cut them off entirely from engineering. Without control of reactor, whatever they use, which I will be interested to see, he won't be able to blow the ship or hyper-drive out."
That idea made Harry wince while they all turned and raced in the direction Reed had indicated. He hadn't considered that the captain could decide to just turn around and head for home with them still aboard. "All right, engineering it is. Jean, use your telepathy to find the largest concentrations of people, I assume that engineering would be more manpower intensive than the bridge or any other section of the ship. That will tell us if we need to go down or up. We can't afford to slow down and double back like that."
Jean nodded as they raced along, sending out her telepathy. She absently warned the others of any upcoming ambush, then watched unseeing as Paige and Harry barreled forwards to deal with it while she kept on concentrating on what her telepathy was telling her, with Susan and Reed watching her back. "I've got four concentrations of manpower, give me a second…"
With a thought she delved into a person's mind in the first such area. Normally she wouldn't have done that, she didn't particularly enjoy going through other people's thoughts, but during a combat op she wasn't about to quibble about it. "The first one's the armory, we might want to take that out on our way it's about two floors down and to the right."
She frowned a little. "At first I was getting a lot of feelings of shock from most of the minds around, but the ones in the armory are confident, ready to fight. I think they might have a few weapons designed to fight the FF, if they knew about you all."
"The other concentration is about five floors down and much further toward the back of the ship. Then there is a third concentration forward." Again Jean delved into a mind this time in that area, riding the other being's senses for a moment then nodded. "That's the hangar Bay, they had a company of ground force, they wear different uniforms, ready to embark for some reason."
Jean scowled, her lips twisting, which for some reason made Harry want to kiss them for some reason. "I wish your translation spell worked on their minds rather than our senses Harry, I can't get anything but emotions from any of them. The fourth is definitely the bridge, I can feel the captain's mind, or at least I would guess it's the captain, feelings of dominance and control, along with a lot of anger."
She shuddered a little, while Harry and Paige came back. Also a bit of dissipating lust, ugh, so wrong and foul feeling, strange. "That's all I can get for now."
They ran into three more ambushes before they reached an elevator, all of them hasty attempts, with sailors armed with light weapons backed by security guns placed in the ceilings. The security guns in the ceiling were a threat to Reed and Susan, but the others could take what the guns could dish out easily. The men were not as well trained as that first security team either.
The elevator however wasn't there, forcing them to scale down. Reed used his powers to create a slide down the shaft, allowing them a speedy passage even so.
The instant they emerged from the shaft however they ran into much more serious defenses, ten security guns in the ceiling already opening fire as well as much more heavily armed security forces bunkered down in places. It's interesting to see that the ship seems designed to repel boarders Jean noted while she raised a telekinetic shield to block the incoming fire. She winced occasionally as a blast got through, but she dodged most of them, and what she didn't, couldn't get through her body armor. . Little protective shields had been flipped up from the floor here and there, giving the defenders foxholes to shoot from.
Harry came out of the shaft after her, his magic flaring. "Bombarda!" Two such spells cleared out the foxholes on either end of the corridor, and Jean ripped apart the ceiling guns. Susan shot out small invisible shields shaped like knives at the few remaining guards who had escaped Harry's attack, while behind her Paige and Reed came out of the shaft. They raced on, taking the cameras out as they saw them to further confuse the defender's responses.
Two minutes running brought them to the armory, where they ran into their stiffest resistance yet. Heavy weapons had been pulled out and dug in everywhere, as well as about a hundred Kree soldiers. They all opened fire the instant the metal clad woman appeared at the end of the hallway which led to the armory. Paige grunted upon the impacts, and one in particular through her backwards to land in a heap cursing yet somewhat undamaged, minus a few blisters, while the others scattered behind her.
Harry teleported, suddenly appearing among the troops and began to lay about him with different spells. A Lacero in one hand and a Protego over his other arm, intermixing more long range spells as he could, Harry forced the defenders to device their attention.
With the defense now in chaos, Reed quickly stretched his arms out to grab a gun emplacement. Pulling himself forward he slammed like a ballistic missile into the troops just rushing out of the armory, throwing them every which way. Then he began to wrap several of them up in his rubber body, suffocating a few while slamming others to the ground and hammering others with giant fists that threw them around despite their enhanced strength.
Jean concentrated her attack on the heaviest guns, ripping them apart or burning them where they stood in telekinetic fire whilst protecting herself and Paige as the other young woman got to her feet groggily. "Whatever that throws hurts like a bitch!"
"It looks like more fusion-based tech to me, a controlled pinch bottle reaction of some kind. Other than that, it looks as if they use similar weapons to what we ran into on Mojo's world. I had hoped for better though obviously I haven't been able to look at the ship weapons yet."
Jean seemed to brighten up with that, and the two of them raced on following after Susan, who had raised a shield to protect herself after the initial outpouring of fire, letting the menfolk get on with it. By this time they had done so, though her husband was looking a little battered around the edges, and was favoring one shoulder before Harry smeared some kind of salve on it. After that they all entered the armory, leaving Paige at the door to look out for reinforcements.
Looking around Harry saw that the armory had more than enough weapons to arm the entire crew. Harry thought for a moment before deciding to simply collect them all in Jean's bag of holding for later. They couldn't afford to let the crewmen arm themselves further, not if they kept running into resistance like they had here. His and Susan's shields could take a lot of pounding, but they might eventually go down or they could run into a weapon that could penetrate them. Besides, Jean might learn something from them, or they could prove useful later.
With that done, Harry concentrated, conjuring up fifty golems out of thin air, which filled the room from one end to the other. With the Kree aware of them and no doubt understanding ship boarding tactics as well as Harry and the others, they needed to sow some chaos to keep them from consolidating. "You lot, seek and destroy. Anyone with blue skin wearing armor like this, is a target." He said, holding up a corpse from the ground.
The golems all nodded their rocky heads and moved off while Harry turned to Jean. "We can't afford to keep to the corridors any longer. Where's the engine room from here?"
She pointed down on a diagonal from where they stood. "Down that way, about… I want to say five decks or so."
Harry nodded. "I'm going to burn us a path straight there, that'll cut down on the amount of ambush points they can prepare."
"It will also severely damage the structural integrity of the ship." Reed said sardonically. "But that doesn't matter to us does it?"
"Not a bit." Harry smirked as he knelt down. "Jean, guide me for this, I want to try to put us down right outside of engineering, just in case we run into something that might explode if I cut into it."
"This is good thinking." Paige said shaking her head. For the next several minutes she and Susan stood guard by the door while Reed tried to look through the corpses of the security team wincing occasionally as he helped those he could.
Reed had been careful to take a few prisoners for later questioning and then repatriation, hoping to use them as messengers to warn the Kree to stay away from Earth, if such a thing could work which alas he was doubtful of. Earth wasn't strong enough to make the Kree respect it, but he had to make the attempt in any event.
By the time he was finished Harry had carved his way through to the deck below them and through that to a third.
OOOOOOO
The captains stared aghast at the cameras showing giant rock creatures moving among his crew smashing into and through defensive positions. Yet they weren't having it all their own way, his crew was armed with weapons that could damage or even destroy them, and they were stronger than humans, able to stand up to the golems in close combat. Indeed, after twenty minutes or so, his crew had demolished all the rock creatures, though their losses had been heavy. But while that was going on the cameras had lost sight of the actual boarders.
Even so Yon-rogg knew their target. Now that the armory was no longer a viable defensive point, he redirected all of the ships internal guards to the bridge and engineering, then ordered the landing party to head to the engineering room as well, hoping to catch them in a crossfire.
OOOOOOO
Yon-rogg's plan worked, but even so he just didn't have enough firepower. The moment Harry dropped from the final hole the defenders attacked him, but none could break through his armor or Magia Erebea given durability. The others landed behind him, attacking or covering themselves, the defenders weapons unable to overwhelm their opponents or at least not entirely.
When the company of ground forces came up behind them, Harry and Jean concentrated on them while the others moved forward to engage the defenders around engineering. They hammered out attacks swiftly, throwing the men there backwards even as Jean winced having taking up a shot to the shoulder. Still, the Orihalcum scales armor protected the two of them even when the shots got through their shields, nothing that the crew could safely use aboard ship could that through it.
But these, the Kree equivalent of marines, were much better trained, and much better led than the navy security teams they had faced up to this point. They didn't break, instead falling back in an organized manner, forcing Harry and Jean to chase after them. The corridor split, making the two attackers have to split up in turn.
Harry demolished a gun team with a series of devastating spells, only to find himself suddenly tackled into a wall. If he had the time to, he would've been amused, but finding himself suddenly slammed head first into the wall behind him knocked that thought out of his head.
To his surprise the man backed off after that, making a come on gesture with one hand before some sort of martial arts stance. "Come at me like this human, let's see how good you are without your powers! Or are you afraid?" He was a blue-skinned Kree, like the majority of the crew, though Harry had seen pale-skinned troopers too. He didn't know the significance of that, what he did know right now was that the man in front of him was daring him to fight him on an even footing.
Given the seriousness of the battle, the very idea should have been ludicrous. But call it a male need to prove himself, but Harry found himself agreeing to it. It had been so long, literally years, since he had last had to fight someone without the aid of his magic, that the idea was refreshing. So Harry actually grinned before kicking out, catching the other Kree man in the side, sending him stumbling backwards.
Harry leapt to his feet, meeting the man's furious punch with a blocking forearm, returning with a chop to the throat which was caught. The man brought him into a head-butt of all things, and Harry saw stars for a moment from the impact of their foreheads. But he recovered quickly enough to dodge the other man's follow up punch, ducking underneath his outstretched arm to hammer him with two body blows.
He couldn't however dodge the raised knee that caught him in the chest, then the double hammer blow that slammed into his back. Harry rolled away from a stomp, flipping himself up and grabbing a kicking leg before hurling the man away. The man landed on his feet, charging forward to body check Harry through the wall behind him this time, and several others before Harry could smash him away.
Harry grasped him around the center, lifting himself off his feet and halting the Kree's furious charge, hammering him with two knee lifts before kicking him away. Still the man came on grimly. Harry shook his head, getting into one of the stances Shiang-Chi had taught him as he contacted Jean through their communicators, which he had emplaced in his crysis suit's mask. "Jean, you and the others keep up the attack, I'm going to be busy here for a bit."
OOOOOOO
Back at the entrance to the engine room, Reed had simply barreled through the defenders like a rubber bullet shot form a cannon. Entering the engineering room he swiftly moved towards a control station while Susan covered him, using her invisibility and invisible shield knives on several engineering crew members who had been in the room, and then throwing several others around, while others were simply pushed against walls and held there by invisible shields. Paige stayed near the door, clearing out the defenders there, wincing occasionally when she got hit by a few of their weapons, favoring one leg, where her knee looked rather molten and her shoulder.
Susan wiped sweat out of her eyes, feeling the exhaustion hitting her now. Using her powers like this in so many different forms and for so long was taking a toll. Reed too was looking a little crispy around the edges, having taken a few blasts from that last battle. Luckily none of them had been direct fire, only incidental, which had allowed him to get through without further injury.
Jean joined them after finishing off the company of ground troops save for the one that Harry, rather idiotically (yet oh so predictably) in her opinion had chosen to fight on an even foot. She looked positively pristine in comparison to the other three, thanks to her armor and telekinetic defenses. "Harry's been unavoidably detained by his male ego, but the ground troops out there are gone."
"I'm not even going to ask." Reed said from where he had spent the last five minutes furiously typing at one of the consoles. "I've cut off engineering from the con, the computers think that the engineering room is the last bastion of the defenders. But I can't control everything from here. I can't shut down the defenses, nor can I shut down the internal cameras."
"That's fine, you, Susan and Paige stay here and I'll continue on and take the bridge. I haven't run into anything that can get through my telekinetic shields so I should be fine."
"Not gonna bitch." Paige said shaking her sore shoulder, deliberately not looking down at her knee, cursing her overconfidence. She was looking forward to changing back to her human form.
Paige had discovered that so long as the damage wasn't heavy, like missing a limb or similar, she could simply shed one skin for another to get rid of most of her injuries. But she wasn't about to do that in a combat zone. I've already screwed up once already, that was more than enough, thank you. And next time, I by god am going to wear some actual armor, no matter my metal form's durability! Maybe I should ask Harry to look into getting me a sample of other metals? Orihalcum didn't work but what about, what was the name, adamittum or something?
"Good, stay here and help defend this place, I'll be back. If Harry shows up send him after me." Jean said, nodding her head at the younger girl's change of attitude. It seemed as if the Guthrie matron had been correct that her daughter would mature quickly if thrown into the deep end.
The fight for the bridge was the hardest Jean had run into yet on the ship. The defenders were ready, and had learned that they had to manage their fire carefully to get through their attacker's shield. But they hadn't realized how heavily armored Jean was beyond her power-based defenses. Jean took hits, but was able to plow through, though Jean took a shot to her side that made her wince. Still, with her phoenix aura flaring around her, there was nothing the attackers could truly do to stop her.
Jean gripped the door of the bridge in two talons of phoenix flame, ripping it open with a scream of tortured metal. Almost as soon as she did, Jean's head cracked backwards hit by a blast of something from the inside. She shook her head woozily but continued opening the door, her aura and mask having taken the brunt of whatever that had been, though her aura actually wavered a moment around her head before restoring itself. Half her mask was also blown off, the protective enchantments on it having been expended blocking whatever that had been. .
There was a startled yell of outrage from inside, and then another blast hit Jean's shoulder making her wince a little, but this time the Orihalcum in her suit stopped the blow from doing much. Whatever that was, it was definitely a higher grade weapon than most of the ones aboard, or at least more powerful. Later Jean would determine that it was indeed very different than the other weapons they had seen, something only a few prized officers could use for some reason. . It only had power for two blasts, but each was capable of taking out most combat armor the Kree had run into before this.
Now however his last weapon had availed Yon-Rogg not at all. Desperately he and the rest of the bridge crew opened fire, trying to overwhelm whatever armor the human female was wearing to no avail. Her aura blocked all their blasts, and she returned fire literally, claws of flame smashing them this way and that.
Yon-rogg knew then that the battle was lost. Angrily he shouted, "You may have my ship, but no mere human will ever take me or mine alive!" He slammed a hand down on two buttons and suddenly warning tones went off through the entire ship.
Every hatch in ship opened, along with the hanger bay and several other, smaller hatches along the outer hull, opening the ship to space. At the same time, a charge of explosives, set into the floor to take out the bridge to keep it from being captured, went off.
Jean hastily strengthened her telekinetic shield but it was all she could do for a second to protect herself. The explosion killed everyone else in the bridge, and opened it up to space. Recovering, Jean fell back to the doorway, pulling it shut behind her before welding it in place with Phoenix fire. For a moment she simply shook her head at the captain's actions, but then she noticed a nearly transparent bubble pushing toward her from deep in the ship. As it washed over her, she smiled, feeling air around her once more.
OOOOOOO
Harry and the Kree soldier he was battling had fought their way down several corridors and through several walls. The Kree had the advantage in experience and strength and seemed to have some kind of healing factor as well. Harry had the edge in speed and endurance, but neither had taken a crippling blow just yet.
The wizard nearly bit his tongue as his head rocked back from a punch but retaliated with a kick that send his opponent skittering back. Before he could recover, a roundhouse kick slammed into the Kree soldiers head, plowing him through the wall of the corridor once more, hopefully breaking his jaw and possibly his neck this time.
This gave Harry a breather to look around and he frowned as he noticed that a female soldier standing at the entrance to a room at the far end of the hall. The woman, one of the Caucasian looking Kree troopers he had seen mixed in with the blue, had short brown hair and a very good figure, wearing a uniform he hadn't seen so far. She held a rifle in one hand, and she was staring hard at him, even though her hands were shaking. Over her shoulder he could see dozens of beds laid out in neat rows with injured sailors on them.
Before harry could try to reassure the woman that he wasn't about to attack her or the infirmary, all around them alarms began. Air began to rush out of the area, and the woman gasped, dropping her rifle and turning, slamming her hand on a button by the doorway. Nothing happened though, and she gasped this time in pain as the air left the area, only remaining where she was by grabbing the hatchway. Harry looked around wildly, then concentrated, pushing his magic out as he summoned up a huge Bubblehead charm, pushing it out and down the corridors, expanding it as he reached every intersection. The woman, at the entrance to the med bay gasped when the bubble reached her, looking over at where Harry had gone to his knees, his eyes closed as he concentrated. The bubble of air had saved her life, Kree being much more susceptible to the loss of air and depressurization than humans. "Thank you human!"
Harry looked over at her, sparing her a nod before going back to his spell. Using a bubblehead charm over your head or your body was relatively easy. Doing it while the 'void' of space was trying to tear it apart wasn't that hard in a small space. Doing it while pushing out outward through a ship, that was much harder.
He looked up as two booted feet appeared in front of him. It was the trooper he had been fighting, back for more. His jaw was broken, he seemed to be favoring his side, and his shoulder seemed broken as well, but he had a gun in his hand. If Jean had been there, she would've recognized the largish carbine as the same type the captain had used on her.
"Stop it commander!" The woman yelled from behind Harry. "He's somehow keeping the air from rushing out of the ship! I have dozens of injured in here, if the area depressurizes again!"
"Silence half-breed!" The man ground out, his jaw really paining him. "No Kree will ever need an over evolved to aid him, better to die instead!"
He raised his rifle to Harry's forehead, and Harry grimaced, stopping the bubble where it was, unfortunately probably consigning many of the first groups of sailors they had run into to death. Looking down at the ground of the corridor, he transfigured it into a spike that slammed up into the Kree man's chest, impaling him straight through, killing him instantly
"So much for fighting fair." Harry said with a shrug, then pushed the spike carrying the dead commander away through the floor of the corridor. He looked over his shoulder at the 'half breed' woman, whatever that meant, as he resumed pushing the bubble charm outward. "Not that I think it after what you said, but just for the record, you're not going to try anything similar are you?"
"No sir." The woman muttered, looking at the dead man's body in shock. "I'm a medic, not a fighter, and I'm not a fanatic either. I surrender."
Harry nodded wearily, this was taking a lot out of him for some reason, but eventually he reached the outer hull of the ship and was able to tie the spell off, allowing it to feed off his magical core without further input from him. He then turned to the woman and nodded his head. "Well then, let's get your patients locked down, just in case they aren't as pragmatic as you, then I'll call in my friends and we can go from there." The ship was theirs, now it only remained to clean up after.