To Hell and Back (Hellworlder pirates)

Ch 72 Into the Frying Pan Pt.V

Into the Frying Pan Pt.V

These fools thought she was weak and vulnerable, ripe for the taking. Astarte planned to prove them wrong. Ah'areds ambush on Femeri had left her half blind and weak for so long, it was that very blind spot that had allowed Kazlum to get the upper hand on her. So when she ordered a new cybernetic eye she had decided to pay an exorbitant amount to make it the most advanced piece of prosthetic hardware possible. When she had lost so much muscle mass during her long several months of recovery process she had realized that she had been neglecting her body and that she had been falling short of what her very expensive synthetic muscles and reinforced bones were capable of, so when she could finally move on her own she hit the gym, and she trained much harder than she had ever done before. Throughout life she had struggled to recognize all the things that made her weak, but once she finally did she always endeavored to turn those weaknesses into strengths.

The Egh'ahds and their Kruhur cronies thought that since they were dead in the water that made them vulnerable, but now they were about to realize just how hard Terrans fought when backed into a corner. They had forced them into a situation where the only way out was counter invade the Venom and destroy them from the inside out.

The smoke grenades obscured the enemies sight, but with her red eye she could cut through all the smoke and see them clear as day. Her prey spread out in confusion, trying to cover all possible routes until the smoke cleared and they could open fire. Astarte lifted her blade perpendicular to her body and dragged it along the wall as she continued to calmly march forward. It was a move that completely gave away her position, but that was fine by her, she wanted her prey to feel fear before she came to collect their heads. Their guns swiveled around and fixed on where the noise was coming from, and moments before they opened fire Astarte leaned forward and charged headlong into their ranks. Bright flashes lit up the smoke and Astarte used the temporary blinding light to get behind her prey and slashed with her blade. Ordinarily a regular person would struggle to cut through the thick coated canvas of their armor, but Astarte was not normal. She was strong and swift enough to go toe to toe with an Aunviry warrior, and the thick fabric guarding their necks was little more than tissue paper to Tenken.

One by one she sliced through the Kruhur's thick neck and freed their heads from their bodies. One Kruhur who was larger than the rest was able to get a clean shot at her and it took it without hesitation, but Astarte saw it coming and had turned her shoulder to take the heat of the blast head on. It hit right in the center of her shoulder plates, but the insanely expensive metal took the heat without any warping and dispersed it back into the air without any of it getting through to burn her skin. It was an incredible feat of material science on the Toy mans part, and had probably saved the lives of her marines a hundred times over. It was too expensive to use as ship armor, and lost a lot of its effectiveness on such a large scale, but it was perfect in small thin plates of metal. Which had made plate armor once again a viable means of personal defense in the age of light-speed space travel.

The big Kruhur seemed shocked that she was still charging forward after a point-blank pulse fire shot, it backed up slowly before turning tail and running the other way, but Astarte wasn't going to let it. She quickly out paced the big Kruhur and had yanked it back by the collar, it fell to the ground and Astarte turned and thrusted the point of her blade through its face shield and easily slid right into its brain. She placed a foot against its chest and pulled her blade free just as the rest of her team of marines jogged up to her. They glanced around at the carnage with awe and horror.

Unlike Astarte, who had always commanded her ship in her maroon armor, the marines had been suiting up from the moment the ship came under attack. So, unlike Astarte who was once again only armed with her inert plate mail and sword, they were armed to the teeth will all the most advance combat hardware money could buy. Inspired by the functionality of her new eye she had asked the Toy man to redesign the Menpo's to incorporate extra functionality, now her marines were capable of seeing things in the infrared, and had a heads-up display that gave them a lot of useful information. That did however mean that Astarte now had to relearn how to tell them all apart since the molded faces of their Menpo's had changed.