[X] Plan
Believe In Getter
As your song hums through your body, it's clear to you that you have to do something, anything, to keep this thing away from the relic fragments. You're not sure what would happen if it got to them, but something tells you that it would be bad. With that in mind, your mind races furiously to find a solution. Tackle the thing? No, it has significantly more mass than you, not to mention if it's targeting the fragments it might just rip out the one currently entangled with your body. There has to be a better way… that's it!
You might not have the strength to take this thing head on, but sometimes you have to fight smarter, not harder. Your goal doesn't have to be to face it power for power; as long as you can keep it from doing whatever it came here to do, that's already a win. Every second you delay is another second that backup draws closer, another second that Chris gets closer to being able to help you. It wants the Gjallarhorn fragments? Then all you have to do is keep it up here on the surface, away from them, and you win.
Of course, that's easier said than done in your current state. You can feel your strength waning, the power of your song fading along with the song of your heart. But right now what you need isn't strength, it's speed. What was it that Ryoma and Go always said? Right, you just need to
believe in Getter. The Getter Rays granted you this power, and they'll grant you what you need to safeguard their chosen instrument. All you have to do is have faith.
Time seems to slow down as the Sarcophagus leaps past you and towards the gap in the deck; as it stands, there's no way you can catch it. Fortunately, you have a plan in mind. The red armor of your Symphogear shatters and fades as you draw it back into yourself, readying for a charge. There's no way around the fact that this is going to
hurt whether it works or not, but it's your only chance at granting yourself the speed you need to win the day. As Chris screams in wordless frustration, as Elfnein screams a warning, you yourself scream in defiance:
"
CHANGE GETTER LIGER!"
And there's the pain you were expecting! Your body contorts as the crystalline matter wrapped around your artificial bones shifts and distorts, shoving and contorting your limbs to fit into a new pattern. You scream in renewed agony as your mind struggles to keep up with the changes overtaking you. The red in your dress is taken over almost entirely by blue, your crown shifting to a three-pointed blue design that lacks the Getter Beam emitter your previous headpiece sported. The armor in your legs elongates and narrows as fins jut out, crushing your legs tightly and painfully as jet thrusters form on the soles of your feet. Your twin-tailed red cape stretches and solidifies into a pair of blue and yellow rocket engines, and in the end your armor is nearly the spitting image of Getter Liger. Only nearly, though; for all you try, for all you sing and shout and scream, you simply cannot produce the drill arm in place of your left hand. Perhaps you are simply too low on power; perhaps such a change is entirely beyond you. In the end, it doesn't matter, as you still have enough of what you need for your chosen goal.
You ignore the various exclamations of disbelief from your allies as you
grin through blood-stained teeth and rev up your engines; if this homicidal penguin wants a battle, you'll show it what it feels like to fight at the speed of sound! You roar your rage into the sky and pour everything you have into speed, rockets flaring to life as you tear past the now painfully slow Sarcophagus as it tries and fails to catch you with a wild swing of its remaining arm. Running circles around it is easy with your newfound swiftness; the only challenge you face is not flinging yourself off the deck as you rocket around your foe at previously unthinkable speeds. Is this how Hayato feels all the time? No wonder he's such an adrenaline junkie! In fact, you might want to be careful not to let the Getter Rays influence you any more than they already have…
Just as you have that thought, you immediately push it aside when you see a glint of steel lying on the deck. You haven't got the strength to finish the job with just your bare hands, but one of your discarded Getter Tomahawks just might be enough to make the difference. With a satisfied smirk, you leap for the weapon just as the Sarcophagus breaks off and moves towards the hole in the deck. If it thinks it can outrace you, it's sorely mistaken, as it learns to its own cost as you turn back around and give chase. It tries to throw its remaining arm up as a shield, but it's too late; you slip inside its guard easily and use your excessive velocity to throw yourself into a spin. Its armor is tough, but the force of your
Tomahawk Tornado tears right through its midsection like a buzz-saw and out through its back as your song reaches its crescendo. The machine explodes as you slump to the ground, Symphogear fading and power spent.
Unfortunately, a shout of pain reminds you that the battle is not yet over; Chris has dispatched the last of the drones that were harassing her, but she's now down on one knee with the literally disarmed Karma-Noise about to crush her beneath its massive bulk. The gigantic belly flop would look comical if it wasn't for the fact that one of your new friends is about to be squished flat beneath it. The lurching motion of the enormous enemy combined with the lingering aftershocks of its arrival combine to throw the submarine one more time, but this time you can't keep your footing and are thrown to the edge of the deck. You're barely able to grab a handhold, but your grip is weakening and it's all you can do to watch as death descends on Chris from above. Just as your grip is about to fail entirely, however,
a new song enters the battlefield, an anthem of love and justice belting out for all the world to hear.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!"
A fist of thunder and lightning smashes into the Karma-Noise like the fist of an angry god. The golden-clad hero, for there is no other word to describe her, smashes clean through the Karma-Noise like its armored body was made of glass. The black beast lets out one final wail before exploding in an enormous puff of smoke and ashes. The roaring flames and impressive speed behind her fist remind you of a rocket punch in all of its glory; how is a person on foot able to generate this kind of power? Is this the true strength of a miracle? Could you do that one day?
"About time, idiot!" Chris shouts in equal parts frustration and joy; so this must be Hibiki then. You wish that you could greet her more politely, but your current circumstances make that difficult. She seems friendly enough, if a bit unprofessional judging by the way she immediately tackle hugs Chris and picks her up in a princess carry. Your rumination is promptly interrupted by your grip finally giving out and you dropping over the side of the submarine to shouts of surprise and horror from both Chris and Hibiki. You don't entirely share their concern, but it would be wrong to dismiss it entirely; while you are an android and thus cannot drown, sinking to the bottom of the sea would be a rather unpleasant way to spend the next few minutes or hours of your life.
Fortunately, instead of falling into the sea you instead fall into the arms of a girl with warm eyes and lustrous black hair. She too wears a Symphogear, this one shining in colors of purple and white; this must be Hibiki's girlfriend. You open your mouth to thank her only to vomit blood into the sea instead as the adrenaline rush wears off and the damage from your injuries begin to catch up with you. Dozens of status reports clog your brain, each of them bearing a warning of something either moderately or critically damaged during your battle. Your savior's smile turns to a look of concern as your vision begins to turn black; today is just not your day, is it?
And so you pass out. Again.
When you come to, you find yourself lying on a bed in what your records indicate is a medical bay within the submarine. Two girls are sitting nearby, watching over you as you rest. You immediately recognize them as the reinforcements that showed up just in time, though they look rather different in civilian clothing instead of their Symphogears. Hibiki is a sandy-haired blonde with well-defined muscles and a goofy smile on her face as she holds hands with her black-haired partner and stares at the floor. The black-haired girl is quick to break the silence; they must have been having a conversation while you rested and recharged.
"-I'm just glad we got here in time. Chris is fine, you know how she is. I'm more concerned about that poor Autoscorer; you didn't see her like I did, Hibiki. She looked half-dead and she barely seemed to care!" You are starting to get really annoyed with this comparison to an 'Autoscorer;' sometime soon, you're going to need to sit your new allies down and have a proper conversation about what exactly you are and how to refer to you. You can tell that she doesn't mean anything by it, though, so you elect to let it pass for now. In truth, you're more interested in learning her name, since you didn't have the chance to do so earlier. One quick hack into S.O.N.G.'s personnel files later, and you can say with absolute confidence that you are face-to-face with the wielders of Gungnir and Shenshoujing, one Tachibana Hibiki and her girlfriend Kohinata Miku.
"I guess you're right," Hibiki pipes up before raising her head to stare into Miku's eyes. "At least it means we have some time to ourselves..." Neither of them have noticed that you're awake; not terribly surprising, given how attached they seem to be to each other. What should you do now?
Vote Choices:
[] Draw their attention. "Thank you for saving me back there. My name is Nine, what's yours?" Just because you already know is no reason to be rude.
[] Feign sleep for the moment; they might be embarrassed to hear you listening in on this, but it's all for your research into the nature of love! For science!
[] Write-In
