2018-07-07: Out At The Library

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<Pose Tracker> Leon Albus has posed.

The Black Wolves were hired by Thessaly -- though, not told the name of the noble house of Rolance behind their employment -- to investigate Cardinal Runette Forton, and discover what precisely caused a tension with her and the Church on Meribus. Perhaps, it would reveal some truth; perhaps, it would be of use. Leon accepted the job.

Since then, after speaking with enough Church officials and quiet interviews, a plan was created: go to the library. "The" library, in this case, is a library of theological texts located in the city of Meribia. Here, scholarly monographs and other works are stored; it is rumored that one represents the work of Forton in her younger days, and received much criticism and even censure.

It is, allegedly, commented on and includes a biography compiled by the Church's scholars.

To enter the library, a simple plan was hatched up: the bartender at the Wolfsbane, a former priest of Althena, will call in a few favors... for a group of acolytes and merchants to enter. Argus -- a slightly plump, understated brown-haired man is with them.

The Wolves met him a distance away.

Now, they walk past the library's front doors... after Argus exchanged a few words with them. He turns, to look back at the disguised Wolves. He nods his head, once. "It looks like my old friends bought it," he says. "The level we're looking for... it's going to be about four floors down."

While the Wolves are here, Leon Albus is not. Instead, he is waiting a distance away; after the recent encounters with the Guard, he is the one on watch. He looks at them through the window, then checks a pocket watch. If need be, he will make a distraction.

<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.

    Argus doesn't have much to worry about at least, cause Janey and Mikaia are super eager to keep at their duty of looking after the Wolfsbane when they're gone.

    A while ago, Riesenlied had spoken to a priestess of Althena who had taken an interest in her -- Amelia Rose, who'd expressed her dismay with the behaviour of one Cardinal Runette Forton and would look into some things on her end. It is as such that Riesenlied's procured a set of Althenan priestess garments, which...

    ...

    ... actually doesn't look all that different from her usual clothes, all told. A soft white flowing gown that's layered atop a capelet and hood that's actually just the one she usually wears when going around Meribia. She has an Althenan cross and staff along with her to complete the look.

    It is rather curious how Riesenlied basically doesn't have to pretend to be a priestess, does she?

<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.

    Noeline-- for all that she boats about being an excellent and stealthy spy, the metal demon seems to be uniquely resistant to actually ever wearing a disguise. But then, perhaps that's her idea of how to go about these things, always preferring to hide in plain sight and let charisma and fast-talk carry her through where possible.

    At least she's dropped her armor, and is instead wearing a familiar red-and-black dress that she hasn't touched much since coming to Lunar. Without a weapon at her side, and with a folding fan tapping against her chest, she does at least the part of a particularly extravagant merchant, though one that is absolutely and unmistakably Noeline. Fortunately, it's been a long while since she's raised any trouble in Meribia.

    "Come along, then," she chimes to the rest of the group, in agreement with Albus' words. She's obviously in high spirits, glancing to and fro at the collection around her as she grins pleasantly. "But you know, I hadn't realized this place had an underground vault of all things. I've wanted to take a peek into here for a while - Vane's library is excellent, but this is quite a bit more impressive."

<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.

Elly's main thought was: It can't be this easy, can it?

But it seems that it could be!

Elly's garb is not greatly dissimilar from Riesenlied, although she is wearing the hood down, not least because she has no horns to conceal; not that there is anything wrong with horns, of course. Instead she has a pair of glass spectacles on, though the glass in the lenses is simply window glass, not actually shaped to improve visions. She bears no staff.

Beneath the robe she is wearing her strategic nylons, a belt with her combat rod and a selection of Gummies, and a halter top. This may constitute a crisis suit. It's also cool and refreshing.

Elly has moved with quiet grace and calm, and tried not to feel the wrackings of guilt that Riesenlied's visage brings to her newformed, thanks to the goatly ministrations of Lydia Seren. She thus answers Noeline: "I suppose the buildings that don't have such grand features don't survive the passage of time..."

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    Acolyte or merchant, was it?

    At the end of the day, there's only one of the two that Josie could reasonably pose as for a long period of time.

    Today, she's playing the part of the merchant, swapping out her usual garb (up here on Lunar at least) for something a little more typical of the traveling merchant sect, adding just a little frill to suggest the possibility that she's had a succcess or five out on the road.
    Her jewelry, also recovered from her belongings collected back on the Fereshte, likely add a little punch to this as well. Her hair is pulled up in a more simple bun than usual, though the hairpin stuck through it is certainly on the more ornate side...
    The makeup helps, too.

    Penelope, notably, is not present at the moment.

    "It's been a while since I've gotten a look at a library. ...I suppose Vane's is nice enough, but I'm not interested in magical theory, and some beetles chewed through Thorodan's Ruins Reference Series Volume 3-8, so..."

    She shrugs, as if to say, 'what can you do'.

    "Well, let's not hang around here, right?"

<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.

Lunar. A place of lush, vibrant, green plains and fields of grain. Verdant paradise-on-the-moon.

Somehow, worse than the godforsaken desert.

Jude Moshe has been largely absent from the going-ons of both Glenwood and Meribia; frankly, he wasn't getting paid, and it wasn't his problem, and it wasn't affecting him in any possible way that he could ever remotely have interest in, and so, he politely begged out in order to do something more productive. Like, things that interest him personally. Much of that has been learning the lay of the land and cultural landscape of Lunar -- at least, the parts of Lunar he could reach.

The rest has mostly been either drinking or gambling, because hey, they kill the time better than most things.

But now? Now, when word comes in down the grapevine about a job, things are different. Now, he's getting paid, and suddenly, these things are in fact problems he cares DEEPLY for to a degree proportionate to the amount of silver/gald/gella/galder he's being paid.

Funny how that works out, isn't it?

Which is all to say, Jude Moshe is there for the Black Wolves' mission and, despite being a flighty and unreliable non-presence 'til then, he is there precisely on time. For as laid back and sometimes (often) irresponsible as he usually carries himself, though, he wears the robes of a church acolyte like he was born to them; despite the fact that nothing is physically different about Jude, he practically looks like a different person as he makes his way to the front doors of the library -- from the straight, serene posture, to the reverence of his gait, to the spiritual calm of his expression.

The way he says, "May the Goddess walk with you," to people as they pass by is nothing short of utterly sincere.

He hardly even has any smoke or liquor on his breath. Now that's the sign of a professional.

"Well, let's get this done, huh?" he says leisurely, in a brief break from his character as he looks back toward the library.

"Because I swear to my great beautiful constipated fun-hating Goddess in the skies I'm going to commit a heinous sacrilege if I can't get a smoke pretty soon. Althena be praised."

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei Fong Wong had a bit of a conundrum at first since he recently obtained a new pet, a chimaera pup named Chaya and he's not really up for leaving the chimaera unattended. Luckily, he had the idea of asking one of the Hyadeans--Dva in this case--to petsit. He has given the water type metaldemonmon the basic instructions before quietly admitting they're still kind of figuring out what the chimaeras need to eat and whati t takes to properly care for them. Boy it sounds irresponsible to have taken this creature out of its habitat but considering its diet would normally be adventurers, it's probably okay to be a little inethical if it gets the chimaera out of that environment. Normally he would be asking Hammer, but Hammer is coming along today on this adventure. He and Hammer are dressed as merchants since Fei doesn't think he could fake being religious enough for this activity. Fei feels a little weird wearing a Hammer-like outfit.

"Well," Hammer says. "Don't you worry, bro. I will teach you all it takes to be a supplier."

"I...I am just doing this for the disguise." Fei stammers.

Hammer gives Fei a few pats on the shoulder.

He does glance over to Elly periodically but doesn't seem to grok what's up. Instead he says, "I hope she doesn't feed them after midnight..." to himself before he nods to Argus. "Let's meander on down then. Casual like."

<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.

    FIVE MINUTES AFTER FEI LEAVES

    "Dva? Why is there a chimaera on your face?" Cetiri asks.

    "Ifff liffes my faffee," Dva complains.

<Pose Tracker> Leon Albus has posed.

Argus, really, doesn't worry about anything.

He looks over the assembled Black Wolves, his head tilted. He isn't much of a fighter -- though, like most priests, he has a little training in Althenan magic. White magic is his specialty, and more than once, he has helped a hurt Wolf with a wound. He seems, as always, nonplussed as he looks between them all. "Mm-hm. Could get suspicious. But..."

He turns to Jude. Argus, as a former priest, reviews his speech critically. Then, he declares: "Checks out."

He leads the way down the stairs. As he does, he keeps his voice hushed. "So... there's one thing to mention," he says. "This area is supposed to be guarded--not by a guardsman, but an acolyte. So... I bribed them to make the acolyte late. But we only have about thirty minutes. The books will be--"

He leads the way down, winding on and on, down a spiral staircase. He comes to a stop, though, and points down a hallway -- where a wooden door is. "--through there."

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

There are many elements to this job that would seem to make it ill-suited for someone like Xantia. Stealth. Disguises. Any element of subterfuge, really. Not something she does a lot, certainly not by her own free will.

And yet, she strongly insisted on wanting to come along. While it may be folly to try and decipher Xantia's reasoning behind, well, anything she does, it may well be as simple as wanting to be helpful to her friends in whatever way she can. Because that's what the Black Wolves mainly are to her, a group of friends.

Of course, there's no way she could convincingly pull off an acolyte. She may have read quite a few books back in Filgaia, but she hasn't exactly filled her time reading up on Lunar-related matters while she was here. Asking her just about anything related to the faith of Althena would be enough to expose her. So she asked about what merchants commonly wear... and picked the most simple option available.

Xantia's entire disguise thus consists of a brown, roomy hooded travelling cloak, covering her completely. And yes, of course underneath that she is still just wearing what she always wears. Which actually includes another, smaller cloak, but that's neither here nor there. It's... more of a disguise than you'd get her to commonly wear, at least?

She is, as always, completely optimistic about the plan. "Sounds pretty simple! I'm sure we'll find what we need really quickly! Or we won't, and then I'll beat up the guards! No problem!"

No downsides either way, as far as she's concerned. Let's be real, she's going to be the most helpful with all this if a fight does break out. Who knows if she's even understood most of the actual plan.

<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.

    Riesenlied softly nods to Noeline, stepping closer to her as she places her hand to her chest. "It does not seem to be the most advertised of places. Amelia did not mention this place either..." she hums very quietly as she looks to the others, bashfully smiling at Elly and--

    --thinking about what Lydia said earlier. She wants to have a talk with her sometime soon...

    "Mister Leon," Riesenlied expresses, "Is there anything about her writing that we are looking for? I worry that written texts can be dismissed, if we were to submit it as proof..."

    She tilts her head. "That, and if it were truly heretical writing, would it not have been burnt by now?"

    She nods and follows Josephine and Xantia when she urges them to head along, listening to Jude's words for a moment. She has to admire how much of a character he can play... even if his words betray him for a moment.

    She also giggles a little at Fei and Hammer. "You're a natural merchant, Mister Fei," she expresses. "May the Goddess Althena bless you with the tradewinds at your crossings, and your coffers be ever ample." She even waves the staff gently as if to give her blessing.

    ... Riesenlied is unnervingly good at playing this part ...

[OOC] Riesenlied says, "*blu-ray Mister Argus"
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.

"I thought that was permitted," Elly says to Jude. "Or was that changed? Still, I suppose you shouldn't light a match around all these books."

Either way they are Guided. The door is opened. They are told about a time limit and Elly reaches into her robe to draw out... something. It looks like a little piece of glass. She adjusts something on it and then puts it back under her robe, explaining, "It will silently warn me when we have only three minutes left."

At the question of heretical writing, Elly speculates, a bit distantly, "They might have saved copies for the sake of comparison."

<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.

    Tilting her head, Noeline nods towards Elly's suggestion. "Quite. Even here, large collections of books simply do not seem to stand the test of time. Either swallowed by Malevolence, or simply left to ruin. It's a terrible shame," she grumbles with what appears to be completely genuine feeling, a hand on her hip as they descend the spiral staircase downwards. "And do not get me wrong - Vane's is terribly nice," she adds towards Josephine. "But as you mention, I have had quite enough of magics that I'm probably never going to get the hang of."

    She's quick to start heading forwards, eager to see what's below. "Understood," she adds to Argus, with a pleased smile. "We will do what we can. Ideally, I would like to peruse it here, then leave it behind - assuming we have time, of course. I can't say I would feel particularly pleasant about outright stealing from a library - much less fuss that way, after all." Their guide stops at a particularly nondescript door - and Noeline can't help but let out an amused breath in Riesenlied's direction.

    "My experience might be based around fiction more than fact, I suppose, but it does always seem like 'inconvenient religious truths' tend to be buried rather than outright destroyed. I suppose you could describe it as moths, unwilling to put out the flame that enthralls them."

    ... someone might be feeling themselves a bit much today, if that snatch of poetry is anything to go off.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei laughs a little at Riesenlied's words, managing a smile at her. "Heh, well... let me see... You insult me, ma'am! If I sell these oranges for that much my family will starve!" He gestures to the side as if to say 'tada!' afterwards.

He does seem to appreciate Jude's tomfoolery, grinning even wider at him. "Althena doesn't say anything about smoking, I don't think. Good to see you again, Jude." Jude's tendency to make light of situations certainly CERTAINLY has been missed.

"Thirty minutes...not much time to search through a library...but hopefully we'll find what we're looking for."

He is a little worried about Xantia who is about as subtle as a sledgehammer most of the time, but she hasn't really SPOILED any schemes so far so he imagines she'll manage what she needs to. She glances briefly to Noeline and adds, "If we run into trouble can you do anything with uh 'illusions' to help us out?"

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    Josie just nods at Noeline's commentary. "True, true. It's nice enough... if you're into magical research." She makes a face. "But I'll pass. I've had enough theory to last me a lifetime already. Now, give me a good history or technical manual... eh?"

    Josie actually stops as Jude passes by, looking him over with a pale arched eyebrow. "Huh," she utters, a strangely thoughtful expression on her face.
    Which is followed by, "I almost never would've guessed you'd pull it off, you know. Not bad."

    A glance follows across the rest of the gathered crew, the look on her own face betraying by turns her own personal assessment-making she's undertaking, before she finally nods at Argus' warning on the time alloted to them.

    "Noted. Ah, well, I guess we'll have to wait for library day for our own research topics, won't we?" Once again, she shrugs, palms to the heavens.

    "So, any hints? Or should we start at F for Forton and hope they didn't censor anything?"

<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.

Off somewhere in the distance, a bird flies, a distant dot in the sky as it circles around to the first opened window it can find within the building to comfortably scoot its way into.

Jacob would stand out a little otherwise, after all.

"You're not going to damn someone with effective power over a whole country through a few written words," Jude Moshe comfortably agrees when Riesenlied makes known her concern. "Whatever we find here is a building block. Or maybe a couple more inches of rope. The way these things go down, you either spend years building the rope to hang someone with and risk it all being for nothing..." And, reverently does the would-be acolyte slip his way in, his bearing never betraying him as he reaches those stairs.

"... or you take the shorter, bloodier route to the guillotine instead."

Never betrays him, except for the mild, ambivalent shrug that comes within the privacy of that stairwell as they wind their way down.

"Used to be kind of a traveling priest in my younger years," he asides to Argus and Josephine at their mutual assessments. "Didn't really take, so I decided to go for a more respectable profession."

Says the journalist-slash-sellsword.

But as Argus points the way, Jude makes his way past him, once more effortlessly falling into character to take point in advancing on that door and prying it open with the groan of hinges and peel of wood to hold it open for the rest of his congregation.

"Sister, brother," begins Brother Jude as Elly and Fei passes by, solemnly, "minor sins acceptable to the common man are to be avoided by a man of the cloth. Please don't tempt this reverent soul with gateways to vice."

And a small, easy smile touches his lips.

"Good to see you too, kid. Hope you've been touching up on your speed reading."

And with that, he slips his way comfortably inside those hallowed halls of knowledge to see what's inside.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Fear not Fei, Xantia hasn't actually brought her sledgehammer, as she would definitely assure you had you said that thought out loud. Now all subtlety bases are sure to be covered.

Xantia smiles brightly as Riesenlied gives the 'merchants' her 'blessing'. "Right! That... sure sounds like a good thing, doesn't it Fei?" She gives Fei a confused look and shrugs. No idea what any of that meant. But she acted like she did! See, she can do this pretending thing! She's... not really doing anything particularly merchant-y herself, but let's not sweat the small stuff.

Noeline expresses concerns about stealing from a library, but Xantia is here to alleviate those. "Don't worry, you're supposed to take books from libraries, they won't mind!" Always happy to share her vast knowledge of how the world works!

As the group proceeds, she increases pace a little so she can sidle up to Jude, elbowing him in the side to get his attention. Lowering her voice a little, she informs him, "Speaking of reading, I did some and found out beansprouts spoil really quickly. So what are you trying to say calling me that, huh?"

No, we are still not past this very important issue of nicknames that are bad and inaccurate.

<Pose Tracker> Leon Albus has posed.

"I don't know if we should beat up guards," Argus says, "but if that's what it comes down to... well, you do you." He nods, placidly, before he puts his finger to his chin and looks up at the ceiling. "I've been giving that a lot of thought, Miss Riesenlied. I think... if you can find the biography the Church wrote, then if she did something wrong before, it will be documented. And maybe Miss Elly is right, and they kept the evidence."

Then, he glances sideways, at Josephine. He tilts his head for a moment. "Actually, you probably want to go with I, for internal review."

This may or may not be a joke.

He looks at Jude, and his nose wrinkles for a moment at his back. Then, he nods. "I can see it."

Jude opens the door. The first surprise may be the way that lantern light spills out from the room, which should have been dark -- three lanterns, in fact, all of which glow. The scene revealed is not quiet stacks, but shelves that have had books thrown off haphazardly by six individuals inside, wearing leather and chain armor, with their own acolyte robes thrown to the side. One big, burly man looks at them with wide eyes -- holding a sack full of books. "Uh, boss," he says. "I think we have company."

A woman with black hair and red eyes turns her head and looks at the Wolves, as they enter. "...well, shit."

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

Talia tilts her head, a purely innocent smile on her face, as she holds her hands up into a full-armed shrug. "I guess two people had the same idea, huh?" she says. "I'm sure that we can talk this out, and reach an understanding, and--" She turns, slightly. She has a short sword in one hand; the weapon is a slightly curved, single-edged blade with a mottled blue and black steel. Her eyes meet Fei's.

"--oh, I remember you," she says. "Well... I am sorry about this."

It seems that was a cue, because one of the brutes behind her whips up one of the rifles that found its way to Hyland's army -- and fires. The gunshot cracks, and the bullet flies into the doorframe. It splinters the wood near Jude's head, and then flies right past Argus's cheek. The former priest yelps, then leaps to the side.

His head snaps to look at Hammer. "I don't think they're going to check those out." He pauses. "I guess we weren't either."

<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.

    "That makes a lot of sense..." Riesenlied expresses to Jude's comment. Gathering evidence to mount a small mountain of them for trial... there are societies in which she's seen that practice play out.

    And if one or two pieces of fabricated evidence play out, then--

    --but her train of thought is momentarily disrupted when she faces Talia, eyes widening. "Miss Talia?" she asks, remembering her from when she met her in Meribia. "Wait--"

    She yelps not-terribly-quietly and clings onto her staff when one of the brutes fires his rifle, exclaiming, "Mister A-Argus!" she stares back with an upset expression on her face. "Do not fire your ARMs in an enclosed space! You risk harming yourselves just as much!"

    Still, it doesn't feel like they're going to listen, so she holds her hand onto the Dragon's Tear -- which has been hidden in the Althenan cross -- and begins to generate a powerful weave of magics. Her priority is to protect the Black Wolves.

DC: Noeline switches forms to The Fereshte Chevalier!
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.

    "That-- is an excellent question," Noeline remarks back to Fei with something of a huff of air, flicking out her hair as she does so. "To be honest, I am not sure yet how well I can harness this power. Or rather, harness it without giving myself a severe migraine at the same time," she grumbles. Even for a Metal Demon, even with the Guardian's approval, there's still teething problems when it comes to pushing sorcery through a frame that isn't completely made for it, after all, but the grin on her face suggests she'll probably be fine.

    She looks glumly towards Xantia - but it's the sort of glum look that has a light of amusement behind it, more to play a part than actually look downbeat. "You are supposed to have a library card," she declares archly, and with a playful grump in her tone. "You do not want to get on the wrong side of magical libraries, you know. The Guardian of Book Returns is a fearsome sight indeed."

    She's quick to move forwards in turn, just behind Jude as the 'priest' works on the door; suddenly her entire posture is a little more tense, a little more ready to explode into action. She doesn't have a weapon visibly on her, but the advantage of being a metal demon is that she doesn't need to--

    --and her reflexes are fast enough to jerk her hand upwards as she pushes herself forward a step, a wide and enormous two-handed blade shimmering into existence just in time to deflect away the next bullet and cover Argus - not to mention more or less everyone else in the doorway, given its size and the way she darts forwards into the attack rather than away from it.

    "--are you quite daft?! The first thing you do is alert absolutely everyone to the fact we're all down here?" she hisses, taking a cue from Riesenlied's recognition of their enemy as she sets her feet, blocking what - as far as she knows - is the only exit. "You realize how that will look, don't you?!"

GS: Noeline has attacked Riesenlied with When I'm With You...!
GS: Noeline has completed her action.
GS: Riesenlied takes a solid hit from Noeline's When I'm With You... for 0 hit points!
GS: Reload! Riesenlied gains 15 extra FP from Noeline!
GS: Riesenlied has attacked Noeline with ...I am not Afraid...!
GS: Riesenlied has entered a Reflect stance!
GS: Riesenlied has completed her action.
GS: Riesenlied heals Noeline! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Reload! Noeline gains 15 extra FP from Riesenlied!
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei does admire Jude's way with words, and if nothing else, the edge to his vision. Maybe Fei was a journalist in a past life. It does seem like the sort of life that, on Filgaia, would lead to an end with a large number of avoidable corpses. He says, "Cutting to the quick gets results." quietly. "Sometimes more results than what you're hoping for."

Speaking of solving difficult problems quickly, as well as sledgehammers, suddenly there is a Talia. Fei glances over to Xantia. He DOES remember Talia, because he remembers Talia can teleport which is pretty fascinating generally speaking.

Hammer has the Spoony Bard Cross Class skill HIDE which he promptly does as he says, "That's an ARM! Not just gunsmoke!" Hammer shouts. "If you guys stop shooting maybe we can get you more??" He looks over to Argus. "Since...we're not here to stop what they're doing anyway??"

Fei Fong Wong asked an excellent question but gets a kind of worrisome answer. He doesn't have time to comment on it because of violence.

"Appreciate the apology," Fei says, looking as chill as an iceberg and as collected as....a library card? Either way, he adds, "I'll probably have nightmares about this."

And with that he runs forward and tries to kick the brute with the gun in the chin so hard that he flies into the ceiling. This may be telling about what kind of nightmares he expects to have.

"Are we even sure we're on different sides here?" Fei asks rhetorically. "Or is violence so much easier ew figured we'd start with that?"

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    "Internal review, huh..." Josie seems to rattle that one around mentally for a moment, then smiles a little sardonically. "If only. Maybe there'll be something under their historical reports, though Guardians know where they'd file that under. ...Well, let's stop dithering around, shall we? Let's find the index and see what they've got in here. Time's a-wasting!"

    The door opens.

    Josie has one moment to assess the scene unfolding inside, her eyes shifting from person to person within, to the books scattered across the floor, then back up--

    As one of the goons draws an ARM and fires.

    "Time to move!" she shouts, ducking low as she charges in through the door and moves to spread out. Electricity already spools down her left arm as she runs, gathering in the palm of her hand; one final syllable is all that's needed to complete the circuit, and overhand, she hurls that lance of lightning at the ARM-wielding man in the group.

    "--Shut 'em down and lock this up fast! We're gonna have additional visitors up our ass soon!"

GS: Fei Fong Wong has attacked Talia with Hagan!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has completed his action.
GS: Josephine Lovelace has attacked Talia with Bolt Lance!
GS: Josephine Lovelace has completed her action.
DC: MISS! Talia completely evades Hagan from Fei Fong Wong!
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Josephine Lovelace's Bolt Lance for 46 hit points!
GS: Disrupt! Statuses applied to Talia!
<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.

So what are you trying to say calling me that, huh?

Jude Moshe's response is a comforting pat on the shoulder just before he slips within the library.

"Don't worry, beansprout," he assures. "You'll understand when you're older. If, y'know..."

There's light. There shouldn't be light. And there are sounds. There shouldn't be sounds.

And there are people.

"... you make it that far."

There shouldn't be people.

"Huh."

For a second, Jude Moshe tilts his head, as if quietly assessing the situation. Packing books. A lot of books. Possibly books they need. Which means...

"Excuse me, but I don't believe you're a member of the congregation. I'm going to have to ask you to relinquish those books before I'm forced to call security."

... someone did a solid chunk of their work for them, if they play their cards right.

Amber eyes center on the red stare of the woman who seems to be in charge. Jude's smile is, of course, a sad one, as all smiles have to be when they're facing a sinner currently in the act of sinning. "I beg you, relinquish those books and surrender yourself to Althena's merc--"

Except she recognizes Fei.

Except a second later, one of those hired goons is firing off a shot with a rifle -- with a rifle -- that whizzes just past the would-be priest's skull and shatters wood behind him.

"--y. ... huh." He lifts a hand, touches it to the dark red of his hair, now a few strands short... and squeezes his eyes shut in the midst of an exasperated sigh.

"Well, it was worth a shot."

Within the next second, acolyte's robes go fanning outward in a fluid motion o rippling cloth; beneath that voluminous fabric, Jude grips his weapon and -swings- it upward. Not his shotgun -- but something that looks almost vaguely like a crossbow if heavily modified, symbols carved into wood and iron beginning to glow a pale pinkish-red as he diverts the sights of the weapon and points it --

--towards Elhaym.

"Something tells me they're more in the 'no witnesses' business rather than the 'peaceful negotiations over tea' business," he asides, squeezing the trigger of his weapon -- and firing off a bolt of pure energy, one to strike Elly and infuse her with a sudden surge of energy and strength.

"We need to make this quick. -No smashing, no burning-."

He feels dirty, being responsible. Where's Leon when you need him?

GS: Jude Moshe has attacked Elhaym van Houten with Canned Heat Blues!
GS: Jude Moshe has completed his action.
GS: Elhaym van Houten takes a solid hit from Jude Moshe's Canned Heat Blues for 0 hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Elhaym van Houten!
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

"We don't have a library card for this library?!" Xantia looks absolutely shocked at this new information from Noeline. How could they not have thought about this when they came up with the plan? This puts everything in jeopardy! "W-well, I'm sure we'll think of something!" Gotta look on the bright side, even so. They've managed to get out of stickier situations than this!

Jude's response doesn't do anything to make her feel better either, that 'when you're older' thing is starting to get pretty frustrating. But she doesn't get to formulate a retort before it becomes clear that they're not alone in here. She may not have understood the entire plan, but she's pretty sure it involved nobody else being here. Looks like they hit a snag earlier than expected.

Aaaand that was a bullet flying by. She briefly exchanges glances with Fei. She doesn't needs a verbal OK when it's come down to this. And she's not hearing a 'don't'. So it's obvious what will happen next.

"...okay, guess I don't need this anymore," Xantia states calmly, before immediately dashing towards the nearest thug-looking person while removing her cloak. She tosses the garment ahead of her as a distraction, then leaps in with a follow-up punch. No sense in wasting any time, she's in her element, now!

GS: Xantia has attacked Talia with Cloaked On The Head!
GS: Xantia has completed her action.
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Xantia's Cloaked On The Head for 51 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.

Elly laughs with her eyes if not her mouth at Jude's remark, and the topic of how to search a library... floats through her mind. It's troubling. She frowns. She thinks: Surely they can just enter search terms.

Slowly, with dawning horror, she realizes that they're going to have to SEARCH THE STACKS. Like CAVEMEN. Noeline at least seems comfortable with it. Maybe I can just follow their lead. But am I really worthy of that? she thinks as she steps forwards, almost bumping into Fei as she goes.

She looks to Xantia, as she says something about beansprouts. Elly has to rewind the conversation to try and get the reference, but that's Josie, isn't it? That's the sort of thing Josie calls people. Like how she calls me R-

                BANG!!

Elly jumps practically out of her skin.

Shocked back to awareness, Elly looks dead ahead at Talia and her supporting people. One of them has a firearm. That's a surprise, but past that, she thinks -- no, she realizes with dawning dismay. I can't just...

She knows Fei? Why is she apologizing to him? No, Elly tells herself. I can't worry about that. She takes a deep breath and lets it out. "This is a limiting situation," she breathes even as Jude speaks with authority. "Right," she begins to say, and then

WHOM

In comes that singing burst of power and energy. What the heck is this!? Elly can't tell. It's almost like a dilute dose of -- of THAT -- but it's like the near occasion, 'that drug' being more her best analogy, her only point of reference. The difference between a damn fine cup of coffee and government-issued amphetamines.

Elly's foot shifts on the ground. The air suddenly gets dryer - like all the water just went to the floor.

THEN! It erupts in spikes of ice, rippling from Elly's foot towards, first, Talia, but that's a feint - the real force is an effort to enwrap and perhaps de-gun the gentleman with the iron. She does not speak further to Talia; maybe she figures it's irrelevant. Jude gets a thankful glance even so.

GS: Elhaym van Houten has attacked Talia with Aqua Ice!
GS: Elhaym van Houten has completed her action.
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Elhaym van Houten's Aqua Ice for 73 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Things are happening very, very quickly. As shots are fired, the ensuing chaos quite easily drowns out the descent from the stairs of another cloaked figure. Her hood is up, and her footfalls suggest soft boots. She steps down, and then closer, making her way quickly behind the group--

One hand rises, fingers extended in a loose grasp, and there's a flash of violet--before one of the men is afflicted by shadows that seek to throw conflicting forces at him in a very painful grip. ...If he's especially unlucky his hand might start disintegrating. The spell is almost entirely silent--save for her target's reactions.

Lily Keil's hood falls back and she is a mess, with a split lip and a black eye, and her gaze is lighter than it should be for how she looks.

"Looks like I got here on time," she comments as she moves up with the others.

GS: Lily Keil has attacked Talia with Gloompulse!
GS: Lily Keil has completed her action.
[OOC] Lily Keil says, "oh let me adjust, bluray*"
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

"Hey, shut up and don't call me daft! I'm one of the Azado Thuggers, and we do whatever we want!" the big, brutish fellow with the rifle shouts. "And--"

"She has a point," Talia interrupts, with a shrug. "Let's make it quick." She looks back at Riesenlied, then shrugs -- with a smile on her lips, but it might as well mean nothing. "It's nothing personal, but I don't think you'll agree to our terms."

The same thug turns his gunsmoke ARM, spinning it away from the fleeing Argus to draw a bead on Noeline. He fires; his aim may be more true, this time, as a round goes screeching towards the faux Crimson Noble. Then, Fei comes rushing in towards him -- which is when another of the brutes calls out, hands held aloft. "Levin's grace, swirl to my fingers! Steady! LIGHTNING BOLT!"

Before Fei closes in, a bolt of lightning crashes down from the ceiling. It smashes down at him -- stopping his charge -- but then lightning whips by, shooting down Josie's arm. It connects with the gun-wielding man, and sends him flying backward. Not a moment later, the ice smashes into him; Elly's ice pins him, briefly, against the far wall. Talia sighs. "I think... I'll have to do this myself." She extends a hand outward. "Blah, blah, something of the swamps, mist and spooky stuff, Althena something something, bored now, Dire Mist!"

A thick, cloying, and icy mist explodes from her fingers. It shoots out towards Josie -- a thick one, that burns from the cold when she breathes it, and it billows out towards Riesenlied and Jude, too. She looks at Jude, before she shrugs. "I'm afraid not," she says. "My employer needs these. I'll see about sending a request later."

Xantia, not a moment later, clocks a thug in the head -- he drops the oversized lance that he was carrying, and falls like a sack of potatoes. Talia frowns, before she turns. She throws her short sword. The weapon goes flying -- and strikes at Xantia. The moment it does, the mercenary vanishes into a burst of shadowy strands. A dozen of them wind together, to reappear at the weapon -- and she is already in motion. Her foot reforms, and comes crashing down for Xantia's face.

A flash of light erupts off it. "Nice trick!" she calls out, a moment before her boot threatens to connect. "Demonic Swallow Kick!"

Another of the goons rushes ahead, charging at their ranks. He leaps as he comes at Elly; he has brown hair, with a blue bandana around it, and a long sword. He leaps, and comes down, slashing his blade down for her as he lands. "Tiger Blade!" he calls, before he slashes it upward. Which is when, with a gasp of shock, he realizes that part of his hand is burning away with sickly violet energies. "What the--"

Talia and a couple of the thugs besides look up, at Lily Keil's entrance. Then, Talia looks at Jude. "One of yours or one of the Guard?"

Outside the smaller room, Argus looks at Hammer and shrugs. "Probably not. Unless they're here for the same thing we are?" He frowns slightly. "Should we ask? Maybe we should ask."

DC: MISS! Talia completely evades Gloompulse from Lily Keil!
GS: Talia has attacked Noeline with Disobedient Discharge!
GS: Talia has attacked Fei Fong Wong with Lightning Bolt!
GS: Talia has attacked Josephine Lovelace with Dire Mist!
GS: Talia has attacked Jude Moshe with Dire Mist!
GS: Talia has attacked Riesenlied with Dire Mist!
GS: Talia has attacked Xantia with Demonic Swallow Kick!
GS: Talia has attacked Elhaym van Houten with Tiger Blade!
GS: Talia has attacked Talia with Warp Point!
GS: Talia has completed her action.
GS: Talia takes a solid hit from Talia's Warp Point for 0 hit points!
GS: Quick! Statuses applied to Talia!
GS: Riposte! Statuses applied to Talia!
GS: Noeline takes a glancing hit from Talia's Disobedient Discharge for 61 hit points!
GS: Fei Fong Wong critically Guards a hit from Talia's Lightning Bolt for 17 hit points!
GS: Jude Moshe takes a glancing hit from Talia's Dire Mist for 25 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Jude Moshe!
GS: Elhaym van Houten takes a glancing hit from Talia's Tiger Blade for 50 hit points!
GS: Josephine Lovelace critically Guards a hit from Talia's Dire Mist for 9 hit points!
GS: Riesenlied guards a hit from Talia's Dire Mist for 28 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Riesenlied!
GS: CRITICAL! Xantia guards a hit from Talia's Demonic Swallow Kick for 39 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.

    Riesenlied can't say she's faced many Lunarian ruffians -- and such she's alarmed for a moment that one of them can call lightning from his fingertips before she realises:

    Oh right, all of them have Althena's blessing.

    "Miss Talia, wait--" as she tries to frantically move around to get herself to a measure of cover, using Noeline's blade-wall as a means to push herself to one side. Talia has the upper hand on her, though, and surrounds her in a mist so cold it causes her to cough as her lungs start to burn. "Ah...!"

    She stumbles towards one side in her coughing and comes face to face with the brute casting lightning just earlier, biting her lip as she holds her deformed Dragon hand out. "Everyone, give me a moment and I can shield us with light...!" She notices Lily coming in from the back -- a relief, given how sour everything's turned out.

    Her eyes shine for a moment as she whispers, touching into his mind with a wave of her own emotion--

    "Be calm -- we can sort this out. My companions are very lethal, and you do not want to draw their ire."

    Lily Keil: the ultimate negotiating chip...?

GS: Riesenlied has attacked Talia with Wave-Particle Communication!
GS: Riesenlied takes 7 damage from Toxin!
GS: Riesenlied has completed her action.
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Riesenlied's Wave-Particle Communication for 0 hit points!
GS: Weaken! Statuses applied to Talia!
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei Fong Wong backflips away just in time to avoid being clobbered by the lightning bolt, the blast coming down precisely where he was just a moment before and leaving thick scorch marks against the floor.

Meanwhile Hammer decides to listen to Argus's advice, "Are you here for the book?! We just want a book! Can we just steal what we both want?? Or everything?" He looks over to Argus for a moment and then exhales and tries to start edging past and towards the records to try and find what they're looking for because odds are, by the time this fight ends, it'll be too late to use library research skills. Hammer is sweating and looks terrified but he's still doing it which is probably a testament to how well folks have encouraged him so far during the last couple of acts.

Fei Fong Wong sees what Hammer is up to but doesn't signal towards it. This is partly because Jude is shooting Elly which even if he KNOWS is a good bullet still causes him to tense up--but luckily he doesn't completely flip out and start trying to eat Jude's face. He remembers in time. This time.

Fei says, "She stopped me from falling off a building once so can we leave it to pummeling for her?" This is probably to Lily. The rest of the goons, well, they didn't save Fei from falling to his doom so they can fend for themselves.

A chill fills Fei's body as he summons his chi and sends a wave of ice. This time he's sending it for Talia, knowing the mercenary might give Xantia a hard time with her trickery and porting about.

GS: Fei Fong Wong has attacked Talia with Suikei!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has completed his action.
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Fei Fong Wong's Suikei for 71 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.

I'm afraid not. My employer needs those.

"Guess we've all got our bills to pay."

One has an ARM. The other seems to be using magic, so probably whatever Althena's nonsense people use on the moon. The leader -- Jude isn't sure of everything she's capable of yet, which probably makes her the most dangerous of them.

And also probably makes her a priority.

They're thoughts that race all-too-calmly through Jude Moshe's mind as that thick, biting mist of frost and rime expands outward towards the Wolves. The redheaded journalist hardly hesitates, lunging towards the side. His robes frost, biting a burning cold into his calf as he hits the ground in a tumble; by the time he's righted himself, he's suppressing a grimace as he tosses those robes to his right, shedding them completely for a much-needed improvement in mobility. Chilled painfully (though his face hasn't been eaten, so -that's- a plus) as he takes aim.

Takes aim -- right on time for one Lily Keil to arrive. Dark red brows lift for a moment.

"I guess I should be flattered you're stealing my schtick," he notes, voice utterly wry.

"But I'm really just lamenting all the hours I could've slept in if you didn't."

But even as he speaks, efficient as he is, Jude is moving. One of yours? Or one of the Guard? Talia asks. And as Jude puts pressure on that trigger, he just smiles that lackadaisical smile of his.

"Honestly, you probably annoyed her even asking. I'd recommend apologizing, but it doesn't really seem your style--"

And fires.

"--and I really don't think it'd help, anyway."

Fires in a wide, sweeping motion towards Talia and her thugs, with one shot very specifically aimed -- to pierce through the hand of the thug carrying that sack --

--hopefully just in time for Jacob to swoop in and snatch it between metal talons.

Why do work when someone else can potentially do the work for you?

GS: Jude Moshe has attacked Talia with Dust My Broom!
GS: Jude Moshe takes 10 damage from Toxin!
GS: Jude Moshe has completed his action.
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Jude Moshe's Dust My Broom for 69 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.

A man, a plan, a bandana: L Panama!

That doesn't work.

Elly can see a man coming towards her with a blade and she leans backwards, her robes fluttering even as she sees Lily in surprised and sparkly clarity. Lily...!

Elly lands on the palm of one hand.

Now, in many situations this is a bad place to be. Elly is a mage, right? She doesn't have much in the way of physical strength. She's not small but she's not big either, and she's from a HabiTrail in the sky (or something).

What Elly does instead is push upwards, twist around, and spin both legs around like some sort of absurd recovery breakdancing move with one kick aimed at the underside of Mr. Sword's armpit and the other twisting round to try and sink her foot in to the instep in his solar plexus. After this Elly finishes with her momentum, aiming to kip back upright in a rustle of skirts. It's called "recoupin."

"You don't seem like a very devoted person," Elly tells Talia, slightly breathless.

GS: Elhaym van Houten has attacked Talia with Cyclone Kick!
GS: Elhaym van Houten has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.

    "Miss Lily-- really, you look like hell," Noeline rather bluntly points out with a sigh in her voice, a weary kind of tone that suggests the Crimson Noble is very used to this fact; she doesn't quite roll her eyes, at least, and it is paired with an amused smile at the same time.

    There isn't much time to dwell on things further than that, though - her gaze whips back towards the thugs as they begin to fan out, and she takes a moment to ensure that the group truly is blocking the only exit. The idea of a bunch of merchants and acolytes preventing a theft from the library is an enticing one - and even if they might have to spin things to try to explain why they're down here, they could always just say they were following a suspicious group of figures.

    You know, despite being one themselves.

    A couple of shots wing past her from one of the thugs, one of the bullets clipping her side before she can manage to get the sword into its path; she winces for a moment, but more at the sheer inconvenience of it than the pain itself, a soft hiss under her breath as she twists out of the path of the next shot. "This is hardly the way to act inside a library."

    The way the thugs are spread out makes it difficult to maneuver; Noeline isn't yet willing to move from her braced position in front of both Riesenlied and the corridor outside. Fortunately, Talia isn't the only one with friends, and a sweep of Noeline's hand in front of her causes a brief cacophony of beeps, as her two ARM pods suddenly burst out of where they've been hiding in her pack.

    They each perform a brief twirl in the air, which would be comical were it not for the way that Strife's laser emitter is beginning to charge - and then the little bot is strafing the entire group with small fire, seeking more to restrict their movements than actually bite home.

GS: Noeline has attacked Talia with Strife!!
GS: Noeline has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Xantia fistpumps after knocking out the man she charged, leaving her cloak draped over him like a blanket. She should have said 'good night, I'll tuck you in' before doing that, it would've been so witty! That's a part of her hero training she really needs to work on.

Moments later, Lily bursts onto the scene, and Xantia can't help but stare at that display of Ether and think, 'not sure if I want to learn to do THAT'. But even so, no less committed to having Lily teach her. She does want to learn how to use this power better, after all.

There isn't a great deal of time to pause and think, as she catching something flying at her out of the corner of her eye. Reflexively, she turns towards it and raises her bracer-bearing arm to try and intercept this... sword? That's weird, swords are generally not for throwing. And it gets even weirder as the sword suddenly has a person attached to it. Even though she still manages to block the kick, it was a bit more than she was expecting to block, causing her to be pushed back, stumble and fall over a scattered pile of books. Nice trick, indeed... Talia must have been talking about her own trick, it was pretty nice, even Xantia would admit.

Fei's ice wave gives her the time she needs to get back to her feet, although she does complain, "Hey, watch it with the cold stuff!" There was probably a reason for her apparently not liking that, but this is hardly the time to go into it. Now it's time for her to take action. "You want to see a really nice trick?"

Xantia slams her right fist into the opposite palm, and electricity bursts forth from her body, crackling and circling around like some kind of protective aura. It's actually less protective and more offensive, as the series of punches she proceeds to launch at Talia now have an electric charge to them, making their impacts even less pleasant than they would have already been otherwise. A straightforward attack other than the lightning involved, accompanied by a straightforward statement: "I don't know who you are, but I need you to go away!"

GS: Xantia has attacked Talia with Elemental Fury!
GS: Xantia has completed her action.
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Elhaym van Houten's Cyclone Kick for 60 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    "No smashing, no burning. Well, you take the fun out of everything, don't you, Jude," Josie comments from her current hidey-hole behind a study desk she's commandeered for this purpose. Before she considers current company in part, and then calls out: "But no, seriously, no fire -- this place will go up like a powderkeg!"

    And they definitely won't get the book(s) they're looking for!

    But that also means, tragically, no ARMs. Or at least, probably not. Not until she's sure she can make a hole-in-one, so to speak.
    Which is looking a little dodgy at present, particularly when that red-eyed woman up in front evokes a sort of icy fog.
    That's a familiar trick.

    Josie drops down behind her current cover of choice, covering mouth and nose with her hands and squeezing her eyes tight. If she's angled herself right, it should blow on past and leave her unscathed...

    Just, whatever she does, she doesn't want to breathe it in. Face pressed into the floor, she rummages in a pocket; she can feel the chill passing right over her, glazing her coat in frost.

    Then she rises, booting the half flash-frozen table aside, thick cloth pressed over her mouth and nose as she surges for the first dark shape she can see through the heavy mist.

    And clears the haze--

    And reaches for her thigh under her traveler's coat. Metal glints for a moment in the lamplight, before she redirects her hand and attempts to introduce the thug to her knife.

    "Same boat, huh?" she comments to Talia, whether that knife strikes home or not; her attentions are redirected towards one of the book piles as she attempts champion-level speed-reading of the volume titles. "Or I suppose a similar but rather distinct boat. Well, in either case, we just can't let you have 'em!"

    Which might be when Lily enters the stage. "Tiger! Just the girl we needed. Hey, do me a favor and try not to burn the library down?"
    A beat.
    "It's a little important! Hey, Argus! Got any idea what what color it might be? Could save us some time!"

GS: Josephine Lovelace has attacked Talia with Surprise Knife!
GS: Josephine Lovelace has completed her action.
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Josephine Lovelace's Surprise Knife for 17 hit points!
GS: Break! Statuses applied to Talia!
GS: Talia takes a solid hit from Noeline's Strife! for 154 hit points!
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Xantia's Elemental Fury for 62 hit points!
GS: Mighty! Statuses applied to Xantia!
<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Lily sets eye particularly on the brutish mage and then on the particularly notable mercenary--who teleports an instant later, which prompts Lily's jaw to set for an instant. The questions hurled back and forth quickly lend sense to the situation at hand, and the request--

Lily glances Fei's way and nods once, before offering a languid shrug to the others. "He's right. That does annoy me." 'Stealing his schtick', is it? "You're a bad influence," she suggests.

Noeline's eyeroll matches Lily approching closer, her right arm down at her side out of the way. "That's a long story," Lily answers her, looking through the haze of mist. "One I'll have to tell you after I don't burn the place down, apparently."

"Magic, is it? how it's done."

The dark-haired mercenary gathers up the Ether around her and extends one finger towards the man, and the air chills; icicles burst into existence in great size and speed, flashing towards him and seeking to pin him to the floor.

GS: Lily Keil has attacked Talia with Mistflash!
GS: Lily Keil has completed her action.
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Lily Keil's Mistflash for 128 hit points!
GS: Riposte! Statuses applied to Lily Keil!
[OOC] Lily Keil says, "bluray* 'Let me show you how it's done'"
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

The man who cast lightning stumbles back, a hand going to his temple. He feels Riesenlied's voice more than hears it. His eyes widen, as he looks up, and meets her eyes. "What--what are you--how are you doing that!" he calls out.

He shakes his head, then he points his hand at her. Flame, this time, crackles and dances across his fingers. Then, a bolt of fire goes screeching across the battlefield -- as it does, a couple sheets of paper ignite. The brute with the sword stomps one out. "Idiot!" he yells. "Don't shoot fire balls inside a library!"

The thug in front of Elly is kicked into, hard; he stumbles backward, the two kicks making him fall backward. He yelps, and then he lifts up his sword, swinging it straight up in an arc -- twice. "Double Demon Fang!" he cries--

--and two fangs of light explode, shooting across the ground for her.

Talia calls out afterward: "It's rude to speculate on a new friend's devotion to the divine and so-on and so-forth!"

The same man, a moment later, is hit by Strife's lasers. They slash and sweep across the room; the mage who shot a firebolt, the one who wielded an ARM, and the thug with the sword are forced backward. The last one has a burnt singe on his arm, too. The mage who shot the fireball, however, screams as Josie rips from the mist, and slams her knife into his midsection.

"Grrk!"

He stumbles back, bleeding heavily. Argus calls out: "Uhm--red binding, with black--should have golden print! It should say... Investigations Ledger, No. XVII?"

"Of course we're here for the book!" Talia yells back at Hammer. "Look, if you're willing to just forget you heard about this place, let us leave with the book, and--uh--maybe let the Guard capture you so it's not inconvenient for us, that would be great, no?"

She pauses. "You're not going to do that, are you?"

Argus actually stops to think about this offer for a moment.

Talia, however, is hit by a bolt of chi before she can further elucidate that offer. She spins, turning to face Fei for a moment. She tilts her head, and then she throws her sword again. Mirage flies free from her hand -- this time, it slams into the wall near him, skewering through a bookshelf and splitting a treatise on deworming apples according to Althena's guidance down the middle.

She slashes her parrying dagger at him, with two quick strikes. "That's sweet of you, but... I'm not nice enough to be worth it!"

Her nose wrinkles at Jude. She frowns, as she ducks -- his shot goes wide, slamming into the shell and blowing out pages from a volume on the proper growth of said apples. She is about to call out -- when she sees the bullet catch her thug in the chest.

"Shit!" she shouts.

She gets ready to move -- but Jacob swoops in. The mechanical bird grabs the bag, which proves heavy enough that the bird's flight dips for a moment, before he can regain that lost altitude. Talia looks ready to move, but then Xantia is is back on her. Her electric charged fist catches her, even as she ducks the follow-up -- but it slams her backward, into the bookshelf. It teeters.

Icicles form, a moment later. Talia hears the scream as they impale the man fighting Elly. He has a leg pinned to the floor, and blood runs out along it. Talia hisses, softly, and then throws a hand out towards her. She murmurs a soft incantation -- and then ice surges up, around Lily's feet; it cuts at her armor, but it also tries to bind her to the floor.

Then, she spins -- and sends out more of that biting, icy mist towards Xantia and Noeline. Ice shards cling to the air, and bite with winter's harshest chill when someone breathes in. Talia, however, runs straight for Jude. She leaps -- and comes down spinning, Mirage cutting down for the reporter-turned-wayward priest.

"LIGHT SPEAR CANNON!"

And it ends with a massive thrust, blade trying to impale him through the midsection. "I'm going to have a word with that bird!"

GS: Talia has attacked Riesenlied with Fireball!
GS: Talia has attacked Fei Fong Wong with Point-Warp Slash!
GS: Talia has attacked Elhaym van Houten with Double Demon Fang!
GS: Talia has attacked Lily Keil with Death's Grasp!
GS: Talia has attacked Noeline with Dire Mist!
GS: Talia has attacked Xantia with Dire Mist!
GS: Talia has attacked Jude Moshe with Light Spear Cannon!
GS: Talia has completed her action.
GS: Noeline takes a solid hit from Talia's Dire Mist for 58 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Noeline!
GS: Riesenlied guards a hit from Talia's Fireball for 51 hit points!
GS: Riesenlied enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: Jude Moshe critically Guards a hit from Talia's Light Spear Cannon for 34 hit points!
GS: Xantia takes a solid hit from Talia's Dire Mist for 51 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Xantia!
GS: CRITICAL! Lily Keil takes a solid hit from Talia's Death's Grasp for 71 hit points!
GS: Shieldbreak! Statuses applied to Lily Keil!
GS: Elhaym van Houten guards a hit from Talia's Double Demon Fang for 52 hit points!
GS: Fei Fong Wong takes a solid hit from Talia's Point-Warp Slash for 82 hit points!
GS: Riposte! Statuses applied to Talia!
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.

    Riesenlied's eyes widen as her attempts to dissuade the thug end abruptly with a wreath of flame coming her way--

    "D-don't use fire in here--!" is about as far as she goes before she flails and yelps, writhing as she collapses to one side to try to hide and put herself out. She can't last long in a direct fight, whether magical or physical. From the cold to the flame...

    She shakily breathes as she holds onto her staff as support, feeling the wellspring of power coalescing into a cogent emanation-- one that might be painful for herself, but beneficial for her allies.

    She sweeps the area with her eyes and scans where the battle's at; Fei's blasting ice and Xantia's battling Talia directly with her martial arts... enhanced with electricity! She's impressed at how they've both been able to channel their ki into an elemental effect. Josie's struggling under the same effects she has been, but retaliates with a blade of her own. Jude's taking the wide approach with his arms and sending his mechanical bird forth! To her surprise, Elly's also employing a martial approach, and Strife and Trouble has joined the fray as well...

    These thugs are individually powerful enough to give them trouble if left untouched -- especially with the way they all have Althena's blessing.

    "It's easy for us to be flanked with all these bookshelves... and they have the ability to teleport, then...!"

    She holds the Dragon's Tear with both hands as she closes her eyes-- and her conscience spills out in a wide swath of light. Each of the Black Wolves sees in their minds' eye what appears to be a top-down map of the library, with the thugs' position and facing as she sees them towards everyone else.

    "Everybody, I'm relaying the enemies' position to you. Be watchful of their own flanking attempts!"

    ... of course, she's now a giant beacon of light who's not really moving given her prayer position...

GS: Riesenlied has attacked Elhaym van Houten with Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World!
GS: Riesenlied has attacked Fei Fong Wong with Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World!
GS: Riesenlied has attacked Josephine Lovelace with Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World!
GS: Riesenlied has attacked Jude Moshe with Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World!
GS: Riesenlied has attacked Lily Keil with Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World!
GS: Riesenlied has attacked Noeline with Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World!
GS: Riesenlied has attacked Xantia with Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World!
GS: Riesenlied has completed her action.
GS: Elhaym van Houten takes a solid hit from Riesenlied's Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World for 0 hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Elhaym van Houten!
GS: Reload! Elhaym van Houten gains 15 extra FP from Riesenlied!
GS: Elhaym van Houten gains a Combo from Inspire!
GS: Jude Moshe takes a solid hit from Riesenlied's Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World for 0 hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Jude Moshe!
GS: Reload! Jude Moshe gains 15 extra FP from Riesenlied!
GS: Jude Moshe gains a Combo from Inspire!
GS: Noeline takes a solid hit from Riesenlied's Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World for 0 hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Noeline!
GS: Reload! Noeline gains 15 extra FP from Riesenlied!
GS: Noeline gains a Combo from Inspire!
GS: Fei Fong Wong takes a solid hit from Riesenlied's Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World for 0 hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Fei Fong Wong!
GS: Reload! Fei Fong Wong gains 15 extra FP from Riesenlied!
GS: Fei Fong Wong gains a Combo from Inspire!
GS: Josephine Lovelace takes a solid hit from Riesenlied's Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World for 0 hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Josephine Lovelace!
GS: Reload! Josephine Lovelace gains 15 extra FP from Riesenlied!
GS: Josephine Lovelace gains a Combo from Inspire!
GS: Lily Keil takes a solid hit from Riesenlied's Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World for 0 hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Lily Keil!
GS: Reload! Lily Keil gains 15 extra FP from Riesenlied!
GS: Lily Keil gains a Combo from Inspire!
GS: Xantia takes a solid hit from Riesenlied's Empathic Prayer - Seek the New World for 0 hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Xantia!
GS: Reload! Xantia gains 15 extra FP from Riesenlied!
GS: Xantia gains a Combo from Inspire!
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

"Why are you after the book!?" Fei asks. "Couldn't you have shown up a little earlier? Or later, honestly??" He's trying to keep her attention off of Hammer. The other goons, well, hopefully they can be distracted by the very terrifying crew of people that are also here.

Hammer meanwhile uses his LIBRARY USE skill which is probably why he's in the party here to begin with. Someone needs to level up the Research skills and one should never underestimate the power of Hammer's information network. His information network right now is Argus who is describing the book. Hammer actually prepared for this adventure (unlike Fei who just showed up) by looking into the Lunar Standard of library organization in the area and had a nice chat with a librarian about where ledgers like this would be typically stored. The title is enough to get him working on this. Will he find it in time?? That does sound weirdly useful for Hammer.

Meanwhile Fei is being told by this lady who saved him from going KERSPLAT that she isn't nice enough to not murder. "Well," Fei tells Talia. "It's mostly so that if Lily melts you into a puddle I don't like dream of you asking me why I let you die but I'm sure uhhhh Riesenlied can you say something nice about this person so she doesn't feel so bad about herself? I mean I'm still going to punch her but I'm sensing low self este---uhhh oh shit."

The oh shit came from when Mirage flies into Talia's hand. He raises one hand but it's the dagger that gets him in two quick swipes along his body.

He grunts, stumbling back, taking a moment to breahte through the pain.

But then he smiles as he proves the value of having non-elemental diversity in your technique roster by skipping past his FIRE PUNCH and skipping straight to leaping through the air and trying to repeatedly throw his feet down hard into Talia's face and head. It is more of a balance trick than a trick of power or agility but, well, at least he isn't using the Fire Punch.

GS: Fei Fong Wong has attacked Talia with Tenbu!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has completed his action.
GS: CRITICAL! Talia takes a glancing hit from Fei Fong Wong's Tenbu for 83 hit points!
GS: Fei Fong Wong enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.

It's an ice fight
you're gonna fight with your ice
Ice fight
not gonna be very nice
Ice fight
ICE FIGHT

The absurdity of this wintertime festivity is damaged by the ice that has wounded the man near her. She glances back towards Argus as he gives them more information on the book. But then Talia -

"And who is your friend exactly?????" Elly answers her, incredulously. "This is not what you do to friends!"

oh no, Elly thinks. I can't shape the ice here right. What would Kelvena do?

SNAP CUT to KELVENA sitting on a CHAIR under a spotlight. KELVENA: "I would not be here, because you are dropping treason like a rabbit drops pellets."

Strategically speaking!! Elly thinks.

BACK TO THE INTERIOR CHAIR. KELVENA: "You're underestimating your abilities, Elhaym, and you aren't thinking flexibly. The Major tutored you in this and you took to the concept easily enough. You've done it with fire, but I think that we both understand that the only reason you tried to use that Ether structure first is that --"

Elly's eyes widen as the plan forms in her head.

Riesenlied then updates them. They can teleport, too? How do you even do that.

Then she realizes that she's got two Demon Fangs coming right towards her. She twists herself to leap partway up a bookshelf which means that she does not get anything profoundly bisected; the righthand blade gashes the back of her calf even as a crystalline awareness of just where the man is rises in her head. What is going on here? Elly thinks.

INTERIOR CHAIR KELVENA TIME. KELVENA: "You're coordinating with your comrades. Congratulations, Elhaym. I hope that you imagined this realistically, because I will never say it to you in reality."

Elly climbs another shelf up onto that bookshelf, pushing past the pain. She twists herself round then to leap PAST Mr. Swordsman - and try to twist his sword arm back, to grasp his wrist, to make him DROP THE WEAPON. "Stop it," Elly says, almost pleading. "We don't want to hurt any of you!"

GS: Elhaym van Houten has attacked Talia with My Ring Name Is The Crimson Light Southerly Breeze!
GS: Elhaym van Houten has completed her action.
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Elhaym van Houten's My Ring Name Is The Crimson Light Southerly Breeze for 126 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.

    "Come on," Noeline mutters under her breath; for a supposed tightly protected vault, the guards are certainly taking their time to hear the battle wafting up from below, and Noeline is definitely reaching the end of her tether as far as patience is concerned - particularly when Talia's weaponized mist seems to claw over her skin, making the metal of it crackle in a distinctly unnerving way that makes her itch and rankle.

    There's a limit to how much she's willing to hold her position, especially given the enemy appears to have the power to completely bypass her should they so choose; she huffs under her breath, noting on top of that that Strife's wild shots are coming uncomfortably close to the shelves. That much she certainly couldn't forgive herself for, and a quick command sends the little ARM skittering back to its position at her shoulder.

    Instead, she begins to concentrate. The mist is cloying and thick, and Noeline can use that. A twitch of a mental muscle she's not quite used to flexing yet, and suddenly there's a spark of darkness rolling in her palm - a darkness that catches the edge of the mist and begins to spread through it like wildfire, racing through the cloud in unnatural rivulets that twist and combine into what might be shapes or forgotten memories.

    A wild grin graces the metal demon's face for a moment as she really taps into Duras Drum's power for the first time - and then she's darted straight into what remains of the icy mist, her form obscured but flitting through it like a shadow that barely even seems to cover the intervening space.

    When the she bursts back out of it she's somehow across the room, suddenly encroaching on one of the thugs from behind-- and true to her word, no smashing or fire is involved in the way she ploughs an elbow into the man's back, hooks a boot around his ankle, and twists to one side to simply slam him down to the ground.

GS: Noeline has attacked Talia with Black Velvet!
GS: Noeline has entered a Reflect stance!
GS: Noeline takes 9 damage from Toxin!
GS: Noeline has completed her action.
GS: CRITICAL! Talia takes a glancing hit from Noeline's Black Velvet for 76 hit points!
GS: Quick! Statuses applied to Noeline!
GS: Noeline enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.

Perfectly timed.

It might be just coincidence, how everything goes to hell the exact moment that Talia turns her attention towards Jacob. Or maybe it's just knowing the ways the winds are blowing. Either way -- the automaton dips just slightly under the newfound burden of his prize, mechanical wings flapping all the more furiously (such that a thing like Jacob could flap furiously); for that brief, terrible moment, he is a sitting duck...

... which is exactly when Xantia reintroduces herself to Talia with that electrified fist.

The tick of a second later, that moment passes, and Jacob starts to ascend with his purloined package once more as the mercenary goes cracking into a nearby bookshelf.

There's one concern out of the way for the moment, at least.

Jude, however, has a very different set of problems on his hands -- mainly trying to figure out what Talia's deal is without getting skewered by her. Short-range teleportation. That's going to make it difficult enough to pin her down. Brows furrow as he watches her scuffle with the others for a few quiet, thoughtful moments as he reloads that repeating crossbow. Is it...?

"How could I be a bad influence?" he remarks instead as he loads that last bolt, sigils glowing a faint, electric gold.

"I'm a devoted part of the clergy."

And then, in a surge of spinning speed, Talia is upon him.

"Ah, Althena's ti--!"

Maybe it's fortunate he doesn't manage to finish that thought.

And so the obviously devout man of the cloth acts on the precious half-seconds he has to react. The Mirage comes down -- and that crossbow comes -up- at the exact same time on nothing more than a veteran's instincts. And before the Mirage can just neatly crush that weapon in twain, two -- a blade snaps into place along the underside of the crossbow, intercepting Talia's sword just seconds before it can find its home buried in his guts.

"Maybe -- later--" he begins, between clenched teeth. "He's got -- his schedule full -- with some light reading first--!"

And with that, he shifts -- just enough, just enough to let that sharpened point -impale- downward past open air as soon as he breaks contact, to hopefully unsettle Talia's footing for a precious moment the rest can take advantage of.

Stumbling backwards a few, wheeling steps to gain breathing room, it's not a second later that he's firing off two bolts once more -- both of pure, bright light rather than anything of substance, one green, that aims for Fei -- one that explodes into a shimmering shield around the young man the second it makes contact. The other? The other is crackling with swift, electrical power that will pierce harmlessly through Josephine, providing a jolt of adrenaline and accelerated perception to make her that much quicker on her feet.

"I get the impression she's not a big fan of birds," he asides to his fellow bird-owner, helplessly.

GS: Jude Moshe has entered a Reflect stance!
GS: Jude Moshe has activated a Force Action!
GS: Jude Moshe has attacked Josephine Lovelace with Smokestack Lightnin'!
GS: Jude Moshe takes 11 damage from Toxin!
GS: Jude Moshe has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Xantia has to hoof it to catch Talia after the latter teleports over to Fei, but manages to catch up eventually. After landing an electrically-charged punch, and completely failing to notice her having saved a certain mechanically feathered friend in the process, she feels confident enough to declare, "Give it up! You can't win!" It may have looked like she was only paying attention to what was in front of her, but she knows full well that Talia's active support is rapidly dwindling as thugs have been going down left and right. To the point where this is starting to feel a little unfair and she'd rather not continue, if possible.

The answer comes in the form of what's rapidly become one of her least favorite things: Ice. As soon as the icy mist comes into contact with her, her eyes go wide, and she just... flees, head over heels, going "cold, cold, cold, COLD" all the way. Huh. That was weird.

She probably would have kept running longer if it wasn't for a sudden warm feeling, and Riese's voice coming out of nowhere having a natural calming effect. Snapped out of it, and now somehow just... knowing where Talia went off to somehow, she doesn't even pause to question any of this. She turns, and rushes directly towards where the apparent leader of the group went off to.

Now she's the one coming out of nowhere - not because of teleportation, she simply jumps out of a blind spot between the bookcases, one arm drawn back, to deliver a single pin-point strike towards Talia's midsection with the flat of her hand. Should it hit home, the electricity - still surrounding Xantia's hand - is sent directly into Talia's body. An attempt to debilitate the surprisingly tough mercenary, as she's rapidly running out of ideas that don't involve just... giving it everything she's got. She'd rather reserve that for actually evil people, not people who are just doing a job, by the sounds of things.

"Come on, just stay down," Xantia pleads, now sounding more concerned than anything else. "I'm going to have to really hurt you if you don't stop this!"

Sooo none of that so far counted as hurting people? Sure, Xantia.

GS: Xantia has attacked Talia with Disrupting Palm Strike!
GS: Xantia takes 6 damage from Toxin!
GS: Xantia has completed her action.
GS: Talia takes a solid hit from Xantia's Disrupting Palm Strike for 117 hit points!
GS: Cripple! Statuses applied to Talia!
<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

"I'm really good at murder," Lily offers helpfully to Talia's response to Fei, but her gaze narrows on the man throwing fire--and on the paper that isn't stomped out. she starts that way immediately, though she has an issue before that: Talia's incantation and ice surging up at Lily's feet, effectively freezing her boots to the ground very quickly. "Huh. Not bad."

Riesenlied's abilities show the enemies' position to Lily, who is in perfect position for someone to try to stab her in the back right now. That doesn't seem to bother her much, as she looks to the man whose leg she impaled and then back to the mage again. Just as she sees Elly engaging in hand-to-hand combat, and almost pleading--

"Point of order," Lily adds to Elly's statement, and yanks at the ice with her boot--which proceeds not to do her any good. Jude's remark almost goes unanswered, until Lily says, "Ah, how could I forget?"

Since she can't recover her defenses, Lily does the next best thing, and ignores them completely. It becomes obvious that she's not in full armor at the moment, as her good hand glows, strange blue circuitry up and down her fingers. ...Her eyes, too, start to glow faintly. Xantia's complaint of the cold registers for her, at least.

Shadows coalesce about her hand, falling dense together until they become a golden radiance as Lily lifts that hand towards her foes, by way of what's already burning. From her hand emits a golden beam of nuclear heat, the sheer pressure enough to suck air from fire. The recoil of the spell is enough to knock her hand backward as she casts it, and at its terminus it explodes into a crackling globe of power.

GS: Lily Keil has attacked Talia with Alphashock!
GS: Lily Keil has completed her action.
GS: Talia takes a solid hit from Lily Keil's Alphashock for 136 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Talia!
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    Those knife-fighting lessons with Lily seem to have paid off. Josie rolls back from the wounded mage, apparently with other things on her mind than finishing the job. Her gaze tracks the volumes littering the floor. "Red binding on black, gold print, volume... got it! --Argus, you might want to get outta here!" Josie calls back, continuing to skim titles when there's a gap that allows her to do so without getting a blade to the guts or a spell upside the head -- those, she has to keep watch for and evade accordingly.
    After all, she's only got the one life, and she'll be damned if she loses it playing librarian.

    Her gaze lifts at Talia's response; it might be directed at Hammer and Argus, but she's near enough to catch it, herself.

    "Sorry, princess, but you'll have to offer double at least if you want that," she fires off in response, before flinging a book over a shoulder as she roots through a pile... ducking out of the way of an incoming blast of chi.

    "Flanked or pinned'd be too easy, yeah," she comments, springing out from her current position amidst the stacks. "And if they can move faster... bad luck for us! So, lay it on me, Sunshine!"

    It's strange, to see an alternate view of the room here and the positioning of their foes. But one never looks a gift horse in the mouth. Josie moves, aware of the positioning of the woman and her gang around her.

    'No smashing, no burning'.

    But apparently, cutting a bookcase in two is fair play... or at least, unavoidable collateral damage. One dark eye watches a page flutter to the floor. "Hope that wasn't it," she says, against the chaos of the pitched battle unfurling around her. "Well, I guess 'avoiding property damage' is a moot point now, huh?" Her gaze shifts as Jacob soars, burdened. As Talia goes after him. "--Hey!"

    She's aware of the bolt flying for her, catching the movement out of the corner of an eye. She turns, as it strikes home, but there, yes, she receives a pulse of energy that sheds an honing into her veins: the world becomes that much clearer, her targets seem to stand out amidst the fury unleashed in these confines.

    Jacob still takes flight with his prize -- and hopefully what they need is among it -- but while a bird can be a difficult target...

    It's not a the sort of target that takes well to being hit.

    "Heh, no kidding. Well, it's all or nothin', I guess," Josie quips, drawing her smaller sidearm from pocket deep in her coat as she kicks a fallen chair up into the air before her.

    "Hey, princess! Look sharp!"

GS: 2 Combo gained from Boost!
GS: Josephine Lovelace has activated a Force Action!
GS: You cannot act while you still have attacks in queue.
GS: Josephine Lovelace takes a solid hit from Jude Moshe's Smokestack Lightnin' for 0 hit points!
GS: Quick! Statuses applied to Josephine Lovelace!
GS: Josephine Lovelace has attacked Talia with Kick the Bucket!
GS: Josephine Lovelace has completed her action.
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Josephine Lovelace's Kick the Bucket for 56 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Which one is princess again, Fei wonders.

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

"I was hired to retrieve a certain book--probably the same one, if I had to guess!" Talia answers Fei. She pries Mirage free of the crossbow, and has it snapped to the side by Jude's sudden blade. She stumbles backward, then, and breathes hard -- locking eyes with Jude, before she sees a shadow descending down for her.

She looks up, and then scowls, as she goes darting in an effort to get away. His feet slam into her back, the kick throwing her face-first into another shelf. "That isn't low self-esteem! You don't need to overanalyze it, no?"

Then she looks at Elly. She blinks, once. "Hell if I know! I just hired this guy an hour and a half ago! I don't even know his name!"

"IT'S TED! I TOLD YOU THAT THREE TIMES!"

"I needed some extra muscle to carry all of these books, no?" Talia asks, with a shrug. "I didn't think they would be so incompetent!"

Ted screams, as he drops the weapon; the sword clatters to the ground, as his arm is twisted sharply behind him. Then, a distance away, one of the other thugs -- the one with the rifle, who just pried himself free -- is caught by Noeline's sudden movement. He slams, face-first, into the stone floor with a loud CRACK.

He is out like a light. His gunsmoke arm clatters to the ground.

Talia is struck, a moment later, by a Xantia's palm strike. The electricity shoots through her; she stumbles back, breathing sharply, and looks up -- alarm is clear in her eyes, and she almost seems to consider Xantia's words for a moment. Then, however, golden light explodes from Lily's hand, and cuts those thoughts short. Talia leaps away from the blast; however, the mage in their number doesn't. He is hurled backward, a burn left on his chest, and smashes against the bookcase. It collapses down around him.

Talia comes up, only to hear: 'Hey, princess! Look sharp!'

"You think I'm a princess?" she says, incredulously.

Then, she ducks, quickly, and then the chair slams into her, and knocks her back away from them.

In the midst of all this mess, Hammer has a good look around. The bad news is that he doesn't find the book -- however, he does find a gap in the shelves, where two books are next to it: Investigations Ledger No. XVI and Investigations Ledger No. XVIII. Given that a sack of books, which these people took, is being flown away by the robotic bird that Jude calls a friend...

...they may have this one, literally, in the bag.

Unfortunately, Talia realizes the same thing. As she remains kneeling, her eyes dart towards the bag, and she starts to stretch out her hand -- but then she hears a more worrying sound. The shrill, furious cry of an old, wizened archivist. She calls out: "Brigands! No... no, even worse! LACKADAISICAL STUDENTS! THEY'RE DESTROYING THE ARCHIVES! SUMMON THE GUARDS!"

"Crap," Talia swears, again.

She takes stock of the situation, and then looks out the door. "Well... I think I'm writing this one is a loss. Best of luck, Ned!" She throws Mirage -- it shoots past Josie and Riesenlied, and slams into a torch sconce outside. She vanishes into strands of shadow, which come together again, and she takes of running, over one furtive cry:

"IT'S TEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED!"

Argus looks around at the library room. Books are literring the floor. Icicles are melting, getting many of the tomes wet. Fires smolder here and there. Bullet holes riddle the wall. Books have been chopped in twain. Shelves are knocked over. One has been singed by nuclear flame. The former priest opens his mouth, then closes it.

"We may want to leave pretty soon," he offers, mildly.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

"Overanalyzing is what I do!" Fei counters. In his world everybody has like 10 pages of backstory that explains that they're mean because their father or mother didn't love them enough. This summarizes the backstory of most of his cast. Don't take this away from him.

Meanwhile, Hammer does just shrug his shoulders and take all the books in that series into his inventory sack plus a few others that will probably fall out of the sack in the ensuing comical escape. He pauses only to

pick up the fallen gunsmoke arm

Fei meanwhile abandons the fight because he says, "Sounds good Argus!" as he leaps over the crevice towards the Library Staff like the end of Wild Arms 3.

It probably ends up like the end of Wild Arms 3 too.

<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.

    Half an hour ago...? Then they weren't a tightly-knit gang. She was wondering if Talia had accomplices she'd worked with a long while ago, but--

    "Miss Talia, please! We do not wish to engage in theft -- we are investigating for a good cause!" Riesenlied tries pleading again as the whirlwind of emotions and light start to die down around her. Utilising that spell well and truly hurts, sending her into a grimace as she lowers herself down.

    It's a bit too late, though, when Talia teleports away with that magical swords of hers, prompting a yelp from her. "Ah-- no! We were just--"

    She looks to Argus, and her horns wilt as she glances towards the scene of destruction. "Y-yes," she expresses, mildly glum. She spares a glance up to Jacob for a moment, then hurries into a retreat with the others. "E-excuse us! May the light of Althena be with you today!"

    Riese you don't have to keep pretending... or do you just enjoy this?

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    "Hmm, close enough for horseshoes," Josie comments, shading her eyes for effect as she squints where Talia lies. She turns her head next, in time to watch Jacob making a gettaway, of a sort.

    Hopefully Penelope isn't out there, lurking in wait for him. Hopefully.

    This, then, is the point where Josie finally turns her ARM on the woman, her finger twitching over the trigger. "So, care to negotiate? Make it snappy, though, princess. We don't have--"

    The archivist, understandably, screams.

    "...Well, then," Josie comments, tucking her ARM away. "Hammer, Argus, any luck? It's now or never!"

    Before movement catches her eye, and she steps sidelong away from Mirage as it goes winging past.
    Talia is for a moment naught but shadow.

    At which point she turns to Argus.

    "You know what? I agree."

    This is the point where she walks right out the door. Last one out's a rotten egg. Or arrested.
    Arrested is more likely.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Xantia, for one, is visibly relieved when Talia doesn't choose to continue fighting, letting out a breath. No any real concern for the fate of the mooks. In her defense, it's hard to take much notice of people who can't take a decent punch.

Either way, this fight is over, although there might be a continuation. "Oh, sounds like they're calling the guards!" Xantia is sounding way too happy about this prospect. Now she's suddenly okay with fighting more??

Thankfully, the suggestion is made to leave, and if the others are leaving she's certainly not about to stay behind. "Okaaaay, let's go then!" And so, as the group beats a hasty retreat, she is left with but one important unanswered question about all this.

"What does 'lackadaisical' mean?"

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

"You hired muscle without vetting it first?" Lily asks Talia, shaking her head. "Civilians."

The awful cracks and shouting and screaming don't give Lily much pause; the alarm in Talia's eyes, she notices, focuses on, and then the man smashing against the bookcase. She looks him over to se if the new pile of books moves. But--

'Brigands!'

Lily sighs, at that, spotting Talia just... disappear, reappear, and not for the first part wonders how she could achieve such an effect. Argus's suggestion, well--

Lily finally manages to point down and melt the ice holding her feet down, and turns towards the exit. "It means lazy," Lily offers Xantia, pulling her hood back up again--and then thinking better of it, and letting it fall. Her swollen eye and lip might just help dissuade library staff from bothering with them. And it certainly doesn't make her easier to recognize.

The glowing gold about her hands doesn't hurt, either.

"We'll be fine," Lily suggests to the others. She definitely... walks, though she does sigh on her way at Riesenlied.

<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.

    Noeline does her best to attempt to block Talia's path, having been expecting the group to flee from the very first moment - but she's still more disoriented than she'd like to admit from her own jaunt into teleportation, and her head is swimming a little as her body sparks with first Talia's mist and then her own sorcery. "--that's far enough!" she calls, twisting out of the way of the thrown weapon--

    --which turns out to be a mistake, allowing their opponent to simply blink away and leaving Noeline to blink in surprise, before huffing at the open air as she folds her arms and takes stock of the state of things in their wake.

    There's a solemn frown on her face at the sight of the poor place; she feels a genuine pang of unhappiness at the state of it all. "Quite, Mr. Argus. Remind me to offer some monatery assistance their way later to make up for this later," she grumbles to herself, turns to grab Riesenlied's hand, and hurries the both of them out.

<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.

"-- You -"

The man drops his weapon and Elly feels a rush of sentiment even as magic and weapons crack and speak and surge. And what she does then is speak hotly. "This man is under your command! Even if you're mercenaries he's putting his life in your hands! The least you can do is not speak of him with such disrespect!! Even if you feel that way, don't you realize you're hurting morale for no reason at all!?"

Then she hurls her weapon and -

THE LAST APPEARANCE OF THE MENTAL IMAGE OF KELVENA IN ELLY'S HEAD: "She does not."

Elly is silent for several seconds. Others are moving with speed. Elly crouches down near Ted and sweeps his arm over her shoulder, rising upwards - this is, she thinks, nowhere near as hard. "I'm sorry," she tells him, with strain in her voice. "I'll give you my Gels once we're out. That will be that. You can tell them you held me hostage if you need to."

Puffing out her cheeks, she starts to double-time forwards.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

"That's way too many letters to say 'lazy'," is Xantia's harsh (but totally fair) judgment of that particular word.

<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.

Slowly, that crossbow lowers towards the crouching Talia as she reaches out towards Jacob and that sack of books. And while Riesenlied pleads for reason and good causes...

... Jude Moshe quite calmly puts the mercenary's head in his sights for the exact opposite.

In the end, they end up going down neither path. With the sound of a voice well-aged in fury fast on the approach, the reporter's amber gaze snaps towards the abused exit. Then back to Talia, just as she hurls that sword.

And his farewell to her is a glib, holy sign of the Church of Althena before she goes.

"Thanks for saving us the effort. May you walk with the Goddess."

And just like that, she is gone, in unwinding strands of shadow that reform so much further away. Jude looks her way, rubbing the back of his head.

"Neat trick."

And with that, he makes his way over, crouching down and swiping up the slightly tattered robes he came in with to hurriedly toss them on over his clothes. "God, do I hate the moon," he mutters -- before giving a quick look around the area. Water-sodden books, smoldering flames, tattered and carved tomes, ruined furnishing.

"Huh," he whistles out. "Think this might be an all-time low on collateral for us. Nice job."

And with that, once his robes are in place, Jude is rushing off once more. Jacob, of course, finds his own way out, sly automated devil that he is. Jude? Jude follows behind the others, offering a passing, inscrutable glance Elly's way as she helps poor Ted off his feet. And as he rushes past he shouts, sounding dutifully horrified--

"They're drinking and dancing on a pile of burning books in there, it's horrible, they said they were getting 'high off sacrilege,' you have to stop them--!"

And distraction delivered, off he goes, a job well done.

Provided Penelope doesn't decide now is the perfect opportunity for her vengeance.

Fingers crossed.