2019-09-02: Breaking Free

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==========================<* Crusader Forward Base *>===========================

To the west of the Mi'ihen Highroad is found a long, jagged mountain chain that serves as a weather break and help keep both Luca and the Highroad itself safe from vicious storms. A large plateau in this chain, overlooking a wide, sloping beach, was selected as the forward operating base for the Crusaders' Operation Mi'ihen.

The site is now a testament to their folly.

Abandoned equipment and scorched stone mar thesurface of the plateau, and the beach below is riddled with the remains of Crusaders, Althena's Guard, and Al Bhed alike -- and individuals still working to bury them at sea. Only scant Pyreflies remain, after Lady Yuna did a series of Sendings over an entire night.

DC: Dispellado switches forms to Duke Lubov and the Furied Steel!
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

The evening sun hangs low in the sky, giving Mushroom Rock Road a red-gold sheen. The northern end of the road has a small outpost, where Althena's Guard has set up -- a place where their soldiers used to move on Djose Temple, and then a place they fell back to. It is a narrow pass, where the cliffs on each side make a narrow chokepoint on the road. More than that, though, there are a pair of wooden buildings.

The buildings are former Crusader-made housing. Once, they held stores for Operation Mi'ihen. Since then, they have been left to rot -- and been left to use by people of lesser morals than those who built them.

The guards that remain are not, truly, Althena's Guard. They are hired mercenaries; the sort of brutal sellswords prefered by certain nobles in Pendrago, who use hirelings known more for their cruelty and efficiency than their honor. Two of them stand out there, hands on the swords at their sides. Their master is only a little ahead.

One of them turns. He looks up, dark eyes scanning the top of the cliffs, on a routine inspection. Then, his eyes light up.

There's a flicker of motion from the cliffs, before a young woman leaps down toward the assembled group from an outcropping just overhead. She wears a dark cloak with blue trim, and has black hair and familiar red eyes, which flash with challenge, as a ring of cold light blazes up around her, and she sends a whirl of glittering ice toward Lubov and his guards.

Then, as quickly as she arrived, she darts away, throwing her sword ahead of her. It lodges itself into the wooden door of an abandoned outpost building some distance away, and her body dissolves into tendrils of shadow, reforming back with the blade and out of easy reach.

As she pulls the blade free, there's a faint sound from behind her, inside the building. A crackling hiss.

That's the only warning before the doorway explodes into flames, engulfing her body.

Silhouetted in fire, she screams, until she disappears into the light of the blaze. As the fire burns on, the building rattles, fire pouring out the windows and doors, before it finally collapses into a smoking heap.

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

The burning building is putting off a smoky haze. A few moments pass, before Ivan steps out out of the obscuring cloud, his hands clenched at his sides and his expression stricken and turbulent. He strides up to Lubov, ignoring the guards unless they physically intervene, standing as close as he's permitted. He looks up at him, his shoulders shaking a bit. Whether from rage or fear is uncertain.

"Well?" he says, sharply, his voice doing strange things as it escapes his throat. "I followed your order." He throws his hand out toward the smoldering wreck of a building, where his sister once stood.

"Was that enough for you?!"

<Pose Tracker> Dispellado has posed.

Cold.

It is, perhaps, the best way to describe the man who emerges from that former Crusader building, making opportunistic use of an outpost once meant for something much more like a hyena dessiccating the corpse of a more noble beast. He dresses well. Like a noble ought to, truly; dark brown coat of Rolance stylings crisp and tailored with sharp, orderly gray cuffs and just a hint of color in his deep red ascot, as if paying the barest minimum homage to the nation of his birth, makes for a highly strict presence. One only aided by how his black hair - peppering gray around the temples - is swept back tightly. How those evergreen eyes look like they could make spring retreat back into winter.

How the very air around him feels at a remove from everything and everyone else.

He is sifting through sheets of parchment with furrowed brows and a slight frown and what might possibly be quantified as interest from someone like him when he first catches sign of movement from the peripheries of his vision. He doesn't look up from those papers, not even as that young woman lands. Not even as his guards turn upon her. Not even as the air around him grows noticeably colder.

It is only after. Only after, when shards of ice are fired only to shatter on the broad greatsword of his rightmost guard, that those dispassionate, evergreen eyes look up.

To look her square in that crimson gaze like someone might look at a particularly persistent gnat.

"... Worthless," he mumbles, half to himself. He presses thumbs into his parchments, folding them crisply at their middle. "Deal with her--"

She reforms, so many feet away, to the bubbling rise of heat.

And the first, true reaction of the evening is scored in the mild lift of dark brows as the entire building that his assailant has absconded to bursts into ravenous flames.

"...."

Slowly does he turn, toward the approach of a figure through the smoke. Green eyes fall on red once more as Ivan draws nearer. He gets close -- but only so close, before a meaty hand encased in metal reaches out to halt his approach by the shoulder at a suitably safe remove.

Even family can only come so close.

Well?

The older man looks towards the crumbling, increasingly ash-clotted heap that was once a building as his son trembles out his words. Gloved hands fold his parchment a second time.

Ivan followed his orders. Killed a sister. Killed a daughter. Is that enough?

His father regards him coolly for a handful of seconds before he finds better use tucking that parchment into the interior pocket of his coat. Because the answer should be obvious, really.

"... It'll do for now."

For Duke Lubov, it's never enough.

"Retrieve the body from the wreckage, and then we will be off. I have business to tend to."

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

The message came a little while ago. A trembling hand, paralyzed by poison, placed on the smooth, glass-like surface of a message sphere. Ivan had already walked away, when Talia's hand fell upon it. When her crimson eyes closed, but she wasn't drifting into unconsciousness. She mustered every last ounce of will -- every last ounce of focus -- to keep her hand on the sphere.

To send a message.

It came in halting words, her mind swimming through the haze of the paralytic. Talia's voice sounded exhausted, communicated and then stored in the message spheres -- in the hope that, somehow, Ragnell and Amaranth, Lydia and Jacqueline, would be near one. That they would check.

"I'm near the northern entrance of Mushroom Rock Road. Poisoned." Her voice stumbled. "Ivan is doing something foolish. It will get him killed. Please come. Please hurry."

And it may be of note that, at the former Crusader outpost, there is not a message sphere on the ground. It is, instead, by the cliffs -- high above, in a crack between the mushroom-like rocks, the prismatic glimmer of one such sphere can be seen. It could almost be missed, and yet -- for someone looking for it -- it is a little glimmer of hope.

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

There is a part of Ivan that doesn't expect Lubov to buy the scenario at all. That he'll see through it at a glance, and casually dismiss it as a childish ploy.

But he accepts it, instead. As if Talia's life is a minor trifle. Like it's his due.

Thoughts race through Ivan's head that he doesn't have time for.

You think I'd do that?! You think I'm enough of a coward to kill my sister for you?!

But that's just it, isn't it? Lubov doesn't think of him. It doesn't matter what Ivan does to prove himself useful or worthy. To disprove the casual insults and criticisms that accumulated over the years, still always lingering at the back of Ivan's mind. There's no way to prove yourself to someone who simply does not care who you are.

Ivan feels so small in that moment that he thinks about just backing down from all his plans, accepting 'It'll do for now' and going on as before.

If the most brutal display of loyalty he could muster can't even capture a flicker of Lubov's attention, can't even get Ivan within sword reach, how can he hope to kill him? Who does he think he is? It would be easy to just switch off and go back to doing what he's told. Maybe someone so inconsequential as Ivan doesn't deserve redemption. Maybe he isn't brave enough to face the indignity of what could be a swift, perfunctory execution if he makes his real intentions known.

But...

There isn't a body to recover in that burning heap. And for that to make sense -- for them not to question finding nothing but ash, there needs to be more time for it to burn.

And -- and -- and!! What did he muster up this whole horrible scenario for if he wasn't going to come here, confirm once again that Lubov doesn't rate him worth the slightest concern, and present the only counterargument that could ever actually matter: Violence.

Ivan takes a shaky breath. "That was--..." And another. "That was not enough gratitude for what you just made me do."

He lets three throwing knives fly, fireballs bursting to life around them, and the flames encircling each knife taking on a ghostly shape that resembles a hornet.

As this display fires off, he tries to push past the guard that stopped him and charge toward Lubov, forming a sword with a flash of his ring as he does so. "I want a different answer!"

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Amaranth has posed.

    One might think Amaranth would be at her very wits' end after all this.

    For Talia to have gone off to Mushroom Rock Road. To have been poisoned. For Ivan to have gone off and done something foolish again. So soon after their incident with the Shadow Dragon Cult. For it to all feel like there's no end to this, that their fool attempt to make a life for themselves is all for naught.

    Maybe.

    But neither can she fall apart now, because Talia needs her. Because she promised her. Because she promised Ivan.

    It isn't long before the large shadow of a beast emerges and lands near the cliff of Mushroom Rock Road; with a quiet *ribbit*, Amaranth lands from her summoned Frog and hurries towards Talia's side. Her, and anyone else who might have been hitching a ride.

    "I'm here, Talia," she whispers tersely.

    Just like before, she is in full shinobi's gear. Her kodachi at her side. She brings her up so she can lie at her lap, and examines her state.

    "I'm here..."

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.

    Ragnell happened to be near Mushroom Rock Road regardless, thanks to a trek down to the beaches where Operation Mi'ihen met failure. She passes a message sphere, and whim makes her check it. It's been a while; maybe something's popped up. And, indeed, something *has* popped up--within minutes of Ragnell checking, in fact. If she'd finished up her conversation with Matilda a little earlier, or if her gait back up towards Guadosalam had been a little faster, she would've missed it entirely, then traveled on quite possibly within earshot of Talia without ever realizing she was nearby, poisoned, with her brother apparently doing something stupid.
    
    Frowning, Ragnell remembers the conversation she had recently with Ivan. Where she basically took back her offer of helping him figure out himself, stating that he'll best figure out who he is as a person if he exerts his own will. Apparently he's doing that. She rubs the bridge of her nose and gives serious consideration to just moving on.
    
    No. For all she knows, Ragnell might be the only one who's gotten word. And Amaranth would be so upset if she ignored this.
    
    Ugh. *Family*.
    
    Which just makes it doubly annoying when Ragnell finishes jogging over to the appointed spot, and Amaranth is already there. Ragnell scowls, but she *really* can't leave now. She jogs up, dipping her body low in case there's anyone in the area to watch, and comes up behind her older sister with silent footfalls. Even so, she expects to be sensed before she rests a hand on Amaranth's shoulder.
    
    She gives her a single nod--an acknowledgement of everything that's going on, of everyone who's here and who's not here. Then she peers down at Talia while leaving Amaranth to tend to her. "What do you wanna do about Ivan?" she murmurs to the two.

<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.

Lydia Seren didn't want to get involved in this fucking war. She had friends on both sides of the conflict and the Guard and Yevon both seem to treat their Beastmen well, sure, but the Guard is the only group that seems to have any Beastman leadership and the idea that she'd have to fight the only example of that she's ever seen is pure anathema to her, to say nothing of battling against her undercover sister from another Riesenlied.

Lydia is not great at fighting but there is one thing she is very good at and that's Explosion. Specifically, artillery strikes. Because what meteor strikes lack in aim they certainly, if nothing else, can cause a great deal of widespread damage.

Those who look up will see Rigdobrite hanging in the air there high in the sky. The doofy looking Guardian doesn't seem angry or particularly emotional, just sort of bobbing along as it does.

Meteoric shards crash repeatedly into the former crusader base, pelting it rapidly with high velocity molten rock. It is not especially aimed, just naturally aiming to cause the most damage as possible.

On top of Rigdobrite is a very sour looking Lydia, just sort of standing there. She has no idea what Lubov looks like and, in fact, she doesn't even know where Talia is exactly or where Ivan is for that matter and if you think about it isn't she kind of putting Ivan at risk by doing this now? Just like, accidentally clobbering him with a meteor?

Well, just because Talia said IVAN was being an idiot, that didn't preclude Lydia from being one.

"I didn't want to do this!" Lydia shouts from atop Rigdobrite. "I just wanted to have cute fucking dates and nap around in a semi-sapient house that has feelings! But noooooo! If it isn't Sinspawn, it's a cult of assassins! If it isn't a cult of assassins, it's these fucking douchebags! Just gaslight yourselves mother fuckers!!! Who the fuck even turns their kids into asssassins anyway!? It isn't just evil, it's economically unviable which is even worse!!"

Lydia pants for breath.

"Oooff...." Lydia says because she kind of is overdoing it here but then she starts hopping down falling meteorites to approach the base because she really is just a ridiculous person.

"Haven't gotten nearly enough smooches for this shit..." Lydia mutters under her breath.

<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.

As a merchant and as someone with people to look after, Jacqueline was never far from a message sphere for long. Keeping communication up with her contacts and suppliers as key - either to monitor supplies she needed or to keep track of the Guard's movements.

It's fortunate for Talia that she is so thorough, as Jacqueline happened to be checking her messages the moment another comes in. A message in an exhausted, stumbled voice.

Jacqueline paused, stared at the message sphere in disbelief...and then, quickly left in a hurry.

It is not long after that that she appears at the northern entrance of Mushroom Rock Road, having returned to the Carakin for only a brief moment to equip her more protective adventuring gear and stock up on her finest antidotes.

She's a little out of breath - she had arrived in a hurry, and her chocobo was napping and she didn't want to take the time to both wake her up get her harnessed for riding.

She scans the horizon for any signs of Talia...but then, she spots a glimmer, in a crack between the rocks. It's faint - but it's a sign. She puts all her faith into it and hurries in that direction, reaching for her Artifical Copy Sea Medium.

...She elects, however, not to use it - she isn't sure what's awaiting her there. It wouldn't be safe to Jump in without knowing.

So, she does things the old-fashioned way - she breaks into a run, conjuring a pillar of earth beneath her fight as she does so to propel her upwards, into the cracks.

She nearly doesn't make it. She breaks her fall with a roll and sighs with relief at the sight of Talia...but blinks, as she sees that she isn't alone.

Her eyes settle on Ragnell for a moment questioningly, but right now they need all the help they can get so she's not going to question what her connection to these events is. She looks toward Amaranth, then, noting the delicate way she cradles Talia.

"Katherine?" Jacqueline asks, looking toward Amaranth. "I almost didn't recognize you."

With that, she rummages through her bags, drawing out a bottle of blue liquid and offering it to her.

"Here - an antidote, the best I have. You should probably be the one to do it." She suggests.

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

Talia looks at Amaranth with wide eyes.

She is slumped over against the rock, not far from the mushroom cliff. Her fingers have fallen down near the message sphere -- resting on the ground. The paralytic, it seems, doesn't stop her from moving her eyes. They shift towards Ammy, slowly. Too slowly.

She can't quite manage a smile. But, her hand twitches -- and then, slowly, forms a thumbs-up.

She can't move that thumbs-up to Ragnell. Her eyes turn to look at her, though, and she sees her. She can't answer directly, but she tries to move her eyes with some alarm towards the battle below. That must be a vote for intervention.

But, it isn't until the blue liquid is poured into her lips by Ammy that Talia can move. It takes a moment, and then she sputters. "You all came!" she says. She stands up, quickly. "We have to stop him! Ivan is--he is going to fight Lubov, and his goons, and this is a terrible plan if he is by himself--"

It is a terrible plan if they are with him, too. She doesn't see a way otherwise. The potion takes effect, and Talia practically springs out of Amaranth's lap. "--so we need to get him out, then get out of there, as quick as we can, no?"

<Pose Tracker> Lubov has posed.

For Lubov, this is all a matter of expectations.

It isn't something worthy of praise, to kill kin at his orders. It's expected. It isn't something worth acknowledging, that wealth of would-be devotion. It's expected.

It's not worth grieving the loss of a daughter.

    It's expected.

So he turns, as gloved hands clasp behind the back he now so presumptuously shows to the son who just killed for him, expecting him to go drag his sister's corpse from the fiery wreckage as he was ordered to. He doesn't bother to watch, because such things are beneath him; it will happen, because he wants it to. So he takes one step, two, indifferently walking away from fresh gravesite of his daughter. Because it's expected.

But this...

That was not enough gratitude for what you just made me do.

... is not.

Knives fly, glinting against the spark of flame before they too are engulfed in crackling tongues of raw heat. The guards don't react fast enough -- they aren't expecting something like this. But that's what being an assassin is, isn't it? The burning, hornet silhouette roars for their mark. Lubov turns around.

Green eyes widen in a brief mote of surprise.

There is a crackling roar of flame --

*FLASH*

It's pure reflex and experience that bring those flaming knives to a stop mere inches from Duke Lubov's heart, throat and forehead. They suspend there as if caught in an invisible web, before the tell-tale shimmer of a protective barrier wobbles around them in the seconds before gravity replaces their forward momentum with a snuffed, sad descent.

And there stands Lubov, one hand raised with the shine of Althena's Blessing, eyes widened in muted surprise.

And then cold fury as he sees the shape of what his son is doing.

"... How dare you," he hisses coldly as Ivan charges. One guard brandishes their heavy greatsword. The other winds back to grip mace and shield. "You've forgotten your place -yet again-, boy. Perhaps you ought to be reminded--"

THOOM

The ripple of force of a small stellar body striking the almost literal broadside of a barn is enough to make the ground quake and unease the footing of Lubov and his guards. Green eyes snap upward -- just in time to see a beastwoman ranting atop a very rotund meteor.

He has time to squint just before a second, and third, and further meteor just -decimate- the building he was once residing in, the subsequent explosions -ripping- him off his feet as a wave of dust and dirt washes over him and his entourage.

    "gh--"

There is the sound of an impact, through the veil of dirt. An irritated groan. A shine of light.

And slowly, Lubov's silhouette rises through the dust, one shoulder very obviously in a different position than the other.

It lasts maybe a second before holy light sets it back into place with a raw, wet, snapping sound.

"..... what childish nonsense have you set upon me -now-."

And slowly, from the dirt, Lubov walks forward. His expression is raw, cold fury contained in a mask of indifference. His guards beside him, dragging themselves up.

Shining with white light from sigils carved into every inch of their armor.

"Perhaps it was foolish of me to expect a failure to do anything less than live up to his namesake. You were ever her lesser. And now you send ranting children after me?"

Lubov's fingers snap. The armor of his mercenary guards start to whine with dangerous, crackling power. Their eyes, deep within their helms, start to turn a bloodshot red as muscles bulge within their protective trappings.

"Bring Ivan back to me alive. I do not care how much of him is broken before that."

His eyes narrow on the floating Lydia in the distance.

"And kill... whatever that is meant to be."

GS: Lubov has attacked Lubov with Astion!
GS: Lubov has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Lubov takes a solid hit from Lubov's Astion for 0 hit points!
GS: Hyper and Shield! applied to Lubov!
GS: Lubov has completed his action.
DC: 1 turn has elapsed in the battle against Lubov! 4 turns remain!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Amaranth has posed.

    It doesn't take long for Amaranth to administer the antidote. To feel relief at her sister being there, by her side.

    Much like Ragnell, she didn't know whether she got the message or not. They were all acting on their own accord, but it seemed like everyone did. That's good...

    "Please. Let this be the last time for this kind of thing for a bit... okay?" she asks Talia. Much like how she remembers her being clingy and bothered at Besaid... she's showing much the same as well.

    She looks to Jacqueline, expressing surprise. "... it's a long story. But thank you, for your antidote."

    She looks up towards the skies where Rigdobrite is summoning meteors, where Lydia is delivering her tirade.

    She winces quietly.

    "... okay. I promised," she answers, looking towards her sister as she asks what they'll do with Ivan. There's a sympathetic look at what she's imagining Ragnell to be feeling, whether it's bemusement or annoyance or...

    Well, it's not the newest feeling in the block.

    She climbs up onto her Frog again. "We'll use the Frog and interfere in a single bound. Be ready, everyone...!"

    And when everyone is ready... the Frog rises into the air and--

    Grows and Grows and Grows

    And attempts to throw the battlefield into chaos and distract the mercenary guards as it hops and stomps and bwomps all over the place.

GS: Seraph Amaranth has attacked Lubov with Frog Squash!!
GS: Seraph Amaranth has completed her action.
DC: Seraph Amaranth switches forms to The Spectre of Hexennacht!
GS: Seraph Amaranth has canceled their attack on Lubov.
GS: Seraph Amaranth has attacked Lubov with Frog Squash!!
GS: Seraph Amaranth has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Seraph Amaranth has completed her action.
GS: Lubov critically Guards a hit from Seraph Amaranth's Frog Squash! for 16 hit points!
DC: Seraph Ragnell switches forms to The Free!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.

    Ragnell flips an irreverent salute of greeting to Jay when she shows up, her assumption being that she's here because Talia had called her too. In the same way, when Talia manages to open her eyes, Ragnell nods back to her. Meanwhile, there is screaming in the near distance, and screaming in the way only Lydia can manage. She looks up, then back down at Talia when she explains what's going on.
    
    "Hnnh," she grunts, rubbing her temple. "Well. At least he's followin' through with what he wants to do. That's. Somethin', I guess?" She shares a nod with her sister, then hops a ride onto that hoppin' mad frog. At least they know they can always go home...!
    
    Sorry. That joke only made sense in Japanese. You'll have to play the original version of Dream Chasers MUSH to understand it.
    
    Either way, as Amaranth's frog descends on the battlefield, Ragnell leaps off, landing a reasonable distance away from Ivan and his dad and his dad's goons. She pops off a couple of lightning bullets at Lubov, sparking across the battlefield, her power funneled through the muzzles of her twin pistols. Can Lubov see Seraphim? Probably, if both his children can. That's of secondary concern to Ragnell, who rises from where she lands to give Ivan a Look.

GS: Seraph Ragnell has attacked Lubov with Twin Bullet!
GS: Seraph Ragnell has completed her action.
GS: Lubov guards a hit from Seraph Ragnell's Twin Bullet for 58 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

"I know. I'm sorry," Talia says, and claps Amaranth on the shoulder. She holds her shoulder for a second longer than she really has to, almost pulling her into a hug. Except, her brother is down there -- and she has to get there. "We'll see it through, no?"

She smiles at Ammy, then she stands up. She dusts herself off, and then frowns. Ivan took Mirage. She, fortunately, has a ride. She hops onto the back of the Frog, and flexes her hands. She keeps a tight grip on the Frog, as it leaps over the side of the cliff -- and then jumps away as it comes in for the landing.

Talia rolls a couple of times, and then she comes up in a half-crouch. She lifts a hand, glancing at one of the soldiers. A magical circle flares to life under her feet, shining white to blue. A single spear of ice fires, and then looses for the guard.

Then, she looks at Ivan, and shouts: "IVAN! I have so many words for you later! SO MANY!"

She sounds halfway between rage and relief. Some of that melts away, though, into anxiety as she looks at Lubov. Here, aware she is alive, and like...

Like he could take control of her life, again, just by drawing breath. Despite her earlier bravado, she stares at him -- and finds every word escapes her.

GS: Talia has attacked Lubov with Icicle!
GS: Talia has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Talia has completed her action.
GS: Lubov guards a hit from Talia's Icicle for 46 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.

Talia's in a bad way, but thankfully, her antidote takes an immediate effect. Jacqueline breathes a sigh of relief...but a frown crosses her face as Talia explains the situation.

"...I see, so that's what you meant." Jacqueline says, with a faint sigh. "Well...I had a feeling it probably would've come to this sooner or later."

Below, she can hear the sounds of fighting - that must be Ivan. ...And Lydia too, from the sound of it. She had even more reason to see this through, then.

As Talia springs to her feet Jacqueline straightens up and takes a step back to give her some more room.

"Right." She agrees with a nod. She looks toward Amaranth as she speaks, offering her a smile.

"I wasn't going to turn down a request for help from a friend." She replies, and then watches with a hint of surprise at...well. Frog. But, if Frog is their way in, she's not going to object - she climbs onto the Frog's back, taking a deep breath and bracing herself as the summoned amphibian rises up and then lands in the fray, bouncing about to disrupt the guards.

Jacqueline takes the opportunity to swap out the Crests in her gauntlet and, with a gesture of her left hand, tendrils of earth rise beneath Lubov's empowered guards, looking to grab and restrain in place so they can't interfere. It's not a particularly painful grip, but it's hard to wriggle out of once they've got you.

"You must be 'Lubov', I presume?" Jacqueline comments with a frown and a glare, adjusting her glasses as she looks upon the strictly-dressed man. "I am-"

She pauses.

"...Well, I see no need to introduce myself." She decides.

GS: Jacqueline Barber has attacked Lubov with Earthen Grasp!
GS: Jacqueline Barber has completed her action.
GS: Lubov takes a solid hit from Jacqueline Barber's Earthen Grasp for 23 hit points!
GS: Weaken! applied to Lubov!
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

Even as Ivan rushes forward, there's a moment where he catches his breath, thinking the knives may strike true as he sees the surprise in Lubov's eyes. Time seems to stop for a moment -- and then the knives clatter uselessly against the shield. Ivan's heart drops, as Lubov rebukes him, and the guards begin to close in. No, no, it's going to go just like before. But he can't just give up and let it, this time, he can't let fear overtake him -- he begins to summon flickering flames around his body...

Just then, there's a whistling, wailing sound, and a meteor slams down, shaking the ground and blasting a building apart. What -- ... no way... it can't be.

... ... but it is. That's Lydia's voice. He looks up to see her surfing her way down her own rain of meteorites, and Ivan's soul basically just escapes his body through his mouth for a moment.

LYDIA NO. LYDIA, HOW.

The blast of a near impact rattles them all off of their feet, sending a ringing through his ears -- Ivan stares through the dust as his father emerges with a brutally dislocated shoulder that he effortlessly sets right with his magic.

You were ever her lesser. And now you send ranting children after me?

Ivan's heart hammers. "I didn't send her, I don't know her, she's just some kind of passing crazy person--" he stammers, as Lubov is casually ordering her death.

He tries to find her in the dust so he can mouth "LYDIA, WHY!!!" to her.
More surprises -- more chaos -- as... a... frog joins the battle? Ragnell dismounts it, and Talia, in turn, as well as... Jacqueline Barber?! Ivan's head spins. This... this is all going wrong!! So many people showing themselves to this relentless murderer they won't be able to kill!

He returns Ragnell's Look with a glare -- didn't she break her promise to let him figure his own shit out?!

To Talia, he just shakes his head with an urgent, distressed expression, hoping maybe, somehow, she can leave before being seen. Jacqueline simply... half introduces herself to his father, and he screams internally --- ---- no, that actually was an out loud scream.

"What's wrong with all of you?!" he demands.

With no idea what else to do, he crosses his arms in an X in front of himself, and summons a ring of fire from the earth that expands toward Lubov and his guards, as if the tongues of fire might hide all of these STUPID PEOPLE COMING TO HELP HIM from Lubov's eyes.

GS: Ivan has attacked Lubov with Burning Pillar!
GS: Ivan has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Ivan has completed his action.
GS: Lubov guards a hit from Ivan's Burning Pillar for 100 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.

Lydia Seren blinks as there's no a giant frog jumping into the fray. "Ammy...you magnificient seraph, I've read your books...!" She murmurs under her breath as she works on descending. It's tough for her to see through the smoke and fire but she supposes that there must be an Ivan somewhere in all of that. But where is Talia? She knew her general position was in the area but nothing more specific than that. Similarly, she is too high up to hear the 'snap'. But she sees an entrance and that's enough.

She leaps for it, intending to leap right through one of the holes in the wall that she had made.

She ... misses the jump and ends up smashing through one of the walls herself. She really needs to learn how to be a better fighter if she's going to keep ending up in warzones and life or death situations. .... Though .... she kind of was hoping to avoid those! And yet somehow she has ended up in more of them than most!

When she lands, Lydia who has no idea there's a kill order out for her (but, to be fair, she still expects it squints through the smoke and flame to try and pinpoint where everything is which she really probably should've done before she launched the meteor shower but see the previous pose about Lydia not being precluded from being an idiot simply because others are also being an idiot.

The first thing she does see are those buffed up mercs. "The fuck?" She says because of course. She darts forward towards one of the Guards, swiping at them with her arm which transforms into a blade shortly thereafter before flipping backwards and landing in that superheroine crouch you see in movies all the time before losing balance and falling onto her side.

"Ragnell!" She brightens. "Uh Talia! You're here!"

She hops to her feet, spotting Jay. "Jay! What are you doing here? I thought Talia was your bodyguard! But if you're putting yourself in danger to help her, I guess that just means she's your friend."

Lydia nods solemnly at that.

"Where's Ivan?" She asks, following Talia's gaze to Ivan. She really ought to berate him but she honestly kind of got all that out of her system already screaming atop her flying godmeteorshrimp. Now she is on the ground and she's feeling way less righteous. It turns out if you literally are looking down at people it becomes easier to act like you know anything. He mouths 'LYDIA, WHY!!!' and she says completely fearlessly, "I told you I loved you so, uh, duh?"

Then he asks aloud 'What's wrong with all of you?!'.

And this time Lydia's hackles rise again, "What's wrong with you?!" She shouts right back. "I don't like the idea of being dead any more than anybody else, but I'd rather be dead than helpless to help those I care about! I'd rather be dead than seeing you vanish out of my life like this! That'd hurt way more than dyin'!"

She pauses and adds after that dramatic speech, "Probably? I don't like the feeling! So I'm here. To kill your dad I guess."

GS: Lydia Seren has attacked Lubov with Speed of Light!
GS: Lydia Seren has completed her action.
GS: Lubov takes a solid hit from Lydia Seren's Speed of Light for 83 hit points!
GS: Riposte! applied to Lydia Seren!
<Pose Tracker> Lubov has posed.

There is something deeply wrong with the Furied Steel.

They were never really much for words to begin with, and prone towards following even the most morally lax of orders without question, for the right pay -- it's why Lubov hired them to begin with. But as the pair rise from their prone positions, armors alight in strange, shining runes, there is -nothing- from them in the way of what most would call coherence. They stumble, knock into each other. One snarls as if trying to produce words.

And all that comes out is seething aggression and an unnatural billow of steam from cracked lips.

More like Fiends one might encounter on the wary roads of Spira than actual humans, the mercenaries remain low to the ground, eyes bulging, muscles growing and tensing, hands gripped so tightly to their weapons one can hear the dangerous groan of leather and wood beneath their grips. Straining, bloodshot eyes turn towards Lydia. The one holding his massive sword tenses, as if he may just lunge straight for her, high in the sky though she is.

Lubov pays it no mind. Dusting off his coat, the frown that carves downward at the corners of his lips promises nothing but unhappiness for Ivan as that cold gaze turns towards him -- past him. Towards Lydia.

"Then it hardly matters, does it?"

The guard prepares to lunge --

and then suddenly

            KERO

(translator's note: KERO means RIBBIT)

FWOMPH

In hops the mighty, gigantic frog, its many bewildering hops and just being a giant frog leaping out of nowhere enough to knock the two mercenaries off their feet. Lubov shields himself with one hand over his eyes and an exasperated "What in the world--" before yet more join the fray.

Ragnell receives her answer first, lightning bullets cracking harsh across the rippling surface of the barrier Lubov has erected for himself; detached green eyes glare at her during her descent, the corner of his mouth pulling taut in thought.

"You are..."

The thought never quite finishes itself; after all, soon moe are joining the fray. The mercenaries, still recovering from the frog's rampage, turns attention towards Lydia as she lashes out in attack. Her blade carves across the sword-wielding guard's side, a splatter of blood decorating the devastated earth beneath him as he staggers.

<Pose Tracker> Lubov has posed.

Steam rises off that blood as the guard turns an animalistic glare upon the beastwoman, and -charges- towards her.

It is not him she has to worry about; there is the twang of an bow's quiver, and then a raucous CRACK like a thunderclap -- and then a -barrage- of arrows fired with all the horrible velocity of a cannonball volley fires upon Lydia from afar courtesy of that second mercenary, wielding a bow almost as large as she is. Arrows fly towards Lydia as she lands. Several pierce through the flesh of the large man bearing down on her, heavy sword held high. He seems not to notice, or at least, be able to express the pain. That sword comes down --

Before a cage of earth traps the man in place seconds before that sword can swing down.

Bleeding, steaming, confused, the man struggles against those pillars. A snarl like an angry bear's ripples past his throat as Jay's cage confines him. Lubov does not even so much as deign to look; a sigh breathes past his lips as green, fae light blooms beneath him. "More fools. You've turned my outpost into a circus, Ivan. Was this your grand plan? To trifle me to death?"

...Well, I see no need to introduce myself.

"I don't, either."

There is a sound of fracturing earth. And that guard literally -tears- himself free, jagged rock cutting deep into muscle as he -slams- his sword down into the earth. A second later, hellish red light BLOOMS from the ground, shrieking burst after burst of raw kinetic power that goes flying for Jay and Ragnell beyond in raucous, unrelenting explosions. The woman turns her bow high, and fires into the air --

Something -explodes-

    and seconds later a massive hammer comes dropping down towards the head of valiant Frog, with the cruelest, most savage

                                   POW!

    in all creation.

And the more they fight, the more it becomes clear. They are moving fast, hitting -hard-, the earth sundering beneath their every blow. It isn't human. But they are. Hellions? Fiends?

No. And it becomes clearer and clearer, the more audible the sounds of tearing and popping are.

The enchantments are making them strong. Making them aggressive. Making them -monstrous-. Far beyond what any human body can tolerate. They're literally tearing themselves apart.

A fact only possible thanks to the bloom of ephemeral green that covers the entire battlefield in a field of verdant life, glowing plantlife sprouting from the ground and releasing spores of healing into the air that knit torn tendons and muscles, seal cuts and gashes, forcibly corrects and reasserts broken bones.

So those berserkers can continue their fight unrestrained, butchering themselves and the battlefield around them.

<Pose Tracker> Lubov has posed.

And in the back, behind them all, Lubov heals wounds just as quickly as his enchantments inflict them, indifferent to the pain his subordinates go through for his sake. Indifferent--

--at least, until fire CONSUMES in a broiling ring, prefaced by a distinctive and familiar burst of ice.

The large man -lunges- in turn, interposing himself and -shoving- Lubov aside so that the flames wash over -him-, protecting his charge from the bulk of harm. A roar of pain escapes him as those flames rise high, seemingly consuming him in a wide ring of flame that entraps the Duke. He feels the heat lick at his skin. But what he is most interested in, even as he finds himself fenced in with Ivan... is that spear of ice that LANCES through the shoulder of the archer, sending her lurching backwards into a crouch.

Green eyes track the movement. They fall upon Talia. And for a single second, Lubov is silent.

"... ah," he sighs, almost weary. A gloved hand rises to rub his eyes. "I see."

And past the veil of his gloved fingers, he -stares- at Ivan. Surrounded by flames, he stares his son down like one might glare at an incompetent employee on his last leg. He turns. Slowly.

"Is there anything you cannot fall short on, boy? You are a poor man's liar. You are a poor man's assassin. You are a poor man's spy. You have never risen up to the task. And when I extend a single olive branch to you--"

His gloved hand gestures broadly.

"--you do -this-. Imperiling nothing but your own sense of worth. You have too much of -her- blood in your veins."

It's vile, dispassionately vitriolic, and most of all --

--it is a distraction.

"GWARGH"

As a large man twice Ivan's size EXPLODES through the ring, on fire, skin charred, a rush of twining water GUSHING healing streams along him and massive greatsword dragging low across the ground so that it might SWING forward in a violent, brutal uppercutting motion towards Ivan's back.

"It's why you were defective from the start."

And it is only then that Lubov looks towards Talia. Talia, alive. Talia, watching him. Talia...

"Then I will offer the same to you, Talia."

He looks away. Towards the madness. Towards the violence.

"These must be your friends, I take it. That is a disappointment enough, but I have no interest in them."

And when he looks back, that gloved hand extends. In offering.

"It's time to come back, girl. Come back...

"... and I will leave your caravan of buffoons alone."

An olive branch.

GS: Lubov has attacked Lubov with Healing Circle!
GS: Lubov has gained 2 Combo!
GS: Lubov heals Lubov! He gains 250 temporary hit points!
GS: Cover! applied to Lubov!
GS: Lubov has attacked Lubov with Elixir Vitae!
GS: Lubov has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Lubov heals Lubov! He gains 125 temporary hit points!
GS:  Restore reduces negative status durations by 3 rounds each!
GS: Lock State! applied to Lubov!
GS: Cover! applied to Lubov!
GS: Lubov has attacked Ivan with Heavy Tiger Blade!
GS: Lubov has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Lubov has spent 1 Combo on Poison, including 3 on Gatling!
GS: Lubov has attacked Lydia Seren with Sword Rain Alpha!
GS: Lubov has attacked Seraph Amaranth with Cruel Pow Hammer!
GS: Lubov has attacked Seraph Ragnell with Demon Fang Barrage!
GS: Lubov has attacked Jacqueline Barber with Demon Fang Barrage!
GS: Lubov has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Lubov has completed his action.
DC: 2 turns have elapsed in the battle against Lubov! 3 turns remain!
GS: Seraph Amaranth takes a glancing hit from Lubov's Cruel Pow Hammer for 80 hit points!
GS: Lydia Seren takes a glancing hit from Lubov's Sword Rain Alpha for 86 hit points!
GS: Lydia Seren suffers an additional 22 from Poison's Combo effect!
GS: Poison! applied to Lydia Seren!
GS: CRITICAL! Jacqueline Barber guards a hit from Lubov's Demon Fang Barrage for 75 hit points!
GS: Seraph Ragnell takes a glancing hit from Lubov's Demon Fang Barrage for 64 hit points!
GS: Ivan completely evades a hit from Lubov's Heavy Tiger Blade!
GS: Mighty! applied to Lubov!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Amaranth has posed.

    The Frog frolicks and thrashes, trying to make as much chaos and to rankle the ranks of the armored bodyguards and keep them out of the fight as much as it possibly can. But it knows its time is numbered, for--

    The cruelest hammer is held aloft over it!

    "K-KERO--"

    *POW*

    "Kaeruuu--!" the Frog chirps with a circle of stars over its head and X's for eyes, before it hops away to return home. Goho-M, Frog. Mr. Gency's Exit is that way.

    Talia says she has so many words for Ivan, and she looks towards him too.

    "... I won't say I've never done something like this. And just like before, my sister had to pull me out of trouble. So maybe it's time for me to try to pass that along..."

    She sucks in a breath and smiles to Lydia, tilting her head. "My books! My--"

    A pause. "Wait which books."

    That shortcircuited thought has to wait because she leaps down to size up the Furied Steel, drawing her kodachi. She's terribly outmatched. What's new?

    But it is his words for Ivan that rankle her, make something within her creep.

    Because she, too, has her once-master. Someone of entirely the same disposition. The appearance, the personality, the temperance, all different. But the single belief in their core is the same:

    You exist because I let you.

    "... there will be no return," Amaranth answers. "Because we are on the step to recovery. To make a life of our own. Outside this network of abusers that you, that the Shadow Dragon Master, that my Once-Master have kept alive... for so long."

    She lifts her head up. Her eyes are gray and filmy, covered in cataracts.

    "We can live free of abuse."

    And with that-- a proper ninjutsu is engaged, as she holds her fingers aloft her lips; she whispers the ancient mudras, and shadow clones erupt from her left, her right, moving as if a disconcerting swarm as she draws her sword and charges forward.

    One--feint, two--feint, three-feint, the imaginary, illusory blades start to strike at nothing, hitting nothing, passing through, hiding the killing blade within.

GS: Seraph Amaranth has attacked Lubov with Little Legion!
GS: Seraph Amaranth has completed her action.
GS: Lubov guards a hit from Seraph Amaranth's Little Legion for 89 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.

    Ragnell only gives Ivan a broad shrug. Technically she never promised that, and anyway, his sister begged her for help, and everyone else was going so she might as well have gone too.
    
    That shrug probably does not convey all that information. At least Amaranth conveys *some* of it; when she mentions her sister helping her out, Ragnell shrugs again.
    
    Either way, she lets Talia yell at Ivan and Jay almost-but-not introduce herself to Lubov; she glances over at Lydia when the beastwoman shouts her name from atop the meteor shrimp and gives them both a crooked smile and a two-fingered salute in greeting.
    
    That smile fades when she looks over at Lubov's flunkies, who transform bestially and lunge for Lydia. Lydia's tough enough to handle herself, though, so she focuses over on Lubov. Huh. A barrier. He seems to recognize her, too, or at least what she is; the latter is likelier, since for all Ragnell suggestedjokedthreatened to Ivan she spy on his dad, she never actually did any such thing. "What about me?" she prompts, without truly expecting an answer.
    
    Either way, before she gets any answer, one of the guards rips himself from the shattering earth, breaking it further with his sword, from which a Demon Fang, But Way Bigger, explodes. Ragnell is genuinely surprised by this, and though she manages to leap most of the way out of the way, it tags her as it passes and sends her *slamming* backwards into the ground as it explodes. Ragnell boggles at this unexpected level of power before leaping up to her feet. Lubov is, at this point, talking to his children. He is a giant dickhole about it. Ragnell peers at him for a moment, unsmiling, before lifting her chin to better look down her nose at him.
    
    "Wow," she utters. "You sure love to hear yourself talk."
    
    She'll let Amaranth be eloquent about it. For her part, Ragnell finds she has little to say to a man like this. Not masking her contempt at all, Ragnell rolls her eyes, points one of her guns at the mook that shot off a Super Demon Fang at her, charges her Seraphic power within it for a moment, and then fires off a bright, brilliant laser to zip across the battlefield and sear into the creepy bastard. Gotta clean up the mooks before moving onto the boss, her stance seems to say.

GS: Seraph Ragnell has attacked Lubov with Rage Laser!
GS: Seraph Ragnell has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Seraph Ragnell has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

"Vanya! I never agreed to say goodbye back there!" Talia shouts at her brother, with a twitch of her eyebrow. "Or to let you do this, by yourself!"

The savagery and brutality of the men that Lubov employs is familiar to Talia. Familiarity does not make it less frightening. She remembers these sorts; remembers how they seemed more animal than human, how they would strike her at Lubov's command -- and how sure she was that they didn't strike her at his command, too.

The cold, sick feeling in her stomach only grows harder. Like a pit of ice that she cannot swallow. She watches those savage, terrible mercenaries launch themselves at her friends -- at her brother. She watches the enormous hammer crash down at Frog. She hears Jay speak with Lubov, and she feels sick. Suddenly, all of this feels like a failure.

She hears what the others say like it is through a din, echoing hollow and tinny in her ears. Ammy's words somehow feel distant, even when her heart screams they shouldn't. For a moment, staring at that extended glove, it feels like everything Ammy ever told her was about some other Talia.

Lubov extends an olive branch, and he knows what she expects; what nineteen years of habit almost make her accept, in an instant and without a thought. But, something else he says echoes in her mind, over and over:

'You have too much of -her- blood in your veins.'

Her hand balls into a fist, slowly, at her side. Then, the cold is gone in a wash of heated rage, her face becoming a furious mask. "Do not," Talia says in a voice that becomes a rising scream, "SPEAK OF OUR MOTHER!"

She sprints forward, her body moving into a burst of motion before memories and doubts can anchor her. Talia ducks low, rolls across the ground, and comes up; her hand snatches Mirage where it plunged into stone, and she yanks it free. Sparks spray as the whorled steel is torn from the stone, and her eyes have an enraged fire rarely seen.

She leaps -- kicks off the back of one mercenary -- and then swings Mirage back over her head and screams, before slashing it down with an overhead slash at her father's barrier, then slams her foot into it with an explosion of chi.

GS: Talia has attacked Lubov with Demonic Swallow Kick!
GS: Talia has gained 3 Combo!
GS: Talia has completed her action.
GS: Pierce!! Seraph Ragnell's attack breaks through 81 temporary hit points! 80 remain!
GS: Lubov guards a hit from Seraph Ragnell's Rage Laser for 81 hit points!
GS: Lubov takes a solid hit from Talia's Demonic Swallow Kick for 69 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.

"That about sums it up, yes." Jacqueline replies with a nod and a smile as Lydia spots her. She looks toward Ivan, then, as he asks that question - what's wrong with all of you? Jacqueline shakes her head.

"Talia asked for my help. And you should know by now that I'm not the sort of person to abandon someone who needs me." Jacqueline explains. "...Even you."

She turns, then, back toward Lubov and his men, a frown crossing over her face. His men get her attention more than he does - the way they act, the way they move...they're more like Fiends and Hellions than humans, but...she doesn't detect any Malevolence from them - at least, not enough to explain this.

And then, suddenly, the guard she had trapped bursts from his prison out of fury. Jacqueline gestures again with her left hand raising a pillar of earth to protect herself, but even that isn't enough - the first burst of power shatters the pillar into dust, and the next comes screaming toward her. She whirls her cloak around her to protect herself, but even so the sheer force of it sends her flying back off of the Frog, crashing down just in time to be struck with the next one.

With a wince of effort she hauls herself to her feet...and stares in horror. As an alchemist with a focus on treating people, she knew a thing or two about the human body. And she knew it shouldn't move like that.

Horror crosses over her face as she realizes this.

"...What have you done to them...?" She whispers. She takes note of the healing power emerging from the ground. She reaches into her bag for a specific potion...but stops herself.

...She could try to reverse the effects of the healing...but such an action would kill them, in their current state - if it took. Even now, she couldn't bear that thought.

Besides, those potions were reserved for Lunata, now.

"...You're a monster." She says, staring directly at Lubov. "Are they just tools to you? Property of yours?"

His specific, derisive use of the word 'caravan' in reference to everyone gathered here causes her to bristle a bit, but she keeps her cool.

She listens as Talia shouts at Lubov, and she doesn't blame her. Jacqueline takes a step back, trying to get out of melee range, and as she moves she casts her right hand out, invoking an earth-based Crest to send a wave of debris flying at Lubov and his guards. It's a distraction, more than anything.

"...They're using some kind of sorcery to patch themselves back up. I can't promise anything, but I'm going to try to see if I can't pinpoint where it's coming from." Jacqueline whispers to her allies. She looks around, flexing her fingers as she tries to look, focusing on the sensation of power. Someone or something had to be maintaining a spell like this - but where could they be?

GS: Jacqueline Barber has attacked Lubov with Rubble-Rouser!
GS: Jacqueline Barber has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Jacqueline Barber has completed her action.
GS: Lubov guards a hit from Jacqueline Barber's Rubble-Rouser for 69 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

I told you I loved you so, uh, duh?

Ivan's soul escapes his body once again, this time because Lydia is TALKING ABOUT LOVING HIM IN FRONT OF HIS EVIL DAD. Don't kill Ivan before you can save him, Lydia!

As he's trying to recover, she calls him out on almost dissappearing from her life and expecting her to sit back and accept it.

He sputters. "I wasn't dissappearing! I have it handled, so you can just get back to whatever you were doing!"

Forget that it's impossible for the situation to simultaneously be too dangerous for Lydia to be so much as seen in while also easily handled by Ivan alone.

Ragnell simply shrugs off Ivan's accusatory glare, which is about what he expected her to do, and Jacqueline explains that helping people -- even people like him -- is simply her approach to life. He goes "aah" again, because he is skillful and eloquent when it comes to handling unexpected and unexplainable kindness.

Lubov's mercenaries go on the attack, their behavior fierce beyond reason, something between an animal and an animated puppet. Ivan doesn't know what makes them that way -- whether Lubov grew tired of having thinking minions and found some magic to get rid of their human spark, or maybe he's just brought them back from the brink of death so often that they left their humanity behind somewhere in the pain.

The fire rises up in a ring, and Lubov gives his critique of Ivan and his unintended ambush.

Is there anything you cannot fall short on, boy? You are a poor man's liar...

Ivan gives a grimace of a smile through Lubov's words -- the word 'defective' bringing out more of the wince in the smile. "I did have you going for a while, though, you have to admit," he says, with strained lightness, even as his heart is sinking. Ivan's gambit is over. Lubov has seen Talia -- and... everyone. Lydia repeated her damned confession in front of him. The only hope now is to completely end it here. And -- can they?

Amaranth joins Ivan and Talia in facing Lubov, offering words of solidarity to the twins, and defiance to Lubov. Talia is given an offer to simply go back to her old life, and responds with rage as Lubov speaks contemptuously of their mother. "Talia-..." he says, with worry and regret. This wasn't supposed to go like this, with her having to deal with this world again.

The thought comes to him again -- is there still a way through this? Can they actually end it here, or have the twins just pulled in several of the people they know the best to die with them in solidarity?

He flicks an eye out toward the chaos he can see beyond the flames, searching out the others, and instead seeing a flicker of movement from just behind him.

Shit!

Fearful memories threaten to freeze him to the spot, but his reflexes don't fail him, and his body moves ahead of his mind. As the massive mercenary's greatsword swings up, Ivan leaps into a back handspring, circling over the large blade as it crashes upward toward the spot he had occupied. His heart pounds in his chest as the memories play on anyway -- of being caught unawares from behind as he tried to threaten his father into allowing him and Talia to flee, the feeling of a sword driving into his back before the guards encircled him...

But not this time. "I'm still better than some of your hires, at least," he breathes to Lubov, as he calls more fire around himself. He shapes his hands into a sphere, and the fire flares off of them, taking form into a translucent ball of flame that lifts off his hands and begins growing and rolling forward, engulfing the Guard who struck out at him, if he stays put, and anyone else who gets in its way as it rolls toward its ultimate target, Lubov.

GS: Ivan has spent 1 Combo on Poison, including 1 on Gatling!
GS: Ivan has attacked Lubov with Searing Sphere!
GS: Ivan has completed his action.
GS: Lubov guards a hit from Ivan's Searing Sphere for 75 hit points!
GS: Poison! applied to Lubov!
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.

"Well, there was Luke's adventure--" Lydia begins answering Amaranth when all of a sudden the guy she sliced has STEAM rushing out of his wounds. Lydia's response is for her eyes to bug out at this horrifying display. It is very distracting from the archer shooting THROUGH him to get to her. It is a level of cruelty beyond even Lydia who has experienced great cruelty can expect.

The arrows punch through Lydia, sending solidified mechanical gears and screws spilling out her back that melt partway through in the air and splash to the ground in liquid silver. Several gaping holes that can Lubov can SEE through remain in Lydia's body though he can also see the body knitting itself back together even as Lydia stumbles backwards, clutching the wound with a hand even though it is strictly unneccessary. She doesn't want to lose it like she did when Talia was the one in trouble.

This doesn't stop her from smiling brightly at Ragnell as she gives the guy the sass.

"Just so you know, blood doesn't work like that!" Lydia manages, gritting her teeth through the pain she still feels. "When you have an asshole parent and a less asshole parent, you don't get someone who is a middle of the asshole person. That's a common myth."

She points an arm dramatically towards Lubov. "They're defective all on their own!"

She pauses, lowering her hand because she didn't quite mean for it to come out like that. "Um, I mean, like, that which you call defects are actually really great characteristics to have, um... I hope that came across."

She throws up some more silver fluid to the side.

Jay is literally over there calling Lubov a monster and if Lydia wasn't convinced this guy was a pure grade dick, that would certainly clinch it.

Lydia raises an arm up and it splits into several tendrils that try to punch right through these men. If slicing doesn't work, well, there's always this option. She STILL isn't sure where those arrows came from in all the chaos but her eyes set on that large bow, frowning faintly.

Ammy's own answer resonates with Lydia though it's difficult to properly appreciate while she's getting skewered and also trying to argue (she has not learned Ragnell's lesson of not having things to say yet but maybe that's an advanced evil mentory lesson).

"Least people like circuses." She mutters.

She does not try to kill Ivan again...

...For now. Though she does add an 'Oh Snap' to his OWN quip. Ivan quipped!

Lydia is so proud.

GS: Lydia Seren has attacked Lubov with Reshape Riot!
GS: Lydia Seren has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Lydia Seren takes 25 damage from Poison!
GS: Lydia Seren has completed her action.
GS: Lubov takes a solid hit from Lydia Seren's Reshape Riot for 116 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Lubov has posed.

From a distance, Lubov watches as Lydia falls apart in cogs, as she spits silver, as she reforms in real-time. His head cocks.

"... Interesting," he muses, to himself.

"And this is the creature you've chosen over your legacy, Ivan?"

What about me?

And as Ragnell might have expected--

"Nothing that will matter."

The answer she gets is far from satisfactory.

It's true of how he deals with much of this situation. The rest of the world might as well be inconsequential. It is writ large in his expression, in the way he carries himself. A man who feels he's owed more than he has, more than anyone has. He looks almost at a remove from this entire encounter, as if it does not merit an iota of his attention.

Lubov, at this time, has focus only for Talia, and the answer he knows should come. Because it's expected. Because he's entitled to it.

Because this is what she was made for.

He hears Amaranth, speaking from the heart, from personal experience, and that weathered, weary gaze flits briefly toward Amaranth. He pauses at the sight of her eyes -- and then that stare narrows in the tick of annoyance. His fingers curl with the creak of leather.

"This is not -your- decision. And the last thing I need," he begins to hiss, "is some blind fool--"

No not SPEAK OF OUR MOTHER!

"...?"

It speaks volumes that it is understated bewilderment that briefly seizes Lubov's expression in the aftermath of his daughter's scream. He stares at the smear of motion that Talia has become, swinging a hand once given in offering outward in raw, slighted aggression. She launches off the back of the larger mercenary seconds before his blade can cleave her, -smashing- into the earth with such force it gets lodged in rock -- rock that churns before pelting him with a volley of earth, welting skin and cracking against joints with more than distraction enough to keep him from pursuit. The other raises her large bow, nocking a broad arrowhead upon its arch. She aims --

--and before she can, clones of woven shadow swarm past her in a dizzying, disorienting array. She -growls-, lips peeling backward to bear teeth as the ironically well-named Furied Steel -wips- one broad arm outward to blow through shadows --

*shunk*

-- only to widen her bulging eyes as a real blade of cold steel sinks into her back, toppling her forward onto her knees with a wet cough before she topples down, face first.

<Pose Tracker> Lubov has posed.

People call him out. Decry him as a monster. He has no time to respond. Talia flies. His barrier asserts itself, white magic knotting itself into a thick layer of semi-transparent space between himself and his daughter. Mirage crashes into it in a FLASH of sparks. It holds fast, resisting with impenetrable defense.

And in the distance, the berserker with his immense greatsword bellows hellishly, -tearing- his weapon from the earth, battered, bruised, bleeding, -steaming-, but ready to lunge for Talia--

There is a crackle of ionizing air. And just as he begins to leap, a laser of pure plasma PUNCTURES through the back of his knee courtesy of a certain gunslinging Seraph. A strangled sound like surprise chokes from his throat as he staggers forward into a topple. He catches himself, hands on the earth, apparently prepared to move even -then-...

... quicksilver tendrils -batter- into the side of him, sending him lurching before he can manage, set off his footing --

--and perfectly primed for the broiling ball of flame that envelopes him.

There is a raw scream that sounds more angry than pained -- after all, in this state, 'pain' must simply be the modus operandi for this poor man -- before he topples over, broiled and smoking distastefully.

And that flame continues on. And the exact moment that Talia's downward kick RUPTURES into Lubov's barrier --

That flame RUSHES into it from the other side. Hairline fractures form.

"What--?!"

And surprise is his downfall, as the combined efforts of his children see his barrier shattered, flames washing over him as the sole of Talia's foot CRACKS across his jaw with a sickening crunch.

And down falls Lubov, with an unceremoniously meaty thud. Silence rains as fire licks at his coat, gobbling a greedy path along couture fabric. Perhaps, for a moment, it seems Ivan's hopes may be realized. This might be the end of it. This--

"Thitthhs...ss... this..." a voice chokes amidst the dust, "is -beneath- me..."

Slowly, the Rolancian Duke drags up onto his knees. His jaw is swollen. It might have been broken, earlier. But now they can all see as it sets itself, as he rotates it with a grimace.

As burn marks melt away from exposed skin like it was never there.

"I offer peace to dogs, and you spit on my hand before biting it. So be it. I should have known your nature, Natalia. I -bred- it into you. And yet -now- you act as if you can be different."

He stands, wiping a lingering trail of red from his lip, fresh blood from where his teeth bit into his now-mended tongue. His hand quivers as he bites the inside of his cheek, indignation stoking in those once detached green eyes.

"But I know. And -you- know." His hand curls, clenched tight. The cold fire of those eyes fixates on his children.

"I have no -less- right to speak of her than you do."

And there he stands. His guards fallen, even if his wounds heal. Cornered. Without his men, with only those defensive spells to protect him, there is likely little for him to do. But Jay will notice, as she searches. Cold green eyes temper anew as they look towards those fallen guards, lips pressed into a thin line.

"... perhaps you are not wrong about that much, Ivan," he concedes, in rare form. "These are failures, too. Stifled by flesh. I am forever surrounded by limitation and mediocrity. But I still have so much more to achieve." His hand slips inside the interior pocket of his ruined coat, feeling that parchment, still intact. His eyes shut.

"... Children are made to inherit the legacy of their parents. One that cannot, or will not, has no purpose. You call me a monster for this?"

Jay can feel it. The spell is still active.

"I say anyone who would do any less will gain nothing of life but contempt and disappointment."

An immense, overflowing wellspring of regenerative potency, all focused around --

"Wake up."

Around Lubov.

<Pose Tracker> Lubov has posed.

And in that moment, celestial light in greens and whites bloom from the man in a way far too radiant for something so heinous. Magic-wrought feathers float through the air, settling on the Furied Steel. Melting into them. Sinking deep. Knitting into their flesh.

"g-guhh -- gahh -- AGHH--"

The serenity of that ephemeral glow ruined by the choked sound of pain and fury rippling from hoarse mercenary throats as life is breathed back into them.

They drag onto their feet, misshapen bodies being forcibly -twisted- back into their right places. Every injury, every wound, washed away, so that nerves dulled down by repeated, self-inflicted abuse can ignite with raging life once more. Reddened eyes turn to stare at the gathered.

"I have changed my mind," announces Lubov. His stare falls on Lydia.

"Take her in alive."

He steps back, the fae glow of rejuvinating life still clinging to him like a sick joke as his guards turn.

"Kill the rest."

And with that -- they -lunge-.

Their movements are heinously fast. The greatsword-bearing berserker -instantly- lunges forward, his velocity building up so quickly he breaks the sound barrier in a deafening BOOM as he -cleaves- through their ranks with his massive greatsword. At the end, he stops, skidding across the ground so hard his femur snaps.

There's no need to worry. It lurches back into place a second later so that he may do it all again.

And while he cleaves through the battlefield with thrust after bone-breaking thrust, the archer tenses, lowers herself --

-- and LEAPS into the air with knee-shattering strength. Her greatbow turns downward. Her arrow ignites in flames that burn at her hand.

And she fires, bolt after bolt, raining misery and destruction on the battlefield, every arrow impacting the ground with a screaming railgun's velocity, as if she were trying to rain arrows all her own between her burning fingers.

Endlessly maiming themselves.

Endlessly being healed, to do it all again.

GS: Lubov has spent 1 Combo on Link, including 3 on Gatling!
GS: Lubov has attacked Lubov with Revive!
GS: Lubov has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Lubov has launched an attack Link!
GS: Lubov heals Lubov! He gains 250 temporary hit points!
GS: Hyper! applied to Lubov!
GS: Lubov's  stance ends. He enters the Avenger stance!
GS: Lubov used Mystic on Lubov! Status effect durations increased by 2! Temporary HP duration increased by 2!
GS: Lubov has activated a Force Action!
GS: Lubov has attacked Lydia Seren with Arise and Crush Anew!
GS: Lubov has attacked Ivan with Arise and Crush Anew!
GS: Lubov has attacked Jacqueline Barber with Arise and Crush Anew!
GS: Lubov has attacked Talia with Arise and Crush Anew!
GS: Lubov has attacked Seraph Ragnell with Arise and Crush Anew!
GS: Lubov has attacked Seraph Amaranth with Arise and Crush Anew!
GS: Seraph Amaranth guards a hit from Lubov's Arise and Crush Anew for 115 hit points!
GS: Lubov has attacked Lydia Seren with Super Sonic Thrust Pincer!
GS: Lubov has attacked Ivan with Super Sonic Thrust Pincer!
GS: Lubov has attacked Jacqueline Barber with Super Sonic Thrust Pincer!
GS: Lubov has attacked Talia with Super Sonic Thrust Pincer!
GS: Lubov has attacked Seraph Ragnell with Super Sonic Thrust Pincer!
GS: Lubov has attacked Seraph Amaranth with Super Sonic Thrust Pincer!
GS: Lubov has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Seraph Amaranth critically Guards a hit from Lubov's Super Sonic Thrust Pincer for 61 hit points!
GS: Seraph Amaranth enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: Jacqueline Barber guards a hit from Lubov's Arise and Crush Anew for 113 hit points!
GS: CRITICAL! Jacqueline Barber critically Guards a hit from Lubov's Super Sonic Thrust Pincer for 62 hit points!
GS: Lubov has completed his action.
DC: 3 turns have elapsed in the battle against Lubov! 2 turns remain!
GS: Lydia Seren takes a glancing hit from Lubov's Arise and Crush Anew for 103 hit points!
GS: Lydia Seren takes a glancing hit from Lubov's Super Sonic Thrust Pincer for 92 hit points!
GS: Lydia Seren enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Lubov's Arise and Crush Anew for 104 hit points!
GS: Talia takes a glancing hit from Lubov's Super Sonic Thrust Pincer for 138 hit points!
GS: Seraph Ragnell takes a glancing hit from Lubov's Arise and Crush Anew for 103 hit points!
GS: Seraph Ragnell takes a solid hit from Lubov's Super Sonic Thrust Pincer for 133 hit points!
GS: Ivan critically Guards a hit from Lubov's Arise and Crush Anew for 37 hit points!
GS: Ivan guards a hit from Lubov's Super Sonic Thrust Pincer for 138 hit points!
GS: Ivan enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.

Jacqueline doesn't find herself hating many people. She tries to see the good in them - to at least understand where they're coming from, even if she doesn't agree with their goals and methods.

This man?

This man, she hates.

Even as the others lash out at him and his guards, they somehow remain intact. He manages to stand up, even after all that.

'You call me a monster for this?', he asks. Jacqueline's eyes narrow.

"Yes," She confirms. "Emphatically!"

She takes note of the surge of power, and the way it centers...on Lubov himself. That was surprising. If that was the case, they wouldn't be able to stop it unless they could stop him. But, he isn't going to go down easily. He changes his mind.

'Kill the rest'.

Lubov's guards attack with terrible fury. One swigs his sword with enough force to break both the sound barrier and bones - including his own. The other fires arrows with all the force of any of the most dangerous of ARMs all over the battlefield.

Jacqueline attempts to defend herself with pillars of earth, but eventually they're overwhelmed, and she and they both collapse to the ground.

Jacqueline lays still for a moment beneath a pile of rubble of her own making...but, eventually, she coughs, and the rubble starts to move.

"You may...be their father, and...do note that I am using only the strictest definition of the word," She says, hauling herself up with some effort. Her breathing is a little labored, but she's still standing. "...but their lives are...their own to live. They have no obligation to carry on your legacy - your job as a parent is to take care of and prepare them to establish a legacy of their own. To inspire them to become great people, not to use them as your tools." She says as she manages to stand up to her full height once more, a cold fire in her eyes. "I am so, very tired, of people telling me that the only way to succeed is to blacken your heart and inflict pain and suffering on others! Look at you! Look at them!"

She shakes her head.

"The moment someone showed them the love and kindness you deprived them, they fled, and they've done great things without your influence. Contempt and disappointment? The only one receiving that here is you. And that is all you deserve."

She places a hand over her heart. This might be seen as just an emphatic gesture...but those who knew her well knew that this was where she kept her Earth Medium.

"Grudiev...please. Show them your Earthly Embrace!" She retreats. It has been so long since she has asked for the Earth Guardian's help. But even so, now, when she is in need of him, he appears.

It's only a faint silhouette, due to the strain required to even manifest, but even so, the image of the great saurian Guardian of Earth appears, in all his glory. Rubble, debris, and all manner of loose items shift, drawn into the vents on his back...which is then exhaled over Jacqueline's allies in a glittering, protective shell of diamond.

GS: Jacqueline Barber has attacked Seraph Amaranth with Material - Earthen Embrace!
GS: Jacqueline Barber has attacked Talia with Material - Earthen Embrace!
GS: Jacqueline Barber has attacked Ivan with Material - Earthen Embrace!
GS: Jacqueline Barber has attacked Lydia Seren with Material - Earthen Embrace!
GS: Jacqueline Barber has attacked Seraph Ragnell with Material - Earthen Embrace!
GS: Jacqueline Barber has attacked Jacqueline Barber with Material - Earthen Embrace!
GS: Jacqueline Barber has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Jacqueline Barber has completed her action.
GS: Jacqueline Barber heals Jacqueline Barber! She gains 250 temporary hit points!
GS: Shield! applied to Jacqueline Barber!
GS: Jacqueline Barber heals Seraph Ragnell! She gains 200 temporary hit points!
GS: Shield! applied to Seraph Ragnell!
GS: Seraph Ragnell enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: Jacqueline Barber heals Talia! She gains 200 temporary hit points!
GS: Shield! applied to Talia!
GS: Jacqueline Barber heals Lydia Seren! She gains 200 temporary hit points!
GS: Shield! applied to Lydia Seren!
GS: Jacqueline Barber heals Ivan! He gains 200 temporary hit points!
GS: Shield! applied to Ivan!
GS: Jacqueline Barber heals Seraph Amaranth! She gains 200 temporary hit points!
GS: Shield! applied to Seraph Amaranth!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Amaranth has posed.

r Ragnell's pressing on the advantage with several blasts from her pistols; Amaranth grimaces as her weapon doesn't quite find Lubov himself, but that of another archer who she leaps off off in a motion that feels all too horribly familiar.

    She can't worry about that.

    Lydia is coursing with silver fluid again, splitting herself up into several parts. She's still astonished by that. She does chime in. "The circus is full of life and humour. It brings joy to those who visit it. It is something you'll never understand."

    Jacqueline is calling Lubov a monster, and explains the sorcery that he's using to patch themselves back up. Which is so evidenced, once more, again and again... as he announces--

    Wake up.

    Talia's shouting reverbs into her heart, however, her eyes widening. Do not, she says, SPEAK OF OUR MOTHER!

    "Talia..." she whispers, sordidly, wincing quietly. No, she has to remember herself...

    Remember herself...

    "... Jacqueline. Ragnell. If it is sorcery that mends these poor souls to their bodies, over and over again..."

    She lowers her head.

    "Then I have a solution. But forgive me for the ugliness I am about to commit."

    It may not be as evident to Jacqueline, but it's far more evident to Ragnell, to Lydia, to Talia, and even Ivan. The arts of the Shadow Dragon...

    To pluck away life where it exists.

    This was for both Ivan and Talia. If she has to step back into that life even for a moment, then she'll do it so they can step away...

    She has to believe it'll work.

    The Shadow Skean Cultist slowly steps forward, empowered by the strength of Grudiev, even as the swarm of berserked guards rushes to meet her. The greatsword-wielding berserker nearly cleaves her in half, but the kodachi aloft stands guard long enough for her to dissipate into smoke-stuff, blood trickling away where she vanishes--

    And again, with the archer, as she nearly impales her at a thigh when she arrives up in the air. Bolt after bolt, she's nearly stricken, again and again, disappearing into shadow as she immerses herself in the very shape she was trained to be--

    A living shadow.

    Amaranth is bloody and battered, even for a Seraph, by the time she arrives at the centre of the field.

    "You called me... a blind fool."

    She whispers back in turn, "... you are correct on that front. But do you understand why?"

    The Seraph of Darkness' work exists not on some physical level, but on the plane which the Earthpulse exists, on which the elements foray and dance with one another, on which the very concept of life and death hold fingers so tightly, intertwined with one another.

    One by one, she reaches for those invisible, unknowable threads--

                      ah the threads they criss and cross
                     they knot and loom and sew and tuft
                        the threads that connect life
                         the very product of a weaver

    The living shadow not so much dances as simply flits across the field, seemingly reaching for empty air in her fluid, momentuous passage. It is random, it is senseless, to the seeing, to those with the fortune to see the world for the richness it still has for them.

                      ah the threads they criss and cross
                     they knot and loom and sew and tuft
                   these threads that she can so simply lace
                      upon a needle whose eye cannot see

    Lunn once robbed the Drifters of the colour in their eyes, in Luca. How frightening that such a despondent technique, made to create people who have no choice but to rob the only colour they can still see in the world, survived a thousand years and more. Is it the inevitable desire of those who have been robbed to blot the world of colour?

    She cannot know, but

                      ah the threads they criss and cross
                     they knot and loom and sew and tuft
                      but in the end with one simple pull
                     it all unravels so she can simply...
                                 ...return...
                                   ...to...

GS: Seraph Amaranth has spent 2 Combo on Poison and Gatling, including 1 on Gatling!
GS: Seraph Amaranth enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: Seraph Amaranth has attacked Lubov with A Return to Inanimateness!
GS: Seraph Amaranth has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.

    Ragnell almost chuckles when Jay calls Lubov a monster. These types, they never care about the hurt they inflict on others. You can tell because they're not Hellions. Granted, Lubov isn't completely bereft of Malevolence, like the Shadow Dragon Master, but the fact that he can do and say all these things and see no contradiction in them is more than enough. No, getting called a monster is not going to work on this guy at all.
    
    And, as expected, the one question she does ask of him, he gives her a dismissive answer. She shrugs again. "Cool. Then I don't have to care."
    
    Mind, it's hard to get a guy as up his own ass as this to care that she doesn't care, because he already doesn't care about her. But then, Ragnell doesn't care, so whatever. She does roll her eyes when Lubov calls Amaranth a blind fool, though. Goddess, these types have no self-awareness at *all*.
    
    But then Talia screams at Lubov not to speak of her and Ivan's mother--quite a history there, Ragnell's guessing--and all of a sudden Talia is murdering the *shit* out of one of Lubov's goons. Like, dang. The berserker goon falls soon after, and then Lubov's barrier cracks and shatters, and Lubov is eating dirt.
    
    "Huh. That was fast," she remarks, tone suspicious. Sure enough, he Terminators back up, using healing magic to bring him back to his feel. And then he pulls out a scroll, and healing on a level Ragnell has rarely if ever felt before *surges*, restoring the berserker and the archer to health and--
    
    oh they're actually very fast aren't they
    
    In the wake of the berserker's sword thrust, a sonic boom explodes. You might perhaps call it a sonic thrust. Ragnell is battered to one side, and while she controls her fall to some extent, that was a hell of an attack--as are the arrows that pour forth like starlight, up and then down upon the battlefield. The goons destroy themselves, demonstrating power on a level no ordinary human could attain, and are renewed in kind, allowing them to actually utilize this self-destructive force.
    
    Ragnell coughs and hacks as she rises, staggering, bleeding from several wounds. As a Seraph, she doesn't need to worry about bleeding out since that blood isn't quite the same as what humans have, but it's a deeply unpleasant and painful experience all the same. Damn. The dark side of the healing artes! Ragnell wonders what Clarine would think if she were here. As long as Lubov maintains consciousness, this will be a battle of attrition, too. No wonder Ivan was shitting himself so hard about fighting his dad.
    
    Ugh. What an asshole this guy is.
    
    Jay calls upon the power of Grudiev, which pours through the battlefield and helps knit Ragnell's wounds shut, raising up power to help shield her against the next attacks. She's not really into doing this fight longer than necessary, though. Something about Lubov drains all the fun of battle out of it. She throws a hand up towards Jay in gratitude even as she frowns at the scummy human. A look towards Talia. A look towards Ivan.
    
    "Hmm. Yeah, okay, we're doin' this," Ragnell muses. She stiffens, though, as Amaranth speaks of the healing power and what she must do, of the ugliness that is to follow. "Are you serious? You don't have to--!" She bites back the words. For one, there's no stopping her now. For another, she's not going to waste what Amaranth is about to do. "Tch!!" she snarls, lip curling in anger. "Then if you're gonna go that far--!" Immense power *bursts* up and around her, Seraphic glyph shining under Lubov, power building and growing and towering into the now-stormy skies far above. Glyphs upon glyphs rise with it, stabilizing the crackling ozone that fills the air and presages what is to come. And through it all, the Lightning Seraph chants:
    
        "I, who stand in the full light of the heavens
        "command thee, who opens the gates to hell.
        "Come forth, divine lightning!"
    
    No words for the damned. Ragnell simply narrows her eyes at her target, eyes as sharp as a cut-in.
    
    "INDIGNATION!"
    
    The heavens fall.

GS: Seraph Ragnell has activated a Force Action!
GS: Seraph Ragnell has activated a Force Action!
GS: Seraph Ragnell has spent 3 Combo on Gatling, including 3 on Gatling!
GS: Seraph Ragnell has attacked Lubov with Indignation!
GS: Seraph Ragnell has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

Talia hears Ivan call out to her, as Mirage slams into the barrier around her father. It is repelled, a few sparks lingering in the air. She turns -- and her kick rips through the barrier in tandem with Ivan's flame. The crunch when her boot slams into his face is sickening and satsifying in equal parts. She lands, the offending foot tracing a path through the dirt.

A little puff of sand and dirt flies up in the wake of her landing. She looks up, standing up straighter and looking down at her father, and thinking for a moment that maybe they did it.

"Beneath you?" she spits out. But he rises, like he always does; his jaw sets, skin knits back together, and it is like they never even hurt him. It is something she has seen before, and somehow the dismay is there and the same every time.

'I have no -less- right to speak of her than you do.'

Talia's eyes widen at those words, spoken with lips that are unmarred. She steps back, breath caught in her throat, and her eyes tremble. There are almost tears in them. "Shut... SHUT UP!"

She screams the words, veins straining in her neck and her face turning red.

There is no further lunge towards Lubov. He brings the fallen mercenaries back up. The mercenary's greatsword slams down, and the shockwave throws Talia to the side. She slams, bodily, into the side of Mushroom Rock Road. A few plates of mushroom-like stone crack and crumple down. Talia stumbles -- and then an arrow slams into her side and her hip, catching in the meat of it. Blood wells up from her wounds, staining her clothes.

She stumbles forward, then grips each arrow -- twists -- and tears them out. Her eyes turn, towards Lydia, and then back at Lubov. "You... you can't have her. You can't have any of them! You did your best to ruin our lives! I'm not going to let you ruin theirs!"

She shouts it, even as she realizes: his healing is beyond what they can work with.

Talia looks up at the archer, her breath shaking. She has to take a moment to collect herself -- and glances, sideways, at Jacqueline. Her red eyes widen a little, and despite feeling exhausted and worn, she smiles a little despite herself. Light and diamond swirl about her, offering protection -- sealing her wounds.

She throws Mirage. The weapon screams through the air, and as the archer lands on the opposite cliff, the blade slams at her -- trying to spear her into the cliff. Talia vanishes, body exploding apart into tendrils of shadowstuff, and then reforming. Her hand grips the hilt of Mirage as she does.

She rips her parrying dagger free, and slams it at the archer's neck. Then, Talia twists -- and tries to knock her from the cliffside.

She goes falling, and turns. She screams, holding a hand out--

--and as the archer falls, a massive block of ice appears. It slams down for her, and tries to smash and pin her to the ground at once. Talia lands, in a three-point stance not a moment later. She looks up -- looks at Amaranth -- and her eyes widen. She sees her as shadow, moving, and doing the same technique she saw her use before.

"A-Ammy..." she whispers, softly.

She stands up straight -- and then her frame is a silhouette against the column of brilliant white lightning that Ragnell calls down on her father.

GS: Talia has spent 4 Combo on Link and Gatling, including 3 on Gatling!
GS: Talia has attacked Lubov with Mirage Edge!
GS: Talia has launched an attack Link!
GS: Talia has attacked Lubov with Glacier Crash!
GS: Talia has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Lubov takes a solid hit from Seraph Amaranth's A Return to Inanimateness for 136 hit points!
GS: Poison! applied to Lubov!
GS: Lubov guards a hit from Seraph Ragnell's Indignation for 114 hit points!
GS: Lubov guards a hit from Talia's Mirage Edge for 101 hit points!
GS: Talia assumes the Avenger stance!
GS: Lubov takes a solid hit from Talia's Glacier Crash for 152 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

"...thanks Lydia, probably...!" Ivan weakly calls back, as she delivers an impromptu lesson on asshole genetics and calls the twins defective... with love. Maybe she can help redefine the word if they all survive this.

... surviving. Yeah! That's what they need to do. No more being mad at everyone for coming to save him -- there's no putting that back in the box. Just got to keep them alive, now. Meanwhile, Lydia is getting absolutely brutalized in a way that is sure to demonstrate her amazing bizarre regenerative powers to his father who would no doubt love to study her and manufacture an army that could regenerate without his intervention, but HA HA HA HE'S NOT THINKING ABOUT THAT BECAUSE HE'S DETERMINED TO WIN NOW SO NO ONE HAS TO WORRY ABOUT WHAT LUBOV WILL DO LATER.

Lydia catches Lubov's eye, forcing that very issue, to an extent.

And this is the creature you've chosen over your legacy, Ivan?

Ivan tries his hand at quips, again. "She rode into battle on a meteor shower, you WISH your grand plan was as cool as hanging out with Lydia," he says.

Only to have Lubov threaten to steal Lydia and kill the rest of them. "DIDN'T I SAY SO!?" he yells out to Lydia.

But the battle continues on, with the attacks of their allies downing mercenaries as Ivan and Talia focus on the barrier.

Ivan's eyes widen with hope and horror as he and Talia actually crack through it, and Talia's kick connects with a sickening crunch, downing their father to be engulfed by Ivan's flames. But... it isn't enough to stop his relentless healing, and he rises, the jaw Talia broke and the burns righting themselves as he dismisses all of that's happening here as simple ingratitude.

Ivan doesn't quite understand what passes between Lubov and Talia -- why the words about their mother upset her so much. Their mother was always... a hopeful abstraction, to Ivan. But maybe Talia can't stand to let Lubov sully that last thread of hope for a caring family that they held onto.

Lubov's men lie felled around them by the combined efforts of their friends, but at Lubov's word, they... rise again.

Ivan feels panic starting to bubble up -- futile, it's all futile -- as the mercenaries rush into explosive motion, heedless of the limitations of their bodies.

Ivan throws up his arms in defense, throwing an outward blast of fire to try to absorm some of the momentum as an attack from the greatsword wielder finds him -- his armored bracers crunch inward, but hold insomuch as his arms aren't severed, as the strike throws him from his feet. As he crashes backward, a barrage of arrows finds him, several of them burying in his back.

He hisses with pain as he rolls to one side, enough to get free motion of one arm. He calls a wind of dancing sparks, gathering power, and more power, until dozens of flickering lights dance around him. If he can blast them to ash, they can't rise again. But there's no way to do that without threatening everyone here. He continues gathering power, not quite sure what to do with it that would have real meaning, while the others make their moves.

Jacqueline Barber has, it seems, seen enough of this. She emphatically calls Lubov a monster, and really rips into him, besides. She calls forth the image of a mysterious Medium, and a diamond dust washes over them, seeping strength back into Ivan's limbs, and leaving behind a phantom image that speaks of magical protection. Ivan rises to his feet, still holding the sparks of gathered spell around him like a cloud of fireflies.

Katherine steps forward to perform some strange ritual. The dark power and sheer potential of it is obvious even to Ivan, though he can't be sure yet what its purpose is. He can only hope it's worth the 'ugliness' she's forcing herself to relive.

Ragnell effectively challenges Lubov to a battle of indifference, and having probably almost destroyed a world once, she is probably better positioned than anyone to simply blow off Lubov, near-immortal though he might be. She backs it up with a dazzling fall of lightning.

It could be enough, couldn't it? Or is that wishful thinking? The way this is going... ... Ivan's gaze goes past all of the activity of the battle, and upward, and he realizes what he can do. All the sparks rush forward -- past the gathered combatants, and out to the cliffs that loom over them. It's not until the sparks bury themselves in the rock wall that they begin to detonate.

GS: Ivan has spent 1 Combo on Gatling, including 1 on Gatling!
GS: Ivan has attacked Lubov with Stars of Fury!
GS: Ivan has gained 1 Combo!
GS: Ivan has completed his action.
GS: Lubov guards a hit from Ivan's Stars of Fury for 188 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.

Lydia hears Jay call Lubov a monster. Emphatically.

She didn't know it, but maybe part of her was waiting for Jacqueline to say words like that to someone like Lubov. A tear start to trickle out of her eyes and she quickly rubs it away, accepting Grudiev's comforting embrace and protection.

Not Long Enough Ago

"Come on dear," Mother rests a loving hand on her daughter's shoulder, pushing back a strand of hair. "Be reasonable. We wouldn't make you do anything you don't want to do..."

Lydia is frightened but her mother's love is stronger as she pulls her in for a hug. "I... It's not fair."

Her mother is understanding. The hug tightens. "I know, dear, it's not fair. But it is the reality. If you want to live a normal life, you have to be seen as normal." Mother steps away, picking up a hacksaw from father's toolbox. "I know you don't want to do it because it hurts but I'll do it for you." Her mother turns to look at her. "You love me, don't you, sweetie?"

Lydia looks at the tool and raises her hand to feel at her horn. She hates that it's there, but it's hard to deny the madness. It's as much a part of her as an arm and she wouldn't cut off an arm, would she?

But...maybe she would cut off an arm, if it meant she never had to feel this pain again. She reaches for the hacksaw hesitantly.

Now

Lydia doesn't understand Lubov just as she didn't understand mom or dad. She just doesn't understand. Yes, the world isn't fair, that's the point isn't it? That it isn't fair? Are they just supposed to accept that it isn't fair? Or aren't they supposed to DO something about it. But being called 'creature'. That she understands quite well. She has been called such things enough that at one point she decided 'sure, why not? Let's be a creature then.' She just accepted it. she wandered Filgaia like a beast, lashing out at the slightest provocation, attaching to whomever showed her the slightest bit of kindness.

Ivan already warned her Lubov would put her in a lab. She grins ferally at the idea, though the shaking of her hands proves that despite her bravado she's terrified of the prospect--just as the alternative terrified her far more.

Bolts crash down around her, tear through her limbs that much like the regenerating men before them seem to never truly die, simply reforming and repairing itself monstrously with every inflicted wound. And much like with those men, every repair, every wound still hurts, still blinds Lydia with pain. A greatsword nearly bisects her, but Lydia's midsection shifts its consistency to a more fluid state and pushes through the blade. She seems about as surprised as this happened as anyone else would be.

"Ivan and Talia...they're really great." She manages, hobbling forward. "Yer blinder than Ammy if you can't see it. I've been to Glenwood'n'Meribia. It ain't so rough there that what makes them shine is worthless."

She stops attacking the minions. She just sees little purpose in it now, moving ever closer towards Lubov. Impalcable, possibly unstoppable. Hurtable, very hurtable. Maybe hurtable forever to an infinite degree.

"Talia is funny, clever, an' kind. She is super pretty and really good at flirting and she doesn't like hurting people but she's strong, yeah, so strong that even after everything you've done she can still cry'n'cheer'n'have a good time'n'get a family plant or pet or whatever that flower is. She doesn't need power cause she's got strength, she doesn't need your life, cause she's got her own. And she doesn't need your legacy because she doesn't need to rule the world to be happy, she is already able to be happy without such a big crutch!"

She transforms both arms into blades, swinging them back. She glances over to Amaranth, then to Talia. Her cheeks silver at the kind words. For the moment, she even believes she's worth them.

"Ivan is really empathic. Not like Mom-empathic but he can tell how others are feeling. If people are suffering, he tries to cheer them up. He'd rather be in pain than see someone else in pain. He is also super pretty but he's kind of bad at flirting but that's okay, it turns out it still works. And he's talented and can do cool acrobatic tricks and maybe he's not the best at murdering people, but he's really really good at protecting people, and making people who are hurt feel better about themselves, and..and checking up on them!"

"And you... What can you do? What even are you, man?" Lydia shakes her head. "Just some guy who wants power, is that all you are? Really? Angry about some woman I guess. Probably because she didn't do exactly what you wanted them to do. That's what it's about right? People not just doing what you want from them, not doing it the way you want them to. Is that what being a noble is like? Being so privileged you don't even blink twice when someone does something nice for you? You just figure 'well of course they did, it's my right? I'm a noble doop'...? Bein' so catered to that the slightest disobedience infuriates you, thinking that your little olive branches aren't slaps t'the face?"

She exhales slowly as she darts towards Lubov. "Well buddy, how about you take a moment..."

She stops suddenly and throws herself backwards unexpectedly. "...you check your privilege?!"

And with that Rigdobrite who had been kind of hanging out in the sky over there crashes through the crusader base in an attempt to, uh, land.

Land on Lubov.

Lydia looks to Ivan and says, "Yeah you said so but so what?? I'm living in the now!"

And then very quietly, "You think I'm cool too...? Y..you're cool too," Her cheeks silver flagrantly. "I-I mean you're very hot, obviously. I mean. Because fire. But also because. Uh. I mean. Ahgghhhhnn..." Even quieter. "You get it."

GS: Lydia Seren has attacked Lubov with Material - Rigdobrite!
GS: Lydia Seren takes 26 damage from Poison!
GS: Poison expired!
GS: Lydia Seren has completed her action.
GS: Lubov guards a hit from Lydia Seren's Material - Rigdobrite for 155 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

Ivan bluescreens as his soul leaves his body a couple more times during Lydia's speech, but what else is new.

<Pose Tracker> Lubov has posed.

There are moments where the things that frighten us seem inescapable, or unstoppable. Sometimes it is so much more literal. Sometimes the bogeymen in our lives are real.

Sometimes, there is good cause to believe you cannot stop them.

It's not all that different, perhaps, seeing all the hard work Ivan and Talia's comrades have put forth -- that they have put forth -- to stop their father washing away like so much mud in the rain. Transient, and meaningless, all that remains of their efforts are ruined clothing that was tailored by one of the finest artisans in Pendrago. He is indifferent to Talia's screams. Indifferent to Ivan's (earnest attempts at) quips. Their defiance is nothing to him.

"You see? You know what you are, Natalia. There is no escaping it. You could have made up for the embarrassment your brother has become, but now you will die feverishly trying to pretend you are something you will -never- be. But it won't matter, soon. I told you both once. I have no use for mistakes.

"Better to wipe the stain of it off my ledger--"

And sometimes, there are moments that prove, for even a hair's breadth, that the things we are so terrified of are not nearly so inevitable as they seem.

And before those scathing words can build upon themselves, Jay's indictment cuts through that cold, indifferent vitriol. A dark brow twitches in irritation. The seemingly-immortal man turns his baleful stare on her -- and he beholds something, yet again, that he has no experience with: the Guardians' invocation. "What is..." His brows furrow. He digests her words, her actions, the raw, healing power behind that spell.

He decides.

".....Take care of her first."

The archer lands. Her ruined knee CRACKS into the cliffside, burying in to brace herself as her arrow turns towards Jay.

The warrior screams to a halt, a deep furrow of rocky earth churned around him, jagged splinters of stone digging into his calf. He tilts his blade in Jay's direction.

He leaps. Her bow grows taut.

And two things happen at once to signal a sharp and immediate end.

The archer's arrow taut, she prepares to fire it... and then she is introduced to the tip of the Mirage burying into her shoulder. It impales clean through just as she fires that bolt; the arrowhead SCREAMS past Jay's cheek, hitting rock just beneath her feet instead of the fatal shot it well could have been as the archer finds herself pinned like a butterfly to the rock.

She sees Talia reforming. Her pupils are dilated, her nostrils flaring with snorts of raw, senseless rage. A dagger screams for her neck. It finds her hand, burying into her palm and stopping mere, bloodied inches from kissing her throat. A complete disregard to personal safety saves her life in this moment.

It doesn't change how Talia -hurls- her from the cliffside. As they both fall, the archer's bloodied, ruined hand swiftly begins to mend as it goes for the short sword at her hip. She screams something incoherent that assails the ears even as the gushing winds try to rob her of her voice. The blade rises high.

And she only has time enough to take note of the shadow looming overhead and the rapid cooling of the air around her and issue a confused sound before that pillar of ice crushes her unceremoniously underfoot.

THOOM.

<Pose Tracker> Lubov has posed.

At the same time, the berserker and his greatsword are ready to charge for Jay before he notices the strange smell of ionizing plasma in the air. Sees the thick, storm-choked clouds blotting out once clear skies. Sees -- or perhaps simply feels -- the danger present in Ragnell's incantation.

Lubov does as well, of course. His hands rise, preparing a barrier. Preparing his healing. Glyphs form in response to glyphs. He is ready.

What he is not ready for is his minion defying orders to save him despite all logic. He does not even see the large mountain of a man until he hears the shuddering footfalls of someone on fast approach. Amidst the dancing crackle of whining, charging sparks, he looks.

And he sees his bodyguard, attempting to do what a bodyguard ought to.

"No, you fool--"

Guard his body.

cra-KOOM

The heavens fall.

And in a blinding flash of white, a column of lightning smites the very earth just as the berserking guard leaps over Lubov, -knocking- him aside just before the electrified magic of Althena consumes him in its righteous fury.

There is still a lingering haze in the aftermath, as Lubov rises. Wiping at the dirt now smudging his cheek, he stares at the charred, twitching body of the man who protected him to the bitter end, and he scowls.

"Idiocy," he decries coolly, tugging gloves tighter over his fingers. "This burden of human error is unacceptable. Something must be done..."

Healing light lines the blasted ground. And in the rocky caverns of Mushroom Rock Road, life blooms where it should not, vines ravenous and cancerous splitting the earth to wrap glowing greenery around the smote warrior -- around the crushed archer. He closes his eyes. Vines wind into their flesh. He exhales.

"We are not finished--"

And then something happens.

Does he know why Amaranth is a blind fool?

To be honest, Duke Lubov simply did not care. A dismissal is a dismissal, and her nature and existence was far from his mind such that he had not even heard the question.

But now he -feels- it.

Something cold. Something dark. Something that grips onto the pathways of life like the Fates holding the threads of existence with a scissors' edge ready to snip--

His eyes snap open. Wide.

"What is this."

Amaranth grasps onto the threads of what is. Vines wither and rot. And Lubov --

"No!"

Fights back.

As death seeks to sever the cords of life that hold on to those poor, beleaguered mercenaries like puppet strings, life is forced to fight -back-. On some unseen battleground, vitality flares in an ignition of blue-green light. It might be beautiful, were it not for the excess of it, causing fissures in the earth that spew choking volumes of rejuvination into the air, as he tries to strengthen threads against snapping.

That he can at all is a testament to that dangerous, frightening skill. But as those inky shadows grow more and more inevitable, he devotes more and more focus into the task, until --

<Pose Tracker> Lubov has posed.

-- he hears the words.

They're a distant, numbed thing. A thing his attentions can't allow him to truly digest. Not until he sees her in his peripheries. Not until it's too late. Green eyes, glowing with the cancerous radiance of superfluous life, wheel upon the strange, metamorphic majesty of Lydia Seren. Her points are salient, cutting. If he were capable, he would react to them immediately. But attention split, he can only marvel at the bizarre way her body works. If he could harness it--

Perhaps it's fitting, that Lydia's heartfelt entreaty falls on deaf ears. Fitting, that everything she says is lost in the potential use she could have for him. Fitting --

*snap*

-- in how that split second diversion of focus compromises him.

Threads of life snap. The mercenaries go limp. Lubov's eyes widen.

"No--"

And it's only then, he notices too late. A barrier erects between himself and Lydia...

... but it's not from her he should be concerned.

It's above.

                                   BOOM

Sparks -explode- along the cliffside. Rigdobrite, in its wild descent, crashes through the falling rubble, mixing in with them as if it was a part of the avalanche of once-fungal-like rock. He looks up to see the shadow casting over him.

And the silent fury that seizes his expression is nothing short of -seething- as he attempts to whip his hand forward in the direction of dual forces of nature.

"YOU--"

                                                    T H O O M .

And hundreds of pounds of rock and Guardian bury a duke of Rolance before he can even so much as spit out his disdain.

It is deafening, monumental, and like all disasters, brutally short-lived. As the dust clears, there is nothing but the unmoving bodies of those mercenaries, and a large pile of rubble.

A reasonable might assume Lubov dead, claim no one could survive that...

... but the absence of any blood might suggest that those assembled might be better off hedging their bets and retreating while they can.

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

Talia stares as the lightning shreds through a bodyguard that, inexplicably, sought to defend Lubov with his own life. Like much of what she felt today, this all felt terribly wrong. She stares at Lubov, watching and listening as he snaps at them. Her eyes narrow.

And, she hears Lydia's speech. She makes a face, turning her head to look at Lydia. She looks almost incredulous. And, really, she misses the sparks until she sees them fly. Talia opens her mouth, gasping and half-expecting that Ivan missed.

He didn't.

The crack-boom of Rigdobrite and the explosions on the cliff make her footing lose. Talia stumbles backward, briefly glancing at the mercenaries that Amaranth laid low. That, she thinks, may be a mercy. Then, she looks up.

The rocks come crashing down -- and her father's defiant shout is lost, as the cliff face collapses onto him. She stumbles backward, eyes filled with shock, and puts a hand to her mouth. She looks about, at everyone, and then at the rock.

There is no blood.

"...We need to leave," she says, softly. "We need to hurry, no? I--" She doesn't know if he is dead. She finds it dangerous to hope. "We shouldn't waste this chance."

<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.

From Lubov, Jacqueline gets a twitch of irritation.

She takes that as a victory, as small as it is.

Jacqueline looks at Amaranth as she makes a decision. She says she has a solution. There's a sharp intake of breath as Amaranth begins to invoke arts she's unfamiliar with - and watches as she does something.

There's a faint nod back at Ragnell as she throws a grateful gesture her way, but for the moment Amaranth's technique distracts her.

But then, Talia offers her a smile - it's a faint one, but even so it's enough to take a little bit of edge off of the fury she's worked herself into, and she manages a faint smile of her own in response.

And Lydia too gets a smile, and even Ivan.

But then Lubov speaks again.

'Take care of her first'.

Jacqueline lowers into a defensive stance. The archer aims for her. The warrior tilts his blade in their direction.

That was one downside to drawing the enemy's attention. You have to survive the aftermath.

As Jacqueline prepares to leap out of the way, hoping that she'll be able to avoid it in time... Talia comes to the rescue, diverting the shot. Jacqueline can feel it as it passes, can feel the displaced air, can hear it screaming past her and shearing right through Grudiev's protection. If it had hit her directly...

She exhales a breath she didn't realize she was holdng.

But she's not out of the woods yet - the berserker starts to charge for her...but Ragnell's sorcery saves her by diverting his attention.

Lightning-based sorcery. Jacqueline considered lightning one of her specialties next to earth, but what Ragnell brings to bear far outstrips anything she's capable of at the moment.

Amaranth grabs hold of the threads of life, and though Lubov tries to overpower it, his mercenaries fall.

And he follows soon after, thanks to a combination attack from Lydia and Ivan.

Jacqueline stares as he's buried underneath a massive amount of rock. Such a thing would kill an ordinary human. ...But he had proven that he was far from an ordinary human. She wasn't about to assume anything

"...R-right." Jacqueline agrees with a nod toward Talia. "Let's get out of here...together."

They were, all of them, still alive. They were still alive, still together, and that was all that mattered.

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

Aside from killing Ivan a few times, the things that Lydia has to say about him tug at his heart -- it's strange to hear himself described that way. It feels like she's talking about someone else. Someone way better. Is that the impression she got from the fragments of personality that made it through all of his denial and avoidance? Is that the person she fell in love with? Can he live up to being that person? He isn't sure.

Something happened in there, as well. Something that shocked Lubov, that seemed to break his grip on the inexhaustible ability to raise his guards from any injury. Was it something in Katherine's strange spell? Either way, the guards remain where they were felled, despite Lubov's frustration. And meanwhile, the sparks ignite, joined by Rigdobrite in a crash of rubble that buries Lubov completely.

Ivan finds himself shaking, to see it. Despite everything, there's a part of him still chilled by the finality of actually killing their own father. But...is he dead? Are they free?

Talia thinks maybe not.

As she urges them to leave, Ivan takes a breath. He turns back to the others. They have done all this -- taken risks on his behalf -- seen the horrors that Lubov can inflict, been hurt and threatened and insulted by him. They deserve the truth. There is something they should know. He announces to everyone, with all the gravity of a great secret, finally revealed:

"...I didn't actually like my job."

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.

    Rocks fall. Lubov doesn't die. Life is so unfair.
    
    Ragnell watches with steely eyes, one hand on her hat, as everyone's attacks pour in, culminating in a landslide that buries Lubov but, based on the lack of blood, fails to actually smush him to paste. That's kind of disturbing, honestly. At least Ragnell managed to take out that berserker guy, but she knows well that if Amaranth hadn't utilized her forbidden powers, Lubov would've rezzed him and the archer same as before. It's not as bad as it could be, but... Either way, now looks like the time to finish him off while they can.
    
    Except Talia insists on a retreat. Ragnell blinks at her in surprise--then then again, is this really surprising? A frown tugs her lips down, but... nah. This is Talia and Ivan's nemesis. Their call is what counts here. "Yeah," she agrees with Jay, jogging to catch up with the others.
    
    Then Ivan reveals a great and crushing secret. Ragnell peers at him... then strides forward and, if he lets her, headlocks Ivan and viciously noogies him. "Yeah? Duh??" she drawls. "Don't talk about the obvious like you're revealin' one o' the great mysteries of the earth, nerd-boy." She lets him go then, assuming she snagged him in the first place. "Anyway, let's save the chit-chat for later. That fight was annoyin'."
    
    And it *was* annoying, which is plain by her tone and expression--but she's also paying attention to something else, gaze flicking back and forth in search of Amaranth.

<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.

Lydia flinches at Talia's semi-incredulous look. She isn't sure what that look was for and what it really means but for all her nigh physical invulnerability, emotionally she isn't. She is probably going to wonder a lot at that.

She stumbles a bit, hobbling backwards from her own <s>meteor</s> Rigdobrite drop. She She's not entirely sure Lydia Seren wanted to kill Lubov.

And Lubov is probably not dead. But for a few moments, Lydia thinks she has killed a man.

She has killed before. Once she killed a man completely by accident. It was a terrible thing to watch and it only further convinced her that killing is a terrible thing from what she sort of always kind of innately believed.

Then not so long ago she killed again. Children, really. Children who were trying to kill her and all her friends, and she wasn't exactly trying to so much as sort of...doing it in a semi-berserk state.

And now for a moment, Lydia thinks she killed again. Not because she was in danger, or because her friends were in danger--no, she wanted to kill Lubov because she hated Lubov. Her friends being in danger were part of that, but she felt this way about Lubov well before either were in clear and present danger.

And even moments later, she isn't so sure Lubov is dead after all, she recognizes that it felt different this time. It's hard for her to articulate, even mentally, but it's very different.

It wasn't emptiness, or intense joy, or anything like that. Nothing so extreme. Nor is it horrifying or refreshing. Still too extreme.

No, it felt... It felt satisfying.

Like a completed program. Like an executable running its course. What are those things? Lydia doesn't know, but it felt very similar to that.

Lydia takes in a deep breath that might not even be neccessary and exhales out slowly. There will be time to reflect on that later. Right now she wants to be happy and she doubts happiness is waiting for her down that particular road.

Her hands are shaking, perhaps not fit holding onto, until she wills them to stop.

She gives Ivan a hug. It's a pretty small one since they really need to live, but that smile on her face, for now, has never been brighter. Because they are safe.

He is safe. For now. And only for now, perhaps, but it's something.

"We'll find you one that pays better," She says, grinning sharply which considering Ivan said he doesn't take money for his work probably shouldn't be too tough.

She glances to Ragnell once, then looks around for Amaranth, but ultimately settles that checking up on her will come later. Escaping first.

If they run fast enough she might be able to outrun her thoughts.