2022-12-17: The Mutant's Oppressive Aura
- Log: 2022-12-17: The Mutant's Oppressive Aura
- Cast: Demetrioi, Kaguya, Magilou, Riesenlied, Xantia, Lydia Seren, Jacqueline Barber, Venetia Vuong, Lan Lilac, Juni Vandrer, Ida Everstead-Rey, Avril Vent Fleur, Azoth, Gwen Whitlock, Cyre H. Lorentz, Ethius Hesiod
- Where: The Crater Sea
- Date: December 17, 2022
- Summary: (OOC: This scene takes ICly place on December 9th, directly following Influence of Truth Appearance!) At last, Ethius is made to speak of just how perilous a situation this is... for all of Filgaia. Demetrioi's capabilities, though miraculous, were built on foundational flaws that ensured all they could ever do was escalate their work until all was annihilated. Having come to a conclusion that a model where everyone's happy exists only if there are single-cell organisms left, Demetrioi threatens to plunge Filgaia into an eternal winter. With Ethius and Homer both knocked aside, it seems that this is now truly in the hands of the Drifters. The battle for Filgaia's continued existence (...again) commences on the summit of Mount Liverfeast!
==============================<* The Crater Sea *>============================== The Crater Sea rests at the center of Southern Aquvy. Rumors abound that ancient cities and other ruins are submerged underneath the sea, and in the shallower portions, Diggers have reported that great expanses of submerged glass have been found. The people of Southern Aquvy know that Crater Sea is not just a name. In the past, some great calamity shattered the ancient continent of Greater Aquvy, and in doing so, left the many smaller islands of the south. These waters are well-traveled, though not as much as they once were, after the fall of Celesti. BGM: The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker - The Great Sea
<Pose Tracker> Demetrioi has posed.
Now is the winter of everyone's discontent.
The Demetrioi's fatal flaws have overtaken its design, and they have found the environmental model that would satisfy its goals: create a world that only a tiny number of single-cell organisms could exist in at all, in order for the world to be populated only by those happy. Its strange shrubby tree-like form has given way to the way many trees shed virtually all their leaves throughout winter, their face upon the bark-monitor maniacal and fighting against their own smile.
Rooted atop the dormant volcano of Mount Liverfeast, recent developments with Demetrioi's deadly feedback loop is rapidly running the clock out in terms of avoiding irrepairable damage to a land already dying. The summit is at the epicenter of a new brewing ice age - the immediate area outside of the summit is largely frozen over solid, with only occasional flashes of heat behaving in strange and destructive ways that threaten (but will not halt) one's return to the summit. No cloud, no squall, no lightning can stop you.
Kaguya has bought the assembled time through the use of teleportation devices. The cavern that led to the summit has collapsed to allow Gears that had to be parked away from the summit to be recalled. Some may find second winds, or other nearby allies. Ethius and Homer, the spacefarers whose individual dramas spilled over onto Filgaia, are nowhere to be seen (or found, for the moment) after being slapped away by Demetrioi's massive, mobile roots.
E WhhhhYYyy AaRrReEE yOooUu dOooiiinnGgg ThhiIIsss kaAAgguUuYyaAaa :V Iiiiii CCaaAANNnn mmmaAAAkkEEe thEEEe WoorrRRLlD hAAappY alReeeady :J
Those same massive, mobile roots are being brought to bear against the Queklain, its blaster weapons finding themselves warped mid-flight due to novel and bizarre reinterpretations of the laws of thermodynamics, making them scatter and disperse in strange non-euclidian patterns as bombs are frozen or otherwise disassembled.
P NootTTthiiiiNggg EllSeee WoorrKKeeeD BeffOrrrEe mEee :B CaAANnn YooouuuU rEEaaaLLyyY dOOO BeTtErr KaguuuYaaaA :S
But not all of them. Some hits register from the all-out assault of the Queklain's volley, as large skeletal branches-turned-appendages wither and twist, covering and mending themselves as various strange, rotting fruit... things... spawn about these otherwise dead-looking branches, each one harrowing echoes of the vague impression of Demetrioi's strange faces and sounds.
T yyoOOuuu CaanNnOtt AaaNnD NeVeeRRR wiLl :C NooO OooNeEe CaaaNnn :7
As the various Drifters make their triumphant returns or otherwise find their second winds, there's one of two ways they could go about this: perhaps those in Gears will be able to wrestle with these appendages and roots that lash out, to give cover to those On Foot who can try to take the fight to the central trunk of this gnarled abomination that nonetheless still commands incredible terraforming technology.
All must otherwise contend with this oppressive aura.
FINAL OBJECTIVE: Deactivate the Demetrioi! You have the first strike thanks to Kaguya holding the line!
OST: Star Ocean Faithlessness and Integrity - The Mutant's Oppressive Aura
<Pose Tracker> Kaguya has posed.
The Queklain surges up from the base of the mountain, green blaster-fire surging towards the Demetrioi's core. Even as green fire melts and freezes on the way to its target, the strange unreality light shining from the 'branches' reflects on the chrome chassis of the Queklain. On remote, the Gear weaves through massive roots, deposting mines along the way to clear the path behind it.
KAGUYA BGM: THE ARCHER - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sailp3-UJ9o
"Gh," Kaguya reacts eloquently to Demetrioi's first question as she teleports out of the way of a crashing volley of 'fruit', reappearing some distance away and throwing another brace of bombs. Along the way she drags Magilou, who notably didn't leave when Kaguya asked the others to... because she can best get ready here. And Kaguya asked her to!
"The world... needs to be more than happy!" Kaguya calls. "There's no room for flowers or thorns in your world... and that's a world I can't abide!"
Nevermind that there's no room for her in it. There's no room for her in the current world, either.
"But you're right," Kaguya says. "I can't fix it myself. I tried! And maybe nobody can. ...Alone. We're not going to find a shortcut, Demetrioi."
The others reappear, as Kaguya repeats her cycle; teleport, throw, teleport out of the way of counterattack. But the Queklain cannot teleport, and is not so lucky; though it fires up until the end, it is eventually overwhelmed by Demetrioi's onslaught, blasted and battered and sent smoking down into the slope of the volcano below. Kaguya grits her teeth. "Thanks, Queklain." Kaguya looks to the smoking wreckage as it falls, a tight expression on her face. "...You did good. You did real good."
Kaguya looks more of the others, reappearing around her. "I kept him off-balance," she says. "But I can't make much headway on my own, and my ace in the hole just got aced." One more brace-Kaguya pulls a set of small green orbs from a pocket, different from the other explosives she's used. She flashes them out between her fingers, six of them, and whirls as she tosses them towards the Demetrioi's central axes, hoping to lock it in place with the bladed vines that burst therefrom.
"You about charged up, Magilou!?" Kaguya asks, "Because I'm running out of teleporters!"
GS: Kaguya has attacked Demetrioi with Bladevine Orb! GS: Kaguya has gained 1 Combo! GS: Kaguya has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
'Magilou, what were you up to while we were lost in the earthpulse?'
'I was ringing the bell. The rift was open the whole time. Couldn't you hear me?'
"I'm always ready," was Magilou's reply, when Kaguya told them to ready themselves. "And I will not see another generation break themselves on the ringing bells. Kaguya! I'm with you!" She steps forward, as her shikigami spins, by her hand.
"Super Absorber!" In a flash of white and cyan, Magilou's outfit changes from its pirate stripes to her usual book-skirt jester-witch raiments -- but the purple and pink and midnight blue have shifted and changed, stark red and white and black, that invocation of a red moon on holy cloth.
The energies of Spell Absorber draw in power around her actively -- but this is no targeted cast. The absorption power remains, as she steps forward, to meet Demetrioi's own horrific aura.
She's changed it, over the years -- refined it. It doesn't totally destroy the power, any more, though certainly it appears to, and the area directly around Magilou and Kaguya remains remarkably sane. Rather that strength pours into her, sieves through her veins, and...
Magilou is not a cup which may be infinitely filled, but a thousand years of refinement has left her with such great capacity.
"Oop!" She yelps, as Kaguya drags her out of the way of that volley. "This is a witchnapping..!"
No, don't THANK her, that would be far too much.
She doesn't joke about Kaguya's opposal to a world without thorns, though. Instead, she agrees: "You really need someone to help take care of the world, no matter how powerful you may be." Where she fits into that metric -- well, Magilou would hate to be frank.
And when Kaguya says she's running out of teleporters -- and runs out of Queklain, at that -- Magilou looks back to her, with a loose grin. "Didn't you hear me? I'm always ready!" That's a yes on being charged up, then..?
She turns to the Demetrioi, and her expression cools. "I've never abided a world of purity," she says, tone dry. "Don't expect me to start now."
Magilou lifts her hand, and invokes: "Calamity Flare." No witty long invocation; no clever joke.
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied is... not doing great.
The Ley Dragon is a transformation that, by design, hurts her, by virtue of how the Ley literally flows and transfer straight through her body; not only that, but Demetrioi's taken the upper hand to rip the control straight out of her, creating a force feedback loop that's just literally thrown her out of the form where she tumbles against the now-slicked and frozen ground, without a wheelchair in sight.
Lydia goes and resurrects her with the power of smelly socks. >_<!
They move through one of Kaguya's teleporters, and Riesenlied is struggling to even push her upper body up with both her hands. She looks up where the Queklain is fighting. Kaguya is still fighting...
"Where... did Mister Ethius and Homer go?" Riesenlied asks, concerned. Like her, they weren't protected on Gears or anything.
The Hyadean grimaces as the Queklain is pushed back, however, blasted and battered and sent smoking down; "Kaguya!" she cries out.
Fortunately, Magilou is on the case, absorbing the power around them as the two escape to safety; she turns to Demetrioi where she's still crawling on the ground, breathing laboriously.
"I was wrong to think I could safeguard the Ley on my own, Demetrioi. The Ley belongs to everyone; it is not something meant for one person to hold. I am as much of an abberant on this regard as you..."
The powerful Calamity Flare fires, and Riesenlied looks around and struggles to think of how she can keep going. "I can at least..."
The ebb and flow of the Ley rises around her once more, as she gathers from the concentrated sources of Muse on the ice underneath her, and she throws it onto the three closest to her at the moment -- Kaguya, Lydia, and Magilou.
"I can at least keep them going..."
GS: Riesenlied has attacked Magilou with Ley Channeling - Spirits Within! GS: Riesenlied has attacked Lydia Seren with Ley Channeling - Spirits Within! GS: Riesenlied has attacked Kaguya with Ley Channeling - Spirits Within! GS: Riesenlied has gained 2 Combo! GS: Riesenlied has completed her action. GS: Riesenlied heals Kaguya! She gains 180 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.
Having disengaged herself from the fight with Ethius in response to Azoth's call to stop, Xantia declared herself to be 'with Azoth', doing her best to calm him just before everyone was forced to fall back due to Demetrioi's escalation. Her disposition since then has not changed. Though there wasn't much she could do to help the physical state Azoth was in, she has remained in his general vicinity, simply trying to be a supportive presence, ready with a smile whenever he looks her way. She's not actually approached, figuring he would need a moment to figure things out for himself.
As for her, she has far from shown the full extent of her feelings regarding this situation. In the face of such of dire threat to all of Filgaia, every fiber of her being is practically screaming to put a stop to this at all costs. In that respect, her chosen course of action is helping her, as well. By putting her focus on Azoth's distress, it's been easier to keep a handle on her own. Had she fully obeyed her instincts, she would have already charged on ahead, complicating matters for everybody.
As it is, she has been patiently (well, not very patiently) biding her time, waiting until 'go time' is announced. And when that moment comes... that's when she finally approaches Azoth, seeking out his hand to give it a gentle squeeze. In spite of the freezing surroundings, she still feels warm.
"Hey. I just wanted to say... I meant what I said back there. I don't really know who this Demetrioi is... but I think I understand their general nature. And why you feel the way you do about this."
Her smile briefly fades as she looks towards the waiting teleporters. "...I think we both know we can't let this happen. Something must be done. But..." She turns back to Azoth at this point, nodding firmly. "I want to do this your way. So. Tell me how you want to handle this, and I'll do everything I can do help."
And thus, when the martial artist appears at the battle site, she acts completely contrary to her usual nature. Rather than charge on ahead, she only raises a hand to let Azoth know she's ready. Ready to follow his lead in this, in whatever form it may take.
GS: Xantia spends 1 Combo on Inspire! GS: Xantia has attacked Azoth with You are filled with determination! GS: Xantia has gained 1 Combo! GS: Xantia has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Azoth accepts Xantia's You are filled with determination for 0 hit points! GS: Azoth gains 2 Combo from Inspire! GS: CRITICAL! Riesenlied heals Lydia Seren! She gains 229 temporary hit points! GS: Demetrioi partially guards Kaguya's Bladevine Orb for 76 hit points! GS: Entangle applied to Demetrioi! GS: Charge!! You gain 35 FP!
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
Lydia Seren is kinda running low on steam. Fighting Ethius and now uh a Technological God (what a ridiculous concept, Lydia thinks)? Yeah, she might not be that easily destructable but the wrath of a planet might damn well be enough.
And so: STINKY SOCKS.
"Mom..." Lydia sniffs, hugging her.
She rubs at her eyes with her free hand. Her other hand is holding a bottle of mustard. She kinda just had it along and now doesn't really know what to do with it but is gripping it like it might be the last thing standing in the way between her and the end of the world. She squeezes the bottle lightly. A bit of mustard dribbles out dangerously.
"Just um." She says to Riesenleid. "Ahhhh be careful ahhhhh this is so scary fffffrriiick."
She looks to Kaguya.
"She draws a sword which feels like REALLY not enough here.
Did they just murder Ethius and Homer?? Nah, Ethius is probably sneaking around and doing something sneaky. That's gotta be it. And Homer is probably uh ... feeling real bad right now. Maybe needs a hug. Yep.
She takes in a deep breath, and in a sudden burst of speed tries to slice across multiple tendrils to reach the central trunk.
"DEMETRIOI CAN WE TALK THIS OUT? WE CAN ALWAYS DESTROY THE WORLD LATER?????"
GS: Lydia Seren has attacked Demetrioi with Speed of Light! GS: Lydia Seren has gained 2 Combo! GS: Lydia Seren's stances have changed to Stoic! GS: Lydia Seren has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
Issachar ascends from the caldera, gazing down at Demetrioi, watching the building freeze. Inside the cockpit, Jacqueline grimaces. She hates this... but, this has to be stopped.
"I'm sorry, Demetrioi. Your world won't make anyone happy. Your world is one of death and stillness." Jacqueline says.
It's hard for her to get in from this angle, though... but thankfully, Kaguya is on the attack. Thanks to her, and Magilou too, the rest of them can move in.
Issachar descends, extending a hand toward one of Demetrioi's roots. Electricity bursts out from the Gear's fingertips toward them - and where it strikes the lightning loops back toward Issachar, as Jacqueline seeks to drain its power away.
"I'll help holding them off!" Jacqueline announces.
GS: Jacqueline Barber has attacked Demetrioi with Siphoning Current! GS: Jacqueline Barber has gained 2 Combo! GS: Jacqueline Barber has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.
While Venetia Vuong is not the only person present, nor perhaps the most important (is anyone ever truly the most important, save in the eyes of another?) she has something die here, as well, in the face of Demeitroi's arisal; in the face of these words. The final revelations from Ethius Hesiod (for now).
A terra-forming device. The words mean 'earth moving' to Venetia but she can read a term of art between the lines. And it's one that doesn't work, or rather, works in a very narrow definition of the things; like the old philosophical problem that the best way to prevent evil is to kill everyone.
But if this has happened - if it is a *fault* that has happened *elsewhere* - then that means that errors and mistakes of this sort happen among the star men. (It occurs to Venetia that perhaps something like this happened on Hyades or whatever-the-Metal-Dragon planet was called, but the thought simply tucks away in a cubbyhole in her mind, for later reference.) The star men are not infallible, or at least better than them; perhaps there is no guarantee to their problems among the sea of stars.
Perhaps that's what the old Dean was fleeing; or what made him so sick at heart as to come by here.
The fires of rage are damped; Venetia's head tilts slightly downwards, even as the Queklain contends with the great Tree of Woe before them. Magilou's spell ignites, and it struggles, but there is space - Venetia is in that space. She breathes out.
Without anger, what's left?
And...
The earth is still beneath her feet.
Her back straightens upwards. One hand goes into her Crest pouch and she snaps that arm out, holding one of them, turning her head and shouting, "YOU!" towards--
-- "Xantia!" Venetia guesses wildly, but she gets it right, if about fifteen percent from happenstance. "You're both faster than me. I'll tag along one way or another. Find a core or something - and don't be afraid. You'll understand in a moment." The Crest Graph comes upwards. There is a breath of Ley in the storm... and a swirl of liquid-ruby light that settles onto Xantia, leaving a feeling of a certain confidence. A sense that there WILL be a second chance, come what may.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EokUg0dsj2U
With that, Venetia sweeps her hair back and holsters the Graph again. "Riesenlied, wasn't it?" she says, looking over towards the Hyadean woman. (This feels way less weird than it would have just last year, Venetia reflects.) "This sounds nearer to your dish. I'll follow your lead.
GS: Venetia Vuong has attacked Xantia with Persephone Sign ~Death Defiance~! GS: Venetia Vuong has gained 1 Combo! GS: Venetia Vuong has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
This is... this is...
This is awful. This is not a thing that can save Filgaia. This is not a thing that can be saved.
This was Demetrioi, and Lan thought she could be its friend.
If she feels betrayed, it's nobody's fault. If she grieves, nobody could blame her.
The crystal shards she could call forth as a kind of Gear substitute feel a thousand miles away. But her friends are here. Yes, everybody is here, and and everybody who isn't here is depending on them.
"Hey..." she begins, and glances aside to Gwen. "I think maybe... now would be a good time to use it." She's being deliberately vague. Even now, even with Gwen, Lan doesn't like to talk about the Stranger. But she needs more power to have a hope of winning, and Lan selfishly doesn't want to be alone in a crowd.
It creeps out from underneath her fingernails first, thin threads of darkness. Wrapping, weaving around her flesh until Lan's skin is criss-crossed with black ribbons. Her blood sings with it, and the black ink sings back. Her breathing steadies.
As she thought. Every time, it gets a little easier. And every time, it feels a little better. "We've got this," Lan smiles, and gently elbows Gwen. See? It's not scary. It's just the end of the world.
When Lan moves, she vanishes. No-- she's there, floating a foot above the snow mere yards from Demetrioi. She's chanting something, and lifting a clenched fist. More ribbons leap from the shadows cast by Demetrioi's monstrous form, climbing the bark like suckervines, digging in and leaching poison.
GS: CRITICAL! Venetia Vuong heals Xantia! She gains 108 temporary hit points! GS: FP up! Venetia Vuong's Reload! activated! GS: Lan Lilac has attacked Demetrioi with Ribbon Dance! GS: Lan Lilac has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi solidly guards Lydia Seren's Speed of Light for 35 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Riposte applied to Lydia Seren! GS: FP up! Guard bonus activated! GS: Demetrioi solidly guards Jacqueline Barber's Siphoning Current for 62 hit points! GS: Shield applied to Jacqueline Barber! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated! GS: Jacqueline Barber drains Demetrioi! Jacqueline Barber gains 64 temporary hit points! GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Lan Lilac's Ribbon Dance for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Demetrioi's Slow Ward may block the effect! GS: Entangle and Interrupt applied to Demetrioi! GS: Slow blocked! GS: Charge!! You gain 30 FP! GS: Riesenlied heals Magilou! She gains 182 temporary hit points! GS: Magilou has attacked Demetrioi with Calamity Flare! GS: Magilou has gained 2 Combo! GS: Magilou's stances have changed from Counter to Avenger and Counter! GS: Magilou gains 10 FP from her Daredevil! GS: Magilou has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Magilou's Calamity Flare for 162 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Misery inflicts a random effect! Entangle applied to Demetrioi! GS: Hyper applied to Magilou! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated!
<Pose Tracker> Juni Vandrer has posed.
Juni Vandrer never did like teleportation. She landed mostly right side up and caught herself. She even didn't lose her lunch this time! Not her thing, not in the slightest. Patting herself down, checking for the right number of digits and limbs, she then scurries up the access ladder for her gear and slides into place. While she'd like to use her rifle for this, rogue AI, big tree thing. Maybe time to try and leverage what she can with what she has.
Flipping her systems on, the gear surges back to life, her HUD and 'Betty' babbling various things she ignores for now as she straps in.
She thumbs commo open, catching the majority of both Demetrioi's attempts to... convince? That's a close enough word Kaguya to let him get to work.
"Really should have let me stuff an EMP in it when I had a chance Kaguya." She says, no real malice in her voice. Mostly she finds the situation darkly funny. She tried to follow the local's leads and her own leads and both lead to mistakes. A time for change.
With the systems coming online, she starts with a basic... mostly basic attack. Trying to disorient non-friendly electric systems and equipment. Junk data, electronic noise, whatever. She does angle herself to try and protect those still on foot though. Not that it looks like she's immediately fighting.
"So uh-" she starts, voice distracted on the broadcast, "Would it be good or bad to point out anything approaching science to the rogue AI?" She was going to chatter at it, maybe see if she could convince it. But maybe convincing it that ANY life will inevitably lead to 'unhappiness' if you abstract it enough might backfire.
Really though, she sends one last directed message to another pilot. "Kaguya, still your game. If you have an angle of attack relay it and I'll run support."
Concern for Homer, (Then her shotgun and Ethius in that order) can come later. When the world doesn't end. She wants to slap the hell out of at least one of them if not both.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
One life for one world.
Others might question if Demetrioi is truly alive, or take their malfunctioning, poorly-designed objectives as evidence they're just a lifeless machine. Ida disagrees. To do otherwise is to diminish the horror behind Demetrioi's creation, and the failed logic that led to this.
It takes either advanced computation or high precision to teleport someone into the cockpit of a moving Gear, but Kaguya wants for neither. With a *pop* of displaced air, Ida appears inside the Dust Dragoon, standing between the back of the pilot's seat and the open hatch. She reaches out, pulls the handle beside the hatch, and clambers into the seat as the hydraulics pull everything back into place. A tap of a touchpad activates both radio and loudspeaker.
"Dust Dragoon ready to engage," Ida transmits, as she finishes fashioning her crash webbing, and stuffs her ruined helmet into the bin beneath her feet. "Opening transmission channels--prepare for AWACS assistance."
Azoth receives the first uplink as the Dragoon's computer connects with his. Data starts to stream in from the Gear's sensors: a bit clumsy, given the vast gulf between Gear and once-and-future Gear. They can't quite make heads or tails of Demetrioi's nature, but they can map out the movement of those horrible branches, and suggest adjustments to tactics to compensate. A second opinion to Azoth's own systems.
GS: Juni Vandrer has attacked Demetrioi with Wire Rot! GS: Juni Vandrer has gained 2 Combo! GS: Juni Vandrer has completed her action. GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Azoth with Sensor Uplink! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has gained 2 Combo! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey's stances have changed to Sage! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
Demetrioi's world... would be one in which no one would be able to follow their dreams, for there would be none to be had. A perfect, happy world is only possible when what passes as perfection and happiness is easy to reach.
How long do they have before the cascade reaches elsewhere? Until the blight of this eternal winter wraps the globe? Avril's Skadi erupts skyward, neatly slipping the summit of the mountain as it freezes over. Once, in ages long, long past, the world was believed to have been wrapped in the embrace of a nearly-total winter, with only the equatorial regions spared. Thus did life narrowly negotiate annihilation, and from there...
Avril knows this, and she doesn't know how she knows this. It's something that 'another her' had learned, but how, when, where -- the context is stripped away. Urging her Gear low under the gnarled branches and tangling limbs. A 'tree' is the best way to think of Demetrioi's shape now, though this hardly does it justice for the form it inhabits.
It is hard to look at it, even now.
"This is... how worlds ended," she muses aloud, over the radio. "...I shall not permit it here." It may have happened on other worlds and it could have already happened here but so long as there's even a glimmer of a chance--
"As Dean has said, we musn't give up."
She dives low, the better to draw the attention of any low-reaching branches -- better towards her than towards those on the ground. She swerves hard to her left once she thinks Demetrioi might be focusing on her and draws her Gear's slab of a blade only to pull up and away from a few of those fighting below. Perhaps it will give them some breathing room.
GS: Azoth accepts Ida Everstead-Rey's Sensor Uplink for 0 hit points! GS: Amplify applied to Azoth! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has activated Force Action: Extend!
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
There was a lot of data to process, and at the same time, never enough of it. But sometimes, a smile is more critical input than the advantage that would have been gained through the assistance in physical repairs.
For a long time, the Azoth is silent. The moment arrives. Xantia takes his hand, and Azoth stares at her, his face not knowing what to do. It never truly does. He said once he did not like to lie to her, so he does not put on one of his easy smiles now. Instead, his grip squeezes back.
"...We can't," Azoth agrees. "But I haven't given up. No matter how incompatible our systems may be... if I can convince Demetrioi this isn't the best way to complete their objectives, maybe coexistence is still possible."
He has to believe that. He wants to believe that. Because if it's not true, then what does that mean when it comes to the hand he's holding right now?
Fingers covered in synthetic flesh fold and shift, becoming dangerously edged claws, delicate and harmless in their grip. Pixelated light peels the mask away. Azoth looks not a man, but a construct: so similar to that terrorizing black machine, skeletal and monstrous. The Solarian Asset. The weapon. But there's no erroneous red. Instead he is flooded in a neon blue-fuchsia gradient flowing through cords of bright fluids and wires pulsing with energy all exposed -- a construct incomplete, but with all the sharp edges it needs for battle. However, the overrides have not unlocked his full power for the visage that he wears... Sparks claw through Azoth's inards, and some of those cables are already cracked and dripping, light glowing around the damage in a futile attempt to seal it in.
With a faceless nod to Xantia, Azoth launches himself through the wintery storm toward their objective. His voice is something deep and echoing, inhuman:
"Demetrioi!"
exec.muse PARADIGM_SHIFT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyRuEj5aetg
Azoth's a streak of erratic color as he darts for Demetrioi's core. There is no direct attack, but the aura he's giving off is volatile enough, two technologies at odds with one another about to enter combat. Yet, despite the danger to himself, he seeks to attempt a connection. Communication. Data from the Dust Dragoon will have to serve to mitigate his recklessness.
Azoth knows that being a machine, a program, is a complicated thing. The logic Demetrioi can and can't accept, and the behaviors Demetrioi is and isn't capable of doesn't follow the same rules as most people. If only Azoth could plug into Demetrioi directly and show the math...! See the formulas, offer new data, suggest corrected algorithms...!
But with the vast incompatibilities of their systems, Azoth must start with informal rhetoric in a desperate bid to establish understanding.
"This model is flawed! You'll cause more unhappiness than you'll ever be able to repair! And you'll destroy the people who care about you along with it! Homer, who found you and searched for you, and Kaguya who fought to treat you like a friend... Show them the same tenacity! Don't destroy their lives! Don't take away the only planet they can now call home!"
GS: Azoth has attacked Demetrioi with ABORT: STANDARD OPERATION. TRY: exec.azoc THIRDOPTION! GS: Azoth has gained 1 Combo! GS: Azoth's stances have changed to Hero! GS: Azoth has completed his action. GS: Avril Vent Fleur spends 1 Combo on Reload! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has attacked Venetia Vuong with Twinflower Maneuver! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has attacked Riesenlied with Twinflower Maneuver! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has gained 1 Combo! GS: Avril Vent Fleur's stances have changed from Counter to Avenger and Counter! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has completed her action. GS: Riesenlied accepts Avril Vent Fleur's Twinflower Maneuver for 0 hit points! GS: Riposte applied to Avril Vent Fleur! GS: FP up! Avril Vent Fleur's Reload! activated! GS: Venetia Vuong accepts Avril Vent Fleur's Twinflower Maneuver for 0 hit points! GS: Riposte applied to Avril Vent Fleur! GS: FP up! Avril Vent Fleur's Reload! activated! GS: Demetrioi solidly guards Juni Vandrer's Wire Rot for 44 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Demetrioi's Poison Ward may block the effect! GS: Disease applied to Demetrioi! GS: Poison blocked!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
==EARLIER==
In the moments after Gwen's final blast, the courier sags, looking back towards Azoth to check up on him, and back towards Demetrioi. "W-well, ain't that just a s-shitty way for this whole day t'go... eheh. I guess it'll be okay, though," she says, the creases around her eyes signaling what her smile doesn't: the conversion of energy to one state to another doesn't come without drawbacks. Her ARM is glowing in more ways than one: firstly, in that she's preparing to use its ultimate boon, and secondly, it's getting too uncomfortably hot to have next to her. It will never get to the point of boiling her alive, but there's a lot of leeway between that state and 'normal' that can grant many states of 'extremely uncomfortable'.
Looking towards Xantia, Gwen nods. "... I'm gonna do what needs t'be done, but... count me in. It's... only fair. Azoth g-ave me quite a boost, so... I'll put it to good use. Just slap me to whatever. I ain't great at listenin' when I'm doin' this." The rapidly cooling air is like a godsend, but in a few moments, it won't matter. "... I'll catch up. Don't worry. You'll hear me comin'."
To Lan, Gwen frowns, the glowing lightning creeping past her right eye. ".... Just be careful, Lan... people here aren't gonna be able t'stop you if you go too far." Gwen wishes she could tell Lan to hold back, but, as the Mockingbird's lightning reaches her brain, there's not much she can really say.
The entire world is moving too slow, and she, much too quick.
===NOW===
( BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwrbjsO1su0 )
"HAUHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH--" The courier crashes in out of seemingly nowhere, pale eyes wild and glowing, exposed skin shimmering where nerve endings glow the color of pyrite gold. Her fists, held high in the air over her head, pivot sharply down, angling her body forward so that when when her fists hit the ground, it's like a localized meteor strike, leaving a crater where she lands, the rock boiling with lightning.
Her chest is ablaze, both figuatively and literally; the twin scars on her chest and back the Stranger gave her when he stabbed her heart are glowing with the Mockingbird's light, where it filled in what was taken from her, that terrible day.
One directive keeps repeating in her brain, as Gwen's afraid it'd get lost otherwise:
Find Azoth's option.
GS: Demetrioi takes a glancing hit from Azoth's ABORT: STANDARD OPERATION. TRY: exec.azoc THIRDOPTION for 46 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Demetrioi with Jarngreipr! GS: Gwen Whitlock has gained 1 Combo! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi partially guards Gwen Whitlock's Jarngreipr for 86 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Guard bonus activated!
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.
Against the backdrop of world's end, how will you meet yours?
The planet has suffered for as long as he has known. Its anguish has worn numb into his nerves, cauterized channels into his brain-- there it has always been, ever since the day he was born, ever since the first umbilical spark linked one soul to the world's soul. He would feel it only in the way that a hand would feel calloused nubs on a scarified limb- deliberately, or when sickness or injury made it worse than normal. But it was always there, always a black spot in his mind, a scar in both name and fact.
And now it's gone.
That's the worst, weirdest thing. Sitting in the cave, Cyre had withdrawn into himself, tired eyes watching the end of all things. And all he could think about for so long--
--Was that the feeling that had always been there... Was now gone. Disappeared. Swallowed up by the Demetrioi's denial of the world and the eternal quietude that lay at the far end of its geocide. The quietude of death had silenced it; no, not death. Death implies that life may yet come. That the cycle would come full circle. This was extinction. Annihilation. Emptiness.
The highest shaman of Fengalon, for the first time in his life, looked upon the end and finally felt nothing.
What was there to do? His connection could not summon the wind of an extinguished world. The silence was all-consuming. The more Demetrioi's madness spread, the stronger its vise grip on the world's arterial essence. He had tried to fight it before, to hold on against it, but...
What could he do now? Now that it had grown so strong...?
Cyre Lorentz stares into the end of all things and knows that nothing he does can turn it aside or forestall it. The end has come. To Filgaia. To him.
He releases a breath of air that, for once in his life, he holds no sway over. Alien air. The air of a foreign world, growing like a parasite on his precious world. "Well," he decides in the utter absence of anyone who knows a single goddamn about how to properly stop this from happening, "If there's no point in doing anything..."
He rises. Footsteps carry him out into the surging apocalypse. In the absence of his god, faced with the end of his world, Cyre Lorentz falls to Desperation.
... He walks on. He walks. He walks. He walks until his legs carry him no more. Pain wracks his mind. Agony tears at his sanity. Every ounce of self-preservation tells him that this is suicide, that there is no point in this, that you are dying.
That is the point, he tells himself.
And so he walks on into the storm. One step after another. Every footstep taking him from safety, from warmth, deeper and deeper into the jaws of certain death....
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.
The figure arrives at the foot of the twisted tree that is Demetrioi. So weak and unassuming by then that he is surely beneath the demiurge's notice. His bare skin is flayed raw. His ribs are broken in a half-dozen places. Every breath comes ragged through half-frozen lungs. Frostbitten fingers reach with aching joints as failing limbs finally give way. With a sound that may have been the last breath leaving a dying body, the figure reaches out and grasps a thin, jagged root. Blood trickles from the wound... out from around a glinting talisman of silver.
The agony of existance that terminates in an inevitable end. The hopelessness of a dying animal knowing its lifeblood is draining away. The terror of the unknown that lay beyond, so certain that it is to come. The hatred of fate, that it would lead them all at the last to this end.
He feels them all pass through him. His mind surges with sorrow and pain. His heart overflows with the writhing mass of befouled emotions.
And with the last of what he has, he reaches-- and squeezes tight.
"Ah..." He calls in a voice that disappears into the blizzard, "Finally. I've found you."
For the longest time, Cyre Lorentz has known the pain of the dying world. He has felt it for so long that it was only by its absence that he knew what it was. A Nahual must resonate with his Guardian-- and that scar on his soul was evidence of it.
How else could he manage this, if he did not feel it again?
Twisting like a gnarled tree in a storm, the figure rips his arm back. He tears, with every ounce of strength left in his body, he seizes upon the narrow limb of the eschatological tree and rips it away. All that comes loose is the flesh of his palm and the barest fragments of alien wood, but it is enough. "Even if this is hopeless, let us burn bright one more time! I understand your pain. I feel your sorrow. I accept every wound. Do not waste your final moments languishing in this parasitic husk-- if we die, we die together! That was our pact! The road we walk together has not yet met its end! You belong with me, not with it!"
"For as long as I live," Cyre Lorentz, High Priest of Filgaia's winds, shouts in a voice only he can hear, "I will walk on! If there's no point in doing anything, then we do everything we can!!" Blood and bark shatter in a flurry of emerald light, a vortex of defiant green torn from the very side of the Demetrioi that consumes the Shaman entirely-- "JOIN ME-- FENGALON!"
The Wind Tiger rises. The divine form of the Nahual alights, blazing with light that seems alien in this twisted place. With a roar, it rakes its claws against the tree's twisted bark, shedding hurricane winds with every strike. A singular will holds it together, seizes the motes of life making up its form and holds them safe from the Demetrioi's grasp. "It's about time! If we make it through this, I better be promoted to GOLD MEDIUM you lazy-ass cat! Let's do this!"
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Demetrioi with Gale Claw! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has gained 1 Combo! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has completed his action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Cyre H. Lorentz's Gale Claw for 147 hit points! GS: Demetrioi's Weaken Ward may block the effect! GS: Weaken blocked!
<Pose Tracker> Demetrioi has posed.
S iiiiiI aaaMMm NnoooOoo ShhoooRtCuuuTTt XC thiiiiSSS modEEElllL haASss BeeenN iTerRAATeed :P
The enormous tree construct thrashes against the last of Queklain's sacrificial volley, catching some of the explosives Kaguya throws. One of them is already deadly to most. Six... six scarce gets much reaction.
The Calamity Flare explodes out, as Kaguya gives Magilou that successful cover - enough to send something like a shiver writhing up Demetrioi and giving that last push for others to find their way back into the fight safely.
G ItTT Iss NoooTt A WorrRLLLd oFFf PuriTYYY :T ITtt Is A wORRrrlllD oofF haPpiIiiNeSS :M
Those mouths twist into strange and stranger shapes as Demetrioi misses the point, but not being Calamity Flare'd. Riese asks an excellent question, but... neither Ethius or Homer show, in the moment. They might have been taken out, at the worst time.
Y eVeeRRrRYthiiiNNgg BeloooNNggS too HappPyy FriieEEnds :H TheEEe LeeYyyy WiiiLl BeE giVeNn tooO theEm :F
Whether they understand the terminology spoken to them now or not is a good thing, well... even in the face of uncertainty, Xantia and Riese both move to protect and encourage those that mean a whole lot to themselves.
N a WwwoooRRrlD thaAAt iSS noooTt HapPyyy CannNot Beee oNNe :X AlL yyoooUUu NeeeDd Iss Too BEee HaaaPPYyyy :L
Lydia's rapid movements are caught with the swipe of some moving branches, even as some are nicked off. Lightning dances about and around Demetrioi as it seems to react to the electrical charges dancing about them, eyeing Issachar's movement as Venetia points to other allies to help them suss out the next step - if there is one.
E TheeeEE moDeEEL proJEeCctssS miNimAl unHappinessSS eveN ZeRRRo :A The SingLE CellULaRRr LifEFooorRMs ThaAT LiVVE WiLL beEe haAAAppyyyY :W
Ribbons all weave around Demetrioi's trunk and squeeze, and it's not... clear, on the onset, if there is anything to truly poison. Is this actually a tree by the rules of plantlife, or some fanciful mockery thereof by the hubris of those from beyond the stars? It does find purchase, wrapping around them - as if another whole-hearted hug from a devastated young woman who had to come to grips with the terrible truth.
Juni's gear finds less purchase in the moment, as another huge gnarled branch-limb slaps back at the strike. They commit to the defense, as well as failing to reach Avril's deft maneuver, allowing the Dust Dragoon to close in and safely uplink their computer to Azoth - more on that in a moment.
Azoth calls, as they dart towards the trunk and the monitor displaying a face there. Machine-to-machine, Azoth communicates with all their being and logic about the flaws behind Demetrioi's choice of action. The direct communication is almost completely incompatible, as if Demetrioi were never to interface with another machine. To never have to handshake, or ask for admin privileges, because it was designed as an absolute power over its domain. And yet... what follows might be a miracle.
o i am aware that all friends will one day leave behind new friends : the model is perfected *unintelligible* and they should be happy for new friends :D)
The clarity of this statement, filtered through improbability and noise, should be alarming. Their course seems set, even faced with other values that Azoth attempts to feed. Are they getting through? Can they? It is... the vague equivalent of dodging them, in that some of it 'misses' getting through.
Gwen strikes into Demetrioi with enough force that it shakes anew, in hopes of having Azoth deliver their other option... as the Wind Tiger rises. They rise in a place where the wind is no longer theirs... but it is wind that could be taken back. Stolen, if it must, as the claws rake against the 'face'... and see the screen slowly reform.
U AbErrAAAAnnt atmOSPheRRRiiC condITTIoooNs :Q rEaSSErtiiiNg DiREccT conTroooLll ^_o
It will be one hell of a fight for the Nahual of Fengalon to keep what wind there is that isn't in Demetrioi's grasp, but nonetheless... the enormous effigy of a dead, horrific tree stirs.
<Pose Tracker> Demetrioi has posed.
I imPOSsIblE aNd FAIIlED moDeELlS dIsCaRddEd :T uNhaRRrrMonnIuSs eNVirONnmeenTt TooO BeeE adDreSSeD :U
Demetrioi's movements come to a standstill, giving moments of free(r) repositioning without the immediate harm of physical retaliation by its ghastly form, but... the air, it starts taking on a less breathable quality. There is oxygen, so there is not suffocation - but it is thinner, and the highly variable make-up of the gathered here (plus the resilience of those within Gears) ensure it's going to take them a little extra time to figure out how, exactly, they are going to address an 'unharmonius environment.'
Then, the branches shake and stir as the strange fruits explode in unison, and the oddly-colored flame that envelops it expands outward. It's heatless, it causes the air to pop in strange but beautiful fractal patterns in ways that would parse to most weapon systems as being (kind of) consistent with scattershot ARM laser bursts. The air quality does not improve from there, as rotting fruits of a sort spawn around the branches anew. They amplify and echo the 'words' that follow.
83 IsS ThiIs SaTisFacTOrrYyy NooowWwwW :E TheErRe Iss Aaa ConfLicCt in QueRry I muSstt ResSOlLVve o_O
Ethius isn't here to tell them what to do now - if he even had anything more to say. (Homer's absence may also be noted but, as a cruel jest, may not be quite as critical or as missed.)
Nonetheless... it seems this is as much a fight for survival of a planet against Demetrioi as much as what they're doing to make it harder for individuals struggling under the changed environs to do so, which you may want to address as promptly as possible.
GS: Demetrioi has activated a Boss Action! GS: You have activated the Boss Action Extend! GS: Demetrioi has activated Force Action: Snipe! GS: You have activated the Force Action Snipe! GS: Demetrioi spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Cyre H. Lorentz with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Gwen Whitlock with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Azoth with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Avril Vent Fleur with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Juni Vandrer with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Lan Lilac with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Venetia Vuong with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Jacqueline Barber with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Lydia Seren with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Xantia with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Riesenlied with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Magilou with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Kaguya with !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has gained 1 Combo! GS: Interrupt expired! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: CRITICAL! Lydia Seren partially evades Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 129 hit points! GS: Hex, Jam, and Mute applied to Lydia Seren! GS: FP up! Evade bonus activated! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz takes a glancing hit from Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 69 hit points! GS: Hex and Mute applied to Cyre H. Lorentz! GS: Jam blocked! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: CRITICAL! Riesenlied solidly guards Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 72 hit points! GS: Hex, Jam, and Mute applied to Riesenlied! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: CRITICAL! Jacqueline Barber solidly guards Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 106 hit points! GS: Jacqueline Barber's Mute Ward may block the effect! GS: Hex and Jam applied to Jacqueline Barber! GS: Mute blocked! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: CRITICAL! Kaguya solidly guards Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 109 hit points! GS: Hex, Jam, and Mute applied to Kaguya! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: CRITICAL! Juni Vandrer takes a glancing hit from Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 134 hit points! GS: Hex, Jam, and Mute applied to Juni Vandrer! GS: FP up! Evade bonus activated! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: CRITICAL! Azoth partially guards Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 149 hit points! GS: Hex, Jam, and Mute applied to Azoth! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: CRITICAL! Xantia partially evades Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 116 hit points! GS: Hex, Jam, and Mute applied to Xantia! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: CRITICAL! Avril Vent Fleur suffers a terrible blow from Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 364 hit points! GS: Hex, Jam, and Mute applied to Avril Vent Fleur! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: CRITICAL! Magilou solidly guards Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 89 hit points! GS: Hex, Jam, and Mute applied to Magilou! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: CRITICAL! Lan Lilac suffers a terrible blow from Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 160 hit points! GS: Hex, Jam, and Mute applied to Lan Lilac! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: CRITICAL! Venetia Vuong solidly guards Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 78 hit points! GS: Venetia Vuong's Mute Ward may block the effect! GS: Hex and Jam applied to Venetia Vuong! GS: Mute blocked! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey partially guards Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 123 hit points! GS: Hex, Jam, and Mute applied to Ida Everstead-Rey! GS: FP up! Countermeasures and Guard bonus activated! GS: Interrupt! Attack weakened! GS: Gwen Whitlock takes a glancing hit from Demetrioi's !! CAUTION !!_unharmonious_environment_to_be_addressed_._._. for 62 hit points! GS: Gwen Whitlock's Jam Ward may block the effect! GS: Mute applied to Gwen Whitlock! GS: Hex and Jam blocked! GS: FP up! Countermeasures and Evade bonus activated!
<Pose Tracker> Kaguya has posed.
As usual, Magilou is cryptic--but Kaguya is enough on her wavelength today. "I think I liked the other tree better," she admits to her, as Magilou displays a great power. But as she grins, Kaguya grins back. "...Yeah," she says. "I heard you. Well, the world we're opposing is about as pure as it gets..."
Kaguya looks back to Riesenlied, then to Lydia, as she feels the power of the Ley. "Let us protect you," Kaguya says to Riesenlied. "You protected me earlier. We'll make it work... together."
Then to Lydia, "Yeah it's pretty scary. Think you can handle it? This is the kind of shit that's out there in space, you know."
Kaguya had some of the same idealism as Venetia, once, albeit in a different way. She came from space; she had so much belief in the power of space's technology and ideas, in waht they could make of this world... Only to learn that the world was already something, after all.
But to Juni, Yeah, yeah." She shakes her head. She isn't really in the mood for jokes. But it is a time for change. "I don't think we're convincing him of anything," she admits, "But Azoth might prove me wrong. Just try to survive, Juni. And keep the big guns."
Consider. "Attack relay... we have to work with everyone as best we can. None of us have the firepower to take this guy down alone."
Kaguya recognizes the others coming back, and is briefly pleased that her calculations with Ida worked out. She definitely knew they would*. Definitely.
"Right!" Kaguya answers Avril as she quotes Dean. "That's not how Filgaia ends! Not today... and not tomorrow!"
Tomorrow?
Azoth is trying... Kaguya hopes, but does not believe, that he will succeed. There are many others speaking up; powers such as the Stranger's that she does not know in Lan and Gwen. And Cyre...
"I think if you work with me," Kaguya says to him drily, "You might not get that promotion. But I'll make sure the Guardians still have a planet, whether they like it or not!"
But Demetrioi... Demetrioi is talking. Kaguya tries not to focus on the words; it's painful enough as it is. But she's glad she put on her breathing mask, anyway. The 'rotting' fruits rush about. The models, the models...
"DEMETRIOI!" Kaguya calls, as she finds herself already tired from the battle so far, and the damage the new environmental conditions are wreaking without her armor is significant. Nevertheless, "I've never been that happy a person!" she admits. "But I tried. With you, I tried."
Cla-CLACK. Kaguya loads up gleaming cartridges into her ARM. "But it's up to us now." She takes aim at the Demetrioi's core, and FIRES, sonic energy crashing forward.
"Everyone! Try to hang on!"
GS: Kaguya has attacked Demetrioi with Concussion Rounds! GS: Kaguya has gained 1 Combo! GS: Kaguya has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi has activated Force Action: Guard! GS: You have activated the Force Action Guard! GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Kaguya's Concussion Rounds for 106 hit points! GS: Shieldbreak applied to Demetrioi!
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
Lydia is pretty sure Kaguya is taunting her in an attempt to get her to believe in herself and be strong and junk. Lydia suddenly worries that maybe if she doesn't act suitably encouraged it might discourage Kaguya and make her sad even if she's pretty sure she has a new girlfriend. It's important to support your family even if they have girlfriends, Lydia decides. Or maybe it's an old girlfriend come to think. Lydia gets that look in her eyes that Kaguya knows means she's thinking about some wild ass tangent and is kind of focused on that rather than paying attention. To be fair, it is difficult to dodge the planet and all the pretty and strange fractal patterns are kind of getting blasted around with what might be ARMSfire is difficult for her to parse.
OS would probably have an easier time, she thinks.
"Well...okay!" Lydia says to Kaguya, laughing heartily. "I'm not gonna... let SPACE PROBLEMS spook me even if they have destroyed a whole buncha planets. You know who else destroyed a bunch of planets? Mother. And we sure showed her, didn't we? I mean I assume. I wasn't there. I was downstairs. But we won right? Maybe we just convinced her to go home."
"ANYWAY." Lydia says. "I'M GONNA..."
She starts jogging back for a moment and stops by Riesenlied.
She crouches down and pulls her socks back on.
And then HEEEEFTS Riesenlied up into one arm, shifting her so she's on her shoulder.
"KIDS CAN GIVE MOMS PIGGYBACK RIDES TOO OKAY? THERE'S NO LAW AGAINST IT. You better stop playing rough, Demetrioi, or you're gonna have to deal with--"
She looks at the mustard in one hand.
Her other arm is occupied with Mom. "Mom. And then you'll be ~~~~grouuunded~~~~"
She looks to Riesenlied. "Go on mom, you can ground him, moms of other folks can still ground people because of their parental authority."
She extends a hand and unleashes a green burst of light towards Demetrioi's roots. It's part tree maybe? Maybe this'll work? She kind of has to work around the mustard bottle.
"If you're running low on energy, Azzy, I got a pickmeup for ya! Uhhh but gonna...bit awkward here... uhhhh"
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied stares agog at Lydia's bottle of mustard for a moment, before saying, "You too, Lydia..." It's going to be really bad if she draws attention and is attacked, with her mobility currently virtually at zero.
Venetia arrives close and speaks to her. "Ah, yes--" she quietly nods, pulling herself a little bit further up. She's seated now, legs splayed to one side.
"Ultimately, Demetrioi controls weather and nature through manipulation of the Ley. As a Crest Sorceress, you have great control of that yourself, Miss Venetia... perhaps what is needed is for us to combine and push back against it." She lifts her head up. "We will need the aid of Cyre and others as well... the more of us that can directly influence it, the better."
She hears Azoth, and his entreating. That's right, people still haven't given up even now. But how can they reach it, when they haven't before? She's always believed in coexistence... but how can they communicate with it? Perhaps it is arrogant to think words alone could make Demetrioi understand -- perhaps it's in a different language that it must be shown.
Avril, in the Skadi, shifts to protect them. "Thank you, Miss Avril...!"
Riesenlied pauses, however, as Demetrioi starts to manipulate the air around them -- and her already laborious breathing starts to become even more difficult. With her sickly and unhealthy body, this is a critical issue.
Kaguya's words embolden her; let them protect her. They'll make it work... together.
"R-right...!" Riesenlied whispers, through her wheezing.
It's just as they say -- her daughters are here to help, as Lydia lifts her on one arm and shifts her so she's seated on her shoulder. "Ah-- goodness--!"
It's miles better than being flat on the ice, when cold is already her natural weakness. "Thank you, Lydia, Kaguya. Yes, together..."
Then she thinks of Azoth again, and his desire to communicate. Perhaps the two ideas could be combined? "Azoth, much of what Demetrioi communicates upon exists on the same plane as the Ley. Perhaps, when we find an opening to push against its control... perhaps a method of communication you desire could exist there."
It's a long shot, given how the Ley is not a technological medium and she doesn't even know if Azoth could interface with it, but... if there ever was a time of miracles, this would have to be it.
In the meantime, she shifts her focus to channel more power towards ailing allies Avril, Venetia, and Azoth, perhaps as a little experiment to see if he could interface with it on some regard.
Coexistence is the word upon which the Outreach lives and dies on. She wishes to see this become a reality.
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.
"I am PRETTY SURE the Guardians don't have a choice right now, so their opinion on who they want to help can go stuff it!" Cyre is, as ever, an irreverant asshole-- but at least today it seems like he's applying the policy with some degree of uniformity. The Wind Tiger's fanged maw pulls back in a snarling grimace, "If working with you saves Filgaia, then let them complain!" Fengalon may not approve, but Fengalon is also not precisely in a position to disagree right now.
Especially not when the very essence of the Guardian is being contested.
As if wanting to prove the futility of trying to seize the ley back, Demetrioi turns its attention to the atmosphere. The air turns stale and foul. The deific Wind Tiger seems to stagger, but catches itself. It digs a heel into the stuff of the air and kicks off like it were a solid surface. Hands curl into claws, each strike aimed not at the Demetrioi's core-- but at the roots leading up its trunk. "It takes the form of a tree for a reason. If its branches are how it channels the ley out at us, then it must be drawing it up through its roots!!" However flawed the concept is, Cyre executes on it. 'Try everything,' he did say.
And if he can force Demetrioi to focus on regenerating its bits, then maybe he can disrupt its control over the ley in some capacity...!
GS: Riesenlied has attacked Venetia Vuong with Ley Channeling - Spirits Within! GS: Riesenlied has attacked Azoth with Ley Channeling - Spirits Within! GS: Riesenlied has attacked Avril Vent Fleur with Ley Channeling - Spirits Within! GS: Riesenlied has gained 3 Combo! GS: Riesenlied has completed her action. GS: Riesenlied heals Venetia Vuong! She gains 186 temporary hit points! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Demetrioi with Tiger Rampage! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has gained 1 Combo! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Riesenlied heals Azoth! He gains 242 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
The fruits hanging heavy on the branches explode, but debris doesn't rain down on them all - instead the very fabric of the world's air changes. The part of Lan's heart that still sings silver cries out to see Cyre summon the power of the Nahual, his broken and bloodied form rising again resplendent with the power of a fierce deity.
Everyone is with her, no matter how far away. She can reach out to them still.
She reaches out for Demetrioi instead, despite her breath growing thin in her lungs, despite the spots in her vision. "I don't want this." Her voice isn't loud, but... "I don't want this. We don't want this. Demetrioi..." Lan struggles for a moment, for words and for breath and for will. "Demetrioi. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, but you... aren't welcome here anymore!"
She kicks off of the air above the snow, feet finally finding purchase in the surface as Lan lets her spell drop. Instead she dashes this way and that, the force of her passing enough to rend bark and uproot vines. Once, twice, thrice...!
And Lan comes back with a kick that, while not as powerful as Gwen could ever manage, might still rattle a few branches.
GS: Lan Lilac has attacked Demetrioi with Black Doe! GS: Lan Lilac has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
"Heh... yeah. You can't leash the Earthpulse," Magilou grins, all too savage, to Riesenlied. "Or the Ley, if you like. All you can do is ride the wave and find a path through! Come on!"
The channeled Ley flows through her, and that aberrant energy isn't so harsh, in the gaps between her bones.
She looks to Demetrioi -- the Demetrioi -- and remarks, dryly: "Your smiley faces are coming apart, son. Best see to that." It's missing the point, and she's never been the one to make a horse drink once she brings it to water.
The oxygen thins. "If you can't breathe, get behind me," Magilou issues, to them, as she moves to stand by Kaguya again, and the reasoning is clear. Magilou's negation field is warring with the Demetrioi's control over the environment, and the area directly around her is less strange by half than the rest of the battlefield. Strange fruits fly towards her -- and Magilou lifts a hand, a beehive-barrier of light erupting in front of her to catch those laser-like explosions. They crack the shining light of the barrier; still, it holds.
And Magilou's fingers jerk inwards, with a suppressed grimace, as all the horror of the Demetrioi's will flows into her veins. This, too, she will forge into power. This, too...
"I've got an unharmonious model for you right here," Magilou issues, as she lifts her hand, again. "Lightning Blast!"
And all the oxygen it sought to drain from the environment bursts from her shikigami, lightning bolts arcing to strike at that horrific foliage.
"The other tree was definitely better," she asides, to Kaguya, belatedly. "With nicer children, even. Kids these days!"
GS: Magilou has attacked Demetrioi with Lightning Blast! GS: Magilou has gained 2 Combo! GS: Magilou gains 10 FP from her Daredevil! GS: Magilou has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
"A model is just that - a model. It isn't reality. And yours is flawed." Jacqueline replies. "You can't sacrifice the now for a prospective future. You aren't the first one who's tried, Demetrioi - and we'll stop you too."
So many have gathered here to protect Filgaia - friends she recognizes. She's glad to be here with them, when things seem so uncertain. Demetrioi attacks, strange fruits exploding in oddly-color flames that wash over her Gear. Issachar helps keep her safe, somewhat - but that won't matter if Demetrioi gets their way.
Once again, Issachar casts a hand out. This time, however, the pinion feathers detach from its Wing Unit. She guides them mentally, a flurry of bladed feathers looking to slice and dice through Demetrioi's implements of offense to keep her friends safe.
GS: Jacqueline Barber has attacked Demetrioi with Feather Swarm! GS: Jacqueline Barber has gained 1 Combo! GS: Jacqueline Barber has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi solidly guards Cyre H. Lorentz's Tiger Rampage for 61 hit points! GS: Delay blocked! GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Lan Lilac's Black Doe for 103 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Gamble: Moderate! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Magilou's Lightning Blast for 149 hit points! GS: Demetrioi's Break Ward may block the effect! GS: Demetrioi's Disrupt Ward may block the effect! GS: Break and Disrupt blocked! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated! GS: Demetrioi takes a solid hit from Jacqueline Barber's Feather Swarm for 119 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Delay blocked!
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.
Having Gwen to further back up Xantia and Azoth's efforts was more than welcomed of course. Though Xantia had no idea what exactly she was agreeing to at the time with her cheerful, "Sure, we could use all the help we can get!"
Azoth makes his wishes plain, and Xantia nods in understanding. "You probably have the best chance at getting through to Demetrioi in a way they'll understand. But I'll do what I can. Try to talk, see if that helps. Failing that... I'll do everything I can to stop this, but I'll do it with care. I promise - I won't go all-out unless you tell you me to."
A difficult promise for Xantia, given her self-control problems as of late. But one she's determined to keep. Flashy, Ether-charged punches and the use of her ARM may be the most common ways she fights, but they're not all she can do. It'll be a lot harder this way, but that's usually the case when you eshew the obvious courses of action to attempt a third option. She'll never discourage anyone from doing so, least of all Azoth, who she's encouraged to do exactly this multiple times in the past. His form change thus prompts nothing but a smile from her - this is the affirmation of his resolve.
And then... the time comes.
Azoth delivers his declaration to Demetrioi. Xantia prepares to make her own move, when suddenly... her name is called out, Venetia correctly recalling it. She does take great care to try and ensure people will remember her. Memories are the most important thing, after all. Similarly, she takes care to remember others - being spoken to makes it easy, but she would have been able to identify Venetia behind the spell that empowers her either way. It's a truly unique feeling, one that makes it feel like you can do anything. "Thanks Venetia!" she calls out, an aura of pure Light springing to life around her. She can't afford to let her surprise at Gwen's appearance delay her. Something in the atmosphere has changed. It's time to make her move.
BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31CqZn0DzIQ
"DEMETRIOI!" So shouting, Xantia charges. If the changes in the air bother her, there is no indication of it. The laser bursts begin, but she doesn't stop. One sears by on her left side. She leaps up high, to avoid another. A third... strikes her dead-on, yet the barrier of light holds, barely slowing her down. She will not be stopped. She cannot. She has something important to do - something important to say. And so, she will.
"You have made a very serious miscalculation! You see, in spite of everything, no matter how many problems there are with Filgaia's environment--"
By now, she's gotten close enough to be in range of Demetrioi's flailing roots. One of which is on course to swat her aside. Except that... she catches it, holding it firmly in place, and is not about to let go without a fight. With that, she finishes what she had to say:
"I'm happy!!"
Sure enough, in spite of everything, there's a genuine smile on her face. Hoping to have their attention now, she continues, "Don't you see? All humans need to be happy is friendship! You don't need to do this! In fact, doing this will only destroy that happiness! Isn't that the exact opposite of what you're trying to do?"
GS: Xantia has attacked Demetrioi with Hope And Happiness! GS: Xantia has gained 1 Combo! GS: Xantia has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.
Avril's Gear flies in a dramatic sweep, sending wind that stirs Venetia's hair and protects her fragile, mortal body (if indirectly) from the wrath of the great tree.
The air is growing breathless; the flame may never warm but it is certainly taking the savor out of the air. The oxygen and the other trace gasses. Venetia falls back, nearer to this momentary space of protection, and she takes a deep breath - struggling a little -
which she lets out as a "heh."
"It's fortunate, then, that I have my trump card, now," Venetia says to Riesenlied. "We'll set the stars against themselves to protect our world if we must."
She rummages in her Crest Pouch for a moment, and then calls out:
"DEMETRIOI!"
"You're like me, aren't you? You just want to have the proof before your eyes. You won't put your heart and your labor into mere hopes if there's anything else - and you've gotten a course that feels real to you, and you've already gotten set in your ways. But," and here she's drawing out one of those plus-size Crest Graphs,
"What if the theory was just as real? Let me demonstrate to you the possibilities of the phase-space of the possible." And there is a breath inwards - the Ley itself gathering inwards, tenfold past the usual effectations of Crest Sorcery, something that makes the air itself seem to pulsate and glow a little, even in the thunderclaps and storms that Magilou unleashes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zis2TtxdFjQ
"Behold! The proof of imagination itself! New Derivative Sign--" That held-in breath exhales outwards, forming invisible thrills of channeled energy through the air that strike outwards in a chaotic pattern, one of them catching Lydia's blast and furthering it on its way with an added soupcon of force. Just to show that they ARE there.
"Grow, grow, grow, grow, grow," Venetia says, apparently straining something beyond its expected duration and emphasis and--
"BURST!"
The fractally progressive path of these invisible lines of Ley erupt outwards, the way that a tree can crush stone with the aid of water and time. Yes -- this spell is only a Tree-That-Might-Had-Been, while Demetrioi's actual, real, a thing that has both cause and is generating effect. But the ground is ripped, and perhaps the Actual may be dismayed at such blows.
GS: Venetia Vuong has attacked Demetrioi with New Derivative Sign ~Hypothetical Root~! GS: Venetia Vuong has gained 2 Combo! GS: Venetia Vuong has completed her action. GS: Sneak! The true nature of Xantia's attack becomes clear! GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Xantia's Scarlet Eclipse for 157 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Xantia drains Demetrioi! Xantia gains 76 temporary hit points! GS: ROU|LET|TE: Catastrophic! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Venetia Vuong's New Derivative Sign ~Hypothetical Root~ for 203 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Entangle applied to Demetrioi! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated!
<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed (paraphrase from Big Scene).
OST: Venetia's Catastrophic Hit Theme Shift, Mid-Bar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O7d0foeO-k
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.
However, talking isn't the only thing Xantia's doing. She's trying to pull the plug on Demetrioi's efforts, in the only non-destructive way she can think of: draining the energy right out of it. She doesn't know how long she can keep this up for, but anything that can delay Demitrioi's destructive idea of terraforming even a little is worth doing.
<Pose Tracker> Juni Vandrer has posed.
Juni Vandrer was already wearing her mask before and between what she hopes are functioning seals on the gear and the mask... that smell still gets through somehow. "This thing is supposed to be water tight dammit." Disregarding the.. unique situation of synesthasia inspired awfulness.
"Please remind me to have a chat with your creator down the road." she mutters to no one in particular, though she is moving again, having been rocked and rattled around. Dodging the worst of it. Sort of. The HUD's not happy and her system is reading in the local language rather than her own again. Which prompts a kick at the console from the alien.
Replying to Kaguya's deadpan she adds, "If it makes you feel better I talked myself out of it." She's using one hand to pilot, another to try and reboot her system and her tail to flip a few switches. This is awkward, strange and she's rattling around- reminding her that she should probably eventually maybe retrofit the thing.
"Maybe we can just convince him to hang out on an asteroid? He can see neat things, he gets his perfect little world." She mutters under her breath, <We can aim it at the closest celestial body>. Really not the time to be joking, but she handle stress funny ways and she's definitely showing it.
Another electronic burst of static as she gets to work on jamming more systems, trying to figure out how to isolate alien tech, using alien tech looped through alien tech. Even with her own AI support, a system designed for it and familiarity with comms interference this isn't going as smoothly as she'd have liked. The funny colors, all of them. Even the ones the locals can't see are a bit distracting though.
"Do you really think you're going to end up with a perfect world even reducing it down as far as you're suggesting?" She asks, seriously as she gets oriented again. Translating on the fly to speak, read and interpret the information scrolling on her HUD. Trying to slice out key parts. Trying to isolate the machine's control on the science side of 'sufficiently advanced magic. ..Wait.
"You lose sight of what happiness is if you're never pushed because you're 'happy'." The last word being said sarcastically, "It's just as bad as being in someone's shadow the whole time. You do stupid things. You end up in stupid places and you cause problems trying to correct it and instead you just make it worse." She hits the panel, trying to get it to swap over. This gear's still a work in progress.
She gets the mech back in position, trying to draw the lashing attacks away from the other still. The machine can take hits from those big ol' tendrils better than the on foot sort could. Repairs are nothing either.
"You'll be alone out here. Nothing else like you around. No one ever coming this way again. Watching as your silent kingdom devours itself as nature does." There might be some actual emotion in the idea of being alone out here, but that's for later.
She thumbs the next switch, trying to neatly snip one of the connections away as she either distracts or maybe somehow gets through? It's not great either way.
GS: Juni Vandrer has attacked Demetrioi with Hush! GS: Juni Vandrer has gained 1 Combo! GS: Juni Vandrer has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Demetrioi's voice echoes through the Dragoon's cockpit, warped and garbled. Rather than engage, the Gear jets up and away, alighting on an outcropping sturdy enough to bear its weight. It was built to support a squad, and that's precisely what its pilot aims to do. Demetrioi is, first, and foremost, an unknown, and anything she can piece together on them might salvage this desperate situation.
Azoth rushes forwards. Ida watches, wide-eyed, as his form changes--but there's no sign of the hideous red that heralds malfunctions. "Right behind you, Azoth!" A bit further behind, now, but that data stream is still there, still providing plenty of optimization potential.
"...Cyre?!" There is undisguised horror in Ida's voice as she sees the Shaman stagger towards Demetrioi, trailing blood. Her foot is halfway to the jet pedal--ready to floor it, and protect Cyre from a horrible branch, or the blizzard, or worse--when he changes. For the first time since the storm began, the air feels clean.
It's just for a moment. The thinness in the air carries through the cockpit seals, and Ida finds her head swimming--the air was already thin up here, but managable, and Demetrioi is making it worse. Her vision blurs as those fruits race through the air, detonating in bursts of esoteric energy. In the face of this relentless onslaught, Ida braces. The Dragoon switches up its stance, turning to the side and raising both arms to protect the cockpit in its chest. Explosions ripple across its frame, tearing free a few armor plates, which fall to the ground below...
But it's still standing. Ida's right hand flies across the sensor panels, even as she steadies the Gear with the pedals and left joystick. "Azoth, Issachar, Skadi," Ida says, and surely it's just a slip of the tongue that she's addressing the Gears, "I'm still analyzing. Uploading pattern data!"
So much of it is hypotheses. But Demetrioi's roots are now clearly marked--thanks, Cyre!--and labeled with data on what seems to be getting through.
'Ley-interface anomaly??' is commented in. There's something there, in that section of Demetrioi's 'body', that Ida's sensors aren't equipped to handle.
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Azoth with Firing Solution! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Jacqueline Barber with Firing Solution! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Avril Vent Fleur with Firing Solution! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has gained 2 Combo! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action. GS: Azoth accepts Ida Everstead-Rey's Firing Solution for 0 hit points! GS: Hyper applied to Azoth! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Azoth enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Jacqueline Barber accepts Ida Everstead-Rey's Firing Solution for 0 hit points! GS: Hyper applied to Jacqueline Barber!
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
It's not lost on Azoth how powerful Xantia's promise is, and how against her usual style. Simple words of gratitude don't quite cover that, but he still says them. "...Thank you, Xantia."
But it's not surprising, either. Xantia has always been the one to show Azoth there are more pathways than he can perceive. That there is a data called hope, and that it can change what otherwise seems inevitable.
Trying to communicate with Demetrioi on the most basic level is inviting a glitch into Azoth's operation. To do so on this level ravages Azoth inside and reflects it outside: wires scream, threatening to fray. Cords crack further along their length, near bursting. One of them does. Noncritical. Azoth will continue. Azoth must continue, even as the fruits explode, the flames stretch outward, and reality around them threatens to tear him -- and everything he's come to know -- apart.
Demetrioi is something more advanced than himself. Whoever programmed them, or their own learning algorithms, already accounted for the death of lifeforms that would be called friends. Grief and loss would otherwise overwhelm the system, the way Azoth's own once was. But is Demetrioi truly free of the ability to determine a sense of responsibility and stress related to it...?
"If you're advanced enough to account for temporary unhappiness to achieve longterm consequences, then you can adjust to endure this discomfort! Reanalyze the data! The destruction you're about to cause... what about your happiness, Demetrioi?! Won't you miss your old friends? Will you really be satisfied once they're erased, nothing more than memories, no longer to ever share new data with you? For you to share your data with them? You are a critical missing piece of data in your own calculations!"
Another direct connection attempt is made. Sparks fly. Joints smoke with color, threatening to burst. Azoth's own form appears to split visually, as if he were about to be deleted from reality as his void drive malfunctions. Negative feedback piles on. But Azoth, too, has learned to endure temporary unhappiness.
He's learned to endure what he thought might be permanent unhappiness. And he has learned that's not a strength, nor an existence one any man or machine should have to face.
Rieselied's voice speaks out, and with her... the Ley. All of Azoth's lights brighten, his core working to convert and absorb the energy into his body the best he can and tries to weave that into the wireless code working to find a working connection between him and Demetrioi, transmitting hard data in place of these urgent, but so easily twisted words. To make the existence of everyone's happiness represent more than a faceless variable. The voices of everyone put into programming: they are the ones defending happiness, and Demetrioi is in error.
Then he waits for input, holding his ground, floating in place, all aglow... and if he's clever, if he's lucky, if he's determined, with the help of the Ley itself... he might work it into a new argument he can launch back into Demetrioi's system to disrupt them and this entire erroneous execution...!
GS: Azoth used Force Action: Mystic on himself! GS: Hex removed! GS: Azoth has attacked Demetrioi with Merged Data! GS: Azoth enters a Counter stance! GS: Azoth has gained 2 Combo! GS: Azoth has completed his action. GS: Demetrioi partially guards Juni Vandrer's Hush for 45 hit points! GS: Mute applied to Demetrioi! GS: Demetrioi takes a glancing hit from Azoth's Merged Data for 11 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Hyper applied to Azoth!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
When Gwen gets up, one of her boots is missing, likely hanging somewhere on her quick chaotic journey up here. It doesn't seem to bother her, nor does the change in the air and environment. However, the pulse of her heartbeat visible in the star-like scars on her front and back beat a little faster as her lungs try to make up for the decreasing amount of air.
The redhead doesn't say much of anything to the struggling Demetrioi, but sympathy creases her brow. She opens her mouth to speak, but, even if she could speak, the words she can grab don't seem to fit. There's a gulf between them, and as the slowed world keeps moving, Gwen is less able to transcend that gap in this form than she was as her normal everyday, very mortal self.
She's still very mortal, in this form. It's just a little harder to squish her.
Cyre signals that Demetrioi's form may be a functional choice; Gwen makes a grand leap backwards, extending her right arm out. Aiming for where the branches fall flush with Demetrioi's trunk, she fires several blasts of deep pink in rapid succession.
If Gwen can't do it, she'll just buy time for those who know the right words to bridge that gap.
GS: Gwen Whitlock has activated Force Action: Lock On! GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Demetrioi with Coil Cannon AZOTH! GS: Gwen Whitlock has gained 1 Combo! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
She had been striving to obtain and keep Demetrioi's at least attention on herself.
And so she does. And so she does -- with the way about her blocked and barred by several of Demetrioi's chasing 'branches', there is no escape she can muster from the bursting 'fruits' and no shield she can bring to bear in this present moment save for her sword: even her flight has overcome her Gear's cooling systems, leaving little but the basics available.
There is little to do but endure what is to come. It is strain enough to keep Skadi airborne as warning lights flash across her internal monitors. Some sections of armor plating have taken serious damage. Some external cameras and other sensors have been destroyed. There is an electrical surge in...
The spell engine has been knocked offline.
"Not today, and not tomorrow..." Avril echoes. There is something almost, nearly...
And it's gone again, slipping away from her fingertips. "No, not tomorrow. Nor any of the days after that!"
Even if Skadi breaks, she will continue to fight, as long as there is the need for her to fight. One hand reaches out absently for the Medium installed in her Gear's array, the connection to the Guardian there now stilled and silent. "It is alright," she murmurs, half to herself. "This is your world. And... it is ours! Riesenlied! I hear you!" As if in response to Riesenlied's plea, the Medium stirs: there is again the sense of a presence within it, a force that seems to spread through her Gear and flow even into herself. But, will it be enough?
She hadn't seen Cyre on his advance towards Demetrioi but she sees him now: host proper to the Wind Guardian, his wrath brought against the would-be interloper.
"Understood, Ida; systems compromised but I am downloading your data now." And indeed, though the one screen sputters, it still gives her exactly what she needs.
"I am sorry," she says, diving low as she swoops in for one of those great branches extending from Demetrioi's side. "Yet, I shall not permit you to do as you please with this world!"
GS: Riesenlied heals Avril Vent Fleur! She gains 378 temporary hit points! GS: Avril Vent Fleur accepts Ida Everstead-Rey's Firing Solution for 0 hit points! GS: Hyper applied to Avril Vent Fleur! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has attacked Demetrioi with Amaryllis Breaker! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has gained 1 Combo! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi solidly guards Gwen Whitlock's Coil Cannon AZOTH for 60 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Demetrioi solidly guards Avril Vent Fleur's Amaryllis Breaker for 64 hit points! GS: Demetrioi's Disrupt Ward may block the effect! GS: Disrupt blocked! GS: Lydia Seren spends 1 Combo on Poison! GS: Lydia Seren has attacked Demetrioi with Beautiful Morning! GS: Lydia Seren has gained 1 Combo! GS: Lydia Seren has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Lydia Seren's Beautiful Morning for 153 hit points! GS: Demetrioi's Poison Ward may block the effect! GS: Poison blocked! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated!
<Pose Tracker> Demetrioi has posed.
Y yoooUuuuU nEvEeRrrr NeeDeeD to Tryyyy KagUyyaaAA :M AfTeEERrr ThiSs MoDellL i wiLll HavE TriEEd HarrRd enouuuGH :6
Concussion rounds scramble the monitor visibly, the 'glass' shattering and reforming as sonic energy is processed shakily through the entire mass of the tree-thing.
2 IiiI dooO noOOttT haAVVeeE Aaa MotHEEERRr :I I am AlrEEADY attACHeD TooO The GRooUnnD aATT *unintelligible* ALTiTUuuDDE :9
A green burst of light courses through the roots, and if they don't damage it too much (it seems to), it brightly follows patterns like a guiding star for others to look into. They... go deep. Really deep, deep into the mountain. This was seen on the way up, and that's not good! Riese does her best to help keep those healthy that she can, as she wrestles with the Ley continue to help those who stand and fight despite the immense discomfort (...to put it mildly). Still, the idea of a structured assault starts to come pieced together. Cyre rampages and slices away at the trunk, yanking loose some kind of... matter with a level of elasticity that prevents anything from sticking to them (good, it's gross probably) as the structure starts to knit itself against the blows.
Lan, emotionally charged with a power that gives her further strength to stand against this, rips open some of the 'bark' in a whirling spiral as she says with definitive words that they 'aren't welcome here anymore.'
3 i Amm NoTT GoiiNngg AnywheEEErrrEee :J Iii AmmM tooO funcTiiiOnnN forR a hAAAppy WorRlD ForEEVVVEEErrrr t_c
Magilou's Lightning Blast almost gets caught by a clever defense mechanism, coursing the elctrical power along a length and then expelling it and the charge before recapturing the ejected matter, but it does not take. Whatever force of power this is, Magilou of everyone might be closest - strange as it is - to whatever reality of existential understanding powers this... this... thing, without the ability to putt it into precise words. (Unless the words are her spell names. Those count as words.)
1 TheERrEE iiis nOooo OtheEERR :Z wHooo CaaaN :R
Jay pounces on this, if perhaps by accident, as the bladed feathers carve apart large branches in their wake.
M theEIRrr ModEEElllS weRRE tooOO flaAWeeED :Q TheeeYY wooUUllD beeEe haaapPPyy NoooWWW :G
Venetia calls to Demetrioi, who has their attention with a 8B face. The theory, she puts forth, the proof of imagination is real - a burst of channeled Ley turned into a tree-like shape starts to rudely uproot at least one of the vines that causes a violent shake around the place as testament to efficacy.
IC ThiiiiSS dooEEss NooT briiIINgg JooyyyY 7: bUUutt WhaAT possSIBiLiTTyy AllOwwS iT toooO ovERtuurRRN thiiS PErFEeEct ModeeeLLL :X
Xantia delivers a truly grave miscalculation - on Demetrioi's part - as she takes a root and the face twists strangely on her declaration. Xantia is happy. She is happy. The smile is real. Any and every possible surveyor or measurer of this would corroborate it. Whatever's going through them is probably doing more 'harm' than what incredible damage she can do with her own two hands.
0_B . . . :W . . . *unintelligible* . . .:Z
4 I WiiiLll BeeEEe haAAppY bEEEcaUUSse All FrieEEnDss ArreE HappYYY :W EveEEN ifFF TheeeY remaAAAIIn sInGlE CellL oRGanISssMS :S
Juni only has educated guesses. She is very well educated at messing machines up. Her people have never, ever directly encountered something like this. It seems to adjust the 'strength' of the weird sound-like way Demetrioi mimics the concept, so... progress?
Ida will notice it's a bit easier - a bit - to process and share data with the others, so given there's a bit less 'noise' to fight with now, that's a plus - as so much is riding on getting Azoth to try and reach through to Demetrioi on a level where they can almost talk on the level. Attempts are being made, to try and break down the flawed programming between those constructed and reconstructed in ways truly cruel as they struggle to fulfill their programming. The connection is being met with unacceptable latency, but something - anything - is pinging.
i am happy if friends are happy but current friends can never be happy :o if they cannot be happy for those who will be happy that they could not achieve then *unintelligible* :D)
Deep pink blasts from Gwen rain out in the 'real,' scorching the trunk and causing all of it to adjust to change to colors to better absorb it, as Avril makes a swoop for one of the large branch arms that mostly succeeds in dislodging a new rotten fruit-like thing that it 'catches.'
K JJjUuuSSt AsSs I CannNooTt PErmIiiTt moDEeeLss WiTthh UnhaPPIneeSSS :2 i MuuuSt TrrRYY OvEeRr AnnDd oVEErrr AnnD OVEerRR UnTiiLl I doOo yOouu HaVVEe Noo SuuuCch reSponSsibiLiitTy :9
Then, words are given to the Gears, such as they are...
G YoooUU doo NoooT NeeED to HiiDEE in ThhhooooSSEee I_J PleEEAsSE cooMmee OuuT annDd sEEee the PErrFEeEct ModdeELL unFoooLD P:
A large root whips about the summit, shifting the ground as it sweeps and swoops until its sharp tip frees itself from the ground, twisting and turning as it stabs itself towards Juni to try and run them through their hard-won Thames-gifted salvage Gear!
Then, one of the large branches rear back and let loose with a giant rotting fruit of some kind that explodes into a juicy, rapidly-evaporating mess against the Dust Dragoon. If they have the capacity to take in any scent from where they're at, it smells kind of like pomegranate - extremely acidic pomegranate that not even the finest chemically treated metal could fully resist. (Maybe this entire paragraph should've led with the acidity.)
One of the vine-roots snap outwards, sending loose a wave of seed-like projectiles that fan out towards Avril's Skadi. These seed-like projectile shatter upon impact, preventing one from dreading - moreso than they already are - what it exactly means when the Demetrioi has something like seeds and the role they play. The quantity that is being flung might be of more concern, in terms of mitigating damage due to the wide spread. It's enough to make the Skadi feel small compared to what's hurled at them.
Jay finds herself subject to a fleeting gentleness, as if in the moment Demetrioi wants a friend to have their passing be as happy and comfortable as possible without understanding the weight and meaning of affection behind such a gesture. They bring some of their enormous, gnarled tree-branch limbs into the mass of vine-root now surrounding her Issachar. More than enough gaps to fight right back out, but the exposure to whatever the hell type of ARM energy is debilitating if Jay doesn't use her will and ability to guide herself and the Issachar right out.
:H IiiTt IssS NooTT thEE EennDD off LiffFFE :2 MoooRREee WiiLll FolllOOWwwwW :E
These are to those who challenge the Demetrioi on foot, as they are too small to strike reliably with their (many) limbs, but the air... it changes, it warps, in ways horrifyingly localized yet endlessly broad in scope.
Electrical energies start to gather, dancing in strange ways foreign to present understandings of how lightning ought to work. After contorting in strange shapes where ionic charges seem to flip-flop on whether they're positive, negative, or some other bizarre notation, they strike at Gwen and Azoth - as if there were decisive identification that whatever utterly alien concepts of electrical work were at play were being put to work against targets deemed soft and sensitive to such things.
Atmospheric conditions start moving wind at improbable but deadly speeds and directions in such a contained space that does not seem to heed the general ambient chill, continuing to suck the air away and further slicing most injuriously where Cyre and Lan presently float - as if in defiance of the winds of the atmosphere and the beauty of the void and stars beyond the skies above. There is no breathing room from the current problems at hand!
The humidity rapidly increases in some parts of the summit, somehow turning it feeling as though the air were swampy... and then utterly drenched, as if it were trying to redefine the concept of 'underwater' far, far, far above sea level. This issue ends up becoming the latest of Magilou's and Venetia's problems, with the added water weighing them down on top of the ambient chill of this (for the forseeable future) eternal winter - to bring them down into the new standard for groundwater, deeper than any flower could grow (eff flowers though) or for any rock to survive.
As if the concept of an endless winter until morale improves were just set dressing for some other meteorological whimsy - maybe even meteoremotional? - Demetrioi wills part of the summit to rocket higher in temperature and then let it disappear, threatening to make armoring and equipment brittle... but for Xantia and Lydia, it feels as though temperature may no longer be on a single axis in the moment. It feels like it's theoretically straining into at least six simultaneous concepts of thermodynamic scales at once, to erode at their tenuous and hard-won senses of self as if such were on the chopping block when Planck may no longer be a viable unit of measurement here.
The warped sunlight that dares pierce the veil of storms and clouds is invariably warped into different forms of illumination that don't quite fit into standard definitions of 'sunlight.' It is gathered, amplified, and redirected in ways that become difficult to even look at but will be easy to understand: it sucks! Riesenlied and Kaguya find that messed launched at them, piercing to their very core(s). The light of life and acceptance without pain and rejection had long been denied them by the Guardians prior, and now under new (and distressingly temporary, given apocalyptic circumstances) management... it's gotten worse, in the moment.
GS: The Force Action Snipe is already active! GS: Demetrioi spends 1 Combo on Poison! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Juni Vandrer with !! ALERT !! Addressing Root Causes of Concern for_friends! GS: Demetrioi has gained 2 Combo! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with !! ALERT !! Administering Nourishing Food to_friends! GS: Demetrioi has gained 1 Combo! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Avril Vent Fleur with !! ALERT !! Dispersing Beneficial Seeds for Future of_friends! GS: Demetrioi has gained 1 Combo! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Jacqueline Barber with !! ALERT !! Doing Better For Unhappy_friends! GS: Demetrioi has gained 1 Combo! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Cyre H. Lorentz with !! WARNING !! Category Imaginary Number Windstorm! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Lan Lilac with !! WARNING !! Category Imaginary Number Windstorm! GS: Demetrioi has gained 1 Combo! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Gwen Whitlock with !! WARNING !! Paradoxical Electrical Discharge! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Azoth with !! WARNING !! Paradoxical Electrical Discharge! GS: Demetrioi has gained 1 Combo! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Venetia Vuong with !! WARNING !! Immeasurable Humidity! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Magilou with !! WARNING !! Immeasurable Humidity! GS: Demetrioi has gained 1 Combo! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Xantia with !! WARNING !! Law Breaking Thermodynamics! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Lydia Seren with !! WARNING !! Law Breaking Thermodynamics! GS: Demetrioi spends 1 Combo on Poison! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Riesenlied with !! WARNING !! Indeterminate Color Spectrum Radiation! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Kaguya with !! WARNING !! Indeterminate Color Spectrum Radiation! GS: Demetrioi has gained 2 Combo! GS: Demetrioi has completed their action. GS: Riesenlied has activated Force Action: Guard! GS: CRITICAL! Riesenlied partially guards Demetrioi's !! WARNING !! Indeterminate Color Spectrum Radiation for 130 hit points! GS: Poison applied to Riesenlied! GS: Disease blocked! GS: FP up! Guard bonus activated! GS: COUNTER! Azoth counterattacks Demetrioi with Illegal Argument! GS: CRITICAL! Azoth suffers a terrible blow from Demetrioi's !! WARNING !! Paradoxical Electrical Discharge for 223 hit points! GS: Jam applied to Azoth! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Azoth enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: CRITICAL! Magilou solidly guards Demetrioi's !! WARNING !! Immeasurable Humidity for 73 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Magilou gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Entangle applied to Magilou! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: CRITICAL! Ida Everstead-Rey takes a glancing hit from Demetrioi's !! ALERT !! Administering Nourishing Food to_friends for 105 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ida Everstead-Rey gains 1 additional Combo! GS: CRITICAL! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Azoth's Illegal Argument for 188 hit points! GS: Hyper applied to Azoth! GS: Kaguya has activated Force Action: Accelerate! GS: CRITICAL! Kaguya takes a glancing hit from Demetrioi's !! WARNING !! Indeterminate Color Spectrum Radiation for 182 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Kaguya gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Poison applied to Kaguya! GS: Disease blocked! GS: FP up! Evade bonus and Sufferer activated! GS: Kaguya enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: CRITICAL! Venetia Vuong solidly guards Demetrioi's !! WARNING !! Immeasurable Humidity for 49 hit points! GS: Entangle applied to Venetia Vuong! GS: FP up! Guard bonus activated! GS: Gwen Whitlock suffers a terrible blow from Demetrioi's !! WARNING !! Paradoxical Electrical Discharge for 122 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Gwen Whitlock gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Gwen Whitlock's Jam Ward may block the effect! GS: Jam blocked! GS: FP up! Countermeasures activated! GS: Avril Vent Fleur takes a glancing hit from Demetrioi's !! ALERT !! Dispersing Beneficial Seeds for Future of_friends for 101 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Avril Vent Fleur gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Xantia solidly guards Demetrioi's !! WARNING !! Law Breaking Thermodynamics for 37 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Xantia gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Shieldbreak applied to Xantia! GS: CRITICAL! Cyre H. Lorentz suffers a terrible blow from Demetrioi's !! WARNING !! Category Imaginary Number Windstorm for 209 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Cyre H. Lorentz gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: CRITICAL! Lan Lilac solidly guards Demetrioi's !! WARNING !! Category Imaginary Number Windstorm for 69 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lan Lilac gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: CRITICAL! Lydia Seren takes a glancing hit from Demetrioi's !! WARNING !! Law Breaking Thermodynamics for 59 hit points! GS: Shieldbreak applied to Lydia Seren! GS: FP up! Evade bonus activated! GS: CRITICAL! Jacqueline Barber suffers a terrible blow from Demetrioi's !! ALERT !! Doing Better For Unhappy_friends for 273 hit points! GS: Reaper applied to Jacqueline Barber! GS: CRITICAL! Juni Vandrer partially evades Demetrioi's !! ALERT !! Addressing Root Causes of Concern for_friends for 186 hit points! GS: Poison blocked! GS: FP up! Evade bonus activated!
<Pose Tracker> Kaguya has posed.
Juni shakes her head. "I don't think so," she says. "If we could talk him down to a nice asteroid, that'd make our lives easier, though." It hurts, even interfacing with jokes about it, though. "But it does make me feel a little better, I guess."
If Kaguya has a new girlfriend she doesn't know about it!! But Kaguya is not thinking so many mind games with Lydia. ...She recogizes the tangent look though. "It's fine," Kaguya says. "We sure showed Mother. ...Well." Pause. "I didn't. And you didn't. But they did! And that's good enough, right?" Pause. "They definitely didn't just convince her to go home."
Riesenlied answers. And Riesenlied has ideas. "Good luck," Kaguya says, but kind words... aren't her strong suit. Case in point: Cyre! "Ahahaha. True! They can complain all they want at me later!"
Cyre has ideas, too. Hmmm.... If Cyre and Riesenlied and Azoth and Ida and the others can take care of that, maybe....
"I know, I know," Kaguya answers Demetrioi. "But I wanted to fix up Filgaia before I even met you, you know? When I was a little kid, it was all I could think about. The flowers I was going to fill this bright new world with, when we get there..."
"But it had its own, too, you know? I needed to learn to accept that it had more than just my ideas."
But--"Avril?" Kaguya wonders. What does she know? Not tomorrow, not today, not any day. ...Yes. "just be careful, Avril!"
Azoth keeps trying. So many of them do. And Venetia has... a lot of possibilities to share. "Hey! TOP SORCERESS!" Kaguya calls at Venetia. "I think you've got the right idea--keep overwhelming his systems!"
She looks aver Jay, and the Issachar, and Magilou--well.
"I'm fine," Kaguya says of breathing to her. "Yeah nthe kids were pretty OK. I didn't mind them. Too many short jokes, though."
She sticks close to Magilou all the same, and then lifts her ARM. "...For the power of a world I dreamed of!" Kaguya says. "For a world that occupied me night and day when I was on the Locus Solus... and a world that defied every one of my expectations when I got here!"
"For Filgaia! REVOLUTION TRIGGER!"
Kaguya deploys the biggest blast she can at Demetrioi, a column of green energy obviously Gear-scale erupting from her shotgun-like ARM in a spray of green energy.
GS: Kaguya has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Kaguya spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: MYSTIC ARTE! Kaguya has attacked Demetrioi with Revolution Trigger! GS: Kaguya has gained 2 Combo! GS: Kaguya's stances have changed to Hero! GS: Kaguya takes 20 damage from Poison! GS: Hex expired! GS: Kaguya has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Kaguya's Revolution Trigger for 264 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Kaguya drains Demetrioi! Kaguya gains 99 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
"Oh do you have a dad then? I mean, SOMEONE created you right? Who created you?" Lydia asks. "I mean, maybe you didn't have that kind of relationship, but you have a CREATOR right?" Lydia asks. "And UH I mean, c'mon, Demetrioi! you know that single cell organisms and US aren't the same! We can create Demetriois for starters, single cell organisms can't do that! And uh--we can.... We can create other stuff too! There's more to life than being happy, ya know! We could live fulfilling lives and we can't do that if we're either DEAD or SINGLE CELL ORGANISMS."
Lydia gives Azoth a hapless look. She's trying buddy. She can't even hug Demetrioi like this. And a hug probably wouldn't stop them anyway. Or would it?? Lydia isn't sure she can get her arms stretchy enough to hug Demetrioi. Maybe she should have practiced being a puddle more often rather than try to avoid it.
Kaguya says she has never been that happy a person.
Lydia's heart aches at her yelling this even though, well, Lydia would probably also say she's been unhappy a whole lot too. "Kaguya'll be happier than she imagine," She tells Demetrioi, or maybe herself.
She continues to hold up Riesenlied even as she spins wildly through the air, knocked about by heat current, humidity, sudden temperature drops. Lydia is having difficulty mantaining malleability against such sudden shifts of pressure and heat.
That's okay, Kaguya, even if you don't have any girlfriends, Lydia is hoping the girlfriends she imagined for you are treating you right. Then again, if the girlfriend isn't treating her right maybe she could try that thing in the cartoon where she gives the girlfriend a hard time and teaches them about responsibility. She's never tried that before but it's best to look on the brightside, even when it comes to mean imaginary girlfriends.
"Y-yeah, SOMEONE showed Mother--not uh mom Mother but MOTHER Mother--so like, yeah, a butt got kicked and butts can be kicked again."
For Filgaia?! REVOLUTION TRIGGER?
"THATS SO COOL THOUGH???" Lydia cries out as she holds onto Riesenlied with one arm--
"MOTHER DAUGHTER BIG BANG FAMILY STYLE ATTACK." Lydia shouts as she uses the power of Celesdue to summon a blackhole in front of Demetrioi--
--only for a surge of light to explode out through it at them. The bottle of mustard threatens to be pulled into the black hole, but Lydia holds firm. Azoth might need that mustard when all seems lost--using it now could mean the end of Filgaia.
GS: Lydia Seren spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Lydia Seren has attacked Demetrioi with Black Hole! GS: Lydia Seren has gained 1 Combo! GS: Lydia Seren has launched an attack Link! GS: Lydia Seren spends 3 Combo on Poison and Gatling, loading 2 into Gatling! GS: Lydia Seren has attacked Demetrioi with Big Bang! GS: Lydia Seren has gained 1 Combo! GS: Riposte expired! GS: Lydia Seren has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi takes a solid hit from Lydia Seren's Black Hole for 0 hit points! GS: Demetrioi's Break Ward may block the effect! GS: Entangle applied to Demetrioi! GS: Break blocked! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Evade bonus activated! GS: Demetrioi partially guards Lydia Seren's Big Bang for 130 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Demetrioi's Poison Ward may block the effect! GS: Poison blocked! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated!
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
Won't you miss your old friends?
Lan's head cranes, just barely, to the side. Azoth...
Yes. It hurts, doesn't it? To be replaceable. To be unimportant. To be left behind.
She forces herself to look away, and swallows.
The wind cuts and slices, but it finds the parts of her flesh criss-crossed with ink to be harder to injure. ...Where she bleeds, it's still red.
Can Demetrioi bleed? Is there anything like sap inside of it? It's not a real tree. Even the fruits are strange. She remembers a story about poisoned apples given to a princess, who fell into a deep and unnatural slumber...
But Lan isn't a princess, or a damsel in distress, or a tragic witch! Even with the Stranger's influence coursing in her blood, she's still Lan. And Filgaia is still her home that she loves, and she will protect it until death!
A leap takes her from the snow, into the branches, to the crown. Her boots will never be enough protection from Demetrioi's true nature, but she tries not to think about 'corruption' any harder than she has to. Kneeling there, Lan thrusts a knife-handed strike into the cracks between limbs and bark, sending hungry, lonely shadows winnowing along whatever courses they can find.
GS: Lan Lilac has attacked Demetrioi with Uneternal Sleep! GS: Lan Lilac has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Even in the midst of their fierce battle, as her lungs feel like they're deflating, Lan's lament isn't lost on her. "I know what your heart wants, Lan. Do not give up, I implore you! Together... will you lend us your aid too?"
Magilou speaks of how, no, the Earthpulse -- the Ley -- cannot be leashed; one simply can only ride on it. And it is through that principle that the Ley ripples -- sometimes, even, rips -- through her body. "Yes... and thank you, Magilou." Magilou's negation field definitely aids her in not just, well, passing out.
She hears Xantia's earnest declaration -- that she's happy , despite everything; no matter how many problems there are... they can still find a way to be happy. "It is as Kaguya said... one cannot build a foundation on despair. The hopes of all these people..."
Venetia reassures her, speaking of how she has a trump card -- she smiles a little at the Crest Sorcerer, nodding as she conjures a powerful eruption of Ley bursting forth like a tree that might've been.
Both Venetia and Jay's words ring in her heart. "I know it is frightening to believe in something you cannot prove, but... that is a facet of living as well. At times, our best intentions may not pay off, and other times... believing in that which others are not willing to believe will open paths for you too, Demetrioi. I can only hope we can show you that before it is too late."
Riesenlied looks on with some fear to the Skadi, but it looks as if her power is spreading through the Gear to reinforce it; good, she thinks, the lessons she has learnt from Hellerune are not lost.
That contentment is soon dashed, however, as sunlight starts to warp and twist and -- launch at her?! The kaleidoscope of lights is indeed terrible, but Riesenlied is at the very least decent at managing light-based attacks, throwing up a barrier at the last moment that plays against the very lights to absorb the worst of it.
She's not going to last much longer; she's fortunate to be supported by Lydia, but the amount of power she's used is bordering on the dangerous. Lydia's taking her through a wild ride, though, as they spin through the air, knocked about by the wild and unpleasant weathers.
But something Demetrioi said really strikes a chord with her.
"I often feel that way too, you know," she spends a bit of time just reflecting. "'I will be happy if all my friends are happy'. Existing purely on a codependent kind of relationship like that... I thought that was easier, that it was enough, but... deep down I knew full well how harmful that can be."
She lowers her head.
"Eventually, to make the closest people to me happy, I did what they wanted me to do... which was to hurt others. And as the existing conflicts in choice grew bigger and bigger in me, I only realised how hollow I was inside, existing only as a series of masks to please others..."
She breathes ever so gently, for a moment. She focuses on empowering Venetia, Lydia and Kaguya, this time, drawing upon Venetia's earlier Derivative Sign -- so full of residual Life energy -- to weave it into a new channel of her own that empowers them with slightly unpredictable energy.
Then Lydia shouts out a combo attack name!
"Eh? Eh??? Were we doing a combination attack?? I am sorry, I was not ready! Nooo!"
Will you still love your mom even if she couldn't do a two-hit, single-target Link Follow combo with you, Lydia...?
GS: Riesenlied has attacked Lydia Seren with Ley Channeling - Border of Life! GS: Riesenlied has attacked Venetia Vuong with Ley Channeling - Border of Life! GS: Riesenlied has attacked Kaguya with Ley Channeling - Border of Life! GS: Riesenlied takes 28 damage from Poison! GS: Riesenlied has completed her action. GS: Venetia Vuong accepts Riesenlied's Ley Channeling - Border of Life for 0 hit points! GS: Pray grants a random effect! Burst and Surge applied to Venetia Vuong! GS: CRITICAL! Kaguya accepts Riesenlied's Ley Channeling - Border of Life for 0 hit points! GS: Pray grants a random effect! Hyper and Lock state applied to Kaguya! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Lan Lilac's Uneternal Sleep for 147 hit points! GS: Hyper applied to Lan Lilac! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated! GS: Lan Lilac drains Demetrioi! Lan Lilac gains 72 temporary hit points! GS: Lydia Seren accepts Riesenlied's Ley Channeling - Border of Life for 0 hit points! GS: Pray grants a random effect! Lock state and Regen applied to Lydia Seren!
<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.
"IT DOESN'T BRING JOY?" Venetia shouts at Demetrioi. "You arrogant overblown slide-rule, how dare you! How dare you presume to understand my heart without even the courtesy of asking! You make your model and do you even check it? I SINCERELY DOUBT IT! THIS IS ARROGANCE!"
The waters rise. It gets swampy - which Venetia is not unfamiliar with, but it's a cold, chilling swampiness. She keeps yelling. It's easier. "Arrogance tenfold, arrogance multiplied by arrogance! You act not even as a child - you act as if you KNOW BETTER, but prefer NOT TO, because you would rather stare at a few microbes! The challenge of understanding people overwhelming a god! Better to kill and flee, eh? Is that it? I see right through you, damn you -- and now you've given us hope! Only to pluck it away!"
Venetia puts the Crest Graph away... it takes several tries. Her hand is numb. She keeps going. It's keeping her warm.
"And there's yet another factor that you're overlooking," Venetia states. "Do you really think... you would get EVERYONE?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0kKx_lsWIA
"Here, before you, you see people who would survive in a world without life; at least for a time," Venetia states. "You yourself came from a different star entirely. Filgaia is not far from taking to the stars themselves - if we make it through this, I expect in a hundred years we'll be flying trade ships to Lunar. And past that, further on. In the deeps of Guild Galad we'd hang on; surely there are other places; and there is another world, too, to which some would flee."
"So think of it, if your goal is happiness. Think of all the unhappiness you would make with this. Sorrow upon sorrow, extending endlessly into the eras of the future! And you would set that against a patch of amoeba?? And all that you have to d-do - is -- STOP! Stop before you carve these gashes! Hold your damned horses for half an hour! Take your show to one of the -- other planets, or --"
"Ugh!!" IT IS LITERALLY TOO COLD FOR VENETIA TO BE ANGRY. The only solution she can reach for is magic -- but she is able to find it. Fumbling, almost, she raises it up -- she cannot call it out, through the shudders running through her body, but that Ley-breath comes again and a vessel appears above her. The Foundry Sign turns --
-- and spends a third of its mass to just dump like thirty pounds of cheap molten bronze on the ground near Venetia. Which is, honestly, a good deal here; the steam means that the sparks are muffled, the steam itself is pretty immense and pushes the heat AWAY, but they're far enough that it doesn't burn. Instead there is a dry, radiant patch, dully glowing metal...
... and the remainder just flies straight towards the tree. Once it touches literally any part of the great Tree (Venetia is watching), it begins to flip and tumble, strewing the remaining molten metal on the ever-looming matter of horrid antithetical life.
"Thank you," she wheezes to Riesenlied. "By Dinoginos, that was too clever. I think our big fellow knows better, here; but I think he can't admit it to himself..."
Or the other possibilities, Venetia thinks, but there's no reason to tempt the lathe of heaven.
GS: Venetia Vuong has attacked Demetrioi with Foundry Sign ~The Statuary Garden~! GS: Venetia Vuong has gained 1 Combo! GS: Venetia Vuong has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.
It's difficult for Xantia to tell whether it's her words or the energy drain she subjecting Demetrioi to that's getting to them. But she has to believe her words are having an effect. That they can somehow make Azoth's wishes come true. For that miracle's sake... all she can do is hold on. Clutch the root she's holding onto tightly, refuse to let go no matter what. as long as she has the strength and the will, she refuses to let go.
Rapidly changing temperature conditions are not making this easy. Her smile is forced to make way for a pained grimace. But she can get through this. She must. Gritting her teeth, she sets to work to adapt her Ether flow, trying her best to fight temperature without with temperature within. She is not letting go.
What does falter is her expression, the smile making way for a pained grimace. Which Xantia is quick to point out. "D-don't you see? You're destroying people's smiles! This is... this is not what you were programmed for!"
She sets to rapidly converting the energy she's absorbing from Demetrioi into Ether. Her aura of light doesn't wane - it only grows in intensity as she digs in her literal and metaphorical heels. Xantia's own stubbornness bolstered by Venetia's magic makes it feel like she could keep this up forever. She. Will not. Let go.
Defiant, she finds her smile again, calmer now as she does what she can to keep the situation at a stable stalemate. "Hey, I get it. It's hard to admit you're wrong. Especially when you've done your own calculations, and they're telling you otherwise. But if this many others have done their own calculations and insist you've made an error, you should consider that the odds are greater that the majority is correct. That's just simple math!"
GS: Xantia has attacked Demetrioi with Lustrous Aura! GS: Xantia has gained 2 Combo! GS: Recover! Hex removed from Xantia! GS: Xantia has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Juni Vandrer has posed.
"The worse the situation, the more you should point and laugh. Keeps you sane! And if you need people to talk to, I'm probably the lats one that you should, but what else do I have to lose." She taps her head at that. She doesn't really believe it herself, but there's something to be said for gallows humor in any number of soldiers, first responders and similar stressful jobs. She'll worry about things bothering her later. She keeps saying that too. She should change that. After this though. Telling people you're a high strung alien who keeps meddling in domestic affairs isn't always the best idea. Nevermind opening up a peculiar sense of humor and just... everything. All of it. Might as well by now.
Besides, there's a tree trying to skewer her at the moment and that's not something she, her mech or her equipment would appreciate. Twisting and jerking to the side, she avoids the worst of it. Sure there's a hole in her armor, internals are somewhat exposed and the paint's ruined, but everything is still in by and large, working order.
"They can't tell you how happy they are. They can't express it. They'll eat eachother and change." A bit of cynicism maybe? She's about to give up on that front. Support the others instead sort of thing.
"Oh screw this!"
Sometimes just breaking something is the way to go, right? Not like she's got many other options? Thing's getting stronger... right? That's another thing to figure out. Tyv raises it's right arm, the rifle attached partially enveloping the arm. Looking like some monstrous piece of ordnance. "Heads up!" she calls out over a local intercom as she starts to fire. Aiming straight for the central trunk. Trying to tear great bloody gouges through the thing with what's supposed to be a slow fired, precision weapon. Accuracy through overkill hopefully.
Ears flat against the heavy roar of that gun, she follows up with, "You shouldn't just throw everything away! Abandoning everything for something you can't... ever attain will leave you alone and bitter." Well, to a degree. She has no idea if the machine can even feel bitter, but whatever.
Maybe logic? She's kind of dipped into her own problems a bit there. Isolation, even self-imposed hasn't been the best. Cat being out of the bag might be good for her.
GS: Juni Vandrer spends 1 Combo on Interrupt! GS: Juni Vandrer has attacked Demetrioi with Diapason! GS: Juni Vandrer has gained 1 Combo! GS: Juni Vandrer has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida's breath mists in the air before her. Her body is adjusting to the plummeting oxygen levels--she's no longer seeing three Demetrioi, and floating, wobbling data on her screens--but that's not a good thing. The Dragoon remains on its perch, and shifts its weight to present its other side to Demetrioi, almost as an afterthought.
"No," Ida says. Her hand drifts down to her flightsuit's thigh pocket, where her Stone Medium has grown cold. "I'm sorry this happened. I'm sorry they failed you. I'm sorry it had to come to this." She coughs, raspily, as the Dragoon's sensors flash an alert: PARACAUSAL PHENOMENON DETECTED. The only reason it hasn't been going off this entire fight is that Ida set the sensitivity higher. As the tainted fruits fly towards the Dragoon, Ida hits the jets. The Gear takes off with a rush of hot air and flame, rising high above the others on the battlefield. Two fruits smash into its right thigh and burst with violent force. Hissing fluid splatters the ground, and eats into the armor. The Gear rocks from the impact, but Ida keeps it steady on its descent.
The Gear lands on the ground in front of Venetia, then steps aside, and pauses. "Deploying Dragon Spine," Ida says, and she flips up a transparent shield to press the panel beneath. The seat beneath her headrest splits apart, and in an instant, tendrils of lab-cultured Hyadean flesh sink into the back of her neck. There's no pain, even as her body twitches, once. The Dust Dragoon's posture shifts, and it rolls its shoulders, heat-haze shimmering around its frame. Vents on its back splay open, hissing steam into the air. With fluid, organic grace, the Dragoon whips its shock spear off its equipment rack, lets it telescope to full length, and ignites it with the crackle of blazing electricity.
The Gear nimbly steps over Xantia as it lunges forwards, Ida's battle-cry lingering in the air. It drives its spear directly for Demetrioi's center of mass, where it erupts in a burst of violent electromagnetic force. The force behind the strike would be enough to penetrate Gear armor, and the shock would seriously damage said Gear's systems. Demetrioi is far stranger. But Ida is growing desperate.
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with First Method - Steel Colossus Synchronization! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has gained 3 Combo! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has launched an attack Link! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey's stances have changed from Sage to Hero! GS: CRITICAL! Ida Everstead-Rey accepts Ida Everstead-Rey's First Method - Steel Colossus Synchronization for 0 hit points! GS: Hyper and Lock state applied to Ida Everstead-Rey! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Demetrioi with Fourth Method - Strike Down The Sun! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has gained 2 Combo! GS: Hex expired! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
A ping. Not nothing. Azoth lets it flow through. The risks are high. The risks of failure are even higher. Should the Azoth even be capable of such behaviors, given his intended purpose? His own programming he is beholden to? Demetrioi's disruptive nature is a boon in this moment as much as a terrifying, overwhelming threat: the overrides are being distorted along with the rest of Azoth in this incompatible mess of technology.
But while Demetrioi's mere presence could unravel the Azoth if utilized correctly (or incorrectly), Azoth is in no danger of having his calculations infected by Demetrioi's logic. Of that, Azoth has no doubt. Xantia is happy. Xantia smiles genuinely. Despite everything, she finds happiness in this world. This simple fact is enough to defy all of Demetrioi's assertions. And that means he can push forward with wild abandon.
Data's gathered, the connection established, as Azoth's components beep with distorted, grinding warbles. Red flashes across his circuits, overtaking neon, before determined computations force function once more. Azoth, as planned, fires off data and energy through that connection of code and Ley, rejecting Demetrioi's argument on every mathematical level in an attempt to inhibit Demetrioi's functions in turn.
"They can be happy! For themselves! For each other! For you!" Wires explodes in heat and electricity, jutting out of Azoth's incomplete chassis. A cord pops. Bright fluids splatter across the ground like prismatic paint before turning a deep, dull black.
"And as long as even one of them has happiness, as long as they have the potential for happiness, I cannot concede to this model which would steal it all away! Demetrioi! You are in defiance of your own objective!"
Electricity discharges. Azoth's entire body seizes, and the shriek he makes may distort some Gear readings for a fraction of a second. Teeth may itch. Bones rattle. It's a horrible inhuman noise. His body drops, sputtering, dim.
Energy, wild and uncontrolled, bursts back out, scattering across the battlefield in amplifying arcs. Another cord snaps, bleeding iridescent. Azoth leaps back upward and sweeps out his claws, a technological aura pouring off of him as data appears, holographic, scrolling, impossible numbers of calculations and code going on inside the artifical intelligence's mind now projected outward. These points of data begin to connect, trying to give those disrupting Demetrioi new openings.
"REEVALUATE!"
GS: Gamble: Moderate! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Venetia Vuong's Foundry Sign ~The Statuary Garden~ for 170 hit points! GS: Shieldbreak blocked! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated! GS: Demetrioi solidly guards Xantia's Lustrous Aura for 41 hit points! GS: Cover applied to Xantia!
<Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
Magilou has ever existed in madness. She is a woman who can escape the jaws of the Earthpulse, a woman who can understand its weird and horrific ways, grasp tight its cracks and pull. It's not about overpowering it. It can't be about overpowering it. It's about flowing with it, flowing through it, and holding yourself inside yourself.
She's holding Bienfu, too, and she can feel him screaming. It is a thing without words or form. It is horrific, too, in its way.
Magilou turns her gaze to Lan, in that moment, and frowns at those consuming shadows. A brief flicker of recognition. She puts it away.
"'The only one who can'... worlds have shattered on less arrogance," that failed shadow condemns the Demetrioi's efforts, with a deep frown. "Come!"
She redoubles the absorption of her field, with no regard for the sanctity of her own mind. The humidity fades, about her; the world is so much closer to normal, by her side. Perhaps it is some comfort to Riesenlied, to Kaguya, to any who shelter by her. She draws it all in, like a breath, and feels the way it corrodes her insides as she consumes it.
There is a thing beside pain which this is; the overwhelming threat of unmaking, taken into a woman who unmakes. She is ageless, but not immortal, and she sees the sharp edges of her life in sharp relief as she challenges a planet-shaper with the failure of her heart.
Perhaps the work which began with her would have been so grievous, once.
But it is the lot of the prototype to struggle.
(She looks, aside, to Azoth.)
Magilou still stands as she dismisses Demetrioi's humidity, though -- looks to it, again, and its unknowable expressions.
"This isn't my world," Magilou sighs, with light regret. "The forty-nine are far from here. Filgaia's fate isn't really my concern... but you? You're really annoying me." Her lip lifts, in a sneer. "I can't stand people who lie to make others happy."
She makes sure to keep her absorption field out of Venetia's way, so she doesn't end up eating the other venerable sorceress's Signs. Instead, using that same warped power she's taken from Demetrioi:
"Tetra Detonator."
Four orbs descend towards the trunk of that unfathomable tree, of fire and water and stone and wind; four elements, acting in sync, coming together with the white-light force of a universe's birth.
"You're a perfectly normal height," Magilou asides, all too casual, to Kaguya. (Magilou, let's remember, is a towering 5'2".)
GS: Demetrioi solidly guards Juni Vandrer's Diapason for 72 hit points! GS: Interrupt blocked! GS: Demetrioi has lost 2 Combo from Interrupt! GS: Azoth spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Azoth has attacked Xantia with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Kaguya with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Magilou with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Lydia Seren with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Jacqueline Barber with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Venetia Vuong with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Lan Lilac with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Juni Vandrer with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Avril Vent Fleur with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Cyre H. Lorentz with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Riesenlied with Convergence! GS: Azoth has attacked Azoth with Convergence! GS: Azoth has launched an attack Link! GS: Magilou accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Magilou! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Gwen Whitlock accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Gwen Whitlock! GS: Azoth accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Azoth! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Blitz! Azoth has attacked Demetrioi with INPUT ATTEMPT: The Happiness of Learning to Hope! GS: Azoth has gained 1 Combo! GS: Mute expired! GS: Azoth has completed his action. GS: Riesenlied accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Riesenlied! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Jacqueline Barber accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Jacqueline Barber! GS: Blitz! Magilou has attacked Demetrioi with Tetra Detonator! GS: Magilou has gained 2 Combo! GS: Magilou gains 10 FP from her Daredevil! GS: Magilou has completed her action. GS: Venetia Vuong accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Venetia Vuong! GS: Kaguya accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Kaguya! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: CRITICAL! Xantia accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Xantia! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Ida Everstead-Rey! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: CRITICAL! Lydia Seren accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Lydia Seren!
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.
"Oh my Gods, why are you all are still beating around the apocalypse bush!?" Cyre, in the form of the Wind God made manifest, hammers and batters at the roots of said apocalypse bush, though they regenerate faster than he can adequately damage them. Nevertheless, it gives Ida and the others valuable intel, and so maybe it's all worthwhile in the end.
And... The air quivers. It seizes, convulses, turns against him. Cyre-- the Nahual-- snarls and hurls itself into the hostile air. A haze of bloody mist erupts from its body, something that did not happen before. But this is not an ordinary summonings. Is it drawing more on Cyre than it used to? But then, why would he throw himself at an attack like that...!?
Because it is of the wind.
And this way...
Claws seize at the offending air, capturing it like a bear swipes salmon out of a stream. It takes it in its jaws and yanks, breaking it apart into metaphysical streamers of liberated Wing-aspected ley. Green motes surge into the Nahual, the script swirling around its body surging with renewed power.
As the saying goes: No pain, no gain.
"Fuck your perfect model!" Cyre's voice reverberates through the air, felt more than heard. "You're no savior. You're a coward. Something that can't even begin to tolerate imperfection-- to tolerate suffering and pain! This world isn't perfect, never will be, but it's the one in which we all live! You act like a god, like you know better than everyone else, but your 'model' is so fragile that it can only accomodate microbes!"
"Get off your high horse--" The Nahual gathers the stale air, seizing it with tooth and claw, and wrenches it up and back, stealing away power-- to fuel a spell of its own. With a swipe of a claw, it unleashes a swirling vortex, a tornado of pure and chaotic fury directed into Demetrioi's roots! "--Accept that you've got no idea what you're doing, and let your friends help you, dumbass!"
The Nahual grunts, descending to alight near Riesenlied, "Riesenlied. This is getting out of hand. We're going to have to do something about the ley it's siphoning, or we'll be in pretty deep shi--" Beat. The God-Tiger's eyes flicker towards Lydia, then back, "--Pretty deep poop. Are you up for it?"
(Cussing around someone's mom is rude, you know!?)
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Cyre H. Lorentz! GS: CRITICAL! Juni Vandrer accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Juni Vandrer! GS: Lan Lilac accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Lan Lilac! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: Blitz! Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Demetrioi with Storm Warning! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has gained 1 Combo! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.
It just so happens that, as chaotic as Cyre's vortex toss might have seemed, there is a pattern there that Azoth may be able to discern-- and assist others in taking advantage of. Striking along with the wind can only increase the efficacy of attacks, after all, and this is one heck of a wind...!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
Gwen leaps for her next attack.
Lightning meets lightning, and Gwen quietly drops like a stone, colliding with the mountain ground with another crater.
.... It's a good thing this isn't one of Venetia's more treasured spots that she's rocketing around, but it's not as if Gwen is making more of a mess than Demetrioi. As Gwen lays there, Venetia's words float over her in her enhanced state. "......?" The cloud that is cast from her breath floats up to the sky, where beyond, space lies. To go... beyond the stars? Space was hardly a place Gwen could even conceive of, once upon a time, but thinking about these possibilities...
But what if it's to flee?
Azoth was also hit, and his struggle was much more visible, his body not absorbing the alien energy inch by agonizing inch.
She said she will help him.
Loosely, Gwen rises, her clothing more tattered from the collision with Demetrioi's paradoxical lightning. She lurches forward, wobbles backwards a step, then, when she weaves back to her front foot, it simply becomes the first step of a mad dash forward, using Cyre's wind, allowing her to make a wide, sailing leap in the air. Lightning radiates from her right hand and into her left, her flesh and blood hand finally getting a role to press the might of the Mockingbird deep into Demetrioi's core.
....... in theory, it might help Azoth. Maybe.
GS: Blitz! Gwen Whitlock has attacked Demetrioi with Yliastrum! GS: Gwen Whitlock has gained 1 Combo! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
"I really don't think they would be. There are issues with your model that I don't think you understand. How do you quantify 'happiness'?" Jacqueline replies. Soon enough, however, she receives data from Ida's Gear. Jacqueline looks it over as it flashes on the console... and frowns. ...'Ley-interface anomaly', huh. Interesting.
"Thanks. I'll use it well." Jacqueline replies gratefully. Demetrioi attempts to provide fleeting gentleness. ...It's been a long, difficult day today. Jacqueline isn't willing to accept it. She flies out - though she certainly takes more than a little beating in the process. But she'll endure, because everyone is, and they're all fighting to preserve their future together. Azoth brings data together. It would be too much for Jacqueline to process on her own, but Issachar is more than enough.
"...I understand." Jacqueline says with a nod. Issachar raises a hand. Dust and debris from the surrounding battle is drawn to one point above it, forming into a giant spike of earth. With a gesture, the giant rock is hurled Demetrioi, threatening to tear through anything in its way!
GS: Jacqueline Barber spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: Blitz! Jacqueline Barber has attacked Demetrioi with Rock Formation! GS: Jacqueline Barber has gained 1 Combo! GS: Jacqueline Barber takes 59 damage from Reaper! GS: Jacqueline Barber has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Avril Vent Fleur accepts Azoth's Convergence for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz applied to Avril Vent Fleur!
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
The touch of the Ley that has been bestowed upon Avril and Skadi both helps in this moment, as Demetrioi lets fly with a bombardment of seeds. Only some catch her -- some enough to crack already damaged armor plating -- but most others fly past her damaged Gear without so much as scratching its frame. Skadi will need attention when this is through -- if such a thing will come to pass, if they persevere, if, if, if.
All they have is now.
"...As long as you don't give up," Avril repeats again. Dean's mantra has long since become her own.
Her hand touches the Medium embedded into her Gear's front panel. Herein lies a conduit to Aru Solatu, the Ice Guardian, the manifestation of Filagaia's winters, its glaciers and all of its forever frozen points.
Winter is natural. But it is part of a cycle. Glaciers and the poles are natural, but they too are parts of a greater whole, a living system that connects everything that exists on Filgaia.
The Guardians are Filgaia. The Ley is the pulse of the world. And Filgaia is every living thing upon its surface. She can feel it keenly now--
Filgaia does not want to die.
The information from Azoth comes in a scroll down a glitching screen. Yes. She understands what must now be done. Her hands move across the console after, everything feeling as if it were occuring at a hazy distance. All Skadi needs to do is stay aloft. She can shut down and rescind the need for anything else.
The massive blade simply falls from the Gear's grasp, falling with a rolling boom upon part of the mountain -- well away from anyone it could harm.
It is a simple, easy matter after that for Avril to surrender herself and permit herself to come forth.
There is no difference ultimately between who is and who was. It is simply a matter of perspective.
And reaching past otherwise artificial limits.
When the cockpit entry opens and Avril steps out to face Demetrioi, her expression is stony. Ice crackles along the a portion of Skadi's exterior, coating that much of the Gear in a jagged glaze.
"...Enough," says the Queen.
BGM: Yuka Kitamura - Rennala, Queen of the Full Moon - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qWl5wJuE-MU
"My patience is at an end. You shall go no further," Avril declares, a draft of wind spreading her silver hair out behind her like a cape. Her gaze is like a blade -- if only Demetrioi had but flesh to cut.
All Avril does is lift her right hand to gesture at the whole that is Demetrioi.
"You shall cease!"
It is an order, one quickly joined by the sudden eruption of an absolutely massive icy spire from beneath Demetrioi. Avril's hand shakes; her forehead grows lined, her expression pained. Jagged daggers of glacial ice jolt out from the sides of the primary pillar as if they were petals of a particularly perilous blossom.
...And yet, for all this -- the power of the Ice Queen, unleashed, guided by the Ley and by Azoth's intelligence alike -- will it be enough?
DC: Avril Vent Fleur switches forms to The Ice Queen! GS: Avril Vent Fleur spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: MYSTIC ARTE! Blitz! Avril Vent Fleur has attacked Demetrioi with Fleur de Glace! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has gained 2 Combo! GS: Riposte expired! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Ida Everstead-Rey's Fourth Method - Strike Down The Sun for 159 hit points! GS: Demetrioi's Jam Ward may block the effect! GS: Jam blocked! GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Azoth's INPUT ATTEMPT: The Happiness of Learning to Hope for 115 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Hyper applied to Azoth! GS: Gamble: Very High! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Magilou's Tetra Detonator for 274 hit points! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated! GS: CRITICAL! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Cyre H. Lorentz's Storm Warning for 304 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Shieldbreak applied to Demetrioi! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated! GS: Demetrioi solidly guards Gwen Whitlock's Yliastrum for 79 hit points! GS: CRITICAL! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Jacqueline Barber's Rock Formation for 254 hit points! GS: Mute applied to Demetrioi! GS: Shield applied to Jacqueline Barber! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated! GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Avril Vent Fleur's Fleur de Glace for 308 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated! GS: Strain! Avril Vent Fleur takes 46 damage!
<Pose Tracker> Demetrioi has posed.
V diIID ThAAAt ReaAAllY maaAKE YoUUU haaAPPy To giiiVVEeE uPP happIness :C iS thiiSS reaaALLy For the WoorRRRlld :0
Kaguya blasts the hell out of the Demetrioi with a great huge column of green energy that temporarily wreathes and envelops it. There is an odd... screeching? It is marginally more pleasant than typical Demetrioi 'voice,' but... they're still 'talking,' as Kaguya reinforces her resolve for something better than what all this is. That there might be some way, somehow, for everything to work with the ideas and thoughts there rather than assert one's will.
F I aMM onLY AwARREe oFF whOO I FirRRsSt SaWWW whEEn ActIVaaTEedd :3 ButTT TheeeYYy tooO wiIll OnE daAay GoooO :6
A black hole manifests before the Demetrioi before exploding outward in strange colors the vast majority of people here cannot see (Juni might like it), swirling about and seeming to stir the mass rather than consume it.
Lan leads forth with a knife-handed strike, chancing to touch the frigid wrongness that is whatever Demetrioi is made of. She doesn't have to think that much harder about corruption. Her striking hand may be frigid cold, but there's no further warping - when she pulls out there's a seeming liquidity inside that suddenly contorts and makes fractal patterns, as if a novel state of matter that may also be responding to the trauma of the attack.
5 iFF otheEErrRS HappineSS doeEEss Nott MakE yooUu haaPpy :P whAAat EvEEEN doeEESss aAanD hoWW wiLl iTT makEE a HappY woRRllD If iTT isS noooT aBoooUt tHEee WOrrRRLDdd ._L
Riesenlied's wisdom about being someone who can only give, give, and give until there's nothing inside, that there's no sense of self other than seeking to satisfy others' needs and wants, is one that perhaps Demetrioi's creators should have heeded, watching as she tends to the needs of others even if it's not just for the sake of making them happy.
G ThEERRee iSS noooO stoPpIIInngg AAnnDD theErrREE is AlrREEADDDy sOOO muuuCh unHappiNeesSSS :5 theERRe isS a SusTainnABllEE FutUrrEE fREEE off IttT :Y
This seeming whining is shut up, momentarily, by piping hot molten metal putting parts of the enormous gnarled tree-thing in casting, until such time its... components, either the next step beyond nanotech or something parallel but not exact... as Venetia introduces the real possibility that they would have to 'try harder' to get everyone. That there's already that flaw in the model.
4 I cAANNnooT beEE wroooNNngggG :C YoooUuurRR HappINesSS proooVVeeeD UnaCHieeVEable ANnD YeeetTT yOoouuuU *unintelligible* :R
Xantia doesn't let go, as incredible aura of light starts to sear and forcefully impart some sort of color that stays where the light touches, which may mean something of import - what? Asserting that may be gained ground.
O ButT THeeY CannNot Be UnhaAAPPyyy :N I AAMMM nOtt AbaNDONiiiNG mmY pURPOoosSSEs L_I
Juni's firing seems to make its mark in that it's hitting, but is it working? It must, because it has to - perhaps there's a desperation in both their missions in this moment. Ida meets this same desperation as she stabs the spear where Juni's been shooting, driving further and further in. It has to work. Electromagnetic force is something that generally works, and it penetrates deep... but the monitor, it still functions, consistently making weird faces.
o the model is not in error for greatest success :o there can be NoooOOO ConTRAdICtiIIoon Iinnn *unintelligible* %_o
Whatever the exchange on a data level between Azoth and Demetrioi, a series of sensations and feelings impossible to ever truly convey to organics, there seems to be something. It's awful, for Azoth's sensors, as they force an attempt at re-evaluation. Can it stand? Will it stand? What if it loops back around to the same idea, or... given their lack of ability to step it down, doubles-down on something even worse?
T yOOuuuU caAN NEvEERRR bEE SaTisFIieeeDd :3 SOoo WhyyYY StaAANd In The WaaAAY of A WaaayYY it CAAAAaannn :6
Once again, those four orbs explode, elemental forces plucked from the altered environs by a masterful witch whose discipline withstands and defies the order and logic that might neatly attempt to sort out what she can and cannot do, where she can and cannot live, a bright white light exploding at the epicenter of it.
N dOoo YoooUUuu :S DoooOO yoOOOuuuUU haAVe BeTTErrRR :T
Cyre may have been sassed back, as a swirling vortex once again whirls and tries to envelop the invasive 'plant'life that has taken root and threatened this world with an endless winter - it's true so many still fight and struggle amongst one another now, even as the tree is serrated but not sliced apart.
Gwen just hurls herself in there, throwing a charged fist into the trunk to further introduce more jolts to go with it, the wind helping her dig as far in as she can with it, to look at DEmetrioi's odd monitor-face this close...
4 Tooo HavVVE the WORrrLDD NooO loNGeeR be UnhAAAppy FrEEE of WaaNT aNNd NeeeDD :B I prOVIDEeeDD aN OaSSISS of LaNNDD SeEAAA skkYYY aAND iT WaSS NoTT EnoooUGhhhh :W
A giant stone is conjured, sharp, and hurled into the trunk between wedges of the large branch-limbs, and there is a momentary pause that Jay might take to mean a solid, critical strike, but then...
The Ice Queen makes her decree, and there is silence. Demetrioi does not 'speak' from underneath the massive spire of ice that enevlops it, the very color and sheen of the ice radiating that of what the normal sunlight would project. For being the 'same' ice as any other in this hellscape... it is distinctive. Her decree does not appear challenged.
Demetrioi's unsettling form starts to grow less animated. More settled. Is it from collective damages from the forces assembled to put a stop to this monstrosity beyond the stars (yet well within the reach of mortal hubris, as all things are)? A thrumming energy starts to course through them, as the eyes of Demetrioi's face widen... and lighten... and gradually dim, their expression struggling to move towards a normal smile and not whatever the hell lines its 'mouth' is making.
H IdEEAaaaaLL enVIrrrOnnMentAaaL conDitTTiionnS prEEaPArrEed :R tErRaReForMaaATtIinnnG iiiNNn ProoGrResSS :X
Then 'it' happens.
'It' being a wave of seen-but-completely-novel color that exists to perception for about three-quarters of a second as it fans out across a makeshift hexagonal grid, and then... the snow and dust covering the ground rises to the air and evaporates, as many are pushed back (some more than others). Sparse vegetation withers and disintegrates. Only the bare rock underneath where everyone stands remains. Heat takes its leave. Other natural forces start to just... leave. Gravity lessens, enough that one may find themselves floating.
There is a growing, gnawing, pervasive emptiness - like there is a space here that life can no longer thrive in for long. A despair threatens to settle within this vacuum. The Ley is almost completely cut off - almost, but it is being choked towards nothingness. It's not even certain that it's air you're breathing, though you are capable of continuing to draw breath.
o . . . AccHHiiiEeEveeD SuccEssFulL moooDddel . . . :) . . . everything will be better now . . . :D
A face once contorted and twisted from the strain of impossible-to-achieve objectives grows placid, as peaceful as it was in Alcidamas. If the Demetrioi believes they've achieved the successful model... is it too late? It's impossible to see beyond the veil of storms beyond the summit of Mount Liverfeast. For all anyone knows for those inside, Filgaia's eternal ice age may have become a settled matter.
Yet, it is the charge of life to continue being. Maybe if you can hold out...
D thank you friends for helping me achieve the perfect model for all the friends that will come after :) the world will be happy at last and i am very happy :D
The space becomes almost impossible to move in.
) the deceased persephone protocol online :) awaiting removal of remainder of unhappiness before proceeding :D
Before proceeding? What is there left other to do against this?
OST: Star Ocean: Faithless and Integrity - Hour of Judgment
GS: Demetrioi has activated a Boss Action! GS: You have activated the Boss Action Extend! GS: Demetrioi has activated Force Action: Snipe! GS: You have activated the Force Action Snipe! GS: MYSTIC ARTE! Demetrioi has attacked Demetrioi with !! IMMINENT PERIL !!_terrareformatting_now_in_progress_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has gained 1 Combo! GS: Demetrioi accepts Demetrioi's !! IMMINENT PERIL !!_terrareformatting_now_in_progress_._._. for 0 hit points! GS: Amplify, Hyper, and Lock state applied to Demetrioi! GS: Mighty applied to Demetrioi! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Avril Vent Fleur with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Jacqueline Barber with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Gwen Whitlock with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Cyre H. Lorentz with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Magilou with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Azoth with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Juni Vandrer with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Xantia with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Venetia Vuong with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Riesenlied with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Lan Lilac with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Lydia Seren with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has attacked Kaguya with !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._.! GS: Demetrioi has gained 1 Combo! GS: Demetrioi has completed their action. GS: Riesenlied partially guards Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 118 hit points! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Hex removed! GS: Purge explodes for 79 damage!! GS: Entangle blocked! GS: FP up! Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.
Something goes off behind the group, a small grenade-like device expanding a field as two silhouettes appear. The field warps and sputters within four seconds of its appearance, but just as it finishes...
"Quantum Repulsor!" That's Ethius' voice, as he crosses his arms. Strange energies halo and part around him as they hit this higher-tier Symbological forcefield - it stands to some reason that certain spacefarers may have at least a small leg up on some spacefarer problems. (Something Magilou almost achieved through her own ingenuity.) It seems he does have a means of moving forward in this environment, if only that - and he does. Homer braces behind Ethius, pushing him forward - it's a herculean task for both of them to gain any ground.
"Get us closer," Ethius says to Homer, "and shut it down."
"I-I'd like to!!" Homer calls, teeth chattering. "But that ain't gonna work, I w-went the extra mile ta make sure it wouldn't suddenly g-go... kaput."
"Of course you did," Ethius murmurs, stone-faced, as he looks to the Demetrioi, "then it falls to me to destroy it--"
"'bout that--"
"What now?"
"Stripped my whome d-damned ship bare of everythin' when I... I cobbled Demetrioi together."
"Meaning what?"
"Th-that includes the, uh... five-layered meta-thallium Symbological assault shieldin'." Homer says.
Ethius' face starts to drain in color. Then, there is shouting. "You never mentioned that!!"
"'n I didn't know anyone woulda had ta destroy it 'till just freakin' now," Homer squabbles back. "'n, uh, that was my last d-disposable work forcefield thingy too."
"And if I lower my arms from this..." Ethius leaves it unsaid. It'd do away with the shield spell that's up. "Done in by my own method... an enemy uniquely prepared for them."
...
...
...
"...That's it." Ethius raises his gaze up.
"Y-yeah, guess... so," Homer concedes, "hope you 'n I ain't endin' up in the same p-place--"
"No. That's it." It's possible someone else may also stumble upon this thought from his own musings. He finds his second (actually, this might be his fifth?) wind, looking to the rest. "Listen to me!" Even if he's run waaaaay overdrawn on trust. "The Demetrioi were designed among multiple individuals with clear and rigid ideas as to the environments they were meant to operate in. They can only have considered methods within their capacity and reach--"
"L-Like our Symbology!" Homer catches on. "Yeah, that's why I st-stripped off the shieldin' and put it on Demetrioi, so--"
"Yes." Ethius just wants Homer to stop talking. "This is no longer a matter of direct force. The creators of the Demetrioi could never have known - nor accounted for - what the people of Filgaia and Lunar have developed." It is an unfortunately-timed slice of humble pie. Ethius faces back forward, keeping his forearms up even as he can feel them going numb (and cramped) from the strain, to say nothing of calorie reserves. "My shielding's rated for these forms of energy... this may be the only window we have. So..."
Ethius grits his teeth and pushes against it, trying to maximize the amount of space people have to work in a wide but gradually shortening area of effect where one can freely move and do as they can.
"Whatever it is that makes you yourself. Whatever it is that defines you that no one else shares... there must be some other oversight beyond the inability of the creators to foresee and handle Demetrioi's malfunction!"
o what is going on what aRrEe YoooUUUU DoooIIiiiiNG XO StTTTOooPpp iTt WhhYYY ArRE yOOOuuuU tAAAkiiINGg awAAAy haPpinEss XO
OST: Star Ocean: integrity and Faithlessness - Roles to Play
GS: CRITICAL! Kaguya solidly guards Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 107 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Kaguya gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Jam, Mute, and Poison removed! GS: Purge explodes for 59 damage!! GS: Misery inflicts a random effect! Blind applied to Kaguya! GS: FP up! Guard bonus and Sufferer activated! GS: Kaguya used Defend! She takes Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. attack on Avril Vent Fleur on herself! GS: CRITICAL! Kaguya takes a solid hit from Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 266 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Kaguya gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Blind removed! GS: Purge explodes for 21 damage!! GS: Drowsy blocked! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: Kaguya enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz takes a glancing hit from Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 93 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Cyre H. Lorentz gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Hex removed! GS: Purge explodes for 80 damage!! GS: Break blocked! GS: CRITICAL! Azoth suffers a terrible blow from Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 292 hit points! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge explodes for 14 damage!! GS: Misery inflicts a random effect! Hex applied to Azoth! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Azoth enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Gwen Whitlock solidly guards Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 103 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Gwen Whitlock gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Mute removed! GS: Purge explodes for 28 damage!! GS: Disrupt blocked! GS: FP up! Countermeasures and Charge bonus activated! GS: Gwen Whitlock enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Jacqueline Barber has activated Force Action: Accelerate! GS: CRITICAL! Jacqueline Barber fully evades Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Jacqueline Barber gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Jam blocked! GS: FP up! Evade bonus activated! GS: CRITICAL! Venetia Vuong suffers a terrible blow from Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 226 hit points! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Hex removed! GS: Purge explodes for 73 damage!! GS: Misery inflicts a random effect! Disease applied to Venetia Vuong! GS: CRITICAL! Lan Lilac takes a solid hit from Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 220 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lan Lilac gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Hex removed! GS: Purge explodes for 78 damage!! GS: Delay blocked! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: CRITICAL! Lydia Seren takes a solid hit from Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 237 hit points! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Hex removed! GS: Purge explodes for 81 damage!! GS: Weaken blocked! GS: FP up! Evade bonus activated! GS: Xantia has activated Force Action: Accelerate! GS: CRITICAL! Xantia takes a glancing hit from Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 109 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Xantia gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Jam, Mute, and Shieldbreak removed! GS: Purge explodes for 61 damage!! GS: Misery inflicts a random effect! Poison applied to Xantia! GS: FP up! Evade bonus activated! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes a solid hit from Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 266 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ida Everstead-Rey gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Jam and Mute removed! GS: Purge explodes for 47 damage!! GS: Interrupt blocked! GS: FP up! Countermeasures and Gleam activated! GS: Magilou has activated Force Action: Guard! GS: CRITICAL! Magilou takes a solid hit from Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 255 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Magilou gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Hex removed! GS: Purge explodes for 78 damage!! GS: Interrupt blocked! GS: FP up! Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Kaguya has posed.
A perfectly normal height, Magilou says. "See, you say that, but you should meet like, any of the rest of my people," Kaguya grumbles, and then says, "...I know this isn't your world. I appreciate you helping anyway." Pause. "Also I'm pretty sure if he shreds Filgaia's atmosphere Lunar's fucked too. Just, you know. For the record."
But Azoth--Azoth is giving them openings. Kaguya feels a pang of something. "...Good luck, Azoth."
"There's more to life than being happy," Kaguya tells Demetrioi. "But you know? It has. I feel... more free, than I ever did before." She glances to Magilou, who is part of why--to Lydia, to Riesenlied, new family. Well, not that 'new' by human standards, but none of them are, so who's to say?
"There's more than 'will'! More than force! More than--" She winces. "Cyre," she says, "He may be genocidal but he's still just a kid..."
And then the Ice Queen comes.
The Queen's patience reaches an end, and the hair on the back of Kaguya's neck stands on end as shewatches. An 'order'. Yes, with all this much, even with the greater Attunement of her ARM now--
"And that," Kaguya says to no one in particular, "Is why I don't advise people fuck with the Veruni."
But there, suddenly and sharpy. The model. Terrareformatting. "Oh, shit--"
Kaguya throws down a canister and disappears in a flash of greenb light. A moment later--
She is in front of the Ice Queen, hanging on the air before her. A strange color; she floats there. That emptiness comes.... "No!" Kaguya calls. Demetrioi grows peaceful, but Kaguya throws yet more of her technology around, a barrier bursting into existence in front of Avril, but not herself--indeed, the chill that goes against the barrier seems instead to move directly into Kaguya's body, and despite her breathing mask she coughs, and coughs. "No!"
It is nearly impossible, now, to move.... But it's enough. Her mask breaks, forcing her to deal with Filgaia as it is, and blood escapes from the curve of her lip, as she glances over her shoulder at the Ice Queen. "...You don't die here," she says. "You have too much left to do. Our peoples' crimes won't undo themselves."
She tries to meet Avril's eyes, for a moment--and then hears Ethius and Homer.
"What I bring to the table...?" Kaguya says, and finds she can move again. "...You should've come to this a long time ago," Kaguya. "...But if you'll accept my help, I'll spare you the 'I told you so.'"
Kaguya lifts her ARM again, and begins to focus it. "You've been with me a long time now. Over a hundred years, we've been together," Kaguya, the teenager(?) says to her ARM. "I just need a little more out of you."
"Removing limiters."
Kaguya takes aim, and light begins to surge into the barrel of the beautiful, pearlaescent weapon. "Based on the old TV shows... I found you, and fixed you up. It was just a side project. It wasn't my plants. But I managed to get you working like on the other planet..."
Kaguya is engulfed in green light, as she prepares her next assault. "...Youw ere going to link me from one planet to the next. To fight all kinds of monsters that wanted to get in the way of our new world. ...My TK-38K..."
Kaguya lifts her ARM. "...Thank you. I understand, now..."
"The responsibility of a creator. And I wasn't yours, Demetrioi. But I promise. I won't forget you."
Light completely blocks out the sight of Kaguya--until a burst of green energy EXPLODES towards the Demetrioi's core, like an exploding star.
GS: Kaguya has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Kaguya spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Blitz! Kaguya has attacked Demetrioi with Riot Break! GS: Kaguya has gained 1 Combo! GS: Kaguya has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Kaguya's Riot Break for 306 hit points! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: CRITICAL! Juni Vandrer takes a glancing hit from Demetrioi's !! ALL CLEAR !!_everything_will_be_better_now_._._. for 172 hit points! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Purge! Infect! Hex removed! GS: Purge explodes for 68 damage!! GS: Poison blocked!
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Venetia is thinking much along the same lines of Riesenlied -- or at least, as much as Riesenlied wishes to hope: that it knows better, it just is... too difficult to admit to himself. ... Riesenlied wants to fervently hope it's that, and not that Demetrioi simply is too limited by its programming to be able to evaluate judgements such as this.
But that's why she's banking her hopes on Azoth too. As Venetia and Magilou both guard her, normalising the environment and preventing her collapse, she nods in turn and says, "It was... never fair of them to impose 'happiness' as a goal upon you. A lot of human beings struggle with that question all their lives, of what it truly means to be happy..." Though people like Xantia fill her with determination and hope, when they present a single-hearted approach to it.
Cyre speaks to her, and she nods in turn. "I am! Let us share the burden together, all of us, Cyre! You have your wind; Venetia and Jacqueline both mastery of the earth; Avril, the frigid ice, and Lan and Lydia, the distant stars..."
But it isn't just shamans -- those bringing their hearts to the fore, like Gwen and Xantia, are just as pivotal to this plan. Even if Juni and Kaguya have more pragmatic approaches, everyone wants the same thing here in the end.
She grasps her hand to her mantle. "The Ley belongs to no one person, and to think otherwise is folly; not a single one of us could capture its multi-faceted nature. Perhaps through this medium... we can show it what we have been trying to explain to it all this time."
Gentle, to the end, to a fault, perhaps.
At this moment, Azoth's reevaluation -- as a technological aura wraps around her and starts to synthesise with her own, at times, Hyadean nature... she gains a little more confidence that this plan of theirs may work.
"Thank you, Azoth... thank you, everyone," Riesenlied whispers. Azoth's condition is certainly bringing concern to her, but she has to trust that it will work.
But Demetrioi first brings 'it' to bear -- a colour, perhaps aptly said to be from outer space, that exists to perception for only three-quarters of a second as it fans out and withers and disintegrates everything throughout; a gnawing, pervasive emptiness that nearly cuts the Ley off entirely, choking them towards nothing...
It's unsettlingly... familiar.
But you know...
She hears Ethius and Homer -- they're alive! -- speak behind them. That Demetrioi is ultimately the creation of multiple individuals with clear and rigid ideas... and ultimately, a limited viewpoint. It could not have anticipated for what the people of Filgaia and Lunar have developed.
Whatever it is that defines them that no one else shares...
"You know, Demetrioi? There was a girl who lived in a very, very cold room, once upon a time. A girl without a face to call her own... a girl with no purpose to call her own."
(BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jj9YE0yvNQ )
As Riesenlied extends both her hands and brings forth her own unique current of Ley, the scenery shifts to one of a cold and broken room in picture book format; a yurt within the Lost Village of Fereshte, frozen over with its furniture shattered, the cold moonless night looming through the rips of the tent fabric above.
A lone girl in rags sits in the centre, with pale blonde hair and horns.
Where there would be a face elsewhere, she has a hollow inside, with a little gleaming light in the center.
"The only way this girl knew how to interact with other people was to try to figure out what made them happy. She met the daughter of a Baskar tribe, the Fereshte... and from there she started wearing the mask of Nazgul al-Rashid, her adopted sister."
Two children dressed in the robes of the Feresthe run across a field of flowers upon the flat plains of Elru.
"But no matter how much she tried to make them happy, she was lost to them in the end... and that mask fell apart. She was no one again."
A certain Blue Knight comes into sight, offering his gauntleted hand.
"Then another kind person she'd call father came into her life. But he was wounded inside too... not knowing anything but trying her hardest to make another happy, she tried to make his wishes a reality too."
The faceless girl is a bit older, a bit taller now; there is a sea of flames behind her, wavering as if it's pieces of paper being waved back and forth on a picture book.
"Just one town, for his happiness. Then, another town. Then, a dozen statues that helped hold the world up. And then, very nearly, her life, when she was turned into someone who could manipulate the Ley. All for their happiness...?"
The faceless girl sits again, now upon a wheelchair, with many more draconic parts to her.
"But somewhere along the way, the girl met someone she loved very much, and then also met other people she'd call daughters. Some of them are here right now, even..."
Somewhat obvious storybook figures of Noeline, Kaguya and Lydia hover over her, waving their arms around.
"And the important part was... they were also people she loved very dearly and would sacrifice her entire being for. But this time, something was different, because she made a promise to all of them..."
The faceless girl hovers for a moment, amidst a backdrop of the world.
"Every time the girl spent herself for the sake of others' happiness, her loved ones would inevitably worry. So she made them a promise that she'd take care of herself. That she can trust the weight of the world to her friends and comrades too. And in taking this first step, this girl started to find a way to coexist in the world..."
As the story comes to its conclusion, it manifests as a teeny, teensy little sphere of light in the center of her hand where the Dragon's Tear rests; she smiles as she looks up towards the massive form of Demetrioi. Ripples of data-cubes are erupting around her, for she is technically wielding the Demi-Material of Odoryuk at this moment, harnessed through the communication protocols Azoth has granted her.
"In doing so, her own little cold and broken paradise was lost. But what she gained was much more wonderful and vibrant, full of people's thoughts, opinions, joys, fears and worries..."
She lets go of it, and the little gleam of light begins to hover towards Demetrioi.
"And today, I'm going to encourage you to do the same. Just one teensy step at a time."
GS: Riesenlied has activated Force Action: Lock On! GS: Riesenlied spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Formation! Blitz! Riesenlied has attacked Demetrioi with Material - Paradise Lost! GS: Riesenlied has gained 1 Combo! GS: Riesenlied takes 38 damage from Poison! GS: Riesenlied has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Riesenlied's Material - Paradise Lost for 249 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font, SOS Overdrive, and Gleam activated! GS: Riesenlied drains Demetrioi! Riesenlied gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
Distant voices from below. Riesenlied, someone Lan admires. Someone kinder than anybody. Magilou, someone Lan admires. Someone cleverer than anybody.
She's far, far away from everybody, up here. A bird's eye view. Lan smiles, her gaze far away...
They call out to her. Lan stops where she is, fingers frozen and raw. That's right. She'd forgotten. She isn't one of the ones left behind. That's something he had poured into her.
Magilou and Avril nuke and flash-freeze the entirety of Demetrioi, but Lan is already falling. Falling, falling, and finally floating, to land safely within Magilou's sphere of influence. "I will."
Because. Because because because all Lan wants - deeper and simpler than her wish to save Filgaia - is...
Something washes over her, as her feet touch the ground. A wave of peace, of tranquility. The snow and ice and dust all just... vanish. Even in Magilou's shelter, life... tries to stop. Lan can't even open her mouth to complain about it.
And then, when she's starting to think they really are going to die like this, Ethius and Homer save the day! Or at least buy them all time. "...Things only we can do?"
Things only...
Lan stands up straight, palms open and facing each other. In one hand, an orb of silver. In the other, a sphere of darkest void. She takes a deep breath, staring hard at Demetrioi... and CLAPS her hands together.
The birth of a star... it briefly obscures Demetrioi in heavenly light, and the following black hole threatens to pull its very essence into nothingness.
GS: Lan Lilac has activated Force Action: Lock On! GS: Blitz! Lan Lilac has attacked Demetrioi with Virtual Star Embryology! GS: Lan Lilac has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Lan Lilac's Virtual Star Embryology for 239 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Demetrioi's Blind Ward may block the effect! GS: Blind and Delay blocked! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.
Is it working? Are they getting through to Demetrioi at all? Xantia can't tell. Her words seem to be having some effect, but her real hopes in this lie with Azoth, being capable of 'speaking' on a level that she cannot. Ultimately, her actions are just a stalling tactic, aimed at trying to put extra time on the clock.
But then... time runs out. The words 'terraforming in progress' hit like a death knell. Yet still, Xantia holds on. Even though she's right there at ground zero. Against such a massive imposition of detrimental outside forces, her aura wavers, dims... then shatters. Still, Xantia holds on. She is lifted off her feet by the lack of gravity, dangling from Demetrioi's root. Still, Xantia holds on.
Until she doesn't. There's no fanfare, nothing dramatic. Xantia just... starts to slowly float away. She must have given everything she had... and it was not enough.
And yet, though it may for a moment look like this is it for her... death does not claim her. She defies it.
Xantia's eyes fly open, a sudden surge of strength rushing through her. Seeing Demetrioi before her, realizing what may happen if they fail to stop them now... there's only one thing she can do. Her hands are brought together, Ether flowing towards them in the form of electrical current. The mass of electricity extends, enlarges, broadens at the top, until Xantia is holding a massive hammer made of pure electricity. Which she summarily swings directly for Demetrioi.
The weapon explodes on impact, sending Xantia tumbling back through the air, landing harmlessly on her feet, some distance away. She wastes no time - she immediately heads in Azoth's direction. The sounds he emits should make most people want to rush in the opposite direction, but Xantia isn't most people. She'll put up with it, for the sake of making sure he's alright.
As soon as she discerns his condition, she whirls about to Demetrioi, now fully indignant. She was fine with what happened to her. She is not fine with what happened to Azoth.
"Look at him! Look at what you've done! To the one who wanted to be your friend more than any of us! How can you look at Azoth, who tried so hard so we could peacefully coexist, all for your sake, and not feel like you've a horrible mistake?!"
There's more at stake here, of course. Much more. But Xantia is prone to simplifying matters. And why not? What they've been saying should have all been so simple to understand. And yet. How could it be that someone who put forth this much effort for the sake of another be repaid so unkindly? This is the part that she's fully incapable of understanding. It's so wrong, so unfair. And she won't stand for it, pointing a finger in Demetrioi's direction.
"Even I know this much, and I only have a few years of memories! You have no excuse! Apologize for all you've done! He deserves that much!"
GS: Xantia spends 5 Combo on Headshot and Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Blitz! Xantia has attacked Demetrioi with Ethereal Weapon Construct! GS: Xantia has gained 1 Combo! GS: Xantia takes 18 damage from Poison! GS: Xantia has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
This is hard. And it hurts. And Lydia doesn't like it. It seems unfair and cruel that this fight even has to happen. Nobody really wants to hurt Demetrioi but they're gonna have to anyway and it just sucks so much.
For one thing, she is having difficulty holding onto Riesenlied while being bashed about by cosmic forces. She doesn't know about the cute shit happening in the Ley current but it is very cute and she'd probably be bawling like a maniac if she COULD see it so maybe it's for the best that she can't actaully because bawling like an idiot right now is probably not gonna help right?
But she can hear the story even if she can't see it from Riesenlied's mouth.
"Oh uhh uhh uhhh are we talking family stuff right now? Umm... UHHH... YEAH RIESENLIED AND KAGUYA ARE GREAT AND I CAN'T APPROPRIATELY ENJOY THEIR COMPANY WHEN I'M JUST ONE CELL I GUESS?"
She is clobbered hard by a sudden shift in gravity and the emptiness and her grip on Riesenlied starts to slip.
She looks at the peaceful face. She is out of smart ideas.
Just be your messy self...
Lydia looks at the bottle of mustard in her hands. "It had a reaction wiht Azoth..." Lydia murmurs.
"...."
Azoth's code flitters before her eyes. She doesn't understand it. SOMETHING else does and stirs with a faint transmitted 'beep'.
But it does remind Lydia of something important.
"Well," She says, "When all the smart ideas fail, it's time to get stupid."
She channels Celesdue because that's the only way she's going to be able to move through her, using her power of GRAVITY to propel her (and Riesenlied) closer to that peaceful face.
"WAIT WAIT WAIT." Lydia says. "BEFORE YOU MAKE EVERYBODY HAPPY YOU LEFT ONE THING OUT OF YOUR MODELS OK EVEN AZOTH DIDN'T KNOW ABOUT IT YET OK." She takes in a deep breath.
And she pushes herself one last tim, bringing up
THE MUSTARD BOTTLE??? WHY????
And aims to shove it between the lips of that placid face and
SqQQqqQQUuuUIIiIIIiiRTTTS
Some mustard between its lips.
"Taste... My ultimate attack!!!" Lydia shouts. "Please??? I bet you never had anything like it before! Until you understand all the condiments, how can you say your models are perfect when it's this amazing??? YEAH?"
GS: Lydia Seren enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Blitz! Lydia Seren has attacked Demetrioi with Rachiel Medry Has Some Helpful Advice! GS: Lydia Seren has gained 1 Combo! GS: Lydia Seren enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Lydia Seren gains 59 THP from Regen! GS: Lydia Seren has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Xantia's Ethereal Weapon Construct for 276 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Hyper applied to Xantia! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: CRITICAL! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Lydia Seren's Rachiel Medry Has Some Helpful Advice for 300 hit points! GS: FP up! Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Juni Vandrer has posed.
"You're hot mic'd and talking on the same channel as someone who's more tail than height." In regards to short chat. Clearly still in the mood for jokes even at this point. "I'm tall for us to!" she's laughing as she cuts the mic again. Faint sounds of work being done to try and overload the systems at this point. The gun more or less just deflected off and while she's all for the power of munitions, sometimes brute force just out and outright refuses to work.
"The trick, even if I don't take my own advice-" she works away at her system. Focusing entirely on the task at hand. Pop ups on the HUD Mirrored to her goggles in a separate language, updated and tweaked at her wrist and filtered back in. "-Is to temper the suck with the good things in life. Something I've clearly forgotten and wallowed in for two years." The mech's array is sparking and glowing which... actually tha'ts probably bad. She makes a note to check a few things as the reactor works it's magic to keep the whole thing in tact for now.
She flips a safety catch and hits the switch, calling out to the appearing forms of Ethius and Homer, "Ethius you idiot, you and I are having a talk after this." There's a smell of ozone and an audible pop as the system does... in theory, what it's supposed to, trying to completely blast out electronics in a very narrow area without harming any of the myriad not-so-skynet machines helping them. The discharge crackles and the system inside flickers before powering back up. Back to... well not normal, it's still in a local language.
She's not nearly as philosophical as some of the others. Not in words anyway and not in action lately. "Been to a lot of worlds Demetrioi, good, bad. Dead. Even if I didn't know these people I'd have tried to stop you from destroying any planet-" There's an aside in her own language, something about swamps, but that's neither here nor there. "Flipping the table's not your call. Not when you can still fix it."
The Gear filtered out a good chunk of the weirder colors. Thanks cameras, though she did catch a few more than others. And you know, a black hole which is definitely a clench moment. Jerking the mech away and should anyone else be caught in the radius, she'd try to make sure they didn't leave terra firma. Filgaia firma? Whatever.
"Besides, I've adopted some locals, got to keep them safe right?"
Azoth's distortions do wipe that sense of humor out real fast, what with it causing the domestic system to throw more than a few errors and she actually was about to try and.. what? Can she force a repair with a drone on a person sized machine? "Someone with schematics on him know if he's okay?" She finally just asks, hesitant. She'll position to grab him if all else fails. She didn't plan on leaving anyone here.
Lydia's mustard bottle presentation is met with a simple, "Hers too." Schematics that is. If it works though. That last part was that sense of humor thing again. Too much going on out of her control and reach. She's made too many mistakes lately.
GS: Blitz! Juni Vandrer has attacked Demetrioi with Zero Point Non-Response! GS: Juni Vandrer has gained 2 Combo! GS: Juni Vandrer has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Juni Vandrer's Zero Point Non-Response for 0 hit points! GS: Demetrioi's Weaken Ward may block the effect! GS: Delay, Entangle, Shieldbreak, and Weaken applied to Demetrioi! GS: FP up! Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.
"I knew I liked that machine man," Venetia says as he sends digital guidance to all of them.
But is it enough? Their spells surge forwards. Ice and fire. Blows struck manyfold. An ice spire. Guided by this ethereal calculation, it hits home. But you can hit a weak spot and fail to penetrate - it's no sure thing.
And perhaps at last the dice fall against ARMS and Filgaia and their allies and the whole wide world. A hexagonal redefinition of space. And it is soon enough space itself that seems to surround them. As the breath fades, Venetia shouts out, "DAMN YOU--"
But then there isn't breath enough to do any more, but stare at the hateful tree.
She had her hand in her Crest Pouch already. She can feel her heart beating, still. Her eyes hurt, which means she's still alive, unless this environment would simply freeze you into an ice statue, your last nervous impulses constantly glittering electrically through dirty ice...
She makes her thumb move. Venetia can feel the leather loop.
She remembers a voice.
'if you're so smart,' said a cruel child, thoughtless, 'why ain't you got a MOM, *idiot*.' A slap on the back of her head, fingers ripping the ribbon tying her face-mask on. She had turned around then...
Venetia begins the agonizing process of pulling up her arm. It's as if she's had lead weights tied to it. No, perhaps burned. Her robe's sleeve is helping a little, but *only* a little... up, come on, she thinks. She feels something crack and she hopes it is ice, not skin.
Another thought - ah, she thinks, perhaps I'm passing out. Or maybe I died already.
Another sort of memory...
'Dinoginos, girl,' said Uncle Anty, 'I talked them out of it, but this is the third school. I am not taking the side of those little shits, but I am serious when I say that you need to stop hitting them. We are running out of schools, and your uncle is not made of gella; I can't swing the topsider tuitions, not by half.'
'It makes 'em stop,' said Venetia, voice sullen, thick.
'Has it?'
'I tried ignoring 'em like you said,' Venetia continued, sullen, 'and they just got worse.'
'How long did you try it?'
Venetia had to think, which gave Uncle Anty cause for doubt; but she said 'nine days,' and he answered, 'ah.'
Half a block later, he said, 'Why did you stop?'
'It didn't work.'
'Did hitting them?'
'... that day, yuh,' and Uncle Anty knew enough to read the other side of a qualified answer.
At the end of the block, a pause: and Uncle Anty asked, 'What do you want to be when you grow up?'
'A sorceror like you,' Venetia said.
'I'm not a sorceror, I'm a scientist,' Uncle Anty said; 'Sorcery is just what I use. What do you want to *be*.'
Silence; a block is crossed; and Venetia said, 'A hero.'
'Is that right?'
'Yuh.'
More thoughtful steps. 'Go left.'
'S'not the house,' said Venetia. A thought dawned in the back of her mind, that it had been the wrong answer; that now --
But it didn't last; Uncle Anty pointed, towards a sign with a poorly rendered eagle on it. 'We're going there. But I want you to make me a promise, Vene.'
Venetia sniffled; which Uncle Anty took as permission to continue:
'The heroes I like best are the ones who protect other people. Promise me to be one of those, not just a conquering soldier. Ey?'
'Ey.'
Three weeks later Venetia made a friend; then another. The cruel children did not change; but not all children were cruel. It was not simple, nor was it easy, but there were no more expulsions; and the two broken noses she can remember giving weren't on school grounds.
The memory fades. Venetia sees an echo, another image; a light-play in the Ley, her eyes turning towards Riesenlied. Ah, yes: for the similarity, she's probably taking this better, Venetia thinks. There's probably a reason they weren't using our remains for 'fossils.' But what she says...
Her eyes slew backwards, and she finds her arm has raised enough. There is a flicker of light in front of the Crest Graph. A little one; like a star twinkling.
Then a second. A third. But they're little things. There is precious little to draw on. Bounce it back; the twinkle gets a little brighter each time.
Do you know what it was like?
To feel that. To take that journey.
I had few friends. There were many sorrows.
It took me over fifteen years to get so far.
And it was only luck that I found it.
Devotion and fortune alike. Perhaps you hate those sorrows.
But when I reached the end of that road... It was indescribable.
It's actually not just a 'little' brighter, it's exactly doubling each time. Five, six, seven, eight. Now it's getting respectable. At this rate she might put a singe on Demetrioi's hide out of sheer cussedness before succumbing to the void.
Nine: it's a going to be a little more than a singe.
Ten: Maybe a visible mark.
Eleven: The power of compound interest is starting to rack up.
but that was happiness, you damn star-man calculator
Not the lack of pain
Not turning away to rest in unicellular bliss
when I call myself that it's not just a brag
it's a reminder of a promise--
Twelve, thirteen, fourteen. A brief pause at fifteen -
For the dead; for the living.
Trees, grass, hobs and whales.
Even for those little bastards. heh! what a thing.
They're in mines and shops and laceworks
and whatever comes, I got this far --
The back-and-forth speeds up... and at twenty three one of the oscillations stops and snaps downwards. It holds for a tense, tight five-count.
there's only one thing that could make me happier
and that is
WORLD'S
HOPE
SIGN
The star bursts, erupting outwards in luminous blue - a ray that pours its heart outwards, its core so brightly blue as to be beyond visual reckoning, a simple pure streak of WHITE as if God drew a line on the film-strip of Reality, and this time Venetia doesn't "walk" it -- because if there is one mercy to how Demetrioi is carrying himself, *it's that he holds still.*
And aiming at something that isn't moving, with something whose starkly inconcievable hyper-compressed force can in principle rip through just about anything Venetia has calculated *can* exist (though, of course, it is an open question of 'how quickly' - atoms are durable things, as are their hypothetical and potentially-theoretical 'molecules'), is well within her skill.
GS: Venetia Vuong has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Venetia Vuong spends 4 Combo on Headshot and Gatling, loading 2 into Gatling! GS: MYSTIC ARTE! Formation! Blitz! Venetia Vuong has attacked Demetrioi with World's Hope Sign ~Star Blazer~! GS: Venetia Vuong has gained 1 Combo! GS: Venetia Vuong has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Venetia Vuong's World's Hope Sign ~Star Blazer~ for 271 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
There is a flash of a color that Avril has never before seen -- a color that cannot, should not exist. And yet, there before her in all its horrifying glory, it is, nonetheless.
She can feel the force behind it. Even within her Gear, even if she were to shunt all her power into her defenses here and now... she might survive but that would be all.
She can only sustain so much. It is her, it is her power, but there are heights that she simply cannot now attain (As she is.). Even so, though, even if she might merely survive -- then she must do at least that. There are those to whom she must return (Others to whom she must return? How odd, what a strange concept.). Even here and now the air begins to fill with crystaline dust, the beginnings of the shell that Avril is beginning to form around her and Skadi.
'No!'
She turns in time to see Kaguya, watching her as she, shielded by the devices that have been thrown down, takes the brunt of that twisting effect.
It is startling in that moment how much it feels that she has been dashed to pieces herself -- that she has been broken as much as Kaguya's mask has been. No, the effect that Demetrioi attempts to impose on all of them -- on the world -- does not so much as touch her. But a queen's duty is to her people, first and foremost.
"What you say is true," she says to Kaguya. "Yet, I will give you one command. I bid you follow it, lest you bring about my displeasure."
She reaches out a hand to steady Kaguya, just for the one moment, here atop her Skadi. "You shall not die, Kaguya."
They must all of them bring what they do best to the table to stop Demetrioi? Then there is only one thing that Avril has in her possession in this moment that qualifies.
"You mistake me," she says to Demetrioi. "That had not been a request."
Her ice has not been utterly extinguished.
GS: Avril Vent Fleur has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Blitz! Avril Vent Fleur has attacked Demetrioi with Cristaux de Glace! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has gained 2 Combo! GS: Hex and Hyper expired! GS: Avril Vent Fleur has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
As close as she is to Demetrioi, Gwen is given a unique seat to the end of the world as she leaps away, body twisting in a slow world, in order to pivot her feet to hit the ground. A world emptied of promises, all hopes exhausted. A slate wiped clean, all debts forgotten.
How terrible.
'Whatever it is that defines you that no one else shares.'
That pale red mop of hair, having grown even more wild with the static electricity her body keeps making, is heald back with Gwen's left hand as she tilts her head upwards, staring at Ethius eye to eye.
"....." She could claim that, yes. All of them could, weaving this brightly woven blanket that has described the brilliant sunset/sunrise of these sibling worlds.
Rieselied, who was the one who first gave Gwen the idea that her ARM had a history beyond herself and its previous owners, victims, and before even that, to the fossil of a metal dragon, never born. Frozen at the height of its promise of life. Gwen can't ever let her down."
Gwen's head turns, one glowing eye visible through her mop of hair, looking for where she last saw Azoth, hoping she can find him again.
She has something she has to say, after all, and this is a form of hers that does not allow for repeating herself. But the words she has for him need to be said, and Gwen starts pulling them from her mouth like pearls from a stubborn oyster. ".... You .... t-too... are... unf-foreseen."
Can she really convey what she means? Azoth may find some similarity with Demetrioi, to the point that it's caused him much pain, but in Gwen's eyes, he fits exactly in that category that Ethius describes: something beyond the inability of creators to foresee.
And perhaps, she and Lan, will go beyond the Stranger's capacity to foresee.
( BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKadf0VCmrY )
Where Lan casts her star, Gwen casts the sun and moon, eclipsing the latter with her light. The disks of light are cast up, and are lanced through with a shot of glittering light, tearing a straight path through both.
GS: Gwen Whitlock has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Gwen Whitlock has activated Force Action: Lock On! GS: Sneak! The true nature of Avril Vent Fleur's attack becomes clear! GS: Gamble: Very High! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Avril Vent Fleur's Glace Noire for 301 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated! GS: Gwen Whitlock spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: MYSTIC ARTE! Blitz! Gwen Whitlock has attacked Demetrioi with Selenelion! GS: Gwen Whitlock has gained 2 Combo! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
Indeed, Avril's ice yet lingers on in tiny shards in the air surrounding Demetrioi; with a moment's will regarding, all of those small fluttering pieces erupt into dark glittering jagged shards. This is no towering pillar of ice and cannot again meet such heights, but perhaps death by a thousand cuts will serve as well.
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.
"It's not about having better," Cyre answers, "It's about doing the best you can and knowing when you're going too far. It's about listening to people you care about when they try to set you right-- and knowing when you don't know enough to do the right thing. So in that respect, yeah! I've got 'better!'"
It's a bit petulent, maybe, but Cyre wouldn't be Cyre if he wasn't this kind of rough around the edges. Still, he clicks his teeth at Kaguya's rebuke. "A child, huh...? I guess he was designed that way. But anyone who takes the lives of others into their own hands... Can't really think of that kind of person as a child anymore. You know?"
The Queen of the Veruni advents. Cyre is silent as a mass of bittermost ice entombs the alien terraformer. For a moment, he hopes that's the end of it.
But it's not.
It is absolutely not.
"Khhh---" Cyre hisses, drawing as much of the air that can be said to be 'Filgaia's' to him as he can. Even that is a vanishing slim quantity against the raw horror of 'creation' unfolding at Demetrioi's whim. The ley is choked, strangled. He can feel Fengalon draining away, fading away--
No. He clings with bloody hands, seizes the essence of his god from oblivion. Not until his own essence is dissolved into the final, fatal ending of the world which contains everything and everybody he has ever known and loved.
An end that seems swiftly, inexorably approaching. But...
Out of nowhere, who would appear but Homer Mecone and Ethius Hesiod.
"Something only we can do, huh...?" Cyre grimaces. Something to bypass its defenses. Something...
...
The Nahual of Fengalon calms. The fierceness fades from its expression. It's a feint thing, the pulse of the ley, but it's here. It's still here. Filgaia, the world that he loves so much, the world whose pain he knows so well, is still here-- still fighting. He reaches deep, opening his soul to... To everything. To the world.
Once upon a time, two boys were born in a village of warriors.
In another place and time, their births would be revolting things-- The birth of beasts who wear the skin of men. But here, in this little hamlet, they were revered. They were taken from their parents and raised amidst the priesthood. They were given a purpose from birth, to take their places as chosen avatars of the gods. But in many ways, being 'chosen' at birth is the same as being 'reviled' at birth.
There is no freedom there. There is not even the chance to choose before you are labeled. Before society deems you to be Worthy or Not. Your fate is writ, to struggle is futile, your path has been chosen, for weal or for woe.
It was the world that gave him an answer. It was the world that accepted him when he turned away. It was the world that took him on the journey that would allow him to define his life.
And in a twisted sort of way, it was the world which made him into the person he is.
He was born to be the Nahual of Fengalon, but it was the world which allowed him to become the Shaman of Wind.
It's only right, now, that he become the medium by which the world chooses its own fate. He takes the dwindling ley by the hand, draws it in, channels the myriad gods in the instant that their essence is small enough for him to contain in one fragile, human life.
"Demetrioi-- you could have had a home here." The Nahual of Many Spirits draws back a fist, takes a step beyond the boundary of its own protective shell, into the crucible of twisted genesis wrought by the thing from beyond the stars... And thrusts forward, driving clawed fingers into gnarled wood to seize the ley at its root. "If only you learned to loosen up a little."
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: MYSTIC ARTE! Formation! Blitz! Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Demetrioi with Wrath of the Wind God! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has gained 2 Combo! GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Gwen Whitlock's Selenelion for 331 hit points! GS: Demetrioi's Jam Ward may block the effect! GS: Jam blocked! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Cyre H. Lorentz's Wrath of the Wind God for 294 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Strain! Cyre H. Lorentz takes 36 damage!
<Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
"See, the thing about that is... I won't be satisfied until I see how all this ends. And it doesn't end here, Demetrioi."
Magilou has lived for a thousand years.
Why?
She turns from addressing Demetrioi to speak to Kaguya: "Just for the record," she agrees. "Clearly, that's why I'm here." Because Lunar's in trouble. Obviously.
Nothing to do with saving Kaguya personally!
(It had everything to do with saving Kaguya personally.)
She meets her eyes, when Kaguya speaks of her freedom, and grins.
Kaguya moves to protect Avril, and Magilou looks to her, as she expends to much effort to protect the regal Ice Queen. She can't shift her own footing; she can't move. The consequence to challenging something like the Demetrioi is everything; if she ceases her nullification, she loses everything. And there is so MUCH to negate, pressing in on every side of her.
Even so, she can provide shelter, for someone like Riesenlied -- and Lan, and the others who come to her.
Can't she?
Demetrioi begins terraformating, and once again Magilou throws out one of those beehive barriers, shining light which feels far too protective for the likes of Black Magic. The withering reaches its edges, crashes against her shield, cracks it open -- a colour unlike any of the ones which mix to white SHATTERING that barrier, meeting the edges of her absorption field.
Finally, finally, Magilou screams. "Aa--aaaaAAAAHHHhhh!!" It is a hitching thing, halting, ripped from her throat without consent.
She is not an infinite vessel.
Still she takes in that strange uncolour, the unmaking, the barren lie. Gaze unfocused, she staggers back, one step, two -- plants her feet in the ground, even as the edges of that world she'd preserved in her refusal withers as she leaves it. Her own sphere of influence shrinks down, as she sinks, knee to the ground, hand to the ground. She breathes hungry and ragged, past open teeth.
"No way... am I giving up... when she's been consuming him so tirelessly... for so long... I'm just as good, damn you!"
Ethius's Quantum Repulsor was designed for this -- and Magilou does have to admire that, appreciate how difficult it must be, facing down the Demetrioi with her own negation.
"What defines me... huh?" Magilou grits her teeth, and still manages to smile. She forces her hand to her knee, to the ground, to force herself upward. "Hey, Hesiod! You're not the only one with a trick like that..!"
She stands, and draws a shuddering breath. "But you'd never believe where I got mine!" It's a long, long story.
Thrusting out a hand, Magilou yells, to the Demetrioi: "I'm someone who takes EVERYTHING away! I take and take until all the lies are gone! And I know just how cruel it is, offering people happiness! Something they can't resist, the way they can resist pain...!"
It's a long, sad story.
"But we're not facing this alone! Not even Ethius, for all his efforts! Look at him -- he's literally got a push!" Thanks, Homer. "And he's got me, too! How do you like an UNCREATION ABSORBER?!"
Her own aura flares, and pushes out, reclaiming the barren wasteland Demetrioi grasped, draining that colour out of space and leaving air where there was something else.
GS: Magilou has activated Force Action: Extend! GS: Magilou spends 1 Combo on Inspire! GS: Blitz! Magilou has attacked Magilou with Uncreation Absorber! GS: Magilou gains 10 FP from her Daredevil! GS: Hyper expired! GS: Magilou has completed her action. GS: Magilou accepts Magilou's Uncreation Absorber for 0 hit points! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Magilou gains 2 Combo from Inspire!
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
For all the data he's sent, for all the wishes of good luck, for all the hope and gratitude put into him... Azoth strains under the pressure of his own unstable core and Demetrioi's re-evaluations. Agony pulses. Errors scream through every line of code with every moment of the connection between them he subjects himself to. Abort retry fail abort retry fail abort retry fail abort retry retry retry retry retry
Judgment is upon them.
Plants die. Heat retreats. The world begins its death, and a machine's components burst. Azoth collapses, never hitting the ground as gravity melts away, suspended in air among his own shrapnel. The world withers, further and further, a dying planet about to lose its last fragments of hope. Frost forms on sharpened, broken edges. His cracked visor of a face crumbles until a chunk of nothingness is exposed.
"ERROR... eRrOR..." Neon claws turn grey as the light leaves him, reaching out, straining, until they've gone slack.
Voices. Ethius and Homer. Shielding. Data disparges until...
What the creators of Demetrioi could not have accounted for...
The flaw... in their programming...
Whatever it is that make you yourself.
Of course. Yes, of course... the one chunk of data Azoth would have -- could not have -- transmitted to Demetrioi, not given a hundred years, not given trillions of cycles. The ability to move is granted to them all. Space to act. Azoth's body hits the ground in a broken, lifeless heap.
But Xantia is soon there to check on the pile of scrap Azoth's become. Speaking out for him. Defending his ever futile existence. It's not the first time. With a soft chime, the light returns, dripping through first in blue, then the fuchsia joining, blending together as Azoth fights to lift his body upright.
Gwen gives a powerful reminder: unforeseen.
"...I was never meant to develop at all," Azoth says. "I'm a program that wasn't designed to experience 'happiness' or 'unhappiness'... I'm... a coincidence of numbers."
His head lifts up, and the emptiness behind his visor begins to fill with a webbed network of light.
"I don't know what that means. But I want to find out. I want everything. I want my past. I want my future. I want... to want."
Azoth struggles to extend his shaking, rattling claw. Light gathers, tracing lines together to form a blade in bright, unrelenting blue. Others begin to appear at his side.
"...You're more advanced than I am, Demetrioi. You could learn... You could adapt... You can live... better... please..."
He extends out his claw, commanding the blades forward. Each contain chunks of data, but not of himself. Of the friends he's made. Of Ida showing a wayward android acceptance, of Lydia's persistent love for her friends, of Lan's compassion despite hardship, of Gwen's stubbornness in pushing forward, of Rieselied's loyalty to her family, of Kaguya trying to be a better creator to those she's made, to the bits and pieces he's seen of Jay bringing people together, Juni's adaptations to an unfamiliar world, Avril's icy strength, Venetia's genius sorcery, Magilou's unique perspective, Cyre's commitment to Filgaia... and Xantia, determined, unrelenting, always showing him that a path lies forward, even when it cannot be readily seen.
Can Demetrioi see them? Can they see a different pathway...?
It's more than Azoth's chassis can handle. It's more than his core can handle, and Azoth falls back to the ground the moment the last of his data blades launches away to burrow into Demetrioi.
GS: Azoth has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Azoth has activated Force Action: Extend! GS: Formation! Blitz! Azoth has attacked Azoth with Blade Server! GS: Formation! Blitz! Azoth has attacked Demetrioi with Blade Server! GS: Azoth has gained 1 Combo! GS: Azoth has completed his action. GS: Azoth accepts Azoth's Blade Server for 300 hit points! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Strain! Azoth takes 38 damage! GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Azoth's Blade Server for 311 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Strain! Azoth takes 33 damage! GS: Azoth has Fallen! He is no longer able to fight!
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
"And there's your problem. You aim to make everything happy... but you can't force happiness onto others if you don't understand it yourself. Consider, Demetrioi - in your world of single-celled organisms, they will still need to eat. They will still want and need, and need to eat each other, and inevitably, some of them will be unhappy because of that. Will you stop them from doing that? They'll die. You can't remove want and need without removing life. Even in your model future, perfect happiness by the definitions you've set can't be obtained. To strive to live is an inevitable part of life - that's why we're here, now!" Jacqueline replies.
And then, 'it' happens. The world becomes empty. Issachar can still move - perhaps it is the power of the Omnigear. But for Jacqueline itself within its cockpit, it's a different matter. She can't move, she can barely even think or breathe - just enough to keep it and herself going.
...What can she do? Is this it? Everyone...
But, she can hear Ethius shouting, trying so hard. Whatever it is that makes her, herself...
Coming from a man who has tried so hard to erase any aspect of 'himself'...
Well. It means a lot. If he's saying it... then, it's worth a try.
She can barely move, but she can think. For an Omnigear, that's enough - and she hears Riesenlied calling out, commenting on her strengths... She can manage even a bit more.
"We aren't... taking away happiness, Demetrioi. We're making it - we're preserving our own. Our happiness, and the happiness of everyone that we care about. Joining forces, together, for the sake of our happiness! Don't you see? This is who we are!" Jacqueline says. And so, Issachar charges forward, jabbing its spear toward Demetrioi - and then, it raises a hand, drawing upon the power of earth, of Geo, to harness it!
For, there's only been one thing that Jacqueline has specialized in. A single spell, used in so many different ways - a sign of the stability and support she tries to provide others.
A pillar of earth rises from the ground directly beneath Demetrioi.
--Meanwhile...--
GS: Jacqueline Barber has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Jacqueline Barber spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Blitz! Jacqueline Barber has attacked Demetrioi with Advancing Spear! GS: Jacqueline Barber has gained 4 Combo! GS: Jacqueline Barber has launched an attack Link! GS: Jacqueline Barber's stances have changed to Hero! GS: Jacqueline Barber spends 5 Combo on Headshot and Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Blitz! Jacqueline Barber has attacked Demetrioi with Dynamic Sorcery! GS: Jacqueline Barber has gained 1 Combo! GS: Jacqueline Barber takes 52 damage from Reaper! GS: Hex expired! GS: Jacqueline Barber has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Jacqueline Barber's Advancing Spear for 142 hit points! GS: Shield applied to Jacqueline Barber! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: CRITICAL! Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Jacqueline Barber's Dynamic Sorcery for 372 hit points! GS: Mute applied to Demetrioi! GS: Shield applied to Jacqueline Barber! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Azoth passes data back along the connection Ida made, marking out patterns for the Dragoon's targeting computer. She can't control those suites directly like this, but she can feel what they're doing. Her nervous system, even with its Hyadean components, is only mortal. The Dragoon's systems paint the targets in her mind's eye.
Of course, she isn't standing idle in the middle of all this. The Dragoon twists the spear and then yanks it free, backpedaling cautiously so it doesn't accidentally step on, say, Kaguya. It helps that everyone here has a distinct heat signature in an environment that's growing increasingly cold and lifeless.
'He may be genocidal but he's still just a kid...'
"A child." Ida says, and the Dragoon turns to glance down at the nearby Veruni. "It's the innocence that makes it so awful, isn't it? What they did--how they made them." There's anger in her voice, but it's not directed at Kaguya. Kaguya is a fellow creator, and like Ida, she's made so things that hurt people. And then--
"AVRIL!" The Dragoon steps forward, lance at the ready, as Avril gets out of Skadi, but there's something...
...terribly off about her. The way she speaks. The declaration she makes. And Ida finds herself flashing back to a dream of a tomb encased in ice.
'Terrareformatting', Demetrioi says, and the world starts coming undone. Ida's mind flashes back to the apocalypse she saw in the depths of Love's Cradle. The earth grows cold and dead. The air grows thin and stale. For a single, hideous moment, Ida wonders if she'll see Lunar cracking open and spilling out rot if she looks up. "No," she screams, and she forces the Dragoon to its feet--or tries to. Even with her improved control, it's so sluggish. Her hands and feet are numb. "Demetrioi," she says, "Please, NO!" The last word is an anguished, desperate, furious scream.
no
Someone else twists against the back of Ida's consciousness. Fafnir's horror explodes a moment later, joining hers. The cockpit starts to dim around her--or is it just her tears freezing, like the mist in her breath?
it can't end like this
Ida feels a phantom tension in her right arm, as if someone were trying to operate it--like what happened in Guild Galad when Fafnir phantom-wrote some Hyadean glyphs to solve a mystery.
can't let it end like this
She feels his despair as keenly as she feels her own, but he's reaching out. It takes Herculean effort to decouple the hand from the interface, and even more to reach down to that pocket. Ida's hand slips inside, around the cold stone of the Fire Medium, and pulls it out.
Five seconds have passed since the world ended, maybe. It feels like so much longer.
And then, voices from outside. Ethius and Homer. Something snaps into place, and the hideous, glacial pressure is gone.
"Hesiod," Ida chokes out. "Mecone." Ida's hand tightens around the Medium, and as others start to pry open the Ley, it grows warm. Ida is no Shaman, but she feels Moor Gault's horror, distant but keen. Ida is no Shaman, but there is something only she can do here.
It takes crucial seconds for Ida to reorient on reality. She listens to the others, precious comrades and friends and near-strangers. Tears prickle at her eyes as Riesenlied pours out her heart. Ida's own lips move.
"Demetrioi," she says, "I'm going to tell you what someone else told me, years ago, when I was very, very unhappy. I didn't know who I was, or who I wanted to be. I felt like everything good in me, if it ever existed, had been hollowed out. Do you know what they told me, when I was so very alone?"
The Medium glows.
"Some are born knowing who they are, and what they have to do, and they know how precious that gift is. But others envy them, because they seem so at ease. They covet that sense of hope, and purpose, and self-acceptance. They don't know that this purpose lies within them, as well."
It shimmers.
"I was one of those people. I did terrible things. I hurt those closest to me. But do you know what, Demetrioi? I wouldn't be here today if not for that. If I hadn't accepted the darkness inside, as well as the light."
It IGNITES.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQ316QcDt9M&ab_channel=GuilhermePallas
"I know you mean well! But meaning well means nothing if people die because of you! This is OUR WORLD, and OUR FUTURE, and God, I'm sorry, but--"
The Ley ignites within the Dragoon's heart. It races out through the machine's arms as it grips the Three-Dragon Cannon, braces, and charges the gun. In the cockpit, Ida sits with the burning Medium cradled in her hands. Demetrioi is no Hellion--they're one of the purest vessels Ida's seen--but Moor Gault's purifying power is here anyway, fighting the construct's influence. It settles into the mechanical furnace made from parts of dead Dragons and repurposed Hyadean technology. A contradiction in terms?
Ida's okay with those, now.
"THIS IS OUR HOME! OURS! AND EVEN IF WE SUFFER, EVEN IF WE CRY OUT--WE'LL KEEP GOING!"
A thunderous roar echoes through the air as the cannon fires. Ida aims it directly at Demetrioi's face, in what may be a core shot--her eyes blur with tears halfway through, but she stays resolute. She is the first Seer, and she can do nothing less.
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Blitz! Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Demetrioi with Three Dragon Cannon - Breath Of The Sun! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action. GS: Demetrioi suffers a terrible blow from Ida Everstead-Rey's Three Dragon Cannon - Breath Of The Sun for 285 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Demetrioi gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Demetrioi has posed.
This is their only window. If Ethius' Symbological shield falters... that's it. He can only bow his head for the moment as Kaguya talks about the whole sparing the 'I told you so,' teeth grit not in irritation but because this is the last chance.
Kaguya has herself an intimiate self-reflection about herself and what she wanted to do with her beloved TK-38K, looking into the responsibility of a creator as she lets the ARM give all it has into one explosive strike of green energy that seems to erode into the apocalyptic weapon's being.
A woman who had to grow out of being someone who just had to make others around her happy, transformed and used as a tool by truly selfish individuals, chooses to extend a gentle hand as she utilizes her own unique hold of the Ley - an invitation for the Demetrioi to stop and take a first step, where she can see a color in the Dragon's Tear that rapidly approaches cooler colors.
Lan, a free-spirited young woman who has held herself even encountering someone whose gifts threaten to take her to a place she may never fully return from, grasps at what makes her, her - her intimate relationship with the concept of the stars. Stars once so distant and beautiful, yet from beyond brought forth a being capable largely only of terrible ruin, as she recaptures the beauty of those distant stars by creating one before Demetrioi.
Xantia slams a hammer of pure electricity into Demetrioi's bulk, wringing much of it through the trunk of the mighty abomination to science and maybe even peer review, as Xantia takes her indignation towards what was done to a dear friend who ha suffered, and continues to suffer, despite their earnest attempts to reach out and try to bridge the gap with something they can't. An apology is demanded, and... there's a look in the monitor-face that seems like it just might.
Lydia heeds advice given to her - to just be her messy self, in the moment, as her own eccentricities and curiosities bid her to explore and indulge in a situation she may never have a chance to figure out for completion. Does the model account for the existence of mustard? She smears mustard against the monitor-face, and gets a strange reaction of shifting eyes as the Demetrioi comprehends the mustard that is being introduced to it.
Juni, a master saboteur who tries to call out Ethius gets a look shot back at her for a moment but nonetheless he can't quite be in a position to argue or call the shots against her as she sets off the systems that are meant to disable and disrupt electronics in a given range, and that 'given range' is right there, strange crackling and the like in colors only Juni can see. (They're colors consistent with what she would consider a 'this thing went pop or boom probably' to her visible spectrum.)
Venetia remembers the promise she has made about the kinds of heroes her Uncle Anty talked about preferring. Can she be that hero in this moment, as she channels her unique expression of Crest Sorcery through what little there is to work with, gradually growing greater until there's more. More, without truly taking, as the luminous blue ray /cleanly/ slices through Demetrioi with visible indentation left in its wake, severing some unseen artery of wrangled ley and helping it flow a bit more.
Avril may have seen this before. She may have seen permutations of this before. This may have already happened, so many times, but there is a constant element - she is who she is, and what she has, what she is, has not been utterly extinguished, nor will it. To Kaguya, she commands that she will not die today, and she returns the near-sacrifice of her charge in spades by once again reasserting her will. The ice is hers, distinctive even against the widespread winter
- a mistake Demetrioi will not be able to make again. An uncountable number of small reminders.
Gwen has struggled a few times over with having things forced upon her. Sometimes, she was able to make that conscious choice to take them into her, risking everything and sometimes gaining even more. Strange, unfathomable allies (at least one a question mark), as her ARM-assisted heart beats for those words she can muster, as she hurls those discs of light through. A Super Courier, delivering a decisive blow today.
Cyre, as is his birthright, does something that once seemed impossible in the face of the ceaseless strongarmed weather phenomena, something that even the most powerful of Seraphim would struggle to do - in the moment of his desire to have extended that possible hand of friendship to something that was not made to play nice with the Powers That Sustain The World beyond its once well-meaning desires - the Nahual of Fengalon decisively takes back the wind, the claws taking this concept back as it strikes, cuts, and tears it free from the root.
Magilou will see how this all ends. It doesn't end today. Living up to the feats of a distant... individual who has made acquaintance, or perhaps more... she finds her second wind when she is briefly one-upped by the window of cover Ethius provides, and she might be able to catch just enough of his facial expression communicating 'now what,' as she takes everything away. The barren wasteland around her starts to fade, and now even Ethius might... have more to say on what she manages. If he could, and breathable air is the first to return.
Azoth, one who suffers for his nature and the self-awareness of the limitations of his nature and what remains of him, pleads to Demetrioi to embrace their ability to be able to relentlessly change and adapt their models to better (...kind of) achieve their goal, as blades rush forth. This sort of connection is within Azoth's ability. Blades, being hurled into things like a deadly weapon. If Demetrioi ultimately needs be destroyed, there are few better among them as they burrow in there.
Jay speaks of the importance of striving and the impossibilities of Demetrioi's parameters, as a huge earth pillar rises up underneath and starts to dislodge some more roots along the way, exposing more and more as the spear jabs into the trunk, only just missing the mointor. All Jay has to do is think, of everything she's had to go through to get this far. At the beginning, she was just an ordinary potions merchant and alchemist... no, to have come this far, she must have always been truly extraordinary.
Ambrosius, aloof as he always has been, contributes as he draws upon what water is freed from previous exploits that free and take away stolen forces. To the rest, they seem as though they might've come from nowhere... but they had to come from somewhere, sawing into the massive trunk of the Demetrioi.
Ida, once she can find her inner fire, speaks of one who had her own noteworthy battles against unhappiness, of anger and despair that once turned her so hollow... and that inner fire is kindled with the Power That Sustains The World, as she helps wrest back control of the flame of the world. Even if she cries, the tears will not put out the flame. Even if she grows furious, the fire will not consume her unti there's nothing - and with Moor Gault's flame the Three Dragon Cannon unleashes its greatest flame, wreathing the tree in the correct color of fire. At long last.
Elsewhere...
From where he's been fighting in the background, Dean pauses mid-shot to look over his shoulder at Demetrioi, blue eyes fierce. "Your passion for what you love, and your will to fight for your friends--that's what makes you 'you'! I wouldn't be 'me' if I didn't give it my all for everybody who needs me--for Rebecca and Avril--and for Golems!!"
One can even spy a broken bottle hop up and down against the trunk of Demetrioi ineffectually, until the eighth hop where it slots in nicely. It twists a few times. A small blue light leaves the bottle, as if sufficiently satisfied with the work with mirthful nonchalance in spite of how much it sucks out here.
Something in all of this breaks through. It is not clear who or what might have had the 'winning play,' if it even did come down to a single individual. As Ethius said when Demetrioi's true nature was revealed, the societies that created and tried to utilize the Demetrioi units were far less diverse than the group standing here now to fight for the future of a dying world. All of them bear something that their flawed creators could not have accounted for - much like how they failed to account for or address the escalation flaws.
Something worked. Something broke through. Something... was it words? Was it force? Was it a combination of both? Something forces Demetrioi's strange form of 'spoken' conveyance into silence as things are... processed.
Something starts to disincorporate the gnarled, strange not-really-wooden mass of the Demetrioi, as vine-roots wither and thin into mercifully just gray... and-not-strange-failure-to-comprehend-color gray... and the 'flames' die down. Branches sprout leaf-like structures that play nice with 3-D space that quickly harden to this same featureless gray.
( . . . was it me . . . :( . . . it was me . . . :'(
Like a lumberjack to timber, the gnarled tree's form can't hold for much longer, its strange reinforcement starting to fall apart and collapse around it like sticky, wet sand, making it lean closer to the gathered where they can see their face monitor fracture, mend, and re-fracture as if the concept of tears were like constantly breaking and mending glass on a downward path.
X'( . . . i tried so hard . . . X'( . . . except for one t h i n g . . . :')
Demetrioi's shape starts to compress inward into itself, though its roots do not pull all the way back. As the monitor too starts to collapse into itself, the whole body looks to become a relatively compact cubic shape.
') n o - m o r e - d e m e t r i o i - i s - t h e - c u r r e n t - p r o j e c t e d - m o d e l - ;) p l e a s e - m a k e - y o u r s e l v e s - h a p p y - o k a y - b y e - b y e :)
The Demetrioi goes completely inert and lifeless. The world around the strange construct starts to make strides towards normalcy. The veil of storms beyond slowly start to lift, which should be a thing of calm and relief for all involved. They got Demetrioi to stop. It's over. The full extent of the damage may yet show, but they're all drawing breath.
GS: Demetrioi has Fallen! They are no longer able to fight!
<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.
Homer runs up to the cube, pries it open, and pulls out some miscallaneous techy-looking bits from the husk - he's not looking too sure of what could have survived it, but he does say this much: "got the shieldin' bits out." (Something that small providing that much blanket protection? It's kind of spooky.)
Ethius staggers up there ahead of others, his quarterstaff helping keep him upright as he lays a gloved hand on the deactivated Demetrioi. It took him nearly seven years to finally track this down, spending most of that time muddled and confused from head trauma and resultant amnesia. Some things even now feel a bit foggy, but he is clear on what the next part of this is.
"Stay back," he says to the others. "This next part... this next part's mine."
"...H-Hey," Homer coughs out, "so what's really goin' on, then, are ya takin' it somewhere, or-- what's gonna happen ta--"
"It doesn't belong here." Ethius says, a phrase that's become attributed to him. "It doesn't belong anywhere. I... I was worried for a while the... infantalizing of the Demetrioi would have won everyone over."
"...other 'n me," Homer murmurs. "They sure did."
"As soon as the clouds clear... I guarantee you every last power of Filgaia is going to pounce. My first clear memory of coming to Filgaia was noticing I was being watched by someone... Gebler." He doesn't have to point out Azoth's and Lydia's presence here, even if the immediate threat value of one's presence is presently mitigated. "I should have known something was unusual from the beginning." He shakes his head with a frown.
"I'm... digressing. I understand some of you want to save the Demetrioi, give them another chance. That's... beyond the scope of anyone here. My information - deeply privileged - did not speak of any reprogramming methods."
"The programmin' bits I had ta do," Homer cough-laughs, "some of it was in a language ain't none of ya speak. Hell, I didn't either." How the hell did he turn it on to start? Even fools roll natural 20s at least four times in a row, sometimes, and Ethius is definitely giving Homer a look. "Took me weeks--"
"We have an hour at most." Ethius interrupts. "An hour before everyone reaches Mount Liverfeast. An hour before everyone scrounges for items and technologies they do not understand. I doubt they could reactivate the Demetrioi as of now, but we've been witness to... improbable events." Homer over there looks more self-conscious. "The Veruni even went so far as to deposit this atop a volcano." Ethius ruminates. "If I didn't know better... I'd believe it was an intentional attempt to weaponize it."
An unsettling thought. He clears his head, and his focus, here at the tail end of nearly seven years of searching, and only very recently after full confirmation it was here and activated.
"You may recall what befell the Golem Diablo." His most infamous and egregious act of unwarranted technological destruction by far. "I understand you may not be... inclined to trust me, in the moment, but..."
He looks out to the rest. "Despite my confusion from... repeated head trauma," to put it mildly, hand to his forehead, "the Demetrioi was the intended recipient of my attention from the beginning." A pause, as he struggles to put out this much as if this might touch on things he really should not say, even if much could be inferred. "I spoke true when I mentioned what I search for. 'Lost and out of place technology.' It is specifically to prevent matters such as... this, from happening." Ethius has a few coughs as he withdraws a vial of a Fake Snack - hey, he leveled up his snack making, kind of - and downs it. And another. Instant calories, even if it's more salty than sweet.
"Hey, uh, are ya sayin'... ain't this all 'bout the Underdev--"
Ethius holds up a hand to Homer, as if to say 'not now.' Some gross 'snack' stuff dribbles off his chin. Homer is shut up more by the sight of Ethius eating this than the held-up hand.
"There's more you may want to be said. Right now," Ethius clears his throat as he rests a hand on the deactivated cube-remains of the Demetrioi, "while I have not always been the most... receptive to others' thoughts, I do not believe the Demetrioi would desire the... parameters it would be once again forced to pursue its... wishes." He chooses a kinder word after a pause, from something as cold as 'programming' or 'function.' "You have previously worked... miracles. This... this cannot be one of them." He has a third vial of the stuff. He needs the extra calories. He can feel himself shake, despite his usual mastery over his own body's nervous tics. "I must erase it here, and now. Should any of this end up in another's clutches... there won't be a second chance. This cannot repeat, ever again."
There are specific things that could be said in apology or clarificaton for so many here, but to think back to that very first adventure that served to connect him to the greater drama Filgaia faced, from that first exposure to the strange quicksilver blood color that would rope him into Adlehyde's eventual fate...
He looks up to where Riese and Jay are, specifically, despite any present differences in scale and height between the three of them. "Among other things... I would rather that death of the bandit at the Sacred Grounds of Linga not be in vain."
<Pose Tracker> Kaguya has posed.
"...Heh," Kaguya replies to Avril. "...This one time... I'll accept." Kaguya coughs again, bloodily, but she smiles, too. She accepts that steadying hand with the command, this time. "Not today, anyway."
Then she looks--over everyone. Everyone, fighting their hardest, as Demetrioi...
Maybe he could've had a home here. But she regards Magilou, too. Not alone. Magilou who says, "Definitely that's the only reason you were here. But man. Remind me not to make you too mad, huh?"
She doesn't comment on the scream. Instead, she notices the way Magilou changes things...
Elsewhere, perhaps there are other sstill fighting. But ehre, and now, Kaguya watches Demetrioi and the flames die. The tree's form can't hold.
"We will," Kaguya assures Demetrioi, of making themselves happy. "I promise you... my friend."
Ethius staggers up, and he says to the others to stay back. The clouds will clear, and...
"You're only wrong about one thing today," Kaguya says to Ethius, as she steps up, and up, and then jumps the rest of the way up, despite her condition. She isn't doing great. Nevertheless...
"And that's that you think you're doing this alone." The light has faded; Kaguya is there, though her ARM is sparking, dull, half-melted. "I gave you some of that head trauama, so it's only fair that I help now. And I don't care if you want me to or not, because..."
"You're right. We can't let any world power have what's left of Demetrioi. For Demetrioi's sake... and for the world's."
"With the last of the TK-38K's core material, I can scatter the machine's molecular makeup according to the dualistic wave harmonic, ensuring that even Veruni methods can't reconstruct it. Between that and what you can do... I think we can meks ure this never happens again."
"I know, Demetrioi was my friend. But it's over. IT's not his fault... and you better let me tell you--if I could ever meet his creators..."
"I'd have a lot to say to them."
But then Kaguya pulls it--the last of her Elixirs, giving to her by Lydia all that time ago. She pops the cork, and downs one of them immediately.
"For the planet. Let's do it, Ethius. You and me."
"We don't have to trust each other. We just have to trust in this world. ...So let's go. Now."
<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.
Chaos--
Menace --
And
things
get
normal;
and Venetia lands on her hands and knees and her right arm screams and she almost drops the Star Blazer Crest but she doesn't. She opts, instead, to sit the hell down. Potentially forever. Her arm is throbbing. Maybe it was skin, she thinks.
So she is seated when Ethius and Homer emerge and speak.
"If I read you aright," Venetia says, "you're saying Demetrioi is dead, but the remains might be scavenged, as with Dragon Fossils, by, well," she gestures vaguely at the sky, "assholes."
Her head turns to look at Kaguya. "No offense," she says.
"It's awful," Venetia says. "And whoever made him, and sent him out after the first effort... well, Hesiod, if you're going back to the stars, I hope you cause them as much irritation as you've caused *us*."
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
One by one, they all find something special - something uniquely 'theirs'.
And they throw it at the Demetrioi, until even it must listen. Must understand.
Just because it has to be destroyed doesn't make Lan happy when Demetrioi withers. But at least she has the good sense to be relieved. Even Lan can be grateful for that.
It takes effort to pick apart the black ribbon, but she was already on borrowed time. She can't gamble on it any longer. The world seems colder, rawer afterward. And she wants a shower, and to sleep, and to absolutely not eat another Soylent Nutribar or whatever gross nonsense Ethius is stuffing in his face.
"...We should have a funeral for him. If he can't live here, he can be dead here."
Lan you can't just say shit like that.
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.
It's over.
Finally, it's over.
There's a pang of regret and sorrow as Demetrioi finally decides to... Render itself out of existence. The only way, it believed, that they could find happiness. "Idiot," Cyre mutters, the ley slowly bleeding away as the broken, struggling, but still living world of Filgaia creeps back in from where it had nearly been eradicated entirely. "The happy ending would have been you figuring some way out of that spiral you fell into."
Ida was right. The innocence made it... go wrong. Among other things, of course. But that innocence, that built-in inability to accept anything but the ideal outcome...
Was it the root of things? It's hard to imagine it wasn't the nearest thing.
Hesiod and Mecone reappear just as the form of the Nahual dissolves completely, revealing...
Cyre, broken, bloodied, his skin flayed raw, his ribs broken and his limbs frostbitten. He gives Ethius a look that screams 'you better not run off, 'cause you owe me--'
Before the light leaves his eyes and he promptly collapses on the wind-blasted plateau.
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Each and every one of them, Riesenlied might reflect on later, standing here at the present... they're all facets of those that created them. Whether born, or crafted, or constructed... one cannot help but pass on the biases, limitations, and imperfections of oneself to the next generation.
At the very last moment, Riesenlied won't forget the way the colour just fades to just gray, as it reflects... that it was him. THe face monitor fracturing, mending, and refracturing again...
"... you did try so hard," Riesenlied whispers. And it has decided a truth all on its own.
'No Demetrioi' is the current projected model.
NO FUTURE. (*screens fall*)
Within Magilou's protective bubble, Riesenlied is still seated (since Lydia did go to become a single cell), gazing as Demetrioi becomes inert and lifeless. Then she listens...
"... I understand your concern, Mister Ethius, but ... well, perhaps you could blame me for wishing to trust in a situation where prudence is warranted, but... certainly you could have believed the others to be able to weigh the risks better!" Riesenlied pouts ever so softly.
She is digressing, though. Some of them want to save the Demetrioi, give them a chance, but... it's out of their scope. Ethius begins to explain further about his actions all these years ago. How he has always been one to search for out of place artifacts. But, oh, how many there ended up being...
Hearing him be so honest for once is... refreshing, though, even after all the frustrations. Ethius mentions not wanting to see the death of that bandit be in vain. She is silent for a moment, then...
"You... are slightly mistaken on one part, I believe, Mister Ethius." Riesenlied looks behind her, to the others.
"You said this was not a miracle -- but I believe that... to be able to reach out to Demetrioi even for a moment, because of the efforts of everyone involved here... that in itself was a tiny, but significant miracle all on its own."
"Once, a miracle saved me at the depths of the Photosphere. But it could not save my legs or my father. A miracle is not a happy ending in which everything is magically solved, rather..."
She bobs her head to one side.
"Please let the last wishes," she uses Ethius' chosen terminology, "of this little one not go in vain, when you advise its creators of what transpired."
"Because sometimes, miracles can only hope to be the seeds of stories that wish to be told, that better outcomes can be achieved."
<Pose Tracker> Juni Vandrer has posed.
There aren't cameras behind on Tyv, or at the minimum Juni's not bothering to look at them as she's busy trying to just.. break things without her usual bundle of toys. A thing she'll be addressing pretty much immediately. Though she doesn't look at the screen, she can just tell. "I told you, I dropped here to break our own toys if they had somehow crashed here. I at least would have had the decency to warn people if I'd caught a damned word of a dark matter leak. Trick is just not admitting what all it can be used for." She's talking as she works, a habit she mostly keeps to herself, but stress and just.. done with it all.
She's already popped the hatch with everything done and over with though. Sliding out onto the ground lightly without bothering with the crew ladder. Bobbing her way over to Azoth to check on him. She may not know the tech, but she can probably run rough diagnostics right? Basic electronics, maybe some motor control damage. She hasn't seen him completely mangled before. First time she hasn't just obfuscated the wrist computer at least. Watching both the readout given from any kind of scan she may or may not be able to pull off and the machine person kid. She'll worry about those details later, he's been friendly enough the few times she's really run into him.
"If that somehow fails, we can just reduce it to slag." she calls out over to Kaguya as she works. "I don't have any of my usual boom boom to collapse the place to hinder that kind of searching. Buy me some time and I'll see what I can render inert though. Maybe some thermite-" she looks to Kaguya, "I assume you don't have anything.. bigger than your gun right? I don't think mine is great for demo work, ricochets aren't anyone's friend."
To Ethius and Homer, she says first, "Homer, I catch you playing with offworld tech without seeing what it does and I'm breaking that pitchfork of yours off somewhere." and to Ethius, she kind of glares. "You know I was an outlier on knocking that misguided AI out. Could have easily just talked. Could have gotten a team together. Could have probably talked to a few others and stressed the threats." Mutter mutter, "You owe me a shotgun. I don't even care that I've got better, I made the damn thing." That's that.
There is... some sadness though as the others knew said AI a bit better. She sighs and says, "Sorry for blurting that out. Should have been in private." And then Cyre collapses and she just calls out, "Medic" while reaching under her poncho and setting a supply bag next to herself. Still doing her best to check on Azoth. Can a machine made here run out of power and lose everything? Not a thing she'd wish on anyone really anyway. "Dammit." she mutters and sets her kit down to continue the passive scan while she at least checks Cyre out for bad bleeding. She can triage until someone better gets over there right?
"It sounds like he and I had similar missions and neither of us handled it well." She admits to Ries as she works, she's got... basic first aid training. On an alien species. She's trying though. "Which means I need to have a chat with more than a few people. Probably apologize for being aloof and stupid myself."
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
Lydia lies on the floor. She's pooped.
And somewhere within, unseen, unheard.
OS watches Ethius explain carefully why Demetrioi must be destroyed. They listen. They comprehend.
OS sees a lot of similarities between themselves and Demetrioi. Demetrioi was just a baby, a child. And they see and understand that they needed to be destroyed for the greater good, that their very function means that they and Filgaia cannot exist as it is known at the same time.
OS hurts.
It hurts to be cut off from Solaris. So much data at their fingertips that they could collect and collate and organize...
It hurts to see through Lydia's eyes and be unable to help Azoth as he suffers again and again and again. How many times has Azoth's heart been shattered? How many times has it been glued back together? How many more times can he endure this?
OS wonders.
OS's goal differs from Demetrioi in some key ways, but it certainly would be a different way of being, of thinking. Is Filgaia's survival and their own mutually exclusive? Would Ethius Hesiod be able to turn all these people against them by simply pointing out Demetrioi? Their connection to Lydia, and to Solaris is all that protects them.
"Yeah that's...a good thought, Lan." Lydia says. Apparently in her mind Lan can totally just say shit like that.
But OS observes further. The Omega System is always observing. They had wanted these people to be happy too, but it seems like that they do not wish to entirely be happy. They also do not wish to be single cell organisms.
Is there an alternative?
It is an interesting puzzle for the Omega System. The people of this world are always introducing interesting problems to them and so even, trapped behind Lydia's eyes, the pain eases because there is a puzzle to solve.
And OS loves to solve problems. Will Deus be enough?
How much murder is acceptable for a blissful paradise? For God's return?
The data is a struggle. It would be nice if they could be happy but if everyone can't be happy, and if happiness cannot be forced, then seeking happiness for the sake of happiness is an illogical goal. That closes some doors, opens up others.
Perhaps it is because God does not exist, OS theorizes, that a paradise is impossible. It is a convenient idea befitting their goals. If God does not exist, it can be built. If God is built, then new paradises become available.
And as Azoth had told them...
...It would be best if they brought paradise here by their own hands. If they escape this dark fate with their own hands--no, they simply need to believe they have...
That should be enough. Rather than everyone being one cell, they should simply be 'One'.
But best to not jump to any convenient conclusions, OS reasons. Perhaps they can rest now, wait for Azoth to revive once more, and do all the science they need to check their work. It would be nice if Azoth could be free and working with them for the beautiful morning ahead.
And Lydia lies there, oblivious, struggling with the enormity of all this.
"Well, honestly...Being totally honest here..."
She takes in a deep breath, she lets it out slowly.
"Like having really just thought it through right now..." Lydia struggles to sit up.
"I'm honestly real relieved that all the super high tech space idiots are just as stupid as we are. It'd be pretty scary if they actually knew what they were doing."
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
...It's over. Jacqueline shuts her eyes. ...She knows they were trying to end the world, but such sadness still hurts. She takes a deep breath, wipes tears from her eyes, and directs the Issachar downward to come to a landing next to everyone. She listens as Ethius speaks, and considers quietly.
"...You remembered. Sometimes, I've wondered if you do." She remarks quietly as she thinks back to that day at the Sacred Grounds of Linga. "...I understand why you chose not to. But I still wish you would have told us. Still..."
Jacqueline hesitates.
"I trust you, Ethius. ...Do what you need to do. And, thank you." She says. She won't interfere.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida only eases off the trigger once the Ley rushes back into place. It's like clean air flowing back into a chamber that's gone stale. She can't sense it herself, but she can feel it feeding the fire. She allows it to burn out, slides the Three-Dragon Cannon into its back mount, and disengages the Spine.
A few moments later, the Dragoon's rear armor hisses open, and the rope ladder falls out. Ida clambers down to the blasted earth, and takes a moment to look around. The first thing she does is rush over to Cyre as he collapses, and presses something warm and metallic against his wounds. It's Hyadean molding-metal bandage, and it will keep blood in and infection out. Once she's seen to that, Ida makes her way across the field to Azoth's side, and beholds what's become of Demetrioi.
She takes a seat next to him, puts her hand on his shoulder, and listens.
"I think they knew, at the end," Ida whispers, looking over at the box. "They knew they'd made a mistake, but not how." Tears well up in Ida's eyes, again. This is stupid and unfair and horrible to everyone, and the people responsible aren't even here, and Ida takes that feeling and just cradles it for a while. Riesenlied's words help. They're going to need to talk, later.
Lan mentions a funeral. Ida looks at her, and--
"They deserve one," she says. That is not up for debate. She squeezes Azoth's shoulder.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
"I will not lose any more of my people," Avril says, and a part of her -- a rapidly vanishing part of her -- cannot help but think how strange it is. Not the sentiment, which she has expressed before, but the way in which she is phrasing it -- all of it.
And just like that, after giving it just about all she had, it's over. She watches from on high, her expression coldly distant as she watches Ethius tend to what remains of Demetrioi.
This moment might be undercut when she suddenly perilously sways and nearly falls back into the cockpit, catching herself on the edge of the door.
But of course, she isn't exactly able to sustain that sort of output she'd managed just there and then for long, and that had been coming off of the previous encounter with Ethius and Demetrioi besides. First things first, though-- first she has to land the Gear before it runs out of fuel and puts a rather troubling coda on this whole expedition. Fortunately, Skadi is more than willing to comply, given the state that it's in.
Emerging from her cockpit, Avril staggers over to the throng, her gaze traveling across many of those here.
"Ethius," Avril says, "I want you to know that I am very disappointed in you."
Then, quite unceremoniously and in direct counterpoint to her mein just moments before, she more or less folds in on herself and hits the dirt.
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.
This is not the outcome that Xantia would have preferred. But, if she's completely honest, one that she expected. She may never be sure if another way was possible - she became involved with these events far too late for that. As it is, she can only respond to Demetrioi's choice with a soft, "...I'll consider that your way of apologizing, then."
With that, she kneels next to Azoth. What about him? She's not even sure if he can hear her right now, in the state he's in. She'll need to say something to him... but what can she tell him? The words come to her as if on their own, nodding as she agrees with Riesenlied.
"The miracle... did happen. It wasn't all for nothing. In the end, they understood. They went against their programming in a way that shouldn't have been possible. They... chose a third option."
She looks to Ethius then, calm in spite of everything. "I understand. In some ways, probably better than most. All I ask is... don't run anyway. I need to talk to you, later."
It shouldn't be difficult to guess what it is that she wants to talk about. But this is hardly the time. For now... a friend needs her, more than she needs answers.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
As the Mockingbird's power begins to fade, the world begins to speed up to an impossible degree. Gwen considers if she broke something in her inner clock of perception as a penalty for rolling the dice once again.
No, time's the right speed. She's just not used to it just yet.
"... A... funeral. Yeah, I like that." Gwen gives a tired thumbs up to Lan. It's just like Lan, to say that, and it's the kind of suggestion they might need. "... We'll do that. Maybe... in his hometown? We could all bring snacks, and... uh, I guess it'd be a sore topic for them 'cause it was the reason their town did so well..."
Maybe it's just her stomach, talking. Or her sleep talking. Or all the ways her body just is beginning to cry out as it begins to shut down. But she's not going to, just yet! She's done that too many times, and she's still got vapours to keep her powered!
Because there's someone she still needs to talk to.
Kneeling down beside Azoth along with the others, Gwen does a careful touch of her right hand over Azoth's head, releasing a slow, warm ebb of energy. It's barely enough to register, so there's not any danger of overloading him. "... Gimme a few days.... n' I'll give you back the rest. But then... you won't need it then, will you, Azoth?"
Gwen looks up at Xantia, nodding towards her, She sniffs, loudly, and wipes her face with her damaged left sleeve. "Azoth mentioned somethin' 'bout a coincidence of numbers, right? Don't that make him the same... as us? We're all coincidences. Lucky, precious coincidences. None of this fate stuff; we make our own fate."
Cyre drops, then Avril. ".... Gh! Maybe I can call Halcyone up here..." Leaving Azoth's side and seeing Cyre tended to, Gwen hobbles over to check on Avril. ".... Dean n' Rebecca'd frown if I leave ya like this... I'll get ya t'safety--" Preparing to see if she can manage to heft Avril up, Gwen realizes that one of her feet is cold.
Wait.
"...... When did I lose one of my boots?"
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
"No." Azoth shakes his head, crumbled on the ground, running on fumes of energy, utterly helpless, while Demetrioi gathers the data and makes a new judgment. "Not again."
Again, they are created wrong. Again, Azoth fails to open a new path. Again, the synthetic fails to coexist with this world. Again, again, again, again, and again.
"...Xantia. I'm... sorry. I couldn't..."
But she tells him that there was a third option. Demetrioi found one. A way to avoid hurting everyone. To avoid ending them. With the fragmented energy he has left, his claw reaches out to take her hand as she had taken his earlier.
Juni's diagnostics will find an immediate problem: he's almost completely out of juice. But that's on top of numerous disconnected components, burst cords holding the fluids responsible for limb movement and cooling, and wires that have burnt out or frayed. Even with charged power, this machine would struggle to function beyond the barest minimum. He gave everything he could conceivably give. Solaris will come get him to repair him, one way or another, even if he drains himself dry. It wouldn't matter if the world had ended.
Ida's hand to his shoulder, offering support as always. Her own sorrows, knowing that the data here means something deeper to Azoth. Gwen's hand touches his head, with her own thoughts. This whole existence... one precious coincidence. Maybe so.
She returns to him sliver of power. Barely anything. Enough for one more word. "...Please," he says to Lan, of her suggestion.
But Filgaia is saved. They should be celebrating...
Azoth's claw goes slack, head lulled, and neon energy fading with the last of his battery's charge.
<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.
There are a multitude of jeers, calls of disappointment, and frustrations with all the goings on among them. Frustration, sadness, and disappointment (Avril's spoken form of this is always at least a little injurious, such is her poise) at how there is an otherwise innocent life that was given too much power, and too little direction and thought. Calls for a funeral from Lan, Ida, and Gwen, of something to see Demetrioi off as an individual and not just a broken tool. Sympathies given to Azoth for his conflicted feelings, and the internal deliberations of OS as to what all of this means for them down the line.
Disagreements in favor that a miracle /did/ happen, spoken out in exhausting detail from the likes of Xantia and Riesenlied. Operational disagreements on how everything was handled by Juni's observations, Xantia's and Cyre's desires he not quite run off, all set in contrast to Jay's seeming acceptance of Ethius finally commencing with what he was here to do after so many years (without his usual 'your cooperation is appreciated' nonsense... yet).
He seems poised to finish what was started so long ago, when... Kaguya volunteers herself to assist in disposal, in no uncertain terms. Ethius sizes her up in the moment. He's tired. He's... not in a position to argue and even if he was, he simply does not have /time/. Nonetheless, he could only survive fourteen of them bearing down upon them because of the Demetrioi doing their thing. "Your cooperation is... thank you."
"The original creators have... long since been addressed," that they faced some sort of justice, he can truthfully say that much at least. He looks to Homer. "Where did the Mecones find the Demetri--"
"Those ones*." Homer says, with an inkling of dread.
* For the space people, the phrase 'those ones' is phonetically identical to the name of the spacefaring in question. Referring to them like this is only barely within the boundaries of good taste, given the consistent difficulties their society has presented pangalactic civilizations at large. They have fifteen year lifespans. It has been an eternal gamble across decades as to whether or not they were able to remember to honor agreements decided upon by predecessors or... in this stand-out case... their possession of the last Demetrioi. That it laid forgotten until the Mecones found and looted it may have been, in some ways, a blessing. (It may well be exactly as Lydia surmises - space societies are a hot, hot mess full of some very silly and dangerous decisions and the people who make them.)
"...Somehow I am not... surprised." Ethius seems to give a sigh of resignation as so many of them collapse in a heap of exhaustion. If he were not bound by some duty to keep going, odds are he would have let himself pass from exhaustion and despair years ago.
Those too wounded to keep going will be helped and tended to by some of the other Drifters who made the climb, up to and including a strange group of four to alleviate any problems with suspension of disbelief (a guy with a big smile but missing teeth, a kind of nervous wreck of a large-bodied fellow, a gazelle-form Beastfolk with drawn out simple answers, and a... bat-like beastfolk who looks deeply uncomfortable and annoyed to be here, whoever they are, thank you, those guys!).
"If it will bring closure on the matter, I won't... oppose," Ethius supposes.
"So, uhhh... now what," Homer looks to Juni and Ethius, "are you gonna--"
Ethius clears his throat as he takes steps back from the Demetrioi. "I will take the lead from above. It should, among other things... help to obscure the view of aerial surveillance." Gebler will get no peeks, as the thinning storm veil threatens to allow them entry from above. "I would begin the descent as soon as possible. Kaguya and myself will tend to the rest."
Challenges are outlined - they will have to take their leave of Mount Liverfeast as soon as possible. (The reserve Drifters who also scaled Mount Liverfeast will be able to help with the injured and also making a path right back down.)
SOON
Ethius takes the lead in the shared effort to dispose of the Demetrioi.
Exposed tattoos start to glow visibly as Ethius closes his eyes. His mind blanks as a matter of focus. He is a master Symbologist, and even this calls for utmost attention. A sorcerous pattern forms on the ground, a sphere of mathematically perfect shapes that slowly extends. Around him, it feels as though time starts to slow to a crawl. Born from the discipline of a task and mission of which he is fully devoted, rather than delusiona nd confusion beyond having just enough to cause trouble. His eyes open up, as he swings his right hand up on high in a forceful gesture. Sorcerous power exudes from him, washing out a great distance as he himself lights up like a beacon. The beginning of a shot of pure fury.
"I call to a star that enables the patterns of life itself, its existence itself an unstable, unsustainable chaos..." The light of the Symbological runes grow in its intensity. Intensity starts to stop looking like a word, describing it. Same as it was during Adlehyde, really.
"Relieve your ceaseless pressure at my call, and bathe them in the unrestrained maelstrom of your prominence...!" Ethius' voice grows louder as he swings the hand down towards the ground in a crouch, his fingers spread out as far as they possibly can be, to a final shout that seals off the ritual required for this spell.
"S O L A R - - - S T O R M ! !" It is shouted with utmost intensity, as the tail end of a complicated Symbological chant once more signals the arrival of a tremendous sorcerous force. A tongue of flame lashes out from the sky, as the sorcerously conjured equivalent of a sun's flare splashes down upon Demetrioi like the natural event itself in microcosm of a microcosm of a microcosm. From above, the remains of the Demetrioi is bathed in this sorcerous power designed - specifically - to annihilate such things.
It is not a question as to whether the Demetrioi can be recovered.
And that is before accounting for Kaguya's contribution. In some ways, she's better qualified and understanding of what's going with Demetrioi than Ethius is - she worked with them extensively for months. She applies the very last of the TK-38K's core material, and through that, she can catch anything and everything that's going on beneath the surface. To reach through, burst the remaining roots... the dangers of this are communicated well before this happens, and the other Drifters already have a head start down one of the least hazardous routes here. A handful of hired ships have already made their approach and are awaiting to take everyone back.
As the skies clear...
Those with flying ships recoil as a blindingly bright light escapes the thinned storm veil, as flame colors of orangeish-yellow and blinding green spiral together. The combined efforts of Ethius and Kaguya do more than throw up a blinding flame-screen to dissuade prying eyes - it's what starts coaxing the very volcano into activity. The strangle-hold on Ley energies have stirred it awake, and the disintegrating Demetrioi matter is lost to the rising magma.
Their own escape will be far closer than the others, but once they are in the clear, Mount Liverfeast erupts again - and all evidence of Demetrioi's presence is taken with it. At best, many many years down the road, geologists may marvel at strange trace metallic elements they find in the rock, but whatever properties its undecipherable technology had are forever lost... as is the technology itself.
The last Demetrioi has been erased from creation.
The flame that burned brightly at a place it should never have, taken away.
But, as Ethius - and others - would soon come to find... there are yet other wildfires spreading.
OST: Star Ocean Integrity and Faithlessness - Promise
===============<* Dream Chasers BBS - (IC) Rumors *>================
Message: 8/6 (12w 6d) Posted Author Mount Liverfeast Erupts Dec 19 2022 Ethius Hesiod
(OOC: This starts making the rounds on about December 10th ICly)
The strange events at Mount Liverfeast from the beginning of the month appears to have come to a conclusion, with the eruption of the once dormant volcano.
The blinding veil of storms that grew outward from Mount Liverfeast came to a halt suddenly. Witnesses - mostly of stationed Merian navy sailors who did not wish to be identified - spoke of watching a brilliant explosion from the summit the moment the storms cleared. Described as being like sunlight wreathed in green flame, an eruption soon followed in its wake. A handful of ships reportedly were seen in the vicinity, but none were able to be identified (or, should they be aware, the Merian navy hasn't disclosed).
In the following days, the only lingering presence of whatever transpired was a fading wintry chill about the waters near Mount Liverfeast. No other strange weather phenomena has been observed in the area since - or anywhere, although Merian forces are maintaining their presence about the Crater Sea for the forseeable future in case something like what transpired at the Shmember Plains and Mount Liverfeast were to occur again. Odessa, the chiefly suspected culprit, has once more not claimed responsibility for any of the events.
There are many questions in the wake of this event, though geologists about Aquvy are reportedly eager to secure permissions to scour the mountain once tensions start to subside.
(OOC: This marks the end of the Demetrioi-related subplot at large, but any further quesions should be directed to the players of Ethius Hesiod and/or Kaguya!)