2020-09-19: The World Can Be Put to Rights
- Log: The World Can Be Put to Rights
- Cast: Boomerang, Clarissa Arwin, Kamui, Marivel Armitage, Ambrosius, Emeralda Kasim, Ethius Hesiod, Ida Everstead-Rey, Seraph Ragnell, Acacia Saitani, Xantia, Loren Voss, Seraph Boudicca, Brad Evans, Ashley Winchester, Dash Caskett, Ivan, Leah Sadalbari, Elhaym van Houten, Gwen Whitlock, Asgard, Azoth, Lan Lilac, Megaman Juno
- Where: Kattelox Island Outskirts
- Date: September 19, 2020
- Summary: In the wake of the Filgaia Summit, and moves by the Veruni, Solaris, and Odessa on Kattelox, tensions have grown. They come to a head when the Main Gate on Kattelox Island opens.
=======================<* Kattelox Island Outskirts *>======================== Locally governed and defended externally by the Digger's Guild of Aquvy, Kattelox Island stands amongst its peers within the Great Sea as a thriving hub for Drifters interested in lost technology from the ancient past. Home to the site of a massive Digsite, a multi-layered ruin keeps an endless trickle of Diggers keeps this city thriving. The northern part of Cardon Forest, otherwise coloquially known as the Outskirts, is the landing point for most Diggers, either through air or ocean. Nearby, the open marketplace known as Apple Market awaits, as do the ruins underground. BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hW_K2fSVQc
<Pose Tracker> Boomerang has posed.
In the last several months, Kattelox Island has seen a storm of activity.
In short order, the three Sub-Gates were opened. First, the ancient being Weisheit opened one, using his Zeboim-era creations. The second was opened when the Veruni, led by Kartikeya, came calling. The third was opened most recently, when Odessa deployed their doppelgangers, and the world came to realize.
Those investigating such matters have heard a rumor: the Main Gate, a ruin on Kattelox, had a countdown occuring. A steady ticking down, which numerous people have followed carefully. From Solaris to the Veruni, from ARMS to Drifters, no one could quite pass up such a mystery.
The first heads poke up on the horizon -- Dario and Romero, Janus Cascade's former lackeys. They look at each other for a second, before Dario laughs. "Awright! We just gotta--"
"GET DOWN!"
A stray bullet knocks the hat off Dario's head. He yelps and dives down, and Romero after, as a lot begins to happen at once.
From one side, Gebler forces approach -- a dropship flying down. From another, Odessan personnel begin teleporting in; some, bafflingly, include copies of Brad Evans. From yet another, a few Veruni aircraft begin to circle, even as the Gebler ship takes aim.
And Drifters appear from all over.
The Main Gate itself is a large, bronzed structure. It has a large, sealed metal door. Next to it, there is a small digital clock near a keypad. It reads out: oo:23:54
It counts down, tick by tick.
And, atop the Main Gate's structure, a figure sits. It's a casual pose; one leg bent up, wearing brown pants. A sleeveless duster blows back in the wind, which is surprisingly human. A Metal Demon, with a torso and face of steel. Boomerang's seemingly mechanical red eyes scan the ground.
"Huh," the former Quarter Knight says. "Yeah. Seems like we're in the right place."
Who he speaks to is not yet visible.
But then he looks out at the Veruni. He waves, casually, at Ambrosius. "Yo. Let's wreck shit."
DC: Ida Everstead-Rey switches forms to Martial Artist Ida!
<Pose Tracker> Clarissa Arwin has posed.
Clarissa never did figure out what Weisheit's deal was - how he knew Felius, and how he was able to use those strange Crossfire ARMs to teach his minions new skills instantly. Now they'll never know.
By the time the blonde girl jumps into the fray, arriving with the rest of ARMS at a dead run, chaos has already broken out. Gebler forces and Odessans are descending, Veruni coming in with them, and for just a moment Clarissa brings herself up short, eyes wide as she tries to take stock of things.
It's brief. Setting her jaw, she steels herself and whips Strahl Gewehr from her waist. One thing's clear: Odessa, the Veruni and the Solarians are all people whose intentions for Filgaia are antithetical to the world she dreams of.
I have to do something. I MUST.
ARM in hand, Clarissa starts towards the main gate. An Odessa soldier takes a swing at her; she ducks under the clumsy punch and manages to do something she rarely does, grabbing him by the head and flipping him over her shoulder to toss him aside without actually killing him. But she's quick to pivot back to her task, dodging a scattering of bullets on her way towards the gate.
The gate, and the figure sitting upon it. With a widening of her eyes, Clarissa looks up towards Boomerang, not really recognizing him save in the most surface of ways, but recognizing just enough to identify him as Hyadean.
It's not all she recognizes. Something is counting down.
Something. Clarissa sets her jaw and brings Strahl Gewehr up, sweeping it out to her side and gripping the ARM in both hands - ready to fire, but holding off for now.
"You're not going to wreck anything!" she shouts up at Boomerang. "Whatever you're planning for what's behind that Gate, I'm not going to let anyone use it to harm Filgaia or the people who live here!"
The fact that Felius doesn't have her back here doesn't deter her. He's here in spirit. (Actually he and Guts Dozer are in the background, fighting some Gebler person in a Gear.)
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
Two months ago...
"Come on... please, come on...!"
Kamui didn't even know she could sweat, but she's right now slicked with sweat; the small Reploid is desperately pulling levers and inputting commands in front of a large capsule in Tishrei, the Sealed Laboratory.
The teal glass slides open, and she gingerly climbs inside; there's a grimace as she keeps inputting. "I gotta... I have to know..."
The sinister and mocking voice of Weisheit taunts her. "Why, she sounds like... a Maverick!"
!! WARNING !! WARNING !! WARNING !!
The sirens are blaring all over the capsule.
EMOTIONAL AND MENTAL RELIABILITY AUDIT PROGRAM INITIATED
IT WILL TAKE APPROXIMATELY
30 YEARS 11 MONTHS 3 DAYS
IN ORDER TO COMPLETE AUDIT CYCLE
ACCEPT? (Y/N)> Y
"I don't have thirty years... but... I gotta..."
She stares towards the teal glass covering her from the rest of the world, and notices tears coming down her face.
"Sorry... everyone..."
Now -- minus 5 minutes
The capsule lay open, without an occupant within it.
The entirety of Tishrei is empty, a red blaring siren continually playing without end.
A message reads:
ANOMALY DETECTED IN EMOTION CIRCUIT
ANOMALY DETECTED IN EMOTION CIRCUIT
AUDIT PROGRAM CYCLE NOT COMPLETED
VERIFICATION CANNOT BE GUARANTEED
Actual Now
A bright blue beam streaks down from the skies and shatters the immediate patch of grass below it; the broken form of a small Reploid, dusky-skinned and black-haired.
It's Kamui.
"No... no!" she exclaims, in very clear distress, looking towards the closest people -- even as Gebler forces appear, as multiple... multiple copies of Brad Evans?? show up. She's missed a HECKIN LOT. "Brad?? How many twin brothers do you have???"
She pauses, and stressed, exclaims, "You can't fight now! You can't!!"
Her arms clench together as she exclaims, in a fit of panicked pique, "The sky... the sky's going to fall...!"
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
CRIMSON CASTLE
Marivel opens up a pocketwatch and looks at it while sitting on a windowsill. "It's almost time." She says, looking at as the seconds tick by. "How I've desired this moment..." She snaps the pocketwatch closed and brings it close to her chest. "...Ana," She says. "I wish I knew more. But even after all this time..." She shakes her head. "...No, perhaps tis best that they wander but even so... Even so..."
She turns her gaze to the horizon. "Even so, I--at least--will not abandon them."
And with a flash of light they're gone.
...And a moment later, they are...
HERE
Marivel ripples into existence next to Clarissa. She shouts at Boomerang but Marivel raises her hand once and sets it down on her shoulder. "What a passionate young woman you've become." She tells her friend. "How exciting. But... You are underestimating Boomerang" Even if he is a dick.
She turns her head and loks up to Boomerang.
"You want us to come up there? Or would you like to come down here? The two of you. I need to introduce Luceid to someone, and in return I'll give you all the blood you can sup on."
She makes no illusion of what this comes down to. She already swings out Guillotine to the side, it's red blade crackling chaotically as she runs her fingers across the hilt.
"The time of promise nears with every passing year. Tis no longer measured in centuries, tis measured in years. It will come in their lifetime."
<Pose Tracker> Ambrosius has posed.
The Gates of Kattelox Island had been of interest to the Veruni for some time, ever since they detected that strange signal. As such, they had kept a close eye on it ever since... and so, when the various human forces move to claim it, that is not something they can allow.
Veruni aircraft circle... and from one of them, two figures drop. One crashes to the ground with great force - a tall man clad in red armor, with a poncho around his shoulders. The second, a woman clad in blue and silver armor, glides gracefully down, leaving a trail of ice particles in her wake.
"Minerva - deal with the rabble." Ambrosius orders. With only a nod of acknowledgment, the armored woman glides into the battlefield.
Ambrosius looks up, then, as the figure on the Main Gate waves at him.
"...Indeed. Let's." Ambrosius agrees with a nod... and with that, he draws out a revolver, scanning the battlefield carefully.
<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.
Emeralda Kasim heard there was a MYSTERY with the Main Gate's countdown. Possibly even an ADVENTURE. An ADVENTUROUS MYSTERY. There is no surprise that she has snuck closer to get a better look at it and see if she can figure out this mystery.
As it turns out, she cannot. She can't even get very close to it.
Emeralda literally falls out of the tree she had climbed up for a better look when everything starts going chaos-shaped at once. She drops about fifteen feet and lands on her feet, amazingly enough. And as the bullets start a-flyin' and the troops start a-droppin', Emeralda starts a-runnin'.
She starts running directly at the Gate without doing a very good job of hiding her direction of travel. Because she just has to see it close up.
<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.
There's been a lot of activity on Kattelox from any number of worrisome powers that be - and it's incorrect to put it in past tense because now it seems they're all descending upon the place at once again - at a time where no small number of higher-profile Drifters are able to converge at once. Where signs of oncoming Gebler craft, Odessa vehicles, and Veruni golems might turn most away...
At least one seems undeterred - one who ostensibly came alongside ARMS despite not being a part of their organization out of convenience, and disappearing from their side just the same. He catches sight of no small number of people who look exactly like Brad Evans. Something in him has him snap a hand out and begin a sorcerous incantation--
He stops himself. He has priorities. Priorities that have never been truly audited or questioned by anyone else, but priorities that make sense to him, all the same, as he continues along his way through the chaos with a detached character. It is as though it is not the first time he has simply moved through turmoil and strife on a grand scale as if he were little more than on a passing stroll. (This manner is beyond eerie.)
'Yo. Let's wreck shit.' A former Quarter Knight looks to a known Veruni. Ethius' eyes track from a Vaguely Defined But Useful Hiding Spot(tm) as he draws closer. His breathing stabilizes and quiets, unaware of the extent of which Ambrosius or other Veruni can track heat signals or other signs of presence. He watches how Marivel and Clarissa address the duster-bearing Hyadean. Not that one. He has an opportunity here.
His breath held and mind stilled, Ethius waits for Minerva to pass. The armored woman does not give him a look, and his angles of attack widen that much more. One spell. One spell, and the tall man in red should be at long last dealt with. His footsteps glide across the ground in measured movements as to try and not to give off too discernible of a reading. His fingers flex and contort in pained poses. He has to say his entire spell's incantation in one breath--
Ethius' foot glides into brush that scrapes loudly. His approach is disrupted. He says the rest of the incantation with greater speed and - as a result - greater volume. He might be coming on Ambrosius' eight o'clock, but Ambrosius is bound to catch him in the act.
The surprise attack is spoiled - but an electrical spell whose name is lost to some of the surrounding sounds of battle is not.
GS: Ethius Hesiod has attacked Ambrosius with Averted Electrical Attack! GS: Ethius Hesiod has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Kattelox Island feels like a bomb waiting to explode. Ida would be remiss to just ignore it, especially given what she found on Garudoriten's ruined remains. The three Gates are part of a system, and that system is coming to life.
Unfortunately, Ida is nowhere near the only person to have realized this--just about everyone with a stake in Aquvy has shown up, too. The heiress makes her way past Odessa patrols, Boudicca at her side, keeping a low profile to avoid the watchful eyes of things that look like one of her friends. Her reinforced duster and light Hyadean armor have been freshly-repaired by Kalve, and she is as ready as she will ever be.
This doesn't count for much.
Ida stops at the forest's edge, motioning for Boudicca to do the same; hunkered down, she's somewhat difficult to spot in the melee, but not impossible. "Solaris," she says, to Boudicca. A Veruni transport jets in overhead; Ida doesn't recognize it, but she does recognize Ambrosius in his armor. "And the Veruni. This has become quite the little soiree, hasn't it?" Ida turns back to Boudicca, managing a grim little smile. She looks back up, and sees Boomerang and his casual pose. "Everyone and their dog, it seems." Ida straightens up a little. "The rest of ARMS is in the area. We neutralize what few elements we can, and push through to the Gate." She arches a brow, but she already knows Boudicca's answer.
GS: Ambrosius critically Guards a hit from Ethius Hesiod's Averted Electrical Attack for 12 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
Flashing in with the rest of the Odessa operatives is one Lightning Seraph Ragnell. Her expression is somewhat grim today, though, arms folded over her ponchoed chest when she arrives in brilliant light. She gaze up at the Main Gate and its digital countdown readout. Her eyes widen slightly when she catches sight of Boomerang; however, his attention is on the Veruni, so she doesn't bother to greet him.
The crowd's large. There's any number of targets. Today, she decides, she'll wait for someone to come to her. It's always nice to feel wanted.
Ragnell folds her arms behind her neck and waits patiently in front of the Main Gate for someone to inevitably try to put her down. She won't have to wait long, she assumes.
<Pose Tracker> Acacia Saitani has posed.
From her perch what she hopes is a safe distance away, Acacia's camera is going off like a machine gun as she hammers the button with a grim look on her face. There's far too much to take in all in one go - from the sight of the main gates of Kattelox and its mysterious countdown, the various Drifters and combined forces of Odessa and Solaris and who knows who else converging on the gates, the multiple copies of Brad Evans--
(she stares at that through her viewfinder for a moment, then takes a photograph for posterity's sake. If it's Odessa screwing around, there's no way she's ever going to print it, but it would probably be fun to make Brad's life hell over it later)
--and one small Reploid racing towards the impending battle, yelling her lungs out. She stares in open-mouthed shock, shortly before a moment of uncertain indecision and anxiety washes over her.
* * *
Two months ago, she'd tracked Kamui's panicked flight back to the ruins in which she'd been found. Acacia hadn't needed to look far - something had already told her that was where the Reploid would be, but even going straight there had been much too slow. What she'd expected was the girl curled up on the floor, keeping to herself amongst some remnants of old memories as comfort. What she got instead was an inert capsule, and a timer counting down thirty years.
There didn't seem to be much option. Dimly aware of how much a 'verification' would mean to Kamui, she'd not been able to bring herself to force the system awake as she once did by accident - and by now, she wasn't even sure if that was her doing it the first time around or if it was all down to Kamui's emotion chip.
All the reporter could do was leave the complex alone to its sleep, send word to Marivel and Gami as the people most likely to be there when she woke up, and throw herself back into her work. As ARMS, not as the Meria Boule reporter - somehow, the fun had gone out of that, so she'd sequestered herself away doing something to take her mind off things.
(As a result, ARMS' archives have never, ever been more organized. And there are rumours amongst staff that if you misfile something, a demon will steal your soul and your coffee.)
* * *
When the wave of vertigo passes, she realizes the decision is already made for her - her legs are already sending her over the edge of the cliff in a wild slide down gravel and rock, then up and into a shaky run as she swears under her breath.
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.
Xantia has had a front-row seat for much of the activity on Kattelox, due to her just happening to be there helping out the Digger's Guild when attacks by the Veruni and Odessa happened. Even though she has no idea what all this commotion is about, it was pretty obvious that that Something Is Happening, and multiple parties are interested. She therefore thought it was prudent to inform Leon Albus of this, leaving any further decisions in regards to the situation up the Black Wolves's leader.
As it turns out, the time to act is now - chiefly because this is the time to act for everyone, it seems, based on that mysterious timer. Not knowing what something means has certainly never stopped Xantia from getting involved with something, and her involvement - by her own preference - usually begins and ends with 'stop obvious bad guys from accomplishing whatever it is they want, so this is fine. Running straight into a chaotic situation is also fine.
Besides, it's not all that chaotic, from her perspective. She can mentally condense it without any problem. When there's several groups of the aforementioned bad guys, you head directly for the worst ones. And thanks to relatively recently recovered memories, the worst ones in her mind are quite solidly the Solarians. They may well be secretly manipulating all the other groups involved in some way, that's what they do. Anything to stay in control, anything to get what they want. Not this time. Whatever it is they're after, they're not getting it this time!
If left unimpeded, it won't be long before a number of Gebler forces will have to deal with a redhead causing explosions in their path. And it's not even Elly! Well, it might also be Elly, but for that you'd have to look elsewhere than this particular redhead, since she will be causing the explosions by hitting things with her fists.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
A LITTLE WHILE AGO
"We found nothing anomalous in the desert save this, sir. The site showed signs of conflict: sections of the sand were glassed and native grasses and plants showed signs of burns. We are assuming conflict took place but we cannot determine the outcome. We are continuing to monitor the situation."
'This' had been a single scrap of cloth. He'd been able to tell at a touch that it was Solarian. As if he had room to doubt in the first place.
Of course it was Lan's.
A LITTLE MORE RECENTLY THAN THAT
Of course. Of course he'd been called up for this one. He'd known it was going to happen. There's still no details about what's going on beyond 'secure the area'. At least not officially.
Rumor, however, has spread quickly in the absence of official statement. Rumor has it that in the ruins, there is a countdown ticking away...
Frankly, Loren just hopes it's not a bomb.
#-1 INVALID ANSI DEFINITION: +196 NOW
He's just one face among many in this particilar dropship, leading up the support team. "Spread out, and stay alert; we'll be backing up the front lines shortly," he informs them. "Keep your weapons ready and loaded. We're likely to take fire."
The Veruni are here, he's already noticed, taking the moment to glance down at the stream of reports on his tablet. Looks like Odessa here to cause them trouble...
And of course, other meddlers from the surface and elsewhere. He holds back a sigh. This is going to be a long one.
"--What the..."
Someone's already started laying into the ground forces. "Hold your ground--" he urges his group, drawing his sword.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Boudicca has posed.
They're running out of time.
It is - of course - a fact of mortal life. A Seraph's friends may not have literal timers above their heads, but metaphorically... it is not so different to this. But this is something different; something more pressing. With all the groups seeking the Sub-Gates...
They're running out of time.
And so, the Oracle of Moor Gault is here. Boudicca came with her Seer, Ida Everstead-Rey; the two of them are stealthier, at least, than some of the other visitors who have come here. (So many visitors.) She ducks down, even though it's futile for two reasons: for one, most of them can't see her anyway, and for two, those dragon horns on her helm poke out from over the bush regardless.
"Many parties have taken interest in this," Boudicca agrees, quietly. "Yes - let us do what we can. To the Gate, then."
Looking out over the gate, her green-grey eyes narrow as she falls on one particular form. "... I leave Solaris to you, Ida. I must ensure... she does not make another mistake."
Who 'she' is...
That much is made clear as Boudicca enters the field, shouldering past an Odessan soldier baffled by the breeze. She ducks a Gebler's bullet; she is not worried by the footsoldiers. Rather, her attention is on --
"Ragnell!"
Boudicca announces her presence with that demand of a name, but the rest of her soon follows; springing forward, she lashes one of her tonfa out in a low swipe. "Whatever your plans for this mysterious contraption - I must once more insist you desist!"
GS: Seraph Boudicca has attacked Seraph Ragnell with Rabid Lunge! GS: Seraph Boudicca has gained 1 Combo! GS: Seraph Boudicca has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Brad Evans has posed.
Brad Evans - the original, and best, and cutest - stomps up alongside the rest of ARMS, flexing his Mechanical Glove uneasily. He spots the doppelgangers and grimaces immediately. "I think Vins thinks those things are funny," he mutters. Fortunately, Kate and Amy have figured out what was going on, but knowing they have exact copies of his ridiculous equipment doesn't particularly make him sleep any better.
He rolls his broad shoulders, half-nervous as he steps up. He fought a monster while actively tumbling through space the other day. And...and he has someone who's counting on him to stop the world from ending. A few someones, in fact.
"Odessa," he mutters, like it were personal, because it is.
Kamui's shout gets his attention, though. "Odessa's been making Doppelgangers," he grunts back. "Be careful, they can copy just about everything about you. No idea why they're so fixated on me, though." He does, actually, have an idea, which comes down to 'spite,' but opening THAT whole can of worms would take a while. Instead, he says: "Good to see you."
The sky's going to fall. ......maybe he should be encouraging her to take a nap, instead......
GS: Seraph Ragnell takes a glancing hit from Seraph Boudicca's Rabid Lunge for 35 hit points! GS: Shieldbreak! applied to Seraph Ragnell! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up!
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
Ashley can't spend all his time oscillating between saving new friends from being trapped in airships, baking and the puppy room. It's time that he pick himself off the floor that Id's terrifying brainpunch knocked him onto and back into the business of <<PROTECTING THE WORLD!>>
Though this time, he's... not honestly entirely sure of what he's trying to protect here? The Main Gate and its contents are kind of a mystery to everyone, after all. Certainly the people of Kattelox would prefer that these miscellaneous paramilitary organization would kindly get off their island, so maybe he can just keep them in his thoughts? Maybe it's better to say that he's more here to support Dash and Kamui and to pursue ARMS' overall goals? Maybe... maybe the things hidden within the Main Gate are so powerful and world-shaking that they need to make absolutely certain that nobody ever gains access to them.
Whatever the case, he is here, and he is...
Presently staring at a small army of Brads.
"...You know, for some reason it's less scary when there are this many of them? I'm actually a little offended on Brad's behalf--" Marivel and Clarissa are there too, because he'd arrived alongside the latter and is present when the former aports in. "Boomerang?" Ashley asks, apparently having missed that particular briefing. "Is that armored guy another one of your mysterious friends, Marivel?"
<Pose Tracker> Dash Caskett has posed.
The countdown was absolutely tracked by the Caskett family. Having been personally part of the delve in two of the three Sub-Gates, the Mayor of Kattelox had expressed worry of the rumors surrounding the Main Gate.
A ruin in Kattelox which is the only one that has been found and NOT opened. Is it due to not being able to trust anyone wwith this endeavor? No one they deemed fit or skilled enough to take the challenge?
Or is it because no one has actually been able to open the door?
Whether or not that is the reason, the countdown nears completion. And everyone is investigating it, For better or for worse.
The Flutter carries the Caskett family (and any ARMS members that want a ride) to close proximity to the Main Gate. Thankfully, friends are already arriving on the scene. "Hey! Hey, get away from that place! Man, when can you all learn?" he calls, at first to Boomerang and Ambrosius.
"K-Kamui...?!" Dash says, spying her on the battlefield. She up and vanished after that one fight... Was she okay? He has to find out soon. "Did she say the sky was going to fall?"
A look up. Nothing there. Huh.
"Uh... Why do I feel like I have seen this place and been here before?" he comments after some thought. I haven't been, and yet..."
He falls silent.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Ivan recently came to the area for the sake of exploring ruins; he stayed because the business of the strange timer seemed interesting. He seems to have underestimated how interesting it also would be to literally everyone else.
The chaos is a overwhelming at first as various forces begin to amass, but those ships... whatever is happening here, is Solaris trying to achieve something that he can impede? If this is another chance to strike at someone (perhaps, anyone) from there directly... he can't miss it again!
As he rushes toward the fray, shouting to anyone in earshot about how Solarians are cowards who need to come and fight him, he crosses paths with... Emeralda? Or rather, she falls out of the sky, which is even more startling. He runs after her.
"E-emeralda?! Do you know why everyone is swarming on this place? Is it that Gate?"
<Pose Tracker> Leah Sadalbari has posed.
The time has come.
From the back of Gebler's group strides a figure in glossy black armor. Heavy boots, a breastplate, an indigo tabard inscribed with ancient runes of silence. Her head is entirely covered; her helmt has an eyelass mask, only two narrow lines of metal bounding what could otherwise be a face. Black, indigo, gold; these repeat over and over in elaborate inlays, from her gauntlets to her greaves. At her side is a hilt sized for a very large blade, but it is only the hilt, apparently; her gloved hands rest at her sides.
She steps forward, uneven in gait but also unstopping. From the ranks of the soldiers she emerges, heedless of the explosions starting up.
"Captain," she says as she passes Loren, in her strange modulated voice.
Did she see? Did she read the reports? There is no information.
But here and now she takes the hilt from her side and extends it. From it ignites a blade of blue light, a terrible ARM sword that blazes with energy.
Her strange voice is distorted, hard to gender but easy to understand. There is something mechanical and alien about it. "And so, the skies began to open, in preparation for the coming rain..."
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
It is not clear to Elly van Houten what exactly is the secret of Kattelox island; the secret that drives the world to this fever pitch of the powers that remain assailing each other. Part of Elly wonders, with a darkling vision, if this is the sort of thing that actually led to the collapse of Zeboim and of the more dimly seen cultures of more recent eras. Did everything truly end in a single great battle or war? Or was it a process?
But not much of Elly thinks this.
For Elly is not a scholar, even if she studies.
What she is, in part, is a nervous mother (adoptive... probably) and that is why she has come here and is not long and far behind Emeralda. Fortunately Emeralda is more or less immune to things like falling out of trees, but there are other things that terrify Elly. She worries more about corrosive chemical storage than she ever has in the remainder of her life.
"I think it is," Elly answers Ivan, even though she was not Asked. Her eyes turn towards - towards -
Gebler Infantry. Elly marvels for a heartbeat. Not since base formations has she seen THIS. And then among them, a blade is drawn - TWINKLE!
Elly recognizes the blade. Her mouth hangs open slightly, and her grip tightens on the iron rod (pipe? something?) that she has carried with her, in lieu of something fancier. "I," she says, but it's already coming, all but erupting out of her throat.
This is foolish, Elly thinks as she steps down a ridge. I should avoid them or - or - or - or - or - even the approaching figure in shrouded mystery doesn't stop Elly's sentiments and confusion and old guilt and anxieties from bubbling out of her throat:
"LOREN!! What are you doing here???" Elly cries out, with sufficient force to be faintly audible across the entire battlefield. (Elly covers her mouth with her palm for a moment after this.)
GS: Elhaym van Houten spends 1 Combo on Interrupt! GS: Elhaym van Houten has attacked Loren Voss with Screamer! GS: Elhaym van Houten has gained 1 Combo! GS: Elhaym van Houten has completed her action. GS: Loren Voss completely evades a hit from Elhaym van Houten's Screamer! GS: Loren Voss has lost 2 Combo from Interrupt!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
A FEW DAYS AGO:
Gwen somehow managed to drag an unconscious Lan to her Gear, and went back up on the Valerie Chateau, where Lan could get treatment. Not much was said about the hows and whys of why Gwen was: 1. looking like she got in a fight with a giant crab or some equally powerful being, 2. why Lan looks the same, 3. why Gwen is going back to consuming various delicious fatty and sugary goods (sorry, Ashley) like she had just, possibly, tried to power herself up to fight a giant crab. TWIST: it was not a giant crab, unless the giant crab symbolizes Isiris's machinations involving the two and drawing them into the middle of a desert to relentlessly fight each other. Then, it might as well be a Giant Crab.
What is known is that Gwen kept close by Lan's side as she healed, until she finally had to, to go to Kattlelox Island. Though, perhaps, it makes sense that Lan decided to come with her.
NOW:
Gates are crazy. Especially since it wasn't too long ago that Gwen was here before, nearly getting her ass handed to her by Kartikeya, who is not a Giant Crab but she wishes he was, because it would make things easier.
"Those Brads ain't Brad!" Gwen warns, rising her voice as loud as she dares to draw attention to herself, the other collecting bullets from a pouch on her belt, slowing as she notices Brad, the real Brad, arrive. Well, this will be awkward. "Okay, uh, if they try to punch you, assume they ain't Brad! They can't copy ARMs, though, thank god." No, just everything else that *isn't* an unique ARM, which includes Brad's arsenal.
Seeing Dario and Romero, Gwen raises a hand, trying to get their attention. Are they with Odessa? Are they not? Does it matter? Gwen's going to give them a clue, either way. "Get on outta here, this place is gonna get real hairy!" She pauses, hesitates. ".... Also! Janus's back from the dead, but he ain't righ--" Bullets interrupt her delivery, though it's hard to say if the two former henchmen will even hear a word of it. Or, for that matter, the right words.
Raising her head back up, she notices Ragnell standing there, in front of the gate. "... I was hopin' it'd be a little later than this, but that don't mean I necessarily *have* to fight you..." she murmurs under her breath, scanning the field.
'LOREN!! What are you doing here?'
Gwen's eyes immediately pivot to Elly's position. "Huh, Loren's here?"
<Pose Tracker> Boomerang has posed.
Boomerang sits, almost languidly, on the top of the Main Gate. His red eyes move, with a hint of a mechanical motion. The truth, of course, is that they are constructs of the strange metal flesh of Hyades. But, he doesn't really care how his eyes work; he cares only that they work. His eyes turn down, slowly, at Clarissa. Without a mouth, his expression is hard to guess at. But, she issues a challenge.
So he stands, then he rolls a shoulder. It's a casual pose. "Atta girl," he says. "I'd hate for the bunch of you to be boring."
There is a flickering glance at Kamui. "Huh," he says. "Her again." He shrugs, then looks back at Clarissa -- and he holds a hand out. A long, segmented blade appears in his hand, with a crackle of electricity. Then, his eyes turn down towards Marivel.
They focus on her, for a moment, and he shrugs his shoulders once. "Take your issues up with them. They're coming, Marivel. And they're real pissed off. I bet you know why."
He leaps. Boomerang crashes down towards Clarissa. He moves like a warrior born, with a millennium of experience, and that laissez-faire attitude hides the way he moves quickly and deliberately. Boomerang is a being familiar with every nook, cranny, and facet of violence, and he comes at Clarissa like fluid lightning. Crescent Fang lashes out.
And a snarl echoes. It echoes despite roars of gunfire; despite blasts of energy; despite destruction raining down. A massive wolf appears, footsteps hitting the ground. Their fur is violet, but black plating runs up the front, and two long tusks come from each side of their head. Their eyes blaze.
"Marivel... what have you done!?" Luceid roars. Their eyes are on Ashley -- but a rush of black and crimson energy forms, in the rough shape of a wolf's head, and crashes down for Marivel. Boomerang watches, impassively. Then, his head turns, looking at Ashley. There is a sudden shift in his bearing. "It's you... the one that Luceid sensed--"
And then there is something manic in how he flies, straight at Ashley. He slams his left fist at him, then a roundhouse kick at the soldier's midsection, before he cleaves down with his sword. "The one who has HIS power! C'mon! C'MON! SHOW ME WHAT YOU REALLY ARE!"
GS: Boomerang has attacked Clarissa Arwin with Crescent Fang! GS: Boomerang has gained 1 Combo! GS: Boomerang has completed his action. GS: Boomerang has attacked Marivel Armitage with Mad Luceid! GS: Boomerang has gained 1 Combo! GS: Boomerang has completed his action. GS: Boomerang has attacked Ashley Winchester with Triple Down! GS: Boomerang has completed his action. GS: Clarissa Arwin completely evades a hit from Boomerang's Crescent Fang!
<Pose Tracker> Ambrosius has posed.
All it takes is a single sound out of place - a single hint that all is not as it should be. Ambrosius turns, raising a hand, and vapor in the air coalesces into a swirling shield of water, drawing the electricity largely away from Ambrosius himself. It crackles with energy as the electricity dances through it.
Ambrosius recognizes that attack. Behind the helmet, his eyes narrow.
"Hesiod." Ambrosius states. There's no further word of warning. He pushes his hand toward that shield, and with that gesture it bursts out toward Ethius in a dangerous electrified geyser. He's always been the type for direct action.
He puts his revolver away, with that. It isn't his first time tangling with Ethius, and he's read the reports, besides. He knows full well that ARMs are not the way to go when fighting him. As reliable as Conversator and the Veritas Varia are, they'll only slow him down.
GS: Ambrosius has attacked Ethius Hesiod with Geyser! GS: Ambrosius has gained 1 Combo! GS: Ambrosius has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Asgard has posed.
A man who is all smug smiles and blonde hair simply teleports in near the rear of Odessan forces. His brown cloak and green headbands which wrap around his body fluttering gently in the breeze. He seems utterly unaffected by the violence as a bullet blurs by his head. His image briefly becoming blurred static...
...before he simply stands elsewhere. "My, how exciting. The struggles of the living to defy death on the battlefield. I shall honor such valor by offering a most worthy demise to those who would stand here this day." With a snap of his fingers, a figure teleports in. A one dimensional line of dull white light that gains a second dimension and then expands into a third.
A three sharl high golem stands inert beside him, yellow eyes staring forward as if entirely unaffected by the battlefield. A honored metallic face and a dull red to brown coat that encircles his entire body like armor. A blue gem sparkles off of his right fist, while rings like magma encircle around his left.
"Go Asgard. Seek out and destroy the strongest of those who would stand above - and apart from humanity." Malik remains right where he is. "Evolution - has ever required, sacrifice."
Without any further orders given, Asgard simply begins to take massive steps across the battlefield. Bullets flying at the Hyadean War Machine as they're simply deflected before ever striking him. A mortar explosion causes him to vanish in a plume of dust and smoke... only for him to emerge. Asgard does not stop to look at Marivel, though rest assured his sensors do note her from his collection of data.
He does not even look at Boomerang, despite their similarities, nor even the Gate. While the Gate is Odessa's objective, it is not currently his. Malik's orders have been explicit. He is heading straight across towards enemy lines.
The moment his optical sensors rest upon The Watcher, brandishing her laser blade though however, he pauses mid-step, as if he's zooming in to better view her. Once he has a good view, his internal databanks begin their review.
His processors should be able to analyze and optimize this data in fractions of a second... but is fully five seconds before his threat assessment completes and he changes direction towards the Watcher, no matter where she goes in those enemy lines.
And picks up his pace subtly, as the silent Juggernaut moves like an inexorable force towards an immovable object.
His orders and his collected data have simply agreed upon the threat assessment of this target.
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
It is with the Geblers that Azoth descends into the chaos. He doesn't ERROR want to OVERRIDE do this ERROR ERROR SECURE OBJECTIVES
THREATS IDENTIFIED
Those who have met Azoth probably wouldn't yet recognize him on the battlefield with his current look, black and red and mechanical all over, draped in a tattered cloak and with a mechanized ring of scrap and energy hovering behind him.
Red eyes gleam brightly, searching the battlefield. They flare with warning, spotting a pair with a trajectory toward the gate itself.
Isn't ERROR that ERROR OVERRIDE
Azoth blasts toward them both like, levitating inches off the ground and cloak whipping behind him with dust scattered in his wake. He twists in the air, blades of red light forming in an orbit around him. They separate from their formation, firing at Ivan like a repeating crossbow, except for the last -- it pulses, growing larger as he moves in closer to aim an overhead cleave at Emeralda.
GS: Azoth has attacked Ivan with exec.bel LOADING! GS: Azoth has gained 3 Combo! GS: Azoth has attacked Emeralda Kasim with exec.bel CHARGING! GS: Azoth has gained 2 Combo! GS: Azoth has completed his action. GS: Azoth has completed his action. GS: Ethius Hesiod takes a solid hit from Ambrosius's Geyser for 123 hit points! GS: Emeralda Kasim takes a solid hit from Azoth's exec.bel CHARGING for 142 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
Ah, here's someone already.
As Boudicca charges in at her, tonfa swiping out towards her torso, Ragnell looks calmly up at the Wind Seraph, then steps to one side and smashes her knee up towards Boudicca's stomach. This maneuver doesn't actually put her out of range of Boudicca's attack, but it does help mitigate the worst of the damage. Ragnell then kicks off of Boudicca, jumping backwards and landing nimbly.
"You can insist all you want, Bou--I ain't gonna do what you say, just 'cuz you say it," Ragnell replies, her paired pistols now in her gloved hands. After all, *she* doesn't consider her actions a mistake.
She does, however, briefly look up at the chaotic battlefield, surveying it briefly to try to pick out the familiar faces. It's only somewhat successful; it is a *very* big battlefield. A small fight like theirs probably won't amount to much.
But then, that's assuming that she's in this for more than the fun of it, isn't it?
GS: Ivan guards a hit from Azoth's exec.bel LOADING for 87 hit points! GS: Seraph Ragnell has attacked Seraph Boudicca with Heartbreaker! GS: Seraph Ragnell has gained 1 Combo! GS: Seraph Ragnell assumes the Avenger stance! GS: Seraph Ragnell has completed her action. GS: Ashley Winchester takes a glancing hit from Boomerang's Triple Down for 71 hit points! GS: Mighty! applied to Boomerang! GS: Seraph Boudicca takes a glancing hit from Seraph Ragnell's Heartbreaker for 73 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Clarissa Arwin has posed.
Clarissa blinks with surprise as Marivel suddenly emerges beside her with a touch. With a glance to the tiny vampire, she nods, but her jaw remains set with the simple conviction that comes with the unwaveringly honest force of her desire. "Even if I am underestimating him, I can't just let him do whatever he wants," she murmurs. "If I can help even a little, then I have to."
It helps that she's not alone. Ashley darts up with them, and she nods crisply to him before looking up to Boomerang again. "I don't know," she admits, voice still quiet. "Whoever he is, he's Hyadean."
Before she can say much more, Boomerang rises, seemingly undeterred by her own air of focus. As his weapon materializes, she snaps Strahl Gewehr up at shoulder level, ready to fire. "Wait, who's coming," she begins.
Boomerang's on Clarissa before she can answer. He moves with the purpose of a warrior without parallel - and yet, as Crescent Fang lashes out, it finds no purchase. Clarissa arches backwards without thinking. Her mind and heart race with the urgency of what she does. She doesn't have to think - she just cranks herself backwards, wide-eyed, teetering perilously as the powerful blade slices over her by mere inches, severing a few thin whisps of buttery-blonde hair before she hits the ground and rolls backwards.
An instinctive dodge, borne of a simple instinct. Live and help.
As Luceid comes roaring into the fray, Clarissa widens her eyes, her breath briefly catching in her throat. She can feel something. Something profound.
It's not enough to overcome that core of need to do something. As the massive wolf rages towards Marivel, Clarissa raises her voice.
"Leave them alone!" she shouts at both Boomerang and Luceid.
It's Strahl Gewehr's turn to howl. Clarissa unleashes a shining blue shot, sending a broad ray arcing across the field, a blast she sweeps from Boomerang across to Luceid, trying to get them both in one shot!
GS: Clarissa Arwin has attacked Boomerang with Running Shot! GS: Clarissa Arwin has completed her action. GS: Marivel Armitage guards a hit from Boomerang's Mad Luceid for 99 hit points! GS: Disrupt! applied to Marivel Armitage!
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
Kamui is surrounded by her closest friends and comrades. Clarissa, Ashley... mom-- Marivel is fighting that Hyadean in the coat, who she doesn't know. Or... does she? It's all so vague and foggy in her head right now.
"Boo...?" is all she gets out. Sorry Boomerang, you're 'Boo' to her right now.
She hears Dash call out to her, and lifts her head up with sudden surprise. "Dash! I... I have a real bad feeling about this ruin, we shouldn't..."
Brad -- the real Brad -- speaks up to her, though. Odessa's been making Doppelgangers?? "Nng... don't make a copy of me! It'll just wind up being really bad for you!" she shouts at, uh, the concept of Odessa in general. But when he says it's good to see her, she nods... quietly.
As Acacia lands near her, as well. "Master..."
But then her attention -- already frayed and stretched out as it is -- is just getting more and more and more stretched as...
A mysterious three-sharl golem lands, along with a blonde man she doesn't know. Dressed in a coat that feels similar to the Hyadean Boo (you're not a man you're a hyadean Boo). Something TWIGS in her already frayed memory--
And Kamui does the absolutely ill advised and runs straight towards the three foot towering Golem and tries to just... hold his hand?
"W-what are you doing here? Why are you fighting?! I--"
*STATIC*
"--hrgh--"
If allowed, Kamui grabs hold tighter.
"I--I promised you... I wouldn't be... so why are you fighting for them?!" she yells, voice full of confusion at a context that she doesn't even know about, because who is this mysterious Golem that fills her heart with such memory?!
This is probably incredibly ill advised.
GS: Kamui has attacked Asgard with Illicit Mid-Combat Hand Holding! GS: Kamui has gained 1 Combo! GS: Kamui has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
It was almost certainly some kind of giant, metaphorical crab.
Though she was just as roughed up as Gwen, Lan healed up fairly quickly. She's still a bit sore, but as always she'll manage.
She's got new clothes and even new sandals, has managed to replace some of her gear... a trip out away from the Chateau is probably just what she needs. She can get her mind off of things. It'll be good to stretch her legs.
If she's been a little quieter than usual, well certainly Gwen understands. They're both kind of processing a lot right now.
A mysterious gate with a countdown and a convergence of forces Lan hasn't seen the like of in months weren't exactly what she had in mind as far as relaxing. She runs after Gwen anyway.
She recognizes Gebler forces. Don't be anybody she knows, don't be anybody she knows--
'LOREN!! What are you doing here?'
If he's here, then that means-- Lan stands up straighter, gaze whipping around. If this much of Gebler is here, there's no way that she isn't as well. Loren she trusts not to attack her.
Leah Sadalbari, however...
GS: CRITICAL! Asgard takes a glancing hit from Kamui's Illicit Mid-Combat Hand Holding for 0 hit points! GS: Boomerang takes a solid hit from Clarissa Arwin's Running Shot for 99 hit points! GS: Riposte! applied to Clarissa Arwin!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
'I leave Solaris to you, Ida.' With those words, Boudicca turns and takes her leave to fight a more personal battle. Ida lets out a huff of breath, scanning what passes for the Solarian lines in this melee. She hears Loren's voice, and her teeth jump on edge in recognition. She remembers how he showed up with OS, cleaning up the "mess" Odessa left behind. But then someone else strides forward. Ida recognizes their armor.
Fear and hate and rage coil through Ida's limbic system, #-1 FUNCTION (ANSI) EXPECTS 2 ARGUMENTS BUT GOT 1.
That armored arm, punched clean through Siegfried's chest.
That cold, mechanical voice, proclaiming her an abomination, a mongrel.
"YOU!" Ida roars, as she surges from cover like a pouncing tiger. One Gebler soldier makes the mistake of stepping between her and the Watcher; for his error, Ida slams into him, gripping his shoulder and hurling him bodily out of her way. "Enough games! Today you answer for what you've done!" The synchronization is effortless. Ida looks at Leah with one blue eye, and one green. Hyadean exoskeleton erupts from beneath her clothes, covering both arms; her right arm is already lashing out for the Watcher's stomach in a body-blow. Her left fist darts out in a jab to their helmet.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
'I leave Solaris to you, Ida.' With those words, Boudicca turns and takes her leave to fight a more personal battle. Ida lets out a huff of breath, scanning what passes for the Solarian lines in this melee. She hears Loren's voice, and her teeth jump on edge in recognition. She remembers how he showed up with OS, cleaning up the "mess" Odessa left behind. But then someone else strides forward. Ida recognizes their armor.
Fear and hate and rage coil through Ida's limbic system, mirrored in Fafnir's.
That armored arm, punched clean through Siegfried's chest.
That cold, mechanical voice, proclaiming her an abomination, a mongrel.
"YOU!" Ida roars, as she surges from cover like a pouncing tiger. One Gebler soldier makes the mistake of stepping between her and the Watcher; for his error, Ida slams into him, gripping his shoulder and hurling him bodily out of her way. "Enough games! Today you answer for what you've done!" The synchronization is effortless. Ida looks at Leah with one blue eye, and one green. Hyadean exoskeleton erupts from beneath her clothes, covering both arms; her right arm is already lashing out for the Watcher's stomach in a body-blow. Her left fist darts out in a jab to their helmet.
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Leah Sadalbari with Relentless Combination! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey assumes the Avenger stance! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Boudicca has posed.
Up comes Ragnell's knee, and for a moment the two of them are motion; Ragnell kicks off of Boudicca, and in the same gesture Boudicca twists away from Ragnell, twirling away and back around. Her braids swirl around her, in the eddies which are her, as she brings her tonfa up to cover herself.
"I thought as much," Boudicca sighs, the WORLD sighs, a puff of air rushing out around them. "This is why I am not only asking. Regrettably, I am prepared to use force to keep you from this Gate."
All those little breezes are just the prelude to the Seraphic glyph which alights on the ground, pale green lighting the air. "You know I cannot trust you with something of this magnitude," Boudicca says, as that spell concentrates. "Not after what you have done. All conditions worsening -- Buffeting Headwind!"
Suddenly the breeze is not just a breeze, as it crashes over Ragnell, a mighty gust more difficult to move against.
GS: Seraph Boudicca has attacked Seraph Ragnell with Buffeting Headwind! GS: Seraph Boudicca assumes the Avenger stance! GS: Seraph Boudicca has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Seraph Ragnell guards a hit from Seraph Boudicca's Buffeting Headwind for 56 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Ragnell gains 1 additional Combo!
<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.
It's *really* chaotic. Emeralda is already lost! Fortunately, she has a direct path: straight forward.
"Didn't you hear?" she calls back to Ivan. "There's a timer! On the gate! I want to see it and I want to see what happens when it gets to zero! Wouldn't that be cool? It has to do something then!" It's her Drifter heart: she can't just let those things sit.
(sorry, Elly)
Emeralda gets partway to the gate before Azoth glides right past her. She does not recognize him, but she does - or seems to - recognize what he is, at least in a general sense. Her eyes open wider. "Hey! Who are you? I didn't know there would be any - "
Azoth chops right down through her head about halfway down her torso. This does not cause an explosion of blood and guts, but instead a faint haze of silver around the blade as something is ejected from the gap as he slices down. Emeralda seems to *flow*, her mass closing up behind the blade, leaving Azoth with his sword stuck in Emeralda's chest - but she still has a head that appears to be in one piece, although with a silver stripe that runs down her vertically from the top of her head down to her chin and then down her neck.
Emeralda looks more shocked than anything else as she staggers backwards, away from the blade. The silver stripe fades as it goes back to normal colours: vibrantly green hair, darkish skin tone. The "Ow! Ow ow ow!" she lets out is nowhere near what a wound like that deserves (she should be dead), but it seems to have at least disoriented her for a moment; she stumbles around as the damaged mass is routed around and rewired.
Her voice is a little off too - not buzzy precisely, but there's something unusual about the tone for the first few words, smoothing out as she speaks. "I don't even know who you are! I just want to see the Gate! Who are you? Where did you come from? Are you a Drifter? Because Drifters shouldn't fight each other! Or - wait, did someone send you?"
Emeralda levels a stomping thrust kick at Azoth's shin. That would be one thing, but somewhere along the way her entire boot changes shape, narrowing to a point at the end, a faint spiral running around it - not a spike but a drill bit, which spins violently as she doesn't really kick so much as drill into Azoth. "Don't hurt Ivan either!!"
GS: Emeralda Kasim has attacked Azoth with Leg Spin! GS: Emeralda Kasim has gained 1 Combo! GS: Emeralda Kasim has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.
It would be fair to say that Xantia is charging into things blindly here. She hasn't even noticed the multiple Brads, she's that laser-focused on the Solarian presence. The Gebler advance force soon has a problem: a shockwave here, an exploding punch there... Xantia literally blows away anyone who gets even remotely close to her range, extending far longer than one would think of someone who's using only their fists. And this is just getting started, she hasn't even tried to really hurt anyone yet.
However, that's when--
LOREN!! What are you doing here???
She hears Elly. Of course, it was pretty impossible not to hear Elly if you were even remotely close by. Xantia turns her head sharply, only regarding the source of that loud voice for long enough to follow her gaze back to the one that was getting yelled at. Xantia's eyes narrow, and she takes off, straight for Loren Voss. Fire flares up from her arms and legs first, spreading until it surrounds her completely. The rest of the distance is bridged with a leap...
And Xantia slams both her fists onto the ground upon landing, creating a small crater and sending flames in every direction from the point of impact.
"You."
Xantia straightens, her tone of voice uncharacteristically venomous in addressing Loren. She's not been this close to him for a very long time - in fact, the last time she was, she still knew him as Thomas. Things are a little different now. She has heard a lot about Loren, and she doesn't like what she's heard. She points an accusing finger in his direction.
"Stay away from my friends! I'm not gonna let you hurt any of them ever again!"
GS: Leah Sadalbari guards a hit from Ida Everstead-Rey's Relentless Combination for 63 hit points! GS: Leah Sadalbari's Force Guard activates! GS: Xantia has attacked Loren Voss with Elemental Fury! GS: Xantia has gained 1 Combo! GS: Xantia assumes the Avenger stance! GS: Xantia has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.
A key ambush gets turned around just like that - a water barrier that captures the electrical power and just turns that noise back on the attacker, splashing Ethius in said electrified water. (He now looks far more like a proper pirate's deckhand, what with all being now sopping wet.)
Electricity courses through him to a painful result - his consciousness taking leave of him for a split second as his body shudders and his hair stands on end. Smoke rises from him as he's put down to a kneel before an unmoved - some say immovable - man in red. It takes him a moment to disassociate with all the stimuli flooding in as his mind tries to recapture the immediate environs. A Guardian's roaring at another overwhelms, as he's not that far off from that engagement. Shining blue light races for Boomerang over yonder. Popping pistols provide a distinctive, familiar sound over to where Ragnell is opening fire on a large, floating, armored woman.
Another glance stolen towards multiple Brads like it's an urgent matter. He re-focuses on the red of Ambrosius. His mind may race with courses of action at a speed and certainty most would find dizzying, but his body does not yet follow suit. He sees how Ambrosius puts his revolver away--
And Ethius snaps into action at last, drawing his quarterstaff horizontally and charging at the larger, heavier man from the side he's not holstering his weapon at, to try and ram him up against the nearest vertical structure.
"What is it you're after?" He tries to ask, in that manner of speech he has - but will he be in a position to ask questions from a place of weakness and disadvantage? Water continues to drip off of him.
GS: Ethius Hesiod has attacked Ambrosius with Stick It To The Veruni Man! GS: Ethius Hesiod has gained 1 Combo! GS: Ethius Hesiod has completed his action. GS: Ambrosius critically Guards a hit from Ethius Hesiod's Stick It To The Veruni Man for 24 hit points! GS: Loren Voss critically Guards a hit from Xantia's Elemental Fury for 21 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Loren Voss gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Mighty! applied to Xantia! GS: Loren Voss's Force Guard activates!
<Pose Tracker> Dash Caskett has posed.
For once, Kamui isn't the only one with foggy memory hitting them. A hand not equipped with a massive drill is raised and gently cups the side of his helmet. There was something about the visage of that Main Gate that strikes him so profoundly. Kamui's mention of this being a ruin to avoid feels apt.
And while that may be true, not letting others delve inside would be just as important. Could the Motherlode be inside? Or something for better... or worse?
Dash hears Ida scream nearby, and rushing a regal-looking member of Solaris.
He recalls the profound statement Ida made during his recovery, and his brow furrows. He isn't gonna let her fight alone, either. "Watch your left!" he calls to Ida, and unleashes a torrent of solar plasma that rips through the air within close proximity to strike at that armored individual.
"I got your back, too!"
The boy takes time to look over the battlefield that has now crowded with dozens of individual, all fighting for a chance to get at the gate. "Did Odessa show up too, even with their wrecked ship?! Jeez." They might need backup, unless in-fighting starts.
"Hm, maybe I should have brought the Active Buster..." Bringing a drill to the battlefield has worked before, but kitting out to delve the Main Gate was the priority.
GS: Dash Caskett has attacked Leah Sadalbari with Buster Salvo! GS: Dash Caskett has gained 2 Combo! GS: Dash Caskett has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
"You could say that. After enough time, the difference between old enemies and old friends can be rather blurry. I hope that's one lesson you don't have to experience too much of," She gives the man a small smile. "...I know why." Marivel admits, glancing away. "...But I made promises I have to keep."
She doesn't have an eye for anyone else. Only Kamui's presence is noted besides Clarissa, Ashley, Boomerang.... and Luceid, of course.
She nods once to Clarissa's words. She doesn't dispute them at all. "But I need to--I need to talk to Luceid. Let me try, please." She begs Clarissa before looking back to the wolf.
Marivel... what have you done!?
"I've hastened--" Marivel begins but the black and crimson energy SLAAAAAMS into her before she can finish her answer. Luceid was always quick to jump the gun. Marivel's form is subsumed by the wolf head energy.
BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2oLSuongkY
The swirling black and crimson energy swirl around in a moment before a faint shimmering green area can be seen faintly between the force of desire itself. The field bursts out from around her, pushing the energy off her--but Marivel is already looking winded.
"I've hastened his return. Lord Blazer will now return to Filgaia sooner than before thanks to be giving him a host. No matter how strong Ashley's will is... Eventually... Lord Blazer will escape. No matter how strong his desire."
She doesn't sound happy about it. "But I had no choice, Luceid. The Promise was already made and the demon we faced is nothing compared to what will come. They need you."
She twirls guillotine around andd its form shifts and crackles, changing from blade to staff.
She slams the staff down into the ground, sending juts of rock and stone bursting out of the ground underneath Luceid. Marivel's specialty may be mechanics, but she can be a sorceress in a pinch.
"Ashley." He says. "Show Boomerang what you can do. Show them what you are capable of."
She leaves it to Ashley to decide this, but her eyes aren't off of Luceid.
"I wanted to ask you to come with us to Pentagulia. We are going to find the truth of what happened that day. You, me, the Guardians. We made too many assumptions!"
GS: Deleting freeattack Turn the Tables. GS: Leah Sadalbari guards a hit from Dash Caskett's Buster Salvo for 61 hit points! GS: Leah Sadalbari's Force Guard activates! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up!
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
He turns his head as The Watcher passes him by, and if his heartrate increases that much, why... who's to know?
His only acknowledgement to her here is to incline his head in a stiff nod. Right now, when he thinks of speaking to her, he can only think of that tattered scrap. And he can't fixate on that now. Or people will die.
He exhales a breath.
There is no preamble as it were. No waving of the hands or incantation. Loren wills it--
Water coils briefly about the Watcher as she strides on ahead, a delicate spray that seemingly dries up in midair before descending about her in a wash of sparkling dust. Then it too fades.
--and it is done. The same in a fashion is done for Azoth, Azoth in his altered battle-ready form, who Loren can see engaging with hostiles not far from him. There is first the impression of hard crystalline edges. Then there is but a puff of mist. Then nothing, the enchantment settling into Azoth's very body.
He doesn't see Lan. He doesn't see her. Not yet.
Not when--
'LOREN!! What are you doing here?'
The shout is /palpable as he twists towards the sound. Just barely, he flinches. Just barely, something in his stance changes. He stands up that much taller, his chest rises that much more shallowly, he
"Fancy meeting you her, van Houten!!"
There's a lot that he doesn't know what to do about, lately. Emotionally speaking, that is. Or, frankly, there's a lot, generally.
But with her, knowing what to do is easy.
He breaks from the squad, shouting to the first Lieutenant to handle things. Because--
If it's any consolation to the Major, the decision would have been made one way or another shortly enough, what with Xantia's arrival.
There are flames, after.
Loren stands amidst the smoldering aftermath, Orias' shield fully extended. ...That isn't Solaris technology. What is it? "Stop me, huh." He twists his wrist; the barrier retracts into the bracer properly.
"I'd like to see you try!"
For her, for Elly -- and unfortunately due to where she's standing also for Gwen -- streamers of water Ether rise, seemingly from the environment about them all. It pulses forward as a wave, barely visible--
Before it suddenly bursts, a hard-edged horizontal downpour surging for the lot of them.
GS: Loren Voss has attacked Leah Sadalbari with Sigma Factor! GS: Loren Voss has gained 1 Combo! GS: Loren Voss has attacked Azoth with Guardian Factor! GS: Loren Voss has gained 2 Combo! GS: Loren Voss has attacked Xantia with Aqua Sequence! GS: Loren Voss has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Aqua Sequence! GS: Loren Voss has attacked Elhaym van Houten with Aqua Sequence! GS: Loren Voss has completed his action. GS: Elhaym van Houten guards a hit from Loren Voss's Aqua Sequence for 51 hit points! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Leah Sadalbari takes a solid hit from Loren Voss's Sigma Factor for 0 hit points! GS: Burst and Surge! applied to Leah Sadalbari! GS: Gwen Whitlock critically Guards a hit from Loren Voss's Aqua Sequence for 19 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
"Hyadean... But that war's over, isn't it? I guess I shouldn't be surprised that there are still some who want to keep fighting, though..." Or perhaps Ashley is just *massively* underestimating how much Boomerang wants to fight. It is, in some ways, like calling the sun 'bright' or magma 'warm.' It's not the Hyadean that makes him double-take, and it's certainly not Boomerang who's responsible for his slack-jawed astonishment.
"You..." He says at the dark wolf's manifestation. "I know you. You're...!"
The one who was always at the Sword Magess' side. The one who, together with the legendary heroine, sealed away the Blaze of Disaster...!
"You're the Guardian of Desire...! Luceid!" It knows Marivel-- and there's no way that it should surprise him. Of course it knows Marivel. But more importantly--
Ashley's gaze snaps back toward the vampire nearly quick enough to give him whiplash, "You didn't tell them!?"
Boomerang's sudden advance catches him halfway off-guard. Ashley makes a strangled noise of surprise when the Hyadean rushes in, surging with violent impulse. The first strike catches him in the jaw and almost sends him sprawling, but he recovers with a stubborn back-step in time to brace his bayonet against the Quarter Knight's kick-- and dodges entirely out of the way of his downward slice...!
"Ghh--!" Ashley grunts as he darts forward, the soft tissue around his right eye already beginning to swell into a painful bruise. He lowers his ARM, almost scraping the ground with the tip of its blade... And then cleaves upward, aiming to slice cleanly into the underside of Boomerang's knee, "You're making a lot of assumptions there! What I am--"
'Lord Blazer will escape. No matter how strong his desire.'
Ashley visibly winces. The reminder-- was not exactly a welcome one. But he fights through it, he fights on through it, because...
"What I am... I'll show you! I don't know what you think I am, but I'm not Lord Blazer! I'm going to be me as long as I'm able to be!"
GS: Marivel Armitage has attacked Boomerang with Do You Remember When We Were Best Of Friends? Or Was That Just Me?! GS: Marivel Armitage has completed her action. GS: Ashley Winchester has attacked Boomerang with Shockslide! GS: Ashley Winchester has gained 1 Combo! GS: Ashley Winchester has completed his action. GS: Xantia takes a solid hit from Loren Voss's Aqua Sequence for 107 hit points! GS: Boomerang completely evades a hit from Marivel Armitage's Do You Remember When We Were Best Of Friends? Or Was That Just Me?! GS: Boomerang enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Emeralda has a certain grasp on the situation that works for Emeralda, but leaves Ivan feeling a little lost. "I mean yes, but--..."
Elhaym is... just a touch more helpful at clarifying the situation. Ivan nods to her. "If they want it, then they're not getting it!" Just on principle, if nothing else.
"All right! Yeah! You! Armor asshole! Let's go!" yells Ivan, as the levitating construct takes notice of them and opens fire. Ivan's armored bracers were not exactly designed with high-tech energy blades in mind, but they buy him some time to shift his body position so he takes the brunt of the damage on his arms, cuts opening up beneath damaged metal.
He turns to see what became of Emeralda during the assault and has to swallow down the entirely-too-familiar horror of watching someone in the process of healing from what would have been a horrifically fatal wound. "AAAAH, YOU GOT CUT IN HALF, ARE YOU ALL RIGHT??" That does it!! Ivan is starting a training school for indestructible robots who need to learn how to dodge enemy attacks so they don't give heart attacks to humans! (Ivan wouldn't this school only have like two students?)
But their enemy is still at large -- and if they're going around cutting young girls in half, they need to be taken down.
"You hear that?! She's not even here to fight and you would have killed her on the spot! What is wrong with you?!"
Jets of fire burst from beneath Ivan's feet, launching him skyward -- it looks aimless at first until he flips in the air and fires off a second set of boosters, then he's careening down toward Azoth, calling a short sword into his hand that seeks a gap in that "armor."
GS: Ivan has attacked Azoth with Rocket Boosters! GS: Ivan has gained 1 Combo! GS: Ivan has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Brad Evans has posed.
The dog is screaming at Ashley and Marivel. This is....not as far off from Brad's experience of Ashley's life as Brad would have once hoped.
Fortunately, Brad has decided Demon And/Or Wizard Shit is solidly not his problem, so he decides to focus on the thing that is. "Got that Odessa shield unit sighted," he announces into the Empathite radio. "Engaging! Watch out for Doppelgangers!"
Then he's charging for Asgard. Kamui goes for the hugs approach. This is.... ...a tactical challenge. For now he settles for leveling the Mechanical Glove's cannon up, peppering the mini-Golem with shells. "Got to test that barrier..." he mutters. "C'mon, c'mon...!" They can't do anything until that door opens.
Oh. Unless that's what the Brad Army is for. They were doing that at the Sub Gate. Shit. "Watch the Doppelgangers!" he calls again. "Last time they were using them for excavation! They might try to blow the doors!"
GS: Brad Evans has attacked Asgard with Iron Fist ! GS: Brad Evans has completed his action. GS: Asgard guards a hit from Brad Evans's Iron Fist for 73 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Asgard gains 1 additional Combo!
<Pose Tracker> Ambrosius has posed.
Ambrosius keeps an eye on the battlefield at large, but his focus now is largely on Ethius himself. The man is a crafty one - it's too dangerous to turn his back on him for long, Ambrosius is well aware of that. And then, Ethius charges. Ambrosius reacts quickly, holding out a hand to catch Ethius's quarterstaff as he tries to ram it. He slides back in the mud a few inches but, without missing a beat Ambrosius pivots, looking to slam Ethius into the same structure he had intended for him - in this case, a bronze pillar decorating the outside of the Main Gate.
"I see no reason to explain myself to you. I am certain you have already reached a conclusion, regardless." Ambrosius replies. "And what of you? Are you here simply to impede our progress?"
GS: Ambrosius has attacked Ethius Hesiod with Turn the Tables! GS: Ambrosius has gained 1 Combo! GS: Ambrosius has completed his action. GS: Ethius Hesiod critically Guards a hit from Ambrosius's Turn the Tables for 22 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ethius Hesiod gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
"I wouldn't expect anything less, Oracle," Ragnell drawls in response, right before Boudicca punches her in the face with a torrential gale. Ragnell digs her heels in, one hand on her hat, as the winds tear at her; when the Seraphic arte dies down, she's been slashed shallowly in several spots, but she's still standing. "An' anyway, it isn't about trust, is it? We're both doin' what we need to do. As long as I'm your enemy, you'd stop me no matter what. Isn't that right?"
A Seraphic glyph of her own lights up golden at her feet, sending up sparkles into the air. At her side, a spear of crackling lightning forms parallel to the ground. "Pierce through!" Ragnell commands, pointing at Boudicca. "Shock Lancer!!"
That lightning spear shoots forward then at Boudicca, bound and determined to do exactly as Ragnell had stated.
GS: Seraph Ragnell spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: Seraph Ragnell has attacked Seraph Boudicca with Shock Lancer! GS: Seraph Ragnell has completed her action. GS: Boomerang takes a glancing hit from Ashley Winchester's Shockslide for 46 hit points! GS: Cripple! applied to Boomerang! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: CRITICAL! Seraph Boudicca completely evades a hit from Seraph Ragnell's Shock Lancer! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Azoth takes a solid hit from Emeralda Kasim's Leg Spin for 133 hit points! GS: Azoth takes a solid hit from Ivan's Rocket Boosters for 155 hit points! GS: Azoth takes a solid hit from Loren Voss's Guardian Factor for 0 hit points! GS: Quick and Shield! applied to Azoth!
<Pose Tracker> Acacia Saitani has posed.
Acacia feels like she has a mountain of words to say. To the other members of ARMS, to whom she hasn't really shown her face since getting that shock two months ago, and to Kamui, where she doesn't even know where to begin. Part of her wants to cover it all up by grumbling out a 'Kamuiiiii--' and scrunching her face in The Claw, but part of her can't bring herself to raise her arms, not sure if she might still be seeing things.
"... welcome back," she says after a long moment and a slow breath, and she tries a shaky and uncertain smile that she hopes has a supportive edge in there somewhere.
She doesn't move when Kamui races to face Asgard down. She's seen the Reploid work this kind of magic before, and there's always the hope that it might work again. Even if it doesn't, the inexorable pace that the golem sets doesn't feel like one that needs to be met with panic and stress - it's almost relaxing, and gives her a moment to try to close her eyes and block out the rest of the cacophony around her.
That, and take several pictures. That, and listen to Marivel's tale. Her expression trends towards D: as much as she tries otherwise.
"Okay, let's-- let's everyone slow down," she mutters. She draws her pistol, and slowly drags it through the air as if met by resistance; white lines collect over its barrel like some sort of etheric spidersilk, before she steps forwards once, lines up a shot at the golem's lower half, and fires the 'sticky' mass forwards. It pools at Asgard's feet, then dissipates - but the dampening force remains.
GS: Acacia Saitani has attacked Asgard with Bury the Lede! GS: Acacia Saitani has gained 1 Combo! GS: Acacia Saitani has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Asgard takes a solid hit from Acacia Saitani's Bury the Lede for 139 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Asgard gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Cripple! applied to Asgard!
<Pose Tracker> Leah Sadalbari has posed.
The Watcher's eyeless gaze casts out over the battlefield. If she's seen Lan, she does not comment on it yet. But she must have; she stops, after all, facing her for a long moment, before turning further.
Ida's roar registers for the Watcher; her head turns, slowly, towards it. There are no eyes in her helmet to look into in return, no gaze to meet and match with fury. "I was not aware that we were 'playing' a game," she replies as she does, the one-two combination immediately lashing out at her. The Watcher steps into the first blow, letting it impact her armor with shattering force though the tabard obscures the damage. The second hits her helmet and shatters some of the inlays there, forcing the Watcher's stance to change enough that her head moves.
In short order, a blast of plasma erupts against her side, bursting into flames and disappearing a moment later. She doesn't react, though there is the clear scent of burnt fabric there.
"Hmm," she reflects. "So you come to me."
The Watcher rights herself, even as Asgard steps closer, and closer, and closer to now the three of them. She makes her decision quickly. She swings down the blade of light straight for Ida in a two-handed strike, as much raw concussive force as cutting power, reaching out to extend her hand towards Dash. Water pools out of the air around him and crashes into his body, moving to strike first at his neck.
"There are many things I have done," she says to Ida. "Do you mean destroying the warrior who hoped to eradicate humanity?" Her voice modulates further as she extends the hand that struck at Dash, a blast of lightning erupting out of her hand towards Asgard. "Yes. I am the one you wish."
"How do you intend to make me answer?"
GS: Leah Sadalbari has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Hammerblow! GS: Leah Sadalbari spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Leah Sadalbari has attacked Dash Caskett with Faithless Grasp! GS: Leah Sadalbari has attacked Asgard with Thundercrash! GS: Leah Sadalbari has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
There's a timer?
Elly blinks several times. Emeralda is running off to see what's timed. This concerns Elly, but she has greater problems on her mind, most of them being related to Loren Voss as she grips her staff. The water comes down on her at great force, and Elly can do little but shudder and shiver at its impact. When it fades, she looks up and...
Xantia is pointing at Loren with accusation. Elly blinks a couple of times, but with an exhalation, she strides forwards, holding the metal rod before her in both hands, balanced in the crook of her thumb. Ready to twist and catch incoming blades, but perhaps more important is what else she does.
Which is, in part, say, "Loren, what are you after here?" in a somewhat less ear-ringing projection.
The shield he has... why is he using unauthorized equipment? Elly thinks. That isn't just a trophy blade or something. If he's using it there has to be a reason --
As she thinks, a star twinkles above Elly, twirls round and draws in three spots of red, and forms a beautiful stellate prism! Which then smashes downwards to burst, not on Loren but directly behind him -- rude! But tactically meaningful, perhaps! If nothing else it might discourage backup!
GS: Elhaym van Houten has attacked Loren Voss with Thermo Crystalmelt! GS: Elhaym van Houten has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Asgard takes a solid hit from Leah Sadalbari's Thundercrash for 149 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Asgard gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Mute! applied to Asgard! GS: Dash Caskett takes a solid hit from Leah Sadalbari's Faithless Grasp for 78 hit points! GS: Entangle! applied to Dash Caskett! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes a solid hit from Leah Sadalbari's Hammerblow for 109 hit points! GS: Break! applied to Ida Everstead-Rey!
<Pose Tracker> Boomerang has posed.
"Huh--not bad," Boomerang compliments Clarissa, when she dodges. He realizes it almost belatedly, and he spins on a foot to look at her. He doesn't even move when Strahl Gewehr fires. The bolt of blue slams into his chest, the armor plate on it smearing black. His head tilts to the side. Behind him, he hears a soft snarl -- Luceid, interrupted by the blast continuing on, to strike into them too.
"You've got guts, kid," he says. "And good form. Most people don't dodge. It's kind of annoying, how many great fights get cut short because I split them in half? And then it's annoying, they're this pile of blood and bones! And it's not really a contest, when humans are in a bunch of pieces."
He sighs. "Human biology, am I right?"
"Justice is purchased in blood, not petty whining, Boomerang!"
"Oh," Boomerang says to Luceid, and then he barks out a laugh. "That's right. Sorry, kid, this isn't gonna be PLEASANT!"
He rushes in. Boomerang is a blur as he closest the distance between him and Clarissa, and his weapon flashes out, striking hard for her side, before he kicks off it and back into the air. He back flips as he does, solid red eyes shifting subtly towards Marivel.
"You sully her memory! You spit on everything that Anastasia was!" Luceid howls back at her. Their jaws drip with lather, as they pad forward, one foot at a time. "And you dare--you dare to tell me that this world needs me! When you betray all of us so!"
Rock and stone explode up at Luceid, but they are not there. No, they have vanished in a flash, and appear just to the side of Marivel. They rush forward, then, barreling straight towards Marivel. The first pounce slams the vampire backward, bodily, and their jaws open. Their eyes turn up, towards Ashley. "Silence, Lord Blazer! Your lies shall not reach mine ears!"
Their eyes turn towards Marivel. Their fangs are opened. They drip with shadow. With rage. With sorrow. With a desire, however dark it they may be.
"I damn you, Marivel Armitage! I will end you -- and then end this husk before it should become the death of our world! I will not walk with you, not after you do this!"
Boomerang back flips down, near Ashley, and Crescent Saber slams down to meet the bayonet. The blades meet wtih a spray of sparks, but the blade cleaves into Boomerang's leg, slashing along metal. "I'm really curious what you are!" he says back at him. "Can't you feel it? That thing in you--wanting to be let out, wanting to fight--"
There is no grin. Just the flat, featureless metal of Boomerang's alien face, as he leans in closer. "Wanting the thrill of the fight? C'mon--LET IT OUT!"
He swings around his sword again. One-handed and so quick; it breaks through the parry, the bayonet's blade flying back in a shower of sparks, and then he thrusts the blade hard, straight for Ashley Winchester's midsection.
GS: Boomerang has attacked Clarissa Arwin with Saber Crash! GS: Boomerang has gained 2 Combo! GS: Boomerang has attacked Marivel Armitage with Shadow Fangs! GS: Boomerang enters a Counter stance! GS: Boomerang has gained 2 Combo! GS: Boomerang has attacked Ashley Winchester with Crescent Fang! GS: Boomerang has gained 1 Combo! GS: Boomerang has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Clarissa Arwin completely evades a hit from Boomerang's Saber Crash! GS: Loren Voss takes a glancing hit from Elhaym van Houten's Thermo Crystalmelt for 60 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Loren Voss gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Marivel Armitage takes a solid hit from Boomerang's Shadow Fangs for 181 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
I didn't know there would be any -
Any... any what? Does she know him? Know of him? He can't he can't he can't ERROR stop ERROR please ERROR ERROR OVERRIDE ELIMINATE TARGETS
Emeralda's body is torn open. No no no no ERROR no -- but then, rapidly, in a way entirely inhuman, the damage begins to repair. Who is this, what is this, her form, her voice her ERROR she's different but ERROR still like him OVERRIDE ELIMINATE TARGETS
She's not even here to fight and you would have killed her on the spot! What is wrong with you?!
ERROR TARGET RECOGNIZED ERROR ERROR ELIMATE
Azoth's body twitches, pained, glitched sounds coming from the frame. He staggers, stumbling on the ground on his blade-like legs instead floating. "I -- I -- I -- I --"
Emeralda smashes her drill of a leg straight through his, and like her, there's no flesh, but instead sparking, exposed wiring and scattering chunks of metal. Ivan comes down in follow up, and what the cloak obscured before, Ivan will easily find: there are plenty of gaps in that armor, with Azoth's muscles being nothing more than exposed bundles of pulsating cords. Ivan's blade slices straight through those of Azoth's arm, severing them with another show of sparks and a glitched, warp sound of... pain?
ERROR ERROR ERROR CRITICAL DAMAGE SUSTAINED ERROR ELIMATE TARGETS
Loren's assistance wraps around Azoth's body, and Azoth's gaze becomes blindingly bright and crimson for it. His attention locks on Ivan. Calculating beeps are the only warning he receives as dozens of bright, red beams blast out from Azoth's body, darting around erratically before changing course to all aim directly for the once cat finder. Sorry, Beans.
Another blade of red light forms nearby, hesitating and flickering before he makes a brutal thrust for Emeralda's middle. ABORT ABORT ERROR OVERRIDE ELIMINATE The blade explodes prematurely.
If only that made it less dangerous, not more.
GS: Azoth spends 1 Combo on Poison! GS: Azoth has attacked Ivan with exec.ohr LOCKINGON! GS: Azoth has gained 2 Combo! GS: Azoth has attacked Emeralda Kasim with exec.mec DESTRUCTION! GS: Azoth has gained 1 Combo! GS: Azoth has completed his action. GS: Azoth has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Boudicca has posed.
That is the fact of their existence - isn't it? The Oracle, and the enemy of all Filgaia...
"Perhaps so," Boudicca says, and there is a weight to the words which suggests it is not the easiest obligation. But for all the weight of those questions, they are followed, speed of light, by Ragnell's own Arte --
The wind picks up as Boudicca lunges to the side, and in her evasion of the sorcery she finds herself balanced, upside-down, tip of her tonfa on the ground holding the rest of her aloft. It might not be strictly physically possible, but, well - gravity plays favourites around Boudicca, and she particularly does not want to get hit by Ragnell's magic.
Cartwheeling the rest of the way, she comes down, greaves to ground again. "Perhaps one of these days I will be able to convince you of the joy one can find without unravelling the world," Boudicca says, "but until then, you cannot expect to enact these ills without my dogged jeremiad. You will not get away with it, Ragnell. Just as you say."
Springing forward, it's her tonfa which lash out again - three quick strikes to try and send Ragnell flying. One might expect, at this point, for her to spring up and attack from the air --
But this time, a Seraphic glyph lights up, and a gust just crashes in after the physical strikes.
Is Boudicca learning to be a little less predictable?!
GS: Seraph Boudicca spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Seraph Boudicca has attacked Seraph Ragnell with Cerberus Strike! GS: Seraph Boudicca has launched an attack Link! GS: Seraph Boudicca has attacked Seraph Ragnell with Unpredictable Conditions! GS: Seraph Boudicca has completed her action. GS: Seraph Ragnell takes a glancing hit from Seraph Boudicca's Cerberus Strike for 73 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Ragnell gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Disrupt! applied to Seraph Ragnell!
<Pose Tracker> Asgard has posed.
The blast of lightning from Leah shockingly, makes him halt. What Ethius could not do before with his incredible spell of electricity, calls Asgard to account. His barrier momentarily just shorts out. And his steps halt. Long enough that Kamui has time enough to close in on him.
How do you intend to make me answer?
He is incapable of any answer currently, other than storing this new data, and continuing his forward advance.
Asgard does not even mark Kamui as a threat, despite her coming straight at him. Perhaps it is the lack of aggression that causes her not to pick up on her as one despite his barrier not currently being up.
The moment she reaches out for his hand though, she's able to grasp ahold for several long seconds. But he does not slow, not even as the reploid conveys her heartfelt emotions. It is like the Golem does not even notice her and is simply content to drag her along.
Until the moment that his foot outpaces her hand holding for a moment, and there is the faintest tug in the opposite direction.
That is the moment he interprets her as a threat. The moment that the pressure in his hand tries to take his attention away from the Watcher.
Suddenly his fingers attempt to seize hold of her by the wrist, and the yellow of his eyes changes to stark red at the moment he shifts into aggression. Glowing, searing orbs, that carry a complete lack of feeling, caring as they stare at her, marking everything he can about her at a glance.
Like everyone else, Kamui is simply battle data to him. Though now that she is a threat, he retroactively seems to process the auditory data.
I--I promised you... I wouldn't be... so why are you fighting for them?!
Acacia's shot finds him the moment he turns aggressive, his barrier systems still not up yet. The sticky dampening force of the shot sinking into his legs.
And then Brad rushes him next, and the veteran soldier's massive fist clashes against something that appears in front of him, a blue field of energy that seems as solid as any wall to him - apparently his barrier systems just finally managed to reboot from Leah's attack.
The eyes of the Golem remain focused on Kamui in these moments. Yet as Brad drives his knuckles further, and further in with his incredible strength, his posture changes.
Wrenching Kamui's arm as he lifts her off the ground. A quick mass evaluation decides that it is significant enough to be useful.
Then raising his giant arm in an overhand pitch, he hurls her straight at Leah with all of his might, pitching her low enough to the ground that Kamui might bounce like a stone across a pond en route to her.
Without missing a beat, his foot grinds into the earth, scattering rocks as he hooks his left fist straight towards Brad's ribcage. The blow erupts with a shockwave on contact, simply from the power he puts into it.
As he turns around, still sluggish from Acacia's shot, he reaches out with a backhand from his other fist. It feels like he simply will not reach her. Like perhaps he was slowed down just enough that he misjudged her range...
... and then a shimmering blue field subtly glimmers over his fist, that field extending to buffet her despite the fact that his fist makes no direct contact.
GS: Asgard has attacked Kamui with Iron Grip! GS: Asgard has attacked Leah Sadalbari with Watcher Seeking MUIssile! GS: Seraph Ragnell completely evades a hit from Seraph Boudicca's Unpredictable Conditions! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Seraph Ragnell enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Shieldbreak expired! GS: Asgard has attacked Brad Evans with Iron Fist! GS: Asgard has gained 1 Combo! GS: Asgard has attacked Acacia Saitani with Barrier Knuckle! GS: Asgard has completed his action. GS: Ivan takes a solid hit from Azoth's exec.ohr LOCKINGON for 169 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ivan gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Poison! applied to Ivan! GS: Kamui guards a hit from Asgard's Iron Grip for 93 hit points! GS: Sneak! The true nature of Azoth's attack becomes clear! GS: Emeralda Kasim critically Guards a hit from Azoth's ?x??.ERR?R E??OR??RO? for 35 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Emeralda Kasim gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Brad Evans critically Guards a hit from Asgard's Iron Fist for 27 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
It's fine. She can't afford to hesitate again. Whatever happens, she can't let herself give in to regret. Lan tells herself that, over and over--
A litany that freezes mid-sentence inside of her head when she sees an all-too-familiar Gebler helmet turn and gaze in her direction. She gets ready, weight shifting up onto the balls of her feet. Leah has seen her, Leah knows she's here--!
Leah... turns away.
Somehow, this doesn't make Lan feel any better. Like, at all.
Why did she come here? To cower? To freeze?
She didn't even come here to fight. She just wanted to get away for a while.
She just wanted to forget, but the world won't let her.
Water Ether bursts and hurtles toward Gwen and Elly. Lan comes up behind the courier, resting a hand on her shoulder. "You okay?" she asks, keeping her eyes on Loren.
Well, it's not like she could have run forever.
GS: Acacia Saitani guards a hit from Asgard's Barrier Knuckle for 59 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
Loren and Lan are friends. They went to the carnival together, right? She even has a stuffed toy from that, which is currently on her Gear's visior.
Sure, Loren and Gwen fought after that, but that's just what happens when Solaris muddies the waters.
She can trust Loren, Gwen feels, from that weird corner of her mind. At least, with this much. He should know, she thinks, about what's going on with Lan.
But what *should* Gwen tell him?
"Loren-"
It's that moment that Loren sends out those currents of water, filling Gwen's open mouth. The next moment Gwen's Mockingbird flashes a transparent energy shield on impulse, absorbing a majority of the impact, at the cost of Gwen being propelled backwards into the dirt.
Looking up at the sky, Gwen's grey-blue eyes wince closed. "Bah, this is the worst time for..."
It's just a small distraction, something Gwen is mindful of due to her recent visit with Ashley. Blazer... return... host.
'No matter how strong Ashley's will is--'
Gwen forces herself back onto her legs, a shudder running through her body.
Why is it, when Gwen begins to doubt herself...
"... I guess that's one more reason. Gotta fight fire with fire, huh..." Gwen charges herself, calling on the power in her ARM, letting it infuse her just enough... but not completely.
Lan's hand touches Gwen's shoulder, and the courier looks to her, and nods. "... Lan. What do you want me to do? Xantia n' Elly'll listen to me, I think, if we try something different."
GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Bounding Flight! GS: Gwen Whitlock has gained 1 Combo! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action. GS: Gwen Whitlock takes a solid hit from Gwen Whitlock's Bounding Flight for 0 hit points! GS: Hyper and Quick! applied to Gwen Whitlock!
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.
Xantia is certainly curious about that barrier Loren just used. Especially given that it comes from a bracer. She can't help but glance at the bracer on her own right arm - also not Solarian technology, but similar enough to suspect a Shevat connection. It does something similar, just offensive in nature instead of defensive. She can't help but wonder...
But she's not afforded to opportunity to wonder for very long. She soon is made to discover a flaw in attuning one's body to Ether of a certain element: a weakness to the opposite element. When the sudden flow of water manifests and strikes her, she -screams-, experiencing a pain quite unlike what she's felt before. Her own flames don't burn her, yet contact with water suddenly made it very much feel like she was on fire, inside and out. Steam rises around her, yet her fiery aura doesn't quite extinguish. Though managing to remain dry isn't much of a consolation following that ordeal.
The fire surrounding Xantia's body is left visibly diminished in intensity due to that ordeal. She yet stands, but she's shaking, fending off the aftereffects of the shock of that sudden searing pain. She only has one thing to say on the matter.
"That... was cheating."
She briefly glances aside to notice Gwen for the first time. Then her gaze turns to Elly, reminding her of who she's trying to protect. Not just Elly. But also Fei. And Lily. Honestly, most of the Black Wolves by now have a story to tell that involves Loren, and any one of them would be enough to raise Xantia's ire. With all of that combined...
Xantia's aura flares up again, regaining its former intensity. "You'd like to see!? Then watch this!"
The attack is deceptively simple. Xantia seems to be attempting to do little more than drive her fist into Loren's stomach. But that would be disregarding a number of facts. a) Her fist is on fire. b) She has superhuman strength. c) She knows enough of martial arts to be well aware of how to best knock the wind out of somebody. And d)... She is rather angry at the moment, and wouldn't mind giving Loren a bit of a taste of his own medicine. Due to the way her Ether functions, should the strike connect, she'll be able to effectively share the sensation of what it feels like to be burning on the inside.
GS: Xantia spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: Xantia has attacked Loren Voss with Shatterstrike! GS: Xantia has completed her action. GS: Leah Sadalbari critically Guards a hit from Asgard's Watcher Seeking MUIssile for 20 hit points! GS: Leah Sadalbari's Force Guard activates!
<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.
Ambrosius pivots, and Ethius wrenches with an advantage in leverage and only that to stop himself from being flung against the wall. It's not to say he stops Ambrosius from overpowering him, when the end result is a twinge going up his left arm and a moment where his right knee slams against the ground.
The bronze pillar remains ungraced by either of their backs. For now.
The Veruni will be able to hear the exertion involved. It takes Ethius using both hands to try and fight against force Ambrosius can exert with just one, and it's a losing proposition. This isn't outside of expectations - Veruni physiology sees them with far greater physical strength than humans, and the human is a dedicated sorcerer. There is something of a glass ceiling for a dedicated sorcerer's athletic abilities for the energy it takes, and this man flattens himself against it.
Water continues to drip from the soaked Symbologist. As the losing wrestling match over a quarterstaff with Ambrosius is seeing Ethius circled around, he can catch the incredible movements of Boomerang (or rather, not, he's too fast), the blinding light of several pictures being taken to that startling barrier-wielding Asgard. Acacia's camera going off makes Ethius flinch even though he is nowhere near her or in her sights, for some reason. It may be disguised as fatigue and muscle pain from the fight over the staff, but it is... curious.
Ambrosius denies him his question, and turns those tables. "...You would ask," is the most Ethius can get out in that breath. It is sort of odd to ask, but everything about the man before Ambrosius is just plain off. He does not use abilities those of Solaris and... at least one other place demonstrate. He's a human being. He should not be approaching the likes of Ambrosius - or reason forbid, Kartikeya - with the level of confidence and calm that he has shown prior.
Is it something that goes beyond just mere impeding of progress? Ethius hasn't said before. Will he now?
"..."
Can he now?
He lets go of the quarterstaff with only a small tell to his true intent as he unclenches his right hand first, mixing that in with the first gesture of a Symbological incantation where he mouths out the syllables with record speed. One glow-up of what tattoos are visible later...
"Dust Compress." There is a lot of dust and grime kicked up from the current battle. The air nearby becomes unnaturally cleaner for a few seconds as a lot of it starts to descend upon Ambrosius' position to try and smother him.
GS: Ethius Hesiod has attacked Ambrosius with Dust Compress! GS: Ethius Hesiod has completed his action. GS: Ambrosius guards a hit from Ethius Hesiod's Dust Compress for 97 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
'Watch your left!'
Dash's plasma fire sears past Ida, and she is profoundly grateful for the advance warning. The backup, too--Ida had a hell of a time fighting this person with Zed and Tesni's help, and is not about to turn down assistance. "Dash!" Ida says, eyes darting sidelong. She gives a single nod of thanks.
The situation evolves. An all-too-familiar flare of power flows through Ida's hindbrain--last sensed, ironically, on a day she'd rather forget about. Luceid, it seems, is back with their current master. She should've expected that. To make matters worse, the thing Zed and Boudicca fought starts advancing on her, and it is...
A cold comfort indeed when it opens up on Grigori instead of her or Dash. Ida takes a moment to stare into that emotionless helm. In the back of her mind, she feels Fafnir's rage mingle with confusion and hope.
the prototype...? has it come here to--
"KAMUI!" Ida shouts, as one massive hand grabs for the Reploid. "WATCH--"
Of course, Ida has problems of her own to worry about. The Watcher's blade sweeps out for her, and Ida leaps out of the way, twisting in mid-air. She almost makes it. The concussive force slams into her, and she feels her ribs creak beneath her armored vest. Moments later, the blade itself tears into that vest, cauterizing the wound as it cleaves. Ida bites back a scream of pain.
The prototype. It's here. It's fighting Siegfried's murderer. And yet, none of it makes sense, it feels so dream-like--
"You did," Ida says, teeth bared as she looks at Grigori. "You killed a father, a dear friend, a source of inspiration--but enough about Siegfried!" Ida throws her arms wide. More exoskeleton bubbles from her flesh, sealing the wound shut and flowing across her torso. "You turned Lydia into a glorified puppet." It rises up to form headgear, and down to form a breastplate, greaves, boots; the armor she wears adjusts subtly, becoming a highly efficient undersuit. "You see us not as people, but as animals."
When the transformation ends, Ida stands before the Watcher in full Hyadean exoskeleton. The only human flesh visible is her face, framed by headgear that leaves her hair free, like Harken's; a single, Valkyrie-like wing graces her right temple. The rest looks like it was pieced together from two separate suits--one blue and gold, baroque and elegant, the other gold, red, and black, sleek and high-tech and vaguely draconic.
"I couldn't kill you," Ida says, her mismatched eyes alive with fury. "But -we- might."
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
"I've been trying but I couldn't find them!" Marivel shouts back at Ashley. "It's not like I have them on speed dial!" The tears threatening to spill from her eyes as she snarls this to Ashley might be reason enough for him to secondguess his instinct here.
Nevertheless, Marivel's face pales when Luceid howls that she betrayed Anastasia's memory. When she... When she... When she is the betrayer...
Marivel's body shakes. The grip on her staff slackens. "Lucy..." She murmurs. She tightens her fist against the staff. "I'm the betrayer...? Me?..."
She loks up sharply. "Where were you?! I've chased you across this world! So we could figure out what to do together, and you always... you always stuck by him! How could I share you what I've learned, when you weren't around!? How could we decide anything when ... when you're so angry! Have you forgotten who killed MY people, Luceid? Have you forgotten who made me the last of my kind?! Have you forgotten everything else except your rage?!"
BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lclt459JpVQ
She shakes her head rapidly. "I'm Alone In This World because of him! Do you think I would do this LIGHTLY?! Who do you think chose him!?"
She points towards Ashley. "That man... Is Anastasia's successor! She chose him! i just agreed because...because he..."
The staff drops from her hands as the pain overcomes heer rage. End her, then end this husk. The wolf tackles into her boddy and she just...
She just lets it happen. Their jaws slam into her body. Can even a Crimson Noble just shrug off a Guardian's desire to consign them to oblivion? Not if they wish for it hard enough. And Luceid feels like they want that.
Marivel raises a smoky hand as her black dust sways out from her body in the wind.
And she places her hand on Luceid's fur. She pets them, once.
"He's... He's the one she picked. But you promisedd right?"
"You'll send me...where my parents are."
"Nowhere. I long for that embrace, to see them again with empty eyes that have been dusted to less than ash."
"But please... Zophar is real... I saw it..."
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Third Method - Shaping the Battle-Forged Shell ! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has gained 1 Combo! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action. GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes a solid hit from Ida Everstead-Rey's Third Method - Shaping the Battle-Forged Shell for 0 hit points! GS: Shield! applied to Ida Everstead-Rey! GS: Cover! applied to Ida Everstead-Rey! GS: Marivel Armitage has attacked Boomerang with Please Return Me To Oblivion So That I May See What Lies When The Soul Is No More! GS: Marivel Armitage has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
For a moment, it's as if she can get... through... perhaps? The Golem doesn't respond with violence immediately, not in kind. Then she realises--
Eh? She's lifted uuuup, as they get to stare at each other for a moment.
Their faces meet; Kamui's stricken, half-broken face, her similarly Golem-like camera lens and good human eye both staring wilfully towards the coated Golem for whom she has a strange recollection.
Acacia's drawn her pistol to take aim at the golem, and Brad himself rears up with the Mechanical Glove to blast Asgard with shells.
"I promised you..."
And then, Ida shouts out a warning and--
*YEEEEEEEEEEEEET*
What happens next is Kamui sails through the air towards Leah and--
Cartoon-like, goes *skid* *skid* *skid* on a pond, complete with sound effects--
--and *BOP*! She lands in a mysterious, menacing masked lady's arms. Kamui, didn't your mother ever tell you to not get caught by masked ladies with beam sabers? (no, no, she probably didn't.)
"Ohh, umm... sorry, ma'am!" Kamui gets off and looks up towards Leah, having no idea who this person is or her allegiances or that she should probably not be doing this!! "I'm Kamui, it's nice to meet you!"
If only she knew.
She does turn back towards Asgard, though, and her expression turns a bit more gloomy. "Why... why would you do this? This isn't... you..."
A pause, as she holds her head again. "Wait... do I know you? No, I... I know I do? Do I?"
*STATIC*
This prompts another unfortunate short mental spasm as she reels back, drawing her head up again as she whispers, "I need you to remember right now, brain..."
There's no other choice. She needs a focus, a totem of sorts -- a way for her to dig into the immense and bizarre labyrinth that is the tangle of her memories. The Buster isn't what's going to be useful right now, so...
She runs for the Golem again. And then, where a reasonable Drifter would attack with a sword or gun or sling a spell, she--
Pulls out her Picto Obscura, and turns around as she stretches her arm as far as she possibly can.
"Asgard!! You and me! Say... Fuzzy Pickles!!"
GS: Kamui has attacked Asgard with Shutter Chance! Selfie! GS: Kamui has gained 1 Combo! GS: Kamui has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
'Perhaps one of these days I will be able to convince you of the joy one can find without unravelling the world...'
Ragnell just laughs.
When Boudicca springs at Ragnell with her tonfa and whacks at her several times, Ragnell moves with her, which still allows the tonfa to whack her, but with not as much force as if Ragnell were trying to block or soak. It would be a natural next move for her to leap backwards, or for Boudicca to move up--but then Boudicca summons an arte to follow up on her initial attack. It roars forward, air slashing in all directions--but while Boudicca might be learning to be less predictable, ultimately the most predictable of all is Ragnell. She leaps *upwards*, twirling in midair as the wind blows beneath her, and then opens fire with her paired pistols on the Wind Seraph below, a rapid *rattatattat* not unlike the sound of torrential rain on a window pane. At least, *someone* will be in pain.
"You're gettin' some good moves in, Bou! Is this improvement 'cuz o' your Seers? Or is it somethin' else?" Despite the supportive nature of these words, Ragnell's *tone* sounds taunting. Perhaps she's mocking her fellow Seraph.
GS: Seraph Ragnell enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Seraph Ragnell has attacked Seraph Boudicca with Storm Runner! GS: Seraph Ragnell has gained 1 Combo! GS: Seraph Ragnell has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Asgard takes a glancing hit from Kamui's Shutter Chance! Selfie for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Asgard gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Entangle! applied to Asgard! GS: Asgard's Force Evade activates! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Loren Voss critically Guards a hit from Xantia's Shatterstrike for 24 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Loren Voss gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Hyper! applied to Xantia! GS: Ashley Winchester guards a hit from Boomerang's Crescent Fang for 102 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ashley Winchester gains 1 additional Combo!
<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.
"I'm okay!" Emeralda assures Ivan. Which seems to be the case, or at least she's okay enough to keep going; she's going to have to do some repair and replacement later, but that's a problem for later. She certainly doesn't seem... well, cut in half. "Are YOU okay?"
She hops back, her foot turning back into a foot again so she can stop balancing on one leg. She felt metal, and she looks down at the hole she drilled. She feels...
Confused? Confused is a good word for it.
"Are you... broken?" Emeralda isn't sure if that is the right word. She feels bad using it. But Azoth sounds more like one of the glitchy ancient security robots she's met once or twice than, say, Tio or Kamui (smile for the camera, Kamui).
Broken or not, he's still got a sword. A LASER sword. Emeralda's hair spreads wide and curls across in front of her, like a shield; also like a shield, it takes the brunt of the blow, rocking her back from the explosion. It could be worse, though, and it insulated the worst of the blast from her body.
"I'm sorry, but even if you are broken, if you keep trying to hurt people I have to stop you! If you just want to go to the Gate that's different!!" Emeralda pauses, then adds: "Can you talk?" He said 'I', after all. She remembers, faintly, what it was like to be told what to do... what it was like when she was starting to wake up, but Solaris sent her out.
But Emeralda puts action to words. Her scarf lashes out of its own accord, stretching long before wrapping around one of Azoth's arms, painfully yanking him off-balance like she was using it as another limb. Or that's the goal, anyway. And for all Emeralda is tiny compared to Azoth, she has mass, and she makes a good anchor.
GS: Emeralda Kasim has attacked Azoth with Ribbon Lock! GS: Emeralda Kasim has gained 1 Combo! GS: Emeralda Kasim has completed her action. GS: Seraph Boudicca critically Guards a hit from Seraph Ragnell's Storm Runner for 32 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Boudicca gains 1 additional Combo!
<Pose Tracker> Clarissa Arwin has posed.
Clarissa's heart is racing in a way she can't fully explain. It's a feeling she's felt a few times before, but she's rarely had time to think about its implications or its causes. It's more than the heat of battle - for in truth, she hates fighting. She doesn't get excited about it the way someone like Ratatoskr does.
There's something else driving her into the danger. Something beyond a need for battle.
It's something she can see a shade of in Marivel. With a glance to the smaller but wiser woman, she nods. "Please be careful," she encourages, before taking a second to listen to what Marivel says - and what it portends for Ashley.
She swallows the lump in her throat and pushes out a slow breath. There are things afoot she doesn't understand, but it scarcely matters. Not with Filgaia potentially in danger - but as it becomes clear who the wolf actually is, things feel a little more clear. A chill races down her spine.
They're fighting a Guardian. A Hyadean is in league with a literal deity. By all rights she should not be walking out of this alive. She's not equipped for this. She's not a Crimson Noble with millennia of wisdom and power. She doesn't have a transcendent hyperpower dwelling in her soul.
Clarissa Arwin, a perfectly normal human who doesn't even like to fight, doesn't so much as hesitate as she turns to face a manifest god and their Hyadean companion. Her heart thuds in her chest but her eyes and spirit are clear and focused.
It doesn't matter.
Boomerang simply shoulders through her blast like it's nothing. Even with Strahl Gewehr in hand, it's becoming clearer and clearer that Clarissa's outmatched. As the former Quarter Knight ruminates on the fragile biology of Clarissa and her fellow meatsacks, she draws herself up with an intake of breath. "I'm not fighting you because I'm looking for a fun time, Mr. Boomerang," she begins to retort.
Boomerang interrupts her before she can monologue. That dreadful blade once again lashes out, ready to reduce her to yet another pile of guts and gore--
Clarissa drops her left knee without thinking.
With a whistle of severed air molecules, Boomerang's blade slashes inches above Clarissa's head as she suddenly drops to the ground and rolls to the side. The tumble is a little graceless, to be sure, but it's again a thing borne of instinct.
She's saved herself again, by the narrowest of margins - but what follows isn't the tactically smart move. There's no shot back at Boomerang. Clarissa's not even moving towards him.
She's running towards someone else.
Throwing herself across the battlefield, Clarissa skids in between Luceid and Marivel with incredible urgency. Her eyes are wide as she throws her arms around the wounded Crimson Noble's upper body, dropping to a knee to pull Marivel close to her chest. She's turned her body to present her back and flank to Luceid - and to position herself between the rampaging god and the wounded vampire.
When Clarissa looks over her shoulder, the emotions in her face are as easy to read as a page in an open book. Tension, sure. Maybe even worry. But not fear. There's something more to it. She knows that she's a completely baseline flesh-and-blood human standing up to a god - that Luceid's more than a match for her, that they're likely to tear her to shreds and end her life.
None of it stops her from raising her voice to shout defiantly at a literal deity.
"Leave her alone!!"
Her arms tighten around Marivel as she pulls the wounded woman securely into her, trying her best to both shield her and staunch the worst of her injuries with her bare hands. "Marivel, please," she urges her. "Please don't feel like you're alone... I know I'm just one person, but you've done so much for me... so much for all of us...! You're..."
a tiny flower blooms in her memory. so small. so treacherous.
"...You're my friend, Marivel," she says with a sniffle as she hunkers over the Crimson Noble, her back turned to Luceid like a human shield. "So please... please, don't give up...."
Marivel can feel how tense Clarissa's shoulders are. Bracing her body feels futile. Luceid could kill her with a sneeze. She does it anyway.
GS: Clarissa Arwin has attacked Marivel Armitage with My Most Honest Desire! GS: Clarissa Arwin has gained 1 Combo! GS: Clarissa Arwin has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Acacia Saitani has posed.
Acacia should be worried. Her heart is already kind of hammering in her chest, and there's enough in the way of danger around them that she absolutely should be looking for a way out. She's not the most courageous person in ARMS - at least, until her temper gets to her - and she's out of practice besides. Brad's uncertainty and anger is proof enough of that.
And yet, seeing Kamui get tossed off of Asgard in the most comical of fashions by a slow-paced golem is so... natural that she almost finds herself relaxing. She's not even sure if Asgard is going to attack her at first; she's stood far enough out of the inexorable machine's path that she's honestly not certain, and the slow backhand is distant enough she doesn't register a threat until barely an instant before.
But Brad's mention of a barrier pulls her to alertness just in time to raise her guard, arms going up to block her face in a boxer's stance. The impact of the blow still sends her skidding backwards before her heels can dig into the ground and catch herself, and she's gritting her teeth and feeling her legs quiver as she pushes herself forwards, trying not to notice the two furrows Asgard has made with her feet.
"Oooookay then," she mutters under her breath, registering that Kamui still seems to be on her feet and trying to distract the golem as best she can. (Acacia has a long history of assuming the best of Kamui's intentions, and it's been a while.) She takes the opportunity to sweep around Asgard's form, looking for some kind of opening - and when she can find absolutely none at all, curses under her breath and settles for vaulting up at the figure's shoulders from behind.
She hesitates, then pushes up off of Asgard's back in a somersault, a sparking flare erupting into an arc of flame as she crashes one heel down on the metallic plating. Maybe this will just end with a wicked bruise on her ankle, but she has to at least try. "Brad, you're up!"
GS: Acacia Saitani has attacked Asgard with Special Edition! GS: Acacia Saitani has gained 1 Combo! GS: Acacia Saitani has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Dash Caskett has posed.
The shots land, though as expected of Solaris tech, even just armor, there is little effect. At least immediately noticed.
Retaliation is swift via magic, and water condenses and rushes for Dash, particularly around the neck. "Hey! Cut it out!" he calls, trying to get away from it to little effect.
He does a good job in weighing him down, though perhaps the main aim of the attack does little in what The Watcher hoped for. "That trick isn't gonna work on me!" he says, even as his throat is crushed. He appears to have little trouble talking, even now.
There may have been a slight static pop to those perceptive, like some kind of feedback. Most likely water related.
And then that giant robot Asgard comes charging across the battlefield toward the armored individual. "Woah! Is he on our side this time?" Kamui is near them. Maybe she knows Asgard?
And then Asgard grips her and throws her like a weapon. "Hey! Party foul! She isn't a throwing weapon!" he says, pointing that large bot's way. Oddly enough, the throw was aimed at The Watcher. Reacting quickly, he reaches for his pack and chucks a grenade her way! "Kamui! Look out! I'll cover your getaway!"
"Wait, is this person to one that affected the lady I fought? That is super not cool." Now he really wants to fight this person, and he normally dislikes fighting.
GS: Asgard guards a hit from Acacia Saitani's Special Edition for 59 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Asgard gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Break! applied to Asgard! GS: Dash Caskett has attacked Leah Sadalbari with Grand Grenade! GS: Dash Caskett has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Leah Sadalbari takes a glancing hit from Dash Caskett's Grand Grenade for 49 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Leah Sadalbari gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Disrupt! applied to Leah Sadalbari! GS: Boomerang completely evades a hit from Marivel Armitage's Please Return Me To Oblivion So That I May See What Lies When The Soul Is No More!
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
There's a vague similarity between bracers -- both seem to be pieces of unknown and ancient origin. But where hers brighter and metallic... his is a dull matte black. Is it even a metal? A single purple stone glints in it dully.
"I don't cheat! How dare you!" he snarls at Xantia, more wounded for the comment than any fist or flame she could have cast his way. "--You're none of my business. Get out of my way--!"
He can see that Elly's already--
She's using it. Ether. At once he rushes forward, keen at both escaping the fire and reaching her. It's just that Xantia's in his way. She, of burning aura and intent, drives a fist right for him. The bracer, again, unfolds itself into a shield, in the same moment that--
Elly's flame itself curls about him and past him, and detonates in a terrible storm of fire and force just beyond. Somewhere in the background the first lieutenant calls for the support division to pull back; a safer location is advised.
They're a little beyond Loren's immediate focus, now.
Gritting his teeth, Loren holds firm against the strike from Xantia, streaks in the dust where the force of her impact -- regardless of the shield's protection -- has forced him back. "I said, get out-- of my way--!!!"
He slams the shield for her, as if to bowl her over, or at the very least, to force her back. Once the opening presents itself, he rushes down Elly; the bracer's barrier might have retracted, but he still holds that blade.
"That's none of your business, traitor," he snarls in response to her, baring his teeth. The fact that he doesn't know either is also none of her business. He cleaves inwards, aiming shoulder to hip, as if to thereby lay her open if not deflected or avoided.
He doesn't stop there. Snapping back, the blade held before him in a guard, he spots another familiar face.
Gwen.
"...Back for another one? I owe you for last time!"
Has he... forgotten about that time at the festival? Or did it never really matter? Or--
Gwen has moments to consider this before he lays into her. But--
"...Lan?"
It may be costly for him, really. He does the one thing a warrior should never do the middle of a battle.
He comes to a stop.
GS: Loren Voss has attacked Xantia with Astral Hammer! GS: Loren Voss has gained 1 Combo! GS: Loren Voss has attacked Elhaym van Houten with Extinction Rush! GS: Loren Voss assumes the Avenger stance! GS: Loren Voss spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Loren Voss has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Meteor Break! GS: Loren Voss has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Are YOU okay?
"Yes!" Ivan seems faintly panicked at the question. "Don't worry about me! I'm here to fight! You don't have to fight at all if you don't want to--" That's likely a promise he can't keep, but he's still shaken by the sight of her half cut through and her remarks about just sort of stumbling into all of this violence.
But the violence does continues, regardless, as the two of them launch their attacks. A gap in the enemy's armor is found, revealing... wires and other inorganic parts. Ivan backs away, seeing that Emeralda has exposed even more mechanical innards.
"A robot!? Shit, are you like Lydia...?" Why does Solaris have to hide behind so many soldiers they've constructed or forced or manipulated into fighting for them?! The damned cowards!
But this insight into the nature of their enemy hasn't stopped the assault. Ivan's eyes attempt to follow the chaotic course of the energy beams that spring forth from Azoth, but it's impossible to predict the precise moment that they will all stop bouncing and choose their target, and by the time they've all locked on Ivan from different directions, there's nothing left to do but brace for impact.
He stifles a yell of pain as they sear into him, frozen for a moment before he throws himself forward into a roll to get himself out of the intersection point before they can burn straight through him.
He lands, breathing hard, and pushes himself up shakily. Ivan is the only one in this scuffle who is just filled with blood and other organic mush, but he refuses to let that mean he falls behind the others.
He holds out his hands as if calling to something, and begins to gather a cloud of sparks that dance in the air as their light flickers with faint pops and crackles. A sudden, warm breeze carries the cloud toward Azoth. The sparks dance around him for a short time in a dazzling array, then begin to detonate in quick succession into miniature explosions.
GS: Ivan spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Ivan has attacked Azoth with Stars of Fury! GS: Ivan takes 26 damage from Poison! GS: Ivan has completed his action. GS: Azoth takes a solid hit from Emeralda Kasim's Ribbon Lock for 85 hit points! GS: Entangle! applied to Azoth!
<Pose Tracker> Brad Evans has posed.
Brad is an expert in anti-mecha warfare. Gears, Cyborgs, Androids, the works; Slayheim threw them all at the SLA and he was on the frontlines of countering each. This....
Boy, this sure does deserve the name Asgard. His shells fail to penetrate in the least. "Gonna have to move to anti-armor," he says, mostly to himself. Kamui gets summarily dismissed from the combat. He knows better than to expect that to keep her down, but--
"oh, shit!" Brad spits out, as Asgard BARRELS at him. He snaps the Mechanical Glove up to the point of impact just moments before the hit, and disappears in a blast-wave of dust!!
When the light fades and the dust clears, Brad's Mechanical Glove is sparking, clutching Asgard's fist millimeters from impact. That should...prrrobably break his arm. The ARM fuzzes and sparks, preventing the forces from shattering him, at the expense of itself. Brad grimaces, teeth grit. He manages to barely hold it off--until Acacia's strike changes the equation just enough! He forces Asgard's fist aside, then clenches his fist hard! "YOU GOT IT!" he calls back to her, and the whole ARM blazes as it suffuses itself with some unseen Cartridge's energy. He drives that fist straight toward Asgard, DRILLING into the golem in a way that will hopefuly punch clean through that barrier! "C'mon....break, damn you!"
GS: Azoth takes a glancing hit from Ivan's Stars of Fury for 111 hit points! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Azoth enters Critical health and gains 25 FP! GS: Azoth enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Brad Evans has activated a Force Action! GS: Brad Evans spends 2 Combo on Gatling, loading 2 into Gatling! GS: Brad Evans has attacked Asgard with Hammer Fist! GS: Brad Evans has gained 1 Combo! GS: Brad Evans has completed his action. GS: Asgard guards a hit from Brad Evans's Hammer Fist for 82 hit points! GS: CRITICAL! Xantia takes a solid hit from Loren Voss's Astral Hammer for 158 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Xantia gains 1 additional Combo!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Boudicca has posed.
Up Ragnell goes. The combination of wind and lightning is well-known to mankind as 'storm', and perhaps it is no wonder the rain comes down. But this is not rain - it is bullets; rat-tat-tat-tat-tat tearing down into the ground.
Boudicca stands, lifts a gauntlet to guard her face. The bullets pock marks into the story of her armour, a dozen little holes which sink into the steel; and yet none of them seem to embed deep enough to draw blood.
Or, perhaps, Boudicca does not care to bleed so easily. Who can say?
There is greater effect written in her words, the mocking encouragement she offers. "I am stronger because I do not stand alone," she agrees, as she swipes down her pockmarked gauntlet. "But there has always been strength beneath my fingertips, Ragnell. Even you were of assistance with this..."
Another Seraphic glyph lights up, as the wind picks up around her. "... now I am not occupied with manoeuvring my vessel, I may direct my sorcery like this." Whirling around her, the gale looses, to tear past Ragnell with staggering force.
The strange thing is, even if Ragnell seems like she's taunting Boudicca, Boudicca doesn't offer her insights with the same mocking tone. She acknowledges Ragnell's assistance genuinely, even as she uses her point to crash into the other Seraph with such violence.
GS: Seraph Boudicca spends 1 Combo on Gatling, loading 1 into Gatling! GS: Seraph Boudicca has attacked Seraph Ragnell with Howling Gale! GS: Seraph Boudicca has completed her action. GS: Elhaym van Houten completely evades a hit from Loren Voss's Extinction Rush! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Elhaym van Houten gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Mighty! applied to Loren Voss! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Gwen Whitlock guards a hit from Loren Voss's Meteor Break for 90 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ambrosius has posed.
"One who is quick to ask questions of others should be prepared for that, yes." Ambrosius replies. Indeed, Ambrosius is familiar with Ethius's unusual confidence. It is something he has experienced before - and taken note of. Where did it spring from?
Ethius releases his own weapon and Ambrosius moves to press the attack... but, he realises his true intention just a moment too late. Ambrosius releases the weapon and leaps back to try to avoid whatever it is he's planning, but he is not quite able to do so.
Dust and grime descends upon him. Ambrosius's suit protects him to a certain degree - it is intended to protect from outside contaminants, after all - but there is a limit even to Veruni engineering. Ambrosius gestures with his left hand, and water surges around him to counter Ethius's spell by cleaning away the offending debris, but ultimately it's only a temporary measure.
He will have difficulties if he doesn't deal with it at the source... and so, Ambrosius rushes toward Ethius looking to deliver, of all things, a scything right hook to disrupt his concentration.
GS: Ambrosius has attacked Ethius Hesiod with Scything Swing! GS: Ambrosius has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Leah Sadalbari has posed.
Leah catches Kamui, though of course Kamui was thrown hard enough that it isn't a casual catch. "Another time," she intones in her modulated voice to Kamui, and resumes the battle, letting off a blast of energy that becomes a terrible rain of blue energy at Asgard. She focuses once again on Ida, changing by the moment. More and more exoskeleton seems to be bubbling out of her, forming powerful armor of two suits, not one. Two individuals...
"You've gained more control," the Watcher notes. "Have you yet mastered your curse? You, who can be neither human nor demon?"
"You speak of Lydia. Your friend has become something you cannot imagine. Where she will go, will you be able to follow? We shall see. Few can approach such perfection."
She is interrupted watching Ida's new form by Dash's reaction. His grenade swings towards her, and she swings her blade to cut it mid-air. It explodes on her, knocking her back with concussive force and blasting through armor on her arm. Dash can see, if he looks--crackling wires, electricity. Something synthetic below the armor, rather than flesh, as even a small hit of such a powerful weapon is enough to entirely demolish the fabric on her forearm. "So it is true, you are as you are. Let us see what else you can do... Dash Caskett."
The Watcher curls her fingers. "Surfacers are as much a part of the coming destiny as any Gazel," she says, returning a look to Ida as she begins to charge electrical power in her synthetic fist, lightning crackling all around her arm. "No more, and no less. Now... let us see, then."
She reaches forward, and lightning courses from her hand towards Ida and Dash both, buzzing and bursting in terrible bolts and rivers of power.
"Come, and kill me if you can, would-be champions of humanity. You may yet see the world that is to come."
Sparkling light washes all around her as she adopts a ready stance, holding her beam sword out forward in challenge.
GS: Leah Sadalbari has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Anemo Rush! GS: Leah Sadalbari has attacked Dash Caskett with Anemo Rush! GS: Leah Sadalbari has attacked Asgard with Cloudburst! GS: Leah Sadalbari has attacked Leah Sadalbari with Healing Wave! GS: Leah Sadalbari has completed her action. GS: Leah Sadalbari heals Leah Sadalbari! She gains 100 temporary hit points! GS: Restore! Disrupt removed! GS: Surge! applied to Leah Sadalbari! GS: Asgard takes a solid hit from Leah Sadalbari's Cloudburst for 66 hit points! GS: Mighty! applied to Leah Sadalbari! GS: Ethius Hesiod takes a glancing hit from Ambrosius's Scything Swing for 57 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ethius Hesiod gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Mighty! applied to Ambrosius! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up!
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
Lan blinks, and looks at Gwen. "What do I...?"
When's the last time anyone asked Lan what she wanted, instead of choosing it for her? And why, even now, does Lan just... not know? Well? What does she want?!
"I... Just... I don't know. Don't let him beat you. I don't want anybody to get hurt, but if Gebler isn't stopped..." Lambs. Shepherds. A city hanging upside down above the planet, its slums teeming with people just like Lan and Gwen and every other surfacer. "...We can't let that happen. I want to save everybody."
That's not entirely true. She wants to tear Etrenank out of the sky. But Lan can't bring herself to even think it, much less say it out loud.
"Try not to hurt him if you can, okay. I still..." she trails off. Because Loren is attacking, and if it comes down to it Lan still isn't willing to let him kill someone, even a stranger like Xantia. A hand rises to tug at the ribbon holding her hair back-- and Loren slows to a stop after attacking Gwen.
Lan stills, fingers still on the end of her 'weapon'. "...Hi, Loren," she tells him, voice steadier than she'd honestly expected. She looks like someone who'd been on that battlefield a couple of days ago should look - rough, but thankfully alive. Here, and as whole as one could reasonably expect.
GS: Dash Caskett guards a hit from Leah Sadalbari's Anemo Rush for 68 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Dash Caskett gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes a solid hit from Leah Sadalbari's Anemo Rush for 108 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ida Everstead-Rey gains 1 additional Combo!
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
Xantia surges in to punch Loren in the kishkes - normally, Elly might say 'don't hurt him' but this is a place where unless Xantia starts pulling out said kishkes, she will accept it. Maybe she's more bloodthirsty now, or perhaps the stakes are too high with a mysterious gate and this brawl.
For that is not a diminutive - this is to be a battle to the trenches, to the knives, to the shot and the shell! There are too many in too little space for it to be anything else!
And speaking of which - Loren comes in so fast that all that Elly can do is step back a pace and throw up her grip, and this carefully poised holding of her iron rod bears fruit. It is easy for her to raise it up at a lateral angle, to shift that light grip into a tight push that lets her leverage core muscles - the blade sparks against the rough, elemental iron, shaving off a thin layer of natural oxide as Elly breaks the clash with a twist and a huff.
She is about to say something sharp in reply when --
'Lan?'
-- Loren is distracted by Lan.
Elly's mouth works for a moment as he faces Lan and she tightens up the grip on her staff. There are several seconds of visible discomfort and decision paralysis on Elly's part, which Lan might see, though her eyes may be towards Loren. She glances towards Gwen for a moment, then towards Xantia. Her lips purse, and she makes a decision, before she steps over one good pace and swings her rod downwards to try and take Loren's legs out from underneath him.
If he's on the ground, Elly thinks, we can just -- sit on him until he cries for mercy. Tie him up. One thing at a time. (Even now Elly does not want Loren to die, even if she will not weep over much about a broken kneecap.)
GS: Elhaym van Houten spends 2 Combo on Gatling, loading 2 into Gatling! GS: Formation! Elhaym van Houten has attacked Loren Voss with Iron Staff! GS: Elhaym van Houten has completed her action. GS: Seraph Ragnell guards a hit from Seraph Boudicca's Howling Gale for 86 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Ragnell gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Loren Voss takes a solid hit from Elhaym van Houten's Iron Staff for 126 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
Are you broken?
No. Not broken. Just never whole.
Azoth's form flickers in space, like reality were failing to load him in properly. Emeralda's scarf ribbons come for him, latching on just the moment he begins to fade seemingly from existence. It pulls him back into it, and continues to do so, in and out and in and out again as Azoth, without moving, tries to phase away from Ivan's sparkling onslaught as it occurs.
Several miss. But others hit, rattling Azoth's chassis. His attention never leaves Emeralda, but when she asks for his voice, all he can give her is a string of sorrowful beeps before his body finally vanishes completely, gone from Emeralda's hold.
He reappears behind the two of them in the air, the red lights across Azoth's body flaring and pulsing.
WARNING DAMAGE CRITICAL WARNING WARNING ELIMINATE TARGETS INITIATING EMERGENCY ATTACK SEQUENCE
The ring behind Azoth rises above his head and begins to glow and spin. Excess power causes it to crackle, sparks dancing across the ring, and then Azoth himself. He twitches, the red lights flashing brighter, but the overrides continue with their chosen sequence.
A massive beam of light blasts out from the ring, searing the ground and trailing toward Ivan and Emeralda both to consume them in otherworldly light.
GS: Azoth has activated a Boss Action! GS: Azoth spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Azoth has attacked Azoth with exec.bel TARGETACQUIRED! GS: Azoth has gained 1 Combo! GS: Azoth has launched an attack Link! GS: Azoth takes a solid hit from Azoth's exec.bel TARGETACQUIRED for 0 hit points! GS: Amplify and Hyper! applied to Azoth! GS: Mighty! applied to Azoth! GS: Azoth has activated a Force Action! GS: Azoth has activated a Force Action! GS: Azoth spends 5 Combo on Headshot and Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Azoth has attacked Ivan with exec.ohr ELIMINATION! GS: Azoth has attacked Emeralda Kasim with exec.ohr ELIMINATION! GS: Azoth has gained 1 Combo! GS: Azoth has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Asgard has posed.
Blue energy rains down upon him, and several of bolts seem to actually pass through his barrier, causing a pock mark like appearance.
The Watcher is strong. His data had already come to this conclusion. Asgard does not so much as pause, as his internal systems begin optimizing the data he's collected.
While certainly more important in his higher processes is collecting data to find the optimal way to defeat her, several of them are working to find out the meaning of her words.
Kamui runs back at him at a fortuitous time, because he does not immediately react. Not as she addresses him.
This isn't... you...
Not as she raises a camera and...
Asgard!! You and me! Say... Fuzzy Pickles!!
Asgard looks straight at the camera, as the sudden bright flash blinds his optical sensors for just a brief moment in time.
Waving his arm blindly in mid-air, he's taken completely off guard by Acacia springing up onto his back. A foot impacts with his back, and he tries to swing around to catch his assailant, far too late as the sparkling flare impacts with his plating - erupting in an arc of flame from which he entirely vanishes in the blaze from his knee joints on up.
C'mon....break, damn you!
Brad's fist barrels in, just as it clears, and Asgard's yellowed optical sensors focus on him, a hand whips up, and Brad's fist finds itself contacting with metal as it grinds into his open palm, before his palm simply exerts enough counterforce to simply shove him back.
Suddenly an aura of blue erupts around him, the air crackling with energy as he erects a high powered barrier. And his glowing red eyes eerily settle upon the Watcher.
How do you intend to make me answer?
Holding up his blue adorned hand in the air, he crushes the fingers together into a fist. And suddenly the air around Kamui, Acacia, and Brad shift terribly. Shimmering purple fields appear on all sides of them trying to box them in.
And then simply compact them. Crushing them as if they had been dropped onto several sides of a hydraulic press for the next few seconds.
And then raising that blue adorned fist higher, there is a mechanical shriek of his joints as he drives his fist into the ground. The ground crumbles around him, as it divides en route to the Solarian Watcher.
Others engaged with her have plenty of time to get away, as it is telegraphed so much the roar of the crumbling and splitting Earth.
And then, Auroral light begins to leak out, like the glow of some underworld, it rushes outwards like an awful curtain of energy in his attempt to consume her in the outwash of all of that excess flood of barrier energy.
GS: CRITICAL! Ivan takes a glancing hit from Azoth's exec.ohr ELIMINATION for 141 hit points! GS: Poison! applied to Ivan! GS: Hyper! applied to Azoth! GS: Ivan's Force Evade activates! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Asgard has attacked Kamui with Wide Barrier! GS: Asgard has attacked Acacia Saitani with Wide Barrier! GS: Asgard has attacked Brad Evans with Wide Barrier! GS: Asgard spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Asgard has attacked Leah Sadalbari with Barrier Flood! GS: Asgard has gained 1 Combo! GS: Kamui takes a solid hit from Asgard's Wide Barrier for 162 hit points! GS: Asgard has attacked Asgard with High Powered Barrier! GS: Asgard takes a solid hit from Asgard's High Powered Barrier for 0 hit points! GS: Restore! Break, Cripple, Entangle, and Mute removed! GS: Quick and Shield! applied to Asgard! GS: Mighty! applied to Asgard! GS: Asgard has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Emeralda Kasim takes a solid hit from Azoth's exec.ohr ELIMINATION for 262 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Emeralda Kasim gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Poison! applied to Emeralda Kasim! GS: Hyper! applied to Azoth! GS: Acacia Saitani guards a hit from Asgard's Wide Barrier for 176 hit points! GS: Leah Sadalbari critically Guards a hit from Asgard's Barrier Flood for 38 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Leah Sadalbari gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Brad Evans takes a glancing hit from Asgard's Wide Barrier for 165 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Brad Evans gains 1 additional Combo!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
Well, they *are* Seraphim. Blood is an aesthetic rather than a life necessity.
"Yeah, even us Seraphim can't live alone," Ragnell acknowledges, nodding once. "Though fillin' that time in with pet humans is kinda, uhhhh... gauche? But then, if you want to rely on human strength as an Oracle, I guess you got no choice, huh? The Guardians keep pinnin' their hopes on them, too. Guess if you wanna live, it's better to push the inevitability o' death on creatures terrified of it. Though if humans are gonna die before the planet no matter what just 'cuz o' th' scale o' things, I dunno how hard they're gonna work!"
Boudicca rebuts by demonstrating how differently she can utilize her Seraphic artes now that she's not weighed down, literally, by her armor. The gale bursts forward into Ragnell, who claims a footing and bears up under the immense force. Once again, she's still standing afterwards, but she does look rather more haggard.
"So in other words, you don't really *need* other folks. The only one who was holdin' you back was you?" Ragnell offers. Her tone is lighter this time, so if she's mocking her again, it's rather more unclear. What *is* clear is the golden glyph that forms beneath her once more, and the chant she calls out: "O darkened stormclouds! Thunder Blade!"
From above and at an angle, a blade made of lightning *shunks* down where Boudicca is, possibly knocking her down with the force of its landing. A heartbeat or two later, the blade EXPLODES with lightning, consuming anything in its path--including the Wind Seraph, if she isn't quick enough.
GS: Seraph Ragnell spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Seraph Ragnell has attacked Seraph Boudicca with Thunder Blade! GS: Seraph Ragnell has gained 2 Combo! GS: Disrupt expired! GS: Seraph Ragnell has completed her action. GS: Seraph Boudicca takes a glancing hit from Seraph Ragnell's Thunder Blade for 83 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Boudicca gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up!
<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.
Ethius takes several cautious steps back as Ambrosius is beset upon by as much particulate matter as he can summon out of that space of his choosing. Indeed, moments later, it's like it wasn't even plucked from the air at all, for more has taken its place.
He can't back off fast enough. Ambrosius' leg strides are longer as he just comes at Ethius with a right hook. The human doesn't quite clear it with a crouch, as he's grazed at the side of his head and sent tumbling along the mud. This is just a glancing hit - and it's another strange piece of the puzzle. He withstood just about everything Kartikeya could do without major issue, but Ambrosius seems to have him on his toes.
What's different in this engagement? It is possible that there is an advantage that can be pressed that couldn't before.
He's pushed a bit too close to the melee between ancient beings and some mortal hangers-on than he'd like. He can catch a sight of Marivel seemingly surrendering herself as Clarissa moves to protect her. He can see Ivan being flustered by a strange armored opponent as Emeralda uses her nanotech body to try and slow them down. A masked woman pontificates at length about destiny. Brad struggles against a mechanical entity capable of producing a barrier that can withstand things he never knew could. So many small things pierce his eyes, stab at his mind. Notice this. That is a thing.
It's like noise.
Filgaia is noisy. Too noisy.
He's not... used to... noise.
...
...
...
Ambrosius' superiority in positioning continues unchallenged and unquestioned, as the oddball Symbologist takes an uncharacteristic amount of time coming back up. Mud betrays him, and he's back down on his knees, and hands against the ground. He could be up and punched again, or kicked around. The clock continues to tick down to an unknown end.
He leans on an elbow and starts to flutter fingers. His spellcasting hits a momentary hitch as he coughs, but soon enough, a light...
"Coronal Shell." And then another, blinding, coronal light surrounds him - hot as all hell, threatening to blind or disorient Ambrosius before he flings that ball of fiery light right in his direction.
"Your presence has gone unquestioned long enough." His voice can be heard through that. Sound may betray the intent to obscure, but he only needs enough cover to get up - but any follow-up dialogue behind that is withheld so he can dedicate valuable speaking time to spellcasting instead if need be.
GS: Ethius Hesiod enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Ethius Hesiod has attacked Ambrosius with Coronal Shell! GS: Ethius Hesiod has gained 1 Combo! GS: Ethius Hesiod has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
The thrill of battle isn't something that one would necessarily consider within Lord Blazer's emotional purview, but one would be absolutely wrong. The pulse of war, the raging-hot surge of blood in the brain, these things that are so close to the very foundations of the human mind, are ultimately just another one of those elements that feeds the Soul Devourer.
Steel clatters against steel. Sparks scatter into the breeze. Boomerang strikes knocks the Bayonet aside and drives his blade deep into Ashley's gut... Only to be intercepted and deflected by the Bayonet's stock at the last moment, splintering the wood even as the Crescent Saber scrapes into the Musketeer's midsection. Blood flows from the cut, dyeing the white of Ashley's shirt crimson just like the ancient evil stains the stuff of his spirit. Ashley bites his tongue and knocks the weapon aside, loading a canister into the breach of his ARM. "I'm not--" Lord Blazer? But what if he is? What if all this time, he's simply been a sack of meat being worn by the demon like a bloody sockpuppet?
The Guardian of Desire rebukes him. The sting reminds him of the weighty, inert mass of the Medium in his back pocket. It trembled at his touch too. Of all the humans on Filgaia, is it only him that the Guardians deny? Do they look at him and see nothing but the demon within...?
Just like this man. This machine.
But...!
"You left her alone...?" Ashley says through grit teeth. He yells, taking aim, leaping back, firing all in short sequence. A canister full of incendiary fluid sails into Boomerang's guard before exploding into a sticky liquid inferno. "You... You have no right...!"
"What have you done for Filgaia!?" Ashley screams his demand, charging into the flame to meet Boomerang's blade with his own. "Aren't you supposed to be a Guardian!? You're calling her out for consorting with the enemy, but here you are following a Metal Demon around like a puppy! You've got no right to complain! You might have abandoned her, but I won't! As long as I'm still me, and even maybe even beyond, Marivel Armitage will never be alone! And you...!"
His eyes lock with Boomerang's. Maybe it was a fatal error even taking them off of him for a moment. But even so...! "You've got no idea... Who I am... What I fight for...! Every other person I run into, it feels like all they see is the demon. Is that all I am to the world...!? I refuse! I won't let it, not you, not the demon, not anyone-- tell me who I'm supposed to be!"
And yet the pulse in his eye-- the crimson pinprick in the depths of his gaze-- seems to flicker just a little stronger. Because it's not just the thrill of battle that feeds the Blazer. This sort of defiant fury is just as appetizing...!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
'You've gained more control,' the Watcher observes, and a tiny, perverse spark of pride flickers in Ida's chest. Even coming from an enemy, it's honest praise. It would be the height of foolishness to interpret it as a sign to stop.
"Mastery is a process," Ida says, "not something to be grasped, or seized. Do you understand?" Something subtle flickers in Ida's mismatched eyes as the Watcher describes Lydia's fate. She remembers how Kalve reacted when Ida told him; how he'd vowed to destroy OS and free his friend. "Perfection," Ida breathes. Her eyes widen, and then narrow in rage. "Perfection is a lie! Whatever you and your masters seek is falsehood!"
Ida sets her feet and steels herself. This is not the first time she's been electrocuted. This isn't even the first time the Watcher has electrocuted her. Nevertheless, the enforcer's Ether spills over her in great, sparking tendrils, and agony races down every limb. Ida chokes back a scream, barely managing to keep upright as her limbs start to spasm.
In her agony, she finds herself glancing back at Asgard. Mismatched eyes fall upon the great golem's face. The green one is almost tearing up as it looks at him, full of helpless rage and desperate hope.
"Are you," Ida chokes out. "Why do I--"
And then the pain dies down to a dull roar, and the synchronization snaps back into its proper shape.
"Whatever you want for this world," Ida says, "I DEFY IT!" Her voice halts and skips a little, but gains in strength as she recovers. "Dash! Go low!" Ida rushes forwards, whipping Devil's Due from its holster. Life-force condenses in the chamber, shaping itself around a fragment of Ida's flesh. She pulls the trigger, and sends a brilliant round of biometal screaming right at the Watcher's face.
GS: Ashley Winchester spends 1 Combo on Poison! GS: Ashley Winchester has attacked Boomerang with Canister - Incendiary Round! GS: Ashley Winchester has gained 1 Combo! GS: Ashley Winchester has completed his action. GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Leah Sadalbari with Bright Bullet! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has gained 2 Combo! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action. GS: Boomerang takes a solid hit from Ashley Winchester's Canister - Incendiary Round for 128 hit points! GS: Poison! applied to Boomerang! GS: Ambrosius guards a hit from Ethius Hesiod's Coronal Shell for 89 hit points! GS: Disrupt! applied to Ambrosius! GS: Ambrosius enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
"T-thanks, Dash..." Kamui calls to the Blue Bomber, not quite sure why Dash seems to be fighting the really nice lady that just caught her. Perhaps that's just how things go sometime! People have things that they need to fight out.
But just after her picture, Acacia and Brad work in tandem, with a flaming somersault kick into what looks like a powerful enormous Drill!
"W-woah! I didn't know you could do that, Brad!" Kamui exclaims, looking impressed.
She grimaces as an aura of blue erupts around Asgard, and for one moment, for one very clear moment--
Kamui knows what to do.
She darts faster than even the eye can follow, as she pulls out and waggles the freshly-printed polaroid from her camera...
...and slips the photo into Asgard's jacket pocket.
"... don't forget to take this with you... okay?" Kamui whispers knowingly, face illuminated by the rising blue barrier, in one of those rare and incredibly lucid moments of hers.
Then she gets yeeted out a second time, because the barrier just slaps her silly out of the air, and then she's sandwiched between purple fields that threaten to turn her into a Kamui Sandmuich. "Nghhr--!"
Sparks and electricity erupt from her already breached body, and whatever moment of lucidity (luceidity) passes as her head spasms, her camera-eye making an uncomfortably gross popping noise.
"Okay... I'm going to do it like mom, then," Kamui answers, uncomfortably lifting herself back up to her feet. Her hair flashes and turns the colour of Crimson Noble blonde, just like Marivel Armitage's.
"Here I go! Super, Duper, Ultra-Speciallllll.....!"
The sky cracks for one, two, three moments, and then--
The greatest bucket the world has ever known sails down towards Asgard.
GS: Kamui enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Kamui has attacked Asgard with Super EX Aport -Dance with the Devil in the Pail Moonlight-! GS: Kamui has gained 1 Combo! GS: Kamui has completed her action. GS: Sneak! The true nature of Kamui's attack becomes clear! GS: Asgard takes a solid hit from Kamui's Copy Arte -Memories of Friends- for 176 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Asgard gains 1 additional Combo!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
Gwen considers several things, in that finite space of time. The way Elly's Ether is so powerful, coming from someone who she's witnessed express such gentleness, since defecting to stand by Fei. How Xantia's power is so overwhelming to behold, and also how Gwen still owes Xantia cake.
She thinks about how, if she is going to do anything, it needs to be Lan's call, and that Lan should definitely NOT see her be cut in twain by Loren's blade.
The blade resonates as it strikes down on Gwen's raised ARM, a squinting wince creasing Gwen's face as she holds back a scream.
... This pain is simply....
".... I deserved that!" Gwen exclaims loudly, for Lan's benefit. ".... I kinda... helped wreck your Gear, after all. Now, t'be fair, you *were* tryin' t'kill us, but it *was* on order..."
She breathes, and then focuses on Lan's words. "Okay." She closes her eyes, letting herself smile. "... Okay. I don't intend on letting Loren beat me anytime soon, so that works. As for Solaris.."
Elly steps in to deliver a swift strike with her rod.
"Well, Xantia n' Elly? They won't let that happen either. I'll need to introduce you to them all proper-like, soon."
She looks at Loren. "Sorry 'bout this." The look in her eyes, as she looks at Loren, is soulful. "But I don't think your superiors would approve of you stopping unless we give you somethin' to stop over. Lan, stick back; keep an eye on any of those clones!"
Regardless of whether Loren was able to dodge Elly's attack or not, Gwen will make it count, by attempting to grip the bespeckled man's body with her right ARM, in order to deliver some sort of shock to the young man's system.
But not enough to kill. Far from it.
GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Loren Voss with Lucky Break! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Loren Voss takes a solid hit from Gwen Whitlock's Lucky Break for 148 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Boomerang has posed.
"You... have made mockery of Anastasia's sacrifice! You have undone her work--work she never should have done!" Luceid snarls back. "A successor!? Madness!"
They recoil back from Marivel touching them, refusing to allow such a thing. They step back, once, twice, and snarl. Jaws open -- ready to bite down, uncaring and lost, in the moment -- but then someone intervenes. Clarissa skids, bodily, between Luceid and Marivel. The Guardian Lord's red eyes blaze, with fury and rage, as they look at this interloper.
Their jaws open, a very canine snarl audible. And they seem ready to leap, but something passes in that moment. A flicker of emotion, which seems to discombobulate them. Luceid pads backward, staring in confusion.
Then, they throw their head back, and howl. There is a ripple of power through the air -- a shudder, that seeps at their strength, clouds their vision, and makes the whole world seem to grow grey and indistinct, for just a moment.
Boomerang, not so far away, faces Ashley. He sees the human bleed; a familiar feeling, one that Boomerang has never tired of. It isn't the suffering that he loves so, though, but the physical evidence of a fight. He steps forward, a couple of steps, as Ashley takes aim at him with his rifle.
The canister fires and it SLAMS into Boomerang's outstretched hand. He doesn't even try to dodge. The Hyadean catches the cannister and CRUSHES it, fire and fluid exploding outward, while flames begin to lick and cling to his metallic grey, armored body. Some of his coat begins to burn away. He sees that pinprick.
"You wanna know what they've done for Filgaia? Fought, suffered, and burnt for it. For four thousand years," Boomerang says. "You think it's just a desire for battle that drives them to me, kid? No--"
He swings back his fist. There is something manic in his nearly mechanical eyes. "It's because they've given up so much because people say the world's complicated. It's because this world bled them dry! It's because I'm not like the rest of them--I'm honest. I'm exactly what I say I am on the tin! One giant asshole, in a world full of 'em, and all I want--"
His hand curls onto the jagged remains of the cannister, quicksilver blood and fire flying with his fist, and he delivers a massive left hook at Ashley's face. "--to crush, to kill, TO FIGHT!"
GS: Boomerang has attacked Marivel Armitage with Curse! GS: Boomerang has attacked Clarissa Arwin with Curse! GS: Boomerang has gained 1 Combo! GS: Boomerang has attacked Ashley Winchester with Crescent Crasher! GS: Boomerang has gained 1 Combo! GS: Boomerang takes 27 damage from Poison! GS: Boomerang has completed his action. GS: Clarissa Arwin takes a glancing hit from Boomerang's Curse for 0 hit points! GS: Break, Cripple, Jam, Mute, Slow, and Weaken! applied to Clarissa Arwin! GS: Clarissa Arwin's Force Evade activates! GS: CRITICAL! Ashley Winchester takes a solid hit from Boomerang's Crescent Crasher for 280 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ashley Winchester gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Marivel Armitage guards a hit from Boomerang's Curse for 0 hit points! GS: Break, Cripple, Jam, Mute, Slow, and Weaken! applied to Marivel Armitage! GS: Clarissa Arwin heals Marivel Armitage! She gains 250 temporary hit points! GS: Restore! Break, Cripple, Disrupt, Jam, Mute, Slow, and Weaken removed!
<Pose Tracker> Dash Caskett has posed.
The blast rocks The Watcher, and is a bit more of a decisive hit than the Mega Buster did. Though, pressive the advantage is lost on a sight gleamed in the smoky aftermath. "Wait, your arm--" Dash says, peering her way. It looks worryingly familiar.
Even something worse. "How do you know my name?!" he shouts. This isn't good. His first name would make sense, Ida called it out. But how did they find out his last name?"
Was Ida and company right? Was SOlaris after him for some unknown reason?
There is little time to ponder, as lightning is hurled his way. He raises his arms to brace for the impact, and lightning courses throughout, amplified by the water clinging to his armor and body. "Ghhh--!"
Most of the water is at least dispersed by the attack, but Dash is left smoking, internal damage reports coming in. Most everything is functional still, repair systems online and beginning to work. But another direct hit like that will probably wreck him, Systems are currently vulnerable while under repair.
A thumbs up is given toward Kamui, but looks like she has her own fight to contend with against Asgard. He cannot help her right now. But the call of Ida gets his attention. "Don't gotta tell me twice!" he returns, Jet Skates spinning to life.
The boy swaps weapons out for the Blade Arm, and speeds toward The Watcher before dropping into a slide, producing a force barrier around himself as he skids across the ground at high speeds!
GS: Dash Caskett spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: Dash Caskett has attacked Leah Sadalbari with Charge Kick! GS: Dash Caskett has gained 1 Combo! GS: Dash Caskett has completed his action. GS: Leah Sadalbari takes a solid hit from Ida Everstead-Rey's Bright Bullet for 126 hit points! GS: Disrupt! applied to Leah Sadalbari! GS: CRITICAL! Leah Sadalbari takes a solid hit from Dash Caskett's Charge Kick for 84 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Leah Sadalbari gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Hyper and Shield! applied to Dash Caskett!
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.
Xantia is at the very least succeeding at raising Loren's ire and getting in his way, making it harder for him to hurt her friends, which is what she was after. Unfortunately, she isn't managing to do it without taking punishment in the process, and getting angry is somehow not helping as much as it feels like it usually does. Her punch only meets with that shield again - how tough is that thing?! - failing to deliver the knockout blow that she intended it to be.
Despite her growing annoyance, Xantia has to admit that those are some good reflexes. Loren must have a lot of experience with angry people trying to punch him.
Quickly springing back into action, Loren succeeds in barreling right past Xantia, the shield's impact solid enough to knock her aside. She couldn't put his intention together quickly enough, for a shield to be used as a weapon just hadn't occured to Xantia at all. She goes down, rolls with the fall, and ends up on her hands and knees. She punches the ground, frustration growing ever fiercer. And he says he's not cheating? This has got be cheating somehow.
"Come... come back here!" she growls, back to her feet in short order. She is left watching the clash of Loren and Elly's weapons, which thankfully works out well for Elly. After a short moment to catch her breath from getting it knocked out of her, she rushes Loren from behind.
At a critical junction, Loren is distracted. Elly takes advantage. Xantia doesn't stop. Shortly after Loren is struck in the legs, Xantia leaps for him. This will either take the form of an attempt to tackle him to the ground, or... possibly just landing on him full force, if he's already gone down. Whatever the case may be, Xantia has Words for Loren.
"None of your business? You'd better make me your business! Because I'm going to get in the way of all your other business! You hear me?!"
If she managed to get as close to him as she intended, it would be impossible not to, as then she'd be practically yelling in his ear. At least shouting at him seems to have calmed Xantia somewhat. She takes a deep breath, gets back to her feet...
...and only now does she take notice that the situation has grown tense in a different sort of way. A way which she doesn't really understand. She looks quizzically from Elly to Gwen, not really understanding the plan from here. "Um. Hi. What are we doing?"
Then she regards Lan. Recognition quickly dawns, flashing back to the attempted assassination of Shakhan. She watched as Leon took the shot. Of course, she saw Lan there. She didn't understand at the time. But now, something's starting to click.
"...It's you. You tried to help us, didn't you?"
GS: Xantia has attacked Loren Voss with Cardinal Impulse! GS: Xantia has gained 1 Combo! GS: Mighty expired! GS: Xantia has completed her action. GS: Loren Voss guards a hit from Xantia's Cardinal Impulse for 98 hit points! GS: Loren Voss enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Boudicca has posed.
"They are not pets," Boudicca defends humanity, "nor are their contributions aberrant. They are just different, Ragnell. Time flows slower for them - they notice every day. Every hour. At times I suspect they notice every minute, every second." It is still a strange condition, to someone who measures time in years; months, if she pays very close attention. She has sometimes gotten so focused as to acknowledge the weeks passing, but it is very strange indeed. "I think they are very much like us, for all our differences. Or, perhaps..."
The breeze blows her braids behind her, as she glances aside, in the battle, to Ida consumed by her exoskeleton, Gwen struggling against Solaris. Her attention comes back to Ragnell, as she concludes: "... we are very much like them."
BE NOT AFRAID, the angel said, and took the form of Man.
Ragnell draws her own conclusions, in the wake of Boudicca's gale. The blade knocks her to the ground, sure enough - but the earth has never been master of her; she rolls over it, above it, and the breeze only serves to carry her further away, blasted by the force of Thunder Blade's explosion.
Roll roll roll roll thud, and the breeze picks her up, but there's a twig in her left braid as evidence of the blow. It is not so much evidence worn on her - except for the way she takes a moment to comport herself properly after the attack.
Fighting Ragnell... really is tiring, even if she doesn't have a mortal body to show blood and bruises!
"It is interesting," Boudicca says, "the way you consider it one or the other. More than one thing may be true, Ragnell. I once believed the world could be explained through simple contrasts - but I was wrong!" More evidence of her tiring is given by the way she lunges forward physically, rather than committing to more sorcery - though the way she sweeps past Ragnell with that tonfa, she's still giving it her all. "The world is complex, and for this it is beautiful! I need them, and I need my 'self,' just the same! Soaring Vortex!"
GS: Seraph Boudicca has attacked Seraph Ragnell with Soaring Vortex! GS: Seraph Boudicca has gained 1 Combo! GS: Seraph Boudicca has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.
"Well... okay." Emeralda isn't entirely sure she believes Ivan's protestations of being okay! But it's not like she can do much about it if he's not.
She has other things to pay attention to! Like trying to keep Azoth held. He keeps trying to move in a direction that she doesn't really have a word for and doesn't entirely understand. Stay HERE, she thinks. Stay and -
And what?
Emeralda is getting frustrated again. It seems like every time she goes out she finds something she doesn't want to! First Josie, now - well, she doesn't know his name, but the beeping made her feel... sad. And she doesn't know why, because she doesn't speak Beep.
She knows he has a voice even if he can't use it. "<Can you talk in this?>" she asks - and not in the common language. She speaks in Zeboim, and sounds fluent. She starts to say something else, but she feels her ribbons slipping, squeezes harder as Azoth slips out of her grip entirely.
Emeralda looks around this way and that and spots Azoth in the chaos of the battlefield. The giant glowing ring was a bit of an eye-catcher. "Ivan! Get out of the way!" She starts running, sliding herself in front of him, her arms crossed across her body with her hair layered overtop like a shield.
Emeralda does not cover people very well. She's too small; even with her legs stretched, as she just did, she still doesn't really top five feet. But she tries to protect Ivan as the light blasts into her. She yells in pain, her voice harsh and raspy in the beam - but she doesn't melt away. She doesn't fade.
When it clears, Emeralda is still there. Her outer layer looks scorched; the blackened-metal areas crack and split as she moves, the nanomachines under them still moving. She walks more slowly, stiffly, as if it was an effort to push herself around - like she was weighed down.
She throws herself at Azoth in an awkward tackle. What is not awkward is her hair, which rises up above her, forming the head and neck of a lizard - a dragon - that bites into Azoth, trying to draw away some of the power he's using to charge his cannon and prevent another attack. "I don't even know what you *want*!" she wails. "Nobody comes just to hurt people without saying things! Someone sent you! Why? What do you want to *do*??"
GS: Emeralda Kasim has attacked Azoth with Hungry Dragon! GS: Emeralda Kasim takes 20 damage from Poison! GS: Emeralda Kasim has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Ivan sees the immense beam of energy burning through the ground as it barrels toward them, his heart racing with alarm. And Emeralda rushes in front of it ...trying to protect him?!
"DON'T STAND IN FRONT OF IT, WHAT IF YOU DISINTEGRATE!?" Even tiny robots can't fix that, can they?!
But he needs to move-- fast. He fires a burst of flame from beneath his feet to push himself out of the beam's path. It sends him up into the air on an arcing path.
It's close. He thinks he might have made it -- until the sensation of burning tears through him.
He crashes to the ground, trailing smoke from where his body intersected with the edge of the light.
He lays there for a moment, gasping for breath. The right edge of his body still feels like it's on fire, and he can't tell yet whether his leg will hold him if he tries to get up.
Damn it. His ring flashes, and he uses his warhammer to prop himself up, hissing as the movement scrapes at raw nerves.
He can barely move, but he can't just let this guy go -- whatever's driving the construct, he's killing indiscriminately out here. Ivan has to keep going -- he has to make a difference for once -- why is he always making these promises if he can't ever keep them?! He has to do something, something!!
He yells out wordlessly, and fire answers that call, as it so often does, a chaotic, wildly flaring mass of it spiraling out from within his chest and gathering into a destructive funnel that rips through the air on an erratic path toward Azoth.
GS: Ivan has attacked Azoth with Inferno Heart! GS: Ivan enters a Counter stance! GS: Ivan takes 23 damage from Poison! GS: Ivan has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Acacia Saitani has posed.
Acacia grits her teeth; as expected, the main immediate effect of her diving kick is a dull clonk and the blossoming of pain through her ankle. She's not entirely sure how Yue manages to do stuff like this on the regular, but at least she can muster the energy to try to push backwards off of Asgard, grimacing to herself as she touches down with a bit of a wobble, and watches Kamui dart inwards.
If she has any reservations about the Reploid's angle of attack, she doesn't voice them. She's lived amongst long-lived creatures enough to place some stock in Kamui's words, and when she does remember something it's usually reliable. Is Asgard another such machine they'll need to wake from a long slumber? If so, perhaps it's best that it hang onto the photo that Kamui offers it, just in case.
She's heard - and seen - weirder, after all.
Before she can think another word, the space around her contracts, leaving her dizzy from the air pressure; she yelps under her breath automatically, then hops up into the air quickly enough to slam her arms against one side of the barrier and her legs against the other, trying to bring her strength to bear in a more effective manner.
There's a spark of power - and despite the fatigue that lances through her muscles, tiny white etheric cracks shimmer across the surface of the barrier. Not part of it, but layered on top, like a forceful attempt to break the thing apart. When it does, it's with a loud and oppressive sort of crack, and she's breathing hard as she hits the ground running, reaching for her battered, beloved, barely even functional pistol.
Functional enough for her needs, at least. Much like Kamui - maybe she's picking up bad habits - she dives low and then lunges forward towards the golem, the barrel of her gun shining an unnatural white-hot where she's gripping it in both hands. "Kamui is talking to you!" she huffs. "So listen, already!" Everything else has more or less bounced off of Asgard's armor to little effect, so instead she thrusts the metal of the gun as close as she can to the barrier's edge to try to pry through it, ignoring the way the iron peels and splits and blisters from the force--
--and pulls the trigger.
GS: Acacia Saitani spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Acacia Saitani has attacked Asgard with Mightier than the Sword! GS: Acacia Saitani has gained 1 Combo! GS: Acacia Saitani has completed her action. GS: Asgard guards a hit from Acacia Saitani's Mightier than the Sword for 112 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Asgard gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Azoth takes a glancing hit from Emeralda Kasim's Hungry Dragon for 64 hit points! GS: Azoth takes a glancing hit from Ivan's Inferno Heart for 112 hit points! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Azoth has Fallen! He is no longer able to fight!
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
Luceid does not accept her touch.
Luceid does not consign her to oblivion.
Two of her closest friends insist that Marivel is not alone. But you can shout the arc words all you want and until it feels true, you might as well be saying nothing. It is not that Marivel does not recognize Clarissa's aid, or Ashley's devotion. It is that a wound carved out of your hide by a friend...
...can't simply be filled in by another friend. The howl ripples through Marivel even as Clarissa heals her. Because in actuality, it isn't just a friend Marivel is yelling at.
To her, those lost comrades--they were the family she had when she lost her own. They are the people and creatures that gave her a reason for being.
Lumen is gone.
Anastasia is gone.
Althena betrayed them or is gone.
Luceid is gone.
That is what it means to Marivel to be alone. As grateful as she is for friendship, there is something beyond that even Clarissa's kindness can't fill.
But something draws Marivel's attention. She hears someone chanting a familiar(ish) spell. She sees hair turn blonde. She sees...
She sees Kamui.
"..." She stares at her. She was gone for what felt like infinity.
Even when she returned, it didn't feel real.
She had forgotten.
"..." She looks at the floor and crouches to pick up her staff. She places it against the floor and leans against it.
"I am undoing it. And I am completing it. Don't you remember our time alone in that prison?"
She shakes her head once and straightens up. "...They are right. About more than one thing. But m ore than anything, they are correct in that I cannot give up."
"And you are correct Luceid. What Anastasia did...that she shouldn't have done. But nevertheless, she did because the alternative was a dead world of demons."
BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdpKEehl9P4&ab_channel=ab
She raies her staff into the air once more and says the most chilling thing Marivel has ever said.
"Even should it destroy this world, I will bring Anastasia back to this world. Rather than her endless nothing, I will allow her to live and die. Whether she live a million years, or a hundred. She will live!"
Her eyes glow crimson.
"So I cannot return to my family yet. I will never be okay with it!! I WILL NEVER BE OKAY WITH IT!!"
She swings her staff forward, unleashing her own dark power against Luceid, bringing her staff before her. She knows already that no matter how much power she unleashes, it won't actually harm Luceid for long. But she can give the Guardian of Desire something to think about.
"I reject this world with heroes! I will destroy it all with mine own hands!!"
And with that she snaps her fingers.
And within that dark aura, the power of the atom.
It splits.
And explodes within the confines of that energy field.
"No more sacrifices! Not for Sin! Not for Althena! And definitely, definintely, NOT FOR FILGAIA! NEVER AGAIN!!"
GS: Marivel Armitage has attacked Boomerang with I Carry The Hopes Of My People Within Me And Sing The Song Of The Extinct - Armageddon! GS: Marivel Armitage has launched an attack Link! GS: Marivel Armitage has attacked Boomerang with Small Hopes Shall Slice Thy Destiny To Ribbons - Split The Atom MEGATON! GS: Marivel Armitage has completed her action. GS: Boomerang takes a glancing hit from Marivel Armitage's I Carry The Hopes Of My People Within Me And Sing The Song Of The Extinct - Armageddon for 90 hit points! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Boomerang takes a solid hit from Marivel Armitage's Small Hopes Shall Slice Thy Destiny To Ribbons - Split The Atom MEGATON for 162 hit points! GS: Seraph Ragnell takes a glancing hit from Seraph Boudicca's Soaring Vortex for 73 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Ragnell gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Entangle! applied to Seraph Ragnell!
<Pose Tracker> Ambrosius has posed.
Ethius is sent tumbling away, and Ambrosius strides to pursue. He moves as if he's not in any real hurry - the slow, but inevitable walk those who have fought him before may be familiar with.
Ambrosius moves to capitalize on Ethius's downed state... but then, he notices the movement of fingers - the preparation of a spell. He retreats back, bringing up a hand again as water in the air once more bends to his will to form a shield in front of him as Ethius completes his spell.
Ambrosius finds a sphere of great, burning, blinding light surrounding Ethius - a sphere that is then flung right in his direction. It collides with his barrier... and then, with the hissing of steam as the water shield is evaporated outright, continues on to consume Ambrosius himself.
There is, for a moment, silence. And then, the heat and the light fade. Red armor is blackened and scorched, and his poncho is burned away(it's okay, he'll find another one eventually).
Ambrosius remains silent for a moment longer.
"...Question us all you like." He says. Once more, water begins to converge - but unlike before, when it formed a shield, this time it concentrates to a single, direct point. A point that he aims right for Ethius.
"However, you may find you do not like the answer." The water bursts out toward Ethius in a pin-point, high-pressure beam - acutely dangerous for its piercing power.
GS: Ambrosius spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: Ambrosius has attacked Ethius Hesiod with Pressure Beam! GS: Ambrosius has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Ethius Hesiod takes a glancing hit from Ambrosius's Pressure Beam for 130 hit points! GS: Hyper! applied to Ambrosius! <Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
"Oh my *goddess*, Boudicca, I *know* that humans are more time-conscious. That was *literally* the point o' what I was just sayin'," Ragnell replies, rolling her eyes at her fellow Seraph.
That humans are very much like Seraphim--or perhaps, Seraphim very much like humans--gets no answer but: "..."
As for fighting Ragnell, it is true that she's a highly tiring individual. She doesn't respond at first when Boudicca lectures her as she sweeps past the other Seraph tonfa-first, knocking her to one side into the Main Gate. She listens to Boudicca for a moment; then she tilts her head, frowning.
"Hm. Maybe I talk... *too much* bullshit?" she muses to herself, low enough that the sounds of the battlefield likely cover it up. But then, Boudicca is a Wind Seraph; sounds may carry to her better than most.
Then she shakes her head. "Say, Boudicca--" She arcs her paired pistols in a circle before her; they trail visible lightning in their wake, crackling dangerously and forking inwards to form a glyph. "Did you know? Sometimes, when a human dies, they get reborn as a Seraph." She holsters her pistols, then whips something up from out of her poncho--something that twirls in midair and falls into her grip. She aims it at Boudicca, its muzzle at the center of the glyph. "Couldn't tell ya why or how, an' it's not exactly a common phenomenon, but it does happen."
The muzzle of the strange, sleek, pistol-like object glows with an internal light. That light sucks in the lightning glyph before it at sharp angles, such that it leaves a brief afterimage of an X in the air. "What," Ragnell asks just before pulling the trigger, "d'you think about that?"
The trigger *clicks*, and the strange weapon EXPLODES with a powerful energy beam that is nigh alive with lightning. Anyone who's ever seen Claude's so-called 'Sword of Light' might find it familiar--especially as it carves a line straight across the battlefield.
By sheer coincidence, this line does not directly impact any other major character's fight. It's a Glove Day miracle.
"X BUSTER!"
GS: Seraph Ragnell has attacked Seraph Boudicca with X Buster! GS: Seraph Ragnell has gained 1 Combo! GS: Seraph Ragnell has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
The weird membranous barrier that extrudes from the bracer is strange. It looks like it should bend under the impact but it's as solid as glass -- even in the face of her strike. As for the timing of his reflexes...
...It's entirely possibly, Xantia. It's entirely possible.
The blade skips across the surface of the staff as Elly deflects Loren's strike; he swings again only to be met with further opposition on that front. "Why won't you die!" he shouts at her, his teeth bared in a snarl. In fact, if it weren't that pressing would have been hazardous to his health eventually (never clinch someone who can set you on fire with their mind) and it weren't for Gwen catching his eye, he might have continued the assault.
"Shut up. That's not the first time you've gotten in our way--" he hisses at her, through and over and past the weird feeling of kinship he has for her. No, perhaps it's all the more reason for him to aim at her--
And then, if it weren't for Lan.
"What happened? Where were you? Why didn't you--" He looks her over and seemingly belatedly takes in the fact that she's been in a serious fight in the last few days. The damage report out in the desert, he realizes.
He reaches out a hand to her, the same hand that bears that strange black bracer. "Come on. I'll get you to the back lines. We can--"
Elly's staff swings into his legs and with a pained shout he drops to his knees like a sack of potatoes.
This is not the best situation for him to be in, particularly when Gwen grabs him by the shoulder before he can so much as move. "What are you--"
She shows him, first hand, as the current courses through his body. The young soldier can't help but scream in the same way his body can't help but convulse with the current. Gwen lets go and he seems to reel for an instant--
Before Xantia straight-up divebombs him, laying him out flat against the earth. The hilt of his sword skitters a few important inches way from his fingers. It's the sort of position in which someone might seem well and truly disabled. But...
His left hand, still free, twitches towards his kit at his hip. A flick of the fingers sees it open, a single inward thrust sees them flush against a particular stone tablet.
He hates it. He hates this thing. He doesn't remember why. Maybe it doesn't matter why anymore. He hates it.
But it's useful. And right now, he's not-- losing to her.
Or her.
Or her.
Or losing--
"Material," he says, and the sound of it might be muffled with his face pressed against the ground.
The ground trembles. The ground rips apart. --No, it does not do this truly, it's merely a part of the Guardian's intrusion as Dinoginos winds its way up from below, baking with the heat of the earth's blood. But it will feel real, as heat and stone and ash erupt beneath them. Beneath everyone close enough to Loren. Which includes...
GS: Loren Voss has activated a Force Action!
<Pose Tracker> Clarissa Arwin has posed.
Locking her arms around Marivel, Clarissa looks over her shoulder. For just a moment, her gaze meets Luceid's, her pale blue-green eyes captured by their furious red ones. Her shoulders and back tense as she waits for the inevitable.
The inevitable doesn't come. Something passes - and Luceid doesn't strike at her. Clarissa blinks a couple of times, pulling Marivel in just a little closer. The young woman widens her eyes as Luceid seems to simply back off from someone who couldn't possibly harm them.
The howl ripples through the air. Squeezing her eyes closed, Clarissa hunkers down into herself with a hiss of breath as her senses cloud with chaos and disorientation. It's all she can do to hold her focus, but something, at least, continues to pulse through it all.
"I appreciate people who don't lie," she says. Her voice is much quieter than Boomerang's, heavy with the weariness of the chaotic aftereffects of Luceid's howl, only carrying on the power of its simple sincerity. "I hate lies too. And I'm being honest when I say I don't want to just be another a-hole.
"I can't imagine what it must be like to care so little about others," she says with a tinge of sadness.
As Marivel seems to regain at least some of her equilibrium, Clarissa looks to her with her lower lip bitten. Her face is pale as she struggles to focus her mind through the curse Luceid laid on her. Rebounding from it is harder for her than it is for the Crimson Noble. "Marivel... you're going to be alright," she encourages with a gentle smile and a dip of her head.
And so she does. Clarissa steps back from Marivel as the smaller woman stands. It takes Clarissa a little longer to rise, and when she does, she's unsteady on her feet. Moving off to one side of her companion, she keeps that smile on her face nevertheless.
"...Don't give up, Marivel...."
Clarissa clutches her ARM as she swings her attention back to Luceid. Marivel's opening up on the Guardian with a power a mere Drifter with a gun can't truly match.
She tries nevertheless. Dropping to one knee, Clarissa grips Strahl Gewehr in both hands and trains it on Luceid. "Marivel's a good person," she declares, her eyes bright with intensity. "Whatever happened in the past, I care about Marivel! And no matter what, I'll stand by her!!"
She fires - and Strahl Gewehr howls with a crackling intensity as a blinding light screeches towards the Guardian of Desire - a light with far more power behind it than any conventional ARM could put out. It's not technological - there's something more to it.
GS: Clarissa Arwin has attacked Boomerang with Howling Shot! GS: Riposte expired! GS: Clarissa Arwin has completed her action. GS: Loren Voss spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Loren Voss has attacked Xantia with Material - Hypogaean Pyre! GS: Loren Voss has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Material - Hypogaean Pyre! GS: Loren Voss has attacked Elhaym van Houten with Material - Hypogaean Pyre! GS: Loren Voss has attacked Lan Lilac with Material - Hypogaean Pyre! GS: Loren Voss has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Elhaym van Houten guards a hit from Loren Voss's Material - Hypogaean Pyre for 164 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Elhaym van Houten gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Seraph Boudicca completely evades a hit from Seraph Ragnell's X Buster! GS: Seraph Boudicca's Force Evade activates! GS: Lan Lilac takes a glancing hit from Loren Voss's Material - Hypogaean Pyre for 91 hit points! GS: Gwen Whitlock takes a solid hit from Loren Voss's Material - Hypogaean Pyre for 190 hit points! GS: CRITICAL! Xantia takes a solid hit from Loren Voss's Material - Hypogaean Pyre for 240 hit points! GS: Xantia has Fallen! She is no longer able to fight!
<Pose Tracker> Brad Evans has posed.
Brad's eyes widen. Same defence. Coincidence, or did it just copy him?
He doesn't have long to consider it before the widening of that barrier forces him to stagger backward. Except it's not widening, he realizes too late, it's...manifesting, forming up and closing in! He feels his flesh and bones contract. He clenches his fist, manifesting the Mechanical Glove's won barrier - trying to resist the vectorless force crashing against him. It stops it from killing him, but when the assault ends he still has to collapse to his knees, wheezing for breath.
"Oh, I'm fulla surprises," Brad rasps toward Kamui. "Gotta work hard to keep up with this bunch, yeah?" He laughs, low.
No more sacrifices, Marivel demands, screaming. Brad grimaces. Well that's not a tall order or anything.
Still, it gives him some strength to stand. He looks at the...golem, he guesses, is the word. "....sorry," he says, quietly. "This whole thing isn't your fault. If you're learning...I'd like it if you could learn that."
Then he whips his arm forward, slamming against that barrier again. But it's not his fist he's doing the attack with, not really.
The mechanical glove's cannon compartment slots out, and from within the muzzle a minigun six-barrel emerges, which emits a high buzzing as it starts to pepper Asgard's barrier with thousands of bullets over the next several seconds. "But I need you to lay off, too!" he roars.
GS: Formation! Brad Evans has attacked Asgard with 100 Knuckle! GS: Brad Evans has completed his action. GS: Asgard takes a glancing hit from Brad Evans's 100 Knuckle for 68 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Asgard gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up!
<Pose Tracker> Leah Sadalbari has posed.
Asgard's eyes settle upon the Watcher. Hr question hangs on the air, as yet unanswered. But he has one to give. Accepting her challenge, Asgard's fist hits the ground and the ground begins to divide as it approaches her. A tree topples as its roots are disturbed; shrubs fall into the abyss. The crumbling, splitting earth approaches the enforcer of Solaris, and she turns towards it.
"Yes... Show me. HRAH!"
The Watcher swings down her blade straight to the ground, power gathering all around her and channeling into a shockwave along the dirt straight towards Asgard's. They meet, and burst, rock showering her from the ensuing explosion... But still she stands.
"To face 'that girl', and a 'hero' of Slayheim... Yes. I see."
Turning back to Dash, she speaks in the same even tone. "I know many things about you," the Watcher answers Dash. "And as you see, we are not completely different."
She did speak those words to Ida--and does not expect her to stop. Quite the opposite, Ida says that mastery is a process-- "Yes," the Watcher answers Ida's first question, and if Ida could see her eye it would carry the same note of intensified interest that her voice vaguely communictes through distortion. Does she understand? She says as much. But perfection...
"No, Ida Everstead-Rey. What I seek is ultimate truth. The only truth."
Ida shouts her defiance, and fires the Devil's Due in tandem with Dash's rolling barrier. There is no immediate reaction to being targetted--it just happens, and the forces impact her. A blast of biometal impacts the side of her helmet outright, and the blast kicks up so much dust that the Watcher is rendered invisible as she is knocked backwards and away some distance, hitting the ground with a vague distorted grunt.
"...Impressive," she allows, hand hitting the ground and pushing her form back up, kneeling to standing again. Her helmet is battle-blasted, where one 'eye' should be a ruined mess of gilt that was once some of the lines of decoration. It's like a melted face, but does not do the courtesy of nose or mouth.
She stops only to turn her face towards Loren as he calls forth the Material summon of Dinoginos, and no one can see the small smile that spreads on her face.
She does not stop to enjoy it; surely the combatants before her will not afford her such niceties.
"Your perspectives are small. You do not yet understand. I, once, also failed to understand, and in this we are alike. But where we differ..." The Watcher raises her hand before her chest, curling it again into a fist.
"Can you feel it?" her distorted voice questions, as black waves of power begin to exude from her hand towards the ground, like seismic ripples cascading towards Dash and Ida both with ruinous Etheric power that is not injurious but weighted with absolute, cosmic certainty.
"Listen..."
GS: Leah Sadalbari has activated a Force Action! GS: Leah Sadalbari has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Gaze of History! GS: Leah Sadalbari has attacked Dash Caskett with Gaze of History! GS: Leah Sadalbari has gained 1 Combo! GS: Burst expired! GS: Leah Sadalbari has completed her action. GS: Dash Caskett takes a glancing hit from Leah Sadalbari's Gaze of History for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Dash Caskett gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Dispel! Hyper and Shield removed! GS: Break, Cripple, Jam, Mute, Slow, and Weaken! applied to Dash Caskett! GS: Boomerang takes a solid hit from Clarissa Arwin's Howling Shot for 173 hit points! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes a solid hit from Leah Sadalbari's Gaze of History for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ida Everstead-Rey gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Dispel! Cover and Shield removed! GS: Break, Cripple, Jam, Mute, Slow, and Weaken! applied to Ida Everstead-Rey! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
It's true - as much as Elly is a mystery, even Lan can see the discomfort on the redhead's face. She needs to do something. She needs to say something. She can't go back. She won't go back. Leah knows now - she has to know. And she'll kill Lan, or make Loren kill Lan, or send her back to Myyah and it will start all over again.
Lan will be the only one ignorant, again.
"I... did," she nods to Xantia. She recognizes the other girl, a little bit. Gwen knows her, which puts Lan at ease. She trusts Gwen's sense of people. Maybe because Gwen and Lan are... a lot alike. "Yeah. Yeah, I... I'll go, protect the gate or something, from the doppels--"
This isn't her fight. Lan doesn't know if she can fight. What if she loses herself again? He reaches out to her. Tells her to come back. And despite herself, Lan lets go of her ribbon, because she wants to reach for his hand. Not to go with him, but to drag him along with her. She reaches out--
And Elly knocks his feet out from under him. He goes down with Gwen on top of him, face pressed into the dirt, his brother's sword knocked out of his hand to skitter away on the ground.
She remembers what happened, the last time it was lost. Lan doesn't even really think - she dives for it, fingers wrapping around the blade and handle as one of her gods emerges from the earth beneath them all.
Maybe it's because she's a shaman. Maybe she just got lucky. The heat sears past her, burning one of her legs, but she keeps her grip on the weapon - even as blood runs down the blade, drips onto the soil under her feet.
Lan huffs once, but kneels down in the dirt next to Gwen and Loren, Engil's sword safe in her grasp. "...I can't go back. Loren, I..."
What's she supposed to say?!
"...Come with me."
<Pose Tracker> Asgard has posed.
Something is slipped in his coat pocket. His sensors were still too blind at the time to notice that it is even there.
It misses his ability to collect data, entirely.
Yet as he was in the midst of assaulting the Watcher with his barrier, it is only natural that his barriers must release the others. While his fist is still contacted with the ground...
Yes... Show me. HRAH!
... Kamui's oversized pail falls on his head.
The last sight his sensors catch is gaining the optical data of a green orb on someone from before, on the Varukias.
He was in the midst of optimizing that to understand it when his sensors suddenly went blind. He's reaching up for the giant pail, and trying to tug it off...
...it's stuck on his horns. And that is when Acacia says something-
Kamui is talking to you! So listen, already!
It is all data.
Just like the muzzle of her gun contacting his barrier and starts to breakdown from its force. With a strange sort of proprioception, the Golem's arm suddenly lashes out, and intercepts the incoming bullet with the back of his metallic forearm, a haze of gunsmoke flitting over his trenchcoat.
There is an indentation in his jacket where the bullet made contact. A small hole.
The bucket is still there on his head, his horns currently impaled through it on two sides.
And that is when Brad makes it rain. The knuckle of his minigun spits fire at him.
His barrier ripples like the surface of a pond, when a sudden storm comes. Concentric circles splitting the air of blue light as shell after shell peppers the ground.
His systems decide it is more important to respond to the threat than to remove the pail, but more importantly, he's marked their positions well enough.
Asgard suddenly explodes into motion, blindly swinging through the air. His barrier leading from the great arcs of his fist. The source of the minigun firing on him is first, as he tries to simply swat at the Mini-gun barrel, and anything attached.
He then turns upon the position his auditory sensors last picked up on Kamui's position, and like radar, he drives his fist into a hammer blow at that spot, a blue transparent force contacting long before him.
Then swiveling around... there's a sudden pause. Like he's assessing the location, picking it out. Then without warning he simply glides across the landscape and hooks his colossal left fist directly into the spot she is currently standing with scary accuracy.
There is no use of a barrier for that one. It's like, he is growing far more skilled at fighting without his optical sensors... before their very eyes.
It is only then that he lifts both hands above him. And tugs the pail off.
His eyes
so very
red
GS: Asgard has attacked Brad Evans with Barrier Knuckle! GS: Asgard has attacked Kamui with Barrier Knuckle! GS: Asgard has attacked Acacia Saitani with Iron Fist! GS: Kamui critically Guards a hit from Asgard's Barrier Knuckle for 16 hit points! GS: Kamui's Force Guard activates! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Asgard spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Asgard has attacked Asgard with Optimize Data! GS: Asgard has launched an attack Link! GS: Asgard takes a solid hit from Asgard's Optimize Data for 0 hit points! GS: Amplify, Burst, and Surge! applied to Asgard! GS: Asgard has attacked Asgard with Fortress of the Gods! GS: Mighty expired! GS: Asgard has completed his action. GS: Acacia Saitani takes a solid hit from Asgard's Iron Fist for 140 hit points! GS: Asgard takes a solid hit from Asgard's Fortress of the Gods for 0 hit points! GS: Lock State! applied to Asgard! GS: Cover and Riposte! applied to Asgard! GS: CRITICAL! Brad Evans guards a hit from Asgard's Barrier Knuckle for 77 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Brad Evans gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Brad Evans's Force Guard activates!
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
rEven as they move and attack, continued beams fire from Azoth, chasing after them to pierce into their flesh. Azoth's cannon of a laser shoots across the ground and then up into the air to nowhere.r
RNING ERROR WARNING POWER OVERLOAD SYSTEMS COMPROMISED OVERHEAT WARNING COMBAT SYSTEMS SHUTTING DOWNr
HimVERRIDE ERROR SYSTEM CANNOT SHUT DOWNr
His body is entangled in crackling energy, even after Ivan's mass of flame strikes into him.r
Flickering, vanishing, reappearing. Yet all the while he falls, spinning and turning to crash into the ground in a kneel. Just in time for Emeralda's draconic head to bite into him. The light within him dims with each moment her teeth siphon his power, growing ever fainter. Quieter.r
Hiszoth's crackling ceases, and all the lights turn from red to white-blue.r
EMPERATURE NORMALIZING CRITICAL DAMAGE AVERTEDr
ut his wounds still flicker with the occasional spark, the damage significant across his body: cords broken open, frayed wires exposed, chunks of blackened metal scattered nearby... Azoth kneels in a growing pool of strange, dark fluid that certainly isn't blood.r
"<Can you talk in this?>"r
he audio data comes to him in a delay, like finally receiving data from a poor connection. Azoth lifts his robotic, masked face to Emeralda. Dizzying data, familiar, forgotten. And yet, something within him responds to it, even if his understanding is encyrpted.r
"<I -- I -- I -->" That again. "<SorrysorrysorrysorryImsorry ERROR>"rHis lights flash and flicker, briefly red as he continues to let loose clusters of lasers thanks, poison" -- but in his current condition, they may simply miss.r%
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Boudicca has posed.
"Eh? We said the same thing..?" Boudicca, proving she is still Boudicca no matter how grim she tries to act sometimes, comes to a dead stop for an instant and blinks in bafflement as Ragnell rolls her eyes.
Luckily, she doesn't stop for long. She can't, really; it's elementally improbable. Lightning goes to ground, and the wind howls. There was no course for them but to move. Or, at times - to be moved, as Ragnell slams into the Gate. "Congratulations on your insight!" Boudicca raises her voice to call back to Ragnell in the wake of what she might have thought was private musing, which is - and this is true - the closest Boudicca has gotten to delivering an actual zinger this entire fight.
MAYBE SHE IS NOT ENTIRELY HOPELESS.
Unfortunately, Boudicca's potential - perhaps not only in the art of banter - only serves to bring Ragnell to another philosophical point. Say, she says, and Boudicca listens; enemy of all Filgaia Ragnell might be, but she is also an elder Seraph, and Ragnell has taught the uneducated Boudicca a great many things about their spiritual condition.
She also takes a new weapon into hand, but at first, Boudicca is too occupied by what she's saying.
"Humans... may be reborn as Seraphim..?" It's telling that at no point does Boudicca even venture the idea that Ragnell is lying to her; Ragnell might be a scoundrel, but she's always been honest about this sort of thing. "But, would that not imply..."
What she is saying is shortly interrupted by a gasp, wind rushing in, as Boudicca's mind finally decides to fall on the thing in Ragnell's hands. "A--ah--!!"
That thing --
-- it's an ARM.
Seraphim are sorcerous creatures, and the use of martial Artes may focus their magic -- but Boudicca has never been one to deal much with the ingenuity of man. And yet - looking down that barrel - she can see why it's Ragnell holding that ancient technology. Ragnell may not agree with her about humanity, but...
... but Boudicca feels keenly Ragnell has always been better at humanity than her. More comfortable, more casual, more immersed in their ways and their words.
Besides. Ragnell is older than her, after all.
And an ARM is a very, very old thing.
X BUSTER --
The coloured light of the wind blows away from that lightning, carrying with it a long, long ribbon. It tangles on the opposite corner of the Main Gate - and Boudicca drops down, pale-faced and still a little shimmery at the edges. Despite her last-ditch effort to avoid the power of that strike - she still felt the base edge of that lightning. That power...
Distracted for a moment from Ragnell's revelation, Boudicca's first question is, simply: "Why... why did you obtain such a thing?"
Not 'where,' not 'how.'
It's Boudicca asking, after all.
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
Even as they move and attack, continued energy fires from Azoth, small lasers continue to dart and chase after them to pierce into their flesh. Azoth remains in place, his cannon of a laser shooting across the ground and then up into the air to nowhere.
WARNING ERROR WARNING POWER OVERLOAD SYSTEMS COMPROMISED OVERHEAT WARNING COMBAT SYSTEMS SHUTTING DOWNr
HimVERRIDE ERROR SYSTEM CANNOT SHUT DOWN
His body is entangled in crackling energy, even after Ivan's mass of flame strikes into him.
Flickering, vanishing, reappearing. Yet all the while he falls, spinning and turning to crash into the ground in a kneel. Just in time for Emeralda's draconic head to bite into him. The light within him dims with each moment her teeth siphon his power, growing ever fainter. Quieter
Azoth's crackling ceases, and all the lights turn from red to white-blue.
TEMPERATURE NORMALIZING CRITICAL DAMAGE AVERTED
But his wounds still flicker with the occasional spark, the damage significant across his body: cords broken open, frayed wires exposed, chunks of blackened metal scattered nearby... Azoth kneels in a growing pool of strange, dark fluid that certainly isn't blood.
"<Can you talk in this?>"
The audio data comes to him in a delay, like finally receiving data from a poor connection. Azoth lifts his robotic, masked face to Emeralda. Dizzying data, familiar, forgotten. And yet, something within him knows how to respond, even if his understanding is encyrpted.
""<I -- I -- I -->" That again. "<SorrysorrysorrysorryImsorry ERROR>"
His lights flash and flicker, briefly red as he continues to let loose clusters of lasers ((thanks, poison)) -- but in his current condition, they may simply miss.
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
Kamui hears, faintly, the deseperate argument between Luceid and Marivel in the distance. No more sacrifices... much like Brad, she's not sure she can keep that promise either, given how she's already *tried*, like, twice in the few months she's been active again.
Asgard is chasing after her, and her eyes widen as his fist comes at her with the full, swell force of a hammer;
"Fourth Armour!"
There is a sickening crunch of metal on metal... and Kamui's brought her arms up in a boxer's guard--
And pearlescent white gauntlets, adorned with blue and gold, have manifested from cubes of data just in time to protect her arms from being purely blown off.
Still.
Even with Lumen's latest gauntlets, she's trembling, the impact very much lasting as hisses of smoke escape from underneath it.
Asgard's eyes have turned red, and the sensation of combat and violence is very much in the air; she looks towards Brad as he says he's got to come up with new tricks if he's gonna keep up, and showers Asgard with bullets, and Acacia's fired with another powerful shot from her gun.
And somewhere, she doesn't know where...
She feels an X-Buster being shot.
"Sorry..." Kamui whispers. "I know it's not you. But like Brad says, like Master says... we can't..."
Her fist draws back with a loud CLANK, and the barrel of an arm cannon replaces it, complete with four emitters on their sides. The Fourth Armour's Arm Parts...
Her own X-Buster.
"The sky's gonna fall... so I gotta..."
She glows with power, a translucent light-blue hue, motes of power coalescing through the entirety of her Buster. She lifts the cannon, face full of regret as she sees Asgard down her sights.
"Gotta make this count...!"
GS: Kamui has attacked Asgard with X-Buster - Charge Shot! GS: Kamui has gained 1 Combo! GS: Kamui has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Asgard critically Guards a hit from Kamui's X-Buster - Charge Shot for 35 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Asgard gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Asgard's Force Guard activates!
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
What does it say about Filgaia and its people that the one being with the purest, most honest desire in the entire world is the demon called Boomerang? Ashley does not have the opportunity to respond before the demon's fist crashes into his skull. Something cracks, something much more important nearly *pops*. Ashley is knocked flying, laid out across the ground in a single devastating blow.
And for a brief, terrible moment, he's absolutely still.
But he's not dead.
He's all too alive as Marivel's rage and frustrations finally boil over. He hears it all, his head spinning, his ears ringing, as she finally, finally reveals why it is that she was so willing to tap into the power of the Blazer- power that could very well destroy the world.
It's all because she couldn't care less if the world *was* destroyed. All she wanted was the love and happiness of a single person.
Can Ashley understand that? The depths of the desire burning in her heart. To him, it's no different from the peerless bloodlust within the Metal Demon. Even moreso, perhaps. Loneliness... is not so easily salved, is it? It hurts. It hurts to hear. The suffering in her voice, the anger, it's so easy to forget when she's acting the clown, wearing a grinning mask. It hurts.
It hurts more than the bleeding, gaping wound. More than the hole leaking fluids out of his skull. It hurts in a way that takes the heart in a vise and squeezes until it's about to pop. But more than that, it hurts...
Because it reminds him-- that there's something he has to fight for, too.
Ashley Winchester rises, slowly pushing himself to his feet. "No..." He whispers, but the word is *weighty* in a way that shakes the foundations of the soul and reverberates in the underpinnings of reality itself. His fingers brush at the crater in his skull-- as if sensing the false absence of something.
Flame ignites in his eye-socket, blue-white like a newborn star. It spreads, igniting the bloodstained, shredded aftermath of Boomerang's punch... And then further still, consuming flesh and bone and body and form as embers rise into the air and the land itself shudders.
"I can't..." The voice of Ashley Winchester cracks, broils and roars like a distant forest fire. "I can't...!"
There is a man-shaped flame there one moment-- and then a pillar of it. Fire that seems to scrape the clouds themselves. Is it done? Is the vessel broken?
A brilliant light cleaves through the inferno.
It isn't Lord Blazer that emerges-- but a figure in black armor. A visor the color of freshly spilt blood. A wound that no longer bleeds-- and not one but two eyes blazing in pits of absolute darkness. "I won't die here! Even to a Guardian, even to a demon! I won't!" The Black Knight swings at Boomerang-- and a blade of world-scourging flame suddenly appears in its hand. It cuts a rift into the world, a scar of burning, castigating radiance that is both holy and profane all at once. "I won't let you kill me-- or let you turn me into anything that I'm not! You won't take it from me-- The place I belong, the home I love, who says they're any smaller than your damn bloodlust!?"
DC: Ashley Winchester switches forms to Knight Blazer!
GS: Ashley Winchester spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Ashley Winchester has attacked Boomerang with Cataclysm! GS: Ashley Winchester has gained 1 Combo! GS: Ashley Winchester has completed his action. GS: Boomerang takes a solid hit from Ashley Winchester's Cataclysm for 182 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.
'...Question us all you like.' The Veruni challenges, as Ethius is up on his feet. For a moment, the two are on equal-ish footing. The ground beneath them is as mud, both have enough utter chaos surrounding them that any one misstep could see them getting thrown into crossfire. Converged water has Ethius' eye.
As does so much else.
The roaring of something he knows shouldn't be here, but can't turn his gaze to fully confirm whether the origin is familiar or novel beyond the baseline knowledge of a combination of sensory inputs that something shouldn't be.
Everything is noisy. So much emotion in word and deed is shed around him as he instinctually tries to acknowledge only the (almost) purely metaphorical noise standing in front of him, around him, behind him, everywhere.
All of it, coming together, at this place, as an ominous timer ticks down.
He keeps his wits enough that the pinpoint high-pressure beam fires through.
Ethius' body twists in a sideways dive as the jet of water grazes--
--rips off--
--his face mask, sending it flying into others' fights where it will be debris sacrificed before any of the powers in play. This is a detail that should not lead the conversation. More than that, in the process of going there at the angle both Ethius and the projectile are going, it rips through his right arm. A puncture wound that adds crimson into purified water, staining it and the earth when it lands. Pinpoint to lance through flesh.
Ethius tumbles. His right hand spasms as he clenches it into a fist. He still has motor control. How much of it is just pain, how much of it is more serious damage, he doesn't have time to evaluate. Ambrosius has time to gauge his facial appearance - white stubble, line creases on the face consistent with that of someone in their mid-30s or later at a guess.
His hand goes from his wound to his face. It is strange priorities, because there's nothing strange about Ethius' face at all. He doesn't look like anyone special. All this, and there's still noise.
Another thought flares about the Brad clones he has to push back.
"...I only need one answer," he asserts, finally, but there's a bleed in the tone of his voice that would be 'normal' were it not him. He takes off running towards Ambrosius...
...and dives off to the side, picking up the quarterstaff from mud-caked earth. His injured arm screams the way he flexes it and tries to move it, and the decision to stop covering his face then and there.
"Your silence." Which Ethius already has, in a sense, from Ambrosius. It's not clear what he intends to do with the glorified stick. Ambrosius is stronger, tougher. His armor is among the very best quality among Veruni armorsmiths. There shouldn't be a weakness a primitive weapon can exploit.
More noise. Noise, everywhere.
It's...
...not even the noise he knows he's after.
"Stinger." Ethius calls the technique name as he leans in and clutches the shaft with both hands - the one to the injured arm as firm and sure as the other through sheer grit and discipline as he tries to stab it in a perceived chink in Ambrosius' armor...
...and then use the mud beneath him, the slight decline behind Ambrosius, to push and try to shove him over in a stabbing maneuver that'd probably be infinitely more effective if it had a spearhead behind it.
It sure feels like there would be.
GS: Ethius Hesiod has activated a Force Action! GS: Ethius Hesiod has activated a Force Action! GS: Ethius Hesiod has activated a Force Action! GS: Ethius Hesiod has attacked Ambrosius with Stinger! GS: Ethius Hesiod has gained 1 Combo! GS: Ethius Hesiod has completed his action. GS: Ambrosius guards a hit from Ethius Hesiod's Stinger for 87 hit points! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Ambrosius enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
D--did Boudicca just do a clapback?? Ragnell gawks at her, as much for the fact that she was overheard as for the words themselves, then breaks out laughing. "Damn! Savage!"
It's true, though. Ragnell might be a scoundrel, but she's an honest one. She rarely lies outright, preferring instead to obfuscate or simply not mention things she doesn't want known. It's not that she *can't* lie, and certainly she has lied in the past, but generally speaking, when she shares information, it's accurate to the best of her knowledge.
Such as in this case. If Boudicca were to ask around, she might even realize she's met several such reincarnated Seraphim before. But then, that would also depend on whether those Seraphim remember their past lives.
Also, it would depend on Boudicca not getting promptly distracted by SPACE LASERS. It's to her credit that she's able to avoid the massive beam; that's a Wind Seraph for you, especially one empowered by a Guardian, if the Guardian of Fire. It is one of those contradictions about Ragnell, though, that she somehow manages to take in stride despite contradiction being the mother of Malevolence: that she can dislike humanity, yet be able to immerse herself in their ways, their culture, and their technology so flawlessly.
Ragnell raises the phase blaster, turning her gaze to Boudicca as her fellow Seraph rematerializes nearby, on the other side of the Main Gate. Then she looks over the blaster itself. "Hmm," she muses. "Looks like I finally got the power settin' down. Good for me, eh?" She flashes Boudicca a toothy grin and a wink. "Next time, I'll have t' pick a target that's not so speedy, though."
Why, though?
"'Why'?" she echoes. "What d'you mean, 'why'? What's it matter *why* I have somethin' like this?"
For all that Ragnell seems to disdain giving an answer, though, she also doesn't follow up with a new attack. Maybe this is Boudicca's chance?
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.
Xantia is just standing there. Casually speaking to her friends. Making a new friend even. Of course she's already decided Lan is a friend, she was helping! Besides, anybody that Xantia can speak to for two seconds without any violence defaults to Friend.
She is also no longer looking at Loren. After bringing him down the way they did, she's considering him defeated. She's not paying any attention to what he's doing. She doesn't notice a medium is about to be invoked.
But someone else does.
Glass shatters as a pair of binoculars hits the ground, the one using them moments ago having already covered too much distance to hear the impact by the time it happens. Those who happen to be looking in the correct direction may notice a blue blur speeding towards the scene, just moments before Loren speaks the word 'material'.
In the next moment, all is engulfed in the flames of the earth. Xantia was just standing there. There's no way that she could have escaped. Seconds later, the rapidly approaching shape rushes directly into the conflagration. In no time at all, it re-appears on the other side. And while its movement speed is absurd, in passing, a few things can be discerned.
Firstly, the source of that light is a humanoid figure, trailing blue afterimages behind in its wake. Their identity is impossible to discern, hidden beneath the bright light and blurred by its movement... and wearing a full-body cloak, besides. Secondly, when the figure emerges from the flames, it is carrying an unconscious-looking Xantia in its arms. Lastly, those with sensitivity to Ether may notice that this is what's being employed here... but it feels 'wrong', somehow.
In seconds, the figure has come and gone from the combat zone... and taken Xantia with it.
<Pose Tracker> Boomerang has posed.
Luceid looks back at Marivel. Perhaps their rage is such that they will not admit that she is enacting a promise; perhaps their rage is such that they do not remember. But, stayed as they might be by Clarissa in the moment before, they still look at Marivel with anger.
With hatred, now. The same hatred that they bear this whole world.
"Do not call your own desire righteous! It is yours--and it is one you would force upon her!" Luceid snarls back at Marivel. "YOU MAKE A SACRIFICE! YOU SACRIFICE--"
Dark power assails the Guardian of Desire. Earth is torn asunder under their feet; power bombards their body, and some of it wafts away like shimmering smoke. They speak even through the torrent. "--HER WILL, MARIVEL!"
Boomerang turns, then, and looks at Clarissa. He seems to have a power of hearing beyond the human norm; he hears her quieter voice, over the din of battle. His red eyes flash once, as he looks at her.
He shrugs. "Guilty. People are an ends to me--something to fight. To strive against. To challenge."
Strahl Gewehr's blast slams into Luceid, pushing them back. Some of their aspirates away, in layers of particles of light. Luceid howls, a snarl there, but they do not seem broken by that. Luceid snarls, then, and roars again -- jaws opening -- and a half-dozen balls of shade appear. THey crackle into existence, lightning crackling around each.
And then each explodes away from Luceid, and come crashing down for Marivel and Clarissa both, with colossal explosions of shadowy power.
Boomerang watches. Impassively, it might seem, as he looks back at Ashley -- and he sees the pinprick of light. Then, the inferno. It reflects on the faceplate of his armor, shined to a polish; there is no grin, for he has no mouth.
"Who says? Who knows?" Boomerang asks. He steps forward. The former Quarter Knight walks into the fire and the light, and he is not a match for it. Armor breaks and chips; some of it burns away. Some of it wafts into ash.
And he laughs. "That's the WHOLE POINT! We'll find out, kid! We'll learn in battle!"
Luceid howls. Flame swirls around Boomerang, as he charges forward. He leaps, blade swung back -- and then slams it down for Knight Blazer. He strikes, twists, and turns. His weapon rains down, repeatedly, for Ashley.
"Your home and the ones you love, some bound demon--or the unending drive for battle, no matter what it does to this planet--" Boomerang screams. "I CAN'T FUCKING WAIT!"
GS: Boomerang has attacked Marivel Armitage with Dark Matter! GS: Boomerang has attacked Clarissa Arwin with Dark Matter! GS: Boomerang has gained 1 Combo! GS: Boomerang spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Boomerang has attacked Ashley Winchester with Enraged Desire! GS: Boomerang has launched an attack Link! GS: Boomerang spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: Boomerang has attacked Ashley Winchester with Fullmetal Shredder! GS: Boomerang has gained 2 Combo! GS: Boomerang takes 23 damage from Poison! GS: Cripple and Mighty expired! GS: Boomerang has completed his action. GS: Boomerang takes 20 damage from Poison! GS: Poison expired! GS: Boomerang has completed his action. GS: Clarissa Arwin takes a solid hit from Boomerang's Dark Matter for 217 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
For a few moments, Ida fervently hopes the golem will catch the Watcher off-guard, but those hopes are quickly dashed. She can't help but be stunned at that display of raw power, invoked so precisely. She'd also hoped to at least stun her foe for a few seconds, but despite the grievous damage to the Solarian's helmet--and, perhaps, the face underneath--Grigori is still very much in the fight. Ida glances sideways, her her lips twisting as she follows the Watcher's gaze. A Medium? she thinks. That's all the time she gets to process the thought.
Grigori raises a fist. There is nothing Ida can do to defend herself from what happens next. She clamps her hands over her ears, but the sound that is not sound goes right through them. She shuts her eyes, but she can see the ripples all the same. "Ghk," she chokes out, as she staggers in place, blind to everything around her--to the steel of Marivel's resolve, to Ragnell unleashing a technological terror, to Asgard's endless, inexorable adaptations. It feels like a desperate struggle, doomed to fail. It feels like the grinding weight of years. It feels like a hobnailed jackboot, grinding into her heart.
Ida listens. She listens, even as tears come to her eyes. In the back of her mind, she can feel Fafnir's own struggle--his fear, his despair, his desperate hope. Somehow, that Golem seems to be tied to that hope.
But of course, Ida has hopes of her own. She has dreams. And she is very, very sick of people telling her what to do and how to be.
"No," Ida croaks. It is not the sound of a broken woman. Blood trickles from her ears and nose, crimson and quicksilver flowing together. "No. I deny you." Ida rises to her feet, shaky but growing steadier by the second. "I deny the tyrants that hold your leash." Lifeforce ignites around her, dampened somewhat by the lingering effects of Grigori's spell, but still bright enough to see. It gathers around her right fist in coruscating arcs as she shifts into a fighting stance and draws back her hand. "You have caged this world, and called it 'protection'. You damn this world to your small-minded designs, and call them 'perfection'."
"I DENY YOU!" Ida roars, "AND EVERYTHING YOU ARE!"
Ida crosses the distance between them, a streak of burning light. Her fist drives for Grigori's jaw like the business end of a pile-driver, the concussive shockwave of pressurized air striking first. Then the raw might of Ida's lifeforce hits home, burning brilliantly with the spiritual might of two warriors. Then comes Ida's fist proper, the blow powerful enough to punch through concrete.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Azoth collapses, torn open in many places and leaking dark fluid.
"F-FINALLY. Now just -- STAY DOWN," Ivan orders, in what is now a rather rusty voice.
The construct, in this state, seems more like a broken doll -- an illusion marred somewhat by the lasers still stubbornly harrying them. Ivan startles and hisses in protest as one of them shoots past his ear.
Azoth seems to be talking, at last, to Emeralda, in a language Ivan can't understand. He leans heavily on his warhammer, listening in a little jealously and trying to somehow parse it by the tone.
Seems sad. Damned Solaris.
<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.
One of the stray lasers does catch Emeralda. It doesn't really hurt (it hit some mass that was already inoperative, so the only real result is that she gets slightly hotter) but it does knock her off of Azoth, her hair going to the expansive mass of... well, hair... that it normally is and no longer able to bite much of anything.
Emeralda clonks to the ground next to Azoth. She manages to land sitting, but she doesn't feel much like getting up. She's not even sure if she *can* get up. "Oww..." Her everything hurts. She still feels slow, though she's getting some movement back; she'll need some time to get fully up to speed, of course, but this is better than it was.
She looks at Azoth. Then Ivan. Then Azoth again. "...error...?" She didn't do that. He was erroring before. But... she heard that other word, too.
And now she feels a little guilty.
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Leah Sadalbari with Unbroken Lotus Fist! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Ashley Winchester completely evades a hit from Boomerang's Enraged Desire! GS: Ashley Winchester guards a hit from Boomerang's Fullmetal Shredder for 128 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ashley Winchester gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Hyper and Quick! applied to Boomerang! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Ashley Winchester has Fallen! He is no longer able to fight!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Boudicca has posed.
Wind empowered by fire is its own contradiction; but the union does not create Malevolence. Rather - the opposite.
"That... that was the power setting set low..." Boudicca is agast, staring at the X Buster for a moment. But her question earns a puzzled answer, and Boudicca manages to collect herself enough to straighten up, gesturing to Ragnell.
"It matters, because... I wonder why you do the things you do, Ragnell. I am not so inured against you that I have no curiosity about your life. And in any case - I wonder what would possess you to take possession of such a frightful thing! Is it for power's sake? Or..."
Her head cants, to the side. "I wonder."
GS: Marivel Armitage guards a hit from Boomerang's Dark Matter for 131 hit points! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Leah Sadalbari takes a solid hit from Ida Everstead-Rey's Unbroken Lotus Fist for 171 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Leah Sadalbari gains 1 additional Combo!
<Pose Tracker> Ambrosius has posed.
Ambrosius observes as Ethius's mask is torn off from his attack, leading to the startling reveal that Ethius is, in actuality...!
...Some guy. There's nothing particularly stand-out or noteworthy about his appearance. Ambrosius isn't sure to what length he's going to hide it, but at the same time, he's currently wearing a helmet that conceals his own face so he isn't in any position to judge.
But, Ethius says he only needs one answer - his silence. And Ethius tries to stab through him.
Ambrosius... takes it.
The quarterstaff goes into Ambrosius's armor, piercing his side. But, as it happens, it is incredibly difficult to topple a Veruni who pointedly does not wish to be toppled.
"Then I shall grant you silence, Ethius Hesiod." Ambrosius replies. And he forces himself forward, tearing the quarterstaff out of Ethius's hands if he needs to, with a full-force, charging strike.
GS: Ambrosius has activated a Force Action! GS: You have activated the Force Action Full Clip! GS: Ambrosius has attacked Ethius Hesiod with Advancing Charge! GS: Ambrosius assumes the Avenger stance! GS: Disrupt expired! GS: Ambrosius has completed his action. GS: Ethius Hesiod guards a hit from Ambrosius's Advancing Charge for 77 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ethius Hesiod gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up!
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
A particular cry rips through the din of war and Elly feels a tight knot of horror in the small of her stomach.
Loren is reeling, and miserable. She can leave the rest to Xantia or to Lan or to Gwen, that's no problem, right? And Loren is brave but he's not suicidal, so, Elly thinks, before Loren says Material and Moor Gault proves that he takes no sides.
The explosion blasts just as Elly is shifting her weight the wrong way and she is sent flying backwards. Toppling, though not quickly, Elly curses in her mind as she looks back and sees that tree, that self-same tree that Emeralda was using for a perch and it is rising in front of her and she is going far too fast.
This will hurt. It might k
but, Elly thinks as her eyes stare ahead at the swift-approaching and increasingly brutalized tree.
but why am I flying like this? (The tip of her staff scrapes the ground for a moment.)
Because of Moor Gault.
But Moor Gault didn't throw me, Elly thinks with the hot laser determination of deadly peril. What threw me was superheated air. Air... and Fire together.
The fruit of Kahm Yugh's inspiration - Elly reaches outwards. The idea takes shape painfully slowly. The tree is so close, so huge when she finishes it. There is a sudden BURST, like a small artillery shell hitting, just in front of her, on the ground. Dirt flies upwards, and the shock propagates. The tree's limbs shake violently, as if hit by a momentary burst of hurricane-force wind.
And Elly topples upwards -- and, slightly, back the way she came.
Aloft. She does not have time to dream, but the theory is proven. Elly thinks in short, hot slices. She sees Xantia but -- someone?? -- is collecting her -- moving away from the front -- she's hurt, but she's being cared for, and there is a heartbreaking streak of unique green, dishevelled and fallen on the ground.
There's another thwack-SLAM behind Elly as the same spell is repeated, clumsily smacking her forwards. She braces herself as she leads with the metal rod; it sinks halfway (that's nearly a full meter) in the ground and Elly herself rolls away from it, having geobraked herself.
The first thing Elly does is look to Emeralda; the second thing is leap to her feet, turning to stand between Emeralda and the nearby figure with the horrid laser emissions. The THIRD thing she does is look at Azoth and see--
-- "What... ah! A, are you a Hyadean?!" Elly says to him. She grips her half-fallen staff. "If you're a Hyadean, then - Tell me you surrender. Do you understand? Surrender! I can get you help, but first--"
I hope Loren doesn't have a gun, Elly thinks suddenly, even as she looks momentarily to Ivan.
<Pose Tracker> Acacia Saitani has posed.
Acacia has only faintly picked up that Asgard might be getting faster as they fight; she'll probably catch it later, once she's had time to sit and process, but right at this moment it's all she can do to keep up with the golem, hissing out a breath as the briefest glimpse of red eyes makes her drop back in uncertainty. The golem is blinded, but something suddenly tells her that might not mean a whole lot right now.
That is driven home by the way that Asgard suddenly launches towards her at top speed, and it's all Acacia can do to jolt in sheer surprise at the unerring way the golem tracks onto her. All she can do is plant her feet and desperately try to block the strike, but when it comes down to it she's just a (sort of) average human against an ancient war machine, and she yells in pain as the golem sends her stumbling backwards. She doesn't think any bones are broken, but only because there's much too much pain running down her arms, the sensation of her legs quivering as she tries to keep her footing.
"--if we keep pushing like this, we're not going to get anywhere..." she hisses under her breath.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
Xantia's exchange with Lan confirms one thing: Lan *did* intend to try to assassinate Shakhan. Gwen's request to Matilda was not for nothing, it seems; it just wasn't needed. Because Lan didn't succeed. Or did she?
... Well, in any case.
Loren's anger towards her hurts, in a way. A way that makes Gwen immediately question her own thought process, because *of course* he's mad, he's Loren, he's part of Solaris, and she *has* been getting in their way, because she's Gwen, and even if she hasn't set out to do it, she's involved, because of the friends she's made, and the influence they've had. And the weight of Solaris's own actions.
They've fought before. It'd be good for Lan to walk away, if he's unable to see her as a proper friend.
But still, but still.
She will *not* be the one who helps screw this chance up.
"I screwed up, yes," she admits aloud to the now down Loren, for the first time since she came to in the desert with a nearly unconscious Lan in front of her. "I did something, and I don't know the consequences of it, but I'm scared of the consequences of doing *nothing*--"
It was muffled, but Gwen is close enough to know exactly what it is.
"GET BACK!" she yells, before the earth consumes her warning.
A blue shadow is barely seen moving towards Xantia
Elly is
A skittering sword
Lan, where is Lan
Gwen, don't be the one to screw this up
'what is this feeling, Loren'
Loren, this is your one chance, don't screw it up
She breathes on the ground, her lungs raw, her hair dusted with ash.
"...." She doesn't say anything. Her inaction, even after she gets to her feet, after the amount of injury she's just sustained, may be enough to speak volumes by itself.
GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Dash Caskett has posed.
Dash is even more disturbed by the person's mention of knowing about him. But he was so careful to hide his identity. Did they find this all out very recently? Was this all put together after Lydia-OS noticed the differences with him?
So many questions. And ones that he will suffer for should he attempt to persue answers with Solaris. Perhaps it may be best to remain in obscurity. "So I noticed! But sadly, there is still an ocean's worth of difference between us in how we treat people!"
The Watcher responds with a kind of strange magic. Encompassing the battlefield area they are in, evading it is not possible, despite the attempt. It is a magic that slows, weighs down the body, mind AND soul.
Dash is unsure if he has that last one even, but he feels it outside, in his mind, and somewhere deep down. "I... why?" It is impossible to discern what exactly is going on, though the world around him seems foreign. It moves in stuttering moments, as though frames on a monitor display are going missing.
Strangely enough, emotions do come to him, but are... muted? Something muddles the same effect Ida has. But the boy seems to don a haunted look, perhaps one of someone who has seen one too many war crimes.
He hears Kamui call out and summon her armor. He catches an all-too-familiar laser blasted by Ragnell cut the field terrain like butter. "You need to... stop this," Dash says slowly. Something far, far back in his mind feels like it fights to be known. It is highly unsettling. "Stop, now!"
Even wit hthe weight of ages pressing on him, he aims his Mega Buster, and funnels as much of his power into the weapon. The interior begins to glow a deep magenta-red. Large buster fire erupts out toward The Watcher, as Dash desperately attempts to fight against this crippling effect.
After all, it is just magic. Right?
GS: Dash Caskett has activated a Force Action! GS: Dash Caskett spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Dash Caskett has attacked Leah Sadalbari with Heavy Buster! GS: Dash Caskett has gained 2 Combo! GS: Entangle expired! GS: Dash Caskett has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
Ragnell, by contrast with Kamui, does *not* sense the firing of another X Buster in the area. There are a lot of explosions and lasers and bullets and so on flying everywhere, and she's not a robot. But if she knew that this gave her something in common with the bot she dislikes so much...
Well, she'd make a heck of a face, that's for sure.
For the time being, Boudicca clarifies her question. Ragnell taps the phase blaster on her shoulder, lightly, careful not to jostle the trigger even in her show of cavalier disregard for gun safety, as she considers. "Well, for one, it really annoyed Lanval, on account o' he found it first," she replies. "When I realized what it could actually *do*, though--well, it'd be a waste to destroy it or not use it, an' I'm sure as hell not gonna give it away, y'know?"
A beat.
"Now are we fightin' or what?" she adds, another glyph forming at her feet as the phase seems to vanish in a brief moment of sleight of hand. It's too powerful to use continuously, after all, even if as a Lightning Seraph she doesn't have to worry about draining the batteries. Really, it was a match made in... *someone's* heaven, anyway.
"DIVINE SABER!"
Incidentally, that would be a six-pointed star forming under Boudicca and thunderbolts falling on each point at random before blasting down a powerful central burst of lightning.
GS: Seraph Ragnell has attacked Seraph Boudicca with Divine Saber! GS: Seraph Ragnell has gained 1 Combo! GS: Seraph Ragnell has completed her action. GS: Leah Sadalbari takes a solid hit from Dash Caskett's Heavy Buster for 149 hit points! GS: Seraph Boudicca takes a solid hit from Seraph Ragnell's Divine Saber for 175 hit points! GS: Seraph Boudicca enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
Marivel can only stand through Clarissa's aid. Were it not for her, she would probably have been out for the rest of the battle. But she still seems weakened. Only her pain and rage are keeping her going. Her suffering. Even after everything she said, even when her unending wounds are not easily healed, Clarissa sticks by her.
More importantly, she stared down a Guardian... and the Guardian blinked. Marivel notices such thing even in the bleakest pits of despair. And it isn't the first time Clarissa has shown a strangely... strong connection to the Guardians. Honestly, she might only be standing thanks to Clarissa holding onto her. And her staff.
But even so she looks so tired. So exhausted. Marivel may look ageless, but she's ancient. Even for a Crimson Noble, she is old if only because Crimson Nobles always feel a strong pull to the sun.
"I lie." Marivel tells Clarissa. "All the time. At some point, the lies became truth. The world isn't so clean cut between good and bad, and heroes and villains. Some lies are worth fighting for."
She closes her eyes, exhaling out a sigh. These humans who understand her so well. And yet...stick by her. They know what she cares about. "Every time I try to warn you two about what I am... Yet you stick by me. It's... I won't lie that it isn't comfortin, Clarissa." She looks to Lord Blazer. "And yet... I am who I am. Tis true that I am gambling the fate of this world. But... What is to come... Unless we win this pot... We won't stand a chance. A gamble is the only way."
When Luceid cannot remember the promise--
--then it is difficult for Marivel to remember the full extent of it as well. Lost in that maze of memories, what does she know? And what is lost to time? What paths were taken? And which were forever cut off? Has she seen the future? Or has she simply seen what lies within trick mirrors?
"It was never her will to die...!" Marivel says as darkness subsumes her once more.
BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oYslv-lWYY&ab_channel=Sakuranoangel
And what bursts out from that darkness is darkness itself. Luceid is a Guardian of Desire, but Marivel remains of the dark. The shadowy true form of Marivel bursts out from her vessel, casting it aside as she throws herself into Luceid. It's a terrifying battle from the outside. And Clarissa...
Clarissa bought Marivel the time she needed so it could happen. She kept Marivel from succumbing wholly to despair long enough that this violent exchange between two friends could happen, this shrieking argument about the will of a woman who is no longer here.
"For thousands of years..." The shadowy THING that is Marivel whispers. "I've waited for this moment. Finally... Finally, whatever will happen... Whether The Time of Heroes is eternal, Whether the Time of Disaster is at hand once more, Whether something new and brilliant awaits us. We will see this new thing. I refuse to accept her death as her will. The Anastasia I know hated death. And so..."
The crimson eyes within the shadow blare. "If that is the will she carries now, then yes. Even that I will rebel against. And you will see the truth one day, Luceid. No matter the madness that inflicts you surges within you. No matter the madness within me...! Ashley is her successor. If that is a lie, then I shall make it truth!"
Her body takes the form of dark lasers, colliding rapidly towards the Guardian of Desire. It's an unreal sight, seeing one turn themselves into kinetic energy just to press against a friend.
"Don't deny it, Luceid. When she walks Filgaia once more, you will be so happy to see her. Of course you will. You miss her as much as I do. Maybe even more so. I see your desire!"
GS: Marivel Armitage has attacked Boomerang with Erg Phasor! GS: Marivel Armitage has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Boomerang takes a glancing hit from Marivel Armitage's Erg Phasor for 134 hit points! GS: Boomerang's Force Evade activates! GS: Reaction bonus! FP up! GS: Boomerang has Fallen! He is no longer able to fight!
<Pose Tracker> Brad Evans has posed.
The minigun fire on Asgard sure does push him up the priority list, huh? That tracks. The swat from Asgard sends Brad flying, tumbling to a stop some yards away while Asgard moves on to flattening people.
MEANWHILE:
The Brad Doppelgangers have been working their way toward the doors - one or two have been sniped out completely, but there were quite a few among Odess'as numbers, and they seem to be important because Odessa's soldiers are going out of their way to protect them. And, unfortunately, well...by copying Brad, they have copied his very high combat capabilities, making sniping them down without a protracted fight a difficult prospect. Brad's assessment seems to have been right, though - they are making their way toward the Main Gate, aiming to be first across the line!
AN INDETERMINATE BUT NOT LONG TIME AFTER THAT STARTS HAPPENING:
Brad sets the stand on the anti-materiel rifle as it finishes resolving in his hands. He lies down for this thing so that the planet can take most of the recoil, rather than dislocating his arm to another county like happened last time. He levels it at Asgard. It has stopped moving, for a moment.
Time to go.
"Sorry," he says again, quietly, tucking earplugs into his ears. Then he fires; and again; and again, the air filling with the unbelievable thunder of high-caliber armor-penetrating rounds that he HOPES will shred some of that barrier and armor!
GS: Brad Evans spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Brad Evans has attacked Asgard with Anti-Gear Rifle! GS: Brad Evans has launched an attack Link! GS: Brad Evans has attacked Asgard with Cover Your Ears! GS: Brad Evans has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
Just like that, even as Loren reaches for the tablet--
Before he so much as murmurs those words--
To his awareness, Xantia is just not there anymore, and perhaps that might have concerned him more if he weren't actively seeking that connection with the Medium and the invocation of Dinoginos that followed.
There is heat. There is fire. And then, as the Guardian's presence fades, there is nothing at all left of the spiritual intrusion.
Slowly Loren rises to his knees, merely a foot at best from Lan, bleeding into the earth beneath her. She's holding his sword. Slowly, he reaches out a hand, but not for her, for the blade.
Wait, when did she get...
...hurt.
His hand falters, and into that moment, Lan asks him something very important.
Come with me.
Loren stares at her, as if uncomprehending. "What...? What do you mean, 'come with you'?" Silence passes between them, several long moments of palpable quiet. When the realization comes, she'll be able to see it in his eyes.
"You... when did you..."
His hand drops.
"...No. How can you ask me that? What do you think I am--"
GS: CRITICAL! Asgard takes a solid hit from Brad Evans's Anti-Gear Rifle for 237 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Asgard gains 1 additional Combo! GS: CRITICAL! Asgard guards a hit from Brad Evans's Cover Your Ears for 143 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Asgard gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Asgard has Fallen! He is no longer able to fight!
<Pose Tracker> Clarissa Arwin has posed.
Somehow, some way, Clarissa's managed to keep herself in the fight. She's not quite sure how she can stand up to a god in any way at all. All she knows is that she has to. Marivel's life is on the line. She smiles at the little Crimson Noble nevertheless, blushing.
"You've helped me more than you know," she says softly. "I wouldn't leave you, Marivel. Let's do this together."
'Do this' as in confront a deity. Clarissa inhales, then turns back to the task. "Whatever happened between you two happened, but that doesn't mean I'm going to let you do whatever you want to Marivel," Clarissa fires off at the literal Guardian of Desire, stepping forward with Strahl Gewehr at the ready. But it's Boomerang who's addressing her directly. She throws a look towards him, setting her jaw.
"That's why we're going to have to fight," she answers succinctly. "The world I dream of isn't a world where people are just used like punching bags!"
Luceid's on her before she can say much more. Clarissa widens her eyes, her mind reeling even before the balls of shade descend towards her. The immensity of the attack is overwhelming just to perceive. She can feel it at a deep, fundamental level.
The spheres burst around her, and she lets out a cry and shields herself with her arms, but it's no use. The massive blasts hurl her into the air like a rag doll. All she can wonder is why she doesn't feel anything.
There are thresholds of pain. Clarissa's crossed one of the last of them, into the space where her nerves simply start shutting down.
Smoke trails behind her as she drops out of the air, landing near Marivel with a sickening thud. The girl bounces once, then hits the turf again, skidding a few feet before rolling to end up on her side - and yet, with a thin groan, she immediately begins to claw her way back to her feet. She starts with one knee, then one foot, then the other, wavering unsteadily as she rises to again confront the Guardian of Desire and their companion.
Ashley Winchester has taken the worst of it - worse than Clarissa herself took. As she watches Boomerang strike at him with such ruthlessness, her heart leaps in her chest. Another friend falling in the heat of combat. Another person she cares about being hurt for the sake of an abusive person's drive for power and battle.
Energy surges along the shell of Strahl Gewehr's jagged-looking outer housing as Clarissa raises her battered arms, her weapon clutched in both hands. "No matter what it does to this planet?" she rasps, her voice choked with pain she's too overloaded to even feel. "That's callous. That's a sick desire. Imagine being so selfish that all you care about is finding someone to hurt in a way that excites you...!"
Pain gives way to the force of indignation as she raises her voice - and the fire that creeps into it is hard to miss.
Desire crackles in Clarissa's shout. "I won't let you do that to OUR world!!"
She opens fire. The beam rips through the open air, swelling immensely to try and swallow both Boomerang and Luceid in a single blast.
GS: Clarissa Arwin has attacked Boomerang with Dandelion Shot! GS: Clarissa Arwin has completed her action. GS: Sneak! The true nature of Clarissa Arwin's attack becomes clear! GS: Boomerang takes a solid hit from Clarissa Arwin's Extra Critical for 168 hit points! GS: Boomerang has Fallen! He is no longer able to fight!
<Pose Tracker> Clarissa Arwin has posed.
The blast Clarissa fires off is no ordinary shot.
The earth rumbles violently beneath the force of Strahl Gewehr. It is more than a shot from an ARM. There is a magic behind it that defies explanation - and as the weapon fires, it's as if Filgaia itself vibrates with a sympathetic tremor. Rocks shudder against the turf. Long shadows cast around the beam as it swells to a size so immense that it nearly consumes the entire battlefield. The light of the assault can be seen from kilometres away.
Clarissa does not even need to sweep the shot. The beam itself is more than wide enough that it could hit both Boomerang and Luceid at once.
<Pose Tracker> Leah Sadalbari has posed.
The Watcher leaves Loren to his decision. For now. She has a battle to fight... as does he, if not the one he realizes.
Crimson and quicksilver flow together, and the Watcher turns her head once more towards Ida as she rises. She speaks of tyrants; she ignites lifeforce around herself brilliantly. The arcs pulse, and the Watcher waits. "Yes..."
The streak of burning light drives towards her. Grigori waits, her blade shifting to the side. The punch impacts--and it is hard to see what happens next, so quick is it. There is the sound of something starting to crack, and it is a pauldron from the shockwave of the blast, even Solarian metal having some limits. Her face is hit, and she is knocked from her feet backwards, the shockwave of impact stirring the ground, shaking trees for yards around them just being near it. Mid-air the Buster blasts into her, and there is a terrific explosion that blocks out all sight of her.
When she hits the ground at one knee some distance away, she looks, and there is something appraising in her stare, even without an expression to guide it, a scrutiny that goes beyond eyes. ...There is also slagged armor, a ruined tabard, and a wrecked helmet. Her blade is down, and she is silent for a moment.
"...Yes," she says. "Your denial is powerful, and yet you deny spectres and shadows, ideas of what could be. And yet, you may yet learn of the truth. You have the will. But can you survive what is to come?"
"I will not stop," she says to Dash. "But you, too, may come to understand in time."
She lifts her hand to the other side of her head, activating the radio there. "...Yes. It is time." She speaks calmly, her voice distorter continuing its work. "Initiate."
She rises, and looks upward. "And so, the trumpet sounded, and the river ran as blood."
She does not move to attack her opponents once more.
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
She doesn't try to hold it away from him. Lan knows how important his brother's sword is to Loren, even if he can no longer remember the brother it had belonged to. She'd promised after all; that she'd remember things for him, when he no longer can. She holds the sword out for him to take -
- but her grip on the blade is unyielding. If he wants to use it for violence, he'll have to take it by force and risk cutting her fingers off.
Of course, he's a medic. He could probably sew them back on, even if she might be crippled for life. And she's an asset - Solaris could steal as many as they want.
But she believes in him. In what he could be without Solaris's poison in his brain.
His hand lowers. He realizes.
When. How. What.
Lan holds out his sword, blood dribbling sluggishly still.
"Because. You're my friend."
<Pose Tracker> Megaman Juno has posed.
A patch of ancient glass-stuff, half-overgrown with foliage, begins to glow--softly at first, but brightening with every passing second. Static crackles through the air above the tile, resolving into lines of scrolling Zeboim text. Then, a brilliant flash--
--And the growth of centuries is nothing but carbon powder, drifting away on the wind.
Someone stands there on that tile, massive and clearly inhuman of build. His smooth, armored torso trails down into a thin waist, and then into a massive cylindrical propulsion unit. His arms are not attached to his shoulders; they float serenely alongside his body, each one almost half its mass. His face is the only humanlike element of their body. It's soft, cherubic, friendly-looking. Long pink hair hangs to roughly shoulder-length, and blood-red gem marks the center of their forehead.
They're smiling. They clear their throat with a soft, electronic sound, and their eyes open. They survey the carnage before them dispassionately, their smile never waving for a second.
"The flood has come," says the entity, in a pleasant tenor. "Administrative Unit Megaman Juno reports, as ordered." He's speaking to the Watcher. "Thank you for your timely summons. I see that the situation has once again reached a critical tipping point." His gaze falls on Dash, and his smile broadens. "But there is yet hope. You have brought me the instruments of our salvation. Thank you. Go with Her blessing."
Juno hovers down a step or two, approaching Dash. His brow furrows. "Forgive me. You are a Purifier model, correct?" He squints, as if sizing Dash up in ways an ARMs Meister could only dream of. "Megaman Trigger, last active during the Class-M Biomass Infection? I--"
And then Trigger seems to spot someone else. His clear, calm gaze falls upon Kamui, and the slightest hint of concern lines his brow. "Unit Kamui," he says. "I was... not expecting to see you here, and in such degraded condition."
To everyone else, he says nothing. They might as well not exist.
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
What happens between Knight Blazer and Boomerang is not a failure of the will, it's a failure of the body. Every single strike, every single blow, Ashley meets. The knight's sword is not a thing of solid matter, and yet it seems more than material enough to connect with Boomerang's blade. But even still, it's not enough. Knight Blazer may be mighty, but the man within the armor is still suffering from a head wound that would absolutely cripple anybody, and the fact that he's still fighting long enough to *occupy* the Metal Demon is a miracle.
And yet, it's a miracle that he grasps. It's a miracle that he holds onto as tightly as he can possibly manage. He presses through, even when Boomerang's relentless assault finally strikes true and the Quarter Knight's weapon buries itself several inches into the Blazer's shoulder. Ashley grabs hold of his arm there, as if to hold it in place--
Even as Clarissa and Marivel unleash their final attacks, he does not yield.
But...
Somehow, Luceid's magic-- leaves him untouched. Is it just the Blazer's own indefatigable inferno, or is it something else? Perhaps an inkling of desire which burns within the black knight's heart...?
As the light and the smoke clear, in the aftermath of the onslaught, Knight Blazer's form has faded away. Ashley is lying on the ground, unconscious--
With his head-wound notably much less severe than it was a few moments ago.
<Pose Tracker> Boomerang has posed.
Blasts of dark energy explode outward, slamming into Luceid. The beams of energy blast the Guardian backward, stumbling over their legs. He snarls. "She had no wish to die--and Althena will perish for her treason!" Luceid screams back at Marivel. "But when that death was forced on her... she chose its meaning! Your love for her gives you no right to choose her fate! To choose to override a decision that Anastasia herself made! I place her desire for herself above yours for her!"
But the blasts of energy slam him backward. He hesitates for a moment.
Boomerang does not hesitate. He does battle with Ashley; it's only with a flash of light that Ashley is at his feat.
And Boomerang is ready to tear into Ashley again -- to lay into Knight Blazer and begin the fight in earnest. Strahl Gewehr's blast slams into his side. The former Quarter Knight is blasted clean away from Ashley, his armor cracked and burnt. Rivulets of quicksilver run down his body; he stumbles, and crumples over.
"Damn... damn, not bad, kid," he says, and his red eyes turn. They meet Clarissa's, for a moment, and he nods.
Luceid pads closer to him, light and particles wafting from their body.
But something else happens, then. A flash of light -- and the white form of Megaman Juno is there. Boomerang's red eyes shift to Juno. His hand clutches his weapon.
"No."
"But--"
"No." Luceid repeats it. Then, in a wash of shadow, Boomerang and Luceid vanish in a blink.
<Pose Tracker> Asgard has posed.
Even a whisper, is perhaps audible to a golem. Kamui's apology receives no response, but that does not mean it falls upon deaf ears. His systems record every word of it. Every word she speaks becomes data.
And just as he's turning back towards the Watcher, he's facing down the barrel of an X-Buster. The energy readings off of it demand his attention. Suddenly the Golem crosses its arms, just as the barrel lets it go.
The translucent energy collides with the shimmering blue of his barrier, and it's like he's been met with by a freight train of power. His own barrier is being pushed back against his arms.
And his feet are sliding against the ground.
Could she do it? Could she truly overcome his barrier. With a metallic noise, he suddenly steps forward into it, and uncrosses his arms with an awful heave to push back.
The energy dispersal washes all over him as blue shimmers through the air, wisps of energy smoking across his barrier.
Yet it puts him still on the back foot, as the first anti-material shot impacts his back, causing the Golem to stagger forward towards Kamui.
The Hyadean War Machine turns around and this time another shot smashes into his shoulder.
A third sparks off of his barrier. That... obviously did some damage. His next step is unsteady. And yet he's still plowing right into Brad's hail of gunfire.
"Marvelous." Something whispers into Brad's ear, before an indistinct blur moves at his flanks and forward. The Slickster is then beside Asgard, still a blur, clapping his hands, "I applaud you humans - and you reploid, for managing to deter him. Your valor is commendable! I never would have anticipated this outcome. We expected that he had not developed enough to overcome the Gebler forces - but to be completely drawn away from them? You deserve a reward!"
His smile is a blur, and yet it still exudes smarm despite being out of focus. If Acacia were to take a picture, it would not develop properly.
"And so it shall be. The continuation of your struggles on this battlefield. Do not disappoint me."
The brilliant flash causes the Slickster to turn. And though he does not seem perturbed, perhaps because his visage is obscured, his words perhaps sound like they give lie to it. "Oh my. Now this just won't do at all."
As Juno approaches, both the Slickster and Asgard suddenly lose dimensions in white light, to become flat. Then a simple white line.
Then they are gone.
Was he... fleeing from it?
However, even though Asgard leaves...
... something precious, remains in his care. Even if he does not yet know it.
<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.
Oh, there's Elly. Hi, Elly!
Emeralda starts to get up to show how not-hurt she is and almost manages it on the first try. She does make it on the second. "No, no! Don't hit him more! He's not a Hyadean, he speaks the old language. I think he's not working, or someone is forcing him to do something, or..." Emeralda trails off. Her enormous energy is pretty much exhausted for the moment. She wants a nap. "...I don't know." She feels bad for him.
Emeralda isn't sure what to do. She comes less sure when half the grass vanishes in a flash of writing. Emeralda looks at Juno - *directly* at Juno, for a moment. Another one? No, not the same at all, but...
"...who's he?"
<Pose Tracker> Dash Caskett has posed.
Dash keeps his Buster trained on The Watcher. "Don't even try it!" he says, weapon still primed for battle. They are getting up, but only talking-- they are not attacking yet. "Why is me understanding your side so important, huh? I am just one person! What about the countless people you and yours have wronged?"
"I... Initiate?" he asks her.
A beautiful flash of light, of greens and yellows and whites, answers his question.
The form seen that emerges answers even more. Some sort of fellow, hovering with a legless body and detached arms. The torso and head structure answering a potential connection. His hweapon is at the ready, and moves to aim at Juno, but is rather disarmed and lowers his weapon when he is politely addressed. "Uh, what?"
"Purifier Unit?" he echoes toward Juno, walking closer. "Megam--"
Eyes quickly sweep the battlefield.
He immediately remembers someone who has been calling him that for a very long time. A certain monkey-shaped someone,"No offense, you sure you have the right person?" Well, this is awkward. Juno also addresses Kamui as well. "K-Kamui, is this person familiar to you somehow?" Dash furrows his brows ever so slightly at the mention of her condition.
Yet there is something about the stylized symbols on Juno's main body that strikes something deep inside. "I feel like I have seen this place, that I have seen you... but." Dash falls silent again.
"..."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Boudicca has posed.
"I see..." Boudicca considers Ragnell's answer. She was annoying Lanval - that tracks; she took an opportunity - that, too. It all fits within her understanding of the Seraph called 'Ragnell'.
Beat.
"Eh?" Boudicca asks, as Ragnell issues that next question, and achieves the impossible --
-- she catches the wind off-guard.
Really, Boudicca might have tried to escape Divine Saber - but she only gets so far as the first random bolt of lightning hitting her before the whole thing is consumed with thunderous energy. She goes flying; there's nothing else she could have done.
It's as she's trying to push herself up - physically, rather than just floating off the ground like gravity is optional - that carbon becomes as nothing and Megaman Juno enters the field.
"Ah..." Boudicca starts to say something, and falls silent. A glance to Ragnell, and she decides that in this moment...
... she needs to find Ida more than she needs to keep dissuading her fellow Seraph.
It's something about the way Juno completely disregards everyone - but that nice young fellow and poor Kamui.
It's not so hard for her to find her Seer even through the battlefield, at least; they are connected, after all. She doesn't say anything on the approach - but she is here.
<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.
Ambrosius withstands being run into - not through, into. Ambrosius is made of tough stuff, and withstands even being moved down that (shallow) slope. The removal of the quarterstaff from Ethius' hands is effortless - as it should be, he has an injured arm. He recoils as such that he brings his left in front of his face, but it is not clear if it is a desperate attempt to hide his face or a defensive posture. He says one word that has no real meaning attached to it as far as anyone would know, as water continues to drip off of his mud-caked body. Ambrosius offers to grant silence - but it is a clever turn of phrase in play as he just bowls into him.
Ethius holds on for some of it, but his legs give out from him eventually. There isn't standing up to a Veruni's physical mass and strength like that in the long term - he is loosened before he can do anything more with that as he staggers, tumbles, and rolls...
...past weird glass-stuff that's glowing, brightening. Reflex tells Ethius not to dwell on what's going on underneath him and run the hell back. (...crawl the hell back... okay. Crawl, stumble, crawl, stumble again, half-rise and jog the hell back.)
He was inches away from being vaporized right then and there by incidental, accidental Ambrosius shove timing - of someone... something? Ethius notes the face. The eyes are closed and aren't looking at him. His left hand goes over the lower half of his face as he holds up his shaky right hand towards it. Ambrosius is only given a cursory look from his left. He knows Ambrosius' dominant hand and where he put his gun. He's confident in knowing the signs as to whether he's about to get beset upon by them.
When they start to look to Dash after mentioning a 'timely summons,' Ethius starts pointing his palm towards Dash instead. The injury to that arm is as such that it's the sorcerous equivalent of pointing an unloaded gun, but appearances is all he has.
"...Class-M Biomass Infection...?" Ethius uncharacteristically says out loud.
He has an idea - a guess. He does not say it out loud as he keeps that shaking palm out.
<Pose Tracker> Clarissa Arwin has posed.
As the light of Strahl Gewehr fades out, Clarissa is left breathing heavily on the other side of the gun, watching as Boomerang goes down. She fixes her eyes on him, wide with focus. As much as she's beginning to feel the pain of things, she's not about to let up. Not yet.
That, however, is when someone else makes an appearance - just in time for Luceid and Boomerang to vanish. Clarissa wilts and drops to a knee near Marivel, groaning faintly, but managing to look up towards the arriving cylinder-bodied figure with some bewilderment.
Off in the background, there's a churning of tank treads. The burly shape of Guts Dozer pushes onto the edge of the battlefield. It's a little battered after a fight with a Solarian Gear, but seems to have come out alright, anyway.
Felius Arwin's voice comes from behind the controls, amplified through an external speaker. <"Who's that?">
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
Asgard is getting stronger, faster and more overwhelming than she can manage, even with the incomplete pieces of the Fourth Armour. Acacia's right -- if this continues on, they'll get nowhere. Brad himself, however, has a big solution in the form of a big darn gun that she wouldn't want to stare down.
"Brad... Master..."
Someone-- something speaks, calling her a Reploid. Something that's a blur, something she can't parse correctly.
"Who are you?! You're the one-- you did this to him, didn't you?!" she accuses.
And yet she doesn't have the time to further react, because he flees with Asgard, and she reaches out to him as she finally remembers a name--
"As...gard!!"
But there's even more things to worry about.
Kamui STARES, stares as something shifts within the Main Gate... the glass upon which foliage has grown over suddenly flashes, and a massive figure that immediately strikes unknown dread in her heart.
That armour. The almost serene, cherubic look... that pink hair. The unmistakable, unforgettable, and yet ominous smile. And he's greeting... that masked woman? Why?
Administrative Unit Megaman Juno
Each proper noun
Purifier Unit
SPIKES
Megaman Trigger
into her head, prompting her to reel even harder as each word clashes against her memory like a hammer against a gong; and... then Juno turns to look towards Kamui.
And identifies her as such.
"I... who-- agh... ahh!! My head...!!" Kamui exclaims warblingly, her head on all but a proverbial vice.
"Trigger... why-- why does that name...?!"
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
Lightning falls, Juno appears, and Boudicca decides that retreating back to her Seer is the best thing she can do right now. Ragnell doesn't pursue her; she simply watches her go, then sweeps another long gaze out over the battlefield, lingering briefly on Ivan, before settling on the strange robonoid. 'Class-M Biomass Infection,' hm?
It seems like things are about to get interesting. Accordingly, Ragnell opts to step back into the shadows and watch how the rest of things unfold.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Elhaym joins them, and Ivan tries to hold himself up taller and look ready to take on more enemies, reminded that they've only taken out one enemy combatant amid the chaos.
Emeralda speaks up in Azoth's defense. He speaks the old language. I think he's not working, or someone is forcing him to do something, or...
"Is that what he said...?" Ivan asks.
This questioning is interrupted by the appearance of... a very... strange figure...
Ivan stares over at Juno, his brows knitted together and his mouth gaping in vague existential concern at the smiling face and disembodied arms.
...who's he?
"Uhhhhhh...nnnno idea...."
<Pose Tracker> Ambrosius has posed.
Ambrosius moves once more to capitalize on Ethius's downed position... but before he can make a move, something happens that drastically changes his priorities.
Foliage is reduced to nothing as a tall, inhuman something. A machine, Ambrosius recognizes that much, and he speaks. Behind his helmet, Ambrosius's brow furrows. He watches this figure - this 'Megaman Juno' carefully. Ambrosius makes a subtle gesture, activating the mechanisms in his helmet, scanning and recording as much as he can.
The Veruni command might be very interested to hear about this.
"Minerva, to me." Ambrosius says. From wherever she is in the battlefield, Minerva hears this, and she leaps away.
The mechanical soldier returns to his side, standing in front of him defensively - just in case.
Ambrosius offers Ethius a brief glance, but says nothing - it looks like whatever Ambrosius had intended for him, it's been delayed.
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
Finally, finally, Azoth's glitching, explosive energy comes to a stop. The "veins" that pulse through him, geometric and robotic, go dark, leaving only a shadowy figure with two, dim white-blue eyes. Stay down. Surrender. With the damages sustained, all Azoth can do is halt down process after process and hope he can scramble enough energy together for a final escape. Otherwise he is, for the moment, completely at Ivan's, Esmeralda's, and Elhaym's mercy. That last one offers in exchange for his surrender. If she had the data he did, she would know that was illogical.
"Error. Term 'Hyadean' undefined." His voice comes out broken and stilted, and with white noise at the edges of his words. Esmeralda helpfully submits that he isn't one.
But then a new machine descends. Azoth looks to the sky at the new construct. Summoned by the Watcher? Why...? What part of the operation is this?
Kamui. Lydia told him that name, and referenced her as a friend. Another construct. But Juno himself...
To Esmeralda: "Data not found."
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
Marivel slowly reforms back into her vessel, her out fit torn and shorn. She sinks to a knee. She looks at Luceid quietly, utterly spent. She doesn't answer Luceid's accusation. They're not wrong. They aren't wrong...
"But I know you don't accept it." She lowers her head. "...She accepts it... And maybe that's your way of honoring her. But it isn't right. It isn't right."
Maybe it's important to let go.
Maybe it's neccessary to give up on her. But...
She looks to the fallen Ashley.
"Why do you trust me?" Marivel asks of Clarissaa in this moment. "I would toss aside everything for her. No, for me. Tis but my own selfish desire. Tis true she made her choice. Tis true she made her sacrifice... But... It was so pointless."
She looks down. "Even if I did nothing... Blazer would one day have returned, fueled by the dark thoughts and feelings of all of humanity."
How could I just... throw her away?" She whispers. "For just a few moments of peace? She was just a child. Not even twenty. So young... So young..."
Blood tears stream down the Crimson Noble's cheek because she is full anime and unashamed of it. "They...They've given up on me. They hate me. I just wanted..."
Her voice goes hoarse. She looks to Clarissa and says, "...Who are you really, Clarissa Arwin? You are more...than you seem."
And perhaps she is going to lose someone else today if she isn't careful. Her gaze turns to Kamui. Asgard.
Just another old friend who does not remember her. Who does not think of her.
"How can I put faith in such short friendships... When so few have lasted a moment of my time? What did I give you, that makes you...so stubborn?"
She looks to Kamui again and says, "...Kamui I'm.."
She lowers her head again. "What if she's gone forever? What if nothing shall be mended?"
She closes her eyes and sings softly,
"~ But what if that star is not to come? ~"
"~ Will their dreams fade to nothing? ~"
"~When the horizon darkens most...~"
And she trails off there. Even Althena.
The wound in the back remains. And the bonds of the present feel ever more ephemeral. Clarissa protects her today.
But in ten years?
In fifty?
Will she seek her husk of a corpse then?
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
Gwen focuses on Loren, and then Lan, still on one knee. She breathes, and, for a moment, she allows herself to close her eyes.
Just for a moment.
'The flood has come.'
"... eh?" Gwen's eyes snap open, and she raises her head, looking up towards the tall Juno.
She squints. That guy has some awfully short arms- oh. Oh, they're connected to those parts floating on either side of him. Interesting.
At least he's friendly enough. "Hey, Dash, y'know this guy, or... ah. Well." Gwen allows herself a laugh, releasing some of the tension in her shoulders. "Well, we'll figure these things out, eh?"
Her eyes look around, scanning for signs of Elly, of Xantia. Elly, she sees with Emeralda, but Xantia...
"Gh..." Gwen gets to her feet. ".... Uh." She raises her right hand, metallic and visible, to the large Juno. ".... Hey. Uh, welcome, stranger. I'm Gwen Whitlock, super courier. And you might be...?"
The right arm being raised was a mistake, but she feels that maybe, this was a good mistake to do.
She missed that Juno was summoned by the Watcher, but maybe that's for the best.
<Pose Tracker> Brad Evans has posed.
Brad jerks, nearly clubbing the presence with his gun - or he SHOULD, if that thing was physical and moved at any kind of reasonable speed. He does neither. By the time he's moved, the Slickster has already darted up right past his attack range and directly up to Asgard. The antimateriel rifle dissolves to dust seconds later, and Brad levers himself upright. He watches, listening. "This is...data...to you..." he mutters. Asgard's not the only one who can learn from enemies talking too much.
Which is when he actually notices Leah. "What! No!" Of course, of COURSE one of those Solaris crazies had an override...!
"Kamui!" he calls. "We've gotta--!"
The thing that actually appears makes him stop cold. It's huge, for one. Not beyond his normal range, maybe, but...he knows to be worried about anything that looks quite so refined. "Reaverbot?" he mutters, noticing a couple design similarities.
He glances over. Ashley's down. Marivel's been fighting a Guardian and is...compromised. Kamui was incapacitated by something it said. Solaris SUMMONED it. He can't assume anyone else has any good ideas here.
He starts thinking. And as he does, he notices the Doppelgangers starting to edge forward. He doesn't know their orders, but he can guess he doesn't want them completing whatever task they have.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
Even Elly -- who he wants to die, for reasons he can no longer coherently articulate -- and Gwen -- who he feels a strange familial connection to, for reasons he's never been able to coherently define -- fall by the wayside in the aftermath of the Guardian's invocation.
In this moment his world has narrowed considerably.
His fingertips brush against the hilt, but he can't quite reach, can't quite risk it with her holding it like that. Maybe he might have asked her to hand it over, if she hadn't said something that...
'Friend.'
He goes completely still. His hand, still part-way lifted above the ground, begins to tremble.
He shakes his head, slowly at first, then emphatic. "No. No-- what do you mean-- I'm not like that. I'm not!" But he pauses, he stills again. His eyes widen slightly. Something has, as sluggishly and slowly as it ever does, occured to him.
"You're not... coming back. No, wait, we can-- this isn't--"
Something begins to glow, brilliantly; Loren twists to get a better look at it at this angle, and is nearly blinded by its light.
Something has appeared here.
'The flood has come.'
Loren blinks, slowly reaching for the backup hand-held ARM. --Wait, did it just acknowledge the Major? ...What's going on here?
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
"Ah, so he's more like," Elly begins to say, before she falters at the appearance of Juno. Other than getting her staff out of the ground and stepping back a pace - putting herself in a position to hurl herself onto Emeralda, should it come to that - she seems utterly speechless.
(Inventing bomb jumps probably was a little brain-scrambling.)
But that word... "I never heard that word in surface language," Elly says, baffled. "What -" (This may give Ivan even more questions for the future.)
<Pose Tracker> Leah Sadalbari has posed.
Nodding to Juno, the Solarian enforcer does not respond to him in words. She has no more she needs to say on that front, in fact.
"Gebler forces," the Watcher speaks over the radio next. "Pull back. Withdraw order. This order takes priority. I repeat, withdraw."
"Sir!" the radio crackles in her ear, and on the frequency. "What about unit Spicule?"
"...Leave her," the Watcher directs.
"Uh--Y-Yes sir!"
She looks to Ida once more, and to Dash...
Solarian forces start to prioritize retreating--anyone still fighting against them finds they're withdrawing as quickly as they're able towards the dropship once again.
The Watcher, instad, turns to watch Kamui for a few moments... and then her attention settles on Lan and Loren, standing. "Captain," she says, voice rising heedless of the difficulties he's having now. "You have your orders." With that, the woman in black armor turns to walk away.
<Pose Tracker> Acacia Saitani has posed.
"Kamui!" Acacia calls sharply. She'd watched Asgard wink out with a solemn frown; she feels bad about it, but all she can think is 'one less problem' right at the moment, scrambling over in the Reploid's direction as the smaller girl nearly pitches over sideways from her spikes of memory. "Come on, come on, it's okay. One step at a time, okay? Don't try to force it," she mutters as she leans Kamui towards her, and then looks up at the figure of the Administrator.
She doesn't really mean to - but that doesn't stop her gaze from being a little baleful, her brows drawn down in a glare. Something about this figure rubs her up the wrong way, and perhaps it's just her being completely biased. "She's not 'degraded'. She's just herself, scratches and all," she declares solemnly-- and then glances aside at Brad for a moment, her expression still sour.
She can hear Marivel's lament, but can't focus on it right now, as she evaluates things in a similar fashion to Brad. Her blood is ringing in her ears; she flexes her free hand, leaving the other in a loose hug around the small Reploid as she tries to figure out what the heck to do.
<Pose Tracker> Megaman Juno has posed.
Juno's gaze sweeps back towards Dash, his head bobbing in a serene little nod. "I assume you were brought here to aid me in purging this outbreak of Biomass. As a Purifier unit, this is your primary function." A slight hint of sadness creeps into his eyes--he seems to realize something. "Ah, my apologies. You've suffered memory loss, haven't you? By my records, you were last... hm." Juno glances at Kamui, seeming to notice her pain. The Megaman hovers forwards, his tone growing stern. That sense of concern is still there, though--it's never really left.
"Unit Kamui, you are suffering from both extreme cognitive degradation and near-total memory loss. According to my last records, the corruption was so extreme that you abandoned us to fight alongside the mechanoids deployed by--" A slight hitch, a pause, as if Juno were looking up a term Kamui might recognize for certain.
"Valmar."
"We have not abandoned you, Kamui," Juno says, extending both hands. He hovers closer, Emeralda and Azoth momentarily catching his eye--interrupting his thought processes, but only for a moment. "We have been maintaining your armor for over ten thousand five hundred twenty-six standard Cycles."
"Clearly, you--and these two anomalies--" A gentle glance at Emeralda and Azoth-- "Have been brought here for urgently-needed repairs. Megaman Trigger, Megaman Kamui--I beg of you. Power down your weapons systems and accompany me. I will ensure that your minds and memories are fully-restored. We will all serve, as we were meant to."
Everyone else... is completely ignored. Marivel's inner turmoil, Gwen's polite introduction, Acacia's defense of her dear friend. The only organic being who gets so much as a nod is the Watcher, and even their existence as an organic may be questionable.
<Pose Tracker> Megaman Juno has posed.
Juno's gaze sweeps back towards Dash, his head bobbing in a serene little nod. "I assume you were brought here to aid me in purging this outbreak of Biomass. As a Purifier unit, this is your primary function." A slight hint of sadness creeps into his eyes--he seems to realize something. "Ah, my apologies. You've suffered memory loss, haven't you? By my records, you were last... hm." Juno glances at Kamui, seeming to notice her pain. The Megaman hovers forwards, his tone growing stern. That sense of concern is still there, though--it's never really left.
"Unit Kamui, you are suffering from both extreme cognitive degradation and near-total memory loss. According to my last records, the corruption was so extreme that you abandoned us to fight alongside the mechanoids deployed by--" A slight hitch, a pause, as if Juno were looking up a term Kamui might recognize for certain.
"Valmar."
"We have not abandoned you, Kamui," Juno says, extending both hands. He hovers closer, Emeralda and Azoth momentarily catching his eye--interrupting his thought processes, but only for a moment. "We have been maintaining your armor for over ten thousand five hundred twenty-six standard Cycles."
"Clearly, you--and these two anomalies--" A gentle glance at Emeralda and Azoth-- "Have been brought here for urgently-needed repairs. Megaman Trigger, Megaman Kamui--I beg of you. Power down your weapons systems and accompany me. I will ensure that your minds and memories are fully-restored. We will all serve, as we were meant to."
Everyone else... is completely ignored. Marivel's inner turmoil, Gwen's polite introduction, Acacia's defense of her dear friend. The only organic being who gets so much as a nod is the Watcher, and even their existence as an organic may be questionable.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida has not left Dash's side. She stares at the strange machine, terror fluttering in her heart. There's no question in her mind that Solaris summoned it--that the Watcher called out to it, and it answered her. Her blood turns to ice as it looks at Dash, yet completely ignores her. Ignores everyone but a scant handful. Two words reach into her mind, and stab in deep.
Megaman Trigger.
no
Ida looks at Dash, eyes wide, incomprehending.
no, it can't be, not him--
And then a memory that is not Ida's scrapes against her consciousness like the edge of a blunt razor.
one of them, the entire time, no, no, i won't allow it--!
Rage boils through Ida's consciousness. It isn't hers. She presses a hand to her temple, gaze shifting sideways to see the Watcher retreat. The synchronization with Fafnir hasn't abated--if anything, it's gotten more intense than anything she's experienced.
In her mind's eye, she sees Enkidu's corpse, lying on its bier, his chest melted by plasma beams.
He remembers when Siegfried told him what happened. These Megamen--Enkidu was just the latest casualty of their depredations. If they could kill a Quarter Knight...
If they could kill his friends...
Ida's face is twisted in a look of rage and terror. "Dash," she chokes out. It sounds like she's fighting for control over her own voice. "I--"
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
There's a giant... floaty-armed robot. That answers to Leah.
After a while, even Lan can't be surprised anymore. Of course Solaris has a floaty-armed robot that answers to Leah. He probably lives next to where they keep the floating carriages in Etrenank. (Lan, that's racist.)
"Loren," she insists, a little more urgently. Because Lan knows, something has changed. "I can't go back. I remember everything." The words want to tumble out of her mouth. She's running out of time. "The night I left, I tried to kill Gwen. I can't-- L- the Major won't--" Because even Lan has enough self-preservation instinct not to say the Watcher's name out loud here.
Perhaps a good thing, too - because as always, Grigori is Watching.
"..." She waits on her knees in the dirt and the blood. But when Leah turns to walk away, Lan sniffles, before taking a deep breath. "I know we're not comrades anymore... if we ever were. But--" she calls after the woman, before her voice cracks and tears spill down her face. "But thank you for..."
It's too much. Lan starts to cry as the long, cruel charade finally comes to an end.
<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.
"Valmar." Ethius repeats that name. He notices that Ambrosius has called Minerva back to his side but isn't in a position to fully obscure him from the corner of his eye, as he dwells upon that word. "...The same Valmar related to Neriah...?"
His right hand is still shaking and he can't flex his fingers the appropriate way for spellcasting, as the adrenaline coming from trying to run through Ambrosius and shove him has long since faded. Gebler forces withdraw (or are withdrawing). He sees Ida shaking in anger as she regards Dash but he cannot comprehend the hows or whys of it.
This is as much as he can get out as he backs away to further account for Juno's incredible size, mass, and presumptive range of danger he's in at his current proximity (which is to say, a level of danger at 'yes').
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
Elly takes a step forwards - mostly diagonal to Emeralda, but it puts herself more in between Emeralda *and* Azoth, and facing towards Juno. Of course they're down low and she's up high, but perhaps the thought is what counts!
"They're not anomalies," Elly says, though not very loud. For some reason, Elly thinks distantly, the pain went away.
<Pose Tracker> Ambrosius has posed.
Solaris is retreating. Ambrosius notes how they seem connected to this Juno that has appeared. This Juno, who has a lot of interesting things to say.
Ambrosius doesn't try to engage him, either in conversation or in combat. He can tell that he doesn't seem interested in anything besides the mechanical individuals present.
It's fine. ...It's far more useful that way, besides - it means that he can observe and gather information without concern, even as Minerva prepares an escape route for the both of them should Juno's priorities suddenly change for the worse.
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
Kamui's eye -- the one good human eye -- widens further as she stares towards the Watcher as she leaves, as Acacia scoops her up and protests against her being degraded. That she's just her, scratches and all...
Marivel comes down next to her, as she starts to sing softly. The song soothes her just a little...
She vaguely hears Brad trying to tell her they've got to-- escape, she thinks idly; Ashley's down, Marivel's hurt too... but right now, she--
Unit Kamui. You are suffering from both extreme cognitive degradation and near-total memory loss...
A pause, as her eye widens, as she shrinks in Acacia's arms.
... the corruption was so extreme that you abandoned us to fight alongside the mechanoids deployed by...
By...
...Valmar.
Memory, as they sometimes say, is like a dam. The great vastness of one's memory is held back in a great reservoir of unconsciousness, and trickles of it pass through by a sluice, a little at a time...
...
And sometimes, dams develop cracks upon them.
And sometimes, just like dams...
Memories come POURING through.
"Valmar..."
Her memory harkens back to Tio, possessed by the Claws of Valmar, in that Catacomb; Neriah, beside her, urging her ambiguously that she's on the same side.
"No... that's a... ..."
*STATIC*
(BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hV20WcTqnU )
An urban road lays cracked and broken, cars and trucks toppled, set on fire. The marching steps of mechanical soldiers are heard as hapless and panicked citizens flee; in the midst of them--
"That's a..."
A figure in violet-obsidian and gold marches. It is a very visible and familiar suit of armour, the same armour she's manifested from sources unknown...
"That's..."
The same figure sits ontop of a broken throne of stone, one leg crossed as she casually leans on an armrest. Emblazoned in what seems almost like living flame upon her chestplate is the mark of Valmar. Her face... her face...
"I..."
It's her face. Kamui...
"THAT'S A LIE...!!"
The Knight of Valmar.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Juno pronounces Emeralda and Azoth anomalies, and Elhaym tries to defend them. Ivan does not understand what he is seeing, but tries to rally himself to be at least half ready to fight somebody over it. At least it seems that some of the forces here are withdrawing. And yet...
"Is he the king of the robots or something...?" he stage whispers to Elly with great concern.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
Retreat. The order is to retreat. Loren hears it, and he doesn't move from where he kneels, close enough to Lan that he could reach out and grab her, if that was what he really wanted.
She can't go back, she says, and it all comes out in a run. She can't go back. She remembers everything. She tried to kill Gwen. The Major--
Loren's lips part. He acts in that moment as if he were about to say something, but no sound comes out. He still doesn't move.
Captain, you have your orders.
If nothing else this reaches through the officer's apparent paralysis. He rises suddenly to his feet, still staring at Lan. Then, as if she were the object he -- they -- were abandoning specifically, he turns away.
And breaks into a run.
<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.
"I'm not a robot so he's not my king," Emeralda objects. Her exact ... state of being is kind of complicated, and once again she feels the stab of Being Different... but she is at least sure she din't know this floating-arm man.
She hears Kamui. Emeralda tries to stand on tiptoes to see her - that was a *loud* scream - but ends up leaning on Elly slightly for support. She must be more hurt than she wants to let on.
<Pose Tracker> Dash Caskett has posed.
"I cant say I have heard of what a Purifier Unit is unfortunately." It seems this person is worryingly calm. As if they know exactly how this will play out. "Memory loss?" Dash's mind starts racing. He sure feels like some things were familiar, but wouldn't something have come back by now?
Dash looks toward Kamui as Juno addresses them.
They mention Valmar. Dash scratches his chin. Tio comes to mind-- wasn't she possessed of a fragment of Valmar? And she is a robot, or android, or something like that as well?
Huh. Some pieces are coming together, but the puzzle is not yet whole.
"Oh, is that where your armor was coming from?" he asks Kamui. "I always wondered where it teleported from." There isn't any malice to the voice that it is being found out it comes from something related to Solaris. Just an off-comment. He was actually curious!
"Go with him..." he ponders quietly. He could find the answers there. But he is ninety-nine percent sure the fate Ida warned of would happen. Speaking of, he looks to the side. "Uh, Ida, you okay? You look like you've seen a ghost. I'm just as confused as you are."
A look to Juno. "Also, why are you calling me Trigger? My name's Dash."
Kamui's sudden outburst causes Dash to nearly be knocked off his feet. "Okay I take it that Valmar isn't a good thing! But these Solaris people aren't doing good things to people either. Are normal folks just kinda caught in it?"
"...Sorry friend, but if restoring my 'memory' has anything to do with those folks," he says, gesturing toward the fleeing Solaris members, "I dont want any part of it. They hurt my friends."
<Pose Tracker> Acacia Saitani has posed.
Behind Kamui, Acacia's hand slowly curls into a fist, and her arm tightens around Kamui's form in atighter hug. "... that's enough," she tells the form of Juno, and slips from the Reploid's back only to stand in front of her, one of the smaller figure's hands held in her own. Her gaze is still hard, but she's already caught herself, and she keeps her tone as light as she can.
"As the person she calls Master... I'm going to ask you to drop that request," she adds as softly as she can manage. There are many things she can think to say - many ways to word it. She could deny the Administrator's help entirely, caught in a pique of protectiveness, but... she can't bring herself to go that far. If it's something Kamui wants to do down the line, that's up to the Reploid. But right here and now, all she can do is this much.
"Leave it alone for now. Please," she adds again. "There's been enough today. ... besides," she adds, and lifts her chin as she squeezes Kamui's hand in hers. "I don't want her to serve. I want her to do whatever she wants to." And yet, despite her careful control, something in her frame says she expects to have to press the point, wired and alert and a little bunched up. Even as tired as she is, even as battered by Asgard's fists, she can find enough strength to stand for that.
<Pose Tracker> Clarissa Arwin has posed.
A weary Clarissa looks up towards Marivel with a pained but fond smile. "I don't think that's true," she manages, voice heavy with exhaustion and hurt. "I'm not a special person at all. I'm just doing my best... and I believe in you because you've always stood by us and done your best to protect us all, no matter what. That means a lot to me, Marivel...."
But there's more being said. Clarissa presses her lips together as Kamui's former allegiance is revealed - and so is what Dash was. The blonde girl swallows a growing lump in her throat.
Drawing herself up, she takes a step forward, Strahl Gewehr in hand. "Hey, leave Dash and Kamui alone!" she shouts at Juno, though it's clear she's in little condition to make a fight of it. "They're both good people just the way they are!"
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
Marivel sees Clarissa smiling at her. She listens to her call herself anything but a special person. And once again, in the eyes of a Drifter whho should scarcely be involved in t he matters of this world, she sees Anastasia's face.
"...I..." She begins. But isn't sure what too say. Not fast enough. And anything else she could say is interrupted by Kamui's own bout of despair. But Clarissa gives Marivel just enough strength to admit something.
"...It's not a lie, Kamui. My beautiful daughter." Marivel says quietly. "The cult of Valmar found where you were resting and pressed you into their service. You fought with the Tio units. And eventually..." She looks to her. "You took those wounds you carry, those wounds that do not heal--while protecting those Tio units."
She shakes her head. "...Kamui, you protected them because yoou saw what I could not. They too, deserved to live. Your time with Valmar... is naught something you should feel shame for. Even within that darkness, you found a pulse of light. A light that lives on to this day in your sister Tio."
"..But no matter where you go, Kamui... No matter where you go, or who you work for, or who digs thier fingers into your neural architecture."
She looks to Kamui. "We will always be family. No matter the madnesses this world inflicts upon us."
Acacia speaks and Marivel adds, "Acacia is correct. Her life is her own. Photojournalist of the Meria Bouletin. That is the life... Lumen wished for. True freedom. True joy. True peace."
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
"Or else he's -Military Police-," Elly answers Ivan. A moment later, she says again: "A chaplain."
A second later, she shifts to support Emeralda and turns her head to say, "Thank you for helping my Emeralda. ... If you stay too close and that person attacks, I can't promise you'll be safe."
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
Retreat. ERROR SYSTEM COMPROMISED Retreat. Retreat. Azoth form flickers again, rapid and with mismatched color in fractions of seconds between that most eyes won't catch, but something is certainly off. He needs more time.
An anomaly.
Hey wow EXCUSE YOU. All systems: Offended.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Boudicca has posed.
Boudicca is silent; but she places a hand on Ida's shoulder, as she watches the exchange between Juno and the others. It's all right, she says, without saying anything. It's going to be all right.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
The friendly greeting is not acknowledged, but it does give Gwen a chance to break from it. her gaze drifting to her friends nearby. There's too much to go to, but Ida...
Has Gwen ever seen Ida make that face before, or sound the way she does now? "Ida... hold strong. Remember who you are." She doesn't dare more from where she is And what Dash is, right now, not what he might've been in the past. You know better than anyone, how much one person can change, even in the space of a few years. And they, by extension, should know too." 'They', the being housed with Ida.
'The night I left, I tried to kill Gwen.'
Gwen will have to trust Ida. She'll need to trust people to defend Dash and Kamui against Juno's innocent reveals.
She has to finish the one thing she's started. Or, at least, the one conflict she's involved herself in, in ways she's not fully aware of.
"Lan." Gwen finally breaks from her gaze on Juno, freed as he pays attention to Dash and the others present. She begins to form a story in her mind- one where Lan was at Loren's side, even in Solaris. Her memories. The Major.
If someone she loved asked her to give up everything she knew, including the truths she's held close to her, just to be with that person. To be among people who regard her as enemies.
The pale red curls on her head shed their ash as she kneels down by Lan and gathers her in, arms wrapping her close like that night not too long ago.
"Whatever you're feeling right now, Lan... he's probably feeling the same."
She looks up at Loren, and sees his back, as he turns and runs. This was better, than if he coldly rejected her.
"It's just that he hasn't had the same amount of time you had to think about it." She smiles, and hugs Lan tighter. "You were really strong, doing that."
Is this the role Isiris wanted, for her? ..... Maybe, but would it matter?
<Pose Tracker> Brad Evans has posed.
Brad watches it unfold. Juno's power. Solaris departing. The movements of the Doppelgangers. He grabs his Empathite radio.
"This is Brad," he says, urgently. "Acacia, Clarissa, Felius, I think it's you and me. I have an idea. Ashley, Marivel, Ida, and Kamui are down or compromised. Not...sure on Dash. Get them to the Dozer then get OUT. I..."
Brad watches as Juno approaches Kamui. So quietly, passionately offers to fix her, to fix Dash. So firmly offers to fix the 'biomass infestation' that he can only presume to be something he doesn't want to be fixed at all.
His hand holding the empathite radio falls away, slowly, as his other reaches up over his neck, numbly fingering the jewel-like bombs planted in the curve of his broad neck. "...dimensional bomb," he mutters, and perhaps the Empathite sends it.
"Marivel. ...I'm sorry."
"There's going to be one more."
He drops the radio and starts running. He catches up to one of the Doppelgangers, punches him out and then physically heaves him, with the strength of a desperate man, toward Juno. He's able to batch another, briefly battle that one, and it slugs him in the gut and sends him staggering back toward Juno as well. Others pile out of the trees, rushing at him. Good, they're coming.
A few seconds pass like that as the doppelgangers move to menace him. He judges it's close enough.
From a distance, what exactly happens next isn't entirely clear. What everyone else sees is that a massive explosion blooms out of the air around Megaman Juno. An all-white annihilating wave of mixed energies, rippling - space and time sheering waves that rip apart anything they touch, a collossal blast wave of dimensional torsion chewing through the ground and sky. It lasts for much too long for a conventional explosion, before the light fades. It looks less like an explosion fading out than a lamp slowly sliding toward off as the released energy fades.
When the light clears, what remains is a MASSIVE crater dug out of the ground, dozens of meters across. Trees have been shattered like splinters; jutting through the bottom of the deep bowl of the crater there are whole hallways, the subterranean portions of the Main Gate poking through.
And defiant, above it all, the Main Gate and its attendant structures still stand - scored and scorched but not nearly destroyed.
Brad - any of them - are nowhere to be seen.
<Pose Tracker> Megaman Juno has posed.
"It is no lie, Kamui," says Juno. "Denial is a trait of the Biomass. One of their more useful ones, but unbefitting one of ours. It is clear to me that you are suffering, and the longer you deny your condition, the greater the danger you present to this operation--and to yourself." Juno gives Acacia dispassionate side-eye, as if she were a clump of bacteria that somehow developed antibiotic resistance when he wasn't looking. "Will you allow this Biomass--this tissue culture--to make your decisions for you, Megaman Kamui? If you have truly become dependent on them, I have no choice but to..."
Something else happens.
For the first time, Juno's gaze looks at someone made wholly of flesh and blood. Brad Evans bulls his way forward, and the Administrator watches intently, as if the whole thing were a novel test--one speck of biomass battling identical copies of itself, different only in a subtle dimensional resonance. He doesn't suspect what's about to happen.
The explosion shakes the earth. It rocks the Main Gate to its foundations, rips up trees, sends chunks of debris flying in every direction. And when the dust settles...
Juno is completely untouched. The earthen patch on which he stood has been completely vaporized, leaving a trail down into the facility itself. The Megaman himself simply floats in mid-air, only mildly inconvenienced.
"Concussive dimensional oscillation," Juno says. "How quaint. How crude. How very characteristic of dangerous Biomass. Unit Kamui, Megaman Trigger, I regret to inform you that if you do not comply with my directions, I will be forced to administer Corrective Protocols, up to and including Termination." More flashes of light rip through the air, identical to the one that brought Juno here. These are smaller, though--and out of each one emerges a Reaverbot. "You have my deepest apologies, but allowing you to operate independently without proper maintainence presents an existential threat to this facility--and to the objective as a whole. The Biomass must be contained. It must be culled, in accordance with the Directives. Your refusal to cooperate puts my record at risk. I will not allow it."
The Megaman raises both arms, and there is a sound like a mighty turbine winding up.
But Brad's sacrifice has given the Drifters a way forward--into the Main Gate, and whatever lies inside.
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
Marivel senses what Brad is going to do a moment too late to stop it.
Marivel. ...I'm sorry.
"No...!" She stands up. There's too many. There's too many to keep her eyes on! "Cancel--Canceller...!!"
She chants the spell but she is depleted. The spell doesn't go off. NOT ENOUGH MP.
And it's over too quick. In her attempts to create a world without sacrifices.
Yet again.
Yet again.
Clarissa no doubt has to drag her to the Main Gate herself because all Marivel can do in this moment is think.
Think about how the man who just killed himself for them...
...was the one in whom her trust had once wavered in thanks to dirty little words from Vinsfeld.
A fool.
A fool. Once again.
Slipped through her fingers like sand.