(Avatar by Coffee)
Wordlessly, Mordred followed the others. He was really, really confused. After all, he just touched the other man's arm... Oliver, wasn't it? And the wound just disappeared in a flash of light. This wasn't something that happened every day... He put his knife back into the sheath in his boot, and walked into the boat. He crouched inside it, and sniffed its side.
The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground
Jason looked around. It looked... almost disappointingly ordinary. He had been expecting something weird and strange inside, given the sheer absurdity of this entire realm, and the strikingly out-of-place appearance of the factory itself. Inside... well, it looked just like any other factory would. Apart from the symbols on the wall, that was.
He found it both reassuring and unnerving, in a creepy - familiar sort of way. It looked like anything he would find in Vessels- except that he knew it was different, in some strange, unexplained way. It scared him.
Of course, there was no question of him actually touching anything... So he leaned against the wall and waited, occasionally stealing furtive glances at Arianna, the only thing here that didn't creep him out.
How long will I be here?
edited 22nd Sep '11 3:06:41 AM by troydenite
The Maid
Fortunately for Rachel, the attack aimed at her was the last one to be launched by the enemy... something that from her perspective was a terrible mistake. The cultist reacted in split second, drawing her sawn-off shotgun from the holster on the side of her motorcycle. Closing one eye the woman took aim at the incoming projectile and charged the buckshot within with incredible kinetic force before releasing the trigger.
If I'm sure of something it's that I'm not sure of anything.
Simon would be pissed about his car if he wasn't so worried about his own.
The white-haired man got out of his car, he would only be a sitting duck there. Simon then ran off in a random direction, he wanted to get away from the attacker.
Some people say I'm lazy. It's hard to disagree.
George tumbled out of the car as it went up in smoke.
Whatdowedo whatdowedo?
George glanced at the others.
Magic.
George looked at his hands.......He was not going to hurl fire balls in the forseeable future.
Water? ice? electricity...
George's hands began to crackle as electricity danced across his fingers.
Seeing the direction things were going, Apollo began unscrewing his sword cane. He moved out of the car still in the process. Al-Kali moved beside him. He made it to the side of to the side of the street before finally unscrewing it fully.
Anti-Gnosis Weapon
As Rachel pulled out her weapon of choice, Clive silently called for Gotimva, beckoning for him through the expanse that separated the worlds. The Servant appeared with a minuscule pop, and with a mental command the Gifted sent the bizarre not-quite-butterfly zipping out through the cover of traffic to circle around the nearby buildings and hopefully come up behind their Infinatus assailants. In the meantime, however, he braced himself for the recoil of the Omega Cultist's shotgun.
GM of AGOG S4: Frontiers RP; Sub-GM of TABA, SOTR, & UUA RPs
George, air crackling with electricity, scanned the surrounding buildings while running for a nearby bus stop.
This was all turning out like a game of Paint ball from hell.
I can't find the attackers.....dang it....run....come on....run.
Apollo's eyes tracked the butterfly as Al-kali stood behind him, they made their way to cover slowly.
Apollo had chosen the cane as a fashion statement, rather than its utility. A 'Let's end the world with class' sort of deal. His first priority was a proper weapon. Colt perhaps, but one shouldn't be too picky.
He wanted to experiment with his spells, he knew it would alter his weapon. It let him hit harder and that included his cane. Vainly, he thought, he might have been influenced to pick a melee weapon as it enchanced his strenght rather than simply sending a projectile faster. Though the question was, could he throw farther? Likely. Could he throw better though? Probably not, but he wasn't sure. Now wasn't the time to ask Al-Kali though. He could light it on fire and freeze it. Could he transmute it to gold? Bend it?
If he could bend it, he could probably expand it. Or maybe make it into a flame thrower or some sort of machine gun. That would be dangerous to whip out in the middle of a busy crowd, but hey, it's not like they'll be around long.
Thoughts rushed through his head as he looked worriedly in the vague direction the bullets came from.
Al-kali was calmer, more measured. For one, he couldn't die. For another, he'd seen this song and dance. Honestly, it was like a bad rerun to him, actually more like one of those very special episodes from the point of view of the sidekick or mentor rather than the hero. This time, it wasn't really his fight. He still owed a debt to Apollo, but he only knew a vague direction from which the shots came, a counter attack would be impossible or risk collateral damage, and so he looked on passively, waiting for a chance to strike.
edited 3rd Oct '11 9:55:10 AM by Fauxlosophe
「MENACING」
Another blue disc cut the car's door in half just as Jason cleared it and stuck into the ground. It spun violently for moment, as if about to rend itself and the ground apart, but abruptly flashed out like a lightbulb breaking. He or one of the others might briefly see a figure ducking inside a window in an office building nearby.
Rachel's shot shattered the rock in midair, the shards losing their magically assisted momentum to clatter uselessly to the ground. A second stone, also hurled at high speeds but with far worse aim, took a chunk out the ground nearby. There were a few places they appeared to have potentially come from, but the stones were old masonry- only one building (an ancient stone townhouse) looked like it could provide that.
At that moment, though, there was silence- at least, a sort of. The gunshots had ceased, but panicked drivers and pedestrians were running from the scene. The sound of sirens rose in the distance, but they didn't seem to be getting any closer.
A blue aura would be visible, emanating from one of the windows of another building. The three possible locations formed a triangle around the car.
The crystal boat's interior resembled a normal speedboat, all white paint and leather seats. There was no steering wheel, and a heavily armored man sat at the rear, his hand on the tilled. The helmet inclined towards Ciaroan, and spoke in a voice that revealed that the man was, in fact, a woman, albeit harsh voiced and fully armored. "Lord. To the fort, then?"
Cid grunted and nodded. "Aye. I ain't yer lord, though." He took a seat at the front, laying his sword against the boat's side.
The armored Cultist shrugged. "As you say, milord. And welcome, lords," she added, as the White Officers stepped up. There was something different about the second time she said it, something that almost implied a different meaning. "Are these the only Gifted you've found?"
"Nah. We jus' met 'em coming back. How's camp, Chirlette?" Ciaroan motioned for Mordred and Cato to take their seats. As soon as they had, the boat pulled back from the rocky beach and away, cutting through the waves as if the water didn't exist. Or, perhaps, as if the boat didn't.
Chirlette shook her head, which sent metallic squeaks rising from the armor . "Nothing much. We've repaired the damage and the wards, but we're still dealing with Servants in the tunnels they dug, and not only that. Mines, traps, Omega's trying damn hard to keep this city from us. There's even..." She flinched noisily, and gestured at the Gifted. "Sorry, can we trust them?"
"You forget yourself. But aye, there's no harm in their ears hearing.
"We've heard that Omega Reborn was spotted in a nearby city. General Untou's went out alone to investigate, but we're almost certain."
Ciaroan groaned and tugged at the clasp of his cape. "I don't want te' have ta deal with this yet. I thought we might've bought a good amount time wi' this victory, but... Damn. We've got weeks at most. Maybe even days, 'afore they're built up enough to try again." He sighed, leaning back. "Well, we win some and we lose some. Who knows, maybe the Powers will come out of nowhere and kill us both. That'd be a gas."
The two White Officers remained silent, sitting opposite of Cid and quietly watching the boat's progress. In the distance, a blue light formed, gradually resolving into a squat, wide island. A good-sized fort sat atop its high seaworn cliffs, its tan stone walls seemingly in disrepair. However, to the Gifteds' vision, every crack was filled with bright light, and a glittering shield built of hundreds of interlocking plates surrounded it. The combined auras of many Cultists lit the fort up like a monochromatic Christmas tree.
"Fort Thompson, our foothold on this continent," Cid said. "It's a tourist attraction most of the time for your city, but since they had closed it for maintainance we... Appropriated it. Secluded enough that no one might stumble upon a battle, but close enough that we can move Cultists to shore. Infinatus must have prodded it into being for our sake, the luck we've had."
The courtyard remained silent and still, but from one of the buildings there was a brief bout of coughing, then a muffled curse. Someone with a red aura moved past a window, paused, and walked back to look out. He wore a skintight black suit, like a diver's wetsuit, and had dark skin and hair. He frowned. "Hey, you lost or something?" he asked, calling out towards the two Infinatus Gifted. "Don't you know this world is dangerous?" He looked back and forth in the courtyard. "How did you even get here?" The man glanced down the hall, shrugged, and climbed out of the window, dropping a story to the ground and landing as if he'd jumped a foot. He didn't approach any closer, though Leone seemed to have vanished.
As the two Curse users entered, Aanki brightened. "Ah, good. Now we will start, once Johann arrives."
"He is here." And he was, standing- Or perhaps just existing- near the hearth of the room. The hard-faced older man with the cane stood with him, and the Cultists nearby took a step back.
Tijuana sucked in a breath. "Whoof. Both Talia and Fisk? Must be something big.
Avrael spoke up from his position on the couch. "So, tell us, O Saint, why have you called us from our duties? We're losing badly enough already. What's the plan?
Johann's featureless mask considered him, then the others. "I have brought you here today to discuss two items of note and relevance to our strategy, two items which may be key to our victory not only here but overall.
"You were told to bring Gifted with you here today-and most of you did not comply. Why might this be?"
One of the three identical-faced men spoke up. "We found none."
"None," agreed the other two heads.
The Saint-masked woman in the corner nodded and left her leaning position. "I had twenty fucking Cultists combing the city of Faldopol, and we found two. Two Powers-damned Gifted, in a city of almost ten million!" Similar but less profanity-laden agreemnts arose from the other Cultists.
The kilt-wearing man grimaced. "Aye, there were four for my area. We couldn't risk bringing 'em this far. And if ye don't mind me askin', how'd ye get this lot here?" He inclined his head towards the three Gifted. "Your place is halfway around the planet from here!"
"Hold, Commander. That comes later. But the rumors speak truth- For the entire planet, there are perhaps ten thousand Gifted. A pitiful few, but a massive percentage are located in a single city. Vessels. There is nothing major to distinguish it, but already everything is encircling that tiny swamp city. I spoke to other Saints, and to what Powers were close enough to hear. I have questioned my counterparts in the other factions, and even gone to Jaed Rusalum in the Spirit World and questioned their seekers. No one knows why this has happened, but all agree that it is impossible that this be natural. Someone or something has disrupted this world, either during formation or our time here, and removed most of the Gifted. Or perhaps even cut the Silver River off."
The room was silent and cold, empty of even breathing except for the Gifted. Whatever humanity the commanders had possessed had abruptly fled, and they looked far more alien than they had. They were shocked- After all, these implications were staggering. "Could the Powers simply be hiding the truth from us? After all, when Omega trapped the world in loop for a while, they knew what had to happen and refused to explain it."
Tijuana laughed without humor. "Yeah, and that ended with a mythological figure being restored to life. We don't got too many left. Who's next, the Myrl?"
"Perhaps the Fourth King," Avrael muttered, "Or maybe we'll find survivors from Old Earth? Maybe the Greater Powers themselves walk among us."
Johann's mask bobbed from side to side. "Even then the Saints were told the truth. This is different. Either they do not know, or are afraid of us learning something so terrible or changing that they cannot trust even their earthly representatives." That brought the attention back to him. "We are effectively on our own against this threat. But even now there are... Opportunities. All of the Gifted share a trait- They have the instinct to use magic, and are incredibly powerful. Even untrained, they can do things I would not expect of some Cultists." The dark pillar seemed to boil briefly. "Imagine their power if trained. But even more so, if we possess all of them..."
Avrael sat up like a snake lunging. His face twisted into something like shocked rage, but suppressed and slathered in oil. "You're talking about genocide!"
Tijuana shook her head. "You can't be serious. First off, I think that's impossible."
The three-bodied commander grinned thrice. The short body spoke first. "Cruel and daring," it said. "We approve," said the other two in unison.
The other commanders seemed uncertain. The masked woman pressed a hand against the featureless white material, shaking her head slowly. Munro shifted uneasily in place. The agressive man in the robes had paled noticably.
Johann spoke, quietly. "I am indeed talking about genocide, but it is in no way impossible. To deprive a faction of Gifted has never been done, true, but neither has it been tried."
"For good reason!" Avrael hissed. "Do you have any idea what they'll do to us? Not just the white knights, we'll have Omega Reborn's Consort after us at best, and our own faction after us too if we do this!" He grimaced. "I'm not going to get sent to Root for your schemes, Johaoh-"
There was a thunderclap, followed in quick succession by two more. Avrael was lifted bodily into the air, his legs jerking spasmodically and his mouth opening and closing silently. The other commanders bit off curses and jumped back.
Johann hadn't moved, but the power and aura flowing off of him was immense. The mask now showed the symbol of the Lesser Powers, glowing sickly yellow green. "You presume entirely too much, Avrael. Seder. Harello." The Hispanic Cultist twisted, eyes wide and unfocused. Johann slid forward across the ground, cliding towards the commander. "Do you truly fear reprisal so much? Or perhaps your loyalties are..." The Cultist's body shook like a ragdoll, and the ring-necklace was exposed. "In someone else's care?" Johann laughed, an ugly sound, and Avrael's eyes shut tight. "If you are so afraid, flee. Flee and abandon this." The power vanished, and Avrael dropped. He didn't bother to break his own fall. Johann turned away and glided back to his original position, ignoring the commander's glare. "Let this be a lesson. You all are under my command for the duration of this world, and I will not suffer any insubordination."
Avrael picked himself up, dusted himself off, and returned to the couch he'd lain on before. His face burned with fury and shame, but he pressed a hand against his forehead and it abruptly went blank.
"As. I. Was. Saying. That is our goal: to wipe out both Omega and Infinatus's Gifted. You will mobilize your Cultists and begin the hunt as soon as you can."
"With so few Gifted, we'll have a lot of ground to cover," the masked woman said. She alone hadn't reacted to Avrael's brutal chiding. "And they're gonna be damn well defended."
"Which is where the second order of business comes in. Munro already asked how I arrived in this land so quickly-Let me show you. Aanki?"
The big man nodded and pressed his palms together. Abruptly, the sky outside turned back and starspeckled, and the air changed. Aanki broke out into sweat, tottering from exertion.
Johann gestured with a black tendril at the outside. "Take a look, and see for yourselves." One by one, commanders and Gifted were allowed to view the outside, and all saw the same sight:
Outside of the Mission's walls were not rocky, grass-covered hills and distant moutains, but a flat plain of white dust that stopped earlier than the horizon should. A blue-green orb hung suspended in the sky.
The masked commander shook her head. "The fucking moon. We have a moonbase. Really?"
"Not quite," Johann said, quietly and injecting a note of annoyance into his voice. "If you would cease your annoying prattling, you would realize this was simply a demonstration."
"Of our new moonbase, yeah?" As the Saint turned his mask to consider her own, the commander crossed her arms. "Don't bother with the shitty intimidation tactics. They might cow a weakling like Avrael, but I've got power and skill to match you. So what's the big secret?"
Aanki stepped in, nervously trying to relieve the tension. "It is teleportation, true teleportation, on a large scale."
"More importantly," Johann continued, as the commanders returned to their places, "It is unaffected by any barriers or shields. No spell can stop it, no ward bar its passage."
There was silence, this time full of awe. "Limited by... What? There's always a limitation," Tijuana argued. "There can't always be enough space for the building, for one thing."
"The building is not required," Aanki said, chuckling. "I just thought you would prefer it to suffocation in the void. Other than that, the only limitation is the strength of the operator." He shut his eyes, and the view outside flickered again, returned to the dust sand. He stumbled to the side, then straightened. "At the moment, that is me, though if we mean to make much use of it Johann will be taking over."
Silence again. Then, from the three-bodied Cultist, a quiet curse. "A completely unexpected, undetectable deployment method." The other two heads nodded in unison. "Anywhere, insantly," they said.
Munro let out a heavy breath. "Land and love, we really could do it."
"What do you mean?" The robed commander looked curiously from face to face. "Tell me, what do you mean?!"
Johann answered. "We can send our Cultists and Gifted anywhere. Ergo... We can wipe every enemy Gifted off of the planet, drop an army on them as soon as we know where they are. And they can't do a thing to stop us."
edited 8th Nov '11 2:31:47 PM by Hydrall
In the shadow of one of the buildings, George drew his pistol.
Lets hope it works.
We've all got to die sooner or later.
Apollo moved forward, with a smirk, heating and setting his cane-blade to ossilate quickly in his hand, the handle became rubbery in his hands, an extra precuation but one not worth forgetting.
He looked towards the blue light and then at a street lamp. With a swift motion, he cut through the metal post like butter, and though the sparking of the wires as he sliced was somewhat worrying, he was safe. As he finished his incision, he didn't grip the cane, allowing it to fly to the ground and revert to it's inert state. As it fell, he wrapped his hands around the street light, extending it as it reached the desired angle, first towards the ground near him, rapidly towards the blue light. He crunched the extended material on to itself until the circumferance of the pole was a mere 2 and a half centimetres and had flew through the window where he suspected his assailants hid.
He released it only to see it whip back to normal and fall down infront of him. He readied himself to dodge any sort of counterattack that he imagined would likely inevitably result.
edited 13th Oct '11 9:23:13 AM by Fauxlosophe
The Maid
"We got some very daring friend around here" Rachel mentioned, putting away her shotgun and grabbing instead at the metallic pole that that was stuck to the side of her bike "Everyone! Stay together! she yelled pointing at the old masonry building
"Get all of you inside and look for the attacker" She commanded right before she accelerated on her bike towards the building, opening up her sense to figure out where her enemy hid.
Her plan was simple. Scattered as their enemy were it was better to concentrated their efforts to rush a single target... And for protection of her followers she would move ahead to present an immediate threat towards one of the enemy's companions.
If I'm sure of something it's that I'm not sure of anything.
Ilsa looked at the two people who had entered curiously. She wondered if they were like her and how many more others were like them. There could have been one or none more. There could have been a whole city full of them.
Her eyes wandered over to the other people about. When she first entered they were simply part of the background. She thought that she was used to strange, but the more she thought about it, the more she realized that they were strange.
And powerful, no doubt. Better try to be likable.
Filler, because I'm tired and I need to post something until I know what to do further.
Only One Avatar
The macabre conversation before Alex made it unequivocally clear that there was no hope in this situation. Two pathways lay before Alex at that moment. One lead to an expeditious death of unknown gruesomeness. The other was a long and sinuous descension into a realm of destruction and horror inconceivable by any living being with a trace of humanity. In such a desperate moment, the former would seem like a fate rather than an option. However, if the world were to be razed by these people, people with the power transcend time and space, what difference would it make if Alex stopped fighting now?
Perhaps he would ascend into a realm of living gods. If any person could choose between perishing and conquering, how many would waste the opportunity? If Alex really did have a power inside of him, why should it be a curse and not a blessing? If there were no hope in escaping The Lesser Power, why shouldn't Alex willfully join there ranks and partake in their plunder?
These thoughts and feelings swirled about Alex's chest like a black, viscous liquid. He wasn't sure if the feeling was happiness or terror, but it was something that he had to accept eventually.
Anime geemu wo shinasai!
(Avatar by Coffee)
Mordred sat, motionlessly. "A stronghold? What do you mean?" The man was obviously confused, possibly in shock. What was going on there? Omega? Powers? Who were these people? What was that creature that answered him when he phoned the police? These questions and more fluttered around his head. He clutched it.
The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground
「MENACING」
Apollo's lamp pole shattered the window and smashed through a wall within. The blue light suddenly flickered.
Inside the room where the light had come from, a small lamp that rippled with ethereal light spun as the pole clipped it. The bulb swelled, glowed blindingly bright, and finally burst. A flood of blue fire gutted the entire floor, blowing out windows all over the building. Seconds later, the sniper rose from the roof, the shield that had hidden him vanishing. He raised his rifle took a quick shot at Apollo.
Rachel would briefly glimpse a terrified teenage face in one of the upper floor windows before it ducked out of sight. Moments later another stone worked its way out of the wall, shaking off dusty masonry and accelerated towards her bike.
One of the office building's windows shattered and a blue disc, shedding strands of light, streaked out from within, spinning like a frisbee straight at George. It clipped a light pole and cut straight through, but the deflection caused it to punch through the wall beside him instead.
The meeting started to break up shortly after, as each of the Commanders excused themselves and left the room.
"We've got to go tell our people about this," Tijuana said, apologetically. Then she was gone, leaving only Johann, Aanki, the seraph-cane man and the masked Commander, who seemed in no mood to move from her leaning position against the wall.
Johann turned to the Gifted. "So, what did you think?" he asked, mildly. "I suppose much of it must have gone over your heads... But let me tell you now, you are lucky. It's possible all of you will survive the coming war, with this."
"Cid, you're confusing the man."
Ciaroan grimaced. "Yeah, right... Well, it's not my job to teach them. I'll send 'em to one of th' Officers. They can deal with 'em." He glanced over at Mordred. "Stronghold, yeah. Place of fortifications, protection, et cetera. The base of our faction, at least over here. Ye got the mark of infinity, and so do I, and so does everyone at this fort now. We're all fighters for Infinatus, may he live forever and all that. It's... T' sum it up, the world's ending. And you've been chosen to help save it, as a Gifted. Or at least potentially save it. There are two other factions, both of whom are fine with it ending, and we fight them. They have the symbol of the omega- Y'know, the upside-down U kind of thing- and... A circle with an X innit." He scratched his red beard. "Which is a really shitty explanation, but I ain't got the time fer it."
edited 8th Nov '11 2:37:17 PM by Hydrall
The Maid
"Faster!" Rachel yelled to her motorcycle, leaving it up to the spirit residing inside to handle the direction as she grabbed her metal pole with both hands. She opened the way within herself to draw on her power... concentrating on reinforcing that which she held in both hands. The pole grew stronger, it's ability to deal damage heightened by her abilities.
Once she rock was close enough, Rachel swung her pole at it to bat it aside.
If I'm sure of something it's that I'm not sure of anything.
(Avatar by Coffee)
Mordred crossed his hands. "The world's end? I do find that hard to believe... But, then again, I find instant healing hard to believe, and lo, what did I do mere moments ago?" He shook his head and began to whistle a tune.
George lost all though of offense for a moment, ducking behind a trash bin, the severed lamp smashed to the ground just metres away.
dammit, its like paintball from hell.
George decided right now that retaliation should ensue and so now jumping out, he made a throwing motion with his hand and willing with whatever faith he had for the lightning to travel towards the building.
The lightning gathered at his finger tips and suddenly formed a ball and went sailing through the air.
Much like a volley ball mused George.
The ball of lightning went like a guided missle in slow motion towards the building that had housed the infinitus members.
Anti-Gnosis Weapon
Focusing on the incoming rock as he crouched by the far side of Rachel's bike * , Clive did his best to twist its course in a completely different direction, toward the Infinatus Cultist. "Heading for that townhouse, Rachel." Without waiting for a reply, he made a mad dash for the aging building, making use of what cover he could.
Meanwhile, Gotimva finally made it up and around to the backside of the building the rooftop enemy was perched on and charged, carrying out an order given earlier, namely: "Get behind that guy and distract him for a while, but try not to get hit."
edited 11th Nov '11 7:12:21 PM by darksidevoid
GM of AGOG S4: Frontiers RP; Sub-GM of TABA, SOTR, & UUA RPs
"Oh! Right!" Talia releases Alex.