CoLC crossover RP, main thread

Hol Horse, ever the thoughtful person, was entirely content to let him talk like this while he was cornered. He was primed to shoot him if he did so much as move a demonic muscle, and it seemed that he never bothered moving while talking, so he let everyone say their (for lack of a more fitting term) peace.

The thumping noise, entirely unfamiliar to Hol Horse, managed to sneak up right behind him before all 8 feet of blue-armored superhuman made himself known. He immediately followed the marine's command and backed a good few feet off. For some reason, he was fairly certain that he couldn't shoot him anywhere...well, maybe the head, but considering it looked like he could break him over his knee he wasn't willing to try.

Ben's brow furrowed and he walked up to the two. "I don't want to hurt you or lock you up or anything. I just want my cousin and my grandpa back. If they're here in this city, I want you to tell me where they are so I can make sure they're safe. If they're in danger, I'd never forgive myself, and if you hurt them..." He frowned at the demon of despair and balled up his fists again. "...then this time I won't turn into Grey Matter."

The space marine slowly lowered his bolt pistol. "You forgot the most important part" Brother Marcus said, adopting a stance similar but not quite like a runner preparing to sprint. As he kicked his legs downward, his jump pack fired to life, and he went arcing right over Rex and Grimlock. "AND THEY SHALL KNOW NO FEAR!" the space marine roared, boosting down directly at Cole and bringing his chainsword to bear.

The pig orcs sniffed after Plague Knight spoke.

"He's not being truthful!" one of them said, bringing his gun up to aim right at Plague Knight.

"It wasn't all a lie" the lead pig orc said, shaking his head. "And if it's even close to true, then we're in a lot more danger than I thought" he added, turning to face his companions, "we need to get back and fortify before this all gets worse." With some nods of agreement, the pig orcs went back to their looting, a rekindled haste urging them on quickly.

"Alright Mary; just one thing before we go" Kelsey said, and started fiddling with the Ruckus symbol on her sleeve. It took a little bit, but she managed to get it off and handed it to the man in the pinstripe suit. "Some people wouldn't understand" she explained simply to Mary, leading the little painting girl out of the apartment building, "but don't worry, that will change."

Once out on the streets and walking about, Kelsey glanced to Mary with a smile. "Well Mary, I like red, blood red. My favorite food is meat... Cooked rare" Kelsey told Mary. "Now what about yours?" she asked in return.

Ben gasped as Marcus leapt into the air. Time seemed to slow down, and in a hurry he readied his Omnitrix, selecting his alien and slamming his hand down on the console. The area was filled with green light, and now XLR8 stood there. With his speediest moves, he dashed towards the now-demonic Cole and moved to pick him up and move him out of the way before Brother Marcus came down and impaled him.

XLR8's speed was just enough to get Cole and himself out of the way before Brother Marcus impacted the ground at high speed, but only just. The impact of Brother Marcus hitting the ground cracked and shook the concrete, stumbling XLR8 before he could get any farther, as well as Sawyer and anyone else standing particularly close to where Cole had been.

"No more games!" Brother Marcus yelled, aiming another swing at Cole while XLR8 had stumbled; and the space marine didn't seem to care if XLR8 got caught in the attack as well.

The blue man struck a noble pose and flashed a handsome grin. "Mister Tick! ...Actually, no, just 'the Tick' should do. Though Mister Tick does have a rather nice ring to it..."

"We're just trying to get to wherever that huge explosion was just now," Arthur explained. "It sounded like it came from directly above us. We're heading over to make sure nobody got hurt."

"And to make sure that any villainous culprit of that terrible noise shall face the echo of justice!"

Caro tried to get Zelda and Sadness before they got lost in this city, but Caro failed. As soon as Caro returned, Caro mentioned that Zelda and Sadness had a little argument, and now they’re in another part of the city. Crap! That’s not good at all!

Caro dashed off and came back with some wrapped sandwiches. Upon seeing the sandwich, Lune just licked her lips in delight. Oh, joy! Some real food! Caro also hoped that these will be good enough for Lune and Lune just nodded.

Lune quickly unwrapped her sandwich, and noticed the filling was a bit unusual. Why were carrots, radishes and fried pork inside of this baguette? The now curious Lune briefly opened the sandwich to see what else was inside, and saw that there were also jalapeño peppers. Guess this submarine sandwich is going to be different than the norm. When Lune took a bite, she experienced an explosion of flavor!

“Yes! Yes! this is delicious! Thank you, Caro!”

Lune continued eating her sandwich as she listened to the others talk. Caro asked about Sans’s diet and asked about how the city worked today. Food from Sans’s world instantly turned into energy when consumed. That sounds really amazing. If it were possible to travel to Sans’s world, she might try a bit of the cuisine.

Sans also mentioned that the city worked on a layer-to-layer basis. The lower you go, the more impoverished the city gets. Sans’ teleports work based on remembering the position he wants to head to next, and since the positions changed, his teleports aren’t effective today. Guess that’s why he took so long in meeting the others.

edited 28th Apr '16 9:50:52 AM by josh6243

Middle layer-Calleth the Plumber, For The Feaces has hit the Rotating Cooling Equipment

Shiara heard...something. She turned and ran towards whatever that noise was, registering the presence of a couple of people, but soon noticed a crowd outside her line of sight. Maybe they would know where her cat was.

Nightwitch had sat in a very cat way, watching everything unfold. She then walked forward, very delibrately, and sat at Marcus' feet.

Middle Layer - Someone teach Ben about the farmer and the viper

Despair-Cole had been prepared to let the space marine strike him down, seeming to grin at the possibility...before getting somewhat unceremoniously tackled out of the way by Ben in yet another bizarre alien form. There was a growl of pain as his wounded side was jarred, even as XLR8 was staggering from Marcus's impact.

Dagger still in hand, a manic grin pierced through the corrupted spirit's face. "Stupid little boy!" Even as Ben was trying to recover his footing, Cole's dagger sliced through the air straight for the alien's face, intent on lashing out at someone.

edited 28th Apr '16 4:54:01 AM by ColeMinor

Doomed To Fail In The Middle Layer

Ironically, Marcus was not until now a person Sawyer longed to see, if only to get him familiarized with a proper threat that was on the loose.

Of course, there was little time to think now; she had to act fast on her feet. Marcus was fast, faster than even the maid who as far as the cleaner was concerned was a prototype of a Terminator. He no doubt would hit even harder.

But she had to do something. Stumbling away from the charge she went for the strike of her own, its intention merely to stop the marine's assault. She was fully prepared to lose a wrist or two, but she had to do something. All this time she's been doing nothing. Her chainsaw was nothing compared to the monstrual chainsword, but it had to do.

"Feathered demon with a beak..." She grunted. "Here in the city... must be stopped first..."

Regrettably, she was unaware of Cole's treacherous attack on Ben.

edited 28th Apr '16 5:20:26 AM by FergardStratoavis

Middle layer — With Cole

Damn it! Garrett swore mentally, as the situation suddenly became significantly worse, what with Marcus barging in, and the other people trying to prevent him from killing Cole. What the hell were they doing, putting themselves under Marcus's sword like that?! At this point it would be better for the boy to die, because then he'd be back to normal from whatever that demon did to him ...right?

From where Garrett stood in the shadows, he had a clear view of Cole and Ben. As Cole brandished his dagger, Garrett immediately let loose the gas arrow at him... not having the time to realize that Ben was in potential danger from the knockout gas as well.

And, of course, it was anyone's guess if Cole — being not very human right now — would even be affected by the gas at all.

edited 28th Apr '16 9:50:40 AM by Korodzik

Middle Layer- Tired of This Nonsense

Specter Knight was watching the entire scene play out. Why was everybody, sans the hulking man with the chainsword, trying to keep Cole alive?! It was clear to him that in this demonic form, "saving" Cole was far more trouble than it was worth, especially if it meant getting themselves injured or even killed. "This is completely inane...", he said to nobody in particular.

Finally fed up with this madness, he threw his scythe at Cole. Hopefully, it would give him at least more than a minor injury.

edited 28th Apr '16 9:59:35 AM by astrokitty

"Oh..." Sadness looked around the city fearfully. "I'm, I'm sorry. I didn't mean for you to get lost too! I..."

Her voice trailed off as a familiar face landed near them. "Twilight. Um...we're looking for my friend, Mary, but—she's lost, and now we're lost too. Did you, see her from the air at all? Can you help us?"

"And do you—" she looked between Twilight and Zelda—"think we should find a staircase, at all? I know there's some places below us we haven't searched."

XLR8 slid a bit when he was stumbled by the ground-pounding attack of Brother Marcus. He was about to catch his bearings when not only did the space marine swing his chain sword at him, but Cole tried to stab him and Specter Knight tried to throw a scythe at him! He zipped out of the way of the chain attack and dropped the demon-spirit as he was about to stab him in the face. XLR8 then whipped around behind the spirit and moved to grab him by the arms, holding them apart so he couldn't stab him again. He then zipped away about 30 feet from the battle so they would be safe for the moment.

"Y'know, you're really sending mixed messages here. I try to save your hide and this is the thanks I get?! I'm done playing around. Where are Gwen and Grandpa?! And no more of your nonsense!" XLR8 snapped, clearly at the end of his rope with Cole.

"@*($H#$*#Y)H)#$#*)Y$@)*Y@)#H@)#*@H$*(%Y!" A rather volatile stream of cuss words flew out from the now very irate martial artist's mouth as she saw everything go to pot. The melee was already chaotic enough without her interference, if she herself hopped in then there was a high chance that casualty rates would spike up as the scene would then snowball further. Mind churning furiously, the girl tried to think of a way to get out of this now utterly ridiculous situation.

Seeing how fast Hero Brat was gave the martial artist a niggling sensation in her brain as she frantically shuffled through her memory for every scrap of info on the City that she could remember before a light bulb sprang up. Taking a deep breath, the neo-girl roared out with ki amplifying the sound to get her voice heard over the din of dual chainsaws. "...Boyo, try to drag Scarecrow into the Library! The lady with the typewriter might be able to magically finangle a transformation back to normal!" The idea bloomed upon remembering the specific rules of the place as well as the great power wielded by the librarian itself. And well, the stressed lady might have a chance to do something more exciting than magicking food up for people.

edited 28th Apr '16 10:23:38 AM by Makaioh

Mary (Somewhere, Middle Layer) - Bonding

"Oh, I like red too!" Mary exclaimed with a wide smile. "Although I like blue more, but red is a still a very pretty color! Now, food..."

Mary thought about the food she liked for a few seconds. She hadn't had much to eat since her arrival to the city: just different pizzas, the chocolate ice cream, the sausages and pancakes, and... that was pretty much it.

"Oh! I had a pizza on my first day that I really liked," the fabricated girl replied. "It was different than the other pizzas because it was blue and purple, and it tasted really sweet. It was my favorite of all the ones I tried, so I ate all of it!"

Top Layer - Emotions and Nagas and Ponies, Oh My

"If anything, it's my fault for not realizing that this could happen," Zelda said, "But regardless throwing around blame isn't going to fix anything, no matter if we're blaming ourselves or someone else."

At that point, a newcomer almost literally dropped in and asked them what they were doing. She recognized this...person, for lack of a better word, as one of the people who were talking about the Lord of Change last night. In fact, she vaguely remembered her being one of the people who Miss Tairee had to purge of the daemon's influence. If the situation had been more conductive, Zelda might have asked her about it. Alas, they had much bigger things to be worrying about right now.

"Sadness explained it well enough," she said, "If you haven't met Mary already, she's a blonde girl with a multicolored dress." She wasn't so sure on the "girl" part, but given the nature of the day she first met Mary it seemed most likely. "Also, I believe I've seen you before, but I don't think we ever properly met." She then gave her usual smile and bow of the head. "My name is Zelda. It's a pleasure to meet you."

Now that greetings were out of the way, she addressed Sadness's suggestion. "That sounds like as good a plan as any. While we haven't covered this entire area yet, we'll probably see more of it while we're looking for a way down anyway. While we're at it, we should probably think of the sorts of places Mary could possibly like. That sounds more like your area, Sadness, since I think you know her best out of the three of us."

She then looked around to find a direction to lead the group in, and it was then that she finally noticed the fight going on. They were too far away to hear much of what either side was saying, but it didn't look like something she wanted to get involved in.

"We should probably stay out of that," she said to the others, pointing towards the scene, "We've already have enough problems as it is; I don't think getting caught in a possible fight would help with any of them."

Marcus didn't ever bother pushing Rex out of the way, instead simply jumping over him to attack Cole. Luckily, Ben used his watch to transform into the blue fast alien and save Cole's life. But not before Marcus, Specter Knight, Garrett, and even Cole tried to attack him. Using his fast legs, he ran off with the spirit.

"Guys, you're not helping. I can't believe I'm saying this, but we can solve this without punching anyone"

Unfortunately, Sawyer mentioned a feathered beak to Marcus. That could mean two things, he would go and destroy the demon fixing this issue in the process (how would he destroy something that can't be killed?), or, more likely, it would make him even more compelled to think that killing Cole was the only solution and that anyone could be a spy of the old crow.

Nah, that was too risky. Better leave and try to help Ben while Sawyer chats with Marcus.

The readhead lady that Rex didn't quite recognize yelled at the top of her lungs that Ben should take Cole to the library since Tairee could probably cure him of the Tzeentch possessing him.

Rex agreed, it was the best option they had short of killing him, and he wasn't going to let that happen. So, he drove off as fast as he could behind Ben but, because he had lost track of him, he drove in a straight line trying to see where he and Cole had run to.

Eventually, he stumbled into another part of the city. A small blonde girl and a woman where there.

"Mary?"

Gon, seeing the chaos. Yep, just another day in this place

Gon got all confused when Brother Marcus showed up. He remembered that he was the guy who saved his ass from the snowstorm a few days ago and now was about to snuff the life outta Cole, although he personally didn't know the guy.

Then he saw the others try to rush in on him to prevent Cole from being killed.

What now?

The assassin saw Rex head out to go after Ben, who he assumed had changed his form.

He wasn't sure if he should go after Ben or help the others get Marcus to lower his weapon.

"What the hell are you doing?" He yelled at Specter Knight when he saw him throw his scythe at Cole.

Now that Hol Horse wasn't in a position of being faced with certain death, the usual mixture of cowardice was fitting. For all he cared sending a demon like that into a random spot in the city would be bad, but shooting at Marcus or doing anything to impede him was not going to help his own lifespan. Indecision was the name of the game, and Hol Horse was throwing out big bets.

Then some asian guy started started yelling at all of them, and Hol Horse felt that at best he could dispense a little wisdom. He shouted back at him, "Everyone's trying to kill each other and the only thing I understand is that we can't do shit about it!"

Despair-Cole didn't have much time to really respond to being carted and whipped about with XLR8's speed, but as soon as he was grabbed under the arms, he growled somewhat, still instinctively trying to curl up around the wound in his side.

"C-clock is ticking...if...if they don't get us first...when you change back...I will kill you..."

XLR8 turned towards Ranma when she suggested that he bring Cole up to the library to cure him of whatever was ailing him. He nodded. "Good idea!" he exclaimed, and turned towards the demon-spirit. "Okay, you're coming with me. And once we get rid of whatever this thing is, you're telling me what you did with Gwen and Grandpa. Let's go," he stated, racing away with Cole still in tow. He would keep zipping through the city until he found a staircase, similar to the one that he used to get to the middle layer anyway.

Once XLR8, Cole in arms, raced up the stairs, XLR8 looked around for the familiar shape of the library. He zipped towards the building and entered the library, stopping in front of Miss Tairee's desk. If Miss Tairee was there, he would try to ask her, "Hey, can you fix Cole? Something's wrong with him and we think you can help cure him." He would then glare at the demon-spirit. "If not, can you at least conjure up a cage so he doesn't go anywhere? He tried to kill us."

Middle Layer- Well, that was Pointless

Specter Knight sighed in frustration. Not only did his attempt to injure Cole utterly fail, but now Cole was long gone, rescued by an absurdly swift being.

"I was trying to put an end to this inane nonsense," he replied to the man shouting at him, "and it would appear that I have succeeded in doing so."

With that, he'd quickly teleport near his scythe (which was now lying on the ground) to retrieve it before returning to the group.

edited 28th Apr '16 5:28:47 PM by astrokitty

Zelda and Sadness were looking for Mary. Twilight already knew what she looked like (having met her before), but...

"I haven't seen her anywhere around here. And I have been flying around for a while. I have a feeling she isn't on this layer."

Zelda then introduced herself. Twilight responded in kind.

"My name is Twilight Sparkle. Nice to meet you."

In any case, Sadness's idea of searching for stairs seemed like a good idea.

However, the nearby fight had now been noticed. Zelda advocated not getting involved. As much as Twilight didn't like the idea of leaving people who could be in trouble alone, she had a suspicion that Zelda and Sadness were no fighters. And while she herself might be capable in a fight, going alone was probably a bad idea.

"Okay, let's get out of here."

Cassiopeia brought a hand to her mouth to carefully stifle the laugh that threatened to bubble up at the blue-clad man's flamboyancy. With a bemused shake of her head, she collected herself and nodded. "That's very heroic of you, gentlemen," she noted with sincere approval, "It's likely not in the same place specifically, given that the city's layout seems to shift at a moment's notice, but provided that it came from somewhere above, you may find it best to start on the top layer. I noticed earlier as I was observing the city perimeter that there are some places where one would be able to peer down into the middle, so perhaps that may expedite your search."

She paused a moment as the elevator doors closed, then turned back to the taller vigilante once more. "If you don't mind my asking, Sir Tick, how exactly did your parents happen upon that name?"