Mancunian Candidate
Zone Six; The Kingburgering Wendy's - Dio Brando
"Poor you," I said, as if he'd not been warned. "But I did, as it so happens, and she looked ready to behead you. That's becoming something of a theme today. You're driving her to terrible habits."
He glid across the tiled floor - and God above, the man could glide, especially in his silks - and perched across the table, number at the ready. He's a striking beauty, Gui Niao, blessed with the skin of a porcelain doll and the body of a dancer, slight but densely coiled, and propels himself with a calculated bumbling grace. Were the vaguery of culture and economy differently arranged, were he an altogether different class of brigand, he'd find his rightful place in six inch heels halfway down a Paris runway. As things have settled, I wouldn’t trust him nearly so far as I could throw him.
"It's quite a thing you've loosed, on our fair servants of the peace. Was that your goal? I can't imagine why you'd think the Soryu girl knows anything useful about-"
I was struck then by a fair servant of the peace, struck fatally and in teenage abandon; as she rebounded from my outstretched arm and my Real French Fried Potato® skittered across the tabletop I turned my head for some rebuke, some passing and instinctive venom, and felt the words drown one by one as I met her gaze. She couldn’t have been older than fifteen. Were I to take her by the flailing arm, I could have met my thumb to every finger.
But this was not the cause; this fair city defines no age of majority in matters of work and its fair keepers of the peace are known to hire any willing body as makes itself present. Fifteen years is long enough to learn to look where you’re going.
How should I put this?
Imagine the sensation of lying in bed, curtains tightly closed, window facing out towards your hometown, and intuiting the passage of a lorry by its vibration. Imagine the tremors of a minor earthquake radiating out from over the horizon, or the mud of an artillery barrage spraying over the edge of your trench. Imagine a tremendous and terrible pressure of the spirit, devoid of bloodlust or intent, a sense of hunger without desire, an echo simply of power alone. One develops a sense for these things.
"-anything," I finished, struck momentarily lame, and smiled. If she struck first, the girl could kill me where I stood. I was certain of it. "Good afternoon, officer. Late lunch?"
"Number three," breathed the girl at the counter, red eyes glinting in the lightstrips. She seemed incapable of blinking. "Cranberry seed and oat porridge with a medium hot tea. I think it is the third."
The persons involved in the current trespassing charge refuse to remove themselves from the premises. Something inside Iota's primitive mind takes in this information and flips a switch - this wasn't a matter of simple guarding anymore. Even with lethal force dispensed, he'd have to escalate further.
"Target hit estimate: below expected levels," Iota says as he regurgitates an internal report. With the initial series of blasts done, the barrel of his fire-arm glows with heat. Even more heat is exuded from his body as he's forced to push his movement beyond normal limits.
Neraida's magic shot screeches directly past him, as he dodged out of the way with an uncanny grace. Amaterasu's whip strikes come close, the nearest sliding against his torso, but even against a god's alacrity he seems all but untouchable. His legs bent to the side, he slides across the ground at high speed - away from Amaterasu, his melee acumen clearly being lesser than hers, and directly towards Neraida, the next physically-closest target.
Something inside Iota's heart stirs at the sound of Lang's playing - a notion that this fight is a hopeless one for a cruel cause, and that he should be fighting for his own freedom. This doesn't go much further than that because of the sedatives pumped into the animal used as an organic processor the moment seditious thoughts are monitored.*
Beyond the music, Langs hellfire crashes against his chassis. It scorches the black and yellow paint, and internally it drives the already high heat of the machine to dangerous levels, but outwardly it seems to do little direct damage.
This fire is only partially extinguished once Everett's cloak of water manages to catch him. This blinds him almost wholly, beyond a vague sense of direction based on sounds around him, and renders his targeting system useless.
So, to be brief: Neraida is about to be grabbed by a machine that, once he's got a grip on her, is just going to squeeze whatever part he can get a hold of until it breaks. This machine is partially on fire, moving at a very high speed directly towards her, and is also firing wildly in all directions in the hope it will hit something.
Edited by wikkit on Dec 16th 2021 at 2:05:48 AM
Transcender of Gender
Zone Six, Andy Retrieval Squad, Ichiban Kasuga
Ichiban grabs the head of his bat with his spare hand and holds it like a shield against the incoming laser blast, which is mostly absorbed by the steel but still leaves a nasty shock thrumming through his arms. He loosens his body and shakes out the pain as he takes stock of the situation, seeing first how Lang falls to his knees and then, to his horror, how Everett dissipates into nothingness after being hit by a laser, his scream reverberating with impossible sound in Ichiban's ears.
"Bastard!" he growls, though his anger quickly changes to relief when Everett's cloak materialises from nowhere and drops onto the robot's head. So he isn't dead, thank god. That's still two of them on their last legs, though, which is two too many in Ichiban's book. He could probably, eventually, help to whittle down the menace with just his bat, but now it seemed that the situation called for a little more firepower.
"Alright, time to call a friend!" What might have been a metaphor proves to be quite literal as Ichiban procures his secret weapon; a smartphone, its screen brought to life by Ichiban's touch despite its long-dead battery. With overblown grandeur he swipes the screen to the left, and then swipes again to the right, his movements becoming so frenzied that he resembles a wizard unleashing his runes more than an urban crawler with his mobile. With one last, dramatic sweep, he slams his finger down onto the "CALL" button.
"Gary Buster Holmes! I SUMMON YOU!"
The mobile starts to shake and glow with unfathomable power, and Ichiban has just enough time to point it skyward before a blast of multicoloured lightning shoots out of its screen and into the darkened sky above. It breaks a hole in Everett's cloud cover, and through this gap tumbles down a dark figure that slams into the ground with enough force to leave cracks in the concrete and dust swirling around their legs.
While it's far from the strangest sight that the city has ever seen, it's still undeniable that the airdropped arrival of a shirtless black man- giant maces where his hands should be and pecs so firm and oiled that he could've arrived straight from a bodybuilder's contest- was not something the residents of Concordia saw every day. He stands up from his crouch, positioned directly between Neraida and the robot that aimed to make mincemeat of her bones, and clangs together his mace-hands with such strength that it produces sparks.
"Is that a robot menace?" Gary Buster Holmes asks, his voice deep and reverberating, "Or a robust bodice?"
There is no time to consider this moment of philosophy, and what possible mangling of the English-to-Japanese-to-Origin language had to have occurred to have made it possible, before Gary sets into action. He steps forward with his left foot and puts all weight on his right mace, waiting for the flaming, furious, and fast Iota to get within range before, with a booming cry of "RRRRRIGHT HOOK!", he brings his mace-hand up in an arc and attempts to slam it down atop the robot's head.
Zone Three, Outside FITNESS ZONE, Wait This Isn't Leo
Leo? Leo gone? Leo go small vanish? Goodbye? Watch hat, small hat, Leo in small hat. Paper? Smell paper, nibble paper, not yummy. Prush new friend. Prush smelly, weird not normal smell, Prush good. Prush pet, yes yes yes yes yes yes. "Prrrr..."
Bad?! Bad guy? Sneak bad guy? Sneak not work? Help Leo! Leo in hat on head. Head lady smell weird, heal sick place. Hospital. Hospital. Leo in hospital? Leo hospital always. Heal sick lady say not bad. Not bad? Relax. Heal sick lady go.
Paper good? Paper help? Hold paper big strong. Sonic help! Prush help! "Oo! Oo!" Jump jump Prush shoulder.
they/them || "Forgive me, regent of queer amphibians" - Lt.BGob
Neraida; Zone Six, Andy Retrieval Squad
Neraida prepared to take flight, slightly perturbed by the robot charging at her that was on fire and shooting lasers wildly in all directions. She was vaguely aware of - what was his name? Kasuga? - yelling.
There was a multicolored flash and then a man with no shirt and maces for hands dropped from the sky in front of her. He seemed to be on their side, though, so it was probably fine. As this, uh, ally? began his assault on Iota, Neraida backed up. Two huge butterfly wings sprouted from her back, and she began to fly. Not far, though, just ten feet away and fifteen up, far out of getting-smushed-by-a-robot range. Thus secure, she shot a few more magic orbs at the robot, careful to avoid hitting Gary Buster Holmes.
So, let's hang an anchor from the sun... also my Tumblr
An Ordinary Oddball
Kayné Ainsel—Zone Six, Saving Private Andy
"Are those...wetware CPUs?" Kayne gasped in shock as she saw little woodland animals escaping from the destroyed remains of Eggman's robots and guessing what they were in there for. "They are! I can't believe it! Wetware CPUs! Those count as several war crimes in and of themselves! Can't say I'm all too eager to see where this rabbit hole leads..."
While everyone else was busy engaging Iota in combat, Kayne surveyed the machine with a practiced eye behind her ion rifle's scope. There had be some sort of hatch welded shut that held the sedated animal behind it. If she broke it, someone else could probably free the poor critter. Even if there was no slight discoloration in the panel, there still had to be telltale welding lines surrounding where it was. Thinking she saw its location, Kayne carefully adjusted a dial on her rifle so she wouldn't accidentally fry whatever creature was in Iota, breathed—
—in, out—
—and took the shot.
Moloch "Moko" Kothys—Zone Six, Angel's Flophouse —> Outside Fitness Zone
"You alright in there, lad?" Moko's muffled voice echoed all around Leo, the cloth walls flexing as if they were alive and the very material itself was breathing. That was probably what was providing him with air, actually. "You'll get turned upside down soon, but you'll still think you're upright in my pocket space. Remember that when you look around, alright, Leo? If you also want to shift around a bit to get comfortable, I don't mind a bit either. With that, let's do it, fellows!"
Indeed, Moko was ready to help spy on Darien Brand.
Edited by JumpingFruit on Dec 19th 2021 at 12:17:37 PM
I wear the skin of the Elder Things, having come unto my own.
Darien’s Shop, Blair
...Who did this guy think he was? All of a sudden, this hotshot just shows up in here, encroaching on my turf? And he invites me over to his place of business to discuss... something or other. Zoning laws? The particulars do not interest me. I am simply curious to know who exactly this person is. Their weaknesses. Whether or not they’re the kind of person who can be beaten down into submission.
I looked down at him. He was quite wealthy - I had heard tell of that much, but he was still presumably just a human with human frailties. Loved ones to threaten. Emotional vulnerabilities to exploit. Dreams to destroy. And if all else fails, flesh to tear apart. Unless he was a being comparable to me or my old colleagues, which would indeed complicate things a fair deal.
Regardless, I couldn’t help but admit this upstart piqued my curiosity.
“Darien Brand,” I addressed the man in an evenhanded, neutral tone. “You certainly know how to make an entrance. Pray tell, for what reason have you summoned me?”
Edited by HilarityEnsues on Dec 18th 2021 at 5:22:57 AM
Breath of the Sun
Zone Six - Andy Rescue
Iota is deceptively fast. No doubt this is one of Eggman's stronger machines. Still, she does not let up her assault. Even as Ichiban summons a strange ally to help, Amaterasu is already circling around Iota.
Once she is certain that Gary Buster Holmes will not get caught in the crossfire, Amaterasu unleashes her Tundra Beads again. Instead of a whip this time, she rapidly launches them like bullets - they snap off her rosary with pops of air, quieter than regular bullets, but no less dangerous.
The spray of icy beads acts as covering fire, hopefully ensuring that Iota will not be able to dodge Gary's attacks.
What is so amusing about this? Why do you take lives? How can you forget?
Witch - Zone Six - The Rooftop of Disappointment
You turned your head back to appraise the situation below, ostensibly ignoring Grey's mutterings. It was at least apparent that their presence was not intended to cause disruption, which served as some small comfort in the face of Grey once again attempting to be clever. His behavior likely meant the documents in question were related to his former organization, which explained the 'blackmail', and in turn meant he was unlikely to have disposed of them, eager as he was to eliminate the remaining bad actors and expunge his involvement in their schemes. It was of little consequence in the end; You were well used to weathering the bluster of petulant children regardless of their size.
Another robot had joined the fray, this one noticeably more suited to combat than its preceding kin, but still no match for those collected. Kasuga in particular continued to impress; Despite being a 'mere' human, he was possessed of a resilient spark, a nearly irrepressible drive to push onward. Thus far, this Wille zur Macht had enabled him to claw his way through unenviable odds, but as you well knew luck always ran out eventually, and it was greatly heartening to see he was not too proud to call upon backup as the need arose. From whence his miraculous allies hailed mattered not a whit, only that they answered.
"Your concern is touching," you said, nonplussed, still glancing away from the pair of renegades, "But I believe we have things well enough in hand." Nevertheless, there was yet much work to be done. Deeming any further conversation irrelevant, you sprinted towards the chaos ensuing below before leaping high into the air- your target, the main set of doors that yet blocked the group's way. By the look of things they were simple, mundane steel, and somewhat rusted besides. You landed with a roll, rising, drawing and slashing with your adamantine blade in one quick flourish. You followed up with several more blows aimed towards the hinges before delivering a kick to the center, sending the doors flying inward.
You planted your feet and fixed your gaze forward, focusing yourself as the doors clattered and came to rest upon the floor. You turned back and shouted "Take heart! Act as one, and we shall be all the greater for it!" Beyond mere words of assurance, your very presence once again served to bolster your allies with your divine power, knitting flesh and steeling resolve as a calming, purifying wave of light washed over them. For but a brief moment, your own radiance sought to match that of Amaterasu's, an irrefutable reminder of the power you still commanded, the power you yet refused to relinquish even as it scorched you. None would forget why you were such a successful commander, as you lifted their burdens and conducted their hearts ever forward in spite of torment and tribulation. An army could weather even the harshest storms with you at the helm.
You faced forward once more, eager to conquer whatever awaited further inside. You would see everyone through this trial yet.
sword of promised halp
Zone Three - Inside Artifacts Incorporated; Blair
You don't actually know that much about Darien Brand. Your sources tell you that he's some hotshot from outside, and that he has, or had, lots of money. But from what you can see of his shop, there doesn't seem to be much money at all. It's a dusty, dry workshop, with pasteboard on the walls and what appears to be the beginnings of a shelf or three. The ceiling is leaking light, the windows are still taped, and the floor is bare concrete. You don't want to know what upstairs looks like.
But what isn't shoddy is the table. It's made of some kind of wood, dense and dark, all fitted together with dovetail joints and capped with shining silver. The grain is black and glistens like teeth, and the engravings around the edge of the table show little knights and snails doing battle in ivory, for the hand of pure Philosophia, a tiny wimpled figure in a tiny gilt tower.
"I didn't make an entrance," says Darien Brand. "I just announced my intentions."
He leans back on his folding chair, twists his quill pen until the plume pulls away, and then tosses the tiny bit of white fluff over his shoulder. You see that his hands have three rings each on them, each one set with a different gem. He's offered you a chair, but it would almost certainly break under your weight, so you've elected to stand instead. Normally this gives you some confidence, but he seems to take pleasure in looking up at you.
"We're in the same line, you and I. Your mother was… well, not a rival, but a person of interest, which is more than I can say for many of my competitors. And from what I've heard, you're doing rather well in this city. Red or white?"
He holds up a bottle of 1855 Château d'Yquem, swaps it for a 1961 Cheval Blanc, then shrugs and slides both back under the table. You're not even sure if there's a drawer.
"Ah, well. I've never been one for drinking. I won't waste your time, Miss Blair. Two of my most trusted employees are gone. One of them has left me, and the other is refusing to do any meaningful work. That means I'm short-staffed. Do you know anyone who might be good at direct sales?"
His eyebrows are raised. He isn't asking you what he seems to be. You wonder where the chains in his eyes came from, and why they seem to be moving.
Zone Three - Outside Artifacts Incorporated; Team Begonia
For very obvious reasons, Petunia elected to stay outside the gym, but he did give you some advice before you left.
"Be careful. The shop isn't all it seems. Send a thought my way if you need help."
You wish he could be more specific, but something in his voice tells you that he doesn't entirely know what the shop is up to, either.
The road to Artifacts Incorporated is entirely too smooth — after the industrialized squalor of Zone Six, you find the happy little suburbia of Zone Three, with its white fences and green lawns and carefully quirky garden gnomes, to be almost suffocating in its staidness. They even have tarmac roads, although for what you have no idea. It's not like there are that many motorized vehicles, and tarmac needs repaving every now and then.
It's an aesthetic, probably. Like most of Concordia, although you really wish sometimes that there was something more solid underneath.
"Over there," comes Petunia's voice, sliding into the back of your mind like an errant thought. "Good luck."
As you stare at the little house with the duct-taped sign, it occurs to you that Artifacts Incorporated is much less impressive than you expected.
An In-Depth Description Of Artifacts Incorporated
One house, white, with boarded windows. Not a single point of illicit entry to be seen, even on the roof. The chimney has also been boarded up.
One porch, with a brown welcome mat. The W is missing. Between the boards you hear crickets, and a mouse scuttles out to peer at you with beady eyes.
A sign with ARTIFACTS INCORPORATED etched on it, only the letters are covered in masking tape. Beneath it is the subtitle PURVEYORS SELLERS VENDORS OF ALL MAGICAL GOODS AND SUNDRIES, which is a bit harder to read.
And, most tellingly, a piece of cardboard hanging from the front door.
CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE
MEETING IN PROGRESS
DO NOT DISTURB
TRESPASSERS WILL BE SOLD
Zone Six; Wendie's - Usagi and Luna
Wow, he's so handsome. I love his nose, it's so thick and strong. And so are his arms. And his chest. And he called me officer! I feel so grown up!
"You bet! I'm starving! My name's Usagi, what's your name? Were you born with that face, or did God hit you with a wall? Papa says that when I was born, God hit me with a wall, but I think that's why I turned out so gorgeous and beautiful. Hehehehehehehejustlikeyou."
"Usagi! Sorry, sir, she's a bit…"
Luna freezes and arches her back, the way she does when she sees a monster.
"Usagi," she says, "get away from that man."
"Aww, but…"
"Now!"
"Oooooooogh! You're such a big fat meanie-head!"
I peel away from the handsome American and stamp my feet a bit, but Luna gives me the look, and so I put my hands in my pockets and walk righteously to the counter.
"Hmmph. Gimme a Baconator and a Son of Baconator."
"Do you want fries with that."
The counter lady doesn't seem like she likes her job. Her hair is blue and her eyes are red, which is weird because only bad guys have red eyes. She looks okay, I guess, but I think she'd be prettier if she had longer hair. Guys dig that sort of thing, 'cause it's way more feminine. Ami has short blue hair, and she's real smart. That's why she'll never get a boyfriend.
"Pile 'em on, sister!"
"And what would you like to drink."
"You got any Tang?"
The counter lady goes to the machine and presses a few buttons, but none of them work.
"No."
"Boo."
"I have produced the Tang," says another counter lady.
Weird, she looks exactly like the first one. Maybe they're twins? Wait, are there twins in America?
"Here is your Tang, your Baconator and your Son of Baconator," says the counter lady. "That will be 55.54 marks."
"Okay!" I say, pulling out my wallet and shaking hard.
The counter lady tilts her head.
"That will be 55.54 marks."
"Uh… ahahahaha. One second, por flavor."
I slide over to Luna, all stealthy-like, and whisper really quietly into her ear.
"Luna! Help! I don't have any money!"
"What? But you just got paid, right? I mean, you did come out with some form of currency?"
"I dunno!" I wail. "They said they'd pay me, but they never mentioned anything about money, so I thought it'd just…"
"Appear?"
"Yeah! Waaaaaah!"
"That will be 55.54 marks."
"Well," says Luna, very slowly, "you should go back to the station and ask for some cash."
"I can't! I'll die! I'm so hungry! Oh, is there anyone handsome enough, gallant enough, brave enough, rich enough, white enough, to help a poor starving maiden like me?"
"Don't you dare!" hisses Luna. "Zip it, young lady!"
"A poor… starving… maiden…"
"That will be 55.54 marks."
Zone Six, Precinct 9, Reception; Violet and Idunn
"Not assistance, Officer."
I do not like to ask personal questions but I understand that in social situations like this it is sometimes good to talk to others. The Major called it small talk and did it often in his balls and social gatherings.
"I wish to know more about you. How long have you been here and why did you join the force?"
Edited by troydenite on Dec 22nd 2021 at 4:01:57 AM
'Being around you guys makes me go "wtf" instead of pondering the ever increasing dread of time' - EchoingSilence, 2023
In truth, the cloak covering Iota's sensors could only do so much to protect Neraida - perhaps it was because his progenitors were made to fight something too fast to be seen with the naked eye, organic or mechanical.
He closed in and was all but ready to chase Neraida into the skies, the hovering disc behind him glowing with an artificial light, but suddenly...the talk of bodices queued him in.
Voice profile: unmatched with other combatants. He had no idea what he was going up against.
The cloak tore away with the speed he was building up, allowing him to look into Gary "Buster" Holmes' beautiful face for the briefest of times before the fateful moment.
Mace-hands, bullets, battle magic and more cracked into his torso all at once with practiced accuracy. Iota was stopped.
Most of it was behind Mr. Holmes' crushing blow, cracking open the sensor dome atop his head and crumpling the armor beneath it. He fell to the ground...
...but he had quite possibly dealt damage before this.
Perhaps Mr. Holmes' could've picked a better occasion to practice his philosophy, because it gave Iota the chance to shoot where he couldn't move. Point-blank, a rapid series of shots had been pumped into his rippling abs.
Regardless of Gary "Buster" Holmes' status, Iota was down on the ground, sparking and faintly twitching as his servos tried to do something. Even with his armor almost sundered, it seemed the machine hadn't given up yet. It just couldn't do anything to further its goals.
Mancunian Candidate
Zone Six: Five Guys Wen and Dies - Dio Brando
Often from sufficient shock there trails an awful period of grace, a clarity so consummate and all-consuming as to become itself unthinking; I knew it then, transfixed in the incessant movements of her pointed chin and giving in by inches to some maddened instinct as I saw her cat alert, the cool numb primate urge to show her nothing but appeasing smile and force the slowing of my heartbeat. It was queer torture, that perplexity, staring down the barrel of a schoolgirl. This rabbit enjoyed rabbiting. Whatever power she possessed had pressurized her words and sent them out as one long stream, and though I had assumed at first she thought to threaten or at least imply, I realized soon she had no thoughts of any kind.
When at last she turned and stumbled to the countertops, the restaurant seemed to rumble with her movements. The air was saturated with her.
I blinked and looked at Niao, perhaps more blankly than I would have liked, but I looked at him and he looked back. He's a foolish man, Gui Niao, but he's no idiot, not least in these affairs, no savant on meridians and all they might expel. No. No matter how he hid it, I knew he'd felt it too. I knew he knew the same.
He smiled at me. I smiled at him. We smiled at each other.
"If you raise an eyebrow," I whispered, "I am going to hit you."
And with that, I flattened my goose pimples and rose to my feet.
Now, I've in the past been made aware, and made aware reliably, that I am in possession of a striking classical beauty - strong jaw, aquiline nose, commanding brow, full lips, suchlike and et cetera. At twelve I looked nineteen, at nineteen to be rounding on thirty, and now a at hundred and twenty eight I seem old enough to be father but young enough to maintain a romance. I am tall, I am handsome, and as our annexation of Honshu nears completion, increasingly I am a gaijin. I can crack a walnut between my buttocks. In our fair city, from certain angles of approach, I resemble some dead-and-yet-beloved actor or another of the theatre.
I've little interest in the precise psychology, but there are certain classes of girleen (too stupid to recognise the danger, else smart enough to find it thrilling) for whom this seems magnetic. As she tried valiantly to extract from me her lunch, I didn't particularly suspect Usagi recognised the danger of anything.
"Please," I said, "let me treat you. Think of it as my apology."
Her cat recognised it cleanly and immediately, turning back arched as I approached, so before she could put up much struggle I scruffed her firmly by the neck and tucked her under my arm like a rugby ball.
"It's a pleasure to meet you like this, Usagi," I said, pouting my lip just-so. Her gaze felt like a searchlight. "My name is Dio Brando, and my friend at the table is called Mie Goreng. We'd love for you to come and sit with us."
"That will be 55.54 marks," said the serving girl. The money here is ludicrous; I took took three portraits a proud moustachio'd Mongol from my pocket and placed them on the counter.
"Tell me, Usagi, do you believe in 'gravity'?"
Edited by OG-Sama on Dec 22nd 2021 at 12:45:36 PM
Idunn; Zone Six, Precinct 9, Reception
"I have been here for about seven months," I tell Violet. "When I first arrived, I was very disoriented from being expelled from the Incoherence. The Peacekeepers found me wandering around this Zone, and they were kind enough to make use of me."
"I am surprised that you wish to know about me. Most of the people here do not express such interest."
So, let's hang an anchor from the sun... also my Tumblr
Zone Three, Artifacts Inc, Blair
It was strange just how spartan this place looked, given the wealth Darien possessed. I wondered if perhaps he had a proper storefront somewhere else, and that this was simply where he concocted his potions and such. The rather ornate table at least suggested he cared about where he specifically did his work, even if he didn’t seem to care about the rest of his surroundings.
“You knew my mother? An interesting coincidence. I didn’t realize her name had any purchase on this remote spaceship.”
That in itself wasn’t exceptionally strange, considering she was a well known figure. But this likely meant one of two things. Either he had lived in my world previously, or it was simply one of many he had visited. I was leaning towards the latter, since I had the feeling I would’ve come into direct conflict with this man at one point or another if he stayed for very long.
I could not lie, the offer of wine was genuinely tempting. I wasn’t a woman who liked to waste time, but I wouldn’t consider the simple everyday pleasure of a drink as such. Everyone from the best to the worst of mankind enjoyed a glass of wine every now and then, surely. When he put it away, a look of slight disappointment adorned my face for just a moment.
“Yes, things have been going rather well for me. Pity that you’ve been having troubles on your end, but… I’m assuming you don’t need my help sifting through the help wanted ads, do you?”
I wasn’t sure why there were chains in his eyes. That didn’t seem particularly normal, but neither did a giant woman to most people. Neither did a talking marten, or a person who was a living precious gemstone. There was little about this city that could be called “normal” at all.
“Brand… are you offering me a job?”
That was really the only reasoning I could come up with for why he had actually brought me here. This was all very strange, though. Why would he even do that? I didn’t have much reason to accept such an offer, and he had no reason to trust me in the first place. Especially if he had some prior knowledge about me, which his comment about my mother made me wonder if he did. Perhaps he was simply that eager to get rid of a rival.
“I suppose I’m flattered if you are, but I’m not sure that would be the best idea. I’m not someone who likes having a boss to answer to, as you might’ve guessed. Of course, pardon me if I’m being presumptuous.”
A dogged fellow, aren't we?
Zone Six – Wendie’s
The commotion at the counter earned a low, exasperated noise from one of the window seats, a brown-haired girl with a coat tied around her waist setting her hamburger down and glaring across the diner as Usagi floundered at the checkout.
Somehow, blondie’s voice had been shrill enough to penetrate the layered defense of her earbuds and music, DJ Medved's hardbass reduced to a tinny rattle as she unplugged and perked one ear to listen.
She was just about to go pay for the idiot’s meal, just for the sake of a quiet lunch, when things took a turn for the worse. A guy from a few booths over unfolded from his seat – holy shit, he must have been like seven feet tall, ripped like a bodybuilder. He sauntered over to Blondie and paid for her.
It was like watching a wolf stalk over to a lamb. Next he was going to put his arm around her shoulders and guide her back over to sit with him and his oily friend, and then probably off to some godforsaken shithole of a future-crime-scene. The fact that the idiot was asking for it only made it worse.
Zima quietly muttered something in her native tongue and pushed her seat back. God fucking damn it, she got enough of this shit at work.
As she got closer, boots stomping, the man’s gaze flicked her way, all arch evaluation and confident superiority. Intimidation rolled off this guy like a stench, even while he was holding a struggling cat to his side. It wasn’t just that he clearly thought he was hot shit and had the brawn to back it up. Her instincts were pounding danger signals through her head louder than DJ Medved.
Fortunately, when Zima got scared, she didn’t run. She just got mad.
“How about grooming? You believe in that?”
Her voice was a low, growling drawl, expertly tinged with menace and challenge, disregarding the fact she had to crane her neck to look the man in the eye. She stuffed a trio of bills into the cashier’s hand without breaking eye contact.
“Keep your money and piss off, before I give gravity a hand and drop your ass.”
Edited by LittleMako on Dec 23rd 2021 at 6:49:05 AM
Anti-Gnosis Weapon
Zone Six, Wendie's
"Now, now!" came the light and airy voice of Mr. Muscle's table partner as he crossed the distance to pick up his porridge and tea, wafting over along with a long, thin trail of smoke that wound away from the ornate pipe held twixt his lips and conveniently past the faces of each of the scant bodies present, "If you're itching to start a fight over personal aesthetics, pray do so outside of Wendie's. Unnecessary violence ruins one's appetite. Now, I can certainly agree that my friend Mr. Brando here believes in grooming - and how could he not, as well groomed a personage as he is? - but you seem to think he seeks something untoward with this pure-hearted maiden. And I am here to tell you that nothing could be further from the truth, and that in fact if anyone is threatened here, it is himself! He is treating her kindly firstly, because he is a gentleman, and secondly, because he fears her like an average man fears an old, stumbled-upon munition rigged to blow at any second."
"You see, like me, he knows a thing or two about an individual's energy and combat potential when inspecting them, especially up close as she is." The white-haired man had by now set his meal down, and made a circular motion in the air, then pointed at the Ursus for emphasis. "For example, I can tell from your stance and the way you walk that you are an experienced martial artist of the brawling sort, and that you are most used to a heavy weapon that requires two hands to properly leverage, a zweihander, a battleaxe, halberd, or perhaps large club. Yet, you are not adept at sensing mystical energies, or you would have concluded the same thing he and I have: this maiden Usagi - no, this proud Officer of Concordia's grand Peacekeeping force - holds enough power within her small frame to summarily annihilate every other soul present here."
"Of course, you've no reason to believe the word of someone you've just met..." he admitted, smiling gaily as he took a seat and slid further into the booth to make more room, "so if you're still concerned for the girl, why not join the four of us to make sure nothing unfortunate happens? The more the merrier, as they say!" He puffed a bit more on his pipe, then grinned toothily at them, pearly whites shining. "I'm Mie Goreng, by the way! Charmed to make your acquaintance, Miss Usagi, Miss Cat, Miss Bear!"
Edited by darksidevoid on Dec 22nd 2021 at 8:50:44 AM
GM of AGOG S4: Frontiers RP; Sub-GM of TABA, SOTR, & UUA RPs
Wait, he isn't dead! Shia Surprise!
Zone Six, Gem Retrieval Squad
Well, the cloak has done its job, more or less.
You watch as the robot rockets toward Neraida, firing blindly in all directions.
You grimace. Definitely leaning toward the "less" end of the scale, there...
It's getting closer now, though. It might be just about within your range. You extend your index finger. A charge starts to build up in your chest and travel down your arm—
And then a beam of light spears up and into the clouds.
Huh. As weird milestones in your life go, a burly black guy with maces for hands falling out of the sky like a meteor doesn't even rate. The same guy being summoned from Officer Bedhead's cell phone, on the other hand? Now that gets a raised eyebrow out of you. And here you were thinking that Ichiban was one of the few normal humans living in the city.
Guess that just proves the old saying about assumptions and asses...
At any rate, Neraida leaps to safety on butterfly wings and the robot is promptly introduced to... what was that name? Gary? Gary's spiky metal fists. You feel the crumpling impact as much as you see and hear it, thanks to the slick sheen of dampness your cloak left on the robot. Despite everything, you can't help but wince. If robots can feel pain, this one must be in a world of hurt right now.
Not enough to stop the thing from pumping Gary full of energy blasts, though.
Now the thing is a sparking wreck on the ground, still twitching. You wonder if it's still trying to carry out its directives, even in its ruined state. You wonder if it even can.
Best not to give it the chance. The thing's done enough harm already.
You let the bolt fly. There’s enough juice packed into it to blast what's left of the bot to bits.
Then, without waiting to see the results, you liquefy.
Your body flows up over the lip of the roof to join the watery mass that was your arm. Gravity does its work, and you run down the building's façade as a not-quite spherical lump of H20. You flatten out as you hit the pavement, and then you congeal, rebuilding yourself from the feet on up.
You have to lean against the wall as soon as you're solid again. That hole in your side is still there. Smaller now, between the rainwater you've soaked up to replenish what was vaporized and the healing magic that seems to have come from Witch, but still there. Still smarting.
Stupid. If you hadn't tried to dodge by sublimating, if you'd just stayed solid and tanked the hit, it wouldn't have hurt you as much as it did. Water vaporizes a lot more easily than flesh, after all.
You shake your head. Kick yourself later. Job's not done yet.
You stagger over to where your cloak landed after it fell off the robot. It's seen better days; scorched and blackened from where the flames licked it, singed where energy balls struck, covered in bits of ice that shattered against the machine's chassis and ricocheted off in all directions. Thank fuck it came off before Gary caved in the robot's torso: at least it isn't full of holes.
Your tentacle manifests and flows beneath it, broad and flat like a spatula. It lifts the cloak into the air so you can grab it with your hand. You throw it on with practiced ease, wincing as the motion pulls at your side. Then you turn to face the door that Witch kicked open and steel yourself.
"Let's get this over with."
The Danse Macabre Codex
Transcender of Gender
Zone Nope, Inside Moko - Leonardo Watch
There was enough space for Leo to rest without injury, but comfort was another matter. One of his feet would bend awkwardly no matter how he positioned them, so he'd given up and allowed the pins and needles to swallow up his left one. His head, too, wouldn't sit in a way that served his neck; it'd almost certainly have a crick by the time he was let back out. But those were the sorts of aches and pains that he seemed to accumulate naturally, and had become little more than background noise in his life- no, what really sucked was the claustrophobia.
Between the tiny, dark space and the breathing walls, it felt like Leo had been swallowed up by some giant creature. His breath quickened, the air hot and stinking of sweat and monkey and something like cotton or wool. When Moko asked if he was okay, Leo responded with a strained, reedy "Good! I'm good! Toootally fine in here!"
God, he could feel a panic attack coming up. Hadn't had one of those since making the worst decision of his life and agreeing to that stupid radio interview. Deep breaths, deep breaths. He couldn't exactly close his eyes, but maybe opening them would-
☇⚎⚭☵⚭☇↠ ⛌⛌⛌ ↟↲◟⚭┓⇃⇃☰⚋☊◜ ⛌⛌
⛌⛌⛌⛌⛌⛌ ☋☰☰☳⇁⛮☈⋔⚭ ⛌⛌⛌⛌⛌ ⛮♺╣◅◟ ⛌⛌⛌⛌
Bad idea, bad idea, now he had a migraine on top of everything else. Where the hell was he?! It felt like looking at the Incoherence, but a single targeted strike right into his temple instead of a simmering, mushy headache that started behind his eyes and trickled through his head. He dug his palms into his eyelids to get as close to darkness as he could and wriggled about in his own misfortune for a while, allowing all the little annoyances to run their course now that they'd all built up into a crescendo.
What felt like twenty minutes later, though who knows how long it'd actually been, the worst of it had passed and Leo had settled back into the vague pain-discomfort that he could just about ignore if he relaxed every muscle in his body and started counting sheep. "Sooo, hey, Moko." he spoke, feeling awkward about calling out to someone he couldn't see (especially after having writhed around in their insides for a while). "You've got a, uh, history with Petunia and his brother. Any idea who Jim is?"
Zone Six, Service With A Pounding - Ichiban Kasuga
The blasts of energy ripple across Gary's chest, forcing him back a few steps and, in turn, dislodging his mace from Iota's cranium. Steam billows and lightning crackles across the expanse of skin that, had Gary been a regular human, would've been riddled with heat-blasted holes, but instead seems no worse for wear- at least, on a surface level. The lightning, similar in colour to the blast that had summoned Gary in the first place, starts to spread across his body, his brief expression of pain lifting up into the satisfied grin of a job well done.
"Thanks for calling Poundmates." he proclaims, gracing everyone present with one last, tight flex of his glorious physicality before the sparks encasing him let out a bright flash and Gary disappears back to whence he came. Ichiban glances down at his phone as it emits a low note, a pop-up explaining that Gary "Buster" Holmes will be out of commission for a short while. Well, that's new. No-one had ever managed to get a decent hit in against one of the Poundmates before. Of course, Ichiban has no clue if the things he can summon are the actual people he knows or some weird apparition that this equally weird place had cooked up- still, it couldn't hurt to be more careful in the future.
He stashes his phone away and jogs over to where their blue-skinned comrade has made his grand re-appearance. "Everett, man, you scared the shit outta me! I thought that thing had vaporised you!" It's only after he offers Everett a hearty slap on the back that he notices the man hasn't resembled in one piece, and he winces at the nasty little hole that's burrowed into Everett's side. "Oh, fuck, maybe it did? Sure you're good to be walking around like that?"
Sobered from the injury, Ichiban trains his bat on Iota's busted remains (on the off-chance the robot still has some juice left in the can- or maybe even a second form?!) and scans the battlefield. He sees, through his special gamer-o-vision, Witch's willpower manifest as a warm red glow around each person, and he can feel that selfsame power bolstering his already powerful resolve. When he calls out, his voice is clear and carries easily across the area. "Everyone all right? Neraida? Lang?"
they/them || "Forgive me, regent of queer amphibians" - Lt.BGob
Neraida; Zone Six, Save Andy Team
Neraida touched down on the street almost in front of the now-open doors, wings poofing away as her feet made contact with the ground. "I am well," she responded to Ichiban's query, slightly distracted by the fact that Witch had apparently busted open the doors with a sword at some point. "I fear that Lang is not. He seems to have exhausted himself in the fight." She tried to peer into the building's now-conveniently-accessible interior.
Salacia Persei Elimo; Zone Three
Artifacts Incorporated looked rather unimpressive. Elimo had expected... well, a storefront at the very least. Not a boarded-up house that looked like it hadn't seen people in years. The cardboard sign taped to the front door notifying passersby that there was a meeting in progress at least confirmed its inhabitants were alive and kicking.
The sign on the front of the door says that there is a meeting in progress, she thought back at Petunia. "Trespassers will be sold", apparently. Let's wait this out while we still have the luxury. I'll try and find a safe place for Leo so he can look at the building.
If she were alone, she probably would have knocked regardless of the sign, but right now she was part of a big heroic plan to save a kidnapping victim and she was - somewhat alarmingly - becoming somewhat invested in the idea. On the search to find a convenient place to set Moko down and have Leo do a little recon, she began to think.
Why had she agreed to participate in this part of the plan? Helena had seemed perfectly ready to volunteer and she was probably more experienced in such things given that huge sword she toted around like it was nothing. She could have let Helena do it and waited at the gym with everyone else - or, even better, just left and went back home - but noooo. She had just had to volunteer. And now she was looking for a place to prepare to un-kidnap some psychic kid's brother with the help of someone who was currently inside of a magic hat.
I admit to acting somewhat vicariously. ...Look, this is going to go wrong somehow. You being here means that it might not end up with Leo dead or horribly tortured by powers beyond his comprehension when it does.
Off-handedly, she wondered if Petunia had been listening in on all that. Well, he probably knew anyway. Freaking psychics, man.
So, let's hang an anchor from the sun... also my Tumblr
An Ordinary Oddball
Kayné Ainsel—Zone Six, Saving Private Andy
"Alright, that was...certainly an experience," Kayne remarked, kneeling down to gently extricate whatever critter—or critters as the case may be—from the smashed remains of what used to be Iota. "Let's get this ever and done with first, though. That was a pretty brutal beatdown. I'm surprised this bot is still trying to move. Actually..." Kayne fired two more shots, one for each servo that Iota still had. She ripped out a handful of exposed wires, and finally opened the offending compartment that imprisoned a small animal. "Okay, now it should be safer to approach the patient for medical treatment. I think they could use some comfort about now..." She pried the remains of the machine further apart and waited for Amaterasu to take over.
Moloch "Moko" Kothys—Artifacts Incorporated
"Hmm...that name brings nothing to mind, I'm afraid," Moko apologized, the cloth surrounding Leo expanding a little bit outwards so as to give him at least a modicum of comfort. Leo would recognize that Moko was puffing himself out, as he sometimes did when angry to look bigger, in an attempt to relieve his passenger's pains. "I must also apologize for the state of my insides. It has been some time since I last had to carry a person inside me. I hope this will suit you better. We are now approaching the site of interest, so I'll try and communicate with you psychically. Er, Moko out, I suppose." The resulting silence brought to mind a very dorky piece of headwear wondering if what they just said was appropriate for the spy mission they were allegedly on.
Edited by JumpingFruit on Dec 29th 2021 at 11:35:16 AM
I wear the skin of the Elder Things, having come unto my own.
Breath of the Sun
Zone Six - Andy Rescue
Iota got off one final blast, but fortunately Ichiban's friend was not seriously harmed.
As Kayne cracked open the machine's casing, Amaterasu strode forward. The small bird that had been trapped within flutters free, flitting about in panic a moment, before Amaterasu's light washes over her and assures her that she is safe.
Amaterasu sits on her haunches, allowing the bird to perch on her nose a moment. The little one leans down to tap her beak gently against the great mother's muzzle, almost looking as if she was praying. Then she chirps happily and flies away.
For a long moment, she watches her child go. Then Amaterasu turns and solemnly treads forward, joining the others near the door.
"Ah, Everett. You're hurt." She almost instinctively calls rain on him, knowing he can absorb it, but realizes that he might take that as a show of authority. So she instead presses her head gently against him. "You can take some power from me, if you need to. Or I can summon more water, to help you recover."
What is so amusing about this? Why do you take lives? How can you forget?
Wait, he isn't dead! Shia Surprise!
Zone Six, Gem Retrieval Squad
You grunt as Officer Bedhead gives you a well-meaning slap on the back. Pain tugs at the hole in your side, and you hear—feel—something slosh around in there, spill over the lip. Some part of your innards, still in a semi-liquid state while you wait for the hole to close. Which part, though? The liver? The intestines? The semi-mythical spleen?
Ultimately, you decide it doesn't matter. What does matter is that it's not where it should be.
You should do something about that.
"I'll live," you say to Ichiban. Then you focus your will on the large dollop of pinkish goo hanging out of your abdomen. It stops halfway through the act of running down your thigh.
Get back in here, you.
It slithers up in defiance of gravity. Like timelapse photography in reverse. Slips back over the ragged lip of the ragged gap in your side to rejoin the rest of the slurry inside of you.
And just in time, too, because Amaterasu is suddenly pressing her head against your leg. Right in the damp spot your maybe-intestines just vacated. You look down in bemusement. That's gotta smell weird...
Her words push that thought out of your mind. She's offering to help you. Actually offering this time, instead of just giving it unasked and unwanted. The offer of power is... tempting, not to mention dangerous. If you were still whole and so inclined, you could drain her dry. Given what happened yesterday, though, you figure that even a sip isn't worth the risk.
As for the other offer, it makes you hesitate. You want to reject it. Water and rain is your domain, and your own rain is doing a good job of repairing you by itself. But it's taking time, and you're all about to go into the lion's den. Can you afford to stay out here and wait?
Probably not.
So, you sigh and look away. "I'll take the water."
The Danse Macabre Codex
Breath of the Sun
Zone Six - Andy Rescue
The scent of blood and viscera doesn't bother her, despite her sharp nose. Amaterasu has walked through a den of demons who eat human flesh, through a plague-stricken city, and even through the bowels of a dragon. She is used to such scents.
So she merely nods in affirmation, before drawing two vertical lines. Nuregami's sacred water springs into existence, in a small downpour focused entirely on Everett. Like all things conjured by the Celestial Brush, the water is pure, and filled with divinity.
"I hope it helps." Amaterasu says. "Though it seems that machine was one of the stronger weapons in Eggman's arsenal, so hopefully our fight is already won."
What is so amusing about this? Why do you take lives? How can you forget?
A dogged fellow, aren't we?
Zone 5 – Shrine Well
After leaving Kim Kitsuragi with just a few minutes of intense scrutiny and the pointed impression that the Peacekeepers weren’t the only ones with a bone to pick with Gui Nao, Satsuki had gathered Asuka and the invisible Rider and headed for Zone 5.
She didn’t press Asuka for any details, the journey spent mostly in a companionable silence, punctuated by quiet small talk, Satsuki a quiet and vigilant presence at the younger woman’s side even as Rider shadowed the pair and kept watch for any tails, Peacekeeper or otherwise. Finally, their silence suddenly abruptly enforced as they stepped through the hatch into the Shrine Well and were hit by the familiar wave of waterfall-roar noise.
Taking a breath of the moisture-filled air, Satsuki finally felt like she could begin to entertain the possibility of relaxing. They passed a checkpoint manned by Militia in their black coats, exchanging a nod for their salutes, and as they stepped across the high-grip flooring on level one, they passed another squad going out on patrol. Her orders for vigilance had set the place mildly bustling.
On the other side of the pool, a paper boat race was about to start. The third round of the championship semi-finals, if she recalled correctly. Children in spray-jackets sheltered boats under umbrellas as they held them against the current, waiting for the signal… Cheers echoed across the stone chamber, and Satsuki allowed herself a faint ghost of a smile as she started up the stairs.
The Militia may have been stirring, but for the most part they knew not to bother Satsuki when she was busy with her ward. Their progress was only slowed by a momentary walk-and-talk with Lieutenant Houraisan, who handed her a summary of the morning’s communiques, delivered a message from Corporal Satta, and then peeled off with his usual efficiency. Then, at last, a metal hatch in the stone wall swung open, and then shut solidly behind them, and they were home.
Satsuki stepped into the small living room, hung her coat on a hook, placed her sword in its stand, and let some of the day’s weight fall from her shoulders with a low sigh.
“I need a cup of tea. Would you like one, Asuka?”
Edited by LittleMako on Dec 29th 2021 at 9:49:32 PM
sword of promised halp
Zone Three - Inside Artifacts Incorporated; Blair
"Not a job," says Brand. "Think of it as a partnership."
It's bold of him to talk about partnership in a space that looks like a cottage dunked in paint remover, but he says it with such easy charm that you're convinced he doesn't care.
"You know who I am, and what I can do. You know that if I had access to all my funds, I could buy your mother's company and yours a million times over and still have enough cash to buy myself a nice holiday universe or two. You know that I built everything I have with these two hands. So if you'll lend me your brain, I'll lend you my hands, and we can see what comes of that."
He pushes his chair back and stands up. Even at his full height, he barely comes up to your nose, but he doesn't seem to care about that, either.
"If not, well, then you're done. You can't compete with me. My inventory isn't what it used to be, but I have stock that you've never even heard of."
To prove his point, he removes a small tube from his front pocket, shakes it a bit, then puts it back in his pocket. The smell of roast coffee fills the air, then your mouth, drizzling down your throat like bitter honey. It tastes like cane sugar and cacao.
He's right. You have no idea what that was.
"I'm starting a plant in Zone Six. Mass production of magical goods on an industrial scale, like Robotnik and Octavius. I won't even have to single you out. They'll flock to me like pigeons."
He cranes his head, as if hearing something at the door, then steps out from behind the table, with one hand on his filing stack.
"Now, this doesn't have to happen. I think you have potential, which is why I'm offering you a partnership role in Artifacts Incorporated. You can still have your storefront, your inventory, your profits, your research, your lab, all the rights to whatever you already have. I may be ruthless, but I'm not a thief. All I'm asking is that we lend each other assistance whenever necessary, and refrain from actively conspiring against each other. I think you'll find more than a few benefits — unless, of course, you want the Diet to have you under their thumb for the rest of time."
He looks like he's going to slide a contract on the table, but he doesn't.
"Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to deal with these customers. Do think about it, won't you?"
He gives you a pat on the shoulder, then walks out towards the front door.
Zone Three - Outside Artifacts Incorporated; Team Begonia
The door swings open and you see Darien Brand. There's no-one else it could be, really — his skin is pale as paper, and his irises are as red as rubies, but what gives it away is his posture. The way he holds himself, with one foot in front of the other and one hand on his watch, tells you that this is a man who is used to being at the center of the world.
"We're closed," he says, before his gaze lands on Elimo and the hat atop Elimo. His expression doesn't change, but something shifts in his eyes, and you see recognition in their depths. The recognition flows down his white face and to his mouth, and the thin lips part in a slow smile.
"Except for old friends," he says. "When was the last time I saw you, Moko? I hope your girl is well. I hear she has quite a name in this City. Come in, come in. No need to sneak around."
He bows, then holds the door open. Inside, you find yourselves in a corridor with peeling tan wallpaper and a wilting daffodil on the wall, pressed into a picture frame.
"Now, tell me, what are you looking for? A potion? A wand? A rare and particular item? We can provide, no matter what. That's what we do here at Artifacts Incorporated. Surely each of you must be after something special."
Zone Three; Inside The Fitness Zone - Susie, Vivy
"Hey. Purple girl. You like Areum?"
The woman is tall, with auburn hair in a high ponytail. She's dressed in a white sports bra and skinny jeans, which is unusual for a gym, but what you notice immediately is the way she holds herself at an angle, like she broke her ankle years ago and it never quite healed straight. Her brown eyes are bright as opals, and her face is sharp and strangely rugged - she could be anywhere from thirty-two to twenty-five.
She holds up a pair of tickets, ones that you recognize immediately as the hated Areum's People Died At Pax Primis Fun Time Concert.
"Ah, not a fan. Well, you could at least go there to heckle. Friend of mine and his girlfriend canceled, so I'm trying to give them away."
Vivy comes back in, fresh from her talk with whoever was outside. The woman turns to her.
"Oh, you look like an Areumite. Do you know each other? Want tickets?"
Zone Five; Shrine Well - Medusa
There are guards at the gate, and guards in the building. The master is engaged in dangerous work. She is a leader of men. I do not believe that she needs a guard apart from me, but a city cannot be overcome with a single soldier.
The master's ward looks around her with a frown. She does not like soldiers, but she moves about them with furtive ease, as if she has spent enough time among camps to be confident in hating them. Perhaps her parents were warriors. I do not know anything about her parents, because she has not told me.
That is fine. She does not need a guard apart from me, either.
We pass through the checkpoint. The master's subordinates come to her with reports, but I do not listen. We come to the place the master calls home.
It is small and there are not many comforts, but the sound of falling water makes me feel cleaner than I normally do.
The master suggests a cup of tea. I know that the master's ward dislikes tea, but will probably accept. Tea is too weak for her taste. She prefers sweet aerated nectar and the bathwater of the painted whore.
I manifest.
"Master," I say, "Councilor Areum is holding a concert today. I am suddenly possessed by a desire to shake it to her hot beats."
I raise the paper that I stole from Eliott Stabler's back pocket. The text is embossed, which is why I could read it.
"I have even acquired very important person tickets for this purpose. How clumsy of me. Will you go with me to the concert, master?"
The fiction is necessary. The master's ward hates being comforted.
Zone Six, Precinct Nine, Reception - Violet
"It is not interest. The Major told me that it is good in some cases to make small talk with other people, but I do not know if I am doing it correctly."
Idunn communicates clearly and says what she means. She is much simpler to talk to than other people, but there is one thing missing.
"Are people not interested in you, Officer? I do not understand. Your hair is bright purple and you wear a hood. Are those not interesting things?"
Zone Six; Precinct Nine - Rufus and Kaguya
"Well, he was kidnapped," says Rufus, as if that's the end of it. "That's how you met him, remember? Kidnapped. He's a gem, it happens."
Your question about the kaleidoscope leaves him staring blankly for a moment, but then it clicks.
"Oh, the silver spyglass? Well, it should operate on the same principle as the Oculus, but you've got to understand, the operation isn't the dangerous part. Whipping out an eye isn't even hard for most street cyberneticists, it's the hole in your mind that the Oculus leaves. Stuff gets through."
He's speaking so casually that you understand, intuitively, the danger he's in. This is exactly how Rufus talks when he's about to die.
"Well," he says, cracking his furry knuckles, "I guess there isn't much for it. If I don't give Brand the eye, he tries to steal Andy, right? And Andy's already stolen, so that means he'll be double-stolen, which will make it the third time. Which I think is more than worth me giving up this crummy eye to stop, if you catch my drift."
He laughs, very loudly.
"I'm ready, Your Highness. Not completely willing, if I'm honest, but ready."
Zone Six; Wendead - Usagi and Luna
"I love gravity! Gravity's my favorite! I love how grave it is, and, uh, -ity. You're such a gentleman. I really like you, Mr. Diobrando."
"Usagi! Do not sit with that man! He's evil!"
"You'll have to excusez-moi my cat, Mr. Diobrando. She thinks all hot guys are evil, but I think she just doesn't like men, because she's a cat and cats can't get boyfriends. Hi, Mr. Mie Goreng. Ooh, you're really dreamy too. Are you Filipinoy? I hear Mie Goreng is really big in Filipinoy. Can I really sit with you? That's, like, peachy-keen, dude. Hehehe."
Wait until I tell the girls about this! They're going to be so jealous that I sat with two real-life ikemen, and so...
SHeS a TeDdy
"Oh my God you're so cute I love your ears are they real? I'm Usagi, we should be friends! I believe in grooming, grooming is real cool. My friend Naru grooms her dog every week. Mamo-chan grooms me too! I love grooming!"
Wendie's has so many cool people! I need to come here every day!
Zone Six; Abandoned Diner - Team Andy
The inside of the diner is bare. The counter is empty, the till is open, the tables are naked save for their numbers, which lie around like so many windblown leaves.
Greed is there on one of the barstools, a large transparent vial planted by his side. In the vial is a person made all of crystal, like a figure hewn from green glass, wearing black and white and with its arms clasped to its knees. It looks to be asleep.
Greed chuckles.
"Okay, you got me. You got rid of that idiot Xavier, you got rid of the stupid flying robot, and now you're here. Right in front of the mastermind. My fault, I guess."
He has the confidence of a block of polished brass. His smile is as jagged as ever.
"Let's be real here," he says. "You can't kill me, because if you could, you'd have done it already. I can't kill you — well, not all of you, at least. Sure, I could take two or three and make it bloody, but getting rid of your little squad? Nothing doing."
He gets up off his seat, stretching like a wolfhound.
"Well, that's if you don't count this little toy."
There is a gun in his left hand, a sleek and slender thing with no slide, looking like the child's idea of a ray pistol. He dangles it like a prop, but there's something dangerous in the way he holds it, like it could get rid of any one of you in an instant.
"This is one of Robotnik's prototypes. He tells me it's strong enough to go through almost anything, which means that the second I pull this trigger, at least one of you is going to die. I was saving it for the wolf, but anyone will do, really."
His grin widens. He taps the side of his head with the barrel.
"Weigh your costs. You know you can't kill me, and I know I can take down at least four of you, and even when you're done with me, you'll have nothing but this talking rock to show for it. Now granted, he is very rare and extremely desirable, but his mouth is way too big, and I'm naturally worth much more than he is. Which is why I have a proposition."
He raps the vial twice, rattling Andy.
"I'll sell him to you. Two million marks. You get your hostage, I get compensation for my time and effort, we all go home alive and happy and mostly whole. How does that sound, officers?"
Edited by troydenite on Jan 2nd 2022 at 1:42:10 AM
'Being around you guys makes me go "wtf" instead of pondering the ever increasing dread of time' - EchoingSilence, 2023
Zone 6, Some Building Near the Andy Retrieval Force; Dr. Grey
"Did you hear that, or was that just in my head?" I spoke from within the old disused locker room.
Vult responded the hallway, keeping watch just in case, saying "No, I definitely heard that yell. Sounded it like it came from all over."
"Yes, that is rather odd. It does sound like a yell of pain though, perhaps it has something to do with the group retrieving Andradite?"
"Who?"
"Oh, right. The group that fought Xavier and then those robots."
"Andradite seems like an odd name for a group though."
"No, they're trying to rescue Andradite, this gem guy or whatever. I accidently stole his hand earlier, which is why I attracted Peacekeeper attention and- well, everything after that such as your transformation, my capture, and our resulting meeting occurring."
"You stole his hand?"
"Accidently, really. It was just lying there behind the Egress Eternal and I took to be some sort of weird prosthetic, rather than someone's actual arm."
"Why were you behind the Egress in the first place?"
"Ran back there to get away from blueface and the musician."
"What? You know what, you can explain it later when we're not trying to change back into our regular outfits and put our shit away."
"Yeah, it is a bit of a long story. Alright, got my lab coat back on and put my stuff back in my duffle bag." I walked out of the room and turned to her, "Now you go put your stuff away."
"Glad you didn't take too long." Vult walked into the locker room, I leaned against the wall.
"Well, I didn't want to stick around too long. Wanted to get back over at the fight before Amaterasu starts wondering where the hell I went. Even got an excuse if she picks up that I'd left the group earlier. Hopefully she doesn't, but best to be prepared, you know?"
"Eh, I just improvise, it hasn't failed me yet!"
"God, that would not work for me. I suck at improvising. I always just end up either stalling for time by rambling incessantly or panicking and fumbling the situation."
"That's why you ramble so much? Panic?"
"Well, rambling can be a surprisingly good stall tactic, people seem to avoid interrupting such long speeches, no matter how nonsensical. Even if it would be a better idea to just shot the speaker in the face. But back to more relevant topics, there is the issue that you are currently a wanted individual, which could likely prove a problem."
"Ah, guess they decided to track me down for beating up Redd. Oh uh, by the way-"
"I already know you neglected to mention your beatdown of your former fellow Peacekeepers. I don't really blame you for such, I would likely do the same and it is true to some extent, after all one could take your assault as a form of resignation."
"Well, I can't really do anything about that. Redd deserved it anyway, he called me a pedophile!"
"...what?!"
Earlier that day; Precinct 9 Infirmary.
"Well none of them like me you know! Hell, I bet Redd said some other insulting thing when he saw me!"
"Yeah, he did say something about you being something from a deleted history? But you can't just leave over friendly barbs, I mean you insult us all the time!"
"Yeah, well they started the insults! I just snark at them, that's- wait, what the hell did he mean by 'deleted history'?"
"I don't know, he said a something about a browser, so it's something on the internet, best kept hidden from what Redd has said?"
"The fuck's the Internet?"
"Oh, it's basically some sort of high tech communication system or whatever? I think Redd said something about lots of 'degeneracy' on it?"
"Degeneracy?"
"Yeah, like pedophilia, I think?"
"...that would be something best kept hidden, right?"
"Oh yeah, probably."
"..."
"Oh, Vult don't get up, you need to be debrief- argh!"
"Where's Redd now?"
"You're -ghk- choking me!"
"Where is Redd?"
"Ghhrk, in his office! Just let go of me!" The officer hit the floor.
"Thank you. Time for Redd to get what's coming to him."
The officer did not respond, having passed out.
Vult exited the Infirmary.
Back to the Present, A Little Bit Later; Walking Towards the Fight
"...anyway, that's what I'll tell them if they press the issue. Might actually be true now that I think of it. Not like I've seen any other Runaway Mutations from Beserker Serum before. Pretty sure you're the first."
"Wonderful."
"Looks like we're coming up on them now. Yep, there they are."
Edited by Mindris on Dec 14th 2021 at 6:27:58 AM