Difference between revisions of "3756/Primary Pursuit"

Latest revision as of 05:03, 27 November 2016

William Pauwel has posed:
    It's hard to say when exactly this little section of the multiverse was unified. It can't have been any less than a few weeks ago, but the incredible dearth of anything for miles and miles and miles suggests that this place could have appeared one day out of the blue, and there just wouldn't have been anyone around to take notice. One thing is certain now, though, this place is definitely not empty anymore.

    Where once there was nothing but empty wasteland, now there is a burgeoning community of ramshackle buildings inhabited by merchants selling water and food at prices that are quite simply unreasonable, and the unfortunate but brave adventurers who are their all-too-frequent customers.

    The cause for this sudden increase in activity is clear to anyone with two working eyes. Rising out from the middle of the growing shantytown is a monolithic, sand-dusted dome with a single open gateway leading down into its depths. It is distinctly out of place, juxtaposed against the network of makeshift cloth-and-wood buildings that spiderwebs out from it. Where the explorers are rough and weary, and to a man seem to come from some civilization locked somewhere between Earth's own Age of Exploration and the days of the yukon gold rush, the ruin is a cyclopean structure of some unidentifiable, black substance. The hemisphere that emerges from the red sands is utterly flawless and geometrically perfect save for its gate, and even that seems to be seamlessly integrated into the construction.

    As you make your approach, you notice a number of men and women of various shapes and sizes gawking at the entrance... As someone is carted out on a simple cloth stretcher. "Make way!" One of his companions cries as they move through the crowd. If you look carefully, you might notice that the man on the stretcher is clutching at his shoulder... Because there's nothing left beneath it. The stump where his arm used to be is clean, cauterized black, and smells vaguely of burning flesh.

    This is a dangerous one, the Chasers conclude.

    One such explorer seems not-so-mildly disturbed by what he sees. William Pauwel stares with uncertain eyes at the man's wound, and at the ruin-gate in front of him. "Well," he sighs, running a hand down his face, "Can't possibly be worse than that darned fortress, can it?"

Even if it isn't, he'll probably need to gather his party before venturing forth.

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    "Hey Irvine?"
    "How can I help you, Molly?"

    Standing to the side is an unusual pair, even by the standards of the Multiverse. There is a man with black hair and gold eyes, clad in some attempt at corporate casual, but with black and gold striped stockings and a tiny top hat with a gold feather askew on his head. Next to him is a woman with blue hair and eyes, wearing a frilly black and purple dress. She is also wearing a tiny hat. Both have a black star tattooed somewhere on their face.

    "There sure are a lot of strange people here today! Do you think we've gotten involved with a tourist group?"
    "Now Molly, just because they look unusual, we must not underestimate them. To judge a book by its cover is contrary to a man's romance!"
    "Eeeeehhhh?! Really?!"

    After removing her hand from her mouth in apparently genuine shock, the two squat down as 'Irvine' starts to deliver a mini-lecture.

    "You see Molly, that phrase comes from 'do not judge a scroll by its surroundings.' Originally coined by Crazed William Hoistjohnson, it means that just because something seems out of place, you shouldn't assume it shouldn't be there."
    "Ahhh, now I see! But doesn't that mean that if we find a scroll in here, it might be there on purpose?"

"Hahah! My dear, you have grasped the meaning of my lesson perfectly! Keep an eye out for scrolls, they will certainly be valuble!"

"How wonderful~! I'll do my best!"

    As the fellow with the lost arm is carted by, Molly stares after him, her face falling into an expression of sorrow and pity.

    "Hey Irvine... he'll be okay, right?"

    Her companion flails for a moment out of sight before answering.

    "O-Of course Molly! Better than okay even! With only one arm to worry about, his brain will become better at multitasking!"
    "Eeehhh?! Oh, how lovely~"

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Yesterday was a bit of an off day for Kazuko, but today's looking better! Helping out with a mission uninvolved in the war is sure to get her some useful contacts, and spelunking in some sort of ruins sounds like just the sort of thing the Captain would do, anyway. The not-really-a-dog's looking chipper and spirited, and surely nothing could-

     Holy crap that guy is missing an arm. Is she getting in over her head with this? Well, it's not like she has anywhere else to go for today. Coming to a stop by William, Irving, and Molly, the schoolgirl with the naginata is looking just a little shaken as she peers at the sandy dome.

     "Hi! Kazuko Kawakami, here for the Prospector's Guild's job. This is the right place, yeah?" She can't let herself get scared off now!

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    The Crimson Spectre hovers over the site, deploying a package via teleporter. Alexis Maaka, decked out in her powered suit, materializes at the cavern entrance. She slings a futuristic looking shotgun, in reality a Kel-Tech KSG, across her back and she doesn't waste time with chitchat today aside from a few handshakes and hellos with fellow Elites along the way, once they come to join.

    The armless fellow is noted, evidently there was a good reason for there to be a call for assistance. She notes the structure itself, cocking a red brow as she overhears the chatty two visitors not far away. "Tch."

    She approaches WIlliam, whistling sharply to get his attention. "Hey, gonna guess this is the place that job post mentioned. What's with the crowd?" She cocks an eyebrow at Kazuko, evidently this girl's here for the job too.

Valentha Summers (834) has posed:
    "Did someone say 'treasure?' Or maybe my name? Because either draw my attention!" A chipper female voice calls out from above. Valentha Summers is riding her Hovercycle down from the skies.. and it scatters plenty of sand and dust as she finds a place to park it outside the dome's entrance. ... Just in time to wince at the procession carrying a wounded man. Slamming both hands against her cycle's seat she vaults off, plants both feet into the dirt, and sighs in disgust. "Biting off more than you can chew means other things get a bite out of you." The quip's made in a singsong-yet-sympathetic tone.

    But seeing where the others are gathering... she makes a beeline for the crew. Then both hands come up to her WW2-style oversized aviator goggles... grasping them firmly, she stylishly dons them over her eyes instead of her forehead. "Soooo. I hear there's some dungeoneering to be done in these parts!"

Starbound Flotilla has posed:
    The STARBOUND FLOTILLA is here! They probably teleported in a while away; what they've brought in is sort of a combination of a tour bus and a dune buggy. So Nozomi didn't have to worry about hiking too long. Of course, they soon disembarked close to the borders of town, and it did involve a bit of a walk.

"Alright Nozomi. Gotta follow basic Movie Theater rules here. All the dismemberments are fine, and sneak your snacks in in your pockets."
"Worried. I am concerned about the dangerous effect that this discovery has on local adventurer populations..."
"Hmh. Valuable resources for this cultural archetype are worth finding. Effect on locals is irrelevant."
"But ever a trade opportunity. Such anachronism is a breeding ground for resources that find themselves without the proper use or appreciation."
"Aye, and that be profit. Wonder what ancients be havin' their hands in buildin' something like this..."
"If find, probably old. Floran ssscavenge, bessst. Floran, take lead. Ressst, follow. Nozomi! You want be with? Floran keep you sssafe today when Tiger runsss, inssstead of fuzzyman!"

    Looks like Biteblade, the Floran member of the group, is eager to take the lead on what is assumed to be a sort of SCAVENGE OPERATION. They'll hassle the others soon, but as soon as it looks like the people taking this job are heading out, they're going to head right on through the sole dome-entry!

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    Taiga is probably up on top of the tour buggy, curled up and lazing about until the group arrives. He can hear the conversation just fine, so why not?

    Nozomi, meanwhile, is... actually looking kind of curious and interested, for once. They are going to a strange new world, and flat-out treasure hunting. Not exploring to look for dangers, not getting a feel for the surrounding area, outright 'looking for cool stuff in some exotic location'. It's hard not to be at least a /little/ excited. She is also very attentive to advice, and... "With you...?!" There's several seconds where she looks torn between 'following along with Biteblade' and 'wow taking the lead is dangerous', but surprisingly enough, she finally nods, grasping her drone staff a little tighter.

    So when the group disembarks, she's slightly behind and to one side of the Floran, with Taiga flanking her on the other side for protection.

William Pauwel has posed:
    The sudden arrival of A SPACE SHIP causes Will- and a number of the other, more skittish Prospectors- to jump in their skins. Fortunately, Will has actually been offworld before, so it's a little less surprising than it otherwise would have been. He blinks a couple of times, adjusting his hat to steady his heart as Kazuko, Alexis and Valentha make their way over, "Oh, uh. Yeah, this is the place. Brand new ruin out in the middle of nowhere, wouldn't you know it. You guys are here for the job too, then?"

    Will was expecting some offworlders to show up the minute he heard about the Guild's announcement. The fact that this many are turning up is just a little bit overwhelming. At least most of them look pretty well armed. Not like those two guys with the star tattoos over there-- Will quietly wonders whether either of them are actually explorers. Maybe... Maybe they're entertainers?

There's a lot of money in that, too, after all!

    More people slowly filter in. An entire crew of offworlders, in fact. And more! Will pales a little bit, taking another moment to re-adjust his hat so that its lip tilts approximately an eighth of a degree to the left. "Well, uh. If you guys don't have a claim to work out of yet, maybe we can head down together? Safety in numbers, right?"

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Looking from person to person, it's becoming more obvious to Kazuko that she might be a little undergeared for this. No cool armor, no guns, no crazy rides, not being super tall or some kind of plant person... Still, she won't let that stop her! She does, however, stare at Alexis and the Floran wide-eyed for a while, looking mightily impressed by the former's impressive stature and the latter's odd combination of furs and vegetation. Nozomi's armor gets a long look as well, and it takes a while for the martial artist to even notice that William's responded.

     "Cool... This is so cool! A-ah! Yeah, just lemme at it. I'm ready to go!" Snapping back to attention, she gives her naginata a graceful spin overhead (being careful not to hit anyone taller with it in the process) before starting to jog in place. She's feeling good, she's getting pumped, and the treasure inside is sure to be worth the challenge! All she needs is the go ahead to take off for the cave, ready to act as the forward scout if need be.

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    Maaka shrugs a shoulder. "I could care less about making claims. Just pay what I'm owed and we're square, everything else is negotiable." She nods to the FLotilla, Taiga, and Nozomi as they flilter in. The redhead deftly avoids Kazuko's naginata hitting her in the back of the head, shooting her a stern look before her helmet folds into place. "Yeah yeah, shock and awe." She grumbles, her voice filtered and depened now. "Just don't go swinging that thing around, it's gonna be tight quarters down there."

    The cyborg will take off towards the mines, acting as part of recon while she grabs her shotgun. Acting as point man is perfectly fine by Maaka, as she switches to night vision once the tunnels darken enough for her. "Any hazards down here we might have to deal with?" She asks William, shotgun in hands.

Starbound Flotilla has posed:
    "Light worksss, made by many hand! Alssso! If many hand, better dice for roll when disssmember come around." Biteblade says, with an eager response to William that somehow seems to be missing a bit of the issue. They also, of course, greet Alexis. "Metal frieeeend! Hiiii! Floran think, you get buggy like Floran. Ssspaceship, make people mad sssometime. Floran ride in on buggy out of town, easssier!" She also gives Maaka a quick hug with a small amount of friendly teeth-latching, because that's what Floran's do. Valentha is greeted in a relatively minor way -- eager, repeated waving -- but is a little more unfamiliar. Kazuko is new, of course. Biteblade looks at them a bit uncertainly... "...Bark-prey? But not...? Floran confussse." There's not a lot of greeting there, but Biteblade takes a quick moment to circle around Kazuko, trying to figure her out, possibly getting a bit too close for something with so many teeth, before wandering off in a way that mixes friendly with apathetic. They've wandered over to the Bandits in their conversation. "Hi! Floran, tourissst! Floran get many sssouvenier! Go to gift shop, pay arm and leg! Hahaha! Floran make a meat persson joke about man lossst arm."

    "If that's quite enough buffoonery, perhaps we should begin the scouting. Someone is already running in place and I expect the weed to start scavneging for the lost limb on its own." Biteblade sticks out a weird floral tongue at Moonfin and starts pressing on through the gate, intending to help lead the charge.

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    And then Maaka is bitebladed in the middle of her pointman duties. "Ack! Bitey, gedddoffme!" She protests, albiet halfheartedly when she realizes the Floran is giving a hug. "You're gonna dull your fangs if you keep doing that, you know." She chides, shaking the FLoran off her back. "I still need one of those myself." The cyborg remarks, thinking about...buggy things for a moment.

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    Oh hey, there's Maaka. Nozomi knows her! The redhead cyborg gets a little nod of greeting in reply, only to realize that someone else is there and staring - specifically, Kazuko. Almost immediately, Nozomi falls back a step or two and shifts to the side, such that she's more or less got Biteblade between herself and the younger Kawakami sister. That is a large naginata. Taiga, on the other hand, simply regards her with a curious robotic eye, before turning his attention elsewhere again.

    Of course, when Biteblade wanders off, so does she, keeping up as quickly as she can. They're going inside! Inside is good.

Kamon Lionward (628) has posed:
Kamon's here!

The Light Warriors are ostensibly explorers and adventurers. Given the lack of opportunity for him to do either of these things since sometime late last year (he had a war to fight), he's been itching for a chance to get out there and do some good old-fashioned dungeon delving. Just because it isn't on /his/ world doesn't make it any less good or old-fashioned.

Kamon stands a little bit apart from the gaggle of potential party members, staring at the dome. He's got a katana slung over his shoulder, the scabbard affixed to a shoulder strap with his hand holding it loosely. There's text reading 'Property of Alexander Academy Practical Education Department' in tiny print along the side of the scabbard. "This is gonna be kind of awesome," Kamon says, to nobody in particular.

He starts forward, hastening to catch up. No sense for the fighter to be in the back.

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Kazuko flinches just a bit at Alexis' reaction to her move, an apologetic frown crossing the girl's face as she holds it tightly against her side quickly. "A-aye aye, ma'am! I can use it for thrusting, too, so..."

     Smooth. At least she doesn't linger on that too long when Biteblade starts moving around her, remaining completely still the entire time. She's not sure if they can smell fear, after all, but it never hurts to be careful. "H... Hi there! You..." She actually squints a bit at those teeth. "... You like meat?"

     Common ground, perhaps?

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    "Irvine, look! Flying machines!"
    "I see it Molly! "

    The two are squeezing each other's hands as they regard the Crimson Spectre, eyes filled with delight. "Do you think that we could steal it someday?" "Hahah! One thing at a time my dear! We have a ruin to plunder!"

    As everyone begins to congregate and discuss teaming up to tackle the venture, the two bandits share a crafty look and begin whispering to each other. They then approach!

    "Hello friends! It's soo good to see you~!" Molly says, going to each girl in turn and pulling them into a tight hug! Irvine meanwhile, goes to each man and gives them a firm handshake. "My fellows! My partner and I had a thought we wish to share! We all wish to search this ruin, and you seem to be familiar with each other. If you would include us in your merry band, your names would be listed when they tell tales of us!"

    "That's right! We're very famous, you see~" And with that, the two suddenly go back to back, looking uncharacteristically serious. "Be it midday or midnight, we shine!" "Like the stars in the night sky, we are everywhere at once!" "All things are ours, they just don't know it yet!" "Tremble! But also cheer! We are..."

    The two strike a pose! STARLIG H T BAN DITS !

Starbound Flotilla has posed:
    "Yeah!!" Well if you were making a diplomacy roll, Kazuko, you just hit the motherlode of natural 20s. Biteblade is arguably a connoisseur of carnivorism.

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    "Don't steal my ship. Please." Maaka says over comms sharply, directed towards Molly and Irvine both with a tinge of 'I can hear you jackasses.' She turns her head just in time to see them doing some kind of sentai spiel, and after a brief gawk the mercenary shakes her head. "Christ. I'm gonna need to keep these people on a leash at this rate."

Starbound Flotilla has posed:
"We need to create a pose and a speech."
"Skeptical. I think if you try to do that, there is a very real risk that Albert will break your nose."
"I dunno, fishface has a point. Are you seeing our competition here?"
"The wardrobe, wordsmithing, and choreography show a degree of style that vastly outpaces our own meager displays."
"No."
"We could get Albert a monkey suit."
"Yarharhar, now ye be the one with the face Albert be wantin' to break!"

    The broader Starbound group behind the others seem to have had a very favorable reaction to the Starlight Bandits.

William Pauwel has posed:
    Will takes a couple more anxious breaths. There... Are a lot of offworlders here, and they're all congregating around him! This is strange. This is a strange experience, but it could be a very, very profitable one too. He's about to declare the start of their little expedition, when SUDDENLY--

BANDITS.

Will stares for a long moment. He blinks once, then twice, as a tiny voice at the back of his head starts twisting and squirming because these guys are SO COO-- no. No! This is serious. Serious Will Time. "Oh, uh. S-sure," he coughs, clearing his throat of the CHILDISH URGE* that burns deep within, "I don't mind. S-safety in numbers, right?"

Right.

    "Right! Uh, then we should probably get a move on, before the rest of these guys get their nerve back and start jostlin' elbows with us," Will says to the group, making no comment about the fact that you don't usually get paid just for going into a ruin, and that he's definitely not got the money that Alexis might be expecting. She seems to have something else going on, and the weird fish-guy does raise a fair point about the girl with the oversized spear. Better get moving before she takes off anybody's head. Will adjusts his hat one last time, this time swiveling its phi-orientation approximately twenty degrees to the left.

    With that, he makes his way into the great hole in the side of the dome. And it is basically a hole- there's certainly no sign of a proper door to speak of. If there was one, it seems to have vanished, seamlessly, into the rest of the structure. Will plucks what looks like an electric torch from his belt and flicks it on, illuminating a long stairwell that leads deeper underground. It quickly becomes obvious that he doesn't actually need it on, though- a series of clinical, white lights flicker on overhead as they descend, lighting up the winding corridor.

    It goes on and on, spiralling downward for at least a minute's worth of walking, before its gyre seems to widen. The hallway opens up into a great, illuminated platform... And nothing else. It seems to ends there, on a metal platform lodged into a very solid wall.

It's only after a few more lights flicker and more of their surroundings are lit that it becomes clear what exactly they're all in for.

    The group exits into the hollow of a massive cylinder, lined with harsh, white lights and small eyelets that seem to be projecting rays of dangerous, red light. After a moment of watching, several of the beams seem to swing and sweep across the room, moving across motorized tracks built into the walls. Other apertures, interspersed between the ones emitting those blood red beams, do not seem nearly so active, at least not yet. Links of jet-black stairs network out from the platform they're standing on now, leading to other, similar platforms that seem to hang weightlessly in space.

    It seems to go down for... ever. If there is a bottom to this thing, you can't see it from this platform. Whether that's just a trick of the light, or if this thing really does go that deep, it's hard to tell. Will swallows hard as he peers over the edge, feeling a toe out for the first step to an adjacent staircase. "Well," he says as one of those red beams makes a sweep just overhead, "Nowhere else to go but down, I guess."

Valentha Summers (834) has posed:
    "Steal my hovercycle and THOU SHALT CRY. Literally. The security system will turn you into a frog!" Valentha, waggling a finger wardingly at the starlight duo, is probably bluffing. Probably. But it would take a Techno-Wizard to know the likelihood of such a lie!

    And, s'far as she knows? She's the only one here.

    Biteblade's waving's returned with a merry, over the top one of her own just before she adjusts her goggles again.. and plonks her way through the entrance!

    Valentha has her own lantern clipped to her belt. It shimmers to life with just a touch. The light it casts is warm and friendly, provided one's not undead or something. Biteblade may find it a viable substitute for sunlight for photosynthesis... if Florans rely on that anymore. Close inspection reveals that the seeming 'electric lantern's bulb is, in fact, a tiny jewel.

    If anyone's looking, anyways.

    And out into the great chamber they all go. Where there's little BUT space. Lots and lots of space.

    "... Wwwwwwwwwooooooooooooah. Who built THIS?! It's HUGE... like it goes on forever!" Apparently fearless, she has little trouble stepping right over to the platform's edge and looking doooooooooown.

    Afraid of heights? Nope.

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    Molly is going to have a hard time getting her arms around Nozomi. She's so completely forward that the tiny girl is rather intimidated; she sidesteps this way and that such that there is a Floran between her and the speechmaking bandit lady at all times.

    Taiga merely looks fairly pointedly at the both of them, one of his shoulder cannons twitching slightly. "I beg your pardon, but I already have both an owner and a designated user. I am in the market for neither." Hmph.

    On they go, and into the cylinder, and... those are death lasers. Nozomi sort of freezes up for a second, before Taiga bumps lightly into her side. "On my back, Nozomi." That breaks her out of her distracted horror, and with a quick nod, she swings a leg over his back and settles in.

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Common ground indeed! "Awesome! You should come by Kawakami City some time, then. We've got all sorts of good places to eat." Kazuko's grinning brightly at Biteblade as she says that. Even in the middle of nowhere, she's doing her part to spur her home city's tourism!

     The Starlight Bandits' entrance draws a similar impressed stare from the girl, but she can't gawk for too long. Not when it's time to enter the ruins! Down the stairs, through the hallways, and into the... Giant gaping hole in the ground. The girl with the naginata peers at the floating platforms carefully, looking from shape to shape.

     She's mapping out a path. "So many lasers... How far do you think it goes?" She asks nobody in particular, her eyes following the lasers' patterns as well. "Looks like we can get over through this way.. Okay! Don't fall behind~"

     Time to make an impression. Strapping the naginata to her back, Kazuko claps her hands together and waits for the lasers to finish passing by before taking a running leap for the nearest platform. She lets her momentum carry her from platform to platform, narrowly avoiding some of the lasers and just going at full speed the whole time.

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
The Spectre, not in any mood for visitors, begins to activate a cloaking device before it takes off. It'll pick up Maaka later, but for now it remains in orbit outside of gawking eyes.

    The cyborg moves along, jogging before she makes it to the gigantic chasm. Standing at the edge, she frowns behind her helmet before she makes her way down the stairway, shotgun raised cautiously while she descents. "Keep your heads on a swivel, folks. This doesn't at all scream safe to me." She warns.

    "This is gonna be...interesting." Maaka muses, eyeing the laser things warily as she tries not to linger in front of them too long while she goes from platform to platform at the bottom of the stairs. Her legs are certainly powerful, as she has no problem leaping across the first couple chasms once she slings her shotgun once more.

Starbound Flotilla has posed:
    Molly winds up hugging Biteblade, possibly twice, due to Nozomi being quick. Biteblade, for her part of things, doesn't seem to mind. Yaaaay hugs! And she's a little -- heh -- starstruck of course, even if these people may not /actually be famous/. Anyway, alright, time to get into business.

    "Ohhh!! Floran know what thisss isss! Oh! You find Ancient facility! Oh oh oh! We work now!" Unlike some of the others, Biteblade doesn't do this casually. Instead, she waits, scanning the lasers and their patterns... "Taming friend, thisss tough for you, particular. Floran gonna help. We find pattern of lassser. Alwaysss pattern. Know pattern, go through. You, ride metal tiger, Tiger find patternsss with Floran, we work together, right?" With that in mind... Time to get to work! Biteblade has much experience with this precise, EXACTLY type of challenge. And so, heading down, they activate their PULSE JUMP technology, and start their platforming shenanigans! But they take it very slow and steady, and surprisingly cautiously, not rushing anything. Very sensible.

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    Irvine just laughs and waves cheerily up at the Spectre as Alexis's warning issues from it. Molly pouts as Nozomi dodges out of the way of her hugs! Her fingers wriggle a little And so, the two successfully infiltrate the group, and steal FRIENDSHIP! And so they go with everyone into the dome! Irvine draws a kukri from a sheath, the handle and bolter being a pistol! Molly draws a meaty-looking revolver and attaches a hatchet to it to serve as a stock.

    "Do not worry friends! Irvine and I know how to handle ourselves.""
    "Oh, Molly is so right! Any foes that lie within will fall to my glittering blade! I swear this upon my man's romance!"

    But, there is no opposition at first. Unless you count gravity and lasers as such. Which the two do.

    "Aha, our most treacherous foe, long drops! Not to worry friends, Molly and I are adept at conquering such things!" "That's right! Ready Irvine?" "Ready!"

    And so, the two take each other's hand, interlacing their fingers... and do a running jump down to the next platform! Completely missing the stairs.

Kamon Lionward (628) has posed:
Kamon ventures forth with the assembled party. He's only sort of familiar with a couple people here, so mostly he's keeping to himself. If it were up to him, he'd bring about half their number into a place like this. They've got a veritable army marching on down. It's going to be tough to conceal their presence from whatever might be lurking in a place like this.

And there's /always/ something lurking.

"If you're a healer of some kind, speak up so we know who to look for when we're in the thick of it," Kamon says to the group on the way down. He stops at the platforms and the stairs and the lasers, waiting to watch for their pattern. A lot of old places like this have defenses that cycle through fixed rotations, and he's spent a lot of time studying how to get through them without getting lasered.

People start running ahead and making the jump. Kazuko in particular catches his eye. She's fast, and she knows how to move, but it looks like she's relying on her own agility rather than observation to go forward. He hopes she doesn't slip up.

Kamon finally starts navigating the stairs himself, moving steadily and carefully, forward and then back, ducking and hopping in measured motions. He's heavy, and while that doesn't make him slow, it makes him careful. Inwardly, he kind of appreciates the practice. If Soan were here, they'd be looking for places to hang the emitters in the club room instead of having to traverse the traps.

William Pauwel has posed:
    "Dunno," Will answers Kazuko. "These places were built by the ancients hundreds, if not thousands of years ago. Maybe this one goes all the way down? Heh." No way those guys could build to a planet's core though, right?

R...right?

    But then people start disregarding the perfectly servicable staircases and begin BULLET JUMPING from platform to platform like some kind of crazy cyborg space ninjas. Molly and Irvine have a somewhat more exciting journey as one of the death lasers comes perhaps too close to cutting the pair into four parts, unless they find the skill- or the luck- to dodge out of the way! Will stammers as people start outright just leaping away, "H-hey, hold up! Some of us don't jump that well!" He tentatively takes another step down the staircase, and then a few more, before ducking abruptly as a DEATH LASER sweeps through the rough region of space that he had occupied barely a second ago. "Nnnn," Will murmurs as he makes his way down, "Careful, careful..."

    Alexis, Biteblade and Kazuko seem to encounter little trouble on their own trips. Evidently, whoever designed the laser network didn't feel the need to take 'super jumping elites' into account. Anyone who chooses the stairs instead will have a slightly more troublesome time of it, as the beam arrays sweep regularly across each flight, their beams apparently having little effect on whatever this place is made of. There's a sense that they'd do a good job of cutting right through basically anything else, though.

    Will lags behind all but Kamon as he makes his descent. He might be taking this a bit too quickly, by the Odynari's judgment. The lasers do move in very regular patterns, and Will seems to grasp at least some of them-- but not nearly enough of them. Another beam makes a pass just about where his neck would meet his head- or would, if he didn't duck underneath it... almost in time. As he scrambles onto the platform, a little scrap of leather flutters down from the staircase. He reaches up to feel for the top of his head, only to find...

His hat.

His poor hat.

The whole top bit of it has been cut clean off, and even now tumbles down, down, down, into the depths.

It passes... Right in front of one of those blank irises.

A little shutter flickers behind the glass.

    Suddenly, the air seems to begin... buzzing. It's a distant, persistent sort of buzzing, like someone had just kicked over a hive of bees somewhere nearby. Will freezes as he hears it start, "H-hey. Anyone else hear th--"

    Pulses of golden light shriek out of the abyss. Will yelps, ducking his head AGAIN as they just narrowly miss taking it clean off. The buzzing builds, growing louder and louder, as its source comes into view.

Calling them 'bees' is remarkably accurate, all things considered.

    Dozens of robotic drones rise from the depths on paired gyrorotors and the bright, golden cones of their maneuvering thrusters. Most of them seem to pack what appear to be twin-barreled pulse cannons, and immediately begin opening fire on the explorers.

    Others are equipped with mirrors, and begin making their way to the DEATH LASER APERTURES. There's only one thing they could possibly be planning with those.

THINGS ARE GETTING A LITTLE HEATED. But the question remains: What sort of treasure are these defenses even guarding!?

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    "Uh oh."

    Maaka tenses up after another jump immediately when she hears the buzzing sound. Tightening her grip on the shotgun, she raises the weapon before the drones fly into view. "Tangos present, get to work!" She calls out, the shotgun blasting at one of the hovering drones. Now might be a good time to get going, and Maaka picks up the pace as she leaps towards another platform, taking aim at one of the mirror drones and firing in mid-air. Before one begins wondering what she's doing, Maaka has targeting software for this stuff. It's fiiiiiiine.

    "Take out the mirror things before we get cut apart!" She barks, firing once again.

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    "Ah, I can... I actually think I can spot this," Nozomi replies to Biteblade, looking at the patter with a sharp eye. "Nozomi. You know my capabilities. Simply find me an opening," Taiga says, to which she nods her head faintly. "Aah, let's see... that one... and then that one's a little out of sync... and... aaaaand... now-" No sooner has Nozomi said anything than Taiga launches, finding his way to the next platform easily, and turning to wait for Biteblade on the other side. Only once the Floran is with them will Taiga proceed again. And again, making his way through.

    Then come the 'bees'.

    "Nozomi. Hold tightly." Taiga's shoulder cannons turn, immediately opening fire on the hostiles; specifically, he's already decided the Mirror Drones pose the much larger threat, and is showering them with as many shots as he can; the baseball-sized yellow spheres of magically-infused energy are effective on a wide variety of targets, so it's the natural option when fighting an unknown enemy.

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Jumping across those platforms is more fun than Kazuko expected, but she could certainly do without the risk of plummeting into an unknown abyss below. "But how far's all the way? You think maybe this goes all the way to the other side of the planet?" Then again... Maybe that's just what she needed to get her adrenaline pumping tonight. She laughs and gives William and Kamon a reassuring grin. "Relax, it's fine! Just don't touch the..."

     The sound of the buzzing gets her attention, though, and she peers over the edge at the glowing lights coming from the hole. Are those... Bees? Shooting ENERGY?

     This is turning into one of her sci-fi movies. Still determined to show off a little too much, Kazuko deftly evades the shots coming her way and continues bounding from platform to platform to get closer to the cannon drones. "I got you now!" She calls out confidently and starts taking quick swings with her naginata at the drones, trying to just bat them out of the air into other platforms, each other, or even the walls!

     Why not cutting? It's blunted. Using a bladed weapon would be dangerous for demonstrations, after all!

Valentha Summers (834) has posed:
    Valentha's having a very bad time with those lasers! She hops and leaps and slithers around them seemingly haphazardly, wobbles down a few stairs and nearly loses her balance when Will ALMOST LOSES her head. "aaah!"

    There's the smell of burning flesh, but...

    As it turns out? She doesn't.... lose anything? Instead she ends up on the next platform, hopping down next to will blowing on her SMOKING ARM and beating on her sleeve to stop it from smoldering. "Ow ow ow! ... Oh..."

    And this is just in time for the security systems to hit full bore.

    "Uh." She just stands there blinking, stupefied. Even for her... she? She's seen a lot.

    But this security system takes the cake. "Well. Maybe we'd better bail!~" She urgently suggests. But the lilty tone she's using is... a bit too playful? Is she serious, or just nervous?

    Or maybe something else entirely?

    Because she whips out a Revolver and just starts FIRING. What's strange is the gun's PRETTY DAMNED QUIET. There's no apparent recoil or muzzle flash, but the air whistles just as it would from any bullet.

    And where she aims, holes ARE blown open. Shapeless force. Pure telekinetic power. That's what she's firing.

    And she's focusing on the MIRROR BEES!

Starbound Flotilla has posed:
    Biteblade's doing well, but as soon as BEEEEEES start complicating things, they start working with Taiga far more directly! "Floran with! Help shooting!!" They're not going to make Taiga carry them, but they are, it seems, going to jump along when Taiga does, and use the heavy military-grade machine's weight and power as something to brace against! They draw from their Matter Manipulator a HEAVY DURASTEEL BOW! Their wrist-module begins dispensing hefty arrows, and they latch onto Taiga in mid-air to get superior aiming power! And also: Cover! Holy crap. A few plates of armor are pretty heavily blasted, battering Biteblade. There's no fresh meat down here and no sunlight! Biteblade is suffering an EXTREME combat efficacy loss! Those familiar with her may particularly note it, but it could be easily solved with SOLAR CHARGING. Until then, she's going to be battered badly by the beeeees.

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    The two do indeed have an exciting time! In spite of the danger, they're laughing cheerfully and are just having a grand old time.

    "Oh Irvine, this is so wonderful!" "What did I tell you Molly? When would I ever show you a boring time?" "Well, there was that time we bored into that safe..." "Oh Molly, you are a delight!"

    As the two land on a subsequent platform, a laser comes close! But, the two drop to their knees, sliding under it! Just in time to spot the top of Will's hat fluttering down into the depths.

    "Oh no! Irvine, the young man's hat!" And then the drones start to emerge... and a cunning gleam shines in the man's eyes. "Not to worry Molly! Watch and shoot after me!"

    And so, Irvine takes a running jump.. towards the drones! Foot on one, he leaps down to the next! And the previous one is fired at by Molly, the sharp crack of her revolver echoing throughout! Irvine meanwhile is rapidly dropping, using the drones as platforms! His goal? To grab the top of Will's hat!

Kamon Lionward (628) has posed:
Kamon gets through without getting his own head cut off because he's taking it slow. Given he can't exactly fly, that's probably sensible. Will looks to be going a touch /too/ fast, though; while Kazuko has the advantage of speed versus the tracked beam emitters, Will is just screwing up the pattern. "Hey, watch out, you're going too --"

Zzzzap. The top of a hat falls into the hole. "...fast." It /seems/ pretty harmless at first... and then there's that buzzing, and the direct result of it shoots up the shaft and starts to, uh, shoot up the shaft.

"Crap!" Kamon ducks his head and powers through, caught out in the open when the shooting starts. He reaches one hand up over his shoulder and the other into his coat, drawing his sword with a shout and slashing into one of the laser emitters right before he's about to barrel into it now that he's going faster. The other hand of his comes out with a roughly spherical object in red. He feeds MP into it...

...and then flings the active Bomb Core into the midst of the bees. KA-BOOOOM!

William Pauwel has posed:
    The legion of drones do not seem to be prepared to deal with this many elites-- at least, not with their current numbers. But judging by how that terrible buzzing isn't actually growing any weaker, that may not be an issue for them for much longer. Still, the elites do a heroic job of clearing the air. Kazuko may find herself wishing that her naginata wasn't a blunt instrument as she tries to smash into the drones. They're easy enough to hit when they get close-- but when she does strike, she'd feel some brief resistance in the air immediately around the drones. Some strange field of force winks to life upon impact, repelling the force of her blow. But with every action comes an equal and opposite reaction, and the drones that she does hit are briefly tossed around in the air, colliding with other nearby robots in brief flashes of projected force.

Do these things have energy shields!?

Not particularly strong ones, it seems.

    Projectile attacks seem particularly effective at shredding through their numbers. Alexis' shotgun acts like a flak cannon, shattering mirror drones into scrap metal that rains down upon the stairs and platforms, but not before tearing through their barriers with brief flashes of light. Taiga's energy blasts sweep through great swathes of the machines, the magical projectiles proving just about as effective on these drones as they are on pretty much anything else.

But there are just so, so many of the things, swarming almost endlessly out of the depths.

    Valentha's MIND BULLETS seem to entirely circumvent whatever defenses these things might have. More polished metal and glass tumbles out of the air as she opens fire. Kamon's blade meets the same sort of resistance as Kazuko's naginata as it cuts into the laser emitters, but his strength is enough to cleave through it, tearing the panels to shreds with his gods-given might. Biteblade's arrows light up even more shields, but tear through regardless, pinning one drone after another to the ruin's walls.

But there are so, so very many of them.

    There are enough, in fact, for the Starlight Bandits to use as a shooting gallery AND a set of stepping stones. Will's eyes go wide as he watches Irving leap down into the darkness, dodging between sweeping security lasers and bolts of pulse fire as the bandit goes to rescue the top of his poor hat. Irving manages to reach a safe platform JUST IN TIME for Kamon to unleash the power of the BOMB CORE. The Starlight Bandit manages to leap just in time to jump AWAY FROM THE EXPLOSION, just like some kind of super cool guy.

    Or at least, Will thinks so. His eyes go starry and misty as he watches, before he realizes that he should PROBABLY do something, and immediately clambers to his feet, gun in hand. Blasts of hot plasma join the others in their assault on the drone horde, even as energy bolts rain down from the greatly diminished pulse-cannon drones.

    If progress was hard before, now it's just plain nightmarish. But still they need to push on. The elites manage to avert the worst of the damage by eliminating the mirror units. Now it's just a matter of attrition, and of finding cover before something worse happens.

William Pauwel has posed:
Speaking of something worse.

    Unbeknownst to the intrepid explorers, those empty apertures are doing more than just watching for anything to cross their path. Signals streak through the superstructure of the ruins as more and more of the eyelets are tripped. Those same signals travel even deeper. Deeper and deeper, as a low humm begins to accompany the buzzing in the air. The facility is coming alive-- it knows there are intruders within it.

It is prepared to fight back.

With everything it has.

There's a light in the depths that wasn't there before. A single, enormous cone of wroth, red light blasts out of the darkness. The platforms tremble as massive plates of metal hammer against the inside wall of the vertical shaft, and that light grows closer and closer, larger and larger.

Then, there is a sound.

It sounds like this: https://youtu.be/VemrhM9Y35M?t=1m41s

    A second light flashes out from the abyss, lancing through one platform, then another, as it converges upon the biggest threat it can currently perceive: The mechanical hostile, Taiga. With another labored roar, the source of that terrible light jumps from the depths, leaping up the shaft like some kind of feral beast. As it comes into view, it does seem exactly that.

    The thing is fifty feet long at the least, and proportionally massive in every other dimension of space. Four enormous limbs grip tightly into the inner wall, yet somehow keep it anchored in place without damaging the facility itself. It's wrapped entirely in what look to be maintenance tarps, indicating that, whatever this thing is, it must have been half-finished before this facility was abandoned, but it's still clearly quite operational.

    It leaps, twisting about in mid air to latch onto the wall high overhead. It peers down with its lone, red eye opening its jagged maw wide to reveal the vast barrel to some enormous gun, built into its face.

Said barrel begins to glow with power. It seems to be charging up another shot.

AT THE VERY LEAST, however, the thing's enormous searchlight face illuminates most of the shaft below. The bottom actually seems to be closer than they might have initially thought-- and there is a large passageway splitting off from the main cylinder, leading somewhere deeper into the facility.

But then, the question is, will you manage to make it there in time!?

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    Taiga is physically strong enough to outright carry both Biteblade and Nozomi if he needs to; simply being used for airborne cover is not an issue, for the most part.

    "I feel compelled to remind you that Nozomi is sitting astride my back." In essence, Biteblade is using poor Nozomi as cover too, sort of. She's bent low over his back for more stability and safety, but still.

    Nevertheless, he's speedy and sharp-eyed enough to keep Nozomi from harm, and to choose paths on which Biteblade will have an easier time evading as well. His cannons keep firing, again and again, the engine at his 'heart' supplying more than enough energy to do so endlessly. But there are so many of the damned things that simply being out here is rolling the dice again and again on taking injuries, and sooner or later the dice will come up snake-eyes.

    Oh hey, look at that scorch mark along Taiga's left shoulder. That's a tad worryi-

    HIT THE DECK.

    Taiga snaps down and grips the back of Biteblade's neck in his maw, not hard enough to cause harm but definitely hard enough to haul the Floran to safety. And then he leaps, as hard as he can. There might be at least one wall-spring involved. He's rebounding until he can find a platform that's /not/ the immediate target of a sodoff huge energy blast. Only then will he slide to a stop, let go, and lower himself to permit Nozomi's disembarking. "Biteblade. Please ferry Nozomi to safety."

    Then he turns around, leaps for the wall, and digs his claws in. He intends to climb straight up a vertical metal surface of some unknown metal and go into melee on the robot.

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     "Tch... These things are strong!" Kazuko calls out in warning to the others as she draws back her glaive, sidestepping another blast of pulse cannon fire. She lets out a startled yelp when she feels her foot go partially off the platform, but catches herself just in time to catch a blast right to the arm.

     That's not going to be pretty. Yelping in pain, she puts all of her attention on just avoiding further shots for the moment, her focus seemingly boosted now that the danger's becomes more internalized. Not only that, but anyone with the ability to sense energy would notice that the girl's finally getting serious as ki starts to gather around her!

     Before she can actually strike at those bees again, however, her attention is directed towards the mechanical monstrosity emerging from the depths and flinging itself above the group of explorers. The light tearing through Taiga's platform gets her attention, though, and she resists the urge to try and just whack the thing.

     "Is that... There's a path down there!" Instead of trying to fight it head on, Kazuko starts jumping for the platforms further down, swinging the naginata one-handed at the bees on the way and hoping her ki-boosted strikes will make up for the difference!

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    Maaka seems satisfied her shotgun has done its job with the bee drones, and she's nimble enough to mae her way from platform to platform. Of course, the arrival of the gigantic robot definitely is enough for her to check her inventory. "...fuck it, I'm bringing the forty out."

    She slings her shotgun over her shoulder, before the matter manipulator whips up a six-round grenade launcher that resembles a bulky revolver than anything else, a Milkor MGL to be specific. She ignores the bees for now as she leaps towards another platform, firing her grenade launcher at the giant Guardian Robot as she aims for its eyes, heading towards the path Kazuko just pointed out.

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    So cool. Irvine is so cool as he leaps heroically from drone to drone, snatching the top of the hat from the air, and rolling on the platform! The explosion behind him (which he doesn't even look at!) makes his tie flutter dramatically.

    "SO COOL IRVINE~!" Molly calls from above as she reloads her revolver. The man just laughs heartily and waves up at everyone, clutching the tattered hat part!

    And then suddenly, a red light from far below! Something massive begins to climb, making the pair's eyes light up! "Behold everyone, a great foe appears before us! Let us fell it, and engrave our names into history!"

    His pistol-kukri is raised, bullets flying at the joins of the thing's limbs! Molly joins in with more of the same! They seem very confident in their ability to fell this thing... that, or just too stupid to understand the dire straits they're in.

Valentha Summers (834) has posed:
    REAVERBOTS!

    Err... wait, wrong kind of ruins.

    Well, whatever the heck that thing is, it gets Valentha's blood running cold.

    "Huuuuuh. Looks incomplete! Probably missing under plating under those tarps!" But with the thing slamming into walls and blasting the already-trapped walls with ENORMOUS guns... she's not so willing to get a close examination under way.

    Not when she's not the only person here, anyways.

    the dragon-in-disguise cracks a sheepish, nervous grin. WHAT TO DO?

    Her eyes flicker about... and she spots the nearby passage at around the same time the others do. "In there! Get in there! No way it can follow!"

    She leaps towards the passage herself,b ut stops out of the way just to the side of it, hand upraised and pointed at the huge machine.

    Power crackles and flows like a strange, snake-like river from her hands. Blue light illuminates the surroundings as she chants something softly but clearly and gestures, shaping the power into her outstretched palm...

    And with a final shout, a HUGE bluish-white beam goes soaring for the offending barrel - half the thickness of her own body!

    No way can that CRIPPLE the giant robot, but if it's already distracted by Taiga...

    Well, that'll knock it for a loop. Buy some time!

Kamon Lionward (628) has posed:
Miraculously -- and with the help of pure strength, honed skill, and the power of the gods -- Kamon does not get cut in half by lasers. The pulse barrage clipped him here and there, but he's actually agile, even if his land speed is less impressive. His sword is actually smoking, scorch marks visible up the length of the blade while he beats feet for the next platform.

The giant robot that laser-breaths one of them and then moves to cut off their escape is... noted. Kamon has a brief urge to leap off the platform he's on and start cutting it up in mid-air. He decides that, given he has no idea what else is under that tarp, he isn't going to risk it. This time. Maybe the next run-in, though...

Kamon spots what looks to be a DOOM LASER warming up and gets the hell out of the way. He leaps off the platform, legs kicking on his way to the ground. When he hits, he goes into a roll, leaving an indent where his surprisingly heavy body hits the floor. He springs to his feet with a wince, sprinting across the room towards the side tunnel.

He really should have brought a gun or something.

William Pauwel has posed:
    Super robot tiger meets giant guardian robot. Taiga definitely has the advantage of speed as it rapidly closes the distance, the TIGER's claws smashing into the thing's face a split second before it fires. Instead of blasting through Nozomi's platform- and almost assuredly somebody else's shortly thereafter, the thing instead EVAPORATES a cluster of nearby bees. Explosions from Alexis' grenade launcher burst all around its face, the blasts tearing chunks of armor from its body-- but that eye seems to be made of slightly stronger stuff. What more, those blasts might even catch Taiga in the crossfire if she's not careful!

    The Bandits have much less luck with small arms fire. A few sparks and flashes of firelight are the only signal that they've done anything to this massive thing, though its limbs seem to move just a little more sluggishly as it tries to mount a counter attack. The massive machine swings its club-like arms with deceptive grace, missing the floating platforms entirely as it tries to smash the TIGER back!

It's about then that Valentha's tremendous blast of magic meets the behemoth machine, face-first. For the Guardian, everything goes white-and-speedlines.

But for now, it seems that these brave heroes are holding the behemoth back! Meanwhile, the others are not entirely free from danger yet.

    Those DEATH BEAMS still sweep on regular intervals through the vertical shaft, but they seem to fire everywhere but where the drones are hovering. More pulse-fire rains down on the explorers as they make for that side passage, even as they try to keep the drone count down to a managable number. Kazuko's ki-powered strikes finally give her the oomph (or possibly the right damage type) to bypass the drones' shields, her glaive tearing into steel and shattering ceramic into so many broken shards.

But...

Where's Will?

    Running for the masculine half of the Starlight Duo, it seems! The young Chaser yelps as he ducks another death laser, the Solano opening fire to tear another couple of drones to shreds. "Hey, mister!" He yells as he reaches Irving's platform. Will grabs hold of the bandit's wrist and begins tugging vaguely in the direction of the side-corridor. "Come on! Fightin' this thing up here is just plain suicide!"

    Said side-corridor is actually... pretty spacious itself. It seems like this whole facility was constructed with the mobility of its robotic defenders in mind. Indeed, even now, more drones begin swarming out of the walls themselves, launching from honeycomb-shaped openings in the corridor to harass the intruders. At least this hallway looks like it's free of death lasers! And in the distance, there looks to be some kind of massive vault door...

--Meanwhile--

--UP THE SHAFT--

There is a flash of LIGHT

William Pauwel has posed:
    It's an impossibility. An utterly unthinkable sight. That thing clings, anchored to the wall by sheer leg-strength alone. Its face and upper torso are a mangled mess of twisted metal. But its hands are raised.

    Two red spheres are visible now, just over its fists. They were hidden, before, by the mummywrap-like cloth that had covered the machine, but now are now aglow with a brilliant, golden light that colors the orbs the color of molten brass. Its 'eye' glows with the same light, as does a much larger source somewhere further down. The light seems to harden before Valentha's assault, growing brighter and brighter as, slowly, laboriously, the azure blast is forced /back/ by an advancing wall of that terrible light.

Is that... A barrier system??

But one so powerful on a machine like this!?

    That deep, bassy growl rumbles out from the giant robot's 'throat' as it begins to advance, one step at a time, down the shaft. That wall advances with it-- faster, even, as it pushes power down into the emitters. A drone flies too close, carried by a sudden thermal of air, and /disintigrates/ upon contact with that strange field.

What kind of civilization builds a weapon like this and uses it as a simple guard!?

"C-come on," Will says, tugging a little bit harder on Irving's sleeve. "Come on, all of you! We need to get into the corridor!"

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Seemingly reinvigorated by her ki-augmented swings actually working, Kazuko goes after those bees with more energy than before! If nothing else, it's at least safer to fight these things than it is to avoid the lasers, and it's DEFINITELY safer to handle the bees and escape than it would be to try fighting the giant machine that just... Disintegrated one of its own drones.

     "... Y-yeah, come on, everyone! I'll take clear the way!" As promised, she does indeed focus on going after those bees coming closer to the side passage, although the strain of using that weapon one-handed for so long is taking a toll on the martial artist. With any luck, though, she won't have to do it for too long before retreating inside with everyone else!

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    Plink plink plink goes the shots of the Bandits. Sadly, it's true, they lack the firepower for this kind of thing. But they're still laughing it up and shooting regardless. At least, until Will approaches Irvine.

    "But young man, a Chaser must take risks! No one ever became great by sitting at home and twiddling their thumbs!" As he explains, Molly has finished running over and concurs completely. "Running from everything just because it's dangerous is no good!"

    But then the thing generates a barrier. A clearly thick one, and the two Bandits freeze. As dense as they seem to be, they're at least smart enough to know there's no way of getting through that!

    "But, understanding when discretion is the better part of valor is part of a man's romance! Come along!" And so, the two put away their weapons, wrap an arm each around Will to pick him up, and dash into the side corridor!

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    Maaka is definitely careful, making sure not to shoot at Taiga while she engages the Guardian. However she knows when she needs to get moving, so she takes another diving leap as she follows with Kazuo. The small fry get shot at by Maaka, the cyborg transitioning to her 10mm sidearm, but otherwise she remains focused on running like hell.

    When she notices Kazuko winding down, Maaka immediately goes to back the girl up. Her sidearm fires at the bees while she heads inside the passage, covering the others when they file towards the side passage. "Move it or lose it, people!"

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    Taiga is a very aggressive fighter. But he is no fool. A melee attack becomes much less tenable when the enemy in question has a defensive barrier that also serves as an offensive field. He stops his high-speed charge up the wall and turns around, digging deep furrows in the metal as he slides down to the nearest platform. And then he jumps and jumps and JUMPS, putting himself at more risk than a carefully-considered path might, for the simple fact that he /can/ without Nozomi there, and also the simple fact that he might be destroyed if he doesn't. But while he's jumping, he's looking. Sweeping the cylinder, looking for one very specific thing.

    Even if they took out all the mirror drones, he's fairly sure one of the mirrors is still at least mostly intact, somewhere around here.

    And when he finds it? He's going to put it towards its intended use of 'reflecting one of the death lasers' - except that it's going to be pointed at a very different target. A very, very big target, descending towards Taiga from above. It'll be hard to miss, that one.

Valentha Summers (834) has posed:
    Exactly Valentha's thoughts. This is WAY TOO BIG, way too fancy for a guard. Unless...

    "WHAT IN THE WORLD did we stumble into? The tomb belonging to the unbroken line of the kings of every cosmos-spanning empire EVER or something?!" Not that such a concept makes SENSE. "The aliens that built Phaseworld?! Something weirder?!" Because Precursor technology can always accomplish anything.

    Either way, this thing's crazy. Which establishes two very important facts.

    A) Valentha very much wants to pit herself against it in a battle of power and wits.
    B) She's love to TAKE IT APART and learn its secrets.

    But perhaps more pressingly...

    C) Let's avoid getting fried to little bits!

    "Yeah. YES! RUN!" Waving her arms comically now, Valentha dives down the corridor... but glances back to make sure nobody's being left behind!

William Pauwel has posed:
    Will's face falls for just a split second when Irving proves to be just as brave (read: stupid!?) as he appears. But before he can even open his mouth to argue, the GIANT GUARDIAN ROBOT does all the arguing for him. He starts to protest as he's so unjustly manhandled, but all he ends up doing is dangling like some kind of confused kitten between the two runaway bandits.

It's kind of adorable, really.

._.

    Meanwhile, the corridor! Without the support of the lasers and their oversized super robot watchdog, the drones are not actually that difficult to deal with. Their greatest advantage seems to be their nearly inexhaustible numbers. Kazuko and Alexis tear through them without much trouble, aided by the fact that this corridor appears to be comprised of a single solid bridge over yet more abyss below. Sure footing, and a minimized risk of plummeting to almost-certain doom, is just another advantage to be exploited.

    Soon, the explorers arrive at the far end of the corridor, next to yet another distressingly monolithic, jet-black door... And the control panel that seems to be responsible for its operation. More drones swarm in after them, but from this position, it's not difficult to keep sniping them as they appear.

    Out in the shaft, Taiga seems to have devised a CUNNING PLAN. Even as the massive machine redoubles its advance as it notices its quarry fleeing, the guardian finds itself face to face with one of the base's very own defenses. The beam smashes into the thing's barrier, sending pulses of flashing light streaking across its surface in creeping arcs. The beam splits into dozens of smaller rays, each smashing ineffectually into the walls that seem purpose-built to absorb their power. But the machine above, now victim to the direct application of one of those DEATH RAYS, seems to have been pinned down--

But this thing is a part of the facility too.

How long until it decides to deactivate the beams, and resume its chase?

Starbound Flotilla has posed:
    Biteblade grabbed Nozomi a short while ago, and is still working on getting her to safety. "Floran ussse ssspecial technique! Learn! Isss called, piggyback ride!!" She's grabbed Nozomi, thrown her onto her back, and then dashed. She's battered and exhausted by the sheer number of bees, combined with the overwhelming lack of meat and sunlight, but she can strain her muscles to get Nozomi down these platforms and out of the way of those TERRIBLE BEAMS. And now it's advancing down! "Run run run! We go!!" In fact, Biteblade starts taking the fast way down; rappeling rapidly with a grappling hook. "Off! Now isss for run on own!"

    And then Biteblade drops Nozomi near the corridor, and grabs her wrist, YANKING her on! The others are hopefully dealing with the drones, because Biteblade's mostly getting Nozomi into the more safe area.

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    Maaka runs like hell down the corridor once everyone's down. Firing one last shot at the bees before she goes, she stops to reload before heading down the pathway. It's a good thing she has night vision, or this would be frustrating to fumble about in the dark, hounded by both these drones and that gigantic robot thing.

    She sprints across the bridge, not paying much mind to the chasm as she ignores the urge to kiss solid ground for once. Only when she sees the doors does she stop running, and she approaches the panel and begins to interface with it. Hopefully there's a connection she can establish, otherwise this might be a bit of a rough night.

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    Taiga is perfectly content to keep pointing that laser up at the machine just as long as he can, though he occasionally stops to descend further. At the lowest still-functioning death ray, however, he will stop and keep the mirror pointed until the moment the guardian robot decides to shut the lasers off (or any other similarly drastic measure it decides to take). Then he will drop it and bolt, making the remaining trip to the bottom in as few leaps as possible and launching off after Nozomi and Biteblade.

    Nozomi has had lots of training in clinging to Taiga's back. Biteblade will find her a very willing and capable passenger. And she's also surprisingly good at running. PE has done her some favors, at least. She's finally activated her drone staff, too; it might not be the most effective of defense mechanisms, but it at least takes potshots now and then, helping to clear the air a bit.

Kamon Lionward (628) has posed:
Kamon goes from one bad spot to another. At least this one has things he can /do/ something about.

"Press on to the door! Don't stop unless someone's down!" Kamon takes to the front, rushing out with his already-gathered momentum into the midst of honeycombed walls and the /endless mass of drones/. He moves like a storm of steel, the young Odynari striking the drones with his rather mundane, blast-scorched katana. He finds places where joints are weakest and most vulnerable, hacking and slashing with the kind of skill and precision that comes from fighting metal monsters for way too much of your life.

"Please tell me someone can open that door," Kamon says, laying out another bee with a sweeping strike. He's trying to keep one eye on the corridor behind them, but...!

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    It certainly is awkward for the young man! But Irvine and Molly are still just laughing it up as they bravely laugh away. Upon reaching the door, they finally put Will down. Molly ruffles his hair fondly while Irvine puts the top of his hat back on, so it sits askew on his head.

    And then the two help with defence! Guns are reloaded and fired down the corridor to deal with the drones. "Flying machine lady! We, of course, can do this forever~! But if you could please get this door open soon, I would be very appreciative!" Molly calls back to Alexis. "Young man, you truly embrace a man's romance with such risky manoeuvres! I now consider you my rival in manliness!" Irvine calls to Kamon. He then stops shooting to charge in and help him in melee with his kukri! His own style is a little more grounded, but that thing must be really sharp! He also mixes it up with some point-blank gunshots!

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Running inside with the others, Kazuko finally gets a breather to let her arm rest. The adrenaline's been keeping the pain in the other arm at bay, but the massive bruise from that pulse cannon is turning a nasty shade of purple, and she can only ignore it for so long. "Nn.. Any luck with that door?" She calls out to Alexis while bracing herself against the naginata, keeping her head down as Kamon and the Starlight Bandits work on keeping the rest of the group covered.

     "Stupid bee robots... Okay!" She might not be able to use the Restoration technique of her sister, but she can still fight through the pain for a little longer. "We'll keep you covered!" And she's up! Gaining her second wind, Kazuko focuses on lashing out at any of the drones that get past the group's ranged attacks.

William Pauwel has posed:
    Kamon is brave. Certainly, he is braver than most warriors in most worlds, most of them having never once even considered being born on a continent that is quite literally trying to kill them. Drones burst like fireworks as the Odynari lays into them, rupturing internal power cells with bright flashes of incendiary light. His ferocity allows him to hold them at bay, and give the Bandits, their cargo, and anyone else running down the corridor enough time to get to the gate at its end. What few drones do make it past him are intercepted by Kazuko's ki-infused strikes, the mysterious spiritual force allowing her to bypass their barriers completely. For now, the group is safe.

    Will is set down, his expression somewhere between awestruck, bashful, and utterly terrified. His head is ruffled, making the middle of those three emotions just a little bit more prominent. He mutters thanks through a rather tremendous blush as he goes to try and right his mangled hat.

He'll need to sew it back together, but... At least he has it back! Grandpa's old hat...

    Maaka can indeed interface with whatever computer is connected to this terminal. While she hadn't noticed even the hint of a wireless network in the area before, this particular security console appears to be wired to receive manual input-- and so, it's just as suceptible to her unique talents as most other machines.

    What she finds as she starts HACKIIIIINNNNNG through the terminal is a veritable mess of security protocols and defensive firewalls. Whatever is behind this door-- something that she instinctively KNOWS from her connection to the machine is called 'Geofront Subgate 4'-- the people who put it there didn't want anyone getting access to it. But slowly, surely, her skill lets her (HEADBUTT STRAIGHT THROUGH) penetrate this terminal's systems.

    But out in the shaft, the guardian may not be giving her enough time to DO that. As Taiga reaches the lowest panel, the mechanical tiger would notice the entire beam network abruptly shut off.

Up above, the thing's barrier flickers, then dissolves.

    Its eye glows, terrible and red. Metal shears against metal as it once again gives chase. Great fingers grip the lip of the corridor when it leaps past, flinging up and around its edge as it begins racing down the length of the hallway. It stops for nothing, its speed is... desperate? The thing leaps the final few meters, twisting in mid air to land just in front of the sealed gate. It really is massive, looming high over the gathered explorers.

It raises its head, standing almost bipedal now as it lifts the glowing spheres on its arms and roars a low, keening roar.

                        **BRILLIANT ABYSSAL WARDEN**                        

                         **EXEC_COLOSSUS DECIMA--**                        

>Gate Access Confirmed

    The beast's gutteral roar is cut short as the gate behind it slides open... And what seems to be liquid darkness sweeps out from within the vault, ensnaring the colossus' limbs like a greedy octopus seizing a meal. The machine roars-- there is a note of... fear in its voice as it's suddenly pulled off balance. Enormous metal hands grip desperately at the widening gateway as it struggles to drag its head free.

It can only scream as the metal doors shear away, drawn inward along with the enormous guardian machine.

The way ahead is... open.

But what awaits within?

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    Maaka isn't as code-dumb as one might expect. She's been able to hack systems and maintain her own cybernetics just fine with the information she's had uploaded into her head long ago. Her hacking IS however very much accelerated as she's stressed out by the others nagging her. "I know what I'm doing!" She snaps, before she begins to sift through code.

    The hacking carries on until she figures out a way to get the door open after brute forcing her way through countless firewalls and security protocols. Hearing the guardian about to unleash some kind of death laser does NOT HELP either, but she's satisfied to find her efforts weren't in vain.

    The guardian gets /sucked/ into the doorway when it opens, and she takes cover until the guardian is completely gone, and she feels her gut churn briefly. "...Here we go." She sighs, resigned to carry on as she moves on in, shotgun in hand once again.

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    Taiga arrives just seconds ahead of the guardian. He is by Nozomi's side before the dust has time to settle from his passage, tracking the guardian with both shoulder cannons and unloading as fast as he can. He's just about dug in for a fight with the robot pinned against the door, when... the door opens. And something horrifying leaps out and gobbles it up. Some kind of frightening liquid darkness. Glompf.

    Nozomi turns a quiet, horrified look at Taiga. Taiga cannot make facial expressions, but something in his body language seems to say, 'Well... shit.' He looks between the door and his user for a moment, before she swallows nervously, visibly trembling. Some unspoken agreement passes between them; Nozomi nods, standing up straight and taking a step away from Biteblade. Taiga turns himself around, and then...

        "Disengaging Independent Mode. Rerouting power from cognitive        
                  functions to weapons and motive systems."                  
                           "Rampart Mode engaged."                            

    It is not the first time the Flotilla or Maaka have seen Taiga come apart. Seen his body fold and shift itself out into armor plating, seen the black skintight suit replace Nozomi's clothes in a flash of light. Not the first time they've seen her eyes go from brown to an eerie yellow, seen her expression go from quiet terror to a cold, merciless killer's gaze. They have seen her reach out into what seems like thin air and grasp the handle of a large, mechanical sword, and swing it up onto her shoulder easily despite its size.

    They've seen Taiga's transformation turn the quiet, withdrawn little girl into a wordless killing machine, but for everyone else here, this will be a first.

    Silently, the now-transformed Nozomi swings her gaze between Maaka and Biteblade, giving them an unspoken 'what are we waiting for' with body language alone.

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    All the gunfire and gunkukri swinging in the world might slow the tide of drones, but there's not much that can be done about the giant robot that has smarted up and begun to bear down on them! Irvine pulls back, standing before Molly defensively as the woman tries to line up a shot at the thing around him...

    And then the door opens, practically with a tonally inappropriate 'ding!' And the shadowy claws reach out and grab the massive thing, yanking it away! The two stare momentarily at the space it occupied... and then put their hands on their hips, puffing out their chests in pride!

    "Aha! It has been bested, and we still stand! We are victorious!" "But Irvine, something else grabbed it..." "Clearly a fan of ours Molly! They simply wished to help, so let us go thank them! Even though it was unnecessary." "Aww, you're so gracious Irvine~!"

    And so the two march right through the gate! They still have their weapons out thankfully.

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Kazuko's panting heavily by the time those drones finally stop coming, and the sight of the giant tiger thing getting drawn into the door by something possibly worse is... Relieving? Worrying? Exhausting? All three. The trainee's determined not to give in before even facing it, though, and she forces her feet to continue forward as she follows the rest of the group to that ominous doorway.

     "Let's hope there aren't any more bees, at least... Alright, everyone. We can do this!" She shouts, as much of a rallying cry for the others as it is for herself. Her morale is certainly improving at least a little, though, with Nozomi's transformation drawing a wondrous 'ooooh' from the girl. At least for that moment, she's able to ignore the pain while moving forward, naginata in hand!

     Even if it does come back by the time she's going through the door. Son of a...

Kamon Lionward (628) has posed:
If there's one thing Kamon knows how to do, it's hold the line against a seemingly endless tide of metallic killing machines. He's everywhere at once, using brute force and raw skill to prevent them from losing more than inches of ground every few moments. With the Bandits' vigor and firepower, and with Kazuko handily taking out anything that that sneaks by, they have enough time to get that door open and get out of here.

"Rivalry accepted!" Kamon calls to Irvine, not even thinking about the consequences of these actions. "Just keep us covered, and -- /move/!" Kamon doesn't turn, instead skipping backwards with short hops terminating in parries and forward slashes. One wrong move, and he'll be out a weapon. Those pulse blasts are serious business, and when parrying is a key part of your defensive strategy...

When he passes the door, Kamon stands his ground, panting. He sees the guardian, and sees... darkness, something in the darkness, pulling it back inside to rip it apart. His eyes track it, finding pitch blackness in the room he's just stepped into.

Without looking, Kamon extends a hand holding a Potion to Kazuko. He's fixed on the seemingly solid wall of black they've just found, and is slowly shifting his fighting stance to respond to whatever could come out. "You... might want to take this."

Valentha Summers (834) has posed:
    "Piece of advice!" Valentha chimes Will's way. "Don't wear it if you're attached to it. Dungeoneering's a MESSY business! Blood, guts, robot oil, and worse things for everyone! Do you have any IDEA how many of these suits I've been through since Unification? ... Heck, before unification. OR HOW MUCH THEY COST?!"

    So... Valentha isn't following her own advice. Huh.

    Well. She definitely could read Will's expressions at least!

    But her attention shifts to the gate just in the nick of time... to see it opening.

    ... To see the darkness lance out and DEVOUR the machine.

    That sheepish, nervous grin returns. This time, full of apprehension.

    Then...

    "ActuallyyouknowwhatI'llsavemyselfafewmillioncreditstakeemoffnowinstead..."

    Although she does turn slightly away from the group first, VALENTHA STARTS STRIPPING. Well... strips down to undergarments, anyways, casually balls up her clothes and gear... and casts a quick spell that appears to just coat the thing in binding GLUE, making it a mass of gear-clothes-stuff.

    Which proceeds to FLOAT at her side.

    "Really, really tired, you know..."

    Then... her flesh RIPPLES and bulges. Just when anyone might think they could enjoy her presence... reality ensues. Scaley patterns flow mesmerizingly across her skin, she drops down onto ALL FOURS.... and GROWS. Right into a large, four-legged... lizard? No. She gets bigger. And bigger. A tail grows from her rear, her neck extends outwards...

    In a matter of moments, there's a DRAGON standing shelteringly over the group. Her skin golden and shining in the light and covered in SPIKES. Lots and lots of spikes run down her spine, they're all over her head, they follow her wing bones...

    There's nothing left of her undergarments. They were torn to bits in the transformation. Just tatters on the ground now.

    No wonder she disrobed.

    "I'd pay twice as much if they could do that convenient VANISHING thing like when OTHER people transform. Future projects. Always something to work on!"

    Valenthanixa has joined the party.

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Kazuko raises an eyebrow as Kamon offers that Potion, setting her polearm down briefly to take it. "Oh? Thanks, Mister Kamon. Yeah, we need to stay hydrated after worksout like these." Still grinning to keep her spirits up, she's genuinely surprised after chugging the thing and feeling its effects on her arm. She even throws a punch and barely winces, the grin widening further. "Whoa.. Thanks! I could fight an arm-uhhh..?"

     And then Valentha's stripping. No big deal, right? She's seen other girls naked before, but what is a big deal is how she turns into a FREAKING DRAGON.

     "... Coooooooool..!"

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    Maaka cants her head back when she hears Valentha stripping, and she stares in confusion until suddenly *DRAGONS.* "Uhh, much as I appreciate the view but...-Oh. Okay. Dragons. Future advice, don't stop at your knickers, but that's just me." She shrugs a shoulder after the initial HOLY FUCK WHAT, then gets going.

William Pauwel has posed:
Will is totally not in over his head, nope.

    In his defense, most ruins don't have this much security. Nor do they mysterious vault doors that house what looked to be some kind of variety of horrible liquid shadow. Will's expression is quite firmly fixed in the 'abject terror' position as he watches that massive, guardian machine get pulled kicking and screaming into the dark.

But... Everyone else is moving in after it.

    So that means... He has to go, too. It's either in there with everyone else against whatever in tarnation that was, or out here, alone, against a swarm of drones. Something tells him that the latter is actually the safer option, but... But he's a Chaser, and Chasers don't run away from danger, as long as that danger is between them and wealth and glory!

At least, with Nozomi's transformation, they have their OWN super killer robot, right? And... And the dragon. Will watches with a confusing mix of distress, terror and SOMETHING ELSE as Valentha disrobes and... turns into a dragon.

A dragon.

What even is that!? Whatever it is, it's gotta be strong, right!? And so, with somewhat more confidence, will enters through the doorway.

    As the adventurers enter the darkness, they begin to hear... Distressing sounds. Sounds of screeching metal, and low, pained, mechanical growls. Sounds of something so much harder than steel being pulled apart and put back together again, sounds of infernal construction, nightmarish surgery. A light flashes in the deep darkness, and then vanishes as it's swallowed up.

    That cloud of pure, liquid shadow seems to advance for a brief moment... Before rushing back into some point at its center. It draws inward, twisting into a vaguely humanoid shape. Pure darkness fuses together, melting and hardening and melting and hardening in endless cycles, until something stands in the distance, fifty feet tall.

    The lights come on. The party finds itself within a simply tremendous chamber. The ceiling is vaulted, held aloft by great buttresses that reach hundreds of feet up. Small buildings-- like a small, underground city, rise all around them, surrounding a very modern-looking network of asphalt roads. But there is nobody here, now. Nobody here, except for that thing at the very center of the room.

    Fifty feet tall, a giant rises from the underground city. Its body is clad in plates of jet black, articulated armor. A pair of horns rise from its great helm, within which glows a single, crimson orb. Similar spheres light its fists, but none glow so brightly as the single, crimson sphere at the core of its chest.

It emits a low, keening, twisted noise, like someone had taken a magnet to its soundchip, as it raises its right hand.

Light strobes across the sphere. A nearby building EXPLODES with a sudden burst of molten-brass light.

                          **Ce1e5TIA1 MaRI-N3TTE**                          

                   **EXEC_P--AD-53 COLOSSUS DECIMATE--**                    

                                **EIDOLON**                                

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    When Valenthia transforms, for almost the entire process, she has a pair of cold yellow eyes locked on her. And it's certainly not because she's in her underwear. It almost gives the impression of 'regarding a potential threat'. But she's apparently not one, so the anti-supernatural warrior simply turns and heads in.

    Kchunk. Kchunk. Kchunk. The armored version of Nozomi walks with steady, confident steps, her strength and weight both enhanced by the transformed TIGER. Every now and then a glowy yellow holographic appears before her eyes, a bit of text denoting this or that, a display indicating change in some ambient field, something that appears briefly then disappears. Without a word, she comes to a stop when the lights come up. Without comment, she watches the five-story ebon guardian rise up. With not one single utterance of shock, she turns her head to stare straight into the utterly demolished building, before turning that cold killer's gaze back on the transformed machine.

    Once again, she lets her body do the speaking. She lifts the EM Zanbatou off her shoulder with one hand, and points it right at the Eidolon. A challenge.

    Then she more or less explodes into the air, jets kicking on all at once, and points her left gauntlet - which at one point was one of Taiga's shoulder cannons - to start unleashing a stream of energy shots. They hit a lot harder than Taiga's did.

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    As Valentha transforms, the two bandits stare at her with amazement in their eyes! "WOOOOOOOOOOOOW!" "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

     But, onward! The two peer around at the darkest depths, eyes flicking around as metal screams. A thing rises up before them, and for once, their bravado seems to slip. That is big, and threatening. They've never seen anything like it.

    And yet...

    "Molly, I think besting this thing will make a fine page in the books they'll write about us!" "You're so right Irvine~! Let's take it down!"

    And so they head into one of the buildings! Heading up the tallest one they can find! For what reason? Well... we'll have to wait and see!

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    DRAGONS, YES.

    Maaka's long past the shock of seeing /that/, but she doesn't expect the tall-ass robot thing. "Oh. Hello..."

    She notes the city buildings, wondering if this was some kind of subterranean metropolis long ago. It sure isn't now, this place's time has long since past. It probably was the result of some kind of long past catastrophe, or a simulation city for testing weapons and tactics.

    It doesn't matter, as the boss of this dungeon has arrived just in time to distract her from her thoughts. Swapping to her grenade launcher, Maaka sprints towards a building, throwing out a grapple line as she boost-jumps towards the side of the building and ascends it. "I'm gonna need bigger guns at this rate." She grouses to herself quietly.

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Kazuko's feeling a little out of her element here. Robotic bees? Sure, at least those are the size of children. Inexplicably floating platforms? She could jump those (and she did). Weird computer door? Alexis handled that nicely while she focused on the bees!

     But this thing? The colossus blowing things up with a light beam? This is way out of her league. How can she even damage something that big?!

     Getting higher, for one thing. Every big monster's got a weak point somewhere, right? She follows after the Starlight Bandits and Alexis, dashing after them and scrambling to get to the top of the building as quickly as she can. Maybe from there, she might even be able to spot somewhere worth bashing her naginata into!

Kamon Lionward (628) has posed:
"Yeah, it's --" He's about to say something about what a Potion is to Kazuko, but Valentha goes and... turns out to be a dragon. "-- woah. Uh... I..." ...don't really know how to respond to that. Stripping down was one thing; turning out to be huge and covered in scales and bone-spikes is quite another.

Then, the darkness boils outward, and suddenly receeds. They're in a city. At the center, the source of the blackness, is... is...

Kamon looks up, and he sees a Nightmare.

    ONE MONTH AGO
    ODIN, GALIANDA

"COOOLOOOOSSUUUUUUS!!"

Kamon jerks his head up in time to see it. A hand, pressing to the edge of a towering cliff face from the far side. The fingers on the hand are too long and too sharp, like someone had assembled a mockery of a human hand out of nothing but razor blades. The figure attached pulls itself forward, hunched over, made up of bent, weirdly angular plates of iron. Light reflects off of it strangely, where it reflects at all. Every time it moves, it seems to be coming apart, innumerable mouths of sharp metal opening and closing from even the most casual motions.

"It's... huge," exhales one of the men by Kamon's side, a scarred-looking man with knives that suddenly seem far too small for the job. "How... how do we /fight/ something like that?"

"Together," Kamon says. Maybe if he says it enough, he might even start to believe it.

    HERE
    NOW

"Colossus," Kamon breathes. It's not the same, but the shape, and the size, and the menace it seems to give off by merely /existing/ is all too familiar. He feels his legs start to move, and by the time he realizes what he's doing, he's heading into the city. "Get to cover," he calls. "Gotta get in close, and get it together--!"

Just as Kamon reaches a wall, the building evaporates in a burst of molten-brass light. The explosion knocks him off his feet, sending the heavy Odynari through the thin wall of another structure nearby. His sword goes in another direction entirely. He feels a burst of pain in his back, and sees stars when his head stops moving. He thinks he hit something metal. A bedframe? Lockers, maybe?

Kamon starts to pick himself up, vision and stance unsteady. He thinks he ended up in a... dorm, maybe. Or a barracks. He urges his body to listen to him, but for a few crucial seconds, all he feels is numbness and pain. He can still fight -- he's had worse -- but what a time to get knocked for a loop.

Valentha Summers (834) has posed:
    There's a thing about Megaverse Dragons. Transforming... doesn't actually affect Valentha's abilities. Being human form... doesn't limit her at all. But there's one thing that does change.

    She wants her allies to know that she really DOES have their back, and her enemies to know they are in SERIOUS trouble. ... Although, against an enemy like this strange synthetic terror... that's probably meaningless.

    There's one other advantage, however marginal it is.

    She's FAR more comfortable moving around like this.

    She and her foe are roughly the same height - with her on all fours, anyways - and she answers its awful keening and opening volley with a loud SNORT that sends plumes of smoke from her nostrils.

    Then... this enormous reptilian creature chants words of power from an ancient language, gesturing with one claw.

    Spells are all based on how much ENERGY the caster can shape and focus, and how quickly they can do it. In her full dragon form, Valentha's MUCH more comfortable at channeling more energy faster, chanting faster, even if only marginally so.

    THIS is her advantage!

    So she uses all the time she has, casting several spells in quick succession.

    A GLOBE OF DAYLIGHt flies up into the chamber's heights like a flare shot from a gun, filling the area with NATURAL SUNLIGHT - or something quite close to it anyways - for Biteblade's benefit.

    Will finds Valentha's tail reaching out to gently brush him and a sizzle of power flows through it into him. Like being connected to a DYNAMO, bluish magical power flows into his flesh, blood, and bone - strengthening it all considerably for about ten minutes. A suit of translucent ghostly-white-silver ARMOR also appears over his existent clothes, styled like a dwarven masterwork.

Starbound Flotilla has posed:
    Biteblade feels vindicated. Fearful, of course; here, she's isolated from the sun and from food, and not as well-armed as she could be -- but she's vindicated beyond that. She really did find an ancient evil. Unfortunately, that also means /she found an ancient evil/. But, as she told the others at the start of this: Once she finds it, she'll stab it. Regardless of being so battered and bruised, she puts away her bow, and draws a pair of daggers, dramatically.

    Time to be a little weird. "Big lizard! Floran, need sssun! You gonna do, then do now!" Biteblade calls out... And takes an intense stance. Her armor unfolds, and leaves bloom dramatically out of her body as she takes a three-point stance. Rushes of vivid green light blast out of her body, creating small shockwaves of wind. The HUNTER'S CRY she lets out is unholy. Kamon Lionward gives an order; Biteblade doesn't have Albert here to give them their coordination, so she awaits his. "You! Call for together! Give sssignal! Floran, follow!" And then... "For now, Floran isss HUNT!!"

    Biteblade's body is re-energized! Thankfully. Unfortunately, this is, at best, going to get her competitive; she's going to be far from overwhelming to the fifty-foot creature. But, with the sun at her back... She breaks into a run. The run is vastly enhanced by intensely energized techs, leaving a streaking trail of bright green. Biteblade's POWER DAGGERS probably can't disrupt or destroy the full presumed structure of what Biteblade suspects is a high-level nanohazard. For now, she follows the spirit of Kamon Lionward's orders as best she can. Others are starting to try to ascend, in large numbers. Biteblade dashes in with the intent to just BLITZ the massive armored figure, bouncing off of buildings with intense, aggressive speed to attack at the lower body or the arms it might use for offensive gestures from all angles quickly, slicing rapidly as hard as she can to stun and disrupt any attempts to direct offensives against the others as they prepare their larger hits.

    "You!! Big puppet giant! Look at Floran! Floran isss big threat! Pay attention to Floran! Fight Floran! Get SSSTABBED BY FLORAN!"

William Pauwel has posed:
A challenge has been issued. A challenge has been answered.

    The giant's single eye seems to focus its attention on the one member of this party that might have the firepower to be an immediate threat to its continuing mission. Nozomi's blasts pound into the thing's jet black armor. The stuff seems to ripple on impact. It bursts and splashes like the whole thing were made of some kind of incredibly dense fluid. Globs of black slag smoulder on the ground as its armor is blasted away... only for much of that sludge to squirm back into its main body, leaving only the utterly unsalvagable material behind.

    It raises its right hand as the fusion of Nozomi and TAIGA screams through the air to engage it in something resembling an honorable battle. Light strobes across the orb on its hand, releasing a catastrophic shockwave of roiling, red-gold force to try to burn the other machine out of the sky.

    Something, somewhere deep within the machine, seems to recognize TAIGA as a major threat, above even the dragon. It scarcely recognizes the sudden onset of natural, warming sunlight. The things scurrying about on the ground to find a weakness to exploit are likewise outside of its immediate notice. Even Biteblade, with all their fury, can only scratch and scorch the thing's enormous, fluid armor. Each strike leaves a long gash of smoldering shadow, which is quickly sloughed away and replaced by more material. But they do succeed in getting SOMETHING to happen.

    They get EIDOLON to notice the presence of other threats.

    With its left hand, it gestures vaguely towards the asphalt. Droplets of roiling, black fluid fall from its fingertips, congealing into monstrous, predatory beasts with limbs like fluid, skeletal clockwork and hungry crimson eyes. The creatures leap up the buildings after the rest of the party, striking at them with jagged, razor-sharp claws that seem to drip the same black ichor from which they were forged.

    MEANWHILE, inside that nearby structure, Kamon Lionward is knocked head-first into... A barracks. The empty, half-made bunkbeds are an eerie suggestion that someone, at some point, slept in them-- but no longer. There are lockers here, however, some of them are even still unopened. He can peer inside of one, through a layer of grated metal, at what is unmistakably a set of BLADES within.

    Outside, the beasts continue their advance. Will cries out in fear and surprise as one bounds at him, and lifts his arms to try and defend himself. It wouldn't do anything. It shouldn't do anything. Mere flesh and blood against these things couldn't hope to be of any help. But the thrill of some alien FORCE that surges through his veins, the layers of adamant-hard armor that ensconeces his body, these are what the monster meets, not a simple, vulnerable boy.

Will's eyes harden behind his arcane helm. He unholsters his gun, no longer looking too oversized, and shoves it into the hollow of the thing's chest.

    Its eyes widen as the telltale blaze of blue-white plasma overwhelms their red glow. It bursts like a pustule of black slime and white-hot energy. Will yells as he charges in after another pack, the Solano unleashing its terrible fury upon the distant creatures.

One disintegrates immidiately.

    It... Doesn't get up. It tries, its body struggles briefly, but there is too much damage. Too much is burnt to too much of a crisp. The thing's body twitches once more before its eyes go dark completely.

Is... that the way?

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    The ripple of disintegrating energy blasts across Nozomi, who brings her massive blade up into a devensive posture - and more than that, as it passes over her, her own armor seems to glimmer yellow briefly. Every inch of this thing is infused with magical energy; it runs on it, its armor is enchanted and energized, its sensors see into the supernatural rather than the higher spectrums. The blast attack scorches and sears it in several places, drawing a voiceless hiss of pain out of Nozomi, but Rampart Mode is strong enough that it doesn't come anywhere near erasing her from the air.

    It also doesn't stop her attack. That gauntlet of hers is raised again, firing off more shots, but they're only cover. The very instant she's in range, she shifts the EM Zanbatou into a two-handed grip and lunges inward. At the same time, /thrusters/ kick on at the 'crossguard' of the big weapon, adding strength to an already superhumanly-powerful swing of a blade energized enough to carve through supernatural defenses and steel alike with ease. She's aiming to carve that weapon-bearing arm off at the elbow.

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    Maaka observes Valentha and EIDOLON throw down, observing the two titans square off before Nozomi-TAIGA join the fight as well as Kamon and Biteblade. Time for her to do something too, so she stuffs her grenade launcher and shotgun in her Matter Manipulator's inventory, then pulls out a gloriously large fifty caliber rifle.

    The M82A3, issued to early 2010s USMC personnel, is a tried and tested design modernized for that time period. It's an antique by Maaka's standards, but it's a popular design even for her time. THe cartridge hasn't gone anywhere either, despite being in use for almost two hundred years by then, and she's got plenty of .50 BMG in supply. Loading the Barrett, she activates the customized scope and links with it, before she rests the rifle on the edge of a building and begins to scan for enemies.

    Aiming down at the smaller creatures first, Maaka fires off a couple rounds, the fifty echoing like thunder from Heaven as high-powered rounds streak towards the skeletal dark-matter beasts. Best to keep far away from those, and Maaka has the perfect tool for them.

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Watching those beasts being created by the Eidolon, Kazuko tightens her grip on the naginata as she doubles back to get out of the building. It'll be easier for her to fight in the open space rather than a cramped interior, after all, and someone's got to help Alexis keep those monsters at bay. She does flinch a bit at each roar of that high-powered rifle, but she eventually uses it to accentuate her battle cry.

     "Kazuko Kawakami is here! None of you are gonna pass through here!" Her boast finished, the martial artist focuses her ki once more as she starts spinning the naginata in front of her rapidly, almost looking like she's holding a solid circle right in front of her. It's doubling as a shield and weapon for her, the ki-augmented strikes enhancing the speed and power behind the rapid pummeling even more as she opts for a more brute-force method of just beating the everloving crap out of the skeletal monsters.

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    The pair's attempt at the high ground are blocked by gross blobby things! "Eeeewwww! Irvine, they're so gross! They'll stain my dress!" "I understand Molly! But getting dirty is part of a man's romance! Grit your teeth and bear it!"

    Weapons are born, and fired into their mass! No doubt doing very little, up until Will utterly fries one. They glance over, seeing how he hit them in the red... and grin at once. Each one starts firing point blank, dodging and flipping among their skeletal lashings, trying to line up with the red glows!

Kamon Lionward (628) has posed:
Kamon manages to get the world to stop, and his head to start functioning as something other than a gong. He takes stock of the room in a few blinks, and what he landed against. With a few quick motions, he discovers he's actually disarmed, and then with a couple more -- including yanking the grating off the locker he's against -- he's armed again. They look like long knives, but with a sort of sleeker aesthetic and a switch on the grips. He takes one in each hand, testing their weight and balance. It'll do.

Kamon jumps out the hole he made in the side of the building and heads up a fire escape. He gets to rooftop height, giving him a view of the battle running nearby. He frowns at the colossal monstrosity, and the /things/ it's creating. "Okay... we need to bring it down to our level. Going up is going to be tricky, so...!"

With a running start, Kamon jumps a street, going rooftop to rooftop in a way that would make DRAGOON MAN proud. "Go for its legs! Knees and ankles, points of articulation!" Kamon's yells carry far, even over the din of fighting. He closes in himself, getting higher up, and then leaping off the building. He crosses his arms, thumbing switches and causing the PROGRESSIVE KNIVES to come to life with a thrumming sound.


                                                                               
                            ARTS OF WAR > REND ARMOR                           
                                                                               


Kamon strikes like lightning, leaving lines of steel in the air. He hits the side of the machine's right knee, cutting inward, planting both knives into the armor, and then dragging them back outward with a scream from the looted weapons that matches the roar from the mid-air Fighter in volume if not pitch.

Kamon feels a sense of catharsis doing this. He's probably not even ruining the loot for once.

Valentha Summers (834) has posed:
    The clash between Nozomi and the creature's so spectacular that Valentha's got her eyes largely glued to it. To think that one unit of any sort, TECHNO-WIZARDRY at that, could go toe to toe with such a HUGE machine... HEAD ON. Sheer firepower with little need for super-tricky pragmatic tactics.

    She wants one of those too.

    So she can take it apart.

    "Magnificent."

    But oh, she's not about to let all of those tiny minions make a lot of progress. Nor does she deign to bother casting a spell with them. Although she can't possibly snag ALL of them... Valentha's answer to TONS OF MINIONS flooding the streets is...

    Is to inhale deeply, rear her neck back, and...

    FWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSHHH!!!

    .... better stay clear of her fire breath. As the huge plume of white-orange flame RACES across the pavement... it MELTS it. No, it goes further than that. The advanced composite material is... glassed?!

    Just how HOT is that fire?!

Starbound Flotilla has posed:
    Biteblade is growing increasingly frustrated with her lack of progress. The way this creature spawns more smaller swarms makes her suspect a NANOHAZARD! Hopefully the swarm won't brutalize her too badly. She grabs a little more sun, coming to rest after one of her leaps, skidding to an intense stop. With a quick flick of the wrist, their POWER DAGGERS are gone. From their Matter Manipulator, they draw a pair of lightly magical ICE DAGGERS scavenged, long ago, from a Shivan dome, invaded by the Heartless!

    Taking a "powering up" sort of stance, her whole body tenses and thrums with energy as she rebuilds stocks of power from the sunlight. Leaves spread wide and parts of her body begin to dramatically bloom. "WILL! You, shoot quick! We make puppet KNEEL!!" Kamon's orders are going to be followed, it seems. And as soon as Will can get that shot off... Biteblade will be off like a flash, darting in like a bolt of lightning. "RrrrrrrrrAAAAAAAAAAGH!"

    She's hopeful -- maybe optimistically so -- that Kamon's managed to remove the armor. She's also optimistically hopeful that it'll still be focused on Nozomi right up until that point. If so: Biteblade ought to have a clear shot to TACKLE into an open wound on the creature's knee, and plunge a pair of SHIVAN BLADES in at core areas of the joint. Her scream rises, building up to a furious, tribal roar; if she can plant them in, she'll just HOLD them there, hopefully spreading vicious cold through that entire leg, and ideally shutting down part of what she conjectures is a nanotechnological hazard by solidifying its moving parts on an atomic scale.

    She also has one hell of a grip; if she can plant those blades on there, as long as she can stay in the sunlight, she'll still hold onto the hilts of the blades, and thereby keep them pumping cold in, regardless of being beaten or manhandled or assaulted by minions, until the creature is forced to kneel into a vulnerable place for Will's upcoming shot.

William Pauwel has posed:
    EIDOLON may have been correct in its assumption that TAIGA-Nozomi was the most dangerous thing in the room. The fused anti-supernatural battleframe surges in with all the force of a hurricane and all the speed of a thunderclap. The EM Zanbatou is swung, each of its thrusters firing to give the weapon enough cutting power to cleave through solid steel! EIDOLON's eye focuses on its rival, the spheres on its arms blaze to life, interposing that wall of red-gold light between it and its attacker.

    EM blade and annihilator field make contact, an unstoppable force smashes into an immovable object. Nozomi cleaves deeper and deeper into the field, streams of white-hot power shooting up from the point of impact. Where they fall, smashing into streets and buildings, they leave nothing but molten concrete and oozing metal behind.

    All of EIDOLON's attention is on her now, it's dedicated itself to repelling her attack. All four of the globes on its body ignite as its barrier system converges on the point of her attack.

That leaves just enough of an opening for the rest of the party to exploit.

    And exploit they do. A wave of dragon fire blasts down across and THROUGH the asphalt, carving a great scar into the once near-pristine ruin. Dozens of the horrifying black beasts are caught in the heatwave, their bodies immediately twisting and curdling before finally dissolving into jet black ash. That flame blasts into the EIDOLON's legs, sweeping beneath the shield it raised to absorb Nozomi's assault. The creature emits a pained noise in response, and turns its head to face the dragon as if it had just recognized the creature's presence.

But that's not all.

    Kamon charges in over the glassy, dragonfire-scar. Biteblade, brimming with the POWER OF THE SUN follows closely thereafter, and is in turn tailed by a heavily armored, blue-plated gunner. More beasts surge in from between nearby buildings, but each is turned into so much splatter by high-powered gunfire, or reduced to puddles of useless technological matter by precision shots to their awareness-cores. Even as others charge in to deal with the covering fire, they find themselves running head-first into a blade charged by energies their terrible intelligence could never hope to understand.

It's all the opening they need.

    Kamon begins the assault. Harnessing all the skill that it takes to survive on the harsh wastelands of Odin, and what scarce dregs of ancient technological prowess he salvaged from the wreckage, the Light Warrior leaps in to strike at the giant's heels. An ordinary man would never be able to do as much damage as the young paravir could hope, but he is no ordinary man. The blood of the first steel flows in his veins, and the might of the JOB CRYSTAL glows in his soul. He strikes, tearing through the black armor and into the skeletal frame underneath. The EIDOLON screams again, its legs buckling at the blow, as more of that shadowy mass flows in to repair the wound--

William Pauwel has posed:
    It doesn't get the chance. Will darts around the creature's flank, some strange device on his boots conveying him at high speed to exploit its new weakness. The Solano fires in tandem with Will's battlecry, unleashing a trio of oversized, blue-white bolts into the Eidolon's wounds. Immediately, the regeneration stops, gouts of black matter are blown away, leaving the thing open for one more attack.

    Biteblade closes in. They dive at the ruined mass of molten metal and struggling nanohazard. With deft precision and incredible fury, they drive the daggers home. Elemental frost seeps into the steel and creeps across the black matter. It shoots out in response, forming into needle-like thorns to try and lance the Floran in place, to CONSUME and DEVOUR this offending pest... But as they form, they find their mobility arrested, frost immobilizing them at the most basic scale. The cold blasts into its solid skeletal frame, rapidly cooling the superheated metal to the point where, with a sudden *CRACK* the thing's legs shatter entirely. It tumbles over, falling, somehow, on what stumps remain of its robotic femurs.

Light washes out from its lone eye. The situation is desperate. The mission is untenable. Only one recourse is left.

    Power surges down its arms, finally forcing Nozomi away. Will is blasted back by the formation of an immense sphere of physical force, not unlike the one they had escaped from not so long ago. But this time... The machine is drawing the spheres on its hands towards the greater orb at its center.

    The air thrums dangerously. Power begins building on every physical scale imaginable as the world begins glowing white hot. Even the machine within seems to fail under the immense thermal strain, but it must perform this duty. The greater mission must not fail--!

There's only one thing left to do.

MISSION OBJECTIVE: DESTROY EIDOLON BEFORE IT UNLEASHES ITS DESPERATION ATTACK

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    Maaka is pretty satisfied when she finds the beasts falling apart from her Barrett's rounds, and she stops to reload before she notices Kamon weakening the machine's armor.

    That combined with whatever it is Nozomi-Taiga are doing is enough reason for her to focus on EIDOLON itself, and she does exactly that as she sights down one of the machine's damaged bits. She takes a breath, letting air leave her lungs while she squeezes the trigger. The Barrett echoes one last time, firing at one of the glowing crystal ball things, with high-ex rounds hurdling straight towards the giant obvious weak spot.

    Then she fires again, the only thing she feels being only recoil against her shoulder as she squeezes off another shot.

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    Only as blade meets field do the transformed Nozomi's eyes show anything other than that machinelike killing intent. Her teeth grit, her body strains, and she PUSHES, with both the strength of the TIGER and the power of those thrusters. She keeps pushing, fighting to carve deeper into that arm. Matching the full output of the four spheres with everything the Gensou Engine can give without disengaging its limiters. Only when a sheer surge of power blasts her back in the air does her ferocious assault finally relent, and that because she is no longer physically close enough to keep trying. It blows her up and away, tumbling for a good dozen or more meters before she gets ahold of herself. There is a simple answer to this conundrum, one she would arrive at even if 'kill it NOW' had not suddenly become a prime concern.

    If she can't cut through with sheer brute force and the EM Zanbatou's base cutting power? She'll just deploy the attack specifically designed to resolve this kind of situation.

                             "EM Siege Breaker."                              

    The TIGER's robotic system announcement echos through the chamber as Nozomi takes a two-handed grip on the EM Zanbatou again. There is a rising energy hum, and yellow light begins to flood the blade, faintly at first, but brighter and brighter by the moment. All that magically-infused energy, filling the blade, compressing, becoming more and more tightly packed, until it's like a bright blade of yellow light, a shining beacon in the air.

    Then she lifts it up over her head, the jets on her back and the weapon both kick in, and she descends like a meteor. At full speed in the blink of an eye, she hurtles down towards the Eidolon, heading straight for the middle, coming straight down from above. She intends to do no less than bisect it with the strike, aiming for the head in particular but not stopping until she's got the blade right square in the middle of it.

    Only once it has carved its way inside does the attack reach its completion. All that compressed magical energy erupts at once, becoming an explosive blast. 'Carve through the armor and defenses with overwhelming power, then unleash all that power inside the target at once'. The Energized-Magic Siege Breaker.

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     Minor scratches, bleeding, and clothing damage aside, Kazuko's feeling good! The beasts go down without too much difficulty, the Eidolon is weakened and on its last-no, none legs, and it looks like it's time to go all out on the mechanical monstrosity!

     Not the Nozomi TAIGA hybrid. They're cool. The one that everyone else is attacking! Focusing what's left of her ki into the naginata, the girl lets out another battle cry as she charges straight for the Eidolon while spinning the weapon rapidly once more. Once she's close enough, the spinning shifts from her weapon to her entire body, and she's practically spinning like a top!

     "Kawakami Style: Big Swing!" And then, with all of that centrifugal force behind it, she extends the naginata and aims a big smash right at the Eidolon!

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    While everyone is unleashing their biggest attacks, where are the Starlight Bandits? Why, inside one of the buildings! Their clash with the smaller creatures led them here, and now that they've run out of things to fight, they're looking around.

    And here, they find treasure.

    A golden glyph of some kind, with an inlaid ruby and red trim. Irvine picks it up and turns it over, face slowly splitting into the grin

    "Well now Molly, I think we've found our reward for this little endeavour." "Eh? But Irvine, that thing is still alive!" "Now now Molly. Claiming your reward before the task is done is part of a man's romance you know." "Ah! Well then, shouldn't we just take everything and leave?" "Nono Molly! If we take everything, the others will be suspicious. So the obvious solution is to just keep the most valuable thing. Which is obviously this. I mean, look at how shiny it is!" "Of course~!"

    And so the two claim their share of the treasure! Not helping at all of course, but it seems like everyone has it all wrapped up.

Starbound Flotilla has posed:
    Biteblade has needles lancing through them. But they're in the SUNLIGHT, so they can regenerate through... Some of it. "RrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!" Biteblade screams her way through the pain, bloodied and bruise, her armor shearing off in waves, until she's thrown from the creature when the entire leg cracks and shatters. She's dripping with blood, and much of her armor is scrap held together with smart-materials and prayer.

    She managed to tear the leg off, but it cost her a little too much. Panting, hissing, she puts away her daggers -- she had a white-knuckle grip on them -- and draws her heavy bow one more time. She loads a particularly hefty bolt, charging her durasteel bow's magnetic launch systems, drawing it back slowly... The arrow is, actually, a full-on space-age nuclear control rod, a tremendous shaft formed from dynamically-forged alloys of silver, indium, and cadmium, and is meant to impede a nuclear fission process, to shut down neutron flux. And then... She begins firing it. More and more. Rod after rod. She isn't trying to kill it. She's trying to add time to the countdown, and, if she can keep the rods lodged in, to shut down whatever weapon -- presumably some horrible, futuristic nuclear fission blast -- from going off.

Valentha Summers (834) has posed:
    Although dragons are often thought to rely little on wit and cunning in favor of brute strength and natural ability, the OPPOSITE is more often the case. So it is with Valentha. She quickly recognizes the machine is STRAINING while it's heating up beyond belief... that its heat dissipation is taxed to the utter limit, between her previous flame breath and its own build-up!

    Realization flickers and catalyzes! Then her entire body sizzles blue--

    *FW-VOIP!*

    She just teleports straight ABOVE AND BEHIND the thing, putting all the force of her weight and gravity into a downward swing. With any luck, she can penetrate that defensive field through overwhelming power! Tear a claw down its back and open it up...

    ... However little...

    Then... for a coup de grace, IF she can puncture open ANYTHING in this creature's form, she juts her neck forth and exhales a focused plume of DRAGONFIRE straight for its core.

    Hopefully, between Biteblade inhibiting whatever it was doing from kicking off, and Val taking advantage of its OVERHEAT status, this won't somehow turn counterproductive!

Kamon Lionward (628) has posed:
Kamon strikes and fades away. He kicks the leg and propels himself backwards, curling up and smashing through a third-story window. He goes into a roll, ending up springing back to his feet in a display of dexterity that basically nobody actually gets to see.

Them's the breaks, though.

The assault outside is unrelenting. He feels a fierce surge of pride, seeing the hints of attacks focused on the weakened point. That's how they beat it. That's how they'll stop whatever its mission is. Kamon drags himself back to the window, ignoring the points of pain all across his body. He's running on heart-pounding adrenaline, the thrill of the fight, of being able to cut loose against a monster that has no purpose other than to be /beaten/.

Kamon turns, hands on the windowsill, and pulls himself up and out. He hauls himself back up to the rooftop, rolling across it and getting to his feet. It's falling. There's a siege-breaking attack coming for it, two kinds of armor-breaking and one backed with dragonfire. He can hear gunfire, and the cry of a technique that can only be familial. And... some kind of bow, firing who-knows-what. All of it's focused on stopping that glow, that bloom of heat.

But it's a machine, right? So heat's a problem. He can work with that.

Kamon crosses his arms, knives held in reverse grips. He centers himself, taking a deep breath. The power comes from within him, not from some place beyond the limits of his body. He can't do magic, not really, but he /can/ do this.

"Rage of Ifrit!" He uncrosses his arms, hands swinging to his side, and practically blurs forward. He goes up and then down, the thrumming progressive knives taking on a glow of their own. The edges of his body seems to shimmer, a ripple from a wave of heat blooming off of him making him hard to track.


                                                                               
                            FLAIR > SHIMMERING BLADE                           
                                                                               


"SHIMMERING BLADE!"

Kamon strikes, stabbing both knives into the body of the machine-monster. Heat and fire flows off of him in a tempest, a world-warping inferno that hurts the eye from brightness and the twisted way it seems to alter perceptions. He has no doubt it won't bother whatever /this/ is.

But that extra source of heat? /That/ just might.

William Pauwel has posed:
The thing about desperation attacks: You wouldn't normally even think about using them if you weren't in a desperate situation.

    The EIDOLON's is getting progressively more desperate by the moment. Even as the local energy readings continue to skyrocket, the Elites begin their final assault. Maaka's frankly absurd AM rifle fires slug after slug of explosive ordnance into the energy field. The first shot explodes uselessly on its surface, but generates a rippling wave through the barrier that gives just enough clearance for the second and third bolts to smash clean through. Spiderweb cracks begin creeping out from the EIDOLON's central core, but its death-charge continues!

    Another ripple blasts through the barrier, this time from another angle. Kazuko's spinning smash doesn't contact the Eidolon directly, but as all martial artists know, ki travels in RIPPLES. More of its strange, fluid armor boils away at her blow, exposing the skeletal frame underneath, and sending more cracks through its four SPHERES OF POWER.

    Biteblade's bolts tear in through the rapidly weakening energy field. They lodge into the machine's nanite-coated torso, burning white hot before the scorching heat surrounding the machine. These devices were made to arrest nuclear reactions, but that's... not quite what's going on here. Still, their presence does seem to do SOMETHING, but on a much subtler level. Those heavy metals, jutting out into the bizarre waveform that makes up the field, act as veritable quantum wells to the high-level dimensional shockwaves that power the barrier. The light dims noticably around each of the shafts in the shield, but the EIDOLON's power continues to build...!

    And then the thing gets WAYLAYED by a giant angry dragon. Valentha takes advantage of the EIDOLON's brief distraction. Her claw drives deep into the rapidly densifying energy field, and further still into the plating covering the colossus' back. The armor responds in kind, forming more of the same lances that speared into Biteblade- but they're not enough to keep her from reaching in to fill the behemoth with yet more thermal energy. Its core burns with unimaginable heat- flames that leap from the cracks in its heart in spurts and bursts. It can barely hold on--

    There's not much left. Few who can get in enough power to push it over the edge. Kamon Lionward answers the call! The blessings of his homeland are clear for all to see, as the incredible heat that is one and the same with the First of Flame infuses his very form. Kamon strikes, driving his blades into the behemoth's frame. Where Valentha's flame was born of the very nature of her being, this fire was forged from skill and the perfection of the soul! From the point of impact, the flame streaks inward, carving a second path, separate from Valentha's blow, deep into the monster's heart.

But still, still it stands. Still its field only continues to grow, building brighter and brighter with each fresh infusion of energy- it's barely within its capacity to control...!

All they need is...

All they need is--

JUST ONE MORE HIT--!

William Pauwel has posed:
DID SOMEONE CALL FOR ONE MORE HIT!?

    Nozomi descends like a proverbial war god. The EM Zanbatou smashes into the EIDOLON's weakened barrier, carving through it like a hot knife through so much butter. Once the EIDOLON had enough focus to mount a concentrated defense against such an attack. But now, the damage it has sustained thus far, coupled by its desperate bid to destroy everything in a five mile radius and compounded by the draining influence of the rods embedded in its body, has made such a thing impossible.

    Nozomi's world goes GOLD as she descends into the energy field. She can feel it as an intense, almost overpowering heat, burning away at her outer layers of armor, but still she descends. Metal and terrible nanomachine armor dissolve before the incredible might of her single, perfect strike. The cracked sphere at its heart gains a final, fatal fault down its geometric center. Her blade lingers there, the light around her building until it's almost intolerable- but the light burning in the EIDOLON's heart is fiercer still. Three flames unite as one. One born of one's very nature, another forged from the perfect union of skill and soul, and this one, created by humanity in its quest to strike down the gods, made of the fusion of both man and machine. It is too much to bear. Its arms tremble in brief defiance as its shield-orbs strobe one last time... Before the line of magical power left in Nozomi's wake ignites, joining those of Valentha's and Kamon's own attacks. They converge and explode, erupting like the death-throes of a collapsing star from the point where Nozomi's blade's path terminates in the machine's very heart.

    The explosion is catastrophic, shattering the sphere that had been so damaged by Kazuko and Maaka's attacks. The whole thing vanishes in a pillar of magical energy and the last dregs of whatever immense source of power fueled this machine's every function. The underground city is briefly illuminated, lit up more brightly than even that magical sun could manage. At last the light fades...

And the EIDOLON is no more.

    Nearby, a mound of shattered building stirs... As Will pushes himself out from underneath the rubble. Fortunately, he was safely enclosed inside his magical armor when EVERYTHING EXPLODED. He looks up briefly, blinking at where the EIDOLON USED to be, and the massive crater it left in the floor. "Is--" He shakes his head, clearing the white noise from his mind, "Is everyone okay!? Sound off, y'all!"

Alexis Maaka (571) has posed:
    "Here." Maaka says over comms, before she unfolds her helmet and wipes some sweat from her brow. Yes, she can sweat. That's a thing. She also can smoke, and she does just that as she sits up and leans against a small wall, lighting a cigarette and taking a drag. "Here, and taking five." Sigh. Smoke puffs from her nostrils as she closes her eyes, draping one leg over the other.

    Yeah, this sounds about right for a job well done.

Starlight Bandits has posed:
    Now, at this point, most scallywags would cooly withdraw, giving no evidence of their wrongdoings. The Starlight Bandits are in a perfect position to do it too! No one saw them take anything, who's to know?

    But having no one know goes against everything they want.


"Good job everyone!" Irvine declares, emerging from the building and clapping his hands. "You all did wonderfully~!" Molly adds, going about to give everyone who will take one a warm hug and a dusting off.

    "Normally, we would love to stick around, but! We have committed a crime!"
    "That's right~! You see, we helped ourselves to the most valuable thing we found while you were still fighting~!"
    "Such is the cunning you can come to expect from us! I do hope you will not take it personally, chums!"

    And with that? Irvine produces a thin, silvery rod which Molly holds along with him. The two strike a pose, also holding up the thing they took! And then...

    bip

    They're gone.

Kazuko Kawakami (942) has posed:
     "Nngh... I'm okay!" Kazuko's voice rings out from underneath a pile of rubble that used to be part of a wall. Her naginata's embedded in another chunk of former-wall despite not being sharp at all, her clothes and hair are an absolute wreck with tears, cuts, and bruises everywhere, and she's still probably on an adrenaline high from having just helped to take down a GIANT FREAKING ROBOT.

     But other than that? She sounds fine. "That... That was so awesome! Ohh, this was the best~"

     She'll be fine.

Nozomi Houken (342) has posed:
    The EM Siege Breaker is a potent trump card. Designed on the same principle as a high-explosive armor-piercing round - cut through the defenses, then release the explosion inside the hardened target where it will do the most damage. But it's scaled up to the point of being made to kill entities on the scale of, well, dragons. The incredible power eating away at the TIGER leaves Nozomi grimacing faintly in pain, but it does not stop her, not even when the whole thing finally goes up.

    When the blast clears, she is not where she was, but she is not far. Her armor and weapon sizzling and smoking around her, she is just touching down on the ground, her cold gaze still pointed at the smoking crater.

    After a few seconds, though, the Rampart Mode transformation finally deactivates. "Disengaging Rampart Mode. Rerouting power from weapons and motive systems to cognitive functions. Independent Mode engaged." Black armor folds back and away, and a teenage girl steps out of the beefy machine. As it reassumes its feline shape, her skinsuit disappears in favor of her street clothes; black hair returns to brown, yellow eyes return to hazel. Scorched and bruised, Nozomi's mind becomes fully her own again.

    And she drops to her knees, shivering quietly, as the cold killer's expression shifts over to one of quiet revulsion.

William Pauwel has posed:
Will teeters a little bit as he crawls out from under what's left of that poor, smashed building. He's in no real state to reject a nice, warm, big-sister-y hug from a nice, warm, big-sister-y lady, nor does he particularly want to. It's over too soon, by his estimate. But with all that's happened, he can only... half-way hear what the two bandits are actually saying.

It's only when he sees the OBVIOUS SHINY TRINKET that he realizes...

These two introduced themselves as the Starlight BANDITS, didn't they?

    "Hey, wait, st-" *bwip* "-op... Dnnnngh," Will groans, rubbing his armored head with his armored hands. "How'd I not see that one... Ugh," he sort of... slumps. And he thought they were so cool, too! N-not that anyone needs to know about that. "W-well. They only grabbed that shiny chunk of metal, anyway. Y-you guys, when you get the chance, let's start piling up as many intact relics as we can carry!"

After all, any proper Chaser knows that it's not the shiniest stuff that makes you rich, it's the stuff that you can actually sell that makes you rich!

Speaking of...

LOOT LIST:
-x1 DAMAGED NAVIGATION SYSTEM??
-x1 ENERGY ACCUMULATOR UNIT
-x25 MYSTERIOUS TECH GRAB-BAG
-x2 DAMAGED PROGRESSIVE DAGGERS
-xMany MISCELLANNEOUS DRONE PARTS
-x2 EXEC_LEGION AERIAL DRONE SCHEMATICS
-x1 ENCRYPTED DATAMASS??
-xMany ADVANCED MATERIAL SAMPLES
-OTHER???