887/Halloween 2014

Halloween 2014
Date of Scene:	31 October 2014
Location:	Boston-666
Synopsis:	Once again, nothing happens in Boston worth noting.
Cast of Characters:	Kirito, 2, 38, Priscilla, 140, 183, 186, 206, 238, 253, 331, 430, 439, Riva Banari, 580

---

Psyber (253) has posed:
    There are many reasons to be in Boston-666 at the moment. Some people are visiting the office, some people picked up the radio transmission that went out before the city went off-contact. But there are some... like Puella Magi or Magical Girls... who just got one HELL of a headache. Something's coming. Something that magical girls are an anathema to.

    Boston-666 is currently, as the weather predicted, in the middle of a monster storm. Wind and rain whips through the city and the streets and ground already have at least an inch of water in the gutters, maybe more. But that's not the concerning part. The part that caused the panic on radio is that from the harbor, a black mist is starting to filter through the streets.

    By the time people have arrived, a massive wall of pure black fog, almost smoke-like in appearance, is gathering out at the harbor and starting to seep through into the city. While it flows like a mist, it's almost impossible to see through. It's not a choking hazard as much as a visual one, and it makes it very easy to get lost and disoriented as it blocks visuals of street signs and whatnot.

    Within the mist, the occasional pale blue light can be seen moving, as if something is perpetually moving behind that veil, just out of sight. It projects an aura, passively, out over the whole city. Anyone in the bounds of Boston can tell what it is, and it's definitely not right.

    What's behind that wall of smoke is a Witch. Specifically, a Witch so large and powerful that it no longer needs to project a barrier to assert itself. It has broken into reality proper and is currently in Boston Harbor.

    Psyber is there as well. His car is haphazardly parked sideways in the street with the trunk flung open. He's currently got a very big gun that he's firing into the fogwall ineffectually, the being behind it seeming to shift and move away from the shots each time, but never counterattack.

    It has, however, arrived. And its presence claws at the mind.

Psyber (253) has posed:
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Samhain
The Horror Witch

Harry Dresden (206) has posed:
    This has been a month of Outsiders for Harry Dresden. A collection of encounters with one of the Lurkers, bullshit with century old demon summoning blood circles and now His Birthday. Always the worst damn day of the year, hands down forever.

    Harry appears, or rather, apparates himself through the Never Never into... uh.

    He's got just enough time to find Psyber before the Witch takes him.
    Blow me to Bermuda.

Ryuko Matoi (140) has posed:
    Well, this is some crappy weather, for Halloween. Who's gonna go door to door, with this shitty fog, and all the wind and rain? Maybe she should have picked a better costume. Ryuko's dressed up, of course, but that clawing inside her head.. She's been in a Witch fight once, before, and like anyone can tell you, it's not something you get used to.

"Ghh! Seems like I'm in for a wild night.."

Satsuki Kiryuin (430) has posed:
    A huge REVOCS cargo helicopter is swooping in over the city when the Witch introduces herself.

    The craft visibly bucks in the air, everyone onboard hit by the psychic shock all at once, including the pilot. It sways to one side dangerously, just missing a skyscraper, before righting itself. Anyone privy to the goings-on inside the helicopter would hear a very familiar voice ordering the pilot to drop low, and then leave as soon as she's disembarked. Otherwise, they'll only be in the way.

    Scant seconds later, Satsuki Kiryuin is on the street, and the helicopter is banking away.

    A fleeing civilian is divested of his motorcycle, with a check worth twice its value. The engine roars, and the bike weaves through the city at a breakneck pace. It takes her short minutes to reach the harbor, and when she steps off her pilfered ride, she strides straight up next to Psyber calmly, facing the black fog without a trace of hesitation.

    It would be very easy, however, to make the mistake that it's Homura that's arrived, carrying a sword for some reason. Because that's exactly how she's dressed.

    "It would be wiser to save your ammunition for a clear shot."

Priscilla has posed:
    Does Priscilla need an excuse to lurk around Heaven or Hell (possibly without anyone knowing)? No. Besides, she'd heard that Psyber's Halloweens are wonderfully ordinary and that Nothing Ever Happens on them, which seems like a good way to finally tiptoe into the shallow waters of this particular holiday. She'd actually just arrived early to start putting on her incredibly witty and totally perfect costume when the call had gone out, forcing her to leave it behind just in case it turned out to be dangerous.

    Which it almost certainly is. When she arrives on the scene, she appears near Psyber's car as though having apparated herself, though she had simply walked the entire way while invisible, holding her hands over her ears to muffle the sounds of gunfire. "Lord Psyber, if thou hast any knowledge of this, I wouldst dearly like to hear it. There is something within that fog, and I hath never sensed another soul so twisted."

Cecily (186) has posed:
     Maybe Cecily's got a knack for finding those with good taste in cars and guns, because she responds to the stormcall with her wife in tow. The angel-dressed-fox's car skids to a halt not too far from Psyber's parking spot, and no less haphazardly. Headlights, engine, and windshield wipers still on, she pulls herself out of the driver's seat and stares at the fog and the light the boss-man is opening fire against.

     The falling rain pelts her head and her ears wilt at the sight. "This is not how I envisioned spending Halloween tonight... I think you're going to need a bigger, gun, dear!"

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    It is fairly trivial for Homura to arrive in Boston.
    Direct pathway between the loft and tower.

    From there it's a short trek to the harbor, made a bit easier by Madoka's presence. Indeed, the two just kind of disappear once they arrive in their guest room in the HoH tower, gone in a flash of pink light.

    The pink link pillars by Psyber, and the two magical girls-- well, one goddess and one magical girl-- are all that's left when it vanishes. INTRODUCING HOMURA AS SATSUKI. She wasn't planning on showing up in public with that, no. She just kind of liked the uniform, it was very similar to her own.

    She's about to yell at Psyber, one finger raised and everything, when she spots Satsuki and Ryuko. Her mouth stays half-open and she can't quite find the words anymore. Well that's KIND OF REALLY AWKWARD.

    "... erm. As I was about to say. Psyber, your city and this date do not get along, and now it just had to go and make it awful for me too. I'm blaming you if we survive."

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva was tooling around the Heaven or Hell building as it was. If nothing happened, great, she could relax and lounge around. If Psyber needed help? Well, she's always happy to assist. She's certainly not the most mercenary of his employees, the money is a side benefit. There are /other/ benefits as well.

This is why she's tooling around in a white robe, with a crown of woven ivy and a smiling drama mask. She decided to be Thalia, the Muse of Comedy for Halloween, for various reasons. Unfortunately, as soon as she hears the reports, she's racing through the streets on a motorbike, having hastily thrown on her Templar jacket and gritting her teeth as she forces her way through the inclement weather. "God damn." She chatters. "I should have picked a costume with a nice coat this year." She mutters to the wind. As she gets closer, the terrible feeling grows. Ominous.

The wind, thankfully, does not answer back. As soon as she reaches the harbor, she skids to a halt near Psyber's car, her hands immediately diving into her robe to pull the augmented MAC-10s that Addie helper her put together. Blue-green Anima gathers within the circuitry laid into the weapons, and she begins spraying magical bolts into the fog as well. "HEY PSYBER!" Riva yells behind her mask. "WHAT THE HELL IS THIS THING?" She yells through the storm. At least /she/ doesn't need to worry about ammo...

Mizuki (183) has posed:
    When Mizuki arrives, she already has her sword out, and her wings, too, seeing as they were her primary vehicle for transportation. Now, there's some good news and some bad news here. Good news is, Mizuki isn't at all put off by the radiant energy of nightmares that's probably making the magical girls sick -- she lives in exactly that sort of environment, man. Now, the bad news? She is really, -seriously- not good for much in situations with low visibility. She does what she can, though, allowing assorted small hints to lead her nearer to any semblance of a cohesive group that may be forming.

    She hears gunshots, and follows their noise. Gonna have to assume that's Psyber, or at least someone else on her side. It isn't until she creeps a little closer, hopping and feeling her way across rooftops that she notices the reason that she's come here. Something grotesquely large is lurking beyond the curtain of mist that she didn't quite catch before. Deeply melancholic in a way she can't quite place, and in a way that might be a bit too distracting for her own good. Regardless, the threat of impending death never was a good enough excuse to ignore ideal times for theatrics, and rest assured that she does not. Pulling down the british hunting hat that she had miraculously been able to keep on her head mid-flight and gripping a curled novelty smoking pipe held between her lips, she studies the massive figure in the distance. Might even smirk a bit, here and there.

    "So this is what they call a 'witch' in Miss Akemi's world, is it?" Nor is the world around her spared a brief monologue. "This should be a wonderful learning experience. A terrible shame that Fenestra can't be here to sketch a picture, really."

Ryoko (580) has posed:
    So far, this 'Halloween' thing hasn't been going well for Ryoko.

    Aside from the fact that every single person she has met has failed to understand what it is, it is also raining, and she's wet. She hasn't managed to get a single person to open their doors for her (though a couple of houses are likely going to need new doors as a result) and now there's this damn fog rolling in.

    At first, she doesn't really notice it. Not until something underneath her wig goes "Nya!" And then she turns around to face the harbor. Her hands go to her hips, and she squints at it. "... You think that's where they're keeping the candy, Ryo-Ohki?" "NYAH!!"

    The more panicked note is coupled with a desperate burrowing into her hair, and the Space Pirate folds her arms over her chest. "Yeah, you're probably right. Whatever it is, that feels... bad. What do you say we check it out?"

    There's a faint ~bweep~ noise, and Ryoko fades into existence behind Psyber. Lounging on the air, as though she doesn't have a care in the world. Her eyes are peering deep into the mist, though, betraying that she's not... quite as indolent as she appears. "Whew, so this is where the party is, huh? I hope there's treats as well as tricks..." She pauses, and then adds, "Although, the trick IS impressive!"

Beli Klum (238) has posed:
    Beli, as mentioned, happens to be right in the passenger seat of Cecily's car. Dressed as a demon in more clingy and showy clothing than she's used to as an opposite to Cecily's angel outfit, she looks vaguely like usual, only...obviously different. The horns, tail, leathery wings, and completely red clothes probably look quite out of place on her, especially considering the short skirt and low-cut top. Thankfully, she has little time to be embarrased, as the rephaite is quick to emerge from the car as soon as it stops and slip into place near Psyber and Cecily.

    Oh boy. This is terrible.

    The hybrid frowns. She takes in a deep breath, then sighs, idly rubbing the side of her head. "...this does not look good. How...exactly are we supposed to deal with this? Whatever it is."

Himei (331) has posed:
    Himei's costume is pretty uninspired. She's wearing a large tricorn hat, has a fake beard stencilled on her face, and is wearing an eyepatch. The rest of the piratical garb goes with it, including a /very real/ cutlass at her side. She's dressed as a pirate, yep. Just a pirate for Halloween.

    And on her shoulder, Tamehito has an eyepatch as well, along with a tiny hat. "Polly want a cracker!"

    Himei herself is looking pretty grim NOW though, as is Tamehito, the Great Grey Shrike on her shoulder. She's jogging toward the docks, slowing as she winces. "Great..." She doesn't change yet, she's still trying to get with the others.

Madoka Kaname (439) has posed:
    Indeed, a gentle flare of pink and Madoka arrives with Homura, a worried look stricken upon the face of the Law of Cycles as she squeezes on Homura's hand. She should have recognized the signs. The terrible weather- the fact that somewhere, a girl was deep in despair. The normally cheery divinity is a wall of worry and grief. "Psyber, we're here."
    She was remiss in her duties, for but one night, as she casts her gaze to the storm, and the terrible Witch- powerful enough to no longer need a Barrier.
    She doesn't look too out of the ordinar, a black seifuku style uniform with suspenders-- oddly with an 'x' on one lapel like it was missing an eye.
    She's also carrying half of a pair of red safety scissors.
    It's just a little awkward.

Kirito has posed:
    Halloween. Having experienced this day before in the Multiverse, Kirito's quite glad he's been spending so much time recently training back up to his own exacting standards. He can finally say he's regained most of his edge back.

    His budding social life's suffered in turn, but the lives he wants to protect are worth too much to worry about such things right now.

    The Multiverse, the Abstractum, and now Boston need the Black Swordsman.

    High above the city, a human-sized fairy warrior penetrates the Witch's aura and immediately goes tumbling through the air. Kirito brakes and reorients himself, rubbing his face. The boy in black scowls. "A witch...!"

    In a word: Crap.

    Fighting down the urge to turn right the heck around, Kirito instead brings both hands up behind his back, grips his twin swords... and draws them whilst inhaling deeply. Gonna have to knuckle down for this one, huh?

    The boy tucks his arms in tight and DIVES, pushing his translucent spriggan wings for all they're worth. He rockets down through the fog and zips over buildings quickly enough to drag a tunnel of sorts through the fog. Not that this helps clear it, but his approach makes a weird wake indeed.

    In a matter of moments he slams down into the pavement near Psyber and those around him... just hard enough to slightly crack it.

    "Is this as bad as I'm guessing it is?!" He asks of the half-angel, brandishing his twin blades. One, a crystal-cerulean, the other a midnight black.

Noble Six (38) has posed:
    Today would aparently be a bad day for Noble Six to have her very first Halloween celebration. She had been planning on going trick or treating, and had even gotten to the point where she was dressed up. Well...Dressed up for her.

    A UNSC drop pod streaks through the stormy skies, and slams into the ground with a massive impact. The explosive bolts that hold the door closed blast off, and the black armored SPARTAN warrior emerges from it. Noble Six's armor has been painted pure black, however there are some differences. A skeleton has been painted onto the armor, looking remarkably anatomically correct, save for the head, which is replaced by a jack-o-lantern with flaming eyes. A little portable holographic generator she had picked up to conceal her helmet. The bones glow with some kind of luminescent paint as she emerges from the pod. She pauses for a moment, and then turns around and grabs several things from inside the pod, before she hoofs it towards where Psyber is firing into the wall with little effect.

    "Try this." She offers, as she sets down one of the SPARTAN lasers next to him, "Though I don't know if a high desity concentrated energy pulse will work either."

Psyber (253) has posed:
    Psyber has about enough time to fire a rocket launcher at it once before tossing the spent delivery system into the harbor with a swear. The half-angel looks around at people gathering. He seems much more paniced than usual, even than usual on a halloween. He looks to Satsuki and sighs, "It was worth a shot."

    To Priscilla and Riva, Psyber simply replies, "A Witch. Something that has the potential to level the city if left unmitigated." A quiet tone. He then looks to Homura, "Must have been drawn to the paranormality of the city."

    "Miss Ayeka." Psyber says to Ryoko, nodding his head. She definitely seems cool. Someone he should meet during a non-disaster.

    While it cannot speak, what it can project is that it seems... content that the others have arrived in the city. Psyber alone would have bored it, now it has more prey. It drifts forward out of the fog to reveal its form:

    

    Floating, it thrusts a hand forward and the fog it was hiding behind rushes out over the ENTIRE city like a tidal wave. It grows so thick that seeing more than an inch away from ones self is impossible. Like being pushed by a wave, a rushing sensation accompanies this.

Psyber (253) has posed:
    RYUKO:

    When the rushing stops, Ryuko finds herself alone in a hallway. The door behind her is shut and blood covers her hands, dripping off of them like a thick syrup. Blood seeps out from under the door and she feels a faint tugging to go forward. The hallway is lined with gas lamps that flicker and burn, and the hallway seems to extend forward for miles and miles.

    She's also no longer in her costume, from what she can tell. Instead she's wearing what feels like her original school uniform from when she first came to Honnouji, complete with high-top sneakers. She is missing her guitar case.

    HOMURA AND HIMEI:

    Homura and Himei are lucky enough to be swept off together. Instead of fog, they feel themselves being pushed through the city and dragged along its paths and alleys. When the two of them come to a stop, it's in a downtown alley that is soaked with rain and grunge. It smells absolutely terrible and it looks worse. They can feel an encroaching evil all around them. Himei, worse, has a migraine.

    They may be more lucky than they realize, as Psyber comes running around a corner, frantic. He stops in front of them, "Both of you. Good. I figured out this thing's power. It's going to unleash every monster we've ever encountered in the city. We need to move fast, get the others, and stop it." The hunter speaks in an authoritative tone, "Before it hurts anyone we care about."

    RYOKO:

    Ryoko is pushed up and back, as if tugged and pulled skyward while her view is obscured on all sides. The inky blackness is stifling, veils and coats and lines of it just floating everywhere. Up feels like down, left feels like up. Direction feels meaningless in this place, just a static world where blackness floats in all directions.

    MIZUKI:

    Mizuki won't get to study it, because she's taken away by the darkness as well. Dragged and pulled, she finds herself in a room as the darkness pulls away. It's a simple room, no windows, and a door. There's a table and a desk. There's a revolver with one bullet on that table with a card that says 'In case you get stumped~ ;)'.

    The door has a microphone instead of a lock, and it won't yield to force. Instead, it simply has a note beneath it which asks the simple question: What are you bad at?

    BELI:

    Beli is awoken by a kick to the gut, "MOVE IT, Mongrel." She wakes up in the city she was found in on unification. A man is standing over her in a police uniform, staring down and scowling. He kicks her in the stomach again, "Worthless trash, I SAID MOVE IT. Tired of garbage blocking the gutters." He says before slamming the ground next to her with a police baton and saying, "You got 60 seconds before I come back and move you myself."

    She can feel all her old powers, but none of her new gains of the past years.

    CECILY:

    Cecily's fate is more abstract. As her fog clears, she's in an invisible bubble, floating over Beli and watching her wife get abused by the cop in the street. Her voice is unheard and the barrier feels as solid as steel.

Psyber (253) has posed:
    DRESDEN:

    Harry Dresden finds himself at the gates of a lonely cemetary. A hill is in front of him, and at the top of that hill is a funeral in progress. A very dismal one, as the only person in attendance is a single priest in shambly robes that look unkept and ragged. The graveyard itself is well kept and in good condition. Hardly scary.

    RIVA BENARI:

    Riva finds herself in a room, at a table. Sitting across from her is... herself. But different. This version of Riva has her hair cut short and slicked straight back in a professional style. She's wearing a suit, complete with black leather gloves. On the table in front of the other Riva is a silenced Beretta. Her counterpart smiles coldly and says, "Let's talk about the direction your life is heading."

    NOBLE SIX:

    When the fog pulls back from Noble Six, she's in a foxhole on a dying planet. She has her battle rifle and Covenant forces are all around her. She's holding them off, trying desperately to save what few people are left on this world so they can evacuate. This isn't heroics, she's in a suicide holdout. She can feel the forces pushing in on every side, and a feelin she won't succeed.

    PRISCILLA:

    Priscilla finds herself pushed off into a different area of the city. Another grimy alley, alone. But as soon as she tries to move, two spirits emerge out of the ground in front of her. One of those spirits is Psyber, non-interactable. That Psyber is talking to Nathan Hall, and Priscilla gets the feeling she is watching a conversation from recent memory.

    "Nathan, she's dangerous. Her world has rejected her, who knows what she'll do."
    Nathan makes a worried noise, "I am a pacifist, so I cannot condone violence." He looks at Psyber and says vaguely, "But I can't order you not to deal with a perceived threat. If you wish to handle it, I won't stop you."

    KIRITO:

    Kirito wakes up. He's at a computer in a room. That is what he experiences. He was asleep up until now, and the entire multiverse was a dream. He is back in his house, on his computer. He can smell dinner cooking in the other room, which means it'll be time to eat with his family soon.

    SATSUKI:

    SPEAKING OF DINNER, let's go to Satsuki. Who finds herself in a very new position. Wearing a lovely white dress, she's sitting across from her mother in a quiet cafe in France. She gets the feeling this was expected to be a casual meeting, but her mother's hands are folded over eachother and she's silently glaring at her daughter.

    MADOKA:

    Madoka has a very special role from here on out. She can consult with the GM and pop into any single Nightmare once per round.

Satsuki Kiryuin (430) has posed:
    The exchange of strategy on the radio is... concerning. A being of this magnitude can't be fought without collateral, and her mind is quite firmly on the big picture almost immediately.

    That doesn't stop her from staring at Madoka. And Ryuko. And especially Homura.

    The coincidence is almost enough to derail her. Almost.

    But as the Queen of Honnouji turns around and draws Bakuzan, the fog rolls forth, and she finds herself in another time, another place. Seated at a table, with her mother. Wait, wasn't she just somewhere else? There was something important... but no, mother's summons is more important. She'll deal with it later. Especially given how upset the CEO of REVOCS looks. This was supposed to be a calm mother-daughter event, wasn't it? "...mother, what's the matter?" Her expression is carefully neutral, but a sharp glare like that isn't encouraging.

Harry Dresden (206) has posed:
    Harry Dresden comes to up on top of... Well hell, Graceland. Graceland Cemetary in Chicago. Cripes this Witch had a kick. Temporal thing maybe? A quick check of his radio... nothing. Right, well.
    He adjusts his Merlin beard, peeling it off from his chin to show a clean shaven Dresden underneath. Might as well go see what's going on. The Wizard's hands slip into his pockets and he rolls his stiff neck, sauntering down in the direction of the funeral.

Ryuko Matoi (140) has posed:
    Blood.. Ryuko can feel the sticky warmth dripping off her hands and fingers, and.. her clothes are changed. She doesn't have anything else, either. Not her scissor or her other gear. And this place is.. She doesn't want to go forward. Not towards that door. She doesn't want to walk, but she staggers towards it anyway. Slow, shuffling steps towards it.

"No.." She murmurs, "I don't.." Something about what's behind that door. She's never felt like this before, even when she went home, for the first time in ages.

Ryoko (580) has posed:
    As the discussion on the radio unfolds, a slow, creeping realization begins to come over Ryoko. This thing is ruled by its darkest emotions. Huge, monstrous, it seems an unstoppable force; one that is descending from nowhere to obliterate a city and its terrified inhabitants.

    This must be what it felt like when she fell upon her victims.

    She's just beginning to rationalize that and start floating up so she can call on her power and strike at the revealed monster without risking cooking everyone around her, when she is suddenly jerked upwards. That alone is surprising enough - she's not used to ANYTHING being stronger than her! And then, then there's darkness.

    "Y-You think you can hide from me?" Ryoko shouts, plasma boiling about her fists. She fires a bolt off into the inky darkness at random, and then... a second. And a third.

    Darkness.

    She grinds her teeth together. Everyone's stopped talking, too. Why has everyone shut up? What the hell is going on?!

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    "What--"

    Swept off? So this Witch has a Barrier after all?

    ... no, hang on, this is different. SIMILAR, for sure, but it's not... Homura frowns. She raises her left hand, producing her Soul Gem. The bright purple and gold egg shines, trying to sense the location of the Witch-- and the pathways of this would-be Barrier too.

    At least Psyber and Himei are there with her.

    "I guess it needed to separate us to prevent us from being an effective team. Now what? It tries to hunt us down? What good is splitting people up unless you can be everywhere at once to hunt them down?"

    She glances towards Psyber. "Unleashing every monster might do it though. We'd all be separated AND dealing with hordes of whatever, so it doesn't need to handle us itself. Your city really is the worst at this time of the year."

Cecily (186) has posed:
     Cecily is busy. Busy focusing on the conversation while she and two of herself brace, load, and prepare a cannon to work as a team to offer suppressive fire. One aims, a second steadies the gun on a thick cloth on the hood of the car, and a third stands by with a drum of fresh ammunition in hand. As Psyber's rocket goes sailing into the fog, the first fox pulls the trigger. The custom modified 40mm Vickers starts to -THUMP- as the fog suddenly sweeps in. The sound of the autocannon is drowned out by reality shifting.

     Cecily finds herself without her sisters, her consciousness and body stuffed back into a single form. Her ears twitch and her tails fan out, her palms pressed against the barrier. "What? Where did..." her eyes widen as she sees the treatment Beli is getting in the street below. "Let her be! She's not trash!" she shouts, hearing nothing but her own voice coming back at her, her fists starting to hammer at the bubble she's trapped in. The connection with the Vault is dim, try as she might she can't even pull the smallest bludgeoning implement into her hands. She may as well be naked for all she can do to free herself, let alone help her wife.

     "This isn't real..." she clenches her fingers and stares, helpless.

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva keeps shooting, but there isn't much she can do before the fog rushes over and through her. She grunts, fighting through the fog, the rushing sensation growing...

Blink. Change in evironment. Stop. Riva blinks at the environment, looking around for a moment. She's wet and dripping and altogether ragged-looking, the comedy mask sort of hanging on the side of her head at the moment.

"Huh." She says. Okay. She puts down the guns on the table and looks at her opposite, tilting her head as she looks at... herself carefully. "You know, that's the line my mom would always open with when we were about to get into a fight." Riva comments, and then tilts her head. "But man, I really /rock/ the professional look." She looks confused, but seems to be taking things as they come so far. "So, um... Where did the horrible city-destroying monster go?"

Mizuki (183) has posed:
    Then, a room. A small room where Mizuki is quite alone. Now, she's versed enough in dreamwalking and intuitive enough to guess that none of this is real, but that doesn't alter its prevalence one bit. It's one of her hobbies to try and work people through their little personal hangups and hatreds by visiting there dreams, so is this -really- any different? Well, she'll certainly find out. She spies the table and the door, checking momentarily to see if her wings, sword, and revolver are still with her. But if not... there's a revolver over on that table, isn't there? She approaches it first, finding the card in question. She reads it. Studies it. As a connoisseur of dark humor, it's only natural that she would immediately grasp its meaning... which she takes as something of a challenge. At the card's own smirk, she returns with a renewed iteration of one of her own. Albeit, this might come with a set of narrowed eyes as well.

    "Cheeky." As if someone can hear her. She briefly contemplates wedging her sword - provided that she still has it - in-between the door and the wall, but quickly decides against it. Brute force never works how you hope that it will in these sorts of hallucinations. She studies the question for a spell, quirking an eyebrow at its sheer simplicity. "Athletics." She folds her hands, shutting her eyes in a manner that would feign restfulness. "I'm a complete invalid in the realm of athletics, if you would like to know the truth. I'm terribly lucky that I have my wings to support me."

Noble Six (38) has posed:
    The dust clears and Noble Six peers out from the foxhole. That plasma blast hit close, too close, "Jenkins, I need you to sure up the right flank!" She says, turning to her side to see that Jenkins has been blasted by one of the Covenant shots and is laying dead in the foxhole. She ducks back down next to him and stares at him and his dead eyes, "No. Damnit." How many is that she's lost in this fight. And for what? To get some VIPs off world?

    She doesn't think she's going to make it this time. She's had a lot of close encounters before, but this one feels different. This must be how Jorge felt. Or Carter. Or Emile. She failed all of them too. Just like she failed her parents, and just like she knows she's going to fail now.

Beli Klum (238) has posed:
    The Witch shifts out from the fog, and Beli's eyes narrow further. It...vaguely reminds her of some kind of hybrid between an angel and a demon, really. Maybe a rephaite? Not that it matters too much; it's not going to act the same as any of those, she knows, so the best she can do is-

    The fog suddenly rolls in, and Beli gives a soft gasp of surprise as she feels herself pushed and shoved. All she can do is raise her arms and try to brace, keeping herself from being pushed too far away. She tries to open her eyes as much as she can to see around her, but it's too dark to make out anyone that was just beside her a moment ago. Soon enough, the rush simply becomes too strong for her slender frame to endure, and she goes tumbling with a shout...

    The next thing she is aware of is a kick to the gut that makes her abruptly lurch into a fetal position on her side, coughing and gasping for breath. Her eyes widen, forcing her into an awareness of her surroundings that immediately makes her eyes widen further. A brilliantly blue sky, a city that seems to almost glisten with a sheen of light, making all the shadows of the city of Venice seem immaterial.

    The rephaite - is that what she is now, or just a halfbreed? - stares up at the policeman with a look of shock as he snarls at her. "W...what...?"

    She seems too shocked to respond yet.

Priscilla has posed:
    The instant the Witch rears its ugly head from the fog, Priscilla's scythe is in her hand. The first couple of steps she takes turn into the start of a run, and just as she gets ahead of Psyber, she poofs out of existence, vanishing from the monster's gaze to buy her time for a surprise attack. This is what her power is good for. The one situation where she can use it freely, without fear of consequence, and with the simple, unclouded knowledge that things will turn for the better if she does.

    That clear vision doesn't last long. The confusion of being forcibly relocated hits her, bringing her to a stop as she splashes into a puddle that hadn't been there before. Suddenly fearing for her comrades, she goes to run again, only to be stopped by the apparitions that rise before her. As plainly obvious it is that the Witch must be generating illusions, she can't help but pay attention at the sound of Psyber's voice, having come so close to walking straight past.

    At first, she simply dismisses it. Nobody had cared about her circumstances when she had first come to the multiverse. Everyone was nothing but accepting. Nothing but understanding and kind. If they weren't, she would have never left the painting, no matter how rocky her start might have been. Besides, even if this conversation had actually happened, Psyber would have had 3 years to make good on it, and clearly he had no interest in doing so. It is only after Nathan starts talking that the alternative becomes clear to her. The last thing both Psyber and Nathan had seen from her had been that night in Anor Londo. When Gwyndolin had broken her heart. She'd barely spoken to anyone since. Maybe this was recent? Maybe they had the wrong idea? Unable to stop herself, she hesitates before reaching the end of the alley, momentarily forgetting her caution just in case this conversation had actually happened. That way, she'd know everything the two of them thought of her, and she could clear everything up. Right?

Himei (331) has posed:
    A girl in an alley is holding her head.

    Himei Shoutan is not sure what happened, and she's really, reallly in an awful mood now. She's just about to say something to Homura when Psyber comes around the corner, hurriedly explaining everything. "Can it even do that?" She grumbles.

    She looks at Homura. "Well... you know what we both have to do." She sighs, gesturing to the bird on her shoulder to signal Tamehito to dive back into her body. Can't have the glaring weak point exposed, right? "Fine, let's get moving. This headache is making it hard to get a specific direction, though."

Kirito has posed:
    kirito's dressed in, oddly enough, utterly black clothes nonetheless. A black shirt and black pants. Completely normal clothes. No weapons, none of his light armor, and... he's awoken by the glowing light of his computer screen. Dang, did he fall asleep at the computer again? Sugu's gonna make fun of him, ugh.

    He stretches, yawns... "...What a weird dream," The boy mutters, half-awake, before going to check his email on his custom-built 24ghz octa-core PC.

    Thinking about how delicious that dinner's smelling isn't doing much to soothe how weird he's feeling though. The boy rubs the side of his head, trying to clear it.

Psyber (253) has posed:
    SATSUKI:

    The CEO of REVOCS calmly picks up her cup of coffee and takes a sip from it, "I'm disappointed in you, Satsuki." She says simply. There's no anger to her voice, simply a calm and decisive tone, "That's why you're here."

    She sips her coffee once more, "I would be a poor mother if I weren't here to console you as you grieve the deaths of your friends and classmates." She notes, in a vague sense, "Just please try to cry into your napkin and not on my dress. It's brand new."

    DRESDEN:

    It's a long walk down that hill and towards that grave, "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid." The man rasps, speaking out of formality.

    "Though he left this world alone, he is truly one of God's Children, and so the lord will walk with him. And though none are here to mourn, this rain is the tearfall of the Lord for his passing. Amen." The priest lowers his head and then turns to Harry, "Oh, are you here for the service? It was in the paper, but no one showed up. I'm sure he'd be happy someone did."

    RYUKO: The door is there. But from behind it come muffled sounds that are hard to describe. The best way to define the sound would be the muffled sound of teeth going into a fresh apple, a crisp cracking followed by some crunching chewing noises. It's ravenous and repetitive, even from behind that door that dampens the sound.

    The door itself is unlocked if she wishes to enter it.

    RIVA:

    The other Riva smiles calmly, "You don't remember? That's the day we made the decision." She chuckles slightly, covering her mouth with her hand, "We're immortal, a higher purposes. Those who aren't? Cannon fodder."

    "And we were better for it. After they were all dead, we were able to tell the story we wanted. We were the heroes. The Union loved us, no one ever knew." She looks at the suit, "You like it? It came when I took over Psyber's business. And then I guided it towards what was best for... everyone."

    RYOKO:

    The blasts from Ryoko sail off in all directions. They give light to the blackness, but soon trail off into distant specks as they soar with nothing to collide into. Flicks and specks of light so far off.

    Ryoko's own voice speaks to her shortly after: "Is it hiding from me? It's so cold here. I'm so alone. Don't leave me here, mom!" Her voice raises, lightens, going to that of a child.

    CECILY:

     That barrier does not yield under her furious assault of verbal shouting. Nor to her fists. It does not yield to her fury and to her indignation. It feels hopeless to watch Beli.

    "It's real enough," Her own voice says in response, "She's worthless without you. You're trash without her. That's why you're so attached to one another. You know that if it weren't for her, you'd be a lonely little fox in a vault that the world forgot."

    BELI:

    "Of course. Stupid too." The cop says, stomping away, "Be cleared out in ten minutes or I'm bringing back higher authorities. Sick of you transients." He scowls, looking towards her.

    Curiously, Beli can feel despair that's not just her own. Call it empathy, but she definitely feels someone else suffering from her pain. Or is that just the conflict of her own soul? It's hard to tell sometimes, isn't it?

Psyber (253) has posed:
    HOMURA AND HIMEI:

    Walking out into the streets is agreeable to Psyber. He nods his head, "Whatever it's planning, we need to be careful." Psyber says in a worried tone, putting his hands on both girl's shoulders, "We've had some close calls and I just can't see you both get hurt again over this." He states seriously.

    "I'll do whatever it takes to stop that."

    Heading out of the alley and into the streets shows familiars, looking like men with pumpkins for heads, traipsing through the streets and throwing fireballs at Civilians. Psyber, of course, immediately opens fire on these creatures.

    NOBLE SIX:

    "We're surrounded on all sides! We can't hold them o-" There's a cutoff as an entrenched tank takes a large blast of plasma that blows it apart, sending metal and bodyparts into the trench. The din and roar of battle around her wails, surrounding Noble Six with the fire and fury of war.

    "We're all gonna die here, in this godforsaken place!" A panicking new recruit cries out, curling up in the trench next to her. He's hyperventilating, "We jus- I ca- I have a WIFE. I'll never see my kid again!"

    MIZUKI:

    "LIAR!"

    Screams the door back at Mizuki in response to her aloof statement. It doesn't believe her for a second. And it doesn't want to take HER dismissive attitude. The room shakes a bit from the fury of its voice, the table jostling.

    Somehow the gun that was on it lands at her feet. A new note is there: 'You don't HAVE to admit anything~'

    KIRITO:

    Email Subject: Where you been, man?

    Body: Ever since you got into the full dive beta for that Multiverse Whatever MMO, we hardly hang out on your other games, dude. Everyone's asking about you. You turning into a Hikkikomori, bruh?

Ryuko Matoi (140) has posed:
    It would all be so much less unsettling, if it wasn't for that sound.. Ryuko's feet have somehow managed to carry her to the door, but her hand is frozen, outstretched but not touching the doorknob. Her breath has quickened, and she can feel sweat beading on her forehead, goosebumps racing up her arms and down her spine, and then her legs. Her white shoes are smeared with blood along the soles, and some of the bottoms, staning the white a dark red.

"What is.." Her fingers, still dripping wet, reach out and grasp against the doorknob, which she turns slowly. She hesitates again, leaning forwards slowly as she pushes the door open.

Harry Dresden (206) has posed:
    Harry looks up at the Padre and grumbles, still not on the right side to see the stone, if there is one yet. Oh hey, there is. Well, he'll get to it in a minute. "Not really, just sota passing through, really. I was... somewhere and now I'm here. Sorta happens a lot, really. All those concussions and you forget things sometimes." He cglances down at the very plain casket and sighs. Lonely funerals are the worst. He's been to a few himself, just a few people.
    Monsters don't get a lot of remembering.

Satsuki Kiryuin (430) has posed:
    Satsuki's brow furrows. Has she made a misstep? Her plans for a number of things are still in motion, including those to find the hidey-hole of a certain 'resistance' group. "If there is something I've-" She halts when her reply is cut off by more words from her mother, and after a second or so to sink in, the Student Council President's eyes go wide. She knows. She knows /everything/.

    The table topples over in an instant, as Satsuki Kiryuin goes from calmly seated to standing for battle in the space of a heartbeat. "What have you done with-" Her hands have gone to her left side, left hand to where the sheath would be at her hip, right to where she would take hold of Bakuzan and draw. But the words die in her throat as she realizes the weapon isn't there.

    That is when she realizes she's in more than a little danger. "Tch-!"

Psyber (253) has posed:
    PRISCILLA:

    The conversation continues from there, Psyber and Nathan talking to eachother pretty directly.

    "Halloween. It'll happen then," Psyber says to Nathan pretty directly, looking around, "Something bad always happens. She'll puppy-dog after me like always, shit will go down, and then I'll-"
    Nathan holds up a hand to Psyber and says, "Stop. If you say any more, this becomes my job. And I can no longer condone it. If an accident happens, that's your business, Psyber. You know how black operations work." He says. His glasses even give off that sinister flash of light.

Mizuki (183) has posed:
    Mizuki jolts backwards as the room quakes, her eyes widening quite a bit in reply. If her skin grows more pale than before, it's impossible to tell, but nevertheless she's silent enough the gun clattering to the ground at its... oddly convenient locale to be particularly jarring. She bats her lashes at it briefly before picking up the note. The hand carrying it shakes slightly, as though she were resisting an acutely strong urge to crumple it and toss it into oblivion. Instead, she eventually sets it down on the desk rather politely, walking back over to the door in due time. Then, with a deep breath, she would begin anew.

    "... that was not a lie. I was being perfectly truthful." Her tone is a bit more even now, though her face has transformed into a decidedly severe scowl. "I must take some issue with a game that does not accept true answers to unpleasant questions, but nevertheless, I shall offer yet more. In all the times I have tried to paint, I have not produced a single worthwhile portrait. All of them are despicable mockeries of the things that they were intentioned to represent. You may know that this is earnest because it is a subject that I care very much about. Now, may we continue? I can do nothing to help either of us if you aren't willing to level with me somewhere."

    She looks pensive. Maybe she's a bit apprehensive, but if she is, she's doing a surprisingly good job of letting it show. She would idly, gently kick away the gun when she next has the opportunity in a show of her resolve.

Ryoko (580) has posed:
    Ryoko drifts backwards - or perhaps it is up. She can't tell. The light failed completely to illuminate anything, and she can't orient herself at all. When she hears herself speaking, the Space Pirate freezes up, and a shiver runs down her spine. She doesn't remember anything before Kagato. Even those memories were indistinct. Had she ever been a child? Had she been... abandoned? It'd make sense, a monster like her...

    "I'm not alone, I'm not!" She protests, her voice just starting to crack. Snatching the wig from her head, she expects to find Ryo-Ohki, the comforting little cabbit that has been her most steadfast companion... instead, she finds herself staring into the bottom of a cheap wig with a pricetag still attached, and her mass of green hair splays out in a mess behind her.

    The woman's knees fold up against her stomach, and she wraps her arms about herself. Alone. Again. Alone. Seven hundred years of crushing isolation presses in about her in an instant. Hot tears stain her cool cheeks.

    "T-Tenchi... w-where are you? I, I need you..."

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    "It's hard to pinpoint, yes," Homura says, reverting the Soul Gem into its ring form at the sight of what she PRESUMES to be Familiars. A bit Halloween-y but then this is a thematic Witch if she's ever seen one given the time it chose to pop up.

    "And I don't know if it can really do that or not. I want to say reproducing every single thing we've ever fought is probably ludicrously out of reach of any singular entity, but it might be possible to generate Familiars that loosely match a handful of encounters a piece. But that'd be pretty unique. Then again, this is the highest tier of Witches... so unique is the name of the game to start with," she asides to Himei.

    If Psyber feels safe unloading, she'll follow suit. A handgun is produced and the clip is emptied towards the pumpkin heads, with explosive rounds just to make sure. Well, as explosive as you can make a handgun. Fayt always pulls through on novelty ammo, at least.

    "Something's off though. Unless it intends for us to just get lost, it should be mobilizing SOMETHING to actually stop us in our tracks. Not... these."

    On the other hand maybe they're nastier than they look.

Cecily (186) has posed:
     "There has to be something..." Cecily mumbles to herself as she just watches and stares. She tries to bite back the feeling of despair, "That wave must've slammed me into standby mode..." she breathes slowly, trying to find something more than smooth nothingness for her fingertips to latch onto, but she can't even 'draw' her claws. So focused on what almost turns into a scrabbling at the walls of her prison like a caged animal that the sound of her voice has her tearing herself away from the sight of Beli below her to look around in a panic. "Wh--"

     She's cut off as the voice continues, eyes widening, then closing, her head shaking. "That's not true.." she breathes, her hands coming up to the top of her head, pressing those vulpine ears flat against her hair. "...I have a -home-... I have my parents." She'd just recently had the anniversary of her 'birth' not two days prior. But the voice pulls at something inside of her. She'd gotten 'lost' when the Vault travelled. She'd lost her family for so long. Thoughts of her own struggles to find her purpose within the Union seep into her mind. "I'm not alone..." she exhales in a voice that surprises her with how weak and unconvincing it sounds.

     Her hands move from her ears to join together as she hugs her knees, looking through the barrier towards Beli, unable to even help one of those she cares most about. Even the presence of her 'sister', the former White Queen, feels missing, preventing her from dividing herself and her escape efforts.

Himei (331) has posed:
    Well those are... strange. Himei's still holding her head, but as she follows Psyber out, she forms a little shimmer around her body. The motes of light shift about, only briefly, before she takes her Sailor form in an instant, ready to fight these strange creatures. "I guess we'll have to just fight our way through. We can't have them hurting the civilians."

    She takes her typical stance, stepping off to the side and sending a blast of energy toward one of the Familiars, just to test it.

Kirito has posed:
    Oh man. It's true. Kirigaya Kazuto has had this bad habit of ditching all his other MMO time for the new FullDive beta. He got lucky enough to be accepted, why wouldn't he try out the latest and greatest? Lots of people were jealous, a source of some nervousness, but he didn't have to face any of it since only those chosen were where he was checking out anyways.

    But still... he's frowning harshly at this criticism.

    The boy starts typing.

    SUBJECT: RE: Where you been, man?
    BODY: As if. Anyways, wouldn't playing on our games all the time still qualify for that? I'll log on later tonight. Catch you then?
    And he hits send.

    Without really grokking who he's even talking to. Or what MO this is. His mind is in a bit of a haze, and he rubs at his forehead again. "Maybe some fresh air will clear my head!" He stands up, stretches again, and heads out into the hallway. His room is on the second floor, so it's down the stairs, through the kitchen, out doos...

    But as he strolls, he's bearing a rather down expression. "Was that really all a dream?" If so... darn it all. His memories of it are already fading some, the harder he tries to grasp at it. There's someone he should be talking to. Who was it?

Beli Klum (238) has posed:
    Beli visibly flinches at the cop's words. Shock and hurt flicker over her expression as she feels something digging into her heart. A familiar feeling, but one that has not been felt for a very long time.

    It aches. And as the cop strides away, shooting a look of derision toward her, that ache seethes into something even less pleasant. A conflict she has dealt with for decades boils and simmers, sparking a debate between two greatly opposing sides. A kind, gentle person who would rather be walked over for the sake of others than raise a hand in anger, and someone who has grown far too tired of spite and scorn to endure it for any longer.

    The hybrid's expression slowly turns to a scowl. Slowly, she pushes herself up, rising to her feet as her glare remains fixed on the officer before her. "...I am not /transient/."

    Beli stands looming where she is, a shadow encroaching along the ground around her as it seems to overwhelm the radiance of the street. Tendrils of sin and hatred seep along the earth as her left hand balls into a tight fist.

    Her voice is a low growl, echoing more with a dull, volcanic rumble than the soft bells of angels. "Do you even know what I am /doing/ for all of you? What struggling I have endured because I believed I could /save/ you? Even when it wore on my soul and mind and made every day a cacophony of pain and fear and darkness, I /tried/! And I am not going to be talked down to as if I am lower than someone who cannot even THINK FOR THEMSELVES!"

Noble Six (38) has posed:
    The panic of the new recruit snaps Noble Six out of her own momentary panic, as she turns to look at him. She frowns below her helmet, and then kneels down next to him, taking hold of his shoulder, "Private Reynolds, right?" She says, looking at his nametag on his armor, "I need you to listen to me, alright?"

    She doesn't sound angry, and is only raising her voice enough to be heard over the battle that's raging around them, "We have a job we have to do. I know you are worried for your wife and your kid. That's the reason you're here. We have to stop the Covenant anywhere they strike, or they'll march straight to earth and kill every man, woman and child there. It's not just your wife and kid that's depending on you. All of humanity is." She motions for him to get up, and turns to fire her battle rifle at an Elite that had gotten too close to the trench, "Hold this position, I need to go find out where our air support is." She says to him, hoping he'll do what she asks, and not cut and run. If he tries to run away in this firefight, he'll be cut down in a heartbeat. She just knows it.

    She moves through the trench looking for whoever has the radio back to HQ. They're going to need that air support here sooner rather than later, though she has a feeling that it might not be coming.

Priscilla has posed:
    The first four words out of the ghostly Psyber's mouth cause Priscilla's blood to freeze in her veins. 'It'll happen then'. Such a statement goes well beyond any ideas she may have had of Psyber trying to distance her from the Union, and straight into territory that has alarm bells ringing full blare in her head. That strange, unshakeable feeling of vicarious nostalgia; the sense that this conversation had already happened; makes doubting the dialogue playing out before her eyes a distant, far-away thought. What if, against all odds, the Witch had spirited her away here, alone, away from everyone else, because it wanted to protect her? What if it was showing her these things because it already knew them, and due to some facet of its unassailably alien personality, it had decided it would rather not see them unfold. Homura had said it, hadn't she? That these Witches are consumed by their most negative emotions. Perhaps in its past life, it too was subject to the same whims of paranoid and spiteful people. Misery loves company, after all.

    Deciding it would be best if she were to not go anywhere, Priscilla sits down in the corner of the alley, knees pulled to her chest, hair, dress and tail getting soaked and soggy in the rain. The words 'puppy-dog' sting. She'd watched this man for three years from afar. Fought by him in some of his worst battles, but never demanded anything of him. She'd declined the invitation to join his inner circle, hoping not to be simply tuned out in the way he'd grown so used to the rest of his coworkers. And he'd come to see her as well. Stuck his neck out for her in Lordran. Was that really so pathetic? Was she really that transparent? Nathan chills her most of all. He'd done nothing but help her every step of the way through the painful process of being reunited with her homeworld, and yet it somehow seems completely in character for him to drone out those words in the same monotone as always.

    So be it. He'll never find her here.

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva blinks. Okay, she's in the future, she supposes. It could be an illusion, but weird crap happens in the Multiverse every day...

"What." She says, staring at her duplicate as she goes full-bore. "Whoa, wait a minute. Sure, I barely know a lot of the people there, but they all seem cool. Why would I get them killed? That's..." She trails off a bit. "Wrong." She edges away from her Future Self a bit. "What happened to you... me? Why would we make that kind of a decision? Since when did we know what was best for everyone? And why would I get a cute hunk of man like Psyber killed in order to have to take over his corporation and have /more/ work to do? I've still got all the Templar stuff at home to deal with!" Riva is looking significantly less confident by this point, but doesn't pick up her guns.

Madoka Kaname (439) has posed:
    Pain. Terror. Despair. Hopelessness.
    A quartet of emotions rife in the world of a Witch, so strong as to break free of her bounds and run rampant on the world, to spread her pain to others. As Samhain, free and wild, flings the Multiverse's strongest into nightmairs and despair of their own, only one remains. Floating in a haze between dream and reality.
    She sees many things.
    She hears many voices.
    A single girl wanders the land of dreams, peeking from world to world, a transient visitor poking her head through many doors. Try as she might to spread herself, she can but open one door at a time.
    Her first stop is a conflict ravaged land on a dying planet. Ash and glassed earth, choked with the dust and fog of war, where a single soldier fights on her last battlefield in an act of Noble sacrifice.
    Like a gentle presence, she approaches, whispering words gently in an ear. "Not here."
    A soft hand, small, fragile, and warm, touches to unyielding armor, solid and assuring.
    "That's right. You have a job to do. Fight. That's what you do, right? You won't have failed if you give it your all. But not here... This isn't your last fight. You're needed somewhere else."

    "So please, wake up."

Psyber (253) has posed:
    RYUKO:

    The door opens to the... Mankanshoku family. The crunching sound is them biting into whatever ingredients Sukuyo has used tonight, hungrily going through platefuls of the delicious dinner. They all kind of look up at her and then look at eachother. Mako is the one that gets up.

    She scuffs her foot awkward, "Ah... Ryuko... uhm." She frowns, "We talked. Your blood always makes such a mess. And the Academy always wants to make trouble. Uhm. We decided you should stay somewhere else. Sorry." She says before slowly starting to close the door.

    DRESDEN:

    The gravestone seems slightly familiar to Dresden. A shape he's seen before, a style he partially recognizes. The priest nods his head slowly, "Yes. It is sad when men simply give out. They're not sure what took him. Sad."

    He motions to a chair across from him, "Please, have a seat. I'm sure Harry would appreciate someone being here."

    SATSUKI:

    Ragyo laughs haughtily, leaning back in her chair, "Ah hahaha. Ah, relax dear. I would never hurt my daughter~." He croons, reaching out across the toppled table as if to caress satsuki's cheek in a relaxed fashion, even as the girl goes on the defensive.

    "But please don't make a scene, I do like this cafe," She flatly notes, her hands falling to her lap, lacking a table to rest them on, "If you're going to get upset," Her tone turns Motherly-lecturely, "Well, if it makes you feel better, you can build your toybox again. I just wanted you to know I don't fear you."

    Oddly, despite not having her sword on her, Satsuki can ALMOST feel it. As if it were at the tips of her fingers, just slightly out of reach. Something she SHOULD have, but doesn't. MIZUKI:

    "Individually you are bad at those things," Comes Mizuki's own voice from out of the door, "But come on. You know what you're actually bad at. Or do you~?" It wonders, taunting her.

    "Perhaps you don't know at all. Oh ho ho~. Silly ignorant girl." It's Mizuki taunting herself. Her cackling laughter fills the room.

    RYOKO:

    "Yes~ Cry cry~." Comes a different voice. This voice sounds like a 15 year old alto gloating in victory, a bully that is happy that she has broken someone, "Cry, cry cryyyyyy, and no one will hear you because you're aaaall alone." Her voice croons, almost sneering in its tone.

    A form appears across from her, vaguely humanoid as it asks, "Someone has the worst day of her life, so why should she suffer alone. Misery loves company, so will you be my company?"

    HIMEI AND HOMURA:

    "You guys can't fight!" Psyber protests to them both, looking between the two of them as he guns down familiars. Psyber steps forward towards the two of them in his typical covering formation.

    "Anyway, whatever this thing wants to send to stop us, it'll get handled." Psyber says, looking to Himei as she takes her stance, "I meant it when I said I'd do anything to stop you two from getting involved in something like this again."

    Himei is suddenly grabbed by the throat, using her migraine as a distraction in her senses. A powerful hand wraps around her neck as Yamiko Psyber moves to lift her up off the ground, "It's okay. Soon nothing will ever hurt you again," He says, tightening his hand and waiting for the telltale snap of bone.

Psyber (253) has posed:
    CECILY AND BELI:

    "Isn't it?" Says the voice in Cecily's bubble, sounding like her. It doesn't say anything else, though. If Cecily cries, she'd notice the tears don't evaporate. Instead they pool at the bottom of her bubble slightly. Beli's torture is her torture, it seems, and the Witch can think of no greater punishment than Cecily seeing Beli suffer.

    Out on the street, Beli is losing her temper, "Save us? What are you even on about," He says, shrugging, "The Angels will save us when they take out the Demons, don't you get that? No one's above them. Especially not... you." He pauses in a disgusted tone. His baton is out and extended again, looking towards her and ready to strike if she tries to attack him.

    KIRITO:

    Re:Re: Where you been, man?
    Body: For sure, man. I'll be proxying onto the Nippon servers like always. I wish they'd release this game in the US-of-A. Sick of this monster lag. I'll be logged in on Psyber, you know, that alias I use for everything?

    Kirito gets some rice balls shoved in his hands on the way out the door. A snack for the road. Outside, his world all seems just like it was before he ever unified. Before he ever tried out Sword Art Online.

    PRISCILLA:

    Like Ryoko, when Priscilla has a breakdown, she can feel a presence next to you. It's a shadow person, vaguely humanoid, that speaks in a girl's voice, "Sucks, huh? People always want to use and betray you. All my friends wanted was my power, so when I wanted to do something else, we all stopped being friends."

    The figure extends a hand to Priscilla, "You wanna be my new friend? I promise I won't ever ask anything from you." She can sense it smiling at her, trying to pry past her defenses.

    NOBLE SIX:

    Noble Six is really in a bad spot. The Private she's lecturing takes a deep breath and slowly nods his head. He shakily picks up his rifle again and starts to hold the position. Unfortunately for her the position comes under bombardment by covenant tanks. Huge jets of plasma begin to rain down, looking like they're about to fall into the trench.

    But it all stops when Madoka appears in the world, her very presence a disjoint in how Witches should work. The bombardment hangs in the air, the world quiets. Noble has time to think now.

    RIVA BENARI:

    Other Riva laughs at Riva slightly, covering her mouth with her hand again, "While he was attractive, and probably long-lived, he was too suicidal for us. He'd get himself killed and he wouldn't come back, and that would be bad for his business." She smiles coolly, "See, we Immortals, we have to look out for our own. We're going to be around forever, so we can see the big picture that..." She thinks, "Lesser beings can't. You figure this out after the first century or two of life. If they don't live with you, they'll just die without you." She shrugs.

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    "What? Why not?" Is Homura's first question. Why can't they fight? They're used to this, it's nothing new. Well okay it's rather new overall THIS scenario, but the overall situation, not so much. Then Psyber is being creepy. And then it becomes a bit more obvious. She can't tell he's a Yamiko, specifically; her best guess right now is that it's an illusion, or maybe shapeshifting Familiars.

    It threatening Himei is enough to cause an immediate reaction, though.

    "Let her go!"

    The handgun is discarded and replaced by a Regisword, which the Puella brings crash down for the elbow of the arm holding Himei in place. The blow echoes in time, and actually strikes twice rather than once, a second iteration of the same slash on a delay of about a second behind the first.

    Can she even hit hard enough to cut Psyber's arm off? If it's the real deal, probably not. If it's a fake, she can always hope. It's not like she has a ton of options here.

Noble Six (38) has posed:
    The plasma was about to rain down on them when everything in the world grinds to a sudden halt. Six rises up from where she had been about to take cover and looks to Madoka as she comments. Six's mind works on this for a moment, and then it hits her. This isn't Reach. This isn't the place for her final stand. She made it off of there. She survived. And she won't die here.

    Wake up, huh? She'll do it. She'll get up, and she'll fight. She won't ever stop fighting until she draws her last breath, whenever that day may be. The only way to stop her is to kill her...But then again, SPARTANs never die.

Ryuko Matoi (140) has posed:
    "Ah.. Well, I.." Ryuko looks down at her hands and her feet, her outfit stained red, including her hands. "No, Mako, it's fine.. I kinda put you guys in a bind, huh? I'm sure I can find somewhere ta' lay my head." She watches that door shut, and she goes limp. Her shoulders sag, and she sighs, turning on her heel, she looks back down the hallway..

Harry Dresden (206) has posed:
    Harry Dresden flinches at the name. And the gravestone. Wait wait wait no no no.

    There's a look of abject despair in his face for all of a moment or two, before... he shuffles overand sits in one of the chairs. Resignation on his face, maybe? Something approaching dull horror, but...

    No. No this wasn't right, this was... "Padre are you sure that... maybe they didn't know? I... there's got to be..." Why wasn't anyone here? What could have gone wrong? He sits down in front of the Padre, knowing what's he's going to see when he looks up at the gravestone.

             HARRY DRESDEN
             HE DIED DOING
             THE RIGHT THING

    Pain, terrible awful pain creeps into his throat. He can't breathe, he can't... why. A look at the padre. "N-no one? I... Waldo? Murph? Gggn. There's... there's got to be someone. Even... Mab, anyone?" No no no, this isn't right, not even a little bit.

Satsuki Kiryuin (430) has posed:
    Bakuzan isn't there. But it /should/ be. For that matter, she should be wearing Junketsu! She's reached the point in her plans where she is never not expecting enemies. Never not expecting a surprise attack, even from her own mother. So why can't she reach down and take hold of her sword? Why can't... why wasn't...

    Something... something isn't right. She would never make this mistake. Never be so unprepared. "What... is happening here?" she growls, only growing more defensive as the hand comes towards her. She was... she was doing something. Something important. Is her mother trying to distract her from it? Why does this all feel so wrong?

    Something clicks. "...you. What are you doing to me? With my resistance to Life Fibers, I shouldn't be susceptible to this from mother." Her gaze levels at the woman, and the Queen of Honnouji begins pushing back on that mental suppression, hard. "The only possible answer is that you aren't really Ragyo Kiryuin. And I won't accept myself or my plans being made a fool of by anyone less!" Like a star being born in infinite darkness, her will surges against the horror pressing down around her. And once again, her hands go for her sword, as if she's certain that in reaching for it, she will find it against all logic.

Mizuki (183) has posed:
    That earlier shock has briefly desensitized her to a point where the reverberant sound of her own voice isn't in the least surprising. Rather, it's just extremely - extremely - inflammatory. Her fists tighten considerably, now, the contours of her face growing ever the more indicative of her worsening mood. Still, with a series of breaths she is able to stay her wrath, facing the microphone with an ever more poisonous glare. "Pray tell, are you mimicking my voice just to give yourself an excuse for greater pretentiousness then you've yet demonstrated? Continue to behave in this fashion, and there will be no recourse for you. The people who came to this city with me will strike you down, and I will laugh as your soul is brought before the guillotine of your own madness." She squeezes her eyes shut with the last word, drawing in another, shaky breath.

    Briefly, she rubs her forehead, opening her eyes and looking around the room in an effort to locate some aspect of the phantom haunting her. "Ignorant I may be, but if I am, then I see no way in which you would be more learned on the matters of my heart. Now, come -- cease this obnoxious charade and speak with me in earnest. What despair has grasped you? To what place have you fallen? My associates..." She pauses here, briefly. "... my associates have a way of pacifying self-doubt and loathing. If you would allow me to pass through this door, I could lead them here. They could help you to find a way out of this maze you have built yourself. Please. Work with me."

    If telling it more of what she believes it wants to hear, maybe changing the subject will? Worth a try, at least. Still, though, in spite of herself Mizuki would find herself contemplating fervently what sort of iniquity it could be referring to. What in Creation's name would this abomina --... tortured soul know about her that she would not? Nothing, clearly. It's a farce, a ruse; something meant to throw her off. Recognizing this, she refuses to acknowledge it any longer.

    Or at least until she's forced to -- it's a safe bet that she much of this solidarity she's attempting to display is just a front. It shows in every twitch of her eye and quiver of her legs for those keen enough to notice.

Madoka Kaname (439) has posed:
    Having given one of Humanity's greatest soldiers a moment to breathe, a moment to regain herself, the girl continues on. One last smile as she slips away and on to the next door of dark dreams down the neverending hall Samhain has trapped those she loves in.
    To a woman trapped alone with her tears, locked in a prison of watching the one she loves suffer abuse, torment, and begin to fall to anger.
    "You're not alone." Says the gentle warmth of a palm on Cecily's cheek. Like an angelic figure bathed in pink light, Madoka speaks true, within the fox's prison.
    "She needs you, just as much as you need her... It's not right to keep the two of you separate, is it?"
    Her giggle is like a silvery chime, as the Law of cycles summons her bow to hand. "Here..."
    A mighty draw upon the string summons an arrow of light. "Why don't you go to her?"
    Indicating for Cecily to fire the bow and break free of her nightmare.

Ryoko (580) has posed:
    Ryoko's crying slows when the teenage voice interrupts her sobbing. Mockery cuts through her self-pity like a knife, a hot flush of shame making her sick to her stomach. The wig falls from her hands, tumbling away eternally into darkness, and she looks up through bleary eyes. She can't see very well, those damn stupid contacts are getting in the way, but she can make it out, that shimmering, indistinct form.

    Ryoko tries to hold herself back; but she's scared. Desperate, even. "You did this." She growls, and her teeth are... fanged, much more noticeably than normal. Orange lightning burns at her clothing, red plastic running down her cheeks and mixing with her tears. The gemstone on her wrist is a bright and brilliant red, even if it completely fails to illuminate more than her own savage features.

    "Let me go." Her voice is a harsh bark, tears replaced by fury as she has a face to look at. "Let me go or I'll kill you. I'LL KILL YOU."

Himei (331) has posed:
    Well this has rapidly gone from suck to blow.

    Or rather, from suck to strangle.

    "Hrk..." any snappy retort that Himei had is cut short by the powerful grip on her throat. Her arms flail a few times, but... well, she has an advantage here. She's already transformed, after all. If this had been a few years ago, she'd have been too panicked to do anything with her powers. She'd have scrambled and scratched. But now...?

    Now Himei still panics, and so she does what she always does when confronted by a powerful, surprising foe that she feels is out of her league.

    She blasts a bolt of silvery light through Psyber's chest.

Priscilla has posed:
    There are no theatrics for Priscilla. Nobody to talk to. To yell and scream at and tell them that they're wrong. The crossbreed watches the little stage play enacted by the two phantoms with dull, glassy eyes, staring over her knees as the oily water pools around her feet. She doesn't feel the rain hitting her face, nor does she even notice the sounds of the distant storm outside that little alleyway, lost in her own thoughts. 'Puppy-dog'. Is that what she was? A creature that thinks of others as part of its pack, but really handled by beings that view it as a lower form of existence. A needy dependant, either just useful enough to keep around, just endearing enough to put up with, or too close to human to get rid of without guilt. The more she plays her own memories through that filter in search of the truth, the more they start to take on a completely different hue; warped by that twisted lens. Awkward stares that had once seemed meaningful. Subtle smirks where there had been none before. Old dialogues spelled out in simple tones for unstable ears. Gazes that didn't really meet. Words that didn't really sound genuine. Psyber and Nathan are like a muted radio in the background by now. The question remains: "was I always the crazy one, and simply the last to know?"

    The sound of a new voice quietly jolts Priscilla out of her stupor; green eyes looking past sodden silver hair at the new character on the stage. "In truth, I am not certain what any of them wanted at all." Comes her plain, toneless answer. "I never did know what they desired from me. When I questioned why they accepted me and found no answer within mineself, I accepted it. That things were simply . . . different here." She presses her face into her legs, taking in a deep, bracing breath, though her voice still comes out as choked and hoarse as it would have been without it. "I suppose I was wrong." Wordlessly, Priscilla looks back up, and offers her hand. There are no tears to be seen. This was the way things always were. They weren't going back to the way they were before: they had never changed. She'd let the multiverse go to her head, and had gone a little crazy for a few years as a result. She'll look back on it and laugh. At least, that's how she rationalizes it to herself. Anything not to start crying.

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva's expression twitches, uncertain and then degrading rapidly from there through shock into horror. "Christ. Are you really what I have to look forward to?"

She scoots back and stands, starring to turn away to stalk back and forth. Her hands waving as she begins to yell. "You've lost it! You've lost everything! What happened to living? Having fun? Keeping some perspective? These people are supposed to be why we're fighting! It's what the Templars were all about! That's why I joined them! Hell, do you even paint anymore?"

She stops, leaning forward and slamming her hands on the desk. "Do you even remember what it's like to be human anymore?"

Kirito has posed:
    Glomph. Kazuto's grateful for something to munch on! He greets Sugu and his adoptive parents on the way outside, then finally reaches his porch, still scarfing down the rice ball. Once he's done though, he pulls out his smartphone. The e-mail alerts just went off. Sure enough...

    There's that name.

    Oh yeah, the demon hunter guy he worked for! Kirito brings up the reply and prepares to tap out a response on the touchscreen and just... stops after a few taps.

    He stopped not because he had nothing to say, but because his contacts list has DRASTICALLY shrunk. No Agil, no Lizbeth, no Tomoe... Silica's nowhere to be found... panicking, he cancels out of the response and scrolls several times through the contacts list. It was never really big back then, he just had a handful of people he sometimes hung with on some games... no.

    Even 'Yuuki Asuna' is nowhere to be found.

    THUMP.

    That's the sound of Kirito transition from 'sitting on the deck' to 'toppling backwards, limbs splayed out limply' as he gazes skyward.

    Could that have REALLY been all a dream? For the first time since waking up Kazuto's eyes show some real energy, but they're clouding up... he chokes down his urge to cry, but a few sobby noises still leak out.

    A montage of memories plays through his head with machinegun-like rapidity. Being flung free of the Death Game, meeting up with Asuna, making many friends, joining the Multiversal fight... "Double Fault?!"

    The Abstractum he was given has a special ability to switch manifestations between digital and physical, but... nothing happens.

    It's all gone. Or rather... maybe he never had it to begin with.

    Now really tearing up, Kazuto sits up on the porch's edge again.

    Is this some kind of sick joke? Was all that just a dream? He'd found something he'd wanted for so long without really knowing it. Was that real? Or was that just some trick of his own mind trying to tell him he needs to stop being a recluse, a product of his own guilt from ditching everything for the new game?

    Kazuto's never been a very loud crier. As his heart and stomach start knotting up, he does something that nobody's ever seen him do.

    The boy warrior who's tried to appear so strong and keep walking no matter what happens... curls up into a fetal crouch and starts quietly sobbing into his knees. Teeth clenched and gut full of nausea, he nearly vomits up his recent meal.

Cecily (186) has posed:
     Those tears do begin to flow, at first one, two droplets streaming down her cheeks to wet her tunic. Down below she can see Beli's anger rising, the devil of her costume showing through more and more than just that of a simple holiday outfit. "No," Cecily rolls over, pressing her palms to the wall of the prison. "Not again. Don't lose yourself, love," she breathes, having seen Beli nearly fall to Wrath before, and how many of their friends were there to help bring her back. Her tears flowing more and more. "You're -not- alone!" she cries out desperately, pounding on her 'cage' with such force that her hands discolor slightly and a sharp pain rushes down her arms. Anything to distract her.

     Then another voice, a touch, a light. Not one taunting or tormenting her. Warm, gentle. Her eyes widen and she jerks her head up towards Madoka. "You--..." she murmurs softly, finding her breath and her voice, breathing shaky. All she can do is nod dumbly as she's spoken to, ears lifting as hope starts to make cracks in the despair and hopelessness. She reaches for the girl's hand, then finds purchase on the bowstring and the arrow.

     Magic and artifacts never did get along with Cecily, but she wasn't the one to draw the string and form the arrow. All she would be doing is letting it loose, letting it go. She puts herself in a position to do just that, hands trembling as she composes herself. "Thank you," she murmurs, clenching her eyes shut to squeeze out the last pair of tears before releasing the arrow into the barrier. "I'm coming, love."

Beli Klum (238) has posed:
    "The /angels/ could not care any less about you than the demons!" Beli's voice raises to a shout. Her hands are clenched into fists so tight that her nails begin to dig into her palms. Her body trembles, her breath nearly impossible to keep regular and even when she isn't snapping at the officer in front of her. "How can you not even see that?! How can you not notice that your choices are not your own? All they want is to influence you so that you will go to their world, and then all they are to you is more service, more /power/! You are nothing more than fuel for an ever-expanding competition of might, and I...I..."

    Her voice cracks. Something slips into her mind, then, that makes the darkness at her feet falter in its steady spread. Rage flickers out of her expression, replaced with a steadily heavier and heavier despair that makes her hands loosen and her shoulders sink.

    "...I was...supposed to save you. I was supposed to save you all..." She blinks, looking down at her hands. Something is wrong. The hybrid pushes, strains, attempts to draw out /something/, but the souls she has taken are silent. Adramelech, Zerachiel, Beelzebub, Barachiel, Belphegor, Jehudiel, Alastor, Raphael...none of their powers come, no matter how she focuses on them. Realization suddenly strikes through her heart like a burning knife, stealing a sob of fear from her throat. Her soft voice is barely a hushed, terrified murmur gasped through panicked breaths. "...this is...this is not right. What happened? Where is...where did...?"

    A terrifying thought begins to settle into her mind as she sinks to her knees, suddenly feeling very, very frail. "...was it all a dream...?"

Psyber (253) has posed:
    BOSTON:

    Noble Six wakes up on the docks in Boston. She can feel smoke clearing from her head, though Samhain is not aware this has happened yet. The massive figure of the Witch is floating high over the city, its smoke causing thousands of wiry lines back to it as it clutches one hand shut and revels in the horror it is unleashing across the city. The others are nearby, heads all surrounded in the smoke, looking catatonic in their standing positions.

    RYUKO:

    Ryuko feels an arm go around her shoulders. That same voice that has plagued two others is now here to talk to her, "Nowhere to go? People abandoned you? You can stay here. That's just one lame room. I got dozens of others to show you if you'll just stay around." He voice practically grins at her, starting to lead her down the hall and towards the darkness, by dragging if necessary, though it tries to avoid seeming like its dragging her.

    HARRY DRESDEN:

    "Shame." Says a feminine voice. A female form, made of shadows, is sitting next to her, "I died alone. Or I was going to. I chose not to, you know?" It asks him, sighing, "I figured... If I was going to go out, I wanted company. I don't wanna KILL anyone, I just don't want to be alone."

    "You don't have to die alone, though. I'm here!"

    SATSUKI:

    A sword is drawn and faced towards her mother. The being taking the form of Ragyo simply shrugs, "I'm making people suffer with me. But if you won't believe this reality so much, well." The woman smiles, "I will show you how hopeless the situation is."

    She snaps her fingers and vanishes. Satsuki also wakes up to the same sight that Noble Six does: A city enslaved under darkness.

    MIZUKI:

    "Can they?" The voice asks curiously, shifting from Mizuki's voice to someone else's standing across from her, "I don't know the inner workings of people's minds. Truth told, this is all new to me. I'm just projecting YOU~. I don't read the slides."

    The shadowy figure waves a hand, "But if they can pacify doubt and self-loathing, why do you keep biting your lip, wringing your hands, trying to figure out what you're bad at? How can you promise me help you don't even have." The figure says before vanishing through the door again.

    RIVA BENARI:

    "Do you think you're going to?" The Other Riva asks pretty calmly, despite the hand slamming on the desk. She watches the real Riva rant about the situation, "Painting is... a frivolity I indulge in from time to time. Landscapes, mostly. Those last the longest before they change. But it all will eventually."

    "That's why immortals are so important. We won't change when others will. Or we'll change for the better, like you're going to."

Psyber (253) has posed:
    HIMEI AND HOMURA:

    Yamiko Psyber's arm is easily taken off at the elbow, causing him to drop Himei as she blasts right through his chest, "Augh... damnit..." He groans, the hole seeping black blood as he wobbles on his feet, "Wish I'd been the new breed. Identical to human. That wouldn't have worked..."

    He has just enough energy to look at BOTH the girls and ask, "You'll finish her off for me, right? Orders and all." Before he falls over backwards, dead.

    It's at this point that the realization that the street is empty sets in. There's only Himei, Homura, and their new friend known as Creeping Doubt.

    RYOKO:

    The shady figure crosses its legs and takes a sitting position, "You COULD kill me. But how do you know that would free you?" The voice asks in a desperate bid to cool her fury. Can't have her get TOO angry and break out, now can we?

    "For all you know, I killed everyone else and it's just you and me." It puts up its hands, "Can't kill your possibly only companion."

    CECILY AND BELI:

    "Haha, what? Are you insane?" The cop asks her, watching her rage flicker out as she collapses to the ground. He collapses the baton and then puts it in his holster at his side, shaking his head at her, "Stop babbling and get moving," Comes the voice of the cop before he starts marching away.

    Beli can feel two hands rub her shoulders. Two shadowy hands, "Come on, now. You can still save people. That's what I'm trying to do. You wanna be fri-"

    The shadow is cut off as a blast of light punches through nowhere in the sky, slamming into the ground as an arrow. The being shrieks before disappearing into nothingness, vanishing like dissipating smoke.

    Cecily and Beli may now reunite and wake up.

    PRISCILLA:

    "They weren't your friends." The voice says firmly, smiling at her as Priscilla takes her hand, "Everything was wrong before, but it's right now. It'll be just you and me here, and I promise. Friends forever." The voice says, wrapping shadowy arms around Priscilla.

    "Promise you won't ever hurt me like other people did?"
    KIRITO:

    New Personal Message from 'SammyHain<3Gaemz'

SammyHain<3Gaemz: Hey u here?
SammyHain<3Gaemz: Cmon dont ignore me :(((
SammyHain<3Gaemz: i just wanna play games
SammyHain<3Gaemz: my friends all vanished but u

The IMs coming into Kirito are light grey on a black background. And they're pretty insistent. They're also the only thing he can pull up on his computer right now, whenever he gets back from being sick.

Satsuki Kiryuin (430) has posed:
    Satsuki finds herself awake, Bakuzan in hand, pushing herself up onto her feet. She blinks away a muzzy-headed sensation and sweeps her gaze around, spotting Noble Six - to whom she nods briefly - and then the others. And then, just for a moment, she calmly looks skyward. "If you've looked into my head, you know that hopelessness and fear are an obstacle over which I step daily. Neither they nor you will prove any obstacle for me."

    First things first. The Queen of Honnouji calmly strides her way straight up to Ryuko, sizing the still-catatonic girl up. She seems to consider her options for just a moment, before a single step back is taken, and without warning Bakuzan whips downward in an incredibly fast slash-

    Right through the haze surrounding Ryuko's head. With all her will, she brings her sword straight through it, as if seeking to disperse the miasma keeping the other Honnouji student on lockdown.

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    Okay that worked. She... didn't expect it to, but she'll take it. So Psyber's Yamiko is destructively overprotective, huh... then again, this might not be true to the real deal. It depends on the Witch's ability to be accurate.

    The Puella extends a hand to help Himei up, right up until the fake half-angel rings out his last words. Then her extended hand is filled with a handgun instead, and actually capitalizes on the fact the other magical girl is probably still grounded. She might have caught herself, though, but either way, gunpoint.

    "... that's problematic. How do I know he wasn't bluffing? We've both already had a Yamiko. Either it's impossible to have two like you said, or I'm with someone who'll try to choke me too."

    She... might be a bit more on-edge than she'd like to admit.
    Normally she'd trust Himei more than that.
    That's probably why her arm is shaky and she can't keep the steady aim.

Madoka Kaname (439) has posed:
    In another dream Madoka has done what she can. And now she's direly needed elsewhere. With one last squeeze to send Cecily on her path, just like that Madoka moves on.
    Elsewhere...
%THope Spirit Madoka Kaname has invaded your world.
    As Priscilla reaches out for that dark hand another reaches for her. A small hand gooved in white. "Things are different. There's nothing to know! Because they are your friends. It's really that simple. You weren't wrong at all."
    Her voice is a slim thread, delicate and gentle. Loving in it's own selfless, earnest, honest and wise way that only one immortal could share with another.
    It is to the other figure that madoka turns her attention. "She won't hurt you. It's okay. None of us will. But I need you to let her go."

Harry Dresden (206) has posed:
    Harry Dresden's eyes come slightly more focused, the tears that were threatening him slipping back a bit as he's got a proper audience talking to him again. A shadow lady. Not suspicious at all.
    No, really in the cemetary Harry's met some... okay people. More than a few young ladies, even. His lip twitches a bit, and he adjusts the big floppy Merlin hat. "I have to admit you've got me at a disadvantage, since.. uh. I'm not used to being a ghost, actually." That's what this is, isn't it? He's dead and stuck here like some damn fool haunt.

    What a way to go. "So, what, just here to gloat that you offed Harry Dresden or... uh." He adjusts the hat again. This feels rediculous and more so that he's dead why is he still in the get up AM I STUCK LOOKING LIKE PARTY MERLIN FOR ETERNITY?

Cecily (186) has posed:
     As the arrow of light shatters her cage, Cecily dives down with it, feeling strength and hope return to her. She descends to the street, seeing the aftermath of the impact, the dissipation of the being rising up from behind Beli. And soon the hybrid will feel a pair of hands on her shoulders again. "You're not alone. I'm here for you, love," comes the fox's voice, still shaky. "Wake up. We have to move. The city is still under attack and the others may need us." Those hands slide down Beli's shoulders, the warmth of the woman's body pressing into her back as she embraces her fully with arms and tails. "I'll always be here for you," comes the whisper with a kiss to the back of her head.

     Then Cecily's eyes flutter open, shaken free where she stands on the Boston street. She presses the heel of her palm to her forehead, shaking off the feeling of waking from that nightmare. She looks around, seeing the state of the others, awakened and otherwise, and huffs. "Can we get the others out of this from here?" she asks those awake, already moving to where she'd seen Beli. In her hands she draws that promised sword, a completely mundane claymore, long and heavy and solid steel.

     A kiss is pressed to Beli's cheek, the cold handle of the blade pressed into her palms, "Wake up," she repeats. She splits, two of her 'sisters' moving to check the Vickers left on the hood of her car, clearing the breech and getting ready for a hint from someone who knows Witches far better than she.

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva has always worn her emotions on her sleeve, and this continues to show now as the other her simply sits there in the face of her increasing volume and agitation. Anger, fear, and desperation etch themselves across her expression as she responds, "Frivolity?! God dammit!" Finally, she grabs one of her MAC-10s off of the desk and points it at Other Her, her hand shaking.

But she doesn't fire. she just roughly stows her guns in her toga and backs away. "Just... get away. Go away, damn you! You're not me, you're just some... Super-cold heartless bitch! Do you hear me! You're not me! And you never will!"

Ryoko (580) has posed:
    "You... killed them?"

    In her half-crazed state, Ryoko's mind swims with possibiities. At the least, Ryo-Ohki, dead. At the worst... there's nothing here. Nothing. It is similar to the moment she found herself in the Multiverse, torn away from the dysfunctional family she'd managed to pull together.

    Ayeka. Annoying, frustrating, stuck-up, brilliant, beautiful Ayeka. Dead.

    Sasami. Adorable, innocent little Sasami. Dead.

    Mihoshi. The most hilariously ditzy police officer she'd ever had the chance to prank. Dead.

    Old Man Yosho, that quiet, stoic, dignified gentleman. Dead.

    And of course, Tenshi.

    "If you've killed them..." When Ryoko lunges, both hands lead the way, aiming to wrap tight about the figure's throat and crush. She's NOT thinking straight; what the shade says makes sense, but Ryoko is about as logical right now as a wounded bear.

    Whether she gets a grip on nothingness or passes straight through, she'll still cry, "Bring them BACK! Give them BACK to me! Or I'll kill you, and join them in the next life! There's, no need for a universe, without my Tenchi!"

Himei (331) has posed:
    THUD!

    Himei blinks a few times, coughing, and rubs her throat as she scrambles away from the arm. A quick pulse of light disintegrates the arm, done almost out of habit, and the magical girl staggers to her feet- or starts to, anyway. Her hand was reaching toward Homura's, but now it's frozen.

    "Clever," she whispers, still getting her voice back. "It should be impossible, but if this is a different world's, maybe not. So... easiest solution is I shoot you. But if your corruption is high enough, it would hurt the real you, too. And you won't let me, because if I am a Yamiko, I could just blast through your chest easy enough... I think. I'm not actually sure how Yamiko power replication works."

    She pauses. "There's something I'm missing, though..." She's now wishing she were sharper about this sort of thing, because she's sure there's a way out of this.

Ryuko Matoi (140) has posed:
    No.. That's not right.

Ryuko clenches her fist.. "Mako.. would never kick me out. They wouldn't kick me out.. They're my family, damnit." She doesn't pay attention to that voice, beyond telling it to shut the hell up. "I'm not goin' anywhere.. This is bullshit!" She resists any attempts, now, to move.

"Mako's my friend.. She wouldn't abandon me!"

Mizuki (183) has posed:
    Mizuki's look hardens yet more, but in that darkening, almost seems to soften. That she finally coaxed this witch into speaking with her own voice is victory enough to void most of the pain brought on by the recognition of her own writhing. She takes another deep breath, here, much of her fidgeting halting. She's holding her breath to reduce her movement where her emotions alone cannot. Whether or not this is symbolic in any way is very much up in the air.

    "They have not known me long enough to become so entwined with my course of life that my actions would be reflective of them in the ways that you are describing. And that is largely because of -my- weakness. I am too preoccupied with professing my own distance from their norms, and far too caught up in my own flights of fancy, for them to have seen even the faintest fraction of what lies beneath my haughty facade. Perhaps that is one of my weaknesses: I am a terribly poor socialite. I am also..." She closes her eyes, again. "... a horribly fickle person. Fickle and arrogant, to a degree that I would think mere words of rote superficiality would undo untold amounts of your pain." Mizuki eases up rather suddenly, her arms falling into neutral positions as her head... bows. Her hands gradually fold at her waist, and she begins to look... vaguely reverent.

    "Forgive me. I had, in a moment of weakness, forgotten myself." Her gaze slowly rises to the door. "I have not experienced a pain like yours, but I have met people like you. People who have been betrayed. People who have turned their back on the world in order to forever indulge their own delusions and scorn. Indeed, while I have no right to the sensation, I had withdrawn into such a realm not unlike the one you are living in now. For hundreds of years." She sighs. "Far too easy is it to turn one's back on reality. And unlike some would say, I would not insist that you return there immediately. But if there is any chance that you will listen -- any chance that I may offer your spirit rest and asylum in any form, physical or figurative -- let me know. If your tale truly meets its end this night, then tell me. Everything. I will write it so that you, and your toil, will never be forgotten. So that one day your story may save some poor soul from the suffering you experienced."

    Then, assuming she still has it on her person, Mizuki would reach into one of her concealed pockets and fetch her notepad and pen. She would then reach a free hand for the door and attempt to press it open, just in case something she said might've triggered the lock.

Noble Six (38) has posed:
    Things start to come into focus again as Noble Six wakes up back in Boston. That was a hell of a trip. She pushes herself back to her feet, slowly but surely getting back up onto her legs and stabalizing herself. It looks like everyone else is still out cold.

    She looks up at the huge witch, and frowns. She would need to call in an MAC strike to take something like that out by herself, and she's pretty sure that the Crimson Dawn isn't on station this time. She moves over to whoever is closest to her, and tries to see if there's a way to wake them. They'll need all the help they can get to bring this thing down, and she knows better than to try to solo it.

Kirito has posed:
    Oh who the hell is this? Can't they see that Kazuto's having a rough day? Glowering at the screen after he wipes his eyes... Kazuto's eyes lock onto the name. There's a name that gets him tense like few others. With a sharp hiss-like intake of breath he gets up to his feet and brings his empty hand up behind his back to grip... empty air.

    And he's quick to mentally chide himself. Of course, he's not a swordsman... what is he thinking? Why would he have a sword?

    That reflex is just so terribly ingrained. He actually feels quite naked without a weapon, even in his own peaceful neighborhood life. Ever since being freed from the Death Game... but wait, was that part of the dream too?

    Kazuto croaks out a hopeless, despairing sound, and seats himself again.

    Maybe he's just losing his mind.

    Though his soul feels far too empty to emotionally process ANYTHING, he reads the messages again... and decides he should ask Psyber if they've ever spoken to this person.

    But the device doesn't respond. Nothing's responding but the response features. "......." How cruel can this joke get? Is the whole world just trying to torture him?

    No, it's not Kazuto's way to cry much. He bottles everything up into a bitter brew and uses it to fuel his journey forward, even if that journey's almost certain to end in ruin.

    Oh, the temptation to tell this person to just bug off. Or ignore them. But he feels he simply cannot do that.

    Sure, once he could've done that. Blow off all his obligations, focus on himself and his needs and worries, but too much has happened since then.R
    Or maybe it hasn't happened, but he must at least act on the lessons he learned... or he'd be betraying everything he feels he now is.

    Nervously, and choking down his bitter anger, he enters a response with rapid fingerpresses on his smartphone.

    'I hear you. What games?'

    He stands up, just trying to breathe now. Both hands - one clutching the smartphone to await a reply shake - stuffed into his pockets.

    The boy's head is bowed and face cast in shadow. Sorrowful and hollow eyes gazing at the ground. He doesn't even try looking out into the yard whre Sugu's often training...

Beli Klum (238) has posed:
    Beli doesn't even respond to the cop this time, as she feels fear, doubt, and a powerful sense of loss steadily creeping through her. Is he right? Was it all just a crazy, desperate dream to escape day after day after day of crushing loneliness and dismissal? Was she simply reading too many silly stories, enough that her mind developed such wild fantisies as a half-angel who encouraged her and trained her to be better than she could be, a strange fox-woman no less out of place than herself and yet even more caring than she, a magical girl whose foul mouth was only matched by her honesty and good nature, a hunter who, while cold and distant, still held a warm and selfless heart...

    ...was it all just...nothing? Idle hopes for a world that could never exist?

    The hybrid jumps and gasps when she feels shadowy hands on her shoulders. They grip, squeeze. She freezes; it's the same kind of touch she's experienced before, almost the same slithering, weaving words. Words she would hear now and then before the Multiverse came into her life, manipulation predations against her weakness and doubt.

    ...but before she can sink any further, piercing light shoots through the street and casts away the figure clinging to her. And another set of hands, warmer and far more loving settle on her shoulders, making her gasp again. A kiss is pressed to her cheek, and a sword pushed into her hands.

    "...Cecily...?"

    The moment she blinks, she finds herself back in Boston. Back in the dark, stormy city, where a Witch looms above the docks. She blinks again, before her expression hardens to a determined glare and she slowly pushes herself to her feet. A glance is given to those around her to make sure she's back, and when she feels confident that everything is where it should be, a light smile begins to settle over her lips.

    Light flares around her. Six black, feathered wings spread from her back, coated in a sheen of blue. Three black halos hover behind her head, blue flames hovering in their centers. And cyan fire slips over the blade of the claymore in her hand, coating it in the cleansing power of angels as she looks back up at the Witch.

    "...I am not afraid of you. Or any other lies you show to me." The sword lifts, braced in front of her. A deep breath is taken, then released, slow and steady to calm whatever remains of overwhelming wrath. Maybe she can't do much by herself right now, but...she isn't alone, at least.

Priscilla has posed:
    That's right. Nobody had ever actually said they were friends. She had people who she thought looked after her, and people she thought she liked her, and even people she thought respected or listened to her, but at no point had Priscilla anyone she could definitively call a friend. It all seems so glaring in retrospect. People would thank her or offer praise, but when did they ever want to meet her or do something just for fun? Why was she perpetually on the outside of every relationship formed between the people she knew, ignored until she could be fleetingly useful? Everyone around her was meeting new people, making friends, saving worlds, forming clubs, even getting married, and what presence did she have among any of them after all this time? Did anyone even think about her when she wasn't there? Had everyone grown up without her?

    Finally pulling herself out of that soggy dent in the asphalt, Priscilla gingerly moves to return the shadowy figure's embrace, doing her absolute best not to give into emotion. This Witch - this person - had been the one to save her from her 'companions'. The one to show her the truth. The one who, here and now, understood her, and wanted the best for her. How could she say no to that? What reason would she have for denying someone who obviously felt for her? Besides. Being forced to write off so many people at once is hard. She can't give up on everyone quite so fast. It'd be much easier if there was at least one person she could trust; something left after she'd gotten rid of everything else. "Thou hast mine word I-"

    Priscilla freezes at the second voice. She turns to see if another spirit has been added to the two from earlier, already on edge, trembling at the idea of hearing more of those venomous words. The urge to close her eyes, hold her hands over her ears, and just ignore it is overwhelming, but she finds no third figure. For the strangest reason, she doesn't flinch at the feeling of the second hand on her own. For an even stranger reason, despite all the evidence to the contrary, she just can't doubt those words. ". . . -I will not harm thee, but I cannot stay." She finally finishes. Just saying those words makes her feel warmer, as if accepting Madoka's words is so natural that she'd wonder how she ever forgot them. Slowly, she backs away from the shadow, letting her arms fall to her sides as she slowly shakes her head. "I begrudge thee nothing. It wouldst be not mine place to hold ire for one who shares the same place I once did." Her fingers squeeze around the Cycle's hand for an instant, before finally letting go. "But such means I can say with certainty that this is not the only way of the world."

Psyber (253) has posed:
    HARRY DRESDEN:

    "Me? I don't want to kill anyone. I haven't killed anyone ever," The voice says calmly, sitting next to him. She crosses her legs and says, "If you need a name for me, you can call me Sammy now, I suppose."

    "We're all ghosts, though. At some point we realize our life is over. That we're stuck in a fate. I'm here to tell you it doesn't have to be alone." He can feel the voice cordially smiling at him. It's a friendly sort of feeling, with no hostility behind it for as long as he's not hostile to it.

    RIVA BENARI:

    "If it helps you to shoot me, go ahead. You know it won't slow me down much," The other Riva says pretty bluntly. However... the other Riva does have a passionate response to her 'younger self'.

    She slams her hands down on the table, "I AM YOU. AFTER however many centuries whittle away what humanity is left of you. When you realize that you will outlive EVERYONE you are friends with. I'm you, Riva." She slams her hands again, "You're never gonna die. And this is what you're gonna become!"

    SATSUKI AND RYUKO:

    Ryuko manages to resist her nightmare. And as the shadowy figure is pulled away from, the world is cut in half. It falls around her, dissolving into smoke. Satsuki has, during a weak moment in the connection, severed the nightmare that Ryuko was resisting.

    The plus side: Ryuko is now awake again.
    The down side: Ryuko owes Satsuki a favor.

    NOBLE SIX AND MIZUKI:

    The closest person to Noble Six is Mizuki! And trying to wake her up would have effects. From the other side of the door in front of Mizuki, she can hear cries of 'Hey wake up!' or 'Come on!'. If Noble Six shakes Mizuki, the room rattles. Including the door.

    Mizuki's confession is made to an empty room around her. And the non-response hangs heavy, the cries for Mizuki's attention coming from the other side of the door. After several moments, there's a click. And she can pass through it to awaken.

Psyber (253) has posed:
    RYOKO:

    The shadow can definitely get grabbed. And it looks surprised to be grabbed in the first place. The woman SHOULD be broken in spirit, but it has turned into desperation. A desire to fight against inevitability that the being could not compensate.

    As Ryoko squeezes down on the throat of the shadowy figure, the world fades to white around her. She is literally choking the life out of her nightmare, causing it to ripple and then eventually burst back into reality around her, snapping her into waking on the dock. She has brute forced her way out of a mental dungeon.
    HIMEI AND HOMURA:

    Do Himei and Homura need help right now? Nope.

    The Nightmare is content to let the two of them stew right now. They can have their square off and doubt one another. Eventually, it wagers, one of them will kill the other and it can swoop in and prey upon the despiration of the survivor.

    KIRITO:

    There's a pause before the screen bleeps back at him:

    SammyHain<3Gaemz: dunno
    SammyHain<3Gaemz: just feelin crummy
SammyHain<3Gaemz: games always help.
SammyHain<3Gaemz: We could play some shitty K-Grinder. Or an american FPS.
SammyHain<3Gaemz: itll distract us!

    The screen is a very enticing thing for Kirito to focus on. After all, if he's feeling bad, surely playing a game to distract himself and re-orient himself in his REAL LIFE will be the best thing, right?

    PRISCILLA:

    The confrontation between the spirit of Samhain and Madoka is a tense one. The Mega-Witch is not sure what to make of the Hope Spirit that has now disrupted no less than four nightmares during this little event. And others are breaking out as well. There's a stony silence at Madoka's words. No hostility, just silence.

    "I don't know who you are," The voice begins, "Or why you can do this..." It continues, "...but please stop."

    And then it ripples and vanishes, letting Priscilla re-orient herself and wake up.

Psyber (253) has posed:
    BOSTON (Everyone who woke up this round):

    Weirdly enough, Psyber is already up and about when everyone is waking up in Boston. Did that guy ever even fall asleep? Who knows! So mystery, much cryptic.

    "Bout time people started coming around," The half-angel declares to the people who are waking up or are re-orienting himself.

    "This thing needs to be taken down, broken apart, and cleaned."

    He angrily picks up a car and hurls it at Samhain, the motor vehicle soaring through the air and colliding with Samhain, who wobbles and teeters in the air, but recovers a moment later.

    Oddly, as people are breaking their nightmares, it causes bursts of smoke and energy, which are now apparent. Every single time someone wakes up, the smoke explodes in vanishing. And from the glowing part of its face that Samhain has, black smoke falls like tears.

Harry Dresden (206) has posed:
    Harry scratches a bit at his hair, hand reaching up and under his hat. He's now talking genially with a ghost lady at his own funeral while also a ghost and dead. "I mean, I get that we don't need to be alone but I'm still a little broken up about no one else showing up for this? I mean... I'm... I've made plenty of friends with the Union. I'm not THAT much of a recluse."
    She's not being violent, but the dull horror of being alone is subsiding now into curiousity as the investigator starts to regain his footing. "Inga? Riva? Puck? No one?"

    The wizard gets up and out of his chair and starts to look around a bit more. Hell, even if he was alone at his funeral, where's anyone else here? It's Halloween, isn't it? "This is the worst birthday ever."

Satsuki Kiryuin (430) has posed:
    The first thing to greet Ryuko when she awakens is Satsuki's face, calm and stern. "How long do you intend to keep dreaming, Matoi?"

    Perhaps surprisingly, though, her usually iron-hard voice has softened just a little.

    But there are no more words for her to give, apparently. She turns to look at Psyber, watching his display for a few moments, and then turns her gaze up to Samhain again, frowning. "...I am a purely close-range fighter. I'm not particularly happy with this, but I can't see any other alternatives. Psyber. Use that strength, and throw me. I'll see if I can cut her connections to her prey. And if not, I'll see if I can cut her."

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    "That's right. Either of us confirming who the other is is as deadly," Homura admits. She tries to think. Yamiko, Yamiko... what all was known about them. Black blood, lack of a conventional soul-- two things those two can prove easily enough.

    "You saw my Soul Gem and I saw Tamehito. It's unlikely either of us are Yamiko. But there's an easy enough way to check aside that," she says, raising the Regisword. It probably still has the black blood from Psyber on it, though the sword being pitch black isn't much help there.

    "We can just draw blood. You have a cutlass, I have this. Together on three, out of arm's reach."

    She takes a step back, though keeps the firearm leveled.

    "Deal?"

Noble Six (38) has posed:
    Kneeling next to Mizuki, Noble Six grabs her shoulders and starts to shake her repeatedly, "Hey! Up and at 'em! We've got work to do!" The movement should hopefully get her to actually come back around, if Six is doing it right.

Priscilla has posed:
    Priscilla rubs her face with her free hand as she wakes up, drawing in the breath she had forgotten while in her personal, hazy little labyrinth of self doubt. The only real plus she can see to the situation is that at least she doesn't feel like a wet cat anymore, since she hadn't actually been sitting down at all. "Lord Psyber, I-" She can't believe she's saying this. ". . . -think it wouldst be best to be not quite so zealous. The Witch represents a very grave threat, yes, but-" But. "-I made a promise I would not harm her."

Madoka Kaname (439) has posed:
    "Mm." Yet still in Priscilla's dream a moment longer, golden eyes linger upon the dark shade pleading her to stop. But Madoka cannot. She cannot remain static and let her friends be brought low by their own horrors. With one last squeeze to the crossbreed's hand before fingers detach, Madoka shakes her head. "I'm sorry. But don't worry. I promise you."
    "You won't have to hurt anyone anymore."
    Just like that, the Law of Cycles is on the move.
    And with a PING PING! Kirito's smartphone comes to life with a new email notification.
    Subject: Your friends are waiting!
    The body of the email is a bright blue background, with pixellated images of so many familiar faces. A half-angel, magical girls of all stripes, a half-dragon girl, faces and people Kirito knows from the Multiverse, friends both new an old. And of course... A chibi smiling Madoka.gif holding a pink heart.
    'Your friends are waiting for you on a new game. Pick up your SWORD and join now for free. Feel free to invite someone in need of HELP to join you.'
    There is a link to click labelled WAKE UP.

Ryuko Matoi (140) has posed:
    Ryuko sees Satsuki, feels the weight of her scissor in her hand, again.. And she scowls, "Oh, shut up. Don't we have a witch 'ta kill? You can gloat and stand above me, some other time." She huffs, and rolls her shoulders a bit, looking back to Psyber. "Can't disagree, though.. Got any ideas?"

Himei (331) has posed:
    Himei stares... and then something clicks. "No need." She shakes her head and rolls, moving slowly to make it clear she isn't going after Homura. "I know you aren't the Yamiko anyway. Your Yamiko's obsession would mean you wouldn't have let me go out anyway. You'd not want me to fight. And if you remember what my Yamiko's desire was, you'll know that shooting me in the back wouldn't really prove anything."

    She cracks her knuckles. "You want me to stab myself, fine. I don't think you need me to, either. Let's go save a girl."

Ryoko (580) has posed:
    Ryoko managed to brute force her way through but... she's not come through unscathed. One look at her tear-stained features, ruined outfit, and expression - a mix of confusion, shame, and anger - is enough to confirm that. She hangs in the air for several seconds, disoriented and trying to make sense of what she's just been through.

    The crunch of car against Witch seems to snap her out of it. Rain is evaporating before it can touch her, all that anger having caused her to call on her power. That orange lightning is still crackling, and Ryoko raises her hand towards the creature. Normally, she likes a good fight - but in this case... well, even the idea there might be something redeemable in there seems forgotten after the personal violation.

    A lance of orange plasma bursts from her palm, strong enough to take out spaceships and released in a continuous stream, she might be awake... but Ryoko's more murderous impulses have still been successfully riled, and she's lashing out with everything she's got. Perhaps most tellingly indicated by the fact she's not even screaming and shouting any more, let along quipping, she just wants to kill this monster.

Mizuki (183) has posed:
    When she wakes, Mizuki's expression is as dour and fretful as could be expected. Rather than rising with a start, she gives Noble Six a passing glance and a nod that just might be misconstrued as dismissive. Not a word emerges from her mouth as she rises from the ground gradually. She seems entirely disinterested in the talk of fight preparation, instead walking over in that same silence to offer a hand to Priscilla if she still needs it by the time she arrives.

    What's digging at her, though? Is it the fact that that whole exchange devastated her little 'I can correct everything with a few words' hero complex? Is it the fact that she's waking up to the realization that she had that sort of preconception at all? Probably a little bit of everything, coupled with the niggling feeling that there really is something wrong with her - some intensely profound flaw - that after all her time sitting idly by a window she has not been able to identify within herself.

    She doesn't even want to think about fighting a witch right now, but no one else is throwing a hissy fit and quitting, now are they? A subtle reflection of a certain Curator from her home might resurface just long enough to criticize her beyond the notice of others while she nods her head at the crossbreed's words.

    "... I agree. We should attempt to make this as quick and painless as possible."

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    "That's..." Basically completely correct. Or rather, as correct as Homura can wager it is. She never met her own Yamiko but she heard and that was kind of enough. With a resigned sigh the Puella Magi lowers her weapons and smiles faintly.

    "Right. Completely right. Better not waste time here then. Here, give me your hand. Let's try something stupid and overly sappy."

    If Himei complies, her hand is held up along with Homura's. She produces her Soul Gem again nestled between the hands, and focuses on finding the way. They're not just good for finding Witches, after all, they're good for finding a path through their mazes, and this MIGHT qualify. Just, thank god nobody is watching.

Cecily (186) has posed:
     Hopefully it wasn't Cecily's car that got hurled. She needs that. Eventually. With Beli awake and the others coming to, the pair of foxes tend to their autocannon. One pats the other on the shoulder and a thumbs-up is granted. The singular Cecily at the Vickers gets it steadied and takes aim at the Witch, Samhain. Then more and more foxes seem to just appear. Three of them, including the one at the 40mm, stay near the car and prep more firepower. The 40mm Vickers S, a Carl Gustav recoilless on a tripod, and the third with a .50 HMG, wired directly into the sight mechanism. There's six more. All nine still dressed as angels.

    "If you're going to start severing connections, people will need help," one of them calls to Satsuki. "We can cover more ground and you can do more damage. The Witch is a big enough target and I can offer fire support from the line here, but the rest of us..." the six sisters nod towards each other. "Will see if we can't round up some transportation for the dreamers and help them out as they wake up."

     Then much like the flare of blue on the sword in Beli's hands, the wings on the foxes shine and they take off into the storm, leaving the trio at the defensive line to open fire when the word is given.

Beli Klum (238) has posed:
    "Yes. I am not very fond of this," Beli remarks to Psyber, glancing back at the Witch as she tries to consider how to handle this situation. Well, at this range, if the Familiars aren't an issue, then maybe...

    The sword is heavy, but Beli manages to lift it up and point it at Samhain. She focuses, sending seraphic flames whirling around her forearm, up to the weapon's blade. Unhindered by the rain and wind, it burns in a calm inferno around the sword...then suddenly blasts forward, roiling and swirling with the calm appearance of a rolling breeze that holds the all-cleansing strength of an inferno behind it. The beam of seraphic fire rushes toward the Witch; hopefully it's power that works against all that is malevolent, evil, and negative will have some effect against the creature threatening them tonight, if only enough to allow those stronger than Beli to take it out before it causes more suffering.

Riva Banari has posed:
The words just continue to batter at Riva's ears. Each one just keeps stabbing at sore points, the secret places and dark thoughts she has when she's not out smiling and talking to people, the things that echo back while she is spattered with zombie and draug gore. "I can't shoot you." Riva snaps, her voice half-yelling, half-sobbing. "You'll just come back. I can't even shoot myself. I'll get bored of hanging out in the Shadow World eventually and then I'm back to..."

She slumps, just collapsing to the floor with a noise of anger and sorrow as she just sits there. "... And then I start just making friends with the other immortal people. Because there isn't a point to making friends with the people who'll just die..." She goes quiet for a minute, and then she continues speaking quietly. "And then it just goes on from there. People stop mattering. Why do anything that doesn't make something that will endure?"

Himei (331) has posed:
    Himei smiles faintly. "Right." She reaches out and shows some trust by taking Homura's hand, because... well, if it were the Yamiko, it would want to keep her safe anyway, right? There's no need to worry right yet.

    "Let's get moving."

Kirito has posed:
    An American FPS? Kazuto scowls.

    Kirito: Your tastes leave something to be desired.

    Then he gets a new message. And just like that, he DOES burst into tears. For a good fifteen seconds, he's staring at that. His head and heart start to clear up. He gazes at his IM lists, flicks to 'SamHain' and adds another message:

    Kirito: Come visit the Dicey Cafe. My friends and I will be waiting.

    That's probably not the smartest thing to do, given the sender of that message, but Kirito's too overjoyed to think about the details now!

    He hits the link...

    And awakens.

    Back in reality, Kirito's unconscious avatar springs to life again. Assisted by midnight-black wings, the swordsman rises to his feet. The dreary winds blowing through the city catch his longcoat. While his garment flaps dramatically in the wind he gathers up his treasured weapons and swings both with a testing flourish.

    "That was a foul trick. But if you're this lonely, then let's have a match. I accept your challenge!" He solidly declares into the mists, then glances about to take stock of the others...

Psyber (253) has posed:
@emit
    HARRY:

    The girl laughs at Harry, "That's logic. Logic doesn't work in nightmares, you know that," She says calmly, "This is what's going to happen to you. It happened to me. No one wants to be alone when they die," She says firmly, repeating herself to her prior points. Mostly because she doesn't have a counterpoint to the fact that Harry has friends who WOULD show up.
    HOMURA AND HIMEI:

    Wandering their way out is pretty easy, all told. The empty street leads forward, the gem guides them down a side path to a door in an alley. When they open this door, the entire world is flooded with light that washes over everything around them. Moments later, they're free to awaken shoreside in the harbor. They may take action against the witch next turn. r
    MADOKA AND KIRITO:

    Hope and Horror, two allignments as opposite as night and day. And they've been clashing tonight in a most curious way. Horror does not have the advantage of being a concept projected into the world, and so has found herself outmatched at every conceivable turn, out maneuvered and out-played. And more than that... out-loved. She wanted friends selfishly, but Madoka had been making pure appeals.

    SammyHain<3Gaemz: maybe
    SammyHain<3Gaemz: i dunno
    SammyHain<3Gaemz:I have bad luck with friends.
    SammyHain</3Gaemz has gone offline.

    Kirito clicks the link and then... wakes up!

    RIVA BENARI:

    The other Riva simply smiles at her 'younger' self, nodding her head, "Now you understand. You can accept this, though. And grow stronger from it. Outlast this sorrow and numb yourself. Accept reality." A brisk, simple message of 'give up' for Riva Benari.

Psyber (253) has posed:
    BOSTON:

    Psyber looks to Priscilla, "I don't want to hurt her. How she is right now is hurting her. I want to defeat Samhain and bring back whatever girl is inside her," Psyber says pretty distinctly, "I don't wanna kill anyone tonight." He says, looking to Satsuki. Then to Ryuko, "Hit it hard with whatever you've got. We'll purify her after."

    "You got it. One Shuriken Girl." Psyber carefully grabs Satsuki at the back of her collar and the center of her back before he whirls around once and flings her towards Samhain at a meteoric speed. But not before...

    Ryoko blasts the thing with a giant laser. Samhain brings up a hand to stop it, but it can't do so fully. It's VERY apparent that the huge strike of power directed towards the massive witch is bleeding through the defense of the hand as burn marks appear all over its body and up its arm. It's survived, but it is incredibly damaged.

    Satsuki's connection severing is pretty effective from the getgo. People are waking up and the multiple Cecilies that are going through the city are able to pick them up in commandeered vehicles which can be led to medical care in the still-free parts of the city.

    Beli's power hits the Witch, and some of the purification comes through. There's a staticy distortion along its body, but it manages to hold strong for now.

Harry Dresden (206) has posed:
    Harry Dresden's eyes light up with sudden recognition, and he slumps into his chair. "Oh. Okay. I'm... right." And then Harry smiles a bit, leaning forward in his seat and looking back at the girl, murmuring. "You know you're not alone right now, right? I mean, there's people out there who are probably trying to save you too, just like... I'm guessing, they're trying to save me."

    And he reaches out to try and plant his hand on the Witch's shoulder, looking at her. "Logic doesn't work in nightmares, no. But I'm not so sure this is my nightmare any more, kiddo." He sighs, and looks at her. "If you don't want to be alone... just... know that you can be saved. I know I can. And hell, if I can't, then I'm a shitty wizard." Now there's tears, as Harry swallows thickly.

    "No one should ever die alone, and you're not going to." He tries to find Samhain's hand, and squeezes at it. "We're both going to be okay."

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    Homura awakens, finally. It takes her a moment to understand why she was on the ground, but once she regains her senses and a rough understanding of where the lot of them still are, that faintest smile she might have had returns to a neutral frown, and she rubs the back of her head, waiting for Himei to get back up too so they can hop to Psyber's side again.

    "Still standing, I see. Has anything actually harmed it so far?"

    It looks vaguely bruised, but she can't tell if that's just how it looks or if it's the result of attacks so far. Could be both.

Satsuki Kiryuin (430) has posed:
    Even without the overwhelming might of Junketsu, Satsuki Kiryuin is a shockingly skilled swordswoman - able to compete with as much as a Two-Star Uniform purely on her own skill. With the Two-Star Halloween Magical Girl-Spec Goku Uniform she wears now, she can move well beyond human limits, and so as she flies towards Samhain like a missile, Bakuzan whips here and there faster than the eye can see, severing connections and cutting people free near the source.

    When she reaches Samhain, rather than take a slash, the Council Prez drives her sword in with a simple, sharp stab, and uses it to arrest her momentum entirely - and then yanks it free and hurls herself up onto Samhain's body. What follows next is a swordswoman dressed like Homura, leaping and darting all over a giant monster's body, striking out not at the monster itself but the connections of power linked to it.

Ryoko (580) has posed:
    Strangely enough, its Psyber's words to someone else entirely that actually helps rein Ryoko back in. The power she had been projecting dies away, and she looks at the bleeding, burned, staticky creature. Her expression softens, and she sighs, shoulders sagging. "Just tell me when to stop." She says, to Psyber. "And remember, you owe me a barrel of sake. /Ryoko Hakubi/. After tonight, I'm going to need it."

    Once more there's a ~bweep~ as Ryoko fades out of existence, and this time she reappears in the sky above Samhain. Rather than one concentrated beam, she lowers her hands, and dozens of scattered blasts rain down along sections of the creature her allies /aren't/ close to, aiming to inflict damage, yes, and definitely not GENTLE... but hopefully less lethal than continuing to try and carve the thing into distinct chunks.

Ryuko Matoi (140) has posed:
    Ryuko nods to Psyber, and brandishing her sword, just goes and charges at the Witch. Big or no, she's able to leap at it, using the buildings to get up to it, if she has to. Either way, she attacks the Witch directly. Like Psyber said, she hits it hard.

Beli Klum (238) has posed:
    Beli's attention flits between the others for a moment as she sees them waking up. Some relief settles into her features, then. Good. If they can just keep working together, maybe this will be over with...

    The rephaite doesn't say much more for now. She focuses, instead, pouring as much of her angelic power as she can through the sword and into that concentrated, cleansing beam. She seeks to simply burn away any of this evil and negativity that she can; if that saves someone being consumed by it rather than simply killing a creature, then all the better.

Mizuki (183) has posed:
    Any contribution Mizuki may make to the fight here is halfhearted at best. A few volleys of gunfire at areas that have already been struck to exacerbate wounds others have already wrought, along with some temporal teleportation around what seems to qualify as the witch's center of cognition to confuse her while others strike. She would continue on with the latter in a pattern, lashing out with her sword where possible and withdrawing where that isn't, until she is either snagged by her foe or she develops a lethargy from overuse of her abilities that would lead to that outcome in the immediate future.

    Then, assuming she wasn't captured, she would land some distance away and simply watch. When this is all finished, she's going to have to remember to ask what people learned about this girl so that she can piece together a story. Even if she didn't acknowledge it, even if she hadn't been around to hear it, Mizuki had still made a promise. As capricious and omissive as she may be, she fully intends to keep that promise, too. Ideally that would mean by listening to her stories by her bedside as she recovers, but one can never be sure that things will work out that way. And if they do? She's not entirely sure she deserves to be the one that hears her story. There are others - two in particular - who are in much better positions to understand. She would likely just be invasive.

    So maybe it would be best to leave this alone, and compile what other people discover. Watch them and content herself in knowing that there had been a positive outcome at all. Like authors and readers classically do.

Himei (331) has posed:
    First, Himei is speaking into the radio. She's doing this as she sits up, grumbling at the power and muttering, "Let's just blast this thing." Seething anger is a good motivator, for her, but she's no longer a berserker. Now, she picks herself up with a shakes of her head, and tugging the eyepatch aside so she can look properly magical-girly.

    "Well then..." An aura of brilliant silver light flares around her, shimmering and swirling upward. Homura will recognize it as one of those rare times when Himei is channeling her full power, something she hasn't done since the Earth-776 incident.

Noble Six (38) has posed:
    Now that everyone seems to be getting back up to their feet, Noble Six turns towards the Witch. The witch wants to fight dirty? Well Noble Six can fight dirty too. She grabs the weapon that had clattered down to the ground next to her, and then levels it at her target. She fires both rockets from the launcher, and then immediately switches to the weapon that had been maglocked to her back.

    This weapon is a sleek, rifle shaped device, which she levels at the target. The weapon whirs to life, building up a charge over a couple of seconds, before it unleashes a powerful, magnetically driven slug at relativistic speeds. It's not breaking any of the laws of physics, in fact it's taking advantage of them to deal as much damage as she can at once.

Priscilla has posed:
    Priscilla doesn't seem to understand the distinction between Witch and girl for a while. For her, the giant monster floating above the city may as well have been the same figure in her dream. Not everything lonely has to look human. She's very understanding about appearances. For that reason, it takes a few seconds for her to really grasp what Psyber is saying. ". . . very well. I shalt do mine utmost." She does stop however, just for a moment, as Mizuki comes by, gently squeezing the girl's hand as she offers it. Just the sight of her face makes her feel stupid for forgetting the time they had spent together. This girl, at the very least, understood her. How could she have doubted someone who spends their unguarded moments so earnestly?

    Letting go of the Author's hand, Priscilla takes a couple of steps back from everyone else, taking a deep breath as she gathers her energies and prepares to do something she hasn't needed to do since Annu. Placing her fingers to her mouth in the way one would to try and warm them with their breath, she sucks in a lot of unnecessary air, pauses, and then releases the full throttle version of her breath weapon; a brilliant, cutting beam of blue-white spiritual energy that slices through the air and across Samhain, sprouting fractal explosions of crystal on everything it touches. This always reduces her throat to smithereens afterwards, but so be it.

Madoka Kaname (439) has posed:
    Email sent. Madoka moves on. She can feel the effect she's having. The others are waking up. They're able to protect Boston. But her work just isn't done.
    With a knock on the door, Riva and Riva are interrupted, and she enters, adjusting the collar of her suit. White on black is the theme, a white longcoat worn over a perfectly pressed black shirt and slacks, and white necktie.
    "Excuse me. sorry to interrupt. I'm sorry I'm late." She says with a smile, sitting down at the table.
    She proceeds to steal Riva's coffee.
    "You don't have to accept anything, you know." The pink-haired divine says in her sweet tone of voice. "You don't need to shoot her. You just don't have to become her. I mean. You can still be whoever you want, right? You should never give up. And you should wake up and see that now."
    It took some effort. A work of sheer will amid all the multitasking and world hopping to go diving in two dreams at once.
    But the Madoka that appears within the nightmare of Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden is not in a halloween costume. She is not 8-bit. She is not a magical girl. It's a flowing white dress of starlight, hair long and free, bound in white ribbons as she appears, one hand on Harry's shoulder. "Ah... It looks like I got a little caught up with all the others, I'm sorry, Harry. But it looks like you handled this just fine, mm?" And her smile widens as she dabs at the wizard's eyes a little.
    Because when Harry reaches out to the shade, so too does she. "He's right. There's still hope. There's always hope. You're not alone right now. You just need to take our hands. All of ours."
    Not just hers and Harry's.
    But everyone that's now awake and fighting as well.

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva sits there, pulling her legs in as she listens to the other her make a simple, final statement, a closer on her arguments. The weight of inevitability is heavy on Riva's shoulders. It's hard to breathe with the stabbing sorrow that radiates through her heart. Her body is just a vessel. Her soul is eternal... But immortality is no blessing. Is there no other way? What will she be like in a couple hundred years? A thousand? Two? Ten?

"I..." She finally speaks quietly. "I..."

She looks up in shock as Business-Class Madoka appears and ganks coffee like a pro. She stares without comprehension for a moment as the words pierce through the fog of grief, a hand held out to a drowning woman. She readily grabs it.

"She's right. I can still... live. There's no reason why that has to be the only end, right? It's just one..." She staggers to her feet, and nods. "Even the little things are important. You forgot that... And even I did, for a bit. We're supposed to be artists, right? What's the point of a work of art if you overlook all the little details that give it life? Even immortality is like that, right?"

She nods to her other self. "But one thing is for sure. This was... educational. And now it's time to go." She turns, a door where none was there before. Doors are powerful metaphors, a focus...

And then there is rain. Riva looks up, now kind of thankful for the chill water that splashes down her face. It hides the tears. The anger is gone, Madoka's words helping to give her another way out... But there is a nod. "Break through." There is no going through something like that unscathed, but there is always a path forward. Sometimes you just need a little help to find it. The guns come up, her hands firm now as the levels them at the Witch. "If we can find another way, so can you." Is all she says as the Anima builds within her, flowing into her guns and charging. She brings the weapons behind her head, then flicks them forward in a deceptively nonchalant manner. There is a large radial blast of blue-green Anima force, a hexagonal color-shifted pattern gleamining in it for a moment as a screaming bolt of devastating force rolls towards the Witch.

Psyber (253) has posed:
RIVA:

    There's a sense of annoyance from the other Riva as Madoka shows up in the dream scape. Shortly after this, the other Riva vanishes, leaving just Madoka and Riva to talk about her future.

    Riva can easily open the door and step out into the real world, leaving the other riva looking about ten shades of pissed off at the fact that she just got trumped YET AGAIN by the pink-haired being.

    HARRY:

    Within Harry's nightmare, the shade finally snaps, "AT EVERY TURN you have outplayed me. What is it that you WANT FROM ME?!" She practically shrieks at Madoka, knowing what Madoka actually wants, but unable to understand it in her current form. So instead there's just rage and despair to meet Hope. She storms off, vanishing and giving Harry the ability to wake up when he so wishes.

Psyber (253) has posed:
    BOSTON:
    "Ryoko Hakubi, barrel of Sake, got it." Psyber says distinctly.

    The hour is getting late, so let's cut to the chase. With the level of attacks that people are bringing against this Witch, combined with the weakened state of its many nightmares being severed, Samhain is not as much of a fight as it could be.

    Samhain relies on the despair of others to create power for itself, so with that being diminished, it is not undefeatable. And it is not able to withstand the sheer attacks being leveled against it. Wave after wave of the assault explodes across it and eventually the witch lets out a dismal shriek and explodes into black mist that vanishes towards the sky.

    But something is falling down as the mist rises up. It's the body of a girl. 15-16, wearing strange clothes. Purple hair. Falling along side her is a jet-black gem about the side of a silver dollar.

    She slams down into the streets of Boston like a stone, kicking up water and debris as she and the stone land next to her. She is a stranger to all here.



What will later be recorded in Psyber's Hunter Diaries:
SAMHAIN, The Witch of Horror
True Name: Erica Weissman
Age: 17
Went missing 3 months ago from nominally Union-alligned territory. A lull in demon activities meant a chip shortage. Erica's teammates attacked her seeking her chip surplus but believing she would not share. The shock of killing her friends in self-defense, plus the horror of their betrayal, would create the despair and hopelessness that serves as the basis for Samhain. Samhain, as a Witch, is unique because in all instances of her manifestation she has never directly caused a death. Her Witch's Kiss has caused several people to kill others, but she possesses an incredibly low fatality count for the magnitude of power she manifests. Ultimately, it was not the goal of the Witch to kill, but this hunter believes she sought companionship as a basic instinct, making her unique among many encounters.

Kirito has posed:
    HERO INTERRUPT!

    As the girl tumbles groundwards from the heavens, a shockwave and a sound like wind instruments blasts over those on the ground. Then, a black streak zoooms up at tremendous speed.

    The Black Swordsman has to make several course corrections, but he arrives just in time to snag her when she's only a few hundred feet up.

    And he's not alone.

    A much smaller fairy appears in a blip of light near him and catches what is rather cumbersomely sized for her: The Soul Gem. Yui raises the gem over her head. "I got it, papa!"

    Smiling, but breathing rather shakily, the Spriggan and his Navigation Pixie daughter descend down towards the group and gently set the girl down before Psyber.

    The boy in black heaves a sigh of relief. "That was close!"

Homura Akemi (2) has posed:
    Homura is not going to complain that the firepower the others brought to bear was more than enough to finish the job. She sighs, and will keep her eyes on Madoka for the most part, crossing her arms. There are much better (but probably much worse too) ways to spend Halloween, she guesses. Boston can be such a pain about it.

    "Looks like a happy ending at least. Psyber, Himei, you've got this?" She's pretty confident they do, but phoning in Flowers or Laine might not hurt once everything clears.

Himei (331) has posed:
    The power fades around Himei as she sees the witch fall. She didn't get to do more than throw a bolt or two, but that doesn't matter. "I think I've got enough in me to handle my part, if Psyber does."

    She looks tired... even if she shouldn't be. She does not, however, look exhausted. She flashes a small smile to Homura, "Heh..." Then, as she approaches Psyber, she says, "Thanks. Your training really helped me out."

    ~

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva isn't gloating or celebrating at the end of that. There are no tacos. She just lowers her guns, and turns away from the situation. "And that's why nothing happens on Halloween." she says in a quiet, matter-of-fact tone.

Harry Dresden (206) has posed:
    And Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden is lying on a bench down the road from everyone else, gasping a bit as he's getting rained on, looking like a very bedraggled wet gandalf.

Psyber (253) has posed:
    Psyber looks very confused at the thanks from Himei, "Yeah, sorry you... got stuck and all." He looks around awkwardly and then reaches out to pat her on the shoulder.

    "I think I can do a purification for her and then we can get her medevac to a secure facility."

Madoka Kaname (439) has posed:
    Phew... With her work complete, the littlest Divine settles down. A gentle flare of pink light returning her to her halloween costume as she kneels by the now freed magical girl.
    Still smiling.
    It is another Madoka that appears beside Homura, draping arms over her shoulders, with that gently satisfied smile.
    "So... So Homura... Hey..."
    ...
    "Can we go trick or treating now~?"