4539/Exploration: Guillotine Square (1)

Exploration: Guillotine Square (1)
Date of Scene:	11 September 2016
Location:	Lumiere
Synopsis:	The sewer level. It is awful. Also, mysterious Lanterns try to kidnap the :D.
Cast of Characters:	974, Staren, 1014, Athela Valemore, Inga, Kushiko, Count Kord, Priscilla, 984

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Carna (974) has posed:
    The walk along the Pristine Plagueway towards the destination their new companion has identified as 'Guillotine Square' is a semi-long one. Long enough that they may need to take a break at times for some of those with actual stamina limitations to rest. While the Pristine Plagueway seems to bypass nearly all of the dangers they'd ordinarily be facing if they'd taken a more direct route, the main downside seems to be how indirect it is. So, longer walks, but safer.

    It's a fair trade off.

    At least when one isn't being accompanied by a chatty Shadow called Crow. It keeps up a constant stream of chatter, and is encouraged to do more of such by anyone responding to it. It flaps two stubby little nubbins of shadow on either side, like stunted baby penguin wings, as it says, "Look! Look! I'm making hands like you!" It gestures, stretching with the two extremities towards Inga, and then towards Athela, its models for hands thus far.

    Carna is not easily annoyed or angered. Infact, displays of any emotion from her are rare. But this Shadow grates on her enough that at one point, she actually told Crow to stop talking for awhile.

    "Okay." Crow had replied unhappily. D:

    ...Then about fifteen minutes of blessed silence later as they wandered through increasingly dense layers of fog and clouds, Crow started up again. "Hey, what's a while?" :o

    Others may notice that the path they are on has gradually kind of felt like it's sloping downwards more and more. Which explains all the spooky fog floating around, even if they're only on the fringes of that ocean of soupy mist they saw from above when they first started out. Shadow hums quietly to itself, voluntarily lowering its volume the closer they get to Guillotine Square. At this point, they don't really need a guide to know they're nearby to it.

    The smell, a faint foul odor like an hour ago, has become an ever-present stench like a cross between a dairy and a sewer. It's bad enough that it seems like the fog surrounding them should have changed color to something like green or brown to indicate the nastiness, but the fog remains dense and impenetrable, and crowding in around them on all sides.

    Just a procession of Elites and a Shadow, on an increasingly narrow path, sloping downwards bit by bit, until before they know it, they're walking on a forward incline and may be having to exert special effort to maintain their balance and not go stumbling down the sky-road that has become a ramp.

    And then, all of a sudden, they just exit the fog, emerging into some dim room with walls stained in rust and dirt and... Probably other things best not guessed at. The floor has many overlapping layers of dark-brown and red, some of the latter fresher than the others, and turns a corner ahead, making the form of the room appear to be 'L'-shaped. What's down the right-hand hallway isn't visible from here, but one thing is for certain....

    The smell isn't getting any weaker.

    Crow decides this is the most opportune time to use its flexibility and semi-two-dimensional nature to slide up behind Kord undetected and whisper directly into his ear in sing-song, "o/` We're hEEErrreee~... o/`"

Staren has posed:
    Staren goes back to riding on his broom, so less risk of getting tired there, although the power armor makes even running or walking easier anyway. Still. Any moment they're not having to fight horrible moments is a plus.

    Staren isn't sure what to make of the shadow -- it seems friendly enough for now, so he hasn't started making contingency plans to kill it yet. Actually, when he has that thought, he starts. Bright lights? Area saturation explosives? Well, plenty of options to try.

    He chuckles at the 'I'm making hands!' bit. And the 'how much is a while' question.

    His filters help somewhat, but not entirely, with the smell. Given he doesn't know how long this expedition will take, he doesn't switch over to internal air supply yet.

    Oh hey, they're... somewhere. Staren looks around warily. "Yeah, but... where's 'here'?"

Heaven's Armory (1014) has posed:
    Svala is right on that cusp between considering the current level of danger too great to keep her human form materialized, vulnerable to basically-everything as it is, but not yet quite willing to forgo it and the ease of speech and 'second' set of eyes it grants her. Her compromise is to stick ever closer to Priscilla and hope that Crow doesn't keep jumping behind her, which might be a hope formed in vain. Climbing onto the crossbreed's shoulder is sounding more attractive as time goes by and the walkway narrows, maneuvering becoming more complex.
    Falling, at least, is not a great worry for her. She can't fly, precisely, but she, as well as anyone wielding her, should have little fear of plunging to their doom.
    Even with this effort to keep the capability available, Svala doesn't speak much. She listens, visibly tilting an ear at this point or that, but keeps fairly quiet without being directly addressed. This doesn't change as they arrive, wherever 'here' is, though their arrival does cause her to crouch down, a trifle awkwardly with knees together, and touch the stains upon the floor.

Athela Valemore has posed:
Long hikes are nothing new to Athela Valemore. They tend to be a common denominator of her role in fact, since as a knight-errant she travels from area to area that needs her help rather than stick to one region. Which is also why she's here now, but that's besides the point. She only stops when others need to do so to catch their breath, but is quick to pick the trek back up as soon as they can.

She has the feeling this place is not somewhere to loiter in one spot too long, even if the pathway has proven safe of peculiar perils. So far. That never seems to last in her experience.

The stench isn't so much of a problem, though Athela does briefly complain about it smelling like a pack of Stunky having a buffet of rotten fish in middle of the bog. The imagery is probably lost to anyone that doesn't know she's talking about a pokemon skunk.

The path starting to slope downward on the other hand is a problem. Not so much for her, but it could be troublesome for her Samurott who gets around by sliding rather than walking. To avoid the issue she quickly transfers him to the magic jewel that serves as the medival version of a pokeball.

At least Kord will be spared any more dirty untrusting looks for a while?

Eventually it's out of the fog, off the road, and... despite the name of Guillotine Square what looks like a right angle. Covered in.. uh.. you know what, she doesn't want to know. She's seen what a guillotine can do to the guilty well enough to not want to ask. "'Here' is not the most welcoming of places."

Not even her Vaporeon wants to dare investigate the disconcerning mess on the ground, instead slicking back her fin-ears while making an expression that's almost as cute as it is conveying disgust. Sprite hooks her fluked tail around one of Athela's ankles protectively.

Inga has posed:
Inga has been an extremely good sport in dealing with Crow. The constant chattering is getting on her nerves, but she tries not to let it show. She smiles as Crow makes 'hands' wiggling her fingers in demonstration. "Very good Crow," she praises. "We don't want to run into any trouble though, so please be quiet so we can hear what is ahead of us," trying, like Carna, to put a cork in the word-hoard. It worked, for a little while.

Inga has noticed the path turning slowly downhill, which on the plus side, makes it a bit easier to walk at a decent pace for her. The fog however, is disturbing. Inga has a very poor history with fog. It doesn't smell like Kingsmouth though. Not quite. It is lacking the smell of rotting fish men. Guillotine Square is almost pleasant in comparison to /that/.

When the road gets much steeper, it stops being pleasant and starts being a hassle. Inga isn't terribly stable to begin with, and ends up slipping and falling smartly on her behind. She sits there looking vaguely surprised for a moment, then sighs and struggles back to her feet, grumbling.

Once they reach their destination, Inga's nose wrinkles. She's quite used to the smell of blood, but it saturates so strongly that it is difficult to ignore. "Lovely place," she comments quietly. She looks to the floor and shakes her head. She's glad she wore her old boots.

Kushiko has posed:
There is a reason why Crow does not necessarily grate nor bother on Kushiko for any particular reason. If anything, it actually amuses her to watch it go from person to person through the optics of Nova Prime.

It has nothing to do with her Ship Cephalon, who has had several privately blistering diatribes to offer on Crow. Still, after assuring Ordis to not worry about it, she progressed silently along with the others, occasionally the plates on the back of her head splitting open and the energy funnels flaring whenever she moved a little swifter otherwise.

The fog was part of why she began to flare lights a little bit--not to interact with the gas itself, but to cast luminescence from one of the diodes on her suit to the elegant Tigris variant she had pulled from her back at some point. The sudden incline does not seem to bother the Tenno's Warframe, easily transferring from the downward slope to the forward incline with casual grace, and resisting the greatest temptation to basically baseball slide down it with a running leap.

Whether or not she smells through Transference--whether or not the Warframe itself has a sense of smell--is best left to the imagination, though Kushiko offers no complaints.

When Crow decides to announces their arrival is another matter altogether, the faceless dome of Nova just orienting on Crow for a few precious moments before simply answering, "'Guillotine Square', of course." towards Staren. Whatever thoughts she had on Crow's method of delivering the news is left unacted upon for the time being, the Warframe merely shining beams of light from the twin-barreled shotgun carefully forward. And minding proper trigger discipline without a word. Or sound.

Count Kord has posed:
    Kord is staying with the group unlike his usual habit of wandering off on his own. He has no inclination to take off when there's just nothing interesting ahead but more arduous pathways. He doesn't actually seem to need to rest like others might, having quite absurd physical abilities thanks to his heritage. He keeps his inhuman eyes on Crow most of the time, because he has no idea how to judge the creature as they progress. He doesn't seem all that talkative, though he does chuckle at Crow's antics especially when they annoy Carna, getting a kick out of the childish nature of the creature. He has seen many ghost-type and dark-type Pokemon do the same, in their own ways, and it is something he just loves to see. At least... when it's only harmless playful behavior and not meant to cause a real fight.

    Kord is unhindered by the sloping path, and not too worried about getting bowled over by the others on the way. He just keeps his wits about him. He does have a comment about the smell, though, and wonders, "What could possibly be making that scent...?" Once they are in that room, where the corridor turns off presumably into another area that the smell could be coming from, he frowns behind his helmet and adjusts his armor as his nervous energy bubbles up. The bubble pops when he hears Crow whisper to him.

    He whips around and would physically GRAB the Shadow by the face, just for a second, and stare at the being with nothing but incredible fury, red light pouring off his arm like he is about to fire pure death energy through his cutesy shadowy smile. Fury built up from years of dealing with things that hide in the shadows alongside him, hoping for an opening to murder him while he's unprepared. He clearly does not appreciate the cheeky creature's comment...

    But instead of making a scene that would draw the attention of the others, he silently releases the shadowy being's face, leaving it with the reminder that he is a shaper of darkness himself, and that it would probably be wise not to piss him off.

    He resumes his mellow tag-along attitude as if nothing had happened. This guy is just stupidly edgy and intense, but at least he has several good reasons for it.

Priscilla has posed:
    "Guillotine Square, I wouldst assumeth." Priscilla intones towards Staren, stretching at the limits of non-committal unhelpfulness. Truth be told, while Priscilla has physical limits well beyond those of a mortal overall, stamina is comparatively her dump stat, and so she has been all too stoically happy to allow anyone else to rest along the way.

    Crow's chatter, though mildly hyperactive, isn't nearly as grating to her as one would expect though. Priscilla likes her silence, her solitude, her tranquillity, but the plagueway is dreadfully boring and even more strange, and having a local who doesn't want to kill or manipulate them for a change lifts her spirits. Besides, after exhibiting the almost infantile non-comprehension of actual violence, suffering and consequences, she'd rather not deal with the headache of purple morality, and just abide by how simple it is to keep him happy.

    Besides, she has someone new to look after as well. As harmless as Priscilla generally views the shadow as, the fact that he makes Svala uncomfortable can't be ignored, and so she quietly does her best to walk between the two, though she tries not to be overt about it. She also tries not to be overt about the stink slowly getting to her, and mostly succeeds by virtue of how poorly her facial abilities readily express visceral and complex things like disgust, but she twitches visibly when Svala crouches and pokes at the floor like a little girl, sharply uttering "Do not. It wouldst ill risk it if I were thee.", as if ever so briefly chastising a child for trying to catch some gross swamp critter.

    In fact, she seems hesitant to step off the walkway. Despite going everywhere barefooted, even in the city, through deep woods, plunged ankle deep into snow and icy water, and over piles of bones, the crossbreed seems to visibly wish, for the first time in what must be ages, that she had some shoes on her. Only very reluctantly does she step forward, and only after, through some concentration, the ambient temperature has dropped severely so that the stained ground freezes over with a thin layer of frost where she steps.

    Thus prepared, she seems to feel bold enough to advance around that corner, and not yet nervous enough to do so invisibly. She takes the time to brush some odd white stone, common to Pilgrims, hanging from a delicate silver chain from the waist of her dress, and so that it emits soft, lukewarm light in a short area around her; it brightens up the place enough to see where people are going, but it does little to alleviate the creepy ambiance, and is far from comforting.

Karal Rei Lin (984) has posed:
Balance is one of the things that Lin seems to be really good at. She's walkin carefully, despite peering off here and there to watch the antics of the Shadow! Finding ANYTHING down here in this doom that's even remotely friendly and enthusiastic... even if it's a walking shadow... is heartening!

    And about the only thing that keeps her from scowling and swearing as they get near that horrible stench...

    Iiiiiinto the room, witth that horrible smell. Lin does her best to suppress her sense of smell through WILLPOWER...

    "The twists and turns of this realm are something else..." She murmurs rather quietly.

Heaven's Armory (1014) has posed:
    Svala does, in stark contrast to the expected behavior of those carrying her form, stop when instructed, and refrains from placing her finger against the floor. She does wear shoes, which makes the frosted ground more manageable than it may have otherwise been.

Carna (974) has posed:
    Crow would totally answer Staren, but it looks like at least two others already have. Also because Kord just grabbed its face. Rather than seeming frightened by his display of fury, Crow seems... Impressed! "Woooowww!" it lets out when its face is finally released. Grabbing it physically like that appears to be a new experience. New enough that its face was rearranged in the process so its eyes are all out of synch and its mouth has been pushed half-way up its pointy-eared 'head'.

    "How did you do that? What was that you did exactly? Can I do that?" Crow waggles its nubbins towards Kord, trying to make contact with his body but having neither the range nor the substance to succeed. Undaunted, it next turns towards Carna.

    Carna simply says, "Do not."

    Crow finds someone else to try next, noticing that Svala and Priscilla are already moving on.

    Carna has likewise continued forward, looking back at the others to make sure everyone is accounted for, as she has been doing regularly throughout the entire trip. She's used to traveling and exploring alone, but now that she has people to look out for, she is demonstrating the caution and alertness of a mother hen leading her chicks. Even if she may be one of the 'youngest' here, at least chronologically. Last thing they need to find out is that someone got snatched off the road silently in the fog or something. And the lower they go into that fog bank, the more Carna feels endangered by proximity to what they've seen lies far below it.

    Once the corner has been rounded, the view ahead is... Less than encouraging. It's a long corridor with the floor broken up intermittently by shallow water ways of some kind, between one square platform and another. Whatever is flowing through them is only ostensibly water, and seems to have more solid matter than actual liquid. There are vertical openings in either wall, from floor to ceiling, where the 'water' flows from one location to another, through drains or something. The vertical openings appear to be large enough for a human-sized person to go into them, but why anyone would want to is another matter. All that appears to be down them is a narrow, confined space with the bars of gutters in the ceilings of these side-passages, from which drips more 'water' with wet, heavy plopping noise into the channels below.

    There might be some secret loot or treasure or something down those side-passages for those brave enough to go looking for what some Lantern may have hidden there under the assumption no one in their right mind would go looking there.

    But there might also be dead ends, or sudden drop-offs, or who-knows-what. So unless someone is REALLY eager to go explore claustrophic passageways full of gross, it might be best to stick to the main corridor for now, even if it seems to only get darker further ahead (at least they have the illumination provided by Priscilla, Nova Prima, and others who may have portable light sources).

Carna (974) has posed:
    Crow seems to just jump from shadow to shadow in this dark area, hanging out at the edge of the light that others provide, rather than allowing itself to get fully absorbed into any of the surrounding darkness. Whether that's personal choice or physical limitation isn't clear. But if the Shadow parallel holds true, you can't have a shadow without light.

    Carna keeps a knife ready in one hand, and a torch in the other, burning with some ghostly blue fire. The death and decay in Lumiere thus far has been a stale, almost-sterile scent. More like dust than rot. So this 'Guillotine Square' is new to Carna in the respect of odor alone, to say nothing of the strange layout.

    "I entered what I thought to be a 'sewer' in search of escaped M.I.M.I.C.s, from the City Limits. It appears that, by comparison, the grounds I traversed were sanitary rather than sanitation." she mutters, though she'll probably be keeping quiet in a new area like this until she has a better idea of what's in store for them.

    Again, she checks over her shoulder. Athela, her Vaporeon, Staren, Inga (who would have been offered a hand up earlier if she required such), Kord, Kushiko (or rather the vessel she explores through. Carna should ask about that at some point, but she just sort of accepted that she has an ally named Kushiko who uses multiple bodies)... And then ahead of her lie Priscilla and Svala... That's everyone right?

    She wants to check her journal, but she doesn't want to be unarmed in here if something goes wrong and putting down the torch before it has burned out all the way is a waste. These things aren't cheap.

Staren has posed:
    Staren chuckles at Carna's wordplay, and looks over the way ahead. "Sheesh. Why do we think anything is even here, again?"

    Then he has a thought: "Wait, why is there even a sewer here at /all/? Did someone in the world of the living go around killing /poop/?"

Athela Valemore has posed:
On one hand, Athela wishes she had a Fire or Electric type pokemon to help provide some light... on the other hand, she doesn't trust that whatever is causing that stench isn't flammable, so it's probably for the better.

That -looks- like water, but neither Athela or her Vaporeon seem keen on testing if it really is or not. Or finding out what else it could be. They both stick to jumping over the channels to the platforms between them. Just.. yeah...

"I hath heard more than one story about assassins stealing away to the latrine to kill a man upon his chamber pot," is the best answer she has to give Staren.

Other than that the only thing she has to say is a bit of experienced adventurer advice. "Pay not mind to the side... passages," she's using the term loosely for the grated offshoots, "It is best we stay together as a group in unfamiliar dungeons. If the main path not leads where we want, we can return hereforth to explore the branches."

Kushiko has posed:
Privately, the furor and the display given form by Kord in regards to what Crow did earned a somewhat mirthless smile far flung from this place, in the confines of the Somatic Link. It was brief, and fleeting as Nova's head cants from where Kord had seized Crow in passing back to the path that lie ahead--including Priscilla working to tromp her way ahead.

At this point however, as she herself moves forward, the Tigris shotgun is momentarily put away for one reason only--though kept in her right hand, the left manifests some stretched, hexagonal-looking light panel that is the center of four makeshift smooth 'wings' that float about the Warframe's wrists as she projects her scanner forward. At least, a more 'dedicated' scanner given the fog and what not.

It also produces another brand of lighting due to it's rangefinding capabilities, rendering a secondary view for Kushiko to view ahead---namely the whole lack of light and needing to assert optical correction to see what could be ahead.

This scanner of the Warframe is leveled at the corridors for a few reasons: mapping, scrying, and taking mimeographic scans of the place itself that could be analyzed by secondary sources such as her Lotus and Ordis and anyone else who gets a chance to sift the data for analysis later.

"Well, hopefully none of those," Kushiko projects absently. As she scans, she gestures, sweeping with her shotgun-holding hand and a surge of energy releases nine individual gold-silver orbs--antimatter that orbits her like a miniature star system, with trails of lilac in their wake.

"Either something here, or something beyond it. The fact that it remains unknown is a problem, really." is what she offers to Staren. Beyond that she can't offer much more as she conducts her scans as she moves up to where Priscilla is.

Priscilla has posed:
    This place is already repulsive enough. Despite Priscilla's near pathological numbness to sights of horrific gore, mutilation, and body horror, she'd spent centuries in arrangements that were otherwise a cold and snowy operating room, totally sterilized of all real life. Just because she's become a jaded killer since then, and only recently begun to improve, it doesn't mean she's not kind of a sheltered royal when it comes to the living conditions, and living concerns, of lower class humans.

    In short: Gross. /Gross/. Shut up Staren. Shut uuuuup. Nope nope nope. Not thinking about it. Nooope!

    She may actually be rushing through a little, taking advantage of being tall by step well over and wide of anything on the ground, like someone wearing sneakers in winter trying to cross a road without stepping into those ankle-deep puddles of melted snow that always seem to happen around the curb. She's actually a little grateful that Crow seems to want to keep with her light source, and more than a little envious that he doesn't physically really interact with any of this. "How much longer?" she intones impatiently.

Inga has posed:
Inga looks to Staren. She makes a face. Though, that is a good question. What is the...substance? Inga finds that she is rather disinclined to find out, however, and so just keeps going. "I am going to take a very long bath after all this. And possibly burn these clothes," she adds quietly to whomever happens to be nearby. She checks the floor ahead of head now and then with her staff to judge the depth of puddles. She does not want to fall into this muck.

Stupid Staren and his flying broomstick!

Count Kord has posed:
    Kord pays little attention to the childish behavior that Crow displays to him after the clear threat to his continued existence. The Count has no confusion about the being's nature... knowing that the shadow may have no concept of death or harm just based off of what it has said to them already. It is innocent only in the way a fae creature can be, and that is why he keeps his eyes on Crow even more vigilantly after that. He does not trust the shadow not to do something detrimental to the group as a whole.

    As for the filth they run into, a sewer in fact, Kord has absolutely no pronounced reactions to the stench or where they are. He just lets out a tired sigh at Staren's comment, and points out toward him, "It would be helpful if you kept similar enlightening thoughts to yourself. You are worse than that chatty shadow when you let such nonsense dribble from your mouth."

    Kord's secret? He lived on a farm in his youth. He's seen FAR more disgusting things than a simple sewer, and all he really does is use one hand to keep his cape out of the filth.

    "Remarkably tame, if you remember what we had to deal with before," he says, in an odd attempt to reassure everyone. "No giant bug monsters that release millions of smaller bug monsters just yet."

Karal Rei Lin (984) has posed:
"HAVING a sewer at all is almost miraculous if you ask me. Much better than chamber pots and a pit or throwing things in a river... or the fields..." Because well yeah, that's how a lot of old style places would do things. Lin's not against pointing this out to Carna, but Carna might well be ignorant of what she's even talking about!

    That's okay, it's a bad topic anyways.

    Lin draws her sword, rather than summoning her blade of light to hand. This place gives her the willies...

Carna (974) has posed:
    Scans performed give an indication that the passage ahead leads into another tunnel, with a sudden drop-off along the side, which goes down a few hundred feet. The architecture is like a cross between the catacombs of Rome and the old and abandoned tunnels under New York City that more modern tunnels were built on top of. Basically, layers upon layers of passages, rooms, causeways, waterways, one abandoned network of passages on top of another, down, and down. There are also indications of movement, though with so much other stuff moving, and so much of THAT being solid or semi-solid, discerning the difference between a body and a pile of... Something is more difficult than it would normally be. The absence of body heat among the Dead probably doesn't help.

    Carna doesn't really understand the intricacies of defecation as-described by Karal, no. "I would suppose," Carna begins as she scans ahead, picking up the pace a bit to not let Priscilla get too far and separate the group. "That what the Dead consider to be waste, would be flesh. Solid as I am, and as all of this is, it is composed of some sort of material spirit matter. We have no need for flesh such as most of you possess. I did not understand what made me up until it was explained to me, but I can not imagine having much use for a body that can only die once. Though where they would be obtaining material flesh to dump into the gutters I can not say. I am also uncertain if this is supposition is correct." Her ghost fire torch does not seem to ignite the air, thankfully. But if it's the ghost of fire then it might not behave like normal flames. It's cool blue, silent, and flows upwards slowly as it is moved about, inspecting the side-passages to make sure nothing is hiding in them and preparing to leap out at them. Athela's suggestion of not exploring may be correct, but ignoring them incase something else is in them might be a mistake.

    Carna had no reaction, of approval or disapproval, regarding Kord's semi-violent threat towards the Shadow, because she places no value on its existence. Some may be annoyed by it (like Carna). Others may be charmed by its child-like innocence. Others may be suspicious of it. But if Crow left right now and never returned, she could not care a whit. So if Kord wants to threaten the thing? He can do that without complaint from the Lantern.

    But the next events kind of change her views.

    Priscilla asks how much longer, and the Shadow pools on the floor in a black blob, rotating its circular eyes and cartoonish mouth around until it is looking at the bare-footed woman. Then Crow asks, "How much longer for what?"

    Crow looks from person to person expectantly. Did it not realize they were expecting it to lead them somewhere?

Carna (974) has posed:
    Those with keen senses or sensors (and that aren't hindered by the somewhat-dispelled dark via lighting, or the awful smells) may detect decidedly conscious and intent movement of human-shaped forms rushing towards them. The splashing of waste water and other materials on either side of them indicates the likely direction, but with the echoing off the walls, and tunnels, it's hard to pinpoint which side-passages exactly.

    Then figures in leather cloaks and hoods (that are almost more like burlap sacks with an uneven number of openings for eyes or mouths or whatever else) come charging out of the darkness, both ahead and behind. The edges of their cloaks have hooks lining them. Nasty, barbed things. Some of them carry short, curved blades, useful in tight quarters, but another group comes around the corner of the tunnel at the end of this one, and they seem to have long black poles with even nastier hooks at the ends of them.

    All of these individuals waste no time in attacking, though the ones with the poles seem to be approaching more cautiously, as though looking for an opportunity to join the fray.

    Well, seems peace in the land of the Dead really can't last.

Inga has posed:
Shouldn't they have hit a, well, square by now? Does Crow not understand shapes? Or did Crow lead them astray, by intent or careless ignorance? There's just...this. Catacombs. Layer upon layer. It's actually rather impressive, in a dizzying way. Inga could say with confidence now that she has no desire to go any further. People could be lost down there and never be found again.

Then there comes the sound. The sense of...movement, if not exactly life. Inga draws her blade from her belt with surprising quickness, the small knife finding her flesh and drawing fresh blood--but this blood is for a good cause. Who would most need a protective spell? Many would think her, but when Carna mentions bodies that can only die once, Inga looks a little shifty eyed.

So Karal gets a protection spell. She looks like she's a melee fighter and will probably be getting into the thick of things, and she doesn't have any suit like Staren and Kushiko to protect her. Blood is flicked toward her, a fine mist surrounding Karal and shimmering with a crimson-gold light. It provides a degree of protection and an invigorating regeneration.

Next, she protects herself. Because she's not sure who else here has any ability in healing and they might just need it.

On a cerebral level, Inga is wondering what would happen if she used this magic on Carna...

Athela Valemore has posed:
Despite now looking like amphibious fins instead of what one would expect of ears, Sprite's senses are no less as sharp as before. If anything, they're better now, unhindered by damp and dank locations like this 'sewer'. Maybe she has something like echolocation like a dolphin?.. No, probably not that specific, or the echoing effect of the narrow passages wouldn't throw her off.

But something is coming, and that is enough for the Vaporeon to yowl loudly in alarm as she snaps her head up, fins bristling stifly with the moment.

Needless to say, Athela doesn't bother asking. She knows that bark, even if the timbre isn't quite the same as before. She's already got both hands gripped around the hilt of her divine weapon, Resolute Blade glowing with swirls of aquamarine rippling around its length. At her heels the Vaporeon's eyes start to glow with a similar effect within their dark almond shapes.

As the cloaked figures come rumbling into their corridor with obvious weapons and likely malicious intent, Athela steps right into defending the others by keeping the ones that look like they'd be the most dangerous up close with those hook-blades at bay. "Come not closer, currs!" The aquatic knight swings her sword in an arc in front of her, sending a surprisingly large surge of elemental water hurtling towards the hood heilders. It's almost more like a small wave.

It's certainly more than Athela was expecting by the way her eyes widen slightly. "Sprite... did you do that?"

"Vaaaporrreon," answers the pokemon, which seems to be a confirmation, though she sounds just a bit surprised. She hasn't been a Vaporeon long enough to realize she could do that.

Kushiko has posed:
As much as Kushiko might be scanning about, mapping and logging this location and studying it--she wasn't the only one. Through her suit's sensors, so too did the Lotus. It was the Lotus who often provided a sense of forewarning to the Tenno because while Kushiko has the Warframe's datafeeds, another set of eyes always helped.

And as she listened to Carna's words, she began to turn her attention towards not just the act of scanning, but sweeping her shotgun back into her hand in order to defend herself against future threats, 'clearing' from room to room. This didn't feel right whatsoever, even if she found herself feeling somewhat amused by the antics of others thus far. No, the sooner they found what was--or what wasn't--in here, the better.

And the moment those motions could be felt on the air, there was a change in the Nova Prime Warframe that Kushiko operated--every movement became diminished in presence for just a moment as she--through a little forewarning as the Lotus picked up the same on her suit's sensors--picked up on the figures nearby.

She didn't even waste time after quickly assessing who needed protection and who didn't--Carna and Inga were priorities for different reasons as she leapt, planting a food on a corridor wall and bounding up it--and about halfway is where she's sortof crouched against it.

From here, two things happen--one is the firing of those antimatter orbs of energy--directed by Nova Prime towards the closest ones, but it's with a hand momentarily off her shotgun that she sweeps her arm forward, gathering powerful antimatter energy into one hand--and releasing it with a dull, concussive sound. It expands as a radial wave--bathing not the surfaces, not even the fog and smoke, but with entirely /too good control/ expanding on all sides towards their ambushers.

If the ambushers don't have some means to quickly defend themselves, the matter-antimatter wave will layer their respective ambushers (though maybe not the furthest ones) with antiparticles and the like that--quite simply? Will slow them down in a way that defies the standards of reality while being highly unstable.

Basically: highlighting targets that have pulsing, circular waves of lilac-tinted energy that can randomly explode and cause chain reactions. Nova doesn't play nice.

Staren has posed:
    Staren dismounts and puts away the broom (it fits in his bag, like Mary Poppins) after commenting. He doesn't want to get it dirty, either.

    He does try to avoid stepping in the... whatever, though, even if he does have a sealed suit. He manifests his wings for any particularly large jumps required, offering to carry Inga.

    "How much longer for what?" he mirrors Crow's question. "This is 'Guillotine Square', isn't it? We were just seeing where the skyway leads... now we know. I thought we were just exploring to see what's here. Oh hey look, people. Or something."

    Staren looks ahead. "Hey, guys! Are you here to talk, or attack? I mean... Listen, the latter won't go well for you, so you really shouldn't--" they just keep coming. "Ah hell, they're Unlit aren't they." He holds out his arm to fire, then hesitates for a second... sensors show no methane, he's clear. He fires the beam cannons at the attackers, then flies back a platform or two and pulls the laser rifle off his back to follow up.

Count Kord has posed:
    Kord has no intention of destroying a foolish creature whose nature is clearly not nearly as sinister as it could be. The fact that it cannot see the Light still disturbs him, but he isn't surprised when it seems confused by the question Priscilla asks. But when it's clear that they are being ambushed by many different creatures, his suspicions start to boil up to the surface, and he spares one wary glance to Crow before drawing his weapon and turning to face the things stepping toward them.

    Kord closes the distance at a sprint, but does so by running along one of the walls. Another demonstration of his superhuman physical prowess. As he does this, he keeps his profile low, making sure that he doesn't run into anyone as he goes, and soon he ends up covered in disgusting 'stuff' but also BEHIND the things that dared to ambush them in short order. And then he starts attacking them brutally one by one, working his way inward toward the party he's with, using the tactic against them. He is cautious toward the ones wielding polearms, but he expects at least some panic if they are really as intelligent as they appear to be. It helps that he exudes an aura of 'I am going to murder you' at all times anyways.

Priscilla has posed:
    You know, hearing all the semisolid goo around them is just rotted flesh, makes Priscilla /marginally/ more comfortable. At least she can easily imagine where it originally came from now. It's not like corpses have been a rarity in her life. Still, she's not stepping in it; or near it. She instead watches the shadow melt into the floor in front of her, pausing in perplexed fascination at the surreal sight of its weird, morphic face moving around, and then subsequently deadpans at its oblivious question.

    She can get frustrated later though. As tends to happen, she is saved from her words failing her by the commencement of hostilities. Something like a vexed sigh almost comes out of her, but even the Lordran native has yet to fully grasp the variety of possible dangers to be encountered here, and already her mind is preoccupied with what sort of greater organization or conspiracy these hooded maniacs could be part of; assuming they aren't just random murderers, or possibly cannibals.

    Oh who is she kidding. Pretty much everything here is a cannibal. Her grip tightens around Svala -- her true form that is, she's not wielding a little girl -- as she shifts her hands closer to the cross-patterned spearhead and further towards the weighted end, shifting the latter higher and the former lower, and taking up a distinctly knightly, though somewhat novice, spear duelling stance; the kind used unhorsed, out or formation, indoors, or as a traveller. She trades the greater control for shorter reach, but she's a tall person and Svala is a long spear in the first place, and the men with the catchpoles are lingering too far behind.

    She catches the first one to come within range immediately, with the silver blade of the spear flashing up from its low position and thrusting forward in what amounts to the same blink of motion, inappropriately agile for what is classically considered a cumbersome weapon. Assuming she can get even a half decent stab into something's flesh, she then communes with her weapon to do a trick similar to the last time with the mecha crab: specifically, repulsing her enemy down the narrow corridor, hopefully hard and fast enough to collapse some of the formation behind him.

Heaven's Armory (1014) has posed:
    This has far passed acceptable thresholds of danger, and the human form of Svala quickly disappears, air collapsing in over a few, quickly dissipating sparks. Svala is still here, but now solely in one form. A large, monstrously-bladed spear, with Priscilla's reach, there shouldn't be much problem taking on any human-sized opponent, even in such a stance. So long as the motions are for a thrust, her length is further irrelevant to her speed.
    All of this is aside from her magic. She doesn't quite need to actually touch an opponent to act upon it, but there is something like an inverse square ratio of effectiveness. Once she does touch a target--by stabbing into it, most likely, her blade having that sharpness reserves for weapons of legend--she creates and reverses an attractive force, pulling it hunched around for less than a tenth of a second before shooting it off with a blast of pure force that will crater any wound as well as toss the creature forward, at speed.

Karal Rei Lin (984) has posed:
Movement! Lin's instantly alert. She's already drawn her sword... but sheathes it (oddly enough) and drops into a combat stance mere moments before the figures actually emerge from the fog...

    But by then it's probably too late for some of them, unless they can hope to compete with one of the Sun's Chosen. For she moves like lightning even as Inga's protective spell closes around her. A WAVE of killing intent pulses from her as her stance shifts and she coils her body like a spring!

    "Too slow!" She takes off like a BULLET across the ground, almost too fast to see! Chances are, unless her opponents are some kind of spectacular superdead (which they very well could be) her sword will flash four times for every time weapons can make a single arc... and she uses that speed to strike first.

    Non-lethally, though. She aims for crushing blows with the FLAT of the blade against joints, and swinging with tremendous cutting skill against the weapons themselves - hoping to chop them into an unusable state.

    It's no good if they kill the first people they come across, who might have useful things to say! Respawning Lanterns tell no tales.

Carna (974) has posed:
    From the noises of pain or anger or even occasional cursing as they're attacked and injured, it seems these are not Unlit as Staren feared, just Lanterns on the hunt who aren't interested in peaceful negotiation. When they get beam cannons drilling into them they stagger, and attempt to fall back behind others while they heal. When the pole-arm wielding ones get sent hurtling back by the water attack from Athela, they scramble to get back up onto their feet, though two of them fall over the edge of that drop-off at the end of the main tunnel and plummet until they hit something solid enough to kill them and cause them to disperse into spirit mist and await resurrection.

    Carna darts in and out of combat with the sword-wielders, her own range less than theirs, but her predatory instincts keeping her senses tuned to their movements, their tactics, as she circles them, and they circle her in turn.

    She parries one of the attackers one handed and then cuts out his throat swiftly and mercilessly with the other, before kicking him to the ground and leaping onto him to stab him with both knives over and over until he starts to fade away into spirit mist.

    Kord's attacks crush one of the polearm-wielders into a wall, injuring others, and taking out another. The think about Lanterns, of course, is that unless they're actually killed even broken limbs are a minor inconvenience. They can get impaled on a spear, and if that doesn't kill them, they'll get back up and keep fighting as long as their spirit holds out.

    So the polearm wielders back up from Kord when he makes his threatening presence known, and thus as the Hookcloak ambushers with swords are afflicted with a damage resistance debuff thanks to Nova Prime, and Priscilla uses Svala to wield gravity to propel the massed formation down the passageway towards that drop off, the ones that were already injured fall quickly and explode, damaging those near them as well.

    The sword wielders were focused on the Elites, including trying to go after Inga, and Karal, while competing with the former's defensive and healing magics, and the latter's martial arts that rob them of their weapons and their ability to fight, all while the polearm wielders were hanging back. But with most of their polearm friends now gone, one of the Hookcloaks curses and says, "Forget the others!" And dodge-rolls away, right through the sludgy channel, to pick up one of the polearms. And use it on the target no one expected.

Carna (974) has posed:
    With the light sources they have swinging about wildly, changing positions, new ones forming in the wake of weapons fire and magic, explosives and so forth, Crow's existence is chaos as it is trying to cling to the edges of shadows that won't hold still. "Whoah! Whoah! Hey, what's going on!?"

    Then one of the Hookcloaks throws up a bundle of something that ignites in the air turning into a spectacularly blinding fireworks display of reds and blues and greens in rapid succession. The things that fall to the ground after their charges are spent are not fireworks, though. Rather, they are finger bone joints that seem to have been pulled from a fire or some thing and converted into flares.

    This basically causes even more chaos among the shadows while at the same time blinding anyone who uses eyes to see with at least for a moment. Carna is affected even.

    It seems clear now what part of the purpose of wearing those bag-like hoods with only partial-visibility is. It's to shield their eyes when they use their brilliant explosives in dark tunnels when their prey's vision has adjusted to partial or total darkness.

    And then, one of the hooked polearms comes down on Crow as its body is distorted and eventually trapped in the center of a pool of light, cut-from nearby shadows. Somehow the hook sticks into its body.

    "AAAH!" Crow lets out in shock as the hook dragging the Shadow across the floor towards one of the few remaining Hookcloaks and a burlap sack that the Shadow is quickly shuffled into.

    The remaining ambushers start to retreat, throwing another bag of explosive finger bones into the air just as the darkness was starting to return and the spots were starting to fade from their eyes.

    "We have the Shadow! Move!" is the distant cry as the Hookcloaks try to flee among the sizzling and popping souds of detonating bones. They had about two dozen ambushers with them, and the Elites took out 3/4ths of them in a few moments of combat. But it seems that the Elites weren't the main target.

    What do they want with Crow? It's unsure, but the Shadow's wailing echoing down the tunnels towards them says that it probably isn't good. And now a choice remains. Do they leave the Shadow they barely know to its fate, and retreat? Be glad it was not one of them taken? ...Or go after it, and face whatever other dangers lie in wait? Crow isn't that far yet. Sure, the people they'd be chasing know these tunnels far better than them. But isn't that why going after them right now is so important? Before they slip away for good? But isn't that also the danger of going further at all?

    Carna may not know much about being a hero. But she looks to those around her who do as she rubs at her eyes with her sleeve. She waits to see what they decide.

Inga has posed:
Inga closes her eyes, but not before she is light-blind by whatever it is that is being thrown at them. Inga steps back, willing eyes to readjust but it is a slow process, precious seconds slipping away as they unlit or whatever they are get their hooks, literally, into Crow and begin to take off with it.

Inga growls, blinking furiously. She slices into her arm again, blood welling, rising from her skin and pooling in the air...solidifying, forming several long, wicked looking spears.

Time is slipping away, but she doesn't know if Crow would be hurt if one of her spears misses. So she waits until she is sure she can aim before hurling them after the forms that nabbed Crown.

Hopefully, it is not too late.

Staren has posed:
    Staren's visor automatically tints, but even if he's not blinded, he can barely make anything out with all the light... He hesitates for a second, looking to see what the others do... Inga and Kushiko seal it. He flies after the shadow-stealers, trying to give them their own taste of weaponized light with his laser sniper rifle. He may not know what lies ahead, but his tactical software is automapping the tunnels as he goes, so at least he'll always know the way out!

Karal Rei Lin (984) has posed:
"grrrrhhhhhghh----" With her original goal of gathering information completely useless now, Lin barely has to waste any time deciding. She turns her face away the instant she spots the use of more flarebones, spots in her eyes from the first flash having not gone away.

    "Those jerks think they can just RUN OFF with the only cheery face in this place?! Pull a fast one on us?! Not on my watch. COME BACK HERE!!"

    Golden light streams from Lin's skin, a liquid radiance that burns without heat and whips around in a nonexistent wind. With the mark of the sun shining from her forehead she takes off with a LEAP, relying on ears as much as eyes to try and track the ambushers...

    Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeah. Never bother asking what the most impulsive person in the group's going to do. It's obvious.

Heaven's Armory (1014) has posed:
    Svala's method of communication with her wielder, in her true form, is difficult to precisely define. It's certainly not words, and very much like feelings, but given of enough fine gradients and such fidelity as to be nearly translatable. The differences remain, even then, as she is particularly capable in the matter of transmitting anything that relates directly to herself--the motion, combative or otherwise--of a spear, far more quickly and precisely than any known language could account. Given also that her sight does not rely on eyes, this presents an opportunity.
    The shadow, Crow, instictively bothers Svala, and she is not convinced that its rescue is of value to the group. But it is of value to those that have attacked them, and there are... other reasons. Immediately, Svala transmits a wealth of information to Priscilla through their sympathetic link. In words, it would be like 'here are the opponents,' 'here is the victim,' 'here are the traps, the deadfalls, the weapons,' and 'here is how I may move, how you may move me, to reach them.' They are too far for her magic to affect, but it can still keep her wielder safe under such circumstances.

Kushiko has posed:
Explosions! Explosions and death just about everywhere to say nothing of the sheer chaos that ensued. To Kushiko, it was an old bag. To others, maybe less so.

The explosions themselves are very peculiar--no fire, but a misty haze of black smoke thanks to what Nova Prime's antimatter simply does--control rods twist on the frame's back as they adjust the flow of the now /brightly/ glowering funnels of pulsing energy behind her head and back.

The additional explosive flares however, are something of a problem if she had normal eyes to speak of--which she doesn't. Nova Prime's optics filter the shine, and frankly Kushiko's own vision doesn't actually use that sort of thing as she twists and propels herself off that wall she was on and makes a straight /beeline/ towards where she sensed and heard and 'saw' what was happening. How does she do this, once she's hit the ground? With nary a second, she'll gesture: a cosmic-looking doorway popping into existence, from which a wavering thread of energy suspended in the air towards another open point.

A Wormhole, for those not realizing it.

She's already running as she throws it open, disappearing into it with a pulsation of sound following her and quickly unleashing a renewed wave of antimatter energy via her Molecular Prime ability--have to keep them from getting away, and she'll open another Wormhole and take off at them quickly--possibly far quicker than the Hookcloaks may be expecting and with those earlier orbs of potent antimatter launching like homing missiles at their backsides.

Couple with a renewed wave of Antimatter this may be utterly debilitating.

Athela Valemore has posed:
"Augh!" Reflexively Athela throws an arm up to try and shield her face, but it's not enough for a fireworks display that's much much worse than a Flash going off in one's face. Sprite squeals and ducks down behind her legs, though maybe it's not a surprise that the pokemon seems more bothered by the explosive sound that the bright light, though it seems to have had a similar effect.

By the time the second flashbomb whatever goes off she manages to grab the hood of her cloak and pull it up over her head, mayhaps having realized that was the reason for their own bizarre hoods. It's not entirely effective but it at least cuts down the time it takes her to recover. And she doesn't need to see to tell from the sounds from Crow generally what's going on.

"Accursed scoundrels!" As soon as she's got most of her vision back Athela is ready to give chase. "I know the Shadow was annoying... but I be more concerned for why such fiends would want it. If they do, it cannot be good for us or anyone else."

"Vaaaaa," Sprite agrees, shaking her head a bit to clear her senses. Then she's off with a bolt, the tracker moving to try and keep a tab on their foes before they get too far ahead.

Of course the Knight is going to go for rescue, even if it was an obnoxious pest. It's what they do.

Count Kord has posed:
    Kord lets loose a string of indignant curses when the flash bomb goes off, and it turns out he is especially vulnerable because he is clutching the face plate of his bird-like helmet like it just made his brain ache. It's probably not fun for someone attuned to dark environments in the first place. Once he's recovered, though, he finds that the Shadow has been stolen. The creature's nature was befuddling to him, and its attitude was strange and grating, but it was no different than other beings here. No, in fact, it was unlike any Unlit that could possibly exist. It was something else.

    And Kord is not about to let a bunch of strangers take off with the Shadow after ambushing them like that. Once he's done feeling his eyes burn like he just got a floodlight shone in his face, he follows the others with scythe in hand with all the vigor that he can. He is well-versed in the pursuit of fleeing prey. In fact...

    Kord uses Pursuit. One moment he's trailing far behind even everyone else, the next he would be practically on top of the nearest target, emerging from the fleeing prey's shadow and chopping with his scythe with a matching burst of black and red energy! Don't ask how this works, because Pokemon moves defy logic sometimes, he clearly just did some weird shadow step.

Priscilla has posed:
    Sadly, Priscilla is one of those plebs who has eyeballs so she can see. She can /sense/ people without her eyes, and fairly accurately at that, but it's not exactly a Blind Fighting feat, and there are too many people in too small a space to attack indiscriminately. She has to shield her face with one hand, hissing quietly with the brief, stabbing pain in her retinas, and the indignity of the Lanterns getting what they want and running, but has no particular desire to pursue. Crow being out of her hair this way is as good as keeping him complacent with chatter, she thinks; easier, even.

    Svala, for whatever reason, seems to think differently. Despite seeming so uncomfortable with the Shadow earlier, Priscilla can feel the spear urging her to place her faith in it, and insisting that the battle can be won if she were to continue it. She doesn't particularly know /why/ the component of Heaven's Armoury wants her strike back when she had shown nothing but concern and antipathy towards Crow, but Priscilla trusts Svala more than she has reservations at this moment; enough to make a snap decision, at least.

    Ostensibly blindly, but guided by the unseeing spear, and reassured by the presence of Dead Lights, she lunges after the abductors, between allied attacks, and lets her hand slide all the way to the back of Svala's haft to triple the reach of the following thrust, only needing to touch, though hopefully stab, the one with the sack, to pull him irresistibly backwards with that oddly gravitational force, and probably into a bunch of other attacks.