603/Home Front

Home Front
Date of Scene:	16 September 2014
Location:	Akita-954 <954>
Synopsis:	Kagenashi comes to Akita.
Cast of Characters:	85, 155, 355, 369, 534, 536

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Shizune Nakamura (369) has posed:
    It's early evening in Akita, a time when those people who /aren't/ workaholics are just starting to filter out of their jobs. A time when the students involved in club activities are just getting out of practice or meetings or the like. A time when the dojos around the city are finishing their afternoon sessions, and in a couple of cases, taking a break for dinner before their evening ones. In short, the city is just starting to bustle with the very beginnings of 'after work' activity.

    As it so happens, Shizune is just coming out of her own dojo, seeing off other students and discussing this or that with them from the day's practice, or hearing a last few 'happy birthdays' from those who just found out her 18th was yesterday. It's one of the mid-level classes, so rather than simply being another student, she is helping to teach; as a result, most of those filtering out will look to her for some piece of advice or another when they need it. Meanwhile, about ten minutes' walk away, Akita East High is just letting its students out of most of the clubs, bar a couple of athletic clubs who are staying a bit longer for practice or to plan things out for an upcoming match.

    Many students are on the walk home, fanning out into the city to join the hustle and bustle, but at least one is actually making her way directly from Shizune's school towards the dojo that is very nearly her second home. Wearing the uniform of Akita East, the tall girl with straight black hair and the pointed ears of an elf walks as if she owns every centimeter of ground she steps on, stopping only once she reaches the gate and catches Shizune's eye. The senior student glances between those she's speaking to, the girl at the gate, and her sensei, before excusing herself and heading over. "Autumnflower, it's a bit surprising to see you here. Is this about the culture festival coming up?" "No. Discussion on that can wait until tomorrow. I had a curiosity I felt the need to satisfy." It is an ordinary conversation for an ordinary evening.

Kagenashi (85) has posed:
    Night approaches, but the sun still hangs low in the sky. The day is long at this time of year. Today, however, it ends sooner than expected.

    As if covered by an eclipse, the sun is abruptly blotted out, becoming a black circle in the sky ringed by a halo of light. The sky darkens, but no stars shine to lessen the depth of that darkness. It is little more than an impenetrable blanket of pitch black that hangs over Akita-954 like a looming shadow, broken only by the ring of shimmering sunlight that still shows behind the illusory eclipse.

    It's then that they begin to appear.

    It's as if they fade in from the very darkness of the sky itself. First is a thick, swirling tendril of black that crashes down on the roof of a tall building not far from the dojo, sending a shudder down the structure's frame. The strange shadow is quick to form itself: a massive, serpentine body of dark, segemented chitin; thousands of skittering orange legs as thick and sturdy as tree trunks; long hind legs stretching out like scythe blades; a red demon's face on the top of the head twisted into a snarling grin, its horns forming curving pincers that drip with poison. Lashing antennae stretch from its brows, bright red eyes glow in its sockets, and toxic fumes spew from its fanged maw like pollution from a smokestack. With a chittering hiss, the gigantic centipede Omukade immediately begins scuttling down the building's side to the street, its long body coiling around the structure with remarkable speed for its size.

    Two more tendrils follow, though these are notably smaller. They dance and wind around one another, weaving themselves until they both come to a halt above Shizune's dojo. Soon they, too, form into solid shapes of strangely tall female figures, one of shining gold and the other of gleaming silver. Their bodies resemble metal dolls, though in place of hands and feet they have the curving talons of birds shaped from complex machinery. Avian wings composed in a similar way rise from their shoulderblades, a row of "feathers" formed by curving metal blades lining each arm with silken fabric draping behind them like a short cape. Their long hair is of spun metal that shines even in the dim light, and they have the curving, pointed brows of horned owls over their vacant eyes. They wear flowing kimonos matching their respective colors and decorated with beautiful floral patterns, the silken fabric flowing to their wrists and ankles as they flap their wings to remain aloft. Beautiful though they are, the constructs known as Gin and Kin are clearly unstable; they constantly tick and whirr with the ratcheting activity of their clockwork mechanisms, and erratic cackling comes from their unmoving mouths.

    A third mass of shadow spreads over the sky, though its shape settles into something nearly as black as the darkened sky. A great, three-legged crow spreads its wings over Akita, its heart a blazing sun whose radiance is kept just below the surface as a glowing point in its black breast. So too does its light shine in the three eyes surrounding its head and the depths of its serrated beak as it releases a deep, powerful cry through the air. Another tall building shudders as Yatagarasu finds its perch, flapping its broad wings and loosing another long screech to the city. Heat comes off its body in waves, each beat of its wings creating a smoldering gust of wind.

    Omukade, the Fukuro sisters, and Yatagarasu. Whatever they're here for can't be anything good, but...they /do/ have a leader. Where is she in all this?

Sayuri Yaguchi (155) has posed:
    Today, a certain pink-haired girl from Mitakihara had intended to surprise a close friend and maybe see a movie. Holding her purse neatly under one arm, Yaguchi Sayuri disembarks the bullet train at the Akita rail station. She gets her ticket punched for the return trip later this evening and then exits the building, descending down the steps with prim steps while pulling out her cellphone.

    The world turns black, streetlights turn on. Sensing the wrongness of it even before she looks up, Sayuri tucks her phone away and looks up towards the sky and the black disc obscuring the sun. The energy feels WRONG, and she can tell that, though it's different from the raw, concentrated evil of the Demons she's familiar with. It's still evil power. The ring around the girl's left ring finger flickers with pink light even as she's raising it, holding up the pink egg-shaped crystal that appears in its place.

    "Not how I planned to spend my evening," Sayuri mutters. There's a flash, her clothes swiftly replaced by the ribbon-adorned outfit of her magical girl guise in a spray of glowing pink cherry blossom petals. The crystal rematerializes in its setting on her bicep and she jumps.

    In midair, she gestures, creating a pink square tile to land on, then jumps off it. Like this, the gunfighter puella ascends above the rail station. At her desired height, she twirls and thrusts a hand out, pushing out a line of tiles, spaced out, which she then starts running across. More pink blossoms flutter around her hands, signaling the appearance of her signature silver revolvers.

    "Each and every one of you fucker's gonna pay for ruining my night, goddamnit. I was supposed to relax today."

Tora (355) has posed:
    Dojos are one of Tora's favourite places to be. Lucky for her, her master goes to one quite frequently. Of course, it's not as if she can exactly spar with anyone present, being barely over six inches tall and all, but the basics of fighting apply to just about all styles of combat, and there are things to be said for versatility! Standing perched atop the martial artist's shoulder like an especially talented parrot, Tora politely waits for the conversation to finish, though she taps Shizune on the ear to grab her attention as soon as her elfin schoolmate shows up. Her main processors are already mentally at home, watching hundreds of hours of battle rondo footage and pondering the difficult questions of how to get stronger (especially within the realms of 'tournament legal' upgrades).

    It seems those particular things will have to wait. For all the exciting stories she'd heard of Shizune's frequent encounters with the Confederacy, Tora has so far lived a fairly ordinary life for a shinki. All but one of her fights have been within the safety of the virtualizer, and as much as she sometimes wishes to come along on her master's Union missions, she recognizes the value of "not getting in the way". As such, even if Shizune is immediately familiar with the cause behind the abrupt, terrifying plunge the city takes from idle, harmless, after work buzz, into a pitch black nightmare haunted by ancient monsters, Tora has absolutely no idea what's going on. "Master. You're seeing this right? This isn't just some un-funny virus I downloaded somewhere, right?" As if it would actually help, Tora rubs her eyes at the sight of the centipede in particular before taking another, long squint at it.

    At the sight of Gin and Kin, easily and immediately identified as enemy robots, Tora leaps from Shizune's shoulder with a cascading electronic tone and a bubbling flash of light, materializing her battle armour and kicking her jets into gear; interposing herself between the constructs and her master. "Then if it's not, it's finally my turn to help! Just watch! I'll get rid of them in no time!" Without waiting for approval from Shizune, the Starf Mk2 rockets up from the sidewalk and into the air above the dojo, spinning up her gatling cannons as she closes in on the twin mechanical bird-women. Were it not in her nature to be so suicidally brave, she might be having second thoughts about the fact that this is the first time she's ever used her "real" equipment. The one without the tournament safeties engaged, built for actual combat.

Jeanne d'Arc (536) has posed:
Jeanne had long been hopping back and forth between her earth, Shizune's Akita, and as of today, Dun Realtai. Overseeing the rebuilding of the church is a slow and long process, but one that is dear and precious to the Maid's heart. However, stepping off of the train station a few trains down from Sayuri.

Violet eyes look up to the sky, and Jeanne immediately frowns.

"O lord, hear my prayer..." She murmurs, before she she makes her way towards the dojo she knew Shizune would be at, her capelet and armored skirt fluttering behind her as she runs down the street.

Nuku Nuku (534) has posed:
    Of the students at East Akita High, one in particular seems to be failing to go home. It would seem that the usual regime of napping in class, napping between classes, scarfing lunch, and lounging in the sun has not gone over well with the teachers, and a one ATSUKO NATSUME seems to be stuck after class in cleaning erasers. It is okay though.
    They make puffy clouds, and this absolutely ENTRANCES Nuku Nuku.
    *Paff!* *paff!* *paff!* "Nyahahahahahahahahaha!" *paff!* *paff!* *paff!*
    See?
    Then the sky darkens...
    *Paff!* *paff!* *paff!* "NYAHA! HAHAHA! HAHAHAh--huh?" *Paff!* *paff!* *paff!*
    Peeking out the window as all her classmates go home and the terrible THINGS begin to emerge, this gives her pause as the feline brain inside her skull runs a mile a minute calculations involving yarn and fried chicken.
    *Paff!* *paff!* *pa--...
    "-OH-."
    Realization has struck, and with a buzzing wwwhhr-hssh, twin sensor arrays sproug from the sides of her head, poking up from the unruly magenta mass of her hair like a pair of metal cat's ears. And she proceeds to fling herself out the nearest window. "SORRY! NUKU NUKU WILL FIX IT LATER WITH THE CORPSE LOOT SHE GOT FROM THAT ONE TIME!" She proclaims as she goes sailing out, absolutely COVERED in white chal-dust from head to toe, to get to ground level below.

Shizune Nakamura (369) has posed:
    The moment the sky goes dark, Shizune's face develops a frown. Autumnflower is in the middle of a sentence, but she comes to a halt as well. "-father felt that it might perhaps behoove me to..." Both of them look up almost as one, and Shizune's face hardens almost immediately. "Yes, Tora, I'm seeing it." She snaps off a quick radio message, and then Gin and Kin appear directly above - instantly the martial artist's demeanor is tense. "...Autumnflower. Stay with my sensei. He's a solid fighter, a little better than me." The elf nods faintly, and begins heading for the dojo. To hammer the point home, the senior student calls out more loudly, "All students, into the dojo! Quickly, quickly! Sensei, keep an eye on them!" They don't dare contradict her right now. Not with a quartet of monsters appearing over the city and panic already setting in.

    Shizune doesn't stop Tora, though, nor hesitate while the students move in to shelter. She leaps right up to the wall surrounding the old-fashioned building's grounds, adjusting her glasses and glaring up at the twins. "You're suicidally brave, attacking this deep in Union territory. I've already got backup on the way. Where is she?"

Kagenashi (85) has posed:
    Yatagarasu is the first to turn his attention to Sayuri. The flare of pink is enough to get anyone's attention, but it seems to draw the awareness of the great sun crow first. His voice comes as a deep, powerful rumble, as he takes to the air, beating wings sending down torrents of heated air on the streets below. "Opposition comes. As ordered by Lady Kagenashi, I shall ensure you do not interfere in our plans, girl."

    Yatagarasu's beak opens, and the sun in its chest seems to flare abruptly. The glow of its heart grows brighter, and cracks of light spread over its body like rupturing stone. It's the only warning before a lashing wave of power like a solar flare cracks out of Yatagarasu's beak at Sayuri, blasting heat and sheer destructive force over the rooftops straight for the Puella Magi.

    Gin and Kin abruptly stop their cackling when Shizune speaks. Their heads turn to look at her with an eerie ticking, tilting in a birdlike gesture of curiosity before they speak. Their voices echo as if spoken through empty caves, and they can't seem to stop interrupting one another with abrupt jolts of their bodies. "Oh, Lady Kagenashi? She-" CHHK. "-is here too! Probably looking for-" CHHK. "-you. Better keep an eye out!"

    Their attention turns to Tora next, and though their metal expressions don't change, vicious smiles echo in their voices. "Ooh! It's a little-" CHHK. "-construct! But how-" CHHK. "-small she is. Could she really-" CHHK. "-put up a fight against us?" Gin and Kin turn to one another, then shrug their shoulders with another ratcheting sound. "Time to find out," they echo in unison before suddenly pulling their wings in and diving toward Tora. Their arms are drawn back, razor-sharp talons spread, and they simultaneously thrust them forward at the shinki when they come close enough, raking at her with a twin slash.

    At the same time, Omukade has reached the street level, but he doesn't seem interested in heading toward the dojo right now. Instead, the gigantic centipede barrels through the streets, his thousand legs shaking the ground like an earthquake and crushing cars beneath each venom-tipped point. His path...is straight for the school, in fact, where Nuku Nuku has just burst from a window.

    Omukade chitters and roars as he pushes through the street to make a beeline toward the school. From the toxin-spewing mouth on his back emerge a swarm of much smaller centipedes, each one simpler in appearance and no larger than anacondas. They move with as much speed as their parent, however, and soon Nuku Nuku has a cackling swarm of poison-filled centipedes rushing toward her!

    When Kagenashi at last appears, it's not in a form she's been seen in before. At the same time, however, it's difficult to imagine that the giant black fox that suddenly fades into existence perched on the dojo's roof could be anyone else.

    She is far more majestic and imposing than she has ever been. Silver eyes gleam brightly, as radiant as the star orb that shines in the center of her tongue and the ghostly blue-green flames that burn at the tip of each of her five tails spread out like a weaving fan behind her. She sits upright on the structure's roof, ears perked, eyes fixed on Shizune like a predator who has caught sight of her prey. Malevolence seeps from her black fur in a bruise-colored steam, and so too does it roll down the dojo's roof like ugly rainfall.

    "Shizune." The woman's voice comes from the great nogitsune, even though her mouth doesn't move. It is unnaturally calm, especially given the situation, but with a chilling edge to every word. "You were looking for me?"

Tora (355) has posed:
    Eugh! Creepy! Everything about the twins is spine tinglingly off-putting. Tora spares a moment of silent appreciation for FrontLine in making shinki as life-like as possible. There's no /way/ she could follow Shizune around if she looked, acted, or spoke like that! "You're speaking to the Battle Rondo champion, Type Devil Strarf Mk.2 Tora! World Martial Arts Tournament champion Shizune Nakamura's shinki! The question you should be asking is 'can /we/ really put up a fight?'!" Introducing herself in a manner befitting the climactic confrontation of a samurai movie, Tora meets the double dive head on, releasing limiters on her battery and capacitors until she has all systems running hot. At the last second, she pulls into a tight corkscrew, arms at her sides, and squeezes just through the gaps between Gin and Kin's razor lined fingers; abusing her miniscule size to come away with nothing more than a series of scratches on her paint job.

    Her core system clock spikes to double its normal cyclical rate; the closest a shinki can experience to a surge of adrenaline. There is a surge of excitement as the 10x drain on her battery floods all of her subsystems with the maximum amount of power they can use. Then, before either gold or silver can turn around to face her, Tora unloads with both hands at once, firing her gatling cannon and plasma revolver akimbo at nearly point blank, targetting systems aiming for where a spinal column should be. The rounds are a tenth of the size of what a normal bullet would be, but miniaturization tech is Shinki earth's strong suit. Every last one of them is a condensed packet of pure energy that goes off like high calibre HE.

Jeanne d'Arc (536) has posed:
Jeanne truly doesn't mind living in bustling cities. She finds herself making her way through the city, before she gets to the dojo... or at least, near it. As she watches people stream into buildings, Jeanne finds herself using the nearest fire escape or easily placed buildings and climbs dexterously towards the top of one of the tallest ones next to the dojo itself. On her way up, she pulls something out... and then she moves to the corner of the building nearest the dojo itself.

As she does, she places down a standard, the metal hitting stone with a crack. The wind picks up the white silk, the golden fleur-de-lises glittering as she moves next to it, her violet eyes locked on Kagenashi.

Sayuri Yaguchi (155) has posed:
    It's kind of hard to miss a giant three-legged crow with a heart made out of The Fucking Sun, especially when it turns towards one and speaks in a voice that rattles windows. Glowing panels reshuffle and press together, forming a straight shot that the Puella can brake herself on. Her heels throw up pink sparks until, when she comes to a halt, just two of those glowing panels remain immediately beneath her feet.

    A superheated fireball is what she sees, and the girl uses the muzzle of a revolver to adjust her glasses while she estimates the timing and the arc trajectory. Knees bend and, at just the right moment, the magical girl springs ever higher. New panels appear just as the old ones shatter, vertical, which she plants her feet against and springs ever higher, adding a twirl to her ascent until she lands in a low two-point crouch close to a dozen meters higher than she was just moments ago.

    "And what plan would that be?" she probes as she rises to her full height, "Petty revenge, I'm guessing, but--" Those revolvers are lowered at an angle towards the Yatagarasu's crow-like face, "--Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong."

    Given the size difference, this feels a lot like when she was helping Ysabel with those monsters in her HELLHOLE of a planet, Wyveria. Mentally, the magical girl calculates estimations to the Yatagarasu's abilities. Fire powers, superheated no less. Most likely the ability to fly. The extent of its flame control is currently unknown. Given the size and elemental affinity-- Her eyes narrow -- Getting close is probably the best solution. Particularly the back, where it would have trouble reaching.

    But first, to create an opening.

    Panels slide out underneath Sayuri's feet when her stance drops and she starts unloading the contents of her revolvers straight towards Yatagarsu's face. The first three rounds of both drums are directed towards its eyes. She then spreads the guns out for the remainder of her ammunition, firing rounds along estimated paths the great bird may move its head to avoid injury.

Nuku Nuku (534) has posed:
    Hitting the ground with cratering force, the instant she touches down, Nuku Nuku glances up. Seeing the monstrous wall of chitin and toxin on a course for the school, the girl's pupils contract into thin slits. "Challenge accepted!" Squealed as she reaks into a dead sprint, heels actually tearing up the pavement as she begins to charge. ... Right towards Omukade.
    This would more than likelely be suicidal to quite a many, and generally a bad idea.
    As soon as she reaches the wave of chittering and terrible insectoid horrors she... Just doesn't stop. Even as several latch onto her, bite through skin, tear her uniform, she seems to just grit her teeth and ignore the damage from hundreds of legs and teeth. Considering the skeleton those jaws will find beneath is solid, and unyielding metal.
    Dropping to all fours, the catgirl's sprint turns into a running lope on hands and feet, throwing herself at Omukade, arms open wide with all the force of a truck to try and wrestle the beast to a halt.

Shizune Nakamura (369) has posed:
    In the city, people are already starting to panic. The presence of that giant centipede has most people hurrying out of their cars just as fast as they can - but let's face it, not all of them are going to make it. The Yatagarasu targeting Sayuri at least has the benefit that its attacks aren't aimed down towards street level; they cause less immediate distruction, but a couple of rooftops do catch fire from the sheer heat.

    Kagenashi's voice has Shizune turned around within the blink of an eye, more and more tense by the moment. "Kagenashi!" Her expression has grown hard. "I'd ask what you're doing here, but I have a feeling I know. Is this how far you're willing to go? Risking a trip deep into enemy territory just to come after me? You have to know you don't have long. And even if I can't beat you, I'm more than willing to keep you busy until someone who can arrives." She glances up at Jeanne's arrival; as much as she'd love to have her Servant's help for this, protecting the civilians in the building takes priority. More Union backup will arrive soon.

    Her arms flourish briefly before coming up in a defensive posture, her balance still perfect even atop a wall as she is. "Well, come on. If you're here for me, come and get me." She meets the gaze of the nogitsune without flinching, glaring her challenge.

Kagenashi (85) has posed:
    Gin and Kin are not especially graceful, particularly in combat. When Tora nimbly slips through their claws, they simultaneously shriek and spread their wings, flapping the cloth-webbed frames to slow them down before they hit something. The effort prevents them from turning around with any speed, and they quickly find their backs assaulted by assaults whose size don't match their power. Their clothes are torn and sparks fly from bullets meeting and piercing metal, cracking against internal mechanisms and making the owl goddess' movements all the more disjointed.

    "Ow-" CHHK. "-ow-" CHHK. "-ow!" All of the sudden, Gin, the silver one, twists her arm back at an awkward angle with a quick buzzing of machinery. Talons snatch at Tora to try and grab the shinki in her metal clutches, and while Kin turns in midair to face the two of them, Gin simply tries crushing and scraping Tora between her talons! "The little one has-" CHHK. "-weapons! Excellent weapons! She-" CHHK. "-will be fascinating to take apart and-" CHHK. "-study later!"

    The twins cackle and chitter in their erratic, disturbing way.

    Yatagarasu flaps his wings to remain hovering, three eyes staring at Sayuri once the puella avoids his solar blast. The cracks along his body have already faded, leaving only black feathers. "Vengeance. An assertion of strength," he replies, talons curling and flexing. "A strike aimed to ensure that everyone knows of her power, and none doubt her authority. And I will gladly assist her in that effort!"

    Sayuri opens fire, and as if in reflex, Yatagarasu's eyes are shut by rigid films that pass over them. It's not a perfect protection, however; the bullets crack against his eyes, drawing out a pained shriek as he falls back in midair and shakes his head. Light flares from the wounds created against his eyes, and with another cry, he lifts his head up. Above him forms a roiling miniature sun out of thin air, at least as big as a van. The next flap of his wings sends that blazing mass hurtling toward Sayuri, or at least where he saw her a moment ago. Whatever it hits, that sun is going to create a good-sized explosion on impact, whether it be against her or something else.

    Omukade shows no intention of stopping or slowing his barreling rush toward the school, no matter who falls underfoot. The smaller centipedes that fall from him may divert themselves to snatch at people in passing, but when Nuku Nuku makes herself known, they move from that brief distraction to instead slither after her. They lunge, bite, coil, snap...but nothing seems to take hold. Many find themselves simply trampled as she continues charging, and their venom-soaked pincers hardly seem effective. It's the big one she's focused on, after all.

    And she crashes into the great centipede's forehead with a resounding CRACK. Omukade gives a shout of surprise and pain as his body buckles up behind him from the sudden halt of momentum, falling sideways into a nearby building. "-gh! What?! Out of my way, worthless maggot!"

    Omukade suddenly rears up like a serpent, and in the next moment, his head is driven down into the pavement in a single quick and powerful strike. Hopefully Nuku Nuku is going to end up between him and the street.

Kagenashi (85) has posed:
    Meanwhile, Kagenashi simply stares at Shizune, her tails swaying from side to side. "Maybe I do not. However, I do not need long to make my point. No one saw me arrive; I can leave just as swiftly." The giant fox moves from her perch, feet spreading and bracing in a prowling crouch on the roof. Her lips pull back in a vicious snarl, and her ears flatten over her head. "I have grown stronger, Shizune. Surely you realize that. Do you really think you can last against me now, even with your home at stake?"

    Silver eyes suddenly glance to the side as she sees Jeanne's standard flaring. One of her tails lashes aside, hurling a large orb of fox fire at the Servant to slow her down. The other four are left for Shizune, as each tail snaps out at the girl in turn, tossing orb after orb of supernatural fire after the young martial artist.

    "Your allies may come, but it will not be soon enough, little one."

Sayuri Yaguchi (155) has posed:
    'Protect the civilians' was Shizune's request.

    Yaguchi Sayuri is not a person who is well-equipped to protect anything. As a completely offensive-aspected magical girl, she can only defend by attacking. Even her personal defenses are weak compared to the likes of Shinobu Kimiko or even Akemi Homura. Given who made the request, though, that won't stop her from trying.

    Sayuri's pistols disappear in flickers of pink cherry blossoms, as do the magical platforms she stands on. The girl drops, projecting a new platform and using it to hurl herself directly underneath the fireball, where a newly generated platform appears for her to brace herself up. Rising, Sayuri reaches back and grasps something. With a much larger flurry of cherry blossoms, a new weapon appears--something of a combination between a cannon, a shotgun, and a revolver with a bayonet that hisses with misty, cold smoke.

    "THIS IS SO FUCKING STUPID--"

    Her shout is drowned out by the roar of the descending sun as she thrusts her Gunlance skyward, bracing on two separate panels in a V-style formation, and unloads the first blast of magical shot and shrapnel. The drum rotates, a second round is fired. Again, it rotates, again she fires. This proceeds for six enormous shots in an attempt to shoot down the incoming projectile.

    As a result, it explodes when it hits the girl rather than when it hits the ground.

    The shockwave hurls her into the street, sending spiderwebs of cracks across the pavement. Smoldering, the Gunlance impales the engine block of a parked car not too far away. Sizzling and smoking, with a groan, Sayuri picks herself up, reaching out to dismiss her weapon's solid form before she looks skyward with a tense frown.

    Black discoloration swims in the pink core of her Soul Gem as Sayuri ascends once again in leaps, generating platforms to land on and immediately jumping off them, ignoring the blood and the pain.

    It's possible that Yatagarasu thinks she's dead. If it's lost track of her, maybe she can get above it for a surprise attack.

Tora (355) has posed:
    Tora has to admit, unloading on big targets with combat-strength rounds is a real blast. Fighting other shinki is exciting in its own way, but taking on not only much larger opponents than herself, but two of them at a time, is a new kind of rush. "My schematics are patented and top secret! The only person I'll ever let take even a single panel off of me is my master, so you can forget it! The only thing you'll be studying is why you lost so badly!" Trash talking is something she's a little bit new at, but it's fun all the same. Really, she shouldn't be acting this light-hearted. Her precious master's hometown is in serious danger, and she's about to take on her biggest enemy all alone. Perhaps it is deep, unshakeable confidence in Shizune, and by extension, her friends, that allows Tora to fight as if this were just another match. Perhaps it is only exictement and a childish fixation on proving herself in front of her master. Most likely, it's a little bit of both.

    Tora cries out as she winds up caught between Gin's bladelike fingers, having spent too long pouring firepower onto the pair without leaving herself enough time to escape. Sparks fly from between those talons as their cutting surfaces squeeze into the remarkably resilient composites below. The flurry of alerts suddenly going off in Tora's virtual HUD, indicating overpressure, joint stress, and electrical failure, remind her distinctly of the last time she had fought outside of the virtualizer; against the champion Victoria. That particular reminder is all that's needed to redouble her determination to win. Her armour disappears into another burst of white particles, suddenly slimming down her frame and allowing her to slip right out of Gin's grasp, freefalling for the intervening second before she is able to retrieve her armour from the slipway, warm up her jets, and throw her boosters into full throttle on a meteoric ascent back up. Both hands of her bulky exoframe are clasped around the hilt of her powered sword, slightly larger than a human sized combat knife. Flying back up the length of the silver construct's arm, Tora slams the point of her blade through the kimono, hopefully into the elbow joint, and then drags it all the way up into the armpit, before disengaging in a wide circle and coming back for another round.

Nuku Nuku (534) has posed:
    As soon as she impacts, the mechanical catgirl is HOLDING ON FOR ALL HER WORTH. For the record, as Mishima Heavy Industries' pride of weapons engineering, she is worth a lot. Put to the test against the great centipede, the creaking groan of metal and servos rises to a whine as Nuku Nuku digs her heels into the pavement, dragging furrows along the ground as she bullheadedly tries to keep the massive insect pinned, even while all the others attempt to tear her to shreds.
    "No!" She hollers back when told to step aside, and then-- goes squish.
    The force applied on the street is immense, and there is an immediate Atsuko Natsume-shaped crater in the ground. And for a long moment there's a good deal of silence. Before the groan of steel calls out angrily. And then there's a sound that's even worse.
    The rowl of a severely hacked off cat.
    Pupils narrowed, sharp teeth bared, her hands plant on the shattered concrete, bracing sneakers against Omukade's face and begins to push. "Nnnnyyyyyyyyyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrghhh!" Just to show that she has not been crushed, to show she still has strength in her yet as she reels one hand back to... Glow.
    With a crackling light, her fingers hum with a golden glow. Electricity arcs visibly between her fingers as she spreads them, turning her very hand into a high heat, high energy, high vibration weapon, lashing to claw the great centipede while she hisses and spits.

Shizune Nakamura (369) has posed:
    "I can if I don't stand and-" Shizune is in motion the moment Kagenashi's tails start flicking. She hurls herself back off the wall. The first orb obliterates a chunk of wall where Shizune was standing. The second sails to her side, the martial artist twisting in the air. The third, she actually turns to deflect, her arm forming a scoop and her ki cushioning her as she redirects its momentum with a spin into the ground. The fourth-

    The fourth sails cleanly past Shizune, her path deflected by her redirection of the third. It slams into a window across the street, where an apartment-dweller was peeking out at the chaos below.

    Was.

    The council prez is watching when it hits. She is watching when the apartment is blasted with Kagenashi's foxfire. For a moment, there is silent, bare shock in her eyes and nothing else. She doesn't even stick her landing. Simply falls to the street in front of the dojo, barely even noticing the pain of the botched impact.

    One hand shivering, whole body trembling faintly, Shizune finally stands up. She looks between the hole in the building's side, and Kagenashi there atop the dojo. A realization settles in. The longer this goes on, the longer she 'holds Kagenashi off', the more people are going to be hurt. Are going to die. The nogitsune can probably see the moment that resolution settles in, that her shivers of anger and horror stop under an iron-hard blanket of resolve. She takes a deep breath, lets it out, and reaches for the small purse she wears.

    "I've failed. I really have. Words and cleverness, that's what I pride myself on, but all I've done is throw myself in your way, again and again. I should have tried to understand you. One way or the other, it might have prevented all this. But I let myself fall into the tunnel vision trap. Maybe... maybe I'll do better afterwards. I'll try. But I don't think I can right now. I'm sorry, but you've forced my hand. I have to answer this."

    The purse drops off Shizune's shoulder, and all she holds in her hand is a tiny little perfume bottle, one whose top she unscrews and tosses to one side. Rather than looking at Kagenashi, she stares into it for a moment.

    "I think I hate you right now, Kagenashi. For hurting people who've done nothing to deserve it. For being so willing to grasp at power that you'll shatter lives and livelihoods just to reach for it. For invading my home and disrupting a peaceful place like Akita." Shizune lets out a sigh. "But most of all, for forcing me to use this where everyone can see. I honestly have no clue how I'm going to explain this to people afterwards." She closes her eyes, murmurs briefly and quickly into her radio...

Shizune Nakamura (369) has posed:
    And tips the tiny bottle back, drinking its contents in one quick slug.

    In half a second she's coughing and sputtering, the tiny glass bottle dropping from her hand and shattering on the road. Her eyes widen in what seems to be alarm, one hand coming up to clutch weakly at her throat as the coughing fit continues. She tries to take a step forward, but her legs give out, the student dropping to her knees. She tries to push up to her feet again but fails, falling to the ground; the coughs at last cease, but in their place, the girl holds herself up by one arm, pushing up, trying to do something resembling 'getting herself on her feet'. But even that fails, and she finally drops prone, lying there on the ground. She is completely unmoving for a few seconds, her breathing slow, eyes unfocused.

    But then, finally, fingers curl. A hand plants, then the other. Slowly, as if the movement itself is difficult and awkward, Shizune pushes herself up to her hands and knees. Her glasses hang off her face, disrupted by the stumble and fall, and when she rocks back in an attempt to get one leg under herself, they drop off entirely, hitting the ground and cracking. The council prez does not appear to notice. She manages to get her foot planted, pushes up with both hands, and... promptly stumbles several feet to the side just trying to keep from falling over entirely again. She has managed to get on her feet... but only just.

    Without her glasses, she stares blearily up at Kagenashi, her expression a scowl tinged with what almost seems confusion. Whatever she downed, it seems to have drained her rather than any sort of strengthening. Even her ki flow has become erratic, disjointed. She takes a step forward and, for a second time, nearly goes face-first onto the street. She sways, barely keeping her balance, and stumbles a good couple feet to the right. Despite the constant battle with gravity she seems to be fighting, despite the apparent failure of whatever concoction she just downed, despite looking as if she's struggling just to stay conscious... Shizune is still trying to take a step forward. Towards the dojo. Towards the nogitsune that has invaded her hometown.

    She is wide open to attack from above.

Kagenashi (85) has posed:
    It's a gambit by Sayuri, but one that just may work. The sun explodes, acting not unlike a real exploding sun on a much smaller scale; heat and force blast outwards, shattering nearby windows and creating a strange whirling of dissipating plasma where the sun was a moment ago. Yatagarasu opens his three eyes, blinking them in sequence even as pain still smolders in them. His great wings beat to keep him aloft, torrents of searing wind cast down on the city below. He looks, tilting his head, turning...

    ...but by the time the plasma dissipates, Sayuri has moved. "Where are you, little warrior," Yatagarasu rumbles, turning around to try and spot the puella. His baleful eyes narrow. "You do not seem the type to have died so easily, leaving nary a corpse. Come; show yourself again!"

    If Sayuri wants an opportunity, this is probably as good as she'll get.

    Gin suddenly finds her hand with nothing to hold. The crafty shinki slips free from her bladed clutches, and before the mechanical owl-goddess can react, Tora is already cleaving through the minimal protection a silver body offers. The powered sword slices through Gin's 'flesh' like butter, digging into the joint, raking through mechanisms and gears with an ear-raking screech. Whether that's only from the tearing metal or also from Gin herself isn't clear.

    The silver woman's arm dangles awkwardly at the elbow, twitching and giving off the sound of mechanisms attempting and failing to move. She whirls around in midair to face Tora, raising her still-functional talons as if ready to strike out at the shinki once she comes back. "Fine! If you won't let us-" CHHK.

    The gleaming golden blades of Kin's wing suddenly swing down into Tora's flight path, aimed to cleave right through her. "-we'll just have to tear you apart /first/!"

    Omukade is at first deeply satisfied with himself, if the gurgling laughter from his grinning maw means anything. However, he is, perhaps foolishly, not expecting such a comeback from the feline below him. Her feet push against his head, just above the snapping, chittering mandibles coated in poison. His laughter abruptly stops, giving way to an irritated growl as he tries to push back against her, but the sudden energized slashes dissuade him from that. Each clawing cleaves into his chitinous hide, raking burning claw marks into his dark armor. His next shout is one voiced in pain and anger as he quickly pulls his head away and scuttles back, shaking his head from side to side and tossing poisoned blood this way and that from his wounds. "Gah! Vile little cat! What are you even made of?!"

    While Omukade reels, his spawn make up for it. The less-giant centipedes swarm toward Nuku while she's down, attempting to latch onto her with their strong pincers and coil around her with their stabbing legs. She may not have a problem with poison, but they can at least slow her down and harass her while their 'parent' is reeling in pain.

Kagenashi (85) has posed:
    Meanwhile...

    Kagenashi doesn't even notice the apartment that's suddenly consumed in ghostly flames. Her attention is focused on Shizune, and it's only when the girl glances over that the nogitsune's silver gaze follows. It's still not something she registers for long, because Shizune's reaction is what seems far more important.

    Resolve. It's a feeling Kagenashi has seen more than once before. She can tell the sudden change in Shizune's demeanor, but what exactly it means now, what exactly that strange vial contains, is not something she can guess. Silver eyes narrow in wariness. Ears press flat against her head. Her lips curl back in a snarl, baring fangs lit by the glowing star orb within.

    The great black fox's voice comes in a tense rumble at the back of her throat. "...you hate me. Should I care? You, as well as countless others, simply loathe me. Perhaps you should have thought more. Perhaps you should have considered me more than a force of mindless destruction. Perhaps you would like me to congratulate you for finally losing whatever naivety kept you from feeling that. Whatever the case, it is too late for anything to change or matter."

    A low growl rolls up from her chest. Her claws rake against the roof tiles where her malevolent energies have pooled like sickly liquid. She watches Shizune struggle, falter...and for a moment, she is simply confused. What is this girl doing?

    Caution and better judgment, however, have long since been set aside. This was a risk in the first place, entering so deep within Union territory with no other Confederate assistance. To falter now would be cowardice. To back down from wariness would deny her this chance to assert her strength. To wait...would simply be unacceptable.

    Kagenashi leaps.

    The dojo shudders under the force of her hind legs kicking off its roof. In midair, the nogitsune is consumed in black, blotting out any light she gives off. Her form shrinks as she descends on top of Shizune, shifting and changing and finally settling on the shape of the masked woman in clothes of fluttering scarlet. She falls, and in her hands, she holds Nageki.

    The cursed blade's tip points to the ground. To Shizune. In those moments of descent, it echoes its relief in Kagenashi's mind of the blood that will be spilled any moment now. Its thirst will be satiated. And Kagenashi's urge for vengeance, whether or not it has been properly directed, will be similarly appeased.

Sayuri Yaguchi (155) has posed:
    The great firebird has lost sight of her. He's still looking at the ground, while Sayuri has already begun ascending again. The opening she wanted, such as it is, has presented itself.

    The magical girl pushes out a hand, generating a series of pink vertical 'walls' and then springs between them, hurling herself ever higher while Yatagarasu circles below, searching for where she had fallen. She vaults off the final apex and flings herself towards the great bird, pushing both of her arms up over her head. There's a flurry of glowing pink cherry blossoms as her Gunlance rematerializes.

    As she soars in an arc, sidetail flipping, she spares a glance towards the dojo in the distance. Golden eyes narrow, then return to the fire-aspected quarry below. Swinging her weapon forward, Sayuri descends, leading with the personal cannon's icy bayonet, aimed straight for the center of the sun raven's back, between the wings, with all the force that her speed and slight body can muster.

    As desprately as she wants to, Sayuri resists the urge to bellow a one-liner on her way down. No sense giving away the surprise when that ridiculous machete they call a bayonet will be plenty surprising on its own.

Tora (355) has posed:
    "That's only if I don't blow you to pieces before then!" comes the retort, uttered in a simultaneously cool and over-excited tone. Rocketing out from under Gin's arm in a spray of sparks and slivers of metal, Tora banks into a wide, circles turn, climbing gradually to build potential energy she can cash in on a steep dive and turn into extra force on her next slash. Her thrusters burn blue as she accelerates, cutting a bright trail of smokeless exhaust through the air as she whirls over the silver goddess' head once, twice, three times, and then is abruptly cut off at the start of her dive by the wings of gold.

    Focusing on one opponent to the exclusion of all else is one of Tora's biggest weaknesses. Her situational awareness simply isn't that great. The metallic 'feathers' cut into her booster unit and wedge her body between them; her small size and low mass working in her favour in that the impact knocks her away from the cleaving edge rather than pushing her into it. She detaches from Kin's wing a moment later, spouting a crackling trail of short circuited amperage behind her as she flickers her remaining rockets to roll herself onto her back. She realizes that she wont get anywhere like this, simply trying to fight both twins in the same way they fight. She needs a paradigm shift.

    And so Tora's armour disappears once again. The bubble of light refracting from the slipway bursts, and a tiny white, gold and red blurr comes shooting out the side of it, scattering drops of white radiance behind it. The Lavina armour's alternate configuration takes the form of something between a motorbike and a fighter jet, involing reverse swept things, double the number of boosters, and triple the number of guns mounted on its front. Tora rides low on its back like a speed circuit racer, completely unprotected, but moving at twice the speed of before. Diving into a tight spiral, she zips around behind Kin and spools up all three gatling cannons; letting off a roaring burst of gunfire three times more intense than her first volley. Steering the vectored thrust rockets by wire, she lets go of both handlebars and summons her revolver and sword, blasting high velocity plasma shells in Gin's direction as she makes her pass at her twin, and then swings the powered blade for the golden construct's neck.

Shizune Nakamura (369) has posed:
https://youtu.be/_BD_eEpuzXw

    As Kagenashi descends, Shizune sways on her feet, stumbling perhaps a half-step to the right. Her arms wobble, trying to find her balance, one flailing back a little, one shifting forward slightly. She manages to just barely right herself, her eyes finally turning upward towards the descending woman-

    The nogitsune will have a brief glimpse of a face alight with ferocity, lips pulled back into a wicked grin that is utterly unlike Shizune-

    And then the street /shatters/.

    Nageki does not hit Shizune. It hits the street, driven /INTO/ the blacktop by an overhand punch from the martial artist aimed to do no more and no less than straight-up smash Kagenashi's attack itself into the ground. There is a frozen moment where for the second time the black fox gets a look into Shizune's face, and sees eyes full of profuse violence tinged with a vague hint of 'not quite all there', and lips pulled back into a toothy smile that promises nothing but pain, and plenty of it.

    Shizune sways a little to the side, and the sway becomes a spin which builds momentum. By the time she comes around, the martial artist's leg is swinging itself upward, driving straight in towards the nogitsune's midsection in a style that Kagenashi... no, that nobody here has seen her use before. Between a burst of ki far beyond her usual power and the sheer brute strength that by all rights she shouldn't have, the kick sails in with the force of a small car speeding down the highway.

    Following through with her spin, the brown-clad martial artist stumbles back a few steps, only to bring her left leg up, bent at the knee and held high up in front of her chest. Her right arm is lifted high and behind her, curled forward to place her fist beside her head, while her left arm is lowered in front of her, curled up such that her hand draws level with her knee, palm open. With a quick quirk of her fingers, one-two, she beckons Kagenashi. Dares her. Challenges her.

    And wobbles a little on one foot.

Kagenashi (85) has posed:
    Sayuri's surprise is as effective as it is earned. The frigid bayonet of the excessively large gunlance digs into Yatagarasu's back, drawing a shrieking cry from the giant crow. It falters in midair, wavering from the agony of cold striking into its body. The wound steams; ice forms briefly, but is immediately melted by the incredible heat of the sun crow. Blazing arches lick out at the gunlance's blade, threatening to melt the weapon with the sheer heat blaring from the injury. Indeed, Sayuri could be faced with severe burning just from that wound alone; thankfully, the enchanted ice of the weapon is enough to prevent both situations from being likely, as it cools the air just enough for it to not be lethal.

    Still, Sayuri now has a flailing sun crow to manage. Yatagarasu falters and wavers, flapping its wings to try and remain aloft. Its heart begins to burn, a radiance that shines in its eyes and the depths of its throat. The glow spreads along its body in cracks between its feathers, snaking in spiderwebs along Yatagarasu's form.

    All at once, the cracks flare with a desperate, explosive wave of solar power. If Sayuri's still standing on the black bird, she may not be for much longer.

    Gin and Kin are faced with a change in tactics they did not expect, either. The clockwork abominations turn to face Tora when she flies away, clearly anticipating what new assaults they can unleash on her...but then she transforms, and neither of them are expecting the sudden boost of speed she experiences. "-what?!"

    Their brief unison is interrupted by chaos. Kin's golden hide is blasted through with cannon fire that pierces one end and fires out of the other, ripping through internal mechanisms and sending her inner workings into an uneven clunking and stuttering. Gin attempts to bring her wings around to block, but it's a failed attempt; Tora's revolver easily punches through fabric and metal alike, making Gin waver in midair as her flight becomes erratic and unbalanced. Kin is already in the process of trying to wheel around to strike at Tora as she passes...but too late.

    The sword slices through Kin's frail neck as if it were little more than a branch.

    The golden woman's head falls, and her talons lash out just in time to catch it. A strange substance seems to seep from that wound, unrelated to the mechanisms controlling her joints. Ectoplasm? Whatever it is, the gold owl shrieks in either pain or anger, and her wings flap quickly to lift her up into the air. It's her silver twin that follows through, raking her claws in an attempt to tear the wings from Tora's new mount.

Kagenashi (85) has posed:
    Meanwhile...

    Even before Kagenashi's blade strikes the ground, she is all at once forced into awareness that something has gone very wrong.

    Nageki's long blade drives into the street almost halfway through, forcing Kagenashi into a kneel she didn't expect to have to make. The nogitsune's head quickly lifts to look at Shizune, and the sight she is greeted with shatters everything she expected from tonight.

    This is wrong.

    She attempts to rise again, but the moment she yanks Nageki out of the ground, Shizune's leg has struck her side. There's a crack; ribs have no doubt been broken. Kagenashi gasps, and she finds herself sent flying. Ten feet...fifteen...twenty...she only stops when the wall of a nearby building forces her to with another painful /crack/, casting Nageki out of her hand and sending her sprawling to the ground.

    This shouldn't be happening.

    Nageki clatters against the concrete. Her mask is dislodged again, sending it rolling a good distance away. Pain shoots through Kagenashi's body, and she coughs, attempting to find her breath again. It's a few moments before she manages to push herself to her feet again, and even then her stance is shakey and uncertain.

    This should not even have started.

    She leers at Shizune. One arm is held to her side, and she sinks down to take Nageki in her hand again. The sword's hilt is gripped firmly; Shizune is strong, yes, but isn't Kagenashi's pride worth that last risk? She is little more than a child. She is a naive fool, an obstacle to be removed. Her blood should be shed.

    Kagenashi bares her teeth in an uncharacteristic snarl. A trickle of blood seeps from the corner of her mouth. The sword reminds her of the urges of a youkai, demands that she accept that challenge for her pride's sake, and with a last push of her better sense aside, Kagenashi rushes toward Shizune. The cursed sword's serrated edge is swung inward, aimed to dig into Shizune's side, to rake through her flesh and drink her blood.

Sayuri Yaguchi (155) has posed:
    As soon as Yatagarasu responds to the icy blade burrowing into the center of its back, Sayuri springs to motion. She wrenches down on the enormous rifle, pushing it down and hauling herself up onto the stock where, while the sun crow thrashes, she balances precariously with magic. In her outstretched hands, her revolvers reappear with a flourish and a scattering of cherry blossoms.

    "You're no different from the shit I kill /every day/, asshole."

    With that scathing insult, her dance begins. Sayuri twirls atop the embedded gunlance, periodically slamming the trigger with the toe of one boot in order to prompt its discharge directly into Yatagarasu's molten body. In the same motions, her arms are sweeping from side to side in time to the twirls of motion she's using to stay balanced on the weapon, firing rounds into those great wings each time they beat upward.

    Five times, the gunlance fires into Yatagarasu's body before the wave of heat and solar power dislodges it and hurls both lance and girl off the beast's back. Surrounded by flames, only kept from incineration by the protective power of her soul gem, Sayuri bares her teeth. Ribbons catch fire as she hooks the tumbling Gunlance with her foot, kicks it up into her hands, catches it.

    When the wave of solar fury passes and she starts to descend again, Sayuri pulls the trigger, firing one final round of magic and shrapnel straight for the mighty sun crow's face. The recoil, with no ground to brace herself on, drastically alters the arc in which she's falling. One can easily follow the trail of smoke, however, to where she's landing in the streets, hard enough to crack the asphalt in a ring of spiderwebs.

Tora (355) has posed:
    "That's one down! Now the only one left is-AH!" Tora switches her attention from Kin to her sister only just in time to see the silver goddess come flying at her straight out of the place her golden twin had just occupied. With both her hands off the handlebars, she can't steet quickly enough to avoid having those gleaming talons carve right through the side of her ride armour, spitting fire and coolant as the left booster tank ruptures, sending the entire vehicle into a swiftly accelerating downspin. Dismissing her revolver so she can at least grab one of the machine's piloting grips, Tora lays about with her sword as Gin's claws pass by, aiming to cleave her fingers right off her hand and slice a clean swath all the way up her forearm.

    Despite her best efforts, her mount isn't going to make it. Half of the flight systems wont respond no matter how many thousands of ignition signals she sends, and she can only partially prevent it from nosediving by yanking back on it as hard as she can. Rather than attempting to salvage a situation beyond her control, Tora decides to use it to her advantage in whatever way she can for one last, ridiculous attack. Dumping a massive amount of energy through her thruster coils, she circles once around Gin to pick up as much speed as she can, and coming three hundred and sixty degrees, angles the smoking machine dead on into the center of her chest. With the flick of a switch, the two halves of her armour's powered punch dagger snap together at the craft's nose, glowing red as the energy field runs through them. The result is like having an eight inch, rocket propelled knife launched point first into the silver woman's bosom.

    At the moment of impact, Tora engages all three gatling cannons and simply leaps off; wearing nothing more than the lightweight interface frame for her larger armour, and firing her tiny auxilliary boosters to slow her descent. Not even looking back to see what becomes of her treasured armament, she begins running across the street as fast as her tiny little legs will carry her, using powered leaps to jet over rubble in her way. "Masteeeer! I'm coming!"

Nuku Nuku (534) has posed:
    Little touch and go that was. While Nuku Nuku probably pissed Omukade off, the smaller centipedes had her pretty harrowed and harangued.
    "Nyaaaaaaaaa!"
    This is the sound of Nuku Nuku flailing off, clawing, and batting away a hell of a lot of insects, glancing up. In all the knock-down drag out fury of her own fight, she's instantly distracted by the sudden massive display if a FIGHT between Kagenashi and Shizune draws slit-pupil eyes that way, sensor-array ears wiggling and twitching, taking information in more reliably than her eyes and...
    "NYAAAAAA!"
    Suddenly she is clinging to Omukade with that inhuman grip, as if absolutely terrified, back arched, hair frazzled on end, teeth bared and trying to clamber along the centipede faster than a cat up a curtain.

Shizune Nakamura (369) has posed:
    As Kagenashi rushes, so too does Shizune. She sways far enough to lose her balance, finally puts her foot down to stall the inevitable drop to the concrete, and that step becomes the first of her own headlong charge straight towards the nogitsune. The smirk is almost gone from her face, the only expression left a dazed and animalistic sort of aggression that suits perfectly with the way she hurls herself unthinkingly at the invader to her city.

    At the last second, she trips.

    Except that the trip becomes a roll, dropping her low to the ground and under the nogitsune's defenses, and when she comes out of it, her foot lashes upward, driving a kick for Kagenashi's stomach. "HAA!" She comes up into a second kick, spinning from there around in a turn that brings her right arm around in a backfist strike like a sledgehammer aimed right at the mask. She lets her weight bring her forward, dropping her low enough that she can lash out with her fists again, rapid-fire blows with curled fingers that ends in a double palm strike for the youkai's abdomen. "SEI!"

    But that is not the end. Oh no. The end comes when Shizune drops into a low crouch, tenses, and then hurls herself forward like a missile. A forward corkscrew straight through the air, a flying headbutt at stomach level, the street buckling under her feet from the sheer strength that goes into LAUNCHING the attack. And it's accompanied by a roaring, "ORYAAAAAAAAA!!"

    And then she drops to the ground, coming up in another ready stance, stumbling to one side, then the other, fists curled as if holding cups of wine. "Ka~ge~na~shi~..." The calm and composed council president lilts, her tone swaying almost as drunkenly as her body. "You know, you look like a pi�ata. Can I punch you until candy comes out...?"

Kagenashi (85) has posed:
    Blast after blast shoots into Yatagarasu's body. Each one draws another cry, another rush of blazing heat hotter than any furnace from the wound, another tumbling of the great bird in the air. It's only spared at last when it discharges that explosive wave to knock Sayuri away, buying it a precious moment to stabilize itself in the air. Its beak opens as it turns to face the tumbling Sayuri again, and its throat glows with a building heat-

    The last powerful blast strikes its jaw and snaps its beak shut, denying the sun crow a last blazing shot at its fallen opponent. It finds the last of its balance torn away, and the great creature tumbles through the air to land with an earth-shaking impact in the middle of another street from Shizune's impact. The ground cracks as heat rushes through it, the Yatagarasu's wound still discharging scorching energy that melts part of the surrounding buildings. The giant crow's next act is not very graceful; it takes time for the creature to rise to its feet again, time that is spent in flapping wings and raking claws. It certainly doesn't seem like it's an effective combatant at the moment.

    Gin's slash is effective, but so too is the one Tora swings at her in return. Silver claws are sliced from their fingers, sending the metal digits tumbling and pinging to the street below. Gin shrieks, echoing the screech of metal as Tora's blade continues up her arm. "Damnable little-!"

    Whatever the silver goddess was about to say, Tora quickly silences her. That craft pierces through her chest, then blazes through her back, no doubt continuing ahead to crash into some helpless wall. The damage left to Gin is enough to match; the clockwork woman's internal mechanisms are bared, and a clear hole has been punched through them. Some gears are displaced; metal is torn; mechanisms reach for holds that are no longer there. Gin stutters, clicks, clunks, and twitches in a way no human body should. Even her flight becomes even more erratic, her wingbeats ratcheting and stuttering unnaturally. It's a wonder she can even stay in the air now.

    Omukade has been in a state of wavering and hissing, and when Nuku Nuku at last tears off the remaining centipedes assaulting her, Omukade is there, leering over her with mandibles chewing at air and pincers snapping threateningly.

    If he was going to attack, though, Nuku Nuku's abrupt clambering rush tears that thought from his mind. "GAH!"

    Claws rake into chitin with remarkable strength that only feline terror can bring about. The colossal centipede chitters in pain and flails in the street, attempting to dislodge Nuku from him even as she's trying to flee the terrifying sight Shizune has become. A last twisting /flick/ of his tail should hopefully do the job, because the feline girl has already left a trail of claw marks through his hide just from that.

Kagenashi (85) has posed:
    Kagenashi is not faring much better than her allies.

    Nageki swings, its path guided more by the sword's than by Kagenashi's efforts. Shizune drops, clearing out of the way of the blade's hooks that seek to tear her blood from her body. What follows almost passes in slow motion, as Kagenashi is more than aware of every strike that lands into her. As aware as she is of each hit, however, she finds herself unable to determine how to /block/ them before they make contact. Bones break. Blood spurts. And, at last, Kagenashi is once more sent flying up into the air, until she slams into the street on her back.

    The illusory eclipse fades, giving way to the starry night that has fallen over the city in reality.

    Pain shoots through Kagenashi's body where she lies. What she manages is little more than an agonized whimper as she rolls onto her front. Silver eyes flit toward Shizune, but as she attempts to say something, all she ends up doing is coughing blood into the street. She still clutches Nageki, its demands pounding in her head, its urging for her to get up and answer Shizune's taunting striking her again and again. She has to-

    Wait.

    ...isn't that the sword's demand? Why does she have to...?

    A sudden realization strikes through the storm in Kagenashi's head. A brief moment of clarity, a realization of her own foolishness. All at once, the nogitsune becomes strikingly aware of something she had been searching for that was standing in front of her the entire time, and which she was simply too blind to realize.

    Kagenashi manages to mumble something into her radio. Slowly, steadily, she pushes herself to her feet, stands against the pain shooting through her body in crashing waves, and looks toward Shizune.

    There isn't hatred in her expression, nor anger, nor humiliation. Only a deep grief shows in her silver eyes, all the will to fight at that moment stripped from her being. She takes the scarlet sheath from her back and slowly slips Nageki into that container, temporarily silencing its cries in her mind.

    Yatagarasu, Omukade, Gin, and Kin; they all vanish in the air, as if they were never there. One more illusion to aid their retreat.

    Kagenashi's gaze falls to her mask, staring at the empty eyeholes that look back up at her with a smirking grin. The aching black fox's next words come in a distant murmur, barely audible to Shizune and far too quiet for anyone else.

    "...this is enough."

    The nogitsune fades away like a ghost in the night. Her mask follows a moment later.

Sayuri Yaguchi (155) has posed:
    Sayuri had landed on her feet, it was the impact strength alone that caused the road to crater. A split second after hitting the road, she snaps the gunlance open and ejects spent, smoking cartridges. New ones materialize in midair, falling into place, and she flips the red-hot barrel back up in preparation for further fighting against the thrashing Yatagarasu.

    Except it disappears.

    Straightening her posture, the golden-eyed Puella glances down the street, from side to side. It's only after a voice on the radio announces Kagenashi's own retreat that the magical girl eases her readiness. The Gunlance flickers, then evaporates into cherry blossoms.

    Without further hesitation, the puella magi turns and bolts down the street, running the practiced path between the rail station and her friend's dojo. Once she reaches the same block, her outfit disappears in a flurry of glowing pink petals, replaced by her school uniform. And it's this yellow and green clad girl who enters the dojo yard, panting softly.

    Pointedly ignoring the black corruption swirling across the surface of the pink gemstone set into her silver ring.

    "Shizune..?"

Shizune Nakamura (369) has posed:
    The battle, as it happens, did not take place in the yard itself, but rather outside on the street... which is utterly trashed.

    After Kagenashi's disappearance, Shizune's face goes through a confused litany of expressions, from puzzlement to triumph to annoyance to... a prompt failure to even remember quite what she's so worked up by. Instead she squints at the ground, stumbling around the rubble for a few moments. She finds her glasses. She puts them on. Upside down. And then takes them off, frowning at them as if betrayed, before tossing them aside and staggering off.

    She heads down an alleyway just before Sayuri comes within sight.

    This, somehow, does not stop her from leaning against Sayuri from behind a few moments later in the dojo courtyard, draping her arms over the magical girl's shoulders and resting her chin on Sayuri's head. "Saayuuuriii..."

    "...'m hungry. I don't wanna go cook. Can we rent a pizza?"

    This is exactly the moment when Sayuri may realize that several sets of eyes have been watching the entire time from the dojo door, which is cracked open. Including a pair of elven eyes staring right at the two of them with an unreadable expression.

Tora (355) has posed:
    Tora only arrives in time to see Shizune completely demolish Kagenashi. The sight is both awe inspiring due to her master's display of sheer strength and ferocity, and more than a little scary, because it isn't how the girl should be acting at all. How cool Shizune looked beating up the evil ringleader single handedly is a secondary concern in Toras mind next to whatever she drank had done to her. Reaching her just as she flops on Sayuri from behind, Tora leaps up onto her shoulders, grabs her ears with both hands, plants her feet into her shoulders, and makes the futile attempt of dragging her upright imaginable. "Master! Come to your senses already! They're all gone now! We won! So stop acting crazy!"

Nuku Nuku (534) has posed:
    On the chaos of cats and centipedes scurrying to get away-- Omukade from Nuku Nuku-- and Nuku Nuku from Shizune, that flick of the giant beast's tail is more than enough to dislodge the hissing cat-girl.
    Who promptly attaches herself to the top of the nearest street lamp post and will refuse to come down for a little while.

Shizune Nakamura (369) has posed:
    When a shinki begins tugging back on her ears, Shizune immediately reacts with a stumble backwards and awkward, flailing attempts to dislodge her. "Aaaa- aaa- owww ow ow ow ow ow- geroff, 'm on a date!"

Sayuri Yaguchi (155) has posed:
    Not spotting Shizune in the dojo yard has the puella magi a little perplexed. It's the sound that alerts her, though, and so she doesn't jump right out of her skin when the martial artist flops against her back. There's just a small noise from Sayuri and a small sigh.

    This Shizune smells like a sake distillery.

    "Yeah," she says in a quiet, almost defeated voice, "Pizza. Come on, you." Sayuri shifts a bit, but fails to do anything about moving Shizune before she starts objecting to Tora's prodding. There's a hiss of "Sssshut up!" with reddened cheeks.

    At least she's no longer being leaned on. She scoots up against Shizune's side to help keep her upright and guides her back to the sidewalk while speaking to Tora, "She's drunk. Your master will be fine, it's just going to take a little time to work out of her system." A glance back, "But she's missing her glasses. Could you get them? I think I saw them by the streetlight over there."

Tora (355) has posed:
    Tora immediately comes unstuck with Shizune's flailing, hovering in the air a few feet behind her with her hands over her mouth, staring bug-eyed at the actions of her unbelievably drunken master.

    "But master! Girls can't love girls! That's forbidden love!"

    Fairly certain that she nailed the execution of that particular cliched movie quote just fine, Tora spends a few moments looking for Shizunes glasses; finally dipping over the pavement, hauling them up by the nose bridge, and then pushing them onto her master's face; this time right side up. The crack . . . well that'll buff out right?

Jeanne d'Arc (536) has posed:
There is an astonished gasp from Jeanne at the front of the survivors that were packed in the dojo.

This is going to be incredibly awkward later when Shizune explains what the hell is going on with tonight. "G-girls can't love girls! It's /forbidden/!"

Shizune Nakamura (369) has posed:
    Once Tora comes loose, getting Shizune to the sidewalk is an easy affair, although it involves some cheek-poking and a drunken martial artist, oblivious to her radio being taken, lilting, "Sayuriiiii, you're blushiiiiiiiing!"

    Approximately ten steps later, there is a soft little snore. Shizune has fallen asleep on her feet, with her head on the puella's shoulder.

    The glasses, by this point, are pretty much a loss. One lens is shattered out of it entirely, the other is so cracked as to be useless.

Sayuri Yaguchi (155) has posed:
    In response to both Jeanne AND Tora both exclaiming girl-girl as forbidden love, Sayuri's response is very simple and very... Sayuri.

    The arm that's not holding Shizune upright raises, all fingers but one curled downward in an excessively rude gesture.

    "This night's been too much of a pain in the ass to deal with that shit, so you can all fuckin' bite me."