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Mordremoth     The city of Treesville... IS UNDER ATTACK! It is actually named Pinnacle City! A city high atop the jungle trees of the world near Tyria's unification, it a is a world high in concentration of magic, with vegetation choking the ground levels. The canopy is almost walkable, and some roads have even been built upon it. Most travel is by simple airship, and there are a few large warp gates that allow airships through. One of these has allowed the attacker to head for the city after blitzing the defenders.
    There is also an artificial gate in the city itself! This must have been a miscalculation, right? Because defenders can mobilize rapidly when the call for help is made! The city is multi-tiered, but the air defenses are mostly in flames already, and the large airship is firing cannons indescriminately at the remaining defenses. A few harpoons with ropes have dug into the wall on one side, away from the clogged and damaged docks, allowing a scrambling group of what must be Sky Pirates to head for the city proper!
Shadowed Scales     There's probably an out of place figure on board the airship making its assault on the treetop metropolis of Pinnacle City. A man in gleaming silver armor, with his hands resting on the pommel of a fairly large sword. With the tip of the blade resting on the flooring before him, BIGGS WEDGE stands on the center of the deck. Silent, tall, as immoble as a statue, the Judge from Galianda seems to be mostly along for the ride while the airship opens fire on the defenses.
Kakashi Hatake     The artificial warp gate allowing for defenders to respond in the case of an emergency like this serves its purpose well. Union forces have been mobilized. While rushing like this isn't really Kakashi's style, when lives are on the line, he can't really put it off. Still, of all the things he has faced in his time... Airships is a new one. The warp gate spins up, depositing the spikey gray-haired jounin on the ground on the otherside, resolving from blurs of light. He remains crouched dramatically for a few seconds before looking up as something explodes.

    One eye covered by his forehead protector, Kakashi analyzes the situation. Taking down that enemy is definitely a priority, but so is rescuing civilians and putting out fires... And... Are those people scaling the walls down aways from the burning docks?

    This is a bit too many tasks to handle all at once, even if Kakashi resorted to Shadow Clones. Maybe especially without resorting to those. They're not his forte and are costly besides. But at least one may still serve a purpose.

    "Well, the first thing to do..." Kakashi says to himself. "...Is to evacuate civilians and attend to the injured. It doesn't appear as though they're the target, but it will be easier to fight of the enemy without them in the way. Furthermore, those fires..." He runs towards the nearest wall, performing a leap and then attaching his feet to it as though it were a horizontal surface, before proceding upwards. He needs to get a better view of the area, see who is in trouble and try to find...

    Bingo. A reservoir.
Shin Tokuyama     Whenever the call goes out for help, true heroes will answer the call to arms! Or, alternately when those people are busy, aspiring heroes who mostly are bored will do so.

    Shin Tokuyama firmly falls into the latter group. He steps out of a warp gate and lands, looking around. He's heard over the radio that this place was in trouble, so his clear and first duty is to help people any way he ca-

    HOLY SHIT IS THAT AN AIRSHIP.

    Shin makes a decision.

    "It is the solemn duty of every protagonist to some day gain an airship. Today is that day."

    He clenches his hand dramatically. As he does so, there's the faint eruption of ki from the act of closing his fist, "We're doin this."
Stygian Mirror     It is on the airship that one can still find Mirror. Currently idling near one of the harpoon guns that hasn't fired yet, the white-haired, fox-eared, cat-tailed and lizard-eyed woman glances down from the deck, admiring the view from the ship. She's not gotten very many airship rides in her life, so you take a bit of fun where you can get it.

    The sight of innocents and civilians caught in the crossfire bothers her, but not so much she shows it. It's annoying, but it's not her job to be worried about it today.

    Clad in her usual tunic, with those bony gloves and boots while her Soulsteel blade remains on her waist, Mirror's arms are over the railing of the ship as she waits, her eyes locked onto the Warpgate near the city center, and the many buildings around it. Defenders finally start emerging; of them she recognizes Shin, but it's probably best she not head down towards them yet.

    Let them fan out and start saving people, it'll be easier that way.
Khusso     Khusso arrives from the Warpgate, armed but alone at this time. Her team has lives and such of their own, so she only has Taimi's communicator with her right now, instead of any help from the Pact. The little asura is armored though, and the crackle of the electromagnetic plating glows as she draws her sword upon arrival. "Huh..." Looking up at the arriving airship. "That's an Aetherblade ship. I think these Pirates are from my world."

    Which means that Khusso is prepared for what is coming. The asura immediately leaps up and rushes to the top of the nearest tower, clambering up quickly to get a good idea of where the worst of the pirates are... and maybe to get onto the airship, if the pirates are handled.
Sakura Haruno     Flowers is quick to arrive, even if she's not necessarily committed to stepping in on the attack right away. Medical support might be the way to go, mostly because she hadn't had time to fully gear up and rest up after a hospital shift. She'll turn up through the artificial gate, still pulling gloves on as she strides out.

    Her first duty is to look for the injured and try to help them. This may, naturally, involve occasionally stabbing an air pirate or two who would prefer they stay injured or proceed to dead.

    Regardless, she's staying at ground level. Sakura doesn't really like heights very much.
Mordremoth     "Well girls and boys, let's see what you can do," comes the Captain of the ship. The new Captain, that is. Scarlet Briar, the sylvari, was in the armor of the Aetherblade pirates, and comes out onto the prow of the airship with Mirror and BIGGS WEDGE. "Just let them spread out a little bit and I'm sure it will be easy pickings, hmm?" She chambers a round into her rifle, the pigtailed, red-headed(are those leaves or hair?) plant-woman surveying the battlefield.
    Kakashi finds the resevoir easily! Teh fire brigade is already working to prepare some tanks on carts to spray down the fires. If he's offering to help, some of the fire brigade will point him toward the gatehouse.
    Shin will have to fight through some of the pirates if he wants to find a line up to the ship. Then he'll have to climb it. The pirates have some flintlock pistols or something like them, but they aren't much of a challenge! There may be a distraction coming though!
    Khusso can find the emergency escape up one of the towers, and engage in a moderately frustrating jumping puzzle to get to the top. This won't let her leap to the ship, but there is the possibility of riding a ley line up to it. This area is heavy with magic. It'll be a tricky ride if she tries that, though!
    And finally Sakura will find plenty to do. Civilian casualties are light so far, and the civilians are being evacuated toward a more secure area, but they do have casualties. Or she can go after pirates because...
    The pirates are focused on just looting what they can. Most of them are shouting and driving away civilians, but some have gathered and are gunning down the militia. They are definitely using hit and run tactics... at least until the sound of catapults echoes over the din of battle, and two large metal casings slam into the street about three blocks from the warpgate's fortified location. These unfold into grinding and spinning monstrosities of metal, gears, and limbs that begin to tear through the defenders much more easily than the pirates are.
Stygian Mirror     "They're busy saving people already," Mirror answers Scarlet Briar, a glance spared towards the plant lady. She'd love to sit down and ask what the deal is with plant people and their relation with Mordremoth, if there even is any, but it's probably not the time and place. Her window is opening up and she'd feel unprofessional for missing it.

    "I'll get to work. I won't be long."

    Or she hopes she won't be, anyway.

    Mirror hops onto the harpoon turret. With a surge of black Essence, the turret clicks and arms itself automatically. The Abyssal stands near the tip of the projectile, perfectly balanced. And then it fires!

    A feeling of dread and fright (unnatural mental influence, resistable) ripples out from the harpoon turret; without even knowing what a Deathknight is, non-Elites present would feel a sudden chill at the idea of confronting one at all. Elites probably won't care as much, if at all.

    Of more concern to them is the fact the harpoon is aimed directly at the warpgate's artificial frame, and Mirror's not having any issues riding it down, sword suddenly in her hand.
Shin Tokuyama     The Captain of the airship has a name and a personality. Shin's quest for an airship may prove more difficult than he initially projected. Shin clenches his hand into a fist all the tighter and tries to find a way up to the ship. He couldn't give up just because a named and now-recurring character occupied his destiny that he decided existed tonight, fifteen minutes ago.

    He slams his fists together with a corona of red ki and then says, "Alright! You pirates better get ready, because much like a teenager's self esteem on the internet, you're about to get put down." It took him a while to think of that one, admittedly.

    Shin rushes forward towards the pirates in his way, ducking and weaving around flintlock shots that peck and punch at him, a couple landing decents hits and staining his white suit with blood. Still, he charges up one of the harpoon lines and eventually full-force slams into a group of pirates with a ki-powered shoulder charge.

    "Tetsuzanko!"
Kakashi Hatake     As Kakashi makes his way to the reservoir, finds people are already working to put out the fires, and receives direction to where the water is needed most, he nods in understanding and says. "I'll be borrowing some of your water reserves then. And you might want to clear everyone out of the way." He forms a hand seal and intones, "Shadow Clone Techique." In a puff of smoke, a duplicate of Kakashi appears standing next to him.

    "You know what to do," he says to his clone, reaching into his tool pouch and withdrawing a trio of kunai and some wire. Clone Kakashi begins going through hand seals in sequence.

    Tiger, Ox, Monkey, Rabbit, Ram, Boar, Ox, Horse, Monkey, Tiger, Dog, Tiger, Snake, Tiger, Ox, Monkey, Rabbit, Bird. Then the Clone intones, "Water Release: Great Waterfall Technique!" A huge amount of water rises up out of the waterfall in the form of a huge spiralling tidal wave aimed at the gatehouse.

    The mass of water pours across any burning structures, overflowing the area, but manipulated by the Shadow Clone to avoid injuring anyone or causing unnecessary property damage. And riding on that wave, standing on the water as though it were a solid surface, Kakashi stands with kunai ready, wire run through the rings in the handles. He appears to be riding the tidal wave towards the airship, spinning one of the kunai by its wire in one hand. His Shadow Clone won't last long after using a technique of that scale, but it should last long enough to serve its purpose of extinguishing flames and transporting the Leaf jounin to where he can make a difference against the cause of the destruction.

    He does let out a 'hmm?' as he notices Shin running up one of the harpoon lines as his method of getting aboard. Good, they have skilled combatants on-site. That should help avoid spreading themselves too thin.

    Though there's an odd chill in the air emanating from above... Kakashi doesn't know what the source is, but it reminds him, vaguely, of a certain night 16 years ago.
Shadowed Scales     For a man who's supposedly a Judge, Biggs Wedge displays a critical lack of care for the carnage and chaos playing out before him. Thumb lazily playing over the pommel of his sword, one scarlet eye lazily surveys the battle from his perch, through the slat of his helmet. That eye slowly turns towards Scarlet Briar, and offers the Sylvari a vague grunt. But.
    That eye focuses back on everything below, a solitary figure earning the 'Judge's attention as he cuts a swathe through the pirates and begins charging up a harpoon line.
    Shin Tokuyama seems to earn a modicum of the armored man's interest, as he hefts his blade and trudges for the harpoon cannons... Heaves the sword...
    And makes to cut the rope.
    This will probably not stop the plucky adventuring martial artist, but will most likely if anything, designate Biggs as some kind of Boss or Mid-Boss figure in the act of trying to cutscene kill him.
Sakura Haruno     Sakura WOULD have been content to just work on helping the injured, right up until she saw the particular monstrosities that had been fired out towards the defenders. Those looked way worse than pirates, really. She makes a quick decision from looking at them - more damage by working on the injured than by stopping those and then getting back to the injured - and will sprint towards the area where they're working on defenders.

    Then the unnatural dread sweeps over her, and she trips over her own feet for a moment. She'll manage to pull herself out of it, rolling forward in what mostly just looks like gratuitous ninja gymnastics for no good reason, but she's trembling ever so slightly as she tries to barrel into one of the things, attemptingto kick a limb off.
Khusso     Are those... those look like Twisted Nightmares, but those haven't been deployed in months. Khusso frowns and takes a quick survey of her options. The asura steadies her sword and prepares to leap for the airship... when it looks like the airship is sending an Abyssal toward her. That's a problem. Especially the wave of fear.

    -Never turn your back-

    Khusso shakes her head rapidly, hearing that snarled and angry voice inside her head. "Quiet, Shiro," she whispers, turning toward the incoming harpoon. Leaping from her perch, the glider unfolds with a loud creaking 'flumpf!' Leaning in, she does a quick dive to intercept Mirror in midair, blade-first.
Shin Tokuyama     "Ah man, I thought for sure when I fought a Mid-Boss on this, it would be Death Cab For Cutie working for the other side so we could have an epic, Tsundere-Star-Cross-Lovers battle," Somewhere, somehow, Stygian Mirror can feel free to sneeze as per anime tropes. Wherever she may be right now in this scene.

    He doesn't have time to bemoan not getting to endorse one trope in lieu of another, since, you know, the rope is getting cut. Shin takes off at a sprint, dashing the length of the rope as much as he can, "But if you want some of this?! Alright, big guy!"

    "Cobra Kai Times TEN!"

    Shin erupts in a massive display of red light, igniting with Ki as he charges up the rope towards the knight. It's easier to run up than to run back down for him at this point. And while the Cobra Kai is a fully aesthetic move, his next his not, "Geiha Genkou-Ryu!"

    He leaps off the rope right as it goes slack, "Mountain-Shattering God Knee!"

    He put most of his ki and speed into a forward leap, his knee trying to drive itself into the center of the armored figure's chest with a massive impact that, Shin hopes, will also let him land on the ship instead of dying via a very long fall.
Mordremoth     Civilians and militia scream in terror when Mirror passes overhead! That isn't a surprise. Khusso will have to take care of Mirror herself. Too bad.
    Shin has little trouble downing a few Aetherblade Pirates! A couple fire scattered shots at him, but he's already on the way up. Scarlet peers over the railing and stares, looking curious. "Oh, now that's not something you see every day..." She's going to let Wedge take care of this, content to watch!
    Kakashi, in the meantime, pours the water over the fires. Some of them have oil on them, making it not an instant thing, but the fire brigade is hard at work to deal with that. It's causing the Pirates to scatter and start to break their organization, and some are making for the ropes, maybe attempting to retreat. Oh that won't do.
    The Twisted Nightmares clank and approach, but one of them is bowled over, an arm torn off. An actual arm. It looks like a mechanical arm of a mroe humanoid construction. The other Nightmare turns and makes a sawlike slicing motion at Sakura, though!
Stygian Mirror     Mirror hadn't really expected to be intercepted mid-air. She might have expected someone to block or parry the attack by getting in front of it and swinging, but certainly not for someone to produce a glider and just zoom straight for her.

    Swords clash as Khusso impacts with Mirror, knocking her off the harpoon, which continues its course towards the warpgate. Without the Abyssal's weight and magic, though, it can only vaguely plant itself into the warpgate's frame without inflicting notable damage, and without enough depth that the ship could yank things out of their sockets.

    Luckily for Mirror, she doesn't end up freefalling; her free hand grabs onto Khusso's leg, while her sword-wielding one maintains the blade-lock. This IS exactly as awkward as it sounds like it should be.

    "Okay, that was pretty cool, you don't see people just leaping off buildings to intercept airship-fired harp--" Sneeze. That was a weird feeling. "-- harpoons very often. We're going to land, not fall, right?"

    Since both of her hands are occupied, Mirror's eyes suddenly flare up with pitch black and grey light. She doesn't push any sort of offensive on Khusso (which given her position might be a bad idea), instead turning to look at the warpgate. Bolts like black lightning fire out, trying to nail the artificial construction; assuming nobody steps in to stop it, the metal ring starts rusting and decaying rapidly.
Shadowed Scales     He comes. He still comes even with the rope cut. It is a study in impossibility as Tokuyama, Shin, charges; sprinting his way up the very last of the rope up until that moment it is cut.
    Of course Biggs Wedge knows even the impossible is possible, when an indomitable will is presented with an obstacle.
    So he comes nonetheless.
    The blade flashes as the rope is severed, but the HERO takes his bounding leap, body wreathing in that red light. This will not be a battle of star crossed lovers, but one of a man against an apparent collossus; that knee bearing down and impacting with a staggering solid blow against the silvery Judge armor. The force of impact is enough to shove Biggs backwards. Though he does not flinch from the assault, and there is a crunching sound of metal thoroughly being caved in by that intense force, he merely grunts, boots dragging furrows in the deck for at least a foot and a half of distance.
    For a long few beats, Wedge stares Shin down, the armored knight's eye hard and unblinking as he... Tosses his blade aside.
    It is almost funny... How from the moment the sword leaves his hand and clatters to the deck, it vanishes in a flare of silvery light. Where the sword had once been is now simply a large, rough, branch; roughly the perfect size to make a walking stick, without properly being carved into such.
    This is because Biggs shifts his stance.
    Armor creaks softly, but his every motion is smooth, as he shoots forward. ... And remains in place. Two Biggs Wedges now in play, one remaining where he is, in a strange, almost lax seeming stance, the other thrusting himself at Shin, a wordless, soundless, lunge, making it difficult to tell which one the attack will truly comr from.
    It comes from the one in motion, however, a blade-like swipe of his arm lashing out with vicious and sharp-cutting reprisal from the sharp points of his gauntlets.
Khusso     "You again?!" Khusso huffs, blade catching. It's a VERY nice sword, by the way. It scrapes along the other blade and locks, but fortunate for Mirror, the asura is not in any way shape or form an aerial fighter either. She doesn't have that Mastery yet. Which means... the descent is happening faster but without an actual interruption, just a loud CREAAAAAAK from the glider.

    "Well, the glider was built for just me, an asura," she points out. "Not for a human, and you're what, about... 70% heavier than I am?"

    CREEEEEEAK~

    "Fortunately," she continues. "It was built to accomodate full plate armor, and my current armor set is electromagnetic plating, specifically built to save weight. Given the safety margin put in, the stresses should be able to handle your weight on top of mine until we reach a safe distance from the ground."

    The glide path slowly turns in a spiral... but then...

    CREAAAAK!

    "... except that I forgot to account for the weight of YOUR equipment," she realizes.

    With a loud *SNAP* the left wing strut breaks, and abruptly Khusso and Mirror are tumbling at high speed the next forty feet toward the ground.
Stygian Mirror     "I'm not THAT heavy! And I'm not wearing heavy equipment!" It's not entirely untrue, Mirror's pale as death and doesn't look especially well-nourished. She also tends to forget that Soulsteel is very heavy to the rest of the world, and so Khusso is completely right either way.

    Entropic eyelasers cease when the glider creaks, presumably leaving the warpgate damaged by rust and corrosion but not to the point it broke. The artificial ring just looks like it could use replacing; it's worn down, but still in one piece. Then the glider breaks outright.

    "Crapcrapcrapcrap--"

    Mirror's sword clicks, because that's her best option. Sadly one's ability to dodge or parry fall damage was removed in an errata (you could still soak it!), so the Abyssal's going to do the next best thing. Weaponlock broken by the fall to begin with, she swings her blade, which separates into its sword-whip form. The upper half streaks to the highest rooftop within view and plants into it.

    Her free hand moves to catch Khusso's wrist (if the tiny asura will allow it), and then they're swinging like Spider-Man, the sword-whip retracting itself and dragging them towards the rooftop.

    "SO HOW ABOUT THEM SKY PIRATES?" she asks over the sound of rushing wind, curious.
Sakura Haruno     The arm will get a look of disgust out of Flowers, who is still fighting off the aftereffects of that dread. This is enough of a hesitation that the other horror manages to actually cut her, though she's moving to get out of the way in time to make it a glancing blow rather than anything particularly traumatic.

    "...Ew!" Sakura declares, finally, displaying her usual subtle grace with machinery. She'll fling the arm she'd ripped from the first one at the second, aiming for one of the joints in an attempt to maybe cause it to seize up. If that fails, she'll go in herself in a moment; she's just trying to buy a moment to stem the bleeding from the wound she just took.
Shin Tokuyama     "Oh we're doing this man style, huh?" Shin says as the sword gets tossed away. He's a little out of breath, but his stance shifts a few moments later. Hands come up, opening into flat palms as he stares down his opponent. One foot slides forward just a little bit as the red coronas of energy from the Cobra Kai technique continue to surround him.

    Shin seems more excited than ever, bouncing on his feet a bit, "Every time I do one of these, the other guy gets out a gun, or a sword, or tries to shoot me. Finally, someone's gonna obey the goddamn laws of kung-fucking-fu and we're gonna do this man-to-man." Shin steps forward a bit, moving in towards the after image as the real Biggs Wedge comes in for a swiping attack.

    With a twist of his body, Shin grips his own elbow and powerfully blocks the swipping cut with his forearm. The tips of the gauntlets, rather than hit his much more vulnerable body, slash into the forearm of his left arm. There's a spray of blood and what look like ki sparks at the impact of the technique.

    Almost immediately after the gruesome cut, Shin's right hand shoots out from its grip on his elbow. It tries to impact the Judge in the chest, right where his knee hit before with a withering palm strike that tries to exploit on the damage Shin did before with his opening attack, "Geiha Genkou-Ryu! Heaven-Sundering Palm!"
Mordremoth     Sakura's hurled arm is thrown with enough strength that, while it doesn't disable the Nightmare, it hurls it aside and snaps some sprockets! This buys Sakura some time to recover while BOTH the Nightmares clamber up and steady themselves. Both are damaged and slower, though... if she is careful, she can probably take both on at once.
Kakashi Hatake     There's a lot going on at once. Pirates ae stealing things, some are retreating, huge robotic horrors are rampaging, there is someone shooting eye beams at the warp gate, there are other villains duelling or bombarding the area... It seems the plans of the pirates are working. The defenders are being spread too thin.

    Kakashi isn't Naruto. He can't be on every battlefield at once by making tons of Shadow Clones. But he isn't without his allies. Kakashi uses the kunai he is spinning to cut his thumb and draw blood, then he forms hand seals quickly, with practiced ease.

    Boar, Dog, Bird, Monke, Ram. "Summoning Technique!" Kakashi intones as he puts his hand down into the water he is standing upon even as his Shadow Clone back by the reservoir runs of Chakra and disperses after doing the best he could to put out or diminish the worst of the fires.

    The tidal wave begins to lower its water level, but before that can happen, Kakashi leaps up off of the water's surface with a chakra-propelled leap, and swings his kunai+wire combo, catching it on the edge of the airship like an improvised grappling hook. Which is exactly what it's being used for.

    Meanwhile, a number of ninja dogs come launching out of the receding waters like canine torpedos, tracking down the pirates either still looting or in the process of trying to escape with what they have. And the ninken engage the pirates with a mix of agility, intelligence, and powerful jaws that goes well beyond a normal dog's. The hounds are trying to make sure the pirates either don't escape, or if they do escape, it is done only after facing solid resistance.

    After several seconds, Kakashi launches himself up over the railing of the airship, performing a hand stand briefly and then pushing himself off with his fingers before landing on-deck.

    He's used a considerable amount of Chakra so far, so he'll have to conserve from here on out, if possible. Just blowing up the ship is probably going to be a bit much, and might endanger civilians. It'd be better if he could find whoever is in charge and put a stop to this at the source. And... That woman there looks important. Possibly...

    Kakashi waves two fingers on one hand casually, but there's no sleepy laziness in his gaze as he calls out, "Excuse me. You wouldn't happen to know where I can find the captain, would you?" His other hand raises with a kunai in hand in a reverse grip. "I'd like to have a word with them."
Khusso     Khusso is snagged! Her sword is still free, though. As the yank hauls her up toward the roof, she flinches.

    -Stab her now and be done with it.-

    "No!" Khusso doesn't have any problems with STABBING Stygian Mirror, but she sure isn't going to do it in midair while being rescued. Mirror's spirit sight might be able to see the vague shimmer of another being inhabiting Khusso for a moment, speaking to her, but she doesn't listen to whatever is said.

    Landing atop the roof is going to be a little rougher. Khusso says, "Why are you working with the /Aetherblades/ now? What could they possibly offer you?" There's an internal struggle though... one that Khusso briefly lets slip.

    All around the asura, the rooftop and stonework is rapidly turning to bright green jade, and it's attempting to petrify Mirror as well. It's very short-lived in duration, a few seconds at most, but it's a surprisingly powerful attempt.
Shadowed Scales     For all the world may be on fire around them, now Biggs Wedge has an oppononent. It would be untoward, and insulting to not give the youth his full attention, when Shin displays himself capable of perceiving the blurred line between what is real and what is illusion, in parrying the blow.
    Though gauntlets draw blood, it is not the lethal stroke the 'judge' had been seeking. Though the damage he does to that arm would be crippling to most, the sense that it will not halt Shin's combat effectiveness comes, when the glimmering essence of his own Ki seems to erupt from the gashes.
    BAM.
    The impact is solid and vicious. This time the Judge flinches. Though without a cry of pain, the slamming thrust of Shin's right makes solid impact against that silvery plating and... He vanishes.
    No, he doesn't VANISH, Biggs Wedge seems to blink briefly from existence; no transition of motion, simply a flicker of his body, lurching to a new position several paces off as his left hand poises to strike.
    "... I see this one can use a real weapon." Murmured in response as he shifts his weight, that arm lancing into a deadly sword-like thrust of the clawed gauntlets, from the right.
    But in truth this is yet another illusion. Though it appears to come from one direction, the true attack is from the opposite, the Judge's body shimmering at the last possible second, revealing for just that vicious instant, the mirrored truth of his intent.
    "But how well?"
Sakura Haruno     Sakura will manage to recover herself, but she's not going to take the gear-monsters lightly at this point, not with one of them having already scored a hit on her and both of them looking ready. She's not used to fighting against things without proper biologies, of course, but that's not going to stop her from trying to exploit them.

    Hoping that they can at least detect a feint and fall for it, she'll take a quick step towards the one on the right before changing course and diving towards the one on the left. Or more properly to the ground near the one on the left, going to her hands and knees even as she forms a quick set of seals, before lifting a hand up and through the dirt to drive a series of large spikes up from the ground at it from both in front and behind. She's hoping to take the one out of the fight quickly with this, so there's a lot of chakra going into it.
Stygian Mirror     In response to the powerful shaping effect, Mirror's Anima briefly flares up, to the point her Caste Mark is bright and visible on her forehead, and a dark contour traces her shape, sucking the light out from around her. The stagnation of Mirror's soul and being, frozen eternally in her moment of death, refuses further change and pushes back the petrification effect.

    She's still immobilized for a moment, a testament of the effect's strength, eventually breaking free with a grunt to raise her hand and point the now retracted blade towards the asura's head. At least she's not attacking back.

    "Knowledge. They want to know how the destruction of a warpgate affects local magic and energy... things. Lines. I didn't catch all of it. My lord's right hand would very much like that data too, and this spares us from having to build a warpgate just to destroy it. The pirates'd probably leave once it's done, you know? Then nobody else needs to die. It's not they can't just rebuild it when we're gone."

    Khusso might give thought to that idea, if they can strike a deal with the pirates' leader to leave in exchange for observing the warpgate's destruction. Win-win at this stage, isn't it?
Shin Tokuyama     "My fists are weapon enough. It's true." Shin comments, slowly flexing his hands after the impact against the armored figure. There's the loud popping and flexing noises that knuckles stereotypically make when a martial artist does that in a movie. Shin adjusts his footing.

    His opponent is using a supernatural martial art too. And one that Shin's having trouble tracking in his present state. There's numerous ways that one can deal with an unseen opponent. Shin shuffles through them all in his mind. He could blindfold himself and fight without sight to heighten his other senses, but that's not always reliable in the middle of a battlefield.

    After Shin goes through a few ideas, he eventually settles on one. As the Judge shimmers back into existence, Shin turns to face the armored form. But the straight thrust of the gauntlets connects square in his chest, digging in up to the knuckles and probably shattering a few ribs. Shin coughs up some blood from the corner of his mouth, "You know..."

    "I usually only let people see two or three moves of my style at a time. I'll make an... exception for you, though. And let you see a third," Shin wheezes out, staring up at the much larger figure. Both hands grip the forearm buried in his chest, "Geiha Genkou-Ryu..."

    Shin throws his weight up and backwards, coming up off his feet as he uses the grabbed arm for leverage. Both feet, charged up with Ki, swing upwards and try to catch the armored figure in the chest before using momentum and weight shifting to throw the Judge up over his head and then back down onto the ground with Shin, ideally, standing on top.

    "God-Crushing Twin Fangs!"

    As soon as the Judge impacts with the floor, if Shin can land it, all of the Ki in Shin's feet discharge into the deck of the ship, probably cratering the vessel from the force of it.

    In the aftermath, Shin pulls himself off the gauntlet impaling his chest and staggers back a couple times. He's definitely taken a nasty hit from that.
Mordremoth     "Talking dogs?" "What's going on?"
    When it comes down to it, the Aetherblade Pirates are skilled men and women of many races, but still just normal men and women. They aren't ready for some of the weirder events in the Multiverse! The ninja dogs are quickly causing a route.
    Scarlet doesn't care, though. She's lining up a cannon to shoot the rusted over gate when Kakashi appears on the deck, and this makes her roll her eyes. "Oh come on, nobody can just leave me alone. It's all for science! What is wrong with everyone?" A large, exasperated sigh.
    Then she smiles.
    "The captain? Certainly!" She places her hand on her hip. "Captain Scarlet Briar, at your service!" The hand whips up into a mocking salute. A process that also hurls a high-explosive grenade at the ninja, very carelessly so given that she's on an airship.
Mordremoth     The Twisted Nightmares are... not really very intelligent. A feint like that is exactly what is needed, and a powerful impact smashes where Sakura was moments ago. Both of them start to turn toward the ninja! This is too little and too late after their initial attack.
    Damaged like it is, the eruption of stone spikes tears into the nearest Nightmare, sending sprockets and gears flying everywhere. It twitches and whirrs before stopping its motion.
    The second Nightmare crawls over the first toward Sakura... and then it stops. Gathering up the pieces of the first, it start to connect them and twist the parts together again, shaping a smaller creation with far too much agility and practice to be comfortable.
Khusso     Khusso narrows her eyes when Stygian Mirror reveals the reason for all of this. That sounds VERY suspicious. Especially with Twisted Nightmares running about in the streets, teamed with Aetherblade Pirates. It's all a lot of coincidences that line up to one person.

    But it can't be that person.

    "Ley lines," Khusso corrects. "That sounds like something Scarlet Briar would have done. Especially with this group. Is one of the Inquest trying to revive Scarlet's legacy? You need to tell them to stop. That will just get them killed. If not by the Pact, then Mordremoth will take care of it. Scarlet was insane and her notes incomplete."
Sakura Haruno     Sakura's not quite certain what's going on with this, of course, her initial flood of triumph fading as it does something or other. Still, given the two choices - charge in and risk that that's a terrible idea and this is about to explode, or stay back and risk that this is a terrible idea and about to explode - she'll go with the latter, taking a few steps back and seeming ready to take several more.

    She just doesn't want to get caught up in it if what's being built is actually just a bomb.
Shadowed Scales     Fingers dig like blades through flesh, and still the Judge gives no displa of emotion, any expression hidden behind that visor, save...
    For the glittering vision of a crescent moon in silver light flickering in place upon his brow. A reverse-C of silvery light, hovering inches off the brow of that silvery visor, his eyes chill and cold as his strike lands.
    Shin speaks.
    Shin grasps him by the arm...
    Shin flips Biggs Wedge like pancake.
    The sound of heavy armor clatters on the deck, resounding and reverberating for a moment in a metal cacaphony as that mighty stomp bears down and dents the deck beneath in a very Wedge-shaped crater. Before, the 'Judge' rises. Now that glittering mark is more pronounced, a solid image of light worn on his brow like a crown, as three Biggs Wedges rise, armor cracked pitiably, blood visibly seeping from plates.
    Blink and there is only one.
    Blink again and there are six.
    He sidesteps right.
    Two of him sidestep left. One paces backwards, another appears. To look upon Biggs Wedge is to look into a kaliedoscope in the desert heat, the eight of him stalking circles around Shin
    "This one uses it respectably well." He convedes in a murmur, voice little more than a breath. Before the eight lash out as one, each unleashing a flurry of blows, kicks like lightning, high and low, smooth flowing slashes of those clawed gauntlets, clearly pushing his body to ignore whatever pain he may be in.
Kakashi Hatake     Kakashi is dubious of the talk of all this being 'for science'. But even if it is, he has met enough people who do things for the sake of science and have been rather twisted for this to not earn any particular sympathy for interrupting the 'experiment'. "Sorry, Captain. But I can't let you--" he is cut off however, as a grenade is just casually thrown at him. Kakashi narrows his uncovered eye and leaps up the object, but its blast radius is more than he estimated, and he wasn't expecting that kind of attack on an airship anyway, so the flames seem to reach out to engulf him and blast him away.

    However, the blackened, burning form that hits the deck with a hollow *THUNK* is not Kakashi. It's a log.

    Kakashi leaps up and over the ship's edge on the OPPOSITE side, apparently having decided to use replacement to get a feel for the threats on deck before committing to an attack. An attack he now engages as he throws a trio of kunai at Scarlet from behind! "Kakashi Hatake," he introduces himself belatedly. "This science experiment is going to have to come to a close." If Scarlet is sharp enough to detect Kakashi and turn around, she may also see that there's a wire connecting the trio of blades, and that the end of it is attached to Kakashi's fingers. He probably intends to manipulate the weapons somehow. Potentially even in the event she avoids them.

    Meanwhile, one of the ninken is chasing down a pirate yelling, "Bark! Bark! Bark!" in a human voice. One of his companions, a dog wearing sunglasses, runs up alongside him and says, "Bisuke! You're just yelling 'bark'!"

    Bisuke, shocked, says, "Ah! Thanks, Akino! How embarrassing!" He then clears his throat and begins yelling, "Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey!" instead.

    Akino nods approvingly.
Stygian Mirror     "It's not up to me. The only thing up to me here is what lengths I go to to do what I was asked to. They just want to see the gate blow up. Is a portal that can be rebuilt really worth all these lives and collateral to you?"

    Without turning her blade away from Khusso, maintaining it pointed for effect, Mirror turns her eyes towards the warpgate, frowning. "A lot of what you just said went over my head, anyway. I don't know anything about about legacies, Pacts, Inquests or even if that dragon has any interest in all this. I just know that Scarlet Briar up there on the ship wants the gate to explode so she can collect data. I've seen way worse deals than this."
Mordremoth     The Twisted Nightmare clicks and clatters as it assembles... a much smaller second Nightmare. This one shudders, lifts itself up, and skitters at high speed toward Sakura. It would appear these clockwork creations are self-replicating to some degree! The small one leaps for the ninja, while the larger one climbs over the remaining pieces and limps after, blades whistling in the air.
    It is a good thing the smaller one is demonstratably weaker. Sakura can definitely take these down, but it's going to be a good lesson on why these things are so feared in Tyria.
Shin Tokuyama     The back of Shin's hand smears some blood from the corner of his mouth as the martial artist takes a ragged breath. He wheezes a few times and then stands up again. He loosens the tie around his neck and tosses it to the side before also shedding the suit coat he was wearing which now has a giant hole in it.

    "You're pretty strong too there, guy. Some fancy tricks you've got, for sure. Having some trouble keeping up," Shin muses, considering the situation he's in and the opponent he's up against, "I might be outmatched again. Haven't felt quite like this since the last time Allenby beat me up." He nods a few times, exhaling.

    He opens those heterochromatic eyes again and fixes on his opponent. He's tracking the movement of eight enemies at once and is managing to try to figure out which one is real. He's only nominally succeeding since his more specific goal is to try to block every enemy at once instead of solve this mystery more intricately.

    "Still. Even if you're way, way stronger, probably. Gotta keep fighting. Because it's the only way..." Shin hops back away from all eight for a few moments, lifting his right arm back behind him, letting it wreath in ki and fire, "That Avenged Sevenfold-Sempai will notice me!" His left hand grips at the deck as he skids back. He uses it to launch himself forward, "POWER!"

    He swings his hand forward, slamming it into the deck with a huge impact. Instead of a focused attack, this just created a forward cone of raw ki and fire across the deck of the ship, trying to catch all of the images at once.

    "GEYSER!"
Mordremoth     One of the kunai draws a line of brilliant green sap out from Scarlet's shoulder, gashing deep. Just one. All three of them were partially deflected, not by a dodge or parry, but by the strange glow of a force field. Scarlet turns around, her shoulder bleeding sap down the arm, and hisses, "Ah, a Mesmer trick? So annoying, illusionists."
    Scarlet still has her rifle. Kakashi is a skilled ninja, so he should be fine when faced with a rapid-fire high caliber spray of bullets fired almost blindly in his direction, right?
Sakura Haruno     The smaller one is not the worst thing that could have happened, but it's still rather frustrating. She'll take it out by going back towards a more aggressive stance, now trying to deal with both at once, abandoning caution and accepting that she's likely to have to patch herself up after.

    This is because she's just going to barrel fist first into the smaller one, dodging its first move and attempting to blast it back with all her might directly into the larger one. It's less like killing two birds with one stone and more like killing one bird with another bird she also wants dead.
Khusso     Khusso stares at Stygian Mirror. She shakes her head slowly, "I don't know what they told you, but whomever is up there on the airship is NOT Scarlet Briar. Scarlet Briar has been dead for over a year. I know because I killed her and cut apart the body, then buried her under Lion's Arch." The tiny asura levels her sword at Mirror.

    "Even if I let you destroy that gate, you'd be working for a liar," she finishes. "How can you be sure she'll give you that information, whomever she is?" Mirror might notice that her sword is quivering at the tip a little more than it should be, and that killing presence that was inhabiting her has fled.
Shadowed Scales     Shin's answer will come in the last instant of the stroke. Only one Judge is real, and only one Judge truly strikes. Blocking seven phantoms and one true combatant is no mere child's play, and is fairly worthy of respect, even if it is a means of tending to a symptom and not the root cause of violent ill intent.
    Though the youth's heroic monologuing is met with stone silence.
    Shadowed Scales Hide Bloody Claws has no clue in the least that Avenged Sevenfold-sempai is right over there fighting Khusso in equally mortal combat. What IS more important is the conic blast of ki that envelopes him and radiates in all directions. In an instant the illusoriy Judges vanish. In fact, in an instant, Biggs Wedge vanishes.
    There is a brief glimpse... A flickering motion of something slender and sinuous. a dark beast as black as the night, body wreathed in silver tattoos.
    As the Elder Lunar lurches in, staring Shin down nose mere inches from nose, body smoldering.
    "Is this for love?" Asked with a throaty, croaking, raspy voice, head tilting sharply to an almost bird-like angle as she smolders kind of badly from the ki burns, but displays no sign of outward agony.
Stygian Mirror     Khusso's words cause the Abyssal to glance up, towards the airship. She wonders if it's true or not, but the fervor behind the asura's words do at least guarantee that she THINKS it's true. She considers what to answer, and then looks back down towards the smaller being.

    "I've been dead for over a century. I don't wear it that badly, do I?" She can't know for sure if these people's world has necromancy on the level the Deathlords practice, but Mirror at least knows death doesn't always stop someone.

    "I don't care if she's a liar, and if she doesn't pay up I'll make her. So how about it? If I get her word we're pulling out if the gate goes down, do we have a deal? I'll even omit to mention her killer is still around, spare you some heat."

    Mirror's blade, still pointed at Khusso, turns pale as it becomes ethereal, ghostly in appearance. She's obviously planning something if Khusso says no.
Mordremoth     This is the best way for Sakura to handle it! The tiny Nightmare might scratch her up, but the super strong ninja's punch will make it hurl toward the larger one like a bullet! Since the larger one is damaged already, the smaller one tears into it and rips off what appears to be the "head" of the construct, making it flail around before dying a twittering death.

    There are still some wounded to attend to, but the whole mess of pirates is well on their way to a retreat now.
Kakashi Hatake     "A barrier jutsu?" Kakashi mutters under his breath as his kunai bounce off the force field, messing up his attempt to tie the captain up. Well, not necessarily a jutsu, but it's habit still to compare things he encounters with that which he's familiar with. He wasn't expecting that defense even so. Explosives, he uses often enough himself via paper bombs. But a force field like that is at least one or two tiers of technological or magical sophistication above a simple bomb.

    Kakashi has been in the Multiverse for several months, his lack of filing and introductory post until recently aside, but even a single bullet is going to move a lot faster than he would normally be able to. Being sprayed with them, even blindly, is a serious threat, and he has to do some considerable gymnastics to attempt to get out of the way. His body has more or less the same basic level of resilience as any other human's, pain tolerance and general survivability aside. He's worn down already as well from the number of jutsu he has deployed, and the summoning technique is still active, drawing from him even as his niken chase after pirates below.

    He manages to get out of the way of the spray of gunfire with some painful scratches, a single torso hit that was mostly absorbed by his flak jacket but left his ribs bruised regardless, but aside from a bit of blood... He's okay to keep fighting, at least in terms of physical health. It's just a matter of having the energy reserves to keep dishing out ninjutsu. If he stuck to low level techniques, he could probably drag out the fight. But that isn't, tactically, to his advantage unless he is buying time for allies to join him.

    And given the varied arsenal he has seen so far, he isn't inclined to hold out hope that there's no other unexpected surprises in store. As he remains crouched on the deck, dripping blood, he says, "Well, this isn't normally something I pull out. It's more my student's style. But I can't be certain I can penetrate that barrier of yours with my usual fare." He stands up, and holds one hand palm up, his other hand grasping his wrist. Focusing his Chakra he begins to rapidly spin and compress it over the up-turned hand, until it forms into a spiralling sphere of glowing energy of intense concentration and power.

    'Let's see if chakra can do what kunai can't. If I can grind my way through her defenses, I may be able to deliver a finishing blow before this goes on too much longer.' Kakashi thinks to himself. Keeping an eye out for an opportunity to attack, while others struggle below, the jounin suddenly blurs forwards, leaping up and over Captain Scarlet, and then attempting to drive the sphere of chakra into her from above as he reaches the apex of his forward arc.

    "RASENGAN!"

    Of course, if he can't punch through, or there's too much resistance from the barrier, the two forces resisting each other might produce a bit too much rebound... And it's a long fall back to the ground.
Shin Tokuyama     "Uuuuuuuuuuuuuh...."

    A lot of things have transpired in close proximity that are confusingto Shin. Only one opponent was real and that was perplexing. And then his opponent was gone and replaced by a very strange looking girl who is not the mid-boss he was fighting a moment before! And she has important questions for Shin.

    "Uuuuuuuh... mmmmmmmaybe. It's hard to say. She's sort of an EGT. Elegant Gothic Tsundere. I don't think she's aware of our burgeoning love potential," Shin explains to Shadowed Scales in regards to the incredibly asymmetric narrative that he's dragged Stygian into being a part of through his snowball effect.

    Shin pulls out his cell phone and switches to the radio app, "Hold on. I'm gonna go ask," He spends a few moments chattering into the radio and then lowers the phone and clicks the app off again.

    "Okay. I asked her and she said I should say no and got flustered," Shin explains to Shadowed Scales, "Which is basically Tsundere for 'potentially'. So there you go."
Khusso     Khusso is having some doubts. That's easy to see. The tiny swordswoman tightens her grip and glares, thinking about her answer for a long few moments. She opens her mouth and-

    That's when Khusso hears an all too familiar voice on the radio.

    Somehow, the dark-skinned subterranean manages to go pale. Her eyes open wide, and instead of replying with a rebuke or a stand down, she doesn't say anything at all. Her sword slashes downward, viciously, and a /rift/ opens in the air, with a crackling roar of indrawn air and a vortex yanking everything intward. It crumbles the edge of the rooftop, and ethereal heat erupts from within while it tries to draw in Mirror.

    It is a /very/ short-lived effect, though. Khusso has no idea what Mirror is planning, she just panicked, and it's very obvious that such happened.
Shadowed Scales     It is an important question for he martial artist. One that very well may determine his fate, as the Waning Moon stares him dead in the eyes. Her features are difficult to make out, obscured in a miasma penumbra of dark shadows, kaleidoscopic purples and midnight blues, though the searing silver light of her tattoos display the much more solid figure beneath it all.
    Those scarlet eyes do not blink, instead a nictitating membrane slides across them vertically much like an alligator or crocodile.
    He answers.
    She... Can't make heads nor tails of his answer, staring long and hard even as he has to dial-an-Abyssal.
    "E... G... T... Potential..." The Waning Moon repeats with difficulty, turning the terms over on her tongue with some effort.
    He asked her but she said no.
    But she flustered.
    Shadowed Scales Hide Bloody Claws comes to a decision. Her hand rises, each scales finger tipped with a talon made of white moonlight. And she thrusts.
    Had the answer been a true yes she probably would have been murderously and unstoppably vicious. This is just a professional attempt to get Shin back off the ship at this point.
Mordremoth     The spray of bullets has something else happening over it. Laughter. Insane, cackling laughter as the pigtailed, redheaded(leaf-haired) empties her magazine toward the ninja. "That's right, die now and we'll- what?" What is he saying? Something about students and masters and techniques? What does that have to do about anything?
    She looks up as Kakashi soars toward her. The copy ninja has some kind of hand to hand attack going? "Haha! Is that all you can do?" Giggling, the sylvari drops her rifle to draw a pistol, lifting it up just as the Rasengan impacts her barrier and makes a swirl of purplish energy. Wait, swirl of energy? Her eyes focus on that suddenly. "Oh, drat."

    There's an explosion as the pistol fires at point blank. There is, at the same time, a much louder and airship-shuddering explosion as the generator of Scarlet's force field EXPLODES, hurling the slender sylvari backward and crashing her through her own ship's window, in flames. That probably hurt a lot, and there's shouts of panic from the crew inside. They're DEFINITELY retreating now.
Stygian Mirror     Whatever Mirror had planned goes out the window when Khusso panics and unleashes hell on her. Forced to pull her sword back so she can both step back and keep herself balanced, she starts losing her footing when the rooftop underneath them gives in. The heat singes the Abyssal and she gives up on destroying the warpgate, turning her sword around and firing it towards the airship. The Soulsteel blade cuts through the air, screaming its way to the ship and wrapping itself around anything large enough to hold Mirror's weight.

    "Well, fine! See if I try to be all nice and merciful next time!" Mirror quips, evidently a bit unhappy, but probably spewing out hot air too to vent and ignore the pain caused by the vortex. She takes off, zipping away as her sword-whip slash hookshot retracts itself, retreating back to the airship she arrived on. Maybe the damage she did to the warpgate will have provided SOME sort of data and this wasn't a total waste.
Kakashi Hatake     Among all the myriad techniques Kakashi has copied, flying is not among them. He has exhausted over half of his Chakra, his summons are still active, and he doesn't think he's going to be bringing in any pirates who aren't already taken down... To say nothing of whatever spooky foes his allies are facing. And, a barrier just exploded in his face, sending him falling over the side in a hail of shattered wood and fire. Also, a bullet just went through his shoulder. Pain, and even blood loss, are less of a concern that the imminently approaching ground.

    He's fought with things stabbed or shot into his shoulder before. It sucks. A lot. But he can do it, as Pain found out. ...Though that fight also ended poorly for him, so maybe that's not the greatest example.

    But no, right now, his biggest concern is the velocity he is falling at combined with his injuries. He has to conserve what Chakra he has left, so his ninja hounds suddenly vanish in puffs of smoke, allowing any pirates they hadn't disabled or restrained a shot at escape. He'll apologize to them later for the rude dismissal. Then he pulls a trick he's seen Naruto use, and creates one last Shadow Clone in mid-air. He stands on his own clone's back, rides his duplicate as close to the ground as he can, and then leaps off, allowing his clone to disperse into smoke, perform a somersaulting arc through the air, and then fall the much shorter distance to the ground.

    He stumbles upon landing even so, experiencing dizziness and putting a hand to his shoulder injury. Then the copy ninja looks up at the airship as it appears the enemy is retreating. What a mission to go out on so soon after getting back. It looks like it'll be a hospital stay for him. At least one good thing comes of this.

    Sakura technically out ranks him now. Maybe he can foist the responsibility of writing a report onto her. He thinks about that and then sighs. "No, probably not." She's keen to his tricks after all. "Well, maybe I can at least get her to pull this bullet out of my shoulder..." he mutters as he goes looking for the medic-nin. He also needs to find out if anyone knows what precisely the enemy was after, and WHO they were fighting exactly.
Shin Tokuyama     "Oof!"

    Shin is summarily shoved off an airship. He kinda tumbled through the air a bit as he freefalls before righting himself and then landing on the street with a pretty anime-style crash through a rooftop.

    Luckily, though, also in true anime fashion: He gets up a few moments later and pokes his head out of the remnants of whatever sort of street-side stand he crashed into, shaking his head a couple times, "What a weird lady."
Shadowed Scales     With Shin thusly ejected from the ship, Scales hunches, lowering to a crouch, growling to herself.
    She'll go check on Scarlet while the airship starts the retreat.