Scene #5597: ICoT - Edge of the World

Owner	Pose
The Kid	Zulten's Hollow has seen better days. As a bloackade, it was always designed to be a tightly-defended chokepoint. Even as a mass of land in the sky, this remains true. It consists of twisting; narrow paths that wind up and up, ensuring the defenders always have the high ground. These tight pathways, the only thing between one and a long fall, have been shored up by barricades creating by freezing water around chains to create great, connected ice boulders. The Ura are clearly prepared. Thankfully, Kid has already dealt with the welcoming party. He sits upon the frosted ground awaiting the arrival of the assisting Elites, surrounded by Ura corpses. They all remain flesh this time, indicating that Kid has forgone the use of the Calamity Cannon for now. Instead, he seems to have gored them with his War Machete and Brusher's Pike, based on how much blood has stained the snow around the bodies. Once everyone arrives, he stands and gestures up the path. There, everyone could see one of the chained-ice-boulder barricades, all smashed up. "Tried ta go on ahead, but they got security. Same kinda turrets we had back in Caelondia, but these ones shoot a stream of somethin'." He gestures beyond the broken barricade, where there are indeed some draconic machines standing guard, swivelling to survey the area. "Too many to take out without gettin' hit, can't hit the beams back, and my shields get hot if I try to block 'em. Hope some of you have a better idea." He seems rested, and of clearer mind. But their current objective clearly has him antsy. Risking melee against multiple foes, trying to charge in even when the others have yet to arrive? He's distracted. Dangerous.
Alexis	Alexis whistles softly at the aftermath they arrive to. By this point she's accepted that for most of the Ura there just wasn't option to deal with them. They were fanatic and unwilling to reason, not to mention what they did to the Bastion and Rucks weighed heavily on everyone's mind still. There is a decent enough distraction though when the Kid points out his attempt to get past the defense measures though. "Hot, huh?" The trainer puts one hand to her chin thoughtfully, the gears already turning as the need for tactics comes up. "How accurate is their aim? How fast are they at readjusting it when needed?"
Rory White	By this point, Rory White has given up most hopes of this incident turning out peaceful. But the more Ura casualties mount up... "... There may not be much of a human population left after this rescue for this world to have a viable genetic diversity. In fact, the female population of Caelondia is currently zero known individuals..." What has a robot bothered about genetic diversity is anyone's guess, but Rory White - once again taking the form of a highly cyber-circuit-stylized robo-tigress - pads up to the Kid with her optics softly aglow. There's none of the prior scolding or disgust being voiced. She's too resigned about what is to follow. "Perhaps this territory had best be abandoned... and any survivors scatter to places in other worlds... once we have Zia secured."
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa does not know how things are going to end here, she doesn't think well she's really got the feeling of the blood feud between the Ura and the Kid's people? Is on par with the feuding in the Middle East of her world. The time is however to aft and Zia needs to be rescued. That's where she's going with this she's arrived after the Kid was and does her best to not focus on the Ura's remains. "I'll see what I can do sneaking on a a head." Her stealth suit seems to be making ready as she'll attempt to tac net, up with Rory and she got where Rory was coming from. <<This feels like the ends of days.>> "I think breaking up to other worlds might be an idea if there are children left they might be able to break free of this raised in another environment..." She finishes cloaking and she's ready to move on ahead.
Flamel Parsons	Parsons plants his palms on his hips and edges away from the corpses. Ooof, corpses. Never will get used to those, but more specifically, he'll never get used to the idea that a child like the Kid is subjecting his own psyche to the experience of all these murders. Nobody kills without some effects coming back around to their mind... But Parsons keeps up hope. The Kid seems resilient! Already recovering, even, maybe! He'll bounce back all the way from grieving, right? Well, in any case, the best way to deal with this situation is to keep giving him support, something to make him inclined to keep calling in help like this. "Alright!" He adjusts his sunglasses. "So, turrets. That, at least, I can help with. Looks like our local replicant infiltrator there," He points to Kotone. "Has the same idea that I do!" Then he tilts his head at Rory. "Zulf too, actually! I found out when I dove into the mind of that commander that he's alive and didn't really turn against us like that." Parsons then brings a hand up to his head and snaps such that his finger comes to rest on his temple, and disappears in a small puff of psychic energy. To Alexis, he says, "If you keep them busy the way you're maybe thinking up, I think we can sneak on them pretty easy!" And then he's already, albeit invisibly, zipping forward, well intent on heading to the turrets and blasting them with his invisibly-launched psychic artillery.
Priscilla	Priscilla for one couldn't be happier to see more dead Ura. Well, as a figure of speech. Priscilla is not happy about anything that has happened in this world for a long time. Dead Ura doesn't fill her with glee, but it is a richly deserved reward as far as she is concerned. "What didst I sayeth to thee about forging ahead alone, Sir Kid." are her first, mildly exasperated words upon seeing the eponymous individual. "Thou art fortunate thou hadst the opportunity to retreat and attempt alternative strategies, rather than being roasted alive. The sight of them shouldst hath been enough to encourage aid." She doesn't plan on sitting around and scolding him however. This is still a sure sight better than when they had stumbled into him by accident, on a one-man grief-stricken rampage running on the dregs of his health bar. Priscilla departs without further comment, quickly becoming nothing but a pair of footprints in the snow, and then not even that as she finds icier ground, which she sticks to as much as possible as she circles around ahead and comes up on the turrets. Not really knowing how they track targets, she makes systematic work of smashing them with her scythe one at a time while stepping in deep snow as little as possible, owing to the noise and visual indicators involved.
The Kid	Kid looks to Alexis and says "Pretty good an' pretty fast," in response to her two questions. He looks to Rory and snorts, his dark cheeks going a bit red at the mention of 'genetic diversity.' He's not too smart, but the mention of females probably clued him in to the general gist. "The world ain't just Caelondia. There's the Motherland, where our forefathers came from. But don't you worry none, we can fix this." Priscilla scolds him, and he hangs his head a little, but his response is firm. "They got Zia up there," as if that's all there is to it. Kotone gets ready to sneak up ahead, but Flamel and Priscilla are much more eager and get the jump on her. As they get close the the turrets, they do not immediately register their presence. However, their footfalls (or even just Priscilla's, should Flamel float) cause them to swivel curiously. But before they can figure out what's going on, they're already being blasted and smashed to pieces. Kid walks up and nods his thanks in their... general direction, before pressing on. The next barricade is more troublesome. Once again, the frozen chains make up part of it. But so does the strange black rocks that only manifested after the Calamity. The ground leading up to it menaces with the spines of buried Stinkeyes, no doubt set out as guard dogs. But the most curious thing is the array of four tall machines arranged to form the corners of a square nearby. They thrum with a curious energy, and there are Ura who see the party coming, but bunch up to defend them rather than rush out to meet their hated for. Kid tenses, and his hand starts straying towards the stock of his Carbine, itching to start picking them off. "What're they doin'?" he murmurs to himself, and that alone is all that stays his hand.
Alexis	Looks like we've got several stealth capable people here, so that's good. Alexis is content to let them do their thing, and when it proves to be pretty effective she'll just keep her own ideas in reserve. Which isn't going to take long as they come to the next barricade and her eyes fall on the spikes poking out of the ground. "Watch where ya step guys." Someone else is going to have to figure out what the Ura are doing, we need to clear out this obstacle. Best way to deal with a subterranian threat is to have a subterranian predator... Which might make it seem a little odd at first when the pokeball she goes for instead releases a dragonic form with insectoid like wings, but trust me on this. Alexis points at the clusters of Stinkeye spines, then makes a swirling motion with her finger to avoid being overheard. Mirage bobs her head, and with a flit of bug-wings floats closer to the hiding monsters. Then starts beating her wings even faster, to where dirt and ice start to kick up around her and spiral about in the air, the sand and rock chips shedding off her body turning it into a minature tornado of sorts. The idea is to use the vortex caused by Sand Tomb to pull the Stinkeyes from the ground and trap them together before they can come out and chase after anyone else.
Priscilla	The turret business looks like it might have been a little dicey, but thanks to Parsons, it's wrapped up without incident. Sort of ironic, that Priscilla's 'natural habitat' is the one most inmical to her primary problem solving ability. After that point, though, there's little purpose in continuing the invisibility, since she'll be traveling the only route forward, straight, narrow, and fortified, with a group. It's not as if the Ura will decide not to start shooting just because they see four people instead of five. Oddly, though, when they encounter more Ura, they /don't/ start shooting. That perplexes Priscilla to about the same extent as the Kid. "A valid question." she says to him, narrowing her eyes as the Ura move to defend them. "But an irrelevant one. If the Ura wish to defend them, then they art important to the Ura." She could draw her bow, but that'd be obvious. "If they art important to the Ura, they art worth destroying." At about the same time Alexis releases her pokemon, but a bit before it starts working, the crossbreed takes the surprise option and goes from standing and staring, just happening to take in a deep breath, to suddenly breathing out a long ray of brilliant blue-white energy that slices through the frigid air and directly up the vertical length of one of the machines, before the Ura figure out what she's doing. She privately hopes it'll catastrophically explode. Priscilla does not have time for the Ura's shit. Not anymore.
Rory White	Rory White's optics dim briefly as she ponders this. A Motherland? "Ah. I did not know!" But there'll be no more talk about that. She about-faces and straightens out... and plods onwards with the group after Priscilla and Flamel have taken out the turrets! All the way up to the next barricade. She glances left and right... and whips up her tail! The tip gleams a vivid electric-blue-violet... LASER BEAMS, invisible save for their gleam at origin and the glare where they strike. The beams are aimed at the bunched Ura, firing in short bursts to antagonize and scorch but not necessarily inflict lethal damage. Unless someone's clothes catch fire - that could be bad! She doesn't like the look of those things, so doesn't want to get close to it!
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone isn't even bothered by Flamel calling her a replicant she could see why given what she was and she does not consider it an insult coming form Flamel. She's uneasy but she can't leave Zia like this, now can she? She keeps the comm active as he moves on ahead she's now lagging behind Flamel and Priscilla but the entire group charging in at once isn't a good idea, not in her book. If there's a trap it could get them all rather than some.? There are turrets ahead, yet they are shamed before she can even do here. The Ura are moving to defend something, what are those things? She creeps forward trying to make sure she does not set off any other traps that might be lurking. What are the Ura up to at this point? She's worried that their ignorance of what the Ura are guarding could bite them pretty hard. She's hesitant but Flamel makes a point as she gets ready to move in, she'll try to stealth her way up there readying some grenades to plant at the base of the thing if she can make it, she'll go in close. Though this could end up being a terrible idea for Kotone.
Flamel Parsons	Parsons flickers out of his invisibility long enough to give The Kid a welcoming gesture and a bright, positive smile. "Now /this/ is business I can get into! Classic psychonauts stuff, laser turrets. I love it!" He says. "Ancient conspiracy headquarters and places like that always have fancy laser turret defenses!" And he presses on, trudging through the snow up to the next barricade. Here, sadly, he'll need Alexis' help. He can't invisibly cross a field of Stinkeyes on his own! Levitation or no, that's just too much density of danger even for an invisible man. Thankfully, she's got that covered. And Priscilla fires an opening volley, signaling Parsons to flicker back to invisibility and try to surge along the path Alexis has cut, zoom in close, and get to the rear line! These aren't the same sort of special forces that attacked the Bastion. Hopefully slipping into the backline, he'll start those eyes glowing again, and hopefully find a mind he can breach among the defenders. He's going to try to find someone qualified to operate these machines among the guards, and invade their skull with his Astral Projection! From there, he hopes, he might be able to flip their alliance switch and mind-control them into sabotaging their own machines efficiently, either to destroy them on their own or to make them particularly vulnerable to the incoming destruction.
The Kid	Alexis's little trick is surprising, but effective. Stinkeyes are known for using their spines to keep them firmly entrenched in their holes, so that any predators who persist past their spines would still have trouble. But when that ground is being ripped apart, they have no resource. The little floating eyes are torn from their positions and locked in place, their pupils spinning frantically as they try to drift free, only to be pulled back into the vortex. Meanwhile, with the path cleared, the others advance on the Ura. Priscilla cannot breath fire like the classical dragon, but her sorcerous breath more than does the job. The blue beam makes the device smoke and splutter before exploding. Perhaps not as violently as she might like, but it does still knock a couple of Ura on their ass. As the device explodes, a rumble goes through the place as one of the Calamity rocks that bar their path slips through the floating, frozen earth and tumbles to the ground far below. Rory's ultraviolet laser flashes, striking a couple of the Ura and making them fall, screaming as they clutch the burned parts. But one tosses down a grenade of some sort, one that quickly subliminates the snow and ice to create a cloud of mist to cause the concentrated light to scatter! And from this cloud, a torrent of arbalest bolts flies, aiming to strike down the party. However, Kotone has made her way up by now, and the explosions from her grenades not only takes out another device, causing more Calamity rocks to crumble and fall, but they also knock down a couple of the bowmen and partially disperse the mist. Finally, Flamel finds one of the bowmen in enough of a state of panic to brainhack him to slip away from his allies and begin deactivating the last two devices. The man's surface thoughts are not ones of fanatical hatred. More... fear for what they've unleashed. They did not expect the Kid to survive the siege, did not expect him to come bearing a weapon like that, to cut down some of their most veteran soldiers... he's just a kid! Not even 20 yet! Regardless, as the mindjacked Ura deactivates the last pillars, the remaining Ura realized what ha sharpened. The one in charge curses in their native tongue, before barking an order. Those that can still fight throw down smoke bombs, creating enough flash and smoke to disguises their strange rapid movement. They clear the barrier and move deeper inside now that the Calamity rock barricade is breeched. As the party give chase, they find themselves in some kind of wide training area. Many many dummies of the Kid himself have been set up, each one covered in bolts, stabbed with knives, or riddled with gunshots. Hanging from an ice pillar by its neck is a Rucks dummy, this one very much the worst for wear. However, there also exists a side area covered in clumsy, childish chalk drawings. Pictures of parents with children, crude depictions of Rattletail pets...
Alexis	The Stinkeyes just get tossed around and banged together for a bit, until everyone is past. Then Alexis motions to her pokemon and Mirage lets the sand vortex loose, sending the spiny little balls scattering away when the restraining force is gone. The two move to follow the others after the Ura retreating farther into the compound. "I dare say someone don't like you very much," is all Alexis really has the say about the variously bashed and broken mockeries of the Kid stewn about the chamber. And not going to comment at all about the one hanging overhead. Tch. Not really time to stick around and look though, they've still got Zia to find.
Priscilla	Seeing the rocks fall away is not quite what Priscilla had expected to result from wrecking the pillars, but then she hadn't much idea of what to expect to start with. It's progress, and so it's good. It seems the others have taken the same cue, and used Alexis sandstorm to get ahead and over the stinkeyes and sabotage the remainder. Whether or not Priscilla thinks less of Rory for trying to zap the Ura without killing them comes down to how she feels about getting a volley of arbalest bolts for the exchange. With her scythe still out, a series of swift movements swat the bulk of them out of the air with the broad flat, but one still slashes across the inside of her wrist, shallowly, but in a really unfortunate place, messing up Priscilla's fingers for the effort, and staining her sleeve red. She unhooks a tiny, gold-gilded glass vial from her hip, swallows a small portion of it, and then puts it back, letting the bleeding quickly stop on its own, and waiting to regain feeling and motion in her fingers. She isn't privy to the raw feelings that Parsons is, but Priscilla gets a picture of it anyways from the training grounds she finds. For a few moments, she feels a kind of grim pride in the Kid, even outside of the sense of being proud of a subordinate. To see his one man crusade so completely acknowledged by his enemy, who fear him exactly as much as he should want them to, builds a strange and very much indescribable vindictive warmth in her heart, perhaps solely out of the sense that these dummies prove that their efforts have been meaningful. That warmth dies when she sees the hung Rucks, and the visceral sense of why she hates these people comes flooding back. Priscilla cannot be softened and dissuaded by childs' drawings while the man she had respected dangles strangled from a pillar in effigy right alongside them. "Thou shouldst be proud of thineself." she says dispassionately to the Kid, advancing out into the training field. If that prompts them to attack her, let them. So much the quicker they'll line up. "It is right that they shouldst fear thee and thine rightful wrath." Still, they had actually come here for Zia, right? It doesn't seem like they'd keep her at a firing range, so Priscilla begins looking around for any obvious entrances to habitable quarters or panic bunkers, checking any trails that might be left on the freezing terrain. Likely, they're too far underground for her to sense them by their life alone.
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa had had a bad feeling about this there's something up the Ura are not engaging they are trying to protect these things they don't have enough intel and are going in blind. She's just as guilty though. She does not go after any further pillars as one is shut down. The smoke makes her pause, for a moment if she charges though she will stand out from how she passes through, this delay her but she does press on wards and that's when she finds the training room she sees dummies that looks like the Kid, and one that looks like Rucks. She's about to move on but she pauses she notices the child made drawings here. There's sinking feeling about this, she'll try to see how fresh the art is but there are clear signs of there may be kids around here. She brings up passive thermal imaging to see, if she can find anyone else. She also feels some faint feelings are they even on the /right/ side in this? She does keep looking though maybe she'll be able to find something and press onwards and maybe, just maybe get some answers.
Rory White	Rory would scowl if she was capable of such expression. Using water vapor to disperse alasers is CLEVER and definitely a thing she'll keep in mind for the future for her own use! The ultraviolet beams are actualy visible - some of their spectrum anyways - when passing through the water. It all leads to an eeeeeeerie lightshow... Thankfully, her proximity sensors are linked to TacNet! She leaps aside and crouches low, allowing most to fly past and overhead! One slams into her leg despite this though, drawing a shower of sparks and half-wrecking the limb! She lurches up with a clunk-thunk and continues plodding on with the group. IT's not long before the leg stops leaking lubricants and other fluids - and stops sparking for that matter - but the nasty 'wound' remains, and it whines and grinds wrongly as she walks! INto the training grounds she goes. The AGI takes one look at the gear on display... and emits a sad noise. "They truly hated Rucks. ... But they never stopped to meet him before launching their vendetta. If only they had..." She is, unfortunately, not quite familiar with children - they're not common in Transhuman territory! - and misses the implications of the strange drawings. Up until Kotone mentions what they are.. "... Are there children around?"
Flamel Parsons	Parsons is uneasy about this as they move on through. "Yeah, this is... I don't like this. Jeeze..." He's tempted to take a look at all this with his clairvoyance, and it's likely enough that he will. "It's really feeling like peace isn't going to be given much of a chance here, you know. We'll need to... Hmmm. Well, I guess just trust that the Bastion will do its thing, I suppose. Those pillars, though. Do you think the Ura are doing something with Calamity things themselves? ...I should keep an eye out for finding out what they know about that Calamity stuff now, I'd have thought only Rucks would have... Mmmh." Come to think of it, maybe there's something to be found there. He heads for the Rucks dummy, treating it uneasily. The visage of the man who sacrificed his life for Parsons, twisted like this... Urgh... Well, he heads up to it, levitating up to its hung position and placing a palm against it, putting his clairvoyance into it to see what sort of psychic impression people have left on it. Hatred, he's expecting, /intense/ hatred, but they used those Calamity rocks... Is there anything in the hatred anywhere? Something useful from the people who understood the connection? Well, in any case, he'll pulse his Clairvoyance out as well, projecting its results into the environment, hoping to find useful psychic footprints that could lead them further past this area and towards where Zia is being kept. She'd probably be kept in a high-traffic area, right? On account of being... Well, pretty harmless herself, or so Parsons assumes, aside from needing to be guarded due to association with the Kid. So keeping her close would make sense, right...? Hmmm. Maybe he can look for signs of Zia herself, she must have had some VERY intense emotions on her way into the Hollow, something he can track.
The Kid	The grinding of Kid's teeth is audible to all as he regards the hung Rucks dummy. As morose as he seems, there's a hot pit of spite bubbling in him, and this little display might have made it boil over. "That's fine. Feelin's mutual," he snarls quietly in response to Alexis' quip. As Priscilla compliments him for driving such fear into the hearts of a whole civilization, he only says "I ain't proud. Just want it done." He certainly doesn't sound proud... but he certainly stands a little straighter. Maybe he's proud that Priscilla is proud? Kotone's thermals would pick up a lot of body heat just up ahead. This isn't over, they're just gearing up for their final stand. Rory considers the drawings and the children. Kid only replies, "They'll be at the Terminals if they know what's good for 'em." He's not saying he'll kill them, but he's not saying he won't either. Flamel's fears concerning the dummies are founded. The thing bristles with an intense psychic imprint of hatred. As the architect behind the Calamity, how could it not? But within that hatred... Flamel sees a book. The one Zulf had, the journal of Zia's father. That book leads to the devices, which leads to the harnessing of Calamity rocks. It's not from Rucks directly, but this technology is Mancer-born. As he spreads his clairvoyance, he picks up some useful clues; the children who made those drawings are gone, the Ura are bunching up ahead, the Kid dummies also bristle with hatred... but also respect? And lastly, Zia's emotions-fear, concern for the Bastion, and an underlying fascination with what she saw-still burns bright. She's here for sure. The party presses on, and finds a proper last stand awaiting them. Ura soldiers, lead by their decorated commanders, bristle with Fang Repeaters, bows, spears, machete, and arbelest. Behind them are strange green chitinous structures that seem to be twitching and breathing... are they alive? That question is answered when one of them regurgitates a cloud of Stinkeyes. Even freshly born, they begin to home in on the party, menacing with bad smells and spikes! To make matters worse, they've stations their Rattletail pets on an over cropping above. From there, the rodentlike birds begin to squawk and use their talons to bring down a shower of rocks on the party! Worse still, the Ura have some catapults behind their final stand, and they're loaded with those chained ice boulders! They launch, whipping about in unexpected ways as they fly at the party. All it takes is one unfortunate bump, and that's someone falling to the ground below... The Ura themselves open fire, those bearing melee weapons standing guard, ready to engage anyone that comes close. Spears are levelled, backed by blades ready to sink into anyone that crashes into the wall.
Kotone Yamakawa	Kids reply is somewhat hopeful to him he's not revealing in what he has done, she's be terrified if he was. She feels the same she just wants this shit to top. She looks to Rory for a moment and then simply nods. "Let's try to get Zia and get the hell out." She's cloaked again and making ready She doesn't get time to comment a the Stink eyes come at them, born and sadly will not have a very long or enjoyable life. There's too many to fully evade them and she opens fire, even as she comes under fire form the Ura as well, this is not going well for Kotone she's starting to take hits even as she keeps trying to evade. Also where is Zia? They have to find her...
Alexis	No one confronted them in the training area, so it doesn't take a tactical genius to surmise that the Ura are regrouping somewhere they feel more capable of defending. Contrary to what the old saying makes it sound being backed to a wall isn't always a bad strategy, when it means your backs are at least defended from behind when you have no intention of running.... All which proves to be pretty much true. The Ura know they are going to follow, so they've set up as much to their advantage as they can, and not holding back any of the stops. As much as she hates to admit it all those years during the Multiversal War did hone her reflexes well, and almost instinctively she dives for the icy ground when guns and Stinkeyes are brought to bear. Not to mention catapults making an aerial advance a no-go either. "Mirage, get down!" She yanks on the bug-dragon's tail to get it to also flatten down before she gets smashed out of the sky. "I guess it's time to live up to your name, too," Alexis remarks, pulling out a Heavy Ball and hitting the release button on the ground in front of her. "I choose you, Seige!" The swell of energy from the ball is considerable, rising up into a bulky serpentine form, stone spires jutting out from the sides of alternating segments. Just as one of the ice-boulder-bolos comes catapulting in the beast slams it's metallic head into it, sending shards of rock and ice cascading away as it roars definately. Now that there's some defense between them and the swarm of angry enemies Alexis grabs onto one of the spikes jutting out of the Steelix's side and hoists herself up. "Get rid of those spiny eyeballs!" she shouts to be heard over the din of the battle roaring to life around them. A rumbling growl comes in response from the steel serpent, like stones being ground together. Which may very much be true as her opens his maw to spew out a cluster of shards of rock at the Stinkeyes.
Flamel Parsons	Alright, how do we deal with this? Psychonauts are not soldiers. They are not good at open warfare, and this promises to be a stand-up drag-out battle. Like Kotone, he cloaks, and becomes invisible. Like Kotone, he can't manage evasion; the man can barely manage survival, trying to balance the mental load of his invisibility with his barrier, under the fresh damage of the Stinkeyes, which assault his nose enough to limit his ability to focus purely on psychic power. No matter how invisible he is, he can't be invisible enough to not deal with /smells/. His weaker psychic barrier means he has several close shaves with stray projectiles and heavy catapult impacts, grazing him with deep bruises and at one point knocking him off his feet with a brutal impact from one of the rattletails above that briefly leaves him visible, and slams him hard enough to drag him to his knees. Thank goodness Seige pops up, Alexis thankfully granting him relief before his visible form is assaulted by the crushing rush of projectiles! now he has something he can take cover behind, and soon dart away from and into the line of ranged attackers! He slips between individuals and tries to take cover near one of the catapults, hiding just in front off to one side where nobody would walk but which won't be getting slapped by moving parts. Taking a deep breath, he plants two fingers on both temples and reaches out, astrally projecting again to try to enter the minds of the soldiers./ In this case, he'll need to work with Rory. Rory can find a location, but Parsons can find things like memories and keys; he's going to try to break into as many minds as he can as quickly as he can -- a tough matter, and possibly even more difficult for hardened soldiers here -- to try to find someone with knowledge of how to release Zia, and maybe just enough information to link with Rory's and zoom there to free her ASAP, the way a spy is meant to rather than a soldier. At the very least, it ought to give the rest of the combatants a particular angle to take.
Priscilla	Without any other leads to go on, Priscilla goes exactly where Kotone indicates the still-living are. Without any good reason not to, Priscilla would do it anyways. Either Zia is there, or there is a certain kind of blood feud to settle, nothing else. Where she might have wanted to try something a little more clever or expedient an hour earlier, especially given the grudging fear and respect these people apparently give the Kid, the sight of Rucks' effigy has something burning inside Priscilla that she hasn't felt anything similar to since she killed Seath. The last stand is an odd moment for her. Even the briefest glance at the situation confirms that it is as simple as can be. There is a certain nobility to it, seeing the the last soldiers of the entire Ura race rallied together like this. A certain laudibility about the dedication to this cause, and a certain empathic connection to how they must be feeling, given the evidence of the abandoned area behind them. It condenses down into a strange and unbidden note of melancholy that mixes in with Priscilla's coldly boiling fury. A little glimpse of the hollowness she expects awaits her on the other side of this sudden, last obstacle, perhaps but a taste of what awaits the Kid. She hates that she feels anything for these last valiant men, probably protecting their women and children, because no matter how she tries to look at those who must be heroes of their people, she can't think of anything else but receiving that fateful report, and imagined visions of the old man's death. Priscilla downs the rest of her vial, partly for what she expects to happen, and partly for good luck. She takes cover behind Alexis' steelix only for the first volley, subjecting the creature to only one deluge of bolts and bullets for her sake, and then when the heavier weapons stop to reload, she turns around and charges straight in. With the repeaters and rock fragments flying everywhere in and around the expertly crafted kill box, there's no point in turning invisible. There's not enough space to be where the projectiles aren't, and even with her prodigious, Lordsoul-powered speed, Priscilla finds launched fangs and rock shrapnel stabbing into her arms, shoulders, and middle despite her best efforts to weave down the corridor, having to keep her arms high to her face with her scythe back. The small blessing is that it quickly puts her well inside the minimum range the catapults can actually fire into, but the number of shots that draw blood and the number that sick would make invisibility useless, and so she commits to a swift, brutal, and utterly fearless rushdown, straight into the enemy lines, as some kind of hellishly vengeful spirit of winter, grim reaper scythe and all. The spear wall concerns her not. She slides her hands to the very end of her scythe for the extra couple of feet of reach, and then swings it such to hook around the edge of the formation, catching the rightmost Ura, and ripping into the spear wall like tearing aside a curtain, using the absurd strength of the 20 foot giant she secretly is for the purpose of sweeping them aside. Heedless to what blades might cut and pierce her skin when ploughing through the resulting chaos, she lays into the middle and rear of the Ura line with massive, slicing arcs of her weapon, whirling the unwieldy thing about her as if it were a martial arts staff, where each flash of the blade can rip through as many soldiers as it can reach. Fully willing to soak up the consequence, Priscilla punishes their coordination with furious, near-suicidal bravado, to make the bloodiest example possible of her hatred for them. It is clearly not fighting borne of pragmatism, but fighting borne out of a need for closure with a hated enemy.
Rory White	Thermals from dead-on at ground level aren't that useful. Rory can see what's on Kotone's visuals through a wireless TacNet Link... and she decides to answer the call for more search-power. The robo-tigress's back ripples and thin sheets of shapeshifting metal peel away, allowing two small Saucer drones to fly free and rise into the sky to provide a bird's eye view of the region! She's not bothering with subtlety in this situation. The drones go full Active Scan and pepper the region with a combination of penetrative lidar and full electromagnetic sweeps in an attempt to locate any life sign that might be Zia. Since she's using infrared and lidar though, she can only detect shapes through walls - not colors, textures, or other details. So she's looking for any person who appears to be in a position indicative of imprisonment. These silvery disks hover high over the battlefield tthat awaits, relaying information about just what's ahead to Rory... and keeping her very determined to not walk into that mess blindly. So she doesn't approach and instead takes cover behind some boulders while her Saucers search for Zia and Zulf!
The Kid	Rory's scans pick up something a way away, partially obscured by all the snow and ice. A solitary figure, sitting behind the blockade of Ura defences. Flamel's mental probe picks up the same figure, as well as identifying it based on Ura memories. This is absolutely Zia, and the key to her cell is on a nail in the same area. However, the Ura have prepared for all this invisibility. In a synchronous motion, the blade-weilders throw out a bunch of flour bombs that explode overhead, coating the area in white dust that clings to thier bodies. Flamel is immediately aggressed by an Ura bearing the same kind of blade that took Zulf's life, while Kotone finds fire being concentrated on her. But as Priscilla charges forward, bearing her scythe, they abruptly change their tune. Shots come fast and frequent, but they fail to dissuade her from collecting the heads of the pikemen with her superior speed and strength. The bladesmen however, immediately leap at her after she swings, grabbing on and sticking their weapons wherever they can. Others use the first to jump higher, to cling to her arms and shoulders to try and immobilize her until the others can wound her. The appearance of Alexis Steelix draws the attention of those who man the catapults, and they change their tune when they see it can smash their current ammunition. They work fast, loading some kind of clay sphere into them before firing. When these one impact, through any means, they produce a thunderous explosion! The Kid, meanwhile, is also climbing the Steelix, using him as a ladder to get to the outcroppings. Once he's up there, flames begin to whoosh out as the cries of the Rattletails become more pained before extinguishing, one by one.
Kotone Yamakawa	Things could be going a lot better, they could be going worse for the party, but they are going far worse for Kotone given all the fire she's just taken? Her armour is light more focused on the stealth systems it prvoides her with. Leaving her Shell to take most of the punishment and even with a mil spec body she can only take so much at once. From the creatures to weapon fire, Kotone's cloak gives out. Alarms go off on her hud, something critical has taken damage and she's down she can't move. "Shit...." With some of her motor systems out and he leaking a strange red fluid that clearly isn't blood Kotone's ... down.
Flamel Parsons	Son of a bitch. This is the first time Parsons' superspy abilities have ever been thwarted by basic kitchen materials, but it will definitely not be the last. A flour-bomb does successfully counter his own invisibility, though it's not precisely how they think it will. Unlike Priscilla's invisibility, which could possibly divert aspects of it, Parsons' invisibility is all psychic and psychological, designed to trip the mind's own instinct to ignore, anonymize, or outright block out something that seems like someone else's problem. The flour is likely to make a mess everywhere, and especially on the combatants, and so Parsons immediately ceases to be somebody else's problem. The machetes bear down on him hard. Swings from the Ura slam against a psychokinetic barrier protecting his neck that he's having a hard time maintaining, and as the keen, razor edges press down, shocks of brilliant orange light bleed into his body. "AAAAAAGH!" He screams out, as the surge of pain and blunted wounding crash through him and he pulls away into a hard roll. Can't restore invisibility like this, and they're increasingly adapting to what secret little tricks Parsons is capable of. And that shining blade... Shimmering... Something sparks in him, a recognition of the situation. Just like before, he's been caught off-guard by clever Ura countermeasures, and just like before, they're about to stab him to death. Would he wait again? ...Maybe just this once, it's worth it to try for the harsher methods he learned. "Wait wait wait wait! No!! Get BACK!!" He calls out. Parsons is a superspy in many more ways. His infiltration might have failed, and he's going to come out of this /damn/ wounded, a lot more than he usually is, but that doesn't mean he can't still fight... Just that it's not what he's best suited to. In a panicked rush, both hands press all fingers along his head in a wide array, and his entire head sparks and flashes with orange and white light, starting to visibly burn and emit smoke. As he does this, a dozen shimmering white, translucent white hands, big enough around to grab someone by the torso, form one by one and rush out to strike the aggressing Ura, to grapple and punch and crush and throw. Parsons himself surrounds himself as best he can in a heavy, durable, spherical, stationary psionic shield, and begins to emit sweeping blasts of psychic aggression-beams. It's a powerful rush of violence, albeit a brittle one. As long as he can keep up the momentum, he'll be able to maintain it, but unlike the others, he's not one meant to be able to deal with the back-and-forth of this particular type of battle. One hopes that this will buy enough time for the others to crash through the blockade and back him up, maybe even give them some space to approach with!
Alexis	Steelix is a defensive brute, but the sheer volume of projetciles being flung about is still leaving a mark of scratchs and dents in the metal wyrm's hide. He's toughing it out though, of the sake of giving others some much needed cover. Meanwhile Alexis is climbing up, and while Kid eventually leaps off for the outcroppings makes for the pokemon's head. Which is briefly interrupted by the deafening explosions as the clay bomsb impact. Seige roars in aggrivation and Alexis has to hang on as he thrashes in his spot to keep from rolling over on anyone. He may be made of rock and metal compressed into a state harder than diamond in the depths of the earth, but that still hurt! Arguably the sound and shockwave more than the blast itself, due to the senses tuned for tunneling such tremendous depths. Out of the corner of her eye Alexis catchs a glimps of Kotone getting gunned down, gritting her teeth at the swell of anger that ripples through her. But it's too far away for her to do anything, and thankfully Rory's on it. They've got a bead on Zia, and that motivates her to climbing the rest of the way up, grabbing the ridges along the back of his head to pull herself the last few inches up. Then stands up there, not hard to see thanks to the pink hair, atop the Steelix's head. They need to get through the blockade to get to Zia? Fine. Eyes narrow. She has one tactic yet the Ura don't know about since she didn't get it until after they'd captured Zulf. "Alright you bastard zealots. If you want to play hardball," she growls as she rolls up her left sleeve to reveal the bracer underneath. "Then we'll play hardball. Seige.." The stone set within the bracer glimmers briefly with a sigil almost like a DNA helix wound into a flame, and then she swipes her other hand over it. "MEGA EVOLVE!" Prismatic energy erupts from the Mega Bracer, shining between her fingers and cascading out to arc downward and surge over the Steelix beneath her. As it is briefly engulfed in the glowing aura the most noticable change is it grows even bigger and longer, its body hardening into even more durable mass. The spires jutting from it's body crack and then shatter the exterior layer, revealing the crystalline cores beneath. But the metal shards don't fall to the ground, but rather get caught into a low electromagnetic field emitted from the 'neck' segments, forming into a ringed collar of sort circling beneath it's head. The Mega Steelix rears up with an defiant booming roar, echoing with both anger and determination from his Trainer. "Now." Alexis braces herself and points towards the barricades they need to get through. "BULLDOZE!" People might have to contend with less Steelix barrier for a bit, but it will be hopefully worth it as the massive metal titan throws itself towards the Ura blockage with the thunderous fury of a freight train.
Priscilla	It is a fortunate coincidence that Priscilla had not decided to lean on invisibility here, not careful planning or an understanding of the 'meta' between Ura and outsiders. The flour is not a concern to Priscilla because she is not trying to hide herself. She is out in plain view, waging a one woman war against the front line, for good and for ill. The Divine Blessing still in her system helps significantly with her mounting injuries, stopping bleeding and gradually closing wounds where they appear, but it has nowhere near the efficacy it would have on one of the truly living. Priscilla is fighting on that blessed water, adrenaline, determination, and a little bloodlust, as she ties up the bulk of the Ura's forces in trying to deal with her. It helps that her anatomy is more or less nonsense past the superficial level, so where crafty bladesmen think they've planted a lethal strike into her vital organs, they will be dismayed to find the result is just more damage on her HP bar, but there are only so many stabs and lacerations mounting in number that she tolerate, even when trading one splash of her own blood for the heads of three others. Without pausing the revolution of her scythe around her, Priscilla takes in another one of those deep breaths (with a stab in her ribs?) and exhales the white dragon's breath once more, this time not as a tightly focused beam, but as its former billowing mist of deadly magical dust, swirling and spreading around her in the fray, to scorch the flesh of the Ura too close to her in cold soulfire and corrosive crystal. She wades her way through like that, buying herself space and moments to catch her breath, even leaving crimson footsteps behind, until she gets to the big, twitching green things belching out stinkeyes, and rips into them top to bottom and diagonal with her scythe.
The Kid	Whatever their reasons-genuine hate for Caelondia, the protection of loved ones, or just laying down their lives in the hopes of satiating the boogeyman they imagine the Kid being-the Ura keep fighting to the last. Those that dogpile Priscilla stab and stab, trying to find some vital or another to deal a fatal blow, but only find vague meats. The sorcery mist she breaths burns them, only the hardiest hanging on to get a few more blows in before letting go and rolling around in the snow to try and soothe the wounds. Even the weakest of them, such as Flamel, is able to do some damage when cornered. The Ura bearing the long savage machete presses all his weight against the telekinetic barrier to try and breech it, only to come face to face with very many telekinetic hands. He is pummelled soundly, the final blow impacting with enough force to launch him from the floating platform into the abyss below. Nothing troubles him now. The sudden shift of Steelix into Mega Steelix has the Ura off-guard. It's bigger, sturdier, and doesn't hesitate to display it by soundly ramming their entire defensive line. The Ura, their catapults, their Stinkeye broodmother... all of it is ejected off the side. In a single blow, Alexis rendered their last stand null and void. The Kid hops down from the outcropping, stinking of burned feathers and roasted bird flesh. "Good job," he says to everyone, before checking on Kotone. "She's tough, she'll be fine. You can patch her up, right?" he says to Rory. He doesn't mean to sound dismissive, but his mind is very much elsewhere right now. The place has been weakened by that final blow, but there's enough time to go further, retrieve the key, and unlock Zia's cell. She's got some bruises and cuts, and she's wearing the same clothes she was wearing when she left, but she's fine otherwise. As the door is unlocked, she rises, and offers a weak smile to everyone. "Thank you for coming. I... heard about Rucks from them. I'm sorry." She steps from the cell, and nearly collapses before Kid catches her. Having her safe seems to be a massive weight from his shoulders. He's almost smiling, instead of always scowling. "Thanks for the help. I'll get her back to the Bastion 'fore I head off to finish this."
Alexis	They weren't expecting it. That brief chance of surprise and unreadiness. Alexis had seen the glimps of it when her Bisharp went hell blender loose on them in the Bastion, and had been planning what ways she could work outside her usual methods to take advantage of it. Fire wasn't her only specialty these days, and the Steelix, along with Steven's gift for helping him out exploring those offshoot islands, had linch pinned that planning. Seige reared back from the impact with the structure, rising up to watch it fall over the edge. These weren't the men that had tried to capture and abuse him, but they had showed the same zealous obsession, and that was enough for the titan to act on. Alexis stared down past the Mega Steelix's brow, expression flat as she watched the last of the Ura's resistance tumble into the emptiness below. If there was land to hit down there still, it would still be the end of this. She let out a soft sigh. Normally, she'd feel regret over having to use such measures... But no. The Ura had sealed their own fate when out of anger and vengence they had turned their willingness to work together into a deadly assault. There was no helping them. If anything, it ended their suffering in their anger. It was a reminder of why she got out of the war, and had stayed out of the new lines that had drawn up in its place. So she didn't have to do this except when it was necessary.. and personal. She gives Seige a nudge with her heel and he moves away from the edge, lowering his head so she can rejoin the others. She hops off, and hustles over to give Zia a hug once she's out of (what remains) of the cell. Mindful of not aggrivating any injuries. "Of course we came. Not the sort to leave friends behind." With the fight clearly over for now the boost fades and Seige reverts back to being a normal Steelix.
Rory White	Rory chose not to fight in order to instead pin down and report on Zia's location,.... and when Kotone goes down... she hits a full-on PANIC REACTION. The robot tigress bounds across the battlefield at ridiculous speeds... not to engage, but to gather up Kotone and drag her behind cover to apply some quick life-saving repairs... or at least, Shell-saving repairs. When the fighting's over... she emerges and meanders with Kotone on her back, and wanders over to the reunited humans... "... Mission Success, pending extraction. I'm glad to see Zia is safe. What about Zulf...?"
Flamel Parsons	Parsons seems to be a little exhausted at the end of that, and quite thankful they could push through. He doesn't like killing, but it's not like he's unwilling to do it in the line of duty. And he does have a license for it! At least he has a learner's permit. Jokes aside, though... Parsons actually finds himself feeling better that he managed to surge through the incredibly dangerous countermeasures that previously threatened him badly. Not without a damaging wound, a spread of nerve-pattern bruises that bleed a disgusting orange light all up and down his neck, but for the most part he's okay. He presses on with the others until it's time to hit Zia's cell, and he instantly works to unlock it with the information he took. from that mind. Over the radio, he calls out back to Rory: "Zulf's at the peak of the Tazal Terminals. We're heading there, I think! We've gotta rescue him - he went to the Ura for our sake after all, and I want to make sure the faith he put in us gets rewarded!" And then, as Zia is released... "..." Thinking about Rucks has him on edge. The old man died for him, and maybe he wouldn't have had to if Parsons had been less... Like he insists on being? He worries, quietly, even with that optimism. "We'll get through it! The best thing we can do... Well, the only thing we can do is try to live up to his hopes and make what happened worth it! And I'm sure we'll get there. Now we even have you to lift our spirits and push us to the finish line!" He says, positively as always. "You get back to the Bastion and wait for us. Hopefully we'll be there with the last Shard we need soon!"
Priscilla	Priscilla comes away from that fight the bloodiest she has in a long time, at least with the criteria that it is her own blood. Her dress is a mess of rips and red streaks from top to bottom, and the snow tints crimson where she walks where both hers and the Ura's drips from her fingers and pools in her footsteps. There was no need to expose herself to that level of violent risk, except somewhere in her heart. She can only hope the dulled and numb sense of accomplishment is a lasting one. And yet, seeing Zia again after all this time, Ura or not, Priscilla can't help but feel it was the one good thing that came out of all of this; a little light at the end of a long and dark tunnel that made today about something other than revenge, which will certainly do a lot for her later. 'Almost smiling' describes Priscilla as well as the Kid, tired and bloodied as she is, albeit almost smiling for different reasons, but she leaves without saying much. Only: "Maketh certain, at the very least, that thou wait for us before thou taketh that final step. Danger or no, I shalt not forgiveth thee for missing the sight of it."