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Lilian Rook     --LAST TIME ON [PROJECT REDACTED]!!--

    Along the high route into town, the carriage approaches even still. Now well within range to hear and see the commotion, it diverts a turn early; by the looks of it, Aidan had scouted out the likely commons between several private manors, perhaps to visit the local collaborators, and now he's left to scurry back into position as the retinue instead takes a shorter path down.

    Down and down, winding a sharp double pin from the cliff, then straight past the fine estates, and to the far edge, as close to overlooking the square as possible. Down far enough to see the horse drawing the carriage doesn't match the flanking guards; gaunt and demonic, skin seemingly of steel, mane and tail as plumes of ghastly-blue flames. The cloaked driver pulls it to a halt without a gesture. Deep red curtains remain down over the windows, but the finely worked door is pushed open, and the carriage rocks with the disembarkation of one occupant, then the other, and then the last.

    Stepping down from their darkly appointed ride, first a masked woman in rich midnight blue, fur-collared robes, draped in decorative cords and bangles fastened with equal measures gold and obsidian against antler and bone and feather. It's hard to tell much more than her being blonde and pale from below, but she holds a gnarled and ominous staff seemingly well-suiting her role. She gestures, and a crow comes to rest on her arm, communing silently through her half-mask, obscuring her eyes.

    Next, the tremendous footfalls of a heavily armoured figure, outstripping the black knights in both sheer quantity and baroque quality. A deep red cape drips from horned and fang-faced pauldrons, nearly brushing the ground where they tread, matching the demonic visage of their elaborate helmet. A sword even larger than the others is carried in a sling scabbard across their back.

    They step aside with rehearsed ease, taking their proper places to flanking sides of the carriage, one step down on the rise to be that one step closer to earth. The armoured figure holds out their hand, and it is delicately taken by the black-gloved figure that reaches out from the shadowed interior. The other is reverently held by the masked sage. Neither are needed in the slightest to support who comes down.

    Her feet don't even touch the road. From shockingly far away, you can hear the theatrical clack of heel on echoing marble, though not necessarily see the spark of shadow-and-star that they step on in lieu of terra firma. The following snap of her fingers echoes just as sharply as in a vaulted cathedral hall, and ghostly lights flare up around the carriage assembly, orbiting the retinue in a slow-revolving dance that casts a stage light-grade glow.
Lilian Rook     For just an instant, you almost don't register who it is. Her hair is let all the way down to her hips in criss-crossing waves. Her dress starts at the throat, skips the arms completely, and ends early, completed by a trailing wake of attached skirts that glitter like the tinted sky on the inside, visible from the front split.

    Figure perfect black exposes shoulders down until the aristocratic gloves and a slash of thigh just before dark leggings flowing into high heels, edged with gothic lace that creates the illusion of the weave unraveling into individual strands at their edges. Ostentatious gold embroidery as a first-time deliberate choice, flower-patterning a dress fastened by exterior corset and ring-fastened straps more than anything else, backed with wine red lining. Held up by the neck, backless is a given, but villainous cleavage is completely and utterly unprecedented. The polished black armour woven into her right glove only superficially resembles her usual.

    A royal torc replaces a tiara or crown; more traditional, and more visible, made of a naggingly familiar helix pattern, its arms enclosed around a miniscule twin to the black hole in the sky. Dramatically dark eyeliner balances shock-green lipstick, matching her eyes. The shape of her pin is still visible in her hair, but laborious effort has threaded with fresh blossoms of red spider lilies, covering up the original white gold. A lily that symbolizes death and separation, growing from the lily that represents rebirth and purity. For dramatics. Clearly.

    But it's not clear how she got a halo. A thin red(?) band of light that outlines her head like the limned edge of the singularity. It distracts and draws attention back to her eyes when yours wander.

    The witch at her side causes the tip of her staff to glow, and when she speaks, a semi-familiar, yet unusually cold voice cuts all the way down to the town square below. The soldiers don't strictly stop in place, but need to move very little, as every one of the townsfolk locks up in fear and dread.

    "It is my pleasure to announce the arrival of Mistress Liliana Lycoris, Queen of the Hungering Star." she says, with perfectly soft-severe flat affect. "Pay your respects. It is more than you deserve that her illustrious name be shortened for your lowly ears."

    With steppy heel click-after-clack to the cliff edge, definitely not Lilian, the most radiantly content that she's ever not been, pauses at just the level she remains a head above her two subordinates, and with smoulderingly theatrical affect, says "I would welcome you, strangers, as honoured guests. But before you can be taken in as friends, first you mustn't keep secrets from me."

    Leaning forward, she presses her fingertip to her cheek, arm folded under her chest. "So tell me. Why must you sew chaos in my nearly-perfect town? I detest sights like these; so disorderly and loud. If you can behave, you'll find that my people have hospitality to spare. Or is it . . ."

    Lilian takes the deepest, sultriest, most enthusiastic-to-deliver-a-line sigh she ever has in her life. "Are you another band of heroes to be added to my . . . collection~"

    --AND NOW FOR THE SHOW!!--
Sarracenia      Sarra is rather jealous that she is limited to a specific type of outfit outside of specific circumstances. She's also jealous of the boldness of that Lilian displays with that outfit. Sarra is not sure she would be brave enough to show so much skin. She helps the freed black knight up and gets her on her way, then looks toward that cliff.

     Sarra hops and wall kicks her way to the nearest tall roof, then turns toward the cliff and twirls her hammer over her head, causing enough of a breeze to get her shining copper hair to flow outward before she brings the hammer down to rest on the roof with a resounding thud. She reaches into her purse after and pulls out a megaphone of her own. She can't let the non-princess Princess or the bird be the loudest, after all!

     She pulls the trigger, and her already loud and somewhat obnoxious voice is amplified. "We will not be added to your collection! We will be adding you to our collection of defeated villains! The people here live in fear and constant threat of annihilation if that black hole is any indication! The chaos had to be sewn in order for these people to be saved!"

     Sarra pulls out a fire flower and gives it a squeeze, and her already red dress gains an even more fiery motif. She holds out a hand palm up and produces a fireball, which just hovers above her hand to add some mood and draw a bit of extra attention. "I am Princess Sarracenia Sundew, Crown Princess of the Sundew Kingdom! And I am sure I speak for everyone here when I say...we will stop you and save these people! This is your only chance to surrender peacefully!"
Rowdyruff Boys Brick is in a cave with Blossom, sketching out the forest and its surroundings. His attention is split between that and the theater going on at this particular moment, which is... well. It's certainly showy, but his eyes are, in particular, on Aidan Proudpick, who happened to be the one that went to meet the "noble carriage" moving towards town.

"I need you for another two minutes," he asides to Blossom, rising from his seat among the rocks to take her by the hand and tug her backwards into the cave at his back. This is what he's planning to use as an auxiliary command center and evac point. Still isn't sure it's a good idea, but it's probably necessary.

    MEANWHILE, ELSEWHERE...

Boomer, who is very late, materializes in a high-pitched SKRRRR of blue light that lands him quite abruptly near the badly-hurt Ivy who never got back-up, blinks rapidly at the scent of blood and the situation unfolding in front of him. It doesn't take much awareness for him to move to act-- he seizes hold of the one-armed knight and jerks it back off of Ivy with a surprisingly from-a-standstill herculean effort, too late to prevent injuries but plenty quick enough to stop them getting much worse.

"H-hey! Can you stop the bleeding?" He asks, sounding a little panicky.
Kale Hearthward Kale sets down, rejoining the rest of the group. This feels important.

He's there in time for Lilian to make her first steps down from the carriage. And indeed, he almost doesn't recognize her. There's little clues, of course - and bigger clues, like how she's one of the single digit number of people here that he doesn't get a mental read from.

He wishes, more than ever right now, that he *could* read her. It'd make things a lot easier, if he could just pick up the clues here that way. Instead, he has to focus and try to pick up the clues the mundane way. Does Kale have enough mirror neurons for that? He's going to have to find out!

Get into the mind of Mistress Liliana Lycoris. She's here herself. She's come down via carriage, with heralds (a witch!) and attendants - she's here to talk, not to fight. And she's put both expenditure in such (via the carriage, heralds, etc) and also a personal interest (showing up herself instead of sending an agent).

And that sigh.

Oh, that sigh.

"That could launch a play that'd last a thousand repeat showings on High Street..." he says under his breath. Kale's inner playwright, long dormant, is reawakening. *Could* he get Lilian Rook in a play?

... Oh, yes, he's supposed to be in character. And figuring out the response here.

"Mistress... Liliana Lycoris, Queen of the Hungering Star," repeats Kale. "I am Chevalier Kale Hearthward, of the Paladins Search and Rescue."

A wind picks up where there wasn't one before. It's coincidentally entirely in the right direction and force to flutter Kale's cape *just so* behind him. The weathervanes and hanging signs, if any in the town, move slightly as well as he makes his introduction. He's not as dressed up as ~~Lilian~~ Liliana, so he has to at least provide his own heroic VFX.

He gives her a sweeping bow, one arm in front. "I am so *terribly* sorry that we have to disturb your town and cause you to suffer such a disturbance," he says, putting as much genuinity and sincerity into his words as he can. "Unfortunately, with that..." The word 'monstrous' almost passes his beak. Careful! "... imposing, black hole in the sky above us, we feel the need to take these people to safety."

"I promise you, it's not my intention to keep secrets," he adds, only then coming up from his bow. She'd mentioned not liking secrets. No secrets, no lies. "And we-"

> "And I am sure I speak for everyone here when I say...we will stop you and save these people! This is your only chance to surrender peacefully!"

Kale looks a little pained. "*Re*-gretfully," he says. "We may be slightly at odds, but I am quite sure it's nothing we can't work out with our words - and I am quite sure I speak for everyone when I say we'd be quite interested in whatever hospitality you deign to offer our humble group." Another bow, albeit a shorter one.
Aidan Proudpick Aidan feels somewhat pleased by the appearance of a witch.

He could jump them. That would be pragmatic. His plan was to bowl over the carriage with a cart. That would be efficient. Maybe even the proper way to deal with this. Make the first strike. Go down hard, do a surprise attack.

The squirrel comes out from behind the carriage, shooting a glare at Kale for getting there first. Treat this like anything else. Treat this like it's real. Find out why. Find out who. Find a way. Aidan is right up close to the party of three, dressed in his beastman armor. He takes a deep bow, arm out, hand at the waist, knee bent slightly.

"Mistress Liliana Lycoris, Queen of the Hungering Star." He stands back up, paying respect right now rather than the defiant and determined gaze he reserved for the Dame Commander, "We came to investigate rumors that there were trouble here. We saw people being taken away screaming." A bright smile flashes over his face, "We had to do something, right? And then, well," he gestures back at the town. "We got into a whole lot of trouble trying to do that. No disrespect meant."
Odette Raskins Things become a blur for Odette. One second, she's checking on a decently cute guy's face after noticing a weird light in his eyes. The next, she's hearing that he might actually be mind-controlled. Yet another next, she's dropping sideways as a familiar friendly face divekicks that guy so he doesn't do something mind-controlled at her while-

"You're not going to take what's mine!"

Multiple conflicting thoughts run through the EMT's head all at once. Is it love at first sight? (No, they're both girls!) (Maybe?) (She needs to ask an expert about this.) Is she seeking legal ownership? (She sounds like she could afford it, but why her?) (It'd be just like the Company.) (Did she buy Odette's image rights from the Company?) Does she even mean what Odette thinks she means? (What else could it be?) Which one of those things does she mean?!

"P... Princess? Did you mean...?" Odette can barely even get that much out correctly as she tries to puzzle all of her conflicting thoughts out, still in a daze just from being shaken off that guy so abruptly. Truly, she has no idea whether to feel flattered, threatened, disappointed, or something entirely different around Princess, and the confusion shows on her face. Her head is still spinning by the time one Mistress Liliana Lycoris steps out of the demonic horse-drawn carriage, pushing herself up unsteadily from the ground with a shiver running through her spine at those click-clacks and the intimidating aura surrounding each of those words.

Unlike many of those present here, Odette really doesn't register who she is for far longer than an instant.  Her presentation is terrifying enough, her words intimidating enough, her underlings numerous enough, and her wardrobe eye-monopolizing enough that there's nowhere else for Odette to focus her attention on. She wouldn't even have a proper response coming out of her mouth if not for-

"Are you another band of heroes to be added to my . . . collection~"

That's a classic villain line from her shows! In this context, Odette can easily guess that Liliana's speaking of legal and physical ownership rather than anything romantic. It also means Princess couldn't possibly have meant what she said in the same way as this!

Wait. That means... She must've meant an unknown third thing, right? And not... Could it? "W... W-we won't be added to your collection that easily!" Odette shouts with all the bravery of a coward as she does so while scurrying over to hide behind Princess. Should Liliana actually look over at her, the EMT will let out a startled yelp and try to hide herself even more via ducking, but while still peeking out to see if she's still actually being looked at.

"I-I'm just here to check on... On whoever's hurt!" She calls out, slowly peeking out again before making good on that and hurrying around to check on the townspeople that had been caught up in that cordon, then the guards that had been targetted as part of that cordon. "D... Don't mind us! Er. Don't mind me!"
Ru Li Cheng      It's performance art.

     Petra said as much earlier. That this is a performance, something to appreciate, something to participate in. Ru Li doesn't *fully* understand that, but he understands that there are rules of engagement, behaviors, and indulgences that should be observed. That there are actions that should be taken, and so on.

     Even with all the makeup in the world, Ru Li could never mistake Lilian for anyone else. His senses are too sharp to be fooled just by his eyes. There are aspects to people that simple perfume, or clothing, or hairstyles, cannot hide from him - especially people he cares about and pays attention to. He pays a great deal of attention to Lilian. He cares a very great deal about Lilian.

     But 'Liliana Lycoris, Queen of the Hungering Star' does an excellent job of fooling his eyes. She's pulled out all the stops. She was already beautiful, but this is something different altogether. She's embraced this role. She's dressed for it, all slink and cleavage, with flowers of both death and purity, black eyes and green lipstick, a helix torc and a halo to complete. This is performance art, yes, but it's something she's wanted for a long time.

     And he can't be there to indulge her.

     His chin touches his chest. It's more than just being chained to a desk again. More than just being forced to watch as other people take the stage. He never minds that. He's perfectly happy, or at least, he's convinced himself that he's perfectly happy, being witness to heroes playing out their dramas on an epic stage. It's more than that.

     It's...

     ...he should be down there *for her*.

     He should be able to support *her* fun, too. He should be able to say the sort of things Kale is saying. He should be able to give her the satisfaction of playing along, just like he did with Petra. That's why he can't see the path here. That's why he hasn't figured out the rules. Because he doesn't know how to contribute to *her* side. Sure, he can direct everyone, help them figure out the most efficient ways to act, and all that, but...

     But that's just behind the scenes. What does she get out of that from him? Nothing. It's just making everyone else's job easier.

     Bureaucracy in action.

     Ru Li bangs his fist against the wall of the tower. It cracks under the pressure, and his arm screams with misaligned wheels and gears.

     He waves it lightly to wave off the pain and begins wheeling up to the top of the tower. If he cannot play the role of hero, he can at least play the role of commander properly.

     "Do not get distracted. The Queen making her presence known is just a prelude. She is distracting, but she may also be a *distraction* - so keep an eye on the townsfolk and be ready to move the evacuation point if necessary."
Ivy Carrow     Ivy's tussle with the clocklilian isn't going well--it doesn't seem to CARE about her stabs, and the pressure is getting to be too much for her to handle...And then, it's thrown away from her. She breathes in, sharply, pained. Then, laughs, pushing herself up. "I owe you one, stranger!" She winked, pushing up to her feet.

    The damage is...Odd. Her arm is prosthetic, of black metal, and appears to have been...Bent. Normally, it isn't the kind of damage you'd expect to cause bleeding. But, it certainly seemed to anyway. "Nothing permanent, I hope. I like this arm..." She tugged some rudimentary medical tools from a side sachel, wrapping the leak up in gauze--just to keep complained, pulling out gauze to wrap it, if only to keep more blood from slipping through.

    When the Dame Commander arrived...Oh, what an arrival it was...! She was maimed, and tragically missed much of her first impression in impromptu self-medication. She allows Kale to take point on 'negotiations.'

    "She may be distracting, but she may also be setting up a distract*ion*."

    "That's right~ It's too early for the final confrontation. This is the part where she demonstrates her power..." Ivy looked down at her sword, finding its edge tragically clean, before sliding it into its sheathe. "You hear that, runners?"

    "Yes, Captain."

    "I hear you."

    "Y-yeah..."
Angela Cinder, okay, as far as Agents are concerned Cinder is a bit of a badass. She's tough, she's motivated, she has a pretty good EGO Weapon that she synchronizes well with even if it's not top of the line.

But Lilian Rook, even Lilian Rook playing the role of a villain--well... The Agents know at this point that generally Lilian Rook doesn't do murders, sure, but she's clearly stronger than anybody IN he facility since she defeated the strongest person in that facility--even if it was a close battle--and frankly even if Lilian had LOST that fight--she'd still be someone leagues and leagues above her in terms of combat ability both in terms of physical skill and, frankly, in group and personal combat tactics. And Cinder knows this about Lilian because every Agent knows this about Lilian. There is precisely one Agent (discounting Outsiders) who would be crazy enough to want to fight Lilian Rook and that's Nonon. And that's because Nonon doesn't care if she wins or loses--she's just in it for the thrill of the fight.

Queen of the Hungering Star. Cinder looks up towards that black hole in the sky. The one Brick said was definitely not natural and was spooking the animals.

"...Because it's not right that you are controlling these people for the sake of order and quiet, leaving them terrified of you like this." Cinder says. "...And a town you have to control isn't right either."

She figures that's the sort of thing a hero would probably say. Cinder is skeptical that she's anything like one herself but this is a training thing and, she reasons, part of hero training is to act and look the part as best she able right?

She is confused by diplomancy--the sincerity of which she is also skeptical of. She thinks to the stories she's read in the facility library. Is it normal to just sort of show up to a hero training seminar and then negotiate your way through it all?

She looks to Odette who seems to be cowering. Then looks to Petra, as if for guidance.

Is this what everyone would do normally if say... Petra was the one doing all this? What did most everyone do? They watched tournaments and eventually Ru Li raised a team to deal with it but they still did something. Okay, how about someone who wasn't even Petra. Someone normal instead of incredible and lovely. Someone, she thinks, who is neither sultry or incredible or really rocking green lipstick.

The Bern Empire? They'd go in weapons swinging. Temptations? Er, she's actually having a hard time remembering what Central did during the Temptation fight. But the Queen at the End of the World? They fought like their lives depended on it, they treated her as she was dangerous--but still someone they had to defeat.

"Hey... I get why everybody's suddenly playing all nice and just sort of trying to play along... But this wasn't supposed to be a game. Even if you're afraid--you're supposed to try and stop this stuff from happening..."

Cinder draws Fourth Match Flame and swings it an arc, sending flame surging towards and--more relevantly--AROUND the Queen--she's trying to make it more difficult for her to advance or move out to interfere with the hostage rescue efforts even as she presses her own assault.

"We're here to save the people of this town." Cinder says, sweat pouring from her face. Her hands shake as she grips her EGO Gear. She is full of fear but at least her gaze is steady.
Petra Soroka     Once it becomes clear that the armored woman in the square isn't being compelled to fight anymore, Petra pulls back and drops her EGO spear into her cloud of morphmetal, letting it be propped up while she drops to her knees to catch her. Petra holds the woman for a moment, eyes unfocusing completely past her desperate expression to instead get caught up in wondering whether she's supposed to start shucking her like a corncob to peel the rest of the armor off. The actress, presumably not in the throes of life-threatening distress in reality, has the time to realize that a Petra's response time post-trauma is extremely poor, and the long few seconds where she doesn't immediately get to work reassuring her or continuing the rescue effort would be very awkward in reality. It's also awkward now.

    Once that passes, though, Petra does jump into motion, fussing over the woman and helping free her from the remnants of the armor. "Hey, are you alright? Physically hurt? Do you have any leftover mental influence you're aware of? What can you remember, from before now? About how you felt, or how you ended up like this."

    She also, without looking, reaches to the side to press her hand to a flat square of morphmetal in the air, pulling out... a small plastic water bottle! Now that's high quality heroism, right there. She hands it to the woman and then stands up, assessing the movement of the guards as they back off and then the carriage as it comes to a stop on the cliff's edge.

> opera gloves

    Oh no.

> heel clack

    Petra's back tenses and she straightens up, in a Different way from how the townpeople stand at attention in dread.

> Held up by the neck, backless is a given, but villainous cleavage is completely and utterly unprecedented.

    There's nothing in all the multiverse less heroic than the sharp intake of air Petra makes when she comes into view.

"Are you another band of heroes to be added to my . . . collection~"

    Petra is, embarrassingly, predictably, pathetically, stunlocked. There's no way that Petra would ever not recognize Lilian, even before the thinly veiled introduction, even with the distance and the makeup and the costuming-- not solely out of familiarity, but because the Lilian in Petra's imagination wears gloves and heels more often than not. Whatever sound is about to come out of Petra's mouth, it is *not* measured diplomatic negotiation, defiant heroism, plans of action, or anything of the sort.

"We will not be added to your collection! We will be adding you to our collection of defeated villains!"

    A razor thin line of morphmetal whips up to slice Sarracenia's megaphone in half, cutting her off with an electronic crackle. Petra, from whose telekinetic quicksilver blob the tendril emerged, freezes, then the glare on her face softens into transparent mortification. She takes a few awkward, stiff steps towards Sarra, bends over to pick the halves off the ground and mutters, "Um... sorry...."

    She scoops off a handful of morphmetal and it quickly forms into a screwdriver, a welding torch, a soldering iron, while she silently works on repairing the megaphone, red-faced. She closes her eyes and tries to focus on being normal. Being a normal heroine. Heroines *don't* find women attractive.

Then [Cinder] looks to Petra, as if for guidance.

    Petra looks a little helplessly back at Cinder, then clears her throat. "Um, yeah, we've-- we've got a goal. Not bantering with her, we've got to-- keep working on freeing people. If she's got something important to say, she'll say it; this is just... uh... forep--... an introduction."]
Powerpuff Girls OFF IN THE FORESTS,

Blossom, benefitting not just from super-hearing but super-senses beyond the physical, knows what's going on is important and dire. Perhaps not the climax, but something very important. Were this an operation that she was leading, she would never agree to such a delay.

However. Blossom is not leading the operation. The ruby Puff looks around the area, pulls out her phone, and pointedly sets a two minute alarm before crossing her arms and looking at Brick. She starts to protest - "There's a VIP I think I'm supposed to meet--" but Brick takes her hand and leads her deeper into the cave. To the end of it, empty.

Sometime in the two minutes her phone buzzes and Blossom silences it, reaching the back. "This..." Convenient, but not too convenient. "Is probably where we should have found and gone. If the simulation... Mission, continues, let's rendesvous here. We can move anyone back to the fortress at the start location once we've gotten a better idea of the mission parameters."

Blossom feels better about their chances after doing so, but would have followed Brick for longer than two minutes on his insistence. She could tell he was caring about something - just not, particularly, what.

IN THE SHOWTIME STREETS,

Princess Morbucks is caught in a moment of overcoming her dreams of wishing to be a 'Hero, Like The Powerpuff Girls' into actually being a Powerpuff Girl and doing things that were - definitionally speaking - both super and heroic. Much of the excess bluster falls away and as she drives her jet arched heel into the Mind Controlled Punk and bootblasts them away, pivoting in an artful palm-controlled twirl rather than a true Powerpuff air-stop to center Odette in her vision--

--Odette has seen these displays before. She's read them, forwards and backwards. In a glance, Princess's Power Crown visor analyzes her vitals with a glance, reports that she's got at least 20 units of crying wuss and shock with the adrenaline coursing through her veins, and prompts a thinly honest smirk from the power armored golden super-'hero'ine.

"Just spooked. It's fine, girlie, I'm here now."

> 'It is my pleasure to announce the arrival of...'

Princess pats Odette on the shoulder and struts past the medic with a soft 'Don't worry - I'm here' delivered with the precision of being practiced a hundred times in the mirror and the rough edges of it being the first time with adrenaline thundering through the neck while speaking it. Walking out into the square, black gloved hands rest on golden skirted hips as the bright ginger-pom'ed hero sizes up...
Powerpuff Girls > 'Are you another band of heroes to be added to my . . . collection~'

Princess Delilah Morbucks III, first legal name 'Princess', is extremely lucky that she's wearing a pink visor over her eyes with a red combat HUD tint, or her blush would be showing. Already at a passion peak from getting to LARP out her dreams, her confident pose is unwavering because at this point she either comfortably knows what's about to happen, or excitedly anticipates what may instead happen. Oh, what a wonderful day.

The woman whose first name is 'Princess' does not, with her very focused eyes, spot the blinking weapons alert on her HUD reminding her that the 'Satellite System' has 'No Signal'. Instead, it is her mouth that expresses her heart. "Queen Liliana Lycoris, I'm Princess - of the Powerpuff Girls! The people have cried out, and we've come to fight the forces of *Evil*. So please, your highness," A black gloved arm reaches out, as Kale tries to smoothen diplomacy, and Odette tries to shout 'I'm not here, please don't notice me!'.

"You look like a very hospitable Queen. Any chance we can talk this out? It sounds like these people will listen to you."
Rowdyruff Boys "Boomer," Boomer introduces himself, smiling and waving a little dorkily at Ivy. He doesn't offer an opinion on the narrative flow because that really goes over his head. He gets that this is a simulation, but he's not going to treat it like one when he smells that much blood on the air.

"I don't want you in line-of-sight right now," Brick explains himself to Blossom, simply. "I've only been so peripherally, and while you've been up at the front, there's somebody else trying to take center stage... I doubt anybody would buy that he was put up as our 'face', but having him up there is useful for my purposes regardless." This is not a very nice thing to be doing, though it had been on his mind enough that Blossom could have scanned it moments ago while he pulled her aside. Obviously, he doesn't think she'd object enough not to just explain it to her.

"If you can identify arms caches when you go back out, they do need ammunition. I can follow up and torch them. If you can guess at something that would make a great distraction if it was blown up, that'd be good, too..." He continues, putting his sketchbook aside and resting it on a conveniently shaped stone outcropping within the cave.

"I'd like to keep you longer, but I think we're pushing it now. Head back out once she's done whatever dialogue she's going to put out," he decides, releasing Blossom's hand and patting her on the shoulders a couple of times. "One last thing... the thing in the sky might be a timer, too. I'm not confident of that, but it's enough of a possibility I'm not willing to keep it to myself."
Lilian Rook     The stirring of the wind draws 'Queen Liliana's' attention first. By the time the breeze reaches her, deflected up from the cliff, it teases the hem of her skirts and the tresses of her hair in an oblique direction to Kale's dramatic cape; waving subtly on a disjointed ghostly current. The corner of her lip quirks into half of a wicked grin at the words 'search and rescue'. The laughter is contained fully within her eyes.

    "My my my, but there's not a soul here that needs to be rescued, sweet songbird. The people of Cinniuint have lived long and prosperously on these lands, and now their sacred home is about to be revolutionized! It'd be ever so terrible if a single. solitary. one. were to misled from the lands of their forbears by some unfortunate panic, now that eternal happiness is within their reach."

    She's good at it. Really good. Implying to the edge of screaming it out loud, while maintaining that highhanded disposition that offers one chance to bow your head and take it back; to get out of jail free by kneeling and recanting.

    'We came to investigate rumors that there were trouble here. We saw people being taken away screaming.'

    Aidan's nearby appearance causes the heavily armoured, cape-swathed figure to step menacingly into his way. Two armour-clattering thumping footsteps are all that's needed to cast their shadow over him. The Queen, being on higher footing, looks down at him over their shoulder, out of the corner of her eye. "Oh what unfortunate timing you have, dear. To have to see that sorry display from the malcontents . . . Well, every society has them; I'm certain you understand~" She says it without smiling a bit. "What a tasteless way to behave in someone else's home. Would you chase down lover's quarrel's from open windows? Merchant disputes in the streets? Would you free a murderer if he should scream loud enough when clapped in irons? I think not."

    'I-I'm just here to check on... On whoever's hurt!'
        "Oh~? Well then scurry along, little mender~ See to your business~" says the Queen, leaning forward, hand to her hip, to shoo at Odette with the other, accompanied by a chiming laugh. "Oh had you but arrived a day earlier or later. I just cannot wait until Glascail is ready to welcome travellers as they ought to be." She should be talking to Kale, but she only has to cast one disapproving gaze down at the square for the townsfolk to cringe and quiver. "Oh darlings, how many times have we been over this . . ." she moans, pressing her fingertips to her forehead and sighing, like an overworked evil mother.

    "They're welcomed in the square, then sent to the tavern, and then the inn. You greet them with a smile, you memorize the shops, and you show them a good time. Honestly! How can it be so difficult for you people? Must I see that you're given even more lessons?" The last word sends ripples of quiet panic through the crowd. They back even further away from the statue-still soldiers.
Lilian Rook     'You look like a very hospitable Queen. Any chance we can talk this out? It sounds like these people will listen to you.'

    "Oh you would think!" Liliana says to Princess, amplified from the high rise, immaculately maintaining the evil corporate mom tone for a moment longer, before shaking her head with a pitying sigh. "No, no, I should be a hint more fair to them. I'm certain all this change must be difficult for them. Ever since their princess abdicated the throne . . . Ahhh, the poor souls must be so lost . . . That's why it's so imperative that they learn to trust me~ I have only their best interests at heart~"

    Pausing to think, the Queen places her cheek right back in the cradle of her curled fingers, re-adopting that naturally arrogant posture. "But I'm afraid that I came by on business. If you'll be so patient as to allow them to clean up their act and get things in order after the Selection, why, let's say everything you like is free for tonight~ As a token of good will~" This, of course, technically only harms whoever would be putting Elites up for authentic fairytale medieval room and board and entertainment. There's no sign of dissent at it.

    '...Because it's not right that you are controlling these people for the sake of order and quiet, leaving them terrified of you like this ...And a town you have to control isn't right either.'
    'I am Princess Sarracenia Sundew, Crown Princess of the Sundew Kingdom! And I am sure I speak for everyone here when I say...we will stop you and save these people! This is your only chance to surrender peacefully!'

    That changes the tone of interaction not-quite immediately. Like a slow slide of relaxing muscles, Queen Liliana's polite fakery of put-upon good-will and second-chance-giving melts away into wry-burning amusement. A fanged smile that only exists in her eyes, while her lips hold a neutral posture of contempt. "I see you have your own misguided little lambs that need shepherding back into the flock." she says, to no one in particular, carrying with it a charged hope of wishing she meant you, specifically; one of the good ones; the respected and honoured few amongst tiresome drudges.

    "Antisocial sorts like them have to be guided back to the right path, you know. They cannot just be left to their own devices. Much like the people you see scampering around, howling and causing chaos below." Of course, most people are on that same level as the townsfolk. "Towns, cities, human civilization is built upon control. Humans naturally crave it. They can scarcely exist without the structure given to them by control."

    "These lost lambs don't need to be saved darling; they need to be taught. If they'd learned order then you, they, all of us would be enjoying ourselves, now wouldn't we? Peaceful and harmonious; a beautiful little community, full of warmth and togetherness, welcoming in weary travelers from the road; each and every one in their proper place and role to be the best part of the whole that they can be. Is that so hard? You don't prefer all this chaos and violence, do you?"
Lilian Rook     The blast of flames is the first act of overt aggression, rather than implicit. Queen Liliana only stands there, arms folded, watching Cinder. The 'witch' at her side intervenes, thrusting out her staff and intercepting the blast of flames with a stream of frigid wind, mutually disintegrating into a wash of dramatic steam.

    "Lady Lycoris."
    "It's no matter. Perhaps a little collective punishment might set those lost lambs straight?"
    "If you will it."
    "Ah, but that would disrupt the Selection even further. General?"
    ". . ."
    "Kindly dispose of any that get in the way. Before we return, I'd like to be rid of that eyesore."
    ". . . It will be done."

    The Queen turns her attention to the Warprunner fortress with a narrow-eyed look of lip-curling disgust. "Revolting. That hideous thing is ruining the aesthetic. How is a comfortable town on the road meant to welcome any adventurers like this? No, no, it won't do at all."

    The Queen's gloved fingers run through her hair, then casually push it back over one shoulder as if it were in the way. She flexes her fingers in idle contemplation, gazing down at her hand for scant moments; and then as she opens her palm, something sparks into pitch black being and bloody red accretion in her hand. You feel the wind subtly swirl around it. The grass bends in another direction. Her hair, her dress, are lightly pulled forward. Gesturing out towards the fortress, layered magical circles, that would seem familiar if not for their discolouration, explode from her fingertips, interlock into perfectly enmeshed, staggered sequence, and aim at the extension of her arm.

    Very, very faintly, you feel yourselves sliding sideways. Inexorably drawn in the direction she points; as if the entire world had become slightly tilted, forcing you to angle yourselves to stay still; stay up. The heavily armoured figure begins slowly drawing their giant sword, tromping menacingly into the way, gradually towards Sarracenia and Cinder, while the witch watches Aidan.

    "The Hungering Star poses no threat to anyone; unless I will it." the Queen says. "To suggest otherwise would be to suggest that I am any less than the Queen. Behold, and let your doubts be purged." Those with magical senses feel an enormous resonant spike from far away, matching the wavelength of the spell.
Lilian Rook     Down below on the street level, meanwhile, the redhead extricated by Petra x Rider co. (feat. Sarracenia) coughs weakly and pulls herself up onto her side. Seeing water in any form, she snatches it with what strength she has, and spills half of it trying to gulp down the rest. She can barely get further than her knees, looking worn out to exhaustion.

    "Nothing other than what you did." she replies, stating her level of injury without resentment. "I can see it. Behind my eyes. Like a picture laid over a picture. The town . . . I can hear her still. I remember . . . I remem--" The young woman freezes, wide-eyed, then curls in on herself, and ceases answering.

    Townsfolk surreptitiously gather around Ivy and Odette, wounded on site, but mostly seem preoccupied with getting them out of there. "Don't." someone whispers. "The last party that came through here . . . She didn't even bother to take down the statues. They never came back."
Timespace Riders "Fear not," says Woz to the redhead. "There is a meeting place where a means of exit is being prepared. If you are able to make it there, do so. If not, I shall find suitable shelter for you to regain your strength, and return to assist you when I am able."

THE ENTRANCE OF THE QUEEN...

Is that who I think it is? Gosh...

    "Hail to you, O Queen," comes the voice of Woz, striding to stand beside a winded, flagging Zi-O, who's managed to extricate himself from fighting the Queen's soldiery at great cost to his energy.

    "Allow me to introduce Sougo Tokiwa," he says, with a sweep of an armored hand towards Zi-O, "Demon King of Time."

    "Hi! I'm Sougo, and this is my retainer, Woz," Zi-O manages cheerfully, if with shallow breath. "It's nice to finally meet you, your highness!" The Rider's helmet bobs enthusiastically.

Do not get distracted. The Queen making her presence known is just a prelude. She is distracting, but she may also be a *distraction* - so keep an eye on the townsfolk and be ready to move the evacuation point if necessary.
Are you another band of heroes to be added to my . . . collection~

    Another Zi-O appears elsewhere in the town, while the present one converses with the Queen of the Hungering Star. "I've never been in a collection before, haha!"

    As he keeps her engaged in banter Zi-O's words have an audible air of enthused warmth to them. "I want to like the idea, but..." The warmth turns to soft disappointment. "A good king stays informed about where he travels--I know what happened to the rest of your 'collection,' and to the people who play your lottery. Peace and order aren't worth anything if they're had the way you have them."

    The future Zi-O presses his back against the wall of a house--not to keep unseen, but to keep from falling over from exhaustion.

    The present Zi-O tests the weight of his greatsword with a light bounce of his wrist--the weapon bears a crossguard resembling the faceplate of his helmet and a gold-silver blade resembling a minute and hour hand flush with one another.

Would you free a murderer if he should scream loud enough when clapped in irons? I think not.

    "I'd try to rule my kingdom so that no one feels scared or desperate or angry enough to do something like that," says Zi-O. "And if someone *did* do something like that, I wouldn't try to fix it by making them more scared, desperate and angry."

Must I see that you're given even more lessons?

    "Actually," says the present Zi-O, "I don't know about the townspeople, but you've given *me* a pretty valuable lesson. I try to learn from other rulers, when I can."

    "That is..." he leans on his greatsword. "I know the story of this place. I'd be a pretty lousy King of Time if I didn't study history, wouldn't I?"

Behold, and let your doubts be purged.

    Future!Zi-O, with the knowledge of his past self, keeps his eyes on the streets as everything is pulled in one direction. Experiencing a second time makes it easier for him to keep his balance--though Present!Zi-O stumbles for a moment without his sword to lean on.

     "It seems like you have a problem with people... not getting with the program," says the Present Demon King. "Maybe we could just take them off your hands? You don't want people in a perfect, revolutionized village who have to be reminded of how good things are, do you?"
Kale Hearthward > My my my, but there's not a soul here that needs to be rescued, sweet songbird.

Mmmh... Obviously a lie, but... does she believe that herself? I think she must. Calling her on it would be the next dramatic move, but it feels so... redundant.

"Nevertheless my lady, we do need to do our due diligence, duly," says Kale.

"Perhaps if you were to tell us more about this eternal happiness they're on the cusp of, we could be enlightened?"

Aidan arrives, and gives his performance. "Six and a half out of ten," says Kale quietly, because he must. One can sooner stop the tides.

> Towns, cities, human civilization is built upon control. Humans naturally crave it. They can scarcely exist without the structure given to them by control...

Kale looks a little bit confused.

Did Lilian go off script here? She's supposed to be playing the evil supervillain, but right now she's just talking good old common sense.

Kale makes a mental note to mention this on the comment cards later.

Cinder blasts out fire. Of course. And Petra *just* got snippy with him about pointing out her friends' many flaws. The smile on Kale's beak becomes ever more forced.

>"It's no matter. Perhaps a little collective punishment might set those lost lambs straight?"

For a moment, Kale entirely forgets that this is a simulation.

"Wait!" he blurts out, foot lifting to take a step towards the Queen, hands raised placatingly, composure lost, in genuine panic and stress. "Please wait, before you do anything, I can-"

When Liliana changes her mind, Kale's foot gradually returns towards where it was, and his composure resets. Wait... that's right. Yeah. This... is a simulation.

Deep breath. In and out. We aren't *actually* going to watch civilians get executed in front of us because of our missteps. Yeah. The winds return to heroically blowing his cape. He quiets down while Liliana continues speaking, and only when she stops does he speak up again.

"If I could have a moment to-"

And then the world tilts.

"*AWK*!"

That's a very un-gentlemanly squawk from Kale, as he goes stumbling to the side. He knows, innately, which way up is, and that knowledge and reality aren't squaring with each other right now!

"Not a doubt in my mind. Please, Queen Liliana of the Hungering Star, have mercy on them. They know not that you control that giant black hole in the sky above them," he adds, as a hint to the others, if the sliding didn't give enough of a hint. "I'm sure we can talk over, uh-"

His mind races. "Your... grand vision, some more. I'd quite like to hear more of it."

Honestly, if Aidan and Cinder eat shit, he's not going to be *too* beaten up about it, but he's not going to say that out loud.
Ru Li Cheng      Ru Li cannot fall over.

     This is an upside. Even if he's off-balance, he's off-balance in a wheelchair. He's off-balance in something that cannot, on its own, tip over, even if he himself in leaning against the side to keep himself angled under the magical assault. His radial senses tilt - an unpleasant, physically loud sensation that twists the center of his sphere of awareness and turns it on its side, as if he's in the center of a ball and the ball has spun to the side.

     The *only* reason he isn't on his ass is that he already is.

     Once he's adjusted himself, and he knows he's not going to fall, he manages to grab onto that single point of stability.

     He can hear her make her announcement.

     Carefully, he starts to wheel himself down the ramp, towards the evacuees. He draws in a deep breath and shouts, "Through the portal! Two by two! Go!"

     Yeah there's no way he's getting down there. It takes all of his concentration to move *three feet.*
Odette Raskins Sppoked? Why would the superhero be spooked? It's not like Princess was in any danger from that guy she kicked. Unless... She was spooked not for herself, but for Odette's sake?

Wait. That makes total sense for a hero, especially one that has to defend someone with 20 units of... Crying wuss?! She is NOT a crying wuss! Just because she was caught crying on a few shifts, and her first instinct in the face of a villain with a singularity in the sky is to hide...

... Wait. This is supposed to be a test. She's not in any real danger of dying in a black hole! Sadly, Odette's HUD is distinctly blue in all of its readouts with her eyes being the only source of red, so it's pretty easy to see the blush of impotent shame on her face. Thankfully, it's most intense after Princess pats her shoulder with those reassuring words, so she might still be able to play it cool if she just toughens up from here on out and meets any provocations head on.

Unfortunately for her, Liliana gives her an out to do what she had come here to do, and the authoritative-yet-dismissive gesture combined with leaning forward has the EMT inhaling sharply with yet more blushing and a startled squeak from the back of her throat that only serves to confuse herself even more at where that could have possibly come fro.

After taking another moment to steady her breathing with no answers forthcoming, she finally manages to look back over at the Queen, hands still trembling against each other as she clings onto the front of her bag's strap like it's some kind of lifeline. "R... Right. Um. Wait. No! I..." Her thoughts are at war with themselves now, torn between wanting to prove she isn't a coward and wanting to actually do what she came here to do.

The titling of the earth... No, everything? Everything throws her thinking into further disarray, jarring her thoughts as much as herself. It doesn't take long for her to settle into the odd tilt, though, and the brief shock even helps to get her thinking into some kind of order rather than the jumbled mess it was earlier when it stops her from thinking too hard about proving herself. Even if this is all technically a simulation, she's still meant to act like she normally would. Doing otherwise would be violating her oath far too easily!

The gathering townsfolk, too, remind her of what she had come here to do, and that there's people counting on her and Ivy's medical expertise to be able to fight at their best. Between that and definitely not from still having some crying wuss in her, Odette's head finally settles back down, and she manages a firm nod towards those gathering around her and Ivy. "D-don't worry. We... We've got this. You'll all be okay."

She swallows once, takes another deep breath, then opens her arms up to start trying to gently shoo the townsfolk towards the exit furthest away from from the armored figure and the Queen. "K-keep moving calmly, everyone! We'll get you all treated outside, so just don't push and everything'll be okay!"

Odette almost sounds confident saying that, holding that expression just long enough to turn to Princess with a half-pleading look. "D... Don't lose out there, Princess! W-we'll take care of everything on this end!" She shouts a little too forcefully, still trembling, still shaky, and still just a little teary-eyed from really trying to look brave by the time she turns back around to the townspeople.

Something that one person whispered still bugs her, though, and Odette has to calm herself down again before finally managing to ask: "Now... Um. What's this about the last party? A-and the statues?"

She's already cursing herself for even asking about that.
Sarracenia      Sarra eeps in surprise and flinches as her megaphone is cut in half. The pieces fall to the ground. She looks toward Petra with an incredulous and angry expression, only for her expression to soften into one of 'I should have expected as much'. Petra is even more obsessed with Lilian than Sarra is. ...since Sarra is not obsessed with Lilian at all! Who thought that?!

     Sarra sighs softly at the apology and waves a hand dismissively. "It is fine. It served its purpose. And, I suppose it -is- quite the outfit." she says, hopping down to land by Petra. Her surprise returns when Petra actually repairs the megaphone, and she watches with an expression of confusion and caution and curiosity.

     The knight they freed speaks up, and Sarra looks toward her. When the woman freezes up, Sarra mmphs softly and reaches to pull out a large towel from her purse. She uses it as a blanket, draping it around the woman's shoulders. "You need to get out of here. Follow the others to the evacuation point." Sarra pauses a moment, then tries asking another question despite the freeze up. "...what happened to your shoulder?" She hands over a green mushroom as well and says, "Eat that."

     There may not be time for an answer though as that huge knight starts toward them with a sword that makes Sarra's hammer look small. She heads forward to meet him, but pauses again. "...murderer?" She looks back toward where 'Maggie' went. Toward some ivy. Now she has two things that she wants to ask Maggie if she sees the woman again.

     As she moves to meet the knight in combat, Sarra finds herself leaning slightly in one direction to keep from falling over. She looks toward those magic circles. "...does Lilian have powers like this usually...?" she asks Petra and Cinder.

     Cinder has a good ranged attack, so Sarra dashes toward the knight and goes into a twirling spin with her hammer to try and keep him at bay for both Cinder and the fleeing evacuees. "Are you brainwashed in that armor as well, sir knight? Do you require rescuing like the woman we freed a moment ago?" she exclaims, then adds for 'Liliana', "As for the supposed crimes of the people, they were not acting as if criminals were being removed from their midst! They need to be rescued from the threat of you using that thing!"
Angela Cinder feels a pull and is reminded of the Blue Star. She stabs Fourth Match Flame into the ground and hangs on for dear life.

Cinder is concerned with treating this as a real exercise. The goal is to rescue the villagers--not win the fight--but Cinder isn't going to cower before villains not even villains who are actually heroes she looks up to because this is just a simulation. Petra told her that treating it like its a play or like its anything but a real conflict. And she knows how real conflicts tend to be treated.

This is forepintruction, narratively speaking, but she wouldn't assume a narrative arc imposing itself in reality this way in a real fight.

Okay. Tactically, what would she do in a place like this in a position like this for a goal like this.

Cinder waits for Lilian to get closer, biting at her lip uneasily. She takes a breath, closes her eyes, and...

She pulls Fourth Match Flame free and kicks off, hoping to throw herself bodily into the Queen of Space.

Is this a power she normally has? She doesn't know.
Aidan Proudpick "Six and a half out of ten,"

'Pretty good for no practice.' Aidan thinks back.

"What a tasteless way to behave in someone else's home."

An opening of his mouth. Then shutting. This is just like Quicknest. If he says anything at Liliana, she's JUST going to take it as an excuse to blow them all out of the water. To blow him out of the water. Deal with the flunkies first.

The usual burning radiates up in Aidan's heart, every emperor, every empire, the anger in his heart. This is a home. She took over their HOME. The talk. He's trying to keep it tamped down. Don't shout. Don't push the supervillainess over the edge. This is just like Quicknest.

But. Aidan also has to have confidence. To do things himself. Not be a pushover. Not let other people force him into a role.

Somewhere in between. Find it, Aidan.

"I see you have your own misguided little lambs that need shepherding back into the flock."

The squirrel has -1 Intrusion Immunity. Everything is on his sleeve, emotions out, with only a few walls protecting his most important thoughts. He staggers, pushing his hand to his head. 'Hurricanes. It would be so much easier. Just submit. Let someone else do everything. You tried. You failed. No one would miss you. No one would judge you. The first of winter.' Aidan's head rocks back, shoulders setting, rolling his back straight.

Very, very faintly, you feel yourselves sliding sideways.

Without even thinking, Aidan's body adjusts, claws digging into the ground, tail shifting. Putting his center of gravity over the new plane. A puff of breath. White wind gathers up into his hand. Little wiggles of his fingers start the wind spinning, forming into a ball, making a show of rotating it, building it. Then, he flicks the ball behind him, thrusting his arm dramatically to form a set of wind walls between the Witch and everyone else. He flashes a toothy grin at her. "I don't want to have to fight you. But I will. Leave those people alone."
Powerpuff Girls "Not in line of sight?" Blossom repeats, already working through the possible ways and things that could mean. Was there an alternate meaning? Was this all a set-up? Someone else was was put in front of them, but, wasn't this operation one of fairly direct means?

They had sent a whole heroing team full of people into the area, and that VIP came. There was the 'selection', and some promise of better.

"But what's the *mystery*?" The ruby Puff asks herself and similarly-situated red companion. "The queen rides out to meet us? I don't think that's the whole plot. Brick--" Blossom touches the Rowdy's arm, velocity charging in her as a gathering energy field, an engine revved with the brakes held. "I'll swing back through the city. You loop around towards that castle, and give it a look. If there's anyone inside - that may be our goal."

Leaning in to give Brick a private kiss on the cheek, the same instant her lips touch skin. . .

SKRR!

. . . she's gone in a ruby red flash of motion back towards present danger.

Speeding back towards the city from the forest, the hypervelocitous Powerpuff scans her approach for concentrations of weapons or ''magic'' to sense down, something hiding in the wings. It would be tempting to laser vision any sites she finds, but...

Stopping here and there she snaps a quick text message or phone camera shot with locational data to Brick, as requested Blossom plays it quiet while several Someones Else take the Commanding Lead. As the battle swings more and more out of her control and element, Blossom realizes that she really isn't *in* Townsville any more.
Powerpuff Girls MEANWHILE, THE MEETING-SQUARE,

Morbucks does not have the direct benefit of super-hearing or super-empathy, relying on the automatic threat differentiation and aggregation systems of her Power Crown and suit systems. While Princess has the best tactical danger sense (equal even to those Powerpuff Girls!) she's nearly deaf to the hearts of others, as is her foible flaw that held her back since kindergarten. Despite every material advantage and the will to realize greatness and genius, she's not fed any kind of situationally correct answer or Elementally Good tutorial tip to help her not fumble the Baddest Simulated Bitch.

Gregarious and welcoming in her own Golden Pom-Pom Bitch arm sweep - what her offering hand switches to when it isn't stepped towards or indicated to, Princess sighs and shakes her head. "Oh, I know how you feel, Highness." The yellow 'Puff' nods, humu-humuing and acting all-knowing as her ginger poms bob. 'Highness' has the same character to her as the name 'Princess', something casual and given the quality of a familiar name. Of course, her tongue spills 'highness' like rainbows spill from diamonds - simple as!

"It's real difficult to find *good* help, they say, because not everyone can *be* it. It takes a special, *refined* class of individual to be a part of something great!" The rotten girl engages in Rich Royal to Rich Royal communication, as much as she tries to connect on Out Of Town Authority to Out Of Town Authority tones.

"And you know," Princess carries on, closing her black-gloved hands into fists. "They're supposed to learn to trust me too. So I feel for you."

Setting her fists into a tighter brawling stance when Liliana begins using the Hungering Star's 'magic', jetting against the singularity's attrition to interpose once more in the Queen's sight lines.

"But there's something I've learned." This kind of line - her *own* recitations, as response instead of call, the other side of the lines, a fresh high, fills Morbucks' voice with an odd sort of truthful relish. "If they can't be taught-- you're supposed to let 'em go!"

> 'Kindly dispose of any that get in the way.'

With a charged vernier whine of focused jetboost, Princess is off like a shot with a pink-dot leading elbow strike that forms the tip of her body charge into the armored 'general's' selecting chest. A sweep-out-and-smack on connection J-turns Princess back from touching range to a pace-and-a-half back to plant both feet and aim both palms, letting loose a concussive shock blast of conal pink kinetoforce.
Ivy Carrow     "Kindly dispose of any that get in the way. Before we return, I'd like to be rid of that eyesore."

    When the Queen's attention turns to the castle, Ivy tenses. Her people are there, her gate is there...her CASTLE is there--and immediately, she knows, their escape needs to happen. NOW. There's a flicker, a fracture in reality, and the girl is gone, leaving a rapidly vanishing portal behind her.

    The evacuation is going better than they hoped. The evacuation isn't going well; gravity is making even a straight run toward the teleport room an agonizingly difficult uphill trek for baseline humans, and the runners on this mission were almost EXCLUSIVELY baseline humans. Still, they did their due diligence. Luz opened a tear in their impromptu medical facility, and was ushering anyone who'd found their way into it into the main portal room, where Alex clung to the wall ushering evacuees onward.

    Nina, meanwhile, was curled up in a corner, overhwelmed by everything they were doing, that she was feeling, sobbing uncontrollably into her hands at the castle entrance.

    The wrath of the Hungering Star loomed, omnipresent, the highest tower bending and groaning. The entire castle slants...Sideways, bits of rock and dust tumbling through the air toward the black hole in a swirl of debris. One by one, windows shattered with sounds like detonating grenades, as the whole thing began to be drawn toward the event horizon.

    Ivy tumbles through, a tear of space in the highest tower by Ru Li, starting at a run toward the gate, but staggering backward as the Hungering Star sought to claim them. She reached out to the god, yelled what she hoped he could hear over its roar as "Grab on!"

    As the tower shuddered and fractured, and everything fell into weightlessness, she carved open a portal to try to snatch her and Ru Li from the jaws of oblivion, grasping on the other end for some stretch of forest they could see from their vantage point.
Petra Soroka     Queen Liliana Lycoris talks. The words are still in Lilian's voice, so before they even reach Petra's conscious processing, they've already been reinterpreted as the absolute truth. She's probably got a point, anyways. Most people *are* just aimless, messy miscreants, causing chaos and misery for no reason besides their dissonant, incoherent whims-- honestly, that's *kinder* than Petra would typically phrase it. Shouldn't that be a little strange? That Lilian is gentler and more forgiving to the populace, and humanity as a whole, now that she has total control over them and dominance over the entire stage the act takes place within?

    That's not strange at all, probably. Usually what gets on Lilian's nerves is people's interminable, incoherent insistence on defying her and tormenting her, so an entire town that just *wouldn't* do that is at the very least better than average. It's a safe location; no wonder she'd be so gentle with the townsfolk. It's not like Lilian is intrinsically hateful of humanity, just the way humanity is while submerged in Earth's culture. That's exactly how Petra earns care, after all; by ridding herself of that need to disagree with her and making herself into a safe location and useful tool for whatever Lilian needs.

"The town . . . I can hear her still. I remember . . . I remem--"

    Oh right! Heroism!

    Petra hastily hands the megaphone back to Sarracenia, now back in working condition, and then kneels down besides the woman again. "Hey, hey, slow down. You can hear her? In your head?" Petra touches her hand surprisingly gently, seamlessly believing the performance. It's hard to believe otherwise, really-- what kind of actress would subject herself to that very real puppeteering, and be so genuinely exhausted and frightened afterwards? This changes nothing about Petra's full personal agreement with the beguiling words of the villainess, but it is, for what it's worth, her fully real reaction.

    ""Are you able to stand? We've got evacuation going just outside town; get there if you can, or at least in sight of people who can help you get the rest of the way. Then you wonnnnnn'... t...." Well, Lilian had said she didn't want anyone leaving town, though. And Petra already *did* save the woman from the harm she was being inflicted with, which was already a 'heroic deed' that *didn't* go against something Lilian had explicitly said. So she should probably just....

    "-- Hold on. Give me just a sec. Sorry about this," Petra says abruptly, then forcefully puts both her hands on the woman's cheeks, holding her head in place looking towards Petra. Petra stares directly at her for a long stretch of seconds, taking in the exhaustion, fear, and all the little pains and stresses on the woman's face, in utter violation of the basic social principles of eye contact and decency.

    Oh, she's reminding herself that people get hurt and need empathy. She takes a steadying breath, and then blinks, eyes finally locking onto the woman's properly. "Alright. I'm normal." She looks up at Sarra, handing down the healing mushroom, and then helps the woman to her feet so she can get away.
Petra Soroka     Heroism! That means shouting defiantly at Lilian! And not finding her attractive! Petra was *so* good at this, just over a year ago, what happened? -- No, don't dwell on what happened too much, that'll just make it harder. Just take a breath, absorb the atmosphere, embody the collective tone.

"Oh had you but arrived a day earlier or later. I just cannot wait until Glascail is ready to welcome travellers as they ought to be."

    "What's happening tomorrow? Is that the 'Selection'?" Queen Liliana can see the shift in Petra's demeanor from all the way up on the cliff; the stiff-shouldered fist-clenched determination to push herself to at least the bare minimum of questioning her. "Is that going to be some kind of event?"

    Petra attempts the reliable method of drawing upon a real emotion in order to facilitate an unnatural course of action. She reaches into the disused and walled off well of 'Hatred for Lilian', just enough to inspire some ability to act in opposition to her with some amount of enthusiasm. Surely there's still something there, from its unlimited depths, to allow Petra to at least want to... they always say 'take her down a peg'? Ruin her until she's-- no, that's too far. She decides to stick with the resentment for being overlooked and talked past, instead.

<J-IC-Scene> Ru Li Cheng, much more off-balance, says, "Keep her talking. As best...as best you can."
<J-IC-Scene> Kale Hearthward says, "Trying!"
<J-IC-Scene> Petra Soroka says, vaguely, "Mmm, mhm."

    "But, uh, Queen Liliana," She says it *without* her voice unwholesomely wobbling, actually. "You're barely managing to hold this town together as-is, aren't you? You're talking a lot about a perfect world and everything, but the people here-- even the ones that are *yours*, which isn't even *all* of them, are still unhappy and in pain. Your idea of a utopia, even with *magic*, isn't able to *work* for everyone, so all you're doing it forcing them to be miserable and quiet for your sake!"

    "And that's bad!" Very good job remembering that, Petra. It's not particularly strong bait for Lilian to haughtily respond, but it's one step above 'begging to be paid attention to', which had crossed her mind with much more sway than anyone would prefer.

    The Hungering Star yawns open over the castle, and Petra stumbles with the sudden pull, whipping her spear around to use it as a crutch. Sparing a glance for the castle as it groans and creaks, she runs through thoughts of how she could even possibly intervene, helping evacuate or somehow cutting off the spell-- how *is* she doing that anyways? Petra is then struck by one of the few things that *can* drive her to violent resistance here, stirred into motion instantly.
Petra Soroka "Kindly dispose of any that get in the way."

    Cinder's choice to throw an attack first actually turned out to be convenient. When the armored General starts approaching her, Petra is there in the way, spearpoint lowered defensively and morphmetal bullets arranged in a scatterplot cloud behind her. Obviously, they have to contend with the General before even touching the Queen herself, and Petra intercepts them before they have the chance to flatten Cinder for attempting to dodge past them.

    "Don't fucking touch my girlfriend!" That's one of those bland shouted hero-isms that Petra would never normally say, but it feels pretty nice to, when the situation calls for it. The weight of the armored knight's massive sword is too much for Petra to contend with directly, so her efforts to even knock it slightly off-course leave her shoulders numb and shaking.

"...does Lilian have powers like this usually...?"

    "The magical geometry? Yes. The black hole...?" Petra squints uncomfortably, looking up at it. "No, but... I feel like there's something I should know about it?"

    A beat. "And I don't-- 'Sir Knight' feels wrong, doesn't it?"
Rowdyruff Boys "UhhhHHHHHHHHHH!" Boomer drones, slooooowly putting together the strange sliding effect tugging on him. This is not actually a problem for him, but his eyes are inexorably drawn towards the black hole in the sky. It is a simple fact that the Rowdyruff Boys are, in fact, tougher than a black hole; there is no natural cosmological phenomena that is actually a problem for them. Deeply exotic environments -- yes, more exotic than a black hole -- were necessary to physically threaten them.

Unfortunately that applied to literally nothing else around them, so the ability was only useful when they had to do extremely ill-advised things like use black holes to slingshot themselves around-- a rare enough thing that it had only really occurred once or twice.

The sound of somebody crying, clearly audible to him through all the rest of this going on. It is at this moment that he perceives the other problem of Ru Li in a wheelchair-- who is being helped by Ivy.

The distinctive SKRRR of Boomer's rapid movement carries him next to Nina, plucking her off the ground at some truly absurd speed while exclaiming, "Hey hey hey, I get it, this is horrifying, try to practice having a flight response instead, I SWEAR it works wonders!"

    MEANWHILE...

Brick quick-copies his map, places the copy in the cave, and strolls out to tail Blossom-- slowly, at a distance, and at the front end of things taking his phone out to send her a text message:
    >> Kissing and superspeeding remains one of the most vile things.
    >> You should, of course, continue.

He stops at the first location that Blossom spotted for him and checks it out-- if he called it and there's a nice peppering of supply depots, he immediately eye-beams the first one and kicks in his own superspeed -- once again skimming the ground so as not to be too visible immediately after -- to start heading towards the next location.
Lilian Rook     'Allow me to introduce Sougo Tokiwa. Demon King of Time.'
    'Hi! I'm Sougo, and this is my retainer, Woz'

    "How amusing. A foreign king?" the witch replies on the Queen's behalf. The smile on her unmasked lower face is twisted in asymmetical harsh amusement. "Walking side by side with the riffraff, late to introduce himself, with no letter, no retinue, no gifts . . . Do you think our Mistress a fool?" Her voice sounds naggingly familiar, even ice cold as it is. Of course, Lilian knows perfectly well it's legitimate, but 'Liliana' has never met him. "Your naïvety is appalling. Take them? I wonder if you're even worth our Mistress' time to play with." Subheather score ten out of ten.

    'Not a doubt in my mind. Please, Queen Liliana of the Hungering Star, have mercy on them. They know not that you control that giant black hole in the sky above them. I'm sure we can talk over, uh-'

    ". . . Talk." says the armoured figure. "Fool. The Hungering Star is the Queen. The Queen is the singular fixed point in all the world. All revolves around her. All is hers to take. All is hers to consume. You will never understand anything until it is too late; when you grasp the truth, you will be unable to object." The voice inside has that boomingly amplified, metal-tinged quality that comes most iconically from ambigious seven foot tall armoured villains in anime. It's a perfect delivery. It's trying to be deep, but only manages androgynous. Kale can already imagine the dramatic unmasking of a pretty girl inside.

    ". . . If you would hear the truth . . . Then stand there and watch. You will be unable to hear if I remove your squawking head from your shoulders." Good cop bad cop subheathers with the Queen. Arrogant and fawning, juxtaposed against brutal and devoted. Lilian has a sense for this.

    Trotting out in front of everyone and delivering a speech while entertaining their back and forth is actually strictly against Lilian's style ordinarily. Doing this from her castle would have been better. Smarter. There'd be no chance to react to it. But she's come down here to play the part. And yet, still, she has limits. Pausing the rising action to keep going on and on is apparently too flawed for her vision of the evil queen. She's efficiently delegated some amount of banter to her boss encounter underlings.

    '...what happened to your shoulder?'

    "Injured. In battle. Before they. T-took me." the young woman replies raggedly to Sarracenia. She stares at the green mushroom with a flash of strange misgiving. Honestly, like she just really doesn't like mushrooms, and doesn't trust a very brightly green one. Hesitantly, she begins starting in on it, and huddles up under the blanket. "Thank you. Any longer and I might have been gone . . ." she murmurs.

    'Are you brainwashed in that armor as well, sir knight'

    For being the huge, hulking tank type, the armoured figure is shockingly fast. Or rather, Sarracenia almost doesn't see them move. Like an anime-classic 'flash step' into her way, slamming out glowing sparks as they cross blade to hammer with her and the camera zooms in on their lovingly rendered CG faces. "Dog. I have served Queen Liliana since long before she was known by that name. I swore my oath long ago when I travelled the Western Lands, and saw what true power is for myself. You stand before the Exalted Lady of the Empyreal Void! So, know, your, PLACE!!"
Lilian Rook     Gravity shifts two more degrees at the worst possible time. The giant knight shoves Sarracenia away with tremendous strength, then chops down on her with a dramatic swing of their red-edged sword; and just as it strikes, suddenly she sees them attack her from the side, swinging through her waist; and then again, a diagonal uppercut from the other side, stomping forward. It's like they all happen simultaneously, and all in a single moment, combining their force to flatten her back.

    With the clear space, they swing yet another, alternative same-moment strike at Cinder; and Petra parries it just in time. For an afterimage, it has tremendous weight. Enough to hurt her arms. Enough to set her into the black knights, already dismounting, two more charging in on her with blades drawn.

    Morbucks sweeping in to intercept likely keeps her from flipping a coin on receiving an immediately deadly strike. With Sarracenia keeping them busy, Princess zwee-steps into close combat easily, crashing her elbow strike into the heavy armour; and feeling like the feedback is somehow wrong. The huge figure rocks back, and then slams their sword into the ground to dramatically arrest their momentum when the force-blast strikes them, whipping out their cape behind them and carving a theatrical gouge in the ground. They rise with an angry snarl, steam issuing from their visor.

    Meanwhile, the blue and black-clad witch moves to intercept Cinder; only to be cut off by Aidan's wind wall. She identifies him as the culprit immediately, despite the mask, and thrusts her staff towards him.

    'I don't want to have to fight you. But I will. Leave those people alone.'

    "Logical. I wouldn't wish to fight myself either."
    Having already demonstrated air magic, it should be less of a surprise when the circles catch light along the crook of her staff, and discharge a cone of searing lightning through the wind-wall, rapidly raking across the ground and scoring Aidan in the blink of an eye. The dirt flash-fuses into glass and explodes into superheated fragments shortly in its wake; the classic delayed-explosion beam effect. Two of the black knights converge on him too, charging him down while he recovers. Wind can't stop lightning, but it is keeping her from Cinder, who--

    Collides with a black knight's arm, and comes to halt face to face with a burning point of deadly magic aimed straight at her forehead, held lovingly at the tip of Liliana's finger. Aimed with looking, wrist upturned as if to tilt her chin, the Queen glances back with a grin so vivid that it seems almost fanged. Her chin tilts back and her hips cock in artful smugness.

    "Careful darling~ Your face isn't bad at all, so let's wait to see if your brains all over the stones are prettier~ Hahaha~!" The queen has two hands, two bodyguards, eight elite mooks, and there are only a few Elites attacking. Which means . . .

    Queen Liliana twists her extended wrist, collapsing the magical circles into linearly interlocked fashion. It's a familiar somatic casting tell. What should happen next is the precise motions of fingertips unleashing a hellish barrage of magic from a stationary position. What actually happens is that the queen snaps her fingers, and the sound echoes all the way into the forest.

    The singularity, far away, flashes fire at its liminal edge, and in an eyeblink, a vast and terrifying beam of roaring darkness tears through the space just by her, like the narrow miss of an onrushing train. Dust, grass, debris, her hair and dress, swirling around and past her. You see her laughing, but can't hear it, because the droning roar of a burning star fills your ears until it feels like they'll burst.
Lilian Rook     One moment, the interior of the castle is buzzing with frantic activity. The fastest villagers are already scrambling over one another to vanish through the portal, escaping in ones and twos, sometimes carrying crying children. Ru Li is wheeling down from his perch. Ivy grabs hold of him, and leaps for cover.

    The next, everything feels like gut-inverting free-fall, and terrible molten heat blooms through the floor and spatters the ceiling with melted stone. The gigantic ray extruded from the black hole punches right through the tower's side. The nearest trees turn to ash. The next row catch fire on the spot.

    Still laughing, inaudibly against the sound, Queen Liliana gestures with the exuberant flourish of a conductor's baton, and the shearing beam of darkness pivots with it like her baton. A flick of the wrist slices across most of the castle's lower floor. An ecstatic flick back carves back across it, the crisscross intersection melting through all the middle floors. To and fro, the Queen dissects the structure; the proud result of the heroes' blood and sweat, with the terrifying gravity of--

    It wasn't the 'starting village' that was meant to be set to the torch. It was meant to be the heroes' retreat all along. The village belongs to the Queen. Her trophy, project, plaything. She doesn't break her own things so easily. To deny the heroes safety; deprive them of rest, primacy, and lower them back to earth, is what serves as the punctuation mark of act one.

    There's just enough time to evacuate whoever is there. The townsfolk still stuck outside flee screaming from the collapse, some coughing and stumbling away from the burning trees. The portal, pride and joy of the Warprunners and the main hope of evacuating the kingdom, is crushed beneath melted slag. In the instants before total collapse, Ru Li and Ivy both find their vision smothered in darkness for just a moment, and become separated.

    With a dismissive swipe of her hand, the Queen disperses the raging torrent of death, the world suddenly snap-tilts back to level, and now, in the tinnitus aftermath, her maniacal laughter comes into focus.

    "Is that it?! Is that really it?! Ahahaha Oh my goodness!" Queen Lilian cackles at the top of her lungs. Her eyes glint with picture perfect ecstatic mania. "What are you even supposed to be?! Can't you decide amongst yourselves? Oh the Party of Heroes before you was far, far more impressive! Ahh . . . Oh it was so much fun to take them apart! I even had to deal with the last of them myself~! But you . . . oh you poor darlings . . . You don't stand a chance~!" It comes out with the deeply unwholesome glee of waiting with delighted anticipation to see someone spectacularly fail. Her breathing is heavy by the end.
Lilian Rook     'Your idea of a utopia, even with *magic*, isn't able to *work* for everyone, so all you're doing it forcing them to be miserable and quiet for your sake!'

    "Oh you miserable little girl . . . You don't understand anything at all~" The Queen croons, cheek smushed into her hand. "They'll come to appreciate it in time~ Or else I'll simply force them to be happy~! Isn't that nice~? Isn't that so magnanimous of me?! Happiness is something that comes to nearly no one at all, and I'm giving it away!"

    'If they can't be taught-- you're supposed to let 'em go!'

    "Perhaps you're right~!" Lilian says to Princess. The manic relief of unbridled destruction still poisons her theatrical tone with beautifully unhinged passion for the topic. "If any more of my subjects decide to desert their posts, I don't need them!! Yes, yes, if they give up on fitting in, then I'll just kill them before they get away~! Ahahahaha!!"

    God knows how many hours she spent in a dressing room rehearsing that laugh. Hopefully a lot. Instead of boomingly maniacal, it's the more difficult variant of giddily malicious. Her gaze slides ackowledgingly to Sougo, filled with unwholesome light. "Take them? No, no no darling, you don't take anything. Nothing, not even light will escape when I've completed my utopia. If you want to have them, then you can become them~!"

    The general is standing back up again, pacing menacingly back towards the heroes that had piled on heavily enough to drive them back. The witch is dispelling the wind wall with her own magic. On the ground, the surviving 'guardsmen' are reorganizing while the townspeople look on in hopeless awe and despair. The woman still recovering from Petra being a freak clings to Odette, and says "Take me with you. Anywhere else. I'll explain. I . . . I think I can help you. I know things." Her gaze is unsettling, with one eye still tainted like that.

    Yet, while the opening act culminates in villainous terror, Powerpuff and Rowdyruff are free to operate with near-total impunity. Private armories in security posts and disused offices are found and destroyed. Magic is partially only found squirreled away in people's cellars; a local resistance? There are signs of a powerful circle somewhere in the church, but more than simply condemned, a powerful exclusionary ward surrounds it, deflecting the faithful (and heroes) from uttering prayers (and examining the source). Certain shops; carpenters, smiths, apothecaries; seem to be set up to produce components that are then inevitably tithed and funneled off to the castle; it's their prerogative whether to torch the family businesses.
Rowdyruff Boys     >> Hey.
    >> We going with your flavor or my flavor of resource denial?

Brick texts Blossom, while assessing several ripe targets. This is a very, very simple question: Am I allowed to be a a bit of a bastard right now, or are we doing things with the obligatory dosage of 'nice' in it?
Lilian Rook     Not moments later, a shadow near the carriage writhes, and from a column of dark smoke, a dark-cowled figure emerges-- and throws Ru Li onto the grass in front of the Queen. Kneeling reverently, head bowed, the figure stands by in silence as Queen Liliana bends down to him, grips him delicately around one arm, and pulls him all the way up to his feet with a degree of the strength that Lilian Rook has.

    "Oh my, and to think you were hiding this pretty face from me!" she gasps in scandalous shock. "And he's wounded-- oh you villains! Putting this delicate work of art to the grindstone even in his condition! For shame!" Leaning in closely, deeply violating Ru Li's personal bubble, Queen Liliana tilts back his chin with a finger into a mockery of defiant juxtaposition, leaning well over him despite him being technically taller on his feet, and briefly seems to filter out the entire world as she locks eyes with him.

    The way she licks her lips seems . . . a little too convincing.

    "He'll be a beautiful addition to my garden. To think his talents were wasted on organizing you when he could be managing the prosperity of my kingdom! Oh how the people will love that noble face . . . They'll go along with anything he says~"

    Looking slyly to the gathered Elites, she wears an unwholesome grin that shows all the dangerous teeth. "Well well~ I'm in a good mood now~ Perhaps I'll even call off my meeting with the mayor and take the rest of the day off? Hmmm~"

    "Those of you who have a good head on your shoulders, stay a while~ Enjoy the town~ Rest your weary legs and see the sights! And for the rest of you . . ." She has to hide her wicked smile behind the swift touch of fingertips to her mouth, still grinning evilly around it. "Tryouts for the role of Black Knight are on at the castle! Ahahaha~!!"
@emit
    Exhaling something heady and pleasant, she turns to her underlings next. Exposing her back to the heroes.

    "Spymaster Aria, see this one back to Seneschal Marcus for orientation. General Satsui, rally your forces and comb the forest for renegades. Guide back any lost sheep before they're picked off by the neighbours. You-- inform Knight Captain Caecilia that we'll be having guests. Tell her that Guardian Dilann may have the first round, if it please them. I'm retiring for the day. Have my usuals ready in my chambers."

    "Of course, my lady." "Without mercy."
Aidan Proudpick Scoriations rip through the ground, crackling with energy that ripples through the ground, glassing everything, blowing up dirt. Aidan is already moving, rolling backwards, tail pulled out of the way. When he pops back up, his world becomes white. The explosion ripples up against him, pushing him up and back with the blast. He hits the ground in a heap, but keeps scrambling. He wasn't in the town fight. He's fresh. His feet get under him quickly. Showing more fur than usual in his armor means having it seared away by the explosion, raw red underneath of second degree burns.

The Black Knight comes in from Aidan's right, a sword already soaring down towards him. Aidan flicks his shield up and down, grunting as he puts all of his body weight into the parry. The sword narrowly misses his shoulder.

THen the world becomes DARK. His eyes feel like they could explode out of his head, several vessels bursting within them. His ears ring, pressure building until blood pours out of them.

I'll just kill them before they get away~!

Another swing of his shield, pushing the sword away from him as Aidan breaks free of the witch and knight. And he rushes in. He needs to be a distraction. He needs to keep her from firing that thing. There are no other thoughts in Aidan's mind. He will pave the way for everyone else. He rushes through the melee, gathering up wind behind his shields for the most powerful blows he can deliver.

One foot on the ground. His lungs fill with air for a wind powered shout. 'I CHALLENGE YOU TO A DUEL!' suddenly fills Aidan's mind. It'll be the only way to distract her from another blast.

The shadow appears and dumps Ru Li on the floor. Aidan twists his body around, slamming his foot down to break his momentum, teetering suddenly. Adrenaline rings through his entire body as he sways through several stagger steps.

Enjoy the town~

Another stagger back. "A-ah."
Ru Li Cheng      Ru Li is falling through the portal-

     -and then he's on the grass, landing with a thump, his head spinning. As he tries to grab onto his own senses, he suddenly feels a finger under his chin, lifting his head up-

     Ah.

     Well.

     He's here, isn't he? He's on the front lines. He's right where he wanted to be. He must've had something to say. He must've had something to say for the script, for the grand game, for-

     -all he can do is stare at her as she licks her lips. As he tastes the lipstick from afar. As he tastes her tongue along her lips, as her perfume filters his senses.

     "I...I will do no such-"

     He tries to stand, with all his might. His legs grind, the screaming, tearing of gears against each other, of misaligned springs and struggling bones, as she holds her finger under his chin. He pulls himself up-

     -and immediately stumbles and falls to be picked up by Aria.

     Damn and blast.

     On the other hand, he allows himself a smile for the brief instant his face is against the grass. It's sort of funny, but in his own way, he's getting to help out, isn't he?
Powerpuff Girls SIDE RED,

"This whole exercise is a little much." Blossom states at a conversational tone. There's only a few people possible that could hear her - the administrator (Lilian(a)), potentially, the Rowdies and Ru Li, certainly enough - but she speaks anyway, lifting phone camera to take a picture of neatly stacked resistance gear underneath a bakery. A flick of the thumb takes a phone shot, and the orange-haired superwoman dips her phone away to move on to the next site.

A blur of ruby speed, and her Mary Janes set down in a second story inn room, overlooking a small fantasy chest cutely apportioned in every way. Framed in bronze that shines with polish and wood that shows fresh lacquer, the regal chest rested invitingly unlocked.

Blossom takes a moment before lifting her phone, X-Raying the chest with a hot flash in her bright-ringed eyes, and then turns to sweep the world-peeling gaze towards the yawning singularity through wall and window. "It's not just a threat... it's a *weapon*." She realizes, and switches to messenger app with an impatient super-swipe of her thumb.

It doesn't make the phone process faster. It just makes Blossom feel, incrementally better.

    >> Mine.

    >> Zip what you can back to the caves.

Blossom listens in, turning her ear towards the diction of Queen Liliana and her retuine of Evil, proudly laughing and declaring her intent - and the capture of Ru Li from the castle.

    >> We might be the new resistance.

When the Powerpuff disappears, the chest in the Inn room disappears too in a ruby ribbon of once-presence still drawn across hotly. She might have to fill in for the 'leader' also, if the honorary Powerpuff for the day didn't pull through.
Odette Raskins Things don't sound nor look like they're going particularly well behind her. Although Odette's focus is primarily on trying to usher all the frightened townspeople out of harm's way, she still has ears, and the wholesale rebukes of so many appeals to diplomacy...

In some distant part of her mind, it's actually kind of refreshing. Odette's far too used to hearing veiled nothings meant to keep people like her unaware at home, so something like this with obvious supervillainy reminds her of simpler times just a few years ago when the only evil she knew of came from her stories rather than her reality.

"You stand before the Exalted Lady of the Empyreal Void! So, know, your, PLACE!!"

Even though Odette can't see great knight speaking at that moment with her back turned, she can hear them easily enough. It's still just as terrifying to hear them that way, just knowing that the Queen would have such a devoted knight under her banner.

When gravity changes again, Odette's still unprepared for it, but she's not caught off guard nearly as much as the first time. She holds her hands out to her sides, both to help balance herself under that sudden shift, and to offer support to anyone (townsperson, Elite, or otherwise) that might need a little help moving away from the battlefield. HEr hands as clammy as hell, though, as if her own fidgeting and rapid breathing isn't already a sign of how nervous she actually is under these circumstances.

In her haste to actually get people out of the town, however, Odette doesn't actually see what Queen Liliana does until the singularity is already sweeping a destructive path through the town. One moment, Odette is pushing an elderly couple and a child through a portal. The next second, she feels like she's back in space, ejected out of an airlock without a suit, desperately gasping for air from the oxygen tank she doesn't have on, screaming in naked terror and clutching at her throat while...

Wait. This isn't that nightmare again. She can breathe. Air is still there. She's sweating, but it's not cold. She feels the ground hitting her back once that free-fall abruptly stops, and she looks around rapidly to confirm that she's still on the planet instead of out among the stars. Odette's still hyperventilating a little as she pushes herself back up, keeping one hand on an injector inside her bag as she turns to see the destruction wrought by the Queen's singularity.

This time, the EMT can't really get any proper words out, and she resorts to just directing and beckoning the townspeople with high waves of her hands, pointing at the exits and the portals, sidestepping around a crush of people to pull up others that might have fallen or slowed their pace just to make sure nobody gets left behind.

Everything after that is something of a haze in Odette's mind. Move people, treat them with the bare minimum of conscious thought to make sure they can keep moving without getting in the way, move more people. It's not until the woman that encountered Petra reaches her that Odette finally snaps back to reality, flinching briefly as she realizes someone's holding onto her.

"H-huh? Oh. Um... Okay! Where do you..." Odette trails off, at first because she's still going through the motions with her handheld wound analyzer to see if this lady's okay, and then from noticing that odd glow in her eye. One hand goes up to her radio, but...

This could be a lead, and that last guy... He didn't really do anything to her, did he? Maybe this lady's even more on the level, or maybe she's able to fight off whatever this effect is. Worst case scenario, she could still be a useful source of information later. Even that's better than causing a scene by trying to incapacitate her now.

"Do you know any good spots here? I-it'll probably be better if we're not.. Um." She glances back towards where she had last seen and heard Queen Liliana laughing that bone-chilling and heart-pounding laugh, then back at the woman. "... S-somewhere she might be able to hear us."
Kale Hearthward > ". . . If you would hear the truth . . . Then stand there and watch. You will be unable to hear if I remove your squawking head from your shoulders."

"... I understand. If the time for talking is over-"

Kale moves. He draws. He joins the fight, finally, trying to give the others a bit more space. "Then I'll make you wish you'd heard me squawk for even a second longer!"

> "If any more of my subjects decide to desert their posts, I don't need them!! Yes, yes, if they give up on fitting in, then I'll just kill them before they get away~! Ahahahaha!!"

"No...!"

He grips his sword. "If - if that's how you're going to treat them, to push them around and discard them if they don't fit, then - you don't deserve them!"

He's properly incensed. The heroic VFX change. His cape is no longer flapping, but the wind is pushed through the trees and gaps in the stone work, creating the abrasive whistling that dramatically precedes the foreshadowed tornado showing up on screen.

"Leaders should - should help their people! Put them first! Sacrifice *for* them! See to their well-being above all else! Not - not treat them as playthings!"

"You're no Queen, after all!"

Behind him, the castle is being destroyed. In front of him...

... In front of him, unexpectedly, Ru Li is pulled out of a shadow.

"No!"

Can he get to them in time? Can he break through the minions, before Liliana carts him away to-

- to-

Visions of *what* Lilian might be planning to do to Ru Li flit through his head.

        The room fills up with steam as the ninety-ninth god overheats. "My... my queen. I can take no more of this. It is too much... once was enough, twice is barely within my limits, but three times....!"
        "And I say," says the Queen of the Hungering Star. "That toys are meant to be played with. Not once, not twice, not even thrice, but as many times as their owner desires. And a toy that can't be played with anymore... is broken. Now, my divine toy..."
        "Do we need to place you back in the toybox till you behave, or are you ready to fill out those requisition forms, properly... in triplicate?"

...

Kale suddenly realizes he hasn't moved or spoken for the last few moments. "... You won't take... him!" he says as he runs forward, desperately wishing he can get there in time to save Ru Li, and also desperately wishing he had a pen and a notepad.
Sarracenia      Sarra's concerns over whether this simulation is too real just grown as the woman they saved from the armor responds like that. Could they really have found actors this dedicated in such larger numbers? Are they all just being paid to be mind-controlled or something? She really needs to ask that woman some more questions but...there's a battle going on!

     Even in the midst of the clash, Sarra imagines in her mind that epic CGI moment. It must look amazing! A proper clash between a hero and an evil knight! In her mind if not so much in reality, her hair and dress flutter back from the clash point. She tries to keep the knight's weapon in the bind. The longer she can hold him or her back the more likely it is that the Queen can be handled by Cinder or Petra...except Petra is defending her girlfriend. While understandable on multiple levels (Sarra probably would not leave her non-existent SO in Petra's hands either), it is a chance that could have been taken.

     The speech about the hungering star draws Sarra's attention. It sounds very much like what Lilian said she liked about the idea of being a black hole. And in proper spoiled narcissistic action she exclaims, "Is this whole thing based on what we said that day?!"

     The princess (not the Powerpuff one) is repelled a moment later thanks to gravity shifts and magical anime speed. She stumbles back, bringing her hammer up to try and block that dramatic down swing...then time practically freezes a moment as all those cuts are unleashed. Sarra is blasted backward and goes rolling, slashes visible in most of the places the sword was swung.

     She manages to get her feet under her as she rolls, and ends up in a similar position as the knight. A three point stance, hammer planted to arrest her momentum. "...they would not have let Ceri into this, right...?" she says aloud. Now panting from pain and wishing she was more durable, Sarra stands up fully again and prepares to go back in. "I know my place! It is between you and your terrible queen and the people she seeks to bend to her will while pretending she cares about them!"

     'He'll be a beautiful addition to my garden...'

     Sarra blinks in surprise and looks to see...Ru Li?! And...he's being taken?! "What the-..." This is just too much. "LILIAN!! You better not be kidnapping /SOMEONE OTHER THAN ME/!!" She cannot keep up the charade of Liliana for that one. She growls hotly after. "Of course you are...OF COURSE YOU ARE!" Although it makes perfect sense that Ru Li is the captured one - he is the most injured and a commander as well as overwatch - being the princess who /wants/ to be kidnapped and almost never is means this has to be a purposeful choice just to needle Sarra.

     In full on rage mode now, Sarra activates her hammer. That prismatic sparkling aura flows over her, and she charges right at the Queen of the Hungering Star with her hammer swinging hard enough to produce shockwaves. "YOU WILL NOT TAKE HIM!! I AM THE ONE WHO SHOULD BE GETTING KIDNAPPED!!"
Timespace Riders Your naïvety is appalling.

    The Demon King's smile is hidden by his helmet and illuminated by the soft glow of his HUD.

    That's good! Great, even. if I stay quiet for long enough, maybe she'll even think I'm off my guard.

Take them? I wonder if you're even worth our Mistress' time to play with.

    Woz chuckles haughtily, not to be outdone by a rival subheather. "I applaud you for your devotion to your Queen, if nothing else."

    Zi-O lifts an armored hand. "Be nice, Woz. We're guests here!" It's almost like he's very well used to hearing Woz's backhanded compliments by now!

     Woz falls silent, though his helmet is still locked on the witch.

Take them? No, no no darling, you don't take anything. Nothing, not even light will escape when I've completed my utopia. If you want to have them, then you can become them~!

     "Hmmm..." Zi-O's free hand lifts up, fingers stroking the chin of his helmet. "I'm kind of working on my own, is the thing..."

Tryouts for the role of Black Knight are on at the castle! Ahahaha~!!

     "Now *that* I can get behind! We'll be there," says Zi-O with a bright nod. And the other me will be in the woods, slowing that general down. The Demon King gives a thumbs up.
Rowdyruff Boys     >> Got it.

Brick didn't hesitate to torch the things that were obvious 'combatant targets', but the ingredients being built up and tithed were evidently going to need an alternate approach. He put away his phone, and considered it. Blossom is correct-- stealing the materials is for the best if they're important to some ongoing... something. The only problem he has with it is that it immediately tips their hand once it's noticed, and it will be once their other surgical strikes are discovered.

SKRRRR!

He'll have to come back to the obvious occult thing going on with the Church. It's something that looks like it's being contained, and it's necessary to follow up on it, but he just isn't going to have the time before the ongoing focus has the chance to be adjusted. Even now, Brick can hear orders being issued. Which is why, between heartbeats, he simply steals the critical components from the carpenters, smiths, and apothecaries that are going into their tithes. It gets amassed steadily in the cave, until there's several neat piles of trade goods that Brick has no idea what to do with.

    >> Hey.
    >> This might be short-term more kind, but...
    >> I'm not sure how much slack she'll extend them for getting robbed, either. We probably need to identify and get those people out of town.
    >> The alternative is that they're VIPs because they can make these components, whatever they add up to, and we need to get rid of them anyway.

... And as he touches down on the last bit of cargo, Brick takes stock of their people.

Ru Li -- compromised.
Sarracenia -- trying to be compromised.
Petra -- would like to be compromised.

>> Gonna cycle frequencies. You know where to find me if it doesn't work out.
Ivy Carrow     Ivy's grip on Ru Li's hand slipped, as they passed through the portal; the terrible roar drowned out sound and sight and sensation. It was possible that she'd screamed, but she couldn't even hear her own voice. The world became a swirl of pinwheel and motion and then--

    --THUNK--

    --darkness.

        Nina shuddered, carried away by Boomer in a streak of blue that cut across the dissolving castle before it disentegrated around them.

    She staggered to her feet, once she was sat down, and stood, unsteadily, to look on their safehouse's ruins. Where had, just a few moments ago, been a great, fortified gothic fotress built into the side of the mountain was just...Burning slag, and fire. These were no enchanted stones, no glamour of belief to dissolve on shattering. It was real, and the scorched debris of it lay scattered about the mountainside, almost as though it had been smashed by a meteor.

    The sound she made was something choked and desperate, on the edge of a wailing. "H-how is this a...a...SIMULATION?!" She clawed across her face, falling to her knees. "How is this FAKE?! I can't...I CAN'T..." Her head fell. Her shoulders shook. She punched the ground once, twice, thrice...again and again and again, until she was up to her knuckle in mud.

    Dappled light fell across her eyes. She raised a hand up into the air, as though to grasp it, momentarily lost.

    "Don't get up," a voice warned, and suddenly Ivy remembered.

    "Ru Li--" She tried to push up, only to find Luz standing over her, pushing her back down onto a bed of leaves.

    "Don't get up," Luz repeated. "You have a concussion...I need time to heal it." She trailed off. "He's gone, Captain. They took him."

    "Haha..." For once, her laugh came out battered down, lost. "She got us good, didn't she...? I didn't expect that..."

    In silence, under the twilight night of the dark star, Luz wrapped Mia's head, coaxing the blood into coagulating with a murmur. "So, we've lost." She said, grimly. "It's over."

    "Oh no, Luz..." Ivy grinned, wide and manic, a bead of blood still dripping down from her temple. "We've just started!"
Angela Cinder is enjoying Petra's hero-talk even if she's struggling because, well, understandable reasons really. She's so brave and strong, Cinder thinks. It's so fucking cool that she gets to know her. Oh it isn't exactly how she expected things to go but she feels so fortunate to have Petra in her life. She just...

...Feels so much more alive herself with Petra there. It's weird to say it like that but she thinks--she wasn't realy alive until she met Petra. And now? Even if it's just for a simulation they are fighting together and--

''Don't fucking touch my girlfriend!''

Maybe Petra wouldn't ever normally say it, but it's nice to hear. A big red flush hits her face until it looks like Cinder's overheating. And she kind of is. Ash drifts off her EGO armor as Cinder's bond with it itensifies in its strange symbiosis.

Of course, Cinder doesn't expect to defeat Lilian Rook('s OC Do Not Steel) in battle but something's tickling the back of her mind.

''He'll be a beautiful addition to my garden. To think his talents...''

" Ru Li?" She asks, genuinely surprised but mostly because she expected she'd kidnap someone else (her girlfriend).

She collides into a Black Knight's arm. Fuck-- Cinder thinks, because that was really her one chance here. She crashes backward and--

--Liliana has her finger pointed right at her forehead, magic dancing at her fingertips. She braces her body, instinctively leaning back--too slow.

But the blast doesn't come immediately. The 'villain' taunts first.

243,''Your face isn't bad at all'')

"Oh, um, thanks. I like your--" Cinder forgets heroism for the moment. "Wa-waitwaitwait we're on opposite sides here--"

A roaring beam of darkness rushes past Cinder. She's close enough to Liliana herself that she feels that rush of power herself--indeed, it's enough to lift Cinder off of the ground and send her tumbling across the stones of the town. A direct hit would've certainly evaporated the Agent. This is some considerable distance even if it's going to leave Cinder pretty bruised since she can't quite control her falls quite the way she'd like to.

"Ogh..." Cinder manages. "Maybe...maybe we can't win today but..."

She looks towards Liliana, pushing herself back up shakily. "...For all your talk...of eternity...you can't freeze time, can you...? Otherwise I wouldn't...even be able to speak."

It might be a little off to say because of the way that this character isn't actually meant to be presumed to be having Lilian's powers--but it's way of Cinder communicating it before she attempts to hobble off and find a hideaway to throw herself in so she can recover.
Rowdyruff Boys Boomer sets down with Nina and... doesn't go anywhere. He crouches down beside her, reaches into a hoodie pocket, and produces a bottled water that he offers to her. "Pretty scary, huh? But you know, a good haunted house has gotta be able to spook you. If it can't, what's the point, even?" Patting himself down, he produces a whole ass Snickers from another pocket. It is a bit squashed and melty, but he offers that to her as well. "I know you're not scared as a part of the 'act', and that's okay. If you want to leave, I can zippity-zap you right over to the entry warp gates and you can be done. Until then you say that or decide to do something else, I'll stick around, okay?"

And he does just as he says, hovering nearby until asked for an out or very firmly informed that one will not be necessary.
Powerpuff Girls SIDE YELLOW

Going through her life with her arm out and her nose up had been a default for Princess Morbucks her whole life, but from one bright point at a very early age that expanded only very slightly for nearly a decade after. Everyone and everything else could be bought or crushed with the power of Money. Her Daddy's money eventually became her money, a cudgel she owned with inherited force bought with the finest armories and opportunities.

A member of the elite, and her peers were...

Princess's Power Crown visor easily contains - and displays - her widening-eyed shock when the elbow fails to do more than cartoon ker-SMACK into the knight. The crosshairs that dot the dark spots of her eyes, and the augmentation washes that shine like a red light over mundane human 'blacks'.

With her visor on, Princess' eyes pop like a Powerpuff's too, wide and wild just like the emerald goth with something that didn't crumple under her first brush of force. From behind posed-out palmblasters the twin kinetic cones narrow and burn against the flared out cape, forcing, shoving, blaring down and washing around the black-armored general's crescent of safety in backscatter. The general cooks, though, smoking from their visor, and in the dimmed aftermath from overwhelming pink and flowing-dot power, so does Princess, the hot emitter crystals embedded in the palms of the gloves like smoking muzzles that continue to issue hot smoke for several seconds.

"You didn't fall down." The gold-and-black super breathes out, as the wings of HUD displays across her cheek. Emitter heat gauges roll down from offlined to recycled with a pianoing of the ring's marks, and the harsh lights cast against Princess' cheeks fades to ready yellows and greens and status blues. Red recedes to outlines--

And then fills her eyes, a live recital of !!! visor-visually realized dangersense displaying a proximal threat not too far over the city. Heat and fire and death. Crouching, at first to brace, in the next instant princess disappears in a VRROOoosh! of jetwash that sends her into the hot angle-path of black hole hurtled beam. Hornet yellow against the shades of solar-molten devastation, the surge of her technological blue flame is engulfed and swallowed up by the grander cosmic surge of complete annihilation.

> 'I'll just kill them before they get away~!'

It's a killer line. Literally and figuratively, if Princess were grading it from the sidelines she'd be in absolute awe of the Dame Commander's starry first performance, the implied lore, the theatrical display, and the personality that clearly was one of the greats of all time. Perhaps a royal roader towards the best that ever was.

None of this is said, because Princess Morbucks is not off-screen clapping at a screen, or side-lined and hatering from a chair. Instead, weaving between molten coronafall, is a great molten meteor that splits into a multitude of smaller flames arrayed around a central ball of hot plasma and gold armor.

Emerging from the wreath of flame to sweep a hot wall of plasma between pursuers and Kale's >>two minute hornily delayed heroism<<, Morbucks' armor has picked up a molten-gold set of shoulderplates, arm glove and bootlets, skirting, and other 'over-armor' accessories burning away with captured solar energy. She cooks worse than the black general, but has hot lines despite.
Powerpuff Girls "Sorry - if this were any other day, I'd let this one pass." She tries to sound cool, despite having run to the limit to scrape together what power was normally delivered by dedicated orbital device. "But today --" Proudly jamming an over-armored fist to her chest, she thumbs at herself. "I'm a Powerpuff Girl!" That same finger points up, thumb traded for proud index. "Even if you destroy the sun -- you won't stop me from using Satellite Power!"

And an accusatory point. "And even if you make a lot of great points, you can't convince me to break California labor law! Nice try, lady!" Like a smug hero who caught the moral of the story. A cherry, on top. A ribbon bow, placed with love.

"But it's an 'at-will' state." She onelines, the 'falling flames' resolving into false copies of Morbucks in cut-down armor, heatmirage duplicates generated by plasma control that nevertheless allow the Townsvillain-turned-Honorary-Puff to fight against all the girls on Even Footing...

Or maybe, just maybe, bail Kale and Sarracenia out from chasing after Those Captured By The Event Horizon of Horniness.

The copies dive and strafe the general and the witch with plasma-heat blasters and powerful kicks, Princess herself doing a straight lunge-charge towards the gloating Liliana that winds up unto an utterly telegraphed, full-speed straight Powerpuff Punch. Can the Queen post through a punch?

Well, you've gotta set a bar some-how. Isn't using last season's superarmor how?