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Angela	A FEW DAYS BEFORE HOKMA'S MELTDOWN Angela had asked Petra to make some secret modifications to the facility. Nothing major or too far out of her way. She simply wanted Petra to disable the system that 'knocked' Angela out during Meltdowns. Angela was quite open with her that it would ensure she could enact her plan to escape. Angela doesn't have many more reasons to play the nice girl anymore, the perfect secretary and cards are being placed upon the table. The process to disable the system largely involved going to a room in Architecture that Petra had been to before--the very same room that Petra had taken Angela to before so that Benjamin could repair her after her misadventure with Stanley nearly killed her. There are Agents down there now, though Petra hasn't seen them before--suggesting they were brought out from cryostasis to handle the work in Architecture. They all have various Aleph-grade EGO Gear and are doing normal Abnormality work with the Abnormalities stationed there, ones that Petra hasn't been sent to work on before including a strange Plague Doctor with six wings spread out behind them, a girl with seaweed hair and a dress of an upturned anchor, a strange airlock-style door within a cell, a kind looking mermaid holding a pure white flower, and a young man with pointed ears sipping at a wineglass filled with a familiar red liquid. The room Angela was created in, and repaired in, still has an empty pod in the center of the room--pipes and cables connecting to it directly from the wall, long since dry, but with dried spots of fallen enkephalin residue suggesting what went into it. Underneath the pod is a pipe sticking directly into the ground. Unclear how much further down it goes. There's some boxes with switches to flip, buttons to push, and numerous vents puking purified air into the room. The box with the switches has ten switches. Eight of them are flipped up, the last two are flipped down. Angela asked Petra to flip those last two switches early. Considering the number of Sephirah, what they represent is obvious.
Angela	ONE HOUR AFTER HOKMA'S MELTDOWN BEGAN. Angela gives a call that a Meltdown is happening and she has 'turned off' Hokma to allow everyone an opportunity to arrive to help out. It has been a while since Angela COULD do this for everyone so it's a bit nostalgic for the AI. Of course, there is still one different element about the situation. "I can provide two warnings about this particular Meltdown. While we have never reached 'Hokma' before, I still do know him very well. The first warning is this--Benjamin controls the T2 Protocol. He cannot just immediately return us to the beginning, but if we fail to defeat him--he will likely have us start over. ... But he will have the ability to manipulate time within this space regardless, though I cannot say exactly how he will make use of this." "The second warning is that Eiji Hino, retainer to Oda Nobunaga--a rival to Demon King Sougo--broke into the facility to provide Hokma with some form of Kamen Rider Timepiece which he used to transform into 'Kamen Rider Den-O', whatever that means. I was still able to shut him down to summon all of you but it seems his intent is to go back in time and no doubt alter the fate of this facility in ways that could be ... problematic. We have tried to remove the buckle before calling for you, but it seems that his Captain--Tennant--has decided to help him by taking potshots at whomever approaches but that is alright, it is ultimately helpful to ensure the Meltdown proceeds appropriately." Angela lets that news hang for a few seconds before bringing her hands behind her back and turning around to face one of the many monitors in her office. "...But once his Meltdown begins, I suspect there will be few opportunities to rest until the end, so if I may--I would like to offer something up for all of you who have helped us in this time. My sincerest gratitude, even to those I do not strictly get along with--you still elected to help and I will not forget." Angela turns to face one of the many screens in her office. "There are many Rivers that traverse this world but there is one River grander than all the others from which even its tributaries become legend. From that River, the Originators of Lobotomy Corp discovered the fluid they would develop Cogito from. There was not enough for the Seed of Light project, so ultimately we had to find a more sustainable way to produce Cogito. Our first attempt was Enoch--the one who ultimately became Tiphereth B but ultimately the role fell to Carmen." Angela says. "There are some who brave the Outskirts and Ruins in the world in search of such water or for stars to wish upon to change this world but... I suppose that is not very much like me. Thank you for showing me the world. Once our work is done, we can finally rest. It is a rest you, and we, fought hard for." "...I will now release Hokma." Angela says.
Angela	Unlike before, Angela doesn't shut down and close her eyes. Instead, the Meltdown warning fills the speakers. Unlike with most Meltdowns, there is not an immediate swarm of Abnormalities swarming the facility. Instead, Hokma's voice crackles on the comms. "I understand this is my last shot. I will cut off this tragedy before it can begin. It will be a return to the past that we can all enjoy. But I know well enough where you stand so we will settle it like this." Suddenly the timer for the Hell Train tollbooth ticks rapidly up to four Lights, faster than it ought to. The Hell Train surges up through the facility, rushing towards Angela's office where it will no doubt do plenty of damage to it--and to everyone still within it when the Train bursts through the walls and through the office. Everyone's movements suddenly feel sluggish as time sloooows itself down. T2 PROTOCOL, .5x SPEED: One combat action a round. The train itself will suddenly slow down once it hits Angela's office but Angela seizes Emeralda and the hat--she is wholly unaffected by the T2 Protocol, and walks out of her office at the speed it'll take most people to run through it. Hokma is down in Records. He has taken the form of KAMEN RIDER DEN-O and has summoned a strange pitch black scythe with a green aura around it--an EGO weapon belonging to one of the Abnormalities in the Architecture floor. A clock has been embedded underneath the scythe's blade. So far he is content to wait there and fling the Hell Train at you and devastate anything in the facility in the way. There is a period between Train movements that ought to make it easy to make one's way down to Hokma but... Tennant is roaming the lower floors and taking potshots with Magic Bullet towards anybody making their way down. They seem to be focusing fire towards Elites rather than Agents but they don't seem to be discriminating. BongBong and Sakura, the other two team members of Records, have been tied up and are hanging off the strange grey spires of the Records Department.            __________________________________________________________                      |ARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING W|                      ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯|=|HOKMA CLASS THREAT|=|¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯                                       ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯                                                           The Price Of Silence                                          __________________________________________________________                      |ING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARN|                      ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯           "Ahahaha! Finally! The grand finale is upon us!" Tennant shouts, Magic Bullet in one hand and a black and golden khopesh in the other. "Let's make this the most cinematic ending we can make together! My role will be the mercenary hired to protect the treacherous Sephirah who was once oh-so-loyal! Aaaaaand! Action!"            __________________________________________________________                      |ARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING W|                      ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯|=|MAGIC BULLET AGENT|=|¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯                                       ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯                                                            Smoke War Veteran                                            __________________________________________________________                      |ING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARNING-WARN|                      ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯
Petra Soroka	Like a cat patrolling her territory, Petra has roamed over nearly every hallway and closet in the entire Lobotomy Corporation headquarters. From helping with most Abnormalities in one way or another, to being sent on odd jobs from the Sephirah, to giving a hand repairing enkephalin processing machinery in the dusty service halls and microwaving popcorn in the dorm area convenience stations, Lobotomy Corporation *is* Petra's realm. If a breaching Abnormality blocked off a route with fucked up evil goo, then the clerks and agents could always count on Petra to bust open some boarded up alternate door that no one's been inside since the days where Angela still thought Benjamin was a good father figure.     She can count the number of times she's gone down to Architecture on a single hand. All of them have been related to imminent doom in some way.     Everyone's cagey about everything to do with Architecture, from Angela herself to the Sephirah and even the agents working there, the only ones that Petra wouldn't say she 'knows'. Creeping down there feels like slipping through security in a government building where you *know* they're hiding aliens or lizard people or something, even when it's still Petra's own job to do. So when she's fulfilling Angela's request, she does it with the most suspicion towards her fellow agents as possible: taking the elevator service shaft in case the elevator is monitored, in the middle of the night, shutting off the cameras with morphmetal droplets and pulses of electromagnetic interference.     The closer everything gets, the more it feels like Petra needs to be wary towards everyone she's been working alongside. Maybe if X or Hokma learned she was doing this for Angela, it'd count as a deviation from the Script, and everything would be reset. Maybe there's cameras, or maybe there's agents who've figured out what's coming next and feel like it's better to throw their lot in with the Script by tattling to Ayin, or there's some other hidden trap waiting to fucking ruin everything minutes before the finish line.     With a little help from her stolen Manual copy and cybersynaptic communication across the Silver, Petra fixes the facility settings to keep Angela conscious. There's a lot of things to stress about, but hopefully this isn't going to be one of them. THE DAY OF THE MELTDOWN "The first warning is this--Benjamin controls the T2 Protocol."     Petra rubs her forehead, exhausted already. She's wearing her EGO gear, as appropriate, with Fourth Match Flame on her back, sleeves and fingernails stained with dried blood that's only clumsily wiped off since working with Bloodbath earler.     "I wish we could've, like... just broken the TT2 stuff. It's not like we *need* it at this point. We're never going to need to reset to the beginning. There's literally no point to that annoying fucking machine besides giving Hokma leverage over us. Ugh." "The second warning is that Eiji Hino, retainer to Oda Nobunaga--a rival to Demon King Sougo--broke into the facility to provide Hokma with some form of Kamen Rider Timepiece which he used to transform into 'Kamen Rider Den-O', whatever that means."     This isn't news to Petra-- it *was*, about fifty minutes ago-- but now that the Elites are here she feels like she has to gripe about it. "God. I don't think old guys should do that sort of thing. That loser should be in a wheelchair, not a fucking power suit."     More relevantly, Petra crosses her arms and looks sideways at Sougo. "Do you know anything else about that all?"
Petra Soroka	"Once our work is done, we can finally rest."     After an uncomfortable pause where Petra reflects on the magnitude of work that she'll be doing in the next while-- something she's known about for a long time, but 'determination' makes something seem like it's forever away-- she sighs and lifts her eyes up to Angela's. They haven't exactly had any other opportunities to test Petra's handiwork, but she's pretty confident that Angela won't just collapse.     "... Love you, Ange. Not much time left."     Petra looks around at the other Elites, in the short time before the Meltdown begins. It's strange to feel like, for once, the amount of trust she feels like she can have in even the non-Lilian ones outweighs how much she feels like she can't.     "Alright. So, he's gonna be fucking with time, and I'm not really sure how-- *selective* he can be with that. So starting off, we should probably assume that it's as bad as possible, like, that he can make us go Angela-mode-- sorry Ange-- while he moves perfectly fine, and if he dumps out any Abnos like they always do, then that they'll be able to move fine too."     "... Or he'll be able to like, time loop us. But I don't know what to do about that. But anyways--" Petra points at Kukuru with a slightly brown-crusted pinky. "Instant travel's good. Make sure you're paying attention to the radio, and everyone should keep in mind that they should rely on you whenever they can."     Petra closes her eyes and tries to think further ahead. "... Is he Kamen Rider size, or fucked-up-Meltdown-tentacle-thing size? I think he's small," Petra looks at Angela for confirmation. "So maybe it's possible to slow him down in return too. Infinite time can't help him at all if he can't do anything with it." There's probably no reason that Petra's thought about that.
Riku Asakura	Riku is here when the call goes out, as he said he would be to Angela.  He listens to how something happened to Hokma, not sure what a Den-o is, but from the explanation gets that it's from the greater Multiverse and not an internal thing.  This is quite a complication, and it causes Riku to frown.  He's about to ask a question, but... Suddenly train. Chaos erupts, and time slows down as Riku is forced to try and dive for cover.  He grabs his Fusion Riser and is forced to transform quickly into Ultraman Geed.  The train rolls over him causing sparks to fly across his smaller body as he's thrown against a nearby wall.  It hurts, but he waves off any attempt to aid and stands back on his feet.   Ultraman Geed, not a giant, is forced to push against the train and attempts to grapple it.  His fists come barrelling at the side of the abnormality, attempting to grapple it before he has any clue if that will work or not.  He uses his superhuman strength to try and slow it down, attempting to make it so it won't destroy more of the facility or hurt other agents.   His feet dig into the floor, as he calls out to the others.  "I can handle the train, someone needs to go stop Hokma before he does too much damage to the facility," Geed calls out to the others.  Straining under the effort he's attempting to put in grappling a train like he is.
Rufus Shinra	Rufus arrives promptly. He's been waiting for this. Actually, for once, preparing for this - time spent at the shooting range, making sure his aim and calibration are both at the top. Time spent fine tuning his materia loadout. Making sure he's fully loaded on spare ammo and consumables. Not enough time or opportunities to go grind out some new entries for his Enemy Skill materia, but - well, he'll have plenty of chances here and now. Besides, he has two killer ones in reserve that he hasn't even touched yet. ------------------------ |ATTACK                  | |MAGIC                   | |>Fire                   | |>Ice                    | |>>All                   | |>Lightning              | |ABILITIES               | |>ENEMY SKILL            | |>>Firmament Driver (4/4)| |>>Silent Orchestra (4/4)| |>Gil Toss               | |>Trick Laser            | |ITEMS                   | |LIMIT                   | ------------------------ > "...you still elected to help and I will not forget." Finger-guns. And then it starts. > "I understand this is my last shot. I will cut off this tragedy before it can begin. It will be a return to the past that we can all enjoy. But I know well enough where you stand so we will settle it like this." "That is, by far, the lamest path forward," grouses Rufus. "Making something not happen is like... introducing entropy into the world on purpose. Erasing stories from a book. Setting fire to a work of art. Smashing a statue with a sledgehammer and not videotaping it." "... Does anyone hear a train?" "... Did someone forget to take a train ticket?" There's that moment of doubt - was it Rufus himself? Was he on ticket duty today? No - no, he wasn't. The T2 protocol activates. Rufus goes, slowly, towards the door - and doesn't quite make it in time. Out of desperation, and not having more than a single combat action - he reaches towards the first trump card that comes to mind, slapping his right hand on the yellow marble embedded in his shotgun, and focuses hard... ... before pulling his hand up, extended towards the oncoming train... ... three fingers on his hand curl. Middle, ring, pinky. Thumb at a right hand angle, and index finger pointed straight onward... and with a twist of his hand, in slow motion, he forms his preferred and well-practiced magical casting gesture... A fingergun. *pew* ----------------------------- |Enemy Skill: Firmament Driver| ----------------------------- A massive column of concentrated light forms in the air above Rufus, blasting downwards at an angle towards the train. It is not nearly as powerful as the original he's copying, but - as far as sheer firepower per combat action, it's still hard to match. It's also probably doing as much collateral damage to the facility as the train itself, but - well, you can't fire a giant laser without breaking a few omelettes.
UFO Gang	!! A MELTDOWN IS HAPPENING !! The girls who have been waiting warmly for -- something -- are all, when it begins, in Welfare, and there was a certain amount of milling about panicking before Angela got on the horn and gave them warnings. All of them - Unzan, Ichirin, Minamitsu, Nazrin, and Shou - looked up at the screens. They hear and they watch, and when Angela speaks, several of them draw in a sharp breath -- As Hokma kicks in, at the same time that there's a sudden roar of a train THAT WASN'T THERE PREVIOUSLY rattling through the hallways, Shou speaks first - "Then to Records we shall go." Her staff is raised and thumped decisively on the ground. "All of you--" "Hold on," Nazrin interrupts. All of them look at Nazrin. "We have to split up," she says. "This place is in chaos. Shou, come with me. Ichirin and Minamitsu, you guys take different paths. Unzan," a nod to the cloud "as you was." "..." Unzan nods, cloudily. Shou frowns... but nods once as well. "I'll trust in your plan, Nazrin. Minamitsu, Ichirin... I pray I will see you all again soon." "Definitely!" Ichirin says, with a perfect (if innocent) recreation of the classical Warrior of Light palm-punch. "Gotcha! Last one down there's a rotten egg!" Minamitsu enthuses, before running out the door first. AND SO... ... it's Minamitsu who ends up in the vicinity of Petra, which may be reassuring, if only on the grounds of Minamitsu being able to produce arbitrary quantities of high pressure water through youkai nonsense. Also, she seems reasonable at taking orders. Though, she does answer Petra: "I can't blame him for wanting to get away from a body that's suffering old age, it's just" And then she is hit by a train. The collision throws Minamitsu in a way that suggests she has been instantly killed, tumbling like a ragdoll in the T2-influenced slowed time. But invisibly, she seems to gain control - flitting through the air like a master of kungfu, or at least tumbling graciously while fumbling with her ladle. The key to the aforementioned hydrological activities. Out it comes, swept forwards to send a barrage of high-pressure salt water at the side of the train...! That'll learn it! In about three days when the corrosion really kicks in. Minamitsu, who probably thought almost literally that, looks with some concern towards the others present, in particular Riku, even as a huge ray of light arcs towards the TRAIN FROM HELL.
Hibiki Tachibana	"...Eh? You're telling me he became a Kamen Rider...?"     Somehow, that's the thing that gets Hibiki more than anything else, at least at first. It has, also, been a long while since she's set foot in Lobotomy Corporation. A long while. Partially because of the period between this Meltdown and the last, partially because of being busy in her own right. But she isn't exactly going to not make time for one of these, so close to the end.     Trailing off with that, she's entirely silent as the history of the Rivers, capitalized, and Lobotomy Corporation's Cogito development is gone into. And, perhaps even more importantly, Angela's thanks. But it's the mention of rest afterwards that gets her watching the back of Angela's head, with a mixed expression.     If she was going to say anything on that subject however - or, a question of why Angela isn't shutting down as per usual, it's time.     "...This isn't the first time somebody's tried to fix things like this. I'm sure it won't be the last, either. Hokma..." Between things like Go and Chase's bizarre adventure, experiences with a Guy Who Sucks in her own world, and a few other cases, she's starting to get mixed feelings on it every occurrence. Even so... "You know it can't ever be as simple as that...!"     But by the time she's fishing her pendant out at the sound of incoming train blaring, everything slo w s d o w n. . .     Speaking of Kamen Riders, this feels painfully similar to getting caught in the Roidmudes' Heavy Acceleration field... she has just the barest chance to widen her eyes, focus back in, and - "Balwisyall nescell Gungnir tron--!"     The exact moment she's about to become as much of a smear as anything else in the Express Train's way, slammed into head on with little dulling the blow, golden light bursts around her body and her right fist rears back.     "HaaaaaAAAAAAAAAHHHH--!"     Hibiki punches it head on. At the same time Geed tries to grapple it to a stop and Rufus unleashes his massive laser, she simply goes to slam her knuckles into the front car and try to stop the rest of its momentum in a head-on clash, with enough raw force to reverberate through it and down the remainder of the Abnormality.     This kind of hurts to do, but that's fine. "Ngh... /we'll/ handle it, and be right behind...!" Closing in on Tennant alone will be enough to deal with. Helping (at least temporarily) stop the Express Train from harassing the group on the way down is the best thing she can think of doing with limited time, right this moment.
Kukuru	It's been a while since the last Meltdown, hasn't it? It's never a pleasant thing to go through, but Kukuru's been through enough of them that she's started tuning her focus just so to know what to actually do instead of asking the same questions every time. She knows to listen to commands as directed, and she knows she'll be on recovery and fighting duty as appropriate with her ability to rapidly move between Departments. That means she just needs to keep her ears and horns open, making sure not to cover them up with anything like ear muffs or other cold-weather gear. She arrives at the facility only a few minutes after Angela issues the call to warn everyone, coming in through a swirling cloud of dark energy with her massive metal claws already obscuring her hands.  "If Benjamin's got time stuff... Oh, thaaat could be tricky unless We can hit him with stuff that's suuuper big. Like..." She holds her arms out to her sides, glancing around a bit to make sure not to smack anyone in the head with those claws as she does that. "Waaay too big to move around, right? Is that how that works...?" The second warning draws an actual frown out of Kukuru. "We're gonna have to fight Hokma in a Kamen Rider form? Oh, that could be tricky. They're always so explosive and loud, and hearing orders through all that... Hmmn. I'll just have to reaaaally tune that out, then." She murmurs, stroking her chin lightly and nodding at Petra motioning towards her. "I can move us around real easy, mhm. Dooon't worry, my ears'll be nice and open for this. And..." Another frown, when she hears of Tennant's involvement in all this. "That could be tricky, but... Oh, I can fix up Tennant after if you want me to. That means nobody has to really hold back against them, right?" Angela's words of thanks and Rivers, meanwhile, turns that frown into a slightly quivering smile. "It's really almost done, isn't it? Two more, and then..." Kukuru vibrates in place lightly as she starts getting excited about Angela's impending freedom. "You can finally rest, see the world, and you'll have all the time in the world to do it. There's so much I want to show you, too. Things to..." Kukuru suddenly slaps herself on both cheeks, made considerably worse-sounding because of using her claws to do it instead of bare hands. Somehow, though, she avoids mulching her own head in the process. "Time for Hokma... I'm ready." As the warning starts to sound, Kukuru moves towards Angela quickly in the expectation of needing to catch or move her, but that doesn't need to be done. She clearly doesn't get it as she watches Angela for a few moments like she's expecting the usual, then shrugs it off lightly with a thoughtful noise. "Oh, maybe the last two are just different like that...?" Undeterred by not getting it, Kukuru gets right to work! Hearing the Hell Train coming before she sees it, she calls up a cloud of darkness right in the floor, but she wouldn't be fast enough to get into it even on a regular day. She only has enough time to bring up her claws and brace against the train smashing right into her, flattening her right against its surface for several moments until she manges to slip right off of it and bounce down several hallways from the momentum. After healing herself enough to sit up off the floor, Kukuru opens up a portal leading right to the ceiling of Records. She holds it open for anyone that wants to head that way first, then drops in herself to dive towards Hokma with her arms and lgs splayed out for maximum area-coverage. "Hokma.. Stopping all this would be the tragedy. Everyone's come so far, and we're almost at the end of all this. Wouldn't letting everyone see it through to the end be so much better?" She calls out in mid-fall, whipping herself around for a single momentum-building rotation to lash out at his Den-O form in huge sweeping motions to try and limit his movements with sheer claw size. "You've come far, too... Don't you want to see this with everyone?"
Sarracenia	Sarracenia arrives when called. She said she would help and she is going to keep her word if only to spite Lilian and Angela or rub it in their faces later. She is in her battle dress, its metal plates and the leather beneath offering better protection than her usual dress. "There are not too many more of these, right?" she says mostly to herself. "Just get through a few more and then we never have to see this facility again..." She grips her hammer, steeling herself for whatever might await them.      '...but it seems that his Captain--Tennant--has decided to help him by taking potshots at whomever approaches but that is alright...'      Sarra mmphs in annoyance. "So, you did not kill her -and- she is helping the source of this Meltdown..." Sarra mutters. She looks around at the other elites, offering greetings to a few that she likes.      Rufus gets a wave and a "Good to see you again, Rufus!"      Hibiki finds a green mushroom landing on her head at some point while Sarra says, "Hello, Hibiki~"      Kukuru receives a friendly wave as well and a "Hello Kukuru. And thank you for ensuring I do not have to hold back against he-...them."           'I would like to offer something up for all of you who have helped us in this time. My sincerest gratitude, even to those I do not strictly get along with--you still elected to help and I will not forget.'      Sarra softens up a bit. A bit of gratitude goes a long way with her. Still, once things get started she immediately heads off toward where Tennant is reported to be. "I will handle Tennant. If she...if they are loose now and have not been punished at all, then it is high time she...they!...were!" she says as she starts toward the lower halls.      And gets flattened by a train along the way. In slow motion. Even if she were fast she probably wouldn't be able to dodge. As it is now she gets plenty of time to contemplate how she might have dodged if she were faster before she gets hit.      When she is able, she pulls out a Bullet Bill power-up in cinematic half speed, holds it over her head, and is surrounded eventually by a puff of white smoke before a large Bullet Bill rockets out, its rocket flames being visible in extreme detail thanks to the time manipulation. Much like the train, Sarra flies through the halls to find Tennant.      And once she does, Bullet Sarra rams into and explodes against them, then normal Sarra emerges from the explosion hammer first, aiming to flatten Tennant. "So! Shooting -one- ally was not enough, huh? You had to turn on the whole facility?"
Timespace Riders	Woz and Sougo arrive in a fluttering vortex of fabric, which thins out and returns to its inert state as Woz's scarf moments later. Both of them already have their transformation belts on, though neither are transformed as yet.     Sougo wears a comfortable looking navy peacoat over a pastel two-tone pink and blue button up. His hands play nervously with the hem of the coat, before he forces himself to hold his fingers straight against his khaki pants. Woz is dressed as he always is, book tucked under his arm, head held high.     Both of them listen to Angela's briefing, even more attentively than in the past--the facility has never gotten this far before. Neither one of them wants to be the reason the cycle repeats, and so they hang on her words as if the smallest detail were life and death. After the second warning, it very well could be, for Sougo.     He clenches his fist, balling the hem of his jacket up before releasing it with a steadying sigh. "Okay," he says, quietly aggrieved and attempting to focus on something positive. Petra gives him the opportunity to put his attention on being helpful.
Timespace Riders	Do you know anything else about that all?     "About Nobunaga? Well... as far as it's relevant to here, he would have had Eiji give that power to Hokma hoping that he'd kill me with it."     "The other thing you'll probably want to know is that... becoming Another Rider is a little bit like having a Meltdown. You're dealing with someone at their worst, needing something they're not getting, wanting something they can't have... dealing with it in a way that's dangerous to the people around them and to them."     "When Woz or I transform," he continues, "It's about engaging with the story of that rider, and retelling it with your own spin on it. But Another Riders--that's not engaging with a story, it's clinging to a fantasy out of anger, or sadness, or loneliness, and forcing yourself to be something you're not."     Woz offers his own input, after a brief consultation with the book he always carries. "Kamen Rider Den-O traveled through time with the use of a train known as the Denliner. I suspect Hokma shall have access to it--indeed, that it may have been given precisely because it does not depend on the company's power reserves to run." Or he'll be able to like, time loop us. But I don't know what to do about that.     After Petra finishes the associated thought, "We have Woz to challenge him if he tries something like that--maybe he can buy us a second or two."     There is no boastful remark or smug assurance from Woz--only a respectful inclination of his head. "I would be pleased even to make an ounce of difference in this crucial time, esteemed Angela." My sincerest gratitude, even to those I do not strictly get along with--you still elected to help and I will not forget.     Sougo and Woz share a brief, tired smile, before returning their attention to Angela.     "It's what a good king would do," says Sougo simply.     "You are someone to whom I am Kamen Rider. Regardless of what happens today, that will be true tomorrow, also."     ...I will now release Hokma.     The two nod. Sougo procures the twinned Zi-O II Ridewatch, Woz the square-faced Woz Miridewatch.     The bulky white Timespace Driver and the sleek black, green-trimmed Beyondriver both announce callouts and play their standby loops. Woz inserts his Miridewatch into the side gate of his driver, Sougo splits the Zi-O II Ridewatch into its component halves and slots it into either side of his own Driver.
Timespace Riders	"Henshin!"     "Henshin."                  Amazing! Time! Future! KAMEN RIDER WOZ? WOZ?!                                     KAMEN RIDEEER.. (RIDER..!) ZI-O--ZI-O!! II!                       Zi-O II cuts a knightly figure, the acoutrements of his silver-and-gold, pink-trimmed armor suggesting two symmetrical analog wristwatches.     Woz, meanwhile, looks like the time traveler he's always introducing himself to be, with his sleek silver, green-trimmed bodysuit sporting lightweight armor which suggests the appearance of a smartwatch, from his wristband-tabard, up to his app-icon pauldrons, all the way to his backlit faceplate, the 'face' of the watch.     Both turn their attention to the speakers.     "I am pleased to see that you do not intend to lie down and wait for what is to come, Hokma. I see our conversation had some impact on you. My resolve wavers no more than yours. Have at you."     The train hits Zi-O, who finds himself slowed much as the train itself is. Woz, thankfully, is unaffected, but yanking his king away by the back of his hauberk still depends on Zi-O himself and *his* experience of the passage of time. A direct hit is, laboriously, averted and made into a glancing blow.     An effortful sprint for Zi-O is a brisk walk for Woz, but the retainer can't afford to get way ahead of everyone and end up fighting alone later. Even if he isn't strictly affected by the Protocol, he still has to play Hokma's game. Let's make this the most cinematic ending we can make together!     "And tomorrow," Zi-O says, his voice stretched by the time dilation, "We'll make a sequel."     The Demon King swings a silver greatsword, resembling the hour and minute hands of a clock, at half-speed. Polychromatic energy curves through the air, and a cluster of disembodied clock faces sail effortfully through the air at Tennant. Well... not at them, actually? It looks like Zi-O's aim was off, and the next swing doesn't look much better, or the one after it. Only once Woz joins in does the strategy become apparent: Zi-O is saturating the space around Tennant with slow-moving projectiles, while Woz and rushing their position down with his touchscreen spear in hand, intending to force a close-quarters engagement amidst gradually arriving slowed-down exploding clocks from Zi-O.
Petra Soroka	"So, you did not kill her -and- she is helping the source of this Meltdown..."     Petra exhales heated and barely restraining herself from violence. "Sundew, fucking kill yourself. I'll fucking hold you down so Tennant can do it themselves. They're not a fucking girl, you fucking idiot." "When Woz or I transform, it's about engaging with the story of that rider, and retelling it with your own spin on it. But Another Riders--that's not engaging with a story, it's clinging to a fantasy out of anger, or sadness, or loneliness, and forcing yourself to be something you're not."     Petra absorbs Sougo's explanation with a slightly odd expression, then nods. She absently drops her hand to her hip, where her own transformation device is strapped, and runs a finger along the plastic ridges. "Right. Yeah. I remember seeing one of those, a long time ago. Too bad I literally can't imagine any version of him that's better than this." "I will cut off this tragedy before it can begin. It will be a return to the past that we can all enjoy."     Petra hisses under her breath, "God I hate this guy. I hate this fucking guy. We're this close to the fucking end, and now he's throwing his fucking tantrum because it didn't all go perfectly the way *he* wanted. If we did this over again then my first priority would be putting him in the *ground*." "Making something not happen is like... introducing entropy into the world on purpose. Erasing stories from a book."     "Right?!" Petra seethes, and then pauses and widens her eyes at the impending rumbling. "Wait, Shinra, who was on ticket duty--"     Petra isn't the kind of psychotic meathead who'd try and stop a train head-on-- or at least, she's not taking on that role today. Instead, she's the type of beleaguered Captain who knows exactly what's coming, and with Time Track dragging her motions, has plenty of time to think about how much getting hit by a moving vehicle is going to hurt. She has several subjective seconds to try and adjust to the disjointed sensation of normal neural impulses and slow bodily responses, gaining rapidly increading respect for Angela, before getting smacked by a train and slamming through a monitor on Angela's wall.     Clumsy movements in slow time leave her wiggling in the shattered screen until she manages to pop herself out and fall to the ground. Petra tries to shout at Kukuru, but the automatic mental patterns for forming speech have a tempo that doesn't naturally line up with what her body's willing to do at the moment, causing her words to smoosh into each other.     "Kukrgetm dwnto Records--! Fu,ck. Hold on. Get, me, down, to, Records!"     Stepping through the portal and into Records, Petra immediately has to drop to the ground when a shot from Tennant's EGO whizzes over her head. Once she pinponts which direction they're actually coming from, she kicks up from the floor while grabbing Fourth Match Flame off her back, throwing an arc of flame off it with a slash towards Tennant. Despite being slowed, Petra still has the convenient skill of instant inertial control to adjust for Tennant's attacks, a psychic power of hers that's always contested the rules of the world whether they're at full speed or not.     "Tennant, you fucking *bootlicker*! What's your fucking problem?! Tell me your real fucking motive or the only narrative resolution you'll ever get is being fridged for my fucking character development, asshole!"
Lilian Rook	"He took his ever-so-sweet time. I've been on pins and needles since Binah. I can't even give him credit for lasting this long because I bet he did it just to stress me out." says Lilan, giving her opinion on the Meltdown almost in totality in a few hasty seconds. As geared up as she's been since the Queen, she seems to have taken the precaution about this Meltdown's proximity to 'the end' very seriously; she arrives already 'transformed', with two briefcases and a heavy backpack of gear that she puts away somewhere, a dozen different carry cases on two tactical belts over her mail, and the bottom half of a surely vile energy drink.     Everything else she has to say about Hokma comes out in only two sentences after she drains the can and throws it away.     'He cannot just immediately return us to the beginning, but if we fail to defeat him--he will likely have us start over.'     "You were the one who reached out to me, Benjamin . . . It's too late to try and fix it now."     'There are some who brave the Outskirts and Ruins in the world in search of such water or for stars to wish upon to change this world but... I suppose that is not very much like me'     "That's why yours is coming true, Angela." Lilian says over her last second gear check. She might only have saved Winter Crow for last so that it makes the dramatic click-clack sound when she's done; subtle as it is, Lilian has never been above such theatre; but the slip of tone afterwards is direly sincere. "A wish is like a miracle because of what it takes to make it come true yourself. If spend your life waiting and looking for it somewhere else . . ."     'The other thing you'll probably want to know is that... becoming Another Rider is a little bit like having a Meltdown. You're dealing with someone at their worst, needing something they're not getting, wanting something they can't have... dealing with it in a way that's dangerous to the people around them and to them.'     "God forbid." Lilian finishes with dry sarcasm instead. It's more comfortable territory to roll her eyes and skulk.     . . . . . . . .     'I understand this is my last shot. I will cut off this tragedy before it can begin.'     "Your last shot was the net café, Benjamin. Do you think it really hasn't begun already?"     Hell Train ploughing into the office isn't exactly what Lilian was expecting, but she already had the precausal roadmap laid out to be against the walls at the time it starts. Seeing Angela scuttle off at double speed, one of Lilian's quickly controlled mini-expressions is briefly visible as relief in the half-speed it looks like to the handfun of souls immune, and then the exact point at which she becomes an inky spectre that is not; just the trails of magical smoke as she phases through the wall as the fastest way of dodging it.     It's kind of weird to think about; that Lilian Rook of all people has clearly labbed out 'how to remove wasted motion' like this. 'How to halve or quarter or decimate getting around' doesn't seem like it'd be an inherently valuable skill to someone like her. But then it's also thematically wrong that she isn't immune to the T2 like Angela and Woz and Hokma as well.     'Aaaaaand! Action!'     Lilian keys her mic on purpose, raises her thumb to the receiver, and clicks a button loud enough over the local comms to sound like a slate clap at the start of a shot. Incidentally, the button is a detonator; one of the frightening amount of munitions she lied about removing after Gebura blows up in Tennant's path.     She can't actually see them. It's timed purely in her head, by the branching mess of a script she'd already seen. Her mental timing is perfect, but the variance of 'pressing the button' is doubled.
Angela	Indeed. The Agents down in Architecture seem a little off. They haven't been around before. They aren't hostile but they quietly do their work throughout the day like that is all they have. But that is a matter for another day. ''I wish we could've, like... just broken the TT2 stuff.'' "...Yes, we shouldn't need it. Nevertheless, disabling the protocol before facing Hokma would functionally make him helpless--which won't generate the Seed. We did not expect ... Oda Nobunaga ... interfering." She does not seem thrilled that Oda Nobunaga is in the picture. She does smile at the idea of Benjamin needing to use a wheelchair though. ''... Love you, Ange. Not much time left.'' "Love you too, Petra. A new sensation, 'not much time'." She frowns. "He seems to be Kamen Ridering, but he's still drawing energy from our systems." She winces a little at using 'Kamen Ridering' like that. Kukuru offers to fix up Tennant after the battle and Angela gives Kukuru a small nod. "You need not hold back against Tennant. This isn't the sort of time where holding back will help against anyone." ''So, you did not kill her--'' "Them." Angela says. "Also, no, I did not kill them. I was ... messing with you." She tenses--but nods when Sarracenia catches herself the second time. When Sarracenia keeps stumbling on for the next several sentences, Angela stared at her for just a moment rather than saying anything at all. Sougo and Woz speak more about Kamen Rider Den-O's abilities and Angela frowns. She hadn't really expected temporal power from outside the facility to start to mess with this one. While Hokma could probably shut down a fair amount of time shenanigans with the TimeTrack, he isn't going to interfere with the Liner when he's using it. She'll just have to hope it all works out. They beat Gebura and Binah. Of course there'd have to be wrinkles here. But they'll get through it, she's certain. "If it comes to that, we can count on you, Esteemed Woz." A faint little smile quirks up on her lips but it's gone just as quick. " True tomorrow, Angela thinks, as she wonders about that while everyone starts rushing off in position or battling a train, Angela walks off on her own, drawing an unusual (not Woz's) book into her hands. "...And so our heroes face off against the final Sephirah. Will the Demon King fend off one more threat against his ascendency or will he fall to Oda Nobunaga's machinations? Well... That might not be the only challenge for him this evening..." She snaps the book closed. "...It's important to honor the legacies involved, isn't it? Otherwise the tale doesn't proceed appropriately." Angela is told why her dream is coming true whereas those wished on stars or drawn from rivers tend to end up distorted or never come true at all. Angela smiles at Lilian. "I've had good mentors."
Angela	Rufus, Hibiki, Minamitsu, and Riku against the train!! Usually zero people go after the Hell Train like this, usually people get out of the way of the Hell Train. That's what people tend to do with the train because why would anybody ... not stop the train? The wave of water puts out some of the flames surging around the Hell Train. Hibiki and Geed, meanwhile, step forward to punch and grapple the train respectively and with the aid of a timely firmament driver are able to arrest its movement and start pushing it back! This is going really well for them so far but it might occur to these folks that this is not the Denliner. Indeed, just as it seems like they'll be able to readily handle this train and suplex it or whatever it is anti-train people do all the time-- The real problem makes itself known. Plowing through the facility at another angle, sort of in a cross-pattern from where the Hell Train has been arrested from is the Denliner itself--the Denliner looks essentially looks like a very brightly colored bullet train and it's attempting to slam through all four of those trying to stop the OTHER train from crashing into everybody. Double the Train! Double The Pain! Meanwhile Kukuru...skips the midboss to go straight for the...other midboss! Dropping in on Hokma like this is bound to prevent him from supporting Tennant, at least in the short term. Sparks flash off the Another Rider armor as Kukuru slashes and claws at it. "You ought to talk. Ayin made the deal with your family and you abandoned it to take another in instead. Now he's dying, doomed to die even. This is my last shot to save him. No, with the Denliner... I can save them all! All the people we harmed in pursuit of our dream, and ourselves..." He retaliates with a scythe swipe against the center mass of Kukuru.
Angela	Tennant has to deal with a Princess and a Petra (and a Kamen Rider, but Tennant's attention is drawn first towards their coworker and their enemy) headed their way. The Bullet Bill detonates against Tennant solidly, and they get sent flying back into a wall, smashing hard against it. One of the goggle lenses on their helmet smashes off in the explosion, but Tennant doesn't seem troubled. Their grin only grows. "I knew if I did this you'd come running to 'punish' me...Heh heh... But you've fallen into ''my'' trap, Sarracenia." Tennant slashes down with their khopesh, dispersing the flame around their body. It still hits them, but the effect seems diminished but Tennant's clashing strike. "Benjamin's feeling soft, you want to free Lady Angela right? I'll make sure Benjamin suffers enough to get that gauge up..." ''Tell me your real fucking motive or the only narrative resolution you'll ever get--'' "...The Dame Commander's wonderful, isn't she? She changed your life for the better, you've devoted yourself to her words and cause. I have someone like her in my life." Tennant's smile is ecstatic. "She sent me here from the start, gave me the order to protect Benjamin, way back during the Smoke War. And then sent me here to make sure the result is what she wants." They would not have told anybody but Petra this, though they stubbornly don't say who ''she'' is. Perhaps they figure they've given enough. The black and golden khopesh gleams ominously. Tennant swings the butt of Magic Bullet for Petra's chin, and then takes aim at Sarracenia with the EGO Weapon. "It is my narrative role to escape to fight another day, I'm afraid. Some people you don't get to crush the first time you run into them, you have to face them again and again and again and then finally you get your big climatic battle with them--and who knows how it'll go? Don't tell me you're only interested in cheap easy and immediate victories in your story, Petra! There's no way you'd be satisfied with that!" Sougo and Woz fire around Tennant. Tennant is an accomplished and trained soldier so they don't even flinch, and in fact start to look a bit confused in that one visible eye of theirs as they realize they aren't trying to hit them. Woz takes the opportunity to slam into their body, shoving them out of the way and opening up a path to Hokma. "Gh--Clever...! Haha. A Sequel to 'Lobotomy Corporation'? I don't know, is it that popular?" And then as if realizing that might be a bit too meta, admits, "Well, even though sequels are never quite as good, I find that that's where the real interesting ideas start to take shape." They slide back and fire Magic Bullet once. A trio of bullets of blazing black flame launch themselves out towards the four assaulting them. Tennant then steps on something and promptly is exploded. The goggles are torn wholly from their face and they slam through one of the strange pillars in Records and lands on the floor, bleeding profusely from all over their body. They reach for an HP Ampule and inject it into their body. Tennant retaliates with an aimless fired shot that nevertheless unerringly appears in a portal and blasting off towards the Dame Commander in an instant as Tennant hobbles up, their goggles eradicated, their bright green eyes gleaming--before ZWOOMING off as the speed is suddenly...doubled! They are rushing off towards their gear locker in a temporary retreat. But they aren't out of the fight yet.
Angela	"It may be too late, but I have to fight for him. I have to. Otherwise, I'd be giving up too easily." Hokma tells Lilian. TT2 SPEED x2, two attacks a round! I attack, you attack, i attack, you pose and attack! As the speed suddenly shifts, Hokma takes advantage by slamming Kukuru into a wall via the scythe. "I'd do anything to save them." Hokma says. "Even if it means never leaving the past behind."
Riku Asakura	Ultraman Geed strains under the force of the first train, he's never had to fight this hard against a train before, so it's a new feeling.  However, when a SECOND TRAIN strikes him from behind, a different and colorful one, it sends him sprawling out onto the ground and forces him down flat for a few moments.  Sparks rain from where he was hit, causing him no small bit of pain.   It's almost too much to deal with at once, but Riku made a promise to Angela to help her out, and he won't back down on that because things are a little difficult now.  He staggers to his feet when the speed of things jumps in momentum and the trains do another pass at him.  This time he's more prepared, bracing against the Denliner and putting effort into his stance.   With great effort, he attempts to stop the train completely and then starts trying to change its momentum.  Fighting the train head-on is going to be difficult, but trying to shift their momentum so that they start to interfere with each other is going to be his strategy going forward.  He shifts his stance, and then nearly 'throws' the Denliner at the Hell train, letting go so that the momentum saved from one can be used to smash into the other.   While this happens, his body surges with energy.  Black and red energy pulses from his center of mass as he attempts to control it internally.  There is a surge of power, as he releases a roar of power, then focuses that energy into his arms.  Making a cross with his arms, he focuses that power directly on them.   What happens next is a powerful wave of energy surges through his arms, firing a beam of red and black energy straight for the trains themselves and attempting to punch a hole through them.  "WRECKING BURST!" he shouts, as the attack explodes upon contact with the trains, attempting to take both out with the powerful attack.
Sarracenia	Sarra tries not to look too embarrassed at messing up Tennant's pronouns so much. Petra yelling at her helps since that means she looks angry instead. "You are such a toxic cesspool, do you know that?! I know what their pronouns are! I am just not used to such things yet! I used the right one when I realized, did I not?!" she yells at Petra.      Woz and Sougo join her...or did she join them? It is a competition, you know? Sarra was probably beaten to Tennant by someone who is not affected by time, so she huffs before saying, "Thank you for your assistance with them!" to the Kamen Riders.      'I knew if I did this you'd come running to 'punish' me...Heh heh... But you've fallen into ''my'' trap, Sarracenia.'      "Your trap? What trap is that?" Sarra says before listening to Tennant for a moment. "So...someone told you to protect Benjamin. And you are. That is noble to a point. But, Benjamin is now trying to keep Angela from escaping and trying to keep all you agents trapped in this hellish place. Sometimes, one must protect people from themselves. Friends and charges should not be supported if they are doing the wrong thing. In those instances, it is appropriate to try and talk them out of the bad things they are doing."      Sarra is blasted by a teleporting bullet a few moments later, then yelps as an explosion goes off. Tenant gets blasted by...a mine or something?! They pop an HP Ampule, then make a break for it. Sarra is off like a shot, grinning a bit at being able to go 2x speed. As she chases her hammer starts to glow, leaving prismatic sparkles in its wake. They quickly overtake Sarra and she starts hammering away once she reaches Tennant again. "You do not want to be trapped with me, I can assure you!"
Rufus Shinra	EARLIER: Rufus chants along with the henshin jingle. "Amazing! Time! Future! KAMEN RIDER WOZ! WOZ!" It does not get old. NOW: Another train! Rufus is momentarily distracted by the yellow Enemy Skill materia shining brightly - and misses the arrival of Denliner, which is already at a climax. 2X SPEED Rufus Shinra is put off balance due to what is to his frame of reference not just a doubling of speed, but a quadrupling of speed, which is a lot to deal with while simultaneously dealing with two trains rampaging through the office, and also Rufus is further annoyed by what Hokma slash Benjamin is saying on the comms, answering "Yeah it sucks that people got harmed," which he doesn't fully truly believe, "But erasing their sacrifices means erasing the things they sacrificed for, right," he adds, unable to properly express the intonation that'd result in a question mark as a result of the sped-up factor in play right now, and then continues, "Clinging to the past like that is a loser move, like you don't deserve to live in today if you're just going to always be thinking about yesterday, so get out of the way of those of us who are trying to move forward," he says, and then focuses on the problem at hand, the problem of two trains, which is somewhere between one and two trains too many, and quickly comes up with the plan of if he can target not just each train but instead each car on each train then he can do a lot of damage at once, and indeed that's what he does, using the All materia linked to his Ice materia, forming twin fingerguns and launching several magical ice blasts at each car on each train all at once, hopefully slowing them down enough for the others to stop, and in the meantime he hopes that the time changes back to normal soon, going this fast is disorientating and he's having a hard time controlling himself as though it's if his body is lacking any form of punctuation besides commas and his every action is bleeding into the next action like one exceedingly long run on sentence
UFO Gang	ELSEWHERE "We're moving away from the battle," Shou says, and indeed they have; Nazrin has led Shou down a level and off into a side-corridor among anomaly storage spaces. The corridor they walk has been devastated by having a train through it when, importantly, it is 'barely the right size for a train to fit in it' -- which has destroyed nearly everything else. "I know," Nazrin says, smugly. A few more steps. "Explain yourself," Shou says, in a slightly - very slightly, for Shou has always spoken in a tone of voice that suggests butter wouldn't melt in her mouth - elevated tone of voice. "I know I cannot do much, now, but--" "We're almost there," Nazrin says. They approach what /had/ been a sealed vault door and which had gotten struck in passing by the train and ripped open. There are electrical sparks in the darkened containment room that sparkle strangely off the ground. Shou squints. She squints and then her eyes widen. "... Nazrin. What's the meaning of this?" "I knew where it was," Nazrin says, "but I think they must have gotten it early. This place sort of vibes like it kind of grew, right? Like that tree of life they talk about sometimes. So... in this area... it wasn't that it was impossible to get to." Nazrin looks up at Shou, rocking back and forth on her feet. "It was that everyone was watching. There was no way I could sneak it out. And... there's no substitute, either. They might not notice a dummy for a while, but that might be less than a couple of days. I don't know about you, but I didn't like the idea of being chased." Easy for a mouse to say. Shou steps ahead of Nazrin, into the room. It is dark - stark and simple. Shou runs a hand over the *thickness* of the vault door, over the layers of harsh and resistant metal with inches of soft, dark metal in between. Lead. "So... I was waiting for the opportunity. I knew something would happen, and I didn't want to wait for everything to turn to butt, since this might be one of our last chances before the end of the stuff they're talking about," Nazrin concludes, walking in afterwards. Shou's sandals walk over simple earth, layered rather thickly. Sometimes they crunch a little, and the stones within glitter, as she approaches what lays on a 1.5-meter-tall concrete pedestal in the center. Nazrin looks around, perhaps fidgiting in the stress of no response from Shou. Her eyes wander over what she's learned is a radiation-hazard sign. "But now... we just have to get it, get the others, and we could have Hijiri loose by the end of February. Right?" Nazrin looks back over. "It's not a fake or anything, is it?" "It isn't," Shou says as she rests her hand on a square cover, evocative of an old pagoda roof. "It is the true thing. I would know it anywhere. It has been so long..." "I didn't tell anyone, all this time, and now we can just get everybody and scram," Nazrin continues, now a little *nervous*. "Vamoose! Hit the high seas, then the low seas. This was a pretty good way to get up to speed for the others, but frankly, I'm starting to get kinda sick of" "Nazrin," says Shou, as she rests her hand atop the jeweled pagoda on that concrete pedestal. "I must praise you... for your diligence and your long service." Nazrin looks, for once, satisfied. "However..." TO BE CONTINUED
UFO Gang	DOWN ON THE TRAIN TRACKS OF LIFE Minamitsu is, frankly, getting overwhelmed. The train is too fast. She already took a huge whack - having perhaps foolishly thought she would be fine. She can feel it, and she's /a dead body/ (despite her perky style and normalish appearance). That's not a great sign. She breathes in and out once -- and at that point she turns her head, and sure enough, there appears to be a SECOND train which is barrelling right towards her. Minamitsu lifts herself up BUT what she does not realize, in her innocence, is that the passage of a shinkansen-type train *in and of itself* is enough to throw superpowerful wind in its passage! She whacks against part of the wall. At this point, Minamitsu reaches deep into the traditional paths and styles of her people - the yokai - and erupts in a storm of surging bullets moving fast enough to produce strange electronic sounds in their sheer massages, bombarding the Denliner (because it's closer) even as she lets out a "gahhhh--" The danmaku surge becomes more like a pressure-washer flood in the general direction of the Helltrain, even as Minamitsu gathers herself more -- and then turns her head as she sees Ultraman Geed! Her eyes widen for a moment at the sheer power and confidence it takes to try to wrestle a train at all. "Waoh..." But her momentary awe at that rising darkling power is dispelled with a shake of her head as she hoists up that anchor on her back - swings it around - and pivots it to point down, in this case after the Helltrain, more than the Denliner. (The Denliner scares her, because it's shiny.) "Good plan! Huwaahhh---" The water she calls forth surges behind her, seems to pour upon itself several times (editor's note: water does not compress meaningfully under pressure) before-- FFFSSSHHHHH -- the anchor of a drowned ship, propepelled by immense hydraulic force, whips after the Helltrain, spraying the seawater of the damned behind it! "Heh... at least they're slowing down... oh... crap," Minamitsu mumbles to herself.
Kukuru	"Hello Kukuru. And thank you for ensuring I do not have to hold back against he-...them." "They're not a fucking girl, you fucking idiot." "Sarra... I'm glad you're here, and I'm glad you're making steps. Just... It's okay to slow down sometimes, you know? I know that's prooobably not great to hear from me, buuuut... It's not super hard to stop for a second, you know?" Kukuru gives Sarracenia a pleading look as she says that, then nods briefly at Petra's own reaction. She briefly considers saying 'language', then pushes that out of her mind before looking back to Sarracenia. "If not for them, theeen... For me?" "This isn't the sort of time where holding back will help against anyone." "Yeah... It's too late in all this to risk messing things up by holding back, mhm. No, we can fix up the damage from going too hard and apologize later." She sounds somewhat relieved at that, glancing at her claws a few seconds later. "I just hope they won't be too hurt in the head after all this. Fixing bodies is easy, but... It still hurts me to hurt any of them." At least, it'll hurt her for a bit, and well after the Meltdown is already concluded. Upon reaching Hokma in her slowed down state, Kukuru lands more comfortably than she usually does with all that extra time to just land on her feet and really think about putting her feet down. It's an odd feeling, knowing that she's moving that slowly, but it's also somewhat liberating at the same time. She looks up at Hokma as he addresses her, raising an eyebrow slowly as he speaks of things that she, as usual, is clueless about. "Wha-at? He's no-ot dy-ing. Are yo-ou rea-lly go-nna e-e-e-e-every-one's sa-cri-fices for...?" There's a long delay as Kukuru pauses in a moment of self-reflection, considering her own question angled towards herself and just how far she's willing to go for her own family. "... Hu-u-u-u-uh." Still feeling the sluggishness behind every laborious movement, Kukuru nevertheless manages to give Hokma one of those shrugging nods just as the scythe cuts a nasty gash right into her midsection. "Ow, you... No, I ge-et it.-" Kukuru sarts to ask Hokma a question she can already guess the answer to easily enough, but her languid speech sounds even sleepier than usual. She doesn't even finish asking it before Hokma smashes her into a wall with that scythe follow-up, letting out a suddenly quick yelp of pain as time starts running faster than expected. "You love them too don't you? I get it so I can't really be disappointed at you just mad at the timing. I guess our fight's to see whose love is stronger then huh?" Prying the scythe out of her gut with a bloody crunch and another quick squeal as blood spills from her chest and nanites stitch that wound back together, Kukuru raises one of her claws and swings it around a few times, then slams it forward at... Empty air? One of those teleportation clouds opens up in the path of her claw, and she flings the claw right through it. A second cloud opens up besides Hokma, and the claw comes out at him like a spiky battering ram made of bad CGI. She opens up a third cloud behind herself to get out from being pinned, then 'falls' upwards from below Hokma to try and clamp onto the Den-O armor from below with a mighty vice grip. "I don't know about staying in the past forever though. That'll become the present sooner or later and then you'll be back here again right?"
Petra Soroka	"Nevertheless, disabling the protocol before facing Hokma would functionally make him helpless--which won't generate the Seed."     "That's literally the worst thing Lobotomy Corporation has ever done," grumbles Petra, who will never learn a single thematic lesson that this particular narrative is trying to get her to internalize. "Contriving reasons we're forced to care about some of these idiots' feelings. I hate your fucking dad and if it wouldn't ruin the bullshit fucking Tree then I'd *love* for him to be helpless, actually." "I have someone like her in my life."     "No you fucking don't--" Petra spits, then chokes, when her head snaps to the side from Tennant smacking her with the butt of Magic Bullet. Being smacked in slow motion does give her the small benefit of doubled mental adjustment to the pain, so she reacts to follow up with her own flaming pommel strike that sparks off of Tennant's EGO before backing up to spit out blood.     "First of all, there isn't anyone else like her, so good fucking job scrounging for *leftovers*. Second of all, if you did, you would've mentioned her in the past year. Because obviously." Petra frowns and takes in Tennant's smile-- with double mental processing speed! She actually formulates her thoughts on what she wants to say next halfway into her previous sentence, and just has to slooooowly plod her way through the rest of the words while waiting for her body to catch up. This talking shit sucks, but Petra's not in a mindstate that'd let her bypass it right now.     "There's something you think is important, at least. But Benjamin's already fucking dead, so, job's over. If he wasn't dead, then he wouldn't be fucking whining so much about 'the way things used to be'." "Don't tell me you're only interested in cheap easy and immediate victories in your story, Petra! There's no way you'd be satisfied with that!"     Petra clicks her tongue angrily, sending an irritated flick of a fiery beam out of her sword after them while they run away. "You're a fucking *footnote*, Tennant! Take your part two finale and--" In the middle of her sentence, time flips to double speed, and having barely adjusted to half, her speech is nearly unintellible again. "fuckignchokeonityousnivellingpieceofshit!"     Tennant's gone before Petra's now-half-speed mind can send the impulse to follow them. She takes an extranneous step after them, impulse following through into motion before her mental cancellation shuts it off, and then staggers at double speed. She fumbles for her transteam gun, lifts her head up with a disorienting grimace, and looks around the hallway to determine which way to Hokma.
Petra Soroka	At chipmunk-on-helium speed, Petra's gun calls out "SILVER" with a nightcore electric guitar sting. She squeezes the trigger, gets coated in glittering black smoke, and then explodes into her Sting Silver armor in front of Hokma in just a few sped-up seconds. One undeniable benefit of increased physical time is that the morphmetal pouring down the rivulets in her armor can pool in her palm and accumulate into a gleaming metal spear in half the time, which she points at Hokma.     "Hey, asshole! Who do you actually think benefits from that?! Your fucking dumbshit boyfriend? He already decided to kill himself a thousand fucking loops ago, and he did it in a way that *didn't* ruin the project! Even that useless coward shit is better than saying you'd *do it all different if you had the chance*!"     "If you couldn't commit to being a good dad, at least commit to being a *bad* one--!" In double speed, Petra rears back and hurls her spear at him as hard as she can, launching through the air with a shockwave that shears droplets of metal off it. Already, there's enough Silver building back up for her to gradually grow another one in her hand.
Hibiki Tachibana	Naturally, this is about the time something like train-suplexing would happen. Rufus already gouged quite a large hole through the facility, as if the Express Train didn't cause enough havoc as is, so honestly there's a surprising amount of free space with which to take a locomotive and remove it from its non-existent tracks, especially when they also have an Ultraman and then some on the job.     She was not, however, expecting there to be two trains.     "Ah--"     In the middle of using all of her strength to try and keep this one locked down as it is, she isn't exactly in a position to try and grab another on such short notice, especially as the rate of time suddenly goes from an unfamiliar half-speed to a disorienting double. There's the deafening sort-of-clang-sort-of-thud of a high impact locomotive smashing into 3/4ths girl and 1/4ths metal armor.     Hibiki Tachibana does not, somehow, visibly go flying out of the way of both of them like a ragdoll. Perhaps thanks to Rufus slowing both of them down with ice magic, and Geed physically manhandling them, she next comes back into view positioned -between- both vehicles - the anchor jacks in her leg armor embedded in the floor, one fist still planted into the front car of the Express Train to Hell, while the other is crumpling into the Denliner's front plating to try and prevent it from just speeding off.     Stabilizing herself like this is her way of preventing the 2x speed from messing her up any more than it already is, even if it means being in the way of both of these things. "...Ugh... if Go was here to hear this... I bet he'd have something to say... about using a Kamen Rider's power just to stop in place...!"     Especially while they're all going through doubled timescale. Ironic.     While Geed preps his WRECKING BURST, and she's doing her best to keep them both still, the pilebunkers on her gauntlets both prime themselves back all on their own, straining against their moorings--     --and then punch back in, to deliver an air-cracking /explosion/ of raw force straight into both of their front cars, to momentarily totally cut their attempts to get any forward momentum and leave them wide open to attacks.
Timespace Riders	The mirrored watch hands on Zi-O's helmet wind forwards--though in the slowed time, their movement is not so fast as it otherwise would be. He moves in 'advance' of Tennant's flaming bullets, which is to say that he moves only at the moment an ordinary person would, and still lethargically as if through mud.     Woz jukes two and is hit by another; the inverse is true for Zi-O, who even with the gift of foresight can't do much about perceiving everything as if it's in fast-forward whilst moving as if in one of those running dreams.     When Tennant takes off to resupply, and time shifts to twice as fast, Woz switches forms, hastily swapping into another Miridewatch--a question-marked fighter, split down the middle between the burning red of a correct answer and the icy blue of an incorrect one. QUIZ!                     Future Time! Fashion! Passion! Question!                                                   Futurering Quiz! QUIZ!                                 Green lasers surround Woz and shift to gold, to the tune of a brassy fanfare. They condense into two concentric rings, circling Woz and printing new armor for him, which snaps firmly into place as the lasers dissipate and a pleasant correct-answer ding plays.     His app-icon pauldrons have changed into an X on the left and an O on the right, and his Rider antennae have been replaced with a golden question mark. The tabard suggesting the wristband of his smartwatch motif is adorned with repeated white question marks, and the katakana on his backlit faceplate read 'KU-I-ZU.'     Rather than pursue Tennant, he leaps to Kukuru's aid, attacking at range with a swipe of his polearm, which now has a crooked head like a question mark. His swing conjures a flurry of red-blue question-marks, which hone in on Hokma's position to pummel him in advance of Woz's long leap to engage in close combat.     "True or false," he says, making a turning kick with his right leg, planting his foot and thrusting with the butt of his polearm, the Jikan Despear.     "I will be Kamen Rider to you, and to Angela, regardless of this battle's outcome." He swipes with the weapon, acclimated well to the increase in speed, catching the haft of Hokma's scythe in the crook to pull his guard wide and go for a snap kick with the left leg. "The correct answer is true. I have answered what I will do if I lose. Now you will do the same."     "Everything's slow now--which means we're faster! Better make the most of it while it lasts..." Zi-O procures a Ridewatch bearing the headlight-lensed, racing-striped helmet of another Kamen Rider, slotting it into the Timespace Driver. With that in one side and the black-gold half of Zi-O II on the other, he spins the Driver.                      ARMOR TIME! Start Your Engine! DRIVE!                           A disembodied suit of armor appears before Zi-O to the tune of an upbeat pop punk track, candy apple red with a pair of classic white racing stripes down the middle. It maintains the suggestion of his knightly profile, but its pauldrons are replaced with two whitewall racing tires, and its katakana lenses (spelling 'RIDER') have shifted hues and opacity to resemble the headlights of a supercar. Zi-O leans down into a runner's stretch (the posture is not at all like Drive's) before bolting forward. The armor breaks apart and flies onto him, replacing his own piece by piece.
Timespace Riders	Tennant is pursued by Zi-O while Woz fights Hokma--in this speed-aspected form, he's tearing down the department as a red-and-white blur. Stopping on a dime with ankle-mounted wheels screeching, he makes a jumping back kick aimed at Tennant's center mass.     "You know, Tennant... one of the most wildly popular, beloved movies ever, that was a sequel. Some people would say it's even better than the one before it." As he lands, he surges forward, then backwards, then side to side, using both his own speed and the speed of the TT2 protocol currently in effect to try and fake Tennant out--every false start has the possibility that he'll commit fully, since he's moving so fast that 'committing fully' takes him a fraction of the time it otherwise would. A swing of his greatsword, aimed at the wrist, after a left-right zip back and forth, proves the real attack.     "And, um, I think we're better writers than that guy. Just something to think about, I guess."
Lilian Rook	'...It's important to honor the legacies involved, isn't it? Otherwise the tale doesn't proceed appropriately.'     "You'll be an incredible human, Angela." Lilian says, last before disappearing.     Two seconds-- doubled to four-- after the blast, Lilian assesses that Tennant is already being matched with more than equal force, and hesitantly holsters her detonator again; conserving resources as much as she can. As much as she wants to know who 'she' is, there are higher priorities at the moment; and if anyone finds out, it'll be Petra.     She's only partway into running down the next corridor when the magic bullet portal opens up behind her. She might normally deflect something so showy, but her reflexes are half as fast, as is the movement of her sword arm. The moment where she realizes she won't make it in time is stretched out on her face. The moment? where hot sparks fly from the flat of Night Mist and the bullet strikes the facility floor, isn't. Lilian is already pivoting her body to conserve moment and keep running; a few seconds later, she makes a sound halfway between a gasp and a dry heave, and catches the wall with her hand as she turns the corner, leaving behind a smouldering print.     'Now he's dying, doomed to die even. This is my last shot to save him. No, with the Denliner... I can save them all! All the people we harmed in pursuit of our dream, and ourselves...'     "Then do it without making it worse, Benjamin." Lilian's voice sounds from the other end of the room as she phases through the ceiling and strikes the ground. "No matter how much you reverse time, you can't reverse a tale. Haven't you heard that one by now? What about this saves Ayin from dying? No death, but the fact that he will always be a dead man?!"     'It may be too late, but I have to fight for him. I have to. Otherwise, I'd be giving up too easily.'     "It's never too late, and, I'm not going to lose." The words hang far apart, then clutter together as Lilian suddenly rushes towards Hokma at double speed, the lethal surprise swing of Night Mist up from her knee through hip hip and throat dramatically overshooting and clipping his suit instead. She overextends forward, nearly topples, then throws all of her weight up on one toe to spark-skid on smooth armour against Architecture's floor, turning like a figure skater to adjust. She breathes out as if holding down a retch, then redoubles her focused glare, fingers tensing up around the hilt of her sword.     "And I don't mean 'give up; leave him to die'. If betraying everyone here was what it took to save Tamamo, I'd do it!" Lilian shouts. "But did you really think I'd treat what you're doing like such a noble goal? How many times in my life do you think that I'd give anything to go back, Benjamin? Are you going to tell me that the only way to have more time is to get it back? That's the best you could think of?! Fuck you!"     'I'd do anything to save them.'     "Then do something else. Not this one-shot, gave-it-your-best, doomed-to-fail noble resistance. I don't see you saving Ayin; just assuaging your own guilt by pretending you did your best."     'Even if it means never leaving the past behind.'     "Because you've already fucking failed. The past is long gone. No matter how many times you redo it, the way you felt back then gets a little dimmer, and the memories you had rot in the ground just a little more. It's already long behind you, Benjamin; and it's slipping through your fingers even now, while you dick around pining over it."
Lilian Rook	Lilian has spent as little time in Architecture as anyone else. She's spoken to Hokma only a middling amount. She'd obviously been dreading his meltdown, to those who know how to see the signs, but the strange vehemence, the projection of almost-hatred she spits the words with, feels unusually out of scope, even for her. "The way you're going is nothing more than gangrene. All you'll have is a bigger hole in your soul, and less and less of what you're fighting for, until there comes the loop where you never see Ayin again. No matter how well you mean, how much you're willing to sacrifice . . ."     Lilian blitzes at Hokma while the current timestate lasts-- or rather, anticipating another switch-up, she already crossed half the distance and put what must be a score of overlapping slashes on him. She exhales at just the right pace, and coughs luminous breath-fog and a drip-drop of blood. She still turns to face him again, just as angry as before.     "Do you think anyone cares? The world doesn't give a shit if you 'did your best'; only if you did what worked. Throwing it all away buys you 'fuck your feelings, nothing changes and it's like you did nothing at all'; you'd know that if you talked to your 'friends', so if you can't accept reality's demands instead of hiding from them behind feelings, then Ayin has no one fighting for him at all."
Angela	Tennant listens to Petra carefully. "Well...I'm sure I've mentioned The Lady before. But! Rest assured... She was right in my heart the whole time." They stall a moment, though, at the idea that Hokma's been dead, actually, already. For a long time. Ultimately, Tennant has to admit that Petra is right. "Woops. I might get punished later."Tennant says before being called...Gasp!...a footnote! "Ahahaha, well, it is not my job to be whispered about in history, but don't worry. You'll get what you want, right? A free Angela? But I really do think so very highly of the Dame Commander... I'm rooting for you, Petra!" And then they bounce. Tennant is being chased after by Sarracenia. This is possible because Sarracenia is two times speed two. Tennant clucks their tongue, "Still struggling with it huh." Their cheery disposition immediately fades away again. "I outright told you too." Tennant adds. "I'm not an employee of Lobotomy Corp. I'm on loan. So what makes you think I follow their rules?" They swipe with their khopesh for Sarracenia's throat with the practiced ease of one who once did this for a living. The Hammer slams into their armor, jerking Tennant's body around and causing blood to spurt out their nose but they seem to still be making their way to where they want to be. A locker with a number on it. They swipe a card against the scanner and it unlocks as Tennant looks back to Sarracenia again. "I'm not trapped in here with you at all. You're just trapped. But I'll kill you before the doors close." Zi-O arriving is more of a surprise. Tennant blocks the strike for Tennant's wrist with Magic Bullet but Zi-O's strike still snaps Tennatn's wrist back with a sickening CRACK. Tennant reaches back for something in the locker, blocked by their body. "Well sure that's not the norm though. What're you getting at, being better writers? Isn't this me taking my turn at writing a story instead of just blindly listening to the Sephirah who are, lets face it, all more than a little broken? I've got my own people to be retainer to."
Angela	TRAINS "...It has to mean something..." Hokma says, "If it can't mean anything, then it cannot be allowed to come to pass." The problem with slowing down the trains with ice is that they aren't on tracks, but the ice can still definitely clear off flames from the Hell Train that would make gripping it even harder--further supported by Minamitsu's water dousing the rest. The ice on the Denliner starts causing the windows to crack under the sudden temperature change. Hibiki clobbers the train so hard that their forward momentum is arrested once more, allowing Riku to unleash a powerful eruption of force to eradicate both of them in one strike. Or at least that was the idea. The Hell Train, at least, Riku can get that one. The explosion erupts across the Hell Train and it 'derails' off its path before collapsing to the ground and flopping over to its side, skidding to a stop... Minamitsu can get the rest of the flames resulting from the crash in short order. But the Denliner suddenly swerves out of the way, spinning away from Riku's explosion and speeding up even further--rather than trying to catch Hibiki dead on, the Denliner is going to just sideswipe the group, hitting them with the side of its body and then zooming off again to clobber another of the four trying to stop it. Hokma is controlling the train directly but it's also his ticket to resetting reality to the way he wants it--so he's not going to let it be destroyed so easily! But now that there is only one train to contend with, it should be easier to stop.
Angela	HOKMA Meanwhile, the other Agents are doing their best to suppress Abnormalities themselves. They're doing a pretty good job so far. They're the best they've ever been at doing Works and preventing problems and the Manager has only gotten more knowledgeable in where to direct them. They are decidedly not paying much attention to the shenanigans Nazrin's up to or, maybe, they've decided to trust them and not worry about it. They've been working with Welfare, which is nice because that's where they get their broken bodies repaired. They also know through Babble that they still have a friend helping out even now, so that's encouraging. Kukuru tells Hokma that Ayin isn't dying. "He's dying. Tell her, Woz." Hokma says shortly. "There is no path to him living unless I use this pow---ARGGH!" The claw rips through Hokma's back and his grip loosens and allows Kukuru to easily slip away from him. "...Smarter than you look." He murmurs. ''If you couldn't commit to being a good dad, at least commit to being a bad one.'' "No!" Hokma shouts, the silver punching into his chest armor. Hokma hacks and coughs and reaches for the spear and tugs it out, flinging it as far away as he can from Petra. "I know I ran. I couldn't bear the weight of what I'd done. And when I saw she had changed, I couldn't accept it. But I'm not... going to... render my mistakes eternal." He swings a sharp swipe with the Price of Silence EGO at Petra. " Twelve shifts of the hand..." Hokma murmurs. Every time the Scythe connects, the hand on that clock shifts. It's now at '3'. It's probably not going to be a good thing if it reaches twelve. Hokma raises the scythe to take another swipe at Petra before a slew of question marks slam into his face. He might be wearing a Kamen Rider outfit, but he does not know the full weight of what that means. The full weight means getting the shit beaten out of him by question marks. That's what it means. Hokma smashes down the polearm with the scythe but he's relying on the suit more than training. He's not a warrior and is using his temporal control to adjust things to make it a little easier for him. ''I will be Kamen Rider to you--'' "I..." Hokma cannot help but be touched. ''Now you will do the same.'' "...If I lose... I have to... I have to accept it all. But it has to mean something, it cannot amount to nothing, not even a Seed..."
Angela	HOKMA...PART 2 Even Tennant can't see how well they're harassing Lilian but that's fine. Their goal isn't to win this fight--though they'll be happy if they can tear Sarracenia apart first. Increasingly unlikely and they've been lured away from Hokma and they are gonna have a time of it getting back. ''No matter how much you reverse time, you can't reverse a tale.'' Benjamin is startled. Usually that isn't thrown back into his face. "...Hubert...He would say that all the time and Ayin eventually made it into a mantra. A warning about the limits of temporal manipulation, and a challenge to all those who dabble into temporal manipulation. I'll always know, but so long as he lives..." ''But the fact that he will always be a dead man!'' "...!!" Hokma has no words to answer that but the jolt upward of his shoulders tells plenty a tale. Some part of him know that it's true. He is not a warrior. Even with time working against Lilian, she outmatches him. A thick carve of Night Mist tears open the armor and sends Hokma crashing back against a pillar which cracks and then crumbles against the force of it. He'd have been torn to nothing if not for the Den-O armor. As it is, he's still badly wounded. Another flurry of strikes rips through Hokma. The broken form of Hokma lays there. He reaches forward and... "...this...wasn't for him...?" He murmurs. Angela's voice pipes in on the comms, then. "Something is wrong. The Seed of Light's progression hasn't moved one inch. This... Is not about Ayin. Or even me. Or it surely would've moved by now. What am I missing...? Shit, we're running out of time. If he calms down the facility will reset without him." And that's when the twist in time is revealed. "Ah... See, I had a feeling this would happen." Tennant says over the comms. They're still with Sougo but Tennant holds up a finger as if to say 'time out'. Apparently they figure the Demon King will actually...obey a 'time out'. "See, Benjamin didn't run away because of Angela, you know? Oh he thinks it's all about his family drama but..." "...Stop..." Hokma murmurs tonelessly. "Sorry! I promised the Lady! And you! Sorry Ben, I know how ''I'' feel about it, but I know ''you'' consider them to be unforgivable crimes." Tennant chirps. "Don't you think it's time to face your actions during the Smoke War?" As soon as Tennant says this to Hokma, the Enkephalin readings suddenly spike, a faint green glow starts filling the facility. Angela, over comms, murmurs that the Seed of Light is starting to generate as smoke starts filling the facility, starting at the lower levels of the facility and moving upwards. "Okay, Time out over." Tennant says, swinging with Magic Bullet towards Sougo but it's just to distract him so they can finally pull out a black and golden mask from their locker and slap it around their head. It is emblazoned with an eye of horus in its center and it thrums with power as it energizes around them. They pop one more Magic Bullet series off, sending bullets, stray fire punching through the smoke towards those on Hokma but Tennant seeks to use the growing cover of smoke to slip away.
Riku Asakura	Ultraman Geed was on his last footing.  Even with the destruction of the Hell Train, the Denliner was still a threat.  Geed had pushed himself too hard, and the jewel on his chest started blinking red.  He groans with effort as the Denliner comes in again, smashing through the area and forcing Geed to the ground with another shower of sparks.   When the train comes back around, Geed swings his hand through the air, creating a few blades of light aiming to try and catch the train off guard.  They slice through, but is hardly enough to take the massive train down.  When it side-swipes them though, it's more than enough to send Geed falling to the ground.   This is when the magic fades.  There is a blue light that fades from Geed and on the ground Riku is left groaning on the ground, unable to fight anymore.  There are cuts along his face and arms, indicating battle damage from what just transpired, but not full-on broken bones, though he's likely to have massive bruising under his clothing.
Timespace Riders	He's dying. Tell her, Woz.      "In every future where the project is finished, it costs Ayin his life," Woz says to Kukuru. "I do not expect you to accept that; I only wish you to know that Hokma is not without reason to say as much."     "But," he says, "You *are* without reason to believe the project's completion would have no meaning. It has an abundance--a sunrise, shared together, after one thousand years of darkness endured. Indeed, one may read the same page a hundred times, a thousand, and find their understanding irrevocably altered by the first sentence of the next. What is that, if not meaning?"     Lilian's strike sends Hokma flying. Woz lifts the Jikan Despear and makes to move in for a strike on a grounded opponent, but his finger stops short of the touchscreen when Angela reveals the issue. Something is wrong. The Seed of Light's progression hasn't moved one inch. See, I had a feeling this would happen.     "Explain." Woz says it without taking his attention off of Hokma, even if he's talking to Tennant.     In the fight with Hokma, Zi-O does indeed lower his sword. He is the type to honor a time-out! Don't you think it's time to face your actions during the Smoke War?     Of course. 'Meaning.' Why else fixate on it, if not as a justification for what has happened? 'Meaning may blunt the fangs of that black time.'     If Hokma calms down too much, the meltdown will fail. Woz, Kamen Rider to those who toils in vain, fights for Hokma in the way he does best--by fighting Hokma directly.     The crooked head of the Jikan Despear catches the hauberk of the prone Sephira's armor, lifting him forcefull onto his feet. "Do you want meaning? Then bare your feelings, or every lash and barb of this wretched place will have been for nothing. 'Face the fear,'" demands Woz, corralling Hokma into a standing roundhouse. "'Build the future.' Or shall I read a passage from the book for all to hear?" 'This guy needs to be upset over personal baggage' is a challenge several people here are well-suited to; Woz is assuredly one of them.     Zi-O is struck dead-on by Tennant's blasts of fire--it doesn't look like he tried to predict them, either, and with Tennant being so courteous as to announce the time-out being over, it really only leaves the possibility that it was intentionally done to give them a headstart and allow the Meltdown to proceed apace.     Getting up from the floor, Zi-O charges after Tennant, the smoke billowing around him before his red armor is wholly occluded by the thick black cloud.
Timespace Riders	"At last," Woz says, as the smoke begins to fill the room. Tennant's fireballs hit him directly, for the fact that he has neither precognitive ability nor a read on where they are. Still, knocked over by the surprise attack, and winded from the fight, there is a note of satisfaction beneath the exertion.      "We arrive."
Sarracenia	'I outright told you too. I'm not an employee of Lobotomy Corp. I'm on loan. So what makes you think I follow their rules?'      "...did you tell me that?" Sarra says, then hmms. "I suppose so. But, if you are contracted to a company, you should still-"      Tennant swings that Khopesh, and...Sarra barely has time to make a surprised squeak as it cuts cleanly through her windpipe and causes quite a bit of blood to escape. Sarra grips at the wound desperately, eyes wide in surprise. She falls to her knees as strength quickly leaves her body, then fumbles for one of her green mushrooms and forces it into her mouth. The wound closes enough that Sarra is not in danger of dying, but she still holds a hand there and weakly backs away from Tennant even while leveling a glare at them.      But, she doesn't have strength left to keep fighting right now. She has to watch as Zi-O is left to handle Tennant. Somewhat fortunately for Sarra, Tennant puts on the mask and smoke starts filling the room. Sarra manages to get back to her feet. "What is this smoke?" she gasps out, then mmphs and downs another green mushroom. "Arrive where...?"
Hibiki Tachibana	The Express Train getting caught up in the wash of their attacks is great news. Seeing it get bowled over so it won't potentially slip off to go harass the others dealing with Hokma directly is a relief - to say nothing of what more havoc it could've caused ramming through the facility at various angles.     ...But the Denliner isn't quite so easy to get, the speedy sideswipe actually catching her off her guard in the double-speed world they're all living in, with her entirely failing to react in time. Brightly colored metal smashes straight into her and bowls her off her feet, sending her into a wall hard enough to leave a Hibiki-shaped indent in the solid surface.     Which she promptly falls out of, hitting the ground a few feet below on her hands and knees, head spinning. "...Ngh... if that thing is part of what'll make doing this possible..." Hibiki inhales sharply past the fabric of her scarf, slowly pushing herself back to a slightly shaky stand.     Before clenching her right fist and rearing it back once more, the still-steam exhuming piston housed within her half-cylinder gauntlet priming itself back for the second time. She takes a few seconds in the sped-up time, watching the controlled train's movements and Elite-bashing drifts across the way. Actually taking a moment to get used to her skewed senses.     Letting Hokma do as he pleases might undo some of the suffering, the awful things that've happened at Lobotomy Corporation. That's true. But if it also means the project was for nothing-- that Hod and the rest of the Sephirah will also have their steps into the future undone, that Angela might too...     The finisher to her sentence is nothing if not predictable.     "--I'll just have to punch it to bits!!"     Knees bend - and then she blitzes down the Denliner in a burst of forward speed. Not head-on, as she's done every time before. This time, she makes the somewhat more intelligent decision of waiting for it to commit to another attempt to bash the whole lot of them, and then crashing into it with all her might from the /side/.     Much more effective when it comes to the one-two of an already powerful strike, followed right up with her Symphogear's machinery slamming back into place to add the destructive shockwave right behind it - fully intending to do her part in knocking the time-tripping train onto its side and 'derailing' it.     ...Well, if anything got rewound here, she'd hope it'd be just how much of the underground building has gotten leveled by these things...
Kukuru	" "I will be Kamen Rider to you, and to Angela, regardless of this battle's outcome." "True!" Kukuru calls out to Woz without missing a beat, feeling a light skip in her heart at seeing one of her beloved family members coming to join her. Her usual gentle smile returns when he confirms the right answer to that question, and she turns her attention back to Hokma for his heartfelt answer that tells her quite a bit more about his drive to succeed here even in this... She's still not fully sure what Hokma's end goal is here. He even raises more questions than he answers, too, after insisting that Ayin is dying somehow. "Eh? Why would Woz know about...? Oh! The... Book, riiight?" She looks over at Woz on cue, raising in eyebrow in confusion as though he really might be able to shed some light on whatever it is she's clearly missing in this that Hokma and Woz allegedly already knows about. "...Smarter than you look." "But it has to mean something, it cannot amount to nothing, not even a Seed..." Even in the middle of all this bloodshed (much of it her own), Kukuru still manages to smile brightly at Hokma. "Even though we're fighting, you still know how to say such sweet things. All of this... Pain you and everyone's gone through. All the work, all this time, it can amount to... No, it already has, Hokma. These Meltdowns happen because they gotta, so you could all find... Something with meaning inside everything that's happened since you started, right?" Kukuru clutches a hand against her chest as she forces her nanites to keep all that blood in, then coughs into her sleeve before continuing. "I'm not gonna pretend that I really get all of what everyone's gone through, or... Even half of it, really. You've all been around so much longer than I have, but I've seen you all change for the better ever since I first saw you. You've seen it, too, haven't you?" "Everyone's happier. You should be, too, so..." "In every future where the project is finished, it costs Ayin his life," So that's why Hokma was so desperate to save Ayin from this. "Even with... My powers? And everyone else's power here?" She frowns slightly as she reconsiders how to even approach this in a way that won't hurt Hokma more. It's not like it's ever easy to accept the death of a close friend or family member, but to know that there's no way to go forward without that happening... It's a lot harder to figure out how to reassure Hokma with that in her head. "Something is wrong." "If he calms down the facility will reset without him." Wait. Has Kukuru actually been screwing things up by trying to reassure Hokma through this fight? She picks up the pace a little as she hurries over to Hokma, standing besides Woz and putting on her sternest frown. "If it wasn't about Ayin before, then make it about him now. You can't change the past, so change the future. You owe him that much, don't youJust... If going backwards to save him doesn't work, then just go forwards and find some other way." "Don't you think it's time to face your actions during the Smoke War?" This isn't how a Meltdown is supposed to go. The Meltdown is, ultimately, supposed to result in Sephirah it's centered on recovering from something. Hokma should be happier about this, right? Everyone should be happier, if they're still alive. "Angie?  Is this... This isn't good, is it? Is there a fire? No, this smoke feels... Wrong." As she says that, she gets shot right in the chest and chokes down another hoarse yell, slumping against a wall to steady herself and smacking the burning spot with her sleeve several times until her nanites compensate enough to absorb the damage. "Gh... Not like a regular fire, but something worse. What did Tennant do?" She looks over at Hokma, then stumbles over to check up on/start patching up the Elites present while hoping for some kind of good answer from Angela that she isn't even remotely expecting to hear.
UFO Gang	UP IN THE EMPTY CHAMBER - "... I must also chastise you." The room fills with a subtle moonlight as the sphere in the center of the Jeweled Pagoda glows. Nazrin's jaw drops and she feels her knees wobble. Shou scoops up the Jeweled Pagoda, holding it and turning to face Nazrin. "With this, it is true that our way to liberate Hijiri is clear, though the journey will not be a short one," Shou says. "And I do not scorn you for your words, for I know that they are well met. And yet." https://youtu.be/w_hnJNnKZz0?si=mDyfcq2tMFTkHreh&t=190 "We have been among these people for months. Perhaps your occupations have kept you from speaking to them... but in the time I have counselled others, heard their sorrows, I have seen into the hearts of the people of this Corporation. They are bound by suffering, as we are; all have experienced birth, and all fear aging, sickness, death. Were we so different, when Hijiri looked upon us?" The moonlight is growing brighter. "Would you have us flee, now, in their hour of greatest need? To pluck this treasure from their vaults and then to leave them all - Nonon, Petra, Bongbong, Kukuru, Miss Angela herself, myriad others - to leave them to face this foe? Alone, unaided? Even if they should prevail, will it truly be the liberation that we seek in each moment of unclouded awareness?" The light is that of a fast-approaching dawn. Shou has closed her eyes at this point. "I have not waited a thousand years, Nazrin, to greet Hijiri with the taste of treachery in my mouth!" The sun has risen in that storage room, glittering on the myriad precious gems that scatter the earth - not recently gleaned, for the jewel collection detail only came in the immediate aftermath of a confirmed energy discharge. Shou's voice raises. "Unsought and delivered into my hands, I will not dishonor Bishamonten's pledge of trust with cowardice!" The gems begin to rise in the false but holy dawn, glittering. Nazrin, who has at this point fallen to her knees while her lip quivered and her eyes watered, raises her arms as if to shield herself, for the gems are also moving - beginning a slow and stately orbit, coruscating in the light! "I shall greet Hijiri in this life or the next, and I shall speak with pride of what we have done, in thanks for the kindness we were shown!" Shou *actually roars*, even as she raises up her staff and strikes it on the ground with a great clatter for emphasis! The gems move in a stately tumbling orbit; sometimes they glide and bump against each other, but not often. "Nazrin! Of you I have only two more boons to beg," Shou continues, her voice still with that strange tigery cast. Or maybe not so strange, really. "For the first -- I am an imperfect avatar, only trained for a mere thousand years, and I stand against Time and Karma itself, trusting only in the powers of the primordial vows of the bodhisattvas. If I fail, plead with Bishamonten to look favorably upon this suffering world! And for the second --" The gems stop their tumbling, rising into a glittering mandala shape. "Point me... to where they are in their greatest need." Nazrin, trembling, orients her dowsing rods -- and they do not take long at all to find the way. Shou smiles at Nazrin then, and advises her: "Cover your eyes." The room is filled with light.
UFO Gang	There is a rumble, probably absorbed by the trains. There is a louder noise - a third train? And then there's a little glowing spot on the roof that soon spreads and smoulders before expanding for a moment like a concrete-and-iron popcorn kernel before erupting into a sudden day-bright column of light that /certainly/ wings one of the trains before fading out into a glitter of light. No: a glitter of gems. A couple of handfuls of gorgeous and perfectly-cut gems roll through the hole just made. Minamitsu looks upwards towards the source of that -- which is when the Denliner swats her in the body! She is clobbered to the ground again, skidding out and sprawling for a moment even as the recently-created hole admits the levitating Shou Toramaru. Shou has, historically, been the boring and quiet one. Minamitsu has water powers and is upbeat. Ichirin is like a cheerful older sister. Nazrin has mouse ears. They all have their charms. Shou just stood in the back with her old-fashioned outfits and smiled. She's still smiling now, but she has an object in her hand. "Thus I have heard," she says. "The past is already gone. The future is not yet here. There is - excuse me -" A sudden sizzling scream of light erupts from the Jeweled Pagoda in her palm, arcing to storm down against the Denliner, a shotgun-blast to add some force to Hibiki's ultimate time-travel-train derailleur strike! Shou resumes: "There is only one moment for you to live, and that is the present moment." Shou smiles towards Hokma. Then her head half-turns. She frowns as she hears, distantly, the words of Tennant. After that, Shou looks towards Kukuru - ancient wisdom too says to look for the helpers. "Alas, that I am too late, I fear."
Petra Soroka	"There is no path to him living unless I use this pow--"     Petra sure hopes there isn't. From a long time ago, she promised Angela that she'd kill Ayin the moment that he wasn't parasitically tethering his life to Angela's through the Seed of Light, and she wasn't planning on giving that up. Unlike with Hod, or Gebura, or even Netzach, it's impossible for Petra to serve any kind of emotional function in connecting with Hokma here, because it's her own hands that guarantee Hokma's desperation.     If anything, it's reassuring to hear that Woz's book told him that. It means there's no way that Ayin is weaseling out of this one. Petra shoots him a thumbs-up on the side. "And when I saw she had changed, I couldn't accept it. But I'm not... going to... render my mistakes eternal."     "Oh, *wow*," Egged on by Angela saying that Hokma's Meltdown so far hasn't been sufficiently emotional, Petra twists the knife in the best way she knows how: by uncorking the contempt within her heart and letting it poison her voice with a mockingly sarcastic miasma. Adding injury to insult, Petra sets aside her arsenal of weaponry to directly contest her suit's strength against Hokma's by wrenching his arm back, because every adult man loves to be overpowered by a girl.     "So this is *all* for *her*, is it? You're so poor and *misunderstood*, you're just trying to make up for all the terrible mistakes you made with raising your *only daughter*. Gosh, I should've known. What else could this midlife crisis of a Meltdown be about? Certainly not your own waning autonomy and lack of purpose after alienating everyone who ever could've been close to you while you start coming to terms with spending the little bit of your life left alone, right?" Petra risks getting smacked by Hokma's scythe just to bend over and lean in, pointing a gauntleted finger at Hokma's suit's abdomen. "Woah, are those abs *stenciled* on?" "...this...wasn't for him...?"     "You're such a fucking worm." Petra turns away from Hokma when he falls down, and her suit vanishes in a firework of black and silver. "If you'd wanted to do better by Ange-- fuck, even better by your shithead fucking old man boyfriend-- you could've started a year and a half ago. Plenty of other people learned how to be good to Angela in that time. If you'd just started when it mattered instead of waiting for your shining fucking dramatic moment then maybe it'd be different. Add that fucking mistake to the pile." "See, Benjamin didn't run away because of Angela, you know? Oh he thinks it's all about his family drama but..."     Yeah. There was no real way Hokma cared about Angela that much. It's impossible for someone to 'come around' on loving their children, instead of finding them a convenient smokescreen for deflecting from processing a different issue of theirs for a while.     Petra looks up at the speakers and mumbles to herself, faced away from Hokma. "So what is it...?" "Don't you think it's time to face your actions during the Smoke War?"     "... Oh. Fuck you, Tennant." For being right, both about being necessary for Angela's freedom, and their indignation about being a footnote.
Lilian Rook	'...Hubert...He would say that all the time and Ayin eventually made it into a mantra. A warning about the limits of temporal manipulation'     "So are you going to listen, or are you going to plug your ears and pretend the tale gives a shit about what you want it to be?!"     '...this...wasn't for him...?'     ". . ."     Even Lilian has to pause a while. She thinks the words, then says then a moment later. "I don't feel like it's my place to say whether it was or wasn't. But at the very least, it isn't helping him." Her sword remains by her side, but she doesn't move to release it at all. Taking him down felt too easy. She can't help but feel like the fight in him must still be somewhere else, if it's not here. "The difference between you and I; Yuri and Gebura, Enoch and Carmen, the helpless ones the City devours and the ones who pay the price and somehow muddle on through to where they need to be; it's that when we get our one big break, we use it try something impossible."     "Doing the obvious, sensible thing, retreading the obvious you've thought over a million times, and accepting the compromise; that's why you'll never get anything."     'Okay, Time out over.'     And she was just starting to let down her guard.     "You fucking rat!" Lilian screams at the intercom with a shocking level of vitriol. She'd never gotten along badly with Tennant at all; it could even be said that she trusted them more than most of the Agents. That they're a soldier and not another hapless employee is something she knows, too. If you're looking closely, her temper reaches at explosion at the moment she sees that mask.     The last several shots stop her from approaching. If the bullets are coming from every direction, she's forced to stand her ground and defend herself from them. Insisting on pushing forward through the spark shower is what costs her a rifle shot to the back and puts a staggering gasp in her pace the moment she lets down her sword. She forces herself to stifle down the sound until the pain fully diffuses, then stomps forward with a roar stifled between her teeth, reflexive gut-stab anger slowly being crushed down into cold and hard fury.     "Haven't I made myself clear what I think about you people?! You're not escaping from me!"
Angela	Through the smoke you can hear the sound of... Gunfire. Plenty of it. Despite fighting Tennant for so long, it is of a different flavor than the dark flame expelled from the Magic Bullet. More normal. And that's strange. Bullets are terribly expensive in The City. What sort of situation in The City would call forth this level of gunfire? It's even more prevalent than when the Rabbits come in blasting. BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KawV_oK6lIc&ab_channel=Mili And through the comms, and cameras, Angela hears Shou indicate she is not the sort of person to be treacherous and flee. In truth, Angela would have been fine with them taking what they wanted and fleeing but Shou, despite still being a stranger and--essentially--pulled into this scenario barely knowing half of the details and still staying in such a dangerous scenario? Angela will remember that even if she does not comment on it. She knows she can never repay that kind of honor in kind, but if what they seek is what they need--the least she can do is not stop them from taking it or interfere. Even as Riku goes down for the count, he can get a good look as his help earlier leads Hibiki and Shou's team up to punch through the head of the Denliner. And then Hibiki just keeps on slamming her fists through the train until it shatters around her. First the windows explode out from the bullet train and then, like superman, it punches up in the air as the train meets a fist stronger than its hull and flips over Hibiki, spinning the the air and crashing down to the floor behind her before, of course, it explodes! Whether or not Hibiki and Shou are looking at it.
Angela	There is no going back anymore. Hokma can only endure the verbal abuse. He's no longer sure of even the basics of what he thought his goals were. He looked towards the past and embraced it--those happier times--but there's no going back anymore. Face the Fear. Build the Future. Hokma's armor fades and his body transmogrifies once more. Not into his Sephirah form. But to Benjamin. Unlike Hokma's cognition filtered form, he's actually a young man like this. Even if it was twenty odd years ago, he wouldn't actually be quite as old as the cognition filter paints him as. "...Yes... I should have started when it mattered. And it mattered even before Angela was born. Those concessions I made against being an honorable man, all for the sake of our goal..." Hokma says softly. "We thought we could pay the price. We thought we could make others pay our price. So I held my tongue, despite my disquiet... But..." "There is always a Price of Silence" And this isn't helping Ayin either, Lilian explains. Not him or anyone. He was such a fool to think that he could retell the tale. That he could build a future in the past. And he can't be forgiven. He shouldn't be forgiven. He doesn't want to be forgiven. But if it could mean something... Lilian explodes in fury and Hokma says, "Wait...Wait! It's my fault...! Don't hurt them--" But Tennant isn't the one that's in danger. Now that they are masked, they are invincible once more. Even if they are crushed to pieces and are wholly slain. Everything. EVERYTHING for the Lady.
Angela	Tennant's expression is impossible to read behind the mask, but the tone of their voice is hurt. "But... I'm just trying to help, Dame Commander." They lower their rifle. "Your scorn...it hurts... From you it hurts, Dame Commander. Hokma was being healed with talks with Father Lucius. The Father nearly repaired their relationship! Hokma was on the fence, but if he grew naturally without the Meltdown... Lady Angela would be stuck here forever. And if you beat Hokma too quickly, we wouldn't have had the Cogito reaction necessary to bring us to the point that would really feed The Seed... Isn't that right, Lady Angela? I was helpful, right?" Angela is quiet for a long time over the comms but eventually she admits, "...Yes, but you should have worked with us instead of acting like a spy." "But..." Tennant says. "I ''am'' a spy. I was even known to be a spy, at least Benjamin knew." Tennant's voice is nearly a whine. "...Look this is my last day here. 'After Benjamin's role is over', I get to return to The Lady... But I really enjoyed my time with all of you, I really did. It was like.... Being with my comrades once more. And now, thanks to you, I get to go home." You can hear Tennant's smile. "So thank you, really--THANK you from the bottom of my heart. I hope that we can work together to make The City a better place... But right now..." The sound of gunfire grows larger. The smoke grows thicker. Tennant vanishes into the smoke as does Benjamin. The sounds of war grow louder... And... Sarracenia and Sougo find themselves... in a house. Despite being a house, it is still enshrouded in that same smoke. The sound of war is not far from it either. A small child is sitting at a piano, wearing a dress they are visibly uncomfortable in. The black hair and eye color remind you of who they are. Lurking nearby, Tennant says, "Oh gosh. I guess... I resonated with the Cogito as well. This is so embarrassing..." They sigh. "Well, perhaps not so much. This is a good day, Sougo, you'll see. Sarracenia, you'll understand, right?" But elsewhere in the facility, The Smoke War rages on. A war that cannot be forgotten. A war that must not be remembered.