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Owner	Pose
Tamamo	'Yeah. You're Fenrir's.'     "Fenrir?" That name gives Tamamo pause. "Oh, yes, you called my Lilian that. I wonder, why do you only use the name made for her by those who wish to harm her? If you wished me to know of whom you spoke, you would have used a name I was sure to know."     She has time to talk while Ash crashes through the traps and marks the rooms. It's not the worst way to deal with a maze, though it is the costliest in everything but time. There's not even a time duration on the curses. Permanent blindness would make the rest of the run pretty difficult, but Tamamo completely leaves that up to Ash to deal with, and isn't disappointed. The variety of weaknesses include everything but magic to silence and deafen.     They couldn't have a conversation then, after all! And Tamamo could always cure everything, to let the run continue, if asked.     She knows she won't be.     "Or was it other than those men who came up with such a name? It is only my guess, of course. Deciding on another's name, like this... and a dog, really? " She laughs. "To make her into what they need, and decide for her her role. An attempt at control, no?"     'Got you.'     "Until next time."     She's out of time, even with so much left to say.
Tamamo	HEALING ZONE:     As another game zone, there's some superfluous and nonfunctional items, here. As something directed in its creation by Tamamo, the merely artistic portion was considered a necessity. It's hard to say whether it's more 'modern' or 'traditional,' as that's all a matter of perspective, in the first place, but it would be very familiar to certain Japans.     There are several rooms, though the largest area is of several conjoined areas, with a mixture of high-backed and low-set chairs and cushions. There are ping-pong tables across to one side and a sparse kitchenette to another. What appears to be an instant coffee maker only serves varieties of teas and cocoa, selected from a cabinet of pouches to its side. There's an onsen visible through one set of windows, more backdrop than main attraction, as Tamamo is doing all of her healing work in the main area, where she's set out a portable medicine cabinet made of many little drawers, and designated a space of floor for preparing medicines. There are tables apart from ping-pong, too, but she's more comfortable sitting on a cushion.     The vending machine near the doors to the (still within the zone) outside is mostly stocked with mysterious milk-yogurt items. Their labels claim many health benefits.
Arthur Lowell	ALPHA CAELI > Arthur: Endure the hell that is the inverse role     The fact that Arthur Lowell's ultra-high-complexity gamescape has managed to defeat Ash several times doesn't mean that he isn't burnt the hell out, and pretty beat up on the regular. It's, I mean, it's bullets and beatings, what else can he do? Well, as the loop persists, he progresses plenty.     On a future defeat...     "Dammit. That naked power again. Only so far I can go. Hahaha. What'd they fuckin' call... ugh. Online, politics, bullshit. 'Materialism?'" He coughs, laying wounded after another bout with Ash. "It's about about practical stuff, huh? That's *important*. You know it's *important*. It's real. No magic circle is ever gonna be more magic than that. But it's..." He sighs. He leans back, his body starting to drift away. "It's not fair, Ash. It's real, it's true, but it's not fair. Don't you wish, somewhere, that it was *fair*, *really fair*? That the lines were clear and your teams were even? That you could have everything you want, if you were just good enough, instead of..." He's off the ground, floating. "Instead of settling for best-you-can-get..."     "'Cuz, I know you wished for something impossible before."     Gone.
Arthur Lowell	HEALING ZONE > Arthur: Heal up     So, as we were saying about the wounding and burnout: It's all post-encounter, and he's always fresh when he deals with Ash. But after Ash? At one point, after his first defeat at Ash's hands, he has in fact shown up in Tamamo's healzone straight-up dead. That, seemingly, hasn't deterred him, because his body with conspicuously ticking like a clock, and after about five minutes and one very concerningly bright burst of light he was...     Alive and still badly wounded. So, thank goodness for Tamamo.     Ya boy is sipping on Yakult in a side-room, watching the healing, gaming between Ash runs and nursing a couple of wounds. "I'm gonna be real." He mutters. "I didn't dress-rehearse this shit and it blows cosmic-style to do in practice. Getting my ass beat in similar-type ways is like..." He gestures with his drink, imploring yogurt to grant him words. "It sucks worse than most fight-types. It's job shit. Mad respect to the real ones keeping the dungeons running."     "...I don't know if this is gonna get to them. I'm gonna be honest, I built the biggest and baddest enrichment sphere I could to let 'em really stretch their legs. And damn," He sighs, wincing as one of his recovering wounds bites at him. "They are *not* wanting to get their ass enriched. It is some pure-ass hate sometimes. They are straight beating my ass in the mindgame, dawg."     He sets his DS aside to rub his face a while. "Shit sucks. I don't like the idea of this just failing and we fallback to my big-ass beam. Anyone else getting headway? *Any* traction? 'Cuz I am *never* gonna understand them." Back to nursing his drink with a big sigh.
Trudy Grimm	> "I can do this all day!"     Skeletons don't slow them down. Traps manage to, in some degree or another. It's obvious that force is met with like force; the shifting nature of the maze itself and the brutal punishments for meddling too hard with it wind up being the biggest hurdles. The witch considers this progress; and how Ash approaches the challenges as presented.     When they give up, she feels somewhat mixed. On one hand, she 'won'. But on the other-- that kind of victory isn't what she was going for.     "Apparently not," Trudy hums to herself when Ash leaves her territory. They really don't seem to like not being in complete control. They don't like to be told 'No' or 'You can't do that'. Just as she had predicted that day she kicked Petra in the face. She wonders, idly, if her suspicion is correct; that NAZCA had poisoned this person's soul from the very start.     She leaves the First Regent in his place at the end of the Grimm Labyrinth and flickers out. HEALING ZONE     When Trudy appears, she wobbles forward and then flops face-first onto one of the floor cushions, arms splayed out. After a few moments, she shifts just enough to tilt her head so that she can see and speak.     "They gave up on my zone. Ah, but I did learn a few things about them. They are all about brutal, unstoppable force. When presented with something that directly punished that solution, they /eventually/ gave up." Eyes closing, the witch hums "It's no wonder, I am personally quite ill-suited to deal with that. But also not exactly equipped to 'convince' either."     She wobbles her head from side to side in thought, "Perhaps I should change my approach... Something more reactive... I want to reward the right realizations, after all."
Angela	Cinder has been feeling a little down on her own abilities as of late since compared to the others, she has a sword that can shoots out fire when she attacks and she was just a clerk until not so long ago. But there's just something about this scenario that really makes Cinder feel like a badass. For one thing, she's not fighting Ash directly which means she doesn't get murdered violently immediately, and for the other, well... ''FUCK you--! I'll--!'' Cinder beams with pride. It's not really out of hatred of Ash or anything like that--and sure, outside of this scenario Cinder would be totally fucked. But right now, in this place, she feels like a superhero and the anxieties of the past melt away. There's stuff even she can do. Angela, observing the King over video feeds through a video feed, smiles a little as well. This isn't really out of hatred for Ash either, so much as having some pleasure over a plan being effective. Sure, it's straight forward relative to mazes and games, but at least it almost certainly gives Ash a bit of an idea of what it's been like to fight Ash. Angela? Vindictive? Never. Cinder enjoys playing the games with Xion. While they've never, like, exactly hung out after work--she's really been appreciative of her as a friend lately. Even if it's as a work friend. They have engaged in arson together and that means that of all the people in the multiverse, Xion--after Petra--is one of her favorites. She IS willing to sabotage Xion is Uno--not immediately--but after a few days she starts to forget it's not a normal game of Uno. Largely thanks to her seeing Xion as a friend, actually, and friends sometimes sabotage one another in Uno. That's how you play Uno. She's thrilled to be called the Red Comet but she has no idea why she's being called the Red Comet. It sounds cool, though, so she elects to keep that in mind. This will have reprecussions some day far in the future, most certainly. The Breakroom ''It sucks worse than most fight-types.'' "You know," Angela says, still in Eggpack and half-remarking this to Petra as well. "It is a little ironic for me to be participating in what is essentially a time loop that requires a perfect run for Ash in order to escape. I suppose we're all getting a little bit of a taste as to what it is like being me." She smiles villainously and sympathetically at the same time. "It is not nearly as long and it is your plan in the end, so I can only sympathize so far, but I appreciate that you have had a taste of the Angela experience. I'd be glad you are merely getting 'beat up' repeatedly instead of having to iterate for 70,000 loops...but I understand it is still unpleasant." She nods to the Yakult. "What does that taste like?"
Angela	''Any traction?'' "Not particularly. But that is not my role here. My role is to assist Petra in doing so. I shared some words but I do not expect to have the magical dialogue option that convinces Ash here. They and I do not have that kind of relationship. I tried anyway, but that is more because it is proper than out of an expectation of success." Cinder pipes in with a, "Gonna run out of healing bullets eventually. I'm getting a TON of cardio though." Like Eris, Goddess of Discord, she is clearly there to make fights more difficult so Ash doesn't get through the game too quickly.
Petra Soroka	"You know, even if you keep me here forever, they're just going to break me out when Fenrir is done. Right?"     Petra rubs the top of her head where Ash smacked her resentfully, eyes winced half-shut. She nudges the beer can towards them with her knuckles, like she's offering food to a stray cat. She sits cross-legged on the colorless interstitial hub-space, matching Ash's querying expression with her own.     "Would they? Like... say they do beat Lilian, you know, because we're all still holding her back, so she doesn't go all out. Now that you say that, they might just think it'd be less effort to drag a planetoid over to some holding cell, rather than risk you flipping on them for Lilian. I mean, to them, once a... 'Bloom', always a 'Bloom'." Obviously, that word's just standing in for the one they both know fits better. "After Lilian, it's not like there's another threat they'd need you for, anyways." "I knew you were the least uncool one."     It's a different sort of feeling from being praised by Lilian. Less brainmelting and condition-tempering into seeking more praise, more reassuringly comforting for a job well done. Ash *is* someone important, and Petra *likes* them, so having that like-- in whatever form it takes-- reciprocated, elicits the simple puppylike joy of successful friendship.     "W-well-- I'm not a traitor. If I fell in rank with all the others and just smugly smacked you around because we're somewhere you can't win as easily, *then* I'd be betraying Lilian. No. I'm not betraying anyone. Good luck." "You do this?"     "Nah, what the hell?"     Petra scrambles over to investigate the swords along with Ash, clearly not a good enough actress to feign the interest in her own eyes. "Maybe it's got something to do with what Lilian's doing outside?" §--er been good at telling people apart. . .§)]     The telepathic projection breaks against Petra's aura for just a moment, before Flamel's mental readjustment kicks in and holds space in her mind for her to listen. Voice of the Tempered: Wait, wait, we have to clean up in here! Hurry up! It's Lilian! Voice of the Pure: Jesus fucking Christ, fine, fine. She's not even actually here. Voice of the Tempered: But it's *about* her! So we have to listen!     Petra smacks the side of her head irritatedly, and her aura winks out of existence. "Oh. This *is* something I know about her, but..." She looks over at the other swords, with their higher costs and more tantalizing phrases, a little unwholesomely. "Little aspects of her feelings...?" Well, they won't get any pushback from Petra there.
Petra Soroka	HEALING ZONE     Petra is at the healing zone, despite being uninjured. Relatively. A thwack to the head hurts even when it's done out of the context of combat, but because it was a wound received superfluously, Petra doesn't request any healing-- mostly because Tamamo is scary, and busy. She sits, surprisingly politely, on one of the cushions further away from the center, Eggpack placed on the chair to her side, while sipping some hot cocoa. "Getting my ass beat in similar-type ways is like..."     "Damn. Sucks being an early stage." Petra takes a sip, side-eyeing Arthur's tutorial-boss-looking-ass. "They haven't gotten to mine yet. But I did run into them, a bit." "Anyone else getting headway? *Any* traction?"     "... I will. I'll manage it somehow. But, so far... it's not been much for convincing them to Lilian; just, uh, other stuff."     Petra shifts her position on the cushion, folding her knees beneath herself. "I don't really know what any of you all could do. I'm, not really good at whatever style of reaching someone you guys have. So I don't think I can give any advice. But... they're not, like, hopeless. Arthur." "It is a little ironic for me to be participating in what is essentially a time loop that requires a perfect run for Ash in order to escape."     Quietly, Petra files that down in a mental folder for 'Angela's video game preferences'. It's a folder that has never been necessary to draw on, but there's a surprising number of minefields located within it.     "Yeah. You know, it kind of is like that, actually." Petra hesitates, a little nervous, and fiddles with the edge of her cup while shooting a look at Tamamo. "So, with that perspective, uh, you know the worst part is repeating it all alone. Doing it alone makes each run not matter at all, and you stop paying attention to the individual events, right?"     "So, um, I've been helping them, just a little. When they get to me, I'll still fight them, and I'm not letting the plan fail, or anything. But I think it's actually really important that it's not them alone against us, so, I'm doing that."
James Bond	As he'd done before his segment, Bond indulges in a cigarette during his time in Tamamo's healing area. At least, until she comes over to tend to him, at which point he ashes it on the back of his hand and tosses it.     He *had* ventured over to the coffee machine (so he'd thought) only to peruse it and go without. I hate tea.     Once he hated it because in his mind it caused the downfall of the British empire, and because it was a muddy, soft opiate of the masses. Now he only hates it for the latter reasons, and wishes that he was correct in the first assessment. This, he keeps to himself, because he's rather fond of Tamamo. And because of that fondness, rather than any preference for it, he's entertaining a cup of chocolate. They are straight beating my ass in the mindgame, dawg.     "You're giving water to someone who's been conditioned to think it's poison," Bond opines from his high backed chair.     "You don't undo that overnight. The saving grace here is that we're doing this now, and not twenty years from now."     "More than just what their environment has done, there's what they've openly said they're fighting. To them, most of us are noise. We exist to perpetuate the lie of meat, to justify its imperfections after the fact and salt the earth with those justifications, with our noise and clamoring, wherever we go. There isn't any *I,* or any *you.* Just what firing synapses will allow out of our mouths."     He crosses one leg in the other and sips his chocolate.     "And to be honest, I don't even entirely disagree. I still find some of the people we deal with insufferablly incapable of object permanence. Let alone proof of some kind of essential human element. I just don't daydream as often about giving them something genuine to complain about."     "When you've had water and seen for yourself that it isn't poison, gruel seems less appetizing."
Tamamo	'It sucks worse than most fight-types. It's job shit.'     "I, to be certain, do not envy such a role. Though I will do what I may, I think it best I not add more direct confrontation to my schedule. In any case..."     'Anyone else getting headway?'     "They finished my maze, though if I had allowed them to exit it, I suppose they would not have done so. They completed it in the most painful way possible. They do seem to despise being asked for attention, even if it is to avoid tripping over an obvious trap." Tamamo's tone doesn't betray feeling one way or another about this.     She carefully eyes two powders, each on a folded piece of paper, before measuring one into the other. "In a sense, they are making it quite easy for me. You can be sure that I will not be the first to tire, with our arrangements."     'Gonna run out of healing bullets eventually.'     "Should it become a serious concern, please inform me. I will prepare a substitute for you. It may be more difficult to use tools with which you are unfamiliar, but I suppose we could... increase the difficulty posed to our protagonist, to compensate." She has healing items she could share, ofuda for Cinder to sling or slap onto targets, but she has a variety of stat-boosting choices, too. If anything, those are stronger, and the unpredictability might be useful against an opponent who's been given the opportunity to repeatedly observe her.
James Bond	I don't really know what any of you all could do. I'm, not really good at whatever style of reaching someone you guys have.     "I could say the same thing," Bond offers with a nod. "I can't reach them in the way that you can, either, but you can. This is a long-term assignment. If you believe the rest of us have our ways, then piece by piece, we'll reach them."
Xion	There's an art to Xion's little minigame extravagance - and a lot of help she needs from Cinder to make it happen, in the later stages, but the start is establishing a language. The language is 'acceptable violence'. And there is no working up to the pain point: It starts at Struggle bat disintegrating violence and works down from there. So the first time Xion is snapped back to the rest area by Arthur's spirograph seal, it's at velocity. For Ash, the unskippable cutscene of the Struggle Match restart isn't that long even if it is long and a bit dramatic for the introduction tutorial fight. There's no need to pick a path or go over two point eight games of memories, so they go right to the good stuff, but... "Jeez!" Xion grunts, bouncing off the ground in the lounge and sliding to a halt on her back. Taking the longest to recover at the start and being hammered down by any fits of pique it's a rough strategy to go back to smiling. In Tamamo's break room, Xion holds a cup of tea against a bruise on her brow and groans. "I had to *start* with the bats, didn't I?" But, communication is made! Mostly. Up and at it again as soon as she's healed, Xion slides in after being wiped out again, staying longer when there's only fights over draw four cards and 'learning' the latest rules of the games. 'They are straight beating my ass in the mindgame, dawg.' "Arthur, they're supposed to." The noirette comments. "If we just made the messed up realm where we win and they lose that's *just* society again. This is... getting hours, days, *weeks* with someone alone where we couldn't get seconds with them before. We can't just hit them and win. It's... like you said, actually. We have to show why we're real, that we're real - important to Lilian, and maybe important to them." 'You're giving water to someone who's been conditioned to think it's poison,' Nursing her wounds, Xion nods somberly. "James has it exactly. We have to make a breakthrough of trust where it's not expected. We have to make the poison... attractive, I guess. They talk like someone who wishes poison was attractive, so maybe that's the key." She doesn't know, though. > At DDR... "Well..." Xion pants, coat hanging on the backbar, sweat-glistening brow from exertion joined with the slow pant of her breath, standing firm on a song ending <- -> hold that will still not give her enough points to beat Ash after a few tactical drops of her step combo. "I don't know!" Xion laughs, not really thinking about her score or competition for once. "I'm a kind of psychic," True-enough. Feeling hearts and hearing desires was like being psychic enough. "-but, she doesn't communicate that way. I just thought - that she was so interesting, I wanted to learn more. Why?"
Petra Soroka	"There isn't any *I,* or any *you.* Just what firing synapses will allow out of our mouths."     "Well, who can fucking blame them?" Petra mutters, Silver holding up her cup while she flips open her case of healing bullets for Cinder to partway replenish from. "No way in hell any of you are convincing Ash of the inherent fucking goodness of humanity, so don't bother trying. There isn't any. It's about Lilian's value, instead." "If you believe the rest of us have our ways, then piece by piece, we'll reach them."     Petra mulls on that for a fairly long time, staring at the cushion in front of her and looking vaguely like she's been rebuked in some way. She chews on the inside of her lip for a while, then says, not quite as a follow-up directly to what Bond said,     "... I've never actually been in the military. I don't really, um, know what it's like. I've been talking about the ways NAZCA sucks for them in the ways *I* know, but... yeah." Seeing more and more of how NAZCA's affected Ash-- *Ash*, of all people-- makes Petra think that maybe, she could probably do with listening to Bond a little more too. "We have to show why we're real, that we're real - important to Lilian, and maybe important to them."     Petra nods, morphmetal loosely coiling around her while she stares into the surface of her hot cocoa. "Yeah. The Blooms are the most important people in the world. Being second to them, being, like, derivative of them, *is* actually meaningful. As long as it's, um, close 'upwards', instead of close 'downwards'. Dragging her down."     Petra looks up and over at Arthur suddenly. "Hey, Arthur,--" but cuts herself off. She wanted to ask whether he intentionally put those swords there, whether it was something he and Lilian worked out together, but whether or not it is... she doesn't really want to reveal it to the room, anyways. "... Nevermind."
Tamamo	Seeing the cocoa find use, Tamamo mentions, "There are marshmallows in the upper cupboard, next to the sugar." James will, indeed, have to go without coffee. Tamamo's medicine is a far cleaner energizing solution, being the main reason, though she politely allows his smoking to continue. Matters of time scale.     'So, um, I've been helping them, just a little.'     Tamamo gives Petra a look.     'I think it's actually really important that it's not them alone against us, so, I'm doing that.'     The look doesn't particularly soften, but it does pass.     'We have to make a breakthrough of trust where it's not expected.'     "I would be far more surprised were a first attempt to show great progress. Ah, but do not fret. We have, to an extent, and here we must continue, create a situation in which they win by accomplishing that which we wish, rather than by the rules of our previous engagement. I have yet to meet a human that never tires of losing." She doesn't think it's a nice thing to do to someone, trapping them in a timeloop. There'd be qualms if she weren't inflicting this on someone who had tried to kill them all. As is, there are concerns, but of a different variety.
Trudy Grimm	> "So, um, I've been helping them--" "Color me surprised!" Trudy's eyes roll dramatically up and away from Petra, "So when can we expect the betrayal? I'd like to make sure I don't schedule something else over it." She is much less subtle /and/ forgiving compared to Tamamo.     She inhales and holds it, then lets it all out in a drawn-out sigh. > "We have to show why we're real, that we're real - important to Lilian, and maybe important to them."     "That's something useful. Thank you, Xion." She closes her eyes, wobbling her head back and forth again, "Proving my devotion to Lilian isn't enough. It's proving I exist; and that acknowledging I exist is better than pretending I don't."     Shifting, Trudy rolls over on her cushion and drapes her arms off either side, staring at the ceiling, "Assuming Petra doesn't just give Ash the keys to the city to bypass everything without learning a single thing about any of us; I think I know what changes I can implement."
Angela	''I will. I'll manage it somehow.'' Angela nods to Petra. "Yes, my plan is for you to do so." She says, completely unabashed in this. "If there is something you would like me to do that you feel will help, I will do what I can--of course--though I know it is likely difficult to imagine. Still, the offer is on the table." Angela at the very least doesn't seem as troubled with this loop as her own, perhaps because hse is not alone in this particular loop. But when Petra mentions that as a possible reason as to why it would suck for ''Ash'' in this instance, that gives her some pause. "Mm. When you say it like that, I have to admit you are quite correct, Petra. We are doing genuine harm to her by keeping her in this loop, even if we has less of a choice in the matter than we'd like. You being a friend here with he means something, at least." She mulls on this a bit longer and then adds, "But there are differences. We remember what happens between each loop as well, and... We are the ones who are putting her through the loop. Even if we lend her a hand--she knows the only reason she is here is because of ''us''. And that limits how much extending a hand can reach." ''I've been helping them, just a little.'' Angela doesn't seem to mind. "I understand. Perhaps the consistency will pay off." She glances to JAmes Bond for a moment though and considers... "...I wonder if that will be enough, however... Perhaps we need to soften our own approaches in time, not unlike the Meltdowns easing relations between the Sephirah...." ''Should it become a serious concern, please inform me.'' "Oh yeah, we're getting there so I'd appreciate it, Ma'am..." Cinder bobs her head respectfully. ''Then piece by piece, we'll reach them.'' Angela frowns thoughtfully. "How 'bout you, Xion?" Cinder asks. "I've been there with you some of the time but..." ''It's about Lilian's value instead.'' "That is where I focused my own words, as you know." Angela admits. "Yes, perhaps if we can convince them we're important to Lilian... I suppose a strategy like that would be difficult for me to conceive of." She is AWARE that she's important to Lilian, but love and friendship is often a matter of insecurity for the AI. "Perhaps we should try speaking of the ways we have assisted Lilian in the past, moments of joy that have passed between us?" ''So when can we expect the betrayal?'' Without heat, Angela speaks quickly. "You know, Trudy, that it is as much part of the strategy. You have ''met'' me. Do you think it would be helpful to recreate, closely, the sort of circumstances that created me?"
Arthur Lowell	> Arthur: "They are all about brutal, unstoppable force."     "Could'a told you that first time they socked me with that big-ass mecha." Arthur grumbles. "Lucky I got my share of that, but it's hard to compete, you know." He sighs, leans back, taps his foot agitatedly. "But it makes me think that..." He shakes his head. "Well, there's something else that might work. Maybe. Hey, next round lemme borrow Knight, I need to go easy on this ankle for a bit." > Arthur: "It is a little ironic for me to be participating in what is essentially a time loop that requires a perfect run for Ash in order to escape."     "Damn girl, you time-aspected? I don't know what your deal is but that sucks, or is awesome, I guess, depending on your time stuff. Sucks for *me* though. I already went through," He counts on fingers. "One, two... Five time loops? Worst one was for sure the killing-infinite-temporal-copies-of-a-girl-forever one. I fucking *hate* time aspect, dude." He emphasizes to her. There's a nod to Cinder though. "Thanks for some of those saves though. Getting to phase-two their ass is good as hell." > Arthur: "I will. I'll manage it somehow."     "Shit. Well, you say it like that with those three-periods-I-don't-know-what-it's-called at the start, I'm gonna believe you. Your ass is only putting that in the dialogue box when it's real-mode time." He rambles, taking a deep drink of his yogurt-milk. "That's also the reason why I'm not dumpin' some mountain dew on ya head for walking in here while you're going defection-mode, for real. Can you at least challenge 'em with some contests or something? Damn, girl." > Arthur: "You don't undo that overnight."     "I mean, sure, but weeks of timestop is about all I'm gonna get. And I don't know if it's getting anywhere even on the iterations." He lets out a childishly exhausted "bleh" sound. "Least someone's tuning into their frequency. I know I sure can't get that... dead-eye-ass-lookin' no-personhood-perceiving thing going on." >Arthur: "They completed it in the most painful way possible."     "Girl that is *so* fucking Ash." He makes a flustered kind of "nnnnuuuuuuhhhh!" sound. "They're... Look. If you had me putting bets on all of NAZCA and, like, bloodlusted speed-equalized Ash," Where in god's name has he been picking up THAT lingo? "Then it's all Ash all the way. This *looks* easier but only because of the momentum! If they stopped, turned, slugged their bosses in the face -- easier! Way easier!" >Arthur: "Arthur, they're supposed to."     "Yeah, well, I sure hope there's enough of me to goddamn... I dunno, walk away by the time I prove some kind of realness to 'em. That's what the circle's gotta be about, equalizing things in a kind of way." He grumbles, looking around. "But I dunno if I'm about to really dig through the years of a whole lot of not-that. Weeks or no-weeks."
Angela	''Damn girl, you time-aspected?'' "Time cursed, more like it." Angela says which answeres Arthur on whether it sucks or is awesome. And when Arthur says it sucks for him, when he says he had to kill infinite temporal copies of a girl forever, there is a small shift in Angela's gaze--like she's actually looking at Arthur for the first time. She thinks if she knows of nyone who has had to deal with the horror of time powers before and she can't think of anything in the moment. "Yes, I've been..." There's a word she's looking for, a pair of words, combined that perfectly encapsulates her experiences. Ah, she thinks, I've got it! "I've been Stuckhome for quite some time. Perhaps, if Ash does not kill us all, we could talk about it some time?" Cinder, a bit hesitantly after that offer from Angela, says, "This stuff's potent... I'm glad I've been able to lend a hand and, well... I can't say it hasn't been fun ''deploying'' the second phases..."
James Bond	There are marshmallows in the upper cupboard, next to the sugar.     "Thank you, Tamamo. If you like this sort of thing," he says, lifting his mug, "I have a little place in Austria you and Lilian would be more than welcome to visit for the holidays." Assuming Petra doesn't just give Ash the keys to the city to bypass everything without learning a single thing about any of us; I think I know what changes I can implement.     "She won't. That wouldn't be helping Lilian at all. In the entire time I've known her, Petra's been consistent about that." No way in hell any of you are convincing Ash of the inherent fucking goodness of humanity, so don't bother trying.     Bond scoffs--not derisively at Petra, per se; more like she'd told a funny joke. "I can barely convince people of the things I *do* believe in." ... I've never actually been in the military. I don't really, um, know what it's like.     Bond sighs through his nose. "You strike me as someone who knows that the world isn't kind to certain types of people--and that sometimes, it just kills them. Thoughtlessly, and, it'd like to imagine, blamelessly. I can hear it in the way that you talk, the way you see most people and who you choose to defend."     "There are a lot of gullible, directionless people that get picked up by military recruiters. But Ash isn't one of those sorts. If you're smart, young, and isolated, then you're on a different radar."     "If you're all of those *and* a particular kind of angry at the world, you'll do a stint in the military first, to sand down the rough edges and get you ready for where they really want you. And they will. Even if you're as smart as Ash is. Even if you're rebelling in a hundred little ways the whole time. Because the people that survive become the ones at the controls, and once upon a time, they were young, isolated, and a certain kind of angry, too." He takes a sip of cocoa. "That's... not really getting into 'what it's like.' But it's why I chose the approach I did. We can talk about it more later, if you think it'd be helpful in the future for someone else worth the effort of reaching." I know I sure can't get that... dead-eye-ass-lookin' no-personhood-perceiving thing going on.     "That's because any recruiter who pointed you out and didn't have the good sense to defect afterwards would've been shot."
Tamamo	A LATER RUN:     Ash may want to save for Tamamo's stage for last, but that's not how bonus stages work! By chance, the ending of one stage connects hers directly to theirs, even when she hasn't been sought out. The longer it's been, the more likely it is to happen, though it only follows the completion of some other stage.     "I said we would meet again, did I not? Come, perhaps you will catch me this time, after all, if you do not tire yourself out, first."     She's lounging, just somewhere out of reach, filling up a courtyard that's not even particularly distant. Leaving marks on each room continues to work -- in fact, the maze hasn't changed at all. It's been reset, with previous marks removed, and all the traps refreshed, but the only difference from the first time is the choice of starting and ending rooms.     To someone who didn't pay attention to anything but the marks they left, it may as well have been completely randomized. The same solution will work again, if just as painfully, or painlessly, as before. That's the 'fairness' offered by the space itself.     "You know, I was searching for you, even before the first time they ambushed us. I suppose they wanted to capture me, then, though it seemed more as if they wished to kill all of us, there in the mountains." With the time it takes Ash to solve the maze, she talks. It's not like she needs a response. This is going to happen over and over.     "The smith's prophetic dreams. He was not clear on what would happen, but it was enough to point me to you. I urged them, then, to find you. You shall never guess why." The traps are just as terrible, every time. There's no respite but to constantly deny them, or else to simply look and avoid them. A fox more heavily favoring illusions might do it differently, but making them too hard to spot wouldn't be 'fair.' That'd just be counterproductive.     "And then we met, and you know what then occurred." One could call her chatty, but only compared to the sort who silently accomplishes their violent objectives and moves on to the next level, interspersed with little more than cursing. Taken from a long view, Tamamo's spacing out the conversation with the expectation that she'll pick it up again 'next time,' every time, relying on her stage's unclear ordering to create new opportunities to do so.     "If it were solely my decision, we would not be doing any of this, of course. I would simply accept your rejection, and leave you be. Would you have preferred that outcome?"     But there's no real answer that can be given to that, when it's followed by, "And yet, they -- and you -- did not allow this. To be here was their choice, and one to which you did not object. I can only wonder what you have meant by this." 'Here' is carrying a lot of weight, including 'fighting, at all.'     "Is it simply easier to walk face-first into a trap, or is it more fun? If you are enjoying yourself, I suppose that is fine. You should take the time to enjoy yourself. Did I not say, before, that nothing here will fight you? Every move is left to you."     At the height she appears to be, those eyes peek from over a outer courtyard's wall, when she leans back. "I suppose it slipped my mind, earlier, but thought to mention -- though I am Lilian's, and she is mine, we have yet to..." A while, searching for a word, "formalize it so, even as she does wear my..." That thought never finishes. It's not like many even notice, even publicly shown.     "I would guess that you are not one much for weddings. That is fine, of course." In English, "No pressure."
Tamamo	HEALING ZONE:     'I have a little place in Austria you and Lilian would be more than welcome to visit for the holidays.'     "Thank you, James." Tamamo isn't looking his way, focused on the paper pouch she's putting down while picking up another, but she's softly smiling. "I believe I can convince Lilian to take a long enough vacation. It is only the... returning, from the time away from 'work,' that is difficult, but what is there to life, if one cannot spend any of it but carrying water to a fire?"
Trudy Grimm	"You'll forgive me for not taking advice from the person who tried to have her minion murder me when I defended myself from rather vicious, baseless, and slanderous lies," Trudy's response to Angela comes out in a bitter tone. > "Hey, next round lemme borrow Knight, I need to go easy on this ankle for a bit."     "Oh, he's all yours," The witch stretches her arms out above herself, "He could use the exercise. I'll get him to your area right away, and even if parts of him break, he can get replacements." She brings those arms up and folds her hands behind her head, kicking one leg up to fold over the other, "Beating brute force with brute force is obviously not going to work, that much is true. Slapping their hands every time they step out of line is-- as was said a moment ago, 'just Society again'."     After a few more moments of rest with her eyes closed, Trudy rocks forward and rises to her feet, "I know what I'm going to do."
Trudy Grimm	Grimm Labyrinth is now Grimm Tundra     The next time Ash enters that muddy Godforsaken place, it's dramatically different from before. Gone is the forest and the mud and the jewel-eye sun of smiting. The interior has become a flat, muted white plain. A field of snow ringed by tall mountains. Cold, with a touch of mist; rocks and the occasional stubborn oak tree provide cover. And the First Regent, who immediately initiates a fight without even a second's hesitation.     "I realize I'd been going about this the wrong way," Trudy's voice sounds from the sky, disembodied, "Telling you 'no' just makes you want to do it more, doesn't it? That's why the maze with its rules wouldn't get through to you. So permit me to adapt my approach."     He seems entirely tuned, now, towards confronting Ash. Not specifically to Defeat them, but to Endure them. He takes the hits and keeps coming, with both ceaseless stamina and supernatural durability and the speed to disengage and get range when he chooses. He favors distance and explosive blasts of golden light while wielding his scepter in shockingly efficient hand-to-hand when necessary.     "My goal isn't to destroy you. Please realize that. But if I am going to convince you that I am real and that my devotion is real, I must first meet you on terms you can clearly and intuitively understand and engage with. That's his job. Please duel the First Regent for as long as you like; as many times as you like. You should know that defeating him isn't my win condition. It never was. I'm sure you can figure out what it is, do tell me when you figure it out, hmm~?"     Being defeated by him, of course, prompts a reset and only a few seconds pause before he starts again. Curiously; defeating him *also* initiates a reset and only a slightly longer delay. There is no timer, only a battle of attrition. Exhausting one or the other for a knockout blow. Ash's exact element. After the first few duels have run to some completion or another, a new condition enters the situation: Large portions of the snow-covered terrain randomly get flattened into bowl-shaped craters some ten feet across. Getting caught by it is like a hydraulic press; but one particular early example demonstrates that the First Regent isn't immune to them either.     So the Regent could feasibly be rather easily defeated by luring him into the phenomenan, it's just-- currently impossible to predict where it's going to happen as-presented.     "If this is going to take a while, though-- why don't we learn a bit more about one another? You can talk and fight at the same time, surely."
Tamamo	HEALING ZONE:     'Beating brute force with brute force is obviously not going to work, that much is true.'     "The King of Greed has been doing quite well, however... it seems. Thank you for agreeing to my proposal on that matter, Ms. Angela."
Angela	''the person who tried to have her minion murder me when I...'' "Um, can...can we use the term employee?" Cinder asks. "I did not have my minion try to murder you for you defending yourself. I had my minion try to murder because you threatened to murder my sister while assaulting her." Angela says. "'The next time you'll see Lilian is from inside a lantern'," Angela quotes with near-perfect mimicry of Trudy's tone. "Besides, my trying to murder you is proof of my point, is it not?" ''Thank you for agreeing to my proposal on that matter, Ms. Angela.'' "Of course, Tamamo. Brute force may not ''work'' but invulnerability is exhausting to deal with." Angela says before adding, a little more uneasily, "I hope the King has not been too ..." She tries to think of a word that means 'creepy' but isn't creepy. "Uncomfortably forward with her advances." She settles on.
Petra Soroka	"So when can we expect the betrayal?"     "Shut up and die," Petra shoots back instantly, before catching Tamamo's look at wincing apologetically. Tone softened by virtue of Tamamo's presence, she's still grumbly annoyed, defensively laying out her reasoning with the morphmetal convulsing in the air behind her.     "I have reasons for everything I do, which is more than I can say about *you*. Being on Lilian's side, for me, means being on Ash's side too. Not yours. So fuck you and your stupid fucking smug skeletons." "We are doing genuine harm to her by keeping her in this loop, even if we has less of a choice in the matter than we'd like."     "*Them*, Ange." The way Petra snaps at Angela is more like how she talks to Trudy than how she normally coddles her close friends. The difference is that the sour hostility slides off her face more quickly, though she's still lingeringly sour-unhappy, particularly because this is the second time she's had to do this. Two times! That's so many times!     "But yeah. We are. And it doesn't matter as much how much we remember, if we're just enemies to break through every time. I'll do my best to be their friend, and I'll still be an obstacle in the way that fits. Not doing this *wouldn't* fit. Not helping them would totally undercut what I'm, like, about-- the things they and I've already talked about." "Perhaps we should try speaking of the ways we have assisted Lilian in the past, moments of joy that have passed between us?"     "Maybe... but it's important to not come across as, like... pandering. I don't know. This emotional connection shit's hard." "Can you at least challenge 'em with some contests or something? Damn, girl."     Petra protests, hands on her ankles to lean forwards on her cushion, but she's petulant more than angry. Dumping mountain dew on her head is an appropriate response to most of the things Petra does, as she knows.     "Okay, I mean, come on-- of course I'm going to. They haven't *gotten* to me yet. I've *got* shit set up, I've got *ideas*, even, for how the setup's meant to *convey* shit. I'll *be* a fucking hassle. But it'd be a whole lot worse and a whole lot less effective to do this if I wasn't here doing *my* shit. So thank me for keeping you from getting killed a thousand extra times if-- when, I mean, when I get through to them."
Petra Soroka	"If they stopped, turned, slugged their bosses in the face -- easier! Way easier!"     Petra is quiet again at that, just adding a small and distracted-by-thought "Mhm." "If you're all of those *and* a particular kind of angry at the world, you'll do a stint in the military first, to sand down the rough edges and get you ready for where they really want you."     Petra listens through all of Bond's explanation without interrupting or brushing him off. She squeezes her hands between her thighs, looking vaguely harrowed by something adjacent to the conversation, and internalizing it with a kind of attentiveness that she hasn't shown to most of the people here.     "... Yeah. Because there's only so much 'rejection' you can sustain against what the world does to you, until, like, you stop being human. You can't not be affected, even if you're literally constantly trying not to be. So they'll get their hooks in you somehow."     After a few seconds, Petra looks away, and adds, in noncommittal reference to talking more later, "Well... maybe it'd be useful. We'll see." "You'll forgive me for not taking advice from the person who tried to have her minion murder me when I defended myself from rather vicious, baseless, and slanderous lies,"     "Don't fucking--" Petra overlaps with Cinder, cuts off when they talk at the same time, and then readjusts her complaint to ideologically align her stance with both Angela and Cinder rather than just one. "*I'd* fucking kill you myself if you keep being a fucking tool. If it's fucking slander, then sue me. I'll blow your house up and not show up at court."
Lilian Rook	'I mean, to them, once a... 'Bloom', always a 'Bloom'.'     Ash, in the Ash hub, regards Petra in a way that must surely be resentful; or it would be if she could see it anyways. The main point of contention is let slide, as Petra speedruns it from practice. "Well then you'd be fucked way harder than I would. Even if that happened, you'd all die or go insane before anything happened to me. You stupid shits designed this like a cringe videogame escape room, so I'd figure it out eventually."     'After Lilian, it's not like there's another threat they'd need you for, anyways.'     "Do you listen to anything I say at all? Holy fuck." Ash huffs, crumpling up the beer can and beaning Petra's skull with it. "The next threat is when the rest of the galaxy's done getting fucked and it notices we're still alive. Not that it even fucking matters since if the brass got stupid enough to leave me here then I'd just kill them all myself once I got out."     'No. I'm not betraying anyone.'     "Work on your shitty story before they interrogate you separate."     'Little aspects of her feelings...?'     That invigorates Ash more than anything Petra has said so far. Not in the sinful way that it gets Petra's interest, but in the forward-leaning way of someone who's just found a loophole, or a way to get out of bounds. "Then it sounds like I'm fucking winning." says Ash. "And like she has doubts about you mouth breathers and this whole shitty idea."     Naraka Bhavaagra:     Ash's new 'purchase' changes the plan: Tamamo's realm must now be the easiest if the new upgrade is going to highlight all 'hidden objects', or so they reason. The fact that the map has clearly changed is evidently irritating, but this time they clearly take their time, scanning around for the luminous markings of trap talismans, and very quickly realizing that they still have to get around them, even when they know where they are. After testing 'smashing through the wall next to them' and finding it seems to send them somewhere random, they spin down from the red hot violence they'd entered with, and at hour ten, commit to a sort of quietly unwholesome contest of wills.     "What does it even matter?" says Ash to Tamamo, given the format of the world is slow and repetitive and Tamamo is always right there. "It's a codename. Nobody knew her real name until we found her this year, so it's older and it's my fucking choice what I call her."     Picking their way around a horrid blindness trap like a claymore wire, they scoff loudly enough to echo inside the helmet. "It's a themed fucking set. Do you really think they're creative enough to come up with four that are 'personally meaningful' or something? It could have been Alpha Beta Gamma Delta, or Red Blue Green Yellow, or anything else. Someone picked Norse and it stuck, and like everything else someone just came up with and it's stuck around forever, it doesn't mean anything."     Hour eleven sees another unsuccessful lunge at Tamamo at ten times the previous speed, biding their time until in striking distance, pretending as if they were going to be normal this time, and then swearing about the teleport.
Lilian Rook	Nimue:     With the power of highlights, Ash and objective markers, slaps the dossier off the table, hastily slots the mandatory sonar headset on, and kicks down the front door. Their movement still has a little of the sluggish edge of navigating in total darkness, but this time they're able to see the glowing bodies of hostages waiting to cause problems, the points corresponding to loudspeakers that they preemptively destroy with guns taken from the fake soldiers (not using their own sidearm?), and most of the main routes through the settlement; definitionally 'hidden'. They're no more careful about the DARPA midboss, simply charging through its attack while their meters are still fresh.     'They actually did this, you know. All of this really happened. To a settlement called Caelton. Your people released the Man in the Moon on the people living there rather than risk something new being built.'     "Big fucking deal. Do you have any idea how many people the Moon Man kills every year?" says Ash, as if this were somehow common knowledge. "Am I supposed to cry? Fall to my knees and weep for some nobodies I don't know?" punctuates the tearing of steel as they wrap up dismembering the boss. "Even outside NAZCA, the agency will kill a billion people to save a billion and one. The Man in the Moon is just a fact of fucking life if you aren't 'lucky' enough to live in a cage."     Smashing in through the fortified bunker doesn't take long after that. They seem to have no particular desire to use the off-brand mech, chasing 'Faulkner' down on foot through a constant chain of epxloding mines that they step on nearly on purpose. Shimmering, they tear into his tank, shouting through the steel "That's what you get when you're domesticated! You surrender to someone above you so they'll take care of you, and the fucking risk you run is that one day they maybe just decide to slaughter you!"     "How is that an inconceivable indignity to you?! Who the fuck is the spoiled one here?! Nothing is free! You don't have a god-given right to be safe just because you were born in the right place!"     The attempt to kill him is half-hearted at this point, fully expecting the emergency teleport, but they do their damndest to rough him up before taking the cure. In Bond's estimation, it seems purposeful. That they're assuming they recover faster than you, or more sustainably than you, and plan to wear you down. It does happen to be hour fourteen once they have the Luna Virus cure.
Angela	''*Them*, Ange.'' Angela's expression is stricken. "Ah, my personal connection to such loops must've been lingering on my mind. My apologies." She frowns, troubled by making such a clear mistake but doesn't belabor the point. ''But it's important to not come across as, like... pandering.'' "Emotional honesty without being a freak about it." Is how she translates it. Maybe Petra's rubbing off on her a bit. ''*I'd* fucking kill you myself if you keep being a fucking too.'' "Before you speak of a double standard, please be aware that I am not someone who cares about whether I am 'hypocritical' or not--I do treat my loved ones differently than strangers and coworkers." She's grateful that the salamanders aren't here, she thinks distantly.
Lilian Rook	Fall of Mirrors:     Perhaps putting off Trudy's maze for a while, Ash takes the route they haven't yet. It should be deep into midnight by now, and they should be asleep. They are not. Fortunately, the gimmick is very simple, in that it is a barely gamified simulation of being betrayed and disposed of by NAZCA, which seems to be about the easiest and most thoughtless thing in the world for Ash to deal with.     The obvious representations of their current allies don't make them hesitate at all. They seem attentive to the radio babble at first, then start to tune it out completely. Despite their currently day-long committment to assisting the real versions of these people outside, they don't delay in the slightest before resorting to caving in skulls, tearing off limbs, and dramatically walking through tactical strikes to cut simulacra apart. The saferoom deals are hardly even a thing, because by that point, Ash seems to even be . . . enjoying it?     'Do you think it's fucked up? Do you really think this is all 'staying behind' has to mean? I mean, not just this whole game world-- outside, too. It's *all* just people making worlds on purpose and forcing you to do dumb fucking rules and rituals and shit. I know you stayed behind for Lilian, but, like-- the place you stayed is kind of turbo shitty.'     "The fuck made you think I want to stay behind at all?" the question accidentally comes out at a normal pitch and volume. Ash tries to put some torque back on it. "I don't have some grand fucking goal. I'm leaving the second I can. I'm just not leaving alone." They cut off, then quickly shove in "I'm not leaving them behind. No matter how filthy you made her, there's still something in there, so she's coming with me."     Petra is the fourth battle this run. Ash attempts to end it almost instantly, and then starts to slow down once they realize something is unnatural about the speed at which Petra is dodging around. Having fought against and with Lilian before, Petra especially can tell the difference; Lilian would have begun testing a slew of combat theories and pinned down the workings of the Gimmick by now, whereas Ash seems to only have trial and error to go on, and is taking perceptible lengths of time to try and think. And being the fourth boss, including the King of Greed, Ash is nearly out of energy when they finally commit the risky maneuver that puts Petra on the ropes, only for Cinder's last second heal to-- "DEAD! YOU'RE DEAD!!"     The game system throws them back to the hub, and the next thirty minutes are taken up with pacing and swearing about how Arthur's whole system is bullshit; how it's obviously just some cheap and shoddy biosign reader, and doesn't account for 'spirit', and how they were just getting warmed up and Could Have Taken the rest. An hour passes with a protein bar and a canteen, then Ash approaches the swords to check their Corruption and do it all over again.
Xion	This emotional connection shit's hard. Xion is somber, icing a sore cheek and sipping a canned juice she had snuck in - a tropical mango flavor. "Yeah, it's hard work. That's part of... what we're doing. Even if we can't pander, we're trying. This whole, array, this whole thing is making more of us 'real' than maybe have ever been real to them before. I don't know..." She lifts the icepack against her cheek as indication. "I don't know if I'm able to not be a freak about it, but I'm trying to be nice and smile while I do it. It's... It's hard." Xion admits. "I don't know if I'd do this, if the world didn't depend on it. Isn't it kind of gross to... become someone's friend for reasons other than to try and get to know them? Part of this, is also figuring out what we're doing. They're not the *only* ones getting second runs, you know. Or thirds, or..." Xion got wiped out a lot in that first room.
James Bond	Nothing is free! You don't have a god-given right to be safe just because you were born in the right place!     "Of course you don't," 'Faulkner' chokes out, between burning electronics and the acrid belch of failing transmission. Escaping the tank is a fluid motion for him; he finds the hatch and pulls himself over and out before the fireball engulfs it completely.     He's wearing his own version of the sonar headset, implemented into a modified combat helmet. "Rights don't exist in the first place." A soft white dart across Ash's screen is the only warning they get for his combat knife sailing through the moonlit air to strike a landmine, causing a brilliant white flash on the screen to follow from the explosion.     "It's a pretty idea that's backed up by force, and only when the ones with the force to *leverage* feel like using it." 'Faulkner' does not have Ash's ability to dictate to the world what does and doesn't effect him--but he does have James Bond's lifetime of combat experience to call upon. When Ash moves in to rough him up, he goes for an elbow strike, popping out like a bolt aimed at the spot behind their helmet where the headset would rest.     That's not to say that Ash isn't without their own experience--he wouldn't expect it to be over so quickly at all. Which is why... "They can be taken away much more easily than they're given." Pop-whirrrr. Little points of light on their headset paint a faint constellation, followed by the almost lightning-like streak of a rocking tree branch.     "It's natural for those who don't run the risk to hate those who do," says 'Faulkner' from the vantage point on high. Even though Bond wants to reach them, he doesn't hold back, trying to go for a headshot with a suppressed pistol and force a game over. "Because the ones who do are so much more numerous and louder." He forcibly bucks the branch supporting him, unclips his tactical vest and tosses it onto the branch of a neighboring tree, sliding meanwhile down the trunk of this one to return to the ground.     "They take up so much more space, and make it harder and harder not to, even as so many of them choke from the leash." They're back on top of him. They're younger and stronger and highly resistant to the ways he has to fight back--resistant to the force of the world. So before the knockout blow they strike, he poses the last response he's able in the time he has.     Tie it back to Lilian and the other Blooms. But subtly. Let them think I'm still only talking about Caelton, and come to the point thinking it was their idea. "If someone were trying to find a new dichotomy--one that didn't involve choosing between the leash or the wilderness--woudln't that be in both parties' best interest?" Thwack. --HEALING AREA--      Bond, rubbing his jaw, absentmindedly notices the fire still burning on his right arm and hastily pats it out, collapsing into the high-backed chair with a sigh. It's not that he doesn't have hope--it's simply that the work is exhausting.
Tamamo	HEALING ZONE:     'I don't know if I'd do this, if the world didn't depend on it.'     "I know that I would not," Tamamo says. "Were it possible to merely leave them be, I would gladly take this option."     Months ago, she'd been pushing to bring Lilian to meet Ash, and Nika, too. There's no contradiction with her change in stance -- they had found them. Tamamo had simply been overly optimistic in what they'd find, and hadn't expected the actions of NAZCA that would happen in-between.     "This is a forced hand we play, and a better alternative than what else we might, but it is, still... a use of force, in response to another. I fear I am not good-natured without limit." ANOTHER RUN:     'Nobody knew her real name until we found her this year, so it's older...'     "Until you found her? Nobody knew her name?" Tamamo's laugh is now openly mocking. Derision flares and rolls off her in electromagnetic waves, her swinging attention carrying with it shifts in the pull of gravity. The certainty of it is carried in the force of her Charm, but the 'why' of her reaction is left fully up to Ash to figure out.     The tone-carrying atmosphere, which hits the mind as more real than metaphorical, shifts only when she asks, "Are you jealous? Do you wish you were the first to recognize her?" Not 'find.' There's intentionality in the word. "Not just her, but the other two."     Tamamo takes a thoughtful moment. "Dear, sweet Nika might have difficulty accepting these sorts of exchanges, and to mold her into that which would suffer nothing for them would be another method of destroying her. As for the similarly, yet differently kind Sakura-chan, I expect she would already know what you plan to say. She, at least, would find no reason to be shocked."     There's more than just the traps that count as 'hidden' in her stage. There are also passages, tucked away places smaller than the full room's width that usually counts as a 'border.' Stepping into one of these finds a hidden item, and a doorway that doesn't quite fit the layout.     The items are all fresh-smelling baked goods, and the doors all lead to other zones. As there's no way back, this is more like a consolation prize for giving up, but without the courtesy of being marked as a zone boundary.     Vaguely, returning to her languid posturing, "There is more than one way this ends."
Trudy Grimm	> "I have reasons for everything I do, which is more than I can say about *you*. Being on Lilian's side, for me, means being on Ash's side too. Not yours. So fuck you and your stupid fucking smug skeletons."     "Since you're so keen on helping Ash do everything like a good little lackey, maybe *you* should take on my challenge," Trudy shoots at Petra, "I'm sure it'd be entertaining for one of us." > "I did not have my minion try to murder you for you defending yourself. I had my minion try to murder because you threatened to murder my sister while assaulting her."     "Ahh yes, the tried and true manipulation tactic of 'leaving out the context'. You might not be related by blood but you really are 'sisters', aren't you?" > "*I'd* fucking kill you myself if you keep being a fucking tool. If it's fucking slander, then sue me. I'll blow your house up and not show up at court."     "You really wouldn't, but not for the reason you think," Trudy's tone shifts from outward hostility to that more teasing voice she uses when she's stopped taking the subject seriously. "I'm on Lilian's side, first and foremost, girl. Ironclad. I know you're profoundly stupid but /try/ and remember that. Your loyalties might be deeply questionable and perhaps because of that you assume everyone else's are too."     > "I don't know if I'd do this, if the world didn't depend on it."     > "Were it possible to merely leave them be, I would gladly take this option."     "If they weren't so essential," Trudy admits, "I would've ripped their soul out of their body back in Nevada." Her eyes shift towards Arthur, "Thank him for stopping me, I suppose. Even if that means we're stuck in this now."
Lilian Rook	Day 3:     Ash did not figure out the puzzle. Ash did, however, make several attempts on Trudy's life, and outlast how long she can actually go without eating, drinking, or sleeping, making it 'a draw*'.     Alpha Caeli:     'It's not fair, Ash. It's real, it's true, but it's not fair. Don't you wish, somewhere, that it was *fair*, *really fair*? That the lines were clear and your teams were even?'     Shot up by bullet hell mechanics and battered by gravity traps, a coruscating Ash holds Arthur by the collar. "Yeah? What if I did? You gonna even the teams? Fight me one on one? Clear up the lines? Or are you gonna make me do more asinine puzzle game bullshit where the rules keep changing, huh?" They toss him as a matter of formality, rummaging for his key. "No. I fucking dont. You're talking about everyone else getting what they want if they try hard enough too, you fucking single-celled organism. I don't want to give anyone else a say at all. The only things I give a shit about, I shouldn't be having to earn them at all. I shouldn't have to try. Nobody else does. Nobody else has to struggle and 'strive' for the shit they won't give me. Don't try and make it 'fair' after I finally started winning."     Monochrome Zone:     '-but, she doesn't communicate that way. I just thought - that she was so interesting, I wanted to learn more. Why?'     "Something I noticed." Ash lies, a full day later, dully trying to pretend they aren't tired and pissed off, but also trying not to let on that they're building up a secret advantage. "Just like, almost none of you are human. Or even 'like' human. You're kind of a fucked up case, and she likes you. And her girlfriend is like a goddess or something. The brain-damaged gamer she trusted to run this place is something else." Nearly a lie. A fabricated thought, improvised on the spot, from thinking about a Secret. "Does she give a shit about humanity, or just you? It's like she thinks she can't tell the difference, but she can. Subconsciously or something."     Naraka Bhavaagra:     Ash figures out the third time that the teleports haven't changed, but their place in the map has. It takes them halfway through the run to fully confirm that the marks are gone and not just in rooms they can't find their way back to.     'The smith's prophetic dreams. He was not clear on what would happen, but it was enough to point me to you. I urged them, then, to find you. You shall never guess why.'     "Yeah there's like a million secret prophecies." At their eighth collective hour in this place total, the tone is nearly conversational, though hatefully forebearing. "I mean, obviously. NAZCA is even named for one. Duh."     'I would simply accept your rejection, and leave you be. Would you have preferred that outcome?'     "That was never possible. There's no universe where I didn't try to take your girl and you didn't try to stop me."     'No pressure.'     "What--" Focused on navigating the trap maze with perfect efficiency, Ash is so startled they walk straight into a trap.     Day 4:     . . . . . . . .
Trudy Grimm	The problem with trying to kill Trudy in her reworked field is-- Trudy doesn't seem to be there. Only the First Regent, relentless as he is.     "If you won't talk, I will."     It's several days of ceaseless combat with the First Regent, so they have plenty of time.     "It's no secret, so perhaps you already know-- Trudy Grimm is not my real name. It's a name I chose for myself when I broke things off from my family. When I stole my father's Grimoire."     "Ever since I chose to live my life the way I want to, rather than the way my family expected me to, I live under the threat of suffering and death from a foe every bit as ruthless and relentless as you. Ahh, but you're hardly the bloodthirsty tyrant that my brothers have become; or the shadow lord I still hesitantly call a father."     "Rather than exist as a blight on the world with a destiny to consume it in death and ruin, I chose something else."     "Are you capable of choosing? I should like to hope so."     "Goodness, you are incredibly, stubbornly, and willfully blind, aren't you? It's been two days and you haven't said a word, let alone perceived me even a little?"      Though-- he does tucker out eventually. About the same time Trudy herself stops talking, where-ever she actually is. Some noticeable time before the Regent exhausts himself, though, it's notable that the mysterious crushing phenomenon slowed and eventually stopped.     The last thing Trudy says before it's officially a draw is: "No matter how hopeless you are, I will not give up on you. See you for the next round~..."     That seems to be the big clue: Engaging with Trudy's words, not her minion. Ignoring her got nowhere. Eventually, one might assume--     Actually speaking with her-- not just short quippy insulting one-liners but actually engaging with the conversation-- causes a change in the sky. Towering amongst the clouds, casting herself in the role of one of the most ancient of Jotunn, Trudy leans over the field. Her chin balanced on one hand, the other held out over the snow. The cratered depressions are created when she drives her fingertip down into the snow with no real rhyme or reason to it.     Only by engaging with her, seeing her, and acknowledging she exists, could Ash exploit the gimmick to consistently and quickly defeat First Regent every time rather than fighting to exhaustive standstill after exhaustive standstill.     That's it. That's her win condition. Acknowledging that someone else exists and having an actual conversation. Upon doing that, the smushed First Regent does not respawn. Finally. He instead dissolves, leaving behind his power-infused heart shaped brooch.
Angela	''The tried and true manipulation tactic--'' "...I also do not care if Petra, say, destroyed your planet and ate your left arm." Angela continues. "This is not about 'fair's fair', this is about 'Do I just sit on my hands and let someone talk about murdering a loved one'. I would make an illustrative comparision but I legitimitely do not know if you have anyone who loves you romantically, platonically, or familially but surely, I'd like to imagine, you would not allow them to be under such a threat ''even if they deserved it by some metric or another.''." She glances to Petra as if to say that this is not an admission that Petra deserves it. ''You really are 'sisters', aren't you?'' "Thank you," Angela says with complete honesty and another wholly villainous smile. ''Fall of MIrrors'' Angela is, of course, lending a hand with the battle and that means she's hearing this kind of chatter. "...How filthy we made her?" Angela asks. "...It does not really matter to me how 'filthy' she is, she will always be triumphant and unbeatable to me, but if she should reach down into the muck and uplift others--the mud on her sleeves should be commended, should it not? It is not just a matter of disgusting responsibility if it earns her the loyalty of many, correct?"
Petra Soroka	"Your loyalties might be deeply questionable and perhaps because of that you assume everyone else's are too."     Petra's jaw tenses, lips twisted into a scowl. "My loyalties are a solved fucking issue. If you had anything inside your empty fucking skull besides the fucking cultural tumor you let ooze out of your mouth, then you'd fucking know that. Don't fucking talk to me about 'loyalty', you faceless fucking husk of nothing. One thing I'm *not* fucking loyal to is the dumbshit idea of *civility* and restraining myself from fucking your shit up the moment I can." "Emotional honesty without being a freak about it."     Petra sighs in agreement with Angela's rephrasing, but when she talks, it's in agreement with Xion too. "Well. I'm kind of a freak about it too, I guess. I can't get on anyone's case for being a freak today. Maybe you have to be a little bit of a freak to actually nail the emotional connection." "Isn't it kind of gross to... become someone's friend for reasons other than to try and get to know them?"     Petra, who has been trying to be their friend since first contact, could maybe have the most justification for protesting that she's not lumped into that same category as everyone else. But she knows, longer and farther back than Ash, before the Blooms, before Lilian, before Elites, before anything, that the ulterior motive of her own interpersonal connections is more disingenuously perverse than anyone else in this room could claim; the intrinsic, slavering parasitism of knowing worse and grasping at better.     Petra flinches and twists her hands together in her lap. "... Maybe. But whatever else, I do want to get to know them. Sorry, but I'd do it if the world wasn't at stake at all. Even if Lilian wasn't either. Probably not with a time loop video game world, though." "I would've ripped their soul out of their body back in Nevada."     "Try and kill them and I'll succeed and kill you." Petra spits, and her derisive motion accidentally spills a splash of hot cocoa onto one of the pillows. She looks up at Tamamo apologetically, then presses her hand to her mirror-metal and pulls out some surprisingly involved cleaning supplies to get the stain out. Then, back at Trudy, "Drooling fucking animal. Keep your hands off the fucking Blooms."         THE FALL OF MIRRORS "No matter how filthy you made her, there's still something in there, so she's coming with me."     "Well-- it's not really my call, but yeah! I don't think you should! Just--" Petra cuts off briefly as Angela says something about the way Ash is approaching in light of the area hazard laser charging on one wall, and with zero milliseconds of delay after auditory processing, her morphmetal swings in the way and flattens into a reflective sheet just before Ash shoves her. "Just, like, she's got a wedding coming up! She has to throw a birthday party for a baby dragon in a giant castle that she *obsessively* designed and loves a lot! She's got stuff *planned* that she *cares* about, right now!"         HEALING HUB     Petra comes back, beat to shit but victorious. Bludgeoned and spent, she feels the need to be excessively contrite when requesting Tamamo for some healing, then gives Cinder an exhausted fistbump then hug. Woozily grumbling, she complains nonspecifically to the room, "I *said* I'd be fucking fighting them too, didn't I? I'm not a traitor."
Petra Soroka	RESPAWN HUB, SOMETIME LATER     Petra is dozing off here, in the interstitial void, rather than in one of Tamamo's rooms. Especially oddly for Petra, she's choosing to sleep somewhere that has no one else around, and her drooping head blearily raises at Ash's return. She scrubs the back of her hand against her eyes to refocus them, then pushes forwards another beer, accompanied by a stack of granola bars.     "G'morning. Or, uh, good respawning, to you." While Ash is held captive by consuming the offered treats, Petra chugs some water and wakes up fully before talking. "You know, like, if this all failed and Lilian got captured while we're all stuck in here, it wouldn't matter that much to me what happens after we get out, or if I lost my mind in here or whatever."     "Like, I said, I'm alive for Lilian. So even if you told them that I betrayed everyone and they kept me alive for some reason, if Lilian's gone, then I'll just kill myself. Well-- I mean, I'd try my best to break her out myself, but odds are that's the same thing."     Each time Ash goes to investigate the swords, Petra tags along unless sufficiently emphatically told to fuck off. She's interested in the Lilian Lore, of course, as always, but the real reward is Ash's reactions to it. In a way, it's like watching someone read your favorite book, and expectantly vibrating for them to come up with their own attachments and theories about the characters.     That isn't to say she's *purely* consuming the Lore secondhand, though. "... Do you think you could save up for 'Touch'? I wonder what that one is."     "Oh, and, here. Since you got to me once already, you've unlocked the upgraded buffs. They're all upgraded to fuck over Trudy specifically, because I hate her. --It's not actually a progression thing at all, I just made that up. This one might actually be a little bit traitorous, but, like, it's fine if you don't tell."         THE FALL OF MIRRORS, NEXT ATTEMPT     Petra is tense and braced for a much worse beating than the first time around, now that Ash understands the gimmick better and without being certain she can rely on Cinder. She might've shit on Arthur, but getting beat up multiple times *does* suck, actually, even though she isn't being subjected to even a fraction as much as Arthur or Xion are. Hers, though, are unpleasantly bloody.     "I know you don't really want to stay. Not for long. But you're here right *now*, right? Why fucking compromise on *right now*, even? Why fucking delay your gratification literally at all? *Fuck* these losers, but at least there's people that actually make Lilian *happy* among the people around her on Earth! If someone scolded *her* for fucking *breaking curfew* like you, I'd just fucking *kill* them, because that's how the world can work if you have the fucking *balls* for it! I *did* do that! And the world got better for it! She might be held back in some ways that you aren't, but at least she's not justifying being dragged around on a leash because it's more *efficient*!"
Tamamo	YET ANOTHER RUN:     'That was never possible. There's no universe where I didn't try to take your girl and you didn't try to stop me.'     "Perhaps so. A destined encounter, then, an unavoidable event... 'conflict' is so trite. There is no world in which you would not try, and no world in which she would accept my having lost. What then?" The traps don't move, either. Everything is just as it was, memorization of a single route only prevented by the changing starting location and destination. Memorizing the entire maze is always a possibility, though looking at a room from one direction isn't the same as looking at it from another.     Memorizing the destinations of the 'hidden routes' would be more useful if Ash didn't have that first 'cheat,' giving another means of finding their way to each other zone, given that they find Tamamo's, first. But only one of those can be checked per run, and it means forgoing 'meeting' Tamamo. Whether that will really count as a victory hasn't been specified. Bonus stages always complicate the scoring.     "She already created one miracle to let us meet, you know. She would find another, if that was the path left to her -- or else, die, trying. I would rather," said with the most droll tone, "no such harm be forced upon her. Have you thought at least this far ahead?"     Pausing the conversation long enough to clap twice at a particular set of traps adroitly avoided and give a 'well done,' Tamamo continues with, "Lilian's other side enjoys my company, too, of course. As to what she might attempt, my, that is a question worth some musing. She is terribly... exciting."
Xion	BREAK ROOM, A general chorus of voices agree with Xion that, given the choice or removed from requirement, they might not try. If this person weren't 'special', would they reach out their hands? If Ash never was more than some NAZCA agent with an inconvenient power, would they put all this work - building a whole universe for their benefit - into some random person? Did doing this much *now* undo anything, make right one single thing? Was it 'good', or 'right' what they were doing? Did it really matter? "If you could 'hit them back' for this, would it help anything? It keeps... feeling like it'd help me, but I don't know if it will any more. I want it to be... real, I want to be real to them, but I also want to be human, and I don't know if that helps." She's pretty sure it doesn't. Does it matter? "If... if we wouldn't help a less-special Ash, how are we going to reach the real Ash in front of us? It's..." Slouching over and chewing on a candybar while squeeze-massaging her sore feet after a whole heck of a lot of DDR and footraces, pushing past the point where the games were games for her, too.
Xion	AND YET, AT GO FISH... Xion glances at Cinder, then Ash, then her own cards. A self-admitted psychic, she squints at Ash across from her as if divining something... "Do you have any twos?" Xion asks Ash, knowing full well they do not. The cool down time over cards is an almost-welcome reprieve from Struggle, DDR, and footraces, and Xion tries to luxuriate a little more in the less active rounds and shark harder -- Ash will have to use more advanced strategies and reads on the Nobody to beat her hands, even though the gimmies are still present. "I'm human." Xion states, a soft-but-clear declarative. The mildest, most smoothed reaction to something that she might otherwise more angrily correct, were situations different. Perhaps, Ash didn't know. And, perhaps, she was feeling a little inhuman at cards, drooping in chair a little, thinking about those who got different. "But I understand what you mean," She admits. It's not easy to. "I'm human, and, other things. A quilt is cloth and memories both, and, it's..." The noirette consults her hand. "I'm like human." Says the woman who wears black on black, a pair of blue eyes looking to Cinder's for a clue or hint but fruitlessly searching for what can't be found. So she looks back at her cards. "I think you have it a little backwards, Ash. What if I could be anything, really, and what if I could do anything, really, and what if I could go anywhere, really?" She looks up, folding her cards face-down before her. "If I could do all that, stupid or not, and I chose to stay here, with her, as a 'human', as a 'hero', then why does that make me less? Am I less of a hero, because I *decided* to be one?" It takes a short while for Xion to pause and break character to get out a metal flask of chocolate syrup and take a swig from it, gulping chocolate and sugar and spinning the top back on with thumb and forefinger before picking back up her cards. "Even 'Human' is just something made up to draw a big circle that leaves things out, to add things to try and understand them, or subtract things to hurt them. Listening to people, I don't think people care anything about humanity except where it touches them. Even people who aren't anything else but human." Losing at Go Fish doesn't send her back to the start, but it doesn't feel that much better. "I think she chooses, and she tried to choose 'everyone', and be a hero. I can sympathize - I tried too. And she was a grand, shining knight for so long that maybe she habituated a kind of love for..." Xion gains a wistful look as she tosses aside her loser hand. "Certain kinds of ways of doing. That's why I think you struck out with the hero hostage situation thing: It wasn't about her, it was about 'work'. Do you think this is different?" "It's about you, you know."
Tamamo	HEALING ZONE:     Petra spits, and her derisive motion accidentally spills a splash of hot cocoa onto one of the pillows.     "Ms. Soroka," Tamamo says, her tone swiftly stern after spending so much time ignoring the topic, "if you cannot threaten murder upon Lilian's allies without spilling chocolate everywhere, like an unruly and unkempt animal, perhaps you should not be threatening murder at all."
Arthur Lowell	> Arthur: Cycle. Again. Again. Again.     The "basic" boss is a routine, after a while.     Arthur is bringing a broom down in an overhead swing.     Arthur is held by the collar of his robe.     Arthur is converging with a thousand projectiles.     Arthur is pinned, struggling to keep a gun away from his head.     Arthur is laughing and slamming into them, disrupting them at apoapsis.     Arthur is bludgeoned in the face.     Arthur swings his broom with ultraviolent speed.     Arthur is recovering in the break room.     Ash is sucked away into the gravitational pull of the Armillary.     "Selfish." He rambles, during one of the runs. "That's what you are. And you know, I think I get it. I think I get it!" He puts his arms out. "I've solved you. I've *solved you.* Take your shot." Utter vulnerability. One shot to take him down.     Defeated there -- even killed -- the next loop is similar, in reverse. All the game rules turn inwards and attack Ash directly. No more fairness. It's a surprise that might overwhelm them. "I've solved your *fucking puzzle*! I've figured out your *fucking game!*" Starlight gushes out of his gritted teeth. Fluttering energy is bursting from his eyes. "Hahahahahahaha, I *GET IT!*" He's gotten the worst out of everyone here after who-knows-how-many runs. But he doesn't explain until next time.     Another run, this time again, no resistance. One shot, one kill. "It's *all* internal. I don't matter. I'm not even human. My voice isn't a voice. 'Single-cell organism.' Right? I'm noise. NOISE!!" He laughs again, that stress-laden laugh, approaching. "You want to leave because nothing's real. Nothing but her. Nothing seems to change. You take actions and, what happens? You hurt us and we don't care. You defy NAZCA and they don't care. You help NAZCA and they don't care. You save the world and it doesn't care. You abandon the world and it doesn't care. God, but it must look so fucking smudged and blurry and washed out, colors all running."     He pounds his own chest. "The only things that change are *inside*, inside you. And you stretch yourself out to make that change enter this, all this space. The *world* is fucking psycho, apathetic, unreactive, nonsense, noise, randomness and inconsequential nothingness, and you're the only normal thing in existence, the only thing where your actions have any effect. You and *Lilian Rook*, the only person in the world who makes sense."     His expression gets suddenly neutral. "And we made her all messed-up. She believes the world can change. That shit's just awful, huh? No wonder you fight like that."     From then on, he doesn't speak much to Ash, unless spoken to.     When he's back in the break room, he's... normal. Like none of that happened. Just gaming and grins and shitty jokes.
Petra Soroka	HEALING ZONE     Petra ducks her head in shame while diligently scrubbing the stain out of the pillow. "Sorry ma'am. I'll be more careful." On the clumsiness part, probably, rather than the threatening murder part. Either way, she won't push her luck continuing with threats of murder today, at least.
Angela	''Like none of that happened. Just gaming and grins and shitty jokes.'' Angela glances at Arthur, briefly, and then looks back down, through the screen. "I see, you are more inclined to close our eyes than your own." Angla says, without further explanation.
Lilian Rook	Bruises ~ Automatic losses halve your energy instead     §I got used to being hurt a long time before I started swinging a sword. I don't mean my feelings; I mean the real, visceral, animal thing that most people forget, when the part that knows decays from disuse. It's not about being strong or weak, but navigating a world in which it exists. Hiding things feels different when it means a shattered cheekbone that lasts for a month. Dignity has a different weight when keeping yours means bare knuckles behind the building. When a moment of peace and quiet means giving up eating for another day, you just think differently. I can tell you know what I mean.§     §A few years ago, I said I hated fighting. It wasn't because I was afraid of pain, but because it wasn't real. For me, with this power, if I get hurt, it's because I let it happen, and if someone else doesn't, it's because I decided not to. So, just like they forget pain, I forgot what fighting really was. It took a long time to realize that 'fighting' is what I was doing off the field; like I went blind without a sword in my hand. Being 'civil' is the same as letting someone strike you. Using only your words is like carefully trading blows. It's testing your own power. If I really hated fighting that much, I'd have killed them already, right? What I can't stand is bruises. The thing I hate is being defaced.§     Falling ~ Each time you defeat the same Key Bearer, the reward is doubled.     §I thought about it. I still think about it. When you know pain well enough, it moves from your environment into your hands. If exists in the wild, it's a tool; that's just how humans are. When the rules never matter, when no one ever believes you, when the safeguards apply to everyone but you, you finally realize those things are 'their' tools. Pressed hard enough to survive, to do it all again for one more day, what seemed so complex finally looks so simple.§     §They're them and you're you. They have their weapons and you have yours. There are no complicated decisions to make; 'disallowed' isn't a real thing, only 'punishable' is. Once I knew that, everything got so much easier that I started feeling like God. Like a human being finally living in the world. It was so intoxicating, so perfect, that when I remembered to breathe, I had nearly killed someone. That moment was so frightening I never want to be there again. But even so, sometimes I miss those days so much I feel sick.§     'G'morning. Or, uh, good respawning, to you.'     "Say that when I die you fucking ape." says Ash, already stalking past Petra again. "Arthur designed this shit for babies with training wheels. If this were real life or death, I'd have killed you all by now, so obviously it has to kick in when you're a little tired." Incredible. The helmet recycles breathable copium.     'So even if you told them that I betrayed everyone and they kept me alive for some reason, if Lilian's gone, then I'll just kill myself.'     "Nah. I'd just make you my bitch instead of hers. Trying to be her slave is basically the only redeeming thing about you, so it'd be sort of shitty to waste it." says Ash.     '... Do you think you could save up for 'Touch'? I wonder what that one is.'     "Fuck off. I'm deciding." says Ash, hand moving away from Lies and towards Touch. "Why do you even care? It's not like you get anything out of them."
Lilian Rook	Touch ~ Deal increased damage when repeatedly attacking the same target.     §Aren't I a hypocrite? Isn't it pathetic? If I was a little more normal, I could tell my sorry little sob story about how hurt I've been and how much I've suffered, and people would worship the ground I walk on. I know that, because they do already, for exactly as long as I can hold it in.]§     §It's not fair that hurting other people feels this good. It's hard enough just to admit. I don't know if it was something that happened to me, or if I was just born this way, but the moment where I lose my patience, my sense, and force someone else to feel pain, everything snaps into focus, and it feels so 'real'. It's not about power or will or anything like that; I'm not like you. It's something else. It's all the wrong reasons. That's why I have to make it off-limits for myself.§     ". . . That's not even a 'why', dumbass. That's just a 'what'. God you're so stupid. You're the only one of us who even thinks half that much about her power."     Ash stops muttering, glares at Petra via suggestive body language, and stalks off. They don't say a word as they snatch up another bullshit powerup. They're too preoccupied with whether Petra knows what these things say or not.     Grimm Tundra:     "I'm back cocksucker!" echoes all the way from the edge of the area, as animated as they've ever been in Trudy's realm, even before colliding in magical boy on tragical bully.     'Trudy Grimm is not my real name. It's a name I chose for myself when I broke things off from my family.'     "Damn. You chose it for yourself, but it's not even 'your real name'? That's kind of fucking embarrassing." Smash. Crash. Kaboom.     'I live under the threat of suffering and death from a foe every bit as ruthless and relentless as you.'     "Do you think that's flattering or something? I'm not ruthless, I just don't give a shit, and I'm not relentless, I'm just not a bitch."     'Are you capable of choosing? I should like to hope so.'     "Kind of what I'm doing right now." Just as Ash maneuvers into the finishing stage to abuse Petra's nasty little cheaty gift (when really they should save it for someone else; they get one per run), they actually linger a moment, just to talk.     "You think it's easier for me to work with NAZCA than walk away? Is that what's going on? Because it sounds like I'm only 'bravely choosing' if I drop everything and run away with the circus, where everyone is nicer and there's no more missions and like half the people there don't still think I'm a woman. Are you actually that fucking stupid?"     Crunch. Glass cheat mode engaged. "Fucking off with you losers would be the easiest, simplest, most brainless coasting-along thing in the world. Choosing to stay with NAZCA, because that's what matters, even though they fucking suck, is harder. Get real."
Lilian Rook	Fall of Mirrors:     'Just, like, she's got a wedding coming up! She has to throw a birthday party for a baby dragon in a giant castle that she *obsessively* designed and loves a lot!'     "That's fucking obvious. Can't you tell what that is?" says Ash, locked in combat with Petra yet again. The trail of dead 'NAZCA' getting here is growing more and more efficient. Their hope that 'Touch' would increase the effectiveness of the attacking part is dashed; it turns out to only be damage, and so Petra is still a pain in the ass this time. But they're mostly fresh, thanks to Petra's under-the-table knee-kicking. "Fenrir is a key to the new world. The first one, even. Designing something new is in her fucking blood. Filling it with something other than human trash is, too. You ever think that maybe she'd like it? That penny-ante bullshit is like watching a tiger pacing around in the fucking zoo. It's sad."     Finally catching and crushing Petra underfoot, Ash hesitates long enough that it's clearly because of something sudden and difficult to think about; like her boss pattern. "I think, probably, 'getting rid of the old world' is in her blood too. Especially as 'the First Spark', whatever that means. So like . . . creating little worlds is just captivity enrichment. Keeping her tame and docile and where she can't destroy anything or hurt anybody, that's fucking cruel."     '...How filthy we made her?'     "Can't you fucking tell?" This is the point where Ash unlimbers the spear and stabs Petra through the chest. "She seems so strong and special to you because you're all completely beneath us. That girl is so fucking ashamed of everything I feel like I'm going crazy seeing you not notice. Even though you're so far beneath us, when she reaches into the mud and drags you out of it, I can see the fake fucking smile and the grown-up superhero mommy act she puts on for you, so that you get it through your heads that you're supposed to thank her and not try to kill her."     Angela, who is an AI that is not stupid, can hear how bitterly personal that last line suddenly sounded. "She's 'respectable' and I'm not, because she's caked in your mud and shit and blood from trying to help you, and I'm clean up to Jesus because I just hated every one of you from the start." The way they say it, 'you' doesn't sound specific anymore.     Kingdom of Desire:     Stacking damage multipliers aren't the perfect thing to deal with the King of Greed, but they stack the fight firmly in Ash's favour. Strangely, they're silent the entire time. This is supposed to be the part they're the most engaged with. Instead, the fight takes less than an hour, and they seem distracted the entire time.
Lilian Rook	Nimue:     "Hey. Last time you said something." This time, Ash is delaying on 'Faulkner'; the auto-loss headshot halved their energy, which is more like doubling their strain, and allowed a counter that forces this moment to happen. "About a new dichotomy. It was something fucking stupid." they say, waving a hand.     "You said 'both parties'. Not 'everyone'. So you know that it's not in the best interest of whose holding the leash, probably." The disaffected roll of the head, the hurried pace, the sarcastic tone; none of it is really very convincing. The way they talk itself is different. Probing. Bothered. Watching carefully. "So you know that nobody really wants a new dichotomy. They want to be holding the leash, or they want to drag everyone into the wilderness. That's it. Like . . ."     Bond has no way to guess just how much Ash just skipped in the moment they let out that frustrated sigh. It was probably a lot. "More than half of humanity lives outside the Urban Centers. They tell you there's basically no one, but it's bullshit. 'Caelton' is what they want it to look like. On a leash. If it looks different, they weed it out; not the Antegent, not even NAZCA, I mean them. Don't call me a liar because I grew up in no-man's land and I'll kill you if you piss me off. So . . ."     "Nah. Changed my mind. Killing you anyway."     Day 5:     Monochrome Zone:     'I'm human.'     "Yeah? So am I." Ash says. The only water they've drank in 76 hours came from desalination pellets from their SERE kit and the snow in Trudy's tundra. They haven't slept, and don't seem worse for wear. "We're not seriously going to argue what that words means are we? No twos."     'If I could do all that, stupid or not, and I chose to stay here, with her, as a 'human', as a 'hero', then why does that make me less? Am I less of a hero, because I *decided* to be one?'     "I don't understand whatever it is so you're trying to say, so it's probably stupid." Ash grumbles. "I think it'd make you less because 'human' sucks shit. Not like, for making that sacrifice to stay near someone who matters, but factually you'd be 'less' because you'd been reducing yourself to human to do it."     'Even 'Human' is just something made up to draw a big circle that leaves things out, to add things to try and understand them, or subtract things to hurt them'     "Ever heard the theory that Human Template Origin is backwards?" Ash throws a card on the pile. "That 'the human form' isn't just something that emerged out of how reality is. Someone changed reality so that 'the human form' was the most powerful." A round of Go Fish later, Ash is so busy thinking that they casually blurt out something completely insane as if it were the most normal followup topic there is. "Like, we're pretty sure aliens mostly look like us. Or used to, I guess. Nobody knows if there's any still alive. The last signal we got was like fifteen years ago."     'I can sympathize - I tried too. And she was a grand, shining knight for so long that maybe she habituated a kind of love for...'     "What like Stockholm Syndrome?" says Ash, obliviously.
Angela	Angela is an AI that isn't stupid. Somtimes she might be naive in the way somone with little outside experience might have, but she has more indoor experience than anyone else in the world. And she also has extreme levels of experience in dealing with meltdowns both capitalized and non-capitalized. It isn't even stuck with only nine people anymore. She thinks back. Is Lilian faking it when she embraced her? Did sh efake it when she smiled at her? Did she fake it when she said she shouldn't give up on being born even if it meant battling her. Even if it meant... She called her 'girls like us'. Was that just aimless benevolence? "Mm... I wouldn't say I'm oblivious. I asked her once if, essentially, she'd rather just go 'fuck it' and leave it all behind. And she said she wanted that..." "But she did not want to be the sort of person who wanted that. I am paraphrasing since this was hundreds of years ago, but it is not as if I had forgotten something so important. If she had said 'I want to, but I do not know how', I would agree with you completely. I am not in a position where I can dictate terms to Lilian. Yes, I suppose I see her as some sort of god, in a way, that she is above me." "But ... is that not natural, for someone who has yet to be born? I do not feel that my connection to her is fake. I admit I do worry, because I have been betrayed before, but ... She would not put me above her Code. I want our relationship to be stronger than .... someone who needs help, and the person who must be saved." ''through your heads that you're supposed to thank her and not try to kill her.'' "I offered to stay in my cell forever." Angela says. "So that we would never be in conflict. But she said I should live even if it hurts her." "I am not being soft, or self-sacrificing, Angela. If I were set back to the way I once was, I'd kill you if that's what it took to be born." She is quoting someone there. "Perhaps she was lying when she said that. I don't believe so. But if she was lying when she said that, if she was lying when she included me when she said 'girls like us' because I was a bit afraid of becoming who I wanted...needed to be. Then I'd need proper proof. And then I would become a blight on this multiverse, I suppose, but that is what a broken heart does." ''She's respectable and I'm not.'' "I missed the arc of Lilian's when she was considered unrespectable, I'm afraid, so I shouldn't comment." ''I just hated every one of you from the start.'' "Understandable. Lilian once told me 'Ah, you sort of hate the people you're trying to save'. So I imagine she feels similarly. It is reasonable to hate the world that rejects you. Certainly, I do." ''Kingdom of Desire'' The King of Greed's role is nearing its end as Ash learns how to deal with her with more and more and more overwhelming force. At the end of a battle that lasts just an hour... "Ah, like you promised... You fucked me." "Don't you mean fucked you up?" Cinder asks as she retreats. "I know what I said..."
Lilian Rook	'That's why I think you struck out with the hero hostage situation thing: It wasn't about her, it was about 'work'. Do you think this is different?'     "Even if I accept the premise-- imagine I was stupid enough to believe that she likes the LARP. This is different because she doesn't get to be a knight in shining armour. You're in here. She's out there. You're not saving anyone. Nobody can even see you. It's just about who gets to decide how the world ends, in absolute terms; who's left to decide it."     "You're here because she can't do anything, and that's because the one thing she could do is pull the gloves off, butcher Red Team, pull NAZCA out by the roots, hunt down the Letter Agency twenty-six like dogs, and hang the president herself. But if she ever did anything like that, none of you would be able to look at her the same way ever again."     "If I'm wrong-- and I'm not-- then she doesn't know that."     Naraka Bhavaagra:     'Until you found her? Nobody knew her name?'     "Aren't you supposed to know how a prophecy works?" is Ash's cattiest reply. "There's four. They spark up in this order. Two are like this and two are like that. There was a 'Fenrir' before 'Lilian Rook'. There was a 'Jormungandr' before me. Get it? Why's her fucking name so important?"     'Are you jealous? Do you wish you were the first to recognize her?'     "I don't even know what to say to that." It's nasty, but it doesn't sound like it isn't true. "The whole point of NAZCA was for me to get to the others. Do you think I signed up for the health coverage?" Ah yes. America. "How is a homeless sixteen year old with no ID and two thirds of their skin left going to think about international flights?" What? "If I were this pissed out of jealousy, that'd be easy to fix. I'd defect."     'Dear, sweet Nika might have difficulty accepting these sorts of exchanges, and to mold her into that which would suffer nothing for them would be another method of destroying her. As for the similarly, yet differently kind Sakura-chan, I expect she would already know what you plan to say.'     "If they're being paraded around like animals in captivity then I'll save them too. And stop fucking humblebragging." 'Cheating' their way into a side area, Ash softly swears at the secret item being 'baked goods', then doubles back to stuff several of them into the empty spots in their SERE kit.     'There is more than one way this ends.'     "Yeah. But we all know which way it's gonna be."     Alpha Caeli:     'I've solved you. I've *solved you.*'     "I was never a fucking puzzle, asshole. You're all so fucking--" Ash takes their one shot. It's not much less than their maximum force. "--illiterate you just can't read the answer. Running around in circles arguing which fucking phylum I fit into. I know how you talk about me." And yet, there is another run. There's always another run.
Lilian Rook	'The only things that change are *inside*, inside you. And you stretch yourself out to make that change enter this, all this space. The *world* is fucking psycho, apathetic, unreactive, nonsense, noise, randomness and inconsequential nothingness, and you're the only normal thing in existence, the only thing where your actions have any effect. You and *Lilian Rook*, the only person in the world who makes sense.'     Ash actually hesitates.     'And we made her all messed-up. She believes the world can change. That shit's just awful, huh? No wonder you fight like that.'     The after-boss pause is quiet. Ash sits alone, spear slung over their shoulder, wreathed in shifting radiation. At some point, a piece of debris scoured a line through the reflective coating of their visor, vaguely below the eye and skidding away over the side. "Fuck you. Fuck you for making her believe in you. If you want to believe in something so bad, believe in Hell and go there."     Ash remains in one place for so long that the run times out.     Day 6:     . . . . . . . .
Trudy Grimm	> "Damn. You chose it for yourself, but it's not even 'your real name'? That's kind of fucking embarrassing."     "Oh, so you choose to respond at last, do you? Ahaha, I suppose that phrasing was rather careless. 'Original' might have been a better choice on my part," The Jotunn Trudy titters with her hand over her mouth. > "Do you think that's flattering or something? I'm not ruthless, I just don't give a shit, and I'm not relentless, I'm just not a bitch."     "This is the first time we've had to properly have a conversation, no?" Curling her fingers, JotunnTrudy leans forward, resting her chin on the back of her hand, "I had only the prior experiences to guess from, you see. Though I cannot imagine any warrior who would balk at being called either ruthless nor relentless. Though of course, such things are also tempered and honed by other qualities, lest they run amok. Love, mostly. Love for their people, for their family, for their country or their thane-- Loyalty or Devotion, are these not also forms of love? Are these not qualities to be proud of, for such talented fighters? Maybe I'm just old-fashioned like that. Why, I communicate with a crystal ball rather than a 'cell phone', ahaha~"     She closes her eyes in thought, walking her fingertips slowly across the field as the First Regent and Ash clash repeatedly, "When unchecked, such traits result in tyrants and despots whose ambitions are untempered by love. The most generous fate I could predict for one who so proudly claims not to care."     An eye opens, "But you /do/ care. About her. And for some reason you've gotten it into your head that the people around her willing to sacrifice and fight for her sake are harmful to her. Why is that?" Tilting her head back, she hums, "Is it because that is what happens to you in that soulless organization?" > "You think it's easier for me to work with NAZCA than walk away? Is that what's going on?"     "Ahaha, it certainly seems that way," The First Regent weaves past an attack, sweeping his scepter in a broad golden arc of slicing light that casts up a wave of snow into blinding mist. A second later, he sails out wildly out of control from a solid punch, the blast of air scattering ice crystals in furrows, "Why else would you stick with such soulless husks? The very hollow shells you decry us all of being, you willingly align to and permit to control you."     "The sword does not command the hand that wields it, you know? Does the sword realize this, I wonder? Just how much leverage do you actually think you have?"
Trudy Grimm	The glass breaks. The vague shape that had been slowly phasing in throughout the chat quite suddenly reveals itself to be Trudy; a colossal, horizon-spanning version of herself, walking her fingertips across the battlefield. She doesn't realize she's been revealed in such a way, expecting the curses to function as intended.     Like this, it becomes suddenly and incredibly easy to juke the First Regent into the 'crushing phenomenon' which is now quite transparently obviously the witch screwing around. When the Regent is smashed thus, she pauses with a little, "Oh? So you're perceiving me, then?"     There's a pause as she assesses the spellcraft. After a moment, her eyes close and she draws in a breath, then lets it out softly, "I see... That thing you used was from Petra, wasn't it?" Her eyes open, "You're good enough not to have to rely on something so utterly banal as that. Do me a favor and ram it down her throat next time you see her, would you? This time you failed because of her. Setting aside that she'd probably /enjoy/ it, she willfully sabotaged you hoping it would hurt someone trying to know and understand you."     "Do it without cheating. I believe in you."     The entire snowfield snaps up and closed like the jaws of a steel trap, inverting itself and resetting while ejecting Ash back to the hub.
Trudy Grimm	Back in the Healing Hub, Trudy flops into one of the cushions again, then rolls over onto her back and drapes there.     And when Petra comes in-- a shadow extends, producing a skeletal arm and hand that grabs her ankle to trip her, all so Trudy can lift her legs and slam them into the girl's back to aggressively claim as a footrest.     "You really are scum, aren't you? I /did/ ask you to tell me when you planned on betraying us but I didn't think you'd try to betray Lilian /and/ Ash at the same time."     "They truly are magnificent, now that I've seen a glimpse of brilliance under that spiny shell. Why would you do that to them?"
Arthur Lowell	> Arthur: Connect     Arthur's voice is... startlingly quiet. But he smiles a little. In soft tones, as his arena dissolves and Ash moves on to the next challenge, he says, "I think she's right. That things, they matter, that they'll change. But that's just noise for you, and it's infesting her. I think..." He swallows. "I think she's scared of what you believe. Maybe you're scared of what she believes." He takes a deep breath. "And they're scary things to believe. God, don't know how you two manage."     "I think she's real though. And what you do with her matters. So I think... if you listened to her, and heard her out, and maybe thought about what you'd do, if doing anything could change things, that would do something good, for someone real." His smile is weak. "I don't think I've listened to her very well. Think she might need it by now."     The bitcrushed announcer declaring "TIME OUT!" Is almost silly. But Arthur finally gives up a different kind of key. Those Cosmic Coordinates have been stacking up, but now... what is this? What actually is this? "Key of Last Resort" doesn't seem to have much use. Or physical shape. Or matter. It's a sound. A tone. A *musical note*. Something to which one would tune an instrument. One single note, impossible to describe, that feels like it leads precisely and perfectly into a melody that's on the tip of your tongue.     Outside, the Armillary is slowly beginning to click, to grind, to slowly shudder. BREAK ROOM > ==>     In the break-room, Arthur hears Angela, sees her glance through the screen. His eyes glass over a little, defocusing as he speaks to her. "Damn, girl. No idea what you're saying but I don't change a thing ever." He gives her screen some friendly finger-guns and a wink. Nothing about his nature has changed here. In a way, he's always been like this.     "Think they're about to hit the finale. I'm gonna be honest, I don't have a final boss set up, and if they make it out, we don't get do-overs." He mutters to whomever joins him in this break-room. "...It's gonna get a little bad."
James Bond	Changed my mind. Killing you anyway.     "As you like." --HEALING AREA--     Bond has upgraded to scotch with no ice. He brought some along himself, as part of his 'provisions.' He sighs and rubs his temple between bouts of nursing the iceless glass.     --- They want to be holding the leash, or they want to drag everyone into the wilderness.     "I don't expect we'll have much time to talk before you're off to the next area. Do you smoke?" If they do, he turns away after offering them one. Whether they do or not, he turns away to light his in cupped hands. He'd made the forest cold and chilly.     "I don't think Lilian, Nika or Sakura want to hold anyone's leash or put anyone into the wilderness. I'll admit I know Sakura the least well, but I'd be very surprised if that were the case, given what I do know." Bond's cigarettes are cheap, rough trash, and they can smell it in the thin wintry air even if they don't partake. He takes a pull, exhaling away, then continues.     "If there's one thing I can think of that's been the most exhausting to Lilian, it's the insistence of the people around her in assuming she does."     "And I can't really blame her. The leash means cleaning up after them for as long as you decide to keep them alive, and it means being the one who decides when they die. The wilderness means that no one even gets the illusion of safety. Not really an attractive solution to someone who always feels like they have to watch their back even in 'civilized society.'"     Exhale. "As for 'them...'" He presumes they meant the weight of the entire rest of the world, when they said it; arraigned in lockstep opposition to the Blooms and what they represent. To anything that 'looks different.     "It's not exactly news that people can be convinced to hate things which are objectively good for them. Should you deny that new dichotomy to yourself just because of that? Those three aren't." He flicks the spent cigarette away.      "Back to it, then?" --HEALING AREA-- ...It's gonna get a little bad.     "I don't know if you've noticed," says Bond, over a glass of scotch, "But nothing is ever good."
Petra Soroka	RESPAWN ZONE "Nah. I'd just make you my bitch instead of hers."     "O-oh." So quickly does Petra shift from matter-of-factly planning her own suicide, to becoming a little flustered, that the tonal difference between them must not be as wide as it would be for any normal person. She tries to hide it by immediately cracking open the can in her hands and taking a long drink; and, in typical idiotic fashion, that can happens to be a beer, which she has to casually finish downing like it was on purpose.     "... Well. I-I mean, it's true that, uh, my ideological duties sort of, um, extend past just Lilian alone. I've got responsibilities to Angela, to finish fixing the Beauty of Ash-- e-er, that's, um, the name of my mech; it's always been called that, I've had it forever-- and then also to Nika and Sakura and including you, too, so... but...."     Petra sobers up, emotionally, at least. "But I couldn't stand it if I failed her like that. I wouldn't really stop thinking about it. Especially not enough to devote myself to someone who did it to her. Sorry." "Why do you even care?"     Faintly warm-cheeked Petra lurks politely behind Ash at the sword-circle, as comfortably close as a friend who isn't worried about getting skewered through by a spear later would stand. Lightly breathless, Petra nods at the assertion that she might not get anything from the revelations of the swords, then shakes her head.     "I just like her a lot. I think she's really interesting. Everything she doesn't say, too." Conspiratorially, and obviously because her inhibitions are lowered from god's own 4.2% ABV, she asides to Ash, "You can, like, *see* the change in her eyes, by the way. From the pain thing. It's kind of hot. It's like, like, microdosing a drug."         HEALING ZONE, NEXT TIME SHE'S BACK     "... Can Sakura see what goes on in here, you think?" A question directed too-casually at no one in particular, from a slightly shifty-looking Petra.         THE FALL OF MIRRORS "You ever think that maybe she'd like it?"     "Well-- ugh-- maybe she'd like pottery or whatever too, until she got kidnapped from her fucking wedding and locked in a room to do it. Fuck." Petra struggles under Ash's boot, but it's over for her the moment she's caught like this. "The world ends on *your* time. It literally only *exists* at your fucking whim still, right? Why *not* have a little fun with it?" "Keeping her tame and docile and where she can't destroy anything or hurt anybody, that's fucking cruel."     "And, like, this is where she *can* hurt people. Will the paradigm of 'hurting people' even, like, exist, after? I think you're giving the world way too much credit. Like you're a fucking-- fucking helpless captive until you dip and burn it all to the ground. Fucking *own* it while you're here."
Petra Soroka	HEALING ZONE     And then Petra dies and goes to hell, and hell is where Trudy Grimm is waiting to be an asshole. Bleary and bloodied, Petra drags her way over to Tamamo to receive healing in silence after her first actual loss of the week-long cycle, and she trips over Trudy's skeleton before noticing that it's not an inconveniently rude stool of some sort. The footrest only lasts a moment before Petra's perception catches up to her situation, and her droopily weary morphmetal orbit whips around Trudy's ankles to rip her off and upend her off the couch. The remainder that isn't cuffed around her ankles coalesces into a smooth spear floating above Petra's hand, aimed towards Trudy's throat.     "Fucking condescending fucking delirious loser. You're *so* fucking *self-absorbed*, like you literally matter even one fucking *shred* as much as the real actors here. I'm *still* not betraying anyone, creep, and maybe keep your fucking slimy, filthy praise for Ash to yourself and realize no one wants to hear it and no one fucking trusts a word out of your mouth. You can't fucking *posture* your way into being more fucking *noble* than me. You can't *game* the fucking *emotional stakes* to try and make me wrong and you right at every turn. Touch me like that when Tamamo's not around and I'll make your life *hell*."     She still has to drag herself a few meters over and beg Tamamo for healing, though. Ash beat her bad. "...It's gonna get a little bad."     "... We'll see--" Petra catches herself, self-conscious of her ellipses. "We'll see. I think... this answer sucks. But it's all I've got. I think it helped, some. I don't know if it helped enough. They're..." She coughs. "Maybe a little stubborn."     If Lilian were here right now, what would she do? Like consulting prayer for guidance, Petra mentally models Lilian's presence in the break room, and attempts to conjure up something she would suggest for this tensely ambiguous running-up to the final result.     "... Should we make, um, escape plans? When this shit splits open, where are we going and how do we make sure Lilian gets out with us?"
Tamamo	AGAIN:     "Sixteen, was it...?"     'If I were this pissed out of jealousy, that'd be easy to fix. I'd defect.'     "Oh, no, you would most certainly stay jealous. When did I ever say I would let you have her, if only you would cease your violence? Ah-- attempted violence, I suppose."     'And stop fucking humblebragging.'     "Oh, my apologies. Did I appear to be humble?" The laughter is kinder, this time.     'Aren't you supposed to know how a prophecy works?'     "Indeed, I do."     'The whole point of NAZCA was for me to get to the others.'     "And yet, you did not." A roll of her shoulders, shrugging in macro.     "A prophecy is a message granted by a higher power capable of reading the threads. Being, myself, such a higher power, I can tell you with certainty that this prophecy is... well, seeing how close you are, I shall be brief."     Tamamo looks down, knowing there's only one more dead-end to cross off before Ash reaches her. "Whether you call them blooms or sparks, no such sloppily-maintained story is as important as Lilian Rook, herself. 'Fenrir' is no one. 'Fenrir' is your idea of what someone might be. That you would reject everyone else is as I expected. That you would reject even Lilian is... disappointing. Did you not say you would 'steal my girl?' Did you think you could accomplish this without finding the strength to see her? Are you just like the rest of this world, or are you merely pretending, to mock me for taking the time to speak?"     There's never any chance of actually catching her. Not when she knows exactly when Ash will be in range. That constant field of distortion doesn't prevent her predictive senses from working on its surroundings. YET AGAIN:     Tamamo is quiet for a while, though she's constantly watching.     "It is not as if I could pity you. You worked to gain your power, so you could threaten anyone. There is nothing to be pitied, no matter how doomed your goal, and how little you have thought ahead to what happens after you break the next wall."     More silence.     "I would sooner destroy this world than let anyone in it separate us."     Maybe she shouldn't be saying that, like something she could simply choose to do. But it's not as if anyone but the Spark that's vowed to destroy the world is here to listen.     "Anyone. Find some other dog to chase."     The maze is nearly fully solved, by this point.     "Unless you can think of a better solution." HEALING ZONE:     Tamamo is normal. She even properly heals Petra, so Petra can be a good girl and go back out to get her ass beaten.     Thinking about what Xion said hasn't been terribly fruitful. A power to unlock hearts would be nice, she supposes, but if it worked on Ash, it would have already happened. The only kindness she can give is leaving out food for her opponent to 'steal.'
Trudy Grimm	"Posture? I'm not posturing," Trudy remains where she's been tipped, just closing her eyes. Whether it's smug or just exhaustion is tough to call in the face of Petra's morphmetal spear, "It's the truth. You literally tried to undermine what we're doing here by sabotaging it. And now you're trying to claim the high road. That's the only pathetic thing going on here. You vile, disgusting worm."     "You'd rather spite me than see this effort succeed. 'Not betraying anyone', who would ever believe you after you so clearly did? Do you honestly think that tearing down our efforts here by giving them the ability to skip and cheat and ignore our efforts is 'helping' our cause? Who, precisely, is the delirious one?" > "...It's gonna get a little bad."     The witch lets out a deflating sigh, "Is it ever anything else?" She shifts and finally rights herself, "Time to get back to work. We can execute this treasonous /bog slime/ when we've succeeded in /spite/ of her. And if we don't succeed..."     After a pause, Trudy hums with a shrug, "Well, we'll have more pressing problems."
James Bond	You really are scum, aren't you? Fucking condescending fucking delirious loser. Do you honestly think that tearing down our efforts here by giving them the ability to skip and cheat and ignore our efforts is 'helping' our cause?     Bond finishes the glass, with a substantial amount having still remained at the time of his decision to do so. He then pours another, and clears it in one shot.     "Trudy."      "We're all exhausted," he haggardly begins. "Ash has beaten me almost every time, and the headache they gave me this last time is only getting worse the longer you insist on these half-cocked verbal jousts with Petra and Angela. She's not going to betray Lilian. I don't care how superficially similar it looks. She has a skillset and she's using it. You wouldn't call a locksmith to get you back into your house and then beat him to death for breaking and entering, would you? Give the skeletons a rest, please."     "Petra, if you lower the spear I'll pour you a glass." Should we consider an escape route?      "I have something to help with that if need be."
Xion	BREAK ROOM, Xion leans against a wall, shoulders flush to the side. In both arms, hugged to her chest, is the same Keyblade she started with - twisted hexagon-length of chitinblack bone or unknown metal capped and ending with the same glass sphere filled with red. Cheek to the glass, she stares at the comings and goings of the others, trying to take a break. There's a smudge of chocolate at the corner of her mouth, unlicked, for even sugar can't keep someone going forever even if at the time it might seem like the rush was infinite. Eventually, even the magic hacks run out and you have to fight 'honest'. Arthur returns to the Break Room, but he's 'done'. He laughs and jokes with the others. Angela looks at him. 'I see, you are more inclined to close our eyes than your own.' "Feeling human yet?" The Nobody asks the Mage of Space. "Hit real?" Rhetorical. But Arthur goes again, leaves and comes back, and when he does Xion is there to offer him a tired fist-dap and a smile. "I don't have a final boss either, Arthur. This was kind of the plan -- kind of. This whole thing was..." Painful? Strange? Different? "... an engine we built on the track together." Lowering grip on her sword and dismissing her comfort blade, Xion summons a pageboy cap to hand and drops it with a tired smirk on lips. "Good luck with your last runs." She insists to say, glancing at James' iceless scotch. --- She smiles, every time, and can look as fresh as monochrome white and black gets, but the training wheels come off. There's no more advantages to be given. Over and over and over and over, even the character breaks down and the not-so-different reality manifests. Struggle. Race. Rest. Repeat. Cardgames and boardgames and dalliances and dances, Uno and Go Fish and Old Maid. Cinder features as regularly as she can, but never for the Calvinball violence and not for the penultimate challenge. A room of black with a white table, arranged with stacks of ''chips''. Ash's have various denominations - 'bullet', 'missile', 'agent', 'mecha'. Xion, across, jacket off and traded for a black vest and a white shirt and a pageboy cap over her eyes, sits before a stack differently situated: Medallions, all neatly stacked up. They don't have values, or clear indicators of what they do. Each is colorful and unique, even in the world of monochrome. Then, Xion lifts deck to shuffle up and offer it out to Ash to cut to a random position. "We don't have to argue about 'what words mean'. They don't mean much of anything until two people come together and agree on them. So," Xion deals cards to Ash and herself, tired smile rising and falling on face. "If we both agree we're human, then, I think we both are agreeing to a different set of terms than most people. But we agree! So, we're human." Flop and river come, turning over some advantage and some danger for Ash - a pair of twos that Xion as looking for last game sailing down the poker game's shared cards. "It might make 'me' less, but does it make me less human? Since we're both human, I guess I 'got what I wanted', huh." Showdown. Xion bets moderately, sizing up piles of medallions in wager as chips and leaving a glittering pile of considered treasures. The conversion value might 'make sense' or might not - does Ash even agree in the value of the chips? Xion, as dealer, remains largely silent on value. She's made her 'bet'. Does Ash fold, call, or raise? The stacks change. Xion never seems to 'hold' any of the NAZCA tokens herself, raking up piles of medallions to stack when she wins and... giving over colorful tokens to Ash when she loses, except, they stop being colorful. All of them fade out, empty, disappear, invert into empty glass and ungiven threads of quilt, and become 'Ash's Medallion', their nothing-doing, nothing-there representation.
Xion	The hands keep going. The piles are all that matters. "Do you get tired?" Xion asks, between hands. "Not in the panting, exhausted way. But... the other way?" Shaking her head, Xion gives up a lot more information on her eyes by pressing up the rim of her pageboy cap. "Not your arm, but, your *want*? Being 'so much more than human', tuning up that high is a little exhausting. I think the world is exhausting, really, but..." 'Ever heard the theory that Human Template Origin is backwards?' "..." Xion starts shuffling one of her Ash glass-chip with a black iron medallion, clinking the two together, swapping which was on top over her pair of cards while staring across table at Ash. "It'd... make sense, if it was. The Human Origin Theory. Wouldn't that make perfect sense? If you were getting signals as late as fifteen years ago, that means that the Vitruvian man *definitely* could have been an echo of an alien signal. And the obsession with the shape, too, and *all* of it. It's--" Xion stops shuffling chips. "Have you ever noticed that the Antegent use the 'same materials' as humans - vertebrae, marrow, teeth and claws - do you think they're trying to flip things back? I remember..." The game is almost forgotten, fingers rubbing both medallions side by side. "When I saw 'through' them, heard them through the Rivet, and they were 'looking down', I thought it meant... a lot of things. We might both agree what 'looking down on us' means. But... If I were grand and magnificent, wouldn't I hold my head high? Wouldn't I look forward? In space, isn't direction meaningless? For light, aren't all things relative?" "So why," Xion moves most of her chips forward, a large bet, no longer consulting her cards. "Do you think they were made to only look down? What if they weren't the winners of the last war, but the losers - and this world is where the human shapes are..." Fully conspiracypilled, Xion looks down and realizes that she has been smoked betting her stacks on two pair, and frowns. The board simplifies. There are only two chips for the last hand, one for each player. Xion checks the two cards under her black iron medallion and thumbs across to check the second. "It's... not Stockholm Syndrome. It's like Stockholm Syndrome? I don't even think that's a real thing, it's really just people catching feelings for activities and processing them more I thought, but... Well, I worked at a florist shop for a while until flowers meant things to me. It's that kind of way." Showdown. Xion places forward her chip, sliding it across monochrome table with a faint scrape, an impression the iron leaves in the material. There's only call or fold. There's only stay for more hands, or continue. And of course... Xion's hand is nothing. Two junk cards. Ash can beat it with anything.
Petra Soroka	HEALING ZONE "You literally tried to undermine what we're doing here by sabotaging it."     "We're not trying to *win* against them, you fucking *idiot*!" Petra seethes in near-incoherent disbelief, the emphatic sweep of her hand drifting the Silver spear closer. "It's a game! A *game*, you fucking *retard*! We *made* the rules!" "Who, precisely, is the delirious one?"     Increasingly manic, Petra's demeanor doesn't help her case. "*You*! *I* understand what's going on! *I* understand *Ash*! Literally, of all the fucking people in the multiverse, there's fucking *no one* with a better chance to get through to them than *me*! I get how they talk, I get how they tick, I get what they want and I get what they hate, so if we fucking fail here, it's because I'm too fucking *worthless* to--" "Petra, if you lower the spear I'll pour you a glass."     Petra lets out a frustrated, exhausted groan. She shudders, and clenches her hand to make the spear dissolve into discrete floating droplets, swiping Trudy petulantly across the face with one of the metal beads before withdrawing. She slumps into a chair next to Bond, stressed and drained obviously by more than just Trudy.     "What, like-- is that alcohol? I've already had--" A beat. "Yeah, sure, whatever. Thanks."
Lilian Rook	' I've got responsibilities to Angela, to finish fixing the Beauty of Ash-- e-er, that's, um, the name of my mech; it's always been called that, I've had it forever--'     "Gross."     ' Especially not enough to devote myself to someone who did it to her. Sorry.     "I think I actually believe that. Congrats, loser."     'I just like her a lot. I think she's really interesting. Everything she doesn't say, too.'     "How are you still allowed anywhere near her?"     'You can, like, *see* the change in her eyes, by the way. From the pain thing. It's kind of hot. It's like, like, microdosing a drug'     "How are you still alive?!"     The weekend begins with Ash taking another Secret. It's unclear if they even realize it's been six entire days. They still act like it's all been one long argument, as if oblivious to the concept. think     Fractures ~ Your energy recharges faster the longer you don't use it     §It's been so long since I could believe that being in harmony with the world is the easiest way to move through it. They say that conformity is a drug, but I think it only works for people who didn't need it in the first place. It didn't for me. No matter how well I study it, there was always some other new rule or facet for how you're supposed to be. The more perfect I get the act, the more that one tiny little flaw sticks out. The better I get at acting sane, the more I feel the presence of an uncanny valley, right before the end.§     §I wonder if I've been marked. I wonder if their brains are wired to notice the impostor in disguise, and I'm it. I kill myself to be kind and they look at me like a monster for being rude. I lash myself to manners and their lips curl at how I hold my head too high. I humble myself and bleed where I'm cut, and now it's my background, or my look, or now even my friends. I'm everything a shining beacon of humanity is supposed to be, aren't I? I save lives, I give charity, I slay monsters, I build homes; I'm beautiful, successful, educated, charismatic, and self-sacrificing. But I killed one of theirs to walk amongst them, and I think they can see the scars where it fought back.§     Grimm Tundra:     Ash arrives with a new incendiary phrase. "So what was your 'original' name then? You know mine; fair's fair." It sounds incredibly testing.     'This is the first time we've had to properly have a conversation, no?'     "Don't flatter yourself."     'Though I cannot imagine any warrior who would balk at being called either ruthless nor relentless.'     "That's because I'm not a fucking WARRIOR!"     An ordinary duel with the Reagent, before even the halfway healing point, escalates into freefall down the impact crater of an invisible asteroid. Ash screams louder than the impact. "Stop making shit UP! Every single fucking thing you say is an assumption! You and everyone else! It's not asking! It's not guessing! It's not 'getting to know'! You can't talk-- can't look at me without deciding some shit about me is true when you came up with it and you DON'T EVEN REALIZE YOU'RE DOING IT!"     Trudy's conditions don't require a friendly conversation. Only a sincere one. Ash is being the furthest thing from insincere. "The fact that you act like it's impossible for anything about me to be because of me and not NAZCA is SHIT! You're going to tell me you ran away from some evil fucking family because you don't want to be defined by them, then talk to me like this?!"
Lilian Rook	"I'm taking her, because I need her, and not you! Don't fucking lie to me! You don't want me! You just think that if I leave NAZCA, I'll finally just dissolve into being one of you!" That the Reagent is hurled away by the force of the blast under giant Trudy's fingers is only incidental. Probably.     Fall of Mirrors:     'The world ends on *your* time. It literally only *exists* at your fucking whim still, right? Why *not* have a little fun with it?'     "Smart girl. Wonder if anyone else figured that out." Ash says, more than a little condescendingly, yet somehow not sarcastic. A feat, given the amount of simulated gore, and the way they've already warped the terrain to reflect light blasts back at Petra from every angle. "I can have fun with it faster once I have what I want. Are you seriously going to try and tell me that you're having fun on that side? Bowing and scraping and kissing ass and playing nice? Letting them talk shit and shove you around and scream at you? You should fucking agree with me! You should want to see a world that she made even more than anyone! What do you have to lose?!"     'I think you're giving the world way too much credit. Like you're a fucking-- fucking helpless captive until you dip and burn it all to the ground. Fucking *own* it while you're here.'     "You ever say that to her, Petra? What does Fenrir think about that, huh? Ever gotten Lilian's answer?" Just before a dozen different reflected lasers converge, Ash shouts "I'll 'have fun with it' when she does. How's that? See if you can get her to cut loose. I dare you."     . . . . . . . .     Branches ~ Weak enemies take much longer to react to you.     §I should be happy. I pushed myself further than I ever should have to get where I am now, so shouldn't I be satisfied? For my whole life until now, I've been fighting desperately, tooth and nail, for just a moment of peace. A tiny space of my own. The right to just exist, without being battered down by the endless waves of the world. But now that I have it, I don't know what to do. I don't feel like myself. I'm afraid I'm so used to being hated that I can't live without it. For the first time, nothing hurts, so most of the time I just feel numb.§     §But while I'm going through the motions, I can't help but notice things. People don't call each other good or evil anymore; they interrogate who supports me and who hates me. They'll abandon a friend who raises their voice to me. They'll edit their own memories to agree with whatever I say. It's like I'm an ideology instead of a person, and everyone wants to be on the right side. I wonder if this peace is only because I've made unreal. They speak of you a lot like they used to speak of me.§
Angela	HEALING HUB ''Trudy tripping Petra'' "Hahnnn..." Angela says. "Like clockwork. Clockwork long broken that it never changes. Petra certainly has a way of bringing out the truth of people out." ''Arthur fingergunning Angela'' Angela blinks and stares. "...Rufus does that too." Is her immediate response, she is struck by this in a way that prevents her from adding much else on the subject. ''The headache they gave me this last time is only getting worse the longer you insist on these half cocked verbal jousts with Petra and Angela.'' "...Thank you, James." Angela says. She seems like she wants to add more a moment after, but doesn't. Instead she says, 'That's what I've been consistently saying, less lyrically. Sometimes I have a sneaking suspicion that I am being ignored when I am trying to be earnest and only listened to when I am threatening violence." Angela considers this again. "Which is a bit of a lesson, is it not?" She's startled by Xion's words but has no response for them. She never really expects those little asides to get a reaction. FALL OF MIRRORS In conjunction while Angela's talking to Ash... ''I've got responsibilities to Angela.'' Angela wants, for that moment, something that she can't quite grasp before her, mentally or physically. She just knows a need hits her that she can't describe. The idea of having an ideological duty rather than one foisted upon you... She almost asks Petra what that feels like, but instead keeps her mouths hut. Now's really not the time. She does have an ideological duty of sorts herself, the more she thinks about it, but she simply isn't in a position to follow through. Because of the very bounds provided to her by Lilian and her fate.
James Bond	Yeah, sure, whatever. Thanks.     "Of course," says Bond, pouring her a glass. "Thank you."     Unlike his taste in cigarettes, he has great taste in spirits. "This is Haig and Haig. It's a sipping whiskey," he says, his slightly embarrassed expression communicating he's fully aware that he just put two glasses away. "If you don't like the taste, that's alright too. I brought some soda water you can use to make it a scotch-and-soda." Which is a bit of a lesson, is it not?     Bond sips, rather than knocks back, his third scotch. "I'd like it if less people had reason to learn that lesson. Which I suppose is part of my reason for being here."
Lilian Rook	Kingdom of Desire:     Walking tired and burning away from the King of Greed, Ash has ostensibly forgotten to punish Cinder. What Angela said bothers them enough to yell it somewhere and assume she'll hear.     "What the fuck does that mean?"     'I am not being soft, or self-sacrificing, Angela. If I were set back to the way I once was, I'd kill you if that's what it took to be born.'     "I'm serious. If she said it then it matters even if you don't."     'Ah, you sort of hate the people you're trying to save'     "Isn't that just telling you that she doesn't want to be here? Like she's just too afraid to try? Fucking-- She's literally telling you people that she's afraid of you, afraid of herself, and--"     Ash storms off in silence.     Nimue:     'I don't think Lilian, Nika or Sakura want to hold anyone's leash or put anyone into the wilderness.'     "That's the whole reason we're special, by the way." Ash says to Bond, a day later an two entire tank chases after. "Maybe it doesn't make any difference if it's because we don't care or we want some weird fucked up third option or whether we just want them all dead."     'And I can't really blame her. The leash means cleaning up after them for as long as you decide to keep them alive, and it means being the one who decides when they die. The wilderness means that no one even gets the illusion of safety. Not really an attractive solution to someone who always feels like they have to watch their back even in 'civilized society.''     The tank is scrap again, but there's a pause anyways. He can almost hear grinding teeth. He recognizes it as creaking in the helmet's neck seal from a week of strain.     "Hey. I'm being completely serious for a second, so don't bullshit me." says Ash. Their tone is flat and biding. "What did she do? I'm not fucking stupid. You're all dancing around something. She did something to make everyone hate her before she got famous enough to make everyone pretend they always liked her. I'm right, aren't I? So what'd she do."     'Should you deny that new dichotomy to yourself just because of that? Those three aren't.'     ". . ."     Alpha Caeli:     'But that's just noise for you, and it's infesting her. I think... I think she's scared of what you believe. Maybe you're scared of what she believes. And they're scary things to believe. God, don't know how you two manage.'     Ash plants their spear, leans exhaustedly on it, and laughs. Not for a long time. Arthur hears the last sight crackle in the air filters. "Do I look like someone who's 'managing' to you? Does she? Come the fuck on. You're crazy too. Something wild is eating the shit out of you, and you're too scared to talk to her about it. Get off my ass."
Lilian Rook	"Fuck. I guess that goes both ways, so watch me do it and call you a pussy."     . . . . . . . .          Blades ~ Key Bearers take quadruple damage while unaware of you     §It's not enough. It's not good enough. I never wanted anything normal. Anything noble. Anything pure. They found out I'm fucked up and realized that I bleed, then they bandaged it up and said 'all better' and now they're doing their damndest to pretend that's it. If they pity me, if they 'care', then they're the good guys, and that's all that matters to them; they don't have to see it; that it takes more than just a shitty life to make a human Bloom. They spend so much time fixing me; they can't admit I'm still sick.§     §Connecting with people, building a life, sharing my secrets, my burdens, falling in love; that was supposed to be the treatment, but it only made me happy, stable, safe, and worse than ever before. A handful of people get clearer, and everything else gets blurrier. The thirst finally leaves, and makes the hunger sharper. Is there a refeeding sydrome for being normal? I feel the opposite of cured. The more I come to trust someone, the more I want to show it.§     Naraka Bhavaagra:     Ash has it too well-memorized. They're tearing through the maze like they've memorized a button combo. It doesn't take long to reorient; even though the compass in the SERE kit doesn't work, it's a little ritual that sets them to it. The thing that gives them the most pause out of the entire realm is a handful of words.     'Lilian's other side enjoys my company, too, of course. As to what she might attempt, my, that is a question worth some musing. She is terribly... exciting.'     Tamamo can see the moment they work through 'but you're her other half?' to its conclusion. With similar reluctance as with Bond, but without the disclaimer of being 'serious', they return to defusing a trap, and ask the floorboards "The way she moved when Arthur turned her inside out; that was definitely her first time. What do you know about 'the other side'? I'm tired of people trying to lead me on with little breadcrumbs of secrets. Tell me why you make it sound like it's a different person or just stop talking because I'm not going to bother listening."     'Sixteen, was it...?'     "What?"     'Oh, my apologies. Did I appear to be humble?'     "Literally never once." Ash grunts, taking an entire staircase at once. "Not that I'd be."     'And yet, you did not.'     "Yet."     'I would sooner destroy this world than let anyone in it separate us.'     "Then do it. I'd never complain about you again."     'Anyone. Find some other dog to chase.'     "Hey."     A trap goes off. A last second fumble. Ash is charged enough not to mind. The explosion may as well be snapping a twig. "Even if it's just to talk shit at me, stop calling her a dog. I'm serious."     'Unless you can think of a better solution.'
Lilian Rook	". . . Did you ever think for a second . . . that . . . if you'd 'destroy the world' or whatever to not be separated . . . you think she might tolerate the world not to lose you?" Ash slows, just before the final door, to prolong the talking a moment longer.     "I don't think that Sparks-- Blooms, whatever-- can die. If you break the shell, the inside just comes out. I've thought about it, and that's the only thing that makes sense. So . . . Don't fucking throw this back in my face or I'll kill you. But you're actually the scariest thing she has to lose. That puts pressure on someone even if you're trying not to. Being that important means there's something they can only say to anyone else but you, so . . ."     Day 7:     Monochrome Zone:     'Do you get tired? Not in the panting, exhausted way. But... the other way? Not your arm, but, your *want*?'     "Literally all the time."     The reality that this entire episode is coming to a close over a game of cards sunk in for Ash thirty minutes ago. The air about them this time is heavy with the sense that they wish they made the fight with Arthur or Bond or the King of Greed the last one. Now they can't avoid a certain kind of gloominess. The knowing that they won't triumphantly shatter the walls filled with righteous fury and momentum, but walk away from a poker table with seven different uncomfortable questions.     "Being that kind of tired is like being drunk though. The hangover only hits once you stop. You can only be tempted to rest once you know what resting feels like, y'know?"     'The Human Origin Theory. Wouldn't that make perfect sense? If you were getting signals as late as fifteen years ago, that means that the Vitruvian man *definitely* could have been an echo of an alien signal. And the obsession with the shape, too, and *all* of it. It's--'     "Yeah, right?" A note of parched enthusiasm accidentally creeps into Ash's voice, and they squash it. "Yeah no shit I noticed. I used to take apart Antegent for a living." they say, stacking up chips to push forward. "Organs, blood, bodyparts if they didn't have any of those. Phantom Circle perverts paid for that shit. G.D.F sometimes too, when there were bounties and shit. If you need an excuse for being alive, it's 'I'm holding money'. That works long enough to buy painkillers and MREs if you're fast."     'Do you think they were made to only look down? What if they weren't the winners of the last war, but the losers'     "I can see it going either way I guess." Ash says, hesitating on whether to even say 'all in' with two chips left. "It's tough to say. I lived around them for basically-- as much as you can 'live around' them anyways, and 'them' being only a certain number-- for like, years. And I just . . . dunno. Got the feeling that people are right for the wrong reasons. It's 'The Onslaught' and not 'the war' because . . . I just don't think they had a side, or a stake, or anything."     "Maybe it was just isolation or something, but I felt like they were more like me than the soldiers I knew. Just . . . human trash. An afterthought. Someone else's problem." Dropping their hand on the table, face up, Ash presses their hand to their right side, as if for emphasis, and says "Or maybe it's just because of all of their shit in my organs and something something cellular memory something fucking whatever."
Lilian Rook	The chair scrapes. Ash stretches after standing up. It wasn't needed.     "There. I win. It's been real, but I'm fucking done with this. I know you can teleport, and since you let me win, I'm feeling charitable."     "I'll give you a head start. You have as long as it takes for me to ask Lilian one question."