Scene #9213: S&M SS2b - For The Lost

Owner	Pose
Petra Soroka	Another twenty four hours passes. It's felt endless, with back and forth skirmishes that barely shift each side's territory, each one bloody and exhausting. Both sides are forced to be on high alert around the clock, because Lilian and Rita can appear at any time, and the other Elites can't let even a moment's opportunity to retaliate slip by. Just a couple days in, running at one hundred and ten percent intensity already feels like it stopped being sustainable a day ago, and everyone is burdened with the knowledge that they're not even halfway through with it. War means war, and the methods that Petra has been employing bring the war to every conceivable front. Whenever she's spared an hour, she spends it committing brutally precise sabotage on the facility itself, to deny every reprieve possible for their enemies. She separates off the wiring for the PA system in the dorms just so that she can hijack the rest of the facility to blare deafening, sleep-depriving klaxons over the speakers, and severs Enkephalin pipes to pour a toxic flow of the psychically corrosive substance down the elevator shaft to the lower floors with Lilian and Rita. Each water source they have access to is ruthlessly executed or poisoned by some means or another. With uncannily precise intuition that she refuses to explain, she directs Rufus and Random to hassle certain Abnormalities until the negative Enkephalin produced calls a monstrous Ordeal into existence somewhere random around the facility-- with them losing ground, it's more likely to be Lilian's problem than theirs. Arcane monoliths flailing tentacles drop down from the ceiling and threaten to crush anyone caught beneath them, swarms of giant flesheating maggots erupt out of the ground, robots from Green Dawn lurch without warning out of the shadows with rusty saws and swords. She reasons that even if Rita manages to take control of them after the initial surprise, they're not Abnormalities: they're nonrenewable resources, not turning into eggs when defeated, and the initial surprise can be a lot of damage. About a third of the time, this means getting dragged out of whatever you're doing as Petra hastily gives a rundown of some horrible meat clown that's about to careen through the halls, but you get warning. It would seem overboard, if they weren't getting dealt back worse. Everyone here has been killed at the hands of one or both of Rita and Lilian since the start of the war. Beheaded, bisected, bled out, suffocated, burnt, exploded-- the worst times have been when Kukuru herself was incapacitated and hidden away somewhere, thrown into a freezer until being liberated by Xion or Flamel. The blood that paints the tilted floors of the facility is more than any of their bodies would actually naturally contain. At some point, Petra settled into treating every person here besides Xion and Angela almost identically. For most, that's actually an upgrade in terms of how sympathetic she's being. Even when it comes to Sarracenia, she's quick to call shots for retreat when their situation is dire, or body recovery failing that, and there's a consistent effort on her part to tend to everyone's material needs with food or assisting Kukuru with healing. This comes part and parcel with her increasingly erratic mood and uncharacteristic sarcastic nastiness, but that, in times of untold stress and grief, would be forgivable. What's much more unnerving is that her leadership feels more like she's maintaining the meters of her tamagotchis than interacting with people. A fundamental absence in some intangible human relatability in her actions, like a single hue turned greyscale in a painting, a fraction of a second lag in the firing of the fusiform facial area of the brain reserved for dolls and corpses. Hibiki especially would be acutely aware that Petra hasn't looked directly at her face all day.
Petra Soroka	Right now, Angela's loyalists are camped out in Safety Department, where the glowing green atmosphere has been largely dulled down to matte and metal, both from electronics shutting down and Enkephalin being drained from the translucent piping. This room is one of the few that they're absolutely sure is free of Lilian's traps at the moment, so insofar as the word can apply at all within the facility, they're 'safe' here. 'Safe' still meaning that she has people posted up on watch, accompanied by ratbots to record where they're taken in the grimly realistic probability of them being killed and kidnapped away in the blink of an eye. Riku is the latest casualty, having just been dragged back into the room minutes ago, bloodied and being rapidly repaired by Kukuru. Petra is incessently at work with monitoring her jury-rigged assembly of screens, not even blinking at the arrival of yet another body, running herself on even more razor thin margins of lacking rest and relaxation than the others. There's couches spread around, mostly pushed up against the tilted-down side of the wall now, as well as the least-damaged tables they could find, but Petra herself is refusing to sit in favor of frenetically pacing around. "So, you know. Obviously I underestimated how much control Rita gets over her monsters. Still, I can't fucking believe she'd turn White Night against us, but, like, what do I fucking know?! It's fine. We'll deal with it somehow. There's Pale shielding bullets in Disciplinary if we can get there, we might need to plan out an operation for that. Maybe I can leave a gift of Shajo's head on Gebura's fucking desk too, just as a fun little treat for me." "And obviously on Lilian's side, it's pretty much the worst it could be. Well, not quite, really. I mean, take it from me; the kind of shit she's done to me would make this all look like foreplay, y'know I was getting killed by Exigent Serenity before it was cool. Anyways. So her Code's not counting this as killing us, because we've got Kukuru. I totally remember her calling that excuse bullshit back when I murdered Ishirou, but whatever. Whatever! We'll get through it. It'll be fine. The real problem is that instead of emotionally wearing her down, it's actually energizing her, so we're a thousand fucking percent losing the mentals there. She'll only be getting weaker in battle as the week goes on, but that doesn't count for much if you all do too."
Angela	Angela has been missing for most of the war which, you know, makes sense to some extent. She doesn't know how to fight for starters! She has been battling against the Sephirah largely on the grounds of facility control, using paths she's kept to herself, facility controls that (as far as she knows) only she has access to. Lobotomy Corp, as a building...as a facility... is something Angela can make use of as if it were her own body. She knows how strong Lilian is, she knows how strong Rita is--and she didn't go into this expecting people like Flamel or Xion to be helping her during it. They were still struggling. Even with everything they already sacrificed, they are still struggling. And Angela can't help but fear she is becoming more like her father rather than less. That she is going to sacrifice everyone and even if she is born will be born dead. It is frustrating. Lilian just has to kill her once and it'd be over even if she was revived. Rita could just make it permanent in seconds. But she had constraints of her own even as she could see them rapidly fall away around her in others. The things her closest friends were saying to each other... What kind of world would she be stepping out into? She's sure Woz and Sougo are using every bit of their stupid time travel powers they can but she doesn't want to know. Knowledge would be binding. "I feel." Angela says. "That we should take a moment to properly strategize. We will not get very far if we keep throwing ourselves at Lilian and Rita hoping we manage to eventually defeat the most powerful Elites in this Sector." Angela sets down a bag of supplies. "I have been using the battles to move around and collect what was salvageable for ourselves. Lilian has far more mouths to feed than we do but fighting most of the Agents in the facility and two of the strongest Elites at the same time is still more difficult than just her and Rita." She looks to Mikey. "As such we will need to find a use for you. I am utterly baffled how continuously you manage to be amongst the last survivors." Mikey smiles brightly. "Radical, bosslady!" Angela sighs then looks to Justin who is healed but sleeping, then to Random who had just come back from one of her own sojourns.. "It's not just Cinder. I don't like locking girls in rooms just cause they're different either." Random scowls. "...But Justin just wants to protect his team. I don't know why YOU are with us." They look at Parker who... Shrugs. "I don't like girls locked in rooms either. The City is already getting Light. And Petra's still my Captain right now." Parker who never seemed to care about that before doesn't comment on the shift but maybe cleaning up all that tribblesauce made her reconsider her hyper aggressive individuality and tone it down to aggressive individuality. "I am here... because I am president of the Kukuru fan club now!" Yaboy shouts, grinning at Kukuru. The other agents sigh or groan simultaneously. Angela exhales, "Parker is our only Agent--not counting the ones who are also Elites--who can stand toe to toe alone with one. She is the strongest in the facility in terms of gear. Hopefully, Shajo won't be getting back up in time as he was one of ''their'' strongest Agents. Nikki is also dangerous and functionally immortal thanks to her contract with Zero Kiryu." She looks to Petra for a moment, but looks back to the group and agrees, "That's right. All the dramatics in the world won't help us if we're exhausted too. We have to be smart about this."
Riku Asakura	Riku is dragged back and revived thanks to Kukuru. It's agonizing to go through each time it's happened. He isn't sure how he even got out of it, the only thing he remembers is the darkness of death when it came for him during the blows he gave as Ultraman. The experience is horrifying, honestly, and it's putting him on edge. Despite this, he wakes up with a forced smile at Kukuru who woke him up, and tries to suppress the horrors he's been suffering. They've all been suffering it, and he does not want to be a burden on anyone. So he tries to just smile through it, though it's increasingly forced and strained. He groans from his position on the slab and decides to lie back even while people start to talk. He's trying to smile to push through Petra's attitude towards the situation and outbursts at them. He knows she's suffered through the worst of this stuff too, having lost her girlfriend before this, and having to fight the people she respects the most now. Angela starts to talk about strategy, but Riku doesn't know these people well. He doesn't know the facility that well. He doesn't know the strengths of the various agents. He doesn't know Lilian or Rita's abilities from what he's seen. More than that, he's just not very good at strategy itself. He's usually dependent on others for that, instead of powering through with his strength. That wasn't helping him right now. "Alright...so what do you suggest we do?" he says, staring at Angela from his position on the ground or table they put him on. His blood was all over his jacket and jeans. "I'm all ears because I don't think we can keep this up the way things are heading," Riku admits.
Rufus Shinra	Rufus manages to get at least some sleep. He's had to dip into his stash once again, burning through it a little harder this time. (He's still not sharing.) When he's not sabotage-working the abnormalities, or responding to whatever threat the other elites or the facility itself throws at the group, or being dead because Rita caught him out of position; Rufus is providing the human element that Petra isn't, in making the rounds as the self-appointed morale specialist of the group. He's making sure to check in with everyone at least once a day. "Alright! Going strong today, Flamel? No more breakdowns? Just think about how much you're showing up those Gastronaut weenies by sticking it out for Angela. I'll help you write the bragging hate mail later, if you want." "Got something tasty for us Kukuru? I bet you could make bread mold delicious, hah." "Can I get an Iwae? He is heir to the power of all retainers! His name is Kamen Rider Woz Normal Clothes!" "Hey I've been curious, Sarracenia, may I? - Oof, that's heavy. How do you swing it around like that?" "Hibiki! You've got the... music stuff, right? What about a concert later?" "Hey, Xion." A Sephiroth keychain (with holographic sword-impaling animation when you turn it) is pressed into her hand. "Here. Had this in one of the side pockets of my gear bag, and forgot it was still in there. Yours if you want it." "Sougo! How's the kinging going? Remember, a ruler must inspire people to be their best selves, right?" "So how did you come up with your Ultraman transformation sequence, do you get to customize it or is it just assigned..." "Yaboy! Here!" Rufus slaps a salvaged inventory control sticker on his chest, and writes 'Kukuru Fan Club President' on it in thick black marker. "Congratulations! You should give a speech later." The rest of the agents get whatever other trinkets Rufus has on him or can scrounge. There's a lot of little gacha keychains, and a random Golden Saucer arcade coin that Rufus tries to pass off as something important. "Petra!" Rufus has nothing. "... Keep on... keeping on." He's all bright eyes and big grins and tireless unflagging enthusiasm today, at least while he thinks anyone's looking at him. "It's going to be a long battle but we'll win as long as we can keep our spirits up! Remember to eat and hydrate, stretch before going out on missions, and get what rest you can. Go team!"
Hibiki Tachibana	"Petra." The last while has really and truly been terrible. The conditions are inhumane at best; it's difficult to imagine it as anything else when death - their own deaths included - is sort of just a day to day fact, and their de facto leader in Petra is scrambling for every underhanded advantage she can get back on the other side. Getting ran through and choking out on your own blood is awful enough, but... It's the Agents who are the ones being caught most in the middle of all of this, and that's a fact that's constantly sitting in the back of Hibiki's head. Maybe because of the encounter with Nikki and Carol, and other encounters since. They're the foot soldiers in this conflict between both sides. The primary victims of the many traps that Lilian sets, or the schemes that Petra harasses the others with. Then there's also the ones who /really/ aren't used to this sort of thing... like Sarracenia. The poor princess is even less suited for this than her. And she's certainly taken notice of how it's been affecting Petra, as well. Which is why, even as she outwardly looks quite a bit like the shambling and exhausted corpse Lilian described her as, between her half-lidded stare and quiet tone, she steps up to her in the middle of all of her pacing around, intentionally stepping in front of her to block her path, forcing brief eye contact. And softly press a steaming plastic cup of instant coffee into her chest, pretty clearly intending for her to take it. "Here. It'll help warm you up. And try not to do that to Shajo, thanks." Presuming she does, that's that - if not, Hibiki will just have to leave it on the nearest surface, slowly cooling to a more drinkable temperature. Since she has another in her other hand, and another to grab. One is delivered to Sarracenia, wherever she might be within the Safety Department here, along with a few wordless pats on the shoulder - and the other to Xion, ditto, except with actual words this time. Although she doesn't seem to really know what to say. "...Thanks. For before. I know all of this is the absolute worst for you..." Hibiki finds a seat on the closest couch after, turning her attention Angela's way. Strategizing... "...As far as WhiteNight goes, I think I've got a pretty decent match-up, if things from before are anything to go off of. But I know we're talking more about the bigger scheme of things..." She exhales, eyes drifting to the floor. Carol... ...Hod. The look she gave back to her, the last time they saw each other, replays through her tired mind. "...We didn't really get a chance to talk to any of the Sephirah before this all suddenly happened, you know. None of this is easy on them, either. Would we be able to get anywhere talking to any of them? Though I guess we'd need more control over the facility to have a leg to stand on..." Hibiki! You've got the... music stuff, right? What about a concert later? "Uh... I'm not an idol or anything, but..." Is she thinking about it? Or figuring out how to politely refuse?
Flamel Parsons	Flamel has busted out some of the worst of the worst solutions to problems. He's started stripping bread out of the just-slightly-expired sandwiches, and making sandwiches that are nearly pure chemical-overload. With the ham getting horribly slimey, he's turned towards a sort of mayo-jam combination using breakroom condiments, something apparently named after someone called Strawberry Princess, which he assures everyone is actually a form of well-studied emergency dopamine-endorphin infusion. He's even removing the crusts. It works. If you're willing to try it. For those unwilling, he's concentrated the psychic impression of that into heavy psi-construct autoinjectors that he keeps in a bandolier over his shoulder. Being treated as a tamogatchi suits him just fine -- he's recognized his nature as an object with limits, a sort of tool that's currently in a cooldown phase but can be sent off to rescue operations or similar suchlike. "The real problem is that instead of emotionally wearing her down, it's actually energizing her, so we're a thousand fucking percent losing the mentals there." "Mm-hmm," Flamel comments in some tired tones, still doing his best to keep the smile up. "We're not really going to be able to maintain much. I can't get at her brain, I don't have the gear to pierce her defenses -- unless you're hiding an astral-projection abnormality somewhere. So if you want to influence her rising emotions, you're going to need to work non-astrally!" "All the dramatics in the world won't help us if we're exhausted too." "You might want to look into Apostle meat." Flamel says, tuning and adjusting one of the latest of his little injectors. "They got massive endurance from the semipsychic frequencies that White Nights was broadcasting on. If Rita's emitting the same energies, we might be able to get some energizing stimulants or something like that out of whatever's left of them." He peeks at his latest creation, holding it up to the buzzing fluorescent light to kind of eyeball if the psychic content in this has contaminants below a reasonable threshold. "Apostle ash could work too. I know how stuff works around here." "Alright! Going strong today, Flamel? No more breakdowns? Just think about how much you're showing up those Gastronaut weenies by sticking it out for Angela. I'll help you write the bragging hate mail later, if you want." Flamel jabs himself with the autoinjector, then gives Rufus a bright, beaming smile. "Going great! Don't worry about me, bud, I may have lost a couple of my definitions of being a rock but I'm still always gonna be the mentally-healthiest in any room, really." He tosses the spent needle aside, and it slowly flickers into evaporating psychic energies.
Sarracenia	After that first battle, Sarracenia found somewhere in the Light of the tree, curled up...and just cried quietly for quite a while. Right up until their next assignment or skirmish or they just had to leave. She has also been keeping her distance from Petra and that terrible psychic needle aura of hers. Sarra may very well be the weakest mental link, but she has one thing going for her. She will NEVER let Lilian break her, because that is what Lilian wants. And Sarra never gives Lilian what she wants. The princess has endured plenty of mental anguish, and the fight with Exigent Serenity in the hero simulation unknowingly prepared her in at least some small part for this. That does not mean it has been easy. Not at all. These deaths are much more painful, the time between waking up is longer, and the pain isn't just gone even when she does awaken. There is no two ways about it. Sarracenia is a wreck and has been since that first battle. Her hands have been shaking almost nonstop since then, and one still strays to her belly every now and then...just resting there, remembering the feel of that sword twisting up her insides and reassuring herself that there is not still a hole all the way through her. Sure, she has likely experienced more and possibly even worse things since then, but that was her first time being truly tortured. Sarra said she would be the shining star for them even in this place and time, but after so many fights and such mental and physical anguish she is at times little better than a zombie. And when the zombie mask breaks she has to spend minutes curled up somewhere with her knees hugged to her chest, trying not to cry to loudly. At such times it is perhaps particularly obvious that her usually vibrant and shimmering copper hair is now grey and scraggly and her skin and body have still not quite returned to their proper youthful appearance.
Sarracenia	Her bounce back is still there to a degree, but as she starts running low on fresh dresses and hair care products it takes longer and longer each time. Sarracenia has been helping with the healing and restocking supplies when she can. Green mushrooms can help with the injuries once Kukuru has brought someone back, but she has to ration those to make sure she still has some for fights. 'Hey I've been curious, Sarracenia, may I? - Oof, that's heavy. How do you swing it around like that?' The hammer wiggles and bucks when touched, and Sarra blinks in surprise at the question. "Um...magic?" she says, a bit confused. The levity helps her some though, and she offers a slight smile to Rufus. Once Sarra has applied a few mushrooms to Riku - as much to help her own mental state as anyone else's - Sarra returns to a couch and sits, pulling her knees up against her again while she listens to Petra and Angela. A strategy occurs to her, but she is unwilling to say it. She said she would not hurt the clerks and Agents, after all. She offers another idea instead. "I think we need to be placing traps of our own. I have plenty of remote and proximity mines we can make use of. I supplied a good amount of them when Lilian was going to fight Gebura." 'The real problem is that instead of emotionally wearing her down, it's actually energizing her...' Sarra thinks on this a moment. "...I suppose frustrating her with words in person simply will not work while she is able to torture us whenever she gets ahold of us. Perhaps you should let me just talk at her over the intercoms?" Sarra says, and while it is said with some levity behind it Sarra also seems serious about it. "I am sure I could think of appropriately optimistic and 'stupid' things to say." 'Hibiki! You've got the... music stuff, right? What about a concert later?' Sarra takes the coffee from Hibiki and offers a small smile up at her, but she quickly has to look down as her eyes start to water again and she ends up looking down while just holding the coffee with both hands much like how Hibiki ends up just holding the green mushrooms that Sarra has given her before. While Hibiki seems unsure on the subject of a concert, Sarra perks up a little at the idea. "Petra can sing and play the guitar as I recall. And Angela can at least play. And as a princess, I naturally have a lovely singing voice." she says, seeming all for the idea. Before all this, Sarra would definitely not have tried a mayo-jam concoction. Right now though...she takes one cautiously and nibbles at it before placing it atop her coffee to just be held as well. 'You might want to look into Apostle meat.' Sarra coughs as if choking as soon as Flamel says that. "I am NOT eating or drinking anything made from a PERSON!!" she exclaims, shuddering. "Not even former persons!"
Kukuru	Petra isn't the only one on team sabotage. Kukuru, despite her otherwise gentle demeanor, proves to be quite terrifying in her own right when it comes to making things hellish for the Agents opposing Team Angela. In addition to making those ever useful portals for Petra to take advantage of, Kukuru herself utilizes them every now and then. She's not ruthless enough to go as far as poisoning anyone, of course, but she does kidnap someone every now and then in the hopes of convincing them to change sides or just allow her to send them back into the City where they'd be out of everyone's hair. That, or sending an Agent back into their sleeping areas minus hands. She leaves them with a note, though, to remind her to put them back once this is all over. Teleporting an Abnormality right into the sleeping area also isn't out of the question, either, although she'll need a little direction on which ones to even do that with. That's not to say any of it is effortless, though, since she's still in the middle of parsing what had happened the day before. Rita's ability to control monsters seems to have finally taken root in Kukuru, too, having made her save Shajo at the last second and give him a big dose of healing so that he wouldn't leave Nonon a widow. Thankfully, going that far away after the fact meant she could fall back with everyone before long, but... She's still shaken. Hardening, bit by bit, as the war drags on for the third day. She's even gotten fairly used to treating people and mending clothing with just the one smaller-than-usual hand, having had little time to recover enough nanites to dedicate towards regrowing that removed limb. She tries not to rely too much on Sarracenia's healing mushrooms so long as there's time to let herself recover and rebuild her stockpile of nanites, but the assistance is greatly appreciated when she has to really go hard at fixing someone right after another fight. On the plus side, it does mean that this side of the conflict still has plenty of healing to rely on, but that only goes as far as curing physical wounds. She's still missing an arm from the elbow down, but the emotional toll is still far heavier than any physical wounds she's sustained thus far. She can heal pretty much anyone and bring them back into fighting fit shape, but seeing so much blood and pain every time she blinks, all while bringing someone back from the brink... "Yeah. You get it, Ms. Kukuru." She shivers briefly, then pats Riku on the cheek softly as he awakens. "Easy, dear... It's a marathon, okay? So... Keep it up, but don't burn yourself out too soon." Her voice is a little hoarser, too, even though she's visibly smaller by an inch in every direction. "She'll only be getting weaker in battle as the week goes on, but that doesn't count for much if you all do too." "I feel." "That we should take a moment to properly strategize." "We're approaching this the wrong way, I think. We... A straight fight's something they'd have a biiiig advantage in compared to most of us." Kukuru murmurs, pausing to put someone's arm back up on their and reattach it with a trickle of nanites to get things moving without draining herself in the process. "So something like yesterday.. That was definitely gonna be a problem. But if we hit them froooom... Opposite sides." She looks around slowly with a groggy blink, then turns to Petra. "Do you have a map...?" If one's provided, Kukuru will tap on the two furthest points of Team Sephirah's territory. "We can.. You know. Make them chase us to one side, then leave while they're on the way... And then do it again. Aaand..." She crosses her finger to the other 'corner', then the opposite of that. "Tire them out that way without ever... Being there."
Kukuru	"I am here... because I am president of the Kukuru fan club now!" Kukuru smiles, but it's a tired and slightly forced one. "That's sweet, Yaboy... OH, but do be careful, okay? I don't want to see you getting hurt for no reason, either." She gently chides him in that soft-spoken way, leaving unsaid the fact that she'd also rather not have to spend effort healing someone getting hurt needlessly. "Got something tasty for us Kukuru? I bet you could make bread mold delicious, hah." That, too, gets a light chuckle out of Kukuru even as she stifles a yawn from not sleeping nearly as much as she already has't been able to do in a while. "Nothing that fresh today. I've goooot... Oh. This stuff's still good with some hot rice, though." She explains, slowly digging several things out of her pocket one at a time: A restaurant-size jar of lao gan ma with peanuts (70% full), a bag of uncooked parboiled rice (best buy date of 2023 but still probably fine), and shredded pork floss (unopened, best buy date of 2020, somehow also fine). "Get some water from the cooler for me, would you? We can get the rice cooker going, and then... We'll have something fresh right here." Fresh enough. "You might want to look into Apostle meat." "Do we have any?" Kukuru asks Flamel, sounding vaguely hopeful as leans sideways to get the rice cooker (probably built before 1980) out of her pocket to finish her meal-prep supply retrieval. "Protein's important, and fresh meat is... A lot better for that than this stuff, even if it's just as tasty." She taps on the prok floss, trying not to salivate at the thought of getting fresh meat to eat again. "Would we be able to get anywhere talking to any of them?" "Getting to talk with them is... Hmm. That'd be the hard part, wouldn't it? Without..." Kukuru rubs her head lightly as she considers Hibiki's suggestion scratching some of the dryness out of her mussed up hair. She hasn't had time to wash or fix it in a while now. "Without Rita or Lilian getting in the way. And no matter how you look at it..." Kukuru giggles lightly, and she actually sounds relieved. "We're the mean ones here, aren't we? Fighting for the few even if it hurts a whole lot more... We even went through all those Meltdowns to convince them that they're doing the right thing, you knooow?"
Xion	The first retreat from a fight isn't the last. Grueling cycles of hit and fades, another day of war, and Xion stops having good words to shout or even stammer out. She could fight this hard for love, but her love lies in choking on its own liquid. So she fights this hard because she 'has' to. The operation's strategy moves deep into pushing the Nobody to be less and less a present person and more and more a distortion that sourly carried out intent. Beaten out of her borrowed powers and run ragged as a flicker of black to hook people back from the edge or worse, Xion goes until she can't, and then stops and hides and curls up until she feels ready to go again. She usually had unlimited stamina, the paramagic she wielded simply coming to her and another step or leap ever in her, but the longer and longer she went in Lobotomy Corporation's leaking coffin without comfort and with dwindling amounts of treats, the less she felt herself. Agents could expect to encounter and even maybe swing a few times at Xion as she went about her business. After the first confrontation, Xion wore a face-shrouding mask and appeared suddenly and without warning or word, bombed out a cacophony of area-effect gravity-Demi and Ruin magics, and took, locked, or opened whatever she came for. Friends, warm and cold corpses, Kukurus in refridgerators. Swordfights were about the clash of heats and wills and honed edges. All she had for a while was sudden danger and being less than human to avoid further harm. She's still wearing the identity-obfuscating +-shaped 'faceplate', the negative space somehow holding shadow over her face. Hanging, sitting with keyblade leaned against shoulder, she hugs the round 'edge' to her chest with both arms and the bend of a knee. Rufus approaches, looking down and offering something -- a keychain. Awkwardly, accepting it one-handed like someone inspecting a wallet to make sure it's theirs from some stranger on the street, black gloved fingers turn the holographic design with thumb, and then close around the little piece and return to her side. "Thanks," Xion begins. Behind her mask, she remembers Rufus' open words that he'd sweeten the pot until the syrup would be to taste as long as they committed to twelve instead of everyone. "Rufus. I think it's yours, but I'll hang onto it if you want me to." A beat. "It's 'Sefi-rot', though. This Sephiroth guy... looked like he's got a wicked down-aerial. Not a lot of spare Light." '...Thanks. For before. I know all of this is the absolute worst for you...' "It shouldn't be." The seated-masked Nobody replies to Hibiki. "None of this should be happening. But because it is, because this specifically is, I'll see it to the end." Xion looks up, or her mask does, and the point centers Hibiki. "Sometimes the one who has to be reliable is 'all of us'. Comparing the length of scars won't make someone win."
Timespace Riders	we should take a moment to properly strategize. "I concur," says Woz, looking up from the book. "And I shall take every available moment to strategize. However, it is plain to see that Rita and Lilian intend to limit the availability of such moments as this." "At my Demon King's behest, I am reading into ways to--" Something in the book catches his attention. The corners of his mouth twitch downwards. "--end this in our favor." "But they don't believe that we can make that future," says Sougo, tiredly staring at the empty hand which held the Vermillion Ridewatch. "And from their perspective, every minute we spend trying is a minute farther away from what the City deserves." "Indeed, my Demon King," frowns Woz. "And, as esteemed Angela noted, we cannot match the two of them in open combat, even without the Agents." We have to be smart about this. Woz returns his attention to the book, glancing briefly at Angela from the corner of his eye. Sougo and Woz bristle at Rufus, initially, in their own ways; the retainer purses his lips and Sougo withdraws into himself. His broader point, though, is taken--at least the part about eating, resting and drinking. Spirits are a little beyond the both of them at the moment. At the very least: "I was able to talk to Fox," offers Sougo. "He'll treat any Agents that need it. So we can send them there if we end up having to fight any. That's the good news. The bad news is that he'll only use the sway he has with the other agents if it looks like there's a clear victor."
Timespace Riders	"Then I suppose we should take stock of what advantages we have, and where our shortcomings lie." With a frown, he closes the book. "I shall start with the latter." "Kukuru is potentially compromised. Rita ate part of her, then used her power of teleportation, and I am uncertain whether her powers of control now extend to Kukuru." "Rita's command over the Abnormalities is another force multiplier against us." "Physicality, put directly at odds with theirs, avails us very little. Rita and Lilian seem able to match any of us individually in that regard. Further, Rita has a few means to make any given area a losing prospect to hold for long, which otherwise would be a point in our favor." "Our ability to counteract 'All the Time in the World is Mine...'" a brief glance towards Petra, "Is also quite limited, though not nonexistent." "Lilian and Rita also outmatch us in experience with grueling conditions such as these." "Now, for our advantages." "Rufus appears to be able to synthesize the abilities of those he battles. Perhaps we might gain an element of surprise by exposing him to more dangerous Abnormalities under controlled circumstances. Your thoughts, Rufus, Angela, Petra?" "Speaking of Petra and Angela, they each have extensive knowledge of the facility. I shall defer to the two of you as to how that might best be used against our adversaries, given that they will surely--have surely attempted to do the same." Woz pauses, taking a bite of a sandwich offered by Flamel. "This is perfectly revolting," he asides. "Our advantage is in our number, but not in the sense that we will overrun either of them. Indeed, they would likely have the advantage--they are both more accustomed to fighting outnumbered than we are to fighting as a team. However," he says, gesturing to the emptied-and-emptying enkephalin pipes, "I know, following our encounter and subsequent escape from Rita, that even with the Agents and Rita's Abnormalities searching for us, they cannot cover every inch of this facility. If there are multiple perceived threats at once, we may hedge our bets and accomplish whichever objectives they deem the least critical." "Like the pale protection bullets or the Apostle... leftovers," Sougo says with a grimace. Those used to be Agents. "Indeed, sire. Lastly, and not the least of our advantages, is myself." He lifts the closed book. "We have the gift of foresight. Within this book are as-yet unwritten futures which may come to pass, with the right adjustments in due time. There are limits," he says. "Some futures which cannot be grown from the hard, rocky soil of the City without strength in excess of our own. Further, it is I who reads this book, and not the other way around; if we do not know what to look for, the book will not simply deliver the answers as if on a velvet pillow."
Petra Soroka	"It's going to be a long battle but we'll win as long as we can keep our spirits up!" It's impossible to tell exactly what Petra thinks of the shaky and fragile optimism that Rufus has been trying to provide to the team. It certainly hasn't been working on her. But she hasn't seem actively angered by his attempts either, just sort of wordlessly placing him in the vicinity of Sarracenia when she starts crying, or nearby whoever's died most recently, or just dragging him and Kukuru together like they're show animals to keep the others entertained, seemingly without malice. "Petra." The half-second delay that Petra has when Hibiki steps in front of her before noticing that she's moved in the way, due to being deliriously unfocused in her ranting, causes her to accidentally bonk right into her. Immediately after impact, she reflexively flickers and retrocausally backsteps away, sword jumping into her hand, before blinking and shaking her head. "Coffee? Eh-- I'm fine. I'm not the biggest priority." Not by default interpreting it as an act of care, Petra saccades her eyes across the rest of the gathered Elites before landing on Riku. "Blood loss. He needs a drink of some kind. Kukuru, do you have any more ice?" "That we should take a moment to properly strategize." Petra runs her hands through her hair, dried blood mixing with sweat to leave pinkish smears on her face. She shivers from the effort of dragging her mental condition out of the blindly pragmatic fever state that she uses with everyone else, then keeps shivering until she grabs the cup that Hibiki left for her on the table, holding it close to her chest with both hands. "Sure. I mean, yeah. Do you have anything in the tank to suggest, Ange?" "Radical, bosslady!" "Mikey's use is that I can torture him to burn off steam like Lilian's been doing with us." Petra says, unhesitatingly blunt, and then equally flatly reels it back. "That was a joke. I was joking about that." "Nikki is also dangerous and functionally immortal thanks to her contract with Zero Kiryu." Petra blinks in surprise. "Hand of the Concord? That one? Tell me about that, I don't actually know." "I'm all ears because I don't think we can keep this up the way things are heading," "We can if we have to," Petra snaps immediately, at the person who just got dragged back from the dead. Then she takes a deep, deep breath and closes her eyes, instantly tone switching to being calm and collected as long as she speaks in one continuous string from a single exhale. "You're right. We have to do something about it, and I think a solid victory would do a lot for people's mindstates. We will win this. But we have to win some other things along the way." "So if you want to influence her rising emotions, you're going to need to work non-astrally!" Petra pauses and stares into space for a while at that, and then quietly checks her phone and types something out. "Yeah. I can do that, alright." "If Rita's emitting the same energies, we might be able to get some energizing stimulants or something like that out of whatever's left of them." Petra mumbles to herself, "I'm just a thirty little flower," and then shakes her head and decides to say something that isn't horrible instead. "Actually, good idea. The Apostles were more densely packed in Asiyah, so we could probably get our hands on some of those corpses. Who's up for some Baba stew? Actually, Kukuru, you would, huh. Let's look into that."
Petra Soroka	"I think we need to be placing traps of our own. I have plenty of remote and proximity mines we can make use of." Again, it's weird when Petra treats Sarracenia with the same level of respect that she does everyone else. Her level of cruelty is evenly distributed, if erratic, rather than being pointed specifically at making Sarra miserable. So when Sarracenia gives a good suggestion, Petra just nods and takes it seriously. "Yeah. Lilian is vulnerable to traps like that if she isn't careful, and if we can get her to burn time while we aren't fighting her just to dodge them, that's a huge win. I mean, less of a win than if she got her leg blown off, but there's no way that'd ever happen. Kukuru, Flamel, you could put them down in Briah and Atziluth pretty safely, right?" "...I suppose frustrating her with words in person simply will not work while she is able to torture us whenever she gets ahold of us. Perhaps you should let me just talk at her over the intercoms?" In a radical, abrupt emotional swing from her raving just a minute ago, Petra bursts out laughing-- not sarcastically or derisively, but suddenly, sincerely amused. "That's great! That's the best idea I've ever heard from you, Sarracenia! Let's do it." "Petra can sing and play the guitar as I recall." Withdrawn again, pulling back and half-covering her face with the coffee cup as she takes a sip, Petra tenses up with a hard to read emotion. "... That'd just be wasting time. I have more important things to do than that. What's next, everyone?" "Do you have a map...?" She does, conveniently. She can pull it up on her big screens, even, and turn it towards Kukuru. She stares at Kukuru's mimed out explanation without interrupting or reacting in any discernable way. "Fucking Yakety Sax shit." "The problem I see with that, though, is that they only have to take the fight to us when it's beneficial for them to. They only need to outlast us. Beating us down until we can't fight is just, like a siege tactic. I think if we did that, we'd either get them circling around behind us to execute Ange, or we'd get you beheaded and then all the rest of us stranded." "The bad news is that he'll only use the sway he has with the other agents if it looks like there's a clear victor." Petra's lips twist into a scowl. "And we don't have access to Welfare personally. Honestly, if we just had control of Welfare, Central, and Disciplinary, we'd be good, but-- that's all of Briah, I know, I know, and we're getting our asses beat just up here." "Our ability to counteract 'All the Time in the World is Mine...'" Petra sips from her cup with one hand, and puts up two fingers with the other, tilting them like some combination between clock hands and a peace sign. "Limited. Yeah. That's why I've been so focused on wearing down her reserves too." "Perhaps we might gain an element of surprise by exposing him to more dangerous Abnormalities under controlled circumstances." Petra chews on the inside of her lip. "Don't have a ton of Alephs up in Asiyah. What would be great actually, is if you could get a lock on Melting Love. We'd have to push to get you to it, but having something to combat Rita's control over the infestation would be really fucking great." "Indeed, sire. Lastly, and not the least of our advantages, is myself." "Cheers, dude. Yeah." Petra finishes off her coffee with a slurp, and then her hand spasms and she crushes the cup in her fist abruptly. She wrenches her fingers open and causes the garbage to fall to the ground, opening and closing her fist to flex her fingers.
Timespace Riders	Hand of the Concord? That one? Tell me about that, I don't actually know. "I bet you'd like him," says Sougo, looking up from his empty hand. "If nothing else," he says, with the ghost of a smile, "Because he's always telling people not to pick fights with Lilian. But I guess the relevant thing is that Nikki was part of a group that helped out with a problem on his and Yuuki's world." "He passed around a... well, a goblet of his blood, and those of us that drank from it got some of his vampire powers to help fight some people that were making mass produced vampires to try and kill any chance of peace between them and humans." "I don't know how his stuff works--at least, not that part of it. So, we should count on Nikki staying around."
Rufus Shinra	> "Uh... I'm not an idol or anything, but..." "Stage is yours when you want it." > "Going great! Don't worry about me, bud, I may have-" Rufus has more or less tuned Flamel out after that point. "Great! Great. Don't worry about the little details, just keep it up." > "Nothing that fresh today. I've goooot... Rufus's grin falters as he looks over the offerings. "Kukuru... this is expired." "We can't eat expired food. Why are you showing me this?" To his credit, he does get it on his own after a few seconds of vacant-eyed staring at the expiration date. This is what they have to eat. They're running out of other options, if they haven't already. It's this or start going without food altogether. Rufus's grin sticks, but it becomes a bit more forced. "Great! Great great. Really... roughing it, making do. Like... pioneers! It's all part of the experience, right?" > "Not a lot of spare Light." "I mean - he was always the brooding reclusive type, yeah, but he was cool, and tough, and he'd be able to tough it out like this no problem." "Rufus appears to be able to synthesize the abilities of those he battles. Perhaps we might gain an element of surprise by exposing him to more dangerous Abnormalities under controlled circumstances. Your thoughts, Rufus, Angela, Petra?" In response, Rufus picks up his shotgun, fiddles with it, and plucks out the large yellow marble that is set into one of the slots on it. "Enemy Skill. If I get hit by something, or see something go off closeby, as long as the attack is..." Rufus purses his lips. "Memorable enough, I think that's part of the trigger. Materia is sort of... compacted memories. How it works doesn't matter, though. And most of the abnormalities are definitely memorable." Rufus then digs into his pocket, pulling out a small handful of similar yellow marbles, albeit ones notably more pale and less saturated. Ones that are less full. "I've got a couple spares of the Enemy Skill materia that I can lend out, too. Learning how to copy skills with one is - well, it'd take more than the whole week to learn and practice. But I can transfer some of the 'juice' from mine to the other ones, if we need to have reduntant Melting Loves." "Just - uh, I'd probably need to get hit by Melting Love, and that's -" Rufus's grin falters more than a bit. "I mean, if that's what it takes."
Petra Soroka	"I bet you'd like him," Petra nods. "I actually met him, once-- er, wait-- yeah, once." She's met Yuuki Kuran twice, as the memory of years before being an Elite jumps into her head. Try as she might, and she can't try that hard without suddenly feeling nauseous, she can't remember if Zero was there for the presentation at Applied Ontology. "But you're right. I do like the guy, from what I've seen about how he interacts with Director Kuran. I didn't know about the thing with Lilian, but it tracks." Almost conspiratorially, like she's confessing something she shouldn't, she adds, "... I kind of like basically all of you guys, really." "I mean, if that's what it takes." Rufus, more than the other Elites, is aware of the procedure around Melting Love's breaching. That being the rule of immediately killing anyone infected by it, including yourself if necessary, to try and limit the spread. Petra considers this without hesitation, tapping a finger to her lip. "Well, Execution Bullets would make you unsalvageable by Kukuru. Melting Love doesn't like cold much, so maybe we could get you hit, shoot you a bit normal-style, and then toss you into the Control freezer for an hour. That's a lot of time lost, but it's probably worth it to get an edge against Rita."
Kukuru	"Kukuru is potentially compromised." So that really was what happened. Kukuru lets out an uncomfortable noise as she rubs her face, then nods after a moment. "It does. I... I went to help Shajo after everything that happened yesterday. After..." She looks over at Petra with a slgiht frown, although it's not so much at Petra using him as a hostage as it is at having control taken out of her her hands so easily. "I dunno if it'll happen again, but... It could. And if she does it while we're fighting her..." She ihnales deeply, then sighs. "I should... Probably shouldn't go near Rita while we're doing all this, huh? That leaves fighting Lili... Lilian. The next time there's something going on, anyway." It'll happen soon, but she still hopes it doesn't. "Kukuru, do you have any more ice?" "I can get soooome, mhm. My freezer doesn't have any anymore, but..." Kukuru holds up a finger, and then she opens up a portal. She settles for just jamming her face and arm in, and she shivers a little on the side everyone can see her from while she rummages around in wherever it is she's wedged her upper half into. It takes some doing, but she eventually brings out... The freezer-burnt stuff. It's still probably fresher than what she showed Rufus, at least, but the closest thing to ice is the frozen soup. "We can't eat expired food. Why are you showing me this?" "No, no, that's just the best buy date, dear. I already learned not to feed humans expired things." She answers Rufus with a quiet chuckle, then nudges the freezer-burnt stuff afterwards. "But we've got this, too. And once it all defrosts... We'll have something chilly to eat. Or we can heat it in..." She pats the rice cooker. "Who's up for some Baba stew?" "J... Just let me know how you'd like it prepared. Or... Flamel, I didn't know you cooked." Kukuru is definitely up for some of that. "Kukuru, Flamel, you could put them down in Briah and Atziluth pretty safely, right?" "Mhm. I still remember where those are, so as long as they're not passing through while we set them..." Kukuru pantomimes setting trap remotely by dipping her still-cold hand through one cloud, depositing the nothing in it on the other side of the room. "Or... I could let Flamel in reeeeal quick, then pull him out real quick after." "Fucking Yakety Sax shit." Her face brightens up just a little. "Oh, my parents used to show me that before the VCR broke..." She lets her guard down for a moment, then smacks herself on one cheek to refocus. "So maybe... That wouldn't work so good. That leaves us with setting traps aaaaand dropping Abnormalities, then? And taking whatever power we can from the Apostles, or..." Kukuru's gaze shifts to the Tree of Light. "That's supposed to... Awaken stuff in people, right? Would going near it ourselves be... Would that work, too?"
Flamel Parsons	"Kukuru, Flamel, you could put them down in Briah and Atziluth pretty safely, right? ... The Apostles were more densely packed in Asiyah, so we could probably get our hands on some of those corpses." "Unless they've gotten something to pierce my invisibility that I haven't seen yet," Flamel rambles. "Then I can do solo low-impact ops like that fairly easily. As long as I've got a decently accurate assessment of where and what is breached, you can count on me! But I'll need someone to make the traps I'm deploying. I can supply plenty of psychic payload, but mechanisms are something I'm out of. No shortage of busted electronics around here for anyone with a crafty eye, though." So upbeat. as if everything earlier just hadn't happened. He's bouncing between that cheeriness and his tantrums a lot lately. "As for the bodies -- I've got enough hands to move a lot around, these days! You can leave that to me." "This is perfectly revolting." "Isn't it? Our field-guides guy found it online." "... I kind of like basically all of you guys, really." He suddenly looks genuinely confused. "The Concord? Really?" A couple of confused blinks, and he peeks over his sunglasses. Despite Kukuru-healing, crystalized psitanium is growing through his right eye at a startling pace, so he shoves them back up. "Well, in the end I suppose there's more of what you want in the world at the Concord than in the other factions." He shrugs, sheepishly.
Riku Asakura	'So how did you come up with your Ultraman transformation sequence, do you get to customize it or is it just assigned...' From the slab, Riku smiles up at Rufus and shrugs gently. "It's all encoded on the Fusion Riser.." he says drawing out the red device with the double helix encased greeble stuck inside of it. "It lets me tap into the powers of the Ultracapsules and use the powers of other Ultramen." He pauses and then, "The sequences are something I made up, though..." 'Blood loss. He needs a drink of some kind.' "Thank you, I do feel pretty thirsty now that you mention it..." and woozy, but let's stick to basic needs and not complain about little things like blood loss. Riku is barely asking for substance as it is, and only eats and drinks when he has to. Despite his big appetite due to the Fusion Rising, he does. 'We can if we have to...' 'You're right. We have to do something about it, and I think a solid victory would do a lot for people's mindstates. We will win this. But we have to win some other things along the way.' The initial shock of the snap causes Riku to recoil, but the gentler way she responds later and the admitting they need a victory settles him out quietly. He nods and goes back to listening to others provide information, wishing he was better at something along these lines, but sadly he is not. It weights on his mind heavily, as he seems to retreat into his mental space. Until he gets frozen soup pushed at him. "Um... it'll have to be warmed up, but thanks Kukuru..." he says taking the frozen soup and pushing himself up. He shakes, woozily, and finds a working microwave should they have one, and attempts to dethaw the soup into something edible.
Angela	It always surprises Angela how willing people are to eat human beings, fellow sapient life. She is starting to wonder at this point if maybe Rita is the exception rather than the rule when it comes to eating human beings. Like, maybe it IS normal? They don't do that in the facility, of course, but maybe that's just because it is a waste of valuable material! It might not be because of morals at all! She refuses to tell Sarracenia she's a bit relieved at her refusal but, frankly, she doesn't know if it's actually a strange thing for other people at this point. Even fucking Kale is eating Kale at this point!! But she supposes that if it comes to it, they might have to worry about starvation too. They, meaning, explicitly not her. But she half expects Kukuru to generate meals out of ether and is not entirely sure that isn't the case. "If nothing else, it would be a good idea to keep any more apostle meat from Rita so we can store it if we ... ugh ... need it." Well it isn't Angela who is gonna be a semi cannibal so it's no skin off her back. Yaboy receives a sticker like it's the holy grail. Tears spill from his eyes. He nods rapidly at the idea of being careful but he IS an agent. During Xion's mask-wearing encounters with Agents, she hears a few whispers comparing her to someone called 'The Black Silence' and other whispers going on 'Come on, no way, that's bait'. Angela is asked by multiple people if she has a strategy but she doesn't answer that one immediately. She can think one hundred times faster than anyone but if the answer she's looking for is difficult to find or, worse, non-present...that doesn't necessarily help. Petra suggests torturing Mikey for practical purposes. He squeaks and looks like he's about to faint. Answering the question of NIkki is easier. "During our early providing of assistance with the Concord, she made a deal with him. I know she has a soporific that can work on Abnormalities, if inconstantly. We were lending The Director a hand with one of her projects and she ended up signing on with them a little more. Smart move for someone who has to deal with Abnormalities with some frequency." She's a little surprised that Rufus is volunteering to be hit by Melting Love but she supposes there IS a Kukuru present. So she finally brings up her ideas. "As Woz says, we have a significant mobility advantage. We can be in many places at once. And they can only really be in ''two'' places at once. Splitting them up won't help us beat them but our goal is not actually to beat Lilian and Rita." She raises her head. "The goal is simply to get me to Architecture--specifically, Carmen's former chamber.. That is where the Light is coming from. I can go into it directly if I have to. But the chamber is teleport-shielded. Gebura assured me even the Purple Tear couldn't directly open a path there." She looks to Xion. "But Xion can still get me very close. It'll take me some time to move there and to absorb it but so as long as Lilian and Rita are sufficiently occupied, it should be doable. I've been able to keep them from finding me directly so far. So I suggest trying to ambush them separately so they can't support each other--a hit and run like we've been doing--and if that doesn't work we try something else. We make them think we need the departments, fight hard for them... I don't think it'll hold them forever, but it is the best idea I have."
Hibiki Tachibana	Petra can sing and play the guitar as I recall. And Angela can at least play. And as a princess, I naturally have a lovely singing voice. Well, at least Sarracenia having a bit of cheer back helps bolster her own energy reserves, just a fraction. It doesn't really make her smile, but it does loosen up some of the overwhelming exhaustion and tension that the last few days have been drowning her in. Still, the mention of singing makes her bring her hand up to her neck and brush along it with her fingers. Just for a moment. We're the mean ones here, aren't we? Fighting for the few even if it hurts a whole lot more... We even went through all those Meltdowns to convince them that they're doing the right thing, you knooow? "You're not really not wrong..." Hibiki admits to Kukuru, eyes briefly closing. "...It's not like I expect them to easily give up on something they're willing to die twice to see through. But the Sephirah are all still people. There are parts of them that want to live past all of this, too." "Even if they wouldn't give up completely..." She trails off, maybe in thought. Or maybe just because she's tired. Or maybe because she doesn't want to think about Apostle stew. Though after a moment, she glances back up at Kukuru, looking concerned. "...Your arm. Is it bothering you...?" Sometimes the one who has to be reliable is 'all of us'. Comparing the length of scars won't make someone win. "I know." If she actually bothered to get a coffee for herself, this is probably where she'd take a sip. Instead, she just holds the face to mask stare for a long couple seconds, then sighs. "...I feel the same way." "We're already here. And since we are... we can't back down." ...Which is more or less one of the few things keeping her mental state functional enough, through all of this. Hibiki lets out a shuddery breath, easing back against the back of the couch. Her head wants to gravitate towards staring listlessly at the ceiling, but instead, her focus is on Petra, who's going through battle plans and finishing her coffee now. She inhales, then exhales. "...A solid victory, huh. I don't think I could ever land one against Lilian. Just 'wasting her time'. Rita... ...maybe." She slowly rummages beneath her collar, before she hauls her Symphogear pendant out. "If I push it - really push it to my limit - ...I might be able to stop her. For a while." Although the prospect of fighting Rita makes her sick to her stomach in a way that yet another lethal engagement with Lilian could never do. One, she's somewhat used to. But that... ... "...I'm not sure how useful I'd be after. Even with Kukuru. Not really a good thing in a drawn-out war like this. But if it'd end up giving Angela the time she needs at Architecture, I don't want to pull punches."
Sarracenia	'Kukuru is potentially compromised. Rita ate part of her, then used her power of teleportation, and I am uncertain whether her powers of control now extend to Kukuru.' Sarra looks over at Kukuru at the news, then back at Woz. "I do not think Miss Rita could order Miss Kukuru to do something that Miss Kukuru would not already want to do. Miss Kukuru cares about family above all else, I think. She would not do something that would harm us." Sarra says confidently. When she gets a chance, Sarra pulls out a grapefruit soda and offers it to Xion. Although, once she does she feels obligated to offer everyone one, and so pulls out enough for all. Some have coffee, so she just leaves them out. 'Yeah. Lilian is vulnerable to traps like that if she isn't careful, and if we can get her to burn time while we aren't fighting her just to dodge them, that's a huge win' Sarra's mood lifts when she isn't told she is stupid or that it is a dumb idea. 'That's great! That's the best idea I've ever heard from you, Sarracenia! Let's do it.' Sarra blinks in surprise at the laughing and ends up laughing a bit herself. "Just give me a microphone and I will make her wish she did not have ears~" she says. '... That'd just be wasting time. I have more important things to do than that. What's next, everyone?' "Raising morale is important for a fighting force." Sarra argues. "And as you said, if we wear out mentally first then this is as good as over." 'Blood loss. He needs a drink of some kind. Kukuru, do you have any more ice?' Sarra perks at the question. "Do not forget about me!" she says, then reaches into her purse. Her tongue sticks out the side of her mouth as she too rummages, then pulls out a bottle of artisanal water. The kind that comes in a fancy glass bottle with an overly bougie name. She hops up and takes it and a soda over to Riku, apparently happy to be of help. Once again it is probably as much for her mental state as for his. She also hands Hibiki one since Hibiki has no beverage. Good beverages are important for keeping morale up. "Oh, and one more idea," Sarra says suddenly. "My power-ups. We can give our agents a rather large advantage if we give them power-ups. Fire, ice, bombs, Bullet Bills, flight...we may not have as many, but as they say quality over quantity. They can help quite a bit," she says, then looks at Mikey. "What did you think of the one I gave you? Did you like it, Mikey?"
Xion	'I mean, if that's what it takes.' "We're not going to win if we start spending ourselves like lizard tails." Xion speaks, head still down. "Or spending hours torturing ourselves for a single power token. Think two or three moves after, if you can - if we have to do a whole plan to just get you Melting Love's power, that's when I'd attack if I was Lilian or Rita. We're not fighting for just one person." Familiar, at least, with the logic of things like Enemy Skill though, Xion sits with that idea. "It might be the right plan, though, Rufus. Instead of Melting Love - did you get one from White Night?" A warcrime against the self, but since Rita was already using it against them it felt so much less necessary to be righteous before no-one. "It should give you an edge against most of the EGO users and Abnormalities, at least." 'At least' being where they were at. "If we need Melting Love's power, I can take it in a medallion much safer, since I don't actually need contact to make the connection - it's just easier." Despite her absolutely ruined mental state, Xion still did not contemplate the acceptability of death. This line, the sickly drawn mark in the sand, kept the otherwise quietly miserable Xion from taking the offers of 'amputation' from the group. "Don't offer to lead them off if you'll get eaten for it. Stop offering to make due through a new way to repent. They're getting better at figuring out how to stop me from showing up and getting you, and I'm..." Not able to bear it all with chocolate and dreams. Being one particular hit away from defeat and never being struck that was beyond maddening of a different sort. What was the point of this brutality? To prove a point to her? It was well-made, by now, but... 'Who's up for some Baba stew?' "Pass." Xion mutters. "I'm..." 'Not hungry' is a lie. She could eat her way through a whole diner menu and lick her lips cartoonishly after with bright eyes for a bit and still have room for another round. "... just resting." She asides instead. Riku's misery is more pointed -- and his pain is more apparent. While he worries about unwarmed food, Xion rummages through a pocket and dips her sleeve somewhat deeply down into her coat before drawing out a single pristine white stick and colorful image stamped crinkled wax paper around a lollipop. The flavor isn't that good - lemon - but it's a little ball of sweet and sugar. "Sorry," She breathes. "I ate most of the good flavors already. You'll feel better," She does, but, she's from the Candy Dimension. "-after one."
Timespace Riders	I kind of like basically all of you guys, really. Sougo nods. "I like you, too. It seems like we think a lot of the same things are important. And I've learned a lot about how to fight for those things, following your example." "I wish I'd started doing that sooner." Then, maybe things would be different now. Execution Bullets would make you unsalvageable by Kukuru. Melting Love doesn't like cold much, so maybe we could get you hit, shoot you a bit normal-style, and then toss you into the Control freezer for an hour. That's a lot of time lost, but it's probably worth it to get an edge against Rita. Or spending hours torturing ourselves for a single power token. "Maybe it wouldn't have to be," says Sougo. "Time lost, I mean. Hours spent. I could just get it off of him--from the him that... will have been in the freezer..." He still seems uncertain about doing it that way. If we need Melting Love's power, I can take it in a medallion much safer, since I don't actually need contact to make the connection - it's just easier. Sougo sighs with relief. "Then that's way better. I think we need every advantage we can get right now." As long as I've got a decently accurate assessment of where and what is breached, you can count on me! "You shall have it." ...A solid victory, huh. I don't think I could ever land one against Lilian. Woz heaves a sigh. "That is because you think too directly, Hibiki Tachibana. I am a Kamen Rider, and therefore accustomed to direct 'honest' confrontation, but I am also a strategist, a chronicler, and a vizier." "During my days as a member of his inner circle, I advised king SOUGO Tokiwa in matters of war, that his forces might break resistance and bring his world to heel." "You undervalue 'wasting her time.' Suppose she is made to believe there is something of vital importance at a location of our choosing, then it is she who must scramble to reach that location, and you who may wait there at your leisure. If you then call for assistance, she will be made to believe we are near, when the opposite may be true. What she diverts to cover the van will be impotent to cover the rear." "And by capitalizing on that weakness, a 'solid victory' may be had without your needing to overpower Lilian or even her reinforcements, at which time your only priority is escape, which several of us are predisposed to offering."
Rufus Shinra	> "... I kind of like basically all of you guys, really." Kind of unexpected? But - somehow, also, kind of believable? > "Melting Love doesn't like cold much, so maybe we could get you hit, shoot you a bit normal-style, and then toss you into the Control freezer for an hour." "Uh-" Yeah, that's right, that's the normal way of dealing with Melting Love infections. Well, aside from the prospect of getting back up later. "I'm not thrilled by that plan." Xion comes in with an ~~excuse~~ solid reasoning to not get shot full of holes and die more than is necessary. > "But we've got this, too." "Ah, that's - uh, yeah, I guess that's palatable." Rufus is buying a really good meal when this is all over. He's buying out the whole restaurant. No, he's buying the entire restaurant. The entire restaurant chain. > "...did you get one from White Night?" "Uh-" "I don't think so, I've got..." Rufus closes his eyes, holding the Enemy Skill materia in the palm of his hand. "I've got... the Train, the Orchestra, the Firmament Driver, and - yeah, I think there was something from Silent Girl... and I don't think there's anything else in there right now." "White Night was memorable, though, but- well, thinking about it-" < That night. The worst night at Lobotomy Corporation. So many people dying. So many people lost. The desperate battle that we weren't winning. And Cinder- Rufus shudders. And the Enemy Skill materia glows brightly. "Okay," he says, with horribly forced cheerfulness. "So it... doesn't have to be right in the moment. If the memories are... memorable enough." Nobody is going to forget that night in Lobotomy Corporation, after all. Rufus's eyes open again. He examines the materia. "I - is it weird if I feel less good about the prospect of using that, than I did about the whole Melting Love plan where I'd have to get infected and literally die?"
Riku Asakura	'"Do not forget about me!" she says, then reaches into her purse. Her tongue sticks out the side of her mouth as she too rummages, then pulls out a bottle of artisanal water.' Riku gets the water, and smiles at Sarra, "Thank you, I appreciate it." He says with genuine appreciation in his voice. He pops the top off of the artisanal water and starts drinking it like a dehydrated man. Which he was. He takes a moment to breathe between gulps, wiping his mouth with his sleeve. '"Sorry," She breathes. "I ate most of the good flavors already. You'll feel better," She does, but, she's from the Candy Dimension. "-after one."' Riku takes the lollipop and gives a tired smile at Xion. "Thanks. I happen to like lemon-flavored pops..." he continues. He pulls the wrapper off, once he's done with the water and starts sucking on the lemon-flavored lollipop, which gives him much-needed sugars and lemon flavor. People talk about dragging things out, trying to waste time. It's true, what they need to do is get Angela in a position to get the Seed of Light. He takes a breath but is still not sure about anything. Right now, his head was spinning. He sits down again, trying to calm down the spinning, and looks up.
Petra Soroka	"It does. I... I went to help Shajo after everything that happened yesterday. After..." "Yeah. So I saw." Numbly, with no sign that she's either upset or particularly forgiving, Petra just acknowledges Kukuru with a wave of her hand and moves on. "Speaking of which, you do have limits to your resurrection. What are they? I didn't want Lilian knowing them because I want her to have to hesitate a little bit, at least." "I should... Probably shouldn't go near Rita while we're doing all this, huh?" "Yeah. If we're talking about divisions of people's better matchups..." Petra turns around and drags over a whiteboard on wheels, without any markers remaining on it. Instead, she pulls a palmful of morphmetal into a shimmering semifluid pen, that leaves a thin trail of metal on the board sort of like Silver ink. "People's good matchups... Hibiki against Rita from now on. Sorry, but Lilian just clowns on you. If Rita pulls out White Night before we can get Pale shields, then you're our trump card for that. Kukuru against Lilian, to avoid Rita. I think you're also a pretty good option against Lilian, since she has to butcher you a lot to get anywhere, and you're strong enough that she can't do it freely in realtime. Flamel to Rita, of course. You're our highest priority for getting that Pale shielding, though. Sougo and Woz, I'd love to split you up since I trust both of you to manage yourselves, but you're kind of force multipliers to each other anyways. I'd rather put you against Lilian, but you guys are solid either way. Sarracenia... since Rita's got those fucked up bug things, you'd be decent there, though we'll just have to hope you don't count as enough of a monster for her, haha. Xion... sorry, you know your own abilities better than I do, but I think we agree that it's Lilian. Riku works against either. So do I, but I'm kind of specialized against Lilian. Parker, you're basically the only agent besides me and Rufus that wouldn't get instantly decapitated by Rita." "I can get soooome, mhm. My freezer doesn't have any anymore, but..." "Mm. That's fine." Petra takes some of the frozen food and, without any consideration for normal human boundaries or respect, walks over to press it into Riku's forehead to start manually cooling him down, more like an overheating engine than a feverish person. When Sarra pulls out the water from her purse, Petra's morphmetal extension reels around and plucks it out of their hand to deposit it in Riku's instead. "Would going near it ourselves be... Would that work, too?" "Not for me," Petra says without elaboration, but-- "Actually. I mean, this would maybe make you cease existing, but as a last ditch effort, using the Beauty of Ash to shoot you near the Tree would totally do something. I don't know if you'd be more or less powerful, though. It could also start... draining the Light through a psychocausal tear in reality or something. So it's a big risk in a lot of ways." "Thank you, I do feel pretty thirsty now that you mention it..." After a minute of holding E to heal on Riku, she drops the frozen food into his open hand and wanders away. "You all need calories. Don't start starving yourselves if it makes you less efficient in battle. Flamel's weird concoction is really good; I'd add it to the stupid little vending machine cuisine thing I was making but, you know, one way or another the facility's going to be gone, so literally none of that matters anymore." "The Concord? Really?" "Yeah. I mean, like, look at me, you know? This time last year, I was literally ruling a kingdom on Doctor Eggman's behalf. Today I'm doing this shit on Ange's behalf. Honestly, it'd be kind of fucked if I didn't, right?" "Not that it matters. I don't even know why I brought it up. I'm doing this because I have to, and whatever I like or dislike about it doesn't fucking matter at all."
Petra Soroka	"...I'm not sure how useful I'd be after. Even with Kukuru. Not really a good thing in a drawn-out war like this." "Okay." This is tactical information, not emotional information. Wringing the last drops of blood out of the resource known as 'Hibiki Tachibana' is something that can be measured and compared to other options; hurting someone that she, despite ups and downs of hurting her already a lot, would like to be kinder to, isn't. "Then that's an option we can keep in mind." "Miss Kukuru cares about family above all else, I think. She would not do something that would harm us." Abruptly and with that same kind of unhinged disregard for boundaries, Petra claps her hands on Kukuru's shoulders and stares directly into her eyes. Extremely firmly voiced, she insists, "Kukuru. Anything you do to cause problems to any of us is going to kill Angela. Angela is your family. If you get mind controlled into harming any of us or helping any of our enemies, you're killing Angela. Directly. It'll be all your fault and the empty hole in your family will be something that haunts you forever. I will blame you for it forever and I'll make sure everyone else does too." As suddenly as she grabbed her, she releases her. "Okay. That should stick in your memory a bit." "Just give me a microphone and I will make her wish she did not have ears~" Petra giggles again at Sarracenia, surprisingly girlishly, in the way that she did when hanging out with Sarra two entire years ago when they barely knew each other. "Hell yeah. Just say anything that comes to mind. Once we're settled here, I'll give you the stage." "if we have to do a whole plan to just get you Melting Love's power, that's when I'd attack if I was Lilian or Rita. We're not fighting for just one person." "Yeah. We'd have to be careful." Not so much about refusing to strategically spend the lives of her companions-- that's a point Petra won't back down on, because, her fervor about 'the right to live' is as singularly strong, but only afforded to Angela. "But Ange's right. They can only be in two places at once. We'd have to strike a bunch of targets simultaneously, and I don't think keeping our hands off of Melting Love would be the highest priority. Though, obviously, you grabbing a token of it would just be way better anyways." Petra turns back to the whiteboard. With a pen-miming movement of her hand, the shimmering metal ink of 'XION' slides from under the Lilian umbrella into the venn diagram overlap of being viable for both. "They're getting better at figuring out how to stop me from showing up and getting you, and I'm..." "Speaking of that," Petra breathes in and sighs, then twirls her finger around to mime swinging a keychain. "Mind if I borrow from you, too? They're prepared for you, but... I don't know how well Lilian understands my power to actually be ready for it." "I could just get it off of him--from the him that... will have been in the freezer..." Petra tries to figure out what Sougo means by this, but doesn't have the same Kamen Rider shaped lump in her brain as him. "Like, temporal stuff? Like, a timeline where he was put into the freezer, and then he isn't, but you have the thing anyways? What?" "You undervalue 'wasting her time.'" "Put it this way, Hibiki. What I'm banking on is being the only person who can match her moment to moment. If you can make her lose fifteen minutes just running around after you, then that's fifteen minutes of stopped time advantage she won't have over me. That's what's worth wearing her down for."
Petra Soroka	"I - is it weird if I feel less good about the prospect of using that, than I did about the whole Melting Love plan where I'd have to get infected and literally die?" "No. That's actually normal, and Rita's being a fucking freak." Petra lets that hang for a few seconds, and then adds, "Anyways, I'll need you to be a fucking freak about it. We can't afford not to."
Timespace Riders	I - is it weird if I feel less good about the prospect of using that, than I did about the whole Melting Love plan where I'd have to get infected and literally die? "No." "No." The Demon King and his retainer answer in unison. "...It's not weird at all. I wish we weren't in the position where we were considering it, but we don't... have the kind of 'inarguable power' it'd take to win this without using everything available to us." She would not do something that would harm us. "I do not know enough about Rita's powers of control to share your confidence. While I would welcome my suspicions being incorrect with open arms," he says, reopening the book to research further, "Kukuru herself shares my uncertainty. You want your feet planted firmly on the ground," Woz continues, pointing downwards with one hand briefly taken off of the book. "If the planet stopped spinning, you would find yourself hurled from it at one thousand miles per hour, regardless of your wishes to the contrary. No matter the means of its delivery, that is the nature of the force Kukuru must now contend with, alongside all the other rigors of this engagement."
Xion	Acting like an Abnormality or a particularly sudden plague didn't really suit Xion but it suited the situation, and her latest ranking. Being chased off as bad weather didn't sit her either, but, pain suited the season. 'our goal is not actually to beat Lilian and Rita.' This, at least, is some sort of relief. Xion had known it, but hearing it again loosens her shoulders a bit. "We just need to do what we need to do, and be done before we die. Wearing them down, drawing them away, ambushes, starving, slashing - it's all pointless if we don't try to win. Withstanding us is their goal. And they can." Reaching up to the face-obscuring plate of her mask, she pulls the metal piece off her face with a gloved hand and sets it down besides her. Underneath, her face is sweaty and her hair is all askew, the front bangs trimmed by a diagonal cut, pale and sick-cheeked. But, underneath, her eyes still can find Angela, seated and looking up. 'But Xion can still get me very close.' Shifting to sit cross-legged, Xion brings Starlight from its lean against her chest to lay across her lap instead. "I can get you close. The 'Power of Unlocking' means even if its warded it's just a matter of working the tumbler some. But just because I can wriggle in doesn't mean it's easy to wriggle back out either - I can't stay and be useful to anyone else. So, Angela - you'd have to be there on your own. And maybe it'd be best to lock you in there - if I stop up the path in there on my way out, it'll be hell to get back in." She talks, somber-serious, like she's describing locking Angela in the reactor room on purpose to buy her an extra few minutes or hours of raw brute force. "Once we do that, we can split up and go for the other zones. As long as we're quick about it, we should be able to throw up all sorts of noise and non-sense enough that even once they figure out what we're doing, they'll still have to try and stop us. It's not like we can risk Angela in a fight... But if we leave you alone," Xion finishes by trailing off in both eyes and expression, not liking the full text of where it goes. "I can get you there. It's the best plan we have, to start going for a win and making them figure out and react." Offered a grapefruit soda can out of 'nowhere', Xion accepts the sugar (sugar!!!) crisp citrus beverage of slightly bitter character and pops the can with a hearty 'psshok', where she starts gamer chugging the elixir without pause for several seconds. A beat before morbidity, she pulls away, having skulled the can in one go in a frenzy of drinking, and 'puah'-ing after while wiping mouth with a sleeve. "Oh... Wow, I was thirsty." She's everything. "Thanks, Sarra." A genuine note from the Candyland swordswoman rings out, as she sets the empty can besides her mask. Sugar, as Petra points out, is probably exactly what she needs. It makes her feel good - more than lemon lollipops - and the physical sensation of energization and bars being refilled was like a mood boost and emotions she didn't have to manage. 'I - is it weird if I feel less good about the prospect of using that, than I did about the whole Melting Love plan where I'd have to get infected and literally die?' 'No. That's actually normal,' 'No.' 'No.' "No." Xion repeats, joins the chorus of. It's automatic. The question is something she expects, after the lead-in. "I've seen how you work, and you have better target selection and accuracy than that child-god that used it first. When you pull that trigger - make the target be something you don't regret aiming at." A beat, and Xion thinks of another, more pertinent tip: "And don't use the 'All' Materia of yours, or wide area attacks. Ask yourself how you'd feel about shooting that at a piece of an abnormality, versus someone we're still trying to save, too. If that bullet can save you, just..." Xion sighs. "Remember. Holding things like that means the responsibility lies on you and not the token."
Hibiki Tachibana	"Oh... thanks, Sarra." Hibiki seems exhaustedly surprised at the princess getting a drink out just for her, but she doesn't complain as she takes it - staring down at the water before opening it right on up and... ...downing about half of it in one go. She might've been thirstier than she actually thought, closing her eyes and sighing afterwards. "You're a lifesaver." She doesn't want to imagine a world where Kukuru is 'compromised', either. That is because you think too directly, Hibiki Tachibana. "That's always been one of my weak points, Woz." She replies back, before there's yet another drink of water before she can help herself. "...I know you're right, though. No matter what she talks like, she's still... only one person. Bearing a whole lot of weight." "'All the time in the world'... still isn't enough time for /everything/ here." At one point in time, she truly did believe Lilian Rook to be an insurmountable wall. Alone, she might as well be still. But everything that's happened over so many years, culminating in the agonizing campaign to save Rita's world... ... ...She has limits like everybody else. If she didn't know that, she probably wouldn't have pushed herself just to wind her a tiny bit, back there. "Getting away in one piece is only going to get harder and harder the more times we fight, though. If we make any plans like that... they have to be good ones. And since I'm a direct thinker, I'll be counting on people as smart as you to make them." If you can make her lose fifteen minutes just running around after you, then that's fifteen minutes of stopped time advantage she won't have over me. That's what's worth wearing her down for. "Yeah," Hibiki agrees after another gulp of her drink. "Wasting her time is one of the things I've always been pretty good at, after all." That's another can't-really-tell-if-it's-a-joke-or-not moments. "...I don't know if I've just gotten too used to being talked down by her or not. A lot of times, before... I really did just go home and cry." "Now... I don't know. Even after everything she said back there, I almost feel more ready to give everything I got instead of less. I'm not used to that." I - is it weird if I feel less good about the prospect of using that, than I did about the whole Melting Love plan where I'd have to get infected and literally die? "No," she chimes in on the pretty much mutual agreement with everybody else in regards to Rufus, with an accompanying shake of her head. "...Though I didn't expect you to actually say that out loud." What she means by that, she doesn't voice herself. Although she looks Rufus' way a little softer than she was before.
Rufus Shinra	> "Kukuru. Anything you do to cause problems to any of us is going to kill Angela. Once again, in response to something Petra has done, Rufus starts to say something, and then stops. > "No. That's actually normal, and Rita's being a fucking freak." > "No." "No." > "No." > "No," Rufus puts his other hand over the top of the materia. "Hah. Right. That's a relief. I'm going to just purge it from-" > "Anyways, I'll need you to be a fucking freak about it. We can't afford not to." Rufus loses his composure. "Gods damn it, Petra." "I hate this sort of- of just, indiscriminate painful destruction. Of people, no less." "I think the Seed of Light is going to be wasted on the average person in the City and so I don't feel any guilt about denying them that, but - I wouldn't want to just blast them apart to get what I want, either. Honestly, even for Angela." "There's only so much worthwhile in this world and just holding this feels like I'm joining the war on entropy, on the side of the entropy." "If Miss Ma goes and uses White Night again then I'll bring it out to counteract, but - I really don't want to use it otherwise. And I'm probably just going to get rid of it once this is all over." He could, theoretically, spin off some of the White Night energy into one of the child materia, and let someone else pull that trigger. But he's not going to remind anyone else of that option right now.
Flamel Parsons	"Not that it matters. I don't even know why I brought it up. I'm doing this because I have to, and whatever I like or dislike about it doesn't fucking matter at all." "Strictly speaking, who you like or hate, why you want to do things, what you dislike or like -- it's always more significant, not less." Flamel says, in that perpetually friendly way. "That's why I'm so surprised! You always seemed like more traditional Watch material. The things you're doing for others, I suppose they're more Concord-like, but everything you do for yourself is distinctly Watch-themed." A cheery, beaming smile. "Like killing Ayin before I could perform the procedure! Fundamentally, you're still someone who would belong in the Watch whenever you do things independently, you know? So I suppose I'd never really thought of your relationship with the Concord as being positive that way... I suppose that casts things in a different light!" What light that is, he doesn't seem to be interested in saying. The rest of the plan seems to be getting together... "Looks like, after I do my trap run and the supply runs, we'll be aiming for consecutive raids... I think I can probably track where those two will wind up by psychic signature if I amp my clairvoyance up. That way, we can aim an ambush right, and have a reliable path through to get Angela to Architecture."
Kukuru	Luckily for Riku, the soup is still pretty okay once it's heated! It's not great, but that's probably why it's freezer-burnt. When bloodloss gets brought up, though, Kukuru makes sure to offer him some more of that dried pork floss. It's still good thanks to all the salt and curing, even after this long. Kukuru does, however, let out a relieved sigh as Sarracenia comes to the rescue with water from some place that Kukuru can't pronounce. "... I kind of like basically all of you guys, really." "The Concord? Really?" Kukuru almost misses that coming from Petra, and she does a double-take when Flamel comments on that exact thing that has her lowering her hand from her face. After a moment of thinking about it, however, she settles backdown with a content little noise while pressing a frozen take-out pint of soup against her stump to both help the healing process and defrost it just a little bit faster. "It's not that surprising, is it? It's... Ah, I must sound like a broken record by now, but... You know how it is with us. Whether the things we're doing are called good or evil doesn't matter as long as it's for... ALl of us. Our family." That statement, at least for that moment, helps Kukuru right herself mentally again. "If nothing else, it would be a good idea to keep any more apostle meat from Rita so we can store it if we ... ugh ... need it." "Don't worry, Angela. We'll... Hm. If we can get it back here quickly enough, we won't even need to store it. And..." Kukuru pauses, clearly considering her words carefully. What would be the best way to put this without nauseating Angela further? Wait. Can Angela be nauseated? Is the Seed of Light already taking effect? THere's a brief spark in Kukuru's eyes as she wonders about the possibilities, then clamps her mind back down on the actual matter of eating Apostles. "I'll... Make sure it's prepared in a way nobody'll even know it's there." Just like medicine, she thinks. Clearly, that's the best way to let everyone eat that meat without feeling bad about it. "The goal is simply to get me to Architecture--specifically, Carmen's former chamber.." Angela starts going through the plan to get her to Architecture, and Kukuru nods slowly while looking between her and Xion. "That should be good, mhm... They'll be expecting me to do something really... Um. Straight-for-ward like that and getting stopped just before the shield, riiight? So if we have them distracted with ambushes and thinking we want places that don't matter...going after the wrong place..." She strains to come up with something after that. Try as she might, tactical thinking still evades her compared to just acting strategically under the orders of someone far smarter. She feels just a little more sour about those scientists from so long ago now than she did before. "Speaking of which, you do have limits to your resurrection. What are they?" "Oh. That'd be good to know, mhm..." Kukuru replies to Petra with a slow nod at first, needing a moment to consider what those limits really would be based on past experiences. "I know I can't bring someone back that's been dead for a suuuuper long time. Like.. Maybe a week or two long? Even a couple of days might be pushing it, buuut most of the people I've brought back have been..." A pause. "Maybe.. A few days, mhm. And bringing them back doesn't mean they'll stay alive if whatever killed them is still there. Sooo... I'd probably have to spend time healing them, too, you knooow?" Another pause to think, and then Kukuru starts frowning again. "And... I don't think it works on stuff. I'm pretty sure it'd work on Angela if anything happened to her, but..." Her lower lip quivers for a moment at the thought of that, and then she hunkers down again with a tight-lipped grunt. "I don't want to find out."
Kukuru	"She would not do something that would harm us." "You want your feet planted firmly on the ground," Kukuru smiles faintly at Sarracenia's vote of confidence, although it doesn't last long as she rubs her shoulder lightly. "I'd hope not, but... I'll have to face Lilian for sure. I might be able to resist some of Rita's power, but I don't want to... To risk her sending me after Angie at the worst time possible." She confirms, nodding towards Woz while rubbing her arm idly. "Even if I could, being distracted thinking about if I could... That could be the difference between me coming back here, or being locked up again." "I don't know if you'd be more or less powerful, though." A moment later, and she exhales softly. "No... That's leaving too much to chance. We've just gotta... Make it happen, with our own power. Still, if I had enough power to destroy a world..." She concludes, trailing off a little at the end as she glances at her existing hand. Petra gets a chuckle next as she predicts that very matchup, and Kukuru gives her a little fistpump in response. "I get it... Hmm. Even with those time things she does... She can't avoid an attack if there's nowhere to avoid it, right?" Kukuru pats her pocket lightly, like that actually means something. She's thinking about the claws, at least, but her range could very well be limited by having just the one arm to fight with. "...Your arm. Is it bothering you...?" She looks up at Hibiki, giggling softly at her question and half-shrugging half-shaking her head. "I'll be okay. It's... It'd be better if I could get it back before the next fight, but there's still plenty of injuries to treat. I can afford to play pretend as a pirate for a little longer." Another chuckle, but it's clear just from watching Kukuru over the past day that she's been struggling to get as much done as she usually does that way. "Think two or three moves after, if you can -" Xion's thinking has Kukuru thinking, too, even if it's with a mildly discomforted noise at trying to actually think that far ahead. "They probably wouldn't want to just hunker down and wait for us to make the first move, then... It'd give us time to scope out their stuff, and figure out good places to hit. Or..." Kukuru looks over at Rufus as Xion brings up Melting Love and White Night. "Even get a hold of more advantages to tip things towards Angela's favor. So that means... Where would they want to get ahead of us first? Is there anything they'd want to... Um. Secure first?" As the discussion about acquiring Melting Love's (or other Abnormalities') power continues, Kukuru gets up to circle around to Rufus and Xion. With little forethought and warning, she tugs on the former's sleeve to guide the former towards the latter, circles around once more, then throws her arm around the both of them from behind. She doesn't even say anything as she does that, either, just hiding her face in-between the two. She does that for a few more seconds, then steps away like nothing just happened. "Kukuru. Anything you do to cause problems to any of us is going to kill Angela." Kukuru's expression cracks, and there's a moment where it looks like she might start crying just from the possibility that might happen. Just before she does, however, her gaze hardens, and she takes a deep breath to place her hand on top of Petra's. "Then... Before that happens, I want you to shoot me at the Tree of Light if it even looks like Rita might come near me. If splitting them up's already going that bad, then then I want the risk to be something that could save Angela instead of just..." Her gaze softens slightly, and then she tenses up again to get herself prepared for the possibility. "Instead of hoping I can fight Rita's control. Even if it destroys me, I can't.. I won't let Angie die."
Xion	'There's only so much worthwhile in this world and just holding this feels like I'm joining the war on entropy, on the side of the entropy.' Xion laughs, dark. "Probably. Ditch it after, if you have to. But when Melting Love or Yin-Yang Dragon are between you and escape, and you can blow them away and save yourself? It's a weapon with a purpose. An abnormality-killing bullet, that's not meant for shooting at people. It's, probably, too dangerous to shoot it at Rita or Lilian in a fight anyway. If their combat reflexes overtake their sense of self, they might kill you in the moment. It's a cursed sword." Xion smirks. "First time? They're always rough. Try to equip it to your armor, if you can, if Rita escalates to it. EGO armor with the element might give you a resistance edge, too. Anything in a fight, right?"
Angela	''The Power of Unlocking means even if it's warded--'' "Understood, but understand that the Light is, essentially, the Collective Unconsciousness given form to energy, a massive font of psychic energy boiled from The River itself. So don't get ''too'' close." She has no idea how it would effect XIon specifically. "...Being alone is fine, so long as Lilian doesn't lop my head from my shoulders. It would be ideal if you aren't gone ''too long'' anyway or Lilian will definitely know where I went." Angela isn't aware that Lilian is a precog exactly--sure it's been suggested--but it doesn't really matter because Angela is assuming that Lilian will see through any plan even if it's not necessarily immediately and is treating her like she might as well know the future anyway in most cases. The area between extreme preparedness and psychic foresight has a lot of overlap. ''Powerups!'' The Agents are a little uneasy about using powerups because they feel that puts a Sarracenia-shaped target on their backs, but Parker says, "Sure." Since she's pretty sure Lilian will try to kill her anyway! Yay!"Hit me up with 'em." Only Chewie would be excited for Baba Stew amongst the Agents. Justin would eat Baba Stew if he had to but he's eeping now. It is a relief to Angela that Woz is here, Sougo too if in a less calming way. She did SAY she knew she won--but that promise of victory came with a dire warning too. She's ready too many stories about relying too much on prophecy to be comfortable about it. She just wanted to try and make people give up faster by stating it out loud where people could here. But she knows she can trust Xion, ironically, because of how trusted she is by Lilian even if it seems a little hazy how strong those bonds are these days. Because of her. Because she's A selfish and always-has-been broken failure. Don't let the corpse get to you, Angela, she thinks. ''Honestly it'd be kind of fucked if I didn't, right?'' "It would be nice if we ... I shouldn't think that far ahead." ''But if we leave you alone...'' "There's just no other choice. I have to take a risk as well otherwise there is no meaning. If I simply wait around for it like it's a gift... Well, that's bad narrative." She didn't answer Rufus's question because she felt adding another 'No' would be ridiculous. "Of course this only works if we don't spill the beans to them next time we meet them so try your best to not murder me by doing so." Oh no, she's looking at Sarracenia! But then she sighs and relents, "But you are still helping me so."
Timespace Riders	Like, temporal stuff? Like, a timeline where he was put into the freezer, and then he isn't, but you have the thing anyways? What? "No, like..." "He would have to go in the freezer no matter what, in this... hypothetical. But we could do it so late that we don't really lose any time, because I'd just be going to get the materia from the Rufus that's in the freezer to give to this Rufus, and he's the Rufus that would just go in the freezer later." "But... it doesn't matter, because Xion can do it without getting hurt." He leans closer to Petra and stage whispers. "I don't even like hurting people I don't like, and I'm kind of starting to like Rufus." Sougo clears his throat and leans back. "Anyway... I think we'd be better against Lilian, as a duo, if we have to fight. Our Rider powers are tied to who we are, and Rita can attack that directly." "I'd prefer to only do the fights we have to do, to get Angela to Architecture. Before we move on that, we should get some kind of pale shielding for those of us who'd end up fighting Rita." It's the best plan we have, to start going for a win and making them figure out and react. "I think so, too. So," Sougo says, sitting up stright, "We'll have two teams, with two different targets. I know Petra said Lilian actually isn't that great at dealing with traps, but I'm wondering if it isn't a better idea to spread them out unevenly near both targets." "We wait for one team to hit their target, then the other team hits theirs, and in the confusion, Xion takes Angela to Architecture. If we do it right, it'll look like what we did put down for the less-fortified side was all we could put down, and whoever goes to respond to that strike will jump to their own conclusions about it." "Then the other side looks like the more 'important' target, when in reality... well, you know." "The only question is where we should hit. Angela, Petra, where in the facility would be the kind of places we could... fortify, like that, to try and funnel someone through? It should be some place that has something at least a little useful to us."
Sarracenia	'I kind of like basically all of you guys, really.' Sarra, for one optimistic and possibly delusional moment, thinks she might be included in 'basically all of you guys' and a slight smile forms on her face for a moment until she reminds herself this is Petra and she hmphs softly. She looks at the whiteboard, arms crossed and cheeks puffed slightly. "I was hoping I would not have to fight Rita, but...after yesterday..." 'Petra's morphmetal extension reels around and plucks it out of their hand to deposit it in Riku's instead.' "H-hey!" Sarra exclaims, then huffs and cheekpuffs again. "...I was already bringing it..." she says in a pouty voice. 'Hell yeah. Just say anything that comes to mind. Once we're settled here, I'll give you the stage.' Petra's giggle makes Sarra giggle similarly, and for another moment she almost forgets that outside of this war they are bitter enemies who hate each other. No. That's actually normal,' 'No.' 'No.' 'No.' Sarra nods firmly. "No." she says in agreement. Sarra's mood lifts again when her drinks are received with thanks and satisfied 'pwahs' and other such things! She smiles a genuine smile for perhaps the first time since the fight yesterday. "You are welcome~" she says cheerfully to all those who thank her. Sarra can't say she approves of Petra's method for getting Kukuru to be more resistant to control, though. "H-hey! Come on! We are supposed to be raising morale!" she exclaims, then looks to Kukuru. Kukuru's expression cracks, and Sarra mmphs softly in anger. "I believe in you, Kukuru!" Sarra's cheeks end up puffed again as the agents seem reluctant to take her power-ups. Still, she pulls out enough for each agent to have a few of the standard ones and one or two of the non-standard and hands them over. Parker's enthusiasm earns a smile at least. "If you run out, just let me know~"
Petra Soroka	"Wearing them down, drawing them away, ambushes, starving, slashing - it's all pointless if we don't try to win." "... Yeah. You're right, Xion." Petra flips her palms back and leans them on the metal ledge of the whiteboard, sagging a bit. "I'm good at focusing on the long game, but not that great at winning on purpose. Usually it just ends up happening, in the end; but not here. If this went on for fifty days, then I bet I'd win so hard that you wouldn't see me outside of a mental hospital for the rest of my life." "I can get you there. It's the best plan we have, to start going for a win and making them figure out and react." "Yeah. Yeah. Okay." After Xion's plan is shared in its entirety, Petra starts to rotate something in her head, becoming more and more energized as she does. She pushes herself up to standing and starts pacing around again, quakily-active, like she's just been injected with a syringe of adrenaline compared to the dismal downswing of a minute or two ago. "Yeah. That's it, definitely." "It's all or nothing. We can't make the gamble until we've got it in our favor. But I've got some things up my sleeve that no one's ready for, and we've got a bunch more operations on the table that'll gain advantage. Once those are done, we'll do it, and at that point, we'll have to. Binah said we need four days of Light for Ange, so we've got our schedule planned out. Right up to the end, we'll be doing stuff to get ready." "Hey, how's that for fucking morale? I could set a clock to count down to the day this'll be over at this point." Petra doesn't look that expectant about people's moods improving, because she's moreso ranting than giving a speech, but there's a vibrating desperate energy behind her words that convincingly proves she means them. "Can I get a hell yeah?" "'Til then: grab Melting Love for Xion, get Flamel to plant mines, grab Pale shields from Disciplinary, figure out what we can do with the Apostle corpses. We'll put Sarracenia on the radio, and if that doesn't work, I'll put Fragments on it instead. Keep guards on Angela and Kukuru at all times, waste Lilian's time, beat Rita's shit in for being the most moralistic hypocritical asshole I've ever fucking-- we'll be using that last bit of juice of yours, Hibiki. Woz, do you have the odds on that working?" "Wasting her time is one of the things I've always been pretty good at, after all." "Attagirl." It's weird for Petra to say that. Not just because it's a sarcastic joke that falls strangely out of her mouth, but because it barely even sounds like 'her' talking. "A lot of times, before... I really did just go home and cry." "Well, if anyone gets that about you, it's me." Now that actually sounds like Petra. "... Thanks for doing your best, Hibiki."
Petra Soroka	"Gods damn it, Petra." "But you--" Petra wheels on Rufus suddenly, pushing her face close to glare at him with bone-aching tension. "Yeah? It's hard for you to use it? It feels bad? Well, Agent Shinra, I'd use it, so what fucking excuse do you have?! It's worth it to me. Everything we do is worth it! So--..." She's also shaking subtly, and it's hard to tell whether it's from the tension, the effort of shouting, or from violently crushing down her emotion. "The things you're doing for others, I suppose they're more Concord-like, but everything you do for yourself is distinctly Watch-themed." Petra is startled to hear it, but tries to quickly wave it off by invoking lore to seem cool again. "Yeah? Liza said the same when she came to assassinate me. She--" Fuck. Fuck. Now she's thinking about Rita's voice choking after saying that she fought for her against Liza, and how Petra wouldn't fight for her against-- "Like killing Ayin before I could perform the procedure!" "He didn't deserve care before he died." Petra shrugs. "He deserved to be tortured until every last bit of satisfaction he could give Angela bled out of him. That's just the way it goes. The Watch would still hate me for how little I care about the common good and commie stuff anyways." "Whether the things we're doing are called good or evil doesn't matter as long as it's for... All of us. Our family." Regrettably, Petra has to acknowledge that Kukuru's point is exactly the same one she said and felt. "Where would they want to get ahead of us first? Is there anything they'd want to... Um. Secure first?" "The biggest one is Angela. They'll have an eye out for her location at all times, since if they get her, they win. Basically every useful facility is in their hands already, but we've got a good chunk of food up here. I don't think Lilian or Rita can do much with Angela's office, but there's some consoles in there that could maybe be threatening to us if the Sephirah somehow get all the way up there." "Then... Before that happens, I want you to shoot me at the Tree of Light if it even looks like Rita might come near me." "Attagirl." Shoulder clap. "Of course this only works if we don't spill the beans to them next time we meet them so try your best to not murder me by doing so." "Yeah. To that end, I'm not actually going to tell any of you exactly when this is happening, besides Xion and Ange. I'm also not going to tell you what I'm planning with it until it's already happening. Sorry. But I don't trust any of you to actually hold up to torture or Lilian trying to pry the info out of you."
Rufus Shinra	>"It's a cursed sword. First time? They're always rough." "... Yeah? I thought cursed swords were supposed to be cool, not..." Poetic language fails Rufus a bit. "Rough." "They seem a lot cooler when it's someone else having to deal with them, I guess," he admits. The materia gets slotted back in. Actually, there's some more fiddling, some pulling out and rearranging, doing the physical version of equipment shuffling that's usually abstracted by menus. Rufus has a slot for materia on his bangle, so that's where it goes. Being worn instead of wielded, as Xion suggests. Maybe it'll make a difference. Actually, already, it does feel like it's making a difference. Being part of his armor, not part of his weapon. > "Yeah? It's hard for you to use it? It feels bad? Well, Agent Shinra, I'd use it, so what fucking excuse do you have?! It's worth it to me. Everything we do is worth it! So--..." Petra leans in. Rufus leans back, startled. The clash is lost. Actually there wasn't even a clash, like the social autobattle system just didn't even bother showing a popup for this one. "Yeah, well..." he eventually says. "You and Rita are stronger than me. That wasn't ever in question. Maybe this also is because you're stronger than me, that you'd use it without hesitation, and I... wouldn't." "So you can go feel smug about that, if it helps you."
Angela	Angela does her best to not ask 'why are you doing this for me?' again. At this point, it seems a bit pointless to ask no matter how hard it is for her to trust in anyone. She can't make herself care about Ayin not getting the kind of death that would have been kinder. It's not what he deserves, of course, even what Petra did to him was hardly compensation--but vengeance is not the first thing that tends to enter Angela's mind. She just has to endure everybody talking about throwing themselves on swords for a couple hundred more days. She can't let herself acknowledge that she cares right now about whether they'd live or die. She's not the innocent idiot she was born as, but she has to acknowledge to herself she hasn't been able to be the kind of person she was before the multiverse. This week she has to go back to that person as muich as shie can. Rely on the people who were somehow foolish enough to be on your side through all this and maybe tommorow you will understand why. Binah said she'd need four days? Angela frowns. That has to be a guess but it's a reasonable one. The Project didn't exactly intend to start with the bare minimum of Light after all--they wanted to make SURE the project would work so there has to be a little extra just to make sure it worked. And what she wants it for is a lot less energy intensive than changing the shape of the entire collective unconsciousness for her world. Four days might even be overstating it for surety. "Then we have a broader plan and some tactical tricks here and there. Try not to make throwing yourself on a sword the first choice that psrings to mind." ''Can I get a hell yeah'' " Hell yeah!" "Hell yeah!!" "Hell yeah." Angela adds monotonally. ''Where in the facility should we hit?'' "Most of the elvators are in Central, so Control, Training, or Safety would probably be the best places since there's fewer elevators leading up to them. And the slope is more angular." Somehow, Angela is starting to like Rufus too but she's not going to say it. Petra might tease her. So she must never say so ever and burn it from her mind. It's probably a trick. She's seen him what he was like before. Cautious, cautious!! But she can at least still kill HIS evil dad. Maybe it feels better when you kill other people's evil dads. She needs to test this otherwise can we ever truly say it's a solved equation?
Hibiki Tachibana	I'll be okay. It's... It'd be better if I could get it back before the next fight, but there's still plenty of injuries to treat. I can afford to play pretend as a pirate for a little longer. Hibiki watches Kukuru in silence for some time, and it's a little difficult to tell what she's thinking as she does so. But what she ends up doing is tilting her head slightly, before nodding. "...We're relying on you a lot. And asking a lot from you, too. I'm an expert in saying 'it's okay' when it's not, so I get it." "...Just promise you'll ask for help if you need it, okay? Even if it's just moving things from here to there." Well, she has a bit of experience in how inconvenient only having one arm to work with makes things. Beat Rita's shit in for being the most moralistic hypocritical asshole I've ever fucking-- we'll be using that last bit of juice of yours, Hibiki. There's another nod and a clutch at her pendant-- although there's no 'hell yeah' included. The thought of fighting Rita is never one should could even fake or joke about having excitement for. It's just... ...something that has to be done, standing on opposite ends of things. She wouldn't be serious about why she's here, what she's doing, if she wasn't willing to bring out every last bit of strength she can draw on. "Right. No guarantee on what'll happen after. I've fought with Rita a lot... and never against her. But I'll give it everything I've got." ... Thanks for doing your best, Hibiki. After thinking that would be that for now, Hibiki's closed eyes open back up, with what might be a surprised blink. She's still incapable of really managing anything resembling a smile in current circumstances, but... The way she scratches at her cheek and idly glances away is a familiar enough gesture, compared to her permanently exhausted flatness. "You can count on me for that much. ...We'll get to the other side of all of this. We've made it this far, 'cause you've been doing your best too. We'll make it the rest of the way too." As long as she keeps her eyes set on that... she can handle whatever comes. And learn to live with it after.
Timespace Riders	Sorry. But I don't trust any of you to actually hold up to torture or Lilian trying to pry the info out of you. "I trust you to do that and more." "Yeah." It's an agreement with Woz. But also a little sad--not that she doesn't trust him, but that he knows she can't, in that regard.
Kukuru	"If we do it right, it'll look like . . . when in reality... well, you know." Kukuru's gaze goes glassy for a moment, and it quickly becomes apparent that she doesn't know at all. That fades soon after, however, as that confidence starts to return to her gaze and she nods firmly in affirmation. "I like it." She answers, mostly because she knows that Sougo knows what he's talking about. As long as she can count on everyone else knowing the plan, she won't have to worry about anyone pulling it out of her! Except for the parts she does understand, anyway, like about Xion and Angela targeting Architecture. "Too bad I can't take that part out..." "I believe in you, Kukuru!" "Attagirl." Sarracenia's enthusiasm gets another grateful smile out of Kukuru even though her tone is still somewhat pained at trying to harden herself to what she needs to do in the coming days. She keeps her hand on Petra's, squeezing it lightly as she holds it together in a rare moment of calmness today. "Thank you, Sarra... But that's exactly why I have to be ready for this. Believing in me is... I love it. I want all of you to be able to believe in me, but I can't ask that if I don't... Do anything to deserve it, you know? I don't want to just... Be there for you all, when you're hurting because of things like this happening. I want to make sure I can make things better, so you can keep believing in me to fix things when things are... You know. Like this, and so much is at stake." "I'm an expert in saying 'it's okay' when it's not, so I get it." "...Just promise you'll ask for help if you need it, okay?" Giggling quietly despite herself, Kukuru lets out a relieved sigh as she nods at Hibiki. "Of course... You know I don't like letting anyone worry, but light work and heavy hands or... That whole thing. THere'll be plenty I'll be asking for help with soon, that's for sure."
Xion	Xion hadn't, especially, wanted to gather Melting Love's power - but worse than that, she certainly didn't want to gather White Night's. If Rufus had been anxious about wielding entropy against entropy, Xion would be trying to add a slice of depersonalization to her personalization stack. Sometimes, tokens held certain tools easier than others. But Rufus seems overwhelmed, and Xion sighs when Petra presses in on Rufus. "Petra, you should try one of Sarra's sodas before we break up for the evening. It helped clear my head a little - probably the sugar. And..." Getting up, with Starlight disappearing rather than tumbling out of her lap, Xion steps up and lifts an arm to pull Petra back, and pauses just before touching Petra, and hoverhands the other woman something fierce. It's like a touch, a quarter of a hug without the contact, as she stares at the tremble. "You need to take some time off, Petra. Mechanically speaking, you're going to burn out your nerves if you keep going this way. We have a plan to win. Don't pay for the pain you expect: focus on what we can do right now." Mantric, trying to instill in Petra something like calm. Over her shoulder, she gives another little smile at Rufus. "That you still have a heart to ache, to think about that 'forbidden' token and know why it's forbidden, speaks a lot, Rufus. Try not to lose it. It, and Angela, is what this is for." As for the plan. . . "Hell yeah, Petra. If we're fighting to win, then we can make this work. We can make them withstand us." 'But I don't trust any of you to actually hold up to torture or Lilian trying to pry the info out of you.' "It's not about trust either, Sarra. If you don't know, it's winning by default." Xion tries to smooth over, shifting to pat the Princess's shoulder. 'You can count on me for that much.' Another sigh, and Xion dips her head from looking up at Sarra. "Unfortunately, Hibiki, I'm relying on you for a lot more than that. I expect you not only to win, but live, and smile after. If you win, you're supposed to, right? I know how strong you are, and I don't mean wearing Gungnir, so the whole tarnished blade doesn't convince me. Sharpen up, if you have to, but fighting for bare minimum isn't why you're here, is it? It's because those twelve people - maybe even just one of them - is worth 'as much as the world'. Doesn't Angela get to see the tree that's grown?" "I think so."
Sarracenia	'Can I get a hell yeah' Sarra blinks, then huffs softly. "H-...heck yeah!" she says, complete with a fist pump into the air! 'Oh no, she's looking at Sarracenia!' 'Yeah. To that end, I'm not actually going to tell any of you exactly when this is happening, besides Xion and Ange. I'm also not going to tell you what I'm planning with it until it's already happening. Sorry. But I don't trust any of you to actually hold up to torture or Lilian trying to pry the info out of you.' Sarra mmphs softly and folds her arms over her chest. She doesn't look happy about that, but she doesn't complain either. "Fine." 'It's not about trust either, Sarra. If you don't know, it's winning by default.' Sarra sighs softly. "Yes yes, I can appreciate the reasoning behind it." she says, offering a small appreciative smile to Xion. 'Thank you, Sarra... But... I want to make sure I can make things better...' Sarra frowns lightly at that, then moves to take one of Kukuru's hands. "What makes you think being there for us when we are hurting is not making things better?" she says, giving that hand a squeeze before handing Kukuru one of the grapefruit sodas. "Here. Like Xion said, it might help!"
Hibiki Tachibana	I expect you not only to win, but live, and smile after. If you win, you're supposed to, right? I know how strong you are, and I don't mean wearing Gungnir, so the whole tarnished blade doesn't convince me. "Ah..." It's because those twelve people - maybe even just one of them - is worth 'as much as the world'. "..." Doesn't Angela get to see the tree that's grown? ". . ." Hibiki doesn't have a reply to Xion right away, meeting her gaze briefly only to glance off to the side, as she does. Or... no. She already does know what she wants to say. It's just failing to come to her mouth right away. Words are so difficult like that. And she's always been terrible at matching how she feels to what she says. "...She does. And they are. The entire reason I'm here right now is because their chance to live... is that important to me. I... ..." She trails off. For a second, it seems as if that might be the end of it. The half-hearted agreement, too exhausted to give that reliance the sort of response it deserves. But her hand falls away from her pendant only slightly lower to her chest, scrunching up her jacket as she clenches it shut. Her eyes shut, thoughts going away from the painful everyday of 'war', to how she felt in the last large battle. Even while she was drowning in her own blood. When she opens them again, it's facing Xion properly. And with her drawing from the same steady ground to stand on from that moment, behind the layers of expected exhaustion. "...meant everything I said to Lilian. I'm gonna fight as hard as I can. I'll give everything I've got, and stay standing tall after. And then I'm going home to Miku with a smile, apologizing for being gone for so long to help my friends... she'll probably still be upset... but then I'll offer to help make a big enough dinner to make up for the whole week." That gets to sit for a bit, like an 'I made myself say it out loud, so it'll definitely happen', before her face and shoulders un-tense some. "...But, I'll be counting on you to be able to smile after all this too, Xion. 'All of us' have gotta be reliable here, don't we? ...So let's all win. And live after."
Petra Soroka	"So you can go feel smug about that, if it helps you." Petra maintains her glare for a second longer, and then breaks it, looking down. "... I don't want to feel smug. I want to win." "You need to take some time off, Petra." Petra's breath catches and she stiffens up when Xion almost touches her, and her shuddering hitches for a moment, until it becomes clear that Xion isn't touching her. She works her jaw for a second, struggling to make noise successfully. "... I can't. That's not... it's just a few days. If I can't stick out a week for Angela, then..." Petra sucks in air between her teeth, "It's so little time. If I rest for an hour that's practically five percent of the whole rest of the war. Lilian sleeps two hours a day, and I don't even know if Rita does sleep for real. I'm not allowed to fall behind." "Besides," She breathes out, barely vocalizing, "I don't think I'd do better if I rested. I think I'd just spontaneously explode or something." "I'll take a fucking soda, though!" Raising her voice again, Petra turns around and exits the Rufus and Xion situation by choosing to approach Sarracenia and pluck a can from her offerings. She pops the tab with an index finger and pounds it back, gagging a bit when the sweet acid hits her raw throat. "...So let's all win. And live after." On that resounding heroic note from Hibiki, Petra finishes draining the soda and sighs. Strategy set, resolve bolstered, glucose obtained, with a victory and end in sight, the mood of the room is tangibly positive, if still heavy with the responsibilities that lie ahead. Petra tilts her head back, and then scoffs. "Say what you need to in order to get through this. But it's already too late for all of us to live after." Petra crunches the can in her hand and drops it on the ground with the other trash. "I'm going to go strangle Forsaken Murderer until Lilian gets devoured by psychic flesh eating worms. I'll see you in an hour for the next steps."