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August Kohler Today's mind dive is...once again, in the Shack. August is sitting at the table, waiting for the group to pile in. His eyes are closed, humming quietly, and there's a placard on the table. 'Prepare your mind.' He's beating Flamel to it without even saying it. If given the psycho-portal, the redhead will set it up himself with a weary sigh, and then the games will begin.

After the group's set up and moves to go in, Flamel will immediately feel...something. It's an invitation, sort of, to appear somewhere else in August's mind away from the blown up entry terminal, and the sensation tastes vaguely like cat hair. A scan gives the identity, which should be obvious.

The entry point, once accepted, is what appears to be a small museum. Bookshelves line the walls, there's several podiums with stuff like 'a suit of tank-knight armor', which is open and empty, and a sled made out of obsidian and magma (Will would recognize it as the sled he and Leyanne Mace made). On the bookshelves are various books such as 'August's Pet Peeves', 'August's List of Crushes: Big and Small', and 'That One Time In 6th Grade'. In the corner, apparently dragged in from somewhere else, is a blinking, flashing globe that constantly changes images and is moving too fast to perceive. In the center of the room is some sort of podium that seems to be like a computer, a reference database for this museum, perhaps?

Those who have been here would recognize this place immediately: the Museum of Memories, the headquarters of Panzercat, who doesn't appear to be in this room right now. However, some sort of noise is going on in an adjoining room, behind a solid door, and it sounds like hitting things and raspy cat laughter. Also, probably more importantly...

There's a Tin Soldier at a desk, working on something. It's wearing some sort of cloak with something drawn on it, but a closer look would be needed to glance at it and make it out. It doesn't respond to the group's arrival.
Flamel Parsons     Parsons lands heavily. The others should have been brought in with the astral equivalents of their own gear, so he doesn't need to give them a lowdown on how to approach this. "Phew, always a rush. Alright, we're in a memory center, it looks like. I linked this in here because an impulse in August's mind, something related to Panzercat, gave me a mmemonic shortcut. Don't know where they are, but keep an eye out, okay? Speaking of keeping eyes out! Spread out as you like and get to checking what's going on and what things are like in here, sounds like Panzercat might be over this way so I'm gonna go meet them."

    Parsons re-adjusts his dark MIB-style sunglasses, fixes his tie, grins positively, and strides over towards the door, intent on either knocking or just striding right through to see what's up, unless something like that Tin Soldier interrupt. The other points of investigation are probably best left to the people who know August the best, and Parsons has a woefully small body of shared experience with the student.
Ainsley     Naturally, Ainsley feels inordinately curious the moment she enters August's mind again. She gets her bearings -- because she is not mentally present in a physical space and it takes a moment to adjust to the 'simulation' of her body -- and then she approaches the books and reaches out to them. She hesitates for a second, as if she maybe thought better of it... but then she reaches out to grab the book that is titled 'August's List of Crushes: Big and Small' and her feathers puff up with excitement and a smile shines on her face. She then cracks it open so she can read it while wandering over to check on what that Tin Soldier is up to.

    "What're you making there?" she gently inquires of the manifestation in the guise of August's Persona. She even cranes her neck to take a look in between being nosy with the book. Awful.
Ran Itoh     Ran is almost afraid to think of it in so many words, but she's hoping that things are starting to look up for Die Reisende. Janine's mother and siblings rescued this week, and now another opportunity to help fix what's come loose inside of August's mind.

    Upon entry, she resists the urge (again) to peek at the book of his crushes or That One Time In 6th Grade. There are things that should remain sacrosant, even if they seem ordinary to someone else. Besides, what if someone she knows is in there? She'd laugh or something and that would be terrible.

    Instead, she tries to look at the flashing images in the globe, possibly even decipher some of them, but it's no good - looking at it for longer than necessary is probably just going to give her a headache so she moves on, waving to the Tin Soldier. Receiving no response, she frowns a bit. ...Why's he wearing a cape? Is August cold? She'd better think to make him soup or something when they get back to reality...

    "Okay," she nods to Flamel, long hair swaying gently. Ran never met the /real/ Panzercat, so...

     W-wait! "Aa-- Ainsley, is reading that okay?!"
Kyoko Takada     Kyoko had said something about not wanting to follow these crazy kids into mysterious places full of who knows what dangers, and maybe that's still a rule she's following, because Kyoko isn't here. Alpha-39, however, is. She lands, adjusts her astrally-projected gear, and looks around, her SMG resting in one hand, finger nowhere near the trigger. This isn't exactly her kind of environment. In fact, the number of books available here is shocking.
    She doesn't touch any of the books until after Ainsley does, and confirms that they're not all wired to explode. After that, she pulls a volume off at random and flips through it while glancing at the contents, intending to put it back again a few seconds later.
    She glances at Ran. Is reading it okay? "No instructions to the contrary," she reasons aloud.
Alopex     Once within the mental landscape of August's mind, Alopex has to take a few moments to adjust. This was her first dive, something she decided to help with due to wanting more interaction with her allies, and thus, she came. Within the man's mind, her steps are slow and deliberate as she takes in every detail she can of her surroundings. "This is incredible," is quietly stated as she starts to wander. The books all are given a brief look before she follows in Ainsley's wake. This is the first time Alopex is setting eyes upon Tin Soldier, in person, that she can recall. She seemed more familiar with place than the fox could ever hope to be.
William Pauwel Here we are again. In the most dangerous mind in the multiverse.

Not for any specific reason. August isn't genocidal or some kind of interdimensional supermonster or anything like that. He's just a teenaged boy, which means his brain probably has a special repository for teenaged boy thoughts, and it is clearly Will's duty as BESTEST PAL to keep everyone and anyone away from it.

"Wh-- hey!" Will hops at Ainsley's STOLEN TOME. "Y-y'all put that back now, y' snoopin', perverted lizard lady! Lookin' at someone's crushes like that, what if YOU were in there, huh!?"

GOSH, AINSLEY.
August Kohler As Ran approaches the globe, the first thing she'll see is...herself, sitting at a table? Wait, the table in the Shack - and then a blink to black, before opening back up. There's a rapid movement, which quickly spots the rest of the group, before suddenly, the globe begins blinking faster, as the image moves towards the ceiling, and then down to the table, and then the globe fades to black.

Ainsley, meanwhile, grabs the Cursed Book, the one that August would murder her for reading. As she goes through it, there's a bunch of names: celebrities, some very apparently German names, some names crossed out, and more. It's alphabetical, and it's entirely possible she'll find 'Minimal-level' next to several of the Die Reisende members (she is not in the book). As she approaches the Tin Soldier, she can make out the emblem on the cape - it looks hand-drawn, some sort of pencil drawing, and has a group of stick figures next to a tree. Below it is, in a fancy overstylized font, 'Die Reisende'. This appears to be a draft for a logo, possibly from when August was first considering the idea when the group started out.

As Ainsley grabs the Tin Soldier's attention, it silently turns to look at her, and then moves to snatch the Book of Crushes out of her hand, right as she was hitting 'Medium-level - Wi-' (anyone else hopping over to Ainsley would notice it as well). It puts it on the table, and then points to what it's working on - what appears to be a Tin Soldier rifle, but there seems to be a modification, and there's several grenades on the table. An add-on grenade launcher?

Kyoko's book, meanwhile, is 'List of Pet Peeves' - eating at the table, pronouncing aluminum as 'aluminium' in English, and repeated finger snapping, among others. One is actually in yellow text, several times, and has been crossed out everytime by some sort of catscratch writing. 'Obstacles'.
Kotone Yamakawa It was time once more to go into August's mind. She was not sure just what was broken in ther,e she had some ideas from her last trip in here. She was tense she was ready and attewmpted to keep her sense of self from wandering into bad mental plances like she did in the past. She keeps her focus and will soon appear she is wearing oddly wrap wround shades as she appears in here with everyone else. Otherwise she's wearing the same high tech clothing she normally does.

All right is everyone all right?"

she looks over to the Tin soldier with intrest she too is interested as Ainsley is about just what it's doing.
Ainsley     "What?"

    Ainsley looks up with the absolutely clueless reaction of someone who hadn't even realized what she was doing wrong, because people are shouting at her. She reacts by recoiling in a startle when Will calls her 'perverted,' complete with a big puff of feathers, and then the book gets pulled from her hands and there's a moment where she looks like she was about to whip around and bite the book thief. But when it's clearly the Tin Soldier taking the book from her, she nods slowly and looks down at the gun, slowly calming down.

    "Upgrading your leg?" she murmurs. Whether that's true or not will be taken from the Tin Soldier's immediate reaction. Then she turns to wander off and head toward where Panzer Cat's voice is coming from.
    "It looked interesting," she weakly defends at the others, as if it weren't as big a deal as it really was.
Kyoko Takada     A-39 gathers intel on annoying August. This may or may not be put to use, but she puts the book back away without sharing what she's learned. After the other book gets removed from the hands of the one who pulled it from the shelf, she refrains from checking out any other books. At least, while the Tin Soldier is watching.
    Oh look, grenades. The child soldier leans around to get a good look at those. She doesn't have a grenade launcher, but she at least carries a variety of grenades.
Alopex     "Information is always useful, but I believe the owner of this mind doesn't want you looking at it, if that creature back there is what I think it is," Alopex muses to Ainsley, offering a little support as she follows, on the same route toward the big solid door. "I am not very familiar with Mr. Kohler, and this is my first venture into this ... place. Is there anything I should know?"
Ran Itoh     The cloak... that drawing...

    Ran has to suppress the urge to smile a bit. Kinda reminds her of the drawings she always did in the margins of her school notes (hers involved more magical girls, though).

    More importantly, though, the globe... She has to blink at it a bit before she cottons on to what it must be. "Is this... what he's seeing now?" she asks the others, reaching a hand out but not quite touching the surface. "And... why did it go black? Wait, now's not the time for a nap!" It's then that Ran has a sudden, unsettling thought. "You guys... he's not passed out or anything, is he?" How would they know?!
William Pauwel 'Medium-level - Wi-'

Wi?

WI WHO!?

WI WHO, AUGUST KOHLER!?

"Uhhhh," Will says, trying VERY MUCH to put what that could have been out of his head. "So uh. He's building a grenade launcher, huh? Wow, that's pretty cool! Y'all could uh. Use some help with that? Or do y'all have it so far?"

Beat.

Will frowns at Ainsley.

"Don't think we didn't see that smirk, y'lewd lizard! Hrmph. Peekin' in that kind've thing... It's forbidden, y'hear!"
August Kohler The door is unlocked, and as Flamel knocks on it, he'll hear that raspy voice call "Come in!". Inside seems to be some sort of makeshift training area, obstacles made out of the various wreckage of the buildings in the factory city. Panzercat is here, the small cat standing on two feet and hefting a tank cannon over his shoulder, before using it to swing at a Tin Soldier in a cloak again, who is wearing some sort of armor made out of...other Tin Soldiers. It seems pretty resistant, though the Tin Soldier goes flying from the force of the blow, as the Panzercat leaps over and up onto Flamel's shoulder. "Top Secret! Glad you took the invitation, it'd have been a shame if you guys had appeared at the same place again and got shot by the battalion guarding it, y'know?" A grin from the cat, as he points the tank cannon sword at the armored Tin Soldier, before attempting to steer Flamel by putting one paw on his suit and pulling, to join the others. "You're all to thank for this, you know. The more hope you give Firehair, the more we get, and in a place like this, imagination runs free if we've got the power! Armor from the dead, grenade launchers on the guns, we're gearing up for war. But, we don't need to talk about that immediately."

As soon as the Panzercat spots Will, he leaps across from Flamel's shoulder and speedily lands on Will's head, on one foot, before draping onto the young man's shoulders. "Willpaw! Good to see you here! Good job with pulling Firehair out of his comfort zone, though he's not getting almost eaten NEARLY enough!" There's a raspy cackle from the cat, as he slings the tank cannon over his shoulder, before eyes mark over to those who would have never seen him before. "Hello, one and all! I'm Panzercat, a very fond memory of the Firehair's, and resident guardian of this here Museum of Memories. If you're going to pry into his books, please put them back in the shelves afterwards, got it? I want this place to be atleast somewhat neat! We're hosting a resistance here, y'know!" Panzercat, if still on Will's shoulders, begins kneading into the back of his head.

There's a glance over to Ran. "Ah, we stole that from the Chief Engineer. It allows us to see exactly what Firehair is seeing. Pitch black means he's unconscious, asleep, or dead, but we'd know the last one because we wouldn't be having this conversation!" The cat's tone is utterly lighthearted, teasing even. "The Chief Engineer must have noticed and put him down, I think, maybe. I don't understand exactly how this works. I do know that it seems you guys decided not to tell him what's going on. Do you think you made the right choice?" A hand is waved at Ainsley, Flamel, and Ran, before a nod to Will. "Willpaw told him a bit, but apparently didn't know anything but 'foreign invader', which I mean, isn't really as worrying as some things, but I hate to break it to you, gunslinger, it's absolutely 100% incorrect! Zero points!" His tongue sticks out, as he purrs a broken, damaged purr for a moment.

"The source is entirely local! This is a homegrown Firehair issue."
August Kohler The Tin Soldier working on the modified grenade launcher nods to Ainsley, moving slightly to show it is missing a gun-leg, and has only one leg, which is requiring it to sit. A glance at the grenades shows that they look like the classic 'green frag grenades', almost like a video game design, and are being put into the grenade launcher seamlessly despite space and size issues.
William Pauwel Oh.

That's...!

"Panzer...katze?" Will blinks, then grins as he runs over to embrace this cat-- only to be cruelly lept upon. "Ahahahaha! Well I'll be darned! I thought, we all thought you were...!"

Dead?

No, not quite, it seems. Instead, Panzercat seems to be living on in each and every one of their hearts and minds. Still, to see an old genocidal friend again seems to have made Will's day, so much so that he doesn't even notice when Panzercat starts flipping tank cannons and kneading into the back of his head.

Actually, he's pretty okay with the kneading.

Cats knead to show that they like you, after all...!

(Or to show that you're their favored nesting site, either or.)

"...Wait, so y'all are sayin' that the invader is actually... From inside of him? Is it... Is it his Shadow? Is that what the problem is?"
August Kohler Panzercat shrugs to Will. "Well, I technically am, but I'm still here, aren't I?" Another grin, and then a nod. "Yep! Yellow eyes, twisted mindset, genocidal urges. The last part is my fault, you see. Firehair got the idea from me and his Shadow went 'that sounds great and will solve all my problems'." Sorry, Will, August actually may be genocidal inside. "We're actually preparing for a strike tonight...so it's just in luck you're all here! The big anger factory has booted up again, and been reworked to be even more defended."
Ran Itoh     Even if he's just unconscious, it's a little worrying... Ran will just have to be optimistic.

    The Chief Engineer, though... Ran draws in a slow, deep breath and chews on her lower lip. What happens when they beat him up, though? Is it really going to be just that easy? She keeps it cheerful as possible on the radio, of course, but it was hard enough seeing that version of August last time.

    "Everybody has things inside of them - urges, desires, that kind of thing - that are ugly. So those of you who haven't been here before..." She looks meaningfully toward Kyoko and Alopex. "Please don't think badly of him, okay? This one just got out of control."
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa looks for a moment and pause as Panzercat who shows up, she's not too shocked about this really. The tin soldier is sent flying and she looks at the Panzercat of August's mind. She tilts her head a little bit.

"We're here to help,. Also a war? I see."

She thinks for a moment longer nbebefore adding.

"Will do Panzer."

She won't look too much into the books but she was curious as the books might have helpful information to them. She also makes note about the Chief Engineer, so she muses on some thoughts about how to deal with Cheif as they seem to be the head problem.

"Yes, we all do, I don't want to think about my own ugly ones and I couldn't guess at what others keep chained in the back of their minds. I don't, not for this Ran, he needs help and we're here to give him that, right?"
Flamel Parsons     "Oh, woah!" Parsons calls out, as the cat leaps onto his shoulder. "Oooh, top secret. I can smell top secret stuff from a mile away, myself, so I had to take the invite! Thanks for offering! I really prefer not getting shot." He says, quite happily. "I'll set up some relays through you for jumping back in here another time, if it's that bad." And he follows along with the "steering", actually briefly levitating and sort of getting yanked along by it, until the unpleasant-looking and pleasant-acting cat leaps from his shoulder.

    Then he sort of restores his suit's proper MIB collectedness, and resume chats. "Oh, I just made it not really my decision at all." Parsons says, straightening out his tie once more. "I mean, I told the -- what was her name, the angry girl -- but anyone else is free to tell him, just as long as they know him well enough to make sure it won't be psychologically damaging. I just operate in vague yet menacing secrecy because it's better to be vaguely yet menacingly secretive than to ask for permission, or... No, I can't remember where I was going with that."

    "Well, anyway, a raid on the anger factory sounds great! I'd love to help out. I've got plenty of lifting power if you need anything heavy set up, and I've got plenty of infiltration power if you need anything sabotaged in there. Just point me at it and I'll get to work! I'd rather not have August going genocidal. It's the kind of agenda that councils of powers that be tend to get very antsy about! Wouldn't want that." For August or for the ambiguous conspiracy topics, presumably.
August Kohler "Ah, Weak-Arm!" Panzercat nods to Flamel, knowing exactly who she is talking about because, well, he sees August's memories. The Shadow cat (yellow eyes and all) hmms, nodding towards Flamel. "Top Secret, you've got just the right idea in mind. So, we've got a bit of reconnaisance, me and the team. You see, it's just us three left, because while you gave us a power boost, we're still up against infinite of those things, even when we recruit more. The volcano makes more, as well as weapons that the Chief Engineer is using to try and get into the center of August's mind, somewhere he can establish enough control to take over directly. This is somewhere in the Joy Parade, which is too tightly defended to even consider breaking into." While he's explaining, Panzercat is pulling up a map. Locations have shifted again, but the gloomy tundra, the Joy Parade, and the Rage Volcano are still there, if in other places. He starts putting pins down to symbolize military force, putting a couple down near the tundra, a bunch all over the place, a bunch centered around the Rage Volcano, and then just dumping the rest of the bag onto the Joy Parade place, allowing a few to roll off his table.

"If we're going to cut down on his manpower, we need to shut down the Rage Volcano. Idol Girl did a good job of slowing it down, and that's kept us alive, buuuut he's already working on the Mk.II of the Archtiger project, and if we're weaponizing up here, so is he, probably! This means we need to shut it down indefinitely, but not entirely blow up the place. Either that causes a rage breakdown, or a complete lack of anger, and both are bad!"

It's at this point that Panzercat leaps off Will's shoulders and straight into the tank-armor, putting the cannon in the giant armor hands and suiting up. "I'll lead the way so we can avoid a big fight with the guards between here and there, but then it's up to you. The gates are shut down...Top Secret, you might be able to unlock them while the group deals with the front security someway or another, right?" The Panzerknight moves for the door, with the Tin Soldier nearby saluting. "If so, we're all ready to go!"
William Pauwel "Well, y'know, you DID live in the... weird other-world collective unconsciousness, right? So now that you're here, it's like you're still alive, but in OUR unconsciousness." That makes sense, right? Though it does raise a few very interesting questions about just what happens to a shadow when it's killed.

Hm.

Well, probably can't hurt, having an adorable if mangy and bloodthirsty cat living in your br--

'Archtiger Project?'

"Uh. Wait," Will raises a finger. "Sorry. What do you mean... Archtiger Project?" Beat. "Do... Do you mean like... MY Archtigers? Because that's... Uh. Hm."

Might this be his fault?

Hm.
Ran Itoh     "So the ultimate jackpot would be in the Joy Parade, and if the Chief Engineer gets in there it's all over? But if we could ever get through the security, we could protect it from him?" Ran looks down at the map. If she thinks of it as a strategy game...

    Well as long as it's not chess she ought to be okay, right? She's horrible at chess.

    Seeing Panzercat load up into his armor, Ran checks her own gear. Better now than never! ...Wait, is that how it's supposed to go? Knives, check. Medical gear, check. Pendant, check. She's as ready as it's possible to get. "Archtiger-- that scary thing from last time? No waaaay," she groans, shoving a hand through her hair. "The first one was bad enough...!"

    Okay. Deep breath. It's just a big kitty. A big, angry kitty. Possibly with cannons and some kind of flamethrower ability.

    Sometimes she really, really wishes she were the kind of person to drug August's hot cocoa. He'd probably feel a million times better if he were on valium.

    "I'm not going to tell him. We don't know what would happen," she shakes her head. "Let's just go and get this over with!"
Flamel Parsons     "Oh, /yours/?" Parsons checks over, eagerly, peering at William. "You know, that just might solve some of the issues! I don't know how we can fix up the Rage Volcano, I'll need to look more once we're there." He seems so unbearably /optimistic/ about this. "But if you can use your psychological ownership over the idea to just sort of nudge the idea to patrol the volcano or something, that might be a really useful way to approach making sure whatever we fix doesn't get sabotaged. I have no idea if that'll work! Or what an archtiger really is, honestly, I wasn't watching that side the last time."

    And then he's out and on the way through the door. "Sure sure! Lead the way. I'll make sure I'm no liability here." He snaps, and then suddenly vanishes in a puff of psychic energy like some kind of magician. His disembodied voice assures Ran, "It's up to you! Just handle however you like." And then he presses on, ready to work on some INFILTRATIONS and SABOTAAAAGE!
August Kohler Panzercat tilts his armored head. "Well, he's already in there, but he hasn't finished getting what he needs done. He's trying to dig up something that Firehair buried in there so that he can use it as a conduit for bad juju. What's down there...I'm not entirely sure myself. I've tried to crack through the memories, but it's repression. But as you can see..." There's a hand wave back at the map and the three areas. "The Chief Engineer is great at breaking through repression, so sooner or later, he'd get it."

And then the tank-armor /speeds/ through the door, moving faster than it should. Panzercat leads the group over to the Rage Volcano, which has maybe a dozen Tin Soldiers guarding the massive front gate. Fire is rising from the volcano, and there's the sounds of machines, hard work...and a roar. The alleyway used to enter before is gone, replaced instead with buzzsaws. Wanted posters are next to it with the party's faces on them, and there's an arrow sign pointing from the wanted posters to the buzzsaws, basically inviting them to run in.

Once the group's up close, Panzercat looks over to them. "Entry is up to you! I'll go make a distraction elsewhere so you don't get reinforcements on your tails." The knight lumbers into the Shadow, and then a few moments later, there's explosions near the Gloom Tundra. He works fast.

The Tin Soldiers guarding the gate each are a standard version of August's Persona. They make no noise, and watch diligently. How do you want to try and get past them?
Kyoko Takada     "Unlimited enemies. Advance positions as indicated. Critical material at 'Rage Volcano.' Got it. 'Archtiger?' Giant monster?" A-39 watches the pins get put down and follows along. She's already checked her equipment. She'd know immediately if the weight was off, so used to it is she. Do things still have weight in dreamscapes? She thinks they do, so it feels like the weight is still there. "Do not destroy the site. Got it."
    She's ready to move out. Once they do, she's there. All too soon, they reach the first obstacle.
    "I can take out one of them from far enough away they might not hear the shot. But not two." Is that the first full sentence she's used today? Probably.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa is ready as she's eve going to be she's a bit grunty hwere and she knows it. she's okay with that they need people to do the heavy lifting after all and she'll keep with the group as she istens.

"So if we shut down the rage volcano we stem the tide of their troops more or less? Sounds like a good plan to me. I can be sneaky and slip in to cause some real havoc there. Away the groupo goes it shouldn't take too long they are moving as the speed of thought, right?

she does cloak now as Panzer goes to cause a duistraction and she grins they should make a hell of a show that should allow them to get in.

"I am going to attempt to sneak in, if anyone up for that I will welcome the help."
Ran Itoh     She watches Flamel vanish with a :/ kind of expression on her face. Maybe one day that will stop being so weird. So Ran just nods to Kotone, because they've all got things they don't want anybody else to see - everyone does. August's shouldn't be used to define him just because his is trying to take over his brain.

    Watching from their hiding spot, Ran counts the Tin Soldiers. Counts them again, just to be sure. "I'm not so great at sneaking into places I don't know," Ran demurs, tugging at her lower lip with her teeth. "But it would be best, right? Since Panzercat is being distracting, we should use it to our advantage and try to be stealthy."

    And then Kotone disappears too. "I'm going to be really jealous if I'm the only one who can't turn invisible," she pouts, but goes with whatever the rest of them decide on.
William Pauwel What the blazes does Flamel even mean by 'psychological ownership' even? What, because he's directly responsible for the Archtiger being here, he might somehow be able to control it, or... Something like that?

...An Archtiger for a pet.

Wow, how crazy would that be?

Fast forward a few minutes! The team is standing in front of a literal volcano of anger, which is protected not only by legions of armed guards, but also by enormous, whirling sawblades. Will frowns severely at this terrible trap, but...

Hm.

"Hold on guys," he says, making his way towards one of the gaps in the floor and walls where the sawblades emerge, "I think I can--"

Will draws his gun.

Judgment burns white hot.

Will shoves his gun into the crack where the sawblades emerge, once said sawblade has whirred its way to the other end of the track... And pulls the trigger.

Maybe a blast of RAW KINETIC FORCE will be enough to stop whatever mechanism is powering this trap!?
Flamel Parsons     That invisible secret agent seems to totally like and accept his given nickname, as well as the current path of operations. He's a trained infiltrator, and is quite eager to get to work. For the sake of the others, he pushes on past the guards, hoping his invisibility will keep its integrity while he works on the feline scheme. Specifically, the invisible man works on the gate; planting two fingers on each temple, swarms of nigh-invisible hands spread out over the gate, digging fingers into tricky places, sinking into mechanisms, and otherwise manipulating the gate in a true puzzle-adventurer style to try to get it unlocked and open.

    He also readies up to coordinate with Kyoko; after he's done with this, he'll quite eagerly do some STEALTH ACTION ADVENTURE [NECKSNAP]S if he can get behind the guards and press the relevant stealth attack button to psychokinetically break their weird robot spinal columns. He's gonna help Kotone where he can, and get in there stealthily, but he also wants to make sure the group comes along!
Kyoko Takada     After confirming some things, notably that there is at least one other person here who can stealthily eliminate a Tin Soldier, A-39 backs up. She's already out of conversational ear-shot, but the thing about over-powered, long-range rifles is that they're really, really loud, even if she uses the lowest-powered shot she has. Fortunately, she can also shoot from far enough away that even that will fade, depending on the terrain. Maintaining line-of-sight might be the more limiting factor, rather than range.
    She's abandoning it right afterward, so she doesn't bother digging in and covering up, once she finds her spot. She just sets down, unslings her AMR, folds out the bipod, sets, and gets her range. Carefully, she adjusts the scope, corrects her aim slightly, places her finger over the trigger, and counts.
    "One..." Her radio picks it up.
    "Two..." Carefully, carefully, she does not move.
    "Three," is let out quietly, her hand squeezing the grip in the same, small breath.
August Kohler The group decides their approach - stealthy murder and also Will being himself. Flamel moves into position, where he begins to play with gears, twisting them, turning them, sorting them, and playing Tetris with them until the gate unlocks. It slowly begins to open, which causes one of the Tin Soldiers to look behind to see what's going on...

And get a bullet for his troubles, crumpling into a heap of metal. Two things happen simultaneously. One, Flamel begins neck-snapping other guards, opening the path for the others...

And two, Will blows up the buzzsaws. The blast goes into the gears, and the buzzsaws stop...start...stop...start...explode. The white energy beacons brightly, and very quickly, a weird flying drone flies in from the factory, scanning a spotlight on Will in the process. More Tin Soldiers start mobilizing, moving through a side passage behind where the buzzsaws were to come at Will. And while that happens, the drone suddenly starts broadcasting loudspeakers.

The voice is familiar, immediately. It's August, though with an odd filter - the filter of a Shadow, for those who have met one before, the filter to their voices that make them sound like a broken record. He sounds excited, absolutely joyful. "Will, buddy, pal, what nice vandalism you did there! If you're here, that means you're not alone, so please hold still and say who else is here before I gut you like a fish. Or, well..." And then there's a shift of the mood. Melancholic, the hint of tears dropping in the background. "I guess you probably won't, because I'm such a terrible friend. Oh, this is all horrible, why do you betray me like this? Why can't you just curl up and die for me?"

And then it starts screaming. Anger, furious anger, as the Shadow shifts emotions rapidly. "I'LL HAVE TO TEAR YOU APART FOR YOUR FUCKUP, WILL! TIN SOLDIERS! BLAST HIM AWAY!" The Tin Soldiers focusing on Will take a single second to acknowledge their orders, and then he probably has gunfire on him, if no one's moved to assist him while this has been happening. On the other side, the Rage Volcano, a giant factory-volcano of lava, machinery, and obsidian, is being worked on various Tin Soldiers, though the source of the roaring is nowhere to be seen. There's a big electronic billboard over the 'POWER VALVE', which is back to Maximum, and it says 'ARCHTIGER MK.II - FUNCTIONAL', 'ARCHTIGER MK.III - IN CONSTRUCTION'

The machines in the volcano are moving and making noise, as Tin Soldiers hammer away at volcanic vents to power it up, moving at insane speeds. Another spotlight drone flies over the area, trying to scan to see if anyone is inside the Ragecano. And all around, something feels off...as if something else is here.
William Pauwel Uh.

Hm.

That's... That's a bit too much boom. "Judgment," Will says to his gun as everything starts exploding all around him. "Why is there so much boom?"

We are in what was described previously as a 'cognitive realm' at the moment. Perhaps this weapon is recalling its original form due to my presence. If this continues, we may be able to harness a simulacrum of CODE--

A gaggle of tin men turn their weapons on him. The Solano beeps, flashes white, then brilliant red.

Explaination protocols interrupted, hostiles detected. Cryptic Speech levels within acceptable tolerances

"Wait, why do you even have--" A gunshot rings out. Will yelps and ducks as it screams through the space his head used to be. He cusses as SHADOW AUGUST shines a heavy spotlight right down on top of Will and...

Opens... his heart...?

Will somehow manages to stare even as the gunfire continues to rain down. It helps that he's ducked behind one of those ruined sawblades. "Why," Will drawls, "August, come on. Y'all ain't a terrible friend! Y'all just have some kind of weird brain cancer. But don't worry, I'm a doctor!"

Beat.

"I'm not really," he says as the Solano's form shifts and transforms, turning into...

...That.

BGM CHANGE: www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFe2ICAWdHE

That is a heavy machinegun.

"But this is one symptom I know how to treat! Y'all fools messed with the wrong cowboy! This is somethin' I learned from old gramma Pauwel!" Will doesn't even bother taking aim. He braces against both of his weapon's handles and... pulls the trigger.

Suddenly, there's fire /everywhere./

ALL OVER THOSE TIN SOLDIERS, FOR EXAMPLE.
Ran Itoh     Get ready to go fast?

    Yeah, Ran can do that.

    Apricot gets into position, Will carries his gun over to the buzzsaws, Flamel continues to be invisible and SUPER MYSTERIOUS, and Ran... Ran just takes one of her knives out of her belt, switching to a reverse grip as she waits for the shot.

    One. Two. Three.

    She physically winces to hear the abrupt shifts of emotion coming from the loudspeakers. Just what happens if they beat the Chief Engineer? What if August starts experiencing moodswings like that? What can they do then?

    Ran grits her teeth and looks up. A smaller knife is drawn from a band on her thigh (she needs it to be there, so it's there). Ran narrows her eyes at the drone, measures two steps forward, and /throws/ it dead-on at the little robot. "I hate listening to that guy," she mumbles, and calls out, "TSUKI-NO-USAGI!" While Will blasts the Tin Soldiers with chaingun bullets, the Rabbit floats overhead, directing pencil-thin lasers of scorching moonlight down on them.

    You know. Just in case.
Flamel Parsons     Whatever an Archtiger is, Parsons has no time to deal with the /shenanigans/ involved here!! He slips through as fast as he can go, trying to avoid the attention that William has drawn. He has to focus, specifically, on what seems to be making the volcano active, or inactive. His plan is actually rather quickly composed, and it's the best he can come up with under the circumstances.

    Do as an adventuerer does. Hit the first interactable point he can -- that is, rush the valve with the intent to invisibly flip it down to a lower level as hard and as fast as possible -- but his broader plan is more engaged with permanent solutions; he stops only long enough to try to run a fast CLAIRVOYANCE scan on the lava! By tracing its psychometric history, he hopes to be able to get a rough bearing on its origin, and in turn, on the central, important segments of the volcano, somewhere he can dive DEEP into the source and, through elaborate platforming, try to manipulate the machinery therein in a less terribly damaging way.

    He might not evade that spotlight drone in time; the dedicated scanning purpose is enough to pierce his invisibility, and avoiding it, preventing the sweeping gaze from chasing him down, is likely as anything to force him into such reckless motions of stealth that he's liable to injure himself from the strain of trying to keep out of its sight. But hopefully, he can do all this amid that, and tear off towards the inner areas to locate and fix up that source.
Kyoko Takada     Now there are two major distractions. That's fine, becuase if Shadow August is here, then the first distraction probably wasn't enough to keep him away, in the first place. Apricot does not break cover until she's identified a route that will take her into the facility while attracting minimal attention, particularly from eyes in the sky. So long as the soldiers aren't ordered after her, she reasons, she won't become a priority target. It's not like the silent things shout warnings. Unless they can shout silently. That's a worry.
    There's no avoiding some risk, but a sniper worth anything knows how to move without attracting attention in a battlefield. If she does run into anything and can't get ouf of its field of view fast enough, her SMG is in hand, AMR slung back away, and while not nearly as accurate, it packs a hell of a kick in short bursts.
    Once inside, A-39 leaves the valve and billboard to Parson and makes for the hypothetical source, as Will mentioned. Maybe something along the line can be rerouted. Maybe something can be changed around so it doesn't /look/ broken, but can't be turned on just by spinning all the wheels back in place. Remove some pipes, and put them back in place in a loop, or releasing elsewhere? If not, they'll have to do things the hard way, and she only carries so many explosives. She's an all-range fighter, not a sapper.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa voice echos on the wind to Ran.

"We'll find a way for you to do it!"

With that Kotone is slinking off but she does agree with Ran on everyone has things they keep repressed and would be ashamed for others to see or know about. With that she heads off to help August and to not speak outside of this mental world on what she sees with in. Given the nature of things in here? Kotone is a bit less restrained than she normally is as she will do lethal take downs if needed. She's going to find the production machinery and plant some grenades in the works. With Flamel's help this should have a hope in hell of happening.

While the others are making a mess? She is going to find whatever is producing the tin soldiers and start planing plasma grenades or that was the plan. The screaming of this aspect of August? Is chilling it's almost more chilling than the whole incident with August and the Iris. She keeps going trying to get for the vents those might move to ... cause issues if they happened to get exploded, right?
August Kohler "Oh, but I'm an awful friend. I'm a burden to everyone around me..." Shadow August moves back to Sadness, as Will prepares the Solano and turns it into a heavy machinegun, and then starts obliterating Tin Soldiers before they can all rip him apart. Bullets whizz in both directions, mostly in that of the Tin Soldiers, as Shadow August's voice becomes cheerful. "So I'll stop being a burden! I've found the perfect solution!"

"I'll kill /everyone/, and then there's no one to burden! Problem soooolved!~"

The Tin Soldiers start bringing in more backup through the alleyway, and Will's sawblade is almost entirely torn to bits. But then...moonlight lasers tear through the rest, incinerating the squadron menacing Will. "OH, FUCK YOU, ITOH. FLYING IS A DICK MOVE!" Shadow August shouts from over the drone, as it moves inside. "I GUESS THERE'S ONLY ONE SOLUTION HERE! Archtiger Mk.II, WAKE UP!"

Several people, at this time, are moving through the Volcano's surrounding facility. Kotone's running to set up grenades in the big machine that is mass-producing extra Tin Soldiers. A-39 is searching for the valve's source, and finds a pipeline that seems to be leading outside the facility. This must be it. And Flamel is running to enter the volcano. At this time, suddenly, there's a loud roar in the center of the area, between all of them. How is that possible?

Because Archtigers can turn invisible, obviously. A cloaking field ripples, and suddenly, a massive mechanized tiger is revealed. It's about seven meters tall, and is black and gray, with vents of scorching red lava pumping through glass panels on its side. It has massive jaws, and long, scythe-like claws, five per foot for twenty. It has a pair of gyrorotor wings, affixed like a VTOL, as it begins to hover into the air mechanically. And then, the front ten claws fire out, moving to target those in the area - A-39, Will, Ran, and Kotone if she reveals herself. One scythe blade moves for Flamel, but he manages to get straight into the volcano, through a maintenance door on the side, before it can cut him in half. Another impales a Tin Soldier in the chest, and then the claw grapples back, throws the Tin Soldier upwards, and into the Archtiger's mouth, the crunching of steel grisly and audible.

The Archtiger Mk.II roars even louder, as it flies around the battlefield. "Isn't...isn't it the best? It's all thanks to you, Will! The first one was an UTTER FAILURE, was nothing but a GIANT TIGER, but this one hits all the specifications!"

"Kill them." Shadow August says one last time through the drone. BOSS BATTLE: ARCHTIGER MK.II
August Kohler Flamel's trace finds a maintenance door hidden underneath a lava waterfall, and he's able to get through because no one locks volcano doors. Inside is a vast mess of machinery, and tracing the pipes with clairvoyance and some study should allow Flamel to figure out what connects to the valve quickly - allowing him to start working on it. But, there'll be a small problem.

Flamel will feel a tug. A psychic tug, onto the connection to the psycho-portal and into the real world, one that is still rough, but is trying to /learn/. One that is trying to study how Flamel's connection to August's mind works so that it can pull through. It's the same feeling from last time, and it has the same feel to it. But it's absolutely close-range, which means...

The Chief Engineer is inside the volcano, right now. And it's trying to use Flamel's distraction and the Archtiger to break out.
William Pauwel Well.

Archtiger, huh.

Will stares agog as the giant rocket claw scythes through the air. "That's--" He gapes as the claw inches forward. "That's...!"

Will's eye twitches.

Suddenly the rocket claw meets with a single silvery slug of pure kinetic energy.

"August, y' moron! That ain't an Archtiger at all!" Will huffs as he darts behind another sawblade. "Swear t' me ma, that's just... It's COOL and all, being a robot, but still. STILL!"

Will mutters to himself as he inches through the battlefield, taking the occasional moment to peg away at a nearby Tin Soldier. He's going... Going to...

...A high place.

Where an Archtiger might be able to find him.

Or rather, where he can totally see that Archtiger.

In his right hand, there's not a machine-gun, but a pistol. It's rippling with coruscating electricity. In his other hand, there's a grappling hook.

"I really," Will says, taking aim with his grapnel, "REALLY wanna see how that thing works though. Zephyr, fire!"

And so Will... goes to try to grappling hook up onto an Archtiger's back.

He's not so fool as to not take precautions, though. He's firing bolts of electromagnetic fury up into the thing as he goes. It might just be enough to stun it. Or, you know, he might get himself eaten.

One way or another, though, he...

...Well, he really wants a pet archtiger, and a mental robot archtiger is about as close enough as he'll ever get, even if it's living in someone else's mind. He can always give it to Panzercat if he can fix it up and reprogram it and maybe put some awesome guns on it and--

Maybe getting ahead of himself a little here. Hm.
Ran Itoh     "BEING A PSYCHO JERKFACE IS A DICK MOVE!" Ran shouts in return, and immediately feels like an idiot.

    There's a roar from between all of them. Ran starts in place, the Rabbit flickering and disappearing above her. "What--?!"

    Oh, god. "ARCHTIGER!" she yells needlessly, because it's not easy to miss a giant lava-powered mech tiger with rotor blades in the middle of an open area. The blonde nurse bites back a curse as she narrowly avoids being impaled by a scythe-like claw, twisting out of the way with only a hair's breadth to spare. This is /super/ not how she wants to die! She doesn't want to die at all, technically!!

    "TSUKIIIIiiiiEEEEE!" Her call for the Rabbit turns into a screech as another blade comes for her. With her dagger in a reverse grip she thrusts her arm forward, the scythe blade ringing off the edge of her knife. The impact strikes sparks and jars her arm all the way up to the shoulder, but she manages to deflect the attack. "Ugh... Will, what the hell are you doing?!"

    And worse... where's the Chief Engineer? Ran kicks off of the ground, long legs eating the ground as she circles wide around the giant tigerbot. If Will's on top of it, that makes its effective hitbox... well, waaaaaay smaller. Ran can't afford to make a mistake...!

    "PERSONA!" Tsuki-no-Usagi pops up from behind the Archtiger, aiming its alien mallet for one of the rotor blades.
Flamel Parsons     Oh god Parsons should have been having more of his Clairvoyance on. He completely missed that terrifying machine monster suddenly appearing, and he can barely slip inside, suffering a deep yet glancing strike as he gets through the door in time to evade being bisected, but not evade the damage that dispells his invisibility. He tumbles off of his feet, hand clasped against a spreading nerve-pattern web of shining psychic damage that has bled brutally through his personal psionic barrier. "Hhhhh..." He breathes heavily, sucking up the pain as hard as he can. He takes a few stumbling steps further in, calling back, "I have to try to hit the root of this, do what you can! Sorry!"

    Enough stumbling. He levitates, albeit a bit wobbily, and pushes forward as quick as he can, and getting to work. Amid his work, he makes sure to make as much permanent effect as he can; that is to say, does his best to remove buildups of pressure, to redistribute potential energy into lower energy states, and to generally force the volcano's danger to subside as hard as he can. But amid all that... He keeps one hand in a sort of "fingergun" gesture. And the other with two fingers planted on his temples, working the valves and the levers telekinetically.

    The Chief Engineer is here. Somewhere. Parsons needs to be on guard. He can't let the Chief Engineer learn any more or study any closer. He's trying to ready himself to detect him. Running clairvoyance passively, he hopes to be on alert the moment he might ominously attempt something tricky to pull more data... And if he can detect it, to fire barrages of high-caliber psionic bolts. Classic spywork here, paranoidly point his "handgun" around as he engages in classic sabotage... Which is coincidentally a form of healing.
Kyoko Takada     Rocket claws. Flying, mechanical tigers. This doesn't seem really all that tiger-like, at all. A-39 can understand some of Will's protest, she thinks. She doesn't think about it very much, since she's swinging her SMG up and firing, deflecting one of the claws coming for her just enough that her quick step, foot placed against the wall and kicked off, carries out of its path. If there was just one claw, that would be the end of that, but ten claws and only a few infiltrators means it's not going down so easily.
    The worst of it, she avoids, but the slice across her leg is deep enough to cripple her, regardles, the bone only missed thanks to her armor's deflection. She goes down, and hisses as her hands scramble in pouches for painkillers and bandages. She keeps the really good stuff for situations like these. Plus, she's not sure if any of this is real, so she probablly won't be using it up. Maybe? She's not sure.
    She's not getting anywhere quickly at this rate, and doesn't have the strength to figure out how all these valves work. The best she can do is pull out every (explosive) grenade she's carrying, and toss them in a bundle where they'll wedge behind something reasonably important.
Kotone Yamakawa So the attack foes on, she's however looking to sabotage things while people like Will and Panzer get the enemy's attention. Even as part of August is yelling about killing everyone she tries to push it out of her mind as she keeps going. She moves to set up grenades in various locations. She will set a delay on them going off, she doesn't want to get caught near them when they go off. Then comes the big horrible thing. She's not even sure what to call the mechanized tiger. Its pretty damn scary, she doesn't make herself known not yet.

While she can up front fight? She's planning to let others get it's attention so she can do some more serious damage to it with a more explosive entrance. She will ready the last of her grenades, wait this is the mind. Does she even /have/ ammo limits here? Is this a place where the childish games of no I still have ammo in my ray gun, actually /work/. She's not going to try to bank her life on it but she will make her move as she, waits a beat longer then lets the grenades go at it, dropping her cloak. There's no point at this point keeping it up, right?

"So you want to kill us all? This is your solution to your problem to make yourself alone forever?!"
August Kohler As Will says that the Archtiger isn't really an Archtiger, the Chief Engineers shouts back, "I'VE NEVER SEEN ONE! I HAD TO IMPROVE ON THE DESIGN! I THINK YOU'LL AGREE IT'S MUCH SUPERIOR THAN WHATEVER THE TELLURIAN ONE IS LIKE, THOUGH! And incredibly adept for murder!"

Speaking of murder, the Tin Soldiers still working have run the hell away because tthis thing already ate one. As Ran deflects the knife blade, A-39 is throwing explosives everywhere, and they go off - causing a chain reaction throughout the valves as they start to vent off steam all around the volcano. Luckily, it does not destroy the Ragecano, but it will make getting it working again pretty difficult without some sort of mental engineer (or actual engineer, really).

And as the others fight it, with Kotone's explosives causing it to briefly heel, Will decides to do the insane thing and try and /tame it/. Stun bolts impact into it, causing it to roar again, as the gunslinger grapples onto the Archtiger Mk.II's back. He'll find that he's in luck: there's a cockpit, apparently. However, it seems locked up tight, and he'll have to work to force it open one way or another if he wants inside. And while he's doing that, it lifts back up, attempts to hover up, and gets hit in the gyrorotor by a rabbit's hammer. The Archtiger goes spinning, and spinning...and starts /breathing fire/, fire spraying at Kotone, Ran, and A-39. "Your archtigers don't even breath fire...I feel bad for them."
Kyoko Takada     Nope, nope, nope, not dealing with that. A-39 still isn't walking properly, and already threw everything useful she had to throw. Almost everything. One more grenade is tossed, the fuse short, and it bursts in the air, covering her area of the grounds with a thick, non-flammable smoke, as the wounded soldier uses her longer rifle as a crutch and finds cover. She sits back down, wincing at every movement despite the drugs, and gets to properly ripping up her clothes with a knife and bandaging the wound. As far as she knows, people die when they bleed out. She's not going to bet on the world telling her, "actually, you'd be okay." And she's not capable of thinking "people don't die when they bleed out" and believing it.
    Everyone else is on their own for this part, because she is not a hero.
August Kohler Flamel's volcano reworking is doing pretty well - the maximum, which reads as 'he could have mass-produced dozens of these in a month', is being lowered and weakened. It helps that the Chief Engineer is still shouting at them over the drone, because Flamel can pin down his location right as he moves to try and /yank/ Flamel's connection instead of just grasp it. He fails when several psychic bolts fly at his face, revealing him in the shadows. He's in that same cross between an engineer's and a military dictator's outfit, and as he emerges, part of his face is gone - revealing veins being pumped by machines inside. "You say you barely know me, so how do you know that I'm the bad guy here? Maybe you should just let me out, maybe I can help /us/?~ The other one, he'd do better under me if he'd just give in. Come on!" Shadow August tries to discuss Flamel with debate to take one last pull at the mental threads...

Before starting to move towards the exit, strafing. "You don't know us. You'll NEVER KNOW US. Because you'll be DEAD! Do you know that I know secrets about you even you don't? Your boss told me where to look. The bald old man who looks like Albert Einstein, a bit, if you don't believe me. JUST HOW MUCH DO YOU THINK WE'RE HIDING HERE? HOW MUCH WE DON'T REVEAL? Because nobody knows who I am!" The Chief Engineer just glares at Flamel with those golden eyes, letting that sink in before escaping.
William Pauwel OH MY STARS IT HAS A COCKPIT.

The look on Will's face is one of sheer elation, and lasts for approximately half a second before a rabbit hammers into one of the Archtiger's rotors and sends it into a terrifying death spiral. The Chaser hangs on for dear life as he's spun around, slammed into a brick wall or two and has to deal with the fact that the thing he's riding on is currently SPEWING FIRE.

But that's all unimportant now.

MERE PHYSICAL INJURY IS UNIMPORTANT.

He has a cockpit to open, and he only has one tool that'll do the job. Will grins through the blood and the pain as the Solano's light burns bright white once more. He takes aim at the bits that look like important locking mechanisms for the cockpit and begins firing to try and open it up.

Once it IS open... Well, maybe Ran or someone will help him get whoever's piloting it OUT so he can get IN.
Ran Itoh     It's one thing to steal a giant tiger robot. It's another thing to blast the cockpit open while a psychic bunnygirl is hammering at the tiger's rotors in hopes of bringing it down.

    Fortunately Will seems to be made of sterner stuff. Ran gets the feeling that no matter what she says or does, Will isn't going to be happy until he's driving that thing... can he even take it home?! Ugh...

    With Will actually climbing into the darn thing she doesn't need to keep attacking it - Ran lets the Rabbit fade and casts around for Kotone and Apricot.

    "Hey... everybody okay?!"
Flamel Parsons     Parsons' assault doesn't stop. It's a psychohazard! He charges his attack for every second August's Shadow remains in his sight, ready to cut loose with that ever-building deadly glow. His first retorts are dramatically confident, still full of that chipper optimism. Oh boy! He's finally getting to have a standoff with a mastermind psychohazard! This is /so cool/! "I know what my job is! I'm a Psychonaut, and we may be a vague yet menacing government agency, but we're the heroes that stop terror and insanity like you from hurting the world!" He says, getting into it for a moment.

    And then the Chief Engineer says something that shocks Parsons into immobility. The charge disperses with a fizzling pop. "C... Cruller...?" He whispers. His hand wobbles, shakily. His entire mind is in revolt against him with only a few words: "I know secrets about you." His heart pumps urgently and his breath shortens, and every physiological aspect of his body rebels against the astral projection in a way that threatens to dangerously -- and informatively -- destabilize it. "What..." He clasps both hands together into his "handgun", trying to keep his ability to fire stable. "What d... What do you know? Tell me. Tell me, tell me." His sunglasses are only barely hiding the look of /starving hunger/.

    He's well and truly disabled by this. If the Chief Engineer plans to try something, now's his chance to get a free success in. But Parsons' destabilized link may last only just about as long as it takes the rest of the gang to get control of the Archtiger. And presumably bring it back to Panzerkatze for later use, if Will can manage that, of course.
Kotone Yamakawa It has a cockpit, the machine has a cockpit,it has a cockpit?! She knows where this is going, she does manage to do some damage to at least bring it to heel for a moment with her explosives she now has a pair of machine guns out? Two? One she's a cyborg, two this is not the material world, she opens up like some old 1980s action hero but she's only firing in burst she does hear the Archtiger call out.

"Why would I want to breath fire?! I'm not an Archtiger! I'm not a thing I AM A PERSON!"

A Button just got jabbed, maybe not hard but it has been jabbed. She keeps moving but it looks like fire is going to catch Kotone as she's forced to leap away, yet she's not quite fast enough to avoid that much fire that fast. She comes out burned, looking melted in places as the heat is doing a good job of robbing her of the illusion of her body being flesh and blood for the most part. "Ran, I could ... use some help."

She's still moving but ya she could certainly needed. Regardless of any healing the sent of burnt metal and plastic would linger in the air here for a bit.
August Kohler Will manages to get into the cockpit of the Archtiger Mk.II. The first thing he'd notice is that it's empty - this seems to be a manual drive either for override or in case someone wanted to be a mecha pilot. An educated guess based off August would make the second more likely. Figuring out the controls isn't hard, because they're all helpfully labelled - there's a switch to take it from Autopilot to Manual, and a cable to cut to stop Wireless Control, which is obviously what the Chief Engineer is doing. Once this is done, Will is in full control of the Archtiger Mk.II and its many weapons.

There are no reinforcements on the group. The Chief Engineer doesn't call for them. Instead he stops at the door as Flamel takes the bait, swivels on his feet, and smiles. "Well! It'd be too easy to just tell you...but the other side of me knows, and he also really wants to know what's going on in here. He's really going to wonder what's going on if he hears about the robot tigers, and why this hasn't been fixed yet, you know? Maybe he'll just trade the information if you ask nicely. Continue to be a happy /camper/, Parsons." Another word from the conversation thrown in, something to make it clear that in retrospect, the Shadow isn't hiding anything. As the Chief Engineer speaks, though, he's taking that time to grasp the connection. He's not using it. He's learning it. How it works. How to pull on it. How to leave the mind. He knows almost enough, but isn't ready to try and fire on it just yet, nor does he have the time. He instead bolts through the door, and expecting a pursuit, sets a trail of fire behind him (it's a volcano, it'll be fine). "Thanks for everything..."

Eventually, after the group's healed up, Panzercat will return with dented armor and move to help the group back to the Museum of Memories. He will stare at the Archtiger Mk.II for several minutes first, and then try and figure out where they'll hide it, but be absolutely thrilled about it. They've made progress. In several ways.