2017-04-30 - We Are Pretty Cure 3

Title: We Are Pretty Cure 3
Summary: The final confrontation between Pretty Cure, Pisard, and Gekidrago; grief, and celebration of new beginnings. Continued from 2017-04-23 - We Are Pretty Cure 2.
Who: Nagisa Misumi, Honoka Yukishiro, Mai Mishou, Saki Hyuuga, Setsuna Higashi, Inori Yamabuki, Flappy, Choppy, Wisdom
Where: Verone Aquarium
OOC - IC Date: 04-30-2017 - 01-16-2015

<Pose Tracker> Pisard [None] has posed.

Shaking water droplets out of his mane of white hair, he hears Cure White speaking his way. Her perspective is one that Pisard cannot fathom. Cannot begin to understand. He cannot admit loss, despite failing to deal with this pair so many times, if he does- then he invites death. He's too proud to admit his weakness, to allow for it's possibility. Even if his fear makes that a lie "What foolishness. In life there are only two outcomes! You win or you lose! In admitting failure- you've sealed your fate!"

You can't get up and try again in his world.

Black though shouts at him, and he sneers at her, "I'll enjoy proving you wrong. Which one of you two will be the first to go I wonder? Will it be her or you?" And once they're gone, there will be no Black Thunder, White Thunder to threaten his world ever again.

Which is why he's surprised when all the Precure leap out of the cloud towards Gekidrago, in one perfect shining rainbow of coordination, "Nani?!" The force blows back his hair, his cape- he stands there struck speechless, his chiseled jaw making inarticulate noises for a few moments.

Fear surges deep and cold into his heart as he watches six Pretty Cure erase Gekidrago from existence, send him back to the Dark King as a pale shadow, leaving him behind. He may not have respected the brute, but he knew his sheer strength well. Pisard takes one step back. Then another. Then another. His pride wounded severely. He cannot fathom that Cure White could mourn such a creature, misinterprets it as pity for the animals caught up in the blown. But even then the confidence that she even has the time takes him aback.

Desperation seizes him once more, gives him the courage that he would not be able to ordinarily muster. "Now there's noone left to get in my way." He's proud, but he can smother it behind his will to survive- to stop those girls from delivering another beating. All of the girls may get a sense of foreboding. A dark aura in the air as he puts a palm in front of his face. And then slowly he brings it away, like a Gorgon lifting her veil.

He's serpentine eyes gleam with dark power that ripples over the room, one of the gifts granted to him by the Dark King. He could turn entire crowds to stone instantly. For magical girls who have defense against the dark powers, his petrification would be more gradual. Bloom, Egret, Pine and Passion if seized by this. They might start to feel their limbs grow heavier. Their skin start to grey, and flake just a touch. Soon it would be hard to move, but they still have plenty of time to act.

The only two spared are his most hated of foes. "It won't be long now." He says maliciously to the pair as he steps forward towards them, cape shifting gently in the breeze, "Before the dark power claims new victims. Can you prove it to me Cure White? That you can get up again?"

His movement is instant, in an unhinged rush- he's on top of her, in a criss-cross of nail slashes across her center mass, before he's right in Cure Black's face, trying to ram a one inch punch into her bared mid-riff, "What about you Cure Black? Do you possess that kind of strength?" And then he shifts backwards in a dark blur- onto a higher point, readying himself, "There will be no more chances for any of you!"

If Pisard is a master of one thing, it's projecting his insecurities onto others.

<Pose Tracker> Nori Ankou [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

Nori pets her otter to clear out her pose.

<Pose Tracker> Cure Black [Juuban Public School (10)] has posed.

A touch to the shoulder can mean many things. Black had touched Bloom's out of affection, cameraderie, and challenge. When she touches White's, now, it is out of shared mourning. She never found out exactly what had occurred at the science exhibit, but she had seen the empathy Honoka had for Gekidrago afterwards, and heard the gentleness in her voice when speaking to the largest and most brutish of their enemies. It went without saying that she had always trusted Honoka's estimation of Gekidrago, and adjusted hers accordingly. But she does not know, as Honoka knew, exactly what sort of man was departing into the dark. All she can do is be with her.

They're silent for a moment, as Cure White holds the Prism Stone.

"C'mon," Black says, with a sad smile. She takes White's hand and helps her up with a whisper. "Everybody's waiting for us."

Battle rejoins with a fury. As Pisard lunges, Black jukes back hard for distance, simultaneously leaning forward into a hard punch, directly at Pisard's fist. "HaaaYAH!" she barks, as her knuckles collide directly, locking their fists together between trembling arms and straining biceps. Pisard may be bigger, but Black is determined to be stronger.

"Gekidrago didn't get in your way! He was your teammate! If you worked together, who knows how much you could do?" Black's whole arm stings and sizzles from the shock of the blow, but she keeps struggling. "People like you... wouldn't last a minute in lacrosse!" Shoving away, she gains distance from Pisard.

She cannot tell what is happening to her friends, old and new, as Pisard spreads his Dark Zone-granted corruption across the rooftop. She wishes to run to them, particularly Bloom and Egret, for whom she feels responsibility as well as affection. But in fight after fight as partners, Cures Black and White have taught each other trust. Sometimes friends need you to help them up. But more often, they need you to stand beside them.

Cure Black lands next to Cure White. Their palms are together before either quite knows it, and Black looks into White's eyes, her own large amber gaze vulnerable. The corner of her lip tugs a little. She makes a soft sound of wordless assent.

"BLACK THUNDER!"

Cure Black's palm reaches for the heavens, and her feelings rip open a bridge between her and Creation. Through it streams Light, crackling and endless, the ambient energy raising hairs and simmering in the air itself.

COMBAT: Cure Black has started a combo targeting Pisard!

<Pose Tracker> Cure Egret [Infinity Institute (8)] has posed.

"Cure White...!" Egret calls, having fallen to her knees for a moment. She takes a shaky breath, and then she feels her limbs grow heavier -- and sees the way her skin has turned grey, along her arms. She realizes what is happening, then. She looks up, then, sharply. Her violet eyes narrow, as she looks at Pisard, and then at the older Cure, so like her.

"You can do this!" she cries out. Then, with a shuddering breath, she stands up. It hurts -- her body protests in pain, and her limbs are much too slow. Her eyes meet Bloom's for a moment; there is a small, almost imperceptible nod. And then, Egret leaps and flies in towards Pisard. She drops down, foot crashing for his shoulder, before she shoots to his side. A trails of silver sparks is left.

It might be disorienting -- and that is the plan. Egret knows she doesn't have the force in her to stop Pisard. She can, at least, try to slow him down. "We have things to keep living for! We have too many dreams, too many things left unsaid and undone... to let someone like you take them away from us!"

Which is when she finishes by driving a foot at the back of Pisard's knee -- and then she slams into the ground, far heavier than she should.

COMBAT: Cure Egret has used White Wing Flurry on Pisard.

<Pose Tracker> Cure White [Juuban Public School (10)] has posed.

Cure White can't ignore Cure Egret's heartfelt attempts to comfort and encourage her, much less her bold counterattack, and looks up. There's a vast bleakness in her eyes, but she tries to shield her younger counterpart from it with a soft smile, and if it's a sad one, well, it's a genuine one, too.

"You're right, Egret. But... I wish..."

Black's hand is on her shoulder now, and she leans in, instinctively and affectionately. Her cheek rests against her partner's arm for a long moment, transferring a cool trail of tears from skin to skin.

"I wish we could have done better," she concludes.

Black can feel her eyelashes close the curtains on the windows of her soul, and then reopen again when her hand is taken, when she's helped both to her feet, and from her precipice of pain. The second time, her blue gaze is--

--interrupted, mostly.

Pisard tears a cross slash across White's chest, sending her flying backwards, and a pretty little Honoka-shaped spiderweb of cracks open up on the concrete pillar she's landed against. But Black has already rejoined her, and her hand unclenches from a furious fist -- a fist curled in defiant rejection of the torture their oldest enemy is enacting through their allies and friends.

There's a shimmering blue heart embedded in her palm, as though the one on the back of her hand has bled through. It detaches slowly, and she tucks it away in the little fairy bag at her waist.

Now there's a little pink heart imprinted on her palm instead.

She looks down at it, then over at Black, and there's vulnerability in her expression, too. It takes several long seconds for her grief to transform itself, like an ancient warrior girding itself slowly but methodically in plate mail, into deadly resolve.

Gekidrago deserved better. And Pisard does too. But...

All around them, his curse infects the other Pretty Cure.

"'Nevaa give uppu!'" she shouts at them, in warm but fierce reprise of Cure Bloom. "We can beat this together -- he has no power over our united hearts!"

And then she's ready.

"WHITE THUNDER!" Cure White completes the channel, and with that a rainbow sheen begins to slide across both of their bodies, as though the energies they share between them is drawing them elsewhere, and their determination is holding them fast within. Power roars through them with unbridled ferocity, as they become one human conduit, to heaven and to one another. Without one another it would be easy to slip away in this current, to be lost between all colors and none.

BGM Swap: Dual Aurora Wave https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3E5UWmTme58

The power of Creation casts strange shadows as it blasts downwards from beyond and rises upwards through their hearts, meeting at their outstretched palms. It makes everything feel more vivid, heightening not brightness but essence. The Pretty Cure all around them can see one another for who and what they truly are, and at the heart of this maelstrom of nascent potential, Black is brave; White is brilliant; and Pisard, across from them, is not just dark but darkened, rage, fury, and fear twisting his kabuki beauty into an awfulness that is all the more terrifying for its intensity.

Together Pretty Cure lift their free palms towards him in perfect unity.

Black does not squeeze, and have White squeeze back. They squeeze together, cloth creaking and fingers gripping, bracing palm-to-palm as their teeth bare and their boots grip the earth in preparation for the violence they are about to unchain.

COMBAT: Cure White has joined the combo started by Cure Black!
COMBAT: COMBO! Cure Black and Cure White have used Black Thunder!! White Thunder!! on Pisard.
COMBAT: Pisard narrowly counters Cure Egret's White Wing Flurry, taking 12 Fatigue damage!  Critical Hit!  Pisard's Reverse
ability activates!  Pisard's Tactician ability activates!  Exhausted applied to Pisard!
COMBAT: Pisard's counterattack, Ziggy's Starfist, fails to get through, doing 0 Fatigue damage to Cure Egret!
COMBAT: Pisard narrowly dodges Cure Black and Cure White's Combo: Black Thunder!! White Thunder!!, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Cure
Black and Cure White are Psyched!  Pisard's Fade ability activates!  Pisard's Flash ability activates!  Bind Break! All of Cure
Black's debuffs are cleared!

<Pose Tracker> Cure Passion [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

You win, or you lose. It's a belief Setsuna knows well.

Gekidrago explodes, and Passion's eyes widen. She hits the ground again and stumbles forward. The feeling of being together with everyone was so right, the feeling of having the chance to be a part of something like that, and yet...

Passion keeps her feet, but finds herself looking, stricken, at what was their enemy and is now falling marine life and a beautiful, pulsing stone. There's the scream that seems to her to still be echoing, and it's not only him that she wonders about. She looks around to the others, to Pine, and then crosses her arms as she turns towards Cure White. She doesn't know of anything that she can say. Wishing she could do better... Passion still can't say anything; her gaze says what she otherwise might.

Maybe the animals will be all right. But is this what they're going to have to do to stop--

'Now there's noone left to get in my way.'

"That's horrible! He was your--" Cure Passion calls out more quickly than she stops to think. She stares at him for a moment, and she knows that that's exactly the attitude anyone in his position has to have, was the attitude she should have had, but nonetheless there's horror in her voice even before she feels the foreboding that starts to dominate her senses. An aura of darkness is in her vision, and then there's the gleam of his awful eyes--

She's caught flat-footed by the mystical effect, and her arms feel like rock at her sides, her legs like lead as the stands. She looks down, lifting her arm with effort, and sees the gray on her hand that has spread all through her body, the flakes where her cloth gauntlet's ruffle touches the center of her hand's back. "What--" 'It won't be long now.'

Her eyes widen even as she watches Pisard go after White and Black again, closing her fingers despite the roughness of doing so as they're already partly stone. Her hair is graying, too, as she looks to the others around her. It's desperate, it's dangerous, but...

She's not alone. She knows that, looking at everyone here. The fact that she can feel herself slowing down at least doesn't have that with it. She takes a difficult breath, and turns to look at Cure Pine, gray, and force her steps along even as she sees the power building before them. She needs something irst. To remember...

Those steps down, Passion reaches out to take Pine's hand. She was looking forward, but now she only looks at her friend and teammate, one of the most important people in her world.

"Pine..." Her voice rasps a bit; she can't deny that she's afraid. But she's happy in a way, too.

"I..."

But it's hard to voice it in the middle of battle like this. Or at all.

She calls up more loudly, to Pisard, "She can do it! They both can do it!"

COMBAT: Cure Passion has used The Crimson Heart on Cure Pine.

<Pose Tracker> Cure Pine [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

Gekidrago falls, and Pine's gaze is upon the animals as they start to fall back in the tanks, "Oh I hope they'll all be alright until we can get them back to their tanks." But, the emotions White feels, for her fallen foe. She feels a pang of something in her heart as she watches the other Pretty Cure speak about their fallen foe. Her mind flashes to the past- and while she can't understand the true depths of White's sorrow, she feels she can at least a little.

She's caught almost flat-footed by the pulse of Dark Power rippling across the aquarium, instinctively leaping into cover behind shattered debris. Even so, she feels a single leg get caught in it, grow heavier under the certain weight. Her eyes flash to it in the horror that it's changing grey as if some creeping doom were coming for her and the others.

But White's cry to never give up snaps her out of the paralyzing fear of the moment, while Black's brings Passionate red to mind again. Half-hobbling, half-skipping towards Cure Passion, she makes it to her side. Passion takes her hand the moment they come close enough, and she says her name. Pine replies almost instantly in a fervent whisper "I'm really scared you know." It's as if she's going to leave it at that, but a moment later she continues, "But I won't let anyone take you from us ever again."

Something passes between them in this moment, as she squeezes her hand firmly, fervently, "No matter what."

And then she faces forward. She doesn't have work herself up to believe in herself, because it's such a simple thing, when her hearts are united with so many other Pretty Cure. Nothing could be simpler, and to her there's a simple phrase that encompasses all of that, "All of us! Let's- Pretty Cure!"

On any other day that statement would refer to just the four of them, but White and Black, Bloom and Egret, Rhythm and Melody had all taught her that Pretty Cure was a team of a far grander scale than that. Today, it's all of them.

COMBAT: Cure Pine accepts Cure Passion's The Crimson Heart, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Critical Hit!  Accelerate and Empower
applied to Cure Pine!
COMBAT: Cure Pine has used The Yellow Heart on Cure Passion.
COMBAT: Cure Passion accepts Cure Pine's The Yellow Heart, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Cure Passion is Reinforced by Cure Pine!

<Pose Tracker> Cure Bloom [Infinity Institute (8)] has posed.

The eruption of Pretty Cure Power smashes Gekidrago to something more primal than atoms. Cure Bloom careens down, landing with loud claps form her shoes hitting pavement. She breathes, deep, recovering her power even as she watches that energy disperse. He's just...gone. Shattered. "Flappy..." "...I don't know-lapi," the little fairy admits. "He's gone back to the darkness, I think."

Cure Bloom grimaces, not the sort to rejoice in even an enemy's demise; but there's no time to process it all before Pisard regains his bluster. So Saki does what she can to throw herself between the wave of Dark magic and the fallen Cure Egret, arms up and hands shining, but even this is paltry compared to Pisard's monumental release. "I know this energy-lapi!!" Flappy squawks. "It's not the same but...it's like before...it's so much like the power that destroyed the Land of Fountains-lapi! It's like the Power of Destruction-lapi!"

And like the last time Flappy compared an enemy's assault to that primal malevolence, Cure Bloom feels it like it's scathing her bones, a horrid, annihilating power. It sinks into her. "You won't be able to resist this forever-lapi!" Flappy blares. Bloom already feels like her breathing is leaden. "We don't need forever," she rasps back, and forces one leg to move. She can hardly feel her feet.

'Nevaa give uppu!' White hollers, and Bloom can't quite make herself laugh. "I need...to go see Misumi-sempai's games!" she yells, suddenly. "I want to, I want to show them the Sky Tree, and have fun at Pan-Paka-Pan...!" She drags another foot forward, defiant of Pisard's demand for final silence. "We have so much to learn about each other! There's a lot more smiling to do tomorrow! That's why...we WILL NOT give up!!"

Her eyes rise up; watching Egret dash in, and then Bloom's moving in smooth tandem with her. Egret crashes against Pisard from a dozen directions, and Cure Bloom follows up from exactly one - bull rushing into his guard, and in a move he may find familiar from Black, just laying directly into him with wild, harsh swings, screaming; her fist exploding with floral magic every time it strikes home.

COMBAT: Cure Bloom has used Petal Crash on Pisard.
COMBAT: Pisard narrowly counters Cure Bloom's Petal Crash, taking 5 Fatigue damage!  Pisard's Reverse ability activates!  Pisard's
Tactician ability activates!
COMBAT: Pisard's counterattack, Ziggy's Starfist, partially gets through, doing 21 Fatigue damage to Cure Bloom!  Critical
Counterhit!

<Pose Tracker> Pisard [None] has posed.

Both Black and Passion mention he was his teammate with Gekidrago but the mere word is an anathema to him- "Silence!" He sweeps a hand across the gap as if he could cut them off with a blow from this distance, "What does your foolish lacrosse have to do with anything!? People who rely on the strength of others can do nothing in the face of overwhelming power except to submit to it!"

Egret comes at her, and he pivots in place, bringing up his leg simultaneously to crash up against her leg, and yet the flinch on his face is unmistakable, as it jars his knee nevertheless. "You have no time to even consider such things anymore. You no longer have a future."

Bloom is coming in at a bull rush, and the wild harsh swings of Bloom are ones he back steps from, taking one grazing hit after another, before Bloom cold cocks him and wipes the desperate grin off his face, "Except-" His hand whips up like a striking snake, as he makes one revolution to throw her backwards, towards Egret's position on the ground, "-as a monument to your failures, and theirs as well."

But then he hears the words which strike a desperate fear into his heart. Is it possible for the skin of the Kabuki warrior to become any paler? No moreso than when he sees them tear power from the heavens sees that pulse of the power of creation rippling through that pair like a prism, rippling into a spectrum and myriad of colors.

He'd like to say that he's ready.

But he has no more time.

He channels that fear into an anger so deep that it surprises him. "Unite all you want-" He channels that destructive force into his fists, as he blurs across the gap between that pair in some mad, desperate rush to deny his own fate. "-IT WON'T BE ENOUGH!"

If he reaches them before they can unleash their strength then he knows within his soul that it's over for that pair. If he doesn't...

COMBAT: FINISHER! Pisard has used Ashes to Ashes on Cure White.
COMBAT: FINISHER! Pisard has used Ashes to Ashes on Cure Black.
COMBAT: Cure White narrowly dodges Pisard's Finisher, Ashes to Ashes, taking 36 Fatigue damage!  Critical Hit!  Cure White's Fade
ability activates!  Cure White's Flash ability activates!
COMBAT: Cure Black narrowly braces Pisard's Finisher, Ashes to Ashes, taking 49 Fatigue damage!  Cure Black's Block ability
activates!  Cure Black's Parry ability activates!

<Pose Tracker> Cure Black [Juuban Public School (10)] has posed.
<SoundTracker> Passion! (Infinity) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybdAac8TOus

The rainbow energy builds across the bodies of Cure White and Black until they glow like twin filaments, crawling bolts cracking onto the ground from their resolute limbs. Cure White's head is draped back, hair floating behind her as though she were submerged in the haze of energies. Her arm raised, her elegant form dangling from the aeon force running through her palm, her sweet voice shouts to be heard above the crackle and rush. "Our beautiful souls...!"

Closing her trembling fist to stall the torrent, Cure Black draws her hand down to her side in perfect time with her partner. Black lightning twists across her bold chest. "...shall crush your evil heart!"

The Power of Creation is harder to contain this time than ever before, but neither girl falters. If the current runs faster it is because they now conduct it so smoothly. If their souls fill deeper it is because they have discovered more of themselves. They seek this power with the heartwrung longing of separation, they gather it with the greed of mutual passion, they endure it with the obstinacy of true love. Two voices rise in unison, two mouths filling with the same words.

"PRETTY CURE..."

Pisard races towards them with all the hateful power of his heart, but the two girls who are Pretty Cure have already backed down against the poisonous feelings of men like him for the last time. Today they do not move, they do not shift, and they will not so much as flinch. Cure Black and Cure White stand together, and together they will remain.

The spiralling cone of black and white light forming at the ends of their fatal hands spins faster and faster, short orange hair and long dark locks whipping alike as they squint together into its hurricane force.

"MARBLE SCREW...!"

COMBAT: FINISHER! Cure Black has started a combo targeting Pisard!

<Pose Tracker> Cure Passion [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

When Pine admits that she's afraid, Passion doesn't look away from her, trying still to come up with the right thing to say, her chilly gray hand in Pine's. She squeezes her fingers slightly, and starts to say that she's scared, too, but it's clear in her eyes even as Pine keeps talking herself.

Pine says they won't let anyone take her from them, and Passion stares for a moment, surprised and... "Pine..." Her hand is squeezed, and feels warmer. It's like the enervation of the magic isn't even there for a moment.

Sometimes she feels different still, but in this they're all together. Pine faces forward, and in the end Passion's answer for now is that she doesn't let go of her teammate's hand yet. 'Let's Pretty Cure!'

"Right!"

Bloom is yelling too, and rushing forward. That too is inspiring. She's seen of many things that motivate people here... That motivate her. Passion doesn't smile, but she stares at Pisard.

He attempts to silence her and Black both, and she shakes her head. "You're wrong," Passion answers. "You're completely wrong!"

But she sees that Pisard is talking to Bloom and Egret too, and more to the point, he rushes forward. Passion's eyes widen as she sees--

"Pine!" Passion calls in alarm and surety, squeezing her hand and letting go. "Let's go!" She stops herself looking at her teammate; they don't have to see one another for this. Besides, movement is hard under this power. In the meantime, she has to move quickly. So she does, clicking her heel for time and setting her feet together and raising her hands over her head in perfect synchronicity with Cure Pine.

Her voice calls out, clear and loud, together with the girl beside her.

"Nasty things, nasty things, fly away!"

Passion's hands fall to her sides and then shift up, across her chest to match her shoulders before she makes a heart with her hands, "Pretty Cure-"

A crimson heart of happiness forms, faint and growing vivid as the seconds move. "-Double-" At the last moment the heart brightens so brilliantly that it fades into formless red radiance in her hands, "-FRESHHHHH!"

Crashing forward, that light crashes towards Pisard, and on its way, is enwrapped in yellow until the two of them are one beam, beautiful light that moves to stop Pisard long enough.

COMBAT: FINISHER! Cure Passion has started a combo targeting Pisard!

<Pose Tracker> Cure Pine [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

There's a certain desperation in Pisard which rings familiar, but it's not something she can place right now. Not in a fight for her life, not when she's smothering fear only with the aid of all these other girls. She feels that creeping, numbing cold up her leg and knows mostly that all of them together have to stop him.

Normally she'd summon Kirun, the fey key. Sometimes you had to have the confidence to do things by yourself, but right now at Passion's side, alongside the other Pretty Cure she feels a certain joyful resonance with her and has confidence in the fact that they can stop him. "It will be! With all of us together- I believe!"

Bringing her hands up over her head, she claps, speaking clearly, as she synchs up with Passion like they're in the movements of a dance.

"Nasty things, nasty things, fly away!"

The hands jut downward one by one, before she brings them up high overhead again, then crosses them over her chest, before she makes a diamond with her fingertips, "Pretty Cure-"

A yellow diamond of faith forms, ephemeral at first, but with growing strength and radiance before her very eyes, "-Double-" The diamond vanishes but it's hardly gone, as it contracts into yellow radiance within her palms, "-FRESHHHHH!"

Lancing out, it's distinct from Passion's heart at first, but before long Happiness and Faith are one, creating a spectrum of vivid orange light that crashes into Pisard, and tries to intercept him- to slow him down before he can reach either White or Black.

COMBAT: FINISHER! Cure Pine has joined the combo started by Cure Passion!
COMBAT: COMBO! FINISHER! Cure Passion and Cure Pine have used Pretty Cure Double Fresh! on Pisard.

<Pose Tracker> Cure Egret [Infinity Institute (8)] has posed.

The kick is blocked and Cure Egret slams into the ground again. She hisses -- and feels how heavy her limbs are. How hard it is to stand, how it gets harder and harder. "This feeling is..."

"Egret-chopi..." Choppy cries, softly, from the commune at her side. "It's too terrible-chopi!"

Bloom's slams into the ground next to her, a pop of floral magic propelling her back upward like a stone off water before she lands, softening the impact from concrete-cracking to a mere rattling thud. When she pushes her hand against the ground to force herself up, it's a sound like stone against stone. And White and Black are preparing something massive - and so is Pisard.

Bloom cuts her eyes to Egret as she stands, reaching out to her partner even as Bloom stands half-upright, visibly tired. She holds out her hand to her partner, lips set. "We have to stop him!" she says. "Let's go!"

"Bloom!" Egret cries out, as she clutches her partner's hand. She squeezes, tighter than she needs to, and realizes how she can't feel the usual warmth in that hand. Something about that breaks Egret's heart, making tears bud in the corners of her eyes, but they refuse to fall. She sucks in a breath, and then stares at the sheer darkness swirling in Pisard's fists. She knows what they have to do.

She looks sideways at Bloom. She knows, too, that she isn't the only one.

The heavens and earth light up, as Bloom thrusts her hand forward -- "O, Spirits of the Earth..." -- and Egret holds hers aloft -- "O, Spirits of the Sky..." -- to unite into a sea of motes of silver and golden light, washing down across the two Splash Star Pretty Cures. Both close their eyes as they speak.

"Now, together with Pretty Cure..." "Release the power of miracles!"

They release their hands. Bloom draws the right half with her hand, fist moving through the motes of light. Egret draws the left, her hand outstretched. The result is a swirl of light that flickers into a heart shape, before they glow and gather in both girls' hands. Then, they bring them together, and the glow only intensifies.

"Pretty Cure..."

The light turns into two swirling, pulsing globes of holy waters, moving with the hint of a wave-like motion that reveals it as more than energy. Each sphere pulses, and grows a little larger still with each.

"Twin Stream..."

And then, the two shoot forward as a pair of beams of water, high-powered and high-pressure, and silver and gold swirl together and entwine. They rush in alongside the brilliant glow of Cure Pine's and Cure Passion's own joined strike -- and then strike for Pisard, before he can reach Black and White. Over the roar of water, two voices cry out as one:

"SPLASH!"

COMBAT: FINISHER! Cure Egret has started a combo targeting Pisard!
COMBAT: FINISHER! Cure Bloom has joined the combo started by Cure Egret!
COMBAT: COMBO! FINISHER! Cure Egret and Cure Bloom have used Pretty Cure Twin Stream Splash on Pisard.

<Pose Tracker> Cure White [Juuban Public School (10)] has posed.

And then it comes. It comes like a crashing wave after a long, tall cresting. It comes like the sweet, gasping inhalation of sweet air after having to hold your breath for over a minute. It comes like the explosion of scent that rolls through the city when the first petals of spring all blossom at once, banishing the dull smoggy winter to nothing but a gray memory.

It comes like the fulfillment of an ancient but vitally relevant promise.

Cure Black and Cure White have opened their palms and their hearts, and the Marble Screw surges forth, through their conduit and into the world, no longer mere rising potential but potent, actualized magnificence.

Their bodies are so tiny, and this power passing through them is so large. The Dark Zone may create foul things like Zakenna, like Pisard himself, but in rightful mirror the Garden of Light can destroy with the raw force of creation, and squeezing this unspeakable power through their souls makes it all the more pressurized when it jets out.

Pisard, due to his life choices, gets the unique opportunity to be directly in front of them in that first instant, before there was time for the energy to propagate, and he sees nothing of the girls themselves -- they are dwarfed by the black and white beams blasting out of their eponymous Pretty Cure.

And one doesn't have to be in such an impossible position to witness the way that the girls are forced to struggle against the wicked backblast -- it tears at their outfits and their hair, sure, but it also grinds their feet backwards against the concrete, raising a slender thread of dust, an inch at a time.

It's so bright that it brings into question if light has ever shone on this planet before, but the Pretty Cure don't squint into the Power of Light -- amber and blue are the only other colors in the world right now, a flash of each, of determination, of intent--

--and of raw, unfettered passion. They're not looking at each other, but they don't have to. To invoke the Marble Screw is to be willing to end a life -- but it's also an affirmation of what makes their own worth living. They are drowning in this power but they're doing it together, and they hang onto each other not just for dear life but for dearest life, the dearness of each other's, as they fight to remain whole and present as their souls burn like a candle at both ends.

That's why no one can ever see the black and white beams as separate entities. Physics would suggest that the force with which they blast would keep them going in a straight trajectory towards their target, but this is not so -- as inevitably as the massive ocean is drawn into tides by the interplay between Earth and Moon -- as inexorably as two pure hearts fall in love -- black and white intertwine, spiraling around one another until there is as much separation between them as there are between Black and White's fiercely gripped hands.

One might expect the combination of black and white to be gray, but this is more than the sum of its parts. It is all colors and none at the same time. It is unstoppable force and immovable object.

It is this unity of dichotomy that carves a trench in the ground as it roars towards Pisard. It does not meet him halfway. There is nothing 'half' about the Marble Screw. Instead it meets him all the way, because wherever they meet is where the way must end.

But when it impacts him -- a Pisard who has just somehow endured the collective will of four other girls who would slow him from his goal -- the backblast doubles abruptly, sending Black and White's eyebrows towards the sky. They deal with this differently; Black grits her teeth and bends her knees, while White juts her chin out stubbornly, then subtly shifts her angle, allowing the worst of the force to flow down her arm past her center of mass instead of directly into it.

By the friendship of their allies, Cure Black and Cure White have been given a few precious moments to force their attack into its rightful course again, and those moments are expiring quickly. It isn't easy for either of them -- they feel a heartbeat from losing control as the pain courses through them -- but although they handle the challenge in their own distinct way, there's one thing they do the same:

They hold each other's hand more tightly than ever.

COMBAT: FINISHER! Cure White has joined the combo started by Cure Black!
Huh?  (Type "help" for help.)

COMBAT: COMBO! FINISHER! Cure Black and Cure White have used Marble Screw on Pisard.
COMBAT: Pisard fails to brace Cure Passion and Cure Pine's Finisher, Combo: Pretty Cure Double Fresh!, taking 247 Fatigue damage!
Critical Hit!
COMBAT: Pisard fails to brace Cure Egret and Cure Bloom's Finisher, Combo: Pretty Cure Twin Stream Splash, taking 176 Fatigue
damage!  Pisard is unable to keep fighting!
COMBAT: Pisard narrowly braces Cure Black and Cure White's Finisher, Combo: Marble Screw, taking 303 Fatigue damage!  Critical
Hit!  Pisard is unable to keep fighting!  Pisard's Block ability activates!  Pisard's Parry ability activates!

<Pose Tracker> Pisard [None] has posed.

Vivid orange light comes at him from one way. With a growl, he raises one palm. The light crashing continuously against it, as he presses forward one pace, then another- fear of his demise making him a Dark Zone Juggernaut in these moments.

Then twin streams of light spiral at him from the opposite direction, and he raises his opposite palm. Digging his heels in against the already ravaged aquarium floor. He finds himself being pushed back a step. But there's a dark gleam in his eyes as he gives a desperate shout, "HaaaAAAA!"

Trembling in a supreme feat of desperate resolve more than actual strength, he brings the guard of both hands together, locking them together into a singular, colossal defense against the twin assaults, and raises it so that he's warding off that terrible light with his forearms and elbows.

And then he presses back, again, and again- "I will bring the Prism Stones back to the Dark King! I am Pisard! I am not-"

The word which he was about to say is smothered by that feared, spiralling cone of Black and White Light that cannot he cannot view as seperate entities, but a unity of samness. He bears witness to it at point blank range crashing against him like a tsunami.

Replaceable.

As the Power of Creation builds upon itself, it's like he's caught in some grand triumvirate of heavenly wrath. Earth and Sky joined by Happiness and Faith, in harmony with Creation and Light. He holds up beneath it's strain for a few seconds under the coruscating assault of brilliance. But then White and Black adjust, each in their own ways which does nothing to seperate the unity of their assault. There's the sound of their grip tightening, before the blast takes him beyond his monstrous endurance. He gives just a little.

That's all it takes.

The Warrior of the Dark Zone is blasted backwards in a shout of agony, Marble Screw lifting him an arc, a parabola sending him heavenward with Twin Streams and Fresh light following. His final words are those of denial, of disbelief, pride crumpling instantly before reality, "NO! IT CAN'T BE!"

He's swiftly torn apartment by that radiant bombardment- as if he were becoming a pale shadow, subjugated to the light, then pale wisps of blackness that are subject to nothing other than the Dark King from whence he came. In the last vestiges of his sentience, he asks one final question, "Why?"

And then he's gone, leaving no trace of the Dark Power behind.

<Pose Tracker> Cure Black [Juuban Public School (10)] has posed.

There is a sense of hollowing as their effort continues, the broken dam rushing through Cure Black and White exhausting them as it passes. Their fingers crush into each other's hands, their outstretched palms never faltering. Their bodies weaken but the beam grows ever stronger, bursting through Pisard's resistance, then his protective arms, and ultimately, along with the others, through his inhuman body as well.

The black and white corkscrew of beams flicks and dances as it is cut off, shaving some of the bleachers behind away with a crackling clang, abrading a gash into the concrete in a brief instant as it dies out. Cure Black holds her palm up steadily still, chest rising and falling as she pants, amber eyes remaining firmly on the place where Pisard once was. Only after a few seconds grant her certainty that he is gone does she cast her eyes around the poolside. They land at last on her partner, and she ducks her forehead against Cure White's in exhausted tenderness, sharing her sweat-damp bangs.

"Tadaima," she whispers gratefully.

With a faint shimmer, the Guardian reappears atop the bleachers. He had been hiding himself behind them previously, but with the danger past, he has arranged himself with some dignity before dropping his invisibility, lest he have to clatter around atop the Prism Hopeish in view of three teams of Pretty Cure. "The faith of those fairies who trust in Pretty Cure is always repaid," he says with his raspy serenity. "Two Prism Stones have been returned, to join the two already held by the Warriors of Light... three still must be found."

A snowfall of sparkles is falling as six Pretty Cure gather themselves from their attacks. From Bloom and Egret, motes the color of sunshine and water fall, mending the wall of the tank and sealing its polymers, the escaped water shimmering with the motes before disappearing to its rightful place. Black and white specks unbend the bleachers and the scores and cracks to the pavement. Rainbow-colored sparklies restore eels and shark to their befuddled home inside the tank. Soon the ground they all stand on is as fresh and clean as when they first arrived.

<Pose Tracker> Cure White [Juuban Public School (10)] has posed.

"Okaeri," Cure White murmurs back, her gratitude Black's equal.

Pretty Cure's connection is so total right now that they wind up lowering their arms in perfect symmetry. White is exhausted but not too tired to bring her still-trembling palm over to the small of Black's back, and presses against her shoulder to shoulder in an embrace that avoids ever quite letting go of that precious, precious hand.

She's leaning on her. They're leaning on each other. She's so tired. She's so happy.

She's sad, too.

When the Guardian shows up, some extremely Honokan social instinct has her leaping out of the embrace like a guilty child with her hand caught in the cookie jar. She's a very private person, even if recent circumstances have inured her inhibitions somewhat when it comes to public displays of affection.

Nodding at him, she presents Gekidrago's Prism Stone, then glances at the ground. There's Pisard's, also glittering with a shard of the immense power that recently passed through her, caught amid chunks of rebar and dirt.

Even as she looks, the concrete is cleansed by Pretty Cure's power, and a bit of hope leaves her eyes as the Prism Stone remains... alone.

"Oh..."

Her lips quirk ruefully. She feels selfish and petty. She feels devastated.

"I had hoped we'd find the false Stone with Pisard," White admits quietly. "The jewelry they took from my room by mistake." She ducks her head shyly, then rejoins Black, unable to stay away from her for long. "You see, it's... it's paw-made."

<Pose Tracker> Cure Passion [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Cure Passion hears Pisard reiterate his identity. She doesn't let up her assault; she keeps pushing along with Pine, from the opposite direction as Bloom and Egret, and soon there is black and white.

She holds, and then Black and White finish. Pisard gives, and he's shot backward, and with both hands up, Cure Passion atches through the light... and listens through the din. Disbelief, wondering...

As their magic fades, Passion huffs, feeling Pine's presence beside her still. Suddenly, she can move again. Those sparkles dance in her vision, and she sees what changes as a result. But she knows what isn't there. That voice lingers in her mind.

Looking down at the ground in front of herself, she can't entirely conceal a little gloomy feeling despite herself. What she doesn't see is Pine looking at her, wondering, imagining. There are still sparkles as the Guardian reappears, and Passion starts to look up. She glances to Pine again, thoughtfully, relieved to see her not gray, and back to the Guardian again.

"Always, huh...?" Passion watches him, and nods. Three more. It helps too to know that they're doing something, that she's really helping. It's not the only thing that says that to her at this time, but maybe she's especially warm to those kinds of statements.

Passion looks around at the rest of the room, happy to see everyone else all right again, checking twice just to be sure. In the process she can't help but see the Stones. Her eyes linger on them, before she shakes her head and looks away. But White admits something...

She tilts her head. "I'm sorry," she says, although she sounds at least as confused. "Paw...made...?"

<Pose Tracker> Cure Egret [Infinity Institute (8)] has posed.

Cure Egret lets out a sigh of relief, though it is a small one. Someone still perished -- and that is a sad thing, even if it was a necessary thing. She does glance, sideways, at Cure Passion. She can only begin to imagine what she might feel in that moment. However, she fights back a smile when she sees Cure White leap to something more proper to the Guardian. Her eyes light up, as the room is repaired by their collective magic.

And then she looks up, at the same time Passion does, with a similarly confused look on her face. Her head tilts to the other side, though, and her lips purse.

"Paw-made?" she echoes.

Then, she adds: "...If something with paws made the stone, then--hm... I wonder how the anatomy... but..." She trails off, on her own, but her fingers twitch.

Like she wants to grab a pencil and try to sketch it out to make sense of it, right then and there.

<Pose Tracker> Cure Pine [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

It's uncomfortable, watching Pisard cease to exist as the flux of power fades from her hands. What she feels mostly isn't even remorse for another foe's death. But...

It could have been her.

She doesn't look at Passion for many long moments. She doesn't want to look at her while she thinks of Eas in her head, being on the receiving end of that. The mere thought brings sparkles of water in her eyes. With an forearm, she dabs her eyes against it frantically until that image is gone.

Fortunately, it's replaced by pride a moment later. Not even pride in herself, but what all of them accomplished together. Fighting such a massive battle, that by all rights they shouldn't have had a prayer against, and making it through it. Exhaustion will take her in a moment, but for now she feels happy. White and Black are sharing a moment of tenderness and- as she leans against Passion she finally looks at her and says.

"You did so well." She says softly to her.

Cure Peach always says that happiness should be something they should get together. Right now she feels so happy to be Passion's teammate, to have been here alongside White and Black, Bloom and Egret. In moments like this, Peach is proven so right.

And then there's a voice with unfamiliar serenity from atop the bleachers, and the girl blinks her eyes, then looks around searchingly for it. Her eyes stop for a moment in wonder as she watches rainbow light the eels and sharks to their home. As sunshine and water restores the tank, as black and white lights restore the bleachers and pavement, leaving everything around them unscathed and in it's proper place.

On most days it's easy enough to take for granted the miracle that this simply happened.

Today the thought strikes her more acutely than ever, "We did this." Then repeats, "We did it." Perhaps it's repeating the obvious, but to her it's wonder over how much more involved they seemed this time.

But then she turns to Wisdom briefly, blinking as she gets her first good look at that fairy Guardian, "He's looks so dignified." She comments quietly to Passion. But then with White's comment, she goes, "Eh?" Then she tilts her head to the side considering.

In her head she gets this image of Chuutaro, Honoka's dog as some sort of lapidary, cutting a gemstone, "Golden Retrievers are so talented..." She says again in amazement. Having a fairy key that can translate animals has really skewed her perspective of what some creatures are capable of.

<Pose Tracker> Cure Bloom [Infinity Institute (8)] has posed.

The breath rushes out of Cure Bloom, but she holds in enough strength that the light doesn't fade from her core, barely gripping on to the transformation. But she's not sure she could take another step, and she ends up with her hands on her knees, struggling for breath the same way she did on the rooftop when this first began.

"...you'll have to do that to Akudaikaan's minions someday-lapi, Flappy says to her, with a certain worry even through his high fairy voice. "...yeah," Bloom says.

Karehaan and Kintoleski hang in her mind even as the light of Pretty Cure slowly restores the damage. With a final hungry breath she pushes herself upright, giving Egret a brief grin to show she's alright. "Uhm," she adds, seeing White's distress but just as confused by her descriptor as the other. "....wow...my cat just sleeps on the porch all day..."

<Pose Tracker> Cure Black [Juuban Public School (10)] has posed.

Cure Black's sigh is quiet, but it's long. She drains out like a balloon sputtering its way through the sky, becoming thinner and more whimsical as she leans against her partner. Her dreamy smile is indistinct. She's got it bad.

After they part, the Guardian solemnly accepts Gekidrago's blue prism stone from Cure White. Black fetches the green from the ground, and thus are both the Guardian's sleeve-covered hands(?) filled.

Black shrinks a bit as her partner asks after the false stone. The beaded necklace that had been taken is nowhere to be seen. She blushes a little, though, as she realizes just how attached White is to the keepsake, and then starts blushing another shade darker as each of the other Cures in turn layers on their concern and wonder at the value and origin of the paw-made artifact.

"I-it's not actually made by an animal," she stammers, but she double-takes briefly at the Queen of Knowledge, expecting to be corrected. "I-I mean, it actually was an animal, but it was a human animal. And we're going to get it back!" Her fingertips match themselves up with White's as the other girl returns, and then she rests the base of her palm down against White's also, leaning their hands and shoulders together in a long straight line. She looks across their shoulders to White's face, nodding with a smile. "It's your birthday present," she says in ample explanation.

Looking back out to the others, Cure Black takes a breath, then smiles a little. "I don't want to think what would have happened if it wasn't for everyone helping," she begins. "I feel like if I don't stop myself, I'm going to keep apologizing every time we see each other, so... one last super big time--I'm sorry." Her pinky brushes White's a moment, and then she ventures, "...we're sorry. And from now on we are going to be here for you too. Something felt really right about this, you know?" she enthuses. "My two cool kouhai are a Pretty Cure konbi. And I'm so surprised!" She grins at Cure Pine. "My friend Buki-chan is Cure Orange..."

<Pose Tracker> Cure White [Juuban Public School (10)] has posed.

The Guardian bestows a final raspy blessing upon the group: "Believe in each other, Pretty Cure, and everything is possible..."

Then he vanishes, and the Hopeish is just a piece of pink plastic on the bleachers. White, who has been watching all this interest in her words with much less visible mortification than her partner (though she isn't so dignified that there isn't a little bit of pink brushing her cheekbones as well), bends to fetch it, and holds it gently.

Though not as gently as she takes Black's hand again, after. "We are sorry," she agrees. "And grateful! We could not have saved Mepple and Mipple without your help. I promise you... if you're ever in need, for anything, anywhere, anytime at all -- just say the word and we'll be there."

Her eyes shine softly as she looks over the group, lingering on Passion's hairpiece, Egret's skirt. Everyone's eyes in turn. "And Black is right... we're especially fortunate to be in the debt of such wonderful Pretty Cure."

<Pose Tracker> Cure Passion [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

"Ah--" Passion is surprised, not by Pine leaning on her but on what she says unprompted. She looks over at her friend and a little smile spreads across her face. "Pine," she answers, and closes her eyes. "Thank you..."

She makes sure to support Pine in the meantime though, and frankly, she likes it herself. The thought comes to Pine, and Passion looks around at what she saw. When she puts it that way, Passion can't help but be struck by it herself. She doesn't quite manage to reply before Wisdom's appearance gets a comment, and Passion nods. "He is," she says, and then... Well...

She's not the only one who doesn't know what paw-made means. Egret's curiousity seems very reasonable to her. Bloom, well, "I like your cat," is Passion's reply. She thinks he's mysterious.

But the questions go on, until the Guardian bestows his blessing, and she smiles, feeling right now... Well, one thing.

But also curiousity; she doesn't see what Black is blushing about, and what even White are blushing about. The explanation doesn't really make any more sense than that to her at first, until birthday present. "Oh, those are... important," Passion answers. "I'm sure we can work hard to get it back then!"

"...Yes, I was... I'm happy that I was able to fight alongside you both." She pauses though, just long enough to helpfully add, "Cure Orange?" Passion stops just long enough to see whether it's something she doesn't understand, before continuing, "She's Cure Pine." Smile.

"I'm just glad we got them back," Passion says to Cure White. "And, I... Thank you." She can think of something she might need help with already. But she can't ask yet. Besides, White is still speaking, and...

"To be..." Passion smiles. "Thank you," she says, touched to be called that, emotion obvious in her eyes as she lifts a spare hand to wipe at her eye gently. Between the sad feelings and these happy ones...

"But..." A shake of her head, "You don't owe me anything. This is... just what friends do."

She knows who said that to her.

<Pose Tracker> Cure Pine [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

And then suddenly that thought image of Chuutaro the gemcutter vanishes as Black applies a tiny pin to that thought bubble. "Oh!" Looking briefly sheepish. Even if she is studying to be a vet, can anyone honestly blame her for thinking Chuutaro is that talented?

Small things like that, like birthday gifts, weren't really such small things when you consider White's face right now. Instead they seemed much larger, much more important, "We'd definitely help you get it back."

There's this smile for the two of them, as she waves a hand at one of them apologizing, the other promising aid, "It's fine. I promise it's fine. I'm just happy to see that everything worked out between the two of you and-" That smaller smile blossoms into a larger one, "-and you're back together." As Nagisa and Honoka, but also as Cure Black and Cure White.

"All of us are just happy to see you back with us-" And then 'My friend- Buki-chan is Cure Orange'. Cure Pine's luminous gold eyes blink twice as if she's unsure if she heard her correctly, "Eh?"

Then she grasps the sidetail of her hair just enough to get a good look at the orange hair ribbon bound to yellow heart. Letting go of it, she lifts up one mostly orange boot, to get a look at it, then puts that leg down and looks at the other, "Ah- Um-"

Poking her two pointer fingers together nervously she has this anxious air about her, she doesn't really want to correct Cure Black but- "-about that- I'm..." But then fortunately Passion says it, "...Right! Cure Pine." It doesn't take long for her to relax though, it's so easy in this crowd. "A-Anyhow I'm really surprised too. I didn't realize you were Cure Black at all, Nagisa-senpai."

But as that thought settles in, her smile returns and- "But it feels so right that you are."

<Pose Tracker> Cure Bloom [Infinity Institute (8)] has posed.

Cure Bloom feels something while Cure Black deflates blissfully against her partner, but the thought doesn't coalesce before Cure Black is explaining the situation, and Bloom finds herself nodding vigorously, her big pineapple hair swaying precariously as it occasionally does. "We told you!" she says, with a boastful grin. "We could never let our sempai down!"

She tries to stand up tall and proud but finds herself so low on energy she ends up with hands on her knees again, huffing. "Uhm," she admits. "Th, thank you for your praise," she stammers out, like a proper kouhai. "...but I'm really tired and can I go home now"