View source for 2020-12-20 - Widows and Orphans 1

{|class="toccolours" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''Widows and Orphans 1'''
|-
|'''Summary''':<br>
''Shibuya is terrorized by a supernatural spider swarm, interrupting an otherwise friendly meet-up.''
|-
|'''Who''':<br>
[[Mikoto Minagi]], [[Fuu Hououji]], [[Georgia Jenks]], [[Kozue Kaoru]], [[Mami Tomoe]], [[Tsuru]], [[Endo Naoki]]

GM: Pink Moon Stick
|-
|'''Where:'''<br>
Shibuya Shopping Ward
|-
|'''OOC - IC Date:'''<br>
12/20/2020 - 10-20-15
|-
|}


 <Pose Tracker> Pink Moon Stick [Admin] has posed.

There are as many reasons to visit Shibuya as there are people; tourists come to visit this beloved landmark; shoppers, monied and window alike, flock to their mecca as inexorably as starlings on the wing; dates nestle in cafes. Stylish, stylish, stylish. There's no admission requirement of stylishness, but the place has that effect on people; just to be here is to be making a stylish life choice, and many carry themselves accordingly, no matter what they're wearing.

It is an overcast October afternoon, after school and before suppertime; not raining, but on the chillier side. Nevertheless some optimists are carting around exceedingly fashionable umbrellas with the hope of an opportunity to use them. The streets are a crush of humanity at this hour, a vast river of people who flow through intersections in every possible direction. But, every so often, cars slide along instead, their roofs like shark fins cresting the surface of an occasionally placid sea. 

Most, of course, arrive here by train. Shibuya Station disgorges tributaries often, and takes them in also, an estuary paradoxically at the center of the district, which nevertheless offers to separate that which is Shibuya, and that which is not, at least until next visit. Coming or going, Hachiko watches over all of them.

 <Pose Tracker> Mikoto Minagi [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

	Mikoto's style is...

	Well, she's changed into a red-and-green striped polo shirt, and that might have been ''fine'' except both the colours are ''so saturated.'' There's an orange cardigan over it which is a little more muted, and probably pilfered from someone else's wardrobe, because Mikoto didn't account for things getting colder and doesn't want to wear a turtleneck for some reason. Her skirt is black, which is difficult to mess up. Her leggings are a cheerful, colourful sky blue.

	She found all of these items in various second-hand stores over the years and she is very fond of them. Look at how colourful they are!

	Well, maybe being in Shibuya will give Mikoto a pass for her unique wardrobe decisions. Maybe she's being a ''daring fashionista.'' Maybe she's a revolutionary.

	Maybe she just wanted to invite Georgia out after school, and Hachiko is the best place for any teenagers to meet, under any circumstance. Don't worry - Hachiko is a good dog, and has forgiven her. She apologised and everything. It's okay now!

	The crush of people is in no way beloved by her, but Mikoto manages to worm her way out of the throng of the crowds to perch ''upon'' Hachiko's statue, sitting by one of his big stone paws. She's texted Georgia to let her know she's here, so now she waits, a smile on her face, legs kicking amicably as she scans the train station for familiar arrivals.

 <Pose Tracker> Fuu Hououji [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

Normally, Fuu doesn't prefer to come to Shibuya for clothes shopping - but this trip is an exception. For this trip, she has a very specific list of things she's looking for. She also, rarity of rarities, has a few images to refer to.

She's looking for something *specific* as she navigates between stores, an umbrella hanging snugly behind one shoulder so it won't smack into anyone. She's also wearing a sweater (a simple green cardigan) over her blouse (white) and skirt (dark green), with her feet shod in understated waterproof boots, in anticipation that it is indeed going to rain. Thankfully, it's not raining *yet* - and she's hoping, in contrast to certain types of optimists, that it won't.

But at the moment, she's also just setting out on her shopping trip, and so she's not that far from the Hachiko statue. The sight of a stridently-garbed Mikoto perching ON the statue draws a wince across Fuu's visage, but she waves to the dark-haired girl. "Mikoto-san, hello! Are you waiting for somebody, or ... ?"

 <Pose Tracker> Georgia Jenks [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

When Georgia got word from Mikoto that she wanted to hang out in Shibuya after school, she'd jumped at the opportunity. School has been a real drag lately. And her monster-hunting activities have been too few to keep things lively. Though perhaps, in hindsight, things being slow isn't ''such'' a bad thing all considered.

She left campus not long after her last class of the day, making a short stop off at her dorm to change into more appropriate clothing for a hangout. Settling for a fuzzy brown woolen sweater that was starting to fray at the edges, a pair of denim green jeans, and scuffed black lace-up boots, she finished the casual look with a simple red beanie that fit snugly on top of her head. Then, satisfied, she departed.

She's just step foot in the crowded area of Shibuya when her phone buzzed with a text from Mikoto, which earned an affirmative response in the form of a thumbs up emoji. Tucking her phone away, she hurried (or tried to, anyway) over to what was to be their designated meeting place -- the Hachiko statue. Grinning from ear to ear when the landmark came into view, she wasn't surprised to see Mikoto perched upon it -- and apparently she had company, too.

"Yo!" She called out with a wave as she paced on over, shoving both hands into her pockets for warmth after closing the gap. She turns her head to look at the other girl, not quite recalling if they'd met or not. "Hey! You a friend of Mikoto's? I'm Georgia!"

 <Pose Tracker> Kozue Kaoru [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.


When a certain someone steps off the train at the station, there's someone in a loose white long sleeved blouse, a greyish blue fuzzy vest, and skinny jeans with kimono cloth patterns waiting for her on the platform. "Fancy running into you here."

That smile of Kozue Kaoru's has mild mischief in it. After all - Infinity is much further away from Shibuya than Ohtori is, her being here waiting holds its own implications.

She's got a powder blue umbrella folded up in one hand, with her bag over its shoulder.

"Walk you home?"

-=-=-

One thing led to another, and they're doing anything ''other'' than walking home. Right now Kozue's guiding Mami off course, towards a cafe that's on the way to 4-4-4. "No reason to be in a rush... let's be irresponsible."

There's yet more mischief in her eyes, "Sit down at a cafe for a while." It's a game Kozue plays, trying to extend the amount of time the two are spending together through small... delays.

Before the evening parts them for their respective careers, "Though... you'll have to monopolize any sweets."

A peck on her cheek, just a quick impression of her lips, as she whispers.

"... I've just thoroughly spoiled my appetite..."

They're not too far away from Hachiko's watchful eye when Kozue picks someone out of the throng of Shibuya style-seekers. "Fancy seeing her out here..." She turns to Mami, "... new plans. It's time for you to meet someone."

Leading her sidelong... she clears her throat, engaging with her, "It's rare seeing you at ground level these days." There's a faint hint of whimsy, "Tsuru-san... I'd like you to meet Mami Tomoe."


 <Pose Tracker> Mami Tomoe [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

The heart of Mami Tomoe's Tokyo is Shibuya, and it may not have her name on it but it has years of her life ''in'' it. Watching everyone that goes by from the benches and alleys and sidewalks that she comes across, Mami has long appreciated the many styles of Shibuya, wearing or watching. ...Today's style for Mami is in whites and yellows, a knee-length dress with frill and a light jacket in white overtop, along with delicate-looking shoes and her characteristic drills. The jewelry makes it in gold, and right this instant... 

Well, right this instant it's hard to see her because she's on the train, about to get off and finally make it home for the day. 

So when the train comes to a stop, Mami is one of the many who walks off, the click of her heels against the path inaudible in all the other steps that come here. But they stop, as she notices--

"Ah!" Mami vocalizes with a smile as she recognizes the girl in blue. "My, what a lovely surprise," the blonde agrees, and at the suggestion, she nods brightly and steps up beside Kozue for walking. "I'd like that." 

-=-=-

"Irresponsible?" Mami asks in feigned innocence. "Ah, I can't believe it..." A beat, "Hmm, are you sure?" she wonders, laughing faintly. "It's more fun to share. ...But you ''do'' make a persuasive argument." 

Mami tilts her head as Kozue mentions new plans while she walks, her eyes scanning naturally across the way--but there are so ''many'' people that she doesn't immediately notice certain friend(s) in favor of the person the other girl is pointing out. Instead she follows with Kozue... 

"Ah!" Mami turns to face Tsuru fully. "I'm happy to meet you properly, Tsuru-san," she greets with motion, formally but warmly.

 <Pose Tracker> Tsuru [Infinity Institute (11)] has posed.

When it comes to Tsuru, the first question is always, what is she wearing?

Tsuru is wearing a hip-length haori of her own design. It is plain black on the outside, but the sleeves are folded up to reveal a graffitied impression of traditional ''wagara'' patterning, ink-like white and purple rectangles floating and sinking amidst needle-thin tracings of overlapping circles. Her white tunic is buttoned all the way up to the mandarin collar that frames her long neck, and all the way down to the deep inverted V that parts at its hem. Loose-fitting black pants do not quite cover her fine anklebones; the pockets each have a small decorative brown tassel hanging from their corners. On the bridge of her nose rests a pair of antique, sepia-toned sunglasses, round in a way that seems eccentric today, but was default when they were made.

She pulls behind her a wheeled bag, holding its handle like the leash of a puppy. She has halted at a department store's display window, gazing at a selection of new jewelry, when one of her two proteges makes herself known. Looking at Kozue over the rim of her sunglasses, she dips her head, seeming little-surprised. It is as though she expected her, or as though it has not sunken in for her still how vast Tokyo (or even Shibuya) is, and how significant a coincidence can be.

"Kozue," she greets, in a tone that will seem pleased to Kozue, but may feel quite neutral to Mami's ear. When she turns her large eyes to Mami, she dips her shoulders as well as her forehead this time. "We are both happy, then," she agrees. "For I have heard much about you, and a city this large feels a bit smaller when I know there is someone in it who may love tea even more than I." She straightens and settles her shoulders back sedately.

"I hope Kozue is not too troublesome to you," she says, in a way that would remind Kozue of her mother, if she had one around.

 <Pose Tracker> Endo Naoki [Juuban Public School (12)] has posed.

Shibuya is not one of Endo's usual haunts-but he is a teenager. And thus, it a pilgrimage which must be occasionally made.

Though he has left his people tackling career behind, Endo still holds some standing amongst Juuban's athletic clubs, and occasionally secures an invitation to join them on their after-school outings. This one in particular is happening at Shibuya TOEI, one of the movie theatres just across the from the station. He's amidst a small sea of similar boys pouring out from the complex, all in animated conversation:

"Of course he's the best one, he has the guitar. The guitar is the best."

"I liked the one with the staff."

"He looked kind of stupid though, didn't he? Like a bumblebee."

"Aaah, but his triangle attack was cool"

"What's cool about a triangle?"

"Triangles are the most powerful shape."

"Naoki-san, what are you talking about?"

The small cluster of boys eventually frays and breaks apart as the gathering ends and its participants go their separate ways. Endo's path takes him toward the central station, into the wave of people entering and exiting. He has no umbrella, so the overcast sky makes him quicken his step in his quest to find shelter.

At least until he spots a few familiar faces on the way. He slows as he passes the statue of Hachiko and the girls nearby, calling, "Mikoto-chan! Fuu-san, hey!" A hand rises as he makes a short detour to say hello to them and their other friend.

 <Pose Tracker> Pink Moon Stick [Admin] has posed.
 <SoundTracker> One Winged Angel (Instrumental; first sixty seconds) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ziury0uVl7c

It's so crowded that it's hard to see what's happening until it's right on top of you, but noise precedes it, like thunder cutting the line in front of lightning. The soft sound of many trees falling in the forest of humanity. The louder sounds of alarm -- shouts of warning, screams of fear. These end almost as quickly as they begin, only, hydra-like, for three more cries to sprout from their silence, as, with newly widened radius, a larger number of people can now see what the others saw.

The light changes, and a cacophany of horns joins the symphony of peril. Traffic isn't moving.

And then it is in front of the train station -- the nearest group of randos shrieks, collapses, and reveals...

...SO many bodies. In the street and on the sidewalks. It's a river within the river, or maybe more aptly a sand bar that splits it, because nobody within it is stirring. It stretches up the street at least a block. People are running away from it in any other direction, except for those who are running towards it to try to get a better look, maybe even to render assistance. Are they dead, this chasm of collapse amid the bobbing, mountainous waves of those still standing? Or are they not?

So many bodies. A garden of fashion, sprawled on concrete and against gutters. Old and young, rich and poor, local and tourist; it's all the same. They share each other's fates. 

So many bodies. So black that they're almost violet, and chitinous, chittering, skittering, scarring -- more of the psyche than the flesh -- for whenever one of the apparently countless arachnids claims its latest victim, it simply drops off of them, faster than they can fall, to scurry forward to claim their next. Or to leap forward, as the case may be.

So many spiders.

They're coming.

They're coming for you all.

 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick transforms into The Swarm!
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used REE! REE! REE! REE! on Endo Naoki.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used REE! REE! REE! REE! on Mami Tomoe.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used REE! REE! REE! REE! on Kozue Kaoru.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used REE! REE! REE! REE! on Georgia Jenks.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used REE! REE! REE! REE! on Fuu Hououji.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used REE! REE! REE! REE! on Mikoto Minagi.
 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe partially dodges 0 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's REE! REE! REE! REE!, taking 0 Fatigue damage!
 Critical Hit!  Mami Tomoe is Quipped!  Mami Tomoe's Fade and Flash abilities activate!
 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi fails to dodge Pink Moon Stick's REE! REE! REE! REE!, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Mikoto Minagi is Quipped!
 Mikoto Minagi is Taunted!
 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji cleanly braces 0 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's REE! REE! REE! REE!, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Fuu
 Hououji is Quipped!  Fuu Hououji's Block and Parry abilities activate!  Fuu Hououji is Taunted!
 COMBAT: Kozue Kaoru dodges 0 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's REE! REE! REE! REE!, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Kozue Kaoru is
 Quipped!  Kozue Kaoru is Taunted!
 COMBAT: Endo Naoki braces 0 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's REE! REE! REE! REE!, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Endo Naoki is
 Quipped!  Endo Naoki's Block and Parry abilities activate!  Endo Naoki is Taunted!
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used REE! REE! REE! REE! on Georgia Jenks.
 COMBAT: Georgia Jenks dodges 0 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's REE! REE! REE! REE!, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Georgia Jenks
 is Quipped!  Georgia Jenks's Fade ability activates!  Georgia Jenks is Taunted!

 <Pose Tracker> Mikoto Minagi [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

	Mikoto waves, brightly, as Fuu comes up. "Yup!" She chirps, and she doesn't have much more time to say who, because -- there's Georgia! She was close the whole time! "This is Fuu!" She introduces her, as she hops off of Hachiko's statue. "We're friends!" Which is an inclusive statement, judging by the way she looks from Fuu to Georgia as she says it.

	"Georgia!" Mikoto goes on, a concentrated ray of sunshine for October. "Let's have fun! Let's --" and here she hears ''another friend,'' and turns to wave, high above her head, to one Naoki-san. Or, to hear Mikoto put it: "Endo! Endo! You're here, too?!"

	She hasn't seen some of her ''other'' compatriots yet, because: Shibuya is ''super'' packed, y'all.

	This isn't anything strange, at this time of afternoon, except --

	Except for the screaming.

	Mikoto makes a confused noise, rolling from the base of her throat through her tongue to her bottom teeth; her head snaps in the direction of the screams, before she looks to Endo and Fuu and Georgia for confirmation. Was there a traffic accident?, is her first thought.

	That swiftly leaves. There's too ''much'' screaming for one accident.

	Her comfort leaves, too, replaced with tense muscles and a drawn expression, as she looks over to the source of the screams. But she is ''really'' rather short; she can't see anything, over a hundred-dozen heads. She reaches for the strap of her sword-case - which is, of course, still on her shoulder, it rarely ''leaves'' - and grasps it, but she thinks in this moment of how ''many'' people are here, and hesitates in a moment of uncertainty.

	Perhaps she shouldn't have. She ''wouldn't'' have, not so long ago.

	Because it only takes a moment - and it's a moment taken.

	From the throng her keen eyes spy something which doesn't fit; in growing horror she watches, transfixed, as something pours out from around them. Clambering, chittering, compounding --

	One dozen and two dozen and three dozen and past a certain point, numbers stop mattering in Mikoto's mind. It just registers as MANY.

	MANY spiders, MANY screaming, MANY bodies.

	Her mouth opens as if to protest -- but today was supposed to be a ''good'' day, she was going out with ''friends,'' she found ''more friends'' on the way, they were going to have ''fun'' --

	Well, it opens, but the only sound from it is thin and high and wordless. Small, at first, until it builds in terrified volume and she builds in motion; tearing her sword from its case with violent motions, and they are COMING and they are MANY and

	Mikoto screams, and drives her blade deep into the earth, in a titanic blow which threatens to crack the road open and open a fissure between the spiders and ''them.''

	She isn't thinking about how many people are around.

	She scarcely has ''one'' thought: she ''does not want the swarm to reach them.''

	If she had the room to think about it - she'd at least hope the crowd is running away.

 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi transforms into HiME Mikoto!
 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi has used Obsidian Blade: Disaster on Pink Moon Stick.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick dodges 10 Fatigue damage from Mikoto Minagi's Obsidian Blade: Disaster, taking 15 Fatigue damage!  Pink
 Moon Stick's Fade and Flash abilities activate!  Stagger applied to Pink Moon Stick!

 <Pose Tracker> Mami Tomoe [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

To say the least, Tsuru stands out to Mami's eye; this has been true for a while, as she's seen her here or there without actually getting a chance to talk, in images and from afar. This is a good rather than a bad thing, though; Mami takes the time to notes her outfit, her manner, and what she was looking at. She doesn't seem surprised, Tsuru... 

But Mami has a feeling that Tsuru doesn't often seem surprised, from what Kozue's told her. 

Naturally she bows as well, and she smiles more widely. "I'm very flattered; I've heard much about you, too, and..." she starts to answer Tsuru more fully, but then the hair on the back of her neck stands up. She hears screaming, and pauses immediately. "Excuse me--" 

As Mami turns, her eyes widen to see the falling tide of bodies, a jolt of fear at the back of her mind, something primal that calls back to childhood as she sees... the river. No, not the river--the ''spiders'', the black things with chitinous bodies that skitter towards them, and there is an instant in which she swallows and is still--a moment in which she's the small girl facing down a monster for the first time--

And then her hands move, ingrained habits taking over where the mind has to catch up. Her left hand comes up and within it is suddenly a brilliant golden Gem, egglike in shape, gilt in setting. "Tsuru-san! Kozue! Stay behind me!" Where she was pleasant and ordinary a moment ago, now Mami Tomoe speaks with authority, throwing up her gem as it begins to glow, and showers glittering radiance down upon her. 

A brilliant shine overtakes her form, and she twirls, as if in a dance, her clothes changing from street style to battle-ready, black and yellow and white, her familiar hat and hatpin appearing last of all as she comes to a stop. 

It is a terrifying thing to look upon these, but terror is part of the life Mami chose. Just putting on her raiments gives her a buoyed sense of life--and she has an audience to consider, no less. 

Extending both hands, Mami pulls a ribbon from her wrist and shakes it out, weaving with her hands--and as Mikoto screams, Mami is extending the ribbon into many, the many into larger, and the larger into a wide weaving tide of fabric with which to push back at the spiders approaching. 

"Legare!"

 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe transforms into Puella Mami!
 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe has used Legare on Pink Moon Stick.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick counters 4 Fatigue damage from Mami Tomoe's Legare, taking 11 Fatigue damage!  Exhausted, Tangle, and Trap
 applied to Pink Moon Stick!
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick's counterattack, There's Just Too Many, interrupts, doing 0 Fatigue damage to Mami Tomoe!  

 <Pose Tracker> Kozue Kaoru [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.


Kozue always suspected that Tsuru would like Mami, very much. So she feels pleased to have it confirmed right away.

All the same she rolls her eyes openly at Tsuru's comment to Mami about hoping she's not too troublesome, though not without affection, "Hey. You make it sound like I'm some bratty little kid she has to put up with."

And that's about the same time the shrieks near the train station catch her ear. Puzzled, Kozue turns and looks.

And sees a RIVER coming at them. "What the hell is..."

Her hand flexes as if on reflex and...

Nothing.

Because of course there's nothing. Which once again ''drives'' that powerlessness into her like a stake through her heart.

"... that." She whispers, as her pupils dilate - as she sees so many spiders. Kozue isn't particularly terrified of spiders, but it's hard NOT to be when it's so many flooding the streets, crawling over body after body.

And in a moment like this, if they reach her, she'll be just another victim - save that she ''knows'' the horror exists. Helplessness is always what she has feared the most, having no power over the direction and course of her life - and death.

Her mouth works, and no sounds come out. Then just a hoarse noise that wheezes out into a harsh noise of fear, and she stumbles, weak-kneed onto the concrete.

Scrambling in an attempt to get back up, she doesn't make it quite halfway when... there's a brilliant golden gleam. And a command.

Kozue by her very nature typically bristles against commands but...

For once, she just nods dumbly once... then twice... then... pulls herself up. Looking at the webwork of Mami's weaving tide of ribbons, and moves over to clasp Tsuru by the hand and pull her more solidly behind Mami Tomoe, and herself as well - as if she expects a certain degree of non-reaction from Tsuru to deadly scenarios.

It's a hard thing for her to trust her life to anyone else, but... right now, that display of confidence in the sake of something that she feels so helpless in the face of...

"I trust you." She inhales sharply... before she adds shakily, "Don't... keep us waiting too long."

Please.

She doesn't say it, but maybe it feels implicit with how she looks right now.


 COMBAT: Kozue Kaoru has used Trust on Mami Tomoe.

 <Pose Tracker> Endo Naoki [Juuban Public School (12)] has posed.

When the shrieks of panic reach Endo's ears he's quick to turn to the source of distress, pivoting sharply and craning his neck through Shibuya station's central walkway. His mouth, half-open to greet his friends further, abruptly forms into a wide 'O' of surprise, and then curves down into something more befitting the terror that's ravaging through the streets of Shibuya.

The mass of spiders instills a urgent fear in the boy, one that he responds to by instinctively clutching at the purple stone hidden in a jacket pocket. There's a flash of ugly violet light that follows before Endo appears again, adorned in dark armor and clutching his oversized sword.

He puts that sword to good use just a second later. The movements he makes aren't well calculated, more of a panicked sweep of the blade through the nearby area. Enough to ward off the coming wave of spiders before he lifts from the ground and ascends several feet above the swarming arachnids. To a safer distance, he hopes.

 COMBAT: Endo Naoki transforms into Barrier Jacket Zerstörer!
 COMBAT: Endo Naoki has used Blauverschiebung on Pink Moon Stick.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick braces 12 Fatigue damage from Endo Naoki's Blauverschiebung, taking 18 Fatigue damage!  Stagger applied to
 Pink Moon Stick!
 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe accepts Kozue Kaoru's Trust, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Mami Tomoe is Cheered!  

 <Pose Tracker> Georgia Jenks [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

"Ah! Nice to meet ya, Fuu-san!" Georgia greets with one of her trademarked thumbs-up. She's never been one to claim that three's a crowd, so if Fuu wants to tag along she's more than welcome to in her book. She turns back to Mikoto, who was about to say something, when seemingly out of the blue yet ''another'' person that knows Mikoto. The blonde blinks and turns in the boy's direction, who Mikoto has enthusiastically identified as Endo.

"Oh! Hey! Looks like we'll end up having a nice-sized group!" She says, automatically assuming the boy named Endo would be joining them. "What should we-"

The screams cut her words short. She immediately freezes and spins around. "Huh?!" Trouble? Here in Shibuya? It's apparently more likely than you'd think! It doesn't take long for her to spy the source of it all. How could she not, given the fact that it was... was...

Spiders. Tons and tons of spiders. Crawling and marching and swarming and...

Coming ''right'' for them.

Panic momentarily wells up in Georgia as she takes a quick step back, eyes widening. The moment of hesitation is there -- and that's all it is -- a moment. Around the same time Mikoto pulls out her black obsidian sword and drives it into the ground, Georgia claps her hands together. There's a sharp ''crack'' -- and then in both of her hands are the chrome escrima sticks that are her element. Gripping them tight, she drops down into a crouch, and proceeds to drag the sticks along the ground in front of her. From this arises a shower of sparks that arc out from her position to rush forward and meet the oncoming swarm, hopefully enough to hold them at bay.

 COMBAT: Georgia Jenks transforms into HiME Georgia!
 COMBAT: Georgia Jenks has used Friction Burn on Pink Moon Stick.

 <Pose Tracker> Fuu Hououji [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

"Good day, Endo-san!" Fuu greets the boy from Juuban, responding to his hail. Her attention quickly shifts back to Mikoto and Mikoto's friend - Georgia, to judge by how Mikoto greets her. The bespectacled blonde from Infinity is about to greet her directly when -

Screaming. A *lot* of screaming, a level that shouldn't happen in Shibuya unless something very bad is happening with no concern for bystanders. Not, thinks Fuu as she turns to look, that the bad guys *usually* care about innocent bystanders ...

It's not the worst sight she's ever laid eyes on, or the most alarmingly disturbing, but it's substantially more than disturbing *enough* under the circumstances. It's bad enough that the normally level-headed Fuu actually freaks out, scampering behind the HAchiko statue for whatever meager shelter it'll provide, whatever part-of-a-second of delay it might buy her, hopefully time enough to dig out her glove-jewel. She's distraught enough that even *thinking* of the words for her invocation is tossed out of the way; instead, she transforms into the Magic Knight of Wind as soon as the glove is snug on her left hand, and under the circumstances, who cares who sees it?

Then she's vaulting over the statue (she'll apologize to Hachiko later) and unleashing her magic. The spiders are too many and too small for Winds of Admonishment, and she'd need multi-arrow barrages to do any good with her bow; that leaves area-of-effect spells, and - yes, tere's a stretch momentarily clear of fallen bodies.

"STORM-DANCE OF KAMAITACHI!!!!"

Possibly, for a moment, also clear of spiders. Or whatever these little things with too many legs are; the Wind Knight is not overtly inclined to indulge in a close identification of the things.

 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji transforms into Wind Knight!
 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji has used Storm-Dance of Kamaitachi on Pink Moon Stick.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick fails to dodge Georgia Jenks's Friction Burn, taking 19 Fatigue damage!  Cripple applied to Pink Moon
 Stick!
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick perfectly dodges 51 Fatigue damage from Fuu Hououji's Storm-Dance of Kamaitachi, taking 0 Fatigue damage!
 Critical Hit!  Critical Dodge!  Pink Moon Stick's Fade and Flash abilities activate!

 <Pose Tracker> Tsuru [Infinity Institute (11)] has posed.

No real warmth appears on Tsuru's face as Kozue banters at her, but there is a sense of comfort to the interaction that runs deeper. She never gets a chance to opine on Kozue's brattiness or lack thereof, however, instead turning at the same time as Kozue to look at the unexpected horror on the road.

"Ah..." Tsuru's voice wavers. ''Now'' she's surprised.

It is her wont to be protected by Kozue (and Nori), but this time, things have changed. Kozue is a normal girl now, or at least a normaler girl. And instead of pulling Tsuru behind her, Kozue pulls both of them behind Mami Tomoe. As she steps in towards Kozue and behind this auric human shield, Tsuru reverses their handsclasp, so their fingers are threaded with their knuckles towards the sky instead of the ground, and they have their shoulders towards the threat, narrowing their shared profile. Her other hand is on Kozue's shoulder for support.

If an intimacy this be, it is merely the sort that danger generates. Tsuru and her protege are a more elegant Shaggy and Scooby, clinging together as the monster appears. There's an archetypal quality that Mami will sense even from the corner of her eye. Though the monsters before her are terrible, there are maidens quailing behind her.

Of course, Mami is not the only one who stands as a defender this day. Tsuru glances around as others make themselves known, with wind and sparks and dark metal. Her wheeled bag rocks back and forth subtly on the sidewalk from the various impacts and breezes.

 <Pose Tracker> Pink Moon Stick [Admin] has posed.

They're almost mesmerizing, the sea of spiders amidst the icebergs they've rendered any humanity unfortunate enough to be in their path. What catches the eye and arrests the breath, beyond the sheer scope of the swarm, though, is the ways in which they are not quite spiders after all. The brain tries to fill in the gaps, unable to process every motion of every leg, and... CAN'T, it doesn't line up quite right, animation frames drop all over the place, because their gait is... off. Like rather than spiders they're approximations of spiders. Whatever environment evolved them into being, it wasn't playing by... quite the same rules...

Thus, too many legs, even for creatures that notoriously already have too many legs. Ten, not eight, and only segmented in one place instead of several, with an almost metallic washer-and-bolt sort of hinge. A dull, dark substance. Dubiously organic. They tread lightly across their victims, leaving no scratches, no marks at all, in the wake of their steps.

Too many legs, and too few eyes. Eye, in fact, singular; lidless, unblinking, and centered at the place where the legs converge, like the heart of the world's creepiest flower. Red, of course. Of course it's red. Why wouldn't it be a blood-red eye the size of a thumbnail? 

An eye, then, and ten legs coming out of it, carting it around like it's crowdsurfing on itself. There isn't room for anything else, except, one presumes, whatever's on the underside.

When the vanguard leap over the chasm Mikoto have created, sailing through the air towards the group, everyone gets the chance to see that, too. To see their stingers, which gleam even in the dull light of a cloudy day, with sharpness and without apology. They are cruel without being barbed; indeed, their slender simplicity is cruelty. For otherwise none would have been stung but the very first.

Mami's ribbons brush many of them away, but she is a weaver and so there are naturally gaps, and through every gap legs are thrust, and sometimes they're crushed but at other times they can get a decent grip and strain, strain to hold these blast doors open for just a second, and in each second three more push through.

Endo might have gotten away, but for his poor life choice to wave his huge sword into the oncoming swarm. Which is to say that he brought some with him. As indifferent to gravity as any other spider, they crawl up both sides of Stern -- one on top, two along the bottom -- towards his hands.

The first line that make it through Mami's defenses are met by Georgia's sparks, and it is at this point that it becomes obvious to anyone who hadn't already cottoned on that these are an immense threat well beyond their tiny size, because they sizzle -- one or two get a nasty eye-burn, the curved surface of the lens bubbling but still unblinking -- and then they keep coming. They just keep coming.

And where they really ought to be weak to wind -- wind is strong versus spiders, that's just the rule, right, that's how the world works -- they seem to ride Fuu's storm instead of being swept away properly. 

At which point, once the spell ends, it is now RAINING spiders. Orphans. Spider-Orphans. For that is what they are, and the HiME know it on a visceral level while others -- if they fought them enough on Southern Cross Island, which is normally where they're found, anyway -- might guess, from the weird organotechnical nature of each otherworldly horror. 

Then the second wave leaps the chasm. Marches through the ribbons. Crawls upwards, instead of falling downwards.

They're everywhere.

 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has adjusted her boss levels. She is now ready to take on 7 opponents!
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used In Your Face on Mikoto Minagi.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used In Your Face on Mami Tomoe.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used Widowswarm on Endo Naoki.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used In Your Face on Georgia Jenks.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used In Your Face on Fuu Hououji.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used Widowswarm on Kozue Kaoru.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used Widowswarm on Tsuru.
 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe braces 11 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's In Your Face, taking 9 Fatigue damage!  Critical Hit!  Pink
 Moon Stick is Psyched!  Mami Tomoe's Parry ability activates!  Blind and Diversion applied to Mami Tomoe!
 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji decisively counters 12 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's In Your Face, taking 4 Fatigue damage!  
 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji's counterattack, Spinning Slash, partially gets through, doing 12 Fatigue damage to Pink Moon Stick!  
 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi fails to dodge Pink Moon Stick's In Your Face, taking 24 Fatigue damage!  Critical Hit!  Blind and Diversion
 applied to Mikoto Minagi!
 COMBAT: Georgia Jenks braces 9 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's In Your Face, taking 7 Fatigue damage!  Blind applied to
 Georgia Jenks!
 COMBAT: Endo Naoki dodges 3 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's Widowswarm, taking 5 Fatigue damage!  Bind Break! All of Pink
 Moon Stick's debuffs are cleared!
 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe covers Kozue Kaoru for Pink Moon Stick's attack, Widowswarm, taking it upon herself instead!
 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe fails to dodge Pink Moon Stick's Widowswarm, taking 7 Fatigue damage!  Bind Break! All of Pink Moon Stick's
 debuffs are cleared!
 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji covers Tsuru for Pink Moon Stick's attack, Widowswarm, taking it upon herself instead!
 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji braces 4 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's Widowswarm, taking 3 Fatigue damage!  Fuu Hououji's Block and
 Parry abilities activate!  Bind Break! All of Pink Moon Stick's debuffs are cleared!

 <Pose Tracker> Mikoto Minagi [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.
 <SoundTracker> Megadeth - Angry Again https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zupUC3issEE

	A fissure does not stop them. A fissure ''could not'' stop them.

	Mikoto's eyes catch the inconsistencies and gloss over them, make them a problem for later. All she needs to know is things like spiders are pouring over the gap, making the leap. She leaps back, too, her back to Hachiko.

	This, in the end, was a mistake.

	Because the things like spiders are carried by the wind to the statue - and hitting solid object, they fall down.

	Down, onto...

	She hears the motion - she looks up.

	Stinger.

	''Not'' a spider, Mikoto recognises, and finally she can no longer dismiss what it is not; in that moment of incomprehension she is frozen, looking up, as reality does not work the way it ought to.

	It falls down, right onto --

	The screaming from Mikoto reaches - and yes, please believe it is possible - a HIGHER timbre. Mikoto has never been particularly scared of spiders, or snakes, or other things one finds when turning aside a forest log. And yet - here, now - she is terrified.

	This does not make her any less dangerous. Rather, clutched by the unpredictability of fear, she is ''more.''

	A sharp and jagged movement flings the spider from her face, a long thin line of red along her cheek where a last-minute motion kept her from being stung through. (Even dulled, she is sharp.) Roar ripping from her chest, she brings Miroku down on it, once and once again and third for all.

	One strike from that massive obsidian blade might have felled a spider - but not an Orphan. She knows that much, ''feels'' it, even as the fear crowds out her rationality.

	She will leave it no inch, to take no mile.

	But it is just ONE thing not quite spider, and there are so many like it.

 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi has used Obsidian Blade: Destruction on Pink Moon Stick.

 <Pose Tracker> Endo Naoki [Juuban Public School (12)] has posed.

Mistakes have been made. Endo finds quickly that the air is similarly unsafe, with both raining spiders and several of the creatures already attached to his weapon.

&lt;THIS IS ILLEGAL BOARDING.&gt; Fallen Stern informs its unwanted passengers, even as Endo flails the blade back and forth to shake the creatures free. It doesn't stop one of those slender stingers from slashing his hand before the attached spider is flung free, the boy grimacing sharply.

His eyes make a quick sweep of the street below, the piles of fallen bodies and the swarming mass of Orphan-insects. It's a deeply alarming sight, especially as the wave crests over his allies down below. The cluster of falling monsters soon provides a new obstacle, one that Endo quickly attempts to address by raising his weapon into the air.

"Stern!" Endo's voice is sharp and shrill, and he trusts his partner to know what to do.

&lt;ENGAGING: ZERSTORUNG DRANG.&gt;

Purple-black energy flares again, this time bleeding out of Endo's device. The edges of the blade crackle with energy as power burns along its surface, violet fire igniting any of the Orphan's unlucky enough to still be clinging to the weapon.

 COMBAT: Endo Naoki has used Zerstorung Drang on Endo Naoki.
 COMBAT: Endo Naoki accepts Endo Naoki's Zerstorung Drang, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Empower applied to Endo Naoki!  Cleanse! All
 of Endo Naoki's debuffs are cleared!

 <Pose Tracker> Mami Tomoe [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

Eyes--Mami can see the eyes, now, much as she can see even from the edge of her vision the way Tsuru and Kozue come together there. Just like she saw the reflex that led Kozue's hand to flex. She knows full well how she must be feeling here--

"We'll be fine," Mami assures Kozue, something softer in her voice for a moment than the hardness of battle. But while she intends it, it isn't going to be something that's true just by itself, just by waiting. Mami tries to brush away the spiders, but there are indeed too many. It's Kozue's reliance on her that keeps her trying, and she narrows her eyes as she has to give up on that particular set of ribbon. At least there are others here, not just herself, now that she can see them. Except.. 

"Aah--" Mami can't help but make the sound as one falls at her face and she's forced to stop her next ribbon-work in order to shove it off of her. She sees, in the moment, them crawling for Kozue--

"Look out!" And steps into the path, spiders starting to crawl up her boots. She can't get her or Tsuru out of the way in time, but at least there's help. Mami kicks out to shake some, quickly determines this isn't good enough, and steadies herself. It's important--because she has to aim very, very carefully for what she does next. 

Muskets swirl into being with bursts of light, a half-ring all around Mami, the first of which fire down at spiders--then more, then more, the entire ring expending with precise aim at each point directly in front of Mami in a line.

 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe has used Tiro Circle on Pink Moon Stick.

 <Pose Tracker> Georgia Jenks [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

Of course it wouldn't be that easy. Georgia grits her teeth as she watches the spiders continue to press onward. The wind attack from the Wind Knight scatters them upward, and then... well... you know what they say...

What goes up, must come down.

"Ack!" Georgia reacts to the sudden threat of raining spiders (or rather Orphan Spiders), jumping around at first to try and avoid them, then after quickly realizing that to be futile, raises her arms and crosses her sticks in front of her in a protective motion, generating a small shield of sparks. It's not quite enough to ''completely'' keep her safe, as the ones that miss and fall to the ground nearby just... well... ''crawl'' up her legs.

"Oh come on!" Georgia yells, letting out a growl as she knocks her sticks together once, twice, and then a third time. Another crack sounds through the air like before, and from the sticks rains a shower of sparks, seeking to zap and burn the crawling spiders off of her. "Get off you jerks!"

 COMBAT: Georgia Jenks has used Spark Shower on Pink Moon Stick.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick braces 7 Fatigue damage from Mami Tomoe's Tiro Circle, taking 11 Fatigue damage!  Stun applied to Pink
 Moon Stick!
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick dodges 27 Fatigue damage from Mikoto Minagi's Obsidian Blade: Destruction, taking 41 Fatigue damage!  Pink
 Moon Stick's Fade and Flash abilities activate!
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick braces 14 Fatigue damage from Georgia Jenks's Spark Shower, taking 6 Fatigue damage!  Georgia Jenks is
 Psyched!

 <Pose Tracker> Fuu Hououji [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

The Wind Knight grimaces, dismay piling on top of (admittedly ebbing) fear. Where she'd meant to obliterate the mass of not-actually-spiders, she just lifted so many of them, *too* many of them, aloft - and with the spell subsiding, they're beginning to descend again, en masse. She can make out enough to see that they're not *quite* spiders - surely they're more dangerous, not less -

She leaps into the air with a loud cry, turbulence enshrouding her sword as it materializes in-hand, and she sweeps her blade through the air above her with extra vigor, finally managing to shred some of the little critters. Some still manage to land on her, but for now, her armor withstands them, and she shakes loose those which manage to threaten her hands or legs. And by now, the green-clad Magic Knight's head is starting to clear in earnest, just by dint of one simple fact: These creatures CAN be killed.

There are just an awfully huge lot of them and it takes some focusing of damage to kill each one.

As the Wind Knight's boots touch the ground once more, she sidesteps, gathering up more of the wind and interposing herself and a wind barrier between Tsuru and another marching column of the tiny monsters. A handful get through the barrier; the Magic Knight assaults them with sword-tip and the soles of her boots, determined not to let a single one through. She glances back over her shoulder, is distracted by her allies; the timbre of Mikoto's roar is noticeably distressed, and neither Mami nor the escrima girl are doing well against the swarming Orphanlings. "Winds of Healing!!" she calls out, mentally shifting from offense to support; her area attacks may not be doing much good (so far), but she can at least aid her allies - muffling the crawly-things' venom, restoring her allies' strength and mobility and vision for the time being.

*Then* she glances back at Tsuru. "Are you all right - ?" she asks, maybe more breathlessly than would be properly reassuring.

 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji has used Winds of Healing on Mikoto Minagi.
 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji has used Winds of Healing on Mami Tomoe.
 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji has used Winds of Healing on Georgia Jenks.
 COMBAT: Georgia Jenks accepts Fuu Hououji's Winds of Healing, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Cleanse! All of Georgia Jenks's debuffs
 are cleared!
 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi accepts Fuu Hououji's Winds of Healing, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Cleanse! All of Mikoto Minagi's debuffs
 are cleared!
 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe accepts Fuu Hououji's Winds of Healing, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Cleanse! All of Mami Tomoe's debuffs are
 cleared!

 <Pose Tracker> Kozue Kaoru [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.


Kozue clings to Tsuru and for once... she's in the same position as her. Usually she's the protector, today she's the protected. This helplessness like ice in her soul. She watches the sea of spiders like one might a tsunami coming right at them, trusting only in what's in front of them to keep them back.

Every survival instinct screams against her, but Kozue has not been in this position in some time... where she feels this helpless.

The creatures come closer, and closer, and Kozue's breath hitches as the spiders start slipping through the gaps in the woven web. As they start passing the other HiME who she now notices, Mikoto in her screaming way of dealing with arachnophobia, Georgia with her escrima sticks until...

Kozue feels something ''instinctually''. "Orphans..." The mere fact feels like a slap to the face in addition to all of this fear. She at least thought... with Cass gone... with her mark gone...

... that she wouldn't have to deal with ''this'' anymore.

And yet now...

'Look out!' Kozue sees what she's being warned about... sees her reflection in the Orphan's creepy eyes.

The shriek Kozue makes as they crawl from the sides is quite maidenly, as she clings to Tsuru even more tightly. And then... the expected skittering of spidery legs and snapping of mandibles doesn't happen. Because Mami is there...

'Are you alright?' As she then looks at the Magic Knight having protected Tsuru from an angle she didn't even ''see''.

And Kozue's eyes widen at the realization. Typically she was the kind of magical girl who didn't concern herself with protecting civilians - always considered it stupid to put your neck on the line for the sake of someone else.

And right now she's forcing Mami to be in the position of slowing herself down, potentially paying a cost for her. As scared as she is... that moves her to act.

"T-Tsuru... C-Come on... we should find cover-! We're just-! Holding her back!" She says to Tsuru, shaken, once the roar of Mami's muskets stops ringing in her ears as she tries to rush away while holding Tsuru's hand. She's not moving that far really, she ''can't'' given the density of the swarm... just to the side of the sidewalk where... the closest possible cover can be found.

Kozue tries the handle of a car door with a sort of violent desperation.

That door sure isn't opening.

"WHO LOCKS THEIR CAR IN SHIBUYA!?"

Kozue shouts, frustrated and thoroughly scandalized at the idea that people don't just keep their car doors unlocked on the ''this'' side of town.

However, it might just alert the Magical Girls that... the ones they're trying to protect are on the move, as Kozue tries to use the few gaps the Magical Girls to try and move another car down and... tries another handle.

Does the idea that every car parked along the street might be locked occur to her?

Spoiler: Not Really.

She's just not thinking clearly right now. This move of hers though will rapidly leave them open to quite the swarm given how many spiders there are...


 <Pose Tracker> Tsuru [Infinity Institute (11)] has posed.

Fuu, the Wind Knight, may not be as strong against spiders as the lore may say, but Tsuru's expression shows no complaints as to her actual level of efficacy. The decimal spiders were well on their way to ruining a lot more than her outfit when Fuu jumped in to support Mami. Tsuru's somewhat frail looking form may have nothing but air between it and these leggy terrors, but at least it is extremely motivated air.

Tsuru stares back at Fuu for a moment, her strange eyes curious. Then she nods. "Thank you," she says.

Kozue tugs at her, and Tsuru does not hesitate to follow along, her sandals clapping the concrete as they go. She is panting lightly despite the short distance when they reach the cars, and she glances back to see how Mami, Fuu, and the others are faring while Kozue tries doors.

Looking down at Kozue's hand as she tries another door, Tsuru asks one of her strange questions.

"You don't have a key?"

 <Pose Tracker> Pink Moon Stick [Admin] has posed.

The spiderlegs are cold. Almost icy. No frost blooms beneath their spindly touch, and no bruises, but it is the gentle caress of the undead, or at least something that isn't properly alive, not alive in the way normal things are alive. Whatever the true source of Orphans, they have always felt fundamentally alien, alien in a way that daimons do also -- maybe they share a quadrant of some distant galaxy.

Maybe not.

They're unfairly fast when they have to be -- as opposed to the ominous carpet of doom they enjoyed being on approach, up against defenseless civilians. Mikoto bisects five legs instead of one eyeful torso, for example. That particular spider tips itself upwards, then totters, crablike, on the quintet it has left. Georgia zaps a half dozen off of herself and they're STILL MOVING afterwards. Yep, they're pretty tough; two-bullet menaces, not one, which means Mami has to shoot four times as much to protect both herself and Kozue. Inevitably, a couple get through, and the Puella Magi can feel them on her legs before she shakes them off.

At which point they run BETWEEN her legs, and behind her, and then they LEAP -- 

Endo, above, suddenly feels a lot less safe, because those spiders cleared a couple dozen feet horizontally towards Tsuru and Kozue. Their undersides 

If they can be taken care of, though, that distance might give them some safety, because there are a whole lot more spiders on the near side of the line of magical girls.

But there's another problem. 

In every direction, there's a lot of traffic going TOWARDS Shibuya that's all backed up.

But the lanes LEAVING Shibuya are completely empty.

Well -- they SHOULD be completely empty.

The one on the opposite side of the intersection from Kozue and Tsuru's flight... isn't.

 **HONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNK**

Maybe there's a pregnant lady in the cab of that massive truck (white paint, advertisements for Fairy Drop Boutique lusciously bright along the sides). DEFINITELY they don't know about the many many bodies sprawled helplessly in the intersection. And if those people aren't corpses yet -- they will be after they've been run over by a semi.

There are a lot of bodies, but also a lot of truck. Stop the truck? Move the bodies? 

Move quick.

And of course, the spiders haven't stopped moving. Here comes the third wave...

 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used The Widow's Kiss on Tsuru.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used The Widow's Kiss on Kozue Kaoru.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used Widowswarm on Fuu Hououji.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used Widowswarm on Mikoto Minagi.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used Widowswarm on Mami Tomoe.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used Widowswarm on Georgia Jenks.
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick has used In Your Face on Endo Naoki.
 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe partially dodges 2 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's Widowswarm, taking 7 Fatigue damage!  Mami Tomoe's
 Fade and Flash abilities activate!  Bind Break! All of Pink Moon Stick's debuffs are cleared!
 COMBAT: Endo Naoki decisively counters 12 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's In Your Face, taking 4 Fatigue damage!  Pink Moon
 Stick is Psyched!  Endo Naoki's Reverse and Tactician abilities activate!  Diversion applied to Endo Naoki!
 COMBAT: Endo Naoki's counterattack, Asteroid Eilen, partially gets through, doing 47 Fatigue damage to Pink Moon Stick!  
 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi perfectly dodges 8 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's Widowswarm, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Critical
 Dodge!  Mikoto Minagi's Fade and Flash abilities activate!
 COMBAT: Georgia Jenks dodges 4 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's Widowswarm, taking 6 Fatigue damage!  Georgia Jenks's Fade
 ability activates!  Bind Break! All of Pink Moon Stick's debuffs are cleared!
 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi covers Kozue Kaoru for Pink Moon Stick's attack, The Widow's Kiss, taking it upon herself instead!
 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi decisively counters 0 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's The Widow's Kiss, taking 0 Fatigue damage!
 Mikoto Minagi's Reverse and Tactician abilities activate!  Exhausted applied to Mikoto Minagi!
 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi's counterattack, Obsidian Blade: Dynamo, fails to get through, doing 0 Fatigue damage to Pink Moon Stick!  
 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe covers Tsuru for Pink Moon Stick's attack, The Widow's Kiss, taking it upon herself instead!
 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe fails to brace Pink Moon Stick's The Widow's Kiss, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Critical Hit!  Cripple, Exhausted,
 and Stun applied to Mami Tomoe!
 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji braces 5 Fatigue damage from Pink Moon Stick's Widowswarm, taking 8 Fatigue damage!  Critical Hit!  Fuu
 Hououji's Block and Parry abilities activate!  Bind Break! All of Pink Moon Stick's debuffs are cleared!

 <Pose Tracker> Pink Moon Stick [Admin] has posed.

Stingers sink into Mami and Mikoto instead of Kozue and Tsuru, and the girls discover that their magical selves are somewhat resistant to the venom imparted. Which is to say that they don't collapse on the spot. But it does course through their veins. At first it burns, and then it leaves weariness and disorientation behind. 

One could describe certain kinds of love the same way.

 <Pose Tracker> Mikoto Minagi [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

	Danger has a ''taste,'' did you know? It's a little metallic, right at the edges. Teeth catching at cheek, more howling than sense. And it has a sound, ''pounding'' like drums, blood rushing through with the flood of adrenaline. It is everywhere; it is everything.

	It is only when a familiar wind cuts through that narrow-band sensation that Mikoto at all thinks: they are here. No - no, first - the ''Wind Knight'' is here - helping her. Blanche is her face as it scrunches, eyes blinking shut for a crucial second. The feral sound dies in her lungs. Her mouth closes, and opens again.

	She remembers how to --

	-- how to ''move,'' first off, because the spiders are still coming. A hand releases Miroku's hilt to press against the base of Hachiko's statue as she backflips away from those cold, cold legs; there is a bend to her elbow as that one point of contact pushes her ''up,'' and her legs hook around that good boy's snout, a full revolution about it.

	She makes herself wonder: did she hurt him? Imposes hope on her mind, that she did not.

	And she's in the air. Mikoto ''still'' cannot fly. Mai can fly, and Fate can fly, and Yumi can fly - even Endo learned to fly! - but Mikoto has ever been with the earth. Even so, she is ''remarkably'' manoeuvrable in mid-air. She twists, in a motion she learned from old friends. She lands on her feet.

	''Now'' the words come to her.

	"It's okay," Mikoto says, more to herself than anyone else. "It's okay." String the sounds to words; place them in her mind. It's agonisingly slow, against the grain. "It's..."

	This is the precise moment Mikoto places in her mind the yell which rose over the din, and her head jerks up. "Kozue?!"

	'... hopefully Kozue can stay out of it from now on.'

	Kozue can't BE HERE, is Mikoto's first thought. It is, at least, a thought, with a consistent beginning and end, and meaning in the middle. Her second: can she be around Kozue?

	She knows enough to know she's mad. That has, historically, not worked out well for Kozue. Well, a little better, these days. Even so...

	There's no time to stop and worry about that.

	There's a problem well-known in philosophy. This is a truck, not a trolley, but the ideal stands. Five strangers, or...

	Mikoto, who has both the will and capacity to halt objects moving at pace, does not go for the runaway semi.

	She moves in the opposite direction.

	She moves for Kozue.

	Some things change, and some things stay the same. Like this: the way Mikoto leaps ''over'' Kozue, and the ground quakes as she lashes in downwards diagonal arc towards three things like spiders looking to take advantage of her cunning plan. Again, with concern under its stark ferocity: "Kozue!"

	But there are so ''many'' spiders, and they are so ''fast.'' Miroku buries in concrete, not Orphan-flesh. Tug, tug, and it will take too many seconds to pull it out -- one of them already leaping --

	Mikoto lifts a hand from Miroku again, but not to propel herself away, this time.

	Rather, she ''grabs'' the Orphan - and bodily slams it into Miroku's bare edge. She feels the stinger sink deep into the veins of her arm. Her fingers clutch on instinct, before they release. She knows before she thinks: it was a bad call. She cries out, more pained than terrified. Her blood boils, more literally than metaphorically.

	Her eyes blink, bleary; for a horrifying moment, her shoulders sag. She shakes her head, forcefully, as she gathers herself again. It takes a different kind of effort, now.

	"It must be 'cause me and..." Mikoto starts, cuts herself off just in time. "It's not Kozue's fault," she says, instead. "It can't be."

	Orphans yearn for HiME; Kozue isn't, any more.

	"We'll --" her teeth grit; she draws a breath sharply through her nose. It doesn't feel right. (Or maybe it would, if she weren't so stubborn.) Sharp of voice and blade as she wrests hers from the ground, she tells Kozue: "We'll take care of it!"

	And that blade lashes out, again, tailed by a war-cry. Horizontally, she cuts a path.

 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi has used Obsidian Blade: Dauntlessness on Pink Moon Stick.

 <Pose Tracker> Mami Tomoe [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

Mami feels the cold of the spiders climbing before she can shake them off, but she has no time to contemplate their natures--not as they run through her space behind. "No!" There are still more of them past Mami's attempt to shoot through them, and she leaps backward, despite the danger--

Because Kozue is right about one thing: Mami does not plan to leave her and Tsuru undefended. 

Mami almost didn't catch what Kozue said about holding her back. Almost. But, before she can speak, something else happens: she's already on the way backward, shifting midair to put herself between the spider and Tsuru, and when she hits the ground in a crouch, she does come away with the spider--and a sting. 

"Ugh--" 

The Puella Magi wavers in place. She doesn't collapse but she feels the burn immediately, and then wobbles on her feet, dazedly stumbling backward. 

She catches herself but still feels sluggish as she moves, unable for the moment to stop and also take care of the honking truck she now notices. "You're--" 

"Not holding me back!" Mami tells Kozue, "I do well with... an audience, remember?" 

As she speaks she's coiling up ribbon in her hands, and since she can't just blast them all away with all these people here, especially not trusting her aim--she throws out another set of ribbon, whirling forward as gold swirls around her in place and swings into great big sheets of ribbon to push back as many spiders as she can back towards the ravine. 

Fuu's healing now feels terribly distant, despite how much help it was moments ago--but she doesn't have the time to complain. She is throwing out ribbons as quickly as she can.

 COMBAT: Mami Tomoe has used Velare on Pink Moon Stick.

 <Pose Tracker> Georgia Jenks [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

The spiders are indeed resilient. Georgia grunts as the ones she zapped off of her aren't exactly completely disposed of. "Annoying...!" She grouses, resisting the urge to start stomping on them as they scurry. As good as these boots she has on are, they aren't made for stomping on Orphans unfortunately. She takes the next few moments to regain her bearings, looking around quickly. There's a girl with guns (which is cool), a boy with a sword who is ''flying'' (which is also cool), Mikoto (cool by default), a girl who also has a sword (which counts as cool raised to the second power), and two girls who have been caught up in all of this (which is not cool, though they themselves probably are rather cool, Georgia assumes). Thankfully they're being watched out for, though Georgia still yells at them: "Hey! You guys should get outta here!" No need for any more casualties, Georgia reasons, wincing at the unconscious bodies dotting the ground around them.

There's another shout, this time from the girl with the sword, and Georgia turns in her direction just as a refreshing gust of wind washes over her. Oddly enough, she feels ''much'' better now. It quickly dawns on her that it was likely a healing spell of some sort, and she smiles. "Hey! Thanks! Ummm... you didn't happen to see a girl with glasses around here? I sorta lost track of her in all of... this." She rubs her neck sheepishly, hoping Fuu-san managed to get away.

That's when there's the sudden loud blare of a truck horn ringing through the area. Georgia turns sharply, eyes widening when she spies the aforementioned truck barreling down the road -- right towards a group of knocked out people! "Oh crap! Hey! Help me!" She calls over her shoulder to the Wind Knight before springing into action. Using the newfound energy gifted to her, she ''leaps'' into the air. She can't fly on her own like the boy with the sword, but she can certainly jump. In the time it takes to exhale, she's landed in the road, right in the path of the oncoming truck.

"Slow down ya idiot!" She shouts at the driver as if they can hear her. Either way, she crosses her arms and knocks her sticks together, calling forth a large conflagration of sparks that coalesce into a convex shape -- a shield, to be precise, that she aims to use as a buffer to stop the barreling semi.

 <Pose Tracker> Georgia Jenks [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

The spiders are indeed resilient. Georgia grunts as the ones she zapped off of her aren't exactly completely disposed of. "Annoying...!" She grouses, resisting the urge to start stomping on them as they scurry. As good as these boots she has on are, they aren't made for stomping on Orphans unfortunately. She takes the next few moments to regain her bearings, looking around quickly. There's a girl with guns (which is cool), a boy with a sword who is ''flying'' (which is also cool), Mikoto (cool by default), a girl who also has a sword (which counts as cool raised to the second power), and two girls who have been caught up in all of this (which is not cool, though they themselves probably are rather cool, Georgia assumes). Thankfully they're being watched out for, though Georgia still yells at them: "Hey! You guys should get outta here!" No need for any more casualties, Georgia reasons, wincing at the unconscious bodies dotting the ground around them.

There's another shout, this time from the girl with the sword, and Georgia turns in her direction just as a refreshing gust of wind washes over her. Oddly enough, she feels ''much'' better now. It quickly dawns on her that it was likely a healing spell of some sort, and she smiles. "Hey! Thanks! Ummm... you didn't happen to see a girl with glasses around here? I sorta lost track of her in all of... this." She rubs her neck sheepishly, hoping Fuu-san managed to get away.

That's when there's the sudden loud blare of a truck horn ringing through the area. Georgia turns sharply, eyes widening when she spies the aforementioned truck barreling down the road -- right towards a group of knocked out people! "Oh crap! Hey! Help me!" She calls over her shoulder to the Wind Knight before springing into action. Using the newfound energy gifted to her, she ''leaps'' into the air. She can't fly on her own like the boy with the sword, but she can certainly jump. In the time it takes to exhale, she's landed in the road, right in the path of the oncoming truck.

"Slow down ya idiot!" She shouts at the driver as if they can hear her. Either way, she crosses her arms and drums her sticks in rapid fashion, calling forth a large conflagration of sparks that coalesce into a convex shape -- a shield, to be precise, that she aims to use as a buffer to stop the barreling semi.

 COMBAT: Georgia Jenks has used Drumming Away! on Pink Moon Stick.

 <Pose Tracker> Kozue Kaoru [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.


Tsuru's strange question is ''very'' her, and while Kozue's accustomed to this weirdness enough to typically be more patient with it than nearly ''ANYTHING'' else - she's also panicked right now.

"O-Of course I don't have a key! What do you think I own every car in Shibuya!?"

Kozue's out of breath only due to panic, less than fitness as she keeps on pulling Tsuru along.

"Before you ask! I don't!"

Kozue spies spiders beelining at them and suddenly she tugs harder, picking up the pace as she heads to the next car. And then... right before the spiders would reach them right as the truck HONKKKKKKK makes it sound like she's about to get run over by them.

... Mikoto...

Those fangs sink right in. And even Kozue can't stop the ''visceral'' reaction to seeing someone else suffer what might have happened to her - in some weird twisted sense of second hand horror, second hand suffering.

And then what she says-

"Shut up." Kozue snaps at her, "Don't ''even'' pretend like this is your fault! I am ''not'' in the mood!"

She's about to take off with Tsuru again, when, she sees what she missed from that perspective. Mami Tomoe between ''Tsuru'' and a spider. Now the horror seems even more personal. Mami insists that she does well with an audience but-

"I know that!" And yet, despite saying that... she starts moving again, pulling Tsuru along with her, "But I can watch you ''better'' once we're behind some cover!"

One more car down... "Come on-!" ... her hand reaches for the next handle.

"OPEN!"


 COMBAT: Kozue Kaoru has used An Ex-HiME's Gratitude on Mikoto Minagi.

 <Pose Tracker> Endo Naoki [Juuban Public School (12)] has posed.

Endo spies Kozue and Tsuru amidst the row of parked cars, thankful that his allies are quick to defend the two unfortunate girls in the midst of the wave of orphans. The blaring honk of the oncoming truck is similarly concerning-as are the jumping spiders.

"I'll do what I can about the spiders!" The boy volunteers, hoping that his allies can avert the coming disaster. He's also being very optimistic about his orphan killing abilities. Especially considering he only narrowly avoids taking on another swarm of passengers in the meantime, blade swinging to ward off several of the orphans that draw too close.

And then he makes his move. Belkan runes appear at his feet, acting as a launching pad that directs him...down. Toward the wave below.

The tip of Fallen Stern crashes down into the mass, a detonation of purple energy ripping through the surrounding monsters. It is not a safe place to be, but if there's one thing Endo is good at--it's crashing in to things.

 COMBAT: Endo Naoki has used Meteor Absturz on Pink Moon Stick.
 COMBAT: Mikoto Minagi accepts Kozue Kaoru's An Ex-HiME's Gratitude, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Critical Hit!  Mikoto Minagi is
 Quipped!
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick perfectly dodges 11 Fatigue damage from Mami Tomoe's Velare, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Critical Dodge!
 Pink Moon Stick's Fade and Flash abilities activate!
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick fails to brace Georgia Jenks's Drumming Away!, taking 26 Fatigue damage!  Stagger applied to Pink Moon
 Stick!
 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick dodges 25 Fatigue damage from Endo Naoki's Meteor Absturz, taking 37 Fatigue damage!  Pink Moon Stick's
 Fade and Flash abilities activate!

 <Pose Tracker> Fuu Hououji [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

Most fights, however frantic they may be, at least offer an occasional moment of respite, or of clarity - a chance to take in the situation at greater length than the instants between slashes or shots or spells. But this particular fray offers no such relief from the ongoing onslaught; there are always more of the miniature spider-like Orphans, it seems, no matter how many are crushed or cleft or caught up and flung away.

The Wind Knight still does her best to stay aware of the situation as a whole - not just where the Orphanlings are now and where they're headed towards her ("all around" in both cases, it seems, but most thickly there or there) and where her allies are currently arranged ... plus those two innocents, trying to find safety. She looks back at Georgia, briefly unsure how to answer, and simply calls out, "She ran for the station." She doesn't like to lie to an ally; she'd rather explain but they don't have *time* --

The Magic Knight of Wind can't help but look when she hears the truck's horn blaring; a noticeable handful more of the Orphanlings manage to crawl up her legs while she's thus distracted, although thankfully their venom finds less purchase in her veins than their legs and stingers found upon her skin. "Too many," the Wind Knight grumbles, dismissing her sword and swatting away the most obvious of the creepy crawlies.

There are too many bodies in the road; they might be *possible* to move, but not carefully, and not without hurting them worse in the process. So if the collapsed civilians can't be moved, the truck needs to be stopped or redirected, and quickly. And, of course, she needs to do it without hurting the driver.

The girl with the sticks is already on it while the Wind Knight is factoring out variables. But stick-girl is also applying a form of force that the Wind Knight wasn't equipped to, and with a shout of, "WINDS OF PROTECTION!!!" she adds shield to shield - a barrier of focused wind gusting to life around the air-drumming girl, buttressing the sparks that her drumming has called forth. If one barrier won't be enough to stop the truck, two barriers interwoven should fare better.

 COMBAT: Pink Moon Stick braces 19 Fatigue damage from Mikoto Minagi's Obsidian Blade: Dauntlessness, taking 8 Fatigue damage!
 Mikoto Minagi is Psyched!
 COMBAT: Fuu Hououji has used Winds of Protection on Georgia Jenks.

 <Pose Tracker> Tsuru [Infinity Institute (11)] has posed.

Tsuru blinks twice at Kozue's question. It gets answered for her, and she does not seem to require elaboration. She claps along behind Kozue to test more cars, glancing back at times to check on the combatants, and once in mild startlement when Kozue yells at Mikoto.

Releasing Kozue's hand at last, Tsuru reaches into her haori. Her pale hand withdraws her vade mecum: a strange metal box attached to a slim cylindrical handle, both decorated with branches and sparrows. Uncapping the handle, she lets a short, dull-edged blade fall into her palm. It's an antique letter-opener.

It is also a car-opener.

Using the base of the 'hilt', Tsuru swings sharply at the rear window of the car Kozue is trying. It sprays a spiderweb of cracks across the glass, which then shatter on a second blow, dribbling gummy car glass onto the ground and inside on the seat.

"If we can't be in a box we can be in a burrow," she tells Kozue, and though her voice's tone is as wispy as ever, there is a curt quickness to it. "Come."

Tsuru takes a few steps back, then dives lightly through the window, landing across the seat with her body extended, face-down. It was the sort of jump a ballet dancer would take when expecting her partner to catch her torso and hold her aloft. That is in fact where she learned it. She pulls her feet through (the car was not wide enough), swivelling to make room for Kozue, while watching the battle out the window she is now adjacent to.

 COMBAT: Georgia Jenks accepts Fuu Hououji's Winds of Protection, taking 0 Fatigue damage!  Critical Hit!  Accelerate and Withstand
 applied to Georgia Jenks!

[[2020-12-21 - Widows and Orphans 2|TO BE CONTINUED]]

[[Category:Logs]]