Battle Fantasia MUSH - User contributions [en]

2020-06-02 - A Turtle Made It To The Water

2020-06-03T03:51:19Z

Tlynn2002:

{|class="toccolours" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''A Turtle Made It To The Water!'''
|-
|'''Summary''': 
''Save the turtles!''
|-
|'''Who''': 
[[Kimiko Akane]], [[Steven Universe]], [[Kasagami Araki]]
|-
|'''Where:''' 
''Tokyo Bay''
|-
|'''OOC - IC Date:''' 
June 02, 2020 - September 02,2015
|-
|}

<Pose Tracker> Kimiko Akane [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

With school break winding down, Kimiko is trying to enjoy her last moments of freedom before getting back to the grind of school work and her nightly routine in the city. It's a really hot and windy day today so she is wearing a short sleeve black shirt with a rainbow across the front and jean shorts with her hair pulled back in two high buns and a red headband. She is not currently wearing her earbuds but they are draped around her neck for now.

As Kimiko approaches the beach area, she glances back up towards the intricate house up on the hill. It really stands out here and she admires it for a few moments before taking out her phone from her bag and snapping a few pictures for later. She imagines it would prove to be an inspiration for her budding artistic talents.

Heading back to the beach, she doesn't seem to have a care in the world. There aren't many people around which is good for her but then there is a sudden commotion to her left side. There seems to be a large flock of seagulls gathering around something in the sand! At first she imagines someone just left some food there but curiosity gets the best of her and she walks towards the birds.

It only takes a moment for her to see what they are going after and she gasps. "Oh no!" There is a bunch of baby turtles emerging from beneath the sand and the seagulls are very eager for a meal. Thinking quickly, Kimiko grabs her bag and uses it to help her shoo them away. One baby turtle falls from a seagulls mouth and flops around on the ground before uprighting itself and heading towards the water.

Kimiko works to help them for awhile but there are SO MANY baby turtles and it feels almost impossible for her to save them all but she is doing her best!

<Pose Tracker> Steven Universe [Juuban Public School (6)] has posed.

At the sound of screaming, laughing seagulls, something stirs near that contemporary beach house. More precisely, underneath it. The sand udner the decks shifts as a large shape begins to move. A pair of white glowing eyes can be seen in the shade.

Suddenly, it erupts into motion! A blur if cotton candy colors, and it is running right at Kimiko at extreme speed! Faster, and faster, until...!

It runs right past and begins snapping at seagulls, chasing one down the bachside. Its... Lion! And he has a vendetta against these LAUGHING DEMON BIRDS. They are LOUD and OBNOUXIOUS and they INTRRUPT NAPS.

"What was that?!" comes a muffled voice from beyond a screened door atop the decking. It opens as a stout child runs out on the deck. It is Steven, of course! Who else would live here? ...Actually a lot of people probably, it is a nice spot! "H-Hey! Lion, leave the seagulls alone!" he shouts. The boy begins to run down the stairs, grumbling with each creak of the board. "If he catches another and brings it inside, it'll take forever to catch again. Who woulda thought three gems and a kid would have such a hard time catching a bird..."

Flip flops touch sand, and the boy starts running out toward the commotion. "Hey! Sorry if the lion scared you! He has a thing against birds, and--"

Then he sees them. His eyes grow wide and fill with wonder!

"Baby turtles...!"

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

Sun, sea, and the last dregs of ''freedom''...at least for students in Tokyo! Kasagami Araki has managed to get herself away from the crush of Student Council duties enough to sharpen up her kendo skills! Sadly, still alone: she's yet to find a partner willing to spar with her since quitting the kendo club.

Ever since then, it's been high on her mind to keep her talents up, to improve. And so the beach with sand and sounds of sea birds is a nice getaway so she can concentrate. She's dressed in the red-and-black wetsuit she prefers whenever she's out on the beach for something that might end up involving water. For now though, the Duelist has her hair tied back a bit extra today, and the long wooden blade swings over and over again in the air.

Uneven makes for difficult footwork, and that's exactly what's on Kassie's mind as she evenly flows from strike to strike to strike. Overhead, side, sweep up, turn! This process repeats itself until two figures as well as the birdly commotion has her pausing. Sweeping aside the neat footprints she's made, the young woman slips back on her waterproof boots after a quick toweling from the sand, and her blade is over her shoulders.

"Kimi-chan, Steve-kun! ...Hey, aren't those...?" A smile, warm rather than her usual ferocious one blossoms for a moment, before she notices the seagulls. Ah. ''Ah''. Well, she can hardly fault the gulls, given her own affinity for large birds of prey.

"Beautiful, aren't they? The circle of life can be beautiful." Her head tilts thoughtfully. Hmm. Can she really break the harshness of predators to such young kids, ponders Kassie in her own head.

Not that she's too many years removed from Kimiko, anyway!

"And a bit brutal." States Kasagami, watching the two as much as she is the competitions of seagulls and tiny turtles!

<Pose Tracker> Kimiko Akane [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

Two more seagulls are batted away before Kimiko notices the blur coming towards her. Her eyes widen in surprise. She remembers seeing the cat before so Lion's presence isn't as much of a shock as his speed is. For a second she is worried the pink cat would make her efforts to save the turtles futile. That is until she notices he seems to be only going for the seagulls. She smiles and continues helping. The first batch of turtles is getting closer the the waters edge and a few quickly get swept up in the current and taken out to sea. It's a relief to Kimiko that some have already been saved.

Steven races towards Lion and Kimiko's face still shows just how scared and worried she was. She didn't care for the seagulls any more than Steven did and she nods at his exclamation. "Steven-kun, please help! There are so many seagulls and....and...." She's out of breath from her efforts already and pauses for a second. "... they are so tiny and need our help!" One of the turtles seems to have trouble flipping over and Kimiko gives it a gentle nudge before it speeds towards the water. Behind her, a seagull flaps its wings close enough to feel the air on her neck and she shudders before waving it away with her hands.

As more and more sea turtles emerge it seems like there is no end in sight. She wonders just how many of them there are lurking beneath the sand. A worrying thought about not being able to save them all crosses her mind before she shakes her head. She had to try to help as many as possible. It seemed super important to her.

Kasagami's presence isn't noticed until she speaks up and Kimiko stumbles a little. "Kasa-chan!" It feels like its been awhile since she has seen the older girl. It is a welcome sight and surely she would help them, right? Instead she doesn't seem to be as worried as Kimiko is. "Can you help us? I...they need our help." She doesn't seem to think about the circle of life when she is here right now and can do something to help them. "They are just babies. So tiny... helpless..."

<Pose Tracker> Steven Universe [Juuban Public School (6)] has posed.

Lion is ambivalent toward the little turtles. They aren't crystal lizards and shiny, so he doesn't want to eat them. Nor does he really care what they are doing. However, seagulls are LOURD AND BAD, and thus, Lion keeps chasing that one seagull he has separated from the rest all over-- his sueprnatural speed keeps up with what would be an advantage the bird would have by flying fast.

Steven gets a good few seconds to see the situation. "Oh no! They are gonna be dinner like that one guy in the cartoon I watched where he talks about turtle soup!" Okay, not exactly the takeaway from that cartoon but sure. "Go away! Shoo!" Steven says, flailing wildly at birds that try to sweeop low and grab a mouthful of turtle. Being so small, Steven is less of a threat to them. "Ugh... we need... Kasagami!"

A sweeping gaze finds another person he knows coming down the beach. "Help us stop the birds, they are being mean to the turtles!" But there are so many of them... "This isn't gonna work! We need some kind of distraction!"

But what could distract a buncha seagulls?

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

It's the look more than the turtles that do it for her. Kimiko is just so ''worried'' and really Kassie thinks the world of the young puella. And Steven is asking her too! The two kids are an unassailable wall of innocent concern! The Duelist relents. Hasn't Kimi having to deal with an evil rodent enough of a problem? She smiles reassuringly to the young girl.

"They are, Kimi-chan. The little ones have to learn to survive on their own." Offers Kassie. Is she really going to leave them to their fate!?

Luckily, no. Stepping forward as one of of the seagulls gets brave enough to try buzzing for one of the little turtles that's slid nearly onto its side with the lightly crashing waves, she adroitly steps around the swells of turtles trying to make their way to the water.

SWOOSH! Kasagami swings her two-handed weapon just outside of diving range, making the bird bank roughly to avoid crashing into it.

A seagull is probably saying something unkind about Kassie from the sheer shrieking volume the bird pierces out.

"I'm the last person that's going to criticize some hunting, Seagull-kuns. What I ''AM'' a bit mad about is that you're acting like one hundren-yen store knockoff eagles! Come back when the turtles are grown up and you're royal avians!" SWOOSH SWOOSH SWOOSH!

Kasagami Araki is, as usual, trying to compete with the loud birds for volume as well as pure intensity. Her wooden sword is swung about as much as her glare is! Grrr! Grrrr!

"If we had some fish maybe?" Suggests Kassie vaguely. She knows eagles and falcons, not seagulls!

<Pose Tracker> Kimiko Akane [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

While Lion enjoys chasing the one seagull around, there are many more still flapping around the trio and the baby turtles. Steven does his best to help and Kimiko is thankful that he is there. It seems like they are getting more angry and agitated though. Before she can help, a seagull takes off with a turtle in its beak and Kimiko gasps. "Nooooo!" Ugh. This is terrible, she thinks.

But then Kasagami is there helping! She is relieved and the seagulls are definitely NOT happy about this sudden development. Their squaking gets louder and more fierce it seems like. There really aren't that many but it feels like there are hundreds of them just by the noise level.

Steven and Kasagami mention two things that get Kimiko thinking and she remembers something in her bag. Taking it back in her arms she quickly shoves a hand inside and rummages around before there is a small crinkle under her fingers. What she brings out is a bag of crackers. Not just any crackers though... fish crackers! Even though her and Mikoto had munched on some yesterday there were still quite a bit left.

Without much thought she rolls it up and tosses it to Steven. "Take those away from the nest please! See if you can get them distracted!" Birds liked crackers right? She can only hope so!

With more and more baby turtles reaching the rippling tide along the shore, Kimiko feels a little relieved but there is still work to be done and she goes back to sheltering the turtles with her body rather than swiping at the seagulls around her. One can only imagine how much poop will end up on her but that doesn't matter right now as the line of turtles grows and finally, after what seems like forever, the nest appears to be almost empty. As the last batch of babies make their way to the water, Kimiko follows them, trying to shield them all the way to the waters edge.

<Pose Tracker> Steven Universe [Juuban Public School (6)] has posed.

Kassie to the rescue! "What were you doing with that? Training?" Steven asks, trying to wave his arms wildly to spook some more birds. Why else would she have a weapon out and about? Speaking of... he needs to remember sometime to ask her about her cool powers! She's like the only person in his magic friends group that he doesn't know a bit about!

Shes very cool and mysterious like that.

The boy sees Kimiko fishing around in her bag for something. "Have an idea?" he asks. A seagull naps at one of his fingers as he swats at them. "Ow! Hey, they are really mean! What's gotten in to them?" He just frowns and looks at the finger. No blood or anything, just sore. He does furrow his brow some however.

She produces... "Crackers!" The boy exclaims, running over. "They like to steal chips and fries and stuff, these might totally work!" he says, The boy quickly empties most into his hand, and throws a few onto the ground, which near immediately get taken, and pulls attention toward Steven. "Its working-- oh thats a lot of-- AHH!"

Within about ten seconds of the child holding his fully hand up, there is a cloud of white feathers around him. "Don't eat me!!!" he yells, and starts running off in a random direction, flailing with a free hand!

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

Kassie's ears are protesting at the volume. The Duelist still barks back with various quips though!

"Wing off!"

"Go fly into a vat of uncooked cheesecake batter!"

"Tailfeather rot on both your houses!"

Each one gets a swing, though she never actually hits any of the birds! Quite on purpose. She really ''does'' have an affinity for hunting birds.

A glance over to Steven, and a quick grin! "Even someone as good as I am has to keep their skills up! I hate to shatter the illusion, but it's not ''JUST'' my natural genius, athleticism, and tenacity that makes me so good with a sword!" Yup. Ego still very much there despite her various kickings and general deflatings since losing to Utena.

Ah, yes, the ancient Cracker Distraction! It seems to be working, and Kasagami laughs. "Excellent work you two! Always exploit the enemy's weaknesses upon the battlefield is the quickest way to victory! ...Huh. Faster than I thought Steve-kun! Charge my friend! Like a great golden bull! Gem bull!" Encourages the Duelist even as she steps before some of the remaining crowd of feathery fiends! And most importantly, defending the defender of tiny-turtles, Kimi-chan!

'Pick on someone your own size' says the Duelist's glare to them! ''SLASH''!

<Pose Tracker> Kimiko Akane [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

As Kimiko turns back towards the nest, she sees Steven get bit and grumbles to herself something about birds, lower life forms and extinction. "Are you okay Ste-" Her question is interrupted by the birds suddenly swarming him. Kimiko runs over closer. "I am sorry Steven-kun! Just hang on for a few more minutes. The nest is almost empty!" The birds are distracted by the crackers enough that the final wave of turtles makes it's way to the water.

Once Kimiko is sure there are no more turtles, she turns her attention to helping Steven. "Throw the crackers away from you!" Hoping he will just drop the rest, she bats a few birds away from him as the birds start to converge on the ground wherever the crackers land.

In all of this, Kimiko can still hear the familiar encouragement of Kasagami. She laughs a little. "Thanks for your help Kasa-chan!" She seems more at ease now that most of the turtles have made it to the water. "Even if I couldn't save them all, at least I helped most of them right?" That has to count for something she thinks.

Her attention turns back to Steven, "How are you doing over there? I think it's safe to head away from here." Kimiko sighs a little, feeling suddenly exhausted and she is definitely going to need a shower after all this.

She covers her eyes with her hand one more time to scan the waters edge without the glare of the sun and it seems like most of the turtles have disappeared under the water. They were on their own now but at least they had a good start. "Thank you guys for helping me.... for helping ''them''." If she can get over quick enough, Kimiko will give Kasagami a big hug and a thumbs up to Steven.

<Pose Tracker> Steven Universe [Juuban Public School (6)] has posed.

That was an extremely Kasagami response, all right! "I think you are pretty good at the sword!" he shouts quickly through the SQUACKING cloud aorund him. He himself has never really been good with a blade-- even a wooden booken at the occasional training classes shows he might not be suited for it, despite his best efforts.

He doesn't slack off or anything! But he is really flinchy.

"I'm okay, the birds just really want the crackers!" he screams as he runs around, constantly zigzagging due to vision obfuscation. And then, he trips!" Oh noooo!" he cries, hitting the sand. Steven quickly balls up on the ground (like a turtle!) and the seagulls just go nuts. Soem crackers hit the ground, but not all of them, the ones in reach are quickly fought over, the rest of the birds fly around and land on top of the boy, trying to fingure out how to get the rest in the hand underneath him.

Hearing Kimiko's voice, he gives a thumbs up out of a blob of white and gray.

When he hears the all clear, the hidden hand flings the rest out to the side, and every single seagull leaps off the boy after it. A bit disheveled and bleary-eyed, but otherwise okay. "We... did it...!" he says, holding his fists up and slowly walking over. On the way over, the boy grabs the collar of his shirt and sniffs it once or twoce. "I smell like birds... ew."

Lion trots over to the group as well. he seems content.

There is a bird foot sticking out of his mouth.

"No! Lion, drop it!" the boy scolds. The cat hesitates, but eventualyl relents, his giant maw opening. A seagull SCEECHES and takes off, coated in slobber. "Good boy."

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

Wiping some sweat from her brow, Kassie can't help but smile a little as she watches the little things amble into the sea! From somewhere in that suit, she produces a small camera. Snap! Snap! Tuck away!

That one is getting shared with Setsu-chan later!

That smile grows however as she's caught up in a hug from Kimi! Leaning down just a bit, she wraps one arm around the younger girl and squeezes tightly. There's genuine warmth there for a bit. "We will be remembered as the heroes of the sea! Just remember Kimi-chan, birds of prey need to eat too." She gently cautions, before looking over to Steven. Wince!

"Those must be good crackers. This is where I'd try to haul you two off for impromptu anti-bird sword lessons." She raises her blade, and swings it one handed thoughtfully in the air.

"...I guess I haven't lost my touch. Wasn't a sparrow, but I have seagulls down!" What is she talking about!?

"But yes. Showers, both of you. We're going to smell like feathers and flying jerks if we don't!" Time to engage Older Sis Kassie mode as she prods her two younger charges towards the beach changing rooms! Prooood!

[[Category:Logs]]

2020-06-02 - A Turtle Made It To The Water

2018-07-04 - After the Dream

2018-07-04T08:59:03Z

{|class="toccolours" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''Title: <Your title>'''
|-
|'''Summary''': 
''After facing certain death and the destruction of the world, Kimiko is overwhelmed by her memories...''
|-
| '''Who:''' 
[[Kimiko Akane]]
|-
| '''Where:''' 
Tokyo Bay
|-
| '''OOC - IC Date:''' 
July 4th, 2018 - April 26th, 2015
|-
|}

The view from up here above the bay is usually relaxing to Kimiko. To be able to watch and see everything going on around her without being noticed made her feel special in a strange way. Trying to explain that to anyone would probably sound weird but tonight it doesn't matter anyway because it's not comforting at all. In fact, she feels more lonely than she has probably ever felt in her life.

Moving away from the edge of the building, she can still see out across the ocean and she focuses her eyes on glimmers of lights in the distance. Her mother never took her to the ocean at night but even just the smell of the ocean air brings back memories. Memories that have been painfully drawn to the surface by the events of the last few days, memories that she wants, more than anything, to erase.

Her mind plays over and over everything that happened, being sucked into the book, having to save and protect civilians so the others could destroy the thing that threatened to take their very world from them. It's overwhelming just going over what they experienced. The one thought that keeps coming back to her though is the feeling of her mother's kiss on her forehead. It felt so real and yet it wasn't.

Suddenly, she kicks a loose piece of the roof off the side of the building in anger. Kimiko wants to scream how unfair it is. She knew that they had to leave the dream but why can't she get past this and how was she supposed to even begin moving forward with her life when she finally had a taste of everything that she ever truly wanted in this world? She thought she knew the answer but now, Kimiko is not sure anymore.

As the night continues, Kimiko eventually is one of the only people around. She raises a hand to the back of her neck, feeling the place where the familiar mark was and then she looks down at the ring on her hand. Both of those things were reminders of what she had chosen and the young girl thinks about how it wasn't worth it. Not for the little bit she gained from her choice. If she had a chance to do it over again, she now believes she knows what choice she would make.

It's too much and she suddenly collapses in a heap on the roof. Her silver hammer lands with a thud near her. For a long time, the only sound coming from her is quiet sobbing...

2018-06-26 - LOTUS INCEPTION: Kimiko Akane

2018-07-04T08:52:44Z

{|class="toccolours" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''LOTUS INCEPTION: Kimiko Akane'''
|-
|'''Summary''': 
''Kasagami and Kimiko meet in her dream and a difficult decision is made''
|-
| '''Who:''' 
[[Kimiko Akane]] [[Kasagami Araki]]
|-
| '''Where:''' 
Akane Household
|-
| '''OOC - IC Date:''' 
6-26-18 - 4-24-15
|-
|}

<Pose Tracker> Kimiko Akane [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

The fresh air in the park makes Kimiko sigh heavily with a contentment she cannot remember ever feeling before. As she sits on the blanket on the grass where her family have laid out a picnic, Kimiko watches her dad playing with her sister just a few feet from them. Watching him spinning Maiyumi in circles and hearing their laughter, she soaks in the memory and then turns to her mom.

"Mayumi-chan really loves him doesn't she?" Her mother nods and after a pause adds, "He loves you too Kimi-chan. Don't forget that okay?" Kimiko feels a warm hand on her shoulder and she tilts her head, resting it on her mother's hand before she reaches up a hand to place over hers. "I won't mom."

This day. This feeling. She wants it to last forever. "This whole day has been amazing mom. We should do this more often." She doesn't add that this is what she always felt was missing from her life because that would mean that she was admitting that this couldn't possibly be real and it feels to real for it to only be a dream.

As her father and sister return to the blanket, Mayumi plops down next to Kimiko. "What are you guys talking about?" Her big eyes peer up at Kimiko and it makes the older girl laugh. "You, of course! We were talking about how you're the cutest little sister in the world." Her parents both smile at the interaction between their daughters. Mayumi grins and hugs Kimiko before looking back to the food and loudly declaring, "I am hungryyyy!"

The four of them begin to eat from the selection of sushi and other homemade items that they had brought with them. It doesn't take long for the meal to be devoured but then Ayuka brings out a small package. "Don't forget dessert!" She hands them to Kimiko and inside are chocolate chip cookies. Kimiko's favorite thing in the world. Taking one, Kimiko passes the others around to the rest of her family. "Thank you mom! They are so yummy as always!"

The sun begins to set in the park and the crowds start to disperse until the Akane family is one of the only ones left there. It's as if none of them want this day to end. Finally, Seiji stands up, "We should start packing up before it gets too late." The girls nod and begin helping with the packing and pretty soon everything is tied up in a neat bundle for the journey home.

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

Wandering the dream Tokyo of others is...odd to say the least. Everything's similar, yet odd all the same. Most of them blurr together, such that it makes Kasagami's head hurt just a bit. Nevermind she's still reeling from being torn from her own dream.

Distractions help though, and soon enough she finds herself amidst the park. Upon noticing the blanket and occupants, she stops, leaning against a tree in a subtle motion. She smooths her coat and school uniform, smiling at the antics of the little one. Whose idlyllic dream could this be?

And then she spies Kimiko. Seeing her ally and friend in the midst of such a sweet dream with her family? It's almost too much to interrupt. She, after all, understands exactly how it feels to have your family in a dream like this. She isn't sure if Kimiko has lost them or not, but it's a good guess that they're idealized at the very least. Tragedy seems common among those she knows.

"Kimiko-chan! Care if I join you all?" She puts on her biggest, cockiest and most outgoing grin, boots thudding as she walks over to greet the family even as they start to pack up.

<Pose Tracker> Kimiko Akane [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

As the family begins to pack up, a familiar? voice makes Kimiko turn quickly. It takes a second for Kimiko to respond, "Araki-san, I didn't expect to see you here." With the question about joining, Kimiko glances away nervously, "Ah, we were actually getting ready to leave but you're welcome to walk with us. We have one more quick stop to make nearby before we go home."

Mayumi bounds over to Kasagami, "Oooh, you looks so cool! Are you one of Onee-chan's friends from school?" The smaller girl seems to study Kasagami as if formulating an idea or an opinion of the older girl.

Kimiko laughs, "Hey Mayumi-chan, give her some breathing room!" She steps forward wrapping her arms around the neck of the younger girl before she looks back at her parents, "Mom and dad, this is Kasagami Araki. She's a student at Ohtori." Something about all of this feels strange again but she shakes it off, trying to enjoy the moment.

"We are heading by Rainbow Bridge. Mom said she wanted to show me something special there." Kimiko cannot imagine what it was, although everyone else in the family seems to know. "Will you come with us?" She asks Kasagami.

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

Kasagami can't help but lean down, grinning at Mayumi for a second. "That's right! I am the Captain of the Kendo Club! And the most beautiful, strongest, and most talented person at Ohtori! Worshipped and adored by all!" Crows the young woman, striking a confident pose. This is, of course, false right about now. But a show of bravado might well shake some of the 'oddness' of the dream.

She's quick to join in with the group though, offering a bow to Kimiko's parents before outright wrapping a companionly arm around Kimiko's shoulder.

"That's a good idea. Actually, I've been meaning to talk to you. Come on, let's go."

She's, for the most part, ignoring the parents now. Aside from the occasional glance back with saddened eyes. She leans in to Kimiko.

"Doesn't any of this feel...strange to you, Kimi-chan? Like something's missing?" Her laugh is a bit bitter.

"Not that I blame you."

<Pose Tracker> Kimiko Akane [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

Mayumi's eye grow wide at Kasagami. "The /Captain/ of the Kendo club?! That's awesome! Can you teach me sometime pleeeeease?" It's hard to resist that adorable face and those pleading eyes for the even the hardest hearted person. Mayumi is quickly pulled away by Kimiko and her parents and takes her place near her father again, grabbing his hand tightly as they walk in front of Kimiko and Kasagami.

As the family walks behind them, the two girls walk ahead and Kimiko doesn't look back, instead focusing on her schoolmate. The question catches her off-guard. "Y-you feel it too? I can't explain it..." She lowers her voice. "...but this feels like it's not right? It's so confusing but I thought maybe it was..." Kimiko shrugs, unwilling to speak the words out loud.

How can she admit what she felt when it means she could once again lose people who are the most important to her? Regardless of the truth, she wants to be here with her family. She doesn't want anything to change. Admitting what she somehow knew would mean that she would have to confront reality and she is not ready for that.

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

That cute face, just how innocent she is. Kasagami's smile falters, and her heart feels like it's breaking. This sweet little girl is Kimiko's sister?

She reaches down, and ruffles the girl's hair. "...I'd love to, kiddo. Make me a promise we'll meet up again, okay?" Her smile is uncharacteristically gentle. She's glad the parents tear her away, as it's the only thing keeping her composure right now.

"Come on, Kimi-chan. You have pretty good senses. This is a really nice place, it is. Hah, it makes me seem pretty garish and overdone." The young woman shakes her head, one fist clenching before she relaxes. That smile evaporates as she turns to really look at Kimiko.

"I think, Kimiko, you of all people know that as pretty as daydreams can be, you can't live inside of them. No matter if they have everything you've ever fought for. Even if...even if you can see the faces of those lost to you. It's not an easy thing, facing reality. Reality is painful, random and cruel."

A chuckle, low. "But what's a world worth if you don't earn the pleasant parts? Who wants to have everything handed to them? It just doesn't work that way. But it makes the friends who love you all the more worth fighting for, in a world like that."

<Pose Tracker> Kimiko Akane [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

Kasagami's words make Kimiko's heart race as she looks around and finally, for a moment, she looks back to her family. The family that shouldn't be. When she turns forward again, her eyes glisten in the setting sun and she cannot bring herself to look her friend in the eyes. "It's... a dream but... it feels so real. Maybe...it's because it's what I always wanted. How things really should be..." Suddenly she feels angry, "It's not fair Kasa-san to ask me to give this up."

She frowns, unable to stop the flood of emotions that spill out from her eyes, "I love them...so much. To go back to the life I had and have to fight again to the point of exhaustion. Knowing that in a second my life would be over... how can you say that I have to go back to that?"

They walk and Kimiko sighs in defeat. "But, you're right. It's not fair to those who fight everyday on the other side." She looks back at her parents again, they seem to know what the girls are talking about and her mother is the first to close the distance. She places a hand on Kimiko's shoulder. "Kimi-chan, you know that I love you with all of my heart. Mayumi and I would love for you to be here with us forever but... you have people that care about you on the other side. You have to fight for them! You have to take care of your father." There are tears in her eyes as she leans over to embrace Kimiko, who melts into the hug, tears still flowing freely.

When she can speak again, Kimiko's voice still shakes, "I am sorry Mom..." Her dad and sister come closer. "Dad, Mayumi-chan... I can't... stay here..." Her dad nods and Mayumi runs up to her and hugs her, sobbing quietly. "I want you to stay but... I know you can't."

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (11)] has posed.

Kasagami's gaze doesn't move an inch. She takes in Kimiko's sadness, that pain in her eyes. The firm gaze is only cracked by a look of sympathy on her face. The anger is all too familiar, and she lets Kimiko let it out. Briefly, a hand comes to squeeze her shoulder. Silence for a moment.

"I don't doubt it. It's /never/ fair, Kimiko. No one should have to fight the way you and Eri-chan do." But Kimiko comes around, and she nods. A small, proud little smile.

"Yup. You and I are warriors, Kimiko. And our battles are not done yet. Maybe we won't have these beautiful dreams, but we can make ones just as bright if we follow our ambitions and fight for the sake of those we love!"

Kassie falls silent. She looks away, not wanting to intrude on such a moment. She bites her lip, trying to ignore the tears running down her cheeks. Anger swells in her own heart. Why must they meet again, only to depart?

Kasagami decides, upon hearing Kimiko sob, that this is the worst and sweetest form of torture. Gloves creak in frustration.

All she can do, for now, is to pray for her friend and let her have her goodbyes as she had.

<Pose Tracker> Kimiko Akane [Ohtori Academy (9)] has posed.

The mention of Eri, makes Kimiko pause. "Eri... Mikoto...I can't leave them alone." As hard as she tried to fight back against letting people get close to her, she cannot deny that the common bond they shared was a reason to fight with them and for them...even if it meant leaving this ideal world.

"I hope you're right Kasa-san... I really do." She pauses as her family surrounds her.

"Mayumi-chan, please take care of mom for me okay?" The younger girl nods and embraces Kimiko. "I am sorry I have to go but I love you and I always will... no matter what!" Her parents take the younger girl in their hands and step back, looking to Kasagami, "Please take care of our daughter. She needs someone to be there for her."

Kimiko's sobs finally slow as she offers one last embrace and then she steps back and turns back to the bridge. In a second, they are no longer on the bridge but the world tree comes into view, light piercing the dream and ripping it apart at the seams.

Kimiko reaches out to hold Kasagami's hand as the dream completely fades and they find themselves back at the World Tree having to once again confront the dying world in front of them..."This is going to be terrible isn't it?" She sighs heavily.

[[Category:Logs]]

2018-06-20 - LOTUS AWAKENING: Nanoha Takamachi

2018-06-20T17:17:17Z

Tlynn2002: lol oops

{|class="toccolours" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''LOTUS AWAKENING: Nanoha Takamachi'''
|-
|'''Summary''': 
''Nanoha wakes up to a normal, happy life with a lot of friends and her loving family.''
|-
|'''Who''': 
[[Nanoha Takamachi]]
|-
|'''Where:''' 
Tama Outer City - Takamachi Residence
|-
|'''OOC - IC Date:''' 
6/20/2018 - April 25, 2015
|-
|}

"Vita..." Nanoha's eyes cloud up again with tears again at seeing the Wolkenritter taken from them. No matter their rivalry, all she wanted to do was to help them and she tried so hard.

Then the darkness takes her...

---

The sound of voices outside her door jolt her awake. As her eyes adjust to the sudden intrusion of daylight, Nanoha feels out of sorts but yet, she's so comfortable. Turning to look across her room, she is surprised and panics at not seeing Raising Heart next to her bed. Her mind tries to think back over what happened but her thoughts are hazy and she can't quite remember all the details.

A knock at the door and the door opens, Miyuki and a couple of kids burst into the room.

"Nano-chan, your friends are here already. You slept late!" Miyuki turns to leave and then her friends come in and start giggling until they see the confused expression on Nanoha's face. "What's wrong with you? You look like you're lost?" Arisa says. Nanoha shakes her head, "It's nothing. I think... I just had a bad dream is all." The girls nod, "Well, come on, you gotta get ready for school and your mom packed you a breakfast to take with you." They don't mention the treats that Shiro and Momoko had packed for all of them for later.

Nanoha shoos the girls out and begins to get ready for school. After putting on her Infinity Uniform, Nanoha fixes up herself in the mirror, taking great care to make sure that no hair is out of place. Her mother always placed an emphasis on looking good. Looking in the drawers though, she realizes something else is missing and the ribbons she pull out are her old ones, not her favorites.

By the time she appears in the kitchen, Nanoha has convinced herself that it was just a very bad dream and she cannot help but feel happy at seeing all her family together, along with her best friends.

Shiro is busily packing his own lunch for work when he sees his youngest daughter. "Nanoha, your friends said you had a bad dream?" He walks over to her and gives her a hug. "Are you okay?" Nanoha smiles and nods enthusiastically. "I am fine now! We better go though." Shiro laughs. "Alright. Don't forget your breakfast!" He pauses and hands her a couple of bags, "And your lunch!"

Nanoha looks around, "Where's mom?" Shiro looks back to her. "She went to the cafe. You know we're doing the big grand re-opening this weekend." Catching the look of confusion in his daughter's eyes, Shiro frowns. "How could you forget? That's all we have been talking about for the last few months! The bakery is doing so well that we needed to move locations and expand. Nanoha nods, albeit uneasily and then finally smiles. "Right!"

She heads out towards the front door where her friends are waiting. "We are going to be late Nano-chan!!" Nanoha laughs. "Okay, let's go! I am ready!" The girls head off towards a waiting car and head to school.

---

At school, Nanoha is greeted by a number of students and they all run around the schoolyard before classes start, laughing and playing games with each other. For the first time in what feels like forever, Nanoha feels like this is the way things are supposed to be and the way she always wanted it.

But in the back of her mind, there is something important she feels like she is missing...

[[Category:Logs]]

2018-06-20 - LOTUS AWAKENING: Nanoha Takamachi

2018-06-20T17:16:50Z

{|class="toccolours" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''LOTUS AWAKENING: Lera Camry'''
|-
|'''Summary''': 
''Nanoha wakes up to a normal, happy life with a lot of friends and her loving family.''
|-
|'''Who''': 
[[Nanoha Takamachi]]
|-
|'''Where:''' 
Tama Outer City - Takamachi Residence
|-
|'''OOC - IC Date:''' 
6/20/2018 - April 25, 2015
|-
|}

"Vita..." Nanoha's eyes cloud up again with tears again at seeing the Wolkenritter taken from them. No matter their rivalry, all she wanted to do was to help them and she tried so hard.

Then the darkness takes her...

---

The sound of voices outside her door jolt her awake. As her eyes adjust to the sudden intrusion of daylight, Nanoha feels out of sorts but yet, she's so comfortable. Turning to look across her room, she is surprised and panics at not seeing Raising Heart next to her bed. Her mind tries to think back over what happened but her thoughts are hazy and she can't quite remember all the details.

A knock at the door and the door opens, Miyuki and a couple of kids burst into the room.

"Nano-chan, your friends are here already. You slept late!" Miyuki turns to leave and then her friends come in and start giggling until they see the confused expression on Nanoha's face. "What's wrong with you? You look like you're lost?" Arisa says. Nanoha shakes her head, "It's nothing. I think... I just had a bad dream is all." The girls nod, "Well, come on, you gotta get ready for school and your mom packed you a breakfast to take with you." They don't mention the treats that Shiro and Momoko had packed for all of them for later.

Nanoha shoos the girls out and begins to get ready for school. After putting on her Infinity Uniform, Nanoha fixes up herself in the mirror, taking great care to make sure that no hair is out of place. Her mother always placed an emphasis on looking good. Looking in the drawers though, she realizes something else is missing and the ribbons she pull out are her old ones, not her favorites.

By the time she appears in the kitchen, Nanoha has convinced herself that it was just a very bad dream and she cannot help but feel happy at seeing all her family together, along with her best friends.

Shiro is busily packing his own lunch for work when he sees his youngest daughter. "Nanoha, your friends said you had a bad dream?" He walks over to her and gives her a hug. "Are you okay?" Nanoha smiles and nods enthusiastically. "I am fine now! We better go though." Shiro laughs. "Alright. Don't forget your breakfast!" He pauses and hands her a couple of bags, "And your lunch!"

Nanoha looks around, "Where's mom?" Shiro looks back to her. "She went to the cafe. You know we're doing the big grand re-opening this weekend." Catching the look of confusion in his daughter's eyes, Shiro frowns. "How could you forget? That's all we have been talking about for the last few months! The bakery is doing so well that we needed to move locations and expand. Nanoha nods, albeit uneasily and then finally smiles. "Right!"

She heads out towards the front door where her friends are waiting. "We are going to be late Nano-chan!!" Nanoha laughs. "Okay, let's go! I am ready!" The girls head off towards a waiting car and head to school.

---

At school, Nanoha is greeted by a number of students and they all run around the schoolyard before classes start, laughing and playing games with each other. For the first time in what feels like forever, Nanoha feels like this is the way things are supposed to be and the way she always wanted it.

But in the back of her mind, there is something important she feels like she is missing...

[[Category:Logs]]

Land of the Lotus Eaters

2018-06-20T17:07:30Z

Tlynn2002: /* Fantasy Worlds */

[[File:Lotuseaters.png|800px]]

''"Sleep -- sleep as my Master sleeps, lie in an endless dream between life and death. Dream peacefully. Dream beautifully. This is my final gift to you, children of a doomed world."''

'''''LAND OF THE LOTUS-EATERS is a special event on Battle Fantasia MUSH that will run through the second half of June.'''''

Magical girls have been absorbed, body, mind and spirit, into the fully unleashed Book of Darkness, who claims to be granting her Master's final wish by giving them all the gift of eternal peace: an endless, perfect dream, surrounded by their friends and loved ones.

A fantasy where no one is missing -- no one is lost.

And everything is fine...

[[2018-06-10_-_What_Lies_Beneath_18|What Lies Beneath 18]]

Over the next two weeks, magical girls will explore their own, personal fantasy worlds, complete with idealized versions of their family and friends, enemies and allies -- and know temptation. Eventually they will encounter one another, not as each other's fantasies, but as fellow prisoners, and must search for the truth at the heart of the lie. And they will have to decide for themselves whether or not the ugly reality outside is really worth fighting for -- given who and what they'll have to leave behind.

Meanwhile, in the real world, the Book of Darkness is beginning to run rampant. She threw a vastly powerful Barrier across Tokyo, shifting the initial violence caused by her simple presence over by one dimension, but it won't be strong enough to stop NachtWal from destroying the Earth. In the meantime, those magical girls who weren't trapped in the Book must contend with a Tokyo fast transforming into an unfamiliar hellscape of grinding pillars of stone and howling pillars of magma. And the Barrier is far from perfect -- millions may have become hundreds, but there are still ordinary people trapped in there with them, too... all too vulnerable.

As magical girls escape from their dreams and into a waking nightmare, they will join their allies outside in doing what they can to protect what's left of Tokyo.

__TOC__

==The Three Phases==

There are there phases to the Land of the Lotus-Eaters plot:

* The Fantasy World
* The Shared Dream
* The Waking Nightmare

Players who absolutely want to opt-out of having a character absorbed by the Book can proceed directly to the third phase, 'The Waking Nightmare', where they will be gradually joined by Book of Darkness escapees.

Everyone else wakes up inside The Fantasy World!

===The Fantasy World===

Anyone who wants their character to have been absorbed into the Book of Darkness (and this is highly, highly encouraged) is welcome to assume they were there on the margins of the magical girl army that witnessed her rebirth, and should read the contents of [[2018-06-10 - What Lies Beneath 18|What Lies Beneath 18]] and consider it IC knowledge.

Characters absorbed by the Book awaken in not only their own bed but the /ultimate/ bed, the bed that most feels like home, a bed that may have been lost forever or even one that has never existed. They are safe and surrounded by the ones they love most, who are eager to comfort them from the nightmare they just experienced, and help them adjust back to 'reality', in a lovely, peaceful world.

Constructing a character's fantasy world is an opportunity to:

* Bring back dead characters, returning them to living, happy selves.
* Reimagine living characters through the lens of your character's fantasy; enemies could become allies, crushes could become romances, broken friendships mended, lost souls saved.
* Rewrite history wholesale, if things went off the rails years ago and your character might awaken in an extremely different life than the one they had.
* Ultimately, explore the ways in which the real world is better than the fantasy one. If Fate Testarossa hadn't had a broken family, she never would have met Nanoha Takamachi. In what ways have the trials of the real world made it worth saving?

It is not an opportunity to:

* Create a Candy Land where all the buildings are made out of choco parfait and takoyaki, NAGISA MISUMI. >:|
* In more seriousness, these dreams are powerful simulations driven by the characters' memories and desires, but they do fundamentally simulate the character's ideal /world/, as in a recognizable Earth, and furthermore, unless it is absolutely unworkable, their ideal Tokyo (for reasons that will become obvious).
* Unfortunately for those who were eager to get into trippy dream logic, it is NOT obviously a dream; the fantasy world has verisimilitude in terms of being a real place filled with real people, even if everything else feels impossible. Impossibly wonderful, that is.

Players are encouraged to introduce their character's fantasy world through a cutscene of their characters first awakening and discovering that everything up until this point has 'all been a bad dream,' posted to the wiki with the following format: YYYY-MM-DD - LOTUS AWAKENING: Character Name. (They can of course also put it on the MUSH bulletin boards if they like.) These cutscenes, besides being an opportunity to really pull on the heartstrings, are useful worldbuilding that can be referenced by other players, because:

During the first phase, any given scene can only exist in a single character's dream. All other participants are invited and encouraged to discuss NPCing special, important characters featured prominently in the main character's fantasy (such as dead family members), but can, alternatively, play the fantasy version of their own character, as envisioned deep in the heart of the main character.

* For example: Fate Testarossa, Nanoha Takamachi and Vita want to have a Fantasy World scene. They decide to let Fate be the main character. Nanoha volunteers to NPC Alicia Testarossa, and Vita appears as a version of herself that Fate dreams of being friends with. (Fate and Nanoha discuss OOCly who the fantasy Alicia Testarossa is, her role within the dream; Fate and Vita do the same about fantasy Vita. Players are encouraged to be flexible about conforming to the fantasies of the main character, as roleplaying (admittedly often somewhat Stepford) alternative versions of themselves, as wished for by another character, is a pretty unique gameplay opportunity. Fantasizing players are expected to keep it classy, as is always the case on Battle Fantasia.)

===The Shared Dream===

Many characters will be unable to break out of their fantasy without intervention by another. The Shared Dream begins when Fate Testarossa confronts the truth that her dream is not and cannot be real, and that she wants to leave it behind -- and discovers the World Tree at the heart of her dream. She can then use it to transport herself into someone else's dream, replacing her dream double.

Once this happens (it will be flagged both via bbpost and on this wiki page), all of The Fantasy Worlds begin to merge into The Shared Dream. During phase two, The Shared Dream, characters are now wandering through each others' fantasies, in a single, larger fantasy. Given that most characters want to live blissfully in a Tokyo-like location, this is often seamless, but not always. Still, the power of the Book of Darkness is very strong, and the Land of the Lotus-Eaters is very seductive; even as prisoners are able to meet one another and speculate as to what's going on, the Book tends to keep mortal enemies apart, unless reuniting with one another is a deeper level of their fantasy. The Shared Dream is still a beautiful dream -- many beautiful dreams, fading into one another.

* For example: Fate Testarossa, Steven Universe and Saki Hyuuga want to have a scene in The Shared Dream. Fate is already fully awake, and replaces her dream double; the world of this scene is is a blend of Steven and Saki's ideal worlds. As this is a shared dream, Fate and Steven can encounter Saki's fantasy version of Michiru Kiryuu, or Fate and Saki can encounter Steven's fantasy version of Rose Quartz, or both...

It is worth noting, however, that the 'idealized' PCs and NPCs within their fantasy are also aware that this is only a dream; they want to keep their main character safe and happy within the dream, but are also willing to grant them absolution to leave them behind and depart into the real world. This is a rare opportunity for closure, though not required.

Players are strongly encouraged to allow others (whether 'awakened' PCs, or idealized but actively posed PCs and NPCs) to help them find the strength to leave the Land of the Lotus-Eaters, as it should not be easy or trivial to be willing to depart; the journey of accepting and embracing a more painful reality is far better undertaken as an interactive scene rather than as a cutscene alone. However, for those who prefer it, cutscenes are also welcome. In either case, logs/cutscenes involving this turning point in any character's arc should be named under the following scheme: YYYY-MM-DD - LOTUS INCEPTION: Character Name(s)

Once fully awakened and accepting of reality, characters can stay in The Shared Dream to help free their friends, or escape the Book of Darkness via the World Tree, which exists at the heart of all of their dreams, and will return them to the shattered deadwood corpse of the real Tree in Tokyo.

This begins the third phase: The Waking Nightmare.

===The Waking Nightmare===
[[History: Modern Times#The Book of Darkness|A generation ago, the magical girls of Earth were decimated trying to contain and defeat the Book of Darkness]]; it was the most significant magical event of the new millennium, until the Long Dark Night in 2013. It is widely understood IC knowledge that Signum, Vita, Shamal and Zafira, aka the Wolkenritter, aka the Cloud Knights, have been ambushing magical girls and draining their magic into the Book of Darkness in order to fill all of its pages -- at which point the Book of Darkness will basically go supernova in a world-ending-threat-level event.

Apparently the first stage of 'supernova' was the Book transforming into a scary woman who calls herself the Tome of the Night Sky. The first thing she did was suck every magical girl she could sense into the Book of Darkness' Fantasy World. The second thing she did was spread a Barrier across Tokyo.

A 'Barrier', in Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha terms, is a particular class of magical spell: a wide-area field that shifts everything within that field about half a dimension to the left, metaphysically metaphorically speaking. The chief effect that it has is to remove all noncombatants and other non-magical people from the area it encompasses, which allows magical combat to continue with only minimal risk of collateral damage.

The Book of Darkness' barrier won't protect the world from ending when the automated defense program within her being known as NachtWal goes berserk, since that blast is far greater than her barrier can contain.

And, because Tokyo is so huge and there are so many people in it, neither is it totally successful at keeping all the noncombatants out. A small handful of noncombatants, usually either already-magical people or people closely connected to magical people, such as friends and family, have found themselves drawn inside... and Tokyo, on the other side of the barrier, is an ugly place.

('''''This is strictly optional.''''' There are a handful of people stranded in Battlefield Tokyo for exactly two reasons, narratively: first, to have people to rescue on general principles, and second, for characters who want to be OUTTED to a normal friend or family member to have a dramatic opportunity to do so, in rescuing them (Recognition Inhibition is still 'on', but this is a good reason for it to fail if someone wants it to fail in order to tell their story). If you've wanted your parents to find out what you do, or want your long-misled best friend in on the secret, this is a good time for that!)

The Waking Nightmare is yellow-and-black-skied, with a great deal of purple lightning. It is filled with eerily empty streets and skyscrapers, punctuated here and there with jagged stone spires and immense geysers of magma, created by the seismic instabilities already beginning to engulf the world as the Book of Darkness' power unfolds.

* The Book of Darkness herself, if engaged, will immediately suck combatants into the Fantasy World, which is another way of saying DON'T.
* Fleeing from her, finding allies, protecting civilians and lamenting the state of things is more the order of the day.
* There is also some pathos to be had wandering through the creepily empty, shattered cityscape.

When everyone has escaped the Shared Dream and regrouped to confront the Book of Darkness, we will be at the true finale of What Lies Beneath.

==Frequently Asked Questions==
Q: I wasn't at What Lies Beneath 17-18, can I still have been sucked into the Book of Darkness?

A: Yes! It is safe to assume your character was on the margins of those events; the Book of Darkness cast a very wide net when she absorbed everyone in.

Q: What's the approximate OOC timeline here?

A: Since there's a lot of pathos to go around, we expect to spend around a week in The Fantasy World and a week in The Shared Dream, with maybe each of those being a bit less than a week to make some space for The Waking Nightmare (though it is the least important of the three for participants of the entire plot, since its experience will in most senses be covered by the plot's actual finale).

A2: Individuals can go at their own pace, if they want to spend more time in The Fantasy World after Fate's escape initiates The Shared Dream. Time is all very relative right now, anyway.

Q: I need someone to NPC my dead parents! What should I do?

A: Ask! The staff will be on hand to provide NPC support, but the playerbase is also very strongly encouraged to volunteer.

==Fantasy Worlds==
Please add yourself and a one-sentence description of the core concept of your character's dream world to the list.
* '''[[Fate Testarossa]]''' is living happily with her mother, sister, and teacher.
* '''[[Niramo Umokeshi]]''' has a family who is always there for her, and is the leader of the magical protectors of Earth.
* '''[[Nori Ankou]]''' is in a storm-wracked and gothic Tokyo, where everyone is gorgeous, especially the precious ones.
* '''[[Fuu Hououji]]''' is a regular schoolgirl, her adventures as a Magic Knight now the province of a tabletop RPG campaign.
* '''[[Mai Tokiha]]''' is a carefree teenager with a pet bird, independent of magical trouble, Ohtori weirdness, or anyone depending on her.
* '''[[Eri Shimanouchi]]''' is an average middle schooler, free of contracts and obligations, living her best life with her family and friends.
* '''[[Inori Yamabuki]]''' is brimming with confidence and getting her happiness as a normal girl.
* '''[[Lera Camry]]''' is back on Midchilda, with her mother... and father, who is alive and well.
* '''[[Mikoto Minagi]]''' and her beloved family deal with monstrous threats from their shrine on Mount Moto, so that the world of Tokyo below can remain peaceful and happy.
* '''[[Steven Universe]]''' is just a human with his mother, Rose Quartz back. Beach City has wholly relocated to Tokyo, and all Gems get along with humans!
* '''[[Kimiko Akane]]''' is just a regular teenager with a normal family consisting of her mother, younger sister and father.
* '''[[Nanoha Takamachi]]''' is a normal, happy and carefree kid surrounded by many friends and her loving family.

==Logs==

Please include 'LOTUS' in the title of all of your logs and cutscenes, and they'll automatically appear here.

{{#dpl: |category = logs¦cutscenes
|titlematch = %LOTUS%
|notcategory = News Files
|ordermethod = title
|columns = 2
|rowcolformat=width=100%
|suppresserrors = yes
|noresultsheader=There are no LOTUS logs or cutscenes yet. Fix it!
}}

2018-06-13 - LOTUS AWAKENING: Kimiko Akane

2018-06-13T07:27:59Z

Tlynn2002:

{|class="toccolours" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''LOTUS AWAKENING: Kimiko Akane'''
|-
|'''Summary''': 
''Kimiko awakens from the worst nightmare to find everything, including her family, is just like it's always been...''
|-
| '''Who:''' 
[[Kimiko Akane]]
|-
| '''Where:''' 
Yamanote High City
|-
| '''OOC - IC Date:''' 
06-13-2018 - 4-25-2015
|-
|}

The small, dark-clad girl sits on the top of a building, a large silver hammer hoisted on her left shoulder. She looks down, watching the people below who are blatantly unaware of the darkness that truly lurks in their midst. Knowing that at any minute any one of them could be taken by it, she is on guard.

A soft sigh escapes her lips as she sits there as if expecting something...

It's relatively quiet though and as the pale moonlight shines in the sky, she glances at her phone. Only a little while longer and she can go back to the dorms and sleep for a bit before school. Before long though a sudden commotion catches her attention. She knows exactly where the noise came from and quickly makes her way to the World Tree. She was aware of the rumours of it blossoming. It takes her some time to get there however and just as she approaches it she finds herself being bound.

Kimiko tries in sheer desperation to pull herself free but she screams out in agony as the binds that have overtaken her pulse and shock making her whole body tense into a hard spasm. She trembles from the feeling it gives and it takes her seconds to find her voice.

"W-what is going on?!" She calls out in desperation but there is no answer before the darkness consumes her mind...

---

It's too bright.

Light pouring through the blinds on her second-floor window is the first thing that brings Kimiko back to the waking world. She yawns and stretches, trying to shake the sleep from her body but then pulls the covers back over her head, shutting out the brightness of the morning.

Only seconds later, the door to her bedroom swings open. The sudden noise in the relative peacefulness of the morning startles her and makes her quickly sit upright as the blanket slides from her head forcing her to face the light again.

As her eyes adjust, a small voice calls out to her, "Onee-chan!!!! Waaaaaaaaaake up! It's time to get ready for schoooooool!" The girl who appears to be about 7 years old, climbs on top of the bed, startling a small black cat sleeping nearby. The cat protests his sleep being interrupted with a tiny meow and runs out of the room. Meanwhile, Mayumi begins jumping up and down on the bed at Kimiko's feet, repeating herself in a sing-song way until the teenager finally responds.

"Mayumi-chan, get down before you fall! Did mom send you up here?" She groans, scrunching up her face in a scowl, but the younger girl just laughs and pulls the floral, pink bed covers completely off of Kimiko's bed before sitting down next to her. She lays a head on her shoulder. "You know you're my faaaaaaavorite sister right?" Her big brown eyes peer up at Kimiko. "It's time to eat breakfast!" She bounds off the bed suddenly and runs down the hallway, singing a happy, nameless tune to herself.

Kimiko stretches again and looks at the time on her bedside clock. For once, she actually has time to eat. After heading into the bathroom to prepare for the day, she glances at herself in the mirror, making sure everything is neatly in place. The reflection staring back at her gives her a strange feeling that she cannot quite place. It makes her uneasy but before she can have time to reflect on why, her mind is brought back to the present when she hears Mayumi calling for her again from downstairs.

Straightening her long ponytail, she makes it to the kitchen and sees her family already sitting down to eat. Her dad looks up from the counter. "Well...it's about time you joined us sleepyhead!" Seiji walks over and ruffles her hair. "Don't you just love having your own personal alarm clock? I think we will have to use her every day. What do you think Mayumi-chan?" He grins at child and she nods in agreement before her attention turns to the plate of food that is placed in front of her.

Kimiko looks over to her mom and is about to say something but suddenly and without warning there are tears in her eyes and she knows why she felt uneasy just moments before. "Kimiko-chan? Are you okay?" Ayuka walks over to her, placing a concerned hand on her shoulder. "I-It's nothing mom. I just had a really awful dream last night." She rubs her eyes and looks at Mayumi who is beaming at her, seemingly unaware of what just happened.

"Mom, did you really have to send her up there this morning? I thought that's why I had an alarm clock!" Ayuka laughs. "Well, it worked out better for all of us didn't it? Isn't it nice to have breakfast together for a change? And you're not rushing off to school without eating like usual." Ayuka Akane took great care in making sure that her family sat down together for a meal as often as possible and breakfast was especially important to her.

Looking down at the plate set before her, Kimiko smiles. "I guess you're right. This food looks delicious as always! Thank you mom!" She eagerly devours the meal as the family talks about their plans for the day ahead. For some reason, this morning feels different to her, everything seems brighter and more peaceful and she can't remember ever being this happy or content before.

After breakfast, Kimiko runs up to grab her school bag as Mayumi runs by her door. "Onee-chan, can you help me with my shoes?" The older girl sighs loudly and dramatically. "I taught you how to do it last year. Why do you still always ask me?" Mayumi smiles mischieviously. "Because... I already told you remember?" She pauses, being dramatic. "You're my most favorite big sister in the entire world of course." Laughing, Kimiko ruffles her hair. "Okay you win this time!" She bends down to tie the child's shoes before standing and adjusting the bag on her shoulder.

Together, the two of them head downstairs to the front door and there is a bus sitting outside. "Don't be late Mayumi-chan! I will see you after school okay?" The two girls embrace for a moment before Mayumi disappears into the bus. Shortly after, a car pulls up in front of the house as Ayuka steps up behind Kimiko, "Kimiko-chan, you almost forgot your lunch!" She hands her a small bag neatly tied with a bow. "Oh! Thank you mom! Rena is here! I gotta go!"

Turning to head down the pathway, Kimiko suddenly stops and then runs back to the door and she reaches out and embraces Ayuka. "Kimiko-chan, are you okay? That must have been some dream you had." She pauses, brushing a stray hair from the teenager's face and smiles. "But... I will always take hugs no matter what." She bends to give her a kiss on the forehead. "Have a good day honey!"

[[Category:Cutscenes]]

2018-06-13 - LOTUS AWAKENING: Kimiko Akane

2018-06-13T07:27:08Z

School: Ohtori Academy

2018-05-19T06:48:02Z

Tlynn2002: /* Student Body */ adding kimiko

Ohtori Academy was founded by the Ohtori Group in the early 1900s on Southern Cross Island. The Academy was built out of a number of smaller schools acquired by the Group, but all of those are now just parts of the Ohtori machine. Based on principles of elegance, nobility and talent, Ohtori Academy is considered an elite institution for elite people. As it boasts a healthy, even aggressive, scholarship program, students from the middle classes and up are perfectly capable of attending, but the best-known students are for the most part very wealthy, very powerful, and very dangerous. That density of wealthy students gives Ohtori a disproportionate influence, with businesses lining up around the block to win the favor of future magnates.

Ohtori Academy's emphasis on personal greatness gives it a number of eccentricities. Its sports programs eschew 'commoner' activities for gentleman's sports; while [[Juuban Public School|Juuban]] practices lacrosse and [[Infinity Institute|Infinity's]] as likely as not to field an ultimate frisbee team to a regional event, Ohtori's top coaches teach combat sports like fencing and boxing, and refined athletics like basketball and rugby. Similarly, Ohtori expects all of its students to obtain a broad education, bulwarking its wide-based general program with after-school arts programs. Unlike Infinity, it offers little in the way of specialty programs; Ohtori expects excellence in everything, from everyone.

By far the most unique feature of the school, however, is Ohtori Academy's enormously powerful student council. A powerful student government has been a part of the Ohtori Group's dream since the foundation of the school, and the student council has long wielded very wide powers. In the modern Ohtori that power has expanded to the point the students wield sometimes more authority than the staff.

Although an informal rule, it is widely known among students that those who oppose the student council quickly find themselves expelled, and by the same token, working with the council provides enormous benefits. Nominally, the student council's task is to protect the interests of the student body, but the current council often seems more interested in its own...

The student council is broken into two parts: The actual Student Council itself, which governs the junior and senior high schools; and the Guardians, a smaller, somewhat more idiosyncratic body which protects the interests of the elementary school students. The youthful Guardians are easily the more idealistic, and although technically they govern different spheres, there are plenty of rumors about the Guardians and Student Council coming to blows over one or the other overreaching their authority.

Ohtori, being a home for elites and nobles, is inevitably rife with intrigue. The Student Council, and a select few other students, wear a rose signet they guard jealously; some say there are others around campus who wear a strange golden mask. People in black suits who won't talk to anyone, businessmen of world-class companies who come by seemingly much too often. Ohtori is a hub of mysterious agendas and transformative people, and the rumors about those many agendas are myriad.

Unbeknownst to the normal students but nakedly obvious to those with the sight, Ohtori is a veritable goldmine of mystic power. Where Infinity's very foundations were designed to leash the World Tree's power, and Juuban draws strange people to it like a magnet, Ohtori Academy's grounds are rife with the seals and signs of ancient evil. The island is so thick with ancient powers of the soul that emotion on the island runs thicker - passions higher, obsessions hotter, loves more powerful and hates more virulent.

Perhaps that should have been the first sign of the doom that lives on Southern Cross Island, but it is far from the only. The clock in the library ticks on, but not to anything so pedestrian as tomorrow; the mine in the hills leads down, but what is the light at the bottom? Witches, Orphans and Noise throng across the island, drawn to a rich stew of emotion, and in turn thickening that miasma of obsession. Above it all, the Castle Where Eternity Dwells looms invisible and insubstantial over the island - a silent harbinger of the coming revolution of the world.

__TOC__

==History==
Long ago, in another Age, there was the Land of Fuuka - a shining island of light and wonder. In that place, the Obsidian Lord held court over his kingdom; a demon king of phenomenal power, sealed away by the power of the Silver Crystal. To placate him, and to serve as entertainment for the masses, once in three hundred years the HiME Festival was held, where those chosen by the King's power would battle for supremacy, the King's hand in marriage - and the honor of a single miraculous wish from their new groom. It was one such wish that allowed the release of Metallia, bringing about the fall of the Silver Millennium.

Amid the ruins of the Serenity Dynasty, the Silver Queen's bindings shattered, and at last the Obsidian Lord was free. Summoning to his side the spirits and powers of his innumerable brides past, the Obsidian Lord called forth the beacon of his omnipotence, the HiME Star. With the Senshi fallen and the Earth Court sundered, the few surviving HiME themselves were forced to rise to the challenge, binding the King to Fuuka, and using great magic to seal the island away; then giving their lives to hurl the HiME Star far into space, where Serenity's final wishes ensured it would once again wander, lost.

The Age turned, as ages do; but the new world would not be safe forever. Clow Reed wouldn't break the Earth's seals for hundreds of years, but another force found its way across the stars, an alien race seeking respite from the destruction of their world by their own hubris. Crashing to Earth, the power that their science could barely contain blew through the seals hiding the Land of Fuuka from the world; when people arrived to investigate, the visitors begged for the aid of magic to seal away the accursed legacy they had created, and together, they settled what would become Southern Cross Island - and buried yet another terrible secret beneath its hills.

The greatest seal broken, the HiME Star veered toward Earth anew, beginning yet again the ancient Festival - more savage now, without the Silver Queen's bindings to soften the Obsidian Lord's ravenous malice. But the Earth was lucky, for the Obsidian Lord's new bride was cunning and brave, and found a way to cast him back to sleep and send the Star hurtling back into space. On the site of the island, before vanishing into history, she founded an academy that became the moniker for the whole island: Southern Cross.

More recently, Southern Cross Academy and several other Island schools were acquired by the wealthy Ohtori family, and the whole collection of schools renamed after its new masters. Patterning the new curriculum after Western academies and building toward a future of excellence, Ohtori became known for its harsh studies but sterling graduates. Building on that tradition of superiority, the Ohtori student council was given phenomenal power, and faculty allowed to override them only rarely. In time, a young prodigy in the elementary school campus, with bright eyes and a powerful insight, even convinced the Family to create the elementary section its own body, to protect the hearts and interests of the younger students: The Guardians.

In the last few years, the present head of the Ohtori house has fallen ill. The position of president of Ohtori Academy - de facto master of the grounds - has fallen to his daughter's fiance, Akio. Akio is perhaps the most hands-off president the school has ever seen, leaving things largely to the respective principals and student bodies of the various schools; however, when Akio speaks, every student listens.

==Student Body==
''This list can be edited by players to add their characters and NPCs to their appropriate grade. Feel free to add your name as a link to your character page!''

{| class="mw-collapsible mw-collapsed wikitable" style="border:0px solid #ffffff;background: #ffffff;vertical-align: top;"
!style="text-align: left;background: #hhhhhh; width:1000pt"|''Ohtori's Student Body''
|-
|
'''[[Schools: Faculty and Staff#Ohtori Academy|Faculty and Staff]]''': [[Midori Sugiura]], Akio Ohtori, Souji Mikage, Yuu Nikaidou.

'''University''': [[Shizuru Fujino]]

'''Grade 12''': Kyouichi Saionji, [[Mamoru Chiba]], Touga Kiryuu, [[Mai Tokiha]], Natsuki Kuga.

'''Grade 11''': [[Azyana Konstantinov]], [[Chihaya Izumi]], [[Juri Arisugawa]], Kanako Watanabe, Shiori Takatsuki, [[Takeo Akamizu]], Takuta Tsunashi, [[Ye-jin Song]], Yua Chouku, [[Mikoto Minagi]], Nao Yuuki.

'''Grade 10''': Georgia Jenks, [[Kasagami Araki]], [[Mami Tomoe]].

'''Grade 9''': [[Anthy Himemiya]], Daiki Asuka Jr., [[Eri Shimanouchi]], Homura Akemi, [[Madoka Kaname]], [[Meimi Haneoka]], [[Nori Ankou]], Rei Hino, [[Sachiko Majime]], [[Sayaka Miki]], [[Inori Yamabuki]], Umi Ryuuzaki, [[Utena Tenjou]], [[Kimiko Akane]].

'''Grade 8''': [[Miki Kaoru]], [[Kozue Kaoru]], Nanami Kiryuu, Takara Maki.

'''Grade 7''': Kukai Souma, Haruka Haruno.

'''Grade 6''': Amu Hinamori, Kairi Sanjou, [[Nadeshiko Fujisaki]], [[Tadase Hotori]].

'''Grade 5''': Yaya Yuiki.

'''Grade 4''':

'''Grade 3''':

'''Grade 2''':

'''Grade 1''':

'''Grade K''':
|}

==Student Council==
Among the significant adults of Ohtori's staff, Elementary School Principal Tsukasa Amakawa and Middle/High School Principal Mashiro Kazahana report directly to the headmaster of the overall academy; the Ohtori clan patriarch is presently very ill, however, and so the acting headmaster is Akio Ohtori, the fiance of the Ohtori heiress. Akio engages his duties extremely rarely, but when he does, his word is absolute.

However, Ohtori is notable for its especially powerful student body. This is an old tradition, and it is one of the few things Akio Ohtori has involved himself directly in maintaining. The Middle and High School Student Councils in particular wields nearly absolute authority, even able to overrule Principal Kazahana if they wish to... although that might be more the fact that the faculty lives in elemental terror of [[Juri Arisugawa]]. Indeed, there is a policy - informal and yet absolute - permitting the council to unilaterally expel students who defy their will (although often the Guardians of the Elementary School involve themselves when this clause is enacted).

It is entirely common for positions to be made up and eliminated by the Councils as necessary. While there are occasionally elections, Ohtori isn't exactly a bastion of democracy, and councilors are often summarily replaced by siblings (or rivals!) if they become mysteriously unable to perform their duties.

''If you'd like to join the Student Council (new characters can easily be retconned in), please contact the Staff on-game.''

{| class="mw-collapsible mw-collapsed wikitable" style="border:0px solid #ffffff;background: #ffffff;vertical-align: top;"
!style="text-align: left;background: #hhhhhh; width:1000pt"|''Ohtori's Student Council''
|-
|
====High School Student Council====
* '''President:''' Touga Kiryuu
* '''President's Dubiously-Ranked Flunky:''' Kyouichi Saionji
* '''Vice President:''' [[Ye-jin Song]]
* '''Secretary:''' Currently vacant.
* '''Treasurer:''' [[Juri Arisugawa]]
* '''Disciplinary Executive:''' Yukino Kikukawa

====Middle School Student Council====
* '''President:''' Open!
* '''Vice President:''' Open!
* '''Secretary:''' [[Miki Kaoru]]
* '''Treasurer:''' Takara Maki

====The Guardians====
* '''King's Chair''': [[Tadase Hotori]]
* '''Queen's Chair''': Open!
* '''Jack's Chair''': [[Nadeshiko Fujisaki|Nagihiko Fujisaki]]
* '''Ace's Chair''': Yaya Yuiki
* '''Joker's Chair''': Amu Hinamori
* The '''Chair of Ten''' through the '''Chair of Two''' currently don't exist, but would be invented on the spot by Tadase and Tsukasa if they were needed.
|}

==Clubs==
Owing to its venerable history, Ohtori's clubs are often especially formal and tradition-heavy. Many observe their own small holidays on especially significant dates, such as the anniversary of the club's founding. Clubs of the same and different types often engage in intrigue against one another, to their own ends or simply for pleasure.

''This list may be edited by any player who wishes to note the on-camera existence of their club. There are many other clubs at Ohtori not listed here because they don't currently have any player characters in them.''

{| class="mw-collapsible mw-collapsed wikitable" style="border:0px solid #ffffff;background: #ffffff;vertical-align: top;"
!style="text-align: left;background: #hhhhhh; width:1000pt"|''Clubs of Ohtori''
|-
|
====Aikido and Aiki-ken Club====
Founded by Morihei Ueshiba, Aikido is a 'peaceful' martial art performed by blending with the motion of the attacker and redirecting the force of the attack rather than opposing it head-on. This requires very little physical strength, as the defender 'leads' the attacker's momentum by using entering and turning movements. The techniques are completed with various throws or joint locks. It is a very 'ki' centered style. In addition there is the Aiki-ken club; Aiki-ken is the art of the sword based upon the principles of Aikido, originated by Ueshiba and his student Morihiro Saito. Aiki-ken uses wooden bokken, and currently shares the Aikido-club's funding.

'''Members''': [[Azyana Konstantinov]]

====Animal Care Club====
For horse enthusiasts who don't care to focus on competitive riding, and budding veterinarians.

'''Members''': [[Inori Yamabuki]]

====Boxing Club====
This is not Fight Club, so you can talk about it. Widely admired throughout the school.

'''Members''': Touga Kiryuu, Yua Chouku

====Crafts Club====
Ohtori has clubs specializing in every conceivable art and craft; essentially all of them see the Crafts Club as a bunch of amateur dilettantes, because this club's stated goal is to explore and enjoy different crafts through weekly, monthly and annual projects. For those interested in being a jack of all trades but a master of none, it makes for a fun, relatively casual place to be.

'''Members''': [[Madoka Kaname]], Kairi Sanjou

====Dance Club====
All people, they love to dance. Separate from Ohtori's extra-curricular dance classes, dance club focuses on creative choreography and fierce competition. Classical styles are always in fashion, but more modern routines also see some representation.

'''Members''': [[Ye-jin Song]]

====Falconry Club====
A school as prestigious as Ohtori wouldn't be complete without sports of nobility, and it's Falconry Club is both well funded and well respected among animal lovers as well as those that enjoy hunting. It's birds are both rare and expensive, the club's members sparing no expense in showing their mastery over such beautiful, dangerous birds.

'''Members''': [[Kasagami Araki]]

====Fashion Club====
Ohtori's fashion club is about as cutthroat as the industry itself, but friendships are founded here on shared enthusiasm and obsession, and there are very real connections to be made with Ohtori alums who've gone professional.

'''Members''': [[Inori Yamabuki]]

====Fencing Club====
With over a century of tradition behind it, Ohtori Academy's fencing club is among the most glamorous clubs on campus, and unquestionably the most prestigious fencing club in Japan. They primarily practice classical fencing, but swap to sports fencing a few times a year in order to dominate regional, national, and even international meets. They don't win everything all the time, but it's always notable when they lose. Members who are not dedicated and passionate for the sport do not last long, but no prior experience with a blade is expected in order to join the fun; they train fencers at every level, from the simple to the sublime.

'''Members''': [[Juri Arisugawa]] (Captain), [[Miki Kaoru]], [[Nori Ankou]], Umi Ryuuzaki

====Gardening Club====
Landscaping is a little bit declasse by the standards of Ohtori's elite, who mostly prefer less dirty and more formal clubs like ikebana, but the gardening club toils gloriously onward with justifiable satisfaction: the Academy is overflowing with flowers, and while they certainly don't tend every lawn or trim every terrace, most of the truly spectacular manicured gardens and endless fields of blooms are their pride and joy. Those sufficiently interested in the study of botany, such that they're willing to get their hands a little dirty, can learn many secrets about the language of flowers, and other, more subtle plants besides. With the destruction of most of the forests of Southern Cross Island, the Gardening Club is leading the effort to restore greenery around campus.

'''Members''': [[Eri Shimanouchi]], [[Madoka Kaname]], [[Tadase Hotori]], [[Anthy Himemiya]] (vague affiliate)

====Kendo Club====
The ancient art of kendo has been performed at Japan's most prestigious private school for a very long time. They enjoy a proud and ancient tradition -- and a rivalry with the fencing club.

'''Members''': Kyouichi Saionji (Captain), Masashi Takeda (Sub-Captain), Kairi Sanjou, [[Kasagami Araki]], [[Takeo Akamizu]], Touga Kiryuu

====Music Club====
Ohtori actually has lots of music clubs which form along genre lines or a desire to form a coherent band, but the overarching umbrella exists, mostly to give them more clout in efforts to lobby the Student Council for funding. It tends to focus on classical music.

'''Members''': [[Georgia Jenks]], Yua Chouku

====Softball Club====
Sumo may be Japan's ''official'' national sport, but everyone knows it's actually baseball. In the Softball Club, the balls are a little softer, but the romance of the ballgame is the same. Pitchers stare down batters for an elemental duel, home runs rush toward the sky with all the force of an untamed metaphor, and individuals become something more as part of a team. A few times per academic session, the coaches will wrangle seats at a professional game, too, and the club will go meet their jerseyed heroes.

'''Members''': [[Sayaka Miki]] (centerfield/batter), [[Sachiko Majime]] (starting pitcher)

====Swim Team====
Ohtori has a long and proud tradition in swimming, an underwater torch carried forward into the future by its latest batch of students. The sweet silence beneath the water, the roar of the stands above it, the burn of screaming muscles... it's all here.

'''Members''': [[Eri Shimanouchi]], [[Kozue Kaoru]]

====Tea Ceremony Club====
One of Ohtori's oldest clubs, the Tea Ceremony Club owns millions of yen in equipment and kimono (a sentence they would find redundant). Many of the wealthiest children are enrolled in elementary school, and the clique is a tight one. Visitors by invitation only.

'''Members''': [[Chihaya Izumi]], Shizuru Fujino

====Tennis Team====
A very popular and glamorous sport at Ohtori, played extensively by many students; the girls' team tends to get more attention.

'''Members''': [[Chihaya Izumi]], Nanami Kiryuu, Wakaba Shinohara
|}

==Uniforms==
Ohtori Academy's yellow-themed uniforms may be found [[Schools: Uniforms#Ohtori Academy: Elementary|here]].

For more information, please see: [[Schools]], [[Organization: Ends of the World]], [[Theme]]

[[Category:Schools]]
[[Category:Ohtori]]
[[Category:Theme]]
[[Category:History]]

Space Jail

2018-05-07T02:41:05Z

Tlynn2002: /* Cell Block Tango */

'''''SPACE JAIL is a special event on Battle Fantasia MUSH that runs from 05/05/2018 to 05/12/2018.'''''

A UFO (technically, two UFOs) showed up on Earth and abducted the Crystal Gems, all of the Sailor Senshi except for Sailors Moon, Neptune and Uranus, and a lot of their allies, too!

[[2018-05-04 - The Return: A UFO Appears!]]

So, what's next?

1. Abducted magical girls were essentially all* knocked out of their transformation along the way thanks to a very scary weapon called the Destabilizer, and their transformation wands, gems, fairies and other such artifacts are locked up somewhere, while the girls themselves have been tossed into holding cells*.

2. These cells are on Jasper's green ship (which looks like a giant hand), which is currently docked, inside Rubeus' much larger Black Crystal Ship (which looks like an even more giant, spikey exploding crystal). A corvette inside a frigate, as it were.

3. Over the next week, Jasper's prisoners will be able to break out of their cells, and have adventures to reclaim their transformation artifacts so that they can meet up, fight back and escape in next weekend's Jail Break!

4. Meanwhile, [[2018-05-06 - Rubeus' Ultimatum|Rubeus delivered an ultimatum]] to Sailor Moon: surrender the Silver Crystal and Chibi-Usa, or he'll kill everyone, starting with the Inner Senshi. The magical girls remaining in Tokyo will have to respond, in more and less organized ways. The Chevaliers, Shepherds, Magic Association and Tuners all have opinions, priorities and resources to contribute to this mission in various ways, but you don't have to be in any of these groups to save your friends as long as you can find someone to go with -- or your own way into The Battle In Space!

==IC Details==

===Destabilizers===

1. The Destabilizer looks like this:

[[File:Destabilizer.png|height:200px]]

It is a melee weapon, one-handed. Its lightness does not preclude its danger.

Getting hit with its energy at all directly temporarily destroys the magical bodies of Gems, and temporarily destroys the transformations of Magical Girls. It looks like it should feel like a taser, but that's only the beginning. No, getting Destabilized feels like your magic being set on fire, inside and out, all over your skin and even in your veins. (It's yellow fire, visually.) After a second or so of burning, there's a sharp, severing shock -- and then your magic is gone, and you're a normal, vulnerable, and also usually unconscious or at best very weak and miserable person. Your transformation artifact falls away from you, and there's always a narrative opportunity for someone to pick it up and take it away (as happened in The Return).

Even if a magical girl is able to keep or reclaim her artifact, it takes at least a few hours to regain enough strength to walk, and about half a day for their bodies to become capable of transformation. Trying before then is a self-immolating act, as their bodies reject the magic and they are momentarily engulfed in a pillar of flame as the power burns away. (This does not actually leave lasting physical damage, it's just incredibly painful in the moment. Dramatic, sustained wounds from a Destabilizer tend to be on the order of a black eye.)

===The Homeworld Ship===

2. The Homeworld Ship where characters are being held is mostly as green on the inside as it is on the outside, but there are touches of yellow, also. The temperature is cool but not freezing, and it is /eerily/ silent for a massive motive machine. What sounds do drift through are from people rather than systems. Peridot and Jasper arguing. Jasper and Rubeus posturing. Rubeus and Wiseman muttering. Other prisoners shouting.

Distantly, a woman singing...

The walls are very hard and very smooth and if you touch them for too long it's uncomfortably cold, a reminder that the vacuum of space is very near, indeed. Like the floors, the walls have faint patterns of interlocking diamonds engraved on them. There are diamond-angles, gemstone-facets, everywhere in the design, including that of the cell 'doors' (really force fields), which are hexagonal.

The cells are dark and windowless, except for that field across the front, which is a translucent yellow and allows visibility through both sides. This is strongly similar to Destabilizer energy, and it administers a nasty shock to any magical girl who tries to pass through it. Apparently something of the experience of being Destabilized has marked even full humans with something that causes the fields to react that way even though they aren't transformed.

The hallways are many and similar and very confusing since they're unmarked or at least not marked in a familiar way. Now and again there are evidence of the systems that must run the ship, particularly in yellow tubing that runs through its structure like veins, and the occasional touch screen.

There are viewports, some small and some large, but instead of showing the vast beauty of space, they show only blackness. That makes sense -- the smaller UFO is docked inside the larger one, after all.

There are few doors, other than the cells; separation of space, privacy, don't seem to be major concepts around here. This makes it difficult, though not impossible, to hide. To hide from Jasper and Peridot and, when they visit, Rubeus and Wiseman; and to hide from the many rolling Robonoids that patrol the halls and endlessly connecting rooms, beeping thoughtfully to themselves and each other.

There are a few important areas on the Homeworld Ship that bear discussion.

* The Cell Blocks are hallways filled with cells. There are a lot of them spread all over the place and it isn't necessarily easy to find a specific other person's cell.

* The Bridge is behind closed, sliding doors, and inaccessible, but that's okay for now because the people running this show are clearly in or around there most of the time. AVOID.

* The Engine Room, where all those yellow tubes inevitably lead to, is similarly inaccessible unless and until it becomes possible to blast one's way into it (see: next weekend).

* Storage Rooms are scattered throughout the ship, though, and awesomely, they have opaque doors which open and close with simple touchpads. They are about the size of a large living room, and filled with sweet little egg-like gray balls, each of which contains somebody's transformation artifact -- or a weird alien creature -- or really the ball is a Robonoid, which immediately attacks! It is theoretically possible to clear out a storage room and claim it as a temporary base. Naturally, you require unambiguous OOC consent to discover the transformation artifact of anyone but yourself.

* It isn't obvious how one enters or leaves the ship, but searching for that (nonexistant) airlock is a really good and logical reason for people to spend a lot of time sneaking around.

==Dramatis Personae==

===Captors===
[[File:Jasper.png|200px|thumb|right|Jasper]]
There are a number of antagonist NPCs present who may exist in some form in your scenes. You have explicit permission to emit them passing by as they go about their business, though they will not stop to chat with prisoners; below we detail a couple specific conversations that you are encouraged to overhear, and we'll also discuss their use in the Scene Suggestions section.

'''Jasper''' seems to be in command of the Homeworld Ship. She is large and in charge and loudly unwilling to let her new Black Moon Clan allies totally run the show. She often wanders the ship, and sometimes can be seen interrogating Gem prisoners, but mostly walks straight past cells containing mere humans. She can be glimpsed from afar by escapees, or her approach fled from, but that's it; any interaction with Jasper /at all/ is an automatic fade to black, wake back up in a cell by yourself with any goodies you collected taken away and stored somewhere else.

'''Rubeus''' is the one who activated the gravity beam that made it so easy for Jasper to take you all prisoner, and he apparently captains the larger UFO that this one is docked inside. He's done some bad things in the past like almost killing people in Jindai Botanical Garden with a black hole. He isn't around much in the Homeworld Ship, but he occasionally shows up to trade barbs with Jasper. As with Jasper, direct character interaction with Rubeus is a no-go; it is an automatic fade to black with some sad 'mission fail' music.
[[File:Peridot.png|200px|thumb|right|Peridot]]
'''Wiseman''' seems to be a floating black cloak with a crystal ball. There are glittering eyes, deep in the cowl's shadows. Apparently he works with Rubeus, and is only ever seen in his company. Sometimes he seems to look directly at escapees, but never points them out or interacts with them in any way, just moves along. His gaze is chilling, like that of an abyss.
[[File:Robonoids.png|200px|thumb|right|The Robonoids]]
'''Peridot''' is an extremely high-strung technician. She's in charge of this ship's systems and periodically makes the rounds to check on her Robonoids. She is clearly both frustrated by and afraid of Jasper, and mutters a lot about efficiency as she goes by. Like Jasper, she is armed with a Destabilizer, and for the time being, once you're out of your cell, a similar Instant Lose condition (though she accomplishes her capture with a little help from her Robonoids).

'''Robonoids''' are pseudosentient spherical robots. They are constantly on patrol. There is an essentially unlimited number of them. They spray sticky teal goop to try to immobilize and recapture their enemies, and are real good at it, and when defeated they explode into even more goop, to boot. If they aren't shut up very quickly they will sound a shipwide alarm which inevitably leads to being back in your cell, which provides some time pressure for every encounter. Robonoids are youmas, and available to NPC for each other using the Battle Fantasia Youma Repository System, or just fight 'em without the csys if you prefer.
:Robonoids have a Youma form, #50. To see its sheet, +youma/sheet 50. To see its attacks, +youma/attacks 50. To see its description, +youma/desc 50. To summon its form onto yourself to use as a GM, +youma/summon 50, then +transform Y.

===Prisoners===

There are also some other prisoners. Some of these can be interacted with more meaningfully, so we'll provide some more guidelines as to their personalities. It is completely fine to have conversations with Ruby and Lapis, but they won't join a 'party' and move around with them; interactions tend to be relatively brief cameos.
[[File:Ruby.png|200px|thumb|right|Ruby]]
'''Ruby''' is a tiny, pugnacious, FURIOUS little red chick with a spunky headband, tank top, and shorts, who is endlessly pacing and/or punching her cell, or else curled up in one of its corners facing the wall. She greets escaped prisoners with suspicion and frustration, but will asked to be let out so she can find 'Sapphire', who she discusses with urgency and desperation. Only Steven is allowed to rescue her, but once she's out she can also be encountered rushing and pacing around, searching for Sapphire, and players are encouraged to try to help her on her quest. EXTREMELY impatient, Ruby won't stick around for more than a moment before continuing on her way, and she has an uncanny ability to vanish around a corner and just be gone.
:Signature quotes (recommended for scene usage):
* "Let me out! Please! I have to find Sapphire! She's all alone, I need to find her!"
* "SAAAAAAAAPHIIIIIIIIIIIIIRE!!!!"
* "UGH, I don't have time for this!!"
[[File:Lapis.png|200px|thumb|right|Lapis]]
'''Lapis''' is the water witch who stole the ocean that one time, but apparently now she's in a cell too. She is a slender blue maiden with short hair and an absolutely desolate expression, and she never gets up from where she's sitting in the corner of her cell. She mostly refuses to converse with anyone who approaches her, but if they persist, will try to convince escapees to surrender before they get hurt. If they try to free her anyway, she will shout to summon the guards.
:Signature quotes (recommended for scene usage):
* "Stop! No! I don't want your help. Things are bad enough as it is. I've already made too much trouble."
* "Whatever you're doing, just stop. If we do everything they say, they might go easy on us."

'''Alien Samples''' are random little aliens found in the gray eggs in Storage Rooms each of which might or might not hold someone's transformation item. None of them are even as intelligent-seeming as the average puppy. They tend to be weird; think a group of chiming rainbow bubbles that rapidly float away into the hallway, or a little flower that sprouts roots and toddles off to explore, or a flickering, bug-eyed bit of orange flame that, alarmed by the interruption to its slumber, flares, then vanishes into soot. Feel free to be creative here and make up your own odd things that emerge from opened pods; keep the tone relatively wondrous, or lightly scary. They are not here to present moral dilemnas.
[[File:Sapphire.png|200px|thumb|right|Sapphire]]
'''Sapphire''' is a tiny, serene, SINGING little blue chick in an aristocratic gown and whose eyes are never visible behind her long bangs. For that matter, her feet are invisible beneath her skirts, too, and she appears to be hovering. She spends most of the time in her cell singing, and is the source of the mysterious wordless music drifting through the prison. She will be found and released next weekend; her cell is extremely near the bridge and cannot be approached in other scenes. Often Jasper can be seen there, trying to interrogate her. Her answers are, universally, too soft to be overheard.

'''Pearl''' is missing. So are '''Sailors Mars, Jupiter and Venus'''. They simply cannot be found on the Homeworld Ship.

===Overheard Conversations===

Here are some conversations or dialogue from otherwise unapproachable NPCs that characters are encouraged to overhear, either from within their cells or while sneaking around.

---

Jasper and Peridot are arguing as they walk down a hallway together.
"We can't leave yet!" protests Peridot hotly. "The whole point of coming here was to check on the Cluster!"

Jasper is unmoved, other than to narrow her eyes at this challenge to her authority. "Rose Quartz takes priority. Get back to the bridge and plot a course for Homeworld. We'll be leaving as soon as I finish dealing with our... friends."

Peridot grumbles as she departs. "'Go to earth', they said. 'It'll be easy,' they said."

---

Peridot is muttering at her Robonoids as she checks on a patrol -- or cleans up after a destroyed one. "Can't believe this," she grunts, "The ONE THING!" she scrubs at something, "ONE! THING! BUT NO... suddenly the /CLUSTER/ isn't even /IMPORTANT?!?/"

---

Jasper pounds on the cell wall above Sapphire's head. "STOP SINGING!!"

---

Jasper is giving Rubeus a tour of the ship. "I've been told that we've integrated these Black Crystals of yours into our highly advanced technology, to great effect."

Rubeus grunts. "In exchange for securing the Silver Crystal and the death of the Rabbit?"

"That's right," Jasper agrees steadily. "Seems like a pretty raw deal to me, we didn't need this stuff to accomplish our own mission at all. I've got half a mind to leave right now."

"No," Rubeus insists, a little heatedly. "A deal's a deal. When the hostage exchange is complete, you may go. Until then... relax and enjoy our hospitality. If you'd care to sample some delicacies straight from the court of Prince Demando..."

Jasper does a double-take as they move on. "Tell me more about your Diamond," she demands.

---

Rubeus wanders through the green halls accompanied by a floating cloaked figure he refers to as Wiseman. "You really believe this will work?"

"Yes," says the spooky voice emitting from the cowl. "Have faith, Rubeus. Your just reward is coming very soon... as is the Silver Crystal and the Rabbit."

Rubeus clenches a fist. "Right. Right! Yes, finally success is within my grasp. Soon I'll be rid of this miserable place and back at the side of my Prince, where I belong."

"At his right hand," agrees Wiseman, soothingly...

==Scene Suggestions==

If you've read this far you can probably see where we're going with this: SPACE JAIL is an event designed to be run without staff GMs, by players, for players, with players, as characters wake up in their cells, discover their circumstances, escape, find their transformation artifacts, and start looking for a way out. The setting provided is fairly defined but still with plenty of room for improvisation. If you aren't sure if something would be allowed, just ask!

===INSIDE THE CELLS===

For whatever reason, most cells have two people in them, but a few have one or three. They are very cramped, especially with multiple people. Inexplicably, ice sometimes forms in a corner and water drips out of it, which can be caught and drunk. After the first round of potty complaints, Peridot programs the cells to periodically extrude little half-sphere toilets, giving people the ability to get rid of their waste. This does not happen without commentary and complaint about the vagaries of organic anatomies.

Often, NPCs go by, especially Robonoids floating along on patrol but occasionally other people. Adjacent cells can easily hold a conversation -- voices carry down the hall.

It is recommended to have at least one desolate, hopeless, scary scene in your cells before the scene where you escape, because imprisonment sucks and is a pretty rare roleplaying opportunity, so why not take advantage of it?

===ESCAPING THE CELLS===

The cell containment can be circumvented in the following ways:

* Steven Universe is relatively immune to the fields, able to (painfully) move in and out, or block their emitters with his arm so that others can escape. Arranging a scene to be let out of your cell by Steven is the #1 absolute best way to be released, and highly recommended. But it isn't the only way.

* From the OUTSIDE, it is possible to open someone else's cell by operating a little dimmer switch on the wall, after unlocking it by solving a small touchscreen puzzle that's a cross between Sudoku and Frogger, but that isn't obvious at first glance and should only be noticed at first by exceptionally technically inclined magical girls (examples: Fuu Hououji, Setsuna Meioh, Ami Mizuno) or Crystal Gems familiar with Gem technology, or sentient mascots (once reclaimed). They can teach others the trick. Also, it takes about fifteen minutes to hack open a cell door, and Robonoid patrols go by every ten.

* As it is a serious emergency situation, mascots who are inherently connected to their transformation artifact are capable of struggling free of their little gray eggs... but they have to leave the artifact behind, for now, and INVARIABLY they get lost finding their partners and won't be able to lead the way back. If you want (for example) to watch Flappy take an hour to fail at the minigame to hack Saki's cell, occasionally having to frantically hide from the Robonoids, until he finally gets her out, that is A-OK. If you don't have a mascot appropriate to this, you'll just have to wait for help.

* However, you can't do an escape CUTSCENE; even if it's one mascot letting out two people in adjacent cells, make sure you're with someone when you escape! And it's generally preferable to let another PC get you out than an NPC.

===OUTSIDE OF THE CELLS, PART 1: FINDING YOUR ARTIFACT===

* Once you're out, you're in immediate and terrible danger. Remember that, having been Destabilized, besides being without your magic you also kinda got wrecked, and are likely to be initially groggy and weak. Obviously, reclaiming your transformation artifact has to be your number one objective -- and something, deep in your heart, indicates that it's on board... somewhere.

* Large groups attract more attention; four is the absolute maximum before it becomes essentially impossible to move around the ship without getting caught and punked by Jasper, etc (though more than four could gather in a room together for a few moments). This is still true for magical girls as well as regular humans.

* It is possible to find an alcove or little room to rest in now and then, but having a friend nearby and awake is a must. It's very dangerous to sleep alone. Remember that not all that much time is passing here, this OOC week is only an IC day or two.

* You can fight Robonoids while untransformed (because they really kinda suck), but not very effectively (you are advised to just not use the csys, freeform it). It is much, much, much better to run from them, and any combats should be very desperate, like 'a group of norms' versus 'a single puny robonoid' is a MAJOR challenge that will probably require trickery and cleverness to overcome. There are no exceptions to this rule, no matter who you are normally.

* If you're recaptured, please don't play it for laughs. They don't need /everyone/ for a hostage, after all, and the potential of making an example out of someone is a very real threat.

* The 'IC Details' section above extensively discusses the experience of being outside of the cell; a lot of hallways, a high probability of getting lost, a lot of patrols to desperately hide from, occasionally familiar faces to stumble across and rescue from their cells or otherwise meet up with to plot. It is a tense, scary situation, but also a happy one as friends find one another.

* And, of course, the Storage Rooms, described above, which is where you'll find your artifact. If you're wanting to do LOTS of these scenes, you can of course take the option to not even find your artifact in the first Storage Room you visit, there are lots of them...

* Storage Rooms have water, and you could /try/ eating stuff in them but it wouldn't go well, nasty tastes are guaranteed. They exist in this setting to be a 'climax' for people reclaiming their artifacts as the (often) final scene of their little adventure, and then afterwards to be a (relatively) safe space to rest in.

===OUTSIDE OF THE CELLS, PART 2: MAGICAL GIRLS===

* It is totally fine, even encouraged, for reclaiming your artifact to be your final scene before Friday, and then the story picks up directly from there. But if you'd like to do more scenes between then and the jailbreak, bear in mind that the prison riot isn't starting until Friday (5/11/18).

* Because of the lingering effects of Destabilization, nobody* is allowed to successfully re-transform again, full stop, until Tuesday of next week (5/8/18). They can find their artifact sooner but will discover the ill effects described in the above section about Destabilizers.

* Once you're transformed, Robonoids are no longer a terrifying threat but more of a satisfyingly manageable fight, even in larger numbers. However, 'unapproachable' NPCs are still that way, and will punk you with a Destabilizer and chuck you back in your cell if you're seen, hiding your artifact somewhere else and leaving you unable to transform again until Friday's scene; if you feel that your character would attack Jasper on sight no matter what and you don't want to get recaptured, then don't let her find Jasper.

* Once transformed, it's a lot less scary to move around (because of the relative ease of defeating Robonoids, mostly) though still something that requires some amount of stealth (because of Jasper et al). It's now possible to just blast a control panel next to a cell to kill the field. Anyone still in a cell after Tuesday is encouraged to be saved very easily.

* The big question that comes to mind once one is transformed again is 'how to escape', and answering that question, and finding some kind of airlock, are the same thing to a lot of people. There are an infinite number of 'sneaking around, looking for the way out' scenes to be done. There are good reasons not to just blast out of there/onto the bridge/into the engine room, not least that you need a way back to Earth. But you may not be able to leave at all before doing something about Rubeus' UFO (see: the weekend)...

* There is also the matter of those unaccounted for: Mars, Venus, Jupiter and Pearl are nowhere to be found anywhere in the cell blocks, and can be searched for indefinitely.

===More Ideas===

Scene concepts don't need to be as grand as 'saving someone from their cell' or 'finding an artifact'. There are a million tiny snapshots that can be a part of this adventure. Here are some examples to get you started on your own:

* You're in your cell, reflecting on everything you've left behind, everything still at stake. Large and small, there's a lot to be unpacked. At least you don't have to do it alone...
:...you're cellmates with your best friend!
:...you're cellmates with your worst enemy!
:...you're cellmates with a total stranger, and you have to get to know each other!
:...okay, you're alone, but you can talk to people in adjacent cells!

* You're out of your cell, slowly working your way through the ship with your friends, and being as quiet as possible because you can hear Jasper further down the hallway, talking to someone. Things get tense when they start to change course...
:...but you're able to hide from them and you listen to more of their conversation!
:...but it turns out they were just stopping for a minute, whew!
:...and you see one of your friends coming from another direction, and have to silently get their attention/beckon/drag them out of the way!
:...and then Ruby rushes down an adjacent hallway, shouting, and you have to run for your life as Jasper storms towards her!

* You and your friends find another prisoner...
:...and rescue them, but in the middle of getting into their cell, a robonoid appears!
:...but it's Ruby, and she yells at you to go away!
:...but it's Lapis, and SHE yells at you to go away, and calls the guards when you don't!
:...but it's Sapphire, and you can't get close because Jasper is yelling questions at her about Rose Quartz!
:...and you've both escaped already, so you have to quietly find a place together to talk safely, and there are Robonoids in the way!

* You're in a storage room...
:...taking turns taking naps and talking quietly, resting, recuperating.
:...brainstorming what to do next.
:...and your friend that you haven't found yet walks in, making for a happy reunion!
:...and your worst enemy walks in, making for a tense situation!
:...looking for water. Or a toilet. There are no toilets outside of the cells. :/
:...opening pods, and one is a Robonoid!
:...opening pods, and a weird Alien Sample appears and starts making way too much noise!

==Notable Exceptions==

* Steven, Amethyst, Pearl and Lapis were not Destabilized, just knocked out the old fashioned way via Jasper's mighty fists and feet.

* That means that once Steven and Amethyst are out, they're out fully powered, and make outstanding escorts for untransformed people (though enough Robonoids, or any of the NPCs, are still a huge threat; tension remains high).

* Steven is in fact relatively immune to Destabilization, able to take the shock of its energies without being too badly harmed (which is why he can handle the containment fields), though he cannot summon his shield or use his other powers at the same time as a Destabilizer is in contact with him, and it isn't a pleasant feeling.

* The Inner Senshi (Venus, Mars and Jupiter) are Rubeus' special prisoners, and have been crucified on Black Crystal crosses in a dark chamber on his ship, inside an energy-sucking field that is a torment to endure and almost impossible to move within (something that has been televised back on Earth, but isn't known to their fellow prisoners, they're just missing, unfindable in the cell blocks). They were also not Destabilized, because Rubeus whisked them away before Jasper had a chance.

* Rubeus had Mercury too, but he and Jasper traded her and Pearl as a sort of hostage-trade-within-the-larger-hostage-situation that also has some kind of meta implications about each of them thinking of their respective trade as their least valuable prisoner, to their extreme detriment... So Mercury is in the cell blocks with everyone else (and Jasper totally Destabilized her on the way in), while Pearl is nowhere to be found.

==Frequently Asked Questions==

'''Q:''' I couldn't make Friday's scene but I don't want to miss out on Space Jail! What do I do?

'''A:''' Any magical girl could have seen the UFO in the sky and been a face in the crowd of first responders, and abducted with all the rest. You are entirely welcome to have been here all along! Please make sure to read the log to understand in full detail what went down: http://battlefantasia.pinksugarheartattack.net/2018-05-04_-_The_Return:_A_UFO_Appears!

'''A2:''' There will also be a group of left-behind magical girls going on a rescue mission as part of next weekend, and probably having some scenes between now and then about how to respond to Rubeus' hostage demands. Either way is fine!

'''Q:''' Who am I in a cell with?

'''A:''' Whatever other PCs you want (obviously, everyone involved has to agree), up to three people per cell. Please keep track on the wiki page for this event, below.

'''Q:''' Do I have to wait for Steven to escape before I escape?

'''A:''' Steven has already escaped. He is the Patient Zero of escaping. It may have happened off-camera until he does it on-camera, but it's the case: he was the first, because he had it so easy. If this bends OOC time a bit, that's okay.

'''Q:''' I'm not sure who should let me out, what should I do?

'''A:''' Ask! If there's someone in particular you want to be rescued by, that can surely be arranged. If not, someone would surely enjoy doing the scene with you. When in doubt, ask Steven -- this is his big chance to be a rescuer, and I'm sure he'd love to rescue you!

'''Q:''' You forcibly detransformed my character and stashed her in a cell, but I don't want her secret identity shared with everyone, what should I do?

'''A:''' Recognition Inhibition > imprisonment. If you don't want to be recognized by someone for whatever reason (and any reason at all is fine, it's an important genre convention!), just say that the lighting in here is really weird or something. ICly concerned characters could obscure their faces deliberately by making masks out of their clothing, etc, which will of course turn out to be remarkably effective.

'''Q:''' Can I schedule a public +scene for any of this? I want to escape/save someone/run some Robonoids!

'''A:''' Yes, but bearing in mind that the feel we're going for here is not, initially, 'prison riot,' more like 'mission impossible.' Doing smaller pick-up scenes via LFRP may be better (or you could set a participation cap on your +scene), and please don't let any larger scenes get too loud.

If you want to take all comers for a scene where, for example, magical girls gradually filter into the same storage room and open all the pods together, fight a few robonoids, gawk at a few alien samples, and finally claim it for their own, by all means. No one should feel left out or like they MISSED it, though -- there's more than one storage room to turn into a temporary base, and none of them are safe for too long anyway, inevitably they have to be abandoned every few hours when they're discovered.

==Cell Block Tango==

As characters determine who they're sharing cells with, please update this with your own cell names. There are five facets. Cells in the same facet can converse via shouting. As you escape, please update this as well so we know who's out.

'''Facet 4, Cell 1S3N-Mu:''' [[Endo Naoki]] and [[Mikoto Minagi]]

'''Facet 3, Cell 2K1X-Alpha:''' [[Steven Universe]] (escaped)

'''Facet 3, Cell 2K1Y-Beta:''' Ruby

'''Facet 3, Cell 2K1Z-Gamma:''' [[Ami Mizuno]] (escaped)

'''Facet 2, Cell 7F0A-Tau:''' [[Fate Testarossa]] and [[Setsuna Meioh]]

'''Facet 2, Cell 7E9X-Rho:''' [[Nori Ankou]] and [[Yumi Ohzora]]

'''Facet 1, Cell 8V9P-Omega:''' Sapphire

==Logs==

Please include 'SPACE JAIL' in the title of all of your logs, and they'll automatically appear here.

{{#dpl: |category = logs
|titlematch = %SPACE JAIL%
|notcategory = News Files
|notcategory = cutscenes
|ordermethod = title
|columns = 2
|rowcolformat=width=100%
|suppresserrors = yes
|noresultsheader=There are no SPACE JAIL logs yet. Fix it!
}}

Ami Mizuno

2018-04-08T05:16:26Z

Tlynn2002:

2017-11-12T13:51:00Z

Tlynn2002: new BF OC!

Kimiko Akane

2017-11-12T06:34:39Z

Tlynn2002: Not much here yet but getting page up at least :)

Organization: The Tuner Organization

2017-10-20T02:01:54Z

Tlynn2002: /* Cast of Characters */

The Tuner Organization represents the new age. Where the Magic Association is a storied horde of scholars, with the occasional battle-wizard riding into the fray, the Tuner Organization rejects the old ways almost entirely. Founded by the heiresses of the then-new industrial class at the dawn of the new rise of magic, the Tuner Organization doesn't have the castles and ancient houses that are the domains of the Magic Association. The Tuner Organization is urbane and metropolitan, with private hospitals on contract and contacts lounging at Starbooks with a laptop and a lifetime supply of lattes.

The Tuner Organization is a collective of mages and magical girls, with one, simple goal: To bring the world into Tune. In other words, to destroy the darkness, to cast out the demons, and generally silence the discordant noise of fantastically-caused despair. This is a never-ending war and they all know it. But they also know that it isn't a war that they have to fight alone.

In practical terms, the Tuner Organization functions as a magical girl union; in exchange for individuals sharing information and, to the extent it's possible, resources, the Tuners will provide certain necessary services to both pave the way and cover the tracks of a long and storied career as a monster hunter. Mental and physical health care, legal support and Girls' Night Out (2nd and 4th Thursdays every month) are only the most mundane examples; the Tuner Organization has arranged for magical veils that function as witness protection for a magical girl's family if her secret identity has been exposed to the wrong group. They've blackmailed Vice Principals who are asking too many questions about their students' attendance records. Though it very much lacks the [[Magic Association|Magic Association's]] mystical nuance that comes from thousands of years of magical library collection, problem solving is what the Tuners do, and they draw from across their membership to match the right skillset to the right issue.

Day to day, the Tuners are also a bounty-hunting agency straight out of Dragon Quest: Monsters of a given type and strength are worth a certain value of cash, payable when proof of a kill is presented to one of various Tuner contacts throughout the region. Some particularly dangerous monsters may have a custom bounty set by the Organization's leaders, the Conductors. Monsters defeated by multiple Tuners generally have their bounty split evenly, unless some private arrangement is held by the involved parties. Such arrangements can be and often are determined by combat; the Organization doesn't particularly care if Tuners fight each other, as long as it doesn't cause problems with the mundanes or the Magic Association's meddling field agents.

Most Tuners have a pretty no-nonsense approach to this matter, focused on purging monsters over anything else. Their politics are generally simple affairs, with bi-annual conventions in which major, union-wide decisions are decided by majority vote. There is some accusation that the more moneyed girls receive preferential treatment, but the books are so opaque -- by necessity, lest they fall into the wrong hands -- that it's impossible to prove. But though they lack the thousand-year internecine feuds of the Magic Association's bloodlines, the organization as a whole is beginning to fall victim to its own measured success. Tuners take pride in their ruthlessness, but cynicism after managing the front lines of the war against darkness threatens the future of the organization; where the Magic Association would definitely seal an artifact of dangerous power, the Tuners might seek to use it in their battle. To save lives, certainly -- no one has a better record of the young blood spilled since the mid-1800s than the Tuners. But such slopes are slippery indeed.

On a similarly cynical note, the Tuner Organization's leadership has rather little interest in rehabilitating powers of darkness; although individual Tuners can (and do!) make those efforts on occasion, the archetypal Tuner and especially the Conductors tend to view redeemed demons as an enemy in the house rather than a new friend.

The Tuner Organization's central headquarters is in New York City, where the Conductors reside and oversee actions across the world. The leaders in Japan are...mostly unknown. Perhaps befitting the decentralized Tuners, the Conductor of Japan, if there even is one, keeps his or her head down. The closest thing to a direct line to the Organization most Tuners know of is an enigmatic man who goes only by Yamada, who maintains a private Tuner message board and serves as an informational contact. Similarly, although there are Organization-owned hospitals, gymnasiums and other services available to Tuners throughout Tokyo, the closest thing they have to a base of operations is a particularly shady-looking soda shop on Southern Cross Island. That, and every Starbooks in the region...

__TOC__

==Example Character Concepts==
'''Appropriate Tuner Organization characters include: '''

* A new magical girl recruited straight out of an early fight, who is happy to be included in the group but increasingly worried about the extremity of some of their tactics.
* A wizard tired of Magic Association politics who just wants to kick monster butt, trying to earn his way into the Tuner Organization despite a great deal of skepticism on their part as to his loyalties.
* An old hat at monster hunting, a sorority girl of Tokyo University's Mu Gamma Sigma, the Tuner Organization's chapter for its post-high school membership!

'''Example Theme Affiliations:''' [[Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon|Sailor Senshi]] (Venus, Neptune and Haruka Tenoh, [[Pretty Cure]] (especially Happiness Charge), Magic Knight Rayearth (Ferio), Mai-HiME (Natsuki), Oto x Maho, [[Puella Magi Madoka Magica]], Princess Tutu (Fakir), Senki Zesshou Symphogear (The 2nd Division Mobile Disaster Response Corps), Tokyo Mew Mew
* ''This list is not exhaustive, nor universally accurate for a given theme's protagonists, but exists to give an idea of typical themes (or characters within a theme) connected to the organization.''

==Cast of Characters==
''This list can be edited by players to add their characters to their appropriate organization. Feel free to add your name as a link to your character page!''

'''Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon''': [[Michiru Kaioh]], [[Haruka Tenoh]], [[Minako Aino]]

'''DokiDoki! Pretty Cure''': Makoto Kenzaki

'''Happiness Charge Pretty Cure!''': [[Iona Hikawa]]

'''Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha''': [[Fate Testarossa]], Chrono Harlaown, [[Lera Camry]], Jad Werke, [[Nanoha Takamachi]]

'''Magic Knight Rayearth''': Ferio

'''Mai-HiME''': [[Natsuki Kuga]], [[Georgia Jenks]]

'''Oto x Maho''': Kanata Shirahime, Ruma Hino, Grace Chapel

'''Puella Magi Madoka Magica''': [[Eri Shimanouchi]], [[Kyouko Sakura]]

'''Revolutionary Girl Utena''': Shiori Takatsuki

==History==
When the world rattled under [[History: Clow Reed|Clow Reed's]] miraculous despair, the very rules changed. The gates that held the other worlds - the great [[Dark Fall|demon empires]] and mystic artifacts that had been cast out into the worlds by Serenity and honed to supremacy by Belka - at bay, had been sundered. The world was soon awash in new threats: Powers that had once been considered once-a-generation nightmares became common. It seemed like the darkness had finally won.

Hope is not so frail a thing. The world rallied and fought back, and soon a surge of new, ever more powerful magical girls rose to the challenge of bringing the world back into tune. At the time, a new wealthy class was taking its place amid the world's citizens, as the industrial revolution surged; it may have been destiny that these two things collided. New, wealthy magical girls, brimming with both power and the grim understanding of the magnitude of their task, set to work. Money disappeared into invisible coffers across the world, as they found a new name, and a new cause.

The Tuners were no new order; the sorority of magical girls, more interested in bringing the world into tune and protecting their home than the Magic Association's high ideals and bitter politics, had been an establishment for ages. But now they had funding; now they had power. Hospitals were quietly bought, gymnasiums leased, discretion purchased, loyalties acquired.

This awakened Tuner Organization declared its home to be in New York, where the most powerful and most dedicated among them claimed the titles of Conductors. There, they arranged for local chapters to be established wherever there were members to recruit. They made plain that they would leave the moral platitudes and ancient pacts to the Magic Association. They weren't interested in that.

The Tuners had Noise to fight.

And fight it they do, sometimes taking extreme measures in order to extinguish Noise faster, more effectively or more finally -- but at what price?

For more information, please see: [[Organizations]], [[History: Clow Reed]], [[History: Modern Times]], [[Theme Primer]], [[Theme]]

[[Category:Theme]]
[[Category:Organizations]]
[[Category:Tuners]]
[[Category:History]]

2017-10-16 - Love and Loyalty

2017-10-17T20:32:14Z

Tlynn2002:

{|class="toccolours" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''Love and Loyalty'''
|-
|'''Summary''': 
''Kasagami confronts Nanoha about something that happened between the Chevaliers and Shepherds.''
|-
|'''Who''': 
[[Nanoha Takamachi]], [[Kasagami Araki]], [[Fate Testarossa]]
|-
|'''Where:''' 
''Midor-iya and Abandoned Distillery
|-
|'''OOC - IC Date:''' 
10/16/2017 - 2/25/2015
|-
|}

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

The Midoriya is normally a busy place but as the evening winds down, the crowds start to thin out and people begin to make their way home. This doesn't change anything for the Takamachi family however as they are all still here working in various places. All of them are easy to spot except the youngest, Nanoha, who could be easily missed as she is hunched over a book, sitting in a booth, near the front corner of the bakery.

The are no food or drinks near her but the book she is reading seems very interesting as her focus seems to be solely on it and not anything else. Normally, she would be snacking or helping out but tonight, this book seems to hold her attention more than anything else. The front cover is blue and the text can be easily read as, "The Caring of Fish." Near her left hand is a pencil, which ever so often, the girl picks up to write something in a notebook.

Nanoha's attire this evening is her normal Infinity uniform, although she is wearing a white, open sweater over it. It's a little chilly in the restaraunt today so it was keeping her warm. Her legs are curled up on the booth seat and most of the tables nearby seem to be empty for the moment, waiting for possible last minute customers.

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Kasagami arrives with her usual lack of subtlety. There's a horn honking a street or three over, a sound of a vehicle swerving, and then a roaring engine and squeeling tires make another mockery of the essence of safe driving. The lights on a black-and-crimson Harley die down, and a helmet is cast about a handlebar. Kickstand down, a long black duffel bag shouldered over her back, and the Student Council Disciplinary Executive walks into the Midori-ya like she owns the place.

The doors come open with a little more force than usual. Her boots make a b-line towards a very specific seat with a very specific person sitting there over her book. A grin is etched on her face.

"Nanoha-chan! Mind if I sit?" WHUMP. Her voice is a bit tight, a bit tired, and that definitely was a rhetorical question.

Kasagami all but falls into the seat next to her. The duffel bag is gently placed beside her. There's a light sound of what might be metal from inside, if one listens close.

Should a waitress come by? She'll shoo them off, first with a hand, then a glare.

"You really are full of surprises, you know that? Oh, my, you've been very busy lately, haven't you!?" There's mirth in her voice, even as she cuts her usually loud and boisterous tone down so that only Nanoha could hear. Her good eye is narrowed, and bores into Nanoha with unflinching intensity.

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

The first thing that takes Nanoha's focus from her book is the tires squealing and then the car approaches and makes her focus even more. She knows that car pretty well but for the first few seconds, Nanoha doesn't make any moves, even as the familiar girl comes into the bakery like she runs things. It does take her by surprise but even moreso that Kasagami comes right towards her.

Nanoha's eyes widen at the question and before she can offer any word to Kasagami, the girl is seated across from her. There seems to be something different about the girl since their last visit but she doesn't question it at first. Instead, she closes the book, marking carefully her spot.

"I... what? Is something wrong?" The girl looks very confused and something about the way the words are spoken makes her feel uneasy. "Suprises? What are you talking about?" Nanoha doesn't address Kasagami by name, perhaps she feels intimidated right now. "Busy with school... I guess." She shrugs, really having no clue what Kasagami was talking about exactly.

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Kasagami, upon seeing Nanoha's confusion, finally just laughs. It's a low thing, and she lets out a sigh. "Really? Playing coy?"

Then she pauses, and frowns. A thought crosses her mind, pehaps that hadn't this entire time. "Huh. Or maybe she didn't tell you. That really ''would'' just be like her, wouldn't it? So, Nanoha-chan...a little bird told me that you met someone by the name of Mami Tomoe. The girl with her pretty little band of make-believe soldiers." Her smile smile is suddenly very pleasant, in that vaguely mocking sort of way.

Her eye narrows a fraction again. "...Starting to get the picture a little more? Or do I need to spell things out for you, my dear friend."

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Nanoha cannot seem to make sense of what Kasagami is saying. The young girl feels like she is missing something important but before any questions can be asked she hears, at least partly, what she is talking about.

"Mami... yes but how did you know that?" As far as Nanoha knew, she hadn't talked to her and she cannot imagine why Mami, or anyone else, would have mentioned it specifically to Kasagami. Maybe it ''had'' been someone else though?

"I don't understand what that has to do with anything. I mean, why..." Make-believe soliders? Sudden realization dawns on the girl, although she is still not sure she understands everything. "Is there a problem? Did something happen?"

She cannot help but feel like something is definitely wrong here. For now, the young girl seems to hold things together. She eyes her parents nearby and her siblings moving in and out of the kitchen. For now, they don't approach though so it's just Kasagami and Nanoha.

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Nanoha is just so innocent, even now. Kasagami's gaze actually softens. Some of the anger in her, while it doesn't go away, pauses. She looks the younger girl up and down. And finally she just rolls an eye.

Her smile this time, despite herself, is genuine. Arms finally cross, and she props her head up with an elbow. Her head is tilted as she assumes something almost lazy as she peers at the girl, openly in half disbelief.

"You know what? I actually believe that you have no idea how or why I know what I know. Yeesh. Dragging people like you into this whole mess? Nanoha. Let me give you my sincerest and fullest apologies in advance. I'm starting to think you're in way over your head. And that makes me very sad because I like the girl that serves pastries in her parents' wonderful shop." Her whispers ends with a sigh.

A glance to said parents. She stands up, and slips to Nanoha's side. Dextrous fingers will try to slip an envelope into one of Nanoha's pockets. Her other hand reaches down to playfully ruffle the girl's hair with a grin on her face. She leans in.

"Meet me soon. And don't be late. Trust me, better to get any bad blood out of the way before this whole farce ends." A wink, and then she' stepping lively towards the exit of the Midori-ya.

That envelope? It contains an address to an abandoned old section of an industrial district. Money for a cab either towards, or...back? The time? Midnight. It would take a magical girl to get there from the Midori-ya.

Kasagami sings aloud as she departs, in near-perfect but heavily accented English.

"Baa, baa, black sheep, have you any wool?"

"Yesss sir, yes sir, three bags full!"

~Later, Abandoned Distillery~

Kasagami, festooned by crimson roses about her coat, has red-highlighted hair fluttering in the wind as she stands upon the rooftop of an old, abandoned distillery in Tokyo's outskirts. A prime place for weaker youma to prey on the homeless and lost of the city. There's no chance of that tonight. The Would-Be-King made sure the battle she'd invited Nanoha to wouldn't be interrupted by such garbage. If Pluto was right?

They wouldn't have been even a challenge for her would-be opponent this night. Kasagami's nodachi is set before her, one hand on the sheath and the other in her pocket as she finishes her ditty from earlier in the day. Her pocketwatch strikes midnight.

"No sir, no sir, no bags full~!"

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

The young Infinity student can only just listen to Kasagami. Whatever words she was trying to formulate seem to be lost in her confusion and the situation she currently finds herself in. The hints given to her are enough to make her realize that this is something that she cannot just ignore.

While she wants to press Kasagami for more information that will help her make sense of it, this is notably not the place to do it in and no sooner had she begun to think that when the older girl stands up and leaves a note with her. Nanoha doesn't resist the action and only after Kasagami has left, does she tentatively open the letter.

Reading over it, she frowns and places the note, and her book and pencil into a bag. Glancing at her phone, she realizes that she didn't have much time. Her first thoughts are to let Fate know something was happening. However, after what happened the night Nanoha was drained, she decides against it. Whatever the repurcussions of that could be, she would deal with later.

Later in the evening, her family is all at home, everyone is in bed. Yuuno isn't there so she didn't have to answer to him. Raising Heart is placed around her neck. The tiny pink orb having been repaired to full capacity with little time needed.

Arriving at the distillery, Nanoha is already in her Barrier Jacket. She had questions for the older girl and the hints that Kasagami already knew of her identity made her less cautious about approaching in this manner and it's just a little after midnight when Kasagami would know she was there.

"That's an interesting song Kasa-chan..." Nanoha smiles, adressing her for the first time this evening as she approaches. "So, what is this all about? What couldn't you tell me down there?" Nanoha gestures vaguely in the direction of the bakery. Although there are no outward signs, Nanoha is a little nervous having not been in any kind of confrontation since she was drained.

COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi transforms into Barrier Jacket Sacred!
COMBAT: Kasagami Araki transforms into Crimson Rose Duelist!

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

And there she is. Kasagami turns, boots snapping and coat flicking. Her smile right now? Is far more relaxed, even if there's an aggressive bent to her stance. The innocent soul that is Nanoha calls to the better half of this burning-hearted Duelist. Enemy or not, she likes the girl.

Grin. "It was one of my Mother's favorites. She'd sing it to me every night. Sorry for all the theatrics!" Another laugh, and her good eye peers around sharply. Nothing. No one. They're alone.

"Just you, then? Hoh-ho! I didn't say you had to come alone, but you did anyway! BRILLIANT! I'm glad I didn't misjudge you, Nanoha-chan!" She sounds so ''happy'' all of a sudden. Then the sound of metal slowly drawing from wood shakes the air. Kasagami takes her time, and then effortlessly lays her massive blade over her shoulder like it was a paper weight.

"I didn't want to get you in any trouble with your parents. Or make any trouble for myself. So now that we're all to ourselves, let's be honest. You signed up with the Chevaliers. I signed up with the Shepherds. We're two warriors on the opposite sides of a war. That alone is enough for us to fight. But...how to put this? I'm not asking you here because of us being opponents in that twisted up little mess. This is personal, Nanoha."

Her good humor drops. The point of her sword is pointed at the Mage. Her gaze goes stern, and she lets her anger flare up. Her eye narrows, and she's tense like a hawk about to take flight.

"You hurt someone I love! All of the Shepherds are my dear friends and sisters! I'll die fighting for their safety if I have to against you Chevaliers, but this is different!" There's equal parts passion and fury involved.

"Don't get me wrong. You're a good girl, but you're just the type Mami Tomoe likes to draw in and use as her footsoldiers! So that's why I'm asking you to fight me with all of your power! I can't let anyone who hurts my beloved Sailor Pluto, right or wrong, go unpunished! Let's settle this as warriors, so that our next clash will be one of sisterhoods and ideals rather than lingering hatreds!" Kasagami proclaims proudly. She makes no move to start the fight. The ball, it seems, is in Nanoha's court.

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Were this a different situation, Nanoha would gladly talk about the songs that her own parents would sing to her or other things but right now her focus is on this personal meeting. The air up here is cooler as the winds lightly ruffle her hair. It's not enough to make her shiver but it is enough to add to the eerieness of being up here so late.

Nanoha shakes her head at Kasagami, "There wasn't a reason for me to get anyone else involved." And then the blade is withdrawn and while Nanoha feels the adrenaline begin to rush, she doesn't yet hold Raising Heart. Waiting and hoping for more of an explanation.

"Just because we have different ideals doesn't mean that we have to fight though." Nanoha is fully aware of the conflicts between the Chevaliers and the Shepherds. The different ideals and values were made very clear to her before she joined a side. "Personal...?"

The idea that she had hurt someone Kasagami loved takes the girl by surprise. She had no idea at first who she was referring to but then she hears the name. "Pluto?" It takes a minute for her to realize who it was. "Wait, that wasn't my fault! They attacked us first!" Nanoha frowns, remembering the power it took to make the Outers retreat.

The younger girl takes a step backwards away from Kasagami. "You didn't see what happened!" She pauses. "Did they even tell you everything that happened? I bet you only heard one side of the story." Her voice is somewhat raised. "The lies...Sayaka... we had no choice! We had to help!"

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Kasagami lets out a laugh that borders on a sneer. "Don't have to fight, you say!? Now that is just ''rich''! You would actually be right if we were sitting at a table debating the ideals that sparked this whole thing. But you see, Mami Tomoe and Sayaka Miki decided that, rather than keep it to words they'd rather start harassing anyone who had power that didn't believe like they did! Don't misunderstand. You reap what you sow! And it was you Chevaliers that aimed the first weapon."

Her free hand points straight at Nanoha. Her eye is once more gazing hard into the much younger girl.

"It's all spiraled out of control. I don't necessarily agree with Eri-chan and the rest of my beloved Shepherds all the time, but this has long ago stopped being about ideals. I fight with the Shepherds for two things. The world at large, and for the love I have for my new Family."

A slow nod. "My lovely Pluto-chan...you really are a brave, good girl. But war isn't about right or wrong. It is a jumbled mess of circumstances. Sorry you got caught up in all this." A shrug. Her free hand flicks out from her coat.

A knife, coated in roses, is tossed right for Nanoha.

"But I don't care why you did it! No one will ''EVER'' steal my family away from me again! Not a Chevalier, or not a youma!" She howls, fury overtaking her! The knife comes fast, and worse, with a steady magical arm behind it.

COMBAT: Kasagami Araki has used Rose on the Wind on Nanoha Takamachi.
COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi fails to dodge Kasagami Araki's Rose on the Wind, taking 13 Fatigue damage! Kasagami Araki is Psyched!

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Nanoha was new to the conflict between the Chevaliers and Shepherds but she was not unaware of the dangers. The situation that she finds herself in though is not how she expected things to happen. "I am not here to defend what the Chevaliers did or did not do before but..."

The weapon is pointed at her and Nanoha realizes that no amount of words was going to end this without a fight. In response, her weapon is drawn, the staff raised defensively in front of her, words ringing out,<Ready Master!>

"Fighting for what you love. I know how that feels." Nanoha frowns, thinking how she would willingly put herself in harms way for Fate, for her other closest friends, for her family. All those people comprised the most important aspects of her life. Just like what Fate had done for so long.

Nanoha doesn't close the distance, knowing that it would put her at a disadvantage but the blade of roses still comes close enough that her Flier Fin move doesn't keep the blade from making it's mark and the young girl winces from the impact.

"I don't ''want'' to steal anything! We don't want to make things worse but just like you..." She continues moving up in the air, hovering just above the ground. "... I will defend everything and everyone that I care about." Raising Heart changes forms. "Even if that means I have to fight you to prove how serious I am!"

"Raising Heart, help me out please!" <Divine Shooter Ready!> From the weapon comes a pink beam of magical energy from just above Kasagami. Nanoha uses what guidance she can muster up to help it along.

In the back of her mind, the girl is worried that her magical energy isn't back to normal. She is worried that something really bad would happen and she would disappoint Fate, Lindy and all the others that have helped her along the way. At the same time, she is filled with resolve and ready to do what is necessary to prove herself.

COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi has used Divine Shooter on Kasagami Araki.
COMBAT: Kasagami Araki fails to brace Nanoha Takamachi's Divine Shooter, taking 25 Fatigue damage!

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Nanoha surprises, all at once. She won't defend the Chevaliers like some zealot. She calls upon Raising Heart, and Kasagami's eye narrows. Not with hatred, but with interest. What kind of magical girl is Nanoha? Curiosity in seeing yet another exotic sort of magical warrior fills the Duelist's heart. The love of battle burns inside of her, like many who seek World Revolution.

Perhaps few more than Kasagami.

A whistle, as Nanoha flits back, on her feet if not unscathed. Her grin grows wider. Her attention is fully on the girl before her, and her protests to love, and the desire to defend. Fingers snap towards Nanoha.

"Such valiance! Such bravery! Such passion for those you love! You'd stand before me, with all of your love for your friends and family, and show me your power!?" It's enough that Kasagami sheds a trio of tears before that pink laser falls towards her.

A single steel eye looks up just in time, and she dodges to the side just in time to avoid a perfect hit. She's instead forced to bring up her right arm to protect her body. Part of her coat flies upwards, but that laser eats through it. Her right armguard smashes into the laser, and with a furious howl she parries aside the majority of Nanoha's laser. She skids to the side.

A full third of her coat is left in scraps, and her right arm's glove and cloth is blasted away down to the shoulder. Even the roof of the distillery has a hole in it where Kasagami once was. Long-scarred flesh is exposed to the world, and Kasagami waves off the smoke from the impact.

"You don't hold back, either. Hey! Nanoha! When this war blows over, let's be friends! Because even if you're my enemy, even if I want to smash you into the ground right now...the kind of person that will fight anyone for the sake of those they care for is a knight I'll take into my court any day!"

Her coat is shed from her back, and taking her sword in both hands, she raises it high! "My name is Kasagami Araki! For the sake of this corrupted, rotten world, I shall become a King! Let me show you my resolve, for my Sisters, and for my love!"

Her foot presses forward, and stone shatters as she leaps on high. Spinning about in the air, she falls. In a blurr, launches herself off a brief foothold of crimson roses at her boots, putting the full force of her sword's heft and her size to use as she tears down for the duo of Nanoha and Raising Heart!

COMBAT: Kasagami Araki has used Falling Petals Cut The Soul on Nanoha Takamachi.
COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi fails to counter Kasagami Araki's Falling Petals Cut The Soul, taking 48 Fatigue damage!
COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi's counterattack, Flash Move, interrupts, doing 0 Fatigue damage to Kasagami Araki!

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Nanoha is surprised by Kasagami's reactions to her words. At least it wasn't like fighting the Wolkenritter who seemed to have very little to say. The reaction gets a smile from the girl. "Nothing else matters..." It's a point that she is dedicated to. "But you care too...I can see that and I can hear it in your words."

The pink beams don't exactly make the move she is expecting but she is not deterred. Before she can prepare for any kind of defense against whatever Kasagami is going to throw at her, the words about being friends causes her to smile even though she knows it's not enough to make things end here. There was too much determination on both their parts.

"You said not to hold back right?" Nanoha hovers closeby. "It's not right that we have to fight to prove loyalties is it Kasa-chan?" There is a slight look of disappointment in her eyes and they sparkle slightly in the dim moonlight. "But this feeling...I don't want to see anyone get hurt."

Kasagami's mantra and then the subsequent stone breaking, causes Nanoha to start to brace. <Be careful my Master!> The warning comes too late and as she tries to avoid the damage, the second guessing, costs her a lot and she takes the full impact of the sword and power of the attack.

Her barrier jacket does little to help her withstand the force as she is cut down and falls backwards through the air onto the broken ground. Pieces of stone surround her and the pain is something she cannot hide. Raising Heart falls to the ground beside her and Nanoha is left breathless, holding her chest. It's a different kind of pain from the magical draining but it still makes it's mark.

In her mind, Nanoha wonders if she can really do this. It's not right, given her previous battles, that she should have doubts but in her state, they linger. She turns towards Kasagami, the resolve remains and she picks up Raising Heart, for the moment not seeing any noticeable damage.

"Raising Heart, please." Her voice shakes a little as she regains momentum. <It's okay Master!> Ever the voice of encouragement, the weapon opens and a cartridge pops out, smoke and steam streams outwards before the area around it is drawn in.

Trying to take advantage of Kasagami's close proximity, a shield forms around her and as she moves upwards and away from her opponent, the shield shoots out magical energy in an attempt to give her an upper hand. The girl knows her strengths and weaknesses and being that close wasn't going to help her win this.

COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi has used Protection: Barrier Burst on Kasagami Araki.
COMBAT: Kasagami Araki perfectly dodges Nanoha Takamachi's Protection: Barrier Burst, taking 0 Fatigue damage! Critical Dodge!
Kasagami Araki's Fade ability activates! Kasagami Araki's Flash ability activates!

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

There's a brief laugh that's all bitterness in response to the optimism that Nanoha holds. Is this how Utena started out? The mere thought of Nanoha being brought so low makes Kasagami's heart ache. Or Steven. Or Ami. Or so many magical warriors she's met.

All because they didn't realize that the world was horrid and corrupt. That it needed to be changed right out from it's center. That a Powerful King needed to control everything.

A smile. "In an ideal world, I'd be sharing cake and a coffee-cream float with you, Nanoha. But there's the rub. Chevaliers fight with the ideals of the world I see in one eye. The one I behold your beautiful loyalty to your friends, no matter what I think about them. I think we've both well proven our love for our friends, haven't we?" A wink.

"A demon's flame stole one of my eyes, and half my body with it. We Shepherds are the reality of this impure world. I don't want anyone to be hurt, to die, that's true. My other eye beholds a hope for the future, that impure can be made pure. That is why I shall be King. The one, through Power and Power alone, shall change everything!" She lands from her strike, and looks over to Nanoha. She breathes out hard, sweat and a flutter of red-black hair accentuating the area behind her. Nanoha, even now, isn't someone to be underestimated.

That shield forms, and with both good and bad eyes widening, both boots shove herself away. Knees tuck up to avoid Nanoha's spell, and twin calves are revealed as magic flares. Kasagami lands in a roll to avoid the power of that shattering barrier, and then she lets out a sigh.

A sword slides back into it's sheath. It's drawn past her, a good four inches of metal then drawn out. Kasagami's gaze is back again on Nanoha. And then she is gone on a wind of roses.

It's a single leap towards Nanoha. Pure, straight, and without pause. Despite the length of her blade, the iaijutsu strike is perfect. Aimed right for the girl, and her 'weapon' in hand.

"But an impure world calls for sacrifices, until the very idea of impurity is destroyed!

COMBAT: Kasagami Araki has used Rose Flash on Nanoha Takamachi.
COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi narrowly braces Kasagami Araki's Rose Flash, taking 15 Fatigue damage! Critical Hit! Kasagami Araki is
Psyched! Nanoha Takamachi's Block ability activates!

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Nanoha shakes her head at Kasagami. "Nothing is ideal is it though? None of this..." She gestures with her weapon, "... is what I want but at the same time the power I have, that ''we'' have is I guess both helpful and also not so helpful right?" Nanoha's words come out quickly as she speaks.

"What is that power going to do though Kasa-chan? Who is it going to help? I didn't ask for this power and I wouldn't say that I wanted it but I guess that's where we differ." Whether or not Nanoha understands everything, she is trying to make sense of the ideals they both hold. "Still, as you already said, I know the other values you have. It's not just about the power right?" Nanoha shrugs a little.

Her barrier doesn't do much but it does give the young mage a little breathing room. It's only a brief reprieve as Nanoha quickly sees the sword withdrawn again and the girl leaps towards her. Rather than try and move, she prepares to take the force of the attack with Raising Heart's defenses activating at the last second.

The decision costs her but at the same time she withstands some of the force. Nanoha quickly finds herself back on the ground though with the sword nearly slicing through her barrier jacket again. Kasagami told her to not hold back but at the same time, Nanoha knows she's failing quickly.

Even through the winces of pain she retorts, "That doesn't make sense! Do you even realize or care what that sacrifice would mean?" There is enough understanding of the Shepherds that it makes her sad to consider what they were planning on doing.

"I don't know if what you expect to happen will actually bring the outcome you desire but let's finish this!" The young girl stands up, her Barrier Jacket slightly torn and showing signs of the damage she has endured tonight. "Raising Heart. Let's go!" The girl flies up once again and as she does this, the weapon gathers energy and she points it directly at Kasagami.

<Divine Buster Ready!> With a burst of pink energy, an orb forms at the end of the weapon. It seems to be gathering energy as Nanoha braces herself and the laser shoots outwards, illuminating the air in large, bright pink flash of power.

COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi has used Divine Buster! on Kasagami Araki.
COMBAT: Kasagami Araki fails to brace Nanoha Takamachi's Divine Buster!, taking 52 Fatigue damage! Kasagami Araki is Quipped!

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Kasagami's eyes glitter with tears, but the smoke and din of lasers and blade leave her the smallest opportunity to clear them. It might not even work. Her laughter is open, oddly honest. It feels ''good'' to fight with someone so passionate. They might be enemies, but it's a far sight from her fellow Duelist's anguish and selfish desperation.

Fury hides so many lies of her own making.

"Don't be an idiot! Power is everything in this world! Whatever values I hold, it won't make a single difference if I'm too weak!"

Hotaru. Teeth grit.

"I'm not the person you should ask that question. Go ask a Puella Magi about sacrifice! I'll happily finish this though!"

And then pink envelopes her, smashing down upon the glorious figure that is Kasagami Araki.

A black-and-red figure is pushed down, until a boot hits a water tower's end upon this ruined distrillery. With a scream, her massive blade slices through the rest of Divine Buster with half of her body smoking from the impact. The weight of Nanoha's magic gets redirected, and lances through the ground beside the building with a monumental act of power and effort from Kasagami. She stumbles to one side, and draws herself up with deep breaths. The water tower is rent into an accordion beneath her.

Her body shivers. The nerves in her right arm shiver vaguely to life, and then she gasps out with a cry. And finally, Kasagami grins.

"No one will know the outcome of a war until it's over! Nanoha! ...You're a worthy adversary. Consider our grudge done. So then!" That demon's grin lurks on her face suddenly. For all her pain, all the struggling, Kasagami is enjoying it!

"Let's end this!"

And then she's leaping one last time. Her blade sweeps low underneath Nanoha. But it's a faint. Suddenly, her steel-toed boot aims right for the girl's head!

COMBAT: Kasagami Araki has used Kassie Kick on Nanoha Takamachi.
COMBAT: Fate Testarossa transforms into Barrier Jacket Assault!
COMBAT: Fate Testarossa covers Nanoha Takamachi for Kasagami Araki's attack, Kassie Kick, taking it upon herself instead!
COMBAT: Fate Testarossa narrowly braces Kasagami Araki's Kassie Kick, taking 20 Fatigue damage! Fate Testarossa's Block ability
activates! Fate Testarossa's Parry ability activates!

<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

What one might see first in their periphery is a flash of gold. The first thing one might hear is the last vestiges of a piston pounding and a chime before a synthetic baritone announces. <Defenser - Plus!> In a rustle of dark cape fabric, there's another girl there. Her blonde twintails awash with the concentric fields of her auto-protection spells. The haft of Bardiche catching the boot.

Her face is alit with determination as she's ground backwards by the superior strength of the duelist.

Spidery-web like cracks form upon the golden circles, but they still sustain against the force of Kasagami's strong foot, before twirling to break their lock in a manner that forces Kasagami off of her at least even if she can't attack back. She pants with effort. Now close enough to Nanoha that the other girl could grab onto her cape if she so chose.

"That's enough." She declares finally, quietly. Scarlet eyes levelled upon the Crimson Duelist and King. With a flourish of Bardiche, she ends with the axe-head pointing at Kasagami.

"Whether you would have won or lost - I don't care. I'm ending this before my best friend gets hurt."

She gives a momentary glance towards Nanoha behind her, there's no disappointment there. Simply relief.

Her eyes then face back forwards. Her resolve returns in that moment, "I don't know why you fight on the other side of this war. Why you do the things you do and act as you do- or perhaps you'll feel that I can't understand you, became I'm too young to understand. So I'll only ask you this. Do you truly believe your course is the correct one? Are you completely certain of this? That those who you support, and what you do is the right path?"

Lowering Bardiche's axe-head so that it no longer is threatening, there's sadness instead deep within those eyes, "Then look at me and know I once thought the same. That there was no doubt whatsoever in my mind. That certainty - those intentions that I thought were good betrayed me so utterly that now I must simply live with the mistakes I've made and the wrong I've done."

That sadness fades away into a fierce determination once more, "I don't know why you fight, but I do. I fight so you won't have to live with the same regret."

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

The young girl isn't sure what to say anymore to Kasagami. The battle, the time, everything was weighing on her energy. Even as her last attack hits, she can't feel anything but sadness. Part of her wishes she had never came up here but it seems to her now that this confrontation was bound to happen anyway. What it will mean for their future remains to be seen but she wanted answers and an explanation and this seemed to be the only way she was going to get it and it was more than she expected to hear.

As Kasagami isn't backing down, Nanoha prepares to fight till the end, whatever that meant. But then there is a flash of yellow. She expects it was a trick of the lighting but then the familiar sound of Bardiche and Nanoha looks up to see Fate arrive, just as Kasagami's blade and then the boot come towards her.

Fate intervenes and Nanoha cries out. "Feito- no!!!! This is my battle!" She doesn't question how Fate knew where she was or what was going on for now. Despite her words, Nanoha is relieved to see her friend here and she moves to stand beside Fate, listening to Fate's words.

Nanoha cannot help but smile, feeling some of her energy, albeit a small portion returning, "It doesn't matter what happens here. Nothing changes right?" She asks towards Kasagami and Fate both and shrugs, leaning into Fate more. There is exhaustion in her eyes and even if she would have fought till the end, she cannot hide how much the battle had worn on her. "You are a formidable opponent Kasagami Araki but I think we are done here."

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

It's the chime that catches Kassie, all at the last second. The cape flap, and then Bardiche snagging her boot. Her good eye widens. Then finally, recognition dawns.

"Wh...where did...!?" Comes her surprise, followed swiftly by her leg flexing. The pair of Fate and Kasagami meet and clash against one another that their lock forces them apart. Kasagami backflips back in her would-be feint, and lands as one.

The end of her sheath lands, and arrests her fall as knees and boots dig in. Her right foot kicks up, and then back! She's only a foot away from being shoved off the old distillery they'd began their brawl on.

A sigh. Her sword slings across Kasagami's shoulders.

"Mmm. Those all could be reasons, maybe! Fine. I'll answer!"

Smirk. "I'm supporting the Family I have right now. I neither fully agree, or disagree with their morals. I say that this world is corrupt, and shall devour right or wrong equally. Only a King with power over everything can change that natural law." She trembles with her own beliefs, laid bare to the two magical girls before her.

And then her gaze to fate softens. "...I won't judge your actions as a human too much! I'm no Saint either! I don't hold any doubt that my own path to Kingship will change the world itself! But call it a devil's or an angel's path to my ideal world!? My only desire is the result!"

One last deep sigh. "...Seriously though, Gym Partner? Getting in the way of a warrior's fight? Lucky for you she's not mad!" For all her animosity, Kasagami is grinning. Steel meets wood, and then, she motions back towards the inner depths of Tokyo with a single hand.

"Nanoha...eh...she's mostly right. When I become this world's King, I shall have places in nobility for both of you, Fate-chan, Nanoha-chan! My anger for you striking my dear Pluto-chan is faded. And as for you Fate-chan?"

A nod. "You intend to save people from suffering. Beautiful. You both may leave."

The roses and highlights fades from Kasagami's hair and body. She dips into a medieval duelist's bow.

She is looking far too happy, if exhausted.

<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

"Nanoha- your battles are my battles." That's what Fate says gently to her. She understands, because it's competitive, "I told you that if you were ever in trouble, I'd definitely be there to protect you."

Fate puts an arm around Nanoha, supporting her upright in her exhaustion. And then she listens to Kasagami, she doesn't interrupt.

She doesn't say anything, though when she says she's supporting her family. She doesn't say anything about being her gym partner or her becoming the world's king. She doesn't feel she ought to interrupt someone else's feelings like that. However at the end- "If you're supporting your family - I can understand that. Though there's something else I should tell you before I go."

She says this quietly, "There was a time when I was an agent of Dark Fall for my mother's sake. Everything I did, all the things I did - I did for her, or at least that's what I told myself. Selfishly I hoped she'd go back to being the kind mother who she used to be. I didn't understand her at all- and every time she did something that... made me doubt, I ignored it, justified it. And so noone was more shocked than I was when she tried to kill me."

A moment later, "There's noone who will tell you it's wrong to support your family - but if you truly love them the bravest thing you can do is have the courage to tell them they're wrong, before it's too late."

[[Category:Logs]]

2017-10-16 - Love and Loyalty

2017-10-17T20:31:32Z

{|class="toccolours" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''Love and Loyalty'''
|-
|'''Summary''': 
''Kasagami confronts Nanoha about something that happened between the Chevaliers and Shepherds.''
|-
|'''Who''': 
[[Nanoha Takamachi]], [[Kasagami Araki]], [[Fate Testarossa]]
|-
|'''Where:''' 
''Midor-iya and Abandoned Distillery
|-
|'''OOC - IC Date:''' 
10/16/2017 - 2/26/2015
|-
|}

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

The Midoriya is normally a busy place but as the evening winds down, the crowds start to thin out and people begin to make their way home. This doesn't change anything for the Takamachi family however as they are all still here working in various places. All of them are easy to spot except the youngest, Nanoha, who could be easily missed as she is hunched over a book, sitting in a booth, near the front corner of the bakery.

The are no food or drinks near her but the book she is reading seems very interesting as her focus seems to be solely on it and not anything else. Normally, she would be snacking or helping out but tonight, this book seems to hold her attention more than anything else. The front cover is blue and the text can be easily read as, "The Caring of Fish." Near her left hand is a pencil, which ever so often, the girl picks up to write something in a notebook.

Nanoha's attire this evening is her normal Infinity uniform, although she is wearing a white, open sweater over it. It's a little chilly in the restaraunt today so it was keeping her warm. Her legs are curled up on the booth seat and most of the tables nearby seem to be empty for the moment, waiting for possible last minute customers.

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Kasagami arrives with her usual lack of subtlety. There's a horn honking a street or three over, a sound of a vehicle swerving, and then a roaring engine and squeeling tires make another mockery of the essence of safe driving. The lights on a black-and-crimson Harley die down, and a helmet is cast about a handlebar. Kickstand down, a long black duffel bag shouldered over her back, and the Student Council Disciplinary Executive walks into the Midori-ya like she owns the place.

The doors come open with a little more force than usual. Her boots make a b-line towards a very specific seat with a very specific person sitting there over her book. A grin is etched on her face.

"Nanoha-chan! Mind if I sit?" WHUMP. Her voice is a bit tight, a bit tired, and that definitely was a rhetorical question.

Kasagami all but falls into the seat next to her. The duffel bag is gently placed beside her. There's a light sound of what might be metal from inside, if one listens close.

Should a waitress come by? She'll shoo them off, first with a hand, then a glare.

"You really are full of surprises, you know that? Oh, my, you've been very busy lately, haven't you!?" There's mirth in her voice, even as she cuts her usually loud and boisterous tone down so that only Nanoha could hear. Her good eye is narrowed, and bores into Nanoha with unflinching intensity.

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

The first thing that takes Nanoha's focus from her book is the tires squealing and then the car approaches and makes her focus even more. She knows that car pretty well but for the first few seconds, Nanoha doesn't make any moves, even as the familiar girl comes into the bakery like she runs things. It does take her by surprise but even moreso that Kasagami comes right towards her.

Nanoha's eyes widen at the question and before she can offer any word to Kasagami, the girl is seated across from her. There seems to be something different about the girl since their last visit but she doesn't question it at first. Instead, she closes the book, marking carefully her spot.

"I... what? Is something wrong?" The girl looks very confused and something about the way the words are spoken makes her feel uneasy. "Suprises? What are you talking about?" Nanoha doesn't address Kasagami by name, perhaps she feels intimidated right now. "Busy with school... I guess." She shrugs, really having no clue what Kasagami was talking about exactly.

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Kasagami, upon seeing Nanoha's confusion, finally just laughs. It's a low thing, and she lets out a sigh. "Really? Playing coy?"

Then she pauses, and frowns. A thought crosses her mind, pehaps that hadn't this entire time. "Huh. Or maybe she didn't tell you. That really ''would'' just be like her, wouldn't it? So, Nanoha-chan...a little bird told me that you met someone by the name of Mami Tomoe. The girl with her pretty little band of make-believe soldiers." Her smile smile is suddenly very pleasant, in that vaguely mocking sort of way.

Her eye narrows a fraction again. "...Starting to get the picture a little more? Or do I need to spell things out for you, my dear friend."

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Nanoha cannot seem to make sense of what Kasagami is saying. The young girl feels like she is missing something important but before any questions can be asked she hears, at least partly, what she is talking about.

"Mami... yes but how did you know that?" As far as Nanoha knew, she hadn't talked to her and she cannot imagine why Mami, or anyone else, would have mentioned it specifically to Kasagami. Maybe it ''had'' been someone else though?

"I don't understand what that has to do with anything. I mean, why..." Make-believe soliders? Sudden realization dawns on the girl, although she is still not sure she understands everything. "Is there a problem? Did something happen?"

She cannot help but feel like something is definitely wrong here. For now, the young girl seems to hold things together. She eyes her parents nearby and her siblings moving in and out of the kitchen. For now, they don't approach though so it's just Kasagami and Nanoha.

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Nanoha is just so innocent, even now. Kasagami's gaze actually softens. Some of the anger in her, while it doesn't go away, pauses. She looks the younger girl up and down. And finally she just rolls an eye.

Her smile this time, despite herself, is genuine. Arms finally cross, and she props her head up with an elbow. Her head is tilted as she assumes something almost lazy as she peers at the girl, openly in half disbelief.

"You know what? I actually believe that you have no idea how or why I know what I know. Yeesh. Dragging people like you into this whole mess? Nanoha. Let me give you my sincerest and fullest apologies in advance. I'm starting to think you're in way over your head. And that makes me very sad because I like the girl that serves pastries in her parents' wonderful shop." Her whispers ends with a sigh.

A glance to said parents. She stands up, and slips to Nanoha's side. Dextrous fingers will try to slip an envelope into one of Nanoha's pockets. Her other hand reaches down to playfully ruffle the girl's hair with a grin on her face. She leans in.

"Meet me soon. And don't be late. Trust me, better to get any bad blood out of the way before this whole farce ends." A wink, and then she' stepping lively towards the exit of the Midori-ya.

That envelope? It contains an address to an abandoned old section of an industrial district. Money for a cab either towards, or...back? The time? Midnight. It would take a magical girl to get there from the Midori-ya.

Kasagami sings aloud as she departs, in near-perfect but heavily accented English.

"Baa, baa, black sheep, have you any wool?"

"Yesss sir, yes sir, three bags full!"

~Later, Abandoned Distillery~

Kasagami, festooned by crimson roses about her coat, has red-highlighted hair fluttering in the wind as she stands upon the rooftop of an old, abandoned distillery in Tokyo's outskirts. A prime place for weaker youma to prey on the homeless and lost of the city. There's no chance of that tonight. The Would-Be-King made sure the battle she'd invited Nanoha to wouldn't be interrupted by such garbage. If Pluto was right?

They wouldn't have been even a challenge for her would-be opponent this night. Kasagami's nodachi is set before her, one hand on the sheath and the other in her pocket as she finishes her ditty from earlier in the day. Her pocketwatch strikes midnight.

"No sir, no sir, no bags full~!"

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

The young Infinity student can only just listen to Kasagami. Whatever words she was trying to formulate seem to be lost in her confusion and the situation she currently finds herself in. The hints given to her are enough to make her realize that this is something that she cannot just ignore.

While she wants to press Kasagami for more information that will help her make sense of it, this is notably not the place to do it in and no sooner had she begun to think that when the older girl stands up and leaves a note with her. Nanoha doesn't resist the action and only after Kasagami has left, does she tentatively open the letter.

Reading over it, she frowns and places the note, and her book and pencil into a bag. Glancing at her phone, she realizes that she didn't have much time. Her first thoughts are to let Fate know something was happening. However, after what happened the night Nanoha was drained, she decides against it. Whatever the repurcussions of that could be, she would deal with later.

Later in the evening, her family is all at home, everyone is in bed. Yuuno isn't there so she didn't have to answer to him. Raising Heart is placed around her neck. The tiny pink orb having been repaired to full capacity with little time needed.

Arriving at the distillery, Nanoha is already in her Barrier Jacket. She had questions for the older girl and the hints that Kasagami already knew of her identity made her less cautious about approaching in this manner and it's just a little after midnight when Kasagami would know she was there.

"That's an interesting song Kasa-chan..." Nanoha smiles, adressing her for the first time this evening as she approaches. "So, what is this all about? What couldn't you tell me down there?" Nanoha gestures vaguely in the direction of the bakery. Although there are no outward signs, Nanoha is a little nervous having not been in any kind of confrontation since she was drained.

COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi transforms into Barrier Jacket Sacred!
COMBAT: Kasagami Araki transforms into Crimson Rose Duelist!

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

And there she is. Kasagami turns, boots snapping and coat flicking. Her smile right now? Is far more relaxed, even if there's an aggressive bent to her stance. The innocent soul that is Nanoha calls to the better half of this burning-hearted Duelist. Enemy or not, she likes the girl.

Grin. "It was one of my Mother's favorites. She'd sing it to me every night. Sorry for all the theatrics!" Another laugh, and her good eye peers around sharply. Nothing. No one. They're alone.

"Just you, then? Hoh-ho! I didn't say you had to come alone, but you did anyway! BRILLIANT! I'm glad I didn't misjudge you, Nanoha-chan!" She sounds so ''happy'' all of a sudden. Then the sound of metal slowly drawing from wood shakes the air. Kasagami takes her time, and then effortlessly lays her massive blade over her shoulder like it was a paper weight.

"I didn't want to get you in any trouble with your parents. Or make any trouble for myself. So now that we're all to ourselves, let's be honest. You signed up with the Chevaliers. I signed up with the Shepherds. We're two warriors on the opposite sides of a war. That alone is enough for us to fight. But...how to put this? I'm not asking you here because of us being opponents in that twisted up little mess. This is personal, Nanoha."

Her good humor drops. The point of her sword is pointed at the Mage. Her gaze goes stern, and she lets her anger flare up. Her eye narrows, and she's tense like a hawk about to take flight.

"You hurt someone I love! All of the Shepherds are my dear friends and sisters! I'll die fighting for their safety if I have to against you Chevaliers, but this is different!" There's equal parts passion and fury involved.

"Don't get me wrong. You're a good girl, but you're just the type Mami Tomoe likes to draw in and use as her footsoldiers! So that's why I'm asking you to fight me with all of your power! I can't let anyone who hurts my beloved Sailor Pluto, right or wrong, go unpunished! Let's settle this as warriors, so that our next clash will be one of sisterhoods and ideals rather than lingering hatreds!" Kasagami proclaims proudly. She makes no move to start the fight. The ball, it seems, is in Nanoha's court.

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Were this a different situation, Nanoha would gladly talk about the songs that her own parents would sing to her or other things but right now her focus is on this personal meeting. The air up here is cooler as the winds lightly ruffle her hair. It's not enough to make her shiver but it is enough to add to the eerieness of being up here so late.

Nanoha shakes her head at Kasagami, "There wasn't a reason for me to get anyone else involved." And then the blade is withdrawn and while Nanoha feels the adrenaline begin to rush, she doesn't yet hold Raising Heart. Waiting and hoping for more of an explanation.

"Just because we have different ideals doesn't mean that we have to fight though." Nanoha is fully aware of the conflicts between the Chevaliers and the Shepherds. The different ideals and values were made very clear to her before she joined a side. "Personal...?"

The idea that she had hurt someone Kasagami loved takes the girl by surprise. She had no idea at first who she was referring to but then she hears the name. "Pluto?" It takes a minute for her to realize who it was. "Wait, that wasn't my fault! They attacked us first!" Nanoha frowns, remembering the power it took to make the Outers retreat.

The younger girl takes a step backwards away from Kasagami. "You didn't see what happened!" She pauses. "Did they even tell you everything that happened? I bet you only heard one side of the story." Her voice is somewhat raised. "The lies...Sayaka... we had no choice! We had to help!"

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Kasagami lets out a laugh that borders on a sneer. "Don't have to fight, you say!? Now that is just ''rich''! You would actually be right if we were sitting at a table debating the ideals that sparked this whole thing. But you see, Mami Tomoe and Sayaka Miki decided that, rather than keep it to words they'd rather start harassing anyone who had power that didn't believe like they did! Don't misunderstand. You reap what you sow! And it was you Chevaliers that aimed the first weapon."

Her free hand points straight at Nanoha. Her eye is once more gazing hard into the much younger girl.

"It's all spiraled out of control. I don't necessarily agree with Eri-chan and the rest of my beloved Shepherds all the time, but this has long ago stopped being about ideals. I fight with the Shepherds for two things. The world at large, and for the love I have for my new Family."

A slow nod. "My lovely Pluto-chan...you really are a brave, good girl. But war isn't about right or wrong. It is a jumbled mess of circumstances. Sorry you got caught up in all this." A shrug. Her free hand flicks out from her coat.

A knife, coated in roses, is tossed right for Nanoha.

"But I don't care why you did it! No one will ''EVER'' steal my family away from me again! Not a Chevalier, or not a youma!" She howls, fury overtaking her! The knife comes fast, and worse, with a steady magical arm behind it.

COMBAT: Kasagami Araki has used Rose on the Wind on Nanoha Takamachi.
COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi fails to dodge Kasagami Araki's Rose on the Wind, taking 13 Fatigue damage! Kasagami Araki is Psyched!

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Nanoha was new to the conflict between the Chevaliers and Shepherds but she was not unaware of the dangers. The situation that she finds herself in though is not how she expected things to happen. "I am not here to defend what the Chevaliers did or did not do before but..."

The weapon is pointed at her and Nanoha realizes that no amount of words was going to end this without a fight. In response, her weapon is drawn, the staff raised defensively in front of her, words ringing out,<Ready Master!>

"Fighting for what you love. I know how that feels." Nanoha frowns, thinking how she would willingly put herself in harms way for Fate, for her other closest friends, for her family. All those people comprised the most important aspects of her life. Just like what Fate had done for so long.

Nanoha doesn't close the distance, knowing that it would put her at a disadvantage but the blade of roses still comes close enough that her Flier Fin move doesn't keep the blade from making it's mark and the young girl winces from the impact.

"I don't ''want'' to steal anything! We don't want to make things worse but just like you..." She continues moving up in the air, hovering just above the ground. "... I will defend everything and everyone that I care about." Raising Heart changes forms. "Even if that means I have to fight you to prove how serious I am!"

"Raising Heart, help me out please!" <Divine Shooter Ready!> From the weapon comes a pink beam of magical energy from just above Kasagami. Nanoha uses what guidance she can muster up to help it along.

In the back of her mind, the girl is worried that her magical energy isn't back to normal. She is worried that something really bad would happen and she would disappoint Fate, Lindy and all the others that have helped her along the way. At the same time, she is filled with resolve and ready to do what is necessary to prove herself.

COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi has used Divine Shooter on Kasagami Araki.
COMBAT: Kasagami Araki fails to brace Nanoha Takamachi's Divine Shooter, taking 25 Fatigue damage!

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Nanoha surprises, all at once. She won't defend the Chevaliers like some zealot. She calls upon Raising Heart, and Kasagami's eye narrows. Not with hatred, but with interest. What kind of magical girl is Nanoha? Curiosity in seeing yet another exotic sort of magical warrior fills the Duelist's heart. The love of battle burns inside of her, like many who seek World Revolution.

Perhaps few more than Kasagami.

A whistle, as Nanoha flits back, on her feet if not unscathed. Her grin grows wider. Her attention is fully on the girl before her, and her protests to love, and the desire to defend. Fingers snap towards Nanoha.

"Such valiance! Such bravery! Such passion for those you love! You'd stand before me, with all of your love for your friends and family, and show me your power!?" It's enough that Kasagami sheds a trio of tears before that pink laser falls towards her.

A single steel eye looks up just in time, and she dodges to the side just in time to avoid a perfect hit. She's instead forced to bring up her right arm to protect her body. Part of her coat flies upwards, but that laser eats through it. Her right armguard smashes into the laser, and with a furious howl she parries aside the majority of Nanoha's laser. She skids to the side.

A full third of her coat is left in scraps, and her right arm's glove and cloth is blasted away down to the shoulder. Even the roof of the distillery has a hole in it where Kasagami once was. Long-scarred flesh is exposed to the world, and Kasagami waves off the smoke from the impact.

"You don't hold back, either. Hey! Nanoha! When this war blows over, let's be friends! Because even if you're my enemy, even if I want to smash you into the ground right now...the kind of person that will fight anyone for the sake of those they care for is a knight I'll take into my court any day!"

Her coat is shed from her back, and taking her sword in both hands, she raises it high! "My name is Kasagami Araki! For the sake of this corrupted, rotten world, I shall become a King! Let me show you my resolve, for my Sisters, and for my love!"

Her foot presses forward, and stone shatters as she leaps on high. Spinning about in the air, she falls. In a blurr, launches herself off a brief foothold of crimson roses at her boots, putting the full force of her sword's heft and her size to use as she tears down for the duo of Nanoha and Raising Heart!

COMBAT: Kasagami Araki has used Falling Petals Cut The Soul on Nanoha Takamachi.
COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi fails to counter Kasagami Araki's Falling Petals Cut The Soul, taking 48 Fatigue damage!
COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi's counterattack, Flash Move, interrupts, doing 0 Fatigue damage to Kasagami Araki!

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Nanoha is surprised by Kasagami's reactions to her words. At least it wasn't like fighting the Wolkenritter who seemed to have very little to say. The reaction gets a smile from the girl. "Nothing else matters..." It's a point that she is dedicated to. "But you care too...I can see that and I can hear it in your words."

The pink beams don't exactly make the move she is expecting but she is not deterred. Before she can prepare for any kind of defense against whatever Kasagami is going to throw at her, the words about being friends causes her to smile even though she knows it's not enough to make things end here. There was too much determination on both their parts.

"You said not to hold back right?" Nanoha hovers closeby. "It's not right that we have to fight to prove loyalties is it Kasa-chan?" There is a slight look of disappointment in her eyes and they sparkle slightly in the dim moonlight. "But this feeling...I don't want to see anyone get hurt."

Kasagami's mantra and then the subsequent stone breaking, causes Nanoha to start to brace. <Be careful my Master!> The warning comes too late and as she tries to avoid the damage, the second guessing, costs her a lot and she takes the full impact of the sword and power of the attack.

Her barrier jacket does little to help her withstand the force as she is cut down and falls backwards through the air onto the broken ground. Pieces of stone surround her and the pain is something she cannot hide. Raising Heart falls to the ground beside her and Nanoha is left breathless, holding her chest. It's a different kind of pain from the magical draining but it still makes it's mark.

In her mind, Nanoha wonders if she can really do this. It's not right, given her previous battles, that she should have doubts but in her state, they linger. She turns towards Kasagami, the resolve remains and she picks up Raising Heart, for the moment not seeing any noticeable damage.

"Raising Heart, please." Her voice shakes a little as she regains momentum. <It's okay Master!> Ever the voice of encouragement, the weapon opens and a cartridge pops out, smoke and steam streams outwards before the area around it is drawn in.

Trying to take advantage of Kasagami's close proximity, a shield forms around her and as she moves upwards and away from her opponent, the shield shoots out magical energy in an attempt to give her an upper hand. The girl knows her strengths and weaknesses and being that close wasn't going to help her win this.

COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi has used Protection: Barrier Burst on Kasagami Araki.
COMBAT: Kasagami Araki perfectly dodges Nanoha Takamachi's Protection: Barrier Burst, taking 0 Fatigue damage! Critical Dodge!
Kasagami Araki's Fade ability activates! Kasagami Araki's Flash ability activates!

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

There's a brief laugh that's all bitterness in response to the optimism that Nanoha holds. Is this how Utena started out? The mere thought of Nanoha being brought so low makes Kasagami's heart ache. Or Steven. Or Ami. Or so many magical warriors she's met.

All because they didn't realize that the world was horrid and corrupt. That it needed to be changed right out from it's center. That a Powerful King needed to control everything.

A smile. "In an ideal world, I'd be sharing cake and a coffee-cream float with you, Nanoha. But there's the rub. Chevaliers fight with the ideals of the world I see in one eye. The one I behold your beautiful loyalty to your friends, no matter what I think about them. I think we've both well proven our love for our friends, haven't we?" A wink.

"A demon's flame stole one of my eyes, and half my body with it. We Shepherds are the reality of this impure world. I don't want anyone to be hurt, to die, that's true. My other eye beholds a hope for the future, that impure can be made pure. That is why I shall be King. The one, through Power and Power alone, shall change everything!" She lands from her strike, and looks over to Nanoha. She breathes out hard, sweat and a flutter of red-black hair accentuating the area behind her. Nanoha, even now, isn't someone to be underestimated.

That shield forms, and with both good and bad eyes widening, both boots shove herself away. Knees tuck up to avoid Nanoha's spell, and twin calves are revealed as magic flares. Kasagami lands in a roll to avoid the power of that shattering barrier, and then she lets out a sigh.

A sword slides back into it's sheath. It's drawn past her, a good four inches of metal then drawn out. Kasagami's gaze is back again on Nanoha. And then she is gone on a wind of roses.

It's a single leap towards Nanoha. Pure, straight, and without pause. Despite the length of her blade, the iaijutsu strike is perfect. Aimed right for the girl, and her 'weapon' in hand.

"But an impure world calls for sacrifices, until the very idea of impurity is destroyed!

COMBAT: Kasagami Araki has used Rose Flash on Nanoha Takamachi.
COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi narrowly braces Kasagami Araki's Rose Flash, taking 15 Fatigue damage! Critical Hit! Kasagami Araki is
Psyched! Nanoha Takamachi's Block ability activates!

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Nanoha shakes her head at Kasagami. "Nothing is ideal is it though? None of this..." She gestures with her weapon, "... is what I want but at the same time the power I have, that ''we'' have is I guess both helpful and also not so helpful right?" Nanoha's words come out quickly as she speaks.

"What is that power going to do though Kasa-chan? Who is it going to help? I didn't ask for this power and I wouldn't say that I wanted it but I guess that's where we differ." Whether or not Nanoha understands everything, she is trying to make sense of the ideals they both hold. "Still, as you already said, I know the other values you have. It's not just about the power right?" Nanoha shrugs a little.

Her barrier doesn't do much but it does give the young mage a little breathing room. It's only a brief reprieve as Nanoha quickly sees the sword withdrawn again and the girl leaps towards her. Rather than try and move, she prepares to take the force of the attack with Raising Heart's defenses activating at the last second.

The decision costs her but at the same time she withstands some of the force. Nanoha quickly finds herself back on the ground though with the sword nearly slicing through her barrier jacket again. Kasagami told her to not hold back but at the same time, Nanoha knows she's failing quickly.

Even through the winces of pain she retorts, "That doesn't make sense! Do you even realize or care what that sacrifice would mean?" There is enough understanding of the Shepherds that it makes her sad to consider what they were planning on doing.

"I don't know if what you expect to happen will actually bring the outcome you desire but let's finish this!" The young girl stands up, her Barrier Jacket slightly torn and showing signs of the damage she has endured tonight. "Raising Heart. Let's go!" The girl flies up once again and as she does this, the weapon gathers energy and she points it directly at Kasagami.

<Divine Buster Ready!> With a burst of pink energy, an orb forms at the end of the weapon. It seems to be gathering energy as Nanoha braces herself and the laser shoots outwards, illuminating the air in large, bright pink flash of power.

COMBAT: Nanoha Takamachi has used Divine Buster! on Kasagami Araki.
COMBAT: Kasagami Araki fails to brace Nanoha Takamachi's Divine Buster!, taking 52 Fatigue damage! Kasagami Araki is Quipped!

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

Kasagami's eyes glitter with tears, but the smoke and din of lasers and blade leave her the smallest opportunity to clear them. It might not even work. Her laughter is open, oddly honest. It feels ''good'' to fight with someone so passionate. They might be enemies, but it's a far sight from her fellow Duelist's anguish and selfish desperation.

Fury hides so many lies of her own making.

"Don't be an idiot! Power is everything in this world! Whatever values I hold, it won't make a single difference if I'm too weak!"

Hotaru. Teeth grit.

"I'm not the person you should ask that question. Go ask a Puella Magi about sacrifice! I'll happily finish this though!"

And then pink envelopes her, smashing down upon the glorious figure that is Kasagami Araki.

A black-and-red figure is pushed down, until a boot hits a water tower's end upon this ruined distrillery. With a scream, her massive blade slices through the rest of Divine Buster with half of her body smoking from the impact. The weight of Nanoha's magic gets redirected, and lances through the ground beside the building with a monumental act of power and effort from Kasagami. She stumbles to one side, and draws herself up with deep breaths. The water tower is rent into an accordion beneath her.

Her body shivers. The nerves in her right arm shiver vaguely to life, and then she gasps out with a cry. And finally, Kasagami grins.

"No one will know the outcome of a war until it's over! Nanoha! ...You're a worthy adversary. Consider our grudge done. So then!" That demon's grin lurks on her face suddenly. For all her pain, all the struggling, Kasagami is enjoying it!

"Let's end this!"

And then she's leaping one last time. Her blade sweeps low underneath Nanoha. But it's a faint. Suddenly, her steel-toed boot aims right for the girl's head!

COMBAT: Kasagami Araki has used Kassie Kick on Nanoha Takamachi.
COMBAT: Fate Testarossa transforms into Barrier Jacket Assault!
COMBAT: Fate Testarossa covers Nanoha Takamachi for Kasagami Araki's attack, Kassie Kick, taking it upon herself instead!
COMBAT: Fate Testarossa narrowly braces Kasagami Araki's Kassie Kick, taking 20 Fatigue damage! Fate Testarossa's Block ability
activates! Fate Testarossa's Parry ability activates!

<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

What one might see first in their periphery is a flash of gold. The first thing one might hear is the last vestiges of a piston pounding and a chime before a synthetic baritone announces. <Defenser - Plus!> In a rustle of dark cape fabric, there's another girl there. Her blonde twintails awash with the concentric fields of her auto-protection spells. The haft of Bardiche catching the boot.

Her face is alit with determination as she's ground backwards by the superior strength of the duelist.

Spidery-web like cracks form upon the golden circles, but they still sustain against the force of Kasagami's strong foot, before twirling to break their lock in a manner that forces Kasagami off of her at least even if she can't attack back. She pants with effort. Now close enough to Nanoha that the other girl could grab onto her cape if she so chose.

"That's enough." She declares finally, quietly. Scarlet eyes levelled upon the Crimson Duelist and King. With a flourish of Bardiche, she ends with the axe-head pointing at Kasagami.

"Whether you would have won or lost - I don't care. I'm ending this before my best friend gets hurt."

She gives a momentary glance towards Nanoha behind her, there's no disappointment there. Simply relief.

Her eyes then face back forwards. Her resolve returns in that moment, "I don't know why you fight on the other side of this war. Why you do the things you do and act as you do- or perhaps you'll feel that I can't understand you, became I'm too young to understand. So I'll only ask you this. Do you truly believe your course is the correct one? Are you completely certain of this? That those who you support, and what you do is the right path?"

Lowering Bardiche's axe-head so that it no longer is threatening, there's sadness instead deep within those eyes, "Then look at me and know I once thought the same. That there was no doubt whatsoever in my mind. That certainty - those intentions that I thought were good betrayed me so utterly that now I must simply live with the mistakes I've made and the wrong I've done."

That sadness fades away into a fierce determination once more, "I don't know why you fight, but I do. I fight so you won't have to live with the same regret."

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

The young girl isn't sure what to say anymore to Kasagami. The battle, the time, everything was weighing on her energy. Even as her last attack hits, she can't feel anything but sadness. Part of her wishes she had never came up here but it seems to her now that this confrontation was bound to happen anyway. What it will mean for their future remains to be seen but she wanted answers and an explanation and this seemed to be the only way she was going to get it and it was more than she expected to hear.

As Kasagami isn't backing down, Nanoha prepares to fight till the end, whatever that meant. But then there is a flash of yellow. She expects it was a trick of the lighting but then the familiar sound of Bardiche and Nanoha looks up to see Fate arrive, just as Kasagami's blade and then the boot come towards her.

Fate intervenes and Nanoha cries out. "Feito- no!!!! This is my battle!" She doesn't question how Fate knew where she was or what was going on for now. Despite her words, Nanoha is relieved to see her friend here and she moves to stand beside Fate, listening to Fate's words.

Nanoha cannot help but smile, feeling some of her energy, albeit a small portion returning, "It doesn't matter what happens here. Nothing changes right?" She asks towards Kasagami and Fate both and shrugs, leaning into Fate more. There is exhaustion in her eyes and even if she would have fought till the end, she cannot hide how much the battle had worn on her. "You are a formidable opponent Kasagami Araki but I think we are done here."

<Pose Tracker> Kasagami Araki [Ohtori Academy (10)] has posed.

It's the chime that catches Kassie, all at the last second. The cape flap, and then Bardiche snagging her boot. Her good eye widens. Then finally, recognition dawns.

"Wh...where did...!?" Comes her surprise, followed swiftly by her leg flexing. The pair of Fate and Kasagami meet and clash against one another that their lock forces them apart. Kasagami backflips back in her would-be feint, and lands as one.

The end of her sheath lands, and arrests her fall as knees and boots dig in. Her right foot kicks up, and then back! She's only a foot away from being shoved off the old distillery they'd began their brawl on.

A sigh. Her sword slings across Kasagami's shoulders.

"Mmm. Those all could be reasons, maybe! Fine. I'll answer!"

Smirk. "I'm supporting the Family I have right now. I neither fully agree, or disagree with their morals. I say that this world is corrupt, and shall devour right or wrong equally. Only a King with power over everything can change that natural law." She trembles with her own beliefs, laid bare to the two magical girls before her.

And then her gaze to fate softens. "...I won't judge your actions as a human too much! I'm no Saint either! I don't hold any doubt that my own path to Kingship will change the world itself! But call it a devil's or an angel's path to my ideal world!? My only desire is the result!"

One last deep sigh. "...Seriously though, Gym Partner? Getting in the way of a warrior's fight? Lucky for you she's not mad!" For all her animosity, Kasagami is grinning. Steel meets wood, and then, she motions back towards the inner depths of Tokyo with a single hand.

"Nanoha...eh...she's mostly right. When I become this world's King, I shall have places in nobility for both of you, Fate-chan, Nanoha-chan! My anger for you striking my dear Pluto-chan is faded. And as for you Fate-chan?"

A nod. "You intend to save people from suffering. Beautiful. You both may leave."

The roses and highlights fades from Kasagami's hair and body. She dips into a medieval duelist's bow.

She is looking far too happy, if exhausted.

<Pose Tracker> Fate Testarossa [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

"Nanoha- your battles are my battles." That's what Fate says gently to her. She understands, because it's competitive, "I told you that if you were ever in trouble, I'd definitely be there to protect you."

Fate puts an arm around Nanoha, supporting her upright in her exhaustion. And then she listens to Kasagami, she doesn't interrupt.

She doesn't say anything, though when she says she's supporting her family. She doesn't say anything about being her gym partner or her becoming the world's king. She doesn't feel she ought to interrupt someone else's feelings like that. However at the end- "If you're supporting your family - I can understand that. Though there's something else I should tell you before I go."

She says this quietly, "There was a time when I was an agent of Dark Fall for my mother's sake. Everything I did, all the things I did - I did for her, or at least that's what I told myself. Selfishly I hoped she'd go back to being the kind mother who she used to be. I didn't understand her at all- and every time she did something that... made me doubt, I ignored it, justified it. And so noone was more shocked than I was when she tried to kill me."

A moment later, "There's noone who will tell you it's wrong to support your family - but if you truly love them the bravest thing you can do is have the courage to tell them they're wrong, before it's too late."

[[Category:Logs]]

2017-10-07 - What Lies Beneath 11

2017-10-09T16:47:49Z

Tlynn2002:

{|class="toccolours" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''What Lies Beneath 11'''
|-
|'''Summary''': 
''A group of magical girls are summoned to Jindai Botanical Gardens to meet with Dr. Kaoruko Hanasaki and discuss their next actions.''
|-
|'''Who''': 
[[Mai Mishou]], [[Usagi Tsukino]], [[Yumi Ohzora]], [[Ami Mizuno]], [[Shigure Shiratsuyu]], [[Niramo Umokeshi]], [[Saki Hyuuga]], [[Fuu Hououji]]

GM: Hotaru Tomoe (as Dr. Hanasaki)
|-
|'''Where:''' 
Jindai Botanical Gardens
|-
|'''OOC - IC Date:''' 
10/7/2017 - 2/21/2015
|-
|}

<Pose Tracker> Hotaru Tomoe [Infinity Institute (6)] has posed.
<SoundTracker> The Nutcracker - The Christmas Tree https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEvcag9BskA

The invitations come as they have in the past -- carried by mascot or by mailman or even by passing breeze onto pillowcase, addressed to the magical girl rather than the normal one and always, through some means of mysticism, being seen first by them rather than any parent or roommate or other normal person. Unlike some of the others, this one specifies arriving 'in costume'. The penmanship is beautiful and delicate as dewy morning spiderweb. Tea is promised, and cookies, and an opportunity to help save the world.

And the private greenhouse of Jindai Botanical Garden's director is becoming more like a familiar clubhouse for some, but every time it's a little different. This time it seems that Dr. Kaoruko Hanasaki is making a study of water lilies or something, because there's an indoor pond set up, and broad green pads all over the place. Frogs croak, but not rudely. No flowers bloom, but there are great, engorged buds atop some of the pads, ready to blossom at any moment.

It smells wet but not muddy, like the city after a fresh rain.

In the center of all this is a delicate pink picnic blanket, much-festooned with heavy-tassled cushions and curiously beautiful trays, each one carved from a single piece of wood into something almost paper-thin yet strong, strong. They are filled with tiny sweets and Eastern teacups, without handles and with the shimmer of true age. Precious things.

Hanasaki-sensei herself fits well in this place. There is a bit of pond water staining her lab coat, her dress beneath is a grandmotherly near-mumu, her long gray hair falls in waves behind her, and her face, no matter how papery ''or'' spiderwebbed, is still the best thing in the room at holding a smile.

Even when she speaks of scary things, it sounds like everything really will be all right.

"So you see," she concludes, having just spent a few minutes taking tea with those around her and bringing them up to speed, "That is why the situation is so grave. The World Tree is one of the great hearts of magic of this world. Those who control the five mystical places of power tied to the World Tree will control its immense power when it awakens, and that time is quickening, it will be soon. And more and more it seems that shadow rises to seize those five places for themselves..." She counts them off on her fingers:

"Library Island, Infinity Institute, Jindai, Tokyo Tower, and... the missing one. The stolen one. The one that we must find."

Today's tea, by the way, is green tea, and every sip tastes of a different green feeling. Like being deep in the cool forest, or exploring a savage jungle, or rolling across a freshly mown lawn. It is definitely just a little bit magic -- but not ''bad'' magic.

OOC: We are opening a bit in medias res so as to not spend the whole evening doing a rehash of the plot so far. I'll take
questions OOCly -- and /one/ round of IC questions, specifically this round, but you'll probably get more out of it OOC, for
speed's sake.

COMBAT: Usagi Tsukino transforms into Sailor Moon!
COMBAT: Yumi Ohzora transforms into Witch Ivy!
COMBAT: Ami Mizuno transforms into Sailor Mercury!
COMBAT: Mai Mishou transforms into Cure Egret!
COMBAT: Niramo Umokeshi transforms into Sourisi!

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

Cure Egret stands there, as she often has. To say that she cares strongly for the World Tree is an understatement. She has had a deep, strong bond to that place for years now. It comes from the times she met Saki there, but also the charge of the fairies that she swore to help. She stands there in her white and purple, her violet eyes regarding Kaoruko.

She nods to each location in turn.

"The last place..." She trails off, eyes dipping down. "...Do you know where we might find it? We could still get there in time, I hope."

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Moon [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Luna sits in front of her teacup on a cushion. Every so often she gently paws Sailor Mercury to pick up her teacup for her so she can take what looks like a sip, and is really a surreptitious lap of her tongue without bending her neck over and drinking like a cat.

Once it's back on the saucer, she leans her head over and whispers to Mercury, "Thank goodness you're here today to take note of all this and keep her in line."

Who is she talking about? Sailor Moon of course, who's sitting in sort of a sloppy half Seiza, legs draped to the side of the cushion on her part of the picnic blanket happily munching on the tiny sweets and seeming blissfully ignorant of the conversation. Occasionally breaking it up with sips of tea.

She's not entirely so, she's heard some of it before, but perhaps the gravity of the matter hasn't fully settled in.

Luna clears her throat, and hisses to Moon, "Moon! You're paying attention right?" "Hai~mmf~Hai~" "Then what sort of thing should a Sailor Senshi ask next?"

Sailor Moon puts a pointer finger to her chin, then looks at the hostess, "Hanasaki-sensei. Could you please pass me more of those adorable little sweets? They're delicious."

Luna cringes on her pillow. "Moon..." She moans softly, "Well what? Egret already asked the most important question, so I asked the next most important."

Luna has to spend many long moments wondering if Usagi is messing with her, or if she's just being Usagi.

COMBAT: Saki Hyuuga transforms into Cure Bloom!

<Pose Tracker> Yumi Ohzora [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

The Witch of Lost Ivy stands among the group in black, having received a letter in her dorm room. It was lovely, and of course Yumi would go to another of these meetings, in this greenhouse here. She also brought a friend.

A black cat pads at her ankles, sitting down beside her as she looks up at Dr. Kaoruko.

Yumi herself is dreadfully careful with the beautiful things thave have been offered to her, almost distractedly so. Nevertheless she has the opportunity to love the myriad feelings of ''green'' hitting her tongue and her mind, her own green-tipped staff propped up nearby, where it is safe and respected and not in the way. And while Luna speaks...

"Honestly," Tama comments, "So much trouble with your charge." She looks like she may be grinning.

"...How many do we know we can't get back, again? We'll have to be careful since time is so short to do everything we can..."

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Mercury [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Going back to the condo to change before cram school, Ami was surprised to find a beautiful letter laying on her pillow. She picked it up carefullly as it seemed delicate, eyeing the intricate designs on the outside. After opening it gently, the beautiful handwriting caught her attention. It was unlike anything she had ever seen before and the message was one she found interesting enough.

Was it a trap of some kind or something more mundane. The words that offered a chance to save the world however was what really stood out to her and so, forgoing her studies (no easy feat for the astute student) she changes, as per instructions and heads to the location.

The Jindai Garden is a calming place and when she enters, albeit tentatively, Ami notes the lilies and various plants and frogs around. Most of which seem to be familiar to her. It made for a peaceful background to say the least.

Ami finds a place among the rest of the group and politely takes some tea and a cookie while Hanasaki explains the reason for the meeting. The senshi listens carefullly while eyeing Usagi and Luna with a slight smile. Should Usagi nod off, she is not above jabbing her friend with an elbow. She also, offers a hand to Luna, picking up the teacup to help the cat lap it up while petting her gently on the head.

Back to the woman speaking though, it sounded so serious. Usagi's reaction was to be expected but for her part, she is concerned given recent events. While she hadn't been there, word traveled fast amongst their group.

For now, the girl in blue is mostly silent. Listening carefully to find out more about their next plan of action and to find out what they were going to have to do.

<Pose Tracker> Shigure Shiratsuyu [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

Shigure discovered the letter late last night, after she'd returned from the supplementary lessons that had often reached late towards the end of the evening. It was a letter unlike she'd received before. She froze a little when she read that it wanted her to come 'in costume'.

Did it mean... the Relic?

Shigure looked nervously towards the thin, pencil-like crystal necklace on her neck...

And she sung.

~*~

It was difficult to move quietly, and the Symphogear Relic-bearer has no experience with this kind of meeting... before. It was all just a rather scarcely-evident blur, the last time, that she still doesn't really know if she's moving for real.

But it is real, all too real. There were others... there, other... 'magical girls', as she'd come to understand it. This was the reality she existed in now.

Symphogear Solais' suit was something approaching a bodysuit, with a predominantly white and silver colour with black highlights; it is sleeveless and has black leggings with additional silver highlights, laced with thicker, greave and gauntlet-like armaments for her arms and legs. A large set of spikes had emerged from either side of her head, framing her chin in a device that lightly looked like some kind of headpiece.

More to the point, perhaps, is the presence of the overgrown, unwieldy device at her back, a burdensome piece of metal that scant looks like a greatsword. It is black, with light edges, with a predominant cross centreing its piece.

"... who will awaken?" she finds herself voicing. She's nervous, and she can't hide it. She feels alone and uncertain of what she's facing.

<Pose Tracker> Niramo Umokeshi [Juuban Public School (8)] has posed.

Niramo was understandably confused as she checked the mail as she returned from school and noticed the envelope addressed to Sourisi, the name she had taken for when she was using her Mouse Miraculous. It was only a few weeks ago that she found the Mouse Miraculous mysteriously inside one of her shopping bags, and finding herself given a chance to help right the wrongs of the world. While she has practiced as Sourisi, she has yet to actually make a name for herself, and an invitation offering a chance to help safe the world is startling in it's own way. But it was a request for help, and there wasn't a chance that she could refuse.

She made sure to learn all she could about Hanasaki-sensei from Tak, the Kwami bonded to the Mouse Miraculous she now possessed, before leaving for the Jindai Botanical Gardens. It took her a little while longer than she had expected, mostly to the fact Tokyo looked so different from the rooftops than down on the street, and just a little case of nerves. The thought that this could be a elaborate setup for a trap didn't even cross her mind as she entered the private greenhouse, closing the door behind her and taking in the sights and sounds that filled the interior.

It would appear to the other Magical Girls there that she certainly have taken the 'costume' part of the invitation to heart, as differently dressed up as Sourisi was. She wore a skintight tan bodysuit that ends at her neck, and with shades of light tan on her forearms, calves and torso matching the rest of her outfit. Attached by small metallic clasps on her calves were a pair of curved dark colored tonfa, and a two foot long tail, pale and slightly scaly started at her lower back. Finally completing the outfit was a stylish eye mask, colored a pale tan, two large rounded ears sticking on the top of her head, with her long black hair stylized in a braided ponytail.

She was being careful not to displease their host as she politely took a sip from her tea cup, listening to the others with a slight smile on her lips. She appeared somewhat nervous, sure, but she looked happy to be here, despite the topic at hand.

"And will everything truly be alright if we manage to protect this...'missing' place? With four places already lost, it's going to be tough."

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

Cure Bloom has oft attended these little meetings in her true form - Splash Star Pretty Cure gains little from disguises, thanks to their foes being ACUTELY aware of who they really are - but today they are told to come transformed, and thus here she is. The thought of the World Tree's continued peril chaffs at Saki deeply, and the opportunity to help save it is something she will never turn down. As usual for Cure Bloom, it's the personal things that bother her the most. The world is hard to think about, but the place she loves the most, why...that's easy.

Cure Bloom waits with Egret. She has tea because it always makes her a little happy, calming the subtle weight of stress that has plagued her shoulders for weeks. She lets Egret handle the questions; for Saki, asking her to plan and think deeply is most likely to just get her tangled up in her own thoughts.

<Pose Tracker> Hotaru Tomoe [Infinity Institute (6)] has posed.

Kaoruko doesn't seem to mind the request for more food. "Of course, Sailor Moon," she says warmly, and passes over a tray. The strawberry daifuku on it are scrumptious.

Then she settles back into her seiza. It's a slightly creaky and arthritic seiza, but not without its own gnarled beauty.

This conversation is well past introductions at this point, but surely when she met Symphogear Solais and Sourisi for the first time, they felt her friendly kindness, her welcoming heart. And she does not begrudge them their questions -- quite to the contrary.

"That is an astute question, Maiden of Solais," she says with a glint in her eye. "Though I think your instinct is closer to the truth, it is usually considered a 'what', the power of the World Tree. A massive power, which only rises less than once a century. Last time it rose, it was misused... and opened the door to return great evil to this world, long-banished evil, including the bulk of the Noise."

It seems she's passingly familiar with Symphogear, this old lady. There's little time for that revelation to sink in, however, because she continues, with the careful sort of speech when one is trying to be precise about something both complex and a little bit holy:

"That sacred time approaches again when the World Tree's power rises, and it is being very overtly targeted by dark forces. And it seems... stronger, the World Tree, in the same way that not all volcanic eruptions are of the same strength. We fear that should its power fall into the wrong hands, it could be apocalyptic in scope."

Inclining her head to Sourisi, she adds: "Never fear -- I don't think it is quite so bad as four to one. Not yet. Not if we take action."

Her throat is dry so she takes a sip of her tea.

"It seems as though Library Island is lost to us now, willingly sacrificed to save Jindai and everything else," she continues, addressing Yumi's question next. "You see," she explains for those who weren't there, "We were recently attacked by those who call themselves the Black Moon Clan, and they unleashed a dreadful magic upon this place, seeking to corrupt or destroy it, and much else besides. We had -- you could call it an artifact -- a tie to Library Island's heart, and there was nothing else available to store all that black magic. In so doing, it has probably tainted Library Island's connection to the World Tree beyond repair."

Again she ticks off from her fingers.

"I think we must also assume that Infinity Institute is also out of reach, connected to the Library as it is. To safely harvest the World Tree's magic, we need three out of five, so that means all the others. The one here, the one at Tokyo Tower, and the missing one. It is the nature of the Tower to be held by no one for long -- it is mystically neutral ground -- so that conflict will surely come around the time of the Tree's awakening. If that was now, even if we won, we would be at two out of five."

Her eyes go to Egret, and smile.

"So, yes -- we must find the one that used to be under our own St. Ursula's Cathedral, but was moved by dark forces. It may be dangerous to reclaim it, but I suspect that we will have the element of surprise. And fortunately... we have a tool at our disposal!"

Back to Yumi, she gestures at her cell phone charm. "I sense the World Tree's love of life in that new broom of yours. Like calls to like... could I impose upon you to enclose our picnic blanket in a magical circle? Everyone else... do get comfortable. If you are all willing, I believe she can work a spell that will allow us to follow that connection back to its source. All that you must do is close your eyes, for the place that we must travel is a road of dreams..."

Rising, she is glad to help collect dishes, distribute more cushions, whatever people need to get comfortable.

COMBAT: Fuu Hououji transforms into Wind Knight!

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Moon [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Moon happily takes more strawberry daifuku, "Thank you very much!" Luna sighs when Tama notes this, "Don't I know it..." Whereas Moon leans over to whisper at the silent and intense Sailor Mercury after a while, holding out one of the passed Daifuku, "Mercury-chan. You have to try some of this. They're just as good as Jupiter-chan's treats..."

Solais gets a wave, an emphatic wave even whenever she looks her way. Does Sailor Moon- know her? Wait is she mouthing something at her? If she can look past the crumb stained Fuku she might be able to read it as - 'You're doing great!'

Well that's weirdly supportive, and knowledgeable about how new she is. Does Sailor Moon just do this for all new Magical Girls?

Luna is staring at Sourisi's tail, a little overlong, before she seems to startle out of it. Sailor Moon waves her way just after Kaoruko reassures her, "Don't worry~ Even if it seems like a tough situation- I'm sure it'll all work out!" "Moon... that's not the least bit reassuring." "Eh? Why not?"

Bringing up the attack causes her to raise her teacup again, as she stares at the surface of the tea. Closing her eyes she thinks about a certain moment, allowing the fresh scent of the tea to strike her nostrils. Then she allows herself to take a sip of the tea.

Which is when they point to Yumi, "Whoa you have a broom now Ivy-chan?" That fact is delightful enough that it barely even registers that it can lead them back. Luna paws her, "Just- get comfortable so she can work the spell."

Sailor Moon lays herself down further and closes her eyes, "It's kind of like a Mahou Shoujo sleepover Mercury-chan." She whispers. Luna rolls her eyes then closes them after, Mercury and Luna can hear something in the darkness behind their eyelids, a soft munching, "Are you still eating!?" "She didn't say I had to stop!" "Would you eat in bed?!" "O-Of course not..."

<Pose Tracker> Shigure Shiratsuyu [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

Solais...

The Maiden of Solais.

That would be as good a name as any. She hadn't quite thought of a pseudonym, a moniker. But it would be appropriate that the Relic that she relied upon for all her power would be her name. Though this heavy, burdensome weapon was as much a cross for her to bear, it was also what allowed her to escape that day with her life. With Kotori's life.

"A power that can be used for good or evil... I see..." she whispers, finding herself no less stiff at the revelation. The Noise...

She looks to Sailor Moon. She-- pauses for a moment, looking down with something approaching... a hint of a smile, perhaps? She nods wordlessly at her, before she slowly relinquishes some of that tension to slide herself onto one of the seats on the edge, brushing her long tailcoat in the process of doing so.

She looks towards Yumi as well, wondering what the power in that broom was... and she is also curious about Sourisi, and the Cures... and the others too. So many different styles... had they all been doing this for... so much longer than her?

In doing so, the Claiomh Solais released itself from her back, ebbing and floating gently in the air. It's hard to sit with a weapon taller than you are, after all.

"Then, just a little..." as she gently sips from her tea.

It was relieving, perhaps, that it tasted... so normal. A hint of normalcy, a connection that despite the impossibly fantastic topics of discussion, they could still enjoy such seemingly normal things.

It relaxed her.

It allowed her to close her eyes.

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

"I understand," Cure Egret says. She bobs her head once, before she looks sideways at Saki. She studies her partner for a moment, before she shrugs. She doesn't really understand the first thing about magic -- she never took those classes at Infinity. She looks at the Witch of Lost Ivy, then, and nods. "Let us know if we can do anything to help, please!"

And then Cure Egret plops down on the ground. She glances over the Sailor Senshi for a moment, before she looks to one of the newcomers. Solais? She tilts her head to the side. "It was... rather impressive," she admits. "But overwhelming to see all of this in action."

Then she takes the teacup. She closes her eyes, before she has a sip. But the sigh she lets out is quite relaxed.

<Pose Tracker> Yumi Ohzora [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

Yumi, too, has been friendly to the new arrivals, both those she recognizes and those she doesn't. She tries to stay unobtrusive though, even iven that she's tall and wearing a hat that makes her taller still. She likes this place, despite the danger that it was in before.

Unfortunately the Witch can't always be where she would like to be. ...Tama, though, displayed great interest in Sourisi, as a cat watching a mouse... though she didn't make any move to start teasing her despite that connection.

The Witch continues sipping her tea, listening to the questions of others to the approval of her familiar... and to the vague concern of some given how attentive she is. "It's all right, Luna." She sounds... still terribly amused.

Ivy though blinks pink eyes at Kaoruko where she'd been glancing down at her phone, and looks terribly surprised. "O-oh, a tool... You mean--" She pauses, and then nods firmly. "Right! I can do it!" She takes a quick breath to steady herself, and stands up. She sounds a little creaky but that might be her leather boots. "A circle..." Yumi walks deliberately to her staff, holding out her phone, and gathers it up into a charm, touching the broom in turn to cause it to grow to her hand. It is beautiful wood, with a stone on one and and ivy wending about the bristles.

A smile to Sailor Moon before she starts. "Yep, here it is!"

But then she's all serious. "...I call upon life to lead to life... As I sweep to the horizon, let us see beyond and beneath..."

The Witch solemnly uses her broom to trace a perfect circle about the blanket, verdant green glowing in place as it traces, little symbols wending in the air just above the ground.

"Lost love be found. Allow us to travel to the source. In dreams we walk, to find..." Another few steps, careful motions, completely precise. "I call..."

Yumi finishes the circle which is brighter now, a warm light much like the tea in its way, speaking of new promise. And she moves to sit, broom on her lap hands on her knees, "We call!"

<Pose Tracker> Fuu Hououji [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

Fuu had mixed feelings about being invited back to the Jindai Botanical Gardens again after what she did the *last* time she was there. Admittedly, last time involved 'saving the Gardens and possibly the world from being swallowed up in a sorcerous black hole' ... but it also depended on 'sacrificing the Light from the control point beneath Library Island,' and it's that last one which she still feels uneasy about. Or more accurately, feels downright *awful* about - and she never did make the necessary time to come back and apologize personally to Hanasaki-sensei.

So the Wind Knight doesn't ask questions; she doesn't even try to sit near the front (to the extent that there *is* a 'front' in the circle). She's hesitant to accept tea or sweets, but (a) it's Hospitality which should not be turned down; that would be rude, and (b) the tea is likely a crucial part of whatever Hanasaki-sensei needs of the magical girls.

... and then there's (c) it smells too good to pass up, plus the sweets and the tea complement each other too perfectly to turn down either. She tries to look insignificant when Hanasaki-sensei recounts the core events of the battle of the gardens - even if what she did was necessary, she doesn't feel *better* about it - but she's cooperative enough about setting up for the dream journey, if there's anything she needs to do besides finishing her tea and getting comfortable.

"It won't be our first time, will it?" she comments quietly as she collects a cushion to support her head. "For some of us, at least - the journey we embarked upon from Hokkaido two winters ago ..."

<Pose Tracker> Niramo Umokeshi [Juuban Public School (8)] has posed.

Sourisi would make a noticable blink as she took in the words from the grandmotherly figure, feeling the calm and soothing aura despite the news she had. She was thankful to know that the situation wasn't as dire as she thought it would be, and letting out a sigh of relief as the plan was revealed to them all. The only thing that would be truly worrisome was when the battle at Tokyo Tower drew near, but that still was in the future. Sourisi's slight smile turned into a full grin as she noticed the black cat next to the blonde-haired Magical Girl eyeing her tail, and would have a little fun as she twitched the tip of the tail for Luna's attention.

Taking a calming breath, she would help Kaoruko gather the dishes first before getting a pillow for her own use. Why should their host do all the work, after all? Being sent into a dream world to seek out what they needed was not what she had expected, but she wasn't bothering to let the strangeness of her situation stop her from helping. Laying down her head onto her cushion gently, she closed her eyes and focused on taking long, deep breaths, though she couldn't hide her smile at the thought she was helping to save the world.

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Mercury [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Ami, after helping Luna for awhile, finally sips her own tea again, noting the flavor is unlike any other green tea she has had. It wasn't bad in any way though and as the other magical girls arrive, she realizes that she is unfamiliar with some of them. Still, if they were invited to this, Ami assumes they could be trusted with the information that they were receiving.

As Usagi leans over to her, Ami smiles and takes the daifuku. "Thank you!" Taking small bites, she seems to really be enjoying it for a few seconds at least until the conversation shifts and more information is given and for a brief moment, Ami ponders taking notes but then realizes she hadn't really planned for it and she shrugs to herself a little.

If she had questions, Ami seems to have been satiated by the explanation given and she glances at Usagi. "Slumber party huh?" She winks and seemingly being trusting of what was happening, she takes her place near Moon and Luna and closes her eyes.

But then, crunching noises, underneath her breath Mercury whispers to Usagi while only slightly opening one eye, "Stop that!" Then she closes her eyes again, enjoying the brief moments of silence and wondering, slightly concerned, about what was about to happen.

Her mind wanders off a little as Yumi begins her incantation. She focuses on the words, taking them into her subconscious mind. This was beyond the realm of comfort for her but Ami stays still, waiting for what comes next.

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

Cure Bloom listens, because someone is giving her a plan and she needs those to function when there isn't a thing to punch directly in front of her. She knows most of this, at least in broad strokes, and she fidgets uneasily as she waits for the hammer to fall. But soon, Kaoruko reveals that a plan does exist.

She looks to Egret, finds her searching for her own eyes. She nods, looking maybe similarly lost.

Flappy pops his head out of the pouch on her waist. "It's flower magic-lapi! You know it'll be fine-lapi!"

"You just say that because it's your own team," Bloom mutters, but does find her anxiety fading. "But I guess he's right, huh?" she murmurs Egret's way, and steps to take her place.

<Pose Tracker> Hotaru Tomoe [Infinity Institute (6)] has posed.
<SoundTracker> Flying Express Delivery https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cb-kriqIEjw

"Have a good time," Kaoruko chimes in, in exactly the way that a parent might send their child out the door to school. She watches over them wistfully, and when no one is looking, the huge (eight feet or more!) stuffed animal over in one corner lumbers over to her to lean against her affectionately.

---

Sleep comes swiftly, swept over the girls by Yumi's magic and the broom's magic and maybe the magic of this place, too, so quiet and beautiful. It doesn't hurt that Kaoruko lights a little incense, lilies in honor of her botanical guests, perhaps, which fills the air with a sweet but not sickly perfume.

It is indeed very similar to that one time Kero-chan led a ritual into the World of Dreams from the highest point on Hokkaido, except for all the ways in which it is different: this is a much more comfortable place than a mountaintop, and warmer too, and also the entire world isn't held in thrall in a sorcerous sleep needing to be saved.

Though that could be coming on the horizon! That is the sort of horror this seeks to prevent.

But all such worries fade away as the rising begins. Rising, not on wings but on individual brooms, each the twin of Yumi's, adorned with ivy and stone. Controlling them is easy, especially since they're controlling themselves. There is a cottony sense of comfort, however, the feeling of one's safest place.

These places paint the clouds themselves, puffy silver-white canvasses, as the group soars into a starless sky. It should be cold but instead it's merely pleasant. To some the height should be scary, but it's more like a height metaphor right now; there is no ground, and falling doesn't exist, either. Just the rushing feeling of the air going past, and the certainty that the brooms know their own direction, like geese inexorably following magnetic north.

OOC: Along with whatever else you pose, please include imagery of your character's safest place, as rendered upon a passing cloud.

<Pose Tracker> Fuu Hououji [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

That distinction isn't lost on Fuu as she dozes off - the fact that the situation is a lot more comfortable and a lot less dire than their dream mission from Hokkaido. Hopefully, it'll also be easier to resolve ...

She hasn't quite finished piecing the shape of that hope together in her head when she feels the broom supporting her, the wind blowing against her. It's not entirely a passive feeling, and somehow she knows it shouldn't be: this is as comfortable to her as the chair in her bedroom, positioned at her desk, a keyboard beneath her fingers and music in her ears, and sometimes - when it's chilly or when she just wants the extra comfort - a plushie in her lap as she works.

The mental image of her room is so clear to her that the vision of it in a cloudbank doesn't even surprise her - a Western-style bed with a green quilt, a handful of fantasy plushies lined up where the bed meets the wall; bookshelves line several walls, their subjects varying from light reading near the bed to computer books and school texts around the desk. A particularly keen and attentive eye might pick out a session of RPG Maker displayed on the computer's screen, but you'd have to be REALLY looking for it.

The Wind Knight takes in a deeper breath, the pleasantly clear air filling her lungs as they fly onwards, and possibly upwards. Though the wind may be her element, she trusts her broom - and those of her companions - to carry them onwards safely, taking them where they need to go. Whatever they need to do when they get there, they'll do when it needs to be done. For now, she glances around at her companions, taking passing note (or possibly a little more) of the cloudscape's beauty and the clear sky above.

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Moon [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Sleep comes swiftly, and when she awakens she feels like she's floating- no indeed she's rising. Her broom has decidedly pink brustles, split in twain, it's long haft painted pink and covered with crescent moons and stars. It's tipped with a red heart which makes it look a little like the Spiral Heart Moon Rod, a tiny mirror flashing in it's center. She's laughing in delight.

Luna on the other hand is in a bird cage hanging near the end of the broom, it's bars entwined in ribbons, with a tiny cushion at the bottom. "Why am I in a birdcage? Sailor Moon you weren't dreaming of this right? Sailor Moon?"

"Wheehehehehehehehe! Mercury-chan! Luna! We're really flying!" She starts waving excitedly to the others, "Everyone! How do I look, flying like this?" She calls out, thoroughly enjoying the delightful experience that is flight in this dream world, seated sidesaddle on a broom, hands upon it.

Luna taps the exit of the cage only to find it swings open quite easily. Then with the grace of a cat climbs out of that birdcage to clamber around Moon seat herself on the back of the broom in a more dignified way. "Hmmph."

As they pass by the clouds, one of them depicts a Torii gate at the top of a staircase. It leads to sliding Shoji screens of a traditional building. The fluffy screens slide back to show puffy indistinct images of five friends in different positions around a table.

One is sprawled out asleep, one has glasses and holding what looks like a book. There's another who looks almost like a Shrine Maiden, and a taller girl besides... and another standing in what looks like a pose.

Apparently the Hikawa Shrine is Usagi Tsukino's safest place... even moreso than home.

As Luna looks at the image, an almost cat like figure appears among the five. After a moment she too relaxes, sighing in contentment.

<Pose Tracker> Yumi Ohzora [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

Sweets fortify Yumi a little bit through her nerves; she lets the magic itself guide her, opening up to it in a way that lets her do ''more'' than she could otherwise. Maybe this place helps her, maybe the broom, maybe everyone... and the perfume fills her nose.

Despite her sensitivity, this doesn't even dream of bothering her. Soon she drifts...

In a cloudbank appears a large room with colorful walls, windows out over Tokyo on their high floor. There are easels set up on staggered floors, one in particular with paints beside it, a stool familiar. The image on the canvas varies, flickering from one thing to a next, but there are figures in silhouette there one moment, and gone the next.

Tama is sitting on Yumi's broom of course, while Yumi sits sidesaddle. "You're a natural, Sailor Moon!" the young witch declares. "it's fun, isn't it?" She wonders where they're going through. ...And after a moment, she points to her hat and speaks an incantation. It blows a little bit less.

"...I'm a little surprised it worked," she admits with a sheepish laugh. She smiles anyway.

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Mercury [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Inhaling the sweet smell of the lilies and the other relaxing aromas in the air, Mercury is quickly taken over by the spell and the dream. In many ways, it seems like so many dreams that she has had before but this one has a different feeling to it. It is one that her subconscious mind can feel. There is no danger here though that she can see so far.

When she feels herself rise up and then looks down, Mercury notices her mode of transportation is not unlike Yumi's and even though this is something that should be scary, she finds her mind at ease. The height doesn't bother her, nor does the broom which seems to have a set direction in mind.

Usagi's voice, while she can hear it, seems far off as her vision changes and within the clouds she can see sprawling rows of books. Her senses are enveloped by the aroma of the old literature that lines the walls. There is an overwhelming sense of peace and tranquility in this place that she feels like she has been to many times before.

Beyond that, the she can see a park and a bunch of people sitting around, laughing. While she watches the girls from afar, Mercury immediately feels a sense of love and peace with them nearby, like every care in the world is gone from her mind. All her worries and burdens seem to be only a distant memory in this place.

<Pose Tracker> Shigure Shiratsuyu [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

Solais is surprised to see herself on a broom in turn, and she's -- rising. She's flying. It's decidely dream-like, but every aspect of it feels decidedly real. Hers has silver engravings upon it, a bit more stiff and scale-like, but no less in wonder.

She quietly glances towards a nearby cloud...

...and her eyes widen slowly at the appearance of a clinically white room, with nothing inside save for a white-lacquered grand piano. Endless streams of compositions, an infinite length of bars and notes upon notes shrouds the neverending piles and piles stacked high atop, beside, and around the piano.

She looks just a bit nervous as she realises it, but then relents afterwards. Her Composition Room...

It's safe in how clinical it is, devoid of anything that was not a clinically grafted note upon a bar.

Within the Composition Room, it is impossible to misinterpret. The interpretation of a single note upon a bar is absolute.

A room of Certainties.

It's safe... it's where she's escaped all this time, to avoid the Uncertainties of her mother's tantrums, her bad moods, her demands. The Uncertainties of daily life, as other people's seemingly errant emotions tended to swing from time to time.

She shakes her head for a moment, as she looks towards several others. The shrine... the sprawling rows of books... the easels...

It seemed to comfort her more to look to others' sanctuaries than her own.

Safety does not imply happiness, after all.

<Pose Tracker> Niramo Umokeshi [Juuban Public School (8)] has posed.

Sourisi slowly became aware of the rising sensation, of air and height pushing down upon her like a blanket. She then quickly became aware of the broom underneeth her that was causing the lifting, and she quickly latched onto the wooden handle and ivy, holding on tightly. The sudden rush of fear over flying on a cleaning tool would itself be washed away as she looked around her and took notice of the others. How odd it seemed to watch all these girls, all brought together for a singular purpose, flying upwards on brooms straight out of fiction. Or what was real and had been hidden from her for so long, Sourisi reminded herself. Only after making sure that the others were here, and with a second glance at the Maiden of Solais, did she finally take notice of the dream landscape around them.

One cloud in praticiliar stood out to her, it's surface showing a place she remembered most fondly from her childhood. A dimly lit study, with only an antique electric lamp providing illumination. A large wooden desk made out of polished mahogany rested in the center, paperwork littering the surface and several coffee mugs resting on the corner of the desk. Several wooden bookshelves, stuffed to bursting with both ancient and modern books stood along the sides of the small room, yet helped bring a sense of homely comfort. The dusk of twilight could be seen though the room's single window, with a steely sky unleashing rain that futilely tried to disturb the peace of the study, yet only added to the comfort. Finally, a cheap wooden chair was tucked into the desk, the top slightly worn from being used to pull back the chair.

A wistful look crossed over Sourisi's face for a moment, looking upon that scene. She hadn't seen that study in years, but she could almost smell the stale coffee that would cling to the books. It certainly wasn't all fun and games on this trip, she reminded herself, and there was a reason why they were here, but... "This is certainly different than I was expecting to spend my night!" If they had to fly on brooms, they might as well talk to one another! "And you are doing great! Remember what you did, just in case you have to do it again in the future!"

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

"I think he must be," Egret says, before she drifts off into a sleep.

When she awakes, she yelps. The Pretty Cure has to straighten sharply, before she realizes what she has doing. She has watched a movie about a delivery service to know how to keep atop a broom. She smiles, then, and grabs it a little tighter on the broomstick. She looks to the side, then.

For her, it's easy -- and she knows what it is, as soon as she sees it. A shrine, nestled high in the boughs of a tree; high in branches that one could walk up. The shrine to the Sky Tree, located part of the way up the World Tree. She gasps, softly.

"Ah..."

Then, she looks to the side, where she knows Cure Bloom will be. "Bloom! Look!"

</poem>
<Pose Tracker> Cure Bloom [Infinity Institute (8)] has posed.
<poem>If Saki ever has a hard time sleeping, today isn't one of those days.

The ascent is sudden, perhaps, but in dream-like logic, easily accepted. Flight has been a part of Saki Hyuuga's dreams often, these last few months, as the powers of the Earth have let her so easily part from it. It's not so strange to feel no fear of falling anymore, and so she thinks little of it as the clouds rush by.

The same vision as Egret's appears again; a shrine, nestled among the boughs of the World Tree, big enough for a priest in residence but long without one, yet nonetheless well-cared-for by a handful of people who know the place and love it dear. One of those is Saki, and Cure Bloom has a big smile on her face as she sees it. She turns it to Egret, nodding eagerly. "Yeah!"

<Pose Tracker> Hotaru Tomoe [Infinity Institute (6)] has posed.
<SoundTracker> The Twisted Woods https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RE3iTLxafyA

The clouds show many places, appointed with many things, but they all seem to blur together, resembling each other more and more until they're just clouds again...

The brooms are starting to descend. Now the group passes ''through'' the clouds, and it is nothing at all like being in a bedroom or shrine or library or conservatory. No, it is chilly for the first time, goosebumps-summoning. And that's the last really coherent feeling before it all seems to dissolve.

The clouds were creamy but they're becoming eclipsed by silver... ephemeral moonlight... delicate like the china teacups back in the greenhouse... delicate like freshly mended feelings after a fight... it sounds like there's fighting below, the unmistakable if distant roar of battle... roaring of a great beast, like a cat or the... low of a cow, cows that break up gradually into birdsong... a thousand thousand tiny shadows, too far away to touch but close enough to hear, swirling as though they're all of one mind even though they must all have separate birdbrains... thoughts, more abstract as the clouds deepen... depth itself loses meaning when up and down are lost as ideas... yet sinking remains, that feeling of pressure... greater and greater... breathing becomes difficult...

--out!

The brooms are soaking wet now, and so are their riders, as they skim across the treetops. If anyone thinks to look behind, the only marker on the horizon is the World Tree itself, unmistakable even in this realm of metaphor, its massive crown as cloudlike as so much else has been. Perhaps they flew within it all along.

But ahead: ahead, a great forest, and a great darkness. The broomsticks thrum with urgency, as they accelerate forward, to speeds that no longer feel safe, not safe at all...

They pass the clearing in a flash, quicker than a heartbeat, faster than an eyeblink, yet in that single suspended moment of nearness it resolves into perfect clarity:

A mansion, heavy upon its own foundation like an old man's flesh upon old bones, slumps in the heart of the woods. It smells like rotting plants, and then like nothing at all, a desolate emptiness that has no place in any earthly garden, especially one as wild and strange as a wilderness. Loneliness is one thing, but this is something else...

They leave the mansion behind... but the brooms do not go with them--!

Absent their rides, only momentum carrying them forwards, all at once the group is truly falling in earnest, through the treetops and through the brush, much more of it than there could possibly be in reality. It seems there is no ground at all, only endless branches to crackle through and, eventually, find purchase on. Branches and mist, curling around trunks and arms with equal ease.

That mansion is nowhere to be found, but the feeling of desolation remains.

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Moon [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Something changes. At first it's nothing more than Sailor Moon's head lifting to view the soft moonlight shining within them, but then the sounds of her battle stir her attention. Gripping the actual Spiral Moon Heart Rod, she whispers to Luna, "Who do you think is fighting?" "I don't know- just be prepared for anything." But then the sinking feeling digs in, and she feels claustrophobic.

She can't breathe, she can't think, she's so scared, what's going-

Moon finds herself shivering from the cold and wet, as she finds herself blinking vaguely into space, her eyes dreamlike, but stung with the saltiness of tears. She finds herself looking back, only barely grasping the scale of the metaphysical battle being waged over the power of that tree.

"I..." She finds herself speechless as she considers that this matter is far more serious than how she's been treating it.

Over the dark forest, and the darkness, she finds herself clinging on for dear life, "Everyone hold-" And then there's a mansion. Which makes her feel worse, like some sort of miasma of darkness is hanging over it, it feels like the sheer desolation is caught in her throat. And then her broom is gone.

Sailor Moon gracefully- flails in mid-air as she falls, shrieking at the top of her lungs as Luna clings to her sailor collar, and she reaches for another item on her person.

The shrieking fades into, "TREETREESTREEESTREES-" Crack, "-OW-" Crunch, "-UWOO-" And then many more branches break. And they can hear the sounds of Sailor Moon hitting every single branch in her path on the way down. The feeling of desolation still stuck in her throat.

Which is when Sailor Moon finally lifts the other item on her person. That would be her disguise pen. With a click a cute umbrella pops out, covered in white bunny heads and tassels. For a moment it seems her fall is slowed.

But all that means is that it snags on a particularly jagged branch and her descent caught on the umbrella. The very picture of a heroine, with dessicated leaves and bark and twigs stuck in her hair. The girl pants and tries to beat back tears which are coming anyhow, catching her breath before finally observing. "That was really scary..."

Luna looks the picture of fright, claws still stuck into Sailor Moon, a few shades paler. "Y-You're telling me..." After she's caught her breath more she calls out, "Mercury-chan? Solais? Pretty Cure? Wind Knight? Ivy-chan? ... Mouse girl?" She really wishes she'd asked for her name now, "Everyone alright?"

<Pose Tracker> Yumi Ohzora [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

There are many of them here. The images shown to all of them run together, sure, but the Witch of Ivy's eye take on each of them. Clouds, and clouds,a and things move silver and chilly...

She shivers, and the strange feelings of these things as they sink, and sink, and feel pressure, and pressure, and Yumi isn't certain that she can ''breathe'' as Tama looks up at her in clear concern.

But it's worse, and worse still, and suddenly--

Yumi is freezing at the wet, and she does glance behind, seeing cloudlike crown and then ahead great darkness. She does not mind travelling faster than feels safe, but she does not want to travel so quickly into this, whatever this is. A mansion looms head. This place has green but it is awful green, rotting and terrible and not with new life, desolate. Yumi thinks she might be sick.

"Aaaaaah!" Falling, Yumi tumbles towards the trees, Tama suddenly latching onto her mantle with her claws. "Ow--" She hits one dead-on in the stomach and curls around it, swpinning slightly and grabbing hold.

Wheezing she manages, quietly, "F-fine... Moon... Everyone...?"

"Yumi, are you hurt...?" says the cat, nosing at her carefully.

"I-it's fine," Ivy croaks, "It was... probably supposed to do that..."

COMBAT: Shigure Shiratsuyu transforms into Symphogear Solais!

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Mercury [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Mercury is enjoying the scenery and just when she begins to think and maybe hope that it never ends, at the edges of her vision, the scenery begins to change. It blurs and runs together like a multitude of different hues of ink spilled on a page. Pretty soon, there is nothing left but the fluffy white dream clouds. Her happy thoughts disappearing with the fading images.

As the brooms continue, Ami suddenly shivers as the scene turns into moonlight. The air is cool and then there is a sound. It makes her heart rate speed up and she looks at Luna and Usagi. "Do you hear that?" Before she has a chance to focus on the voices though the pressure overtakes her thoughts and she is suddenly aware of how difficult it is to take a deep breath.

In an instant, she is soaking wet and freezing but still she is able to, just for a second, look at Luna and Usagi as they begin to descend. "Hang on guys!"

'This is going to be really bad if they can't stop,' she thinks. She can feel it, the fear as it rises up within her.

Mercury can only hold onto the broom as the feeling of the dreamworld pulls her downwards and across trees. The branches scratch and scrape at her skin and she makes a futile effort to grab at them to slow down, only ending up with handfuls of leaves instead.

Then, if it was even possible, the broom beneath her begins to move even faster, Ami is barely able to stay on as they make the first clearing. "Hold on... guys!" And then the mansion appears briefly as they move past it quickly and into the emptiness and void.

Mercury is quickly aware that she no longer has a mode of transportation and she is falling, frantically trying to find ''something'' to cling onto but coming up empty. The fall seems to last for hours, although it couldn't be that long. Mercury finds herself bumping against sharp ends of branches again, this time with more force.

Finally, somehow, she manages to end up on a branch just behind Moon. "I-I am fine. Luna-chan..." Her eyes squint at the cat. She can't reach out but she eyes her closely. Just thankful that they stopped.

"Do you have any idea where this is?" While Ami is looking at Usagi, the question is not exactly directed towards her. She glances around, trying to gain some sense of direction from her perch.

COMBAT: Shigure Shiratsuyu transforms into Symphogear Solais!

<Pose Tracker> Niramo Umokeshi [Juuban Public School (8)] has posed.

As they passed through the clouds, Sourisi started to feel as if she was truly in a dream, and nothing made sense again. The cloying feeling, like it was part of the very mist they flew through, clung to her, with her own thoughts starting to make any sense to her. All the sounds, the sights, the overall rapid change and lack of logic, it was as if she could barely focus on anything at all. Then they were out, and the leaden weight of fear that was clinging to her heart slipped away, and Sourisi let out a soft sigh as she slumped her shoulders in relief.

That relief quickly changed into focus as they were suddendly over the mansion, the sight of it standing out in flinching clarity before her. The smell was most vivid to her, the smell of rot and decay that clinged to the mansion as the lack of reality had clinged to her moments ago. The overall feeling of hopelessness as suffocating to her, and this was only on the exterior. The mansion looked long abandoned, and longer still since anyone had walked those halls. That thought shouldn't make sense to her, yet it did.

Now all they had to do was turn back around and go to the front do-...where was her broom? Almost comically, Sourisi shuffled her hand in front of her without looking, trying and failing to grasp what was just underneath her just a moment ago. Then she was dropping, faster and faster towards a ground that wasn't coming. Panic took over for just a moment, a frightful, wordless scream leaving her chest as she plummeted, unsure of what she had to do. Thinking quickly on seeing a larger branch coming towards her, the Mouse Miraculous swung her tail upwards to catch hold and stop her decent. Her tail got a strong grip, yet her speed had her spinning around the branch before she slowed enough to land on top, feet first.

Hearing the Magical Girl that the black cat was riding with call out, she would raise her voice to answer. "I-i'm okay, just surprised, that's all! Oh, right! Call me Sourisi! I'll explain my name later, promise!" Looking around her, she would start to jump from one branch to another, planning on reuniting up with Sailor Moon.

<Pose Tracker> Shigure Shiratsuyu [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

The girls descend, and she finds herself thrashing and lashed against the harsh and whipping winds that begin to strike at them. She shiver and winces, hanging onto the broom as best as she can -- and she gazes upon the rotted mansion of vines for a moment... and then the broom collapses, letting go of her -- and she's forced to roll and tumble and collapse against a tree with a cough as she lands on the ground.

She heaves herself upwards, not feeling nearly as hurt or mortally injured as she would have been without her transformation, but it was staggering nonetheless. She tries to find her companions, and calls out, "I-I'm fine!"

She leaps against the branches of the tree to upright herself upon it, as she gazes around for what could be waiting for them in this dark and foreboding forest...

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

Cure Egret closes her mouth, holds her breath, and her whole face screws up as she plunges through the clouds. When they finally burst out, she inhales, her hair soaking wet and beads of moisture flying off as she exhales. That purple hair, done up so high, makes quite a mess on her back as she descends. She dives down -- into the great, dark forest below, on the broomstick that is also soaked.

And then she sees the mansion, huge and foreboding, and gasps at it. Her head is turned to stare at it as she soars past -- and then the broom vanishes. She yelps and dives down. She can fly, ordinarily, and throws her hands down. Silver light erupts.

She flies right through it.

Be it magic or a growing panic, she can't muster a flight she never quite mastered. The Pretty Cure tumbles through the branches, and then she throws a hand out. She catches onto a branch.

"Y-Yes," Egret says. She looks up. "I am. But... where are we?"

<Pose Tracker> Fuu Hououji [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

Getting drenched on her descent through the clouds makes this whole experience feel a lot less like a dream ... and although her armor doesn't get soaked easily, it means her blazer *underneath* the armor is going to impossible to dry out unless she de-transforms -

And it is abruptly very, VERY clear that this would be a Bad Idea, when she reaches the clearing without a broom underneath her. The Magic Knight manages to conjure a headwind of her own to brake and control her fall; at this velocity, 'steering' is more a matter of 'aim in an approximately safer direction' than anything else. She manages to come to a halt on one of the sturdier branches, after bouncing around (and occasionally through) less supportive boughs.

Her landing when first summoned to Cephiro was a little more graceful than that, but there weren't any trees actively in the way. There was also ground. The Wind Knight spares exactly one glance downwards.

"I seem to have landed safely," she calls out in reply to SAilor Moon and the others. "I hope somebody has an instinct or some such of where we need to go next?" Her only real thought is 'back to the mansion,' and they flew *how* far past that?

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

Parsing dream logic is far outside Cure Bloom's wheelhouse; the cacophany of battle, shifting from beast to bird and back, means little to her other than what her spine tells her: Something's fighting around here. It's like being underwater, she thinks dully, suddenly remembering that battle with literally the entire ocean, and her instinct to breathe almost cuts through her at a bad time; but soon they crash out and into something that could credibly be called the sky, if only by virtue of being opposite something that is ''absolutely'' the ground. She feels the urgency in her broom and her fingers creak around it as she tightens against it. She sucks in a long breath, closing her eyes and half expecting to impact the mansion like a splashdown - except she doesn't, quite, actually impact it at all; instead the broom just sort of STOPS COLD, and Bloom goes sailing, cartwheeling crazily through the air until she throws her arms wide, blasting out with Pretty Cure magic to gather herself and--

Immediately slam face-first into a tree.

"ow," Bloom mutters, and then nearly falls the entire way to the forest floor; but she comes to enough to lash out and catch a branch, keeping herself up for a moment more. Don't want to trust gravity in a place that isn't a place, her instincts tell her. "Egret!" She calls. "Are you--" She finds her. "Oh, good. I'm alright!" Her face hurts. "Mostly!"

<Pose Tracker> Hotaru Tomoe [Infinity Institute (6)] has posed.

Some girls look for each other; they seek and they shall find. This is, after all, still a dream, and even in reality the below-average-mobility magical girl is quite capable of leaping nimbly from branch to branch -- so traversing the treetops is not overly difficult.

It is a little scary though. A patch of slippery moss; a sudden shadow as a tree trunk, three banks down, blots out the hazy, half-lidded sun; movement is a little too light and easy but that makes any disruption particularly ''so''.

The temperature drops about five degrees around the moment the girls are able to huddle up in earnest.

Then the shadows start moving... little tendrils erupting from the edges to writhe like maggots without having anything to do with sunlight through leaves.

And finally it strikes! A fluttering black cloak, a scythe tearing through the group, and the instant and total realization that not only are they in danger, but that there is no one who can help them...

...the mist thickens, and each girl is alone.

OOC: The Taunt on this attack is a 'nightmare' effect; taunted girls begin to see their particular fears in the mist, and will
need support from their friends!

COMBAT: Hotaru Tomoe transforms into Dream Reaper!
COMBAT: Hotaru Tomoe has used Dreamripper on Cure Bloom.
COMBAT: Hotaru Tomoe has used Dreamripper on Fuu Hououji.
COMBAT: Hotaru Tomoe has used Dreamripper on Cure Egret.
COMBAT: Hotaru Tomoe has used Dreamripper on Shigure Shiratsuyu.
COMBAT: Hotaru Tomoe has used Dreamripper on Niramo Umokeshi.
COMBAT: Hotaru Tomoe has used Dreamripper on Sailor Mercury.
COMBAT: Hotaru Tomoe has used Dreamripper on Yumi Ohzora.
COMBAT: Hotaru Tomoe has used Dreamripper on Sailor Moon.
COMBAT: Cure Egret narrowly braces Hotaru Tomoe's Dreamripper, taking 13 Fatigue damage! Critical Hit! Cure Egret's Block
ability activates! Cure Egret's Parry ability activates!
COMBAT: Yumi Ohzora narrowly braces Hotaru Tomoe's Dreamripper, taking 15 Fatigue damage! Yumi Ohzora's Block ability activates!
Yumi Ohzora's Parry ability activates!
COMBAT: Fuu Hououji fails to dodge Hotaru Tomoe's Dreamripper, taking 38 Fatigue damage!
COMBAT: Sailor Mercury narrowly braces Hotaru Tomoe's Dreamripper, taking 5 Fatigue damage! Sailor Mercury is Taunted!
COMBAT: Niramo Umokeshi narrowly dodges Hotaru Tomoe's Dreamripper, taking 17 Fatigue damage! Critical Hit! Niramo Umokeshi's
Fade ability activates! Niramo Umokeshi's Flash ability activates! Niramo Umokeshi is Taunted!
COMBAT: Shigure Shiratsuyu narrowly braces Hotaru Tomoe's Dreamripper, taking 14 Fatigue damage! Critical Hit! Shigure
Shiratsuyu's Block ability activates! Shigure Shiratsuyu's Parry ability activates!
COMBAT: Cure Bloom narrowly braces Hotaru Tomoe's Dreamripper, taking 6 Fatigue damage! Cure Bloom's Block ability activates!
COMBAT: Sailor Moon perfectly dodges Hotaru Tomoe's Dreamripper, taking 0 Fatigue damage! Critical Hit! Critical Dodge! Sailor
Moon's Fade ability activates! Sailor Moon's Flash ability activates!

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

"Bloom! I'm okay! Are--" Egret looks at her friend, who hit the tree face-first. "Are you okay?"

She pauses, though, when she catches the first flutter of a black cloak. She tenses atop a tree branch. That they're easier than one might expect to move upon is noted. She is grateful for that, but the stuff of dreams can give strange gifts. It can also bring strange problems, as the mist swirls and gathers around her!

She starts to back up, frightened, before she shakes her head. Her eyes squeeze shut for a moment and she draws in a breath. Then, she turns her head, and peers to the side -- towards where Cure Bloom is. She can see the outline of her through the mist. The silhouette of the girl she cares about.

"Bloom!"

She rushes in. Maybe she can't be seen, clearly, but it's easy enough to see one thing reaching out for her best friend. A hand, clad in a white fingerless glove, outstretched and ready to clasp.

COMBAT: Cure Egret has used Hand in Hand on Cure Bloom.

<Pose Tracker> Niramo Umokeshi [Juuban Public School (8)] has posed.

Sourisi was glad to see everyone else regrouping, and not lose each other in the mist. As the last Magical Girl reached them, she looked around, a slight frown forming on her face. Did it just get darker...and colder? Sourisi stepped backwards, her hands slowly grasping her tonfa and pulling them free of their clasps. Gripping them tightly, she looked over her shoulders, calling out to the others. "Everyone? I don't think we're alo-!" Sourisi took in a sharp gasp, movement out of the corner of her eye instinctively making her move, and she would quickly try to leap to the side as a 'blob' of shadows seemingly rushed at them all, swinging a massive scythe. Caught off footed, she found herself getting hit in the torso with only a fraction of the deadly weapon, yet it was enough to move her a few feet on the large branch. Her bodysuit didn't seemed to be cut, though there was a scruff on her stomach.

Looking back up, Sourisi gasped softly as the mist thickened, causing her to lose sight of the others. It was almost hard to see her own hands through this mist, and she took in a breath to call out to the others. That call froze as she started to see shapes form out of the mist, shapes that were as big as she was tall, with 8 moving legs. They seemed to appear and disappear randomly on the outlying branches, but it was clear to her that they were getting closer. "S-spiders? D-dream spiders?!"

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Mercury [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Although Ami is not too sure how it happened, they all seem to manage some form of landing without falling too much further. Although some of their landings are harder than others and she cringes as Bloon faceplants. "Ah, are you okay?!" That looked painful!

Looking down briefly she cannot see any sign of anything other than more jutting branches and the eerie mists. She also notices that her leg is pretty scratched up but for now adrenaline seems to be keeping it from hurting too badly.

Moving closer to the group carefully but quickly, Ami stops next to Sailor Moon, putting an arm around her briefly. "Are you really okay?" Her eyes fill with concern but then she flicks her other wrist and a visor appears. Does her vision work the same in this dreamworld? She wasn't sure that it did but it seems like she needed to try at least.

Before she can get any kind of information though, the shadows begin to move like wiggling worms emerging from the earth and then the black figure draws up and before she knows it, Mercuy is alone! Completely alone. She can't feel the presence of anyone around here anymore. The very brief warmth she felt at being close to the others disppears in an instant.

Mercury calls out but cannot hear their voices as the darkness seems to consume her very soul but then there are voices of students around her. They are not the same voices she is used to and they are calling out to her loudly. She cannot see them but they are all too real. "CHEATER!" "GOODY TWO-SHOES" "STUCK UP!" The horrible words reach her from all directions and Mercury begins to panic. She holds two hands up to her head, trying to make the voices go away but it does nothing to assauge the sounds.

"No. No. That's not true!" Mercury calls out, her voice cracking and breaking. She feels lost and as she wanders around, even more voices gather around her until they are overlapping each other with the same taunts repeatedly. "I bet she cheats!" "She probably thinks she's better than us!" "What a snob!"

It seems like the harder she tries to escape the voices, the louder they get. Through the voices, her mind can barely focus on anything else but quickly she whispers to herself, "Usagi-chan..." Her voice lowers even more to a whimper. "Make them stop..." A pause. "...not true..." A few tears roll down her cheeks. Would she ever find a way out?

<Pose Tracker> Shigure Shiratsuyu [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

Shigure's eyes widen at the emergence of the tendrils; she hadn't quite been certain about what they would encounter... but this perhaps wasn't what she was expecting. She bites her lip, feeling the hairs rise on her... but she isn't in turn certain herself.

She hears everyone else calling, and tries to narrow her thoughts down... she narrows her focus, and thinks she could hear Sourisi's voice--

Her eyes widen, as she hears her shouting about spiders, gritting her teeth for a moment. She has... absolutely no clue what to do here -- she doesn't have time to ask her peers.

She takes a chance.

With another leap, she's managed to break through towards some particularly thick mist and land nearer towards where she's hearing Sourisi shout about Spiders...

... spiders... Shigure didn't like them either.

She pushes through, and finds her -- and reaches out with her hand. "Sourisi! It's me, it's--" she swallows. "It's Solais..."

She looks around, and then says, "There are no spiders here. Concentrate your eyes on me. It's okay. It's trying to perversely claw away at our thoughts, I think. You're stronger than this!"

She hesitates, thinking of what happened last time, but then... she opens her mouth and--

She sings, slowly.

The notes that she carries with her soprano voice is wordless, but it carries weight with it. The weight of the Song of Power. It is carried from the heart, through a language of emotion more primal than one expressed through syllables and phonemes.

COMBAT: Shigure Shiratsuyu has used I Know You Can Do This! on Niramo Umokeshi.
COMBAT: Niramo Umokeshi accepts Shigure Shiratsuyu's I Know You Can Do This!, taking 0 Fatigue damage! Niramo Umokeshi is
Cheered! Empower applied to Niramo Umokeshi!
COMBAT: Niramo Umokeshi has used I Can Do This on Niramo Umokeshi.
COMBAT: The entered attack name could match more than one available attack. Please try being more specific.
COMBAT: Niramo Umokeshi accepts Niramo Umokeshi's I Can Do This, taking 0 Fatigue damage!
COMBAT: Sailor Mercury has used In the mist... on Sailor Mercury.
COMBAT: Sailor Mercury accepts Sailor Mercury's In the mist..., taking 0 Fatigue damage!

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Moon [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Hoisting herself up onto the branch, she unsnags the umbrella, and after picking out some leaves- with a click causes it to retract into the pen smoothly. "Okay so we're all alright." Then her voice gets lower, "Except that we're... lost in a scary nightmare forest..." She laughs nervously there. Following the others, she leaps from branch to branch, to branch, Luna propped up on her shoulder.

Sailor Moon slips twice during the journey, needing to catch herself and flip her back up, she looks at shadowed trunks in paranoia. It's not long before she finds herself leaping even closer to others- Even scarier than a scary forest is facing it alone.

Shadows drip upon her blonde twintails, as little tendrils erupt and she sees none of it.

A scythe then rips through the night. And Sailor Moon twists suddenly in mid-air, the scythe coming close enough that it seems like it will shred through her twintails.

Instead it just misses her by a literal hair. A black cloak seething near her skin as it passes by.

And then mist curls around her, stealing her sight.

In the mist, she feels like she can see the purpled and violet stone of D-Point. Those neverending hallways that she walked through- utterly and completely alone.

The friends that she loved all dead and banished.

It's Mercury's voice that snaps her out of it, takes her out of that place. Upon the branch she stands there. "Mercury-chan?" She wasn't at D-Point. Mercury wasn't dead. Even the visage of horror couldn't steal that small sense of reason from her. Nor the feel of the fluffy fur on her, "Sailor Moon! Sailor Mercury is in trouble!"

But she already knows that upon hearing her voice. Ami is upset. Ami is in pain. Clasping her hands together, she looks about fretfully. She thinks she can hear the direction that she's in, "Mercury-chan." She sounds smaller when she hears her voice. Telling her to make her stop. "I'm coming! I'm coming! I won't let you be alone!"

And then suddenly she leaps in a certain direction, as if she'd finally honed on her.

The Soprano song of Solais keeps her head clear as her feet tap tap down on a misty branch. Then on another.

And then she thinks she can glimpse her blue fuku. Mid-leap- Luna leaps off. And that's the sensation Ami feels first. The soft fur of a cat landing on her shoulder. "Mercury! We're here. Get ahold of yourself! You have to stay calm!"

And that's just before her arms wrap around her mid-section, the feel of Moon's face behind her, against her, pressing against her.

"Do you remember the day we met?" She whispers in a way that only Luna and her might hear voice filled with emotion, "You said an angel fell down from heaven. And I promised myself on that day that I'd never let anyone say a single bad thing about my friend Ami-chan. Such a kind and gentle girl deserves better."

She can't actually hear what's going on, see what Ami is seeing, but she asked her to make her stop. And then her voice upraised, "So whoever it is out there. You leave Mercury-chan alone! Because I'm here, and I'll protect her from ''anyone'' who tries to hurt her!"

COMBAT: Sailor Moon has used Do you remember...? on Sailor Mercury.
COMBAT: Cure Bloom accepts Cure Egret's Hand in Hand, taking 0 Fatigue damage! Empower and Withstand applied to Cure Bloom!
COMBAT: Sailor Mercury accepts Sailor Moon's Do you remember...?, taking 0 Fatigue damage! Critical Hit!

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

"My nose hurts," Cure Bloom whines. "But I'll be OK!" And thus she levers herself up, and leaps away to rally up with Egret. But halfway across that distance, something...changes, as her foot finds slippery moss and she awkwardly has to slam her other down to reclaim her balance. She feels a little misty-brained and shakes her head a bit, trying to clear the mist; and only then realizes that the strange mist is not just an artifact of her own concern and fear. "Egret!" she calls out, as the mist thickens to choking, as the scythe comes at her. Her arm comes up and a flash of golden light repels the assault, but something--a nagging, mumbling whisper. This is so big. An enormous, impossible task. Can she possibly--

'Bloom!'

Doubt vanishes like vapor. She holds out her hand, "Egret!" and reaches out to her friend and partner, fingers threading together like key and lock. "I'm here! I'm fine!" She smiles, wider, seeing Egret much the same.

COMBAT: Cure Bloom has used Hand in Hand on Cure Egret.

<Pose Tracker> Yumi Ohzora [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

Where are they...? Well, Ivy doesn't know. Somewhere. Somewhere closer to a source? "I think the spell was working..."

Her glasses somehow stay on her face, as Yumi scrambles to try to get a better hold. ..She gives up quickly on being graceful about it, but at least finds some amount of mobility as she hops here and there; she almost slips, staring out into the mist and finding it's... cold. Too cold.

"H-huh?" A black cloak, a scythe--Yumi throws up her hands with a burst of green power, but the scythe still hacks through her shield well enough, knocking her backwards and making her find herself to be alone.

"H-huh...?" She blinks once, staring into things that aren't here, walls pressing in against her. There is a--

"Yumi!" Tama calls out to Yumi and presses in with claws, bringing a yelp from the high schooler that nevertheless breaks her out of what was beginning to be a reverie. "Huh? Right, we're... We're alone? No..."

She can hear the voices of others, vaguely, and starts to move towards the others. "Everyone!" Ivy calls, her voice caught up in the mist. She starts to trudge towards where she thinks she hears voices. "We'll be okay!" She wants to mean that, wants to try to be encouraging. Tama stays on her shoulder, nudging her face once. "Stay sharp. It's still out there..."

COMBAT: Yumi Ohzora has used Everyone! on Yumi Ohzora.
COMBAT: Yumi Ohzora accepts Yumi Ohzora's Everyone!, taking 0 Fatigue damage!
COMBAT: Cure Egret accepts Cure Bloom's Hand in Hand, taking 0 Fatigue damage! Critical Hit! Accelerate and Surge applied to
Cure Egret!

<Pose Tracker> Fuu Hououji [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

No sooner have the magical girls rendezvoused successfully, it seems, than the darkness lashes out - and scatters them.

The Wind Knight's reflexive reaction is to try and not be where she was, but she misjudges her leap and feels the world spin off in yet another direction; leaves and shadows and branches and eldritch darkness dance madly in her vision, and when her body hits something hard enough to wrap around whatever solidity she struck, she clings to it, her eyes clenching shut until it feels like the world isn't spinning quite as crazily around her. Once she's comfortably certain about which way is down, she unclenches and works on getting back into a standing position.

"Hello?" she calls out uncertainly, looking about for a sign of her allies; she sees nothing, and hears only slightly more, not clearly enough to guide her to join up with them again.

This is a dream - but it is not *her* dream; willpower alone will do as little to help as it would in the waking world, unless she takes action to apply her will *to* the world, magically or otherwise. The question is *which* action to take. She has her bow and arrows but -

Her train of thought comes to a halt as she strains her ears. She can hear her allies a little better if she really concentrates. But the shadow which scattered them is still out there; she's certain of that much. So they need a beacon, something which can't be duplicated. Of course, that beacon will provide their attacker with a point of reference to keep after them ...

Realization dawns then - she knows *roughly* which way she was flying in because of how she landed. That's at least going to narrow down which way she went from. "Is everyone all right?" the Wind Knight calls out as she finally starts moving again. "Are we all still accounted for? - Ivy-san!" she adds abruptly, *recognizing* a fortunately-close voice, and moving to rendezvous with the Witch of Lost Ivy.

"Whatever scattered us may still be out there, but it wants us separated," the Wind Knight comments as she follows Ivy's voice. "It can't beat us if we keep working together!"

COMBAT: Fuu Hououji has used Favorable Observation on Yumi Ohzora.
COMBAT: Yumi Ohzora accepts Fuu Hououji's Favorable Observation, taking 0 Fatigue damage! Critical Hit!

<Pose Tracker> Hotaru Tomoe [Infinity Institute (6)] has posed.
<SoundTracker> Kairou no Shikaku https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-riUf6BdPfY

That black cloak was the first impression anyone received -- that and the edge of the weapon. As the creature... monster... being? --no, monster seems pretty good, about right... comes back around for another pass, though, being forewarned is forearmed and it's much easier to get a better look.

The Dream Reaper lives up to its instinctively-bestowed name in most respects.

Black cloak turns out to be black robe, all hooded and with no visible limbs at all, but for the bone-white hands clutching the scythe. The scythe, a complex instrument, dripping with blood-red runes upon its lengthy staff, and a blade that has the maniwaved tint of truly excellent steel. Only, normally the waves don't ''move'' like that, as though it's continually parting a living sea...

Instead of a face it has an expressionless white mask, which is somehow worse than an angry or smiling one.

And, like the shadows, its edges seem to undulate, to writhe.

It is absolutely silent as it closes with the group...

...and slides beneath, as suddenly and beautifully changing direction as a raindrop that impacts and descends a pane of glass. The scythe flashes out and, in a single gorgeous chop that contains legions, multitudes of subtleties--

--misses--

--everyone--?

Then everything begins to tilt off-center.

The blade made no sound when it harvested the life of every tree bearing one or more magical girl. Death by decapitation.

And every other tree near enough to jump to.

The mist's thickness is kindness to some and terror to others. It means that one cannot see the ground, if there is a ground. But there is plenty of sense of the passing of space; the wind ripping tears out of eyes and hair out of fasteners; the dimming of that distant, diffuse sun.

...falling...

"...wake..."

The voice is faint and distant, as though coming from down a distant hallway.

"...up... wake up..."

Though muffled by thick sweaters' worth of subconscious, it is persistent.

She is.

"...wake up...WAKE UP!!"

Kaoruko has, obligingly, turned on the cold water hose. She does ''not'' mess around when lives are at stake. And something is very wrong, clearly; all the panes of the greenhouse rattle, as though caught in an invisible storm, and one or two are spiderwebbed with cracks.

For a terrible moment, the shadows in reality twitch unnaturally.

And then they stop -- and all is back to normal.

COMBAT: Hotaru Tomoe transforms into Hotaru Tomoe!

<Pose Tracker> Yumi Ohzora [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

Ivy can hear Fuu's voice as she comments the way she does, calls out to her. It doesn't entirely pierce through the way Yumi's mind is working at this problem, but it's at least nice to meet up with someone. But nice doesn't last for very long as the Witch turns to look at the others as best she can... and sees instead this Reaper.

She shivers immediately at a vision of death staring straight at her as far as she can tell, as sure a reminder as the hospital rooms that she almost found herself trapped ina gain. Her throat feels to close up. Expressionless, meriless...

"A-..." She can't quite get even the noise out. This time Tama can't rouse her. The trees move... and the world tilts. The wind is so fast, as they fall, and so painful. Yumi falls, her broom long gone, frozen. She feels cold already. But there is a voice. It seems so, so distant.

But the cold gets her. Yumi awakens with a start, jarring as she sits up straight all of a suddenly, her broom falling off of her lap. She doesn't notice the shriek that escapes her throat, or the fact that she has arms around herself for more than just the cold water, shivering. The rattling, the crackes, the shadows...

Even if it's gone...

Yumi is going to need a minute before she can do anything other than sit here. The black can beside her noses at her knee, worried. Ivy...?

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

Egret has Bloom's hand for a moment.

But then, she has a good sight of the Dream Reaper. It isn't what she expected. Cure Egret does not get especially scared often; she frets, she worries, and she overthinks things, but raw and crushing fear is rare. Seeing that white mask, though, she feels it. Her insides turn to jelly. She stumbles back, and she tenses her fingers so hard into Bloom's that it might hurt.

And then it grows terribly, terribly cold.

She jolts straight up, from where she fell asleep -- and her now emptied fingers curl onto nothing. She lifts them, fingers shaking, and stares down at them.

Her eyes turn to the side, at Yumi. She looks down at her fingers, swallows, and shakes her head. "What... what was that thing?"

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Mercury [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Just when Mercury feels like she will be forever lost to the voices and just when she can't imagine that they could possibly be any louder in her head... the haze breaks. It's only for a brief moment but she can hear Moon's voice coming through to her but there is still no sight of the others. Even if they were standing right in front of her, the personal nightmare she is in is relentless.

Mercury falls to her knees, feeling utterly defeated. Then just when she thought the nightmare wouldn't end, the soft impact of Luna on her shoulder causes her to break through the fog enough to see the cat. Her eyes are still sparkling in the dim light and she reaches out for her. "Luna...they won't stop. Can't you hear them?" The sounds are still there for Ami, although a bit dampened down.

Then someone grabs her from behind and Mercury jumps until she realizes it's Sailor Moon. When she asks her if she remembers, Ami can't think of anything else but the voices and she shakes her head at first, but then as Moon continues, she finally nods whispering softly. "Usagi-chan... yes." She reaches to pull her friend in front of her. The voices growing dimmer and quieter.

"Together." Mercury makes what seems like a random remark until she continues. "We have to fight together..." She winces. "We have to... stay together." her words echo Fuu's and the others as they gather back together.

The bad voices fade out but the reaper is very much still there and as it comes into view, Ami seems to have worked up a little more resolve. "I.." She pauses. "No ''we'' can do this!"

The faceless reaper is eerie to look at, like looking into a void of despair and hopelessness. And then the scythe is there and Ami moves back, "Watch out!" Her voice is slowly getting stronger but it doesn't help much as the blade moves towards them.

Mercury attempts to dodge while pulling Moon back but it ends up being unecessary as the blade slices at the dream itself and they are once again falling into the void and then another voice slowly breaks through. this one more pleasant, and Ami is aware of being pulled back from the dream.

She shivers again when she waves up...soaking wet and freezing cold. "I... uh..." Her voice stutters as the others begin to come to. "Ivy-chan..." Her voice is much softer than it was before and despite having just awakened from the dream, she feels even more exhausted. It's not just physical exhaustion either but her mind and emotions are still on edge.

"Hanasaki-sensei, that thing we saw..." Mercury finds that she can't make the words come out. She can't ask the question and instead she slumps back into a pillow. She wants to cry, to scream... Mercury knows it was a dream but the feeling... she can't forget it.

<Pose Tracker> Fuu Hououji [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

Reaper, certainly, is clear enough; 'Dream' seems to apply as well, given its use and abuse of the nature of 'where' they are. But the clear-if-fleeting view of their assailant does nothing to make its reality any less discomforting - Fuu's nightmares may have a new occupant, if she lives long enough to have any nightmares again.

And for a heartstopping moment, there is *great* doubt about whether that'll happen or not. That single slash avoids the magical girls, only to strike targets who *can't* evade - the trees themselves - and with no sign of ground, the Wind Knight wonders if she'll still be conscious, or indeed alive, to find out whether there's *anything* solid.

The voice reaches for her, not to harm but to haul back to safety, commanding her to wake up. Slowly, she tries to focus -

And sits up, soaking wet (again?), hosewater rather than rainwater beading plentifully on the lenses of her glasses, unharmed by her eventful sojourn. "I'm sorry about the ... brooms ... ?" She looks around, takes her glasses off to try and wipe water off of them, and looks around again.

"It would seem that our way to the old St. Ursula control point won't be so easily travelled," she observes wryly. "Hanasaki-sensei ..."

She trails off abruptly, her head slumping forward. "I'm sorry, sensei," she says softly. "I seem to keep letting you down, no matter how much I want to do better. Losing the light from Library Island, now this ... how did you know we were in danger?" She just barely lifts her head as she speaks that question.

<Pose Tracker> Niramo Umokeshi [Juuban Public School (8)] has posed.

Sourisi would gasp softly, her eyes trying to keep track of the spiders, all the spiders that were closing in on her. They had to be getting closer, and she wasn't ready for-a song, filled with emotion of caring and love seemed to have cut through her panicked thoughts. As she looked around her, the mist no longer seemed to hide those spiders-wait...the spiders never were there in the first place. It was only then that Sourisi finally see Solais in front of her, compassion filling her body as she looked up at her savior. A slight blush colored her cheeks, and her heart stopped trying to climb up her throat. "Solais, I...thank you. You helped me escape a dark place..." Raising a gloved hand, Sourisi made to touch Solais, then upon seeing her tonfa realized that they wern't out of the dream woods yet. "I need to thank you once we beat this guy! No one makes me sees spiders and runs away!"

Looking around, Sourisi was able to see the Dream Reaper coming this time, and she adjusted her footing. What she wasn't expecting was for the Reaper simply swing it's scythe, seeing the scythe seemingly multiply by a thousand, and she raised her tonfa up in a hasty defense. A puzzled look crossed her face as the scythes seemed to miss them all, then as the branch she stood on started to list, she understood. "Ooooh, not agaaaaain!" As she fell downwards into the deeper darkness of the bottomless woods, she looked around her wildly for some sort of footing she could reached for. That annoying voice can wait until they're not fighting for thei-

Sourisi rose with a splutter, spitting out water and gasping in shock as she found herself back in the waking world. Her mind attempted wildly to reach out for safety when she was already on solid ground, and a few moments passed before the mouse girl took notice of the greenhouse, and the twisting shadows of the Dream Reaper that had almost followed them. It was if it was angry its' prey had escaped. "I...really do not like that thing. Kaoruko-sensei, what happened?"

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Moon [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Moon doesn't let go of Mercury. "That's right. We can... we can do this... now just leave her a-"

Even as the scary Reaper comes into actual view. That heroic defiance melts into a shriek. Even as it slashes. Even as her world starts to topple because her footing is gone. Even as tears spring to her eyes as she's falling clinging to her friend. She's babbling a little, even as she starts to hear the voice.

Even as it gets closer, even as cold water splashes her and Sailor Moon shrieks worse than than the time Shingo turned off the hot water while she was climbing into the shower.

For a while she's shaking, as the shadows grow so long. Her long hair drips, and Moon clings to Mercury and shakes and sobs some, cold and miserable and scared.

But at least she wasn't alone. At least Mercury wasn't alone.

It takes a moment in her comprehension for Ami to pull her out of it, and so she's tugged upright. After a moment she let's go of her...

Wipes off her face.

Wrings out each twintail individually in a gloved hand.
Shehe's quiet for a moment "That thing was really scary."

Her eyes dart to the others- even Shigure and Niramo. She seems to feel no shame whatsoever about letting her fear show, even amongst all the others.

"We don't have to go back right away right?"

Luna who finally unstiffens from what looked like pale furred rigor mortis just moments before finally relaxes, and says- "Maybe you can take a little break before we... try something else..."

<Pose Tracker> Shigure Shiratsuyu [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

Shigure's own throat is dry. She was fearful, of what may happen when she channels her song. Yet, when she hears Sourisi's gasp, seeing her eyes regain their focus and turn her attention to her...

She nods gently as she holds onto Sourisi's hand in turn. "Anytime," she's able to say with confidence.

She looks towards the mist to nod in turn, saying, "Yes, we need to be on our guard...!"

The reaper's scythe comes -- it's an apt imagery, one that does not waste time with subtle metaphor. It was here to reap what they had sown... and--

--it missed?

No, it cleaves cleanly, and... everything begins to fall. She turns and stares with a gasp, exclaiming, "The tree--" as she tries to make a run for it, but everything begins to descend, and she grimaces as she starts to fall towards the mist. The light was being swallowed.

"Sourisi! Sailor Moon! E-everyone!"

Her vision is jeered out of where she seemed to be drowning in an eternity of cold, clammy, lonely... somethingness as--

--as she wakes up.

She's undeniably pale. She lowers her head and shakes it. "... I understand now, just a little bit better... when you said it was more of a 'what'..."

She doesn't sound like she's ready to make another go at it. She pauses. "S-Sourisi? Are you--" she casts her eyes around for her, then... hesitates, before giving her a hug all the same. "Good..."

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

Cure Bloom is usually fairly confident in midair, these days; Dark Fall rarely task them to fly, but she's had to learn to do some pretty tricky maneuvers in the air, even if perhaps with a little less grace than some of the other flying magical girls. But it strikes ALL of it down in a single move - the tree and eveyrthing they could reach. Egret and Bloom have leapt ''dozens'' of miles in a single bound before, from one end of Tama Ward to the other.

Every tree between her and the horizon falls away. Bloom's eyes widen as something shocked catches in her throat. "The--!" she croaks out, befre gravity seizes her. She can feel Egret's fear, and her own hand cluttches back nearly as hard. This, ''this'' is a kind of fear that Cure Bloom does not recognize, has so little hold over her shining heart. If she has Egret's hand, then this...they can overcome this...somehow...! Even as she feels like her whole body is freezing, her crazed pineapple of an updo rips free of its clip, and--

SPLOOSH

Cure Bloom bolts upright, right beside Egret, sucking in a sudden, hungry breath. Her hand slams to her chest, clutching at her ribbon and the lungs beneath. "That...thing," she rasps out, echoing the end of Egret's question.

<Pose Tracker> Hotaru Tomoe [Infinity Institute (6)] has posed.
<SoundTracker> A Mysterious Premonition https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91ZWUuuRvJw

The afternoon light feels warm and welcoming but not as much as Kaoruko's smile. She's concerned, certainly, it's there in her eyes, but much more present is her surety, not stoic but confident. All will be well. All is well, already.

She comes around with more tea. A comforting hand on a shoulder. A long, steadying look. A few words. "There, there. Don't be afraid. You're safe now."

Also, towels for those she soaked.

"I sensed the presence of a monster," she gestures at the damage to the glass, among other signs, "Though I cannot say exactly what it was. You would know better than I what you saw. But I felt it best to end the ritual immediately. Battle within the dream realm is terribly dangerous. There's so much more at stake than bumps and bruises of the flesh."

She winds up next to the Wind Knight, and lifts her head further beneath forefinger and thumb, while her other hand brushes back the girl's hair, motherly.

"But... no, Hououji-chan. Why do you assume that you have failed? If anything, I think your attraction of dark forces to be a fairly clear indicator of success. Where did you journey? I imagine you found someplace special..."

The question is addressed to everyone, gently.

"Take your time. Breathe. Drink. Warm yourselves. Storytelling can wait... you come first."

<Pose Tracker> Yumi Ohzora [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

"I--" Ivy swallows, arms still shaking as she shakes her head. She tries to answer Egret but it takes a moent before she can say, "It was..." It's hard to say. She knows she isn't the only one here afraid, but it helps that Kaoruko comes around in turn too. Confident, with tea. Yumi looks up at her, uneasy despite the comfort, but wraps the towel around herself, cold.

"I wasn't expecting..."

She glances at the others, and sniffs at her tea, taking a slow sip to try to warm herself. The question addressed to everyone gets a few breaths from Yumi. "It was..."

She shivers again, "S-sorry, my heart..." In short order she has her familiar in her lap, purring soothingly. "Safe..." She can contribute, just... after a bit of taking her time, as she's offered. That if nothing else is one of the kindest things that sticks with her.

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Mercury [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Mercury, seeing Luna's expression, puts a hand out to the cat and ruffles her wet ears. "Luna, are you okay?" Of course, only a second later, she is over at Sailor Moon's side, hugging her. It doesn't seem to matter that they're both soaking wet.

She offers no response to the question though. The last thing Ami wanted to do was go back in right now. She didn't even really want to ''think'' about it.

As she takes the towels, one for her and one for Usagi and Luna, she hesitates and with a quiet voice, Ami struggles to recount the dream. "Sensei, it was good at first but then... there was this mansion...and we were falling." She pauses to wrap the towel around her shoulders to warm up.

For now, she lets the others pick up where she left off or fill in gaps. Ami seems unwilling to talk about her part. Maybe a fear of speaking about it or possibly something else.

Still, her exhaustion is clearly visible as she leans gently into Usagi, looking down towards her lap and the resting Luna, allowing for others to speak their part.

<Pose Tracker> Fuu Hououji [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

It wasn't so much thinking that she had 'failed' by dint of being attacked in the dreamscape, although the distinction is somewhat academic at this point. But clearly Kaoruko doesn't see a need to dwell on it, so the Wind Knight nods to her, attempting to shove her dismay to the back of her mind.

That's not a thing so easily accomplished, either - especially given that her previous failure still weighs so heavily on her heart. She accepts a towel and a cup of tea, though, and dries off as best she can, even trying to peel her blazer off from under her armor. (She has a blouse underneath that, so shucking her blazer shouldn't be a problem.) Then she just focuses on collecting herself, nursing her tea and letting its warmth filter through her body - both the physical warmth, and whatever calming effect may have steeped into this batch.

"We were flying when the dream began," she recounts. "On brooms, like Ivy-san's. We flew among the clouds, then descended; we saw a mansion - old, even collapsing with its age. The brooms stopped there; we 'landed' among trees ... there was no ground below us, though."

She pauses there, distress clear on her face, and she drinks some more of her tea while trying to pull herself together again.

<Pose Tracker> Niramo Umokeshi [Juuban Public School (8)] has posed.

Sourisi would focus on Kaoruko's words as she tried to calm her heart, her mind slowly realizing that they were no longer in any harm. Her hand would reach behind her, tugging on the end of her braided ponytail. She thought she felt it becoming undone as she was falling, but--no...that was in the dream world. It was so odd what the mind could focus on at times. Finally looking away from Kaoruko, to look to see how the others were fairing, she was taken by surprise as Solais caught her in a tight hug. Her mind finally managed to focus on what had happened in the last few moments, and she returned the hug with Solais with all of her strength she could muster. Her arms would wrap under Solais's 'claymore' device, and she closed her eyes, a tear being shedded.

"You...you are amazing, you know that, Solais, okay? We only just met, and...you have done so much for me back there. I won't forget your k-kindness, and i'll return the favor. Double it, in fact!" Sourisi opened her eyes, another tear being displaced, and looks around at the others, her heart unclenching as she saw that the other Magical Girls were there. Shaken up, and scared, but they were all still here. As she looked over at Sailor Moon, she felt a little better about shedding tears. If someone who was as clearly experienced as Moon was letting herself cry, then it was okay. There wasn't any shame here from showing how much the Dream Reaper shook her. "We...we were seperated after our brooms disappeared, but thankfully we all managed to meet up with each other quickly, despite the mist. That...that is when it grew darker, colder...like whatever joy there was left in those trees was devoured. I reached for my weapons as I thought that a change this drastic had to mean something. That is when...a...thing attacked. It was so fast, I couldn't see what it looked like, or what it was attacking with, but...I know I got hit in my stomach. The mist started to thicken, I couldn't see the others, and then...then..."

At this, Sourisi trailed off, her throat clenching as she remembered the shapes that started to appear. She couldn't see any details, only vaguely tell what it was that was coming, and that was more than she wanted to see. She turned her head as she refocused her hug with Solais, her body spasming several times as terror tried to return to her.

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Moon [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

"Fine. Perfectly fine. Thank you Sailor Mercury." Luna says, then promptly jumps to Mercury's shoulder instead for security and comfort and scritches.

More dangerous than bumps and bruises. She can definitely believe that. Moon clings to Mercury a little overlong, before accepting the towels, which she drapes over her shoulders and starts to dry out herself off closely. "You're okay right Mercury?" She whispers, knowing how badly it must have shaken her to cry out like that, but not wanting to embarrass her publically.

For a moment she finds herself looking to Egret and Bloom, watching the two together. Maybe seeing little things like that was calming her down.

As Yumi sniffs and shivers, Sailor Moon sidesteps over some, and puts a hand on her shoulder, "Hey. Hey. You don't need to apologize, we're all pretty shaken up. Are you okay?"

She listens to Kaoruko, "I guess it just didn't feel like a success." She says beneath her breath. Taking a cup of tea, she takes a bracing sip, before leaning over to Sourisi and Solais and whispering so she doesn't disrupt the conversation at hand, "Hey. I just wanted to say I'm really glad you both were there. I don't know what would have happened to us if we didn't have either of you." Then she adds quickly as an aside to Solais, "... also I really liked your song. It was very pretty."

Apparently it touched her too some, while she was out there.

<Pose Tracker> Shigure Shiratsuyu [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

Solais tried to root through the details herself, but past the dreams and where they'd come to, she didn't think she could recall it as well as the others. Sourisi seemed like she still needed the support, so she nods as she expresses, "You don't owe me anything..."

She swallows quietly. She feels a bit vulnerable, to be shown her safe sanctuary thusly; she wasn't certain if anyone else picked out what it was, but it felt... exposing, to her. And added to that, that monster... that ''thing''... was clawing away at their deepest insecurities...

...

That was more frightening than any physical monster.

"It tried to drag us into the murky mist... it was a really good thing you woke us up," she agrees. She looks at Sailor Moon when she approaches, peering towards her with a faint smile as she comforts Yumi.

"... t-thank you. It was... it was the first thing that came to mind, and I'm glad it worked... without anything going wrong."

She pats Sourisi on the back again. "You're stronger than that monster... it's okay. W-we're all here for you." ... technically speaking, it was a little presumptuous, perhaps, but everyone seemed so kind and supportive. ... it felt... it felt... strange, but... also good.

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

Cure Bloom's hand quietly reaches for Egret's, fingers squeezing tightly, now in the world as much as the dream. She breathes slower. Her body has recognized her fear, even if she had a fistful of determination to surpass it. Kaoruko's calming voice accompanies Egret's presence and her own slow, steady breaths. "We saw a lot," she murmurs, quietly.

She doesn't reach for tea. The hand holding hers is a better balm.

<Pose Tracker> Hotaru Tomoe [Infinity Institute (6)] has posed.

Kaoruko makes sure that Yumi has particularly warm shawls wrapped around her -- that Ami is properly tucked into her towels -- that Fuu's tea is kept topped up and hot -- that Niramo has ample hankerchiefs available -- that Sailor Moon gets an extra round of snacks -- that Shigure has a place she can rest comfortably in all that gear, weapon in tow -- that Bloom and Egret can remain easily close together.

And she listens. She's a great audience, really, with sharpness behind those gummy gramma eyes, and she nods and gasps in all the right places.

"You were all very brave," she says, afterwards. "And yes -- I think you found what you had to find. I did not send you to such a place to battle monsters... I sent you to find what had been lost. To find what was missing. I will reach out to all of my contacts, and I encourage you to do the same... to see what we know about a mansion, hidden in the forests outside Tokyo. I am sure that someone will know of it... and then we can make our move. For the World Tree. For the world itself."

Her smile was never really lost, but it emerges in full force now, like the sun coming out from behind the clouds. "Thank you, girls. Thank you all. Truly... knowing you are out there gives an old woman like me hope."

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Mercury [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

Mercury smiles at Usagi. "I am okay. I think it just was a little overwhelming you know." She probably would be more willing to talk about it in private but for now that is what she offers to her fellow senshi.

Kaoroku is ever the wonderful hostess and Ami just watches in amazement as the woman moves around, tending to everyone's needs. It makes her feel warm inside and actually seem to help her mind calm down even more. It had been a crazy time to say the least but for now, Ami is relieved that part is over.

As she sips on a cup of tea, Mercuy suddenly yawns. "I think I should head out soon." She offers a polite nod to Kaoroku.

"We will ask around. I am sure you're right about there being someone that knows what it could mean." There is a mental note made for her to check around the school, although she is not exactly sure how to approach it but Ami had spoken to many of the teachers at Juban, even the ones that didn't have her in their class seemed to know about her.

Ami stands up as Luna leaves her perch, and she sets the tea back down on the table. Looking to Usagi, "Are you heading out too?" Whether Usagi follows or not, Ami will slowly her way towards the door but not before offering a thanks to everyone else, "Thank you all for being there tonight. It was a pleasure meeting you." Mercury seems to be feeling better at least.

<Pose Tracker> Yumi Ohzora [Infinity Institute (10)] has posed.

Ivy doesn't need to add a lot other than her quiet recovery with everyone else explaining so well. It's for the bet; it's still difficult for her to talk. The difficulty is plain in her expression, though the added warm shawls start to help her quickly, concealing and then abating some of the shivering.

Sailor Moon's hand on her shoulder too helps, and Yumi sniffs again. "No," she admits, "But I'll be fine. Just hurts."

She keeps sipping at her tea, slowly calming, and listens to Kaoruko. Even before she looks to others like Mercury moving to leave, she focuses on the older woman with them, and manages a small smile back to her. That does make her feel better. She can't quite make promises at the moment, but...

She'll be here again, for this.

<Pose Tracker> Niramo Umokeshi [Juuban Public School (8)] has posed.

The mouse-suited Magical Girl would take the handkerchiefs offered to her by Kaoruko with a grateful nod, thankful for the kindness that the grandmotherly teacher was offering them all. The fact that she was so kind and understanding for everyone there spoke volumns about her nature. Taking a few calming breaths, Sourisi would close her eyes and start trying to get her tears and shaking to stop, so she could act like the Magical Girl that she was. Sighing softly, as she felt herself regain her self-control, Sourisi pulled away from Solais slowly and look around herself with a soft smile. "Hey, we're doing fine, and like Kaoruko-sensei said, we found what we needed, right? Once we find this mansion, we just need to go in and make sure it's safe. And if somehow that Reaper shows back up, we know now what to expect, and we can make a plan this time. We're Magical Girls, after all, and we'll win in the end!" Sourisi would look at the others in turn, a cheerful smile on her face as she looked at each in turn. Then she would blink as an important detail came to her. "Aaaand I completely don't know anyone here. I'm Sourisi. I may be new as a Magical Girl, but i'm more than happy to be here to help you all!" Sourisi would nod her head once, trying to distract the others and formally introduce herself to the others.

<Pose Tracker> Shigure Shiratsuyu [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

There's a kind of fain and weak nod from Solais as she pulls away... and she watched Sourisi bounce back-- with a quiet smile of her own. "... Solais, but you knew that... the Maiden of the Symphogear Relic, Claiomh Solais."

Was that... all right? It would have to be.

She places a hand to her opposing elbow. She was kind of envious of Sourisi's vibrant spirit... and how sure she was that they would win. She finds herself questioning everything she didn't know about this gigantic struggle she'd suddenly found herself in, finding herself with a scant few pieces of the proverbial jigsaw puzzle.

"I-- am new too, but I shall do my best to help," she bows in turn again. She stiffly draws her hand to the tea to sip from it.

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Moon [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

"Okay. If you're sure." Moon smiles at Yumi, before repeating it to Mercury, "It's okay. I understand."

When Mercury asks if she's going, she says, "In a minute!"

And that's when she listens to Sourisi and Niramo. There's a smile on her expression that seems radiant, "It's nice to meet you Sourisi! That attitude is really admirable you know." She claps her palms together after she's listened to them both, "Just so you know. It's fine to be new at this. Most of us haven't been doing this for that long either. I haven't even been Sailor Moon for two years. And back when I was starting out-"

She holds up a finger, "-there were people who were there for me. People who had been doing it longer, who taught me and supported me when I was really uh... not that great at this." She looks at Sourisi and smiles, then back at Solais, "I only hope that all of us can be here for you too, just like they were there for us. I guess what I'm saying is..."

She walks towards them, and puts a hand on each of their shoulders in this gesture of almost sisterly comraderie, "Your desire to help- and your best is more than enough. And the rest of us will be here to support you."

She gives each of their shoulders a squeeze, then raises both hands up, palms facing them, "And now we should totally high five, that's a thing we do sometimes."

<Pose Tracker> Niramo Umokeshi [Juuban Public School (8)] has posed.

Sourisi honestly felt pride well up in her chest as she looked up towards Sailor Moon, knowing that she was indeed doing the right thing. It was her bright attitude on life that helps her decide that she wanted to accept being a Magical Girl in the first place. "I'm not so great at this either, that i'm sure of, but this is a learning experience, right? Just keep on looking forward, learning and improving ourselves so we can face our next challenge, no matter what it is."

As Moon rested a hand on her shoulder, Sourisi would look over at Solais as her smile grew on her face. "And i'm here to support you, both of you, no matter what you need!" With that, she would raise her right hand and give Moon a high five, glad to know that other Magical Girls out there were indeed there to support her, and to help her grow into a proper Magical Girl. Sourisi would offer her left palm up to Solais, to spread the high five with her. "I'm sure we're going to do great, Solais. Let's do our best!"

<Pose Tracker> Shigure Shiratsuyu [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

"T-two years... ..." Solais' mind had already raced at the very inception of her creation of... exactly how this worked. How long she'd have to take this mantle. Some part of her hated herself for already stressing about this instead of embracing the miracle for what it was, the day magic became real for her.

But still...

That comfort was great and overwhelming indeed. "... thank you... I feel-- welcomed. I truly do." And she doesn't lie. Though everything was unknowable and wondrously large... the best she can do is as Sailor Moon says. As Sourisi says. To take it one step at a time, to do their best... to have the desire to help.

"E-eh?"

The last comment totally gets her, and you can totally see the sproig of hair pop up. "H-high... five?"

She-- clears her throat, then quietly holds her hand up. "... h-high five..." A-aww, she's so embarrassed! Hers is a bit more reluctant, but their palms touch. "yes, let's do our best..."

<Pose Tracker> Sailor Moon [Juuban Public School (9)] has posed.

"High five!" Sailor Moon repeats cheerfully with a nod after Shigure's statement- looking pleased when Sourisi returns the gesture.

Maybe she notices Solais' embarrassment, and just doesn't want to call attention to it to embarrass her more. Or maybe she doesn't notice at all. Either way even if Solais' palm touch seems so reluctant, she makes this little happy sound when she does it.

"And we'll all do our best to be responsible senpais to the two of you!"

Luna may be groaning at the thought of Usagi and the word responsible and senpai entering into the same sentence together. "Sailor Moon please don't oversell yourself..."

<Pose Tracker> Niramo Umokeshi [Juuban Public School (8)] has posed.

"Then, i'll do my best to be a good kohai, Moon-senpai! Thank you." Sourisi would smile up at her new mentor before looking around Sailor Moon by leaning slightly around to the right. "Uh...I think we're holding up your friend. Thank you for taking the time to give us some advice and being there for us. I need to get going as well, I...actually need to take care of a few things before I go to bed tonight." Sourisi would glance off to the side, not sure if speaking about their personal lives was a good thing. Homework seemed to get even more stressing despite the fact there was a dream Reaper out there now.

<Pose Tracker> Shigure Shiratsuyu [Infinity Institute (9)] has posed.

That was a good point. Shigure herself did have some things to do before bed... and the question of whether they could share their identities was one that was in her mind too. ... she assumed that it was polite to not ask, much like-- the stories of masked superheroes that she'd seen.

... but it was all the more inspiring to see her senpai here, and she nods gently to say, "Yes, I must go as well... but... I look forward to learning from you."

She quietly rises and slowly moves, shifting with the unreasonable weight of Claoimh Solais shifting behind her, rising into the air as she leaps into the night.

Despite the fear she'd encountered, there's a quiet, private smile on her face.

[[Category:Logs]]

2017-10-07T14:16:00Z

Tlynn2002: raising heart pics

File:RaisingHeart2.png

2017-10-07T14:12:45Z

Tlynn2002:

File:RaisingHeart1.jpg

2017-10-07T14:10:45Z

Tlynn2002:

Niramo Umokeshi

2017-10-07T13:44:22Z

Tlynn2002: code help!

{| class="toccolours" style="width: 25em; float: right; margin-left:2em; margin-right:0em; margin-bottom:2em; text-align: left; font-size: %110" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''Niramo Umokeshi'''
|-
! colspan="2" align="center" | [[File:YourPicture.png]]
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''IC Information'''
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Full Name:
| Niramo Umokeshi
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Aliases:
| Sourisi
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Gender:
| Female
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Age/Birthdate:
| 14 (July 19, 2000)
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Height:
| 4' 8"
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Hair Colour:
| Black
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Eye Colour:
| Dark Green
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Astrological Sign:
| Cancer
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Blood Type:
| A
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Favorite Food:
| Tuna Sashimi
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Least Favorite Food:
| Steamed Vegetables
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Favorite Subject:
| History
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Least Favorite Subject:
| Social Studies
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''Dossier'''
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Organization:
| [[Magic Association]]
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Position:
| Novice Magical Girl
|-
! style="text-align:left" | School:
| [[School: Juuban Public School]] (Grade 8)
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''OOC Information'''
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Source:
| [[Miraculous Ladybug]] (OC)
|-
! style="text-align:left" | Player:
| [[Blasktin]]
|-
|}
'''Profile:'''

Cheerful and outgoing, Niramo is an idealistic-minded young woman. If she spots a fight between others, she tries to diffuse the situation. Her cheerful view on life helps her find ways to appeal to almost everyone, and she actively seeks out ways to help others in need. Being a native of Tokyo, Niramo loves the busy streets of Tokyo, but she always finds pleasure in finding unique things off the beaten roads. She's been in the Juuban school system her entire life, and enjoys cooking treats to share with her classmates. While she's using her Miraculous, she takes on the name of Sourisi and uses a pair of tonfa to fight. Her courage goes to the forefront, and she jumps in without a thought when innocents are in danger. Completely new to the Magical Girl scene, she wishes to make friends among her fellow Magical Girls.

====Logs and Cutscenes====
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|notcategory = News Files
|notcategory = cutscenes
|ordermethod = title
|columns = 1
|rowcolformat=width=50%
|suppresserrors = yes
|noresultsheader=There are no logs on this wiki that {{PAGENAME}} participated in.
}}

{{#dpl: |category = cutscenes
|linksto = {{PAGENAME}}
|notcategory = News Files
|notcategory = logs
|ordermethod = title
|columns = 1
|rowcolformat=width=50%
|suppresserrors = yes
|noresultsheader=There are no cutscenes on this wiki that {{PAGENAME}} participated in.
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[[Category:Characters|Magic Association|Juuban Public School|]]

2017-10-05 - Mountains and Magic

2017-10-06T08:11:54Z

Tlynn2002:

{|class="toccolours" cellspacing="2"
|-
! style="background:#CC6699; border: 2px #CC0033 solid; font-size: 110%;" align="center" colspan="2" | '''Mountains and Magic'''
|-
|'''Summary''': 
''Nanoha and Steven go exploring and run into Sucy! Magic and secrets are revealed!''
|-
|'''Who''': 
[[Nanoha Takamachi]], [[Steven Universe]], [[Sucy Manbavaran]], Surprise appearance by Yuuno
|-
|'''Where:''' 
Tokyo
|-
|'''OOC - IC Date:''' 
10/5/2017 - 2/24/2015
|-
|}

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

The Nishitama Park District isn't far from the city but it remains one of the few places that a person could just get away from the noise of being in the city. With dense forests and spectacular views of the mountains, it's easy to lose time here and find it hard to return to the city. While many people camp out here, there are those explorers who come out to just hike the trails nearby or simply come for recreational purposes like fishing or even sunbathing along the river when the weather is warmer.

Today, there are a couple of miniature explorers making their way through the park. Nanoha is dressed in her Infinity uniform still and eagerly moving along the path. "It's over here Steven!" She looks back to him. "I saw it when I was here last!" Whereever they're going, Nanoha seems excited about it.

After a few minutes she ducks into the trees away from the path and then emerges. In front of them, there is a wide, open clearing and Nanoha stops abruptly and points. "See?" In front of them is the most beautiful sight of the mountains and she smiles warmly in silence for a few minutes.

"Isn't it gorgeous?!" At first, she just takes in the view but then Nanoha grabs her phone and takes a few pictures. "It's so peaceful here..." All around them, there don't seem to be many people but every once in awhile rustling comes from behind them or a distant set of voices can be heard.

<Pose Tracker> Steven Universe [Juuban Public School (5)] has posed.

Adventure! The park district is full of it. From old structures, to sacred sites, to just beautiful nature, one can find any form of advanture as long as one's imagination is large enough. So invites to the place are always welcome.

It didn't take Steven long to get here thanks to Lion, his trusty... uh. Steed? Pal? Enigmatic figure? He still hasn't quite placed Lion in a catagory. Then again, can normal house cats be placed in a category easily? Such a mysterious animal.

Lion has since began to wander the area, but in relative sight of the others. Steven has taken to following Nanoha, whom seems to have a thing she wants to show him! "Coming!" The boy has since changed into his standard attire; deep pink shirt with a yellow star, blue jeans, and flip flops. The weather doesn't seem to bother him all too much. Perhaps he is used to much colder?

And the thing he was brought to is revealed. An amazing mountain range, just beyond Tokyo as a whole. "Wow!" he says, excited. He has been ''on'' a mountain once or twice, but never really saw something like this before. "Someone told me these mountains are really important to locals," he adds in. "So...! What have you been up to lately, huh?" he asks, setting down his hamburger backpack.

<Pose Tracker> Sucy Manbavaran [Infinity Institute (7)] has posed.

"Left now."

A pause. "I said... LEFT!" An odd moving column moves awkwardly to the left after stumbling around aimlessly and keeps going left but slowly and with uncertainty.

Their movement would be quite a sight, which is why the being on the top of the column, Sucy Manbavaran noted witch, potion-maker and mycomaniac chose such a secluded location.

She's not pleased. This one isn't working out either. At this stage of growth it should at ''least'' be able to carry her and all the herbs and mushrooms she could want and more, but it was still struggling, not only to transport, but to follow commands as well. She can see the cracks in its cell walls, and curses to herself in Cebuano softly. Another failure most likely. Back to sporing board.

"Stop."

The carrier stops and struggles, no longer having the momentum of its forward movement to help carry Sucy, her broom, a basket of mushrooms, a six pack of sodas, a small selection of books, and a giant bag of big rocks she picked up just to punish it. It wobbles alarmingly.

It's a small myconoid, not unlike the ones deep in Library Island, though this one is very small, only about 3 feet tall, and it looks like it's being worked to the... well... it doesn't have bones. Core? is that what that is poking out from the cracks in its body?

After a period of time Sucy spends looking at another mushroom, and just around the local area at various things... then down at the myconid with a cold, exasperated detachment.

"Go. Keep straight this time." and the little myconid marches them forward messily down a trail.

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Just being the open air like this, Nanoha seems to already feel a bit rejuvenated. Even though her magical ability was coming back and Raising Heart was repaired, she still wasn't at 100. Although, just by looking at her, it would be hard to notice anything amiss as she is pretty active and enthusiastic.

She laughs at lion as he walks off to explore on his own. "He really is a cute..." A pause. "Pet?" Nanoha shrugs. "So, I guess that everyone can see him right?" Coming from anyone else, the question would be weird but given their associations, it makes perfect sense. "We should introduce him to Yuuno sometime." There is a giggle. "He's a ferret... well kind of..." She grins at the idea of them meeting.

The question of what she has been up to causes Nanoha to look at Steven hard. Even just to summarize things would be exhausting so instead so offers a more simple response, "Well, school mostly...hanging out with friends. The usual." Her hands gestures vaguely and she looks back up to the mountains.

"You know, I heard stories about people getting lost up-" Her remark is cut short and she suddenly stops to listen. "Hey Steven, did you hear something?" Suddenly, Nanoha turns and walks back towards a patch of trees nearby. It could be a wild animal but the young girl seems fearless.

At first, nothing seems amiss but Nanoha seems positive that she heard something. And then she sees it, the myconoid is only a little shorter than her. "Woah. Look Steven!!!" Her eyes grow wide with surprise. "It's... moving!" For now, Nanoha doesn't seem willing to approach it too closely instead looking to the rider.

"Hey isn't that Sucy-chan?" Their acquaintance was minor but she had at least caught Sucy's name at the library. Nanoha finally approaches, although a little tentatively, "How are you doing that?!" She seems completely amazed!

<Pose Tracker> Steven Universe [Juuban Public School (5)] has posed.

The strange movement by an unknown creature gets Lion's attention. The animal, having taken shelter under a tree, perks up at the wobbly movement. The animal begins to stalk them, walking slowly but precisely in the park's froested edges. Though it is blatant how visible he is, he still performs this, as if by instinct. Though he makes no moves to attack or anything. Perhaps he is just honing his skills?

"Sorta. I don't really know!" Steven replies with. "He just hangs around me and the others ever since we met him out in the desert." What that cat's motives were are still a mystery. Though he is definitely magical somehow. "I think he also knew my mom somehow." It occurs to him that Nanoha may... think Garnet is his mom? Hum.

"Uh." The boy looks behind. "I dont think I did. Wait--" A creature does approach! "What is that?!" he says aloud. Well, it didn't seem to be much of a threat. It wasnt very tall either. "I... I think it is..." That girl from the chopper ride. And the library. And the not-so-dangerous library. "Is she fighting it?" he asks Nanoka.

<Pose Tracker> Sucy Manbavaran [Infinity Institute (7)] has posed.

Sucy has her eyes closed, perhaps trying to get what rest she can during her bumpy travels, or maybe just irritation at the situation. In any case, she's not visually paying attention, until she hears a voice say

"Woah. Look Steven!!!" "It's... moving!"

Sucy pops awake and speaks some unknown word. Is it a spell? Is it a command? Is it a curse? (perhaps all three...) and the little myconid sort of sprouts up in reverse, disappearing into the dirt and Sucy and all of her things tumble down and crash into a noisy graceless pile.

She tries as best as her reflexes allow and she lands on her stomach with a splat, but rolls to her side and leans on an elbow, just in time to wince slightly at being called by her actual name.

"Do what?! Nap in the middle of the trail? I just stretched out and closed my eyes and it was working well until you two came by..." Her delivery is completely straight and calm. She may very well be counting on passing this obvious lie because it looks and sounds like SHE believes it.

While she waits she takes stock of who's speaking to her . The girl is wearing an Infinity Uniform, but Sucy's never met talked to her before that she can remember, though she's vaguely familiar... She does find this strange, usually her notoriety at Infinity works the /opposite/ way as what's happening now. Sucy notably isn't wearing her unform today, instead wearing (OOC: This outfit, a few shades darker across all materials, it would take me too long just to describe it so I'm just linking the picture: https://i.pinimg.com/564x/38/23/19/3823198215bd45b2aaec536f60aeb939--japanese-fashion-styles-japanese-style.jpg ) which luckily for her, has plenty of rugged layers to absorb the fall.

And with this mysterious Infinity student, Shield Kid, which means.... Her eyes dart in search of his Lion, finding it as easily as a Big Pink Lion in a winter forest. She sighs, and uses it to help sell her lie of having been asleep, because she sounds exhausted already.

She feels the Myconid squirm nervously deep in the dirt beneath her. Maybe it's her, maybe it's the other human voices, maybe the giant Pink Lion, but she leans extra hard into the ground to try to communicate that it needs to stay down there.

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Nanoha glances at Steven, "Oh well, I guess it doesn't matter too much. He is still an adorable pink furball." Right now, she doesn't think that Garnet is Steven's mom but that could change if she ever visited the beach house and met her and the other gems. For now she adds, "I wish I had a pet lion." There is a tiny laugh. "Although I don't think my family would like that very much." True, they loved Yuuno and even Arf, but they were more normal 'pets' and well a lion would be crazy, no matter how 'tame' it seemed.

Shaking her head, Nanoha peers closer until they are almost upon the girl and whatever that thing was and then suddenly it's gone and Sucy and her stuff, fall and roll, coming to a complete stop right in front of her and Steven. "Hey, are you okay?" She looks concerned and walks over with the intent to offer the girl a hand up and to help her gather her things.

For a brief moment, the myconid seems forgotten as Nanoha tends to Sucy. "Eh, sorry if we interrupted something. We were just out here looking around and well..." She rubs the back of her neck nervously, glancing around. ".. we heard something."

The young girl may be a little naive but she is pretty sure of what they just saw and even though it's mostly gone now, Nanoha seems intrigued. "That was kind of amazing but uh... it's okay. You don't have to tell us about it." There may be a little hint of disappointment but the fact that the girl doesn't inquire more, probably means she has seen stranger things.

Brushing a little dirt off of herself, Nanoha greets Sucy, "I am Nanoha Takamachi! And uh.. I think you know Steven?" She gestures to him and pauses. "I have seen you around before but I don't think I introduced myself?" Nanoha suddenly glances around.

"Hey Steven, what happened to-?" And then suddenly, she sees the pink fur. "Oh! I guess he was here all the time. Nanoha laughs before walking over to the pink cat. "Lion... remember meeee?" She bends down and stares into his adorable eyes seemingly at ease around what most people would consider a danger.

<Pose Tracker> Steven Universe [Juuban Public School (5)] has posed.

That... mushroom man just kinda poofed. "Oh, well it's gone now."

The sudden disappearance of the myconid has Lion running out of the forest at high speed, abruptly stopping right by Sucy, and sniffing the ground. 'Where did it go?!' is clearly on his mind, though after a moment, turns his attention to Sucy herself, gives her one sniff, then promptly lays down ''right beside her''.

It was like he is in on her art. Or maybe he just wants pets? It is always so hard to tell with him. He is just at the edge of being inscrutable, all the time.

Steven's eyebrows raise. "You okay?" he asks. "Sorry to uh, wake you?" He isn't quite sure what to go with at the moment.

"Lion isn't bad, but he has a bad habit of coughing up on the only rug in the house. Its a doormat. There is literally tons of other space that is easier to clean, and he does it there. Seriously." The boy looks toward Sucy, and back. "Yeah! We have met." Last he recalled, she was a rather quiet person. Or rather, maybe just reserved in talking.

Lion looks up from by Sucy, and lets out a baying growl. If he could talk, he probably would have said something just now. At least he seems to recognize Nanoha. And Sucy, for that manner. "Soooo... this is a pretty good place to sleep," he comments aloud. It is a serene location. "How have you been since the helicopter ride?" he asks the girl with the napping plan.

<Pose Tracker> Sucy Manbavaran [Infinity Institute (7)] has posed.

If it were possible, would Sucy have turned even paler as Lion sniffed for the myconid and then WHUMPED himself right in her personal space? She looks a little uncomfortable, but it's not fear exactly... She stays still and watches Lion, and maybe even considers petting him for a moment, but she stays in that one spot, on the ground and replies to Steven instead "...since the helicopter ride? I've been okay. Laying low, mostly." She's sort of glad he didn't mention the day at the bakery..

Then Sucy reflects on Nanoha's introduction. It's true, she realizes now, Nanoha was on the helicopter too... and she mentions Hotaru... Sucy thinks to herself about what happened after they'd all gone home, and tries to think of something else.

Of course that something else is the myconid beneath her, which is shaking more and more uncomfortably now that Lion is so very close to it. She can't let them see it though, she knows.

Steven beat up the Myconid that she used pieces from to grow this new one, so he isn't the problem.

But if Nanoha goes to Infinity... is she in the magic program? Sucy doesn't know, and even if she is, that's still a problem.

The pale witchling hasn't gone through the rulebook completely, it's a dry boring read for such an old book, but she can assume students aren't supposed to be growing monsters in their bedrooms. and if Nanoha is a magic student, she might tell the instructors. She ''looks'' the honor student type, friendly with the teachers. Too risky... Gotta just keep changing the subject or keep them talking about something else, but what? It's not a great moment to bring up school now. Maybe the helicopter, urgh no, back to that. Or how she met Setsuna? She can't talk about that either. Agh. Helicopters it is. "Yeah, I... helicopters sometimes I guess. Flying on them..."

Sucy thinks back to how sick it made her feel, since it was so incredibly different from flying on a broom as a single person

"...sure is."

That wasn't a question. Agh.

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

For the moments that Nanoha locks eyes with Lion, she seems entranced, reaching out briefly to pet the soft pink fur. Lion abruptly looks away from her and growls. It startles the girl a little but then Nanoha laughs and stands up again, leaving him to do whatever he does best. Probably sleep or go hunting something. Although it's kind of hard to imagine such a tame thing hunting anything.

The look of discomfort is not lost on Nanoha and she headtilts a little at Sucy. "What is wrong?" The ground moves and Nanoha steps back away from it rather suddenly. "Hey! It's still ther-!" She looks back over to Steven and then back to Sucy. Why wouldn't she tell her what it was? Nanoha tries really hard to ignore it but every few seconds she glances back down, expecting it to jump out at them again.

The remarks from the girl don't help anything and Nanoha finds this all very strange. Luckily for Sucy, she is better at coming up with a response. "Oh right! That was a fun day Steven!" Nanoha had enjoyed it, especially since Fate was there too and it was so different than other ways of flying, airplane or otherwise.

There is a pause in the conversation and suddenly a ferret comes shooting out the forest and climbs quickly onto Nanoha's shoulder taking her by surprise. She nearly falls over on top of Lion and the wiggling patch of dirt. "What the- Yuuno!" Things get very awkward for her. "Um, this is Yuuno." In her mind, she is trying to find out what is going on. She can't exactly talk to him like a normal person but why hadn't he just come untransformed?

Rather than talk in her head though, he speaks out loud, making the girl frown at him even more. "I am sorry Nanoha. We couldn't get ahold of your phone and this was the fastest way. Lindy and Amy want you to come to the apartment later. It's important." Nanoha's mind seems to race as Steven and Sucy are probably just as confused as she is but her main concern is that something happened to Fate. "Is something wrong? Did you guys find out more about uh..." She looks at the present company and her voice fades. Yuuno nods. "Everyone is fine. They just want you to come okay?" Nanoha nods.

Yuuno looks at Steven and Sucy as if he just noticed them. (He hadn't but it didn't seem to matter) and just squeaks. Steven, knowing Nanoha's magical ability probably wouldn't be surprised but Nanoha looks really closely at Sucy's reaction. Worried that she was going to freak out but then again she had just been riding a myconid so...

<Pose Tracker> Steven Universe [Juuban Public School (5)] has posed.

It is hard to tell whether Lion is still interested in the Myconid or not. He isn't sniffing the ground or pawing at the dirt. Maybe he just wanted to be with the hip crowd down here on the floor. He is warm, fluffy, and very pink. He seems just so wonderfully pettable!

"Ummm," is all Steven can muster. What was that supposed to be now? Was that a declarative statement, or...? Maybe she is just out of it from her 'nap'. "They are cool!" Steven adds in, trying to help Sucy out.

Lion is funny sometimes, but he would never hurt somebody, despite how fearsome a creature he is. Perhaps whatever makes him special makes him more intelligent or pacified. Or he is domesticated to a degree.

The moving ground does get his attention when Nanoha mentions it. Seems to be hiding. Why? It was like, his size. "I've been high up before, but never quite that high," he adds in. He still wonders about how well that pilot knows Pluto. He should have asked!

And then A FERRET. Steven nearly loses it as he stares at the small furry creature with stars in his eyes. "Ohhh myyy goooood!" And then it talks! MAGICAL FERREEEET. His hands are on his cheeks just staring at it. THe adorable thing even got Lions attention when it talks.

Thankfully he doesn't seem to be making any moves to go after it like a cat might. He seems comfy right there by Sucy.

<Pose Tracker> Sucy Manbavaran [Infinity Institute (7)] has posed.

A Ferret Appears!

And it looks like it has something to say!

"Do you?" someone might have have asked it, to which it would have replied "YES I CERTAINLY DO." since it starts talking to Nanoha, loudly conveying what seems to be a very private message!

Reactions abound!

Nanoha looks unsettled but not particularly surprised and watches Sucy!

Steven has stars in his eyes and he's one ukelele-to-arm's-length away from writing a power ballad about how awesome ferrets are!

And Sucy? Sucy doesn't react at all. Which is generally her thing so she just sits there for about a minute, and thinks about dinner. It's getting pretty late isn't it? Until she notices Nanoha's watchful gaze, and in that space of time Sucy wonders why. She doesn't know who any of those people are, there's no secrets to keep. Nanoha's familiar ''should'' be a bit more discreet though, it's sort of shout-... OH.

Sucy bolts from her recline next to Lion an exaggerated fashion and jumps to her feet!

"A TALKING FERRET." she says conspicuously in a raised voiced monotone.

"HOW SURPRISING."

"ANIMALS ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO TALK."

Yep, that's what she was forgetting, Sucy was supposed to be convincing Nanoha she's a non-magical, but there's a problem, Sucy is born-witch with a ghost for a mom. Sucy is not used to this role at all.

What do non-magicals ''do'' when they see they see a talking animal? She consciously opens her eye all the way open to help sell her surprise. OK that's a good start. What else?

She opens her mouth and lets it hang open in what she hopes is surprise. All right, that works.

What do they do next? She doesn't feel like running away...but what would a nonmagical do instead? Taking too long...

She raises her arms above her head.

"DON'T SHOOT."

<Pose Tracker> Sucy Manbavaran [Infinity Institute (7)] has posed.

Her weight no longer keeping it down from its panic, the Myconid sees its chance, bursts out of the ground and tears off into the forest as fast as it can.

Sucy pretends not to notice.

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Yuuno just blinks at Steven a few times. He realized his mistake but it's clearly entirely too late for that. Nanoha is starting to panic a little inside. Even if Steven was amazed by it, it definitely not something that should be broadcast to non-magical folks. At the very least, she assumes that they would have to play it off later. How though, she wasn't sure.

Being unconcerned about Steven, Sucy gets her full attention and there is a long pause with awkward silence and just when Nanoha is about to ask if the girl is okay, she suddenly stands up! Startling her, Yuuno and probably Lion as well. "What-"

Then Sucy remarks about how animals aren't supposed to talk and then the feigned look of surprise. Nanoha seems to be scrutinizing the other girl and then she suddenly shakes her head. "Nope. I am not buying it." She folds her arms across her chest.

And then suddenly the ground shakes and the myconid bursts out of the ground. Dirt flies everywhere as it does so and it leaves a hole in the ground. Before anything else happens though, it's gone, running off into the forest.

After shaking yet ''more'' dirt from her uniform and wondering why she hadn't changed, Nanoha laughs. "Well, did you have something you wanted to tell us?" Nanoha smiles and winks at Sucy. "Talking animals are one thing but that..." There is a vague gesture to the forest. "...is something else!" She actually seems to be in awe of Sucy in that moment.

"Steven, have you ever seen one of those before?" The fact that he hadn't seemed overly surprised at it when they first came across it, makes her wonder.

Yuuno is silent at first while all of this happens. If one paid close enough attention to his face though they would see that his eyes are huge with surprise. "Was that some kind of monster?" He asks Sucy and Steven. At least it hadn't attacked them though.

<Pose Tracker> Steven Universe [Juuban Public School (5)] has posed.

This cute animal. Is so amazing. Just look at its fur and long body! The boy is jsut overtaken with this thing. There is absolutely nothing that can take his mind from this cute thi--

A sudden tone change from Sucy gets his attention. It sounds forced and very odd. Why does a talking animal surprise her? She was dealing with the library dungeon-y place, where SKELETONS and GIANT DEMON WOMEN were. Maybe it was something she hoped to see one day?! Her next reaction makes Steven glance from Sucy to the ferret repeatedly, and he says in a voice that barely contains exploding excitement:

"Please tell me it has a little ferret gun. Please."

And a cop uniform and a block he patrols and a uniform and a ferret cop car and and and and

Meanwhile Lion seems to just watch the mushroom man pop up and beat a retreat into the forest. He sniffs the area it burst from curiously. The heck was that thing.

Steven has full attention on Nanoha and her ferret to ''even care'' about the Myconid. "N-Not in person!" he exclaims. To Yunno's question-- "Yes! Yes it was!" he says happily, as if he was answering a mundane question. Ferret ferret ferret ferret.

<Pose Tracker> Sucy Manbavaran [Infinity Institute (7)] has posed.

"It was a mushroom." Sucy just says to all inquiries. RE: the myconid

"I grew him from pieces of a bigger one." he beat up. She looks over to Steven with her eye for a second. She looks back over at her stuff on the ground at last, "It wasn't very strong. Need to try again".

She picks up her sodas and books and crams the books into somewhere...next to her hip where someone might keep a purse, but there's no purse, yet the books disappear. She goes to put the sodas in there too, but decides she doesn't want to risk putting them in with her books given their recent fall so. "You want one?" She motions to offer them to everyone, even Yuuno. Familiars can have odd tastes, maybe the first ad-executive who thought to use a ferret with sunglasses to sell soda just ran into someone's familiar. Speaking of which.

"So you two have familiars huh. "They're a little weird, especially him." She gestures to Lion.

She's very matter of fact now, and why not, the jig is up, the mushroom's out of the bog.

<Pose Tracker> Nanoha Takamachi [Infinity Institute (4)] has posed.

Nanoha frowns at Steven. "A ferret... gun??" She glances at Yuuno. "No gun." Of course, he did have other awesome capabilities although probably not as amazing as a tiny gun would be. That was something for another time though maybe.

"A monster?" Nanoha is surprised at Steven's enthusiastic response to Yuuno's question. Sure they fight monsters all the time but still just that reaction catches her a little off-guard.

Then Sucy, starts explaining and Nanoha looks at her and listens. "Wow, so you grew that thing?!" Her eyes widen. "What were you planning on doing with it?" Other than riding it and sleeping on it of course.

The books and Sucy's stuff disappears and Nanoha smiles. This is all so amazing, she thinks. To the offer of soda, she takes one and then looks to Yuuno, who surprisingly nods. Nanoha takes two and then glances at the label before opening it.

With a loud escape of air, the soda oozes and fizzes out and she nearly drops the can on the ground trying to keep it off of her uniform. "Whoops!" Nanoha takes it in stride though and laughs. What she doesn't see immediately however is that Yuuno was sprayed directly and is frantically trying to clean his tiny ferret face off.

The remark of familiars though, makes his pause. "So you knew huh?" He looks at Nanoha, while still trying to get the soda off his fur. "I guess you don't have to worry after all." She laughs. "I guess not..."

It still was strange to her but she was learning that there were all kinds of magic in this world. Something that she would have never imagined only a couple of years ago. Taking a sip of the soda, Nanoha glances upwards for a minute. "It's getting late. We should probably go soon Yuuno." She didn't want to leave though and hesitates before actually starting to head back down the trail.

"You can carry your own soda though!" Nanoha laughs. Yuuno doesn't look amused and seems unwilling to transform in front of Steven and Sucy.

Before they leave Nanoha looks back at Sucy, "So, I hope I get to see you again sometime." She really sounds sincere. Whatever the source of Sucy's magic, it seems fascinating to her and she would love to learn more about it eventually.

<Pose Tracker> Steven Universe [Juuban Public School (5)] has posed.

A walking mushroom. No wait, a running mushroom. Scratch that, a ''fleeing'' mushroom? "Oh hey! I remember that." Down in the library. Those weren't friendly. That one... was at least neutral. "Uh, sure!" he says toward the offer of soda. Very nice of her. "Familiars?" he asks but responds with, "Ohhh! Right," moments later. Like those books Connie likes!

Wait, Lion was a familiar? Steven seems unsure. He could be, but he figured gaining a familiar, like in the books, needed somethign special liek spells or magic items. Lion just sorta... showed up.

The boy pops the top on the offered soda, and besides fizzing over a little, it seems fine. The boy comes out unscathed from a sticky future. "I uh, I dunno what it was to be honest. Seemed monster-y to me." Was that even a word? The fact that Yunno does not in fact have a ferret gun does not phase him. It was still a talking ferret and SO CUTE.

"Gotta go?" he says rhetorically to Nanoha. "Okay! Thanks for hanging out and inviting me to the mountain scenery! I haven't been out here before." A look toward Sucy "What do you plan to do? Wanna--" He has an idea. "--You need help getting your porta-buddy mushroom guy?" he remarks.

It is obvious he feels good about himself popping a mushroom joke. Livens up the scene and helps it from being so sporing. HAHA THATS TWO.

<Pose Tracker> Sucy Manbavaran [Infinity Institute (7)] has posed.

Sucy nods when Nanoha asks again if she grew the myconid and Sucy takes a moment to consider her next question. "I suppose, I could have it clean my room, record TV shows while I'm at school, Footstool, nightstand, carry heavy things, rearrange my furniture, tackle my bullies, pick mushrooms for me, keep people away from me when I'm picking them myself... Maybe they taste good..." She keeps going but is interrupted by the *WHOOSH!* of sodas opening, and she cracks a fanged smile, espcially at Yuuno, at whom she can't help but chuckle.

When Nanoha goes to leave, and asks if she'll be able to meet her again. Sucy shrugs. "I keep running into him. His lion seeks me out or something I guess, so it'll probably happen.

Sucy grabs her broom and sits on it sidesaddle.

"Tia Freyre!"

She says this magic word alous and with a gust of green magic, the broom floats up with her on it. She waves to Nanoha as Nanoha and Yuuno make their exit. As for Steven... he offers to help Sucy shrugs, She was planning on letting it fall apart on its own, but she has nothing else to do, and he seems really excited and it could lead them to more mushrooms as it looks for places to hide. "Okay. Sure, let's go."

She begins to fly off, leading the way, this time trying to make sure she ''doesn't'' escape Steven and Lion.

Such an odd feeling...

[[Category:Logs]]