[center][h3]Arahabaki - Mental Faculties[/h3]
Raz’s / Roland’s [@Archmage MC] vs [color=#0087BD]Rude[/color] / [color=red]Reno[/color] / [color=red]Joryu[/color] / [color=lime]Moira[/color]
[b]Word Count:[/b] 3199 (+4)[/center]

Being split from the rest of the group upon using the teleporter, Roland found himself with the psychic kid Raz. The area wasn’t anything remarkable, just your basic industrial urban graveyard much like most of the lower class areas of Midgar. Roland didn’t really care much for those in PsyOPs, mostly because they gave him headaches when he was around them for too long. [color=d7d7d7]”Hey, the teleporters messed up. We’re all split up!”[/color] Roland said over the linkpearls he had gotten from the rest of the group. Soon though, he was informed as to why, and could only sigh. Looking at Raz, he said. [color=d7d7d7]”Well, I guess we’re stuck together for now.”[/color] Having almost no idea exactly what kind of person Raz was, he would hold his sarcasm and witty banter for now. 

[color=FF8c00]”I wouldn’t say we’re [i]stuck[/i] together,”[/color] Raz replied as he donned his goggles, a clear sign of things getting real, [color=FF8c00]”I see it more as an… opportunity for stronger, uhh, team cohesion!”[/color] He hadn’t passed the Psychonauts’ “Positivity Training” yet, but he had a good feeling about it. Whiiiich was a form of positivity! See, he was nailing it. [color=FF8c00]”I keep getting paired off with other people with R-names, though. I wonder if that means anything.”[/color]

As if they were waiting for someone, a welcoming party appeared hopping off from a high perch to intercept Roland and Raz.Two were Turks which Roland knew, Rude and Reno, who were quite the infamous duo within the organization. The other two he didn’t recognize, though one looked like a Turk -maybe a newbie- and the other looked like someone from R&D. “Well now, look who the cat dragged in.” Reno snarked. “Y’know, I kinda had you pinned as the turncoat kind of guy.”

Roland only rolled his eyes saying. [color=d7d7d7]”More like the guy hunting the guy who has Rufus mind controlled, but who's keeping track.”[/color] He then turned to Rude, saying. [color=d7d7d7]”How have you been Rude? Asked out that bartender lady yet?”[/color] Rude did not dignify the rather personal question with a response, his eyes inscrutable behind his trademark sunglasses. Seeing this, Roland quipped, [color=d7d7d7]”C’mon man, you gotta make your move sometime before fixer life catches up to you. Especially with those assets…”[/color] 

Reno interjected, cutting Roland off near the end of that though, saying. “You better watch that big nose of yours, plainface. It’s gonna get you into trouble.”

The “third” Turk, the one Roland didn’t recognize, kept to the back of the four-man group. He regarded Roland coolly, sizing the man up in both physical form and attitude. Even though his fists were clenched at his sides, he wasn’t prepared to brawl like the others. His focus turned to Raz, who himself was gearing up in classic psi-pose. More to himself, he simply said, [color=D6E7FC]”...a kid?”[/color]

“Hmph.” Moira, the newcomer, crossed her arms stuffily. “They’re already in trouble, so if you’re quite done palling around, let’s cut to the chase.” She lifted her right arm, her mutated, clawlike nails extending as a purple orb of necrotic energy took form above her palm. “And begin operation.”

Well, it was time for combat. Roland knew Rude and Reno, and not the others. One of the newcomers, the one who was using energy, seemed like more of a threat than those two. Nothing good ever came from an enemy that wielded strange energy in his experience, especially something with that color. And that energy reminded him of a specific fallen Arbiter who was the leader of the Floor of Philosophy. 

Roland started with a dash at Moira, swords out as she fired her energy ball at him. Rude however intercepted Roland, seeing him go for his medic and fists met sword in a clash of power and wills as Rude knocked Roland away, Moira’s ball taking away Roland’s counter as he countered it and finding that it wasn’t as bad as he thought it’d be. Instead of being one big blast, it seemed to just be a lot of small hits that siphoned his life, which was a lot easier to manage for him. It still tingled in a bad way though. Still, he was open from an attack from Reno now, before swapping over to his lance to clash with Reno’s followup attack and push him away. 

Having clashed, he reached Emotion level 1, and with it gained the power of Long Arms, with a chirpy solemn voice echoing “I condemn you, but you will still commit more sin without end…” and with it, everyone saw a series of two pictures within their minds. [url=https://i.imgur.com/QMhM3hJ.png]
The first depicted a forest in forever twilight,[/url]  saying. “Once upon a time, three birds lived in a dark forest…” with the [url=https://i.imgur.com/sFaC0ta.png]
second picture appearing soon after[/url] saying. “To keep the forest’s peace, Long Bird weighed the sins of those who entered the forest. For Long Bird’s scale was just and could weigh any and all kinds of sin.”

“What the?” Reno said upon seeing this weird play in his head. “I knew you were a weird one.” 

He and Roland clashed again, Roland matching him this time with his durandal and with it, getting to emotion level 2 and acquiring Big Eyes, a deeper chirpy voice saying “With just one simple act, I’ll give you a permanent and comfortable rest…”. And with it, [url=https://i.imgur.com/G7auUju.png]
another scene played out[/url], this time of Big Bird and his many eyes, with the caption “Big Bird, with its many eyes, decided to watch over the forest for intruders. For Big Bird’s eyes could see very far and see things we cannot see.” 

Roland had gotten the first strike, drawing most of the attention away from Raz. [color=FF8c00]”You get ‘em, Roland! Wait, we aren’t doing codenames, are we?”[/color] The peanut gallery shtick drew Rude’s attention, and with Roland preoccupied with Rude (who was supported by Moira, keeping his vitals up with her healing spray), the Turk rounded on Raz. Raz, only slightly daunted by Rude’s imposing glower, leveled his psychic aim on him. [color=FF8c00]”My turn, huh?”[/color]

Rude dashed towards Raz. The junior Psychonaut fired off a volley of Psi-blasts, the first two nailing Rude in the chest before he ducked the third. Raz was pulling his punch a little - they weren’t robots, monsters, or cyborgs, but real people. Though it was moot since the first hits had already set Reno and Rude into telltale ‘Galeem Fight Mode’, locking them in a fight to the death.

Rude was on him quicker than expected. A straight jab, nothing Raz couldn’t have dodged himself, but the moment Rude pulled his fist back his arm stopped short of throwing it; with a barely audible [i]wrrzt[/i], thin wire coiled around Rude’s wrist.

[color=D6E7FC]”Hmph.”[/color] Joryu, the as-of-yet identified man and last person to participate in the fight, scoffed. His arm was outstretched, the wires holding Rude back connected to his watch. [color=D6E7FC]”I can’t tell if this was part of the plan,”[/color] Joryu mused, still mostly thinking out loud rather than addressing anyone else, [color=D6E7FC]”but frankly, there’s no way I’m gonna beat on a kid.”[/color]

With that, he turned tail and ran. [color=FF8c00]”Hey, do you know something? Get back here!”[/color] Summoning his levitation ball, Raz took off in pursuit, chasing Joryu out of the fight and down a set of conveyor bridges leading away from the area. Of course, that short-sighted maneuver meant misfortune for Roland, who found himself abandoned and pitted against a team of three enemies by himself.

Roland kept his clash going with Reno, first with his daggers, coming out about even with Reno winning a bit, then continuing on with a clash with his hammer, which also came out about even. Getting tired of this, Roland then decided to pull out his big sword and finally overpower Reno in the third clash. He’d find that dealing with Moira’s energy balls wasn’t that bad, but Reno was tactically retreating to her as Roland pursued him and he’d find she had another power that he couldn’t parry when he got close, a more direct draining type move. This made Roland retreat for now, with Reno chastising him for retreating from their medic.

Although with those three clashes on Reno, even if he didn’t do all that much damage, he got Emotion level 3, and gained Tilted Scale with the same solemn voice from earlier saying “My scale won’t cease its duty until the day all evil beings disappear.”. He also gained the EGO page Lamp. Being a more utility based EGO, Roland didn’t use it right away, but instead would start to deal with that medic by pulling out his gun and just shooting her from range, keeping his distance, before going to intercept Rude who was trying to break the restraints of his… ally…? Was binding him with. That was… odd… Was this guy the one controlling Reno and Rude?

Using his lance to knock back Rude, but doing very little damage, Roland said. [color=d7d7d7]”Are you doing ok there? I thought PsyOPs could fight a bit more than that.”[/color]
At least shooting the full hp Moira healed Roland a bit from Tilted Scale, so he wasn’t in as bad of a situation, but they did need to make some headway somewhere as Moira could heal Reno with her yellow healing beam.

Headway would eventually come as Roland clashed again with Rude, finding him a bit easier to clash with than Reno. While not as hard of a hitter, Rude was for sure tankier as he erected a barrier around himself and his allies, reducing the damage they took from the duo’s attacks. Which was helpful for Rude as Roland was starting to overpower him having gotten his emotion level up. As he clashed, Raz was dealing with the 4th member that Roland hadn’t even bothered with, with Moira still healing Reno before he went in with another round with Roland. And as Roland clashed and won his clashes against Rude, he healed himself, although slowly. And also gradually increased his emotion level, getting to level 4 and getting Small Beak, a high chirpy voice saying. “Thus, punishment must uproot sin…” and [url=https://i.imgur.com/57ZNL6u.png]
another scene[/url] flashed into the heads of those in combat with Roland, this time showing a small bird with a strange portal on its body, the caption saying. “Small bird decided to punish the creatures’ wrongdoers with its beak.” Roland also gained the EGO page Twilight. 

“Something is coming. We should wrap this up before things get complicated.” Moira advised, still acting stoic but was getting a bit unnerved by these weird images flashing in her head. 

“Yeah, I get whatcha mean. That one’s from the OSF, it's probably coming from him.” Reno replied, looking at Raz. He then got an idea, and as Rude kept Roland busy, Reno dashed to Raz and threw a device at him, which trapped Raz in an energy shield the shape of a pyramid. “There, that’ll keep you busy until we deal with your friend!” Reno said, before powering himself up to deal with Roland.

Roland wasn’t a huge fan of this, and decided to start to use his EGO pages. He started with Lantern, causing the area to turn into a twilight lit forest of dark trees seen in the first scene, which were so tall the canopy couldn’t be easily seen, with Roland donning the appropriate EGO and revealing an antique lantern. As he did, the area went pitch black, with the only light source being his lantern, and as a low ‘dong’ echoed through the area, Rude, Reno and Moira, all getting unnerved as when the lantern flashed, they saw [url=https://i.imgur.com/pxPXCtt.png]
thousands upon thousands of large yellow eyes[/url] looking at them from every direction in the dark forest, before the area returned to its twilight lit aesthetic for 10 seconds. Roland used this time to strike at Reno, who found his powerup had been canceled by the eerie light and eyes that had unnerved him. 

Seeing Reno getting hurt pretty badly, Moira had no choice but to keep healing him as Rude had his attempt to get Roland off Reno clashed with, and as the two Turks soon realized as Roland topped off his emotion level to 5, it wasn’t Raz that had been causing those images, but Roland. Upon reaching emotion level 5, Roland gained The Beast, and turned into a [url=https://i.imgur.com/mUWXKa2.png]
horrifying visage of some creature[/url] that would make any metal band proud. A voice of a monster saying. “I can’t let evil take all these precious things away.” An aura of dread emanated from Roland, which Rude soon found out made his barriers completely useless and any empowerments also useless. Roland also gained the EGO Apocalypse, and the [url=https://i.imgur.com/GGm21gv.png]
final scene[/url] of Apocalypse Bird played out, accompanied by its deep bird like roar, the caption saying. “Then, in the middle of all the chaotic cries, someone shouted: “It’s the beast! A big scary monster lives in the black dusky forest!”

“The hell is THAT? You’ve been holding out on us?!” Reno said, shocked and a bit horrified at what Roland had turned into, but soon shook off his fear as he engaged him. 

[color=d7d7d7]”Yeah, I learned a lot paling around with this group.”[/color] Roland said, his calm voice coming from such a monster. Raising his hand, Roland used Twilight, turning the area into a dark forest much like before, but this time it was pitch black, with the [url=https://i.imgur.com/ti3IWZo.png]
only light emanating from a 50 meter tall monstrosity[/url] in the back, the light coming from its many, many yellow eyes along its wings. Eyes that started to pepper the area with laser beams that Reno and Rude had to go onto the defensive to deal with as they rained down. He then took this opportunity to rush Moira with his large sword and powered through her orb to deal some damage.

Moira couldn’t help but take this damage, but she also gained her ult from this and said. “That's ENOUGH, I’ll end this now!” and put her hands together and unleashed her ultimate, a massive beam of both positive and necrotic energy that healed herself, Rude, Reno, and damaged Roland. Or that was the intent as Roland unleashed his second stored EGO, Apocalypse. Pointing at Moira and the rest of them, the massive creature in the back roared and lifted up one of its massive claws, intending to crush Roland’s enemies. And thanks to the size of this claw, Moira found her beam couldn’t overpower it as the creature’s claw crashed right through it and stomped down hard, crushing Moira into ash and dealing some heavy damage to Reno and Rude. She was the weakest in her group, so Roland wasn't expecting her to go down as easy as she did.

Roland turned his gaze to Reno and Rude, and pointed at them again. This time though, he tried the technique he had learned before as the two Turks decided what to do, and pulled out a Friend Heart for each of them, before dashing to them in his monstrous form and Friend Hearting both Turks. 

[color=d7d7d7]”I’d rather not take the lives of people I used to pal around with if I can help it.”[/color] Roland said as the area turned to normal, but Roland still stayed in his apocalypse form. Rude shook his head, his head getting cleared as the influence of Galeem left him.

Reno had to blink twice, his sword in his hand raised in a defensive position looking at Roland. “Urk…” Reno groaned, trying to process what was going on. Memories came flooding back to both Turks, but seeing as this area of the world was roughly what they knew, the only thing they really realized was that Roland wasn’t originally a Turk, and just ‘appeared’ one day with the position.

“Ugh… why do I have the feeling I just woke up from a nightmare,” Rude murmured. 

[color=d7d7d7]”Eh, that's normal I guess? That's how I felt when they did this to me. There's some like…. Angel thing up in the sky you guys can see later.”[/color] Roland said. [color=d7d7d7]”And yeah, I don’t know if you guys remember what I said, but there is a thing controlling Rufus and all the Shinra high ups. They are named Consuls, And they might be the ones behind the ever crisis? Their plan is to use Midgar as some sort of playground for their sick games, and they will mind control whoever they can to make that happen.”[/color] 

Reno put his baton away and could only scratch his head at hearing that. “Oh, I remember them telling us that you betrayed us and we were supposed to hunt you down, then… something else happened I can’t remember.”

[color=d7d7d7]”Yeah. Although I think after me and this group fix what's going on in Midgar, they say there is something even bigger out there. That angel thing I was talking about. I got a feeling I’ll have to deal with that. And also more of those Consuls out there. Then there are these weird shadow robed people you can’t see unless you break out of the mind control I freed you and Rude from. And the guys controlling Rufus and the rest of Shinra can’t influence you now.”[/color] Roland said, before sighing and saying. [color=d7d7d7]”It's just a huge, huge mess…”[/color]

“Well, uh… I guess we’ll go look into that. Sucks that the medic bit the dust, but between you and me, she was pretty creepy.” Reno said, confused on what was going on but accepting what Roland had said.

Rude nodded solemnly with him. “Although not as creepy as you are now Roland.” 

[color=d7d7d7]”Yeah, this’ll turn off in a little while, not much I can do about it until then. Believe it or not this is something I used to do back where I’m from. I was only reminded of it when I got freed. Maybe you guys can find something cool you forgot as well.”[/color] Roland said. [color=d7d7d7]”Oh, and go find that lady you're into Rude. Maybe you can protect her from that mind control thing, and that’d score some big points for ya.”[/color] Rude nodded vigorously at this, and with that, Reno and Rude made their way off to do their own things.

With the combat over, Roland moved forward, hoping to find Raz and the man he’d gone to pursue. It wasn’t long before he discovered another teleporter, which he figured the others must have used. After taking it though, Roland found himself alone, and maybe even farther from Arahabaki’s center than the first place he ended up.. [color=d7d7d7]”Uh…. I dealt with the Turks that were sent to ambush me, but I got separated from Raz again due to a teleporter. Where do I go?”[/color] Roland said, and soon after got a bit of direction from Sandalphon, Roland made his way there, getting some time to rest as he traveled.