Response Level: [b]0[/b]

[b]Redana![/b]

As you conduct your holy work shapes move through the war of armageddon. They are not a part of this world and the energies of Regret do not infuse them; instead they cloak and shield them, escalating them from Coherent soldiers to the greatest perils of the age of myth. This is how the Hermetic weapon operates; while it paralyzes its victims with visions and crushing emotions, specially shielded soldiers can walk amidst the fallen placing cuffs and collars.

You fight them now, half dreaming. They come wearing the face of Mengekai, of Thriss, of the golden rooster, of fallen space craft, of the fire that consumes islands. The heavens roar with the might of the silver spheres and clatter with the footsteps of a MRU rendered into crashing starships. You catch glimpses of their true nature here and there but you must fight them as though they were the apocalypse itself.

[b]Alexa![/b]

It's over.

Somehow it just stops. The madness that fills the air fades away and Demeter's hiss is distant. The Master of Assassins backs up a defensible few steps and lowers her weapon and she's [i]done[/i]. It's an agonizing anticlimax, the cold calculation of Artemis ending a hunt when what your soul craves is battle to the finish. You take involuntary steps forwards but she matches them evenly, backing up with her spear sweeping low and wide to deter further advance.

Once distance has been established she takes off her helmet with a bouncing toss of black and bushy hair, skin like the savannah and eyes like the river bank. Budding white daisies open and bloom around her head in a simple little crown. She lights a cigar one-handed, incongruously large against her feminine features, and takes a puff.

"[i]Really[/i]?" she said. "You sit as unchanging and lumpen as a literal statue for three hundred years and [i]I'm[/i] the idiot for not predicting you'd flip out and invoke Ares? Every other variable was accounted for but I literally got attacked by a [i]dues ex machina[/i]."

[b]Vasilia![/b]

The Thunderer grants you victory, crowned with lightning. The Thunderer, too, is your victory. You and she are inseparable; your glory is her glory for she is glory itself. 

The Thunderer, too, grants you spoils. Are you not a pirate, Vasilia? Are you not breaching the vaults of a most rare and precious archive? Those who have to make decisions about winning fight [i]or[/i] getting away with the loot are not truly cut out for the Starsong.

What is it that you snatch in passing as your prize for this encounter? This can be something small and precious, or a huge mass of raw materials enough to fill the cargo hold of your ship. After all, the Anemoi's docking berth is laid out with treasures in massive piles ready to be loaded.

[b]Dolce![/b]

"Until she - I am [b]not[/b] letting go of Redana again!" said Mynx. "Take your oath and [i]shove it[/i] because I'm not going anywhere - me, [i]or[/i] Bella! You've got no idea what she's been through to catch up with Redana! Even if Redana's not heartbroken, Bella is -"

She stops. The wild air is quiet. The steel floors are still overgrown with grass and cherry blossoms have still erupted from water pipes but it's no longer overwhelming.

"Bella," Mynx breathed. And she is off so quickly you lose track of her in seconds.

[b]Bella![/b]

It is Apollo who smiles at you amidst the ruins.

Servitors are made for a purpose. Dopamine washes over adrenaline-scorched nerves, a biochemical reward for fulfilling that purpose. You have broken every other machine in your path and Saved Redana. For a moment the lights are dark. For a moment the air is quiet. For a moment the breeze on your fur is cool. For a moment your Auspex is not flooding your soul with data. For a moment it's just still, and a shuddering and righteous pleasure is trying to sooth your hypersensitive nerves. 

It isn't working. You pushed too hard. You are a broken machine amidst the ruins of a broken machine. You are in the dark and quiet and solitude, feted by no gods and feared by no mortals. And all that is here for you is Apollo.

The god of the sun! A relic from an unimaginably ancient time where there was but one of those and it was warm and life-giving. Oh, but you have learned better, haven't you? You've learned that there are billions of those and their light is so cold and indifferent. People once celebrated Apollo as a god of kindness and virtue but this, [i]this[/i] - this is his true face. That same smile here in the dark. That same smile here in the cold. That same smile despite the poison pleasure that mixes hideously with the aftershocks of your anger. Only a fool would have believed there was anything special about the sun in an age where stars are tamed for Engine cores. 

Compassion? Kindness? Warmth? All of those things that made you feel alive? Apollo smiled the same smile then as he smiles now. Like nothing has changed at all.