[center][h3]Tora, Poppi, and Big Band[/h3]
[b]Location:[/b] Sandswept Sky
Level 9 Tora (228/90) Level 9 Poppi (228/90) Level 7 Big Band (56/70)
Midna’s [@DracoLunaris], Sectonia’s [@Archmage MC], Primrose and Therion’s [@Yankee], Jesse’s [@Zoey Boey], Raz’s [@TruthHurts22], Raiden’s [@XoXKieroBombXoX], the Phantom Thieves, Braum, the Scout, Peacock
[b]Word Count:[/b] 1657[/center]

Except for the odd bit of discomfort, or the occasional nightmare about Wendigo, both halves of Yellow Team slept like the dead. While those privy to the interior of Gerudo Town enjoyed much nicer beds and accommodations on the whole, the inn at the oasis served the others’ purposes just fine, and even those who slumbered under the stars enjoyed a night of peace and quiet until the break of dawn. Some time after the sun had risen, a very groggy Tora emerged from the inn, his conspicuous lack of overalls hinting at his chosen method for freshening himself up.

“...Meh-meh-meh-meh-meeeh!”

The Nopon took off running across the hot sand, through the gauntlet of palm, and finally  performed a flying leap into the sparkling desert oasis. Being cannonball-shaped, he made quite the splash, loud enough to stir Big Band out of hibernation in the palm trees’ shade. “Huh, wuzzat?” He blinked the sleep from his eyes to see Tora swimming around, using his wings like oars to push himself through the water. The detective shook his head in resignation as he rose from where he laid himself to rest, causing his bones to pop and his metal joints to creak. “Oh, good heavens. Stiff as a damn board, I need a tuneup or…or somethin’.” With deliberate slowness he got to his feet, where he watched Tora continue to paddle around. “Y’know, for a beach ball your swimmin’ ain’t half bad, kid.”

“Hm-hm!” Tora chuckled, a smug look on his face. “Friend Band not see anything yet. Poppi!”

His artificial blade, seated at the water’s edge, perked up. “Masterpon!”

“Initiate Rally Mode!”

“Roger, roger!” After standing, Poppi clapped her hands together above her head in an A shape, then launched herself into the water in a corkscrew dive. She vanished beneath the surface, and a moment later, Tora began to rise out of the water. Poppi emerged in a big splash and set the Nopon like a volleyball, sending him flying straight up.

“Whee!” he sang, his limbs tucked in as he arced up and back down toward the water. Poppi moved to bump him as he came down and return him to the air, then repeated the process where he fell down next. 

When Vandham walked over to investigate the noise, the sight of his friends elicited an uproarious burst of laughter. He held out his hand. “Over ‘ere, I’m open!”

Poppi obligingly bounced her Masterpon his direction, and with a big grin the man adopted a wide stance. Just a hair too early he bumped Tora back to Poppi, sending him at a low angle. “Cripes, you’re ‘eavier than I remember!” he laughed. When Tora hit the water with a splash and bobbed back up to the surface, all smiles, he crossed his arms. “If this ship ever makes an emergency landin’ in the water, we’ll ‘ave a good float at least!”

“Even Tora sink like rock if Biggypon take hold!” the Nopon joked back as Poppi waded over to him. At his level of durability, such mild impacts barely even registered. “C’mon Poppi, let’s go again! Now friends Midna, Braum, and Band play, too!”

“Oi, don’t forget about me!” the Scout called, waving from the shoreline. He’d gone for a dip himself in a pair of swimming trunks from the market, and his bulbous red beard was heavy with water. “If anyone lands on my ‘ead, they’ll bounce straight off like a bloody trampoline, trust me!”

They set up another rally, although this one didn’t go quite so smoothly. Poppi and Vandham both possessed such an abundance of strength that they made bouncing Tora around look easy, when in fact it wasn’t. A few hard splats into sand at the feet of a would-be hitter, which left the Nopon half-buried with his legs wiggling in the air, convinced the others to dial up the power a little, but that wasn’t without its own consequences. As Vandham walked into the inn to get the others, he heard a loud [i]BONK[/i] as Tora bounced off the hull of the Virgin Victory, and shook his head in resignation. “Alright mates, rise an’ shine!” he shouted, visiting Therion, Raiden, Joker, Skull, Panther, Mona, and Raz in turn. “We got a big day ahead of us, so don’t make me chuck ya in the lake with Tora!”

Having slept on Joker’s bed as usual, Mona woke with a start and promptly rolled off onto the floor. “Okay, okay already! Sheesh.”

With that more or less taken care of, Vandham headed on over to [url=https://i.imgur.com/lpw8pOY.png]Tumbleweed Saloon[/url], where Commander Nelson and James Shirogane were already seated with a breakfast of black coffee, beans, and tropical fruit beneath the wagon wheel chandelier. With them he also found Alice MacGregor, having returned bright and early from Gerudo Town with ill tidings, or so he assumed from the general dour mood and lack of stuff for the Virgin Victory. The mercenary leader nodded to them and sat at an adjacent table, joined shortly by Big Band. One or two at a time the rest of the Seekers trailed in, bringing in or ordering food before they found somewhere to sit, which could include the bench for the piano since nobody was playing it. A few faces appeared from the Gerudo Town contingent as well, including Panther, who was eager to see her friends again.

After everyone got a chance to chat and eat, Vandham kicked things off. “So, Miss MacGregor. What’s the sitch?”

The solemn-faced pilot took a long breath in through her nose and began. “Well, in terms of fuel and mechanical parts with which we might make the Virgin Victory ship-shape, I regret to inform everyone that the town is rather lacking. It is not as, for lack of a better word, anachronous as we might have hoped. There is very little technology even approaching ‘modern’ to be found.”

Nelson looked grave. “So we may be stranded here for some time then, I take it. That is most unfortunate.”

“Luckily, we might have an alternative.” Every eye was on Alice, their momentary despair converted in an instant to hope, as she continued. “I visited the train station, the only modern facility in the city. I was curious, since we saw no tracks anywhere in Gerudo Town’s vicinity, and indeed, the place seemed to be empty. And yet, as I waited there, a subway train pulled into the station. It arrived from a dark hole in the wall, pulled by an orange tabby cat the size of an elephant, running along a track of yellow light. The train opened, and a number of desert folk came out. The station guards allowed the women into town, but the men were obliged to leave the city immediately through a second gate that seemed to link the station directly to the outside.”

Fox adopted a pose of exquisite thought. “Just like the subways in Mementos,” he observed. “Phantom trains arriving from nowhere and leading to nowhere, in stunning defiance of Euclidean space.”

“Those never stopped though,” Skull remembered, looking from his friend back to Alice. “But you said this one did?”

“Indeed. And to indulge my curiosity, I boarded it, as well.”

“Now ya got [i]me[/i] curious,” Band told her. “Where’s this midnight special train take ya?

Alice tented her fingers. “When we set off, we disappeared into a dark tunnel, the sort you’d expect underground, except that it would have logically ended after only a few meters on the opposite side of the city walls. But the train emerged in what appeared to be a large city, lit by bright neon signs and full of black cats. After I got off, however, I realized my first impression was incorrect. In fact, ” She paused for a moment. “Most importantly, there were other train lines. Other than the yellow line I came in on, I mean. There were all the colors of the rainbow. So naturally, I assume the place is simply a gargantuan, multi-story train station. And if each of the train lines warps space as ours did…”

Poppi’s processor had already come to the same conclusion. “That mean it potentially lead to places all over world!”

“Like hub for fast travel, meh!” Tora piped up.

Not sure what he was referring to, Alice delivered her final report. “I did not try any of the other lines, since I did not want to risk getting lost, and some of them required paid passes, regardless. While waiting for the Yellow Line train to run again, however, I did find a door and step outside.” She crossed her arms as if shivering. “What I found was freezing cold. A city sitting atop a frigid ocean, blanketed in snow, yet full of life. I could see very little before I went back inside, but when I looked up, the exterior facade of the train station appeared to be a gargantuan pumpkin. So big as to be unmistakable from any distance. In other words, it may as well be on the other side of the world from here.”

As that sank in, the others reacted with a mixture of bafflement, wonder, and excitement. Tora in particular bounced up and down in his chair. “That mean we not stranded here after all, meh! Just need ride train, and no more awful hot-hot desert!”

“And it sounds like the ladies in town let men into the train station, at the very least,” Band observed. “How forward-thinkin’ of ‘em.”

Nelson nodded. “Certainly a more promising prospect than a journey on foot across the desert. We need only ride the rails until we come across somewhere with the materials we need. Or better yet, somewhere close to home base, in Alcamoth.”

“Sounds like we got a plan then!” Vandham announced. “Eat up and get ready, mates. We got ourselves a train to catch!”

[center][h3]Ms Fortune[/h3]
[b]Location:[/b] Deep Blue Seaside - Limsa Lominscuttle Town
Level 9 Nadia (32/90) 
[b]Word Count:[/b] 3313[/center]

As much as she wanted to hang out with her friends, Nadia just didn’t have the patience to check this incredible marketplace out at anyone’s pace but her own. With only so much time and money available, she needed to cover as much ground as possible to ensure that whatever purchase she ended up making would be the right one, and what better way to avoid getting lost in a never-ended feedback loop of sensory overload than to take the whole place one shop at a time?

The feral quickly plotted a course around the Argentum Bazaar. If she essentially hugged the right wall, she could hit every shop in a big counterclockwise crescent around the outside, then turn around to make an inward clockwise crescent back to the start along the new right wall, which would eventually leave her in the innermost core of the market. With that plan in mind, she set off, and immediately discovered that things wouldn’t be quite so simple. The bazaar was stuffed with people, be they traders from afar, citizens of Limsa Lominscuttle Town, or the shipgirls of its Azure Navy. Throughout the place the crowd flowed and swirled like the currents of the ocean blue, and it seemed all too easy to be swept away, or even dragged under. The hubbub reminded her of the Little Innsmouth dark markets, specifically the chaos that befell them when the fishers and trawlers came in with the day’s catch, and Dagonians of every shape and size came out of the woodwork to snag the freshest seafood for their businesses and families. Though not quite a feeding frenzy of that magnitude, this bazaar did have an even greater variety of patrons. Many diminutive but very solidly-built Nopon scurried around, liable to trip any customers wandering around with their head in the crowds, and the shipgirls who skated over from the city under their own power still had their somewhat hazardous rigging on, however folded-up it might be. Some of the busier shops had lines out from them that followed no particular pattern, creating blockades that other customers needed to get around or through. If anyone could duck, dodge, scoot, and scurry her way through such a crowded place, though, it was Nadia Fortune. By habit she kept her eyes sharp at all times, darting hither and thither to speedily take stock of just about everyone she crossed paths with. Not that she planned to pickpocket anyone, but still.

First on the docket was the incredibly noisy Immortal Core Store, tactfully placed by the main entrance, and quite possibly the biggest, fanciest, and most eye-catching shop in the whole bazaar. Unlike the rest, which made little to no attempt to doll themselves up as anything but ordinary market stalls, the Core Store looked like its own little building done up in a dark fantastical style. After Nadia made her way over she sidled past the raucous throng at the counter and joined a handful of people spectating the process. It took a bit to wrap her head around what was causing such a ruckus, and how, but as best she could gather, customers could buy a couple different kinds of Crests that would then allow her to physically grind open geodes for an unknown gemstone hidden inside, which would then empower any equipment they got socketed into. It sounded kind of fun, but there air of discontent around the place was potent enough to put her off. In the end Nadia decided against it; after all, since the whole thing came down to random chance, who knew how much she would need to spend to get anything good? “Now that I think about it, I don’t even have any gear I could stick ‘em in,” Nadia muttered to herself as she disengaged from the Core Store crowd. If anyone in her group wanted to try that, she hoped they had good luck!

Next door she found Honeycomb Sweets. Though its cakes, cookies, candies, pastries, puddings, ice cream, popsicles all looked incredible, Nadia was still very full from dinner, and the thought of eating anything else threatened to make her ill. After a few deep breaths to enjoy the ambient aroma she moseyed right along.

Shroomblade Smithing occupied the last spot on the outer-bottom row, and it was a big one. Complete with its own forge and workshop behind it, where its supply of more generic armaments was assembled in-house, this shop drew the attention of soldiers, adventurers, and enthusiasts alike. Those not drawn to ogle the walls of weapons on display could watch the smiths at work as they pounded, chiseled, carved, and enchanted away. As fascinating as the process might be, Nadia didn’t have minutes to waste on entertainment, or money to splurge on a whim. Never in her life had the cat burglar received formal training with any kind of weapon, not even with knives, the thief’s tools of the trade. No blade would serve her better than her own body, thanks to the feral ability to harden her claws, tail, teeth, and so forth. With a final longing glance at all the badass sabers, halberds, kukris, morning stars, knuckles, rifles, and shields, she moved on.

The next couple stalls, all on the bazaar’s right side, turned out to be Reedirait Bookstore, Nopox Hobby Store, and Strummer Instruments. Neither seemed to offer Nadia much value at first, since she never tried an instrument and couldn’t call herself much of a bookworm. Besides, where could she possibly find the time or place to actually read a book or play an instrument, either in her frenetic old life or her crazy new adventure in the World of Light? But after today, she wondered if she might occasionally get enough time to indulge herself after all. It might be nice to immerse herself in a good story, or to pick up a new hobby. If she could actually learn how to make music, it might bring some benefit to everyone else, too, by means of raising morale or just helping to connect them better. She pictured herself plucking the guitar and working the accordion that Strummer Instruments had on display, maybe around a campfire somewhere with Ace and the others. That sounded pretty great, actually. But then again, she would need to carry her stuff around with her everywhere, and with her pouches discarded alongside her old clothes she possessed a single means of storage, that being the thief’s teal shoulder bag. In the end Nadia moved on, but she noted the shops down as a solid ‘maybe’ in her mind.

When she reached the outer-top row she came face to face with Noodlers’ Delight and promptly skedaddled. On its left stood Shynini’s Accessories, where all sorts of bracelets, pendants, broaches, watches, and other vanities could be purchased, virtually all of them inlaid with stones and crystals purported to grant magical effects. While looking over its tempting wares, Nadia happened to run into Cerberus, who she found in the process of spending their entire stipend on pretty baubles. On second glance, however, the accessories they chose were bejeweled cuff links of amber, amethyst, and aquamarine, which in addition to matching their eyes perfectly, promised to boost their fire, electric, and ice elemental attacks, respectively. It didn’t take much searching to discover accessories that boosted physical attack, defense, and even water attack, or offered better health regeneration. Nadia only stopped herself from buying something then and there with the logic that there might be something better elsewhere. Hopefully the stuff she had her eyes on would still be sitting there when she got back.

Last on the upper row was Cleo’s Cosmetics. Normally Nadia wouldn’t give a place like that a second glance, since a lifelong tomboy like herself seldom thought twice about such fripperies as foundation, false eyelashes, and blush. For some reason though, as she stood in front of the counter with her arms crossed, her eyes lingered on the rows and rows of aesthetic products. She figured that under normal circumstances, people used stuff like this in order to make themselves look like someone they weren’t. Someone better, more attractive, more perfect. Even if she didn’t partake herself, Nadia understood why so many would. At the same time, she wondered if the same products might serve a different purpose: to make her look like herself.

Nadia took hold of her hair. White as dead coral, longer and more flowy than usual, as if perpetually underwater. It was nice, and part of her just accepted it as ‘her’, but her memories assured her that wasn’t always the case. If she kept fusing with more spirits, how long would it be before she looked in the mirror and could no longer recognize the girl staring back? It would be foolhardy to believe that every enemy she ran into with powers she wanted would happen to look like her. No matter what happened, she wanted to keep a hold of herself, and not become something else. Her first instinct when she fused with Northampton, to cut her hair back to jaw-length, said as much. As the gears turned, the feral came to a decision. She spent two 250 gold on a bottle of platinum blonde hair dye, good for five applications. [i]No matter who I fuse with,[/i] she thought as she placed her first purchase in her bag, [i]I’ll still have the ol’ bob.[/i]

The moved a little faster around the inner crescent, spending just enough time to get an idea of which shop sold what and whether or not she needed it. She soon noticed that the inner crescent seemed a little…stranger. While the stalls she passed so far all featured cute Nopon shopkeepers, these more cluttered, dimly-lit stores featured the enigmatic [url=https://i.imgur.com/qNvgZ9K.png]Bazaar Masters[/url], and though each styled himself as ‘Mr’, Nadia found herself doubting whether they were really men. In clockwise order, she went by Mr. Chimes’ Lost and Found, a highly exclusive antique vendor, Gottery the Outfitter, a clothes store run by Mr. Veils, Crawcase Cryptics, a shop of secrets and rumors run by Mr. Papers, Dauncey’s, Mr. Wines’ liquor store, Nassos Zoologicals, a pet (and minion) shop under Mr. Eaten’s leadership, The Great Downward Engineering Company, a gadgetry workshop run by Mr. Iron, Empire Adornments, operated discreetly by the employees of Mr. Stones, the Bridge Without, that being a grocery cheerily attended to by Mr. Apples, Carrow’s Steel, a less popular arms provider run by Mr. Fires, and Nikolas Pawnbrokers, run by Mr. Mirrors. Beyond these curious shops lay only the innermost portion of the Bazaar, occupied by Whiteside Salvaging, the storefront for Argentum Trade Guild’s own special industry. There she spotted the Bowsers, just finishing a transaction.

The trip took more time than Nadia expected, even though she avoided entangling herself with her friends whenever she happened to run into them throughout the marketplace. In the end, she went back to Gottery the Outfitter, since the clothes she bought today wouldn’t be much use in the coming battles, and bargained for a new outfit. The [url=https://i.imgur.com/dZ8VKXU.png]zip-up jumpsuit[/url] she settled on for 800 gold covered all her bases: cute (although in rather less innocent fashion than Rika’s new sundress), stylish, didn’t cover her separation points, and thanks to a remarkable degree of durability, pretty practical actually. It came with a set of fingerless gloves that could help her punch, as well. After that the feral went between the accessory shops looking for the best bang for her buck. In the end, she spent her bottom dollar on two new trinkets. One was a [url=https://i.imgur.com/ktEcUw5.png]shiny ring[/url] that would increase her ‘maximum equipment load’. Though skeptical at first, she realized once Bazaar Master let her try it on that the ring made her gear feel light as a feather. As a direct result, she also got a [url=https://i.imgur.com/P6hZucd.png]charm[/url] that promised to boost her attack power the lower her equipment load was. Hopefully, all that meant that because she traveled so light, she would be able to hit way harder, and even if she needed to gear up for harsh conditions, it would be easier to maintain her agility. Even if that didn’t work, at least her finds were pretty, and the charm looking rather like a cat toy spoke to her on a fundamental level.

It was getting to be that time, and soon after she met up with the rest of the Seekers back at the Trade Guild’s dock. The others had been every bit as busy as she, and everyone sported some fancy new stuff, be that equipment, supplies, or just whatever caught their fancy. Nadia loved that Sakura got herself a bike, it was just such a Sakura thing to do. Not everything had to be functional, and seeing the girl enjoy herself with her new purchase made Nadia sort of wish she bought an instrument or something, after all. Geralt, meanwhile, got a cool new bow, while Peach somehow managed to find a fearsome new weapon of destruction, the [url=https://i.imgur.com/0jaWmAa.png]Agro Torpedo[/url] rocket launcher, able to wreak havoc at ranges her Boomshot could only dream of. “Looks like everyone’s made good use of their allowances,” she giggled, seeing a few of the purchases. “It’s getting late, so we should probably disband for the evening. I feel like tomorrow’s going to be another very busy day, so let’s all rest well.”

Once the ferry deposited all of them back at the Limsa harbor, the Seekers could go their separate ways. Although the sound of another long snooze in the comfy white sheets of Mizzenmast Inn sounded divine, Nadia couldn’t help but feel a little paranoid about how secure her hotel room really was, on account of her repossession efforts that afternoon. Best case scenario was that her disposal of both Rita and Barth left the gang she’d fallen foul of scattered and leaderless, with those nasty customers’ more redeemable underlings free to pursue better opportunities elsewhere. Worst case scenario was that her incursion sent ripples through the underworld, putting a target on her head that any number of assassins might be eager to cash in on. Someone in her line of work didn’t survive by assuming she’d always get lucky.

She decided to bid the other inn-goers farewell, and tag along with Peach back through the warp portal to Alcamoth. “Night-night everyone!” she called as she waved the others away. Only as she, the princess, and a couple others crossed the seaside city to reach the teleporter did Nadia really begin to feel just how tired she was. “Whew. Gonna sleep like a log tonight.” By the time she finally reached an empty room in Alcamoth’s residential sector, she was shambling like a zombie, and when she collapsed into bed she zonked right out.

[center][hider=For Nadia]Items obtained:
[url=https://i.imgur.com/dZ8VKXU.png][b]Asuka’s Outfit[/b][/url]
A combination of ice blue zip-up jumpsuit, fingerless MMA gloves, and royal blue sports bra. Stronger than it would appear and well-suited to Nadia’s fighting style
[url=https://i.imgur.com/ktEcUw5.png][b]Havel’s Ring (?)[/b][/url]
A ring for warriors keen on heavy accouterments. Increases maximum equip load. This ring was named after Havel the Rock, the battlefield compatriot of Gwyn, the First Lord–or so it should be. This ring is but an imitation, only providing a measly 15% extra equip load instead of the original 50%
[url=https://i.imgur.com/P6hZucd.png][b]Blue Dancer Charm[/b][/url]
A cloth doll depicting a dancer garbed in blue. An ancient heirloom of some sort. The dancer in blue represents a fairy, who in legend bestowed a flowing sword upon a blind swordsman. Blade in hand, the swordsman sealed away an ancient god — a god that was Rot itself. Increases physical damage as equip load lowers, with a maximum of 14% extra damage dealt at the lightest threshold
[b]Platinum Blonde Hair Dye[/b]
Too white to be blonde, too blonde to be white, it’s the closest hue that Nadia can find to her original hair color, as far as she can remember. 5/5 applications remaining[/hider][/center]

[hr]

Just shy of eight hours later, some noise outside Nadia’s room made her cat ears perked up, followed shortly by the slow, bleary blinking of her eyes. It took a second to remember where she ended up this time, although compared to the last time she awakened, so oblivious from ten hours straight of alcohol-induced unconsciousness that she couldn’t even remember her own name, she felt a whole lot better. With a groan the feral reflexively grabbed hold of and hugged her pillow tight, eyes squeezed shut, but after a few seconds she sighed and rolled out of bed. Here in the futuristic, almost alien floating city of Alcamoth, she really missed the soft chorus of seagulls and the distant crash of waves on the sandy shore, as rhythmic and soothing as a lullaby. After stepping into the tiny adjunct bathroom to splash water on her face, she put on her fresh new outfit for the first time, which did require carefully cutting a hole in the back for her tail. “Hah,” she said, looking herself over in the mirror. “Feline fine.” Satisfied with what she saw, the feral made her way out from her stark, minimalist room down the stark, minimalist hallway toward the shopping center in search of something to eat.

A few minutes later she sat on a second story food court, working her way through a stack of [url=https://i.imgur.com/AuHPZd9.png]Tea Break Pancakes[/url], bathed in sweet berry syrup, as well as a handful of fried eggs and bacon from a restaurant called the Pancake Bar. Here at least, surrounded by stores and people from countless worlds, the rather austere Smash City felt like it had plenty of life. Just watching the denizens of Alcamoth prepare for the day kept her busy as she ate her fill, since no matter where she looked she found something interesting and new. Even more than that, she felt as she observed a certain sense of unity. Though everyone here had their own lives to live, their freedom from Galeem and commitment to a brighter tomorrow meant that they shared a common bond. Every meal served, every consumable crafted, every weapon made, every hour spent training, and every mock battle between the mercenaries…they all served that purpose. It got her a little worked up, she had to admit, although some coffee worked pretty well, too. The next chapter in this grand campaign to save the worlds was about to begin, and Nadia knew she needed to be ready.

She’d just finished eating and lifted her coffee to her lips for a big sip when a Moogle poofed into being in front of her, scaring her so badly that she blew hot coffee all over her face. “What the f-whah!” she yelped as she tipped backward in her chair and hit the ground. The Moogle flew over to the edge of the table in concern, only to get grabbed as Nadia shot up to her feet, dripping and angry. “Hey, ya stinky little furball!” she growled as she squeezed on its face like a stress ball. “What’s the big idea, scarin’ the livin’ daylights outta me like that!?”

“Oogh! Urgh!” the critter grunted, eyes bugging out. “The boss! Needs you! At the! Meeting!”

“The boss?” Nadia relented, her eyebrows furrowed. “You mean Peach? Or maybe Bowser?”

Breathing heavily, the Moogle nodded. “Yes, yes, everyone’s meeting right now to decide where to go next!”

“Oh, man, I must be late!” Nadia moaned, smacking a hand to her forehead.

“No no, you’re good. It’s in, um, ten minutes.”

Nadia stared at the messenger. “Ten minutes?”

“Uh-huh…”

The feral’s dark eye twitched, and her grip tightened again. “If I got so much time, what the hell’dja have to go and gimme a heart attack for!” As she spoke she reeled back and hurled the Moogle like a football over the railing, sending it flying out into the open space until it poofed itself away.

Sighing, Nadia dabbed at her face with her napkin. “Well, here we go, I guess.”

She grabbed the railing and jumped over, stretching out her muscles to lower herself down and reach the bottom floor at a controlled speed. Once there, Mercenary HQ was only a hop, skip, and a jump away. Inside, Nadia found Peach and the somewhat intimidating Pokemon Mewtwo standing at the huge screen table at the very center. Her eyes widened as she grew closer, taking in the immense computer-generated map of the continent, the first time she’d borne witness to a map of the World of Light in any capacity. While much of it remained to be filled in beyond a loose outline of the different regions, it impressed her a lot. “Wow.” She glanced over at Peach, who nodded her agreement. “So. Where we headed, princess?”

Peach shrugged, then sipped her tea. “Once everyone’s here, you’ll find out.”