[center][h3]Sector 04, Veles - Neuron Helipad[/h3]
Level 6 Goldlewis (92/60) Level 4 Sandalphon (57/40)
Karin’s [@Zoey Boey], Blazermate, Roland, and Susie’s [@Archmage MC], Geralt and Zenkichi’s [@Multi_Media_Man]
[b]Word Count:[/b] 2013 [/center]

When Consul Y ended negotiations by seizing control of all gleaming fighters present, it became clear that the time for talking was over. That suited Jena just fine; she’d heard enough out of her old nemesis already, and wasn’t in the mood to listen, whether to him or Blazermate. As the fight began, she sprang forward and barreled toward Y, leaving Mephisto and Faust to take supportive rolls. In response, the Howard twins leapt to the Consul’s defense. Akira’s Arrow Legion, outfitted with black armor just like its legionis and sporting a bright red core, unleashed a flurry of projectiles from its dual bow-arms. Jena put up her arm as she ran in, manifesting a chimeric shield wreathed in purple to soak the bolts until her own archer got Akira’s attention with a crossbow bolt that knocked her flat on her back. As the Arrow Legion turned to help Akira up, Hayato moved to clash with Jena in his sister’s place.

He threw himself into Jena’s shield with a flying kick, then cartwheeled backward away from her retaliatory slash. His Sword Legion rushed in with a double slash that drew blood, putting Jena on the defensive as she blocked slice after slice with her lance. When the Sword Legion performed a hurricane slash, she went low and pierced the ground, creating a purple rupture. The next second a spike of astral matter burst upward to hit the Legion from below, launching it into the air. Jena smashed through the crystal shield-first and into Hayato, knocking him back, but when she brought her lance forward in a thrust Hayato capitalized on the split second he had. He dismissed and then instantly recalled his Sword Legion in front of him, executing a Perfect Summon that threw Jena off and left her wide open. There was a blue flash, and he followed up with a Sync Attack, sending his Legion across the ground splayed out like a starfish and spinning to grind into his enemy from below.

Jena’s teammates moved to help her, so Akira went to back up her brother, too. At that moment, though, the sight of missiles coming in from Susie got Y’s attention. “Here!” Akira wheeled around to help, taking aim with her blaster alongside her Arrow Legion to mow the missiles down with a barrage of laser bolts. From there she stood ready to continue defending the Consul.

At the same time, the party had really gotten started for the Seekers. As Sandalphon stumbled toward Penance, Roland acted fast to save the archangel by intercepting the Judge’s follow-up attack. Blades metal flail in a furious clash of metal, pushing both apart. The trade powered Roland up, but with more foes on the way, Penance acted fast. In the moment that Zenkichi used Valjean to bolster Sandalphon’s defense, the Judge unleashed Last Word. Her empowered flail smash didn’t just hammer Roland for 200% damage, but also stunned him for five whole seconds, leaving her free to trade blows with the Witcher. Shielded by Guardian of the Law and Quen respectively, she and Geralt whaled on one another’s barriers, but Penance had one trick up her sleeve that her opponent didn’t. Whenever he struck her Arts barrier, it reacted with a burst of thorny lashes to deliver an attack equal to half a swing from her flail in damage. Her barrier also boasted much greater durability, more than half her own max health in fact, so Quen was gone long before Geralt could take Penance’s shield. Despite his greater stopping power and his efforts to mitigate the blows from her swings, he found himself losing the war of attrition. That was where Karin lent him a hand with her martial prowess, joining in to whittle down Penance’s barrier and distribute the recoil from Wreathed in Thorns. Together they destroyed her shield, putting the Judge on the back foot–until she spent a chunk of SP on Trial of Thorns. A new spiky golden barrier flailed to life around her, this one worth 130% of her max health, and reinstating Wreathed in Thorns. It also boosted her rather low attack by 400%, her attack speed by a little bit, and her inherent threat, turning the Judge from a thorny roadblock to terrifying powerhouse.

Vigil proved no less formidable. The minute Susie got him off Goldlewis’ case, he rounded on her with guns blazing. Still not used to her personal shield, she brought up the arms of her Business Suit to protect herself when Vigil shot at her head, and in the brief moment that bought him Vigil activated Leader of the Wolfpack. Two Wolf Shadows appeared on Susie’s position to Block her, both striking in quick succession every second or so. Their bites might be weak, but Susie couldn’t effectively reposition or attack anything else while Blocked, and that wasn’t all. Thanks to Vigil’s Wolven Nature, both him and his Wolf Shadows penetrated a huge amount of defense for anyone his Wolfpack blocked, and every thirty seconds a new Wolf Shadow would appear–even if there weren’t any left. By the time Roland recovered from his stun and came over to help Susie, both Vigil and Akira were ventilating her Business Suit without a care in the world. 

Thanks to her allies, Blazermate in particular, Sandalphon managed to recover her gunstaff, which she accepted with a curt nod. If the archangel was mollified by getting disarmed, tugged around, and almost pancaked by Penance, she hid her indignity well. She escaped from the fighting unscathed and took a quick look around, clearing her throat. Penance seemed to be weathering the assault of both Karin and Geralt at the same time, which was no easy feat. Having used only his revolvers until now, Vigil had torn open his bag of tricks in order to shoot up Susie and Roland. On the other side of the brawl, Hayato was holding off all three Reunion fighters at once, while Akira was shooting from a defensive position near the Consul. Everyone needed a hand, and out of everyone present, only Sandalphon could actually help them all.

“Angelic Wings,” she proclaimed, lifting up her staff. Angular streaks of radiant blue light surrounded her, emanating from her staff and encircling the ground around her like embroidered threads. Four curved screens appeared around her, spinning in a ring, before launching outward in a divine pulse. Geralt, Karin, Susie, Roland, Giovanna, and Goldlewis all received a massive heal for over 100% of their max health, fully restoring them all. With Sandalphon in Concentration protocol, her powerful skill did not provide her teammates any extra benefit, but it charged her a certain resource of her own by a third.

That boost was just what Goldlewis and Giovanna needed to get back into the fight. Given the sheer threat exuded by Penance, the veteran understood that his team couldn’t make progress as long as she still stood. “Sorry ma’am,” he rumbled, running toward the melee. “But you gotta go!” He jumped, then burst forward with an airdash to land on Penance with a barrage of [url=https://i.imgur.com/1FTUsj3.png]alien swipes[/url]. Pushing through the pain from Wreathed in Thorns, he canceled that into a downward Behemoth Typhoon that caused a ground bounce that an ally could follow up on. Penance rose quickly, and after landing Goldlewis joined Geralt and Karin in their assault, three on one. If the Witcher wanted to prove he wasn’t a liability to those around him, this was his chance. Together they finally began to overwhelm the stalwart defender. Two enemies Penance could withstand, but three was pushing it, especially with opponents of this caliber. That left no other options. The Judge reeled in her flail, then held her book high, surrounding herself in the golden light of Stoic Atonement. Protected by 60% damage reduction, she began to emanate ripples of thorns around her, each one dealing magic damage to any opponent they hit on the ground.

“Gah!” Goldlewis spat, recoiling from the painful wave of briars that bit into his legs like bestial fangs. When another wave rolled out the next moment, cutting into both his pants and the flesh beneath them, he grit his teeth. “We’re in trouble!” Taking a gamble, he performed a shorthop over the next wave and landed with another Behemoth Typhoon that struck Penance head on. Her poise withstood it, steeled by superhuman endurance, but she did flinch beneath the blow, a look of strain on her face. “But not helpless!” If they stood and fought normally Stoic Atonement might very well be a death sentence, but he’d found a way around it, risky though it was. The fight had become a dangerous game, and for the next twenty seconds or so, it was up to him, Geralt, and Karin to overturn the Judge’s ruling.

At the same time, Giovanna dashed in to help Susie and Roland against Vigil. Once the Turk got Urging and made it clear he wouldn’t just be eating bullets for breakfast, the well-dressed gunslinger sent his Wolfpack after Roland instead. From there had been able to flee from both foes consistently, keeping them at bay with his trusty revolvers. When he used Packleader’s Gift, his Wolf Shadows gained one instance of boosted damage plus lifesteal, and Packleader’s Dignity gave them three attacks for the price of one. But the secret agent’s sudden arrival threw a wrench in the works. “Need a hand, Roland?” With Rei at her back, Giovanna darted into the fight with blistering speed and took Vigil by surprise with [url=https://i.imgur.com/y6RVR0h.png]Trovão[/url]. The flying kick knocked him down, and as he rolled to his feet he knew he couldn’t afford to let his foes pin him down.

“Sic ‘em!” He growled, using Packleader’s Call. A new Wolf Shadow manifested and lunged toward Giovanna, a streak of gnashing black.

The secret agent hunkered down to block, putting her under duress as she sustained chip damage from both blazing guns and flashing fangs. When Susie got Vigil’s attention, Gio took her turn back with a spectacular [url=https://i.imgur.com/1teJQ43.png]high kick[/url] that struck the Wolf Shadow below the jaw, and as it flew into the air Rei gave it a taste of its own medicine with a lunge of her own. The two ethereal wolves fought savagely, thrashing in the air and rolling on the ground, at times little more than green lightning and pitch-black fury. Giovanna broke off from her spirit animal and closed in to help Roland with Vigil himself. She slid in with a [url=https://i.imgur.com/QytfTOX.png]knee thrust[/url], then combo’d with a [url=https://i.imgur.com/MXpyZ2B.png]punch[/url] into [url=https://i.imgur.com/uOikY2L.png]Sepultura[/url], kicking with her leg in lieu of Rei. From there, it was up to Roland. “Go get ‘em, tiger.”

Meanwhile, Zenkichi had reached the other side of the fight. Having left Susie to Vigil, Akira had brought her Arrow Legion close to let loose well-aimed charged shots at Blazermate, forcing the Medabot to stop summoning ghosts and start spending her Projectile Shield. Hayato still fought Jena, his entire arsenal of legions brought to bear against Reunion’s leader, but Mephisto’s shots kept interrupting him, and Faust happily healed whatever damage the legionis did to Jena with a tap of his cane. Neither Jena nor Mephisto would let him go after Faust, either. That meant that for a brief moment, Zenkichi and the Consul were face to face.

Y turned toward him, his sneer imperceptible beneath his helmet but imparting a scoff to his voice. “It’s true, you’re quite unmanageable.” Y held up his hands to his chest, one curved above his purple core and the other below. “Fortunately, I have other uses for you.” Suddenly the core started to glow, and around it appeared a conical purple vortex of pure sucking power, as big as Y himself. With fearsome strength, the vortex began to pull Zenkichi in.

[center][h3]Suoh - Shinra Building Gate[/h3]
Midna’s [@DracoLunaris], Sakura’s [@Zoey Boey], Pit’s [@Yankee], Luka[/center]

Despite his very useful power, Luka was no less tense than his allied Seekers when it came to the task set for him, and he wasn’t about to take it any less seriously. For a few more moments he continued to scope out the security checkpoint, trying to get a feel for which guards were patrolling and where, as well as checking and rechecking the cameras, turrets, and spotlights in the fading light. On a clear day the sunset would’ve illuminated the scene well enough, but today the stormy skies offered only a dying flicker of dusky orange over the western mountains, and an infiltration under the cover of night meant that nobody could bumble around. Neither could he afford to make any mistakes and compromise his team, which included overuse of his power. Teleportation wasn’t a common ability after all, and with the OSF soldiers stationed here, it was by no means impossible that one might recognize him just from the sound of his power going off.

Luckily, being little had its advantages. Small and fast, Luka could hide in places the others couldn’t, and his dark attire -especially with his good up- helped him blend into the plentiful shadows. He couldn’t literally fade into them like Midna could, making recklessness her only real risk, but he wasn’t that far behind. Luka even went as far as to temporarily disconnect from SAS, which caused the orange Vision cables that ran across his outfit to fade away. Alternating between bursts of speed and stretches of patient waiting, Luka made his way through the area with a couple close calls, but no incidents. That brought him close to the front gate, where he lingered, considering how to get through this final stretch and make it inside. There weren’t any entrances with low activity, since those were closed. From his hiding spot he spotted Pit entering a vent, and gave a nod of approval. Unfortunately for him, he couldn’t get up there without teleporting, and if anyone looked up at the sound he’d be a sitting duck.

After a few more seconds, he noticed a patrol that would pass within inches of him in about thirty seconds. Luka took a deep breath; it was now or never. Going with the best idea he had, he borrowed Yuito’s Psychokinesis to levitate a bit of debris and throw it against the wall. The noise got the attention of one of the two sentries by his chosen entrance, who shared a glance with her partner and then sauntered over to look. Poking his head out from behind the wastebin, Luka waited until the remaining sentry looked away, then teleported. As long as he had line of sight and could confirm an arrival point, the distance didn’t matter, after all. He warped through the open door and to the far side of the foyer.

In truth it was more of a garage mixed with a warehouse, loaded with various materials, vehicles, and military hardware. Possibly the Sector 05 muster station for Public Security, or a parking garage for Shinra Power Company employees. Without missing a beat he ducked between a couple vehicles. In here, there were plenty of spots to hide and no patrols, just workers not paying too much attention, so as long as he kept a low profile there wouldn’t be much trouble. As it happened, a low profile was the only one he had.

A couple minutes later, the Seekers gathered together. Tense as the infiltration had been, they’d made it inside, so now it was time to go deeper. Hastened by the threat of discovery at any time, they moved from the station to the transport hub just beyond it. A number of routes seemed to lead to various destinations from this room, including two sets of stairs up to a secondary security checkpoint for the Shinra Building itself, a downward staircase between them that led to a large and ominous-looking lift, and a few other doors. A contingent of soldiers was just heading toward a stairwell marked ‘Seiran Access’. Given Karen’s city-wide announcement, it made sense to send extra security that way. Once they all left, Luka and the others could proceed toward the lift. Judging by its position, it couldn’t possibly go upward, so that plus its lack of label made it a prime candidate. Before running over, though, Luka noticed the odd set double doors on the right side of the hub. While the rest of this place seemed almost brutalistic in its stark, functional appearance, those doors were decked out in bright colors, and above them was a label spelled out in large capital letters, pale yellow-green with darker green dots: [i]Daycare[/i].

“Daycare?” Luka whispered. “Why would this place have a daycare? Who’s bringing their children past a security checkpoint?” Spurred on by a mixture of curiosity and dread, Luka headed for those doors instead. On the other side lay a wide hallway with an arched roof, with a matching set of double doors on the other side. Once Luka jogged down the corridor and pushed the door ajar, he could see exactly what the Day Care was.

[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/OYwcgj1.png[/img][/center]

Before him stood a very large room shaped like a square donut, with high ceilings that reminded Luka of a gym despite its somewhat alien appearance. Its look wasn’t anywhere near as strange as what was happening in it, though. The ‘donut’ featured two tracks separated by a central channel, and along those tracks were a number of people on ordinary bicycles. Though mostly human, these riders came in all shapes and sizes, most featuring a handful of inhuman or animalistic features like ears, tails, horns, et cetera. Clad in black and red sports attire, they were just…peddling around. Every one of those bikes, however, had a basket on the front laden with eggs, very pale green with darker green spots just like the sign over the doors. After stepping inside to confirm the truth of his eyes, Luka just stood there for a couple moments, baffled. “What are…why are they doing this?”

He gradually turned his attention toward the structure in the center of the ‘donut’. Though it had several windows and no doors in its entry, he couldn’t see very much from this angle. Mostly just glass walls, hazy -or dirty- enough to reflect the light in such a way that he couldn’t really see through it. Luka did see one thing, though. It was a line of ordinary people in nondescript white shorts and tank tops, some of them teenagers or even younger. Some of them held little orbs, of various colors, the majority half red and half white. As he watched, the central chamber suddenly filled with prismatic light. It shone for a moment, then died down, and after another couple seconds the line advanced.

[center][h3]The Under - Mercy Dreams[/h3]
Level 12 Nadia (133/120)
The Koopa Troop’s [@DracoLunaris], Primrose and Therion’s [@Yankee], Sectonia’s [@Archmage MC], Artorias’ [@Dark Cloud], Nocturne’s [@Grimnir], Tingyun, Stetson the Scout, Paintbrush the Gunner, Overhard the Engineer, Cyclops the Scout
[b]Word Count:[/b] 3172[/center]

Once she confirmed that the high-pitched, all-too-familiar voice in the distance wasn’t just her weary mind playing tricks on her, Nadia’s mission was clear in her mind. Her first instinct was to vault over the wrought-iron railing before her and plummet down into the depths of the dungeon itself, single-mindedly rushing forward and taking all comers until her best friend was safe and sound. After all, this eerie penitentiary layout meant that she could leap straight into the belly of the beast if desired, a tempting prospect given her love for dramatic entrances. And what situation demanded drama like a daring rescue? For once, however, Nadia decided not to be reckless. While she and the others had run roughshod over plenty of dangerous places so far, every fiber of her being told her that this morbid, uncanny prison wasn’t a place she could take lightly. Not this time. Her instincts told her that Mercy Dreams had some sort of strange intention to it, and though she couldn’t fathom what it might be, she knew in her gut that it was best left undisturbed. As a paper butterfly took flight nearby, Nadia released her tense grip on the iron fence and stepped away. If she wasn’t going to jump, it was past time she found another way down.

Nadia and the others split up, separating under the tacit assumption that nobody was to make a scene if they could help it. With how quickly the feral scampered around, and how undefended Mercy Dreams’ uppermost level. seemed to be, it wasn’t long before the girl and her dog found the intended way down to the second layer on the left side. Using it was another matter, though. The access route took the form of a stairway corridor, and both landings featured their own sturdy metal portcullis. Sliding to a stop on all fours, Nadia stood and laid one hand on a metal slat as she turned to look around. She found the mechanism not in the form of a lever on the floor or wall, but suspended from the ceiling up near the pulleys that controlled the gate. It was an assembly of gears all contained inside a large glass jar, and she could see what appeared to be a weight resting on the jar’s bottom with rope coiled atop it. Going with the obvious solution, Nadia stepped back and raised one fist extended like a rifle as she closed one eye and squinted the other. A brief moment of blood pressurization later, she fired off her fist and smashed the fragile glass with one punch. She flinched at the sound of shattering glass as it broke apart and hit the floor, tensed up in case any prison denizens noticed, but nobody seemed to. Instead the counterweight dropped, and as it fell the gate rose. Once she felt sure no enemies would be coming to corner her in this narrow corridor, she and Chucho raced down the stairs to the gate at the bottom.

This would be slightly more complicated, as there seemed to be no way to open the gate from this side. She couldn’t see another switch jar either, though she suspected one must be close by. “Weird system,” she muttered. Maybe this double gate system forced mutual agreement between parties on both sides of the stairs for anyone to get through? She scratched at a metal slat with her claws, but it wouldn’t yield. “Watt about this?” When she tried to bolt through with a Charge, it ended with her head slamming into the steel bars. “Ow, right. Lightning likes metal. Well, there's more than one way to skin a cat.” Nadia stuck one arm through the lattice and detached it, letting it fall to the floor. Then she took her head off with the other, squeezed it through the biggest space available, and dropped it as well. “Oof!” From there, she grabbed her head with the fallen arm and moved it around until she spotted the switch jar around the corner. “Bingo. Nothin’s safe from me as long as I use my…head!” With that she hurled her head like a volleyball and struck the jar with her mechanism, shattering it to open the gate wide and let her body through.

“Rrrrruh!?” Nadia’s smug satisfaction evaporated like morning dew as she heard a questioning snarl just down the corridor, far too close for comfort. Rather than snatch up her arm and head, she allowed the rest of her to fall to pieces, eking out blood to give the illusion of a freshly-dismembered corpse. Right on time, the guard she alerted arrived. Watching through barely-cracked eyes, Nadia beheld something that looked like a man, but clearly wasn’t all there. Though muscular, his bloodied, half-naked body exhibited signs of atrophy, and he lurched around with unnatural vigor. The heavy, gasping breath that issued from his scarlet headwrap suggested the presence of fluid in his lungs, and the motes of sunset red within it seemed more like sparks than eyes. In both hands he held bloody scourges. After he staggered to a stop, another flagellant came into view, followed in turn by a Spear of the Cathedra atop his floating chair, clad in flowing red. After a moment, the flagellant determined that not enough blood had been spilled and grunted, lashing Nadia’s torso across the belly. The intensity of that pain brought tears to Nadia’s eyes, her teeth and eyes clenched as she fought to give no signs of life. By that point the Spear and his other attendant had turned to resume their patrol, and after seeing blood trickle onto the ground the first flagellant gave a satisfied purr and turned to go.

When she heard its steps receding, Nadia cracked one eye open, then extended sinews from her body parts to connect them back together. Once whole, she stalked after her attacker into the dimly-lit hall, drawing Athame. The flagellant didn’t know what hit him. As one arm locked around his throat from behind to cut off his air throw, the other drove the dagger into his back, eliciting a guttural, breathless wheeze. To the feral’s surprise, however, he continued to struggle violently, not slowing down even when she stabbed him two more times. “The hell?” she hissed. This thing wasn’t human–not even close. When he managed to reach around and grab her by the ear, panic spurred her to resort to desperate measures. She released him and jammed the knife into the undead monster’s head, then delivered a heavy cross slash to his back with her claws. Finally the flagellant slumped down, but as he fell, the sound of his body slamming against the floor got the attention of the other one. With no time to grab her head, Nadia sprang into the air and sunk her claws into the ceiling, hiding in the darkness. When the second flagellant came to investigate, the feral waited until the right moment when he was standing over his comrade’s dissolving corpse. Then her head burst forward on a jet of blood from her neck, knocking one of the flagellant’s legs out from under him. As he teetered forward, Nadia’s body dropped onto him from above to take him face-first to the ground. This time, she knew she couldn’t be lenient. Pinning him beneath her, she revved up both arms like drills, thrust them into the monster’s sides, and brought them together until the flagellant had been halved.

That took long enough and made enough noise to alert the Spear of the Cathedra, who turned with a wordless cry to hover Nadia’s way. With his lackeys gone, however, the feral felt more confident. “Careful,” she said darkly, spinning her arm drills down. “This isn’t a bit.” As she rose she shot out one hand to grasp Athame’s handle, and as she took off running she yanked it free. As the two approached one another, Nadia threw her dagger, only for it to sail past the Spear’s shoulder and off down the hallway. Groaning, the feral went low, avoiding the old man’s thrust with a Cat Slide beneath his floating throne. After getting behind him, she jumped up and delivered a drop kick to the back of the cathedra in an attempt to knock him out of it and onto the floor. Instead she heard a crack as she flipped away and hit a three-point landing. When the Spear turned toward her, she was horrified to see his spine somehow fused with the cracked back of his chair, and the same nightmarish sparks in the sockets of his eyes. With a hollow cry he jabbed at her repeatedly, drawing blood with the first and then forcing her to block until she timed an evasive roll away. The Spear advanced on her turned back, but Nadia looked over her shoulder with narrowed eyes, hardening and then bloodily launching her tails. They flew up and sank into the Spear’s body, staggering him long enough for her to flip over and fired off a maximum-power Fiber Upper. Her spring-loaded double kick struck the monster in the chest and snapped his cathedra’s back, sending both it -and the Spear- flying off. Immediately the throne went up in flames, and the Spear dissolved right after.

Nadia stood slowly, taking a deep breath. Chucho caught up to her with a whimper, looking a bit nervous. Those enemies hadn’t been too hard, but their unnatural constitution demanded a sort of ruthlessness from her that even she found a little scary. “I’m a thief, not a fur-eakin’ assassin,” she muttered to herself as she went to collect her tails. Finding Athame took a little longer, but she stumbled across it about halfway down the second layer cell block. She slid it into her belt, stood, and found herself standing before a strange cell. Its lock was broken, so instead it was boarded over from the outside, and unlike most of the doors this one had a barred window. Inside, Nadia could see a large chest wrapped in chains, just begging to be open. Normally she would’ve been all over it, but right now, even treasure could wait. “Minette?” Nadia dared to raise her voice slightly, hoping her misadventures had brought her closer to her imprisoned friend.

“Nadia? Where are you?”

At the voice, Nadia whirled around, looking back the way she came. For a fleeting moment, she thought she saw the visage of a teenage Dagonian girl in an apron and seashells, [url=https://i.imgur.com/BiPpccp.png]silhouetted[/url] against the weak glow of candles in the gloom. Nadia’s ears flattened in alarm as she blinked rapidly, trying to see more clearly, but just like that the apparition had vanished so suddenly and completely that she couldn’t be sure it had ever been there to begin with. “Minette!?”

“I’m here, Nadia!” Now that she was facing the source of the voice, the feral could tell that it wasn’t nearby. Closer than before, but still not close. Maybe one layer further down. But then…what was that shadow? Was she just seeing things? Once again, the sound of her friend’s voice roused her to action. “Please, hurry!”

Nadia did. The second layer had a couple more patrols, but she avoided them, sticking to the shadows and zipping past with a Charge when necessary. Chucho helped a lot, alerting her to enemies and illuminating alternate paths. Nadia could hear fighting from elsewhere in Mercy Dreams. Were the other Seekers facing demons of their own? When the cat burglar found another barred staircase, she smashed the upper switch jar like before, then raced down the steps. This time she didn’t plan to screw around, so when she reached the bottom, she conjured a copycat that could simply pass through the portcullis like the glorified water she was. As the copycat went to smash the switch jar, Nadia heard a magical noise from the right, and a ray of brilliant green light blazed in from a blind spot to splatter the copycat against the wall. “Mew gotta be kitten me.” Wrinkling her nose, she looked over through the bars to see a Mind Flayer shuffling into view. Though clothed for the most part in a ratty robe like a burlap sack, the head of the cephalopod monstrosity looked just as bad as it smelled. “Urk, what nyeow?” She crouched down, her claws sharpened despite the separating barrier. “You want a copiece of me?”

In reply the mind flayer lifted its bell and unleashed a wad of magical electricity. It flew through the gate, and Nadia’s eyebrows shot up. “Hey, that’s not-!” Then the spell struck her, paralyzing her in a wreath of eldritch green lightning. “Gya-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah!” While she struggled, the jailer grasped the bars of the gate and extended its tentacles to grab her. Barking, Chucho grabbed his owner by the arm and pulled her over backward. The impact with the stairs barely registered; Nadia was just glad her pooch saved her from that grab. Gurgling, the mindflayer gnashed its beak and thrashed its tentacles until the spell wore off. Then, as Nadia rose, it lifted its bell to cast again. “Alright already, no need to spell it out for me!” the feral yowled. As she fled back up the stairs, another Soul Ray went off where she’d been a moment prior. Hounded by its awful gurgles, she didn’t stop or even look back until she reached the second layer.

Once there she sat down for a moment, panting as she pet her softly-glowing Polterpup in the dark. “Okay. That guy’s clearly no octopushover. Gotta find another way…” Her eyes landed on the perimeter fence that ringed Mercy Dreams’ central space. Jumping to the bottom was out of the question, but maybe she could abuse this layout in another way. Nadia made her way to the railing. “After all, I’ve got a good head on my shoulders…or off them, for that matter.” She carefully lifted off her head, still connected by a length of muscle fibers, then dangled it over the edge and began to let out the slack. She extruded more and more to lower her head down to the third layer, allowing her to see the mind flayer upside-down as it guarded the staircase. After confirming its location, she reeled her head back in, then grabbed onto and vaulted over the fence to lower the rest of her down the same way–by extending the lengths of tissue connecting her hands. Eventually she reached the bottom, it being built out slightly farther than the layer above, and gently touched down so as to not alert the watchful sentry. Once in the clear, she let go with her hands, reeled them back in, and scampered off down the hallway with Chucho right behind. By the time the mind flayer looked over, she was gone.

After getting a safe distance away, the feral tentatively raised her voice again. “Minette? Are you there?”

“This way!” Her friend’s voice was low, urgent, and close.

Nadia homed in, pausing only to hide in the shadows from a passing mind flayer. Lucky that they were carrying bells and not lanterns. If the atmosphere in Mercy Dreams had been bad in the first layer, it was much more pleasant halfway down, and promised to get even worse closer to the bottom. She called out a couple more times as she went, and soon, Minette’s voice wasn’t from somewhere in front of her, but from the cell right beside her. Nadia took a deep breath. “Minette. I’m here.”

“Nadia! Oh, thank goodness!” Though she whispered to avoid being heard, the fishgirl’s voice was wracked with emotion. “I c-can’t believe it’s really you.”

The cat burglar swallowed. “Yeah…”

“H-h-how’d you find me?”

Nadia hesitated to answer. She didn’t want to say ‘pure coincidence’, which was the truth. Instead she put on a gallant smile, even though her friend couldn’t see. “What can I say? Whenever I hear my bestie’s in trouble, I come runnin’. That’s just how it is.”

Something between a happy sob and a rueful laugh issued from the cell. “Y-yeah…no m-matter how many times it happens, you’re always there. The brave knight rushing to save the perennial damsel in distress.” She exhaled, then inhaled sharply. “I’m…I’m s-sorry this k-keeps happening. That I always bumble into stuff like this, and you have t-to save me. Those creeps, the-the robbers, the cops, the Medicis, the…”

From the beginning, Nadia had harbored her doubts. What were the odds that she’d really run into her best friend in a place like this? But this didn’t just sound like Minette; those were her memories, too. [i]Their[/i] memories. Nadia allowed herself to open up, genuine concern expressed through her voice. “Hey, hey, look, don’t do that to yourself,” she cooed. “Some guys have all the luck, right? Me, I’m just glad you’re okay. And always, always happy to help! I don’t mind one bit if you need me, ‘cause I need you, too. In fact, I need you outta here. So just hold on a little bit longer, ‘kay?”

Minette’s voice turned panicked. “W-wait, don’t leave me!”

“I just gotta go find the keys, right? My friends’re all lookin’ too. It’ll be a ‘lock’ in the park, you’ll see, so just give us a ‘Minette’, eh?”

Despite her current predicament, the fishgirl couldn’t help but laugh. “H-heheheh, ohh, Nadia. How can you crack jokes at a time like this?”

“Crackin’ yolks is just how I roe, baby,” Nadia grinned, relieved that her comic relief was actually working as intended for once. After a moment, though, her smile faded. “Uh…just one last thing, Minette. Somethin’s been buggin’ me…”

“What is it?”

The feral took a deep breath. “How do I know…you’re real?”

Her question seemed to take Minette aback. “R-r-real? Wh-what do you mean? I…of course I’m real, you know I am. I’m M-minette, and I lived in Little Innsmouth all my life. The R-River King is my dad, I’ve got a b-bunch of sisters, and I work at Yu-Wan’s r-restaurant. And you’re my best friend, Nadia. My hero.”

Nadia looked down at the cold stone brick floor, speechless. She swallowed, her throat dry. Her stomach felt hollow, and her heart ached. She kept on smiling, but for a brief moment, the corners of her mouth twitched. Sensing her distress, Chucho whined. Nadia knew that should make her happy. Why then did she feel such dread? 

“R-right,” she replied after a moment, petting her dog for stress relief. “Sorry I asked. This place–it’s got me a little, ehe, y’know, loopy.” She pressed her hand against the cell door, just hard enough to make an audible noise. “Just hang in there, like I said. I’ll be back be-fur ya know it. I purr-omise.”

The voice on the other side took a deep, steadying breath. “...Okay. Please hurry back!”

Nadia waited a second more. Two seconds. Three. Ten. Then she stood, and resumed her search.

[hr]

At the bottom of the huge, dark shaft opened by the heart that Ganondorf sent crashing down from its tower lay a fetid mire that stank of death, its sludgy waters full of fleshy mounds far too big to have come from an ordinary animal, crusted over with fungus and festering with maggots. There, in a pit of its own juices, the heart came to rest, wriggling in vain until its spasms became palpitations and finally ceased altogether. Even after it ceased, however, its loathsome flesh continued to move, until finally a host of grotesque [url=https://i.imgur.com/FFGgSeL.png]man centipedes[/url] tore their way loose and began to spread around the bog.

By that time, though, Ganondorf and Jesse had no doubt navigated the crude, rotting wooden walkways just above the mire and found a sturdy door. Once forced open, they stepped out onto the third layer of Mercy Dreams, roughly opposite the side where Nadia had meddled with a mind flayer minutes before. This was an unorthodox place to enter the underground prison, but then again, he’d blazed an unorthodox trail. When the warlord used his linkpearl, the feral -being a little on edge- was the first to respond.

“Shhhh,” she shushed him gently. “We’re scattered around the prison. Lookin’ for the boss. There’s somethin’ weird about this place. Keep a low profile, will ya Big G? Good hearin’ from ya again, by the way. Thought we mighta parted ways for good back there.” Did she really like Ganondorf? Not really. Was he good to have around? Definitely. With the warlord (and allegedly, Jesse) in Mercy Dreams with her, Nadia felt a little less lonely. Plus, with a Toady on its way to deliver a requested key, things might get livelier very soon.