Dragoknighte

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

Mali Anson

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Location: Tinder's Place (Basement)
Skills: N/A

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The good news was that there probably were no more monster clown bitches to deal with in the immediate future, only the more of the same bullshit as usual. And Zoie's tone and body language was enough to indicate that she didn't have to be entirely on edge, ready to shoot people at the drop of a pin. But she still wasn't 100% convinced of anything. After all, the fog and weird haze were still there. The horror movie setting was still in place, the clown might have been a red herring. And the fact that the voices were familiar didn't mean that they didn't have ulterior motives.

Mali was still breathing pretty heavily, so she didn't answer Zoie's question immediately as she gathered what exactly just happened down in the basement.

"So, I went down into the basement and this balloon floats into view. And then suddenly there was this clown-thing with a voice like a gutter. And the moment I saw it I panicked, screamed, shot it and ran back up here." A small part of her brain chimed in that she had no definitive proof that the (presumably) dead clown in question was actually a monster responsible for all this, but the voices of life threatening horror and paranoia drowned it out rather effectively.

"I think that thing probably killed the Tinders and caused these weird blood spray marks. How, I don't want to know, and I don't want to go back down there and check on the body. I splattered its brains all over that basement, and the last thing I need right now is to see it stand back up." Why couldn't today just have panned out normally? Sure one might argue that it was her fault she was involved in all this Juno stuff, but Mali was certain that even the worst crimes and sins she committed combined did not produce nearly enough karma to warrant evil clown monsters.

🦄 The Paradoxical Emendation - Merged With T.S.

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Giosue Zino

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Location: Babylon Fortress, Cairo, Egypt
Skills: N/A

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"If it were not here, it would be bad as well," Gio said in reply to Sofia's last comment. "After all, it would mean we returned here for no reason. Although that might mean that time is more stable than we initially worried about. Regardless, the effect this haze is having on the local populace is worrisome, especially since Misters Grady and Keystone are out in the thick of it. It is fortunate we arrived in a fortified position such as this. A less stable arrangement such as a random run down storefront would be a far less secure situation. " After all, people could be just as dangerous and destructive as the Destruere given the right circumstances. Perhaps not individually, but there was something to be said for when numbers, malice and chaos were all thrown into the mix.

"Hmm, I feel two presences Northwards. One is relatively close by, that must be Nancy. The other... far more distant. Somewhere or somewhen. Perhaps it's Evelina," Gio mused outloud, mostly himself, but with enough volume for Sofia to hear. But he made not a single move to act on said musing. Him and Gilbert had decided to trust Faith to make the journey to locate Eve, to start chasing after her the moment they had a lead would be undermining the entire purpose of her ordeal and the resolve she made to throw herself into peril. Perhaps if there was more pertinent reasons to do so he would look into it further, but for the time being he would have to content himself with not knowing the source of the pull.

"So young Sophia, if you had to assume leadership of the remaining Paradoxes, what would your plan of action be for averting the End Times?" Gio asked casually, looking down at the city in chaos. The question was partially to pass the time while they waited for Gilbert and Peter's groups to return, but it was a serious inquiry as well. The number of perspectives were quite limited compared to what he was used to, and although the Paradoxes lacked the breadth of experiences the Emendators had, their fresh outlook could reveal things he might have missed. Sophia was literally the most perceptive person in the bunch so if anyone might have noticed something that had slipped past everyone else, it was probably her.

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

Mali Anson

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Location: Tinder's Place (Basement->First Floor)
Skills: Perception

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Mali wasn't sure how she managed to actually hit the clown, let alone actually get an instant kill. She'd never seriously fired a gun before now, perhaps it was just beginner's luck. She saw the bullet make its mark, but she still ran back up the stairs. Her body moved without her conscious input. Hell, even if she was thinking about what she was doing she would have ran. Horror movie logic dictated that clowns were immortal and guns almost never actually solved the problem. She wouldn't want to be around when the clown got back up.

By the time she got up the stairs and had slammed the door shut behind her, back to the door, she was hyperventilating. She stood there for a few seconds just catching her breath before she slowly slid down until her rear hit the ground. Mali dropped the gun before trying to pull herself together enough to answer Zoie.

"I'm okay. I think," Mali called out to calm her partner. She was pretty sure she had remained unharmed, but maybe she just did and didn't notice with the massive injection of adrenaline into her veins. However, she didn't really have time to come to terms with what had just occurred before somebody shouted in asking who they were and not to shoot. The voice sounded vaguely familiar, but she couldn't place where. The way he spoke also didn't sound like he was overtly hostile. But she did not just survive a monster clown to get killed by the first guy who used a really dumb trick to lower her guard.

Mali picked up the gun and waited. She wasn't going to fire at whoever was there, but she wasn't going to answer either. Any information given away in a situation like this could pose a major liability and if things came down to it, she'd rather be the one shooting again than being shot at.

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Roll Request

Action Attempted: Figure out who's asking the questions outside (number of people, potential amount of weapons involved, intentions, etc)
Skills called: Perception
Reason: Trying to listen for footsteps/additional voices, catch glimpses of anything (guns, additional cars on the street, etc) through windows
Desired Location: N/A

🦄 The Paradoxical Emendation - Merged With T.S.

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Giosue Zino

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Location: Babylon Fortress, Cairo, Egypt
Skills: N/A

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"We want to act moving forward on the principle of applying minimal necessary force. If we can get something done without resorting to power use or otherwise attention drawing tactics, we do it," Gio said, expanding upon the judgment call Gilbert made regarding Bart's idea. "It is good to be fully aware of all options on the table, but let us avoid 'jumping the gun' as far as resolving problems goes." Gio glanced around the room briefly before he walked across it to an unoccupied spot of wall and leaned back against it. Thousands of years of standing took a toll on the feet.

"But concerning what we do once we determine whether this haze indeed allows us true sight as The Glasses had. Young Faith has shouldered the responsibility of finding Evelina, so naturally we need to work towards averting this End of Days. To stop it, we must first know the source of this cataclysm. But before even that, we need to properly regroup. As Gilbert pointed out, Nancy knows we're here. Our presence alone should tip her off that we need to meet once again. Not to mention the haze that appears to be following us around like a skunk's spray. Unless we run into something that truly needs immediate redress after we have properly assessed our current situation, then we can configure a concrete plan of action." Gio took a moment to pause, thinking over something before he spoke again, although his expression hinted that whatever that thought was, it wasn't related to the topic he addressed in speech.

"I think I shall stay here. At the very least, one of us need to stay behind so that should Mister Grady and Peter return prematurely they do not find themselves in an empty fortress." Out of the corner of his eye, Gio noticed something change outside on the streets. It appeared Cairo was whipping itself into a frenzy.

"Ah. Lovely. Just what we needed."

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

Mali Anson

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Location: Tinder's Place (Basement)
Skills: Perception, Athletics, Weight Lifting

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Mali was already pretty on edge. She liked nothing about the situation she was in, which could apply to a lot of things that had happened over the past few weeks, but none of them could quite touch the feeling of impending doom that walking into a horror movie brought along with it. And the balloon blocking her view of the spooky basement didn't help in the slightest. But when she saw the clown a few things happened. First, in some distant corner of her mind, she was relieved that she had made semi-proper preparations. Furthermore, that at least the horror movie monster wasn't a zombie or some other undead thing was another thing to be grateful for.

Second, she screamed. Really loudly in a much higher pitch than one would think possible for her frame. Perhaps if this were some movie or tv show where she was an always above it all, cooler than thou protagonist she would have had some appropriate quip to throw at the abomination before her, but as it stood, the vast majority of her mind was in abject terror. And finally, she pointed the gun at the clown and opened fire. If the scream wasn't enough to hear, then the gunshots sure as hell should. After a few rounds, regardless of whether they hit or not, she turned back around and sprinted as quickly as she could out of that basement. If that clown had killed the Tinders... well she didn't want her blood exploded out of her either.

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Roll Request

Actions Attempted: Shoot the Clown, Get the fuck out of the basement, Shut the door behind her
Skills: Perception, Athletics, Weight Lifting
Reason for each skill being called: Perception to assist in aiming the gun at the clown, Athletics for bravely running away, Weight Lifting to keep that door as sealed shut as her muscles will allow
Desired Location: Out of the basement

🦄 The Paradoxical Emendation - Merged With T.S.

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Giosue Zino

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Location: Babylon Fortress, Cairo, Egypt
Skills: N/A

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Gio didn't expect the portal to seal shut as quickly as it did, but with a second thought, he came to the conclusion that he should have. After all, he couldn't do much more but delay the collapse of the time loop; why wouldn't his other Watch related abilities be weakened as well? It was something of a small miracle that it worked in the first place. Perhaps it went even farther than that however. Maybe all "supernatural" abilities were in a state of flux and liable to fail. But that was a level of contemplation not necessary at that moment. He just resolved to be more judicious than usual moving forward.

Gio wasn't too concerned about his clothes not fitting in. He wore a normal suit, and the styling for a men's three piece hadn't really changed all that much in the 19 years between the current era and that of the Camp. Any differences from style likely wouldn't be noticed unless his outfit was studied more thoroughly than possible with a passing glance or he happened to run into some unexpected fashionista, and even then they could be written off rather easily. Truly, the major issue with his outfit was how hot it was likely to get. It might have been October, but he knew from experience that even then it could still get far toastier than he'd prefer and his suits dark coloration did not help things in the slightest.

"It would be best to avoid engaging any Destruere you may happen to come across, Young Bartholomew. Each and every one of you is too valuable to us. They are dangerous foes and we are under-equipped to lock horns, so to speak. Although I am not saying to not defend yourself if attacked, generally it is better to flee if possible in this hypothetical situation. And ah yes, excellent thinking, Mr. Grady. Do take care on your trip. Stay out of trouble." At Sophia's question his mind suddenly blanked. At any other moment he would have been able to answer the question with ease, but now it was as if the answer never was there to begin with and his face showed it.

"My apologies, Miss Harris. As foolish as it sounds, I can't remember right now. It's as if my keys aren't where I thought they were and now they don't seem to be anywhere in the house." It only occurred to him after he said it that speaking in a metaphor opened the door to others running with it too far and then confusing the less abstractly minded in the conversation. Oh well, too late now.

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

Mali Anson

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Location: Tinder's Place
Skills: Perception

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"Dunno, could be one of a hundred different things. Is it that weird that the CEO of a company that was buddy-buddy with Queensguard would know about the death of an FBI agent so close to home?" Perhaps a half-hearted attempt at explaining why Caesar and pals could/would know about Marc's death, but she had more important things on her mind. Like figuring out what the hell happened that had the blood vaporizing like this. She wasn't any criminology expert or whatever, so she couldn't say for certain that there wasn't a reasonable way for blood to splatter like the way if had. But, unless the Tinders were testing out a new blood-colored spray-paint on their carpet, there wasn't anything she could come up with that would explain this.

Another issue was why the haze wasn't getting any better. It didn't look like the smoke she'd been seeing earlier, and the fact that it seemed to be everywhere she looked only pissed her off. Mali rubbed her eyes again. Still nothing. She really hoped she hadn't suddenly developed cataracts.

Alright. So Mali was confronted with a choice. Either follow the bloodstains upstairs, or down into the spooky basement. Her intuition told her that the answers were more likely in the spooky basement and that checking upstairs first was likely a waste of time. However, since she was in a horror movie at the moment, the psycho killer/Satan spawn/swamp monster was also hanging down there too. Or it was like that one Home Alone movie where there actually wasn't anything down there and it was just really spooky. Regardless, she didn't want to go down there. But she didn't want to waste her time either. Finally, she decided that she would settle the decision via eenie meenie miney mo, only for it to tell her to go into the basement.

"Hey Zoie," Mali yelled across the house. "I'm going down to check out the basement. If you hear me scream, there's probably a demonic monster down there. In that case some back-up would be very much appreciated." Mali pulled the gun out of her back pocket, checked that the safety was off and took the trip into the underground. At the very least, if there was a monster down there and it tried to go after her, she would be ready to shoot at it rather than get mauled while fumbling for a weapon.

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Roll Request

Action Attempted: Make sure the basement is safe and secure
Skills used: Perception
Reason for skill: She's really paranoid and on the lookout for spooky monsters
Desired Location: Basement, although that probably doesn't need to be factored in here

🦄 The Paradoxical Emendation - Merged With T.S.

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Giosue Zino

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Location: Outside Camp Au Ville->Babylon Fortress, Cairo, Egypt
Skills: The Watch Act I: Time Portals

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Gio was the last one to step through the portal to Cairo, and by the time he had, the haze had already set in. Not one second later, the portal closed behind him and he looked to the Paradoxes and Gilbert with him.

"I believe you're owed an explanation for what's going on with this particular excursion," he said, primarily addressing the young Paradoxes, but also to Gil and Peter to a lesser extent. It never hurt to make sure everyone was one the same page. "I do not recall if you have ever been told this explicitly, but in the past we had a fifth Emendator. He was The Glasses, and he had what you might call True Sight. He was the only one of us who could see the Destruere. He never told us much about what he saw. However, thanks to Young Bartholomew, I was reminded of one thing he did mention: a haze of sorts when he utilized his abilities."

"If my hunch is correct and the glimmer that currently plagues us is the same effect as utilizing The Glasses, then that's a major boon moving forward towards this End of Days. We lack the time to properly study this phenomena so the best I could think of is taking us to the last known location of Destruere. Assuming they haven't left the area, which is probably not the case, we can locate them and confirm whether or not this is the case. Any questions?"

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

Mali Anson

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Location: Tinder's Place
Skills: Perception

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Mali blinked hard. What the hell? And then she tried rubbing her eyes. No, it was still there. Only her vision seemed affected. It didn't feel like allergies, and it wasn't quite that time of year yet. And she doubted that she suddenly developed a need for glasses all of a sudden. Zoie seemed to be going through the same shit as well. Maybe it was the smoke and fog blowing over and affecting them. That seemed like the most likely explanation for all this.

Regardless, the screaming and hollering at least cut through the puzzle of the weird blurring. It wasn't interfering with he ability to actually do anything for the most part. The other people at the scene and the fate of the Tinders themselves were far more pressing issues.

"If it was them, then this is probably connected to Marc's death. Maybe Juno is already here ahead of us. Or it could be someone else entirely." She couldn't answer Zoie's rhetorical question. Hell, she was asking herself the same thing, but standing around clueless wouldn't help anything. Now that they were alone once again, they had some time to properly investigate. Not to mention Mali could let herself chill out a bit since she didn't have to worry about unfamiliar people busting in to shoot at her and/or Zoie.

Well, investigate as well as she could with what felt like a simultaneous case of mild near and farsightedness. But what happened to the Tinders? Were they dead? Kidnapped? Bound and tied somewhere hidden? Simply knocked unconscious and she'd not seen them earlier? Even if she couldn't answer most of her other questions, Mali was reasonably confident she could at least learn the truth of the matter at hand.

"Did you see anything out there Zoie? I'm going to scope this place out." Mali rubbed her eyes. Nope. Still blurred.

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Roll Request

Action Attempted: Figure out what the hell happened in this house
Skills: Perception
Reason: Perception to pick out details of the crime scene for any clues
Desired Location: N/A

🦄 The Paradoxical Emendation - Merged With T.S.

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Giosue Zino

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Location: Outside Camp Au Ville
Skills: The Watch Act I: Time Portals

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"Just because you can speak does not mean that you should comment on every change you see." Gio spoke, in his head, he was speaking specifically to Bartholomew asking the obvious question of whether the otherworldly shimmering was normal, but when spoken aloud he left it without a direct "address". Of course it wasn't normal. Could he not see? Gods.

Wait.

See. Shimmer. Why did these things seem to connect together in his head? Ah yes. Drem did mention that one time. Gio suddenly stopped in his tracks.

"Sir Gilbert. Do you perchance recall a conversation with Drem we had some 135 years ago? I could give you the precise date, but I doubt that would help you much. The conversation was unrelated to the event at hand for the most part, but he happened to mention something about shimmering when he saw things. I could hypothesize one hundred explanations for what this shimmering is, but I believe that it might allow us to see reality for what it truly is. Perhaps it really is how they say: one door closes and another one opens. There's only one real way to check if this hypothesis is correct. Find those who hide from mortal sight. If you catch my drift." Gio pulled out the Watch and opened up a time portal back to that fateful time and place where Peter met his end for the second time.

"Everyone, come along, we could use as much help as possible. And it will be good experience for you all. I can answer any questions you may have on the other side, but time is short and it is unseemly to hang around this time and location any longer. Forgive me Peter for dragging you back. Under no ordinary circumstances would I subject you to this. I understand if you wish to avoid returning while we investigate this hunch of mine."