Nono, Castle Tepes

Nono let her attention settle on Saber as she took command of the situation and the managing of the defenses, with no opposition to speak of. That was only reasonable, and she listened intently for whatever might be said next, in terms of handling their current situation. As expected, Jack was kept in his current position, to defend the Eye up close and make sure that nothing happened to it. It didn't take the keenest tactical mind to figure out the wiseness of that decision.

"Understood," she agreed with a nod when Saber concurred with her own silent deduction, that she would be best suited outside, where her weapons could be used to their full effect. But that was Onee-sama for you, and if anyone would figure it out it would be her. The Shadow Eternity had no idea what would be waiting for them when they showed up.

She glanced over as Gintoki returned, smiling as she waved. She'd known that he would come back eventually, and this just saved her the trouble of going out and dragging him back by his collar, which made his voluntary return that much more preferable for him, though he wouldn't know it. But with that done she turned her attention back to Saber, to hear what else the King of Knights would have to say in the coordination of their defense strategy.

---

Misaka 10032, Academy City

Misaka was annoyed that her bullets missed their target once more, but she could not complain as Kakine managed to use his dark matter to moor the Witch in place, keeping her from fleeing. And if she did manage to slip free at this point then there were other Sisters close enough to aid in the pursuit and stopping her. By now, the crisis was over.

"Greetings, Kamijou Touma," she said as she lowered her goggles and resumed her aim at Marisa, just on the off chance that she did think up some way to escape this. Otherwise, she would let Kakine handle things. He was the one working the ropes after all, and she couldn't let bystanders proximity interfere with this. They didn't need Aleister being any more annoyed with them any more than he was already.

---

Ilyasviel von Einzbern,Foecrusher

Ilya glanced around as troops marched onto the ship, forming a practical army to attack this one place. Well then, that showed just how important this must be, if they were wiling to commit such a large force to it. Of course, she saw the fodder for what it was, but it wouldn't hurt. At least they would point out the ones that she could have fun with. especially when it came to this 'Clark', or whomever. She could manage it, just as she always had.

A shudder ran through the vessel as the engines fired and took them away, en route to their target. She considered getting in some sleep, but that was interrupted as the big ugly thing began practically yelling into the intercom, going on about how he was in charge of this and they had better listen to him or else. It was loud, and distracting, so she was forced to pay attention to it, even if she planned on doing what she wanted once they got to the fight anyway.

As far as the plan went, it wasn't terrible. In fact, it was a half decent, if incredibly simply plan. And they had the numbers to pull it off, if that thing he was pointing at could actually do what it was supposed to do. She'd hold off judgment until she actually saw it happen.

"Sounds fine by me," she commented with a dismissive wave, still relaxing in her seat. "Just try not to ruin the Eye, alright? I didn't come all this way for nothing." That said, she glanced over at the other people of interest, the various knights, warriors, and the like. "Nice sword," she added to the lady with the Katana, which was a sincere statement since she knew her blades. If the ork wanted to go on, then more power to him, but she'd stopped listening.

Raditz answered the girl's question by forcing his ki downwards, lifting him off the ground to float lazily a foot in the air. "Do not forget my might!" he warned the girl. She was brave, to give lip to the mighty Saiyan warrior Raditz. Too much, and he would CRUSH her!

He raised two hands, pointing towards the zombie grunts, and demanded a pertinent piece of information. "Are these the enemies that drop the true prize of pudding?"

Dr. Facilier gave a satisfied grin to Hi-hat. "Looks like everything's movin' smoothly," the bokur said. He checked a pocket watch. "Though we did spend a lot of time out in the courtyard; I don't know if we'll be able to do the rest of our business here before they're attacked."

Facilier did a good job of hiding the fact that he was mostly in for relieving some of his debt to the Loa (upon someone else).



Lucina, following Kakine and Misaka, stopped with her sword drawn as she witnessed Marisa... get trapped in a mass of dark matter. "Um... okay. I suppose my assistance isn't needed," Lucina said with a shrug, sheathing Falchion and approaching the suspended Marisa. "She's obviously some sort of mage..."

Lucina turned to Kakine. "I'll be happy to retrieve her possessions if she needs them; if you must keep the restraint on her, by all means, do so. Apparently she's more dangerous than I am, judging by the relative ruckus that's erupted in her capture..."



Supernatural defenses?

Rasputin twiddled his fingers. "Ah, but they do not know the black magic of Rasputin..." the Russian lich sneered to himself. "Yes, the forces of darkness shall be unleashed once we take the Eye..."

Rasputing hungrily fingered his reliquary. "Soon, my minions," he tittered. "Soon..."

And so as Chuck sped out from the treacherous landscape that was the Sea of Silt, he found himself racing over an actual body of water. Truly it was mysterious, and not so mysterious considering he had just gotten through past the Sea of Silt. Peering down at the mini-map he realized that he had much more land to traverse. This was supported by a simple glimpse out into the horizon. His vision was stopped by a dense amount of foliage. Made sense considering it actually could be sustained by the actual water near it. But clearly it was not the Ivory Wastes that were talked about earlier.

Chuck gave a small pat to the frame of the hover-bike. "Don't die out on me here. At the least you won't be running through swarms to speed the demise." He muttered out knowing that, at least generally, being stuck in a horrific barren wasteland was always a recipe for disaster. And more to the point, being stuck out here would just be a plain boring situation of doom. Chuck knew that replacing the fuel source for his hover-bike would be a pain in the ass here. And risking it through lengthy travel would be a bad idea.

Luckily for Chuck, the camera-operator seemed to realize that as well. The power armored camera-man hovered towards Chuck, "Oh Chuck! Thank goodness I found you because if I di-" Chuck was quick to respond, "My fuel source would've probably died out here."

"Yeah!" The camera-man responded. "Uuuh good thing we thought about that." Chuck gave a simple nod to the man. "Now as long as your teleporter still has juice..."

Knowing that Chuck left this pause for a reason the camera-operator responded, "Oh yeah. This is a local transport, shouldn't use up too much. Should have plenty for getting to the other segments and studios." Chuck took in the news and felt a touch relieved. "Toss it up would ya, Dave?" Chuck said, while name dropping the name of the cameraman.

Dave did just that as he tossed down the small orb device towards the ground. It flickered a bright blue light from a central piece on the top. Emerging from the orb was the spherical burst of energy which encapsulated Chuck and Dave.

As long as Dave set the right coordinates, everything would go as planned and the pair would be whisked away to the Ivory Wastes.


Most fortunately for Chuck, Dave did in fact set the right coordinates. The orb appeared between the two, and Dave collected it and began examining it. "Hey Chuck, why don't you do a test-run and I'll set us back to go to, I think you got just a little time before a segment? I'll program this to the Studio."

Chuck simply took the dialogue in wordlessly. His thoughts were being devoted to the examination of the landscape. It certainly was different compared to the vast terrain of sand that he was dealing with before. It was far more jagged.

"Not bad." Chuck remarked noticing that this environment would be far more suitable for motocross racing, due to its inherent obstacles in the very landscape itself. And with that he unleashed the speed of his hover-bike once more.

"Man, flying's always impressive," Kelly said, waving her hand under Raditz. "Yeah, you're good, handsome. But uh... that doesn't smell like pudd-"

Kelly retched a little.

"Oh god. Oh god I can smell rancid milk and rotting meat. J...just come on please."

As the two flew over the horde of shuffling zombies, Kelly's cheeks puffed up further and further. Thankfully, the smell of chlorinated water greeted them as they entered a large room... with the walls painted in a tropical vista as skeletons lazed about in a pool down below. On a marble surface, before a statue of the Virgin Mary (who neither the alien or criminal from a universe where god is a horse dragon thing recognized), a Skeleton had set up a fancy bar and was shaking up drinks. Around the statue, shelves held fine vintage alcohol and old-fashioned iceboxes. A red skeleton sat on a large rock, a bit of white gunk over its nose signifying it as a life guard.

"Urgh... looks like they set up some kinda pool... I'm... I'm gonna get something to settle my stomach."

She tried to sneak around, but a skeleton looked her dead in the eye... and went back to trying to swim. It seemed the skeletons weren't going to start anything just yet. Kelly made her way down to the bar as the skeleton bartender began shaking up something.

See, Raditz the Saiyan was a man with priorities. Ambitious priorities. And now, his true ambition lied beyond gaining power, beyond usurping Frieza, beyond the defeat of the God of Destruction Beerus. No, this was truly the most ambitious goal of all.

To obtain the legendary pudding.

"Woman!" Raditz called out, still floating amidst the bones that floated in the water that smelled of chemicals. He made zero effort for stealth. "Where are these creatures! I need to slay them immediately!"

Seiga - Seiga's Retreat, Unknown

"Mm. Not this one, either.", Seiga mumbled as she tossed a gold ring off onto the rejection pile. Next, she held up a wide, flat brush, of the sort one would use to apply varnish. The hairs were stained black from apparent use, and the bristles had an oddly silky quality about them for such a stiff brush. She swished it experimentally, feeling a twinge of power. Wonderful! Looks like the Teigus hadn't been a total loss after all. It was instinctive, calling upon a basic resonance in her being that wasn't entirely unlike using her chisel. She tapped it slowly with her finger, and the brush began so seep a dull black ink, almost like the sort used in calligraphy. She flicked her wrist, and the brush left a thick, solid line hanging in midair. She touched the line carefully, confirming that it was indeed a solid barrier formed of the brush's paintlike substance. Perfect. Now to dispose of the other ones that hadn't worked- after all, if they weren't of any use to herself, why keep them around?

"Yoshika, dear."
"Huh? Who's there?"
"Could you come here for a moment?"
"Okaaaaay~"

"...Yoshika?"
"Huh? Who's there?"
Seiga pinched the bridge of her nose.
"I'll just bring them over."

A short while later, Yoshika was happily munching away at the magical WMDs, finishing up the book.
"Nyuh-Nyuh"
"Don't speak with your mouth full, dear."
Yoshika swallowed.
"Nyan-Nyan, can I keep this one?", she held up the breastplate with a small gem what looked like a topaz.
"...Certainly, yes. Let me strap it on for you.", Seiga replied.
"Thanks, Nyan-Nyan! You're the best!", Yoshika said cheerfully as her master tightened the breastplate's straps. Had she attuned to it? Could teigus be given to the dead? Was that something that could be done? Seiga pondered these things as she helped the zombie don her new armor.
"After you finish with these, do your exercises, okay?"
"Roger!", Yoshika struggled to give a salute, but the best she could manage was some uncomfortable-sounding popping noises and pivoting her arm about twenty degrees upwards.

As Yoshika did her afternoon calisthenics, Seiga turned towards a different task. The paintbrush, though a nice trinket, would not be enough to defeat Suiki. Seiga needed something with a little more kick to it, something that let her take the offensive. She lit incense, cast bones, and read tea leaves, amassing information bit by bit until she had found her next location.

"Yoshika?"
"Uh huh?"
"I think we'll be paying somebody else a visit. How do you feel about alchemy?"
"Is it a food?"
Seiga chuckled, "It may very well be, my pet."

Geo and Omega-Xis - Castle Tepes

Geo just stayed put and listened to what was going on. It made sense that a couple of their teammates had their positions worked out now, but it only made him more curious as to what Saber had in mind for him and Omega-Xis. He turned to see Saber out and caught Gintoki on his way back in. "Oh, hey, you're back," he greeted him.

"Oh! Hey! You're back!" Omega-Xis gruffly greeted to Gintoki as well, "'bout time you got back here. Something weird you out just as much outside as it did inside?"

While Blake wasn't being rough with the injured Cinder, she wasn't exactly going out of her way to treat her gently. The Dust vials had gone into an empty pouch on her own belt, although she'd hesitated for a second as she picked up the Black Dust. A shiver went down her spine, and she hurriedly put it away too, resolving to hand it over to the UMMA as soon as possible.

The faunus had also winced as she saw Dlanor's wound, but she'd read about the inquisitor's healing capabilities and wasn't quite as worried. She turned to inspect the third member of the small party, her yellow eyes inspecting him cooly now that they weren't in the middle of a battle.

"Are you the only other agent in the area?" She asked Kanji after a moment, raising one eyebrow slightly.

Kanji was weirded out by the bleeding ladies lack of care and way of talking. "If you say so." Turning his head, he noticed Blake looking at him, and gave her a cocky cool guy grin. Before he could say anything Blake asked him a question. "Agent? What are you talking about?" He said with a confused look on his face.

"QVESTION TWO! ARE YOU CURRENTLY VORKING FOR OR HAVE YOU EVER VORKED FOR EIN MILITARY, MILITARIZED COMPANY, OFFICIAL CRIMINAL ORGANIZATION, STREET GANG, OR HORDE OF ZE DAMNED?!"

TV Fly caught the riding crop as it nearly slapped him in the eye again. Even as the large print options for the deaf scrolled, TV-fly glared at Starfish Hitler.

"I swear to god you fucking kraut if you hit me with that one more time I'll turn you into seafood bratwurst."

---

Skin pale from nausea, Kelly clutched her stomach and looked at Raditz.

"What is it with you and pudding? I'm pretty sure that the Perseph-"
"WELCOME!"

The Skeleton Bartender threw the drink tumbler at Kelly, hitting her dead on. As it did, she began backing away, looking down, and then to Raditz with a look of terror in her eyes... as she slowly turned to stone. The Crobat stared in horror before landing on the statuesque Rocket Grunt's shoulder and nudging her, trying to get her to move. The skeleton proceeded to mix up another drink, shaking the tumbler and preparing to throw it at Raditz.

"THIS ONE'S FOR YOU!"

Sawyer wasn't sure what to think about the two...things giving the interview. Calling them people just didn't seem right. "No. Maybe. Yes. Yes and No." She just hoped this wasn't some kind of joke.

The walk back inside the mansion was fairly uneventful, save for the few maids that gave him odd glances as he walked by. Well, that much was to be expected; after what had just transpired, he was bound to be looked down upon by them... And probably everyone else, but that didn't really bother him as much as it should have. So what if they looked down on him for such a thing? Wasn't their problem.

The fact that he had met everyone already filing out of the dungeon probably meant that the worst of this crap was over and that he could safely assume that someone else was dealing with that giant-ass crystal instead... Which was convenient, to be sure.

"Planning a defense, you say...?" he asked, nodding his head in faked understanding. "Alright, since this place is about as crazy as it gets, I'll let you decide for me."

Well, hopefully enough, he'd get paired with someone that wouldn't call him out for his own... Well, even in his mind he hesitated calling it 'fear'... Maybe dislike was a more apt term for the situation. Either way...

Choosing to let the cyber-kid's and his pet robo-alien thing's words pass through one ear and out the other, Gintoki sighed and sheathed his bokuto for the moment. It was much less effort to keep it at his side than carry it around in that position the entire time, after all...


Ignoring Index's complaints about the entire ordeal, Kakine turned to Lucina and nodded his head in approval of her offer. Letting the crazy magician bounce around like she usually did would probably lead to more headache for everyone involved, and though he didn't like having to restrain her as he did it seemed to be quite necessary.

"That'd be nice, though gathering up what seems to be a crate's worth of goods seems to be... A bit of a daunting task." he said as he slowly reeled in his catch. As soon as she was close enough, Kakine turned over to Touma, who at this point was greeting 10032 like it was nothing out of the ordinary.

"Kamijou Touma. The witch still has custody of Magic God Othinus, correct?"
"...Yeah, I'm pretty sure she does."

Sighing, Kakine put his hands on the net, which immediately probed around Marisa's pockets and found the person in question. Pulling her out with no effort to spare, the Dark Matter immediately spat her out and into Touma's hands.

"Well, that should resolve that issue. Excuse us for taking up your time like this." Kakine stated as he turned towards the Windowless Building, Marisa still in tow. "Whenever you're ready, we're heading out."


Hazama tossed a furtive glance at the weird person... Thing floating inside the containment unit. It reminded him heavily of a Murakumo unit, they way it looked, which gave him a pretty good idea of how to deal with the hermit, given half the chance. He'd have to work for it, sure, but if he got to...

The Leader's words, however, seemed to have more of an impact on him than his own desire for revenge, and he nodded his head, digging through his thoughts with his eyes closed (even if they always seemed to be closed anyhow).

"Yeah, I think so too. But it's gonna be difficult getting that signature without forging it. If we have documents on hand, I could probably do the job myself..." he trailed off before shaking his head. "And even then, I'm not entirely sure that hermit would be compliant. Just out of curiosity... Do you, by any chance, have a soul I could use? I could craft myself some backup just in case things went south."

Well, better to be safe than sorry, right?

Queen Tepes gave Jack a happy grin. "Not all of my maids know how to prepare sushi, but I know for a fact that Rei does. She even works like a refrigerator, it's pretty useful!"

The benefits of having a yuki-onna working in your kitchen were many. Even before the installation of various forms of technology in the castle, she had an excellent way of keeping unprepared ingredients nice and cool. It helped that Rei seemed to have very few issues with standing still for extended periods of time. "I'll send a few maids down when it's ready. I also have some tending to the dungeons, so feel free to ask any of them for anything you need! Thanks again!"

With another quick smile, she turned and sprinted up the stairs, past the UMMA agents. So there were people lost in her kitchen then... how did that even happen? Whatever. She'd tell Rei about the sushi and then see what the apparently travelling salespeople at her gate wanted.

Meanwhile, Saber had expected that Nono would not find any error in her judgement of the robotic girl being placed outside. That allowed her to use her larger, ranged attacks more effectively. For this reason, Saber intended to place herself outside as well. This did as little damage to the castle as possible and allowed her to use Excalibur's ranged functions(albeit not the fortress-destroying full extent for fear of harming an ally) in order to keep their enemies at bay. "Nono, would you accept being placed on the roof? I believe you may be able to attack targets approaching from all sides, or launch a counter assault on them them from above if you do."

"Geo," she continued, addressing the boy, "I do not know what abilities you possess in detail. However, my understanding leads me to believe that you may be suited to holding the interior of the castle. Do you believe this is suitable?"

She paused for a moment, then faced Gintoki as well. "Gintoki, as you seem most suited to close combat, I wish to pair you with Geo in defending the castle's interior. Do you agree?"

Ultimately these people were her fellow agents, whom Saber had nothing but respect for. As such, she felt it necessary to confirm that they agree with her assessment of their capabilities. The next task would be to assemble all the maids capable of combat in the ideal locations. As they were servants, the ideal outcome would be that they were never forced to fight. However, chances were slim that the outcome would be ideal.



Marisa grumbled as Othinus was retrieved from her pocket, and some new girl talked about collecting all her stuff. Well... if she did, maybe it'd be easier to get it back into her hat all together. Wait... that guy ran the city or something didn't he? The one she had to go see... well, now the Perfectly Ordinary Witch knew exactly what one of the demands she would make of him was! She'd dress up that tiny girl yet!

Waving her hand as best she could while restrained by all the dark matter. "Fine, fine, let's go see him..."



The katana-wielding woman sighed. Oh, wonderful. The hulking brute was forgetting his position.

"I'm suspecting the Leader intended for us to work together," she began resting her cheek on her hand as she leaned on the arm of her seat. "Not for one person to take charge without bothering to learn anyone else's skillset. A distraction-based plan is fine, but have you considered that simply throwing our soldiers up against the front gate is liable to end in a bloodbath rather then anything viable? I'm certain they'd rather avoid that just as I would."

She glanced at the soldiers. Not a single one seemed to be flinching, but it was difficult to tell under all the dark gear they were wearing. Still, it was a disciplined group. Good. "Now, that's not to say you don't have something good there, but trying to shut down all discussion by threatening to start a fight with your allies is going to end up with a lot of people dying unnecessarily. On top of that, we need to place all the teleportation devices on the Eye, they may very well have defenses in there as well. While, as I said, a distraction is a good place to start, perhaps some contributions from the other operatives are in order?"

If he attacked her for this, their arrival would take far, far too long.



A soul...? What an odd request.

But as someone who had traveled the multiverse even before founding this organization, the Leader had no shortage of resources. Even the unusual ones she did not expect to be useful immediately had been gathered for the purposes of furthering their progress. After all, who knew when they would be useful?

"You're in luck," she began, reaching into her cloak, "I've collected many things in my time, and to be honest was unsure of how this would be useful... to me, at least."

The item she produced was perhaps unlike the souls Hazama was used to, but nevertheless it was a soul, and a brilliant one at that. It floated above the Leader's slight palm, an orb of white flame blazing like the sun.

Tails - Outside of Castle Tepes

Tails had really no idea where he was at all he was legitimately lost and he had no idea where he was but he knew it wasn't anywhere close to home so he decided if he couldn't pinpoint exactly where he was he was going to have to handle the situation as best as he could he could see that the place where he was now is inhabited and could see a castle in the distance and some people talking so he knew this place must be somewhat civilized but he always came back to the fact that he had no idea where he was.

Tails kicked a rock in anger.

"Stupid me!"

Tails grumbled to himself, he knew that this was going to be something that he was going to have to figure out himself but he also didn't feel inclined to return to his home.

He knew he was on a different plane of existence but he didn't know which one so Tails just sat there getting aggravated and muttering in anger to himself.

Tails knew he was hopeless but that wasn't the reason he was upset it was because he was all alone in a place full of people and things that he doesn't know.

Tears ran down his cheeks as he sat on the ground and then he started crying because he didn't know where he was and he was surrounded by strangers and he had no one to talk to or relate with.

How typical; the brainless thug was attempting to direct what everyone else would be doing and trying to assert its superiority through force of arms. Not that the plan was entirely without merit--except for the flaw in pointlessly assailing a defensive position whilst trying to undermine it to create a breach--but the brute behind it was far too full of itself.

"A plan reliant on the survival of a single beast is inherently flawed in its premise, especially because your plan assumes that getting a small force inside would be sufficient to storm a castle," the ex-paladin stated, looking at the umber hulk with disinterest. It was burly, for certain, but not so durable that its survival could be relied upon. Kerri had, in the past, killed a more exemplary specimen, "Forgetting that, as a castle, it was built with defence in mind, and this plan would allow all the defenders to retreat unharmed to block a small tunnel. A better plan of action would be to create a large breach in the defences--such as by tunnelling and then collapsing as much of a wall as possible.

"Sorcerous protection might render such an approach invalid, and a better use for that creature's ability to dig would be to break through the gates." Or its gaze could just confuse the defenders; that was a good backup.

Kerri lifted up the curved blade, just in case the green thing carried through with its attempt at mutiny, and looked at it closely, "I would advise against issuing threats in the future, I will not be so accommodating a second time."

---

With everyone else having gone through whilst the Railgun was still behind the podium, it was at least clear that the strange gateway was pretty safe. So, with no fanfare aside from taking hold of the lost girl's hand to lead her through, Misaka followed the others to this 'Pensee' place.

Nono, Castle Tepes

Nono continued to listen calmly as Saber went through the defensive plans for the castle, addressing each member of the group and telling them where to go and what they could do to defend this place. They'd be a spread a bit thin if there was a large attack, but they were all strong enough that they could handle it. At least, she was fairly certain of that, since she couldn't judge what the Shadow Eternity might throw at them next.

"Of course Onee-sama," she said with a nod and a smile. "You can count on me." And that was said with all the determination that it deserved, since she expected as much. She would do what she could to protect this place and fight off any attackers, and she would not let Saber down. Any attackers would have another thing coming, that much was for sure.

That said she returned to waiting for Saber to finish so they could move on with their preparations. They had the time, and once it was set up then they would be able to deal with whatever might be coming. So she was confident in her chances.

---

Misaka 10032, Academy City

With Marisa back in custody the situation was rapidly resolved, Touma's involvement no longer needed or required. It certainly could have turned out worse, and this time there had been no significant property damage either. That immediately put it above several other incidents in Academy City's recent history, though the new arrivals wouldn't know about that to be sure.

She nodded back to Kakine before giving her attention to the unfortunate boy in front of her. "Until next time," she said as a goodbye before heading off after the others, alert for any more breakout attempts and keeping the Sisters in reserve as they headed for the Windowless Building to meet with Aleister.

---

Ilyasviel von Einzbern, Foecrusher

Okay, so maybe the argument wouldn't be over that fast. Well, there were some good points presented as well, and she certainly hadn't given it much thought before. So now Ilyasviel found herself sitting up to keep better track of the situation, before it turned into a fight or something. She wasn't going to caught unawares.

So she added her piece to this business. "Well, when it comes to magical defenses we've got me and Mr. Crazy over there to take care of it," she said, gesturing over to Rasputin. The guy was a creep, but he might be useful in this case. There was only one way to find out really, and she wasn't hinging all her hopes on that at the end of the day.

With that said, she turned to the other matter, that of breaking through the defenses. "I don't suppose anyone knows how the previous attacks went off," she asked, looking around. "That could help us figure out what they're expecting from us." That was all she was willing to say for now, while the three of them argued it out.

---

Cinder Fall, Museum World

Cinder sighed as she walked along, ignoring the crackling flames around her as the fire department finally got around to putting out the museum fire that she had started. Well, that had taken long enough. Someone wasn't doing a very good job here, were they?

At the same time, she listened to the ongoing conversation while noting the vial of black Dust that Blake had taken. Well, here was hoping that she could handle it. Or rather, couldn't. It was dangerous and powerful, and who knew what might happen before it could be safely disposed of?

"I wish it was as easy for me to get competent help," she said before coughing, a slight shudder running through her form in the process before she straightened up as if nothing had been wrong. But she knew that wasn't the case. It was very unfortunate, but there was nothing to do about it, not now. She would not play the rest of her hand just yet.

Arragoz Plizgin - Da Foekrusha

"I'z figgr'd you'z humies were used to sluggin' it out, like da gitz back 'ome. But, If'n ya don't wants ta jus hit da frunt, go ahead 'n' split up, just keep em dis'strak'd." So long as they weren't in the way when the Kommando reached the Eye, the finer details were hardly an issue.

Now, as for the armoured humie's complaints. "Ya know, if'n ya wants to bust a gate open or krakk a wall, I'z k'n fink uv a betta way to do it." Reaching into his backpack, the Ork withdrew an odd-looking red cylinder: a Melta Bomb.

"See dis? It'z wunna da few fings da humies back 'ome made dat's wurth nickin'. I'z can't show ya 'ere, but it'z proppa killy, 'n' it can melt just abowt anyfing, frum plasteel beems to wunna dem humie 'Bayneblaydes.' Plant a few a dese at da wallz, 'n' dey'll fall proppa fast."

"As fer da gate, I'z got sumfing spesshul fer dat." Delving into the pack once again, Arragoz withdrew an ungodly contraption which resembled a number of Orkoid hand grenades wired together and slaved to a single pin.

"Say 'ello to da Super Stikkbomb. Krumps humie trukks 'n' tanks just fine, 'n' I don't fink sum fancy door iz gunna be much 'arder dan that. Since I'z gonna be sneakin' in," The Greenskin paused mid-sentence, and proceeded to toss it to the armoured humie. "You'z gets ta use it. While I know you'z humies ain't very kunnin', it shuldn't be 'ard fer ya to figger out. Just pull da pin, 'n' throw da uvver part."

When the armoured humie decided to threaten Arragoz, he simply sneered, and responded in kind.

"Dat'z a proppa good joke, humie. You'z gotz any more?"

Geo and Omega-Xis - Castle Tepes

"Yes, ma'am. That sounds suitable to me." The young boy stood at attention and saluted to Saber. He figured that little extra flair would help him sound a bit more serious. A serious defense operation like this required a serious defense operative, after all. But, seriously, he had no problems with guarding out the interior of the castle. He wasn't some top grade martial artist or samurai, just a kid with a gun. And plenty of weapons to change that gun into. Running people down in a castle was fine for him. As for being paired with Gintoki...

Honestly, Gintoki didn't seem particularly reliable here if he was willing to ditch the whole mission, but he knows that the guy can pack a mean punch in that wooden sword of his. ...How exactly he can do that is still a mystery to him, but it's for that reason that he's willing to go ahead with it.

Omega-Xis had just as many qualms with this set-up as Geo. Which is to say, barely any. He knows they don't have giant huge missiles or laser beams or anything (at least not without the meteor server, but that's long gone) to pick off enemies from the outside, but he could hold the inside well if they aren't getting flooded. He was just as skeptical about being paired with Gintoki, however, but he figured he could just pick up the silver perm's slack if he fell behind. He could feel it in his... wave... parts. The part of the wave that gives him intuition. The... Bah, what he's getting at here is, "So long as we get to go buck wild on folks, I think it's fine too!"

"Well and good," Lucina said to Kakine. She put her arms akimbo and tapped her foot, realizing that she had no way of knowing from where Marisa had come, and how to tell which of the items were [actually] hers. (There was mention of the sheer number of items that Marisa owned; Lucina would cross that bridge when she got there.)

Lucina approached the suspended Marisa and caught her attention with a wave. "Ma'am," Lucina called. "Do you mind telling me where you had left your belongings before you were apprehended?"