It was amazing how quickly things started to fall apart.

While the presence of what appeared to be a strangely armed bandits approaching the front of the 'carriage' was of some concern, what had really caught Fortune's attention was the witchcraft that it seemed one of them was employing; He had heard tales of beings who could alter reality and cast devastating spells, but he had never seen it in person before.

Of course, it was at this point that he found himself deafened as one of his 'peers' decided to pull out what appeared to be some kind of dwarven firearm and proceeded to blow away the driver, the horrible din more then enough to deafen everyone inside of the carriage for a short time. While others panicked and fought to get themselves out, Fortune took a moment to wait for his hearing to recover while he tried to think of a plan. There was some shouting from the other people in the carriage but between nearly being deafened by a coward with poor impulse control and the general chaos as everyone was shouting and trying to be heard, he didn't make out a word of it.

The discovery that one of the passengers in the carriage was a witch herself, using her vile magics to shield them from harm was useful information but at the time being not as important as dealing with the threat out front. He did have a plan... through even Fortune could recognize that it wasn't exactly the best one. Removing the shield from his back, he bent down before charging towards the front of the carriage, his intent to use the shield and the weight of his armor in order to burst through the two layers of windows at the front.

If successful, the idea would be to try and taunt the bandits to waste a few more shots on the witch's shield before charging them and fighting them in melee... provided of course that they were foolish enough to be baited in such a manner... and that the magical barrier held under the onslaught.

Amelie had been prepared when the arrow was launched, and tipped it up to fly over the car. In her mind she figured that they’d be safe from the lightning as long as they stayed in the car. Then… the sound of the impact made her flinch and made her open her eyes wide in surprise. What? That arrow should have sailed straight over the car! That’s why she only did about thirty degrees, to maintain most forward momentum! But then she pictured it in her mind; the arrow curving unnaturally downwards in mid-air, homing in towards them, yet not being able to turn the entire way fast enough and instead impacted the back of the car.

‘Shit,’ she cursed, suddenly making the assumption that the crossbowman was a magician and that the arrow had been homing. This regardless of the simple truths that Amelie may not have realized. That meant said arrow-tip could have been loaded with any amount of magical powers that were doing gods knew what behind them. Whatever it was, it really didn’t sound like staying in the car was a viable option anymore. Yet, she didn’t want to let the people in front of her out of her sight, and if she stepped out the lightning sphere might…!

Amelie hesitated, but her action was chosen for her as the woman from before grabbed her arm and pulled. Not being about to doubt the intention of an adult, Amelie broke to run at the door with her. If given the opportunity, she’d jump out and dash for a building, intending to make distance from the car. The redirection orb in front of the car fell, Amelie confirmed somewhat uncomfortably that the gunman appeared to have handled that threat anyway.

She did not realize the knight had charged out the front depending on her protection when she dropped the defensive orb, this largely due to no communication.

If she managed to get out of the car then instead she created a new orb in between herself and the back of the car. Due to the peculiarities of her powers, Amelie made sure to turn around to face the car and run as well as she could backwards, so she’d be able to see her own orb. Just in case a sudden danger shot through the redirection orb at her from whatever was happening at the back of the car and she needed to redirect it, likely upwards to not hit any of the others by mistake.

If the woman that pulled her arm also ran, Amelie would be following her and the location of the redirection orb would calibrate accordingly to protect the two of them.

"There's an open window, get to it," he said.

You don't have to tell me twice, thought Luca.

"Get out, now," he said again.

Oh. Right.

Luca tumbled face-first through the window, landing sloppily on his shoulders and back. He scrambled up and started moving away from the vehicle, but paused when he saw the corpses lying in the road. He stared at them. What a terrible waste. In Luca's timeline, life was the only scarcity in the universe. To shed blood was unthinkable, and those who shed it were detestable. He looked at the driver, or what was left of him -- or it? It was difficult to tell whether the driver had been alive or merely a simulacrum, so total was the annihilation. Luca's knees felt weak. And I am meant.... I am meant to.... follow that man? He stared at the shooter. Calm. Unaffected. Without remorse. How can he just stand there? What is wrong with him?

Then all at once Luca had a realization. [i]Oh, shit. How can I just stand here in the middle of the road? What's wrong with [b]me?[/i] He sprinted towards the nearest wall and pressed himself against it. As luck would have it, this random vector put him nearly shoulder-to-shoulder with the red-haired shooter. Sssssshhhhhhhhhiiiiiiiiiii........

"Who are you?" he asked. In his mind he had phrased it more elegantly, but when he spoke he simply blurted.

The moment that the magical barrier that he had been factoring into his plan had dropped, Fortune couldn't stop himself from cursing the cowardly witch for her cowardly treachery; Through in truth he was more mad at himself for daring for even a moment for trusting the magic user to do the right thing and stand her ground.

With the barrier down, there was only one action left to him. Drawing his sword he charged at the small team armed with crossbows and some kind of advanced firearm, his shield up in order to be moved to protect him from what was no doubt going to be a hail of fire. All he could do was trust in his shield, his armor and the gods themselves to protect him from injury and death; If he could somehow manage to close the distance before they had the chance to reload, he might have a chance but it was a big if...

It was the only course of action left to him through. The only alternative was to turn and try to run away but not only was that absolutely cowardly all that it would do was provide them with his back to shoot at. Charging forwards was the only way now. "FOR BRETONNIA!"

Nothing of concern drew his attention. Now that he didn't have anything nasty being pointed in his direction, at least to the best of his knowledge, he felt like he had finally managed to seize upon some small vestige of control.

Indeed, perhaps to his immense relief Donny saw upon closer inspection that the tripod-device the teenager from earlier had deployed was little more than an aggrandized lightning rod. It had some rudimentary wiring near its base, probably to make up for its lack of elevation, but it was obvious the device was far from the rail-gun he had initially estimated it to be.

His crack marksmanship had also definitively put the knight with the crossbow down, the armored figure toppling to the ground with a clatter. Their fall was somewhat curious - the kinetic force from the magnum round should have knocked him flat on his back a good three feet away and exited out the back of the helmet, but the knight had simply slumped forward and fallen as though pushed down from behind - and the back of his helmet did not even appear to be dented. Discrepancies easily explained away in less than a moment of conclusory thought. The bullet had probably grazed the visor just so and hit the knight's face while pinwheeling, shedding much more of its velocity than normal. The armor itself was probably also much heavier than it looked, which might explain why the knight had not been blown clear off his feet. Stranger things had happened, and the splatter of viscera plus the dribbling lumps of gore oozing down from the helmet's neck told that whoever he had been, he was dead now.

As Donny turned his attention back to the passengers and the limousine however, he found something that was definitely worth his attention.

@Cruallassar@PlatinumSkink

As Kael, Donny, and Amelie looked back at the rear of the limousine they saw that the grinding sound was not the result of any kind of compression or tearing. The cylindrical bolt was sticking up out of the limousine's trunk, its head adhered to the surface of the lid by a congealed mass of glowing, white-hot magma - and spreading from that epicenter, a wave of silvery, glistening metal was spreading across the limousine's surface.

@mdk

As Luca had a rather good view of the limousine's rear himself, he would have been able to immediately deduce what was happening. The limousine was being electroplated. The how was a matter of interesting speculation - had the bolt injected enough electrical current into the car's surface to turn it into an electrode? Was it just emitting an EM field that acted as an intermediary for induced binding by the spreading pool of dissolved metal around the bolt's head? Was it magic? Molecular golems or homunculi?

More importantly, why would anybody design let alone use a weapon like that? It seemed a lot less effective than just using conventional firearms, as the red-haired gunman had just viciously demonstrated a moment ago. It was probably lethal enough if you got hit or were close enough to the impact zone, but its utility was questionable. If the objective had been to kill them, a simple grenade would probably have been a more effective and drastically less expensive option.

With the barrier down, there was only one action left to him. Drawing his sword he charged at the small team armed with crossbows and some kind of advanced firearm, his shield up in order to be moved to protect him from what was no doubt going to be a hail of fire. All he could do was trust in his shield, his armor and the gods themselves to protect him from injury and death; If he could somehow manage to close the distance before they had the chance to reload, he might have a chance but it was a big if...

It was the only course of action left to him through. The only alternative was to turn and try to run away but not only was that absolutely cowardly all that it would do was provide them with his back to shoot at. Charging forwards was the only way now. "FOR BRETONNIA!"

From Donny's perspective, it happened in the split instant he turned his attention away from the three corpses he had left in the street. They had all been dead. He had seen the shattered skull fragments and the thoroughly bespattered grey matter. Then he heard the passenger - the one who had been wearing knight's armor, just like the crossbowman - roar out some kind of battlecry, and movement registered in Donny's peripheral vision.

Standing there in the middle of the intersection, apparently completely unharmed, were all three assailants. Upright and standing on their feet.

Their corpses were also present, still lain low on the ground in addition to being splattered across the general environs. They were unquestionably the same entities - the thugs were wearing the exact same workout clothes and the same tattered chainmail. The design of the knight's armor was wholly identical to the one on the ground. The only perceptible difference between them and the individuals on the ground was that the knight now clutched a Vector submachine gun, while the two visibly startled and confused thugs were holding empty compound crossbows.

Fortune himself was experiencing the inverse situation. One moment he had been charging the three upright figures, and scarcely a foot later he saw their own corpses lying behind them, previously obscured by their angle relative to him. It was as if the universe itself had twisted in order to accommodate the passengers' relative, incompatible perspectives.

If the knight was anywhere as surprised as the thugs or any of the passengers, he dealt with it remarkably. He promptly raised his submachine gun and opened fire at Fortune, the weapon erupting with sound and a curious, soft iridescent muzzle flash - if the thugs had been uncomfortable wielding theirs, the knight had the disadvantage of having to use the weapon while wearing his extremely unwieldy gauntlets. He could barely fit his finger into the trigger-guard and was having trouble keeping the trigger depressed, resulting in an erratic and wild spatter of fire and a multitude of stray shots, most of them hitting the ground or flying around Fortune, quite a few of them flying into the thoroughly destroyed limousine windshield that he had barreled through just moments earlier. The few that came close smacked flat into his shield. He was pleasantly surprised when they hit with barely any force at all - if that was all his adversary's spray of fire was worth...

A split second later, a creeping wave of a silver-hued metal rushed over the lip of his shield from every direction and began encroaching on the handles, accompanied by a keening, grinding noise akin to metal being shorn or compacted. The others, looking on, would see that the stray bullets impacting the street were busily in the process of layering the cobblestones with small patches of glistening metal.

Amelie, however, did not see any of what was occurring on account of having turned her back to the trio of enemies who she had seen die nearly less than a second ago. As she ran towards the nearest building and side-alley, a number of stray bullets fired by the knight past Fortune hit her cloak. They failed to penetrate, instead surging and blistering into lumps of white-hot, molten metal that adhered to its fluttering surface. Like a curtain of dye, a glistening wave of silvery metal began to envelope the cloak's surface - and it proved to be exceptionally heavy altogether at once. Amelie, still mid-step in her run, lost her balance to the massive displacement of weight and fell down with her cloak falling on top of her, pinning her to the ground in a surreal twist of fortune.

As the wave of glistening metal approached the edges of her cloak where it would turn inward and start spreading across the inside, it would be immediately obvious to anybody watching that Amelie only had a few moments before the silvery metal spreading across her cloak made contact with flesh...

@Holmishire

"If you are calling us from a cell-phone ma'am, I need you to tell us where you are so we can send a slug your way." The voice at the end of Ariett's phone replied as she watched the stray bullets stick to the young girl's cloak, and the spreading wave of metal unbalancing and then pinning her. "Ma'am, is that gunfire? Seek cover immediately please..." The voice at the other end of the line, still accompanied by a soft ticking, was oddly dispassionate.

The only silver lining to the situation was that the levitating sphere hovering above the intersection had not try to electrocute any of them. It was humming in an imminently ominous fashion and the air outside the limousine reeked of ozone, but it either did not see the passengers as threats, or else simply could not fire another bolt of lightning for some reason.

@Terminal

Kael looks with some alarm at the spreading metal on the back of the car, before hearing more bangs from where the attackers were...alive again? No, the bodies are still there...he decides to not waste any time thinking about it as he quickly nocks and draws an arrow. The knight had full plate armor which Kael's arrows weren't likely to penetrate, but he was also the primary threat, and the visor of a knight's helmet was always a critical weak point if you could hit it. Standing at an angle behind the passenger knight, Kael was in a good position for that...and it was a nice short range too. Kael's first arrow flew straight for the slit eye-hole of the attacking knight's visor. He quickly drew another, and two seconds after firing the first, loosed the second shot at the throat of one of the henchmen. It might be nice to have some answers for why this attack was happening, so he sent a third arrow at the third attacker's knee. After all, it wasn't as if that crossbow this one was carrying was loaded...wait, it wasn't loaded? What moron holds up a carriage full of apparently dangerous people with an empty crossbow? Kael's attention was quickly diverted to the spreading pools of silvery metal on the ground, and he noticed the cloaked girl lying on the ground with the stuff spreading over her. On one hand, this place was quickly becoming a very hazardous place to be. On another hand, that girl seemed like she was going to be dead quickly if someone didn't get her away from the stuff. On the other hand, Kael had absolutely no idea how to accomplish that...he didn't have any spells, and if he tried to touch the cloak to get it off her, there was a good chance the metal would spread onto him. Having no good ideas, he just stayed away from all the metal pools for now and hoped someone knew what was going on here better than he did.

@Terminal@mdk

Donny didn't bother trying to guess what was going on with the car. He was no scientist, he had no answer to this kind of shit. He was about to answer the kid who had ran up next to him when he registered something moving in the corner of his eye. The sound of gunfire and the flicker of muzzle flare. He spun, left flank facing the trio of thugs to present as small a target as possible. They had somehow been warped back into a living existence. There was a hole in Donny's coat pocket, and through this hole he could always keep a grip on his gun. He had it drawn in the same motion he turned, but never got the chance to fire. All three enemies were taken down by arrows. Suitably, one was still living. He had an arrow in the knee, and Donny estimated that the fellow's days as an adventurer were over. Donny walked slowly over to the fallen thugs, answering the kid's question as he did.
"Jus' cawll me Donneh."

He'd stop before the wounded thug, and if the man made any suspicious movements or tried to pick up one of the weapons on the ground, he'd only wind up with a bullet in each offending limb for his trouble. As neat as you please, as cool as a cucumber, Donny hooked a foot under one of the dropped vectors and kicked it up into the air, catching it neatly. He checked the magazine and adjusted the stock and grips. After having inspected the weapon, he stepped sideways so that he could keep the wounded thug in sight whilst also being able to sight what had happened to the woman who had been shot at. Instead of unleashing deadly kinetic force, the bullets seemed to transmute matter. Neato. He turned his full attention back to the fallen thug and aimed the vector at him. "Ah'll spare yuh thah convincin' talk 'bout how much longah an' more pleasant yuh life will be if yuh cooperate. Yuh got ten seconds tuh tell me information good 'nuff tah make me think twahce 'bout seein' what happens when a fella takes a few rounds from this puppeh in thuh bawlls."

"Ah'll spare yuh thah convincin' talk 'bout how much longah an' more pleasant yuh life will be if yuh cooperate. Yuh got ten seconds tuh tell me information good 'nuff tah make me think twahce 'bout seein' what happens when a fella takes a few rounds from this puppeh in thuh bawlls."

That was when Donny noticed the armored knight slowly pushing himself up off the ground. The arrow the kid back by the limousine had fired had hit the visor squarely, but the head was a touch too large to fit through - it had gouged the visor's edges and caught. Sticking out as it was, the arrow had probably penetrated the knight's left eye, but it had not been a killing shot.

"Something like this." He answered Donny's rhetorical question with grim invocation, raising a second large, cylindrical bolt in his right hand, just like the one his predecessor had fired at the limousine - clearly preparing to ram the projectile into the ground with his remaining strength.

"Don't!" The crippled thug cried out, his face contorting in terror as he immediately turned on his back and tried to crawl away.

Andy had made it out of the car and lifted his arms in the classical sign of victory, but as he noticed the situation hadn't improved at all he lowered his arms again. He watched in astonishment the events taking place around him. A silvery metal spreading across the limousine's surface, the three assailants standing on their feet again, the bullets creating the same silvery metal on impact. As one of them hit the ground close to his feet he quickly backed away and looked for a place to hide. What was going on here? Thankfully the archer took out the assailants and the spray of bullets stopped.

He looked around for a quick headcount, the ticking boy was on the same side of the limo as he was, the gunman seemed busy interrogating the knight with his barely understandable accent. The archer was on the other side of the vehicle and he wanted to see what the girls were up to when the cried out 'don't!' from the thug caught his attention. While he couldn't see the details of what was happening there, it was a bad sign the crippled thug tried to get away from it.

His mind raced, was there anything he could do? There was nothing in his training or experience that had prepared him for a situation like this and he was too far away to make a difference in the little time that seemed to be left.

"Donny, huh...." And just like that, Donny was off. Hey, wait a second! Luca wanted to say, but as he followed the gunman with his eyes he saw three more bodies, or.... wait, three of the same b.... what the hell is going on here? The replicating corpses were entirely more interesting than the electrochemical goings-on at the limousine, so rather than inspecting that whole situation, Luca wound up following Donny like a puppy. But he certainly noticed the spreading reaction, and part of his subconscious was striving -- and failing -- to understand the mechanics. It manifested as a surreal sense of danger, as something unnatural -- impossible -- and malevolent. His attention nonetheless was drawn to Donny's interrogation of a corpse which, apparently, was not dead, and had been shot not with a firearm but with some even more primitive stick-like weapon. When did that happen and what was I looking at? Luca wondered.

"I'll spare you the convincing talk about how much longer and more pleasant your life will be if you cooperate. You got ten seconds to tell me information good enough to make me think twice about seeing what happens when a fella takes a few rounds from this puppy in the balls."

He doesn't waste time in conversation either, was the gist of Luca's reaction. He kept it to himself.

The knight -- one of the knights? A knight -- none of this made sense -- appeared to rise from the dead. One of the sticks was protruding from its face, dripping blood. In his hand was a cylindrical tool.... an assaying furnace? A strange one, if it were one, or some kind of high tech...

Luca's musings were short-lived. "Something like this," said the knight.

"DON'T!" Donny's captive cried in horror.

Luca reacted on instinct. He dove at the knight and grabbed his arm, slowing -- but not stopping -- its movement. His thoughts were racing too quickly to keep track of them all. Tesla chemical weapon death death STOP him STOP STOP danger plating death "No! NO! NO! NO!" PAIN!!!

Luca only managed to keep the implement from striking the ground by grabbing the business end with his left hand. But something inside commanded him to stop the weapon. He held on with all his might, with no plan-B and, for that matter, no plan-A either.

@Terminal

Kael's attention was drawn away from the trapped girl for a moment by the cry from the front of the carriage, but all things considered, it didn't seem near as concerning as what was going on right here in front of him. In near desperation, he casts his Ethereal Sight magic. His eyes glowed verdant green as he looked over the spreading silver areas, the area near the attackers, and...oh yeah, that lightning rod thing too, and that lightning-emitting orb. Another thing he didn't understand...why would they have placed that there and performed that seemingly meaningless action?

‘Wa-!’ Amelie cried out as a sudden weight befell her and she fell over due to having been made unsteady from the immediate pull of gravity.

Amelie fell on her side with with the cloak falling on an angle so it all fell on top of her. She had instinctively brought up her hands to her face to protect herself from the sudden fall. It became immediately obvious that some form of magic was doing work on her cloak, and she didn’t have long before it encompassed her. She had to get out.

She quickly formed a Redirection Orb with herself as the center. It took a second to manifest, a second which she used to untie the knot holding her cloak together, that part not yet metal. She could do this because she was lying on her side, as her body itself gave her hands wiggle-room by lifting the cloak by existing. With it no longer attached to her she pushed herself to turn with the help of gravity, landing on her back so she faced up towards her cloak. From here she pushed the cloak as hard as she could upwards from underneath. She did so as soon as she could with as much force as she could muster, hoping to create an opening at the top of the cloak.

Because this was happening within her Redirection Orb, this meant she could redirect the downward movement on the cloak caused by gravity to be directed upwards instead as soon as any of the cloak left her body. However, this was constantly counteracted by new immediate movement caused by gravity, so she couldn’t actually make it fly off her body. However, as downwards and upwards movement neutralized one another, it meant that with the addition of Amelie pushing it could lift the cloak. While it was still a matter of lifting a dramatic weight, any progress she made would not be instantly undone by gravity.

Redirecting movement only worked if the cloak was actually moving, but by turning to lie on her back from her side, she was creating pockets of movement that she could direct upwards, forcing gravity to push down, and that’s where her power kicked in and she could keep it in mid-air. She was aware of the entire cloak because she had felt how it was placed and could see most of it, and just had to counter the movements as she felt it rise. Then, when she was on her back, she could push upwards.

This, of course, probably wasn’t very fast, but Amelie only needed the slightest bit of wiggle-space.

By then essentially spasming her entire body, moving every single available muscle, she then caused movement energy in her own body. Using her Redirection magic, she took all this movement energy and used it to push herself out of the confined space where she was laying, out the top of her cloak. She continued spasming and used the movement energy to worm herself out the top, dragging herself out of the cloak while still lifting it as long as she could. This process would be pretty fast, as her muscles were more than strong enough to generate enough movement to push her a distance, the pain of being dragged across cobblestone aside.

If the metal turning reached the inside while she was lifting, she’d immediately let go and accept the height she had managed to lift the cloak to, using her Redirection Orb to keep it in mid-air, while she dragged herself out over cobblestone. This would work until she was out of her Redirection Orb, which would be pretty soon as it was only two meters in diameter, but by then she had hopefully gotten free enough that she could jerk her limbs to roll to safety. If she got that far she’d eventually land on her knees with her hands on the ground, breathing heavily in agitation and turning her head rapidly trying to confirm her current situation with her eyes.

Out of her cloak, she was merely wearing a plain white shirt on her torso, in addition to the black skirt and black pantyhose under over her legs, as well as her shoes. She just lost the cloak.

---

Tl;dr - Fall on side. Undo knot holding cloak together while making Redirection Orb around her. Roll onto back to create movement energy in cloak to push up. Lift cloak upwards using redirection of cloak’s downwards movement energy to counter gravity. Spasm body to redirect the movement energy from muscles to drag her out from under the cloak once any wiggle-room was created. If successful, roll onto knees breathing heavily while looking around to confirm current situation.

Every good knight knew that a firearm was the weapon of the cowardly... even if they were effective at what they did. As he charged forward Fortune found himself surprised to discover that whatever kind of weapon that false knight had been firing not only proved itself highly inaccurate, but also unable to even get through his shield! If the crossbow men had still had ammunition they would have made a better show of it!

However, if there had been any lingering doubt that he was still in the real world they were very quickly dashed due to assaults on multiple fronts. Watching copies of the very people you were charging towards drop dead while the people in question were still clearly standing was... disconcerting to say the least, but it was what appeared to be some strange kind of liquid metal that was trying to spread over his shield that was cause for more immediate concerns. He didn't know what would happen if it made contact with human flesh and he didn't want to find out; Without hesitation he cast the shield aside as he continued the charge... only to have the archer prove himself worthy of wielding a bow.

Slowing down to a stop as he watched the interrogation of the last surviving goon, Fortune took a moment to catch his breath as he looked around at the full extent of the strange growing liquid metal and the harm that it was doing. While he had yet to see it encounter flesh yet... he didn't want to find out what happened when it did.

Despite the fact that the knight whom had used the enchanted firearm was clearly a disgrace of a knight, one couldn't deny his tenacity; Arrow lodged in his visor, he rose once more in an attempt to drive what appeared to be another of those enchanted bolts into the ground once more. While another of the passengers attempted to wrestle the man and prevent him from being successful, Fortune attempted to close the distance as quickly as possible in order to assist by slamming the pummel of his sword down on the knight's head as hard as he could in an attempt to stun him.

@Terminal

A pair of legs ending in polished black dress shoes scissored smartly past the crippled thug. Figuring that the kid and the knight had the situation covered well enough, Donny strode to what he estimated to be a relatively safe distance from the scene, about twenty yards. From there he brought the vector up and kept it trained on Mr. Arrowknee. The flaccid smile on Donny's face was catlike, nay, closer to leonine in its sardonic arrogance, however the Machiavellian mirth contained in that mug was not reflected in the hitman's eyes. His cloying Maine accent was the amiable purr of a predator in its element. "Stawp there. That pawticulah spawt'll do jus' fine. In light of recent events, Ah've extended yuh time till this moment. Yuh ten seconds stawts naow. Talk."

Luca reacted on instinct. He dove at the knight and grabbed his arm, slowing -- but not stopping -- its movement. His thoughts were racing too quickly to keep track of them all. Tesla chemical weapon death death STOP him STOP STOP danger plating death "No! NO! NO! NO!" PAIN!!!

Luca only managed to keep the implement from striking the ground by grabbing the business end with his left hand. But something inside commanded him to stop the weapon. He held on with all his might, with no plan-B and, for that matter, no plan-A either.

Grasping the bolt, Luca got a good look and feel for it. The metal bands were faintly warm, and he senses that the bolt had an active power source of some kind - and he also feels that the tip was not firmly set in place. Clearly it was designed to break on contact - or under enough pressure. If the knight had even a little more strength, the tip might have snapped off just from him pressing it against Luca's hand. Thankfully this was not the case, but caution is clearly warranted.

Even devoting all his concentration to the task to hand though, Luca cannot help but notice when a peculiar disturbance emerged. His mechanical nature gives him immaculate precision, motor control, and coordination. It would not have been an exaggeration to say he could have stood perfectly still, or kept his hand perfectly level - as long as he was undamaged, anyway. Abruptly though, his internal gyroscopics were telling his brain that he was moving slightly in every direction simultaneously despite remaining in exactly the same spot.

Luca did not have much time to consider what that meant before the other knight - the one who was a passenger in the limousine with him - charged in and gave the armored crossbowman Luca was wrestling with a vicious love-tap directly atop the helmet with the pommel of his sword.

Fortune attempted to close the distance as quickly as possible in order to assist by slamming the pummel of his sword down on the knight's head as hard as he could in an attempt to stun him.

Rather than the hollow clanking noise one might have expected, the pommel makes contact with the hostile knight's helm it created a dull thud. The kind of sound of a person heard after throwing a small rock at a solid iron bulkhead. The knight does not so much as flinch, and the metal of their helm did not dent whatsoever - in fact, the wounded man did not even appear to have been jostled by the blow.

Completely ignoring Fortune, the knight began swearing profusely as he attempts to wrestle the bolt free to Luca's grasp one-handed. "Get off you pissant!" He snarled, struggling to keep his body raised with his other arm. Growling in frustration, he stops supporting himself with his free hand, falling fully back to the ground - and then solidly struck Luca fully across the face with his gauntlet-clad hand from a prone position.

His eyes glowed verdant green as he looked over the spreading silver areas, the area near the attackers, and...oh yeah, that lightning rod thing too, and that lightning-emitting orb. Another thing he didn't understand...why would they have placed that there and performed that seemingly meaningless action?

With his enhanced vision, the surrounding scenery was markedly different. Hidden underneath the cobblestone street, unnaturally straight and ordered line of power flowed like pipeworks along the street and underneath building, though he could only sense it for a short distance. More notable was the massive node and line of power drawn like a webs through the airs above the street, like ley-line that had somehow been twisted and forced into an unnatural configurations. The magician girls that were using the 'redirection orbs' was emitting an aura of her own, and there were several faintly distant, peripheral presence of something magical of power out of his line of sight. Curiously, the levitating spheres, the blackguard who had accosted the limousine, the tripods, their weapon, and the crossbowman plate mails were all dark and utterly devoid of anything magical of signature. How they work without magic was not readily apparent.

These paltry detail paled in comparison to the single most startling aspect of the worlds revealed to Kael's ethereal sight. Looking into the sky, far above the webbing of leyline rendered just above the city street, there is a massive, double-helix structure with arm that spanned from one end of the horizons of the other. Set in the center of its mass at the of zeniths of the worlds was an immense focal points of power - and Kael could distinctly feel that massive power directing its attention at him. At them. They were being watched...

Abruptly, his ethereal vision started to waver. One of the otherwise stable leyline of hovering above the city street bends. A few of the smaller of line of power beneath the street snapped and curls in on to themselves - and most notably, the smooth and sleek, spreading wave of metal of the vector bullet started to burst to jagged shoot of metal that spear out in every direction through the air, although thankfully the pool and the jagged spine stopped growing mere moments later. The limousines, however, was a different story. The massive and rapidly-spreading waves of metal that had been of consuming it shimmered and shifted, and thousands of small, of jagged of lance of metal burst to out from the ruined vehicle's surface in every direction - threatening to reach out and to impale everyone immediately surrounding the vehicles.

@PlatinumSkink

Just as Amelie crawled free of her own redirection orbs, she feels a sudden change in the gravitational pressure being exerted on the capes. It had started to flicker, as though the gravitational force of the Earths was of rapidly shifting between two specific variable. while this resulted in a loss of energy to redirect and keep the now entirely metal-coated capes afloat, it settled to the ground to more like a drifting leaf than the heavy weight it had been a moment ago. Unlike the other metal-coated object around, the metal upon its surface did not start to suddenly explode to spines in every direction - though the metal on it had stopped expanded before the other pools of the spreading of substance had started to erupt. As though something in the environments had changed just after she had gotten free.

@Doc Doctor

"I'll spare you the convincing talk about how much longer and more pleasant your life will be if you cooperate. You got ten seconds to tell me information good enough to make me think twice about seeing what happens when a fella takes a few rounds from this puppy in the balls."

"Stop there. That particular spot will do just fine. In light of recent events, I have extended your time until this moment. Your ten seconds starts now. Talk."

Donny abruptly realized his accents was gone. His voices was suddenly been replaced with a wholly unaccented and neat, clear tones.

The thug declined to say anything to particular of interest. In his hurry to crawl to away he jabs the shafts of the arrows stuck in his knees against the streets, and was now howling pitifully in pain, clutching at his maimed legs with both arm and sobbing freely, with both spittle and snot streaming from his faces. The pools of blood accumulating beneath him from the injury was rippling in an odd way, with tiny wave stretching up into the air, lapping at the edge of the surrounding cobblestones. Donny felt strangely light on his feet as well, as though he had suddenly taken off a suits of soaked clothe.

The rising suns, now fully above the horizons, also felt oddly cold - as though its light carried no heat.

What was going on?

Ariett felt her grip on the phone loosening, one hand dropping from her ear to her side while the other lifted to rest upon her forehead.

She should have been helping—stopping the combatants, saving the girl, anything—but instead she stood in shock, trying to make sense of the chaos about her. Technology beyond her understanding and supernatural abilities beyond her capacity to believe were being bandied about as if no more unusual than the aesthetic relic that was this town. What little grasp she had on reality began to slip from her fingers…

And then the world shifted, and the phone clacked against the ground.

She glanced behind her and saw the car explode in a multitude of metallic spears. Pulling her heavy backpack up so that it would cover the back of her torso and head both, Ariett dived forward. She hit the ground hard, taking the blunt of the force on her elbows and forearm as she skid forward a few feet.

Luca could feel that something was wrong. It wasn't just the vertigo he suddenly experienced, though that would certainly have been a serious cause for concern under other conditions. In this case, the 'wrongness' that frightened him most was that his fingers were losing grip. Perhaps those two conditions were related.

He was going to lose this tug-of-war, but as his opponent yelled a threat in his face, Luca realized he had an alternative to winning. He squirmed until the knight raised up for another blow to the face, then pulled with all his strength, hard enough to entice the knight into doing the same. Then, abruptly, Luca released his grip. The knight lost balance and tumbled backwards, with the device clutched in one flailing hand. Luca immediately scrambled up and lunged for the knight, who now lay on his back, stunned for just the briefest of instants. Luca reached out and grabbed at the arrow -- but not the one he had been wrestling for. Instead, he reached towards the arrow lodged in the knight's visor. He meant to drive it down with the full force of his body.

Andy saw how the red-haired gunman walked away to a safe distance and threatened the injured thug with his gun. Perhaps this was an ally of the knight who had shot at them, it was also a wounded human being and that was something he couldn’t ignore. He was about to walk over when the light reflecting off the shimmering and shifting metal on the limousine caught his attention and stared at the spikes that suddenly burst out. He was glad he wasn’t close to the vehicle anymore, being impaled by something like would be both painful and lethal, unless there was some luck involved and nothing of importance was pierced.

The howling and sobbing of the thug caught his attention. “That’s it,” he muttered and he strode forward, although he almost missed a step when his body suddenly felt different. Lighter? It didn’t matter, it was just one of the many strange things that had happened here. What mattered were the real things he could actually do something about. The crippled, crying thug for instance, that was one thing that mattered now. He lifted his arm and pointed to the gunman who had killed their driver. “Fire one bullet and I swear I’ll make you eat it,” he warned him. “You can interrogate him as much as you want after I looked at his wounds.”

As the gunman nodded and backed off, Andy continued towards the struggling knight and the thug with the arrow in his knee. He stopped next to the thug to inspect the wound. A bloody wound with a piece of wood sticking out. It definitely wasn't the worst he had ever seen. "Come on," he said to the man as he moved to grab him under the shoulders so he could drag him away. "Hold your leg, I'll get you away from here and have a look at it." The last thing he wanted was to stay close to the struggle and on a road. This man could be moved, so he had to move him to a safer location for the both of them.

He glanced only briefly at the knight with an arrow sticking out his helmet. There had to be considerable damage there, but the knight seemed to have plenty of energy left to fight and he hadn't forgotten this was the one who had fired both the crossbow and the gun at them. One of the golden rules with giving aid was that it should never be at the expense of ones own safety and he didn't trust this knight to not harm him. The thug on the other hand, he felt it was worth the risk.