Predictably, Ganondorf was not particularly amused by Nadia's little pun storm. He was, however, very interested to hear that the Seekers had taken out two of Consul P's protectors, leaving the consul himself potentially vulnerable to attack. At last, the Gerudo thought, some much needed catharsis after his imprisonment and having to slog through that hellish Basement, "If you must know," he eventually told Nadia as an answer to her questioning, "I left my weapons with a blacksmith overnight to give them an upgrade. You wouldn't have wanted me to go gallivanting into this 'Soul Sanctum' place without any of my weapons, would you?" He was being somewhat facetious, having already demonstrated by now he was perfectly capable of fighting without his weapons.

He also listened to Rubick's recounting of the fights he had won in the Thorn, although he did not answer. Of course the Magus handily won his matches, he'd been using Ganondorf's power after all. The King of Evil would have accepted nothing less than total victory of anyone who would 'borrow' it.

When everyone was finally meeting back up outside of the Consul's tower, that was when Ichiban spoke up. He told the others that Consul P was just a child, and should therefore not be judged too harshly. At this, the King of Evil could only scoff. "Just a kid, you say? Ha! Hardly!" He replied. Ichiban wasn't the only one who had seen this Consul before, "He has power beyond most adults, much less children. And in my experience, you either snuff out your enemy early, or they'll simply grow up into a bigger threat later." Clearly he knew better than to write off an enemy just because of their age, and for good reason.

"The moment that 'kid' declared himself the ruler of this Underground, he also then accepted the fact that he would inevitably be making enemies and other risks that such a declaration would entail. Such is the nature of being a ruler of any kind. You will have enemies, and you will be taking risks, regardless if you are a man, woman, or child." This also didn't stop him from holding up his fist and making the Triforce glow, almost as a reminder of just who it was Ichiban was in the company of. Kid or not, Consul P had played a role in Ganondorf's imprisonment in the ruins. There was no way the Gerudo was going allow that to stand.

The sight of a thousand machines was unnerving, but only for a moment. After that, it sparked a familiar memory deep down in Roxas' heart... a memory that wasn't his own. The seemingly distant memory of his Other Half rushing headlong into an army of one thousand Heartless in order to the defend the town of Hollow Bastion allowed Roxas to steel himself for what was to come. He didn't say anything to the other Seekers, largely due to them springing into action of their own accords. Instead he brandished his two weapons and broke into a full sprint toward the first cluster of machines he could spot.

The Nobody already had a strategy in mind for mitigating the threat of the machines, but it required him to last long enough for his MP to recharge. And since he had just used it up to heal Pit only a moment ago, that meant Roxas had a ways to go before he could start using his magic again. Thankfully, he could still use Flowmotion. That allowed him to swing himself around the clunky machines, lamp posts, or traffic lights in order to empower his attacks with momentum to strengthen their damage. One, two, three bipeds cut down, followed by a leap upwards that allowed him to perform a circular aerial slash that cleaved through an entire trio of medium fliers. Without missing a beat he slammed the tips of his weapons into a ground as he landed, unleashing a small shockwave that took out two more medium bipeds.

Nearby, a goliath was lumbering forward with a big telegraphed swing that would hit the Keybearer hard, but Roxas was simply too quick for it. He slid left to avoid the swing and then dashed toward the giant, jumping up and kick himself of the goliath's other arm and putting both keyblades into a diagonal slash against its head. It toppled and even fell on top of a pair of quadropeds, crushing them. Another flier swooped in for an attack, but only caught the boy's keyblades. Roxas then hurled both weapons in opposite circular arcs around himself, taking out the flier in addition to two bipeds that were trying to sneak up on him from behind.

After that Roxas leapt from the ground level and used Flowmotion to zip between five different medium fliers to cut them down in midair. Then before he landed he hurled both Keyblades at the head of another lumbering Goliath walking in his direction. He had to immediately dive out of the way of an incoming attack from a multilegs machine. He recalled his Keyblades to his hands and used them to block the machine's followup attack and then swung at it response. Then he had to whirl around and instinctively slash at yet another flier trying to swoop at him from behind.

"Come on... just a bit longer." Roxas muttered as he used flowmoton to swing himself around a lamp post and out of the way of a Goliath's giant swing attack. He dashed toward it, having to cut his way through two bidpeds and two quadropeds along the way before he was able parkour up the machine's body and attack its head, similarly to what he did to the first goliath he had toppled. Unfortunately, this one didn't crush any other machines when it fell over. Oh well, at least it was down. After that Roxas did another circular throw of his keyblades to take out four bipeds that had tried to surround him. He just had to make it a few more seconds, then he could really start dismantling this machine army.

13 Bipeds, 9 Medium Fliers, 3 Goliaths, 4 Quadropeds, 1 MultiLegs
Total = 30 enemies

Worries about their assassinations (and one kidnapping) attracting the attention of the city’s fishy guards proved entirely unfounded as each and every team successfully regrouped just outside of the clocktower without a hint of what they had just done getting out.

The troop’s first business was regrouping within the growing assembly of heroes, and once they were sure everyone was ok, started trading tales of their exploits. Bowser was just in the middle of telling the others about how he punched a giant golem in the face when Nadia poked her nose in and requested the use of the Snaktivator.

Kamek, naturally, obliged her request, and they all took a moment to admire her ”Cool triple tail” as Jr put it.

That promptly reminded Rika that she had gotten quite the plethora of spirits from her and Bowser’s adventure, the fetching of which from her pockets attracted the attention of Queen Sectonia, who conveniently preempted her request to borrow her item enhancing hat.



Not all the spirits were crushed however, as Rika instead requested to be able to use a few of them for herself



The result was first of all, the ship girl having to kick off her heeled shoes due to them becoming rather uncomfortable all of a sudden, and then being quite confused for a moment by her new lizard shaped feet. Then even more confused when she rolled down and removed a stocking and found she had scale patched legs and entirely scaly and spread toed feet, ones like those of a dragon or dinosaur.

”huh. Weird. I didn’t realize they were lizard people under all that armor” she said, mostly to herself, before raising a foot up and presenting it to the royal koopas and noting cheerfully that ”Hey look, now we match. Kind of” which they found rather neat.

The actual benefit the spirit had brought failed to be immediately obvious to her, and it was only clarified later when she mounted up and felt the distinct urge to have a lance in hand. The downside however immediately presented itself when she accidentally cut herself while handling the ax they had received, which resulted in quite the unexpectedly nasty gash that had to be healed by Jr.

Fiddling around with the other items they had gotten let them discover a few things:

That the ax seemed to be intentionally making itself unwieldy to, well, wield,, as if Bowser, who tried to test swing it, was entirely unworthy of its use.

That though the stone glove proved to have quite the handy set of spells, it was rather useless for their flying mage, which resulted in Kamek asking ”Gandorf, Rubick,
Primrose, would any of you be interested in this tremor causing magic gauntlet?”, which would result in a small fee for the other king, and none at all for their spider battling and tree climbing comrades.

That, though the scope would attach to Rika’s rifle it was more or less impossible for her to line her eye up with it to use it properly.

That the rune’s ability to launch someone airborn was both incredibly funny when done unexpectedly, and that it synergised rather well with Rika’s existing antigravity, as well as her grappling hook and maneuvering thrusters, and finally with the fact that her hands could actually hold the run while still using her forearm affixed gauntlets.

That they had no idea what ‘uses/charges/stocks’ meant on the label of the potions and that they had to ask about that (and would hand them off to whoever might find them useful).

And, finally, that if Rika took off her helmet before donning the Agastya Alternate Costume, and then re-applied it afterwards, she could give a half decent impersonation of one who slithered in the dark, even if between the cat ears, wyvern wing ears and two mismatching horns sticking out of it said helmet was getting rather busy details wise.

That led to a little plan of her leading the way and trying to bluff them any extra time she could via impersonating one of the slitherer’s members here to deliver a message, or something along those lines. A bit more talk also got them an idea of how they were going to handle P, and so after that, the team split back up into the same duos they had just been in.

With the plan settled, the shorter duo of the troop approached Iguana Gallo Valetto to set about seeing it through. And filling him in on it.

”Hi. We’re going with you to do the sneaky ambush thing. This P kid won’t know what’s hit him” Jr declared as he rolled on up with Kamek in tow

”Indeed,” the mage agreed, before cutting to the chase and informing P’s traitorous minion that ”Though I should note that we very much intend to take the boy alive. I hope that won’t be a problem?”

Gallo sniffed, displeased by the idea. "If you think him a mere misguided youth, you are woefully naïve. That brat deserves to suffer, and not just for what he's done to me, as your allies will see once they reach his lair. If he's allowed any leeway, he will reach the Absolutely Safe Capsule in his hideout, and that's that. Mission failed. Our only chance is my Clock Lancet, and to finish him off whilst he remains under his spell." He waved his hand dismissively. "But what do I know, P's destruction being a mere lifelong obsession of mine."

”Eh, we caught one jerk already today, no sweatm so another should be a piece of cake” Jr insisted, while Kamek inquired ”And what, may I ask, is this Absolutely Safe Capsule? Could we not simply disable it and then have more leeway to handle the situation?”

Crossing his arms, Gallo replied, "I've tried, believe me, but its construction predates me. Despite its mind-boggling simplicity it is completely immune to all forms of attack, technology, and magic that I've seen, and therefore, utterly foolproof. That's why we must be there to stop him before he can get inside."

”Second time we’ve encountered something like that down here. How annoying” Kamek noted. Or rather third, though they had not even bothered trying to physically break into the black egg.

”Couldn't we just, I dunno, barricade it shut or something then? He just has to be slowed down enough that I can put him to sleep after all” Jr suggested ”Close the door. Pile a bunch of furniture and minions in front of it, then when he tries to dig all of that up it's off to snooze land and we’re sorted”

Gallo cleared his throat. "Forgive me, I must have neglected to tell you. Consuls can warp space to travel long distances in an instant. I expect that is how he will reach the hideout in the first place, but he will only secure himself in the Capsule once he realizes that his hideout is no longer safe. You understand the problem that insinuates in your scheme, I trust?" The mage pinched the bridge of his nose, frustrated by the child's spitballing. "I understand your company possesses no small measure of power. I must urge you not to risk everything on cheap tricks, however. Even I must confess myself mystified by the exact nature of P's powers. I will leave his fate in your hands, just as I said I would, but please...do not allow all this to come to naught."

”Well that is worrying news, even if I am able to do the same in a sense” the teleport capable Kamek nodded, before partially conceding ”Perhaps it would be best we wait till we can have a look at this hideout in person, to see what kind of ambush we can set up and if live capture is viable or not”

At the same time as their more private talk was occurring, a much more public debate over how they were going to deal with kid Consul P started taking place. On one side, the newly joined Ichiban was rather concerned about the, well, ethics of that, and on the other side, the only slightly longer serving party king of all evil declaring that age mattered not at all when it came to your foes.

Into this stepped seeker veteran and one time child killer Bowser, to take a (minor) stand against repeated failed child killer Ganondorf’s position ”Look, you and me, we might be bad guys, but we still got to have standards. Like maybe trying to not kill kids when you can avoid it. Beat him up if he’s able to put up a fight, sure. But let's not end him, alright?”

On the heels of that assertion, a now drake riding (it just felt right) Rika leaned in and asked ”Are we going to capture and interrogate him then? Because knowing your enemy and their movements and stuff is important, so you should try and find out that kind of thing and report it to your superiors” seemingly quoting out of some order or doctrine she had been given while part of the abyssal fleet, before correcting herself with ”Or wait no I mean use it for ourselves”

”Hmmm.” Bowser furrowed his brows for a few moments, and then agreed ”Yeah. That’s probably a thing Ka- I mean I could do stuff with that kinda information”

Unlike Bowser, his crew, and Ichiban, Sectonia found herself agreed with Ganondorf of all people. Well, she was split between Ganondorf and Kamek in all regards. "My plan was to mind control him and gain info from him like that, but with this 'absolutely safe' capsule, if he escapes from my grasp it would be best to just end him and gain information from his remains." Sectonia then thought. "... Although if he has the power to just teleport if hes in danger to this capsule at any time, how would we even hold him in place to do anything? From the sounds of it, we'd need to just strike him unaware. Especially if one of our 'summons' can't take it for themselves and deny it from him." Either way, with her ideas set, Sectonia was on the 'kill' side of the debate as in all honesty, she didn't care. But from what she got from the koopa clan, they didn't have to play royal games, while the 'king of evil' did. How strange...

Rubick meanwhile, was more interested in being able to craft something from his world, his father's staff? And he was asking for nearly 1000 geo to finish it! The nerve! She could afford it, of course, but it was a gamble since she had only the barest of information about Rubick, as he had spent much of his time seemingly by himself or with the koopa clan. Although from what she heard, it was mostly collecting stuff for this staff... "Hmph, you say its strong, but I have no frame of reference of what that would even be." Sectonia started, but thought a bit. Honestly if Rubick was a loyal minion she wouldn't have a problem funding him if it was worthwhile, but right now he was more a free agent. "I can offer to pay for some of it, but if this is not something unique and instead something you can 'craft' at will, I would require you show and explain why it is worth so much to those here after this whole thing is said and done." Granted, she only had 182 geo, so Rubick would be getting most of his geo from the koopa clan if he couldn't find ways of raising it himself.

"I can invest 100 geo into this. If you have gold, there is an exchange shop that can exchange it for Geo at a 1 to 1 ratio nearby." Really 100 was generous in her eyes, but money was surprisingly difficult to run into so far without doing menial labor or anything. Come to think of it, this Consul P, being called the glutton he has been, might have quite the large amount of decadence or even items of great power.

"Aw man! Can't believe I'm stuck on this side and not there fighting the bad guys!" Raz rolled back and forth atop his glowy Levball, so practiced with it that he barely had to think to work it like an anxious pace. He paused briefly to add, "because, uhh, I want to help everyone, of course. Not so I can keep doing cool bad-guy-fighting things," before continuing to circle around. The sounds of their friend in combat muffled, all Raz could do was bound around in wait. If only he had Clairvoyance he could at least see what was going on.

From the sounds of it the going was tough, especially with such a large amount of Other while the team was split. It wasn't that Raz didn't trust the others of pulling their weight, but it felt wrong to just be standing there when half his team was in trouble!

Luckily they could teleport, only Luka only managed it after the fight had concluded. Or, so they thought.

"Whoa! Didn't miss all the fun I guess." Raz prepared for the fight, tugging his goggles over his face, and following Luka's lead - not that Raz had done this before himself - pulled on a chord tucked just below his coat's lapel. The peacoat's collar sprang up, curling over his head, completing the psycho-isolation field around him. Raz's own display flicked on, a criss-cross of diamond lights forming two crosshairs where his goggles were.

"Woooow..." Raz's thoughts strayed for a moment as the Brain Drive's effects hit him, affording him more focus and reaction speed than he was normally used to. He was quick to acclimate though, and just as quickly sprang into action. "I'll run the flank!" Springing back onto a Levball, Raz tore across the concrete, drifting around the huge Other's berth, peppering its side and rear with a flurry of Psi-blasts, each one hitting harder than the last, to try and divert its attention.

---

Wonder Red's sudden outburst was, thankfully or otherwise, ignored, and any follow-up was put on hold by Band coming in to pull him back. Red didn't even open his mouth to argue, only nodded thoughtfully. True, he'd nearly sold out their position for no valid reason. He was just not used to running blind.

"Of course," Red agreed, no hint of anger or annoyance to his voice. "I'll handle myself better in the future."

This was put to the test almost immediately, though, once Mewtwo divulged more information. Only the group could hear the Pokemon's thoughts, which was good, considering how dense the crowd still was. Red's face was hard to read as Mewtwo explained the severity of the attack, not just because of his iconic mask, though the more he heard the more Red clenched his fists. It was strange that L took the fight to their home base with a consul other than N, but it wasn't anything he commented on in the moment. He looked back up to the floating Aether Paradise, to Mewtwo, Ace, and finally back to Band.

He straightened his back and raised his chin. "Detective Band. This is a dire situation; Alcamoth has been hit with an attack of an extreme severity. Casualties we are not sure of, even if some of Alcamoth managed to escape. And the civilians..." Wonder Red paused, raising his fist in front of him. "For all we know Alcamoth could be razed to the ground right now. L has to answer for this. As Mewtwo said, L is injured, her main method of attack is hobbled. She can't be expecting news to have reached us - she's holding a public ceremony, so she isn't worried for an attack, meaning she very well could be unprepared for it. I can get us up to the structure from here."

Wonder Red lead into the end of his little speech by turning his gaze to Aether Paradise once more. "This could be our only chance to engage Consul L, Detective Band. If we leave her now, we're giving her the opportunity to recuperate, regain her resources, tuck herself away behind her organization and all its members... whatever the case may be, I trust your judgement," he concluded, meeting Band's gaze, the intensity clear even through the mask.

---

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As the squadron of Bipeds splashed toward them, backed by that lumbering Goliath, Tora and Poppi could enjoy only the briefest lull in the action. The rain had picked up, turning from a light shower to a downpour, and when the murky, roiling heavens flashed with lightning, hundred and hundreds of marching machines were revealed through the haze. Thunder roared high above, and across the battlefield the booming report of Susie’s missiles answered in kind. Neither Tora nor Poppi could see her, only the destruction wrought by her electricity-infused onslaught. Behind them, they were vaguely aware of rambunctious shouts and incessant gunfire. Azure flame split the dark as Zenkichi blazed a trail through the horde, the warpath he mowed through the Machines and punctuated with huge blasts of Almighty light. Given the sheer numbers they were up against, the Rust Crew ditched their strategy of background support to plunge into the enemy ranks aboard their truck. The heavy-duty hauler crushed smaller Machines like soda cans while Marshall and Big Bo fired away, their environment so target-rich that they scarcely needed to aim.

That was all behind Tora and Poppi, though, and their moment had come to a close. The gang of Bipeds stampeded them like raging cattle, Were he and his shield much larger Tora could have held them all off as a living barricade, but his diminutive size made it all too easy for the Machines to circle around him, so the pair had to rely on offense. He bludgeoned and bashed, eating hits for breakfast in order to doggedly strike back, while Poppi hacked and swung. Only when sure of stabbing through two or three Bipeds at a time could she go for a thrust. Often enough they overlapped on the same target, though that also led to an inadvertent extra blow to an already-beaten Machine. This frantic melee went on until the Goliath reached the pair and made its presence known with a megalithic punch, smashing through a couple Bipeds to send Tora soaring with a panicked cry. “Meeeeeeeeeeh!”

“Got you!” Poppi dove like an all-star goalie to try and save him. She caught him and the two hurtled backward, Poppi shielding Tora as they bounced along the ground. Thinking quickly, the Nopon fired a Boom Biter at the ground to launch them both upward, giving Poppi a chance to slow down and stick the landing. “Nice one!”

Machines cruised toward them, filling the air with marbled pink projectiles, but Tora pointed straight at the Goliath with his wing. “Nopon delivery system, go!” He hopped over onto Poppi’s back as he passed her the Drill Shield, who used it to launch two Riot Gun shots at the Goliath to tide it over, before boosting forward. From atop her back he swung his hammer at every Machine in their way, felling Small Fliers left and right, as they closed in on the Goliath. It raised its massive hands and brought them together in a calamitous clap at the perfect moment, but its metal palms didn’t quite meet in the middle. After a tense second, Poppi’s superstrength parted the Goliath’s hands to either side with such speed that the titan staggered back. “Meh-meeeeh!” With a battle cry Tora springboarded off his creation and fired his shield’s thrusters to hurtle the last couple dozen feet and drill straight into the Goliath’s chest.

As Poppi landed and raced toward it, the Goliath found its footing. It snatched Tora before he could fully breach its chassis, and as the Drill Shield tumbled to the ground, it squeezed him like a stress ball. “Pop-! Pi-! Help!” Tora wheezed, his eyes bugging out with each squeeze. Gritting her teeth, the artificial blade snatched the shield and span it up like a buzzsaw. The Goliath pulled its arm back to throw Tora off into the horizon, but Poppi blazed upward at maximum thrust with the shield extended, and sawed through its narrow upper-arm at the last second. Cut loose, the whole arm -and Tora- went flying, arcing through the air until Poppi caught it on her shoulders. Tora plopped down on top of it, shook his head to clear the stars from his eyes, then hefted his hammer. “Full throttle!” With a shout, Poppi used her superstrength to cast the arm like a giant javelin, hurling it through the air to finish what Tora started by caving in the Goliath’s torso. A mechanical groan echoed out as the sparking hulk fall backward, crushing a handful of other Machines as it slammed into the ground.

While the two waged their war, Giovanna had stepped up to the plate as well, and with the serious, pragmatic manner that befitted a professional. Dealing with one hundred opponents minimum might sound like a tall order, but in the end, you only needed to do the same, simple thing one hundred times. Like stamping a form, making a copy, or dotting an i. And this was a lot easier -and more fun- than filling out paperwork.

The secret agent carved through the battlefield like lightning. With Rei at her back, she dashed across the ground and slid in with a triple kick, her leg firing like a machine gun. Bangbangbang. Three craters appeared in the Large Biped’s body in ascending order, and with a strong turn kick she blew the Machine’s electronic innards out its back. One. A Quadruped stabbed at her with its bladed leg, but she went low and Rei swept its legs out from under it, sending it to the ground head-first. Giovanna’s leg then shot upward in a burst of dust, and the Quadruped’s front half ripped off to disappear into the sky. Two. A Reverse-joint took aim at her as Medium Bipeds charged in, but after a flying knee to the first one she kicked off it with burning legs to stomp, melt, and jump off each one’s head in turn. Three, four, five. With her flying dropkick Trovão she shot through the Reverse-joint’s flurry of projectiles like an arrow, unimpeded, to slam into its face. A Roman Cancel kept the pressure on, and the next second Giovanna had wound around its head like a snake, her electrified fists plunged into its neural processors. ...Six.

By the time her target hit the ground, Giovanna was already gone. A Biped with a sword chopped at her and got nothing but air. Giovanna took out its legs with two quick low kicks, leaning on a prone Rei for support, then flipped the Machine head over heels with a rising kick. Another attempted to block her with its scrap-metal shield so its buddies could pincer her. She flipped out of the way and nailed both with a withering Sol Poente split kick, then beat the shielder’s block with a throw and finished it off with a spinning Rei crescent. Without giving her a second to breath, another Quadruped raced in, forcing her to guard against its flailing legs. It whipped around to follow up with a mule kick, but Giovanna blew straight through it with a well-timed, upper-body-invincible punch. As it teetered over she leaped herself forward with a flying snap kick and bodily launched it off the ground, straight into an incoming Legpower. Medium Bipeds surged around her, but so too did the power inside her, and with a green flash she merged with Rei to unleash Ventania, scrapping them all with her whirlwind breakdance. By that time the Legpower recovered enough to challenge her, but despite its legs’ size it just couldn’t compare. Giovanna dodged its stomps and kicks, putting cracks in its armor with every punish, until a final Sepultura shattered the Machine’s oversized leg into metal shards. As it fell she smashed the earth with her powered gloves, then rose in a series of fiery flip kicks only to shoot down again in a burning dive. After knocking the Legpower onto its back, she rode its burning body down the road for a few hundred feet, and all the small fry in her way quickly found themselves reduced to spare parts. Once it came to a stop Giovanna was on the move, the force of her incredible legs clear-cutting the machines like so much timber. She squashed spiders, broke horses, and ravaged raptors between entire courses of Bipeds, all dispatched with the same impersonal, pragmatic precision. Only the fliers remained well beyond her reach.

Meanwhile, Tora and Poppi were clearing a path of their own. With the Drill Shield’s bit extended, its thrusters engaged, and Poppi pushing up from behind with her own rockets, Tora bored through the Machines’ ranks like a mole through the earth, a constant spray of sparking scrap in his wake. While the two didn’t finish off everything they hit this way, they racked up a lot of kills and managed to sow chaos through the horde for a solid thirty seconds, until finally their momentum came to a halt against a hunkered-down Multileg. In an instant the two found themselves completely surrounded By Machines on all sides, weathering a storm of blows as they tried to defend themselves. It was too much, however, and after a moment the pair were dogpiled, buried beneath the machines that grabbed and held them while the others pummeled, slashed, and stabbed away. “Poppi!” Tora cried as the tide of metal swallowed him up. “Defense not work….mmmmph!”

Orange light suddenly shone from within the pile, quickly building in strength, and after another moment it exploded in a shower of molten slag. Poppi QT burst up from within in a blazing uppercut, her mode and elemental core both Poppiswapped out. Then, hovering in midair with her Masterpon clinging to her back, she popped open the Mech Arms to take a page from Susie’s book and bombard the whole area with missiles. When they fell to earth Tora took hold of the Mech Arms, the pair switched from Block Tank to Evasion Tank and ready to rumble.





Not until their yellow glare shone upon him did Goldlewis, fixed on either shooting at the camera or jumping between L.I.F.T.s as the situation demanded, notice the Cleansers’ appearance. “What in Sam Hill is that!?” he roared over the scream of the rails and the groovy synthwave. While he flinched from their antimutagenic light after one accosted Midna in its gaze, it turned out to have no effect on him other than some minor discomfort. That didn’t mean that he could rest easy, however. The half-man, half-car monstrosity gained ground as it pursued the L.I.F.T, its brawny arms outstretched to seize the team’s’ mode of transportation and wrench it from its track, oblivious to any harm it might cause itself in its single-minded attempt to send the Seekers to their death. With a frustrated grunt Goldlewis performed an about-face to bring his Skyfish and Thunderbirds to bear against the Cleanser. Loathe as he was to prolong this ordeal, the camera would have to wait.

With the supply of Session Pounds cut off, though, the members of the group who struggled at long range could refocus their efforts on the Cleansers as they appeared. Even with their spirit powers stripped away, both Midna and Geralt were still seasoned warriors with a bevy of magic and experience under their belts. The Twilight Princess’s plus-size arcane explosive proved wonderfully effective, blowing the first Cleanser almost all the way back into the void on hit. Only by a twisted miracle did it avoid a violent derailment. The Witcher, meanwhile, stopped another Cleanser in its tracks just as it reached one of the L.I.F.T.s with a combination of deft swordplay and good use of his Signs. Try as it might, the monstrosity wouldn’t be getting a good grip on any L.I.F.T with Geralt on it. That left one track unattended, with a third and final Cleanser en route to sabotage it, but an intervention proved unnecessary.

After helping Benedict, Blazermate took the lack of opposition from the camera’s direction -as well as what seemed to be a slight relaxation on its part- to nail it with a Medabeam. That full-force blast, stacked on top of the bullet and erosion damage dealt to it already, was just what the team needed. The ActionMaxx Camera gyrated wildly, giving off a boatload of curious red energy, and the entire tunnel seemed to distort. After another moment the entire scene just blipped away, returning the Seekers to exactly the point where they started: standing on a single L.I.F.T. in a dead-end tunnel in front of a solid wall, an ordinary-looking camera in front of them. With the Altered World Event finished, the recorder displayed no more anomalous activity, and the subway system was back to normal. As normal as it was going to get, anyway. Only one thing was different: the presence of a VHS tape at the feet of the tripod, titled ‘The Seekers of Light in: Swift Platform!’. Goldlewis didn’t recognize the archaic technology, and even if he did, he sure wasn’t touching anything else in here. “Let’s get the hell outta here,” he grumbled.



The team reunited with Karin, who happened to be looking down a different dead end when the others wound up taking an unexpected ride, then proceeded through the tunnels. After a few minutes the echoed sounds of voices reached them, and Goldlewis called out, “Hello? Anyone there? We’re friendlies!”

“Hello!” a no-nonsense voice called back. “Be with you in a minute!”

After a few moments the Seekers made contact. As Goldlewis expected, they turned out to be a Psych-OSF platoon, this one under the command of the man who’d responded to him earlier: the dignified Captain Seto, his manner and manner of dress the consummate battlefield professional. His soldiers introduced themselves as well. The rather curt glasses-wearing blond guy was Shiden Ritter, the lackadaisical girl with pink twintails Arashi Spring, the friendly redheaded airhead Sam Boole, the dapper lavender-haired man Lucian, and spiky-haired dude with a conspicuous lack of shirt Akira Tadokoro. This platoon seemed to have a thing for face masks, being featured by three of the four male personnel. “Seems like we’ve been encountering more people than Others down here this last hour or so,” Seto remarked. “Though, you don’t exactly look like Psych-OSF personnel. May I ask who you are?”

“Goldlewis Dickinson,” the veteran replied, not missing a beat. “Former Secretary of Defense? We were sent down by Konoe to make sure everythin’s hunky-dory down here. Think of us as consultants. We been busy, too. Sounds like y’all got it easy.”

Seto cleared his throat. “Ah, forgive me, that does ring a bell. We did just take down a Major Other known as a Gunkin Fisher a few minutes ago, and we were wading through Others for a while, but yes, it seems like we’ve managed to clear things up. The operation must be coming to a close.”

“That’s what I like to hear.” Goldlewis gave a nod of approval. “Did y’all happen to link up with any other squads down here? We’ve been looking for Luka Platoon in particular.”

Brows raised, Seto nodded quickly. “How fortuitous. Yes, in fact, they assisted us against that Other. Hurry this way and you may be able to catch them.” He pointed the Seekers down the tunnel his squad came from. “Good luck and farewell.”

The two teams parted ways, with the veteran’s moving double-time. It didn’t take long to pass the junction where the battle against the Gunkin Fisher took place, but they didn’t slow down; heavy rumbles were shaking the underground, making Goldlewis worried about the possibility of a cave-in both for the sake of his team and Peach’s. Soon after, a hideous roar echoed through the tunnels that made the blood freeze in the veteran’s veins, spurring the group on even faster. Goldlewis pushed past his fatigue to keep on running, pounding the floor with one heavy footfall after another. Just what had the others gotten themselves into?

Suddenly, the six emerged into a large, open area. It looked like some sort of dug-out underground complex, like a quarry, long-abandoned and recently collapsed. Rubble littered the whole place, blocking off a whole portion of the otherwise square space, but Goldlewis cared less about the stage and more about the actors upon it. Another Psych-OSF squad, five strong, were faced by the biggest, most monstrous Other that Goldlewis had ever seen. It was a contorted mockery of the human shape, covered in greenery and swarms of live butterflies, with weaponized sashes and a head like a three-dimensional painting, an empty chair depicted inside. Above that bizarre aperture perched two cowled marble heads. It wasn’t just any OSF troopers this horrific Other was attacking, either: it was Sakura, Raz, and their teammates, although try as he mighty Goldlewis couldn’t see any sign of Peach.

First things first, though. “Here to help!” he bellowed, charging in with his coffin at the ready. Raz had managed to get the monster’s attention with his shots, but its size meant it could cover a lot of ground quickly, so everyone needed to hurry and make sure it didn’t reach him. “Let’s work together an’ send this bastard packin’!”





After Concetta left, Nadia got right back to trying to figure out her new tails situation. Having them be smaller and more flexible than the fish-tail she’d gotten from Oceanid was a welcome change. It had not only had it been unwieldy to fight with, but also thrown off her balance especially in the air, which only got more difficult after her fusion with Massachusetts made hangtime that much harder to achieve. And don’t even get me started on chairs, she thought wearily. Sleeping on her back last night turned out to be flat-out impossible, and she’d only managed to seat herself at Definitely Not Fried Chicken last night by turning her chair sideways. Though, leaning on the seat back with one arm did give her new monster friends a particularly sassy impression that she didn’t mind. Of course, everything was a trade-off, though, and in this case her new change also meant muscles at her disposal that she’d never had before. Nadia crouched down, span her head around, and tried to get her new tails to cooperate. After a few moments, she managed to curl two of them together into the rough shape of a heart, which made her giggle. “Nyeheheh…”

Before the team’s preparations concluded, Nadia found herself solicited by Ichiban. She quit goofing around, turned her head back around, and stood to face him. “What’s up, Itchy Buns?” At first she’d just taken him to be a local handyman with a daredevil streak, tagging along to the Soul Sanctum out of curiosity or a desire to help, but if he planned to stick with them to challenge a Consul he might be with the Seekers for the long haul. That very confrontation, however, was what concerned him. Nadia pursed her lips as she considered the man’s trepidations, one eye narrowed and the other’s eyebrow raised. It sounded like Ichiban knew the little guy, and he made it sound like P wasn’t all that bad. His obvious good intentions made the situation all the more frustrating. “I…well, I get he’s a kid, but no way he’s just some brat who doesn’t know any better. These Consuls are, like, Galeem’s henchmen or somethin’.” Right after she said that she remembered that Ichiban wouldn’t be able to understand her. Not with that sunset-red glow in his eyes. The cat burglar momentarily considered finding some other roundabout way to explain things, but gave up with a sigh. Too much effort. Not my problem, she thought. You’ll just have to find out for yourself, buddy. Besides, Ganondorf offered as good a reason as any, she supposed. Though Bowser’s reponse made her second-guess her initial, somewhat callous reply. After making a mental note to try and Friend Heart Ichiban during the fight if she could, she shrugged and added, “Look, offin’ a child’s the last thing I wanna do. But if this guy tries to kill us, we can’t afford to kid around. The bigger your heart, the easier it is to stab. Take it from me, I LITERALLY got stabbed in the back like half an hour ago. Not a knife feelin’!”

Ichiban also threw some shade at Gallo. Nadia glanced over to where the mage-scholar seemed to be engaged with Junior and Kamek in conversation. He did look pretty shady to be fair, what with that classic conniving wizard look, but the feral felt like he’d made his motives pretty clear. Up in the Soul Sanctum he made no bones about the pride and pettiness that drove him to vengeful, nigh obsessive scheming, nor that he shamelessly meant to use the Seekers for his own ends. Could be be planning to replace P as the city’s ruler? Maybe. To be honest, Nadia didn’t really care to analyze him further. Everyone had agreed that these Consuls were going to keep being thorns in the Seekers’ side in their campaign against Galeem, so getting rid of them would make things easier. Besides, the heroes could just beat him up too if he became a problem. So unless turned out to be one big, elaborate ruse that ended in a classic double-cross, there was no need to worry. Still, might as well offer Ichiban some reassurance. “Guess I’ll keep an eye on him,” she told him, though in her mind she thought, Why is he telling me this, anyway?

Before much longer, everyone was ready. Nadia had her blade case strapped on tight, and both her box cutter hilts and new dagger Athame in her belt. Once the Seekers marched through the garden of bioluminescent fungi, their softly-growing crowns umbrellas against the rain, Gallo gathered everyone together before the immense building’s majestic gates. “A few final words,” he began. “This tower -my tower- is magic in nature, and the space within it, convoluted. For starters, you’ll be pulled in the moment I open the door. It would be easier to show you than tell you, but suffice to say, once in you will not need to climb. Just walk. Those of you who mean to engage P in battle should head toward the light. Those who mean to finish him off, toward the dark.” He looked off into the distance. “...There is one final domino I must still erect. I will join the latter group in a few moments.” Gallo positioned himself beside the doorway, then extended his hand to push it open. “Go right ahead.”

Moving inward with startling speed, the grand oaken double doors slammed open. With a surprised Nadia flew off her feet, falling straight toward the yawning doorway as if gravity itself had reoriented ninety degrees. Caught completely off guard, she could do nothing but twist wildly in midair as she plunged into the insides of Gallo Tower. Once everyone was inside, the doors closed behind them.

Now alone, Gallo turned his attention back toward the mushroom garden, and waited patiently. After a few seconds, a dark portal opened up in front of him. Out stepped a figure in a black hooded coat, only a couple feet in height. “‘Ello, ‘ello,” she greeted him, her voice a youthful chirp. “Wotcha think, eh? Think they’ll do the job?”

Gallo exhaled wearily. “I must admit, I thought your prediction too good to be true, at first. Yet they not only came, just as you said, they also toppled the Agarthans in the span of a single morning–nay, in less than two hours. They may very well possess the strength to make my dream.” He coughed. “Our dream, a reality.”

The hooded girl chuckled. “See, I toldja so, didn’t I now?”

“Where’ve you been, anyway?” Gallo asked, unamused.

“Oo, me? I’ve just been playin’ with F, is all.” Smirking, the girl summoned a glowing blade of silver, cyan, and black, bedecked in hollow spikes, clock faces, and devilish detail. “Course, I play rough. Gave ‘im a proper runaround, I did. Needed to keep ‘im off our heroes’ backs while we deal with ‘is friend, after all.”

Gallo sniffed. “They want to let him live, you know. Too soft-hearted to slay a wolf wearing sheep’s clothing.”

“Well, then. Sounds like you’ll be needin’ this in case they muck this up.” From her pocket the girl produced a glowing hourglass. “Don’t go studyin’ it now, you bookish old git. And don’t waste it either, yeah?” Banishing her weapon, the girl crossed her arms. “We’ve gotta show ‘em they can be beaten.”

Only with a concerted effort did the mesmerized scholar tear his eyes off the hourglass’s beguiling glow in order to place it in his Inventory. He then turned his back, and headed for the tower’s door. “I understand.”

---

After a brief but terrifying moment, Nadia landed, and as always she landed on her feet. For a moment her head swam, her senses of orientation one hundred percent confused, but after readjusting she got a look around. Despite entering what she understood to be a tower, she and the others now stood in a huge, stone brick corridor, extending in a straight line as far as she could see in both directions, one way bright and the other increasingly dark. At first it looked normal enough, like a haunted castle from a cheesy vampire flick, but her keen eyes quickly noticed a couple abnormalities. The windows, for one, were oriented sideways rather than upward, and unless her eyes were playing tricks on her, the rain was falling sideways, in the direction of the corridor’s dark end. When Nadia looked up, she spotted something that left her blinking in confusion: the double doors through which the Seekers entered, neatly built into the ceiling.

“This is…weird,” she murmured, at a loss for puns for once. But only briefly. “I’ve been tryin’ to come up with a pun for like ten seconds now, but I guess a cat got my tongue. I’m pawstruck!” Against all odds, it really looked like gravity within the tower oriented sideways, against its back wall.

After a few moments the doors opened again, and Gallo came flying through. He landed on the ground with is robes fluttering, his tome in his hands. “Still here?” he asked. “There’s no time to waste. Let us be off. Just remember: the furnishings up ahead may…unnerve you, but you must not disturb anything. When you find Consul P, be ready for anything.” With that, he turned to proceed toward the darkness.

Nadia shrugged and turned the other way, headed toward what she assumed would be the top of Gallo Tower. Weird as this might be, it actually came as a major relief; just the thought of climbing hundreds of flights of stairs before a tough battle had been making her woozy. She, Ichiban, Sectonia, Ganondorf, Bowser, Rika, Jesse, Primrose, and Therion moved at a brisk pace, past numerous antique sofas, fireplaces, bookshelves, and candelabras. Everything seemed more or less normal for a solid couple minutes, but eventually the truth behind Gallo’s warning became apparent. They began to encounter what appeared to be young boys, all completely identical to one another, with blond bowl cuts that covered their eyes and blinking red lights on their heads, white shirts, red bow ties, gray shorts held up by suspenders, their expressions all frozen in an open-mouthed look of surprise between rosy cheeks. The first ones Nadia spotted were playing hopscotch on a pattern scrawled onto the stone brick with white chalk. Their movements were stiff, uncanny, and mechanical, and they often wasted time in a lazy manner between their turns. “Well, not really ‘unnerving’,” Nadia remarked, watching the robots closely as she gave them a wide berth. “But weird.”

It only got weirder from there, though. Robots turned up more and more often the further the Seekers went, engaged in all sorts of hollow activities. There were machines playing tag, jumping rope, drawing with crayons, doing arts and crafts, play-fighting, and more. There was a kitchen table surrounded by decorations where four of them sat with presents, the spot at the head of the table empty but surrounded by piles of half-eaten cake and torn wrapping paper. There were couches with TVs where robots sat waiting to play, the Player 1 spot always empty. There was a little movie theater full of robots, the best seat sticky with soda and popcorn but unoccupied, and a vacant stage in front of robots with their hands poised to clap. There were plenty of board game pieces and broken machine parts scattered around, too.

“Kinda creepy,” Nadia admitted after a while. She crouched down for a moment by what must have at one point been an incredible structure built from tiny plastic blocks, which now lay mostly in ruin. “But also…sad?”

The echoed sound of coughing caught her attention, and she stood in a hurry to catch up with and pass the others. After all this walking, the top of the tower lay nearby. Nadia gazed up at the ‘ceiling’, namely the massive red-tinted glass that shielded the face of Gallo Tower’s clock, though the clock itself seemed to by missing. From it a vivid crimson light poured down to bath what looked like a medieval throne room in its glow. At its center, atop the carpeted stars, on a plush red mattress in a purple bedframe, laid a boy. Though shaped like the machines the Seekers had seen so far, he wore futuristic red armor atop a dark gray suit, and his helmet resembled a pig’s, with its snout’s nostrils where the wearer’s eyes should be and a crown atop its head. The whole area was a mess, strewn with discarded amusements, packages, and wrappers, but Consul P just sat there, leaning on his arm.

“Miniooooons!” he whined. “I’m booooored. So, so, bored. Bored out of my mind! Get me something fun to do!” Looking down, he noticed the newcomers with a slight start. “Wait. Who’re you? Did my minions send you to play with me?” A hint of excitement entered his voice.

No doubt everyone had something to say about that, and Nadia didn’t hesitate to say hers. Hiding her thoughts behind a smirk, she withdrew Athame from her belt and gave it a twirl. “Actually, your ‘minions’ are takin’ time off. Purr-manently.” She replaced the dagger. “Not to alarm you or wind ya up, but we’re here to clean your clock. Y’know, face off. Throw hands? Strike one–that one bein’ you.” Laughing, Nadia sharpened her claws and clanged them together. “Your luck’s run out, P-brain. Big time.”

After everyone said their piece, P coughed a bunch, then straightened up in his chair. “You guys don’t like me? That’s too bad.” Suddenly, his bed began to rattle. It sprang from the ground into the air, sprouting arms, spider-legs, and two ferocious faces: a fanged one on the underside, and a crowned head up above. The bedmech, a terrifying combination of bed and mech, landed hard enough to make the tower rumble, and when the dust cleared, the Consul glared at the Seekers from within his protective casing. The lights on the heads of nearby Mecha-Porkies began to blink, and the machines turned to approach the budding brawl. “Anyone who doesn’t like me,” P announced. “Can just die.”

—

”We won! And the crowd goes wild!” Sakura cheered happily. High fives all around for the other two ladies on her side of the wall. Clearing space for the inevitable teleport, Sakura bent down to make sure the laces of her combat boots were secure.

When she glanced up at some kind of disturbance. Sina noticed something was wrong, and Sakura glanced at Peach. Something bad had happened to her. ”Peach-san?” She asked.

There was a sound like cracking glass and Sakura saw Peach and the air around her crack like glass. Sakura shrieked in horror and rushed over to do something. All would be in vain as the glass, the air- Peach- all shattered and was replaced by the largest Other Sakura had seen yet.

Sakura fell backwards, propping herself up on her elbows. Sina was knocked away and the other half of the squad appeared to do battle with the Other monstrosity. Everything became blurry, and Sakura tried to blink hard against her tears. ”W-what..?” She asked.

Raz emerged, and began to distract the monster. It began to target him. This sight pushed Sakura back to her feet, even as the tears flowed down her cheeks.
”Leave him alone!” She shouted, her voice cracking with distress. She sprinted towards the Other and came at it with everything she had. She sprinted after it and spent an EX-Meter to do an EX-Hadosho. Her fist ignited with blue flame and she dashed forward, looking to knock the creature solidly while it chased after Raz. Though she had pushed herself into combat, she had only been able to convert despair into anger, not able to rid herself of negative feelings.

”Give her back!” Sakura shouted, using her close range Hadokens and Hadoshos to trade precision for power, using her ki to wallop and explode against the beast with both hands.

When Karin entered with her team she was eager to get back into the fight, having missed the last event. Fortunately, they all seemed to make it out okay. After briefly passing by another team, Karin was eager to meet up with Peach’s team and see how Sakura and Raz were doing.

But before that could happen, they would have to battle through the great Other in the way. The last time Karin battled a large beast, it hadn’t gone so well, and Karin was determined to not let it happen again that time. All she had to do was act carefully and get a read on its patterns before attacking too aggressively.

A lesson that apparently Sakura hadn’t learned, as Karin saw her plunge straight into danger and begin spamming some of her most powerful attacks like she wanted to crank out as much damage as possible with no regards to combos, or, more worryingly, defensive and evasive maneuvers. Karin was a good enough fighter to know when someone was emotionally compromised. Especially someone like Sakura. Concern passed over Karin’s face.

”Sakura!” She called out. ”Pull back!” But her friend didn’t hear, or didn’t listen.

Karin grapple hooked ahead of the pack and went to get on the outskirts of the melee fight to give herself enough time to gauge the situation. Right now she was looking to see any particularly cumbersome attacks the creature might throw out. Then, she would go in to punish with powerful advancing strikes, before retreating again out of immediate melee range.

Benedict rolled his eyes at the giggling medabot as she poked fun at needing to carry the older soldier "Yes, yes save this delightful banter for later when we are not fighting the Other." punctuating his point rhe sound of their teammates shooting wildly at the camera as well as the screech of the rails as the platform sped along the tracks.

"Asparas, Bofu." he could not contain a air of indignation as the persona giggled at its host cradled in the arms of the medabot yet she still cast the spell healing the other Seekers for a small boost to their vitality, he couldn't do much from the position he was currently in other than when Blazermate set him down to take on the ActionMaxx Camera herself, thankfully it didn't leave him much time to necessitate leaping to the next platform as both the music and seemingly their surroundings fell away.

'Interesting, was it all just some elaborate trick of the mind?' with but a moment to dust himself off, Benedict stared at the tripod with a strange object labeled "Seekers of Light in: Swift Platform!" but he had no time to inspect what strange object the tape was, gathering his wits and nodding at the poignant but blunt words of Goldlewis. They indeed needed to get the hell out of there.

Benedict's breathing grew ragged as he ran along behind the others, legs aching and sore from their previous misadventure, even Bird of Prey could only speed him up yet it wouldn't help his exhaustion, he had little time to catch his breath to add to Goldlewis's words when they met up with some OSF soldiers "Benedict Pascal," he said, doubled over and breathing heavily in ragged breaths "Recent developments have lead to necessitate investigations down here...Pardon my...Current state..." with that put of the way and everything seemingly going to plan, the Psych-OSF being none the wiser they marched double time towards the commotion ahead and what a sight it was...

Whatever monstrosity spawned this Other, it was nothing like any beast Benedict had ever encountered. It challenged his perceptions on what was fantasy and what was factual, but there was not a moment to spare to consider such trivialities in the heat of battle. Benedict drew his weapon, following the goliath of a man Goldlewis's example and leaping into the fray.

"Bird of Prey!" the old war vet cried, a soft flourish of light flickering as the buff took effect and he took a running leap towards the monstrosity slashing at its hind legs before he landed with a grunt. Benedict only had a moment to recover and get out of the things way, retreating towards the soldiers he got an idea he took a moment to assess the situation. They were fighting a beast of tremendous size, thus it would be slower if it were somehow disabled. One of the soldiers seemed to be using a similar magic as Asparas.

"You there," he shouted to the girl with a sort of bracelet-like device om her wrist "Focus fire upon the monstrosities legs, and then have your allies focus on taking out the frozen appendage!" of their ilk her two other allies wielded a hammer and sort of brawlers mit "Everyone focus on its legs! Knock it down." it had been a while since he had taken on a commanding position in the field and while he didn't know whether they'd listen he hoped they would heed his advice. As the old adage went: 'The bigger they are the harder they fall.' They needed to fight it from all sides, some taking out its legs while another would take its front.

No doubt it's legs were as dangerous as its arms but he would have to take the gamble of positioning at its rear, the strategist stepped lightly and swiftly as possible flourishing his blade as he passed Midna and his intrepid but a bit quippy medabot companion. He applied a Bulwark to the imp increasing her durability and defensiveness "Blazermate with me."

When the Psychic Pokemon began to recount the course of events that brought him all the way across the World of Light to this very moment, Big Band had been standing up, but by the time Mewtwo finished the detective felt like he needed to sit down. From what he said, L clearly hadn’t been exaggerating when she described the offensive launched against Alcamoth as war; what Mewtwo spoke of was an all-out invasion. Huge armies, massive airborne battleships, and the bleeding edge of murderous military technology, with a staggering death toll to match. It was hard to imagine, especially given Big Band’s somewhat outdated perspective. Neither could he assign a face to any of the names Mewtwo mentioned. Nevertheless, the gravity of this woeful revelation weighed heavily upon him. A few moments passed between the gathered fugitives, in silence and in grief.

Along with the anguish, however, came anger, and thanks to the rest of Mewtwo’s report, an opportunity. Alcamoth’s finest fighters had emerged from the fog of war to confront the enemy’s masterminds in the high-up perch where they roosted, and made them pay dearly for their crimes. While it did Big band some good to hear that Smash City’s avengers had managed to exact some vengeance against the Consuls, the end results sounded anything but definitive for either side. Both Mewtwo and Red agreed: with L back home in Edinburgh with her tail between her legs to lick her wounds, it fell to this motley crew of Seekers to finish the job. His rational side knew that nothing about the situation surrounding the Aether Resort had really changed, but Band could see the fire in the eyes of his teammates. He could feel it, heating up the room. The fate of ill-fortuned Alcamoth had ignited the will to mete out some richly-deserved justice inside them, and he’d be lying if he said that same feeling didn’t burn within him, too.

He took a deep breath in through his nose, his eyes closed to think, then out as he fixed Mewtwo with a firm stare. “I ain’t gonna argue. L’s got a hell of a lot to answer for, and I sure don’t mind askin’.” Agreeing to do something about the unconscionable Consul did not mean throwing caution to the wind, however. “But let’s make sure we don’t do anythin’ stupid and hang ourselves out to dry. Right now, there’s only us four. No way to get in touch with Peach or the others. Same goes for Frisk, Albedo, and Lucia. We sure weren’t expectin’ a chance like this to come along outta nowhere. If we run off on a wild goose chase, we might lose our shot at L, so if we’re makin’ a play it’s gonna be as a four-man band.”

Instinctively Band glanced around, peering throughout the Pokemon Center for any sign of eavesdroppers or other threats. Then he continued. “For a bit I forgot you got it easy when it comes to movin’ lots of folks at once, Red,” he mentioned to the superhero. “We’ll be relyin’ on you to get us up there, then. I can fly well enough, but I only got one seat, and it sure ain’t for passengers.” The detective narrowed his eyes. “Once we’re up, we gotta find her fast. Don’t want any more guards on our case, whether they got guns or Pokemon. My main concern…” After clearing his throat, he lowered his voice just a touch. “Is N. I figured this might be a trap from the start, and just ‘cause she’s real hurt don’t mean it ain’t. ‘Catch more flies with honey than vinegar’, y’know? Makes sense she’d see him after goin’ out on official business anyhow. Plus, you said y’all took care of four of her ‘beasts’.” He raised an eyebrow at Mewtwo. “Was that all of ‘em? How many you think she still got?” Once supplied with a response, Band went ahead and wrapped up his precautions. “All I’m sayin’ is, it ain’t outta the question that we’ll be runnin’ up against two Consuls for the price o’ one. But if y’all are game, let’s make it a killer quartet..”

If everyone was in agreement, it was up to Red to kick things off once the Seekers retraced their steps to the waterfront.

After meeting up with the others in their group, Pit was informed that they'd found the intel they needed about the machine attack - and that it was happening a lot sooner than they'd expected. They needed to hustle if they wanted any chance at intercepting it. Considering the timetable for their main mission just got pushed up, Pit wasn't too bummed about losing out on the material boxes in the flooded ruins. Of course there was the question on how they'd all get to where they needed to be, since apparently the other truck had been destroyed. It was a question that was quickly answered by Tora.

"Ooh, me!" he told the Nopon, scrambling to join him and Poppi on the tall machine they'd brought over.

The group moved, back toward the ruined city they'd seemed to come through earlier. There they quickly found their targets: a veritable army of robots, with sandy colored metal bodies and beady, bright red eyes. Way more than Pit could count, but Poppi had that covered. A thousand, huh?

There were quite a lot of robots, that was for sure. But nothing a handful of heroes couldn't handle, right? Pit hopped in place a few times and stretched out his wings, preparing for battle with the rest of the group.

"I'm used to taking down tons of enemies," he said, manifesting the Palutena Bow in his hands. "Heh, I'll even take two hundred!"

Big words, but ones that Pit could back up... well, if he'd been at full strength. He wasn't entirely sure when or how he'd regain all his capabilities in the World of Light, but what he had should still be enough to take on a hundred or so robots. Whether he could or not didn't matter - he would, so that the machines wouldn't reach the city and hurt anyone.

The Seekers charged, Pit along with them. As he entered the fray, his opener was much the same as every: a volley of light arrows. The arrows swerved around the faster Seekers to strike their targets, only staggering the larger robots. The weaker, smaller robots had their vitals blown apart with one or two well placed shots. Perhaps if they'd been up against physical arrowheads their metal chassis might have fared better, but the pure condensed light fired from the Palutena Bow was just made of different stuff.

He'd managed to take out a number this way while the Seekers were still relatively close together. Biped medium and large with limbs broken off so that they couldn't move, chest cavities dented in and damaging core mechanisms inside, or head pieces completely broken for instant downs. Fliers of all sizes crashed down from overhead, destroyed while in the air or smashing to pieces once they hit the ground. "Twenty!" Pit called his tally aloud before a mass of robots finally made their way to him, converging together.

Though he was more proficient in long range, melee suited the angel just fine as well. A goliath reached out to swat Pit but he hopped up and onto its arm, running up the length until its small head was in sight. He slammed the bowblade into the space between its eyes, carving a slice through its head that sparked and gradually shut the machine down. It fell to its knees, toppling over and squashing two bipeds under its weight. Pit dashed off, spinning the bow in his hand as he cut through a group of bipeds that scrambled toward him. The small area around him was a cyclone of blue, gold, and flying metal chunks. When he came out the other side, he left behind several scrap heaps. "Thirty!"

Now that he was in the thick of it, there didn't seem to be any end to the robotic hoard. When he put one machine down, another came at him. They climbed over the fallen bodies of their fellow machines with singular focus. A legpower goliath came stomping through, but it only suffered the same fate as the previous goliath. When it kicked at the angel, Pit jumped up high. A flap of his wings brought him out of range of the follow up kick, and he came down on the robot's head with a downward strike that punctured its cranium. This time the bipeds around it scattered so as not to be crushed, leaving a couple open for Pit to sweep in and skewer.

It was clear that the more simplistic, humanoid bots were not going to be a match for Pit. However, there were more than just those kinds of machines in the army they were facing. Four quadrupeds galloped toward him, pushing the other robots out of the way and charging directly at him. These didn't need to fumble around and try to strike him with a weapon, their bodies were sharpened enough that a simple tackle had the potential to do a lot of damage. He parried the first and very nearly dodged the second. He was a little too late, and when he turned out of the way the quadruped clipped his wing. It was a relatively minor wound, but also the worst place he could have been hit, and in his haste to protect his wings he turned back into danger's way. The third slammed into him, its front legs caught by the bow but slicing into his arms and bracers. Refusing to be bowled over, Pit dug his heels in and grit his teeth. He was being pushed back, so he rolled with it - throwing the quadruped behind him with a kick where it slashed apart a biped.

The fourth quadruped had missed when Pit had rolled backward, but it had already turned and was running in for its second charge when he stood back up. He leapt up and kicked the machine over, following up with a windmill slash to take it apart before it could regain its footing. There was a repreive of about one second when Pit swapped equipment before the robots swarmed in once more.

Faster than their two-legged counterparts, the quadrupeds made to tackle Pit first. This time they were easily deflected by the dual Orbitars that floated around him. They turned the robots away as though they were simple charging animals, and a spray of rapid fire shots took out a squadron of medium and large bipeds that followed behind. The orbitars then swept around, turning their fire on the four-legged machines. Individually each shot was weak, but enough clustered together on joins or weak spots was enough to destroy what amounted to robo-fodder. Two of the quadrupeds crumpled, and the last threw itself at Pit only to be pummeled into defeat by the swirling shields.

Whew! How many is that now? It was getting a little hard to keep track. Gunfire showered over the area from some fliers that arrived, and a pair of reverse-legged goliaths that stepped up to the plate next. The Orbitars slammed together to block the bullets, focusing on defense and only taking pot shots at the fliers. Some crashed down to the earth, and once there was a enough of a gap in the firing the orbitars came apart again, returning fire with gusto at the enemies overhead. The orbitars' shots were more than enough for the fliers, and Pit took them down while the reverse-legs advanced. Bullets zinged by, and the angel didn't escape completely unscathed as he closed the distance between himself and the robots. He slipped behind a goliath, scrambling up its back while the other peppered it with its arm mounted guns. Pit peeked out from behind the goliath's head, ducking when the gunfire moved up and obliterated his ride. Kicking off of its falling body Pit landed on top of the other reverse-leg, letting the orbitars do their thing. One shield softened its rusty-looking dome by slamming into it, the other firing to finish it off.

"Uh, fifty! I think." He tried to keep an ear and eye out for his comrades in case they needed any help, but at the moment the battle actually seemed to be going alright. There was the stray yelp of pain and startled shout, but none of the Seekers were in dire straits. That was great, they could definitely get through this if they kept the pace up! The group's stamina reserves might not be able to catch up with their intent, but so far so good. Pit himself could definitely keep it going for a while yet.

With the orbitars still equipped he focused on keeping his distance and focusing fire on a few enemies before moving on to the next, looking for the perfect moment to use his charged shot. Robots rushed in and were put down two or three at a time until the group was getting too big and too close to continue this strategy. Metal fists and slapdash weapons were beginning to reach him. No worries though, it was time!

"That all you got?" Pit said, grinning despite himself and hopping backwards out of the crowd.

He gave himself a whole lot of space by unleashing the Guardian Orbitars' charge shot. The shimmering energy shield flew forward, mowing down a whole host of bipeds, quadrupeds, and even fliers that had swooped down too low. Any enemies it didn't destroy outright where damaged and pushed out of the way, perfect for Pit to dash in and finish off. One legpower goliath had lost a foot, making the weak spot on its head easy pickings. Another goliath had raised its bulky arms up in defense, leaving the head on its undercarriage vulnerable. The smaller robots were no issue just yet.

After carving out a chunk of the robots, the rest that were trying to target him had to spend some time crawling over the wreckage. He took the moment afforded to him for a quick breather, then jumped right back in to battle to meet them.

Midna’s grand slam worked like a charm, the massive explosive knocking the incoming Cleanser back a country mile, though not quite enough to send it back into the abyss from which it came

”You not like that huh? Well too bad, there’s more where it came from, and it’s all me!” Midna taunted the monstrosity, already preparing to charge up another titanic explosive to finish the job. That proved unnecessary however, as the lack of immediate threats from the front had freed Blazermate up to take down the camera with a massive laserbeam.

Reality warped again, and then returned back to normal, leaving them facing down a now inert camera, one with a strange black box now at its feet

”We, glad that’s over. Nice shot at the end there Blazermate” the princess praised the bot girl, before floating forwards to look at, but not touch, the source of the entire situation.

”So … does anyone know what these are? I guess it kind of looks like those weird machines they had all over the top side city now that I look at it more” she said, referencing the multitude of security cameras that infested Suoh, which she didn’t know what they where either.

She’d leave it to the others if they wanted to try and use the two devices, but if no one else did, she’d shove both into a sealed off spot in the twilight realm (a process that did not involve touching them), unintentionally emulating the OoP’s former jailers with her improvised containment unit.

After that they caught up with Karin again, who Midna was more than happy to fill in on what she had missed ”You would not believe the nonsense that we just went through-” as they rode through a few more tunnels.

After hanging back and keeping her mouth shut though their brief run in with the Seto’s Psych-OSF squad (and dithering upon and then deciding against informing them of the fallen squad they’d run across the remains of for the sake of moral) they rushed off to catch up with Peach, Sakura and Raz’s squad.

It was a good thing they did, as in the time between Seto having last seen them and their arrival, Raz and co had managed to run into some hulking titan of an Other that somehow managed to be even freakier than all the ones they had seen before.

Also, worse, Midna could not find, at a glance, any hint of the presence of her fellow princess among the squad. She would have asked about that, but Benedict’s first move was to launch right into commander mode and start ordering them about. The princess did not exactly appreciate that, but given that the beast was bearing down on Raz, and his idea seemed sound, she did not waste time complaining.

”Good plan, on it!” she called in agreement, before pointing a finger at the monster and commanding ”Initiates, root that thing!”

The three strikers stepped out of the aether around her and then bent down to press hands to the earth, summoning up a swarm of psychic roots that lashed out to try and grapple one of the hulking Other’s legs.

As they did that, the princess flicked a hand and summoned her clubba-club from the twilight realm. She gripped the massively oversized mace with her shadow hand and then, empowered by Benedict’s magic, rode into the fray atop her trusty wolfos steed, dragging the weapon behind her. Once close, she would swing the wrecking ball of a blunt instrument at the limb their tactician had ordered frozen in an attempt to shatter it.

At the same moment she swung, she summoned her undead Darknut, the super sized knight (who gave the Other a run for its money in the hight department) stepping out of the twilight realm and delivering a shield bash to its side to try and knock it off balance at the same time as its legs were under attack.

With her medaforce beam, Blazermate was able to take out the camera that had been causing the warp in space they were all experiencing, healing herself up to full in the process from whatever damage she took from the Cleanser's retaliations. Having dealt the finishing blow, a few members of her team congratulated her, but she was sure they would've gotten it eventually. She was very sad though that the Cleanser disappeared with the camera's destruction, leaving no spirits behind for her to make into parts. "Dang, being able to disable spirits might've been really useful if those cloaked people also got spirits." Blazermate said, a bit disheartened, but that was battle, sometimes you didn't get what you wanted.

As they moved on, Midna, having not really seen technology before, questioned what those things were. Since she was just healing everyone and didn't really need to exert stamina to move unlike a few of those in the group, Blazermate answered. "Oh, those are cameras. They record what they see, usually sending it to a monitor somewhere else. Think of them as robot eyes basically. Some can even hear!" Blazermate said, simplifying what a camera was for Midna.

When they encountered an OSF squad, Blazermate didn't have all that much to say since Goldlewis and Benedict were better at that sorta thing. She just mentioned her name was Blazermate and healed the OSF squad as they passed by. If anything that collaborated Goldlewis story, as everyone loved healing!

And soon after passing that OSF squad, they ran into Sakura, Raz, and that whole team! It was about time they had found each other! Peach wasn't anywhere to be seen, perhaps she was somewhere else or something? There was an Other that looked like 2 lady heads riding a house though, and that was a more pressing issue as it seemed their friends were engaged with it.

Going into battlefield commander mode, Benedict started to give orders that the others began to follow, IE, just attack the legs. Blazermate summoned her engineer as he started to make his sentry, and at Benedict's request, stayed near him. She would zoom off to heal someone if needed, but the old man seemed to like her company. "Hehe. Your not the first guy to want a female medabot as a partner~." Blazermate said, giving a bit of a tease. Considering Raz and Sakura probably didn't have much in the way of heals, Blazermate was surely a relief.

Raz was trying to give the beast a wide berth, continuing to pepper its center mass with Psi-blasts, but the thing was pretty damn nimble for its size. The big house head (was that it's head? Or was it the two... heads?) swung towards him, dragging the rest of it behind, but the ribbons were even faster; they lashed ahead of the Other, swiping at Raz, each strand long enough to reach him. Luckily ducking under sharp whip-like things was part of his forte. The Aquato family had been on rotation for lion replacement ever since they lost the original lion while on the road in upper Ohio. It was kind've like a chore wheel, but less painful.

Jump, bounce, duck, slide, Raz slipped past every ribbon strike by the skin of his teeth. Part of him, beyond the show-boating hoops and hollers he did with each successful dodge, was sure it was all thanks to this fancy 'Brain Drive' capability his new outfit came with. He was more focused than he'd ever been before, his brain running so fast and clearly that the world almost moved in slow motion.

Thanks to this heightened sense of attention Raz was able to catch sight of the emerging group of allies down one of the dark tunnels, even while dealing with the Other. "Hey guys!!" Raz called, waving as he spun around and dealt three more blasts in rapid succession, two of which missed the mark just barely, disturbing some butterflies clinging to its limbs. Guess he wasn't all that perfect still. "Made it in time to help with the big one!"

With the added backup, Raz changed tactics - most everyone who joined were grounded, so he'd take to the air above the Other to keep its attention split. Having made a little more than a semi-circle around the monster Raz stomped down hard, skidding to a stop for a brief moment as his Levball, boosted by the Drive, sprung him high, high, high up, managing to almost match the two stone heads. At the zenith Raz began to levitate, in the more classic sense, borrowing Sakura's power again. He wasn't sure how much control he'd have now, but it didn't really matter.

"Hey, jerkface!" Raz shot at the Other, verbally. "Or, uhh, Jerk...faces? You big thing!" Witty as ever, he aimed Mental Connection at one of the heads, sending himself careening fast towards it. He wasn't going in for a dive-bomb, however, instead managing to slingshot himself right past and end up about where he began, just floating in the air now, the momentum placing him just above the Other. There, Raz used TK, the tell-tale hand floating down to the rubble that had trapped them moments ago. TK, too, was significantly improved thanks to the Drive, allowing Raz to grab hold of a real hefty chunk of concrete and lift it up.

In one swift motion Raz swung his arm overhead, willing his TK to follow suit, circling upwards into the air behind, then over himself. "You might have two heads, and that's better than one..." He said, performing a karate-esque chop-esque swipe downwards. The hunk of stone mirrored it, Raz effectively slamming it down on the Other's head(s). "...but that just means you have twice the mouths to eat concrete with!"

---

@Dark Cloud



"Can-do!" ears ringing from Zenkichi's firearms blasting any unlucky machines who dared near them, he thrust the lodged spear forward just as a ball of crackling energy got within distance to make the hair on his arms stand on end. The quadruped jerkily moved forward before gaining its legs and galloping in a line lurching as it turned with the spear steering it "Woah there." he called pulling their steed to a halt, he looked back at the giant ape of a machine then to his partner "Got something fancy up them nice sleeves of yours friend?" he asked, leading the quadruped between its cohorts and even trampling over a few.

Wolf shook his head, swapping his greatsword for one of the grenades he’d picked up and tossing it at the Goliath and the smaller machines that were near it, frowning when it failed to destroy the larger machine. ”Not much, unfortunately. Though I figure I can take it down mano e mano if you want to pick me up again in a minute.” Buffing himself with Tarukaja would likely be more than enough to take the Goliath down, frankly.

Their steeds joints groaned as it turned, still some fight left in it but not enough to clear them right off "Well sometimes-Hngh" he ducked as a volley of bullets whizzed by "Sometimes a simple plan is good as any." not like he could do much, without needing one hand on the spear and another to hold on for dear life.

Nodding, Wolf kicked off the quadruped and drew his sword, calling out to the Goliath, ”Right here!” Giving himself a buff with Tarukaja, he charged, sword lashing out at its leg as the Goliath charged up a whirlwind uppercut, but the Phantom Striker was out of the way far too quickly for the slow, telegraphed attack to even have a chance at landing, along with its follow-up hammer smash. Wolf took the opportunity while it was distracted and recovering to get off a short series of slashes, the backswing taking down a biped that risked getting close. When the Goliath raised up again, Wolf backstepped, watching its movements carefully for a tell.

Another smaller biped windmilled its arms, charging him, and was batted aside by the Phantom Thief’s greatsword, only for the Goliath to do the same. He couldn’t block or counter that, and he knew it, so Wolf backpedaled some more, grunting as he lashed out at the Machines trying to block his path. So they did have some coordination. Well, lesson learned. Probably the hard way, as the Goliath approached. ”Valjean, Triple Down!” He called, the Persona appearing to lash out at the large singular enemy with its chains, the Gun damage being somewhat reduced by its armor, but still enough to put a dent in the Machine.

Meanwhile the merchant had been bearing down on the bucking quadraped, losing some control on it as it trampled through the battlefield, Partitio noticed the spear was getting jostled out of the thing’s back and the loose wires were sparking. Now he wasn't all that well versed with machinery so he couldn't have anticipated his next gambit to be a shocker, taking the wires and pulling on them was a bit more painful than expected as the merchant was shocked by a jolt of electricity.

Yet Partitio endured, using his tenacity and endurance to bring the Onailgun at his side to his hands and get to work on this bucking bronco of a machine. He got the feeling that their steed wouldn't last if he didn't have an easier way of controlling it so he ripped out a decent length of wiring nearly shocking himself to death had he not used Rest. By this point the two had been galloping willy-nilly taking out smaller bipeds that got in the way.

A handful of weird looking string to the merchant was more than enough for what he was thinking. Dislodged spear in hand he decided to take the dangerous but much more efficient option of taking the damn bull or rather machine by the horns or rather wires. He grabbed onto the wiring once more and tugged grunting painfully as he gained some control over the quadruped again, it'd have to do for now.

He took the assault rifle off his shoulders by the strap and with one hand on the wires and the other gripping the handle of the gun he cried both in triumph and a tiny bit of pain as he turned his steed and galloped back across the vale. He pulled the trigger of the rifle letting loose a volley of bullets going every direction as he went missing more machines than it hit, but taking out quite a few unfortunate fliers that had decided to tail the merchant as well as several more bipeds that were either trampled or shot.

As Partitio and his mount rampaged through the machines, Wolf carved through the smaller bipeds blocking his path, as the Goliath finally finished its tantrum. Snarling, he turned around, stabbing his greatsword into its arm and following up with a heavy, over-the-head circular slash which carved through the thin beam-like structures supporting one of its arms. The machine stumbled, lopsided, and a final slash put an end to its existence. Breathing heavily, Wolf turned to a group of bipeds with a multilegs that were approaching and called for his Persona once more. ”Megido!” The Almighty spell managed to destroy a couple of bipeds and deal a pretty serious amount of damage to the Multilegs while he reloaded his revolvers, taking advantage of a momentary lapse in the attacks against him.

With a shrill whistle the merchant came from behind in the breadth of a moment looking a bit worse for wear but he persevered, thanks to his indomitable vigor and knack to shrugging damage off. Possibly the other man's fancy ability also saved him from getting downed by a stray bullet. Anyhow, he rejoined his ally just as his steed finally buckled and collapsed.

As gracefully as he could Partitio leapt from the quadruped as it collapsed landing by Zenkichi with a grunt, firing a slightly more accurate spray of ammunition at the few other bipeds that were standing around them as he got to his feet "Dunno bout you friend but I'm all outta tricks, looks like we're settlin' this the old fashioned way." his arm as sore from the guns recoil, nerves shot from the electric shock but most of all he sounded disappointed that the metal bucket kicked the bucket, but now wasn't no time to complain.

”Fine by me,” Wolf replied, drawing his revolvers and firing at the approaching bipeds and the multilegs which survived his Megido, then turning his aim skywards and knocking a medium flier out of the sky. ”Don’t forget the ones above us,” he warned Partitio, reloading his last rounds and drawing his greatsword to fight, a few more multilegs, these ones with blades instead of cannons, approaching. He stepped forward to meet them, sword stabbing out to attack the main body of the closest one. It scored a retaliatory hit, but Wolf stepped in rather than back away, and brought his sword around and down while the Machine was preparing a follow-up, carving one of its legs off and throwing the thing off-balance. He took the opportunity and with a hefty overhead swing, bisected the creature’s head and torso.

As it crumbled to pieces, the next multilegs attacked, scoring a couple of hits in quick succession, but Wolf turned with a back-handed slash, knocking the blades aside, staggering the multilegs, and following up with a pair of lighter slashes before stepping back and calling for Valjean, ”Triple Down!” The Persona appeared, raising its chains to lash out, and struck true, damaging both multilegs pretty badly. The one that Wolf had hit before was on its last legs, both literally and figuratively, and the Phantom Striker rushed forward, bringing his sword down and dissolving it into ash. The other Machine cried out and charged, but Wolf was ready, stepping forward with a warding slash to meet it, and following up with a pair of crossed slashes to destroy the thing. As the rest of the machines continued approaching, he moved back to help cover Partitio.

Partitio hadn't the luxury of a big fancy world companion to fight by his side just his gumption and a big ass gun, which after running out of ammunition the merchant switched up his tactics and started fighting tooth and nail, taking on several medium bipeds with his spear and nailgun before the former Turk rejoined him to fight as a combined force.

The pair managed to make quick work of the medium bipeds, moving on to hardier targets with renewed confidence and vigor. Even large bipeds found themselves quickly taken down, though Goliaths proved a bit tougher of a target. Wolf kept Partitio covered with Rakukaja as best he could, fighting more aggressively when the merchant wasn’t protected, both to regain his own lost vitality and to keep him from being harmed when his defense wasn’t boosted. Between spear, greatsword, nailgun and revolvers, after abandoning the destroyed quadruped, the pair found that more mobility meant quicker results, not having to fight their mount to get where they wanted to go.

Even after Wolf’s guns clicked dry and the pair were battered and bruised, they still fought, the Phantom Striker focusing harder and harder on offense to regain his lost vitality, tossing out Megidos and Triple Downs like they were going out of style. Each AoE attack cleared a few of the smaller enemies, and with hard, heavy breaths, Wolf planted his greatsword in the ground, the carnage around the two a sure sign of their efforts.

Geralt, Midna, and Goldlewis did one hell of a job keeping the Cleansers off their backs, with the Twilight Princess knocking one so far back that even Geralt's eagle eyes had trouble spotting it for a moment. Their victories heralded a greater Victory, however, as Blazermate unleashed her powerful Medaforce beam now that she was free of the burden of keeping them alive against an onslaught of explosive foes. The camera defeated, it spiraled through the air, giving off an ominous red glow, and as suddenly as they found themselves in the Infinite Corridor, they were freed from its endless clutches, back where they had started.

Geralt sighed, not wanting anything to do with the damn thing, and followed Goldlewis' lead. Not worth it, even if Blazermate's explanation made the technology seem less sinister. They swiftly carried on, reuniting with Karin, who had been spared the surreal experience, even if she got a firsthand explanation courtesy of Midna.

After a bit of walking, they came upon a group of OSF Troopers, whom Geralt didn't pay terribly much mind. It wasn't that he distrusted them; if anything, the OSF was much less ambiguously Good than the other organizations keeping this horrible city intact, but he was very much not interested in blowing their cover with his obvious lack of psychic abilities. He could pass off his Signs, he supposed, but his understanding meant that such a hollow disguise wouldn't last more than a few seconds under heightened scrutiny. So, he slightly played up his usual standoffishness, and let Goldlewis handle the deception.

When they passed on, Geralt hurried with the others, eager to catch up with the rest of their team. When the roar of what could only be a monster, an Other, resounded throughout the cave, he joined the others in hurrying even faster. When he saw the thing, his mind took a minute to comprehend just what he was looking at- which seemed to be a pattern with these horrific monstrosities. He'd deign to call even some of the more hideous monsters he'd faced back home downright normal compared to these things.

The team exploded into action, Midna summoning companions and riding forth, Karin moving to reinforce Sakura, Goldlewis rushing directly at it, Benedict moving to attack the legs while imploring others to do the same, and Blazermate summoning her sentry-creating Engineer and staying back to heal.

Geralt started with the customary Quen shield, rushing forward to attack the Other's legs, his size and strength making him an ideal front-line combatant against a large monster. He slashed at its legs, hoping to get its attention, and circled around to its front, silver sword in both hands and ready to carve at its eldritch flesh. "Pick on someone your own size." He taunted.

With a few quick strokes of his weapons, Roxas was able to destroy five more bipeds that were attempting to close in on him. Then he did a circular throw of his Keyblades to take out four medium fliers attempting to swoop down on him. He breathed heavily, fatigue was starting to catch up with him. He needed his magic to be recharged, and he needed it now. He glanced around himself as five more bipeds in addition to five quadrupeds began to surround him. Up above, he noticed 6 fliers circling ahead in a manner almost like vultures waiting for some animal to die so they could feed on it. But the Keybearer refused to let himself be overcome by fear or despair. With heavy breaths he readied his weapons and steeled himself and thought of the friends he was searching for - his whole reason for even being here.

This is it.

It comes down to this.

If you fall here, you won't ever see any of them again.

So don't fall here. No matter what it takes.

As the robotic enemies finally began their lunge for an attack, Roxas lifted Oathkeeper and pointed its tip straight up. "Thunder!" With that call, bolts of lighting rained down all around him. The Thundaga spell rained lightning on the robots that were about to go for the kill. They were all caught up in the blast, many of them were destroyed immediately by it. Others were just heavily damaged, easy prey for Roxas to finish off with a few quick Keyblade strokes. His magic recharged, Roxas leapt back into the thick of the battle with a renewed viger.

With flowmotion he quickly traversed himself to group after group. Raining down magical thunder on them and then picking off the survivors. First it was a group 10 Multilegs. The opening Thundaga spell tore through their armor and defenses, and left them open for Roxas to finish off with a single, circular sweeping slash of his dual Keyblades. Then he launched himself between a total of about 10 fliers utilizing flowmotion. He took quick slices at them, taunting them to try and swarm him with their numbers. Except this was merely a ruse to lure them into grouping close together so that he could wipe them out with a powerful Thundaga. Having cast it a total three times by this point, Roxas reckoned he could cast it maybe five more times before he would be out of MP again, so he knew he had to make each one count.

After that group another one consisting of 5 bipeds, 5 quadrupeds, and 5 multilegs started charging at him. Roxas used a nearby ruined car to jump upward and then made himself land in their midst. As soon as his feet splashed onto the flooded street he cast a Thundaga that washed over the machines like the previous group. Then he lunged between each of the survivors and finished them off with a fluid combo of slices and slashes with his weapons. And that was when he saw it.

It was a large swarm of no less than 20 small fliers overhead looking to overwhelm the Keybearer like a flying, mechanical storm. But Roxas was not afraid. He stood his ground and waited for them swoop down on them. In a slight change up, he first lifted Oathkeeper up to cast a Thundaga. But rather than go on the attack immediately, he instead instantly followed that motion by doing the same with Oblivion and stacking a second Thundaga on top of the first one. With a double dose of lightning raining on them, the fliers convulsed and exploded in midair, every one of them destroyed. Roxas thought it was over for a moment, but then heard more mechanical sounds. Emerging from the rainy shadows was 15 Reverse-Joints, resembling a pack of mechanical wolves.

As they closed in on Roxas, he simply flourished his Keyblades and readied himself. When they all lunged, he opened with a final Thundaga that did heavy damage and left most of them stunned. Then he leaped up onto a nearby vehicle and off of it in order to come crashing down on the ground amidst the stunned machines and unleashing a shockwave from the weapons that finished them all off. Roxas looked around, noticing no more machines nearby. He also noticed that he still a small bit of his magic leftover. Good, he thought, he could use that cast another Curaga when he met back up with the other Seekers should anyone be in need of some healing.

Speaking of which, Roxas dashed off from his chosen battlefield and went looking for the rest of the Seekers.

Once they'd all ducked into the Pokémon Center and got Mewtwo as healed up as they could, the Ace Cadet, Big Band, and Wonder Red crowded around the Pokémon in one corner of the building. They had to know what really happened, which left Mewtwo with little chance to catch his breath before the Seekers sought an explanation. Mewtwo wasted no time at all in giving them as much information as he could.

There really had been an attack, and the Alcamoth Mercenaries lost. 'Mass causalities,' Mewtwo had said. Though the Cadet hadn't known any of them well, it was like a punch to the gut to hear that most, if not all, of the kind people he'd met there were now just ashes in the wind. Along with their demise went the Seekers' central base of operations and any connection they had between the different groups. The freedom fighters' situation wasn't good. But... they weren't starting over from scratch. They still had four of Galeem's Guardians down and two other teams out there chasing down more. They were aware of the Consuls now, and their mighty power, but also proof they weren't invincible or anything like that.

Mewtwo and Red pointed out that now was their best chance to take down one of those Consuls. The Cadet had been for himself that she was hurt from the battle, in which she'd helped to destroy Alcamoth. They couldn't just let that go. The monster hunter agreed with them - he wanted to go after her too, for answers if not only to pay her back for her part in the destruction.

Even Band agreed, so it seemed their next course of action was clear. The detective brought up some good points not to dissuade them, but supply them a sense of caution. The Cadet nodded, and when asked if he was in he responded enthusiastically.

"I'm all for it," he said. "If N does show up, well, we were gonna have to deal with them both at some point anyway. Someone needs to bring them to justice."

He wasn't sure how much stronger Linkle had gotten since he'd last seen her, but she was able to go toe to toe with N. With the four of them versus two Consuls, they might be able to pull it off. The sooner they did this the better, not just to take advantage of L's weakened state but to get those two off their backs so no more innocent bystanders got monsterfied and sent after them. Maybe they could even lose the heat of the police too.

With all of his weapons and equipment already packed into the square bag on his back, the Ace Cadet looked to Red who'd volunteered to ferry them all to the Aether Paradise.

"Let's go kick some Lunasstra."

100 Geo wasn't much, but Rubick supposed it was a start. He was going to ask the Koopa Troop for additional funding, but Sectonia's next words were a surprise to be sure. "A currency exchange shop?" Rubick asked. "That's perfect! Then I should have enough money to purchase what I need from that magic emporium! Thank you for this information, Queen Sectonia." He collected his money from Sectonia, then bowed in respect. Rubick then proceeded to teleport in rapid succession towards the direction he believed the currency exchange shop would be at. Fortunately for him, he found it easily enough and proceeded to exchange some of his Gold into Geo. There was a line, to which Rubick rapidly tapped his foot on the ground in impatience, but he soon got some Geo and proceeded to make his way over to the magic emporium.

Once inside, he looked around for the components he was searching for. The Staff of Wizardry, the Ogre Axe, and the Blade of Alacrity were in their respective locations, but there was one more item missing... Then, he spotted it. The Point Booster, found in a more remote corner of the shop. Rubick went to the front desk and made his purchases, then dashed out of the emporium and teleported back as fast as his Blink Dagger and Weaver's Warp allowed him to.

When he got back, however, everyone was gone.

It was easy to get into the flow of a battle like this. Unlike going up against a boss or a group of elite enemies, chewing through several weaker ones didn't demand quite as much brain power. It was still dangerous, there was always the chance that a wrong move could lead to being overwhelmed by the flood of machines, but for the most part Pit just let his momentum carry him around the battlefield. He bounced from one robot to the next after switching back to the Palutena Bow, keeping it in one piece so that he could use it either as a bow or a sword whenever he needed. He'd gotten used to the Quadrupeds' method of attack, taking them down before they reached him with a couple of arrows to their head piece. The bipeds he met with blade, easily chopping through them in melee. The spider-like multi-legs were a mix of both, cutting away their limbs if he managed to get to them before they formed up into a protective ball and arcing light arrows to target their exposed heads when they did.

This might as well have been second nature to him. He'd fought through the three realms of Angel Land like this before (multiple times), plus alien spaceships and the Subspace Army. At some point the headspace he was in must have unlocked some power that had been sealed away by Galeem, because he noticed that as he was dashing back and forth between a pair of goliaths his arrows were packing more of a punch. When exactly had that started happening? His realization was delayed, but now that he was aware of it Pit focused on his bow. He let loose a dash shot on purpose this time, watching the arrow strike the circular head on the goliath's arm and damage the limb enough that its guard dropped.

"You robots definitely don't stand a chance now!" he crowed in delight. The Palutena Bow was back at full power! If he really tried, maybe he would be able to feel Lady Palutena's gaze on him even if she couldn't communicate with him at the moment. Spurred on by that thought, Pit dodged the slam of another goliath as he charged an arrow and let it fly to take out the goliath he'd already crippled then turned on the one that had just attacked him and did the same to it. Rather riddling goliaths with several weak arrows, a well placed stronger shot would be enough to disable them so long as he had an opening.

With the some power return to him, once he passed the first goal of a hundred robots down - or when it felt like he had, anyway. He'd given up trying to actually keep track by now - he switched gears to specific target practice. He ignored the smaller enemies and went right for the largest ones, the goliaths. The Legpowers were faster than the others, but compared to the other goliaths their weak points were less protected. He ducked beneath one as it tried to stomp on him, dashing between its legs and taking out the head there with a more powerful arrow. The next stop was another large-armed goliath, and he weaved a few standing charge shots to strike its weak points. The sting of gunfire hit his side and he once again dashed away, this time shooting the Reverse-leg that had been targeting him. The first shot hit its sturdy chassis, the second curving and blasting through its head while it was off balance.

Doing things this way did use up more of Pit's stamina. Though he'd tucked his wings in close to his back when they weren't in use helping him to jump higher, on the rest of his body he could feel cuts, gashes, and bullet wounds stacking up. He pushed through, made of tougher stuff, but had to take a short break from "overdrawing." Speaking of pushing, he wondered how far he could push the weapon? He'd thought earlier that it was back to its full potential, but there was one more thing he could try just to make sure.

The angel sliced his way out of a small group that tried surrounding him as another Legpower ran toward him. This time when he fired an arrow toward it, he willed fire into being around its tip. Technically he hadn't used a "fire arrow" this way in a long time, years even, but it worked and the fireballs appeared. The shot soared straight through the gap between a pair of bipeds, battering with the flames before the arrow and fireballs surrounding it hit their mark on the goliath's leg. It staggered briefly, but before Pit could celebrate the true restoration of the bow's power the goliath completed its trek and punted him away. Not even remotely prepared for that attack he was unable to use his wings to stop himself, tumbling clumsily through the air in a shallow arc with a wail. He crashed down on top of a multi-legs, the impact hurting him more than it. He scrambled to hop off as its blades came up to try and skewer him but only ended up taking itself out.

A little embarrassed about what just happened, Pit flitted back towards the goliath that had launched him to get some payback, stopped by a reverse-leg that stepped into his path and opened fired from both of its guns.

"It's not gonna be that easy!" Pit informed it, quick-summoning the Upperdash Arm to bull through the bullets and land a heavy uppercut. The goliath's body jerked backwards, its bullet spray forced skyward where it downed a flier before it stopped firing. Pit moved around it, slicing through its weak point and continuing the fight until he could reunite with the other Seekers after the army was defeated.

An intrepid Large Biped challenged Tora’ new weaponry right away with a charge into melee range, a section of rebar partially encased in concrete held like a greatsword. It swung the crude slab down at the little inventor, but Tora caught it in the upturned palm of his Mech Arm. Of course, the force it absorbed hurt his wing a bit, but with teeth clenched he held firm and pounded the Biped's torso with punch after punch. A roundhouse kick from Poppi QT swooshed over his head to knock the Biped's off after the second punch, and a third for good measure blasted it away, half its arm still attached to its weapon as Tora tossed it aside. A Multileg scuttled in with two Medium Bipeds in tow, surrounding the Nopon from the front as a Small Flier took potshots from above. Thinking quickly, Tora staggered them with an explosive ground-pound from the Mech Arms and threw himself into the air. Taken by surprise, the Flier missed its last shot before Tora put his oversized gauntlets together and dunked it with an overhead smack. It fell to earth and blew up in a burst of flame that knocked the other three machines to the ground. Poppi grabbed the Multileg's cutter arms, planted her foot against its body, and pulled the limbs right off. In quick succession both Bipeds found their comrade's cutters buried in their chassis, one apiece, and the next second Tora dropped down right on top of the disarmed Multileg, splitting the robot's pill-shaped body like a spent casing.

Without giving the pair a moment to breathe, more machines pressed in, and a Legpower reared its ugly head. Poppi narrowly snatched Tora out of harm's way in time before the upside-down goliath's stomp squashed the doomed Multileg flat. "Going up!" Not missing a beat, Poppi whirled around and hurled her Masterpon up, out of the crowd and straight into the Legpower's body. Tora put his Mech Arms' hands together like a diver and was promptly embedded into the machine chassis, where he proceeded to open it up and dig right in. Scrabbling uselessly at its torso with its little arms, the Legpowder could only spin its wide-eyed head around in horror as fiery blasts punched out of its body in all directions, one after another. After a moment Poppi boosted up out of the destruction and rocketed forward in a flying kick, straight into the hole in its chest and then out the other side, picking up Tora along the way. She remained airborne as the Legpower fell, not hindered by the weight of Poppi Alpha's armor, and held Tora beneath her so he could rain down missiles on the horde in a sort of makeshift bombing run. After a few seconds the two found themselves faced by a bevy of pink orbs cluttering up the airways, courtesy of a whole battalion of Fliers. "Hold on tight!" Poppi maneuvered as well as she could through the blistering bullet-hell of projectiles, hunting down Small Fliers one at a time until Tora's punches built up enough power for a level three Blade Art.

Tora flipped around to his companion's back and passed her the Mech Arms. "Let's show cruddypons what real engineering look like!"

"My pleasure!" Channeling a vast amount of ether, Poppi threw wide the Mech Arms' missile pods and filled the sky with fiery missiles. In a beautiful dance they rained down on the machine lifeforms, earthbound and airborne alike. "Noponic Destructiooooooooon!"

Elsewhere, Giovanna paused for a moment to wipe her brow. It wasn't just the rain; these hunks of junk were making her sweat. Around her lay the wreckage of an entire pack of Reverse-joint goliaths, their knees kicked out, their heads caved in, their circuits lightning-fried, and their cables Rei-chomped, but still they kept coming. Those wrecks weren't dissolving, which intrigued her somewhat, but she focused instead on the Quadruped that leaped onto and then used one Reverse-joint like a trampoline to try and bulldoze her beneath its bladed front legs. She dodged back and took out both legs in a revolving sweep, then raised her flashing fist and smashed it down with Seismic Hammer to launch its fallen body back up into the air. As it fell a well-timed heavy Thunder Knuckle to the dome spiked its head into the ground, finishing it off. A moment later, however, an orb struck her in the back. Wincing, she turned around to see a Medium Flier hovering a few dozen feet ahead, its gun trained on her and more projectiles in the air, which almost distracted her from the Multileg lunging from the same direction. She blocked two slashes and a final cross-slice from its cutters and went to counterattack, only to fall victim to a frame trap as the Multileg launched into a spinning spiderleg blow. "Agh!" Caught in a flurry of strikes, she hit the ground a moment later, and rose a little wiser. "...Damn." The Multileg repeated the same strategy, but this time she pushed it off with Faultless Defense, forcing its final strike to whiff. The next second her Trovão kick crushed its spin attack on start-up. As it reeled she climbed on top of it and unleashed an EX Seismic Hammer, blowing the Multileg into the air with her atop it. Springboarding off the wreck, she somersaulted through the air toward the Medium Flier with EX Burning Kick and, legs wreathed in fire, melted through its body like butter.

As it spiraled away to crash, a Goliath loomed. She dashed toward it, Rei swirling around her to rip through two marauding Bipeds with her teeth, then unleashed Trovão again to blow through its left knee. It toppled, unable to support its weight, and Giovanna turned her attention to a trio of Large Bipeds with weapons. The one with a spear lunged; she went low and snapped the shoddy weapon in half with an upward kick, then rammed her leg through its torso. The other two pincered her, and when she avoided a killer slash from the one with an axe, the one with dual blades slices through her raincoat and into her skin. "Ugh." The secret agent ripped it off and flung it at the offending machine, disappearing from its sight. Its wild slashes tore the coat to ribbons, only to realize Giovanna had seemingly disappeared. By the time it realized where she'd gone she'd already wrapped her legs around its neck. Electricity crackled around her gloves as she prepared to electrocute the dual-wielder, but at the last second she launched herself off it instead, and the axe-wielder's weapon cleaved its comrade in half. Giovanna's eyebrows rose as she flipped through the air, sparks and scrap metal flying, and a moment later she descended on the culprit with Burning Dance. Her fiery divekick drove it across the earth straight toward a fresh gang of machines. Giovanna ended the ride with a blazing flip kick and landed on her hands to send the newcomers packing with upside-down whirlwind kicks. For the grand finale: a skyward jump straight toward a Goliath, past the punch that would have creamed her were she a split second slower, and into its face for a high-voltage cross chop. With a yell of effort she took it to the ground, frying its systems all the way.

When the titan fell, she came to a rest lying on its chest and in sore need of a break. Drenched by the rain and heavy of breath, she knew this wasn't her finest work. How many of them was it now? Fifty, sixty? In the background lightning crashed, thunder roared, and her allies destroyed machines by the dozens, but still hundreds upon hundreds remained. Everyone knew from that outset that this wouldn't be a walk in the park, but their foes' sheer numbers were taking their toll. Part of the problem lay with the Seekers themselves; a few of them just didn't have the damage output for a slobberknocker like this. After pushing herself into a sitting position, her eyes fell on the Rust Crew's truck as it continued to speed around and through the enemy ranks. All three of those guys would need to take on a hundred each to make ends meet, which included the driver. Did they even have that kind of ammunition? The fact that they seemed to be using their pistols struck her as a bad sign, and as she watched, things suddenly went from bad to worse.

A Legpower planted itself right in front of the truck, and when Cain tried to swerve around it, it swerved to. When its gigantic leg slammed into the truck's front the whole vehicle flipped over, sending both Marshall and Big Bo off its top and into the mud. The mob of machines surrounded them, and they disappeared from Giovanna's view. "Oh no." The secret agent got up and took off running, her pawprint shoes pounding through the puddles as she made her way toward the wreck. More enemies appeared in her path to obstruct her, and she grit her teeth. "No time for you!" Thunder Knuckle decked a Medium Biped. She flipped over and then nailed a charging Quadruped with Sol Poente. She decapitated and then used the body of a Large Biped as a shield against a shooting Reverse-joint, then beaned the shooter with the body and dunked its head into the muck with Burning Kick. Jets of wind from her shoes propelled her through the air to grab a passing Small Flier, which she grappled and then electrocuted to careen in the direction of the Rust Crew. A Golith swatted the Flier like a bug with a massive punch, but Giovanna bailed just in time to flip off, run along its arm, and Seismic Hammer its head straight into its chest cavity. Panting, she paused there a moment to try and get a view of the truck, and when she did she squinted at what she saw. The machines had beaten the men bloody, but they hadn't finished them off; instead, they were forcibly holding them still, and those strange bug-like drones she saw earlier were crawling on their bodies. With their stingers they seemed to be extracting some sort of strange substance from them that glowed bright blue.

"Leave friends alone!" she heard Tora cry.

From atop the staggering Goliath she watched as Tora and Poppi descended on the scene, the latter with the Mech Arms and the former with his hammer. Much more angry than they were hurt, they pounded the Bipeds into the dirt and scattered the drones. Those with tanks full of that blue stuff flew off into the distance, while the rest continued to buzz around while Tora and Poppi mangled the other machines. At that point, Giovanna couldn't spectate any longer. The headless Goliath reached up to grab her, and more machines swarmed. She plunged down into the hole she'd created and burned through until she burst out through the Goliath's underside, then left it to die as she charged into a squad of three Multilegs. The first fought defensively to give the other two a chance to take potshots, which made her growl in frustration. "Out of my way!" In a flash she merged with Rei, overcharging her gloves, then blitzed through the irksome machines in a green lightning blur. The Emergency Combination left all three a fried mess, and she sped onward, still brimming with power. Bipeds, quadrupeds, and even a Legpower all crumbled before her. She dashed through the air from flier to flier, popping each one like a balloon. With shocking speed she took a Medium Flier down with her, crashing to the ground only to find herself just a couple dozen feet away from the crashed truck. As the power faded she hurried the rest of the way to join Tora and Poppi as the last of their enemies fell.

Marshall, the first to succumb and with less vitality to give, was dead. His body had somehow calcified after the drones finished their work, turned to a stony statue. Big Bo was in awful shape, laying there on death's door. "Medic!" Giovanna called, searching for the team's only healer, Roxas. "Kid? Where are you!?"

Tora was holding his head in his little hands, his wings hanging limply. "Meeh-meeh-meeh! Am so sorry!" he moaned. "Stupid Tora got so caught up trashing machines that Tora forgot to protect friends!" He gazed up at his partner imploringly. "Can't we do anything, Poppi?"

Almost as anguished, the artificial blade shook her head. "I can't...look out!"

She pushed Tora just in time to avoid the pistol shot. Furious, Poppi looked up to see Cain halfway out of the sideways truck's passenger-side door, a pistol in his hands as his eyes gleamed red. "Cain?" she gasped, her shock turning to outrage in an instant. "What are-!"

As he adjusted his aim, Poppi abandoned words in favor of action. She burst upward and closed one Mech Arm around his head, yanking him out of the truck. With her thrusters at maximum burn she flew up, then down in a spectacular izuna drop that ended with a fiery explosion.

"Meh-meh!?" Taken completely aback by the suddenness of what just happened, Tora pitter-pattered over as the smoke cleared. Poppi stood a few feet away from Cain's body. "What going on? We thought him friend!"

Big Bo seemed just as baffled as him. "No idea," he gasped. "The hell's gotten into you...Cain?"

Suddenly, the robot moved. He rolled over onto all fours and looked upward, red eyes blazing from the nightmarish mangle left where his faceplate had been. With a wordless cry he launched himself at Poppi. Unyielding, she finished him off with a red-hot uppercut, scattering his parts far and wide.

The whole thing left Tora beside himself, close to panic. "Wh-what in the world just happen, meh!?" he stammered. "He turn into scary monster all of sudden! Tora not understand!"

Giovanna shook her head. Even she was a little horrified. "I...don't know. Black Tech is almost totally alien to me. In fact, that was like something from a horror movie." She furrowed her brows. "I know Midgar is extremely strict about what androids are deployed outside city limits. Could this be why?"

Tora swallowed nervously, the gears turning in his head. Nearby, the scattered machines were beginning to amass. Even with multiple Seekers working hard to fell over a hundred foes each, about eighty still remained. "Tora have bad feeling," the Nopon squeaked. "We should get out of here, meh. Fall back closer to city, get help to deal with rest. Come on, Poppi!" Reaching up with his wing, he tugged at her hand.

She didn't move. Her other hand was on her temple, as if she were suffering from a headache.

"P-Poppi?"

Big Bo’s eyes widened, and he drew in a sharp breath. “Shit. Shit, it’s a virus! Back away, little man!”

“Tora! Get away from her!” Giovanna called, tensing herself to run.

The Nopon glanced back at them, confused as to why they’d even suggest something like that, then back at Poppi as she turned. She was wincing in pain, and the light had vanished from her eyes. “Masterpon…” she rasped. “Please don’t…come after…me.”

Suddenly she pushed him away, then disappeared in a flurry of red ribbon and orange sparks. After a brief moment, Poppi QT Pi appeared, then sprang into the air. The thrusters on her back ignited, and she hurtled away through the rain, past the incoming machines and off into the distance.

Tora blinked, stunned. But only for a moment. “W-wait!” He started running, bouncing along the ground as fast as he could go. Which wasn’t that fast. “Come back! Poppiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!”

He ran for just a couple seconds before he realized that he couldn’t possibly catch up to her like this. Smashing aside a Biped, he looked around wildly, then spotted the Tallneck waiting in the wings where he left it. “Susieeee!” he cried, his voice pleading. “Fly me to garaffypon, fast as can! Am going after her!” He furrowed his brows at Giovanna, and anyone else who might warn him against this. “And not take no for answer!”







The Other’s massive size made it an easy target, so even in the throes of confusion, anguish, and fear Sakura landed a flurry of attacks, her strength and meter usage unrestrained. Of course, each of her techniques hurt a lot more than individual psi-blasts, so after just a moment spent swinging at Raz the monster refocused on the girl now whaling on its body. Its maneuvered away just enough so that a sweep of its arm across the ground could knock her back in a spray of dust, dirt, and rubble. Then it took hold of its bizarre head with both hands, lifted itself up, and pounded it against the ground, each crushing blow as strong or stronger than the body splash of the Gunkin Fisher. Even with Raz running interference, Sakura couldn’t take this horror head-on by herself.

Of course, Luka had no intention of letting her go it alone. Pushed to the next level by Brain Drive, he struck the other like lightning and vanished just as quickly. His uncanny usage of gravity and momentum to leverage his hefty weapon made the hammer seem almost weightless in his hands, but when it fell on the Other it splintered wood, dented metal, powdered butterflies, and left craters in its flesh. Unfortunately, this freak had a lot of wood, metal, butterflies, and flesh to get through. With Sina still rooted in place, an expression of horror frozen on her features, Dexio focused on protecting her. But the squad wasn’t left wanting for backup. Out of nowhere a whole nother squad of Seekers arrived, and they wasted no time lending a hand.

Karin attempted to convince Sakura to withdraw from the dangerous situation she’d thrown herself into, then entered the fray herself. Rather than go whole-hog like her friend she kept some distance, daringly playing the spacing game with the giant Other. This thing wasn’t playing nice, though. Its punishments were a lot stronger than hers, and its limbs so much longer that landing a hit on its torso might as well be impossible. That left its head, and while the red flash of the pinecone flowers lining its bottom jaw indicated some sort of weak point, a head slam from this thing couldn’t be sustained. Still, Karin made it work. Goldlewis joined in, hammering the monster’s limbs with his coffin rather than risking its business end. After a moment spent crawling on its tiptoes and elbows, hits coming in from all sides, the Other let out a howl with such physical power that everyone in its vicinity got blown away.

“Gah!” Gritting his teeth, Goldlewis remained where the wave of force pushed him back for a moment, and riddled the Other with a barrage from his Skyfish minigun. Luckily Benedict had managed to escape before the roar came out, but the shallow cuts inflicted by his blade amounted to almost nothing. His forte lay elsewhere, and as he quickly demonstrated, one could always trust a strategist to come up with a plan.

He solicited the aid of Sina, although she didn’t respond with the snappy professionalism he might have expected. The girl looked shell-shocked, her eyes wide as saucers and her mouth agape. Dexio had been trying to rouse her gently, but after being shouted at she managed to come to her senses. What she said, however, was nonsense. “Wh-what are you people doing!?” she shrieked. “Don’t hurt her! It’s Peach! That thing is Peach!”

Dexio blanched. “Wait, what? What are you talking about? That doesn’t…!”

One of the Other’s ribbons whipped toward him. Luka appeared in a flash and tackled his squad member, narrowly preventing a grievous head wound. “We need to focus!” he told the team as he stood up, disappearing to continue his hit-and-run onslaught. “Even a second’s hesitation could mean death!”

“R-right.” Dexio hefted his cestus and prepared to join the fight, but despite Benedict’s orders Sina refused to fight. Only when Luka backed the tactician up did she reluctantly begin to use her Refrigerant Coil, but her arm was shaky, and not one shot hit its mark. Dexio joined Geralt and the other melee fighters in their precarious dance, getting clear when the Other attacked and striking back as it wound back down. Goldlewis joined them, able to stay in closer thanks to both his sheer fortitude and an effective shield in the form of his coffin. Midna’s strikers helped stymie the Other’s movement, and even without Sina’s help, when everyone attacked it together they dealt enough damage to its limbs to knock the Other onto its side. The one-two of Midna’s bludgeon and Darknut worked wonders, and a slab of concrete from Raz sealed the deal.

The Other collapsed for a moment, the heads on its roof lolling limply with their mouths open in silent expressions of pain. Luka and Goldlewis both paused, waiting to see what happened. After a moment it stirred, however, galvanized into action in part due to the shots from Blazermate’s new turret. Its wrists cracked and rotated around, followed shortly by its entire body, turned upside down. Now it stood on all fours on its feet and the backs of its hands, its heads dangling beneath its front. It gave a tremendous groan, then plunged its ribbons into the ground. They began to pop up all around the arena, bursting from the stone to skewer Seekers and Scarlet Guardians from beneath on their golden spikes. Their first casualty: the immobile sentry.

“Keep movin’, and watch your feet!” Goldlewis called out, taking off at a run as ribbons erupted behind him. Noticing that the Other wasn’t moving during this attack, he charged in and struck at its head with a Behemoth Typhoon spun like a lasso, battering the loosely-hanging statue heads like speedbags before a final overhead smash cracked its eaves. The Other withdrew its ribbons and leaped backward, then reared up. Its hands flailed around as if scratching at the eyes of a normal head that wasn’t there, its body contorting wildly, before it unleashed an even more terrific roar. Debris flew away from it in every direction in a heavy barrage, and dust billowed into the air. In mere moments the entire room was one big smokescreen, with no more than a few meters of visibility in any direction. “Damn it,” Goldlewis cursed, hearing more ribbons burrowing through the earth. “Where are you?”

Perfect. In a corner of the shrouded room, a lone, slender figure dressed in black leaped from a hiding place and began to run, sprinting through the haze toward the tunnel that Team Goldlewis came from.