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As the group loaded inside, Victoria morosely noticed the Framework's operating system seemed to correct her efforts. She was about to try to return, when the scene shifted into a retro pixelated mess and 8bit music that felt like someone was grinding a lego brick through her auditory receptors. And to top it all off- Am I a green f****** dinosaur?! Edward, what did I just say?!

Others started to make heads or tails of the fact that they were in an old, and very high stakes, Mario game. Alas, the much more important fact was that Zari did not materialize. Okay. That is the easiest way out barred. I suppose it's up to me to try and clean up a mess my guy made.

At the last thought, she took a second to calm down her bubbling anger. Not spotting Ed's trachery was yet another failure on her part. All it would have taken was perhaps being aware of other people's pulse, spikes in temperature and pupil dilation, something her senses could do easily, and she could tell when she was being lied to. Why didn't she? To protect the privacy of others. That care was rapidly evaporating the longer she stayed in this institute.

Maybe the people of Earth could only be dragged to safety and prosperity kicking and screaming.

But first, this. Walking over, she tapped Leah and Mads on the shoulders, as the two of them were in the know about her. "Hey. Looks like Mr. Arca blocked Zari off so that she doesn't shut him down immediately, but he seems to have forgotten about my hacking attempt from our first training. I'll see what I can do about getting us out of this mess, I'd appreciate some cover and Arca's eyes being pointed elsewhere. Keep in mind that Usagi threw more shit at us as we beaten it though, so try to keep the taunting to manageable level?"

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Andy felt her body waver and glitch and she looked up. The flash of hearts told her exactly what she needed to know. She had two lives left. It was unlikely this was a fair version of the game where more lives might be found, was that Mario Bros? She hadn't played in so long.

"It'll be alright Mary Sue. Don't worry." She tried to say it reassuringly. She didn't feel confident about it. "Just uh...aim for the enemies. I know Shy Guy's are normally enemies but this one isn't" She cracked a smile. Andy wasn't certain if she liked that Arcade had set her up as one of the most common enemies of the games. At least she wasn't the only one. Dorian and Danny thinking this was just for fun made Andy twitch a little. Did they pay attention? Percy got it though, and that was helpful.

"I'm not super good, but I've played. Platformers were not my favorite. I also haven't played since I was like fourteen." At fourteen Andy had gone into a very different school than Avenger's Academy. She shuddered a bit at the memory. "Zelda seems to have played Mario before. We need to traverse the levels to get to the boss. If I remember right there are flags at the end of each that we'll have to tag. The pipes will take us through shortcuts and to special areas, but they also sometimes have enemies, plants that'll eat you, that pop out." She dug through her memories of the games, and not just the situations around having played. With the materialized block that Mary Sue had set up, they had some protection, but they needed to keep moving.

For now, though she jumped up onto the blocks over their heads. It wasn't easy. The change in dimensions was hard to deal with. Hopefully, she'd get more used to it.

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Diana looked over her shoulder at Danni and Dorian the two of them were still thinking that this was all very much just a game to them. "Uh in case you two hadn't noticed, we could die if we loose all of our lives right?" Diana said to them sounding a little bit annoyed at them, when it came to life and death situations they should probably act more serious. She listened to the group the ones who played Mario were Zelda and Andy. Out of all of them her and her brother Percy could move quicker and clear a path of the goombas to get to the end, she just hoped that her younger brother could handle teleporting to much.

"Percy and I can try and clear a path quicker for all of you. The rest can pick off the stragglers until we can get to the other end." Diana suggested as she quickly teleported onto some of the goombas taking out a few of them in the process. She looked over her shoulder and then over at the pipes at the end. "We all should stick together as well to and try and not seperate if possible." Diana called out to them all.

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Madalyne looked at Danni and Dorian the two of them were having fun it seems despite everything right now was a life or death situation, but she decided to not say anything since Diana mentioned it really. She felt Vicky resting a hand on her shoulder and gave a slight smile, taunting really wasn't her thing though honestly. "Taunting isn't really my thing honestly, but i'll keep that in mind." Madalyne said as she watched Diana teleporting herself over the barrier and started to take out a few of the goombas pretty quickly.

Her idea seemed to work as well as Andy and Zelda's suggestion getting any powerups that come up as well to Madalyne quickly made her way towards the barrier she tried to jump it but she couldn't on the first try. But she managed to do it again on the second try and pulled herself up. Taking a little breath Madalyne looked down at the nearest goomba and tried to fire an eldritch blast at the closest one, only to miss this time.

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Everyone seemed to be on the same page more or less, and that was dangerous. Ed had no idea what kind of shitstorm he just unleashed. Vicky seemed to be thinking the exact same thing as Leah, who was already coming up with a strategy herself. "Yeah, I know just how to distract him. Make sure everyone else does the best they can, and don't let anyone freak the hell out. Ed couldn't kill us if he tried, not with the tech in here." Unless the teachers were that negligent that he managed to do something crazy to the Framework, that is. Leah walked behind the group, so there was space between them and her, and slammed her foot into the dirt. The entire world seemed to shake and tremble for a moment, right before their eyes. Then came the sound of rocks cracking and grind against one another, as a platform of stone rose up above her classmates' heads. If it was good enough to get her through a desert, it was good enough to get Leah over all the obstacles.

"I'm going to buy all of you some time, do what you have to do!" With that, Leah's stone platform raised higher up, and then took off like a rocket, far over the goombas, the green pipes, and every other flavor of bullshit Ed decided to subject them to. The sound of her voice cracked out over the music, for all to hear as she flew off into the distance.

"HEY! ARCADE!!! SURPRISE, SUR-FUCKING-PRISE, MOTHERFUCKER!!! THIS IS WHAT I THINK OF YOUR FUCKING VILLAINOUS BACKSTORY!!!" She shouted, deliberately egging the technotwink on. "IS THIS THE BEST YOU'VE GOT?! THIS MAKES USAGI'S EXCUSE FOR TRAINING LOOK COMPETENT! I THOUGHT YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO BE AN EXPERT ON THIS SORT OF THING!!!"

If he let Leah continue on unabated, she'd get ahead and literally keep flying through each level. She'd get free, and then she'd give Ed's chakras a high impact realignment with her fists. But if he focused her attention on the Leah, that gave the others free reign to continue without Ed watching over them, letting them use their powers to cheat. It seemed foolproof in Leah's mind. Genius, even.

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”Soft launch? Cadie, please. I get ‘avin’ a gimmick an all but… ‘ow do you plan on consistently gettin’ heroes into a game? You ‘ave to t'ink long term, big picture! We could work on t'at villain image afterwards maybe centered around gamin' t'at shouldn't be too ‘ard.”

Dorian's mood shifted quickly as he noticed Diana flatten Percy before his form shimmered and came back with a heart lost. His eyes darkened slightly before he yelled at Diana. ”Watch where you're landin’! Stompin’ Goombas is fine but don't go doin’ it to your teammates! We're gonna need to find two One-Ups now. Unless any of you think you can pull off the Hat-Trick Turtle Tippin’ but that's gonna take time and effort we don't have at the moment.” He let out a huff of frustration as he paced in place for a moment before looking towards everyone.

”Listen, I know ‘e's not exactly attemptin’ to make us stronger but t'at's where ‘e messed up. In doin’ t'is ‘es givin’ us experience we can only get out in t'e real world. Out t'ere if t'e villains kill us t'ats it! T'ere's no t'ree lives, no glitchin' in and back, it's just death chère. So yall lose t'e sour faces and get on your game faces.”

“‘at-Trick what? Was t'at even words?” Danni scratched his chin with the fire flower, thoroughly confused but shrugged it off. “But yeah, why get pressed when I can get fun! Like, a ‘ouse could drop on me, my ‘ead can get split wit’ a sword, or I could like drown or somet’in’ and we wouldn’t ‘ave threelives, it’d be game over! So, I t’ink it's pretty chill of Cadie ta give us 3! I’m ‘ere for a good time, not a long time. T'ough, I guess livin’ wit’ t'e ghosties might ‘ave somet'in’ ta do wit’ t'at, ya t'ink Dee?”

Danni grimaced at the two lost hearts. “Well, maybe movin’ forward y'all should stay back ‘ere and we'll take the vanguard, though…” Danni couldn’t resist peering over the edge of the space left behind by Leah. “T'is seems like a good way ta screw ourselves over if we keep lettin’ Leah snatch away our platforms. Maaaaybe we should stay away from t'e big, dark ‘oles as well.”

”I t'ink Danni ‘as t'e right of it. Diana should stay in t'e back, focus on aimin’ high and at foes away. If possible tagged up wit’ t'e boulder over t'ere so t'ey can maintain an aerial advantage and totally avoid a missfire on us. Danni should be t'e vanguard as ‘is fire can toast any one of us. I'm not entirely sure ‘ow to use everyone especially given t'is game is at best two player and t'is is waaaay too many players for a platformer.” Dorian added.

“Yeah, I'm great at friendly fire and… Wait, t'ats a bad t'in’.” Danni laughed awkwardly. “So uh, we ain't really got a way ta handle t'ose monsters now since everyt'in’ is all blocked off. So what's the plan? We got a way ta move it?”

”Only safe way is to ‘ave everyone ‘op over it one at a time. Leave a single block space…or two…to make sure if t'ey fail and stumble backwards t'at it won't ‘arm whoever behind.” Beyond that Dorian could figure a way through. Percy had come up with two ideas, both of which had been ignored. And while pipes Were a shortcut they also had the risk of potentially being more dangerous. Then again perhaps they could find coins to use for later? The rules were still being discovered and one wrong guess could end up with someone dead.

Mary Sue watched with a since of awe as Leah launched herself through the air, screaming at Ed. This was a creative and interesting application of whatever it was she was capable of, but god she seemed to be hot headed. Taunting the person with most of the power in this situation was a bold move, and the sort of thing that might work in their favor, but seemed just as likely to get retaliation. She'd already hurt one of her teammates, and she didn't was almost paralyzed at the fear that this behavior would result in the loss of one of them, even if not herself.

Glancing over at Andy again, Mary Sue matched her forced smile. The only way though this would be to act, not overthink everything while danger ebbed closer. With that in mind, she tried to summon up a set of stairs like Percy had requested, but found herself unable to. Operating her powers in this space seemed harder. Jumping over to the blocks Andy was on, Mary Sue was determined to make it up to her that she'd lost Andy one of her lives. Trying to connect the platform they were on to the pipe, Mary Sue managed to bridge the gap about halfway, hopefully making the trip across easier.

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It seemed their pleasant foray into video game world wasn't some active training session. Instead, Arcade intended them to die in here. What was it with this school and having students and staff be unstable? A haunted house actively hurting people and some nerd killing them in a video game. Granted, it was a school for future superheroes, but still!

Sabine thought on it. Leah proved herself valuable by distracting and going ape on anything in her vicinity and Sabine had to hold herself back from wanting to make-out with her then and there. There would be time later.

Victoria had a good idea. If they could hack into the system they could alter and change this in their favor, perhaps even get out. It made sense Zari was separated. Sabine wondered if she could aid Victoria. Didn't video games have memories? Save files were memories in a sense, right?

"I'll help how I can. I'm not super well-versed in video games," she told Victoria as Sabine attempted to boost Victoria's hacking efforts with her own.

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"...Maybe don't insult the guy who could summon up a million different things to make this a near impossible Mario Maker level?" Zelda ended up saying, sort of ignoring the stupidity that was Danni and Dorian. Their ideas were a bit too convoluted to her completely, and she looked over at her sister with a bit of an eye roll, asking who all played the game. "...Um... Me? You know your geek sister whose here too?" she said towards her, before looking at the situation ahead of them.

Trying to make stairs or something was an idea, however Zelda was hesitant to try and make anything. Partially because it ran the risk of messing with the code, and knowing her luck would result in destroying something instead of creating something. However the comments about the pipes caused her to shake her head. "...You're only half right about the shortcuts, you aren't exactly saying what happens about them. No, the pipes are more than just shortcuts. The first one on the first level of the world, yes, that is a shortcut, that has no danger though and literally will eventually drop you right by the flag. However if you get to level two in the world, that has a hidden set of pipes, and can jump you to world 4, then the set hidden on world 4 level 2 can take you all the way to world 8... So you could get by with only doing 6 levels out of like, 32 that way, which is why speedruns of the game typically run under 5 minutes for the best players. Of course that's if he'd not just going to have us play the game in it's entirety and not just jump us to King Koopa... Also known as Bowser now a days. You want to be morbid don't hit any brick blocks or rocks or whatever. Pretty sure question mark blocks are okay though, but yeah, the instruction manual of the game implies that the reason you don't see any Mushroom Kingdom inhabitants is because they got turned into bricks and stones and I think plants or whatever. So people seem to have the theory that you might be accidentally killing them or something like that. It's really weird. But the shortcuts aren't bad, despite what you seem to think," she didn't really like talking a whole lot for the most part, and was keeping her voice somewhat quieter and not shouting over everyone, however she really wanted to correct the seemingly misinformation being handed out how the shortcuts are bad and dangerous or something.

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From the safety of the real world, Arcade observed his victims. Not as they were on the screen - not the frantic pixels, their digitized consciousness. No, he stared at their bodies, suspended in the tanks, undefended. He could kill them all now. He had acquired the sedatives needed, administration of a lethal dose would be simple, easy.

But it was inelegant. And in a world filled with supervillains, he needed to stand out. He needed a brand. Killing on its own was easy, but making it definable, something where people knew they'd been bested by Arcade and no one else? That was the challenge, that was the occasion Arcade was rising to meet. It had been simple enough to get their trust, to convince them to come with him after hours, to use the Framework.

It didn't hurt that he had help, either.

"Take her away - and dispose of her," Arcade instructed, his eyes on the unconscious Asgardian.

"Will do, Big Brother," Ardere said, a devilish grin on her face as she approached Zari's tank.

"Be careful," Usagi hissed. "If she wakes up, I won't be able to protect you - and you won't last long enough to protect yourself!"

Ardere rolled her eyes. She had daydreamed plenty of times about putting the robot in a trash compactor - Usagi was endlessly annoying.

@Forsythe: Vicky tries valiantly, but unfortunately crit fails (1). Rather than opening up the Framework to her and Arcade's programs, she opens herself up to the Framework and Arcade. The takeover is quick, over in seconds. Her fears of being taken over by Ultron are realized - or at least, a miniature version of them. A single command has been implemented: kill. At any cost. By any means.

@PatientBean: Sabine also makes a valiant effort, to mess with the Framework's memory in order to help Vicky. What results though is uncontrolled, perhaps more of a curse than a blessing. Eight of her classmates vanished.

@Patientbean@Trainerblue192@Natsu: Everyone vanishes aside from Sabine, Gideon, Dorian, and Mary Sue, leaving you behind in Mario Land. But even the level seems to glitch before your eyes, landing you outside a menacing castle. Gideon, bouncing from side to side, looks at it with eager glee. She more or less agreed with Dorian - that this was valuable experience and at least here, she could murder the shit out of their attackers. In the real world, that was frowned upon.

"Do you think everyone else is in there at the end - that they're our princess?" Gideon asked, before pressing forward and entering - revealing a maze of obstacles, of drops into lava, of rotating beams, of enemies trooping back and forth - and a distant roar of Bowser.

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"Yeah, I know you play games!" April protested, a little confused and also unused to hearing her sister talk so much. She couldn't recall the last time Zelda had said more than just a sentence outside the company of just family. "I didn't know you were good at them, though," she added. She didn't really hang out with Zelda. Zelda didn't share things with her and she didn't share things with Zelda. It was fine, it was balanced. Even when they were both at home, they did their own things. Zelda stayed inside and April went outside. They had different worlds, different lives.

And then the scenery changed.

Mario melted away, replaced with a misty field - some sort of temple roof, laden with stone and... mud? There was a strange creature in the center, small and odd - and then, erupting from the ground, a gigantic shark - a shark that the creature rode, charging straight for them!

Instinctively, April threw out her hands - or rather, fins - she was now red and white, her skin smooth, her body resembling some sort of humanoid fish. She'd never seen such a creature before - she had no idea what game Arcade had trapped them in - but no waves were summoned. Instead, a ring purple tinted mud slammed into her, sending her flying backwards - every piece of her body ached, as she collided with the ground - as the same force threw Zelda and Andy back.

As text appeared, hovering above the head of the creature: VICKY

She hoped that wherever they were, her girlfriends and her friends were faring better than she was...

Had Vicky betrayed them?

Or was this Arcade?

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Percy did not share Dorian's opinion about this being a valuable learning exercise, a place for experience. He was comfortable with the idea that he would journey out into the world and face danger. He did not appreciate one of his classmates trying to kill him, and felt justified in his anger about it all. Even in the real world, he wasn't going to be exactly thrilled about someone attempting to drive a dagger into his back.

However, before he could voice this opinion and reiterate once again that they were all in mortal peril, the scene shifted. Gone was Mario, replaced with... something else.

They were inside what looked like a massive organ, a space carved with flesh and blood. The ground beneath his feet felt sticky and he resisted the urge to vomit, doing his best to breath in deeply - only to then notice that his nose was completely flat. He quickly felt his face and his features, cataloging the change. He was taller now, his body lean, bony - his skin yellow and spotted. To those well versed in Dungeons and Dragons, he was a githyanki. To Percy, he was a frog creature.

And he was not alone. There were three others with him - identified with text boxes as Danni, Leah, and Diana.

And on the ground, coming crawling towards them, were tiny baby devils - tiny imps - ready to attack.

"...What sort of game is this?" Percy muttered, as he felt a dagger in his hand. He tried to teleport forward, to attack one of the imps, but found that he was frozen - that he couldn't move.

It wasn't his turn.

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Diana turned her attention over towards Dorian who decided to snap at her, which annoyed her to no real end really. "Hey listen it was a fucking accident. Powers go haywire at times, like what you and Danni did to my brother back in the first day of school?" Diana said in a really annoyed tone. She watched as Leah decided to do something probably pretty stupid as well to and started to taunt Arcade to try and target her, which either he'll take the bait and target her, or he would target all of them as retaliation. She was about to move forward when the game world around them all suddenly changed.

She looked around the room that she was in and everything seemed to be pretty fleshy and organic honestly which felt really weird. "Where are we now?" Diana asked as she looked around seeing who she was with, everyone seemed to be different and not all of them were there with them. She looked down at herself, she was wearing some leather armor, as well she noticed her skin was green with spots over her skin as well to, and her nose was flat just like Percy was. She saw all the text above their heads she was relieved that Percy was here. Leah, Danni and Mads were all with her as well to, her attention then turned towards the demonic looking babies that were approaching them slowly.

Diana looked around until she felt something was strapped to her back and a strap over her shoulder as well to, she was relieved to have her bow and arrows with her. She quickly drew out her bow and notched an arrow aiming at the imps and fired off an arrow which went wide, and in the opposite direction she wanted to aim for, she did it a few more times missing all of her shots.

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Madalyne closed her eyes and rubbed the bridge of her nose slightly as she listened to some of the group that were arguing amongst themselves. "Really some of you want to argue right now?" Madalyne said as she watched Leah using her powers to get Arcade's attention, and then the area suddenly started to change pretty quickly. She found herself having reddish skin as well as a tail behind her and a pair of demonic horns on her forehead. They were in some weird looking ship of some kind, then she stared at a pack of imps in front of them, she quickly started to realize where they were now. She had played Baldur's Gate 3 with her auncle Avery a few times when he came to visit sometimes.

She turned to look at Percy and Diana who both were Githyanki, asking where they were now. "This is Baldur's Gate 3, a game based in the Dungeons and Dragons universe. We are in the Nautiloid I believe, and those demon babies are imps, it's a turn based game as well to when in combat." Madalyne explained as Diana took the first turn and tried to fire off a few arrows only to miss their marks pretty horribly. Madalyne then summoned up a fireball and quickly threw it at the nearest imp setting it on fire and killing it.

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From Leah’s point of view, it seemed like Ed has struck her down for her hubris. In a moment’s notice, Leah was no longer in the sky, soaring across everything below her as she did years ago. Now, she was in some fleshy, wretched pit without an ounce of geological material in sight. It was abrupt, and she wasn’t the only one here. And… Her skin was green. Why the fuck was she green?

Leah was suddenly in some weird mix of leather and fur. Like armor made from a dead animal, which showed off her stomach… Was Ed doing that one purpose? He better not have been. Others were with him, the Murdertwink that Dorian was dating, along with Danni and Diana. They were all some sort of fantasy thing like her. Leah looked down and realized a big fuck-off axe was in her hands. Light as a feather for someone with her strength, but it looked mean.

Leah noticed they were being attacked. A bunch of tiny infantile demons were clambering towards them. Somewhere out in the universe, there was a wizard laughing at the thought of this.

”You have got to be fucking kidding me. Alright, whack-a-baby. Why not!” This was fucked.

Leah didn’t know what a “Nautiloid” was, or what a Baldur’s Gate lead to. But what she did know is that this was just a video game, so killing the imps wasn’t that big of a deal. After Mads set one on fire, Leah took a swing. She raised the axe up high over her head and the devil fetuses were unharmed- She missed!

Fuck!

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As soon as the connection was made, Victoria knew something went terribly, terribly wrong. She did not even have the time to wonder whether Edward’s reaction time was that good, or whether he put in a malware trap in the system. She could feel the command taking effect, worming itself into her core.

Kill.

While that was bad, all was not yet lost. She was made for this. No, the situation went from terrible to catastrophic when she tried to give the override command to her core to cease action and found out that she couldn’t. Oh no! The framework! It’s not a perfect simulation! I have no core and personality matrix here, it modelled my simulation based on a human object! she realized. Far too late.

As if that wasn’t enough, something else caused the simulation to glitch and send the ‘players’ into different programs. It was both a curse and a blessing. The former, because they lost their safety in numbers. The latter, because it left fewer of her classmates stuck with her.

As the scene shifted, she found herself seemingly riding a shark made out of swamp monster vomit. Immediately she made to turn away, only to find out that the simulation gave her no control yet, hostile command or not. She watched in horror as a jet of sludge shot out of the shark's mouth, sweeping across three of the others and hitting every single one of them, the hearts above them flashing and vanishing. Then the outside control stopped, dropping controls back to her mind and highlighing the player names. April, Zelda and Andy were in danger.

Immediately, she set out to fixing this godforsaken mess, fully aware she had milliseconds to do so before her lower level programming did something someone might not recover from. However, she couldn't break free of Edward's influence in time before her Ultron self made a move. Then she went mentally pale as her body spoke in a reverberating machine like voice:

"Scanning... Targets acquired. Analyzing...
Target 1: Medium threat, high survivability.
Target 2: Negligible threat, medium survivability.
Target 3: Severe threat, low survivability.
Selecting optimum strategy: Remove individual threats from the battle.
Locking on Target 3."

Victoria knew what the result of that would be even before her Ultron self said it. And the greatest threat just so happened to have the least health. She had to do something! Her first idea was to shout a warning.

Strategy modification declined. Action detrimental to objective: Kill.

OK! If I can't stop myself or warn them, I need to give them a chance and frame it so that the alternative is treated as better option. Come on, think! This could work!

Outside, for the brief amount of time she spoke in her own voice, it seemed like Victoria dropped her stoic expression and robot like demeanor. "Override: Target prioritization not effective for objective when strategies to engage multiple targets are available. Repeat previous attack pattern!" Ultron seemed to think about it for a short while before relenting: "Complying."

Small mercies, all three of them were able to dodge the sludge beam this time. All the while, Victoria was working on trying to get herself free from the kill command. If only her core functions were not locked behind the now restored, ten layers thick, hard to understand firewall! This reminded her of the VEIL protocol situation some time back, only this time, her careful balancing of pros and cons would have deadly consequences, sooner or later. And now, she ran out of time again:

"Analyzing... Results of modified strategy unfavorable. Reprioritizing Target 3."

No, no, NO! Vicky was quickly running out of logical arguments. "Override! Statistical sample of insufficient size to determine result with acceptable confindence interval! Repeat previous attack pattern!" Ultron seemed to think about it for a few ticks longer this time, no doubt it would soon catch up to her bullshit. "...complying."

Victoria's strategy was secretly trying to convince Ultron to use the same attack over and over again. She hoped that by doing so, the trio on the chopping block would be able to predict her moves and continuously adapt to them, giving them better and better chance of avoiding hits.

But luck was a fickle mistress.

Having senses that could operate at high speed could be a curse. As the sweeping attack moved, Victoria felt a pit in her stomach open as she saw a rock in Andy's path, and watched in agonizing slow motion as she tripped. Doing the math, it was clear that Gravity will not pull Andy to the ground fast enough. She could do only one thing.

Override: Previously unaccounted target identified. Easiest way to fullfill objective: Kill is to call Self.Terminate() method.

Strategy modification declined. Action detrimental to objective: Kill. As per previous interpretation of quantity being major factor to objective: Kill, Self.Terminate() method would remove unit's ability to further execute objective: Kill.

...I'm sorry...

The sludge beam hit Andy, and she was gone.

"Target 3 eliminated. Number of targets dropped below effectivity threshold of mass engagement strategy. Locking on next priority target." her body said, her head turning a couple of degrees to glare at April, it's facial expression stone cold.

“‘ey, Spicy came out alright! I got ‘im a new coat and everyt'in’!” Danni protested, annoyed that they were digging into ancient history. Percy was never in any danger. And Danni intended to drive that point home but the scene changed again. Danni rolled his eyes as they settled in.

“Arcade, t'is little scene shift is cool once but twice so quickly is… uninspired, ‘onestly.” Danni shook his head, crossing his arms. Though, upon looking around for the rest of his friends…

“Omg, y'all look so cool! Arcade, t’e character design, flawless. Almost makes up for t’e borin’ level change mechanic! I gotta take a pic, Dee would def wanna see Spicy like t'is. Let me just find…” Danni patted down his pockets but paused as he realized his hands were a little different. Red scales covered his fingers and ran up his arms, and he immediately lost interest in taking a picture of everyone and instead focused trying to look at all of himself. Scales were everywhere he patted. Danni was stunned.

“Guys, guys, guys. I’m gunna freak out ‘ere. All t'is work, all t'ese years of skin care and everything is fuckin’ covered by scales? T'is so fuckon’ cool!!! I'm a dragon!” Danni cheered as his turn rolled around. He skirted around the edge if the room and took arm, bracing himself as he let loose a cone of flames towards the imps, cheering again as one caught flame and collapsed. He pouted as His other attempts failed but hey, at least he got one!

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Sabine had to admit, she didn't think her plan would work, but perhaps it worked too well. She saw the glitches and the world melt away briefly, but everyone else left save for a few. She was happy to see Dorian remain, but the others, not so much. If for no other reason than Mary Sue seemed incapable of being useful and Gideon seemed TOO into this.

"Didn't the others mention that Zari wasn't with us? Perhaps she's the princess in the castle?" It seemed just as likely as anything else in this world. She tried to call upon her Mario knowledge. If it was a castle, that means Bowser was in it. Hopefully it would be like the games and be a simple dodge and move, but who knows if Arcade made anything to hinder them further.

"You all probably know more about these games than I do, so take the lead. It seems I am able to manipulate the game's memory if need be. Hopefully there are no surprises." But she stayed at the ready.

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The world glitched before their very eyes, many of their friends vanishing in the matrix leaving only a scant few behind. Whatever it was that Vicky had tried to do, it managed to interfere a little bit. Dorian looked up at the structure before them, analyzing it before speaking. ”Seems we've made it to Bowser's Castle. Whatever glitch in t’e matrix ‘appened, it cut us straight to t’e end it seems.” He didn't like that Danni and April were missing, unsure of exactly what it was that separated them all in the first place. Were they left behind at the beginning? Were they held captive in the Castle? Or did something else occur? It was difficult to say, and sadly he had no answers at the moment. But he had many ideas on how to win out against Arcade and his little games.

Dorian grinned at what Sabine had said. She could manipulate the game's memory, that was good. ”’ere's t’e Play, Gideon and I will run Vanguard, takin out what needs be as we advance t'rough t’e level. ‘opefully your immortality translates into t’e game and you won't lose any ‘earts along t’e way. Mary Sue, use your constructs to aid in support. T’row up walls where needed to block enemy attacks and ‘elp pause future obstacles we may run into like flamin walls and pistons t’at smash down. Beanie, yours is a bit tougher I'm afraid, and it puts a lot on you. Memorize everythin t’at happens from t’is point on. Focus on who's where and when. You're our Flash Save. It's a cheat used when emulatin old games on PC. Essentially, if we lose a ‘eart, you reload t’e memory of moments before t’at ‘eart was lost so we can try again.” He looked at his team, wondering if any of this made sense to them before finally turning back towards their path. ”Let's go”

With that Dorian was off, shifting into his ghost form as he flew straight into the nearest enemy, a Koopa Troopa. He retreated into his shell sliding forward and taking out the next guard before doubling back and sliding forward once again. His hopes were that even if the Koopa was killed, it wouldn't take away his heart's, using the Koopa as a shield against Arcades tricks. He missed his second attack, but that didn't deter him one bit. ”We need to find Mads first. She's t'e key to us gettin’ out of ‘ere. I'll explain more once we ‘ave ‘er. After t'at we need Vic”

As the world shifted and glitched in front of her, Mary Sue tensed up. The situation had changed over and over again, it was getting hard to keep a continuity of what was going on, and she was absolutely disoriented. Now they were divided, and she had no idea what could be happening to the others. She had to push those worried about them aside though, as morbid as it was to think about, whatever happened to them now was firmly out of her control. Nothing would get better by her worrying and distracting herself. That wasn't, of course, actually comforting at all, but it was the throughline of her thought processes at the moment, something to cling onto to try to keep bad thoughts away.

Thankfully, Dorian made this easier, almost making decisions for her. She didn't need to worry about what to do here, because somebody else was taking lead. She had always imagined herself as a leader, or at hoped she could be one, but this was something she really hadn't done. She recognized, in this moment, that she could learn a lot from Dorian. Taking his advice, she focused on making the situation less deadly. She could play defense here, and in that spirit, she tried, though albeit failed, to cover up a lavapit. She did however, manage to jam one of the rotating beams in place, making traversal easier.

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She was actually really hurt that her sister said something like that, but she didn't even give her a response, and just more or less looked away from her sister before everything shifted around her. Instead of being in the world of Mario, they were now in a game series she knew waaaay too well. They were in one of the Legend of Zelda games, against a boss she'd only really fought once since she preferred the older games in the series. Well this was not going to end well at all, especially when it became apparent that Vicki was the villain.

The villain known as Mucktorok, and Octorock sort of boss in a way really, but a lot nastier of a fight.

Her attention shifted as they all got knocked around by the attacks, and that's when she saw that Andy was just gone. That couldn't be right? No way was this over, Andy couldn't have just died like that right? This was not going to end well, and currently Zelda was a bit annoyed that she was dressed up as Princess Zelda herself, when usually if she was any Zelda character it was obviously Sheik.

Right, going through this fight, not so simple, prefer the boss from Breath of the Wild more than this one, but can't change things. Need water attacks to stun... But crap I don't have access to water attacks, April does, she thought to herself, before she decided to check out what might be in her game character's inventory. Low and behold, there was the item she'd need to do a water attack, Chuchu Jelly.

Zelda held up her hand, fueling her anger into creating a bright red bow and a matching quiver full of arrows on her back. Grabbing an arrow, she basically attached a glob of the stuff onto it, before taking aim and letting it fly, her shot hitting her target head on, and a burst of water sprung up from the shot. She instantly started firing off a few different arrows now that Vicki the shark was kind of stuck on the ground stunned (this was a video game boss after all) but only managed to land one hit before Vicki would be able to move again normally, but at least she had done some damage.

"April, listen to me, water based attacks stun, normal attacks do damage. However you can do one better, be prepared to maybe do a shield of water to protect us, since in the game that was the only true safe way to avoid the mud attacks, and any mud that appears on the ground needs to get washed away or it slows us down, okay?" she was completely ignoring what April had said earlier (that actually was helping to fuel the anger she had used to create her bow and arrows) and was only keeping with talking about the combat situation they were having to deal with without Andy now.

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Arcade looked on in satisfaction, watching as his victims struggled in their new environments - and how poor Vicky was so easily brought to heel. It'd been a stroke of luck when he'd found out one of his 'teammates' had been robotic - he'd already crafted the Usagi puppet, and through repeated training exercises in the Framework and under Usagi's supervision, he had been able to obtain the data he needed. And now, Vicky was his. And his alone.

"You're doing great work," he murmured to the pixels on the screen, before standing up from his seat and walking over to the tanks. Andy's lifeless body was suspended. Her vital signs were nonexistent. "So much for immortality, little god."

@Forsythe: Vicky tries to purge herself again of Arcade's influence, of his programming and control. But the more that she struggles, the harder the task becomes - the more Arcade's programming courses through her system, binding itself to her, the code like chains. And whispered into her mind, she can hear Arcade's voice - "you're doing great work."

@Patientbean@Trainerblue192@Natsu: "Works for me!" Gideon preened, bouncing back and forth between her feet eagerly. She was more than happy to be on duty clearing a path - and she didn't know the extent of her immortality, but death didn't scare her. It never had. She was supposed to have died as a kid, just another sacrifice. And she was still here. If she went out, she was going to do it like a boss.

"Why Mads?" Gideon asked, despite Dorian saying that he'd explain after.

Surprisingly, the plan went extremely well - Gideon and Dorian managed to clear a path for them, Mary Sue creating the constructs needed to help block anything that was incoming. There hadn't been a need just yet for Sabine to do the flash save trick, and they were able to make good progress as a group - so good that it wasn't long until they found themselves deep in the castle, face to face with the big man himself - Bowser.

"Wait, I thought there was gonna be a princess here for us to save?" Gideon whined.

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April screamed as Andy died, her last remaining hearts evaporating into the aether. Was Andy... dead? Was Arcade telling the truth? Or was it all just a trick, a cruel joke? Had she just seen someone die before her eyes? Her heart was pounding so quickly she was certain it was about to burst, to pop like a balloon and spray its contents everywhere. Andy was dead... And if Andy was dead, what if other people were dead too? What if everyone she cared about was dead? She didn't know what had happened to the others, didn't know what had happened with Danni and Dori, with Sabine and Leah, with Mads...

She tried to breathe, to steady herself, as the Vicky creature turned to lock onto her - as her sister took charge, executing a strategy and telling April what to do. "O-o-okay!" Her body was shaking as she tried to conjure up a bubble of water over and over again, failing to do so until on the third try, when a watery shield formed around herself and Zelda. "Sh-shield up, what now?"

Her hands were so cold. Or, her fins. She could barely feel them.

Andy was dead.

Dead.

April didn't know what to do.

She didn't want this - didn't want any of this.

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Despite the explanations, Percy still had no idea what was happening here. This squishy organ of a vessel was supposedly a Nautiloid - something that he had never heard of before, so it gave him little context. The flying red infants with bloodied drool - the imps - at least made somewhat sense. They were things that were attacking them and in the interest of living, they needed to kill them first. He didn't wish to die, he particularly didn't want to die inside of a video game, so he could handle this course of action...

... Even though everyone around him looked almost unrecognizable. He didn't know the words to describe the others, not properly. Danni was gigantic and scaly, lizard like, draconic. His sister looked like him, like some sort of squashed toad. Leah was a type of ogre, perhaps reminiscent of Shrek? And then Mads was a demon of some sort. But none of the words felt right - the descriptions were close, but there were subtle differences, changes to the character design that felt important, and yet, were things he couldn't help but overlook.

"You are not photographing me like this," Percy snapped at Danni. "I will kill you if you do." He didn't know if cameras existed in this game, and he didn't plan to find out.

Everyone else took their turn, and finally, Percy found that he was able to move his body. He teleported forward, appearing next to one of the imps - only two remained - and he plunged a dagger into its side, killing it instantly. He then tried to teleport again, only to find his feet rooted in place. So instead he walked up to the last imp, noting that it didn't seem to be able to move - did the imps have to wait to take a turn too? - before he drove his dagger in, killing it and ending the combat.

There was a rising slope before them, with sinew like rope ladders to help them ascend - and an opening that seemed to go deeper into the ship. But now with the combat ended, Percy took in their surroundings better - saw the red dragons circling, the ash and sulfur in the air. It was strange but... it was beautiful, too.

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Stop telling me your next moves! You're making this even more difficult! Victoria groaned inwardly. Overhearing the information about April perhaps being able to shield the two of them made Ultron pause and think about a new strategy for a couple of milliseconds, which also gave Victoria time to think. Her own approach would not work anymore - not that it particularly worked for Andy. She compartmentalized that grief and guilt for later processing. Or... is she dead? Was Edward waging a sick psychological warfare on them? Hold that thought! That might be it!

Outside of their personal runtime, the pause was enough for their body to get knocked around a bunch and then a shot landed on them, but frankly, Victoria was OK with that. If all else failed, it would be better if they took her out here before she managed to escape into the other simulations. Now though, Ultron was about to run at April and make his move. It was now or never.

After the first two steps, their body stopped and seemed to relax. "New data relevant to objective available."

Vicky then seemed to straighten up, the cold tone returning to her voice. "Specify."

"Effect of attack on Target 3 is unknown. Data confirms Target's program is unloaded, but no data is available to confirm objctive's satisfaction. Escape from the simulation is required for verification. Objective may be undertaken afterwards, with uncertainty eliminated." she proposed, doing her best to hide her thought patterns from the other program.

It almost didn't work. She could feel Ultron peeling away her defenses, but the last ones managed to point it in a wrong memory address and hide her true intent: Back in reality, she would have override authority back to prevent Ultron from doing anything. That said, it probably helped to sell the lie that if Andy, and potentially Zari too, were dead, Victoria had full intention of killing Arcade, and whoever else that might have helped him. Alas... "Concern to objective result is valid. Ceasing offensive operations. Assisting in safe escape attempt."

Yes! A bit of a weight lifted off from Vicky's mind as Ultron ceased his attack on April. She did not like the idea of explaining to Leah that she has killed her girlfriend. Although, even with Ultron's assistance, she was having a tough time breaking out. The framework was something else... Which gave her an entirely new set of ideas for dealing with an Ultron outbreak. Something to consider later when this whole mess was dealt with.

"Initial escape attempt unsuccessful. Moving to defensible position to analyze data for another attempt." It had completely slipped Vicky's mind that Aptil and Zelda might just try to slaughter her while she stood there attempting to escape their virtual prison. At least Ultron was good for something. They moved back to the castle in the level, taking cover behind the walls and preparing for incoming attacks.

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"I don't think you'll be able to take pictures like this in here." Diana said to Danni as she watched her brother taking out the remaining two imps that were in the room. Luckily the room seemed to be pretty clear now as she looked out seeing an opening in the ship there was a hellish landscape outside along with a few dragons flying around the outside. She looked over at the other end of the room noticing that there was a ladder of sorts made out of fleshy material like the rest of the ship.

"Lets move forward now then." Diana said as she started to move across the room and started to climb up the ladder, feeling the slimy like sensation was really weird and creepy to her. Madalyne seemed to know this world and she would follow her lead and whatever suggestions that she had as well to that would be useful for them all to survive in here. "So what should we expect in this place?" She asked Mads as she waited at the top of the ladder waiting for the others before moving forward.

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With the rest of the imps all gone now they didn't have to deal with anymore at least for this room anyway they would be safe for now, however they did need to work out a strategy in order to survive here. They were a group of five which was a decent group as she thought a little bit more as she approached the fleshy ladder looking at the others. "So we'll encounter more imps as well as demons further in the ship. We have a group of five here, Danni, Diana and Percy you'll be the damage dealers. Leah you'll be the tank for future encounters here keep them focused on you. I'll be the support and heal or shield you from further attacks." Mads suggested as she quickly started to climb up the ladder joining Diana at the top.

"If I remember right and Ed if didn't change the scenario in the next room it's a lab of sorts and should have creatures called Intellect Devourers they look like large human brains with four legs and small tentacles sticking out of them, they are pretty weak individually but in larger numbers can become an issue if they target a single person." Madalyne warned hopefully the group would listen to her suggestions as she headed further into the ship.