As a rule, Kat was never quick about answering her phone. Don't get the wrong idea! It doesn't have anything to do with danger sense, or some kinda wisdom thing, or a mistrust of phones or anything like that. She loves her phone! The super cool wolf moon part's a little, uh, let's just say... she loves who that represents? That feels safe. Point is, if you'd taken her to the phone... store? And let her trade for one all by herself she'd have picked something a little bit more glittery and soft, like the sweet little kitten bapping at a crescent moon charm that dangles from the top of it when she pulls it out of her bag. But this is hers and she's proud of it and she would never ever ever do a bad girl thing like not answer the phone when it rings.

But she always, [i]always[/i] let's it ring. Meaning she lets it play. When Kat got this phone she spent hours 'n hours n' hours picking out the perfect little jingle so she'd always know when it was her phone that was making noises and didn't get excited over nothing. Which worked a treat, except she picked such a good one that she listens to pretty much the whole thing out of habit and only ever picks up at the literal last second. Which is important to remember when you're callin' her 'cause it's easy to give up too early if you think she's just busy and don't wanna go to voice mail, but no, she's just jammin'. 

Today? That saved her life. Because while Cyanis and Angelesia were busy screaming at the phone-monsters trying to eat them, Katherine Isabella Fluffybiscuits was bopping her head up and down and listening to her favorite tune. And that gave her a crucial bit of time to hear screaming and look up to see what the heck was happening. Which meant that when she started screaming too, it wasn't because tentacles were trying to drag her into the phone-o-verse or whatever it is that technomancy calls it. I should ask Xiu.

Still, getting an extra thirty seconds of freedom wasn't the same thing as coming up with a genius plan to save anybody, or even herself, even if speedrunning taught her that amount of time was basically an eternity. It turns out that in situations you haven't practiced, it really super duper isn't. She looked around in a panic, trying to find an out. Who could she count on? Berserker was frothing mad but was so busy defending herself she couldn't even get a proper wall started, let alone a fortress that could protect anyone extra. Cy was clinging to the table so tight her nails were dragging grooves across its surface, and the most you could say about Angelesia in comparison was that her nails weren't long enough to do the same. 

Normally she'd look to Actia as the oldest fox, but someone had slipped her an extra dose of crazy powder in her coffee this morning or something, because goodness goshies what was she thinking?! If that was a genius plan to save everyone, Katherine didn't understand it well enough to trust in it. Diaofei was a monk, which put Kat on edge to begin with, but even if desperate times called for desperate situations this particular monk was frozen in shock and also chained to a crazy-powedered foxgirl. That's no good!

Wait. Oh no. Oh [i]nyo.[/i] She was still holding her phone. Clutching it tight, even! Was it going to do the scary thing to her too? It rang when everyone else's did so you'd have to figure but sure [i]Hyra[/i] of all people would be cool enough to find the only not cursed phone in the world? If it was for a birthday present? Right??? But her tails were bushing, and they didn't do that if she felt safe. 

No girl, you've gotta throw it! Even if it's the most precious thing you own, it's gonna eat you! Why hasn't it done it yet? Oh, oh, oh goshies, what was she supposed to-- nyeh!!! 

It left her hand at the very last second of her ring. She threw it as hard as she could, but too little too late. Black as night and neon green, the phone spiraled in the air before sprouting tendrils of its own that managed to lasso her delicate and desperately scrambling wrist. Not enough to hold her tight, but its pull was stronger than she was. All she had was her legs. She used them. 

This is the kind of moment they made security blankets for. She wished she was curled up safe in hers at home, with the fireplace crackling and a tea kettle boiling over for her to whine at until Yue turned it into hot delicious leaf juice with even more delicious leaf-juice cookies to go with it. Not for the last time! But Katherine was a brave girl, whatever her trembling knees would want you to believe: when she runs, it's [i]forward[/i], not away. It puts a bit of slack in the restraints this curse's tryin' to put on her. It expected her to run. It expects everyone to run, y'know?

See, people never tell you this, but when it comes to a duel it's really little things that make up the difference between victory and defeat. You'd like to imagine that having big fancy finishers or secret swords or whatever'd be really super duper mega important, and I ain't sayin' it's not or anything but none of that makes a lick of difference next to just having enough courage in your heart to believe in what it is you're doing. 

Does that make sense? It means that, Katherine could've run screaming like everyone else or froze up and nobody'd blame her. She could have screamed for help and decided before she tried anything that she needed saving, and understandable as that mighta been it'd'a been the end. Maybe for everybody. There's no time but what you buy in a fight, is the thing. But her special song's a thing for magical girls and heroes, and how could she stand to look at herself in the mirror if she didn't try to live up to that? Her, tryin' to save the world and everything. So when she leaps into the air and sends a kick at her still transforming phone, her form's lousy as anything and it doesn't matter at all. It's the one thing she coulda done that the other side wasn't expecting either. It buys her time, time that was already bought and paid for by someone else who'd been expecting to use it for themselves.

She doesn't even get to say the line about asking someone to take care of the landing. Before she can fall or gracelessly tumble face first into a wall, or just plain get eaten anyway because let's face it determination or no this little sweetie weighs about the same as a loaf of bread, something catches her. Something that could not have crossed the distance with all this interference, if she'd gone the other way. A brilliant, shining laser sword slices through the tentacles grabbing at her before it cracks her beautiful Cyber Wolf Moon phone in half.

"Our plan managed to fall apart before we finished making it," muttered Ivar, "I am impressed."