Septentrion, First Class
Blazermate’s @Archmage MC, Geralt’s @Multi_Media_Man, Sakura and Karin’s @Zoey Boey, Goldlewis Dickinson, Sandalphon
Word Count: 4557 +5 points
As Karen rose from the epicenter of his cryokinetic avalanche, Geralt’s Quake Rounds peppered him, but a much bigger problem was headed his way. “Armstrong!?” The sight of the huge man, not to mention what his presence here implied, left the psychic stunned just enough that he reacted instinctively. He fired off an icy blast like a cannon, but the senator armored straight through it and brought his heel down in an arena-shaking stomp. The shockwave shattered most of the ice spiked that remained, and also triggered the Tremor built up on Karen. “Urgh!” Left reeling from the impact, he gritted his teeth and worked to put together defensive measures.
His enemies were already coming to seize the opportunity, after all. Goldlewis thundered toward Travers, crunching fallen icicles with every fallen step. Yet he did not throw caution to the wind; his opponent was unbalanced, but far from helpless. Thanks to the toxic clouds that gnawed away at the Seekers and shored the Septentrion up, the deck was still stacked in Karen’s favor. Goldlewis jumped up, airdashed forward, and dropped on Karen with a flurry of blows from the UMA. With Blastokinesis and Sclerokinesis both offline, the psychic had only a couple options, and Invisibility wasn’t going to help here. He blinked backward without looking, putting his back perilously close to the edge of the platform with only a little Teleportation left. While his allies continued the pursuit, Goldlewis stopped to cover them with his Skyfish.
Blazermate directed her allies into the direction of where Karen was dodging, while she herself swooped along the ground to touch a crack and summon a purgatory ghost. Although she wanted this to zoom at Karen, it instead went for Tycoon as he was closer. This gave her a bit of an idea though, and she looked for and stood next to, but not touching, the next purgatory crack in a more defensive measure. She had gained a fair amount of uber as well, so soon Karen would be feeling a kritz… although who would be best for it?
Sakura ran forward full speed towards Karen Travers. A bead of sweat and a nervous smile flashed across her face. Feeling the daredevil, she leapt towards him with a flying kick that had more than enough momentum to carry her over the edge should he side step. Provided he did, she would swiftly turn around and use Mental Connection on the aggressive Geralt. She would swing herself around with her momentum and go to leap onto Karen from behind. ”Yattaze!” In a callback to a fight neither of them remember, she moved to lock her comparatively small but still very strong arm around his neck and grab his head, yanking back and squeezing as hard as she could.
Karin stayed back a short distance behind Karen, predicting he would teleport out soon and wanted to be in range to immediately engage should he do so.
“Urgh!” Already distracted by the gunfire coming from Goldlewis and the other foes approaching, Karen hadn’t spared Sakura any extra thought when her flying kick took her past him. Her Mental Connection and subsequent chokehold, then took him by surprise. He struggled with prodigious strength, his Cryokinesis soaking into his captor’s body, but Sakura held firm, and grappling him like this made escape very difficult. His eyes blazed as he activated Marksmanship, firing off a barrage of psychic lasers, but without any defensive powers available he could only do so much.
Geralt took advantage of the distracted Karen to fire another salvo of Quake Rounds into Travers, aiming carefully so as not to clip Sakura. Each shot was only a small nuisance to the Septentrion, but together, they were slowly piling on the damage and allowing all of the others to get a hold of the man. It was a different style of combat than she was used to, but its results could not be denied.
Blazermate saw that Karen was running out of steam or so she thought? He wasn’t moving around as much now, so maybe she could go up and do something. Her projectile shield wasn’t charged yet, but there were other things she could do. She kept her healing beam on whoever his psychic lasers were hitting as she zoomed around and came from Karen’s flank, shield raised. As she got close, she used the stunning scream from her shield to follow up with a bite from it to infect the guy with her undead plague. She then got ready to kritz whoever wanted to deal with him next.
Despite his relatively low mobility, Goldlewis managed to close to melee range first out of all the Seekers fighting Karen. He couldn’t go too hogwild with Sakura perilously close to their collective opponent, but Geralt’s carefully-aimed Quake Rounds set him up for success. When her pistol clicked empty, demanding a reload, it was a perfect chance for Goldlewis to make the most of this window of opportunity. Just then, however, the team medic got in the way, earning herself a volley of Marksmanship lasers in the process. Taken by surprise, Goldlewis slid to a stop, inches away from bashing the medabot in the back with his coffin held like a battering ram. “Hey, watch-!”
A horrific shriek from Blazermate’s twisted shield arm cut him off. It’s ‘stun’ was in truth more a side effect caused by the excruciating pain of the damage it dealt to one’s ears, and without any means of preventing friendly fire, both Goldlewis and Sakura took part in the auditory bombardment meant for Karen. They all reeled, and with the street fighter’s grip loosened, Karen bottomed out his Cryokinesis in an explosive burst, coating his foes -and filling the Suffering maw- with ice.
Still, that left him surrounded, without means of escape or defense. Yet within reach of an invaluable prize. The Septentrion had only a moment to act, but with the right power a moment could feel like a lifetime. He gritted his teeth against his pain and activated Hypervelocity. “Stupid.” In a gray blur, traced by pink afterimages, he stepped around Blazermate and delivered a barrage of punches to her chassis. He paid special attention to her elbow joints, his fists crashing into them again and again. “Shouldn’t have tried your luck!” He finished with a kick to her back as his time ran, sending her -and any loose parts- toward the abyss.
”Miss Blazermate!” Karin called out. Having been hanging back to catch Karen off guard, the other street fighter was in position to save her ally. She dashed forward and just put herself between Blazermate and the edge. ”Umph!” She took the impact and wrapped her arms around the mechanical healer, dropping to the floor.
”Are you alright? You don’t feel pain, do you?” She asked.
”Thanks Karin. And uh… sorta… it's hard to explain.” Blazermte said, holding her arm in the common anime pose of being injured. She had to call her healing drone over to heal herself alongside her own healing beam for a bit, the dents left by Karen slowly popping back out as she healed herself. ”Beaten up by Karen, and saved by Karin. Thats going to get confusing.” Blazermate said, trying to lighten the mood more for herself.
”Well, suck it up, my dear!” Karin said, giving her a hard but reassuring pat on the shoulder before rushing back into the fight.
As soon as Karen slowed back down, Goldlewis rounded on him. “Hey! You’re fightin’ me!” He whirled his coffin around as he advanced, step by step. The Septentrion tried to block the first mighty swing, but its raw power combined with Geralt’s Tremor blew his guard wide open. Before he realized what happened, another terrific wallop connected. It drew a spurt of blood from Karen’s nose, but also knocked some sense back into him, allowing him to duck under a third bone-cracking blow. “Gotcha, ya sumbitch!” When Goldlewis pivoted into an overhead smash, Karen swerved to the side and narrowly avoided its crushing force. His Pyrokinesis flared up as he lunged forward. A fiery palm strike slammed into the veteran’s heart, then detonated. Winded, ignited, and thoroughly agonized, Goldlewis fell back with a haggard gasp.
Just then, however, Sandalphon’s Angelic Wings radiated across the battlefield. Its divine light healed and cleansed the archangel’s allies, giving a maximum health boost to those who were purged of frost, poison, and flame. Goldlewis might have crumpled from the blow, but instead he planted his back foot and lashed out with a giant backhand. The Seekers hadn’t lost their momentum just yet.
Sakura joined up with her melee partners in crime. She followed up Goldlewis’ back hand with a kick into Karen’s ankle. ”Shunpu!” She canceled it into a spin kick. Thanks to Sandalphon’s ability, she was basically at full health. ”Come on, come on, get him!” She stayed right up close, minimizing any reach advantage by in-fighting with elbows and knee strikes.
As Sakura pressed her advantage, Goldlewis joined in. He complimented his teammate’s quick, punchy attacks with heavy blows of his own to fill the gaps in her assault. More cognizant of friendly fire now more than ever, Goldlewis made sure not to get so aggressive that he accidentally struck Sakura, instead working with her to create an immense amount of pressure that kept Karen on the backfoot. The Septentrion couldn’t pay either of them the attention necessary to shut them down without opening himself up to the other, and when one started a combo the other could chime in. ”Yeah, yeah!” Sakura cheered, feeling the rhythm with Goldlewis. After just a couple moments, Karen threw in the towel.
“Fine.” He leaped backward off the arena, activating Levitation to float over the open space and Blastokinesis to shield himself. Then he began to draw on the Phantom Ruby, creating an abundance of crimson-shrouded cubes that he hurled back onto the battlefield. Each exploded on hit, creating a quick ring wave of cubes that shot outward from the point of impact. That constant barrage forced his foes to hop or block rather than fire back, and if any worked up the guts to jumped out over the void, they’d be leaping straight into his fusillade of projectiles. Even worse, Tycoon unleashed Artificial Gravity during this time, turning the situation from bad to terrible as everyone had to seek safety amidst the storm or eat heavy damage plus Vulnerability Up stacks.
Sakura squinted at the cubes, and then locked eyes with Blazermate. She ran towards her and then reached out with Mental Connection, locking onto Blazermate’s stray thoughts. Then she zipped over at high speed, landing with practiced agility at her side.
Karen did not notice the streak of green lightning circling around the room’s periphery. A red-and-green blur leaped across the pipes, pumps, cables, and machines that crowded around the portals on the walls, maneuvering behind the Septentrion. Even Goldlewis, shorthopping like his life depended on it, barely recognized the intruder through the thinning haze. When he did, though, he realized that the Seekers’ ship had come in. The next moment, Giovanna cannoned off the outer wall, propelled by a sigil airdash and sustained by jets of steam. She shot straight toward Karen, and rather than try to strike his shield, she passed harmlessly threw it to lock her legs around his neck. “Going somewhere?” She zapped him point-black with her gloves, then twisted and hurled Karen back toward the arena, her airthrow strong enough to crack his shield on impact. She then used a Roman Cancel to refund her airdash and fly to safety, while Karen scrambled to get up.
Geralt, who had transformed back to her original Identity to try and dodge as many cubes as possible, found herself in a good enough position to intercept Karen. Her Quen shield was gone, but she herself was in good shape thanks to the relatively recent heal Sandalphon had gotten off before Mephisto’s demise. She’d managed to avoid much of the cubes Karen had sent their way, though Artificial Gravity had managed to hit her, hence the missing Quen. She descended on Travers with her steel sword at the ready, taking advantage of his own lack of shielding to dish out as much damage as possible. Karen was quick enough to avoid being caught off-guard, and his Electrokinesis empowered his attacks, but Geralt was relentless, flashing her signature blade out as quickly as she could manage, mixing feints in with her attacks to bait out a counter, then parry and punish it. She had the advantage of range, but Karen had versatility on his side, as he demonstrated by summoning duplicates to force her back onto the defensive. Used to being outnumbered, Geralt held out surprisingly well, but she could not find an opportunity to strike against the Seekers’ enemy.
Blazermate, instead of flying into the barrage of attacks outside the arena, instead just floated above the cubes and found a spot where the circles wouldn’t intersect so she wouldn’t get hit, saying. ”Hey guys, pretty sure this place is safe, at least from the circles.”. The spot didn’t have much room at all once the circles expanded, but Blazremate was safe from the attack at least.
color=f49ac2]”Wanna gimme the juice again, Blazermate-san?”[/color] She asked, turning towards Karen and widening her stance. She pumped her arms like loaded shotguns and activated her V-Trigger, Sakura Senpu. Her fists and feet lit up with flames. Now she would have an advantage in close quarters combat. ”I’ll say when!”
As soon as Artificial Gravity detonated, Sakura sprinted forward, slingshotting forward using her allies and Mental Connection, Blazermate able to handily keep up due to their medibeam link. Maybe she was crazy, but with her karate techniques, V-Trigger, and a properly timed Kritz that could lead into her Critical Art? She thought it might be best to bait all the duplicate Karen Travers into attacking her at the same time.
Sakura barrelled forward and opened up with a flying kick towards Travers and his duplicates. She backed up. All she needed was for one of them to whiff a hit, and for the others to come strike at her to cover for him. Just one moment. Sakura blocked ducked, weaved, and then finally side-stepped to dodge an attack. ”Now!” She shouted. Her leg snapped out in a light kick, a quick and long ranged kick against his knee. With Sakura Senpu, she instantly converted into a blazing fast spin kick with a blade of ki behind her hee. She span around to strike all the duplicates at once.
”Power and Skill!” She shouted, converting it into her critical art. She stopped on a dime and than span the other way, surging forward with her kicks and carrying her and her opponent a significant distance. With a yell she dropped and thrust her crackling fist forward before he could hit the ground. ”Sakura no Ame!” She plunged it against his stomach and then dragged it upwards into his chin. There was a plume of ki energy all around her that would blast the other duplicates as Sakura shot up into the air to send Karen flying.
Goldlewis whistled in admiration as Sakura’s offensive initiative paid dividends. When their opponent used Duplication to make every move in triplicate, he’d managed to fend off Geralt and keep Goldlewis at bay, but the street fighter had found a hole in his onslaught and made him pay for it. And with Blazermate giving her kritz, the damage she dealt reached a whole nother level. “You-! Graaaaaaaaaaaaaah!” he howled, only to get cut off as he slammed back down onto the arena. ”And that’s a wrap!” Sakura cheered, landing and balancing on one foot for a second before steadying herself. Yet even that wasn’t enough to put him down, and when his head whipped up, his eyes alight with rage beneath his disheveled gray mane.
”Bwah!” Sakura scampered back in alarm.
“Enough of this!” As his foes rushed in to finish him off, he activated Sclerokinesis. Protected from arm, he wound up and brought down a megaton punch that blasted back everyone within a few yards, and shook the entire arena. As the battlefield flexed perilously, Karen pulled the cord at his collar. His hood flipped up, hiding his face in a dark veil that then blazed with a set of orange jaws, and all across his outfit imaginary cables began to glow. Aglow with the power of Brain Drive, he lifted his hands once more. “This is what real power looks like,” he declared, ready to turn the tide.
Instead, he found himself staring upward like a rabbit at a hawk as Heavenly Wings swooped toward him in all her glory. With armored scales like interlaid tiles of marble and jet, her claws and crown of lustrous gold, she looked like the embodiment of divine punishment, and she hit like it as well. At the bottom of her dive she whipped around and lashed Karen with her tail, Its strength obliterated Karen’s emergency Blastokinesis shield and hurled him through the open air. Even before he slammed into the far wall, Sandalphon cast screens of holy light like gigantic stamps that buffeted his point of impact. Goldlewis joined in the bombardment, his Skyfish roaring as bullets pounded the area, along with bursts of fire from Geralt, who had transformed into a new form, complete with ethereal wings of flame, a few complimentary fireballs from Sakura, (and anyone else who can projectile can join in). After a few seconds, SandaIphon’s time as Heavenly Wings grew short, so as her final act she cast Celestial Skewer. Holy water around her frothed into raging rapids, and from the maelstrom flew a flurry of javelins that punctuated the Seekers’ assault.
Even before the dust settled, however, lightning erupted from the crater in the reactor wall. The smoke blew outward from the center, revealing Karen in critical condition. Most of his uniform had been destroyed, and wounds covered his body, especially around his chest. Having returned to her normal state, Sandalphon scanned his vitals, and her pupils turned to exclamation marks as she realized what had happened. “He defibrillated himself,” she reported, her deadpan tone tinged with a note of surprise. Though the Septentrion’s hood still obscured his face, she could feel his determination. “This is the final stretch,” she told the others flatly. She planted her gunstaff, creating a healing field, then swapped to the Eye of Sol with a flourish. “Brace yourselves.”
Sakura looked at Sandalphon, a hushed look of awe on her face. ”I-I’m ready!”
”As am I.” Karin rejoined with the others.
Karen yelled–no, roared. In one go, he activated Cryokinesis, Duplication, Clairvoyance, and Psychokinesis. He flung himself back toward the arena, landing in an explosion of ice. Debris of ice and metal, further compounded by Duplication, floated around him as both a damaging field and to glom onto his every move, in a manner that might remind Sakura and Karin of Oro’s Tengu Stone. More dangerous than ever with his powers amped up by Brain Drive, Karen Travers attacked once more.
Geralt stayed back, flinging balls of fire at Karen every chance she got while also summoning the Judicator to launch its own spectral fire at him. As Karen rushed at her, trying to take advantage of this form's seeming lack of weapons, she gave a devious smirk and ripped free the Hateful Flesh, crashing it violently into his outstretched arm and forcing his attack off-course, to which she followed up with a spinning elbow to the face, and a blast from Aard to further punish his hubris and give herself some space.
Before Karen could get his bearings, Goldlewis occupied the space that Geralt opened up–but not quite the same Goldlewis that the others remembered. When Karen had powered himself up one last time, full of fatal fury, the veteran had done the same. Producing the spirit of Jack-8 that he’d claimed after the remarkable robot’s defeat, he’d slammed it into his heart and transformed in a burst of prismatic light.
“Rrrrah!” Goldlewis blew through the floating debris and dashed in to deliver a heavy lunge punch, followed by an overhead Behemoth Typhoon. Karen backed up once struck, but rather than pick up his coffin again Goldlewis stepped onto it to land a near-instant overhead knee strike, then land into a brand-new Tyulpan Blast that fired his shotgauntlets with both hands to blast Karen back. This also activated Heat, and Goldlewis charged forward with an aura of white flame. The Septentrion scrambled to his feet with his arms up, using Cryokinesis to create a spiked shield of ice. Goldlewis hammered the spike wall to pieces with a barrage of punches. “You damn…!” Then he grabbed Karen’s guard and headbutted him to the ground. “Fool!” Reaching back for his coffin, he unleashed an upward Behemoth Typhoon to force a quick rise, but let go of the weapon at the peak of the swing to send it flying into the air. Karen struck back with a vengeance, his freezing attacks supplemented by Psychokinesis-propelled debris, but after a moment Goldlewis unleashed his Heat Smash, Meteor Raid. A quick open-palm strike knocked Karen off-balance before an overhead punch grounded him, setting him up for the coffin to land on him. As it exploded, Goldlewis added insult to injury with a powerful flex.
The next moment the Septentrion disappeared, courtesy of Teleportation. He warped behind Goldlewis, only to find Giovanna waiting there. “Sucks for you I’ve always got his back.” She countered his first strike with the upper-body invincibility of her own 6p, then jumped up and springboarded off Goldlewis to launch herself at Karen with her nigh-unreactable Tempestade drive kick. Together, she and Rei unleashed a flurry of attacks that culminated in Burning Kick, melting through the last of her foe’s Cryokinesis as he once again got pushed back.
Sakura winged the stumbling Karen in the side of the head with a push kick, and Karin came in from the other side with a wince-inducing kick to his knee. Sakura jumped on his back once again and drove her elbow down like a jackhammer into the top of his skull. Then she wrenched backwards, trying to force him to stand up straight. In just a moment more he could have shaken her, but Karin wasn’t going to give him that moment. His body and defences were weakened. Truth be told, the heiress didn’t know if this would finish the job, but she wasn’t going to hold back.
”Kanzuki-Ryuu…” Voice rising, she stepped in and swatted him across the jaw and kneed him in the gut. Then her right hand sparked blue. For a moment, it was like there was a vacuum of air around her fist as dust kicked in and swirled around it. Super Combo. Fully stocked.
”Shin-! Pi-! Kai-! Byaku!” She thrust her hand, palm flat, fingers first, like a knife, targeting his liver. She stepped forward, pushing him back with her strikes, the ground literally quaking around her with the force of each blow. Each syllable was punctuated by a lancing, impaling strike like she was trying to punch a hole clean through his body. Liver, lungs, heart, stomach, liver, her hands indented him and Sakura felt the force in her own body as gusts of wind traveled out the other side. This move wasn’t nearly as flashy or fantastical as the one she used against Rufus Shinra, but that wasn’t the point. This was a technique meant to disassemble someone from the inside.
Karin stomped the ground and it cracked beneath her. ”Sei!” With a final cry she thrust her twisting fist into his center. He didn’t go flying away or explode. Typically, the victim would just crumple around the blow. Sakura had to let go, her hands numb and her body vibrating just from being attached to Karen. Karin withdrew her fist and took a few steps back.
For all his determination, Karen Travers could do little in the end. Finished in decisive fashion, he could muster no last words, nor final self-reflections. By the time his assailant’s technique came to an end, he scarcely felt the pain, instead comatose in a state of shocked numbness. His organs failed, his body failed, and he died. In the last moment he could still think, however, his thoughts were of Alice. The woman he’d been willing to turn back time to save, now just another footnote on the pages of history. Forever.
Karin lowered her palms and exhaled, shutting her eyes. She was a warrior now. Had been since she set out. It was the Seekers, collectively, that killed him. He was immensely strong and could not be held back on. And in the days to come, for Midgar’s recovery, far too dangerous and powerful to be left alive. Still. Sakura set a hand on Karin’s shoulder and looked at her. This wasn’t why either of them learned to fight. But they had the strength to do battle, and so they must. Neither of them needed to say anything.
As Karen’s body crumbled away, Giovanna and Goldlewis looked on, taking a moment to catch their breath. The secret agent gave her friend a smirk, nodding at his stomach. “You gotta tell me about this new crash diet of yours.”
Goldlewis rolled his eyes. “Wasn’t my aim. Honest! I’ve been tryin’ to lose the spare tire forever. But you know I’m partial to stress-eatin’.” Shaking his head, he turned toward the element in the room: Tycoon. “Anyhow, save your yappin’ ‘til after we’re done. This ain’t over yet.”
Sighing, Giovanna brushed her braid back over her shoulder and assumed her fighting stance. “Yessir.”
