eldest

Masks: Resurrection Roundabout

The sky does not fall.

The building sets down heavily on the runway amidst plumes of fire. Immediately people pile out through the front doors, getting to safety as the fire suppression systems start to completely cut loose.

And behind you the rocket roars.

There's so much else that's happening right now, Ferra, but if that satellite goes up then all of this will be for nothing. Everyone else is distracted, distant, busy - you're the only one who has the opportunity to get aboard before the boosters engage and it's gone for good.

@Thanqol

I'm sorry, this is the girl who geeked out about seeing infinity. She got super excited about the quick moon trip, and you think she's not going to intercept a rocket that happens to get her to space?

She's grabbing onto the rocket with one leap, holding on for dear life.

Masks: Resurrection Roundabout

Angel-IKA!

"Fuck fuck fuck fuck -"

You and Dominus dive to the side just as the entire corridor explodes in a pillar of cosmic flame. Dominus reacts like a trained professional - pulling you behind her, rising to one knee, and firing a volley from her rifle at that spooky, levitating black shadow outside. You react like an idiot, putting your hands over your head and wishing for magic werewolf powers. Dominus has to pull you by the arm again as Turbo Knight fires another shot that rips through the core of the Gears building, causing huge chunks of molten masonry to fall down on the starport below.

"This is your captain speaking," said Professor Gears over the intercom. "Please be advised that we are losing altitude, so hold onto something."

@Thanqol

Ferra looks up at the Gears Foundation. No, fuck that, she looks up at her home. And it's got a giant bloody hole in it and is rapidly falling down towards the spaceport, including all the civilians. And Victor is calmly pointing it out. Her cat is in there. She is aware.

She doesn't register her surge of power from her core, or the leap that follows, or the absent, toneless "Thank you Victor, I know". That is her home, her home is in danger, and she is going to be there and helping. She rises up straight through the center of Sara's pattern, her last hardlight sword spread out into overlapping, neatly glowing fields, spreading out between her hands as she rises until the spirograph is large enough to encompass her home.

And she catches the building, and holds it there, her whole world between her hands.

Masks: Resurrection Roundabout

"Fiend! You dishonour the sacred laws of the duel!" said Lyra.
"I weep for this fallen age!" declared Scipio, and true to his word, he stood stock still and took off his helmet to wipe tears from his eyes in a perfect melancholic pose. His team effortlessly moves to defend him while he takes his moment.
"You dare hold back?" roared Yates, pressing the attack. "You think that we are unworthy of your full efforts? Fie! Fie and damnation, let our swords teach you the price of your arrogance!"
"Use the promo code Arrogance-2187 to get 10% off our limited edition Armour Mark 55 Unboxing Video, featuring our unabridged reactions to our iconic new gear!" added Violet.

@Thanqol

"Hi Sara!" She turns and smiles at her teammate, swords still running interference with the rest of the knights. "Do you think these guys are going to have to rebrand? There'd be a whole lot of knights around if they don't. Also Turbo Knight 2 is really insecure and has a very poorly made death satellite in there. Also the Shogun but I think that part's fixed." Hm. Where is the Shogun, anyway?

Masks: Resurrection Roundabout

There is no more noble cause than the defence of cat. You cut through the anti-air lasers easily - they're as obsolete as the shutters, and for a moment the skies are clear.

Then sleek black drone fighters begin lifting from the spaceport; vantablack triangles launching one after another in streaks of golden light. These are BlackSun's mobile reserve, the cutting edge of the corporate-industrial complex and the moneymaker showroom pieces. They scatter up, wings opening - too small to take the fight to the Gears Foundation directly, but dangerous enough to intercept anything or anyone jumping from the skies.

And then...

"TO PROTECT THE STARS FROM DESTRUCTION!"
"TO GIVE GREAT BARGAINS ON CONSTRUCTION!"
"TO GUARD THE WORLD FROM ABOVE!"
"TO BLACKEN THE SUN WITH OUR LOVE!"
"LYRA!"
"SCIPIO!"
"VIOLET!"
"YATES!"
"AS HOLY KNIGHTS WE WIN OUR FATES!"

In a perfect sentai group pose the four Knights of the Black Sun, the elite megagoons - each a celebrity in their own right - emerge onto the roof of the aircraft hangar on an elevator. They're Maria's hand-trained elite badasses, surrounded by swarms of camera drones, instinctively catching every splash of sunlight and turning to let the illumination of explosions catch their good sides.

They then draw their swords - a complicated manoeuvre that involves graceful leaps, pirouettes, moments of break dancing and dramatic, smouldering stares into each others helmet-visors that no doubt have their fans screaming from the romantic tension. Once they're done with that it'll be time to use those swords, and perhaps strike more poses.

@Thanqol

Ferra is singularly unimpressed. She holds up each arm, both in a "come at me bro" gesture and a focus, and a halo of five blades, longer than she is, appear behind her. "Learned this one from Sara." And they spike towards the Knights, one held in reserve for the surprise she wasn't seeing coming.

There's another AI involved. There was a surprise coming.

8 on directly engage, I will avoid return blows.

Masks: Resurrection Roundabout

"Wah-ha-ha-ha!" laughed Turbo Knight 2. "Everything is going according to plan! Minions! Launch the rocket!"

Ferra, you can feel the rumbling of massive engines begin to roar below you. Channels of golden light run through everything as Prometheus begins executing his plans. Megagoons all over the open launch silo light up like lights on a server bank. It's all happening now, and those are your friends up there above you.

You've already done the groundwork to free the Shogun and bust free - and with your friends up there and in trouble, taking out some of that anti-air would be a damn fine assist.

@Thanqol

A few shards of hardlight in strategic places, and they're both off the rocket. A dozen more, whirling around in a precise pattern, gives them both enough cover to get away from the rocket without being shot, and she's straight out the window and towards the AA emplacements. They are shooting at her cat. How dare you. The swirling vortex of glass and baffling hardlight following her is almost an afterthought.

7 on dice, I assume this is an attack which would make it a 7, in which case she's taking something (the AA emplacements). If this is instead a defend, that's a 10, baby.

Masks: Resurrection Roundabout

"Mars? That pitiful red planet?" said Turbo Knight. "And Sylvanius, the one man outside of my system... You know what!? You're right! Change of plans! Fuck Australia! Lackeys! Turn this satellite around! We're going to blow up Mars instead!"

There was a wide and suppressed groaning from the tech support staff at this declaration.

@Thanqol

Ferra groans for much the same reason. "You... you idiot! You completely immature, insufferable, overgrown brat! This is obnoxious. If you're so insecure that I can get you to change your plans twice, in ten minutes, by asking questions, what are you doing wanting to rule the world?" She should probably not be egging her on, but dammit, if nobody else will. "Make up your mind, get a plan, stick to it, and stop crying about how nobody is acting like you're the queen of the world when you're not acting like one!"

Masks: Resurrection Roundabout

There's a music here. It's twisted and off rhythm and far, far too rapid - but everything is a part of it. Turbo Knight's influence seeps into everything here. It all beats in time with her finger drumming against the safety rail - the Shogun's heartbeat, the satellites above, the ticking of celestial mechanics, the Gears Foundation and all inside that closes in on her. Data flows in monumental channels through these walls, tying her to the world around, pouring through the crown sculpted into her helmet like the words of the gods into the head of an ancient king. She is the avatar of this whole world. All flows to her, and she flows to it - as above, so below. Everything here is her design and every decision plays into her hands.

But there is something that you can see in the distance that is not a matter of numbers. A red shadow looms above everything. When it falls, so too will the music.

@Thanqol

She's ready. She's been ready. She really ought to let things be.

But she's really curious.

"Hey! Turbo Knight 2 lady! What's your plan for Mars when you're ruler of the world and stuff?"

Masks: Resurrection Roundabout

While you're thinking of countdowns...

The rocket fuelling finished a few minutes ago. You were expecting blast-off at any moment but it hasn't happened just yet. Rather than running for cover, Turbo Knight 2 is up there on the balcony, looking expectantly at the sky. She's waiting for something. For a moment she looks down at you, and it seems like she's waiting for something there as well.

"Interesting," mused the Shogun. "You... think you could drop me off there when we go up? After we've solved this problem I think I'm due for a vacation."

@Thanqol

"Do my best" she mutters absently, mind on other things. She's staring right at Turbo Knight 2, makes eye contact, and then when she blinks (Ferra is a robot. She does not blink first.) looks away, up at the sky, and smile slightly. The stars and satellites above are gorgeous, and she can see them quite well, but that's not what she's after. She focuses, and they drop away, duplicating and forking away from her like staring into an infinity mirror, warping ever so slightly in every kaleidoscope shift of possibility until she's looking at the souls of the worthy, and the points of pyros in the aether, and the majesty of frozen tears lighting the earth with the goddess's love. And in there, she looks for what the rocket's waiting on.

Masks: Resurrection Roundabout

"That is a complicated question," the Shogun mused. "Back when I was growing up the stars were mythical spirits that revolved around the earth at the will of the gods. Flight was something reserved for birds and arrows. But then I extended that privilege to musket balls and now I'm here, about to be consumed by the unthinkable conclusion of the forces I set in motion on that day. I... am having trouble getting all of that into a haiku. Maybe it's short sighted of me to hold onto haiku at all. Maybe the same process of technology has ruined poetry for me as well..." she drifts off, voice meandering and melancholy.

Then her eyes shift. "Actually," she says, looking you in a kind of sideways way where she's avoiding exact eye contact. "How far are we going into space? Just hypothetically. Does our orbital trajectory take us past Elysium Spire? You know, the incredibly exclusive luxury resort orbital?"

@Thanqol

"I think we're pretty close to it at the apotheosis of the orbit? Just need to get up about 22km in orbit and rotate the orbit by 3 degrees or so?" She mutters to herself, going through math as the countdown starts, air container sliding up to rest next to the Shogun.

Masks: Resurrection Roundabout

<Snipped quote by eldest>

The Shogun gives a rough little laugh. "No, I can't survive space. I'm just hanging here trying to compose a fitting death haiku but everything about this situation is so ridiculous it is not working out. Help me out?

Friendly robot comes
Unlikely guide to heavens
Literal and otherwise."

@Thanqol

"Oh. Drat, I was looking forward to going to space. What if you could survive going to space? Also, I'd do "literal or not" for the final line." She's nattering on, but she's doing math, and a lot of it. Average oxygen consumed by somebody of the Shogun's... status, pressure requirements, rocket drag increased from a hardlight shield, projected trajectory with and without adjustments, all of it. And in the shadows of the rocket, there's an odd, pulsing hardlight construct, quietly using one bulbous sphere of force to compress and filter air into another, building up the Shogun's lifeline. "I think we're gonna be just fine, myself." And wink, as the technicians retreat out of the launch bay.

[13 on protect, with the aim of getting off the rocket post-launch, Shogun's reaction determines if it's going to be before or after space.]