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Penny approached her just as she spread and stretched her legs, testing her ankles with little twirls. She grinned coquettishly back at Penny as her bespectacled teammate inquired about their relationship status, and leaned in to give an emphatic smooch to the Siscian girl's freckled cheek.
"Nahhh, we're like this," she confided, locking her index and middle fingers in a tight cross. "Thick as thieves always, Penny, you know that. Great firepower out there."
"Wha- hey!" Penny says, rubbing the cheek, blushing rather strongly, probably out of embarrassment. But then she breaks into a grin at Nichole's response.
"Hey, you know me," she replies. "Hit hard, hit fast, no mercy. You know what they say; when all you have is a hammer, everything else is a nail."
Her smile widened and she swung around on her perch, lifting up her legs and wrapping them around Cordelia's midsection. Nicole's right leg tucked between her midriff and her tightly drawn legs, wedged underneath her head protectively.
"You girls don't think I'm that jealous now, do you? Think I need to try and keep all the hotness to myself?" she asked the two nobles playfully. "You can dance if you want to, Cordy. All my best friends love to dance. Especially with each other."
Nichole was a shameless flirt, no doubt about it, Penny thought as she could barely contain a chuckle at Cordelia's predicament. Between Nichole and Dana, this team was a real ray of sunshine, even if Nichole can be quite teasing about it.
Cordelia’s voice faltered while she spoke in a way that was informative to how unused to speaking while laughing the young Ars Magi was. “I can imagine you and your bevy of men, women, probably even the nox would line up for a dance with you!” she managed between quick breaths. Her face carried forward, its smile and lightness this time. “Thank you,” she wrapped her arms around the leg pressed against her midriff. “I’ll be easier on myself, I promise.”
Cordelia watched as Dana responded to Aiya’s question, innocence incarnated on full display for all to see. It made her grin just that bit wider, and she laughed with the group at the name dropping of one Guardian Gunslinger Alexis. For a moment, Cordelia didn’t feel as though they were on a mission. It felt almost as if they were simply hanging out together. She relished in this. This moment of serenity admist the rain, and the ruins. Cordelia felt for the first time in a while that she was getting used to it. That she wasn't in combat. This conversation wasn't life or death. It was just a bit of fun.
She turned to Aiya, resolutely. “Whenever you want to dance, just let me know.” Her words were confident this time. “If you think you can handle me,” she added, trying to wink but only managing a slightly delayed blink.
"There ya go, you gotta be more confident in yourself," Penny adds, hefting her hammer onto her shoulder one-handed as though the giant gladius were a prop item. "You gotta take things easy, smile a bit more. You got a nice smile."
“Aren’t you the cutest.” Aiya replies to Dana, the dark-haired girl resting her chin in her hands as she casts a winning smile at the energetic Norban. “Don’t worry, you’re not doing anything wrong. I don’t mind sharing the spotlight.”
The girl’s chestnut gaze turns to Cordelia after, listening to the other girl’s musing with a careful gaze. “Cordy,” She says, appropriating Nicole’s nickname with not even a hint of hesitance, “You’re one of the most powerful, most important women in the world. You should enjoy it while you can.” Her lips split into a wide, almost wolfish grin at the girl’s offer. “I won’t disappoint you.”
Craning backward after, the dark-haired girl stretches her arms overhead and remarks, as if reading Nicole’s train of thought: “We should all dance,” She suggests, musing. “Maybe I’ll arrange a celebration, if we pass our little exercise.”
Penny can't help but grin. Aiya was as big a flirt as Nichole was, it's rather scary. You'd think a Duodecim would be more serious and cordial like Vanna, but it seems they come in all types. She's a strong fit for Nichole, and she can see how the two hit it off.
"As long as it's not a formal dress affair, it's fine with me," Penny comments.
And it’s the mention of that exercise, perhaps the reminder of it, that seems to break the tranquil spell that’s settled over the group.
“We’ve got a request for assistance. Webber’s group.” Says Garnier, the boy raising his head to motion toward his fellow officers. Both Aiya and Holst abandon their perches, huddling close around the communication equipment. The speak quickly between themselves, breaking after a hurried minute and turning back to their escort.
“One of our teams has run into a problem.” Holst explains shortly. “They’re requesting our assistance. It’s about a mile out, we’ve already got a route for you. Tell you more on route.” She tosses an earpiece to each of the Ars Magi, adding: “Go fast.”
"Webber?" Penny asks cautiously as her gaze turns to Dana. "You mean Noah Webber?"
She's clearly thinking of Dana's dance partner at the ball, though part of her wonders if Dima's there too. However, the request for aid and the haste required calls for speed, and Penny catches the earpiece, hurriedly puts it in, then starts rollerblading as fast as she can without straying too far from her teammates.
The Ars Magi find themselves at the mercy of the elements once more.
The route that Aiya’s squad has charted for them leads off the roof of the parking garage and on to that of a nearby building, and another after that, racing across the rubble-strewn rooftops of a long-ruined skyline. Ahead buzzes one of those triangular shaped objects that the officers had unpacked; a baseball-sized drone that leads the way. In the darkness it leaves a contrail of burning green light in its wake, a guiding beacon for the girls that follow.
Up high the wind is even more fierce, though the rain has slowed the veil of clouds has begun to part, illuminating the ruined district in the moon’s pale light. It’s still difficult to see the ground down below however, and the footing is uneasy on the shattered concrete the Ars Magi make their was across.
And then they see it.
It looms out of the darkness, easily three stories tall, but impossible to mistake for just another ruined building in a crumbling cityscape. It’s humanoid in shape, bipedal, two arms and two legs, though it eschews a head in exchange for a blocky central body. Its armor-plated body is gunmetal gray, illuminated by the garish red lights dotted over its massive frame. All along its frame are lined the weapons of war: machine-guns, missile pods, a dozen compartments filled with a dozen violent instruments.
Some of those instruments are currently in use. One of its arms, a massive cannon, glows with magitech energy as it discharges into the street bellow it.
Things do not look like they’re going well.
Penny ignores the driving rain; it's cold and uncomfortable, but they have someone to help. Besides, being an Ars Magi comes with more endurance and ability to weather the elements, so she doesn't complain. Besides, if her mom can do this day in and day out, who is she to complain? She uses her agility and rollerblading experience to skate around obstacles or over them, while trying to stay close to her teammates in case anything happens.
The real kicker is when they see the mecha. This was no small fry, this was a goddamn beast, tall as a building.
"Jesus, that's a big bitch," Penny mutters. "That's going to take quite a bit more to take down..."
She winces as Blair gets tossed like a ragdoll through a wall, but knows the Celtic girl can take more than that. Still, that the thing took Blair's strikes and barely noticed doesn't bode well for this group, her own dislike of Wagner aside.
"Yeah, this is clearly going to take more effort to take out than the previous two," she notes, studying the thing through her visor. She tries to spot any weak points, but realizes the size and bulk of the thing would make it harder to bring down. "And how much firepower does that thing have?! It's attacking in two-three-four different directions and not slowing down!"
“I’m going to give everyone quick access to the battlefield,” she spoke commandingly now. “Above our main target, and as close to both compromised parties as possible. These will be two-way doors I’m making, so if need be, they can be used for evacuation and then disabled.”
Penny turns to her silver-haired teammate, surprised at first, but then grinning at the possibilities.
"So we can sneak up on that thing or move quickly? Not bad," she says with a smirk. "Do your thing, Cordy! Let's start this off with a bang!"
Cordelia’s hair and clothes flew upwards in a brilliant display of power and pressure, the strands of her clothing coming apart at the seems revealing below them not skin nor flesh, but brilliant, glimmering possibility. It shone a bright blue, twinkling light a painted reflection of the night sky as details of her Parma started to sharpen into focus. Cordelia shot to her feet, trailing from her hand was what looked like a spinning thread of molten glass, slowly dangling around her as if it was a ribbon. The rain halted around her for a moment as the sound of cracking glass erupted from her, and the spinning thread took shape into the great sword known as Pridwen.
The massive blade stood nearly as tall as the Ars Magi herself. The length of the blade appeared to be made up of many different pieces of stained glass, perfectly crafted and honed to a dangerously sharp edge. As the details of her Parma honed into detail, the rain began to fall around her once more, the once Verdant unconfident eyes of a butler had now shifted to a yellowish cat’s eye glean that shone confidently in the moonlight. Her once simpler outfit now bursting out white, black, and blue with ribbons and crests too regal to be found on the typically reserved girl.
The biggest change, perhaps, was the now crescent moon grin, wide as could be and hungry. She hefted the magnificent great sword with a single hand reaching it up into the night sky, as if daring lightning to strike, before spinning it and plunging it into the Earth.
A pulse echoed out from it that expanded well past their target as Cordelia began to sense in the area just how much glass she was given. The grin only grew from there. All at once shards of glass all around the ruined battleground they were being thrust into, and in front of her team began to form into doorways made of piecemeal shards made up of just about any kind of glass you could think of. Sea glass, windshields, windows, mirrors, if it could reflect an image it began to rise into the air. One doorway was located by the pinned down team, another towards the redheaded Ars Magi Cordelia had watched get thrown into a wall. The third, however, shimmered magnificently above the humongous three-story mech.
Penny has to squint to withstand the glare of Cordelia's new transformation, surprised at the new trick her teammate pulled out. Part of her can't help but think of her old shows, before she forcibly quashes the notion, reminding herself that several lives were at stake and that they're going up against something that could splatter them across the landscape if they're not careful.
Glass from the cityscape shot back over to Cordelia as well, just enough to create three doorways in front of her team. “First leads to the pinned team, second to the top of this mech, third to the pinned down Ars Magi. If you need a doorway once we’ve entered combat call for me over the radio with your location and I’ll do what I can.” Cordelia had transformed, in more ways than one. “Let’s do what we do best, once we’re done, we’ll see about that dance.”
Penny grips Groß Eisen in both hands as the rocket begins warming up.
"Guess I'll take the second gate, if it's okay with you girls," she says, preparing herself. "Oh, and if Blair starts swearing at you, don't worry, that's just her way of saying 'hello'."
The rocket hammer then blasts, propelling Penny forwards at breakneck speeds as she disappears into the second portal, leaving a trail of crackling lightning behind her. She materializes a moment later above the giant mecha, boosting her speed as she comes down hard on the top of the giant war machine.
"Surprise, bitch!" she calls out cheerfully, slamming her hammer right on top of the thing full-force. "CANDYGRAM!"