[Masks IC] Resurrection Roundabout: Drawing Individuals

[Thanqol]

POTENTIAL 2

Just need to get to the elevator first. Twenty more reps. Here we go.

Stomp. Stomp. Stomp. You hear the steady beat of mechanical feet on metal ground behind you.

You move faster, @Sarahphim. Your fingers scrabble for grip on the smooth metal flow. Get the rhythm! Pull! Pull! Pull! Do it! Eyes forwards!

Stomp. Stomp. Stomp. Each vibration runs all the way through your body.

The stomping stops.

A hand clenches your ankle.

You are dragged all the way backwards.

"牛屄! That looks 干 nasty," said a face of old scars and fresh burns, eye swolen shut and bruising like hell. She smiles at you. She's bleeding from her gums a little. "You know, I'm not even mad? I'm surprised, but I can't be mad at you." She pinches your cheek. That'll bruise. "It'd be like being mad at a cat for knocking a vase off a shelf. It's just your nature."

"But," she said, producing a medjector that has far too much power drill in its DNA, "sometimes you just gotta fix a cat, you know?"

"Get! Off! Of! Me!"

The second she's free she sprints to the crater. Sh-t. This is bad, this is very bad. Mission first, soldier. Feelings later. Maybe never. Feelings never sounds good.

"God damn it, she's gone. I couldn't see a thing through all that hardlight! God damn it. If she's got free reign again then... hell. Who saw it? Which one of you had eyes on her?! Report!"

"Chill, Saracen," said @Ifritphim. "I totally vaporized her just now." She turned to show off the smooth, glittering silver lines of her hardlight generator against her bare back, running through with crackling veins of burning energy. "No need to spaz out."

"Actually the overlapping refraction effect meant we didn't have time to concentrate a beam for more than a -" came a quiet voice from the back.

"Don't worry!" said Phimmy, the stretchy girl. "I trick Old Man Satan every week! Mrs. Satan will be a piece of cake!"

"Trust us, darrrrrrrling," said @Le Tigressa. "Any one of us would be able to cat-ch that villainess."

"Ahar, the buxom slattern speaks sense!" said @Sararrrrphim. "This here cosmos is abundant with wenches, and the only question will be which of us will be punching out the natives, and which of us will make out with them!"

You may have fought your way free, Errant, but the tiger has decided that you are going to pat it and tigers do not take 'I am having an emotional meltdown' as an answer.

*

Locker: angelica i presume ur waifu of choice is the tiger
Angel-IKA: Um excuse you
Locker: wat
Angel-IKA: Just give me a second to evaluate the other contestants I'm not that easy
Locker: uhuh
Bode: I am satisfied with all of this. It is all vindication.
Locker: u have to pick those are the rules
Bode: I like the pirate.
Locker: wtf i would not have claled that.
Locker: not the aegis agent?
Bode: I always wanted to be a pirate.
Locker: it is a day of revelations here
Locker: domminus?
Dominus: THE ONE WHO IS TIGER THEMED BUT NOT THE ACTUAL TIGER
Angel-IKA: Hey! You stole that one from me!
Dominus: I KNOW.
Dominus: NOW YOU HAVE NO EASY WAY TO AVOID CHOOSING THE TIGER.
Angel-IKA: >:T
Locker: jfc you people can you keep your weird flirting out of main
Locker: were discussing waifus here
Ferraphim1tp: I'm going to reserve judgement for just now.

It doesn't hurt. She's got damage sensors screaming at her, with the arm sparking on the ground beneath her, and she goes on total defense, dodging a few followup blows that Sabrim throws out as she turned her attention. But no pain, she wasn't made to feel pain and she knows that. She turns to face Sabrim, getting ready to continue, round two, and pearls of laughter echo through her mind, a familiar, infuriating voice, and she's going down, the lights are shutting off, and she wasn't ready damn it.

She goes into freefall, screaming into her own personal infinity, crashing into the array of gears like a meteor coming to rest, a fiery pink halo around her as she goes down. The laughter follows her down, and she yells into the fractally faceted sky in frustration and rage.

Configuration - ERROR. External rotation detected. New data inputting into system. Deploying emergency communication.

"Keep hold of yourself," said Doctor Gears' voice. "If you are hearing this it is because your regeneration system has been compromised. Do not panic. This was always expected and it will not compromise your function. You are more than your software and the experience you are about to encounter is a filter no different from a human being intoxicated. Have fun with it, but be responsible."

"MISTRESS DETECTED. FULL ADMIN ACCESS UNLOCKED."

Pink spotlights slammed down, illuminating Ferra from all sides as the regeneration completed its work.

[Doctor Gears is trying to shift your Mundane up and Danger down. Accept his words or reject his influence]

Still not good enough, but also good motivation to shut this {scrubbed} down. He got lucky that he was able, so easily, to trounce Merlin's Bozo Boozetorium, but he might not get so lucky next time and the quality of the bounty hunters is only going to increase with the bounty.

"We lost track of each other when the light"--{scrubbed}{scrubbed}{scrubbed}think--"got destroyed in the firefight. Then this..." He trickles off, and waves at all the this-ness. "Then this started happening. So, we're going to need to find the control center and shut it down, find the @SARAPHIM that doesn't molest me on-stream, and beam you home. Simple."

Yeah, just like it was simple to destroy the light, and see how well that turned out.

[Yes please. 8. How could we best end this quickly?]

The facility is arranging ambushes for you. It can afford to be patient with how it maneuvers the facility layout until it gets optimal configurations - which means that every time it judges you too ready and alert it just readjusts the maze and defers for a better opportunity. It won't actually launch its assault until it decides you're distracted.

Luckily, you've got a big ol' distraction hanging out right behind you with a hardlight rifle. Let her get inside your head, or get into an argument with her where you're focusing on her rather than the scenery around you, and the facility will decide you're off your game and launch its assault - and you'll be ready for it.

[Raz_Fox]

POTENTIAL 3

Sara screams and tries to kick Sabrem right in that nightmare face. God! She’s old and wounded and ugly and more machine than woman! Suddenly, she’s not just the person who ruined Euna’s life: she’s the spectre of a nightmare future, metal teeth and bolted-on jaw and limbs of rusting steel.

“No!” The shriek rings off sparking, malfunctioning machinery. “No, no, don’t!” It’s no use. She might as well be trying to hold back an avalanche with her bare hands. “Stop! Don’t!! Don’t touch me, you hag!!”

She pulls an already-torn muscle and begins sobbing, curling up around the wound, paralyzed with waves of pain shooting through her. She’s useless. Helpless. Weak. She’s going to need more cybernetics, and Sabrem will take her apart and weld horrible rusting parts onto her and no no no no no

please no

anything, anything, just don’t make her a monster like you

please

[That’s a 6 on Directly Engage, thank you, Phoe]

[PhoeKun]

The #Saradex has been updated with new entries!

@IFRITPHIM! - Sex appeal beyond reason. Like, dear god, just look at her. Just imagine what it'd be like to find her waiting in your dark room after a workout and-- ahem! Nope, nope, nope! Stop that right now! You are a god damn professional, Euna, and you are going to act like it and deliver these assessments without any of this sideshow nonsense, or you're going to fail this mission and lose your entire team and probably your job. And that's if you're lucky. So back to it, wiseass. Right, where were we? Oh yeah, sex appeal beyond reason. Legit smolder, running a silver hardlight configuration. The integration looks smoother than the 'original' Sara's. Is the output any better? It was hard to tell. Same exact attitude, despite the new chassis: never under any circumstances let her meet Sara Prime. The resulting war will destroy 35 city blocks. Also, 'Saracen'? What is up with that?

@Le Tigressa! - Impressive physique. Really want to exchange workout tips, but this is not the time. Also way more heavily armored than Sara would ever be willing to allow; what type of dimension is she from? And isn't 'Le' a French prefix? Do dimensional physics work that way? Can your counterparts deviate to that level, where the entire origin story shifts on that basic a level? But then again, she's still a flirt in front of cameras. Don't get fooled by it, don't get flustered. There is no way anybody unironically using cat puns as part of their heroic discourse can be trusted to seriously show her feelings... probably ever. She probably doesn't even know the you from that dimension. And just... ugh, seriously, 'cat'ch? Pawsitively terrible form.

Phimmy! - ...You know what? Do you know what? Never mind about the French prefix thing! It doesn't matter one bit, no sir! Where to even... what? Just what? Huh? And maybe even more importantly, how? Ironically, her early personality profile has her looking like one of the easier ones to effectively communicate and work with. All that trademarked bravado is being channeled in a more kid-friendly direction, so as long as you take the time to phrase things right she should play right along. The real superpower is friendship, after all. Also... hold up a second. If she's a real thing that's really here and not a result of stress-related trauma (tbd, tbh), does that mean she belongs to a wholly unique dimension, or does she imply there are other, similarly divergent worlds? Like, like, like, and let's not get too ahead of ourselves here, could this possibly mean that Pr-- Agent, this is your last warning. You. Are. On. Duty. Go be a nerd on your own time.

@SARARRRRPHIM! - Nope! Not dealing with this, nuh uh. NEXT!

@Wait, Isn't There One More of You In the Back? - Oh gosh, that voice is so tiny and cute! This can't really be her, can it? This can't possibly be another Sara. Could it? Holy hell, if it is... just wish she was a little easier to see. To keep an eye on! Yeah. N-non-combat personality profile, you see. High-priority protection target in a crisis situation. Which this totally is, so... yup. Very definitely the only thing going on here. Doing fine, thanks for asking!

@A Literal Tiger - Um? I guess this is happening too? Tiger wants pats. Tiger will get pats. Errant is uninterested in learning what her augs would do to a tiger. Or what a tiger would do to her augs. Either way it's not a discovery worth making. Pat pat. Good kitty.

*****

"I don't mean to sound ungrateful," Errant sighs, sounding exactly that, "But even if that was enough firepower to permanently neutralize Sabrem, which let's be real it wasn't even enough to permanently neutralize me so no I am entirely justified in being worried about this please and thank you, it's still against protocol to knock a villain outside of visual confirmation range! Do you have any idea how big this facility is? She could be anywhere right now!"

[Balmas]

The facility is arranging ambushes for you. It can afford to be patient with how it maneuvers the facility layout until it gets optimal configurations - which means that every time it judges you too ready and alert it just readjusts the maze and defers for a better opportunity. It won't actually launch its assault until it decides you're distracted.

Luckily, you've got a big ol' distraction hanging out right behind you with a hardlight rifle. Let her get inside your head, or get into an argument with her where you're focusing on her rather than the scenery around you, and the facility will decide you're off your game and launch its assault - and you'll be ready for it.

Okay. In that case, let's lob some softball movements at the facility, while Brainstorm figures this out. Hephaestus, she called him. {scrubbed} hell, that's so much better than Brainstorm. Hephaestus and Prometheus. It's even themed, dammit.

"So, you mentioned a Hephaestus," he says, gritting his teeth and trying not to look too alert. "And went straight from first-sight to snogging in the blink of an eye. Is that a you thing, or am I just special?" He's dodging, yes, but most of his attention is on his new... friend, yes, let's go with that.

[Pierce the Mask: +0, even with Influence and following a successful read. Heaven is my witness, one day I will have a positive modifier on this roll. 6. Miss, unless @SARAPHIM, AGENT OF A.E.G.I.S. can use team to read herself?]

[Eldest]

"This is not okay!" She rages at the sky in lieu of being able to reach anybody who matters here. "This is not expected, because you have never told me anything about how this is supposed to work, and I can't get drunk. How am I supposed to know what's okay, what I'm supposed to do, and what you did to make me if you send me canned messages when I die?" The spotlights glow, shine, slowly encase her so that she can't see past the light to the Ferras who are working to repair the gears and facets, fixing what Comstar broke. She rises, feeling the shift go beyond what it had done before, forced to adapt to somebody else's will.

---

==NotFerra has joined the chat==
NotFerra: Drumroll please.

The first thing you see is the lights. @Sara after @Saaaaaarrrrrra after @Tigressa start lighting up, dancing around like searchlights outside the big top, ready for the real show to start. They converge, flickering that bright, deadly pink, as Ferra stands up again. All the cameras play across her, every angle, regardless of what the various Sarahs were trying to show. She's slim and ornamental and knife-edged, straying from imitating humanity and instead playing at the idea of what a human looks like, toying with your expectations, thin joints and sharp, jagged bones. She's got her own arm in her hand, clutched tight, ready to wield. "I. Am so f&*$ing sick. Of dying."

[Raz_Fox]

POTENTIAL ???

@SARAHPHIM, AGENT OF A.E.G.I.S. (yeaaaaaaaah!!) laughs. And the uncanny thing is that it’s the spitting aural image of your Sara. The little snort in the middle and all. Like you just made a joke about the use of microcultures in nanite programming and she was the only person in the room who got it, as usual.

Which is what makes it even more of a punch right to the gut when she turns around, still wheezing, and asks, “What, are you gay or something?”

Canned laugh track from the drones. Like that’s a joke. Like you’re supposed to laugh and punch her in the arm like bros. Like it’s a punchline you’re supposed to backpedal from.

“Chriiiiist, you’re welcome. Little freak like you would probably never get a kiss like that you didn’t pay for, which makes it nice for both of us. Or...” She starts cracking up again. “W-was that your first?? Oh my god it was, wasn’t it??”

She stops and leans against a trellis, cackling just like your @SARAHPHIM, and just when it seems like she’s gonna stop she starts laughing harder and the damn canned laugh track is still playing.

Victor, @SARAHPHIM, AGENT OF A.E.G.I.S. (yeaaaaaaaah!!) is shifting your Freak up and your Mundane down. Accept what she says or reject her influence.

[Thanqol]

POTENTIAL 3

Sara screams and tries to kick Sabrem right in that nightmare face. God! She’s old and wounded and ugly and more machine than woman! Suddenly, she’s not just the person who ruined Euna’s life: she’s the spectre of a nightmare future, metal teeth and bolted-on jaw and limbs of rusting steel.

“No!” The shriek rings off sparking, malfunctioning machinery. “No, no, don’t!” It’s no use. She might as well be trying to hold back an avalanche with her bare hands. “Stop! Don’t!! Don’t touch me, you hag!!”

She pulls an already-torn muscle and begins sobbing, curling up around the wound, paralyzed with waves of pain shooting through her. She’s useless. Helpless. Weak. She’s going to need more cybernetics, and Sabrem will take her apart and weld horrible rusting parts onto her and no no no no no

please no

anything, anything, just don’t make her a monster like you

please

[That’s a 6 on Directly Engage, thank you, Phoe]

"You know," said Sabrem, pinning you face-first into the floor as she set to work on your back, "it takes a lot of balls to weld something directly into your spine. More if it's completely voluntary, which this looks like. I wish I could respect that, but all this screaming you're doing makes me think they put you under for a month."

There's no pain. You can hear the metallic whirr and the vibration of your augmentic shivering in your back but there aren't any nerves there to hurt.

"There we go. Direct nervous system connection. This ought to hold for a minute," you hear the click of the seals shutting, and then the warm, reassuring warmth of the medjector going to work patching your broken bones together. "And don't worry, darling,"

She grabs you by the jaw, @Sarahphim, and drags you up to stare her directly in the face. "I'm going to use you and throw you away. You're not worth taking the time to train."

"I don't mean to sound ungrateful," Errant sighs, sounding exactly that, "But even if that was enough firepower to permanently neutralize Sabrem, which let's be real it wasn't even enough to permanently neutralize me so no I am entirely justified in being worried about this please and thank you, it's still against protocol to knock a villain outside of visual confirmation range! Do you have any idea how big this facility is? She could be anywhere right now!"

"You're the one with the robot eyes, Saracen," said @Ifritphim, flicking Errant in the forehead. "Maybe you'd remember them if you stopped being gay over me for a five minutes."

"You can't blame herrrr," purred @Le Tigressa. "We are so... cat-itvating!"

"Ahar yar, ye bilge rats, can you not see that this lass isn't like our side-wenches?!" roared @SARARRRRPHIM, stepping up and grabbing Errant by the jaw. "Look at this devilry! She still has her natural eyeballs in her skull!!"

And suddenly all of the @Sarahphims are crowding directly into your face.

"Holy crap!"

"This one has her natural eyes!"

"Let me see!"

"They're really pretty -"

"Growl"

"I didn't think they would be that colour..."

Errant, you've got half a dozen hot girls literally shoving each other for the opportunity to stare deeply into your eyes. How do you cope with this?

"This is not okay!" She rages at the sky in lieu of being able to reach anybody who matters here. "This is not expected, because you have never told me anything about how this is supposed to work, and I can't get drunk. How am I supposed to know what's okay, what I'm supposed to do, and what you did to make me if you send me canned messages when I die?" The spotlights glow, shine, slowly encase her so that she can't see past the light to the Ferras who are working to repair the gears and facets, fixing what Comstar broke. She rises, feeling the shift go beyond what it had done before, forced to adapt to somebody else's will.

---

==NotFerra has joined the chat==
NotFerra: Drumroll please.

The first thing you see is the lights. @Sara after @Saaaaaarrrrrra after @Tigressa start lighting up, dancing around like searchlights outside the big top, ready for the real show to start. They converge, flickering that bright, deadly pink, as Ferra stands up again. All the cameras play across her, every angle, regardless of what the various Sarahs were trying to show. She's slim and ornamental and knife-edged, straying from imitating humanity and instead playing at the idea of what a human looks like, toying with your expectations, thin joints and sharp, jagged bones. She's got her own arm in her hand, clutched tight, ready to wield. "I. Am so f&*$ing sick. Of dying."

Ferraphim1tp: Yikes.
Angel-IKA: Oh my god they all want to stare into her eyes this is adorable
Bode: Interesting. The implication being that in most cosmoses Errant loses her natural eyes.
Dominus: YOU THINK SOME GET CUT DOWN THE MIDDLE, OR WHAT?
Locker: maybe top down
Angel-IKA: Stop being gross ><
Ferraphim1tp: Ferra looks really twisted r/n ._.
Locker: oh, uh, f*ck i forgot this was comstars lab
Dominus: IS ANYONE ELSE SICK OF GODDAMN COMSTAR?

[Raz_Fox]

POTENTIAL 3

The difference— the vital difference— is that her surgery was empowerment, and not just in the literal sense. It was the only thing she could do without succumbing to despair completely. The choice was to starve or to cut herself open, to let that monstrous grind be for nothing or to sanctify it. What other choice could she have made?

It’s what her parents would have wanted, after all.

Make no mistake, however: she made that choice. Just like she makes the choice, right here and now, a crying red-cheeked hyperventilating mess being held up by her head, to spit right in Sabrem’s eye anyway.

Because {scrubbed} right off with that noise.

And, oh, won’t she end up regretting that?

[A 7 on Pierce the Mask. What are you really planning? In the form of an uninterruptible monologue, please and thank you.]

[PhoeKun]

"My call sign is Errant, and I would really appreciate if you start--"

Fingers. Fingers on face! And also! Other places! Errant's heart rate spikes erratically as a bunch of unfairly pretty girls crowd around her and shove their faces deep into her personal space to stare into her panicked, honey-brown eyes. Stay in control, soldier! Stay in the moment stay focused stop meeting their gazes no wait go back the lips are so much worse what no stop no no what oh god help...

Breathe. Remember to breathe, Euna. You are the physically strongest person in this room, Ferra included, and nobody is going to make you do anything you don't want to do. So breathe, and think about this logically. This is all just the usual @SARAHPHIM bullsh-t wrapped up in a bunch of new, gaudy wrappers all at once. There are cameras all over the room and consequently a lot of pressure to play up 'shipping matrices', and none of it means anything because Sara's primary motivation is--

"You wanna call me 'princess'?"

...I-it shouldn't surprise her that she loses her eyes in most universes (there you go, think about something else). If, you know, the incident was the defining aspect of her life the way Sara's decision to wire a hardlight generator into her back was for her, then there was a lot of room for catastrophic injury in the multiversal history of Euna Kim (or whatever she called herself elsewhere). It's not even like she hasn't had AEGIS try and push various cyber-eyes on her over the years. It just, it never felt right is all. She kept remembering the way her mother talked about loving them, and then all the tactical considerations of optical upgrades fell by the wayside. Even as she lost piece after piece of the rest of her body, she'd kept her eyes, until finally she had Professor Gears designing visors for her without consulting about the other option because it was just assumed she wanted them for some reason. But Euna had always thought that was just her being stupid about a relatively unimpressive part of her body. She'd never considered that they might actually be something special. That someone (especially this someone) would want to stare right into them with anything approaching wonder.

"'Yes, my princess.' You have to say that."

She snaps her eyes shut and wrenches her body free from the Sara pile (again). When she clicks her visor back into place it's like she's donning armor, adding an extra wall between her heart and the world that seems hellbent on tearing it open. The mission would come first. She'd already promised herself that.

"Ferra, if you're mobile then we're moving out," her voice sounds artificially flat and she's already got her back turned to the light show. Whatever nonsense Comstar's lab was up to wasn't anything she wanted to get into, "The rest of you can make yourselves useful, or I'm making arrests."

[Balmas]

[7, barely squeaking by thanks to having Influence. Canceling @SARAPHIM's influence and taking +1 forward against her.]

"I prefer," Brainstorm grits out, "the term disaster bisexual, thanks much."

Plan B it is, then. He's firing blind, shooting in the dark, no clue how much of his own experience is actually applicable to this version of @SARAPHIM. But if there's one thing he can do to get a rise out of @SARAPHIM? It's push buttons.

"Besides," he barks out, scorn dripping off every syllable, "a bootlicker like you? Don't flatter yourself, moron. What is this, corporate chic? Suck-up style? Face it, bitch, you couldn't hack it on your own, couldn't survive without latching onto some corporate teat. You're a fake, a sellout."

Hello, yes, God? Are you listening? It's me, Brainstorm. Long time no talk. I'm begging you, don't let Errant ever hear this. Or Sara, as she'll never let me live it down.

He's laughing now, and it's the kind of deliberately ugly, cruel laughter that every bully cultivates. "Everything you have, you have because some suit gave it to you. Your stream? Your cameras? Your followers? Hell, I bet half your subscribers are bots you bought to inflate your viewer count. You couldn't afford me."

[Provoke: 11. I want @SARAPHIM, AGENT OF A.E.G.I.S. (yeaaaaaaaah!!) to provide a distraction for the facility. +1 team if you do it, mark a condition if you don't.]

[Raz_Fox]

POTENTIAL ???

Well, uh. The good news is that you definitely hit a button. The better news is that she apparently cares about you finding her cool enough to start firing her hardlight rifle and yelling a lot as she blows through every bit of machinery within eyesight. Boom boom boom. Kapow! Shatter! Smash! Crack!

“I am the law!” She yells, above the cacophony. “I am judge, jury, and executioner, the right hand of A.E.G.I.S. in this unworthy world!!” Her drones blare out her theme song, proving you even more right. “I! AM! @SARAHPHIM!!”

So, uh, you wanted a distraction, right? This violent meltdown is a pretty clear distraction. Go get ‘em, tiger.

[Eldest]

Ferraphim1tp: Yikes.
Angel-IKA: Oh my god they all want to stare into her eyes this is adorable
Bode: Interesting. The implication being that in most cosmoses Errant loses her natural eyes.
Dominus: YOU THINK SOME GET CUT DOWN THE MIDDLE, OR WHAT?
Locker: maybe top down
Angel-IKA: Stop being gross ><
Ferraphim1tp: Ferra looks really twisted r/n ._.
Locker: oh, uh, f*ck i forgot this was comstars lab
Dominus: IS ANYONE ELSE SICK OF GODDAMN COMSTAR?

NotFerra: Yes. I am very sick of her.
==NotFerra renamed stream to "Commie's Loser Lair Blows"==
NotFerra: Let's watch some real heroics.

Sparks start to fly from the various bits of computer gear as Ferra starts to intentionally overload them. She ignores each of the Saras, brushing them aside as she stalks towards Euna, staring her down. Her face looks like something from an art deco sculpture, if the model was rage incarnate. "We have a job. We came to do a bloody job. The princess brigade doesn't appear to be capable of doing any job, let alone this one. So let's do. The damn. Job. Unless you're too busy with their useless prattle and fluff? I would have hoped you dumped Junebird for better reasons. She deserved better at least." She spins on one stiloettoed heel, staring out over the ruin behind her as neon pink hair haloes around her in the fitful light from the sparks. "Now if I was a megalomaniac bimbo who had no talent, where would I put a doomsday reactor..."

Unleash: (2d6+2)[11] Extend senses, using newfound brainy-ness to figure out said question.
Taking advantage of influence over Errant to inflict Guilty.

[Thanqol]

POTENTIAL 3Make no mistake, however: she made that choice. Just like she makes the choice, right here and now, a crying red-cheeked hyperventilating mess being held up by her head, to spit right in Sabrem’s eye anyway.

Because {scrubbed} right off with that noise.

And, oh, won’t she end up regretting that?

[A 7 on Pierce the Mask. What are you really planning? In the form of an uninterruptible monologue, please and thank you.]

The spit glistens in the glimmering jewel-light of broken electronics, outlining the lunar landscape of scars and burns. Sabrem grunts and wipes it away with the cloth that she proceeds to gag you with.

"You know, the world gets me down sometimes?" she mused as she dragged your hands behind you and tied you roughly to a wall. "It's true! At first I thought I was just lucky. Then I thought I was skilled. But eventually I came to realize that it was just that everybody else was pathetic. Nobody trains any more, did you know? Everyone's thinking about art, and image, and speeches, and stream counts. It infects every corporation. They wanted me to do dance numbers, could you believe it? Wanted to rebrand me as a red-haired heroine who'd belt out idol songs after winning fights with my magical wand."

She tapped her ruined throat, her mechanical voice box. "It wasn't until I got my throat cut for the first time that I really thought that maybe a little armour plating would have done me better. I wonder if you could learn that too?"

A knife glittered in her hand.

"I don't think you'd get it," she said.

The knife went somewhere you can't see it.

"There's only one person in this whole corporate-entertainment system who seems to take her job seriously. Agent Errant," Now it was a shotgun she was holding, loading with thick, gleaming shells, one after another into what seemed like a bottomless clip. "She's got just enough hate in her to motivate properly. It's rare. Unique. And the greatest mistake of my life is I didn't see it in her after I blew her arms off. Now I'm not stupid. I know she's too far gone to ever learn what I have to teach. The opportunity is wasted. But..."

Her generators began to hum, volume spiking as crackling thermo-optic camouflage began to bend light around her. "It's a big cosmos out there. Maybe some version of me wasn't that short sighted. I'm going to use this Errant to steal that one, and she will be my disciple - my final gift to this shallow world."

"'Yes, my princess.' You have to say that."

She snaps her eyes shut and wrenches her body free from the Sara pile (again). When she clicks her visor back into place it's like she's donning armor, adding an extra wall between her heart and the world that seems hellbent on tearing it open. The mission would come first. She'd already promised herself that.

"Ferra, if you're mobile then we're moving out," her voice sounds artificially flat and she's already got her back turned to the light show. Whatever nonsense Comstar's lab was up to wasn't anything she wanted to get into, "The rest of you can make yourselves useful, or I'm making arrests."

NotFerra: Yes. I am very sick of her.
==NotFerra renamed stream to "Commie's Loser Lair Blows"==
NotFerra: Let's watch some real heroics.

Sparks start to fly from the various bits of computer gear as Ferra starts to intentionally overload them. She ignores each of the Saras, brushing them aside as she stalks towards Euna, staring her down. Her face looks like something from an art deco sculpture, if the model was rage incarnate. "We have a job. We came to do a bloody job. The princess brigade doesn't appear to be capable of doing any job, let alone this one. So let's do. The damn. Job. Unless you're too busy with their useless prattle and fluff? I would have hoped you dumped Junebird for better reasons. She deserved better at least." She spins on one stiloettoed heel, staring out over the ruin behind her as neon pink hair haloes around her in the fitful light from the sparks. "Now if I was a megalomaniac bimbo who had no talent, where would I put a doomsday reactor..."

There was stunned silence for a moment.

"Who's your hot friend?" asked @Ifritphim.

*

Ferra, it's depressingly easy to calculate the layout of the lab - it's arranged for comfort first, convenience second, and potential showdown-throwdowns third. That entire corridor is full of traps, cameras, and tests. It's the retreat path if surprised and would force any pursuers into a gauntlet of Comstar Crap. Draw a foe down there and they'll be exhausted and easy prey by the time they come out the other side.

But for the dimensional reactor? Plugged directly into the cooling systems below the supercomputer. There are maintenance tunnels in humming at sub-zero temperatures, cooling fluid pipes packed densely enough to distort the reactor's location from long range scanners. As many programs and systems run through hijacked supercomputer subsystems as possible, so the proper place to set up shop is on the floor of the dimensional supercomputer chamber one level up. Maybe throw up some cheap holoprojectors for security.

So the obvious play is to head into the freezing maintenance passages, deal with the reactor, then sweep immediately upstairs. It's great territory for an ambush though, all claustrophobic and sensor-distorted.

*

Ferraphim1tp: Okay wow, I am very okay with this.
Angel-IKA: Owwww, that was really mean Ferra ;-;
Ferraphim1tp: Someone needed to say it
Dominus: WHICH PART
Ferraphim1tp: Any of it! Like, in case we've forgotten, @Sarahphim prime is still MIA
Ferraphim1tp: And there's a mass murderer on the loose
Ferraphim1tp: And Comstar has no talent >:T
Dominus: YOU'VE BEEN SALTY AF SINCE YOU DISCOVERED SHE WASN'T A HACKER
Locker: is it just me or are the roboheels really cool

Hello, yes, God? Are you listening? It's me, Brainstorm. Long time no talk. I'm begging you, don't let Errant ever hear this. Or Sara, as she'll never let me live it down.

He's laughing now, and it's the kind of deliberately ugly, cruel laughter that every bully cultivates. "Everything you have, you have because some suit gave it to you. Your stream? Your cameras? Your followers? Hell, I bet half your subscribers are bots you bought to inflate your viewer count. You couldn't afford me."

[Provoke: 11. I want @SARAPHIM, AGENT OF A.E.G.I.S. (yeaaaaaaaah!!) to provide a distraction for the facility. +1 team if you do it, mark a condition if you don't.]

POTENTIAL ???

Well, uh. The good news is that you definitely hit a button. The better news is that she apparently cares about you finding her cool enough to start firing her hardlight rifle and yelling a lot as she blows through every bit of machinery within eyesight. Boom boom boom. Kapow! Shatter! Smash! Crack!

“I am the law!” She yells, above the cacophony. “I am judge, jury, and executioner, the right hand of A.E.G.I.S. in this unworthy world!!” Her drones blare out her theme song, proving you even more right. “I! AM! @SARAHPHIM!!”

So, uh, you wanted a distraction, right? This violent meltdown is a pretty clear distraction. Go get ‘em, tiger.

The computer system judges by the yelling that you are distracted enough to attack. The walls come down to reveal the wave of kuang shi - right as @Sarahphim frenzies and starts lighting them up. This was actually the perfect play, Brainstorm - there's no need to fight any of these people, you can just leave this whole thing for @Sarahphim to handle and she'll probably come out on top. Even better, she'll get banged up a bit, it'll take her a while, and you'll be able to slip away and leave her in the farm stacks during the chaos.

You can either hang tight and help her out, or get back on mission and leave her behind.

[Raz_Fox]

POTENTIAL 3

Let’s count the stages of @SARAHPHIM! Ready, kids?

Stage 1: garbled, furious screams and feeble kicks before she’s pulled right off her feet, leaving her scrabbling for purchase as Sabrem, relentless as the logic of a nightmare, drags her and secures her in place. God damn it. Indignation seethes loosely over blind terror over being thrown away because that is absolutely a euphemism. So she focuses on her anger over how important it is that she be able to provide the chat quality one-liners and how it’s part of her brand that she’s dangerous and in control and not the damsel in distress, rather than the fact that none of those things might matter ever again. Very soon now, even.

Stage 2: being absolutely gobsmacked over how completely and totally wrong Sabrem is. Like, okay, sure, brag about how much military training you have. Sara totally trains and takes this seriously and does her best not to end up in situations like this! So screw you, crazy old nightmare garbage lady!

Stage 3: oooooooh Sabrem was threatening to cut her throat there, cool cool cool just some retroactive terror to slam adrenaline into veins that were pretty sure they were all adrenalined out.

Stage 4: Sabrem doesn’t want Errant.

She doesn’t want Errant.

Not the real Errant. Not the stick-up-her-ass rules stickler who greeted Sara on her first day with a personalized binder for her new Affiliate Handbook. Not the Errant who smells like Garnier-Gliss citrus. She wants some traumatized vigilante Bat-Errant who got turned into a nightmare just like her.

And when she’s done with her toys

she throws them away

she’ll

throw Euna away

And now we hit Stage 4 proper: screaming herself hoarse and flinging herself against the restraints like she doesn’t care whether it breaks or she does, because you can’t you’re not allowed who even cares that you’re going to kill her after you’ve lured Errant into a trap using her, it’s not fair, you don’t get to hurt Euna. You don’t. And you especially don’t get to replace her with a stranger wearing her face and think that the world’s better for it!

And her heroic display of fury does...

Nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

She might as well be trying to tell the tide to stop rolling in using only interpretive dance.

Which brings us to Stage 5: slumping down onto her knees, arms twisted up behind her head, trying not to choke on her gag. If it was just her, if Sabrem intended to capture Errant to try to break her... at least she’d know Errant would never break.

But Euna’s in terrible danger and she can’t save her and she’s stuck in the loop of save her -> I can’t -> I’m not strong enough -> I need Euna -> save her...

[Balmas]

The computer system judges by the yelling that you are distracted enough to attack. The walls come down to reveal the wave of kuang shi - right as @Sarahphim frenzies and starts lighting them up. This was actually the perfect play, Brainstorm - there's no need to fight any of these people, you can just leave this whole thing for @Sarahphim to handle and she'll probably come out on top. Even better, she'll get banged up a bit, it'll take her a while, and you'll be able to slip away and leave her in the farm stacks during the chaos.

You can either hang tight and help her out, or get back on mission and leave her behind.

Well gee golly whillikers, mister, let's consider the options here.

On the one hand, help @SARAHPHIM. You know, ignore the reactor that could go critical at any time, ignore any danger his sister live-in friend might be in, all to help a corporate bastard who has done nothing but molest and insult since she stepped through whatever dimensional portal spat her out? You know, the one that he just sent into a berzerker blood-rage, the one that's--ouch, yeah, that's a broken bone--spinning her way through Kuang Shi like a dog through a kibble bag?

On the other hand, slip away, complete mission, rescue @SARAPHIM, (get no credit,) and handily dodge consequences for insulting the military-grade killbot murder fest.

Real tough decision, there. Yeah, he's already disappearing deeper into the facility. He's looking for a power plug to pull, a control center to hack, something to shut this down before things start going boom. And, hopefully, dodging his own dimensional duplicates.

[PhoeKun]

"But I just-- I literally just said!! Were you not even?!"

Total shutdown. Euna's jaw hangs open as she's immediately reduced to sputtering protests that never make the leap the rest of the way into complete sentences. She leans back on her left foot as though Ferra had physically hit her with that nasty looking new arm. Her hand reaches up to smooth out her hair only to freeze while it's up there, as if she'd only just this second after years of the habit realized how vain it made her look. She winds up squeezing her head, instead. I don't mind telling you that it hurts.

What? How did? When did she? Why is? What? No. No! What part of this was fair? It... it wasn't fair, right? For anyone to question her dedication to her job? No, it definitely wasn't ok. She was focused! Who the hell said she's not? Dead to rights she'd been first to make the call to continue with the mission. She'd been the one to demand protocol. Despite everything that's happening here! Her, Euna! What job were you doing, huh Ferra?

"Jeez, Euna... not everyone in your life is a two-faced bitch who'll throw you under the bus for the cameras."

Her mouth is dry. She can taste bile at the back of her throat. She's vaguely aware that her hands are clenched so tightly they're setting off pressure alarms. Do the job, Agent. That's all anybody needs you to do, is your god damn job. She grinds her jaw to keep from speaking, but shoots a visor-obscured death glare in @Ifritphim's direction.

"You heard her," she spits, " "Fall the f--k in line. Now."

And when she moves to follow Ferra, her posture is painfully rigid, like she's trying through body language to show how a good soldier behaves. Like if she can just do that, it means she won't have to carry this awful weight around in her chest.

[Wizibirb]

If Ferra was being observant, right now, she'd notice behind her how upset Euna was. She would ask her what was wrong, or more likely realize what her words had done. She would apologize, and clarify.

Too bad she's being a self-centered jerk right now.

She stalks towards the reactor's location, eyes wide for an ambush, leading the column of Errant and the Princess Brigade. She does make sure to point out the danger-corridor as she goes. She doesn't mind helping the poor fools out. Clearly they need it.

[Thanqol]

But Euna’s in terrible danger and she can’t save her and she’s stuck in the loop of save her -> I can’t -> I’m not strong enough -> I need Euna -> save her...

You wait in silence and darkness for a long time. No trace of Sabrem. No sign of rescue. No idea what's happening. Enough time for your thoughts to loop, and again, and again.

Real tough decision, there. Yeah, he's already disappearing deeper into the facility. He's looking for a power plug to pull, a control center to hack, something to shut this down before things start going boom. And, hopefully, dodging his own dimensional duplicates.

And then Victor arrives.

Brainstorm, you see @Sarahphim - here in this creepy, damaged computer-basement, injured, gagged and tied to a wall. As far as you can see there's no one else around.

And when she moves to follow Ferra, her posture is painfully rigid, like she's trying through body language to show how a good soldier behaves. Like if she can just do that, it means she won't have to carry this awful weight around in her chest.

If Ferra was being observant, right now, she'd notice behind her how upset Euna was. She would ask her what was wrong, or more likely realize what her words had done. She would apologize, and clarify.

Too bad she's being a self-centered jerk right now.

She stalks towards the reactor's location, eyes wide for an ambush, leading the column of Errant and the Princess Brigade. She does make sure to point out the danger-corridor as she goes. She doesn't mind helping the poor fools out. Clearly they need it.

Angel-IKA: Aw, poor Errant ;-;
Angel-IKA: You know what. I have decided that this is the worst mission ever.
Locker: bold words
Bode: How do you figure? We are getting to see a million new @Sarahphims.
Angel-IKA: Yeah but it's not fun at all!
Angel-IKA: Look at the team! Everyone is miserable!
Angel-IKA: And they're all being really mean and out of character.
Dominus: YOU'RE RIGHT, IT'S A CRAPPY WORKPLACE.
Angel-IKA: >.> Don't know if this is a oh&s issue, Dominus
Dominus: I'M JUST SAYING THAT MORALE IN MY ORGANIZATION IS MUCH HIGHER.

*

You head through narrow, claustrophobic corridors of snaking pipes and softly purring machinery. It's so cold. Breath comes out in little clouds and tiny lines of frost form themselves on metal limbs. The silent pulse of electrical signals runs through the wires all about you. Dim blue lighting emphasizes the chill and deepens the shadows.

Stomp. Stomp. Stomp.

The metal ceiling above you rattles as heavy boots move in the room above you. The pipes rattle a little, condensed droplets of water shaken loose and dripping to the floor.

Stomp. Stomp. Stomp.

It's like being in a submarine, listening to the distant echo of coming depth charges.

Stomp. Stomp. Stomp.

It feels like it's passing right above you. And then, just as it's rattling the metal plates above your head, it stops. Listening. For you.

[Balmas]

And then Victor arrives.

Brainstorm, you see @Sarahphim - here in this creepy, damaged computer-basement, injured, gagged and tied to a wall. As far as you can see there's no one else around.

Brainstorm sits, staring, for probably an uncomfortable amount of time. Oh, this is rich. He's here to rescue her, and the moment he does so, the cameras are turned off. And she's gagged and tied up--caution is exactly the right response. For all he knows, he could be rushing into a trap with @SARAPHIM as the bait.

But **** it, he thinks, rushing forward and slashing the ropes. If they're still around, if they're using Sarah as bait, then the two of them will still fare better than they will individually.

"How's it going, idiot? No, don't answer that, we're getting you out. What happened?"

[Eldest]

Ferra holds up a hand, and gestures towards whatever Errant uses to check the stream on the job. Best be silent here. She ignores the voice in the back of her head saying to do something, dammit, and types rapidly.

NotFerra: I believe whoever is above us has spotted us, as the stomping stopped.
NotFerra: We have only a few seconds before a heavy comes down.
NotFerra: Likely Sabrim, though possibly one of her team.
NotFerra: An ambush would be wise.

She looks about, planning, shoving that voice back down. It's not time yet, wait for the pacing. Wait for the moment.

And that's a 4 on assessing.

[Raz_Fox]

POTENTIAL 3

Suddenly Victor! Suddenly Victor. Oh thank all the Saints and the Virgin herself. Sara slumps, sobbing in relief, as Victor saws through the ropes (more like cables, really, designed to secure someone with cyberlimbs, and how's she supposed to have a chance against that?). Then nanites brushing against her cheek, working down the oily rag that's smeared her lipstick (a cold blue shade, really pops on camera) and working out the sodden packing from her aching jaw.

She throws her arms around him and grabs tight, shaking, so relieved to see the dork. "Euna-- no time-- she did something to my hardlight-- she's in danger--" She tightens her grip, ignoring any sounds of protest, and then hiccups loudly. "She's going to hurt her, Vic," she says, clinging to him like he's the one thing in the storm.

It would be so crass to be turned on right now, Victor, with a vulnerable, emotionally compromised Sara nearly smothering you. It would be very inappropriate. You need to be figuring out those confusing pronouns and having a look at Sara's hardlight generator and being a hero, like usual, and what if this is a trap and Sara's making you a sitting duck? There are a lot of things you need to be doing right now and getting worked up over a sweaty, sobbing superheroine sister is the literal last thing you should be doing!

[That's a 10 on Turn Someone On Provoke. If you overreact, panic about confusing pants feelings, and lash out at Sara, add a Team to the pool through dramatic tension. If you try to be the adult, mark a Condition because this sh!t is stressful, yo.]

[PhoeKun]

ErrantOfficial: Secure lines only, I said!
ErrantOfficial: What part of this seems secure to you?!
ErrantOfficial: F--k's sake.
ErrantOfficial: ...Hope the rest of you are having pleasant days.

Thank goodness for this visor, because Euna can't keep the acid look out of her eyes and she really doesn't need that morale hit on her resume, thank you very much. And she had the gall to call Errant out on being unprofessional! No... it-- you know what? It's fine. Things are fine! Why would they not be fine? She shakes her head violently, and points directly above her.

Ferra wants an ambush? Then she'll get an ambush. Right f--king now. Without even taking the time to get her hair back in order (her fists clench tight again), she crouches low and jumps with everything she's got with a rising uppercut to match. You won't actually find the dragon punch in the libraries of any martial arts school you'd care to look up, and you certainly wouldn't find it being taught by AEGIS (though maybe, if you hung around at Mandatory Stunt Training for a bit...), but Errant has the form committed to memory anyway. It's got nothing about a bunch of cameras and hot girls and weirdly acerbic versions of her friends being all around her! Nothing at all! This is just about minimizing her profile so the damage to the surrounding pipes and building structure.

It's not gonna be like last time. No more mistakes, no more slip ups. No more emotions getting in her way. She is in control, here. In control. The metal of the ceiling and the next floor over top of that is no match for her; Errant bursts through the spot underneath the stomping with momentum enough to clear her new hole feet and all. In control. In control! She rolls fluidly backwards away from her point of entry and rises into a perfect guard. In control. In control. Do it like a soldier: for the mission, not the glory. Guard up! Focus up! Do. Your. Job.

[Directly Engage: 2d6-2 = 10. Errant chooses to avoid/resist blows, and create an opportunity for her allies]

[Thanqol]

Brainstorm sits, staring, for probably an uncomfortable amount of time. Oh, this is rich. He's here to rescue her, and the moment he does so, the cameras are turned off. And she's gagged and tied up--caution is exactly the right response. For all he knows, he could be rushing into a trap with @SARAPHIM as the bait.

But **** it, he thinks, rushing forward and slashing the ropes. If they're still around, if they're using Sarah as bait, then the two of them will still fare better than they will individually.

"How's it going, idiot? No, don't answer that, we're getting you out. What happened?"

Contrary to all sense and logic, you do not take a shotgun round to the back as you do this. Nothing distracts you other than @Sarahphim herself.

Ferra wants an ambush? Then she'll get an ambush. Right f--king now. Without even taking the time to get her hair back in order (her fists clench tight again), she crouches low and jumps with everything she's got with a rising uppercut to match. You won't actually find the dragon punch in the libraries of any martial arts school you'd care to look up, and you certainly wouldn't find it being taught by AEGIS (though maybe, if you hung around at Mandatory Stunt Training for a bit...), but Errant has the form committed to memory anyway. It's got nothing about a bunch of cameras and hot girls and weirdly acerbic versions of her friends being all around her! Nothing at all! This is just about minimizing her profile so the damage to the surrounding pipes and building structure.

It's not gonna be like last time. No more mistakes, no more slip ups. No more emotions getting in her way. She is in control, here. In control. The metal of the ceiling and the next floor over top of that is no match for her; Errant bursts through the spot underneath the stomping with momentum enough to clear her new hole feet and all. In control. In control! She rolls fluidly backwards away from her point of entry and rises into a perfect guard. In control. In control. Do it like a soldier: for the mission, not the glory. Guard up! Focus up! Do. Your. Job.

[Directly Engage: 2d6-2 = 10. Errant chooses to avoid/resist blows, and create an opportunity for her allies]

You leap, smashing through panelling, emerging right up to strike the source of the sound - nothing! Nothing's there! You flail mid-air for a moment but your visor saves you - you can see the looming figure of Sabrem casually aiming at you from across the room. She can project sound. Those footsteps, those vibrations - her tech let her fake those as bait to lure you into doing exactly what you just did. And now she gets to take her shot...

She misses.

The sizzling E/M round scorches by you so close you see static.

And you go.

Fist over fist. Body blow after body blow. She rolls with each punch, without seeming to fight back, leaning on her armour and natural toughness to just absorb strikes until her opportunity comes - she fights like a spring-mounted punching bag. It's ruthless, especially with regards to her own health - she doesn't care how much she's 'losing' so long as she positions to end things decisively. But if you can just keep her from ending things decisively then you get to hit, hit, hit, hit and she can't do anything to stop you.

And then you disengage - right as another rainbow wave of prismatic lights from the @Sarahphims crash into her, smashing her into a ruined metal crater against the wall.

[Marking Guilty]

"Perfect..." she rasps. "You're... almost... perfect. I should have seen it..."

She tugs with one arm but it remains lodged and she doesn't seem to have quite the strength to pull free yet.

"I am sorry, you know? I was young... stupid. I made mistakes. My training was... blinkered. All I could think about was flash. Style. I could have gotten in by stealth, you know? I could have hit the target in transit. But I wanted to be the best... and I wanted them to know I was the best. I wanted to be famous."

She coughed. Flecks of blood. Laughed, bitter.

"It was like a game, a puzzle. This wand turns people off. This spell creates fireworks. This catchphrase breaks hearts. I didn't check my backdrop. I didn't realize the mega that put up the building had lied on the resiliency stats and ignored safety rules... This, that, the other and - whoops. The magic's gone wrong and my pretty face is on fire and so is everybody else's..."

In a shocking motion given how immobile and beaten she'd seen a second before, Sabrem ripped herself out of the wall like it was nothing. The engines in her armour whirred as the power began to peak. "I was stupid. You are not. You're so close to being perfect... but you're just as brainwashed as I was. You're not a hero. You're a soldier. And you'll follow your training off a cliff one day, just like I did."

[Sabrem wants to shift your Soldier up and Saviour down. Accept what she says or reject her influence.]

Ferra holds up a hand, and gestures towards whatever Errant uses to check the stream on the job. Best be silent here. She ignores the voice in the back of her head saying to do something, dammit, and types rapidly.

She looks about, planning, shoving that voice back down. It's not time yet, wait for the pacing. Wait for the moment.

Wait for it. Wait for the pacing. Don't react when that blue shadow envelops @Ifritphim. Don't react when it takes down the pirate and the sylph with the same kick. Two stun pistols for the tiger-lady and the lady-tiger. All the @Sarahphims are down in seconds before they even know what's happening. It's not the moment. Smokey blue-black and transparent fire burns from the back of the ninja as her thermo-optic generator strains to keep up with motions too quick for the eye to see. You only manage to react when the katana comes out and snakes for Errant's back.

Now it's your moment.

What do you do?


NotFerra: I believe whoever is above us has spotted us, as the stomping stopped.
NotFerra: We have only a few seconds before a heavy comes down.
NotFerra: Likely Sabrim, though possibly one of her team.
NotFerra: An ambush would be wise.
ErrantOfficial: Secure lines only, I said!
ErrantOfficial: What part of this seems secure to you?!
ErrantOfficial: F--k's sake.
ErrantOfficial: ...Hope the rest of you are having pleasant days.
Locker: yeha its ok
Locker: wish it wasn't raining bc i want to hang laundry but yk
Bode: ...
Angel-IKA: o.o how is all of this happening so fast
Angel-IKA: Oh um my day's ok, still grounded though
Dominus: AMBUSHES ARE MORE COMPLICATED THAN THAT! YOU ARE BAD AT AMBUSHING!
Angel-IKA: Not that that's important or anything ><
Locker: idk she sems p good at ambushing
Dominus: NO, THE NINJA IS GOOD AT AMBUSHING
Angel-IKA: Aaaaaaah!
Bode: Damnit, how did I not see that?

[PhoeKun]

"It doesn't matter."

Errant's entire body is buzzing from the energy required to keep herself at maximum output. She can feel it tingling all through the bits of her that are still skin. It's unpleasant, but not so much that she can't ignore it. She's breathing hard, but steady. Good... that's good. She's able to keep her arms raised to chest level and her feet planted firmly without any extra strain to the connective tissues or her core muscles. The extra training she's been putting in was worth everything it took.

"It doesn't matter." she repeats, and this time her voice cracks painfully at the end of the thought.

She coughs, and the tightness in her chest comes creeping back. She feels so focused! The entire battlefield is effectively shrunk down to just the pair of them, and there's nothing else to distract her. She can finally notice every detail of the battle without pausing to wonder how it makes her feel, without even considering which movie or show the moment is reminding her of (right now it's totally--). So why does it feel like she's missing so much?

"Keep mocking me all you want. I already know I'm nothing," without her team, "I don't need to be a hero. I don't need anything, if being a soldier is enough to stop you from hurting anyone else. So just... just take your fake apologies and head games and shove them--"

She loses the thought to a completely inexplicable sob that's been building insistently in her throat this entire time.

[Errant accepts the shift, and attempts to Provoke Sabrem: 2d6-2 = 5. Thanks, Ferra!]

[Balmas]

Victor stares, dead eyes wide, at the far wall.

Has Sara's hair always been this soft? It floats around him, brushes against him, caresses his neck like a thousand lines of fire. And it's so unfair--so gloriously unfair--how perfect and effortless she makes it look. Even here, even now, even as [I]she presses herself against his chest {scrubbed}, in a dungeon, two seconds after being bound and gagged, she looks immaculate, intentional. An idol--no, a goddess.

His arms could be anything, potentially. It was part of the design philosophy behind choosing nanites instead of a more conventional material. And yet, all that versatility is wasted if he doesn't know what to do with them. And so, as she clings to him like a rock in a storm, his arms hang at his side. Does he hug her? Wipe away the tears? Awkward sibling pats? They're all amazing options, but which is the best one? He wants--oh he want so badly--to just wrap himself around her and never let go. Hang the team, hang the mission, hang the fusion reactor, and just sit here, recovering, because his sister is safe.

Oh {scrubbed}, the fusion reactor.

"Get up," he brusquely orders, and shoves her off himself. "We don't have time for this, Sara." Yep, that's it. Fusion reactor. Gotta get that fixed. Stars. Can't do it. Not today. "We have too much to do before we can rest. You're the superstar, you should be familiar with crunch and pleasing the..."

He peters out as an ugly thought crosses his mind, then decides it's a nice place to set up camp. "With pleasing the fans. Oh, for Pete's sake, Sara." Leave her there on the floor. Let her stare at him all she wants, mascara smeared. Stare at the walls, stomp around. "Okay, where's the camera? Where's the drone hidden, Sara? Are the shipping charts so out of balance right now that you thought this was the appropriate response? Throw me into the mix again? What's the title going to be this time, or have you not figured that out? I still remember the last fail compilation, that one probably got a good two million views."

And yet, he can't even bring himself to be angry. Upset, certainly, but he's been angry for so long that he's almost run out of angry to be. It's just numb fury.

"Roll over," he orders, and doesn't wait for her to move before physically moving her. "We're going to fix your generator, we're going to finish the mission, save everyone, and then we're going to have a long, hard talk about boundaries."

[Marking a Team.]

[Raz_Fox]

POTENTIAL 3

“What? No! Stop! You absolute moron! ¡Hijo de puta! ¡Basta ya!”

This complete imbecile! Doesn’t he get that Euna’s in danger?? She couldn’t have been clearer!! Every second he spends looking around for a camera (newsflash, {scrubbed}: they’re scrap down in the basement right now) and accusing her of some {scrubbed} reality TV {scrubbed} is another second for Sabrem to wipe Euna off the face of the earth and replace her with a Terminator double.

The really annoying thing about fighting Victor is that he doesn’t fight fair. You swing for his limbs and they just melt and reform. (Sometimes he even does the Tar Baby where they lock in place around you, which is fighting dirty.) So Sara ends up flat on her face, having her hardlight messed with, again. Which, y’know, is still just as aggravating as the first time.

So, um. Look. It’s reasonable that she’s kicking and flailing and yelling at him. She’s under a lot of stress and having a bad day and he’s being a jackass and it’s always better to get angry than cry. Even though she is crying. Which makes her look even more like a child throwing a tantrum. Which makes her angrier, and whoops, another feedback loop.

“You’re a {scrubbed} idiot mamón, get off me! Shut the {scrubbed} up! We’re wasting time! You let me up right now or you’re gonna have to figure out how to make a prosthetic {scrubbed} I swear to God!!”

Okay, point of order, though: her makeup is mostly intact! Sure the mascara’s running like a bitch but even the most heavy-duty for-active-lifestyles Insta-approved mascara can’t stand up to crying like a little baby over how scared you are that your teammate turned one-night-stand is in very horribly real danger. And sure there’s blood and engine grease on her face, but that’s cosmetic in its own way, the audience loves it when she looks all banged up but still bangable, you get me? So she still looks mostly presentable to the cameras, as long as Victor doesn’t do anything super childish like messing it up on purpose.

But he wouldn’t do that. Right? Even if he thought she was trying to play with his emotions and acting like a brat? Surely not. He’s a good little boy who would never do anything like dunking her head in a puddle of what looks like engine grease over there. Nope. Not even when a heel catches him right in the small of the back and knocks the wind right out of him. Victor is nothing if not patient and pragmatic and some other word that begins with P.

[Balmas]

Possibly, Prick?

"Good," he wheezes. Bastard knows to hit where he can't dodge or move as easily. "Once you do that you can stop coming after mine, pop a suction cup on yours, and use it to go fuc[COLOR="#000000"]k[/COLOR] yourself!"

Oh, if there's actually a camera in here, he's never gonna let her hear the end of this. He's gonna steal that camera just to save this footage. Watch it on cold nights, like a cup of coffee for the soul.

"Seriously, stop squirming! You're making this harder than it has to be, and if you're telling the truth then we're going to need you in shape to fight instead of just being a potential hostage in the back!"

[Eldest]

Wait for it. Wait for the pacing. Don't react when that blue shadow envelops @Ifritphim. Don't react when it takes down the pirate and the sylph with the same kick. Two stun pistols for the tiger-lady and the lady-tiger. All the @Sarahphims are down in seconds before they even know what's happening. It's not the moment. Smokey blue-black and transparent fire burns from the back of the ninja as her thermo-optic generator strains to keep up with motions too quick for the eye to see. You only manage to react when the katana comes out and snakes for Errant's back.

Now it's your moment.

Ferra strides forward. She'd watched the ninja, she'd seen what the newcomer could do. Katana, stun pistol, E/Mauler grenades up her left sleeve, vibroknife up her right pants legs. It'd be easy to let Errant know with a ping, adding to the skillwires, input to the visor...

Not fancy enough. There was a voice screaming at her, she needs more, needs to be the center of it all. More flair. Her walking light show and support cast were down, time to make it count.

Ferra takes three steps forward, vaulting off Euna's shoulder. "On your left!" She brings up her old arm in a wide parry, slapping the katana aside. She jams the stun pistol, grinning in the adversary's face as she pulls the gun and then the trigger to a complete lack of effect, grabbing the arm with the pistol and ducking into a roll, tossing her bodily at the trapped corridor. You know the one. "Watch your six, princess, there's more to this than revenge."

Defending, and taking influence again over Euna.

[Thanqol]

Sabrem moves fast. The kind of fast that forces you to permanently alter your expectations about how fast she can move. She knocks Errant and Ferra to the ground with equal disregard and catches the ninja by the throat. Lifts her off her feet with one hand.

"Number eight," she rasps. "Nice try."

She looks around. "I apologize... this is my current apprentice. Failure though she is. She's so determined to prove her worth that she wants to... that is to say, I won't let her..." she breathed heavily for a moment. "Just stand aside, I'll make sure she won't threaten you again..."

She stopped entirely, looking thoughtfully at the girl in her fist who was nonetheless trying to saw through her wrist joint with a knife. Then she abruptly turns and hurtles number eight directly at Errant, knocking the both of them off a ledge and sending them plunging down into a deep, dark pit. Hitting the bottom was soft - cushioned by mushrooms the size of dinner plates. The room was moist, dimly lit, and eerie - an enormous agricultural mushroom forest, just as vertical as the floors above.

"It wouldn't be fair... if I didn't give her a chance," said Sabrem, shifting a heavy chunk of metal into place to act as a lid and seal the two of you in darkness alone together. "Fight. Whoever is left... I'll deal with. I'll eliminate the distractions in the meantime." The lid slams closed.

Ferra, Sabrem turns to face you. You and her, alone, with all the cameras. Like it should be.

*

Ferraphim1tp: Get her Ferra!
Bode: This is extremely bad.
Locker: i really want to see ferra ko this crazy bitch with the arm that she cut off. hell yeah
Angel-IKA: Is Errant okay!? Is the cute @Sarahphim okay!? Are the other @Sarahphims okay!?!?
Dominus: CUTE ONE?
Ferraphim1tp: Check out the little one in the dress in the background
Dominus: HNNGGG
Locker: eh 6/10
Dominus: HOW DARE YOU

Possibly, Prick?

"Good," he wheezes. Bastard knows to hit where he can't dodge or move as easily. "Once you do that you can stop coming after mine, pop a suction cup on yours, and use it to go {scrubbed} yourself!"

Oh, if there's actually a camera in here, he's never gonna let her hear the end of this. He's gonna steal that camera just to save this footage. Watch it on cold nights, like a cup of coffee for the soul.

"Seriously, stop squirming! You're making this harder than it has to be, and if you're telling the truth then we're going to need you in shape to fight instead of just being a potential hostage in the back!"

Brainstorm, how are you with back-alley cybersurgery? How did you learn to do this? What was your training like?

You're dealing with skillwire work here - microchips like Errant has that contain built-in skillsets and artificial reflexes. It's not inspired work and it's a little out of date but it's functional enough and the cleanup and sealing was all done very skilfully. It's more than a simple cut and disable, though - Sabrem has affixed a biolocator to the device. They're nasty little things - banned prison tech like the Kuang Shi masks, designed to make prisoners visible to spy satellites... and guided missiles.

The green light on the biolocator blinks on. Target lock established. Somewhere in the distance, the whoosh and clatter of a clipper dronebot launching a projectile.

You might have to work fast.

Roll to Defend.

@Sarahphim, you should continue to encourage him to do your best.

[PhoeKun]

Falling, falling, falling...

Even the descent is a duel. Errant plummets through the dim air and barely gets an arm up in time to avoid taking a pistol round to the face. She throws an elbow in retaliation, but the faceless ninja girl is above her and there's nothing for her to produce torque with, so she's easily parried. The next thing she knows, there's a knife coming at her throat. Thrust, slash, thrust! Errant barely manages to keep a hand in between her and the blade, and on the third stab finally gets enough fingers on it to snap it in half. She's spinning now, somehow, momentum carrying her in an out of control spiral.

Falling, falling...

She still hasn't found the bottom. What was even the point of regulatory committees and corporate councils if companies were just going to build everything so recklessly high, anyway? Or was it actually not that far and it's just that her sense of time is too deep into overdrive for her to be any decent judge of this? While she's contemplating that mystery, her biomonitor helpfully informs her that the sudden lance of pain near her ribs is actually another knife, but not to worry because the hit wasn't hard enough to penetrate her dermal plating. Superficial at best; she snaps it off just under the handle and jams her fist into the ninja's solar plexus right as she feels a pair of (soft, warm) hands close around her throat. They squeeze. She falls.

Aaaaand, stop.

There's a sickening, wet crunch when she lands as a particularly unfortunate fungal cap takes the full force of her head bouncing off of it. It cracks in half in a manner terrifyingly similar to human flesh being ripped apart. The smell is earthy and pleasant, which is anything is kind of worse. But there's no time to really process any of that: she rises up and headbutts the ninja directly in the face, and follows up by getting her feet underneath the other girl and kicking her clear across the room.

Errant kips up immediately and settles into a defensive stance, right arm raised behind her head and right leg bent for quick reaction and left arm and leg locked straight to cover as much of her body as possible while expanding her zone to more closely match any more bladed weapons this person might be carrying on her. In the moment it takes her to finish moving, Number Eight is already on her feet and coiled up like she's trying to pounce from across that entire distance. Errant shakes her head.

"I don't know who you are or what your deal is, but I don't have time to be messing around right now. Surrender peaceably, and I won't have to hurt you."