Vigil 8: Try jumping

[Shadowcaller]

[Snakes Alive]

Wenomir sighs deeply. It couldn't be this simple, could it.

"I wasn't there when she was captured, so I don't know much. But yes, please tell us more about what happened, Lapis."

[Snakes Alive]

Oh boy it's time for a story!

"I was chasing the Boss Bird because I found it spying on Miss Alethie and then it saw me and started flying away so I chased it but it couldn't get away so it flew through that window and so I drifted in after it and it was hiding under the bed in Miss Ophelia's room and I started talking to Miss Ophelia and the demon and I was asking them to help me catch the bird but they wanted something to eat so I came over to their room to talk better and then the demon made Miss Ophelia try to eat me so I sworded him until he was gone."

Simple!

Oh!

And an important thing!

"Drifting is where you go inways or outways to go around things because no one ever builds walls in those directions except the ones at Miss Geneva's lab that one has got walls in all the directions but they're made out of other things when I asked Miss Geneva about it she said it was important for experimental controls."

Excellent.

Now everyone is up to speed.

[Snakes Alive]

A 'boss bird' being chased into the demons 'room'? As in her cell? Sounded like Lapis might not know the difference which was a bit concerning. Nonetheless, it was on theme regarding everything else she had told them so far.

"So are this 'boss bird' and 'Miss Alethie' relevant here? Since you mention them by name." Shanti inquires. "Furthermore, would you be okay if I scan you with the staff?" She means bonk! "I just need to see if you've been afflicted by anything."

[Morty]

[Snakes Alive]

"The 'boss bird', as far as we can tell, is some kind of surveillance device or spy taking the shape of a bird." Wenomir decides to cut in, as Lapis' explanation is likely to only make Shanti more confused. "Lapis has been trying to catch it. But so far it's eluded all our attempts to apprehend it."

[Blanche's Barracks]

Wenomir indeed approaches the scene. When he sees the situation that's unfolding, he sighs. Not just because of the situation itself, but because he hears this young woman call him "High Lord Commander". It's probably sarcastic. He hopes. The idea that people out there really call him that is too bleak to contemplate at the moment.

"Alright, what's going on here?" he asks.

[Gullara]

[Dragon Storm - An Aside]

The wood-dragon halts when Ambrosia moves out of the way of its charge, not wishing to end up skewered on the large weapon. It starts making swipes with its claws while stepping towards her, trying to probe her defences and seek a weak spot. These creatures are smarter than they look...

Meanwhile, Thariza puts her bow aside and reaches for a mace and an axe as one of the creatures leaps at her and the other gets off the ground. Ambrosia knows that her mace is an old, battered Iron Legion weapon, while the axe is a newer one she made in the Nexus. She steps to meet the creature charging her, the mace swirling with sickly purplish flames as she swings it. She strikes the ground, rather than the creature, causing flames to erupt under its feet. It reels, stepping sideways to avoid them, and the other wood-dragon is caught in them as well. She gives it more encouragement by swinging her axe and causing a cold rift in the air to open near it.

None of it does them any real harm yet, but it does a good job keeping them focused on Thariza, meaning that Ambrosia is only dealing with one of them and Utayo isn't being attacked yet.

[Dragon Storm - An Aside]

The power of the ssangsudo came from keeping you opponents at a distance, which was exactly how Ambrosia was using it right now. Her blade doesn't move an inch even as the creature starts swiping at her. She knew its arms weren't long enough to close that distance so she wasn't going to waste energy at trading air slashes with her opponent.

However, as soon as it steps too close she moves in the direction of the arm currently closest to her while making a quick slash at the attacking claw. This before stepping out of its reach again.

While she could easily close the distance between them she wasn't confident that she could fell such a large creature in one attack even if she did manage to impale it. She was satisfied just punishing her opponent for getting in too close while also testing just how tough its wood-like skin really was.

[Dragon Storm - An Aside]

Utayo takes advantage of being beneath notice for the moment. She can help while maintaining distance. Well, enough distance she hopes. She positions herself so that she's behind Ambrosia's attacker, shifting with the flow of the fight. It's like a dance, and her partner is her foe. Then when she sees an opening, at any point where the creature's arm is extended away from it's body upward or to the side, she trikes. From the bangles she donned extend strands of what looks like solid light. She tries to loop them around the creature's arm and pull. Her own strength is hardly a consideration here, but instead the technology dampens the force acting against the strands.

[Reinholdt]

[Blanche's Barracks]

There was no sarcasm in Ava's voice. And she doesn't buy Blanche's straw argument either, narrowing her eyes in return... though mostly at Anika.

"Then I'm free to leave at any time? When we're done talking."

Her attention slides over to Wenomir, but she's not going to explain anything in particular about the situation.

[Rebonack]

[Snakes Alive]

Lapis scoots away from Shanti, doing an expert job of hiding a grimace of pain as she sticks one of her hands in her pocket. She just got whacked by some of those terrible zombie things Outside and the damage is echoing like it always does. But Lapis is tough! She's pretty good at hiding her injuries until they have time to heal up. She just needs a few moments out of combat and then she'll be just fine.

"I'm fine," Lapis insists. "I don't want to get bonked."

She DOES have some afflictions, though!

One of the big sylvan beasts hit her with some awful lingering magic that decays flesh and slows movement with frostbite.

Thankfully the supernatural fear part doesn't really work on her.

Why did this have to happen when Mister Wenomir is here!

What if he notices?

What if he realizes that she's doing quests!

Is she going to get in trouble?

[Ironsmith]

[Word Among the Birds]

Lapis returns triumphantly with the canary!

Only it isn't a canary now it is a skunk-bird.

"I got the bird Mister Max!" Lapis loudly announces as she approaches the door. "Can you open the door for me my hands are full of bird."

That makes opening doors difficult.

But then!

A phone call!

"Hello Miss Eun how is your vacation going?" Lapis asks cheerfully into her communicator which, sadly, requires her face to be closer to the stinky bird.

[Word Among the Birds]

"It's going well, thank you." Comes Eun's voice through the crackling speaker. "I'll have to share the details with you later. For now, I... have some concerns about the messages you sent me earlier."

Judging from the hesitancy in her voice, "some concerns" might be underselling it.

"...Honestly, I'm mostly confused. You said one of my cats got out, turned into a fox and made more foxes?"

What does that even mean? Was someone screwing around with a polymorph spell, and it turns out one of her "tomcats" was pregnant? Because that's a weirdly specific set of circumstances.

"The important thing is, are they all okay? Babo, Gom, Martin, Sable, Tiger, Byung? They're not going to get eaten by foxes or anything?"

[Lord Magtok]

Zomboards and Zweihanders

Zomboards and Zweihanders

"Damn, I wanted to fight a dragon." Anika mutters as she finally seems to have had time to take a breath between her words.

"And nah, its fine dude. You just spooked me a bit. I just couldn't figure out what that weird sound was at first." Laz might get the feeling that Anika is shrugging at this very moment based on her tone alone.
"Anyway, bad zombies doing bad things and you're one of the good zombies?" She had heard of 'light zombies' but never actually seen one. But Laz went around in full armor, did that mean she was some kind of paladin?
"Like a paladin or whatever? Since I never heard of those zombies. Unless it's the ones I'm thinking of?" Not sure how Laz is supposed to know what you're thinking of, Anika.

"Uhh...maybe? Listen, I-" Jenette pauses, wondering how much she can risk saying on the comm. I mean, it's possible Blanche has already bugged Anika's, just in case. Probably not, though. I mean, if Jen were a double agent, she'd want to keep some stuff out of her villain dad's view, and chats with Fidelia would be top of the list of stuff to not wiretap.

"I have some concerns about Blanche, and I was hoping we could discuss them away from the base, and this zombie mission seems easy enough to keep us occupied while we talk it over. I mean, it's just zombies, and half of them are fighting the other half, so how hard could it be?" Jenette, this kind of overconfidence is dangerous. You're more or less a zombie yourself. What guarantee do you have that they'll be disposable, mindless hordes of shambling tissue paper soldiers, and not superpowered murder machines like yourself?

[Shadowcaller]

Zomboards and Zweihanders

"Blanche concerns?" Anika sounds confused. "Um, alright." Was Blanche sick or something?

...

Was Blanche turning into a zombie too?! Since Laz would know right? As she was a zombie herself and all...

If she was, she certainly hoped she would turn into one of the good ones too.

But probably best to not assume anything just yet. "But okay, where do you want to meet up?" A beat. "Unless that's a secret too?"

[Rebonack]

[Word Among the Birds]

"I'm glad you're having a nice time but one of your cats didn't get out and turn into a fox one of your cats got out and made another cat that turned into a fox and then those foxes turned into more foxes and also two dogs a squirrel and a bird," Lapis helpfully explains. "But it's okay we caught them all and we brought the extra animals to Mister Max and he's going to make sure they don't keep turning into more and other animals."

That clears it all up, right?

No more confusion now.

"Here's the bird Mister Max where should I put it?" Lapis inquires of the technician as she brandishes the stinky bird at him.

Wow.

Today sure has been a fun day, hasn't it?

The idea that things have been at all weird doesn't even occur to Lapis.

[Morty]

[Dragon Storm - An Aside]

Ambrosia will find that the wood-dragon's scales are strong and supple, resistant to slashes. A gash appears in it, but more force will be required to deal serious damage. It does provide the opening Utayo needs and a strand loops itself around the fey beast's arm. The wood-dragon looks shocked and enraged by it, struggling against the pull and digging its heels in. With one of its arms immobilized and presenting an easy target to Ambrosia, it changes tactics - it opens its mouth and breathes out. A cloud of cloying poisonous gas bursts forth towards Ambrosia. Utayo might be far enough for it not to reach her.

Thariza has successfully managed to draw the attention of the other two wood-dragons to herself, but it's taking most of her concentration just to defend herself against them. However, once they're both focused on her and in close melee, her whole body suddenly erupts in sickly purple-black flame, with a blurry multi-eyed visage briefly appearing above her. The wood-dragons recoil, their movements growing sluggish and seemingly stuck with pain. Thariza uses this opportunity to clobber them some more - but how long will it last?

[Arkhosia]

Blanche's Barracks

"That depends," Blanche answers, her gaze only leaving Ava to note Wenomir's approach for the slightest of moments. "I'm not entirely sure it's safe to let you leave here on your own. Anika, would you mind filling the Commander in?"

[Shadowcaller]

Blanche's Barracks

"No! That's not the point, Ava!" Anika turns to Wenomir. "I came across a- well, a redeemed demon seeking our help called Tarim. Since there was a demon in Riverside that had admitted to kill a thousands of people playing in a concert and that sounded super-concerning. So I came there to check it out and while I was waiting outside a bomb was detonated inside so I went in to investigate. I found a whole lot of dead concert-goers and uh... well, it wasn't clear what was going on but there were demons fighting one another and Ava here had at least killed some of them with a bomb. Then one of the demons- or fey, I wasn't sure what the goat was, but she turned Ava into a fey at least. I tried to heal as many of the victims as I could but there was still a lot of dead there."

A beat.

"Then, uh, well later on I talked to Ilpholin and we agreed that it was probably a good idea to make Ava not a demon, which we thought she was back then. Since I thought- I mean, when has someone being turned into a demon worked out well for anyone? But- um, then I kinda overreacted when one of the guards accused me and- I freed Ava without their permission. I know it was super-stupid now but I wasn't thinking straight. So we took Ava to the moon well over here and cured her. Then now, she should probably be put on trial for all those deaths."

Anika turns to Ava again and gestures at her. "Since that's the point, you don't even know what people you killed, Ava."

[Dragon Storm - An Aside]

Ambrosia was expecting a counterattack of some sort, but Utayo's intervention changed the whole equation. She would have taken this opportunity to strike but she recognized the wood dragon's body language. That look in its eyes, that build up. She had never actually looked herself in the mirror before unleashing her own breath weapon but she had seen many other dragons do it during her research.

So that begged the question, what kind of breath weapon could she be expecting? Since that would influence how she should defend herself.
Instinct told her that this was more likely to be a classical kind of breath weapon and the smaller size of this 'dragon' meant that it probably didn't have as long a range as larger ones. But she wouldn't underestimate it either.

She throws herself backwards in a diagonal direction and then rolls around before getting up again and turns to face her foe while covering her face with one arm. A rather impressive display considering the armor she was wearing.

[Lord Magtok]

Zomboards and Zweihanders

"But okay, where do you want to meet up?" A beat. "Unless that's a secret too?"

"About a mile north of the Tower of Oujet, then we'll walk the rest of the way. That should be far enough from the site to not get their attention right away," Jenette answers, looking at a map of the area on her phone in her other hand. Should be easy enough to get there first and just wait for Anika there, since she has a headstart. It sounds like Anika might not be the best with tech though, so maybe we should look up the directions for her instead of assuming she knows how to use a phone...

"It's not too far from here. After you leave the base, it's-" Jenette does her best to provide simple, plain English directions that even a talking bear should be able to grasp. "You'll recognize me when you see me, there probably won't be anyone else with a big sword standing around by the side of the road."

[Shadowcaller]

Zomboards and Zweihanders

The tower of what? A mile north... darn it, she didn't even have a compass on her.

"...I'll head out right away once I got my clothes on. Maybe that'll make us able to leave the base together." While the directions Laz gave were simple she would rather not have to focus on remembering all those names.

"But big sword lady, got it. I'll keep an eye out for you."

[bc56]

Snakes Alive
"You ssshould do thisss," Ophidia advises Lapis. "It will build trussst. It doesss not hurt." She subtly positions herself behind Lapis, such that if the child continues to resist, she can corral her back towards the bars where the bonk stick is waiting.

[Recaiden]

[Village]

A knock comes at the door of Mia's residence. Hopefully she's home at the moment and not out working on the flying island's engines, vehicles, or other machinery, like she so often is.
Outside is Sophia, the alien demon attache, who is making herself perfectly visible and not doing any tricks or surprises using her illusions.
"Hello, Mia?"

[Ironsmith]

[Word Among the Birds]

"I'm glad you're having a nice time but one of your cats didn't get out and turn into a fox one of your cats got out and made another cat that turned into a fox and then those foxes turned into more foxes and also two dogs a squirrel and a bird," Lapis helpfully explains. "But it's okay we caught them all and we brought the extra animals to Mister Max and he's going to make sure they don't keep turning into more and other animals."

That clears it all up, right?

No more confusion now.

"Here's the bird Mister Max where should I put it?" Lapis inquires of the technician as she brandishes the stinky bird at him.

Wow.

Today sure has been a fun day, hasn't it?

The idea that things have been at all weird doesn't even occur to Lapis.

[Word Among the Birds]

"I..." Eun starts on the other side of the phone, before giving up and just deciding she's not keeping up with Lapis this time. "...All right. Just make sure all of the cats are safe for when I get back, okay?"

If Lapis gives her an affirmative answer, she'll follow up by abruptly and awkwardly hanging up. With no word as to what to do with the foxes.

Max, meanwhile, is buried under a pile of sleeping vulpines and can only give Lapis a little thumbs-up, before mouthing "over there" and making a small gesture towards an open cage.

Once the hoatzin is put up, Lapis's job is done! ...More or less. Depending on if she wants to go back and help miss Awen.

[Morty]

[Blanche's Barracks]

Wenomir's expression becomes carefully, meticulously blank as he looks at Anika. She's probably well familiar with it. It's often a worse sign than if he was shouting. Blanche is not as familiar with Wenomir's expressions, but she's no doubt learning quickly.

"So... you did help a terrorist escape," he summarizes, his voice deceptively calm. The corners of his eyes twitch. "We do need to deliver both of you to the Eastside authorities now. If the goat turned Ava into a fey, she probably was fey herself. Though I'm not sure if that's important."

[Snakes Alive]

"Let Shanti work, Lapis," Wenomir asks in a tired voice. "She knows what she's doing and we need to trust her if we want to untangle this."

[Shadowcaller]

[Snakes Alive]

"It's only to check you for afflictions, child." Well, not only. It was possible that the demon had in fact left this woman and possessed Lapis instead as she was the only one could confirm this whole "swording" story.
"The 'bonking' is unfortunate but necessary I'm afraid."

[Reinholdt]

[Blanche's Barracks]

Ava's fist clenches and face gets red with rage. "I freaking knew it, you two faced rat! When VIGIL kills a bunch of demon worshipping cultists, they're above the law sitting up here in the clouds, but when someone like me does it, she's a terrorist - put her on trial and string her up. Well ****** you ***** too you ***** ****** **** *** ******."

She's practically frothing at the mouth and honestly, where did she learn that language? Maybe she took an exchange course with some dwarves. Only they could come up with such colorful ways to express displeasure over an elf's ear.

Blanche can already see Ava's hand twitch. The young woman's very likely to do something stupid in the heat of the moment.

[Shadowcaller]

[Blanche's Barracks]

Anika would have been more enraged by those accusations if Ava hadn't just proven what she said.
Or at least what her understanding of the situation was which was partly out of ignorance. She had seen the audience as innocents that were probably(?) seduced by the succubi. She had no context of them being long-term fans or anything.

However, rather than going for the punch like at the police station she chooses to trust that Blanche or Wenomir would deal with this before Ava did something really stupid.

Besides, if they all reacted at the same time they might sabotage one another's efforts.

[Arkhosia]

Blanche's Barracks

”When VIGIL deals with demonic cultists, we make sure they’re demon-worshipping cultists intent on hurting others, and we don’t execute non-combatants.” Blanche’s voice is calm, but with a stern edge to it that suggests she has Very Strong Principles about the matter. A hand stays by her hip, ready to draw her gun or more likely prevent Ava from taking it, but she doesn’t act to apprehend just yet. She doesn’t want to provoke Ava more than she already is.

[Rebonack]

[Snakes Alive]

Oh no.

Everyone thinks Lapis should be bonked!

The girl glances from one person to another before, hesitantly, scooting forward into bonking range.

Smacking Lapis in the head should reveal that she does not, in fact, have any ongoing afflictions at the moment.

She managed to shake off the ice debuff she had been hit with earlier!

Lapis is a very sturdy child.

Still...

Not to fond of getting bonked.

She'll rub her head afterwards, giving the druid a rather cross look.

[Shadowcaller]

[Snakes Alive]

Shanti tries to be more gentle than she was with the demon, she wasn't completely without mercy. But as she said she also had to be firm with the staff or she would have to bonk Lapis twice.

But with nothing else afflicting Lapis, the staff's eyes glow green. Seemingly confirming that she was fine.

"That should do. Thank you, child. Looks like you're clear... but you've recently changed haven't you?" Shanti looks to Lapis, hoping that she would elaborate.

What should be done with the demon, well, that was the commanders decision now. Not hers. She had given her advice already.

[Zefir]

[Village]

A knock comes at the door of Mia's residence. Hopefully she's home at the moment and not out working on the flying island's engines, vehicles, or other machinery, like she so often is.
Outside is Sophia, the alien demon attache, who is making herself perfectly visible and not doing any tricks or surprises using her illusions.
"Hello, Mia?"

[Village]

It might need a bit befor an answer comes. Since Mia does know the voice she doesn't have to worry and maybe there is some kind of doorspy as well. So the door opens.
"Sophia was it?" She asks, it has been a bit. "How can I help you?"
Mia is right now dressed in her work clothes. a jumpsuit and shirt. Nothing special. It is still a bit dirty and she got a towl to clean her face which makes the towel go black.

[Morty]

[Blanche's Barracks]

"Enough. This is not the time or place for a debate." Wenomir's voice cuts through both Ava's tirade and Blanche's response. He looks down at Ava, sensing danger. "Do not make this any worse on yourself. We are not above the law, which is why Anika will also answer for her involvement in this."

[Snakes Alive]

"I'm glad Lapis is fine, but that still leaves Ophidia," Wenomir observes. "Using the moonwell appears to be our only option right now, so let's do it. Then at least we'll know where we stand. Or we might be able to fix it."

[bc56]

Snakes Alive
Ophidia looks relieved. "Thank you sssir. Pleassse let usss go quickly." She can't shake the feeling that something's terribly wrong. It must be an effect of the demonic corruption she's still suffering. She slithers to the door and waits to follow Shanti once it's opened.

[Gullara]

[Dragon Storm - An Aside]

Ambrosia will find that the wood-dragon's scales are strong and supple, resistant to slashes. A gash appears in it, but more force will be required to deal serious damage. It does provide the opening Utayo needs and a strand loops itself around the fey beast's arm. The wood-dragon looks shocked and enraged by it, struggling against the pull and digging its heels in. With one of its arms immobilized and presenting an easy target to Ambrosia, it changes tactics - it opens its mouth and breathes out. A cloud of cloying poisonous gas bursts forth towards Ambrosia. Utayo might be far enough for it not to reach her.

Thariza has successfully managed to draw the attention of the other two wood-dragons to herself, but it's taking most of her concentration just to defend herself against them. However, once they're both focused on her and in close melee, her whole body suddenly erupts in sickly purple-black flame, with a blurry multi-eyed visage briefly appearing above her. The wood-dragons recoil, their movements growing sluggish and seemingly stuck with pain. Thariza uses this opportunity to clobber them some more - but how long will it last?

[Dragon Storm - An Aside]

Ambrosia was expecting a counterattack of some sort, but Utayo's intervention changed the whole equation. She would have taken this opportunity to strike but she recognized the wood dragon's body language. That look in its eyes, that build up. She had never actually looked herself in the mirror before unleashing her own breath weapon but she had seen many other dragons do it during her research.

So that begged the question, what kind of breath weapon could she be expecting? Since that would influence how she should defend herself.
Instinct told her that this was more likely to be a classical kind of breath weapon and the smaller size of this 'dragon' meant that it probably didn't have as long a range as larger ones. But she wouldn't underestimate it either.

She throws herself backwards in a diagonal direction and then rolls around before getting up again and turns to face her foe while covering her face with one arm. A rather impressive display considering the armor she was wearing.

[Dragon Storm - An Aside]

Utayo is out of the range of the breath weapon, but now this is a bit of a pickle. She's drawn attention to herself now... The snare holding the creature dissipates and it's free again. The moonfolk backs away again, wary of being attacked.

[Rebonack]

[Snakes Alive]

Lapis will likewise depart the cage, about to answer the druid's question when she winces quite suddenly.

It's a very subtle motion.

One she's good at masking.

Dealing with echoed damage is always a pain, but thankfully she's really good at mostly avoiding it to begin with. Those dumb ghost things were just really numerous and it was hard avoiding them all. They mostly scratched her along the back and thankfully her VIGIL uniform covers up those spots so maybe no one will notice.

This gives her a good excuse to think about the druid's question.

"I learned how to ride a bike at the Frescots' yesterday?" she ventures.

She had to change in order to do that, just like how she has to change whenever she learns something new.

[Shadowcaller]

[Snakes Alive]

Shanti does not seem satisfied with Lapis answer but suddenly it seemed her talents were needed elsewhere. Thus her reply is a curt, "I see." And smiles to Lapis despite ot believing her bicycle story one bit.

This was far too recent. Only a child (and maybe her sister) would believe such an obvious lie.

But she had other concerns than a lying child right now, like the snake-woman following her.
She turns to the commander. "But if we're done here, would you be so kind to escort us down to the well, Wenomir? Since I will need to focus on the ritual down there, not anything else."