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Eiko     Shinjuku City, a special ward of the Tokyo metropolitan area. The nightlife here is pretty active, especially in shopping areas like this one. Last time Eiko had called people over, it was for a mall, but this time it seems a smaller area has been hit. There's a single, tall building here, on a sharply-angled corner of a five-way intersection, that people are weirdly avoiding. Weirdly, because the streets are lousy with foot traffic, and it's even worse with everyone subconsciously avoiding the walkway around the tower-like shopping building. When people /do/ walk in, which happens a couple of times a minute, they walk straight to the doors and disappear inside. Nobody has yet walked out again.

    Eiko is standing across the street. She's slightly more attention-grabbing than last time, since not only is she some young woman holding a katana in public, but now she has a finely-tailored trenchcoat and gloves, like a more blue-tinged Matrix extra. She just needs to wear some dark sunglasses (at night) to complete the picture, though her obvious impatience kind of ruins it.
Ban Ban arrives in Shinjuku rather fast. An amazing coincidence, Ban just decided to pick one of these Earths and add a number to it when he entered the warp gate, plus aim for a Tokyo. Somehow, he got Tokyo-490. WHAT ODDS?

He stands out a bit, an open leather top of sorts with no undershirt, bright light blue spiky hair, and a pair of fangy teeth, as well as a three-sectioned staff at his side. He looks around a bit for something interesting, before spotting Eiko. She looks interesting! Which is why Ban heads towards her direction, looking to ask her about the local ale and also if there's any adventure to be had.
Alexis Maaka     Eiko ain't the only one dressed for a cyberpunk convention, as Alexis Maaka sifts through the crowd gracefully. Hands tucked within her jacket's pockets, she has a duffle bag tucked over her shoulder containing her weapons for the day. She has a talisman from the last time she came here, luckily, which makes easier on her as she approaches Eiko.

    "Hey kid." She greets with a grim nod, popping her neck as she waits for everyone else. Just a tall butch lady in a trenchcoat and a dufflebag, nothin' to see here.~
Souji Murasame While Eiko looks almost like an extra from The Matrix, Souji looks like he walked straight out of a cyberpunk dystopia. He is dressed in his immaculate midnight blue suit as always, with a katana at his side. His glasses are polarized at the moment, making them appear as mirrorshades for the time being. The only mark of decoration he has is a gold ring.

He approaches Eiko, addressing her in a calm and professional tone. "Greetings, Miss Eiko. It is good to see you again. I am prepared." Or, well, as prepared as he will ever be.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa always like Shinjuku, well the New one, the old one like this? Was in ruins and partially underwater on her world. She catch the call as it were and here she is wondering just what happen. She was ready for everything to go nuts this time and was packing more gear thn last time. Kotone given the stealth suit she's wearing and orange mirroed sunglasses did carry a bit of a different vibe then she often does. She comes in just after Alexis.

"Eiko, Alexis hey."
Audrey Stormfist     Eiko and Souji will not be the only ones with a katana in public, although Audrey's is sheathed, and does have the whole gunblade aesthetic going on. She won't be far behind Souji, dressed in that blue military overcoat. The dark-haired girl walks straight, almost perfectly so.

    She is concerned about this whole reality warping thing, since it's so undocumented; a world that casually requires some sort of protective talisman to so much as enter buildings? There must be more to it than that. That just sounds awful.

    "Hello-- Maaka, Eiko." Those she immediately recognizes.
Starbound Flotilla     The STARBOUND FLOTILLA arrives! Moonfin likes this area even more than the last. The tall fishman is leading the way, and the rest follow confidently. Are there people staring? Probably. They do not give a single fuck. "Like the style." George says, grinning as he approaches Eiko. "Kinda got the ironic razor factory thing going on. Hey coolkid," He pulls out a single-use autoinjector. "I'm a stranger! Offering drugs!" He'll toss it at her, inviting her to partake in not Just Saying No.

    If she actually examines it, she'll find that it's some kind of corporate-branded stimulant, intended for use by astronauts.
Kazusa Ujikane     Exploring Tokyo? Count Kazusa in!

    Someone who doesn't know Tokyo that well is always interesting to lead around, so when Ban mentioned going exploring, Kazusa jumped at the chance. Granted, she did so thinking 'it's an Elite, right? If an Elite is going, that means either something is happening or something is bound to happen once we get there!', but she jumped at it nonetheless.

    And she's not disappointed! A weird shopping building, people who seem to ignore it, some girl is standing there holding a katana and dressed like she's from a cyberpunk movie, and a whole bunch of weir- NEAT people are showing up too! Including two more with katanas! And some aliens! "Ooooh, did we find some kind of secret mission? Is this an alien invasion we're trying to fight off, and you're rogues that have joined the side of good to help humans?!"

    She sounds way too excited at the prospect.
Eiko     This Earth doesn't show a lot of awareness of the Multiverse, for how long it's been since unification. Those sorts of stories haven't gone much past being crack conspiracy theories. The truth is, most people don't care a lot about the stars having changed configuration, and this is off the beaten path of trade and tourism. This would all be why, when people do start showing up who look like weirdly dressed foreigners, the initial reaction of those passing by is that they're just weirdly dressed foreigners... or weirdly dressed natives. (Don't these chumps know that /Sunday/ is for cosplay? Get ye to Harajuku, guys.)

    On the other hand, nobody's going to be bothering the touristy types either, anymore than Eiko is being hassled. She actually might be, a little, but she's a pro at ignoring crowds. Not so when actually addressed by name, though. "Yo. Good to see you two again." She looks over at Ban. "Hey, you with the Syndicate, too? Haven't seen ya." She blinks a few times at Kazusa, but--assumes someone else is gonna fill her in. She doesn't KNOW that Ban is just as clueless on the topic. Another turn, "Hey~ Souji. Audrey, yeah?" Yeah, she is hella informal.

    The Flotilla crew, on the other hand, include actual aliens. That, inevitably, gets more looks. And some people casually following behind them with cell cameras out. EVERYONE in this town has a camera, so that's just gonna happen. Likewise, Eiko greets, "Hey, guys! Huh," she says and catches the injector, "what's this you've got for me?" She gives it a look, and another 'aw, sweet' expression, recognizing a single-use buff item when she sees it. "Yeah, this'll work out nice. Thanks!"
Alexis Maaka     Souji is bowed to lightly, Kotone is given a little grin, people Alexis doesn't know get a funny look, and Alexis punches George in the arm lightly with a good natured chuckle. "Folks."

    She seems oddly immune to having her picture taken given SERIOUS PHOTOGENIC INTERFERENCE. The people trying to get her picture will have a trollface over her head, the clever bitch.

    "So what's the word, where's the big wedgie in space-time at this time around and is shit like it was last time?"
Souji Murasame Alexis is given a small bow in return. The Flotilla represenatives are greeted with a wave. Audrey does not get greetings, she arrived with him. "Indeed." He says to Eiko. Other than his sword out in plain sight, he'd probably fit right in here in Japan in the businessman crowd. "If there is anything we should know ahead of time, I would like to know." Souji comments.
Audrey Stormfist     "Audrey Stormfist, supervisor for the Murasame Zaibatsu's KIRIN branch," she introduces herself, mostly to confirm Eiko's guess. She isn't bothered by the lack of formality-- this isn't a professional meeting by any stretch. And if it WERE, then Souji would be the one handling it. She would only become offended if he were disrespected, and he's not being.

    "I would like to know more about talismans and the effects they shield against, myself. It seems like a vital piece of information to have on-hand."
Ban As Eiko asks Ban if he's with the Syndicate, he just cocks his head and replies. "That's that mercenary group? I'm not with them, naaah.~" He eyes her sword a bit, before looking around at everyone else there.

And then his mouth drops when he spots Moonfin, as he jumps back a bit. "A fishperson?!". Ban is not quite used to all the amazement of the Multiverse.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa is taking note of other people she knows, showing up. It's not too much of a shock to be perfectly honest. Given the pay from last time she can't fault anyone for showing up right? She seems in good spirits she takes note of Moonfin and George. She seems ready at this poin, any idea on hte creatures that will be hiding in the wedgie?"
Starbound Flotilla     Moonfin gives a bow to Souji, but the others return the wave as they arrive. "Bossss!" Biteblade calls, smiling with all their many teeth. "Hello! Lassst time, worked with big rock Zaibatsssu man. Work together, again! With you and Punch Thunder! Maybe get more loot! Floran will do all the ssscience to it."
Eiko     Eiko points across the street. From the signs on it, giving the names of different stores every floor, it's a fair guess that it's a vertical shopping district. Nothing really strange about that; just think of a strip mall on its side. It is kind of strange that over 95% of foot traffic is giving it a wide berth, though--people are walking across the street just to not be next to it. There's a subtle mental effect of 'go away' affecting the area, though it only really hits if you walk up to it. The 'everything is normal' effect has a farther range, but does not generally affect elites. Resisting that is what lets someone point at it, like Eiko is doing, and say, "Weird, huh?" like Eiko is saying.

    "There's a piece of the Other Side that's kinda, you could call it invaded? It invaded this side, and takes the place of a piece of the world, and then does this assimilation thing that we stop by going in and wrecking the place. If we don't do that, we get a--well, long story short, we lose the chance, and people die. But as a rule, we--people like me that live around here--don't let that happen. And by 'wreck the place' I mean, at a minimum, we break the core. Oh yeah, the assimilation thing is why we need the talismans. Otherwise you kinda get your existence melded into the new place showing up. Pretty much means you die. You can resist awhile without one, but I don't recommend it."

    Fortunately, none of this was intended to be secret, so it also serves as her explanation to Ban and Kazusa. "So, dunno who you guys are, but if you ain't up for that, just let us mercs do our thing, yeah?"
Starbound Flotilla     George gives a quick grin and a nod to Alexis. Meanwhile, Albert is busy giving greetings to Kotone. "Mmmh. Welcome again. We've no healer this time. I'll be covering you." He says, grunting. "Keep close. Anything in melee range, I'll keep it from you."
Souji Murasame Eiko gives some valuable background information, and Souji looks over at the area that Eiko pointed at, nodding. "I see." He stares at the vertical shopping district for a moment, perhaps seeking something out. IF he sees what he is looking for, he doesn't say anything. He looks over to the Flotilla again as he is addressed, and nods. "Indeed. Valodjn is one of my best men. You will find Stormfist and I are equally capable, however. Our goal is to destroy the core of this unusual area, then. It should be within capabilities. I am sure we will learn more about what we are against when we get inside."
Starbound Flotilla     Moonfin then gives a short bow to Ban. "I am Moonfin, of the Hylotl." He says, simply, and just slightly tersely. 'Fishperson'. Jeeze, never heard anything so absurd. Then Moonfin shows his own talisman, as do the rest of the group. "There may be coins within the anomaly. We're to loot as many as we can, but distribute them amongst us equally at the end if that is how arrangements go. With these, new talismans may be purchased for future anomalous incidents." He explains, doing his best to seem like a really wise authority even though he's a complete goddamn newbie.
Alexis Maaka     Maaka doesn't feel the need to sound like she knows more than she really does, unlike Moonfin, and she just folds her arms. The Hylotl does however raise some good points, at the very least. Looting anything in sight sounds like a fair enough strategy for this stuff. The cyborg's gold eyes glance over to Kazusa and Ban, still not quite sure what to make of these two new faces.

    Shrugging, she supposes that answer will come soon enough. Alexis gives Eiko a firm nod, before she clears her throat. "So, we just gonna keep making a scene or are we gonna go loot the shit out of some monsters and wreck their heads in?" Straight to the point, and eager to get shit done, that's Maaka's way alright.
Kazusa Ujikane     Kazusa listens in quiet, rapt fascination to the exposition, eyes getting wider all the time. "Oooooooh. No, I'm up for it, I'm totally up for it! Just, um-" She fishes around in her purse, then comes out with a trio of cards, which she holds up in a spread in front of herself. "...who to pick, who to... no, Knight is faded right now... YOU!"

    The girl in a cardigan and glasses is pointing at Maaka, and holding up one particular card. "I think this should work!"

    And then she runs right up to the cyborg, holding up the card as if judging the merc on something. Then the card seems to shimmer briefly with an image on its face, and she breaks into a grin. "/Yesss/. You're a Marksman! Okay, so I have a biiiig favor to ask."
Audrey Stormfist     "I see," Audrey answers to Eiko, the explanation making sense. So bad dimension leaking in, killing people, talismans a good way to go in without horrible pain or death ensuing. Got it. She also nods at Moonfin, though follows up with: "Are the talismans consumed upon use such that they must be constantly purchased? Or do you mean this as a way to plan ahead for future newcomers into these operations?"

    Seems handy to know.

    Either way.

    "Breaking things is one of my specialties. It will be my pleasure to assist in this."
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa says "I get it they are trying to snatch and convert locations on your world to basically terraform it to thier needs and make it easier for them to move in, right?"

She hears som more she grimaces, more and more she's glad her world does not have one lick of magic. It's got enough problems as it is. She listens a bit more and looks over to Alber for a moment.

"Good, and well I can take a bit of a pummling better than some Right, I'm better with guns either way."

Even if she could dead lift a motorcycle and then some now. If there's one thing she learned from last time? She's packing more ammo than she did last time.
Ban Ban just grins at Eiko. "Sign me up. I need a talisman thingy or something or I die? Where would I get one of theseee?~". Not that he needs it. He'd get better!
Alexis Maaka     Alexis seems about ready to go before Kazusa kinda calls her out for some reason.

    Any cool, collected professional element of the cyborg merc is disippated for a moment as she stares at the kid in the cardigan. "...okay, I'll bite. What is it?" She asks, confused but it's not like Kazusa is /wrong/ per say about the assertion.

    Friggin magic cards.
Eiko     Eiko doesn't have extra talismans, nope. What she CAN do is split the power on hers between multiple people, which is what she did last time, and also what she expects the others so equipped to be doing. She's planning on taking most of that work on herself, and relying on the stimulant that George gave her to keep her in fighting form long enough to get through. "I'll handle it, no worries, just make sure you pull your weight if you want a share, get it? And yeah, coins're good, if you know who to take 'em to. And I do." That's to Ban, and then to Audrey, "Multi-use. Takes a lot to break 'em, though I've heard it can happen."

     And then, back to facing the point of the dimensional breach. "Like I said, let me hold open the door, and everybody go on through. If you've been here before, you know that drill."

    She steps across the street--too choked with pedestrians to even worry about cars--and her form becomes oddly indistinct as she gets close to the building. She takes a step back, and resolves into full solidity again. "Woah. Okay, door's right here." Not a physical door, then, but just a more-or-less distinct boundary surrounding the building, slightly further in than the point at which the normal civilians are avoiding the area. "Roll in, crew." She turns to the side, and makes an obvious beckoning gesture. Anyone who's paying really close attention elsewhere will notice that this gesture attracts no attention at all from passers-by--she's already in that zone of 'everything is normal, nothing to see here.'
Kazusa Ujikane     "It's a card that lets me make a copy of your powers and then use them! It looks like The Marksman is responding to you, so can I?" Who knew a girl her age could make such great puppydog eyes.

    However, at the same time, Maaka receives a sort of formless impression. There are no words to it, there is no voice, it is merely a vague concept of a 'request'; but if one were to put it into words, it would come out something like...

    O keen-eyed ranger, will you lend your eye to this brave soul?

    Kazusa doesn't seem to notice it. But it's as if the card itself is asking her permission.
Ban Ban follows after Eiko, cracking his knuckles. Excitement! Adventure! Loot?! This was going to be worth it after all, it'd seem.
Alexis Maaka     Alexis kind of stares at Kazusa for a moment before she gets that weird concept of a question. Given how this is possible despite her head being partially synthetics, Alexis may just be better off saying yes.

    "Alright, do the thing I guess." She says, before she eyes the portal.

    She opens up her coat and pulls out a PDW chambered in 6.23mm rounds while wandering through the portal. "Kid, stick close to me and do not leave my back. Worst thing we can do is get split up while we're inside this." She tells Kazusa, nod seeming to care about the stares she's getting from civilians around her she's toting a future-Uzi lookin' thing in broad daylight.

    If they only saw what else she had.
Souji Murasame Souji waits and watches, listening intently to the additional information. When Eiko prepares the gate, Souji nods, and begins moving forward with a determined expression on his face, threading his way through the crowd to enter the area.

He is sure it is going to be weird.
Starbound Flotilla     George grins wide. "Ladies first, right?" He says, chuckling, as he swaggers on in. Immediately passed by Pavo, who is insisting on being first in line for the Starbounders. The piratey bird-girl is quite eager to pull vast amounts of weight, because she is greedy for DAT FUKKEN LOOT. The Starbounders will head in, and likely summon their respective armor just as soon as they do. The rest will likewise use their own talismans, hopefully sustaining the others. Pavo, then Seft, then Moonfin and George, and then Pavo and Biteblade, all offering stabilization to the others and doing their best to distribute the load.

    Many of them have their hands going right to their Matter Manipulators on their belts, intent on drawing their weapons as soon as they enter...
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa has to wonder about the other little bit with Kazusa but hey it's not wuite her business she does look at both for a moment, however she won't press thing. There's other things to worry about at this point. So she listens to Eiko but Kazusa getting an aspect of Alexis' power is pretty woah she has to admit. She's going to fall in with Alexis and do her best to help Kazusa, as after all Alexis has done a lot for her and maybe she can help.
Audrey Stormfist     With everything having been explained, and Souji moving forward anyway, Audrey follows suit, herself as ready as she'll be to head in. She doesn't know what to expect, but that's part of the job description. Hopefully, nothing that can't be solved through rigorous use of weaponry to things' faces or weak points.
r    She does make note of the strange girls and her card powers-- certainly something beyond what even the greatest Gamblers or card-based Jobs can accomplish. Perhaps a Gambler/Blue Mage? No, that'd be simplifying it far too much, she suspects. Offworlders often defy the ability to be categorized using only two terms.

    No reason to fret about it, either way. It's not like they're here to fight. She can worry about it if they ever have to.
Eiko     Eiko's giving Kazusa a curious look, but she's kind of distracted on account of holding things open for people to file on through. Copy powers're pretty OP, worth taking note. She gives a thumbs-up on seeing Maaka and the Starbounders already having their gear ready, then ducks in after everyone else is through.

    On the other side of the boundary, things are remarkably different. There are no people here. The ground is a cracked, lifeless field of dust as far as the eye can see. Winds blow up clouds of what might be sand in the distance, though everything is kind of foggy and indistinct, not in the 'actual fog' way but more like 'this is the background, you don't have to notice it.' It's not quite real.

    The foreground is dominated by a single structure, a tower of forbidding black iron, rising from the desert in perfectly straight lines and both rimmed and topped with spikes at a variety of angles. It's fairly narrow, but you could still fit, say, a corner shop on the ground floor. And where there had been an entrance door, there still is, though it now looks halfway between a door and a gate. Someone will have to pull the foot-wide iron rings if they want to yank that door open.

    High up, there's something moving in the air above the top of the tower. A lot of somethings, possibly black birds.

    Eiko immediately jams ASTRONAUT DRUGS into her arm. Aw, yeah.

    "So, inside? Unless someone wants to go straight up. Too bad I can't fly." Eiko shrugs at that. "Probably gonna be traps either way. It's a dungeon; you know how it is." Possibly looking at the Galiandans when she says that. She shields her eyes and looks up, but can't describe the birds, since she can't actually make them out from here. They're pretty high up and they've got wings, but given the place they're in... "No way are those just wildlife. You don't get wildlife in here."
Kazusa Ujikane     When Maaka gives her consent, the face of Kazusa's card changes, from the bow and arrow it had been to the cyborg's signature Sickle P40. Looking as pleased as can be at acquiring a new set of powers, she gladly falls into step behind Alexis. "Yes ma'am!"

    Once inside the boundary, she gets much more quiet, much less excited, but no less energetic. She's on high alert, looking at what used to be a vertical strip-mall with wide, slightly-nervous, mostly-amazed eyes. "It's like some kinda creepy villain's final lair..." she murmurs, keeping The Marksman close at hand. "I dunno, I'm alright with either way, I guess. I'm not very good at climbing, but uh..."

    Kazusa looks at Maaka. "...if she is, then I /could/ be I guess?"
Alexis Maaka     "Inside. I left my jetpack at home." Alexis says, tinged with sarcasm as she continues onwards towards the big-ass tower if nobody has any objections. She seems to take vague note of the spooky wasteland hellscape, but otherwise is less likely to get worked up over the details when there's more important shit to do.

    The fortress itself is very spooky, and Alexis uses her SUPER CYBORG EYES and COMMANDO INSTINCTS to sight down potential ambush points from both ground and above-ground level as the cyborg holsters her PDW and produces a grappling wire. Nodding to Pavo, and Kazusa as well, she begins to spin the wire until giving it a big toss at a distant window.

    Then she begins climbing, knowing that Kazusa probably will follow suit as she begins to ascend...
Audrey Stormfist     In they go! The world is SLIGHTLY less fucked up than expected, but in exchange for that, is more ominous and barren. Audrey keeps her poker face on straight. She's immediatly ordered to open the door, so...

    Without hesitation, the Heritor walks over to the large gate and gives a tug on the rings. She's pretty strong-- comes from having two physical combat classes, one being Monk. The tug is meant to test whether the door can be moved or not through use of superhuman strength. If it cannot, she'll move on to plan B.

    Which is to clench her gauntleted fist as it crackles with lightning, and strike a blow into the door. She's yet to meet a door that can RELIABLY keep her out. She has a grappling hook, mind, like any good field operative should-- that and a dozen other gadgets. But the front door is pretty tempting, too.
Souji Murasame As Souji passes through the boundary from city to desert wasteland, he reflexively raises a hand to ward off desert dust and sand from his eyes. He frowns for a moment, looking over the titanic edifice. As intended, he pays little intention to the background. The important thing is before them.

Souji does not waste time. He steps forward, moving to one side of the door while Stormfist opens it up. She and Eiko are probably going to be the tanks on this outing. Should it prove resistant to Stormfist, he will move in to assist.
Eiko     Eiko gives a little tug on her sword, but it stays sheathed, not budging. Damn, but that's annoying. She heads closer to the tower, still holding her katana by the hilt, and trying to glance around the side of the tower. It doesn't look much different around the right than it does straight up the front.

    Audrey will find that the doors CAN be opened--they aren't barred--though they're so solid that the weight makes them move very slowly. They're not quite rusted, but they do seem like they could use a lot more oil. For someone with her level of strength, though, it's not a big deal to just pull, and pull hard, and get one side of the double-doors--which is still enough for anyone to walk straight in--to slowly pull open.

    Nothing immediately leaps out when she tries this, but it's pretty dark inside. It's a fair guess that any traps will only trigger on actually going inside, then, which Eiko cheerfully puts into words, "Probably gonna start the shooting and stabbing soon as we walk in. OR they'll wait like ten or fifty paces. Never can be sure."

    Climbing the outside is easy enough, if you have a grappling hook or anything similar. There are lots of places to grab onto, though they're places too far apart to easily climb without equipment. Maaka will find that there are places, several stories up, that seems like they might have once been windows, but are quite solidly sealed up. The owner definitely doesn't want anyone going in this way, but the sealing job doesn't look impervious to heavy weaponry, if you know what you're doing. There's a lot of the tower still to go, so anyone climbing also has the option of trying further up. The sealed-off windows seem to be placed every three stories or so.
Ban Ban's going to join Kazusa and Maaka in climbing. He doesn't have climbing gear.

So he's just going to use his super strength to jump onto the spikes, obviously! He's going to make a decent pace, jumping from spike to spike until they're face to face with baddies. And then he'll gear to punch those guys.

Let's just hope he doesn't fall off.
Kazusa Ujikane     With their plan of action decided, Kazusa whips her hand forward, holding the card between two fingers and straight out. "By the card I choose, I stand as a hero! THE MARKSMAN!"

    The card bursts with a white light, then leaps out of Kazusa's hand and whips around to slam into her chest, only to flare out and pass over her body in a flood of sparks. Sparks that recolor her hair to a deep red, sparks that tan her skin, sparks that sink into her body and sparks that form a familiar set of clothes... followed by the full armor of the STALKER suit. When the light show fades, the now-armored girl lifts her new sidearm and looks it over, followed by the armor she now wears. "Huh. Little unexpected, but I can work with this." Shortly thereafter, she's on her way up after Maaka, hauling herself up only to stop outside a window.

    "What you think," she asks, looking between the window and the (other) cyborg, "Blast our way in?" She holds up her right forearm to punctuate the question.
Alexis Maaka     Alexis seems to pause mid-climb as she stares at Kazusa, with her turning into a copy of the cyborg with a MAGICAL GIRL COSTUME SEQUENCE. "Shit. I'm irrelevant now..." She snorts, before she goes back to climbing until she finds a sealed ex-window. She attaches her wire to a hook on her belt, before producing some charges from her duffle.

    These frame charges are connected via wires, and they affix around the 'window' in a square pattern before making little bleeping nosies, blinking red as Alexis primes a detonator.

    "Breaching." The charges go off after Maaka is in a safe position, before she rappels in and curls up her grapple to store once more.

    Drawing the PDW once more, Alexis turns on the attached tactical light and begins to survey the room she finds herself in, securing it.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa makes up her mind she's going to go to the out side she looks to Albert.

"You game for a little free running?"

She notes it's not going to take long however she did bring supplies and whelp away gos her own grappling hook, it's maybe not as advanced but it should not be too much of a problem right? She's a behind behind Maaka but she's keeping up well enough, she's starting to get used to what she can do. Also Kaz's transformation was something else. She just manages to catch keep up just in time for the breaching.
Starbound Flotilla     "Only one way to beat 'em then!" Pavo cries out. "Start shootin' and stabbin' before they do!" She draws her cutlass. "Take all ye can! Give nothin' back!" And if Audrey can get those doors open, and nobody... You know, tries to force some stealth, she'll immediately head in, battle-ready. But not irresponsibily. She's got light from her Matter Manipulator to illuminate things, she's moving quietly, and she's making sure to be light of step with her hollow bones and Avian jumping skills. She's prepared to dodge, leap, or strike; she wants to be the first to draw out any traps or guards.
Audrey Stormfist     Nothing blew up and the door is open. She'll go in first, naturally, especially when Eiko warns that those inside are likely waiting for them to go in to start firing. Always have your tank up front. With Pavo at her side it shouldn't be too hard to cover the others, right?

    Illumination is provided from her gloves, the green screens atop them lighting up like torches. It's nothing great, but in a pitch dark environment it's better than nothing. Her gunblade is unsheathed, knowing they're probably headed straight into a firefight.

    Internally she's just happy to be useful to Souji.
Souji Murasame After Audrey opens the door, Souji allows Audrey to take point. Souji is confident, but he does not let pride stand in the way of sensible party action. He moves in behind, one hand on his katana as he fans out behind Audrey, with Pavo in preparation for the inevitable assault. Pavo helps provide light, which causes Souji to nod. Matter Manipulators, handy tools. He doesn't talk audibly, sticking with the radio. No need to alert whoever is present to strategy.
Eiko     The walls of the tower may or may not be entirely invincible. They are, at least, extremely difficult to damage. The sealed-up window isn't, and the C4 blow it into wreckage, through which the climbers can pass and move on into the room beyond.

    Down below, Audrey takes the main tank role, which is probably the safest choice. While the room was pitch black, it suddenly isn't--and not just for Audrey's gloves and the opened door, but for the hole opened up three stories above them. Those looking through that hole are in a better position to get the actual dimensions of this ground-floor chamber, which takes up about five stories of height. Measurement is a little rough for just how empty it is, with a spiral staircase around the circular, outer edge being the only important feature, apart from the traps.

    Contrary to the medieval appearance of the tower's construction, the weaponry that pops up from panels in the floor and walls all has a distinctly high-tech appearance. Sleek lines cover what are, after they begin firing beams of coherent energy, obviously laser cannons of some sort--apart from the fact that the energy they fire is just slow enough to watch it move through the air. The complex, mechanical arms onto which each is placed swivel across several axes, correcting their aim and firing again, and again, only once every few seconds, but there are dozens of them in total, with a staggered firing schedule.

    Things are harder down below than up above. The majority of the cannons are in the floor or the bottom ten feet of the walls, and all of those are targeting the door. There's only a scattering in the upper ceiling and higher on the walls, all of which are positioned to point down. There's an opportunity there to start working from a relatively safe position, so long as the turrets that ARE swiveling to face the breach are taken out quickly.

    There's trap door blocking off the top of the stiarcase, looking like a wire fence on its side, though considerably heavier. That serves as the door to the next room up.
Audrey Stormfist     Audrey takes about a dozen laser blasts to the face. Not quite to the face, but they're direct hits. Fortunately, she's a Monk-- she didn't walk through that door unprepared.

    [Brace]

    She steels herself-- magic reinforces her body (and clothes) to the point the lasers scorch skin but don't dig any deeper. It still looks extremely painful, but with her free hand she makes a strange gesture.

    [Chakra]

    The wounds close, as rapidly as they're forming.

    "They are focused on me. Go!"

    She takes a few shots with her gunblade towards two of the turrets-- lightning bolts firing from the barrel of the weapon, trying to disable the turrets with strong electrical currents. She has a plan to retrieve one of the turrets a bit more intact, once enough of them are down that she isn't pinned in place constantly alternating between the enhanced defend command and self-healing.
Ban Ban passes Maaka and Kaz as they go through the first window, and insteads climbs towards the next one up. He doesn't have a breaching charge.

So, he decides to dive into the window! However, Ban's incredibly strong, and he's putting quite a bit of force into this. If he breaks it, he'll probably go through. Otherwise, he'll probably plummet to a swift and painless death and have to /start all over again/. And that'd be no fun!
Souji Murasame Souji doesn't yell orders when the lasers begin firing. He immediately throws himself to one side, a few beams sizzling and striking glancing hits on the initial salvo, burning painful black strikes across his suit. He grimaces in pain, but doesn't give these things the satisfaction of a yell. He thrusts out a hand, his mind forming the Pattern as he marshals his MP reserves, energizing it. He then calls out, "Haste-2."

There is a flash of orange light, the aura seeping into the others at the ground team as gleaming clocks appear, the arms swinging faster as the group is energized with temporal acceleration. Unfortuantely for the window team, they're too far away for him to affect.

Souji's movements accelerate as he moves in a blur, twisting and rebounding off of the wall as he strives to keep ahead of the rotation speed of the lasers. That is the key: You're not dodging the shot. You're dodging where they are /aiming/. As he backflips off of the wall, he thrusts his hands out again. "Thunder-2." He calls, crackling lightning splitting the air as he sends a surging blast of electricity cascading towards the emplacements, trying to knock out a group of them at once.
Kazusa Ujikane     The tower is breached, but Kazusa's smart enough not to dive right in even without the benefit of experience. The suggestion to use fiberoptics to scout is a good one, though, and that's exactly what she does; speaking as she takes a quick look. "Got a couple turrets that could be a problem. Up on the ceiling, looks like they've got the range to turn and take shots at the window. Think they're all close enough for an EMP grenade, though..."

    And without further ado, that's exactly what she decides to try. The transformed girl leaps in the window, rolls to a stop, and hurls a primed EMP 'nade up towards the turrets on the ceiling, aiming to catch as many of them as possible in a single group. If she misses any, that's what she's got a sidearm for.
Alexis Maaka     Alexis carefully guides Kaz through the usage of her tech, making sure to observe how Kazusa does her thing. It's pretty surprising to the cyborg how quickly Kazusa seems to adapt to this stuff, and she gives an approving nod. "A plus, kid." She grins a bit, before bracing her self to withstand the EMP while she takes notes of how Kazusa adapts to this.

    She may in fact end up liking this girl a lot.
Starbound Flotilla     Pavo takes a moment to say, quietly, "Avast." When the light comes on and she sees dozens of laser turrets pop out of the panels. Then she immediately leaps into action, enhanced to super-speed with Haste 2 from Souji. The cannon emplacements are all focused on Audrey, hopefully, and so Pavo immediately dashes into action, LEAPING to strike! The arms are great, because this means Pavo can dash and leap through what elements of the barrage that aren't directed to Audrey, and then slice at the robotic arms with her electrified SHOCK CUTLASS. And if she can cut them off, she is... Apparently looting them directly with her Matter Manipulator's auto-pickup mode. Her movement intends to go HIGH as soon as possible, bouncing rapidly between walls of the interior to strike at lasers pointing down.

    Albert calls out, "COVER!" He and Biteblade take opposite sides of the door, launching grenades and explosive arrows respectively at the storm of laser emplacements, while Seft draws a fancy high-power laser pistol and returns fire with much swifter, traditional lasers. The group as a whole is only pulling through this initial barrage because of Audrey taking their shots. They intend to clear out many of the floor targets to make it up to her. What few stray shots get through to them are likely to smash their stylized armor.
Starbound Flotilla     George gets into cover, but has no ranged options. Albert calls out, "Moonfin! Move up!" And with a superhuman rush of speed, the Hylotl breaks into a dash, allowing what few shots Audrey doesn't generously tank to slam against his blade and cut down his endurance through jarring impacts against it. He intends to head up, to the TRAP DOOR-ish structure! Where he hopes to activate the proper REVENGEANCE blade-slashing mode and cut a gap in the fence-like structure.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa is keeping up with thing and she pauses peering into the breach she takes a good look at what's inside and humms. She listens to Alexis over the comm for a moment. She thinks it's pretty solid really. She looks to makka and Ban as they go through ans she follows however Kotones now moves to stealth her self rippling and then seemingly merging with the enviorment. She has no idea how much good it will do but it might help.

<<So, Alexis and our new friend got any ideas?>>

If Kaz copyed Alexis right she'd have a comm now too right?
Eiko     The lasers have a lot of vulnerable points, at least for anything that either hits with enough force or strikes or causes an electromagnetic overload. Even if not outright destroyed, the arms that let them swivel aren't heavily armored, and hitting those will stop them from tracking, as bending the barrel will cause them to explode on next firing. Since the first thing Eiko does on getting hasted is to run into the side and bash the nearest turret in the arm, before going for a second a third, Audrey will have her pick of disabled but still partially-functional tech once she's done facetanking the room.

    Drawing all the aggro is unfortunately impossible, as the turrets switch targets to whatever's nearest or gets in front of them. However, they go down quickly from lightning and EMP, and their numbers are reducing quickly. And, as hoped for, someone moving sufficiently fast can get past with just grazing wounds, or none at all, if they just never stop.

    Things might get harder for Albert and Biteblade, with turrets popping out beside the door--but those are the ones Eiko personally went for, and the grenades are further reducing the trap's numerical superiority.
Eiko     Ban gets up to the next window, and starts bashing it in--only to discover just how resistant it is to being forced. Not immune, though! Putting everything he has into that, assuming he also has the leverage to put his strength to work (which the tower's frequent spikes make easier to find), will find him flying through--and into the waiting arms of the tower's next group of defenders.

    Loose, purple bodysuit, hood, mask, metal wristguards, straight, short blades, socks in sandals--this definitely looks like a ninja, if someone got their impression of ninja from old TV. New or old, his ballistic trajectory will take him past, or possibly straight through or into, the raised and waiting blades of half a dozen defenders, if he can't do something about that quickly.

    Either way, he'll get a brief impression of the rest of the room. Storage? Lots of boxes and barrels here. The spiral stairs keep going up, at least another three stories before reaching another door. There are wooden rafters here, providing the framework of two floors without actually including the floors.

    Meanwhile: The trap door between the first and second rooms is pretty sturdy, but not as much as the windows were. It isn't fully sealed, just heavy and locked. George's momentum lets him get the first slash in to cut through the wire, and that makes it easier to just keep cutting, still at high speed, causing it to break apart and fall, tumbling down the steps in pieces. The ninjas notice this, but the visible ones are still dealing with Ban.
Alexis Maaka     Time to stop watching the rook do her thing, Alexis decides. She takes off amid the remaining laser traps, firing bursts of tungsten-core rounds handily at each she sees, leaping across the destroyed turrets like a portly Italian plumber stomping mushroom monsters to death underfoot.

    She's a hell of a lot faster than she looks, and she nimbly seems to carry on alongside Kazusa without a beat missed. "C'mon!" She tosses another EMP over her shoulder, just for good measure as she ushers the rook along towards the staircase.

    "Check your corners, never know what you might find." She reminds, keeping her weapon trained.
Audrey Stormfist     Sadly Monks do not get any manner of taunting, so Audrey won't be able to do anything about their tendency to switch targets to whatever is closer and directly in front of them. Thankfully with all the damage flying around, this doesn't cause too much of an issue. So Audrey goes on with her plan to provide more turret samples to loot.

    The chamber of the gunblade pops open; the Heritor produces a white cartridge and slaps it in. As she pours magic into the weapon, it starts glowing faintly, and the blade becomes much, much sharper. Temper, a handy, if sometimes forgotten, black magic spell, one of the extraordinarily rare black magic spells that buff. This is only Temper-1, though, so it could be better.

    Whatever turrets remain, Audrey makes blinding dashes towards, slicing with the gunblade to try and cut the turrets off their support arms outright. The folks with the Matter Manipulators can handle picking them up, she wagers. Handy toys, those.
Kazusa Ujikane     As soon as Maaka takes the lead, Kazusa's right behind her, an SMG in hand to match the other cyborg's. She moves at a sidelong strafe, covering their flank and back while Alex takes the lead, although after a short ways, she seems to realize something. "Hey, got a thought." And then the optic camo of the STALKER suit switches on, hiding her from view and making her at worst 'still visible to hostiles that can detect her' and at best 'invisible to anything that relies on sight'. Could be a nasty surprise for anything that thinks Maaka's alone.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa would be dropping the odd grenade on her way, and there might be the slight ripple as she goes. While Alexis and even Kaz may be more direct than she is? Given her own origins? She's learning to well be far more sneaky and underhanded when she fight.

<<Thanks for the reminder Alexis.>>

She's also got an pistol of some sort ready, there would be the odd ripple in the air when Kotone picks up speed a bit, it seems her stealth does have a price so to speak. She see's Kazusa has picked up on thing fast as she also cloaks, hey if some things rely on sight here? It's a heck of an edge, if not it didn't cost them, much right?

<<Right, we make them think Maaka is alone if we're lucky. Not a bad plan.>>

She's going to keep up with this idea, hey maybe the three of them can wreck some baddies day with this plan, right?
Ban Ban goes flying straight through the window! But he forgot to plan how to stop himself, and finds himself flying straight into ninjas and their blades. RIP Ban.

Wait, no, he's going to get better. As the sliced up Ban flies forward, he's turning himself around and stomping his feet on the floor, putting skid marks in it as he stops his trajectory. And then he's moving towards the ninjas at an incredibly rapid pace, knuckles pre-cracked to break their jaws.

And the next time the ninjas spot Ban, his wounds are healed (but his jacket is still cut up). Also, he's attempting to break all their bones with his fists.
Starbound Flotilla     It would seem the exterior walls had some risk too! Albert's commando armor suffers some heavy blasting, and Albert himself takes some severe bruising wounding, but he covers George and Biteblade effectively. Moonfin, meanwhile, has had several jarring impacts reduce his combat efficacy. Pavo continues to dodge for a long time, suffering only light blasting because of her superior and enhanced mobility!

    As such, the Flotilla can advance, though Albert requires help from Biteblade to do so. "With us, Stormfist! We have no time!" Albert calls out to Audrey, asking her assistance, and intending to use his powerful squad tactics abilities to make sure she can tank the fewest shots to the most efficiency and cover the Starbounders' collective rise from the lower chamber.

    Moonfin explodes into the upper chamber. He is a samurai, which is practically a beacon for ninjas. Pavo shortly leaps in too, having looted enough for her fancy and wanting to get where actual storage is. So now a samurai AND a pirate just showed up in a room full of ninjas. Thankfully both have their blades drawn, and while suffering some exhaustion, they move to keep the entrance covered so that people advancing up the spiral staircase can have an open entryway. They'll engage anyone that gets close.
Eiko     It looks like the turrets can still track Kazusa through her camo, but only if she gets really close to them. Since she doesn't need to get close, this keeps her safe so long as she's not blindsided.

    Bullets, grenades, and swords all lay waste to the remaining turrets. At least four out of five have either been looted or damaged beyond still being a danger, by this point, and the few remaining, and still tracking, are easier to dispatch, for being easier to avoid on the way in. Eiko has gotten through with a few scrapes, continuing to lend her own (still sheathed) sword to bashing the traps, but her trenchcoat being a magic item has saved her from more serious damage. She's running up the stairs, now, after seeing George break that door. "C'mon!"

    Ban gets cut up, then suddenly isn't cut up anymore. This would be disconcerting to most, but the ninjas just roll with it, immediately getting into a swords-vs-fists fight. This would be really easily in their favor against most opponents, but Ban's regeneration kind of nixes that. Even as one ninja goes down, and then a second joins him, three more are slashing or stabbing Ban in the back, or at least trying to. These guys don't have a lot of defensive staying power, but they're quick and hard to avoid.

    This still leaves a pair of ninjas to engage Pavo and Moonfin from the front--and another pair to engage them from the back, all flashing blades and thrown daggers. The total number of bodies is now nine, with two of those downed. There don't appear to be any other enemies in the room.
Alexis Maaka     Alexis makes a surprised noise before she begins to understand Kazusa's idea in mind. "...hm." She then advances up the stairs, PDW ready while she counts on her armored trenchcoat to keep her intact.

    As hse makes her way up a floor, suddenly there are a BUTTLOAD of ninjas to contend with. "Well, this is happening." She murmurs, before she begins to engage a group of the ninja with...

    Fuck this, she's getting out the grenades. Said flashbang grenade is primed and tossed towards the feet of one of the ninja, just for good measure.

    Then she begins to shoot up ninjas with her PDW.

    Never expected ninjas, huh.
Audrey Stormfist     Once the turrets aren't an issue anymore, Audrey is hot on Albert's trail, following his instructions. He might not be her superior, but he's smart, and from a squad leader to another, you don't let your ego get in the way of following good orders.

    Though her gunblade is sheathed during the ascent, she has withdrawn out of her coat two new weapons-- a long spear, the bladetip shaped like a snowflake, and a nasty metal mace that hums with purple light. As the ninjas attempt to ambush Pavo and Moonfin, they will find the Heritor all up in their business.

    The spear cuts through the air with a chill, trailing ice behind, threatening to freeze targets stabbed with it (namely: those ninjas). Basically Blizzard-1/Ice-1. The large mace, on the other hand, would only show its effect upon reaching the near-impact point of its swing. Gravity-1. It generates a strong pull when it's near hitting, drawing the target in.

    Audrey is kind of a whirlwind of blows right now, trying to pry the aggressive ninjas off the crew.
Ban Despite the fact he's getting cut up over and over, Ban's actually /enjoying/ this! He's grinning like a mad man as he grabs one ninja but his arm, and spins him into a few of his friends. And then tosses him out the window Ban came in through. And then he gets back to taking care of the rest of them.

Once all the ninjas focused on him are gone...Ban's going out the window to /climb again/. Ballistic Ban, reporting for duty.
Kazusa Ujikane     When a particularly nearby turret turns towards her, Kazusa's reaction is to instantly snap her weapon up and fire off a short burst to neutralize it. After that, she's /very/ careful to keep an eye on any turrets that get particularly close. However, shortly thereafter, turrets stop being the only threat. As soon as Maaka starts opening up on the ninjas, Kazusa takes a step or two to the side, drops to one knee and begins doing the same; short, controlled bursts, trying to lead her fire, and also take advantage of the fact that - to normal eyes, at least - she's cloaked.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa is keeping a good pace, with Alexis on point and Kazusa also backing up the ninja's are goinbg to be in for a little bit of a thing here. She's not sure what the ninjas are but given these words are errasing people who get caught up in them if they fail to stop it. Ya she's going to be getting on the attack here. She'll wiat for Alexis to make her move first. She watches to keep an eye out for more trouble. She's now got her pistol ready and is doing short bursts fire as well, she's cloaked, so it might be hard to spot her as she's not moving very much as she takes her shots. Well if the ninjas are relying on sight alone.
Souji Murasame In the chaos, it's simple enough to lose track of Souji. The exploding turrets had quickly been getting disabled, and there's a great deal of firepower getting blasted throughout the area.

But where is Souji?

There is a rumble of thunder from across from the faceoff between the Starbounders, Audrey, and the ninja, as Souji holds his blade before him. his hand clenches around the handle, and he narrows his eyes. "Murasame." He intones. "It is time to feed."

The crimson ribbon binding the blade into the sheathe unties itself, and Souji withdraws the blade, the black metal gleaming in the dim light of the tower with deep crimson runes incides along its length. "Cower... before the end." He hisses, blurring forward with a hasted strike as he slashes past a pair of ninja, his weapon slashing through the air. A moment after he passes, a black and crimson trail lashes through the area, ripping through the air. Blood, if they have any, is drawn towards the weapon, pooling upon it and being absorbed into the weapon. As it does so, Souji's own wounds begin to heal.
Starbound Flotilla     The two Starbounders guarding the entry will cover their eyes when Alexis Maaka calls out the flashbang. And then, Moonfin steps forward with a dramatic flair to his step, sweeping the blade to one side and then up to his head, parallel with the ground. "Fourth Sea Hyltol Style: One Wave Sinks Two Ships." He rushes forward, all sweeping two-handed swings and deft dodges, but the first block he has to do against their initial rush means his dominant arm is growing increasingly exhausted and battered. He's oblivious to the strikes at his back, but he works in perfect samurai tandem with Souji, timing his swings with Souji's own.

    Pavo is the one who turns just in time to get stuck in the side. She parries away the strike at Moonfin even while she squawks out in pain and goes down. Biteblade bursts out of the lower floors now, attempting to tackle the one going after Moonfin. Biteblade's got two steel daggers in their hands and they're doing their absolute god damndest in a brutal trible style to stick the ninja in the neck while also getting important limbs somewhere within severing or mace-smashing from Audrey. Meanwhile Pavo has suffered major wounding to the side of her torso. She goes down, and can't get her cutlass around herself to the ninja, so she settles for trying to crack their head with her feathered elbow. "SCURVEY BILGERAT! GO JUMP IN THE DRINK!" George is the one who bursts out of the lower level next. He doesn't draw a weapon. Instead, since Pavo has hopefully forced the ninja attacking her to fall ONTO her, he's going to go for a much more stree-brawling kind of approach and try to slam a brutal kick into the ninja's sword arm, with intent to break it and send it tumbling at Audrey to finish off.
Eiko     Ban tosses a ninja out the window, and gets out again--though he might want to do something about that short sword stuck in his back, unless he can trust his regeneration to just pop those things out. About three stories further up, there's another window. He can make it there, but this high up, he can now see what those 'birds' were. They are not, in fact, birds at all. They are flying security drones with stabilizing wings, in the same sleek, technological style as the laser turrets. They are also armed with more energy weapons and mini-rockets, as demonstrated when several descend from the swarm above the tower and begin firing on him. At least one is zooming past him, getting fairly close to increase its accuracy while staying well out of arm's reach, but most are farther back.

    The rockets will explode whether they hit him or not, without doing any noticeable damage to the tower, though the explosions can be heard from within.
Ban Good news! The sword is dislodged out of Ban's back, and will no longer be a problem for him!

Bad news! The sword got dislodged as Ban got hit by a mini rocket and sent flying to the bottom of the tower. RIP Ban.

But, he's not going to very kindly put up with this, no sir. As he stands up again, wounds gone once more, he's finally grabbing that three-sectioned staff of his. But he doesn't jump up the spires again. He just looks up at one of those drones...and whips the staff upwards.

BANISHING KILL

And with that, Ban's going flying, staff striking at the drone. He's not entirely sure if this will actually /kill it/, as he rises above the drone, looking down on it. And also aiming his trajectory to land on top of a spike. It's time to have some fun!
Eiko     The ninjas are quick to react and aware of potential traps, dodging as expertly as one might expect. They're not, however, faster than bullets, even if it is hard to get a bead on them, and they get punctured pretty easily once shot. The flashbang got a few to scatter, and Maaka brings one down while he's leaping toward her. Audrey's spear is dodged, but not the ice effect, which slows one target down long enough that she grabs him AND his buddy with Gravity-1, the magic throwing off their acrobatics and giving an opening to get both of them. It's also getting her more attention.

Eiko makes things much worse by doing something inexplicable to anyone without detailed magical senses, but that involves launching a surge of black smoke toward the two ninjas Audrey aggro'd, that then spreads to several more. Now there are four ninjas all being pulled toward her mace, all of which are slowly freezing into ice blocks. She mutters something that sounds like "pandemic."

    This doesn't leave many visible targets, but it does leave several easy ones, and Kotone and Kazusa are both in a good position to finish them off before they can manage a counterattack. Again, ninjas turn out to be vulnerable to bullets.

    Of those /not/ debuffed into temporary helplessness, Souji finds two targets--and they do bleed, quite heavily. It was less obvious with gunshot wounds, but they're definitely living beings. And though they try, his blade is strong enough to shatter their own swords without slowing him down. They're not actually dead, just badly wounded, and already struggling for secondary weapons--until Moonfin covers the remainder, taking that moment of vulnerability to finish them off.

    This leaves a larger body count than there appearaed to have been ninjas moments before, and that isn't even counting the one on Pavo, which is finally taken down by George. This is still probably not proof that there are no ninjas in the room, a fact confirmed by the fact that, three stories up, the trap door to the next room is opened, and a series of forms briefly flash through it.

    Now there are no hostiles left (if you can believe that), though there's still all those boxes and barrels.
Alexis Maaka     Alexis takes a breath as she and her cloaked lady counterparts stand there, amid the Starbounders, Ban, Audrey, Souji, and several dead ninjas. She swaps magazines, chambering the weapon deftly before she approaches the boxes and barrels. Holstering her PDW, she begins to smash one of the barrels open with a swift kick, before she draws a large knife to pry it open as she reaches inside to sift through.
Eiko     Ban goes flying. The drones zoom about in an attempt to not get hit, though they are not particularly good at this. Mostly, they rely on fast, random motion, which is usually enough. Given that Ban's ability pulls him straight at his opponent, it isn't enough in this case--and the rotary blades keeping the drone humming in the air are pretty fragile, so just running into them like this is more than the drone can take. Rest in pieces, drone. (These are, fortunately, not staying aloft on rocket boosters or anything like that.)

    Now he just has to deal with a swarm of at least a dozen more. The rockets come in staggered bursts, as the ammo for that seems limited, but all of the drones have those same energy cannons.
Eiko     The boxes are mostly empty. Except for the ones that are mostly empty, but have piles of plastic coins. The barrels are all like that.

    Some of the boxes are absolutely full of plastic-wrapped convenience store lunches. These ones do not contain any coins. The lunches have bar codes on them, but no price tags. Some of them seem like they should be refrigerated, but all look edible, despite the lack of a fridge.
Audrey Stormfist     It's not like Audrey didn't sustain a few cuts or further laser shots in the meantime; ninjas are ninjas, after all. If they were just random dudes with swords it'd be another story. Still, once they run, the Heritor puts the weapons away, and will finish off any still-living ninja, frozen or otherwise, if any, with cold but professional strikes, using a black dagger she'd retrieve from inside her coat as well. Death as a status effect is... not very effective, most of the time, but against weakened, already dying targets, it's a great finisher.

    With that done, she'll glance towards Eiko, then Moonfin. "What did you do, exactly?" she'll ask the former, and then the latter: "I've never seen that style before. Would it be too much to ask for documentation on it if it's available? Not that it'll replace proper training, but I am curious."

    She'll let others handle the crates and barrels for now.
Kazusa Ujikane     Well, Maaka seems to know the most efficient way of putting her (their) abilities to work in opening these barrels and boxes. So Kazusa goes about doing the same thing.

    And pocketing as many of the plastic coins as she can. And several of the lunches.

    She might be using Maaka's powers and a bit of her personality, but she's still Kazusa, and this is all pretty obviously 'the loot'.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa is able to take down a few ninja,s who seem to be very much vunrable to bullets she sees as the lat ninja approaches she reloads her gun, then moves to . She also drops her cloak and gets to work on the boxes and barrles, she's going to grab what loot she can, after all it's going to be useful for now.

"Not bad..."
Alexis Maaka     Alexis seems to stare at Kazusa for a moment, confused by the loot present before she shrugs her shoulders.

    Nab nab nab. She grabs some of the lunches and coins, stuffing them in her duffle of LOOT just for good measure. She also grabs a plastic lunch and sniffs it. Sniiiiiiff. Removing the packaging, she shrugs again and NOMF goes the cyborg as she tosses the wrapper away.

    Satisfied, somewhat, with her loot today, she pops her neck. "C'mon kids, let's get going."
Starbound Flotilla     Pavo can stand, and she'll be okay, but she can't much fight right now. Using the butt of her cutlass, she slams open crates brutally, vacuuming up coins with her Matter Manipulator again. She also grabs the first sandwich she can find and crams it down her throat, chomping through it with her beak in a piratey way after she haphazardly constructs a NANOSTOVE onto the ground and sort of rubs the meals on it.

    The rest of the Starbounders seem in fighting condition, after Albert manages to get a stim into his thigh, and immediately press their advantage. "We have no time. We move on immediately." Drawing his hammer, he prepares to lead the charge up the stairs. Seft draws a battle-axe and pairs up with him, and they'll try to mostly flank at Audrey's sides yo dysty heading upstairs, with the remaining three rushing up behind them. Pavo stays behind to clean the entire chamber out.
Ban As Ban jumps from spike to spike to dodge the blasts...he's suddenly aiming at the next avaliable window, and diving at it. INCOMING! He does wonder if those drones are going to stalk him in, though. Though close-quarters would likely be more useful for fighting them.
Starbound Flotilla     "The Oceanic Styles of Hylotl swordsmanship are a profound school. To understand them, you must first understand our race's superior philosophical perspectives." Moonfin says. "To build a castle with no foundation is to build no castle at all. I can send you an extensive library of requisite Hylotl philosophical texts." He doesn't have documentation for that one style, and he's covering it up by being a pretentious jerk.
Eiko     Eiko is grabbing coins, largely ignoring the lunches, though she does tear one open and cram the more immediately appetizing bits in her mouth, on account of stimulants having given her the munchies. She doesn't take too long, because Pavo will be able to vacuum up loot a lot more efficiently than she can grab it. Then, it's on to the last trap door, which she will likely wait for Audrey, Albert and/or Seft to push out of the way and jump through first. The stairs on this floor are actually wide enough that two or three people might be able to fight comfortably, so getting everyone through quickly won't be tough.

    In the meantime, she does explain a little. "I got this, like, curse magic. If stuff's getting frozen or burning or paralyzed or whatever, that's my ammo." She shrugs. "It's about as vague as it sounds."

    And, given that this is about the time that Ban breaks through the next window and into the room--it might be a good idea to get up there quickly, even if the drones aren't following him, which they're not, and even though the room seems empty, apart from a square of four pillars in the middle, leading up to a large, square shaped hole in the ceiling another three stories up. There are no stairs here, but there are a few barrels, and the same rafter configuration as the room below, with the exception of that central shaft being clear.
Audrey Stormfist     "Oh. I see. So you are able to amplify or use status effects to make them deadlier. That's impressive," Audrey comments, trying to remember if that's any Job's purview. There's Green Mages, who specialize in the debuffs, but they don't draw power from it or amplify them exactly... perhaps Arcanists? She isn't too well-versed in what the magical Jobs do, though. And as usual, it's likely whatever Eiko did completely defies classification, anyway.

    While others handle the loot if that still isn't done, Audrey will keep in formation with the Starbounders, advancing-- especially as Ban makes his grand entrance right through a window, and drones become visible outside. At least they're not trying to come in, but best not stay in their line of fire regardless.

    To Moonfin, she also asides: "I will take your word for it. If you can forward those documents, I'd be very grateful."
Souji Murasame Souji turns back to the battlefield as the combined strike leaves several dead ninjas. He looks back to Moonfin and nods in acknowledgement, his blade still out of its sheath. Even as some might watch, any remaining blood on the blade soaks into the surface, vanishing. "The spirit hungers." Souji states, twisting the blade and immediately moving for the stairs. "Stormfist, Moonfin, we have to keep up the pressure. If we wait they will have more time to defend and make our battle more difficult." He begins mounting the steps, only pausing to let Stormfist and Eiko get on point.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa gets the call from Alexis to stop looting, so she wisely does so. She's managed to pack away a good deal of loot and the weight if any isn't much of an issue to her.

"Right."

She hates to leave some loot but she knows it's foolish to let one's greed over come her. So away she goes at this point she does however get a lunch that looks all right on her way out however.

"Still it seems to be worth something right?"

She pauses at the empty room and at that moment she does however seem a bit on edge. She knows the Pavo and the others likely.

"Keep alert, I don't like this."

She's a rookie still herself yet? she got enough experience to not like this.
Kazusa Ujikane     Seeing Eiko getting ready to book it upward is... a tad concerning, perhaps. So Kazusa quickly finishes stuffing coins (and one last bento) into the plastic grocery bag she picked up off the street on the way in (shut up, litter is a problem, she's HELPING, see) and turns to follow after the girl. In the process, she activates her stealth camo again, and thankfully enough, it obscures the stuffed grocery bag as well. So there's that, at least.
Alexis Maaka     Alexis seems to take going upward as a sign, and she follows suit as she begins to make her way upwards after she's done looting stuff that will probably be useless outside of these weird sub-worlds. She does draw her PDW again, covering corners as she opts to be the tank for Kotone and Kazusa given their cloaking devices. It's only natural, right?

    She does make a note to show up here again with her own STALKER gear next time around. And a coilgun.
Eiko     The central shaft lights up. Only that--it seems like it has electric lighting, and it shines downward, but there aren't any lights in the room itself, apart from the natural lighting via Ban's entrance. A flash of sparkling color somersaults down, bouncing against the walls, finally landing as a crouched figure, which then stands and makes a beckoning pose, one palm forward and the other raised behind her head. It's a woman in a bright red cheongsam, hair up in a covered double bun and face mostly obscured by a veil. Eiko immediately points at her and shouts, "That's a /China/ dress. You're in Japan! Ninja are Japanese!"

    She naturally ignores this, and while it's neither Chinese nor Japanese that she speaks, the language is still translated to everyone here. "Intruders! Face justice!"

    Eiko is still groaning, "This is all wrong," as second somersaulting figure joins the first. This one is much like the first, but wearing green, and holding an overly fancy spear. The third to appear is in blue, and holding a tasseled sword that begins to spin in complicated fashion, while edging forward. Blue is silent, though Green repeats, "Fall, evil-doers!"

    Eiko draws her blade. "Gimme an opening if you can." Quick eye-shifts to either directions. Almost whispering, "Where the hell is the core, and why aren't they sticking back to defend it?"

    It's at this point that a storm of daggers are thrown at the group from every possible direction. More ninja, hiding behind the barrels or among the rafters, all striking at once. They look much like the ninja previously slain, though these are clearly the female of the species, as judged by the prominent fishnets.

    Eiko is not, for the record, well-equipped to deal with this kind of attack. That would probably be why an "Oh, shit!" can be heard from her direction.
Alexis Maaka     "Fishnets, seriously?!" Alexis says as suddenly kunoichi show up, as well as three colorfully garbed fighters begin to ambush the group. She herself catches a few knives in her back, but her cybernetically augmented body and armored coat seem to leave her rather unworried by this.

    She pries another dagger from her shoulder before she lets off a burst of fire towards the nearest ninja, not really leaving a lot of room to mess around as she draws a hilt in her spare hand.

    A blade the length of a chokuto unfolds, and her HF sword begins to adopt a defensive stance.
Ban Suddenly, daggers! As soon as Ban stands up from his crash, he is taking several to the face, as ninjas strike. He charges at a group of them with his staff (still taking some daggers)...and they crash out his window openining, to plummet all the way to the bottom.

They'll be fine. Maybe.
Eiko     Ban takes his share of the fight outside, replacing the need for things like 'weapons' or 'armor' with suicidal recklessness and an apparent inability to die. Every knife he takes is at least one not stuck in anyone more vulnerable to stabbing, so at least there's that. Thanks to his staff, he even gets a few of them at once to go with him. Their acrobatics are probably not going to save them from a nine story fall through nothing but air, onto dry ground.
Kazusa Ujikane     Oh shit. More ninjas.

    And this time they're wearing outfits that /stand out/. Which means they're extra dangerous.

    Kazusa drops low and begins darting to one side as soon as the first one drops, looking to take advantage of her invisibility. That plastic bag is going to be a little bit of a hindrance, though, so she drops it out of sight behind a barrel herself, and takes a moment of quiet to get set up.

    Then she starts hurling every single flashbang she has into the rafters, one after another after another. Her timing is just right so that they go off at the height of their arc, right up in the rafters, right where they'll make life difficult for any lurking ninja that need to balance without interference from things like 'explosions of light, sound and concussive force going off in their faces'.
Audrey Stormfist     The nuances between Japanese and Chinese culture are lost on Audrey, being a dirty, dirty non-Earthling. She can mostly make note of what Eiko says and try to remember it in the future if knowledge of how your enemy dresses were to become critical information to have on-hand.

    Without wasting time, the Heritor reaches into her pocket, pulling a large martial arts staff out. It's vaguely brown and green, presumably etched with a Quake-1 or some other nature/wood/earth Spell Matrix of some kind.

      Attack
    > Instinct
      Martial Arts
      Item

    [Wermut]

    Audrey storms in, and makes a wide arc with the staff, in a full 360 swing. It trails magic behind, which decays unusually slowly. "WERMUT!" The staff's strike, on top of being able to hit most opponents in the room regardless of whether they're in melee range or not (Heritor techs are great about being ranged melee strikes like that, non-elemental though), attempts to inflict Slow-1 upon the ninjas and three significant boss figures. It's not THAT big a deal, and definitely would have more punch coming from a Time Mage or something, but every bit helps.

    Plus the wide staff swing allows deflecting a volley of daggers.
Starbound Flotilla     Seft readies her battle-axe aggressively, and rushes in at the green one. "Aggressive. I am sure you will." The thing about polearms is that they depend on people going down when they're stabbed, instead of being heavily armored robots who can take a stab to the gut and keep going, with intent to behead the opponent immediately with a vicious battle-axe swing. She's battered by daggers that turn her into a pincushion, but she seems to have been protected most of this battle, and so she's still got a fresh endurance, compounded by being a machine.
Starbound Flotilla     Albert is still wounded, and must help the others, and continue to function as a tank. KOTONE is the one he moves to cover, her being the weakest of the group and also the one most focused on ranged combat. Sustaining several brutal stabs, his body shields her from damage where he can while his heavy hammer is used to slam any who get near away, shattering bones where he can.
Eiko     Kazusa's guess that 'there are ninjas in the rafters' was, in fact, correct. Their stealth is interrupted, and even after the flashes, they're still going to be easier for everyone else to see. The unluckiest of them actually fall, having been too close to just weather the storm.

    Audrey's attack hits, even if the staff itself doesn't. While the three in the colored dresses are stronger than the mooks faced so far, they're not strong enough to shake off this attack completely. That they got hit at all means that Eiko has her opportunity. She's limping a bit, and has been stabbed in at least four different places (having managed to use her relatively meager sword skills to only deflect two), but she doesn't need to actually reach her target to get her magic out, either. The smoke rolls down her arms, coils around her blade, and swings out as the blade slashes air, striking the RED woman. Red is no longer slowed as the smoke hits her, but in turn she's taken a deathly pallor. A second swing flourish from Eiko's blade, and GREEN finds herself on fire, just in time for Seft to reach her. This is naturally accompanied by screaming, though unfortunately also by the spear blocking the axe as she takes a defensive posture, then leaps back as she tries to take distance and put herself out, still taking damage in the process.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa is thankful for the chances she gets to work with Alexis and Kazusa is proving her self to be very reliable on a team as well. She keeps her self ready and she does debate trying to find other weapons she really finds to find something heavy hitting. She's going to get into things now as they reach the core however are a lot of female ninjas now.

Okay seriously that's kinda tacky."

She now readies her pistol again and keeps ready and at this moment it hits her her close combat skills rely almost entirely on her body's raw physical power. She gets a few shots off but she's close to the others and she's taking some knives too. One or two impact and sink into her and that is a tell tale sign she's there also it hurts, she's forced to pull them out but she's now known to be there. However she might have been spotted this point and she's forced to go hand to hand and and to shut off her own cloak. Thankfully Kazusa stun grenades do get her some breathing room.
Eiko     Kotone and Albert won't be too harried. The kunoichi seem to prefer ranged combat, at least more than all the ninja previously. And the previous ninja are dead, so who can blame them? There's still a slight exception to this, sort of--one of the kunoichi gets close enough to start slashing the pair with a chain-sickle, a weapon particularly difficult to shield against. Her main target is Kotone, trying to down her before she can bring she can get a hit with her gun, or Albert can catch the shinobi with his hammer.
Kazusa Ujikane     That's a pretty good start right there. Kazusa can't say she's dissatisfied. But they're still breathing at the moment, which means that they're still a threat. Especially if they're ninja. You totally can't trust ninja to not kill you.

    So she sets aside the sidearm she's been using, and instead switches out for one Alex no doubt would find much more familiar... if Kazusa were still visible, anyway. Regardless, the telltale report of the Sickle P40 opening up with micro-explosive rounds probably says all it needs to.

    Kazusa's also not really bothering to hide her location anymore, even if her optic camo is still on. She's taking single, precise shots, one after another, sticking and moving, trying to take out as many as she can. It makes her much easier to track.
Starbound Flotilla     George is also mostly fresh in terms of endurance. His EVA suit can take a few knives. He rushes at the ninjas, drawing his STUN BATON from his Matter Manipulator and closing the distance swiftly. And he just starts jabbing and smashing, trying to bust heads and electrocute the foes. This sort of thing tends to preclude all blocking, and his brutally relentless style, despite having several knives sticking out of his suit at awkward angles, is difficult to dodge, in a sense.
Starbound Flotilla     Biteblade launches into violence immediately! Though somewhat exhausted, they are more severely damaged due to the daggers than most of the Starbounders. Their response tactic is to POUNCE VIOLENTLY at a nearby ninja and attempt to tear off an arm with their teeth and start devouring it. This seems to be intended to help them jump-start their healing and frenzy-motion. If they CAN, they'll start moving with superhuman speed and regenerating faster than those daggers can stab, and the little plant-person will start trying to stick the swarm in their many necks.
Starbound Flotilla     Moonfin does not attack. Daggers fly all around him, and occasionally INTO him, but he does not strike. Instead, he closes his eyes and feels the battle, the positioning here. He takes a deep breath and opens again, looking around... He's seeking to look beyond the fight itself. Though his sword is still drawn, his focus here is currently on locating the CORE, based on a combination of the combat tactics on display here (and what they could be defending) and on any signs in the environment of where an Important Thing might be.
Alexis Maaka     Alexis chases down one of the martial artists, her PDW raised as she goes after Blue, only to get flashbanged. Her optics seem to adjust immediately before the explosion, as do her auditory sensors (eardrums) as well. With her weapons in hand, she lunges at one of the ninjas and slashes at them in a random strike. Meanwhile, Blue will get a burst of tungsten-core SMG fire, a burst that's just enough to fell anybody with a good enough aim.
Eiko     George is going to find his foes, though they will also find him. Covering your rear is important but difficult in a fight full of highly mobile enemies, so it's pertinent that when he does manage to jab his shock stick into an enemy, there's a second one coming straight down at his back from above, aiming a pair of knives for either shoulder.

    Biteblade will have trouble grabbing an opponent, as they are notoriously slippery and dodge-prone. A chance to do so anyway will come one tries to strke them with the weighted end of her chain-sickle, trying to tangle the floran up, and finish them with the bladed end. If they can somehow take the hit but not be rendered helpless, they can reach their target by following her weapon.

    Moonfin might get the feeling that, as tough as the three central women are, they shouldn't be the final defense. Like Eiko said, the core has to be defended. And there's one obvious path through which it could be--where the three dropped down from.
Starbound Flotilla     Albert tries to block the chain-scythe several times and fails. Kotone will have to deal with that. After several failed attempts, he gets extremely angry. This motivates him to fucking lob the hammer at his opponent to attempt to disable them, then do a mad apelike sceeching rush towards them to start trying to punch them in the face, and not stop.
Starbound Flotilla     Seft seems quite satisfied with shoving the green one back for now, actually. This means she didn't get to stab the robot-girl, whi immediately turns around and focuses on the the other two as soon as Moonfin calls out, "Seft! Draw attention!" Swinging intensely, she means to keep them off balance and on edge, focused only on her, meaning to prevent them from looking away from her without a punishing strike!
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa is going to have a rough time of time of it now as one gets in close to her as soon she finds she's up agains a very old, however a very nasty ninja. The Kunoichi. She's now not only hit and messed up some more she can't get another shot off she's getting cut up pretty bad, and Kotone now tries to use her intante speed to try an grab the chain and violently pull to either break it or pull it free of her enemy's hands. Is she pulls this of she's just going to deck the ninja lady.

"You shouldn't be trying to STEAL OTHER PEOPLES WORLDS!"
Eiko     In a display of just how good she is, even with the lingering slow from Audrey's attack, Blue actually twirls her blade such that almost every bullet strikes against its surface. This would normally result in a broken sword, but it doesn't this time. She still gets hit, having not blocked every shot, but the damage isn't enough to visible slow her.

    The ninjas don't have nearly that skill, but Maaka's sword strike still at least puts the nearest one on the defensive, and saves her from another knife to the back. Maaka will still need to finish her off, though, and the wounded Blue is coming at her with intent to kill.
Souji Murasame     Souji arrives on the scene and looks upon the new, unusual, more dangerous ninja crew. "You are throwing away your lives." Souji says, simply. There is a shower of knives, Souji taking one in the arm as he slashes, a blast of thunder crashing outwards to deflect and scatter a number of them. He pulls the blade from his arm and drops it to the gloor, letting the wound stain his suit red. "You have chosen your path. Now face judgement!" Souji calls out.

    Mystic Knight
        > Thunder Blade

"Thunder Blade." He intones, as his weapon crackles with a sudden burst of murderous electrical force. He lunges into melee, using his hasted speed to cleave into and through his opposition. A hand sweeps out. "Gravity-1." He intones, A dome of gravitic force washing out to attempt to drag down and hold the ninja for critical moments, allowing him (and others) to drive forward in another column dash strike. His blade demands blood, and these ninja are in prime position to donate.
Starbound Flotilla     Moonfin takes another deep breath and wipes blood from his three eyes that had sprayed into them. The others are at work on the group. He dashes forward, sliding his katana in a sheathing motion into his Matter Manipulator, and tries to leap up while the ninjas and the Elite Trio are occupied. He hopes to launch himself, using jump-enhancement techs developed by the Flotilla, through the passage the trio arrived through, up to the area above.

    This is, presumably, where he'll seek and ideally destroy anything core-looking, if this is all working.
Audrey Stormfist     With Eiko capitalizing on the debuffs inflicted, Audrey puts the staff away, back into her coat-- RPG inventories are great like that. Rather than pull another weapon out, she clenches her fists, and the magitech gloves she's wearing crackle loudly, almost like thunder. She surges in-- towards 'Blue'. No fancy techniques, no screaming attack names. Audrey just delivers rapid, electrified punches in an insane flurry, but with a goal: to disarm Blue and take her sword.

    Having taser fists is usually pretty good for that, but you can tell she's trained to knock and grab weapons out of people's hands. Probably because she's a Heritor and directly benefits from doing that sort of stuff.
Alexis Maaka     Alexis notes Blue being able to deflect bullets, and suddenly makes a whirling moment as she swaps to her sword against Blue. Her PDW meanwhile aims towards the ninja as Maaka lets off a burst of fire, her sword lashing at the disarmed Blue to finish the job on both ends.
Starbound Flotilla     George takes one in one non-dominant shoulder, spraying blood, but he manages to avoid the next; ROBUSTING is a very complicated martial art that involves a complete lack of the concept of "up" and "down", and that means that rolling dodges and suddenly engaging enemies behind him as if they were enemies below him, using sweeping kicks and dodging with rolls while still jabbing violently with that stun baton.
Starbound Flotilla     Tangling a Floran would be more viable if it weren't for the fact that Biteblade is entirely willing to bodily rip an entire arm out of its socket just to get a chance to sink their teeth into the neck of one of those ninjas, creating too much slack to tangle them before closing the distance swiftly and pouncing like a monster, hissing and screeching!
Eiko     Gravity is particularly difficult to dodge, and proves again to be an effective tactic, especially coupled with the earlier slow, to keep down a dodge-heavy opponent. Souji's sword continues to take its blood tax from the debuff-combo'd enemies, while his magic shows good effect at disrupting the thrown weapons. The kunoichi don't speak--it's uncertain if they can, but the tri-color women yell in response,

    "This is our lord's land!"
    "We brook no foreign interference!"
    "Your only choice--"

    The last line is interrupted as Audrey punches Blue's sword. Blue's on the defensive, backing off while still weaving a complicated pattern of strokes to stab or slash into the Heritor without getting her weapon grabbed. She doesn't know about her opponent's abilities, but she does know not to let someone with gloves grab her sword.

    It happens anyway, because Audrey's trained to do that and better than she is. For her trouble, though, the moment the sword is firmly grabbed, Blue leverages the hold to aim a powerful, spinning kick to the side of her head.
Eiko     Kazusa has a short period in which everything is going perfectly and enemies are dying. This ends abruptly as her position, once given away, is attacked from multiple sides, at ranges long and short. She's managed to draw enough aggro that there are daggers coming from one side, swords from above, a whip from the front, and a chain near her feet. She's racked up a mean bodycount in the meantime.
Eiko     Moonfin is in a unique position. It is possible that he triggered this, though given that he is not immediately attacked, it may be that he just stumbled onto it before everyone else.

    There is some kind of squat, tank-like golem coming down the shaft. Or perhaps a large robot? You could certainly fit a few people inside it, though it has very stubby legs and arms, and does not look particularly deadly--apart from the rows of missile launchers and the claws. It is also covered in antennae, seemingly one atop every surface. It reorients, hovering in the air with constant downward velocity, to face him with a single, red eye on a hooded, dome-like head.

    Moonfin can try to do something to it now, but there may be only a small window of it not attacking. It is currently just making a lot of beeping noises, like someone dialing a phone.

    Drones begin zooming into the building, through the hole where there used to be a window. They're far less maneuverable indoors, but they still have laser(?) cannons, and a few of them still have mini-rockets left. Anyone not in close range to three boss-women is liable to be immediately targeted, as all remaining rocketes are fired.
Kazusa Ujikane     The noise Kazusa makes when she discovers herself surrounded is definitely words. They are not very polite ones, though. And then she's dancing and dodging and just barely avoiding being flayed alive, only just managing to parry a sword strike from above with the arm of her STALKER suit - the protective barrier keeps it from injuring her, but the impact alone hurts, and the dead-on thrown daggers from other angles are enough to pierce through that and actually hurt. "Gh-!" And now she's bleeding, and the optic camo probably won't be able to hide that perfectly.

    Then the original owner of her powers reminds her she has a sword. A high-frequency sword at that.

    Oh right.

    In the next heartbeat, Kazusa becomes a nigh-invisible flurry of sword strikes and gunshots. With the Sickle in her left hand and the collapsible HF Blade in her right, she starts parrying, dodging, slicing at anything in range with an impossibly sharp blade, and shooting anything that isn't with a ridiculously beefy sidearm.
Audrey Stormfist     Audrey acquires a sword!

    The mood is quickly offset by the kick, which sends her flying back a few feet-- she's graceful enough not to land on her ass or face, or crash into anything, but that impact probably still left quite the mark. That is to say, she's bleeding, and it flows down her cheek. A strike to the head like that could have been a huge problem if she wasn't so sturdy. It's with a brief, pained grunt that the Heritor straightens herself back up, and then grips her newly acquired weapon. Passive magic effects are certainly different from a Spell Matrix-- it's actually weird, holding a weapon you DON'T need to feed with magic when you swing.

    This is offset by what it provides, and Audrey grins.

    "Hulan."

    [Hulan]

    The weapon shines, and provides Audrey with a minor Haste effect. But more importantly, she follows up by running back towards 'Blue', with the enhanced speed of the sword, to suddenly deliver a chain of thrusts at fairly high speed, in a manner that should be all too familiar to the former wielder of the sword. There's a minor range boost, like with the previous Heritor tech, but since Audrey is running into melee to use it, it's only going to be useful if her target dodges backwards.
Eiko     Biteblade gets their pound of flesh. Or rather, the whole ninja, who does not think to let go and run quickly enough, thus becoming Floran buffs. George's opponent lets the one knife stay in his shoulder, keeping the other to rush in and engage in close combat, though he has a good chance of winning that encounter just in time for another opponent to target him. (If not, that will mean more trouble.)

    Seft manages to draw Red's attention, which could be very bad if Seft keeps it long. Despite the deathly-ill look, Red's still has strength and speed in the 'obviously superhuman' range. If the floor weren't so nigh-invincible, there'd be visible damage from every stomp. The effect of her punches is best avoided.

    Albert would probably not have quite reached his opponent had Kotone not grabbed the weapon. As is, they together succeed, and hit that enemy however they like.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa has pulled the weapon free and opened them up now with it in hand she seems intent to keep it for now but what does she do just punches the enemy ninja out. Oh ya she's wearing shock gloves so a cyborg punch with a side of taser, and if there's anything left for Albert to worry about. She's going to keep the weapon though.
Eiko     With Audrey after Blue, Maaka has time to deal with the opponent on her other side. That taken care of, they can both go after--

    "How did--" you know my name? she would have asked.

    --they can bother go after Hulan, the blue-clad martial artist, with the flanking advantage. She sees Maaka's weapon coming from one side, Audrey from another, and leaps upward, grazing both in the process, bleeding but not out. Her feet touch the rafter some twenty feet up, then send her rocketing back, trying to take the sword-thief from above in a complex-looking spinning kick, and trying to do it before anyone else can reach her.

    Meanwhile, no one has kept Green down, which means that she, now no longer on fire, is coming at Eiko. The burns are rather ugly, but these women have some seriously inhuman pain tolerance. Eiko is pushed back and on the defensive, on the wrong side of a weapon triangle, and presently lacking any immediately obvious method of working her magic to fix things. "Li'l help!" And then the drones burst in and start firing. She lets out a few choice words while falling further and further back, and gettign in more danger of being backstabbed by any kunoichi still alive.
Starbound Flotilla     Moonfin is exhausted, but has the good sense to bounce back away from the hole and skid to a stop in front of the machine when it lands, the hand going back to the hilt of the sword, all three eyes narrowing. Then he glances at the storm of drones. "Second Sea Hylotl Style: Unyielding Anchor." And with a swift storm of swings, Moonfin swipes his blade rapidly, facing the flat of his blade to the many lasers and slicing cleanly through rockets. It's EXHAUSTING, and the jarring impacts slam into his arms brutally, but he stays mostly clean of damage.

    And then he leaps forward! he's not focusing on those drones, he's focusing on that golem! Going right for the eye with a swift leaping, dashing stab, instead of doing anything with those drones.
Eiko     While definitely easy to spot, Kazusa is still a blur, both in the 'moving quickly' and in the 'indistinct' senses, and both help her avoid further punishment. She's still surrounded, but becoming less so, through combination of sword and gun, which turns out to be far more effective in this mixed-range fight than gun alone. Pretty soon she should be well enough clear to see who else is in trouble.
Starbound Flotilla     Biteblade maims and partially devours a ninja. It's /really/ gross. But Eiko has told them to focus on the golem, and so they plan to do so. Devouring as much flesh as they can to supercharge their movements and regenerate their missing arm back to a mostly functional state, the frenzied Floran draws a pair of knives, turning from the ninjas to focus on charging at the golem and leaping at it, intending to begin rapidly swiping it with deep gashes.
Souji Murasame "Your skill is impressive enough." Souji replies. "But the only one who can make a choice is you."

The drones explode into the area, and Souji turns, looking at them for only a moment. His glasses flicker with information, and he holds out a hand. "Thunder-2." He intones, once again using lightning on the mechanical foes. He slides to one side, using his blade to deflect part of the first salvo of shots in much the same manner as Moonfin, though his own style seems to incorporate more evasiveness than pure deflection here.

The yell from Eiko gets Souji's attention, and he turns. bringing his blade up and running his hand along the length of the blade. "Murasame Sword Arts..." He intones. "Spirits of hunger and darkness, I call you."

There is a sudden tear in the air near Green, and red, clawing streaks of shrieking spirit lash out, shredding towards the ninja and seeking to sink themselves into the ninja, holding it still for several moments.
Alexis Maaka     Alexis finds Kazusa's situation a bit of a jam, and she trains her PDW at the ninjas still alive and hounding the MiniMaaka. Her weapon lets off a hearty BRAAAAP before clicking empty again, and the cyborg holsters the machine pistol before she goes in with sword in hand. She goes to stab and slash away, assuming she didn't initially end up dusting up her current target, fighting as one in tandem with Kazusa.
Starbound Flotilla     George, for an old man who comes up with shitty jokes, is surprisingly brutal. He isn't here to kill the ninja, he's here to disable them, so he's content to break their arm and then rapidly grapple and kick at the foe behind/below them in a way meant to toss them to the ground... Long enough to disengage and go after the Red! Because he's hoping that the ROCKETS and LASERS going after him will just kill his pursuer! Because it's slamming burns and bruises into his body otherwise!
Starbound Flotilla     Seft's armor barely deflects some of those blows and dents badly even in those times, while she has a tough time rolling with the superhuman punches that land solidly. After an attempt to block with her battle-axe causes the handle to simply EXPLODE, she's left without a defensive option and is forced to take more drastic measures. With a sudden harsh buzzing noise, she catches the next punch in one hand, causing her forearm to explode... And leaving her with a brutal jagged arm-piece and, hopefully, an opening to stab it deep in Red's chest.

    Or, at least, keep her occupied enough for George to try to rush in from the side and brutally break one leg with a swift jabbing kick from the side.
Eiko     Kotone's opponent goes down, having been immobilized and then punched in the face with shock gloves. One more kunoichi bites it.

    Biteblade and Moonfin go after the golem. It looks like this one doesn't have a lot of close-in weaponry, but it does have two giant claws. The whole upper body can swivel around without it moving those ponderous legs, but the arms aren't too quick, and both Starbounders are fast-moving enough that they can probably keep ahead of it. If they DO get grabbed, it's going to really hurt, but be more crushing than slashing damage. In the meantime, that stab and slash, but the thing is damn tough--and it always has one claw ready to grab anyone who goes straight for the eye.

    Neither of them are valid targets for the missile launcher the golem has. On the other hand, Souji and Maaka are both in the correct range. While Souji's magic effectively deals with the drones--which are rather fragile, for all their firepower--and further makes a grab for Green, the explosives the boss 'bot's rockets are packing are on a higher tier. They're also (since the drones emptied most of what they had on Ban earlier) more numerous. Maaka's downed yet more of the kunoichi and gotten Kazusa clear, but likewise, incoming explosives.
Kazusa Ujikane     Finding herself in the clear through her own swordplay and gunplay along with a heaping helping of Maaka's help, Kazusa darts for that opening as fast as she can - and in the process, gets the radio message from Eiko that they've discovered the finish line, so to speak, while she was protecting herself. It's some kind of big golem, apparently. And coming down the central shaft. Well, she should be able to handle that.

    Dropping the magazine from the Sickle, she clears the chamber in a smooth movement and then slams a different magazine into place, chambering the first round as if she's done it a thousand times. In a skidding, agile series of runs, darts and hops, she makes her way over until she can get a clear shot at the golem, and starts unloading.

    Explosive rounds might not be very good for getting through that thing's hull. Now, armor-piercing flechettes, on the other hand, are a very good ammunition type for this situation indeed.
Audrey Stormfist     "Heritors inherit things; that is my skill," Audrey answers, calmly, adjusting the angle of her swings to not crash straight into Alexis when Hulan decides to make a leap up and back down. While one hand still firmly holds the newly snatched blade, her other retrieves her gunblade, and with a click the cylinder rotates a few times, until from the back one can tell the cartridge currently loaded is green.

    Standing her ground like a true Monk, Audrey crosses both blades in an X for the spinning kick to impact them. The gunblade is sturdy enough to survive the impact, even if Audrey's arms are going to be sore and hurting as a result-- whether or not Hulan's is is about to be discovered.

    But more useful to the Heritor is that the impact allows her to cross-counter immediatly. The gunblade flares a bright green and she would attempt to break her defense to slice-- with the added Bio-1 effect. Inflicts some immediate poison-based damage, and has a chance to stick the status effect on.

    The sickness might be enough to make Hulan consider retreating, although the opening in Audrey's guard could enable her to retrieve her sword too, if it didn't break.
Starbound Flotilla     Albert is very busy punching a particular ninja to death. His severe wounding has gotten to the point where he's not likely to remain combat-capable for a while, and may retreat a fair bit here after his rage is done due to severity of wounding.
Ban Ban is alive. Don't worry guys. I mean it! Seriously! Hahaha! (Or /is he/? Yes, he is.)
Eiko     Souji's magic grabs for Green, and completely blindsides her. Yeah, she knew he was there, but she had no idea he had magic that could hit from that kind of vector. She's a tough one, and it actually looks like her wounds are healing, but Eiko isn't going to let this chance slip by. She grabs every knife still sticking in her, yanks, and lets the blood flow. It's as painful as it looks, and she's cursing more heavily with each passing moment, but the word "burn" is spoken like an invocation, and her wounds immediately clot, all bleeding ceased. She had been slowing down, but now she moves with a burst of motion. Green is tearing free, her spear coming up--but not quickly enough. With one, last, heartfelt curse, Eiko stabs her sword clear through Green's chest, and yanks it back out.

    And wouldn't you know it, after stumbling back, Green's spear lashes out and stabs Eiko anyway. "Oh you've gotta be kidding--"
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa seems to like the new weapon but she'll have to pick it up later it's going to get in th way for now. She doesn't even think about biteblade eating one of the ninja. She'd had almost forgot about that aspect of Biteblade's species. Given it was shockingly well behaved most of the time. Then again Biteblade's smart enough not to go for meals that would get it into a lot of trouble right? It's a reminder of how cautious she needs to be about certain people in the Foltilla.

She however now turns her attention to the remaining female ninja, She's got her pistol out and is shooting agian, however she's on the move and she's moving pretty damn fast. So fat no unagumented human on her world could do. Hopefully she can lend some good help to Alexis and Kazusa.
Starbound Flotilla     This is a part where Moonfin is a JERK.

    In a moment, Biteblade is deftly dodging away from the huge claws! And then, in the next, Moonfin catches their arm and whips them around to intercept the arm coming towards him. The jerk fish causes Biteblade to suffer a great deal of crushing damage in order to save himself from any impeding. It is a /completely/ dishonorable act, which by nature tends to severely lower his DPS. But, hopefully, it'll still be enough to use the opening to try one more mad dashing stab for the eye, trails of energy showing off the tech at work toi close the distance swiftly.
Eiko     George gets away and after Red, though this is likely only possible for just how few kunoichi are left alive. Seft takes the hits, and Red is quick enough that the opening just isn't there--from the front, that is. George gets his, and knocks Red's leg out from under her, She kinda huffs and loses her balance, having suffered an awareness and dexterity penalty from her debuff that is only now at all obvious. She strikes the ground in an attempt to quickly get herself back on her feet, but both crew members now have a good chance to keep her down.
Alexis Maaka     Alexis finds herself facing down explosives hurdling downs her. She narrows her eyes, trying to make a move to evade the direct explosion, but she is sent flying as she's scorched by missile fire. Grunting, she tries to stamp out the flames on her coat, only narrowly avoiding getting turned into chunky salsa.

    Owwww...

    She coughs for a moment, before she reaches inside her duffle and grabs two things.

    ONE is a sandwich.

    The OTHER...is a magazine of HE rounds. Her hand reaches down to grab the Sickle on her own hip, and she loads up after taking a bit, hearty bite of her healing item. THis is how it works, right?

    Anyway, she loads up, and Kazusa will find herself with backup in the form of Alexis Maaka herself, the Raven of Neo-Fuji, the rogue that seeks to overturn the very kingdom she helped build in a river of blood.

    "Let's finish this." she says quietly, before peppering the Golem in HE fire, aiming for any weaknesses she can detect.
Eiko     Kazusa seems to have had the right idea. The AP rounds don't all go through, but the armor seems to be thinner in some areas--and of course, direct hits, rather than against a slope, have better piercing power. If she can get the right angle, she can really make that count, and she's already causing damage. Sparks seem to bleed from the openings, if briefly, and there's some mess of exposed electronics underneath, though the damage still isn't slowing the golem down. If 'golem' is even the right word.

    Albert has a chance to get away, though he'll want to avoid the drones in the process. It doesn't look like they've taken to the level below, so that may be his best bet. (Jumping via Ban's route is not generally recommended.)
Eiko     Whatever else Audrey's new sword is, it's very difficult to break, even to a superhuman, gravity assisted strike with that kind of momentum. The blow's heavy, but she seems used to that. The counter works--in the air, it's a bit difficult to dodge, with the only thing to land on being an opponent's in-motion weapon. Hulan lands without the chance to take back her weapon, and regards Audrey's dual-wielding more wearily. She can't give up, though--her rank isn't high enough to make that decision.

    What she can do is ignore Audrey and run straight for Moonfin, aiming a from-behind series of strikes aimed to take his sword, or at least keep him from working on the golem. Even sickened and injured, she's still pretty damn fast.
Starbound Flotilla     George and Seft get Red on the ground. She's gonna be up in a moment. As soon as she's getting up, George is going for a brutal kick to the gut, intending to drive up and into the solar plexus and keep her on the ground. Seft, on the other hand, still has no weapon: She continues to use her jagged, exploded arm, intending to spear it through Red at the back dramatically!
Souji Murasame Green could have stopped at any time.

but they have chosen their path. And blood calls to blood. As Eiko moves and she and Green stab each other, Souji's presence is like a grim aura, the blood-soaking blade seething. He raises the weapon to his hand, and draws the blade across his palm. The blood of the Murasame heir soaks into the weapon, the weapon beginning to crackle.

    Sword Arts
        > Draw Out: Murasame

"Murasame Sword Arts..." He hisses. "Spirit of the Hungry Blade, come forth! The feast is laid before you, consume and sate thyself upon the corpse fields. MURASAME! COME FORTH!"

There is a colossal surge of MP as the crimson runes on the blade shudder... And go dark.

Blackness shreds the area around the Green Ninja, tears in space opening up to reveal black, seething holes in space. From it, crimson claws lash out, much like before, but this time sharper, faster, and more numerous. The claws rend, slashing out at Green with growing intensicty, a growing shriek of black and crimson as they seek out the blood of their chosen target, drawing away the blood and life force of their target with horrifying, painful abandon.

After what seems like an eternity, it ends, the tears sealing up.
Eiko     Kotone keeps after those ninja, putting on some ranged pressure. Helpful, since everyone else is focusing instead on the golem.

    Moonfin's strike DOES reach the eye, thanks to Biteblade's (un)willing, (dis)honorable sacrifice. The golem stops turning its head as the eye is shattered, and its arms become uncoordinated in their pursuit of crushable intruders, though they are still going to try to crush Biteblade until they get away. It must still have some ability to sense enemies, since the rockets are still firing, if not particularly well-aimed.

    HE rounds aren't as great for piercing armor, but with the golem being broken in various points, weak points are thus created and exploitable. Further, an HE round striking a rocket about to be fired causes a chain reaction, which blows off one of the golem's legs. It starts to teeter, but then begins to hover in place, even as continued damage blows off its other leg.
Audrey Stormfist     The sturdiness of the sword is a nice surprise, although Hulan disengaging is not. Fortunately, Audrey is Hasted, and that applies to most attacks she makes too. The gunblade is simply leveled towards the martial artist, and several further shots, bright green, like magical balls of poison, fly towards Hulan at surprisingly high speed-- and at the right angle that they won't accidently hit Moonfin, if Hulan straight up dodges.

    These three ladies are pretty good, she'd have to admit.

    Shame they're on the wrong side.
Eiko     Green tried ignoring Souji to finish off Eiko. To be fair, focusing on Souji may not have let her fare any better. As is, though, she's fully hit by his sword art. She was better prepared, this time, but she'd also just been stabbed in the gut, which tends to slow down your reaction time. And, once hit, this magic doesn't end until she's finished.

    Red isn't doing a hell of a lot better. She can take an enormous amount of punishment, but is too far down to be able to escape George and Seft just hacking her too pieces if they keep on it. The only danger there is that they let her be and it turns out to have been not enough, but they're probably too careful to let that happen.

    Finally, Hulan has to deal with shots from Audrey. This wasn't wholly unexpected, since the gunblade had already been drawn. She's hit once, but it's only enough to interrupt her attack, not to take her out.
Starbound Flotilla     Biteblade is currently being crushed. Their amped-up regen is the only thing that's keeping them working at the moment. Meanwhile, Blue appears to be going after them. HOPEFULLY someone deals with Blue before they get to Moonfin, who is currently vunerable to a backstab if someone tries it. If he's not interrupted, though, he lets his sword stay impaled in the eye. With an unusual half-circular palm-rotating motion, he says, "Sixth Sea Hylotl Style: Harpoon Splits Oceans."

    The katana is then slammed forward like a piledriver, hopefully with enough force to tear out through the back of the head, potentially disintegrating into shrapnel as it does so.
Eiko     Eiko is, meanwhile, going down. She's trying to hold onto consciousness, but it's pretty hard by this point. It's fortunate, then, that Moonfin takes one burden off by her. With the destruction of the golem's head, together with the damage through its body, it finally breaks fully apart. Hulan is about to say something, but whatever it is is lost as reality warps. The core was broken, and the tower disappears.

    Almost everyone is now standing, or kneeling or sitting, in a small, speciality clothing boutique. It is a sea of fancy dresses, and a few people are bleeding on them and should probably get out before they're forced to buy things. (Eiko is one of those people.)

    Pavo, and anyone else with her, is instead standing in the middle of a crowded Chinese to-go shop, several floors down.

    Any loot gained is still there, at least if it was in a container brought into the dungeon from outside.

    The unwelcome civilian attention begins immediately, of course. No rest for the weary.
Alexis Maaka     As the dust settles and things kinda happen...

    Alexis calmly wanders over to Eiko and just gets out her wallet, "You owe me for this." She mutters, before examining just how much money she is going to be paying in order to cover the damages done for the store.

    All while she has knives sticking out of her back like a side of beef.
Kazusa Ujikane     Kazusa remains invisible. Aside from the wounds in her back. Now is a very, very good time to be invisible.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa watches as suddenly everything ends, and soon Kotone finds she's stuck in btween some clothing wraks and looks very embrassed. Kotone just looks left she looks right and she cloaks now and just is slinking out now, there is n0o vansihing lady whose cut and not bleeding where she should! Nope Kotone is /gone/