Avatar RP VIII: Chapter VII: Timing

[Inbred Chocobo]

"Actually they were still trying to put more energy into me, though I really couldn't contain it anyway. So you really just interrupted that process." The Being shook its head at A9's request at wishes. "Nah, you didn't rub the box 3 times before you blew it up so no wishes for you." it replied in some sort of dry humor.

There was a fight going on, and everyone was announcing attacks and making flashy stuff. "Hearing them fighting is making me wonder if I shout out a random name of an attack and launch it if it would do something cool. I think I'll try it." and just like that, it was gone from A9's vision, no movement, no dash, no feeling of magic being used, just gone.

Only for it to appear in the midst of the battle. "Time for my Technique! FOR" Then the depletion zone that had been tossed at Sophie hit the bastard. apparently it had appeared inbetween the ground those two were fighting on, and been in the way of the attack. However, it simply reached out and grabbed to the naked eye nothing, but those that wove magic saw it grab the energy that held the field together, and tear it apart like paper, leaving no trace of it as it left the things grasp. It turned towards Type-B and stared, not of one of angry, but simply of focus.

Forbidden Technique: Kick from the house of rounds!

The thing was upon Type-B before the words even reached its ears, and her face was struck with the force of a Mac Truck, if the Mac truck was powered with the fury of a thousand suns. And those were those little dwarf suns that burned really really hot. And that morning, those suns drank like a gallon of Red bull or some other energy drink, because lets face it, not every sun would want to drink red bull, or monster energy drink. Some of em would probably drink just like half a gallon of that 5 energy stuff so they wouldn't get the sugary crash either.

[Astral Harmony]

Alean's shots bored into the Type A's barrier and burst into what looked like sprays of pale pink cherry blossoms.
"My barrier takes all the harm you would inflict and transforms it into harmless flowers." the Type-A announced, the petals blowing past her. The red eyed girl frowned at Alean, folding her arms under her breasts defiantly. "You're not destroying anything."

"Heh. You just lit my fire," Alean said to the Type A. "Universe-trotting mercenaries don't give up just because you absorb one attack, and now you've gone and made it personal."

The air around the Type-B's wings shimmered with hungry darkness. "Depletion Zone." the sorcerous robot said, raising one elegant hand.
A sphere of dimness formed and rolled forward, expanding as it went. A corona of pale light around it was the only thing that made it visible in space. Nearly invisible threads of light tied it back to its caster.
Soleen's elemental sphere entered the forward edge of the field. Light dimmed, fire died, air stilled and water froze. The threads linking to the Type-B became brilliant as energy poured through them. Her Mana Condensate Wings blazed and expanded, filling up with the stolen energy.
Missiles of ice and earth shot out of the back of the draining zone, robbed of some of their momentum.
"I like them already," Soleen mused. "I'm already this close to inviting them to Paradiso."

Barely visible from Kira, a dark blur shot in from above. The ice spells hit something, freezing instantly into a mass of ice. The shadow of the frozen form inside was off, multiple dark patches instead of the shape of one person.
It then violently exploded.
Someone set her up the bomb.
"Fight harder." the lean, sinister Type-C drawled, floating above. The stubs of her Bomber Knives were lengthening, generating new segments of the sectioned blade to replace the ones she had fired off.

Kira's Strength and Influence stats surged up. Her ice-cold pupils radiated chilling light. "Be glad to," Kira said darkly.

"Signature Counter: GRIM EXPRESSION MINIGUN SWING!" the Type-D burst into view, shouting gleefully.
Arranged her features in an appropriate scowl, the Type-D swept both her miniguns upwards, their barrels spinning up. She played the two streams of bullets over the golden spear in a hard boiled manner, tracking the spear's downward plummet until it disintegrated. The fragments that rained down entered the Type-A's pink nanomist fields and became a flurry of petals instead.
The Type-D kept swinging, raking her fire across the rocky and frozen projectiles headed for the sorcerous Type-B ASURA and chewing them to powder.
"I've not lost yet!" Alucard swore.

Someone caught Rachel in the midst of her relentless attack. It materialized behind her, arms already wrapped around her. The aggressor's limbs bent upwards and backwards from where they had snuck through between Rachel's arms and her body. Hooked backwards, they effectively pinned Rachel's upper arms.
A low chuckle came into Rachel's ear. "Move as fast as you like. You might as well not be moving at all." the Type-E snickered.
The youthful looking gynoid was armed with a copy of Arhra V's Ouroboros Drive, mounted in the unit on her back.
And she was lying, of course. A key weakness of the Ouroboros Drive was its inability to undo damage to its user that had already happened when it wound back time. But with it, the Type-E had looped back through the handful of seconds the Drive could travel through to assume a position where the final jump would let her appear right on top of the Type-C's attacker.

The Type-C, seeing how her companion was holding Rachel in place, lifted one of her Bomber Knives thoughtfully.
"No stabbing!" the Type-E told her sharply.
"Hmph." the Type-C said, tossing her head. "If she wants to do things, I'll do 'that' then."
She reversed her grip on a knife and tapped it agaisnt her hip as if to sheath it. She rleased it and it stayed in place. She drew that hand over her eyes, iris taking on an appearance of concentric rings. Looking into those eyes promised amazing things.

CHARM

It seemed a rather inexplicable addition to her design.

Soleen found herself ganged up on as well.
"Fall quietly into nothing's embrace." the Type-B murmured, launching out a new Depletion Zone. By enveloping Soleen she intended to interfere with any defences the spell slinging former diplomat could throw up and reduce the speed of the Type-D's bullets to turn them into non-lethal weapons.
"Get shot a lot and give up!" the Type-D shouted on cue, both miniguns whirring up again.
The Type-A was running interference, ready to stop Alean, Alucard or Kira from getting involved.
The tendrils still grasping the ship had entered the second stage of their progress. They were fusing to the hull, veiny distortion creeping outwards from the burrowing cables. The veins spreading across its armour were a sign Arhra V's corruption was starting to take hold. If the crew of the Azure Aesir didn't act fast, their ship wouldn't be their ship any more.

----------

Rachel, under a charm, rushed Kira who took the forefront. Rachel's daggers penetrated the right arm that Kira offered so that they wouldn't hurt anything further.
"Kira, I don't like where you're going with this," Alean said.
"No time for other options," Kira said.

And when Type-A started shooting, Kira and Rachel were the ones hit the worst. Rachel because she was attacking Kira at the moment, and Kira because she had just drew the Type-A's fire.

Rachel was mortally wounded and floating uselessly in space. Alucard drew back to resurrect Rachel, but was stopped short by Alean, who kicked Rachel away. A ninja catgirl intercepted the uncontious girl and dragged her back inside. Another catgirl jumped out.
"Maya, I thought I told you to start up your STIGMA?" Alean asked the catgirl.
"Systems're infected. Iris shut it off just like the rest of the Aesir and I can't boot it. It's as worthless as when I first laid eyes on it. So what've we got here?"
"I dunno, but they're ridiculously strong. And it's doing something to the ship."
"That's not the worst of it. Our healing rigs are all disabled from infection. The ship's crippled. We're going to have to abandon it if we can't save it."
"The healing rigs are down? Rachel could use some help."
"Regular items still work. This fight is still winnable. It'll just be costly. Oh, Rosalyn reported in. She's having to do everything manually because all the regular diagnostics equipment is FUBAR."
"This is insane! How can one opponent, no matter how big it is, just suddenly have everything they need, right when they need it, to almost completely disable us?"
Maya shrugged. "Chillax, 'lean. We've still got our Force Levels, that bizarro radiation, and each other. Speaking of which, that lesbian sorceress is under heavy attack."

Forbidden Technique: Kick from the house of rounds!

"Or maybe not," Maya observed as the Type-B had its depletion field destroyed and its face was struck by the power of a thousand energy drink binging suns.

Kira was now ready. Her Strength and Influence had skyrocketed from the botched Signature Technique and now all the damage absorbed from Rachel's daggers and the Type-D's bullets. "Alucard, cover Kira!" Alean shouted, then took aim with Alucard and attacked the Type-A with the combined fury of holy light in laser form and rapid fire.

Kira was making a suicide attack. Bleeding from wounds numbering in the triple digits, Kira lost any shred of humanity she may have had, and was suddenly much more dangerous to be anywhere near. She didn't even shout a kickass signature move name, instead she charged the Type-D with berserker rage and opened up with a blazing fast flurry of over-extended axe swings, not evening bothering to use any kind of ice magic. Maybe she had already bled it all out.

"Cover Kira? What'm I, leftover meatloaf?" Sophie said. Even though something that Soleen couldn't identify just made Type-B regret being so cocky, she still had two opponents, the Type-C and the Type-E. She had absorbed a good deal of minigun fire herself and, being magically inclined, didn't have the ridiculously high Hit Points that hardcore physical badasses like Kira and Maya possessed.
Maya hurried over to Sophie's side, wearing special goggles. "Identifying the enemy," Maya said. "Searching out dismantling shortcuts."
"Search faster, please." Soleen said, looking over herself quickly. Apparently, the fury that irradiated them all also kept their Encrypt Points at the maximum as well, but Soleen tried to restrict her use of magic. She didn't understand what the fury was doing to her body, and overusing magic would leave Sophie with a splitting headache that she didn't want and would also leaving her extremely hungry, even if she could cast forever.
Soleen used an Alba Fount to fully restore her low health to full. This fight was going to end up being very touch and go, and they would probably lose the Aesir out of it.

-----

Damn, Armored, how much more time to charge an oversized electromagnetic pulse do you even need?
"Mah-num-mah-num, doo doooo doo doo doo. Mah-num-mah-num, doo doo doo doo. Mah-num-mah-num, doo doooo doo doo doo, doo doo doo, doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo chargin' my attack..."

[Teal Mage]

Still on the same non-descript floating piece of ship debris, a decidedly formal and long haired Teal stood with his back to Bard. Around the two magic-users, banners of scarlet light fluctuated. Teal's attention was still on the gradually diminishing number of carmine flower petals that floated before him; while Bard appeared to be talking. Remarkably, the two seemed to have found the only Overcast-free piece of space on the battlefield.

"...I say we destroy whats left. Valkers, Valker ships, and Valker appliances. Once the final boss is defeated it all ends right? Instant safety and whatnot?"

"I believe that is in line with Video Game cliché, yes." Teal observed, attention still focused on the matter conversion spell in front of him.

"Yeah I like that." Bard nodded, clearly pleased with his idea. "We should get to work ending this," the long haired summoner paused, before adding, "if you're cool with that."

"Let me get back to you." Teal replied, still busy preventing the NPF from becoming swiss cheese.


* * *

A Few Minutes Later


"Yeah you tell him...whatever Roman numeral you are!" Bard cheered, attention now on the situation developing on the surface of the NPF City-Ship.

"Nine." Teal helpfully supplied, his debris clearing nearly completed.

Whether or not Bard heard the bishonen mage in the heat of one of his Friendship speeches was subject to debate. "Who does he think he is anyway criticizing us when he doesn't even have a name? He's alone as well, so he clearly has no friends," Bard went on, employing Fury-Empowered Logic to make his argument, "yet here we are all together and we've gone far enough. With the power of friendship we can surely do anything!"

He slashed the pale skin of his arm with his knife. A flash of candy-apple red energy heralded a spurt of darker red liquid from the wound; which sealed itself quickly with a shimmering barrier of pure fury. Bard was fortunate that, at a dosage this high, the Fury was able to replace body parts - the skin, though often overlooked, qualified. Those spilled beads of blood - each with its own little corona of Fury - floated aimlessly in space.

Bard seemed disappointed at the lack of reaction.

"Sooo..." he said dragging the last sound, "while we're being meta, can I get a retcon over here?"

There was no reaction.

Obviously, Overcast just hadn't heard Bard yet.


* * *

Several minutes of escalation later.


"I don't think Overcast is coming." Teal stated bluntly, dusting his pale clawed hands against one another. Shined leather shoes clicked softly on the platform - a hint of his Fury blessed power was more than sufficient to add a degree of gravity for effect - as the ninetailed-mage approached Bard. "I can't Retcon your dagger back to you." Teal's scarlet eyes glinted malevolently as he came to a stop dangerously within Bard's personal space.

"But..."

Their faces were inches from one another's.

"I have a better present."

Teal's hand snaked behind Bard's head, then, without any more warning, gently urged the brown haired summoner's head forward.

Their lips met.

White light exploded over the piece of space debris. Fragments broke away from the edge, the strength of this ancient bonding spell quickly overwhelming the platform's flimsy structure. It quickly disintegrated, leaving the orb of pure light to float aimlessly in space. Leaves of paper - fanfiction - swirled out from the orb's center; they quickly fell stagnant in space, little islands of off-white in the sea of nothingness. A cursory scan would reveal that Teal and Bard's name came up frequently in all of them.

Seven seconds later, the orb vanished.

A circular platform of semi-transparent crimson energy had materialized beneath Bard and Teal's feet, supporting them in place of the - now destroyed - piece of debris. Pulling away from Bard, Teal held a glowing rectangle - less wide and slightly taller than his hand - in between the pads of his fingers. The luminescence faded moments later, revealing a red backed card, emblazoned with a black casting circle around a six-pointed star. Teal's scarlet eyes regarded the card's front critically - before turning toward Bard and offering it toward the youth.

On its front was a picture of Bard in his trademark gothic-summoner's robes. Daggers - blades dyed the deep red of spilled blood, hilts wrought of jet black metal with bands of candy apple red leather wrapped around them for grip - were arranged in neat ranks behind the summoner's back. From their blades, blood dripped to pool at the card's bottom. Three rows of elegant black script overlaid all of this. The first, in size ten font, read, "The Fifth Light Varrior." Below, in size sixteen font, was the word, "Bard." And finally, in size eight font now, was the latin phrase, "Cruor Advoco."

"This," Teal explained, "is a Pactio Card." He paused, as an apparently Forbidden Technique resounded in space some distance away. Glancing toward the epicentre of the fight - some distance off - the mage sighed. "I'll give you a full explanation of how it works later, but for now -"

He turned his scarlet gaze back to Bard, "All you need to know is that, by saying the word 'Adeat' you can change the card into an Artifact - a special set of daggers, if I had to guess - it looks like you'll have a limitless supply, so after you activate the artifact, merely willing them to your hand should summon a new set of blades. Ah, and you may want to avoid cutting yourself with them - I think they do something to blood, but I'll need more time to determine what."

Teal smiled brightly, "Good luck, we're all counting on you."

He gestured, narrow streams of coral lightning arcing up from the platform at Bard's feet, as iridescent scarlet flower petals spilled from his hand into space. One of those petals swept in front of his eyes, and by the time it passed, Bard was gone.

The summoner would reappear somewhere on the battlefield. Probably floating above the breach in Arhra V's hull, from where the ship's tentacles had appeared to try and devour the Azure Aesir. From there, Bard probably would have some choice in where he entered the battle.

"But just in case..." Teal shut his eyes. "Sis Mea Pars," the Aura of Fury around him flared, doubling its size in response to the latin words. "Ministra Teal, Bard the Fifth Light Varrior."

The aura gutted out, reduced to an eighth its former size. Though likely excessive in light of Bard's likewise infinite power, the spell he'd just cast would transfer the vast majority of his magical energy to Bard - enough power that even a feeble summoner would be able to keep up with the most experienced melee-fighter.


* * * * * *

"I'd better do this before I lose the Fury's power." Teal muttered, turning slightly. He probably didn't need to worry, but mysterious power-ups like the Fury were often far more temporary than one would like.

He made a fist, collecting the bright red energy of the fury into the palm of his hand. Then, casually, he raised his hand and pulled it back - aiming at an empty point in space. Quick as lightning, he lashed out.

Fully extended, his hand broke through something. Bright red iridescence poured through the quickly widening breach in reality, as the reverse-teleportation spell quickly unfolded. Teal's clawed fingers closed on the orange cape of the figure on the portal's other side.

"Steel!" Teal shouted, sharply wrenching the man's cape through the portal, as he tried to bodily haul him from wherever he was into this section of space, "We have things to discuss!"

[Overcast]

Robo-OC, now to be dubbed Rovercast sat in his chair and shifted a bit under the eye of hospitality mode. He had hoped to be further integrated into Araha's systems, the ships systems, for their programming to mingle in a sequence of integrations and cross compatibility that would arise into a beautiful design. Instead he was tied to a chair, so close to the thing he wanted to be with, but so far away. Far too distant. If he knew how to feel sadness he would have at the time, but instead he just felt incomplete.

His box skull, the mechanized LCD screens glowing black with red features just as the initial head was yellow with black. Low bit resolution made to a question mark, his voice ringing out to the standby program,

"I DESIRE TO AID. I FEEL USELESS. WHAT CAN I DO?"

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Professor Overcast, now Provercast, stared across the space between himself and his one odd desire in his short existence in this world short of the ship they stood on and the weapons it could fire. He wasn't happy, he still felt something in his fickle heart for the creature though she had denied him. He couldn't understand why, scientifically he should have seen it as a failed experiment and moved on to a new hypothesis. Something in his soul led him on though, incapable of letting go,

"I can't."

He said, the Box springing a small leak, water dripping from the corners. What was this? Had his time run out? Had meta finally run out of Fury...no. No there was something wrong. The salty solution dripping off the edges of the figure,

"I-I..."

He wiped off the Box, his throat felt thicker than usual. Like he couldn't speak quite right. His chest hurt, like there was some kind of pain, but it wasn't properly physical like his knowledge of medicine pulled on. It was something else. What was this?

"I will fight for this. I'll fight you. I must...I was made. Only for this."

It was beyond him, but he was made for this chaos. The push of meta driving him on. It was torture, but he couldn't change. It was his nature, just an avatar for a mad god.

Nothing more.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Meta was enjoying himself a bit too much now. The fight was on between two of the groups, it seemed a natural effect that wasn't even his fault. Though he did hope to escalate the severity if he could, after all escalation was the key to approaching a climax, and that damned bot had gotten in the way of one of his incarnation's desires. A strange thing that he hadn't quite given his first avatar, but these ones were so much more specialized. A brilliant thing.

Another was absolutely amusing, his heart descending into darkness as he tried to defy his nature. Though of course he couldn't, none of them could. They were as he made them, no matter what they did.

Dammit he was distracted.

[Arhra]

"I DESIRE TO AID. I FEEL USELESS. WHAT CAN I DO?" Rovercast said, stuck in a virtual chair in a romantic dinner setting, with only a hovering program and Arhra V's discarded simulation body slumped in the chair opposite for company.

"You are useless." a new Arhra V faded into existence around her words like a particularly irate Cheshire Cat. Her stutter was gone. "Get out of my sight." She stomped towards him as a dark thundercloud of imminent disaster, her strapless black dress swishing with each step. Jaggged strings of data from a scan fizzed behind her like lightning.

Her furious red eyes flicked up to the gylph floating over him. "Varia Weapon, deactivate hospitality mode."

"Sir." her aide responded and disappeared.

"Did you think I wouldn't realise?" she accused, stabbing a finger at his chest. "Leading me on like that... how dare you!" She turned away and sniffed.

She never gave him a chance to answer. The scene frozen and dissolved into meaningless static.

Freed from Arhra V's virtual reality, Rovercast found himself stuck in a hole, cables explosively popping free of his body and retracting into the wall. Something thrummed and then invisible forces pushed him into the center of the tube. Burning light appeared at the far end of the tunnel. A massive acceleration flung him towards it.

He'd just been shot at the Sun.

* * *

A man sized something was shot out of what had been the Valker mothership. It was headed Sunwards.

The black tendrils entangling the Azure Aesir began to withdraw into the dark hangar space they'd emerged from, pulling the ship with them. Arhra V apparently intended to swallow it whole. The forward hangar was more crowded, thousands of lights twinkling like the stars of a galaxy inside. The adjustments to the Valker mothership had reached a final stage. The lumpy potato of a ship was now absorbing its own hull plating, contracting into... something else.

The Azure Aesir was in trouble. The tentacles had fused to the hull and finally penetrated it. Their tips split, dozens of cables whipping around like a nest of vipers, hunting for equipment to attach to and reactivate.

The battle between the Aesir crew and Arhra V's new machine species was interrupted by a new robot.

It tore apart the Type-B's energy draining field and roundhouse kicked her with energy legs. The energy of energy drink quaffing suns times a thousand, etc, etc. The Type-B wasn't able to react to this sudden newcomer in time. The hit sent her flying backwards, wings leaking energy and her body mostly immobilised.

The rest were forced to simply carry on.

"Heh. You just lit my fire," Alean said to the Type A. "Universe-trotting mercenaries don't give up just because you absorb one attack, and now you've gone and made it personal."

"Alucard, cover Kira!" Alean shouted, then took aim with Alucard and attacked the Type-A with the combined fury of holy light in laser form and rapid fire.

"How many attacks will it take?" the Type-A asked, her defensive shield expanded. Bullets struck and became petals. Fuzzy edged circles of pink light spread from where Alucard's holy lasers struck, the nanomist shield dissipating the energy across its surface. The barrier was infinitesmally contracting as it was ablated away but she showed no signs of intending to make an attack of her own.

Kira was making a suicide attack. Bleeding and completely berserked, the amazon charged the Type-D, the tallest and most heavily armoured of the ASURA series.

"RARRRR!" the Type-D threw her minguns aside and charged as well. Probably not the smartest move.

Kira got in three blows, the armoured carapace on the Type-D's chest and right shoulder buckling under the axes. Then she was inside Kira's reach, leaking black fluid from her wounds. The ASURA wrapped her arms around the amazon's body and squeezed, trying to turn their fight into a contest of raw strength.

Sophie and Maya were discussing the situation.

"I'll show you... the TRUE Mana Cannon!" the Type-E shouted at them, apparently hating discussion. Her arm splayed apart like liquid, shapes drawing themselves in light and assembling into machinery. Her arm closed again, integrating the weapon that had materialised. It was an exact copy of Arhra V's infamous weapon. Lightning began crackling around the barrel as the youngest of the ASURA charged her new arm cannon.

"We haven't even been activated for five minutes." the Type-C said, somehow swaggering despite relying on the thruster array wings on her back for movement in space. She was still holding just a single Bomber Knife. It had become a whip, the segments of the blade linked together by a chain of energy. "And yet we're grinding you down."

She flicked the whip and it extended, generating dozens of new segments to reach all the way to them. "Don't think you can even move!" The chain whipped around, spiralling upwards to surround Maya and Sophie in a tunnel of whirling blades.

"VOLTEKA!" the Type-E shouted, fat streamers of lightning erupting from her cannon and to catch the pair while they were hopefully trapped inside the Type-C's whirlwind of steel.

* * *

The Robot of Fury - which Arhra IX had privately named Bob - corrected her, said no to wishes and then was inexplicably gone to rain on someone else's parade. Arhra IX was now left alone atop the Kurosen Tower in the heart of NPF City.

"What an idiot." she said to herself, white hands on pale hips. The floor was slowly turning to crystal beneath her feet. "I'm probably going to have to end him." she decided.

She suddenly clutched her sides in pain and became paler the only way she could, flickering between translucence and solidity, the red glow of the Fury giving her a hectic flush.

"Ugh, I've wasted too much time." she panted, body stabilising again. She should have known her miscellaneous personal crisises were far more important. She had to get clear of here.

Streaks of light drew themselves behind her, the ribbons of energy twining around each other like bandages wrapping a limb to become seething, multi-coloured wings. All three of her constituents had some sort of wing, so this was hardly unexpected.

She took to the air.

Her sickness was not entirely unexpected either.

Arhra was an avatar of Chaos. Flux, change, unpredictability, impossibility, growth, decay, creativity, insanity and contradiction were all represented in her nature. Theoretically she was a fully fledged reality warper, able to distort the universe around her to bring it into alignment with her whims. But reality was rarely so kind. In fact it tended to screw her over whenever her control slipped. The universe did not care for celestial parasites.

To actually function in an ordered universe, she was ringed in by restrictions and locks on her physical form and spirit. It was a protective shell of sorts. Nasty, corrosive, poisonous reality found it difficult to gnaw on her tender innards and her metaphorical sharp edges were blunted to stop her doing the same back to it.

Outgrowing her shell was the issue right now.

High above the NPF, but not yet clear of the city limits, Arhra IX's manifested wings spasmed out of control, unspooling into useless, frantically spasming strips of energy.

Combining three damaged Arhras into one meant her spirit had outgrown her body. This was dangerous. To her and, to a lesser extent, everything around her.

Struggling to master her own power, Arhra IX plummeted out of the sky in a death spin. She was a rainbow meteor as she crashed into the wreckage of the Discussion district. There was a highly disappointing lack of an explosion.

To avoid existential collapse, Arhra IX had intended to pursue a disastrous course of action. Using the limitless but undoubtedly short lived power boost from the Fury, she intended to redefine her personal boundaries vastly in her favour. The transition period would be dangerous to everything around her and, to a lesser extent, her.

Lying stunned but essentially undamaged due to the Fury coursing through her, she decided her continued existence was more important than everything around her.

She was a tiny white speck in the charred greys and browns of the destroyed Discussion district. She vanished as lines of burning crimson light as wide as a street burned through ground in eight directions. They traveled for several blocks and then Fury rose from them, becoming walls of light.

From the middle, a flowing, waving column of tangled together ribbons of light stabbed towards the Moon directly above the NPF. The red light of the Fury became discoloured, a patina of orange and purple contaminating its surface. More colours crept in.

Just above what would have been the top of the buildings, there was a spherical area of sudden rotation, the paths of energy torn and dragged into the center where they ceased to exist.

The light show faded away.

Arhra IX was levitating at the center, a pure white figure completely unaware of her surroundings. She dangled like a marionette, upper body slouched forward, arms limp and legs slightly bent under her body.

Two spots on her back bubbled and erupted, cracks spreading into the empty air to make wing-like patterns. The cracks crawled towards the sky like two towers and then spread sideways, reaching for the short horizon of the NPF and seeking to spread beyond. In an illusion of movement, the branching veins of light faded and closed, others opening and widening. The effect was slow wingbeats, an afterimage of their motion lagging behind them.

Starting directly beneath the tiny white speck supporting these grand fissures in reality, the ground melted and boiled. It became swaying filaments straining upwards, turning translucent at the tips and lights splitting from them like water droplets falling upwards. The effect spread outwards, swallowing what little was still standing in the Discussion district and showing no signs of stopping there. Surrounded by reversed rain, as an afterthought to the processes she'd kicked off, Arhra IX started to grow to a gigantic size. It was the least significant symptom of her activities.

Within her newly established beach-head, Arhra IX's damaged souls were unfolding from their present cramped conditions to regenerate properly. Transforming from a incomplete mess of broken and conflicting parts, she was becoming a single, complete whole. Inside this protected zone, she'd shred and consume the reality around her, expanding her unstable essence into a grand, glorious, terrible and, most importantly of all, stable configuration.

She'd also melt at least half of the NPF in the process and possibly become godlike.

This was unlikely to make anyone happy.

Except possibly her.

[Overcast]

Rovercast flew through the emptiness of space. In his eyes there were many individual scans occurring. Though only a few seemed to matter at the time. The survival outcomes ran out loud in his head.

Current trajectory to Sol star. Chances of altering current flight path: 0%. Chances of being able to build a survivable body to resist heat/gravity of sun surface: 0%. Chances of survival for all but the Box: 0%.

Begin final protocols. Run dramatic end. Scan Valker ship, find communication receive locations. Found. Manifest RF beams, open connection to Valker Ship. Connected. Offending defense system found. Bypassed. Force control of all interior communications. 10%...20%...50%...complete. Open all mail systems. Dictate final words.

I DID NOT LIE. BUT I WILL BE AS YOU WISH. EVEN IF IT IS NOTHING.

Message sent. Closing communications.

Even his sophisticated processors had found that to be quite the task. He had burnt out most of his systems in the Overclock. Though it didn't matter. The RF faded. His body began to burn away. The lights on the Box began to fade. Shutting down.

Transmission ends.
Disconnected.

[Astral Harmony]

Originally Posted by The Enemy

The Azure Aesir was in trouble. The tentacles had fused to the hull and finally penetrated it. Their tips split, dozens of cables whipping around like a nest of vipers, hunting for equipment to attach to and reactivate.

Systems began to reactivate all over the ship. From exterior lights to the Purple Mushroom Stamp Cannon to even the capuccino maker, the Azure Aesir came back to life...

"Everyone, together!"

And then were promptly shut down again. The Aesir was suddenly cooked by an epic electromagnetic bomb. The only saving the B-Force was Isis, who jumped out and set up a shield to protect the crew and the robot ally.

Unfortunately, Isis's shield also protected the ASURAs.

Armored Bishoujo, her Fury gone with that one attack, fell uncontious and simply drifted like a piece of space debris.

"Isis, you're okay!" Alean said.
"Of course she is," Rosalyn said, right behind Isis. "I know what I'm doing."
"We cannot stay here," Isis said in monotone.
"I know, I know, just let me think for a bit!"
"But I already have an idea."
"Let me guess. In true game cliche, we charge inside that giant ship attacking us, which is changing shape, I might add and somehow take out of its core, then run like hell during a self-destruct sequence."
"Well, I suppose we could try to reach Nuklear Power Forums city somehow."
"That's our only option. We can't continue this fight and it'd be absurd to bring the fight inside the belly of the beast."

But the battle was still on.

"I will destroy the tentacles," Isis said. "Keep the ASURA units distracted."

"You heard the gynoid. Signature Technique! Grenade Cluster!"
Alean unpinned no less than six grenades and flung them in a small cluster at the Type-A and, in an overdramatic fashion, shot all six just as they struck the shield with six pinpoint shots.

"Signature Technique! Divine Storm!"
Holy meteor shower? Eh, why not? The Aesir, the Valkyr Mothership, and the ASURAs were hammered by falling boulders chock full of holy magic.

Kira did not use a Signature Technique. Instead, she let her rage go into struggling against the Type-D. Out of the entire B-Force, only Isis matched Kira in raw physical strength, but only at the start of a versus match. Kira easily dominated when she was pissed off.

Soleen raised a barrier against the Type-E's thunderous magic assault. It was like a scene out of Dragonball Z, except that Soleen was using a magical shield instead of countering with a massive beam of her own.

"Signature Technique! Centrifugal Cannon!" Maya shouted, launching her own oversized adjustable wrench at the Type-C. With the Type-C using her only remaining weapon to keep them entrapped for the Type-E to hit Maya and Sophie both, the Type-C was delightfully vulnerable...Maya hoped.

[PyrosNine]

Then everyone was attacked by Random Badgers!

Mauve turned her head to look out the window, only to find a bunch of random furry creatures gnawing on her ship. In particular, one trying to pry open the hatch, and another one growling furiously at her, foaming at the mouth and looking both random and deranged. THe hatch prying badger nudged him with it's shoulder, and the rabid badger stopped, got a hold of himself, and took his pills.

Professor Hattington found his attempts to grab a hold of a metaphor for Dr. Ethington's breasts stopped only slightly from the technical bra unclasping by Random Badgers leaping out of the airducts.

The Aesir and the Arhra squad found themselves both under attack by random badgers with jetpacks.

Teal was surrounded by a bunch of ill natured, college drop out badgers who rode motorcycles while swinging chains and generally were of a random nature.

Aboard a stealth ship far off in the distance, a distinguished yet highly random badger laughed a badgerly chortle.

"Rarra!"

Translation: No one suspects the Intergalactic Random Badger Inquisition!

[Steel Shadow]

An unimportant account of things that Steel was up to, even though he really should have known better. Excerpt from the book of Liz, Chapters 1 through 5:

"In the beginning, there was nothing. then stuff happened, which we will not go into here. So, some time after the beginning, there was still pretty much nothing, but slightly more 'nothing' than there had been before, and with things like planets and what not dotted around the place. And into this void between things, arrived a man wearing orange, who did declare "Verily, This Power Of Mine, Which I Am In The User And The Existor, Of Time and Power Imemorable Unto The Mind O Lesser Men, Has Been Fucking Screwed Up Sideways By All Thinen Furion Energys."

"And he did look upon the void and call aloud "Now Whereth Haventh I Landed Now, For There Had Better Be No More Of Those Abominations, The Fire Breathing Kit Kats Of Bar, Who Didst Set Upon Mine Cape Alight."

"Because It Is Said By Me, They Are Freakin Anoying. Do They Not Know How Much Dry Cleaning Costs These Days." And so he cursed the Kit Kats of Bar Thrice, and turned to the void once more."

"And as he looked upon the void, he discovered a rock, and he proclaimed it to be so "Ow, Wheren Did This Rock Come From, That Didst Bloody Hurt.", and he did rubst his head to soothe the pain."

"And so unto the rock, he said "Righten, I Haveth Had Enough Of All Of Thiseth." And so he cast the rock away, and with a grand cry of power, he spoke the ancient words unrecorded to this scripture. And then he did say "Shite, I Did Not Think This One Throughet." And So the Rock did grow, larger and larger, as his great mighty powers did enfolden more unto the rock, casting it so as to grow into a larger rock. And quickly, quickly as is befitting the work of such, the rock attracted other rocks, and gasses, and things, and we're really kind of unclear about the whole business but are much assured that this did come to pass."

"And so it came to be that the world began. And he in orange and blue, he did look upon this new world and said "Oh Jebus, This Thingen Is Indeed Fast, As I Have Made It, So Why Dost It Chose To Fall In My Direction, Whence There Is No Down Within The Void, I Think The Universe Is Justen Screwing Witheth Me Nowen." And next to him, didst appear the man in orange again, who did say "Yes. This Is Pretty Much The Way Things Are For Thee."

And unto this Apparition, the one in orange who wast first did speak out "Oh Great, And Nowth I Musten Deal With A Futuren Incarnation Oft Mine Self." To which the second did reply "Well You're No Charmer Yourself, Kiddo, Be Greatful I'm Doing Anything For You. I Tell You, Past Selves Thesen Days Art A Righten Pain In The Behind."

And unto this vision of the future to be, the man did instruct "Just Sod Off Thee Smarmy Bugger, I Haveth No Time To Be Having Dealings With Thee." And the vision claimed "Waiteth a Moment, Because Seriously, This Is Pretty Cool." And the man did ask "What?" and to this he did hear "Dudeth, This Is a Greath Opportunity. Just Followeth These Instructions Upon Which I Do Leaveth With Thee, And You Shall See What Of Which I Speak."

And so he did follow the instructions he was given by himself, and laid the sun within the sky, and the moon within the other bit of the sky, and then waited some time, for our people to arise. And when he did sight our arrival, as he had planned long before, he came before us and told us "Wow, A Race Of Giant Radioactive Lizards. Mine Creation Is A Success." And thus, the first of our people met our great God."


----

"Steel!" Teal shouted, sharply wrenching the man's cape through the portal, as he tried to bodily haul him from wherever he was into this section of space, "We have things to discuss!"

"Huh?" Steel blinked, looking around, before finding his feet and standing up, stretching. "Oh, right, saving the world. Wow, I'd forgotten all about that. How's it going? And why are there badgers everywhere?"

Apparently he wasn't quite up to speed with the latest developments!

[Inbred Chocobo]

Bob the great a terrible energy being blinked, even though he didn't have eyes because he was also a robot. "I'm suppose to be the final boss, and they got me fighting a damn badger?" It exclaimed at the hairy creature that growled and foamed at it. The fearsome beast charged the floating energy being robot man, teeth glaring as the badger closed the distance. Then bob (which really is just what Arhra calls him, not his actual name) grabbed the creature and crushed it.

With guts floating around him, his gaze fell upon all that was around him. Everyone was busy with their own thing, each tearing reality a new one in their own way. The being looked at its arm, and in similiar Megaman fashion, found it to turn easily into a cannon. "Oh yeah, I got all kinds of weapon systems. Lets see what they can do." He looked around, trying to decide on a target. Ah, that floating city there... NPF was it? That sounds good.

The thing pointed the cannon. "Let's see what happens." And fired. The shot itself was no bigger than a fist, and glowed brighter than any sun. Its speed was faster than light ever had hope of travelling, and reality and time itself seemed scarred from its passing. When it hit the city... well Arhra IX suddenly found her reality of herself mending interrupted as the ground beneath her burned away. Towers didn't crumble, merely gone, just melted away into nothing at all. Everyone that turned and looked at the city found that nothing remained but few bits and pieces that lingered through death.

The forumers that were still here that were located upon the city found the ground beneath them vanish, and themselves floating on bits and pieces that somehow were not taken out. There was no explosion, no shockwave from the hit, so it just floated right were it was.

The being looked at his arm that the shot originated from. "Damn."