NPF Avatars 5 - Burning Down The House

[Inbred Chocobo]

IC had landed with only minor injuries, considering the attacks from the shadowflare had thrown him off-balance until he slammed into the ground. After getting up and recovering from his injuries, which weren't bad since he did land at least somewhat decent, he went into a defensive stance. He just wasn't sure what to think of his enemy, considering that the evil Flare seemed to not like him.

Then Rei jumped in, said her stuff, and IC retreated into the portal, in hopes of getting away from Flare. Besides, he wanted his weapon in his hands again. He was getting sick of this unarmed fighting business, and the Wind Edge did help him kick more arse.

[Bailey]

Newb scurried out of the way, only to crash this time into Mesden.

This collision involved no clothing removal, but it DID involve a sudden vertical to horizontal shift.

[Mesden]

The shift was one sided though, as the New Christmas-Business Mesden was far, far too important to actually fall on the ground! With a disapproving shake of her head, she used Newb as the doormat she viewed him and all his annoying ilk as.

With a devilish smile only the most demented of business geniuses could muster, she approached the enraged Asheth, "Asheth, Asheth, Asheth, come now! Sure, fiery doom and femininely fortified mayhem are one way to solve the problem, but it's always so temporary! How would you like to punish the fearful disrespecter on a much more permanent scale?"

[PyrosNine]

Asheth held up a pair of christmas themed scissors, with candy canes for handles. "You mean like this kind of permanent?"

[Astral Harmony]

"There's not going to be anymore wackiness, right?" Armored Bishoujo asked no one in particular, knowing the answer before she even bothered to ask it. Her legs had recovered now and her sword and gear were still good, although she noticed that one of those bees from earlier had stung her CosGear. She figured she should expect a reaction one or two transformations from now. Sighing, Armored accepted the downside of her desire to help NPF and turned to the portal. "I know, I know. Stupid question, right?"

The self-proclaimed Machine Princess jumped through to O'Sullivan Tower.

[TheBlindMime]

TBM still coughing from his prior lack of oxygen made his way towards Rei keeping a large distance between the dieties, newb and the frighteningly on topic themed scissors. He straightened himself for a moment before speaking, "If we're asking for favors, perhaps now would be the perfect time to ask for a second chance at the tournament, or perhaps even better a match pitting me against another symbol of Americana; I already fought smokey, I'm about to help kill Santa 2.0, why not have me kill some more totems of America while we are at it. How about Uncle Sam, or Samurai Lincoln, NO wait, I got it!"

"The formerly blind mime versus Jesus, Grudge Match!" TBM stood silent for a moment expecting applause, when none followed he began mumbling as he stepped into yet another crazy portal. "Hey, god does everything for a reason, he took my sight but didn't give it back when I asked. Also Jesus hates mimes. I can't be held respons-" Thankfully as he stepped through the portal the remaining members were spared the remainder of his speech.

[POS Industries]

Stepping out from the portal, the NPFers found themselves in familiar surroundings: the dining hall of O'Sullivan Tower. The buffet counter had been cleared of food at this point and replaced with a neatly organized line-up of the weapons and items submitted by the tournament contestants. In fact, the various items held by IC, Mesden, Rhiya, Renee Revenu, Raiden, the bear, Pyros, and PhoenixBot had been teleported away from their possession at some point between entering the portal and arriving at their destination and were themselves laying upon the counter, as well.

"All righty, that should be all of your property is right there and, ah, thank you..." Rei informed the group as one of the POS Industries employees scurried up with a new suit to replace the one ruined during the Kurosen Tower adventure, "To prevent confusion, each item is labeled with the owner's name, of course. I need to go change, but once everyone's ready we'll get a move on to Doukhobor Labs..."

"Yeah, just where is Doukhobor Labs, anyway?" someone called out from the back. Probably Mauve.

Rei, on her way to the nearest dressing room as she was programmed not to just strip down in front of everybody (there had been an incident some months ago prompting this), paused to answer the question. "Oh, right... Well, you know the old abandoned amusement park on the edge of town? The one that was closed down after all those orphans died on the Tilt-A-Whirl, and now it's said their spirits haunt the grounds after the janitor said he saw them telling him to bring them more friends to play with, and that was why he flipped out and killed all those people? Remember? He wore their skin as robes and painted his face with their blood, sharpening their ribs into makeshift weapons and using them to carve apart more victims? Sure you do! Yeah, that place!"

The NPFers nodded slowly, many of their faces a couple shades paler.

"Yeah," she continued, "Well, Doukhobor Labs is about three and a half miles west of there, in a nice little office complex that was built about two months ago."

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Spotting the intruder, the RoboHobo quickly began to leap into action against the newly-arrived Santa Claus, before being stopped in its tracks by the hasty order of one Doug Doukhobor.

"Hang on, there! It's never wise to assault a large man bearing gifts, is it?"

The robot halted its attack, though kept a target locked on Santa as Doug moved a bit closer to him, offering a warm greeting from a safe position behind the RoboHobo's right leg. "Welcome, Mr. Claus! A bit early this year, aren't we? What brings you here to my offices, where you have destroyed the last of my robotrooper army in such a, erm, jolly and yuletastic manner...?"

Santa eyed the little man disdainfully, though made no move to reach into the neverending bag of gifts slung over his shoulder. "Well, little Dougie," he yawned, "I simply found myself drawn to the naughtiest young man I've ever sensed in all my years and found myself in this place..."

"R-Really?" Doug gasped, stepping out from behind the RoboHobo, "I'm the top of the naughty list? Wow! I've really made it, haven't I? I had no idea that my plans were so--"

"What? NO-HO-HO! Not you, Dougie!" Santa laughed heartily, before shifting his tone to a low growl as he pointed at the helplessly floating Pedro, "Him."

[Nikose Tyris]

Nikose proceeded to calmly pick up his hat off the table, and began petting it. "Oh, it's okay, daddy missed you..." he crooned to it softly. He placed his hat on his head and grinned wide.

Then, he spotted the power crystal he had had earlier sitting on the table, the thing from Wizardcat.

He glanced around quick to make sure no one was watching, and proceeded to pocket it for now. He had an idea for later, but didn't want to let it out yet.

[PyrosNine]

Pyros reclaimed his three weapons, the sword, the armbands, and the third thing that he'd forgotten what it was. It'd hit him again eventually, possibly after he did a forum search for "ball of death." Or was it doom?

Hearing Mime's rant about Jesus, He gave him a hearty smack on the back. "Oh come now Mime, are you of the confused? It's not Jesus that hates mimes, it's Hay-zeus. The Spanish Jesus. And Kali, she hates mimes more than she hates life! But Jesus? He loves all the little people. Like Leprechauns. Now aren't you glad that we had this little talk. Also, I may be glad to see you again. Ah screw it, I MISSED YOU!"

Pyros tackled Mime like a 5 year old girl. Not as, but like. Pyros got a subpoena last time he did a little girl form and hugged someone. Filthy perve.

"Don't you ever lose in a fight to the death again! OR I'LL KILL JUU! Like Pedro O' Sullivan."

[Arhra]

Newb stumbling around crashed into the cluster of Arhras. Fortunately for him, before they took any action, the half de-pantsu'd Asheth kicked him in the crotch.

Talking amongst themselves, Arhras had sorted out something very important. To tell each other apart, they settled on a numerical system, in order of appearance. They'd initially considered colours, but they all had the same favourite colour.

It was simple enough. The Arhra who had appeared inside the Kurosen Tower had been the first to appear, and so was Arhra One. She'd been the only one to actually have the powers she'd initially had, before complications with fusions and time holes.

Arhra Two had appeared inside the reality bubble, on top of The Bear and been chatty with Inbred. This Arhra was the one with the wings of chaos (not shown). Evidentally she could put them away. As she was otherwise identical in appearance with Arhra, this could complicate things.

Three had been the one to physically crawl out of the time vortex as a part of Arhiyara, before deciding she was sick of the whole thing and amputating Rhiya. She'd ended up with Rhiya's powers and subsequently been poisoned by Wilshasa. The Arhras found it worrying that the succubus wings she should have seemed to be on holiday and suspected shenannigans. The venom still in her system, she wasn't looking very good.

Fourth was Four, the Arhra Previously Known As Arhdra. She was the one who had ended up with the ability to assume a dragon form similar, but not quite like Rhiya's. The first main distinctions that had come to light so far were the possession of innards and an inability to change size at will. She was sulky about the last part. As she was in human form, this made the fourth physically identical Arhra.

Finally there was Five, also the last to arrive at the Kurosen Tower. She was also the only Arhra to currently be showing any physical divergence in appearance. This was due to the fact she'd absorbed technology from the Mashirosen Tower. The misconception of her being a cyborg from the future was swiftly raised and then dispelled. Her current state was because of her being altered by a sideways step temporally and then looting technology from the past.

This sorted, they moved to reclaim the Sundered Heart of Chaos and immediately found they had a problem. There was one mystical artifact and five Arhras. It was solved through random chance, Arhra Two ending up with the Heart. The other Arhras weren't very happy about it though.

It reminded them of something else. "Wait, then who has the Armour That Shall Not Be Mentioned?" they thought together. Quickly investigating, they found they all did. After that check, they all tucked it quickly away, lest Ecurt notice.

Three still sick, the other Arhras put Five in charge of taking care of her while then went off and fought Santa. She hasn't happy about that either. It seemed the seeds of division were being sown.