Drowning Aspirations, Zarack's free...now what?

[TigStripe]

Karin was not happy. It was the middle of the night, when normal people should be sleeping. But now, her head pounded as she balled her fists at the noise outside her room at the Blaswarpe inn. With naught but a lack of leads behind them, Augustine and Karin had scoured Zarack for two people: Arissa Stutenberg and the man known as Judas. Their search had led them to stay the night in the northern town of Blaswarpe, where they assumed that they would catch a night's rest and head south in the morn, hopefully to stop in at the Crimson Blade one more time before heading towards Southern Zarack in one final sweep for their beneficiary's nemesis.

Unfortunately, the concept of sleep seemed to be foreign to these people.

Karin slammed the front door to the Inn open as loudly as possible without throwing it unhinged and, without surveying the area, promptly shouted, "QUIET!"

No one seemed to pay attention to her outburst - there was a large group of people in the town square, and also many...dead bodies. The smell of blood wafted up to Karin's nose, where she covered with the back of her left hand at the realization of what it was that tickled her olfactory sense.

"What in the name of Japan," Karin muttered, finally taking a moment to survey the situation at hand.

The large group of people in the square were a mix of civilians and soldiers who were helping a much smaller group of roughed up soldiers and a few civilian-looking individuals that had evidently been summoned into a summons circle, a type of rune magic scribbled on the square's grounds. With the roughed up people had also come what appeared to be a veritable mountain of dead bodies, all clad in soldier uniforms of the Zarackian influence. Utilizing her weary and half-awake detective's intuition, Karin gathered that there had been a large-scale battle somewhere away from Blaswarpe, which had been chosen prematurely as an emergency escape route via the summons circle. How said evacuation would have been possible, the detective didn't know.

Nor did she care at the moment, for her eyes fell upon a certain woman amidst the group in an orange top and a ponytail crouched over a mammoth of a man, lying on the ground with a blade lodged in between two ribs. Blood was staining his shirt, but the blade seemed to act as a stopper for now. The wound itself looked fatal.

"Arissa! Daniel!" Karin cried, rushing over to the group. When a few people moved to keep Karin away, Hayden merely rearranged their ideas of what was right to do, and they allowed Karin to pass unhindered. She knelt beside Daniel and surveyed his wounds before looking back to his wife.

"This looks fatal," Karin said in a desperate voice. "He needs medical attention, quickly."

"Remove the blade and he'll do the rest," Arissa replied simply. "Daniel is much tougher than that." She reached forward and grasped Vice's previous weapon. With some difficulty and a little bit of painful cries from her husband, Arissa successfully dislodged the blade and pulled it from his side. She applied pressure to the wound immediately, and chanted something under her breath. Both she and Daniel began to glow a light red for a moment, then it faded.

"What was that?" Karin asked.

"It was a connection spell," Arissa said, an audible strain in her voice. "I now share half of his pain until his system is able to heal the wound. 'Until death to us part' is something to live by, Setsuna."

"Indeed." Karin realized that now was not the time for such things, but she and Augustine were running out of time. The question had to be asked immediately. "Arissa, do you know the location of the richest person on Zarack?"

Arissa's face was fighting the urge to twist in pain as she now experienced half of the excruciating force in her husband's side. "What is this, Karin? We've just come from a battlefield - can't we rest a little?"

"This is important, Arissa. Please, can you think of where this Judas person lives?"

"What purpose do you have for this information, Karin?"

"I have been sent to him with naught but a name and my beneficiary's word that it's the name I need. I have no idea where he is. It's my latest contract, you see." Karin avoided telling her the entire truth, that she fully intended to kill Judas until he was no more.

"Judas resides in Lakeside, down south of the Carmenn Mines. But I don't understand how this couldn't have waited..."

"Thank you, Arissa. You could not have been a great help to me. I'm afraid I can't stay to help these soldiers...this contract is priority." Karin gave Daniel a gentle touch to the face, wishing him the best in his recovery, before standing to her feet and making a bum rush to the Inn. Once in her room, she cried out, "Yo, Mike! We got a lead! Get your butt out of bed, Augustine, we're heading out now!"

Back outside, an outright brouhaha had been started. Having been connected to Arissa via her binding spells, Vice had also transported to Blaswarpe. Her binds were weakened, but still holding. Just the mere presence of one of the Horsemen in Zarackian custody was sending people into a panic.

[PumpkinHat]

Augustine scowled, a pillow held tightly over his face. With a groan he slipped out of bed and reached for his discarded shirt, "IT'S NOT LIKE I COULD SLEEP, YOU KNOW! WHAT WITH PEOPLE ALWAYS YELLING!!!"


He shook his head and slipped into his leather jacket, adjusting his belt. He sauntered out into the street, rings hinting around his eyes. He couldn't recall the last time he actually had a night's worth of rest. He was used to it of course, but it was irritating all the same. Perhaps the very reason he was not at all pleasant to be near most of the time was rooted in this cause.

As he reached into his pocket the man felt a shock of sorrow. He had only one cigarette left. Oh the tragedy! With solemn resolve he set it alight carefully, savoring the sweet taste of tobacco as the smoke filled his lungs. He caught up with Karen and looked at her with a mix of frustration and sadness, "This....is going to be a very...Very bad day."

The last of his cigarette ran, disappearing in a trail of smoke as August crushed the useless stub beneath his boot, "So, what's this about a lead?"

[Zeke]

somewhere in Blaswarpe, a dizzying majin clad female slowly revived from a concussion induced loss of consciousness. "What? huh?" she looked up and around. She saw no one around her, or none paying attention to her at least. The girl eyed left and right, her body forming hair, her eye growing out of proportion. Before long the black clad female was now a black and gray furred rat squeeking about the streets.

[TigStripe]

Karin grinned. "Lakeside. Judas lives there. Even if he isn't there now, it's a nice place to start." She led Augustine out of Blaswarpe, where Hayden formed his favorite form of transportation, the gigantic eagle. The eagle sunk into the earth, leaving Karin and Augustine on their own momentarily, then rose slowly from directly underneath, lifting the two of them into the air. Turning south, Hayden pushed off needlessly with his wings and darted to the south.

[Teryngale]

Percival pushed up off the ground with all his might, but the two slain soldiers that lied atop him did not budge. The strength in his arms gave way and his hands slipped on the cold stone square. He grunted under the weight, and pushed again, staring down at the faintly glowing ink as the magic whiled away its expiration.

Suddenly, the extra weight upon the mage lifted. He rolled over and sat up, looking to thank the person that helped him, but as quickly as his gratitude formed, it was replaced with loathing. Percival stared emotionlessly at his vampyric rescuer, who held both corpses by the collars of their armours.

"Well. You can say something. Like, 'Thanks, Nicholi, for saving me from being crushed by cadavers. You're my bestest friend ever.' or something instead of just glaring at me." The vampire said with a smirk and a warped sickly sweet tone as he gently laid both bodies on the ground beside the mage.

"We're out of the capital. What happened-- I thought we were progressing." Percival questioned, his mind clouded by the rush of the spell.

"Pft. Don't ask me. I was making my way to the capital when that stupid spell of yours started freaking out on me." Nicholi replied, rubbing against his neck where the remnants of green glowing ink was finally fading away.

"That stupid spell saved us from whatever turned the tide of battle against us, you ungrateful idiot." Teryngale snarled in reply.

"Calling me ungrateful? Who received no thanks from whom for saving from inanimate corpses, Crim?"

"Just shut up, and get out of my way Petrovoff." Percival snapped and pushed himself off the ground, warily taking step around the two fallen that were next to him. He glared about indifferently as he stepped away from the corpses. His skin crawled with aggravation, and his pointed ears burned with embarrassment at the sight of a good deal of the city out helping the valiant heroes who had to retreat. The mage walked towards one of the soldiers pulling bodies from the pile and laying them in a more dignified position. "You there. Who is in command right now?"

Nicholi shrugged off Teryngale's usual pompous irritation and looked around the area. "Wow. Looks like someone had one hell of a night here. Too bad I didn't get much of the fun." He muttered as he ran his right hand through his dirt infested mane.

[TigStripe]

Nicholi heard footsteps from behind him and a light chuckle. "Eh, you wouldn't have wanted that action anyway. So boring, it was just a hellstorm of magic and some swordfighting, from what I understand." The vampire turned to see the violet-haired goddess standing with her arms behind her back and one foot planted in front of the other. She looked quite the innocent to those who would not know better.

"The city's been liberated. I...I pulled the trigger when Sanakuna sent up her signal. According to Nights, though, the Majin threat was settled. I got her signal just moments before Sana's flare went up. When I saw that last flare, I panicked - the spell was loosed before I realized what I was doing." She gave Teryngale a sorrowful gaze. "I'm sorry for wasting such a brilliant spell." She shook her head. "Unfortunately, not all of us were removed by the spell; Nights and her infiltration group are still there. I'll be heading over there in a moment to see if they're okay."

"Why not leave now?" Arissa sidled up next to Eio, her hand on her side and the look of pain in her face. "We have things under control here."

Eio didn't look straight at Arissa, but instead looked down to the ground. "I'm sorry about Daniel. Is he okay?"

"He'll be fine. Go," Arissa said simply.

Eio gave Nicholi and Teryngale each a woeful smile before lifting into the air and vanishing in a flash of speed.

Arissa set herself to the ground, her arm still on her side. "I shouldn't have done that...I could be helping more people..."

[Rubilon]

A robed figure moved through the bodies, examining each in turn. He sighed as more and more of the bodies he touched lacked pulses. "Can I get someone to help me get these bodies moved?" Reese yelled over the clamor. A few nearby soldiers who were less grievously wounded came over and helped the mage to move the bodies to an ever increasing pile of deceased.

On his way back to the mass of wounded a groan caught his attention and he diverted himself to one side. A swordsman lay on the ground clutching his face, the smell of burnt flesh lingered about him as his blood slipped between his fingers onto his armor. "Move your hands." Reese stated, closing his eyes white flames began to envelope his hands.

The soldier merely looked at Reese, not comprehending for a moment. He then nodded and dropped his hand. The entire left side of his face was missing, burned away by a fireball he'd been to slow to avoid. Reese quickly moved and placed his burning hands over the mans face. For a moment the blood merely flowed between Reese's fingers, staining the wrists of his cloak, but slowly the blood stopped as the holy magic worked it's way into the mans flesh, helping to accelerate the healing process.

"There, that'll stop the bleeding long enough for you to get to a healer. You'll live" he stated, patting the soldier on the shoulder before moving on. He moved through the bodies, getting the less injured to get the men and women close to death into one area so the town healers and anyone with first aid experience could work on them, and even setting up a que for the most serious injured down to those with just scrapes. So focused on this task was Reese that he didn't even noticed the Eio's appearance/disappearance.

[Badger]

Sanakuna stood trembling as she surveyed the damage. Not as many had been lost as she had first thought... only about 9 out of her 25...

Still, the loss hurt.

She dropped Amondius to begin tending to the wounded with what leftover white magic she could muster. Images of the things that she and Reese had fought flashed through her mind. Greenish skin and hollow eyes and all dressed in black armor that looked to be made out of darkness itself...

After the group had scattered and narrowed down to about 12, the soldier brought the number down to 9, and Sana and Reese brought it down to 4. Unfortunately, the last few were a very tough batch. More of her charges had gone down in the last quarter of the battle than the beginning. She could still see the icy, unblinking stares of the Majin as she scorched and impaled them with Amondius. They almost looked as if they had enjoyed it...

"Hey!"

Sana whipped her head towards the boy grasping at her tiny arm with both hands. He smiled softly, blood still drying on his face from a wound on top of his head.

"Thanks, m'am..."

Sana gave a little twitch of a grin back, and then continued with her work.

"So," she spoke up. The usual quietness of the Eludarian priestess broken, she had quite the commanding voice. "I'm glad we succeeded in our mission. Who are the new faces? Oh, and I'm ready for the next set of plans whenever you have them, Arissa."

[TigStripe]

Arissa sat as still as she could on the ground as Sanakuna addressed her, her face still contorted in pain. "Please, take things one at a time. Finish helping the wounded - Reese could use some help...and if you could find it in you to help work with Daniel's wound, both of us would greatly appreciate it."

Arissa sighed as Reese walked by her to make his way to the next wounded person to be placed with the waiting line for healing. "Reese, wait." She reached out with her left hand and tugged at the bloody hem of his sleeve. "The wounded are top priority, but we need to find out how things are at the Blade as soon as we can. Our edge in the race against Sekhmet - the Runic Box - could have activated in the time we were gone. Is there any way you can think of to contact them? Perhaps Teryngale could help. Our advantage in this struggle is our closeness to our allies."

[Rubilon]

Reese stopped as Arissa grabbed his sleeve. "You're right, I think I've got the worst cases stabalized for the true healers." he stated. He looked at the sleeves of his robe and happened to find a 'clean' spot, which he then used to wipe his face, which mearly smeared the blood that had gotten there. "I'll track Teryngale asap." he stated with a nod of his head.

He was about to turn to leave when the blood stain on Daniel caught his eye. He sighed and shook his head. "You should have drawn my attention to this sooner Arissa." He tskd lightly, more in jest then anything else as the fingers of his right hand began to burn white. He placed these around the stab wound inflicted by Vice. The flames were warm, and they soothed away the pain as they accelerated the division rate of the cells in the area to help close the wound and atleast stitch the muscles together faster as the holy magic worked to remove any foreign substances and cleanse the fast sealing wound. His left hand began to glow simularly as and he moved it in a fairly random pattern over Daniel's body, allowing the flames to 'drip' onto various wounds, causing them to begin the healing process.

"There, that'll take care of a majority of the wounds, but I'd advise getting a healer to make sure everything is in order" he stated with a nod as he stood, most of the flames had vanished as he finished but one remained on the tip of his finger, which he promptly 'blew out'. "Now if you'll excuse me I will go to work on establishing contact with the Blade."

[Teryngale]

“Percival looked to Eio, but did not pay much attention to her words. He shrugged indifferently as he turned to the pile of the dead again. His eyes glazed as he stared at corpses laying throughout the street. Blood. Filth. Death. The ideas seeped into his mind, numbing him as he stood in the city-square.

Reese's voice pierced the mage's clouded thoughts as he walked by, yelling something about moving the bodies. Percival took a couple of steps back as two soldiers picked a corpse up like a game carcass and tossed it onto growing mountain of slain unceremoniously.

"Hey! Don't just throw them around like trash! Lay them down properly, not in heaping mounds." Percival snapped and began to storm towards the two, but stopped after a few steps, soaking in several fresh thoughts. He placed his hand over his eyes for a moment, trying to pushing the growing headache out of his mind.

"Ergh.. I'm sorry. It's been a rough night for us all. And I know we are lacking in time to both prepare the dead and save the living, but we should still take the time to respect them by treating them as honoured fallen instead of dead rats. I want you two to do just that, lay them properly here until we figure out what needs to be done with them." Percival explained slowly. He cradled his eyes again for a moment and turned back to the filing line of wounded. His head ached and his youthful want to help was replaced with the urgency of duty and a pang of guilty fatigue.

Soldiers continued to pull wounded from the jumbled crowd and lay them down aways to the north in respective triage groupings as the uncanny mage Reese had pointed out to them. A handful of civilians were running to and fro, with jugs of water, baskets of food, and armfuls of bandages. Even with chaos coming to order quickly around him, Percival could not find Orryn or the Majin they imbued to return with them.

Nicholi smirked at the thought of not enjoying fire fights and swordplay as he artfully dodged the people rushing to help. "Well, it looks like you guys have everything in order. I think I'll go to a bar for a night-cap and make good use of a hole in the ground before you decide to fill it with a corpse." He called out with a laugh, patting several passing soldiers and Reese on the shoulder as he slowly strut onward.

[PumpkinHat]

Orryn had been conversing with a couple soldiers, a few light hearted jokes within their talk of the previous turn of events. He had been ritually checking up on the majin that they had taken captive, his eyes always darting back to her unconscious form. Oh dear...I wish I had not hit her so hard...

One soldier had a particularly funny joke and the samurai guffawed, leaning on his knee. He happened to glance at where the majin was supposed to be resting, only to see it empty. His face contorted in a comical form of shock and dismay, and he pushed through the group in a hurry to see what had happened.

He looked over the spot, unable to believe his eyes. It was then that his sharp ears picked up a faint skittering of feet on the streets, She's a shapeshifter, you fool! He immediately took off in pursuit toward the noise.

In his haste he nearly missed a small rat running frantically away from where they had been transported. How he knew for certain he wasn't sure...but he could almost smell the creatures fear. Besides, how often does one see a rat out in the open? They were elusive little beasts by nature.

With a quick flourish of his blade, the end of it cut off the rat's escape and he looked down at the creature with pity, "You always run away... Tell me, why is that?"

[Zeke]

The rat reeled back at the sight of the sword and squeaked frantically as it made and about face and turned the other way. It was at this point Orryn grabbed the mouse by the tail and lifted the creature to eye level. With nothing left to loose the mouse, exerting powerful muscle control hoisted itself up and bit the mans finger. If only as a muscle twitch the samurai relinquished full control for a split second letting the rat fall on the ground.

Where there was once a gray mouse now sat a woman dirty and wet. She stared at the samurai in confusion and panic.

[PumpkinHat]

Orryn yelped and held his bitten finger, "YOUCH!! Oww!" He whimpered, Now that really did hurt!! He looked down at the woman, looking absolutely pathetic, "Was that really necessary?"

He sighed, "I was not trying to hurt you or anything..." He sheathed his blade and plopped down beside the girl, his legs and arms crossed, "Now, if you would please answer my question, madam. Why do you insist on running? If we had wanted to kill you, then it would have been done. If we had wanted to keep you prisoner, then you would have found yourself bound by ropes. If we had wanted to torture you, then you would have awakened to a nightmare I am sure. So why then, do you think it was so easy to escape?"

He felt a swell of pity for the woman, she must be frightened, "Forgive me for giving pursuit, but I did want to apologize for that bump on your head.. That and I wish to speak with you if you will allow it."

[Zeke]

She stood up, bearing a face of resent. "If all you do is wish to speak, then why draw your sword? I'm a soldier of the Zarackian military and even I know practices of good diplomacy. One doesn't go around waving a blade around demanding that all he wants to do is have a nice chat and a spot of tea!"

The woman seemed to have games some confidence all of the sudden, despite the man's stature compared to her 5'5" self.