World Tree MUSH

    Tokyo, this time, isn't filled with the songs of The Muse, or the distress of a young Adept being persecuted for having powers at all. It's filled with screams, and hungry moans, and the snapping of bones and the spilling of blood.

    It's not great.

    The Sun hasn't set yet on the futuristic city, which probably makes the sight of zombies all the stranger in the streets. They don't quite fear the light - they're agitated by it. Civilians, Sumeragi troopers and bystanders alike, chewed up and turned into black-and-grey skinned, purple-veined zombies displaying unusual agility and speed, bouncing off buildings to get at prey.

    And there's someone, much more visible, leading the horde. A teenage girl, probably around sixteen, wrapped in a vivid purple glow, whose movements are even more rabid than the zombies'.

    She dangles off a lamp post, screaming.

    "AdePT SlAYer!!! COMe ouT!!! ADEPt slaYER!!!"

    It's Elise, in her armor, but she hardly looks like the meek one, or the dominant one. Her tongue is sticking out, long and snake-like, her eyes are absolutely crazed, and she moves more like an animal than a person. Her voice keeps spiking irregularily, too.

    "THIs woN'T sTOp unTIl yOU coMe oUT!!!"

>> GAME >> Elise uses a Free Edge for: She pissed.

    Xion really gets into the weirdest places sometimes. At the moment she's standing on the observation deck of a skyscraper, watching the city below, hooded face concealed by shadows as usual. She's getting a few worried stares from some civilians who've taken refuge up this high (or possibly were just already here when the zombies showed up). Especially when she steps over the guard rail.

    Monsters. Well, no hesitating this time.

    The Nobody Replica leaps off the building, arms and legs spread wide, hood flipping up off her head. Her Mirage Blades appear in her hands. Time to test these weapons of light on some creatures of darkness.

     This is his fault. 

     The words on the unchained devil's lips are thus. The words of Slothful Conjurer Merak are thus. This is his fault. His burden. His failure. 

     And he can't make it right. There is no way to make it right. Each life lost at the hands of the screaming girl is a life that cannot be replaced, something precious, something that could have been wonderful now cut down by a monster. Something like that is irreplaceable. Something like that can never be 'made right'. Each screaming face, locked in an irrevocable glass-eyed death, will be carved into his memory. He will remember each human who died here as if he was the one who pulled the trigger. That is something that can never be made right. 

     But he can take responsibility. 

     The distinctive white armor and glowing red cross of the Adept Slayer hits the ground only moments after six zombie heads erupt under the pressure of a spray of assault rifle shots. In one hand he is clutching that selfsame assault rifle, sleek and black and of Sumeragi make, undoubtedly bought on the black market. His other hand is bare, tucked against his chest as if in a cast. Slung over his back is a rocket launcher. Hanging at his side are a pair of semi-automatic shotguns. Around his chest is a bandolier of grenades and bombs and ammunition, all black-market. He is covered in the distinctive burn pattern of having taken a laser to the face. 

     And his face is a mask of rage and hatred. 

     Almost nonchalantly he points the assault rifle off to the side. He fires into the crowd of zombies with what seems like abandon - but is in fact not abandon at all, each shot perfectly-aimed to save a civilian, a bystander, a Sumeragi trooper, each shot of the clip perfectly fired straight through heads that erupt in a plume of blood and flesh and gore. 

     Copen's hate gives him strength. His rage gives him energy. He's burning the candle so close to the edge it might give out before he can finish the job, but one way or another, he will do what he must. 

     "God has heard your prayers," Copen says as he locks eyes with Elise, "In His infinite wisdom he has sent you what you sought, what you craved, what you desired in every inch of your filthy mutant soul." 

     "He has sent you repentance." 

     "He has sent you your death." 

     Copen shoulders the assault rifle, firing it directly behind him into an approaching zombie. The creature erupts as Copen takes another step forward towards the massive horde. 

     "Your Slayer is here, Adept! Right here! Come on! I'll send you to God so you might thank Him personally on your way to damnation!"

>> SUMMARY[Copen] >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYjWczq721U but earned this time (recommended listening)

    Just where did he end up now?

    Blues is not exactly having the time of his life trying to find home, but at least with some repairs done on his reactor, he doesn't have to worry about DYING now. Unfortunately it looks like a lot of other people... do have to worry about dying. The robot is atop a building, scarf flapping in the wind, trying to see what's going on and figure out an angle. Okay, crazed-looking girl screaming incoherently, and lots of zombies.

    He knows what a zombie is, at least.

    Blues at first isn't sure WHAT he is going to do, but seeing the zombies threatening civilians, that changes his mind. While Copen is shooting some of the troops by shooting them, Blues takes another tactic.

    The Adept Slayer is making his announcement, and a faint whistling tune is heard, carried over the noise and chaos. A few moments later there's a loud *kthoom* as a heavy shield slams into pavement. The incoming zombies crash into that, and the helmeted 'man' braces himself to hold them back. "Find a clear space we can defend!"

  This was not the destination that Princess Zelda had had in mind.

  That she stepped through the wrong Vine is immediately obvious. The princess is dressed in simple riding clothes, a wicker basket tucked in the crook of an elbow, full of herbs and flowers. Her bow is over her shoulder and a quiver at her hip.

  "...Oh for the love of Hylia, what fresh hell is this?" Her statement is a mumble, tone one of numbness, as she tries to compute the tableau in front of her. Civilians are in trouble, though, and it's the screaming that gets her attention.

  In one smooth motion she drops her basket, slings her bow down from her shoulder, fits an arrow to the string, draws, and fires. A second arrow is fired onto the zombie, just in case she missed. She's in motion, then, stooping to retrieve her basket and crab-scuttling towards the nearest thing she can use for cover, which is... nothing; she's just heading for the side of a building so she can have her back to the wall.

  Well, this is kind of awkward and unexpected.

    There's someone that Zelda knows, at least. Coming to try to stop the crazed Elise, Aloy has this time brought some reinforcements of her own! Fight smarter, not harder! Astride a Strider, a fast-moving horse-machine, Aloy whistles loudly and does a quick motion toward a patch of zombies. "Clear out someplace safe, got it!"

    A moment later, two more large machines, looking like some sort of sabertooth cat that has been mechanized, burst into view in a feral charge! The sawtooths plunge toward the zombies to trample through, their 'teeth' literal saws.

    A few of the crawlers rush to Xion to meet her advance, without hesitating. She leaps down, they leap up, straight for her. The exchange is a losing one for them against her blades, but when she cuts them apart, their purple blood splashes everywhere. It burns! And it blinds, momentarily. It's like an awful gimmick from a video game.

    Another row of the zombies is blown to shreds as Copen enters. He taunts Elise, and her attention shifts. Her horde's attention shifts, like a well-oiled machine. That makes Blues' intervention that much easier on the robot, not that he needed it with his strength. Keeping the zombies at bay with his shield is pretty easy, and between the shield and his shades, that purple goop is way less of a threat! 

    A place to defend, though? Copen seems more concerned with taking the horde head on. There's a mall nearby though, that always seems popular for defense against zombies.

    "YeS, yoU are whAT sHE waNTS!!! LoOK at YOU, SLayeR!!!"

    Elise's crazed alter shoots a glare towards Xion, and another towards Zelda as the arrows find their marks, bringing two more of the zombies down. "LOOK at yoU aLL! dO yoU eVeN REAlizE hoW MuCH sHE wanTS TO bE liKE YOU?!?!?!"

    Machines stride in. Aloy's reinforcements plow through a dozen of the zombies, their corrosive blood latching onto the lower halves of the machine even as the bodies turn to dust.

    "KyA kYA KYA!!! THerE'S plENtY moRe WHErE thEY cAME FRoM!!!" Indeed, dozens more. Three zombies immediatly try to tackle Xion to the floor when she lands - if she lands. Two exploding zombies try to dismount Aloy. Two zombies, latched onto building walls, spit corrosive purple goop at Zelda. The half a dozen that Blues is pushing back produce claws and try to get around his shield, surprisingly able to slice through metal (although, not his shield, predictably).

    Copen has zombies trying to grab him by the arms to pin him in place, as Elise produces a massive kunai and lobs it straight at him.

    "IF She cAN't hAVE IT ThEn WHY shOuLD yOU?!?!?!"

    Xion grins with some exhileration as her blades slice through these creatures with surprising ease - and then lets out a sudden yelp of surprise as she winds up getting purple 'blood' in her eyes. She crashes down to the floor, writhing a bit as she tries to get the gunk off her face and clear her vision.

    Unfortunately she's quickly jumped by zombies before she can stand up. She struggles and fights - she's much stronger than she probably should be, but she's not really a match for three adult zombies! But she can move just enough to... "FAITH!"

    Summon down a shining pillar of white-blue light, bathing her - and, more importantly, the zombies - in brilliant, searing light.

    Xion then jumps to her feet, trying to wipe gunk off of her still. "I don't know what you're talking about!" she shouts at Elise. "Do you know me?!"

    She decides... melee combat is probably not a great idea, and attempts to get some distance between herself and the horde.

     Blues speaks. Copen ignores him for a moment as he swings the assault rifle into another zombie. "There is no place to defend. Moving it is impossible. The Adept will simply kill any innocent humans nearby. These monsters in the shape of men...there's no depths to which they won't sink." 

     Two of the zombies come lunging at him. They get him by the arms - they force him backwards and down, and he almost screams at the pain, the pain of the broken arm being forced down to the concrete, the pain of the opened knife wound, the pain of his back arcing on the rocket launcher. Pain clouds his senses. Weariness dulls his thought. 

     It's almost so dull that he doesn't see the kunai coming. 

     Almost. 

     The red glow from his armor shoots into his right arm all at once as the kunai glints in Elise's hand. As it leaves her wrist, his arm surges upwards, tearing through the zombie with enough force to shatter its arms and split its head open in the process. As it comes within an inch of him he rolls towards the other zombie, that powered fist hammering through its jaw and out the other side. Rather than a kill shot it's simply a gut shot - the knife jamming its way inside his side, digging in between his ribs. He suppresses another hiss of pain as he stands and tears the now-detached zombie arms off himself. He's not bleeding. The armor staunches bleeding. 

     His broken left arm settles back into that pose against his chest as he unslings one of the shotguns and starts walking forward again. "Each piece of you is a disease," Copen's voice rings out, punctuated by another shotgun shell to the chest of another encroachin zombie, "Each portion of you is a sickness to the core. You are tainted to the soul. Of course you yearn to be like me." 

     "But there is no cure for your sickness but me. If you wish to be like a human, then die like one. It is all the peace any part of you will get." 

     "It is all the peace any part of you deserves, Sumeragi horror." 

     Copen's eyes flick to the sides at Xion's magic. Zelda's already registered on his radar as he was glancing over his shoulder. Blues gets a look over his side. 

     "I'm going to clear a path. It's me they want." 

     "Which is fine." Copen's lips twist backwards in another hateful snarl, "I want her." 

     "Do whatever you want." 

     And then he moves forward into the crowd to, well, to cut a path.

  Upon seeing two zombies nearby fix their attention on her, Zelda instinctively throws herself to one side at about the same time the two creatures spit that corrosive goop at her. The stuff spatters against the concrete, burning holes into the sidewalk, smoke curling up from the point of impact. Some of it grazes past her arm, sizzling and searing its way past an arm and a leg on one side; Zelda recoils--

  --and shrieks in abject terror, because her path takes her around in time to catch sight of Copen in the middle distance. That flash of red and white had stirred something in her subconscious, and now her horror comes clawing to the surface as realisation sets in.

  I mean, it's not like the zombies aren't scary, they absolutely are, but she has personal reason to run away from Copen as fast as her feet can carry her.

  These things are pretty awful, too, though. Zelda shrinks back, homing in on a familiar face and limping toward Aloy astride her Strider. "Aloy!" Zelda's voice is almost hysterical with relief. She waves her bow, even as she starts to try and put some distance between herself and the uglies. Her leg is burnt and raw, though, and it's slowing her down. She raises her bow and waves it wildly in Aloy's direction. "Aloy, over here! Can that machine of yours carry both of us?"

  She /really/ wants to run away, but these people are going to be torn apart if they don't do something.

  In the meantime she's going to hyperventilate and hope that Copen hasn't noticed her yet. (He has, but she doesn't know it yet...)

>> SUMMARY[Copen] >> Dropped the assault rifle, got pinned, being slow, got stabbed. Another day of Copen Hasn't Slept For Like A Week Theater. Tells Blues that he's not gonna bother going to defend because Elise will just keep killing people on the street until he comes out, and he wants her, after all, so he might as well go to her.

    Scrambling at his shield is a distraction for Blues, because if he lets these things get through they can actually hurt him. That's not a good idea when he doesn't know what they're capable of... aside from exploding into corrosive goop. he definitely doesn't want that on him!

    Seeing others try to defend the civilians, Blues gestures to Xion and the civilians, "Try to get to there while I hold them off!" He's pointing at the mall, of course. Maybe Aloy's sawtooths can help with that?

    In the meantime he's decided zombies are fair game, and his arm cannon configures to blast off a couple shots, just to see if he can scatter a path.

    Oh that's Zelda. The sawtooths can get eaten, they're expendable, but Aloy does get the idea Blues is signalling. She whistles, sending them toward the zombies in front of the mall to try to help clear a path, even though one of them is already limping. They're not really smaart enough to defend themselves against the zombies correctly.

    The explosions splattering her mount - and her armor - are a problem though. Tearing off a patch of her sizzling armor, Aloy kicks her Strider into gear, trying to escape the worst of it... though the Strider loses its cannister on the way. Whoops. Well, it probably won't survive the battle anyway.

    Drawing her bow, Aloy fires some freeze arrows filled with liquid nitrogen(or something like it) into the zombies nearby while heading for Zelda. "Yes, but not far. We need to find a safer spot while those others are busy. Who is the girl in the coat?"

    Holy light doesn't just seem to damage the zombies more. It reduces them to ash faster, and that goop doesn't splash everywhere. Keeping the horde at range is also a pretty good idea, let's be honest!

    "I DOn'T knOW!!!" the crazed Elise answers Xion. "DO I?!?!?! iT doESN't MAttER!!!" It really doesn't. Visibly, Xion has something Elise wants, like everyone else.

    Copen says things. The berserker turns to him, her tongue snapping about as she suppresses laughing to actually talk. "THAt's RighT!!! THat'S soMEthiNG elSE SHe wAnTS!!! BUt thE thIRD of US wON't leT HeR!!!"

    The meek Elise did apologize to Copen.
    She apologized for /getting revived/.

    Copen's arms overpower the zombies. Purple goop splashes everywhere, and the bodies turn into harmless dust. His guns claim another few. The horde is thinning, slowly.

    Don't worry Zelda, the zombies are in fact less scary than Copen. Probably more huggable, too, and their blood is acid, so take from that what you will.

    Escaping isn't a bad idea - though the zombies spitting blobs of purple goop at her are relentless in their dedication to being turrets.

    Blues' arm cannon might not be holy light, but energy is pretty good at scorching zombies too. Their blood vaporizes and isn't as much of an issue then, which makes clearing a path MUCH easier. They're dead anyways, not technically human by any definition. At worst, this counts as defiling corpses.

    Aloy's frost arrows have a similar effect; the zombies freeze and shatter, making the blood a non-issue and reducing their numbers. There were probably a hundred when people arrived, it's down to half now.

    The crazed Elise grabs ahold of the lamp post with her arms, and hops off it. She tears it out of the concrete, and suddenly tries to slam the entire thing into Copen, vertically.

    "SHe'lL nEveR bE HAppY!!! THAt'S Why I EXisT!!!"

    The zombies leave the others alone, surprisingly, for a round of respite - except the ones spitting blobs at Zelda and now Aloy too. But there's screems, suddenly! Coming from the roof of the mall.

    A dozen civilians barricaded themselves onto the roof, and a handful of the beasts are starting to crawl up the building walls towards them. Think quickly, or there'll be less civilians, and more zombies, shortly!

    "YOu CAn'T sAVe tHEm ALL eveN iF YOu tRY!!!"

    Xion dodges between zombies before hopping up onto a handy wall, kicking a zombie in the face in the process - not hard enough to really do much damage, but just because it's there and she doesn't really like these things.

    "My name is Xion!" she shouts in Aloy's general direction even as she tries to scale the wall to get a better vantage point. She's just about the leap off again and rain destruction down on the zombies below when she hears the screams from the mall...

    She points the not-Keyblade in her right hand in the direction of the wall-climbing, civilian-threatening zombies. Reddish-gold light coalesces at the tip of the blade... "Don't miss! RAGNAROK!" As she shouts the name of her assault, she twists the Mirage Blade in the air like a key in a lock - and 'streamers' of reddish-gold light spiral outward from the tip, before swooping through the air at the zombies. Each of the zombies climbing the mall gets its own personal homing laser! Isn't she thoughtful.

    And then Xion plummets to the ground because she didn't consider how she was going to land after she jumped...

    Another few blasts explode a few zombies, hopefully clearing a path for the civilians. "Go! I'll catch up!" He's trying to defend them, so even if he could normally handle the zombies without trouble, a few manage to gouge his arm. Not important yet!

    While the civilians get toward the mall, Blues leaps into the air. He can't be everywhere, so he calculates that maybe, just maybe, Xion can help him with the ones scaling the walls. That's why he tries to intercept and catch her, so she doesn't slam facefirst into the ground.

  The Strider plunges through the crowds in a blur of churning piston-limbs and gleaming steel hooves. It might not have weaponry, but its legs are still a threat to anything in its path.

  Zelda stows her bow at the Strider's approach, glancing back at the horde behind her. One of them lunges ahead of the pack. Sizzling acid splashes to the pavement, smoking.

  She runs.

  Every step is painful, but once she's close enough Zelda flings herself for the Strider, scrabbling at its flank and hauling herself aboard with a snarl of pain and effort. She is absolutely physically not made for this heroic nonsense.

  "Thanks for the save," she gasps, already pulling her bow down from her shoulder. Leaning forward and around Aloy, she nocks an arrow and draws, aiming for the hordes Aloy's already focusing on. The creatures are already focused on Aloy, so it would be smart not to draw others to them.

  There's a short pause between arrows, and Zelda's mouth quirks in a bitter little grin. "Nice horse," she calls, to her impromptu saviour.

  And then the screams drift down from the roof of the mall. Zelda's gaze snaps upward, and the best she can try to do is fire an arrow to distract the creatures. Her eyes flick between the crowds on the roof and the base of the building, calculating. "I may be able to reach them from the ground," she states urgently, "but it's a long shot even for me. What do you think, Aloy?"

     The acid splashes against his armor, sizzling and sparking. None of it got on his face, but his hood and his armor is starting to grow weak spots. Not only will he have to repair it, but now he can't use his right arm's super-strength; the circuits have been cut, the diagostic flashing in his eye warns, disrupted and damaged on several different levels. His right leg, too, got splashed in the jump. No speed or strength or auto-aiming for half of his body. He's never been so vulnerable before. 

     And there's never been more at stake. 

     It's not even a choice. There's no hesitation. A moment ago he was walking towards Elise with pure and ruthless abandon. Now the left side of his body lights up with energy as he flings himself towards the horde of zombies trying to crawl up the walls. His mind is whirling, panicking, operating on instinct. 

     Can't save them all. Can't save them all. Can't save them all. More problems, more problems. Most efficient route, most efficient route. 

     The most efficient route is to use the rocket launcher. Too many potential casualties. 

     The AR. 

     On the ground. 

     The shotgun. 

     Too slow. 

     Voder. 

     Not enough shots. 

     Aixgear. 

     Aixgear. 

     But he needs the position. 

     The blurry poisonous witch provides an opportunity. The homing lasers splinter outwards, and Copen leaps on one leg right past the horde. Aixgear deploys against his broken arm. The pain is writ on his face as he forces his arm to move, to position the shield below him as he hangs in the air. Aixgear unfolds piece by piece. 

     The shield becomes a massive, high-tech bow. It looks more like a railgun one happens to draw than a bow, and it lacks a string or arrows or anything. It simply glows with that ominous red light. 

     Then the light of bow turns a brilliant purple. The light of his armor does the same. A holographic targeting reticle lights up in Copen's eye. 

     "Sinners in God's eyes / Look not upon His fury / lest you turn to stone." 

     "GORGON'S GAZE!" 

     Copen releases the shot. The purple light splinters and fractures, smashing into the zombies only shortly before Copen himself does. They aren't homing, but they *are* aimed, and they *are* precise. Copen refuses to take even a single chance that one might survive. He may not be able to get them all, but the sheer saturation of firepower... 

     He hits the ground, all the impact on one leg, and stands up to look at Elise. 

     His lips part in a smile. "Your torment only makes my heart sing. If you sought pity, I suggest you look among your fellow monsters. You will find none with me." 

     "I know what you are. And I know that you deserve no joy in God's Creation, wretched witch-plague."

    "Not a problem," Aloy says easily, even as she tries to get the two away and winces at the splatter hitting her shoulder. So far, her armor is managing to blunt most of the effect, but if she stays still too long she has a feeling she'll get worse than a minor chemical burn. That's why she rounds the Strider to try to keep it a moving target while it still has legs. "They're fast, but not the toughest mounts. My sawtooths won't last much longer under all the acid, so we need to come up with a plan fast. At least Copen is occupied with the girl instead of us, right?" Small favors. And...

    The building. "See what you can do, I'll climb up and give them a hand." She brings the strider to a halt and leaps off, looping one end of a rope around a post, then carrying the rest as she leaps up to the building, limber and quick in trying to climb up the side not holding zombies, or the least zombies. Her aim is to get up there and make an improvised zipline for the civilians to escape on.

    It's a team effort, but it pays off. Xion scorches the zombies crawling up the wall, and then Copen activates the Septima he stole from Elise. A number of the zombies - and hopefully no allies - turn to stone, and become fragile enough that the slightest brush or hit will shatter them outright. The ones that were perched or posed unstably just tip over and break like that.

    The crazed Elise, though, covers her eyes.
    She knows her own tricks, even in that state.

    "YOu'RE fuNNy, SLaYER!!! YouR heaRT siNGs?!?!?!" She seems to pause, but then the glow around her becomes even more intense. "SHe WAnTs tHAT tOo!!!"

    As Aloy climbs up, the berserker rumbles.
    As Blues catches Xion, the berserker rumbles.
    As Zelda lets arrows fly, catching the few zombies still left, the berserker rumbles.

    There is a big, great surge of Septimal power, violet light filling the streets. Bathing over the dead, reaching deep underground, into the sewers and the underground tunnels.

    "I caN DO thIs TOo, SLaYeR!!!"

    DiE DIe diE dIE DIE
    Die DIe diE DIE dIE die DIE
    Die diE DiE dIe DIE!!!
    "ReSURexIOnnN!!!"

    Oh look, it's all the zombies. They're back. Well, most of them. They're all missing limbs, or pieces, or SEVERAL pieces, especially the ones that got incinerated. And they're all converging... on the rooftop.
    Aloy had better hurry.

    But Elise isn't done.

    With blinding speed, she surges towards Xion and Blues.
    "YOUr FREeDoM!!!"
    Her tail-hair lashes out with absurd strength, and she straight up bounces off them afterwards, streaking towards Aloy and Zelda next.
    "YoUr hApPinEss!!! YOuR STAtuS!!!"
    Her hands are armed with blades, and she slashes past the two of them like a deadly blur, crashing and bouncing off the wall behind them, going strauight for Copen last.

    "YoUR juSTiCE!!! yoUR moRTAliTY!!! YOuR rIGhT tO a NOrMaL LifE!!! YOuR SINgiNG HeART!!! YOuR GOd!!! I'lL TAkE THeM AlL sO SHe CaN HaVE THEm!!!"

    She slashes. She cuts. She stings. Kicks, whips, tries to grab Copen by the arm and beat him into the concrete for thirty seconds straight, tries to fling him at the rooftop to shatter the bricks and potentially cause civilians to fall.

    It's simple, but brutal.

>> GAME >> Elise spends an Edge for: A brutal onslaught, and zombies wave 2.

  Once they've gotten out of the thick of it, Zelda fires where she can, twisting with impressive agility in the nonexistent saddle. Picking them off where they look to do the most damage is the best she can hope for. Her shooting is no novice's skill, though, especially firing on moving targets from the back of a moving not-animal.

  The Hylian risks a quick glance back at the conflict between Copen and Elise. Violet light washes over the streets, and in the span of a heartbeat Elise flashes past her, leading the charge with those wicked blades. The princess jerks to one side with a grunt; a line of dark blood stains her riding clothes. She thins her lips and soldiers on after Aloy, but stumbles to a halt at the base of the building, shaking her head. "I'm sorry, Aloy, I can't climb that. I will guard your steed."

  Backing up, she settles in beside the Strider, eyeing the machine warily and then nocking an arrow and waiting. If anything moves erratically in her line of sight, it's gonna get feathered with arrows.

    As Elise comes rocketing at Xion and Blues, Xion instinctively throws herself in front of the robot. She... can't really explain why she does things like this - he's obviously tougher than she is, she shouldn't be the one protecting him!

    But, well. It's her nature, right?

    As she takes the brunt of the attack, the Nobody Replica is thrown to the floor, bouncing off the hard concrete twice before coming to a stop.

    She struggles to stand, panting hard, her black coat stained with purple zombie ooze as well as her own blood. Crystalline motes of light are starting to issue forth from her body, floating around her like some sort of 'aura'. "...Light, give me strength..."

    She leaps forward, her form a blur as she closes the distance between her landing spot and Copen, attempting to interpose herself between Elise and God's Demon. One hand is raised above her head - her swords seem to have vanished.

    "MAGIC HOUR!"

    She snaps her fingers. Her body is surrounded by a brilliant white pillar, as four more descend from the heavens in a diamond pattern around her. The light doesn't harm her allies, even as the pillars rush outwards. Even Copen, who's partially inside the main pillar, isn't burned by the holy light...

>> GAME >> Xion spends an Edge for: Perk: Hovering at the Edge of Oblivion

     It's simple. It's brutal. 

     And it's effective. 

     Elise gets Copen's arm in her grip. She smashes him against the ground over, and over, and over. His body, finally, at last, lets out an unmistakable grunt of genuine pain, the first he's ever given up to an Adept. Pain throbs, overwhelming in every part. His arms. His legs. His head. He can feel blood spilling out of his body even with the armor gapping it, holding it closed, keeping the monsters from seeing that he bleeds, that their nightmare is just a man. The holographic display in front of his eye reports multiple breaks. Multiple fractures. At a certain point in the smashing the pain starts to fade, and Copen briefly wonders if this is how dying feels as he's flung up into the air. 

     And then the sound of static plays in his mind again. The sound of crackling lightning. 

     It rouses him, only briefly. He swings around as he hits the bricks. He forces his broken arm to move, as much the armor as him, and shoves his fist into them. His left foot smashes into the wall to hold the bricks. They won't hold for long. 

     Copen swings up the rocket launcher with his right arm, ignoring the pressure. He fires at the crowd of zombies. 

     He misses spectacularly. The damage hits the edges of the crowd, no real damage to the horde. He flings the rocket to the side and releases himself, dropping amidst the rubble. He's too weak for the grenades, and he's right in front of Elise. His vision is hazy. His body is weak. He can barely see. 

     The rippling, indistinct freak, the one his mind can't seem to land on, stands in front of him. Light descends around him. His subconscious starts racing through potential Lifewave effects, through what Septima it might be. 

     Then his conscious mind sees its chance. 

     Voder swings up. 

     Voder swings up to Xion's back. 

     Voder swings up to Xion's back right in Elise's blind spot. 

     Voder swings up to Xion's back right in Elise's blind spot, aimed to kill Elise. Xion might survive the tremendous bullet. 

     Copen doesn't care either way. Two Adepts with one bullet is value. 

     He just pulls the trigger and lets God sort it out.

>> SUMMARY[Copen] >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9tKwSboJeg

    Leaping up to climb the building is great and all, but it makes it hard to dodge. Aloy also gets a gash, hers running along thigh and up her side to her waist. Her armor took some of it, but she doesn't have anything high-durability... so she's starting to get a spreading bloom of red, and slips on her grip to briefly hang from one hand. Dangling for just a moment, she kicks up to scramble higher, panting softly. "Move... move..."

    Wait. She dropped the rope.

    Now more zombies are converging, and Aloy backs away as she sees that she's cornered herself. She readies her spear, which at least manages to thwack the nearest zombie away, but... well, now SHE is in danger of being overrun, because climbing down while bleeding is going to be hard.

    Elise comes at Blues and Xion, and the shield comes up... but Blues is still send backward, despite his heavy body, with a look of surprise on his face, what is visible anyway. Crashing into the side of the building, he has to pull himself out, a few sparks seen on one shoulder. That... hurt. Worse than he thought. What is this girl? "That can't be a human," he mutters.

    That's when he sees it. The rope dropped, Aloy climbing to the top. The robot glances at the incoming zombies, then makes a dive for the rope, tumbling over to grab it and skid across the pavement before hurling it upward. It's a ROPE though, and he can't throw it very far-

    That's when he blips with a flash of silver-blue light, only to reappear partway up the building in a careful precision teleport. Grabbing the rope on its way down, he flings it the rest of the way up, over the edge, so Aloy can finish the job.

>> GAME >> Blues spends an Edge for: Precision Teleport to help get the people off the roof.

    Blues and Aloy work together to ensure the civilians have an escape route. A few spear whacks, a few shield bashes, those might not hurt either. It's good timing on Blues' part that restores the escape route, too.

    Xion's holy light starts searing away the zombies faster than they can reach the rooftop, all the while blinding the berserking Elise and causing her to back away, hissing like a snake.

    Even Zelda's arrows prove invaluable, plucking at the faster, smaller zombies that make it past Xion's light and near the roof. If a single gear amidst the gathered crew was out of alignment, this could've been catastrophic. It isn't.

    The civilians escape.

    The zombies, shortly after, are reduced to black, harmless dust.

    And a thundering gunshot goes through Xion and into Elise's skull. The Adept falls onto the battered concrete, her tongue slithering and her eyes glaring up at Copen, past Xion. No, maybe at Xion, too. She sees something there.

    "As LOnG aS ... shE fEElS eVEN A TinY ShREd oF ENVy ... TowARDs PEOplE ... i'LL ALwaYS cOMe BACk ... SLaYeR!!!"

    The crazed Elise's body explodes into a shower of... not gore. Not even a single drop of blood. It's like her body, her Armed Phenomenon (the armor), starts boiling and turns into a black and purple mess, and then bursts into a dozen purple, sparkling wisps of power. They gather up together, forming the Glaive, that technological-looking sword she uses to transform. It cracks a bit, and teleports away.

  Nock, draw, and release.

  The onslaught of creatures seems to be without end. Not only are the humans of this world affected by the spreading virulence, but the smaller creatures roaming the streets have also succumbed. Birds, rats, dogs, even stray cats have erupted into the same kind of mindless, corrosive-fuelled aggression as the townsfolk.

  Nock.

  Draw.

  Release.

  No matter her terror, Zelda wouldn't think of fleeing. This strange machine may be their only hope of escape if the hordes multiply; it would also be safer to escape with Aloy, if she can at all delay long enough to wait for the hunter.

  Every aimed shot costs her, though. The stain of red at her side spreads incrementally with every shot. Her breath saws against the back of her throat; on the periphery of her senses, she's silently keeping track of where Copen and Elise are, all the better to flee if she has to.

  Yeah, sorry, Aloy, she's not going to die for that horse-thing.

  Zelda raises her bow, trying to provide some kind of cover fire for Aloy, if there's anything near enough to shoot at, but the arrow wobbles in flight and falls short, striking sparks where it bounces off the concrete.

  "I hope you're not going to kick me if I climb on you," she asides, to Aloy's strange horse-thing. "I may need to if your mistress doesn't return soon."

  She lowers her expectations a little, and her sights as well. The next arrow punches through an infected pigeon, putting the beast out of its misery. It splashes acid as it spends a few minutes dying noisily, but at least it isn't as much of a contaminant as a dying ex-human.

  Raising her bow, she takes aim at another infected creature. Looks like it used to be a rat. Used to be. By the time Zelda moves her aim onward, the thing's skull is wholesale obliterated by a steel-headed arrow.

  She might stare at the three-way brawl between Copen, Elise, and Xion, but she's too busy picking off the smaller creatures. If she understands this right, the infection will only spread if anything gets away.

  And so the princess nocks another arrow, takes careful aim at what used to be another rat, and lets fly the arrow with military discipline.

    For a moment, Xion's power eclipses everything she had done previously in this battle, combined. Her stance is confident, her hand raised above her to call down the holy light of the heavens as though it's second nature.

    And then a shot rings out.

    The light doesn't fade. If anything, it gets even more intense as Xion looks down at her chest. There's... no blood. Just more of that crystalline, shining light.

    And then she tips forward, knees buckling to catch her for a moment before she just slumps down on her face.

     Copen slumps forward. He takes a moment to draw a breath when he confirms Elise's death. The shimmering Adept falls forward, too, and he smiles through the pain. That gives him strength. That gives him *joy*. 

     He pulls himself to his feet. He wobbles slightly. For a brief instant, perhaps, it seems like he might be too tired to keep fighting, too tired to chase, too tired to act. 

     "It is not a human. It is an infection." 

     Copen's answer to Blues is filled with loathing, with hate, with a deep, personal spite. "A poison called witch. Called wizard. Called magician. Called Adept." 

     "A chained devil born with overwhelming power, descended into madness as all of them do." 

     He turns towards Zelda. He looks like a zombie himself, half-shambling, dark bags under his eyes, hate on his lips. 

     "They are an infection that wears human skin until they have convinced you that they are harmless. That they are decent. That they are people." 

     "And then the mask comes off, and you cannot undo what damage is done. Cannot make up for the innocents lost to those that believe themselves greater than man and God alike." 

     He raises his gun towards Zelda. "You have to cut out the infection before it can do any damage."

  At the sound of a familiar voice, the princess' head snaps up in spite of her overarching fatigue. Her eyes widen; she manages a soft, strangled sound of inarticulate terror.

  "No--please--"

  Most royals aren't in the habit of begging, but she can't die yet. There are still things she needs to do. Hyrule must be restored; her people saved--

  She shrinks against the mechanical horse, drawing the arrow in a single exaggerated motion, but the shaft trembles against the bow and her guiding forefinger.

  "Stay away," she breathes, shaky. "Don't come any closer!"

  Her arms are trembling, as much from fear as the effort of holding her shot.

  He turns toward her; lifts his firearm with clear intent to fire once he's done making his speech about how much he hates the supernatural.

  Princess Zelda is normally a good and honourable person, but right now she's exhausted and wounded and terrified. She doesn't give Copen the chance to fire.

  She looses her arrow.

  There's no telling whether it can find its target, precisely because she is exhausted and wounded and terrified. Instinct compels her to try, all the same.

  "ALOY!" The volume with which such a slight person can bellow is nothing short of impressive. It's commanding; meant to cut above the din, and it does. Fear is a powerful motivator. "TROUBLE!"

    The civilians are getting free, and then... the zombies collapse. Aloy slumps, clutching her side and almost collapsing in relief. Almost. Because just then she sees that fanatic going after Zelda, despite his obvious exhaustion... and hers. She's too far away to do much except use her bow or whistle for her Strider. The Strider is pretty damaged already though... it won't survive another hit from Voder.

    Bow it is.

    In deference to Copen not killing them and helping stop the apocalypse here, she doesn't go for a killing strike. Aloy nocks, draws, and fires a Tearblast arrow, aiming the concussive blast at Copen's feet to knock him away and give Zelda a chance to run. Because the Strider WILL listen to her. "Get moving!"

     The arrow hits him square in the small of the shoulder almost at exactly the same time as Aloy's arrow hits the ground in front of him. The concussive blast picks him up and sends him smashing into the wall. It's the only reason the arrow doesn't pierce all the way through; that side of the armor lost power long ago. 

     More breaks. More cracks. He'll need to invent a whole new form of medicine just to get himself back to fighting form. He falls forward. 

     He's still on his feet, and that's probably the most frightening part of all. Those red eyes are still there, still burning, still *hating* with every fiber of a broken being. All that abuse, all that punishment, half his armor off, one of his arms very clearly shattered, all his ammo expended, and he's still standing. 

     Voder wavers in front of Aloy. 

     But she already knows he won't kill her. She already knows. She's seen him throw himself in the way of death itself to protect the people of her town, people he barely knew. She's seen him apologize to Yahiko for taking a shortcut that could've cost Yahiko his life. 

     His resolve to kill Adepts is strong, but his resolve to protect humans is stronger. 

     So Voder hangs there in front of her for a moment before it falls back to his side, clipping onto his belt. He wobbles for a moment. He murmurs something into his armor. 

     Then he moves off into the darkness of the alley.

    Blues is none too happy about how things have ended up. Not because Elise was killed and the zombies disappeared, because that's good, but because people are now shooting at ONE ANOTHER and Blues has no idea what this conflict is about. He watches the showdown between Zelda and Copen and decides...

    Not his fight.

    It isn't, either. He doesn't know which to save. Copen seems a little intense, but Zelda shot him too. Not what he likes to see. Some rivalry? Not his problem. "I'm not going to stick around for a grudge match."

    That's why he leaps down, landing with a loud thoom of his feet hitting the ground, and lifts Xion up. "Let's get you somewhere out of the firefight."

    A shimmer of energy sends the two of them zipping off to someplace safer.

  The Hylian doesn't have time to nock another arrow to the string; it's just as well, because her quiver is empty. At Aloy's call, the Strider is in motion again, and it's all Zelda can do to pull herself aboard the mechanical beast. Half-aboard and hanging on for dear life, she clutches at the thing's smooth plating with clawed fingers.

  "Come on," Zelda whispers to the beast, shifting until she's less in danger of being thrown off. Her words come too fast, all piled up together in her bristling fear. "I know you aren't a horse, but you look like one, and you run like one, so let's see what you can do, and for Hylia's sake get me as far away from that homicidal lunatic as you can."

  Hopefully the thing will pick up Aloy. Or Aloy will catch up to them. Or if the mechanical thing gives out, it'll be somewhere more convenient than an infested street in an unfamiliar city.

  Until then, Zelda's just going to hang on for dear life. It's all she has the strength left to do, and even then, most of that is probably coming straight from adrenaline.