World Tree MUSH

    Seattle-Vancouver Megacity, Earth. Vines have been dropping people off in one of the harsher areas of the city lately, a weird event for Vines, which tend to avoid heavy populations. It's a rough area, with a lot of gang violence between the Melted Cougars and the Buzzsaw Badgers. For all the violence, though, few people are normally killed... sleeves are too expensive for gangs to buy easily, and it's largely a 'war' or pride.

    At least, that's how it used to be.

    Maybe people are arriving because of one of the random Vine dumps, or maybe investigating because there's actually been some talk about it and even a small bounty on settling the situation, ever since a group of offworlders was dumped in the area and got caught in a surprisingly bloody crossfire that left quite a few gang members 'dead' temporarily, and two from offworld. A bit of a mess, politically, but it wasn't like it was the government's fault.

    Whatever the reason, the street that the firefight happened on is still reeking of death, though it's controlled somewhat. People are shuttering their shops and homes, because right in the middle of the street, two small groups have guns out, staring one another down, with no sign of police coming to break it up. And there's a heated argument of some kind going on.

Seattle-Vancouver Megacity, some version of Earth. Hrm. There's a disproportionate number of versions of Earth here, a certain young woman is thinking. At least she managed to...restock. It's not hard to find a place to work on dangerous stuff, what's a challenge is finding the ingredients. Which might well be part of why she's here. That and there's violence! Sweet, sweet, violence. Right now, though, Ace is simply crouched in a nearby alleyway, watching the gangsters and their weapons. She has her head tilted as she observes them, as if trying to work out what's going on.

A staticky portal opens up right behind Ace, and out steps Emily. She's currently in the form of a lavender-skinned demon with four arms, three pairs of glowing purple eyes in two vertical rows, a pair of short stubby horns poking out from her forehead, and a long prehensile tail with a spaded tip; she's dressed in a bright pink T-shirt bearing the text "I'll Stop Wearing Pink When They Invent A Darker Color", white booty shorts, and neon blue sneakers.

"Hey, Ace!" She peers out over the improvised explosive expert's shoulder at the standoff. "Well, this is interesting!" she says, with her trademark smile of amusement and faint smugness. "Wonder which side is the good guys." A pause. "And also what the hell that stench is."

    "Look at all this Authentic American Gun Violence!" Shin declares merrily. He takes out his cell phone and takes a picture of the two gangs squaring off against eachother, "Even in the future!" 

    And then he drops the cell phone into his pants pocket and seems to have no hestitation wading straight out into Death Avenue with his hands in his pockets, "Oi oi oi. Why don't you guys put the guns away for a bit?" 

    "We can talk this over." He offers, "We'll go get some of those shitty hotdogs you guys eat with the cream cheese on them. Or one of your crappy crappy craft beers made by someone with a man bun!" Shin makes some fingerguns, "No need for more Second Ammendment Exercise here, guys."

Demi's not quite sure why there's people shooting each other either. Part of her is curious about the guns of course but she figures she should deesclate this first. "Please stop firing at each other!" Of course the question is would they take her seriously. She's not exactly the most imposing person at after all. The android could always start stunning people if they refuse but it would be best to try and resolve this without resulting to force.

As Shin suddenly walks right up to the gangs, Emily snickers and smacks her forehead. But when Demi shows up with a more plaintive version, she groans, still grinning, and smacks her forehead with one of her other hands.

>> SUMMARY[Emily Nyx] >> Facepalm x2 COMBO!

"Ordis?" Ash looked about this... Location? Cityscape? Cyberpunk feverdream? It was pretty well right beneath where his ship got spat out in orbit and he didn't know enough about local geogrophy (marsography?) to question.

Ordis could see through Ash's glasses as Ash prodded a body with a booted foot, "Fairly recent, rigor hasn't set in. SSuggest you evac and return with your warframe."

A headshake from Ash as he knelt down to turn the body over. Bare fingertips hovered milimeters from whoever this poor unfortunate was as he frowned. "The locals here have some kind of wetware right? Something that preserves their minds if it isn't destroyed." His voice was soft aas he seemed to make up his mind and rolled the body over. He was no doctor but he had a fair bit of experiance in the making people dead department.

Then he heard voices, or at least that's when the arguing started to register. Ash's eyes closed and he got to his feet and started walking towards where the people were intending on doing more violence. At Emily's question Ash snorted, "Near as I can tell neither side are strictly 'good' or 'evil.' Least as far as I'm aware." 

He held his hands where they could be seen, using them to emote as he spoke, left wrist bulging as something bulky like a heavy bracelet made of dark metal clung there. "I thought the vines were supposed to dump you in relatively peaceful locations. What gives?"

>> SUMMARY[Ash] >> Ash is confused on why he's dumped into violence, but not phased by said violence.

    Unlike some others, Athena is actually here because she's investigating. She walked here. A walk that she did armed, and armored in lightweight riot gear. Nothing serious, but enough that she isn't going to be bothered. She doesn't carry her weapon in her hands though, she's moving closer to the disagreement as well, and like Ash, has her hands up to show she isn't there to start shooting. In fact, the approach has her a little concerned, because so many offworlders showing up...

    Huh. Is that Demi? Been a long time. And Ash, she also vaguely knows. This means she has a reason to speak up. "Hey, a lot of offworlders are showing up, why don't we take a breather for a second-"

    Oh... well. Let's hope fingerguns aren't a sign of hostility here.

    Yes, there ARE a lot of offworlders here, as Athena so wisely(heh) points out. That's something even the mid-argument gang members can notice, as well as the various uninvolved sorts who are quickly vanishing from the streets. Most of them anyway.

    The groups not arguing are alert and belligerent, but even though two of them ready their knives, they relax quickly because Shin's yammering is... dated. The US doesn't even exist and most meat is soy protein, so a lot of his references mark him as offworld right away, which at first is confusing but then determined to be 'not an immediate threat' even if they're keeping an eye on him. People like Athena get much more wariness, which makes them all alert and... yes, noticing strangeness now. One nudges, "Hey, Feral. Company."

    The two who were arguing were getting pretty heated, "We KNOW you got them, so give 'em back!" "Not until you give us our stacks too!" "Shit, why would we take your crummy stacks! You're the ones who yank dead bodies!" "Don't be an ass, we didn't take your-"

    Looks like they were accusing one another of something. They halt when their buddies draw attention to everyone else. The one called Feral ends up speaking first, "Huh? More offworld loonies? Come one, what do you guys want?" He eyes Ash, too, kind of dismissively compared to Athena and... well, Emily if he could see her, but he can't see her or Ace yet.

    The other spokeskid speaks up, "Look, if more offworlders die here we're both in for it. Besides, this kid can probably summon meteors or some shit." He gestures at Shin, "Listen to the... uh... guy." How do you refer to Shin?

Ace may or may not be obvious as an offworlder. Hard to tell. She's certainly out of fashion. Emily gets a thumbs up. "I think that guy's right. It's some kind of argument over something, but I'm betting there's..." And then Shin steps in. "Well, *huh*." She isn't reaching for her backpack yet. Everyone's safe. For now.

Emily shrugs in response to Ash's comment. "Yeah, probably," she says. "As for the Vines ... seems like an exception was made, possibly due to events of some significance happening here." She nods. "Ash, this is Ace, she makes bombs that can take out a medium-sized Machine Lifeform. Ace, Ash, he owns a space station." She pokes her head back out, still smiling as she watches the goings-on unfold.

    Shin looks confused for a moment, "Naw. I don't summon meteors. I just beat people's asses with martial arts. I'm a tourist." He holds up his passport and points to it, "Honestly. So far, unimpressed. Gonna leave this place a low review on Trip Advisor. Very tourist un-friendly." 

    Shin puts his hands into his pockets, "That said, you're all dipshits. Like honest-to-god morons," Shin points out bluntly as he listens to them argue over who did what, "You're so piss-baby set on believing the other is a liar, you're missing the whole Occam's Razor." 

    "Neither of you did it and a third party is pitting you against eachother for their benefit."

Ash glanced over to Athena before gesturing to the overal post-gunfight-everyone-not-involved-leaving-ness of what was going on. "Yea hi Sorry I mean I have more control on where i land but my ship kindof popped up in orbit at a wierd spot and here is literally directly under where it's parked." He started walkingtowards the gang-voices, showing the teltale bulge of a pistol at his hip. More a hand-cannon given the size of the barrel. "First off before we do anything else one way or another are you lot game for third party mediation? Or if not that at least a time out to try getting your buddies over yonderway off the street?"

He jerked a thub at the corpse he had examined earlier. "I know you lot have a way to bodysurf but I dunno if whatever lets that happen got busted so... yea can we have a five minute time out?"

THen a helpless shrug as he again looked to Athena, "Never hurts to ask right?" Besides he was out of his warframe thus relatively squishy. A deep breath, perhaps to try calming his nerves, perhaps for effect, before he looked about. "Well if they're not shooting I'd rather avoid shooting. Seems wasteful and here looks like it's got enough problems withotu some off-world busybodies adding more bullets and explosions ya?"

Demi remembers the last time she visited this world and how she was somehow reprogrammed. She would rather avoid that again. Hearing Emily's comment about Ace she looks at the woman frowing a bit. Hopefully she wouldn't find about her ability to destroy machines first before turning towards Shin. "Could you please be less rude to the upset people wielding firearms? If I'm to understand correctly someone's been stealing back-up memory storage from members of both of your organizations?" It wouldn't hurt to further clarify what's going on.

    Well Ash seems much less combative now, and some of the others Athena knows. This is... probably getting more calm, and that makes her both sigh because shooting things is usually easier, and also because it means she might actually figure out what is going on here.

    It does let her relax! She moves over next to the group, with Shin and Demi and Ash, letting Emily and Ace join if they choose to reveal themselves. "I think Shin here is right. There is probably something more going on. A lot of offworlders showing up? Could be something offworld."

    It does look like they are standing down. Things could have gotten worse pretty fast, but right now it's all getting smoothed over... for now. The two do still look ready to go at one another's throats, but there's a lot at stake and they aren't about to whip out the knives and pistols right this second. At least not to use them. The atmosphere, while tense, eases a lot. The two groups eye everyone suspiciously, before one brings up, "Who would yank a bunch of corpses and stacks?"

    One of the more articulate members answers the others who are asking intelligent questions. "We had a pretty nasty firefight. We're pretty sure THEY shot first, but whatever now. Lot of people died. Then we skittered when we heard sirens, but they were from another street down the blocks. When we got back, the bodies were gone."

    Feral, the other spokesguy, warily looks around, but before he speaks up someone else steps in. A young woman, dark of hair, with a large dog beside her. A large, cybernetic dog. She clears her throat... and immediately blushes, fidgeting with her coat. She has some kind of light armor on underneath the coat though, that's obvious.

    She finally speaks, "I saw a truck come by. I was here to um... collect something and they beat me to it. I should have stopped them but I wasn't sure what was going on at the time." She scratches at her side and looks away from the eyes that are probably turning to her. "If you want the bodies I can ah... I think I know where it went. I was going to go get it with some hired help, but..."

Ash nodded thoughtfully at the information provided. He held a hand up as he started pacing, "So two gangs get in a turf scuffle, your average Tuesday. Cops show up so everyoen bugs out, and when you come back the important bits are gone." Then his voice gets more questioning< "I take it that's... not normal right?"

He then lowered his hand before looking to the lady that spoke, "Anything about this truck stand out? First response, millitary... or just a big unmarked box?"

He continued to pace as he looked about. Another deep breath. "Athena, how's that track? You're local... or at least local to this Mars. I'm just the outsider butting in."

    "Oh. No. I'm like... categorically incapable of not being somewhat abrasive." Shin says to Demi with a chipper smile. At least he's kind of honest about that, "Calling them dipshits is about as nice as I can be about it!" 

    "Well, shitlords." Shin immediately demonstrates his point by talking to the present gang members, "Sounds like this woman of mysterious origin and arrival has given you a lead on this matter." He looks to the two gangs. 

    "Personally, I hope it turns out that in the future, famed American Monster Truck Gravedigger has been implanted with an AI and is fulfilling its true purpose of digging graves."

    Not too long after the woman and her dog emerge, the distinct click~clink click~clink click~clink of heels and spurs ring out through the street. The elf in red with the wid-brimmed hat seems to be that hired help; mismatched eyes looking from face to face as her duster swishes lazily behind her.
    Salome Highscribe falls into place at the side of her employer of the eve, flashing a sharp-toothed grin as she crosses her arms under her chest.
    "Oh. The fightin' is over? It was kind of entertaining to watch."

Ace frowns a bit, then slowly moves a bit further out of cover, as it doesn't seem that anyone is shooting right now. The woman with the dog has a good chunk of her attention, bluish hazel eyes resting on her.

Emily can see a Wacky Misunderstanding about to happen from Demi's expression. For a moment, she toys with the idea of just letting the potential comedy keep going ... but nah. She radios Demi a sound clip of a burst of radio static, followed by, <Machine Lifeforms ar a specific type of robot native to this one particular blossom, they're variously hostile to anything that isn't -- HELLO!>

She breaks into a grin as the woman -- and the more familiar Salome -- arrive on the scene. "Iiiiiinteresting," she says. She steps out of the alley and continues on past Ace, one pair of hands on her hips, and gives Salome a cheerful wave with one of her others.

Even Demi isn't programmed to be sarcastic she'll assume Shin is being so from his earlier statements. She then radios Emily back, <There are civilizations that are hostile to artifical intelligence.> "Please lead the way to the truck Miss..." She doesn't believe that she has the woman's name on file.

    Athena glances toward where Emily and Ace emerge, giving the latter more of a look than Emily's appearance... weirdly. Maybe the idea of a four-armed woman here just isn't as shocking as a normal human. Either way the situation is defused, only to introduce another mystery. The newcomer.

    She'll set that aside for now to answer some questions for now. "It's odd, but there have been a lot of odd things happening lately. Maybe they were interested in the offworlders and the rest got snagged by accident. Maybe they were wanting something else and just used the rest as cover. Worth checking out anyway." She pats her sidearm, then stares at the dog, before looking at Salome. "Hiring offworlders, huh? Might be a good idea. Anyone interested in tracking down this truck?"

Ace does, indeed, look like a completely normal human, from some version of Earth. "Tracking down a truck?" Ace asks. Hrm. Does she trust this woman...she's not a merc, after all.

    The woman's head snaps over to Athena when she hears her called that, but she doesn't say anything at first. The dark-haired girl rubs the back of a dog's ear. A dog? Yes, because another creeps around from the corner to join the first, wagging tail and eying Ace and Emily. Sniff sniff.

    She gestures, and now that this has happened, the gang members are... arguing over who gets to go with the group. Sigh. The woman coughs, "I... think maybe we should handle this ourselves. I'm pretty sure at least one of us knows how to handle ourselves," she gestures to Athena, the native of the group. "And offworlders usually know how to handle themselves, like my mercenary here." She smiles sweetly to Salome as she starts walking, joined by a third cyberdog along the way. "It isn't far."

    Demi asked a question though. "Oh uh..." She glances at Athena. "... call me Kore. It isn't my real name but it works."

    The gang members are cowards at heart and back down. "Yeah yeah..." One of them grins at Shin, "Right back at you, asshole." Looks like Shin speaks their language in a way?

"Operator," Ordis chimed in Ash's ear, "Perhaps it would be good to volunteer my services to route longer range communications and act as off site data backups."

A single nod from Ash before he looked to Athena, "Considering I came here to apologize for giving you the fifth degree the first time I was here? I'm game." Then a look to the lady with the robo-dog, which caused him to frown. Something was bothering him about the woman.

"Too Clean," Ordis hissed in his ear, perhaps knowing Ash well enough to understand why his attention lingered. "I'd advise keeping an eye on her."

At that Ash would smile and extend a handfor the lady with the dog, "If you don't mind miss perhaps having a local to the area would help us offworlders out."

Ordis would then rado Athena, "Miss Athena. Ordis has memorized the lady's appearance for later Identification if... ShE eNDs UP BeING A MoLE ...needed in the future and can't be found BeCAUse ShE RaN FrOM uS." If Athena were looking in Ash's direction he would just shrug. "I will offer what services I can."

Another dog. Then... A third. Ash nodded as he understood perhaps how the woman might defend herself, "Kore?" He nodded to himself]

    Shin is being 100% honest to Demi about the fact that he is almost completely incapable of not being weird and slightly off-putting. The leisure-suit wearing man then flips the bird at the guy that called him an asshole, "I'll try to bring your buddies corpses back here so you can do whatever weird voodoo magic you do to bring them to life." 

    And then Shin looks towards Kore and says, "Core." you can some how tell he conceptually mispronounced it despite the two sounding exactly the same, "Got it. Shin Tokuyama, martial artist. Most people call me the Dragon of Dojima," Most people do not call him that. He just wants to see if he can steal a video game character's epithet for himself.

    Athena has also noticed Kore is a little clean, and the cyberdogs are weird. She doesn't say anything about it at first, more concerned about Ace and Emily. "Okay, I'm fine with this but is everyone fine with violence? Because I bet there will be violence if they're bodysnatching." She checks her sidearm. "If we're /lucky/ it's just some organ harvesters. That happens, though it's a little weird for them to go this route..."

    Then she freezes. "Kore, huh? That's... an odd nickname, but kind of fits." She looks at Salome, then toward Demi and Shin and Ash. Ash she can message directly via her head radio, but the others she's not sure about. She backs away to whisper to Shin and Demi(and Ace and Emily if they're close enough) the same thing she messages back to Ash/Ordis.

    "Kore isn't a name. It's a nickname from ancient Greece. It's like calling someone 'cute girl' or something."

    Hopefully that stays out of earshot of Salome's keen elf ears.

    Emily emerges from the alley and...
    Salome's eyebrow twitches as soon as she sees her.
    Though the witch maintains her composure, it and her smile by proxy are strained. Her thumb lingers over the hammer of the revolver at her hip, but she manages to peel her hand away just in time to start following Kore and her puppers.
    Odd. Those pointed ears give a twitch.

"It's a pleasure to meet you Kore, I'm Demi. This sounds worth look into further." Of course she has no clue what ancient Greece is so Athena's comment doesn't hgelp her much. "Their organs were missing along with the data storage? Or is it common to remove them as well?" She's not familar with how this world prepares its dead. The robot dogs get her attention as well and Demi can't help but to wonder where Kore got them from.

    Athena turns to Ash and tilts her head. "An apology... accepted. Things are different now anyway. We'll have to sit down and talk later. I still need to know more about other worlds if I'm going to be any good at my job."

To a dog, Emily probably smells ... well, pretty much like a robot, basically. A quick scan might show that her body is made out of magical nanomachines which are currently arranged in the form she's taken today. (A deeper scan might detect her CPU core, buried in the middle of her torso.)

She shoots Shin a grin. "I have literally never heard anyone call you that the entire time I've known you," she says cheerfully. She raises her eyebrows and nods at Athena's comment, but Salome's ... reaction has her attention. "Hey, Salome," she says. "We really need to set aside some time for our grudge match, don't." It's a cheerful greeting, as between friends. Possibly she's just trying to wind Salome up with her casual speech? Emily is the kind of person who likes winding people up.

She taps her chin thoughtfully. "Welllllll ... this sounds like it could get interesting," she says. "As long as we're the good guys, that is. Joining in on the side of the bad guys tends to have consequences that are just a huge pain in the ass." She says this very matter-of-factly, as if this was invariably a straightforward thing to figure out.

Ace smells human. Has explosives in her backpack. Hopefully they're stable. She glances between Emily and Salome. "Do I even want to know?"

>> SUMMARY[Ash] >> Ash would smell human, but weary. He also doesn't trust the lady wit hthe three robo dogs.

    Shin looks towards Emily as she says that, "My girlfriend calls me that! You wouldn't know her though. She goes to the Kanpyo Era, so you've never met her!" Shin points out.

    It isn't a long walk. Kore seems satisfied that everyone can handle themselves, if they weren't scared of gangers fighting. Hands in her pockets, she shies away from looks with a few mumbles. Actually eyes on her seem to make her blush a little, but she still walks forward resolutely.

    The dogs don't have the sort of sensors to fully analyze a human, but a brief rumble from one says they CAN sniff the explosives. No barking though, just an electronic whine as the canine hurries to catch up with the others.

    It's just a few blocks though, before a conspicuous(really?) truck is parked next to what looks like a closed down clinic. A few guys lounging against it at first look like they're just relaxing, but they're a little too alert, and just seeing Kore(let alone any of the oddities that might follow too closely to her) has them straightening up.

    Kore smiles at Ace, "I think she likes y- RUSSEL, NO!" She was too distracted, and one of the cyborg dogs bolts foward, barking and pouncing at the first 'guard' who curses and whips out a pistol, the shot going wide as the cyborg jaws clamp down on his arm.

    Well, there's no stealth option now.

    Meekly, Kore says, "Um... they're probably in there."

Ace shakes her head. She steps back, ducking behind something to study the clinic building. Probably in there, and she definitely doesn't want to Nitro-9 anything without knowing more of the lay of the land.

Ash rather enjoyed the walk. Random smells of a living city, surrounded by armed and hostile folk, and... well that's convenient! Thei target was quite literally a short walk how hand-

"Ordis...."

Ordis helpfully transmitted the sound of facepalming.

"Thank you." As he drew his pistol at his right hip, the bracilette at his left wrist unfolded to a palm sized disc with a trio of forearm length ultr-athin curved blades protruding from it as he threw the disc weapon at another guard just before he rolled towards whatever passedfor cover.

    "Bad blood." The voice that replies to Ace comes from... A cat.
    A small black cat that emerges from an alley and falls into pace with Salome and Kore, seemingly unafraid of the dogs. Though Salome seems to keep her eyes averted from the woman that's hired her, the cat does not.
    "My my..." The elf replies, "You know, if I wasn't on a job right now I'd offer to throw down here and now, but I'm a professional." The witch replies coolly.
    Then there goes Russel.
    "Oh no. Russel. Bad dog." Salome drones tonelessly as she draws a derringer from the inside of her coat and aims to put both bullets in another guard without much hesitation. None at all, in fact.

    "Oh. The fight is starting. Okay." 

    Shin remarks this casually as he adjusts his sunglasses and then cracks his knuckles, "Might as well just..." 

    Shin darts forwards, "Geiha Genkou-Ryu! First Secret Art! Mountain-Shattering Strike!" 

    As he moves, Shin isn't aiming at a person. He's aiming at the front section of the transport truck to try to punch the vehicle square in the grill. At the moment of impact, there's a shotgun blast of his own ki that rips through his knuckles and into the engine block of the vehicle, trying to shake it apart like an earth quake.

>> SUMMARY[Shin Tokuyama] >> Using his special martial arts on the engine block of the truck.

Emily shrugs in response to Ace. "I blasted her in the face while she was robbing a train."

And then there goes She blinks, and grins as the dogs start negating the possibility of stealth. "Welp!" she says. She looks around at the others, hmms, and then shrugs. "Releasing capacitor seals three and two." She's immediately surrounded by three distinct auras: one silver, one gold, and one pearlescent; the first two shatter, and the third simply fades.

In a swirl of silvery glitter, four swords materialize on her back. And then five golden bolts of light manifest, and fire out towards any guards who happen to be still standing.

Demi was hoping they could solve this without any more violence so much for that idea. She begins to scan the truck for signs of the missing wetware. She want to make sure it survives intact given the amount of force they were using.

Okay. Sneaking past, bad idea. Nitro-9, bad idea. Baseball bat time! Not that Ace is charging in, given how many others there are. She's trying to get behind a guard and cold cock them from behind. (And not to kill. Killing is disapproved of!)

    Athena had also kind of hoped for a quiet approach... but she isn't good at those anyway. Odysseus was better at that, and she really liked that in him, but she tended to find it easier to lean on the Goddess of Battle part of her domain and just... shoot things. Like now.

    "All right, guess sneaking in is out of the question." Shin seems to be taking care of the truck to make getting away out of the question, so Athena concentrates on snapping off a few shots with her sidearm, aiming at the center of mass so the stacks don't have any chance to be damaged. "Don't worry too much about holding back, they have stacks."

>> SUMMARY[Ash] >> Ash is rolling for cover while throwing his frisbee of death and yes he is totally going to get sued by lucy lawless.

    And just like that, the guards are overwhelmed. Athena's shots slam into the torso of the one fighting Russel, and Kore looks horrified, clapping a hand over her mouth. Ace's falls with a meaty 'thud' as he looks like just a hired thug, and as the bolts and glaive blast the other two, smacking them against the wall, they go down easily too, but one stays down for good as Salome riddles him with bullets. Shouts from inside indicate that the alarm has been raised.

    Demi scans the truck even while it shudders, the front crumpling from the impact. These guards were just to keep riffraff out, they can't stand up to the more hardcore combatants here. Not much of a challenge, really. But Demi finds that there are seven bodies in there, definitely. Seven bodies on ice. This is important...

    "Oh... most of you were nonlethal. That's... inconvenient, but I'm glad." She smiles, looking relieved as she looks at the one Ace conked out and the one slumped against the wall. "I guess... I guess we should go in to take care of the others. The two offworlder corpses are in the truck, I'll go take care of them. The five from here seem to be inside. I'll..." She swallows. "I hate this part, but I'll take care of the ones out here and let the rest of you handle the guards. It'll just take a moment to collect the offworlders."

    Though she makes a face of distaste about it, she doesn't hesitate at all in kneeling next to one of the dead guards. His stack is still intact, but... she gently tugs at his shirt, then pulls back, a brief ghostly outline pulled from the body before condensing into the palm of her hand. "Hurry, before they call backup. If you want to spare them, go ahead, I like those with mercy."

"Killing ain't part of the program 'less there's no other choice," Ace says, her accent broadening for a moment, before she moves to, well. Deal with the door. If it's locked, she kicks it in. She knows how, too. Hinges side.

Ash turns to the lady with the dogs and extends his arm out palm facing towards the truck just as his bladed disc flew back to him. "Pardon my Grineer," Ash, as a reminder, looked like he was at best a hundred and twenty pounds (55 kilograms for you metric viewers,) soaking wet. He was also not a tall person as he slow walked towards the dog-lady. "However the situation demands I ask."

He put his right hand on the woman's shoulder, or at least would try to in efort to clean jerk her to her feet and spin her around toface him. He was far stronger than his rail thin frame suggested. Assuming this were a thing? He would ask a simple singular question.

Ace could perhaps feel the anger rolling to a boil inside Ash, "WHAT IN ARCIUS'S NAME IS YOUR GAME WOAMAN?!"

    Shin stops as he looks at Core, "Oh hell-the-fuck-no. You're a Shinigami?" Shin makes a hand-wiping gesture, "I'm out. I don't want nothin' to do with this any more!" 

    Shin makes this decision abruptly and unceremoniously as he watches Kore pull the soul out of a newly-departed guard and then shake his head repeatedly, "Nuh uh! NUH UH! You stay the fuck away from me!" He points right at Kore. 

    "I'mma go home and eat a bowl of rice and you stay the fuck outta my house! I'll have a dragon eat you if you come near my house, Shinigami!" Shin rapidly shakes his head and then promptly starts marching away from this whole ordeal.

>> SUMMARY[Shin Tokuyama] >> Shin is done with this Shinigami nonsense. Also this coincides with his player having to get ready for bed.

>> SUMMARY[Ash] >> Hey Sketchy dog lady. I'm about done with you being skeevy. TALK.

Demi's quite surprised as Kore claims the man's soul. Of course as far as she knows she doesn't have one, just programing. Had they been hired to help Kore retrieve the souls of those killed? She watches as Shin leaves, she would have to make sure this done as non-lethally as possible. While she tries to sneak inside without making too much more noise, there's a faint metallic clank as she walks.

Emily blinks as Kore ... does her thing. "... Huh." She breaks into a wide grin. "This got a lot more interesting all of a sudden!" In lieu of dealing with the other guards, she saunters up to approach Kore from a different direction. One of her hand reaches up to gently grasp at the handle of one of her swords. "I'm kinda curious myself!" Good cop bad cop? ... Emily probably wouldn't be good at either option.

    Athena reloads and starts heading for the door to back up Ace and Demi... when Kore yanks the soul out of the dead man, causing her to stop in her tracks, and to get Shin to just back out right that moment. Not to mention upsetting Ash. She looks back. "Ash." To the one being confrontational. "I think we should concentrate on doing this without killing. And fast. She's just doing her job." She peeks around the door Ace is busting down, and if needed provides a few shots of cover fire before she explains, "The dogs. Her hellhounds. The shyness. She isn't just a girl. She's the wife of Hades. She's the Queen of the Underworld claiming souls. Isn't that right?"

    This time she isn't shooting to kill though. She'll go for the arms and legs. Not that Athena has a problem with death, but the others seem to. And her host body is reflexively against true death.

>> SUMMARY[Athena] >> Covering for Ace as non-lethally as possible this time.

    Off goes Shin. And Salome makes no motions to stop the man as she casually tucks the spent derringer back into her coat.
    "You know," The black cat says, "That wasn't exactly subtle, boss, but it's your call." As Kore takes something very, very, important from one of the dead guards. Though the cat remains right where he is, Salome...
    Salome follows after Ace as she kicks in the door.
    "'Scuse me, sugah, let someone who isn't afraid to get her hands dirty handle this."
    Because well.
    She starts opening fire.
    And she does not have the non-lethal mercy Athena does.

>> SUMMARY[Salome] >> It's okay, I'll be lethal for you, Ace, Athena.

    Two threadss are happening.

    Ace busts down the door, surprising the three guards that are just getting prepared still. They aren't elite at all, they'ree just hired thugs, and one goes down quickly to a bat, while another screams as her leg is shot through and she collapses. Salome kills the third.

    Meanwhile, Demi sneaks in. She gets the attention of one of the three remaining guards, but he'll be easy to take down if she's fast. It also puts her in a window that is nearby a large device, one that hums with power and has a lattice of wires connecting small, coin-sized discs, five of them connected to it.

    Meanwhile out front, Kore doesn't resist being pulled around, twisting without any attempt to stop it. She shakes her head, but it confirms what Athena says when she answers quietly, "Hellhounds? Not quite. My husband has been missing for some time. This is not a pleasant task, but it must be done. Please, don't make this any harder for me than it already is. My only other option was to kill everyone in the building and harvest them all. This way... maybe I don't have to do that."

Ash did not look pannicked. His hand was steady as his eyes sought Kore's. "You have ten seconds,"

Then Salome started opening fire, which seemed to get no reaction from Ash, not even a glance in her direction. "Your dog was out of position and this could have been done with zero casualties other than the actual target." 

He held no weapon to Kore, as the bladed disc had tucked itself back onto the bracelette at his wrist. His gun was put away. Ash even let her go. Yet for just a moment as his emotion swirld from a rainbowed mass of outrage/shock/confusion and solidified into cold anger Kore would see the light in Ash's eyes swirl between all colors and none.

Then the moment was gone and Ash's green eyes stared intintly into Kore. "I do not like infromation being withheld when I'm working."

Ace winces. "Can we have less lethal force?" she asks as she looks around for any more guards or, well, other trouble. There has to be trouble. She can smell it. As for any emotions she's picking up...

Demi's chest opens up and two energy green energy beams fire from the android's chest at the guard who spots her. It wouldn't kill him just stun him so she can focus the device with the discs attached to who it.

    "I didn't bring anything less lethal," Athena points out, dashing in and using her tactical sense to try to pin down where the other guards are. When she finds them, she'll motion to Ace where they are, so she can handle them with her bat. Salome gets an even stare though. "I have a feeling some don't care though."

    She will restrain herself from firing unless immediate danger presents itself. Besides, Demi is in there, she might need to back her up with the tech analysis, if it's from her world.

Emily hmms, considering the situation. And then she shrugs and lowers her hand. "It would have been nice to know about this in advance," she says. "But all right." She turns back towards the building, and radios Demi, once again starting with the same sound effect of radio-static. <How's things looking in there?>

    "Oh no, I vaguely care. You know, just..." Salome replies to both Ace and Athena. "When a Goddess of the Underworld hires you for a job, I'm pretty sure the expectation is to 'do the deed' more than a few times." The witch replies as she holsters her guns. "And when I take a job I don't like to do things by halfsies, hear?"
    Meanwhile, back outside with Kore and Ash, though, the cat clears his throat.
    "You decided to come along on your own. And please be careful about manhandling the boss. Sally can see everything I do, and she might come running."

    Ace can sense... confusion and fear, which probably explains why the moment the next guard goes down, the last just holds her hands up. "Hey! They don't pay me for a new sleeve! I'm out!" No reason to fight to the quasi-death, is there?

    Ace will ALSO sense... faint confusion. Some contentment. Some terror. All from the other room.

    What Demi and later Athena find out, aside from the guard who goes down so easily, is that the machine is hooked into the stacks of the dead gangers. Some kind of simulation/experiment, most likely, which is why they took nobodies.

    Kore explains quietly, "I couldn't ask you to do that. It would go against my entire being. I had to just... enlist your help and let you do as you pleased. I want people to live, but I also know they must die. If I requested your help and told you what I needed to do, I would need to tell you to kill them."

    She sighs, as Russel pads back over toward her. "But the CERBERUS units are trained to bring new souls. They get overeager." She looks aside when the cat speaks. "I didn't hire you so I didn't need to tell you everything... not like Salome. Please don't interfere. I will have to respond with lethal force. It is my duty until Hades comes back to restock the Underworld."

"Got it," Ace says. "You just stand there quietly, then." It's always better when they surrender.

Ash's head shook, "A few things you have said along with the other bits make a few thigns make sense." He was still angry, if anything he was even more angry now. However his voice was cold.

Then Salome had to do the dumb thing by speaking, "I came here as part of a retrieval mission, not extermination." He gestured to the people Salome shot at, "and good luck getting them to speak unless Persephone there can get dead men to speak to her." His voice never raised to either woman. "This is a convrosation between the lady here and me, take your opinion and shove it out the airlock."

He then... blinked. One moment he was standing near Kore. The next he was crouched on top of the van looking about before again seeming to just blink to a new perch with only a faint prismatic energy trail connecting where he was to where he went. 

Now was time for Ash to act as overwatch, see if maybe anyone was comming, and stay out of sight, and more importantly line of fire, while doing so.

    Meekly, Kore raises a finger, "Um... actually I can..." she mumbles, to the comment about talking to the dead. But then Ash is gone and she's left feeling a little awkward about that.

    "Some kind of VR setup..." Athena guesses. She sighs, looking at the android. "Come on, let's see if we can't get this thing safely shut down. Kore will probably want to claim more souls if we don't get finished in a hurry."

Demi assists Athena with shutting down the machine. She doesn't want any more lives to be lost today after all she was created to help maintain life not end it.

Emily sighs. "Well, this clearly isn't a fair fight regardless," she says, almost petulantly. She moves to lean against the truck. "So, like. I'll stay out here in case more peeps show up and the fight does suddenly become fair." ... Whoops!

Ace frowns, and moves into the other room. Her body language has shifted a bit. There's...something in that room. She's not sure what. Demi and Athena got there first, though. "This is bad mojo," she murmurs.

    Bad mojo all right. The emotions fade when the machine is shut down... fortunately it is local tech, and meant for safe operation, even if it's illegal. Works well enough, and shuts down cleanly.

    Kore sighs at Ash and moves over toward the other body. "Mmm... no, nothing dangerous this time. With the Reborn showing up, that could always change. But until then I have this dirty task to do. We should hurry, before the police show up. They will eventually."

    Sounds like a good idea.

Ash seemed to just pop into existance beside Kore before falling into step. "We will have disagreements, but that does not mean I don't want ot learn more. Perhaps another time with less....." He waited for the sirens to pass by, "Get less hectic." 

Then a look back at the truck. "I'll probably stay in this world for a time anyway. I don't like leaving loose ends and I have businesswith Atena anyway."

He would then wander off to where not even he knew.