World Tree MUSH

    The air is pregnant with the expectation of the assault. Inside the sanctum's front offices, where rather mundane cubicals clash with the fact that the office space is far larger than the small drab accounting storefront could ever hold, the people assigned to defend the prison section await. The Order of Hermes' liasons for the mission are Kira Nocturne (a woman who dresses in severe black clothing and possesses equally severe glasses and piercing stare) and her apprentice Alan van Allen (who somewhat resembles a Greek angel, complete with toga and great feather wings).
    Outside, the sound of glass breaking indicates the opening move. The mundane office has been broken into. The lead figure, clad in both blinding moonlight and deep starfields, raises a bow made of utter black, nocking four dark iron arrows, shaped from the handful of black oboli she brought. The lunar huntress lets the arrows fly into the sanctum door, where they stick and begin breaking the wards and magic that keep the magical space separated from reality.
    From inside, strange glyphs and sigils begin to burn their way into existence, visible to the defenders where the entrance is. Kira shouts, "Here they come! Remember- don't let them get to that door!" She gestures to the vault-like door to the rear and left, where the prison resides.
    As though timed perfectly, the gylphs and wards complete themselves, blowing a massive hole in the sanctum. Smoke billows out from the hole, and seven shadows can be seen within it.

     Poppy heard a cry for help! Evil attempting to free other evildoers, and those who wish to keep such evil sealed are in need of defenders! So she came to do the defendy thing! She doesn't really understand any of the technical details honestly, but "bad guys setting other bad guys free" needs no further explanation.

Thus, she stands with the first line of defenders, hammer in one hand and shield in the other, ready to fight. When the glyphs appear and explode, she raises the shield to protect her eyes from flying debris, then peeks over the rim to try to catch a glimpse of the enemy. "Only seven? Either they're undermanned, or they're /really/ confident." she remarks.

    A defense mission!, he is not a stranger to this, if you involve fending off Team Rocket grunts and pokemon from trying to grab valuable pokemon and things. Still, he tried his best to coordinate, "Wait, should I focus on range?... physical things?... fire or..." he spends a little while discussing with the figure. Realizing this is close quarters and... likely friendly fire is an option, he ultimately decided on his Bewear to begin with. Thus, while the kid remains in the back of the defense group, next to Dynamo, his electric tiger, just in case, but his main contribution is given by another digimon enterily. 
    On the front end, flanking Poppy, there is a 7 feet... bear?, while it is tall, and bulky, it looks more like a costumed person than actual fierce fighter, yet Luke seems confident on it. The pink and black thing glances at the hammer Poppy is wielding, great, now it will want one later. For now, the Bear takes a fighting stance as the wall breaks down, "Bewear!, remember, don't let them through!, help the defenders!, Bulk up!" he adds by the end, the pokemon lets out a rather sharp, squeaky growl, a crimsom aura flaring around it, the indistinct 'fluffy' figure of the bear growing more defined as it prepares for battle.

Benedicta's also already present after all if the Order falls, Beacon Society could very well be next. It seems like they already have company. Her horn glows yellow as the arrows fly to the door. "It's not rabbit season, go away dammit." Her attention turns Poppy, "I didn't know that the order has smurfs working for them." Of course the al'miraj girl has no idea what a yordle is.

 She focuses a bit and quills start to grow out of Benedicta's back before she returns at the moonlight archer. It seems like she's not the only one who can impale people.

>> SUMMARY[Luke Gray] >> Bewear uses Bulk up, attack increases, defense increases!

    There are a few things that Raylene can do. Naturally, the young witch is interested in studying foreign magic systems, but... she isn't well equipped to fight. Oh, she has a knife, but she is dangerous(to her allies) with firearms and most of her magic is not offensive. Sure, she could summon the Horror but that seems like it would be a lot of effort for something that may not contribute to the defense, so it's better as an ace in the hole.

    Instead she is cowardly(?) hiding behind a barricate for now, peeking out to watch the oncoming fight. So why come here at all? Well, she's actually staring pretty hard and trying to get a good read on the magic of the attackers with her Sight. If push comes to shove... maybe she can do something about that to temporarily thwart it.

    Eventually.

>> SUMMARY[Raylene Dunwich] >> Hiding and watching the attackers to try to grasp any weaknesses in their magic.

Earlier, Serrah was loudly complaining about having gotten wrapped up in "more hero business", although if pressed, she would have admitted that her crankiness is due to having a harder time moving around the World Tree, especially unescorted.

Now, however, there's a slightly deeper shadow against the wall right next to the door that just got blown in. It's ... kind of obvious that it's some sort of "darkness" on the wall, if you're looking in that direction, rather than something cast by a physical object. But aside from an obvious twitch at the suddenness of the blast, it makes no move towards the attackers just yet.

Hartford vampires, it turns out, are pretty good ambush predators, with their ability to melt into shadow.

    Aurelia hesitates, then summons her sword to her hand, a crack of thunder and flash of light across the crystal blade. The blade's gathered glow reflects off the heavy orichalcyon armor of her transformed state, highlighting the lions, eagles, and suns that decorate it in an extremely baroque and ornate manner. Her voice emerges from the stern statuesque face of her helm. "They're experienced mages. They probably only need seven."
    Alan nocks an arrow of blue magic, waiting for somebody to emerge from the smoke.
    Kira makes the opening move, clouding the area around the makeshift entrance with darkness and tricky grasping tendrils of the inky darkness, clutching her small magical book as a focus for her spells.
    The darkness is undone with a burst of radiant multicolor light that hurts the eyes and and is accompanied by the sound of an electronica dance riff. The seven are revealed to the senses.
    A man who seems to be clad in a cloak of autumn leaves, with a buzzing cloud of insects swarmed all around him. Above his strange face are long slimy stalks on which sit a pair of inky orbs that move around with purpose. He carries a stone-bladed scythe wrapped in dead vines and twigs for a handle.
    A young woman, with a steel frame around her body and a Metallica 'Ride The Lightning' shirt. Her hands are clad in steel gauntlets and she reeks of ozone as arcs of electricity leap around the metal frame she wears.
    A man in a flowing robe whose motions seem to skip steps like he was being viewed through a strobe light. A thin wand dances between his hands.
    An older woman, wearing what would be a stereotypical witch outfit in all black, with a long staff topped with a crystal blade.
    Flying in, a woman with long hair and a lion pelt that flaps in breezes that aren't actually there.
    A young man, possibly in his late teens, grinning sadistically as he juggles a knife with a too bright reflection.
The source of the light and sound is colorful, with strobing colors and lights on her jumpsuit and a pair of glowsticks that slowly change color in her hands.
    "Last one to the door is a rotten egg!" says the kid with the knife. And they move forward.

     "What's a smurf?" Poppy asks Benedicta, shooting her a confused glance before looking toward the bear by her side. "Whoa! Looks like someone's really getting pumped up! Alright big guy, let's show them a thing or two about fighting." This is soon followed by a wince at Aurelia's words. "Oof... mages? I hate fighting mages. They're tricky."

As the seven villains begin their charge, however, Poppy takes a deep breath and raises her hammer. "I think you guys need to slow down a little!" she declares, bringing her oversized weapon down with such force that the floor erupts in front of her, an explosion of force that leaves a crater between her and the attackers... or threatens to knock them off their feet if they're caught within it.

>> SUMMARY[Poppy] >> Slowing the bad guys down with a shockwave and a crater in the floor.

    The kid with the knife is knocked off his feet, being too far ahead to avoid Poppy's ground-shaking attack. The aerial lion girl isn't even affected by it, while the others have to take a moment to regain their footing.

     Luke is quick to react, perhaps used to smoke and bursts of light given the crazyness of pokemon battles. He does have to cover his eyes for a moment, but is quickly able to focus again on the group. The bear seems impressed by Poppy's attack, and Luke decides to assist, "That's a great idea, Bewear, Rock Slide!". The bear growls again, bringing his paws to the ground, slamming it, and causing a large block of rock to raise from the ground, then the bear punches it, turning it into a group of large stone shards that are sent flying to the group.

"I'll explain later, it looks like we have company." Benedicta's attention turns from Poppy to their opponents. Well, it was certainly an interesting septet that tried to break in. Her attention instantly turns towards the woman wearing the lion pelt, "That better be synthetic or the lion isn't the only getting skinned." Those who abused animals were quick to earn the rabbit's girls ire as the quills disappear from her back and are replaced by wings. She takes the air and slashes at the Lion-attired woman with her claws.

>> SUMMARY[Benedicta Cornell] >> Killer rabbit vs lion, let's see who wins.

    The visibly stuttering man waves an arm defensively as the rock slide is performed, the shards slowing their advance then dropping to the ruined floor and crumbling into dust. That was almost certainly an application of Time magic.

    The aerial combatant is taken by surprise as Benedicta claws at her. Winds buffet both Benedicta and the woman as she tries to dodge but she is clearly not the best of combatants, taking some nasty gashes for her troubles.

    Interesting. Raylene squints, mostly at the knife-wielder. "Mmm..." That's not as great a concern as some of the others, exceept that he hasn't revealed himself yet. "Fuzzy one, your opponent appears to be a water mage. You appear to be competent enough that I'll leave handling that to you without further advice."

    For her own part she rises at last and strolls toward the Spook woman, actually sheathing her knife and doing a small curtsy. "It would appear you are the one that has abilities most like mine. Interesting. Shall we chat?" She probably doesn't expect this to end with just a chat.

    The witch hmmms at Raylene. "I suppose." She makes the sign of the evil eye and ghostly hands reach out to hold Raylene still. "Can't have any surprises from you, young lady. Now then, what sort of tea do you like?" Yeah, this one is very strange. It does open her up for being bushwhacked by one of the defenders though.

The shadow by the door twitches away from Aurelia as she gathers her power; vampires and the sun do not get along. The time mage might feel an eerie sensation of being watched by a predator.

And then suddenly, the shadow coalesces to form oh god it's a vampire! Serrah reaches for the sports bag at her hip --

From Serrah's perspective, and the perspective of the time mage, a ripple of light erupts from her, and everything freezes in place and becomes purplish and monochrome except Serrah herself (and the man, if he can stop time and uses his own timestop power in the interim). She glances around, and in the space of less than five seconds, she throws six baseballs out, one aimed at every enemy except the time mage; each baseball moves at fifty miles per hour, but becomes frozen in time like everything else the instant they stop touching her hand. Then she jumps a bit further back and to the left, and resumes time practically in mid-jump.

-- and from everyone else's perspective, it looks like Serrah suddenly changed position, as abruptly as the time mage's movements, and now there's baseballs flying.

>> SUMMARY[Serrah Delany] >> Timestop-baseballs at every enemy except the time-mage!

    Most of the baseballs hit home, causing injury. The one aimed at the Metallica girl though, self-immolates from a blinding arc of electricity. The time mage peers at Serrah suspiciously and waggles a finger.

    "Oh. Hmm. Well, not too strong, with just a hint of honey," Raylene states, not even struggling. Not herself, at least. "Also, perhaps you shouldn't be using this sort of spell on me. My companion is not particularly appreciative of such." The Horror being insubstantial for the moment, it can't affect the witch... but those ghostly hands are likely a different matter, and the formless monstrosity swiftly slashes talons at the spell that has his Master captured.

    Raylene is quickly trying to figure out what to do. Despite her calm facade, she knows she's one of the weaker Harbingers in the World Tree, even with the Horror. But then, all she has to do is keep this one busy... "And here I was hoping you weren't an incompetent witch."

    The knife boy growls as he sees his teammate injured and reaches out to the spilled blood, weaponizing it into ice-like shards aimed at Benedicta. He's still on the ground, just twisted around so he can see better. He really looks like some kind of 1950's greaser kid. The knife glints in his hand as he tries to dive past Poppy.
    The multicolored lights of the light mage flare with the sound of a trilling electronic scale growing in loudness, and it focuses heavily on Serrah. "Don't like the spotlight, hon?"
    Uncle Slug chuckles wetly. "Oh what wonderful friends I bring, beautiful lovely creatures that bite and sting." The swarm around him moves to swarm about Poppy, bringing annoying stings and bites. Worse still, it seems the other insects in the sanctum have been drawn out by the mage's call, with swarms of flies and cockroaches emerging from their hiding places.
    Seeing the fracas at the entrance, Aurelia grabs the various metal chairs and cubical walls using her magic and flings it towards the vault door. With some concentration, she melds it all together to form a second layer of defense other than the big heavy door, the metals forming strangely organic shapes in the wake of her magic.
    Alan's golden bow lets the blue arrow fly towards the time mage, but uses his own gravity magic to curve its flight path, aiming for the electric woman. A spray of electricity and blue sparks erupt as the arrow strikes.
    Kira grits her teeth, trying to use her own darkness magic to counteract the intense light being cast at Serrah.

    Samantha Spook smiles thinly at Raylene. "Let's play a game then. Can you prevent my ghosts from reaching the vault?"

     Poppy hefts her hammer again, preparing for another attack until suddenly the water mage's blood becomes weaponized! She cries out to Benedicta, "Duck!" and then turns back toward knife boy just in time to see him trying to run past her... only for a golden barrier made up of magical energy to pop into existence around her (and Bewear by extension), which will surely put a sudden halt to the wannabe greaser's charge if he lacks the agility to stop himself.

However, the insects from Uncle Slug seem to have no trouble finding the gaps in the barrier, quickly swarming over the yordle defender despite her best attempts to squash as many as she can. "Aack! I can't deal with things /this/ small!" she says, grabbing a particularly large roach and hurling it against the floor.

>> SUMMARY[Poppy] >> Magic barrier to stop knifey boy's charge and protect herself and Bewear! But the bugs are not deterred!

    King Knife shouts an expletive as he smashes his face into Poppy's golden barrier. Serves him right for being so impetuous. It musses up his slicked-back hair as his face slides along the barrier on his way to the ground.

    Chaos around her has Raylene mildly distracted, but she notes with some relief that there appears to be another time-mage here, and on their side. She can't see exactly what Serrah does, at least not without a lot more analysis, but she can guess. With the battle starting to heat up though... she has to be honest. "Me? Perish the thought, I'm a witch, not a fighter. But the Horror might." She flicks her head toward the vault, directing her invisible friend to interpose itself.

    "If it can, I suggest you go," Raylene points out. "My friend here grows more powerful by feeding on death, so if it stops your ghosts, it might end up a bit hungry." While it isn't manifesting, the Horror does make itself known, and a witch might be able to see the spirit form rushing toward her. Not that it CAN hurt her until it manifests, but instincts! And the ghosts may not be so lucky, if they're immaterial.

Getting stabbed with blood icicles sounds gross, it wouldn't be her first experience with blood magic but that doesn't make it any better for Benedicta. One of them grazes her but the wind's mage magic makes it rather difficult for anything to hit her directly. She notices Air Lion seems to have some problem with direct combat and dives in kicking at her. They were both pretty fast.

    Spook narrows her eyes, her senses washing over the area looking for Raylene's Horror. Spirits and ghosts were her bread and butter. She had been lying about the ghosts, in truth. But... she reaches out to the myriad little kami who are running around panicking like chickens at the presence of the Horror, marshalling them and directing them to flee in order to deny the enemy a power source. Raylene would probably sense this direction.

    Luke is tryin to figure the best... appropiate target. He didn't expect someone to stop his attack so easily, and hearing 'witches' and magic just makes it hard to consider what to do. Knife guy certainly makes a mistake trying to dash towards Poppy and Bewear at once. The barrier effect is quite nice, even as Luke offers further assistance against Knife guy. 
    "Bewear, Drain punch!" Wasting little time, and taking advantage of the protection, the bear springs into action, his left arm is engulfed in green energy with yellow streaks spiraling around it, bringing it into a straight punch aimed at the knife guy's chest, green sparks flying frmo the impact, and being absorved to Bewear, since he hasn't taken any real damage yet, there is no real visible effect, beyond smashing that guy's chest.

    Air Lion twists away to try and avoid Benedicta, throwing the (now clearly) faux lion cape in a misdirection attempt. The kick hits home, knocking the untamed breeze into a ceiling fan (with some unpleasant thump-thump-thump sounds as it whacks her multiple times). The cape momentarily blocks Benedicta's view.

    With a loud cough as the punch hits, King Knife slumps into the crater created by Bewear's drain punch, out of the fight as far as he was concerned.

Serrah peers at the Metallica girl, and at the remains of her baseball. "... huh. Welp!" She just furrows her brow at the time-mage's finger-waggle. "... You could see me, huh," she says. "Crap ... uh ..."

She briefly recoils from the burst of light, then smirks, augmenting Kira's darkness-magic by turning her left arm into shadow. "The spotlight?" she says. "I've been on TV, sister!" (... because she helped stop a bank robbery.) "Howabout I stop your show ..." She dramatically turns away. "... and Stop the World!"

Once again, time stops. Serrah charges forward at the light-mage and leaps into the air, fist swinging.

It abruptly resumes in mid-swing. The light mage might have enough time to dodge! But yeah, it would be pretty obvious to anyone watching her that Serrah's posture just completely changed there. Raylene wouldn't need to put that much effort into analysis.

    There's a deep multi-harmonic sound as literal blades of light emerge from Neon Nocturne's glow sticks as a response to Serrah's timestop punch. She is not that fast though, and takes one to the face. Immediately after, she blinks out from in front of Serrah and more towards the middle of the office space.

    It is a battle of bluffs then! Raylene is trying to outposture a witch posturing at her! But then again... she only has to delay her! The Horror chases a little spirit for a few feet before Raylene calls it back, finding herself in a dilemma. Squirming she reaches into her dress... in no position to throw anything, but she can drop it quite well! And that's all she needs to do.

    Her potions are pretty simple, but a flash of light and billowing smoke. A simple flash-bang sort of thing, since she saw one of them go out of the fight. If she can delay a little longer...

    Samantha squints at Raylene. "What are y-" And then a flashbang, and then she's left groping uselessly for a time.

Benedicta's view is blocked by the cape as Air Lion is knocked into the ceiling fan. She grabs it and tosses it aside clearly a bit disgusted. "Look, I'm going to give you a chance to surrender since you're clearly in over your head here. I'm trying to be nice and you're either not very good at this or not fully commited." She waits for her response.

    Uncle Slug stretches as two pairs of insect wings emerge and grow from under his leafy cloak, taking to the air to confront the fellow beast mage and grant Air Lion some relief. He takes a arcing swing with the stony scythe at Benedicta. "Would you stop being so unkind? The lady there certainly wouldn't mind!"
    Sandman obviously has more tricks than just manipulating the flow of time, as Serrah can sense the man using a great deal of magical energy to create shadowy time-duplicates of himself. The stuttering movement ends, with five different versions of the Sandman moving in concert with one another to alter Serrah's local flow of time to at least hinder her timestop capability. The mage knows he cannot match Serrah's time stops, but he can certainly try to 'trip her up' as it were by making time more turbulent around her.
    Frankenfreak goes straight for Poppy and Bewear, leaping in with electricity crackling around, unleashing a lightning strike as she lands. "Ride the lightning, dweebs!" From his prone position on the ground, King Knife just groans at the stupid catchphrase. Uncle Slug likewise pauses to facepalm at it.

    Aurelia pulls a crudely made throwing knife from her extradimensional space, flicking it towards the rave-themed magician. "Over there, Alan!"
    Hearing Aurelia call a shot, the winged archer draws his bow again and lets fly with another blue arrow. Kira assists by conjuring binding darkness. The two projectiles hit, with the impact of the arrow knocking Neon several feet back towards the fray at the entrance.
    And for ONE moment, the techno beat is silent.

    Air Lion curses at Benedicta in fluent French, creating a burst of air designed to drive Benedicta and herself apart, with Air Lion forced towards the barricaded vault door. She lands roughly though, and it may be a moment or two before she can pick herself back up.

    The flashbang goes down, and does exactly what she wanted! It isn't a true flashbang, as it doesn't outright blast the eardrums and stun that way, but it does give Raylene cover. She's tried to be nice and everything, but she doesn't have much respect for Samantha and she wasn't lying about the Horror feeding on death.

    In short, she tries to use this opportunity to just slip up next to Samantha and shank her in the lung with her knife.

Benedicta doesn't know French but she figures that it wasn't a compiiment. Uncle Slug certainly gets her attention, he's likely a better beast mage than she is. "Oh can it, Dr.Seuss." She might be in over her head as the scythe cuts the fur against her arm. She kicks against him trying to push him away from her.

     With the knife guy dealt with, it seems like the bug man is what Poppy needs to focus on now... though focusing on anything is quite difficult with bugs all over her! In fact, her barrier actually flickers out of existence after only a few seconds because of them, Poppy's concentration thoroughly broken by trying to deal with a thousand little stings and bites.

Until Frankenfreak appears, at least. Turns out bugs don't much like lightning, and Poppy's armor conducts it /quite/ well, frying all the poor little creepy crawlies on her. Unfortunately for the lightning mage, yordles are much more resilient than insects, and despite her groans of pain, Poppy keeps her shield held tightly and raises it in front of her. Strange, as it won't protect her from lightning striking her from the floor- oh, wait.

She's CHARGING, her sudden burst of speed leaving a spiderweb of cracks in the floor where she was just standing from the force propelling her forward, barreling at the metal-loving dork like a pissed off electrified rhinoceros. With all that momentum behind her, she isn't likely to stop until she hits a wall either, whether by herself or with a lightning mage squashed between it and her shield like one of those bugs from before.

    It... works. But this gets a very nasty glare from Samantha instead of the expected falling over and choking on her own blood. Hoarsely, with black ichor sputtering from her mouth, she speaks quietly. "Ah, pain my old friend." She reaches down and gently pushes Raylene away. "I'm getting too old for this crap." And she pulls herself across the veil of spirits to make a retreat.

>> SUMMARY[Poppy] >> Shield charge at electric mage, aiming to pin her against the wall.

    Uncle Slug is pretty heavy and maneuvers about as gracefully as a drunk bumblebee. He's shoved back a few feet through the air, since flying doesn't grant you brakes (unless one uses gravity magic like Alan). "No need to be afraid, young furred maid." He flashes a grin that lacks any teeth at Benedicta.

    The smell of ozone fills Poppy's nostrils as she slams Frankenfreak into the wall, feeling something crack nastily in the electric maho's body. The Metallica fan slumps against the wall, coughing wetly. "Th-this isn't... even. Even my final FORM!" The young metalhead seems to change, growing and shifting into a weird assembly of flesh and metal that stands 7 feet tall and lit by electricity. She coughs for a moment, not seemingly healed by her transformation.

Serrah doesn't have time to react. She winces slightly as the blade enters her chest, then jumps back from that sudden teleport, which seems to surprise her more than getting stabbed. She looks around, watches Aurelia, Alan, and Kira triple-team her target, and then ... staggers as she's suddenly on unsteady footing, time-wise. "Whoa!"

She turns back to Sandman and glares at him. "Okay," she snaps, "you first!" She stops time, walks right up to him, and then ... time uncontrollably resumes as she unleashes rapidfire punches on his face and torso. Even without time-manipulation, she's at "several punches a second" speeds, on top of the fact that with her vampiric strength, her punches hit like a truck.

>> SUMMARY[Serrah Delany] >> I'd say "MUDA MUDA MUDA" here, but we already have Jojos on the MUSH.

    "Hmm, not what I expected," Raylene remarks. Oh well. She isn't particularly bloodthirsty, so her opponent surviving isn't a big deal as long as they retreat. Just to be safe, she starts sweeping her gaze about to make sure she didn't miss some stealth mission going on... and she scoots away from the more physical violence going on like flying baseballs and tiny adorable champions. At least Luke with his pet creatures is pretty normal.

    The Sandman jukes, jives, ducks, bobs, and weaves across multiple duplicates of himself. Some of the punches land, leaving massive bruises. It seems that Sandman is fairly adept at using his magic to quicken his own reactions. It certainly keeps Serrah and Sandman busy enough to forget the other fights going on.

    Raylene senses an invisible presence step into the sanctum, one cloaked in illusion and deceit. She can sense this same presence reaching out across the aether, into the vault, to a particular cell where a woman in black waits for escape. Raylene would have been warned about Grayson Grau's two halves; William Weiss had escaped but Susan Swartz had not.

    Luke is kind of glad he stood behind this time, the electric blast causing some damage,and making the poor Bewear poof out dramatically, making it look as fluffy and soft as it actually is. He looks around for a target, assuming the crazy electric Lady was gone, at least, until the transformation! "Ok... that looks kind of bad." he mumbles. 
    "Bewear, come back now, Dynamo, tag in!" he calls as the two beasts switch places for now. "Dynamo, let's show her some real Lighting power, Thunder!" The big, round cat growls and roars as it suddenly bursts with electricity, glaring at the metallic 'thing', before unleashing a massive beam of electricty towards the Metallica fangirl!. Poor Poppy might get some shocks too, being wearing a large metal armor/hammer, but hopefully it won't be so bad?.

"That's a really forced rhyme." Bendedicta makes sure that Air Lion isn't trying to break into the vault before turning her attention back towards Uncle Slug. All this flying was a bit draining, it would be nice if she could grow more than one animal trait at once since she's limited to fighting with her hands and feet like this. Well, there is one other thing she can do as she closes in him and headbutts him with her horn.

    Although electricity and lightning is totally Frankenfreak's thing, it takes concentration to do things with it. With cracked ribs, Frankenfreak is able to redirect some of the lightning from herself into Poppy, but judging from the cooked meat smell now emanating from the hulked out Metallica fan and the fact she falls slumped to the ground, her goose is cooked.

    Uncle Slug's flesh is... not pleasant to headbutt. It is about as squishy as one would expect a slug's to be. It's also coated in slime. He gets knocked back a bit and examines the gooey wound for a moment before flying in with a circular slash. "This doesn't change my mood. After all, it is you who will be worm food!"

    Seeing that her foe is harassed by Uncle Slug, Air Lion surges forward with a barrier of broken chairs and dust to shield herself from the three rearguard defenders. "A la victoire!" She is shot down by Alan, a wake of debris showing where his gravity magic was used to keep the arrow true. One can even see the particulates in the air actually gravitate towards Air Lion moments before she's downed.
    Kira's hand gestures as she holds her book out to focus her magic, a duel between a darkness mage and a light mage erupting in the middle of the office space, with visually spectacular results.
    Aurelia draws a javelin from her other space and hurls it at Neon Nocturne, wincing as a scream pierces the air as suddenly as the javelin pierces the other maho's leg. Aurelia has never caused that level of harm before and it shakes her.

    While Sandman and Serrah duel, a third party steps in with a knife, ducking low to avoid being smacked. The knife comes upwards towards Serrah as William Weiss reveals himself. Chances are that Serrah will see this coming, but reacting to it may allow an opening for Sandman to strike.

Benedicta gets goo all over her horn and face, while she cares about animals it's still kind of gross. She tries to defend herself from the slash but her vision is a bit blocked as she tries to scrape the slime off of her face and it goes straight through her hoodie into her stomach. She cringes in pain a bit and tries to toss Uncle Slug off of her.

    At the shove, Uncle Slug flits away from Benedicta, sensing the need to regroup. He's headed back towards the entrance hole, leafy cloak fluttering as he does.

     Poppy stumbles back after she hits the wall, her shield and hammer still held but in a shaky grip, her breath coming in ragged gasps. It seems the damage is taking its toll on her, and even her normally pristine armor is blackened by the lightning. But it seems like her foe still isn't down for the count just yet, so she stays standing, even if her legs want to give out.

"You really are a tough one, huh..." she remarks, flashing a faux-confident grin at Frankenfreak as the mage transforms into a metallic beast that towers over her. The sound of Luke shouting orders behind her gets her attention though, and she looks over her shoulder... /just/ barely stepping aside in time to avoid being hit by the main body of that lightning bolt. The arcing tendrils of electricity coming off of it still catch her, causing her to wince and hiss in pain again, but also... they give her an idea.

"So, heheh, you guys weren't expecting this much resistance, were you?" Poppy asks the Metallica fangirl, holding her hammer up to intercept Dynamo's Thunder beam with its head. Turns out, the hammer's metal can hold a charge pretty well as the yordle then lifts it over her head again, lightning crackling around her, and despite gritting her teeth in pain, she still gives the mage a shit-eating grin as she follows up with, "Guess we left you... /Thunderstruck/."

Then SLAM goes the hammer into the floor again, magic and lightning channeling into the ground for a half-second before another, bigger hammer made up of ethereal energies erupts from the ground underneath Frankenfreak like a volcanic Jack-in-the-Box, accompanied by all of that absorbed electricity discharging in a second bolt of lightning that blasts through the roof. And given the force that ghostly hammer came up with, it might just carry Ms. Big and Scary with it.

>> SUMMARY[Poppy] >> Pop-up lightning hammer from the floor, Frankenfreak is probably doing the Team Rocket thing now. Also, terrible pun, Poppy should feel bad, but she's too busy gigglesnorting.

    Frankenfreak was on the ropes before, but the hammer of lightning gods embeds her in the paneled ceiling of the office space. She's got no spark left in her at this point.

Serrah lets out a snarl, dodging back from William's stab. "LUKE!" she growls. She stops time, jumps back --

Luke and Dynamo would suddenly find themselves perceiving Serrah's stopped purplish-monochrome world as she puts one hand on Luke's shoulder and the other on Dynamo's back. "Use that ... Thunder ... thing!" She's furious, perhaps even slipping into vampiric traits, and she's clearly pushing herself herself beyond her normal limits ...

As soon as Dynamo fired off, the time stop would immediately fail. But Serrah is gambling that lightning is faster than baseballs or punches.

>> GAME >> Serrah Delany spends an Edge for: Pushing harder against Stop the World's limits

     Luke is confused, but to his credit, reacts quickly when his friend gets stabbed and calls for his help. Noticing it's multiple opponents, he manages to make what hopes is the best judgement call, "Dynamo, Discarge!" he calls. While Dynamo seems a bit stunned by the time stop, the big round cat is quick to follow the command, once again electricity bursting out of it's adorably round figure, and unleashing another massive burst of lighting, but this time, rather than a solid, thick beam, several thinner bolts of electricity shoot from the big cat, all aimed in the general area of Sandman and William, trying to cover a large radius around them.

>> GAME >> Luke Gray spends an Edge for: Using Discharge to hit multiple targets as hard as possible.

    The radius of electrical discharge manages to catch all of Sandman's duplicates, the time-steps vanishing as the primary maho writhes in agony from the electric jolt. As for William, he was never a heavy hitter and relies heavily on deceit and illusion to win. His magical knife clatters to the ground as he falls face-first into the ruined linoleum floor.

    Uncle Slug lands near the entrance hole with a wet splat, as slimy gross mages are prone to doing. He grins, revealing his disturbing lack of teeth and rather slug-like radula instead. He looks back into the wreckage of the accountant's office. "Mistress, we are undone! But why shouldn't you have some fun?" He turns back towards the defenders and leers disturbingly, eye-stalks only adding to the hideousness of it.
    From the darkness of the outer office, one can barely see the shadows within shadows move as a crescent hole in the universe is raised. The deafening roar of thunder as it lands at one's feet is heard as an arrow streaks through the inner office space with the speed of a falling star. As it passes by, heat roils off of it. At first it looks like it might strike Poppy or Serrah since they're closest to the entrance, but it unerringly flies by, narrowly missing Alan's wings. It finally strikes the orichalcyon armor, knocking Aurelia off her feet, diamond sword dropped as the young woman is impaled to the metal barricade she had erected.