World Tree MUSH

    The warehouse on the docks is empty at this time of night, used as a front by the Order of Hermes to move goods in and out of San Francisco. Kira Nocturne is keeping Mona shrouded in darkness so Serrah doesn't have to spread herself thin, so to speak. Alan turns the lights on as everybody enters, otherwise there would be a lot of bumping into large wooden containers.
    Aurelia and her familiar are in their civilian guises for now, and they're keeping an eye on the entrance at the moment.
    Mona mumbles about the ghosts in her head that won't go away as she leans on Kira for support.
    The darkly clad woman just sighs. "A terrible night for a lunar curse..." She helps Alan's aunt into a comfortable recliner that has yet to be boxed for transport.

    If the request was to come around in a civilian outfit, Luke at least seems able to do that, he still has the same outfit, backpack and belt, but at least at this moment, he is simply alone, passing as a regular kid, who.. might be a bit suspicious in the night, in the docks, but that's a different story perhaps. The boy appears at the entrance, checking on a handheld device that might double as a gps, glancing into the warehouse, "Hopefully I am not too late?" he asks as he wanders inside, dodging boxes.

Benedicta's just glad no one else can see her right now. An al'miraj girl would attract additional unwanted attention right now. "I hope the Cabal doesn't know about this place." That would just make things even more complicated, "Hey Luke, I hope you don't have school tomorrow because this is going to be a long night." They're going to have to keep watch until morning after all.

    Spreading herself thin is also something which Serrah would literally be doing. She sits against a nearby wall, frowning, dressed in her usual black shirt and rainbow skort. "Yeah, I wouldn't wish this kind of curse on anybody." Her remaining essence of humanity is dwindling, but she has enough for empathy. Empathy for losing your free will, your sense of self ...

    She nods in greeting to the new arrival. "Hey, Luke." She glances at Benedicta. "I mean, I could watch her all night, since I'm nocturnal. But still, we might need all the help we can get here."

    It really does feel like time drags on forever when one is on watch. Aurelia and Zero chat with Luke and the young man's pokemon, especially since the pokemon are much needed extra manpower. Alan is keeping an eye on his aunt, hoving like a worried parent. Kira keeps watch, but occasionally checks on everybody, offering some of the bad coffee she's brewed up in the warehouse office to help with wakefulness.

    Luke always comes with the same basic team, but for any situation requiring actual strength, he always relies on the three, Bewear, Agni and Dynamo. The pink and black bear seems to feel more comfortable trying to help keep watch, if allowed, even if he can't quite speak, while Dynamo seems adamant on trying to steal a sip of coffee from someone, despite Luke's worries about giving a living battery twitchy juice. The fire pokemon simply lazes around, 'saving energy' but keeping his trainer and the others company.

    Serrah is looking every bit as awake and alert as she was at the beginning of the evening. She grimaces as she accepts the coffee from Kira. "Y'know," she says, "I was gonna compliment you on how awful this coffee is, possibly bordering on flirting, but ..." She sighs softly. "It reminds me of the coffee shop job I lost when ... when Vincent got me." She sips it anyway, and grimaces. "Oh, yeah," she says. "You haven't lived until you've had some truly awful coffee. Here, Luke, want some? -- No, Dynamo, this is human-food, you can't have mine."

"I'm not sure if Kira can taste anything due to how her body is made up...." Benedicta know the woman has some unique traits to her and takes a cup of the offered coffee. She doesn't normally drink it but she could use all the help she can staying awake. "Maybe we should let Serrah make the coffee next then..." Her normally lop ears suddenly lift up, "Oh crap what was that?" Her head turns towards the door, have they been discovered?

    For a large ball with stumpy limbs, Dynamo is quite graceful, moving around Serrah, meowling, and cranking up the charm to max, or at least, that's what the pokemon is gunning for, it is purring, and twitching it's tail, eyes wide as it seems magnetized by the powerful coffee. "He seems to really like it, used to get bits of coffee when it was smaller, but... being twitchy and having as much energy as he does, means he might accidentally shock someone.". The 'tiger' tries its best to look harmless, even rubbing against Serrah's legs when she offers Luke coffee. "Dynamo, no, maybe after this is over, adn we are back home, you can get a bit."

    Kira laughs about the coffee. Anyone who looked in the office kitchenette would know that it is coffee that was born bad for its cheapness. She has been avoiding giving the pokemon any coffee unless Luke okays it.
    The noises become audible, a sort of scraping sound along the outside of the brick and mortar walls. The clicking of nails on the roof. Aurelia's eyes widen as she recognizes the sound that Benedicta must have heard first. "... Grendels." The noise prompts Zero to transform into his big metal lion form and Aurelia to summon her armor and sword.
    The grendels opt to first rip open the loading bay door, their massive shaggy forms shrouded by clinging tendrils of shadows, snarling and loping towards where Alan and Mona are situated.

"And I thought things were going to be boring...how the hell did they find us here?" Benedicta can't help but to wonder as she unsheathes her claws and moves to defend Alan and Mona. She doesn't want to fight the creatures but they might not have choice here.

    Bewear was near the door as the attack happened, wanting to keep the boy safe, and likely taking the task more seriously than its trainer. The not... very intimidating looking beast roaring in challenge to the shaggy figures, moving forward and doing what might be best described as a DBZ powerup scene, growling loudly as a red aura suddenly appears around it, and seems to 'bulk' up slightly. 

    Luke is taken by surprise, spitting some coffee and turning to the source of the noise, while the other two pokemon move to flank the trainer, both of them also doing some pretty displays, Dynamo glowing with barely contained electric power that shoots out of its fur in small sparks, while Agni rears up, the flame shaped tuft of fur on it's forehead glowing brightly, looking almost like a lit fuse, and starting to heat up the room a bit. "Agni, help Benedicta protect the others, Dynamo, go ahead and help Bewear stop those monsters!.". Of course, this all takes time.

    Serrah chuckles, and scritches Dynamo. "Heh ... Yeah, uh ..." She frowns at Benedicta. "Huh? What is it?"

    Grendels.

    "Aw crud," says Serrah, jumping to her feet and rising off the ground. "Dollars to donuts they're attracted by the 'new Metallia Luna'. Unless our enemies suddenly figured out what we're up to, I mean it's not like her blowing up the building was flashy or anything," she adds sarcastically.

    A timestop-instant later, she's next to Benedicta, baseballs held at the ready, but glancing around in every direction in case anything unexpected comes in from another angle.

    The grendels seem to have a plan, they're flooding in and engaging the defenders, doing their best to dodge and eat the energy of our heroes. The shrouds of darkness that cling to them make them seem to be in a place just off from where they actually are. The shaggy monsters even caper between the boxes, knocking things over to throw off attacks directed towards them. They are quite different beasts than the ones encountered before: more cunning than the one that coveted the talking clock radio, less human than the ones who just wanted to listen to music.

"Dammit, there's so many of them!" Tentacles grow out of Benedicta's back as she does her best to try and keep them at bay. She grabs an empty box and throws it at a wall to try and drive them off. "Maybe we should get out of here, but I'm not sure where to go!" She's not sure if the grendels will try to follow them or not.

    Serrah frowns. She can kinda see how their darkness works, but only enough to give her an edge, not enough to really negate their advantage. "Oh great," she mutters. She throws the four baseballs at a hundred miles per hour, then simply goes in for melee damage, punching and kicking with superhuman strength.

    "Going somewhere else won't help if they're gettin' drawn to her directly," she snaps back at Benedicta. "Argh!" She gets knocked backwards by a stray swat from a grendel; one timestop later, and she's suddenly swooping down to grab it from behind. If successful, she will physically lift the grendel off the ground and swing it in a circle around herself in an attempt to clear the ones immediately surrounding her.

    Unfortunately for the Grendels, Bewear is not the kind of opponent that will just let large shadow monsters pass through him. The bewear's reaction to the shadow cloak is snarling, while Luke yells, "Bewear!, try Darkest lariat!" ca his arms covering in dark purplish aura as it begins to spin and charging at the opponent, looking almost like a small pink and tornado of some sort (or a top), trying to ram into the monsters. "Dynamo, try Flash, maybe that will dispel...! the boy command is interrupted as some of the monsters charge through, and dives out of the way next to Agni, who tries to grab and throw the beast away, hopefully not into someone else.

    Kira has her hands full trying to keep the grendels away with tendrils of darkness, lashing out at the ones that get too near. Zero savagely mauls ones that get too close to Aurelia, who is trying to use her magic to erect a protective barrier around Alan and his aunt. The efforts of Luke, Serrah, and Benedicta slow the tide of bestial monsters to a crawl, but enough have managed to eke by to menace the pair of mages in the middle.
    "I'll get my aunt out of here!" Alan grabs his aunt and transforms, shielding her with his wings as he uses his magic to punch a hole in the roof and take off into the sky. It's not like he actually needs the wings to fly, after all.

"Good idea!" Benedicta's pretty sure that the grendels can't fly after all. Still there might be a problem if Mona gets exposed to the moon again, she also wonder how long Alan can stay in the air for. "Kira, can you keep the moon off them?" She figures maybe she can erect some kind of darkness barrier or something.

    Serrah promptly leaps up into the air and flies after Alan. "I'll handle that!" she answers Benedicta, one hand making sure her baseball bag is secure at her hip, just before she once again turns into a shadow, and with a flicker of sudden timestop-motion, she positions herself between the moon and Aunt Mona. "Here we go again ..."

    Luke and his pokemon seem mostly focused on trying to stop the furious beasts rushing at them, even if Luke finally manages to get safe and orders Dynamo to keep the monsters away from Aurelia, Kira and Zero, flashes of bright light, wide bursts of electricity as well. Luke gets close to Aurelia, "Dynamo, help Aurelia with the protection, Agni, help Zero.". Unfortunately neither can fly, but at least it can shoot down things jumping at them!. "Is there anything I can do to help?, I don't think some raindclouds would help with the moon thing, right?" calls Luke. The Bewear simply continues trashing the monsters, seems less at risk of being defeated and just.. he simply can't hit them all.

    With effort, the grendels seem to be retreating, grabbing their wounded as they do, loping along out the ruined loading dock door. Mounrful howls can be heard, probably the signal to retreat.
    The infamous fog of San Francisco is helping for once, having rolled in like a pouncing cat in the hours spent waiting. The world is a gray panorama with city lights hanging in the air like will-o-wisps, the more distant streets reduced to a dull glow. Alan gets up into the air, keeping his wings closed around his aunt to protect her from any stray moonlight. He's grateful for Serrah's help too, giving the shadow-form vampire a slight smile and a nod of the head in acknoledgement.
    There was somebody waiting on the roof, though. A woman clad in oily black metal armor, face covered by the same. She lifts a metal bow with a midnight-oil sheen and draws a bead on Alan, firing what looks like a flurry of meteors through the fog-clad night. The sight of the projectiles break Alan's concentration, making his ascent wobble and stop long enough for the things to hit home. He starts falling, leaving the semi-conscious Mona to Serrah.

"Alan!" The tentacles vanish from Benedicta's back and are replaced by feathery wings. Hopefully she can catch him before he hits the ground. She takes advantage of her natural agility to leap up into the air and propels herself upwards. Of course her effort leaves her wide open to being shot by Noctis herself but she doesn't care. Her horn glows yellow in the night sky providing a bit of light in the darkness.

    Serrah's hand sticks out of the shadows and returns Alan's thumbs-up, immediately before those meteors appear. "Oh fl--" One timestop later, she's solid again and her arms are wrapped tightly around Mona. "--cker!"

    Oh, and there's a half dozen baseballs flying towards the black-clad figure at a hundred miles per hour.

    Luke's attention is on Alan and the aunt, and Serrah!, shame neither him or any of his pokemon can fly, the best they can do, is follow from the ground, so, when the attack happens, Bewear joins Benedicta in the attempt to catch the falling Alan, seeming almost as nimble as Benedicta!. Dynamo tries to find a way up, in the direction of the shots, but climbing up might take a bit tricky, it is certainly not a thing built for speedy parkour and climbing up.

    Noctis flinches as a bunch of baseballs hit her at high speeds, causing her to misstep and fall off the roof. There's a loud clang and clatter as she seems to fall into a dumpster below. Benedicta manages to catch Alan, who is unconscious and covered in his own blood. Luke's dynamo emerges onto the roof just in time to see the third Metallia knock herself off the roof.

"Alan! Stay with us!" Hopefully the Order has a facility with medical staff not too far from here. She knows sunset road is inacessible at the moment. Benedicta removes her hoodie to try and stop the bleeding and keep him warm. She's not too concerned about Noctis right now, the most important was getting Alan help after all. She could always dial 911 if there's no other options, but she's sure it would be rather difficult to explain what happened. Plus they might not have the equipment to deal with his injuries.

    Serrah floats down, and gently sets Mona back down back inside. She winces at the smell of Alan's blood; he sounds delicious -- nope, nope, none of that! "I'm, uh, I'm gonna ... check on the attacker," she says weakly, then melts into a puddle of shadow.

    Which, one time-stop later, appears in front of the dumpster, and then reforms as Serrah, looming over Noctis. And vampires are good at looming, even when they're in scrappy street clothes. "Hey there," she says coldly. "How's it goin'?"

>> SUMMARY[Serrah Delany] >> Because if there's one vampiric trait Serrah embraces wholeheartedly, it's being Completely Extra.

    The dumpster is being twisted into armor for Noctis as Serrah watches, the drab green paint peeling away to reveal the metal being infected by the oily blackness. Noctis looks much taller in her new armor and the metal facemask takes on the features of a Japanese oni, which glowers at Serrah. "Don't you have somewhere to be?" A subtle chill slimes its way around Serrah's ankles, revealing that the Metallia is attempting to lock the vampire's feet together with scrap metal.

    Dynamo snarls, and spots Serrah trying to menace at Noctis, and decides to join in. For better or worse, the pokemon seems to believe in a more direct approach than just 'looming', and when the zap tiger spots the armor lady attacking a friend, it strikes, rushing towards the armored lady, a large bolt of electricity shooting from the round feline to the tall, metal coated target.
    Luke meanwhile, tries to help Benedicta with first aid or something, he kinda panics a bit, he has bandages and... first aid kit?.

    Serrah glances down at her feet, which promptly dematerialize into shadow as she rises further off the ground. "Tryin' to catch a shadow, are ya?" she says, her New Yorker accent shining through. "Okay, but for real though, wha--" She stops as there's suddenly an electric pokemon zapping everything. "-- hi, Dynamo," she says dryly.

    The metal mage's armor falls apart as dynamo shocks the bejeezus out of it, revealing that Noctis has somehow fled the scene. Kira and Aurelia finally get to the rooftop, with Aurelia pulling medical supplies out of hammerspace as Kira rips things open and tries to do what she can to stabilize Alan long enough for Benedicta and herself to get him somewhere better equipped.