World Tree MUSH

    It's early in the morning in Tokyo, an hour or so before sunrise. Which is to say, it's a couple of hours before good little vampires go to bed, or at least vampires who don't want to end up sleep-deprived.

    Serrah has been looking for Leene, searching in her shadow-form through the gutters and other spots you'd expect only a Shinki to be able to fit. She flows out of a gutter and discreetly makes her way to an alleyway chosen by prior arrangement -- it's kind of spooky, if you're paying attention, but there are noticeably fewer pedestrians out in Tokyo at this hour -- before she transforms back into her humanoid form, dressed in the same black grungy outfit she had at the fight where Alty made her appearance.

    "No dice," she says, looking gloomy and irritable. "Just a bunch of other strays. And ... some of them ..." She grimaces. "... saw me." She gestures vaguely. "L-let's just say I hate creeping people out just by being something that I was forced to be against my will."

    Dante really hates waking up this early, not because he's groggy but because it's sooooo boring.

    He's downing some canned coffee as he follows with Serrah, wearing skinny jeans and a Nine Inch Nails t-shirt with his best shitkicker boots and a red leather jacket, guitar case slung over his shoulder. "There some kind of law against vamps being seen, like a masquerade or somethin'?" He wonders aloud. "Otherwise, I think we're good." The devil hunter does sympathize, he's been in situations before where people freaked the hell out seeing him trying to save them, in their defense he'd just split a demon in half with his sword.

Holly's in Tokyo again! Of course given the witch's poor set of direction she doesn't realize it's a different version of it. The fact she doesn't know Japanese doesn't help matters either. She hasn't been able to find the pumpkin ice cream stand again, but given the time of day it was likely closed anyway. She lets out a loud yawn from above as she flies on her broom overhead about to call it a night before she sees Dante and Serrah below. She smiles widely before levivating down to their level. "Hi! Something going on?"

    It's early, but some people were already up. Some people like a certain one-foot-tall helper robot by the name of Alty. One pair of new arms replacing the ones she lost, and a fresh battery to make up for the one that was damaged, and the Altines is ready to continue her search through Tokyo's underground as well.
    It's slow going in comparison to Serrah's ability; she simply can't cover as much ground as the vampire, and she's been searching for days on top of it.
    "It's alright." She says when Serrah admits she couldn't find anything on her shinki hunt except a few that she wasn't looking for. A tiny hand sets on Serrah's shoulder.
    "It's okay. They just don't understand, is all." She says before explaining to Dante:
    "Most solo and masterless shinki are skittish and afraid of being caught on their own. Serrah just spooked them a little bit."

    Serrah snorts. "Yeah, plus I just didn't want to startle people with 'hey there's this mass of darkness leaking out of the gutter'," she answers Dante. "Vampires aren't a thing in this world."

    She brightens slightly. "Oh, hey, Holly!" she says. "We're looking for Alty here's sister Leene." She gestures to the Shinki by her shoulder. "She, uh, showed up while we were doing a sting operation, but she got away." She grimaces again; she feels partly responsible for Leene's getaway after she lost control of her vampiric rage, even partially.

    She takes a deep breath; her expression suggests that a deep breath doesn't actually help her. But then she frowns. "... uh-oh," she says. "Crrrrrap, Vincent's getting close to this Blossom, I got distracted and didn't notice. We'd better sneak out before he gets here." She glances between Dante and Holly, and brushes aside the hair across her forehead, exposing the black heart-shaped mark. "If this starts to glow purple, try to knock me out."

    "Oh. Well, no vampire police to fight. That's good." Dante says, and nods to Alty. "Right. I'll let you take point on that one, I guess." He says, quirking an eyebrow at Alty's new limbs. "Those new?" He asks, indicating the more pristine parts on the shinki's body.

    Holly gets a nod, as Dante sips his coffee again. "We're lookin' for somebody." He explains curtly, just as Serrah begins to get antsy after that breath. "Ah, shit."

    Without hesitation, the devil hunter nods again. "I apologize in advance, 'cause it'll hurt like a bitch." Dante points out.

"Shinki? Are those what the tiny metal fairies are called? Come to think of metal and fairies are kind of an odd mix, a lot of them are weak to cold steel..." Holly looks a bit puzzled at what's see them.

 "I believe they're some kind of small machine Holly, not magical creatures." Servis is quick to correct her, "Machines? They look like some kind of kids toy. Like those dolls you push a button and they say something," Lavaux offers a third take on what they're seeing.

 "Machines? But those are huge and bulky not small and cute!" Maybe Lavaux is on to something, they could be like those wind-up dolls!" Her attention then turns towards Serrah, "Oh are you have trouble controlling your vampire urges again, Serrah? Oh not, that jerk again! Why would I punch you? I'll punch him if he shows up!" It's rare for Holly to get visibly upset.

    "Um. Yeah." Alty replies to Dante, flexing her new arm a few times and curling her fingers. "I lost the old ones." She mutters dourly, before her brow furrows.
    "We're not fairies." She points out to Holly. "And we're not toys, either, we're robots." She keeps the explanation simple, before her attention returns to Serrah.
    And she frowns.
    "U-uh. Wait, knock you out? Who's Vincent?"

    Serrah nods to Dante and gives him a thumbs-up as she starts heading out of the alleyway and down the street, looking around for Vines. She does have to pause and furrow her brow at Holly's idiosyncratic line of reasoning. "I mean, I understand the confusion, but like Alty said, they're robots," she says. "No magic, either. ... Which is still slightly weird to me, but whatever." She shrugs. "And the reason for punching me is so that he doesn't use the Blackheart Mark on me ..."


She looks at Alty. "Oh right. Duke Vincent D'Ambrosio is the vampire who turned me, and he can use this Scepter of his to remote-control me. Good news is, he can't control my mind or my mouth." She glances around. "He's a total clown, but he's a powerful clown, and --"

    Suddenly, she pushes Alty to sit on her shoulder, grabs Dante and Holly's arms, and then stops time. It looks like a ripple of light emanating from Serrah, and the world becomes desaturated and purplish. She pulls the three of them into the alleyway, then resumes time and points across the street. "I think that's Major Maledicta," she whispers. "One of Vincent's flunkies in both of his invasions. The hell's she doing here?"

    Sure enough, on the opposite side of the street, there's a woman whose face might be familiar to Holly; like Serrah, she's attractive in an anemic sort of way, and her skin looks somewhat unhealthy. She's wearing a black trench coat, and seems to be absorbed in reading a Japanese newspaper (from yesterday).

    Dante listens, nodding. "Blackheart bad, gotcha." He says, with a surprisingly grave tone in his voice considering the circumstances. Serrah had come to him for this for good reason, and if she's worried, then he's got reason to take the matter seriously.

    He's about to draw on the Major before Serrah stops time, making the point moot. He does however keep his focus on Maledicta, eyes narrowed. "Probably lookin' to sniff you out herself? Tempted to go and ask, personally."

    A clown, but a powerful clown. Got it.
    Alty is briefly left picturing a vampire in mime makeup before she squeaks, more from the surprise of sudden motion than anything else as she's tugged onto Serrah's shoulder. But the little shinki latches on as time freezes and everything visually desaturates. Scarlet eyes blink as the woman across the street is pointed out.
    Alty squints, advanced sensor array kicking into gear as her vision zooms in on the figure. "That paper is from yesterday... And most people on this world would just read the news digitally..." In other words, she's saying this lady sucks at being inconspicuous as she tries to pick out any others like the Major that might be sticking out with her sensors.

"You said something about masters though, are you like familars?" It's starting to get through to Holly a bit but she doesn't fully understand. "Those must be some really tiny tubes inside of you." The witch's attention then turns towards Maledicta not remembering her that well. "Is she trying to distract us for Vincent?" Serrah mentioned that he was close by.

    Serra chortles. "Yeah, I dunno, Dante, that might not be a good idea, depending on what she's really here for."

    She frowns, glancing between Alty and HOlly. "... Excellent point, Holly," she says. "But no, she preferred to be involved. You kind of had to be, given Vinny's level of ... 'competence'. But, uh, yeah, let's hurry on outta here, next street over." She heads deeper into the alleyway, away from Maledicta.

    Maledicta's expression turns into a slight grimace immediately after Alty speaks up. A shinki's heat-sensors might be able to detect that her body temperature, like Serrah's, is a little too close to 'dead' for the comfort of most human beings. And, when Alty starts scanning further afield ... she might detect that there are several such dead humans wandering around, or standing around, or making their this way and that. One of whom strides purposefully into a Vine in the opposite direction from where Serrah is leading the group.

    "She's not alone." Alty points out, biting on her lower lip.
    "Familiars?" She asks distractedly. "K... Kind of? We're just programmed to be helpful and 'attach' to one person, usually." She explains half-heartedly to Holly.
    "One just left through a nearby vine, but there are uh... Several signatures a lot like Serrah's around here.
    "... Maybe we can try and avoid them and get out of here?" She suggests hopefully.
    This is getting kind of scary after all.

    "Basically slaves, in this case." Dante asides to Alty. "I haven't exactly hunted vampires, but I know enough about the lore." He says, keeping a hand close to Ebony. "We'd better get going while we can." He points out.

"Yeah, I rather not fight the undead." Holly's not so great at it. She's better at getting their attention. Sure there was the time she helped killed a vampire, but he wasn't exactly a threat. Plus Vincent might try to turn Serrah against them again. She lets Serrah lead the way.

    One of the vampires starts heading directly towards the group.

    Serrah grins nervously but fangily. "Uh ... okay, I'm not sure what she's up to. Maybe they're ... communicating somehow?" She shakes her head. "Okay, I dunno, but yeah, Holly's got a point, I think we'd better jump ahead to the vine. Stop the --"

    "Stop what?" says a familiar voice behind them.

    "GAH!" Serrah whirls around, turning to face the voice. It's a raven-haired woman in a black and red French maid uniform with a completely empty smile, standing with her hands behind her back. "Wilhelmina!?" says Serrah.

    "Yes indeed, Your Ladyship," says the maid. "Now, excuse me, but I have been instructed to bring you to His Grace posthaste." She brings her hands out from behind her back, revealing that she's holding a pair of kitchen knives. She throws one of them at Dante, and the other at Holly, and reaches behind her back to grab another pair.

    Dante draws his pistol as he whirls behind him, aiming Ebony right at Wilhelmina. "Hey, babe. I can't let ya do that, unfortunately." He says, before he reaches out to stop one of the knives. Specifically, he tries to stop the knife headed for Holly with his HAND. He's pretty used to stabbings by this point, so he braces for the pain as the kitchen knife buries itself in his palm. Without wasting time, the Devil Hunter opens fire with a barrage of .45 rounds. Magic guns being magic, Ebony doesn't really need to reload.

    "WEH!" This is the sound of a shinki on Serrah's shoulder holding on for dear life as the vampire whips around. Alty has a strong grip, but she does go for a bit of a ride and nearly topples off from how fast Serrah turns.
    "--!"
    In an instant there's a flash of white light as Alty's armor manifests from her Slipway storage and latches into place with a series of ratcheting clicks, skull-faced visor snapping down over her eyes.
    "Dante, look out!" Blurted as she launches off Serrah's shoulder at top speed and draws-- her broken greatsword from her Slipway. There's a brief sputter as she remembers it's broken, but she hauls off with it anyway, the cracked red blade slamming into the kitchen knife and sending it careening off course with a ringing clatter of steel against steel.

Holly's tougher than she looks, thanks strength potion but she's still glad that Dante stopped her from being stabbed. After all you don't want to start bleeding around a bunch of vampires, "Thanks! Sorry, but she can't come with you. She doesn't like being a vampire! I like the maid outfit...it would look better in black and orange though." She attempts to grapple with Wilhelmina to stop her from reaching Serrah. "Run for it!"

    Wilhelmina starts to turn into shadow, but her head jerks back from some of Dante's shots. This doesn't keep her down for very long, however, and though she is clearly wobbling from her gun wounds, she attempts to stab Holly with her new knives. Seems she's carrying a bum bag filled with the things. "I'm afraid my aesthetics are chosen by my master and those before him," she says languidly.Serrah nods, takes Dante's arm, and stops time again. They carefully make their way down the street in stopped time, but they haven't gone half a block before time resumes. "Dahhh ... okay, bringing two people along with me eats up time like nothing." She frowns at Dante's wounded hand. "... You doing okay there?"

    More vampires are approaching. In swirls of shadow, their clothes change into the Hartford Empire's familiar military uniform, but they don't go for their weapons yet.

    "Miss Nocturne!" Maledicta shouts irritably as she approaches Wilhelmina and Holly. "... blasted one-track-mind ..." She frowns, and mouths 'eats up time' with a confused look. Then she shrugs, and peers at Holly. "I hope you have a better idea of how to stall us than this, Miss Winn," she says casually, as if she doesn't particularly care one way or another about this entire situation.

    Dante waves off Serrah's concern, yanking the knife out by the grip with his teeth. His wounded hand knits together quickly, and he flexes it a few times as the pain subsides and he regains full motion and feeling of it. "I'll be fine, more worried about you." Dante says with a little grin, "Stay close to Alty, I'm goin' back for Holly!" He says, before dashing after Wilhelmina and Holly.

    "Sorry to cut in, ladies!" Dante says with a laugh, before drawing Ivory in his other hand, opening fire at the two vampires.

    Dismissing her broken sword, Alty produces a shorter red blade, hunkering behind the shield integrated into her armor's left arm.
    Behind that skull visor, Alty is doing her best to not panic as more vampires emerge. Especially when Serrah and Dante vanish due to stopped time. Though when Dante returns and opens fire-- Alty zips off down the block, hovering by Serrah's side.
    "... I have no idea how Dante thinks I'm supposed to stop any of them, but I'll uh. Do my best?"

Holly cringes a bit as she poked in the stomach by the knives. They scratch her a bit but she's not bleeding a lot. "If I could only use my magic to take control of them!" She points her lollipop staff at them but only a few orange flecks of magic come out of it. That's not the result she was hoping for. Instead she uses the weapon as a makeshift bat and swings it at the pair. She smiles at Dante as he comes back, hopefully she bought enough time for Serrah to escape.

    Serrah is startled. "Hey wait!" she calls after Dante. She sighs, and gently puts her hand on Alty's back. "Okay, sure," she says, looking at the vampires surrounding her. "Don't worry about it, Alty, I'm just gonna to use my special ability."

    And then she just stops time. With only Alty, she makes it two blocks before time resumes. "BYE!" she calls back to the vampires, who immediately spin around towards them in consternation. "Uh, Alty, can you get a fix on the nearest Vine?"

    Wilhelmina is hit by Dante's gunfire, and drops to the ground and goes still, her empty smile not even shifting. "Ouch," she announces.

    Maledicta is much quicker on the uptake, and manages to change into shadow before his shots go off. "I'm not the one you need to worry about stalling," she says as she reforms. She hurriedly tries to dodge Holly's magic, and stops when she sees that it isn't going to do anything. "Good grief, don't you know a diversion when you see one?" She dodges Holly's swing. "Miss Nocturne wasn't even supposed to attack you! You'll lost the minute His Grace arrives in this Blossom and remotely activates Lady Delany's Blackheart Mark."

    Oh right Serrah can just stop time. That really is pretty handy as Alty was gearing up to psych herself up as best she could to try and heroically fend off an army of vampires.
    Thankfully she doesn't have to do that.
    Two blocks away later, and the little shinki is blue in the face from the sheer though of having to fend off that many guys.
    "Y-yeah bye." She decides that, in this case, discretion is the better part of valor and starts quickly scanning, pulling up a series of small hologram screens displaying timetables, charts, graphs, and internet studies on the nearest local vines, she locates the closest one.
    "That way!"
    Thankfully it is 'away from the scary guys'.

    Dante scoffs, "I dunno, think she's a lot more squirrely than you give her credit!" He says with a laugh, before stowing his guns in favor of reaching for the case. Opening it, Rebellion comes out with a loud *SHNNNNNNNNK* as the greatsword deftly dances in Dante's hands. Adopting a fighting stance, he lunges at Maledicta with the blade. "C'mon, don't tell me you're too chickenshit to take a fight seriously!"

"If he reaches this blossom in-time!" Holly is quick to point out and she tries a simpler spell. The sky opens and a pile of Christmas items, including wreathes, lights, and even a Christmas tree fall at the pair. Maybe the religionous symbolism might have a effect on them if nothing.

    Serrah smirks, and nods to Alty. "Got it," she says. "Okay let's --" She frowns. "Oh shit, he's here. He's coming." She gently holds Alty down and jumps into the air, flying towards the Vine at superhuman speeds.

    She suddenly frowns, but doesn't slow down. "... He usually grabs me by now," she says. "Why hasn't he grabbed me yet? Wait, he's stopping by Dante and Holly --"

    Maledicta smirks, and conjures up small golden shields of light; they would stop Rebellion in its tracks, but instantly shatter. "Only if she reaches the Vine quickly enough," she says, lunging in to punch Dante with the same kind of superhuman speed and strength Serrah herself has displayed before darting back with practiced ease. "Although, if it is at all possible to resist the Blackheart Mark, I'm reasonably certain that Countess Serrah Delany is determined enough to --"

    She jerks back in alarm at the sight of Holly's spell, then stops and looks blankly at the Christmas artifacts. She then fixes Holly with a fangy grin. "Religious iconography only repels us when held by a true believer, Miss Winn," she says. "And manufacturable Christmas imagery might not even work that well. Anyway, as I was saying ... in the meantime ..." She charges forward and swings another superhuman punch at Holly. "... His Grace need only appear."

    A shadow at the end of the alley coalesces to form a tall vampire with brown hair and a razor thin beard, wearing a black dress uniform with epaulets and holding a black metal scepter with bat-wings and a purple heart-shaped gem at the tip. "That's right!" says Duke Vincent D'Ambrosio. He raises the scepter, and the gem begins to glow.

    Serrah's Blackheart Mark glows, and she abruptly stops completely still in midair. "... Shit."

    And then things go south. Things go so far south.
    Despite the headway that had been made due to Serrah's supernatural speed, it matters little when Serrah stops dead in her tracks and that mark starts to glow.
    "Wah!" Oh god, this was the point where Serrah said to knock her out wasn't it. Alty looks at her tiny, tiny, hands. She looks at Serrah. Then back at her hands.
    "... I don't think I'm even remotely strong enough to KO you, Serrah..."

    Dante swipes and thrusts with his sword, really he's toying with Maledicta as much as she might be with him as he evades punches in turn. "I figured as much. You might not get her after all!"

    He isn't too affected by the iconography either. The amount of churches he's hung out in, and usually cleared out of demonic filth.

    He brings Rebellion down on Maledicta's arm when she tries to strike Holly, "Not so fast!"

    Unfortunately, before he can really finish the job, the Duke shows up.

    And Dante realizes he forgot about Serrah. "...oh, fuck me."

"I was actually trying to summon Halloween magic..." Holly's durable but she's not all that quick and takes the punch stumbling a bit as she does so. "Ouch! Why does he want her so badly? Don't you read books! Making someone a vampire against their will always backfires! Let her go, or I'll make you regret it! Serrah's nice, she doesn't deserve this!" Was the witch actually getting angry at them?

 "Holly, I know you're trying to help Serrah! But you're in over your head here," Servis already knows this isn't a fight that the witch can win.

 "But she's a friend, I just can't run away..."

    Serrah is starting to panic. "Then ... uh ... shit. Try stabbing me, maybe? I, uh, I'm pretty sure I can survive decapitation ... wait nonono, that might drain the last of my humanity when I heal ..." She doesn't sound completely sincere about this concern, but she still thinks she should be worried about that. "Uh, just try stabbing, that's a good tri--" And then suddenly she's half a block back towards Vincent.

    While that's going on, Maledicta lets out an animalistic hiss as Dante's sword cleanly cuts her arm off. She stares at the bleeding stump. "... Well," she says, "I'm certainly going to have to hit up the Imperial blood bank today."

    Vincent chuckles at Dante's reaction. "Yes indeed!" He shrugs at Holly. "Because she's mine," he says, as if that explained everything. "When you saw I saw her at Daaria Qarr'zy's bank robbery, I just had to have her! I would've taken you, too, if you were a citizen of the Hartford Empire." He glides through the air in the direction Serrah fled. "And now," he says, smirking down at Dante and Holly, let's try that teleporty thing she's been using to get away from me!"

    And then a timestop-instant later, he's facing away from them, his posture one of complete shock, in the middle of exclaiming, "--LL WAS THAT!?"

    "... Lady Delany is stopping time," says Maledicta, grinning. "I knew it!"

    Dante enters panic mode, slapping Maledicta right across the face with the flat-end of his greatsword. Grabbing Holly, he stows Rebellion. "We gotta move, NOW." Dante says, before activating Devil Trigger right then and there. Suddenly, Dante sports horns, fangs, wings, claws, the whole nine yards and such. Then he takes off, gliding through the air as Vincent was beforehand. Hopefully no more time shenanigans happen here.

>> GAME >> Dante spends an Edge for: GOTTA GO FAST

    "Wh-what? No way I'm not gonna stab you!" Alty bleats. "And I'm not cutting your head off, either, cripes!" The shinki squeaks. Whether she actually CAN do it or not is a question Alty doesn't want to find the answer to as she-- is suddenly a lot closer to Vincent because she got pulled along with that latest timestop.
    Leaping off Serrah's shoulder, Alty takes off at full speed, eyes wide and wild behind the visor of her helmet as she...
    Launches herself into Vincent's hair-- which she grabs ahold of and starts yanking to see if she can gain control over Serrah through making the other vampire flail.
    It worked in that movie about the rat in the chef's hair, didn't it?

That had been only a little over a year ago, it seemed like longer for Holly. "I remember that, and you weren't there. I really wish I had those demons to help me about now though... that reminds me I wonder what Darria is up to, I haven't seen her in a while. I hope she's okay.." She doesn't realize the irony in her statement as Dante grabs her and they take off into the air, "You're much better at flying then I am...wait the staff only works on people from this world?" She just realizes what Vincent just said.

    Vincent is having trouble processing everything that's going on. "She can ... she can stop time!?" he says. He does a double-take at Holly's question. "What, no, it was just because it was easier to find where she lived, and legally I could just WAIT WHY IS HE A DEMON ALL OF A SUDDEN."

    Maledicta grabs her arm, and also turns into shadow. "I think it might be a good idea to order the Countess to evade!" says Maledicta, in a tone which makes it clear that she really wishes she could give him a direct order.

    "Right," says Vincent. He gestures dramatically with the staff, and then squawks and flails as he suddenly has Alty grabbing his hair. He turns into a shadow, and Alty disappears along with him --

    And it suddenly looks from Alty's perspective as if she's been dunked under a black liquid, with a hazy view of the alleyway in front of her. It wouldn't be too hard for her to break free, though.

    "Oh yeah!" says Vicent's voice from the shadow. "I can also do ... this!" The head of the Blackheart Scepter sticks out of the shadow.

    When Dante and Holly reach Serrah ... the glow is gone from her Blackheart Mark. "Hey guys," she says, smirking faintly. "What's Alty doing to Vin --" The glow appears again. "Oh. Phooey --" She, too, immediately turns into a shadow. "Crap," says the shadow in Serrah's voice as it starts to flow away. "Uh. Look, he always grabs me right before he starts his dumb 'invasions', you'll probably be able to find me wherever he goes next, since they aren't that great at hiding their military operations!" Her voice is starting to get farther and farther away. "And if things go really south, Manor D'Ambrosio is at Point Crescent in Queens! ... No I'm not gonna shut up, Vincent!"

    And now the other vampires are converging on Vincent, Maledicta, and the prone but still-conscious Wilhelmina, ready to escort them away.

    Dante is just about to dropkick Serrah to knock her out, but sadly he just kind of passes through. "Dammit! Shit shit shit shit!" Whirling around, Dante's wings flap as they stop him in mid-air, just in time to watch Serrah get stolen by Vincent's weird magic thing.

    As she disappears, Dante begins taking mental notes. "Manor D'Ambrosio, Point Crescent in Queens, find you before the invasion starts...gotch-FUCK!" Dante can't even finish his notes as Serrah is zapped away finally. "Well...great. At least we know where to go from here..."

    Nope.
    Nope. Nope. Nope.
    Vincent turns into a shadow, and when everything goes all inky and black Alty leaps away flailing before she regains her balance in the air.
    "H-hey!" She blurts as Serrah is spirited away.
    But... She recorded all that information.
    Almost immediately a series of hologram windows pop up as she faces Dante and Holly, as the little shinki hits up the internet as fast as she can, pulling up maps of multiple versions of Queens, New York, zooming on on Point Crescent on each of them. It's, mostly, in the same place in most iterations, it seems.
    Helpful little thing.

"So he's in New York, the question is where he's invading? And I'm glad he didn't go after me because I'm staying in New York too. Then again he would likely have a hard time breaking into the University." Holly's grateful for that. "Well, it's the one in the Hartford Empire which should narrow it down right?"