World Tree MUSH

    The whole of the BioSys Dome on Mars is in a bit of a pickle. While BioSys is extremely successful and does have a small spaceport of their own here, most civilian traffic comes in from neighboring domes. The dome itself is property of the megacorp, but for convenience, it leases out and sometimes even sells portions of the dome for residential services, so people can work and live in an arcology-like environment.

    This may be why it's impossible to hide that something is going wrong. Civilian traffic to and from the dome is not cut off, but warnings have been posted of 'civil unrest' and Vines have started to pop up nearby, possibly related to the cross-world research that has been going on. It's easy to see that this is a thing happening... they have ads streaming constantly talking about their success in treating something called 'oripathy' from another world.

    The ads briefly summarize oripathy as a mineral growth that spreads through the bloostream, causing lesions and eventual death, which has no known cure. While the ads do have a disclaimer that the BioSys cure is still 'under assessment', many brief testimonials and before/after blurbs from the animal-eared people they have been recruiting to test seems to show bad cases now turning into pleased and clean ones... and these ads are playing everywhere, even over the entrance platform that overlooks the domed city and the tall building that makes up the central spire.

    Traffic has slowed down with the warnings of necrotic 'zombies' popping up in some of the residential areas, but there's still a decent amount of foot traffic. And also a hightened number of security forces to greet those coming in and provide directions. The martian sky outside is a dim red right now, as night rapidly approaches and the trusses running along the dome begin to glow from the heating elements protecting against the cold martian night.

    Wearing a jacket and carrying a duffel bag, a petite catgirl is here! Yes, catgirl, so either she's had cosmetic surgery, or she's an offworlder. Given the Ancients in the ads streaming by, it's a fair guess she's here for treatment! But she doesn't have any obvious lesions like those in the ads... maybe she isn't an advanced case, or is here for a friend? Jessica shifts nervously, holding the heavy duffel that carries her weapons, Black Steel's PMC status giving her some ability to carry them but the whole fact that they're in a LIFE SUPPORT DOME keeping her pistol in its holster.

    She also doesn't have any implants, so she's looking at a large holo-projected map to try to figure out what to do next. Her ears twitch in thought, and she stands out like a sore thumb for those who can see the short girl. "Mmmm... it doesn't say where the problems are..."

    Given the huge-ass sword, coat, and guns, Dante looks like a perfect match for this cyberpunk wonderland of madness. He's got all his gear in a duffle bag, with credentials identifying him as an authorized contractor present to deal with the 'outbreak.' It's hard to say if Dante's immune to this virus, but he's never had anything more threatening than the sniffles far as sicknesses go.

    "The briefing said residential areas, right? We'd better head thataways." He says, retrieving Rebellion from his bag and stowing it to his back. He pops his knuckles, and the demon hunter ushers civvies along.

    "Huh. First time I ever been to space." Dante muses.

    Hyouka does not have the faintest clue what most of the local situation is. All the info about this 'oripathy' is a bit over her head. But she keeps an eye on inter-world info and requests in hopes that she'll spot some sort of job that a.) pays well or seems like it'll pay well, and more importantly, b.) looks like it's an interesting job and/or on an interesting world. An adventurer ought to do interesting things, after all!

    "You ought to try zero G some time," Hyouka says as she comes up alongside the son of Sparda. "It's a really fun, floaty kind of feeling." A pause, as she glances Jessica's way. "Here for the zombies? I think it's this way." She looks back at Dante. "You know where we're going, right?"

    It isn't widely known - and wouldn't be believed - what causes the whole zombie thing to happen. Here, there is one who does know... a young-looking woman with grey eyes who has arrived on-site with some others in tow, and is now scanning the area for others who might be of use. Dante, at least, she recognizes. Athena is in a light set of riot gear, and carrying a rifle and sidearm that she doesn't bother to hide. She's already had one 'argument' with a security guard intending to keep the place safe, but that has lead to her getting at least some time without harrassment.

    "The zombies aren't the root of the problem," she says, just stepping right into the conversation. She's tagged Jessica as a native of the world this disease came from, but whether to bring her in or not she hasn't decided yet, so she's just talking to Dante right now. "Whatever is causing the zombie outbreak is nearby, but not always directly nearby. Try not to blow holes in the dome walls, though."

The rather brazen advertisements of a miracle cure for a disease alongside a /martian dome/ is enough to pique the curiousity of Chrollo Lucilfer. Also actual zombies. It's a recipie for chaos and chaos means opportunities to loot anything not nailed down. With the Spider missing it's legs, this is a golden opportunity. 

The dark haired, pale skinned young man is dressed in a fur-lined hoodie that he hopes matches the local styles close enough, with a pair of black jeans and a white tucked-in t-shirt for some local band beneath the hoodie. Chrollo keeps the hood down, obscuring his features as he comes up upon the security forces and the small gaggle of fellow Offworlders with his hands casually in his pockets. 

No sign of weapons on this one, at least to a first glance, just a confident walk and far-too-quiet feet. 

"So the zombies /aren't/ someone's idea of a joke?" Muses the man quietly.

    Space. The final frontier.
    It's actually not the first time 2B and 9S have been to a planet other than earth before. The last time though wasn't so great. The ended up as witnesses to an assassination that's probably setting off a huge war right about now.
    Right now though, the YoRHa androids are accompanying Athena.
    9S is recognizable enough; the young-looking android in his standard black uniform mask, coat, shorts, and boots.
    But the Battle unit may be harder to identify right now thanks to the sleek, black, armored bodysuit covering her from head to toe, with a riot style helmet, visor, and heavy armor plating trimmed in gold, her katanas floating in the air behind her within easy reach.
    "So. Zombies...?" 2B asks, voice hissing and attenuated by her helmet's speaker.
    "Yep! Zombies." 9S replies chipperly. "I made sure to study up on them too!"
    "Oh?" The Battle unit inquires.
    "Yep! I watched a lot of old world documentaries by a human named 'Romero'!" The naieve Scanner chirrups, flashing a bright grin.
    "..."
    "Statement: This unit does not believe those were documentaries." Pod 042 announces where it floats by the pair.
    "They totally were!" 9S says defensively.

A moment ago, just outside a vine:

    "Hold on a moment," says Lightshard 18, "I think this Vine has been redirected."

    Lex pauses. "Think we should get, uh, our 'friend' to deal with it?"

    "Oh yeah," says Shard, with a little too much enthusiasm.

Now:

    Hyouka gets a tactical radio message from 'Lightshard 17': 'Magical girl incoming.' "You're going in more-or-less the right direction," says an electronic girl's voice which some here might recognize as similar to Lightshard 18. There's a masked young woman in a sort of cyberpunk magical girl costume approaching, all black and white and-mint green, with a five-foot-long high-tech sword with a curved blade on her back. "Lightshard 17 is my designation," she says, smiling as she approaches the growing group, "but you can call me Shinewander Sky." She nods in greeting to Hyouka.

    And does her best not to show any sign that she recognizes Dante and Jessica.

Of course his feet would take him to a place full of dead mortals.

There's a man standing here leaning against a wall near the entrance area. He's built solid in a black hoodie, jeans, and boots. Hood drawn, short dark hair combed back. Glowing red irises in black eyes. Yeah, this joker is probably not human.

Is that a scaled tail wrapped partway around one pant leg?

Definitely not human. Probably not a threat, though. He looks like a bored, lost tourist as he frowns -- scruffy goatee and five o'clock shadow, rugged features -- and studies an unfolded map of the area. Maybe he's trying to pinpoint the sense of the weirdness, too. Those reports are ominous and they probably point the right way.

He has a toothpick sticking out his mouth, which he rolls from side to side in annoyance.

He hears Jessica, but doesn't respond. Dante is regarded by glowing, lurid red eyes thoughtfully for a few long seconds. So are Hyouka and the young woman who smells like a goddess.

The hellhound's mouth twists into a baffled little frown, and his nostrils flare beneath the hood. He folds up his map and stuffs it into the back pocket of his jeans, stuffing his hands into his front pockets and strolling forward with the others.

If anyone can sense the supernatural, there is a blinking neon sign over his head with ludicrously oversized letters saying 'INHUMAN!' and way too many exclamation points. This is definitely something that feels like it shouldn't be able to fit in a mere human vessel. This thing is ancient. And it is monstrous.

Behold, Cerberus, the original hellhound...

...but looks kind like some kind of scruffy tourist.

"Residential district it is." He turns, trudging towards the district in question. He was studying a map, after all. Those glowing red eyes settle on Athena again, and though Cerberus is silent, he's eyeing the goddess warily.

    The ads blip and repeat, and one of the security detail is giving the growing group the hairy eyeball, until he tilts his head as if listening, then just eases it to a wary look. With the growing number of offworlders who look kinda weird or dangerous, most people are giving the cluster of strangers a wide berth, though a few stop nearby to gawk.

    The light clatter of claws on the metal platform announces someone else's arrival though. First one dog, then another. Not just any dogs though... while clearly biological in parts, these are canines with obvious and dramatic cybernetic enhancements, to the point of armored sides and artificial legs. They wander closer, and the crowd seems to instinctively shy away from them, but neither seems aggressive. Finally, a third emerges from the crowd, with a hand patting the head. The young-looking woman, late teens or so, who accompanies the third cyborg dog murmurs, "Good boy, I should have known we'd find some snooping around."

    Then to the offworlders, the dark-haired young woman smiles. "From the arrival of Athena and 2B and 9S here, I can guess why you're here. I've been very busy reaping souls in the area, and not all of them are native to this world. Would you mind terribly taking care of BioSys? They're causing a severe case of Soul Rot. I'm going to be busy for days cleaning up this mess."

    She sighs, as a flitting pair of tiny drones buzz down and slip under her shirt while she is talking. She pays them no attention at all and looks over the group, eyes pausing significantly on Cerberus with a brief look of frustrated confusion. "If it's the zombies you're after, the residential district has them. If it's the source... well, BioSys is the obvious culprit, I think. I haven't found any proof, but that isn't my task now, is it?"

    Meanwhile, one of the three dogs is wagging his tail while looking at Cerberus.

    A little overwhelmed at all the strange people, Jessica perks ears and looks at Hyouka. "They aren't... really zombies are they?" Hyouka gets her attention, but Dante is someone Jessica recognizes! A timid wave is sent that way.

    Except it sounds like they really ARE zombies, and her ears wilt and flatten meekly. "Oh no... but what about the cure? Oripathy is a really awful disease. I um... I'd like to find out if they really have one," she says quietly. Meek as she is she certainly seems aware that she's proposing industrial espionage.

    She sort of knows Dante, but since Hyouka spoke to her she goes further. "I'm from the world they come from." She points at a bunnygirl on the ad talking about how much better she feels. "My name is Jessica, I'm with Black Steel Worldwide, Private Military Contractors, to check on the progress..." She trails off looking at Kore and the dogs now, but the shiny Lightshard 17 draws her eye a moment later.

This group of people, ranging from leather-coated swordsmen, to magical girls, a mercenary looking kitty, a scruffy man that sets his Nen to writhing a little, armored androids and then the cyborg-dog leading woman all has Chrollo keeping to the back of the group and doing his best to observe them all at once. 

It's a bit fruitless at this point, but the thief has an utter buffet of potentially Interesting people. He finds himself smiling despite the ache he feels without the other Troupe members. 

"Would you mind filling in us latecomers, Miss? Soul rot? Reaping souls? I'm assuming you aren't just being poetic." Questions Chrollo. 

Introductions! He briefly eyes Jessica, then back to Kore. She's had him distracted since the words 'soul reaping'. 

"Call me Crow. Mercenary, scouting specialist for hire." It's a plausible enough identity for now.

    Magical girl incoming?

    Hyouka looks up in mild surprise, and then her face lights up with a warm smile. "Yo, Shinewander~. Oh, 2B and 9S, too. Evening." She completely misses the stares coming from both Cerberus and the bystanders, but she's not gonna miss cyberdogs, no siree. "Oh-! They're adorable." She gives the dogs' approaching owner a curious lookover, and then another curious lookover at the mention of reaping souls. "Oh, are you some kind of local shinigami? Interesting."

    At this point, another voice speaks up towards Kore; a different woman's voice, coming from somewhere in the vicinity of Hyouka's collarbone. "While I'm certain Hyouka would continue regardless, I feel compelled to ask whether any sort of bounty or direct payment is available."

    "Honestly, I don't know," is Hyouka's reply to Jessica. "But that seems to be what everyone's calling them. If you ask me, it sounds like that 'cure' might be the problem here. But I'm not a mage or a scientist," she adds, with a shrug. "Hyouka, by the way, Hyouka Kiyama. I'm an adventurer by trade. Ah, don't let the ears fool you, I'm not an elf. I'm human. Originally, anyway."

A cybernetic dog makes its way out of the crowd, followed shortly by a second. Then, the third one parts from the crowd, with the young woman's hand on its head.

Cerberus double-takes sharp enough to grunt, and then stares in Kore's direction, glowing red eyes widening slowly until her gaze moves on to somebody else. Athena gave him a strange sensation, but--

He knows Kore. He's not sure how, but he does, and he knows it down to the marrow of his very bones.

He's still staring as the others react to Kore, as though he doesn't hear any of them at all. Or even what Kore's said, until sound closer to him brings him to look down. Claws on the ground. One of Kore's dogs is tail-wagging at him.

Cerberus' gaze drops to the dog. Then raises up to Kore. Dog. Kore. Dog.

One can almost see the lightbulb go on.

And then the man laughs, dropping to his knees and throwing an arm around the dog's neck; he laughs somewhat maniacally as he proceeds to ruffle and noogie the top of the hound's head. What parts aren't cybernetic, anyway. That scaly tail of his is whipping back and forth in glee.

Then he lets the dog go, straightening as though it never happened. Those glowing red eyes are on Kore.

"Mistress," and there is a curiously archaic weight to the word, "let me help."

    Dante returns the wave at Jessica, offering her a friendly grin. He turns to nod at Hyouka, "Sure, I'll keep that in mind." He says.

    Hiding the urge to snort at 9S's pop culture confusion, he watches Cerberus meet Cerberus. "Huh, guardian of the underworld's pretty different around here." He muses to himself.

    "I'm Dante, here for the zombies to be quite honest." He introduces himself to the woman, after briefly sizing up Lightshard 17 a bit. Why does she seem so familiar?

    Hyouka has a good question, and Athena has an answer. "While there's no bounty exactly, generally taking care of these sorts of problems does get a payment from the local authorities. And if it's due to a corporate messup, you can try asking for hush money, but don't get too greedy or the whole assassin thing will happen." Athena sure is blunt about that!

    Kore's approach and quick summary doesn't surprise her, but she narrows her eyes. "You ending up in a place always brings trouble, but I'm pretty sure you didn't cause it this time, Kore." At least she's using that name!

    Cerberus is given wide berth but less from fear and more... curious and cautious respect. "It's almost always Soul Rot," she agrees, "But maybe we'll get 'lucky' and the cure isn't the cause of it. They might be doing something else or just some fragmentations."

    While Lightshard 17 might be a curiosity, Athena is taking it in stride for now, even if she sniffs and eyes some of the tech the girl is carrying with an almost hungry gaze. But Chrollo - 'Crow' - here is distracting her more, and she edges away instinctively, even if she doesn't seem to know why. "Sounds like a plan. I'd rather not get in the way of the Queen here doing her job, so let's get into the BioSys building. Any ideas or should we take my improvised elevator approach?"

    Shinewander Sky taps her chin thoughtfully as she listens to Kore's story. "BioSys, huh," she says. "Let's see ..." She pauses, as if looking off into the distance. "A biomedical firm which has been seeking out exotic materials. And making, I venture, significant ... PR stunts. I believe that it should be within my ability to assist."

    Oh good, Jessica gave her an excuse to greet her! And possibly offer some connection to Dante. "I believe an associate of mine named Lex Brando has mentioned you before," says Shinewander Sky. "I was ..." She grimaces. "... built by the same terrorists who created her Lightshard 18." She draws the sword from her back; sure enough, it has a fairly similar design to the sword Lex was carrying when she passed through Jessica's world -- just with extra metal bits. And a heart-shape by the hilt. "Let's just say that my freedom was acquired in a different manner."

    She smiles to Hyouka. "Just so you know," she says, "'Shinewander' is the category of hero I belong to, with 'Sky' as my personal title." She pauses. "Unless you were being impersonal with that greeting, in which case, never mind."

    She hesitates, and raises her eyebrows as the 'humanoid' Cerberus addresses Kore as 'Mistress'. Chrollo's general weirdness barely registers to her at that point. Neither does Athena's scrutiny; if anyone were to scan her, her costume seems to be made of magic, and so are some of the tech bits, but beyond that she seems to be have some sort of sensor-shielding. But she breaks into a grin at Athena's last comment. "'Improvised elevator'?"

    "Hello, Hyouka. Dante." 2B's voice is unmistakable even with the hiss of her helmet's speakers. But then... Then Kore makes her presence known. The androids turn to exchange a glance with one another.
    "You know, Kore, it feels like everywhere humans are dying en masse you're there, you know that?" 9S points out.
    "Statement: in prior incidents involving mass human fatalities the unit designated 'Kore' has been present." POD states the obvious.
    "We could always try the front door?" 9S ventures to Athena about getting into the BioSys building.
    2B... Gently pats 9S on the head for his effort.
    "N-no seriously, why can't we just use the front door?" The Scanner says, flailing.

    Kore chuckles, as the dog wresttleplays with the man that moments ago looked threatening. Another dog wanders over, and then Kore gently says, "Maybe 'Mistress' isn't the right term. I'm not /your/ Queen, but I am a version of her. I'm pleased that my Cerberus likes you though. Despite their separate bodies, they are one being." She smiles. "I won't ask why you aren't at the gates, I presume you have a good reason just as mine does. I'm afraid the Underworld here is in poor shape."

    Politely she smiles at 9S, "Of course I'm there when humans are dying en masse. As the other one there-" She gestures to Hyouka "-implied, I am a death goddess. Or, married to one at least. Someone needs to collect all those souls, yes? A failure to do so is /why/ we have those zombies." Her smile falters a bit and she nods at Athena. "Still no sign of Hades. I'm starting to wonder if he isn't just taking an unannounced vacation and maybe something has happened."

    "We could just shoot our way through the security, because I'm pretty sure they won't just let us walk in," she points out to 9S. "But if we can find out where they're keeping the patients, I was thinking we just grab a lift from one of the locals and smash it into the window and go right to it. Since we don't work for any other corporation there's no reason to fear backlash, but you might end up criminals for it. I was thinking between Little Owl and some of us who might be able to fly, we can find that out and take the shortcut." She looks at Jessica. "I'm not sure I want to assume the cure doesn't work. If this disease is that bad."

    When Kore notes a lack of Hades, Athena grimaces but shows a hint of sympathy. "Don't give up yet. Remember that many of us just haven't awakened yet. Or have incomplete memories. Ares is practically a different god."

    Hyouka is corrected on her choice in greetings. "...A-ah. Oops. Ah, sorry." She scratches the back of her head, a touch embarrassed. So she decides to shift topics, moving attention to the matter at hand. "Well, anyway, shouldn't we deal with the direct threat, first? We can always go look into this corporation after we stop the zombies. But if we go and deal with the cause first, they're kind of still out there rampaging..."

    "Hyouka's right, if we wait we'll be enabling this." Dante says, oddly serious given his usual mood. "Besides, all this standing around's not my style." And there it is.

"Can't say I know what happened." Cerberus shrugs nonchalantly, pulling his hands from his jeans pockets to stuff them into the hoodie's single pocket. Were those leathery pads on his fingertips? "One day it's business as usual. Souls in, nothing out. Next thing I know there are souls everywhere." He looks at Kore, red eyes glowing, expression bland. "I mean souls. Everywhere. I was blown away."

"...Now I'm looking for a reason why the Underworld's cracked open like an egg before my master decides it's my fault, and puts all three of my heads on a pike." The last is given in a tone of resignation.

Wait, he's only got one head.

He pulls his hands from his pockets and folds his arms, scaled tail switching from side to side restlessly. "And since I've got nothing else going on... you're close enough to my mistress. I can't shepherd souls into my Underworld, so I might as well help you with yours, in the meantime. I'm here, aren't I?" ...Wag, wag.

    "We need to get to the tower anyway, why don't we take care of the zombie-things on the way?" Jessica suggests a little nervously. The realization that she's standing around with apparent actual GODS is making her fidget some. "Um... also... they'd probably react to that really fast so um..."

    Jessica shuffles closer and makes a few gestures with her foot, indicating the tower. "We take care of the zombies so that the news knows that's what we're here for. Then some of us go through the front door and try to find what we can, but we make it very noisy. The rest go through with the um... flying into the window plan, that way they won't be able to react as fast, right?"

Athena's edgeing away earns her a quick glance, though there's little reaction aside from a quiet 'mmm?'. 'Crow' finally seems to settle his curiousity mostly on the trio of Shinewander, Cerberus, and of course Kore herself thus far. 

And there goes his questions getting answered. There's talk of gods and souls and death, and Chrollo can't help but eye Kore, then Cerberus with just a hint of gree in his gaze. Are they really divine things? 

What kind of Abilities would a god have to steal? 

Athena is working on entry into this BioSys. Refocusing and tearing his gaze away, he looks from Athena to Hyouka to Athena. Hmm. 

"I agree with Miss Hyouka. Everyone will be on edge if there's zombies around. More vigilant, looking for anyone outside of the ordinary." 

Chrollo in fact is starting off a semi-brisk vaguely in the direction of the residential area, yet not-yet Aura-enhanced pace. He pauses, looking to the others, waiting.

    "Oh." 9S says when it turns out that going through the front door would lead to a shootout.
    "... Oh..." He says when Kore admits she's doing the job of the lord of the underworld for him. "Well I mean. I guess? I don't know how souls work." The android says scratching at his cheek.
    "I can help with the zombies." 2B says matter of factly--
    "Oh oh oh, remember to aim for the head!" 9S interjects before pausing. "Though in some of the old world documentaries the zombies heads could function without a body. ... They were really inconsistent."

    Shinewander Sky smiles at Hyouka. "It's fine." On impulse, she reaches over and ruffles the elven-looking woman's hair. She snickers at Dante's remark. "A man after my own heart," she says. "So to speak."

    She strides after Chrollo with her sword in hand (given her cover story, it's supposedly with herself in hand), sending DARGN and the two PODs a feed of tactical data as she does. "Not precisely how I would have phrased it, Mr. Crow," she says, "but I do believe Miss Jessica's plan is sound."

    She pauses to give 9S a look. Then she grins, and continues forward.

    Dante slaps 9S on the shoulder. "Let's go! It's why most of us are here, y'know?" He points out, then continues onwards with Rebellion in hand, slung along his shoulder. He's raring for some action, and all this discussion is grating on his nerves. They can talk when there ISN'T a zombie pandemic.

    Kore nods, "I don't really care how you do it, but I'll do what I can to keep the 'zombies' from spreading. If you find something of interest to me I'd like to hear it... though I know we aren't on the best of terms, with some of you." She turns to Cerberus. "I'd be curious to hear more, as that is similar to what happened here. And to know what world you are from... I can guess though. I've spoken to Chaldea at one point, if that means anything to you. But for now I should get back to harvesting. Good luck, Athena and everyone else. I'll make sure you're comfortable if you die helping with this."

    Kore's a sweet girl, really, but her many ages in the underworld have really lead to a few quirks, huh?

    After her departure, it's just a matter of going to the nearest 'infection' which is... not hard. Even though they aren't announcing it, traffic and crowds divert pretty quickly from where the outbreak is. Police do attempt to keep quarantine, but they don't stop heavily-armed offworlders from walking right by, they just give a quick warning. "For your own safety, this area is declared unlawful and dangerous."

    It doesn't look too great, either. The 'residential' areas aren't defined by neighborhoods, but by altitude. So, anyone close to the ground is basically poor, while the wealthy and better-protected are in the penthouses and skywalks above. It does look lawless, but the only unexpected lack is a complete lack of literal dumpster fires. No fires at all. With how precious oxygen is, those get taken care of quickly.

    There are, however, a trail of corpses which don't appear to be rising up, and the alleyways leading further down have the sounds of shouts and clatter.

The hellhound reaches up to pull the earbud headphones from his ears, draping them around his neck by the cord, where they mostly stay in place around the iron collar. His hands go back into his pockets, and Cerberus settles his glowing red eyes on the group, considering.

He shrugs and follows the others for now. Kicking some zombies around won't garner any remorse out of him. They're already dead, aren't they? Soulless, to boot, so it's basically like throwing mindless husks around.

"If they're already dead... well, there's nothin' I can do for them, anyway, 'cept burn the husks." Cerberus rubs his jaw, absently scratching at the scruff. "So..."

Oh. Chaldea? Cerberus scratches at his scruff again, frowning. The name seems to jog some kind of memory, but it doesn't look like he knows all that much about it. "I don't pay attention to mortal matters..." He sounds almost embarrassed. It was, in other words, completely beneath his notice. "But I know it."

So he follows the others. Logical!

    Once past the police Jessica's shaky nerves seem to vanish. While there is a quaver in her voice, her ears are up and alert, her tail flicking lazily behind her. "These bodies won't just stand up, will they?" She looks at them unsure about this, but draws a pistol. It's an odd pistol, with a bizarre trigger mechanism, but it's recognizably a firearm of some sort. When the corpses appear she begins to dart from one place to another, then hop up to stand on a fire escape and try to get a view of the place the noise is coming from.

    "Nnnh... I wish Penguin Logistics were around. They're way better at this." Regardless she is definitely going to keep an eye out to cover the others, continuing to move in a way she can provide supporting fire.

    Dante kicks in the door, so to speak. He hears a lot of zombie growls and moans as they reach the residential areas. "Jeez, this place just doesn't stop going up, huh?" He wonders. Zombies are easily chopped apart and blown to bits with sword swipes and gunshots, so he's not exactly worried.

    9S does raise a good point. Wherever Kore is, it seems like something always goes to shit. What a mysterious trend.

    "What?" Whaaaat?" 9S says when Shinewander gives him that look. Only to jerk when Dante slaps his shoulder. "Gahhh! Whaaaaaaaaat?!"
    2B ignores her Scanner's plight and is already moving, her POD and 9S' POD relaying the tactical data from Shinewander Sky to their respective androids.
    "I'm guessing we follow the screams." 2B says, ornate katana already in hand as they approach the corpses.
    "Hey uh. If we die does that mean Kore deals with us?" 9S muses.
    "Don't be silly. You'd be reconstructed from your memories uploaded to the Bunker." 2B says.
    "... Right I'll uh. Do a quick upload of our memories right now. Just in case. For reasons."
    2B pays her Scanner no further mind.
    "If they stand up we just put them back down again." The soldier android says matter of factly to Jessica.

A quick nod to Kore, even if 'Crow' is sad to see her go. Oh well. He'll have to find a way to interrogate her some other time if the opportunity presents. The empty Nen-book burns inside of his mind. Patience Chrollo. 

Is this what Hisoka feels like all the time, he idly wonders. 

Bodies that aren't moving are a good sign of this being the right direction. 'Fire', too, seems like something that might be useful. And so Chrollo decides that he won't be but so cautious around these openly weird fellow otherworlders. A purple aura gathers around the man, then fades out, his life energy gathered in his legs. He leaps to the side of the building, starting to briskly run along the side of the alleyway wall, keeping vague pace with Cerberus. The man doesn't look like he has a flamethrower, so the hopeful spider splits part of his attention on the big doggo-person. 

A rather large knife is suddenly in his left hand, the man silently wall-running as he keeps an eye out for undead or the slayers of undead.

    "Little Owl," Athena says suddenly as she hears the ruckus. From her shoulder, a small boxy device pops off, turbines flicking out to hover nearby. It beeps, and she says, "Why don't you make incisions on all the corpses and remove their stacks? Then they can be gathered for later analysis."

    Athena then answers the others once past the cops. She's eying Chrollo still, but has calmed a bit. "The corpses probably won't get up," she explains. "Zombies are caused by Soul Rot. They're recently-resleeved whose souls don't have enough energy to animate the bodies. Basically, because nobody dies, and sometimes even gets replicated, there's not enough spiritual energy to go around. Persephone back there probably knows more about it than I do, she's the one that has to deal with the fallout. Sometimes dead souls escape from the Underworld to try to fill the gaps, but these zombies are the ones who just snapped. Killing them will let their souls recombine and maybe move on." She looks up from where she's examining a body.

    "I wouldn't want to die though. Persephone is a lot nicer than Hades, but she's really not cut out for the job so the Underworld is a mess right now." She unholsters her sidearm and starts toward the noise. "Shooting in the head works. Enough trauma to the chest will bring them down, too. They don't feel pain though, and can keep going when most people would die, so just be careful."

    Hairmuss. Augh. Hyouka is used to being the one doing that. She's not entirely sure how to respond to having it done to her - the net result comes out somewhere along the lines of a 'did that just happen?' look. But Jessica has a suggestion that sorts things nicely. "That works," the cyborg says, giving the girl a nod and a smile. "I can do 'loud'." As if to demonstrate, she brings both arms out to either side and declares, "Fisto, ON!" Her forearms come apart, a flurry of smaller panels sliding aside and shifting apart to allow much larger parts, plates and pieces to fold out. In less than two seconds, her forearms have been replaced entirely by massive gauntlets; she slams her oversized fists together with a solid WHUD, and lines of red-orange light up along either one.

    As they walk by the police, she gives the officer warning them a brief, "We're going to try and fix that for you," and a thumbs-up with a fist that's bigger than a human head.

    "Hmm. If they're not getting up, maybe they aren't zombies? Or they're zombies someone killed..." The sound of shouts and clatters draw her attention, though, and she gives a glance over her shoulder at Dante. "Sounds like our cue, doesn't it?" Without waiting, she starts off at a jog towards the alleyway.

    Sky just looks embarrassed at Hyouka's reaction. "Aha. Um. Sorry ..." She just sort of ... runs on ahead after Dante. She hesitates when Athena speaks up and describes the way the zombies of this world 'work', but ... even though her eyes aren't visible, there's clear determination in her expression. She is helping them by doing this.

As they get up to the quarantine area, the hellhound tilts his head at the police officer.

Mortals.

The hood swings from side to side as Cerberus looks around, and a low, reverberating growl issues from him. It doesn't sound even remotely human. He kneels near the closest corpse on the trail, pushing the figure over onto their back to lean in and squint at their face.

The body is pushed aside as he stands again, folding his arms again and frowning. He stays quiet, listening. If he notices Chrollo watching him, he's blithely ignorant -- until his head raises to look at the Nen-user, glowing red irises narrowing. Yup. Watching you, now, little mortal.

"So we're putting down the rabid ones." Cerberus grunts. "I can do that. What about fire...?"

    Oh yes, fire. Athena glances over at Cerberus. "Fire... works well, but only because Soul Rot also causes advanced necrosis and well, rotting. So they burn a little better but the fresh ones are a bit more moist. The older ones will go up like a matchstick though."

    The corpses are just that... corpses. And as Little Owl begins to go toward them and slice the back of the neck, those who aren't used to this world can see the small discs being yanked out of the spinal cord. But that gruesome job is thankfully easy and Athena left it to a drone. The shouting and the like is from a group of civilians fleeing from OUT of a building, hurriedly trying locked doors... as a dozen or so shambling 'civvies' stumble out. These look pretty fresh, so fire may not be any more effective than against normal people, but they are also clumsy.

    Athena seems to have forgotten to mention the super strength, though, as one casually shoves a noodle cart aside with one hand, stumbling toward the cluster of six people, one of them a child. They look exhausted, and are beating on the nearby door shouting to be let in.

    Dante dashes toward the sounds of chaos up ahead without hesitation. With a flick of his left hand he draws his sawed-off, and Dante rushes toward one of the zombies. "HEY!" He announces himself, blasting away with the shotgun point-blank into a thick concentration of the undead, then lunges toward the horde with his greatsword in a stab. "Get the civvies!" He calls out to...somebody, hopefully.

    Okay, now Sky has people she can directly help.

    She does a ten-foot vertical leap, and glides forward towards the zombies; with a few swings of her sword, she sends out out slivers of mint-green light which tear through the undead. A grimace briefly crosses her face, but she doesn't slow down.

    She lands directly between the civilians and the undead, sword held at the ready. Then she stops. "... I'm not entirely sure what to do from here!" she calls back to Dante, sending another sword-beam at the zombies. (Lex's skills are optimized for dungeon-crawling, and Shard doesn't have any initiative except 'whatever her wielder wants' ...)

Cerberus straightens. The hellhound cracks his neck, watching with some interest as Little Owl goes about its stack extraction. He doesn't look disgusted so much as fascinated, leaning a little closer to see what exactly the drone is dealing with, but before he can gawk too much, there's trouble up ahead. He watches with calm interest at the screaming, scanning the situation.

Dante dashes past him, and the hellhound sighs, taking his hands out of his pockets. Shadow ripples about him, and his form changes. When it clears, there is a very large coal-black dog with glowing red eyes. It only has one head, but the shadow it casts very distinctly has three heads. A big shaggy wolfhound, which grins to show a lolling red tongue and white teeth.

The dog leaps forward, barreling for the undead that are harassing the civilians. He leaps, placing himself between the exhausted survivors and the unliving ones. The hellhound bares his teeth are bared as he skins his lips back from his teeth.

He waits for them to get closer. Closer...

And then he leaps around one side of the group, snarling like the monstrous Phantasmal Beast he is, and... breathing fire?

Yep. Breathing fire. It's not a whole lot, but it's enough to maybe ignite things like clothing. It might buy him a second or two as he springs forward to try and knock the nearest one down with his front paws, standing on his hind legs and boxing at it until it stops trying to march; snapping and snarling in an effort to rip out the throat. That works, right? Guess he'll find out in a few, if he gets lucky.

    Well, looks like her plan worked. Jessica has someone to cover! Like... everyone. And immediately she sees fire breathing and flight and wall-hopping. She whines, "Why does everyone have superpowers but me?!" She huffs and holds her pistol out, channeling a bit of energy into it to ignite teh originium inside and snap off several shots far, far too powerful for the size of the pistol they're in. Unlike the others who advised shooting for the head, she's trying to blow off the kneecaps.

    "Oh, fire works? That's good," Hyouka says absently. "That's all I brought. I'd have to shut off a lot of my firepower if it was a bad idea." The sight of the discs being removed is a bit... well, perturbing, to say the least, but they've got people to save so it's not like she has time to be bothered!

    And for that matter, she's right behind Dante - and her fists are swinging almost as fast as the demon hunter is shooting. The zombies might be superhumanly strong, but Hyouka's stronger still; her punches can smash concrete even before the added elemental power, and she's got a lot of elemental power to add. Each punch comes with a burst of fire mana, adding not just a lot of heat, but magical and physical force to the blows as well.

    There's a brief pause in the fighting, during which she glances Jessica's way and calls out, "They're not easy to earn, I had to save a dragon to get mine!" Punch.

Athena is a wealth of information, and Chrollo laps it up hungrily. At least he knows generally what's up, and how to kill zombies thanks to her and the others. 

Cerberus has clearly noticed his interest, and so Chrollo...well, he doesn't exactly stop. Instead, he focuses on the undead for the moment. Kicking off of a rusty balcony rail, he becomes a falling black-and-pale-and-white blurr of a spear with that knife-point going for some of the zombies menacing the younger of the civvies. Not because he's a hero, but looking like one might make this group seem more relaxed around him. That beautiful fire aside from Cerby's mouth aside, he's yet to see much that he can steal. 

He carves through one zombie's head on the landing, leading into a kick to break the legs of another too close to a civilian, sending it flying back. Finally, his free hand reaches for where he's sure he saw that disc Athena's little helper showed everyone. 

It's a gorey /ripppp/ sound, and Chrollo's fading away before the blood splatter ruins his hoodie.

    Annnnd there are zombies.
    "Gehh!" 9S blurts as people come running, chased by the shambling dead. Especially when one shows the strength to shove a whole cart aside-- and Cerberus turns into a fire breathing hound that's a thing too.
    2B says nothing. In an instant the combat android is in the thick of it, katana in hand, flashing keenly as she starts cleaving into the mass of the dead.
    "Well if it's any consolation, I don't have super powers?" He offers to Jessica. "2B doesn't either!"
    So he says as the battle unit bodily lifts a zombie by the neck and runs up a wall, using said wall to grate the zombie's face into a red smear.
    "... Okay so maybe she was built a little differently."

    Looks like everyone is going after the zombies. Gotta protect the humans too though! Athena runs toward the zombies and... well, everyone else is handling them, so she gestures to the humans, "Stand back." Then she assesses the door.

    "We're cleaning the area out, but we need someone to shelter these civilians until it's over. Ten minutes, that's all we ask. If you don't comply I will consider you unfriendlies. You have ten seconds."

    While she doesn't see Chrollo already figuring it out, she is reminded, "You can tear out their stacks, at the base of the neck, and it will disable them! Don't damage the stack though! That's basically their brain... it's the only way to save them. Maybe we can't afford bodies for all of them but there's always a chance!"

    She surveys the area with her tactical sense, letting that warn her of any side approaches.

    Right away the zombies are in trouble, huh? Because Dante is a fighting machine, blasting away with splatters and stumbles from the zombies. Worse for them is the sword, actually, which slices through with deadly efficacy and disables limbs... much like Jessica blows off legs to make them topple over and flail. They seem to have rudimentary intelligence, but not enough to compensate for losing legs beyond crawling desperately forward.

    This makes them easy prey for the fire breath when they stumble too close. At first this looks like a bad idea, as they ignore the fire and just shamble forward... but the tissue damage swiftly overtakes their ligaments, causing them to crumple when the heat chars past the skin nad muscle, disabling them until they can be permanently handled.

    Hyouka's attacks shatter bone all right... but like Athena warned, the zombies can keep moving even with broken bones! PULVERIZING them does help, but what helps more is knocking them back... and Chrollo is discovering a few things as well. Chrollo and 2B. For one, Chrollo yanks out that odd disc and the zombie immediately stops. The disc is glowing faintly, but otherwise just a shiny piece of tech. When 2B grates a head against the wlal though, the source of mobility is seen... the zombie stumbles for a few moments, horrifyingly looking like even headless it's a threat... but it's just residual pulses from the cortical stack, and without a brain the body can't really be controlled. A few twitching gestures and then the corpse collapses, twitching but slowly gurning immobile.

    Athena's threat at first does nothing, but reluctantly the door light turns green and slides open. Those inside aren't hostile... this is Mars, and people tend to stick together more than on Earth. They were just scared, but with the promise of the zombies being gone in a few minutes it's a risk they can take.

    Within moments, there's far fewer zombies. The only one of concern is the one that is coming from the side, rushing with surprising speed toward Shinewander Sky. Fortunately Athena is close enough her tactical sense can pick it up.

    "ON YOUR LEFT!" Athena shouts to Lex. She doesn't know the woman very well but she is here protecting the mortals. Athena fires a quick shot as well, more to slow down the zombie and indicate where it is than stop it. Maybe it'll stop it too, but she's focused on the civilians right now, and the angle isn't great.

    "Those stacks might give us an idea of why these people were the ones to zombify rather than the others, there's still a lot even Persephone doesn't seem to know about this!"

    Dante slashes and blasts with ease, at times reaching down to blow a few zombies apart with his shotgun. Of course, amid all the splatter, Dante does notice something's off.

    Stowing his shotgun, he reaches inside the stump of where a zombie's head used to be, and begins to reach through before ripping a glowing chip thing free. "Hey, these gadgets look like they're the source!" He points out, before pocketing the stack for later. Athena can take a look at it once they're through.

    Hyouka's blows are more than just bone-shattering. It's like being hit by a small car every time she swings her fists, and that's before the fire-elemental energy comes into play. If fire and knockback are the order of the night, she seems to be very well-suited to taking down these things indeed - so anything that's still moving and isn't on fire, she'll swing on it as hard as she can. Of course, that might be a problem.

    On hearing what Athena says, Hyouka stops mid punch. "-ah. I... I hope I haven't broken any of those 'stacks', then..." This very nearly gets her pounced by a leftover - but she finishes the swing, a little less forcefully.

    Sky pauses, and glances over at Jessica. "... Do I need to cover you, too?" she asks, in an almost conversational tone.

    ... She looks away from Hyouka. Setting aside the 'built by a terrorist organization' cover story and the fact that Shard is technically the one doing most the talking, there is no way Lex wants to describe what she went through in order to get her superpowers.

    She glances up at Athena. "Well ... that works, and stuff," she says in a low enough voice that probably only Athena and the other civilians can hear her.

    She winces and looks away from the ... graphic way Chrollo and 2B are handling the zombies. "Okay," she says as Athena guides the civilians inside, "I don't really have a stomach, and I'm still feeling queasy at this. Can I be part of the sneaking team --"

    Her own tactical readout highlights the oncoming zombie just as Athena finishes calling out. "Right!" she says as she launches a couple of sword-beams at the zombie, carefully aimed so as to cause fatal damage while avoiding the stack. "I mean ... acknowledged!"

    "I don't have powers but I am a skilled mercenary!" Jessica points out, taking another quick shot that happens to punch a hole clean through the noodle cart. She still sounds jittery and nervous but... 

    The gory sight of Chrollo and 2B's solutions don't seem to jar her at all, so there might be something to what she just said.

The hellhound is listening, even if he's busy trying to establish and maintain a perimeter around the building, while Athena works on getting the doors open. As the first wave of them fall, burning, Cerberus hangs back. He paces in front of the door in an effort to keep the zombies away. The sooner Athena can get the survivors out of there, the better.

He'll just try to take care of the perimeter and be quietly helpful in the background while the others do their thing.

He isn't fast enough to warn Shinewander Sky, but that's okay, the others have this handled. Cerberus will still hang out here and wait in the background, though; hackles still up and teeth still bared. Just in case. His shadow, in fact, has three sets of teeth it's baring.

Now that he's certain ripping out these 'control discs' as he decides to term them stops the zombies, well Chrollo stows the knife. 

Then the control chip. 'Crow' puts his thievery in full view, continuing to ignore both nominal allies and the lives of innocent people (surely he just has trust in Athena here!!!) in favor of continuing to work his way through any zombie that gets too close or tries to bite him. He'll keep a disc or two in view of others. 

The rest are hidden in inner pockets of the hoodie, because the man is going to fence the heck out of these offworld once they all know /what/ they are specifically. 

Reach. /Tug/. Splurt. For some reason, he briefly smiles towards Shinewander. More of a smirk, really. Don't look too long in those dead eyes, oh valiant magical girl!

    "Oh gross." 9S declares as the headless zombie judders about for a moment longer before collapsing.
    2B continues her grim work, katanas hacking zombies apart deftly. It's bloody business as she aims to take heads off and make removing those stacks easier.
    No she is not having fun.
    Fun, much like emotions and dancing, is forbidden.

    There are a few stragglers to finish off, stumbling out of the other building, but by the time all the civilians have funnelled into the other door, it's just a few left to take care of. Of course, the one from the side is dressed a little differently, so there are some stragglers elsewhere to.

    Speaking of the one from the side, the bullet slams into her shoulder, sending her into a spin before Lex reacts in the fatal manner of a sword beam blasting off the top of the head, leaving a cooked zombie to smack face-first into the pavement right next to Shinewander Sky. Gruesome but effective. It seems difficult to take these things down without being gruesome in some way!

    But the discs definitely put an end to the matter when removed. They're a little warm and glowing a light blue, which fades after a few moments outside.

    For the moment, the residential area is safe.

    Athena calls out, "Those are their stacks! Their memories and personality stored in there. The bodies are just meat, those are the actual people." She sees Hyouka's hesitation and quickly clarifies, "They're meant as death insurance so are pretty tough, just don't explicitly target the neck. Even kids have them, but bodies are expensive so most of them may take years for families to get a new body."