World Tree MUSH

    TO say Devil May Cry is a dump is putting it lightly. It was a shut down bar (expired liquor license, go figure) that Dante had gotten on the cheap, thanks to the fact nobody really liked the place anyways. Having converted it into a loft and office, Dante's made himself at home after reconstructing the place painstakingly. Demons seem to jump him here every other month, it's ridiculous.

    The Devil Hunter's gone and dedicated a whole wall to string theory and pieces of paper connecting each strand, each being locations Serrah's frequented, as well as where her sire Vincent has been since Serrah's capture.

    Pouring himself a scotch, Dante is currently trying to shake his memory. There's SOMETHING he's missing here, all the evidence they've found has amounted to jackshit at the moment.

    Alty is here. The little helper robot let herself in through an open window and has been painstakingly working, doing internet searches left and right, and adjusting Dante's string wall in some points, before she settles down on a table.
    Pulling a tiny canteen of jelly from slipway storage the little shinki sits herself at the edge of the table, several hologram screens popping up at her sides and over her head displaying a map of Queens, NYC, with a big hilighted circle around Point Crescent as she takes a slow sip of her coolant.

Holly's drinking a strawberry soda herself, because having a drunk witch with unpredictable magic generally isn't a good idea. She tried using her magic to summon Serrah away from Vincent directly, but the pile of merchandise from various holidays was a sign that didn't work too well. She's not too good with technology so she let Alty do the computer searching and is instead reading various books she can find about vampires.

The 'Mercenary' Crow is here! That's what Chrollo Lucilfer has taken to calling himself on tasks outside his now missing Troupe. And is in his usual long dark-purple coat with upside down cross with fur lining. Not even hiding the weird purple forehead tattoo. The man is sticking to a dress shirt underneath though today. He's here as help. 

In theory, anyway. Actual legit vampires have the thief's attention, and as usual, he's been salivating on the inside about the prospect of thieving from such mythical beings. 

Oh, and he's also studying the pegboard of doom and it's string theory, glass of wine in one hand, and basically occupying the shadiest corner of the Devil May Cry. 

There's a goth in your home, Dante!

    Of course, since Serrah was missing, Luke wanted to get involved as well!, even if he admitedly doesn't know much about investigations.. he can ask his pokemon to track someone, but this is quite a bit far from that point. He just hovers near Dante, glancing at the large wall of 'clues' and trying to see if he got inspired!. He is even mimicking Dante, except his glass only has some soda of course. 
     
    The boy is not familiar with Chrollo, but he never judged anyone willing to help, waving to the spider thief, "Any ideas?". 
    Holly meanwhile has an expectator hovering near her!, a small floating panda in a Jiangshi costume just watching the small witch read, trying to peek over her shoulder, apparently Pangshi was curious about vampires as well.

    Dante's hand points to the map of Queens. "So we know she's being held HERE. But I don't know what's waiting for us. For all we know, they've got a gun to Serrah's head and they're just waiting for us to make a mistake." Siiiip. "Normally I'd kick the door down, but I'm not used to runnin' with a pack."

    "Um." Alty ventures between sips of coffee-flavored jelly. "I could always go in through the vents and have a look around." She ventures. "It would be good to have a scout go in first anyway so we can know what we're up against and if I'm lucky, they'd never even know I was there." She suggests.

'Crow' vaguely motions his wine glass to the map, and where Dante is pointing as Luke asks his question. 

"Honestly? The problem is our lack of information. Our two choices seem to be either drawing them out and away from Miss Serrah before they can harm her, or offering them a trade of equal value, then springing an ambush." 

Alty's small size sure does seem like it must come in handy. Chrollo nods affirmatively to the little 'bot. "I'd be willing to start a stakeout with Miss Alty's support, perhaps gain a disguise that would let me blend in and gain entrance." Seems there's a scout team in the works.

Holly pets the Pangshi and looks at the others, "Well, what would be of equal value? One of us? Vincent said he was interested in me, but I don't think he would trade me for Serrah...I might have better luck summoning Serrah if we get closer but there's no telling how that'll go. I did manage to break Iota free of mind control once, but I haven't been able to do anything like that again..."

    Luke nods to Chrollo, "I'd offer to send Pangshi to check, but since he can't speak... at best maybe he can tell us if he can see Serrah, or her captors, but not much detail." he muses, "He is a ghost type and can go through walls, but is not very good in combat yet.". The panda leans into the petting happily, tiny tail twitching, looking almost like it was dozing. It perks up when named and quickly hovers to Luke's side, trying to stand up and push out his chest." 
    "I am happy to help with a distraction too, I mean at least with my pokemon, maybe all three of them can cause enough trouble to keep them distracted, or get their attention?."

    At that moment, a portly, scruffy looking guy in a bowler hat bursts in. "Ton-- uhhhh, Dante!" he exclaims. "Erk --" He comes to a screeching halt as he takes in the scene before him, but he quickly recovers and shakes his head. He clearly has more important things to worry about than a preteen a panda-ghost, a goth, a witch, and a toy-sized robot. "Dante, we got friggin' vampires attackin' the city! It's this whole military operation! There's this guy callin 'imself a 'Duke of the Hartford Empire' blinkin' around, the Army's gettin' their ..." His gaze flits to Luke. "... heads handed to 'em on a platter!" On cue, there's a faint 'boom' from off in the distance.

    Well ... it seems like part of the problem is solving itself.

    Dante hasn't used 'Tony' in years as far as aliases go. It's a brief bit of Memberberries for him. Quickly, he grabs another glass and pours Enzo some scotch. "You. Drink this." He says, with less silliness than usual. The ideas are gonna have to wait.

    "Vampires? Dude, you know I have a phone right?" He says, throwing on his coat and grabbing his guns. And swords. And also guitar. And also some ice nunchucks. He's gonna need all of these tonight.

    "Yeah, sounds like our boys are making themselves welcome. Let's kick 'em out! Enzo, don't...go anywhere. I got somethin' for you to deal with later."

    "A stakeout could work." Alty agrees tentatively.
    But then in an instant all of her holoscreens flicker out of existence as soon as Enzo comes bursting in. There's a beat during which the shinki looks between the devil hunter and the information broker, before she puts her jelly canteen away and stands herself up.
    "Mn... It uh. Looks like they're bringing the fight to us." She says as her armor manifests.
    There's a tiny flare of white light that suffuses the shinki's body. When it fades the little action figure sized robot is clad in what would be the most intimidating set of black knight armor; spikes, studs, a skull-faced visor... What's new is the black katana worn at The Angel of Death's hip. But she doesn't draw that as she pulls a red-stee longsword from slipway and floats her way onto Dante's shoulder, flipping her visor down into place.

    Luke blinks as someone bursts into the building, and hears about the battle. "Oh for arceus' sake." he mumbles, reaching for his belt, "At least I feel I can help more like this than... in investigating." he mumbles, watching Dante's ongoin pile of weapons. "That's... quite a lot." he mumbles, "Let's hope my pokemon are up to the job.". Just like Dante and Alty, he doesn't waste time, asking Pangshi to stick nearby as he reaches for his belt. 
    "Let's see... fire works witih vampires, right?" he asks, "Agni!.". He grabs a pokeball and clicks the button on it's front, a large cream/orange and black creature materializes in a flash of red light, it mostly looks like a bear, and has a curious 'tuft' of fur on it's forehead that looks like a flame, it even flickers around in the air. "What's the plan? we go out there and beat them up?, or should we send someone to check where Serrah is held?"

"Oh no! Did I lead them here somehow with my summoning magic?!" Holly looks a bit concerned all of a sudden, "Or was Vincent tracking me after we met before?" She does have a bad habit of attracting the undead after all but Servis and Lavaux weren't present for once figuring they might draw even more attention to her. "Well, it's going to be kind of hard to go anywhere with all the vampires out there..."

Chrollo's eyes go slightly wide as Enzo bursts in. He looks between the man, and Dante, then lets the knife slip back into his pocket. The man's information is more than helpful. 

Sometimes you can be all subtle and get the information you want. Other times you have to beat it out of people. Chrollo sights a little, then opens one of the windows of the DMC office. 

"I doubt they'll be difficult ot find. All the better to figure out what advantage we can get over them. We should capture one alive, at least." He'll let that dangle in the air for a moment, then the thief is leaping up towards a rooftop. 

Luckily he gave everyone the number to one of his burner phones. Time to get a look at the chaos!

    Enzo accepts Dante's drink gratefully. "They cut the phone lines," he says. "I tried callin' ya, but didn't even get a dial tone."

    He sits down heavily in one of the seats, and nearly spills his drink at the sight of Agni. "Jesus Christ ... uh ... yeah, that ... is definitely, uh, a fire ... guy ... you got there!" he says nervously to Luke, before he looks back up at Dante. "Right. Yeah. Got it." He lets out a ratty snicker. "Make sure that this is the last mis-stake those vampires ever make, y'hear?" he says. "I bet with the resistance you'll be able to show, you'll be able to drive 'em completely batty! Ngeheheheheheheh."

    The chaos in question isn't remotely difficult to find. There's a Vine a couple dozen miles south of Devil May Cry, and the surrounding area has turned into a battlefield, the noise cutting through the evening air. The Army is there, fighting vampires wearing the uniform of the Hartford Empire, and the battle is clearly going in the vampires' favor.

    Near the edge of the fighting in the direction Chrollo's going, behind a group of soldiers, a tall, brown-haired vampire with a razor-thin beard appears, dressed in a version of the uniform with golden epaulets; one instant he wasn't there, the next instant he was, as abruptly as a video skipping ahead. He is also in mid-swing with a black metal scepter with a glowing purple heart-shaped gem, knocking the soldiers forward from behind. "Hey, wait a minute!" he says. He turns back towards the center of the fighting. "Why did you stop it before I hit them!?" hollers Duke Vincent D'Ambrosio.

    "Fuck you!" shouts an angry woman's voice in the distance.

"You don't have a telegraph line like Columbia does?" Holly doesn't really know about phones, let alone cell phones as she looks at Dante and Enzo chat. "Maybe I can get a better view of what's going from above!" She climbs onto her broom and flies through the window into the skies above. While she's not the best flier, the fact that one of the vampires is decked out instantly gets the witch's attention, not to mention the staff he's wielding.

 "I found them!" She belts out to the others down below at the top of her lungs. Of course she likely just got the vampires' attention as well, oops.

    Dante sighs. "Uuuuugh, figures." He doesn't waste any time running out, Ebony and Ivory in hand as he rushes toward the sounds of chaos. He deftly avoids the odd civilian as he keeps running, and takes aim at some of the closer vampires.

    "Hey, Chompies! Let's rock!"

    Gunfire blasts away at the vampires. "WOO!" With immense speed, Dante sprints over crashed automobiles and other obstacles, parkouring his way into melee range as he opens fire on the fanged menace.

Golden epaulettes and very fascinating movement? A scepter-gun that's glowing!? And someone yelling explitives at said tall oddly-gaiting vampire? 

Chrollo eyes Vincent from afar for a few moments, trying to get a bead on /how/ he's doing that. Greed alights in the man's eyes. Then, dropping down the roof, he stealthily makes his way into the fray. 

This isn't so much slinking between shadows as winding his way around fighting bodies. Should a vampire close in? He starts lashing out with a nen-coated knife, the weapon cutting far more keenly and strongly than normal. Then he fades back into the crowd of Army soldiers, essentially using them as cover. 

The man is trying to find a nice, sneaky way past the soldiers of the Empire towards their obvious commander, hopefully able to use his louder allies' work to help. He's never in one place for long, using his speed and agility to his advantage!

    Alty remains right where she is, perched on Dante's shoulder. She has to hold on as the devil hunter goes running.
    She can't help but wince visibly when Holly calls out so loud. But it's a moot point as Dante goes in guns blazing.
    Rather than join the fray, she flips her visor down, flitting skyward, advanced sensor array kicking into gear as she tries to get a count of how many vampiric body 'heat' (or lack there of) signature she can read, as well as any other pertinent details that may crop up.
    "I don't think I'll be much help actually fighting. But I'll try and keep an eye on their movement and numbers.

    Luke smiles to Enzo, "Don't worry, he is friendly." he reassures the nervous man, "And thank you, quite proud of him.". The boy can't fly, and is not particularly fast, so he does the best he can to keep up with Dante and the others, eventually settlin on riding his pokemon!. The pair finally make their way to the battle, adn he watches Dante effortlessly just sprinting away, "I wonder if he can teach me how to do that." he muses, as he slowly clambers down Agni's back and glances at the group of Vampires. Seems he doesn't waste time, "Agni!, Sunny day!". 
     The pokemon nods, growling loudly and rearing on its hindlegs, looking up, and gathering bright golden energy in it's muzzle into a large orb that is shot to the sky, it flies several feet before it suddenly pauses and seems to grow in size, turning a bright white, and bathing the area around the pokemon, in bright light!. The orb seems to 'follow' the pokemon as it starts to charge ahead, while Luke reaches for his belt in case someone approaches.

    The picture Alty gets is relatively straightforward; the battlefield is a rough circle several blocks wide, and there's a couple dozen attacking soldiers, all vampires. And the circle seems to be widening, slowly but steadily.

    A shadow detaches itself from a rooftop near Holly and coalesces to form a red-haired vampire in a middle-ranking uniform with a glowing purple heart-shaped mark on his forehead -- just like Serrah when she's under Vincent's control, although this guy seems fairly free to move. "Oh, you're Holly Winn!" he says, shooting her a fangy grin. "You were on the TV at the same time as Delany after that bank robbery!" His grin runs positively nasty. "Let's play --"

    Dante starts making noise, and he stops, and his expression goes blank as he looks down at the devil-hunter. "Hold that thought," he says, and swoops out of the sky, firing bats made out of water out of his hands -- a few towards Holly, but most of them fired at Dante. "None of that!" he snarls viciously.

    Nobody notices Chrollo; he's free to continue as he is. Several vampires stagger back and hiss from the attack by his knife, glaring at him and retreating, but they don't seem to be able to distinguish him from the defending soldiers he's moving among.

    But then Agni and Sunny Day arrive, catching the attention of every single vampire in the area. None of them are directly hurt, but a couple of them stumble. "Uhhh ... whoops," says Vincent, "do I have time now ... yepI have time. Uh, bye!" And then he vanishes again, reappearing a couple of blocks down and running away towards the vampires' makeshift base near the Vine. Again, there's no time between it -- his position, too, is completely different.

    The Army soldiers in the area take that moment of this distraction to press their own attack against the vampires. The advantage doesn't last very long, though; the vampires seem somewhat more immune to bullets than they are to Dante's weaponry, Luke's sunlight, or nen.

>> SUMMARY[Serrah Delany] >> There's lots of vampires. A Heart-controlled mid-ranking vampire goes after Holly but is immediately distracted by Dante. Chrollo can do what he wants. All the vampires are distracted by Luke's Sunny Day and Vincent beats feet.

    Dante dodges side to side, practically short-ranged teleporting to dodge the blasts of bats.

    To say he's pissed is pretty redundant, as he furiously unloads on vampire after vampire in a rush towards the vampire leading the show. With Luke's sunlight, he'll be able to press the attack. "Hang on, Alty!" He says, before running along the side of a building, and taking potshots towards the vampire officer.

    "There's... A lot of them." Alty says, trying to keep her sensors spread as far as possible. "They've got a perimeter around the nearest few blocks and they're trying to spread fast." She says, holding on tight to Dante's collar as a hologram screen appears in the corner of his field of vision- something he can look at without being intrusive- of the battlefield situation.

There's more of that odd movement! It doesn't look like pure speed from that distance...Chrollo could track that kind of thing. Teleportation perhaps? The thief /wants/ it deep down in his heart. 

And so Chrollo lurks in and out among the army at the fighting's edge, waiting on the opportunity to grab a vampire vaguely of his build! Which comes as Luke's pokemon lights up the night! He'll need to get to know the boy soon for his pets' abilities, but for now... 

Nen-enhanced arms aikido-throw a vampire down, and cracks a neck. Really Chrollo doesn't care if it kills the vampire. He'll leave that for the Army. No, he wants the uniform. 

Not too long later, there's a young 'vampire' in an Empire uniform seemingly trying to follow after his leader with a quickness. Hopefully Dante won't shoot him. Chrollo intentionally left the tattoo visible, just in case.

Holly's known for many things, but being subtle isn't one of them. "Oh, I didn't know I had fans! I don't think this is the best time to play though..." She looks a bit surprised and does her best to steer to try and avoid the bats made of water, but struggles to do so. She tries to counter by summoning bats of her own but they're fruit bats and don't do much more than serve as a bit of a distraction.

    Luke seems pleased that Agni is catching attention!, hopefully some vampires might decide to attack it in a group!. "Agni!, hit them hard, Lava Plume!" The pokemon pauses, glancing at the somewhat dazed vampires and once again seems to prepare charging at them, and roaring loudly, the tuft of 'fire' on it's forehead suddenly bursts into real flames, followed by it's full frame, the bear is on fire!. The pokemon slams his paws on the ground a tall pillar of flames erupting, filling the area around it with flames and smog.

    The red-haired vampire officer's good cheer returns, and he continues firing water-bat blasts at Dante. "Oh, hey, who's your buddy!" he says, taking note of Alty. "Ow!" He jerks back from a hit from Dante's guns, and quickly puts his hand behind his back, before he turns into a jaguar with glowing spots -- the glowing heart-mark is still visible on his forehead -- and tries to get in close so that he can lunge in Dante. Almost immediately, the jaguar lets out a loud growl as he has to take a moment to dodge Holly's bats, snapping at them with his teeth.

    Suddenly, he changes back to his humanoid form with one hand over his ear as if listening to to a radio message, frowning and looking slightly embarrassed, but then he grins, and darts towards Dante with the vampires' trademark superhuman speed, fist raised.

    No sooner does Luke's pokemon unleash that flame than all the vampires are screeching and yelling. It seems that flame is more-or-less one of their weaknesses; where they only made a token effort to avoid the gunshots of the defending soldiers, they're skedaddling out of Agni's way.

    One of the defenders laughs. "Okay, wow, 'lava plume', you weren't kidding!" he calls over to Luke.

    Ahead of the still-unnoticed Chrollo, Vincent reaches the makeshift base, which is surrounded by half a dozen soldiers and lit with a spotlight. It's much easier to see in the extra light that they all look attractive in an anemic sort of way, and have unhealthy or dead-looking skin. Waiting for Vincent are three vampires. One of them is a woman in an officer's uniform, with a glowing purple heart-shape on her forehead like the other officer, sitting on a folding chair with a look of intense concentration on her face. The second is an angry-looking young woman dressed in an elegant purple gown and with a single red streak in her black hair, likewise with a glowing purple heart-shape on her forehead, but it seems to be slightly brighter. The third is wearing a black and red maid uniform, and has a completely empty smiling expression. There's a black heart-shaped mark on her forehead.

    The officer frowns. "... and Sergeant Vilinus is leaving his surveillance post again," she mutters.

    "Ugh, let him go, it's easier that way." says Vincent. "Now, Delany ..."

    "Ugh, let me go, it's easier that way," says the woman in the gown.

    Vincent groans. "Seriously, don't tell me your 'ability' immediately shuts down when I try to hit people!" he says. "That misses half the fun!"

    "Miss Delany clearly doesn't wish for you to use it effectively, Your Grace," says the maid, and her voice is as empty as her Stepford-smile.

>> SUMMARY[Serrah Delany] >> The officer goes after Dante while avoiding Holly's bats. The vampires around Agni are burned. Chrollo finds Vincent, Major Maledicta, Serrah, and Wilhelmina at the base.

    Dante bounces off the side of the building, letting Alty handle the scanning and such. He opens fire on the officer some more, meeting him head-on and tanking that fist with his face. Up close and personal, Dante shoves one of his guns into the vampire's face, opening fire again.

    There may be a lot of dodging and swiping with the guns, all in mid-air, as the two struggle.

Holly was trying to avoid hurting the vampires too much, after all they might go back to being normal humans after they destroy the scepter. It might be best not to tell her its too late for most of them. It seems like they lost Vincent and Serrah though for the time being. "Could you please tell us where they went?" She thinks it would be preferable for the vampires to being shot and set on fire.

Chrollo does his best to remain out of sight as he simply tries to blend in. Surely this is just another pale vampire mook amongst others! The man sneaks a hand into his pocket and, after shooting off a quick group text to any that took his number. 

'Found the girl. Several troops, the leader, and officers.' He makes sure to spit off a vague location. 

The Spider's head doesn't like his odds against all of them /and/ trying to get Serrah out of this place. 

And then, with a bit more knowledge thanks to the vampires, he sneaks back to the outer edge of the camp. One vampire in his arms, broken neck later, and then the thief rips his uniform and gives himself the lightest of wounds with his knife before leaving the corpse. 

Suddenly he goes bursting towards the officers, voice in faux-terror. 

"Officers! Lord Vincent! There's been an attack, the enemy is at the outskirts of our base! I saw them fade into the shadows!"

    Luke is not looking to kill any of them either, his goal is mostly making them stop, and rescue Serrah, then they can strategize further!. The fire bear's pokemon blast stops after a moment, and Luke rushes closer to his pokemon to keep within hearing range, waving to the defender, "Yeah he is pretty strong!." the boy replies. He changes his focus to force the vampires further back, "Keep pushing them back!, flame charge!" Thsi attack is a bit less flashy than the first, but impressive on it's own right regardless, the fiery aura emerging again, the pokemon burning brightly before it charges at the closest group of Vampires, trying to tackle/ram into them while engulfed in flames, moving faster as he rushes from target to target, the glowing sun orb still following the pokemon, but starting to flicker.

    And that vampire just turned into a jaguar.
    That's different.
    And a little scary.
    But Alty relies on Dante to deal with him as she keeps her sensors going at full scan. It's when the vampire turns human again and aims to sucker punch the devil hunter, she lunges off Dante's shoulder, sword flashing as she tries to harry the officer with a few slashes at his face.
    Before she gets Chrollo's text and re-takes her place on Dante's shoulder, a new screen popping up with a big red 'go here ASAP' blip as she tugs on his ear urgently.

    The vampire smirks, ducking under Dante's shots and returning fire with water-bats. "You aren't completely human, are you," he says. "You've got 'dhampir' written all over you with those moves." He grins a fangy grin. "I'm Sergeant Lucian Vilinus. What's your name?"

    The vampires are struggling to get away from Agni's assault, and the vampires in the area are starting to beat a retreat; seems the fire doing real damage to them. Soon, they regroup, and start firing back with darkness-blasts, other spells, and one or two guns. One of them gives Holly a funny look and stops firing. "Where who went?" he says flatly.

    Back by Chrollo, the officer in the seat frowns. "That beast-taming boy is here again," she says. "He's causing a lot of trouble on the north side. Moving people to -- just a moment, Sergeant Penumbra just spotted Lieutenant Cain looking like he was thoroughly attacked --"

    Then Chrollo makes himself known, and all eyes turn towards him. "Ex-cuse-me, the proper form of address is 'Lord D'Ambrosio'!" says Vincent. He nods to the officer. "Major Maledicta ..." He frowns as he sees her expression. "... Maledicta?"

    Maledicta gestures, and several of the other guards and officers rush to investigate. Ruse successful!

    But then she frowns. "Why did you come here?" she asks Chrollo. "Your commanding officer informed me through His Grace's Heart Control much more quickly ... than ...." And then she smirks. "... ah. An impostor. I can hear your heartbeat, on top of all your other mistakes." Ruse ... not successful!

    Serrah bursts out laughing. "Careful, Vinny's making me stop time for him," she tells Chrollo.

>> SUMMARY[Serrah Delany] >> Vilinus spars with Dante; the vampires flee Agni; Maledicta uncovers Chrollo's ruse immediately after it succeeds; Serrah says something perhaps unwise.

    "I'm not some vampire, asshole..." Dante growls, as he and Vilinus trade blows. "You're talkin' to Dante the Demon Killer." As they land, Dante switches to hand-to-hand combat, delivering a flurry of jabs with one hand before swapping to a furious haymaker with the other. "Got a nice ring, don't ya think?" He follows the punching up with a nasty roundhouse kick, aimed right for Vilinus's jaw.

    Nomrally he'd be all too happy to knock this guy's head sideways, but Alty begins to tug on his ear and point him toward a new location on the map. "Eh?" Time to put this guy down fast.

Chrollo is caught! It doesn't seem to rattle the thief too much, as he turns those cold eyes on Maledicta, then to Vincent, and finally over to Serrah. His gaze goes wide. The vampires in the room can hear his heart beat quicken in something close to excitement. 

So the man doesn't bother with the pretense. "Why? Perhaps I wanted to see mythical creatures with my own two eyes." Starts Chrollo. It's almost mocking, if his tone wasn't so damn /respectful/. 

It doesn't last too long, as consider him distracted. "But that one in particular interests me the most. Stopping time? Really?" 

A knife shines in his hand now, big and curved. There's a subtle aura about the man, yet he doesn't immediately attack the vampires. 

"Miss, how long can you maintain that Time Stop?" Is his immediate question. No attacks from the man, though he's very obviously ready in case the other vampires do!

    Agni is forced to stop it's charging attacks once the vampires finally seem to get their act together and begin shooting at the approaching beast, the bear rushing aside from the attacks, it seems more concerned about hte bulllets than the arcane/darkness attacks! "Agni!, seems we have their attention!." he calls, before reaching for his belt. "Hit them hard! before they manage to properly secure a new position!, Inferno, and get closer!". 
    Upon hearing the command, the bear stops dodging and roars at the vampires, the flame on it's forehead growing massively in size, before the fire ursine settles on all fours, lowers it's head and unleashes a torrent of blue flames in their direction, sweeping in an arc, before starting to move again. The attack is relatively clumsy, given the need to keep moving, but it keeps trying to get closer.

"Vincent, I know I saw him earlier! And that likely means that Serrah is close by too..." Holly doesn't know that Alty's already found them. She needs to get closer to her before she can try summoning her. She could try her trick with one of the vampires that they're fighting, but getting it to work once would be difficult enough for her.

    "Pardon me--" Dante's punches successfully land on Vilinus, knocking him back. That last kick causes a nasty cracking sound from his neck, and he goes flying into the air before smacking against the wall. He lands on his face, and a hand shakily raises a middle-finger. Looks like Dante's free to go now!

    And Agni is still burning through the vampires like a fire through kindling. "Retreat!" exclaims the vampire who'd shouted to Holly. "They're at the base, you prat!" But at that command, the vampires are falling back. One of the defending soldiers gives Luke a thumbs-up, and the Army starts pressing forward, filling the gaps that Luke is vacating. But then his head jerks around. "Look out!" he exclaims -- a particularly dark shadow, plainly visible in the light of the flames, is starting to inch towards Luke -- clearly a vampire in shadow-form.

    At the base, Vincent looks genuinely baffled. "... What do you mean mythical?"

    "It's whole 'thing' in worlds that, uh, 'don't have magic'," says Serrah. "And where vampires 'aren't real.'" Even now, the idea seems odd to her. She smirks at Chrollo. "Uhhh ... it varies depending on how much I do on the inside. People touching me physically or magically also get it and drain it more." She's speaking rapidly so that she can get it all out, so that Chrollo can use it to his advantage. (She doesn't realize how he's going to do so.)

    "Sh-shush!" snaps Vincent.

    Maledicta puts a hand over her mouth as she peers at Chrollo, but there's laughter in her eyes. "Nevertheless, you've assaulted one of our own," she says. "Perhaps several someones. All those different reports of soldiers with a strange knife ..." She abruptly frowns and turns to Vincent. "The north side is collapsing." She puts a hand on the side of her head as she quickly conveys the news via telepathy.

    "Argh, this always happens!" says Vincent, shooting Serrah a glare.

    "It's never been my fault," Serrah shoots back.

    Dante stops Vilinus short of finishing that sentence. He doesn't even break strike as he puts a bullet in the sergeant's head, the gun barking loudly and the bullet blowing brains out. All business. These animals are on -his- turf, his territory. This is personal for him.

    Dante makes his way towards the blip, hopefully the base. He's raring to put down more than a few vampires tonight before the night's over.

    Alty winces as Dante puts another bullet in the fallen sergeant. But she holds on tight as he gets going, motioning this way or that as she flits of his shoulder to lead the way.

"Now, we just need to find the base!" Holly follows Dante and Alty hoping they're not too late. She's not going to fight any more of the vampires on the way unless they try to starting anything with her.

    Luke seems confused about the warning from the soldier, still rushing to join his pokemon, but does spot the rushing shadow, and in a panic, he reaches for one of his pokeballs, "Dynamo!". He is not sure what to do, given the vampire seems incorporeal, so while rushing back to his other pokemon, he calls. "Dynamo, Flash!". The electric tiger doesn't seem to spot the target of his master's/trainer's panic, but still obeys, electricity building up on the round figure of the stripped 'feline' before he roars and basically does a great impression of a flashbang, at least in the 'sudden surge of light' area.

At first, the thief is almost pleasantly conversational, even in the middle of enemy territory. "That's correct. Magic...vampires...strange things like that. I have an interest in rare and beautiful, mystical things." 

Really, Serrah is almost offering it on a silver platter. Now, can he get /out/ of here with all these vicious vampires? Nevermind the vamp-girl herself. Chrollo needs her alive for her ability to work. Or alive enough for Skill Hunter, anyway. It will be a good experiment. 

Chrollo nods to Maledicta, smiling just slightly. "Like I said, I'm just interested in the girl. You and your troops are only my target as long as she's captured. Hand her over and we're done." The 'offer' is about as paper thin as one can get. 

He'll wait for the inevitable decline. Whether it comes or not? There's a knife tossed at Maledicta as a distraction, even as he's lunging for Serrah! 

"Miss Serrah, stop time for me!" Pleads the Spider Head. The aura around him grows, more purple, the odd energy of a Specialist. He puts as much faux-desperation in his voice as he can, already reaching for Serrah's hand.

    The vampire pursuing Luke quickly rematerializes, covering his eyes. "Ow! You mortal punk!" he snaps, staggering back ... which is enough for the surrounding Army soldiers to shoot him to hell and back.

    There isn't a whole of resistance as Luke, Holly, and Dante-plus-Alty approach the camp. "Absolutely not!" says Vincent, placing a hand in front of Serrah, glaring at Chrollo. "She's mine!"

    "Oh dear," says Maledicta. "It seems you've riled up -- ack!" She catches the thrown knife out of the air by its blade, and then lets out a hiss and drops it. "What is that technique ..."

    Serrah actually looks somewhat nervous as Chrollo reaches for her; she stands stock still, as Vincent isn't giving her enough freedom to move on her own. "Uh, I can't, I --"

    "WAIT NO WHAT ARE YOU DOING STOP THAT!" says Vincent. As Chrollo makes contact with Serrah's hand, Vincent reaches out to her ...

    From Chrollo's perspective, it looks like a ripple of light emanates from Serrah, the colors of the world become faded, and everything freezes except for Serrah, Vincent, and Maledicta. Her movements jerky like an inexpertly-controlled puppet, Serrah starts to dodge back from Chrollo ...

    And then immediately, things return to normal. From everyone else's perspective, it looks like there was a slight twitch before Serrah was suddenly in the middle of the beginning of dodging. "You forgot to turn heart-control off for everyone else, Vincent Dincent," says Serrah.

    "Damn it!" says Vincent.

Luke, and his pokemon, (after Luke returns Dynamo back on his pokeball), decide to hang around the resistance, helping them clear around the vampires still língering around!, he is a bit reckless about it even.

    Dante rushes the bunker as the vampires falter. Blowing away remaining vampires, he's aiming to turn the camp into a smoking hole. "You're in my house, assholes! This is MY TOWN."

    He makes a beeline for Serrah and Vincent, sighting down the latter and squeezing the trigger.

It's even more glorious than he could have imagined. 

The colors, the sheer /feeling/ of control over something so elemental as time itself! How this unliving woman can so effortlessly do so! Serrah quickly becomes a puzzle in his heart. What about her could lead to her creating this power? Is it the vampirism? Some effect on her mind and emotions and desires? 

He quickly shoves away that end of the puzzle of Serrah's Time Stop. Worse still, the others seem to be moving even amidst the frozen time! 

He gets a clue, though, thanks to Serrah. "So then, Miss Serrah, you're being controlled by him? That's how he was able to move that way earlier." Chrollo's gaze turns back to Vincent. 

"He only has the power to force you to do something. That sublime, amazing ability is something beyond the likes of him." Now he's just trying to make Vincent mad and make a mistake he can capitalize on...and try to get Serrah on his side with some base compliments. 

He pours on the speed, trying to once more get close to Serrah, even as he splits his attention between the two hostile vampires. Nen concentrates on legs, and arms. Something begins to form in his right hand... 

Dante arrives just in time! As the Devil Hunter shoots, Chrollo springs again into action. A quick, feinting kick at Vincent, only for Chrollo to reach out again with his hand to Serrah. 

This time it isn't his hand he's attempting to touch her with. Instead the black cover and white handprint'd book known as Skill Hunter fades into existance as he tries to get her fingers on the cover!

Holly lets Dante take the lead as she watches him and Chrollo try to fight off Vincent. Hopefully, they can distract him long enough for her to get her spell off. She closes her purple eyes and does her best to focus on the heart-shaped mark on Serrah's forehead. The witch points herself lollipop shaped staff at the pair and a few orange sparks fly from it once again. "Why isn't it working?!"

    The soldiers join Luke as he helps fight through the vampires. "Thanks for the help, uh, kid!" says an Army officer, patting his back. "With your help, we've got 'em on the run!"

    At the camp, Vincent harrumphs at Chrollo. "Your words mean nothing to me!" he says. "You hear me? Nothing!" He's a little too riled up for this supposed 'nothing'.

    Serrah rolls her eyes. "Yeah, I know, stopping time is the best, can you kick his ass already?"

    Vincent whirls around as Dante arrives. "Oh, there you are, demon-boy!" he says. "I was wondACK!" He recoils backward as the bullet grazes his head a little too deep, and takes a drunken swing at Chrollo with his scepter ... only to completely miss as the nen-user goes for Serrah instead. He stops time, orders her to dodge ...

    ... a split second too late. Serrah's hand ceases to make contact with Skill Hunter, and even then, though he's frozen in time at first, Chrollo can see the stopped world just fine.

    And then Vincent staggers to his knees, clutching his head where Dante's bullet hit him, and clutches his head, and the glowing heart-shapes disappear from Serrah and Maledicta's foreheads -- leaving a black heart-shaped mark like Wilhelmina's, in Serrah's case. Serrah immediately raises her fist to punch Vincent, but her hand seems to hold itself back.

    Maledicta glances up as if trying to see the glow that was just on her forehead. "Retreat!" she announces. She lifts up Vincent in a fireman's carry, and flees towards the Vine with a vampire's superhuman speed.

    Wilhelmina, still smiling emptily, watches them go. "Oh dear," she says. "Well, goodbye again, Miss Delany." She does a quick curtsy, then melts into shadow and hurries after Wilhelmina.

    "Jesus." Serrah laughs. "You saved my bacon again, guys!" She pauses. "We ... should probably be somewhere else in the next few minutes, Vincent was using the Scepter to 'control' a bunch of vampires just so Maledicta could take advantage of the telepathy -- her special ability is this trick to spread powers around or something -- and they've got standing orders to drop everything and run for the Vine here if the Heart Control fails completely."

    Cries of "Retreat!" are heard from the vampires elsewhere in the city; most of them transform into shadows, but others carry the wounded, with white flags held in their teeth.

>> SUMMARY[Serrah Delany] >> Luke and the Soldiers are beating back the vampires, Dante grazes Vincent, Chrollo copies Stop the World, and Vincent is KO'd, prompting a retreat.

    It could've been so much easier if Dante was a second sooner.

    He could've plugged Vincent right between the eyes and this would've been over, Serrah would be free and these vampires would be leaderless and hopefully run if they had any brains.

    Oh well. Two out of three isn't too bad. Dante dashes towards Serrah, and checks over over. "You okay, kid?" He asks, genuinely concerned as he stows his guns.

    Nodding, Dante watches the vampires bail. "Sounds like they're bailing. You wanna go after 'em?"

The book is freezing to the touch of someone who has activated its' requirements. It might even give Serrah a brief moment of that frostbite feeling as something thrums through her and into the book. But there's no physical damage, and the pain is gone just as quickly. 

And then, it's done. Chrollo just as quickly lets the book fade out of existance as the vampires beat tracks. He turns to Dante and Serrah. 

"...Telepathy? Power spreading?" He's even /more/ intrigued. "You vampires really are impressive. Miss Delany, I look forward to getting to know you." He's smiling lightly here. It may look a little odd as he isn't looking directly at the vampiress. 

"But we can plan an end to it all later. We may want to rest, regroup, and conceive a plan of attack." ...A thief has joined the party!?

    Serrah shakes her head at Dante's question. "I'm not a fan of being in the same world as Vincent without a backup," she says, nodding to Chrollo. She's surrounded by a swirl of shadow, and then she's dressed in a black shirt with cutoff sleeves that says 'BAD WORDS' in large unfriendly letters, and a rainbow skort. And ... she's wobbling slightly. "Sometimes, when you're turned into a vampire, you gain some kind of power. I got Stop the World."

    She pauses. "Hey, uh, quick question, can I crash at Devil May Cry?" She looks at her hand where Chrollo's book touched it. "I ... really need to rest. Vincent doesn't know how to treat me that badly, but, uh ... yyyyyyeah. I'll, I'll, we can come up with a plan for getting back at him ... later."