World Tree MUSH

    Isabelle, New York is a city in a newly-Blossomed world, right by the edge of New York City. It's the late evening, but in this part of the city, the holographic advertisements are bright enough that the primary discernible difference between night and day is what the sky looks like, the precise color of the ambient lighting, and whether or not the street lights are on. Holographic doll-like fairies flit through the sky, glowing with a distinct silvery light projected from floating drones of various designs.

    The people are going about their business, walking or driving hither and thither. A woman with striking red hair wearing a gray business suit walks up the sidewalk, carefully avoiding getting in the way of a parked news van where a sharply-dressed reporter is animatedly talking about the World Tree in front of a cameraman in a T-shirt.

    Oh, and Vines are suddenly being diverted to the vicinity from their previous destinations.

    A hooded figure accompanied by a boxy robot strides through the streets. The cloak gives off a lone fantasy wanderer vibe, for certain. Talia keeps to herself for the moment, unsure if alien lifeforms are really the norm around here. A green woman might draw the wrong kind of attention on a world like this, so she observes the news reporter from a distance.

    The droid beeps. Talia shrugs a shoulder. "I have no idea. Something about the Tree." She answers the machine's query, before her eyes gaze skyward to the strange fairies.

    You know what's out of place in the big city?
    A very green girl on a very big yellow bird.
    That is to say a re-directed vine dumps Rydia of Mist right in Isabelle, right in view of the reporter, and their camera, and news van, and it takes her a second to rein her bird in from the dazzle of all the lights and holgraphic screens.
    "Ugh, by Hylia, where are we now?" The girl mutters under her breath.
    So that just happened.

Misaki was taking a shortcut. Go through one vine, then another, be back home faster than the straight route. ... And then the vine doesn't lead where it's supposed to. "... that's usually a sign of trouble, isn't it?" She asks herself, and transforms just in case. Then she spots Talia, "Hello miss Kyras. Do you have any clue why the vine sent me here?"

    Somewhere out in SPAAAAAAACE. "Captain, Vine forming ahead, it's tracking our course like last time." says Minerva.
"Understood, bring us out of Linespace and take us in. Prepare all sensors for area scan on exit at the terminus." replies Justina, strapping into her chair for any turbulance.
"Aye Captain, emerging from Linespace. Folding Radials. All sensors primed for scan pulse. Contact with Vine anomaly in three... two..."

    Orbit of local Earth: "... one, contact! Transition successful, beginning area scan... Another Earth, high technology, detecting high EM radiation signals in recognizable patterns... moving to a higher orbit to evade local satellite networks... significant urbanization, detecting a concentration of ground-based Vines... Entering coordinates to deploy Type-93 Urban Frame."

    "I'm ready, initating transfer on confirmation of teleport completion." remarks Justina as she straps herself into the Astral Projector.

    On the surface in an open area, a teleport spell manifests, and resolves into a 6ft tall golden armoured robot with a lithe, nearly feminine frame. On the shoulders are a pair of ornate, runed repeating crossbows. After a moment, it seems to 'jolt', and the optics iris open, revealing a green-yellow hue, with piping along the frame limming in the same colour. The robot looks around, spotting others the operator recognizes, though they may not recognize her in the current frame until she speaks. "Ah, Miss Rydia. Miss Sakai, Miss Kyras.... I take it the Tree has something to do with this sudden course correction? We were intercepted in transit between star systems and deposited in orbit of this world."

    "... but still, we definitely have to expect the unexpected," says the reporter immediately after Rydia's arrival, with almost perfect comedic timing. Cars start honking their horns, and the reporter turns around to see the young summoner. "... Case in point!" he says without missing a beat.

    A fairy without any obvious projector floats closer to Rydia curiously. Up close, it looks more obviously like a doll, with short pink hair, a red dress, and a large hair with almost cartoony black eyes. She pauses, as if she has to translate Rydia's words in her head, but it seems to be giving her trouble.

    And then she whirls around in midair at the appearance of Justina's doll, and she gawks openly, brow slightly furrowed as she regards the doll, Talia, and Misaki.

    "Whoa!" The reporter gets distracted as well. He stares for a moment, but since the doll doesn't seem to be attacking anything, he relaxes. "Well, this is certainly something!" he says cheerfully. "Like I was saying! Just like that, we've got a few Vine-visitors in Isabelle!"

    ... Those who can sense dimensional warping and/or darkness, curses, or corruption would detect ... something ... happening nearby. All fairies in the vicinity pause what they're doing, and start looking around, frowning. This includes the fairy by Rydia.

    Case in point indeed as Rydia takes a moment longer to calm her bewildered bird with a few clicks of her tongue.
    "Something to do with it, yeah." She replies to Justina's familiar voice. Though the doll is a different one than the last time she had run across each other, the voice is familiar at least as something snags the Summoner's attention.
    It's the fairy-thing.
    When it floats closer, the Summoner curiously tries to give it a light poke with a finger.
    ... It's when the fairies all start to look distraught that Rydia's brow knots.
    She can feel something in the pit of her stomach. Something is happening.
    "Uhhhhh, guys. Something feels wrong."

    Talia shakes her head at Misaki. "I was on my way to Onderon when my ship brought me here." She explains. "I think we're going to get very popular all of a sudden." She muses, canting her head to the news reporter.

    She's about to speak again before she feels a disturbance in the Force, a frown creasing her features as she furrows her brow. "I sense it." The Jedi says. "I've got a bad feeling about this..."

"Guess I was right to transform." Misaki focuses for a moment, "I think the problem is this way." Misaki yells, and a big arrow of red light suddenly points towards a nearby alleyway, the character for 'Danger' floating above the arrow in the same shade of red. "Yeah, definitely a bad feeling. Let's investigate, miss Kyras? Miss Mist, Miss Thyme?"

    Minerva chimes in, pinging Misaki's phone and Talia's commbit. "Picking up strange disruptions in local Aetheric flow... cannot localize, perhaps one of you can pick it out better than my sensors."

    Justina, meanwhile, waits for someone to start leading the way, and once Misaki sets off, she turns to follow, the crossbows angling into an aggressive posture as she charges after the magical girl. Her robotic body can keep up well enough, and with each turn taken, it seems to morph slightly to lean into the turns, a hand dragging the road a couple of times as the robot fluidly mantles over vehicles, and scoots around pedestrians. "I'm filtering through UV, Thermal and Auric vision modes, but I can't pick out what's happening. I will trust your instincts, Miss Sakai."

    The fairy ... seems solid enough. She pokes Rydia's finger with a tiny finger of her own. "Hi," she says distractedly, in a voice which sounds as if it came from a speaker. She points at herself and says, "Sheen Jewel 44247101."

    And then Sheen Jewel's gaze, and that of every other fairy nearby, settles on the alleyway which Misaki just drew attention to. "... Specter Spawn," she mutters. And then she pauses. "... Transform?" she calls to Misaki.

    The reporter, meanwhile, has gone back to talking to the camera. "And that's just one example!" he says. "Is this 'World Tree' another anomaly, like the Static Anomalies we've been having to deal with? Or have we just become part of something greater?"

    At that moment, a different fairy swoops down past him, her holoprojector-drone flying sideways. "Specter Spawn!" she calls out.

    The reporter smiles patronizingly. "Yes, we know, your word for them is 'Specter Spawn' --"

    The fairy looks confused, and points at the alleyway. "Specter Spawn!"

    Just as the group starts to enter, the colors around it start to fade. Brick walls, parked cars -- everything not moving starts to turn grayscale. Something large is approaching from deep inside the alley, and big floppy elephantine-ears flickering with static like an old TV are already visible, glowing with the same kind of silvery light as the fairies.

    "Oh! Specter Spawn!" exclaims the reporter, as the camera momentarily turns to Misaki's "danger" sign. "Speak of the devil! Sorry, viewers, we're going to have to cut this short! Back to you, Cheryl!" He and the crew immediately start disassembling their equipment and hurriedly getting into the van. At the sight of the faded colors, all nearby civilians are panicking, running or driving away as fast as they can; several of the fairies, on the other hand, fly over to watch.

    Is that an introduction?
    That seems like an introduction.
    "Uh. Rydia. Of Mist." Rydia replies to the fairy, before Misaki seems to have pinpointed the source of the disturbance.
    'Specter Spawn' sounds a little bit ominous. The reporter mentions something abotu anomalies...
    Rydia rolls her eyes.
    "By Hylia, I swear if I get dragged into another mess every time I leave Snowpeak." The Summoner grumbles as she hops off her bird and makes to follow Misaki and the others.
    "Stay. Staaaaay." She says to her chocobo as people begin to panic and flee.
    "Kweh!" Her faithful and stalward steed chirrups back, nosing at her cheek.
    "Good boy." She says as she makes for the alley.
    And the color drains from the world.
    "I'm coming, I'm coming."

    "Talia Kyras." The Jedi introduces herself, and then they have their suspect. Specter Spawn...

    "It seems there's a lot of questions to be asked." She muses soflty, until she watches the people panic. Rushing towards the alleyway, Talia ditches her hood. "Stay put, En-Dee!" Beep boop.

    She'll tag along with Rydia, fishing for her lightsaber hilt on the way.

"I can detect and locate reality warping magics, it's because my job is to fight reality warping beings." Misaki explains to Justina. She glances to Sheen Jewel "I'm a magical girl, normally I don't wear anything this fancy, but when I want to use my magic I transform and get access to it." The color is drained from the world and Misaki glares at this, rather than summon her guns she calls upon her magic to try to send colored light everywhere so as many things as possible are roughly the color they're supposed to be. "What do you think you are doing?" She demands, pointing at the creature. "You stop it right now."

    Minerva calls out. "Got a lock, updating your onboard protocols, Captain, you should be able to see them now."

    "Understood." replies Justina, skidding to a stop and backpedalling as the thing starts to emerge... "It's bigger than I expected it to be."

    Belatedly, Minerva contacts Sheen Jewel. >"Forgive my charge, she isn't used to people. I am Minerva, AI in control of the ship orbitting the planet right now... the robotic entity is being controlled by my Captain, Her name is Justina Thyme."< introductions out of the way, Justina is currently summoning a pair of blades onto her arms, the steel knitting itself out of blue-white motes that seem to 'seep' out of the chest of the robot frame.

    Sheen Jewel just stares at Misaki when she says the phrase "magical girl", even if she doesn't seem to understand the rest of the sentence. She almost looks like she's completely forgotten the monster currently approaching.

    The dimensional effect fades, but the darkness remains, as the monster's body starts to glow firetruck-red, revealing that it's a sort of cyborg elephant with its eyes closed; it seems like it ought to be too big to fit inside the alleyway. Its trunk darts this way and that, as if it was using it to see, emitting pew pew laser-like noises; however, it stops once it reaches the group, and unleashes a loud screech which sounds like an 8-bit sound effect, and a yellow light starting to shine from behind its eyelids.

    The monster scrapes the ground with its foreleg and then charges forward, trying to trample anything in its path and knocking aside a car that was in front of the alley!

    Jewel transmits a message to Minerva and ND-77 with a data packet in a dense machine-to-machine language, describing everything that's publicly known about the Specter Spawn: they're supposed to be a rare byproduct of industrial use of Spectral Energy (which isn't explained in the data packet) without proper safety measures, but large numbers have been manifesting and causing trouble lately. Some of them seemed to have specific goals, but the overall reason for this isn't clear. She then sends a connection-request to Justina's doll to provide realtime tactical information, followed by a message to Minerva in a dry tone: <<Just a moment. Organic language difficult.>>

    Thankfully ND-77 doubles as a rolling, mobile, sassy datadrive. THe Droid acknowledges the acquisition of data with a message, before she follows Talia, keeping her distance. En-Dee isn't much use in a fight after all.

    Meanwhile, a boss fight! Talia looks at Misaki for a moment, as if about to chide her over what she expected an obvious monster to say in response, before she rushes out of the way of the monster's attack!

    It's go-time, and Talia's lightsaber flashes to life as she leaps over the monster, letting it smash into that automobile. "Go high, Sakai!" Talia calls out to Misaki, then slashes the creature's vulnerable back with her lightsaber.

Misaki manifests both her guns. "Not much for talking, huh. Well, it was worth a try." She leaps up on top of a nearby lamppost at Talia's instruction, and begins to slowly charge her guns. She begins though by creating a cone of strobing light in rapidly varying colors and intensities, at its strongest near the trunk but wide enough to catch the entire monster.

    Minerva accepts the handshake, then pulse bursts back in machine language. She also opens the ports for the tactical info system, since Justina is just an organic and has other distractions right now.

    As the creature charges, and knocks a car aside like it was nothing Justina's reaction is to dodge, cartwheeling aside and morphing into a back somersault, and ending in a crouch, skidding back a couple of feet and kicking up sparks from metal on asphalt. "Tactical readings coming in... okay, lets see what I can do with... this!" She dismisses one of her blades, and seems to focus for a moment before incanting. "Ye Lords, Masked in Flesh and Blood. High Charity, ye who bear the name of Man. Truth and Temperance, strike upon this sinful wall and unleash the full measure of your fury! Firebolt, Demolition Shift!" The open palm of her robotic hand glows with red light, before licking with flames. She points this at the Glitchephant and unleashes a volley of flaming projectiles that burst into small fiery explosions on impact. She's careful to not fire near her allies.

>> GAME >> Justina Thyme spends an Edge for: Casting Magic!

    The lightsaber seems to cut through the monster's side like a hot knife through butter, eliciting a louder screech as its trunk tries to track Talia's movements. When the blade passes, it leaves a flickering yellow scar, and its movements become ever-so-slightly jerky.

    Distracted by Talia, and by Misaki's sudden light-show, it gets caught flat-footed by Justina's fireballs, and actually stumbles slightly. The monster's trunk darts between the various combatants, but only for a second; it finally opens its eyes open completely, shining yellow spotlights on the ground which buzz with energy and drain the color even further, as it turns its entire bulk to face Justina's Ur-Doll.

    Jewel floats next to Misaki at that moment, and if allowed, will land on her shoulder. "Energy drain!" she says, pointing to the yellow light. Her tactical connection with Minerva provides the same warning.

    The Glitchephant scrapes the ground with its foreleg again, but doesn't charge just yet. Instead, the light shining of its eyes attempts to sweep up to Talia and Misaki (and Jewel) to drain a bit of their energy if it hits them. Then it charges at the Ur-Doll.

    THat blow might've been a somewhat glancing strike, but it tells one thing: Talia knows it can be hurt. The Jedi leaps backwards to evade the creature's attacks, using the Force to rip some busted pavement out of the ground, then she smashes it to tiny pieces with her powers before she begins to hurl handfuls of clumps at high-speeds at the creature, like a shotgun spread of pebbles.

"Got it." Misaki leaps from one lamp post to the next when the energy drain threatens to go her way, making sure to keep her motions steady enough to allow Jewel to keep her spot on the senshi's shoulder. Having finished charging Joyous, she waits for the Glitchephant to attack the Ur-Doll, then aims a bright white beam straight for its back.

    Minerva relays the warning, filling in the 'beam cone' from the eyes to overlay where the 'danger zone' is. It also announces. >"Warning, Ur-Doll Stress approaching 38. System instability may begin soon."<

    Justina plots the tracking of those eyelasers, and then gets charged at. She summons a hexagonal 'club' onto her arm, and crosses her weapons while digging her feet in. She braces for impact, and as the thing hits her, she unleashes a girlish scream as she's forced back by the sheer bulk of the creature... but she doesn't topple.

    Furrows are made as she digs in and the Doll attempts to correct its pitch automatically.

    >"System Stress exceeding 70, Frame Damage detected, Feedback loop within tolerance."< reports Minerva as the Ur Doll tries to bring the thing to a stop.

    The monster appears to be particularly single-minded. It's not that three opponents is too many as such, it's just ... well ... easily distracted.

    The Glitchephant discovers that it is failing to trample the Ur-Doll. It backs off a hair, raising its trunk to try to get a better "look" at her, and then tries to headbutt the Ur-Doll, and gore it with its tusks. That's when it gets hit by Force Gravel, and gets shot in the head with a beam of light.

    It lets out another pained roar and starts staggering back away from the Ur-Doll, its whole body flickering like its scars, before it whirls back around much faster than you might reasonably expect of a creature that size -- it's not really trying to slam the Ur-Doll with its bulk, so it might be easier to avoid it than it would be if it was, but there's definitely still a danger from that bulk.

    The spotlight effect from its eyes disappears; they glow brighter for a few seconds as it charges up a laser attack of its own, before firing a rapidfire burst of yellow laser bolts which sweeps towards Misaki and then towards Talia.

    ... There's someone in the alley.

    Tusks scrape at the armoured frame. "Divert auxillary power to hull plating!" commands the half-elf, an extra layer of metal forming to take the brunt of the impact, which finally knocks the Ur-Doll off its feet and sends it sprawling in a spark-spraying heap a couple of feet away. Thankfully outside of trampling range as it loses interest and starts attacking the other two.

    This vantage point allows Justina to look down the alleyway, and with one of her crossbows, angles it to fire a steel bolt, not at the Glitchephant, but at the figure in the alleyway, aiming low to try and hit a leg to disable.

Misaki notices the person in the alley right as she's dodging the glow. "Hold on tight." She tells Jewel before leaping towards the roof next to the person, sending a strong purple beam from Marvelous to try to finish off the creature they're fighting, taking a closer look towards this someone.

    Talia's lightsaber bobs and weaves as she narrowly blocks and deflects projectiles from the glitch creature, batting them away with ease. In the back of her mind, she can't help but feel something about the alley, but the Jedi can't get distracted. She rushes toward the creature, and leaps to slash at it with her lightsaber!

    Fortunately, Jewel understands Misaki's quick instruction, and clings to her so that when she leaps, the fairy is still on her shoulder. When Justina fires, there's a grunt from the alleyway -- it sounds like a woman's voice -- followed by a clatter of the bolt landing on the ground.

    The purple beam strikes the monster, and then Talia's lightsaber blade does as well. And that seems to be enough: the monster lets out an unholy screech, and collapses as if it was deflating; its body starts to disintegrate into motes of silver light, and in another moment, it's gone. The faded colors of the world are all that remains.

    ... In the alleyway, the figure appears to be a black silhouette on one knee, clutching her shin where Justine's bolt struck it. Said arrow is lying on the ground a few feet away.

    "Heh ... Shooting first, are we?" she says. "Surprisingly impressive, though."

    Sheen Jewel just stares at her, looking utterly confused and bewildered.

    The figure stands up. "I'll see you later," she says. "Which isn't to say that you'll see me, of course." There's a brief dimensional warp which is entirely different from that of the Glitchephant, light seems to warp around her ... and then she's gone, teleported away.

    Sheen Jewel lets out an irritated grumble. "Who?" she mutters, and then shakes her head and floats off of Misaki's shoulder. "Should leave here," she calls out to all and sundry, gesturing to the uncolored world around them. "Curse ... is bad." The color-drain is still happening, and the area would feel more and more unpleasant, but at least it isn't spreading.

    Talia stands from a slashing pose when she finishes the beast off. She blinks in surprise when she sees the other figure in the alleyway. "Who are you?" She demands, only to be answered with nothing as the figure up and teleports away.

    "Grife, she's the cryptic type." She murmurs sourly, before her lightsaber is switched off and stowed away. "Can it be undone?" Talia asks Jewel, worried.

Misaki looks closer at the result of things, "I hate to leave it like this, but..." She heads out of the cursed area, trying to meet up with Talia. "Well I guess I'll add this place to my list of places to keep an eye on." She holds up her phone and takes notes, "If you need help and I'm in the area, contact me, ok?" She has no clue if she's being understood.

The phone has the ability to exchange contact details over bluetooth, not that the Senshi is even thinking about this.

    Jewel nods to Talia. "Goes away ... in days," she says. "Less, maybe. Was quick." She gestures to Talia, Misaki, and Justina's Ur-Doll. "Thank you."

    She peers down at Misaki's phone, then sends a contact request over Bluetooth. "Maybe!" she declares, regarding the magical girl thoughtfully. Then, "... yes. Ideas." It looks like her mind is racing for a moment.

    Then, she shrugs, and gives a wave. "Thank you," she says again. "Had things to do. Later!" And with that, she bows, and flies up to join the other D-Fairies.

    Talia nods her head. "It was our pleasure to aid." She says with a smile, before she begins to make some datapad typings. En-Dee beep boops in her earpiece. "I've got the data sent, appreciated. Take care now."

Misaki accepts the contact request, "There. I'll come over now and then." She pockets her phone, "Good luck." And with that, she begins to head to the vine she came in on. "See you later miss Kyras."