Manhattan Restoration: Mining for Shards

Manhattan Restoration: Mining for Shards
Date of Scene:	14 January 2013
Location:	The Old Kingdom - Dwarf Woodlands
Synopsis:	The heroes come to the Woodlands in order to get one of the Manhattan Shards... but run into a bit of trouble.
Thanks to:	Stormfall as the Bucket O Heartless
Cast of Characters:	Deidra, Will Sherman, Mercade Alexander, Tifa Lockhart, Zia, Avira, Maira, Baigan, Bucket O Heartless, Cirra Constantine, Leida, Emi Dennou, Glayffe
Tinyplot:	Manhattan Restoration

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Maira has posed:
Deep in the woods, a small cottage rests in a glen. The trees are lush with greenery, the grass littered with wild flowers. The air is sweet and the sunshine warm, dappled through the trees. The birds sing, a few deer graze upon the dewy grass. It is a charming forest scene. At least until the door to the cottage bangs open suddenly, scattering the adorable woodland creatures as a man, very short in stature, wearing a red tunic with a brown leather belt, shoes that looks a great deal like socks, and a floppy hat. His nose is bulbous and his mouth seems set in a scowl. He holds a pickax in his hands, which he shakes at the sky in frustration. "Pig's eyes! It's past time we get to the mine! These darned Heartless are keeping us from our work! Where are those so-called 'heros' suppose to be coming!?" Grumpy demands, only to look across the glen to see the first of the group appearing.

He blinks, takes a breath, then grumbles, "Bout darn time. Everyone out!" he says, then moves aside so the other six can come out and greet the heros.

Six dwarves, most bearded, file out of the cottage. They mostly look like their names, because apparently, no one was feeling especially creative that day.

Grumpy however, is apparently taking charge here, as he is rather annoyed with the disruption in his routine and all of the others would have just given that there world shard thing away for nothing! Not Grumpy, he's going to put these people to work, as is fair. "We will lead ya all up to the mine, then you are on your own. Everyone single file!" he says, and the dwarves all line up as they are used to. Grumpy waves the others in line behind the dwarves.

When all is ready, the march up toward the mine begins. "Alright, move out....and yes, the singing is necessary," he grumbles.

"~Hi ho, hi ho, it's off to work we go..." you'd better whistle!

Avira has posed:
Speaking of arriving 'heroes'...!

Avira leads her own little group in, likely with Maira in tow and anyone else who has joined her recently. She's actually been out here for a day or two now, making her way on foot since she wanted to take a trip through Bramble Woods. Though she had resolved to visit her wolf buddies on the way back, she couldn't resist taking a detour to do just that. Only now, after being waylaid by a roving band of Heartless, is she FINALLY here.

She doesn't seem very surprised to see the dwarves come rushing over-she'd heard about them being here during the Baron attack. "Hi!" Avira cheerfully waves only to be rudely interrupted by Grumpy demanding SINGLE FILE MARCHING and...and...

...singing?

Fantastic! Avira loves singing. "Well, if you say so." she says cheerfully and follows with her 'haters gonna hate' strut.

Cue whistling.

Maira has posed:
Yep, Maira is most certainly in tow! Upon arrival she begins prancing through the grass and spinning around like she'd just entered The Sound of Music--at least until she is hit with Grumpy attack, and ordered to get in single file. Her frown is brief, as there is then singing, which she adds her voice to without hesitation and with a great deal of glee.

Will Sherman has posed:
Will shows up with the rest of the TDA, as the Dwarfs come out, lead by Grumpy.

"Yeesh...worse then Tom when he first wakes up." he assides to Avira. He puts his hands behind his back as the dwarfs start moving single file...and Will laughs it off. "What if I decide to walk with you backwards? Or out of the line?" he asks, no harm in it, just wanting to give the GRUMPIEST OF ALL DWARFS A HARD TIME.

Will, follows through, "Hiiiiiigh Ho, High Ho, it's off to puch Heartless I go..." and cue Whistling ensomble!

"So...do we get anything out of this?" he asks, not paying attention to why they are here besides punching heartless out.

Zia has posed:
Well, there could certainly be some discussion as to if a certain gargress actually counts as a hero or not. She might have been there when the last light of Manhattan fell, but Zia is certainly no warrior like many others might be. It is by some small stroke of luck that this world happens to be just far enough off of her usual time schedule that even with the sunlight coming down, she doesn't feel the smallest twinge of the change to stone. Consider it the 'world lag' if you will, with the biological function of stone sleep having lined up more with Fluorgis time than with anything in the realm of Phantasia.

It was only recently that Zia even found out about things being set into motion. Never-the-less, she's here, with a hood drawn up to keep her eyes from the sunlight. It didn't /used/ to bother her, but since becoming nocturnal again, it's made her a bit more sensitive to such things. She isn't exactly drawing attention to herself as a gargoyle, but it isn't hard to see that this particular 'warrior' isn't human. She's just stepping up to join the others when she spots Avira.

Wait, what? Blink. The gargress stares from underneath her cloak. "Yer lookin a wee bit be'ta, lass." She notes, but there isn't too much time for small talk on that matter. The dwarves are calling them into the line, and the gargress falls somewhere in the middle. While she'd sung once before, Zia decides to instead join in with her pan pipes. Oh, and you can bet she's giving Will a wary eye. Regardless of what explinations she's gotten, the gargress remembers Manhattan.

Emi Dennou has posed:
"HIIIGH HOOOOO, WHAT'D YOU CALL ME, HIIIGH HOOOO, WHAT'D YOU CALL ME?" Umi sings along because she thinks she's being hilarious. She has, naturally, come along to this great day of following several short old men into a dark cold place with maybe some glitteries? Naturally glitteries just encourages Emi to come along too.

"Sing normally," Emi tells Umi.

Umi pouts faintly. "High ho, high ho, it's off to totally have an awesome wicked adventure we go..."

....Good enough, Emi decides, looking over towards... MAIRA. Who is also singing.

She raises a mining pick over her back. o.o

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart isn't singing, but she's following. She seems more about listening than singing right now, maybe learning it? Or just lost in thoughts perhaps. SHe looks up ahead at Zia in front of her "What are we doing here exactly anyway..." She's always up for helping out, but sometimes she's lost in whats the actual plan. Following dwarves while singing sounds more like a theme park attraction than needing a platoon of adventuring bodybuards.

Cirra Constantine has posed:
Not everyone just traipses through the forest at the behedst of a Dwarf in a foul temper.

Cirra Constantine, Judge of Archadia watches the others walk single file through the forest. She sits in a tree, on a branch with her legs crossed as she stares at them through the visor of her dark knight helmet. 'Observe, take advantadge of the situation, and retrieve anything of value' Those were some pretty outright antagonistic orders she recieved.

Still, she supposed if anyone could discover something from this, it was Dr. Cid.

She hums quietly under her breath despite herself.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade arrives with the rest of the TDA. He looks around. He doesn't sing along, but he does whistle. His hands are in his pockets as he walks, looking around. He sends questioning glances over to Avira, who's been doing a lot of scouting in the area, but he nods to the others in greeting. "Hey Tifa. Ma'am." He waves to Zia, smiling pleasantly. She isn't the first Gargoyle Mercade's seen. He's taken a liking to them. Most of them have been solid (ha ha), dependable people.

"There's a lot of unusual things going on here." He comments, apropos of nothing. "Think we're going to find anything interesting down there?" He asks.

Deidra has posed:
Zia is not the lone member of her king here, not the lone member at all. Deidra's in on the effort to save Manhattan as it's their home after all. Given how often she's taken to using cloaks herself she really should look into something that's not really just some salvaged fabric repuposed for the job. She really needs to do that but for now here she is. Being awake by day is still a strnge thing for her really, but she's adapting at least the sun's warm right? She's here with the rest of the TDA and peers over at will for a long moment. "Lets not talk about tom when he wakes up."

Zia's noticed she knows the cloak and she gives a bit of a wave to Zia, whom she does consider a friend. Even if Zia is wary of her. She'd had more time to get used to the problem Will has and was helping to tackle keeping the thing /sealed/ rather head on. Right into the belly of a whale like Jona. Seriously don't mess with Monstro, that whale is crazy. The dwarves are interesting beings to be sure as she looks them over as they arrive.

Leida has posed:
Following along behind the two Legions is another less identical girl. Leida is wearing a long oversized shirt for a dress which is belted about her waist and her normally shoddy attire and short stature makes her almost fit right in here with the dwarves. She does not sing, however. Infact, the princess looks embarrassed by this boisterous behavior.

Normally, her shy nature in the presence of so many strange new people would have her hiding behind the older girls, but these two were also fairly new faces to her - figuratively speaking, all of the Legion siblings looked the same - and she was not completely at ease with them like she might be with Imi or Shida.

Still, Leida stuck very close by their sides especially once the dwarves came into view and the grumpy orders began to fly. She looked relatively normal, especially compared to some of the people here, but both Will and Mercade were present and that fact made her uncomfortable in the light of the recent changes that her body had begun to undertake. Even now her eyes retained the dark yellow lizard-like pupils that had been brought forth by her sudden rage and she made sure to keep her gaze towards the ground as often as possible.

"Um... Emi-chan... why is everyone singing?"

Baigan has posed:
Meanwhile, beneath the earth's crust...

GNRN GNRN GNRN GNRN GNRN

"I said," Baigan shouts over the sound of shattering rock, "are you certain this is taking us in the right direction, Sir Glayffe!?"

Up above amidst the singing dwarves and marching heroes and frolicking woodland critters, the damage of Baron's assault has not yet been fully restored, due in large part to the destruction which Makenshi and Kaze's epic duel wrought. Yet the dwarves are industrious workers with a miraculous rapport with nature. Having briefly neglected their mine, blocked off as it had been by an avalanche, to call the animals back, within mere weeks the beasts working in harmony had helped to restore much of nature's lost glory. Though divots are still torn in the soil and stumps mark the places where Baron made off with their timber, even these are now overgrown with vines and shrubs.

In the meantime, however, once the boulders had been cleared and the path to the mine reopened, Heartless had invaded, and the dwarves began making a big stink about their 'new treasure' being compromised.

Well, Baron's might fears no Heartless. And besides--

"What do you think this new treasure is, anyway!?"

As their /secret weapon/ continues to churn through earth and stone, Baigan cranes his neck back toward his co-pilot, barely able to move enough in their cramped quarters to even look at his ally, grimacing with aristocratic distaste.

"I SAID--"

It's useless, Baigan.

Glayffe has posed:
There is a deep, ominous humming sound in the ground. It gets a little hot in places. There is something moving underneath, but it's not entirely clear what outside of increasingly louder creaking and sizzling sounds. At first it might be confused for a really odd hum from one of the newcomers out to lend the dwarves a hand.
There is no confusing the sudden onset of one red-hot thin beam of light coming from the ground, though. Or another. And another. And some blinking red lights, as dirt is tossed aside while /some/ largely wood-and-steel bulk of... something... tries to push up from the ground. Some plating shears off in rubbing against a rock at an inopportune angle. Whatever it is, it's big, and it's struggling to get out.
"Huahuahua!" A coughing-like laughter is barely able to be heard above the chaos, due to poor sound mixing by the English voice recording studios. "We're here for sure this time, my lord," and he sure seems sure of it after the last six mishaps. He doesn't really hear much of Baigan's other questions on the matter, as he is clearly happy with every damaging collision while the whole thing struggles to emerge.
As the bulk of the /thing/ finally does, it's more and more clear that this is a Baron airship that has been refitted (...we're using this term loosely) for underground travel. Mostly by blasting all the dirt and rock in its way, as opposed to any real conventional method of tunneling - and it shows, with how hideously uneven the laser battery array is situated in the front hull. Most of it has probably melted or fallen off due to undeniably shoddy worksmanship and collision damages.
More laser batteries and more traditional cannons line the deck with crew members of varying degrees of reluctance to even surface outside of the ship move to try and man them.
Compare this to the white-haired man in the gask mask and purplish armor, who is laughing his dark little heart out at this sudden emergence as he follows suit. "You thought I was ready to give up after that last test run?!" He points a finger out to pretty much the entire gathered hero troupe and the dwarves, a generic gesture for what will be a suitably generic boast. "This mine, and whatever's in it is Baron's now! Take it from us if you dare!"
He stops to think thoughtfully about this claim.
"Except for any of those terrible, horrible, no good, very bad monsters that prowl these woods outside the mines! You... you can... keep them." He starts to visibly shake at the thought.

Maira has posed:
Grumpy turns his curmudgeonly gaze toward Will, and looks at him...just...looks at him. "You could fall off the mountain, that's what," he informs Will, then moves on and picks up the song until they reach the mine. There is a reason single file is called for, as there is a very precarious bridge on the way. So there!

The dwarves are none the wiser to the Baronian presence in their mines, and will be very displeased to know of it. What a nice extra little surprise for the heroes!

Upon reaching the mine, the dwarves lead everyone in, ready to give them the low down on the Heartless situation. Grumpy open his mouth, ready to bellow, then stops. "What...is that humming?" he asks, then falls backward as the ground shakes then ruptures beneath his feat as the tunneling abomination of a machine surfaces to the music of maniacal laughter.

Grumpy scrambles back then turns his glare on the machine and those running it. He has never seen such a thing, but it doesn't take him long to know HE DOESN'T LIKE IT. "What!? This is our mine! You barrel of fish heads! Get that thing outta here!" Grumpy says, then turns to the heroes. "Well, guess you've got to fight them too if you want that thingy we found! Don't break the mine!"

Grumpy turns toward the rest of the dwarves. "Out, out! We'll wait outside!" And then the seven little men get the heck out of there.

Emi Dennou has posed:
"It is tradition, The Network informs Lei Lei. You should join in." Through the power of song, THE DEMON will surely be defeated. AND THEN--SUDDENLY--BARON!?

"You!" Umi shouts, pointing a long finger towards ... Baigan's left(?) arm. "We remember you! We haven't forgiven...or forgotten--what you did to poor Mr. Snaggletooth!"

"We think they explode consistently, The Network suspects it's a racial perk." Emi says blandly.

Zia has posed:
The gargress lowers her pipes for a moment, miming a stage-whisper back towards Tifa. "Helpin our vertically challenged friends up yonder te clear out some Heartless." She's keeping her voice down, spoken well below the level of the singing, but hopefully loud enough for the other woman to hear. "Rumors said somethin about these lads maybe knowin where there might be a part'a Manhattan." While she might have been filled in on those mysterious things known as 'world shards', Zia has never actually /seen/ one, for all that she may technically be a 'Shard Seeker'. So even now, she hasn't a clue what in the world they're looking for.

Since her pipes are lowered for the moment, the gargress does take the opportunity to let her eyes sweep over the others. The TDA group is easy to recognise, and she offers Deidra and she offers most of them a small, tentitive smile. "Do any of ye know wha a shard even looks like?" She asks in the direction of the other 'heroes', or at least those who are listening anyways. Best not to let the grumpy one catch them not singing. Luckily, she's saved from any angry dwarves by the rumbling, shuddering arrival of *dun dun dun* the bad guys.

"Oh fer the love of..." She blows out a breath, fluffing up a few strands of white hair in the process. Being underground is bad enough for a gargoyle, but having to fight something likely /worse/ than the Heartless? Ugh. As the Dwarves scarper off, Zia glares after them, "Wha a spectacular show of courage." Oh well, if the Dwarves were going to use them to handle this mess, then she might as well get started. There isn't enough room to get properly airborn down here, so she does the next best thing, flaring her wings and leaping up for a nearby ledge, using some quickly muttered Latin phrases to condense the water from the air and try to freeze it over the purple-armored invader's gas mask, and then shove him backwards with a passing gust of wind.

Will Sherman has posed:
Will grins at Grumpy. "Are you so sure? I'm...lucky." he says, and ignores the glare from Zia. He'll take it, he's been taking it for a long time...a very long time. He'll just ignore it, and power on through. He continues to follow the ground, hands behind his head and contiues to hum along...he wasn't going to let it bother him, he told himself...

And then Suddenly Baron. Baron was here to try and take back a piece of their home. Time...and time again, Baron assaulted the worlds...aided the shadow lords...

And now they're here to stop them from taking a piece of their home back. Will's eyes narrow and he starts advancing. He's tired of this crap, he's tired of these monsters getting in his way. He simply walks forward, right towards the giant mechanical thing, glaring towards it. "Get. Out. I am sick and TIRED of you people getting in my way. I've tried live and let live, but now I am going to try live and PUNCH THE <GOOSEHONK> out of! SO BRING IT ON BARON SCUM!"

Avira has posed:
Avira says, "@emit Hell yes a precarious bridge!!!

Signs of Avira's manic excitement about going on adventures threatens to rear its head again at this rate. Apparently this song is putting her in a great mood!? "Well I expect to find something! It's a little unusual to see a place so sparsely populated suddenly get all this Heartless attention. Near as I can tell, it shouldn't be due to Baron, because Baron doesn't control Heartless!" Yes, Avira, now expert on Baron. "Unless the Heartless are attracted to adorable forest creatures. I...uh...don't think they are."

A question is posed about World Shards and Avira answers Zia, since she does know a thing or two, "They can look like anything. We saw one that looked like an ice cream recipe. There's one we're trying to locate now that looks like a giant gemstone stuck in a wall."

Avira stops, if only for a moment, as the ground begins to rumble and shake. Then Baron's latest crime against engineering unburrows itself from the ground and out pops THAT GUY who was here last time. "Baron again?!"

Will suddenly hares off at them in such an impressive fashion that Avira looks, nonetheless, a little shocked. Laughing nervously, she starts to usher the dwarves over the precarious bridge so they'll be safely on the other side in case anything unfortunate happens. "Things are going to get ugly here in a moment so we should move it.""

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart nods and waves to Mercade as well "Hey there." She notices there's alot of people she knows here at least. Guess that's what happens when you get around as much as she does since the multiworld happened. She keeps her arms crossed, looking at the mine "So we're supposed to get rid of whatever is in there, huh?" She blinks at Will "... What an outburst of hate." Well, she'd feel the same if it was Shinra, but probably not that vocal.

Cirra Constantine has posed:
Cirra watches the group move ahead and pushes herself up to stand on the tree branch. She starts following them, carefully, slowly, not wanting to announce her pressence-

Then Glayffe has other ideas. Cirra puts one gloved hand over the faceplate of her helmet as she resists the urge to groan. "Blast it." she settles for whispering a curse.

The Dark Knight starts jumping through the trees and then drops to the side of the mountain and runs up it's side.

At least those two make a good distraction.

Maira has posed:
Baron. Why does it always have to be Baron!? They are just /everywhere/ ruining /everything!/ And Baigan. Of course Baigan is here. Seeing him again, she can almost forget the sliver of honor he showed them at Baron castle with Kaydin kidnapped Avira and they all came for the rescue.

Maybe she'll try not to fireball him in the face this time. She'll see.

Maira looks toward Will and his outburst. Well, she can't disagree! Baron is being quite the thorn! Maira stays close to Avira, beginning to cast some protective magic around herself and her friend. Things are going to get crazy in here real quickly.

Leida has posed:
"O-oh... well..." She did love traditions but this one felt so... awkward. Plus her singing was, if she was being quite honest with herself, painful in ways that she did not wish to subject her friends to. Her family had even gone so far as to pass a royal decree that she was not allowed to sing within the city limits. Yes, it's that bad.

As the group comes to the PRECARIOUS BRIDGE, Leida hesitates and makes the rookie mistake of peering over the side of the mountain. A few loose rocks tumble away from her feet, clattering noisly as they tumble down the sheer surface and the princess can't help but imagine herself in the place of those stones. A sudden queasy feeling in her gut makes her step away quickly and she latches onto Emi's shoulder for morale support as they cross, closing her eyes and simply following in the other girl's footsteps..

The princess does not dare to look again until they all come to a halt, unwilling to face whatever other terrible pitfalls or harrowing passageways they might travel through in these mountains. The sound of rumbles and shouting forces her to open her eyes, however, and she peeks around the shoulder of her escort to take in the strange machine.

"Are... are they enemies?" she asks quietly, peering up at Emi and Umi. Just in case, the great bow across her back in unslung and held timidly in her hands as Leida watches this potential disaster unfold.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart shakes her head "Well, there's the fighting anyway." She slides into fighting position, since Glayffe is apparently here just for that purpose, which is getting between a dwarf and its mine. "So what exactly did Baron want out of a hole in the middle of nowhere exactly?" What kind of strategic importance does this place hold anyway...

You can find metals in mines, and when she thinks of metals she can only think of Midgar, big rusty old bucket of metal there... Is that Baron's goal too? And what's with the guy with the talking snakearms... Between that and the dwarves, we got a regular tent of wonders here.

Baigan has posed:
Baigan, seeing a glimmer of sunlight through the magically-reinforced windows, stumbles out of the retrofitted airship's cabin door and shields his eyes, bracing himself as the Baron Super Driller careens wildly, emerging at an unhelpful angle from the loamy earth, its already poorly implemented stolen Xanatos technology further battered by its journey through the earth. In his human form, half-tangled up in his own crimson mantle, Baigan cuts a less impressive figure than his beastly snake self.

Slipping and sliding across the debris-ridden deck, even less so.

"There!" He espies the seven dwarves scurrying away and points angrily with a white-gloved hand. "Those accursed cave-rats were the ones that foiled us last time with their miserable traps! No more! The contents of this mine will-- oh, you've covered that," he murmurs, realizing that he's late to the boasting game. No matter. He will gladly delegate to the accomplished Sir Glayffe on the extolling Baron front. More importantly--

"Neither you nor some pitiful Heartless can stop us!" Baigan exclaims, rushing over to seat himself before one of Glayffe's custom-mounted laser cannons, which he swivels to face the heroes as the, uh, earthship begins to further emerge, churning the ground beneath it. "Now taste the wrath of-- hmm--" Tap tap tap. "Sir Glayffe, this big red button does not appear to-- whoa--"

Abruptly, Baron's big machine accelerates toward the mine, threatening to leave the heroes in the dust, and then begins to bore into it, attempting to force its way inside. As it does so, however, Heartless begins to pour forth from the mouth of the cavern, much to the alarm of Baigan, who did not quite expect so many Heartless, and now is not entirely sure /what/ to shoot. Fortunately, if they're looking for hearts filled with light to devour...

"Sir Glayffe!" Baigan shouts, growing vexed at these new developments as the oversized airship, clearly too big for this job, tries to burrow its way into the dwarves' mine. "How do I operate these accursed cannons!?" As he berates his ally, the rest of the crew, at last more scared of letting the Vanguard down than peering outside, begins to assemble, preparing to man the Earthship against the heroes.

Deidra has posed:
Deidra would not be very happy if she knew a Baronian was in the mines either. She has no love for the nation at all given what they done. She keeps her head down a little bit as others handle the whole talking part. "Afraid not exacly I have some vague ideas from what Merlin told us but that's about it." She admits to the other Gargyole also caves maker he uneasy there's no real flgiht space down there. They may have to end up digging deep...to find the shard

Well it seems she's going to be unhappy now as there are invaders in the mine at this point. She doesn't blame grumpy for pulling out and she says "Of all <the Goosehonked> up things.>" The dark knight surived the fall form the airship how the heck did he do that, either way she's getting ready to ... fight.

"You think you will. Your pretty delusional."

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"I don't actually know, ma'am." Mercade replies to Zia. "I've only seen one myself, and that was, as mentioned, in an ice cream recipe. With some luck, maybe we'll see another one today!" He makes his towards the mine along with the other heroes and the Dwarves, smiling as he looks as the area in mild wonder. He's never seen a rich, active mine like this. It's actually kind of fascinating.

The ground begins to rumble, and Mercade steps back. "Huh..." He says. "That sounds almost like a..."

PEW PEW PEW! Baron makes their super amazing entrance! "WHOAAAAAAAAAAA!" Mercade yells, falling on his tush as the machine breaches ground. He nods to Tifa. "Well, Baron HAS been causing a hell of a lot of problems lately..." He says. He gets to his feet and pulls his gun. There's no way this is going to be solved with diplomacy. "Oh crap!" Mercade yells. "They're getting away! AFTER THAT TUNNELLING AIRSHIP!" Mercade yells. With some help from Will, Mercade launches forward, running over the ground to leap up onto the side, trying to mount the craft! The Heartless are another problem, but he'll think of something!

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart jumps up after Mercade, he always needs a hand. Not that he's as clumsy as Reize though, never got himself imploded with his own attack at least.

Or has he? She wasn't there.

Anyway, seeing the airship-drill-tank coming out of the mine... was rather unexpected. Her eyes widen in surprise, wondering how exactly they managed to get it in that hole. It was a dwarf mine after all. Well, doesn't matter much. What matters is that pointy tip doesn't go into her body. She jumps up along the side of the burrowing airship, following Mercade there "I got your back, Merc." Always better to have some backup.

Glayffe has posed:
"Huh?! Another flying rat girl thing!" Glayffe's attention is called to the gargoyle that is flying up towards him from a convenient ledge. He hastily brushes away at his face as there's a sudden annoying cold weight around his head, followed by that sudden push that sees him sliding up against Baigan, whom is struggling to work this blasted blasty thing. (Double blasted.)
Then the whole thing takes off at breakneck speed, leaving some Baron soldiers on the deck to scream for their lives as they hold on to what they can to stop from flying off as the ship starts to clash against Heartless upon Heartless.
"Uh, push the buttons and pull the little trigger things! Graaah!" Glayffe struggles to communicate the simple ideas in wake of his head being temporarily frozen, thawing ice dripping into cracked and damaged armor as he staggers across the deck back towards his would-be assailants as he holds onto one of the cannons, crouched over while the breeze whips in his hair on the speeding machine of his ill-thought redesign. "You! Flying ratty girls! Everywhere!" He scowls (presumably) under his gas mask as he sweeps his arm outward. "This time I've prepared for your ilk! Huahuahua! YOU! Fire! Fire! Keep firing!"
It's nigh-on impossible to keep a stable hold on the old cannon, but nonetheless the Baron soldier manning it makes good on it as he loads two cannonballs onto the machine. Glayffe, unimpressed by the speed of this, stands /in front of the cannon/ and points.
"YOU! Fire now! What did I say?!" Says an impatient engineer to a Red Wing he technically does not have command over.
The soldier decides to comply regardless of where Glayffe is standing, bowling him over with one of the cannonballs. A second one flies for Zia, in her vague direction.

Cirra Constantine has posed:
Tunneling airships, what the hell Baron?

The montain side cracks and shifts as Cirra tries to climb the side, and shadows boil out from hte baps in the stone. The judge takes her scythe in hand and steps wearily to the side.

Seeing as she's alone, she deecides on the prudent approach and casts spells of protection on herself. Let the enemy make the first move and capitalize on it.

Will Sherman has posed:
Will just looks... /REALLY PISSED/.

Will jumps towards the Ship, aiming to try and grab onto the burrowing...airship. "HOW DOES THIS EVEN WORK?!" he shouts, before moving along, trying to get to the Deck or something. On the ship, like this, is like a walking electrical problem. Will's aura moves to try and cause the worst possible problems, as he moves, punches, and tries to break random things as he moves across the ship itself.

Will is just looking for ANYTHING that SCREAMS important...or about to explode, and knowing Glayffe's designs...

There were like a million of them.

Maira has posed:
As Avira shuffles the seven dwarves back across the bridge, she might just notice that she has counted on six. Where is Dopey?

Doc soon notices this as well. The only non-bearded dwarf is missing. "Dopey must still be in the mine!"

Meanwhile, Dopey had slipped past the big machine of Baron's, having the brilliant idea that he was going to help defend the mine. Dopey comes running, tripping once over his own feet, carrying what appear to be balloons of some sort. He gives a big silly grin then throws one of the objects at Glayffe. Its filled with a sticky black oil that just gets everywhere and sticks like glue. Perhaps this little bit of mischief will help!

Upon seeing the Heartless however. Dopey's eyes grow very wide and quite terrified. Gulp!

Emi Dennou has posed:
Of course the irony is that despite saying that big dramatic thing towards Baigan, the two actually set their sights on Glayffe who--well actually they don't really have a problem with Glayffe, even if he is terrible, because Legion generally doesn't actually have issue with anybody. They can't really think of anybdoy they really really dislike. They certainly have people they aren't especially fond of but nobody that just gets their blood boiling. Their blood is strictly non-boiled.

MEANWHILE

Sarafina sneezes.

NOW

"Leida... I believe they are. Be careful. Do not charm them or they may steal you away." She nods a few times.

She gapes as Mercade goes a bouncing over the craft. That's so great! She, in this case, is probably Umi. The Emi however is observing the craft and trying to figure out what's important to shoot at. She can't really tell, however, because 1) she's not an engineer, 2) she's not a Glayffe, and 3) she presumes technology functions in a reasonable manner.

So instead she just unleashes an electrical blast for the machine before ducking and covering her head in case something flys out at her.

IF ONLY SHE STILL HAD HER PIC--OH wait there it is. She picks it back up.

Avira has posed:
"Go go go!" Avira encourages, rather musically, for the dwarves to get right out of dodge. It seems to be working and she guides them to safety on the other side of the bridge. But wait.

She does a quick headcount. One is missing. That weird dwarf that Avira can remember quite clearly because he LACKED A BEARD. (What kind of dwarf lacks a beard?!) Looking over her shoulder, she sees past those already busily engaging the Earthship and Heartless to spot the purple-hatted individual. "Hey-! uh oh-"

Drawing her weapon, Avira runs back over the bridge and finally joins the melee proper. Her focus remains not on the Baronians but the veritable flood of Heartless that now spills forth from the caves and threatens dwarf, human, and gargoyle alike. Once close enough, Avira plows into the oncoming horde! ...which does not have the large effect she envisioned in her mind's eye. Avira is kind of tiny, after all.

Zia has posed:
"Rat?" Okay, in other circumstances, Zia might be a bit offended by this, but she figures he has an excuse - since she kind of just froze his face. Maybe he just can't see. That must be it. She's still moving towards the ledge when the cannonball grazes her, pulling one wing back and forcing her to have to grab on to the stone wall with her claws and haul herself up. By the time she's gotten her higher vantage point, the gargress is just in time to watch some of the chaos going on down below.

Muttering a creative oath under her breath, she blinks, peeking out over her ledge. Another cannonball comes arcing close to her, so he ducks back down for a moment to form a plan of attack. Maybe, just maybe if she could get the loud-mouthed one away from the guns?

There isn't much room to maneuver, so Zia extends her wings only to half-spread, using her own abilities to keep her airborne as she moves in chase of the out of control machine. Somewhere in the caves, there is a river flowing, and she uses that as a source. Water surges up, flooding across the deck and threatening to force poor Glayffe backwards with possibly hilarious consequences, figuring he's got a cannon behind him.

As soon as the water washes over, though, she follows up with a spark that uses the water as a path, catching a few of the gunners and lighting them up like Christmas trees, complete with a shocking view of their skeletons in the process.

Leida has posed:
Leida's eyes go wide as the small tip of the machine that had originall burrowed forth becomes a giant SHIP somehow tearing its way through the ground. Yet another completely bizarre thing she has witnessed since coming to these worlds. Fortunately, it seems like she isn't the only one completely baffled by this turn of events this time.

"S-steal me? Why would...?" The princess swallows hard. She hadn't even counted on the threat of being kidnapped! Time to be as uncharming as possible!

To this end, the small girl reaches to the quiver on her hips and draws forth a long wooden arrow with a flat blocky tip. Nothing deadly but it will smart like crazy. Nocking it to her bow, the girl scampers off to find a good place to set up shop, eventually climbing atop a large boulder that gives her a good vantage point away from the ground.

Dark demonic eyes narrow as she picks out a target, taking aim at the most important looking person on the ship who happens to be the man her good friends have sworn eternal vengence upon. Baigan's goofy expression becomes the point of her focus and she draws in a soft breath. The bow creaks as it bends to her unnatural strength, the arrow drawn completely to the head as she aims down range. And with a sharp twang, the projectile is loosed, ripping through the air with a shrill whistle at speeds far exceeding a normal arrowshot.

Deidra has posed:
Deidra is aware of who is here she's not a happy lady given he's spouting the flying rat girl thing line again. Soon the knight will find he's got another one the one from last time infact.

"Hey Spam! What are you doing here I think getting launched off an airship woul have knocked some sense into you." Prepareed she's not sure how well he's prepared for them. Still she's going to lend Zia a hand, this guy is just plain out insane.

"This guy is insane he's got his hands on some of the laser weaponry the national guard and swat had been using just before the fall of the city!"

Where the heck did he get that, seriously? She reallty wants to know but as Zia opens up with magic of her own Deidra follows it up with a cloud of ice shards of various shapes and sizes.

"You will not get away with this!"

Bucket O Heartless has posed:
The heartless spill out of the mine like poison from a wound. Most of them seem to be possessors and pot spiders.

Extremely long chains of pot spiders have joined together by root like tangles to form spidery forms with giant snapping mandibles along the front and back.

Centipede ouroburos form into lashing, chomping formations. THe EPIC CHARGE flails into the center of this mass of Ceramic Pots, Flailing Shadowy Spider Limbs and snapping manibles. Yellow eyes peer from holes in the ceramic. There are suddenly a lot of them, from close range, all of them wiggling their limbs.

Jibbily Hibbly jibbly.

While those heartless seem to absorb Avira's charge in themselves, more heartless spew from the mine to scuttle towards those they can bring within reach while flashing, flailing tendrils erupt from the earth, from more pots that dig themselves out of the soil in eruptions of shaking, thrashing earth.
% The Heartless have arrived (Finally) OooOoooO! BEWARE.

Maira has posed:
"Eep!" Maira exclaims as canons begin shooting and Heartless flood out of the caves. This is not good! Maira looks for Avira, who is charging into the horde with all her fury--and there! There is the little dwarf! What is he still doing here!? Besides throwing....is that oil?

Maira's smile is practically cheshire as she summons flame to hand and aims at the machine from Baron!

Baigan has posed:
Ironically, what Will succeeds in destroying on his rampage end up being most of the equipment that the crew has already decreed to be nonfunctional, but this does not prevent Baigan from being extraordinarily irate about the matter. "You there," he shouts -- maybe unrecognizable without his snake arms? -- half-rising from his seat at the armored laser cannon, which seems to be sputtering back into life, "how dare you damage Baron property!!"

He swivels the mounted cannon over to where Will stands, which is probably not a terribly good idea, considering that this means the cannon is pointing at his own ship. Baigan does not particularly seem to notice. "Taste the wrath of your own pitiful lost world's technology," he chortles, "mixed with the ingenuity of Baron's brightest!" Oh, Cid, where are you when Baron needs you. But the cannon begins to glow, and things don't look so hot for the Lucky Hobo--

"Aaarghh!?"

--until Baigan gets clobbered by a blunt arrow laced with dark fire right in the side of head, nearly falling out of his seat, the force of the impact helping to swivel the cannon around so it points in the general direction of the airborne Leida. "How dare you!?" Furiously, he pounds the button, and laser blasts echo uselessly into the sky. "Grraahhh!"

In a rage, now that his laser cannon is working, he begins twisting about and firing laser blasts into the sky, espying an old enemy as he does so. "You! Accursed detective!" he shouts at Mercade, pounding the red button as he does so at him and Tifa, who has decided to back him up, and thereby foolishly oppose Baron!! "Have you come to avenge your master Xanatos, dog!? It is too late! Today, the superior technology is /ours/!"

Yeah, it's all looking very superior right now.

Laser blasts everywhere, basically, as Baigan swivels the cannon around furiously, targeting everyone he can see who he doesn't like. "I say, stop that!" he shouts at Will, who is probably still breaking things, adding a laser blast for emphasis, narrowly missing his own deck.

Glayffe has posed:
Glayffe, cannonballed, is caught in the cold wave of Zia's magical water as the electrical pulse runs through the entire deck. He is saved from the two electrical surges from Zia and Emi alike by suddenly getting launched upwards into... a wedgie from a busted mast that has somehow managed to stay on the 'refitted' airship, a horrible wheezing as he struggles to catch his breath following the cannonballing incident. It is humiliating and highly uncomfortable!
The people on deck are of course washed all about everywhere, conducting electricity making their days even more miserable as they writhe and conk out. Some manned cannons and artillery pieces all start fanning fire in wild, dangerous directions as their stationed soldiers slump against the controls in their slip to unconsciousness. The Xanatos tech-inspired stuff surges dangerously from electrical contact, though it also suddenly gives their laser fire significant more kick (and makes them brighter).
"Hurrgh! Why, why I," Glayffe struggles as he ineffectually swings a hamemr in mid-air. Deidra's rain of ice strikes against him and the mast, destroying where he is wedgied and letting him collapse humorously against the battered deck where Dopey's bunch of sticky oil crashes all over him. It's so sticky it pastes him to the ground. "Eh? What's this?"
No time to wonder about it, for he is now suddenly set on fire! "GYARGH! WOORAH!! EEEEEGYAH!" Caught on fire, Glayffe somehow breaks out of the sticky bonds of the splashed oil. He runs around in a panic around some of the other heroic sorts that are on deck, humorously narrowly avoiding violent wild laser fire--
But all this chaos has a price, for there are large explosions forming on deck everywhere from the combination of electrically overcharged laser batteries, shorted ones, and even a few clogged old-style cannons. Even an innocent plank of wood, somehow, explodes for emphasis. (Emphasis on what, exactly? Who knows.)

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade swings up. "Thanks, Tifa!" He calls, always appreciating the backup. He gives her a thumbs up, and grabs onto a stray rops, swinging up as he runs up the side of the ship and flips into the air. He lands as lasers fly around him, and he grins, standing up as he is surrounded by Baronian troops. "Doesnt matter if you have the best weapon in the world if you can't /hit/ with it, Baigan!" Mercade says, before he turns and punches a Dark Knight in the face. He grabs a dropped sword, turning to chop another rope and leap up, grabbing onto it ans buckling his swash right over to give Baigan a KICK IN THE FACE. "YARR!" Mercade yells. "WE BE PIRATE DETECTIVE! ABANDON YE SHIP!" He says, jokingly.

But really he wants to just try to get Baigan away from the bloody lasers before he suddenly stops having Stormtrooper Aim.

Avira has posed:
Avira should have expected this, what with these Heartless all coming out of the EARTH. Even then, as she fully realizes their shapes, Avira seems to recoil in horror a little. All those wiggling and reaching limbs!! She starts to back out, but it's not fast enough!

She officially freaks out when the ground tentacles arrive and even mor epot spiders crawl out of the earth. Avira doesn't get very far before one of those tendrils wraps around her and pulls her into the air. "YEEEEEE!!!" Failing, she slashes and hacks at the Heartless appendage until she's sufficiently freed herself.

Ice magic immediately creeps over the Spine afterwards and she waves it at the Heartless in a threatening manner. "Go on, try that again, I dare you!!"

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart shows just how dodgy she can be. Lasers? Pshaw, nothing to it. She jumps, flips, and even handstands through the shower, somehow evading all of them as she moves up toward the snakey leader of this odd airship. Really, she can't get over it, why put an airship in the ground...

Nevermind. Looks like Mercade's punch to the face works, so how about she tries it too? FIST TO THE FACE... actually, the top one, not the snakey arms. Those look icky :(

Zia has posed:
Why is it never just a trickle of Heartless? One or two or three... it's always some great big bucket full of the little black creatures. Every time she gets involved, there always seems to be chaos everywhere. Maybe Skoll is right, and she really is a trouble magnet. Then again, there were probably worse offenders for that fighting right along side her at the moment. Her eyes widen slightly, watching the arrival of all the Heartless, offering up some creative language under her breath.

She might have actually set up for another attack, but it seems like the strange man in the purple armor manages to do just fine on his own. The gargress glances at Deidra, "Are ye even sure we need te attack 'im? He seems te be takin care'a the problem nicely." There's fire, and explosions, and who knows what else going on down there. Being up high and far away from it seems like it really was the smartest decision. Then again, she can't risk all the carnage being turned towards those down below that she counts among her allies and friends.

"Here lad, let me see if Ah cannae help ye with yer fire problem." The gargress's idea of helping, of course, is to send another blast of air at Glayffe, hoping to knock him up into the air and then slam him back down onto the ground. Hey, it might knock out the flames. Maybe.

Emi Dennou has posed:
It's all a great mystery.

"You never know," Emi says, moments before she's launched into the air! She doesn't manages to roll with the explosion and land feet first against the side of a mine wall, electricity crackling around her legs to keep her affixed to it. "Umi! Now!" She shouts.

"YAAAAAAR!" Umi charges, tackling the machine. She ends up bouncing off it and falling flat on her back, dizzily. "wahhhh.... it didn't look that sturdy...The Network protests this false advertising..."

Emi sighs severely before dropping down, intending to land on top of Glayffe's contraption with enough force to ... maybe dent it a little? Okay she's more going on there for positioning purposes. She smacks a hand down into it, unleashing an electromagnetic pulse even as her other hand thwacks at the machine repeatedly with what is commonly known as a 'pick'. "Umi please assist." And so Umi does, picking herself up and firing

HELPFUL BULLETS

To help solve this problem. Guns are awesome, kids! Emi worries about blowing herself up.

Leida has posed:
Leida smiles faintly as her arrow strikes the foppish commander in the side of his head, though the painful impact also causes her to wince instinctively in empathy. She's not really cut out for hurting people.

Fortunately, her distraction also seems to have thrown his aim off completely and aided her allies in avoiding harm. The downside of this is that she is now one of the primary targets of Baigan's clumsy wrath and she has not yet mastered dodging things that move at the speed of light.

Thin beams of searing fire lance into her unarmored torso and the princess shrieks in pain as small holes are burned into her clothing and flesh. Not good, she was too successful at being uncharming! Leida ducks down to avoid the rest of the wild blasts, channeling a tiny bit of darkness towards her rocky hiding spot to cloak herself in a veil of thin shadows.

Another arrow is drawn and nocked but she does not fire yet, instead taking careful aim at the figure on the deck now that he is mixed up in a frantic swarm of chaos and fighting. She didn't want to hit anyone who did not deserve it.

The princess struggles to find a place of calm, reaching for that zenith of focus that seems to come naturally when she draws her bow but the stinging burn of her wounds is distracting. Black blood bubbles up from the cauterized flesh, pushing past the charred black scars to interweave together as sticky strands that fill the ruined pockmarks like tar in a pothole.

Will Sherman has posed:
Will can not dodge light.

He wasn't expecting to hit useless scrap, because he was aiming at important things. He was expecting the possibility that he'd get intercepted by people with shields, or miss and accidently punch something thicker...but putting /useless scrap/ there was just /<GOOSEHONK>ing/ genius. It must have been painted in gold, and with signs that said /hit this/.

And for taking the obvious solution to the problem, Will pays for it with villian monologue and a laser to the face. The force of the attack burning his skin and causing all sorts of burning, including his hobo-rags. Except his hat, which somehow remains perfectly unharmed somehow. Falling across the top of the ship, rolling across the bridge, and then hitting the side of the ship he starts to fall off...until he barely manages to catc himself on a railing. Or perhaps it was more useless equipment stappled onto the hull made to distract heros from things.

Groaning, he pulled himself back onto the ship, and back towards the laser cannon. Because that was a visible target that had someone important looking in it, unless it was more useless equipment painted god with signs that said hit me. Then Will would fall for the same trick twice.

Will was just about tired of Baron's crap, as he dives towards the cannon, aiming to try and grab it by the barrel, flip over it, and try and repeatedly bash it.

Red lines travel through his fists, once more, trying to find important bits around the ship to cause critical errors, as the badluck field that Will was generating extends.

Cirra Constantine has posed:
Heartless boil out of the rock and leap at Cirra. Chittering mandibles and clawing legs scrape at the Judge, bashing her about inside her armor. Her scythe swings at the first wave, knocking them aside after they attack.

This is all going very wrong. She was supposed to slip in during the fighting and escape with the target, no one should ever know she was here. It might not be unsalvagable.

Cirra pushes forward, spinning her scythe around to slam the blunt end at the nearest pot-Heartless-spider thing. She spins the weapon around her back and swings it in for the side, smacking the hearltess as hard as she can before raising the weapon high overhead and bringing the curved weapon down, trying to just slice the thing in half.

Bucket O Heartless has posed:
The heartless squirm and wriggle in dismay. There is one thing that insect heartless fear and it is-- the onrushing sound of a BOOT to the HEAD.

Or Thorax. Or-- whatever these Pot type creatures are using for a head. (A scissor type manible bounces and rolls past, jaws working as it rolls or is carried by several other skittering pots) --like that one.

So. The heartless flail and skitter away from Avira in all directions, the ice magic making their bodies and tendrils brittle and easy to snap and hack away in a flurry of brittle plant/pot particles. Several Pot heartless are smashed, further racking up Avira's eventual bill in the China Shop.

It's more worrying however when they /turn around and come back/ -- all chomping limbs and manibles and spidery legs or rolling pots and ONE LONG Screeeeech aimed straight for the Fell Squisher.

While all of these heartless are too worked up about Avira, the one trying to take a bite out of Cirra finds that it should have stayed with the others. Heartless explode in fragments of plant material, ceramic and plumes of dark vapor. The Scythe smashes through into the pot of a spider pot, the creature inside thrashing and wiggling. The empty pot rolls down the hill leaking darkness and smashes against the ground when it bounces twice and hits a rock.

Some of the other Heartless begin to boil from the landscape again, forming up to catch Cirra and Avira in a -- Pincer, of Pincers.

Deidra has posed:
It's because Heartless are like a certain alien race in a table top war game played in Manhattan. There's always more of the damn things comming out of the wood works. She's started to accept it. "He's rather good at that himself but trust me Zia! he's too dangerous to leave to his own devices hie 's like a child with a loaded machine gun!" She notices some of the network is here and she's happy to hae their help as they jon the battle. She wonders the guy could have made it big as a pro wrestler at least wuith the show he tends to put on. She seems to ahve some idea of how he fights as she well evades the incoming attack pretty well all thigns considered and keeps herslef mostly aloft.

"Little too slow!"

She stops raining ice spells down upon him and launches something else a terrible curse that might just make the Dark Knight's life a little more misrable.

Maira has posed:
Fire accomplished! Now it seems like she has way more important things to be doing--like keeping people alive.

She gasps as she sees the hit Will takes, and immediately begins to run toward him. Now, as he is obviously rather busy trying to pummel a cannon with his /fists/ Maira is glad she doesn't actually have to touch him to heal him. "Uist! There!" she says to her ghostly companion, pointing to Will.

In an instant, a cool, tingling feeling should wash over Will, hopefully healing a good deal of the damage he just sustained.

Meanwhile, Dopey has disappeared again. Apparently, he's good at going overlooked!

Cirra Constantine has posed:
The pincer attack (with pincers) blindsides Cirra. The mandibles crushing the armor aroundher upper arm, "Nhg!" She grimeces and tries fruitlessly to shake the insect heartless off.

"Damn you!" The weapon in her hand swings up and is stabbed directly down at the pot-spider, trying to pinit in place while she extracts her arm. The weapon is puleld backa nd swung across the spider's legs, aiming to knock it down and then pulled with force as she sings around on her heel, aiming to fling the spider off hte mountain side.

Baigan has posed:
Needless to say, Baigan takes Mercade's joke completely at face value.

"A pirate and a pest!" the pompous courtier shouts in rage, his human form doing nothing to disguise the monstrous immensity of his wrath. He suspected that the dwarves would gather some foolish heroes to purge the mines of Heartless, but to think they would be all his least favorite people! "I knew you were nothing but aaARGGHH--"

Baigan is dropkicked right out of his seat and directly into Tifa's waiting arms, if by 'waiting arms' you mean 'punch', which I do. The hapless captain is flung directly into Tifa's attack, which then sends Baigan rolling across the careening deck with a wail. The laser cannon spins around firing wildly in the absence of a controller, one of its blasts striking Mercade, until Will seizes it and smashes it to smithereens, the field of misfortune surrounding him causing nearby cannons to spontaneously combust as well, as if they needed any help. Crew members go fleeing for the cabin, not particularly wanting to get caught in the crossfire on this particular misadventure--

"For Baron!!"

At least until, reeling, Baigan staggers to his feet, and rallies his guardsmen to him. The Earthship (let's just go with Earthship) is still trying to burrow its way, somewhat fruitlessly, into the mine where whatever the dwarves's special treasure is must surely be located, and the sound of grinding stone threatens to drown everything else out and set folks' teeth on edge. Nevertheless, those guardsmen accompanying Baigan move to surround him, raising their shields even as most of Glayffe's handiwork sends up showers of sparks in every direction. "Eject these fools from the premises!" Baigan shouts.

"The premises, sir?" asks one of the guardsmen.

"The ship! The sh-- just-- just beat them up!"

Drawing his sword, electing not to transform so that he will still be able to manipulate the upgraded technology once he can get back to it -- as much as his snakearms clamor to be released -- Baigan and his minions rush forth to meet the nearby foe. Four guardsmen each rush in an attempt to pile on Will and Tifa, desperately swinging their swords and/or hiding behind their shields at the heroes, while Baigan, flourishing his saber, leaps at Mercade, a cackle escaping his thin lips. "I shall deal with you myself, and dispose of you at last! You have been a thorn in Baron's side for too long!!" A series of elegant cuts and thrusts hint at the honorable past of this once-noble man. For all his buffoonry, his fencing is nothing to scoff at.

Everything else, though, scoff away.

Avira has posed:
Avira used Flail! It's not very effective...

The huntress holds onto the magic, keeping it stored in her charged sword for now, just happy to have her feet back on the ground. It was not fun being in the air not on her own power! Though as if she had thought that bad, the unpleasant ear-splitting screech that follows is perhaps worse. She feels her concentration starting to fade.

When she's regained her senses, the Heartless have formed up around her on both sides. She backs away, only to find herself bumping into a familiar face: Cirra. She startles a little at the sight of the judge, but doesn't spend time questioning her presence.

Leaping away from Cirra, Avira swings her weapon in a wide arc which shaves off a large blast of ice magic into a spreading crescent shape. The projectile cleaves through the Heartless before her with relentless momentum.

Glayffe has posed:
Glayffe, being completely terrible, is still running around the deck like a complete lunatic on fire, because he is on fire. He may or may not be a complete lunatic, but the undeniable part is that he is on fire, something that Zia, er, "helps" with as she blows him out. Namely, the magical winds blow so hard that he is thrust through an opening on the deck with such a thud that it shakes the entire poorly-refit vehicle.
There's a muffled 'thank you' in there somewhere as Glayffe crawls back up out of the hole, steam and smoke rising off of him.
"Grr! That does it! You've had the run of my time long enough! It's time we say goodbye!! So, check out my brand new Anti Flying Rat Girl Cannon Thing!" For once, it seems like a thing of complete majesty, maybe even actual engineering might as a steel cylinder rises up, tilting downwards. A huge cannon with lasers strapped around the outer rim, as if to give the cannon an even more menacing payload on top of a single large cannonball. "I'm going to blow you away! I'll even forget you existed or something. Huahuahuahua--"
Just as he raises his hand to hit the button. Emi whacks at the base of it. Some bullet shots point it upwards in recoil. The electrical surge causes it to, well, shudder and shake. It then stops doing anything, seemingly powering down with a hiss. Glayffe stops laughing and peers off to the side, though the ajar goggles on his gask mask do not reveal what he may be thinking. Confusion? Anger? Disappointment? He decides to crawl up top to the barrel and peer inside.
He is rewarded with this violation of common sense with an incredibly violent explosion. He disappears into the fiery mushroom cloud that forms from the seeming super-gun's ruins as he staggers through the smoke. He is somehow coughing a lot despite wearing a gas mask, dark indigo-purplish armor sheared apart in places and his white hair singed as a plume of smoke escapes one of the mouth-vent things.
He is angry. With a roar, he raises up his hammer, gathering dark energy... but then ice spells rain around him in a halo as her curse of withering makes the terrible darkness gathering around the hammer disappear.
"Nuts!" He spits out as he digs behind his back. "You things don't respect my genius and all the time and effort I put into these things! Now I'm gonna have to get you the usual way!" He reveals he's holding onto three oddly-shaped black... ball things? With a strangely dramatic flourish, he sweeps his hand atop them. "Baron can't fail now! Huahuahuahua!"
Suddenly cowering in the foetal position, the three black ball things sail through the air. Then they explode into pretty dark purple plumes of fiery darkness. Dark fire? Well it's purplish so it's probably safe to assume that the lot of them are about to be exploded in darkness unless they beat feat.
"Let me know if you're blown up already!" Glayffe asks above the carnage of exploding dark grenades of darkness and explosions.

Will Sherman has posed:
A dogpile of troops?!

They were /everywhere/ trying to dogpile him and drag him into the ground. "DON'T TASE ME BRO!" he shouts out, before...

The dogpile lands, however, Will is where he needs to be, and out form the dogpile, disney style, he slides out and starts running for Baigan. His eyes narrowed, as he moves to try and flank Baigan, while Mercade his attention. His fists rain down, as he punches, strings of fate start to appear, tearing and breaking these things, trying to weaken his grip on fate for the engagement, it's...not a fun feeling, combined with actual physical damage by repeatedly being punched in the back, before Will follows it up to a kick in the rear.

"Seriously. /The the <GOOSEHONK> out!/"

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Now that one hurt. As the Baron captain slices down toward the barmaid, the airship gets shaken, probably hitting some vein of harder ore or something, not allowing her to get her footing back properly, just in time for the sword to slash her down across the chest. That will leave a mark. She reels back, arm over the gash that it made. But hey, she can still move. "What the hell do you want with these mines anyway, there's nothing for you to find here! Or are you trying to disturb the drawves because you can?" Baron was the master of the skies, why would they want to bury their airship down in a hole like this, makes no sense to her.

But hey, punching worked the first time, how about some more knuckle sandwhich? Even without Mercade to toss him into her fists, she's more than capable of aiming one herself. Or a boot to the side of his head too. That's always good (for her).

Zia has posed:
It would be foolish not to take Deidra's warning to heart, especially as the other gargress has far more combat experience than Zia. She's just sweeping around the ceiling of the cave when the strange man comes out with that huge weapon that apparently has been made to take care of creatures like them. "Do ye think he's overcompensating?" Zia asks towards the other 'flying rat', a smirk on her lips. It's really quite hard to take this seriously.

Even more so when the gun backfires quite literally in Glayffe's face. "Looks like ye'll havete be goin back te the drawin board. Too bad." Zia scrambles back up onto the ledge just in time to see those firy balls of darkness coming towards her. Drawing her wings in, Zia uses them as a form of shield, then flares them outward again, sending the nearest of the plumes of 'fire' right back towards their maker.

With the close confines and so many people fighting all around her, there is no way to truly call down the pure power that she has at her command, so instead the gargress decides to try something a little different. It would start with a little unhappy stormcloud that forms right over the poor, abused Baronite. Alas, the storm seems content to make him unhappy too, as the tempest in miniature starts trying to follow him around, aiming lightning bolts at his rear end.

Bucket O Heartless has posed:
The heartless are shaken and stirred and thumped soundly, some of them even pinned in place while they are flung off mountainsides. The thing about Heartless however, is that no matter what is done to them, if there are enough of them-- they just keep coming.

When Avira sweeps through with a spreading blast of ice magic carved off like so much ice turkey, Heartless freeze in place. They explode with the craackling snaps of exploding trees in winter. Dark vapor roiling across the ground as the darkness of their forms is temporarily disrupted.

But if there are enough of them.. and there is no great light to push their darkness back, they simply keep coming. They are implacable. It is these mindless hoardes that have consumed worlds. Not any one dark champion, but these scuttering, flailing masses by the tens and the hundreds.

The entire mountainside is churned up by the emergance of yet more shadowy shapes. They cluster together, as though these pots were organizing a union rally for the fair and organized treatment of Heartless Ceramic Objects.

Hey.. Those-- those pots are stacking. This should not be a Game Mechanic available to them.

The Heartless start to loom in large whirling, wiggling towers of plant tendrils, seed cannons and pots. All of them are aimed at Cirra and Avira.

Go Go Heartless Seed Tower Cannons!

Leida has posed:
Through squinted eyes, Leida attempts to force her vision to clear, the distant shapes upon the deck of the ship swimming in and out of focus as the act of her demonic body renewing itself sends tendrils of pain streaking throughout her body. The girl's grip on her weapon wavers, the tension of the bowstring going taut and then slack several times as she tries to get her meager constitution back together.

'Well this is just sad.'
'Sad, indeed.'
'To think this weak little kitten was the one who killed me! Oh I'll never live this down...'
'But we're already dead...'

A sudden storm of voices echoes in the princess' head and she snaps her eyes open, whipping around to find the source. "W-who...?" There is no one around at all, everyone that she can see is tied up fighting off the invaders in some capacity or stemming the tide of Heartless unleashed by their carelessness. Deep overwhelming apprehension overtakes the girl and her shoulders hunch up as she takes cover behind the rocks again. "Where are you?"

'Inside of you, ofcourse. Don't play dumb.'
'I don't think she knows...'
'What?! How can...? Okay, look kitten. You killed us. We're dead. But since that thing inside of you was sealed away, we got sealed with it. So now we're here. Understand?'
'We can help you... just call on our power.'
'Grrr... I'm not real happy about helping the person that killed me but we don't really have a choice here and besides... it looks like you need it.'
'Don't mind him. Just call us and we'll come.'

"I... but... how...?" Her questions are cut off by a massive explosion from the ship. The princess ducks timidly out of habit but her rock is a pretty good distance away and solid enough to provide protection from any stray shrapnel. There was no time to get the specifics now, they needed her help! Probably not, actually, but she wasn't going to just sit here and be useless if there was another option.

Putting on her best serious look, Leida steps into the open again and raises her bow, lining up another shot. This time the arrow in question is tipped with a glinting steel blade, its flared edged serrated and dangerous. She concentrates, eyes narrowing upon the back of the Baronite commander as he charges into melee, taking he time to place the shot. A few inches off the mark could be disastrous.

And then the moment comes. The shot is released and fell black demonfire rises up to engulf the projectile, leaving a nauseating streak of darkness across the sky as it bears down upon Baigan.

"Please! Lend me your power!" One after another, a half dozen puffs of green flame appear in the air about the princess, hovering lazily for a few seconds before they spiral off after the arrow, each one attaching itself to one of the Baron troops. They whirl about, darting in and out of their fields of view like annoying insects, smacking into their face and arms and generally making a nuisance of themselves as they weave curses from the world of darkness upon them.

Emi Dennou has posed:
You mean Four Berin.

"Why is he looking inside the cannon?" Umi asks of Emi or perhaps anybody who happens to be around her.

"Do not look inside either." Emi says, feeling that she really has to give this order. They just recently avoided SUPER DEATH at the hands of a time guy and really getting your head blown off by a cannonball isn't much of an improvement to that. Glayffe is truly terrible and Emi is about to admit that no she doesn't respect Glayffe's genius when suddenly he draws out... BOMBS. OF DARKNESS. DARK BOMBS. Maybe he is a genius?? Well no probalby not, Emi reflects, after considering the amount of times Glayffe got himself shot with artillery this day. She is about to counterattack when--

ZA PURPLE HAT! Where did that dwarf go?! Emi swirls around but, too late! He's gone. Emi isn't feeling too ingenius after that either, but she supposes any dwarf named Dopey has gotta know a thing or two about the world. She settles and focuses on the matter at hand.

THERE IS EXPLOSIONS

After a moment of explosion, Emi says, "I have exploded. Please close your eyes so you get the victory cake, The Network congratulates you on exploding The Network."

Umi frowns faintly. There's no way Glayffe is going to fall for that, is there?

As it stands some DARK SHRAPNEL managed to lodge itself into Emi's arm, but this doesn't stop her from attempting to drop a massive electric blast down upon Glayffe! It might be easy to avoid if Glayffe kept his eyes open, but if he did that he lost all rights to his Victory Cake!!!!

Deidra has posed:
Deidra has only more by grace of getting into trouble. Or following after her friends in the TDA, really they are trouble magnets all of them are when you get down to it. "I think that's pretty much obvious. He totally is, The worst part is he's actually serious about this."

She is smirking gith bak at the other Gargress but after all that magical output she's been dishing out she's going to need to pull back and recover that's saves her from his brutal counter attack. She's got time to get a barrier up and she's managed to prepare it well enough that black ball bounces off it and falls away from her, then it explodes out of range to harm Deidra

"Sorry it was a dud!"

Avira has posed:
Alas, Avira has no great light to her. Just a small one, kept in a crystal around her neck. Since this was a fight, though, that necklace had been shoved down into her breastplate so it doesn't swing up and smack her in the eye. "GUYS!!" Avira calls out, "WHEN YOU ARE DONE PLAYING WITH BARON I COULD /USE A LITTLE HELP OVER HERE/!" Sure, there was Cirra at her side but she's actually unsure about calling the judge an ally. She was a citizen of Rabanastre and basically beholden to these judges.

Jabbing her ice-laden sword through a pot, Avira spins to find them both being shadowed by huge eldrich tentacles of stacked Heartless. They spin and she sees the ends click open, pointed down at her. Her eyes widen and Avira runs...

...she runs AT the wiggling plant tower mass. If they wanted to shoot her, they'd have to risk shooting itself to do so!. In fact, one such plant does just that. With a mighty swing of the Spine and a silver shimmer of power on her part, Avira slaps the projectile into the plant cannon tower.

Avira continues to dodge and duck between the stalks, not really afraid of getting close to the Heartless when they've formed up like this.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade removes Baigan from his seat at the cannon only to find that he is far more capable with a blade than a blaster. The Detective rolls, clumsily trying to block the strikes so he can get away, but Baigan overpowers and out-finesses him, knocking the borrowed weapon aside and slicing Mercade up. "Damn!" He curses, his wounds weakening him and causing him to stagger back. "I'm not going to die today, Baigan!" Mercade retorts, ducking and rolling away from the next slash as rock bits fly overhead from the grinding front of the machine. "The only reason I've been a thorn in your side is because you've been trying to conquer everything! This is too much, Baigan! You're going too far!"

Glayffe runs past in the background, on fire, and Mercade glances over at the guy, then back to Baigan. "Where do you /get/ these people?" He asks... And then he leaps upwards into the 'rigging' of the airship, trying to keep his distance from that deadly blade as he tries to draw Baigan towards something explosive. Like that thing Glayffe is messing with, that looks perfect. "OH CRAP!" Mercade yells, pointing past Baigan. "IT'S THE KING OF BARON ON A FLYING MANATEE!"

Provided that Baigan falls for it, Mercade swings from another convenient rope, kicking for Baigan. "YOINK!" He has to say yoink, that's how this WORKS.

Cirra Constantine has posed:
Cirra didn't see Avira until after she flung a heartless off the mountain. It's only then that she sees the other woman, and in turn realizes she's been seen. "You-"

But before she can react to Avira, the Heartless form up in to seed cannons, and a seed smashes right into the ground at cirra's feet, tossing her up into the air as the second seed explodes itno tendrils, wrapping around the Judge, squeezing the air out of her lungs, hhgn.

Cirra squeezes her eyes shut in mid air and pries her arms outward, tearing through the vines. She takes hold of her scyth as gravity taks hold of her and she drops down to the ground. It drops like an executioner's axe as she passes the heartless. As she lands, she spins around on her heel, holding the weapon out horizontally to try and chop the tower down.

Glayffe has posed:
Glayffe sure isn't looking to see his handiwork because he's pretty sure he knows how all things look after they are nice and blown up. It may be pathetically humorous how he twitches and visibly cowers on the deck. "Are they gone yet? Are they gone yet?" He chants to himself.
Emi chimes in as the stormcloud forms over him. He suddenly throws his arms up. "BARON WHOO!! BARON IS BEST!" He doesn't even think to look behind himself where they're all making fun of him, as the victory(?) rain soaks him. "Wait. This place has cake? In here? They make cake in mines?" He scratches his head. His eyes are open, though, so he is technically forfeitting Victory Cake as he looks around. "I don't see any... cake. The cake's a--"
Then, suddenly, the two incredible electrical strikes of Emi and Zia intertwine together into one blindingly bright, all-encompassing thunderbolt that makes his white hair stand out on end as they get a glimpse of his skeleton. (His skeleton is somehow also wearing a gas mask. Make of this as you will.)
The leftover fiery plumes from the deflected explosions catch up soon after, launching Glayffe up, up, and away from the out-of-control landship as he sails past the trio.
"Curse you caaaaaaaake!" His voice becomes increasingly distant as he falls further and further behind, bouncing like a ball a couple times before he lands in a charred, collapsed heap.
"I was... getting... hungry..." He raises an arm up, and then goes limp.

Zia has posed:
With the crazy inventor blasting off (again?), Zia takes the opportunity to land back on the ground level of the mine, looking this way and that to try to see where she can lend a hand. While the others take center stage, the white gargress sinks to the background, dealing with a few Heartless that have broken off from the main groups, which is where she'll remain quite occupied for likely the rest of the fight.

Baigan has posed:
Baigan's minions do not have much luck. Baigan's Earthship is having even less so. The collateral damage from their battle -- and, let's face it, all the magic that's being rained down on Glayffe -- aren't doing much for the state of the deck, and it doesn't look as though their big drill is making much progress right now. All the damaged laser cannons and energy converters, linked in all the worst of ways to the ship (by the worst engineer ever, and by worst I mean best, and by best I mean worst), are beginning to overheat, and explosions are echoing all over the big mechanical abomination, only adding to the chaos and the overwhelming din of churning rock. The ship, nosing its way into the mine, is churning up big divots in the earth around its hull, to little avail.

Baigan himself, however, could have done worst. After his assault on Mercade, sensing the eerie intuition that something very bad is about to befall him -- that odd feeling you get that your luck is just about to turn sour -- he rounds on Will Sherman. "You!" he barks, for once not hissing. "You're one of those pesky detectives too, aren't you! It's high time I dealt with all of youuarhgh--" He staggers backward, forced to shield himself from the furious hobo's blows, and, wouldn't you know, unluckily slips and half-collapses, making it difficult to fend his adversary off. Yet manipulating someone's threads of fate in the heat of battle can surely be no simple task. Baigan's technique is unfoiled, and even in his fallen state he sneers and slashes away viciously, forcing Will back as he rises to his feet. "Despicable swine," he scoffs, "to think that you would oppose the almighty whaa--"

And then Tifa is there, a flurry of fists. Yet Baigan has regained his poise, and with several quick flourishes parries the martial artist's initial assault with the flat of his blade and then hops back, steel flashing as he reasserts the distance between them. "Accursed woman. How many fools dare oppose the unassailable dignity of Baron no-- His Majesty!?" Baigan spins on his heels, only to see Glayffe, uh, on fire, at this point. The shocked aristocrat deadpans, then frowns. "Sir Glayffe, I realize that the depth of some of your schemes may be beyond me--" Another malformed cannon explodes behind him. "--but I must ask why precisely you--"

But no one will ever know, because Mercade kicks him in the face. /Again/. "Aaargh!" Baigan flails about with his saber wildly, maybe scratching the detective as he swings by, before collapsing in a heap. "Ridiculous... you scum will never understand... what needs to be done to exert /order/ in these worlds..." Groaning, he begins to pull himself to his feet. "...so long as you exist... gghh..." Even in his human form, he seems to regenerate slowly, but not as swiftly as usual.

"Captain!!" Seeing their lord slumped and temporarily confounded by the heroes, the guardsmen, recovering themselves from their failed dogpiles, gather around Baigan defensively. One of them pipes up as they defiantly raise their shields. "We'll protect--"

It's then that Leida's arrow descends from the sky, blasting directly into Baigan, utterly flooring him, the wood of the deck beneath splintering. He doesn't move, and there's an awkward silence as the guardsmen stare blankly at the felled captain, shields going slack. But before anyone can say anything, ethereal fire descends upon them too, and wailing and screaming, the panicking guardsmen scatter, trying to swat away the tortured souls and their foul curses.

"...nngh..."

Eventually, shaken, Baigan drags himself to his feet on weak legs. "N... no matter," he announces, ignoring the fact that most of the deck immediately surrounding him has caught fire at this point. "You miscreants... will never overcome Baron's glory... and right to all shiny treasures everywhere!" Well said, Baigan. Inspired by love for his King, and maybe disappointed that he was not in fact here on a flying manatee, Baigan's sword gleams and he leaps about, with all of his strength cutting a swath through the heroes arrayed before him, attempting to dance between Will, Tifa, and Mercade as best he can, leaping and rolling as need be. It's a rather stupendous display, but of course, it's all for the sake of Baron. And what can't Baigan do for Baron!?

"W... wait," he manages, after about ten seconds of this, chest heaving, broken into a sweat, raising a hand palm out. "T... time out. Just... just need to catch my breath... huff... huff... whew."

Just change into a snake monster already, Baigan.

Bucket O Heartless has posed:
Ashes. Ashes. We all fall down.

Klonk. Plink. Rumble. BANG. /SMASH/ -- Annnnd other shaking apart sounds. As the heartless don't have enough sun power to place convieniently placed potato heartless shields to keep off the rampaging Judges and Aviras, they go down pretty quickly. The seed launched by Avira back at the cannon lodges there, causing several pots to explode in chain reaction explosions. Pottery EVERYWHERE.

Those shards start to jump and bounce on the mountainside-- and-- there is nothing to be providing the tremors in that part of the battlefield. The shards jump again as something appears to be tunneling itself up from beneath the earth.

While it does so, the poor tattered remants of the Heartless towers mill and flail at Avira and Cirra,

Heartless uses FLAAAIL. It is not very effective.

Will Sherman has posed:
"GOD DARN IT! STOP LIMIT BREAKING!" Will shouts!

Narritive awareness: GO!

Will moves, trying to become a leaf in the wind between Baigan's attacks, but this time fate would not have him avoiding the LIMITBRAKU!

So Will gets stabbed alot, but luckily he avoids actually taking anything life threatening, but it /hurts/ horribly.

"Yeah, I am. You helped destroy my home." he says, his right hand starting to glow red. It is not so hard for Will to screw with fate in battle, it's /sort of how he does anything/. However, he runs right towards Baigan, the fist glowing bright red, before he aims to slam Baigan upwards, aiming to grab him by his arm, and repeatedly drag him into the ship's deck.

Before he slams that hand RIGHT into the captain's chest, aiming to litterally destroy any threads of fate he can...it is a uniquely painful feeling by attempting to erase someone's existance. Will share's this pain.

Emi Dennou has posed:
Emi watches nonchalantly as Glayffe engages in Glayffe like behavior and fails to get cake Glayffeishly but really it's her own fault because she never intended to give Glayffe cake. She is kind of surprised that worked.

She looks for Zia to try and thank her and maybe exchange notes and addresses so they could sleep over sometime and talk about electricity and its many uses late at night, giggling under the covers as they talk about various things that Emi guesses that people talk during sleepovers. Magnetic domain theory? She assumes so anyway.

But she can't find Zia and her head hangs, slightly, as she thinks on what she has missed...what she has lost...

"Oh, yes." Emi realizes. "Purple hat. We have to find him, Umi."

Umi meanwhile is looking at Leida who seems to be having some serious issues. "Er...go ahead, I will catch up? The Network offers."

Emi nods and hops down, jogging off to try and find a certain Dopey Esquire. He was around here somewhere. THAT PURPLE HAT IS IMPORTANT, she feels, and with luck it'll bring everyone one step closer to bringing Manhattan back. And then maybe Mercade, Will, and Riku could group hug again.

"Are you okay, Leida?" Umi whispers to her.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart knew she shouldn't have given him those 10 seconds! But she's too nice :( And that gets her to be skewered again by Baigan's sword. That's definitely not nice! She's getting lots of cuts and gashes now, at least its not like what Sephiroth's sword left her. Yet. But it did tear away at her leather dress.

She grrs "As long as we exist, we'll keep getting in your way, because as long as Baron exists there will be useless wars just for the sake of your own country's paranoid safety!" She's not really pleased no, but she's still pushing on. But given what little she's able to do to Baigan... change of plan. She charges up her magic to support the two fighters beside her.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Poor Glayffe, we hardly knew ye.

Or really, knew you at all. Why would Mercade even known your name yet? He has not faced his masterful malevolent maniacal masterful machinations of... m-word m-word m-word moose?

Mercade looks away from the shocked engineer, noting that backup might be imminent. However, it looks like he might really need it in a second, because holy crap, Baigan is a terrifying swordsman! Mercade is carved into, multiple strikes sending shooting, crippling pain through him as he fails to evade the powerful, multitudinous strikes. "AGH!" He yells in pain. Also, "OW! OOF! ARGH!" and perhaps even a, "MY SPLEEN!".

Finally, Mercade collapses to one knee, gasping for breath as he struggles to not collapse under his many wounds. He doesnt have all of his weapons. What can he do now? Has Baigan become stronger, or is he weaker? Whatever it is, he needs to think of something fa-

And then there is a clatter as a handheld laser pistol, fresh from the workshop of Glayffe and company clatters to the deck near him. He glances over at it, arching an eyebrow, and grabs it up, looking it over.

He then pulls out the battery pack and puts it in the right direction. "You can rest all you want, Baigan... BACK IN BARON!" As Tifa helps to augment Mercade with her magical powers, the Detective shows Baigan how to use a laser gun!

ZORT ZORT!

Leida has posed:
The souls of the damned are silent as they go about their tasks, tormenting the soldiers on the deck with chaotic movements and ancient curses that spring forth at their touch, the magics simply a part of what they have become. At least, they are silent to everyone but Leida.

The princess looks on with a blank wide-eyed stare at the horror she has unleashed upon the world. Okay, it's not really all that bad, but the language being used by the glowing green fireballs would floor the saltiest of salty sailors. Had she consumed an entire crew of pirates at some point?! Maybe they learned this in the underworld. Either way, she was going to have to talk to them about this!

Her face a bright red for no reason apparent to anyone else, Leida looks down at the ground, trying hard not to drop her weapon and cover her ears against this storm of profanity. But before a decision can be made, another soft voice whispers in her head and the princess shrieks in surprise, her shoulders clenching up with a start.

"No more! Please!" Oh wait, she knows this voice. Turning, Leida deflates as she exhales upon seeing her friend. "O-oh... E-emi-chan? Or maybe... Umi-chan?" Yes those are the only two options available, well played. "I... I am fine." Laser burns notwithstanding. "But... oh, there is still fighting going on!"

As if it were an afterthought, Leida draws another arrow from her quiver, this one with a flat chisel-like tip and deftly unleashes it at Baigan. More screaming souls rip into existence, cackling with glee as they are let loose for a few moments after several months of imprisonment.

"H-hey! I didn't say you could go!"

Deidra has posed:
Deidra sees Zia has gone off to go after some straggling heartles but she loses track of her friend shortly after, she'll try go find her after this mess is done but there's some other heartless to deal with. So off she goes into the battle to go deal with more of the glowy eyed horrors

Avira has posed:
You! Indeed. Avira can only spare the lady judge another glance before her attention is occupied by the dangerous Heartless. Seems her unlikely combat partner was a lot less lucky when facing the ballista.

Her footsteps become crunchy from the sheer amount of pottery on the ground that does not all fall down the mountain. At this point, Avira is breathing heavily, each move feeling heavier and heavier as she runs out of energy to fight. She's unsure if she can keep up this pace for much longer-but at the same time, she knows she has to. If she fell to the Heartless...

Well, Avira has never seen anyone come back from being a Heartless. It was equivalent to death at this rate and that was no good.

One of the pot centipede arms smacks into her, but it's not hard enough to knock the small huntress over. Avira retaliates, though not as quickly as she would have liked, by driving her blade deep into the pottery shell closet to her.

Cirra Constantine has posed:
Cirra is flailed at. The pots and bits of plant smash against her armor, shattering her as it knocks her around again. She stumbles, threatening to fall until she regains her balance.

Panting slightly, Cirra eyes the remaining Heartless pot towers. Avira is begining another set of attacks, good for the Judge to capitilize on.

She runs back up the mountain and leaps, bringing tge scythe down to try and slice a tower vertically, and then leaps again. She flips over and swings the scythe around in circles. She plants her foot and proacticlaly dances between the heartless, slicing and scything her way through everying in her path.

Bucket O Heartless has posed:
Rumble rumble. Avira smacks the blade, the shard of heartless going still with a final wisp of dark energy.

Oh boy. This is not good.

Cirra goes through the remaining heartless forces, creating great swathes of empty space populated only by pottery shards and munny. Scythe! Scythe dance, dance up the mountain and down. Towers crumble. Heartless flee and scatter. And-- then they start /REALLY/ running and this is not a good sign.

This is the part that is going to-- AIIIIIIE. GIANT CENTI-- Antlion?.

A titanic heartless chews through the mountainside, a vortex of debris, mountainside clutter, rocks and and other bits and pieces are pulled into the vortex as the Heartless Antlion opens scissor maws wide and lets out a piercing SCREEEECCH, yellow orbs hungry for the light of the remaining heroes.

But Avira and Cirra are closest, so it's going to start on them first.

HEARTLESS TURN. Limit Break: The First Course Is You.

Baigan has posed:
"Nooooooooooooo!" Baigan screams.

Time out! He called time out! But no, they're all mad about something something you helped destroy our world something something where are we going to get our Xarbucks now. Pah! Who cares!? What's more important is that the Earthship is blowing up all around him and-- oh, Fiends, they're coming! They're coming!!

Wailing, Baigan desperately scurries about the deck, ducking behind one of the few remaining laser cannons, which Will's fist probably plunges into instead, promptly causing all manner of horrible things to happen to it, no doubt. But what happens when Will shares the pain of a laser cannon? This existential conundrum must be faced some other time, for Baigan comes face to face with Mercade's laser gun. "How dare you!?" he shouts, even as he scampers in the opposite direction, swinging his saber wildly in the general direction of the laser beams. "How dare you steal the technology that we stole from your world!? You-- gaahhh!" Unfortunately, Baigan's saber is not a light saber, and after eating a few of the laser blasts, it more or less melts in his grasp. He did at least deflect those which strayed close. Unfortunately, he deflected them into his own ship, which seems to be creaking ominously at this point.

Like, super ominously.

Adding injury to insult, another arrow explodes into Baigan, ripping him off his feet. It's true, he literally has like three sticking out of him at this point. Is... is he okay? "WHO KEEPS DOING THAT!?" Yeah, he seems to be okay. At least, as okay as he ever is. He staggers to his feet-- and then blinks, finally realizing how super super ominous this is all getting. Like, so ominous all his crew has begun to jump ship. Looking over, he finally realizes what the cause is: not just all the explosions, but the fact that the giant drill on the front of the airship has gotten stuck, and its attempt to turn is instead threatening to rip the whole Earthship apart. Baigan stares blankly. You're going to want to get off this boat, guys. Seriously. But--

"For Baron!!"

The Captain cannot abandon ship.

It's so obvious what's coming that it's doubtful anyone's going to be consumed by the explosion or take serious damage. Instead, the heroes currently on the ship will get the awesome and actually rather empowering experience of leaping off of the Earthship as it blows up behind them, the resulting wreckage clearing the path to the mine and, as the wood breaks off from the drill, the remainder of the ship goes spiralling off in the opposite direction from all the built-up force, sending loyal Baigan and Glayffe off into the distance.

For Baron.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Why can't tehse bad guys just... kill themselves, rather than exploding their ships with everyone around? Sore losers. Not to mention the entire cave with it. Which.. isn't good, considering where they are. She moves over to Mercade, putting a hand on his shoulder "... let's get out of here, like now?" She jumps off ahead, running as fast as she can toward the exit. Fortunatly, she's still under the haste speed, so she should manage... Mercade probably has some tricks, and Will... well its Will, even if the cave came down on him he'd live probably. She's not that lucky.

Cirra Constantine has posed:
Cirra turns aside the tides and comes to a stop, holding her scythe in both hands as she pants slightly. She watches as the Heartless run off and starts to relax, "Good-"

The ground explodes out in front of her as a massive heartless Antlion comes out of the mountain and then down on her with massive pincers.

Cirra is starting to hate pincers.

Cirra braces herself and holds up the scythe, the mandibles clash against the haft of the weapon as she pushes against it with super-human strength. A groan escapes her mouth as she resists the sheer mass and power of the enemy with everything she can muster, but it's pushing her back down the mountain, feet sliding across broken potery and broken rock.

Panting, Cirra's eyes focus on the beast and she twists, catching the mandibles on the shaft of the scythe as she twists the beast sideways. "I can't be stopped, by a mindless beast!" She slams the weapon forward itno the heartless' mouth and gives another twist, aiming to flip the entire thing over on it's back!

Emi Dennou has posed:
Emi engages in INVESTIGATIONS. There's probably some phoenix wright remix for this.

Umi on the other hand, gasps! "You got it on the second try! The Network is impressed with your investigative intellect. Hm hm hm, you must have known my great power, and that's what clued you in." Umi nods a few times. "That's right." She adds. "My job--is to be the badass." She grins widely. "...Though uh..."

LEida shoots souls at Baigan.

"...Man, nice sfx." Umi says after a moment.

Avira has posed:
It's okay Cirra, Avira will be bravely eaten in your place.

Though the Heartless seem to have thinned, miraculously, any relief Avira feels is short-lived as the largest of Heartless appear and promptly start sucking in everything in the vininity. Avira, unfortunately, is of small stature and is very portable. In spite of her efforts to dig the Spine into the ground and hold on, she is dragged through the air into the maw of the heartless antlion-well, not quite. The large pincers of the beast close in on her and hold her there.

Deep within her chest, she feels a tugging. Her stomach twists in horror as Avira realizes what this must be-clearly, the Heartless trying to reap her Heart.

Cirra's intervention is likely what saves her, the fierce attack causing the beast to drop her from its grasp. Avira hits the ground running, a tiny scream of fury escaping her as she follows up after Cirra's attack, once the beast is flipped.

Leaping up onto the upended Heartless, Avira slams the entire length of the spine downward deeply into the antlion. There is a pause and silvery-blue light follows as her ice magic is driven through the sword, worsening the wound.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Who DOES keep doing that? Mercade can't tell what's going on through the chaos. Baigan, however, expertly parries LASER POWER. He winces. "Wow, you're incredible." Nercade says, spinning the gun. "You know, I'm going to keep this." He pockets it into his coat. "It is part of my world, after all."

Unfortunately, everything begins to explode! "Uhhhh... This isn't what I intended, but I'll take it!" He yells, waving to Baigan. "See you around!" He calls, as he grabs the Hobo Lad and waves. "COME ON! ABANDON SHIP!" He calls, moments before he leaps off of the Earthship, a massive and totally awesome explosion behind him as he tumbles to the ground to rejoin the others who are fighting the Heartless.

"Whoa!" He says. "You guys cleared /all/ of them out? You're amazing!" He says... and promptly collapses to the side, using a handy tree for support as he nurses his wounds.

Leida has posed:
The tiny spirit flames continue to flicker and dance all across the deck of the ship, most of them simply floating around listlessly as the number of crew on board has dwindled drastically in the last few moments. Several, however, remain tauntingly weaving about the commander as he goes on a mad dash about the ship.

Another arrow thuds into Baigan as he flails wildly about, burying itself deep into his body but to seemingly little effect. Is he some sort of immortal?! The princess nevertheless winces again at the visual. "H-how is he...?"

At the furious yell of displeasure the girl gives a soft 'eep!' and ducks behind her rock, both hands clasped defensively over her head. She gives a tenative glance up to the Legion node after a few moments as the ominous creaking begins to fill the mine.

"U-um... did he see me?"

CREEEEAAK-CRASH.

'Woah, did you see that? Hahaha, people flying everywhere!'
'Truly spectacular...'

"...I want to go home now."

Emi Dennou has posed:
"Can't," Umi tells Leida. "We have to make sure we've saved the world (1/4) before we can go back!"

It's true.