Lower Vaults of Doom!

Lower Vaults of Doom!
Date of Scene:	20 October 2012
Location:	Halloween Town
Synopsis:	Part Two of the Halloween Town Vaults of Terrifyingly Bad Ideas. Heartless. Jaunty Chicken Robots! Pie! We have it all. Come on down. Leave your SAN at the door.
Cast of Characters:	Mercade Alexander, Kaydin, Avira, Tifa Lockhart, Reize Seatlan, Oswald, Jack Skellington
Tinyplot:	Vaults of Terrifyingly Bad Ideas

---

Riku has posed:
When we last left our heroes....

Hordes of cute and somehow collectible pocket monsters were assailing the party. These cloth-made perils were deactivated by means of pressing a switch which at the time looked like an even more sinister trap.

In the aftermath of this CLOSET CATACOMB of PERIL, the two groups reunite while new challengers approach the Spooky Graveyard in which the vaults have been kept.

For those of you joining us-- You've heard the rumors. Now play the game! The great marble slab that sealed the vaults has been torn asunder, mechanical arms flailing or snapped away by uncaring claws. The room below is sparce, with a portcullis blocking the only gateway farther into the vaults. There are heavy indicators that a great fire swept through this room of bare rock, scorch marks on every surface .

For those of you still in the vaults below, a key has been found-- one that may unlock the silver plated door that branched off from the now burnt out Jump Scare Infinite Corridor. What new perils await past this locked room? It's a mystery.

And now--- DR. Finkelstein's Vault of Terrifyingly Bad Ideas welcomes you-- TO YOUR DOOM. (Moooooooo) Wait. Just a second.

(CRAASH. BANG. WOOF)

TO YOUR DOOM (Ominous Crash of Thunder)

Kaydin has posed:
Kaydin arrives with little to no change to his outfit, helmet on his head kept his face hidden as he walked down into the vaults, seeking power and ideas for the great country of baron. So he was down here. Surely something here was worth bringing back to Baigan to hush him up.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade has been moderately nibbled by the dangers of the LOWER VAULTS. He wasn't expecting that switch to be the thing that turns it off... But so it is! "All right, Avira. Looks like we're probably on the home stratch now. It can't possibly get any worse." Mercade says, invoking the most horrible thing to possibly happen to them to get queued up.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Zombie-Tifa almost wants to slap Mercade for that one. She had to fight through an army of angry kitchen ware, she's not too amused by things getting any worse right now. She shakes her head "I found a key on my side, any idea where thsi goes into?"

She was already deep within the vaults with the others. At least that winged girl isn't following her anymore... She isn't sure why, but she wasn't really feeling at ease with her following her around either.

Avira has posed:
Avira the werewolf, so far, has gotten the following loot:

- rubber terror chicken
- cloth pocket monster bat, now a stylish hat
- frosting, stuck in her face fur and now hardening a little

Not a bad haul, really! "...Mercade, don't /ever/ say that while exploring a tomb or vault, okay?" Avira says, making a face at him.

Oswald has posed:
Oswald arrives at Halloween Town through a corridor of darkness. He has heard something was planned here and has come to watch events, possibly even turn them to his advantage if the opportunity arrives. Stepping from the darkness, he pauses a moment to catch a glimpse of himself in a reflective surface. His appearance has changed -- still in blue, but now with orange pumpkin emblems on his clothes in various places. Good enough, Oswald thinks.

Pressing on further to the hub of action, the Lucky Rabbit passes through the broken marble doors and looks around cautiously at the flame-swept room. Interesting... but not unexpected. He stops at the portcullis, tapping the metal a couple of times to test it. Can he break it down? Probably not without making a noise... but is there any other way in?

Jack Skellington has posed:
"It can /always/ get worse!" Comes a voice, before it breaks into mad cackling. Something had found them. Ancient, legendary to the town and certainly the most talked about /thing/ there.

A familiar voice comes from the entrance, farther down, or rather up, the hallways. It isn't until a moment later that the figure that had spoken up... appears behind Tifa, of all places. Skeleton Jack looming over her from behind, seeming to almost grow out of her shadow. "If they only got better, where would the fright be in that?" Jack exclaims, a shorter burst of laughter, far less menacing, coming out.

"A door of course, my dear! Oooh, but is it rusty? Or is it jagged and sharp? It's important it's the right door, you know." Unless it's a skeleton key, he has free reign to the entire Town, after all.

Reize Seatlan has posed:
Who is the presence in the undead town?

Halloween Town is a place where on can become lost in. It's spooky, it's creepy. The stories of it was worth exploring. That is where the young adventurer was trying to make his way to see what the place was about.

OOoooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!! ~

The haunting chilly noise goes in.

OOoooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!! ~

And he chilly voice resonates...

Then, the ghastly for that is Reize appears. In fact, somewhat looks like himself, except that he's all white. His antenna hair is white as well.

"Ooooiiiiiiiiiii!!!"

o/~ It's Re-eize, the Friendly Ghost. o/`

His eyes drift to see the surroundings, the marble slab torn asunder, and pretty much indications of flames wrecking the place.

Riku has posed:
Up on the surface

A Victrola strolls past you. The old timey recorder slinks along on curled metal stalks by on metal limbs, the great flower of the protruding hat wobbles back and forth as the table bearing it wobbles down the scorched steps. The metal portcullis certainly feels real enough but it's open about eight inches at the bottom. It isn't even pointed at the bottom, so it's reasonable you could push it upwards without entirely too much exertion.

The Victrola bobbles into the corner where it stretches and settles down. A hissing recording begins to yap., "Hey! You-- you over there. Why haven't you got out of my vaults yet? I'm warning you. If you don't get out of there right now you umbral goons, I shan't be responsible for the consequences. That's all delicate research you monkeys are fiddling with! Stop touching things!" The recording continues to yap these harassments.

Riku has posed:
Down in the Vaults

The silver plated wall doesn't like anybody messing with it without the correct key. In fact, it starts to grumble in Dr. Finkelstein's voice. "Jack? I see.. well. I have expected this.. but this is no place for you. There's nothing here! Nothing at all! My experiments are very delicate! Please go away! This is my private property." If the silver key is used on the room however it muffles the complaints and silences the recording.

Inside is an empty room. It's large and somewhat spacious, but still empty-- except for a small blue bag in the middle. It has been securely tied up with black cord to keep it shut.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade Alexander is admonished by Avira. "Well, yeah I gue-OH GOD!" Mercade yells, the Spectral Detective diving through Werewolf Avira to hide behind her. "LOOK OUT BEHIND YOU, TIFA! IT'S SOME KIND OF GIANT LANKY DOOM SKELETON!" He points dramatically! He doesn't really notice the surroundings at the moment because surely, the skeleton is going to devour them at any moment!

Kaydin has posed:
Kaydin looks to the people with him and shrugs as he keeps a hand resting on his sword. He raises an eyebrow at the recording and would head on down. "Come on you two. No telling what type of stuff down here." He says as he begins to proceed.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart's eyes grow wide when Jack appears out of nowhere, making her jump. She's been nervous sicne she got into this town, and that's not helping! She turns around with a small shriek "Don't do that!" She doesn't quite share Jack's fascination with frights after all.

And Mercade's screaming is not helping either!

She used the key on the door after being pointed over to it, opening up in the new room. If she can put some distance from Jack she'll feel a bit more at ease for now ~_~ She hmms, looking at the bag in the next room. She feels a trap.

You gotta admit, after what she just went through... everything is suspicious.

Avira has posed:
See Mercade? See what happens when you say things like that?!

Though much like before, Avira's reaction to the newest "person" to join their party is much more restrained. She does, however, make a little face when Mercade dives through her. That field weiiiiiird. A little awful and chilly too! "Mercade! That's him! That guy I mentioned the other day!" Jack might not recognize her in this furry and terrifying form of hers, but Avira certainly remembered him! "The Pumpkin King!"

Wait, does this mean she should be bowing or kneeling right now? Avira's never really bumped elbows with royalty so these aren't things she practices. Before she can really give it much more thought, her Looting Senses go off and she looks to that little blue bag. "Oho, what is this~" she says, following after Tifa into the large room.

Oswald has posed:
Oswald gives Reize Seatlan and Kaydin a nod as they all seem to congregate in the same place. The victrola's insults and dissuasions aren't given much attention, the Lucky Rabbit regarding the device with a sideways glance and flattening his expression slightly in exasperation. "I was thinking the same thing," he lightly replies to Kaydin.

Gesturing at the portocullus base a thick blob of antimatter - a gravity spell - starts to blossom, pushing the grate up and allowing others to pass. "After you," Oswald says politely.

Jack Skellington has posed:
"I noticed something was off and it simply wouldn't do to leave it unacknowledged, Dr! I'll be up and out of here just after - Actually, with the heartless plan not going so well, perhaps there's something down here we can use for this Halloween!" He exclaims!

Just as Mercade yells, diving through Avira to hide. "Oh!" he exclaims, clasping his bony hands together, "Just how wonderful, that scream of fright~!" Jack exclaims, laughing. "Just how wonderful! We'll be great friends if you're that easy to scare! It'll be wonderful!" Of course with Tifa shrieking, it's like music to his ears. "Your scream isn't that bad either, my dear!" She exclaims. "Don't worry, I wouldn't think about leaving you out, or not complementing you!" As Avira acknowledges his regal... self, she bows to her, long, lanky, and very dramatic. "Yes, it is I, Jack Skellington, the Pumkin King! A pleasure to be with all of you. Following Avira and Tifa, Jack has to crouch and duck to get in. "Hmm, I haven't a single idea. Oooh, whatever is in here, I hope it's just /terrifying/."

Reize Seatlan has posed:
A Victrola strolls past them. He is heading down the scorched stairs. And then, a recording yaps at the group, the ghastly boy looks rather confused over the warning.

"Uhhh... Consequences?"

"I wonder what those consequences are..."

But then, that dark knight shows up to tell him to follow. The ghastly boy squints. "...I don't know... Shiki mentioned something about guys like you..."

Pause, Reize squints his eyes. "...You aren't holding candy, are you?"

But, the matter of the situation is important, he does, after a moment, follow.

Reize, the friendly ghost, beams at Oswald, "Thanks!" And he slips on through.

Riku has posed:
Up on the surface

The portcullis easily moves upwards. As it does so more than a few inches, there is a soft 'click' as the gravity spell continues to force the metal grate upwards, there are a series of louder and louder 'CLICKS' every few inches or so. The clicks have the sound of something mechanical being triggered and the floor underneath them and this little room shudders before cracking apart into two halves.

These halves shoot into the sides of the wall rapidly, revealing a gaping chute underneath the floorspace that drops into darkness and gloom.

Those who continue into the corridor find it a dark and spooky place. It seems to continue far into the gloom without any indiction of stopping, or even any light source guiding the way. Are you even making any progress? The clicking begins again, followed by a few paltry sparks. Soon afterwards, light can be seen up ahead.

It is growing quickly. The sound of roaring backdraft follows as a shock wave of hot air surges in the wake of a plume of fire surging down the corridor at top speed. Of all of the options, the chute is the most mysteriously perilous. Possibly even inevitable. There could be anything down there. It could even be aroom.. with a moose. And that would be a terrible fate.

Kaydin has posed:
"I have dried fruit my parents called candy." Kaydin says as he then nods to Oswald. "Thank you sir." He says with a bow of his helmeted head. As he goes down and continues on, the light catches his attention. "Trap." He says calmly as he would try and get Oswald and Reize out of the way if possible.

Riku has posed:
Down in the Vaults

The little blue bag is very plain, the black cord has bound it shut in at least six different twists and several combinations of knots. It will probably be difficult to open unless someone just cuts the cords. There doesn't seem to be anything else to the room, each wall shiny and sterile with the look of well hewn stone. There is barely a seam to be found. Except for a pall of dust over everything, the room is clean and seamless. A large rectangular cube with a ceiling that juts low over the doorway for a few paces, then opens up to a vaulted ceiling overhead. The door slams shut behind the group. A large and very heavy looking slab of metal blocks the entrance with a resounding BANG.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"He's... The Pumpkin King?" Mercade says, blinking his glowing red eyes. "I guess... In a town based on scaring people... yeah, I can see it." He gets out from behind Avira, and sort of tries to float-stroll along beside Jack. "So, what's it like being in charge of a place like this? I mean, you have to have all kinds of terrifying things going on. Do you treat scares like money or anything? I mean, it'd be kind of odd to go 'All right, 3 eeks is worth 1 aieee'. How would you carry something like that around?" He rubs his ghostly chin. He's rambling again, which seems to be keeping him from jumping around.

Until the door slams shut. "WAAAAAGH!" Mercade yells. "This place is going to be the death of me."

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart had barely stepped inside the room, she didn't want to get too far in...

For this reason, exactly. Smelled the trap, still fell into it.

She oesn't move a hair though, as the slab WHOOPMH down behind her, a few scant inches from her. She doesn't even turn around, she's like frozen there for a moment, and making sure nothing else is going to fall down.

"...... I wanna go home." She sighs.

Avira has posed:
Or Jack could do the bowing instead. Avira looks a little surprised-isn't this backwards? Royalty is so confusing! Maybe it's just this world that is backwards.

"Mad scientist stuff...so it's gotta be terrifying, right?" Avira reaches down and picks up the bag, immediately trying to unty it. Between the tricky knots and the big clawed paws she's trying to work with, Avira can't untie the bag.

She flat out drops it when the door slams behind them. Her fur and tail immediately floof up at the same time too, "AHHH!' She turns behind her, looking at the now shut door. "Mercade! What did I just say about saying stuff like....wait, would it even count if you're already dead?" Huffing, she picks up the bag again and just snaps the strings with her claws to get it open.

Oswald has posed:
Oswald tenses up a bit as he's diverted away from the trap by Kaydin, but heaves a sigh of relief when he sees what the fuss was about. He really is a Lucky Rabbit!

"That was close," he breathes. "Thanks--?" A pause is left for the knight to drop his name in... if nothing else pops to distract them in the meantime.

Reize Seatlan has posed:
Kaydin confirming that he has candy puts a big frown on his face.

So he is one of /those/ people.

The boy ghost shudders, quaking in fear. A bad. bad. Bad man.

"Wow...." Reize gapes, "It's spooky...." He looks around as he floats along the corridor. When he turns to see the pat ofgloom, he can see sparks light up.

And light is ahead.

However, before the boy could make it through the patht hat would ultimately lead him to the plume of fire waking...

Reize can see a shiny, shiny gil gleam in the air.

The eyes widen and he floats down to pick it up.

And the flames scorch nearby the boy. It barely even grazes him, but overall the boy is pretty safe as the roaring flames pass him.

The boy turns around to hold up a shiny gil, "OooooooOOOooooiiiii~! I got a shiny coin!" He's waving it around happily, oblivious of the plume of fire that could had ROASTED HIS SORRY GHASTLY BUTT!

Jack Skellington has posed:
SLAM.

Jack looks back as the room closes behind him, the metal block and the rest seemingly trapping them inside. "Oh! Seems... a bit simple, however. Being locked alone and off from everyone isn't quite as hopeless as it used to be." He laments, shaming his head, boney fingers sliding against his white skull. "What's it like? Wonderful! Of course not... we really don't work that way. We're all working together to ensure you and everyone else is scared right out of their skin! It's a joint effort, at least... mostly." He explains, walking along into the middle of the room as Tifa laments alongside her.

"Oh, cheer up! Your despair isn't that deep yet, I can feel it in your breaths and hear it in your voice. You've still got a whole lot more to give!" Cheery for the undead, after all. "Oh, it must be! The Dr's work is far from shabby, but I imagine everyone has their ... little secrets." He exclaims. Failures, in this one. Perhaps horrifying ones! The skeleton king walks among them, towards the bag, peering at it. "How peculiar.. I wonder what it must be!"

Riku has posed:
Up on the surface

The Victrola tips into the void, still grumbling and harping at the group as it falls down-- and down to clatter against the sides of the metal chute. There is a thump as it comes to a stop somewhere in the shadows below. It looks like this is the only way down into the vaults. The Flame corridor comes to a stop with only a large nozzle where flammable gas has been discharged. Halloween Town is no stranger to ghosts. The walls are treated with something that prevents passage.

Holes open up in the walls of the surface vault. Mechanical arms protrude from almost every available surface, including ones where it shouldn't be possible. They appear to be trying to repair the room and put it back togehter-- if they have to grab, polish, clean, spindle and mutilate the others in order to do it. They have also been treated with ghost stuff-- so they CAN and will Fold Reize into a nice sheet and pack him away in a closet inside the walls if they can get their hands on him.

Riku has posed:
Down in the Vaults

Something rigid and papery wings out of the bag in a torrent. Paper floods out of the bag in a neverending fountain right into Avira's face if she's not careful to dodge. Then a torrent of multi colored tree pulp spews from the bag in all directions. Crumpled pieces of paper. Old memos. Shopping lists. Origami spiders made from the remains of research papers from annoying colleagues. Then more junk follows. An endless pile of paper.

This must be the slush pile, where all the miscellanous junk was stuffed into the vault. It doesn't seem to be stopping at any time soon either. Plastic puzzle pieces fountain across the floor, the bag bucking and heaving on its own as it disgorges hundreds on hundreds.

Kaydin has posed:
"Kaydin, Dark Knight of Baron." Kaydin says as he bows his head to Oswald and Reize. He then looks around. "Considering that any part of this place may try and kill us, perhaps we can trust each other for the time being." He says helpfully more to Reize because he said he was warned about people like Kaydin. It was during this talk did he stop paying attention and get grabbed by metal arms. "Hey!" He calls as he tries to slash at them only to have one arm take his sword. Curse metal armor!

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"I guess... That makes sense." Mercade replies. "What's the purpose of fright?" Mercade asks the Pumpkin King. "Does it help people? I mean, besides the obvious part of running from danger." He figures the incarnation of fear in the area would have a better grip on this than most of the psych books he's read.

The bag is ripped open, and it fountains paper spiders. "OH COME ON, THIS IS GETTING RIDICULOUS!" He yells, leaping for a wall... And finding there's no handholds. Damn. "Seriously, this is just creepy. Shut the bag! Shut it! What is the /capacity/ of that thing?" He doesn't /have/ anything useful he can do here, and getting in Avira's way would just slow her down.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Oddly enough, the tall skeleton does manage to cheer the barmaid-turned-zombie, if only a little. She never gives up, but she is getting tired of all of this. She had to kick out of a pile of coffee makers with teeth, she's not really that happy to be here either. But at least this skeleton is not trying to eat her. Yet. She doesn't look yummy like this anyway.

She blinks at the sudden flood of miscellaneous thigns pile up in the room though. "Oh no, what's going on this time..." Judging from what she's seen up to now... This could be garbage disposal... which means eiter a trap door will make the entire room plummet down... or something is going to burn everything down to ashes to get rid of them.

Neither prospect is terribly interesting to the barmaid right now. She shouts over the sound of paper being thrown everywhere "Can we close that bag up before something else happens!?" Its more a question than an order though, she isn't sure if anyone can reach the bag. To illustrate that, as she tries to get some footing, she steps on some piece of plastic rolling to her and ends up falling back against the wall, with a nasty thud sound following "Ow!"

Avira has posed:
Curosity killed the...wolf? Avira had been hoping for more stuff to loot but this pile of trash is certainly NOT her treasure today! The bag explodes in her face and she cries out in pain, tons of tiny cuts opening up on her furred face from the deluge of paper. She drops the bag in the process and flails, batting further junk away from her face. What a time to not have her goggles on!

"I broke the string!" she cries out in a panic, "I don't know if I CAN close it again!!"

Oswald has posed:
"Pleased to meet you Kaydin, Dark Knight of Baron," Oswald replies, but declines adding a title. "My name's Oswald." Seeing as they've just narrowly avoided a sinister trap cooperation seems like the best idea for now, so Oswald accept this idea with an eager nod. "No complaints from me!" He looks over at Reize the Friendly Ghost. "You okay with that?"

Before having a chance to hear the stranger's reply claws strike out towards the Lucky Rabbit, him shouting wordlesly in confusion. Without thinking Oswald's hands are covered with shadowy energy, him tapping the various claws grabbing at him in turn to cast a spell to confuse their electronics. It's not long before the claws are on to his plan and try to disable Oswald's wrists, but eventually he wins out.

"That was close," he breathes. Seeing that Kaydin is still having some difficulty he flexes his fingers again to ready himself to help out a newfound friend.

Reize Seatlan has posed:
"Reize Seatlan!" That is all that the young adventurer says in regards to the introduction. He looks over towards Oswald and Kaydin, "Of course! Umm.. just as long as he doesn't offer me candy and all..." He leans over to stage whisper to Oswald. "A friend told me that those are bad people." He frowns. Nevertheless, the three have to rely on each other for the situation, "Yeah! Let's work together. Ghhooooost's Vow #2: Let's work together for a peaceful world!"

Pause. "Ghost's Vow? ...That's not right..."

Alas, the ghost is unable to go through the walls. Otherwise, the walls would not even be a factor to the traveling boy ghost. As the holes open up to reveal the vault, the mechanical arms are protruding.

 !!!!

"Oh no!" His eyes widen, "There are lots of arms coming our way!" As the ghost is held by the arms, the boy ghost struggles, "BAD TOUCH! BAD TOUCH!" Reize, however, through sheer will, breaks out of the hold and he rushes away.

But then he turns around to see that the Bad Dark Knight With Candy is getting manhandled by the arms. "He needs an adult!"

Pause.

He looks at Oswald, "...Are you an adult?" After a moment, "...I guess he needs us then!" Reize runs over towards Kaydin, a hand reaching over to grab at one arm. With Oswald usng his manipulation of gravity to disable the claws, the ghost is trying to PULL!!

"NNGGGHHHHH!!!"

Jack Skellington has posed:
Not as enthralled by the situation, and despite Mercade's rather amazing show of fear, the Skeleton King is happy to answer!

"Purpose? What's the purpose of joy, of sadness?" He exclaims, "Fear is just so wonderful though! The way it makes normal humans act so ... different, act in a way you, and they, would never expect to!" He exclaims, almost giggling, a few hee he heeee's getting out!

"But ... I will have you know I took a very scientific approach to coming to it. beyond just safety, there's a bit of kinship your kind shows, the living, when it's afraid! It brings you all together, and most importantly..." He walks forwards, arms crossed behind his back, suddenly twisting around, hands clawed! "Life's no fun without a good scare!"

Then, paper. Endless paper. "Hmm?" He asks, the sheets coming down upon him, some hanging and draping off. "I don't understand this at all, myself. What's the fear he is trying to play upon here?" Jack hmm's, moving closer. "Now, now, it has to end eventually, doesn't it?"

Riku has posed:
Up on the surface

The Cleaning Service continues to operate, it's mechanical brain still set on classifying Oswald, Kaydin and Reize as some form of errant materials or stains to be dealt with. The magic confusing the hands seems to tangling up the system a little, as the hands sometimes start to grab eachother and pull them away through the walls, sometimes ripping said arms out of their mechanical sockets, leaving spluttering and trailing wires.

This creates an even bigger mess than before. This causes even MORE arms to show up. They appear to be getting into eachothers way, one with a giant vaccuum cleaner attachment sneaking up on Reize as he PULLLS mightily on the hands to help the dark knight.

Kaydin has posed:
Kaydin grunts as he tries to pull from the arms. "Reize watch out-" He tries to warn the ghost but it may come too late before he falls to the ground with a clatter of metal, sword falling infront of him as he goes to get up now.

Riku has posed:
Down in the Vaults

Maybe it's the nightmare of the obsessive compulsive, because paper is everywhere. None of it is sorted. Maybe it's just junk he couldn't be bothered to get rid off and stuffed in a bag. There is going to be a problem here, and not in the distant future.

The bag continues to spray it's contents across the floor and the snapped strings are going to make it difficult if not impossible to close the bag again, even if someone could get close enough through that storm of paper. Even in this large chamber the rain of paper is a foot deep across the floor making it more difficult to move.

There doesn't seem to be any exits except the one already blocked by a large slab of metal. Something flies out of the bag, striking the wall with a 'Clink' almost lost in the sound of paper. A quick glimmer of metal, and then gone, buried under the paper.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
If it was just normal paper, Mercade wouldn't have a problem.

The problem is that they're SPIDERPAPERS. "AGH IT'S ALL CREEPY AND CRAWLY AND seriously is that going up my leg OH GOD WHAT THE HELL!" Spectrecade leaps up and down, shaking his legs in the air to dislodge crawly papers going everywhere! "If we don't move, we're going to be paper-cut to death!" Mercade says. The flash of gleaming metal causes him to glance in that direction. "Could that be a key? Crap! Where did it go?" Mercade picks his way forward, trying to find it... somehow. It clearly takes an effort of will to smash the papers down and sort through the momentary gap filled with flattened crinkly paper for the key.

Oswald has posed:
Oswald only just frees himself from the mechanical arms when MORE appear to claim the group. This is getting tiresome now... if he wasn't with a group he wouldn't be worried about showing his power, destroying them all to progress more quickly, but is hampered by his desire to appear normal. He bends down to help Kaydin up but turns too late for Reize -- his eyebrows raise in surprise as he's pulled away. "Dang..."

Avira has posed:
"Wait, you saw a key?!" In the meantime, Avira's been trying to grab the bag and find a way to close it. There's been exactly zero success with that, "Where'd you see it?!" Rather than wait for Mercade to answer, she sees him digging through one area and rushes over to help look. "We need to get out of this room. At this rate with the stuff flooding in, we're gonna get suffocated in this room!"

Tifa seems to be on the same page as her which is only slightly reassuring. Oh good, so they both know how they might die!

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart is still picking herself up when she sees the shiny thing fly out of the bag "What was that?" Mercade is already after it though. Too bad we don't have a metal detector handy, although that might nto help either right now.

As she tries to get back up, another slip sends her face first into all of the piling papers. If this was money, Uncle Scrooge would be in familiar territory. As it stands though, this is just a nightmare instead. "At least its not water were we can drown, but I rather not stick around to be crushed either."

Reize Seatlan has posed:
Reize tried what he could to help Kaydin. Unfortunately, as the boy worked his way in assisting in Kaydin, he found himself in bigger trouble when a vaccum arm came out.

"Huh?"

VVVVVVRRRRRMNNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!! The vaccum pull is tugging against Reize, "GACK! NOW /I/ NEED AN ADULT! GAAAAHHH!!!"

Thomp! The boy struggles as he's suctioned in half-way, then he's completely inside the vaccum tube. And those hands take him into a stuffy closet.

"ARGGHH!!"

The sound of pain stirs. The ghastly Reize is rolled up like a towel and then he is stuffed into the cupboard. It's cramp. It's dark. And he cannot hear anything. There are various clothes around.

Nnggggghhhh!

He struggles.

"...Gotta move...."

Nnggggghhhh!

He tries to reach a hand out, then he thrusts himself forward to try to break out of the cramped, tight spot.

Jack Skellington has posed:
Still peering over it, paper flowing over his bony form, Jack tilts his head. "Ah! I got it!" Hearing Mercade and Tifa talking.

"Inevitability!" He exclaims, raising a hand above the paper as it begins to flow over him, beginning to cover him. "It's ... a bit to subtle. I can see why the good Dr didn't focus on it!" Then comes Avira, Tifa, and Mercade all talking about such things.

"...Hmm... Oh!"

"How inconsiderate of me, you're not from around Halloween Town... why, I saw you on that beach, before!" The Pumpkin King adds, "Well then, let me welcome you all to Halloween Town! It's important that I do, we do treasure guests!" He adds, walking, no, wading through the paper with ease. It just comes to him.

"I imagine that does mean you'd be suffocated then, wouldn't it? ... oh.... Oho!~" Jack remarks, eyes darkening, widening as something rings inside his boney head. "Aha! You've all given me quite a few good ideas. Perhaps this year should be something less ... direct. Hmm, but not too off. Halloween is the night for scares, after all... Oh, a key?"

He looks about, "Ah, it must've went somewhere in all of the paper." They're all on multiple pages, to Jack.

Riku has posed:
Up on the surface

The hands spirit Reize the friendly ghost away into the bowels of the vaults. They take a few moments to regroup, folding up the stairs that lead back up to the surface and cleaning the scorch marks off the walls. A couple of them get out cleaning rags and polishers.

When everything has been put to rights, the hangs start to tangle together into larger masses. They detach and reconnect into a single giant clawed hand that grabs for Oswald and Kaydin, smaller hands branching off the main to flail dust mops and cleaning rags at them. They might be in for a serious clean and polish.

Riku has posed:
In the Closet

Something is moving in here. It's dark and you may be eaten by a Grue. The Closet door seems stuck, even struggling against it doesn't seem to give any leverage. The squeaky hinges have become TOO squeaky and have rusted partially shut. More effort will be required to escape.

Riku has posed:
In the Paper Vault

The key bites back. Mercade gets his hand around it, and the handle, shaped like a monster's head, bites at his hand before leaping back into the pile. More paper fills the room, the bag seeming to strain and fray apart from the stress. The paper is now almost knee deep and quickly rising, shopping list spiders joined by memo scorpions and the occasional Report Snake.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
MERCADE HAS GAINED A KEY ITEM!

"Hey guys! I've got it!" Mercade yells, holding it up triumphantly! There might even be a DAH DAH DAH DAAAAAAAH playing in the background!

And then there's a record scratch as it bites his hand. Mercade looks up and yells, dropping the key in the process. "OH GOD OW THAT HURTS I hope this doesn't mean I'm going to become some kind of horrible werekey JESUS CHRIST!"

He grips his ghost hand, the deepening floor seething with paperspiders. at least they seem MOSTLY harmless... Though he doesn't appear to notice the incoming scorpions and snakes. "GET BACK HERE YOU BASTARD!" Mercade takes refuge in anger as he lashes out at the sea of paper, inadvertantly scattering the more dangerous paper kin as he does so. "It's righ here! Let's get it before it gets away!"

Jack Skellington has posed:
As the key leaps back in, and /what/ a way to do a key, Jack thinks. Well, yes. This does has to come to the end of it, doesn't it?

"I wouldn't want my guests to suffocate then! No, that would never do!" Just as spiders, scorpions and snakes, all personified by the memos, reports and lists bear down, Jack slides his head right off, ducking into the paper, sliding through it on his knees, throwing up the papers as he powers through it.

It's almost dramatic.

At the very end, the key, which bites and has slipped away from so many of them, he powers to. There happens to be something else, however. He throws them all up, but ... seems to have disappeared into the various bits of paper. Jack may have found an 'exit', or maybe the Mayor requested Dr Finkelstein do /something/ to get Jack out of there. After all, the others aren't as important to him!

Jack, however, has left the vault... or /has he/. Anyways, they won't find him for a bit, if at all!

Avira has posed:
"I know I would...dunno about Mercade and Tifa though." Ghosts and zombies don't need to breathe, right? "By the way, if you don't mind me saying, Jack..." Avira says as she digs through the paper like...well, a dog. "Heartless are not such a great idea to have for a Halloween celebration. Sure, they're scary, but they're dangerous too and they'll certainly hurt people. You guys aren't into hurting people, right?" They didn't seem that way, based on Avira and Mercade's visit. Scaring people, sure, hurting people, not at all.

She'd say more but, between failing to find the key and suddenly getting attacked by paper creatures. Worst part is, they aren't even worth looting. She's busy struggling against the paper critters nipping her, yelping with each 'bite'.

Kaydin has posed:
"Damn these things." Kaydin says as he slashes at the megamaid and looks to Oswald. "Watch out." He says as he would keep slashing and hacking at the hands trying to cut them off.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Jack might like fight, but this isn't scary as much as annoying. Being nibbled off like that, the paper spiders and scorpions are not doing a whole lot of damage, but she isn't fond on being food either. She manages to move back to her feet at least, but still niibble upon, she swats them away with the back of her hand annoyingly "Where's that key now?" She tries to look for it, but she isn't having much luck. At least Mercade seems to know what what direction it went too.

Oswald has posed:
Oswald's reactions are sharper this time around, managing to duck and weave his way outside and away from the pesky claws. He's had enough. Sparking a disturbance in the atmosphere with his powers over darkness, he intends to short out these claws and stop them from interfering once and for all. He has his goals for this mission and has had enough of them being disturbed by annoyances. It may come too late for Reize, and as the result of showing his hand a little bit, but it's worth it to progress further into finding this mechanical heart everyone's raving about.

Reize Seatlan has posed:
Meanwhile....

Reize is trapped! In the closet! The boy has been trapped in the closet with all of the clothes. The door is stuck and the area doesn't to give too much wiggle room. Reize keeps trying. He keeps rumbling against the invading space.

Reize keeps pushing and slaming himself out to get through to the door. THe more he keeps slamming, the more the thoughts of a friend comes to mind.

How is Ivo holding up?

"...Wait, why am I thinking about Ivo right now...?"

THONK!

The ghastly boy flies out of the sealed doors, erupting forth as both arms rise up. "I'm free! I finally got out---" He turns his head towards the door behind him.

"-- of the closet?"

Somewhere and for reasons unknown....

Ivo's affection for Reize has increased!
> Reize's L.I.P.S. points with Ivo has increased!

Riku has posed:
Up on the surface

The megamaid doesn't really appear to be built to handle offensive capabilities such as dark knights chopping at it and hacking as well. It starts to come appart , but for every hack, there is still a few hands picking up the detritus of the fallen hands and dropping them down the chute in the floor or pulling them through the walls.

It breaks apart into the many other mechanical hands and withdraws quickly back into the walls. A 'Out for Lunch' sign appears on the wall, tacked there by a mechanical hand as they all beat a retreat, leaving the vault chute but no longer the stairs.

Riku has posed:
In the Closet Catacombs

The room outside the closet is lined with shelves. Masses of cloth hang in piles. Some of them appear to have teeth or at least very rigidly starched edges. Some of them resemble rats and others like little goblins made out of cloth. They all seem to be deactivated.

There are some stairs but they only lead to a small dais on which there is a switch. Maybe that should be left alone. Switches are tricksy. The stairs around wrap around this small and somewhat cramped closet catacomb to a door at the top of the stairs.

Riku has posed:
In the Paper Vault

The Paper Vault is now about waist high and the little paper creations have started to pick fights with eachother as well as the three occupants. A paper on theorhetical terror starts a claw fight with a memo to remember to pick up some more neck bolts for the inventory.

As to the Key. It jumps up out of the papers like some sort of metallic, bitey dolphin and crashes down into the paper again, sliding and skittering to bury itself even deeper into the slush pile.

Kaydin has posed:
Kaydin sighs as he takes a few deep breathes. "Now that is over with. Lets see if we can find Reize. Who knows where that vacuum dragged him off to." He says as he begins to approach the chute.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade continues to struggle agains the tide of papery disturbance! "This is completely silly." Mercade says. "Okay, disturbing as hell, but kind of silly." He grabs out at the key, and gets bitten once again, yelping as the key goes flying across the room! Maybe someone else can grab it! "DON'T LET IT ESCAPE!"

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart has pretty godo reflex, when she's not smack on her butt, and also pretty fast when she can get enough footing. Fortunately for her, this time she had both on her side. She sees the key flying out of hiding, and she moves to intercept it quickly, using what footing she has to jump in that direction.

It looks like she's going to miss it, but at the last second, one of those long legs stretch out, and arches up widely, connecting with the key and sending it flying upward. It tinks against the ceiling, and falls back down into Tifa's outstretched hand. Whatever 'teeth' the key had, it looks a bit too dazed to use them right now, and then she makes sure to hold the key by a safe spot before she get a bite from it. "Got it!" She hold sit up "Where's the door?"

Avira has posed:
"I GOT THIS I GOT THIS!!!!" Avira shouts, leaping after the key as it goes flying across the room. Her clawed hands stretch out, ready to grasp the metallic object of their almost destruction when....

CHOMP

Avira's muzzle clamps down on empty air, Tifa kicking the key away from her teeth.

Avira falls to the ground, buffeted by the paper, and whines a little. "I totally had it."

Oswald has posed:
Oswald makes a face at Reize being pulled away. "It was a good idea," he says to Kaydin reassuringly while approaching the chute. He looks down into the abyss whilst dusting off his clothes. "Maybe if we go down here it'll take us to him? These traps might lead to a common holding cell after all, then we just have to break out of that."

Reize Seatlan has posed:
This closet area...

Reize looks at the mass of clothes, freezing at the sight of teeth around.

"Gu-guh! They have teeth!"

He cannot help but wonder what would had happened if they came to life and tried to eat him. Thankfully, the ghost would not have found out.

To keep things that way, Reize decides to take the option of making his leave. He does see a switch nearby. He looks up to see if he should press that switch.

...

Maybe not.

Instead, Reize makes his way up to the stairs, getting trying to make his way towards the door at the top of the stairs. Spiraling up the stairs, Reize moves to open the door.
"Hopefully I can find those two..." His face turns sour, "And less of those claws."

Riku has posed:
Up on the surface--ish

There is a room at the bottom of the chute, should you choose to descend it. At the bottom of the gloomy chute is a fall-breaking pile of junk and one cranky Victrola that is now upside down, the recording now speaking backwards and in crackling gibberish. Of course, this is the junk of Dr. Finkelstein so the somewhat squishy hoard amounts to old research papers from disfavored colleagues, body parts, broken springs, mechanical apparatus and rubber chickens with horrifying expressions.

Terror poultry. A grim new weapon in the war against Comedy. . There are other research worthy bits and pieces now dusty and forgotten. It also seems to be a Dentist's Office. It is scored and burnt in places by laser burns. Dentist machines are everywhere. Attached to the walls are all manner of drills, picks and mechanical arms. Also everything is colored in hideously bright colors. Cheerful reds, yellows and blues.

A brightly multi-colored wig adorns each machine or bears the masked face of a clown. Floppy shoes lay in piles along with the terror poultry. Each machine has been thrown into startling focus by an intermittant light that casts shadows across the empty padded chairs and old magazines in a little rack. Cheerful wallpaper patterns and a little flowerpot sits abandoned in a small corner of the room. The far wall is lighted by it's own power, a terminal inset near a door. The screen reads 'Lower Vault Access Pending. Please give Final validation."

Short version. This one large room has three exits, with a fourth being the chute above. The middle of the three doors is locked with a heavy slab of metal with no seams blocking that doorway. There is a door set into the left wall and the right wall. Above them is an arc that reads. "West Vault" and "East Vault" respectively.

A little door, no more than the size of a quarter, opens up in the ceiling. A cheerful and nearly perfect rendition of Dentist office music starting to play-- entirely using Kazoos. This one is melted a little and so is drastically off key.

Riku has posed:
In the Closet

There is a Y branch corridor here. One branch leads to a darkened room with a pair of double doors blocking the way. Another is a Silver plated room. There is a little button with neat labeling. "Room In Use. Press Button to Reset before opening."

Riku has posed:
In the Paper Vault

There it is! On the ceiling of the Paper Vault is a keyhole set into the corner that was hard to see from this vantage. One just had to wait long enough for the paper to rise up to the key, and keep it still because it is WIGGLING like nobody's business-- then the key and keyhole will meet in harmony and hopefully let them out of this junkpile.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade Alexander looks up. And then he looks down at the mass of rising paper. "When you're a mad scientist, physics be damned." He says. "Good work, Tifa! Now get that key to the keyhole before I die from being ooglied to death." He shudders as more paperspiders crawl up into his coat.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Whoever designed this place is quite crazy, and the more she thinks about it the more she's comforted into this opinion.

Somewhere int he distance, a carzy scientist sneezes.

Tifa looks over to Aivra apologically "Sorry, but at least we got it." She eyes the wiggling key "Someone has a metal stick or something, we can just keep it impaled until we get up there..." As much as she'd like to reason with the key tos tay quiet... she's not crazy enough yet to attempt that.

Kaydin has posed:
Kaydin nods. "Agreed. Let me go first to see if there are any more traps ahead. I will call up to you when I think it is safe, Oswald." He says as he would leap down the chute, landing on the stuff with a loud heavy THUNK as he looks about. "Looks good." He calls out.

Avira has posed:
"Ooglied?" Avira giggles, despite the situation, and takes the moment to swat a paper spider away from her shoulder. "That's a new one-oh! I've got this! For real now!" Crawling over the papers, Avira reaches behind her and pulls out The Spine.

Since this is Halloween Town, it is no longer made from metal, but straight up pure bone. "...it'll have to do! Hold still, you!" If Tifa allows it, Avira will use her weapon to pin the key down until the keyhole is in reach.

Reize Seatlan has posed:
There is a path in the Y branch corridor. One is the way that leads to the double doors. The other bend leads to a silver plated door. Reize looks between the two. A hand rubs along his chin, "Hrmm..." He looks to be in deep contemplation as he muses about which path to take.

"AH!"

He quickly floats towards the door. He looks over the door, then he reads the sign, "Hmm.." He reads the neat label and he nods.

"OKAY!"

He presses the button.
%

Oswald has posed:
Oswald smiles at Kaydin. "Okay," he says. Why is the Dark Knight doing this? To look like a hero? The Lucky Rabbit is suspicious, the darkness enveloping his dark allowing for nothing else. He fist tightens, up until the point he realizes he's doing so and glances at his hand with confusion. He breathes, hand relaxing. "Good?" Oswald echoes down. "Good!"

With that he leaps, sliding down the shaft skater-style and occasionally using his magic to stabilize himself on the way to meet Kaydin.

Riku has posed:
In the Dentist Office--

Every so fainty, the sound of a giant vaccuum can be made out over the creaking silence that falls after the kazoo eventually gives up on the cheerful music. This however is not the first thing that comes to mind. The first thing would be the clown faces. They seem to start frowning in a menacing fashion at Kaydin and Oswald. The Dentist Office becomes full of the sounds of Drills and Lasers as all the machines simultaniously target the pair of them and begin firing. The door to the West Vault explodes inwards.

A rush of -- popcorn? No. It was wiggling. Popspiders slide into the room, having overfilled the room that contained them. They begin to multiply, eating everything and anything in sight and creating more of themselves in the bargain.

Riku has posed:
In the Branch Corridor

There is a roar of a vaccuum and the sounds of ghastly elevator music that plays over the roar, the plinky strains somewhat catchy in a disturbing way. Sparks fly from the button which now reads "Caution: Malfunction. Caution: Door Opening" and there is a sliding sound of metal just before the door opens.

In cartoon fashion, a stream of scorpions, snakes and paper origami spiders jump out at Reize along with about a metric ton or so of junk.

Riku has posed:
In the Paper Vault

A large vaccuum pokes its way into the room through a hole in the ceiling. Mechanical hands open up in the walls, fishing for and eventually retrieving the spewing bag. Another hand shows up with more black cord, which chokes off the flow of papers. The roar of the giant vaccuum turns on as the mechanical hands pull the bag into the walls, starting to pull everything upwards.

Smoke billows from the vacccum hose as something breaks in the infrastructure. They aren't very far from the keyhole now and the key, once inserted into the wall dissolves into sand. A little panel opens up. "Lower Vault Verification given. Watch your step. Secondary Cleanup protocol active." Then everything starts to drain away towards the floor again as innumberable mechanical hands start to sort and disappear with papers.

Kaydin has posed:
Kaydin looks to the spidrs as they blast out. He raises his sword, the blade beginning to glow with black energy. He goes to swing only to get lasered and thrown back.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
The Paper Vault has internal systems to apparently deal with infinite amounts of paper. Wooo! "YES! OOGLIED!" Mercade yells back. Finally, as they all begins to drop back towards the floor, the masses of animate origami skittering and slithering out, Mercade shakes himself, dropping a few more out. "Okay. Now what?" the Detective says, staring at the wall. "Are we really going to go past here? What if it's like, paperclip skeletons or something?" He looks around, not sure if he really wants to proceed. that was ridiculous.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart moves herself against the closest wall safely, watching everything being drained away "Phew... How many more of these vaults are we going to have to wade through you think?" She looks over to Avira and Mercade as she asks that. She frowns a bit. She's really not feeling at ease, as if something else is going to pop out any moment now.

Avira has posed:
Avira drops to the floor, landing with her knees bent, once they are free from the junk hell. "You know, Mercade, I thought about that as those paper scorpions and spiders were stinging me with papercuts. I thought 'man, do I really want to be here in this place that combines a dentist office with death traps?' It would be a better idea to pack up and go home, right? Well."

She stomps a foot on the ground, "No! I dunno about you guys, but when I start something, I finish it! Whatever is down here, the Heartless are still after, and I'm gonna get to the bottom of it!" She pauses, "Also by way of the announcement, it said the lower vault was open. So we just backtrack and take that one door. Let's go~"

Reize Seatlan has posed:
Good: The door is opening... At least, that should be a good thing, right? It would be beneficial except that it mentioned that there was a malfunctioning. Reize quirks an eyebrow, his antenna hair twitches many times. He looks pretty happy, however.

That smile changes to a frown and a surprised gasp as the wall floods before him. Scorpions, snakes, spiders,a nd origami spiders flood along the ghost.

"WWAAAAUGGGHHHHH!!!" A white chastly hand stretches out to get out of the junk before it buries him inside.

R.I.P. Reize.
"Hghnk."

Oswald has posed:
The dentist drill, the world's most reviled sound, rings malevolently in Oswald's huge rabbit ears. Huge rabbit ears, as you can imagine, can only make the world's most reviled sound that much worse. Oswald winces on genetic instinct, the same genes that all living, breathing creatures feel upon hearing the high-pitched whine, and attempts to remotely crush the machines with a spell. Considering he rolled a 1 last round however (which will be a spoiler to you folks reading this as a log but whatevs) it's more likely he's going to get drilled. Hardcore. In the teeth.

Riku has posed:
In the Dentist Office--

The malevolent Dentist Clown Machines continue their assault, hands reaching out to grab Kaydin and perform completely illegal teeth extraction procedures while the already captive Oswald has a drill ENTIRELY too near to his head. The popspiders crawl over the machinery, starting to chew into the metal, snapping wires and even eating into the walls. Mechanical brooms attempt to sweep them back into the West Vault, but to little effect.

Riku has posed:
In the Branch Corridor

This would be a bad time to reintroduce an old friend, wouldn't it? Tifa can hear banging, clattering noises in the walls. A vent sags under the assault of something behind it and a half dozen biting kettles and coffeemakers tumble out of the vent into the branch corridor. Another vent starts to bend inwards with a clattering CLANG, CLANG. The man eating cookware has arrived.

Kaydin has posed:
Kaydin grunts as he grabs the hands and pushes them off and swings his sword to try and cleave a hand in half before beginning to head towards Oswald. "Hold on I am coming!" He calls as he triess to hack his way to the rabbit.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"You know I wasn't going to give up. I'm just..." Mercade sighs, a bit on the overdramatic side. "All right, let's finish this." He turns and walks out of the Paper Vault...

And then Reize shows up. "AAAAH! GHOST REIZE!" Mercade adds, eloquently. "HIS HAIR IS EVEN MORE SCARY- no seriously how much gel do you use for that? That's so crazy man." He hops away from Reize for a moment, staring in mute horror at the spectral ahoge of doom.

CLANG CLANG CLANG. Mercade doesn't look. "Let me guess: Murderous, man-eating death cookware. That sounds like a dutch oven. Is that a dutch oven?"

He racks his shotgun and prepares to get to work.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
It's not that she got something against Reize. But she's already spooked and nervous enough about this place, when a ghastly hand reaches out and wraps around her ankle...

There's a loud shriek and the sound of STOMPSTOMPSTOMPing, accompagnied by the hanting chant of "GETITOFFGETITOFFIHATETHISPLACEGETITOFFGETITOFF" >_<####

Reize Seatlan has posed:
As the hand takes a hold for Tifa's leg...

"OoooOOoooo...~ ...guh, my head hurts... As well as everything."

And then....

Stomp. "AGH!" Stomp. "HGK!" Stomp. "GACK!" Stomp. "EEE!!" Stomp.

Reize is planted deep into the surface of all of the things that buried him once more. As he liesfrom the stomping experience... Well...

Reize's current state: X_X

Avira has posed:
"You're just...?" Avira starts, pausing to think back to that moment in Mercade's office. 'So many weird things, I don't know what to think.' Maybe he's hit absurdity overload. "Eeeeh don't worry about it. We'll get some pizza after this, relax a little?" Seems she really wants to motivate him.

Suddenly a REIZE ARRIVES. A little cute ghostly Reize that is immediately curbstomped by Tifa as she screams in terror. "Uh...I don't think he can..."

Oh no, those noises. Avira's fur stands on end and she finds odd comfort in the sound of Mercade's shotgun being cocked. Without hesitation, she whirls to the busted open vent and unleashes a blast of her ice magic on the hole, aiming to temporarily seal it. "Back to the main vault!!" she calls, agreeing with the 'running' sentiment.

Oswald has posed:
In a way, a dentist's office would be far too tempting for somebody who wants to do harm to Oswald. I mean he's a rabbit for Pete's sake! That said, he ... what am I saying, there's nothing he can do with this! Oswald struggles beyond struggling to avert his fate in the dentist's chair. That's all he can do. Strugglestrugglestruggle!

Riku has posed:
In the Dentist Office--

As scary as the machines look, they too are not really combat oriented. It takes the work of a few moments to shred the machinery. The lasers take another few pot shots at Kaydin as he makes his way to the struggling Oswald.

The popspiders are going to be much more of a threat now however. They have started to consume part of the room and are spilling towards the Dentist chairs and the middle of the room with nibbly doom on their tiny, popcorn kernel like minds.

Riku has posed:
In the Scare Corridor

The ice magic plugs up one of the holes, grumbling cookware chipping at it with the clattering noises of their movements. Grumble grumble. CLANG. A lone kitchen blender tries to menace, but is easily dispatched. The burnt out Scare Corridor is next. Except, it doesn't seem to be quite as burnt out as advertised. The corridor chokes and snarls to life, starting slowly and beginning to pick up speed while man eating cookware clatters around in the walls trying to find other outlets to drop down or scuttle out onto them.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"Sounds like a good plan, Avira!" Mercade calls, shotgunning a blender and sending it to Appliance Heaven. Or Hell. Whichever. He gets back to the Jump Scare Corridor, and frowns. "Ugh. This place again." He shakes his head, and charges forth, expending ammo as needed for Team Kickassia to make their way back to the closed vault.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart isn't going to let Reize there, considering that she just rendered him...

How do you kill a ghost anyway?

At any rate, she picks up the unconcious Reize up, sliding him over her back and running off toward the other vault after Mercade and Avira. Its a good thing Reize isn't too big at least. She would be strong enough, but it's not as easy when big like... well, Gaston or Gilgamesh for example.

And she did toss one of the two out of her bar, don't underestimate her.

"They are still in the walls, stay away from the vents!" Looks like they managed to chew through the grating Uzuki had placed to bar their way, and follow the same path she used before to escape them.

Kaydin has posed:
Kaydin tries to dust the creatures off his armor, noticing they are eating his metal armor. Before the upper portion of the helmet is eaten by the creatures as blonde hair is now seen as he tries to get them all off.

Avira has posed:
Avira was mysteriously held up by Heartless when Mercade first went through this particular area. By the time she came through, everything was mercifully deactivated. She's not sure what, exactly, when on in here, but judging by Mercade's tone...she doesn't really want to know.

"Right! I can hear them too..." mentally, she prepares herself for casting more ice magic in case the killer cookware creates any more holes that need to be plugged up.

Reize Seatlan has posed:
Reize's current status. x_X

Give it another round and he'll start to see some semblance of consciousness. The pain. Ow. The pain. He is supposed to be a ghost, to! What kind of ghost is he?!

Oswald has posed:
Oswald comes >< this close to having a few unecessary cavities and -- out of nowhere -- the machines lose power. He exerts a little more strength and is finally free, leaving him just to breathe a heavy and long gasp of relief. He doesn;t even notice Kaydin for a few seconds, . Then he realizes there are things eating him and approaching him. His eyes flash, either metaphorically or literally depending on how b4d455 you figure Oswald is on that particualr day. "Not us, friends, You've picked the wrong people to mess with." Then FLASH! A burst of shadow envelops the machines. Oswald is /through/ playing around now. His naked ambition is on show: he wants that heart.

Riku has posed:
In the Dentist Office--

The brooms sweep more and more frantically to keep the popspiders at bay, but the out of control Halloween Town Snack simply continues to pour into the room. They are stalled somewhat by eating holes in the floor, dropping down into the spaces between where pipes, wires and machinery are kept.

That may not be the best place for them... but it keeps the main horde from consuming the rest of the room. The Clown machines sag and go silent, lasers pointing to the ground and drills powering down as the power to them is finally cut, their control stations smashed or nibbled away by popspiders

. A large metal slab creaks, then slowly lifts as the middle door opens up an inch at a time.

Riku has posed:
In the Scare Corridor

The sound of activity can be heard for the main vault chamber. A weird popping noise along with the sounds of clanking metal. A few cuisinarts fall from the ceiling. A waffle iron leaps from a shattered side panel with a tiny growl but the biting cookware is not really much of a threat except in large numbers.

The corridor snags somewhere in the machinery, the floor binding up with another sudden lurch. It's not more than a few steps from the small 'airlock' room leading out into the main vault and the now occupied Dentist Office.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade hustles. He's not going to give up now! They're so close! Mercade slips and almost trips as the floor jerks randomly, almost sending the Detective flying. HE does, however, maintain his balance. "Let's go!" Mercade yells, waving. "We're almost there!"

Avira has posed:
"You don't have to tell me twice!" Avira calls out, hot on Mercade's heels. ...wait, does he even have heels right now as a GHOST DETECTIVE? Either way, she's fast, and she does occasionally look over her shoulder to make sure Tifa (with undead Reize) are still following along.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart is still carrying Reize around right now, which doesn't make her quite as mobile, but she's still strong enough that she can manage at least.

The ground starting to wobble like that though is not really a good thing. She starts running faster, as much as she can manage at least. Good thing for strong martial art legs. She's not far behind the others though, but she definitely doesn't want to stand around now "Let's go!"

Reize Seatlan has posed:
Thankfully, the ghastly fiend is starting to wake up. "Ow... Ow... I think my head is hurting..." The ghost is starting to gain consciousness. For some reason, that antenna hair seems even more lively than before.

It twitches and it shifts around.
"Ooooohhhh----- where are we go--- WHOA!!!"
So much is happening! Reize is trying to get his mind wrapped into everything that has---oh dear sweet god chaos.

Riku has posed:
In the Dentist Office--

The door in the middle opens up, revealing a set of stairs going down amidst pipes and machinery. The Dentist Office is quickly being consumed by a swarm of popcorn, so it might be wise to evacuate this place as soon as possible-- although leaving again may be an issue.

At the bottom of the stairs should you descend is-- more junk. Piled almost over head height and creating a sort of labyrinth from discarded robots, body parts and other spent research projects. This has been damaged by the passing of something BIG however, and there are oddly wheel marks on the floor here and there. The trail smashes a path through what would have been a maze back into the distance.

The skittering sounds of heartless can be heard, the touch of darkness has twisted and corrupted the machines here, and the sound of the heart beating can be heard almost all the way back to the Dentist Office.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade shakes his head. "Focus, Reize! No time for antenna reception!" He moves into the Dentist's office to see the two present: Oswald and Kaydin. "Oh, hey. Uh.... Hi." He says, at a loss for words for once. "What are you guys in for? Did you step out of someone's shadow and got lost again?" He asks the Knight, before he looks to the vault door. "Avira! Tifa! Heartless down there. Quick, let's move." He looks to the others. "If you guys want to help, feel free to come along! There's enough crazy for everyone here!" MErcade hustles down the stairs, looking around at the trail smashed straight through the maze that WOULD have been down there. "Anyone else have a bad feeling about this?"

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart phews, hearing the sound of the heat. Maybe they are getting closer to the prize, that menchanical heart they were looking for. So much for other kinds of treasures though, this place is a mess, and a dangerous one at that too.

She looks over her shoulder when Reize stirs awake "Welcome back, sorry about that earlier." She jumps into the vault, escaping the twisting hallway, and then lets down Reize when it seems to be in relative safety. She didn't want to stop for anything before that point at least.

Even if it doesn't seem that terribly inviting right now. She glances down the stairs, looking at the marks on the floor at the bottom "Something big is or was down there..." She'd ask if they really wanted to go downt here, but the answer is obvious after getting this far... Not to mention the way back is somewhat blocked off right now...

She nods to Kaydin, that she met before, although... he doesn't look that different as an undead for some reason. "I do Mercade..."

Avira has posed:
This dentist office looks a whole lot more crazy than what she last left it, now that she thinks about it! Sniffing at the air, she pauses to nod to Oswald and Kaydin before scampering off after Mercade. "Heartless down there? Man, they must've cheated! Stinkin' Heartless and their ability to melt through floors and stuff."

Loping after Mercade, she shivers, "Yeah, I've got a bad feeling about this too. Oh, hey, looks like Reize is finally awake. Hopefully he won't freak out about cooties or anything ridiculous like that."

Mercade Alexander has posed:
"God, don't set him off." Mercade says. "We need to have him on task for this. It's probably some ultra death scary hell Heartless." Mercade pauses. "From Hell."

Reize Seatlan has posed:
With popcorn swarming the area, the boy can see that things are... not o hot.

 !!!

As they reach to the botom of the stairs, they find themselves around more junk. Discarded robots, body parts, and other strange mechanisms. Tifa's apology earns a smile, "Hee! It's alright, Tifa!" Blink. "Wow, you look different." Then, he looks towards everyone, "Wow! Everyone looks different!"

And Avira mentions about the dreaded thing.

"ARGH! COOTIES!"

Panicing, the ghost finally pulls off from Tifa's shoulder at the same time as she helps him down. Of course, the ghost is rolling along the ground like a roly-poly, overreacting to the course of the situation.

"I caught the cooties, I can't believe it. I done so much to avoid it, why, th---huh?"

And suddenly, his pendant illuminates as bright as a sun. "....I can feel something..." His eyes narrow, everything becoming a bit more serious. "Everyone, we may have to fight whatever Heartless comes our way soon." The ghastly boomerangs draw, the youth of a ghost floats. "...Time to deal with the great beyond."

Thunk. "...Did you all hear something..?" A beat of some sort?

Riku has posed:
There are tanks of something lining the walls at the back here. The labels on the grey canisters read 'D-Fuel' with a little meter saying how full these tanks are. The pipes and connections are as tarnished and corrupted as the rest of this maze. Heartless soldiers and wights are loading up other heartless with these large canisters, the ones where the bars go all the way to the left.

These carrier heartless look like cartoonish cars with yellow and black color schemes and gnashing teeth instead of grills. Headlight eyes swivel in the direction of the party as they come in.

They eeriely look a little like Manhattan Taxis. Several dark portals have been opened. There is something else in the gloom however--- is that a jingling of bells? A blood curdiling SQUAWK rends the air as the Overseer comes into view. It's belled hat jingles.

The corrupted machine towers over the other heartless and in fact most of the room. The robot chicken who manages to embody a fear of clowns with a fear of feathers has a jaunty jester hat, eyes filled with dark hate fixing on the group as razor wings flutter. BACAWK.

Avira has posed:
Mission accomplished. Avira can depart this adventure with satisfaction, having gently pushed Reize into freaking out just a little. Bwah ha ha!

More importantly, beneath the junk and deep in this middle vault are Heartless. Lots of Heartless. Enough to make Avira pull out her weapon without much question. "T..there's so many..." she stops, taking note of the tax-like Heartless as they all focus their headlights in their direction. "You've gotta be kidding me. Are those really Heartless taxis?"

The absurdity meter has finally been tipped for Avira.

Somehow this isn't as bad as a giant Heartless robot chicken clown jester. "....ohhh that's a big one. Welllll...I'll keep it busy. You guys bring the hurt!"

She's the first to approach it. Brave or foolish, it's hard to say. "Hey! Hey birdbrain cheaterpants. I'm gonna dismantle you for getting in here without going through what we did!!!"

Reize Seatlan has posed:
"..What the...?" It looks like that the Heartless are taking those canisters. Reize's eyes widen, then the fury starts to draw on his face. "Whatever are in there, the Heartless are trying to steal them!"

While hovering in mid-air, the Friendly Ghost is now... Reize, the Fighting Ghost! The adventurer-turned ghost is now eyeing all of the dark portals that have rippled in existence. Further complicating things are the sound of bells.

As the blood curdiling squawk rends the air, the boy looks up to see the Overseer. It's a corrupted machine and fills the oom. The giant chicken... The ghost sneers and he says, "Guys! We have to stop the Heartless from taking those!" He knows that trying to get the golem-cars would not be beneficial, but the wights and shadows are smaller. He will have to get rid of the middle man.

Winding his boomerang-held hand back, he snaps out towards the Heartless, "Oh, no you don't!" He flicks his wrist, sending the boomerang sailing along the air to arc. The arcing boomerang twists and turns as it tries to strike at the smaller ones.

But that is not all, Reize is reaching into his bag of tricks and he starts throwing some small bombs at the Heartless. Something to disorient them.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade looks over at the Heartless assailants.

"Huh. So that's what Riku was talking about." He comments offhand, apropos of nothing as he immediately moves to engage the Heartless forces. "I FEEL LIKE CHICKEN TONIGHT!" Mercade yells, clearly running low on witticisms after the amount of SAN damage he's taken so far tonight. He engages in evasive maneuvers, taking a high road as he prepares to engage the clown-chicken at range. "God, I bet your eggs honk." Mercade comments.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart nods as she helps Reize back to his feet as well, decending the stairs. She blinks as she hears the giant chicken... clown chicken...

...

She might be surprised if it wasn'at after all they went through to get there. She shakes her head "Okay, that does it." she stombs her foot down and tightens her gloves. "I don't care what you are, but I've had quite ENOUGH of this place." And that thing is is going to pay for it now ~_~

The heart is just behind it. And as much as she likes chicken, she won't eat this one. Oh hell no.

She rushes it for her opening attacks, testing out the defenses with a flurry of punches, unloading her foul mood on the stupid fowl ~_~

Riku has posed:
The overseer lashes out with a powerful kick, battering Reize's bombs away from the carrier heartless. The flailing of its razor wings as it flutters about and squawks with rags miraculously seems to deflect the attacks perfectly.

It is not intimidated by Avira. It is the one who does the intimidation. Especially when large and very dangerous looking cannons bloom all over it's spine and rigid crest. It throws wings wide, staring around at them. BAWK. BAWK BAWK. Bawcaw. The voice of doom, certainly.

It gets pummeled by Tifa's rush, but the metal is very resistance and it stumbles back only a step or two before lashing out at her as the nearest available target, cannons firing to cover the rest of the room.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade is having none of this crap.

The clownfish rain down upon him, and he powerslides under the rain of fish, while the blasts of slime crash down around him, barely missing him with its sizzling darkness power. He doesn't even say anything as he unloads, blasting the chicken-clown-robot with a shotgun, then rapid-swapping to his pistols to unleash a damaging barrage of firepower that could knock the thing into the air and keep it there for a bit.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart isn't too pleased. First her punches seem to not do a whole lot, but then she gets tossed around by the explosions from its guns, being bounced against the ceiling and the floor a few times. That chicken means business alright. Well she's not going to take it sitting either. As the next salvo is sent down on her, she rolls backward, one arm outstretched, landing back down on her feet, just long enough to spring back forward that chicken-that-wanted-to-be-mecha-goldzilla. Its missing about 500 feet mind you.

The first hit is a straight punch, but the momentum doesn't make her stop there, when she lands she sends a flip kick toward the chicken's head. And while she's in the air, she grabs the mechanical head, flipping it over and landing on top of it into a hard bodyslam, hopefully making a small crater with it.

Reize Seatlan has posed:
As it flails the wings out, it deflects the bombs from going after the carrier Heartless. "No!" The face turns of dismay at the display of his plan not working.

Further hindering his momentum is te voice of doom, which knocks him to his knees. "Ggghgh....!" He winces, then he looks towards the large beast. As the canoon firesrapid fish at the group, the boy is slapped up off of the ground, "Whoaaaaa--!!" And the glob of slime blasts him against the chest, sending him crashing towards the ground pretty hard. "Gaaaaaahhhhh!"

Ick... "Ick..." Reize slaps his hands to the side, gritting his teeth. Not going to let this, Reize tightens his fists and he sucks in a breath. The hand extends out towards Mercade, Tifa, and Avira.

"Everyone. We can dddddDDDdoooOOOooo this! We have a large bird to beat and Heartless to keep from taking what are in those canisters! Let's believe in each other!"

Kaydin has posed:
After going through the various traps and tricks and just plain freaky things that exists in this vault, he comes to...This. A group of people fighting a giant chicken. He sighs as he looks to it, helmet half eaten off, armor broke and eaten in several places. He shakes his head as he swings the sword once, sending a black energy blast for the chicken, before approaching, grabbing the chain at the pommel and beginning to spin his sword. "Hello Misplaced Aggression." He says as he hurls the black sword at the chicken.

Avira has posed:
Experience has shown...Heartless really cannot be intimidated. That seems to be a strategy worth ditching in the future so it doesn't open her up to attack like this. To make matters worse, it doesn't even focus fire like Avira had been hoping.

Most of the shots that hit her seem more aimed at the ground then her, sending her flying into one of the nearby junk piles. Avira's quick to scramble atop it and leap off of it, leading with a foot at the mechanical heartless's head. After dropping back down to the ground, Avira quickly follows up with another lunging strike to the 'belly.'

Riku has posed:
The jaunty-hatted heartless overseer again seems to spasm at JUST the right moment, throwing up it's wings in a crazy stomping dance. The shotgun and pistole barrage are deflected from vital regions just as a clawed foot lashes out at Tifa as she springs, jamming her first attack. A thrashing wing and buzzing, crackling lights prevent her from Meteodropping the chicken. It just isn't there and is moving too erratically to get a good grip on.

While it is engaged in CHicken-Fu with Tifa however, it gets blindsided by Kaydin's dark energy blast, the dark sword sticking straight into it's eye. The Jaunty Jester wails in panic and pain, all cannons and guns firing all at once as it rampages around in a panic, squashing one of it's own cars in the process. Klaxons wail from inside the robot's beak, blindingly loud. Cannons fire, raining exploding... frogs? Yes. Multi colored exploding frogs. It leaps forwards and backwards, lashing out with its massive claws and all mechanical 'feathers' raised to give it an even more ghoulish appearance. Well. For a giant chicken. It gets whalloped in the head by Avira, then punched backwards to SLAM into a nearby junk wall, causing the junk to rain down in a torrent as it kicks feet and flails trying to get back onto it's feet. Cannons fire. Klaxons wail.

Dark fluid leaks from the ruptured canister, quickly evaporating at the touch of open air. The other Carrier heartless start to hurry their operations, loading more canisters as the Chicken of Doom flails about.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
How can it be raining while they are inside a closed room, further more, raining frogs! Exploding, multi-colored frogs! As if the day couldn't get any worse. Well, it is, at any rate. She grumbles as she stands back to her feet, taking quite the blow in "I hate this place." She slides a hand through her hair a bit, and then concentrates her magical energies. Time to put some buffing on instead, since her attacks are not doing too well.

Kaydin has posed:
Kaydin runs past the people in time to hear Tifa. "It is definatly not on my favorite lists." He says as he leaps along the Chicken to grab his sword from it's eye, sending in two quick slashes as he runs past the machine and hurls his sword back at it once more.

Reize Seatlan has posed:
Inspiring his friends into battle is the best that Reize can do. He may not be the greatest war tactician, but he can at least rally his friend's spirit to fight once more. With the presence of that Overseer still engaged with his friends, Reize tightens his fists and he already moves over to run towards the beast.
Klaxons wails from the beak, earning an alared stance. With multicolored exploding frogs, Reize shifts around and springs from one part to the next to avoid the frogs, the explosion flying behind him. However, this does send him flying towards the air.
"HUP!"
As the cannons fire, Reize twists about to spin away from the incoming shots, Reize is shifting over to have his hands along the bird's back and he quickly dives down toards the bird, "Kiyaaaaaaaaa!!!" The foot strikes down towards the large bird, aiming to send him to the distance of striking it.
And also put him where the carriers are at.

Both boomerangs form, "You're not getting away!" He sneers, dashing towards the carriers with his boomerangs to hack at them and unleash a flurry of kicks.

Avira has posed:
"Ugh!" If Avira could somehow close her ears, she'd be doing it right now. The yelling and sirens and cannon fire was simply overwhelming. Incredibly difficult to concentrate amongst! Without really intending it, she's knocked aside by one of the chicken's giant wings as it flails about in panic. Due to just how small Avira is, it's enough to send her flying backwards and she falls atop the windshield of one of the Heartless taxis.

Groaning, she picks herself up, uncaring of how bad her performance must look, and charges, her blade flashing bright blue with her ice magic. Two powerful upward strokes are made, one aimed at one wing, then at the other as she dances around the giant heartless. To finish, her magic winks out and with a heart-filled blow, she slams the spine into the chicken's back.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade isn't sure why, but something about Reize seems to make him keep going.

Maybe it's because of the silliness of it all. Mercade begins to laugh, even as he turns his guns from the chickenbot to the Carrier HEartless, firing at them with debilitating shots aimed for their tire-d 'limbs'! Firepower rains down around Mercade, launching him through the air, but he lands, luckily, in a relatively soft pile of rubber chickens. "I can't even figure out whether to be laughing my head off or screaming!" Mercade exclaims. "I'll just settle for shooting it and letting the rest sort itself out."

Riku has posed:
A car is loaded up with a full canister, several heartless hitching a ride as the possessed killer taxi swerves around and drives towards the nearest dark portal. Avira SMASHES into the windshield, the car swerving out of control and running into a pile of junk. The support heartless continue to load up the next while the fight continues. They don't defend themselves as Mercade fires into them, only flee and disperse like oil to grab canisters from the other side of the room and try to get out of his range. Most don't make it, evaporating in curls of smoke.

Reize's boomerangs take out more but there are still more cars and the overseer is about to spin around to stop him, when Avira smashes into it's spine, cratering the ground as it falls hard into the metal floor.

Kaydin's slashes hit home, the neck almost completely severed. The overseer rises up, a chicken robot without a head-- and every indicator light on it's body goes red, lightning crackling over it's surface as it starts to thrash, wings buffeting at anything close.

Cannons fire party streamers and rubber ducks and glitter.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart was apparently out of sight of the giant chicken, so she was in prime position to watch everyone dodging the attacks. She whistles to herself a bit, but she can't stay on the sideline for much longer either. Let's see how it likes kicks, since punches and throws don't seem to do much to it.

She raises an eyebrow when the almost beheaded chicken turns her way though... she hadn't noticed from the back.. this is rather... unsettling... Headless chickens are not a fun thing to watch, admitedly. She rushes it, starting with a strong swpeeing kick to attempt to knock it off its mechanical feet. That should help slow it down some at least, as she brings in more attacks.

Avira has posed:
"Ha HA!" Avira stands triumphantly on the back of the fallen chicken, only to subsequentially marvel as Kaydin chops off its head. Gruesome! Except it's a robot and that apparently doesn't disable it as much as Avira had hoped. In fact, it doesn't even seem to shut the darn thing up, which is what she was REALLY hoping it would happen.

As it starts to thrash, Avira leaps off-just in the nick of time too as it electifies its body. All the other Heartless in the room were fortunately not attacking...but they WERE still able to accomplish what they came here for while they were busy, Avira realizes. "Guess we better cook this turkey! And fast!"

Determination surges through her and the Spine takes on a silvery white sheen once again. That glow spreads to Avira herself as she charges, surrounded by what seems to be a shockwave of force that slams into the giant robot heartless chicken and launches it up in the air with one powerful stroke of the Spine.

"Heads up, Mercade!" she calls out, hoping he recognizes the setup. A second wave of force blasts forth from her unusual weapon, knocking it even higher.

Reize Seatlan has posed:
Cannons fire out party streamers, rubber ducks, and glitter. The presence of such weird, but threatening mechanics has been made clear that those are things that should be avoided. Especially after that earlier shot of the slime.
However, the impact of the threat blasts does send the boy flying high into the air... Whoooaaaa!

However Avira manages to knock the bird to set it up for Mercade for a strike.

An opening!

/_\

The ghost shouts, "Ooiiiiii! Mercade!"
The ghost calls out to the older man, "Let's show this one what we can do with lightning work, huh?"

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Everything goes chaotic as Mercade sees the face of death.

And it's a chicken.

"THIS IS MAKING NO SENSE WHATSOEVAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" He yells as the rampaging overseer sends him blasting upwards in a popfly over the battlefield. Avira launches the chickenbot. "I GOT IT, AVIRA!"

Mercade's eyes narrow as he flies over, coming in near Reize. Reize calls for him, and there is a mental prompt:

/\ Twin Spirits

Mercade hammers that button, and yells, "YOU GOT IT! REIZE! LET'S FINISH THIS!" He banks in the air, mirroring Reize as he uses him to launch towards the opposite wall, hitting it and latching up in a wallgrip to lash out with a series of shotgun blasts, Reize bombarding it from the other side. He pushes off, leaping for the chicken in tandem with Reize, descending with overwhelming force as both of them lash out from opposite sides with the classic finishing move:

BOOT TO THE HEAD.

Reize Seatlan has posed:
As Mercade and Reize use each other to launch each other towards the wall, Reize is catching himself over to hang on to the wall with a grip. As Mercade launches out the shotgun lasts, Reize extends his hand up to manifest the glowing tarot. The tarot shatters and releases a large fireball...

It breaks apart into tiny fireballs shooting forth at the Heartless in the same fashion as a shotgun to mimic Mercade's own. Then, Reize leaps off and pushes for the chicken along with Mercade on the opposite. He twists about to launch his foot out. "KAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!"

Kaydin has posed:
Kaydin manages to evade the attack but the chicken grazes his head and throws his helmet off, breaking it as he shakes his head. As he remains in the air, slowly falling, people can see the room darken around the knight, black energy surging about his body into his sword. "Darkness Consume you." He mutters as he swings his sword and a massive blast of darkness will do just that.

Riku has posed:
The support crew, though diminished, manage to get another car loaded up and driving towards the dark portals. The robot overseet is swept from it's clawed feet, thumping onto the ground with a merry jingle of bells. The severed head sullenly snaps it's beak at her from where it lays on it's side, the main body getting kicks and punches for the trouble. The metal dents and splits, wiring spilling from the rents and sparks arcing from the broken body as it continues even still to flail and thrash. Rusted springs pour from the severed mouth, arcing in a wide spray as the body is launched upwards by the powerful blast of force and the swing of the Spine.

The giant body tumbles, juggled ever higher by the waves of force while the severed head continues to squawk. While the body is pummeled, it's arms continues to flail and shotgun is again shot back at the owner, clanging into the walls and floor. The Boot to the Neck just doesn't seem to be quite enough to finish it.

Reize's attacks get through and there is another bone jarring SLAM as it comes to earth, now half buried in the floor. The consuming darkness destroys what remains.

The massive darkness blast obliterates the body of the chicken, the cannons on the back firing a few last cooked clownfish while several heartless leap into the defunct chicken head, the metal contorting and shifting. It gains wheels, turning into a Severed Chickencar with an open maw as the grill and the front half.

The eyes bleed together into one somewhat cracked windshield where Kaydin's sword went through. The chicken car tears across the ground with a squeel of tires that sounds like SQUAAAWK, the car bearing down on Mercade and Reize in an attempt to ZOOM past them, and escape through the dark portals which are blinking out one at a time like dark stars.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
The super crazy Heartless of Doom tries to make its escape! Riding high on adrenaline, Mercade drops and dramatically points his shotgun at the escaping boss. "All right, you chickeny bastard! LEt's see what you've go-WHUMPH!"

That's about when he gets run over. Mercade is left lying there on the floor, groaning. "Anyone get the number of that abomination against all that is good in this world?" He says, unsteadily.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart phews as the chicken is defeated... Wait, it turns into a car instead. She scratches her head, watching it zooming out...

Well, there's no real need to destroy it entirely either, all they needed was to go through to find the heart after all. Now that what was barring the way is gone...

Tifa moves over to the backdoor, looking for the source of the sound... She looks to Mercade "I rather not."

Kaydin has posed:
KAydin tries to land on the car, hoping to land on it and run his sword through the top. Unfortunatly Kaydin is not a real geomatry expert and therefore comes down too fast due to weight of armor and him falling so lands right infront of the car. It isnt pretty.

SLAM

He flies past and just groans. "I....think I am going to call in sick...can someone else get that?"

Reize Seatlan has posed:
The Dual Tech was not as effective as it should had been. The fight had proven to be true for the forces of the good as the massive darkness does help with adding assist in wearing and tearing against the body of the chicken. The cannons releasing the last clownfish while several Heartless leap into the chicken head.

Reize, by the time that the Heartless gained wheels, is on the ground, rolling. "Ooofff." He winces, shaking his head while rubbing his head. But then, Reize sees the severed head shaping itself into a car.

It is going to get away.

"NO!"

Gathering his will, Reize is getting up to his feet.

/_\ Last Ditch Effort

As Reize pushes himself up, the boy's feet forms from the ghastly body. His arms are briefly returning to normal, but it becomes that ghastly form once more. The ghost is filled with determination as it charges...

Time itself has slown down as the boy runs straight ahead towards the vehicle.

Illumination comes from the pendant as the brilliant light forms in his hand. The tarot card manifests its brilliant light as the adventurer charges forward...

Time, slowed down, keeps ticking away. That speeding vehicle is making its way towards the gate. The only one who stands in its way is the determined boy, seeking to bar its exit.

As the vehicle closes in, Reize leaps off of the ground. He springs straight towards the vehicle, the hand lifting up in the air as the card shatters.

A large fireball forms in his hand as his legs kick up along the hood. In that slow motion, the boy leans forward with the glowing hand with the massive fireball.

"THIS IS MY WILL!"

It may be a suicidal move, but...

Reize is going to do everything in his power.

Avira has posed:
Nobody told Avira that fighting Heartless would include fighting cars! How do you fight a car? You can't parry it, you sure as heck can't get in front of it! Avira's attempts to stop it result in her effectively...keying the Heartless.

It'll have to do.

Breathing heavily, she heads over to the fallen Mercade and offers him a hand up.

Riku has posed:
The heart is hooked up by the now silent machines. These pipes and channels all lead to more empty canisters. Apparently it was part of the infrastructure that created the canisters. Without the active force of the heartless corrupting the machines, everything starts to fall apart.

This jumble of parts wasn't meant to work together without dark magic forcing it to function and so the parts too corrupted by darkness begin to rot away and the heart goes silent. Then there is the matter of Reize and the out of control Chickencar--- the fireball impacts the top, and the entire car, heartless and all, explode.

The metal mess sags, starting to dissolve right out from under the boy with the yellow scarf. This could be BAD. When time stops being slow, if he is still atop this flaming heap-- it could be VERY bad.

Mercade Alexander has posed:
Mercade Alexander accepts Avira's hand up, and he grunts, moderately flattened but he'll be fine.

UNLIKE REIZE.

He looks over at the contraption as the Heartless detonates in the background. "What were they even doing down here with that thing?" He asks. "I mean, it's a heart, but... what were they doing with it?"

Avira has posed:
"Good question...looks like they were loading up these barrels and driving off with them too." Avira notes, looking around at the junk pileed up about the room. "These Heartless were pretty organized, Mercade. Maybe they're working for somebody."

Reize Seatlan has posed:
This attack.... What Reize did... was foolhardy. What he did was not one of the smarter choices.

However, it had to be done.

The out of control Chickencar faces the point blank impact of the fireball. However, the one issue is that Reize is still in the vicinity. As the metal sags, sarting to dissolve...

The eyes widen.

A storm of an explosion ignites, creating a large bright light. That powerful rending tears against the ghastly boy. The flames roaring. But the worst...

The blast point.

That blast sends Reize flying across the air, landing with a harsh thud. The body makes a very sick crunch as he slams into the ground and twists. The ghastly presence disppears, revealing the boy to be in very bad shape. Soot, charr, and other sorts are left. Clothes are torn, eaten by the flames.

Worst shape he can be.

Tifa Lockhart has posed:
Tifa Lockhart is seeing that... this heart hunt was completly useless now. The heart stopped beating. She doesn't even know if she should even attempt to bring it back right now. But there is something that gets her attention. Her good nature is definitely affected at seeing Reize in this state. She rushes over to him "Oh no, Reize! We need to get him out of here, this place is about to crumble away.. The heart is not working anymore either, I think we did this for nothing now!" she attempts to pick up Reize, if she doesn't get help doing so at least, so they can move out of here as fast as possible. She doesn't have any curing magic with her.

Riku has posed:
NPC Epilogue: Dr. Finkelstein explains, after some considerable griping, about D-Fuel if you return to his lab. It was an abandoned experiment in creating fuel out of the terror and dread evoked by the residents of Halloween Town. He could never pin down the formula however. There was something about it that made the fuel inherantly unstable.

It needed a second thread of refinement he could never first out, although he supposes the Heart could have been used for that. He abandoned the project. So-- somewhere out there, a villain is stockpiling energy, but for what purpose? And why taxis? ---Questions for another day.