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Juno sighed as she held on to Ramsden's waist. Since Toby opted to be in the sidecar, that left her on the bike with the Minutemen. Her helmet along with the sounds of the engine and wind prevented her from talking. There wasn't much to talk about anyway...

'Sides, it didn't seem like Toby really wanted to talk to her.

She knew he had people issues (not that she could blame him for that) and there was no reason to believe that she would be an exception to that. Maybe now they would get to talk. Being on some grand adventure might make them bond right? Or maybe we'll bond over the fact that a couple of kids got screwed and were somehow picked to "save the world." She didn't believe that excuse. Why some kids like them? It didn't make sense. Ramsden or Paul would probably take on this mission and pass with flying colors. But her? Toby? We haven't even graduated from high school!

Either they had some kind of advantage that Juno had no idea was there (maybe they'd be given that advantage?) or humanity was so desperate that it all boiled down to some kids dealing with the problem. It still doesn't make sense. Hopefully the Oak siblings would explain everything once they got there.

Tsuki looked at the place where Terrian was last seen. "Who in the world was that," he said picking himself up. He dusted himself off and walked over to Lexi. "Still don't get what's going on," he said to himself. "Anyone care to tell me why some crazy nut was after me," he asked ignoring the gunmen now that they were too shocked to even move. "Ah, forget it," he said and looked around. "Now, can you tell me why every person and their aunt is out in the woods," he asked, hoping for an answer from someone.

Tsuki took the answers as they came. "Well, that explain's some things," he said. He looked back at the group of Guardians. "Shall we go before these guys start moving again?" he said. He then looked up at Dirk, "Sorry for not intoducing myself. My name is Tsuki Kuro, but you can call me Tsuki," he said, then looked around him. "Still think getting out of here fast is a proper idea," he said, starting off in the direction opposite of the Guardians, hoping to find something familiar so he could go home and tell his mother what has happened so far.

Elty was a gorgeous piece of equipment. No, not aesthetically; its appearance looked like something a child had constructed with K'nex, or Tinker Toys, or an Erector Set. But it worked marvelously well as it hovered through the clear, dry air of late summer afternoon, underneath a cloudless, blue sky. The Gods had deigned Ulysses and his crew had decided to accompany Maddy and her charge at least for the first few dozen miles, until the roads split so that Madelyn could meet up with Paul. The roads were a little clearer than those from Riverdale, but all in all were nothing a Jeep couldn't handle. As had become the norm, at least for those who spent any amount of time outside of Cliffshire, there was "roadkill" scattered here and there, sometimes picked at by spearows and crows, or moving shiftily from the activities of rats. Tall grasses had tried, failed, tried again, and in places, succeeded to nurture themselves despite the oppression of the fallout in the soil.

This was pleasant for the thirty- or forty-some minutes they spent traveling. However, the universe seemed unprepared, as of yet, to allow anyone to remain unmolested by circumstance for very long.

It was mentioned that Elty is a beautiful machine. This is the only reason that when Dr. Terrian appeared hovered up next to it from below, he moved slowly, from a distance, and did his very best to make sure he did not startle Madelyn. The man was dressed in his customary charcoal shorts, stark black designer tee shirt, and unforgettable onyx hat. Once he was absolutely certain she had seen him, he grinned disarmingly and gestured for her to land. In case she hadn't understood his awkward, dolphin-like hand motions, he shouted out, without using a commanding tone, "Can you please land? It's very, very hard for me to have a pokébattle with you up here, although I could, but it would seriously risk crashing your machine." He was genuinely concerned, and imploring her. "I have to do this. It's very important; otherwise, I wouldn't ask for something silly like this. But..." He covered his face with his palm, and the next sentence came out as though he was completely sick of saying it. "You can't trust me."

---

The men in the clearing snapped out of their daze quickly enough that one finally did manage to level his rifle at the retreating machoke and fire a shot, but though the animal grunted and turned itself to guard its wounded arm, it was far enough distant by then that there wasn't even a spray of blood. Jeb then turned his thin, mustached face and bright blue eyes to Lexi and Tavish. "Well, I guess he'll turn up sooner 'r later, and he's runnin' anyway, so shouldn't be a problem 'r anythin'. Hi there, Mr. Tavish." He stepped forward a few paces to shake Dirk's hand in a friendly greeting, then backed up to look at the two kids. "You know anythin' about this? We jus' got out here after hearin' some kin' a noise and that thing was holdin' Sooky and looked like 'e just killed these other two, but if that nutjob with th' kadabra was tellin' the truth, ain't how it happened at all." As soon as Tsuki seemed like he was about to run off, Jeb grabbed his shoulder and held him firmly in place. "Uh-uh, Sooky. We're headed back home."

Dirk was saved from having to answer by the approaching clop of fast-moving hooves. A man wearing the customary protective leather vest and face-mask for someone riding a rapidash was coming on his ivory, ever-burning mount at an easy canter behind the group, from the direction of Woodmount, and flashed a salute to Jeb before dismounting and removing his mask, revealing a fair, white face with blond, wavy hair and green eyes. This was a familiar face in Woodmount, because despite having shown himself to be just as cold-hearted a killer as the rest of the Guardians, he was a genuinely innocent, almost childish, friendly personality among them, something which had actually managed to ostracize him from much of the group. He offered Dirk his hand, greeting both men with their name and a nod, before saying, "Name's Jesse. Herzstein just got a call from the Oaks, and they said to tell Mr. Tavish, uh..." He looked down at a piece of paper he had taken from his pocket and unfolded, "'Bring Tsuki Kuro with you, too. Japanese, teenage, long hair, if you don't know him.' That's, uh, Tsuki right there. Hey, Tsuki. Uh, it goes on - 'Sorry about the short notice; we just now got another few names. Thank you for this. We will make it up to you.'" Business finished, he finally turned to Lexi and smiled. "Hey, Lexi. Guess the Oaks need you, too?" When she confirmed, he shook his head. "Weird. Well, good luck with whatever it is! I've gotta go. Dirk, Jeb." Another nod for each of them, and he replaced his face mask and swung himself back up on the rapidash to trot back to the city.

Jeb shrugged. "Well, if it's what it is, it's what it is. World is weirder and weirder. Good luck t' the three of ya." He patted Tsuki on his shoulder amiably, whistled to round up his little squad, and walked off at what was not quite a brisk pace with the lot of them, some of whom still sported completely bewildered expressions.

((As an aside to this post, please don't let me railroad your actions by these long-ish interactions. These are because it is simply more efficient, I feel, when I know posting is as erratic for Siber and me as it is. If your character would have legitimately (and really think about this; consider whether they would have actually had the proper characterization and reason) interrupted an action, do it, and we will edit and/or adjust appropriately.))

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((I have taken over for the rest of this, because iD is distracted by talking to her boy-toy. Admittedly, I'm now slightly debilitated as well, but mine's physical because she saw what I typed. Luckily, I don't have to delete it because she's thoroughly distracted ^.^ ))

Paul and Alyssa got on the road in Paul's pretty cool Hilux. And one has to hand it to them. It was pretty cool. All up and rollin' down the road like it ain't a thing. Stands of half-mutilated trees all bending towards it to hear the roar of the engine. Pidgeotto runs straight into the ground trying to get a closer look. No one could possibly argue about how cool it was.

Sadly, it wasn't awesome.

Moving along, they really did barrel down the highway at a respectable clip, the roads not perfect, but certainly not unaccommodating. It was a decent hour and a half of this pleasantly unadulterated travel and existence that led them to a four-lane stretch of highway surrounded on both sides by scraggly, but nonetheless very tall, trees. Over the sounds of their no-doubt raucous-beyond-all-reason conversation/dance party and their engine, they suddenly heard what would be a very pleasant, droning rumble if it weren't completely impossible to distinguish whether the buzz was originating from some great horde of animals, or a smaller coterie of motorcycles. Because of the current curve they were on, nothing was visible on the roads behind them except a few glimmering, black shapes. The question was quickly answered for them more emphatically as the first enraged, mutated scyther overtook the truck and clumsily slammed into the windshield, bouncing off and onto the road behind them. Its half-blackened blades struck sparks on the asphalt, and if it hadn't broken its leg, it might not have been squashed by the motorcycle that was following behind it; as it was, it had over-expended ether preparing the slash that it drunkenly failed to deliver, and its middle was thus reduced to an unrecognizable, chitinous mass.

Two cyclists followed behind the first, and above them an octet of scythers remained, their unworldly speed currently abated as the motorcyclists gained on the Hilux. The central rider slipped a gun from a holster on her thigh, aimed, and in a quick series of shots (ping! fwip ping! ping! fwip crash!) shot out the back window. The others more carefully drew weapons and began to pull up on either side of the truck, while three scythers moved forward and hovered ten feet above the bed, their twisted faces eager to be on the offensive, mottled blades glimmering in the bright sunlight.

---

Ryan, Tobias, and Juno were all confronted perhaps more bluntly than the previously described scene. They, too, had a little more than an hour of comfortable, pleasant travel, before an obstructions was spotted ahead of them: a trio of onix were very effectively blocking the road, and two figures sat atop one of them. One of those figures saw the three coming and snapped to alertness, bringing a shotgun to bear lazily in one arm while the other held up a megaphone. "HALT," he bellowed, while his female cohort trained an uzi on them. "WE DON'T NEED TO KILL YOU, BUT WE WILL IF YOU DO NOT COOPERATE." His aviators and military buzz-cut would have been douchebag enough, but the way one leg dangled off his gigantic creature and the way the sun caught on his belt-buckle sealed the deal in ways that are truly unique to douche-dom. His partner, on the other hand, was an incredibly good-looking nerd, complete with black-framed hipster glasses, a tattered tee shirt whose holes revealed Kevlar padding, and a short, thin skirt. Even at a distance, the same tattoo that had been on the attackers from the previous night was visible on their cheeks, although the man's had been modified to add a second black slash, crossing the first.

Tsuki looked at Tarvish and then at the pokemon. "I would rather you ride, sir, if you don't mind. I can probably keep up with an Arcanine's jog, not to sure as I never had to before, but I wouldn't mind giving it a try," he said. "Plus my mother wouldn't let me live it down if I rode while you didn't," he added. He looked around the area, catching the last pieces of color from the Guardians. "So tell me, where are we going?" he said and looked around.

Paul had first been tempted to slam on the brakes, but when he realized it was an attack, he'd switched his foot to the gas, then decided against that, too. He'd let the motorcycles get closer, get a sense they were accomplishing something, and then he'd outrun them.

Then they shot out his window.

When the bikers had appeared, Paul's eyebrows had gone down perhaps a millimeter, and his eyes had become hard and vicious. Mentally, he prepared for combat, which was a simple change of mindset, one that came without emotion. When the window went out, there was still no physical reaction, except a twitch of an eyebrow and a duck behind the seat to ensure he didn't get hit by too much glass. But now they'd hit the truck in expensive ways, and intentional or no, that made him extremely, extremely angry.

The scythers were the main problem. Not because they were more dangerous, per se, but because they presented more targets, and the solutions weren't as simple as the one Paul had planned for the bikers. Their flight meant that he'd need buckshot for a turkey shoot, and he'd handed the shotgun off to his passenger. Which, in retrospect, probably worked fine, assuming she could shoot the shotgun as well as she could the pistol. But for eight scythers, well, that once again just wasn't enough. He had no counter-fliers, but he did have a fire-spitter, and if memory served scythers tended to kind of just... cook when presented with fire.

Paul kept the truck at a level speed, refusing to accelerate. Zoidberg, you should deal with the bikers. You know what to do. I'll deploy you and Oddjob to the bed of the truck; instruct him to hit the fliers with a flamethrower as soon as possible. Paul, no longer needing to open the rear windshield, simply pushed the buttons on both pokeballs and let them roll out onto the bed, where in flashes of light Zoidberg and Oddjob appeared. Oddjob's job was simple, and he relished it: Fire fire everywhere, directly above his head, ensuring no direct attack. Zoidberg's was no more complicated, but involved a touch more skill: He located, precisely, both bikers, and then set up to teleport them both precisely three feet left of their current positions, leaving Newton's first law to do the rest of the job for him. The air forces could be engaged more directly after the bikers were down.

As per the laws of physics, both bikers suddenly found themselves hurtling through the air and suddenly subjected to the impartial dictates of gravity. With brief shouts, one was crunched under the rear right wheel of the Hilux and the other tumbled not unlike ragweed to an uncertain halt. The first bike spun harmlessly away, but the second caused a little turbulence for the truck's passengers as it slammed into the left rear wheel. The third biker, who had been ready to fire again at her new targets, swerved out of the way of the oncoming obstacle, but was in no way prepared to give up the chase. One scyther attempted to brave the flames being spewed at it and screamed as, for anyone watching, the absolutely glorious display of a pyrotechnic tide splashing against the weak, but extant ethereal protection along its chitinous flesh before penetrating the thin barrier and sending the insect burning in a heap to the side. The others went for a pincer attack around the impressive cone of flame, whose sheer breadth quickly became taxing on the charmander. One aimed directly for Zoidberg, aiming a furious slash at his left side while the other put on a surge towards Oddjob. The remaining five continued slowly increasing speed while their remaining human companion leveled her gun again and shot for Paul's tires: fwip... fwip... tink... BOOM. The left rear tire deflated rapidly, causing the truck to swerve drunkenly and pray Paul knew how to handle a lamed steed.

---

"GOT 'EM FROM YOUR MOM, JARHEAD!" the man shouted back good-naturedly while his companion spread her legs crudely and stuck her tongue out at him. "Now hand over the kids! Your little rat dog doesn't stand a chance against these guys. Just walk on over here, kids, and no one has to die!" He still held the gun casually, then listened for a moment to a radio in his ear before his grin faltered a little, then replaced itself. "It's Ryan, right? Where's Erin? Let's see how that bugbitch stands up to Jet, Sable, and Pitch, here!" He patted his mount fondly.