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Lilian could tell from a slight jump from Vanity that he hadn't expected her little story. A corner of her mouth perked up slightly at that. Anyone who had been around here for long had heard of the Don, so she figured he knew what exactly that meant. She actually smiled a tiny bit when he said he was glad to have someone like her with him. Most of the time, she refused defense jobs and never really teamed with anyone, since most people looking for her services would weigh her down. Vanity seemed more likely to be an asset rather then a liability. She walked along with him, rifle unslinging as they walked, coming to rest in front of her, ready for use. She wasn't terribly surprised when he said he used to be a soldier, he acted like one. "So that's what these guys are called." She remarked when he said Praetorian soldiers. She listened to the rest of his small tale, letting it run through her head for a sec. "Well then, the commanders were probably part of the plot for the assasination, along with the security. Sounds like a long-term plan for a coup." She said. It may have been a statement of the obvious, but throwing things like that out sometimes helped new thoughts come out.

Vanity looked back to Lilly, smiling behind his visor. "Not exactly. My guess is that they planned the whole thing, prepared a cover story and even managed to get a few disposable assets to get involved." "See, there's an age old tradition that the palace guards do every time they change shifts. between shifts there's a short period of prayer for the dead from an 80year war that happened a millennium ago. That means the guards weren't present... they've never changed it until a couple of days ago." Vanity was one for tradition, and knowing that he'd witnessed the change of a thousand year old ceremony kind of got to him. Not enough to affect him, but he definitely acknowledged it. They were nearing the battlefield, so vanity started to pick up the pace. "Alright, we're here. I want you to get on the rooftops and provide overwatch. We're going to move up on the enemy, plus I'll send two guys up to cover your six. Feel free to take out any and every soldier you see, 'kay?" He definately had a good feeling about this girl, he just hoped that she was prepared for an all out war. "I'm counting on you!" He broke out to a full sprint and headed for the barricades he'd made earlier. For someone so big, he could get a very good speed behind him.

When he arrived he saw the most amazing thing he'd layed eyes on: no-one was here. All he saw was the bodies of his old comrades and the odd militiaman. The gunfire was coming from the next street over. "... no way. No damn way that these guys are putting it over the Preatorian military." He started to sprint again and, sure enough, there were his men, making constant ground on the enemy. They had managed to get their hands on a mass of riot shields from the nearby police station and formed a phalanx. "Get the RPGs on the tanks, now! You three, move into the building and flank them from the side- KEEP A STRAIGHT ******** LINE, DIPSHITS!!!" Something was off. Maybe they had another commander leading the assault? He started running up to the front line when one of his subordinates from the chopper made their way up to him. "Commander, you won't believe what's just happened!" "Let me guess, you got a decent soldier to take the reins from me?" "No way, sir. One of the soldiers from another squad turns out to be from another dimension like you. Only she wants to see you personally to get a decent idea of who her commanding officer is." Oh great, one of those types. "Alright, well you're gonna have to tell her to wait, we're in the middle of a war right now." "Sir!" As the man ran off, Vanity simply shook his head. Anyone who used those words was a control freak and watched too many war movies... though if she was the one in charge of this little operation, she was doing a damned good job of it... plus it looked like the Damned Angels were starting to send out some better trained soldiers.

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Treas expression started to look all the more grim: If this guy didn't know any log distance teleportation spells, he was screwed. The Sanctum was well over 2'000 meters deep with no top-world access of any sort and what was worse was that the location was another 5km away from the city. If he had no form of long range teleportation, Trea was knee deep... it only left him with one option. After Alex shook his hand, Trea started rummaging through his bag. "We can't walk. The place can only be accessed via teleport. What -you- can do is act as a guard." Trea pulled out two metalic poles, about 80cm long, though they looked like they telescope to longer lengths. "Now, I don't normally use these, but they're a gate to the safehouse I'm getting the people to. The reason I don't like them is that when I turn them on, it takes 5 minutes to prepare them, and then you only have another 5 to get the people through. After that, the power runs dry, the gate sucks itself in, and any trace of its existence is sent straight to hell. Plus if anything was passing through it at the time, whatever didn't get into the gate in time is left behind." Trea didn't look the slightest bit enthusiastic about this little plan. If anything, he looked like he'd preffer to have the people grab a shovel and start digging.
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The city was brimming with soldiers left, right and centre: it was almost enough to put him off of searching for the bar. Not that it really phased -him-: he was more worried about the girl rather than himself. There's no point in reviving the dead if they're just going to die 5 minutes later. Plus if he drew too much attention to himself, then the area would start to flood with more soldiers. That was the last thing he wanted. God damn it, why the hell do they need to be so focused on -this- area... it's not like there's any more people alive out here. He paused for a second, then smiled. Well, I guess I still count for something. When the patrol started moving onwards, Ragna bolted for the next alleyway. At least he was getting close, now. Only three more streets and he was in the clear. God damnit, why the hell am I even going through the effort of doing this? I'm free, I should be doing the opposite of this crap. While he didn't want to admit it, even to himself, he just couldn't let down a favour. When he finally made it back to the bar, he was surprised to see even more bodies than when he was last here. And the LAV that was riddle with bullets was quite a scary sight, but for Ragna it only raised a point of interest. Any normal rebel would have tried to take it and use it for themselves, but this looked like someone wanted to prevent it from being used ever again. "Weird. Anyway, may aswell get this over with." He walked into the kitchen and found the body. Her skin was beggining to go white and any sign of life that was once there is now long gone. Ragna heaved the girl up and brought her out into the open air, then lay her flat on her back. He then took a piece of charcoal and started writing a large, intricate symbol on the ground. When he was finished, he stood up and looked around: not a single soul. The sounds of battle were in the distance, too, so he figured that the war was now focused in a single area. Perfect. He picked up the girl and placed her in the absolute centre of the symbol."Alright then. Lets do this."

Clapping his hands firmly together and rubbing them together, he prepared for the ritual. His right arm had a small trinket on the back of his palm, but when he placed it on the girls chest, it opened up like a camera lense. The only difference was that it glowed a brilliant blood red when it opened. Bracing it with his left hand, he closed his eyes and focused all of his willpower of her wound. Then, glowing red tendrils made their way to the open wound on her chest, while black ones connected themselves to the symbol beneath her. For a few moments nothing happened, but after a minute, Ragnas arms began to tense slightly. All around him was a faint glow, and the symbol on the ground started to perfom the opposite, sucking light into itself. The debris around him started to float and, from the strain he was beggining to feel, the same could be said for Ashley. Except she was the focus of the ritual, so the laws of nature were being bent to benefit -her-. As the ritual continued, she began to become harder and harder to keep on the ground, but it was vital that at least her torso was connected. "Crap, I'm gonna have to get on top." He then shifted himself so that he was sitting on top of her: at least now it was alot easier to keep her down. "Sorry, kiddo, but in the end you're gonna be thanking me for this." The ritual had reached its peak: the symbol beneath him began to glow a deep blue, a sign that her soul was about to be judged by a greater power. It also let anyone who saw the symbol get a clear idea of how pure or dark someones soul was. "And now for the verdict... let's see just what kind of person you really are." He shifted his weight back so she would begin to float slightly: at this point, instead of anti-gravity, there was no such thing for the person experiencing the ritual. As the symbol faded, Ragna watched for a sign to state she was ready for revival. Already her wound was starting to heal over and colour returning to her pale skin. Patiently he waited, until the symbol had entirely dissapeared. This was it. And here's the fun part. With all of his might, he pushed Ashley down into the ground. As soon as she touched the floor, the symbol reappeared as a pure white: she was absolutely pure of heart. Ragna watched as the symbol swiftly coursed its way towards the girl, then it was followed by dead silence. Though it was only less than half a second, to the Bloodedge it felt like a year... because the next part wasn't all too enjoyable. With a deep, glorious boom, Ragna was sent flying towards a section of wall that the blast earlier didn't destroy. He collided with it pretty hard, keeling it over on onto the ground. Simply shaking it off, he stood up and had a slight stumble. He might not be able to feel pain from an outside source, but he could still get shellshock. "Well, at least the hard part's done." He made his way over to the girl and knelt down next to her, giving her face a couple light taps. As she opened her eyes, the first thing she saw was Ragnas red and green eyes... just like Coreys. She tilted her head and saw that, rather than orange, she stared into a head of white. "... C... Corey?" "Close, but not quite. The name's Ragna." As the confused girl sat herself up, she clasped her head with one hand. "... what happened?" "You're gaonna have to be more specific: are you talking about the blast that killed you or the part where I revived you?" "W-what? What are you ta..." She looked at the devastation around her: the bar was gone, there was a massive crater in the ground and the skies were filled with military airships. The sounds of war were abundent, and then it hit her. "Get the picture?" "B-but how did-" "Questions later. For now, I need you to up and ready to move. We've got alot of ground to cover and not enough time to do it walking." Ashley couldn't believe what she was hearing. Revival, the war starting so soon, needing to run straight after she woke up. "How do I know you're not the one who did all this?" Ragna helped her up. "Because you're the reason he brought me here." As soon as she heard that, she was instantly reminded of that strange boy she met in the hospital. Taking Ragnas hand, they both started running towards the action: where there were Preatorian gunshots, there were people who were fighting them. And as the old saying goes, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

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Vanity watched his soldiers take orders from their radios, so obviously this person controlling the soldiers was of decent skill. Something seemed a little off, however... it was too easy. The enemy was in a constant retreat when they had no need. Sure, Lilly was dropping soldiers left right and center, though even then they'd simply revise their tactics. Then it hit him: "HOLD POSITION! No one in my squad moves any closer to the crossroads, understood?!?" Around half of the squad turned their heads and listened perfectly to Vanity, while the rest wee unsure whether to move up or not. Sure enough, though, they started their movement towards the crossroads after someones radio almost sent a soldier deaf. "Everyone, split up and enter the buildings, spread yourselves out into the levels and prepare to provide cover-fire for the guys down below. You two, get to that sniper nest back there and support the sniper there: keep her a** safe while she picks the enemy off." "Sir!" Just as his troops began to split off for their orders, a young girl came out of one of the buildings, almost fuming. She looked very, very pissed off about something... then what one of the soldiers said came back to him. "Just who the hell are -you- ordering my men around, huh?!?" "I'm sorry, I didn't realise that half of this force was my men. I'll take it you're the one who wanted to have a word with me?" The girl started to look at him a little more respectfully, but that wasn't saying too much. "Yeah, but I guess that'll have to wait, won't it? After all, 'we're in the middle of a war right now', am I right?" "Good girl, glad we understand eachother." The young commander gave Vanity a very dirty look, then stormed back to the building where she came from. "Also, comander to comander, I'd suggest-" "Oh, now you wanna talk to me? Go sit on a d**k!" He was not impressed by her lack of respect: people like her get others killed because of stupid arguments. "*sigh* Why do I always get the psychotic ones?"

As the young comanders soldiers made their way to the crossroads, all became clear as to why Vanity wanted to wait behind: as the troops made their way to the crossroad, a mass of gunfire hailed down on them. While the shield-bearing soldiers were barely able to survive, he heard something very disturbing travelling towards the square... tank tracks. Before he could radio them to retreat, they were blown to oblivion within seconds. He heard some voices over the radio and after a moment he saw 3 soldiers with shields and two with rifles. "Alright boys, guess what? We're bait for the ambush. We move up together, but stay behind me. Got it?" "Y-yes sir." Vanity and the group started moving up, then he looked at the group behind him. "You boys scared?" They all nodded as they ran. "Good, the adrenaline helps." As they neared the crossroads, Vanity slowed them down to a complete stop. He started creeping up to the corner, then started sprinting towards the men: there were 3 tanks either side of him and there was no way in hell he was staying there. Shortly after he ran back the tank tracks started rolling towards the ambush site. Each time one of the behemoths shot a round, he brought up a wall of stone to counter the bullet, but they were only good for a single shot. By the time they reached the site, Vanity got his soldiers to duck into the unmanned buildings while he distracted the 6 lumps of steel. This was the moment of truth... As the tanks neared their target, he brought up a wall behind them to slow down their possible escape. Then, out of the buildings behind him, Rocket launchers began firing down onto them, instantly destroying 2 of the tanks. Vanity realised that the drivers were scared out of their minds, they weren't even reacting according to training. One of them even turned their turret around to shoot the wall, but shot one of the other tanks at point blank range, blocking the only way out. Now the only tanks were the 3 stuck in between the wreckage and they were dropping bricks in their pants. Then, out of nowhere, the most thunderous roar of gunfire came from the sky and obliterated the remaining vehicles: as he turned around, a plane roared past the buildings, then turned back and prepared for another make sure they were dead. Vanity didn't like the idea of sitting around and waiting for the bullets to rain down, so he sprinted for the building next to him. When the strafing run ended, Vanity walked back out into the street to see just how much was left... next to nothing. Vanity was starting to think that maybe the Preatorian army was a little in over its head. He never even imagined an aircrafts main cannon would leave an armoured tank as nothing more than a pile of metal scrap. The thought actually scared him.

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Trea put the pylons back into his satchel carefully: they might be 100% safe when inside, but in the open they're very sensitive pieces of kit. "Exactly. Think of the wrong place and you might end up stuck inside a wall. Precision is definitely key." As soon as Alex started looking out to the battlefield, Trea knew that time was critical. He also knew that one single person wasn't enough to hold off an army for 10 minutes. 5, maybe, but he'd need a little extra help to hold them off for the rest. Then he remembered Corey and Noel: perfect. "Alright, try and gather as many people as you can. I'll head over to the little front that the rebels have established. That'll be our safe-zone." As Trea walked away, he turned back to Alex and pointed to the Militia safe-zone. "Remember, we're gathering there. I've got a couple people that'll be more than capable of helping you defend the portal." Folding his arms, he got a sly smirk on his face before saying "See you down there." Then, in a puff of smoke, he teleported down to the field below. Now that his head was clear, he could finally defend himself effectively.
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Tsubaki was getting masses of reports left right and centre about the massive resistance they were getting from the enemy. It was actually getting annoying for her. "Ma'am, we've lost contact with one of our HQs. They never even got to let us know what the hell happened to them!" The crew was getting restless: Tsubaki didn't want to do anything rash just yet, but this was getting way out of hand. "I need to consult the king. I'll be back in a moment." As Tsubaki walked out the main command-rooms doors, she turned to a much smaller room. Pressing one of the buttons, she watched as a holographic image of Jin came up in the centre of the room. "Ah, Tsubaki my dear. How goes the war effort?" The look on her face showed she clearly wasn't amused. "Our men are getting slaughtered, sir. And not just by the hundreds, either." "Oh please, you know the people on that ship had perfect ideas of what their jobs-" "This is after the initial invasion, sir. We've lost masses of resources already, ships are getting taken out of the sky and all I ever hear on the radio are cries of terror and fear. And those are just the ones I hear, sir." Jin simply shook his head: he already knew what she was asking. "Requesting permission to destroy the cit-" "Denied." "Sir, this city possesses no tactical value to our effort whatsoever! Why the hell do we need it anyway?!?" Jin simply started laughing at the remark, leaving young Tsubaki in dismay. "Don't you see, my dear? This is simply a de-motivational tactic. We make them think that they've won these miniscule victories for some greater cause. Then when they think they've won, we send every single soldier, tank and artillery round raining down on them and obliterate them entirely. What they don't realise is that these people are the volunteers for the effort, not our actual trained soldiers: no training whatsoever apart from some virtual lessons." The commander looked at the king sickly: all of these people she was sending down were nothing but civilians with a gun and cheap armour. No skill whatsoever. "No wonder they were getting decimated..." "You see? You're starting to get it now." Tsubaki looked at the king with reluctant eyes, but something still didn't make sense. "What will happen to the city after we take it, sir?" "Well, what's a world to rule if there's nothing left to rule over?" Tsubaki simply shook her head: If that was the case, then destroying the city wasn't an option. She at least wanted to keep some of the men down there alive, so she stood firmly and said "Permission to use Aerial Ordinence to support the troops, sir?" Jin simply sighed. "Granted." "And heavy tanks, too-" "Yes yes, fine. Permission to do whatever pleases that young, childish mind of yours. Just keep the city intact." And before she could respond, the transmission cut off. Tsubaki -desperately- hated that man... but he was the king. She already killed the last one, albeit from Jins corrupting words, and she didn't ever want to stoop to his level.

Walking back to the main command bridge, she saw a familiar face with two guards as escort: Makoto was pretty hard to miss thanks to that large tail of hers. "Ah, Sergeant Nanaya. It's good to see your face again." Makoto turned around quickly and saluted her commander. "Thank you, Tsubaki." She was horrible at stating superiors ranks. She never said sir or ma'am under any circumstance, but Tsubaki simply laughed. "Don't worry about the formalities, Makoto. You're not here as a soldier... at least not yet." Makoto looked at the commander, confused. "Everyone, we have full, unrestricted access to all resources available to us. All of my subordinates are to command the war effort from this point onwards, understood?" "Ma'am!" She turned back to makoto and smiled. "Come with me." As they walked through the ship, Tsubaki started to pick up her pace, heading towards the armoury. "Tsubaki, what's going on?" "You and me are going on the ground: we're not holding anything back anymore." At first Makoto wasn't sure what to think, but then it all became clear. "You don't mean-" "That initial force we sent after the Battleship was sunk was only a group of ill-trained grunts. Now we're sending everything we have, equipment and all." Makoto was shocked, she thought that what they sent was already the best of the best. "And you and me are leading the force." "WHAT?!? No way, I'm not letting you go out there!!!" Tsubaki simly laughed. "Obviously you've never seen me fight." As they made their way to the armoury, they could see 30 troops preparing for battle: these guys worked completely like clockwork, fine tuning their rifles and equipment for urban combat. Their weapons looked like they were much better quality, as did their armour and equipment. If skill could be measured in weight, these guys would be too heavy for any normal soldier to handle alone. "They're using new armour, too: Nox generators replace the electronic equipment and gears, making the soldier faster and stronger. If they go against these SOLDIERs..." "... they'll have a fight equal to that of another SOLDIER." Tsubaki looked back to Makoto, smiling. "Say hello to our personal task force." The men turned to their commanders and saluted them instantly. Makoto was actually scared for Midgar: these were the Preatorian Defence And Tactical Offence Regiments best. "Tell me, Makoto, what are these peoples name to our people?" Tsubaki was extremely proud of these soldiers, and she felt honoured to be working with them. "... PREDATORs, ma'am." That was the first time she ever called Tsubaki 'ma'am', and she picked up on it instantly. Makoto looked more in awe of these soldiers than scared. "Exactly. The world of Midgar has it's SOLDIERs, we have our PREDATORs. I think that we're going to be the group that turns the tide of this battle, Makoto. And we may even pave the way to our worlds victory." Tsubaki was a patriot by nature, and the thought of going down in history was a beautiful feeling.
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