Encke pulled his foot back when he saw the way the captain's fingers slipped, the way their grip on the side of the building became more and more tenuous until it loosened entirely.
Good.
Unlike Cybele, no part of him necessarily took any joy or delight in the task, but he was relieved. Perhaps pushing Captain Asthma to the ground would stop him from ever coming near any civilians ever again. Stop him from coming near any other senshi or knights ever again. Stop him from coming near Richard ever again--
The relief was quickly shattered when he suddenly heard an attack name--Gorgon's Gaze--and then following afterward a name--Faustite. Encke stored that in his memory banks, and decided to take this moment to back up, fully away from the ledge.
And then couldn't.
... Well.
Encke felt his heart jump into his throat and he rushed to bury down the flashes that came into his head. Not right now, not right now, not right now--
stari_maga
Strickenized
Sleet Tempest Snape
Posted: Fri Feb 22, 2019 9:10 am
There weren't words for the way that time slowed down when the last of his grip left the edge. There weren't words for that visceral shock, that systemic jerk like the cosmos reached into his core and wrenched at his gut, tried to remove it from his body, or tried to haul him back to the rooftop by that so-altered center of gravity. There weren't words for the way his body rewound his words, sucked them back into his throat, clenched at them like some misbegotten emergency cushion for when the ground rushed up to meet him. There weren't words for the latent, naked, instinctual panic coating his eyes like a film. There weren't words for perspiration caused by a sense of doom. There weren't words for the immediate moments before death, where a boy felt so terribly and egregiously alive in ways he never wanted to feel.
Then the world
sped
up
and
Faustite
fe
lt
t h e
f a l
l until caught by a wayward bubble, a wayward glance, cobbled up out of airy nothings, spun and woven into a wary safety, and he felt at the walls with all his childlike disbelief.
The ground struck but no force of it harried him. Voiceless, Faustite only sighed out the mix of panic and desperation. He felt the lot of it leave his body, leave him weak, limp, powerless. Embarrassed. Safe, now, thanks to a member of the Mirror Court. A member standing with eternal pride affixed to his back. Faustite's hands, once feebly outstretched, tightened into fists. How good for you.
Above, beyond, he heard no clamor for pursuit. No ceaseless footsteps rushing down a fire escape, sounding their chase with clank-clank-clank like a worker's strike. Here, in the dirty, dingy, piss-stinking alley, Kiuchi and Faustite remained untouched. Up there, on the pristine roof, the two senshi sat with their glittering new acquisition. One, he knew, would go to the body at once. The other might pursue.
Doubt was the first sensation to flood back into his body. "Thank you." Licking dry lips, he added, "we need to leave."
seiana_zi
good to
stari_maga
start wrapping
sleet tempest snape
up!
Strickenized
Garbage Cat
Offline
Sleet Tempest Snape
Noble Vampire
Offline
Posted: Sun Feb 24, 2019 11:58 pm
Oh god. He'd made it in time and the other had been within range. He hadn't thought he'd make it, he'd thought his magic might not touch the other or somehow it would go right over the others head, with the other falling and landing on the ground unsafe. But no - he'd done it. That panic he'd felt left him, left him panting and his cheeks flush and warm.
He could feel them though...the other two. Between the two of them they couldn't take on an eternal and a super - not like this. He might be able to handle one of them...but not both, and he knew that. "We need to be out of the area fast...if you can't teleport there is a mirror nearby." They could at least get through a mirror and out another, creating much needed distance. "We can power down then." Already he was moving to sling an arm about the others wait, so he could take one some of the others weight.
"Glad I could use my magic to save someone...but we're not safe yet." He didn't trust it, not with those two auras right here - above them.
seiana_zi
stari_maga
Strickenized
Posted: Fri Mar 01, 2019 4:17 pm
Seconds passed with Cybele just staring at the concrete below her. Every ounce of consciousness went into getting her breath under control, which was only possible if she didn't risk looking back down to the void below. In time, she was shaking less and getting more oxygen to her brain, at least enough that she could pull her head up.
It was strange. She could still feel the auras right below her, not teleported off or fled. The spike of fear in her chest grew again. Were they coming back? Her magic had faded, and she didn't think she could finish them. Not now. She was in no state to fight. The Eternal, now that she looked, seemed trapped in some kind of magic that glowed a sickly green. That didn't bode well, either.
Cybele scanned the area from where she sat, her back teeth grinding together so hard that her jaws ached. It was a surprise when she actually saw the a blue gem towards the center of the building, intact and glowing faintly. The starseed?
She shakily made her way to her feet and started over towards it, keeping an eye on the other senshi and the side of the roof where the monster had vanished. When she picked it up, she saw that it it was brighter than the one she'd been given as some sick tactic or the one she'd picked off the corpse of her first kill. Alive, then. Despite it all, Cybele smiled.
Seiana_ZI
Strickenized
Sleet Tempest Snape
staripop
Offline
Seiana_ZI
Codebreaking Conversationalist
Offline
Posted: Sat Mar 02, 2019 10:33 pm
When the magic released him, Encke gasped a bit harder than he thought he should have allowed himself, backing further away from the edge at a speed perhaps a bit faster than he would have backed away in any other circumstance.
Not that again.
Not that--
He swallowed hard, attempting to bury with the swallow the thoughts that were creeping into his mind, turning his attention towards the other senshi who was with him. She was holding something small from what he could see. From the way she was smiling, he presumed it was the starseed. He hoped it was the starseed. He knew there was no way the starseed was with the two below him at this point.
Now he needed to make sure it stayed away from them.
(And, preferably, that whatever the hell that Dark Mirror just did didn't--)
Encke neared the edge again, just long enough to assess their location and murmur out an, "Ionization," pointing to a location nearby and, hopefully, a bit above their heads.
Prevent them from considering coming back up, he hoped.
And then, he bolted over to the other senshi.
"Is that the starseed?" asked Encke, attempting to take a closer look. "If it's still alive, we should see if we can figure out who it belongs to..."
Attack #1 (Senshi) "Ionization!" (Offensive / Attack) - Encke points his left pointer finger forward at his adversary and shouts, "Ionization!" Suddenly, the air around the adversary sounds like it is crackling, and before long, small purple-blue sparks begin to hit their body, causing the sensation of small shocks all over them. Effectively, the air around them has become conductive and ionized, like plasmas. (Uses: Twice per battle. Duration: 30 seconds Range: 10ft radius around the target. Weaknesses: This attack does not really discriminate--if he is within the ten foot radius, he will get shocked just as much as the adversary is.
stari_maga
Strickenized
Encke's just trying to block off them coming back!
Sleet Tempest Snape
Mainly using his attack as a deterent~
Posted: Tue Mar 05, 2019 4:19 pm
Soon the magic wore thin, then out. Gone was the strange bubble that encapsulated him from the rest of the world. Gone was that sense of helpless safety. Now he faced his urgent savior, so harried with the knowledge that two senshi lurked above then, and urging him through a mirror if teleportation was no longer a part of his energy stores. Faustite looked skyward as touch wrapped about his waist. Sparks fizzled and blew like fuses overhead as he did so, their own warning for what he would experience upon retrieving that starseed. A loss, a sore one, and Faustite's mouth soured at the loss of it.
"Then we leave." Faustite leveled the taller boy a hard look, drawn with resignation. Overhead, the sparking, roiling noise droned on. Droned like a television forecasting doom. Droned on like a senshi lecture for better causes.
Drawing breath, the captain considered places they'd been -- quiet corners of the city where they scampered about, learning of each other's pleasant secrets. Dodging truths where they were better left buried. Coffee shops and Romano's hallways and dorm rooms kept cookie cutter tidy, ever home to the headmaster's peculiarities. He thought of the heat in each of those places, ever unbearable, and how their windless spaces soaked into his skin. He thought of how shadows cut over desk lengths and bedposts and bistro tables. And when at last his mind's eye settled on a location, far beyond this place, he seized Kiuchi's wrist in a sure grip and sent them both on an instant trip to elsewhere.
