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Page Santa Maria Novella


He'd thought he'd been quite enough, not wanting to be caught yet wanting to see and hear what was going on, and yet he'd failed in that seemingly simple task of being silent. He'd been caught and one of the females inside had come out to him - had invited him in. As silent as he could be, because he obviously was not silent enough, the teen made his way ijust into the room, keeping to the doorway really. He kept his distance, looked over everything, as he kept his back pressed to a wall, the frame digging harshly into his back. The wood of the doorframe was dirty and gross this place really was a wreck, one which needed to be destroyed. He was certain there was no fixing this place.

When someone else came into the room, joined the others, he was glad for the shift in focus it would hopefully provide. He didn't want all the attention on himself, disliked the feel of eyes on him, and he pressed back into the wall as if he might meld with it and become even less noticible. This figure didn't seem pleased with him being here, that might not be good, but he kept silent and didn't say anything in return. He'd let someone else handle things for him, it would be easier that way surely.

One of the figures was rather startling to look at, and the way they spoke was different as well, and he wasn't sure what to think of it really. They clearly weren't normal although what they were he wasn't sure, he was however sure that asking might be considered rude and would land him in some manner of trouble. Though he was curious...oh so curious. Pale eyes watched everything while he listneed, taking in what was going on. So this was some sort of a kidnapping, something he'd noticed now since he was done staring at the alien in the room. It was a surprise to him when someone entering the room having come up behind him, had pulled him along into the room properly. Old enough to die? Well wasn't everyone old enoug hto die? Even the unborn were old enough to die. Before he could say anything the rest of what they said registered. There was some fight going on....and people were dying?

Did he look lost and confused? Because he certainly was both things as he kept next to the one who had grabbed him. They were a bit shorter than he was and were perhaps his age...but they looked so...pastel. It was annoying, those colors and that outfit in general. "I was fine standing where I was..." Outside the group and yet close enough to listen and observe...close enough to be apart of things and yet still not so much...not too close. Not a meber of this all.

“I thank you for shielding us.” Hy said to the Mauvian. She’d already arranged for another to shield their auras but they would be better served with two of them to make sure no one was over taxed.

"Grieve." She said with a nod, committing the name to memory. She knew little about the deep space senshi but that wasn't because she wasn't interested. Just her interaction with them had been almost non-existent up until this point, but she had heard rumblings of them.

Two more arrived. The room they were in wasn’t big, and was now starting to feel full. “Anyone is welcome. I am not going to tell someone who is involved in this war that they can’t do something. If the page wants to be here, let him.” Hy offered the youngster a smile in greeting.

It was interesting to hear the differing perceptions to the situation at hand. Surprisingly, it seemed several who were here were on the page of utilizing their captive as a message to the negaverse in some way or another. Some, Grieve being the first, was all for jumping in deep. And, while Hy wasn’t completely opposed to it, she did still have some morals left. Outright murder of a man who couldn’t protect himself soured her stomach.

But, there were other ways of sending their message.

“If there’s one thing I know about General King Faustite is the monster’s viciousness. Sending a piece or two could be useful. Make him wonder how far we are or have gone with this.” She shrugged. “I’ve also, I believe, found our friend here’s pen. I can’t be 100 percent certain thanks to glamours, but I left nothing in tact that he carried on him. We could send that along too.”

Her eyes tacked and item as went flying across the small room from their newly arrived deep space senshi. She didn’t much care for whatever it was, but found the exchange amusing.

“What would you do, beyond. outright killing him?” Hy presented to the room. “To note, he’s part of Faustite’s team and it’s been…insinuated to me that he may mean a bit more to the monster beyond just being a team member.” Which still bothered Hy. The General King had sold himself body and soul to the negaverse. How could anyone consider him human enough to entertain the idea of any romantic interests?

Knight Halle of Lysithea

There was another very tall, very thin senshi with pointy ears, and for a moment Halle thought he looked less off than the awful yellow one that had to cuss every other word. But then he saw the eyes. Some aspects of becoming a knight were still...taking some time to get used to.

The page's quiet complaint brought Halle's attention back, and he gave the other a look that was one part friendly, one part concerned, and the third part was full-on bossy elder. "If you skulk, it's suspicious."

Halle's expression turned solemn as he watched Illyria leave. She was usually in the thick of things and taking action. If she chose to abandon this, then it was probably a bad sign. But he couldn't bring himself to leave, not when he had questions about himself lingering on, or being able to help the people here.

He was a little surprised, to be honest. To hear that people in the negaverse might have real relationships. Did they feel love? Romantic or familial? Was it as much as someone outside of chaos could feel? Or was it more muted or twisted into some toxic?

The man on the floor looked very human, and very vulnerable. There was a vague discomfort in his chest, and he reminded himself of how it felt to have a corrupt senshi reach into him at brush across his starseed. Yeah, all murderers looked human and vulnerable, after they were caught.

"Do we know his background and connections as a civilian?" Halle asked after a moment. "Do we know where he lives?" The Lysithea Knight was young, but after sorting through his feelings, he decided to approach the situation the same way he would a new chess puzzle. Which meant looking at the whole board, not just the easiest piece within reach.

Page Santa Maria Novella


This name, the General King, was unknown to him and this whole conversation was over his head. He knew it was all serious, something big, but he knew nothing about all of this. He was in over his head and he knew it...but they didn't, and they didn't need to. He didn't think they'd let him remain if he proved how clueless he was, that he could be of no use, but he needed to know and to understand. So he needed to remain here...and he had to keep silent for that, or at least keep his talking to a minimum. He couldn't risk them figuring out how very clueless he was, it would hinder his ability to learn.

At least he had an idea of some of this. Apparently this person, the one on the floor who seemed to be the most normal of them all, was connected to someone whom everyone here disliked and wanted to take down. The connection seemed to be a working relationship as well as something romantic, making them a weakness to the one everyone wanted to get at, it meant this persons posistion was rather percarious right now. They might live...they might not. Either way they were going to be used against their partner. They were all just trying to figure out how to use them and what they even wanted to gain, how to go about it. There hadn't been enough planning, that much was clear, so they were trying to figure it out now.

"This seems a bit...disorganized." The words a whisper to himself, not meant to be heard less someone was just too close to him, as he kept his back pressed to the wall behind him. "A piece or two might work, unless he's to change sides." He didn't understand everything but he understood just enough, if they changed sides and were missing pieces it wouldn't help them one bit. It might also mean they changed sides but how loyal would they be? Considering they'd removed those bits and pieces. It seemed like too many ideas were being tossed abotu and nothign decided on, no approach figured out. But should he really be speaking here at all?

He tried to take note of every face in the room. Attempted to memorize them so he could give a full report whenever he got himself out. Names he tucked in the back of his mind.

The ttwo deep space senshi would be the most notable. The ones named Grieve was very vocal in her thoughts on the matter. The other one was keeping to himself it seemed. Staying more vigilant and quiet. Observing. Same with the little page.

His fingers twitched. How he longed for his pen that now lay in pieces in his bag. He’d been devastated when he saw it. A panic had swelled when she’d shown him, but Aelius had talked himself into taking this all one step at a time. The pen was going to do nothing for him if he stayed the way he was.

“You’re all idiots.” He commented. The Earth Knight most so. The fact that she had jumped him with no clear plan besides ‘pulling him from the street’ showed the lack of organization that order had. It was one of the biggest attributes that the negaverse had was the unity that existed in their militaristic format. While harsh, it was effective.

Aelius glared up at Hy-Brasil from his spot on the floor. He mentally cursed his restraints again. The damn b***h was working on making Aelius a living trap for the team and Faustite. “You’re wasting your time, you know. They won’t come for just me.” In the moment he hoped that he and Faustites current rift would be enough to keep him away. Likelihood wasn’t good, but he could hope none-the-less. Cause he’d. be damned if he was the reason that Faustite or the team got hurt. Best to instill doubt in their plans.

“Do you honestly think I’d ever want to purify after being held like this?” He laughed softly that turned into a cough. He paused to catch his breath before flinging his hair back out of his face. “Your hospitality hasn’t been anything but welcoming.”

Knight Halle of Halle

Halle shot the other boy a sympathetic look and asked in a similar whisper, "First time?" Gatherings like this were always loosely organized at best. Random people just being curious, resulting in literal explosions at worst. But at the end of the day, things did get done. Hopefully this time as well.

Considering the information offered by Hy-Brasil, Halle walked closer to the captive and squatted down for a better look at the man. Where before he found it hard to look straight at their "victim". now he was starting to find it much simpler. This was a problem to be solved, writ across a person and not a paper, but his part was ultimately the same.

"I think...pursing further information from his home and associates will be more reliable than further questioning him. He's a murderer." He wanted to think that was enough, but then remembered Lysithea and the fact that she'd purified out of chaos. But still..."If he was going to purify, it's be because he didn't want to keep being a murderer, not because of anything we do or don't do here. And..." his eye slid toward the teal senshi that seemed to wear experience like a badge of honor, despite not even being an eternal. "Anyone he murders after this will be part of the consequences of our choices here."

Rocking back on his heels, Halle went on, "In chess, the most powerful piece is the queen, because she can move as far as she wants in any direction she wants. Any member of chaos powerful enough to teleport is basically a queen." Finally he stood up, brushing off his pants. "The best way to get rid of a queen piece is to force it into the position of your choosing, into a trap they can't avoid."

Looking away from the captive and back toward the other Knight, he finished, "Our magic isn't for killing. So trap him with bait, take them both to space, drop the in the middle of an ocean, or an arctic to starve and die."

It felt, in certain ways, wrong to talk at length to a room of adults and...old space aliens. Especially about something as serious as this. But by coming here he'd made an active choice, and he was determined to keep making choices here. To talk and act with the confidence that those choices required.

Super Solaris of Catalysts

The smirk she cast back at Grieve's odd look--was she being threatened or threatened with a good time? Both? Neither?--was wiped off her face as she listened to the... extreme lack of planning, from the sounds of things. Her brows furrowed as she tried to line things up, as if she might be missing some obvious, glaring pieces on how the knights planned to go about things with this bait and, supposedly, trap.

That another super senshi seemed less than amused at the knight's moral judgment being on killing pulled a bit of a snort of laughter from her as she allowed herself to lose that bit of composure. This all felt like some huge joke, anyway. Once upon a time, she might have agreed with the knight--did, before even her world's politics and religious convergences gave that moral value a death blow.

But she cared far less about the tied up man's crimes and far more about that preverbal hornet's nest. That people were voting to kill him didn't even make her bat a lash.

"Let me just... make sure I've got this right." She spoke calmly, lightly, knowing to keep accusations and anger well out of her voice. Her gaze focused on the Earth knight, expression neutral. "You've kidnapped someone you believe has emotional value to a General King, who even on a bad day is known to be an extremely difficult target, and who has no apparent qualms of killing innocents just for the fun of it..." Okay so keeping the accusations part out was... maybe not her strong suit. She clearly had gotten rusty on maintaining a dethatched political façade. Need to practice that again... ew. "And your goal here is to... show him there are ramifications for doing all this, by hurting someone close to him. Alright. Fine."

She shrugged and leaned more against the wall, mindful of her wings but needing the moment to keep herself from laughing in disbelief. "So what happens after you send some token back, or when someone eventually realizes he's dead, and potentially connects it to Order's doing? Unless you've got a good cover story to why he died, bound and bruised, out here. Dying on some other world would still raise questions when he's never found, I'd think. But when Faustite kills more innocent people because we've pissed him off by hurting said person, or when the General King comes after anyone here personally, what actual plan do we have? I don't really care what happens to him," and she nodded her chin briefly at the bound man, "but I'm not hearing any plans for how to handle the likelihood for very explosive and fiery fallout. Even just him seeing us here has us on a list," she added in delayed agreement to Harper's words of consequences. There wasn't a question of if there was a fallout, in her mind. Everyone there was now complicit and fully involved, regardless of what they actually did or didn't do. Her only concern was how they were going to mitigate the damages now.

Again she tipped her head, this time back to the tall yellow senshi. "What they said. All of it--outside the hair bit, I'm not that crafty. Kill him sooner rather than later. Less chance of any reports getting back. Cuz even with numbers, we don't have nearly enough to take down a General King without heavy losses, unless you've got some powerful friends you can invite over right now. We can't even discuss plans for a trap unless we know our resources, and... it doesn't sound like you have any prepared before this?" She glanced at the brightly colored Knight near the captive, and a small smile peeked its way out of her exasperation. "Not a bad idea to drop 'em in the ocean. I've got a pretty violent one. But whoever has to be close enough to them, and have the magical power, to teleport them off-world needs to be willing to accept not only a solo fight, but also a strong chance of getting burnt to a crisp in the process."

DSS Thalassa of Exhaustion

“The whelp raises a decent point, actually,” Thalassa chimed in, uncommitted to anything beyond trying to get the people in this room to be more interesting. Scuffing one of his boots on the floor, he made a kicking gesture in Aelius’s direction by way of indicating which specific whelp out of this assembly of toddlers he meant. “Not in the way that he thinks he’s raising a point, mind you. As, uh……” Thalassa made a throaty sound and vaguely gestured at the child who was standing with Grieve (“Harper”). “As they so astutely point out, love makes people stupid.”

To say the least. Love had blinded Rylafein and Bernard to the true danger of that accursed Chaos-infested crown. Love had made Heibing ignore the potential that his own brother had brought Chaos to their world. Just because Chaos was the way that it was didn’t mean that those infected by its presence couldn’t experience love, or that they wouldn’t get just as stupid as normal, healthy people about it.

“Our little friend down here wants us to get comfortable and think that we won’t get some kind of pushback from his team. Remedial-level mind-games. Unworthy of serious consideration or taking at face-value.” And to emphasize exactly how much he meant that, Thalassa cast a long, withering look down at Aelius. The sort of expression that really wanted to know how stupid the boy thought that the room full of his betters actually was. “He wants us to slip up by thinking ourselves safe from any retribution for what we might do to him. But we would make a grave error by believing him that his team is truly so heartless as to abandon one of their own in such a manner. Chaos can change people, but it doesn’t remove basic emotional experiences like that.”

Making a pensive sound, Thalassa pulled an apple out of his subspace. He crunched into it as he pondered how to make his ultimate point. Dimly, he filed away in his mind that the Squire (Celadon) was possibly affiliated with Cybele, ******** weird. Cybele hadn’t had Knights a thousand years ago. Their senshi hadn’t even managed to achieve Royal status, far too busy flitting around, shooting arrows at things, and marrying every remotely woman-attracted being who sauntered vaguely across her path.

“We should extract whatever intel we can from the whelp and put him down,” Thalassa said. “But only if there’s somebody who can verify that he tells the truth. Intel obtained from torturing him won’t be worth a damn. People will say whatever they have to in order to stop the pain, so the torture should only be considered as a fun indulgence, not something helpful. But if someone has truth-compelling magic, though……?”

Thalassa shrugged. “Anyway, it’s significantly more important to prepare for retribution and make a stand against whoever shows up for the attempted retrieval.”