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"Remember, this is Crossover. Our magic will be immensely more powerful because we're being more or less bathed in its essence," Josh warned. "Controlling your magic is going to be more difficult because there is now more Unreality in the surroundings than in you, rather than the reverse, which you're used to. Anyway, let's head for the stairs. They're right through... this wall." He gestured at a wall that exploded away from them in a burst of plaster and support beam fragments, decimating a group of zombies and showing there was, indeed, a staircase, unless the door was deceptive.

"This level of Crossover is fairly safe," Alan observed. "There will be little in the way of spontaneous and dangerous environmental changes or killer beasts. Just weird beasts. Legion is, I think, making a point, using fear rather than death. The problem is... governments across the world are going to be mobilizing paranormal divisions, and down here, just as it's easier for people to utilize magic, it's easier for magic to utilize people. We need to first, attack Legion and his followers; second, locate and rework whatever is anchoring us in Crossover."

"Anchors, plural," Alan countered. "He must've been pumping at or near his full output for a day into a new anchor for days or weeks, preparing for this. He needs massive amounts of energy to ground a whole city in Crossover... we'd need several teams to go, and they may be scattered all over the city.

Joe rolled his eyes and threw his hands up in exasperation. "Well, <********> What are we gonna do then?" He began to head towards the stairs after Siber, little sparks squirting their way out from between his clenched fingers.

"Whee, catastrophy," Paul replied genially, grinned with an odd combination of insanity and joviality, and charged the stairs. He was on a roll, and he obviously intended to keep on rollin'. "The solution seems obvious. We shoot things until Legion can't keep doing two things at once. When that happens, we go back to normality, and the battle is won. I say we worry about the anchors, resistance, demons, etc. after we've shot the merciless crap out of them. Am I right, am I right, or am I right?"

"Anyhow, we don't have forever, so let's keep moving, shall we?" Paul rushed for the stairs. This was not the cautious approach Siber appeared to be taking; this was the SWAT approach of run in, shoot, and keep running. Foes would not slow, only threaten. It was clear why this was necessary; time was short, foes were numerous, and they had an end objective, which left them no time to be dilly-dallying.

"Up," Josh answered simply, blowing the door to the stairwell off its hinges with a two-fisted strike. "Preferably straight to Legion's floor. Siber, can you send something up to scout ahead?"

Chaos had been leaning against one of the consoles, arms and ankles crossed when Legion had finished the last part of his speech.



Damiens roaring laughter echoed in her ears as she gaped at Legion in surprised awe at such a thing.
She felt the magic as it worked and rolled over her skin like a static wave. She shivered and looked around, curious at Damiens sudden silence.



Though she couldn't see outside, she had heard of the realm before, and had always liked the idea of it, but hadn't thought it able to be "broken" into as a living person, only ghosts.

Guess she was wrong.



The thought made him roar with laughter again, and her lips twitched, but she refrained from laughing, not wanting to interupt Legion's speech.
As Damien continued telling her what he knew, between bouts of laughter, she looked at Legion and grinned mischeviously, wondering where all this was going. I really like this guy and his thinking.

Damien huffed at being ignored.

She mentally shrugged.

Paul suddenly stopped when he saw what Siber had referred to. It was, indeed, a dragon.

A dead one, it would appear.

Two others, red and green, were fighting off minor hordes in their own corners of the room. A massive shattered window was behind them.

Josh stopped beside Paul just in time to see the two dragons flying away and the dead one on the floor.

"Oh, s**t. We have visitors from Next Door," Josh called out.

"Abaddon's avatar wasn't in L.A., was he? He was in New York or something, right?" Alex asked as he ascended the stairs.

"I sure hope so," Josh responded. "We're in deep s**t if he and Legion start fighting in L.A."

Siber called up Monoculous in a protector state and rushed to the side of the black dragon on the floor. While the flying eyeball did an air-dance around him, fending off attackers with perfect precision, Siber checked for a pulse. "Y'all want to explain to me what exactly is going on? Who is Abaddon?"
There it was... a fluttering heartbeat in the creature's neck. Thanks, Monoculous. I'll be fine from here. The dæmon backflipped out of existence as Siber drew a knife to protect himself from anything that was still undead.
"Hey- you still there?" he asked the creature. As he did, he talked to his first-level Anahata, the weakest dæmon attached to his cardiac plexus. Will you help me out yet?
The thing was silent for a while. I still don't feel that you've completely balanced yourself, but your argument with Keldan was pretty convincing. What do you want me to do?
Siber caught movement in the corner of his eye and lost contact with the dæmon for a while to activate his Ajna and de-animate the corpse approaching him. For now, just keep this guy's heart beating. I don't know if he'll be cooperative or even sentient, but on the off-chance that he's either, I want him alive. Or her, I guess. Draconic anatomy was largely unstudied, given the complete absence of specimens.
"Josh and/or Alex, what exactly are these? Are they sentient? Can they be turned to our side?"
If they were connected to this Abaddon and Abaddon hated Legion, then a enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend deal could probably be made to happen. He kept one hand on the dragon's neck, a few inches away from the giant monarch butterfly perched there, keeping the beast just barely alive.