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It was too many people.

Hvergelmir tried not to succumb to the jittery feeling in her stomach, but she couldn't help it; every time she looked around at the gathered assembly, she peered into faces she didn't know and motives she couldn't read, and she thought, this is too many people.

Iris had assured her that, if the attempt didn't work, she wouldn't do anything to harm Bischofite, and Hvergelmir assumed that went for *********, as well. That was two of them, secured -- but the senshi had bodyguards with her, too, and there were others along as well. She didn't know them, didn't know anything about them. Were they level-headed? Would they keep their cool?

And so many of the energy signatures here were powerful -- more powerful than hers. She'd promised to protect Princess Iris, but other than that . . . She was here as a proctor, nothing more. Did she stand any chance fighting any of them, if it came to that? Of fighting all of them? Would she even be fast enough to try -- or would there be blood on the ground before she knew what was happening, another young life spent in an instant, like Degrasse and Cove?

"Alois," Hvergelmir said, taking a step forward in an unconscious gesture of intercession, trying out the new name. "You made it." Already it felt like the energy around them all was shaking the ground, just from so much power concentrated in one space -- or maybe that was her hands, trembling. Too many people. It's too many people.

(She should've brought Aquarius with her, or Babylon, or someone. Everyone else had brought a buddy along, apparently. How was this discreet? Was Bischofite having reservations, and trying to shore up his confidence by giving himself no apparent safe way to back out?)

"I swore an oath against harming Negaverse officers, and it dies when I do," she said, more for the benefit of the others standing around her than for Bischofite himself. "I'm sure it comes as no surprise: you'll find no danger from me."

She held out a plastic bag, at the bottom of which rested a single beer bottle, its label obscured by the translucent plastic. "For congratulations or consolation."

Her gaze went sideways, to the pale-haired man that Bischofite had brought with him. Unsurprisingly, there was no spark of recognition. He could've been anyone. She offered him a smile of greeting -- because surely, if Bischofite still had a human connection, that was good -- but her smile was drawn and tired, at best. She was too nervous.

Hvergelmir's part to play here was small. In truth, it was mostly done; from here on out, there was nothing to do but wait and watch, and when it was all overwith, protect Princess Iris if anything went wrong. It was a relief, in a way: she was in too low of spirits for much more than that -- and at least it wasn't likely she'd have to deal with any more stressful questions from Bischofite that she didn't know how to answer, this time.

Her work here effectively done, she stepped off to the side to watch.

Kairatos attended edgily, suspicion and curiosity and maybe a dash of hope for the best battling on his features as he sized up the situation. He wasn't too fond of there being an apparent civilian here. Could only guess the connections between Alois, or Bishophite and anyone else here, but he was damn sure he was going to be there, if for no other reason than to try and provide what little assistance he could if... something... went wrong.

The "Alois" part of Bishophite might want this, but he couldn't imagine the youma half of him would. He sort of imagined it to be like trying to purge a particularly aggressive disease, only instead of just spreading aggressively through the body, this disease might do something unexpected. For all he knew it could separate and attack those present. Might have unexpected powers granted by this time incubating in a human host.

There was so damn much about this entire process they didn't know.

"Alois." He agreed, a touch dismissively maybe, but he had plenty on his mind, and not just the purification, as might be obvious, since Kairatos still showed the vivid healing bruises of his fight with Titan, and other injuries besides, his forehead gashed, his arm in a sling and his other hand bandaged, battered, and clearly tender, though he flexed his fingers slowly in preparation to act anyway.

Maybe calling him by a human name was ridiculous. Maybe it was pointless, but it was also harmless enough. The man might be beyond help. Using the name he preferred was the least he could do. Possibly the most.

He was damn tired of being unable to help people lately.

He glanced at Hvergelmir, probably having his own thoughts on her oath, but kept it to himself, at least for right now. She wouldn't hurt him, but Kairatos didn't have any such reservations.

"Let's get this show on the road huh?"

".....sh*t... too many people..."

Hvergelmir might have only thought it, but Iris was willing to say it. True enough, she had brought a couple members of her team to ensure her own safety at the end of this attempt, but there were at least two she had not known were going to show up.

The blonde eternal briefly glanced to the unfamiliar brunette, then to the familiar blonde knight. The civilian also could have been distressing, but the voice of a certain cat had whispered something about an ally from her spot on Iris' shoulder.

With a pinky, she pointed to Kairatos. "I don't even know why th'f*ck yer here..." He was clearly a mess, to say the least, and she could get away with calling him out on it. With a dismissive shrug, she then turned to Psyche and Irene.

Their mission was simple. Once the light-show was over, one was to whisk her away from the scene, and the other was to stay behind to ensure nobody followed. It had also taken quite a bit of talking and translating to ensure that Psyche wouldn't just attempt to start "smashing the monster." The rule was simple. Only if he attacks first.

"...let's make this quick..." she murmured to the teammates as the manx hopped off of Iris' shoulder and found a new spot on Psyche's shoulder. Even if Bischofite didn't have an ambush planned, as he attempted to explain earlier, just the sheer number of powered energies for order could be enough to draw other officers in.

Breaking away from her own cluster, she stepped forward, seemingly narrowing the gap between herself and the hideous creature at the center of all this. As she moved, her fuku seemed to glisten before glowing a heated white color. The material seemed to almost grow fluid as it melted, growing longer til the bottom edges had hit the ground. Her hair also seemed to gain a bit of length rather suddenly, the strands that framed her face nearly touching the bottom edges of her dress. Her tiara had vanished, revealing the symbol of her world upon her forehead. When her feet stopped, the dress had cooled to the familiar yellows and pinks one would normally associate to Iris' fuku. It was only once a pair of wings had forced themselves out of her shoulders (she had to grit her teeth to prevent herself from grunting out as usual) that her own energy had easily eclipsed the rest at the gathering.

She had no crystal at hand. Instead, she had a single question.

"...is this what you want... Alois?"

"TV was a repeat." Kairatos fired back at Iris, flashing a smile in her direction in appreciation of his own joke. "Besides, how many people can promise to make good on the threat of doing something with one arm... well it's not behind my back but hey. Cutting linguistic corners a little." He shrugged.

Honestly he knew it was probably a bad idea, but he hadn't been this beat up when he'd found out it was going down, and he wasn't too keen on missing out on the chance that this might actually work.

A crooked grin crossed his features when Hvergelmir offered a single bottle of beer, meticulously encased in a plastic bag. "Buying alcohol for minors is a crime, is it not? Even when said minor sports a monstrous appearance." Despite the playful chastising, he received the encased bottle between two taloned fingers, examining the label for a brief moment before setting it aside on the nearby bench. It tipped from its new position, settling between the slats with its neck pointed far from that place.

Watching Iris and Kairatos banter coated the air in its own meager relief, strained jokes tossed between loose friends to keep their teeth from grinding, their tongue from swelling due to the pressure. It felt hollow, yet necessary. Idly he wondered how many purified through Iris' touch, how many succeeded in such a manner and how many still died after purification ran its course. He wondered if she attempted the act on one like him before, if she considered the potential repercussion. And naturally, he wondered if Chaos may seek him afterward like thick smoke spooling out over the ground, searching for every last wisp of oxygen.

Your german improved so much during the short course of a month, Quenton. I remember how thickly your accent grated on my nerves when you first agreed to it. And now... It's still forgettable, but better. Half-turning toward the blonde, he drew a breath to offer song in a minuscule clip:

"Wie ein Phönix will ich sein,
Tauche in den Himmel ein."

Looks like I stole your role, Quenton.

Yet now, Iris demanded his attention. Alois watched when Iris approached, a flash of bloody nose on his mind while her fuku lengthened, transformed, melted of light and ire into a new and more powerful form. He felt her bright aura bubble beneath his skin, pulling a seething groan from the twin shadows at his back Alois himself grimaced but offered no further indications of discomfort. His gaze darted to her wings initially, watching the pair emerge from her back in a manner absent blood and splintered bone - the means which he imagined his own wings coming about. Yet, they stood at her back silent as the stones surrounding the lot of them - and were they of some youma affliction, he found no indication for it.

"I find zat a lot of my time spent as a Negaverse officer compares to portions of a written work called In Der Strafkolonie." His gaze darted to Hvergelmir temporarily to search for recognition. "In it, a man who maintains ze punishment of ze condemned describes his apparatus, composed of sree parts. And as ze reader continues, he finds zat ze man speaks incessantly highly of zis device, zat it is ze masterwork of ze previous Commandant, and zat its execution is somewhat artistic. But as he describes it, he furzer disclaims zat ze device is worn, noisy, and frequently breaks down. I find ze Negaverse is much ze same as ze Harrow to me - while I held it in high regard, it's a festering heap of disorganization and petulant motivations. It's broken in parts, hiccups frequently, and much like ze apparatus, its sole purpose is total annihilation - of ze city, razzer zan ze individual."

Alois hesitated, stoicism faltering while the meticulously held triangle of his fingers broke into a curl. His gaze cast toward the light far in the distance, a brief linger, before returning to the audience. "I cannot repair ze machine," he said finally, voice quaking almost imperceptibly. "Furzermore, I suspect zat at some point in my career, I will invariably subject myself to it - feed myself into its harrow and inscriber. But perhaps it already happened - perhaps I bear ze very worse of zat script in ze form of wings and monstrous visage.

"To answer your question in short, Iris, zis isn't what I want - it's what I need."

In life spans a thousand dichotomies, a swirl of events and emotions intermixed to render the most brilliant parts of a lifespan. Death catalyzed by the most startling expenditure of energy, loves tempered by blatant fear. And there he stood, nigh paralyzed by the sheer display long before the more guttural terror settled into every last tendon still beneath his control. Exhilaration chased at the heels of abject horror while he gazed upon the spectacle of the crystal and for once, but once in his insidious and insipid lifespan, knew one concept known as

balance.

And just before recognition dawned across his unmasked features, a boiling agony far beyond the most blistering flames besieged every nerve in his body, wholly setting him alight from the inside. The pain systemic, his initial response was to raise hand to chest and tease inward the warped fingers he now knew as a curse, to reap from harvest one of the most rotten starseeds belonging to the Negaverse. And somewhere beneath all that bleached pain, the caustic light met to skin to flesh to the very core of his bones, a voice bogged down with a surfeit of echoes loosed a strangled scream to mitigate what scraps of concentrated agony he could muster.

The creature collapsed to knees, unfeeling of the wet grass soaking through the tatters of coat, as both warped hands pressed to the very source of his pain. For a brief moment, he felt a veritable tear in his existence - a moment at which Malicious ended and Bischofite - or Alois - began. Yet, the wet suck of tar engulfed that hairline crack in the fusion, restoring it to its own atrocious synergy.

Yet in the moment where he experienced a breath of Malicious as she was, all her fetid tones tainted by the length of souls along her back. "I want to taste something sharp. Something odious. I want to taste your derision, General."

But you knew it from the start - you sampled it until it whet your palette, and then you nurtured it to suit your needs. You wanted this freedom, built from my disgust, and now you'll never know flight for as long as I hold one modicum of loathing in my veins.

In time, the light faded, and what chaos peeled away, ebbed along the edges of his starseed soon seeped into every pore left behind - indulging the creature's existence with intoxicating chaotic energy. Yet, even as chaos crawled over and reclaimed what meager portions of him stripped bare during the process, he found no inclination or power left within him to even clamor to his feet - instead Bischofite lay half-crumpled across the ground, hands frozen over the gaping scar in his chest while his mind struggled to rouse itself from drowning in pain.

Very
soon he
will vanish

completely in the wings

of his own
wordless
stanza*

The creature tried to speak, yet only breath clamored from jaws shaken and trembling from pain. For a moment, his gaze lingered on the lot of them, alight with hot betrayal set against algid condemnation, a brightness so succinct that his gaze mirrored the pure intensity of Iris' crystal for the stunted lifespan of a second.

When the light began to falter, the princess staggered back. She didn't even need to look at the being before her to know that her efforts had yielded no positive results. The crystal faded back into nothingness, seeming to zap away any remaining energy from the princess who buckled down to her knees as her gown broke away into shimmering pink transparent ribbons wrapped against Iris' flesh. When those ribbons of light seemed to cool, her eternal fuku was what remained.

The blonde senshi's whole body trembled as she panted aloud, barely able to comprehend her surroundings. Her vision had long turned into a blur, and she somewhat heard a curse which she herself would have used if she wasn't using every ounce of her will to remain in the senshi uniform.

With a slight tsk sound escaping the feline present, she couldn't help but murmur "...that is disappointing..." It seemed as if this affliction that Bischofite suffered from was not so easily removed. Though, granted, even if it had worked it still wasn't technically considered easy.

Glancing to the senshi attached to the shoulder ********* rested on, she commented "It's time for us to work, Psyche!" With that, she almost seemed to roll off of the silvery haired girl's shoulder, landing squarely on her feet. With a very unimpressive jump into the air and a backflip equally as lackluster, a starry printed blanket dropped to the ground.

"Let's go!"