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“Almost there! biggrin DD”

Harper smirked as she replied with the stupidest, happiest emote applicable. The cover was solid, supported by falsified paperwork that included permission for an array of freedoms. There was a bounce in her step tonight thanks to her recent promotion, and she couldn't wait to tell Pene. She had pushed her family into the support of the enemy for their own safety – careful to avoid inclinations toward actual corruption – and currently lived at the senshi base. There was nothing to lose except herself after slipping out of the forest. Tonight, the paperwork sat snugly against the encrypted documents procured for Pene. Like a cat bringing a mouse home. Well, she technically left the mouse's body in a dumpster, but it was what the mouse had shrieked that was important, anyway. Tonight, should a lieutenant or a captain discover her, they would be equally disposed of and a general or general king… well, that would certainly be a treat. The city was certainly overrun with vermin.

Approaching a corner and a bright streetlight, Harper pulled the tails of her knit ski hat down to further limit what the light could expose. It was not fear that prompted her, but simple tactical reasons: she wore the hat to cover the mess that was the left side of her head. There was marred skin that marked a fourth of her face and padding that protected that side against attack, since she was deaf in that ear. With glamours weakened, Harper couldn't risk the Negaverse putting two and two together.

Turning the corner, her smirk shifted into an earnest smile. There was always Pene. Thank Cosmos the girl had toughened up. Harper closed the small distance between them, waving.

“Hey there! Easy walk for you, too?”

“Two blocks down. Lights blown at intersection. Empty building.” The instructions were short and concise, but not clipped or harsh. On the contrary, if it was not for the contents, then the tone would be the equivalent of telling her where they were having afternoon froyo some five or six years back. It was enough information to know their cover and what to look for in general – the rest would be supplied later. Military-like exchanges were an easy second language. The danger level was still quite high, as any situation where senshi needed to guard their civilian identities while powering up within the city, but the underlying tension felt appropriate rather than strained. Like a heavy coat in the depth of winter. This was the new normalcy for her, being more Nyx than Harper - or, rather, she had been absorbed and the barrier burned.

Harper broke the hug, sliding her arm down Penelope's as a point of friendly contact. She was always grateful to see her best friend, before and after the fall of the city. Their contact was infrequent now due to their “occupations,” but it was more than some were able to have. Especially the ones who were dead or might-as-well-be – the corrupted. Bodies sometimes didn't even see graves, either due to their utter destruction or being forced to leave the corpse on the battlefield. But, her Pene, she was a fighter. Harper didn't have to worry about her. She gripped Pene's hand in her own and began to walk casually down the street.

“He’s an adorable little slobber-monster, just like his father! Does he still make those little high-pitched snorts?” Harper ask, laughing lightly at the memory. Minotaur Jr. had been rightfully wary when she suddenly dropped into Pene's home once, but his actual effectiveness as a guard dog was… up for debate.

So far, it had been another thankfully smooth night. Harper was getting steadily better at putting these secret meetings together, which she liked to think had some bearing on her transfer: patrols coordinated, secrecy insured at the right time (enough time that it was not repaired or altered, enough time to dissuade immediate suspicion), and locations scouted via proxy. Too much foot-traffic to their base endangered it; she wanted no one to even think in its direction for too long. Thoughts easily turned to trouble. On the occasion that a city meetings was discovered, she could still count it as a victory in defeat, for the Negaverse would likely least suspect a fortified headquarters if the Order and its allies were caught whispering in deep in their territory. Harper noted mentally to suggest staging a few “failures” to keep up appearances. Routines were one of the few luxuries allowed for planning in her future.

Still, the teal haired girl could only smile when Penelope checked behind her. It wasn’t insulting - perhaps from someone else, it would have been - but rather, proved how much of a survivor the other girl was. Sailor Nyx was forced to trust what was left of the Order - Harper trusted in Pene freely.

Once in the building, she slipped a fat drawstring bag out from under her woolly hat and summoned up her cosmic power in time with her friend, “Nyx Comet Power, Make Up!” By the great will of her comet, she assumed, the padding remained. Eternal Sailor Nyx settled easily beside Eternal Sailor Pasiphae, their overall demeanor not shifting greatly with their new facades. While Pasiphae adjusted her bag, Nyx stole a look at her own buttwings. It had been a long journey - longer than most - but she was still proud of what they symbolized.

“Like I would let that happen,” Nyx smirked with her reply, well aware of her friend’s great care with their remaining culture and secret notes alike. After a moment, she gave a snort. “As if you would let that happen.” She plucked up the nondescript bag again and produced a nondescript pocket notebook from within, along with some curling, loose pieces of paper. “From our side: a few senshi and knights have powered up. From the other: thoughts on the alternating allegiance of the Dark Mirror Court. A possible coordinated assault from the Negaverse, unknown scale. Unknown location, too, but…” No comment was needed about how they only had so many hubs left, and only one consistently stocked with Order members. “Those are the highlights, anyway. Fresh and straight from the rat’s mouth.”

Nyx handed the notebook to Pasiphae after the summary, along with some encoded maps.

Nyx’s mirth at once widened and softened at Pasiphae’s careful query. In some ways, her friend still held on to the crumbling bases of the Order's former pillars of operation. However, the phantasmagoria senshi thought she might be more interested in the methods, this time. Or, at least, whom had carried them out. Nyx let her hat phase into the nowhere subspace where regular clothes disappeared off to when they transformed and stepped through the offered door. She picked up on Pasiphae’s intention to set out and quite agreed with it. After all, it had been awhile since the opportunity arose for them to fight alongside one another. Nyx's final parcel was saved for this situation, most certainly because it was only half done. Even with the gap in monitoring for this area, their combined auras should be enough to attract some decent attention, so they had to keep moving or risk too much unwanted attention.

The updates on their mutual compatriots was itself much appreciated news - she knew of locations and orders, but also usually divested on feelings and more personal statuses. There were still a few out there that Nyx wanted to think of as human.

“He didn’t hurt me a bit,” she said in answer to the question, looking back to Pasiphae and crossing her arms. “But, to be fair, he was delivered right to us, so that wasn’t the hard part this time. The hard part was getting a tip on a nice pile of ‘illegal terrorist propaganda,’ also known as Destiny City legal records sometime in the last five to ten years. Just a perk of being part of the Shadows, I suppose.” Nyx let the information fall nonchalantly, but her being practically vibrated with the bottled excitement.

"Quite the motivational tool you have there," Nyx replied with a lighter, warm smile that contested the cooling night, inwardly preening at Pasiphae's approval. "But why not both? Make it Irish, as they say." She motioned her palm towards herself, emphasizing the silly joke. With a smooth bend of her legs, the phantasmagoria senshi was momentarily airborne before alighting on a nearby balcony. The mid-level rooftops followed, offering the best compromise away from the harsh street lighting and the eyeline of Negaverse patrols on the higher buildings. It exposed them equally to assaults from both, but that was only a concern if you messed up. Destiny City was an impatient teacher.

As Nyx led the way, she shared further information in curt stage whispers. Again, it was a risk, but so was remaining still for too long. It would not be a long sprint to be in an aura-sensing distance, if their targets were being wary. The senshi could be loud and long in their words when they were safely drinking cider later.

"One story. Old post office. One up top; backup is always late. Down another due to illness. Cocky."

“s**t,” Nyx growled between clenched teeth. She didn't like to drop foul language, but this situation certainly warranted it. If nothing else, it kept her from roaring in rage and giving away their advantage of surprise. This had been planned to a tee. Now something was off. Nyx didn't do off, anymore; off got part of your face blown off.

“Too soon,” she spat again, deep and low and more to herself than useful commentary. Negaverse auras were popping in and out around them, which meant more power than had been accounted for. The numbers were still down in accordance with her information, at least, and the documents were nicely bundled, though it was altogether a small respite in the face of this development. Nyx felt the shift in her best friend, the deep breath and body language telling that Pasiphae was fortifying herself for something. There was no simply leaving then; Pasiphae would not willingly leave such a cache behind unless the situation became impossible. And it was not yet so, despite it all. When her friend spoke, Nyx approved, softly giving a soft affirmative noise in the darkness. Divide and conquer. Go for the head first and repel the legs.

“I’ve got it. Watch out for generals and cats. I can't guarantee they're not around anymore.”

Nyx slipped from the roof to land solidly on the pavement below, shadows still clinging to most of her figure. As she reached into a makeshift pocket of fabric, the weak lamplight was magnified tenfold for a fraction of a second - the glint of metal. Armed with the small weapon, magic, her strained wits, and a trusted comrade at her back, Nyx launched into battle.

She slammed her shoulder into the old government building`s door, avoiding the agent entirely. It didn't give on the first try, even with her cosmically enhanced strength, but it shuddered violently on its hinges and crumbled inward with a storm of splinters. Another slam with her shoulder destroyed a big enough panel, thinned by detail work, and Nyx squeezed inside.

“Horrible Shadow!” Her super level attack rose out of the shadows to assault its target - she hadn`t aimed for one officer in particular. Only one of them needed to be out of commission for her to take out the other.

The terror-filled screams of the agent to her left was akin to white noise for the phantasmagoria senshi. It was the rain outside the window; grousing of birds in a summer field. A sound quietly expected and acknowledged. It would have been alarming if it had not been there, but as it was, it signaled that she was free to shift her attention to the agent on the right. That one would get something special, a technique she resorted to in the recent, darker years of Destiny City. Senshi magic had come to tolerate the method as a body would when constantly exposed to a disease.

With a flick of her wrist, the sharpened vegetable peeler was primed to strike the downward blow. With the strength of arms that wrangle a 1,400 pound animal on a daily basis, Nyx plunged the weapon into the agent's upper torso, near the collarbone. Wrenched it out. Brought it down again. Only stopping when the other target grew too quiet, the senshi turned and gave him much of the same, slipping the peeler up through the guts this time. Her hands, arms, gloves, and a good portion of her formerly white fuku's torso was stained in splatters of bright red.

Pasiphae's voice broke like a wave over the intermittent gurgling and screaming. Good news, sorta.

Nyx wiped her hands on the agent's uniform, shock keeping both targets relatively tame, before letting him fall to the ground.

"We're clear in here. I'm grabbing what I can," she called back as she began quickly glancing over piles of paperwork for the most important looking documents. "Let me know when you're out and we'll trade before getting the hell out of here!"