Welcome to Gaia! ::

So, here was the downside to all the glowing transcendent uncorruptable excitement: youma zeroed in on Babylon like mosquitos on a diabetic. (Was that an urban legend? He was pretty sure that was an urban legend. He was going to look that up later, like, as soon as he got out of here.)

(s**t, it would be embarrassing if he didn't make it out of here alive. Killed by mutant alligator monster would look terrible on a tombstone.)

Eventually, Babylon knew, he was going to have to stop running and fight this thing head on - but he had no plans to do that just yet. Maybe he could tire it out first? But he'd been running for about ten blocks and if anything, the creature was gaining on him. He supposed he could give it credit for dedication, but, uh... he would do that later, when it was not trying to crunch his bones.

Needless to say, a little bit of help would be much appreciated.

Help came in the form of a Chronos squire, all decked out in green and pink and yellow, and god was Babylon ever glad to see her. "Yes, Tinkerbell!" he yelled, spinning around with his lantern arm outstretched, hoping the spin would push the youma back. It did... a little.

"As you can see," he called, hopping backwards and out of reach of those terrible snapping jaws, "he's very, uh, sharp? But if one of us draws his attention, the other can whack him from behind or - s**t--"

He dodged again, the youma's jaws closing where his hand had been a moment before. "Got it?" Babylon called to the squire. "Let's bring him down."

The youma made a very crocodilian sound - Babylon wasn't sure what other kind of sound he expected it to make - and rounded on the squire, jaws spread wide. "Watch out!" Babylon hollered, following it, his lantern swinging in his hands like a flail. He brought it down on the youma's back with a heavy thunk.

The youma seemed very, very keen that Chronos squire was now on the menu, and much, much tastier than Mercury knight.

"I think it's angry, Tinkerbell," said Babylon breathlessly, swinging his lantern again. It hit heavily. The youma growled again and whacked him with its tail. Babylon stumbled sideways. "********," he said. "Um. Okay. We need a better idea."

"He'd still be attacking us," Babylon called, regaining his balance. "He'd just be attacking us, like, super straightforwardly." Which - nope. That wasn't going to help. "We need to- um-" They needed to do a thing. Drop something heavy on it or - or something. Honestly, he was kind of running out of good ideas here, and it wasn't like he could get up close to the thing and hack at it until it died.

"Like - a ton of bricks. Or a truck. Or divine intervention. s**t. Let's just keep hitting it with things."

He took a couple steps back, gearing up for a running jump. "Draw its attention! I'm gonna try to get on its back and- ******** if I know."

Hit it a lot with his lantern, probably. Maybe that would work. Or he'd wind up dead. One or the other. Maybe both.

"Great!" yelled Babylon, taking a running leap as the youma turned away from him and started lumbering towards the squire. He landed squarely on its back, and the creature reared up onto its hind legs for a moment.

Babylon held tight.

The youma thudded back to earth a moment later, and Babylon sprang into action, holding on tight with his thighs and whacking it viciously around the head with his lantern. Finally, they were getting somewhere, and with every roar, the youma sounded weaker and weaker.

"Go for the eyes!" he hollered. "We've almost got it, Tinkerbell!"

The youma roared, a horrible, pained sound. Babylon almost felt sorry for the damn thing - but that didn't stop him from hitting it as hard as he could for as long as he could and, between the swings of his lantern and the squire's sharp jabs, they managed to finish the thing off. With a puff of acrid black smoke, it crumbled to dust, leaving Babylon kneeling on top of the pile of ashes.

"Well then," said Babylon, dusting ash off his pants as he got to his feet. "That was. Uh. Harrowing."

He turned to the squire, offering her a wry smile. "Good work, Tinkerbell," he said. "Name's Babylon. Who do I owe for saving my a**?"

"Pharos," repeated Babylon, meeting her grin. She was one of Chronos's knights, and that meant, by extension, she was part of the same court as Virgo. Perhaps they even knew each other - but he didn't want to bring that up and make things awkward if he had to explain how things had gone down between himself and Virgo. I had sex with your captain, bad things happened, and she hasn't spoken to me since February was not a great first impression.

The glowing was a nice diversion, anyway. "It's called transcendence," said Babylon, leaning down slightly so that she could touch him better. It was sort of weirdly sensual, but, uh, he was pretty sure he could deal. "Uh. I know Hvergelmir and I don't think it's like that. I haven't talked to the code. Um. I performed a service for my wonder? And it gave me an upgrade."

Well, it was a fair deal more complicated than that, but he thought it was probably better to keep things simple. "I can do some rudimentary healing magic," he shrugged. "That's handy. More handy is that I can't be corrupted. Chaos tries to do the whole starseed fondling thing and it's like trying to jam twin magnets together. Whoosh, denied."

As for the code at his wonder, well, he had no idea where it was, but he knew he was supposed to be looking. Next time he had a night off, he'd go to look.

Transcendence, as far as Babylon could figure, varied supremely from person to person. "I relieved my ancestor from his vigil and returned his starseed to the Cauldron," said Babylon, hefting his lamp self-consciously at her mention of how sturdy it was. He was lucky how much of a beating it could take - smashing things to oblivion had saved his life more than once. "That was enough for me - but I'm not sure what would do it for you. I think wonders differ on what they want. If you're serious, I guess start poking around and doing favors and talking to your ancestor if you've got one, and it'll reveal itself to you."

He bit his lip.

"Maybe," he added. "I know for sure that other people besides me have managed it, and they did it other ways than I did. I can give you some names if you want to ask about it."