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 Posted: Tue Aug 16, 2022 7:16 pm
Crouching low, Ida dug her fingers into the blackened, sterile soil of a Blight spot, turning over the soil in a vain search for... something. Anything. After the first time she'd been attacked by the monsters, she'd been spending her time patroling around the spots she knew. Each one she found, she marked down in her little notebook and added to her route, trying maybe futilely to protect people from seemingly random attacks. They didn't seem to attack everyone... and so far, never groups bigger than two or so.
There had to be a source for these things... in the past, there had always been some sort of... seed, or nucleus, providing the monsters with power. They had always... disintegrated after the seed was destroyed. There had to be a seed somewhere, and if her hunch was correct, it was bigger, and stronger, than any of the others they'd found... and probably connected to all of the dead spots. They'd all sort of appeared at the same time, as far as she could tell. They were related somehow.
Not far away, a small rustle of dead leaves caught her attention and Ida's gaze snapped to the source, her body going still. It was so hard to see... the bushes around that space threw deep shadows tonight, as every night, and this area didn't have a particularly close street lamp... but she felt like she could see small, subtle movements in the shadows.
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Posted: Mon Aug 22, 2022 1:56 am
He wished he was home. That wasn't exactly anything new. He always wished he was home. Or practicing his parkour. Or just generally doing nothing related to this ******** uniform, but mostly just at home. He guessed it could be worse. Albite seemed to be keeping his word, even if his husband apparent was not. Not that Fulgurite had ever sworn him to-- He stopped and did a double take. Wait. He recognized that grey s**t the blindingly bright transcendent eternal was leaning over. Looked like the same kind of s**t Albite had accidentally cultivated onto his cultivars. His peppers. Whatever. He didn't need to be so technical lest he somehow ruin being a florist too. He didn't really want to talk to a White Moon. She'd probably attack him. He opened his mouth anyway. "Do you know what the ******** that is?" He crossed his arms under his chest. "Know a b***h who might be interested." A himbo. Whatever.
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Codebreaking Conversationalist
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Posted: Mon Aug 22, 2022 8:01 pm
The young woman started as someone called out to her, only belatedly feeling the bitter, sour sense of a Corrupted's power signature. She turned on her knee, freeing her hands, and narrowed her eyes as she searched for the owner of the voice. Where...?
There. A young man... and a terrible sense, suddenly, of double vision. Like she knew him, except... she'd never seen him before. Long, dark hair, rich green eyes... his uniform was black, as most corrupts were, with a wrap of bright blue. She couldn't have said what it was that gnawed at her, looking at him, but it made her feel very strange and uncomfortable. It put her on edge, a frown creasing her forehead.
"I... do, actually." She called back, pushing herself to her feet. She didn't bother dusting the dirt and ash off her knees, unwilling to take her eyes off him just yet. He seemed roughly her height, maybe a few inches taller... unusual for the people in this city who tended to run taller or shorter. "Could I ask who's asking, if you don't mind? Not that I'm unwilling to tell you, but I'd like to know who I'm talking to."
Perhaps this was a way to spread the information through the Negaverse. She had been looking for a way to do that, even as she'd been reluctant to approach officers when she found them out in the city. Kind of an odd feeling, when she usually sought them out to drive them away from their hapless victims.
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Posted: Mon Aug 22, 2022 9:45 pm
Fulgurite waited, patiently, for her to realize where he was. Wasn't like there was anywhere else for him to be (except home, doing literally anything else but nearly getting himself murdered by some blindingly powerful member of the White Moon--). Wait. As she studied him, he studied her. She didn't necessarily seem familiar, but a part of her did. As he found himself facing a senshi that stood about as tall as he did, he had to wonder if he had crossed paths with her before. He had been a senshi for a while. Maybe at a battle? At one of those operations that had been more successful but still hadn't quite ended the war? At one of those strange moments where there had been a common enemy? That frowning expression and the way her brow creased reminded him of something he should know, but he couldn't quite place it. Maybe it wasn't important. At least she wasn't going after him for asking. It sounded like she might even help. Miraculous. Maybe he could fix Albite's very dead and ashy peppers-- His name? "Fulgurite," he replied, as nothing really had stopped him from giving out his name like Halloween candy. "You? Just in case my superiors want to know more." He wasn't sure if Albite would actually seek her out, but... He still wanted to know who he was talking to, really.
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Codebreaking Conversationalist
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Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2022 10:29 pm
"Fulgurite." She echoed, pondering the name. It didn't... spark anything, not like when she looked at him. His eyes tugged more at her than the strange mineral name.
As for her own... she hesitated to offer it up as freely as he did. She felt foolish as soon as she realized it though. There was some concern about making herself known to the Negaverse through one of its members... at least more than she already was, but that was the problem. She'd already given her name out to enough officers that the chances of her really being unknown were slim. And what was he going to tell his superiors about her anyway? That he found her digging around in the dirt?
"I'm Ida." She said, now suddenly feeling the need to brush of her knees and valiantly resisting the urge. She didn't particularly want to look flustered around him.
"As for the dead spot... Its caused by chaos monsters I've been calling Blight. I've seen them before on my world and some others, but they were always... contained to that world. I've helped, in a few cases, to remove them." Ida continued, going back to his original question. "They drain the life and energy out of whatever place they're hiding, and when they're strong enough, they start attacking people that get too close."
If he'd spent much time investigating these recently, he'd likely know about the inky, gooey monsters. They seemed to like to focus on people alone... which reminded her of the movement she'd seen in the darkness, subtle and quick.
"You should be careful around the dead spots. They're not fun to deal with, and they like to attack from hiding."
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Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2022 11:11 pm
Did she recognize him too? She repeated his name and was studying him as if she was trying to figure something out. They had to have run to each other at a battle or something, right? Maybe he had seen her at that cursed masquerade op he kept doing his best to forget. Would explain the only vague familiarity. Vague, but strong enough to bother him. He felt like he should know who she was, but the name, "Ida," wasn't ringing any bells for him either. It had to be a one-off thing, where they got a really good close look at each other and that was it. But that didn't quite explain the fact that he felt like he knew the way she spoke. "Nice to meet you." Better to not focus on it. "Chaos monsters? Typical." Something about his tone was incredibly blasé and dismissive. Why wouldn't it be chaos? Wait until he went back to All-Bite and told him that it was actually chaos that killed his precious peppers. "But not youma, right? That was one of the things we noticed. Despite being in Negaspace, didn't really feel like us." And it destroyed those peppers-- Of course they liked to attack. Honestly, given that information, he was a little bit surprised that he hadn't been yanked back to the mysterious house that belonged to the whole team to deal with it. It would probably be assumed he knew something of how to deal with plant monsters... He crossed his arms, looking at her a bit closer as if it might crack a code. "So they drain indiscriminately if they've taken to hanging out in Chaos spaces too. So this s**t was just on homeworlds before?"
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Codebreaking Conversationalist
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Posted: Fri Sep 02, 2022 11:01 pm
Ida shook her head slowly as he spoke.
"No, they're not youma. They don't feel like youma, and they don't dust when they're destroyed. They just break apart and sink back into the barren ground. And I've seen them attack Negaverse generals. I didn't think youma did that." She said, trying to watch him without being too obvious she was doing it. The way he spoke, dismissive and irritated, reminded her a lot of her little brother. He seemed like he might be the same age. She had to wonder if he'd gone to school with him... maybe fallen in with the wrong crowd, or just got unlucky enough to get snagged by an officer and corrupted. The thought of the same happening to Matthew gave her chills... This was why she worked so hard. So this didn't happen to the people she loved.
She blinked and shifted uncomfortably as his gaze sharpened on her.
"As far as I know, it was just one-off things on a couple of worlds, a few years back. Each time it appeared, we found the source hiding on the planet and destroyed it. That destroyed the monsters and let the planet heal." Ida said. "With how wide spread it is, with more on Earth than anywhere else, I suspect they're all connected... and the source might be here. If we can find it, we can destroy all of them, maybe for good."
She still didn't know what exactly caused the blight or how it had ended up on multiple worlds to start with. She didn't know how it had spread so far now, why it was appearing on many worlds simultaneously, or where the source might actually be. Always, too many questions.
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Posted: Sat Sep 03, 2022 4:32 pm
Taking a harder, deeper look was not only not producing any answers, it was also making her uncomfortable. And while he wasn't sure if he should care about the comfort of the White Moon, he wasn't sure he should care about the comfort of chaos either and pulled his gaze back just slightly. Just slightly, he was still definitely giving her A Look, but it wasn't getting him anywhere was it-- And yet, he couldn't convince himself to stop looking. Who was she? He wanted to tell himself he knew her from somewhere, but he couldn't come up with any place he could have possibly known her from. His best guess was a prior operation, but even a prior operation would not be giving him this kind of weird sensation. She seemed so gentle. Youma didn't generally attack generals, it was true. The only time he had seen anything like that happen was when people decided that pulling out star seeds willy-nilly was a good idea. And he wasn't sure The Rift really counted, anyway. So these weren't Negaverse sourced, and they were still chaos originated, but there weren't even a threat from space if they were really in Earth-- "They're probably all connected somehow if I had a guess." He huffed. "This might be a threat the Negaverse still wants to deal with even if it is chaos. Something something protecting the earth," he really didn't seem like he bought that, "something something it killed my peppers." Fulgurite shifted to his back foot. "Guess it makes sense it's in the Negaverse too if it's spreading around the planet..." Time to report back to the himbo probably.
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Codebreaking Conversationalist
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Posted: Fri Sep 23, 2022 7:20 pm
Ida nodded slowly, shooting a glance over the dark bushes before finding green eyes again.
"As far as I know, it was only on a couple of asteroids. I haven't heard of it anywhere else before this recent explosion of infestations. I'm not sure how its been spreading, considering most of these worlds don't have any connection to each other. Maybe it was dormant, sleeping for centuries, and just suddenly awakened... or maybe there is some other method its been spreading. But it is definitely not youma. You're right in that it doesn't feel like them, but its been attacking your people too and it doesn't turn to dust when its destroyed, like youma do." Ida said, shrugging gently.
"I know our sides don't usually work together, but... I think its in everyone's best interest to deal with this. If we put all of our combined resources together, we stand the best chance of dealing with it."
It might be too much to ask. Still, they had an interest in keeping the planet safe too, or she thought so. She was counting on that to get their help with this.
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Posted: Sat Sep 24, 2022 7:12 pm
Was this the threat from space that the Negaverse sometimes called the senshi and knights? It was from off-world, because of course it ******** was, but yet the White Moon didn't seem to want this blight that killed Albite's peppers anymore than they did. At the concept of working together, he frowned. But was it such a bad thing? Could he perhaps work with Nectaris again? Could he briefly pretend he hadn't been recruited to a mess in the first place, and they were all just senshi and knights, united against a common threat instead or perhaps not even having to fight a threat at all. Then he could just go home, arrange flowers, laugh with his sister, write fiction-- It was a distant fantasy he quickly buried. "Fine." He crossed his arms. "I don't have the most influence, but my boss sure does." Well. Not as much as someone like Jet, but Fulgurite was noticing it was hard to find someone who didn't at least have some idea who Albite was;
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Codebreaking Conversationalist
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Posted: Sun Oct 16, 2022 2:30 pm
His agreement brought such a wave of relief, Ida had a hard time not letting it show on her face. As much as their two sides fought each other, this wrongness was so wide spread she had doubts how much of it Order could handle on their own.
Strange bedfellows, and all that. She thought.
"The important thing right now is to look for the source of all this. Some... seed this was all born from and is connected to. The more people we can get to search, the faster and more likely we are to find that source, and then we can destroy it." Ida said, warming to her subject now. Approaching had been the hard part... she was well prepared for what to do after she'd gotten agreement to help. "Look for places where people don't usually go, or places with low traffic. No one has spotted it yet, so it must be hidden. It could be a place with more than the usual number of dead spots... I haven't been able to plot enough of them to know if there is a denser concentration of them yet, but I am working on it. Look for places where things are just... off."
"And if you need to reach me, to let me know what you found or get help, whatever... just find another senshi or a knight, and ask them to pass me a message. I don't know everyone, but I'm confident there are enough connections that someone would be able to find me." She said finally, feeling again the awkwardness of trying to communicate with the Negaverse or the Dark Mirror. By nature, they did not cross over much... but she was not going to tell him about their phones and the network that connected them. Truly, anyone searching should be able to reach her. She'd been making sure as many people as possible knew she was working on this.
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Posted: Tue Nov 29, 2022 6:40 am
Locate the source. To do that, go to places where people didn't usually go. Seemed reasonable enough. If this intrusion was going so deep as to go to the Negaverse, where no one but a very specific group of people could even go, tracked that it was keeping itself in places less traveled. No one had spotted it yet so it must be hidden was also a reasonable conclusion. "Alright, find a hidden area where this s**t seems particularly rampant and ********. Sure." Fulgurite found himself glancing over her once more. ... Where did he know her from? General patrols? Prior fights? Who had he gotten a close enough ******** look at to be giving him this unnerving sense of deja vu? Maybe it didn't matter. "Alright, Ida, I'll find one of your fellows and deliver the message if I have one." He swatted into the air. "And I'll go get this message delivered to Al-- my boss. See you around, eternal." Was easy enough to vanish afterward. He didn't need to think of the familiarity if he didn't need to see it.
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Codebreaking Conversationalist
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