Participants:
| Scene Title | Don't Blink |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | When a cathedral just lands in the middle of a park, a band of heroic Scions go forth to investigate. Four psychotic angels attack. Wesley was the Storyteller for this scene. |
Lots of grass and trees everywhere. And a biiiiiig cathedral that shouldn't be there
Later in the afternoon, in the middle of a Brooklyn park, there was an incredibly loud bang, as if the sound barrier was breaking, and suddenly there was a rather modestly sized cathedral sitting in the middle of everything. There's police tap surrounding it, but it's a good 100 feet away from the church itself. The reason why they're all so far away becomes apparent when one sees so many people rubbing an invisible forcefield, and no one knows what to make of anything.
Meanwhile, Wesley's rapidly punching the field, off to the side and away from the police working. They tried to stop him a few times, but eventually just let him at it. He's not hurting anyone! "Damnit, I bet there's some awesome huge guy in there to fight! Come on, let me in!" he exclaims, as if he expects the field to simply open.
"You're a total tool, you know that?" Shou sits on his surfboard, slowly lowering himself down towards Wesley with a raised brow. "I mean, seriously? Beating on it with your fists? What's next? Piss on a fire hydrant and chase the mail man?" The floating surfboard disappears, and Shou lands gently on the ground next to Wesley, dual katanas strapped to his back, and a wakizashi on his waist.
He hadn't been too close to Brooklyn Park, but he heard the news reports on his way home from work while driving. Whatever's going on, it just didn't sound good. So Rufus Scrivner found a parking garage, left his car, and then /flew/ the remainder of the way as quickly as he could, carrying little Miss Vette Adams in his arms. Landing quietly behind a gathering of trees and eventually emerging when he was fairly sure no one was looking, he comes alone with his hands in the pockets of his suit jacket and his eyes faintly narrowed in curiosity. It's by chance alone he espies Shou and Wesley, and silently, he approaches the pair before turning his head to study …well, empty air. "Good afternoon, gentlemen," he levelly says. "What have we here?"
An interdimensional incident. How exciting! Vette tilts her head and studies it, looking for the source of the force field that might provide some hint as to how to get in or as to what put this cathedral out in the middle of the park. She also studies the cathedral itself—it's architectural period, it's apparent country of origin, if she can figure it out.
Running from one appointment to the next, okay, perhaps not exactly running, but Mariana pauses to glance down at her watch to check the time when she hears this initial boom and then the loud raucous to follow coming from the direction of the park. Being that this is New York City and monsters have begun appearing everywhere, despite being scheduled to meet with a friend for after work drinks, she decides to investigate instead. Just the large crowd which begins to filter over towards the forcefield is eye catching enough, police and all. Reaching for her phone, she begins dialing it up semi-casually, as she makes a quick approach to the center of the scene where the action is taking place. "Richard, I'll be running a little late. Something just came up…" Not so strangely, there are quite a few familiar faces present, even if she doesn't know them all by name. "It's too early to start breaking out the Christmas decorations, I think. I mean, a giant snow globe?"
"What the crud…?"
Albert's ears felt as if they were bleeding. Even from his high ledge on top of a building, he could hear it as if it were right next to him. He almost falls off the edge he was sitting on. "Gah, man… I can't hear myself talk!"
And then he sees it. The sudden appearance of the cathedral. "Hmm… I better find out what that is…"
Some time later, after jumping from building to building to get nearer to the cathedral, Albert looks off the ledge down to the ground. He braces himself for impact, then jumps down, smashing into the ground. He then gets back up, and slowly walks over to the small group of Scions. "Hey, Wesley," he asks, "What's going on here? Oh, hey guys. I'm Albert. Oh. Hi, Mariana. Okay, probably not time for introductions, though…"
The cathedral itself is unlike anything seen in human history. Sure, it's obviously a cathedral, possibly of some European origin, but the design is almost otherworldly, with countless points at the top like some sort of crown, perfectly structurally sound. It almost has an eerie presence.
Wesley slams his hand against the invisible dome, then looks around at the other Scions gathering, sniffing the air. He recognizes a few, but there's some he's clearly never seen before. "This thing's a bitch, but there's nothing that's indestructable. How many of you can punch a hole through a wall? Sync the hell up with me, then punch it as hard as you freakin' can. It's like when you pluck a glass really hard but don't break it, it vibrates to freakin' pieces." He's not smart, he just knows how to destroy stuff!
Shou just stares at Wesley. "You are… /amazing/. D- do you realize that you could very well be the Missing Link? I mean, sure, your brow's a little small, but…" He glances over at Scrivner and Vette. "Ooh, hey guys. He's trying to punch a wall into it." Shou nods a little, pursing his lips, then shaking his head a little.
"Hmmmmm." Rufus watches Wesley for a moment, then he looks over at Shou and arches his eyebrows. "Do you have a better idea then? I certainly don't. Not yet, anyway." As he reaches up to take hold of the hilt of the sword he keeps sheathed across his back in a nylon case, he draws it carefully free and turns his eyes back to Vette. "My dear," he says quietly. "What do you make of this? Do you see anything that might be a … ahh… power source?" Once his sword's free, he reaches out to poke at the shield with the sharp tip. Poke poke! Jab!
Vette shakes her head and says, "I don't see a power source at all. I'm not sure what's powering it, but I get a feeling that physical force won't do much. I think, however, that I can work with this." She bends down to put her hands on the earth. She's just going to try to Shape a way UNDER the dome, like a little dog hole.
"This is absolutely beautiful." Mariana murmurs, taking the time to admire the otherwordly structure and its architecture from what could be considered a safe distance behind the forcefield — even if the field is there to protect the cathedral and not the people. Or you would think! Just as she's about to slip her phone into her purse, something changes her mind and quickly she begins to snap pictures of the looming building. Not that she takes her time, and soon enough that task is done. Her phone soon disappears to be replaced by a sacrificial dagger, though she does have to say, primarily to Wesley since he is the one calling people to attempt and destroy this field, "I can't say how much this will help…"
"Okay," Albert exclaims, "Ready!" He pulls his arms back over his head, and puts his hands together, ready to deliver a full-power strike. "Just give a signal, and I'll give it my best!"
"At least someone listens!" Wesley exclaims to Albert, and nods to Rufus, but Shou earns a middle finger. "Alright, anyone who's gonna actually help, let's knock this thing down!" He draws a fist back, getting ready to slam it into the barrier. "1… 2…" And Vette digs a clear hole under the forcefield!
And just as Wesley is counting, Shou notices that Yvette has dug a hole clear under the forcefield. "Hey, Duke Nukem," Shou tells Wesley. "Do you want me to tell you where you can stick your finger, or should we just use the entrance the nice lady provided for us without resorting to Marvel Comics copyright violations by pretending we're the Hulk?"
Even Rufus looks amused. As the others get ready to smash the shield, he had raised his sword as well, but now he lowers it. "What Shou means to say is," he calmly amends, "is that Miss Adams has kindly dug a hole for us, ladies and gentlemen. We can go in now without having to resorting to possibly bruising ourselves." He takes a step back and turns, quite ready to explore this cathedral. He crouches down beside the hole, and then he goes slinking beneath the dome.
Vette, of course, slipped through her hole right away. She raises a hand to her mouth and ducks her head, hiding a smile—but there's no hiding her twinkling eyes when she drops her hand. Now she begins another intensive study of this cathedral, looking thoughtful.
Before she event attempts to take a literal stab at the field, Mariana lifts a hand to run fingertips over the barrier. It's Yvette's earth crafting that skills that does garner her attention and once she notices the earth shift and move, a look is then given to Wesley and the others just as Shou makes an announcement about the new entrance. "Well, that was easy enough, wasn't it?" She says with a smile. There is no way that she's putting that dagger back into her purse, keeping it held firmly within her grasp. Like the others who are attempting to enter, she waits near the hole, prepared to follow.
Albert's eyes dart from Wesley, to the hole, then back again. He sighs. "I hate to ask this," he groans, "but… are we still knocking down the forcefield?"
Suddenly, Albert chuckled. "Actually, I think it best to take down the forcefield," he says. "If we suddenly need to retreat, and the hole is blocked, that could be a problem. Of course, I'm not gonna retreat, but still, there are other reasons why we need this down…"
"We're not gonna bother with the wall, Dirt Girl'll make another hole, and we're not retreating, we don't even know what's over there. But my educated guess is that it's some kind of pope dinosaur." Wesley says with a swift nod, then starts crawling under after Vette. Since she's the first out of the hole, she'll be the first to note the strange library-like smell, like old books. It's as if the grass and the few trees aren't even there, one can't smell them at all. Whatever the forcefield is, it's clearly altering the air in some way.
Shou glances at Wesley. "You have /educated guesses/?" He sounds amused, until he hears Albert. "You /retreat/?" He shakes his head, tsking softly. He slips down to the hole, and through it, muttering under his breath (but easily heard): "/Pussy/." He pops up next to Yvette and smiles at her, nudging softly. "Nice one," he says, winking. He sniffs. "Augh, it smells like a library in here."
Scrivner takes a deep breath and pretends not to have heard any of the nonsense going on behind him. He adjusts the grip on his sword and looks around, eyes narrowed. "Yes, it rather does, doesn't it?" Then he goes walking forward, marching, but slowly. He glances around constantly, on high mental alert for anything darting about, anything moving that might be approaching with hostile intent. He's also looking for the nearest door.
"It smells /great/," Vette says. "This is so one of my favorite smells!" She grins at Shouok, this guy is annoying clear up till he ends up growing on youand peeks into the nearest window.
Mariana notes the strange shift in atmosphere within the bubble as it no longer has that nature in the big city smell to it. To the heiress, it actually smells nice in here as long as the books aren't all stale from poor air circulation. "And what's wrong with a library." She then asks the surfer, "You make it sound as if its a terrible thing." See, Vette agrees! "It does, doesn't it?" Mariana can't help but respond. Taking an interest in the structure once more, she tries to listen for any sort of sound — menacing or not — coming from within as she assesses the building.
"Eh, true…" Albert sighs, as he enters the tunnel. He then hears Shou's comment about him retreating. "Hey, I just put the retreat option out for you," he says calmly, shrugging," Just in case you chicken out." Once in, he then jestures to the tunnel. "In fact, you can go now. Nobody will think any less of you."
Albert suddenly becomes tense and serious. "Something's not right here," he says. "Be careful. Prepare for combat." He clenches his fists, then moves forward…
As they approach the cathedral, there isn't anything obviously out of the ordinary about it, though that strange otherworldly feeling is still there, as if they're approaching a space ship, or a dragon, it's just so… there.
"Hey, my brother's still new, he'll get badass soon, he just needs an instrument, whiskey, and a hooker." Wesley explains, standing in front of the cathedral doors, which, upon closer inspection, are very large and a very light purple/grey color.
Shou stares at Albert. "Oh no, you've wounded my pride." He taps his heart. "Ow." And then he rolls his eyes. "Anybody got a spandex suit for the Power Ranger over here?" He glances over to Albert, while he unsheathes one of his katanas. "You got your Special Moves scribbled on your forearm so you don't forget what to call out to let the bad guys know you're coming?" Wesley gets a snort from the son of Susano-o. "Yeah, better get him the instrument before the hooker else he won't be able to do much, yeah?" And then? Then Shou kicks the Cathedral doors hard enough to break'em, if they don't open.
"Ah, that's right. You're my cousin, aren't you?" Scrivner says, glancing over his shoulder at Albert, looking him up and down. Then he looks over at Wesley. He's sure the trio there will be able to sort out their issues without his interference, so he shuts his mouth again and approaches the cathedral at a careful walk, exhaling a breath. He looks up and down, then at Shou as he makes an attempt to kick down the door. Effective, if it works, but not very subtle. He doesn't complain, though.
"Be careful. There's some guardian angel statues in there that worry me," Vette murmurs. "There's books /everywhere/ though, and clothing from all different times. Let us hope this is not someone's version of the TARDIS or we might end up in the middle of the Black Plague or something. There's also quite a bit I simply do not recognize…"
While she marvels at the artistic lines which make up this entryway, Mariana silently listens to the conversation though doesn't seem at all affected by the negativity being shown by certain individuals. It's Vette's words that draw her gaze to peer further towards the doorway, whether it's broken in by Shou or not. Just the mention of angels, makes her lithe muscles tense.
"This is quite strange." Albert's statement is definitely an understatement. "This is just…strange? I don't really know what to think of this place." He looks around, staring at all of the angel statues, half-expecting them to jump out at him…
When Shou kicks the door, it doesn't break, they're insanely strong, but the doors slowly open, groaning loudly as the air practically pulls one forward, the clothing within the cathedral blowing everywhere. It takes a moment, but eventually the air settles and the clothing laying around is almost like someone preparing to send stuff to a Goodwill.
Wesley starts to enter behind Shou, looking around, but so far so good. Some of the clothing almost looks like Sci-Fi stuff, while others are medieval, and some seems like tiger leotards. "Fuck, this is weird." And the smell within is stale, that library smell even stronger, though one can almost feel an aura of death, like when one walks into a graveyard…
"Okay," Shou says, glancing over, "Wesley, you can be Kirk. Roofie can be McCoy, Vette can be Uhura, and I'll be Sulu before he came out of the closet, while he was still nail hot chicks. The rest of you are… uh… red shirts."
"Damn it, Shou. I'm a lawyer, not a doctor," Scrivner very quietly murmurs in answers as he steps forward over the threshold, his sword in hand. He glances back at Vette, a silent warning in his eyes. Stay behind him. Then he turns away from her and looks all around, eyeing the clothing, breathing in the stale air. He has such a bad feeling about this, but what can be done but to push forward? So he goes inside, keeping a wary eye open for any sign of life. Or any sign of bodies or skeletons. He also takes a moment to look for those angel statues that Vette mentioned.
Vette will happily stay behind Rufus, and she's not keen on touching anything. Yet. Those books are a real temptation, but…
Not being particularly geeky in the sci-fi sense, most of this goes over Mariana's head. Not that Shou's words hold any weight, as something else has fully grasped her attention. At first, her eyes flicker towards the other members of the party, to see if they are sharing the same vision. Though as some of the members start forward, she raises a hand as if to halt their movement, "Slowly and carefully. You're scaring them. Or… I think that we're scaring them." She's not entirely sure about this, but she carefully navigates her way forward as if moving to avoid something or someone.
"My name is Albert Matthews," Albert Matthews declares. "I have a first name and a last name. Therefore, I am protected from red…shirt…suicide…" He trails off as he has the feeling that death is nearby. "Uh, this doesn't seem good…" Albert stops walking and looks around slowly. He finally sluggishly moves forward. "Scaring what," he asks Mariana…
The groaning of wood begins again, and slam goes the door behind them all. There's still plenty of light from all the windows, and every inch of the large room can be seen. They easily spot the first two statues, which are on the other end of the room, but when Rufus looks around for more, he'll spot another two, these two five feet away from the corners of the room, unlike the first two, which are firmly planted against the walls.
"The hell did all these clothes come from?" Wesley asks as he lifts a pair of overalls, tilting his head, not really looking at whatever Mariana is. There are no skeletons or bodies anywhere, and the books seem like various versions of the bible, some dating back to extremely early times, and others being editions one has never heard of.
"Scaring them?" Angels or… whatever… can feel fear? Rufus stares at Mariana for a long moment, and after considering that for a second or two, he slowly sheathes his sword in the scabbard across his back. The man wets his lips and walks forward still, but slower now, hands at his sides and palms facing outwards. The man draws a deep breath and then calls out, "Hello?"
Vette suddenly does not like this at all. On instinct, she taps her foot against the floor, her puzzlebox glowing as she reaches into her divine nature for her echo sounding ability.
Shou balances his katana in his hand, and sighs. "For fuck's sake." He puts the tip of his sword the to ground and /drags it/, creating a harsh, grinding sound. "HELLO?"
Keeping her eyes on the center of the room, Mariana's gaze can't help but peer at their surroundings every so often as if attempting to find something. "There are the spirits of the dead here. I can only assume that these clothes are theirs, for they wear similar attire and something has them freaked out of their minds." She shakes her head to Rufus, "They don't look like angels and there are a /lot/ of them, cowering in the center of this room. If not our presence, something else…" The echoes of Scrivner's hello makes her freeze for a moment, when she continues on, "Has them all frightened."
"Spirits? You can see spirits?" Albert seems awefully puzzled by this. "Wow… that's interesting… So, they're scared? Why? Wait, hold on…" Albert walks over to the nearest guardian angel statue, and taps his knuckles on it. "How are the spirits reacting to this," he asks.
Mariana already thought the statues of the angels were eerie the first she set eyes upon them when entering the room, but now she looks at them all the more warily. "They are afraid of…" And then Albert goes and starts rapping his knuckles against one of them and the young death god spawn simply stares. "The statues. I can tell you… that they aren't taking it well Albert. Not at all. Now, I have to wonder if there is where judgment is dealt…"
Of course they're not paying attention to all four statues, and by the time Wesley looks back at the door, the one on the right side behind them is suddenly standing in front of the door, holding its sword up to its face in a rather challenging stance. "Alright, so what the hell, you saying this is the afterlife or whatever?" he asks as he stares at the door, tilting his head. "And who put that in front of the door?"
"We're still on Earth, anyway," Vette murmurs, sounding /intensely/ relieved. She whirls around to see the statue standing in front of the door and frowns. This just got creepier.
Shou rolls his eyes. "Oh great, /ghosts/. Call Jennifer Love Hewitt… or… Hayley what's-his-name from the Sixth Sense. He can see dead people." He turns around, and notices the statue's change in spot. "Shit." He taps absently at Scrivner's shoulder. "Roofie, was that statue there when we came in?"
The creepiness of the situation just jumped up about a thousand notches, leaving every hair standing up on the back of Rufus' neck. In a heartbeat he's drawn his sword again, and he whirls around to look at the door, finding the angel statue there. "Oh God," he whispers. "No, Shou. They're the statues… This is like that episode of Dr. Who I watched." The one that freaked him out more than he will ever admit out loud. "Look away from them, and they move incredibly fast and silently. In the show, the four statues were tricked into looking at each other, and thus were frozen forever… But I don't think we're going to get so lucky with this batch."
Mariana's attention is drawn towards the angel which stands, blocking the entryway now. But she doesn't simply stop and stare there, her eyes continue to wander the rest of the cathedral to get a count on exactly how many angels they need to worry about and then to get a sense of how much space they have to actually face these things. "I think it put itself in front of the door, Wesley. The angels have these spirits terrified." She says as she continues forward to the mass of frightened ghosts that cower under the watchful eyes of the statues. It almost looks as if she's attempting to help them, all the while, she looks from one angel statue to the next. "Who are you people?" Is asked rather rhetorically.
"You know," Albert says, "these statues are getting me very nervous. "I wonder… does anyone here think I should try to do something about them?"
With nearly everyone's attention on the statue at the door, with Mariana looking around at the others, at least one of them isn't being focused on, and the next thing they know a curtain falls over one of the windows that was shining light on the door, and the angel can no longer be seen. So now both angels that were on the right side of the room are hidden in the shadows somewhere.
The doors crack open again, just enough for someone to squeeze through, allowing the sound of a jackhammer to be heard vibrating the entire dome to an annoying degree. "Albert!" Wesley exclaims, pointing at the door. "Go punch whoever's doing that shit in the face!"
"With pleasure," Albert says, grinning. "Be right back." He runs through the opening between the doors, ready to pound whoever is causing his ears to bleed again.
Shou sniffs a little, and hefts his sword. "Dammit." He heads for one of the angels that he can still see. "Screw this shit." And then he tries to decapitate it. A fairly straightforward attempt, in fact.
Rufus breaks a sweat and slowly backs away from the centre of the chamber, eyes wide and flickering back and forth quickly. He's just a bit pale, but he doesn't run. "Yvette," he says slowly. "Darling, I think we're going to need you. Come with me, Vette, while I watch these two statues…" He's trying not to blink. "Sink the closest bastard into the stone for me, would you please? So I can go about chipping out its eyes and hacking it into tiny pieces once we have it in the floor?"
Albert has disconnected.
"No problem," Vette says, her voice serious. It's always serious when Rufus uses her full name. She puts her hand on the floor and starts attempting to shape the stone as Rufus has requested.
With this sudden shroud of darkness that envelopes part of the room, Mariana peers out to attempt to see if she can make out the statue that she had caught a glimpse of earlier. "Tricky, ethereal things, aren't they?" Noting that Shou is about to launch his own attack, her eyes continue to scan the darkness, before her gaze settles on one of the beings that Rufus is watching, in the case that it suddenly begins to move.
The attempt at manipulating one in the darkness doesn't work, though why it doesn't work is known only to Vette. Meanwhile, the statue Shou attacks doesn't budge, but it doesn't seem to be affected either. It's clearly not a normal statue. And Mariana's pleas to learn what they want goes unheeded, but there is another wooden groan in the room, first when the doors close, and again as if the room itself were taking a breath.
"What the hell, screw this crap. Dirt Girl, you feel anything? 'Cause I hear stuff, they're moving around, really freakin' fast. I smell 'em too, they smell like angels when they're in the dark, but they smell like rock when we can see 'em."
Vette nods her her head. "I can feel them. This thing dodged away from my floor sink. If they smell like angels when we can't see them and smell like rock when we can…" She says, "I think we'd all better close our eyes, and I'll tell you where to strike."
Shou backs up against Vette and holds his sword up. "Okay. So say when." He closes his eyes.
Scrivner hesitates for just a moment or two, staring at Vette. But he trusts her completely. He tightens his jaw and summons up every scrap of courage that he has in him, roughly telling that gibbering voice in the back of his head to shut the bloody Hell up already and hang on for the ride. Here we go. He adjusts his grip upon his sword, squares his stance, and he closes his eyes. Without sight, he strains to listen now, trying to keep track of every rustle of fabric and every whisper of breath.
Hearing the impact against the statue near the door, Mariana peers over her shoulder to see how well Shou is faring. She figures Scrivner's got the other two statues covered as she attempts to assess what sort of damage, if any, is being done to the looming threat or whether it attempts to strike back. So far there is no movement out of that corner at all that doesn't belong to the surfer type. However, Vette's request does get an arch of a perfectly shaped brow, "Yeah… That might be the way to go if their rock selves are that tough." She, too, closes her eyes, putting her full faith in Vette to guide them. And safely.
Suddenly there's flapping, lots of flapping, the rustling of feathers all through the air as if they were about to be swarmed by birds of prey. Benches are knocked out of the way, Mariana can hear the terrified screams of ghosts, and everyone can hear the groaning of the chathedral, as if it were growing restless. Wesley's eyes are closed, and suddenly there's the swinging of swords above each of their heads.
Vette is not attacking. She's calling out locations in times. Six o'clock, 9 o'clock, 12 o'clock, 1'oclock, and then offering air or ground level. "1 o'clock, air!" She keeps her eyes closed so she can read the cathedral and keep track of all of this. It's a bit harrying, but she does it.
Shou takes 1 o'clock, air. He leaps, effortlessly, and rips through whatever it is with the harrying force of a mighty samurai. Or something equally poetic. Maybe like the cutting wind of the Wendigo's breath; or the sharp sigh of a forlorn mother's phantom. In any case: his sword is sharp and he's /really/ fast.
Rufus Scrivner can hear it, feel the stirring in the air, just before that sword comes down at him. In the flash of a heartbeat the ichor in his blood wells up and coats his skin, hard as metal, shining like pewter. He twists his body instinctively, catching the strike coming down at him from the attacking angel with a clang across the blade, roughly but quietly snarling as he shoves it away and parries the attack. Then he retaliates, moving swiftly as he summons every scrap of courage, hissing his defiance as he listens to Vette's voice to guide him for his counterstrike.
The shrieks and screams of the terrified spirits both distract Mariana and prevent any attempts of her to try and feel out where the angels are based on her hearing alone. Thus even with the sound of foosteps or even the slashing of a blade cutting through the air, all of this is nearly blocked out completely as she can sense the panic all around her. This makes her an easy target and in her disorientation she fails to evade the incoming slash of one of the angel's blades which rips across her abdomen and tearing a very expensive blouse in the process. Biting down hard on her lip, enough to draw blood, she drops to one knee as she crouches amidst the terrified ghosts, one hand placed at her open wound while the sound of her dagger clatters upon the floor.
Wesley turns his head in Mariana's direction, able to follow the movements of the things based on sound and smell alone. When she's down and he smells blood, he quickly charges for Mariana's angel and jumps into the air to send a spinning heel kick to the side of the angel's face. "Bastard! Don't touch my woman!"
It's hard to say what the angels are doing, but they release inhumanly grizzly screams, far from angelic, they're like some sort of beasts from hell whenever they get attacked. Shou and Wesley's angels barely shrug, if they do shrug, it's hard to tell what they're doing with their eyes closed, but it's easy to say that the sounds they're making aren't sounds that come from normal mouths. Then, suddenly, the onslaught of attacks begin again.
Vette is still calling out locations, and it occurs to her that she's feeling them well enough to shoot. So she draws her Peacemaker and draws a bead on one, firing off a shot while she's at it. Hearing Marina go down didn't do much for her temper. She's getting a little miffed at these angels.
Shou dodges the angels' attacks, miraculously enough, and spins around, following Yvette's orders as to where to slice-n-dice. Hopefuilly this time he'll do more than just scratch the surface of this thing's tough exterior.
Teeth gritted, Rufus fights faster and harder. He can't seem to strike out at one of the angels in any effective manner, but damn, is he trying. That fear is lost, finally. Now there's only fury. He heard a woman cry out, and if that means they've lost one more, then there is one less person between Vette and death. Nothing must touch her. /Nothing./ He whirls and then whips up his sword, again searching for an angel to destroy.
The frightened shrill screams continue on and Mariana is drifting in and out of consciousness just listening to this terrified chorus and the battle cries that burst out around her. All the while, her lips move to whisper out a prayer in her native tongue and offer her own blood to the gods.
Wesley can't see his in detail as he narrowly dodges the sword swipe, but he's standing in front of Mariana's body, drawing back a fist to slam into the angel's stomach, the veins in his arms suddenly throbbing as his inchor whells up, and moves to slam a fist directly into the angel's gut.
Both Scrivner and Shou's angels recoil back with deep hisses, and the sound of something bubbling up from the floor can be heard. It's not slippery, but it smells vaguely of bile as Wesley's angel doubles over, but still doesn't die.
Vette continues to fire into the darkness, but she's having trouble shooting and calling at the same time. She errs on the side of calling the stuff out correctly and not on the side of getting her own hits in!
Shou follows the sound of the screaming, closing his eyes and taking another randomly wild stab in the dark. Quite literally.
Shou has disconnected.
His eyes are starting to ache from all the scrunching that he's doing, but Rufus does not give up, nor does he slow. Knowing he's hit angelic body, he whirls around with his sword, pursuing his prey. He takes a slow step forward, baring his own teeth as he snarls.
Wesley groans as he continues to try and stay firmly planted in his spot and keep his eyes closed. Heightened senses are useful, but having a person behind you that really needs to be attended to is a bit of a distraction. He doesn't want Mariana hurt, he wants this thing dead. "Damnit, I like talking to her, she's a girl I like talking to and we don't even screw. I won't let you hurt her again!"
The other angels are incredibly fast, dodging people like rabid dogs with feathers landing everywhere, but finally one goes down, Wesley's fist goes right through its already sunken in gut, and he screams with the voice of a thousand angelic voices before bursting into light. It's so bright it's almost like having a lightbulb close to their eyelids. But once the light is gone, all that's left is a burst of feathers.
Meanwhile,t hat bulbing liquid is getting higher, already at the bottom of their ankles, and they can feel a strange breeze, like being inside a lung. The screams of the dead in Mariana's ears go from terror, to horrible pain.
Vette is sweating a little bit now. She doesn't like the goo, or the sounds, or fighting with her eyes closed. Hoarsely she keeps calling out the locations. She fires at something, and has no idea if it hits or doesn't. But the report of the weapon sure is comforting.
Rufus can feel that liquid swirling around his ankles, and he figures he can kiss another expensive suit good bye, but so long as it doesn't start burning his skin, he doesn't worry. Not yet. Listening carefully out for his lady's voice, then listening for Shou and the others, he steps forward and snarls, whipping out his sword to strike again. Must… /destroy/ the angels. That bright flash of light /hurts./ But he doesn't go blind from it. Not that it'd matter if he did, since he's not looking around anyway.
Wesley hunches down to pick up Mariana when he finally notices the liquid, carefully sliding her over his shoulder. "That's it! She's dying, I'm getting her out of here, I don't care if I ruin your fights!" He reaches over, grabs a church bench, then slams it directly down toward Scrivner's angel, hell bent on crushing the thing.
Just the unholy sound of the angel's scream mixed with the shrieks of the tortured spirits makes Mariana shift, her mind troubled. The only think that escapes her lips, though, has something to do with her dagger which rests on the floor where she had fallen and a mention of her Father.
The bench breaks over the angel's back, causing it to fall prone on one knee, turning to stone in that position. Meanwhile the other two, one badly battered, the other still plenty healthy, go for Scrivner and Wesley, swords once again rapidly swinging at an inhuman pace. The liquid's rising up to their shins now, and the the air becomes a large breath, a smell like being in front of a dog's mouth.
Vette doesn't want Mariana to lose her relic, if that's what it is, so she bends down to get it with her eyes still closed. If she can sense angels, then sensing another metal thing in this room isn't going to be that hard, she hopes. She fires towards the one that is still moving.
"Then take her and hurry! Get out!" he bellows at Wesley. For now, Scrivner backs off from the incapacitated angel, whirling around. He's searching out the weaker of the two left, guided by Vette's instructions. The man wets his lips and goes rushing forward, sloshing through the stinking water and gasping for breath. "Vette!" he calls out. "Where in the Hell is the water coming from? What's going on?"
Wesley leaps over the weaker one, just as Scrivner attacks it, and it explodes into another brilliant light. But there's still another, flying after him as he heads for the door, still holding Mariana tightly. "Leave her the hell alone!" he exclaims, slamming his foot back to smash into the flying angel's face.
The angel kicked by Wesley goes flying back, flapping rapidly back in Scrivner's direction, but feints, flying over him, then swoops down to Vette, hissing and screeching in a mixture of pain and rage as it tries to dice the Dirt Girl to bits. Once Wesley rams into the doors, the chathedral roars, doors still held shut as the liquid raises even quicker, fleshy sounds suddenly heard all around them, and the floor soft and sticky, like walking on a large slab of meat.
Vette fires the Peacemaker into the angel that is trying to slice her to bits, her mouth now set in a grim line. She clutches Mariana's dagger in the other hand, but doesn't bother to try to attack with it. She's ready to go home now, actually. This place is disgusting.
Mariana hangs like a limp ragdoll over Wesley's shoulder, bleeding out all over him.
This is looking preeeetty desperate. Rufus Scrivner backs off a pace or two as he sloshes through the muck and realises that whatever they're in, it's coming /alive./ "Don't give up!" he calls out. "Don't give up, we can do this! We are the children of /gods,/ and we will never surrender!" Then he charges forward, baring his teeth and snarling as he slosh-slosh-sloshes ever so bravely after that angel.
Wesley turns around when the doors close, knowing there's nothing he can do until this last thing is gone. He has no idea what's up with the cathedral, but the one thing he can do is try to kill that angel! "Hold on, Mariana, I'm getting you out of this fucking thing!" He's still holding her securely, making sure he doesn't irritate her wound, and while the angel is busy with Scrivner, he leaps into the air above the angel's head, raises his lead, then attempts to slam the heel of his boot right into the angel's skull.
Wesley's foot goes right through the burst of light as Scrivner completely destroyed another, then the squishy floor under them starts rapidly rumbling and moving, before all the bile comes up and just tosses them out in a huge wave. The souls suddenly start flying out of all the windows as they break and burst, then with a loud roar, the force field cracks, and gigantic wings sprout from the fleshy and impossibly now-non-euclidean cathedral. One can barely even call it a cathedral now, it's… like a mass of flesh, flying away into the sky until it's no longer visible.
And, our heroes are left covered in cathedral vomit, with an incapacitated angel statue sitting hunched in the grass.
There's only one thought on Scrivner's mind as he opens his eyes at last, thrown from his feet to the roiling muck and flesh. He gasps for breath and summons his power, shooting up and out of the water towards Vette. Throwing wide his arm, he catches her around the waist as they're bodily hurled from the cathedral and tossed to the grass. Their landing is made gentler by the fact that he's flying in midair, soaking wet, stinking and panting for breath. It flies too quickly for him to catch, and he knows it, so he's left hovering in midair and looking down at this angel on the grass. Snarling, he lowers himself to set Vette down on her feet, and then he approaches it. Time to die. He lifts his blade on high, closes his eyes, and swings down as hard as he can to decapitate the bloody bastard.
Vette will try to understand the problem of transmutation to stone vs. flesh upon being /seen/ that she barely understands…later. For now? She's all too content to just be set gently on her feet. She keeps her eyes closed until she's sure it's dead, and then she opens them and murmurs, "And we shall never speak of this again."
The last angel's face is incomprehensibly horrible, as if Nosferatu spent countless eternities in some sort of hell. But once it's decapitated, it bursts into a bright light, and all that's left are feathers and the imprint of angel wings burned into the grass.
Wesley's not even bothering to stick around, he's cradling Mariana in his arms, then leaping into the air. "I'll fucking get you to a hospital, just don't die!" he desperately calls to her unconscious body. He'll get her dagger fom Vette later, but for now, more pressing matters…
Rufus bends to take some feathers. Those will be his trophies. Then he turns to Vette, ready to get the Hell out of here.
Wesley was the Storyteller for this scene.
