The City (IC) [M]

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Witt raised an eyebrow.

"You're after one man, only? Dare I wonder what he's done to deserve your attention? As for the treasure, I won't say no; I don't need it, but no matter. Iffn you want company, company you've got."

He paused, unusually delicately for him, then went on. "When d'ya want to leave?"

[Aisha deCabre]

With her arms crossed and an incredulous look on her face, Aisha followed along with Gareeku behind the young shrew.  As they went, they passed some of the most interesting paintings that she'd yet seen in her life, and she glanced at them every so often.  It seemed a shame to leave such museum treasures in obscurity.

But of course, she couldn't waver from more important information.  Her eyebrows quirked at the mention of things like formulas one could use to predict things.  Smart as she was, Aisha wasn't a mathematician, so it all sounded like Greek to her.  In fact, moreover it sounded very suspiciously impossible.

Still, who knew?  When the predictions pertaining to herself and her lupine companion were brought up, she was a bit surprised at how close it was.  She traded a few disbelieving looks with Gareeku.  A pair in black and white?  Seeing eye-to-eye with the devil?

And what was going to happen in a few minutes...?  People dying?  And she was apologizing?  Why was she shaking so much?

"Slow down!"  Aisha tried to interrupt.  "What's the rush about...?"

But the answers were nothing more than a sad smile and her name given as the rodent handed her notebook over and walked onward, turning the corner before she could be stopped.

"Jeanette...?"

It happened quickly.  The two heard voices yelling, followed by a sound Aisha knew too well...a projectile piercing flesh.

"Shit!" she exclaimed.  Eyes widening, the panther drew her sword and rushed forward and around the corner to help, expecting the worst and more than ready to fend off a killer, if there was one.

[techmaster-glitch]

   Traxen had been on edge from when he started seeing all the strange things and wandering people. He became increasingly tense every time he passed yet another "something that looked alive". However, as he checked the digial version of the map and the line that was steadily being traced on it, he started to relax his nerves as he neared the city hall.
  PTANG!
  "WHAT THE HELL?!"
  Traxen would've jumped clean out of his seat as the entire van jerked, had his seatbelt not slammed him back down. He almost lost control of the van for a moment as he struggled to maintain speed His head began whipping around, looking all around "himself" through the panoramic screens. Where was it, what was it, where-
  PTANG!
  This time he felt the direction it came from, and as he focused on that direction in the panorama, he still didn't see anythi--wait. There was something moving, a small white thing that flew up and down rythmically... a snack packet? Wait a sec, the way it was moving, it was almost as if it was stuck to...
  "Pamcawv, initiate full scan, all cameras, all sensors on the rear-left quadrant!" Traxen shouted aloud. Pamcwav immediately complied, focusing every sensor it had; cycling through various specturms above and below visible light (ultraviolet and infrared), laser rangefinders, sonar and rader, and a host of other sensors besides as Traxen again tried focusing on driving, going as fast as possible without being suicidal. If there was anything to detect, Pamcawv would detect it.
  Hopefully.

[SpottedKitty]

Andrace kept one ear twitching and turning to catch any suspicious noise from the surrounding houses while she listened to each of the group's reactions to whatever had been playing with manhole covers. "Y' sure it's gone, Edaric?" she asked. "Not sure I like th' idea of these things bein' set on us, like someone's pet monster. Even if it's just t' keep track o' us."

When it seemed fairly certain the mysterous lurker had definitely gone away, the lioness relaxed slightly. Not completely, though, she kept her eyes scanning likely ambush spots, and her ears and whiskers were in constant motion. "Looks like th' place let us off wi' a warnin'," she said quietly. "All right, let's pick up th' pace a bit, but keep alert, folks. Whoever "him" is might not be that far off, or there could be somethin' else round th' next corner." She lengthened her stride a little, but not too much faster that she couldn't place each paw-pad carefully so as to make the least noise.

[Boog]

The Last Chance Inn

"As soon as possible," The demon began checking over various arcane or otherwise adventuring trinkets, all apparently in the pockets of the coat. A compass appeared, moved to another pocket, a charm necklace whisked out of a sleeve and was dangling about her neck as her free hand reached for something else. "All you need to know about the man is that he's about five foot ten, a frog, has black and orange skin in a blotched pattern, answers to Jeremiah Ac'Gregor and is keen on illusions. And that I want him alive." The girl grimaced, her grip on her cane tightening until her knuckles turned white. "Initially, anyway." She blinked once, remembering something that hadn't occurred to her. "Ah, by the way, my name's Alice. What should I call you?"

--

One block from city hall

Pamcawv did not detect it.
Various filters crossed Traxen's screen, each one still showing that damn snack cake. Which was swooping in closer again-
There was a thump from the side of the van, but this time the car didn't veer off course. Just further thumps. One of the roof mounted cameras saw the snack packet smear itself across the top of the car, around the gun turret. Something was CLIMBING up there, towards the front of the van.
A face swung into view, in the windshield. Some sort of canine, barely recognizeable as furrae anymore. Once yellow fur had been stained black by some sort of grease and soot, that smeared against the glass when it banged its forehead against it, trying to get in. Some sort of glow burned behind equally blackened teeth, and across its eyes and forehead some incredibly brave soul had spraypainted a large, orange "X".
It wore a frayed coat stuffed with shredded newspaper, presumably to keep out the cold.
This thing, invisible to Traxen's cameras, ROARED and bashed its head against the window again, trying to get in.

--

The suburbs

The group moved on, faster than they had been earlier. There was the occasional close moment; the sound of skittering in a nearby house, the whole group freezing as someone stepped on a twig... But overall it stayed uneventful until the bridge was reached.
The booths were still smashed, and the body of one of the Gator-creatures Ed had encountered earlier was still there, but otherwise it was quiet. The bridge extended across the river to the mist-shrouded city on the other side, littered with the occasional car. The breeze was light, nearby houses were quiet...
This would have been more peaceful for Edaric if he didn't sense at least ten drowsy SOMETHING's, somewhere underneath the bridge.

--

The Museum

The first thing Aisha saw, turning the corner, was Jeanette pinned to the wall by one of the white, ivory javelins she'd seen the demon crucified by outside. It looked like it had pierced her directly through the forehead. She'd died instantly.
"Aw hell, th'daft girl, meant to hit 'er arm. Now whot'm I gonna-?" Further down the hall stood a rat, tall and thin wearing slacks and a jacket that looked like denim. His tail was missing, and his left hand was wrapped in what looked like a leather belt, covered in glowing runes. His eyes locked on Aisha and Gareeku and he swallowed.
"A pair in black an'... Ffffff-!" He pounded his left hand against the wall. There was a flash, and suddenly he was holding another one of those white javelins, the material perfectly gouged out of the wall as if by an ice cream scoop.

[Mao]

  Mao nodded.  "As expected.  Best to not make any assumptions about it's intelligence just yet.." he thought to himself continuing in this manner, and occasionally letting the cuts come very close or even allowing them to nick small sections while also sending some very wide from his postion, or at least as wide as he could reach.  He made his way to the foot of the stairs and began to look about for something to hop along to make his way out of the building and on to slightly better fighting grounds, hoping the creature would follow.  The disfigured mouse he had seen before  was moving towards the strange fellow he had seen following earlier.  With a burst of speed from his abilities, Mao began hitting as many erratic spots as he could, moving as much as possible.

  "Do as I do!" he yelled, hoping that the poor fellow would be able to catch on.
  With that, he started to make his way to the nearest exit.

[Mel Dragonkitty]

Sister Alex stopped herself from fiddling with the paper in her hand. She hadn't had a case of nerves for at least fifteen years. She tried to quell the nerves. Nerves made her twitchy and a twitchy mage couldn't react smoothly to sudden events. But she did have to admit that this was one of the strangest places she had ever searched for books. Considering the company that rogue magical tomes usually kept it took quite a lot of crazy to impress her.

[techmaster-glitch]

One block from city hall

  Nothing.
  As the cameras, and various non-camera sensores focused on where the invisible thing was, they showed nothing. Traxen's mouth was agape for a moment, before he glared and started cursing under his breath.
  Then, with thumping sounds and the snack packet moving up and on top of the van, Traxen knew whatever it was was climbing on the van. Seconds later, the ugliest face Traxen had ever seen was glaring back at him in front of the window, and trying to bash it's way in. Something that was invisible to every one of the vans sensors, but not to his eye?
  "...Magic." Traxen cursed.
  Traxen quickly pressed the button that slid the armor plate back over the window. While the small window was reinforced glass (he wasn't supid enough to leave such an obvious "weak spot" unprotected), he wanted to be doubly-sure that this crazy thing wouldn't have such an easy point of access. He then went for the the keyboard next to him, and quickly set Pamcawv to autopilot itself the rest of the way to the destination on the map. The van immediately slowed down from the speed Traxen was going himself, as Pamcawv was not capable of safely naviagting itself at such a high speed.
  Traxen then jumped out of the driver's seat, slid through the tall, thin door that separated the driver's area from the rest of the van, shouted "Pamcawv, prepare turret!", reached up to the roof to grab hold of some bars, and lifted himself up into a small dome, curling up into a fetal position as shaped and cusioned slides of metal moved into place under his suspended body. He was now inside the roof turret, in just a few seconds thanks to practiced motions.
  The large dome on top of the van split open, showing a slighly smaller dome with a heavy machine gun mounted on it. The turret swiveled towards the front of the van. Inside, Traxen had a similar camera to the ones that were outside of the van, which admittedly wasn't much help, but at least he could manually fire.
   "Get off my van."
   He aimed the gun in the area at the front of the van, where the thing should be hanging off of, and started letting off short bursts of machine gun fire in the general vicinity, carefully spreading in the most likely spots to hit, particularly where the snack cake was and the half of the van the driver's area was on. Even under this kind of attack, Traxen kept his cool. He only hoped that something would happen to signify a hit, like a spurt of blood...

[Myr]

Pale eyes observed the manhole cover briefly-heh, thank heavens they didn't try and go in the sewer! He'd have been unable to join them. And personally, Raek was inclined to believe that the creature may not be as gone as they thought.

True, he could somewhat trust the 'cubi's ability to sense minds, but that didn't mean much. What if the creature had retreated to only shield it's thoughts? If it was said to be intelligent, it wasn't too far-fetched. Nor was the alarming-yet possibly entertaining-concept that it might also decide to bring back friends. Or him, Raek noted.

The Mythos smiled slightly-even if he'd rather not get into a fight without reason, his very nature sent a trill of pleasure through his veins at the idea.

Still, he listened at the moment-more to Andrace than to anyone else-before nodding and picking up his own pace somewhat. A warning? he was thinking as they walked quickly through the seemingly dead area, That makes sense. I'd best be ready then, since it seems we're disregarding it. His nearly furless swayed slightly as he walked-a type of counterbalance effect, really, that helped his ungainly form keep on it's feet. And a pity, really, that he couldn't be as silent as his feline employer...at least not on pavement.

And as ready as he could have been, the brutish canid found the silence to be somewhat annoying.

How was he to be ready when there seemed to be nothing to be ready for?! True, there were a few sounds here and there that gave cause for pause, as well as the occasional scent...but nothing came of it. All in all, rather frustrating.

So it was Raek was decidedly grouchy when they reached the bridge a bit later...though it quickly vanished as he saw the area in question.

Ah, now here was something interesting!

His ears perked alertly as he took in the damage-whomever had been here put up a remarkable fight! Smashed booths, the light reek of death and blood (Not to mention, oddly enough, the scent of their incubus companion)...but only one body. The reptile was strange...and even to the somewhat deformed Troll-wolf seemed a bit unnatural. That could have been a challenge, he decided, at least for me. Other thoughts on the matter were more along his nature-such as, perhaps, how it would taste if he got an opportunity to eat it...or even if a monstrous gator-thing would even be edible.

But he kept himself under control, and forced himself to be content with keeping an eye on the area. Again with the silence! Ah well, it was probably for the best.

Raek glanced at his employer for a moment, before stepping closer. "So, where now?" He asked in a quiet rumble-but not without a look at the corpse. Was that...longing in his eyes? Eh, maybe one was imagining that....

[Lisky]

The general seriousness of his pose loosed a bit as Ed noted the thoughts and emotions drifting further away.  It wasn't a 100% full proof method of detection, sure enough, but it was rather useful, and it had served him well in his past.  He followed along, shifting his tentacles back into wings, and wandering the suburbs.  He kept himself tense, picking his way through the streets and making his way towards the bridge.

The scene was eerily familiar, save for several missing bodies, everything was exactly where it should have been.  His first move was towards the gator creatures, heading a few steps ahead of the rest of the party.  Suddenly he froze.  His tail twitched from side to side as he felt several living things... semi-intelligent it seemed.  "We're not alone here..."  He said over his shoulder.  The large, leathery wings twitches, and a few tentacles slid out, their mohawked draconian heads seemed to look every which way, as the feline slowly backed towards Andrace and the rest of the party.  "I think there's eight... maybe ten."  He tried keeping his focus, but the preparations for combat were clouding his longer-range senses.

[Kafzeil]

"Don't need to tell me!" Jinx yelled back at the Adventurer, keeping his gun trained one the beast.

As he chased after Mao, he turned back to the mouse and, with his hand outstretched, index and middle finger pointed at the the beast, still clutching his rapier, he blasted a tongue of flame in it's direction.

The flames would likely not reach the the beast, Jinx had cut the spell slightly shorter then usual. His intent was to scare the beast, prevent it from following them, or even get it to run off.

Then again, since when had anything in his life gone according to plan?

[SpottedKitty]

As she came into sight of the smashed toll booths, Andrace paused for a moment to survey the scene before stalking cautiously onward. The wreckage matched Edaric's description, but she'd expected to find more bodies. Scavengers, maybe? She noticed Sister Alex and Raek's reactions out of the corner of her eye, and perked one ear towards Edaric when the 'Cubi spoke up.

"We're goin' across th' bridge there, Raek," she replied to the wolf-troll with a wave of her tail towards the far bank of the river. "It's th' only way t' th' oth'r side, we just got a few speedbumps t' clear away first. Th' critters 're under th' bridge, Edaric? Mmm, mebbe they don't like light. Anyone got a nice bright flash-bang spell they c'ld toss under that arch? Th' rest o' y' get y' weapons ready, just in case, this could get real nasty real fast. If we get an openin', we're gonna run f'r th' bridge." The lioness reached over her shoulder and drew her sword, her eyes fixed on the end of the bridge and her ears turning and twitching around to cover everywhere else. She seemed calm, her expression an impassive hunter's stare, only her slightly twitching tail-tip betraying her rising excitement as she prepared for action.

[Angel]

The kids hadn't shut their ears since the manhole cover. Mykst could barely keep himself from springing onto anything that made a sound, and Kali had unconsciously crouched lower and begun to move her arms and shoulders more as she walked, almost as if she was stalking something she couldn't see.

When they got to the bridge, an opportunity finally arose. At the mention of a "flash-bang" spell, Mykst ripped his eyes away from the ruined phone-booths, cleared his throat, and spoke up. "I think a fireball spell would work about the same way. It's the only fire-spell I can cast so far, and I can control it pretty well. Would that help?"

Kali was still looking around. "No bodies...feels like there should be. But I can't cast a 'speak-with-dead' spell till we really need help from immobile and blind folk." Affirming this to herself, she turned back to the group and tightened her grip on her staff unconsciously.

[Boog]

The Church in the Suburbs

There are few things in this world so effective at their purpose as fire.
The churchmouse shrieked again, pulling back from Jinx's gout of flame in time to get away with merely singed eyebrows. Bleeding, mangled and now slightly burned, the creature turned to run for it, slamming through the church doors and off into the suburbs to presumably tell everyone it knew about the weirdest goddamn thing that had ever happened to it.

Whatever it was that Mao was dealing with followed the places he hit, but it was getting cannier at predicting his movements. There was another brush of SHARP from the last surface he hit, a slash that felt like it may have drawn blood. Its senses appeared limited though. His shouting had MOMENTARILY attracted its interest, but not as much as the clap of something actually colliding with a surface.

--

Half a Block From City Hall

A few shots seemed to hit the snack cake, producing a splash of blood- was it blood? Blood couldn't be BLACK. Didn't smoke either. Regardless, it was a hit. Whatever was outside the van howled and the snack cake swung over the side. No telltale shudder of the van running someone over, so it was probably still clinging to the front... Banging began coming from the right side of the van. Even with a foot full of lead slugs, whatever it was still wanted in. A crackle came over Traxen's radio.
"This is a message on all bands. Armored vehicles are not permitted on government property. Repeat, your van is approaching city property with a large weapon." The message paused for a second. "Also, there's a Vagrant on it. Halt. Neither Vagrants nor armored vehicles are permitted on government property. Violators will be persecuted. Repeat..."

--

The Suburbs

For a brief second, Ed could feel whatever was under the bridge having a dream about chocolates. Except they were chocolates with spider legs. This didn't seem to detract from the overall pleasant air of the dream. Another one was starting to come up from its drowse. Amid the static fuzz of its mind he could almost make out the words I smell... Something...
The smell of the dead gator-creature, to Raek, wasn't quite the usual for food. Oh he could detect the usual piquant aroma of reptile meat, marrow from a crack in one leg. But there was also a chemical undercurrent. Not in a manufactured sense so much as just what happens when someone eats so much of something they always smell like it. Artificial preservatives and cough syrup and processed tobacco...

[techmaster-glitch]

Half a Block from City Hall

  Some of the shots from the turret must have hit, because some black smokning fluid sprayed about. From the sounds, fortune would have it that whatever the thing was flipped over the right side of the van and was still hanging on. The turret was built in such a way that the gun could go over the sides of the van, making them the only non-dead-zones for the turret. At around the same moment, a voice crackled over the radio. Traxen vaugely took note of it, but didn't bother too much to listen to it at the moment. Pamcawv recorded all input it recieved, anyway.
  Traxen swung the gun on the turret over the right side of the van, aiming squarely at nothing. Or rather, the big area that whatever the thing was could only be. And just after pulling the trigger, he braced himself and shouted, "Pamcawv, hard stop, then speed forward!"
  The turret machine gun ripped in burst-fire at point-blank range to the area the thing should be in, when the van suddenly applied its brakes at maximum capacity. The van luched and screech to a hard stop, and on top of getting shot at hopefully throwing the creature off before the van suddenly accelerated again. Maybe the van would even run over the creature, if things were lucky...

[Mao]

Realizing that he wouldn't be able to keep this ruse up for long, despite giving the attacks some openings in which he expected to be grazed, Mao started to look for alternatives.  "Maybe something to throw, or that I can bat away.  The delay from the inital impact sound followed by the landing sound might buy me the time I need.."  he began to look about for anything he could use as a projectile.  Anything loose and with a bit of heft would do.  He, in retrospect, began to wonder if there was a bell on this church.. "How amusing that would be.." he quietly chuckled, "If the creature were to strike at the bell it would just ring louder, which would draw it's attention even further I think."  He grinned at the thought and continued to look for objects he could launch about, while looking for the standard opening that most churches have for a bell...

He simply hoped he could make it to the exit, or find some better distraction for his unseen assailant before it wised up to his tricks completely.  "The worst part is, even if I escape, this thing will still be around to ensnare others.."  He frowned at the thought.  "I may have to do something so that others do not fall prey to it."

[Lisky]

Ed strolled a few paces in front of everyone else.  He could tell roughly where the things were this time... he was actually being cautious this time around.  Actually paying attention.  His wings shifted into long blades, some capped with mohawked, draconian heads, others with claws, though most were merely vicious looking barbed points.

He didn't bother with the distractions this time, though he muted his fur color, folding some of his wings over his clothing, and brought his entire appearance to match more with the faded grays and browns.  He strolled a bit forward, some of his tentacles hugged the street, matching is dark gray tone perfectly.

He waved the party ahead a bit more, saying, "They know we're here... get ready."  Ed himself started preparing an explosive bolt of dark energy.  He mentally picked out one of the center booths, and if nothing happened in the next few seconds, he'd see about putting the spell through the wall.

[SpottedKitty]

"That'll do nicely, kid," Andrace replied absently to Mykst as she kept her attention on possible routes along the riverbank for the bridge monsters to jump up and attack them. "Just r'member, we still got t' cross that bridge ourselves, so if y' could make y'r spell more flash an' less bang, none o' us'll want t' toss y' in th' water f'r blowin' up th' bridge." Her light tone of voice said she was only joking, but the fangs in her smile implied she'd be first in the queue of tossers.

The lioness glanced at Edaric out of the corner of her eye, noting his own preparations with a brief approving nod. "All right, folks," she said just loud enough for her voice to carry to everyone in the group, "let's make a move. Mykst, toss that spell just under th' near edge o' th' first arch. Black Magic, Sister Alex, Edaric, get y' spells ready. Th' rest o' y' — weapons ready, an' no hangin' about f'r dramatic gest'res, run 'cross th' bridge th' moment y' see a chance." She took a deep breath, adjusted her grip on her sword, and murmured one quiet word.

"Go."

[Mel Dragonkitty]

Sister Alex had a piece of paper in each hand. She prepped an offensive spell for her quicker hand, then a defensive spell for the slower one. After a moment's thought she moved the hand with the defensive spell a little upwards and closer to her face. she wouldn't be any good if the flash spell blinded her just as it flushed out the bridge creatures.

[Cogidubnus]

"Maps are for people who are lost." Giles said, planting his feet firmly on dry land and turning to look at Polyglot. "And I'm right where I want to be." he said, smiling. "See you around, little leech guy."

He kept moving, a slow, deliberate pace, and as he did so he realized that he was running out of paper to roll cigarettes with. He sighed, and kept his eyes out for a tobacconists. Or a library.

[Myr]

True, such subtle chemical odors were hard to ignore for Raek's attuned sense of smell. Maybe it would have turned his stomach if he'd been a being...but instead, it merely made him more interested in the body.

A wild beast didn't typically dine on such things so much that it attained their odor, afterall!

The lupine troll frowned, the expression twisting his muzzle in a rather eerie fashion. Should he mention it? It could be pure chance, afterall...that didn't look like any being or creature he'd seen before...except...no. Not quite. This was too...well, feral in nature to match....

Hmm? He blinked, an ear twitching back to his employer. Yes, he was doing that quite a bit lately! It was understandable though, given when she gave orders he happened to be focused on something else, however briefly.

So, weapons out, but no attacking unless necessary...and be ready to run for it? Well, that seemed to be the gist of it, at any rate.

And he already had his axe at the ready...even if he didn't actually need it, given what he was. Just happened to be that the additional reach was a rather pleasant bonus.

"I understand," the lupine Mythos said gruffly, before eying the opposite end of the bridge with a pale brown orb. "Though if you can't keep up, I will try and carry you. And..." He hesitated. "Something doesn't seem right about that lizard-smells like one of you beings that live in these cities-like medicine and those little things you smoke." The word 'chemical' wasn't in his vocabulary, unfortunately...but still, it meant the same thing. "And the 'cubi says they think like us, if I've been hearing right." His nearly furless tail flicked once, before settling in that typical wolven arch.  "But I'm ready."

Gripping his axe casually, the fellow started off at a fast walk that bordered on a trot, taking the lead. Even if he couldn't heal as fast as most trolls, it was probably best he did-a surprise attack might not nearly be as lethal for him as it would be for others. Still would hurt like heck though, and maybe even incapacitate him....

[Angel]

Smiling nervously at Andrace, hoping that the half-implied threat would stay half-implied, Mykst gripped Kali's hand with one hand and his staff with the other. She gave his paw a squeeze and then slipped to a different angle, watching the things beneath the bridge and waiting, her staff hovering over the ground and her teeth bared.

The young mage pointed the staff at an angle under the first arch of the bridge, aiming at the rocks below it rather than the bridge itself. "Flamma sancta," he muttered, calling the power up within himself and focusing it through the pearl-topped stick, "dona nos lucis et salva pontus." The power focused into a spark, glowing like an ember at first. But when Mykst flicked his staff, the spark flew off and under the bridge, and there was a flash that glowed more with heat than with the strength of a pure flame. Whatever power Mykst controlled, his respect had been enough to please it.

[Tipod]

Up to and through their planning phase, Payden kept himself completely silent. That is, completely silent save for the pounding in his chest. At the first sign of something loud, something mean and hidden beneath a bridge, an unpleasant tightness clutched at his heartstrings. The more he thought about it, the more he realized that this was as far as he'd ever wandered into enemy territory before. People had died here in the wrong ways, and if he fell, there was no telling if death would be as simple as a mutated sewer gator taking his head off or something much, much more lingering. And by "lingering," he figured "Eldritch horror tormenting the damned for all eternity."

At Andrace's "go," he jogged with an awkward gait, rifle still clutched tightly in both hands as he followed after the troll.

[Aisha deCabre]

Aisha didn't know whether she was expecting the worst or not, when she turned the corner.  But when she did, a horrified grimace struck her features just the same.  No doubt that Gareeku would have one too, the instant that the scene was spotted.

The shrew was dead, pierced straight through the skull by the same kind of weapon that she only barely recognized from the crucified demons outside.  The panthress had to keep from gagging at the sight of the diminutive girl who had only been speaking to them seconds ago.  And the rat that did the deed, after having muttered a curse at the sight of them, had another one poised and ready simply from quickly crafting it from the wall and threatening the same to them.

If Aisha wasn't filled with rage, she would have thought about how strong that either he or the weapons must have been to speed through bone without what seemed an inch of trouble.  All she saw before her was a murderer.

She held her sword upward in a horizontal position with one arm and quickly drew her boomerang with the other.  Her teeth were clenched, fangs glittering, and eyes of red narrowing with a predator's edge, keeping a close eye on his actions.  The growl in a jaguar's throat could only have been matched by that of a hellhound.  "Alright, you have five seconds to explain why you've just attacked and killed a small unarmed girl.  You try anything otherwise and you'll find Nex here in your spine before you blink."

[Boog]

Around the corner from city hall.

Gunshots seemed to be something the PAMCAW's assailant was used to. Not to say it ENJOYED them, but they didn't seem to be acting as a SIGNIFICANT deterrent. Slamming on the breaks, however, worked like a magic trick. The creature flew off, the cameras showing the scuff in the road and the kicked up dust as it hit the ground. There was another howl... Interrupted by the thump of the van's wheels passing over something man-sized. The voice crackled over the radio again.
"STOP REPEAT STOP YOU ARE BRINGING AN ARMED VEHICLE ONTO GOVERNMENT PROPERTY! STOP AND REPLY OR WE WILL OPEN FIRE!"

--

The church in the suburbs

As Mao threw the occassional object, landing with a thump before getting cut in half, his attention eventually found its way to the stairwell where he'd encountered the churchmouse in the first place. If there was a bell, it was up there.

--

The Waterfront

Giles found himself standing on the docks, near several warehouses that had apparantly been abandoned, renovated, turned into theaters and studios before eventually sinking back into a more bohemian sort of decay. A cracked mural of a woman playing something that looked like the missing link between harps and bicycles faced the sea behind him, the paint from her shoulders up long gone. In front of the warehouses was two levels of road; an overpass with laundry hanging over the side and an underpass with the visible remains of campfires. Beyond that was... more bohemia, less patchwork but no less obvious. As if simply to piss off its neighbors there was a single skyscraper, half constructed and surrounded by half-demolished scaffolding, gleaming glass sides cracked in most places and lending to the impression of a massive funnel-spider's web.

--

The Museum

"Oi, I consider it as much a tragedy as you do." The rat replied, twirling the javalin in his hand once, feeling out the balance. "I meant to hit 'er arm."
His hand moved like a blur, sending the javalin whistling through the air. He was already tumbling to the side, slapping the hand with the belt on it against a crumbling sculpture of a feral horse to rearm himself. "Never wanted to kill 'er, hell, she was the goose that lays the golden eggs, but you gotta present some deterrent against these escape attempts."

--

The Bridge

What sounded life ten voices under the bridge GROANED as the flashbang went off, and something shook. Everyone was already running, ducking in and out of cars. An armed, panicked rush across the threshold.
To Ed's psychic senses, whatever was under the bridge started to overlap. Five minds at a time crisscrossing and unfolding and blooming into something incomprehendable. A large clump of the minds fell back into the water but one group of five rising, behind them...
Cables supporting the arches of the bridge TWANGED as the creature climbed them, noticeably creaking under its weight. It had two arms, each with three large powerful fingers, and supported between the arms was a squat, toadlike body with no other noticeable limbs. It had faces scattered over it like acne, all moaning at once in different voices. Some of them seemed to be crying.
Whatever it was, it was agile. It clambered amongst the cables of the bridge with ease, swooping down toward the stragglers at the back of the group...

[SpottedKitty]

Andrace kept her eyes scanning back and forth along the riverbank until she heard Mykst begin his invocation. Then, at the last second, she screwed her eyes tightly shut, twisted her ears back and braced her paws a little farther apart on the ground. Her tail-tip flicked back and forth in stiff little jerks as she prepared to duck either a titanic splash or chunks of hurtling masonry. Just in case the kid blew it with a bridge-shattering kaboom...

The bright flash she saw through her closed eyelids was exactly what she'd wanted, though. She opened her eyes and lunged forward, swerving around debris and abandoned cars in an easy, ground-eating lope and urging the others forward. When the weird-looking critter hauled itself up the side of the bridge, she laid her ears back but forced herself to keep to the same pace. She not only didn't want to leave anyone behind, she didn't want anyone to think she might be leaving them behind. She glanced around at the others. They were mostly keeping up a good pace, except...

"Payden!" she yelled as she doubled back and raced towards the sherriff. "Get y' hairless butt movin'! C'mon, y' ol' relic, quit dawdlin', y' want that critter t' find out too late y're too tough an' stringy? Move-move-move!" Her paws skidded to a halt as the lioness put herself between the weird critter and Payden. Then she started running backwards, keeping pace with him, sword ready, her eyes fixed on the approaching monster, and her ears turned back over her shoulder to catch any sound of a stumble or change of direction.

"Raek, get over here," she called to the wolf-troll. "If our friend — or friends — here gets a bit frisky, it'll be time f'r y' t' earn y' pay."

[Lisky]

As the magical blast went off, Ed blinked his eyes back into focus, and took off at a sprint.  The spotted feline made sure to keep moderately close to the kittens, trying to keep his tentacles between them and anywhere he felt thoughts that he didn't recognize as those of the group.

Then the hideous, frog-beast crawled out from under the bridge, using the tension-cables as some sort of deformed and unstable bridge.  It's considerable weight causing the cables to creak under the strain.  Edaric was no master of engineering, nor physics... but that creaking couldn't be a healthy sign.  He stepped with his right, planting his foot, as his left foot started to come down, he pivoted on the balls of his feet, heels in the air, turning to face the great beast as it started coming closer.  "Keep going kids... FUCK! What the hell is that... thing?!... "

The feline paused, took a deep breath, then shouted at the party, "EVERYONE, GET YOUR ASS IN GEAR... WE -ARE- LEAVING!"

Raising a hand, Ed loosed a bolt of dark magic at the center mass of the beast.  As soon as the spell left his hand, the 'cubi pivoted again, tearing down the bridge in a full run.  A sprint would be faster, but far more draining, he was putting some additional distance  between him and that thing... working out how best to deal with it... he also considered that really... he didn't have to be faster than -it-... just faster than the slower members of the party.  A smirk crossed his face as the image of that racist, and so called lawman being devoured, filled his imagination

[Myr]

Good thing he'd stopped when all the commotion had started-Raek truly didn't need to miss out on any of it!

Then again, it was his job to be in the center of that commotion a good deal of the time-and usually being the source of it.

As it was, the blinding flash the others had to deal with thankfully didn't get to do more than leave a rather annoying afterimage in the lupine troll's eyes. Otherwise he'd have been quite useless for a few moments as his ears picked up a loud splash from below, followed by shouting and the sound of running as-most horribly-there was the creaking groan of tortured cables as some thing made it's way onto the bridge.

And was was proper, he'd turned to face the source of the sound.

"Ah."

No, he wasn't frightened-that wasn't quite in his nature. However, the brutish Mythos could respect something that, most likely, was more than he could handle. Besides, he was actually trying to place what it was-even as his employer was telling him to get his nearly fluffless tail to the forefront and be ready to hold it off.

A facestealer? he wondered as the somewhat toadlike creature swung among the cables with remarkable agility, Perhaps. But they only use one face at a time, not many. It must be something else...but what? The troll-wolf's muzzle twisted into a grotesque frown.

Bah, I'll puzzle it over later, if I'm still alive. He grunted softly as he immediately made his way in their direction, axe ready.

The real challenge would be how to attack it. What if the beast-if it was indeed a beast-stayed out of reach? While yes, he could throw different objects at it, there was a limit to those and their effectiveness...and heavier ones, like cars or rubble, would tire Raek out sooner than he'd care for. And given its movements, he was pretty sure anything that took a moment to lift up would either miss, or be a bad idea overall.

Well, he always did like a challenge....

"Right," he grunted as she kept moving-before turning to keep pace with her, "Just give the word, and I'll keep it busy." His muzzle curled into a toothy smile. "I don't think I can win against it, especially if it stays out of reach...fair warning."

[Mao]

Mao shook his head, and continued trying to get out of the building and hopefully into a situation where he could face it as it was.  "If I stay in here, and put myself in an enclosed space, I'll be a sitting duck.  For now, I'll focus on getting out and forming a strategy from there."He thought to himself.  "No.  For now I'll have to think of how to get myself clear of danger before I try to worry about anyone else."

[Kafzeil]

Jinx lowered his weapons. the only thought going through his head a surprised Holy shit that actually worked!

Keeping his guard up, he looked around for that long eared fellow, keeping his guard in case some nastier popped up. If that thing was just a mouse, then he hoped the foodchain here was seriously messed up.

He seemed...preoccupied. Maybe it was that thing in the floor. He kept his weapon trained in the Adventurer's direction, in case whatever was harassing him tried something, while trying to make hand signals towards him.