Reactions and Splendor (mini-arc part 2)

*hunters gathering.*

Serena emptied the rest of storm's clip deflecting some of the shots fired at her while dodging the rest. Head on she wasn't going to get shot again. She reloaded storm with explosive rounds. Kain sonido'd down out of the way of the circles and then back up again as six tentacles emerged from under his cloak, and they started to throw ice Javalins that explode with a cold energy blast on impact.

Serena was tripped from behind but managed to twist out of the way of a shot. She blocked the swing with Reaper and fired two explosive shots from storm before being sent flying down through the roof of a building. Kain dodged most of the bullets, but a few tore through his cloak and him. He shot towards the man as a large lance formed and thrust it at him. If it hit it would explode with the force of two cero of cold energy.

Serena stood back up and in the cover of the building, cloaked herself, rendering her into an almost invisible shimmer, and also undetectable. She made her way up and came at the man from behind. As soon as she got close she formed her nano blade and drove it towards his back. Maybe she'd get lucky twice.

*Sweden/Gaiges workshop.*

The group set out into Hueco mundo and Gaige wasn't surprised to find herself emerging in the Cero kings throne room. Arngrim looked up momentarily from the fascinating article about rising taxes in the suburbs of america, and greeted his daughter. "Hi dear. Hi Laura. Hi Gaige. Hi strange green haired man." He looked back down to his paper. "Its been three days, have you moved yet Rui?"

Arriving in her house/workshop Gaige was not so happy to find Liv had ordered ahead. "You know I have a house keeper who can cook basically anything you want right?" She said as her father walked in. "I'm not your house keeper I'm your father." He looked at Laura and Liv. "Welcome back, Are you staying long?"

"I'm here too..." Gaige said. Her father smiled and patted her on the shoulder. "I'm teasing." Then he noticed Alexander. "And who are you?" He asked suspiciously. "Don't worry about that. We've got work to do so.... Go do dad things or something." She said. "I'm doing dad things. I want to know why there's a strange man in my house."

Gaige let Alexander answer and ate some food. Eventually her father left muttering about something. "Don't mind him he's over protective. You should have seen his reaction when I cut off my arm and replaced it. Anyway make yourself at home and have some food." She said. When everyone was finished, except Liv, Alexander asked a few questions. "I'm not sure. It's going to be a tough fight, I know that for sure. My mother is no slouch, she's atleast as powerful as Laura. Since our last meeting I've upgraded my battle armor. I should stand more of a chance when I'm in it so I'll be a little weaker than Liv. Your a wild card since I can't sense you, you'll have to fill us in on that one. All I can do to make it a little easier is offer everyone a set of Reactive armor, you included of course. It'll lower the chance of a lucky shot killing one of us."

She paused for a moment then nodded. "The Sensor grid will allow a full scan of the facility. If your fast you can help Laura deploy, since you can't be sensed. And I can always use your help analyzing the data to formulate a good plan of attack, since it will show us everthing from entrances to defense grids and every living soul inside the area its covering."

Hunter's Association

Tadatomo made like Chow-Yun Fat in that archaic martial arts movie, Bulletproof Monk. He dodged and weaved around the enemy, dodging bullets and slashes and everything in between. His worry about the Hollow subsided for two reasons. First, the Alexei/Clone was a far more pressing concern, and second, the Hollow seemed to favor attacking the Alexei/Clone anyway. Tadatomo lost sight of the Clone, only to sense it appear behind him. He spun with Kurato raised to block, only for the blade to meet a Gran Rey Cero powered attack. The attack detonated, sending Tadatomo careening threw several buildings, moderately damaged. He shook the cobwebs off, and Blurred directly at the Clone, stopping 10 yds short, and fired off 5 more Lightslashers at the Clone.

Gaige's Workshop

Liv ate. And ate. And ate. No matter how many times Laura saw her friend eat, it never ceased to amaze her. On hearing Alex's comment about her eating compared to his student's, Liv replied, with a mouth full of food "He's got nothing on me." Laura chuckled with amusement. "Yeah, the world probably wouldn't survive if there were two of those monsters in existence." When Mr. Ashe walked in, Liv, swallowing a dangerous amount of food, and Laura spoke in unison. "Hi Mr. Ashe." They giggled when he inquired about the "strange man" in his house. "Oh, that's Gaige's boyfriend. Say hi Alex." Liv almost choked on a Won-ton.

When they had all finished, they were discussing plans. "You can tag along with me if you like Alex, but be warned. Gaige gets jealous fast. And I'm also ridiculously fast. So you might not be able to keep up." Liv piped up again, wiping her mouth with a napkin and then eating it. "So. What can I do to help?"

*Alexei vs three peeps*

The man got hit hard, clearly not expecting an attack of that type. He matched the ice javalins with a single, large tentacle from his back that spewed out black flames. One of his Darklings. The two bullets from RoboChick bounced off a dark shell he had around him, in true Amarius like fashion.

He did use the pistol to block the ice spear thing, only to go sliding back some from the cold explosion. Raising the gun again, he witnessed it shatter from a far off bullet. "Haven't lost your touch it seems, Yuri..." His darkling sprayed dark flames all around and at the hollow.

Alexei spun, his dark sword glowing with black energy, sending all five of the energy blade things away. The darkling bit the invisible sword. "Yeah...something like that doesn't work very well with me." The man tried to kick her in the gut. He then jumped up, pulling out the other gun.

At the tip of it, a small, black ball appeared. And started to grow rapidly. When he fired it, it was the size of a truck. It stopped at the ground, started splaying energy beams everywhere. He was lightly amused by the three...but was getting really bored with them. He did look around and noticed something amiss. He heard the clone curse inside his head. The dark sorcorer shrugged and just waited for them.

*Gaige's Workshop*

Alex chuckled some at the bold proclamation. "Let me see the bills, then I'll believe you." He then paid attention to the man, and refrained from laughing at Laura's antics. That was something Jun would say. "Alexander Kerensky. I'm from the Coalition. We have a common interest, hence why I'm here with them. And for the record, this is the first time I've met Ms. Ashe in person...so don't worry. *turns to Laura* You really shouldn't spread lies like that."

Alex listened to them. "My greatest strengths may be sensing and reiatsu analysis, but I'm no slouch on the physical department. I'm not as strong, or fast, as Ms. Fisher, but I'm still a captain class fighter. Actually, I'm about as strong as Ms. Firestorm, if my readings from her is correct. The reason you can't sense me is because I'm a bounto. So it takes a special device to even detect me.

I guess we'll see when we get the sensor data. I'm sure I can draw Junny away if the other two officers aren't in need of him, and maybe a member or two of Kai's personal guard. If she's up for it and back in tip top shape, we could pull a mercenary we hired from Cairo to here. So it's not like we can't call for reinforcements if necessary." He'll wait on their answer on that.

Serena cursed and jumped away as her stealth attack failed, and got kicked for her trouble which sent flying back into Kain who had run from the fire. He caught Serena and deposited her to one side before firing off three blades of ice that would explode on impact throwing out shards of ice that also explode with the power of a bala. Serena fired storm three times, sending out a burst of six explosive bullets at Alexai right before he fired something at the ground beneath them.

And beam's of energy were fired up at them. Kain turned and fired a powerful ice blast at the ground to destroy the other attack assuming  it worked a 30ft area would be encased in spikey ice. Meanwhile Serena was dodging the best she could. She seen one attack going right for Tadatomo and, knowing his fleshy man body was likely to take more damage from it she intercepted the attack, storing her pistols to block the beam with her hand. The beam exploded, sending a pulse of harmful energy up her arm tearing back at the nano flesh and exposing the robotic limb beneath. It caused some serious damage to her hand and arm and she was sent careening away.

Cradling her arm to her chest she watched as the nono flesh reformed quickly, but the structural damage was far worse, and she was forced into low power mode for it to repair. She let her arm fall to her side since it was useless from the elbow down, and pulled out Reaper as she prepared to continue the fight.

*Gaige's workshop.*

Laura decided to explain before Alex had a chance. Gaige turned red from embarrassment. "LAURA!" She splutted with indignation, a plate full of wantons launching into the air. Her father believed it too, and was also turning red with anger. "Gaige what the-" Gaige almost tried to kick Laura through the wall. "We just met-" "That's even worse!" "Seriously no, gross! He's so old!" Eventually Alexander got a word in and Gaige's father looked him up and down before nodding. "Just keep your hands to yourself... I'm watching you."

Gaige face desked, launching more wantons into the air. "He lets me play with rifles and work as mercenary, but reacts like that when someone mentions the words boy friend." She muttered. Eventually the conversation turned back to seriousness. "Your readings shouldn't be to far off. She is the daughter of the strongest Arrancar in existence." Gaige said. "Jun is a little underpowered for something like this dont you think? plus he's.. 16? kind of young. I'm not fond of coalition people so the less the better, but Jun's alright so if you wan't to bring him in i'm sure Laura will be very very happy to see him again." She looked at Laura and winked.

"As for your mercenary I'll consider it. I want to know who it is first since we might have met before and it might  not have been on freindly terms."

Hunter's Association, Ruins

Tadatomo spun and ducked and weaved as the Alexei/Clone deflected his Lightslashers and performed an attack which sent beams spraying everywhere. He dodged pretty well until one was about to impact with him. He brought his sword up, even though he knew it was pointless, and prepared to parry. But in that split-second, Serena was suddenly there and took the impact, her arm becoming severely damaged in the process. He saw the robotic limb exposed, but was unconcerned with that for the moment. "Serena, fall back!" Tadatomo sensed a dramatic decrease in her power level, which was unhelpful to say the least. He drew both of his pistols and began to pepper the Alexei/Clone with shots from both guns while he Blurred around him, with Apollo's hitting as hard as a bala and Artemis' hitting with the wallop of 2 bala.

Once his guns were drained again, Tadatomo holstered them and used his Super Lightstorm to barrage the Alexei/Clone's position with 30 projectiles of double-bala strength and poor accuracy. Tadatomo wasn't even sure if they were harming the Alexei/Clone, but he wasn't going to give up.

Gaige's Workshop

Laura giggled stupidly at Gaige's embarassment, and continued to laugh when Mr. Ashe began to interrogate them. Each time won-tons were sent flying, Liv caught them all in her mouth. Laura snickered and whispered to Gaige after she was done muttering. "Boyfriend is one word silly-head." She chuckled stupidly to herself again. The conversation turned serious again and a discussion of reinforcements began. Liv smiled proudly when Gaige explained her heritage. "That's me. Daughter of Arngrim, at your service." Upon the mention of Jun, Laura stuck out her tongue. "We have to work with that jerk again? You gotta be kidding me..."

The ice user actually got him after catching RoboChick. The darkling started to melt the ice off as he used his sword to block the explosive bullets. After the beams, he continued to match the man's guns. Yawning, he actually had to move a little and use a minor defensive spell to avoid getting hurt by the energy attacks he was doing.

It was about then he noticed his barrier was gone. "When did...shi-" Twin white magic circles appeared on both sides of him and fired, creating a rather devastating explosion. When the dust settled, he looked mostly unharmed. The possessed clone looked up at the figure that was on a white magic circle, with his arms crossed. "Done already with Lucius?"

"Not quite, but enough for Connor to start shedding him out of that protective caccoon. I definitely need to sharpen my knife. I would have thought he would have put up a fight instead of trying blow us up."

Alexei chuckled a bit. "Alright then. I'll leave you be. We'll talk later. As in me myself, not my clone." He jumped up and it looked like he was distorting space that disallowed anyone from interfering. Then promptly disappearing to who knows where.

The young man looked at the array of people before him. Shrugging, he went back to the room where he found his lead. The young man the two Coalition officers had seen earlier straining himself to tearing away the metal caccoon. Below that was a magic circle. "Before you ask, I'm healing the man. Can't have him dying on me just yet." Taking out his vibro knife, he continued assisting the pup.

*Gaige's Workshop*

"I noticed. That was quite the shocker...I guess I should be glad he didn't know I was Coalition." He listened to everything. Even having a thin smile on his face. Clearly they didn't know him well enough. "Junny under jet-lag equals more bratty and attitude than normal. Ok, by leaps and bounds. Once you actually get to know him, he's a good kid. Young, yes. Underpowered, hardly. He's around your level, Ms. Ashe. And with his trump card...let's just say he would be a match for Ms. Fisher so long as she doesn't go into her second stage. He has his uses.

The mercenary's name is Annabell Munroe. I've worked with her before. Simply put, you don't get in her way, you let her bulldoze away. She got hurt pretty badly when defending herself against the Alexei Romanov Clone. She's a mage if that helps." He did find Gaige's wink to Laura rather funny. Clearly the two didn't get along the first time. "Also, for the record, he was a little dejected and even pouted when I proved to him that your shooting skills while going in for a strike really was skill and not sheer luck. And if he bothers you more than normal, I can and will poison him. Just make sure the bathroom is available when I do should we decide to bring him in."

"I'm fine its not as bad as it seems." She said as she was ordered to fall back. But it didn't matter in the end, as Yuri showed up and Alexei decided to leave, which resulted in the hollow letting out a roar of pure rage. He looked at Yuri for a few seconds before ripping open a garganta and vanishing into it.

"Well, I've had my fill of insanity for one day. Who wants to go get some ice cream? No?" She followed Yuri to the house he'd caught the man in and seen the werewolf who had been badly injured. "I remember you. Good to see your still alive. So what is this... thing?" She asked as they worked to cut the man out of a metal shell.

But before they could finish, all the cell phones in the room began to ring. Serena looked at Tadatomo as she answered the phone. Assuming the others did too, they would all hear the same thing. "I am the Mountain. You have a freind of mine. Is he still alive." "He is." She responded.

"Let him go. If you refuse I will turn your hunt into a bloodbath. I will bring destruction to your freinds, allies and the innocents you swore to protect. You may finally stop me, but i will make sure you regret it for the rest of your lives. I have the means and the man power to do this, do not doubt that. If you let him go, I will fight you and you alone. No one else will suffer. three on one if you want, I don't care."

*Gaige's Workshop*

"I think you were safe enough. I've never seen him attack anyone who was with Liv. Jun's stronger than me, actually, if I'm not using my battlesuit. What I meant by underpowered though, well.. He's a child. Far be it from me to say who should be allowed fight, hell knows I never followed the rules. It just doesn't sit right with me. But if you want to bring him in, maybe he can provide battlefield intelligence, and if we really run into trouble he can give us a hand." She said. Then she nodded about Annabell.

"I've heard of her. Never encountered her though. If she's willing and your paying, bring her on board to take care of the rubes. But we deal with my mother. No one else touches her... i'ma shoot that bitch right in the face with a railgun. When ever your ready we can head out and set up a safe house in china to prepare for the assault. If Amarius is there like you think we might take a few days to prepare."

Hunter's Association, Ruins

Tadatomo was trying to cover Serena as much as possible, although she refused to fall back. Then, as Tadatomo was preparing another attack, Yuri Romanov arrived. Tadatomo stopped what he was doing and observed, moving to Serena to check on her. Alexei/Clone decided to leave, resulting in the familiar-looking Hollow howling with rage and also departing. Yuri simply shrugged at the two operatives and walked away. With the chaos seemingly subsided for now, Tadatomo permitted himself a small smile at Serena's inquiry about ice cream.

Tadatomo and Serena followed Yuri to where the werewolf they had seen earlier, now fully healed, was working feverishly to try and open what looked like a metal cocoon of some sort. Serena was inquiring about the cocoon's contents when they all received a phone call. Someone identifying themselves as "The Mountain" was threatening to do a bunch of bad stuff if they didn't let their captive go. "If we let him go, how will we know you will keep your word?" Tadatomo knew that this was their best chance to get to the Mountain, and he didn't want to blow it.

Gaige's Workshop

"Well, as long as he stays well away from Crescent Rose, we'll be fine." Liv chuckled at Laura's wariness. "Don't worry Laura. Who knows, maybe he likes you!" Liv burst out laughing loudly. Laura grabbed the back of Liv's head and slammed her face off the table. Liv sat up straight with a serious look on her face, wiping Satay sauce off her forehead. "I deserved that. So, when you are all ready to leave, I'll open a Gargantua. But I gotta stop into my house first, tell daddy where I'm going." Laura snickered quietly at the sauce in Liv's eyebrows.

Later on, they were standing outside. Liv looked at them all, clean-faced and wearing her aviator sunglasses. "Y'all ready? Right, let's go." Liv opened the Gargantua, and they all piled in. Soon enough, they were standing before the Cero King. Arngrim Wolfcloak was still reading the newspaper, apparently still waiting for Rui to make his move in their chess game. Liv walked over to the throne. "Hey daddy, just checking in. I'm just on my way to beat up some dishonorable rogues. Wish me luck. Pfft, Not that I need it though." She looked at the chess game in progress, approaching the board. She studied it carefully. "Hmmm. You know what would liven this game up?" Without warning, Liv kicked the board up into the air, before punching it into splinters. She caught Rui's king piece and tossed it to Arngrim. "There you go! Checkmate!" She grinned stupidly. "Right then smell ya later Rui! Bye daddy." She opened another Gargantua as Laura said, "You just have to break things don't ya?" Liv and Laura chuckled as they all entered the Gargantua, bound for a quiet area of Xiang Dong Province, China.

The werewolf simply nodded. "His voice is still a bit raspy. Silver doesn't do a werewolf good. If I had my way, he would still be in Amesbury. This thing wrapped up the guy. Luckily, my healing spell works beyond it, so he's not dying yet." Then his main target showed up via phone lines.
 
Yuri laughed after the three of them talked a little. "As if this haven't already been a bloodbath, Gregor. By the way, is Sarah with you? Either way, I'll find her too. The point is, we can't trust you...and it's extremely tempting to just go ahead and cut off his head, we got the upper third of the caccoon off. But I'll see what these Coalition officers want to do. I've already traced you and got your number...you used one hell of a strong signal. I'll contact you in fifteen minutes tops." He shut off everything and kept it off.
 
The disguised man motioned the two of them to out in the hall. He leaned up against it. "If the library knows they're coming, there's a dual system that will kill every intruder. It takes some time to activate, that's why it wasn't used the first time. Either way, they're gonna get warned and they'll have it ready just in case. Me? I personally would want to kill him right here right now and meet him at Amesbury. The system won't kill us so long as it's programmed with you in mind. Alternatively, we lie, kill him, and show Gregor and Sarah his head when we meet and duke it out. Or we keep him alive for the moment, but only with a bomb or something inside of him to detonate upon my command. And kill him in the middle of our fight. Tracking him down after dealing with Gregor would be too much of a pain in the ass.

I hope you get the general idea. He dies. No matter what. In your custody or out there in the world. And unless Lexie became a pushover, you two are too heavily damaged and used too much energy just staying alive to tell me F you right now. Let's decide before the fifteen minutes are up, yes?" The man more or less took charge. He didn't trust them, at all. But they would be necessary in the coming fight...
 
*Gaige's Workshop*
 
Alex frowned. "If Jun was younger, I would agree. But he isn't much younger than Ms. Fisher. If we decide we do need him, the supporting role would suit him just fine." He didn't like the bias just because of his age. He's proven himself time and time again. Again, the two other women amused him. He handed the arrancar a napkin while telling her she had sauce on her eyebrows.
 
He might get hit for it, but he still commented on it. "Oh, come on Ms. Fisher...you might be good for him...since his last significant other ditched him without a word, it may do wonders for his personality."
 
He was pretty much ready. He'll call for Annabell later and maybe Jun. When they got there, the two arrancar were still there...the board pieces seemed to have moved quite a bit...with the smaller one at the advantage. He, and the younger one apparentely named Rui, watched in amusement as Liv broke the board and gave her father Rui's king. Then they left.
 
Rui blinked a few times while suppressing a chuckle. "Your daughter is quite lively, isn't she? *takes out another chess game* ready for another game of chess or should we go with a different board game?" He had a rather huge pile of board games from the human realm stockpiled in the corner.

Serena watched Yuri carefully as he threatened to cut the man's head off. The mountain chuckled slightly. "She's with me, and she's well capable of taking care of herself. You should be more concerned with your own Life. I keep my word. You leave him alone and I won't kill a bunch of people, just you three." Yuri mentioned he had tracked the mountain's signal. "Good, now i don't need to tell you where I am. But I wont be here if you kill him. And I'll know if you do kill him, so dont worry about trying to trick me. I'll Give you two days." He said and the call ended.

Serena looked up at Yuri when he spoke. Her arm was back in working condition. "He'll fit right at home in the coalition Jail, no bombs or tricks. I wont let you risk innocent lives over a vandetta. And don't bother threatening us, do you really think you can get away with attacking Coalition members if we go against you? As for what happens to him after the mountain is dealt with I couldn't care less. Now, Commander Tadatomo I think you should call reinforcements to come take Lucius into custody." She walked out of the room and waited for Tadatomo to join her when he was ready.

"He revolts me." She said when Tadatomo got around to Joining her. "I don't understand how he hasn't been thrown in prison, considering the things we've seen him do and his general disregard for innocents. I don't trust him either."

*Gaige's workshop*

Gaige nodded. "I suppose your right. I'm not saying it because I dont think he cant fight but i've seen kids younger than him die on missions, and as much as I don't care about most people, I hate seeing things like that. I'll trust your judgement on it though. " She said. Laura smashed Liv's face off the table and Gaige burst out laughing.

"Your right they would make a good couple, if Laura wasn't all but officially married to crescent rose." Gaige said. Then they got ready to leave. Liv returned with a clean satay free face. Gaige tossed her a remaining wonton and they headed into hueco mundo, and stopped by Liv's house.

Arngrim looked up when they got back. "Where are you going? Do you need someone dead? I haven't killed anyone in a while, I could come to.. Well if you need me to crush anyone body just give me a call." Arngrim watched her destroyed the board and watched them leave. "Was it just me or could you not sense that green haired man?" He asked. Then chuckled at Rui's comment. "She's just like her mother. Lets play hungry hungry hippos." He said.

Tadatomo listened carefully to the conversation. Each word reinforced his belief that doing things Yuri's way would end up unnecessarily messy. The call ended and Yuri spoke. After he was done, Tadatomo decided that they would need to remind Yuri of his place. He grabbed the man by the front of his shirt and lifted him several inches off the floor. If the werewolf tried to intervene, Tadatomo would keep Yuri in the air with one hand, and draw Apollo and aim it at the werewolf to stop his advance. "You are a menace to society. We will do this efficiently and without needless casualties. As for this guy..." He let Serena continue the thought, as they were on the same wavelength. Once she was done, Tadatomo let Yuri down and and straightened the man's shirt. "We will go to him. You can come along if you like, but attempting to get in our way... would be unwise." Tadatomo then left the room after Serena.

Outside, Tadatomo took out his phone and called a team to bring the cocooned man into custody. He turned to Serena, who explained her appraisal of Yuri Romanov. "Agreed. His methods are... crude. But I have the trace to the Mountain's location. Once the retrieval team gets here, we can leave immediately. He appears to be in Greece. Mount Olympus, to be precise."

The werewolf didn't move. He knew Yuri could take care of himself. Listening the conversation, he left to grab the appropriate suitcase.

Yuri chuckled at the duo. "If you're of no use to me, yes, I would shoot you in the back. Kai knows better than to use my wolves as bait or anything. And I would do her in right now if I had any ammo left. And all I would get is a slap on the wrist. I can bust out even without my powers...I'm not worth the sacrifice of hundreds of soldiers to keep me locked up. Menace? This coming from a member of the same organization that KILLS for misunderstandings. So who is the real menace? Don't make me laugh with your self-rightiousness.

I'll deliver the message. I'll meet you at Mount Olympus." He was laughing all the way back inside the room. Really, it was awfully tempting to kill those two here and now. But whatever. Connor came back with a suitcase. "We're gonna take him with us. I'll call Angel just in case. And I'll tell Gregor to have a ship or plane or something ready for his man. These nano-mites are experimental, so who knows if they'll explode like they're supposed to."

They got out of there before the team arrived to pick him up...

*Hueco Mundo*

Rui nodded. "Yeah, I couldn't sense him either...glad to know I didn't imagine it the first time they went through. Could be a bounto with the Coalition, but I think he's smart enough not to do anything to her...besides, I don't think she has done anything to warrant their attention anyway. Hungry hungry hippos it is." :3

~Thread End~