Cross Effects 3.0 - April 13, 2015—June 23, 2016

[Elf]

Rin

"I mean it.  I can't wear florals, they can wash me out, but on you they could look great," Rin said with a nod, "And you need a pretty dress to wear when Emiya-kun proposes."

[SINIB]

Sakura

Sakura blushed profusely. “It’ll be so romantic and perfect...” She began to fantasize about what would happen. “He’ll kneel down, there’ll be flowers and music and everything will be wonderful...”

[Elf]

Rin

Rin grinned and asked, "Now what if he spontaneously does it in the kitchen?  Would you make him do it again properly?"

[SINIB]

Sakura

“No, that would be perfect too! So many of our best memories are in the kitchen!” She wore a big stupid smile on her face, with no other cares in the world. “No matter what, it’ll be perfect.”

[Elf]

Rin

"I don't know if your standards are extremely high or low," Rin said with a chuckle. 

[Kat]

Noriko

"You called this small? Have the passage of time addled your sense of scale?" Noriko mocked Seras. Indeed, this place couldn't be called little. Easily it would be one of the largest stores in her world, a cathedral temple devoted to consumerism.

After filling her shopping basket with foodstuff she needed, she wanted to check out if there was some bargain sale of clothes. Buying her own clothes felt more right to her than borrowing clothes from someone jobless. Passing through, her sense for the supernatural tingled again. She turned her head to the purple haired girl, accompanied by a dark haired one. They talked to each other in Japanese, so they must have been Japanese, or at least have some Japanese blood just like her. Purple hair aside, they looked like pretty normal bunch, but you never knew. Bother them or not to bother them?

"Hello. I didn't expect to run into people from country. I'm Ametsuchi Noriko, nice to meet you.", she introduced herself as nicely as she could manage.

[Kat]

Noel Vermillion

Noel continued to hold her hands over him, allowing his arm to continue to soak up the healing light. As she looked up, her concentration was nearly broken. There was a woman who looked suspiciously similar to Saber who apparently knew Henry.

“Who are you--you’re not Saber!” She exclaimed in surprise. “How’d you get here, I don’t recognize you on the force!”

She was still worried about Henry's well-being, but it seemed he was doing better than she expected. And it seems that his friend was some sort of healer using magic, as she guessed. She felt a bit jealous that she wasn't one to treat him, but all she knew was rudimentary first aid, so it was better he got handled by professionals. Anyway, she had to answer the healer girl.

"I just climbed the tree while the police here slacked off so much they let a civilian sneak past. Man, maybe I would do better job than them, your friend seems like one of few responsible guys here." she answered Noel.

"And yeah, I'm not Saber. Fortunately. Woe me if I were as short." Mordred smirked at her own remark. But if she was interrupting major police force operation, she could have get out at least something out of it. She needed protection for herself, and still felt somewhat responsible for Emily's safety.

"Heard you are in need of manpower? I'm unemployed right now, and I'm an ex-soldier. I know you are busy right now, but's let's arrange job interview tomorrow." That would be also a chance to infiltrate their ranks and make sure no vampire is up to something nasty. She was kinda suspicious of their influence already, to put it mildly.

[Panda]

Seras

The vampire ignored the girl's mocking, looking about this glorious monument to consumerism with a sense of boredom. Beneath all skulls and the gold, it was obvious to her. This place was dying, slowly but surely. The system too far gone to be salvageable, this Emporium would need to be remade, rebuilt from the ground up. Only then might it regain it's former-

Shut up, Frank.

Hey, what's wrong with a monologue?

Because this isn't the Imperium of Man from that silly little board game you used to play, now shut up.

With nothing better to do, the vampire simply watch Noriko from a safe distance as she approached two more girls, taking advantage of the fact that she didn't even need to be nearby to hear and practically see everything that was said.

[Panda]

Emily

While Mordred was off attending to her own matters, Emily's sleep was broken all too soon, the Changeling awakening to absolute agony, a long groan being the only thing she could manage.

...Oh god...how much did I drink?

The Changeling had to resist the urge to run into the bathroom to empty the contents of her stomach, but the sick feeling stuck to her like thick morning mist.

Note to self. Never drink that much again...

With that, Emily tried to climb out of bed, only to find that her body wasn't entirely cooperating with her, resulting in the Changeling falling to the carpeted floor with a thud.

"Ugggh," the Changeling groaned, "Wha..."

Emily was cut off as the remaining bottle, still untouched, fell off the night stand, landing right next to her. In that moment, it might have seemed to most that Mordred was starting to rub off on Emily a little, as the look of hatred that Spring Courtier transfixed that bottle with would've looked far more fitting on her Summer fellow.

And now to deal with this annoyance.

Grabbing the neck of the bottle as if she were trying to throttle it, the Changeling grabbed hold of the edge of the nightstand with her other hand, pure unadulterated hatred burning away the agony of her hangover enough Emily to push herself up to unsteady feet. Taking cautious, wobbly steps, Emily managed to reach the door, resisting the urge to collapse against it as she opened it to allow a blast of cold winter-y air to rush into the room, icy spikes of pain driving themselves into her head as the Changeling staggered outside.

Lacking the energy to yell as she threw the bottle, Emily settled for winging it as hard as she could manage, the bottle shattering into a thousand glittering shards as the alcohol seeped into the pavement.

"And good fucking riddance," Emily muttered, grabbing her head again as fresh waves of pain assailed it, grabbing onto the railing with her other hand before making her way inside, shutting the door behind her. Just then, another detail made itself known to the Changeling.

...Oh god I probably smell horrible right now...

With that in mind, Emily angrily staggered into the bathroom, slipping out of her clothes and stepping into the shower before turning it up as hot as she dared, trying to chase away the chill of the winter night.

[Panda]

Adjutor

Adjutor stared at the kid for a moment before sighing.

"If you're sure," Adjutor said, "Then this should be easy enough."

With that, the teen put a hand on Roxas's shoulder and pushed the teen down into a nearby shadow, pulling his hand out of the shadow once Roxas was all the way in.

Now alone once more, the teen briefly considered taking the rest of the night, or at least an hour or two, off to rest and recover.

...You're not going to.

Eh, tough as it was to heal, it's more or less fixed now. Just need some basic healing to top things off.

Well, I might as well get to that before you forget.

Thanks.

Allowing a content sigh at the warm buzz of the healing magic going to work on his back, Adjutor allowed himself some time to sit down in the hospital's lobby while he considered where he'd go next.

Well, we could go on a normal hunt...

Well, all things considered, we probably have bigger fish to fry...

True. I suppose resting up at the Compound is already out of the question.

Do you even need to ask?

Not really.

Drop by the police station? Maybe see if they found any info on that guy at the Blast Furnace while we were out?

Sure, why not...

With that in mind, Adjutor waited a few moments more before finally getting up, the Armogarian stick retracting back into his hand as he tested his legs out a bit. He wasn't exactly fully healed, but the teen supposed that what he had now would be enough. With that, Adjutor made his way out of the hospital before manifesting Tyrfing and dropping into it. The Shadow Elemental quickly set off back towards the police station, and it wasn't before...they...arrived?

...What?

Disconcerted by the sudden disappearance of the multiple layers of shadows, Adjutor brought Tyrfing to a halt, withdrawing to a nearby building before slipping out to find...nothing. Nothing but a smoking crater where the police station had once been. Adjutor stared at the scene for a few moments, bewildered, before his brain kicked back into gear.

Laivatain, you ready?

Yup, found some more fire. Find any trouble.

...Yes.

In the seconds that passed before the Fire Elemental settled into his hands, Xarrest instead took a moment to prepare a few Shields, just in case. Finally, Laivatain was back once more, just in time for Adjutor to catch sight of a flash of silver. Quickly applying Reinforcement to his eyes, the teen unsealed them and took a closer look to see a strange scene. A kid with a sword spinning around like a top, slicing the fuck out of-

Holy fucking shit what the fuck is that?!

Had the teen been more relaxed, the sight before him might have had his jaw dropping. Not that Adjutor would ever be able to relax upon sighting an absolutely massive collection of energy swirling around in the...dragon...sorcerer...thing...whatever it was. The terrifying thing, however, was the simple fact that he could look upon this being. Normally, energy in such quantities might have been blinding to the teen, but this energy...it was all...dark. Like there was something fundamentally wrong about it. Amidst the sea of dark energy within this being sat numerous foci of some kind, each attuned to different purposes.

Before he could take a closer look, however, the dragon-sorcerer-thing lashed out despite having been cut more times than the teen bothered to count, knocking the weapon from the kid's grasp and sending her flying away to crash painfully into a wall.

There was another man there, who now interposed himself between the girl and the dragon-sorcerer-thing. Without giving it a second thought, the teen Reinforced the rest of his body just in time to catch sight of one of the foci, this one seemingly oriented towards fire, lighting up as more of that dark energy gathered in the dragon-sorcerer's hand. Plunging into Tyrfing's shadows, Adjutor had just enough time to surge mana into the Shields before Tyrfing arrived, the teen leaping from the man's own shadows to cast forth the manifested Laivatain. The Elemental manifested as a wall of fire before the dragon-sorcerer, Adjutor grabbing the man's shoulder and bringing the man with him over to the girl, intending to grab both of them and escape into the shadows.

[Kat]

Richard Maxwell

Oh shut up, asshole. He thought of the staffed man's words. Not with any ill will, mind you.  If he would have bothered to speak it out loud, it would've been nothing but playful banter.

Richard shook his head. "No, don't. If a beautiful one like you wasted her life to avenge me of all people, I'd be rolling in my grave. Heh, who knows if I'll even get one. I don't really care either way, about gods, graves and anything else. I just need one thing, just one thing..."

Quivering weakly, Richard then proceeded to do something impossible. He stood and patted Rikuyo on the shoulder.

"Can you smile?"

Rikuyo

"Yeah...", she smiled as he asked, even if she shouldn't be in mood for that. There was something truly beautiful in how he struggled just for such small thing. A man with a will of iron, both in life and death.

[Kotomine_Rin]

Richard Maxwell

Richard gave the girl a toothy grin and a thumbs up. "Good." He said with a chuckle. But there was something different about his cheerfulness. Yes, compared to that fake smile from before, this one was truly more bright.

It seemed he finally did learn how to smile.

And with that, Richard Maxwell closed his eyes and fell asleep. Not falling, not stumbling, still standing as tall and proud as ever, he fell asleep like a baby. Perhaps he would wake up in a better world, a world of cafe au lait, pancakes, rivers of scotch and trees filled with steak.

In mormon heaven.

[yinsukin]

Roxas

The golden haired teen, gave Adjutor a friendly smile as he was pushed into the shadows.  Now in the strange shadow world, Roxas couldn't help but notice how nostalgically empty it was.  The atmosphere of the place reminded him of the world that never was, the home world of the organization.  In that sense, he wouldn't mind staying, if only to maintain a sense of familiarity.  However, he needed to go back to that site and stop the priest.  Now that the teen with the armor has left, who else would stop him? 

Roxas raised his arm and snapped his fingers.  In front of him, a large circular portal radiating with darkness appeared.  Not wasting any time, the boy rushed through the portal.

Roxas emerged from the dark portal, arriving on the scene of the furnace just outside the building that the priest had entered before.  It would be stupid to show up in the same spot where he almost died.  He looked around, scanning for possible enemies.  Just then, he spotted Micheal and Rikuyo standing above the dead body of Richard.

He ran over to the two, looking concerned and distressed.  "What happened?"  He asked, staring helplessly at the two.

[Kotomine_Rin]

(Dead)(OOC) Richard Maxwell

"Well, maaaaybe someone just had a moving death scene!? Dunno, just a wild guess!" Thought Richard Maxwell as he watched over from his couch right on the Mormon Heaven Express.

[SINIB]

Noel Vermillion

“Noel looked at the strange woman with a funny look. She didn’t look harmful, but--she definitely wasn’t going at this the right way. Well, the elites are always recruiting, all you need to do is go to your local station and ask. It’s dangerous though, so think about it carefully. Detective, is your arm feeling better now?” She asked full of worry.