The Midgar Zolom [Event!]

"Perhaps it is us doing the reckless thing."

Azure pondered this aloud, mostly to himself, as it was extremely unlikely that Dart could hear him over the multitude of other things going on at the same time: the Zolom's painful cries, the Turk's own violent activities, and of course the fishman firing that minigun straight upwards like it was some kind of day of independence-- the envy of any fireworks show. And 'fireworks show' was probably a fitting analog to the situation; Autumn had rightfully spent quite a bit of the ammo in the mounted gun when the chopper was still in the air, so Azure's time with the gatling was explosive but ultimately very short.

He frowned as the 'click-click-click' of an empty belt ended his rampage... though that was probably for the best. It was devilishly difficult to keep one's footing in the mouth of the serpent to begin with, and that was before everything was slick with its own blood. "Sir Dart, perhaps it would be best--" Azure paused in mid-sentence, grunting as he fended off the Zolom's tongue by swinging the empty minigun like a club though losing the weapon down its massive throat in the process. "Hm... A shame. I quite enjoyed my time with that. Dart! We should evacuate!"

The decision was all but made for Azure though. For a monster to fling something like an entire crushed helicopter from its mouth took no small amount of force and the fishman wasn't hanging onto anything when it happened, being ejected from the cavernous maw of the beast alongside the wrecked chopper.

"Shield of my forebears." He had told Autumn that he would remain to support Dart's retreat though, and the fishman was not one to go back on his word even when forced to egress. So, he would do the only thing he could in the moment, the surging lifeblood of a sahagin prince causing his body to glow with the mysticism of a monster. "Become his bulwark-- Shell Game!" Reaching out to the Turk left behind, the aura shifted through the space between and became a shimmering cerulean aegis, surrounding him on all sides.

With that done... It was time to get himself to safety. The lancer's Jump materia certainly was getting a workout today; it blazed like the sun for a second time, gifting its wielder with at least some control after being thrown-- curling, rolling, flipping through the air before slamming into the ground on all fours, skidding a dozen feet across the dried wasteland and kicking up an impressive cloud of dirt in his wake. And upon coming to a stop, Azure looked up suddenly, the settling haze revealing the writhing form of the snake.

"... I hope that was enough."

Then the thrown chopper came to a thunderous crash, impacting with the ground just behind him.

---

SPOILER: Click to show

ATB Stock: 1
Status: +1 Magic from Gaia's Chosen (Magic 3; One turn remaining)

Big edit energy-- single target Shell Game limit break cast on Dart. Shielded for 2 attacks (or one big one).

Fieldy watched the snake fall and begin to squirm, the creature was truly a magnificent beast. It was a shame that it had to go out like this.

With magical energy still pulsing through him, he sighed and clasped his hands together. From the same geyser as before water began to stream out, followed by the eruption of several more around the serpent. As the water cascaded all around, shimmers of rainbow danced in the mist. Each geyser’s stream arced towards the zolom.

There was something different about Fieldy’s magic than before. His eyes were glowing with energy, he felt like he could feel every drop of water in the air. With a sudden realization Fieldy started pushing his hands together as if he were holding a ball. The water began to gather around the serpent's head, defying gravity as it formed into a swirling sphere. Fieldy was going to attempt to use this newfound control to drown the snake and finish it off.

Amanda's torrent of wind came violently towards the Zolom's neck. The creature darted its head to the side, its long forked tongue trailing behind as it attempt to avoid the attack. As the powerful gust trailed towards it the tongue was severed and fell to the ground, a writhing mass of bloodied pink. The right side of the creatures neck was cut as well, hitting the scale rather than the soft underbelly, but it still managed to tear through them enough to cause heavy bleeding.

The first voice that would speak over GAWAIN’s comm and those on the same channel was one that would not be expected.

“This is Alpha-0, do not allow the creature to be killed,” Rafferty’s voice chimed over the radio. “A trap has been devised in the sewers of sector 3 in the underplate, you must lure the creature there. The media is on blackout.”

In the sector 3 slums there were swarms of Shin-Ra troopers. A very large machine with a drill on it was pulling away from a rounded hole into the ground that exposed the sewer systems below. Inside the sewer strange electrical fields pulsated to create a containment area. The slum dwellers had already been forced from the area under the guise of an evacuation to protect them from the zolom.

Back in his office the president sat at his desk, awaiting an acknowledgement to his orders. The science department was enticed with the size of this zolom and wanted to study it. He was intrigued as well.

Meanwhile the Zolom itself found its head enveloped in water. As it struggled its mouth opened and Dart was shot into the propulsion of water enveloped in a sahagin shell. The turk would be launched behind Thalia’s position as she continued to carve into the snake. Nearby the ice from Lucas’s attacks seemed to melt as it struck the flesh of the Zolom. As he struck he could feel a heat coming off of its scales.

The creature's movements were becoming more erratic as it struggled to escape from the water that was suffocating it as well as with blood spilling from its open stomach wound. It seemed as if the matter would soon come to an end.

-This is the Zolom post for this week.

Dart Azure VI GAWAIN Thalia Melpomene Autumn Nevada Leonhardt Lucas Garett Amanda de Valliere Sergeant Oswald Takeshi Minazuki Kaze Walker Damian Summers

"It is an order, not a request," the president responded.

"GAWAIN is in command of the operation. Alpha-0 out," Rafferty said as he turned the channel off.

He wasn't going to listen to back talk, not even from his niece.

Autumn Nevada GAWAIN

The truth is, Dart was feeling a little bit sorry for himself.



He had been shot before - as well as stabbed, crushed, slapped, punched, run over, and dropped from heights. And if that wasn't enough, he was pretty sure that he had some pretty fierce toothache in his time. Adding almost being eaten and electrocuted by your own team to the list, today, was just pebbles at the foot of a monument. And none of it really compared with the feeling of being wrapped up and tossed around in someone else's goals.

Which was appropriate, he thought, as he picked himself up, surviving the expulsion and the fall and maybe wishing just a little bit that he hadn't. The shell that Azure had cast around him was gradually fading, and beyond it he had heard the sound of a crackly radio clipped to the shoulder of a nearby trooper. It was Gawain's words first and then the President's next, and upon hearing it the trooper took a long look at the serpent and said, "$&#$. %#@$."

Well, quite.

Dart took care of his own weapon first, by which it meant that he had turned it off, letting the glowing blade ebb back into a metallic black. Then he reached inside the pocket that he felt a bit of an unnatural weight in, and found the orb of Jump materia nestling inside.

"Damn. Autumn," he said. He looked around for her, but didn't see her immediately. He did spot Azure standing nearby, however, so as he clipped the materia back on he went back over to the fishman's side.

"Good to see that you're well," he said. Almost with unnatural ease the fake, perpetual smile came back to his face, which was incidentally how he finally realised that he had been scowling all this while. "Are you ready to die because the President's parents never bought him a puppy, my blue friend?"