(Untitled)

[tanukipoint]

Who: The A-Team
What: A plan does not come together.
When: Forward-dated to final day of the draft
Where: Sirry Crags battlefield
Summary: His most powerful weapon is nothing more than leashed poison.
Rating: High-PG13/R

Comments

01 - The Ambush

[tanukipoint]

[They had been getting too confident. Too careless. They probably never intentionally separated as they did - none of them were that sloppy - but things had been going so well thus far, and they'd given themselves an inch of breathing room that was one inch too far.]

[So of course they should have expected the Third Party to get smarter. After being mowed down for days in a row, you don't not. But they hadn't, and had allowed themselves to spread out over the battlefield a little more thinly than they should have.]

[Then they were ambushed.]

[skulljokelol]

[Brook was worried this would happen and had tried to keep the group mostly close enough together that he could run between them all annd help where needed.

But there are a lot of independent people on this team. Capable people at that. And they'd been doing relatively well up until this point, so he'd allowed a little breathing room so they could cover more ground. Keep the team happy without bending on his decisions too much. Compromise is good.

He's made a fatal error and now he's paying the price for it.]

Polka Remise!

[This is too many opponents for even Brook to deal with in quick fashion. He needs to get to the others, but he can't even see all of them.]

[OOC: The whole group is dispersed, so you guys can choose who's near who and what not! Though I imagine the fifty-foot monster reindeer will be noticeable by them all when it pops up.]

[redhairedknight]

[Not too far away, Erza was having trouble of her own. Normally, mobs of opponents rarely troubled her (for some reason, her enemies were more effective when it was one-on-one), but in this case, it was different. She was using her Knight armour as it allowed her to wield the most swords (many of which were floating around her) at once, but it still wasn't enough. Some of them were managing to slip through her defenses and get some attacks in.

Normally, she'd try to make a break for it and draw some of the Third Party away from the rest of the team, as she was basically the party's tank (seeing as she took a building-leveling laser cannon point blank and got up fifteen minutes later relatively unhindered), but in this case, there were too many for her to escape from. She was forced to stand her ground, not knowing how the rest of the team was doing, and it frustrated her to no end.]

((OoC: Sorry I haven't posted for the past few days; I've been very busy, but I should be okay for the next little while.))

[meanandgreen]

[And if Erza's having trouble, you know it's bad. Luckily Raph's used to taking on massive amounts of enemies at once. What he isn't used to is them all flying at him from all angles, using their shifting to propel weapons made of rock and frozen river water. Daggers and sword cut through his tough hide, drawing blood to mingle with his enemies'. But he presses on without a hint of pain. It only fuels him further, drives him farther away from the group until he resorts to using his chains. Snarling, blood in his mouth, he ensnares wings and breaks bone, rips them free with his bare hands. Flies, leaps through the air and tackles them bodily to the ground.

No time to think. No time. He needs someone with a blade in here fast, but he's effectively distanced himself from the magic users. Now he serves as station one for the ambush, receiving the brunt of numbers until they dub him as a lesser threat and move on to the more powerful warriors in the valley below.]

02 - The Third Party

[tanukipoint]

[It doesn't have time for this. Those things are getting away. It shakes its head and rears back, jaws open in a shrill roar as it leans forward with its arm swinging downward. Two forms with wings are slammed from the air into the ground, others circle around him, slashing at his fur, flies.]

[They're getting away. It turns to the small-winged creatures fighting the large-winged ones, heaves a growl through disfigured teeth, and turns to the Running. Let the bugs fight bugs. They're getting away.]

[meanandgreen]

[The roar startles him from the bloody rhythm of fighting. In the valley below, the monster casts its massive shadow, lashing out at any living thing within reach.] What the shell is that thing!?

[When he manages to get a free hand, the blade of a sword caught in the tines of his sai in the other, Raph taps his communicator.]

Don? You seein' this? We got trouble over here!

[Then he turns back to fighting, panic rising in his gut with every minute that stretches on with no reply. He wrenches the sword out of the soldier's hand, and plants a flying kick to the chest, landing on top of him and finishing the job.

The monster roars again. Feathered wings beat the sky to darkness. In his communicator, he receives nothing but static.]

Don? Don! Donnie, answer me. Somethin's going down!

[Raph finds himself torn between two places - go down to the valley and help fight this thing, or go find his brother. In the end, fraternal instinct wins over. Disappearing into the landscape, he follows Don's unmoving signal away from the main fray

[i_speak_softly]

[Just a few short miles away, Don's shell-cell lets out nothing more than a thin hiss of static.

He ignores it. It's been doing that intermittently, is nothing more than some minor signal interference.

He shifts, leaning out from under his rock overhang to scan the skies for Third Party members. Nothing. He conceals himself again, and continues waiting for Team C's scout to arrive and give him the news from Area 2.]

[meanandgreen]

[Raph sprints across the rocky terrain, arriving breathless at the spot where Don's signal leads. But he doesn't see his brother.

All around him there's a startling silence interrupted by gunfire, screams, and monstrous roaring in the distance. Raph squints up at the harsh white sky by the skeleton of a stark black tree, hands on his knees, gasping for air. He swallows, coppery thickness sliding down his throat. A cut on his forehead dripping red raindrops on the ground.

Breathlessly, almost a whisper:] Don?

03 - The Chase

[tanukipoint]

[Everything is full of scent: the blood pooling around his hooves, the drips of sweat clinging to sheet-white skin, feathers lined with must and dirt. The air itself is stale; full of scent.]

[The Running each have their own smells. Its eyesight is filled with nothing gray blurs, but already he has pinpointed each one as they zig-zag and race between his feet like mice.]

[Mice are vermin. Bugs are vermin. Filth. Disease.]

[Cure it all. Cure all disease. Chase the Running.]

[sniperkingftw]

Damn it, Chopper- doing this again- [ This is Not Good. In fact, this is a million new levels of Not Good, even for a place like Luceti, and Usopp really regrets thinking that this draft thing might go smoothly. It's roughly around the time that Chopper's swatting another half a dozen enemies out of the air that he thinks moving is an appropriate course of action.

The river feels like a good direction. He'd like to say that he's immediately thinking ahead- river, water, Devil's Fruit, even if they have to try throwing it at him in buckets- but for now Usopp is more concerned with the forty-foot tall reindeer monster that wants to crush everything. There's time to take care of his nakama once everyone's at less risk of being attacked by their own teammate. If it wants to chase the Running, here's the first to take off with a lot of flailing at Brook and Sokka who will be making up the majority of the rest of this thread. ]

GET OUT OF THE WAY!

[skulljokelol]

But he only took the one rumble ball! I thought that you told me it has to be three- Oi, Usopp-san! Come back!

[markofthewise]

[It took Sokka a moment to get over the huge wtfery of what was going on. Chopper was huge. Not your typical everyday garden variety huge. Ridiculously and cumbersomely huge. He'd never fit in anywhere! He'd b ostracized, unloved, and unwanted. Oh, and he'd probably kill everyone too. Sokka only managed to catch a vague idea of what was going on with Usopp and Brook.]

Wait, wait. No, Usopp has the right idea! [With that, Sokka starts running after Usopp. But with less flailing and more reaching in his bag and throwing an explosive in front of Chopper.]

Big guy, this way!

04 - The End

[tanukipoint]

[Almost there.]

[The sounds of water]

[...]

[DESTROY THE DISEASE]

[markofthebrave]

[Katara and Toph arrived at the river well before any of them, with the use of their elements to propel them there - Katara never wants to try to ride on Toph's moving-earth again, for the record.]

Toph - first we need a dam. Then a trench. And when he comes - you open the ground up underneath him and connect him to the trench, got it?

[markofthebrave]

[And so Katara holds back the water gathered by the dam. And holds and holds for far too long - where are they?

Please, be all right.

And suddenly, Chopper's there, towering against the tops of the black and white trees. He's not exactly quiet. And the world narrows down to him, and the much smaller shapes leading Chopper towards them.

Wait for it. Wait for it. She trusts Toph's instincts, but damn it all he's getting so close and Sokka is shouting something and suddenly - Toph cries out 'Now!' And the ground beneath Chopper disappears, and Katara is guiding the water down, through the rushing trench before splitting it as it races towards him - he has to be submersed, and that means she needs to hit him hard enough for him to go down, or stretch the water up high enough.

And as the water approaches Chopper it stretches up and up until it's the whole of the river turned into a tidal wave and heading straight for him.]

[tanukipoint]

[In one instant, it is almost there, the Running only pale smudges on a gray canvas. Its arm raises in the air, preparing to launch its fist at the dead one -]

[Before it realizes that the ground is gone, and it's falling, and water is gushing around its head as it impacts the earth. Liquid splashes over its face and funnels into its ears, its nostrils, its mouth; it howls, the dirt shaking around it, thick fingers dragging deeply across mud, with its towering antler thrust deeply into the wall.]

[It's going to drown. Animals have no greater fear than simple death, and so it screeches, rocks and dirt flinging up from the hole as its antler tear free. Mud drips from its teeth and fur in heavy globs, turns the steadily-rising water at its shins a dark shade of gray