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Hazen Gregory

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Tavvy rubbed his forehead, looking up at the rusty ladder that was attached to the side of the wall where he'd returned from the sidereal area on the collapsed side of the Negative district. It was such an odd place filled with noises that were more disturbing than Tavvy originally expected when he'd agreed to survey the area for +h3m. He hadn't actually received any details other than that he was to collect samples of several static that apparently were mutating for unknown reasons. In his own opinion, Tavvy figured that just like how R.3.M withheld memories and information, that these people were doing the same things to him. It was an odd feeling, one that made Tavvy annoyed with how badly things ended up turning out after the last game. His memories had returned but things were changed, he knew they were. Somehow the things he remembered from his past weren't feeling authentic.

"Ugh, this really sucks." Tavvy looked at his phone, sliding it out from the small pocket of the pink blazer he was wearing, fully loaded with yellowpolka dots."Hmm it looks like things are really getting hectic." The special app installed on Tavvy's Uphone showed various pieces of data concerning both static in the areas of the game and the specific signatures of collectors based on how close Tavvy was to them. He continued climbing the later, upon reaching the top he found that is was sealed. An annoyed look spread over Tavvy's face, intensifying as he thought about how +h3y had given him directions to the WRONG manhole cover"Damnit, why does it always have to be like this??" He let go of the ladder with one hand, wincing as the ground above him rumbled. "What the hell is that?!?!" Tavvy placed his hand up onto the manhole cover, radiating his frosty essence over it for a few seconds. The metal was frozen near immediately, when Tavvy pressed his hand harder onto it, it cracked and the entire thing broke up onto the pavement above.

As he climbed out, Tavvy dusted the grit off his all white slacks, the aura he projected had frozen the dirt particles, causing them to be easily removed. He then adjusted his bow tie."Oh my freaking gawd..." Tav turned around only to see that he was across the street from the Enix Hotel, his app warning that there was a collector nearby, probably in the lobby. Of course there was a gigantic Static looming in front of the building. "I deff didn't think I'd see that thing again so soon....ugh." He knew the static Horn all too well, he'd been blasted to oblivion by it. "Great so Topsy freakin Kretts is somewhere around here. I'm definitely not about to take that thing head on. Fuq dat..."

Tavvy ran forward, his footsteps immediately alerting the creature to his presence as it roared, swinging around to look at Tavish with its glowing yellow eyes. The creature was quite fast for its gigantic size, even running at full speed, Tavvy had to dive into the hotel lobby as Horn's hand snatched at him, he barely made it inside. He looked around, there were several fragments but the person he immediately recognized was...."Blaster." He hadn't been noticed just yet, he was finishing up an explanation when Tavvy saw one of the fragments whom injured on the floor, crawled over to Blaster, grabbing his ankle, screaming for him to shut up. He started to pull himself and Tavvy already knew what had to be done.

"Oh my God...that kid's NUTS!!!"

The boy was swinging up wildly at Blaster's face, at the same instant, Tavvy opened his eye, which had been closed. In the next second, he caught Shiro's fist, now standing in the exact spot that Blaster had just been in. He looked at Shiro. "Shit, kid are you gonna be okay??" Tavvy released his hand and closed his eye again. He sighed and took a step back from Shiro, whom had probably already added himself to Blaster's torment list. Tavvy still felt uneasy using his eye, holding his hand over it after having swapped spaces with Blaster whom was now in the center of the lobby. His shoes nearly fell off in the process....

"Remember me Blaster?? I recall you doing this same shyt the last game right?? Picking on us fragments even though you're strong as shyt and could easily run an area by yourself." Tavvy spat, "You killed Kourtney and Kael!!!" Tavvy looked pissed, he was visibly shaking, his left hand radiated violently with a bright blue mist. "You bastard!!! You made us all forget. I can't let you hurt these people when they barely understand anything yet...besides, I HATE you. You twisted piece of shyt!! Tavvy started to walk forward, his locks of spiky maroon hair swaying a little with each step. There was such a twisted scowl on Tavvy's face from his memories of how Blaster had tortured his friend and comrade before ending them that he almost started to lose control.

"Fukker!!!" He screamed, opening his hand and fired off a flash of frosty matter that curved around the fragments in the way and raced toward Blaster, exploding before it actually hit him, generating a volley of corrupt icicles, all which missed, careening off into the walls. "I missed on purpose. Next time I won't. Leave and don't bother these fragments until they can handle it. Why is an elite such as yourself even bothering with these newbies??" While he waited for a response from Blaster, Tavvy popped his feet neatly back into the gold loafers he wore.
 
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Ðari

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Dexter gave a nod, he said it, they were called "Collectors" from what he understood. They were worlds apart now, but if that was an option you were given after seeing whatever the hell this poor excuse for a mess was, then thats what he decided. Even still, choice remained to harass these fragmented, I guess them? He would put it together eventually, not before long passing this information on to Shiro and the others. All the while his rod dis successfully pull Rainee to them and she looked substantially different from the body suit earlier.

"Cute outfit. You definitely weren't wearing that before!" Dexter shouted, watching as Rainee engaged the stranger.

His hand was held out, the other wrapped around Jeane. As the rod flowed all the way back to it's point of origin, it coiled tightly around his right arm. She was definitely going at it, and Dexter gave a fist pump tapping his arm as he cheered for Rainee. Jeane was chuckling next to him, though they could hardly forget about the static that still remained on the floor. The stranger raised his gun and fired a red bullet directly into one of the afflicted static creatures. The sound echoed off the walls, as all the doors were still closed, dexter covering Jeane's ears as her hearing was even more sensitive than his.

"Tch...I'm so sick of this sound!"

In that instant the hallway became filled with...red light? It was in that instant Jeane could see everything crisp and sharply, what dexter, Rainee, and even this collector looked like. It then occurred to her, this sticker really was dependent upon the source of light, specifically red. Slinging her rifle over her back, she extended her hand and it also irradiated red as well. From her hands, threads trickled out and grasped the red light, catching it stationary and reshaping it into a small wall, which took the brunt of the wind that followed up. Jeanes eyes were widened, befuddled, confused as she didn't understand at all what she just did (this should look familiar to Sync).

"What..." was all she could manage to say.

"Whoa...how did you...?" Dexter's retort was interrupted as the static from the far side of the room were rushing towards Rainee. "Oh crap, Rainee mo-"

His eyes widened as they completely ignored her and darted directly towards Jeane and himself. "Never mind then!" Dexter shouted, watching them dart through the wall Jeane created. A single headbutt, followed by a second, the third finally shattering Jeane's wall. The young boy gripped his fist as the four wolf-like static were buzzing feverishly fast towards the two of them. Raising his right arm, he shot the rod to grab one of them, and he slammed it into another one, doing substantial damage. One of the wolves, slammed directly into Dexter, and it threw him into the the far wall by the stairs leading to the third floor. The wolf over him, buzzed with a loud static hiss.

CRACK!

The sound of a grenade toss, shattering over Dexter and the static. It was glowing purple while Dexter was glowing yellow, feeling a little revitalized. Suddenly the wolf, was shot by Jeane, and it flopped over, with "ZzzZzzz" debuff coming from it. Dexter rolled over, watching one of the two he slammed get up. He was still glowing himself, Jeane was aimed at him, and she shot much like when he joked earlier. Feeling his injuries minimize, looks like that joke wasn't a joke...SHE COULD ACTUALLY HEAL THEM.

"HOLY SHIT! I was just kidding before, but thats...thats huge!!!"

Jeane gave a thumbs up. Her hand waved, and she pulled back the rest of the red light the the collector made before and used it specifically to enhance her vision to as clear as she could. Proceeding to make a mad dash from where the wolf from earlier pinned Dexter, she was reloading her rifle. The counter on her sleep dart was about to pop back up, and sure enough the wolfs both from before got up, the one asleep was about to wake up.

"Go to sleep." Jeane said, shooting it just as it started to move again.

"Thats so messed up..." Dexter said swinging his rod and cracking at the sleeping wolf, finally finishing it off. Jeane ducked behind dexter, and rolled at the mid-section of the stairs, raising her rifle and began to shoot her regular darts into the static, to deflect their lunges as Dexter was body-blocking for her. The key here, was completely beating them at range, the rod's range could create the space they needed to effectively finish them all off one vs one.

Eventually Jeane cleaned up the last of them as they tried to push them even further away from Rainee. The both of them darted back down the stairs and broke into the hallway, it felt things had a solid chance of stabilizing here. Jeane held up her rifle as a form of support for Rainee, the static on the floor were taken care of at the very least. With even crispier vision, Jeane was able to more accurately depict opinions from facial expressions as she could now see them a bit more.

"Nowhere for you to go now Collector!"

------------------------

The collector yawned and he crossed ways through the city as was intended. He stretched his tired limbs, stopping for a moment to take a look at the section of the area that had been snowing. Looking straight up, he didn't even think it was possible for the weather to change like this so sporadically. All it really did was give him terrible ideas, but due to his laziness, he doubt he'd probably ever use any of his hair-brained and clever tactics.

"How many of us really glitched out and got stuck?" Rien asked a rhetorical question aimed at himself

There was of course undoubtedly an answer to this question. Tavish was on the list, and there was someone else, originally speculated it to be...someone unfamiliar, there were obvious holes in his memory. He speculated this after their final encounter with Topsy, everything just seemed fuzzy.

The sound of a whip cracked. This was a sound that Rien was familiar with, and instantly pulled him back in time to the previous game.

"Vandiken finally remembered the game. I remember the game, but Van was the original red player in first phase, he said someone else picked up his login sometime later. I remember all of them. Irukandji, IntagonistSix, Purplepanda1, Digital_Kill, GreenIs4U,
7h3b0x-13, Jay-666...shit the list man."

Rien's head popped back and turned around looking up, not realizing he'd aimlessly walked into alley. The buzzing of static complemented the scene, they were shaped like raptor dinosaurs, with a terrifying buzz. Dripping in a bright white tint, "white nose?" Rien said confused, this burst with a purple overlay and then his eyes widened from dull, to concerned. At first thinking this was a prank, but as his muscles convulsed, the static lunged for his position.

"Christ, can a japanese male catch a down swing, sheesh..." He slapped the wall next to him, and paper shot across creating a wall as hard as adamantium, the static smashed into the wall reckless and were greeted by Rien's spikes that jutted out the opposite end of the wall, as precise and deadly sharp as a laser beam. They disintegrated into their normal and awful noise he was more than familiar with. For a second he thought this static was surveillance, security static usually a pale white that doesn't attack players unless they enter restricted zones, but he was wrong.

Hold your breath.

"Should've been your head fam, guess not. Well fuck all! Die anyway!" a voice above lit up the alley. A swarm of violet colored lights started to emerge, raining down into a complete purple wash moving as fast as they could appear.

Rien stomped the ground, turning the thin ground of the alley way into paper almost instantly. He buried his hands into his pockets and sighed, digging in with his heel,s, he was violently thrust backwards skating on the paper floor outrunning the barrage at a similar pace to being knock backed by Sync's wind. His scarf fluttered
awry, and was tattered by a knick from the purple whatever the hell. The collector cringed, stomping the ground again, to revert it to concrete again, and then he himself poofed into paper and scattered, tattering all over the alley.

"I don't remember you being able to do that??"

There was a tap on the stranger's shoulder.

"Sup?"

Rien turned with a quarter step and gave a square box to the figure, connecting, and shredding the shadow with brass-knucklesque chip from his splinters. Purple mist sprayed everywhere, seems he'd been duped in a similar way he duped him. It only seemed fair, but he looked down, and even the static behind the walled off part of the alley was gone.

"LOL. Looks like we got another Glitch? For the love of...come on..." The collector frowned. "Best I can do is continue the game, i'll probably come across it again, whatever."​ Rien shrugged and went up in paper again, transforming into a mass of flying Origami birds heading for the hotel.


The flock of origami birds, reformed as he landed on the fifth floor side rafters of the Enix-Hotel. The collector, made his way inside easily enough. And he sat at the end of the stairs that lead up to the fifth floor from the right side of the building (Shiro and Co.). He had virtually every incentive to pretty much troll the group that tried to climb this staircase, and well, they'd learn that the hard way!
 
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Endless Warrior Sora

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Tap!

Shiro's eyes widened as his fist connected with a...hand? Another man arrived seemingly instantly, holding Shiro's fist with a sort of stern gentleness. Shiro's breathing sped up, as his eyes frantically whizzed toward the lobby where the figure from earlier stood, now looking considerably pissed off. How'd he get there? And how did this new guy now stand where the guy from earlier was just standing??

"Wait...I recognize this guy..." Shiro thought. Things just kept getting more and more complicated. Shiro started to think their chances of survival were becoming slimmer and slimmer by the second.

"Shit, kid are you gonna be okay??"

Shiro was a bit surprised at the new figure's concern for his wellbeing. It was hard to trust anything that didnt wake up with him in that parking lot.

"You're...that guy from his memories..." Shiro mumbled, a little dumbfounded as the figure released his fist. He forgot how much that last punch drained him.

"Remember me Blaster?? I recall you doing this same shyt the last game right?? Picking on us fragments even though you're strong as shyt and could easily run an area by yourself."

Blaster seemed to be the name of the guy that attacked him earlier. Fragments? Was that supposed to be what they were? That didn't sound too...promising.

"You killed Kourtney and Kael!!! You bastard!!! You made us all forget. I can't let you hurt these people when they barely understand anything yet...besides, I HATE you. You twisted piece of shyt!! "

Whoa. This was...unexpected. It looked like this new guy hated Blaster for killing someone. Was this similar to how Raito died? The guy began to walk as he yelled, each step meditated and mencaing. Shiro looked to Anna, and the rest of the fragments, almost communicated. He could see the guy from Raito's memories shaking, his hands radiating with a mist.

"Fukker!!!"

The man screamed, unleashing a form of frost matter that avoided his friends and then exploded, releasing icicles. However, in that moment, it hit him. This was his chance. His plan could still work. Wordlessly, he took a quick deep breath and gathered the rest of his strength. He then darted off toward the staircase, almost tripping but then regaining his balance and up the stairs.
" I missed on purpose. Next time I won't. Leave and don't bother these fragments until they can handle it. Why is an elite such as yourself ...

The man's voice faded away as Shiro ascended the stairs to the third floor.

Huff...Huff...Huff...Ngnna....Huff...

Shiro frantically sprinted through the hallway of the third floor, finding another set of stairs behind a doorway. Opening the door, he could see static flooding down the stairs, aiming to stop him.

"Holy sh-!!"
Shiro closed the door, darting for the end of the hall where he found another doorway with stairs behind it. He ascended THOSE stairs to the fourth floor.

"Five...Six...Seven...Three more to go..."Shiro murmured.
 

Story Keeper

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~- Make A Choice Now -~

"Geez..."

While she was waiting for the boy to respond she heard an annoyed comment from one of the others. Looking at them, Siam felt her cheeks flush out of embarrasment, wondering how it was that she'd missed that Rain was so close. Before she could say something though, the boy to got her attention by talking. Apparently his name was Leonard and he was hanging in there only to ask her if she was alright. A laugh escaping her, Siam waved a hand in the air and answered, "About as well off as can be expected. Nice to meet you Leonard."

She looked straight at Rain, about to ask how she was when the older girl decided to try something. Concern crossing blue-violet eyes, she felt a shiver rundown her spine as a mouth appeared out of nowhere. Backing away from it, she watched it cautiously as she listened to Rain talk to it. Is this thing one of Rain's stickers? Siam thought panically, it didn't seem malicious at the moment but she wasn't entirely sure on it. She was even more disturbed when the floating mouth decided to talk to Rain.

"Of course we am child. How can we be of service?"

She was creepied out by the floating mouth thing, even more when it decided to change Rain's clothes. Siam watched the transformation, something about it seeming familiar to her, almost like she'd watched something similar happen; but she couldn't place her finger on it. Stunned by the appearance change, Rain looked stunning in her angel get up, Siam dipped into a quick responding curtsy when Rain did one toward her. The surprise she felt cleared out just in time for her to call out, "I'm sorry about ignoring you Rain. I like your outfit."

Siam didn't hear Rain's answer if she gave one, and she couldn't blame Rain. Looking at the remaining ones that were there, Siam fidgeted slightly. Panic raced through once more as Shiro said he was going to head up to the seventh floor, opening her mouth to protest to the idea she closed it and frowned in disapproval as Shiro ran off anyway. Anxiety made her groan as Anna took off after him, and despite knowing that they were alone, Siam couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong. What if the group that was in here before them was right? What if splitting off from the group was a death sentence?

What if....

"You lead, I'll follow."

The remark from Leonard drew Siam back to the present, looking at him she forced a weak smile. Walking away from the lobby doors, she saw that Harmony had somehow disappeared while she'd been distracted, this made it where it was just her, Ally, Selene and Leonard down in the lobby. "Come on girls, we should get a moving so we don't get grabbed." She commented lightly.

The sound of glass breaking had Siam looked around, confusion clear on her face. Looking in the direction that Anna and Shiro had gone, Siam saw a guy move away from Shiro and dust himself before turning to address them. Watch yourself, he's a predator. Some sort of instinct whispered to her. She looked over the guy's shoulder, listening as he talked down to them, talking about collectors and fragmented and predators and prey. It was all too overwhelming to focus on any one thing at once. Then this guy had the nerve to ask if they had any questions? Siam had some questions, she even had a couple of suggestions for this jerk; but there wasn't much point in trying to get herself killed. Shiro, on the other hand, told the guy to shut up and even tried to hit him.

"Any questions?"

"Just one, will ya shut up?"

Siam didn't know if she wanted to laugh hysterically or scream.

She expected to see Shiro get pummeled by the guy he was attacking, only for a strangled shriek to escape her as the guy appeared just a couple of feet from her. A string of rather innappropaite phrases slipped free, things that Siam knew her mother (did she have one?) would probably wash her mouth out for and then ground her for several weeks on end for saying.*

Scrambling backwards, she found herself back by Leonard again. Looking at him nervously, she mumbled, "Sorry about the phrases."

It was only when she was standing back by Leonard that she noticed that there was someone new standing in the lobby, holding Shiro's fist. She took in his appearance, and Siam couldn't help it, as soon as her eyes took in the pink blazer, she started laughing. She figured that it was from the stress on her reaction, but it felt good to laugh.

She recovered just in time to hear the newcomer's explosive greeting to the one that had appeared to them before. So, this is Blaster? The name does certainly seem to fit, she thought to herself. The winged doll from before floated down next to her, looking at it she saw the cold look in its eyes before it focused back ahead of it. Cheeks burning ever so slightly from embarrasment, she was once more caught off guard when the newcomer attacked Blaster with a barrage of icicle-mist thing. Inching closer to the other side of the room, Siam kept her eyes focused on the two collectors in the middle of the room. They are both collectors, right? If so, are we going to be forced into this after we get our memories back? She thought.

All she knew is that she didn't want to underestimate Icicle Man, but something told her that she'd be safer the closer she got to him. She kinda hoped Leonard was following, and it took her a moment to realize that Shiro had bolted. A soft oath coming from her, Siam bolted for the stairs to see about catching up to Shiro and finding Anna, wherever the other girl happened to be.

~- The Door is Still Shut -~

Anna literally had no idea what was going on, she saw a body come through the window. She saw it tackle Shiro and Shiro disappeared for a bit. She felt something on her arm, and it was stinging like crazy. Reaching out her left hand, she felt around on her right arm until her fingers came across something slick and sticky. It had a tangy smell to it, so it told her what it was. Blood. She turned around, the fuzzy aura of static alerting her that there was more there.

Holding her left hand out, she watched as the fuzzy auras went flying out of the window. A smirk spread across her face, only for it to fall away as more appeared in their place. She almost thought about running down the steps to find Shiro, but the chill at her back made her hesitate. Remember, you separate you die. She reprimanded herself mentally, sighing in exasperation she set to work flinging the static out the window with her wind abilities more and more. Hopping to the side of the staircase, she felt someone bump into her.

She turned her head in the person's direction, and felt joy at seeing Shiro retreating up the stairs. Running after him, Anna was relieved that he was always just close enough for her to see his aura. She "saw" him open up a door at the far end of a hallway before he slammed it shut and then ran back toward her. Pressing herself against the wall to avoid getting hit, she ran after him again to try and catch up to him.

There was another swirl of colors up ahead, and it seemed to be humanoid in shape. Her heart leaping into her throat, Anna called, "Shiro, stop!" Anna pushed herself a little bit harder, reaching out to grab Shiro's hand she added, "There's someone up ahead. I know this because of their aura. It's hard to explain but there's swirls of colors floating around in my head, it's because of this aura thing that I can tell where someone's at according to me."

Alice on the other hand was growling, her eyes glued on the door at the end of the hallway.

~- Four Is Enough -~

Sync was aware of Jeane and Dexter teaming up to take care of the static that came after them, after all it was kind of hard to miss when a grenade goes off and the sound of static fills the air. Sync glared at them, this allowed him to notice that another Fragment had joined them, this one with blonde hair that had red tips. He was grateful for his wind barrier as it blocked the energy bullet. He shot the girl a look, clearly wondering what the heck was going on with her. He also was well aware of the one with the rifle, and that had him even more on edge.

"Okay, four is enough." He mumbled to himself, sending a gust of wind toward the door and slammed the door shut hard enough to jam it, barring anyone else from joining in on the fight.

"Just why do you have to be hounding us, though? Why did you pick us for whatever this thing is?"

"Nowhere for you to go now Collector!"

Sync sighed at the declarations, he heard the commotion going on downstairs via of airvent. So, Blaster was downstairs? This new batch was in trouble, yet this was probably a good thing, Blaster was a good one to let them find out what they can do. The sudden chill in the air made him smile, he hadn't felt that type of power in a while. Looking at the Fragmented in front of him, Sync spoke coolly, "Whoever you guys left down there is lucky, they're guaranteed to live now. Also piece of advice from someone that's been in your shoes, don't split up. Something else you should know, never assume something, things can change in a second."

He fired off one more shot from the pistol in his right hand, aiming at the girl with the blonde hair. With his other hand he sent another gust of wind at the four of the Fragmented. Even so he retreated down the hallway to give himself more space between his opponents and himself.

Although he thought he caught a glimpse of two more sneaking into the hallway before the door slammed shut.
 
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Ðari

Look at you, armor-less
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[HitPLAY<-]


There was a tap on the doors at the end of the hallway, a shriek of lightning rattled as the doors were being transmuted into complete paper quickly blowing away and being scattered all over the place down the hallway of the 4th floor.

"Oyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!" He said with some robust flare arching in his voice. A laugh filled the hall pretty quickly following this, the collector already started to contemplate his next motion.

"Questions. Questions, I know you've got'em, so for once in this hell your experiencing, let me drop some knowledge on you kids. Just to be sure you don't try to run away..."

The collector stomped his foot, transmuting the floor, a zip of lighting trailed through the floor past and behind them hitting the stair case the two of them ran up, and just like the door it turned to paper and fell downward to the third floor. Unless they had knees of steel or parkour abilities, really anything to cushion their landing, jumping back down was an easy suicide. It actually appeared he was taking this seriously (for once in his very short career) and there would appear to be no downswing to his current momentum. He whipped out his phone and went over the profiles again, there were only three males in the group, this one's profile and the other girl's with her pet.

"Oh, please excuse my lack of manners. Hanekoma, Rien. Or really, just Rien. Lackadaisical, uninterestinutg, boring really. I like to laze about and not really get involved unless absolutely vital. Thats what my dating profile looks like anyway, more importantly. I'm what you call, something of a Harbinger, at least thats what Topsy said we used to be called, I think it's Collector's now. If i'm here, its a spell of trouble for you, the Fragmented. I'm kind of generous with information right now, pick your questions carefully...Shiro, Anna. Don't worry, it's my job to know exactly who you are after all."

It'd probably throw them how compromising Rien was willing to be with them. Everything had a price, even information, but he felt like they could afford to take a gamble with him right now. He stood tall and composed, his large orange scarf wrapped up to his nose, his spikey pale-green hair and heterochromia eyes looked at Shiro and Anna with what appeared to be sincerity.

'I'm actually not interested in directly attacking the players right now. I'll at least get them squared away, that glitch might come for them, hopefully this challenge I've got prepared will tell me something about these two.'

----------

The gust of wind threw Jeane and Dexter who were at the complete opposite end of the hallway near the stairs leading to floor three. Both of them were blown through the door, just as Harmony had joined their group. The torrent of wind was strong enough to completely seal the door shut. After Dexter and Jeane both hit the wall, the frantically ran to violently jiggle the handle on the door, even both pushing against it to force it open, but to no avail.

"You can't be serious! Raine! Harmony!!" Dexter said beating on the door and violently jiggling the lever/handle. "Arghhh! You suck collector!"

"We're gonna have to trust them Dexter. We need to go up." Jeane said placing her hand on his shoulder. "This hotel...the two different stairwells are going to intersect at the seventh floor. We need to keep going until we run into the others that went the other way."

Dexter gripped his fist, he wasn't about standing around. "Fine, but we're doing this the fast way, grappling up to each floor alright? I don't want the stairs to suddenly cake in on us or fall apart as we're climbing."

Jeane understood and gave Dexter a nod and she held onto his waist.

Dexter's Six God sticker, formed, and the cyan pole wrapped around them both and extended through his hand. He shot straight up, until it stuck to the ceiling, pulling them both up and swinging to the doors leading to the third floor. Dexter opened them, and it felt like a damn near identical hallway, he could see an elevator shaft off to the right, useless to them now. The two of them bolted down the hall without looking back. The doors to the left and right flying open, as hoards of insect static were buzzing louder and louder behind them. As the two of them burst through the door at the end of the hallway, they quickly turned around and slammed it shut. The static began to thud against the door mindlessly.

"Next floor!" Dexter said holding onto Jeane and repeating the same process as before, this time bringing them to the fourth floor.

As they opened the doors, this time the floor was color coded in tiles. This admittedly confused the hell out of Dexter as he was about to take the first step before Jeane stopped him. She pointed at the floor, there were nine tiles moving horizontally, the vertical ones stretched all the way down before the last door. It illuminated similar to a game of simon says. And LED screen was above the door at the end of the hallway, reading "CLOSED". Dexter saw this mocking him as he gripped his fist ready to jump on the tiles, but Jeane beat him to it. She started to glide across the tiled floors, taking on the order as they came. But she made a mistake eventually, landing on a tile, it glowed red, and Dexter looked at the LED screen from across the way. "ERROR" The floor blow her opened to reveal the static from the previous floor. And she was about to fall through it.

"Goddamnit!" Dexter quickly whisked the Cyan rod to grapple around Jeane and pull her to him, right before the floor closed back up. The LED went from "ERROR" to "CLOSED" again. Jeane's heart was beating, so loud that Dexter could actually hear it as he was holding her, this was becoming a redundant habit of him saving her skin.

"Thanks again Dex, I think I was cheated..."

"What exactly were you doing just now? Following the light pattern?"

"The floor lights up in a specific order, I can sort've see it...but I can't see all of it...I guess thats my sticker's limitations. Once the panels get closer to one end of the electromagnetic spectrum...I'm basically blind all over again. I need you to tell me where to jump after I get more than halfway across."

Dexter didn't really get what she meant by how limited her vision was, but Jeane had light sensitivity it seemed. Looking at the floor, it was going crazy, doing a hard reset until the tiles started to flash in stagnant order. Just as Jeane said, the colors started at red on the white tiles, and proceeded to get colder, he assumed once they got to green, she started to go blind.

"Ok, I think I get it, try it again."
 

Endless Warrior Sora

Return of the Kid
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"Shiro, stop!"

The turq head felt an arm reach out and grab his wrist. Out of obligation, he stopped already knowing who it was.

"Geez..."He panted. "Aren't you...blind?...How...did you....catchupsofast?" He squeezed out the last group of words. Anna's hand moved from his wrist to his hand, causing Shiro to stifle a small gasp in surprise. It was soft. He wasn't used to this kind of contact with girls.

"There's someone up ahead. I know this because of their aura. It's hard to explain but there's swirls of colors floating around in my head, it's because of this aura thing that I can tell where someone's at according to me."

"Soooooo you're blind but...not blind?" the teen inquired, cherry picking his information from her statement. However, it didn't matter. The 'someone' made themselves known fairly quickly. All the doors in the hallway began to turn into paper and scatter throughout the hallway. Shiro lifted his left arm to shield his face from the bits of paper fluttering about.

"Great, what now?" He groaned.

"Oyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!"

Shouted a voice as laughter filled the hallway. Shiro placed an arm in front of Anna protectively as a figure walked out from the door he turned to paper. Shiro recognized him as well, from Raito's memory. He was that Rien guy. Shiro called The Spray Can to his free arm in front of Anna and clutched it as threateningly as he could. Like THAT was going to do anything. If anyone was going to be doing the protecting, it was probably going to be her. The figure stomped on the floor as lightning trailed through the floor and turned their return path into paper that floated down to the floor in a heap. He whipped out his phone, glancing at it before continuing.

"Oh, please excuse my lack of manners. Hanekoma, Rien. Or really, just Rien. Lackadaisical, uninterestinutg, boring really. I like to laze about and not really get involved unless absolutely vital. Thats what my dating profile looks like anyway, more importantly. I'm what you call, something of a Harbinger, at least thats what Topsy said we used to be called, I think it's Collector's now. If i'm here, its a spell of trouble for you, the Fragmented. I'm kind of generous with information right now, pick your questions carefully...Shiro, Anna. Don't worry, it's my job to know exactly who you are after all."

Seriously, another one?! Don't these guys get, like, tired or something? Just how many were there?! Shiro clenched his jaw. If he was anything like that Blaster guy that pummeled him, they were in trouble. However, that was the second time he heard it. Collector and Fragmented. Shiro could practically confirm the information now. But something felt off. Why was Rien offering so much information? He cut off their escape, and shook their feathers a bit. So why wasn't he attacking? Speaking of, didn't Raine come flying in the hotel on a paper airplane earlier? Was that from this guy as well? So was he here to help? But that couldn't be right! He JUST said his appearance is "a spell of trouble."

"Alright then Rien," Shiro announced, trying to sound just as confident. "The hell's going on? Why do you and your friends keep coming after us? What do you want?"

This guy didn't seem like someone he could easily slip past like last time. Maybe he could come up with some kind of plan while Rien was answering...some kind of bluff or lie....?
 

Hazen Gregory

doWnloAd ProgoNOSKES 99% cOMplETeD
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Respectively, things had definitely gone from bad, to much worse. It was going good, at least for the others. Rain was still feeling a little down after how easily Sync had managed to block every single one of her attacks. What use would she be if, her most standard of attacks didn't even work?? She wondered how serious of damage Sync took from her guarded blows, she knew that the visor had explained some features of the type of 'special' damage she caused, but for now she didn't completely understand how it worked.

"Ugh, I'm so...winded..." Rain had to catch her breath after her initial attack on Sync, in the meantime of her stamina returning, the fight picked up several notches, Dexter and Jeane joining up to make relatively short work of the wolf static that were running rampant on the floor. The static avoided her at first, careening past her in the hallway. It didn't take long before the group ended up separated, AGAIN.

Sync used a blast of wind which blasted the group apart at the seams, Rain being blown backward, she toppled over to see that she had been thrown all the way down the hall from the strange air blast, ending up partially around the corning of the long hallway. Her head hurt now but after picking herself up Rain didn't see any obvious injuries, nor did she feel like an part of her body was bruised or battered. "So tired of this, the last thing I need is to be fighting in a cramped hallway." Rain quickly viewed her surroundings, focusing wholly on the sounds she heard in the hallway and not on what was below. How would an of them make it to room 707 if the constantly kept getting split up??

Rain didn't hear Sync's voice, nor did she know what had happened to Jeane and Dexter on the other side of the door which had been jammed by wind. After being thrown down the hallway, Rain had also lost sight of Harmony. It was possible she had chosen to engage Sync, or had also been incapacitated for a bit by the wind blast. She thought that going back for her was probably the right decision to make but Sync hadn't seemed like he was the killing type. Harmony would most likely manage on her own for a bit, at least until Rain could finish pulling off her plan...

The Enix Hotel was extremely lavish, decorated with all kinds of top end designs, the floors covered in plush carpet, it really was an amazing place. The Fragments hadn't gotten enough time to look around at how cool the place was because they feared for their lives. Rain noticed various pictures in frames had been ripped from the walls in the hallway by the wind blast Sync created. There had been some kind of tunnel effect, causing the wind to pummel down the thin corridor more intensely than Sync had intended.

"I need to go up but all the paths are pretty much blocked off." Rain looked up at the ceiling

Fortinbras' lips materialized next to her, grinning widely, "Are you sure dear?? There are always unorthodox ways to accomplish a task." Rain began to respond but Fortinbras' action cut her off. The lips rippled for several seconds as Fortinbras moved closer to one of the suite doors nearby, the room was labeled 306B. Rain watched silently as Fortinbras literally took a bite from the door, near the handle with a loud crunching sound. The lips grew slightly bigger while Fortinbras ate at the door, sparkles of glitter and dust blew about while the sentinel worked.

Rain stared, "Hmm, that's nifty." Fortinbras had eaten away the lower right side of the door which included part of the frame, door handle and the entire locking mechanism. Rain smiled at Fortinbras and he smiled back, moving into the suite through the hole that had been made. "Sweet, that was a great idea Fort." Rain kicked the door, causing it to crash open where she peered into the overly decorated hotel suite. "Umm I can call you Fort right??" Rain laughed.

"Yes Dear, you can call me whatever you like," the lips closed in a partial grimace. "Be aware however that I will not respond to certain earthly terminologies that disrespect my higher being. I'm not low class like you humans." Rain wondered what Fortinbras meant by this but didn't ask. Her attention was being drawn to the large bay window that faced the southern wall of the suite her and the sentinel were in. Rain rolled her eyes, already knowing that her idea was ridiculous BUT just might work if she could stop thinking about Harmony. 'Damn' she thought and turned walking from the room, then ran down the hallway, curving back around to where Harmony and Sync were on the opposite side of the floor.

While Rain had made her way back, she made sure to absorb Fortinbras' spirit like she had the first time, the extra command inputs were going to be critical. "Heyy Sync!!! You ready for round two??" Rain moved to the left of Harmony, peering at her from beneath the helmet's display. "Can you hold him off for a bit while I work on a SPECIAL move??" Rain grinned slightly and jumped back, leaving Harmony ahead of her. She was trusting that Harmony could hold her own, especially after Rain had watched her use the energy blast when she came upstairs.

"HERE. WE. GO!!!!" [>><>><
 

Lunarmaster54

Her Trouble-making Paladin
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Leonard wasn’t proud to admit his mind wandered back to Rain and her get up in the short lull between him telling Siam he’d follow her and them actually moving in a new direction. He tried to focus on other things, like not wanting to die for example, but apparently his brain decided the best way to keep stress away was by conjuring up images of scantily clad girls he had just met. Barely met as a matter of fact! Which worked annoyingly well because beforehand Leonard had worked himself up in a panic. After everything that had happened so far it was a wonder he had taken so long to start. But start he did.

What if they met trouble and the trouble was too strong for the girls to deal with properly?

What if he couldn’t activate his sticker?

What if he was killed before he could activate his sticker?

What if he activated his sticker and didn’t know how to use whatever neat new power it gave him?

The thoughts wouldn’t stop and the worries were piling up but then his brain forcefully shut down those lines of thought with the aforementioned distraction and then he was alright again. More or less. He wasn’t panicking anymore at least. In fact it worked too well, Leonard probably would have stood there and gotten himself killed by idly standing around if Siam didn’t shock him out of his thoughts with a long string of curse words so horrible that he almost blushed.

Maybe he had been a sailor before he lost his memories?

“Sorry about the phrases.” Siam actually looked ashamed of herself. Leonard waved off the apology with a dismissive hand and a shake of his head. Really they had more important things to worry about right this minute. Who cared if she was a potty mouth? Provided they all lived to see another day he might even tease her about it.

He didn’t have a chance to say anything however, Siam darted away when a new arrival in pink started firing off icicles. With a grunt Leonard ran after her, hoping the other girls beside them (really he had to stop being oblivious to other people around him you can’t do that when your life is literally in danger) were following suit. If there was going to be a fight of any sort in the lobby then it was best for him to make himself scarce. If there was fighting going on between two powerful strangers then all the fragments should get away from it to be honest. The problem with following Siam became apparent quickly though. She was going in the direction Shiro had gone and that was an issue because wait a minute that wasn’t right was it? They should be going the other way. Away from the danger their companion was looking for. Away. Not towards.

Was Leonard always this much of a coward? Because he was getting disgusted with himself.

“Damn it all.”

Leonard followed her as best he could, right hand twitching towards the sticker on his forehead once or twice and his mind began to wander once again.

In theory all he should really have to do is rub it in order to make it activate right? He sure hoped that was it. As they made their way up stairs (Leonard actually tripping a few times) Leonard clenched his fists and held his arms as still as he could. Something wanted him to touch the sticker. He wasn’t sure if it was outside forces or his own instincts but Leonard’s hands were moving and he wasn’t sure if he wanted them to go where they pleased. The concept of the sticker not working when he touched it terrified him after all. Leonard was sick of being terrified.
So he kept close to Siam and tried not to think about the inevitable confrontation they were moving towards. He tried not to think about anything.

When it came time to throw down he refused to be useless. Siam would need back up not a liability.

Damn Leonard hoped he wouldn’t be a liability.
 

Eternal Dream

The Messenger
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~- It's All Been Done Before? -~

"Whoever you guys left down there is lucky, they're guaranteed to live now. Also piece of advice from someone that's been in your shoes, don't split up. Something else you should know, never assume something, things can change in a second."

Wait, what? Before Harmony could get her questions out, however, the guy had called up a gale of wind, forcing Dexter and Jeane out of the hallway, slamming the door shut with such a loud bang that Harmony knew they wouldn't be getting back in again. Rain was blown backwards, the angel wings at the girl's sides useless against this boy's attack, until she'd been blown around a corner and out of sight.

Harmony didn't know how she'd weathered the attack, but she gained the answer to her question as soon as it was over. A wall of water twisted around in front of her, waves and ripples flowing across the surface of the water to show the passage of the wind across it. A white staff was gripped in her hands, and Harmony loosened her hold on it ever so slightly, allowing her knuckles to resume normal color and blood flow. She felt warmth between her shoulder blades. That sticker activating? Did that mean she had access to two of the three, then? For some reason, it seemed a little early for that.

The toll from the water wall came almost immediately, however. The wall collapsed, soaking the carpet in water, and it took all of Harmony's strength not to join it. Her knees had turned to jelly, barely willing to support her weight. If it wasn't for adrenaline, Harm knew she'd have been on the ground. She planted the butt of her staff against the carpet, feeling a few drops of water hit her jean ankle as she did so.

"Heyy Sync!!! You ready for round two??"

Thank the heavens for scantily clad comrades! Harm doubled up for a moment, taking a few deep breaths as Rain came rushing back from where she'd been thrown. Harm had regained her breath and some strength by the time Rain's surprise attack was over, but she had a feeling that if that moment of weakness went unnoticed, she'd be highly lucky.

"Can you hold him off for a bit while I work on a SPECIAL move??"

"I think so," Harmony said, looking from Rain to the other boy. Rain had just called him Sync, and he'd identified himself as having been one of them not too long ago. This had happened before? You could chose to be a Collector and attack others? It just didn't... seem right...

Harmony raised her hand, taking careful aim at Sync. She could get off several rounds with that energy bullet, she was sure of that. It seemed like it took a lot less strength than that water wall, and she needed all of the strength she could keep until she learned how to use these stickers without getting tired. She kept the staff in her one hand, but she started firing bullets with her other hand, careful to change the angle of her shot just a little each time so that if Sync managed to dodge one bullet, he just might jump into the path of another one in the process.

~- Omen Tatted on My Wrist -~

"Come on, we need to get out of here."

Selene had been riding a wave, just going with the flow since they'd gotten out of the parking lot area. It took Ally talking directly to her to get Selene to finally get with it again. Tearing her eyes away from Tavvy and Blaster (those were their names, right?), Selene saw the direction that Ally was pointing, to the door where Shiro and Anna had disappeared through just a few moment ago. Taking a quick look around, Selene could see that she and Ally were the only ones still in the lobby besides Tavvy and Blaster. The way those two were acting, Selene would be more surprised if a fight didn't break out than if one did.

No way did she want to be around for that.

Selene followed after Ally, both girls being careful to make as little noise as possible, not wanting to risk the Collectors attention turn from each other to them. While it was true that Tavvy seemed to be sticking up for them at the moment, Selene didn't want to test that theory; it was best to skedaddle while they had the chance.

They didn't find any obstacles to stop their progress up the stairs. However, the two of them were greeted with a shower of paper when they reached the stairwell that led from the third to the fourth floor. Selene looked up just as Ally yanked her back against the wall, pulling her out of the way of the door that landed where Selene had just been standing. Taking a shaky breath, Selene exhaled, "Thanks, Ally."

Ally nodded her head, but held a finger to her lips before pointing above them. Moving her eyes from the ruined stairs, door, and floor, Selene realized that she could hear voices above them.

Don't worry, it's my job to know exactly who you are after all."

"Alright then Rien. The hell's going on? Why do you and your friends keep coming after us? What do you want?"


Shiro was up there, along with someone named Rien? Selene was also pretty sure that Anna was with Shiro too. Turning to Ally, Selene mouthed, "How do we get up there?"

Ally shook her head, telling Selene she was out of ideas. Frustrated, Selene pulled the two stickers out of her pocket that she'd found earlier, studying them. One looked like it had some sort of gravity field on it against a purple background, while the other had two strange daggers crossed on it. They were supposed to use these, right? How?!

Almost as if in answer to her question, the stickers floated out of her hand; the gravity sticker attaching itself to her left wrist while the one with the daggers stuck to her right wrist. Surprise flowed through Selene, but it was quickly overtaken by a strange sensation coursing through her body. She felt like she'd lost half of her body weight, like she'd float away from the ground if she wasn't careful. Selene looked to her left wrist to see a soft glow; even though the sticker had sunk into her skin, she could still see the design. Did this mean it was active? But what could it do?

Light. She felt really light. Like maybe gravity didn't have a strong hold on her? Going with her gut instinct, Selene jumped, amazement filling her when she jumped from one floor to the next. What was that; ten, fifteen feet?

She couldn't think too much about it. The same instinct that told her to jump also made her think about her weight and gravity's pull on her returning to normal, and it caused her to roll across the floor, landing a couple of feet in front of Shiro and Anna, collecting a serious case of rug burn on her arms from her tumble.

Selene tried to come out of the roll gracefully, like that guy Blaster had. While she didn't think she was anywhere near as successful at it as he'd been, she considered it somewhat decent that she'd been able to get her knees under her so she could scramble to her feet really quick. She moved back a couple feet, making sure she was with Anna and Shiro before Selene said softly, "Just how many of these guys are there?"

~- Problem that Doesn't Want to be Solved -~

"...Just one. Will ya shut up?!"

Blaster cringed a little on the inside, even though he couldn't stop the laugh that came out of his throat, the only reaction that the Fragments would see. He hadn't meant to kick the kid in the ribs, honestly; but damn, Shiro had held up well under the tackle. And to have the stones to try to sock Blaster in the face right after? This little accident was already proving to be interesting in the testing department!

Blaster had been all set to catch Shiro's hand and hold him still for a moment; it wouldn't have been all that hard, either. Despite the kid's bravado, Blaster could see that Shiro was still seriously winded. It'd take a little time for him to recover from that kick, Blaster knew that much; he'd had pretty much the same damned introduction to the Collector Set during his Fraggie run, so Blaster knew the pain Shiro was in.

However, Blaster's intentions were completely sidelined when he found himself way away from Shiro; he was suddenly standing in the middle of the lobby, and a different man had caught Shiro's fist. Blaster couldn't hear what he said to the boy, but he damn well heard what was said when Tavvy turned and started yelling at him.

"Remember me Blaster?? I recall you doing this same shyt the last game right?? Picking on us fragments even though you're strong as shyt and could easily run an area by yourself. You killed Kourtney and Kael!!! You bastard!!! You made us all forget. I can't let you hurt these people when they barely understand anything yet...besides, I HATE you. You twisted piece of shyt!!

Yep. Tavvy was still clearly quite butt hurt over what happened last game. Blaster thought for sure that them both being done with being Fragments would make it a little better; shit, Tavvy should understand by now that what Blaster did to them during the last game wasn't malicious in any way. He decided to say as much by shrugging his shoulders before saying, "Hey, a guy's gotta f.ucking eat, kiddo. Bugging these pipsqueaks is the only way we can earn our meals around here, as you should damned well know by now. And come on, you damned idiot. When did I start hounding the shit out of you guys? The first round was a damned test, you little bastard! I didn't actually get serious until later, as you should damned well know by now!"

And Blaster never killed anyone. He'd had a run in towards the end of the last Game with Kourtney and Kael, yeah. They'd also started fighting, too. But the fight was never that long in Blaster's memory; it was like one moment, he'd been dodging Kourtney's blade as Kael fired up for an attack, and then the next, Blaster had blinked and the two Fraggies were gone. There had been some blood in the alleyway were they'd been fighting, but Blaster hadn't seen bodies, or sensed the telltale buzz of static that said that a Fraggie had gone the way of the little monsters. He knew that they'd been turned to Static by the end of their Game, but Blaster had always assumed it was some other Collector that had done the deed. He'd always thought it was Topsy, honestly; that son of a bitch always seemed to have an overly dramatic and stylish need to take care of business.

Why did this little shit seem so certain Blaster had done it?

"Fukker!!! I missed on purpose. Next time I won't. Leave and don't bother these fragments until they can handle it. Why is an elite such as yourself even bothering with these newbies??"

Blaster didn't even blink as Tavvy unleashed a wave of icicles and frost against him. All of it went careening across the lobby, never actually hitting anyone, even himself. Blaster had already known it was just a warning shot. With the way this kid had been ragging on him, Blaster knew Tavvy wouldn't actually intend to do harm with the Fragments still in the area. However, Blaster could also see that the Fragments had all hightailed it out of the area, using Tavvy's appearance as the distraction they'd needed. Great, this little fukker had just messed up Blaster's job.

Well, fu.ck him.

"Are you finished yet?" Blaster asked, forcing all the boredom into his voice that he could. He reached for his left shoulder, dusting off what little frost had actually collected there before he actually turned his attention back to Tavvy. His eyes cold as ice, Blaster said, "Look kid, I said it before, and I hate repeating myself, but I'll say it just one last time. It's my job to test the new Fraggies to see how far they'll go before they get turned into chow for the Static. So how about you piss off, already? It's none of your damned business what the hell I do with these kids, so get the stick out of your ass and go fu.ck yourself already."
 
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Story Keeper

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~- Don't Want to Fall -~

Sync was surprised by just how strong of a wind gust he'd created. Shaky exhaustion tried to creep into his muscles, but he shoved it to the sidelines for the time being. He remained visibly composed as Raine attacked him as she shouted, "Heyy Sync!!! You ready for round two??"

To be honest? No, I'm not, Sync thought even as he backpedaled quickly, putting space between him and the two females. He saw the winged, scantily clad one whisper something to the water-using one and he felt heat creep up the back of his neck, alerting him to the red tint that would reveal his embarrassment. Looking away from them, Sync was grateful when he caught a glimpse of the scantily clad one having moved away from the water using one. He focused back on the Fragment closest to him, although over her shoulder he saw the other girl standing back, but he didn't know what she was doing.

He saw the energy bullets moving toward him, and dodging out of the path of one or two, he called up a wall of water to take the hit from the other bullets he'd jumped in the path of. He heard the squishing sound of his boots hitting wet carpet, it made his skin crawl even as his mind remained focused on what he was dealing with. He raised the pistol in his left hand and pulled the trigger, sending a bullet clad in green light heading toward Harmony; then, shifting his position quickly he fired off one more shot at Rain. The bullet that sped toward Rain was enveloped in orange light, so Rain would have something slick to deal with plus having a citrus smell clinging to her and Harmony would have some earth to deal with; along with a earthy smells.

He expected them to retaliate and quickly, but for the time being Sync took advantage of there being no more attacks being sent his way. Looking at them, he thought about giving them another tidbit of information but he decided against it, having decided that he'd given too much information as it was. Besides, it's not like he owed these two anything anyway. Right? He did raise the dagger-gun in his left hand only to change his mind, lowering it he ran toward Harmony, ducking low once he was close enough, he did a sweeping kick to her legs in an attempt to knock them out from under her; and even while he was working on that he swiped at her with the dagger in his right hand since his left was being used to support his weight.

~- If You Only Knew -~

Anna scowled a little when her suspicion was confirmed, they weren't alone on this floor. She watched the blob of color move closer to her, fear gripping her as she read their aura. As she'd told Shiro, she didn't understand how she could "see" but she was willing to take this strange aura sight thing she'd been granted. It was only a small comfort when Shiro moved to stand protectively in front of her, shielding her from the other boy that had appeared. She didn't understand who he was, but based on the power his aura was reading and the sudden tension in Shiro's, she was guessing that this was one guy that they didn't want to deal with.

Anna was aware of Alice being pressed against her leg, and the vibration that traveled up her leg alerted Anna to the hostility that Alice was feeling. Reaching out a hand, she gave the border collie a quick scratch behind the ears and cooed, "It's okay girl, we'll be okay."

She sensed it as another presence joined them, this one felt and the color pattern seemed familiar as it came to a stop in front of her and Shiro. She watched as the young woman scrambled to her feet, a hint of embarrassment creeping into the other woman's aura, causing Anna to smile at the fact. Focusing back on the unknown boy's aura, Anna stayed where she was at behind Shiro but asked, "What do you wish to gain from tormenting us? Why can't you just let us get to wherever we need to go to in order to get the Game Memory?" There was a tiny shaky in her voice, almost as if Anna wasn't confident communicating using her voice and instead preferred a different method of communication. She tracked Alice via of her aura as the canine moved to stand guard in front of the new female that had appeared, judging by the aura pattern it seemed to be Selene but she wasn't entirely sure.

Returning her focus to the other boy, the one that was blocking their path, Anna mustered up as much courage as she could. She was prepared for trouble, and his aura seemed to promise it along with the fact that this guy was probably one of the most chill people she'd ever met, even if she didn't remember everyone she met. She was still positive on that fact.

~- Taste the Fear -~

Siam didn't stop to think, she ran up the stairs to the point she was practically flying. Her hand flung the door open for the third floor, seeing the static on the floor she looked around for the winged doll only to see that she'd somehow lost it in her mad scramble up the stairs. Anxiety racing through her at that piece of knowledge, she felt as if she was being strangled. How was she supposed to defend herself and Leonard if push came to shove? Which given what she'd seen so far of this sick, twisted game, it was likely to come to it. Taking in a deep breath, she danced out of the way of a static. Extending her hand, she felt warmth radiating from her left shoulder.

She watched as a red orb materialized, the doll that manifested from the orb had blonde hair and blue eyes. She had a Victorian style dress, with a green ribbon tied around her head and small roses. Siam watched as the doll dusted herself off before the doll turned to look at her; the look in the doll's eyes clearly reading, You called me? What can I do for you human?

Siam didn't know what to think about it, only to watch as the doll raised her left hand and nodded. Staring down at her left hand, she saw a ring there that hadn't been there before hand. Staring at it, she got the feeling that it was there because of the sticker that had been activated. Nodding her head, she piped up cheerfully, "Alright, let's go!"

The doll smiled at her, seeming satisfied with her answer before the doll focused on the hallway of static and started to attack it with rose petals. Following after the doll, she saw Ally and Selene (how had the girls gotten a head of her and Leonard?), she watched as Selene seemed to trigger her sticker and flew away to the fourth floor. Confusion shining in her blue-violet eyes, Siam glanced back to see if Leonard was close behind; and after seeing her answer she looked at Ally and asked, "Do you want to try and hit up the higher floors since we seem to be free of challenges at the moment? Ow!"

She got a sharp kick in her ankle, looking down she saw the red dressed doll seemed angered at her. Hearing the buzz of static, Siam turned to see some insect type static rounding the corner. Dread made itself at home in her stomach, making her feel a bit nauseous as she thought back to what happened with Lizard Face. The doll apparently didn't like her hesitation, because it kicked her again. Surprise coming to her eyes, Siam was about to snap at the doll when she saw the gentler look in the doll's eyes. "Right, sorry. I won't space out like that again," she promised the doll.

Backing up toward Ally, she nodded to the doll and watched as it set to work attacking the static with rose petals. After a bit of time had passed, Siam watched as the last of the static cleared out. She felt exhaustion move through her, causing her to stumble a bit as the hallway spun around her. Placing her right hand on the wall for support, Siam closed her eyes and rested her head in her left hand. Taking a couple of shaky breaths, she opened her eyes to see that the doll had disappeared along with the rose ring that had been on her left ring finger.

"So, it's just part of the sticker being active?" She whispered, taking a couple more minutes to get herself under control she looked at Ally and in the direction that she hoped Leonard was coming. She really didn't want to get too separated from the group. A thought coming to her, she looked up in the direction Selene had gone and continued listening to what pieces of conversation that she could. Wordlessly motioning toward the other end of the hallway, she raised an eyebrow in question. What she was wondering about was clear, "Do we make a break for the Game Memory while Selene, Shiro and Anna keep whoever is up there busy?"
 
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Ðari

Look at you, armor-less
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Juni0/2 C1@55

It was a pain, the tension was so thick you could slice through it with a knife. Yet there Hanekoma stood, practically as mellow, cool, calm and collected as anyone could figure. He rubbed his neck and sighed, sure he was just doing his job as a collector and making this experience more difficult by margins, but there was a certain incremental difficulty to be applied. It happened to them, so shall the same thing happen to this rookie class, you could say they were the juniors here while him and Sync were the graduating class. Everything fit into place and quite honestly was unraveling as what could best be expected, but he couldn't help but feel something was off, something odd.

It was in this instant, that someone else was in a strange manner of putting it "floating" up to the stair case. The collector raised both of his hands and clapped with a lot of bravado at the use of sticker mobility and utility. Looks like these juniors had some bright ones out of the bunch.

"Not bad Chica, good to see another one join us. You must be Selene. Put those talents to use little sister..."

Shiro asked one of the most basic questions. But even before this, he looked at the collector as if he were a familiar, but he was almost positive that this was their first meeting. It didn't take him very long to really put it together in the back of his mind, Rien's intelligence and deductive skills were passive, never expressed, he just did it and showed no hint whatsoever in his mannerisms that even broadcasted this kind of skill. His ears twitched as Alice, Anna's canine companion was growling with intrepedation and danger, but it seemed short lived.

"Check out that little cutie."

Theres no way they could've even seen it. The collector had moved through the room without actually moving, and there he was scratching the pup's ears. Feeling as though she'd taken to him, as he induced chill vibes and a calm nature from himself. If you were looking at where Rien was standing originally, his body suddenly looked like a propped up cut-out of himself standing in place from his last position, and meanwhile, there he was petting Alice at complete random, before reducing himself to paper-confecting, and the cut-out started to animate itself and start moving again.

"Oh yeah? Shit. You wanted to know why you were here yeah?" He said, his fist hitting his open palm as if he'd had a sudden revelation.

"Theres no easy way to really explain it really, I doubt you'd believe me even if I told you. Still i'll give you an inkling of an idea to get you started, the rest you guys are admittedly going to learn of your own volition."

Rien took a step back and shrugged, his scarf just below his chin. This was hard for them the first time, so he had to make sure the information was correct. Shiro, was classified as a [Blank] so this effectively meant he had no existing memories of life previously, believing an explanation was several times unlikely for them in particular. If he were any other type of Frag, this might've been easier to deal, their memories were "incomplete" but depending on the type, they had them, dormant to be activated or like pushing a pressure point to trigger them. Nope. Blanks didn't know left from right, but they got the clearest picture when it came to really remembering anything.

Rien pointed to his head.

"It's all in here. Just think." Rien said casting a mesmerizing and almost hypnotic gaze on both Anna, Selene, and Shiro.

"Gotcha."

Memory Theft: REWIND

Placing them both in a stasis, time seemed like it stopped. There was the sound of all the the paper that was scuffled across the room, rise, and create images before the collector. Images of...his last group? Wait a minute, it was strange enough, but a blank had memories of his team? Anna and Selene did as well, there was a person unrecognizable, Rien switched his perspective to view with audio, and he brought forth a conversation had between the group, and the first collector they defeated.

"You are here, because you were looking for a second chance. Unlike where you were, you don't remember who you were, but when you found your way here, lets just say your consciousness tried to resist a lil. Some of you remember absolutely nothing, but will have no issues remembering anything by furthering the game. While others do remember, but they'll be all jumbled up or wonky in some way shape or form. Point of me telling ya this, is so you can get through it with as little confusion as possible. Guess the best part is, if you aren't satisfied with who you were, you've got choices to become something here, but you just have to survive long enough to see change or even a differn' future."

Memory Theft: RESUME

Rien then snapped his fingers and broke the trance, bringing the three-man squad back into the present flow of time. He'd probably regret using the easiest method to explain something, but this would likely generate even more questions.

"All i'll say is something happened to all of you. This is your last chance to redeem yourself, you may want to really let it sink in. Survival. Something I live by even now, and i'll do whatever it takes. I was in your shoes before so I would know, but as of right now my circumstances are different than yours. Besides, it's no fun not giving my juniors an idea of what they're dealing with this early in, we didn't get that hint until halfway through, your blessed."

He stretched and snapped his spine into place, preparing to answers Anna's question from before easily enough.


"Kind of a boring question junior, lame if you ask me. What makes you so different from us just by a simple deviation in position? This is what it means to live as a Collector, we can't just let you do whatever uncontested, it defeats the purpose of everything the boss is trying to do. If you don't struggle, if you don't resolve to survive, then how are you damn well going to be able to face choices your gonna deal with after this conversation, or even after everything's over? C'mon, ya gotta level with me here, nobody gives out shit for free anymore. But I'm not gonna be an ass and just leave you for dead without knowing shit, thats something Blaster would do....not me and Sync, but we don't have a choice either. Thats why..."

The walls were jutted with paper spikes, down the narrow and far stretching hallway.

"Thats why we exist. To challenge that resolve. Desire to live, survive, to dream. You either die with it right now, or you live, to carry on like we did before you. So what's it gonna be junior class? Your team can't get to this floor after I'm done with you, I'd suggest you haul ass. Like, I don't know...now?

Rien stomped his foot, and true to form, lightning surged along the walls and they started to encroach down the narrow hallway, in an avid attempted to crush, Anna, Shiro, Selene and Alice. The collector naturally didn't move as he wasn't the one that was in danger here. Behind them, the floor started to peel apart and crumble by gravity just like the staircase from before. His paper that was scattered from when he first entered the room, was zipping around the hallway like rogue jagged blades. They should take care not to get a nasty paper-cut or two while fleeing to the opposite end of the hall. Hanekoma sighed, and turned his back and walked through the spikes protruding that were made out of super hardened and super-sharpened paper as if it were an extension of himself. His two fingers, being the last thing seen by the trio, him throwing up the "OK" sign. All they had to do now was get the hell off the 4th floor before they were dropped onto the 3rd with no other way to ascend the hotel from that side.

"Nothing more for me to do here. Set the stage for you juniors, lets just hope you show up for yourselves." Hanekoma said, moving outside of the building and placing his foot on the balcony.

He could hear the vibrations of the walls. The collector would remain within 100 meters of his moving death trap until the walls cased in and the floor had completely crumbled. From his experience, Sync had the second floor roadblocked, Blaster was on the first floor by now, and Hanekoma had effectively chopped their team up even further. Thankfully that wasn't the test he'd prepared, if they remembered correctly he came from the 5th floor. They'd see the true surprise he had waiting for them.

Twelve Hummingbird static. Fast little S.O.B.s with the speed of a zigzagging dragonfly, 1/3rd the health pool of a Trigger Happy Collector, and they hit with enough physical force to cave in cars. As much as Hanekoma would've cared to heckle them and waste even more of their time, there was a g1i+ch that needed to be tracked down.
 
Last edited:

Endless Warrior Sora

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"Just how many of these guys are there?"

Shiro noticed that Selene had somehow made her way up the stairs too. How. the hell. did she do that?? He must not have noticed her following them or something. If he was being entirely honest with himself, he was too busy focused on Rien and his dangerous nonchalance to even check his surroundings.

"You're asking me?!," he hissed back. "I thought the guy that tackled me was the last one!"

"Not bad Chica, good to see another one join us. You must be Selene. Put those talents to use little sister...Check out that little cutie.""

Shiro watched Rien's body freeze. Suddenly, he was next to them, petting Alice! Shiro jumped back a bit, on the defensive. He could clone himself?! Since when? Shiro checked over to Rien's 'double' and noticed it still didn't move. Upon further study, it was even flat. He turned back to the Rien before them, petting Alice. Alice, for some reason didn't attack yet. Maybe she was just as confused as he was. However there was something...tragically peaceful about this. Like, maybe Rien wasn't such a bad guy. Like maybe if circumstances were different...

It made Shiro smile, albeit a little uneasily.

"Oh yeah? Shit. You wanted to know why you were here yeah? There's no easy way to really explain it really, I doubt you'd believe me even if I told you. Still i'll give you an inkling of an idea to get you started, the rest you guys are admittedly going to learn of your own volition."

Shiro watched him intently. That seemed to be all he was capable of doing. If that last display was any sign, there was absolutely no way any of them would be able to take Rien. At all. He didn't like that. He didn't like being so...helpless. He forsure wasn't trying to get curbstomped in front of two GIRLS. Rien pointed to his head.

It's all in here. Just think.

Memory Theft: REWIND

Shiro looked into Rien's eyes and something about them was...off. He could feel his consciouness changing. Not neccesarily to UNconsciousness, but a sort of in between. Like sleep paralysis. He could hear the sounds of paper as it rustled and crumpled about the group and began to form...images. Rien was replaying the memories they had just acquired from Raito's Static before everything went black. Shiro could hear a voice echo:

"You are here, because you were looking for a second chance. Unlike where you were, you don't remember who you were, but when you found your way here, lets just say your consciousness tried to resist a lil. Some of you remember absolutely nothing, but will have no issues remembering anything by furthering the game. While others do remember, but they'll be all jumbled up or wonky in some way shape or form. Point of me telling ya this, is so you can get through it with as little confusion as possible. Guess the best part is, if you aren't satisfied with who you were, you've got choices to become something here, but you just have to survive long enough to see change or even a differn' future."

Memory Theft: RESUME


A snap of the fingers jolted Shiro out of the trance. He blinked, staring at the ground. He was trying to absorb everything that just happened. His breathing was a bit ragged from the shock. Shiro was looking for a second chance? What was he doing before he came here?? Why was he looking for a second chance?! What happened to him?! DAMMIT why couldn't he remember?!? This was going from scary and bizarre to outright frightening. Seeing as how he didn't remember anything, he must be one of the ones who won't have any issues in the future.

"All i'll say is something happened to all of you. This is your last chance to redeem yourself, you may want to really let it sink in. Survival. Something I live by even now, and i'll do whatever it takes. I was in your shoes before so I would know, but as of right now my circumstances are different than yours. Besides, it's no fun not giving my juniors an idea of what they're dealing with this early in, we didn't get that hint until halfway through, your blessed.Kind of a boring question junior, lame if you ask me. What makes you so different from us just by a simple deviation in position? This is what it means to live as a Collector, we can't just let you do whatever uncontested, it defeats the purpose of everything the boss is trying to do. If you don't struggle, if you don't resolve to survive, then how are you damn well going to be able to face choices your gonna deal with after this conversation, or even after everything's over? C'mon, ya gotta level with me here, nobody gives out shit for free anymore. But I'm not gonna be an ass and just leave you for dead without knowing shit, thats something Blaster would do....not me and Sync, but we don't have a choice either. Thats why..."

SHKT! SHKT! Spikes suddenly burst from the walls. Shiro jerked his body left and right, affirming this fact for himself. He began to get tense. So Rien WAS going to attack. He clenched his jaw.

Thats why we exist. To challenge that resolve. Desire to live, survive, to dream. You either die with it right now, or you live, to carry on like we did before you. So what's it gonna be junior class? Your team can't get to this floor after I'm done with you, I'd suggest you haul ass. Like, I don't know...now?

Who did he think he was, acting all high and mighty?! The floor below Shiro began to feel uneasy and unstable. Grinding his teeth, Shiro began running toward Rien, using his arms to shield his face, resulting in several paper cuts. Shiro gritted his teeth through the pain and kept moving toward Rien, who turned and walked toward the wall nearest to him.

"Don't turn your back on me!!" Shiro spat, throwing his spray can as Rien disappeared into the wall. Clicking his tongue, Shiro flexed his hand and called the Spray Can back into his palm. He turned and noticed Selene, Anna, and Alice were only a few feet away. The walls were closing in and the floor was collapsing. They needed to move. Now.

"COME ON!" He shouted behind him to the group. "We gotta haul ASS! Watch out for the paper, use your abilities if you can. Do NOT get cut! It hurts, trust me!"

Shiro clutched the Spray Can in his hands. He wished it would...DO more. If he had a lighter, he could use it as an igniter against all this paper. How did he know that? Shiro's finger reflexively pressed down on the nozzle of the can, by accident, but a small tuft of stylized flame quickly emerged and dissipated as quickly as it showed. Shiro did a double take and almost inhumanly moved the Spray Can to his face.

"Did I just do that?," he whispered to himself, before turning to his comrades. "Did any of you SEE that? I didn't imagine that did I?" He asked, excited as a paper blade cut his face.

"Ow!!! GOD DAM- STOP!" He screamed, waving and spraying the can around, producing a consistent stream of the highly stylized fire, disintegrating some of the paper around him. Becoming excited, he looked toward the Spray Can and beamed.

"I did do that!! HOW did I do tha- y'know what I don't even CARE! I can make fire!" He grinned widely, before wiping the blood from his cheek. He gestured for his friends to follow him as he held the can in front of him as it spewed flames like a miniature flamethrower with about half the distance. He dashed through the hallway, trying to protect himself from as many cuts as possible while hating the smell of burning paper. He slipped a few times as the floor beneath him gave way.

"Hurry!!! RUUUUNNNN! Don't stop guys!!! Come on!! Don't fall or you won't be able to get back up!" He called supportively behind him. He wanted to help, but he knew if he was in front, it was best if at least ONE of them made it. The quicker they got to floor seven, the better.

After making it to the top of of the stairs, Shiro took a moment to breathe. He began to feel the sting of all the paper cuts he acquired in his mad dash here. He seethed in pain before releashing a shaky exhale. GOD paper cuts hurt like hell. He had forgotten how much they actually hurt (because, y'know he forgot EVERYTHING). However, he wished that remained something he forgot.

A sharp, high pitched zipping sound tore through the air before hitting the Spray Can, flinging violently it out of Shiro's hand. The impact was enough to make Shiro grip his hand and wrist in pain, as the object crashed into the wall, leaving a considerable amount of impact. Shiro turned and saw more of them.

Hummingbird shaped Static. Shiro groaned.

"JEEZ, does it EVER end?!"
 

Story Keeper

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~- This Is Gonna Hurt -~

Anna jerked backwards, she hadn't expected the collector's aura to temporarily disappear on her. Blinking sightless eyes, she waited tensely for the aura to appear again in her head. Looking down in Alice's direction, she noticed the calmer yet confused aura that took over the canine, finding the arm she traced it back up to see that the collector had somehow gotten close enough to be petting Alice. Anger gripping her, Anna snapped, "Don't pet her! Didn't your mother teach you any manners? You ask first if you can pet someone's pet!"

She knew she was being slightly unreasonable, but she didn't care. Alice was hers, and she could already tell that in her previous life she'd been dependent on Alice. The colors swirled through her mind, signaling to her the calm, quiet danger they were facing with this collector. A part of her decided that she didn't want to see agitated colors in this collector's aura, something told her it'd be an insanely bad idea. Next thing Anna knew was that she couldn't move, and everything felt too close. The auras of Selene, Shiro and Rien all swirled together in her mind, making it hard to distinguish one from the other.

Anna didn't know what was going on exactly, all she knew was that there were different swirls of color that appeared in her mind's eye. The sensation of someone touching her skin relayed to her whatever conversation was going on, she frowned a little bit as the dialogue kept jumping around, almost like the speaker didn't know what they wanted to say. She didn't say a word though, she just stayed quiet during the relaying of the conversation. Only to be forcefully waken up by the original three auras that were in her head snapping back to life, the other odd auras disappeared; leaving Anna feeling confused about what had just happened.

The color surrounding the collector was tinged with one that meant boredom and disgust, and even though she didn't know what he was saying, she felt her cheeks start growing warm because of his aura. She saw Shiro's colors go chasing after the collector, signaling to her that he was giving chase. And she saw him bump into a couple of things, but other than some fuzzy edges of color around the edges of these objects, she didn't know what Shiro had bumped into. She knew that it wasn't the same thing as that lizard thing downstairs, the color was way too faint. It was almost like it was connected to the collector so that was the only reason she had any indication. This fact set her on edge, since it told her that she saw helpless when it came to alerting her friends about non sentient objects.

Feeling a couple of tremors, she saw the urgency in Shiro's aura, almost like he was trying to encourage them to get moving. Not even sparing a glance in Selene's direction, she said, "Haul ass, girl." She didn't wait for a reply, she just bolted toward Shiro, letting Alice guide her toward the exit for the floor. She wasn't sure how she'd managed it, but somehow she avoided getting injuries on her arms. Her legs were a different story though, she could tell that there'd be various bumps, bruises and cuts along them from where she'd collided with something hard and sharp.

Getting into the area with Shiro, she allowed herself a ten second breather, before she returned her limited senses to her surroundings. Seeing some fuzzy, yet brighter colored flying things ahead Anna snapped her left hand forward and sent a gust of wind barreling toward it. The wind bypassed Shiro, and other than a bit of ruffling his hair and clothes, it did no damage to the other Fragmented. The wind tossed the humming bird static that was closest to them away. Even so, Anna was more focused on the fact that the building was still trembling. Alice on the other hand was snapping at anything hostile that got too close to her and Anna.
 

Ðari

Look at you, armor-less
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i[3 C1imb3/R5

This was about as smooth as things had gone for them. Some little puzzle or whatever you wanted to call it, wasn't much of an issue for both Dexter and Jeane. Steering her in the right direction this time, she accurately navigated her way across the pressure plated tiles that were glowing with a corresponding color in RGB. Once she knew were to jump with instruction from dexter, the LED sign lit up "OPEN".

The floor below the two of them shut off and stopped glowing. Dexter took the first step and bolted across the now dimmed floor, high-fiving Jeane as he passed and the two of them propped open the door for the others to pass through without hesitation. Sure enough the "OPEN" LED remained the same before they ventured up to what they now counted as the 5th floor. It seemed pretty obvious at this point, that these floors were either passive, triggered with traps, a puzzle of some kind, or even static.

"This isn't my idea of fun, just what the hell are we really doing here...ugh. That stupid 'memory' didn't tell me anything, it all just looked like it melded together. Did you see anything??"

Jeane actually hesitated to respond.

"Hey, I know you kinda ended up here blind, but at least tell me that doesn't effect how you remember things?? Are you listening J9?!"

She placed her index finger on his lips, and looked up at the staircase leading to the fifth floor. "Dexter. I could hear everything said during the memory word for word, I could hear Sync's voice and a lot of other people. Rien, Raito, Kael, Kourtney, Tavish, Absolon or Topsy, Silver, DJ, ???, and Vandiken. At least just a list of names...there was a bit about, being here due to something happening to us. It was incredibly vague...not really explained, it just seems like whenever that Raito guy died, apparently it effected everyone who was in his group's memories. You didn't look too surprised by Sync when you first saw him either, he must've been a blur in your memory, I recognized him by voice alone."

Dexter took a second to take all of it in, before releasing a hefty sigh. It always seemed to boil down to things like this, information, but his impatience wasn't quelled just by a little fact checking.

"You gave me more information that I had readily available. Seems like we all remember things in a different way, if you have audio-only with no picture...what does that mean? I just...get flashes that appear at random times. It's like subliminal advertisements..."

Jeane chuckled, and proceeded to climb the steps, for once beating him to the punch of forging ahead without her. Dexter kinda let it go for once, and he flipped up his royal blue hoody and climbed the steps after his blind teammate. Resting his hand on the door, dexter pushed it out with a gesture from his palm. This was definitely the fifth floor by the plaque emblazoned above the entrance. Before crossing the threshold, Jeane touched the floor to scan for anything hiding in the side rooms, booby-trapped panels, the usual.

"I can't see anything that looks...even remotely dangerous. I don't hear any static. Is this a neutral floor?" Jeane said still hesitant to stand over the threshold.

Dexter folded his arms behind his head and groaned. Again, he wasn't the type to wait around, he could dig that Jeane was just being extra cautious. He remembered how he said to her in the beginning that he wasn't a fan of her causing him lag. rolling his eyes, he stepped across the threshold, honestly expecting just about anything at this point. To his surprise, nothing happened, nothing actually in fact happened.

"Looks like it is a neutral floor...we needed a friggin break. Geez. Lets go." Dexter said proceeding to take multiple steps without consequence.

Jeane squinted, still scanning the entire hallway, yet she found nothing. No hidden devices, no panels, nothing from the ceiling to drop down, bodies suddenly waiting on the opposite side of any of the doors on this floor. Perhaps that was the trap, letting their guard down maybe? It didn't seem to deter Dexter who was walking further and further ahead mindlessly. Jeane darted and walked closely behind him, by the time they got to about the middle of the hallway Dexter suddenly stopped walking, and looked over at the elevator shaft.

"Dexter?"

"Hold on a second..." he said walking over to the doors. He knew theres no way it would open, it got destroyed when Rainee broke through the lobby earlier, but it seemed the least likely to be bait if they'd already taken it early. "Lets climb to the seventh floor using the elevator shaft. Seems safer than trusting the floor, we just can't fall...screw that! We're not gonna fall, I got us!"

"How reassuring...fine, lets get this over with." Jeane said with a bit of defeat in her tone, holding onto the shaft.

With their strength a little help from Dexter's sticker, they forced the elevator door open. They were looking at a narrow but flat wall, and the cords and pulley system that brought the machine up and down. It was dead quiet, no static, no crazy ass collectors, it was about the only break they had since this floor actually. Dexter jumped to grab the rope, his rod snaked around his waist and fastened to the cord. He extended his hand and coiled around Jeanne, as it wasn't like she could actually see the cord he grabbed onto as it didn't connect to any nearby wall. Raising his hand, he lifted her up to the next ledge that was the sixth floor. Dexter himself proceeded to physically climb the cords upward, and repeated his previous actions until Jeane was at the elevator shaft door to the seventh floor.

"Duck."
Dexter said, reeling his arm back and coiling the rod around his fist like a spring. With a quick thrust, he threw the rod like a spring, to smack through the doors, opening up the seventh floor for them. Jumping from the cord to the shaft door, he and Jeane broke through. Looking at what appeared to be two different sets of entrances followed by the door at the end of the hall. Pulling out his phone, Dexter quickly thumbed through it, opening up the Memory Map App from the text message, the dot pinged white on the current floor.

"Nice. Looks like we're here." Dexter flipped down his shades, as there was a light that was ridiculously bright.

Jeane didn't have the same problem as she was blind, but it was a relatively noticeable patch of light red on her eyes.

"Is that the game memory? Careful, we don't know what else is on this floor!"

"Yeah yeah. Would you relax a little? The hell is gonna be up here now when we're so close to the goal?"

"Weren't you listening to what Topsy said earlier!? He said there was a static somewhere on the upper floors, as well as the
fact we couldn't leave the building until we got here! Good chance of a boss fight happening!"
 

Lunarmaster54

Her Trouble-making Paladin
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When Siam ripped the door open to the third floor the last thing Leonard expected to see was monsters.

He wasn’t sure why the appearance of the Static surprised him the way it did. But seeing the thing prowling about the third floor caused his heart to practically stop it felt like. The two had barely entered the room when the creature attacked them. Siam gracefully moved out of the way while Leonard himself stumbled over his own feet. Now was the time. It was time to rub his sticker and hope for the best. He couldn’t just let Siam fight his battles for him this entire trip! With his luck this entire thing was being watched from afar by these people and they’d be like “let’s see how you do on your own!” on one of the later floors and separate them! Rub the sticker. Now.

Leonard raised his hand, fully intending to touch his sticker, when a red orb materialized right in front of Siam. Leonard let his hand fall, distracted, as a doll materialized and stared at Siam. Siam for her part was gleeful and told it “Alright let’s go!”. To Leonard’s amazement the doll started attacking the Static with flower petals and the girl followed close behind it. Leonard moved after her. Okay fine. He’d activate his sticker when the time was right.

Almost as soon as the thought crossed his mind insect looking creatures turned the corner, looking (to Leonard) creepy and dangerous. Leonard’s throat closed up even as he watched the doll engage them in battle. He had gone from hiding behind a girl to hiding behind a doll. Who hides behind a girl and a toy when they are perfectly capable of taking care of themselves? Apparently Leonard. His hand moved up again, this time he really would fight too! But before his fingers could get where they needed to go the doll had already finished, the insects falling over dead. Siam stumbled, throwing out a hand to use the wall as support and Leonard watched her curiously before it hit him. It hit him that the doll didn’t just randomly appear. The doll was probably her sticker or related to it in some way. He took a breath. If Siam continued like this, fighting alone to protect him and the other girl, then how long would it be before it got her killed?

Leonard wasn’t about to find out.

He touched his sticker. Index and middle fingers pressing down hard on the plastic as the mental image of Siam collapsing over dead filled his mind’s eye. His world went black for a split second, liquid fire seeming to shoot through his veins before Leonard realized his eyes just instinctively closed. He felt something hard attach itself to his face, seemingly pushing itself out of his face and attaching itself there. Leonard opened his eyes, the world appearing to have a much sharper clarity than before. He felt...energized. Ready to fight. Like he could take on the world and burn it to the ground.

Burn it to the ground? That was oddly specific.

Leonard raised his hand and wiggled his fingers, curious. Flames, white as snow, materialized and danced between his fingers. His eyes widened. He had just conjured fire from nothing. Was that was his sticker gave him? A mask and fire powers? His arm tingled as his heart filled with elation. What in the world had he been so afraid of anyway? That he was going to use his sticker and suddenly become a completely different person? That it wouldn’t work? It all seemed so silly now. With a laugh Leonard made the fire dance again before casually throwing his arm back. His plan had been to see if it would make more fire appear in front of him but what actually happened was his arm got hot, as if he’d dipped it in warm water, and white fire shot out of his palm, throwing him forwards. He flew all of two feet down the hallway before crashing back down painfully.

He had a feeling that would come in handy later.

Leonard walked back over to the girls, delighted and ready to get moving. This feeling started to fade when the rumbling started. As if the ceiling was going to collapse right the hell on top of them. Honestly it felt like the entire hotel was trying to fall down. Siam had an eyebrow raised, a raised eyebrow that Leonard took to mean “do we make a break for it?”

“Lead the way.” he replied “But we’ve gotta move.”

Either get onto the next floor or backtrack. They couldn’t afford to just stand there.

He himself could probably lead the group, now that he had nifty fire related powers and better eyesight, but it was better to follow Siam like they’d been doing. Because there was no way he was going to pick a fight and then get the crap kicked out of him because he didn’t know how to use his powers properly.

Teamwork was what would keep this group alive.
 

Eternal Dream

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~- Are You Strong Enough? -~

"You're asking me?! I thought the guy that tackled me was the last one!"

Selene shrugged her shoulders, keeping her eye on the Collector in front of them as she hissed back, "Hey, a girl can only hope to get an answer when her memory's been wiped clean. Thanks for trying, though."

"Not bad Chica, good to see another one join us. You must be Selene. Put those talents to use little sister...Check out that little cutie."

What wasn't bad? Having mad jumping skills? Before she could ask though, that guy (Was his name Rien? Like the one from the memory? His voice sounded right, but her vision had been so weird and fuzzy she couldn't recognize him,)... was a cardboard cutout? WTF?

Selene's head whipped around, trying to find him, only for her to scuttle to the side when he appeared right next to her, bent over so he could pet Anna's dog. The blind girl seemed rather outraged about that, shouting after the Collector as he moved away, having gotten his fill of stroking Alice's head. After he'd reestablished the distance between them, Rien started talking, giving the three Fragments a lot of actually very useful information. Selene filed it all away for now, so she could take a look at it when they weren't trying to get this "Game Memory" thing; plus, it'd be good information for the others that weren't with them right now, and Selene knew that their input could be helpful in figuring things out. But that last bit, about a final chance at redemption...

That sent a nasty chill to rest in her stomach.

Thats why we exist. To challenge that resolve. Desire to live, survive, to dream. You either die with it right now, or you live, to carry on like we did before you. So what's it gonna be junior class? Your team can't get to this floor after I'm done with you, I'd suggest you haul ass. Like, I don't know...now?

Selene had actually begun getting that message when the walls had erupted into crazy paper spikes, actually. However, she was the last to get moving, some instinct making her want to stay back to make sure Shiro, Anna, and Alice made it. That sticker seemed to have activated again, allowing the floor around Selene to stay together, but when she tried to direct the gravity manipulation towards Anna, Selene found she couldn't do it. The paper wouldn't obey the command to hold together. After a moment, Selene realized that the paper around her own feet was drifting apart too, so she finally booked it across the crumbling floor to catch up with Shiro and Anna.

The paper fell out from under Selene's feet at the last moment, causing the girl to once again come to a rolling stop behind Shiro and Anna. Coming to her feet, Selene groaned when she saw the monsters in front of them. "Again? I don't think that gravity thing's gonna help here!" She snapped. Shiro had his spray can, and Anna had Alice and wind manipulation, but Selene...

A flash of light appeared, and Selene felt a balanced weight appear in her hands. Looking down, she saw two daggers, each with two blades attached to the handles. "Okay, that answers that question," she muttered to herself. She took a deep breath, using the moment to collect herself, then she plunged into the fray, striking out and stabbing at whatever hummingbirds came at her.

~- The Way My Life Goes -~

Sync dodged some of Harm's bullets, then called up a wall of water to stop the rest in their tracks. Wait, he had wind and water on his side? "That's not fair!" she blurted out. She knew it was stupid to say something like that, but still...!

It seemed that Sync's bag of tricks didn't end there, however. Taking careful aim, he fired back his own bullets, one that seemed to have a green tint to it hurtling toward Harm. She spun out of the way, just barely avoiding the bullet; it struck the floor instead, causing the wood to explode and dirt to fly all over the place. Had the dirt come from the bullet? Harmony was beyond ready for this crazy ass dream to be over with.

Sync followed close after his bullet, coming in low for a sweeping kick at her legs. Harmony's mind blanked on her, unable to process or figure out what to do. Where her mind failed her, however, her body took over. Muscle memory, unaffected by the Game, took over, causing the girl to jump over the kick. She planted her staff, using it to block the strike from Sync's dagger, then followed up with a quick pop of the staff toward his face. Using the moment he backed away to give herself a little room, Harm then went on an aggressive offensive of her own, the staff spinning around her as she struck at him, the movements designed to provide both the ability to attack and defend at the same time.

~- Another Confession to Make -~

"Do you want to try and hit up the higher floors since we seem to be free of challenges at the moment? Ow!"

Ally had been so focused on Selene just freaking flying (floating?), away from her that she didn't notice that Siam and a new boy had shown up right behind her. Ally flinched, but was also proud of the fact that it was pretty much only her shoulders that had tightened up. She'd also been unaware of the monsters behind the door to the third floor until Siam took them out; again, Selene and Ally had been distracted by voices and paper, so it hadn't crossed Ally's mind to check for danger.

That oversight was really starting to irritate her.

"Sounds like a plan to me," Ally agreed, finally answering Siam's question. Remembering what Harmony had said about her sticker, Ally reached up, gently placing two fingers on the necklace at her throat. She pictured that shield and dagger in her hands again, and her desire to protect Siam and the boy; Siam looked pale, like she was running out of strength, and Ally wasn't sure if the boy knew how to defend himself yet.

A soft white light flashed out of the locket, dissipating quickly enough to reveal the dagger and shield that Ally had had against Lizard Face. As soon as the light faded, however, what little color had been Siam's face drained away as the other girl barely managed to wheeze, "Turn that thing away from us!"

Startled, Ally quickly pointed the shield toward the open door, and a Static that had been missed by Siam's doll suddenly cowered away from them when it had been advancing just a moment before. Confused, Ally looked over the top of the shield, but quickly pulled back, her own heart racing. She hadn't seen all of it, but there was a face on the front of her shield, one so hideous and contorted with such rage and hatred that just a glimpse of it had Ally terrified. There was a thought tickling in the back of her mind, something about a shield in an old legend, but Ally couldn't remember all of it.

A lick of fire caught her attention, and Ally realized that it was the boy... but now he had a mask? Looking back at the girls, he responded to Siam's unspoken question of leaving with, “Lead the way. But we’ve gotta move.”

Ally looked back again to the fourth floor, where she knew Selene and Shiro were at least. She didn't want to leave them behind, but she also knew she couldn't join them. Turning to Siam and the boy, Ally said, "Then get behind me. This shield seems to work for scaring things away, so we should use it while we can. And the name's Ally."

It was time to move.

~- Chewing Through the Ropes -~

Prey. It noticed immediately when Its prey showed up from the ruined elevator shaft. The Collector was still far below, engaged with the R0ug3, the Fragment that had survived his run, only to join the 0+h3r Sid3 from the R.3.M. Even though the Collector was engaged, It knew that he sensed the two that had found their way onto the 7th floor. Of course he would notice.

That was why It was there, after all.

Light burned brightly across the floor, causing the male to shield his eyes from the glare. It shifted its weight a fraction, causing the softest sound of static to fill the air. True, this wasn't Its true form or power; It was an extension of Its Collector's will, and so It knew in the back of its mind that its time of autonomy was limited. However, that didn't mean much in the grand scheme of things. A low, rumbling growl echoed around the hallway, a growl laced through with white noise and the popping crackle of static. However, even with the distortion, it was highly possible that the Fragments would recognize the growl, as they had heard it back in the alleyway when the Collector had first introduced himself. If they did recognize it, or even if they didn't, it would still bring the same sense into their minds.

They were being hunted.
 

Ðari

Look at you, armor-less
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Rien understood everything well enough, he wasn't sure what he was expecting from this group of kids. Naturally, he'd supplied them with the necessary information they were scrapping for, it seemed a little...strange that they had a memory like that. Did they defeat a static that had a life memory from a participant last game? How? None of them could be a grossly overpowered static fresh out the gate...unless.

It then hit him, that, he might've indirectly helped. His face grew exasperated, a bead of sweat trickled down his face, as he remembered sending Rainee through the lobby on his paper plane. If he had to guess, his unintended transport might've sliced whatever they might've encountered like a chopping an onion. To think even he forgot about that in such a short window of time, it might've been just weak enough to be finished off by his splinters super-sharpened edges. He was beginning to think that he was bad at his job, at this rate they would just breeze through without actually feeling challenged. It would be unlikely...not with people in their ranks like Silver, Topsy, and Blaster. It'd get harder on them, each area would brandish even stronger and more ruthless static. Quick eliminations simply by sneezing in their direction, would reprimand them quickly when the static became more durable, sentient, and with more tools to deal with the fragments than mindless erratic attacking.

"Geez...I may have to look at alternatives to survive, but this is better than being attacked by static around the clock at least."

Rien removed his hand from the wall on the balcony, sensing that the floor was completely sealed now. With the floor gone and the two walls compressed, it was a done deal for progressing up that side. Looking at the [collector's edition] memory map app, there were names next to the dots. Shiro, Anna w/allice, and Selene were on floor five in the east wing of the hotel. Meanwhile, Jeane and Dexter were actually already on the 7th floor. They would be greeted with the trap that Topsy left for them undoubtedly, but he closed his phone and placed his hands in his pockets.

"You juniors better put up a fight at least. Looks like they already got a hold of a life memory of at least a third of our progress from last game. Thankfully after looking through all of it, there weren't too many major details we learned at the time."

Rien, even though he could become paper, simply felt heavier. It was in that moment he started to reflect...to remember the last game, towards the end, about a district or two. This was well after Kourtney and Kael were obliterated, thinking about who was left, him, Sync, Tav, Van, DJ, Kit, and Rhys. Hanekoma was absolutely terrified, coupled with terrible memories, on top of the amount of gore that they were exposed to. Vandiken seemed to have the least problematic transition, he was the most confident one in the group and from Rien's experience he understood that Vandiken had an adoptive family. He might've very well have been japanese, but from his stories, his sister was african-american, sort of timid with confidence issues, he didn't really pay attention but he defended her.

"Oh fearless leader, what the hell were you thinking at all times, i could never bring myself to care enough. It was just nice having you around as a security blanket for sure. Feels like you and the minority were only ones with enough sense to escape." Rien said as he shrugged.

He jumped high as hell from the balcony, adjusting his body weight accordingly. There was a brushing sound like paper scattering as his skin reeled and flared like a gust of wind had overtaken him and brushed over his body like turning pages. He extended his arms and arched them like a paraglider, jumping from the 4th floor balcony of the Enix-Hotel.

--------------------

Holding his head, he looked just outside from the 8th floor concealed partly by one side from the balcony. The Paperboy Collector was seen flying away from the scene. A grin emerged on the onlookers face and with a snicker, violet mist emerged from the onlooker's body.

"It's about time you left, pansy piece of trash. Killing season starts now..."

Leaving the balcony and stepping through one of the windows, to move out to the hallway of the eighth floor. The person was clad in vestige type of armor, wearing a helmet to conceal it's face. Glowing a bright violet color. A circle formed under their feet, a massive amount of focus was being taken in, and on the reverse side of the floor (7th floor ceiling) the a circle appeared. The purple light pumped out a distorting glow, and a mist settled onto the floor. One after one, solid violet human-shaped duplicates started to spring up all over the floor, effectively barricading the Game Memory, pulling their mass together to forge a violet-colored box.

"Oh don't worry...I'm hijacking the static too!"

Having been said, the mist grew thicker nearly obscuring visibility from further down the hall. As there was definitely something else lurking on the floor with the two that already inhabiting it. The sound that was the ID of static seemed controlled, rather than flare violently, it chimed in briefly before cutting out. Dangerous given the predicament of not being able to distinguish where it was coming from.

-------------------------

"Do you have to jinx everything Jeane..."

"What did I do??"

The two of them swapped banter, making note of all the impending changes that began to go into effect upon reaching the seventh floor. The game memory was already blockaded unexpectedly by a bunch of purple figures, that just bound themselves together. To top it off, the room was growing darker by the minute, in a thick purple mist. That was Jeane's blind spot, this was a color that hindered her workaround to physically distinguish objects and if not for her accuse hearing, and tag on Dexter, she wouldn't be able to see him.

Dexter removed his shades, and lined his body up against the wall not far from the game memory, Jeane did the same.

"We're gonna have to listen out for this man-eater static...whatever it is."

There was shuffling of footsteps, coming from the far side of the hall, as if it's thunderous steps couldn't be heard. The two of them slid back, moving behind a side-table that housed a lamp in the hall, as the beast lurked past. To be honest, it would've been suicide to right to engage with a static this large, similar to their encounter on the first floor. From what he could barely see, it looked to be something of a moving giant, with elongated arms, and a very oblong appearance. It's eyes were purple, and it chimed in every so often with a signature rush of white noise, to confirm that it was intact static. It lurched its way back towards the two connecting flights of stairs, through which the others would undoubtedly have to come through. It was doubtful they would immediately spot the static given how thick the purple mist was.

"Can you little mice hear me?"

Dexter and Jeane's expression turned in horror, as their stomach's curled at the only voice on that floor, coming from the walking static.

"I know you're here somewhere...lets play a little game, how about it?"

Stuck in a state of anxiety and shock that static was talking to them, neither had the guts to respond.

"Oh come now. I just want to make this little game you're playing a little more interesting...just where are you hiding?"

It's foot steps did a roundabout, lurking up and down the hallway as they stayed concealed behind the side table. As it released a sound every so often, it seemed like it would emit noise roughly every fifteen seconds or so. It was easy enough to tell just how far away the static was, it moved slow enough to be out run, at least thats what it looked like. Still too anxious to move, the two of them stayed put fearful of trying to fight it alone.

"I don't think i've been this scared before, I don't remember if i've ever felt so worried either...come on guys, get on a move on so we can team fight this thing."

"You think Rainee and Harmony are ok?"

"You really think someone dressed that cool is going to be held up by Sync?"

Truthfully he didn't know, the chunk of memory he reciprocated was enough to argue against his claim. Dexter suddenly could hear foot steps being taken by the static anymore, in all of this mist it was hard to see anything at all except for a few feet in front of your face. With how long the hallways were, things could disappear in just a few steps, this only made him even more nervous. An arm slithered around the surface along the carpet of the long hallway, taking a hold quickly of Dexter's leg and he was whisked along the floor screaming until he was brought up to the static's face.

GIVE IT ALL UP FOR ME!

Dexter's heart was racing several miles a minute, his body trembled as he was nearly paralyzed with fear to a point where even his voice cracked as he could barely breathe. Jeanne was already blind, she had a hard time seeing, he was wondering if she could even see him now. His attention was shifted to the thing that snatched him, it was huge, towering the hallway. Humanoid, with a moving eye around it's face, the eyeball scanned all around Dexter's body, he was too petrified to even resist at this point. This static didn't make any "static sounds" and to his surprise, there was a zipper on it's face. It was definitely a static created by the Invigilator without question.

Slowly the zipper began to move as the eyeball slid to the right, it gripped Dexter's torso as he was still in shock and couldn't move, aside from trembling. There was a loud roar that raced, a puttering buzz, it sounded like a chainsaw buzzing right before gassing the trigger. It spun faster and faster and clattered in the teens ears, at that point he was completely overwhelmed. A blade brandished from behind the zipper, they were locked tightly into place on the inside of where it's face was. Stammering, trying desperately to get words out, being muffled by the sounds of the chainsaw buzzing from it's face, Dexter was stone. Trying everything in reason to move, but fighting against his adrenaline that left him petrified, his life was flashing before his eyes.

"Dexter! Where are you!"

'Crap. I knew she couldn't see either of us...say something...ANYTHING!'


"Uuuurrrrrrrrppppppppppppp!!!"

The sound of a belch, loud as hell, coming from that, soon being washed out by the buzzing of the chainsaw. It's arm of the static starting to move, bringing the fragmented closer to it's face, shaking violently as can be. The sound of a gunshot breaking through buzzing, and hitting Dexter's back, through the grip of the oblong static. It's grip weakening briefly, just enough for Dexter's sticker to wriggle its way and push the hand's grip feeling his body tumble to the floor. His vibrated erratically, as if on the verge of going insane and buckled back down the side of the hall that he was dragged from, the thud of his foot steps as he was moving through no visibility with the shroud of purple, suddenly being grabbed by by his arm by something else. A purple body, grasping at his arm, followed by another one forming itself out of thin air from the mist.

"My prey can't just walk away unharmed...your as good as dead."

His breathing got really heavy, words, reason, arrogance, they were reduced to pure terror. The buzz of static flashed, and fist flew down the hall, pushing against his entire abdominal section, and the purple figure release as the fragment tumbled along the carpet until he slid right next to Jeane.

"Dexter! Are you-"

"NO!!! NO I'M NOT!!"

He snapped shuffling to his feet, coughing and holding his chest. He felt weak, the weakest he'd felt since being on the first floor, or when Topsy knocked him into a wall. His adrenaline was overwhelming him, the static wasn't the only enemy here, was there a collector doing things here as well. This was so incredibly frustrating, what could they do by themselves? The first idea that came to them when they even got here and things went awry was to hide, and for only so long did that even provide a viable option. Jeane was healing him, placing her hand on his shoulder, unknown to him, threading his entire structure to make it easier to track him despite her vision being negated by the purple mist.

"C-Calm down. Lets put our heads together and figure this out."

"Whats to figure out?! WE DIE! You can't see anything and I'm gonna fight the friggin texas chainsaw massacre with a rubber-pole? NO IM NOT!!!!"

Jeane looked at him, and she truly felt some kind of concern. He must've been put into such a state of shock that he'd either crack or do something insane. Teetering on the edge of either, she felt like she had to push him into doing something crazy in order for him to regain some of his cool. So she raised her hand, and she went across his face with a very hard but firm slap.


"Get a grip on yourself!"
she said placing both of her hands on his shoulders. "I'm scared too you know, no one has made it up here yet, meaning we have to take this stupid thing out. This is what you would've had to deal with since you leave everyone behind, don't wuss out now, all you end up doing it making yourself look bad. So whats it gonna be Dexter?"

He held his face specifically around the rosy red area from where she slapped him. Talking static, chainsaws, purple figures merging in the fog, everything was just against them, but with all these collectors and static running around, this was just a taste of their experience. Dexter had to accept this was the state of his life currently, and he needed to keep up where his most hated thing was stagnation. This was a scary time, these odds were complete trash, but this was the reality that they were faced with, and his trembling finally reduced, as his anxiety settled down some. Looking over at Jeane, she was shaking too, it had to take a lot of guts to say the things she said knowing there was no way in hell they could beat this thing with their skills.

"Fine...keep the heals on me...this is suicide waiting for anyone else to get here, oh well. Might as well make a decent suicide run."


Dexter even having said that, had trouble keeping stance, steadying his legs, you name it. He was scared as anyone else, that wasn't unusual, he could still here the buzzing of the chainsaw face. Anything that came out of the mist he quickly smacked it as he and Jeane started to move towards the noise until a silhouette was in range. He could see a sudden change in his sticker, feeling it break apart into a split. Holding out his left hand, another rod breaking from his original, giving him two. Confused, but too terrified to really ask questions.


"Turn around ugly!"

The shadow raised a hand, and a fist broke through the mist. Dexter raising his left arm, threw his rod forward like a whip, to catch the momentum of the swing and throw it into the wall just to his left. It swatted, the rod and tried to pound the teen through the floor. He stuck both rods into the floor and pushed them upwards to catch the balled fist, using his own upper body strength as well, to push the fist away. Calling his rods, to wrap around his wrists now, he could use them as whips to grapple easier rather than hold them in his hands. In that moment fist came for Jeane and he body blocked, using his rod coiled into both hands, still absorbing damn near all of the shock from the strike. Dexter with all of his strength, pushed back, coiling his rod around the left arm and forcing a major push to cause the static to tumble backwards, towards the opening in the hallway where there were two sets of stairs.

Even as Jeane tried to focus on healing Dexter, she was shooting the purple figures that periodically spawned in the barely visible hallway. Just in front of her, Dexter fell to his knees, physically and mentally taxed to the point he just needed to sit down for like five minutes. He quickly came to realize, there was no dealing damage to this thing, without a major bump up in fire power. If they could get rid of this mist, they wouldn't have to worry bout something binding them or preventing them from attacking.

"You little mice are just vermin resisting the inevitable."

The static again, they could confirm was talking. Zippers appeared along it's body this time, slowly opening creating bit of a vacuum effect now. Sucking up the purple mist from the room, the static itself now now as radiating violet.

"You have got to be kidding me...ha...hahaha......hahahahahahahahaha..." Dexter dropped to his knees laughing hysterically.

The only benefit they gained now, was that there were no random spawns, but both him and Jeane were visible now. Dexter took one step before collapsing onto his ass, he was trembling still, this thing had a lot of physical power for sure. If it suddenly started shooting out projectiles, he would loose his mind. Jeane moved towards him, urging him to move, and sure enough Dexter struggled to get up, he was more concerned with the status of his mind more than anything. Seeing this "static" that was obviously sentient, or being controlled remotely as it could talk, was truly a frightening thing. He looked up, seeing the purple circle, probably for the first time and realized, maybe that was how?

Dexter blinked as his vision flickered blurry with the oblong static slowly moving their way. Jeane stood up, slinging her rifle over her and running straight for the behemoth sized enemy. Dexter's eyes were wide, his exasperation clutched his throat as if to strangle his voice from stopping her. Blind as she was, it didn't matter, they needed a stall until someone else came. Her fists lit up red.

"I don't know what your thinking...you know those attacks are way weaker than sniping..."

The oblong static raised it's arm, it was a towering just inches from the ceiling of the hallway. Save for it's mobility, it's arms could extend, it's orifices opened and could absorb what appeared to be toxins. Jeane looked up now that the lights were cast in the room, there was enough to debunk Dexter's claim.

"Theres more than enough light in here, including the game memory to make this a lot more lethal than one of my darts."

"Hey...try shooting that cir-"

"Dexter. You barely cooperate when your running off ahead, don't tell ME of all people what to do when your the one quivering."

Dexter's eyes flickered, naturally he was tired, more so than he'd been since starting. Jeane was coming down him a little harsher than normal, his legs were shaking, but he looked on at her as he was borderline useless. This terror he was feeling, wasn't a joke, even as serious as Jeane was, he didn't believe she'd put a dent in that thing.

"Urgh....just listen to what I'm saying...your gonna get yourself pummeled to death fighting that stupid giant alone!"

"SHUT UP!" Jeane turned and blasted the floor in front of dexter, creating a gaping hole with wood falling through to the sixth floor. "I'll prove to you that I'm not dead weight, so do me a favor and let me fight already!"

Jeane clutched both of her fist tightly, the red light swarmed and gathered, moving like several billion tiny red threads knitting themselves around her fists. She turned to the static as it's orifices split even further open, blades began to brandish, spinning with a wild "whiirrrrrrrrr" sound to accompany them. It's face opening up wide to the buzzing of the chainsaw sound, with a violent static buzz heard afterwards.

"I'll bury you!" Jeane shot up at the purple circle, breaking the bind that covered the game memory.

The static's arm raised, extending as it did before like an elastic band. The teen formed a hand shaped construct from the red light, which caught the fist in midair. Bringing up her second hand, she forged another fist to score a direct hit on the static's chest. As it staggered, she took advantage and persistently struck one after the next.

"Whoa...what kind of sticker is that..?" Dexter said just watching in astonishment, but he was hard on himself to move. Eventually managing to stand, legs shaking, but in truth it was fatigue. His legs braced, and he slumped over to the wall, towards Jeane as she just pummeled away at the static, but it was evident that she couldn't see any physical damage being inflicted, only that she was making contact. It was as Dexter feared, in a 1v1 situation, or even 2v1 this was a waste of energy and eventually she'd burn herself out just like him.

The static blocked fiercely, tossing a table to clip Jeane in the stomach, throwing her into Dexter. He skid backwards a bit, but held her tucked in his arms. This was getting old really fast with having to catch her from the clutches of the enemy or some trap. Dropping on one knee, he was already annoyed. The Static beat on it's chest and let out a really loud roar. Jeane was out cold in Dexter's arms, while he himself was about to die with her.

"Man...you go on a proving rant, and a table catches you, now your catching Z's. What am I going to do with you..."

The static slowly started moving towards them. Jeane wriggled in his arms again, moving around, raising her arm to pinch his cheek. "You were saying?"
 

Endless Warrior Sora

Return of the Kid
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Wind barreled past Shiro, tossing his turquoise hair to and fro. The gust was powerful enough to knock back the Hummingbird shaped Static that was dive bombing towards him. During the moment, Shiro stretched forth his arm, and his Spray Can wavered in response before picking itself up off the ground and flying into his open hand. After snatching his can out of the air, he dodged another Hummingbird static zipping toward his head. Letting fly another stream of fire from the Spray Can, he managed to clip the back of the creature. The Static sharply turned in his direction, now on FIRE and buzzing near him menacingly.

"Aw crap....I think I just made it worse!" Shiro cursed aloud to his party. The Static raced at him again, causing Shiro to roll dodge roll out of the way. It veered into a turn zipping toward Shiro's form.

"Oh shi-"

Instinctively, Shiro brought his arms up to block the attack, causing the Hummingbird static to crash directly into Shiro. However, the Static struck the Spray Can being held in his hands as opposed to his actual body. While this was an extremely fortunate save on his part, the Static was powerful enough to send Shiro flying upwards and through the ceiling to the 6th floor. Rolling a few times, he scrambled to his feet, and without thinking quickly bolted toward the next set of stairs towards the seventh floor. Screw those stupid Static. He just needed to get that Game Memory. The Humminbird Static would eventually burn out anyway.

As Shiro ascended the 6th-floor stairway, he suddenly felt a staccato, but steady rumble in the floor. As if something large was moving. His sprinting became more cautious tip-toeing.

"Jesus, what is it now..." He groaned, in a tense whisper. He heard a roar from within corrupted by the sounds of Static. Shiro broke into a crouch off instinct, trying to be as stealthy as possible. He suddenly heard the sound of what may have been something realizing it wasn't alone. Tightening his grip on the Spray Can, he was ready to go off on this thing if it spotted him. Honestly, he didn't really have a choice in the matter, to begin with. However, his reasoning wouldn't matter. The Static made a sudden move and Shiro considered that a lethal threat. Using the wall as a springboard, Shiro leaped off the wall and sprayed the creature in the face with the can. However, the fire didn't come out, as he expected. Just the regular old brand of spray.

"Aw come on, seriously?! SERIOUSLY?! RIGHT NOW?!" Shiro complained, mid-air, vaulting over the Static. However, the purple beast was not amused. It let out a vicious roar, howling in Static. Its eyes appeared stained with whatever Shiro did to it. It flailed its arms in fury, swatting Shiro further into the hallway before bumbling down the stairs to the 6th floor.

Shiro landed with a hard thud, rolling a few times before coming to a complete stop. He coughed a bit, and groaned. He didn't bother getting up yet. He let out another exaggerated groan. How many times had he been viciously sent flying today? There was that one time where Blaster pummeled him, the Hummingbird Static, now this purple thing. He seriously needed to stop getting tossed around.

"I seriously need to stop getting tossed around..." He mumbled, before staggering to his feet. He knew he was going to regret that decision because now a large purple Static beast would be waiting for Anna, Alice, and Selene on the way up. While on the floor, Shiro lifted his head and noticed an upside down Dexter and Jeane in an embrace on the other side of the hallway. Wait...how'd they get here before him??? He grinned, though. It was good to see they were okay. Getting to his feet, he intended to run over to greet them.

"Oh hey!" He waved, breaking into a jog to meet them before noticing, outside the window and peering menacingly at the group was a humongous purple static with zippers all over its body.

"...Oh hey..." Shiro croaked, his attention now to the monster, his wave deflated but still managing to weakly wave at the creature. "SERIOUSLY?! WHAT THE HELL?!" He turned desperately to Jeane and Dexter, gesturing to the creature with both arms extended. "WHAT THE HELL?! What are we supposed to do against THAT?! OTHER than
die?!"
 

Ðari

Look at you, armor-less
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Beyond the Final Destination
N0 35C@p3

Dexter held his head down, holding her heavy ass in his arms with almost no strength as the rest was still impaled with a feeling of despondence he tried hard not to show. She soon let go of his cheek, and out of his grasp. The teen quivered still, regretting that he couldn't exactly calm himself, no matter how he tried to mask it visually. He heard footsteps near the split entrance of the hallway, like clod-hoppers jamming against the wooden stairs.

"Oh hey!"

Dexter turned his head, his eyes were filled with a bit of light finally. Never had he been more relieved to see someone else from their group, let alone Shiro! Still a bit weak at the moment, his confidence was starting to come back little by little, he raised his arm and waved back. Shiro then seemed to notice the "odds" that were stacked against them with the floor BOSS apparently, courtesy of Topsy just based on the zippers alone.

"SERIOUSLY?! WHAT THE HELL?! WHAT THE HELL?! What are we supposed to do against THAT?! OTHER than die?!"

Dexter gave him a light tap on his left arm.
"Good to see you too Shiro." Dexter said partly in jest, "Me and Jeane have been up here for several minutes now stalling. You see that light in that glass container down there? It screams 'Game Memory' to me. We can't even touch it until we kick this thing's butt."

He scratched his head.

"I could barely move before...well...it kinda took me out of my comfort zone earlier. I don't think I've EVER been this afraid, or if I was, i sure don't remember. I think the best we can do is have the two of you hit it with attacks while I bind it using my rod. OH! Bro you'll never believe it, but that monster actually split it into two working rods! IDK how to do that again though! Maybe it was a fluke...eh, whatever."

It was then that Dexter noticed Shiro was bleeding, it looked like he got a few nasty cuts just looking at him. "Holy crap man, what happened to you on the other side of the building? You look like you got hammered worse than us! Jeane, can you heal him?"

He had to of been thinking to himself, 'Wait what do you mean heal me?' and as prompted, Jeane could easily enough visibly see the red blood blotches where the cuts were by her sticker's passive. It seemed nastier from this perspective than looking at him head on. Pulling from her side she spawned one of her grenades, "Don't be alarmed, it's a healing grenade. I used Dexter as a test dummy to see if it was safe to use on allies."

"Thanks for adding to my turmoil when you did by the way." he remarked with a pout.

Crushing it in her hand, the radius of the grenade's yellow vapor hit all three of them. The cuts Shiro sustained were quickly fizzling out and replenishing some of his lost health and stamina, same for herself and Dexter. Jeane stood up finally, and took her sniper rifle from off her shoulder and mounted it, aiming with sights directly at the purple static.

"Ok, Shiro we don't know how, but earlier this static was...er, it was talking to us. We assumed it was being controlled by another collector or something."

"There was some purple mist before, and a purple circle, but both are now gone, but it's still glowing purple. I don't really know what that means, but I just know we need raw damage to take that thing out. I can use my rod to crowd control and pin it down, you guys gotta do the damage."

Dexter finally able to stand, the trembling had for the most part subsided. He looked as the static always seemed to be reactive to motion, it never moved from the area where the game memory was. A little detail like that, is probably why it used it's extended arms to zone them out before. He chuckled, his leg wriggled even now, but he tapped it and brought forth his Six God and ejected it forward to zip past the static's legs and quickly tangle them in a bind. With that being done, Dexter gave a mighty thrust backwards and caused the giant to topple over.

Lining the static in her crosshairs, Jeane repeatedly fired from her rifle into the moving eyeball on the static's face. It's loud screech was a reflection that the beast was sustaining significant damage. The eye moved wildly around it's face as it writhed in some kind of pain further immobilizing the behemoth.

"Take your pot shots now Shiro while it's CC'd."
Dexter said further tightening the grip of the rod.

 

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Tavvy looked on at Blaster silently, his mouth twitched while his mind raced with numerous responses to what Blaster had said. Having been in he previous game, he was well aware that Blaster was basically a nut case. The guy rambled about survival and activity but during the games he was basically a savage. Taavy remembered the multiple run-ins the group had with the guy and he was virtually the same each time they saw him. Much too strong. Strong to the point in fact that the entire group feared the possibility of running into the guy. As fragments with un-evolved stickers and powers, Blaster's combat skills and control over hell-fire had kept the fragments on their toes in several areas.

It was like the explanations he and the others had been given fell apart. It seemed to be the same here. Blaster hadn't changed a bit. Tavvy new a lot more than he did before, Collectors were classed in certain ways based on both abilities and how they could handle fragments and directions. Blaster had managed to rise up to the status of an Elite Collector but even so, he still acted as the lowest tier, tormenting and chasing down the weak who couldn't fend for themselves. Tavvy was so disgusted by the response Blaster gave to him, that he literally closed his eyes and took a deep breath to try and stabilize his mood a bit before he gave a response.

Blaster was basically denying all the claims Tavvy made which immediately caused Tavvy to think about the information the agency had given him. It was possible that Blaster's memories had been manipulated or worse, his use of the rage ability left him clueless as to the monster he turned into. "Bull shyt..." Tavvy growled at Blaster, having said the words so low that he doubted they'd been heard. He rubbed his temples slowly, speaking louder. "Not. My. Business??" What was wrong with this guy?? Not only had he denied killing Kourtney and Kael even though Rien, Vandiken, Rhys and Sync had witnessed first hand the hell-fire storm that Blaster had whipped up around his comrades and their struggle to survive. By the time the group had been able to fight off the collection of A-rank Garuda static, it was too late. All that was left of Kael and Kourtney was dissipating miasma and a puddle of blood.

Kourtney's sunglasses that she'd stolen from Vandiken laid smashed in the puddle of blood while further to the left of the bloody area, Kael's chain lay broken on the ground, no doubt from when Blaster tore it from his neck when the duo tried to double team him. For now, he didn't want to get into a verbal debate with Blaster as he knew it wouldn't really get anywhere. Half of his attention had moved to the upper floors where on the right side of the lobby Tavvy could see pieces of paper falling from up above.

"Rien maybe??" Tavvy voiced the name aloud, then thought about his current objective before being rash and going off to seek answers that probably wouldn't even be what he was expecting. He'd been asked to make sure that everybody from the group survived the first area. He'd arrived late but s far all the fragments had advanced further into the hotel and the lobby was clear.

"Heh. Okay Blaster." Tavvy chuckled, "So I should take the stick outta my ass and go eff myself huh??" He laughed again, "Apparently your both a puss and an oxymoron. If there's already a stick crammed up my nice ass, I'm already fukked eh?? No need to do it myself if I got a stick." Tavvy was too amused at the vulgar words Blaster used so often but it was something he'd seen many times over. The agency had records of all known collectors that R3M had activated. "You never fight anybody after they get stronger, only target the weak. Ha, why?? Or maybe there's even more going on than either of us realize." Blaster denied everything, so there was little else to be said. "I won't let you hurt these newbies. Bottom line. I'm guessing you're the same sadistic tactical brawler you were during the 'last' game eh?? Figures you'd show up, even when my source feed says there are already multiple collectors here in the first area." Tavvy's voice had softened a bit, he was trying his best to regain his composure and stay that way. He was well aware of the disaster that could occur if he allowed Blaster to reach the fresh fragments. "Try and thrash me if you wanna, I don't recommend it though. Either way, I'm just doing my job like you say you are." Randomly Tavvy found himself wondering about how the agency really obtained all of their information and why he wasn't given the information of the fragments themselves. It was a bit strange, especially since his objective was to keep all of the fragments alive this round.

For now, he'd stay focused on Blaster and let the mayhem that was upon the upper floors go its course. True, Rien was DEFINITELY up there, but there wasn't a doubt in Tavvy's mind that, at this stage even as a Collector that he'd be out to kill. Then again, what did he really know?? This was all a serious nuisance already. A shrill beep sounded as Tavvy's collector app updated itself from when he'd been outside the hotel. A classified non-player was within the vicinity, somebody much like himself but of a separate nature. He looked over at Blaster, gauging if he should still try and keep Blaster from proceeding, or risk an encounter with the anomaly and Blaster giving chase.

Tavvy honestly knew that regardless of what option he chose, the end result would be the same. He could hear the distinct sound of clothing fluttering in the air and turned, rolling his eyes. “Figures,” free-falling from the upper floors was none other than Rien. “Great. Just what I need right??”

------------------

Rain had her eyes closed most of the time she'd been meditating while Harmony took on Sync by herself. It actually was going to turn into the best possible scenario, even if Rain had taken an energy shot to the chest and smelled like a giant orange. Her head was a little fuzzy but her body felt GREAT. The information she'd been able to absorb by rapidly using her helmets functions on her own moves was a marvelous idea. Her body was charged with enough spirit force from Fortinbras that now the rate at which she could produce high level attacks had gone up....way up.

SAKURA GETSUGA TENSHO

She'd entered the command twice for her first hyper art, doubling the power and potential behind it. In a flash of light, Fortinbras retook itsoriginal lightsaber form, causing red light to irradiate all throughout the hall where Sync and the two girls were. As Rain charged forward, Fortinbras doubled in size, getting thicker and longer, forming into a sizable beam blade that Rain slashed forward with, causing a huge crescent of red energy to emit from the blade at an alarming speed while she ran past Sync. In the same motion, Rain used one of the attached belts on her outfit to latch onto Harmony, basically pulling her to the other end of the hallway with Rain. Within ten feet around Sync red light flew all across the area along with the original red crescent bursting apart causing a violent vibration that easily spanned 20 feet.

Rain knew there was now some serious damage caused to the part of the hall Sync had been in but she also knew that Sync was dangerous compared to them. She'd met Rien face to face already, regardless of abilities or looks, Sync was just as dangerous. His ability to take both of them on and release a wind blast powerful enough to momentarily incapacitate and throw them like rag dolls proved that. "Ugh, I think I used a lot of energy just now but I'm not really sure." Rain sighed and watched as Fortinbras reverted back to the floating lip form, chuckling at her in that scary raspy voice.

"I recommend that you and your friend here get a move on. But first...." Fortinbras paused, chuckling again, only to spit out what looked like they were jolly ranchers. "Here, eat these girls...I promise they'll make you feel a lot better." Rain looked warily at Fortinbras and snatched up the substance, tossing one to Harmony. She didn't even say anything else, just popped the sparkling light red 'candy' into her mouth and chewed it up. She was delighted to find it tasted like Trix Cereal and also amused. It seemed that whoever these people were, they knew things about her that made strange sense, or was in fact Fortinbras that knew about her?? Rain had no idea.

As she giggled at Harmony and walked the last few steps to the stairwell door, yanking it open her chest already had stopped hurting, she felt revitalized. It was like a second wind. She'd have to ask Fortinbras about it when she really had a chance...just like a lot of other things that definitely were on her mind. As Rain trotted up the stairs to the fifth floor and pulled the door open, she sighed, "Two more floors."

 
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