[NEXUS] WATCHTOWER 17: Through Cloud, Shadow, Earth, and Flesh.

[UncleWolf]

[Infirmary]

A rather amusing coincidence that someone was rummaging through medicine cabinets while the muse had been idly poking fun at the idea when she felt coherent enough to manage internal natter between the throbs. All Ghoul had done so far was to walk into the infirmary although the somewhat disgruntled greeting was about on par for what she expected. She wouldn't particularly feel enthused about a task where the prime reason people come calling is to just get patched up from whatever latest ills they had suffered.

In any case, though, she had a question that needed a response. "First, what is the paperwork I need to go through if I'm looking at transfusions? Actually, no, that's second. First thing is what is the strongest thing you can give me that doesn't require a prescription for headaches?" she said, shutting her left eye in a mild wince from a particularly notable throb.

Infirmary

Cutter pushes off the doorway with a small shove of his shoulder before walking closer. "Well, first, depends on the transfusion. I presume blood? Give me your blood type and we'll see." He tells her with a small smile before opening up a certain cabinet. "And it depends. Headache-Headache, Sinus Pressure Ache, or Migraine? A lot of people don't really know the differences."

[Terumitsu]

[Infirmary]

"O-Negative. And can I just answer yes to that?" the muse replied as she slumped down on a stool. "I've got like a hundred hot needles shoved into my braincase and they're trying to crowd my grey matter out my ears. And then they sometimes want to be a million threads of raw cable every so often." Ghoul said. Maybe some exaggeration there but it had certainly been getting progressively worse ever since whatever Klitcht had done wore off. Or this was some new side effect that she was just now running into that hadn't been forseen.

Regardless, it was far from comfortable. It would be a bit more on that ongoing lesson of how capricious some of the forces here were. Still, at least she was intact and alive still so it wasn't as horrible as it could be.

[happyturtle]

Ilpholin's Room

Decker pulls Blake inside, and closes the door behind them. Motioning Blake to stand guard at the door, Decker takes out a tube of president glue (something like sovereign glue, but without the 'only one specific way to unbond things' limitation) and tries to glue Ilpholin's hands to her sides, and her ankles together. She starts with the AMEN Ilpholin, and moves next to Ilphy (if neither awakes or anything else happens to interrupt her). She's also counting on the fact that, since it's Ilpholin, the room is probably sound proofed.

This may be a mistake.

[Earl of Purple]

Ilpholin's Room

Blake will stand by the door, sheathing his wristblade because that's not something a young boy should have visible because that leads to questions.

He'd really like to be poking around for magical artefacts, but he isn't.

[Reinholdt]

Ilpholin's Room

Oh. Hmm... I forgot to put Mister Squiggles in the hall. I guess he's further down around the corner somewhere and will show if there's a particular ruckus. If Watch soundproofed the rooms, I'm unaware of it. Also there is a variety of objects on the floor that Blake could poke around in. I know there's a magic item or two there. A utility spy belt, a necklace, a ring, a glove that looks somewhat darth vader-esque, and a rod-like object with an engraving on one side lying near the bedstand, where it no doubt fell during prior events.

So the glue can be defeated by a congress of solutions? Good to know.

Decker gets through AMEN Ilpholin and halfway done with Ilphy before she might find herself roundhouse kicked in the face. Twice, since Ilpholin's feet are stuck together. Even so, she gets remarkable spin just lying on her back. A talent that I won't elaborate on. Hit or miss, she's soon off the bed and balancing into a standing position, albeit with some difficulty.

"Please tell me they didn't send just you two to take ME, rightful Demon Queen of AMEN." Ilpholin states incredulously.

[happyturtle]

Ilpholin's Room

Congress only blocks President Glue from acting; it can't remove it.

Decker goes flying across the room, but scrambles up, seemingly unbothered for now, though that's going to leave a dreadful bruise. "Oh! Rightful Queen - that's great. Then we're here to rescue you rather than abduct you!" Decker says. She starts to glow read and transforms into her devil form, which is a massive goat legged and goat faced figure with immense horns that isn't sexy in the least. There's no incubus blood in Decker's lineage.

The transformation will take the rest of her action.

[Earl of Purple]

Ilpholin's Room

Nephrim would like to be poking around, but she isn't. At least, not yet.

"Still guarding the door. Or do you want help?" Blake doesn't look away from the door as he speaks, so doesn't actually know what's going on.

Also, to remove President Glue, you just need to spin it in a circle. Might take multiple revolutions, though.

[Reinholdt]

Ilpholin's Room

My ideas have been impeached! D=

"I don't need rescuing morons. Things were under control." Ilpholin says, hopping a little over there and using her tail to grab the rod like object and flick it, unveiling her whip with a crack. Not a big crack with a bunch of force behind it like usual. More of a thwip really. Or a thwack maybe? This is definitely not a fighting style that she's used to, and certainly doesn't have the leverage she's used to either.

"But if you insist on this nonsense, I shall be forced to defeat you both with my hands tied behind my back. Side. Whatever. Just to keep my cover. Now get out before I get murdering." Ilpholin's eyes flick briefly and switch over to the not frequently used hypno-eyes. You want to please Mistress Ilpholin. You want to make Mistress Ilpholin happy. You want to do as she says. Yes...

Ilphy is scrambling to her feet, since those aren't glued and making her way towards cover. Probably the closet. She'd go for the door if it weren't being guarded.

[happyturtle]

Ilpholin's Room

I blame gerrymandering.

Decker at this age (rather than the older catgirl version) would be more vulnerable to hypno-eyes, except for the fact that she went to school in the First Circle, surrounded by sucubi and incubi. It also helps that she's watching the tail rather than the eyes.

"Blake, grab the nymph." Decker says. "Listen, Ilpholin. I'm here to bring you back, and that's what I intend to do. If you want to remain leader, you need to deal with the coup that's going on." And if you don't, then you obviously need to be captured and returned so the Thing can eat you. She squeezes one great devil hand into a fist, and then lunges at Ilpholin, trying to grab her around the waist and hoist her into a fireman's carry.

[Earl of Purple]

Ilpholin's Room

Blake turns from the door and looks at the Ilpholins. "Which one?" A red blade of hard light shoots from his right wrist. "Stop moving! Both of you!" He's directing mind control at the pair of Ilpholins; it's strong, but blunt- it's trying to force its way through mental barriers, rather than work around them. It's more effective on the weak-willed, but less so on those that are paranoid/strong willed enough to use proper mental defences.

[Reinholdt]

Ilpholin's Room

"I'll deal with it in my way. Not a pair of mooks deciding what's best for me."

Ilpholin's no slouch to countering mind control herself, though that amulet she's not wearing would've helped. Ilphy stumbles mid stride because of it, but Ilpholin's already moving and doesn't stop.

Particularly Ilpholin's hopping backwards and shooting a web at Decker's face. It might be enough to cause a miss, but it does require throwing Decker off balance a little to work. Otherwise she's grabbed. Her tail does flick the whip at Blake though, sending a razor sharp coil of death at him. Not particularly aimed beyond 'towards' him though. Really quite hard to fight from two angles at once.

[happyturtle]

Ilpholin's Room

"The one I'm not grabbing, you idiot!" Decker yells. The two Ilpholins look completely different!

Decker gets webbed, but it mostly catches on her horns and doesn't throw her off much. After she hoists Ilpholin to her shoulder, she opens her fist which she just used to crush the glue tube with the intent of glueing her own hand to Ilpholin's rear. "Let's go!"

[Earl of Purple]

Ilpholin's Room

Until just now, I didn't know that. I don't follow WATCHTOWER ordinarily, and I didn't realise there was a visual difference.

The whip narrowly misses Blake, but the boy turns his attention to Ilphy and, sheathing his wrist-blade, drops his rucksack and wrecks his t-shirt by growing a pair of snow-white feathered wings before diving after the fleeing female, aiming to tackle her waist and cling on. He's stronger than he looks, but still only adult-human-average rather than superhuman.

[Reinholdt]

Ilpholin's Room

Hmph. Decker might still find herself cut pretty bad when Ilpholin's tail flicks to whip her with the super sharp whip instead. I imagine gluing her hand there will stop all future instances of that though, so that's the last of that.

However, I'm not sure if it'll stop Ilpholin from using her face spider pincers to bite Decker and forcibly inject her demonic C'thun essence into Decker. Normally she asks nice, but...

Ilphy's actually a fair bit more graceful than Ilpholin at the moment, what with having her feet free and being a better dancer. She nimbly, if barely leaps out of the way. Ilpholin would have recognized a good counterattack opportunity there, but Ilphy lacks any of Ilpholin's follow through. That and limited weapons of a nymph. She ratchets up her nymphy pheromones for all the good that'll do. But mostly she'll show off her latest singing voice. With a high pitched, deafening scream. It even makes Ilpholin wince uncomfortably.

[happyturtle]

Ilpholin's Room >> FLEEING!

Decker flings open the door and runs, hobbling a little from a cut leg, and then getting venom in her system. With that scream, help is bound to come, so there's no time to lose. Maybe she can get down the stairs, out the front gate, and away from the anti-teleport field before anyone catches them!

Maybe...

[Earl of Purple]

Ilpholin's Room --> Fleeing

Blake is unaffected by the high-pitched scream and the pheromones; he spent a lot of time around very loud music, so he's used to it, and his true gender is non existent. His response is to open his mouth and sing. The song is linked to his mind-control; in fact, it's a slightly purer form of said mind-control, and he's trying to use it to get the Ilpholin in front of him to bow and put her head in his reach. If that works, he'll try to deliver a blow to the back of the skull that should knock her out.

[UncleWolf]

[Infirmary]

"O-Negative. And can I just answer yes to that?" the muse replied as she slumped down on a stool. "I've got like a hundred hot needles shoved into my braincase and they're trying to crowd my grey matter out my ears. And then they sometimes want to be a million threads of raw cable every so often." Ghoul said. Maybe some exaggeration there but it had certainly been getting progressively worse ever since whatever Klitcht had done wore off. Or this was some new side effect that she was just now running into that hadn't been forseen.

Regardless, it was far from comfortable. It would be a bit more on that ongoing lesson of how capricious some of the forces here were. Still, at least she was intact and alive still so it wasn't as horrible as it could be.

Infirmary

Cutter smiles a bit and reaches into a cabinet to pull out a bottle of medicine. He peels off the cap and gives her a couple red pills. After a moment of staring at her, he gives her a couple more. Another moment, and he goes to a minifridge to pull out a bag of blood. O Negative.

"Have you thought of getting treatment for the headaches? I may have a couple ideas. And how long have you been part-undead?"

[Terumitsu]

[Infirmary]

Ghoul let out a short laugh before responding. "That obvious, is it?" she said, knowing full well that she was now looking a bit too unnatural from her going too long without feeding and.. Well, just asking for blood was kind of a tipoff as well. "It's been long enough for me to get used to it but not quite comfortable with it." she said, managing a wry tone between the pulses. "But this has just started recently. 'S probably due to having someone poke around my brain, really. They meant well but I'm probably having some kind of reaction. Or it could be something else entirely but it seems to be the most likely event." the fledgling said.

Taking the first pair of pills Cutter had given her, she tossed them back and made a face as she swallowed. Now all she could do was wait until they either did or didn't work.

[UncleWolf]

Infirmary

"Well, I have a helpful suggestion. It sounds outlandish, but I wonder if you'll consider me putting you on a regimen of chiropractics, acupuncture, and meditation." Cutter suggests. "It sounds a bit silly, but it should help your physical and metaphysical conditions that cause the headaches."

[Terumitsu]

[Infirmary]

"If that's a joke... Actually. What exactly would that do for me anyway? I mean, you can say Fffffff-" Leaning heavily on a nearby counter, Ghoul gritted her teeth and pressed on the sides of her head while letting out a hissing stream of expletives that were probably more colorful than a delux box of neon crayons. "...I'm gonna say that if you think you can get this to stop, I'm willing to try." she said once the pain-pressure had receeded somehwhat.

"Probably the only silver lining here is that I'm not trying to rip that bag from your hands right now given that this takes the edge off my appetite.." she mumbled. It was worth giving this guy's suggestion a try if he thought it would work. And besides, it wasn't as if he was likely to be a quack if they stationed him here. Else she would have to do some real re-evaluation of this organization.

[UncleWolf]

Infirmary

"Hold still for a sec." Cutter says before moving around behind Ghoul. "Now hold still. This'll feel weird." He admits before he tries to set a hand on her shoulder before using his other hand to make some quick adjustments to her spine and backbone. As a result, pressure in her head should decrease by a noticeable amount.

[Terumitsu]

[Infirmary]

While Cutter might clearly be able to tell there were a few rather nonstandard things about the muse's skeletal structure during his little procedure, they wouldn't get in the way, at least. Though, it might be because of them that there wasn't as robust of an effect as he would have expected. Still, it did have an effect and Ghoul was more than a bit surprised at that. "Alright.. What was it that you just did?" she asked, her accusatory tone clearly undercut with relief. She wasn't pressing on her head either though she was holding it in her hands in a gentle massage of her temples.

"And you can't tell me that's the only thing you had to do." she said with a small note of incredulity. There was still pressure and pain but it was a magnitude of difference from what it had been before.

[UncleWolf]

Infirmary

"There are teachings that certain parts of the body, when out of alignment, can damage other parts despite being wholly unrelated. A toe connected to the back, a finger to liver, things like that. When put back into alignment, it supposedly helps." He says before grinning. "Congrats. You're the first I've tried it on."

[Terumitsu]

[Infirmary]

"Ah. So I got to be your test subject then?" she said with a not imperceptible amount of what could be called 'playful derision' to her tone. Still, the explanation made sense in the way that a body was rather complex. Toes were actually rather important for balance and bad balance was killer on the back, after all. Was why sole inserts in shoes were a thing. She'd debate on the finger/liver connection, though.

"So basically it's a form of global treatment through regional interaction, then?" Ghoul asked. Having been in and out of hospitals as many times as she had been, she had picked up more than a few concepts during her varied stays. "Can't say I would know exactly what part of me would be considered 'out of alignment' seeing how many time's I've been put back together now." she said, that wry tone returning to her voice.

[UncleWolf]

Infirmary

"That's probably the biggest problem." Cutter points out before leaning back against the counter. By now, the extra-strength undead-special painkillers should be taking effect. "It's entirely possible, depending on one's definition of a soul, that because you've been taken apart and put back together like a puzzle so often, that your own soul or spirit has scars and is out of alignment along with your body."

[Reinholdt]

Fleeing

Ilpholin pumps so much of her essence venom into Decker it makes her woozy.
Or maybe that's being held upside down.

Ilpholin's Room

Singing as a form of mind control. Ilphy really should of thought of that. She'd be pretty good at it she thinks.

Anyways, she fights it, but is clearly lowering herself all the same. As she does though, she grabs a dirty sock with her tail and throws it at Blake's mouth. This no doubt would have been completely ineffectual against Decker. Still, barring that providing necessary interference, he's still in position to knock her out and can do so.

Whether he knocks her out or not, Mister Squiggles rounds the corner from the hall onto the scene. He barely glimpses Decker rounding the corner over there and has to make a split second decision. Since he's not sure he can catch up with whatever's making their escape, he skitters into the doorway instead and will be shooting a sticky web at Blake. This will occur briefly after possible knock outs though. Probably in the midst of scooping and turning to leave.

[happyturtle]

Fleeing!

Decker gets down the stairs...

Staggers a bit...

Gathers her strength and keeps going...

Reaches the door...

Outside...

Decker can see and feel the border of the anti-teleport field as clearly as if it were the surface of a lake. It's just so obvious, so flagrant in it's overdesign. As she runs, she reaches her free hand out, thrusting it past the border, and opens a portal to AMEN's meeting room.

And that's the end of Decker's strength. She collapses on the ground, just short of the portal, with Ilpholin glued to her and half-pinned to the ground.

The portal remains open.

[Shadowcaller]

[Courtyard]

Cessie comes wandering out in the courtyard from the main building as she thought she heard a sound, in her company is Garn the gargoyle who walks in her steps, always vigilant of danger.

Her eyes are drawn to devil and the demon laying between the gates. What in the void...

The others will have a chance to do stuff before she reacts. Garn is already moving in their direction however.

[ThirdEmperor]

Courtyard

Two gloved hands reach through the portal, trying to grab hold of Decker and Ilpholin by the wrists and pull them in.

[Darkcomet]

[Courtyard]

Popping out of the ground now is a drone. A little mouse-sized thing, possibly recognizable as one of DC's designs.

DC's drones probably took notice of the yelling.

The Cat Burglar there may find his life suddenly unpleasant as a laser shot is fired his way. Not especially powerful, but a laser nonetheless.