Intense Struggle! (Round 7 - The Database)

Originally posted on MSPA by Ixcalibur.

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As the robots advanced upon Sister Clara she nervously gazed down over the rail of the catwalk, contemplating a leap of faith to the floor below. It could be dangerous, it was a long drop after all and she wasn't as young as she used to be, but she felt that she'd rather risk that than to be put back inside that cell. In that box where her powers were stripped away and she was completely helpless.

But before she could take the leap her attention was caught by Aph, slowly climbing to her feet. Sister Clara stared at the risen nymph, there was something off about her, besides her quick recovery, that she couldn't quite place. Quickly upright Aph hesitated for a moment, staring down at her hands. Momentarily a black blade emerged from her palm. She turned to face the confused nun, whose hands were still planted on the railing, ready to make her escape, and gestured somewhat clumsily towards one group of advancing robots, before spinning around and launching an attack on the other.

It was at that point, as Aph rather gracelessly sliced through one of the advancing machines, that she realised what was different. Aph always hovered slightly off the ground, but now she was standing flat upon it, something Clara hadn't actually seen her do during the battle so far. She shrugged it off, something to worry about later, and opted to make sense of this temporary truce, taking up her cane and smashing it hard into the monitor-head of the nearest robot.

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For a moment Aph had been plunged back into own confused memories; the mangled pasts of hers and D'Neyas, then the bizarre blend of D'Neya's throne room and Xan's apartment vanished to be replaced by a endless expanse of blackness. She was crumpled up on the floor, unable to move a muscle. Guiding hands, one cold and clammy, one hard and metallic lifted her to her feet. She resented being treated like a manikin but she couldn't move her lips to admonish whomever was doing this.

'Greetings Aph.' These words arrived in her mind without ever having passed her ears. 'I believe we have a mutual acquaintance; someone called The Ghost. He enabled my escape from my cell, and that is the only reason I am carrying out his request. I will not be in any man's debt, least of all a coward who dares not show his face.' She watched as somehow the hands manipulated a black blade to emerge from her hand, following which they quickly spun her around.

There stood her puppeteer; a man with pallid white skin, black eyes and disgusting fleshy tentacles emerging from his face where his mouth should be. He wore black plate armour, which was torn off at one shoulder, exposing his mechanical arm beneath it.

'My name is Thane.' He thought, not pausing in his manipulation of her body. He gestured off to one side with her arm. 'This isn't the actual means of control I have taken you understand, but a handy visual representation while we chat.' Thane elaborated. 'I am personally looking for a way out of this place and I have decided we will work together. After that you can pursue a vendetta against this Monitor or not. I do not care.'

Thane turned her to the side, no longer bothering to keep up the appearance of manipulating her with his hands. From this new vantage she could see a skinny man with a missing eye clutching at his head in pain. He was missing one arm and a spiked mass of bones lay on the ground at his feet. 'A snack,' Thane explained, 'for after you deal with those robots.' The monstrosity moved her forwards, and had her slash at the air in front of her.

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Sister Clara and Thane in Aph's body slashed at the encroaching robots. Thane was having more success with the twilight blades, already having sliced his way through a couple of the guards and sent one spinning over the rail into the depths below, but Clara was managing to hold her own even with just the cane of her swordstick.