Logs:Long Way Down: The Soul Cages

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Content Warning

Violence happens!

Cast

Calamity, Dandelion, Finley Adams, Little Fox

Setting

Underneath Odd Fellows Cemetery; the Lair of the Beshilu

Log

A highway riddled with graffiti tags, a dilapidated buildings taken back by natural growth, mountains of trash where people have been dumping illegally, and the hiss as noxious fumes leak through cracked pavement, secreting those long-burning, poison fumes into the air.

Centralia is a real-live ghost town. Population: zero, down from five at the last census, a city on top of a giant burning clot of tar-like coal, smothered underground, the fires raging, still, after half a century.

Dandelion's phone had been found near the Odd Fellows Cemetery, a sad little collection of tombstones that went, more oft than not, without visitors, and about halfway between that cemetery the constructed ventilation shafts, is the entrance to the burrow, just as the exploratory investigation and scrying had revealed.

Occasionally, in view, one of the loathsome Hosts came, or went, difficult to make out in the dim light.

Inside the burrow, and deeper still, in that giant, circular antechamber - the one with the bloodied altar in the middle - Dandelion and Calamity are in the cell they've been tossed together in. It's dark in there, too, but by the sounds, by the familiarity that has clung to them like a grime, they can tell that fewer of the things are around. While they are nocturnal, most of the Hosts seem to spend their active time out of the burrow.

The thing about being Fox is that it's just as easy, at this point, to be a fox as it is to be anything else, but it isn't possible for her to cast Speak with Beasts on a Vampire, so... uh... let's hope that Finley has been watching lots of Lassie lately.

The little red creature underneath Finley's obfuscate lets out an unheard burst of sound -- well above human hearing -- and then another, and her tail sways slowly -- a little more fluidly than a fox's tail should. As if, at any moment, the fox might grab on to something with it. What a strange, strange creature she is. Crouching down, she pap pap pap near-silently toward the ventilation shaft, protected by Obfuscate. (This is not new to Fox. She knows lots of Obrimos. Forces Invisibility is legit. That's how she thinks of these things.)

Dandelion has been sleeping more often. Oh, she still insists there's people coming for the pair of them, but she's not as often awake to make that assertion as she was at the beginning of this everything. This is taking a toll on her, this whole experience. She hasn't made contact with anyone in the Astral (honestly, hasn't tried) in a couple days. Right now, she's awake, but only just, watching the prisoners in the cell across from them, sitting up against the wall of the cell in a way that suggests she'd be slumped over if there wasn't a cell wall behind her. Her greasy hair hands limp and lank in her face, and she's rubbing at one hand with fingers of the other.

Finley actually is Prettyed tonight--Fox's magically enhanced senses likely can pick up a wiff of blood coming from them. No mask tonight, no rows of teeth. Just eerie beauty pulled into a very, very anxious frown. Interacting with a fox is new to zhem, but boy are they staring at the Fox with wide-eyed wonder. Wait. Focus. They shake off the urge to snatch up the fox to cuddle, and instead focuses on approaching the vents. A quick look around, listening for heartbeats of the Hosts--then will try to start climbing inside with Fox.

Calamity has fallen into a fitful sleep, body pressed against the cage bars closest to Dandy, their hand flopped through the bars like they'd been reaching out to, or actually holding, Dandy's hand at some point. They're frowning, their damp curls falling across their face, and even through their bandana it's easy to hear their wheezing breaths.

The shafts are dirty - they've never been cleaned. The soot and dirt makes it easy to slide... might be easier going down than coming back up. And navigation, well. The ductwork starts to split at the crown of the antechamber, and who knows where Finley and Fox might get spat out. A passing grate spares a chance to get a glance around.

Fox and Finley can see the rows of prison cells, lining the walls of the circular chamber, but it's simply too fucking dark, and too fucking far, to see which one holds Dandelion and Calamity. However, they are able to narrow down the ductwork path to take that will deposit them near the cells. There are two main options: a southern duct, and a northern duct, and the cells are lined in between them. There seem to be about a half dozen Beshilu milling about. They are largely disinterested in the hostages; each of them has a task, and is almost zealously focused on that task, so it's easy to identify that there's no one actually appointed to guard the hostages.

Finley looks down the North and South ducts with a frown, chewing at their lip. "Maybe... that way...?" Zhe whispers, pointing north. But it's clearly a blind guess. If Fox has another suggestion, zhe will follow them!

The Beshilu in the chamber suddenly waste no time in trying to put as much distance as possible in between themselves and that room, overpowered by the primal impulse to scurry, flee, run! In what seems like a matter of seconds, the chamber floor... is empty.

Dandelion licks her lips, and then gasps loudly, her eyes opening wider. "Calamity. Calamity!" A harsh whisper, as she uses the bars of the cage to pull herself to her feet, though she's clearly only barely capable of that. "Wake up! Now, please. Get ready."

Finley stares in surprise as the Rats just... fucking run. Zhe looks sideways to Fox with a quick blink-blink of awe before zhe starts to climb down into the lower ducks, listening for abnormal heartbeats.

Calamity jerks awake with a gasp and a yelp, banging their head against the cage as they flail for a moment. "Wh - what?" Their voice is fuzzy, and they blink sleepily, peering at Dandelion in the dark.

The Nimbus of the Fox is an unmistakable one to the people who can see such things: the scent of petrichor, the feeling of looking deep into the eyes of a trusted canine companion, fresh-cut grass. There's also about ten seconds where everyone's got a surgeon's eye, capable of understanding everything medical like they're like, way better than usual. A low, subtle gekkering as Fox's eyes squint mostly-closed. She snickers, and then scrambles forward quickly. Apparently, it's time to go. Mind, they'll keep fleeing for a bit, but that's no reason to waste time, is there? Down the South corridor we go!

Or Finley can just follow.

"They're here for us. Now." She moves toward the door of the cage. Slow--it feels like each inch is hard won, in her current condition. "It might get dicey, here. But prepare yourself as much as you can."

Finley hears several heartbeats that are worse for the wear. In fact, there are at least three heartbeats that could be someone suffering from untreated medical fragility that is normally treated. But one is slower and a bit calmer, a bit less shocked by adrenaline at this situation; those for whom all of this is brand new, the first time that the veil between their world and the Real World has been lifted... for them, their heartbeats are hummingbird wings. Dandelion is by the South duct, second from the last in the line of them.

Calamity staggers to their feet with a shiver and a cough, and then slowly reach down to take their sweatshirt. They're not nearly as bad off as Dandelion, but the heat and the lack of fresh air have taken their toll, and they have to use the bars for support, and pause for a second once they're upright to let their vision clear. But then they move toward the door, looking out into the darkness and fishing around for something in their sweatshirt pocket.

The air in the chamber is filthy and putrid. Doubtless that without the ventilation shafts, the hostages would choke to death on the foul air. The burrow is carved out of the giant slabs of the earth in an effort that must have taken years, even at Rat Host speeds. Those slabs rumble. It shakes the jars that line the walls - the soul jars. Lined up like pretty little glass trinkets alongside the humans that have been selected to fill them.

"I think they're this way," Finley whispers, moving to climb out of the duct and down into the corridor, moving down the cells to the second from the last one. Zhe looks inside, wide-eyed, then gasps with relief when they see Calamity. But zhe doesn't let the obsfuscate melt away just yet, instead looking over the cell to see how it's locked.

There are Actual People here, so it's time for Fox to melt upward into a human, before the Obfuscate is dropped. And then take advantage of her own Nimbus Tilt in order to look over Dandelion, not saying anything yet because she figures Vampire Forces Invisibility will make that not work. Standing there, a barefoot woman in a tank top and shorts, holding a sword and armor. Like you do.

This a prison-grade door, the best money can buy, with the word Kenco stamped on the bottom of the bars. It appears to have no supernatural properties. There's a mechanism to operate the lock, which appears to also have a keyhole.

Dandelion looks to be in rough shape--her blood sugars have been doing weird things, between being off her metformin and eating whatever's been put in front of her in the cell. Add to that her existing blood pressure issues, and the stress of captivity and she's in a non-mechanically defined Unwell State.

The sounds of dirt and rock shuffling can be heard from the section that leads out to the burrow's main entrance, about one hundred meters west and up.

Finley looks anxiously towards the sounds, then looks over at Fox, wide-eyed. "C-can you make this weaker? I'm--uh--super strong but not that strong..."

Calamity, at this point, has their fingers hooked through the bars of the door, trying to see what's going on where the sounds of dirt and rock shuffling are.

"Yeah," agrees Fox, then their hand rises up to grab hold of their necklace. "One second, let me get Dandy up and running. Her blood sugar is all fucked up." There's another rush of Nimbus, all green and Alive, as Dandelion's body just rights itself. Her pancreas starts working properly, pumping out the right amounts of insulin, her blood pressure corrects to within proper error bars... all of a sudden. It doesn't take a genius to know someone is there, fixing her up unseen. "Okay... and for my next trick... "

As the power of Fox's Life spell washes over Dandelion, she stands up straight as is possible within the cage, as she licks her lips again. "I recognize this energy. I felt it before--a friend, as I said. Naika." Whispered to Calamity. "He must be close, very close."

The door springs open, just in time for the impending sound of more Beshilu approaching comes, perhaps alerted by the half-dozen who fled, perhaps simply headed this way for an unrelated reason. But the sounds of their footsteps shuffling in the dirt and gravel is audible and drawing closer. They have seconds before the open door will be seen.

"How about we just... " Fox answers, her green-gold eyes glittering, as her Nimbus flares yet fucking again and the door just... clicks open, starting to swing under Calamity's fingers. "I'm going to destroy these fucking jars, by the way. They have to fucking go. I'm not leaving them. But let's get Dandy her stuff and get this kid and get the fuck out."

"Where?" Calamity hisses at Dandy, narrowing their eyes and shifting to try to see something - anything - on the other side of the door. And then the door opens and they stumble backward, their pale eyes wide.

"Invisible, I take it." She grins at the open door. "Naika healed me. I'm ready for whatever comes next, either a run or a fight--are you?"

Finley blinks, surprised again--but clearly not complaining. "O-oh--okay. My powers will stop once you attack them," zhe sputters out, then quickly steps into the cell and reaches to smack Calamity lightly on the shoulder. Not enough to do damage, but definitely a strike enough to break Obfuscate. But just for them. Finley does the same for Dandy.

Calamity yelps and jumps away from the unexpected touch. And stares for a dangerously long second as Finley appears in front of them. "Fin?" It's a shaky whisper, and their arms drop to their sides.

"You're here - you came -"

Then all of a sudden, the hilt of the sword that Yoshitsune gave Fox is resting in Dandelion's hand as Fox flips it around, resting the hilt against her palm. "I like to be invisible, but I like to be a fox better," Naika answers, her green-gold eyes catching fragments of the Poor Light and reflecting them back like a canid's, not a person's. Attainment use leaves its marks on the Orphans, after all. "Suit up, Auntie." She holds out the armor. "It's time to go."

She puts the flak jacket on, taking both swords and sticking the longer down the back of her shirt (secured by her bra strap), before she unsheathes the shorter--it's a lovely and very magical katana. "Thank you, Naika. Calamity, you'll introduce me to your friend when we get out?"

"Of course I came," zhe whispers, turning back to Calamity with wide emotional eyes. "We're gonna get you out of here..." Zhe looks up, blinking at the ceiling. "There--we can get you out there."

"Will do," Calamity mutters to Dandy, and pulls Finley into a short but tight hug. And casually steps over to ease the door shut.

Fox skitters in through the open doorway, apparently not at all concerned about the fact that the doors are closing. She's muttering to herself, a strange, fractional sort of language, and stands still, turning her concentrated attention toward the hallway once more. "I can make it possible for ... well, everyone but Finley... to get up the wall easily, as long as ... there aren't any normals that can see us." There's a glance over to the cages, where ... who knows if they're normal or not. But chances are if Calamity is being Told Things by Dandelion, he's not A Normal. Fox Logic!

The two Hosts who had been walking into the chamber, for reasons unknown to them, are compelled to hurry quickly, speeding up and running in tandem down through one of the tunnels, getting away from the chamber as quickly as they can. But it seems to have a domino effect; as those Hosts flee, curiosity deeper in the burrow starts to pique, and more shuffling Hosts make their way from that same tunnel the two had scurried away into. While it may be quiet by burrow comparisons, it's by no means empty.

"Calamity and I are both psychic. I can't say everyone here is, but it seems to be a trend, them targeting people who aren't normal." She holds the one sword in both hands quietly, smiling. "Someone remind me to bring Master Yoshitsune some good sake, when this is done."

"Fin can you...get up there?" Calamity glances up at the grating in the ceiling, and then back at the shuffling Rat Hosts.

"I can jump up," Finley murmurs, eyeing the grate above.

"You'd have an alright defense factotum, if it went to trial." She glances around. "There's people coming to get the rest of them out. Right?"

"Yeah, I can do that," Finley replies with a nod. Then... squints up at the grate and jumps. There's a very awkward moment where they hang from the grate, feet kicking until they manage to get their feet planted on the ceiling, grunting with effort as they try to pull the grate down. They are going to go down with it, granted, but hopefully it opens.

The grate opens, the bolts popping loose, and Finley is treated to the true grace, beauty, and bounty of gravity with a Vigor kick, thumping down to the floor, victorious, despite appearances. Splat.

Dandelion looks to see if anyone or anything heard the noise from that splat.

"Fuck - Fin're you okay?" Calamity hisses, and drops to help get the grate off them.

"I mean, granted, but I'd rather not make My Heart's life more difficult than it needs to be right now," answers Fox, recovering from the spell-casting like that's, you know, totally normal. Everyone snarls and snaps their teeth and all that. "As soon as we're all unseen, we should get the fuck-- " And then she scoots to the side, tugging on the straps of her backpack, to dodge zher descent. "-- out of here. Y'aright?"

Finley winces as zhe hits the ground, giving Calamity a sheepish smile. "Yeah, I'm okay..." They reach out, touching their arm to gently squeeze. "I'm gonna hide you now, okay?" Then does the same, reaching out to touch Dandelion. Zhe nods to her. "There's more people coming for the others, don't worry."

"They aren't paying much attention to us. The Beshilu, I mean. They will hardly notice, that we escape. They don't care about us." Dandelion whispers, even though she's hidden, gripping onto the sword in her hands with an angry look in her eyes.

There is extensive commotion starting to raise in the chamber and attendant tunnels, commotion that is obscure-ish for reasons.

Calamity gives the rest of the room a nervous glance, and grips their sweatshirt tightly. "Okay so...how do we get up there?"

"You walk," Fox answers Calamity. "Go on. Quickly. Just climb. You will find that you can stick to the wall, like a fly or a chameleon. I have to get rid of these jars, and I will follow you." More snarling! More eyeflash! More Nimbus!

Dandelion tucks the sword in her bra beside the other one, moving to the wall and beginning to climb as instructed.

Calamity looks like they want to watch the mage, and tried to climb whlie they do, their eyes wide and curious.

Finley waits for the other two to get up into the duct, then will jump up and grab hold to try to climb up after them.

Simultaneously, the soul jars start to shatter, long cracks splintering through their surfaces. There is no uniformity to their shape, their composition, their apparent origin, and some start to break before others. This attracts attention. The Beshilu on the other side of the prison door begin to seethe, snarling and screeching and wretching. They don't sell Soul Jars at Pottery Barn. The burrow starts to erupt with vibrations and sounds, some that come from other cells, some that come from the chamber, some from above, and some from below. It feels like the world is shaking in the cell right now.

And something else happens. It's not visible so much as it is felt, and most strongly by Dandelion. Fox's Peripheral Mage Sight will notice it, too, a Twilight glimmering in the walls, in the ceiling, in the ground, the air.

And they all feel this: a weight, a heaviness. It feels so, so heavy. The air is hard to suck down, like pulling cotton through a straw.

Dandelion gasps. "Something is coming. Astral. It's bad." She draws one of the sword, and braces herself. "It is very, very bad. Breaking the jars--I think it hit the ban of something in twilight nearby. Naika!"

"Time to go!" Fox chirrups, as if this is the most normal thing in the world, all of this weirdness. It's time to go. And as soon as Finley is up, she starts walking up the wall, too, moving at her full speed, quick like bunny. "I know, I know! I couldn't have left them. Move, move!"

Dandelion clings to the wall with one hand and both feet, unsheathing one of the swords and taking a deep breath, her dark brown eyes filled with utter conviction as she begins to speak in a slow, rhythmic voice.

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."

Her voice rings out in the area around her--at least, to those under the cover of Obfuscate, but there is a clear power to the words, and there's almost, almost a glow around her, some sanctified fire.

Calamity stops and stares at Dandelion, an impressed smile crossing their face despite their obvious fear.

The air ruffles and the wind goes out of the place like a snuffed candle -- when was there ever wind in here? And hissing, a hissing sound, more than from walls; it's a voice.

And then comes the scream. A blood wail rising, thick, like dough, from deeper in the chamber.

Bodies start to slam against the cell door in a mad rush, the crackling glass of the shattered soul jars underfoot, as mass panic starts to rise, separated from the four of them by that Kenco prison grille gate. The only way out now is through the ventilation shaft - hopefully it's safe.

"Dandelion - lets go." Calamity crawls over to gently place a hand on her shoulder, like they're unsure if touching her will fuck something up.

Finley blinks at Dandy, mouth falling open. But--uh, yeah. Even with the effect over, the vampire isn't sticking around. Zhe climbs up through the duct.

She nods. "I'll keep the vanguard. I think...I think it ought to be much more scared of me, than I am of it, now. But yes, let's go."

"Hot damn," Fox laughs, crawling up the wall alongside Dandelion, her green-gold eyes flashing delightedly. "Come on, Auntie." Once she's up into the ventilation shaft? It's time to be a Fox again! Fortunately, Attainments are easy, so that means that she just... melts back into Foxness. With a prehensile tail and Wallwalking. Because of course!

Tonight has already been a Lot, and the addition of Fox turning into...a fox, is just the icing on the cake. "...Huh," is all that Calamity manages to get out, and then they're scrambling up into the ventilation shaft behind the fox, turning back one last time to make sure Dandy's following.

Dandy does follow--she doesn't want to be a martyr, but she has one eye on their rear as they head up and out.

That shaking. That rumbling. The thin aluminum walls vibrate as the group climbs through the ventilation in near total darkness, led by Finley and Fox's recollection of how to get back out again.

Everyone recalls a general sense of what direction to head, Fox and Finley from their trip in, and Calamity and Dandelion from shuffling around in the space for the last week and a half or so. with enough wherewithal to prevent anyone from taking a wrong turn.

But that deep rumbling has not changed... and the frantic activity from the Rat Hosts, specifically from what they can rightly suspect are the Tunneler variants, starts to shift the earth around them. It starts to press against the sides of the ductwork, pinching it, straining it, collapsing it in some places. Behind them. Down that way. Down another. The path ahead is still clear. For now.

Finley, who I think is in the lead? Or behind Calamity, either way zhe tries to pick up the pace, looking increasingly nervous as the ducts start caving in.

Calamity slips behind Finley, resting their back against the Kindred's for just a moment - i'm here, the touch says - before they close their eyes and take a breath, bringing their hands up as they do. They shove their hands in the direction of the rat in front of them, bracing their feet as flames erupt from their fingers to cover the Rat Host.

As Calamity lights the closest Host, lashing blindly at air, ablaze, it screamed, leaning its head back and calling, perhaps, for more of its fellows. But its dark, and there are many such screams, bodies moving around them in the dark, a mad dash for cover. By freed hostages? By running scared Beshilu? It's hard to say.

But as the fire opens up at one of the Beshilu, another reads the room, apparently, and reaches into the Gauntlet to tear the fabric of it, wrapping it around itself like a blanket and blinking out of view for all but those who can see in Twilight. ((No Roll on this one, it just happens. Finley! ))

Finley is... not meant for combat. Zhe looks around wildly, staggering backwards from the spray. Kill stealing is bad, but let's be honest--Finley has far more chance of knocking out a near-dead rat than doing much against an uninjured one. Zhe flails a moment, then lunges towards the rat that Fox magic-smashed, and tries to throw a Vigor-empowered punch. (Spending 1 Vitae to add a +2 weapons bonus. Spending WP, and going All Out for another +2.)

"Finley. Keep looking in that direction, until or unless we say otherwise. Do you understand? Do not look over your shoulder." Her voice is calm, steely, and then she flows into motion. Oh, it's clear the old bat knows how to use the blade in her hand effectively--and it is an amazing piece of work, rather than a showpiece. Woman and sword are one, as she lashes out with a mighty blow. (Can I cleave it in twain?)

Battered by the razing blow that digs deep, ripping through its reinforced hide to separate sinew from muscle, snapping nerves and bones like twigs and rubberbands, the Beshilu reels backwards, physically staggered and fucking shocked.

The last of the Beshilu takes a similar tactic to one of its kindred, and the very air around it seems to vibrate, and blur, suddenly make it very difficult to see.

Was anyone asking themselves 'can Fox actually gekker a rat to death?' Is that a thing that people were asking? Well, there's an answer, and the answer is yes. She's bleeding, of course, because she got bit, and she does not LIKE THAT, so there is more fox yelling and then the rat host just sort of... unceremoniously falls over, and bleeds from its mouth.

The Beshilu doesn't scream, or roar, or even hiss. It just... wilts. Coughs, a dribble of blood, and its long, pointed tongue lolling out of its mouth.

Gekkered to death. Its nearest associate, though, has eyes on Dandelion, and makes a lunge for her, a wild and desperate one.

The attack is clean, the angle, perfect, the execution, exceptional. To anyone watching, the Beshilu rushes Dandelion and seems poised to strike a fatal blow to the jugular, but something happens. Or rather, it doesn't happen. The favor of destiny bends around the Exorcist, and a root - the most insignificant root in the world up until this very moment - that sticks out of the ground catches the foot of the attacking monster, and it's just enough. The momentum, the weight, the balance, the lunge, the timing, it's all just enough. And the attack, meant for Dandelion's jugular, only glances off her forearm as the monster spills past her.

Dandelion laughs.

The Beshilu that had disappeared now reappears again, but the effect of Obfuscation still thickens its vision, and it circles around the body of its fallen burrowmate, and then slams and stomps its feet on the ground, thundering it like an earthquake.

Fox has had just about enough of this, and she's running out of both potentia and willpower, so she makes a valiant screeching fling of Life Magic at the rat who's ensnared Calamity. Her Nimbus flares, blood drips from her body, and she runs over to literally fling herself into the mess of the exploded rat carcass from which the little rats ran away. Orphans have weird yantras, y'all.

The Beshilu that held Calamity ensnared and seemed to be drawing closer is blindsided by the explosion of energy and bad intentions from the Orphan, staggered sideways and dropping control of the toxic cables of poison that reach up from the ground to hold the pyrokinetic in a bind.

While his compatriot makes a desperate lunge to lash out at Dandelion for the offense of injury and, likely, its impending death, even as it burns on fire, smoldering. The attack only barely touches the Exorcist, and then the Host is crumpling down the ground, burning alive, until it's dead, the rats in its corpse going up in smoke with it, except for the few that burst out through broken skin, scurrying as quickly as they can back towards the burrow.

Calamity looks...fuckin' beat, honestly. Breathing hard, sweating, they break away from the grip of the cables and flash a thankful look at Fox before sweeping the patch of fire at the Rat Host that had tried to tie them down. Fur singes as flames break like a wave against the Beshilu.

Of the two that remain, both are thoroughly pissed off but one is in slightly better shape and not on fire, and that one wheels now towards Finley, swiping with a massive claw.

Finley lets out a yelp of pain as they're raked deep by the claws. They are... not prepared to continue fighting in this state, their vitae already almost gone--so they're going to... move backwards away from the Rat Hosts.

Once more the Arrow's strike is true, and with a snicker-snack, she brings the blade to bear upon the foul, vile creature. Ichor sprays and fur flies, as she closes on the damned vermin. "Foul beasts..."

The force of the attack manages to split the hefty creature in two, and Dandelion stands above the composite parts with a look of triumph on her face.

Finley staggers back, but the distance just isn't enough, not when they feel empty and in pain and there's fire nearby. Their fangs descend as zhe lets out a howl of terror, turning to sprint away from the scene.

A mess of wriggling rat bodies bursts out of the corpse that Dandelion stands above, the lot of them streaming across the gravel and sand towards the safety of the burrow, and all that remains is one, bleeding, entrails starting to drag in the dirt while it lunges and lashes all around.

The final Beshilu is slammed sideways, bursting apart into a mess of gore by the force of the blow from the Orphan's Life Magic, and despite the panting, and the shuffling noises of more rats streaming away from the site, for a moment, it's still. The night is almost quiet. There's a light breeze. And a clear scrap of land between them, and the Odd Fellows Cemetery, and the way back home.

Dandelion wipes the blade off in the grass, taking a slow, deep breath in and assessing herself. "Naika, I am hurt, but not dying. If it would be any trouble to you, to heal me, then don't. I can let my Cadre take care of it, when I get home. Calamity, how are you?"

Fox is pretty much entirely over this bullshit. Also, running low on potentia and willpower, as has been mentioned. She whips her head around as Finley runs off, and there's a sharp whine at the last burst of Nimbus from her. Still bleeding, the little fox limps away as quickly as she can. Maybe it'll say something to those who have a clue how far Fox pushed herself that she doesn't heal herself right away. The risk of Paradox is just too great.

Calamity is heaving out wheezing breaths as they stare in horror at the carnage around them. Dandy's question seems to snap them out of it slightly, and they lift their head to stare at her for a long few seconds. "'M fine -" they rasp out. "We should - go -"

She makes sure the blade is clean as possible, before resheathing it, and carries the sword in her hand rather than tucking it down her shirt like the other one. "Do you have a place to go to tonight? I can offer you a couch. I don't want to worry about you out there."

"Yeah, I always got a place to go." They start to pad in the direction of...well, not here. Centralia's a long-ass way from fuckin' anywhere, even with cash to cover a cab.