World Refugees Final Mix

Ray raised an eyebrow at Aria. The roof? When the place they were headed was on the second floor? What kind of logic was that?

Refugee logic, she answered herself with a sigh. And because of it, they'd get to listen to elevator music all the way down. Joy. It wasn't like they could be all that stealthy here in the first place...

"I'm ready," she said with a roll of her eyes that quickly turned into a grin. "But where will you be picking us up once we've got him? And how are we gonna stay in contact with you in case we need back up? We taking walkie-talkies or something?"

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"Cellphones might do the trick." Mabry tapped the one attached to her belt, then double-checked the first-aid supplies in the various other pouches hanging beside it, counted the ethers to make sure they were all there, and made she that Valentine rested comfortably in the harness across her back and could be drawn easily. Everything seemed to be in order.

Ashlyn's absence felt odd, but it was time. She was more than just a mom, and her skills were certainly needed for this adventure. So she'd put away the baby sling and shawl, the bag of a hundred necessary baby supplies, and gotten out the old adventuring gear: comfortable green divided skirts and tunic, soft-soled leather boots, the all important leather gloves, and so on. She pinned the long braid into a coil at the nape of her neck, so it would stay out of the way, and she'd borrowed her husband's best sword.

She knew she was ready for this. Strength and speed had never been her advantages in a fight; it had been skill and tactics, which did not go away with lack of practice. Her new Stop spell could get her out of most danger if necessary. And then there was the inevitable result of her months of near-constant healing in Haiti . . . her magical reserves had grown to meet the need, and after days of little use, they were quite full. She doubted that she would even need the ethers she carried . . . but nonetheless, better to be prepared for the worst.

And besides, knowing she was ready and feeling like she was ready, were two very different things. It had been a long time.

"I guess I'm set." Mabry gave an awkward, crooked smile and turned to the others.

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In between mentally preparing himself and flexing his muscles, Lesley gazed at the surrounding city through his sunglasses with wide eyes. He'd never seen a city that size before, one hell of a sight! But it was no time to let such things get to you, they had a mission to complete, and he wanted this to be over with fast.

His head perched at Ray's comment about communication.

"You mean you guys hadn't thought about that before?"

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"If someone has, they haven't told me. But I have been at Yen Sid's for a while, so maybe I'm just out of the loop," she shrugged. She pulled her gloves on tighter, anxious to be moving again. She, unlike some of the others, wasn't expecting too much out of this little excursion, but it didn't hurt to be ready for it.

"I know we've done the walkie-talkie thing before, though. If we've still got some lying around, we can take one and leave one here. The back-up team could probably use one, too."

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Mabry frowned. "We used to have some. Not sure if any of them ended up with us though." She glanced at their pilot questioningly.

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ariakitsune.livejournal.com

"Oh, right. Here." She handed over a small walkie talkie like device. "Just push the button to talk to me and I'll send a signal to Fox's ship if you need help."

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"Thanks, I'll keep that in my mind."

After a quick sound test he attached the device to his belt, and let his hand rest on his new saber's handguard. Nobody would notice one less of those in the Royal Armoury. Or so he hoped.

"Well then, do we have a plan?"

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Mabry glanced at Ray. "I was figuring you'd be in charge, since you've probably had the most experience at this sort of thing. I'm used to being back-up that's really far back behind the lines."

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Ray blinked. "Oh. I guess I am, huh?" She shrugged. "Well I guess the plan is to go in, get Roxas, and get out. Simple enough, right? And when things go south and that doesn't work, we make sure no one gets hurt as we turn tail and run. If this is a trap and we get stuck, call in the back up team," she said, nodding at Lesley.

She clasped her hands together and grinned at the others. "Alright, then. If you two are ready to go, we can go ahead and portal right down. That's if a Light Corridor won't bother you too much, Lesley," she added curiously. "If it does, we can go down the normal way, or Mab and I can go ahead. Whatever works best."

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rox-chan.livejournal.com

Though she wasn't going to argue, Rox was inexplicably weary of the Light Corridors. The jitters may have had more to do with the fact that she had never personally seen one in use...or maybe she was just jittery in general, and looking for an excuse. All she had been doing in Twilight Town was schoolwork - she had found a teacher willing to tutor her, since she hadn't been on a regular school schedule in months. That was leaving her with a lot of pent up energy. Twilight Town wasn't like Radiant Garden, where she could just go to the Maw whenever she needed training. Or something to smash.

It didn't help that she really wasn't sure what to expect, here. The tutoring had left her feeling more then a little cut off. Compared to the rest of the team, she felt like she was going in blind. All she knew about Koios was what she could gage from reading his post after the fact, and that honestly wasn't much. If this really ended up being no big dead, she'd be relieved. But, to err on the side of caution, she was prepared for the worst.

"That sounds like a good plan to me." she said, simply. There wasn't much she could add, really. She just hoped that she could be of some help, should they need it.

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fox_the_kitsune

Fox had forgotten how boring being a passenger in a ship could be sometimes. While it was her ship, Chase was flying since Fox was the back up team's healer. Not exactly formally trained, she at least knew a decent bit of first aid and Curaga.

At the moment, she was reading and debating whether or not to start a game of poker. Actually, the probability of getting Seph to play poker was extremely improbable and so not likely to happen. Nor was getting anyone to play Magic: The Gathering.

With a sigh, Fox went back to her book, muttering something along the lines of "Let me know when we're needed."

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Peter sat back in the back-up Gummi ship. He, too was reading, reading a book he had read several times before, which meant that he wasn't reading just for the sake of reading. He was, in fact, training. What he was training amused him somewhat, since he was training exactly what the main character in the book was also training. That was splitting his mind. It was a tough task, definitely, reading while trying to cast Reflect, but he had to do it if he wanted to succeed at his goal.

As for the mission at hand, Peter hoped he wouldn't be needed. He had signed up to feel important for a change, instead of just hiding in a castle while everyone else was fighting to save Radiant Garden. The fact that he was hiding in a castle didn't bother him that much, it wasn't like he could've done much anyway. Right now, though, he wanted to show the others he was willing to help. The problem was that he wasn't able, at least not in his own mind, to help at all. He knew Reflect and Reflera and was almost done studying Reflega, but they served only to keep himself safe, not to actually help anyone else. His fighting prowess in general wasn't noteworthy, the only thing he really had going for him were his mind and his mouth, but he didn't know if either of them would help at all.

His Reflect spell failed again. He was thinking about too many things, and he decided to give up on the mental exercise for now and just looked around the ship.

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Back-up Team apparently translated to Book Club. Song was reading too.
She'd borrowed the book from Yen Sid. An old volume on magical theory, most of it information she'd already gathered from combing the Radiant Garden library. Still, she'd caught a few new tidbits so far, and was fairly hopeful that she'd learn more. Every little thing could make a difference. The ultimate goal that all of her magic training was leading up to would not be easy. She just had to hope it wouldn't be impossible.

She looked up, though, when Peter put down his book ended his attempts at spell-weaving that she'd been vaguely aware of. "Can't concentrate?"

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"Yeah." Peter sighed. "It's hard enough trying to concentrate on two things at once, but when you start thinking while doing it? Bloody nightmare." Peter's worry about this disappeared soon after he had gotten that off his chest. "Although, I've got time to practice."

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"Too bad you're not a woman. We're supposed to be good at multitasking." It was an attempt at a joke, but her tone was too bland. In a way she was feeling quite a bit like Peter right now, not sure how useful she could really be on this mission. The chances that they'd need a negotiator or an emergency dream dive did not seem particularly high today.

Hence the small talk. "That was Reflect you were working on, right? I wonder if I should learn that one. It might make several people feel a bit better..."

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Peter gave a chuckle, there wasn't much behind it though. "Yeah, though what I'm mainly working on is casting Reflect while doing something else," he explained. "Reflect itself is only really useful when you're already planning to get into trouble." At least, for now it was. Peter couldn't really wait to see if Reflega was powerful enough for his experiment to succeed. If it did, it would open a lot of doors.

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""I wonder if there's some kind of general shield spell that would work against both physical and magical attacks," she mused as if simply speaking a private thought aloud. "If not, I'll just have to improvise."

She smiled a little sheepishly, embarrassed at focusing only on herself. Egotist she was, but at least she recognized it.
"What sort of situation do you imagine needing that kind of skill for? It usually only takes a moment to pause what you're doing and cast a spell like that."

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"Right now? Yes, it would take only a second." To show that he was fully capable of doing so, Peter casually cast Reflect. As casually as he could manage, anyway. "But that's only if I use Reflect in the way everyone else does." He had practically rehearsed the explanation of what exactly he was working on.

"Because, right now, Reflect is just a shield for a person and that is pretty dangerous, because if it fails while protecting you, you're pretty much screwed." He nodded, more to keep himself going than for any other reason. "So what I'm trying to do is cast reflect somewhere else, and that takes a lot of effort." More than he had thought it would take, anyway.

"But that's not all, casting reflect somewhere else is nothing but a neat trick to show off to other people, it isn't really useful," he explained. "Where it gets useful is when you've got another spell to bounce off of it, like a fire spell. Problem is, keeping a Reflect spell standing in a place where it's not really supposed to be while casting something else to bounce off of it, yeah, that'll take a lot of training." Once he could actually manage either feat, that was. He was still relatively new to this whole thing, and, so far, he only had experience with Reflect and its more powerful variants. He didn't even know what casting fire was like yet, but he was sure it wasn't going to be as easy as he hoped.

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creepy-son-of-a.livejournal.com

Seph had not intended to join the conversation but, he was getting bored.

"Reflect works on both. It only lasts a moment though," he muttered quietly.

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"Maybe I'll just go with a strengthened bubble spell then," she mumbled back. She'd only been half serious in the first place.

She was still focused on Peter, though, giving him a look that said she hadn't yet gotten enough of an answer. "I can see how that would take some work, but I'm still trying to picture how it would be useful. Why bounce a Fire off of a magic shield when you could just shoot the Fire directly at what you want to hit? I can see how it might work as a surprise tactic, shooting a spell past an opponent so that it bounces and hits them in the back, but that would be such a spur-of-the-moment tactic that even with the skill to do it, would you even think of it in time to use?"

She wasn't criticizing him. This was Song's game. She was testing him.

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"I don't like whoever I'm shooting at to see me, and if I can cast spells around corners, it'd be pretty useful." Peter hadn't even though of taking it at criticism, being lost in his own world. Right now he was probably the weakest refugee around, but if this worked and he got a haste spell to boot, that would change dramatically. He smiled at the thought of it.

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That tactic had also occurred to her, but she hadn't spoken it for what seemed to her like the obvious counter. "If you can't see around the corner, how can you be certain what you're shooting at?"

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creepy-son-of-a.livejournal.com

Seph settled back into a thoughtful silence. Peter's ideas about uses for the Reflect spell were imaginative but, not particularly practical. He would need to be able to cast two spells at the same time with accuracy. Which he knew wasn't impossible. Aria regularly did so in order to try combining her spells but, she had been practicing magic for much longer and still had dangerous backlash from some of her attempts.

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Peter shrugged. "Peeking around the corner. I won't expose myself too much, that way." But that wasn't the hardest part, of course. Peter figured it would be hard enough to make two spells at once, especially if one of the two was cast in an unusual way, but that was only complicated further by the fact that the two spells actually worked against each other if he were to try this.

"It'll take a long while and a lot of training before I can do that, though," Peter admitted. "But every step, no matter how small, is one in the right direction." That sounded way too corny, even to him, but it'd have to do.

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After a significant amount of silence, Peter came to another realisation. "You know what's odd? We're the negotiators, right? Yet we sent in the assault team first. That's the wrong way around, isn't it?"

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"It's not exactly like that," Song said. "The hope is that there won't be any fighting or negotiating. The guy said he would give us Roxas. If he's on the level, the other team should be able to just get the kid and go." She glanced towards the front of the ship. "Either way, we should hear from them soon."

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"True," Peter admitted. "But if things do go wrong. Our area of expertise isn't really useful." If only things didn't go wrong, it would make things a whole lot less complicated. Then again, Seph was on their team. He hated the fact that he was actually getting worried now.

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Ray knocked on the door and waited a few moments until it opened. She stared at the man's chest for half a second longer than she probably should have, suddenly uneasy, then mentally shook herself and looked up at his face. She gave him a smile, and said, "Hey. We're here to get Roxas out of your way. We're his friends."

She hoped he didn't realize that the smile was forced; that could lead to trouble. But there was obviously something wrong with this guy, if she couldn't see into his heart. The merchant at Star Market had insisted that only a few rare magics and devices could fool the contacts he'd given her, and they hadn't failed her once yet. So either this guy had something to hide, or they were dealing with someone a lot stronger than they'd initially expected.

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sandandflannel.livejournal.com

Koios didn't miss the hesitation. He wasn't sure what had caused it, exactly, and the girl had been quick enough to recover from it, but it hadn't escaped his notice. He kept his curiosity about it in check, though, and merely smiled down at three of them.

"Great," he said genially. "I was starting to think you guys weren't coming. Come on in; I'll take you to him." He stepped out of the way to let them enter.

It was about damn time.

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Mabry followed Ray as closely as she could. Her lips were firmly held together, not in unfriendliness, but in concern for Roxas. She hadn't heard many details about his condition and she wasn't exactly certain what to expect.

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sandandflannel.livejournal.com

He led the three to a back room, furnished only by a single mattress and the boy on top of it, sleeping.

"Uh," he said, looking at the group, "how are you guys planning on moving him, exactly? I dunno if carrying him would be that comfortable for him, but if that's what you're set on doing, I can help take him out to your car or something."

God forbid he stay around the brat anymore than he needed to, but with only one guy? They'd probably have trouble getting him out. And besides, women should not be carrying men. It was embarassing, and just plain impolite to let them do it. Koios may not have had a heart, but he still had an (albeit twisted) sense of courtesy.

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Ray followed him in, worry creeping into the forefront of her mind as she saw Roxas. He still sported some bruises, but looked mostly fine. She gestured at Mabry to go ahead and look him over. Flannel guy here had a point about carrying him, though, especially if he really was out.

"I'm sure we can take of it," she assured the guy. "We can wake him up and help him walk, if he needs it."

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Mabry knelt down beside Roxas, examining him and trying to take stock of exactly what was wrong with him. She was beginning to wonder how much she could actually do for him. Her magics were for injuries, which did not appear to be Roxas problem. She had some training in more mundane magic now, but most of that was midwifery (not a skill Roxas was likely to need!) and herbal medicine.

Well, at least she had enough knowledge for a quick examination. She felt his forehead for a temperature, checked his pulse, and peeled back his eyelids to check for a concussion.

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The short trip through the Light Corridor had felt weird, albeit in an oddly ticklish sort of way. He had no idea if this was normal or exclusive to him, but he decided not to mention it. In fact, he hadn't mentioned anything since they got in, actually. It was nothing new, he wasn't much of a talker when it came to real-life conversations. Plus, he had a habit of saying stupid things, especially with his inability to detect most forms of sarcasm.

As soon as they entered the room however, Lesley noticed that his left hand never left his saber's handguard during the entire interaction, as if his body was warning him of something his mind hadn't noticed. With that thought in mind, he took a step forward.

"I won't have much trouble carrying him on my own, if needed."

He was at least a head taller than pretty much everyone else after all.

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thirteenth_brat

If Roxas were aware at all that any of his friends were there, he'd be telling them they ought to get their asses out of there. However, he's out cold and totally oblivious to who is present. He doesn't stir at all while Mabry checks him.

While there wereren't any visible signs a fresh injury, there were some signs that his time spent missing had been rough. Among these signs were odd little scars on his wrists that looked as though he was bound with some sort of barbed cord or maybe a shackle with a somewhat sharp edge to it. These were largely healed up. A much closer inspection of his right wrist would show that it was broken at some point and did not heal properly. His breathing was even, though maybe a mite shallow, and his pulse was somewhat normal. He might have felt a bit warm.

Carrying him didn't seem like it would be too much an issue as he looked to be a teeny bit malnourished, though not severely. Not that he was a heavy weight to start with.

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"Let's get him back to the ship. I'm going to need to give him a more thorough exam, some antibiotics." Mabry paused to grimace. "And probably re-break his arm before healing it. Oh, that's going to suck."

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sandandflannel.livejournal.com

"Okay, if you can handle it," he said reluctantly, looking from Ray to Lesley. "But at least let me walk you out front. Wouldn't be a good host if I didn't."

He raised an eyebrow at Mabry. "Ship? What, you guys got a boat waiting in the Hudson or something?" He chuckled. "Somehow I don't think all of you would fit in a taxi."

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Ray restrained an annoyed look and kept her gaze focused on Roxas as Mabry looked over him, frown deepening. "You shouldn't have to carry him on your own, Lesley," she said quietly. "There's enough of us here to help out, so we may as well do it."

She eyed the kid, not liking what she saw beneath the physical injuries. She winced at the healer's assessment, and took a deep breath. "As long as we can get him back to working shape, he can get over it. Let's go," she said, nodding at Lesley as she knelt next to Roxas. "Help me carry him?"

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An eyebrow rose above the trim of his sunglasses. More people carrying the unconscious Roxas would mean less people keeping an eye on the blond dude, a fact he didn't like very much. Nevertheless, he rolled his yellow eyes and knelt next to the kid as well. Damn, must've been through one heck of a beating to end up like this. He shot a glance to the 'host' before resting his gaze upon Ray.

"You take the legs." He said as he manoeuvred his arms underneath those of Roxas. Bah, terribly exposed, a Fremen fanboy should know better.

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