POTS TSAL ♞ FFATS HTFIF

[beknightedheroine]

Characters: Sayaka Miki, anyone who was interested in a Witch's Kiss, and the Nuke Squad.
Setting: Floor 28, and on the way to.
Format: Any is fine, but I prefer prose.
Summary: My wish is somewhere not here.
Warning: Spoilers for Puella Magi Madoka Magica, death.

On the path to Floor 28.

Sayaka has become despondent, over this last week (well, eight days, to be more specific). It felt like all her feelings fell away, one by one, watching the battles in the labyrinth - only a few days in, she'd lost all will to pay attention to it at all, and stopped making appearances in places she would normally be found in.

Anyone who's attentively lived through the start of this month, on either side of events, wouldn't be surprised by this in the least. But it's over now, right? So why does this girl look just as hopeless as if the worst was still to come? She's shuffling relentlessly forward, with some sort of purpose - but it doesn't look like a happy one.


Floor 28.

There's something different about this floor today. Something on a more unsettling, dangerous caliber than the usual fare - it's the tower, after all. It's never safe. But this is on a whole different level.

The air feels heavier. 'Humid' might be the correct descriptor, though that makes no sense - there's no water significant enough on this floor to cause an atmosphere like that. A close look would reveal that it's the truth, though - on some of the instruments, a bit of condensation has appeared. It's more obvious in a specific part of the floor - and anyone who can significantly sense magic will have been drawn there, anyway.

Because here, in the strings section, where a song gently waves through the air - there resides a Witch.

Comments

[nemophila]

A look of dull surprise crossed his face at the new voice; one he'd only heard for a little bit, awhile ago. "You know too...?"

Jun didn't seem to be listening to anything they were saying. He took a step back, his shoulders hunching as he grasped the sides of his head with his hands. "I'm sorry... I just don't want anyone else to suffer--!"

He almost sounded like he was going to cry but instead his entire body seemed to jolt. His head shot up and his arms fell again, one arm holding up the flower and throwing the sharp stem straight towards Miyabi.

[vvvroom]

Jun. Jun, are you ready for the pain train?

Because your kinda-sorta boyfriend is sprinting right at you very fast and tackling you to the ground as soon as that flower is thrown. No talking, no blocking the projectile. Just boom. Right as Miyabi was threatened.

He is not going to let this kind of shit escalate again! Enjoy trying to move when the person stopping you outweighs you by a good forty pounds.

[deathboss]

Eikichi, meanwhile, had placed himself directly in the spot where the rose was thrown. It finds its mark right in his elbow right.

"Son of a bitch!" No time to wonder how Jun can even throw a flower so effectively it can tear at his skin (even if he's seen it do that a hundred times). He leaves it there for now, knowing ripping it out would just make the blood flow faster. Now it just looks like a grotesque testament of what just happened.

"If you don't want anyone else to suffer, you might want to take a more pacifist approach! Tatsuya, you need to get his hands behind him!" Eikichi knew his brawling stuff pretty well, but Tatsuya was the son of a cop. He trusted him to be able to subdue Jun.

[kamikozy]

She probably wouldn't have been able to dodge it- Jun was faster than most of the enemies they'd faced, and while Miyabi was pretty quick, light on her feet as she was, he was still quicker. Seeing Eikichi step in front of her to take the hit worried her though, and the hand that hadn't already pulled out her knives moved to grip his arm a little tighter.

"Eikichi-kun is right- if you really don't want us to suffer, then you should let us help you! We can't exactly stay happy when you're feeling so awful still."

[nemophila]

If there was pain or not, Jun didn't give any indication or any reaction to it as he was tackled to the floor sans a small, reflexive grunt when the air got knocked out of him.

"...It's not about me..." He didn't try to struggle or escape Tatsuya's grasp, only stared at the ceiling blankly as he spoke. "We can't be happy here... Everyone here is hurting. I just want to make it stop..."

He still didn't move, but he summoned his Persona instead. For a moment, the figure that rose was Chronos, and the Persona almost seemed to be yelling something-- but it flickered and flashed before Chronos could get a word in edge-wise, In his place was Seker instead, beating its wings and attacking the group with a Wing Flap.

[vvvroom]

Something was definitely wrong with Chronos. Maybe the others couldn't tell what it was trying to say, but Apollo at least got the point of it. He was calling for help.

Even during the attack, Tatsuya held on, holding Jun's hands back and dragging him to his feet. His grip weakened a little, but it didn't stop him from trying to drag Jun away from the room.

And this will play in the back http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILcv7hGr35s

[deathboss]

"You idiot! You're stronger than that Jun, I know it!" Jun don't make Eikichi punch you in the face...oh okay that definitely was not a very healthy Chronos. Hades was pissed.

Even as he wondered if he should switch for another Persona, the Lord of the Dead literally refused to budge until Eikichi let him out. When he did, he wasted no time, useing his skull bouquet to smal it into Seker, while Eikichi flinched in pain both from the Wing Flap attack and the numbing sensation from the flower still lodged in his arm.

"Hade's gonna take care of the Persona he calls out! We need to get him to snap out of it!"

[kamikozy]

"So what? You just plan to make everyone's suffering stop by-?"

She was halted by the sudden attack, and for a moment, she felt more or less useless as that attack hit her. She braced herself against Eikichi's side for a moment before focusing on Persephone, who silently clasped her hands and let a Heartfelt Prayer spell wash over them.

"We can help too, if you need us to."

[nemophila]

Seker flinched from the bashing, but again, Jun didn't outwardly react. When Tatsuya began to drag him away however, is when he started to resist, trying to wrench his hands free (no easy task when he was already at a disadvantage). But he did manage to wiggle enough to drop another flower out of sleeve, taking a hold of it and trying to turn the abnormally sharp stem on Tatsuya.

"Stronger...?" He says it as if the word is foreign to him. "There's nothing strong about rejecting hopelessness. Just more people will get hurt..."

Seker disappeared, and he summons up another persona. For a moment, it seems like Chronos tried to get through again, but it was Throne that won out in the end. It spun and rotated, unleashing a High Pressure almighty attack on the group. "...It'd be better if we were all just dead."

1/2

[vvvroom]

Weird, as soon as he started to get Jun out of here, that's when he tried to fight back...maybe the other presence here had something to do with that.

Stabbing his arm almost worked. The High Pressure attack was enough to make him let go, but he almost tried to grab Jun again.

Until he said that last part. It...stunned him for awhile, to be honest. Tatsuya stood there, head done, not knowing what to do.

2/2

[vvvroom]

And then, finally, he marched over to face Jun again and slapped his shit. A full on hard crack right in the face.

Tatsuya never had it in him to slap Maya when she was freaking out about Sudou, about the fires and about everything that was happening. Maya wasn't his other half, though. Jun was. And if Tatsuya were saying this kind of bullshit, he figured that he would deserve it too. So did Jun. He could take it.

"Don't you ever say that. That's not true. Don't you ever say or think or believe that."

[deathboss]

Oh no he hadn't! THAT wasn't the Jun he knew. That wasn't the Jun who had talked, when they were all huddled together, preparing for that final battle and promising to remember each other no matter what.

If Tatsuya hadn't hit Jun, Eikichi would have. His hand was already curled into a fist and he looked incredibly serious when he spoke, even if he kept getting more cuts from each attack that Jun launched on them. Thankfully Persephone was helping with that, and the biggest injury right now was the flower still stuck in his arm.

"It ain't him Tatsuya. It can't be him..." He glared at Jun again. "HEY! You remember the first day you game to the school? When I met you and heard rumors you were a dangerous guy? I didn't care what they said cause I could see you weren't really that type of guy. I told you I'd be your friend. I said I'd protect you if you needed it. And that's still true, you shithead! If you don't snap out of it, we're gonna keep repeating and beating into you the same things over, and over and over UNTIL YOU GET THE TRUTH IN WHAT WE'RE SAYING! YOU HEAR THAT?!"

Breathe in. Breath out.

"So you better the hell stop thinkin' like that!"

[vvvroom]

...Eikichi was right. It couldn't have been Jun. So, he wasn't the only one who figured that.

"Then it's whatever's in here. It doesn't want us to get him out of this room...whatever it is." Basically, if they want Jun out of here, Tatsuya was going to need some help dragging him out.

[kamikozy]

There wasn't really much she could do, considering the situation at hand- but she had to do something, even if it was just playing back-up.

"Eikichi- help Suou-san keep a hold of Kurosu-san- I'll try and keep his Personas from lashing out."

[nemophila]

Jun'd rushed a few steps away when Tatsuya released his grip, brought his flower up to attack again and-- then got slapped.

And that gave him a moment of pause; his eyes widened in shock, and it was about as much of a normal emotion as he had shown this entire day. He focused his gaze on Tatsuya, and slowly brought his hand up to where he had been hit.

"I... Why.... Why would you..." He didn't move or say anything again until Eikichi finished his tirade, and unlike the rest of his ramblings, he seemed to be at a loss-- stunned, in fact. He dropped his flower and grabbed his head with both hands again, a frown seeping back into his expression.

"No... but, I..." Jun didn't seem to be able to process much of what was happening anymore; but Throne disappeared in a flash, and Chronos finally manifested properly.

My alter ego has been possessed by the song of a siren, He spoke, rather than attacking. She distorts the depth of the this room and the reason within his mind... So long as her song continues, he will not listen to me, nor anyone.

"--Stop!" Jun yelled, grabbing his head tighter and cutting Chronos off, forcing him to disappear in another light.