[Episode Three] Going the Extra Magic Mile

[Kai]

Miyuki could already feel the boost of magical energy begin to die down, and her Mana level returning to normal- after just a few moments the boost was gone, but it had been enough. However, it had taken until now for her to realize that she had yet to call out the Sapphire- yes, she had called the guardian beast, Saph, but the sapphire itself was still away, unused. this confused Miyuki, and during that moment of confusion a whole lot of things happened- a very pink girl showed up, she noticed a set of twins where there had just been a stranger, although one twin was rather ghostly, and, opposite their target, she could see the trickster, who had become an ally of convenience, set of quite a powerful attack of some kind.

During this chaotic moment, she had time to realize that she had been doing magic on her own, without the help of the Gem. And that scared her- she didn't know how or why she could do that! So, with nothing further to do, though a bit late, she called out the Babylon Sapphire, and her school uniform was replaced by her magical outfit, with a flourish the light-colored uniform became a blue, be-shelled outfit fit for a magical girl!

"Okay Saph, we need to help out, I, uh, think..." Miyuki was unsure by now, but the cat-like creature simply nodded, and started forward, charging in an attack toward the ribbon figure. Miyuki could see Saph's form turn less solid and more liquid, becoming something of a water-sprite as he dashed toward his target.

[CadetNewb]

The Pink Mahou Shojou arrived on scene and struck a righteous pose!

But quickly went unnoticed as the others began their attack, leaving her standing their awkwardly without love or attention from anybody - save for two. "Holy cow! It's another Mahou Shojou!" Duncan exclaimed in English, quickly reaching for his camera-phone to snap pictures. "My little sis will want to see this!" The little speakers in his smartphone excitedly 'snapped' away in facsimile of shutters closing as the ribbon wrapped figure pointed a finger at HeartPure from its stalk, it too noticing her arrival. A muffled, distorted series of words proceeded to sound from its bound mouth before it was cut short; Sakura's flame runes forced the stalk to creep back as Jane's bullets pummeled the figure, sticking hard and binding to the fabric or outright bouncing off as the substance flexed.

The smell of molten plastic and fiber quickly suffused through the air as Haruka's bombardment opened up, though it dodged and juked about, the stalk was clipped as several stray rounds burned through it - as Akanus circled about overhead, the figure plummeted, but quickly caught itself, only to scrabble out of the way of Ruarc's Fire Dragon on it's tendrils. As it bit down, a foot was seared off, but that didn't seem to hamper its mobility in the slightest. As Saph pounced, it merely dodged to the side as the many spider leg lengths propelled it out of the way, before bounding back and opening wide like a fan to take the beast down with it over the ledge! As it made to attack, Sakura's gravity arrow flew straight and true, landing squarely between its shoulder-blades and causing both of them to plummet out of sight like rocks. Duncan's eyes widened as he realized what was going to happen next. "Look out! It's coming!"

Ribbonlike tendrils wrapped about HeartPure from behind, binding her wrists, ankles and waist as the Ribboned Figure rose from under the rooftop's ledge, having easily traversed it while Saph fell. It held the newest girl in between the group and itself, pulling her in closer before turning the Mahou Shojou about so they were face to 'face'.

"Uwaaa! It's a real Mahou Shojou!" the singed figure spoke with awe as the ribbons unraveled just enough to reveal a mouth, her voice small and childish despite her larger, more womanly form.

At that, Duncan's jaw dropped.

[Kalshion]

Sakura stood there, staring up at the monstrocity as her arrow did the trick but exactly how she had expected. Her intention was to stop it's movement to give the others a chance to possibly defeat it, instead she just caused some mayhem of her own. She moved quickly from a crouch and over toward the roof where she came to a halt and looked over the edge toward Seph, she quickly dug her hands into her pocket and pulled out an air rune, which she threw with precise accuracy toward where she felt Seph might land, when the rune hit the ground it activated and such a tunnel of wind upward, hopefully to either stop or slow Seph's decent.

Then she turned her attention toward this thing, had she heard it right? It spoke? This baffled her, but she pushed that thought to the back of her mind as she drew a slicer rune in the ground and then picked it up and threw it toward the ribbons that were binding HeartPure, once the rune was between her and the ribbons, it burst forth - sending six crescent shaped blades toward the ribbons in hopes that they'd be cut.

[Revolver]

Enjoying the love and admiration from the boy with the camera, HeartPure struck a couple of heroic poses, whipping her long, pink hair behind her. "I'll finish this quickly," she claimed, before the ribbons claimed her. Pulled in with such force, the girl in the pink and white ribbons and frills was swept off her feet while the blue ball of energy just laughed, ringing with it's bell-like chime.

Face to face with the ribbon creature, HeartPure could only grin. "I'm much better at up-close combat anyway, fiendish creature," she announced, pulling against the ribbons bound about her arms and legs. Calling out "Rose Fleuret!" HeartPure swung the silver rapier about, the red rose in the hilt glowing, enveloping the blade with it's energy. She could hear the whistle of the blades coming at her-- for this to work, she'd have to thrust, then spin and hold out the ribbons. That's like Ally of Justice 101 right there. Full of confidence, the newly arrived magical girl then plunged the sword at the evil figure. "Ha!"

[Kyoki]

"Wait... people actually do that?" Haruka queried as she lowered her lance before facepalming.

"Yeah, you get used to it," replied her ghostly clone.

Then came the fangirly squeeing and, at that, both Haruka and clone stared before the former facepalmed again. "What are we fighting again? And why? Also, are we technically mahou...."

"I don't know, because we thought it was dangerous, and yes, we are. Technically. Just without the frills and... that," the doppelganger gestured at HeartPure, "and, that's probably for the best."

"That's what I thought."

Without a safe opening to fire upon the monster, if you wanted to call it that, and quite unwilling to go into close range where the pair would be at a distinct disadvantage, they put their two lance-rifles together. The weapons were sheathed in magical light briefly as they fused back into the singular gun-lance form. From there, Haruka and her copy held the lance together and aimed, waiting for any good opportunity to snipe.

[Kokuten]

Percy tapped his staff against the ground as he watched the battle unfold, his attention briefly stolen by the loud, pink magical girl. Though, what caught him off guard more was how Duncan reacted to her presence. The usually cool and/or quiet american reacting in such a way to... Anything? The picture in front of him was mildly jarring, but not too jarring that he noticed Akanus land right in front of him again. The Mini kept his back to Percy, but seemingly for the fact to stay between the summoner and the ribbon monstrosity.

"Your orders, Lord-Prince." demanded Akanus.

"Uwaaa! It's a real Mahou Shojou!" the singed figure spoke with awe as the ribbons unraveled just enough to reveal a mouth, her voice small and childish despite her larger, more womanly form.

Both Percy and Akanus went slack for a moment as they seemed to recoil from the sudden voice, along with Duncan. Another unexpected thing. At the very least, HeartPure seemed to be quite capable of dealing with the ribboned attentions, though her uniform was a tad distracting. The other two girls, who pressed the assault, were--...

Wait, who were they? He didn't recognize the one with the guns, and the other was the one Akanus had heroically saved only minutes ago. Agh, how many more magicians were there!?

Nevermind that. He thought. There was still the ribbon lady.

"Akanus, is there anything else you can do to give the others an opening?" asked the Welsh boy.

"Boh." replied the Welsh god positively. The lance disappeared, and Akanus took to hunching over, tucking his arms in tight. He started to hum lowly, rising in volume as his wings lowered around him. "Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm."

"Akanus?"

"Mmmmmmmmm!" No response, just a struggling hum.

"W-what are you doing?"

"MMMMMMMMMMMM!" Akanus began to shake as the space around him appeared to ripple and shear.

"Are yo--"

"BOH!" Akanus threw up his arms, standing straight, his loud declaration sending out a jarring shockwave that put Percy on his back as soon as it hit him. Though, as Percy quickly saw, that was only a 'back-blast'. The real force sailed upwards towards the ribbon woman as an almost invisible wave of powerful kinetic energy.

[Kai]

Miyuki could only really gasp when Saph was pulled down off the side of the building, but she couldn't just dash over from her position in order to get to him. In return for that, however, Miyuki wanted to do something to get back at the enemy they were currently facing, and so, she decided to stand her ground, and concentrate, summoning up as much of the water in the area as she could, and drawing it together into a ball. However, instead of simply throwing it at the ribboned figure as she normally would have, she brought the ball of water around her from behind and used it instead to encapsulate her.

Thankfully, Sakura seemed to be making an effort to help Saph, but there really wasn't much Miyuki could do about that, concentrating on stopping their enemy as it was.

[Straken]

Ruarc was still surprised, and a little relieved, that the ribboned demon didn’t care about him attacking her flank. His initial strike had severed one of the creature’s feet, but the area around the target was getting more hectic and crowded. The druid extinguished the dragon.

Pulling his staff back, Ruarc got a better grip on the weapon and began focusing energy into the tip.
“Créatúr,”Ruarc began slowly in order to keep the flames as controlled as possible, “na tine…”

About halfway through the incantation he took a few steps forward to gain momentum for a powerful physical strike coupled with the fire spell. As he gained momentum and closed the distance between him and the abomination, he got a funny feeling in the pit of his stomach. It was a familiar feeling, one he could remember from instances such as when he was power tackled by a deranged goose, used as a football by a giant skeleton, and when he was a chew toy for hundreds of evil fish. At the same time he could also hear a rumbling sound that was rapidly getting louder. In his current stance there wasn’t much he could do, given he didn’t even know what would happen or if anything would happen in the first place, so he simply tried the finish his incantation as soon as he could. He also tried to dig in his heels a bit in fear of being sent flying again.

[CadetNewb]

As Saph landed on all fours safely, Duncan turned and rapidly started to limp away, his face draining of color as he did so.

*****

"Hey! I'm not a fie - "

It's protest was cut short as everything hit it all at once. The mouth, barely visible in between the ribbons, opened with surprise as Sakura's blades sliced through the lengths of ribbon before HeartPure's silver blade plunged deep into it's chest. Blood briefly sputtered out of it's mouth, but the sight was slapped aside as Akanus' blow smote it from the side, knocking it clear of the pink Mahou Shojou and taking the deeply embedded blade with it. With a clear shot, Haruka and her double fired! Blasts of energy shot out of her weapon and struck with impunity, burning and charring more of its tough, red hide with the concussive shots and sent it sprawling into Miyuki's capture bubble just as Ruarc's spell was nearing completion; the druid took aim and prepared to -

"I'VE HAD IT!"

The crimson figure extruded spines like a sea-urchin and quickly soaked up the water like a sponge, expanding in the process - several metal cans dropped to the floor from the figure before a series of brilliant bright lights and sounds erupted; a sword clattered to the ground and before they could even recover from the stun grenades, the figure somersaulted over to Ruarc and lashed out at him with a ribbon, picking up the boy like a rag-doll before tossing him at the Mahou Shojou like a baseball. It then made a mad dash right at the two Harukas - the girls fired their gun-lance, but the ribbon wrapped figure divided into triplicates of itself. The bolts of energy burst them into soggy bits, but as they fired at the third, a figure exited the back as the true ribbon armor took the blow and expanded to consume the duo in a sphere which then rolled madly at Miyuki! Though she attempted to scrabble away, it swallowed her up as well as though it were a Katamari; the ball of ribbon then spat the three out, wrapping the two Harukas and Miyuki together, a neat bow on each of their chests. As the others were quickly subdued, Ruarc would find that a strand of ribbon had tied itself around his ankle as he was thrown like a bit of fishing bait and waited for the perfect moment to pounce - it had lashed out and quickly entwined both him and HeartPure together so that they were looking at each other, face to face in an embarrassing embrace!

"Now. Now I have you!" the little voice called out from behind the veil of smoke. Another ribbon snaked out and grabbed the glowing blue ball, chucking him hard at Akanus with a flick and 'Konk!' as the two impacted down below in a near comical fashion. Though Percy was still ready to fight, he was at ground level - Sakura was the last person standing on the roof, the others having been incapacitated in a blink of an eye! Everyone could see it now, the figure emerging from behind the smoke cast from the bodies of burning ribbon.

It was a little girl, easily five or six years old.

She was dressed in a pink t-shirt with a small hole in the front and a pair of short jeans, with hair done into a pair of pig tails - on her back however, was a Breakfast Bears Breakfast Bars Backpack, into which the remaining ribbons retreated. The little girl pointed an accusatory finger at Sakura. "My brother was doing fine and being nice to people again until he took an arrow to the butt!" she exclaimed, pouting in anger at the Trickster.

*****

Duncan stopped fleeing mid-step and sheepishly looked over his shoulder at everyone.

[Kalshion]

Sakura blinked in shear confusion, looking at this little girl as if she was having a dream now. Hearing the accusation, she looked around to realize no one was there, and gulped. She was sweating profusely, but not all of it was due to being scared or worried but most was due to her having used up a lot of her magic and feeling tired and worn out. "I... didn't mean to... it was supposed to hit the ground.. not.. anyone.." she said while looking at the little girl. She tightened her grip on the bow.