Salutations! It's been a while, though I assure you its not because I haven't been writing. More like I haven't been satisfied with what I wrote. Still aren't, but I shouldn't procrastinate forever.
Many thanks to nitewind for beta work!
Thebel Block, Hakuno's POV
"I still have about 28% charge left," I inform Mitsuru while scanning the bloody stairway before us. We had sped up our exploration after the first fight (mainly because I had finally gotten permission to keep Saber summoned) and had actually cleared the first floor of Tartarus in what Akihiko had called a record time. Bolstered by our success, he had then managed to convince Mitsuru to take this expedition further.
All the way to the third floor.
It had gone very smoothly, the Shadows were nothing compared to even the Enemy Programs at the final levels of the Chimeric Lunar Sea, let alone Servants. And Saber was the strongest Servant.
The Shadows hadn't even scratched us –any of us- yet.
I had really worried too much about this.
"Almost down to a fourth huh…" Akihiko mutters with exasperated awe. Exasperated because Saber had annihilated nine out of every ten Shadows we had run into, and that was only because they weren't always grouped. Awe, because of the aforementioned slaughter.
"For essentially soloing three floors and keeping a Persona constantly manifested for that long, it's quite the bargain." Mitsuru muses, "Still, its about time we bring this excursion to an end and look for an Access Point."
Access Points were a confusing feature of Tartarus' floors. They were spread around Tartarus at random, sometimes multiple ones on a single floor, sometimes none and they worked as one-way portals to a larger Point at the entrance. According to Mitsuru they were unknown technology and they had no idea why or how they existed. And they were apparently indestructible, as they hadn't had any luck taking apart or even analyzing the one at the entrance. It didn't help that even if people were made able to function during the Dark Hour, they were still easy prey for Shadows.
"Wasn't there one on the second floor? Do we backtrack or go forward?" I ask and let out a sonar pulse, checking the stairway for Shadows. How would a Maya even move on those? Would they just flow down like liquid or would they hold together? Their bodies were pretty malleable, or maybe that was just Saber's strength.
"I vote we go forward," Akihiko declares instantly, to the surprise of no-one.
"That is a bit risky…" Mitsuru shoots him down and I appreciate her sentiment, as we are not in a hurry here. We can continue exploring some other day, we're not on a schedule here. Then she continues:
"But I believe we could do that this time. There is still good twenty minutes left, and we are both fresh enough to take over if Kishinami overexerts herself."
…And it seems I underestimated how much she wants to do this. Well, I guess we go forward then.
"But Kishinami, you should preserve your power unless it seems we are running out of time," Mitsuru adds as we begin climbing, with Saber leading the way.
This again? What does she have against me keeping Saber at my side?
"But that would slow us down again. What if there is no Access Point in the next floor?"
"We don't slow down. As I said, Akihiko and I are still fresh. If it's just one floor, we can cut loose with impunity with your support. Besides, it will be a useful to see what you can do without your Persona."
Why would she need to see that?
"Why? Personas are the main weapon against Shadows. I could be a battle tank and I wouldn't be as useful against them as Saber." For a moment I think about mentioning that I'm not confident enough on my footing to fight in a battle myself. It was even true, while I had no trouble walking or even running, my fast movement was limited to going straight or else I would take a tumble from trying to balance on a body part I didn't have. In the end, however, I leave it unsaid, because with a gun as my weapon there really is no need for me to be able to be very nimble. Especially if I have two melee fighters protecting me.
"But its costly. Clearly, Saber is ridiculously strong Persona, but that doesn't mean you should waste your energy. These Shadows are weak but there are many of them. If you tire yourself on them, you'll be in trouble with the bigger ones." This is starting to get irritating. Of course I know the importance of saving your energy for the real battles, I've done that before. With Saber. We're a team.
But there is a hardline for Saber now. I focus on the charge icon on my HUD. If this drags on, it… is possible I won't be able to summon Saber when I need her.
Mitsuru has a point.
I'll… just call Saber when I need her. To fight I mean. Its just a slight delay, these Shadows can do nothing in that timeframe. It's no real danger. They are not Servants.
"Understood", I tell Mitsuru through clenched teeth and focus on the vanishing form of Saber. She gives me a comforting smile and a nod as she disappears.
Right. I can do this.
3rd person POV
It didn't take long for S.E.E.S. to run into a pack of Shadows on the new floor. They oozed into a large room with a curious stone arch in the middle at about the same time Akihiko entered from the other end. He reacted quickly, running towards them with a shouted warning to the others. Mitsuru reacted immediately, drawing out her Evoker with one hand and dashing after Akihiko at more sedate pace. Hakuno followed suit, her handgun ready to shoot but pointed towards the ground for now.
As Akihiko neared the Shadows – six Mayas, four of them with blue masks and the rest wearing red ones, he smoothly pulled his Evoker from its holster, aiming the silver barrel into his eye. A pragmatic sort would probably chew him out for obscuring his own vision when attacking an enemy, but to Akihiko it was necessary, as he just couldn't pull off the mindset required to summon a Persona if it didn't get in his face.
Glass cracked and the towering form of Polydeuces manifested behind Akihiko, its arm spike crackling with lightning from a Zio spell and already pointed at Akihiko's chosen target, a red masked Maya furthest away from him. As the bolt of lightning stuck forth eliciting a pained roar from the puddle like Shadow, Akihiko himself nudged his rush so that he ran past the first Shadows, evading their grasping claws by a hair and drawing them after him, leaving their backs open for Mitsuru.
It was one of the tried and true tactics the two had refined during their years of operations, this one being reserved for when they could give it their all.
A flash of pink light informed Akihiko that Mitsuru had joined the battle, prompting him to go for his Evoker again to keep the Shadows focused on him. Polydeuces appeared again, this time hammering a Maya into the ground and swiping at the others with its armspike, then disappearing before they could strike back, taking advantage of how the Shadows didn't differentiate between a Persona and its user to get them to focus on him again.
Well with the exception of the two that started to fight each other as Mitsuru's magic messed with one's mind, causing it to attack its kind. Akihiko always found himself smiling at that. The ability to make Shadows fight each other had saved them countless times before.
Still, the deciding factor had always been physical prowess, and that was Akihiko's specialty, be it punching one in the face or just keeping away from them. Like he was doing now. He didn't like it, but it was the best he could do against multiple Mayas, considering his fighting style.
Boxing wasn't really that useful against something that barely came up to his kneecaps, not counting the grasping arms, the direction of the punch was awkward and while it was easier to put his body weight behind the blows, his return was slow. And slowing down was out of the question for him.
So for now, he had to just 'enjoy' the sensation of summoning Polydeuces to do the fighting for him.
"Finish them off, Kishinami!" Mitsuru ordered Hakuno and moved to assist Akihiko, trusting that the ASW could defeat two wounded Shadows with just her gun –or if situation got really bad, just use her Persona to maim every Shadow in the room- while she and Akihiko killed the remaining four.
That suited Hakuno fine, seeing how this was her first hands-on fight, the first fight where she really held the weapon and not just given the command. Much to her shame, she had entertained the thought a few times during the Grail War, after all that was what Julius had done with great success. In the end, she hadn't had the heart for it then, and she didn't think she had it now.
So it was a good thing her opponents weren't anything close to human.
The moment the Cowardly Mayas seemed to stop tearing into each other, Hakuno struck hard.
Two green gems were flung from her hand, aimed between the two wounded Shadows trying to catch their bearings. The Garu gems burst violently, releasing an explosive burst of visible green tinted wind that splattered the Mayas all over the area, leaving Hakuno blinking at the aftermath.
I… even if that was a weakness, I seem to have underestimated the gem's power, she thought as she looked over the slowly disintegrating mess, before focusing back on the fight.
Mitsuru and Akihiko were doing well, Mayas that were not attacking their fellows were noticeably crispy and sluggish. It seemed that after setting the remaining Mayas on each other, the two Persona users had decided to just bombard them with impunity.
After one last flash of Zio, the armored form of Penthesilea darted forward, spearing the remaining red masked Merciless Maya on its blade. Mitsuru didn't pay it any attention, instead focusing on checking the team's condition and nodding approvingly at Hakuno's pristine form before commanding them to continue. Hakuno quickly took her place next to Mitsuru while Akihiko took a moment to check the quickly disappearing enemy remains before continuing down the hallway the Mayas had entered.
It took Hakuno another moment to realize what Akihiko had actually been doing, as while she was used to 'dungeon diving' she was also used to the spoils automatically uploading on her portable terminal at the end of a battle. Just one more change she had to remember.
The next group of Shadows they ran into consisted merely of two Muttering Tiaras in a cramped hallway. The disembodied heads were promptly crushed, Akihiko's sudden charge taking them by surprise after which the boxer kept slamming them around, not letting them recover. Hakuno was almost impressed by how he grabbed a Tiara by its crown (revealing that the headdress was a solid part of the Shadow's body) and repeatedly applied his knee to its face, if the other one hadn't used the time to get off an Agi spell in his general direction, however Mitsuru encased the offending Tiara in a block of ice with a Bufu in retaliation. Luckily Akihiko's wounds weren't bad and Mitsuru could treat them with a simple application of Dia, even if the healing spell wasn't her specialty.
Soon after they ran into the activated Access Point, the small golden machine giving off a slightly lighter shade of green light compared to the Block's normal lighting. After Hakuno checked that there were no Shadows lying in wait nearby, they walked into the teleporter one-by-one, leaving Hakuno for last as she was the most likely to survive a sudden attack even if she were alone.
15.3.2009
Iwatodai Dorm, Hakuno's POV
As I lay down on my 'bed,' I feel myself fill with a certain nostalgia. Exploring Tartarus felt really similar to exploring the Chimeric Lunar Sea in the Moon Cell, what with the endless corridors and empty rooms with the occasional monster here and there. Of course, the Enemy Programs didn't crowd nearly as much as the Shadows seemed to do. And the programs were much stronger than the Shadows, at least what we faced today. Even I could kill one easily with a spell gem, though did that speak of the gems power or the Shadows' weakness? According to my internal database Cowardly Mayas were practically the weakest Shadows recorded, only showing a little power with… magic?
I actually stopped for a little while to review my memories of the fight. I don't think the Mayas used magic even once today, not even during the relatively lengthy battle against Mitsuru and Akihiko. They seemed to prefer swarming the target and then slashing at it with their claws. Should I add my analysis on the Cowardly Maya Information Matrix?
Probably not. Mitsuru made these entries with Penthesilea's sensory ability and she and Akihiko have done this for years, maybe today was the exception, not the norm? But there still isn't any real combat data here… And those two were clearly aware that the Cowardly Mayas would focus on anything that attacked them first, that was their whole battle plan. Why is there no mention of that?
Really, this whole thing was starting to feel… amateurish. I mean maybe they would tell all this to the new recruits at training so that's why they don't put it in the files, but then there was the whole fighting thing too.
Its just… the Shadows were weak. That's a fact, but I don't really think Akihiko and Mitsuru were that much stronger. Polydeuces and Penthesilea too. Polydeuces needed a few shots with Zio to kill anything and Penthesilea didn't really create that much ice with Bufu. And her Marin Karin only hit a single target and didn't last all that long. Although to be fair, just a second's lowered guard was enough to destroy an enemy.
I should know, I've almost died too many times because of it: Dan's Archer, Robin Hood, had especially specialized on it, although Julius's Assassin Li Shuwen had done a good job of it too with his one hit kill Noble Phantasm. Then there was that time Rin and Lancer wrecked the Arena entrance with their trap. Oh, and let's not forget the mad chase for the Alices in their Reality Marble.
But that was because they had the power to do that. Clearly, Polydeuces and Penthesilea lack that power. As do their Masters, which is really troubling, considering how they actually fought the Shadows by themselves.
And wasn't that just a ridiculous notion? I mean in hindsight I should've realized, there are so many hints everywhere, but I just rationalized them away.
Personas are not "weapons" like Servants. They are supposed to be more like Noble Phantasms, trump cards to be called upon when your own power is not enough. That was the big deal with me trying to keep Saber manifested, what I was doing was like if Shinji had had Rider ferry him around Tsukumihara on the Golden Hind! This really is different from the Grail War.
I'm really glad about that.
So now, in the name of saving my batteries, Mitsuru is having me learn how to fight by myself. Not really a daunting task, thanks to ASW combat programming. Using my gun is literally just point-and-shoot and although I have to aim myself, the process is laughably easy with my HUD calculating the trajectories. The rest is just trying to not get killed, which I already have excessive experience with.
Well, excessive when compared to Akihiko and Mitsuru at least. Or maybe not, those two have years of experience compared to my month. Except that my experience is with legendary her- Oh. Oh!
Maybe that's why everything seems so weak and unimpressive to me? I've been spoilt by the high level of the Grail War. Of course Akihiko would seem slow and clumsy when I'm comparing him to someone whose transcendent skill made a second strike needless. Of course Mitsuru's swordsmanship seemed lacking when compared to a Knight of the Round Table. Only the Masters were normal humans and they too were usually geniuses of some sort or other masters of their craft.
Thinking it like that, as a facsimile of an average human being I would have stood out a lot even if I wasn't an amnesiac back then.
Suddenly an annoyed presence makes itself known, originating from somewhere in my mind. Ah, I think I annoyed Saber with that last thought. However, the feeling fades quickly and is replaced by enveloping warmth. I think she's telling me to go to sleep already. Well, it's not like I'm in a hurry anyway, and if I close my eyes, it's a bit like Saber is here with me.