[X] Plan: Get The Damn Book And Go
Two explosions cause the building you're standing on to rock; one off in the distance, to your east; the other much closer, to the south, but only just barely. You can't see much from this distance, so it's up to Archer to relay the news to you. "Target eliminated," he says. "It doesn't look like her forces are dispersing any, but thankfully Rider and Berserker are doing what they can to keep them from entering the building."
That's good to hear. You look towards Matou Sakura; she's currently blasting at airborne familiars alongside her sister and your aunt. You don't see on her any way she could be carrying Twardowski's Mirror. "Let's hope they're able to hold off the rest of Sidonia's forces. I don't want to think about what could happen if one of her smarter familiars were able to get in and get their hand son that book."
You crane your head towards the sky, scanning for more incoming aerial familiars. Instead, what you see is the mighty flying battleship of Ramesses II, bombarding the workshop of Sidonia with its solar laser beams. Each beam kicks up a massive explosion as it makes contact with the church and the ground around it, and if they're big enough to cause the earth to shake where you re, you can't imagine how bad it must be for the environment at ground zero.
As if it could be worse than what Sidonia is doing.
"Kirika!" You hope your voice reaches your sister amid the din of battle, but it takes you until you've downed the incoming-most familiar near you before you can spare a moment to turn your head towards her to confirm. "Get Matou Sakura to tell you where she put Twardowski's book, and go get it for me!"
Kirika isn't able to spare the time to respond, until she herself has managed to slash her way through the familiars that are crowding her. But once she finally manages to- "Are you crazy, sis?" she shouts back. "You want me to head back down there? Where all the creepy-crawlies are?"
Another incoming familiar forces you to tear your attention away from Kirika. You take aim, loosing your frozen payload at the same time as one of Tohsaka-san's gemstones explodes in the air. Your projectile meets the gemstone's glittering magic dust, flash-freezing several nearby familiars in a single shot. "Is it really any worse than what's up here?" you reply. "At least if you're down there, you're getting that book out of reach of Sidonia's forces, and we can pull Berserker and Medusa back!"
That is what finally manages to convince Kirika; the thought of pulling her servant back and deploying him in a more advantageous position, one where he can actually use his greatest assets rather than be stuck defending a building where an old book was left behind. "Got it," Kirika says, before dashing off to convene with Matou Sakura, who is currently in the process of mowing down aerial familiars alongside your Aunt Illya.
But that still leaves a few more people…
"Tomoe-san, feel free to have everyone that's with you go all-out if they can manage. I don't care what it takes. We'll be there with reinforcements and to refresh your Soul Gems soon."
"Thank you, Akemi-san. But do hurry; I don't know how long the three of us will be able to hold out if you're late."
You'll try your best to not be late, but you won't put it past Sidonia to throw something else your way. But until then, you can only do what you can. "Oriko, get in touch with Nurse Ortensia if you can, and tell her and Assassin to head towards Tomoe-san's apartment. They're still under siege and could use some help breaking it."
"Of course, Akemi-san. I'll get in touch with her right away."
You make sure to thank Oriko for taking care of her cousin for you, because you still have one more person you need to coordinate with. "Archer, I've got Kirika making a run back to our building to grab Twardowski's book. Cover her. If things start looking a little too hectic, feel free to open fire with whatever you feel is appropriate."
"You're really sending her back there?" Archer asks. "I… I'll support her, but you'd better know what you're doing, Homura. What about your group?"
"If we look like we're about to be overrun without Kirika-" Which you sincerely doubt, since she's just one person and this has so far been a largely aerial battle, "-then feel free to open fire on the familiars that are coming after us, with whatever you feel is appropriate. But if we can secure Twardowski's book, we won't need Berserker or Medusa to hold the line anymore, and we can reposition them somewhere they'll be more useful; like Tomoe-san's building, or the Saints' base. That's what I'm hoping for."
As you see Kirika heading out, you force yourself to concentrate: on specific memories, of Archer, your father who loves you and Kirika, and who will do anything to keep the two of you safe; of your friends and family, both circles which you consider Kirika to fall squarely into; and of your teammates, because what else is Kirika to you right now, but one of the people fighting alongside you to save the world?
A cacophony of *Pop*ing sounds echo in your ear, on repeat, as though part of a song you keep skipping back to, and you're left surrounded by a horde of small familiars. The ones shaped like you in their folded-metal Archer-shaped armour, and the five troublemakers who take the shape of you nd your teammates. "Go," you say, directing your 'children' to assist in the fighting. "Head to whichever other groups we're closest to, and help them in whatever way they need you to."
The tin soldiers do nothing, standing there stock-solid, while the five in Quintet-shape stand around giggling to each other. You don't have time for this. You shoot down another incoming vampire familiar, and bark your orders at them again, this time adding a certain caveat. "Do it, and I'll make sure you get as many hugs and as much juice as you want after we're done here."
That does the trick. The familiars wearing your shape and Oriko's shape head off west, hot on Kirika's trail as they drag a small detachment of tin soldiers with them; while the familiars shaped like Tomoe-san and Kyouko head southeast, bringing with them another detachment to help break Tomoe-san's siege. Atop your icy, spider-shaped familiars, several others ride into battle, skittering along on their spindly little legs to join the rest of their respective detachments.
Only the Kirika familiar stays behind; not obstinate, not disobeying your orders, it throws itself into the battle on its own, drawing up tiny little claws, more like folded paper toys than actual weapons, and it joins the battle alongside Oriko. "Goodness, Akemi-san, I didn't know these little things were so eager."
Oriko is managing to keep herself calm and collected, as her drones shift rapidly from defensive walls to breaking apart and returning fire on the familiars that try to come close. She turns her drones around, blasting at several Skrzak that are trying to approach from the flanks, before reforming the barrier in front of you and she to deflect the sonic scream of one of the vampires. Tohsaka-san deals with that one.
"I told them to help whichever group they were closest to, but it looks like they just picked whichever group had their favourite person in it," you reply. It's the only explanation for why they broke off in the manner that they did.
Kirika landed on the roof with a pained grunt. The landing had been a bit too far down for her liking, not to mention the fact that she'd been forced to land in a less-than-ideal position thanks to an unlucky strike from an airborne familiar. She flicked her claws, sending a splatter of black sludge streaking across the roof from where they had found their mark. Moments later, after Kirika had picked herself up, the remains of a vivisected vampire familiar collapsed in a heap on the roof behind her.
Kirika tore her eyepatch off, stuffing it into the pocket of her costume, as she looked out at the massive horde of familiars that had the place surrounded. "Damn," she whispered to herself. Her eyes caught sight of a massive crater in the center of the sieging force. "That must be where Sidonia's puppet was standing before dad blew it the fuck up," she said.
"All right, time to get to work!" Kirika skipped over to the other side of the roof, and stared down. Fortunately, this side of the building was less besieged. These was no entrance here; except…
With all the grace of an Olympic gymnast, Kirika slung her body over the edge of the roof, angling her descent just so that she slipped in through the window of the upstairs residence. Going in through the front, where Berserker and Matou's Rider were still fighting, wouldn't have been possible for her, not without getting seriously injured; "And then dad'd kill me…" Kirika scoffed to herself, retracting her claws and slipping her hands into her pockets as she strolled through the upstairs residence. "Then again, he and mom'll probably kill me anyways if they find out I wasn't joking about not being a virgin; so it's like, six of one, half-dozen of another, right?"
But Kirika wasn't alone inside the building. Quickly, she drew out her claws, and her eyes shot back and forth. "Shit-!" she whispered. "How the fuck did one of them get in here? I thought Berserker and that other lady were-" She didn't have time to finish that thought. The wall to her left caved in, and a winged vampire charged at her, teeth and claws bared. "You slippery little fuck-"
Kirika had to move fast, thrusting with the claws in her left hand. They stuck, impaling the familiar through the hand as it tried to swipe. Its mouth opened wide, blasting Kirika with an ear-piercing sonic scream. Kirika ducked underneath the beam, sweeping her legs underneath the familiar's and causing it to stumble, altering the course of the blast and forcing it into the ceiling.
Kirika slipped her claws out of the familiar's hand as debris carved loose from the sonic blast fell onto the familiar's head, dazing it just long enough for Kirika to deliver the killing blow, thrusting her claws into its chest, before dragging them out and in one quick motion decapitating it. "Not so tough when you're not able to fly around like an annoying little fucker, are you?"
The defeated familiar dissolved into a puddle of bubbling black sludge, and Kirika winced as the sludge cooked a hole through the wooden floorboards. "Shit," Kirika swore to herself as she peered down through the hole. An almost perfect hole had been cooked, right from the kitchen in the upstairs residence, looking straight down onto the bed her parents shared. "Mom and dad'll be pissed when they see this."
"All right, gotta find that stupid book Sidonia wants…"
Leaping over the hole above her parents' bedroom, Kirika continued on her search, making her way to the guest bedroom currently occupied by Matou Sakura; and there- "Got it!" Twardowski's Mirror lay on the floor of the guest room, its pages opened from its fall, likely during the initial earth tremors, and she could see some damage on its spine from when it had fallen. Carefully, Kirika picked the book up, holding her breath that the book didn't fall apart in her hands.
Its ancient pages opened up to reveal an intricate diagram that, to Kirika, looked uncomfortably like the one she and Oriko had used to summon their servants. Just as carefully, she turned the page. She couldn't read any of what was written on the pages. It was all in Polish, and Kirika's understanding of any language besides Japanese was tenuous at best. She knew she was failing English, and that was before she decided to skip school for an entire week. "Mom's gonna kill me when she's sees what I got on that last test…" she said to herself.
"Oriko's so lucky… How come she gets to take a language she's already good at, while I'm failing English even when I try to do the work?"
It was enough to make Kirika want to tear her hair out. But she restrained herself, because doing that would mean impaling her claws straight through her skull. She'd survive, of course; as long as nothing broke the citrine-coloured diamond clasped to her waistcoat's back, nothing could actually kill her. But with her claws still slick with the black corruption from the defeated familiar, sticking them into her head would just cause her a lot of pain as the corruption seeped into her brain.
"So why don't I just stick my claws through this stupid book so we can be done with this?" she asked herself, as she continued to stare at Twardowski's Mirror. "Oh yeah, 'cause then dad's one friend'd get mad at me. Something about this book being super-valuable…" Kirika sneered at the open book, but pocketed it anyway, stuffing it into the folds inside her waistcoat rather than tearing it to shreds with her claws. "Who fucking cares if this thing's valuable to a bunch of crusty old mages, anyway? After all the trouble it's caused us-"
Again, Kirika didn't have time to finish her thought. The earth shook, and she was thrown to the floor, hitting her head on her way down. "Ow~" Making sure to dispel her claws, Kirika clutched at her head, as a pounding voice echoed in her mind's ear.
"Dearest, are you all right?" That wasn't just a voice- That was Oriko! "I saw an explosion coming from the direction of Akemi-san's building. Is everything all right where you are?"
"I hit my head pretty bad on the way down," Kirika replied. "But I'm… Still good to get back, I think. Tell sis that I got that stupid book, and I'll try to get back there as soon as I-"
Again, Kirika was thrown to her feet. At least the fall hadn't been from her previous head injury, which she was grateful for, but this was getting annoying. "Sorry, Oriko, I'm gonna have to call you back after I find out what the hell's going on."
Kirika pulled herself up to her feet, and tried to make her way to a window so she could see what was going on- "Oh…"
What she saw was not at all good. "Master, if you can hear me, please inform the others that Medusa and I are requesting immediate backup."
Kirika could see her Berserker, and Matou Sakura's Rider, engaging in fierce combat with one of Sidonia's giant serpents. The earth shook with each thrash of the serpent's body as it crashed into the surrounding buildings, and Kirika was once again thrown to the floor. "Hey, Oriko, can you tell sis that Sidonia's pulled out the big guns? 'Cause something tells me we might be a bit late trying to break the siege on Tomoe's place."
[ ] Wat do?
