middleofsomewhere | A City Falls: Start

A City Falls: Start

Preparation

Just after light on the seventh day of the month of Bassoon everyone’s SCA glows with the colour of the void before showing a message. A briefing for the mission to come.

Anyone who goes to investigate the dressing carriage will find all the cupboards and drawers open. They may need to battle through spider webs but soon will find an array of clothes. Trousers, skirts, dresses, shirts, robes, cloaks. Everything they will need and plenty of choice. All the clothes have accents of team colours in more muted hues than the normal bold hoodies they wear.

A few hours later there is an announcement over the speakers. "Arrival to Planet #25768 imminent. Prepare for exit from Void. Drop order: Purple, Orange, Red, Blue. All passengers are to wear their Safety Control Apparatus and are reminded that emergency evacuation protocol is three short taps."

The train shudders and jerks. It is time.

Purple

"Purple Team to doors. Drop in two minutes. Purple team to doors."

The train flies down through the air before coming to a stop between two rocky outcrops. The doors hiss open, it’s a bit of a jump down to the ground and anyone who looks back will find the train hard to see. Not invisible but definitely cloaked, shifting to blend in with the rock.

They can hear the sound of many footsteps and the high sound of young voices. It is easy to hear where they need to be.

As they move down the rocky slope they will see the main pass. A large group of children are walking. Spirits are high even if it is clear they are on their guard. Older teens are wearing weapons, swords, the odd axe, a few daggers. Nothing expertly crafted but they all wear them with ease. Slightly younger children carry the very young, toddlers and those too young to walk and keep pace.

There’s a sound from in front of the group. From around the corner a girl, about thirteen years old, runs towards them. Her braids bounce against her shoulders, her eyes are wide with fear and she waves her hands at the others. “Run! Run!”

A shadow looms behind her, a winged wolf, gaining speed towards her. Sat on the wolf is a spear wielding goblin.

From all around them a growling of many more wolves, in the hills, close and ready to pounce.

Orange

Once Purple Team are gone the train flies again. "Orange Team to doors. Drop in two minutes. Orange Team to doors."

The train seems to be still concealed as it hovers at the city walls. There’s a bit of a jump onto the walls but at least they are near one of the staircases down into the city.

Also luckily no one seems to have seen them appearing out of no where though that has more to do with the general chaos rather than anything else!

There is a lot of chaos! People evacuating, animals everywhere, people looking lost and bewildered. Get herding or helping and encourage people up that cliff path!

Red

The train flies onward. "Red team to doors. Drop in two minutes. Red team to doors."

The train makes a slightly bumpy landing on a rocky slope. Scrambling up the slope red team will see a group of fighters, perhaps eighty in total. There are some supplies to the side, not yet allotted. Some horses and weapons. All the fighters are currently focused on a tall woman who is on horseback, facing them from the front.

“… Say those that stand here, as few as we may be were the ones who end the goblin menace on our lands for good. For our children and our families. We fight!”

The end of what was clearly a rousing speech, the fighters cheer. They begin to move over the slope, towards the goblin camp below. If you are joining this battle the time is now!

Blue

The train flies low, skimming over the lake. "Blue Team to doors. Drop in one minute. Blue Team to doors."

Jumping down off the train they will land in the shallows of the lake. It’s not deep enough to go over their boots and now too far to wade to shore. The shore is rocky, loose rocks and pools of water to avoid. The tower stands before them. Three goblins, riding wolves perch on the walls high above them. The sky above crackles with lightning that is not at all natural.

The doorway to the tower is open, there are a lot of stairs to get up. The howls of the wolves fill the air as the wizards fight them off above. Time to climb!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Preperation

So this was why they were on the train! To go and help people. He spend a long time reading the information really carefully. He can read it all, which he is surprised at. He thinks maybe it is in Italian, he has always been able to read all the letters in Italian and they don't use kanji so it's less tricky!

So he's got to go and protect some wizards why they do a ritual to stop some bad news goblins! It's a bit like a big prayer. One that needs everyone. That's alright, he knows how to do really good teamwork!

But first they have to put on different clothes. He picks some up and starts experimenting. Dressing up is always fun! But he has to make sure it is practical too if they are to go and help people!

Stairs!

He jumped off the train, splashing through the shallows as he ran to the tower. There were big wolves in the air, he was used to weird looking monsters but these look very different than ayakashi. They look more like the fire wolves on the volcano except they hadn't been real. These wolves were!

There are lots of stairs! He began jumping up them. He can jump high, it's not quite flying but it lets him clear quite a few steps at a time. Up and up and up and up!

Fight!

"Line! Line!" Two slashes of energy hit the wolves. They really don't do as much as they would have if these were ayakashi and it's getting tiring to keep attacking like this. These goblins really are bad news! He looks around, looking for somewhere he can help. Maybe he should try and find a weapon. He knows how to use a spear, mister D2 had been teaching him.

A wolf was flying in from the side. "Line!" This time it's a shield. He grits his teeth as he concentrates on it, not letting it fall. The wolf claws at it, it holds.

Right! That's how he can help! His borders are much better as shields than attacks! He will make sure none of these bad news goblins can hurt any wizards! Or his teammates!

Honestly, Madoka has no idea of what exactly she's going to do when she makes it up there - what can she do to fight those things off, really? But it's not like she can stay down there by herself, so she's also doing her best to run up the stairs as well as she can.

.. except then she notices Romeo and how he's managing to climb the stairs much faster, despite seeming like a preteen. And it seems like he's just.. jumping? But Madoka is pretty sure she could never jump high enough for that.

"A-- ah, sorry..!" She says, trying to draw his attention.

He pauses when he sees the girl with pink hair talking at him. "Are you okay? There's a lot of stairs isn't there!"

Many many stairs and he slows in his jumping. It's important they get up there to help but also he doesn't want to leave anyone else behind and she's quite little even if she's bigger than him!

"Y.. Yes, there really are." And it's obvious that while Madoka is trying her best to get up them as fast as she can, it's pretty exhausting for a normal teenage girl. Her breath is a little uneven as she speaks, although she's trying to put on a brave face.

"I was just wondering how you're managing to get up them so quickly.. Or maybe it's just that I'm slow."

"I don't think you're slow!" He smiles at her, "You're doing your best! I can jump really well 'cause I'm lighter than most kids but you're doing really good running!"

He wants to keep her spirits up and help her get to the top! He won't leave her behind. "I'll run with you and we can get to the top together!"

Her jaw drops slightly at the last part he says.

"Ah.. A-Are you sure?" Look at you, Madoka, now you're even holding up kids that are still slightly younger than you! Not that it isn't incredibly sweet of him to offer, but she feels a little bad.. "I don't want to hold you back from getting to a safe place quickly.."

"I won't leave you behind! We're a team and good teamwork means sticking together!"

He's lucky that he's had good practice being in a good team! And he knows that you never leave people behind! It's a very important rule. He reaches out for her hand. "Come on, let's run together!"

"Y.. Yes!"

Team spirit is at the very least an idea that Madoka can very much get behind. She wants to be a good part of the team as well! So when Romeo holds out his hand like that, she reaches back until they're holding hands. She quickly starts running too to make sure she won't just drag him further behind as well. Thank god that all that running in Witches' dimensions prepared her for this a bit.

"I wonder how far up it still is.."

"I don't know! It's lots of stairs though!"

Many many stairs but they can run and soon they will get to the top! It was important that they got up and were able to help the wizards because that was their job!

He held on tightly, making sure not to drag her. Together they would get all the way to the top!

Although Madoka only has a regular teenage girl's stamina and speed, she's still doing her best to at least not give up and keep on running, even as she's slowly starting to get more tired as they keep running. But she's pretty sure everyone is already ahead of them by now, so she feels like can't stop and make them only lag even further behind.

At least it feels a little less bad knowing there's someone right here with her. Although he seems so young.. So she can't help but wonder-- "U.. um.. Once we get up there, do you have a way of dealing with those goblins..?"

She knows not to underestimate people based on appearances (that's what the whole magical girl thing is about, after all!) so for all she knows, Romeo could be some amazingly powerful wizard. But he could also just be a regular boy, in which case the responsibility would fall onto her to make sure he wasn't in direct danger, right?

"Um I learned how to use a spear! But I don't got a spear..." He's slowed a little naturally. He's got lots of energy by default of being young and enthusiastic, but it's still a lot of stairs!

"I can make borderlines though and I know how to throw them so they are like fighting!"

For a moment Madoka glances at Romeo like he grew a set of extra limbs while still running. It's not as if she's totally doubting the other's capabilities here, but.. the idea of someone as young and tiny as Romeo using a spear is kind of wild.

(Sure, she's seen it from Kyouko, but.. she's a magical girl, she doesn't count!)

"Borderlines..? I don't think I've ever heard of that before.."

"They make a wall so nothing can get through and eat you!"

They were almost near the top now! All that running had been worth it!

"So if the bad goblins try and get us I can keep us safe!"

"That's amazing.."

It's still a little confusing to try and visualise it inside of her mind, but just that last part by itself makes it amazing. Despite being in her general age category, Romeo is so much more impressive than her already.

"I-- I'm sure you could do so much for the wizards here with that..!" Since protecting them was supposed to be their mission, right?

"I hope so! I'll try and keep all the wizards safe." He grinned at her. "Do you know how to fight?"

Hopefully between them they could help everyone as best as they could!

That makes her look a little guilty. She glances ahead, like she's trying to mentally calculate whether they're maybe just close enough that they'll arrive there in a time that she can still avoid having to answer that, but it seems they're just a little bit too far off still.

So instead she slowly answers.

"N.. No, I don't." Which shouldn't be a thing a regular 14 year old girl should feel shameful about, and yet here Madoka is, looking exactly like that. "It seems like I'm one of the only ones who can't.."

"That's alright! I didn't know either until mister D2 taught me!" There was no shame in not knowing something, as long as you learned and did your best!

"I can't teach you borderlines but if we find a spear or a stick I can teach you how to fight with it!"

He was sure he knew enough now to teach someone else and Elfnein always said that teaching others was a good way to practice.

D2..? That's.. a rather odd name for a person, but Madoka is both too polite to say that out loud and too distracted by their current situation anyway. But the suggestion he makes is something worth considering even as they're running. Being taught by someone slightly younger than her is slightly embarrassing - not due to pride necessarily, but since it makes her feel like she should have been on that level to begin with.

On the other hand, what other options does she have? But..

"Well.. Right now we have a lot of other things to worry about.."

Like, you know. The tower being under attack. Who knows if it'll be under attack the entire time they'll be here?

"S-So it's alright. You should be careful and try to help protecting the people up here.."

Well yes, there wasn't time for training right now because the goblins were attacking! But he would stick with her and keep her safe until she learned to fight herself!

"I will be careful and I'll help protect everyone! We can protect everyone together alright! Because team work is really important!"

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A City Falls: Start

Blue

stairs

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