A Tale of Two Cities

*She draws her two guns and smirks.*

Roger<Hold on there, Miss. Negotiations are a delicate situation. The kidnappers will almost surely expect you to try and get out of the deal. A liar's curse is that he can never trust another person. If you want to negotiate from a position of force, you'll need something...less conventional.>
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*Lilith steps in the elevator as well, which gives a loud groan. Thiera presses the door close button, then the button for the basement.*

T"There are multiple generator systems for various things in my house. The system that powers the machines which run the elevators is off-site. So, even if every other power system fails, they can still run, so long as the elevator has its individual circuit to register commands."

*At the bottom, the elevator opens up into an enormous cavern. Zell can see the outline of stage lights above, but they don't flicker on.*
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*Vega wakes up to find that his gloves & mattress are all missing.*

*She shrugs and holsters the guns.*

Topaz: <I don't know anyone that can help me besides Thiera Psyche.>

[When did I fall asleep?]

"Why didn't they take the manuscript that I'm sure has been talking to me?"

"I had no idea this place was directly below us." Zell said, "I remember you talking about working with, or on, the megadeī before, but I had figured it was somewhere away from... your basement." She finished, taking a look around.

*Thiera flicks a switch as Noctis realizes she's wading through water. She finds herself right in front of one of the many eyes of a giant eel before electricity shoots from the switch to its mouth & the lights go off again.*

L"...I have located the cause of the power outage."
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Roger<...Let me cut right to the chase: I know you have a Megadeus.>
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*As he looks at it, he swears he can see the tomato doodle whispering, "Memories & tomatoes, memories & tomatoes...."*

*Vega takes the manuscript and stuffs it under the couch cushions.*

"I liked it better when typewriters were the only thing I had to worry about talking to me."

[My career as an exterminator was short lived.]

*Vega leaves locking the door behind him wondering how he'd go about reporting a stolen mattress.*

Noctis looks at the giant eel, then at the water, "I am most definitely in the wrong RP, screw this shit, its lack of yuri, and its giant monster eels." She says before disappearing into the shadows.

--

Zell looks at the giant eel and nearly faints.

T"That was...what? ...Aamon, it has to be Aamon!"

*The eel becomes visible again as it charges a blast of electricity in its mouth. Thiera tosses the flashlight to Zell.*

T"Find a Megadeus & get in!"

*She herself begins running up a catwalk.*
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*Once outside, he finds tire tracks, leading towards the dam.*

*Vega follows the tracks.*

Topaz: <You people have been too busy stalking me. Okay. Fine. So?>

"What do you mean find a mega--" She is cut off by the sight of the giant eel being incredibly, fucking scary. "Fucking have to find a fucking something!" She said, running in some random direction away from the giant, scary monster. After a few seconds she comes across the Megadues from before, the one that almost killed her. Without a second thought she hopped in and hoped that it would protect her from the eel, which was still doing a good job at being on a level of scary that was just fucking ridiculous.

*Lilith herself jumps absurdly high, landing in another Megadeus. The next thing everyone knows, Basilisk plows into the side of the eel, cutting it in half. Two more eel heads raise out of the water, charging electricity in their mouthes.*
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Roger<While I'm handling the negotiations, you come in with the Megadeus, causing confusion among Beck & his lackies.>
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*He finds a red van parked near the dam.*

*Vega approaches the back, peering in the windows.*

Zell sees the other eels and screams, "There are more of them." As she screams the cockpit slams shut on her and she feels the Megadues slowly come to life.

*In the van, he sees his mattress, with the gloves sitting on top. He then feels a gun at his back.*

Nasly voice<Looking for something?>
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*Lilith punches out, jackhammering one of them into oblivion. Basilisk coils around to the other, but it blasts the serpentine Megadeus with lightning.*

Thiera{His whole plan can't be the eels. It's too easy a win for us.}

Topaz: <...That's something I could have done without the--fine.>

"What gave it away? Was it the peeking in the windows? It was the peeking in the windows, wasn't it?"

Zell finally stopped screaming and looked around her. On the glass she could see a sentence scrolling across on a loop. "Cast in the name of God: Ye not guilty." Zell read out loud slowly. "It is almost like what they tell executioners..." Before she could continue she felt herself something wrapping around her legs. A quick look down showed that what looked like metal straps were wrapping around her legs, with three bars at each foot, one under her heel, and another under her toes, and one on top of her mid foot. "Pedals?" She asked, "What is going--" She was cut off by the same thing happening to her arms, only instead of bars at her hands it was gloves, or, what felt like gloves. She couldn't really tell.

What she did know was that her slightest move was replicated by the Megadues. "This is insane..." She thought out loud. Just then one of the eels raised its head and glared at her, looking mighty fucking scary. Zell tensed and back into her chair, as if realizing her fear the megadeus lunged back thanks to a set of thrusters, and shot out a volley of lasers at the eel, obliterating it.

Zell looked around at her surroundings, "Was, did I do that?" As if in response the screen in front of her read again, 'Cast in the name of God: Ye not guilty.' Just under that read, 'Mirror Zero', in a much smaller font size. "Well, you nearly killed me before, I guess this makes us even."

*The next thing to emerge from the water are several branches from a tree that look to be made of stone, with large, fanged mouthes on the end of each branch. One darts towards Zell, growing several smaller branches as it goes. Lilith takes the chainsaw to one of the branches, but it just bounces off.*
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???<Shut up, fool. Beck, what should we do with him?>

Beck<Just knock him out, you moron, they're coming.>

*The man pistol whips Vega in the back of the head. On the ground, he can see that the man with the gun is a short, portly pale man with long, greasy black hair, while Beck is a man with blond hair & a similar goatee in an all-yellow suit. A black limo drives up & a man with slicked black hair in a black suit & sunglasses steps out.*

???<I have the money & I came alone, as we agreed. Now, where is the hostage?>

Beck<Hmm...where's the other one?>

???<Other one?>

Beck<Never mind. Here.>

*The man drags Topaz's bound-&-gagged brother out of the passengar seat.*

Zell throws her hands in front of her face, or tries to. As she does Mirror Zero does the same, only its right arm splits at the forearm and rotates to brandish what looked like a sword with a bladed edge made from energy, not unlike the lasers she shot out just seconds ago. Doing her best to keep calm and control her megadeus, Zell sidestepped the branch quickly, and sliced at it with her energy blade.

"Ow... You don't have to be so rough."

*Topaz in standing by in her Megadeus.*

[Should I wait for a sign or...?]

Beck<Shut up!>

*Beck kicks him in the side.*

Roger<Huh? Who is that?>

Beck<None of your business, just hand over the money.>

*Roger pulls out his briefcase. Opening it, he shows it to be filled with money.*

Roger<How do I know you'll play this by the books, Beck?>
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*The tree makes a horrifying screeching noise out of all of its mouthes as the branch is cut off & cauterized. A dozen more branches shoot towards her. One starts eating Basilisk head-first, seeming only mildly phased by its electric shocks. Lilith grabs another branch & starts pounding it with the jackhammer, which seems to be slowly cracking it, before two more branches approach her from behind.*

L{To make several giant monsters, he must be getting a lot of protein from somewhere. Most likely, he is using animals, or....}

T{...Are you suggesting the tree-monster is made out of people?}

"You're not very good at this, are you? You were told to knock me out and instead you just knock me down."