1647/The Witch from Mars

The Witch from Mars
Date of Scene:	08 June 2024
Location:	Tokyo - Docks
Synopsis:	Amy brings some friends along on a Witch hunt. Katsuko is also there. Taro sits out, but the Backstreet Slasher joins them in the Labyrinth! Witch weirdness ensues, with a space-themed Labyrinth populated by cat familiars with fishguns and a fight against the Witch Jaidyn on the surface of Mars!
Cast of Characters:	Amanda Faust, Yuuto Shiraishi, Taro Yamada, Madoka Kaname, Katsuko Takezaki, Usagi Tsukino

---

Amanda Faust has posed:
The Docks

     The party approaches a veritable maze of shipping containers, with 'POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS' tape discouraging entry. But Witch hunters can't let a little caution tape stop them.

    Amy figured it'd be easiest to sneak around after sundown. Hell of a way to spend a Saturday night...

    Deep, pure red Soul gem in hand in its 'egg' form, Amy follows a feeling through the area, sometimes just leaping up atop a wall of shipping containers and down the other side (princess carrying Taro if he needs the help.) Those who can sense dark energy or other forms of bad juju can definitely feel it too, although whatever Amy's doing seems to be more precise at tracking this target then a general 'dark energy sense.'

    Amy hops down into an area where something bad clearly went down. Those looking for them can see bulletholes or bullet impact pockmarks on some of the containers around here, as well as more visible giant claw marks that have torn through the steel.

    Especially on one particular empty container that's been knocked a bit askew.

    Well, as odd as that is, no one here is police. They're not here to investigate, today, but to put a cursed soul to rest before she can hurt any more people.

    And sure enough, Amy walks up to some seemingly random spot nearby, holding out her hand, and her hand dissapears in midair, the air around it seeming to 'ripple'. "Found it."

    The redhead pulls her hand back, takes a breath, and turns. "Okay. Uh, some of you are familiar, but just to be safe: The most important rule of Witches is 'Never enter a Witch's Labyrinth alone.'"

    She continues, "As best I can tell, we're going into some kind of pocket space adjacent to reality, shaped by the Witch. Uh... it'll pretty clearly be different once we get inside, but stuff doesn't just look weird: We can't count on everything working inside the way it does outside. Like, your magic will still work, and stuff, but I wouldn't count on, say, trying to map the labyrinth like a euclidean space even if monsters weren't attacking us at the same time. All the more reason not to get separated."

    "...As far as I can tell, anything we can actually interact with, besides the Witch herself, is a familiar, and they're generally pretty hostile. We might see, like... people-like things in the background and stuff, sometimes? But if they're not interacting with us they're just set dressing. Uh, any actual people who wandered in and are still alive will be obviously visually distinguishable."

    Amy looks upon the others assembled. "Man, it's been awhile. Um. Any questions before we go in?"

Yuuto Shiraishi has posed:
Already henshined into the Steampunk warrior Cascade, Yuuto checks the water blasters built into his armor's arms and listens to the briefing. He's not actually interacted with a witch before, but since it was dealing with the docks and possible water, he figured that it might be in his wheelhouse. "Not that anyone needs to be told to make sure I'm safe, but so noone freaks out, I'm also a merfolk." he offers, his attention on distortion on that is the witch's labyrinth.

"Can a Witch be purified?" he asks finally, really his only question - since he does have a purification attack, in case it's needed. A few breaths are taken in, and a few stretches, just to make sure he's ready to go when they enter.

Taro Yamada has posed:
Taro lets Amy princess carry him over the areas he can't climb easily - ugh, it'd be so EASY if he was in his true form, but he's not and he's keeping that in the bag, thank you very much - and anyway, he was a mere mortal in the realm of yoka- mahou, whatever. He'd save his strength. Survival came over pride any day of the week.

He looks up at the bullets and claw marks. Is it bad he feels nostolgic? It's been years since he got in a fight with mortals bad enough to get guns involved, but there was something about causing mayhem as an immortal being that was just... wonderful. It was good to know he had greater mountains of strength to climb, but he really did need to go menace someone. (Why were all the mahou teenagers, huh? It wasn't going to stop him, but the age difference did make him feel a little! Weird!)

"Is it bad I find it reassuring people will try and shoot monsters?" Taro says, hopping up on hies does to look at the claw marks. One hand grazes over it, trying to estimate the length of the arm that struck. It's quite a sight, the boy in Thursday the Twelth: Shopping Before A Big Day t-shirt looking over the crime scene curiously.

"So reality will act funny inside the barrier, all monsters are hostile, all humans are victims, and it'll be a pain to get out once we're in?"

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    Hope Blossom is here, as she often is whenever there are Witches to be hunted. Gretchen is hovering over her shoulder, arms crossed and mask covering her face. When Amy finds the Labyrinth entrance, the Witch Chara says, "Okay, you found the Witch. I'm going home now."

    Blossom asks, "Home as in my room, as in Homura's dorm, or as in your Labyrinth?"

    "Well Homu's cat isn't gonna get any funny ideas ambushing me so I guess the middle one!" declares the dark fairy, before vanishing into a portal of her own. Madoka gives the portal a sideways glance and a slight frown as Gretchen's presence rapidly moves away.

    To Cascade she responds, "You can use purification attacks on the Witch, but she won't be 'cleansed' that way. Most of the time it just does normal damage, but the rules can vary from one Witch to another."

Katsuko Takezaki has posed:
    <UNBEKANTE ENERGIE!>

    Katsuko was just wandering when she heard the alert, and she immediately find a spot to transform to investigate. She's flying up high, scanning for whatever the cause might be when she spies people sneaking past the police tape and lands on a nearby lamp post right when Amy opens up the Labyrinth. "Hello." The knight greets from her perch, kneeling a little as she looks down.

    "I guess my first question, if I'm allowed to ask questions, what's a Witch's Labyrinth. Second, can I help?" She twirls one of the tonfa she's holding casually, trying to be cool while also clearly younger than the rest of the lot. Perhaps compensating. Then she spies a familiar face, "Oh hey Gretchen!" She drops the cool act to just wave, "Glad to see you're feeling better."

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
Sailor Moon had come along with everyone because a Witch is always a threat worth facing with company - and, even beyond that, it was... was good the right word, for a bit of normal mahou-ing? Either way, she's been following along as Amy guides them to the Labyrinth entrance, thinking to herself that really, it would be cool if she could sense things, but nooo, Mamochan, Rei-chan, Mako-chan, and even Kaiou-san were the ones who got to sense things, not her.

She's a little startled, when the Device Mage shows up, standing up on a lamp post - a tall thing, as Mamoru would have put it - and asking questions.

"It's like a pocket dimension made by a Witch, which is a type of monster," she says brightly, "We're going into fight the Witch, because she's what's probably causing all these problems."

Amanda Faust has posed:
> KATSUKO: What's a Labyrimth? Can I help?
    Amy looks up at her and blinks. "In reverse order: Yes, you can help. And besides what I just said... like... it's a pocket reality controlled by... it's a... it's a closed space outside reality controlled by the Witch, which is a sort of... powerful curse-monster that drives people to suicide and feeds off their deaths. Actually fighting it means going into its realm and fighting it there. Extremely dangerous alone, and impossible without magic."

    "...Pretty dangerous in a group and with magic, but... we've survived several of these so far, so..."

> YUUTO: Can a Witch be purified?
    The flicker of the beginning of a wince hits Amy's face, but... well, Gretchen's got it. Amy nods at her summary.

> TARO: Is it bad I find it reassuring people will try and shoot monsters?
    Amy shrugs. "I should hope so. The thing is, we're in Japan, so who even has guns?" She follows his gaze to look over the battle damage around them, and furrows her brow as she walks over to it. And then sees more. And more.

    "...So far only one policeman has turned up dead. And this wasn't from fighting the Witch," she waves a hand at the containers. "since there'd be no outside effect from that. This is an awful lot of shots for one dude to fire with a pistol, in a battle that would have lasted how long?" She folds her arms and holds her chin thoughtfully.

    Then shakes her head. "...Well, we deal with the biggest, most immediate danger, for now."

    She walks back over to the labyrinth entrance. "Anything else, before we go in?"

    Once things are sorted, she looks to the newcomers: "It is okay if you changed your mind. No one should judge you for not wanting to deal with this." before walking in herself.

Yuuto Shiraishi has posed:
There's a nod of his head as Cascade gets the information from Gretchen. "Right, got it. But that's okay. Still going to help. Amy-kun's a friend and I'm happy to help her." he offers as he hears Taro's comment on guns. "They're water based projectiles, to be fair. Can be normal water or purifying. But well... I guess gun works well..."

A cubby male fairy with coveralls and a beard and a wrench shows up at that. "Don't you be callin' 'em guns, lad! These are percision weapons made specifically to work with your unique physiology and abilities!"

"Sorry, sorry!" Yuuto gets a little sweatdrop. "There's no need to improve them!" he quickly adds.

"Are ye sure?" he asks, a gleam in Tinker's eyes.

"No? Yes, I mean I'm sure!" A clearing of his throat as Sailor Moon arrives. At least this time he doesn't mistake her for Sailor V. Sailor V wears a mask.

Taro Yamada has posed:
"If more cops died, there'd be more of a fuss, especially with all the other weird stuff going on. Could be the Yakuza? Can mahou use guns? Can witches?"

He could tank a shot in his true form, but he'd rather not test it like this. Ugh, he's going to try and stay in his human form as this all goes down, but survival comes over pride every time.

(He's sure if Jack was here, he could feel what was waiting for them. But he isn't, so Taro doesn't. He just has the weight in the pit of his stomach that comes from anticipation of a fight.)

"Ranged attacks are ideal, especially if this thing's got claws this big," he tells Cascade.

And he waves to Gretchen and Sailor Moon as they appear - "I'm the human plus one. If things get hairy, I'll get out of your ways so you don't worry about collateral damage."

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    "She's not feeling that much better," says Hope Blossom to Katsuko. "That's why she's going home. I take it you've met Gretchen-chan? She's one of my Chara, one particularly good at sniffing out Witches, but I told her that she could sit out of combat until she gets better, so...." She trails off, then offers the tonfa girl a soft smile. "... anyways. My name's Hope Blossom. Little fairies like Gretchen are a part of my magic. It's a pleasure to meet you!"

    Gretchen pokes her head out of her own portal and waves at Katsuko before vanishing again. A careful observer might notice that her tiny little fairy hands now have Cheeto dust on them.

    To Taro, Hope says, "Well, sometimes mahou use guns, but not often. I don't recommend it unless you really know what you're doing. Normal bullets don't do much against even the weakest youma unless you enchant them in some way."

    As Sailor Moon arrives, Hope Blossom smiles and waves at her, being friendly despite the danger in the air. She summons her branch bow and shakes her head at Amy. "I'm good to go when you are. Let's all stay safe, okay? Stay behind us if you need to." Then the Chara Bearer hops into the portal to the Witch's Labyrinth, while her dark fairy stays outside feeling uneasy.

Katsuko Takezaki has posed:
    I'm in." Katsuko offers, jumping down to land on the ground. Touching down in a gentle manner that makes it obvious she was flying. "I'm Katsuko Takezaki, nice to meet you." She introduces herself by her actual name with no hesitation, then twirls her tonfa, "And this Zwillingrute." <GUTEN ABEND> The device's voice rings out, and she glances to the others. Taro says ranged attacks are ideal, and she just glances to her device. "Yeah I met her, she was uh... having an issue with rainbows." Katsuko answers Hope Blossom vaguely. "Zwillingrute doesn't really seem to trust her for some reason, but she seems fine." She waves to Gretchen when the Chara pops in briefly. "Let's go?" She asks.

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
"Anyone can use a gun if you can find one," Sailor Moon says, shooting Taro a look, because - "Not to criticize but... should we really be bringing you into a Labyrinth? The last time I came into a Labyrinth with somebody who didn't have magic, he almost died like three times."

And only hadn't because he was lucky, and Hannah and Coco both were there with their defensive abilities. Madoka might distantly remember that - she'd wisely chosen not to enter the Labyrinth that Hinote followed her into.

It's not that she doesn't know mundane people can be a great asset - of course she does, Naru's her roommate. But uh, there's an asset and then waltzing into a Witch's labyrinth.

"Like, everything wants to kill you in a Labyrinth, and I don't know if you'd be able to get out on your own. But I guess if you're still going..."

She absolutely does not like it, but, it's not like she's going to let him die. She recognizes him, of course, even if it's been a while, and the guy who fed stray cats is not... well... you can't judge a book by it's cover, but also, he's the one who said he wasn't magic!

She waves at Hope though, smiling a little to see her friend, and other than that, she really doesn't have any protests. They're here to kill a Witch, and - oh, that's Katsuko-chan! There's the veil breaking, making it easy to recognize the Device Mage as the new girl. Good thing she already knows Usagi is Sailor Moon.

"Well... we're all then, I guess. Let's get this handled, before anyone else gets hurt."

Amanda Faust has posed:
                             Witch's Labyrinth...?                              

    You're falling.

    You're falling!

    You stepped through the rippling distortion but now you're falling! Although, you don't feel air rushing past...

    The whitish void around the group rapidly starts to fill in as the world is... painted? into place.

    It kind of takes a moment for senses to recalibrate, especially those who have never done this before. Where reality should be, is some kind of watercolor painting? It's painting itself in, as if a team of sped-up giant painters were still finishing the scene. Within a couple of seconds, everything visible from 'here' is painted. There are... walls, and floors, and ceiling. Like the inside of some facility. It's kind of hard to tell if surfaces are concrete or paint or metal, since everything is... watercolors.

    As eyes adjust to seeing, it becomes clear, they're in a hallway, which goes... tens of feet? ahead, then through a large bulkhead door is a T-intersection hallway. Through an opposite doorway is a sort of garden, or hanging garden? Finer details are hard to make out given the aesthetic, but it seems like there's green leafy planty stuff, maybe.

    Periodically set in the walls are windows to the night sky.

    Oh, and you're still falling.

    ...The whole building must be falling with you?

    You're not actually pulled towards the floor or anything.

    However, here and there are handles within reach, set in the walls... and floor... and ceiling... spaced such that you could probably sort of fling yourself from one to another. It's almost like the building was designed for people to move through while it was falling. Weird!

    There is a uh... like someone sketched a cartoony blob-cat thing in ink and is flipbook-animating it, about the size of half a basketball, slowly moving this way along one of the walls. It doesn't seem to react to anything, but looking at it closely, one can see small runes floating near it:

https://radiantheartmush.com/File:Peacefulblobcat.png

    As people begin to move, a couple of other things become apparent:

    1. When close to the windows, the sky can be seen to have way too many stars in it. It's kinda like the sky some saw in the past. And on one side, the pale red moon is way too large in the sky. Also the artist forgot the rabbit...
    2. The hallway behind the group ends in a very heavy door with some kind of caution sign on it. You can probably guess vaguely the nature of the sign even without being able to read Witch runes:

https://radiantheartmush.com/File:Witch-mars-1-caution.png

    As people begin to explore further, more hallways and intersections are painted into place around them...

Amanda Faust has posed:
    (Amy nods at 'anyone can use guns'. At Katsuko's introduction, she blinks and cocks her head for a moment, confused before the veil lets her recognize... "Oh! Uh, it's me, Amy Faust. Good to see you again!")

    Oh shit, falling?! Amy tries to look for the ground she's falling towards, but... It isn't there until the walls are painted in, and then why isn't she hitting anything? She tumbles, spinning in place, before summoning and using her launcher to try and steady herself, although that still leaves her slowly spinning and drifting. It's nigh-impossible to float perfectly still! Then she sees one of the handles and grabs it, pulling herself against to the wall and pressing against it, looking around in confusion. Why is she falling? How is the entire Labyrinth falling?! What freaking Witch bullshit is it THIS time?

    She groans. "Okay, uh. So you can visually see how labyrinths tend to be, uh... yeah."

    She pushes off the wall and floats to a window, grabbing a nearby handle. "Are we falling towards the red thing? Is that the Witch? ...oh."

    She looks around, "Is everyone alright?" She experiments with very cautiously pushing off from one handhold to another while they get situated.

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
Falling.

Falling...

Falling!

Sailor Moon yelps and sort of flips end over end in the air once she realizes she's falling, making herself incredibly dizzy, and the world is a white void - no the world is a watercolor painting, slowly coming to life all around them.

"Ohhhhh," she groans, sound sea-sick, car-sick, motion-sick, all at once, flinging her arms out to try and stop the rotation and ending up spinning even more, like a top, bow flapping. "I hate this! I wish Labyrinths could be like, normal!"

But what's normal, for a Witch? For a Labyrinth? There's a floor, a ceiling, walls, a hallway, was that a garden, maybe - but still, falling. Without ever hitting anything.

Sailor Moon manages to catch her hand on a handle, ceasing her spinning before she succumbs to the final stage of motion sick, and just kind of clings there for a moment, green around the gills.

"We're in space," she proclaims, with the kind of surety that someone who lived in space can have. "But like, weird watercolor painting Witch space. I hate it. But that blobbycat isn't attacking us yet -" she points to it - "So that's a good sign, probably."

Taro Yamada has posed:
Taro considers the odds. He ponders. And then he wonders about if, once in the labrinth, he'll be able to transform unnoticed. In front of Amy, whos friendship he has just gained, and Sailor Moon, whose friendboy he had fed on some months previous.

"I got bit by some creature when I was a kid so I can see all kinds of magic, but I don't have any powers. I think I may sit tight here, peek my head in I get curious," Taro says sheepishly. "Sorry," he tells Amy. "This sounds interesting, but I think I'm gonna sit this one out if there may not be an easy way out. I'll keep watch out here."

.....and when they have all jumped in and gone, when they have all fallen - Only then does he take out the coffin with Dory the doll from his backpack and hold it to his chest. "I ate it all and it was very nice. Catch me if you can!"

His body warps up, up, bigger, wider. His clothing transforms into a brown cloak and a skintight straightjacket; his eyes glow red under his hood as he stalks forward.

He hooks the coffin to his belt and dives in. Time to see what kind of monsters the mahou stalked!

Yuuto Shiraishi has posed:
Along with the rest of the group, Cascade steps into the labyrinth and finds himself falling and falling - and he fights off transforming, because really, the merfolk form would do nothing, but the air feels like it should be swimmable or someting and it's just odd and off-putting as he finds himself in the technicolor/watercolor nightmare.

As they land, and Sailor Moon makes the proclomation that they're in space, Cascade ohs. "So this is like... some nightmare space station?" No chest bursting aliens, please.

Taking one of the handholds to steady himself, he takes a couple of breaths to steady himself as the blobcat is pointed out, but the sign, he considers it.

"I have no idea what that says, but it looks like a caution sign to me?" he comments, waiting for someone that may know to speak up.

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    And now they're in free fall. Or at least that's how Madoka takes it. Falling, and the building that's being painted into existence is falling around them.

    Madoka has seen enough Witch Runes and been in her Hope Witch henshin enough that she's started to recognize at least a few of the words, even if it's a little bit more difficult to read or make sense of it. She'd probably giggle at the blobcat if this wasn't such an intrinsically dangerous place.

    When she sees the danger sign in the hallway behind them, she squints at it and tries to read it, pushing off of a wall in order to get closer. Weird. Is that the way out, or the way to the Witch?

    Hope Blossom looks down, at the direction they're falling in. "Y'know... after how convenient Gretchen's spacial distortions have been, I probably should've expected something like this."

    When Cascade asks, Madoka says, "Well, I think it says something about an airlock. I can also recognize the words for 'danger' and 'hazard'. So... it's probably bad whatever it is."

Katsuko Takezaki has posed:
    Falling, falling. Kaysuko tries to control the fall with flight, eventually realizing that the falling is a weird part of the natural state of the place. She more or less goes with the group, trying to stay up front in case something comes attacking, so she can defend. She seems like the kind of obvious very nervous of someone who thinks they're doing a good job of trying to hide it.

Amanda Faust has posed:
    (Amy looks surprised at Moon's declaration, and then has this look of 'oh that makes sense'. Especially once she sees the planet(?) they're orbiting(?) out the window.)

    Amy's slow progress eventually gets her out to the intersection. As she somewhat awkwardly peers around the corner, trying to keep her hold on the handle...

    There's a sound like voices in the distance, although you can't understand the language... and there's also an unnatural, identical quality to the sound. Like it's a sound clip being played over and over again from different places... and the speakers come out from behind the plants in the 'garden' room soon enough:

    Cats?

    No, no, what the hell, they're not the same aesthetic as the environment, they look like they're stop-motion animated from photos cut out of a magazine or something. Cats, yes, but with ever-changing human faces. They seem to have no trouble with the environment, merely floating whichever way they want to go, and using their forepaws to hold and manipulate, uh... vaguely gunlike shapes assembled from printed-cutout-photo fish. The first one you see briefly has runes floating over it:

https://radiantheartmush.com/File:Witch-mars-1-catfamiliars.png

    "I have a bad feeling about these ones!" Amy shouts back, then realizes she LET GO OF THE WALL to manifest a gun and scrambles to get a hold again.

    Moments after coming into view, the familiars change how they're holding their fish things and... the sound of gunfire is recognizable if distorted, and those sure are bullets and hurt like them. Ones that miss just kind of go inert against the wall though, and any hard physical barrier stops them, even if the armor's not good enough to withstand a proper bullet.

    If anyone stops to examine the 'bullets', or is unlucky enough to get one lodged in them: They, too, are tiny little photo-cutout fish. What the hell, Witches.

    "ARGHRGH!" Amy screams, returning fire with autofire gyrojets which send her spinning back into the entry hallway. "Shattered Horizon made it seem so much easier than this!" She conjures her rocket launcher, "Ha! Well I don't need recoil if I don't want to!" (Neither, it seems, do the cat-things.) ...But she thinks better of it: "F---! I dunno what happens if I breach the hull...!"

    For the moment, she moves from handhold to handhold, briefly stopping at each to fires back at the ones in the garden room, (and, upon being hit several times, they do kind of just... pop, like balloons, into a few little bits of shredded paper instead of rubber).

    And by the sounds of it, even more are coming down those side hallways...!

Katsuko Takezaki has posed:
    Katssuko isn't panicking, but she is quite confused and essentially operating on autopilot. Once gunfire starts, she positions herself in between the group and gunfire as much as possible. <PANZERSCHILD> A blue magical triangle appears in front of her, forming a largely physical barrier. When she gets a moment's respite, she floats over to Amy. "Need help getting back to a handhold?"

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
They all start to get their bearings, figuring out how to adjust to a world that's making them feel like they're falling even when they're not - and Sailor Moon is not feeling good about it, per se, but is thinking, the blobcat is cute! This is alright! What if this Witch is going to wait for them to start the combat?

That's when the cats with human faces and fish guns appear.

"Luna would eat her heart out," she says in disbelief, seeing those fish guns -

And then they're being shot and she yelps, flinging herself away from one handhold to the other to try and get away from the bullets. She's never been shot, and she'd really like to keep up that streak, and -

"Moon Tiara Action!"

A hand to her forehead, and then the tiara itself becomes cosmic energy, a discus of light that's thrown at the attacking familiars, aiming to cut through them in a wide, boomerang arc before returning to Sailor Moon.

"Someone pick a direction, and we'll book it!"

Yuuto Shiraishi has posed:
Okay, fine. We're doing this. As the fish-bullets rain down on the group, Cascade loops his wrist through one of the handholds for the moment to draw up his cannon arm. Aiming it down the hallway there's a krak-throm as he fires a blast of compressed water at the targets, recharging and firing another one. Once his first two shots are off, he switches arms by moving to the next handhold, aiming with the other cannonade to repeat the process.

As he does so, in order to maintain his balance, the lower half of his body transforms into a brigh yellow fish tail with fins as he takes on his merfolk form and shifts from his blaster, creating a large water shaped barrier to protect the group from the incoming projectiles.

"I can hold this for about fifteen seconds if you need a moment to recover!"

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    So it begins, mentally notes Hope Blossom. The Witch's Familiars are coming out in force, and they're cats shooting fish guns?

    Honestly, at this point, Madoka doesn't question it. Her own produces freaky angel things so why not human-faced cats shooting fish? A part of her wonders what manner of despair or soul corruption led to this, but there's not much point in speculating now.

    Madoka, until now, hasn't really been using a handhold. She's spent enough time floating around as Hope Witch that she's kindof used to this sort of freefall thing. It's only when she realizes just how quickly things can go south that she reaches out with her bow to snag one of the windows, pulling herself a bit closer for stability. Then she weaves together a wooden shield and hides behind it, letting it absorb several of the fish bullets as she tries to think of a plan of action. "Um... down one of the hallways, maybe?" she suggests.

    Behind the barrier that Cascade provides, Madoka takes a moment to fire her pink magic arrows. She doesn't even bother to aim them at anything, instead magically directing them to turn and home in on the cat gunners, spraying them with pink magic from multiple directions.

    Glancing outside the window, she wonders, "I mean... unless the Witch is on the moon? Considering the warning sign, going outside seems like a bad idea. I'm picking a hallway."

    She fires another spray of arrows ahead of her, then pushes off the window towards one of the side halls that the human-faced cats are coming from.

Taro Yamada has posed:
The shadowy creature catches one of the handholds high up in the labrinth as he feels gravity loosen it's pull on him. His cloak billows around him like the hood of a jellyfish, shadows hiding his body as he watches and listens in on the assembled mahou.

So this place is a spaceship, huh? Which means that breaching that warning sign would likely lead to...space. Whether that meant even less gravity, no air, or alternating freezing and boiling from void and sun respectively was unknown, and Taro did not intend to find out.

And here comes. Cats? Really ugly cats. This was the kind of thing you saw in nightmares after misjudging how much pain medication to take. Human sized human faced cats with fish guns. Yikes!

A stray bullet slams into the bulkhead by him, and he flinches. Looks up - a paper cut out fish? Oh, he definitely made the right call choosing to henshin first. Even Jack in the old days paled next to all this!

He loves making an entrance, but he loves not being shot more. He flips around and positions himself on the wall like a swimmer, then kicks off, launching himself at a wall handhold just above a hallway. He grabs the gripper and swivels, letting his center of gravity recalibrate, and then lets his arm drop to the side of the hallway. A long red blade extends from his palm.

When the first cat passes the threshhold, he slams his palm into it's head. The thirsty blade sucks up what little magical energy the cat has; the cat bursts into paper pieces. The second and third cat that pass through are speared just the same. The fourth shoves it's fish-gun up at him, and Taro swings down and spears it and the three cats behind it with a single strike of his palm-blade.

It's like eating candy! It's not a lot to eat but it's so tasty, and he's feeling - good! Whatever's in these cats, it's not half bad!

His cackle echoes through the chamber as he waves from the hallway. "Hey, mahouuuus! I made you a little passageway. Catch me if you can!"

Let's see how far this rabbit hole goes! Into the deeps!

Amanda Faust has posed:
    Amy glances back at the device spell. Tank what? "Oh, that's more like it!" She moves to a handhold near the barrier so she can shoot from behind cover. That makes this significantly easier.

    So too do the attacks on the Familiars coming from the garden. Rocket-bullets soften them up and a magical tiara slices through many of them (and also the plants, behind which is white void for a split second before another doorway is painted in) while water blasts (They don't get soggy despite their appearance, but the force is enough to do the job) and magic homing arrows (if a witch pulls bullshit at you, you cheat right back!) catch the rest!

    Also... ready player seven? The Ripper flies past them. Amy calls out, "Who the hell are you?!"

    And then watches as, well, he seems pretty suited to catching the cats coming around the hall corners, with the help of more homing arrows.

    "Yeah, I uh... I feel like we should try going forward, first-- wait don't run ahead!" Amy warns as the Ripper heads down a hallway. At least Madoka's positioned close to follow.

    Those further behind can see Amy's took a couple of bullet-fish in that initial exchange, one in the gut and one in her upper left arm. She must have turned off pain. She's a puella magi, she'll be fine with that much. She starts wall-to-wall jumping after the others.

    The hallway Taro goes down leads into... well, the white void, but it rapidly paints itself into existence around him. This hall leads to... Is this a bar? There are tables, and shelves of painted-on bottles behind a bar, and several of the face-cat-fishgun familairs are positioned as if sitting at the bar, before emitting their alert call as Ripper approaches. That gives him about a half-second to find cover behind the doorway or using a table or something before bullets start flying, but he's got a pretty good system worked out if he can do that -- the Familairs don't seem to be smart.

    For reasons known not to man nor Godoka, doors on the other side of the bar go right to a docking bay (with a couple more familiars in it) they can use to reach a ship. Maybe that's progress?

    Amy, for her part, tries to snipe from farther back in the hallway once the next melee begins, but it's not working very well; until she takes a page out of Madoka's book and starts using mini homing missiles, anyway. She makes sure they don't hit any walls!

Taro Yamada has posed:
The Ripper makes it out the front of the hallway and kicks the table into the air, then grabs a leg, using it as a shield. He waits a few seconds for the mahous to make it behind him.

"I'm the Back Street Slasher. I heard this place was great to go fishing," he cackles. "I'll charge, you all get blasting! This place is a buffet! I'm not here for you all tonight, so stay outta my way!"

And with that, he charges forward with the table - drawing fire away from the mahous and towards him, especially when he starts using the table to start whacking the cat familiars like a wrestler with a metal chair, occasionally grabbing one to spear and drain with his palm blades.

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    When a strange magical shows up to help, Madoka generally does not question it. She's been at this long enough to know that even Obsidian people will fight a Witch. Fallen Puella seem to not have any friends, including other Witches.

    ... Which is a sad thought, and one that Madoka doesn't have time to dwell on.

    "Hope Blossom," is the name that she gives Ripper. Maybe she wont share her secret ID with someone who calls themselves the Back Street Slasher, even if they are at least temporarily on her side.

    As Madoka stumbles into the bar, she pauses for a moment to look for the next door and finds one on the other side of the room. "Only way forward is through!" she shouts before unleashing another hail of arrows at the fishy guncats. She runs up to a table and kicks it over, then hides behind it while, shooting more and more arrows over the top. Only when she sees an opening does she go for the door to the docking bay, and instead of rushing too far ahead she turns around to provide fire support to anyone needing to catch up.

    "Be careful, everyone! They're everywhere!"

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
The familiars are easy to tear down, at least, but there's someone in the middle of all that, launching attack after attack, and when he calls out that name -

"Seriously? You're claiming to be that old meme guy - wait."

Her tiara is thrown about again, tearing through enemies, that aren't fighting the Back Street Slasher, and in the bar, she ducks behind the same table as Hope Blossom.

"DID YOU ATTACK MY BOYFRIEND?!"

Forget about the rest of the fight, she jumps up from her cover by Hope Blossom, staring in outrage at the Back Street Slasher. This, of course, gets her shot in the chest, and that chest armor does a good job because she doesn't start bleeding, but there's absolutely going to be an impact bruise, and she absolutely falls back down, groaning.

Katsuko Takezaki has posed:
    "Happy to help." Katsuko more or less keeps pass with the others, casting more of those shields to help provide cover for those who need or want it. Once they make it to that path to the docking bay, she sets it upon herself to be the rearguard while the Slasher does whatever a Slasher, does, though she frowns a little upon overhearing Sailor Moon yell at him.

Amanda Faust has posed:
    Okay yeah they apparently can't shoot through the table so slamming it into them is a pretty good way to disable them. Claws, arrows, and tiara make swift work of the remaining familiars. They pop, leaving only sparse confetti on the watercolor floor.

    Amy runs into the room, "Hi, I'm Am-----Magical Rocket Girl Red, there's more behind us, did you say he ATTACKED Tuxedo Mask?!" She'll help Sailor Moon up, carrying her as they move to the docking bay and towards the docked shuttle.

    The moment people start pulling themselves through the docking port, something weird happens.

    Everyone's sight is filled by a series of still images, framed by a... painting frame around which a child has scribbled and stuck flower, cat, star, and rocketship stickers on the wall(?)

    The images show the group boarding the small ship. Sailor Moon takes the pilot seat (Amy frowns, then is in the copilot seat in the next slide of everyone buckling in.)

    [They take off.]

    [The ship, seen from the station, pulling away into the distance.]

    [Amy points in alarm at a screen.]

    [Missiles fly from the station!]

    [The silhouette of a catgirl in a magical girl dress suddenly next to Amy leans over to press buttons, much to Amy's surprise.]

    [Thanks to the catgirl's valiant efforts, one of the missiles swerves off-target! The other still explodes near enough to damage the ship.]

    [Sailor Moon is gritting her teeth and white-knuckled at the controls while the catgirl presses buttons in front of a confused Amy. The other passengers look generally upset!]

    [The ship, trailing smoke, is going down towards the planet...]

    [Everyone is putting on their emergency oxygen masks.]

    [Above the red sands, the spaceship streaks down out of the pink sky...]

    Your vision goes black. There is the sense that you have just crashed, although you didn't... feel an impact, or anything. Or, you know, get crushed?

    The scenery paints itself in out of the blackness: The party stands in a red desert, surrounded by their shuttle's debris field, under a pink sky.

    It's cold here. But like, refridgerator cold, not immediate-death cold. And the air doesn't seem to chill you nearly as fast as it should. Sounds seem a bit muffled or distant, although as long as you speak up you can talk. Movement soon finds that gravity is back! But like, weak. Maybe half of what it should be? A little less than half? How do you even gauge that accurately by feel?

    Also, there's no sign of the eighth crewmember that appeared back there. At least you still have your oxygen masks! Handy! They don't interfere with speech, somehow. At least some Witch nonsense has gone in your favor.

    "Uhhh... did we just.... so did that happen, or... wait, Sailor Moon are you OK?!" Amy rushes over and tumbles due to the low-G.

    There is a faint scream of rage and pain in the distance.

    Something is coming.

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    The sudden Space Flight Montage leaves Madoka a bit disoriented. After a moment she suddenly exclaims, "Wait, was that a cutscene?! Did we just sit through a cutscene in real life?"

    Well, at least they all lived through it. Cutscene deaths are the worst.

    "Not even Gretchen is that weird," she mumbles, though the sound is probably too muffled to be heard at any significant distance.

    While her mind is still trying to figure out what exactly she just experienced, the sound in the distance makes her suspect that they'll soon meet the master of this Labyrinth. She shouts, "That might be the Witch! Get ready!" She raises one hand into the air, and a bunch of branch bows appear in a circle around her, stuck into the ground. While waiting for the oncoming boss fight, Madoka nocks an arrow and waits.

Katsuko Takezaki has posed:
    The whole experience is weird, with an actual cutscene it just gets a little weirder on top. Once they're through, Katsuko takes to the sky to provide a ready defense setup for those who lack meaninfully close for it and can't condone eating or licking space rock.

Taro Yamada has posed:
"I'm not a meme! I'm the actual urban legend!" the Ripper snaps. "I just nibbled on your boyfriend a little, he should be fine! What kind of lazy urban legend leaves behind someone who can't tell the tale after? If you're that mad, you can keep him -"

And then hits the cutscene. The Ripper falls back on his butt, rubbing his head as he takes deep breaths through the oxygen mask. Ooooh he's dizzy. Ow ow ow. He wasn't made to be run through a fax machine! Or put in a GBA! And... ooooh. Was everyone supposed to stay looking like scribbles? HIs body was cold, but his head was starting to feel hot...

Ugh. Ok. Ok. He's just gonna. Wobble to his feet, hands under his hood so he can rub his forehead. "I'll send him a fruit basket or something if it's that inconvenient. Can you all yell at me AFTER we defeat the horrible space beast?"

(It stings a little that Amy's giving him that look. But he can't break character now!)

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
"Yes! Yes I did say that! Because he did - are you the vampire that tried to eat my boyfriend on his bad day?!"

There's no fear in her, as shouts over at the so-called Back Street Slasher - why would there be, when they're in a Labyrinth, and she has friends? But he hadn't been feeding on their fear to begin with, so it probably doesn't matter. She still glares.

"Oh please, like I believe that! You're just some jerk who stole a meme to give yourself a reputation, I can't believe this -"

She should have figured! When Mamoru said he was attacked by a meme! Also, why does everyone who feeds on people think-"

They've all been running to the docking port, and once they're there, the cutscene kicks in, and they're all just - experiencing it.

Sailor Moon shrieks when it's over, because -

"I can't even drive! Why did it make me the pilot?! No wonder we crashed, which - we're all okay, right?!"

Everyone looks okay, even the jerk who ate her boyfriend.

"How would you like it if people ate you? And uh - ohhh boy," the Witch is coming. The Crescent Wand drops into Sailor Moon's hand, appearing readily.

"Brace yourselves!"

Amanda Faust has posed:
    ('why does SHE get to be the pilot' was the expression on painting-Amy's face too, yeah.)

    "Yeah, that's not a good sound..." Amy says, although she hasn't raised her voice yet so she sounds far away. She shouts back to Sailor Moon, "I don't know, you're from space??? Kind of???"

    She looks back in the direction the scream came from and conjures her launcher on her shoulder. "Bigger fish to fry. Slasher, the Witch'll kill you just like any of us..."

    Katsuko taking to the sky gives her the clearest view that something big is coming, although it's hard to say what , beyond that it has some sort of body and two long legs and moves without the natural back-and-forth rocking of its body something should have. It's fast, kicking up dust, and has two smaller things flying with it.

    Back at ground level, everyone else can see it come over a ridge and approach, though it stops several dozen feet(?) away (It's kind of hard to tell distance what with the weird aesthetics.)

    The... something is 15-20 feet tall, depending on just how it 'stands'. There's a rectangular 'body' about the size of a small refridgerator which appears as an ever-changing-printed-photo-cutout of a face, like the cats' but just a rectangular section rather than the whole head. It sits atop two long spindly legs that are too thin to really make out much of a specific image, they could have been cut out of anything.

    Floating to either side of it are boxes the size of a microwave with two human (printed cutout) eyes pasted on, flying by animated cut-out propellers sticking out of the sides, with two spindly arms that end in (printed cutout) buzzsaws.



    The boss titles appear. The Witch lifts itself up on fully-extended legs and shudders as it roars like a woman's scream of pain and rage, and extends arms like thick pencil lines being drawn into place, some of which are empty and just lash out, and some of which have structures on the end, including:
        · A bigger fishgun
        · Some kind of cannon that shoots little printed-cutout suns that set things on printed-cutout fire where they hit
        · A printed-cutout kitten shooting cutout-photo-SFX beams from its mouth.

    The flying-buzzsaw Familiars, at least, are polite enough to straightforwardly swoop towards the group with flying buzzsaws instead of doing something really weird.

    Amy is already returning fire -- magic reccoilless rifles work on targets at short range under a variety of conditions, warhead exploding against the Witch and making it rock only slightly from the impact -- and running -- well, loping? Weird half-gravity -- for cover behind some of the spaceship debris, yelping as a little cutout sun almost hits her and leaves burning paper-cutout fire in the spot she just leapt from. It does not appear to care about the lack of paper-cutout oxygen. Such bullshit.

    One of the Familiars flies up towards Katsuko, the other towards the Ripper. Their heads are the highest up, which means their necks are the closest targets for those menacing buzzsaws! That makes sense, right?

Taro Yamada has posed:
The THING climbs up, like the child of a spider, an air conditioner, a ransom note and a cat. It keeps on flickering between looking like it's made from paper cut outs and being scribbled by a child and it looks! Bad! "Wow, I hate that thing," he says, and then grabs the buzzsaw familiar just before it can slam into his neck. AS he lifts and drains it with his palm blade, the buzzsaw slices his cheek - a line of blood bubbles over, then disappears seamlessly, the injury wiped away in seconds thanks to all the familiars he's been eating.

"I'm not a meme! I'm the real thing! And what other people are copying MY gig??" he snaps at Sailor Moon, spinning to face the creature properly.

He lunges, a shadowy blur on Mars' surface; the low gravity lets him cross the distance quickly,and he bounces off a ridge before a laser blast can get him. His hands and feet extend blades that he uses to latch on to the Witch's side; he crawls down and starts swiping at the many arms.

"I'll deal with these stupid lasers!" His eyes HURTY. "Blast it down!"

Katsuko Takezaki has posed:
    "Incoming." Katsuko yells to warn about what's the likely boss as soon as she sees one. She gets ready to fight, and is ready just in time for one of those Famiiars to show up.

    <PANZERHINDERNIS>

    She briefly encages herself in a polygonal barrier, firm sturdy magic to help slow down the biting teeth of those buzzsaws. Then, when opportunity arrives, she drops that shield to strike at it with both her Tonfa at once, letting those teeth rip into her Knight Armor, which hurts but she persists.

    <ZWILLINGSCHLAG>

    Magic pushes those weapons forwards with additional force. This isn't the gentle magic of a Mid-Childan Device Mage, this is pure unadulterated blunt force barreling down on the familiar.

    Right now, she's ignoring the interplay between Sailor Moon and the meme.

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    Madoka glances between Sailor Moon and the Back Street Slasher and winces. Oh geeze. There is a lot of Big Mad energy going on right now and Hope is silently wishing that she could slip away and avoid the the mess that's playing out in front of her. Sadly, she is stuck in here with not only a Dangerous Witch, but also a potentially Dangerous Meme and a Socially Awkward Situation. Oh geeze.

    Fortunately, Madoka is already used to dealing with and thinking about weird gravity (thanks, Gretchen) and even with normal Earth gravity she'd at least know how to handle a super jump. When she pulls a second branchbow out of the ground and leaps away, the paper cutout suns impact the rest of her circle of armaments and lights them all in paper fire.

    Yikes! So much for that plan.

    While her sheer mobility in these conditions make it a little easier to avoid projectiles, they are still fast moving and whiz right by her. Her loose-braided hair catches on paper cutout fire, and she seems to be mostly unaware of this. For now.

    Deciding that the best defense is a strong offense, Madoka fires a spread of arrows into the air to intercept the suns and some of the fish bullets, though they probably aren't that effective at getting rid of lasers. When Madoka finally gets close enough, her two branches suddenly erupt in pink flame as she slams them down towards the Witch's side like a pair of baseball bats, each one breaking after only a few impacts but exploding in rosy fury with each strike.

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
"I am from space," Sailor Moon acknowledges. She doesn't know how a Witch would know that, but she doesn't exactly know how a Witch does anything, so she probably shouldn't question it. Besides, they already crashed, so clearly she wasn't the right pilot.

Or maybe they were supposed to, given the cat girl that she swears was there and is now not.

The meme vampire-slasher villain-enemy jerk is helping them, so she's not going to throw her tiara at him for scaring the shit out of Mamoru on a day when he'd already been through the wringer, but she's saving up a head of steam for it.

Post-fight yelling, an all new relaxation technique!

"Moon Tiara Action!"

Again, her tiara circling through the air, this time to launch at one of the Witch's long, spindly legs with the aim of cutting through it. Take out the Witch, end this nightmare. Take out the Witch, get rid of the buzzsaw creatures!

It's too bad her strongest attack is entirely purification based!

She is pointedly not continuing her argument without the Slasher, because -

"You should send him a fruit basket," grumble.

Maybe she's not continuing the fight, but she's not dropping her conviction that he owes Mamoru something!

Amanda Faust has posed:
    The witch 'says' something indecipherable as Madoka counters its projectiles. The fishgun-arm retracts into its 'body' and another one comes out. Okay?

    The headhunter Ripper's grabbed struggles as it's drained, but with him holding it it can't actually slice through his neck, and the cuts it makes elsewhere just regenerate from the drained energy. You could almost feel sorry for it if it were not a magical construct whose only purpose is cutting off your head. After a few seconds it just turns into more tech-debris which falls to the ground, slowly.

    The other one slices uselessly against Katsuko's barrier. After one failed attack it stops...? and then the witch 'says' something as Katsuko drops the shield to get an attack in on it, but the Witch also turns its new fishgun on her, faster fish-bullets (you can't see them move, there's just a trail of bubbles where they passed) firing with the dropping of the shield! Mean! Wait, is the Witch actually smart or was that just incredibly unlucky timing?

    That's probably going to hurt but that's all either monster can do about her bashing the other Familiar until it, too, turns to junk and falls.

    Sailor Moon, meanwhile, goes for a leg! The cutting tiara boomerangs through the Martian air, and... cuts right through a leg.

    It would be almost comical if it weren't a terrifying monster, the way the Witch slowly falls over. It does, however, keep flinging attacks at its victims! Laser(?) beams do indeed shoot at Taro as he called for earlier, and a whiplike tendril tries to grab at Sailor Moon!

    Amy, meanwhile, is leaning out from behind a chunk of crashed-watercolor-spaceship to fire rockets while a second sun-cannon keeps shooting back, which doesn't stop when the Witch begins to fall over and is resulting in a ring of cutout-fire starting to surround her and also get all over her cover.

    "Gah! Don't call me that!" She shouts back at the Ripper. "Just Red is fine, thanks! I'm gonna try to weaken it!"

    She doesn't actually have to break cover? She just holds her right arm straight up as her launcher becomes a larger tube braced to her arm. "AURA PILLAR!"

    The missile fires up, then arcs down, splitting into a dozen smaller ones that rain down on the Witch, detonating in lances of light that are more focused then usual here, the Witch screeching as it's covered in tiny holes...! Maybe? It's kind of hard to tell with how everything looks so weird...!

Taro Yamada has posed:
HOoo boy, his vision's starting to go double, and he can see sparkles and patterns forming when he moves his eyes too fast. It's a good thing he's firmly latched onto this enormous cat - thing??? - or he'd definitely be falling over. (Was this the witch? Or was it eating all those little witch creatures? Uuugh, those little critters were too delicious to not have side effects!)

But this thing is tilting, faltering, and he is - ohhh his head is spinning. Forget it. He's gonna make like those guys on the animes and blast off.

"If you wait, I'll show you my knife!" he snarls, and he slams his hand down against the biggest hole in the thing's head and drags his hand down, down,down, opening up a nice weak spot for the other mahou to blast.

And - hopefully BEFORE he gets caught in the crossfire - he launches himself off the creature,hoping he can land somewhere nice and soft before it - exploded? Imploded? Whatever! He's not getting squished by that thing!

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    Madoka can't really take the time to figure out what the Witch is saying without Gretchen's help, and even if she did have the Witch Chara's insight right now there's no guarantee that the Witch is even saying anything. You don't really communicate with a Witch, as far as Madoka knows. You just get laughed at or yelled at by it.

    Oh well. Hope Blossom isn't here to communicate with magical monsters. She's here to put a lost soul to rest, before the dead can have a chance to increase their number.

    A lucky laser beam scores a hit right in the middle of her chest, sending her gracelessly onto her butt and sending a jolt of pain through her torso. The disadvantage of not being a real Puella is that she doesn't get to shut out this pain, but at least she still has magical armor.

    Getting back up to her feet, she takes a few small steps backwards, which end up being a few giant leaps in this gravity. Pulling an arrow back, she holds it and lets it charge up for a moment. The Witch seems to be short a leg, so hopefully it will hold still long enough for Hope to get a finisher off.

    "Cherry Blossom Blaze!" she shouts, releasing the overcharged arrow which splits into many, saturating the area around the Witch in pink death for a few brutal seconds.

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
The leg goes down! Sailor Moon would whoop with satisfaction at that, except, there's a tendril snaking out to grab her, and though Sailor Moon rushes away, the gravity on Mars and her natural klutziness combine such that she hits the ground instead of managing to dodge and stay on her feet.

She yelps as it catches her around the ankle and yanks her into the air, shaking her this way and that, and oh, she's got an idea, but it's a stupid, terrible, no good idea that she's definitely going to do anyway because she would really like to get off this ride -

She twists in the air, crunching (the PE teacher is NOT allowed to know crunches were useful!) so that she can slap her hands around the tendril and tug, just barely managing to slip her foot loose, and she keeps her hand firmly clasped on the tendril as it shakes her, shakes her, shakes her -

As she tries to flood her the power that let her turn near about anything she seemed to catch in her hands with that light -

"Moon Shaky Tendril Action!"

And then she drops to the ground, and lets the lack of her weight serve as the necessary trigger for making the yanking tendril smack back towards the Witch, now glowing silver-pink-gold with cosmic energy.

Charging part of the Witch itself, huh... first time for everything!

And of course, when the seething mass of charged cosmic energy that is that tendril collides with the rest of the Witch, it will explode.

Boom!

Amazing, how the only things that could retain their shape when she charged them were her tiaras.

Sailor Moon herself hits the surface of Mars with a soft whump! and an "owwwwww..."

Katsuko Takezaki has posed:
    Unlucky timing or a smart witch, the result is more or less the same. That attack barrels into Katsuko's Knight Armor at full force, and is enough to overwhelm that defensive magic, forcing the Belkan-style Knight out of her transformation after the emergency landing she makes, falling over without having a chance to throw a solid attack at the Witch.

Amanda Faust has posed:
    There is probably some way that it could use its resources to avoid being disabled here. Repurpose a tendril as a leg, for instance. But the mad tortured soul that is the Witch does not think super fast or have the tactical acumen to quickly come to brilliant ideas. Its only way of interacting with things is attacking them.

    Well, it downed one Mahou. That's less than some Witches, but more than a lot of them get!

    It begins to fall. Amy shoots it full of holes. Ripper tears one of those holes into a great big weak point. Madoka's arrows find every weak point and the tendril -- part of the Witch itself, this just goes to show that when Witches bullshit you you bullshit them right back! -- is charged with energy and snaps right back into it, and the whole thing just... with one last scream, it tears apart and pops like the cats did but larger, and the martian landscape watercolor fades away with a rippling in the air as the dockyard full of shipping containers returns.

    Amy leans out from behind her cover to cheer as everything hits the Witch, "Yeah!" and then realizes that she's on paper-cutout fire, "Oh f---!" but as she tries to pat it out it vanishes with everything else the Witch made.

    She takes a breath and exhales. "Phew! Everyone alright?"

    Before actually going over to the others, though, she walks over to the grief seed now lying in front of the open container and picks it up, looking it over briefly before putting it away in her belt pouch. She pulls out the other, half-filled one, and looks to Madoka. "Do you want Su--uhh, the other one back now, or...?"

    Although, then she sees Katsuko on the ground out of henshin. "Katsuko!"

Taro Yamada has posed:
The Back Street Slasher lands several metal containers away. His body crackles and ripples as he sits up, groaning. Uuuugh. A victory, sure, but not his finest moment.

But he was alive. Now he just had to cover for his own escape.

He quickly checks the toy coffin at his waist - his doll Dory is intact, and his immortality with her. It's the work of a moment to de-henshin; he's still seeing double, but the effects seem...slightly less? Or maybe it's just time. Anyway.

He finds his backpack and puts Dory's coffin in. Pulls out his wallet. Counts out several thick bills in cash. Puts the wallet away.

Wobbles over to where he can hear the other mahou, waving with a hand full of yen. "Welcome back!" he says, putting up a brave face despite how shaky he feels. "Uh. Question. Is it normal for a big monster to drop from the sky, shove 8000 yen in your hand and ask you to buy Sailor Moon a fruit basket?"

Madoka Kaname has posed:
    The fight is over, and Hope Blossom breathes a sigh of relief. When the subject of Grief Seeds is brought up, Madoka is suddenly reminded of the fact that she gave Amy the name of the last one. Then, she thinks back to the runes she saw from this Witch and tries to remember the name.

    "Jaiden. I mean, really, that's no more her name than Gretchen is mine, but..." After saying that, she blinks and then clears her throat. "S-sorry. I try to make it a point to remember. Um... Sure. If it's only halfway full, I might be able to share her with someone who needs it. Or keep her safe with Gretchen, at least."

    When the guy they left behind starts approaching them, she blinks. "Um... maybe? I'm not sure what counts as 'normal' for magicals, if I'm being honest."

    Fortunately the Veil prevents her from questioning literally anything about this.

Usagi Tsukino has posed:
The Witch goes down. There's some satisfaction there - not just in victory, but in knowing that a suffering soul has is out of her misery - or at least, no longer able to hurt anyone.

Sailor Moon hauls herself up as the world fades back to normal, stretching a little - she's going to be aching, but that's okay, it will pass with some sleep, and food, and -

"Eh? What, did that jerk give you money for me? I mean... that's probably a good thing, I don't really want him tracking Kamen-kun down to give him a fruit basket, but... sorry, Taro-kun, that must have been scary!"

A beat, and then she notices that Katsuko is on the ground, but, Amy is taking care of her, and...

"We did it. Good job, everyone!"

Katsuko Takezaki has posed:
    Katsuko is awake, but not in great shape. That Knight Armor did its job and made her have any serious injuries, but there's bruises and she's not quite got the energy to get up on her own, at least not right now. "Hey Amy. Did we win?" She asks, blinking as she looks around.

Amanda Faust has posed:
    "Yeah, we won. Can you stand?" She helps Katsuko up. "Hey, Yamada-san. While I wish I could have given you a chance to see what we're dealing with... this was probably worse than most to have a tag-along, honestly. We might've had difficulty protecting you."

    She makes her way over to Madoka and hands the slightly-more-than-half-Corruption-filled Suzanne back, before reaching for her belt pouch and then realizing she still has pain off. She sucks air in through her teeth as she inspects her bullet wounds and looks down at the scorched costume where the fire was. She has a fresh grief seed, so...

    When she regenerates, the wounds close and turn into bruises, and then slowly fade. Pain back on, she runs a hand over the formerly-wounded spots and nods to herself somberly.

    Amy pulls Jaidyn back out of her belt pouch and touches it to her soul gem, which is now about a fifth corrupted; the corruption drains into the seed.

    "Oh. And this... is uh... what we get for hunting Witches," she explains to the newbies, "Besides the satisfaction of a job well done. Puella Magi need them to recharge our Soul Gems. If you ever kill a Witch without a Puella Magi present, bring the grief seed -- that's this pointy thing -- to one of us or to Madoka as soon as you can."

    She looks around. "I guess that about wraps it up. People can investigate this," she waves a hand at the bullet holes, "without getting driven to kill themselves, now."