Sirens in the Distance [Private w/ Prof. W B Copperfield]

[Ahia Seiryú]

(This Thread follows the events described in A Dust fueled (Re-) Union from Ahia's perspective)

It‘s a silent night out in Vale. The night sky cast itsself above the city as the last lights start dying out from people going to sleep. Observing all of this from a distance at the edge of a cliff, there stands a slender, but crimson armored, figure looking into the night sky, stars scarcely shining in the night with the moon high up. Each digit of their brutish claw on the left moves erraticly for a moment, as if trying to get used to the feeling of the new appendage. The other hand, mantled by a gunmetal grey gauntlet, holds a black visor.
“Tonight‘s stars are fading. A darkness is coming.“
With those words, she puts the visor onto its frame over her face, a clicking noise locking it in place, with a heads-up display lighting up on the inside. From the outside, the helmet is a blank black canvas.
“Counting on you, Snake Byte.“ her distorted voice rasped out, before then jumping down the cliff.
“Understood.“ a voice on the other side answered, almost in a boring tone.
Orochi‘s claw raised, shooting forward to clamp down on a passing air ship. From it, she swings forward, moving into the city of Vale and jumping elegantly from roof to roof, like a silent gale. Her target? A dust warehouse at the edge of the industrial district.

Sneaking onto the site was easy. The night guards stationed at this place are either poorly trained or do not take their job seriously. Either way, it meant they were easy pickings. One by one they fell after Orochi entered the warehouse, easily taken out by the experienced assassin until only the guards outside remained. Not all of them were hurt, but most of them. Once clear, Orochi could walk around without issue. With Snake Byte on the other side doing their thing, hacking into the cameras to install feeback loops she could just walk past them to a stack of containers, bearing the Wyvern Incorporated emblems.

“It should be the one with designation 0720. And remember Miss, once that thing is placed you have...“ Snake Byte called in from the intercomm, interrupted by Orochi finishing her sentence. “...One minute… I know.“
She forcefull opens the designated container, crushing the lock with her claw hand and swinging the doors open to find loads upon loads of Dust inside, mainly Fire, just what she‘s been looking for. She activates a tube-like gadget and rams the extended spike from it into one of the crates, a timer now ticking down from 01:00.
With the container subsequently closed and hastily leaving the premises, she now stood farther away a top of a higher building, looking back to her work as an explosion could be heard throughout the city. The warehouse went up in flames, debris shooting into the sky, scattered everywhere.
It‘s as if the city was shook awake with sirens blaring in the distance as a new era of crime dawned upon the city.

[Ahia Seiryú]

With her first objective complete, Orochi jumped from roof to roof, silent as a ninja with each step. Next up would be… a Dust Shop on the other side of the districts. Time to liberate from the merchants themselves. Though a very unlikely and… peculiar… thing happened, as Orochi seemed distracted as she neared the edge of the industrial area leading to the residential, standing at the top of another tall building with an alleyway below. A familiar face there was on the street. Her dearest daughter came running, she could guess to investigate what the explosion was about.

“Oh little cub, curiousity kills the cat as they say.“ With these distorted words uttered quietly to herself Orochi casually stepped off the roof and into the air, falling feet first to the ground onto Vlithra‘s path, the impact kicking up a bit of dust. Her dearest daughter didn‘t hesitate to draw her blade. Immediately on guard. That stance could use a bit more work, but otherwise… good. Now… for the stress test.

Orochi lunged furward with her claw, swinging with what could almost be considered reckless abandon. Her spawn had gotten stronger, but just enough to hold out against her onslaught. So, how about some gravity? Ruhfriedens hand opened and a purple-black ball of gravity dust formed that Orochi promptly shot forward like a fast ball. Vlithra‘s response was her semblance, not quite the best option as she takes part of the brunt of the gravity‘s impact and is sent rolling across the floor with Orochi hot in pursuit, striking forward with her claw. A clear statement was made here, if Vlithra didn‘t give it her all, she‘d fail… luckily, she wasn‘t about to dissapoint. "I can't die, not here!"

Vlithra started glowing and green-black lightning enveloped her. While it was clear that the tigress would give it her all when her life was threatened, this was the first time Ahia had seen the semblance used this way which certainly made her look on in some awe and filled her cracked heart with a healthy ounce of pride. She could really feel this presence that her daughter was developing, but… she could also see the glaring weakness this had. Vlithra‘s movements became a bit jittery, sluggish even. Sure, the increase in Speed and Strenght was troublesome, but it was only a matter of time 'til her body would give out from the stress… and it‘s nothing that the more experienced mother couldn‘t hold out against. With this confidence they started clashing, her daughter‘s green sparks illuminating the night. Until…

[Ahia Seiryú]

“Someone‘s inbound. ETA 30 seconds. Analyzing...“ SnakeByte called in, informing Ahia of the arrival of someone. With this Orochi knew she had to end her little greeting then and there, and it seemed that Vlithra wasn‘t going to hold out much longer either way. With that Orochi practically embedded the clenched fist of Ruhfrieden into Vlithra‘s stomach, lifting the cub‘s body from the ground a bit, only to pull back, open the hand and ramming a repulsor blast of gravity dust into her opponent in the same motion. This sent her flying into the wall of the alleyway, digging her into the stone work and making her drop to her knees in exhaustion, the aura flickering like crazy as it was about to break. Clenching Ashura, a vial of fire dust is activated and the claws started hissing with melting heat as she approached her little cub.

“Professor Whitehorse… ugh... Copperfield is the most likely match. ETA 3...“ SnakeByte stopped trying with the mouthful of a name midway and just finished with the most recognizeable of the names the approaching person had. Man, are Beacon‘s Professors on speed dial or what? It was expected that there‘d be huntsmen running around in Vale with how close it was to Beacon, but this… almost… seemed like a joke. Either way, this worked for forcing Orochi to retreat. She wouldn‘t want to seriously harm her dear daughter anyway.
2… 1… aaand around the corner he came.

“Get away from her, you bitch!" he shouted just as she was about to lay her claws upon her daughters face. She immediately turned to look to the source only for him to do a pushing motion. Out of reflex, Orochi jumped back to the other end of the hallway in a high angle, dodging what she could see was a wave of pure kinetic force. Odd how similar the powers of these two were, both drawing upon raw and physical forces. She watched as the Professor went and made sure that Vlithra was alright, but not letting Orochi out of his sight. He knows better then to turn his back, it seemed. Good enough the mother supposed as he now intended to make her exit.

"Heh heh heh. Lucky you." she cackled a bit, her helmet distorting the voice beyond familiarity as she then raked up the ground in front of her to hurl melting hot stone at them. As soon as she saw that ice wall come up, she dashed out of the alleyway. “Is he following?“ Orochi asked to which she only got a “Nah.“ as an answer. An answer that would suffice, with which she took back to the rooftops, jumping up in one go and running across through the veil of night. Now for her intended targets, the dust shops. She had two more bombs to place. The next target was a quaint little dust shop owned by a man commonly reffered to as ‘Nickly‘.

“Owner‘s currently not home. Let me just… aaand security is dark. Well, most of it...“ As if on queue, the cameras inside and outside were completly dead. Through a window, Orochi got herself entry to the place. She could just bust in and trash the place, but doing this discreetely was more beneficial to her at the moment. Only issue, she couldn‘t go blindly in and touch the display cases, since those usually had a seperate alarm system. Instead, she armed the bomb behind the counter, right next to some fiery dust crystals in the displays. It would make for a proper explosion when it goes up. Although…

Orochi pondered as she set the bomb. Maybe... she could set the timer a bit longer to steal some dust? It was certainly tempting, to say the least. It wasn't long before, as if her intrusive thoughts had won, she set the time to 3:00. Three minutes should be ample time for a smash and grab. Long enough for her to be clear before the place went up in a chain reaction of dust explosions. With that set, she slammed her hand through one of the display cases, triggering the alarm. She deliberately went for gravity and ice dust crystals first, stowing the goods in a little pouch on her hip. The latter to lower the chance of it counteracting the force of the explosion and the former due to it's uses with her weapon. Naturally due to the alarm, the lights in others houses sprang to life at a moments notice.