Fate/Kaleid Liner Prisma Taylor
The streets were flooded. That much was obvious from the taste of saltwater in my mouth. I pushed myself up and coughed the fluid from my lungs and tried to make out my surroundings. I couldn't quite make out where I was, but I could see… What was left of the Boardwalk from here.
Other heroes and villains were doing the same, with other flyers taking to the air, some helping others out of the water. I could make out someone lifting the girl with the needles and the giant crossbow onto a building.
I was about to see if anyone needed help when I realized that he was there. I could see his silhouette in the rain. He was getting closer, and soon I could make him out. Thirty feet of lean muscle, hunched over with arms and legs that were too long. The lumbering gait. The long, rocking tail.
Pictures and video from endbringer fights sometimes make it out to the public, but you never really see Leviathan's face.
He didn't have one. There was no nose. No ears, no mouth. Just cracks in his perfectly smooth face with something glowing green in them that might have been eyes.
Gallons of water in a rough afterimage of him.
...I wasn't prepared for this.
People were talking, screaming, but between the cacophony and my own frayed nerves I couldn't make anything out but Legend calling out to get ready.
I didn't even think. I just moved.
A second later, I was in the air, staring at Leviathan who was now right in the middle of the group I'd been in while my watch listed off a bunch of names. I only caught the last two, telling me that Browbeat and Brandish were both deceased.
I saw Glory Girl charging Leviathan, only to be swatted away. I could see her correct in mid-air, but…
I forced myself to move. I got in front of the monster and swung Opal at his chest while focusing on how much I wanted him gone.
The ball of mana was the size of a beach ball and exploded on impact with Leviathan's chest. By itself it wasn't enough to drive him off but the sudden blast made him stumble and the follow up of Lady Photon, Laserdream, and Shielder's color-coordinated lasers, one of Mister Saito's molecule cutting sword-arrows, three black needles from crossbow girl, a ball of green fire, a bolt of lightning, one of Dragon's giant missiles, and a lot of Legend's blue-white beams to push him back enough for the rest of search and rescue to get in and pull out the injured.
I landed just in time for Alexandria and Armsmaster's respective squads to start engaging Leviathan in melee, keeping him occupied.
I saw Myrrdin banishing the… corpses into one of the pocket dimensions he was famed for in time for Opal to speak up.
"How did he do that?" She asked, bending in his direction. "That was dimensional manipulation but-"
"He's a wizard," I dismissed quickly. It wasn't the time or the place for any of that. She could ask him if he and I both made it out of this. The four or five people who'd been downed had already been grabbed and nobody had pinged yet, so I wasn't sure what to do.
My troubles were solved when the wizard-hero pointed at me. "After that blast," he said, "I think you're better suited for Legend's group." Unsure of what to say, I nodded and took back to the air.
The ranged attack group had already scattered to take tactical positions and I wasn't really in a position to ask where I was best placed so I just took some empty air space and launched a cutting crescent of mana at Leviathan.
My blast left only a superficial scratch on the monster. I'd need to hit it with something bigger, but people were in the way, and…
My watch went off with a message. "This is Tattletale. Levithan does not have vitals the same way a human does. He most likely was never human to begin with. He might not have vitals at all, I can't verify at this time. So like… don't bother aiming for pressure points or major nerves and vessels, it won't be any more effective than anything else." There was something about her voice that I couldn't place.
But it did have a notable effect—some of the melee groups' members had gone from hitting center mass, thighs, and the neck to just wherever. I could even make out Armsmaster taking a swing at one of Leviathan's ankles, misting the water the beast was standing in.
But, Tattletale didn't have enough data to know if the Endbringer had any vitals at all.
"Install: Lancer!" I declared as I drew and activated the relevant card. Immediately I used Lancer's ability to draw runes in the air to create platforms that I could jump across to get closer.
As I neared melee range, I steeled my nerves by allowing myself to fall into the role of a legendary slayer of gods and monsters. I conjured runes in the air and summoned demonic spears so as to draw Leviathan's attention with the blast of fire and sea-monster bone.
"Serpent!" I cried out as I came within striking distance and summoned a spear to hand. I came to a stop on a runic platform just in front of Leviathan and with a flourish used the spear to draw the runes of the Ath nGabla in a circle to bolster the power of my Noble Phantasm. "Do you have a heart!? Gáe Bolg Alternative!"
I swung and thrusted my spear with both hands and immediately it became a beam of piercing red light that bent and twisted, pulling me with it.
I found myself behind the monster, tearing through his water-shadow and with my spear embedded in the base of the monster's tail.
It wasn't dead. But it also wasn't happy. My grip on the spear was forcibly broken as Leviathan twisted around. In a flash, I was held in its giant hand and a moment later I was sprawled out on the asphalt with some achy bones.
I pushed myself up and looked around and found that I was at least a mile away based on how small Leviathan seemed from my perspective. And then a building bent back into the side and I realized that I probably needed to thank Vista later as my perspective was cut off.
I pressed the message button on my watch. "Hard Override: People, this is Princess. Leviathan got really defensive after I used a heart seeking attack on him and hit the base of his tail, so anyone who can penetrate deep into his flesh should be aiming there."
"Also," Opal added speaking loudly so that the watch would pick her up, "he's using some kind of extra-dimensional effect to behave as though he had significantly more mass than he does. He's layered, like an onion, and each layer is progressively dense."
Once I'd sent the message, I checked where I was in relation to Leviathan and started walking off.
And then I stumbled and fell to my knees. I'd forgotten. Lancer's Noble Phantasm was a bit mana intensive.
"Princess," Opal began, "you need to take a break."
"No time for breaks when the city's being flooded," I replied. "I just… Just need to switch to something a little less mana intensive. Unless you've got a way for me to get Magical Girl level mana refresh with Lancer's power level."
Opal was silent.
"Opal."
She made a sort of whining sound.
"Opal, if there's something we can do that-"
"There's a special feature," Opal admitted reluctantly. "Many years ago, to rescue Sapphire's master from a particularly obnoxious brute, Ruby's master formed a temporary contract with Sapphire and transformed with both of them at once. It not only doubled her mana generation by bypassing several safety features and forced her bones, nerves, blood vessels, muscles, and organs to all function as secondary magical circuits. Her power increased enough to easily defeat even the strongest of servants, but channeling that much raw mana caused her body to break down from the strain," Opal sounded afraid as she spoke. "My creator was later able to use data from that incident to upgrade my sisters so that such a state could be accessed on their own, and I was constructed with that functionality, but such a thing is far too dangerous-"
"How do I do it?" I interrupted.
"No! That feature is only to be used in the most extreme of emergencies, and believe it or not this does not yet qualify."
Opal's declaration was met by my watch announcing that ten people were down and that four more-including Hookwolf-were dead.
"The situation still isn't dire enough," Opal stubbornly insisted.
I shook my head and drew a card that wouldn't wear me out after one good hit. "Install: Caster."
Sufficiently equipped with my fluffy tail and magic talismans, I double-checked Leviathan's current location and made my way to him.
On my way, I passed Grue kneeling in a temporary river… A few seconds later, I turned around and offered him a hand. Right now, everyone was working together. A little courtesy was the least I could do.
I helped the crook up and he grunted his thanks, before I carried on, stopping only briefly to make sure I was still heading the right way.
I'd finally made it back to where I could see Leviathan. Off in the distance, I could see that several layers of tidal waves had been frozen solid, and Eidolon himself had joined the ranged attack group, flying through the air and attacking the monster with gouts of fire, blasts of lightning, and globes of orange light.
Eidolon and Legend together seemed to be doing most of the damage at this point. A lot of the Armsmaster and Chevalier's group had been taken out of the fight by now and I couldn't make out Dragon's suit in Alexandria's group anymore. It seemed that most of the melee fighters were staying out of the ranged group's way while they, primarily the two of the Protectorate, assaulted the beast with assorted blasts. Even the ranged group was smaller-I could make out a flyer carrying off crossbow girl.
I took a breath and started chanting caster's Merciful Sky mantra. I needed to be careful with my mana, so that meant that getting the most out of each spell. This mantra used a little bit of mana to make the following spell several times more powerful for the same cost, so…
Once I finished, I drew a talisman. I doubted that ice would be effective, this seemed like a bad place to try wind, and fire… Honestly, now that I thought about it, fire didn't seem like the best thing to use against someone with the power of 'all the water' unless it was special fire or it was all you could do.
That left one option for direct damage. I moved closer to get a clearer shot and tossed my talisman.
The paper tag impacted the monster's groin, as close to where its heart was as I could get from here, and it exploded into a curse called Void Cleft. Not fire or ice or wind or any other element. A blast of void.
Leviathan stumbled, but I couldn't be sure if that was from my curse or the dozen or so of Legend's beams that hit it at the same time, but I drew another talisman just the same.
And then the ice at the shore shattered all at once and a surge of water came right down the street. The flyers dispersed but those of us on the ground weren't so lucky.
The next thing I knew I was flat on my back in a pool of water and everything hurt. Also, turns out that I hate it when my fur is wet.
I was able to force myself up and stand in time for my watch to start listing out who was down and who was dead. I froze when I heard that Tattletale was down. She was a crook, but that thinker power of hers was vital… If she managed to come up with anything and share it, that is.
Actually, I could see her, or rather, her purple covered ass since she was face down in the water. I rushed over and pulled her up, leaning her against me… I… Kind of wished I'd taken a CPR class…
Well, improvise. I leaned her over and started on the Heimlich. If it could get something lodged in your throat out, maybe it could force liquid out of her lungs?
I wasn't sure if it was working. I was second-guessing whether this would work or not, but about ten thrusts later, the last of the seawater spilled out of her and she started coughing. I just stood there, supporting her, till she stopped and started to breathe.
"You gonna be okay?" I asked.
"I think so," she said roughly. I let her go, she wobbled for a bit before catching her balance. "Thanks." she turned around and I noticed that her mask had gotten washed away. The black makeup around her eyes was running and…
And the look in her eyes told me that she was thinking something along the lines of 'oh shit.'
And then I could see the freckles on her face.
"...Lisa?"
She turned back around and rushed off. She stumbled a little but she managed to clear my line of sight just fine while I stood there frozen by the shock and the feeling of betrayal that my best friend was a supervillain.
Just as soon as my heart sank as low as it could go, Opal spoke up. "Princess...?"
"It's fine," I lied. "There are more important things to focus on now."
I checked where Leviathan had last been seen and made my way there. I had to keep going. Had to keep helping. Had to stay busy. Had to do my part to save the day.
The search and rescue team, it seemed, had abandoned retrieving the dead in favor of rescuing the living: I passed four or five corpses on the way.
When I came across the remains of Dragon's suit, the one from earlier with the giant rockets, however, I got an idea.
"Install:" I said once I'd drawn the right card, "Saber."
Once I'd traded my ears and tail for a sword and armor, I approached the wreck and tore one of the rocket launchers loose. This one still had three missiles, and Knight of Owner's effect quickly got it back in working order.
Only a handful of people were still actively fighting Leviathan at this point, at least in melee.
The Triumvirate were there, as was Dauntless, and Chevalier, and Myrrdin. I couldn't see Armsmaster, but the watch hadn't said he was down or dead.
I could see a girl with dark red hair trying to lead a whole lot of dogs on leashes out of an abandoned-looking compound. She seemed panicked.
I hoisted Dragon's giant rockets up onto my shoulder and willed one to fire. The missile, traced in golden lines, roared like the most primal of dragons as it soared to Leviathan with bright blue flame, the pitchest black of smoke, and the smell of brimstone leaving a trail behind it.
The projectile impacted the serpent and lifted it from its feet, carrying it up into the air. I willed the explosive to twist up and carry Leviathan high into the sky and fired another rocket.
The first rocket exploded with such intensity that it was as if Hell had broken loose, and Leviathan was thrown higher into the air. I fired the final missile just in time for the second to explode, throwing Leviathan higher still into the air.
I spun around tossed the missile launcher as the final missile impacted Leviathan and exploded. The now useless weapon impacted Leviathan and created a smaller, normal explosion on contact.
I marched forward to the other heroes but collapsed into the flooded street just as I made it. I had to push myself up with Arondite, burning it into the asphalt under the water and pulling against the hilt to get to kneeling.
"I think I bought us some time," I said. "I'll take him at least a minute to land from that high up."
"Princess, you need to rest," Opal said sternly. "You've been burning through mana like there's no tomorrow and I can't replenish your reserves while you're using a card. I'm certain that you've done more than your fair share of work when it comes to defending the city from that beast and-"
Opal was cut off by the sound of thunder. Levithan's storm was getting worse.
I reached for my card holster. "Compromise," I said. "Install: Berserker!"
If Leviathan's storm was bad enough to thunder then it was bad enough for me to draw lightning from. I let the madness of Frankenstein's monster take me and…
It was different this time.
The madness was… Lesser. Less, less something.
But the rush of power that came with it was so very much more.
Instead of the wedding gown, I was wrapped in white cloth bandages covered my torso from stem to stern with more wrapped around my thighs, calves, shins, and forearms leaving only my hands, feet, shoulders and upper arms, knees, and slightest traces of my hips exposed.
The bridal chest was embedded in some kind of apparatus. A large bladed guard across the entire staff with the headset into a pincer claw or something.
"Berserker Install: Saber Inheritance!" I declared on a reflex. I spun the Bridal Chest-the Bridal Blade, and raised it to the sky.
A massive crack of thunder and I pulled every last charge of electrical energy building in Leviathan's clouds out into a single bolt of lightning. Chevalier had been staring at me, for some reason, and the suddenness of it made him jump.
The pincer at the end of the Bridal Blade opened to accommodate the blast, and the sheer rush of power flowing into me, taking away my aches and chasing away the fatigue. There was only one thing I could say after taking it all in.
"My boyfriend's gonna get it tonight!"
"Excuse me?" Legend asked as he came lower. Doing a quick look around I could see more of the surviving Capes coming into the area to regroup.
"I apologize for my Master's crudeness," Opal sassed from the Bridal Blade. "She's never going to follow through on that, they haven't even kissed yet. Berserker's mental state and social impairment manifest in my master as a sudden lack of inhibition combined with a great deal of overconfide-"
"I think I can kill Leviathan!" I interrupted suddenly. It came to me as the knowledge of how… Saberstein's powers worked.
"I can absorb energy, you all just saw me do it!" I said. "And this here can make blades out of plasma." I made a small blade to demonstrate. "If everyone with energy powers gives me a bunch of juice and then someone really strong throws me at Leviathan, I can probably make a blade big and strong enough to split his ass in half."
I started twirling the Bridal Blade. "I just need enough juice to get all the way back to full Mana capacity. Lightning works best, but fire, lasers, or radiation all work in a pinch. Come on, there's like a dozen blasters here," I said noting how we' regrouped, "Don't look away Photon Mom, I can see you in the back. Come on everyone, lend me your energy!"
I could make out Armsmaster in the crowd. He was down a halberd and the one he had left had fresh welding marks. Off in the distance, I could hear a loud crash as Leviathan returned to the surface.
"Yeah," I said. "I think we just ran out of time to decide. We gonna do this or not?"
"For-the-rec-ord," Opal said as I spun her around, "I-am-op-pos-ed-to-this-plan."
"It can't possibly hurt," Legend said. "Squads one, two, and four: keep Leviathan occupied for a minute. Everyone with energy powers, shoot the teenage girl."
Just before the fighters left, I shouted out: "Wait! Alexandria, you're the biggest and strongest Heroine ever. Do you think you could be the one to throw me?"
She stared at me but didn't say anything. She didn't leave with the rest of her squad though, so I guess that means she agreed to it.
Once the melee fighters and battlefield controllers left to occupy Leviathan, the blasters spread out around me. I raised the Bridal Blade up above my head and kept it spinning. Belatedly, I realized that spinning it was actually pulling static charge out of the air. Honestly, I'd only been doing it to do it.
"Now!"
People fired-actual fire from two sources, the green fire from earlier, blue, red, purple, and other blue lasers, three different colors of lighting, big blue balls of electrical plasma from Eidolon, bolts of electricity from Dauntless's lance, what I think was a burst of gamma radiation, and something that ripples in the air all came at me and were pulled to the spinning Blade above my head, forming a sparkly rainbow kaleidoscope as they were all pulled in and the power surged into my being.
I could feel it tingling in my nerves and spilling out, flowing through the rest of my body, The power. The phenomenal power!
"This is… Enough!" I said. Reluctantly. I had to force it out. The power… It was truly amazing, but… I felt like if I kept going for too long I'd explode.
The assault stopped and I sucked up the dredges of energy that remained. I noted that it was Photon Mom that was the last one to stop offering me power.
Once I was full to bursting with converted mana, I hopped up and grabbed Alexandria by the shoulders. "Okay, now fly me up and throw me hard."
"How hard?" She asked.
"I need to be going as fast and hit with as much force as possible, so just as hard as you can. I can take it."
"I'll be holding you to that," she said and took to the air.
Instead of flying directly at Leviathan, she flew in the other direction and then took a hard right once we reached the limits of the main city.
I could feel the wind practically tearing through my hair. I'd never, ever, ever even tried to fly this fast. My cheeks were vibrating from the g-force and the surge of adrenaline combined with the power rush I was already feeling was amazing.
Halfway through our third lap around the city, Alexandria made another sharp turn and started heading right for Leviathan.
She reached back, grabbed me by the arm, and did kind of a super-fast spin and suddenly I was flying head-first towards the monster at speeds even greater than when we were flying.
I swung the Bridal Blade out and channeled all of the power I'd absorbed into it so that a massive blade of plasma, at least as long as Leviathan himself was tall, and swung it forward just in time for the momentum to force it clean through the serpent's lower belly.
Eventually, the blade of plasma reached a point where it couldn't penetrate through anymore.
And Then the momentum carried Leviathan off of his feet. He flew with me and I swung the blade again making us spin in a circle.
We stopped moving at the exact time I slammed the monster into the beach.
"Skewered…! Plasma…! Blade!" With that declaration, I managed to force the blade an inch further in and then Leviathan and I were both engulfed in a sphere of white-hot plasma and crackling lightning.
…
…
…
My vision cleared and my ears stopped ringing a few minutes later.
Leviathan was down. He wasn't moving.
His flesh was charred black and there was a huge rift in his belly. I couldn't see any organs but I could see his bones and some kind of lump.
I stumbled back from my vantage on him and landed on my feet on the glass that used to be the beach.
I didn't intend to uninstall, but the four Cards I'd used today ejected regardless. I caught them, reholstered them…
And then what I'd just done sank in.
"...I just killed an Endbringer..."
"Princess," Opal said, "now that the monster is dead you really need to rest before you overstrain yourself."
"Opal," I said. "You don't get it. I just killed an Endbringer. No one's ever done that before. Not even Scion."
As if to illustrate my point, someone from further into the city cheered. A few more started clapping
I was about to turn back and rejoin the others when Leviathan suddenly lurched up. My eyes went wide as I found myself clenched in his fist and…
...Honestly, I wasn't sure what happened next, but I remember at least five slamming sounds and the next thing I knew I was dizzy, laying in a pile of broken glass, Leviathan was heading back into the city, and I was staring down a huge wave that was coming out from the far end of the bay. It'd maybe be here in…
One of my Class Cards had been shaken loose. I reached for it, saw which one it was…
"Fuck it," I said. Either I used it or I'd die when the wave hit. "Install: Rider."
*end*
Disclaimer: While the Heimlich maneuver can be used to clear water from the lungs and throat of a near-drowning victim, it's only effective before cardiac arrest or other problems set in. The general consensus I've seen is that proper CPR is the most effective treatment and should be used if possible. Don't confuse the needs of the story for proper medical advice.