[X] Purple

This day had been an ordeal.

Perhaps that was putting it lightly, but a harsher term for what this day was usually conjured to mind the image of something unrelated to an emotional shock. Trying to think of a better way of saying it was too draining, right now. After what had happened today, she didn't want to waste time thinking of words to describe today.

Three had never been good at dealing with things she didn't like. Usually, she could just ignore the problem, or kill it. Right now, neither was a possibility for her.

Even just a few minutes ago, it would not have been too bad. She hadn't finished her experiments with Pyrrha yet, and people were coming to take her away. And worse, the method through which it had been done confirmed that Pyrrha was still able to hold on to her humanity beyond the programming on the mechanics wresting control away from her. She hadn't made any progress, and was going to end up starting from scratch.

And then there was the fact that the tournament winner was alive. On one hand, if Three had been able to capture her in a low-profile environment, there was opportunities there. But so blatantly like this, as part of a coordinated assault? She clearly had backing, who would likely know about Three's last attempt at holding the tournament winner captive.

One was going to be upset with her now. Three had gone through her experiments, and now she had enemies which knew things that would turn the public against her. If it was just her, that would be irrelevant. But One had such bright dreams, and needed people to make it work. If the people behind this incident leaked the news of what Three had done, that would be a bother for One.

Three didn't want to cause problems for One. One had enough problems to deal with. Juggling all the different business deals, personal deals, and military contracts for the company and herself, to push towards her goal. Preparing her influence in the other Kingdoms, waiting for the news of her success before she started to rally the world around her. Preparing Weiss for her role in the future. Dealing with the pain that came with her increased sensations.

It was unfair that One had to work so hard to get what she wanted, and now Three had made things harder for One because she had tried to satisfy her own curiosity.

But even that wasn't the worst part. If that had been all there was to it, Three would have been sad, but it would have stopped at a certain point. One would have scolded her, and Three would have to fix the problem while One did damage control, and then after feeling terrible for a while Three would finish solving the problem, One would forgive her, and Three could forget it ever happened.

She was never going to forget the sensation of Zero stabbing her in the stomach.

Her memories of Zero were vague, but they were there. They were happy ones, too. Being grumpy at times, but happy whenever she thought nobody was looking. Hiding away her happiness so it couldn't hurt her, only letting her guard down when she thought it wouldn't last, but Three could remember those smiling eyes watching her as she slumbered off to sleep.

Those silver eyes had once belonged to someone who had cared about her, and had been happy to see Three safe enough to sleep peacefully. Now, all there was in those eyes were a cold hate.

It hurt. More than anything, it heart. The pain throughout all the wounds in her torso, just barely enough to not kill her, and the pain of her ruined arm from where Zero had stabbed her, those were nothing. The idea that Zero was trying to kill her? It was like if One was trying to kill her. Three didn't know how to respond to that.

It was keeping her off balance. She didn't like being off balance. She was something of a scientist, but a scientist at least had control over the situation. Investigating unknown variables was nice, but in controlled environments. It was like playing with dolls. The replica dolls she had used for that tea party had been stained and needed to be remade, because there was no control there. Three needed that baseline, she thought. That aspect of control, where variation from her expectations were either the purpose of the activity or kept to a minimum for her to control.

This situation was nothing like that. Zero was trying to kill her. The red cloaked child that she remembered seeing around somewhere before was Zero's daughter, and another Intoner. The person that Three was using to get robot parts out of Ironwood had been part of the treachery too, there was that, but that was mostly unimportant in the grand scheme of things.

Too many unknown variables, too many unknown unknowns. Known unknowns were something she could deal with, and even a few unknown unknowns were bearable. But not on this scale. She couldn't deal with it.

Perhaps summoning her Angel was a fix to more than one problem, then. It was giving her a chance to embrace her Song again.

Her lips opened, and Three sang. It was a wordless song, one without purpose or meaning. With this much of it here at once, she couldn't control it or direct it, no more than she could control the sky or the sea.

The Song itself was such a beautiful thing, like a force of nature. And as she sang, Three found it so easy to just lose herself in it. There wasn't any need to worry about anything while in the Song's embrace. No need to worry about older sisters being disappointed in her or trying to kill her, no need to worry about mysteries which had blindsided her while she was trying to solve a different problem, no need to worry about ruining a doll by spilling hot tea over it, nothing.

It was like she was asleep, in a way. Except even when she slept, she dreamt. She didn't always remember her dreams, but they were there. Here, in the embrace of the song, there wasn't even that. There wasn't anything flitting in the back of her mind in the Song. It was without reason or purpose, it simply was. That was the nature of the power that Three had nestled within her.

And then Octa's words and deeds seeped into Three's awareness, and reluctantly, like a child awakening from a pleasant dream, she allowed him to tap into the power of the Song. Guiding it, giving it direction, giving it purpose, as she continued to cling to the calm at the centre of it.

She couldn't afford to lose herself right now, alas. One would be very disappointed in her, in that case. She wanted to leave herself in the centre of the song, enjoy it's mind blanking power and push all the painful thoughts out of her mind, but she couldn't afford to do that right now.

But, it was so nice, to hide away from the world...

But the idea of failing One wouldn't leave her mind, and Octa was keeping enough of a grasp on the Song to ensure that she couldn't lose herself to it that easily. For a split second, she hated him for that. He was a man who let himself revel in his small pleasures, why not leave Three to hers?

But, this was the right thing to do. She needed to do this. As easy as it would be to turn away from the world and let it slip by without notice, she couldn't step aside now. Not with Zero still here, trying to kill her.

The song on her lips shattered the purple light that had started to cling to her, and as the shockwave force everyone away, Three allowed sensation to return to her, as she looked over the battlefield again.

There was so many people here who she didn't know. The yellow girl dying off to the side. The bird man dying not far from there, near the unconscious body of Zero's daughter. Which was a question that that Three would love some answers to sooner or later, come to think of it. She looked to be about fourteen or fifteen, but that didn't make sense. Zero had still been with the rest of the Intoners fourteen years ago, and she certainly hadn't had any time to have kids then.

...But then, keeping track of time outside the Kingdoms was a difficult task. Perhaps there was just an error in Three's memories and recollection of time passing. But that was a question for another time.

Even as she looked down, Three noted the important aspects of the battlefield. Her doll, Pyrrha, was gone. The tournament champion was trying to pull that annoying boy in the green scarf outside of the aberrant time area. Zero was glaring up at her, armed with her sword in one hand and her dagger in the other, but wasn't making her move.

Cautious. But that was only natural. She had summoned her Angel, and yet it had yet to reveal itself.

But, how unfortunate for Zero. She had lost the initiative.

"Armisael." Three whispered, as she heard it all around her. Skittering through the building, past the walls. The humans near Zero below looked around frantically, as they came into view.

From the windows, they began to claw their way down the buildings. From the roof, they jumped. From behind the gate, they climbed. One hundred purple eyes stared at the battle in pairs of two, and the fifty Armisael began to move.

The purple lights shone in the eyes and stomachs of the doll-like beings, as they started to scammer around. The smaller ones, ones actually an appropriate size for the vaguely baby-shaped Angels, reached Zero first. They leapt, clinging to Zero's leg, and as she moved to throw them off, a wire wrapped around and connected Angel to Intoner.

Then they began to detonate, and Zero let out a scream of pain and rage. Her sword swept through the air, the changing current throwing aside the dust that had been kicked up by the explosion, and she kicked away from the next small Armisael to approach her. Zero's supporters huddled together away from Zero, putting their backs together as they faced off against the rest of the hoard. Red lightning and burning flames soared through the sky towards Three's Angels, that continued on undeterred.

Hm. There seemed to be less people here than there were before, wasn't there? Three's Pyrrha doll for one thing, but then there was the other girl who had taken her from Three who had left as well. And a boy in grey hair, come to think of it. Well, no matter.

There were still a bunch of people not Zero or in the corner of Zero's allies, trying to keep their distance from the Armisael. There was a girl in white on the ground, with only one leg. There was a girl in brown near the front door, near the rest of Three's Angels, but Zero had been the one to throw something at her so she was probably dead. There was the girl with the green hair near the girl with one leg. There was Three's niece near the dead man, and there was the dying girl in yellow.

The green-haired girl seemed to be looking around frantically, as the human sized Armisael started reaching Zero. Their wires were flying through the air, moving to bind Zero and forcing her to act fast to stay free. She pulled on one of them for a moment to slam two Armisael together, and tripped up a third, but her sword was barely effecting them.

Intoners were powerful, but the Angels were something else entirely. The army of Armisael that Three could call up were, potentially, enough to beat Zero. Maybe. Hopefully. Assuming-

"Michael!" Zero roared, as she stabbed an Armisael in the eye. Her arm blurred as she let out a scream, her song flowing around her to enhance the power of however many blows happened in that second, and the Armisael fell back, defeated.

One down, Three mused. But Zero had been distracted to do just that. The Armisael behind her looped it's arms around, a wire cutting into Zero's Aura, before it detonated.

Zero was thrown to the floor, and Three smiled. Zero wasn't unbeatable. The Armisael self-destruct attacks were powerful to knock off Three's Aura in a single explosion from the middle-sized ones, and even if Zero was powerful, she wasn't infallible. She could only last so lon-

There was a flash of movement, as Octa suddenly threw his Chakram in front of Three's face. She jerked back in surprise, and heard the clash of steal. The dagger closed into her field of vision briefly, before it and the Chakram both fell.

...Right. She had forgotten, caught up in her song. She was only looking out of one eye right now. Zero had cut through the other one when she sliced through Three's face.

Turning her head around briefly, Three saw two different sights at once.

The first was the blue light burning in the distance, from the front door. Two? It was approaching quickly, and as she focused, Three realised she could hear the distant singing of her sister.

Two was coming. That was nice. She'd be able to help carry the bodies away so that One wasn't too upset.

The other sight wasn't so nice, though. There wasn't very much nice, about seeing a dragon soaring, on a trajectory to run into Zero. Or rather, the Armisael around her.

That...

That wasn't good. Dragons were powerful. She'd read the legends, and One had given Three some information on the tests with her own dragon, Gabriella. But more then that, there was something about dragons. An inherent factor that, according to One, gave them an advantage over the song and it's users.

Armisael had a chance of beating Zero. Maybe it would restrain her and capture her, or maybe it would force her to run. But with that dragon added into the mix, Three didn't like her chances.

...Two was on her way, Three noted. She would want to save the people who weren't able to run away by themselves. If Three just ran now, like she wanted to, then Two might risk herself anyway to save them.

So perhaps Three should stay. It wouldn't be for long. She'd just need to focus Armisael to fight the dragon and Zero instead of Zero and her associates, and then Three herself could fight the assorted allies of Zero until Two arrived and they could all run at once.

But that might be too dangerous, she mused. Perhaps she could just grab the one in red, and tell Two that everyone else made it out already? Two might want to have confirmation on that, though...

Well, there's no time to think with the dragon so close, unfortunately. So it looked like Three didn't time to think about it any further than that.

[X] Run away now, and hope Two doesn't go in anyway.
[X] Hold the line, and hope the dragon didn't kill her.