To the readers
I appreciate any comments on the story.
Notes
[] are used to indicate stage directions
All dialogue follows a "Speaker: dialogue" format
{} are used for author comments.
CONTINUE
["Winter at the Continental" by Joel J. Richard, Tyler Bates starts playing] {The time codes correspond to what point in the song is playing.}
0:00
[Show the interior of the shadow avatar ship.
The inside of the ship was a giant box with two floors. The two doors that had ramps to the sector enter into a cargo bay on the ground floor. A bank of monitors and controls winds around the walls of the place with seats along the walls. Clear empty ground floor. Two ramps in the front lead up to the second floor command station. All the command consoles faced a viewing screen at front showing the surroundings and other data with a raised Pilot control station in the back.
Beneath the pilot control station was a small room with a circular teleportation pad. Behind its wall is a balcony that looks over the cargo bay. The back of the second floor had weapon stations, one in each back corner connected to the front by walkways suspended from the ceiling.
Ethan and Ombret dash through the same hallway Ai and Ombret used into the room. He sees Ai trapped on the right side of the room with one of the missing segments of wall at her back. Two staff wielding avatars run out of the ship and down the ramp to join the fight.]
Ai jump kicks the second staff avatar. It autododges only to get sniped. Show Ethan laying down at the edge of the walkway in the prone position looking in his scope.
0:17
Tarantulas line up along the railing. Lasers rain across the battlefield, each one targeting an agent. The black avatars around Ai are forcefully jerked back by their ability attempting to prevent them from taking damage.
POV of the tarantulas, with eye of XANA superimposed in their vision, switching from target to target. Timers attached to each avatar counting down from 2 seconds. They are always targeting a black avatar with its autododge available.
Ethan is between two of the spiders and a POV of him smoothly pointing at each agent around Ai and eliminating each with a shot to the head.
CLICK
He holds out his hand and a tarantula places its foot in it and allows itself to be absorbed turning into another sniper rifle in his hands with the tarantula design.
Ethan: Sherlock where are they?
Axel: At your 10 and 1. Behind the far cover. No angle at this elevation.
Ombret: Ai! Take this!
[Ombret, behind an opposite barrier on an opening from Ai, reaches into her beret, takes out a pistol made from a kankrelat and slides it across the metal floor over to the cover Ai is behind.
Ai takes up the pistol and manages to body shot and take out an agent preoccupied with the monsters with a couple hits.
0:51
Three agents are shooting arrows at the sniper platform. Pan up to the ceiling.
WUMP
The EMP cap lands and sticks to the ceiling. Ombret steps out from the EMP cap walking on the ceiling with her spatial spikes sticking out of her greaves. Throws down flashfire cards. Agents auto dodge back from lasers only to land on the cards she had placed behind them.
BOMBOMBOMBOM
One of the soldiers from the explosion looks around dazed. Ombret drops down, the guillotine arms stretch out around the avatar.
SLICK
Ombret LP: 100 - 100
The other shadow soldiers look over and see Ombret slicing its ally in half. She throws down her hat and gets sucked into it as the attacks whiz by.
0:59
A blox uses its ice beam to freeze the avatars. Ethan snipes two with 1 sniper shot. [click] shoulders his rifle.
A zweihander wielding shadow and a staff wielding shadow find the left ramp up to the sniper platform at the front of the room. They start cutting their way through the tarantulas to where Ethan is.
The Blox is still sweeping its ice beam across the battlefield. An agent yeets a sword into it knocking it onto its side. Seeing the vulnerable blox, Ethan knee slides over to the blox and absorbs it before the MIB can finish it off.
Ethan's pupil changes to a square split into four sections. The new weapon is a sphere with a cavity for someone's hand and trigger inside. Has a blue XANA's eye on the front.
A swordsman comes up the right side ramp behind Ethan. It down swings at Ethan and he ends up on the ground kicking at the sword agent, blocking its swings with his empty sniper on his back. Slices through the rifle destroying it in red voxels landing a hit.
Ethan LP: 100 - 90
He shoots icy blue-white beams from his new pistol that create chunks of ice wherever they hit. The swordsman avatar blocks the shots aimed at it by blocking with its sword, but the ice is frosting on the sword as it does so until he's completely frozen over. Runs up and shoves the agent off the platform toward the glowing planet below. Then he peaks out from the hole in the side of the wall curiously. He grins.]
1:09
[An avatar with a sword flanks Ai on the right and cuts her across the back.
Ai LP: 25 - 15
The staff user Ai was facing knocks her down off one of the raised platforms in the pit into a group of enemies: another swordsman, two martial artists staff avatars and one shooter shadow.
A megatank virtualizes right above her. It squishes one of the martial artists, then opens up. Ai looks questioning at it, but it's not attacking her. A saber user jumps down from above. She dives into the open monster. It closes up around her and rolls elsewhere. She's disoriented as she's thrown about. It opens up right into a crowd of avatars.]
Ai: Okay, I see what you're going for.
[Ai fires at the enemies with the pistol and scores a hit or two. Ducks back inside as arrows whip past her. She braces against its frame as it rolls around. When it opens up again, she pops out the top of the crack and fires again.]
1:13
[Tracking shot as Ethan parkours outside the structure everyone's fighting in by using his red sword as a foot and hand holds where there isn't any, manifesting and re-absorbing it in red flashes from his arms and legs. Then when he reaches an opening in the side with a black avatar visible in the opening passing by, he swings around, kicks the agent to the ground, rolls underneath a slash from a second agent and as they turn around to see what just happened to their partner, shoots at the sword user to force it to autododge back, then he spartan kicks the recovering agent off the opening to the void he just entered from.
The sword avatar slashed Ethan in the leg cutting where the black windbreaker didn't cover.
Ethan LP: 90 - 80
SLICK
A guillotine slices the avatar in half. Ombret fell from the ceiling onto her weapon, just as the sword user is about to run Ethan through.]
KURRM
Ombret: A thank you?
[Ethan just looks at her for a second before arrows hit the ground around them. Ombret holds up her guillotine in front of her and the arrows flit and blip through the swirling portal. A barrage of arrows lands on Ethan, but they bounce off his new black jacket. One scores a mark across his cheek.
Ethan LP 80 - 78
Shooters on top of raised blocks in the middle of the structure have sighted Ombret and Ethan. Ethan covers his face with his jacket flap and the arrows continue to bounce off the black material. A huge agent with a Zweihander comes out of nowhere and lands a slash on Ethan's side, tearing through the black jacket, his blue wireframe exposed undeath, his avatar sparking.
Ethan LP: 78- 28
Ethan tumbles off the raised walkway on the side of the structure to the pit floor where most of the fighting between the monsters and black avatars is taking place. The black coat dissolves into red pixels leaving his red one albeit damaged with the blue wireframe revealed underneath.
Ethan: XANA. Need a med kit. [a blox materializes a short distance away]
BURZINGINGING PNCKER BOOM
[Arrows from the agents destroy it before Ethan can move. The heavy jumps down and slashes down at Ethan, for the finishing blow.
KLANG
The sword deflects off the EMP cap that fell between the two at the last moment. The force still slams Ethan back across the floor into a wall. Ethan glances over at Ombret on walkway seeing she rescued him while she herself was already fighting above. Zweihander avatar moves up but Ombret bought Ethan the time he needed to ignite his sword and redirect the zweihander downward swing.]
1:29
[Ombret sprays spikes across the two avatars in front of her, the sword user getting their blade stuck in space. Throws a card at them, blasting them back into the staff user, leaving their sword stuck in the air.
1:32
Hurls a spike into the sword user's arm. Slight-of-hands the spike out of the sword, letting the blade fall into her hands as she hurls the spike into the head of the staff wielder this time.
1:35
Blows the sword avatar's feet out from under them and pins the sword across its back with spikes so it can't stand up. She jumps off its head to knee the staff wielder in the chest, reaching into her faux sleeves and fans cards and spikes. Keeps pulling out and yeeting spikes and cards into the staff user's chest, its weapon going flying before freezing in place.
1:39
She grabs the staff user's arm, spins under it, and flips them onto the sword avatar. Flips back to guillotine, reaches up and flips it over her head onto the two.
SNICK
Two more heads are devirtualized.
Ombret LP: 100 - 100
1:40
Ombret and Ethan's fighting intersects. Ombret is dancing around more agents on the walkway above in the background while Ethan is weaving around the heavy in the pit while taking potshots up at the other agents in the foreground shooting back at him. He curves a footbomb right at the heavy.
TING
It bounces off the flat of the zweihander only for it to arc up into two agents slashing at Ombret above.
BOOM
Ombret takes a run up to slide between the a sword avatar's legs into her cap on the ground, flying out of the EMP cap at the heavy just as the explosion rings where she just was. Sinks a spatial spike into the back of its head.
Ethan takes three shots-
PRUNG PRUNG PRUNG
-taking out the shooters harrying him. Looks back at the agents on the walkway takes a few shots to get them to block. Kicks his second footbomb through the EMP cap.
BOOM
KURRM
More agents blown off the walkway.
Zweihander cuts the spike off his head, canceling the effect. Attacks Ombret, she dives into the cap to save herself. Zweihander turns back again to attack Ethan. He dodges back from slashes. Once, twice, thrice. The heavy takes a full rotation circle slash. Ethan hits the wall, a side of one of the block walkways. Lasers impact against the zweihander wielder from monsters, a golem this time, coming to join the fight with Ethan.
More agents from the ship are dashing up a ramp toward Ombret. Looks over to see other agents jumping from block to block above the pit to reach her. Throws down cards at the corners of the platform walls near the top of the ramp.
Ombret's explosions on the walkway ring in the background as Ethan's master rifle is sliced in half as he tries to block the heavy metal blade. Avatars in mid devirtualization slam into the ground around Ethan.
KURRM
A golem picks up one of the black avatar reinforcements coming to help the zweihander agent and throws them as an improvised weapon, camera zooms ahead at one of the shooters on top of the blocks trying to get out of the way right before the two bodies collide.
KURRM KURRM
Ombret throws spatial spikes at the staff users vaulting toward her. Gets one stuck mid jump but the rest land on the walkway charging at her. The rest of the agents from the stairs not caught in her card trap pincer her in from the other side.
She runs up, flips over the EMP and uses it as a gymnastic beam to flip on and around the handle, its two arms posted in the ground with the portal spinning between them. Kicks one of the sword agents from the ramp and continues her flip. The staff user tries to get her from the other side, but she and the agent's staff disappear into the portal as they touch it from opposite sides. Pan over to behind the staff users to the beret where she flies up straight behind them, spinning spraying out cards the pepper the area in tiny explosions.
Dives back into the cap, out the same side of the EMP portal she entered, springboards kicking off the shooter shadows, looks to grab the top of the EMP handle…
Only for staff user to jump into the air and intercepts her. She falls to the ground doubled over from being kicked in the stomach. The shooter avatar she kicked fires a steam of energy projectiles at her from where it's laying on the ground and soon other lazer arrow avatars join in.
Ombret LP: 100 - 98 - 94 - 92 - 86 - 80 - 74 - 68 - 62 - 56 - 50 - 48
Ombret's avatar sparks. She sees the Emp that landed a few feet away, grabs it, and blocks the arrows with the portal.
In the background, the arrows fly out of the cap, narrowly missing Ethan to hit the heavy. The heavy turns around and bring his slab of metal down to destroy the cap.
Ombret presses a button and recalls the cap, a flash and it reappears on the end of her weapon, and shoots it on the opposite side of the room on a wall riddled with geometric patterns of squares with gaps to the outside. She throws the EMP in the air over one of the raised blocks and jumps in her beret to escape as the staff and sword wielders all swing and miss at her. Pops out of the EMP cap just in time to catch the EMP.
Looks over at the ship. With no agents currently around it. She smirks.]
[Cut to inside the ship. Someone new is being virtualized in at the pad in the center. Ombret's beret is WRRHMM-ed through the doorway. Agent looks over just to get a spike to the face.
She uses them as a spring board to jump into the air, onto the second level, pins a second agent in place. Ombret slides in behind it and flair kicks to sweep its legs out, flings a card into its chest and backflips away before it explodes. Flourishes her hat and points it at the black avatars charging up the ramp from the ground level. A beam of ice shoots out and freezes three agents before Ombret turns it on the agents on the second level.
Cut outside to show a blox shooting their ice beams into the EMP portal.
Back inside, she vaults the console and sends flashes of cards down at the teleporter pad with the spiked agent still on it.
SNAP
Both disappear in an explosion.
PHLEW PHLEW.
Ombret's beret slips from her hands and falls to the ground level.
Ombret LP: 48 - 42 - 36
Ombret spots the agent that shot her from the back of the firing at her. The agent she carded is still on the ground next to her. Throws down another card, blowing them up into the air. Ombret grabs their leg and jumps out into the open air. Pins them in midair and uses the body as a platform to jump to the back area of the second level. The agent only hits the body she threw. Grabs and spins around the railing as she lands, the camera following Ombret from the same orientation, she climbs up the ship wall as she grabs the agent by the neck and arm and flips back over the railing plunging them both to the ground floor.
2:04
The spatial spike greaves and agent's head hit the floor at the same time. Except the spatial spikes only cancel out "her" momentum.
KURRM
Camera shifts with her as she turns to reveal a staff and sword agents mid attack.
Ombret LP: 36 - 16 - 6
[Cut back to Ethan blocking a downward sword swing by crossing his pistol and sword in an X. The swordsman avatar kicks him backward.
Ethan LP: 28 - 25
Ethan's exhausted. He can't hold his pistols up anymore. And there's still a sword, half frozen shooter, and the zweihander wielders to deal with.
Golem charges up and fires plasma canon at the zweihander. Zweihander black avatar blocks and absorbs the plasma canon blast before uppercutting the golem in half. The blade glowing green from the absorbed energy. Then turns to Ethan.
The sword agent breaks the ice off the shooter's arm with its blade. Ethan rapid fires at the shooter, but the sword avatar blocks the shots.
He shoots a volley at the sword avatar, it auto dodges closer to him. The shooter lands a shot on Ethan's leg and the blade user follows up.
Ethan LP: 25- 19 - 9
Back in the lab, Ethan's card flashes on the screen.]
Axel: You both take one more hit and you're done.
2:08
[Agents are pushing the megatank off the ledge of the room where there's nothing but the glowing planet below. It's trying to roll away, but it has no momentum.
The megatank opens up to fire, revealing Ai hiding inside.
One agent lands a shot on the Megatank's eye. It rolls end over end.]
Ai: Oh cra-
[Bails out just as it explodes. Its death throes hit her and lay her out flat.
Ai LP: 15 - 10
The black avatars run over to surround Ai where she was blown to.]
2:12
[Ethan's pinned against the wall after his golem guards have been destroyed. Holding off zweihander with his sword, cutting himself with his own weapon.] {Cannot damage your Life Points with your own weapon though}
Ethan: [grunts] XANA. Sidearm. SIDEARM!
[Kankrelat materializes in the air and falls onto his open hand. Ethan transforms it into a kankrelat pistol, his pupils changing to the Kankrelat's reticle, and aims low. Knee shot. Grabs the zweihander and absorbs it while shoulder checking its owner, pushing them into a sword avatar that was circling behind Ethan.
2:15
Pulls out Oracle Sphere Emitter (pupils switch to blox reticle) and freezes the shooter agent's arms just as they aim at him, laser arrows unable to fire.
Quick switch back to pistol and torso shot on the sword user to make them bend over. Runs up, use the reeling zweihander as footstool to jump and knee the sword user in the face.
Double tap with pistol shot on the sword agent, torso then head.
Then a sword slash to finish off the frozen shooter.
Spins around, and his swing slows down as he materializes the zweihander back out into his hands…
…and SMASHES it through its previous owner into the wall they were just wrestling against.]
KURRM
Ethan: [panting] Trip-da-k…kill.
BURZING
[Laser hits the wall that just materialized in front of Ethan. He looks over to see Ai holding out her hand using creativity to save him while she herself is surrounded by enemies.
Ai LP: 10 - 5
2:20
Ethan sees Ombret struggling on the ground, trying to kick away an avatar halfway through the ship doorway, the ripple effect on the black mat surface surrounding where their torso surfaces. He absorbs the zweihander, rolls toward them, manifests the zweihander blade on the end of one foot, detaches it, and tomahawk hurls the sword through the executor's chest.
KURRM
Ombret pushes them back into the ship mid-devirtualization.]
Ethan: You're welcome.
[Ombret gets right back into action, back up and dashes toward Ethan, running up the new wall with her spatial spike heels, grapples onto a shadow soldier's neck with her legs, then flips it through the air ejecting the spatial spikes as she lands pinning it midair.
Ethan nails the helpless soldier with a body and head shot.
Ai's lashes out at a sword avatar. It just autododges back from her fist. She raises the pistol Ombret gave her, but the black avatar just raises its blade to block her shots. Takes a step to attack the girl. Immediately pinned in place by a yellow spike growing out of its back. Ai grabs the agent by its shoulder and forearm, pins its leg with hers, shoots the spike, destroying it, and hip throws the avatar into the ground. Just in time for Ombret to land with her guillotine and-]
Ombret: EXECUTABLE!
[The two pieces of the MIB halves go flying and an something goes flying from its upper torso into the guillotine.
Ombret LP: 6 - 100
Cut to Ethan freezing another agent mid attack on Ai.
Second agent attacks Ai after first is frozen. She blocks the hits with a guard stance, arm guards growing on her arms from creativity. They are made out of the same material as the blocks around them.
Ai LP: 5 - 2
Ethan freezes a black avatar with the last of Oracle Sphere Emitter, chucks it at a second agent to waste its autododge, kneecaps it with pistol.
2:38
Limping agent takes cover behind its frozen ally, just for energy to form around their neck as Ethan uses hollow of his materialized sword to trap them against the freshly made ice statue and make an impromptu human shield against some arrows.
BURZINGINGING
2:40
He twists around the statue, dragging the trapped avatar by the neck, and shoots a third avatar, the shooter.
2:40.5
Ethan twists around and puts the butt of the gun against the live agent's forehead as it's struggling to get the sword off its neck. Straightens his aim just in time to line up with the final avatar with a staff leaping for a downwards stab at Ai.
2:41
Shoots, headshots the staff avatar, and the recoil forces the trapped agent through the energy sword, decapitating him and the ice statue.
Ethan: [trills] Trip-da-killllll. [Looks around at the empty battlefield apart from the three of them. Thumbs up] Good timing … [pants]… on the cover Acceptable Casualty.
Ai: You're welcome.
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