TFF Academy - Story Thread

[Zenithos]

Things were quickly heating up, and if anyone knew any better, placing a Black Waltz in a desperate situation was next to plain suicide. Zeni knew this. He also knew that the key to defeating this thing was to defeat it FAST before it got any ideas.

Unfortunately, the Dovescape put quite a dent on his current fire power. For one thing, he could do nothing but watch as his manna-bound twin double-ended blades dissolve into a flock of doves.

What was a mage/alchemist/vampire to do in such a situation?

"Hey....just wondering...what exactly are those folks in the black robes over there doing?" Aaron asked, patting Zeni on the shoulder. A number of doves, product of the manna he had spent on his Diamond Edges, had taken to perching on his head and shoulders.

"Them? Oh, organization XIII." Zeni shrugged. "And since when were DITE agents capable of Shinigami attacks?"

"I believe the term is bankai." Eterna supplied, patting one of the doves that had taken to perching on the handle of her katana. "What now?"

"Well, the bankai would probably finish off the Black Waltz." Zeni said calmly, watching Epsilon's blade dissolve into what seemed like thousands of pink, sparkly cherry blossoms. "If not, then we'd have unleashed hell. Black Waltz don't take defeat lightly."

"Is it ok for us to stand about idly here while Epsilon, Legacy, Abramczyk-sensei, and Campbell-sensei all fight?" Eterna asked, letting the dove take flight to safety.

"While Epsilon's bankai is in effect, it would be a good idea not to attack rashly. Besides, do you know why a Black Waltz is CALLED a black Waltz?" Zeni asked, turning around to face the other, empty end of the rink.

"Because....you don't mean...?" AMM suddenly gasped as the shock of realization hit him.

"There are three of them?" Eterna asked, raising her blade.

"Well, most likely there are many," Zeni said, reflecting upon his past encounters. "but they always attack in groups of three, hence the name...."

The wall before him exploded inwards, forming yet another hole in the already crumbling structure.

"...Black Waltz..." Zeni finished, taking out a number of phials and bottles out of his apparently bottomless trouser pockets. "Man, I hate it when I'm right."

Hundreds of small, black forms with glowing yellow eyes poured in through the hole, followed by two prominent figures, dressed in Black Waltz fashion, both seemingly wondering about the doves they kept on spewing.

"Time to pull real bunnies out of hats." AMM shouted, taking out a top hat.

"I'll take the two Waltzes, you can take the little guys." Eterna said, marching forwards, katana raised.

"Seriously....my first day of school...." Zeni sighed, positioning a phial filled with bluish white liquid in between each finger. "Somebody up there hates me..." He sighed, shaking his head.

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

David looked carefully at the rink. "Excellent. There's water under this rink!" he said, drawing his pistol. He fired several rounds into the ice, shattering it, before grabbing the Black Waltz he and Campbell had been tag-teaming.

"Time to go 'Old School', Sunny Jim!" he barked at the Waltz, before slamming it's head into the ice-cold water.

 

[Epsilon]

Epsilon quickly recapped who was facing what. 'There are three Black Waltz characters and they brought reinforcements. Zeni, Abramczyk, Eterna and AMM shouldn't have much of a problem since the majority of the enemy magic has been neutralized.' He directed the cherry blossoms to slice apart the Birds that were under the control of the Black Waltz mages. Considering that these Birds were born from the effect of an enchantment, they simply dissolved when they were killed. One less worry for the caretaking staff.

Another glance allowed him to view two girls in his peripheral vision. The taller one took a relaxed stance as if she's standing by for something. And the short one seems to be re-evaluating her approach to this skirmish. It looks like she may want to stay out of it. Not that he could blame her... most of her offensive magic would be useless in this case with Dovescape in effect.

That leaves the hockey nut and the beings in those stylish black cloaks. The leader had disappeared amongst the chaos and was nowhere to be seen. Legacy was doing his best to punch the lights out of one of the four cloaked beings that surrounded him but that person wasn't really taking him seriously.

He wasn't one hundred percent certain of what objectives that the members of Organization XIII wanted to accomplish today but it's best not to take any chances. Time for a distraction.

The conditions were already set as far as he was concerned. Due to the many Birds that have been killed by his weapon and by others, the element of Death in the atmosphere helped to reduce the casting cost of this particular summon spell.

It didn't take him too long to gather the bits of black mana for his spell. "Kuchiyose..."

One of the figures in black suddenly noticed the mana fluctuation in the air and whipped around to see Epsilon slam his empowered palm on the ice.

"AVATAR OF WOE!!!"

(Reference for Avatar of Woe)

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

"Eat yer heart out, Vinnie Jones!" David shouted, dunking the waltz again.

Suddenly hearing the sound of ice breaking, he looked down to see the ice break up beneath him.

"Aw, nuts..."

*KA-SPLASH!!!*

 

[Legacy|iB]

As soon as Legacy heard the ice crack, he knew something was wrong.

After sending a hard right hook at another one of the cloaked idiots, Legacy looked behind him and noticed the Black Waltz was now on the ice, with Abramcyzk-sensei and his friend going Krzysztof Oliwa on it.

Slowly, the ice beneath them started to crack. It finally broke, sending the three combatants falling through the ice and down below.

Huh...the ice in the rink was surprisingly deep...it was like there was a lake down below or something.

Cracks grew along the surface, steadily reaching Legacy's position. Pushing the cultists, cloaks, idiots, or whatever he should be calling them aside, Legacy skated away, making it out just in time before parts of the ice broke.

Damn, the cultists were still coming.

Looking over to one of the benchs, Legacy spotted something - a hockey stick and a bag of pucks. Jackpot! Picking them up, Legacy dumped the pucks down on the ice and readied the hockey stick.

Winding up, Legacy fired a puck. The fierce slapshot caught one of the cultists in the chest, dropping them to the ground instantly. Lining up another puck, Legacy fired one off again, catching another in the head. Another puck, another downed target, and another, and another.

Legacy smiled and laughed as one of his shots nailed one of them in the groin. It was hard to confirm, but that pained cry that hoser made upon getting hit sounded like a Wilhelm Scream. Legacy always wondered what would happen to somebody if they ever got in the way of a Dion Phaneuf or Roman Hamrlik slapshot - now, he knew.

He fired off a few other pucks, keeping the cloaked guys at bay. Looking back at the broken section of ice, Legacy realized Abramcyzk-sensei and his friend, as well as with the Black Waltz, was still down below. He skated over quickly and looked through. In desperation, he stuck his hockey stick into the water.

"Abramcyzk? Grab my stick!"

Looking back up for a second, Legacy spotted more trouble. More of the cloaked guys were coming in, while it looked as though another pair of Black Waltz's were incoming. Legacy spotted Eterna marching towards them, katana in hand.

What was she thinking? She was really going to take on those things?

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

A wet hand suddenly burst out of the icy water and grabbed the hockey stick in a death grip as Miss Campbell pulled herself clear of the water. David was still under the ice, and it looked as though the freezing water was loosening his grip...

===================================

"Glub glub glub glub...."

 

[Epsilon]

In hindsight, maybe he shouldn't have cast that summon spell.

Then again, he had gone under the assumption that this was a normal ice rink that didn't have a huge body of water underneath the ice. It was thick enough to support the pressure of a big hockey game but then again, the combined weight of the Black Waltz group alone was at least twice that so...

Well, that'll teach him to depend on a conclusion reached upon by an assumption.

No use focusing on the past so he prepared to address the summoned creature in front of him. Unlike Shinobi summons and Servant summons, the types of creatures available at his disposal usually needed at least thirty seconds to a minute to stabilize themselves in a new environment. Some didn't have such a summoning sickness.

"Target the people dressed in the stylish black cloaks but try not to kill them. And cover the human girl moving in to engage them as well." Epsilon wasn't certain what role the Organization would play in the future (other than the fact that some of them seemed interested in Legacy for some reason earlier) but to eliminate them prematurely didn't seem like a good idea.

While his creature leapt off to obey his orders, the Chinese youth began to consider his other options. He did have a few more useful summons ready to go and he still had mana available to bring them out for this battle but he would probably need to move to a more advantageous location provided that he could make his way towards an area in which he could get off the ice.

That was when his danger senses alerted him of an incoming attack. He dived to the side as a red energy saber wielded by one of the black figures struck the ice, further weakening its integrity. 'Shit...' He quickly directed the cherry blossoms towards his new opponent to buy himself some time. As expected, his enemy possessed extraordinary agility and used his two sabers to block the tiny miniature blades.

While his enemy was distracted, he mentally ordered his weapon to go back to its normal state (being a magical staff with a crystal secured by a clawed hand at the top end) so that he would be more prepared for melee combat.

"Let's go!"

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

All of a sudden, emerging from the water like a great walrus, David dragged himself out of the water and collapsed with a wet *squelch* through the door to the stands, where he lay shivering, blue with what seemed to be the onset of hypothermia.

 

[AyanamiRei2]

"Sleep" was the last word David heard before unconciousness claimed him. He was then placed on a bench and covered with a blanket as with a warming spell, David's face losts it's paleness.

"Master still have uses for you all, so get stronger." whispered Reimaru before leaving the area through the shadow, moving back to the highest point to observe the rest of the battle.

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

Miss Campbell stretched her hand out to the side, and with the sound of a wood pidgeon flapping its' wings, a medieval English Longbow whirred into her grasp. Notching an arrow against the string, Marian began firing into the black morass of enemies.

 

[Legacy|iB]

Ah, shit!

Getting over to where Abramcyzk had managed to reach in the stands, Legacy realized he was on the verge of hypothermia. The water under the ice was awfully cold, now that Legacy thought about it.

"Stay with him and keep him warm!" Legacy said to Abramcyzk's friend, Miss Campbell.

Legacy got back onto the ice. More of the black cloaks came into sight. Who were these guys? Who, or what were they after?

Are they after me? Legacy thought. Was that why they were now coming straight for him?

...well, in all fairness, he did throw a few of them around quite hard. In short, Legacy was going around with a penalty for instigating. Worse, it was like he had knocked out their star player and now the entire team was after him.

"Come on!" Legacy shouted aggressively. "Come on, what're you waiting for?! Come on!"

Out of nowhere, the cloaks were blown away by that thing Epsilon...summoned...watching as it engaged in a melee with them, Legacy couldn't help but be reminded of how little he knew of what was happening. Creatures, people in weird costumes, summoning...what the hell?! Was this some sick joke, or was this all for real?

Well, unless somebody can summon for him a young Gordie Howe at his prime and stick him onto the Calgary Flames, Legacy was not convinced.

"...you..."

Turning around to face the new voice, Legacy found himself staring at...nothing. Where was the voice coming from?

"Hey, down here!"

Legacy looked down, and realized it was Evangeline. He looked at her curiously for a second. Was she always this...short? Chachamaru, who came into place beside Evangeline, was much taller than her. It was quite a funny sight.

"Give me your tool" Evangeline said, bluntly.

Tool? Did she mean his hockey stick? Evangeline impatiently tapped her foot against the ice.

"Give it to me..."

"Wait, what? Hey, come on, I haven't exactly scored the game winner here..." Legacy said, somewhat out of humour.

Legacy chuckled a bit. Evangeline did not.

"Please, my master will require that item" Chachamaru said in a quiet, yet emotionless and mechanical voice.

Wait...what? Legacy looked at them, confused. Evangeline got fed up. She then stuck out her hand. Before Legacy could try and guess what she was doing, something...hit him. Some sort of force contacted against him and threw him back. What the hell was that?! By Maurice Richard's 50-goals-in-50-games, this must have been what Denis Hamel felt when Dion Phaneuf hammered him.

Legacy fell back against the ice, almost landing in the icy water under the rink. He got back up just in time to see Evangeline pick up his fallen hockey stick...and simply disappeared.

What the hell?! Were they hardcore collectors, or something? Using force to steal a hockey stick...? Legacy might have felt a bit offended and embaressed that he was just checked by a little girl half his size, but he wasn't concerned about the stick theft. Hell, that wasn't even Legacy's real hockey, just a cheap plastic one he borrowed when his backup was incinterated just recently, the backup being used because his real stick was still confiscated.

But still, what just happened?

Legacy got back up and went over to where Abramcyzk was at. He then realised a blanket was draped over him. Funny, there wasn't even a towel here, let alone a high quality blanket like that. The teacher was unconscious, and his friend attended to him.

Strange...where did the blanket come from?

Looking back out at the chaos, he tried to find something for him to do. The hockey player wasn't done yet - he wanted in on this brawl...

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

Marian sighted her next arrow carefully, whispering softly before she released it. The arrow flew straight and true, slamming through her target before embedding itself in another opponent.

 

[Mereo Flere]

It was taking too much time.

He had not expected things to go beyond his schedule to this extent. Covering it up would be nearly impossible through conventional means.

Then again, could anything be even considered conventional in this world?

He had options even now. He always had options. The question was, which one would be the most effective with dealing with the situation?

If he was not careful, he would attract the very attention he was trying to keep away. If he was too cautious, it would continue to spread out until everybody got involved. That was not at all desirable.

Focus.

Even if you've never done it before...

It is possible, so long as you focus.

Imagine her power.

Take it in as your own.

Now...release it!

"Weg vom Anblick, ³ber der Welt selbst hinausà Eng zusammenstehend!"

And with those words, everyone inside the stadium disappeared from the plane. However, to them it seemed that everything had turned grey, save for the people caught inside. Epsilon in particular realized what this was: Closed Space, or at least a phenomenon similar to that.

The cause didn't matter. It could be investigated later. Right now though, he understood one thing: It was time to cut loose.

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

Marian lowered her bow as she gazed around in suprised.

"What manner of sorcery is this?" she said softly.

 

[Legacy|iB]

"What manner of sorcery is this?" Miss Campbell said softly.

Legacy looked at Miss Campbell, and back to his surroundings. Inside, he felt he had at least some sort of response. It wasn't an answer, but it was a reply or some type of view point, at least.

"No, that's not the right question to ask, miss," Legacy replied calmly. "The question you should be asking...?"

Miss Campbell looked at the hockey player, puzzled. Legacy smiled back weakly. His smile slowly faded. In a matter of nanoseconds, Legacy was transformed into a screaming, hysterical mess.

"WHAT THE F*CK IS GOING ON?!?!"

Legacy started to scream. There wasn't any other way to actually respond to something like this. It was as bad as when the Flames lost Game 7 to Tempa Bay for the Cup. Granted this didn't seem that bad - the Stanley Cup was worth much more, in his opinion.

But still, it was pretty bad.

Looking around, he caught sight of Zeni and a few others.

Zeni...

Legacy got onto the ice and skated towards him. Ever since all this shit began to happen, Legacy had noticed Zeni being somehow related to it. He had to have known something, at least.

"Hey, you!" Legacy yelled as he skated over.

Legacy wanted answers...now.

 

[Epsilon]

While his cloaked opponent felt the large shift in the atmosphere, Epsilon realized that this was his opportunity to end this skirmish quickly and to do that, he would need to transform.

"KAI!!"

His human form instantly became replaced with a taller green humanoid body with insectoid qualities. His limbs were thin and somewhat skeletal while his head was rather big with two eyes and no mouth except for a pair of golden antenna where the edges of human lips should be and a white streak of energy buzzing between both ends.

"... ?!?"

The cloaked figure barely had time to register surprise before using the two red sabers to deflect the first attack made by the alien. Epsilon quickly shifted the staff to cause his opponent to go off balance before making a sharp thrust at the stomach which pushed him backwards.

Recovering quickly, he performed a backflip while creating a ring of fire to prevent the alien from immediate pursuit. But it was to no avail as the cloaked figure found out the hard way that his opponent could teleport as well. A well placed kick slammed his right side and the ring of fire fired its multiple red energy blasts in a random direction, having waited for a predetermined amount of time.

This mission was quickly becoming a failure. He glanced over to see that the alien's summon had used some special power from her own staff to kill Number Eleven... and there goes Number Four as well, being at the wrong place at the wrong time. And it was a remarkably skilled combatant, being able to hold off Number Three and Number Five at the same time. The human was doing well against Number Thirteen with her combat skills preventing the wielder of Oathkeeper and Oblivion from executing his combos.

Yes... he can safely say that the mission has to be postponed for the sake of recovering from this battle and preparing a resurrection spell for their fallen. He gave a silent gesture before teleporting out of the battlefield. His fellow cloaked figures quickly followed their leader's instructions and vanished as well. Being a natural ability rather than an external spell, the Dovescape enchantment was unable to prevent them from escaping.

At the same time, the Black Waltz mages also decided that a retreat was in order, seeing how things were going so terribly (as they had lost almost half of their original reinforcements). They too were able to escape as they had prepared a teleportation rune long before charging in to attack Zeni.

'... well, I suppose that's one way of ending things.' Relaxing from his combat stance, Epsilon saw his summon approach him, slightly worn from the combat.

"I thought I told you to avoid killing?" scolded the alien lightly. The Avatar of Woe simply gave an apologetic look while Eterna had a surprised look on her face upon seeing Epsilon. He then dismissed his summon back to her plane, causing her to vanish completely.

'I better help out Abramczyk. And then I'll have to take a little dive underneath the ice. There's some unusual fluctuations of data hidden beneath... unusual enough to attract those black figures.'

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

Davids' eyes slowly fluttered open, and he looked up into the face of someone he couldn't make out.

"Not exactly how I imagined I'd end up going west..." he mumbled, slurred from the lingering cold. He coughed wetly.

 

[Unknown-common-827]

A boy in a Washington Capitals hockey jersey was casually walking the campus when he saw the destruction coming from around the rink area. Realizing something was the matter, he transmuted his shoes to rollerblades and bolted for the ice rink.

He arrived and saw a teacher in the stands shivering with a blanket on his frozen body.

"Well, looks like you got hit hard from this... thing... right, teacher?" said the youngster.

"Sh-Shut up, you... what's your name?" asked Mr. Abramczyk.

The student took off his jersey and placed it on the teacher's back, with the jersey being a little insulated. Underneath he was wearing a body suit that was tailored for what looked like martial arts. His pants were saggy, yet also tight if needed. His blue eyes were as bright as the ice that was still in the slowly melting rink. His blonde hair was shining like he was on fire. "I'm Unknown... Unknown Common to be exact. If you'll excuse me..." Unknown then placed his hand on the ground, transmuted his rollerblades to special ice-gripping shoes and pulled a double ended spear from the ground.

"Well, time for an ass whipping!" said Unknown, with a hint of insanity in his eyes.

With a flash he ran into the foray in search of the first non-student. This would be a good warm-up for much later. However, when he got to the disaster area, he only saw... students... multiple students.

"DAMNIT! Second time in as many hours that I'm late for something." said Unknown. He then walked off, got his Brashear Capitals jersey, and went to his dorm.

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

"Murgle-fleugen Oswestry Camenbert..." David mumbled.

 

[Epsilon]

'Come to think of it, it would probably be more efficient if I simply summoned a Water Elemental to go down and investigate.' Unfortunately for the alien, he didn't have that particular summon ready to go. And he didn't have a Tutor spell which he could use to fetch the summon.

He pondered how that kid was able to enter and exit Closed Space so easily. As far as he knew, other than teleportation, there was no real solid gateway between here and the real world.

He then materialized an red object that he had kept in his subspace pocket and tossed it to Eterna, who had slowly approached him. "Keep this near Abramczyk for a while. The red mana that this artifact generates will speed up his recovery."

"Right."

The alien focused his attention on the hole where Abramczyk had fallen and dived in. The cold temperature didn't bother him as he had a steady flow of red mana to prevent the arctic temperatures from doing any damage to his body.

It took him about ten minutes to complete the round trip. About four minutes each way and two minutes to record what he had witnessed with his staff. As soon as he emerged out of the cold water fully, he repaired the broken hole by transmuting some of the water into replacement ice before changing back to his human form.

By now, everybody (at least those who remained behind to fight) had assembled on the stands. Legacy, Eterna, Campbell, Zeni, AMM and Abramczyk were all recovering. He extended his senses and noticed that there was no sign of Eva or Chachamaru anywhere. How fortunate.

Legacy was still fuming at how Zeni wouldn't say a thing. He then focused on Epsilon instead, hoping that the Chinese male would give some answers. "So you wanna tell us what happened? And what was with that insectoid look earlier?"

"The insectoid look is simply another form I have to use in order to utilize all of my powers and is more durable than my natural form. As for the reason why that Organization came today..." The crystal on his staff shimmered to reveal an image of a green behemoth with multiple eyes, some blue and some yellow.

Zeni nearly freaked when he recognized the monster. "What the hell is Emerald Weapon doing there?!?"

"I'm not sure. I was able to get close enough to see it guarding something large. I would have gotten closer but it started reacting as soon as I got within a certain distance. It went back to a dormant state as soon as I swam away. If we're going to get to the bottom of this little mystery, we gotta take out Emerald Weapon and see what it is guarding so closely."

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

There was a faint rustling sound, and Mr Abramczyk slowly rose up to a sitting position on the bench, almost entirely hidden by whatever people had used to keep him warm.

"That was... unexpectedly brisk." he remarked, shaking his head from side to side to get any remaining water off.

 

[Epsilon]

"Wait a second. You're suggesting that at some point in time, we have to create a hole in the ice, swim down in arctic temperatures and face that thing?" asked AMM.

A nod.

"ARE YOU MAD?!?"

Epsilon had expected this outburst. "Just stop and think about it for a moment. Whatever is down there is so valuable that those cloaked guys..."

"Organization XIII," supplied Zeni.

"... the Organization would come out in broad view just to get a feel of the environment and determine what has to be done to get that prize. It would be in our best interests if that prize were in our hands so that they can't abuse whatever power it may possess."

"Wouldn't it be counter-productive? If they were coming out anyway, they would probably be ready to ambush us once we wear ourselves out defeating Emerald Weapon... assuming we can beat that thing," said Eterna.

"If we just sit back, they would go down to fight Emerald Weapon themselves and then secure the prize. Damned if we do and damned if we don't. At least if we take some proper precautions before fighting Emerald Weapon, we may be able to thwart their ambush."

"Just what is down there anyway?" murmured Campbell to herself.

Epsilon shrugged. "Who knows for sure? My best guess is a World Alteration power or at least something that can lead to a World Alteration power."

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

Marian spotted that Mr Abramczyk was awake, and went over.

"How are you feeling?" she asked.

"A bit like a penguin." David replied, putting his hands on his cheeks.

 

[Zenithos]

"That was fast." Fuyutsuki said, striding over to where the students were gathered. Apparently he and Misato had kept themselves well hidden in the stands throughout the entire fray. "It's nice to see you've still got a bit of the touch left, despite having turned human, Zeni. A good thing we sent for Reimaru beforehand, eh?"

"Whatever is down there, it must be a part of the underground library complex." Zeni said, ignoring Fuyutsuki. "So it is in the realm of the conceivable that there is something down there, a tome, artifact, or maybe even a pure extract of world-altering power."

"Please do note that we are in closed space." Eterna remarked.

Everyone looked around at her.

"And...?" AMM asked, gesturing for her to continue.

CRASH....

"Well....that." Eterna shrugged as more of the rooftop collapsed, revealing a bluish glowing giant with two globular pinkish orbs for eyes.

"Ah, a macrospatial temporal...." Epsilon started.

"Hey, before you answer, allow me to ask, for the sake of dramatics, WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?!" AMM shrieked.

"As I was saying...." Epsilon continued....

....to an empty audience.

"Sigh....and I was going to help them get out..." The DITE agent sighed and shook his head as the bluish white macrospatial temporal something leaned down to take a better look at its new query.

 

[David Alan Abramczyk]

His hands shaking, but mercifully hidden from view, Mr Abramczyk shook out his M1911A1 to try and dry it out. Checking that the clip was dry, he drew the hammer back and crouched behind the wall. If that thing, whatever it was, wanted a piece of a student, it'd get a .45 between the eyes before it could say 'John Wayne'.