Meanwhile, John’s Allies Battled On...

For the fourth time, Moira cursed the man bearing down on her as his axe glanced off her shield with such **** that her arm shifted. She was the Shield Warden, she was supposed to be above this kind of power, to be an immovable bulwark against the foes of the Lady. Instead, she was being manhandled by this brute of an oaf, only safe in large part thanks to her Warden's armor and the Shield of the Warden. Yet her defenses were pelted from every angle, seeking weakness, while every strike of her hammer was countered deftly by a redirection by the man's shield or a hook with the curve of his axe.

The man wasn't physically stronger than she was, and his strikes were not so skilled as to completely overwhelm her. He demonstrated no real mastery of magical abilities, nor any particular bloodlines that would aid him. His offensive skills were more or less negligible, it was simply his repeated ability to completely negate her own strikes that annoyed her. At first she thought he was merely trained against a hammer-wielding foe, something not unthinkable for an organization as shadowy and typically as prepared as the Albidian Society.

But the first time his shield completely deflected one of Moira's heavenly strikes, the first time she watched the Lady's golden light ricochet into the distant ceiling… that was when she realized how fine-tuned her opponent's guard was.

"Can they really have spent so much time targeting us?" Moira wondered, almost afraid of the answer. She remembered her encounter with the Albidians on the roadway, how even when she was little more than a hostage to use as a pawn to use against John and his private world, they had been fully prepared to take the Rose, even known its weaknesses. There were many who knew that much, of course... the Rose's legacy was widely known in Europe, to pretend it would remain a mystery in the Americas was naïve at best and foolish at worst.

But to have honed a fighter so keenly to face her, to hold their own against her, and to be able to match a Warden's ability? Were they really so **** for her power?

Moira found herself pressed backwards as she considered the implications, as she wondered to herself how long these bastards had been considering assaulting the Golden Rose's manor in Springfield. Though she was doing her best to keep her back away from the walls, Moira eventually found herself pressed against something solid anyway… something twice as solid and ten-fold more durable than the cinderblock walls - one of John's creations, the rabbit-looking woman apparently named Lerianna. The other woman grunted as she was in turn **** back into Moira, though neither of them dared turn their head too far; the shiny man with the metallic gleam in his eyes was approaching Lerianna nearly as quickly as Moira's bulky foe was approaching her.

"Given their mysteriousness and unknown abilities, I did expect our foes to be somewhat stronger than we have seen so far," Moira admitted, shifting her stance and regaining her balance. "But I would be lying to say that this is anything resembling an easy fight… I am glad that you and your allies are here. This man seems to have trained specifically to fight me."

"Can't say this one has trained all that hard, but I can't punch through his defenses… I'm a bit more durable than I am strong," Lerianna admitted, ears twitching with annoyance. "Feel like switching it up? That hammer looks like it could smash through just about anything."

"Are you afraid of an axe?" Moira asked, a bit hesitant to swap foes. She hadn't had enough breathing room to check on the others, but she would not back down if John's allies needed her aid.

"Not even a little bit… I'm just afraid of breaking my bones if I keep kicking this bastard at full strength," Lerianna admitted, shifting a bit. The Viking-like man was nearly upon Moira, and the Warden had to make her decision then.

"Alright, but this one's been after me from the start, so you may have to keep him occupied!" Moira called out, moving to get in front of Lerianna. Just as she was stepping into position, though, the muscular rabbit-woman grabbed Moira by her wrist and tugged. Moira thought she had changed her mind, but instead of pushing the Warden back, Lerianna pulled her tightly. Moira wasn't expecting to be thrown off balance by her own ally; she didn't stop until she connected with Lerianna… lips first.

Moira grunted at the unexpectedly intimate contact, so surprised she took several moments to collect herself. She most certainly did not instinctively throw herself forward into the kiss; no matter how much of the Lady's power was coursing through her or how much her blood boiled, there was no way she would ever allow herself to stoop quite that low!

When she recovered herself enough to pull away and speak, Moira was halfway to railing the rabbit girl verbally when she noticed the strange look on the woman's face. Moira hadn't really had much time with Lerianna, and she knew the woman was traumatized, but after her initial outburst she'd managed to put on a brave face most of the way here, even from what little Moira had seen of her during the fight. Now…

Now she looked downright lecherous. As she pulled away from Moira, her tongue poked out the side of her lips just slightly, as though she had been about to deepen the kiss. The bronzed woman's cheeks were blushing so strongly it drew the eyes, and she was breathing far more heavily than Moira was.

"W-what was that?"

"Just needed the boost," Lerianna said quietly, punching Moira's armored shoulder so strongly Moira winced slightly at the sound of bare knuckles meeting metal. "Go get 'em, tiger."

"What has gotten into you?" Moira tried to ask the woman, but she got no response. Lerianna squared up against the bulky man with the shield, bouncing on the balls of her feet and her ears twitching madly. Moira's new foe, the shiny man with supposedly incredible durability, was already approaching. The answer to Moira's question would have to wait until later.

"Well, then… we'll see how well you can withstand the Lady's light," Moira grimaced, squaring up against her new opponent.

"I hate myself for needing this… but by the goddess does this ever feel good!"

The kiss tasted bittersweet on Lerianna's lips. It might've otherwise been a glorious and mind-bending experience for the rabbit-girl ordinarily, but it was quite tainted due to its one-sidedness and her own feelings of inadequacy. But her body knew nothing of these complications, or the intricacies of real relationships. It only knew what it was born and bred for - and as Moira's shocked lips pressed against her own, Lerianna felt the surge of adrenaline, dopamine, and other hormones in a burst developed over hundreds of generations of evolution.

Giving into her race's needs disgusted her, but it was the only way she could steady her nerves and give herself the boost she needed. Her right foot tapped rapidly, her energetic and suddenly eager body unable to stand entirely still. Her nerves were steady, and for just a moment, she had forgotten the horror of her time in that cell, the sights that would haunt her dreams for years to come.

All she could feel now was the heat… the intensity. The thrill as she stepped forward and into the reach of the bulky man. His eyes darted to the Warden, seeking his original target as she approached him.

She would make him pay for that.

"Eyes over here, numbnuts!"

Lerianna squatted down just a few inches, and when her legs extended again, they carried her forward and up at such a pace that she passed under the man's guard completely unmolested. Her fist caved in the man's breastplate by a solid inch, so firmly that she could hear the man wheezing from the strike, while her leg swept his out from underneath him, only avoiding breaking the man's leg at the knee because he had the sense to bend and twist as she struck.

The man toppled over, rolling for distance before shoving himself back up in an instant, guarding himself as if expecting a downward strike. Lerianna was in no great hurry though. She simply stood there, bouncing back and forth like a boxer while grinning at the fallen man. He grimaced up at her, briefly glancing toward Moira again, but quickly thinking better of it as he focused up on the energetic and aggressive woman now standing in his way.

"Sucks when you spend all that time training to fight one thing, doesn't it? Guess what, where I come from, we adapt… or we die. It's that simple. So come on. Give me everything you've got, big boy," Lerianna teased, offering a wink as she continued to stay light on her feet. The man grimaced for a moment, beating his axe against his shield as if he thought he could intimidate Lerianna. Her face grew more grim for a moment, a low pulse of tension running through her body as her grin grew darker.

"I'm gonna make you pay for every moment in that cell, and every nightmare I'm gonna have after this is over."

Then Lerianna's knees were coiled, ready to spring as the man howled and charged at her once more. As he raised up his axe, she went for a left kick toward his shield, a move so obvious it should've been criminally negligent to even attempt it. The man didn't seem to think anything of its criminally basic nature, though; he braced his arm and tilted his shield to take the blow in. The moment that he had, Lerianna flicked her body backwards, cancelling the momentum and bringing her right foot up off the ground. While catching herself on the ground with her left arm and leg, Lerianna brought her right foot up from below to flick upward and catch the shield from behind. Hitting it with the top of her foot hurt slightly, but on her terms and with her in control, it was a lot better than slamming herself uselessly into the metallic man's body over and over.

The result was far more satisfying, too; the man wasn't prepared for that angle of a strike, and as Lerianna's kick pulled the bottom edge out from the man, the top edge crashed back toward him. Its rim smashed heavily into the man's nose, not only causing pain but shocking him and throwing his balance off as he recoiled from the unexpected blow.

While the man was still stumbling over himself, Lerianna took advantage of the recoil from her own strike, tensing her arms slightly before springing forward with both legs outstretched. Her feet slipped past the man's offset shield, connecting with his breastplate solidly. While she didn't have the strength to cave in or outright destroy the man's armor, she pressed him firmly into the cinderblock wall behind him with such **** that she could hear the man wheezing as the wind was knocked out of him, and felt the crackle of nearly-shattered bones under the balls of her feet.

The man tried to bring his axe down on her, but by then she'd already pulled her legs back and righted herself. Before the overly-aggressive man could even fully right himself, Lerianna was already in front of him, bouncing almost joyfully on the backs of her feet, grinning all the while. There was nothing playful about her smile, though - there was blood in the air, and even if it hadn't quite touched on Lerianna's lips yet…

After that kiss, now more than ever, Lerianna could taste it. And she'd make sure there was much more before long.

Moira was still thrown off by her ally's strange behavior, but the familiar heat of battle had her head in the right place before long. The man that Moira found herself facing did indeed have some incredible resistances and endurance, after all.

She could tell, because as the man threw himself toward her, a blow that would have ended lesser men only slightly caved in his chest. The man's fist made contact with Moira's armor, even slightly indented the solid Order steel, but he was otherwise hapless as he was sent flying by the full **** of a frustrated Warden's swing. The man's face remained impassive even as he impacted against the far wall, showing no signs of pain despite leaving a car-sized crater in the cinderblock wall, actually having to brush off debris as he stepped free of the school's lunchroom perimeter.

Moira had been somewhat curious as to Lerianna's claims of an incredibly defensive man to begin with, and the strange behavior of her new foe had made her all the more curious as she struck out at him. But now that she'd had a more direct chance to observe her foe, now that her hammer had touched upon him, Moira was starting to suspect something she assumed Lerianna had no knowledge or suspicion of.

It wasn't a man or a machine Moira was facing off against, but rather something in between - a highly advanced artificial and magical being. It wouldn't be unthinkable for the Albidians to have captured an android or other superior technology, but despite its seeming lack of expression, Moira's first blow against the creature had revealed something. Her hammer had cracked its chest where it hit, even if it was only slightly… and a soft glow was coming out from within. Not the glow of machinery, either.

"I think you'll find my durability and stubbornness even equal to yours," Moira said, holding her shield high as the man pulled himself free of the wall, and began to charge towards him once again. "The Lady's faith is as unwavering as any material, even magical! And She yields sinners no ground!"

Moira's boots glistened with golden magic as the man's shoulder impacted on her shield, and she did not move even an inch. Her arm scarcely swayed; the man was durable, but his strength was no match for the Warden, or for the Lady. Judging by his stoic demeanor and lack of response to pain or damage, Moira suspected the crystal used as the base for this artificial spirit must have been a fairly basic one. No personality, no intelligence, no learning… only basic commands.

A few weeks ago Moira might have thought that as a useful tool, now the idea only saddened her as she shifted her weight and pressed outward with her shield. She **** the living metal backward until she felt its feet start to stumble and lose their balance, then brought her hammer forward. Moira's arm moved with less than its full ****, but struck with all the accuracy that she could muster, bringing the blunted weight of her hammer down upon the same spot her last blow had connected. The man wasn't **** back nearly as far this time… because his chest shattered and absorbed most of the ****.

Unlike the crack that had formed before, this damage was far from superficial. Almost a fifth of the magical construct's chest cavity fell away, shattered into fragments that rained down onto the floor below. Another third was strung together by the barest of metal links, some sections actually wiggling as Moira's foe staggered back, clutching its arms to its chest. Most important was the glistening crystal inside, now nearly half exposed, whirring and already attempting to seat itself further within the creation's body. The man's movements grew uncertain, almost stuttering, his coordination suddenly unstable. For the first time, his face looked… almost ****. His dead eyes stared at Moira with a look that was perhaps an understanding of what was happening to him. A hint of fear.

Moira steeled her resolve as she stepped forward, hammer already raised.