Emergency Room Shakedown [Boss]

[Chidori Tsukino]

After the battle here with the scalpel-brandishing Gigas, the mute had been a little wary of returning to the Old Saints Hospital, but nevertheless, it drew her back once again with its lure of information. There was every chance that a clue could show up there, amongst all the old documents and filings - or perhaps something that could help her own personal situation too. Either way, it warranted further exploring, and that was why Chidori stepped back into the abandoned halls, calling upon Juno's battle-ready calmness in order to keep herself stable and calm. Who knew what might await her in any one of the badly-lit rooms that flanked her as she wandered about?

[Vice Ysal]

It had been quite a bit since Vice last visited the old bloody hospital building but just like the many times that he'd visited the place before, there was absolutely nothing new aside from the bloodier walls and more wrecked equipment. It was a lot darker, and the presence of the place was more oppressive than the second floor but there was a twang to it that Vice could almost taste in his proverbial tongue.

Whatever it was, it was pretty much the reason why the young man was continuing on his exploration within the area. A change of pace, he'd call it, but whatever the reason was for him being there didn't matter. Confident in his steps, weapons and armour already donned on him and ready to be used in a moment's notice, Vice also made sure that his Persona was merely a thought away from being summoned into battle. It wouldn't do to be caught off guard by some creepy crawly after all.

[Pyxis]

Pyxis wasn't entirely sure why humans tended to be scared of hospitals, but she could hazard a guess. It was a place of life and death, which could become something sinister if corrupted. She imagined it would be like if she found an abandoned robotics lab in the shadow-infested zone, full of broken pieces of machinery that were once part of something like her. Or, only slightly less unsettling, planned to be.

That was a bad mental image.

She had come exploring this far out because of simple curiosity, but the moment she drew near she sensed something powerful inside. Abandoning any intention of just exploring and looking around, she dashed inside, following the readings on her sensors towards the source of the strong presence. She stopped running as she reached the floor that the presence was on. From there on, she took slow steps, hoping to find it before it got the jump on her.

[Za Bossu!]

The hospital seemed to be dead quiet. There weren't any shadows nearby for some reason. Not for a good while up the stairs, anyway. The silence was soon ended as a slow but painful screeching noise began to drag across the floor. There was nothing visible that was causing it. Not yet, at least. Out from the darker corner of the building, the first thing visible was a hand, pulling itself out from the dark. Of course, that hand was connected to something. A something that made a lot of weird gurgling noises.

The hand pulled what it was attached to out of the shadows, causing screeching noises as it went. This, slowly revealed a rather large zombie-like shadow. And by large, the shadow was obscenely obese and seemed to be stuck in a hospital bed that it was dragging across the floor as it crawled around. Honestly, it seemed rather pathetic in terms of strength. Was this really the boss of the stratum?

Uni-Boomer

[The Boom]

[Last Resort]

[Mazionga]

[Foolish Whisper]

[Sick Day]

[Chidori Tsukino]

That awful sensation of being pressed down upon by an invisible force haunted her as she moved through the silent halls of the abandoned hospital, reminding her of the experience of that strange crocodile in the sewers; there was a tough shadow around, perhaps? Utterly on guard, Chidori noted that there was the same distinct lack of normal shadows around, but before she could think much on it, the screeching noise lanced through the quiet air.

What the hell...? Somewhat perturbed, the mute brunette slowed her pace, trying to work through the noise as best she could whilst she sought out the source; when her chocolate brown gaze fell upon the strange and grotesque creature, she had to forcibly stop herself from gagging at the sight. Even for a Shadow this was disgusting and bizarre...but whatever it was, she couldn't let appearances deceive her. Summoning Juno around her, Chidori blazed into action, showering the aberration in a column of light.

Action: 25% Enhanced Hamaon

[Vice Ysal]

It was coming. The oppressive presence had slowly began to increase in its potency and Vice, with his slowly increasing mastery over his powers, had been able to sense it out and with the pattern of the layout of this building, made his way towards a particular area where a familiar looking brunette stood with a not so familiar persona.

Huh. So imaginary friends were like pokemon. You can either swap them or evolve or something.

That tidbit of information filed for future reference, his focus then shifted to the more important personality in the vicinity and…well, wasn't that just disgusting? It wasn't so much as grotesque as it was aesthetically unappealing really. Still, it was the cause of the same oppressive feeling and thus had to be eliminated. Maybe finally, the next stratum of the hospital would be opened should this one be dealt with. Calling forth the black knight, Vice decided to open up with a Mudoon given that one of the people who'd be fighting it had used the alternative.

---

Action: Mudoon

[Pyxis]

Not long after Pyxis reached the floor where something strong was lurking, she heard the sound of something screeching. She stayed out of sight as the thing causing the noises came into view: a massive undead-looking abomination with a hospital bed still stuck to it. While her immediate thought was that it looked like something out of a particular multiplayer zombie survival game, she also recognized it as a shadow that needed to be eliminated.

Two more persona-users showed up almost immediately, both people that Pyxis recognized from the battle at the school. One, Vice, she had also encountered during a mission where one of her sisters had gone rogue. The other was the healer from the battle. Pyxis was reasonably sure that Chidori was her name. She said or did nothing to acknowledge them just yet. There would be plenty of time to talk afterward, or even during the fight if they needed to strategize. For now, all that was important was that they were out of her line of fire. Once she was sure of that, Pyxis left her hiding place, focusing her fire on the massive shadow slowly making its way down the hall.

[Za Bossu!]

Slowly focusing its gaze of the users, the shadow picks up its pace as it makes its way over towards them. Along the way it takes the dark and light attacks, dealing normal damage. However, the piercing attack seemed to be very effective, causing the shadow to groan painfully.

[The Boom]

Opening its mouth, the shadow releases a large ball of light that begins to slowly float towards the users like a simple bubble. And just like a bubble, it pops. . . dealing moderate strike damage to everyone in a large explosion.

[Sick Day]

After the ball is released, the shadow begins to hack and cough uncontrollably until it lets out the "leftovers" of the attack. The "leftovers" land on everyone, causing them to smell awful and poisons Chidori.

[Chidori Tsukino]

Chidori's attack seemed to only be the first of a few, as she was soon joined by two people she actually recognised - Vice, the civilian motorcyclist who had later awoken, and Pyxis, the strange maid girl she met at the battle in the school auditorium. Watching the shadow intently, she noticed the different attacks as they hit and remarked that Pyxis' had been very effective - obviously piercing damage was a good idea here. Except that her needles were pathetically weak really; she could probably stick to healing and maybe an odd Hamaon or two.

"Vice, do you still have your gun? If so, use that instead; I think it's weak to those kinds of attacks." The strange timbre of Juno's projection voice sounded out the mute's thoughts, allowing her to communicate her observations to the other two, just before the Shadow return fired. The explosive bubble of light struck her back a few feet, but she pulled through...just in time to be covered in a gross volley of 'leftovers'. Ew ew ewwwww. The smell was awful, but the nausea in her stomach spiked painfully, and Chidori knew whatever it was had poisoned her. She could probably risk the damage for now, and get rid of it later if anyone else got poisoned, so instead, she chose to use Mediarama, healing their whole little group.

[Vice Ysal]

Well, wasn't that just lovely. Not only was it an obese freak of nature, it didn't even have a properly working digestive system. The ball of light…was weird to say the most and the resulting damage from it was something Vice could deal with. He may not have a resistance to that particular type of damage but it wasn't like he was a push over. Then came the unnerving part, because as a male Vice couldn't allow himself to shiver at the sheer disgust he was feeling right then and there.

Thankfully, the most the left overs had done for the time being was just make him smell like the sewers and nothing else.

Ugh.

Mental cringes and preference for being clean aside, the transmitted information passed through his thoughts clear as day and the biker chanced a look at Chidori. He had his gun still, of course, but there was still another attack that he could try to use to see if the opponent was weak to it as well. Besides, he was pretty sure that even if the thing held a weakness to pierce attacks, his Persona's skills would deal more damage in the bigger scheme of things.

"I'll try and scout for other weaknesses first! I'll fall back to my revolver when all else fails!"

Vice answered back, a serious nod towards the fellow user, before summoning the black knight into the fray. The bladed edge gleamed in the darkness and with a resounding battle cry from Arondight, a Blade of Fury was unleashed on the sole opponent.

---

Action: Blade Of Fury

[Pyxis]

Blegh. Being a machine in body didn't change just how disgusting being vomited on by a bloated, zombie-like shadow was. The damage from the preceding blast was minimal, at least, and she didn't seem to have suffered any ill effects other than now smelling horrible (fortunately, her sense of smell was something she could turn off), but that didn't make it any less obnoxious. The only other positive effect was that it hadn't started attracting other, less obese zombie shadows.

...Yet.

She glanced over at Chidori, who looked like she hadn't gotten off quite as well. In fact, she was most likely poisoned. That didn't stop her from healing, but...well, at least that would minimize the effects of the poison for awhile. It wasn't a problem...yet. What the shadow was doing and could do was of greater concern. It looked weak, but was clearly more than capable of causing its own brand of trouble. Pyxis just hoped that it wouldn't blow itself up when the odds turned against it.

...Actually, that was a good point. "Try to keep your distance from it," she suggested, taking a few more steps away before opening fire again. Fortunately, she had a long-range weapon to begin with.

[Za Bossu!]

The shadow watched everything come after it as soon as it attacked. The first attack that actually came in was a slashing attack. The shadow simply remained still as the attack came in, sending it right back at the user. However, the gun attack that proved to be very effective, persisted. Through the bullet shots, the shadow made another move on the enemies.

[Foolish Whisper]

A purple aura emanates the three users as the shadow lets out a gurgled noise. Vice and Pyxis are silenced!

[Mazionga]

Following that, a powerful charge comes from the shadow, dealing moderate electric damage to all enemies.

The shadow begins to hack and cough some more as the battle goes on.

[Soren Jensen]

A CHALLENGER HAS APPEARED!



Soren just happened to be wandering around in the ruins that day. It was not until he heard the screams of a brother. This was not a cry a human would have heard. It was the cry only a fellow Shadow would hear. The man rushed inside the hospital. Numerous of the “lower breeds” wandered about as he flew up the stairs, but none of them bothered him. Shadows were not the sort to argue over territory. For that reason alone, they were superior to humans. Greedy, possessive, perverse, and short-lived beings that could not look past the color of one's skin had no need of life.

He reached the floor where his ally was. He rushed, so he wasn't too late, he believed. Clenching his fist, he sighed before blackness seeped from his pores, covering his body and hardening. It only took a few seconds. Where a fairly normal man once stood, an armored god of war that looked more like an accursed devil wielding a spear of hell had taken his place. His power surged. It was time to assist his brother or sister- or whatever the other Shadow might have been. Gender, race, color, build- none of that mattered! His approach was slow. It seemed that the skirmish was on the other side of the wall before him. He hefted his spear up before twirling it. A blast of kinetic energy would remove that barrier.

Heat Wave would do nicely. With a violent swing of the spear's shaft, the Shadow ripped through the wall and emerged a short distance away from the battle. He needed to get a good grasp on what was happening before he could attack, though. Blindly rushing in would only lead to him being a burden.

[Chidori Tsukino]

The mute watched as Vice's attack rebounded off of the Shadow and zipped back towards him. Note to self, they can repel on top of simply nullifying or absorbing. Something to keep in mind for later, and to perhaps warn the others of if they weren't aware of it already. Thankfully, Pyxis' attack was still quite effective, thanks to its piercing quality. Unfortunately, the grotesque shadow had a few more surprises left in store for them; the gurgled noises were very much distracting, but looking at her companions, Chidori noted that it had left them inflicted with some kind of status effect, one she hadn't encountered before. Perhaps it would be a good time to use Amrit-?

Her thoughts were interrupted as the Boomer unleashed a strong surge of electricity, zapping all of them. Her body spasming as it tried to regain control, Chidori was all too familiar with getting shocked by shadows - they seemed to have some kind of fetish for electrocuting her apparently. Nevertheless, that shock paled in comparison to the sudden boom that resounded from the wall a little ways down from them. The hallway was littered in debris as something tore through, a humanoid being draped in black and carrying a large spear. It was distinctly inhuman, and for a moment, panic gripped Chidori - they were now blocked on either side of the hallway by two shadows, and from the looks of things, two strong ones at that.

Fortunately, the confidence she'd been building up returned swiftly, allowing her to return to assessing their situation. 'Watch out, we've got company! Her priority on healing was now disrupted by them all being afflicted by varying ailments as well as the new arrival. She might need to switch to offense soon, just so that they could beat back the two shadows, but for now the ailments were the biggest factor here. Channelling power through Juno, a cleansing wave of light washed over the three of them, ridding them of the awful poison and silence statuses, before they could do much harm. Hopefully, it was the right move.

Action: Amrita

[Vice Ysal]

One would think that something so thick would have more chances of repelling Strike attacks rather than Slash attacks but alas, the misconception had caused Vice's attack to rebound back to him. Thankfully though, he had a natural resistance to his own attacks and topping it off with his armour, didn't deal as much damage as it should have. The following attack, however, had made Vice wonder just why he couldn't feel Arondight's voice in his head.

No matter how hard he tried to call for him, there was no reaction from anything. It felt like the time when he had been a normal and his thoughts were jarred to a halt when the explosion on the other side of the wall had rocked the entire battle field. And suddenly, the oppressive feeling just multiplied on all of them. The biker couldn't let it affect him though, not for too long. Eyeing the monster in black, a Shadow whose presence proved to be more intimidating than the first one there, Vice wasn't going to do anything just yet to attract its attention.


The lapse in attention however had been enough to allow the bolt to make contact with his chest. It was always the goddamn chest! Pulling out his revolver, Vice took aim and fired at the Obese Shadow to at least deal some damage in.

"Tch. Any ideas on what we can do?"