Beware the Greeks [Ala]

[Phoebe Minola]

Phoebe was getting weary of these routine training excursions. She always reminded herself sternly that she needed the practice and she needed the money that came from the salvaging she did during them. She also made better headway with mapping out the Outskirts and keeping notes on what milled around out there. Dressed in sturdy jeans and a funny old T-shirt (purple with "Keep Calm and Call Batman" on it) and her black pea coat over it, she trudged out into the wasteland that was the Outskirts.

Her hammer hung heavy on her back; she'd gotten quite good at using it. She wasn't very fast with it but she could hit hard enough. Today she was going to poke around an abandoned shopping street. Before the perimeter drop it had been a pretty nice area, teeming with small, family-run shops. Phoebe always liked those kind of places; they were a nice change from the bustling shopping district.

No Shadows had shown up so far but she always kept alert and ready for anything. She'd kind of figured out how to recognize suspicious sounds and behaviors now, partly thanks to Vice. That guy'd really put her in a good track towards learning how to cope with this mess and fight. Of course, she still messed up sometimes, as was proven by her goof during the last full moon - she tried to push that away. No need to to revisit painful memories. She was stronger now.

Phoebe reached the old street and climbed on the roof of a broken-down van. It was a better spot to survey her surroundings from.

[Aile Kalias]

A few days had passed since his excursion to the subway and Aile was still bruised, but still in some pain, though he still wore the bandages over his chest incase any of shadow attacks decided to cut him up again, that way he would have something to patch it up with. So, he and his stubborn self decided to go back out on another excursion to train some more despite what happened last time he went alone, but this time he was prepared, not physically as he had not a clue where to find armor, but mentally that enemies would not always be weak against what he used.

So the magician wandered out into the outer circle which for some reason wasn't extremely guarded though it could always be the off chance that he was getting extremely lucky with his timing.

Once outside, he started towards some abandoned shops in hopes for something to fight, but only found some rotted food and a few unopened twinkies. He took roughly four or five of them before popping one of them into his mouth. The Greek was really glad that twinkies had no expiration dates. He then stuffed the others into his small bag that he brought with him to bring back special things.

Some time passed, probably only a few minutes or so before Aile found what he was looking for, shadows approximately four of them but fortunately for him the shadows were yellow masked mayas, and yellow meant electricity, but only half of them were yellow, the other half seemed to be blue which led Aile to guess that they had some sort of domain over Ice. But unfortunately for him a few red masked Mayas had joined the fray and the Greek cared not for the red ones, they seemed to be his weakness, but he proceeded to battle them anyway.

He started his small assault by bashing one of the yellow ones in the face with his wooden sword, before backing up a few steps. Then the Mayas as a whole started towards him shooting off wave after wave of electric bolts and ice shards, with him shrugging off the bolts and feared for the ice shards until they actually connected, yes they were cold, but they didn't penetrate or stab him, they pretty much shattered on contact.

The fire Mayas were a different story, and led to Aile turning into a temporary track star as he ran from the fire balls as though his life depended on it, before leaping behind a car, only to remember that cars were explosive and the shadows seemed to realize this as well. So diving away from the from the car, just moments before it exploded, Aile looked up and saw a girl in the distance and while trying to avoid being seen by the shadows, he tried motioning the woman over to his location. And while all of this happened, Volt only laughed.

[Phoebe Minola]

Phoebe saw something in the distance and squinted at it. Was that...?

Oh for the love of...

She was running into quite a few people in the Outskirts lately, wasn't she? The guy was being chased by quite a few of (thankfully weak) Mayas. 

I think he may require our assistance.

Ya think!?

Phoebe hopped down off the roof of the van and ran in his direction. She hissed a curse at all the fire spells the Mayas were firing off. There were others too but she'd take care of them when she got there. She hurried on over in his direction.

"Hey!! Guy! Get behind me!! I can help!" she shouted and ran past him in the opposite direction, summoning Hypatia.

The Persona burst forth out of a wave of azure light and raised her shield. Phoebe shook the fire off like a champ and knocked back a Maya with a swing of her hammer.

"Hypatia! Maragion!"

A large wave of explosive, fiery blasts rocked the area. The blue Mayas, which Phoebe knew to be weak to fire, all exploded into nothing immediately. The rest of them were knocked backwards, not happy, but not dying either. She grunted lightly as a thunder spell hit her but she willed Hypatia to counter-attack with Myriad Arrows, further thinning their ranks with the rain of energy shards from the sky, piercing through Shadows.

She blurted a Greek cuss and raised her shield again, groaning when an ice attack hit her. "Man, you sure had to go and drag all of them," she chuckled.

[Aile Kalias]

Seeing the woman up close as she came to his aid, Aile realized that she was somewhat attractive, undesirable to most due to rather high social standards set by people nowadays, but still attractive none the less. And then he realized what she had done, and was grateful for her taking out almost all of the blue masked Mayas, however only one remained, but unfortunately for him, the red Mayas were still out and about. Though as he noticed, she seemed to be able to handle the fire, which was good. So after ducking and cowering for that brief moment, he stood up and summoned Volt, the little mechanized child, through his concentrated power of will to live. Though unlike the other times, where he just managed to get a spark of energy, he also started getting a chill down his back.

Volt then stated," Haha, looks like I managed to learn something since last time buddy. See see, watch me, watch me!!" And the man did, but so did the other Mayas. The small child cried out, "BUFU!!" and it echoed in Aile's mind, as the little mech shot out a moderate size shard of ice ,when compared to the size of his body, towards the red Mayas. Which the first one it hit, had felled almost instantly. After that, the yellow Mayas that were still alive shot bolts of lightning at him, which only caused little prickly feelings over Aile's body where the bolts struck. But when the red Mayas struck, that was when the child's courage turned into that of a coward.

The first one hit Volt in the chest, and his robot face went from showing an emoticon of happiness to that of crying, yelling "It burns!!" and Aile flinched as well, it burned and at first thought it was heart burn, but was corrected went there were little flames falling from the mech. Djehuti cried out, "You meanies...hmph....I'll get you back for that!"

Then an idea sparked in Aile's mind which he said," My name is Aile, my persona is the little mech over there, his name is Volt, and I have a strategy to share with you. You block the fire shots, and I'll block the ice and electric shots, sounds good?"

[Phoebe Minola]

"Sounds great and--" Phoebe started, but then blinked at the guy's Persona. "Aww, what a cute little Persona! He's adorable!" she giggled.

This is not the time for that, Hypatia said incredulously.

But look at him! He's a tiny little robot.

...He's very endearing, said the Persona, confused. But... enemies?

Oh, right.

Phoebe chuckled at herself and willed Hypatia to unleash another attack. The Persona obediently threw her spear into the sky, causing another cascade of energy shards to come crashing down onto the Shadows. Most of the Mayas, already battered from her earlier attacks, dissolved in defeat. Now there were only a couple more left to take care of, and Phoebe promptly killed off one with a swing of her warhammer.

"Nice to meet you! I'm Phoebe and my Persona is Hypatia! Like the philosopher," she said with a smile. "What on earth are you doing all the way out here, Aile?"

[Aile Kalias]

Aile watched and marveled as the woman's persona managed to kill almost all of the rest of the Mayas in a single AoE type of attack. And in response to her question he said," Well, Phoebe, I was out here in an attempt to train, as per my other friends' request, though they kind of told me to have someone else with me since I am still new at this, but I needed to learn how to handle things on my own, and I thought it would be a good idea to start while I'm still fresh so I don't entirely depend on others as often...and well...you see how that turned out."

This only got another muffled laughter from the little mech," Ppfffft...ah aha, we were running like our lives were depending on it...though in this case, I guess we really were running for our lives...yeah." And with this, Volt slumped his shoulders, with a frown emoticon showing up on his visor, before straightening back up with a smile, and excitedly said," Now we have an ally to kick their butts." And Aile just nodded, before prepping his sword.

"Yep, we got an ally now."

"So let's roll!"

And then Aile started to analyze the situation from the now blackend remains of the car. There were surprisingly only three of the Mayas, the last remaining blue masked maya somehow managed to stay alive, and then there was a single yellow and red maya respectively. After taking this into account, he ran around the car, charging the blue maya which hit him with another Bufu skill, still doing almost nothing before he put a full forced strike behind the blunt force of his sword slash, making the now weak maya dissolve. All that was next was for Volt to take charge of the yellow one. Which he did, in a maniacally child like way.

As he approached the yellow maya, his hand formed into a singular point, as he giggled in a maniacal way," It's skewering time." As he proceeded to stab the maya mercilessly until it too dissolved into nothingness. All that was left was for Phoebe to take care of the red maya.

COMPLETELY POINTLESS SIDE NOTE: I kinda imagine Volt sounding like Gir from Invader's Zim

[Phoebe Minola]

((OOC: That's cute X3 Hypatia... I guess she sounds like Rukia from Bleach? ^^; She has a lovely voice anyway, but she just speaks like a prof ))

---

She chuckled a bit at his explanations and gave him a wan smile. "Well sweetie, you kind of overdid it," she said, gesturing at the Shadows. "You pulled too many for someone this new to this. Your friend has a point, it's best to have someone watching your back but you should've paced yourself a bit more carefully. I can help you. I can take point just to tank and let you take charge of attacking. I'll only step in if you look like you're getting overwhelmed, how's that sound?"

Hypatia, still hovering over her, was staring at Volt. Though her expression never altered under the Corinthian helmet with the constantly waving, lush dark plume, Phoebe could sense a mix of amusement and bewilderment at the little mechanical Persona.

Aile was pretty good for a novice so Phoebe was sure he'd make good progress with time. He took ice like a champ (unlike her) and his Persona made short work of some of the last few Mayas. The last one, she handled herself. She ran up to it and wound her arms back, swinging her hammer with all her strength. It crashed through the Maya's red mask, cracking it; a second blow shattered it, causing the Shadow to dissolve into nothing.

"Alright, good job," she said with a smile and shouldered her warhammer. "If you want, I can do the next bit of pulling so we get a more reasonable amount. Then I'll let them try to target me so you can work on formulating attacks."

[Aile Kalias]

Aile just nodded at the woman's idea. It was probably for the best for the magician and his persona to learn how to formulate various attack strategies before actually attacking as that simple fire and forget strategy would only get someone so far before it failed. Afterwards, Volt just walked back towards the duo with some of the left over goop from the shadow that he stabbed mercilessly in his hands. He was giggling almost constantly while he walked towards his other self. Then, right at Aile's foot, Volt stopped, saying," Looks like I got gooped." Before wiping the sludge on Aile's pants. It caused a chill to go down Aile's back, because some of the sludge got through some of the holes in the jeans, and it felt strange.

Afterwards, Aile put the little robot on his shoulders as they walked with Phoebe and Hapatia.

After the group walked for a while, Aile asked," So, what's the plan? If there is a certain way you can pick out certain shadows, or something akin to know which possible flocks of shadows to fight?" Volt was just humming, kicking his legs to and fro as if he was bored. Despite how calm Aile was, Volt was showing the magician's true feelings. The last fight had been exhilaratingly fun and he wanted more, but if he wanted to survive, he needed to learn tactics, similar to those that Vice and Tristan would be teaching him soon.

Then Volt said," I wonder if we'll be seeing any of Tristy and Vicer out here at all." All Aile did in response was shrug, which almost made Volt fall.

"Watch it big guy, I almost fell." And Aile's only response was a chuckle. He thought it was funny how Volt greatly resembled his childish nature, but only to a greater extent, and how with a childish nature, came the blunt end of speaking.

[Phoebe Minola]

Phoebe chuckled at the mannerisms of Aile's Persona. It was just too cute and she could feel Hypatia getting confused by that. His Persona was like a little, excitable child, while hers was... well, she was an awkward scholar with a big shield.

I'm not-- she blurted. I'm not awkward.

Suuuuure...

The armed philosopher floated gently alongside Phoebe with her arms relaxed and her large shield lowered.

"Well," Phoebe began. "I've fought around this certain location long enough to know what types of Shadows mill around here. Surprisingly, they don't really wander very far from where they 'spawn'. It's something we've observed. So I more or less know what the common types of Shadows around here are all about. As for picking out certain ones... well, that's not really a high science. They are quite thick, after all. Still dangerous, but none of them are winning any Nobel Prizes any time soon..."

She bent down, picked up a stone and after taking a moment to decide, chucked it hard at something in front of her. It bounced off a yielding surface with a meaty thud and something stirred. With lazy, almost languid, motions a fish-like Shadow that seemed to be made by a twirled piece of colorful paper ribbon and gossamer, glass-like fins rose from behind some debris. Two more joined it and they all floated towards them, as though swimming through water. They swayed from side to side like snakes but they seemed to hesitate a little bit.

"Careful. We call these types Pesce. These particular ones are Paper Pesce. I'll let you try out different attacks to see what works and what not. I'll step in if you need help. Don't worry about me. I'll boost our defense. Hypatia, Rakukaja!"

Hypatia swung her shield-bearing arm and a gentle orange light danced around them, fortifying their strength and defensive capabilities as the Pesce swam forward to meet them. Hypatia dropped into a stance and raised her shield defensively.

"Oh, and uh... if you see any of them hitting me suddenly go bang... there's a chance that their attacks might backfire on them by Hypatia. Just do your thing."

[Aile Kalias]

Aile simply nodded at the woman's introduction of the shadow fish that were strangely enough named after a constellation if he recalled correctly. Thus after receiving the veil of light from his female comrade, Aile took a step towards the fish with his sword in hand, Volt did similar, though he started clapping excitedly," Yay! I get to shoot some fishies!" Before his visor went from a light green with a happy face to a vibrant red with a devilish emoticon grin on it. To prevent the little mech from doing anything rash, Aile put his hand on the child's head.

"Now Volt, we need to take a quick second to think. Okay?"

"Okay," Volt replied, seeming to calm down as Aile patted his head.

With this, Aile squatted down to where he was eye level with his inner self," Alright, so so far we only know to things about the giant fishies okay. We know their name is Paper Pisces, and what is easily destroyed by fire?" He asked.

"PAPER!" The robot replied energetically.

"Yes, so by going by their name, we can assume fire is a possible weakness, but also, they are fish, and what are fish not good against?" He replied, making sure his partner knew what they were doing before the fight actually started.

"A shockingly good time?"

Aile paused before letting out a chuckle," I'll give you that one. But yes, I think we can assume that the fish are weak against electricity-" but his response was cut short as the fish finally managed to notice the two.

Aile nodded towards his little persona and the Persona started to giggle in a maniacally cute fashion again. The magician then called out to Volt," Shock 'em with Zio!" Volt only nodded while still giggling, and walked up to a fish saying," Boop" as he shocked the fish. Though the actual shock didn't seem to do much, the fish seemed to slowly fall down and stop moving, yet it did not dissipate.

Aile then said to Phoebe,"....I don't think Zio works....but I think...I think Volt's boop paralyzed it or something." After that, the other two Pisces split up, staying near Aile, while the other focused on Phoebe

[Phoebe Minola]

Phoebe chuckled a little at the way Aile interacted with his Persona. It appeared that he was in good touch with his inner self. That could be good; she expected that might help his Persona grow stronger sooner. He caught on to the notion of weaknesses too and he seemed to work out easily what the Paper Pesce in particular didn't like.

"Good going. The Paper Pesce turned out to have a double weakness; they simply can't stand fire and they don't like electricity either, but they're almost impervious to ice and wind," she said casually. "Oh, do be careful, when they rear up and look like they're about to do a flip, they're attacking physically."

Saying so she moved out of the way of one such attack, that sent a wave of energy shaped like a blade towards her. She could've easily stood there and taken it, but she preferred to teach by example and with a careful step she dodged it.

"Not all Shadows telegraph their attacks so clearly. I got hit a lot in the beginning until I figured out how this worked," she mused. "...And I was sort of out of shape, too, ehehehe."

These things resisted striking attacks but she didn't want to deploy Hypatia immediately, she'd wipe these things out too quickly.

I feel offended you want me to hold back, she said irritably.

Aw, but look how happy the little guy is that he gets to practice!

Hypatia let a patient sigh. I suppose.

Phoebe readied herself and swung her hammer as the creature was coming back around. It struck home and caught the creature on the side, knocking it away and sending it tumbling on the ground. She ran after it and brought down her warhammer on it again, striking the mask on its head. One more hit and the thing dissolved to nothing.

"By the way, don't forget that to cast spells or use physical skills, Personas sort of take the energy needed from you. Think of it like the HP and MP deal from video games: You cast a spell, you pay for it in mental fortitude; you order an attack, it takes a toll on your body," she explained quickly. "You'll know the feeling if you overdo it. If you use too many spells you'll probably going to feel like your head's about to split open and you won't be able to cast any other spells."

[Aile Kalias]

Again Aile nodded at this information. It was somewhat of a review of what Vice had told him previously but it was still nice to get a refresher course without the scolding. Then, almost immediately after her warning, the Pisces reared up, before charging and knocking Volt back, sending him skidding across the ground with Volt going'" Bump...bump...bump," as he bounced across the ground. Needless to say, Aile's butt hurt right not, not terribly bad, but like he had been pushed himself.

Afterwards, Volt got up excitedly," I wanna do that again...though, not on concrete...maybe a bed...or pillows!" It needed not to be said, but Volt was enjoying himself.

The little mech then approached the paralyzed fish, chanting in his usual happy voice," Fishie...Fishie...Fishie.....Fishie gonna go night, night!" When Aile called mentally for the mech to skewer the foe, and as the fish could not dodge, nor defend itself, it had died a painful and defenseless death at the amusement of a little robot. Volt then blurted out," I got me some fish!"

After that, Aile noticed that Phoebe had finished her fish off rather quickly. All that was left now was the fish focused on him, and he noticed that the fish was too far from Volt so he dove out of the way to avoid getting hit, though the fish barely missed its target. The magician managed to recover quickly despite the rising stress and how his arms and legs were starting to get sore.

Once he rose, Volt waltzed up to Aile as though this were just a game, and sooner or later, the little mech would have to learn that these fights would be life or death scenarios until they could get stronger, but then Aile had realized something. He had managed to keep Volt out for longer than his usual ten or so seconds. He didn't know how or why, maybe it just took some time to adjust to the mental change and training or maybe it was because they were outside of the city, either way, Aile was happy with this progress.

Then once Volt was done getting all giddy, Aile focused on the fish, calling out," Zio!" and Volt responded with a giddy shrill of laughter as he shot the fish down. It was weak, but Aile started to feel a headache coming on so if what all of his comrades information was true, he was probably coming close to his spell limit. So he said to the woman," You wanna finish it off?"

[Phoebe Minola]

"Sure thing, let me handle it," Phoebe said and stepped in closer.

The Pesce reared up when she approached and charged her. It motioned to do its signature flip and Phoebe calmly stood there, willing Hypatia to act. The philosopher raised her shield on time and the Pesce's attack hit the hoplon shield with a crash, then a sharp noise rang out as the Pesce suddenly just flailed backwards and dissolved into nothing.

"Love it when they knock off themselves," she chuckled. "My Persona has the ability to block some attacks and redirect the damage they would do back to the Shadows. Not all of them, but once in a while it happens. Even if the counter hadn't triggered, the particular Shadows use slashing type attacks and Hypatia nulls them, so there's no danger," she explained.

She brushed some hair off her face. "Anyway, you look tired, so let's take advantage of the space we have and wait here for a bit till you recover a bit. Don't expect that a ten minute break will let you cast like crazy again, but getting a breather will at least help you to be ready for another fight."

Phoebe cast a glance about to make sure the coast was clear and then leaned against an abandoned, dilapidated car that lay near them. Hypatia lowered her arms and hovered near her idly, likely deep in thought. She was a philosopher, after all.

"You know, I can't help notice that you've got a tiny bit of an accent," Phoebe said curiously. "It's kind of familiar but I can't place it exactly. Where are you from? Aile is an unusual name."

[Aile Kalias]

He watched as Phoebe had deflected the shadow's attack upon to itself, almost effortlessly. But was also somewhat surprised when almost immediately afterward, she had managed to notice that he was tired. Was he really that tired? He must've used too much mental power, but them again, he was still somewhat new to this whole ideal. Then Phoebe had asked where he was from, and he answered, scratching his head," I'm from Laconia..uh, Laconia, Greece."

After that, Aile sat down, cross legged, relaxing as Volt started to get somewhat more wound down. "Hey Pheeby, so...I gotta question." The little robot started before waddling up to the woman, and tugging at her shirt," So, what was your first time like?" Pausing so he could find the words to his simple question," Um..I mean..like when you summoned Happy?" Aile face palmed internally, he was blunt, but never THAT blunt whenever asking about someone's personal past, unless it was something he really wanted to know. And judging by Volts actions, he must've really wanted to know, at least on the inside.


OOC: Apologies for the short post.

[Phoebe Minola]

((OOC: No worries, short posts can be good for quick conversations. Also... your Persona's adorable~ ))

Phoebe's face lit up when he mentioned Laconia and Greece. "No kidding?!" she blurted. "Awesome! I'm from Greece too. My mother's from Sparta, Laconia. I was born in Athens, but Greek through and through! This is awesome," she chuckled. "How'd you come to live Mosaic?"

Then she bent down with her hands on her knees to get level with the little Persona. He was so adorable! But Phoebe couldn't help but wonder. She'd never seen another Persona, even her own, speak to someone other than her, or even just speak with an audible voice.

"Sure, what is it Volt?" A bit of read spread on her face when the little robot phrased it's question initially... because she took it completely the wrong way. "Oh er, that," she blurted.

Hypatia actually left her spear hovering in midair and palmed her face over the helmet. The Persona's shoulders shook in quiet laughter.

Phoebe chuckled nervously. "Ah well..."

"I did not come to her under favorable circumstances," Hypatia herself said suddenly and appeared as surprised as Phoebe was to hear her own voice out loud. "And my name is not... not 'Happy'. I am Hypatia."

"Uh, yeah," Phoebe picked it up, sensing her Persona's discomfort. "My first Persona was Antiope. I wandered into the Outskirts one night, not far from where we are now, and I got attacked. I thought I was going to die, but then Antiope showed up and saved me. She was my other self."

She gulped a bit. "Some time ago... something happened. I... can't talk about it quite yet. But Antiope changed into Hypatia. I don't know for sure but I think it's because that event changed my perspective on things. That's how I think you guys work, Volt. You change as we change because Personas and their Users... are one and the same."

"Change... is the one thing even Shadows can't stop. We are change embodied," Hypatia murmured, looking down at the smaller Persona.

She patted the little robot's head. "And hey, change is good. That's how the world goes round."