aterat | When ur luck stat is in the negative somehow

Entry tags:

fate (ou): waver velvet

When ur luck stat is in the negative somehow

Who; Lord El-Melloi II and anyone around
What; Dark Hour Event
Where; Aterat on the other side of the mirror
When; Backdated to the 10th because I am slow
Warnings; None yet, but I will update!

The arrival - OTA:

A certain magus had not trusted the standing mirrors that appeared in everyone’s lodgings from the moment he saw them. Even before he’d heard the whole ‘other world’ thing, he’d seen his reflection, and it had been irritating to see to put it lightly. So rather than interacting with it, or continuing to put up with it. He’d covered the mirror with a sheet and simply ignored it for the last few weeks since his arrival.

Then the bloody thing had started shaking one night, and the sheet fell off… On the one hand, the annoying sight of his other self had not been present. On the other hand, the sight of the room on the other side of the glass had still set off warning signals. So scooping up the sheet, he moved forward to cover it again and go back to relaxing and playing a round of a tactical game on his Gameboy. Only… Well, the sheet was dragging on the floor at his feet and he’d stepped on it and pitched forward clumsily.

And through the mirror, one Lord El-melloi II had gone.

With no mirror present on the other side, the man had done the only thing he could do: Utter some frustrated curses at his bad luck and leave the building behind in search of answers and hopefully some portal back.

What he found outside the building wasn’t much better, of course. Not the worst sight he’d seen in his life… But damn disturbing, accompanied by a tug of unpleasant nostalgia nonetheless, as he looked down at the blood covered streets before his eyes came to rest on the countless coffins stood in rows. What kind of messed up reality had he inadvertently slipped into?

At least this was… manageable outside the obvious disturbing sight. He ended up in weird situations all the time, after all. This was just another day at the office for the professor back in his world… Sure, usually Gray or one of his students was around, but he could manage a small investigation to getting himself out of here easily enough, right? Right. Wrong.

On the run - OTA:

If one skipped forward about two hours, ignoring the standard investigation sequence that inevitably leads to someone finding something they shouldn’t in a horror movie and ending up on the bad side of the thing that’s been lurking in the shadows for most of the movie.

Instead of wandering from one building to the next in a thorough search for a mirror that might be the way out, the mage was currently running (not an activity he enjoyed) between buildings and down side-streets in an attempt to lose more of the damned dark shadowy creatures that kept finding him. Getting too close seemed to cause them to shift into something else though, strange or frightfully beautiful at times, making him wonder if they were some kind of security system for this place, familiars created by something else… But it wasn’t as though he were stupid enough to stick around and ask, they seemed prone to attacking and Waver wasn’t really suited for confrontations of this nature.

At first, running into one here and there had been troublesome, but… not entirely impossible to slow down with a few low-grade gandr shots and flee. Running into several at once was another matter entirely, especially if you say… Were being chased by two and then found yourself cut off by another group ahead that soon morphed to look something like a giant starfish with an eye in the center. “Shit…!” He muttered, skidding to a halt and backing up slightly. Waver’s hair was in total disarray at this point, one hand reaching up to brace his arm as he let another couple cursed shots fly from his fingertips, grimacing as they did little more than slow the things down slightly as they seemed annoyed by the attack more than anything.

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Curiosity had a habit of killing the cat, or in this case the wizard, and much light cats, curiosity would normally bring at least this one back, or so Harry hoped. He hadn't trusted the mirrors from the moment they'd appeared, there were too many beings of the Never ever thst could use them to travel or to be witch viewers, and he'd been right.

Not long ago, another world had revealed itself through them, populated by strange, other versions of themselves, and honestly, he wanted no part of it. Unfortunately, at midnight, it had started vibrating, which had dislodged the wooden slat he kept over his in order to prevent just such a transferral. He'd initially moved to replace the cover, but the sight in the mirror gave him pause. It was a haunted and tainted version of his own room, which meant it was either a twisted reflection... Or something on there was waiting to do them in, probably through the mirror.

Hells Bells.

He'd gone to collect his staff, his blasting rod, a shield bracelet, and pulled on his heavy enchanted leather duster that made him look like an extra on the set of El Dorado. He completely the look of a vigilante cowboy wizard by donning a cawboy hat he'd acquired here from a charming snowman which he'd also enchanted to keep his head as safe as the rest of his body.

And then he stepped through. The environment was immediately oppressive, and there was a slight drain on his energy in the air that he couldn't place. He was looking around the dark reflection of his own bedroom, cursing the fact that the door had shut behind him, when he heard the sound of heavy footfalls from his window. Someone was being chased. He wasn't alone, here.

He raced to the window first, doing his best not to get distracted by the odd sight of blood-soaked streets lined by caskets, and immediately recognized the running man. He threw open his window and was about to shout when he saw the man-armed, deceptively fast blob of goo pursuing the man. He had no idea what it was, but he could see what it wanted.

He pulled his blasting rod, a length of wood about a foot long, carved with runes that sprang to scarlet life as he pushed his will through it, took aim through the window, and shouted the quazi-latin command that would give the spell shape.

"Fuego!" A molten fireball shot from the end of the blasting rod, careening through the gloomy night, and smashed into the pursuing blob, sending it momentarily to the ground in a roll. The flames clung to its gelatinous body as it struck and the thing toiled.

Cool. It didn't like fire. Hopefully it was down long enough for the wizard to get down two flights of stairs.

Waver had known this was all going to end poorly for him, though he’d almost fooled himself into thinking if he were careful he might slip under the radar of whatever might be around here. It had seemed as much for a little while, at least until the first creature showed its ugly blobbish self and seemed intent upon catching up to him. It only got worse, of course, when he fired off a couple of gandr shots to try to deter them from following. Maybe if he were as strong as Luvia or… just about any other mage, really, it might have done more than agitate them further.

So a game of chase it was, which wasn’t going to last terribly long, knowing his stamina was fairly pathetic as most people went. He was a professor, a researcher, not an athlete! Though one could point out with the amount of bad situations he ended up in, he should be used to this and in slightly better shape by now.

But he really wasn’t made that way, and so he was on a slight time limit that he could feel ticking down as the creature pursued him. Legs starting to ache and lungs burning, he tried to throw another shot behind him that bounced uselessly off cobblestone and wasted more magic than his circuits could really afford. “Fuck, just go away already!” He muttered, unknown to him, that someone was currently witnessing his race with the blob that was somehow gaining on him, despite being a blob.

Then he heard a familiar voice shouting out ‘Fuego’ with a particular force that sounded like a command, and as a damn fireball shot through the air and slammed into the thing behind him (thank god it seemed to actually be weak to that compared to his flimsy attempt) he realized the shout had been to call up a single action, one count spell.

Does Waver stop running just because the thing had staggered and toppled over? No, because he wanted to be as far from it as he could and it looked like Harry Dresden had just miraculously shown up at just the right time… Was he wearing a cowboy hat? Really? Not the point, Waver. He groused at himself. He just saved your ass. Focus on putting some more distance between yourself and that freaky amalgamate!

Which was probably smart, because the damn thing was slowly getting back up and it was even less pleased to have been flambéed…

Harry was already gone from the window when he glanced back, hopefully to exit the building and do that again. Which was why Waver himself shifted the course of his mad-dash slightly to take him by the building. The man had been on one of the upper floors by the looks of it, and probably needed some time to get downstairs… But the knowledge that he wasn’t on his own here at least helped urge him forward despite the fatigue setting in.

Waver and Harry had something in common when it came to the lack of stamina. Making his way downstairs two at a time, as a man well over six feet in height was want to do, had his lungs burning and his thighs screaming in protest. Whatever that thing was had looked like it was working on shaking off the fireball Harry had thrown at it which meant he needed to move quickly. There were things a lot worse than death, he had no idea what sort of physics or metaphysics this place adhered to, and Waver's life depended on him making it down to the street before that thing caught up with him.

He cursed himself for not running down more flights of stairs as the burning in his chest reached a fever pitch even as he reached the door leading out to the street. Thankfully, the Second had the presence of mind to bring the thing closer and the huffing wizard stumbling out onto the sidewalk didn't have to go too much farther to level his staff, a seven foot length of uncut wood carved with intricate arcane runes, perpendicular to the ground, aiming at the mutating creature as it closed in. It sprouted tentacles of darkness even as he took aim, and he pulled all his fatigue and pain into himself, focusing it on a non-elemental blast.

"Forzare!" A rippling ball of energy shot from the end of his staff, connecting solidly with the mutating body of the creature, taking it off its manifesting leg-tentacle-things and sending it careening into the brick side of a building two blocks down. He took a steadying breath and tried to pull in more energy for a follow up attack, but he was evidently going to need more time than that, his limbs felt like jelly. He glanced back over his shoulder in Waver's direction, still breathing heavily.

"You okay back there, the Second?"

Waver would actually appreciate that knowledge, if it should ever come to light. His rather weak stamina tended to be a source for teasing from Reines. She delighted in pointing it out whenever he got a bit winded from longer walks or situations that called for more physical exertion than he was used to. But for now, the mage was focused on not being caught by the damned thing chasing him. He wasn’t keen to try out the whole ‘death not being permanent’ thing about Aterat, nor was he sure that would this other would count for that considering it seemed both like and so very unlike the proper Aterat.

Hopefully, the timing would work out as he ran by the building itself, not entirely sure how long it would take Harry to get down the stairs and out into the open. Thankfully, luck hadn’t abandoned him entirely (even if he would question its timing considering he was here in the first place) as Harry came stumbling out of the building and onto the sidewalk, another spell command breaking the silence and throwing the creature several blocks away and through a building if the sound of a brick wall crumbling was anything to go by.

The professor finally skidded to a halt and let himself breathe for a moment. Bent in half and braced against his knees as he appreciated the final end to the frantic marathon he’d been stuck running. It takes a minute or two, and some staggered attempts at words from behind a curtain of hair in his face before he could respond properly. “The definition of okay might not exactly be accurate at this time.” His words were a bit broken and spaced between breaths. “But damn well better for the help. Thanks, that was uh- oddly lucky timing. Nothing I did seemed to do more than piss it off.” He meant that, despite the small twinge of jealousy that he always felt around those more powerful or capable of their magic. It was there, but secondary to the relief of being helped and the need to press forward. He really wasn’t sure how much longer he could have kept running, considering how tenacious that creature had been.

A little while longer and he was sure it would have caught him the next time he stumbled or slipped in the blood on the ground. “Do you think it’ll stay down for a bit this time?” He added, hoping for ten… or even five minutes to just stop moving for a bit.

Murphy, a good friend of his and sometimes partner, often teased him for his lack of stamina as well, which was made even more embarrassing by the fact that she was, in fact, a tiny person who stood barely five feet in height made made him feel even more like a giant than he already appeared to most people. She was also a martial arts expert with several first place trophies on her shelf and could destroy him with her bare hands.

"Definition, huh? Okay. Breathing? Good. Got all your limbs? Also good." Harry was about to respond with the movement of debris interrupted him and he looked over in the direction he'd sent the creature flying. "I'm going with no. Hell's Bells."

It was one thing to take a big push of energy and throw it at a monster, but it was another to irritate a wizard with your own stubbornness. It gave a guy a lot of ammunition to keep slinging spells at you, and this Shadow was quickly getting on his last nerve.

He took a step forward even as the beast pulled itself back to its metaphorical feet and appeared back in the street. Harry pulled his blasting rod from the custom-fitted hook on his belt and leveled it at the creature. It roared.

He grinned. The runes along the shaft had already begun to glow, brighter than before. He channeled all his fatigue, all his frustration, all his confusion at the strange turn of events that had placed him in this twisted world, and unleashed fury.

"Pyro Fuego!" White hot flame belched from the rod, singing cobblestones and wrapping itself around the creature, sending it writhing to the ground, but this time, he followed up with another shout, "Fuego," a follow-up fireball that ate away at flyers on buildings and left the street sign a smoldering pile of wrought iron and did a lot to slow the movements of the Shadow. And then it died, disappeared in a vibrating rumble of darkness and was gone, leaving only the smoking remains of the pavement on which it had expired.

Harry's shoulders slumped, energy expending and leaving tiredness in its wake. "Okay. Now it won't get back up."

A huff escaped, not necessarily a laugh but a dry humor in his tone in response to the description. “Yeah, then by that we could say I’m okay. Though a bit longer, and I’m not sure we could have even said that much.” He agreed, finally straightening enough to look at the wall the thing had been thrown through for signs of life. Somehow, he found himself unsurprised as the rubble began to shift and move. “Seriously, those things are goddamned stubborn once they want something. It would almost be impressive if it wasn’t horrifying.” He griped with a small groan. Maybe they didn’t get much in the way of pray here, or maybe they were part of some kind of security system to deal with intruders and it was made to be like that…

Either way, he hated it. A lot.

Harry already seemed to be ready to retaliate and hopefully put the damn thing out of commission once and for all, though, like some kind of big hero. Which… Based on what he’d seen of the man’s personality so far? It fit, and the lord was damn grateful for it too at the moment, the feeling of uselessness aside.

The man’s magic was also a curious thing to watch, the runes on his staff getting waver’s attention, as much as the way he’d unleashed the spells had. It was a nice distraction from the slight tremor over fear still gripping him at the sight of the thing that had been chasing him getting back up. Keeping his mind on that and not on his legs that felt about ready to give out beneath him to fall on the rather unsettling street. There was a certain tone to his voice as the thing finally died and disappeared to into shadows. That tone was decidedly impressed and relieved. “Glad to see these things can be felled at all.” He sighed, glancing at the definitely fatigued form of Harry.

Well, it meant he didn’t have to beg for a brief break at least, right? That was a step up from the usual back-and-forth bargain for a few minutes. “I must say, I’m glad we’re on the same side. You pack a particularly impressive punch there.”

He chuckled, clearly winded. "only because I'm prepared. Believe it or not, I'm not the greatest at evocation." Which was why he needed so many foci. Still, he'd love to talk shop, and maybe they finally should once they figured out how to get out of this mess, but right now, they were sitting ducks and he needed a breather before he was ready to unload on another one of those things.

"We should get off the road and figure out what we're going to do from here."

Waver definitely wanted to know more about Harry’s magic and how it went in his world, but the situation wasn’t really ideal for it. He wasn’t really a fan of getting ambushed while they sat around swapping information on how magic worked in their respective worlds… As fascinating as it would be.

He didn’t quite stifle the tired groan at the idea of moving again, but nodded. “Yeah… We should get inside before something else spots us. That’s not the first one I’ve run into, but it is the first I wasn’t able to give the slip.” He glanced around, before gesturing towards the building Harry had just exited. “Shall we?” He pushed back his hair and straightened, figuring the building had at least been clear based on Harry’s exit.

They'd have to make a mental note to talk shop after they were both back, warm and safe in their own beds in the other alternate dimension.

He nodded at the suggestion and motioned him ahead. "I'll take up the rear. The coast was clear when I left." Though, given how that thing had been moving, it was hard to say if that would still be the case now. Besides, he hadn't been subtle. He never was.

"Be careful, though. Who knows what those things are capable of."

Waver offered a nod, appreciating the logic in the decision. It was pretty obvious that it was better that way, given he wasn’t much good in these situations. “Let’s hope it stays clear. I don’t know that I’ve seen them inside as yet.” He responded with a frown, though the magus was slightly concerned he might have called the universe down on their heads for that comment. It would be just his luck to discover that they could indeed appear inside.

Making his way back to the door about as quickly as he could manage at the moment, he tugs open the door and holds it open behind him as he entered the building and gets a look at the grim-looking insides. It was about the same as the building he’d entered from, but it seemed clear for now… “You been here long? Or did I just get exceptionally lucky?” He commented over his shoulder, wondering if this was where the man had entered from or if they had a chance at finding a way out from here.

"I just hopped through when I heard you out on the street." Not that it had been the most intelligent idea of his life, but maybe it wasn't as stupid as he was making it out to be. If he hadn't, The Second may be dead, and dying over here was probably just as detrimental as dying in Aterat, if not so. Death might even be permanent here.

"How's long's it been for you?" He didn't want to risk opening his third eye here, so instead, he just listened. The building was deathly quiet, and he didn't know if that was a good thing or not.

“Then lucky for me you happened to when you did.” He could see Harry deciding to hop through the mirror on purpose to investigate, he definitely seemed like the sort to the professor that would investigate regardless of how smart it was to pop through an unknown portal to check things out. Though after what he’d seen just now, he was pretty sure Harry at least had the ability to back up a confident decision like that.

Is he going to admit he tripped and fell through instead of making the conscious decision? No, not if he doesn’t have to. Instead, he shrugs and pats down his pockets, looking for something that might help once they were sure the building, or part of it, was secure. “Honestly, I’m not entirely sure. An hour or two, maybe?” He hadn’t had a way to track it, and trying to avoid those weird creatures had kept him fairly busy before the full on chase had begun. “Not long enough to have a lead in getting out of here, but long enough to know I’d rather not stick around.”

Harry tended to play fast and loose with his own life, but he tried his best not to risk the lives of others. Did that always work out? Well, no, but he did his damnedest to limit the risk.

"I hate relying on luck. It's too fickle to count on it when you really need it to save your ass." Not that Melloi II didn't have a point. It was so damned lucky it was almost contrived.

"I don't think that takes very long." He had no idea where this was in relation to where they'd been and that didn't help matters. "I wonder if there are any mirrors on this side. I guess you haven't seen any?"

“It doesn’t, at least not in this instance.” He responded with a small sigh, poking his head in one room to look around as they passed by. “That I’m not sure of… When I accidentally went through mine, there wasn’t one on the other side. Guessing that’s normal, based on your comment.” He’d heard it was the same last time people took trips through the mirrors that had appeared… So perhaps there was something to be said for that consistency. People had found their way back out, after all.

“Afraid not. If I had, I wouldn’t still be on this side.” He’d have been long gone. Even if he was thrown into odd, dangerous situations, it didn’t mean he’d stick around in them if he had the choice. It wasn’t sensible, at least not without backup. The professor put on a brave face most of the time, but really, he was still every bit as scared as he had been in his youth when it came to things like this. The only upside was the danger was obvious. Those creatures, rather than mages that he couldn’t know if or when they’d stab him in the back for miss-stepping.

"Yep. The door closed behind me when I came through, too." Which didn't bode well for either of them. There wasn't a way for Harry to open a portal on this side without any knowledge of where he needed that portal to go, so the only other option was finding a way back.

"But that doesn't mean there aren't other doors." He breathed a sigh, though. "It does mean one isn't likely to be around here, though."

The confirmation was expected, but still appreciated. It was another thing to tick off the mental list of things they knew compared to the overlong list of things they didn’t know.

There were probably other doors elsewhere, and he nodded. “No, it would be too easy if there was a way back so close to an entry-point… But it gives us a chance to stop for a minute and work out which way to go next without being interrupted by one of those things again.” Provided they couldn’t show up inside, anyway… But he wasn’t about to tack that on and invite one to prove him wrong.

"Haven't seen one indoors yet and hopefully they decide to stay that way." But having a door he could ward, even temporarily, while they regrouped was important. He made his way down the hall, pushing his senses down the hall first without opening his third sight. He didn't want to rush into anything, but he also didn't want to waste too much time and attract them in that way.

If they even had ways of sensing people. He wasn't sure. The coast seemed clear, though, so he took the nearest room to the right, stepping into a living room that clearly wasn't used, though the sofa was sitting at an odd angle, blood ran in rivulets down the walls, and the atmosphere inside was generally gloomy and horror-esque.

"This one's cheery. Get inside and close the door. We'll get it warded and then we'll pow-wow a plan."

“Neither have I, at least not since I arrived.” Hopefully the two of them hadn’t invited something unpleasant on their heads. Waver was happy to follow the wizard’s lead, though. Let Harry go on ahead in case of something unexpected coming up in front of them, and he could let out a warning if something came up from behind. Hard to not miss Gray in a situation like this, though. She would have handled things rather easily compared to himself. Though most people would, that was beside the point.

Entering the room they stopped at, his brow rose a little at the description. “I get the distinct feeling the interior decorator has an overall theme.” He commented wryly, eyes following the trails of blood running down the walls with a frown. It’s not like he hasn’t seen overly bloody, gruesome things before. Between what happened in the grail war and the cases he was called in on… It was more that the lack of anything like a source for the macabre sight was unsettling. Usually that much blood was accompanied by corpses, after all.

On the subject of wards, he’s already patting down his coat pockets for his cigar case, tugging it out a moment later. The mage definitely to get something up himself to alert him if they were being approached, something to set his mind at ease enough to focus on their plans rather than paranoia over a potential ambush.

"What? 'Chateau du Death Metal'?" It really did look like the living, breathing cover of a Megadeth album as he pulled from his own pocket a small black satin pouch and, leaning his staff against a half-rotten end table, pulled a well-used piece of white chalk from the pouch as well, and moved to the entrance where he began drawing a line of runes from memory along the door frame.

It was a simple warding spell, meant to strip whatever spiritual or psychic entity that shoved its way through it of a lot of its power, but each window in the small apartment would need the same inscription, and then be activated before they were effective. He had to move quickly.

Training with the army had given him the ability to multitask, though. "What's the cigar case for?"

Waver huffed, a little amused at the quip despite the situation. Glancing around again at the comment. “Can’t say it doesn’t give the overall impression.” He could almost see it on the cover of an album now. Most of the place could be, really.

Equally curious, he watched as Harry began moving about the room, drawing runes along the frame of the door. Runes were an interesting subject. A lot of them had been lost to time in his world. It was only more recently that a mage in particular had begun recovering them. It was interesting to see Harry pull them from memory and setting them so quickly.

Moving on to look for the cutter and his lighter, he paused with the case in his hand. “It’s for holding cigars.” He responded with the obvious in a bland tone, finding what he needed. He opened the case and selected one in particular before closing it and tucking the case away into another pocket.

Only a few people had figured out what his cigars even were back in his world. In light of the situation though, and the fact that they were from different worlds, he forgoes some of the secrecy for a change. Speaking up as he clipped the end off one, he offered an explanation. “Where I’m from, mages are usually in possession of or develop a few mystic codes over time. These are mine. There are different varieties I’ve developed, such as defence, stabilizing, and creating small bounded fields in a room.”

To spite appearances and his choice pretty often to run in guns blazing, Harry's greatest magical strength was not evocation or the immediate creation of magical effect, but thaumaturgy. He had a keen memory and a cunning focus and that, coupled with an impressive well of personal magic, made him one hell of a ritual mage and enchanter. His coat, his bracelet, his staff and rod, all he'd made himself. The rod gave him minute control over energies he usually found chaotic, and his coat was bulletproof. The bracelet would erect a shield that was also bulletproof around himself and anyone near him, and he really hoped he wouldn't have to use that here tonight.

He smirked as he continued to work. "So, they're enchantments?"

Waver clipped the end off one and lit it with his lighter, continuing to watch Harry work. “They are. Just convenient aids for things that most mages can do rather easily.” They also gave him a slight boost in magical output, and every little bit counted for him. Though in a situation like this, even that wouldn’t be enough. He was lucky Harry had come along when he had.

Once it was lit and he activated his magic circuits and took a few short drags from the cigar to trigger the effects of the bounded field, he felt a little more secure in their presence, being less likely to be noticed outside the space. “More impressive mystic codes have more powerful offensive capabilities, or pseudo-personalities like my sister’s mercury maid, Trimmau.” Or Gray’s ‘Add,’ that contained and preserved Rhongomyniad, and only released it for her. Waver had a few other than the cigars, inherited or purchased for his own studies, but he never really carried them. It would only weigh him down and the time it took for him to use them even half as efficiently as others would have made them a bit pointless, especially if he came up against another mage.

Harry nodded, finishing up the drawings around the entranceway and raising his right hand, the hand of order, uttering a psuedo-latin phrase. "Impedimus Nunc". There was no flash of light from his hand or anything so grand, but there was a stirring of energy around him, detectable by another mage, and then the runes glowed a faint blue for a moment before fading back to chalk. Then he moved on to the first window, repeating the same sequence of runes.

"I get it. I'm not that great at evocation, myself." With is left hand, he patted the side pocket of his coat, under which was fastened to his belt his blasting rod. "So I make things to make it easier. The bad guys don't always give you the time to draw a circle and enact a ritual." And he knew something of personalities, too, though he'd never attempted creating one. Why would he? He had Bob. "I've heard of things like that, but I've never tried it. I might be good at enchantment, but that's the sort of thing that if it goes wrong, it's usually explosive."

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When ur luck stat is in the negative somehow

Running

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