//------------------------------// // Episode 187: Bloody Prelude // Story: Equestria Girls: Friendship Souls // by thatguyvex //------------------------------// Episode 187: Bloody Prelude Amid a stinking ocean of fetid, acidic bile, an endless series of isles of near lifeless stone rose like the spinal chords of fallen giants. Between two lines of jagged stone rocks, a Kushanada traded blows with an immense knight of blood red crystal. This titan of shining ruby dragged a bladed fist across the Kushanada’s chest, then immediately reversed course, transmuting its blade into a widening spear that then pierced the Hell giant’s shoulder in a gout of blood. The Kushanada’s blazing eye pits flared, and it retaliated, gripping the spear and lashing out with its building sized cleaver with air rending speed. A clarion ring of screaming crystal sounded as the blade dragged a deep gash in the crimson knight’s chest, but even as the damage formed, flickers of red power coursed over the towering construct’s chest. From the chest emerged cylindrical barrels, cannons with bores wider than battleship guns, and as the cylinders rotated a storm of devastation fired out in a relentless hail of exploding reishi shards fired at ludicrous speed. The Kushanada’s chest was ripped through like wet beef, but even as it fell back into the acid ocean, it tried to drag the knight down with it, meaty hands clasped around the construct’s waist. However the entire titanic knight glowed red, and immediately broke apart into its hundreds of component pieces, now resuming the form of Rarity’s army of knight constructs. The damaged Kushanada fell into the ocean as the knights sent it on its way with a final flurry of explosive arrows and cannon fire, while Rarity herself now rode astride her gleaming construct pegasus, blade in hand as she watched the bloody work be done. “It won’t stay down long, but damn if that doesn’t take care of things for a few minutes,” Cozy Glow called out, perched on one of the nearby, jagged rock formations. “We can’t stay still long,” said Sunburst. He was flying through the air, jets of flame rolling from his feet and hands like riding a carpet of fire. “I just spotted about ten more coming up on us from the last Gate. They really seem pissed off this time.” “Hahaha! And why not!?” laughed Cozy Glow, “They probably haven’t had sport this good in centuries! Hey Rar-Rar, you having fun yet?” She wasn’t. She was exhausted. While her reiatsu was still going strong, lack of sleep, food, or water was starting to mount its toll on her mood. It didn’t help that this layer of Hell had such an appalling sea of acid that left the air stinking profusely. Licking dry, cracked lips, she said, “I shall refrain from comment. Let us just hurry to Tartarus. It’s on this Layer, is it not?” “It is. Main landmass isn’t far off. Now where’s that cutie patootie boyfriend of yours?” Rarity didn’t rise to the bait. It was clear Cozy Glow vastly enjoyed teasing her companions, and Blueblood was not only a prime target himself, but his... admiration for Rarity left plenty of ammunition in the child’s arsenal to fire off. Glancing behind her, Rarity searched for Blueblood’s spiritual pressure. She lost track of him a bit after they breached the Gate and had to fight past the Kushanada guarding it. And she could tell that Sunburst was right, they didn’t have time to wait around. Already she could see the faint form of the Kushanada she had felled stirring under the ocean waves. The acid didn’t seem to bother it, and its damaged body was quickly regenerating.  She picked up Blueblood’s reiatsu just as he appeared nearby from a Flash Step, breathing heavily. “Apologies. I led one of them on a bit of a merry chase, but I think I lost it.” His words were punctuated by an explosion of rock as one of the spires of stone were shattered, and an enraged Kushanada’s roar filled the air as another one came barreling through. Blueblood groaned, and Sunburst shouted, “Just move it everyone! We can’t waste time fighting, otherwise we’ll be swarmed.” He jetted off on tails of intense flame, and Cozy Glow followed by shooting out her chains and using them like high speed grapple lines to swing like a crazed, giggling acrobat. Rarity nodded to Blueblood and without asking, grabbed him by the arm and hauled him onto the back of her pegasus construct. He gave her a surprised look, but she just winked back at him and told him, “Do hold on, please.” She directed the construct to fly with all speed after her companions, while the remaining knights retreated into her own gateway. This freed up the reiatsu she’d use to maintain the army to pour directly into the construct she was riding, boosting it’s speed even further, and easily catching up to then outpacing Cozy Glow and Sunburst. The Kushanada chased after them, but the terrain left several narrow crevasse between island mesas and outcroppings, letting the group weave between and slow the giant down until, after about half an hour, they finally left it long behind.  By now Rarity noticed the ocean and uneven islands of stone were giving way to a larger landmass. The ‘sky’ above was an ugly shade of yellow, streaked with unpleasant, brown clouds. The land was a bleak, dark gray, uneven with rising hills and sharp cliffs. There was no majesty in the vast mass of tall, dead rock. It was like a tumor of mountains, no life or greenery to see, no snow caps or wisps of white cloud. Just depressing gray and black in the shape of irregular, sharp angles. Every inch of it offended Rarity’s sense of beauty and esthetic, but then again what did she expect? This was Hell. She understood she’d have to get used to it.  As they traveled, Sunburst flew a little closer. Cozy Glow had taken the lead to show the way to the next Gate, and Rarity did note the little girl did glance back at them as Sunburst got closer, but Cozy made no comment. Sunburst himself was silent for a time as well, but Rarity could see the hesitance on his weathered face. It still left her with a burst of sympathy to see how drained and beaten down the man looked. If she squinted and used her imagination to look past the sunken eyes, hollowed cheeks, and faded, stringy strands of hair, she could see the youth that would have been. She could imagine the rich, fiery hair, and energetic, kind eyes. But what she saw now was like a tattered painting so faded with abuse that whatever colors and clear imagery there had been was a nearly broken and unrecognizable mess. There were only a few small glints of hope and kindness buried under a lifetime of suffering in Sunburst’s eyes as he spoke. “Before we get to Tartarus, I should warn you that you’ll be tested.” “What do you mean by that, sir?” asked Blueblood, suspicious burning in his tone, but Rarity cleared her throat loudly. “Ahem, I suspect he means the local population will try to see what I am made of?” she suggested, and Sunburst’s expression flinched with a cynical shadow. “That’s one way to put it. You’ll be seen as fresh meat, even with me and Cozy Glow with you. And we can only do so much to shield you, otherwise it’ll make you seem vulnerable. So... My advice is to make an impression. A violent one. The more harsh, the better.” “Are you speaking from experience, by chance?” she asked, and he closed his eyes with a pained nod. “I didn’t meet Cozy right off the bat. My first few weeks here... were pretty horrible.” “Just how did you and Miss Cozy Glow become acquainted, if I may ask? She's rather, how shall I put this, an unusual match for someone such as yourself. You two have very different dispositions, to put it mildly.” His response was accompanied by a very odd, twisted smile and a certain fondness in his eyes as he looked at the companion in question, “No kidding. No sugarcoating it; Cozy’s nuts. Unpredictable. Violent. Manipulative. Ruthless.” “Oh God, just keep complimenting me, why don’t you!?” Cozy shouted back at them, “Don’t mind me, I love it!” Sunburst sighed, but kept smiling in that odd manner, “As you can see, she’s also got a weird sense of humor and nearly zero sense of shame. When I met her, I was just some gang’s plaything. I hadn’t even manifested my Sinner powers yet. But that gang must have done something to piss Cozy off, because she and her Legion tore through like a blender one day. Thought I’d just be on a different gang’s chopping block when that happened, but Cozy, she just saw me and it was like she saw something in me I didn’t even know was there. ‘Hey, you tired of being the butchered instead of the butcher?’ she asked me, and gave me her hand. I’ve stuck by her side ever since.” “Awww, you’re gonna make me cry so hard I’ll barf!” Cozy clamored, her swift chain slinging leading her to land upon a humongous ledge of stone that jutted out from the land like a blade tip from the side of a tall mesa cliff. She made a gagging noise as Sunburst landed next to her, “You made me sound like a nice person, when we both know I’m a die hard opportunist! I figured anybody that could get abused as much as you did and still look so damn pissed off had enough pep in his guts to be worth my time. And hey, turns out it was a solid bet! You’re like, one of two or three competent lieutenants I’ve got now, so I’d say my investment was totally worth it.” “If you say so, Cozy,” Sunburst replied, which only seemed to irritate the girl as she puffed her cheeks at him like an angry bellows, then huffed and turned to Rarity and Blueblood. “Alright then, you two beautiful, creamy skinned meat slabs, here we are! Our next step on the way to Tartarus!” she swept a hand back at the cliff, which Rarity now noticed had a thin slit on it’s stone, as if a sword had cut into the cliffside and left an opening now more than three meters wide. “Me and Sunburst go first, you two follow behind. Heard the advice Sunburst gave you, and it’s pretty solid. Even being lead by yours truly, some Sinners with mucus for brains won’t be able to ignore the chance to feel out a pair of pretty pieces like you two.” “For what purpose?” Blueblood said, expression askance, “Surely they cannot be so foolish as to attack a formidable group such as ours.” “Ugh, c’mon pretty boy, get your two brain cells into gear! Nobody can die down here, so nobody has anything to lose by trying until it’s made crystal fuggin’ clear that screwing with you is bad news. I mean,” Cozy glow gestured up and down at both Blueblood and Rarity, “Do I got to paint a picture for you two!? This is H-E-Double Hockeysticks! Filled with the worst of the worst, most of whom ain’t seen a gal half as fine as Rarity in centuries, or a guy who ain’t far behind her in the looks department. Every gang in sight is going to want to snatch you for all of the reasons you don’t mention in polite society, and guess what, this ain’t nowhere near polite society.” “I believe we get the picture,” Rarity said, taking a deep breath, “I don’t think we need to go into any unpleasant details. Suffice to say I understand that we represent tempting targets, and it is our first task to make it abundantly clear that neither of us are prey to be so accosted.” “Got it on the nose. So let’s get on with this, and you can show me just how you handle things,” Cozy Glow said with a bit too much eagerness for Rarity’s liking. Sunburst might have had a bit of a soft spot for the little hellion due to being rescued by her, but Rarity was inclined to believe Cozy Glow’s words about acting purely on opportunistic motives. At least thus far the child hadn’t shown much indication of being trustworthy outside of willing to be helpful as long as she found Rarity interesting. Which was fine as far as Rarity was concerned. This relationship could be mutually beneficial, and Rarity could learn to sleep with one eye open. The crevasse they entered didn’t stay narrow for long, widening into something more akin to a sheer, mountain ravine as they walked along. Rarity remained wary, knowing that if they were about to approach another Gate, there’d be more Kushanada. She could handle herself against one or two of the big brutes, but only just, and a larger group would be difficult even for her. It was unsettling, as she knew she’d gotten strong enough to readily deal with Captain-level threats at this point, but the Kushanada even in small groups posed a deadly threat. Well... deadly in the sense that if she had to fight more than two, she’d probably be ‘killed’, but apparently that was a very different kind of issue here in Hell. A part of her wondered what the process was actually like, and she felt the chains of Hell weighing upon her as if they were hooked right into her bones.  “Once we’re at the Third Layer, how far is Tartarus?” she asked, and Sunburst whispered back to her. “Very close, actually. The Gate that’s currently between the Second Layer here, and the third, is nearly on top of the plateau that Tartarus is built under. So once we’re through, it’s practically a hop, skip, and a jump to get into Tartarus.” “Just gotta deal with the Gate guards, same as we did with the ones back on the First Layer,” Cozy said, “And with us four, or three, since I don’t expect much from pretty boy, we ought to have it wrapped up in... no time...?” She trailed off, the small form of Cozy Glow stopping dead in her tracks. Up ahead the ravine-like area opened up onto a wide, rocky shelf, which in turn looked out into a truly enormous, volcanic caldera. The air stank with acrid smoke as waterfalls of acid bile poured from the caldera’s inner cliffs and rushed down to fill a gigantic lake within the caldera’s center. If Rarity looked closely enough, she thought she could see the occasional skeletal face peering from the depths of the lake. At the lake of acid bile’s center was a blackened isle of rock, upon which stood the tall, bone-like structures of the Gate between Layers.  However, instead of Kushanada guards, there were instead two Kushanada corpses, ever so slowly regenerating, but so devastatingly damaged and demolished that Rarity estimated it’d probably take them hours to recuperate. But what had done something like that!? “Oh my,” said Blueblood, “Um, c-could a friend of yours have taken care of the guards?”  At his hopeful question, Cozy Glow gave him a sickened, angered look, like one might give a slow minded child for asking a less than brilliant question, “Are you goddamn kidding me? Ain’t got a single friend who can pull that off, and there’s only a handful of bastards that can.” Sunburst’s face was even more ashen than usual as he looked around in equal parts fear and intense scrutiny. Rarity sensed both the immense nerves and combat readiness that came over Cozy Glow and Sunburst, like starved wolves sensing the presence of another predator. She took their cue and began scanning around herself, flicking her wrist to summon forth a glittering red rapier to her hand. Sunbrust’s mouth twitched into a grimace as he looked to her and Blueblood. “The only ones who can do that to Kushanada besides Cozy Glow are... the Lords of the Lowest.” “Ugh, don’t use that stupid pet name they gave themselves,” Cozy Glow groused, “Bunch of egomaniacs, so freakin’ full of themselves. They’re just a couple of Hollows, former Arrancar that claim the lowest two layers of Hell as theirs.” Her eyes narrowed dangerously, her chains rising around her like angry cobras that gave of metallic hisses. Suddenly she shouted, loud and piercing, “We know you’re out there; Typhon! Cerberus! Whichever one of you it is, or both, I don’t care, but stop trying to act all cool and make an entrance! I’m not in the mood for your crap!” Rarity found herself blinking in surprise. Typhon and Cerberus!? But weren’t those names... from Glory’s tale of the betrayal of the Soul Queen? Even as she thought of it, there was a sensation of ancient reiatsu that vibrated across the surface of her spiritual senses. It was no doubt the reiatsu of a Hollow, and an immensely powerful one, but it was more than that. Rarity could feel just how strangely vibrant and primal this reiatsu was compared to the Arrancar she had sensed before. It was akin to Tirek’s, if not in the same overwhelming power, in a very similar vein of something far older and more elemental than the reiatsu of modern Hollows. He appeared before them in a distinct blur of motion that Rarity recognized as Sonido. She was able to follow the movement just enough to understand that he’d been poised above them on the cliff, watching and suppressing his spiritual pressure until Cozy called out. Now this figure stood before them, not holding his reiatsu back any longer. Rarity looked this strange individual up and down, trying to work out what to make of him. He was tall and gaunt, yet there was no denying the bare chest of marble white flesh was tight with corded muscles. And scales. Thin, fine scales marked his arms and chest in dull waves, all the way down to his wiry legs and thin, clawed bare feet. The man wore a tattered shroud of cloth around his shoulders, and a blood stained set of snake skin leather tied around his waist. Upon his face was the fragmented remainder of a snake’s skull, covering part of his brows and left cheekbone, but otherwise leaving his intense, ghostly thin and pale face bare. Eyes like gray lakes of ash stared at her, but only for a moment. At the man’s waist, thrust through his snake skin loincloth, were two deadly, jagged knives of bone, bearing fanged protrusions that rose from the back edge as if carved from jawbones. Over his arms and legs was the faint clink of chains, the same chains of Hell that bound Rarity and all others to this plane, but there was something different about them, as if the chains were imprinted on his flesh almost more like tattoos.  The last thing she noticed was that this man’s Hollow hole was absent, or rather transformed, taking the shape of a ring of bone that rose from his shoulders and wrapped up around him, like a mockery of a halo.  “Cozy Glow... you’ve made some unusual friends,” the man said in a voice cold and sinuous, like a greased piece of wire strung over glass.  Cozy smiled thin as a blade and kept her chains at the ready, not stepping back, but rather leaning forward, arms crossed, “Oh yeah, you know me, can’t help but just going around making friends with everybody I meet. That’s me in a nutshell; the Empress Supreme of Friendship Town. Now, as a friend, can you kindly tell me what you’re doing here, Typhon, and if it’s going to involve me having to get violent with you?” He tilted his head in a way that was far less human and more animalistic in the way it left him almost staring at her sideways, his hands spreading out in smooth, empty motions. “Such words are so meaningless between us, child. How often have we barked at each other? How often have we torn out each other’s throats over... whatever comes to mind, really. No, today I was in no mood for playing your little games. I am here because this day I sensed what I have not in eons. A sensation that boils my blood with... murderous fury...” Power was now radiating out of him in a palpable, gray wave. Dark, smoky gray reiatsu pulsated around Typhon in a rich, terrifying aura and his eyes bored directly towards... Blueblood. Blueblood saw this, visibly gulped, and reached for his Zanpaktou. Typhon smiled, showing blackened teeth and sharp fangs. “Oh yes, little Soul Reaper, your fear smells so... intoxicatingly fresh. I know not why one of your kind was sent here, but I have not had the pleasure of destroying one of your ilk in far too long. Cerberus wanted your blood as well, but I am the stronger between us, and the kill is mine by right. Prepare yourself.” “AHEM, I think not,” Rarity said, moving with the speed of Bringer Light and standing right between Typhon and Blueblood. She raised her crystal red rapier and aimed it’s point at the Arrancar’s chest, meeting his questioning gaze with a steady one of her own. “I do think that what you would rather do, good sir, is get a grip on your bloodlust and explain precisely what our companion has done to warrant your ill intentions.” Typhon now looked straight at her, as if not quite grasping what she was, like a man studying some strange and new animal that suddenly appeared in front of him. “You are... human, but not entirely. I smell... Hollow in you... and something else. What might you be, so clean and new, but smelling so much of blood?” Rarity shook her head, “Alright, first of all, can we not be talking so much about what we smell like? It’s... quite rude. Second of all, my name is Rarity. Anything else you wish to know, I am glad to speak of, but only with a civil individual who understands the value of polite conversation and doesn’t threaten my friends and allies. Can you do that, I wonder, or are you a mere animal I will need to soon put down?” Cozy Glow snickered a bit at this, “Damn, girl, way to just throw the gauntlet at him. What do you say, Typhon? If it were just you, me, and Sunny, we’d be evenly matched, but want to try your luck against us, Rarity, and even the wannabe Soul Reaper Captain here all at once?” Blueblood shot her a venomous look, hissing, “Wannabe Captain!? I am a full fledged Captain of the Gotei 13, I’ll have you know. Very respected and such... within my own Division. Mostly.” Rarity cleared her throat loudly, “Blueblood, not now.” He pouted, but nodded, putting his game face on as he glared at Typhon. For his part, Typhon did not seem to know quite what to make of the exchange or those in front of him, but there remained a simmering hatred in his burning gray eyes as he looked upon Blueblood. His lips sneered, a forked tongue licking his dry lips.  “I owe his kind an endless debt of torment, Cozy Glow. I fear ‘death’ no more than you, and if you think you can protect this weakling, then by all means, try. That applies to you, too, child known as ‘Rarity’. Hmm, perhaps you are a rarity, but in this place all must be proven by action. Words come and go as swiftly as blood in Hell!” With that, there was no more negotiation. In a mist-like haze of speed Typhon drew forth his jagged bone knives and moved with singular purpose, rushing forward past Rarity and aiming the deadly points of his weapons right for Blueblood’s throat. ---------- In short order all hell was breaking loose within the confines of the smoke filled, dim space of the Warren’s factory grounds. Pharynx moved like a storm of onyx motion, his chiseled face a confident smirk as his glaive carve a hammering path, first into Di Roy who braced his arms to receive the blow, and then right into Gaw, who’d blurred in behind Pharynx to try to get at his head. However her sword strike crashed right into the backswing of his glaive, rattling the amazonian woman and sending her into the ceiling in a shower or shattered rock. Di Roy’s arms bled profusely, his Hierro keeping the limbs from being severed, but leaving gashes where Pharynx’s glaive had struck. “Right, note to self; sonuvabitch is tough!” “Then hit him harder!” Fenice shouted, and wove past him, zipping left and right in flashes of Bringer Light. A trail of lava roiled out of her giant two handed claymore and the girl let out a roar, sweeping an overhand chop at Pharynx’s exposed back, sending a sheet of lava at him. He looked at her with a gruff snort, “Impressive enough, human.” He sliced through the wave of lava, but then Fenice grinned, gesturing with her hand, “I haven’t even started trying to impress you.” The ground beneath Pharynx’s feet grew white hot, and a geyser of magma that Fenice had sent tunneling beneath him then burst upward, engulfing the man in a curtain of scalding, reiatsu enhanced lava. Pharynx actually let out a notable grunt of  pain, jumping from the shower of molten liquid with some of his skin actually burning. But his eyes were no less focused and with a sweep of his hands he conjured a series of glittering, dark green orbs of power that then grew sharp protrusions. “Bala Mandibulas!” (Bala Mandibles) In a swift storm a series of Bala shot out at Fenice, each bullet of reishi converted into a set of energy mandibles. The girl let out a shout, dodging one, smashing down another with her sword, then got caught by the left arm by another. The Bala, instead of bursting, instead carried her around like a doll and pinned her to the wall, where the remaining Bala also surrounded her, pinning her arms and legs. “Argh! Jerk! Lemme go!” “Fenice!” Roka shouted, appearing next to her sister in a flash of Sonido. Her threads flew out around her, Roka raising her arms as the shining strings of reishi moved to her whim, her one exposed eye narrowed in supreme focus. Some of her threads into into the Bala holding Fenice pinned, seeking to burrow in and undo Pharynx’s reishi. The rest of Roka’s threads shot out towards Pharynx, but the man swiftly vanished, moving further back down the tunnel. “No escape for you, rats,” he said, “If you give up, for my brother’s sake, I’ll ask my mother to keep you alive. Perhaps she’ll even listen, and deliver you to Adagio’s doorstep relatively... unscathed. Relatively.” “Yeah, pass,” Di Roy replied, “Think we’ll make our own exit. Gaw!” He pointed up at the ceiling of the vast underground cavern with his sword. Gaw, pealing herself off of the tunnel ceiling, shook herself and jumped back, looking up at the higher cavern ceiling. Understanding dawned in her, and she gave off a deep, throaty laugh. “Burrowing? Hah, somehow that feels nostalgic.” Di Roy gave her a look, “Someone’s vocabulary is improving.” “Shut up, I’ll still bite you! Go for the throat; Cazadora!” Gaw snarled, releasing her Zanpaktou and coating the whole area in a burst of her violent, wild reiatsu. As red light surged forth and a near liquid, ruby energy surrounded Gaw as she went into her Resurreccion form, it was clear that any semblance of stealth had flown from the situation. Di Roy could see the flurry of activity from the factories, dozens of Bushwoolies giving up a frightful howl as they pointed stubby hands at the action on the cavern shelf above. Some of Grogar’s twisted servants were taking note, but they apparently weren’t under any immediate orders to do anything other than begin to move the bodies of the Adjuchas the Bushwoolies had brought into the factories themselves. Di Roy was worried how bad things might get once those Arrancar did receive orders to interfere, but at that point it’d also likely be Grogar coming after him. No doubt the Espada had sensed the reiatsu going off, especially with Gaw transforming, but that was why Di Roy had given the order he had. They only had one, potentially fast way out of here! Gaw emerged from her sanguine bath of energies, so big she couldn’t fit inside the tunnel entrance and shattered stone as she emerged. Her massive, armor-clad saurian body, like some humanoid theropod with spikes and a bad attitude, raised her arms now bearing hooked blades and built up a swirling aura of power around them. Without hesitation, she went flying up at the ceiling, spinning her whole body around in a blurring corkscrew, blade arms outstretched. So fast she spun, she all but became a single blur of crimson motion, and hit the ceiling like a living drill. The whole chamber shook, rock raining down, and Pharynx looked at the spectacle with a combination of irritation and genuine respect. “Hmph, Adagio’s servants are stronger than I thought. Does she really think she’ll tunnel through all that rock? Pfft, I’ll deal with her after I’ve dealt with all of you.” “Good luck, asshole,” Di Roy said, baring his blade before him, “Laugh at death; Picar-” Before he could finish his release phrase, Pharynx came barreling in at him with blinding speed and a powerful left hook that caught Di Roy by the jaw and sent him flying. He managed to right himself in mid-air, wiping blood off his lips, and shouting in annoyance, “H-hey! That’s cheating! You let Gaw do her thing, dammit!” “That was because I was still evading the young lady’s threads,” Pharynx responded, tilting his head towards Roka, who spun her arms in a dance and as if to confirm what Pharynx said, sent a cat’s-cradle of cutting reishi threads towards him. Pharynx coated his glaive in thick green and red reiatsu and spun it in an arc, cutting her threats while aiming a hand at Di Roy, “Also, there’s no cheating in battle, you fool. Just whoever is standing at the end.” A Cero blasted from his palm, and Di Roy, growling, aimed his own palm forward, a red sphere of power gathering there, “Geez, I bet you’re a real laugh at parties.” “Di-Roy, hold up, two Ceros in a confined space-” Fenice started to shout in warning, only halfway free from Pharynx’s Balas, but Di Roy was already firing his own thick scarlet Cero beam to blast right into Pharynx’s. As one might have expected, the colliding beams did little to cancel each other out, and instead resulted in a combined explosion of energies that all but obliterated the tunnel. Fenice yelped, trying to shield herself with her blade, and blinked as she felt herself get yanked free of the Balas and was wrapped up in threads. Roka had pulled her free at the last moment, and used Sonido to leap to safety with Fenice in tow. The two sisters were left standing in mid-air, looking now at a huge pile of rock dust and a thick cloud of smoke that now poured from where the tunnel entrance had been. The factories were still below, shouts of alarm rising up from the Bushwoolies, and Grogar’s factory workers all now alarmingly absent. Gaw remained above, her spinning form tunneling straight up through stone and leaving a constant waterfall of debris raining down below her. “Holy crap, is Di Roy insane?” Fenice breathed, gripping her smolder sword of lava tightly, “I don’t have freakin’ Hierro to deal with big explosions like that!” “W-well, I do believe he accounted for me pulling you out in time,” Roka said, her voice filled with a note of worry as she looked at the fallen pile of rock that was now the tunnel entrance, “But... where is he? Did he... get buried?” “As if!” Di Roy suddenly said, popping up next to them. He was covered in rock dust, which he was patting off as he chuckled to himself, looking immensely pleased, “Your boy Di Roy is way too smart to get caught in his own trap.” “Trap?” Fenice said, then her face reddened and she kicked him, “Trap!? Like hell! That was use making up stupid crap on the fly and nearly getting us killed!” “Whoa, hey now, I might not have planned that in advance, but a trap you think up on the fly is still a trap, ain’t it!?” Di Roy shouted back, ignoring her kicking him, “Besides, it worked out. Dude’s buried under enough rock to keep him busy for at least a few-” The rubble of rock exploded in a haze of baleful green energies, and Di Roy’s face blanched as he finished lamely, “-...minutes. Ugh... I need to talk to Adagio about some vacation time.” Pharynx did not simply emerge from the pile of fallen rock, but came catapulting out of it with all of the speed and fury of a supersonic ballistic missile. Di Roy had just enough time to turn and face the oncoming freight train of pain before his face was grabbed by a meaty onyx hand and Pharynx fast balled Di Roy straight into the nearest factory roof. Di Roy felt his body impact with metal and stone, and go careening through several floors, catching only a glimpse of a bizarre, mad scientist interior, before he hit a ground floor that “broke” his fall by having him smash right into some manner of laboratory table that had thankfully been unoccupied. Groaning, head dizzy, he flopped over and raised his head. The bottom floor of the factory had a faint semblance of the textiles manufacturing center it once was. There were still some industrial sized weaving and wood carving machinery that Smooze would have once used to make the clothing and few amenities seen around Las Noches. But now most of that was gone and was replaced by what could only be described as a mad man’s idea of a testing and construction factory for monstrosities that fused Hollow flesh with Grogar’s cybernetic, crazed designs.  Suddenly the ‘Stage One’ and ‘Stage Two’ crap Di Roy had heard Grogar talking about made more sense, as he saw a number of the Adjuchas-class Hollows strapped along the wall to metal slabs where mechanical arms moved with automatic proficiency to finish sewing and grafting various metallic enhancements and strange bio-organic weaponry onto their bodies. There was a clear delineation between the level of modification between them, with only a handful of the unfortunate Hollow test subjects being so overwhelmingly modified that they looked more like twisted machines of war with a little Hollow left in them, compared to the more half-and-half level the rest were at. But regardless, most worrying of all, was that each Hollow, no matter how modified, had an artificial siren gem embedded in their Hollow holes. “Tut, tut, tut,” Di Roy heard from behind him, and he turned to feel his face grow cold as ice upon seeing who stood in the middle of the lab, giving him a narrow eyed glare of irritation, “So it’s my wayward experiment’s little servants causing all that noise outside?” Grogar looked up through the hole that Di Roy’s passage had made, where Pharynx was seen to be looking down from the top of the roof. Voice raspy with annoyance, Grogar shouted, “Do you lack any form of common sense or subtlety, you meat brained barbarian? If you’re going to toss these interlopers around, don’t throw them into my work space! These makeshift labs are pathetically appointed compared to my previous lab, and I don’t need them made any more cluttered by your incompetent combat tactics!” Pharynx was heard scoffing, and then he leaped down, landing with the weight of an ox, towering over Grogar. Not that Grogar showed one whit of care for Pharynx’s imposing size.  “You complain entirely too much, old man. You’re lucky my mother still sees any reason to make common cause with you.” Grogar gave a phlegm filled, darkly amused laugh, “Oh please, don’t even pretend to think I find your barking intimidating. Now deal with this fool and whomever is with him before... before... oh dammit all!” Grogar growled as he noticed that, while he and Pharynx had been glowering at each other, Di Roy had taken the moment of distraction to make a bee-line out of there. He was already out of the lab, Sonidoing down a few hallways, and after a moment of consideration, blasting his way through the walls via Cero to find himself back out in the main cavern. Knowing he had perhaps at most a few seconds before Pharynx and/or Grogar both would be coming right out after him, Di Roy looked up to see the progress Gaw was making. He was glad to see that the tunnel upwards was now so expansive that he couldn’t even see his giant dinosaur companion's tail, and it sounded like she’d easily burrowed a good distance upward. “Time to go!” he shouted, spotting Fenice and Roka, who’d been in turn about to rush towards the factory to go help him, but now were left watching as he flew straight up, gesturing wildly at the tunnel Gaw was making. “Don’t need to tell me twice, but first let’s give these jerks something to think about,” Fenice said, taking Roka’s hand and rushing upwards alongside Di Roy towards the hole Gaw had made. At the same time she swung her claymore down, and Di Roy felt the human’s reiatsu surge upward in a heated, fiery display. He was honestly impressed, sensing that Fenice was yanking out all the stops to pull as much of her spiritual energy up as she could and channel it through her Fullbring. Rather than a mere simple small wave, a singular torrent of magma blasted out of her sword as she swung it, in much greater volume than anything she’d generated before. It filled the air with blistering heat and the tsunami of roiling lava poured into the factory grounds in a sizzling tide. In moments Bushwoolies were left screaming and shouting, scampering to get to safety before their bodies were engulfed. Fenice directed her lava with precise control, aiming to burn into the factories, rather than consume any of the captured and unconscious Adjuchas-class Hollows. This had the intended effect that, when Grogar emerged, he gave out a furious shout. “Oh blast it all! Deal with this mess, you fools!”  He was apparently commanding his servants, who came rushing out of the factories at their master’s call. As Grogar’s mutated servant Arrancar started trying to use small, contained Ceros to blast away the lava, Grogar took more direct action and simply raised his hand. His miasma of raw, powerful reiatsu rushed out of him and directly started to suppress the very spirit energy Fenice had infused her lava with, in some areas stopping the lava flow in it’s tracks or causing the magma to lose all heat. It was as if Grogar’s spiritual pressure alone was such that it was forming a counteracting wave, diffusing the power of the lava. And Di Roy knew he shouldn’t have been able to do that. Sure, Fenice was no Espada, but from Di Roy’s own experience there shouldn’t have been any way the old Grogar, the Grogar who’d been the Eight Espada, could have pulled off fully negating such a potent attack like Fenice’s massive magma wave in one fell swoop like that. Looking closely, Di Roy saw a pulse of power, of strange ethereal light, coming from Grogar’s chest. Only this wasn’t just a simple artificial siren gem. It seemed... larger, and the glow from it was more of a pale violet color than the red of a siren gem. Di Roy couldn't see it through Grogar's vest, but the sensation of spiritual power stemming from whatever Grogar had grafted to himself was gut churning. Whatever it was, it was magnifying Grogar’s power to a point that Di Roy didn’t think that Grogar’s current position of Ninth Espada even remotely applied anymore. “We have to get to Adagio,” he whispered, “She has to know about this. All of this.” “Then we follow Gaw, quickly,” Roka said, and the three of them went up into the hole in the cavern ceiling Gaw had carved. Chunks of rock and dirt were still falling down from Gaw’s tunneling, but the three of them were able to mostly avoid it as they bounced off the walls, leaping upwards. However before they got far, Di Roy felt a spark of dark energy below them, and looked down to see Pharynx standing at the mouth of the carved tunnel, aiming his glaive upwards and charging up a Cero. “Just freakin’ great. Didn’t you learn your lesson from last time, dipstick!?” Di Roy shouted, and prepared to fire his own Cero right back. Even if the two beams collided, all it would do is create an explosion that’d collapse the lower half of the tunnel, barring Pharynx more than it did anything to affect Di Roy and the other’s escape. However, just as he fired his crimson Cero beam, Roka seemed to sense something he hadn’t. He heard her fearful shout, “Di Roy, wait, don’t-!” But it was too late and his Cero discharged straight down. However Pharynx hadn’t fired his own Cero. It had simply been a bluff. Instead all of that energy Pharynx had summoned up was absorbed into his glaive and he hurled it like a javelin. Encased in a sheath of power meant to penetrate rather than explode, the flying glaive cut through Di Roy’s Cero like so much beard under a hot knife. Di Roy didn’t have time to react, the glaive was thrown at such speed, but he felt himself being knocked aside by somebody. He hit the wall, slightly dazed but unharmed, and looked to see, eyes snapping wide in shock that Roka had body checked him aside and now had Pharynx’s glaive impaled through her stomach. “R-Roka!” The half of Roka’s face that wasn’t covered by her skull mask was pale, but there was a glint of utter focus in her eyes, despite the pain Di Roy saw in them. She lowered one hand to the wound itself, while her other hand gripped the glaive itself. Her threads wove out from her sleeve and entered around the bleeding injury, and Di Roy starred as Roka yanked the glaive out of her own body and threw it clattering down the vertical tunnel.  “Oh my God, sis!” Fenice was at Roka’s side, one hand holding Roka’s shoulder while she still kept her claymore in her left hand, “Oh crap! H-how bad is it?” “Look pretty freakin’ bad to me!” Di Roy said, feeling his mouth going dry at the sight of all the blood that was now coating the front half of Roka’s robes. Roka, however, despite sweat now beading on her brow and her eyes swimming in pain, she shook her head at them. Blood was trickling from her mouth, but she kept her hand focused over her wound, the threads of reishi moving inside the injury. “D-don’t worry,” she said, “We have to keep moving.” That much was true, Pharynx had caught his clattering glaive and was coming up after them. Di Roy looked at Fenice, who looked back at him with wild eyes, but the human understood what needed doing. Together, they both supported Roka on either side and together, pushing with their reiatsu on the air, they flew upward through the vertical tunnel Gaw had carved for them. Suddenly there was a break of light above, shining down on the rising trio, and Di Roy saw Gaw now peering down at them from above. Her huge, theropod face, covered in bone armor, couldn’t show that much expression, but it was clear by her widening eyes that she smelled Roka’s blood and knew what had happened. Di Roy heard Gaw’s angry growl, and saw Gaw pull back to give them space to exit the tunnel. It only took a second, Di Roy and Fenice pouring on the speed as they flew up the full distance of the freshly carved tunnel, leaving behind numerous offshoots of Warren tunnels tha Gaw had heedlessly burrowed through in her bid to reach the surface. Di Roy felt Pharynx’s reiatsu hot on their heels, knowing the man was coming up right behind them! In an instant, they were free, flying up out of a twenty foot hole Gaw had carved in Las Noche’s sandy surface. Di Roy and Fenice landed a few dozen meters away, still holding Roka, who was doing her best not to make any pained noises at the jarring motion. Gaw remained near the tunnel, her bladed, clawed arms poised to strike the moment Pharynx appeared. He did a split second later, coming out of the tunnel like a cannonball. He’d sensed Gaw’s presence and already had his glaive swinging just as Gaw herself brought both her bladed arms down on him, her barking roar shaking the air. Transformed into Resurreccion, Gaw was far more formidable now and her double armed blow struck Pharynx’s glaive in a booming clash of power that could be heard like thunder. His muscles bulged and strained against her, and Pharynx actually grinned in a flash of white teeth. “Hah! So you actually pack a bit of power, once you stop holding back!” “I never hold back,” Gaw said bluntly, and opened her fang filled dinosaur maw wide and discharged a point blank, thick Cero beam of pure crimson right into Pharynx. The beam destroyed the tunnel exit, along with carving a melting path through hundreds of meters of sand. Pharynx was pushed along the beam, his glaive held in front of him like an oar carving through water, but the skin of his arms were burning from the potent contact of Gaw’s Cero. By the time the beam petered out, Pharynx was left standing in a smoking line of glassed sand, his body injured, but the man himself just shouldering his glaive like someone was finishing up the warm up to a workout. “It seems Adagio Dazzle picks her servants well. Still...” He began to stride forward, his body emitting a pulsating aura of green reiatsu, “It’s not as if I’ve released my Zanpaktou, yet, is it? I wonder if you can keep up? I’ve heard you’re supposed to be Adagio’s ‘enforcer’, but can you live up to such a title?” “Okay, while the goon is busy talking himself up, let’s get Roka out of here,” Di Roy told Fenice, then looked to Roka, “Can you hold on? We’ll get you to... to...” His wracked his brain. Roka was their go-to healer, dammit! It was obvious Roka was trying to do something with her threads to keep her wound in check, but Di Roy didn’t think such a deep injury could be so easily handled. That glaive blade had nearly gone fully through her! It was kind of impressive she was staying conscious at all. Di Roy thought, and he suddenly felt like smacking himself. Fluttershy. Duh! That weirdo kindness obsessed girl was like someone took a white mage and a shaolin monk and smashed them together into a walking font of miracle working! Last Di Roy had heard from Adagio, they were going to some kind of meeting with Fluttershy and other folk at the newly established Coalition embassy. They just had to get Roka there before she bled out.      The problem was that Pharynx wasn’t about to just let them walk away. Facing Gaw, he spun his glaive above his head, and although she blurred towards him with Sonido to try and stop him in time, Pharynx was already speaking the intoning words to release his Zanpaktou. “Stand unwavering; Hijo Leal!” (Loyal Son) Gaw’s charge was knocked back by the sudden burst of emerald reiatsu that shot upwards from Pharynx’s body in a solid pillar. Blood-like trails of flickering red spirit energy joined the predominantly green pillar, and Pharynx’s form was silhouetted in darkness amid the torrent of power, rising up as his body morphed and grew. Gaw suddenly found a huge, bone white pincer even larger than she was fly out of the pillar in a wide swing. It was a huge, curved pincer, like that of a titanic beetle, and Gaw took the blow by crossing both of her arm blades in front of her. Her thirty foot tall, saurian body was sent crashing to the ground, where she landed on her clawed feet and skidded backwards. Meanwhile the rest of Pharynx’s transformed body emerged from the dissipating flare of green spirit energy, the ground shaking with his steps. “Oh... screw this...” Di Roy said, looking back over his shoulder at what they now faced. Pharynx had grown humongous, at least by normal standards. His body was now fifty feet tall, but more than that, it had transmuted and changed until it had become something quite different than his normal humanoid form. A long, thick, beetle body of white carapace supported six tremendous, tree trunk insect legs that carried him along. At the front of this, a humanoid torso rose up, bone white, and sporting the stupidly muscular shape Pharynx was known for. However his face was clad entirely in a thick helmet of bone, sporting a long and downward curving horn jutting from the helmet's brow, and only showing a dark slit where his eyes glinted dangerously from. His arms were only half humanoid now, ending in the gigantic pincer blades shaped like that of the horns of a Hercules beetle's. His voice boomed out alongside an oppressive surge of spiritual pressure, “Go ahead and run, if you like!” Wings opened and buzzed from his back carapace, lifting Pharynx’s massive body into the air. “But you won’t get far!” ---------- Sombra was not an inexperienced warrior, but he knew he was operating with far less magic than he was used to in the past. Fortunately he had one advantage when faced against Firefly and the Reigai of Zecora... he didn’t need to defeat them, just escape them. As long as he could find a way to last long enough to create an opening, he ought to be able to slip away. The biggest hurdle was the weapon Zecora wielded. These Zanpaktou were irritating, given each one had a different kind of power, and Zecora’s was a detection-based ability that largely negated the primary advantage of Sombra’s shadow merging. His shadow magic, even in a weakened state since his rejection of his Umbra nature, still usually made it supremely easy to evade, ambush, or simply hide from a target.  That wasn’t possible as long as this Reigai woman had that blasted blade of mirrors on hand! So he had to find a way to neutralize it, if only for a few moments.  He did have one other thing going in his favor, despite the gap in raw power between him and his opponents. Neither Firefly or Zecora knew in full what his shadow magic could do, what all of its properties were. He wasn’t going to overcome them with strength alone, but perhaps he could outfox them. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t spent a large chunk of his life being a less than noble individual, so he was under no notion of fighting fair, and had plenty of practice being a cunning bastard. Sombra began by hurling the shadow blades he had conjured in a spiraling pattern around him. Some were aimed at Zecora and Firefly, but only a few. The rest he sent streaking in wavering, smoky lines of darkness towards the Kido lanterns that Zecora had conjured up. In the same instant, he hurled himself towards the nearest canyon wall, gliding along the shadows beneath his hooves to increase his speed as he galloped.  Zecora swung her mirror-blade in smooth arcs, deflecting the shadow swords that flew at her, and she frowned at seeing several of her lanterns were cut in half by the other blades streaking through them. She had conjured more than enough to still keep the canyon floor bathed in light, but it was clear Sombra, if given time, could shroud the area in darkness once more. She didn’t chase after him, instead raising her Zanpaktou and observing his movements, while preparing to cast another Kido. Firefly on the other hand had no compunctions about chasing Sombra down! She used her Dragoons to fire several thin beams of purple light that pierced the shadow blades he sent her way, and then with her metallic wings jetting violet energy, she flew after him. It was only a split second for her to catch up, and she aimed her cannon at his legs. “Sorry about this! I’ll try to be gentle!” she said, visor beeping with a target lock and her hexagonal cannon barrel discharging a beam of crackling purple energy. Sombra leaped upward, just barely avoiding the beam, and he landed on the canyon wall’s vertical surface. It took a lot of effort due to the lantern light, but he used the shadows his legs and hooves made to keep himself grounded to the canyon wall and he started to run up it like a living spider. At the same time he forced his shadow magic to generate another barrage of shadow blades, which wouldn’t last long in the light, but would do so long enough for him to sent a rushing swarm of them back at Firefly, this time mostly focusing on her as he tried to ascend the canyon wall. Firefly sent herself into a sharp corkscrew motion, flying away from the canyon wall as Sombra’s shadow blades chased her. As before the flitting forms of her metallic Dragoons came flying around her and started firing thin beams of energy to strike down the blades of darkness, and they scattered in puffs of inky black smoke... or at least that was the impression Sombra wished to give! Having anticipated Firefly using those flying bits of metal to protect herself again, he’d intentionally had his shadow blades shift form, becoming a blanket of thick shadow stuff like a floating cloud of oil. It wouldn’t last more than few seconds under the light of the Kido lamps, but it didn’t have to last long for Sombra to use the nature of his shadow magic to absorb the laser blasts from the Dragoons and transfer them to another shadow, the one’s beneath his body, created by the angle of his position on the canyon wall. The Dragoon beams fired out of the shadow his body was casting downward, and they tore massive chunks out of the rocky surface. And just as Sombra had hoped, the shower of thick rock chunks not only smashed through several of Zecora’s Kido lamps, the falling rock also generated shadows upon the ground. He leaped off of the canyon wall, aiming for one of the shadows, hoping to dive right into it. By now Zecora had finished preparing her next Kido, seeing Sombra’s actions and narrowing her eyes in focus. Her hand moved in a triangular motion, blurring so fast it was nearly invisible as she traced three golden lines into an inverted triangle. At each corner of the triangle bloomed a burst of golden light and formed three beak-like protrusions.  ”Bakudo Number Thirty: Shitotsu Sansen!” (Triple Flash Beak Slash)  The three triangular planes of pointed energy fired out like missiles, flying at Sombra. He saw this and grimaced as he poured magic from his horn, the horn shrouded in midnight darkness as a stream of roiling shadow, like a small river of ink, burst from his hooves and he used it to glide to the side, like riding a slide. The Kido spell’s projectiles flew past him, once, twice, but the third caught his tail! Sombra was yanked off of his darkness slide and shoved into the canyon wall, pinned by his tail! Grunting from the impact, Sombra didn’t hesitate to conjure another shadow blade and cut the strands of his tail, freeing himself. As he dropped once more, the tumbling rocks from earlier had impacted the ground in a crashing cacophony. While the main shadows of the falling rock was gone, the rubble now at least created a few more cracks and pools of shadow for Sombra to work with, having also taken out more than half of Zecora’s Kido lamps. He used this fact to start summoning forth growing strands of shadow from these cracks and pools, forming them into tendrils he sent snaking towards Zecora. The Reigai evaded with relative ease, flickering out of sight with the speed of a Flash Step, but at least it put her on the defensive for a second. A second Sombra needed, because Firefly was rushing him! Her speed was incredible, and it was easy to believe that this pegasus was the mother of at least a version of Rainbow Dash. He barely had time to react as Firefly stowed her cannon, and from a hatch on her flank, the dark purple hilt of a blade shot out and into her waiting hoof. In a blaze a purple blade of light energy shot of the hilt and Firefly slashed it low, trying to take his legs out from under him! Sombra, still in free fall, grit his teeth and his eyes grew fierce as shadow magic roared from his horn. A singular shadow blade formed, filled with so much of Sombra’s magic that rather than looking like a mere thing of loose shadow and smoke, it was a blade of solid, glinting onyx metal that pulsated with an aura of void black. Moving it much like he might have a regular sword under telekinesis, he sent his sword of darkness to clash against Firefly’s blazing energy saber! She slashed and slashed again in a blinding rush, carving the air with multiple streaks of light form her energy blade’s path, and as they fell together towards the ground, Sombra continued to parry her blows and send back dark slashes of his own.  He felt the painful burn of a grazing hit on his right leg, and saw Firefly flinch as his solid sword of shadow cut a gash on her cheek. But neither got a telling blow before they reached the ground, Firefly pulling up and away in a flying streak while Sombra used his shadow blade to pierce the canyon wall and slow his fall until he landed neatly on the ground. There wasn’t even a single moment for him to relax or catch his breath, because his hooves were barely touching stone before Zecora, having Flash Stepped through all of the slashing movements of the shadow tendrils he sent at her, appeared in front of him in a whoosh of air and slammed her mirror blade down at him! While the Zanpaktou did not have a sharp edge, it hardly needed one to be dangerous, and Zecora was attacking with superhuman speed and strength. Sombra drew his sword of darkness from the wall in a flash, bringing it down to try to deflect the blow, and only partially succeeded. Sparks flew as Zecora’s strike was turned just barely an inch’s length, allowing Sombra to roll away, but the blow still struck the canyon wall and floor where he’d been standing and stone was smashed and blasted like a bomb had gone off! Sombra rolled to his hooves, staring in a little shock at the strength of Reigai’s attack. A bit of blood oozed down his head from where a small chunk of rock had struck him, and he felt a moment of dizziness, but pushed it away and focused. Zecora was turning towards him, and Firefly had already flown around to come at him in another pass. But despite the desperate situation, he’d succeeded in creating enough natural shadows and extinguishing a sufficient number of Zecora’s Kido lamps that the canyon floor was coated in plenty of gloom once more. In an instant Sombra’s horn darkened to a tar-like pitch, and he pulled in all of those shadows around himself. A dark swirl of bubbling black smoke poured from every shadowed corner of the canyon and wrapped around him in a thick, spherical shroud. “Dammit, he’s gonna bolt!” he heard Firefly yell and sensed her Dragoons flying around in a swarm to surround his shadows. Beams pierced into the dark sphere, trying to find him within... but Sombra had already sunk down, merging with the shadows completely. Merged now with the shadows, he slipped through the dark cracks of the stone rubble strewn about the canyon floor. In a mere split second he was streaking along the canyon, past the few remaining Kido lamps, now making full use of the dim canyon to rush away from the battle site. Yet he sensed danger behind him! From the shadows he streaked through he saw the blurring motion of Zecora, the Reigai moving from point to point with Flash Steps that allowed her to keep up with him. Her Zanpaktou as piercing through the shadows to pinpoint the exact location, allowing her to follow him as readily as if she were a bloodhound. Now, high above in the sky, Sombra also saw Firefly soaring along, following Zecora.  As long as Zecora was following him with that Zanpaktou, there was no chance he could escape... but he’d known that from the get go and now it was time to spring his surprise upon the Reigai. When she had deflected his shadow blades at the start of the battle, he’d made use of his shadow magic to infest the small shadows that existed between her hand and the blade. After all, shadows existed everywhere, in almost every dark little corner one could imagine, including the dark that existed between a person’s hand and any object they might hold. He couldn’t afford to spring his trap until he was already merged with the shadows and making a full run for it, for if he’d done this during the fight Zecora could just recover her blade swiftly... but now? Now shadows sprung from the hilt of Zecora’s Zanpaktou, sharp nails of hard darkness that pierced her hand in an instant! Zecora cried out, instinctively letting go of her Zanpaktou and clutching her bleeding hand. As the mirror blade clattered to the ground, Zecora had to halt and not only deal with her now badly injured hand, but recover her sword. But that would take a few moments, now with her hand in such bad shape, and with Sombra moving at the speed of darkness, merged with shadow, now was his chance go give both her and Firefly the slip! He rushed along the canyon floor, and in moments it broke out into the vast Bone Dry Desert as the canyon itself ended and emptied out onto the wide fields of sand dunes beyond. This was... admittedly a problem. It was still daylight out and with the sun beating down on the desert there were few shadows to be had, at least ones connected enough to each other to allow Sombra to glide along them. He paused amid the last vestiges of shadow in the canyon, and adjusted his course to move along the canyon’s outer cliff edge, keeping to the few remaining shadows between the rocks.  His only choice now was to hide, to play cat and mouse with his pursuers. Zecora could still detect him if perhaps let her get too close, but if he was lucky, perhaps he could keep his distance and remain undetected long enough for dusk to settle in and give him all the darkness he’d need to flee the area, then the region itself, and return to Canterlot. But as he saw Firefly streaking through the sky above, and saw Zecora, her hand freshly healed from the use of Kido as she held her Zanpaktou once more, he knew that it was going to be a long, tense wait for nightfall...