Gun Running

[Madotsuki]

Moving the mouse, Madotsuki swept the cursor across a digital canvas. Just a few more details and it would be finished. It had been a few days since Hiro had left for an event known as "Dante's Abyss," so the dreamer had plenty of time to herself to look for jobs. She was currently working on the last of the drawings she had been requested to make, this one being an anthropomorphic blue-and-white lemur wearing iron battle armor and wielding a giant flail.

It seemed the majority of her art appealed to the furry crowd, although she didn't really mind. Heck, arriving at one of their conventions wearing a cat tail, paws and ears sounded quite appealing, if only for checking out the costumes the others brought. She even had the Effect for it. Unfortunately there weren't any in the nearby vicinity, and the idea of joining a giant group of people...

Nah, she was content just making art for them. She drew the final touches and mailed it to her client. Her smile widened when the notification told her that she had been paid. It wasn't much, but it was just a drawing. It was probably one of the only things she was good at using her recently-formed laptop for, though.

She didn't draw just for the money-- it helped keep her mind off of the incident at the arcade. While she wasn't scared of the event, the possibilities of what happened proved troublesome. Coruscant was a civilization built around technology. Sure, it only effected the arcade machines, but what if that was only a fraction of its power? It would have an entire city to control! She had texted about the incident to Madeline shortly after she returned to the Tier 2 apartment, and her response was... worrisome, to say the least.

She mentioned that while she was working at the Song and Dance, the Miku animatronic had bugged out; it assaulted the customers and kept rambling about how Skynet was the superior race and other things like that. They managed to restrain her before anyone got killed, although a few people got injured during her revolt, including Madeline. This wouldn't bode well, but Madotsuki needed to get her mind off it before her mind wandered into places best left unknown.
 
Making her way to Omniart, she typed into the shoutout box;

"I'm ready for more requests."

She was about to hit Enter when another notification appeared on the side of the screen. Madeline had sent her an email, and the dreamer took no time in opening the message.

"Hey, Mado. Some group in Tier 5 is interested in your services. They need you to deliver something to one of their outposts in Tier 7. I wasn't given the specifics."

It didn't take the Night Terror long to come up with a reply:

"Tell them I'll be there soon. Meet me outside the Song and Dance." Madeline probably wouldn't be too happy hear about that, but it was the only landmark in Tier 5 Madotsuki could recognize besides the base of the Night Terrors.

Shutting down her laptop, she slid it underneath the bed and left her room. Her clients would have to wait.

She had a job to do.

[Madotsuki]

The dreamer raced through the kitchen, swiping her backpack off of the table and slinging it over her shoulder as she swung the door opened and bolted out of the apartment. She skidded into the elevator and narrowly managed to keep herself from slamming into the wall. Within a few moments, she pressed the button for the ground level. Muzak played from the speakers as Madotsuki ran in place, barely able to keep herself still for the first time in her life.

The doors slid open, and she rushed out of the building, ignoring the robot bellhop along the way. Given the events that happened a few days before, she wouldn't have talked to it, anyway. Outside, Tier 2 was still as beautiful as always, with the holographic sky simulating a sunset. The light bathed the few people whom were outside at this hour in golden colors. A few Stormtroopers also roamed the streets, but since her data had been registered, she was free to explore the city without having to hide from anything. She jogged by, and the group of troopers gave her what were probably suspicious looks from under their helmets before returning to whatever they were doing.

And speaking of not having to be as sneaky, she could finally take the elevators to the lower Tiers. She noticed that the elevators for Tiers 6 and 7 were out of order, and she piled into the elevator for Tier 5 alongside a man in a plaid shirt with glazed eyes. He smelt like a factory, and that wasn't a compliment. An awkward silence passed before the elevator opened to the slums she had called her home. They parted ways after that, but when Madotsuki glanced back at the guy, he was staring back at her before he retreated into the darkness. Whoever he was, the Night Terror wasn't keen on crossing paths with him again.

It had taken her longer than usual to locate the Song and Dance. Why? Well, for starters, this wasn't where she entered Tier 5 the first time. During that first time, she found the establishment via the saxophone music Miku had been playing inside. Predictably, after the incident that Madeline had mentioned, the pub was now dead silent. There weren't even any customers. As Madotsuki rounded the corner, she saw Madeline glaring up at the pub's neon sign with disdain. Her arm was in a white cast. Next to her stood a tall, bulky man with a brown mullet and beard. A tattoo of a skull-and-crossbones covered his hairy chest, which was revealed from behind a purple jacket.

The two suddenly noticed the dreamer's presence. Madeline waved at her fellow Night Terror with her good hand, but the man just scowled at her. He was lacking some teeth. Lumbering over, he held out a sweaty palm to greet her. Madotsuki tenderly accepted the gesture.

"I thought ye'd flaked out on us," he grumbled, briefly glancing at Madeline as if to say "is this scrawny thing really her?" "Anyway, ye can call me Crusher. What might I have the pleasure of calling ye?"

Madeline replied for her. "Her name's Madotsuki."

Crusher chuckled. "What, does the lass not have a tongue?"

"She doesn't like talking."

"Ah." He turned back to the dreamer. "Just my kind of girl." He patted Madotsuki on the back so hard, she thought she was going to cough up a lung.

"Alright, down to business." He glanced around and frowned. "But not out in the open. Ye never know. 'ow about we 'ead inside?" He pointed to the Song and Dance, and much to the Night Terror's surprise, Madeline gave the muscle-bound man a very convincing death glare. It took Crusher one look at her cast to realize what he said was wrong. "Ah, right. Ye know what? There's another place not too far from 'ere we can go to. It's called the 'Blue Moon Cafe.' The place should work just fine for our purposes."

"No robots?" Madeline asked, cradling her broken arm.

"No robots," Crusher promised. "Now come on. We don't 'ave all night."

[Madotsuki]

Madotsuki wasn't entirely sure what to expect from a place called the "Blue Moon Cafe," but she certainly wasn't expecting the quaint building she now stood in front of. The sign didn't even need to say anything; a blue crescent-moon was all it needed. Unlike the Song and Dance, the dreamer didn't feel as if the establishment was about to collapse on her. Patrons celebrated inside, despite a lack of music. All in all? This was the superior pub.

Crusher swung the door open, and the bartender, an older women with graying, black hair done up in a bun, smiled back at him. Despite her otherwise homely appearance, a pistol hung from her belt.

"It's great to see ye, Brenda dear." Crusher embraced her in a hug. "'ow's it going?"

She sighed, polishing a glass. "Same as always. Thankfully there didn't seem to be any more incidents."

Madeline glanced at her fellow Night Terror with a knowing frown. "...Are you referring the robots?"

The woman shrugged. "What else would I be talking about?"

"If that's the case, then there was another incident. All the machines in an arcade in Tier 2 bugged out, and Skynet was mentioned there as well. Madotsuki was there, weren't you?"

The dreamer nodded.

The woman tittered and served a patron a drink. "I've never trusted those confounded machines."

"Me neither. Anyway, me and my friends need to talk in private."

With a nod, Brenda lifted the platform that normally blocked entry to the back of the bar. The group ducked past it and she opened up a nearby door that led to the back of the building. Once the three made it through, the raven-haired lady shut the door behind them.

The room was sparsely furnished with a poker table. Surrounding it were about five chairs, although Madotsuki doubted it could bear the weight of anything sitting in it. The walls were caked in grime, and a nearby refrigerator hummed loudly. Another door stood at the wall opposite of where they entered.

"Sorry about the mess," Crusher apologized, raising his voice to be heard over the roar of the fridge. Apparently the appliance wanted to be included in the conversation. The man walked over to it and pounded on it, and the whirring noise died down to an acceptable level. "Again, sorry. I usually use this place to play poker with the boys."

"What about that door?" Madeline pointed to the entrance.

"That leads to our 'ouse."

"You live here?"

"Yup. Me and Brenda."

"...You really live in a cafe?"

"What underground group is good without a front? Anyway, ye came to talk business?" Crusher took a seat and grabbed a deck of worn cards. "'ow about we discuss this over a game of poker?"

[Madotsuki]

Crusher explained the rules of poker as he shuffled the deck. All of it just went over the dreamer's head, though; there were more important matters to attend to. A few poker chips were tossed her way, but she paid little heed to them, aside from moving them to a place where she wouldn't accidentally knock them off the table.

After she got the chance to look at her cards, the game began. Crusher slid a blue chip forward and said "bet." Madeline fidgeted with her cards for a moment before sliding a blue chip of her own towards the center of the table and saying "call." Madotsuki just repeated what her fellow Night Terror had done-- mostly because she had no idea what her hand was worth.

"So... I need something delivered to Tier 7," the muscle-bound man began, raising the bet. "I'm the leader of the Gear Grinders, and some of my men are stationed down there in an old warehouse. It's more like a stockpile than anything else-- if we need something, I just go down there and get it."

The round of betting ended, and everyone revealed their hands. The gang leader looked over at Madotsuki's hand and chuckled. "Ye don't even 'ave a pair," he laughed, pulling all the offered chips towards his side of the table. "Maybe ye aren't cut out for this kind of game. It's a shame; ye 'ave a real good poker face." The dreamer wasn't sure if that was supposed to be a compliment or an insult, but she decided to take it as the former.

"The time's come around to restock the storage, but... if ye 'adn't noticed, the elevator to Tier 7 is broken." Madotsuki was about to say that they knew a tunnel to take them to Tier 7, but with what happened at the factory, she wouldn't be surprised if the entrance was discovered and plugged up by the workers. "I'd do it myself, but the tunnel that's easiest to get to from 'ere only goes to Tier 6. Plus, it 'eads into gang territory. Rust's, to be exact. They warned me if I step into their territory again, I wouldn't live to brag about it. And I don't doubt them-- I barely made it out the first time."

"So you want Madotsuki to do it because they don't know her?"

"And she's a Prime! She could handle those guys, no problem! Anyway, it shouldn't be too difficult to find a tunnel to Tier 7 once ye handle Rust. Ye up for it, kid?"

Madotsuki nodded, and Crusher disappeared behind the door. He returned with a giant backpack and tossed it onto the table. The dreamer tryed to peek at what was inside, but Crusher slapped her hand away. "Plauible deniability," he said, helping her put the bag on over her shoulder. "Just in case. And if ye mess up, I'm gonna strangle ye. Good luck."

With that odd pep talk out of the way, the muscular man led her out of the cafe and back into the dim alleyways of Tier 5.

[Madotsuki]

Unlike the first time someone brought her to a tunnel, there was a distinct lack of copious backtracking. Mere minutes after leaving the house, the dreamer and the Gear Grinder arrived at the designated exit. There wasn't really much she could say about it-- it more or less looked like all the other tunnels she came across, except this one opened up from the ground rather than the wall. She turned to say goodbye to Crusher, but he was already making his way back to the Blue Moon Cafe. With a sigh, Madotsuki hopped in.

The Night Terror wrapped her fingers around a disheveled ladder and began descending one rung at a time. The damp air clung to her lungs, and Madotsuki hastened to reach the bottom before the atmosphere choked her to death. Before long, she made her way to the end and dropped out onto another road.

Considering that the state of each Tier worsened the farther down you go, the dreamer wasn't all that surprised about the condition Tier 6 was in; she was actually surprised that this place was somewhat inhabitable. Tier 7 couldn't even be called a city by any stretch of the imagination, and Madotsuki didn't think that a city could be worse than Tier 5.

Remembering that she was now in Rust's territory, the Night Terror took no time in readjusting her backpack and racing off. Her eyes flickered between each alleyway she came across, hoping to see if anyone dared to attack her. No one did, but the man from before occasionally popped up; whenever Madotsuki stopped to see if she just imagined it, he was nowhere to be found.

This continued until she located one of the tunnels Crusher had mentioned. She was about to open up the entrance and bail, but a shot rang through the air and froze the Night Terror in her tracks. Slowly turning her head to face the sound, Madotsuki discovered that the man was standing behind her. A smoking gun hung from his right hand. Beside him stood a woman of about 18 years with white, toussled hair and gleaming, red eyes. A grey turtleneck shirt and white miniskirt highlighted her pale skin and black leggings. She held an iron pipe in both hands, and it was covered in what appeared to be rust... or was it blood?

"Thanks for letting me know about this, Errol," he said glancing at the man. "I'll take care of this." With a nod, Errol retreated further back.

"What's a little girl like you doing here?" she asked with a smile, leaning on her iron pipe. "You don't look like a gangster, but what do I know?"

Madotsuki said nothing, merely backing up towards the tunnel. Errol disappeared from sight.

The albino's smile faded into a frown. "I hope you don't mind if I take a look inside that bag of yours?" Upon hearing this, the dreamer whipped out her knife and attempted to stab the older woman. She acted just as quickly, and the blade met nothing but rusted steel. Immediately, the Night Terror felt something cold pressing against her back.

"You don't mess with Sabitsuki," Errol warned, his hand poised to pull the trigger.

[Madotsuki]

Madotsuki had to consider herself lucky that the two weren't aware she she could phase. She flickered out of reality for a moment, then reformed herself right behind Errol. Predicting the direction the man would take to shoot her, she swatted her diary at his hand, knocking the gun out of his grip and sending it out of reach. In the space of a second, she summoned the giant fist and shot Errol across the street. He collided with the wall, then slumped down.

While he struggled to pull himself up, the dreamer pulled out her knife and twirled around to parry an incoming blow from Sabitsuki. Metal rang against metal as the two gangsters dueled. For a moment, Madotsuki could catch a glimpse of primal joy in the albino's eyes as she flashed her a wicked grin full of sharp teeth. That was the first sign that this woman wasn't quite human. The second was when she forced the knife away from her and butted her head into the dreamer's torso.

Immediately, pain erupted in two places. Madotsuki grabbed her chest and stumbled backwards, staring in awe at Sabitsuki, whom now had two short, thick horns sticking out of her head. Her nails had grown into razor sharp claws. Wherever the oddities emerged, the area around it had turned a deep red, like the act of doing so had broke the skin so a person could see the muscles below. This odd effect was also apparent along her jawline, which dropped lower than Madotsuki thought was possible. The scent of rust was overwhelming, and Errol screamed.

The Night Terror tilted her head back to dodge a set of claws, then glanced over at the lackey to see what was going on. Errol was staring at Sabitsuki, but not in that "what just happened to you" sort of way. Madotsuki couldn't quite put her finger on it, but something about his expression told her that he had seen her do this before and was terrified of her doing it again.

She had to wonder what the poor guy had witnessed if he was that horrified at his own boss, but when you're in the middle of a battle, you don't have much time to think. The dreamer slashed at her, sending waves of purplish energy toward her foe. Sabitsuki gave an inhuman bellow and flailed her claws around, groping about for the little girl she had underestimated. Madotsuki took no time in fleeing the scene, but when she turned to see what the monster was up to, she saw that she had abandoned the iron pipe and was loping on all fours, her feet having torn through her leather boots via more sharp claws. Madotsuki wasn't even sure what to call the creature in front of her anymore-- it looked move like a undead corpse than anything else.

The dreamer briefly considered phasing into the tunnel, but decided that the monster would just follow her. And she'd follow her until the dreamer needed to stop. What then? Instead, she plowed deeper into the underbelly of Tier 6. She needed to get the beast off of her tail before she could do anything.

Sabitsuki was definitely fast, no doubt about it, but Madotsuki was faster. Slowly, the monster eeked out of sight, and the dreamer took the opportunity to duck into an alleyway. Hopefully the tight space would help her against the monster should she discover her. Her fingers wrapped around her knife so tightly, her knuckles turned white. Desperately, she wished that the beast wouldn't see her.

And then the strangest thing happened: when Sabitsuki rounded the corner, she paused. She sniffed the air, then snarled, slowly but surely returning to a more human form. Once her jaw resembled that of a regular person's, she glanced around and frowned, realizing that she didn't have her weapon anymore. She stared down the alley, not quite at Madotsuki, but rather, at the dead end wall behind her.

"How..." she managed, looking as if she had no idea where her prey was at. She examined her claws for a moment, then turned around and walked off, muttering that the girl wouldn't get off so easy next time.

...What on earth just happened? Madotsuki glanced down at herself, only to find that she wasn't there. There was nothing where her body should've been. She really had disappeared.

Once she was sure that the beastly albino was gone, she sneaked towards where she remembered the tunnel to be at. Thankfully she didn't have much trouble trying to move around when she couldn't see her limbs. When she arrived at the tunnel, she noticed that Errol was no longer there. With that in mind, she hopped into the entrance and vanished into the depths of Tier 7.

[Madotsuki]

While walking around invisible didn't seem to bother the dreamer, trying to climb down a ladder without knowing where your hands were going to was another deal entirely. Madotsuki thought about seeing herself, and her body immediately faded back into view. She slid down the ladder, slowing down when she reached the bottom. Kicking at the exit flap, she rolled into Tier 7 and collapsed onto a pile of sheet metal. Slowly, the dreamer rose, taking care not to accidentally cut her body in the process-- who knew where those parts had been?

Crusher mentioned while they searched for the tunnel that his stockpile was located in an abandoned warehouse that used to be owned by Ultron Inc. Considering that the man didn't know which tunnel the Night Terror would take, he couldn't give her directions. Even if he did, Madotsuki decided that she wouldn't be able to tell much of Tier 7 apart, anyways; sure, there was the occasional factory dotting the landscape, but otherwise it looked like nothing more than a sea of machinery.

Maybe she should've brought some food with her?

Nah. If it took longer than she expected to locate the warehouse, she could summon whatever supplies she needed.

The faint noise of battle caught her attention-- yelling and whirring echoed across the metal plains. Where there was a fight, there was people. Maybe she could ask whomever was left behind about the location of Ultron Inc.? She raced off in that direction, whipping out her knife and keeping it ready by her side.

What she discovered at the top of a mound of gears, however, wasn't the kind of fight she expected. The good news was that she had found Ultron Inc. The bad news was that the guards Crusher had stated there were fighting against a large group of robots. Over a dozen rustbuckets converged onto the warehouse; some were missing arms or legs. Even when one of the guards chopped off one of the metal warriors' heads, they would just keep walking as if nothing happened.

That wasn't even describing the biggest robot; the 2-story-tall machine was most likely meant to be piloted, due to the thing having a cockpit. However, there was no one inside, indicating that the robot had somehow gained sentience. It lumbered around on four spidery legs, its thick arms pounding at the roof of the warehouse-- much like an arachnid centaur.

Oh boy. How was she going to kill that thing?

[Madotsuki]

Madotsuki slid down the metal hill, swinging the knife and shooting several crescents at the sky. She wasn't intending to actually hit anything, but she wanted to attract the attention of the enemy robots.

Bad news: it worked. Immediately, the swarm of bots crawled towards her. One crept up behind her, and she rolled further down the landscape, now aiming several of the crescents at the enemies and knocking over a decent amount of them. The majority of them rose back up to their feet, except for a select few that lacked a set of arms.

A metal limb wrapped around her neck and yanked her backwards down the hill. Tugging frantically, she wrestled against the robot as it strangled her. She pulled hard, toppling her enemy upside down and using the momentum to smash the android's head in. It struggled to rise, but she kicked the rustbucket in the back and knocked it down the bottom of the hill. As soon as it reached the end, it collapsed into a pile of parts.

"Hey!" Madotsuki glanced around, trying to locate the voice. Somewhere near the warehouse, a man in a hoodie was waving his hand over his head, the other holding a baseball bat. The dreamer waved back. "You must be the Prime Crusher sent!" the man said, pointing at the giant mech. "We can handle the smaller ones; get that one!" He winded up for a moment, then swung at a bot, cleanly separating its torso from the rest of its body.

Right-- a little girl with a knife versus a 2-story-tall wrecking machine; like those were good odds.

But she'd find a way. Firstly, she had to figure out the durability of that thing. Holding her palm out, she began forming a blob of chaos in her hand. She almost lost focus when a gunshot rang out, decapitating an android that had managed to sneak up to her, but she kept it steady until the purple column launched away from her and towards the mech. To her disappointment, the robot didn't even budge.

Now what?

[Madotsuki]

Madotsuki stared up at the towering mech, her hands subconsciously wrapping around her chest wounds. Now that the dreamer had to stop and think, the pain of the holes in her chest suddenly caught up to her. She doubled over at the burning sensation in the pit of her belly, a wet, warm sensation caressing her fingers. The contents of her stomach wanted to leave through her mouth, but she managed to keep it down. How she managed to ignore it this long, she had no idea.

And of course it had to be in the middle of a fight.

The giant robot finally noticed where that odd tap had came from and leaped over to the dreamer. It raised a spidery leg to crush her, but she swerved out of the way and started to back up. Wincing, she turned and ran back up the hill; it was the only thing she could bring herself to do without fainting. She glanced back at the mech, only to find it rearing up with both of its arms raised far above its head.

The dreamer rolled away just in time before the two humongous fists made contact with the mountain of metal. Gears, springs and other pieces of indescribable metal flew into the air, coupled with a hideous clanging noise that reverberated throughout the area. Madotsuki held her hand up, shielding herself from an errant gear the size of her face as she sidestepped to avoid a much larger part. Her body burned all over, screaming in agony as rusty metal scraped her skin. Laying down and falling asleep for a week was starting to sound like a good idea-- except for the fact that the ginormous machine was right behind her, easily clearing in one step the distance that the girl needed five to do so.

She ducked, barely avoiding a backhand from the behemoth's steel arm. It instead hit another robot warrior and knocked it across the clearing, the now-broken fighter beeping in terror as it soared across the warehouse. At that very moment, the Night Terror got an idea: if this robot didn't care about what it hit on the outside, would it act the same on the inside? If this thing had a cockpit, then there had to be room on the inside for a person. Would it still attack her if she got inside? It seemed like the best option, but how was she going to get up there?

She screamed internally when she realized that she was going to have to climb up the thing. Ignoring the temptation to stop and rest, she dodged another leg and jumped to a chink in the casing that she could grab ahold of. The machine raised the leg and began shaking to and fro, trying to make the dreamer lose her grip. But she held firm.

Upon realizing what their new partner was doing, one of the guard tossed his shovel at the behemoth. It didn't do anything in terms of damage, but it distracted the machine long enough for the dreamer to climb her way up to the mech's torso, leaving behind bloody handprints as she scaled up the steel-enforced mountain of destruction. The robot tried to crush her with a curled up fist, but Madotsuki hopped away at the last moment and raced up its arm while it struggled to free its hand from its own body.

She finally arrived at the cockpit, the robot now thrashing its head about violently. Clinging tightly to a little space underneath the glass casing, she tugged upwards in an attempt to open it. It didn't budge, but the Night Terror remembered that she could just phase through it, and she promptly did so. Now inside, she saw a giant wall of code that was only visible on this side. The text "SKYNET" was superimposed over it, but before she could notice anything else, a giant fist broke through the glass, sending shards everywhere and destroying the control panel as it groped around.

Suddenly, it stopped. A deep, creaking sound alerted her that the mech was going down. Phasing out the robot's back, she watched as it toppled over and sent up another wave of metal rain. A quick look confirmed that the little robots were fleeing, apparently not intent on fighting without their huge backup. The guards were all staring at her in awe, but to be fair, the Night Terror not only managed to take down a giant mech, but she also straight up passed through it like a ghost-- they had every right to be surprised.

She slowly hovered to the ground, returning to normal once she had landed. Her legs held her weight for approximately half a second before they buckled beneath her and everything went black.

[Madotsuki]

The Night Terror awoke to the noise of someone talking. She turned to find the man in the hoodie standing there, holding his arm up like he was speaking into a communicator. He shuffled about on his feet, seemingly nervous.

"Of course she's fine. ...Well, she came here with..." He briefly glanced at the dreamer, then turned back. "There were two holes in her chest-- not straight through, but... you think Rust did that? But I don't know what kind of weapon could even do that; looks like she got stabbed by a horn of something. Look, she'll be okay. I'll go get the package from her now. I really hope Nico got his numbers right this time."

He hung up, then knelt by Madotsuki's side. Only then did she notice the gauze wrapped around her torso. "Hey, that was quite the fight out there. Crusher chose well." His fingers reached towards the bag that had somehow managed to survive the escapade. "You mind?" Realizing what he was asking, she slung the bag off of her shoulders and handed it over.

With both of his hands, he pulled out a machine from the sack. It wasn't humanoid, but the dreamer hesitated at the sight of the metal. She backed away until another voice called out. "Do you really think I didn't take into account the malevolent robots that've been popping out?" Stepping out of the shadows was a lanky man with a dirty labcoat and brown hair. "It's okay... I think Crusher called you Madotsuki, right?" She nodded, and the scientist shook her hand. "Nice to meet you! I'm Nico." He raised to glare at the man in the hoodie. "And of course my numbers are right! What kind of engineer do you take me for?"

"The kind that blows up our supplies in a teleportation attempt?"

Nico pressed his palm against his face. "Just set up the teleporter already, Lennox."

Lennox grabbed the back of the teleporter and pulled it out of sight. "If this fails," he called out, "then I'm so going to kill you."

"Crusher wouldn't be very pleased with that," Nico retorted, pulling Madotsuki to her feet. He glanced at her with a forced smile on his face. "How about we prove Lennox wrong and watch my magnificence in action? That is, if you're able to walk."

Madotsuki nodded and followed Nico to a spot that had been cleared out for the teleporter. A small group gathered, curious but silent, around the device as the engineer whipped out a remote. After a dramatic flourish, he pressed a button on the controller and the machine roared to life.

Slowly, something began to form in the center of the device. Once it was fully materialized, once could see it was a crate of weapons. Nico turned to face Lennox with the biggest grin on his face. "I there anything you'd like to say?"

"No comment."

Over the next few hours, the residents worked to get all the supplies packed away. Once the last shipment arrived, the whirring of the device died down to a purr.

"You know, Mado," said Nico, examining the wounds under her bandages, "that teleporter works both ways. You don't look like you're in any condition to make it back up without any help. We can send you through the teleporter."

Upon hearing this, the dreamer raced back to the machine and stood on top of it, nodding at the engineer to get the thing running. Nico pressed the start button as Lennox walked by.

"What are you doi-"

With the sound of an explosion, the room suddenly filled up with smoke. After a few moments of clearing the air, the two saw that the teleporter had splintered into pieces. Madotsuki was nowhere to be seen.

"D-don't worry," Nico said, adjusting his glasses. "I can fix this."

[Madotsuki]

Madotsuki wasn't quite sure how to explain traveling through a teleporter; if she had to, though, she'd probably describe it as a "black hole in your body." The inner workings of her body, coursing with electricity, were stretched and pulled until she finally arrived at the other side in a puff of smoke. Judging from the nauseating taste in her mouth, she guessed she had puked during the trip over.

She tripped over a piece of the device and fell into a pair of meaty hands that had to have been Crusher's. Slowly, the smog filtered out of the room. The dreamer looked up at the Gear Grinder with a dazed look in her eyes, a tendril of smoke curling out of her lips.

Crusher led Madotsuki over to the table from earlier and rested her half-consious body in a chair before stomping over to the machine. He picked up a piece of the teleporter, then tossed it aside, muttering "I told 'im that thing wasn't meant for 'umans." He ran out the door, bringing Madeline and a drink back into the room. The Night Terror was now dressed in a maid outfit.

She rushed over to the dreamer's side, pressing her hand against Madotsuki's forehead. Sluggishly, she pulled Madeline's hand off of her and leaned back in her chair, examining her arms. Despite the fact that she felt like she had been cooked in an oven for an hour, her skin appeared relatively untouched.

Madeline pushed the mug towards her and motioned for the dreamer to take a drink. She did so, recoiling at the pungent, citrusy taste.

Crusher made his way back to the table with a sack in his hands. He tossed it towards Madotsuki, and several coins spilled out of the leather pouch. Crusher's expression was oddly grim. "Lennox explained what 'ad 'appened down there. If I knew what ye would be facing, I would've equipped ye better. Ye deserve this."

Now that her senses began to return to working order, she stowed away the reward and made her way out the door.

It had taken her a while to get back to Tier 2, but she eventually returned to her room, collapsing on the bed and falling asleep before she even had time to reopen her Omniart requests.

After all she'd been through today, she needed a nap.