What Was Lost

Donella didn't get why they were going straight forward her. No matter, it just made things that much easier on her end.

"Burst." She said simply and calmly, a black energy forming around her and then expanding from her form, destroying or damaging anything that went close.

As for the strange armored woman, once she went into closer distance, the floating blades suddenly went on the offensive. They attacked with frightening speed and accuracy, despite the fact no one seemed to be guiding them. Three attacked Motoko, and the other three attacked Aisis. If Motoko had been in her old body, she would have been too slow to react, but that wasn't really the case this time around.

* *

Hino simply frowned, activating his blood-line as his eyes changed, scanning Varia. It lasted just for a moment before he turned it off, his eyes turning back to normal. "..You're just a machine." They said flatly. "We aren't here for you. We are here for the boy, Chris. Move aside or be turned to scrap to be used at the landfill. It's your choice."

Maya's response was to bring back a knife-hand, focusing energy at the forefront. If it worked on shields and barriers... She drove her hand forward, fully intending to rip through the barrier. Ignis backed up slightly, and held out her hand toward where Donella would be, waiting for her to come into view.

Aisis used her own sword to parry the swords after her, while Motoko moved toward the armored attacker, nimbly dodging the swords with flips, rolls, dives, and quick reflexes, getting close with surprising quickness before driving a powerful kick upward toward the unarmored jaw.

Varia just looked at Hino, and blinked. "I propose a second set of options. Leave now or be eliminated. It's your choice."

The barrier shifted the moment Maya went to strike; he attack actually passed through it surprisingly. On the other hand, it wasn't solid anymore and instead shifted to a dark, shrouding mist. With that mist, even the sound was muted and the only thing Ignis or Maya would be able to see was that strange mist which clouded their view. This was why Donella was a pain to fight. When she was actually serious her power-set and spells were a pain in the ass to deal with.

However, just from their side vision they could apparently see the silhouette of Donella, or seemed to be. Or it could be a 'bait and switch' trap.

The attack didn't hit, the woman showing surprisingly, and alarming amount of speed as she blocked the kick with her shield. Her free arm went to throw(or attempt to, as she might have failed) Motoko into Aisis who was still parrying the phantom blades. While this happened, her form seemed to be glowing faintly, in preparation of something.

* *

"If that's what you want." Hino began to make some hand signals, as did Maru into the background. "Fireball Jutsu!"

A large, powerful fireball came his mouth to seemingly engulf her. At the same time, Maru attempted to hold her in place with his own Jutsu, something that seemed to call powerful, thick vines to try to hold her into place from underneath her.

Maya didn't seem alarmed at all by not being able to see. "...Ignis." Ignis smirked in response, and dove deep into the mist, before throwing out both hands, a burst of heavy wind blowing the mist away with ease. Maya kept her eyes on Donella, and seemed to drift toward her, eyes promising death.

Motoko allowed herself to be grabbed, only to reverse the throw at the last second, twisting and grabbing the arm the had held her, and pulling, driving both heels toward the woman's jaw again. At the same time, Aisis shot inward, advancing to attack directly.

In the meantime, Varia simply stood there, allowing the fireball to wash over her, ignoring the vines that wrapped around her. "This is your last warning."

The attack worked, but not completely. It blew the wind enough to where things were more visible but not completely gone. No sooner did they do that however, did some strange shadow-daggers hit both Maya's and Ignis' shadows. When they tried to move, they would find themselves seemingly bounded in place. It was a spell called shadow trap, and its function and use was obvious. Even with their strength, they would find it very hard to move.

"Honestly, you two are starting to bore me." Donella said, yawing a bit, turning her left arm to a flesh-like blade. "I think I'll just kill you both now. But first..." Donella 'stabbed' one of the shadows on the ground, and for some reason, despite not physically being stabbed, would almost feel like it. Donella was going to enjoy this little part.

What she didn't know or counted on, was there were in fact somebody nearby that could counter her magic spell. Or rather a certain race that was hand made to counter such things. That was why, Xelena who had otherwise been distracted by the other enemies intervened when she had a bit of lull on her end of fighting, activating the Draw Out ability.

Like magic, the strange fog began to vanish as if it was never there, and even the shadow-trap began to weaken. Donella frowned a bit at this, but it did reveal Xelena's location to her. She wasn't worried though; she set up a few clones to jump too, if not for Draw Out making them vanish. However, her pet was coming and she'd make them sorry.

Xelena didn't get to sit idle when she heard something due to her enhanced hearing, the noise seeming to come from above. She looked up in time to see a massive beam of purple energy come towards her, she didn't seem to have time react as the attack seemed to hit. When the dust settled, there seemed to be no sign of Xelena but a crater. The attack coming from one of those abnormal Gemma Dragons.

"Looks like the doll went to bed." Donella said happily.

Motoko's attack hit and actually sent them back a bit, but there didn't seem all that much physical damage. The fact they were currently glowing might of had something to do with it. Either way, they simply waited for Aisis' first attack to come as she parried with a her own sword; having a immense amount of force behind even the blocks.

* *

Again, Varia was ignored. Maru upped his game a bit, dust, dirt and ground covered the android like a dome. While this was happening, Hino had backed up a bit, charging up an attack which seemed to be the Chidori.

Maya's mood darkened after the attack on Xelena. She knew Xelena was okay, but she did not appreciate Donella's attempts. She noticed Ignis out of the corner of her eye, and smirkd. Ignis suddenly pointed at Donella. "Bansho Tenin!" At the same time that Donella was yanked uncontrollably toward Ignis, Maya got into the path, shooting toward Donella with a fist cocked back, her intent quite obvious.

Varia glanced around at the dome surrounding her, and turned on her multi-spectrum sight so she could still clearly see Maru and Hino. She saw what Hino was doing, and simply waited. He was about to move into her range of his own accord, it seemed.

As Aisis struck quickly, using her unpredictable fighting style to full effect, Motoko continued to weave between the two fighters, delivering random blows to that unprotected jaw, and the joints of her armor, while trying to figure out exactly what other things she could do with this new body.

Nilona, on the other hand, glanced up at the dragon, and pointed both hands toward it. Her arms morphed together, expanding out into an utterly massive gun, fourteen feet long and eight feet in diameter. The core of it began to spin and glow, gathering mass amounts of energy in a short space of time, before suddenly firing a powerful beam of Astral Energy at the dragon. Nilona had a point to make.

It seemed strange for Donella to simply stand there and gloat when it was obvious the two would be attacking soon, and it became apparent soon why. When Ignis pulled her, she didn't fight with it at all(not that she could very well anyway if she wanted too) instead went with it. When she was within striking distance of Maya, the strange, unnatural dark energy forming as tendrils that tried to pull her inside the source of where it came from.

The attacks Aisis and Motoko gave mostly seem to bounce off her, for the most part. The glowing however, seemed to be dying down gradually. Motoko had a few other options inside that newly upgraded body of hers. One of the new features was an 'energy net' that not only ensnared somebody, but also drained them rapidly of their energy. It was good for fighting or simply catching somebody. She also had a variety of built in weapons; some somewhat similar to her old ones she used but notably upgraded for use against much more powerful enemies she may one day face.

Today seemed to be one of them.

* *

Gemma Dragons were strong and durable, but they were hardly fast. While mostly animalistic, it did have some intelligence. And it was instinct that was telling it, no screaming at it that the beam would mean death. They needed to move away from it.

That thought lasted only for a second as the beam connected, the blast killing the creature before it even had time to roar. There was the typical explosion, an blinding black light but it wasn't just destroyed; it was erased. It's essence was simply gone, even down to sub atoms, there was absolutely nothing left after the large display of energy. Windows had shattered and car alarms went off as the ground shook from the force.

* *

"Hino, stop." Maru said suddenly. "We don't know what she can do, don't just charge her. Keep it at range."

Hino was going to ignore him, but he did have a point. He cancelled out his attack and then focused on making some more hand seals, Maru in the background did the same thing. Soon, the result was the combined power of two huge fireballs together. Not only that, but with the sand and ground put together around Varia, it would end up turning to glass. Hino had remarked she was a machine, so it likely wouldn't hurt her. Unless they could Chakra empower it perhaps.

Maya almost immediately disappeared, letting Donella shoot past her toward Ignis, who grinned rather wickedly. She glowed brightly with white energy building around her as Donella neared, and spoke quickly. "Bakuhatsu!" The white energy suddenly exploded from her as if she were a living bomb, the blast radius stretching widely, as Maya quickly flew away from it.

Motoko indeed felt it was a good time, and held out one hand, launching the 'energy net' to ensnare their opponent, making sure Aisis wasn't in the way as she did so. At the same time, the other hand morphed into a rapid fire energy gun, which she opened fire with.

Varia blinked at the glass surrounding her, and broke it immediately without effort, looking at her opponents. "You will die if this continues. I will not allow you to harm anyone in this house."

Donella eyes widened a bit and she quickly scrambled to put up a barrier around her body, which absorbed the brunt of the attack. Though due to being so close it was almost effectively at 'ground zero' the shield was unable to take it and crumbled under the weight and power. When the energy died down, Donella was still alive but banged up. Her clothes were torn a bit and she had bruises over her body.

"W-what, how.." Donella said shakily more to herself in shock her barrier had crumbled like that. With the pain she felt it was starting to settle in exactly in her insane, childish mind of the stakes. If she lost, she'd die. Donella had never thought too much about it before, but after she came close to dying not too long ago, a sense of mortality had crept in.

If she lost she died.

She was losing.

For the first time since Donella was a little girl, she was genuinely scared. Even her will to fight started to rapidly leave her.

* *

Strangely or not, the woman when hit with the energy blast even when it went through didn't bleed. Instead, it was as if she wasn't made of flesh and blood but she wasn't an android either. It was more like they were a construct of some kind, clay to be exact judging by the bits left behind.

Despite the energy net draining and weakening the construct, they tried to resist it to reach Donella. It picked up she was in trouble, but was unable to really reach her.

* *

"Yes, you said that. Now are you going to do something our talk us to death?" Hino said coldly. "We aren't 'harming' anyone. We're here to collect Chris along with the other half demons and angels. Then they'll be returned."

Maru looked furious. "..You.just told them?"

Hino didn't care. "I did that on purpose. Consider our ties after this, severed."

Maru wanted to wring his neck, but forced his hate under control focusing on Varia instead. He just needed to get this damned robot out the way.

Maya was suddenly behind Donella, grabbing her by the hair, and twisted around, flinging Donella as hard as she could toward the ground, following it up by putting her hands together and firing a blast of energy at Donella, driving her hard into the ground, forming a crater. At the same time, Ignis gathered that white energy between her outstretched hands, before firing it at Donella. THe ball rapidly expanded as it shot toward her, and as the smoke cleared from Maya's attack, it reached her, sucking her into it's core, fractured, and then exploded violently as Ignis called out the name. "Kie Nasai!"

Motoko suddenly leapt up, planting her feet on the constructs shoulders and pressing two formed energy guns to it's face, and opening fire, as Aisis gathered energy on her blade, slashing at the stomach.

Varia, in the mean time, raised a brow. "Hm. I'll have to capture one of you then, and get you to tell me where any of the captured people are, if you have any yet." She paused, then pointed at Maru. "I'll capture you. You appear to be the leader, if a poor one."

Donella wasn't thinking correctly, but she did manage to teleport at the last second on the ground from causing a crater. That didn't save her from Ignis' attack, the barrier was formed again desperately but once again wasn't able to hold this time. It only lasted as long as it did because of the last minute desperate strength Donella had. When it crumbled, Donella was in even worse shape in a crater, bleeding on various places with her breathing ragged.

She would have teleported away but there was something interfering with just going all the way back to somewhere safe.

No..can't die..not here... Donella dragged herself along the ground, she couldn't even pull herself properly out of the crater correctly. Donella could feel her body starting to shut down from blood loss, tears streaming down her face.

* *

As for the Motoko and Aisis, the construct seemed to get more desperate/enraged, the black glow forming again as it broke out of the energy net. Not only did it break it, but a burst of energy knocked them violently backwards and away. After that, it turned to Donella's location, but the wounds were starting to catch up to it, but that didn't stop the construct from going anyway. They didn't feel pain or bleed, but if certain important parts were cut, it would still make them sluggish or unable to move.

By the time it reached Donella, it had came to a literal slow crawl to reach the dying Donella.

The Fae had a hard time moving, but saw the construct coming towards them, they were dying too, it seemed. "..Why..why..did..you..still come?" She said in a weak voice.

"...Friend.." Was the only thing the construct said, its body starting to glow faintly. When it died down, the construct had seemingly died, in its place was instead a worn out teddy bear missing a eye and looked as if had seen better days with a few bandages and such keeping the stuffing from falling out.

Donella trembled, reaching for the stuffed doll and clutched it to her chest as she finally and slowly died.

* *

Maru ignored Varia, he was tired of her. Instead, he decided to do a summon and get things over with. A few hang signals later, a winged creature came into view from a red light. It looked like a demon of some kind, but that wasn't really the case. It was muscular, and at least 12'11 in terms of height with clawed hands and a long, lizard-like tail. There was an immense feeling of power that came from the being, much more then the two ninja themselves.

Maya watched this with mixed feelings. On one hand, she felt satisfaction that Donella had been punished. On the other, there was a slight pain in her chest, seeing Donella seem to break down like this. 'Perhaps she once had a heart after all...' SHe blinked as there was a gust of wind next to her as something shot past. She saw Ignis closing in on Donella, and frowned, assuming she was going to finish her off. 'Probably ending her pain...' SHe was shocked, however, when Ignis stopped, and placed a hand on Donella's chest, whispering to herself.

"What is she..." Maya paused, then her eyes widened. Ignis was healing Donella! Feeling the flow of energy, she found that some of Ignis' energy was flowing even into the teddy bear. After a long moment, Ignis slumped over, unconcious. It has taken alot out of her, but she'd manage to save Donella, and possibly even the bear, that had clearly had some form of sapience. Donella would have a hard recovery ahead of her, but she'd live. Everyone would have to wait until Ignis woke to find out why she had done this.

~~~~~

Varia looked up at the creature blankly, then seemed to disappear. She was suddenly in the air, grabbing hold of the creatures face, and drove it backwards, headfirst into the ground with enough force to crater the ground. She then simply leapt back to her previous position in guarding the house, waiting. She had essentially just said 'screw you' to Maru in regards to the summon.

Xelena appeared not too long ago, she had drilled her way underground to avoid the blast from the Gemma Dragon. It wouldn't have killed her, but it would have done some damage. She went to where her mother was as the fight seem to wind down, a bit taken back by Donella's seemingly break down.

When Ignis went to heal them, she was surprised, but reacted quickly to catch her before she fell. She was wondering why Ignis ended up doing that but they would have to wait.

* *


Maru was annoyed, but he wasn't going to give up that easily. Instead he ordered the summon to bear hug Varia and keep her in place. While that happened, both Hino and Maru made a mad dash to get inside and retrieve Chris. There was of course the fact Terra was still inside, and there was no way they were getting past her. If any of Aurelia's traps didn't do them in first.

As it turned out, Aurelia and Terra didn't need to do anything. Varia's eyes narrowed, and she easily broke free, grabbed hold of the creature, and spun, swinging the creature around, catching Maru and Hino in mid-stride, knocking them away from the house. She then drove the creature's head into the ground again, followed by a devastating kick, before disappearing.

She reappeared above Hino, and grabbed him by the throat, and without hesitation, drove her fist into his chest, over his heart, as hard as she could, before simply tossing him aside and grabbing Maru by the hair and flinging him into a tree, aiming to stun him.

Maru wasn't just stunned, he was simply knocked out. Varia may have over done it if that wasn't the intention but otherwise the man was out. Hino was dead before he hit the ground, and the monster vanished in a puff of smoke as if had never been there in the first place.

Varia glanced around and, satisfied, walked over to Rikimaru, picking him up by the collar, and tied him up with what could only be called energy wires, securing him so he couldn't move. She also made sure his hands were tied so that he couldn't form those hand-signs of his. As for how to get information out of him... well, she'd figure that out later.

While this was going on, Darrien along with his usual people in his unit dropped by, appearing a flurry of digital codes and numbers. Galena had a face of disinterest, but there was obvious something big had been going on just moments ago with all the collteral damage.

"My, my, seems we always come after the fact." Darrien said to no one in his group in particular. "The caller said there was a disturbance in this area, and seems to have been a big one."

Galena rubbed her nose a bit after sneezing. "..Something here is throwing me nose off."

Darrien looked around, then to where the Santos were at. "Let's go ask a few questions and get an idea of what happened." He went to the door, knocking on it as a few moments later Terra opened it. "Hello. Sorry to bother you, we're with Nobus and we just wanted to ask a few questions."

Terra glanced at the people present and the badges and moved aside. "Come inside. There's actually someone you should pick up in the back.."

While Akuma was standing back with a bored expression, the other member of the group was looking around in curiousity, looking rather... well, adorable. If it wasn't for the bazooka she was carrying around like it was nothing, one would think she was a rather innocent young woman. She noted the people milling around, and then noted the unconcious man bound by some sort of energy, and being dragged around by what looked like an android. Interesting.

Darrien blinked at the scene. "..Maru, leader of a rogue group of ninja a run branch off or smaller branch of Atasuki. How did you find him?" This was pretty much gold; they had been trying to find this man for a while. Now they had them, not only did they put a dangerous person away, but a bit of positive publicity never hurt either.

"He came from the back, or tried too." Terra explained to him. "Any other questions you can ask him when he wakes up after you take him in. I'll try to answer any questions you might have."

Akuma blinked, finally noticing Maru. He'd been distracted up until the name was mentioned. He grinned. "Oh, they are going to have fun getting info out of you, Maru..." He glanced around. "Okay, who actually caught him? It's difficult to catch a shinobi without killing them."

"I grabbed him and threw him into a tree." Akuma blinked at Varia's words. Was it that simple? Really?

Xelena was slightly amused at that. "..My sister always been to the point."

Darrien picked up Maru, making a note to get something to dampen Chakra use so they could make sure he didn't cause trouble. It was surprisingly or not Galena who did most of the questions and answering. While this was going on and things settled down a bit as the conversations continued, Yulina who was a bit bored and wanted to talk to one of the new people.

It just happened to be the only other vampire of the group besides Galena, she went over to her. "Hi, I'm Yulina. What's your name?"

Only Yulina could start up a conversation like that with a complete stranger.

The blonde woman smiled sweetly, kneeling in front of Yulina. "Hello, Yulina! My name is Niya Kotan. It's nice to meet you." Her voice was as sweet and innocent as she herself appeared to be, also carrying an unmistakable english accent.

Yulina's smile grew a bit. "So you're..part of Nobus? Do you get to catch a lot of bad guys then?" She was honestly just curious more then anything. Yulina wasn't violent(far from it) but she did find what Nobus did 'cool' and thought when she became a teacher, she could be Nobus at night. Sort of like that one movie mom was watching, she didn't remember the name.

Niya nodded, smiling brightly. "Mhm! Lot's of them, all the time. Protecting people is my favorite part of the job though. Why, are you interested in joining one day?"

Yulina nodded a bit. "Yeah. I want to get stronger so I can join too one day and I can help mom and big brother. What do you have to do to join?" She asked, looking up at her curiously. All the other people around her were very strong in their own ways, so maybe she could get strong like them too, if she tried.