9084/Path of Glory: He Will Judge

Path of Glory: He Will Judge
Date of Scene:	29 January 2022
Location:	Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine, Morningside Heights
Synopsis:	The Resistance scores a rather decisive victory at the Wellspring of Fire inside the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine. But even decisive victories come with a cost in this war.
Cast of Characters:	Michael Demiurgos, Jonathan Sims, Sarah Rainmaker, Terry O'Neil, Veira Lazarescu, Cael Becker, Johnny Blaze
Tinyplot:	Path of Glory

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Michael Demiurgos has posed:
    The mid afternoon sun shines on the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine. The massive structure that takes up an entire city block with its presence, stands as a testament to the faith of the people who usually inhabit the island of Manhattan. But, as has been the case for many days, the building stands silent. Even without the congregations gathering for services or simply to seek solace it stands as a burning monolithic presence of belief.

    Which is precisely why it serves as the wellspring of fire for Gaea in the city.

    The Heavenly Hosts approach, a full invasion force thousands strong ready to bring their own fire against that of the Resistance--who no doubt was already set up inside. As they approach the building though something happens. The rank and file of the force, the lower tiers of Cherubim, Lesser Angels, Principalities, all stop in their tracks as they reach sight of the Church and then they change. Where thousands of armed warriors ready to rain destruction and wrath upon all obstacles stood, now it is a wash of color as they all change into...

    Lego Bricks.

    Even the secondary tiers: Powers, Virtures, and more than half of the Dominions find themselves turned into the solid blocks of construction toys. They stand, (or fall as is the case for many,) in place; disoriented by the transformation. The remainging force of 3 Dominions, 4 Thrones, 4 Seraphs and the three Archangels in attendance seem irritated by the change but press on into--and through--the walls of the church to face the resistance force set up inside.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    It was surprisingly easy to get into St. John the Divine; there was no angelic patrol waiting there for them this time, no barrier to take down, no fight to be had at all. It's almost eerie, how easily they're able to get set up in and around the Cathedral. Jon doesn't take it for granted, though; he orders the people back at Grand Central to quietly prepare for an attack some time in the next 24-48 hours, and goes on to deal with the wellspring at St. John's.

    The boxes from Project Gozer are set up around the building, eighteen of them ringing the outside at 20-degree intervals along a circle, and the six drones buzzings around the inside to pick up any stragglers. It should keep the overwhelming numbers of lesser angels down to a minimum, and hopefully give even higher tiers some issues. He's asked Cael specifically to watch his back and keep the higher tiers out of the wellspring, which he's marked with a wall of magical fire ten and a half feet from the altar, all around. The other resistance forces he's told to not bother trying to hold the door--since the angels will likely just phase right through the walls--but to /try/ not to destroy any of the priceless relics or art in the place. Damage Control can replace buildings, sure, but some things cannot be replaced.

    Is it strange that one of Gaea's wellsprings is in a church? Well, maybe, unless one knows that Gaea's Champion is a lapsed Anglican who actually ever-so-briefly came to this very church for a few services after the death of his elder daughter. While his husband was losing his faith, Jon tried to regain his, and though he ultimately turned to the Egyptian gods, it was a long talk with the Suffragan Bishop--an avowed lesbian, in fact--that convinced him to look into the practices of his ancestors in earnest. The place matters to him, is the point, and maybe it would have been one of the wellsprings regardless, but it certainly makes /sense/ from that point of view.

    As the archangels enter, Jon turns to face them, putting his back to the wellspring with its gold and red magic. He puts up a hand to signal for the others to wait rather than attacking. "Finally showed up, did you?" He actually glowers; he has reason to be /very/ angry with Michael just now. "I wondered if you were going to bother to join the party. You could leave, now, rather than desecrate this holy place." He smiles brightly; it's his turn to offer for them to surrender. "I really don't want to fight you, but I think other people do. And as you can see... I don't think it'll go well for you, this time around."

Sarah Rainmaker has posed:
Sarah Rainmaker has been practicing for awhile with her spear. The one that she's still getting used to, made of Michael's blood. That still feels unfamiliar. She's been working on it for the last few days, practicing training with it and taking what instruction she could get from more experienced fighters in melee combat. So by twirling it in her hands on and off for a few hours at a time, being on patrol or available.. So when the fighting starts she will be comfortalbe with it.
    So with the group coming up and out and the spear in her hand, and her freshly forged gauntlets on her hands, Sarah is ready for whatever is going tos tart. Her hands are in front of her with the weapon, a slow build within them as she would get ready for the melee to start. She's braced and has used the winds to lift her up by just a cuople of inches. She's spent her time looking over the map of the place to figure out where all the large bits of metal were within it. In the supports, in the building, in the architecture.. She's spent time preparing in her head over every large conductive surface that she can just to be on the safe side if she needs it. So weapon in front of her in a defensiev stance, waiting for the chaos to start. Not commenting on the form of the Destructor..

Terry O'Neil has posed:
Terry doesn't have any particular attachment to the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in the strictly /religious/ sense of the word. Buildings of faith have never moved him, outside, perhaps, on the strictly architectural sense where someone can be awestruck by the sheer beauty and pretentiousness of a bulding.
Of /that/, Saint John The Divine has in droves.
But that is also not the reason why it's important to Terry.


"Dear /god/ mom, where did you get all of that?"
Terry, aka Vorpal, is glancing at his mother. Agatha is decked from head to toe in tactical gear. To her already considerable personal weapons reserve, she seems to have added several more.
"Your friend Harley was kind enough to lend them to me."
"What, did you just go and ask to borrow a cup of ammo or something?"
"Something like that."

The conversation is cut short by the arrival of the angels- and the legos. The Cheshire cat smirks, and then his mother asks a question.
"Is that Michael?"
"That's the one. The one who looks like an asshole."
"Terry O'Neil!" Agatha's sharp interjection comes with the threat of a middle name not yet pronounced.
"Sorry, sorry, I mean jacka-- jerk. Look, mom, I gotta go to the front. Just... just stay back here and ... yeah."
"I'll be /fine/, Terry,"
"I only wish you had stayed at Grandcentralstation-"
"Terry, go, your friends are waiting."

The Cheshire cat, clearly not happy with circumstances, goes and takes his place, staring up at the angelic host with your typical feline respect, which is a mixture of insolence and curiosity.
"You guys are such assho-"
"TERRY"
"-jerks."

Veira Lazarescu has posed:
Agent Lazarus was here tonight, dressed in the tactical gear that she's worn in extractions before and on other missions. The mask that she wears protects her face, but there is the one umber colored eye that is stark in comparison to the rest of things. She finishes the braid in her hair about the time things start. She carries no ICERS or guns. She does have combat knives sheathed on each hip and she's currently holding a straight razor in one as she waits for the inevitable clash to happen. She's rolls her shoulders, trying to loosen up as she reaches up to remove the other earbud from her ear.

"It's the sound of another deadline whistling past your ears.
"It's the forming of a million regrets mounting over years."
"It's the words that were never spoken that echoes through the times."
"It's the ruins of the burning temples swept away by rhymes."

The Unseelie sings quietly to try to get over the jitters before she quiets. She then turns her one eyed gaze to the space next to her, "If something happens and I can't come back for a few, you know what to do." she states.

Who was she talking to?!

Cael Becker has posed:
    Cael stands between Jon and the entrance - just beyond the wall of fire he'd created to mark the space. She's dressed in SHIELD tactical gear as usual - but in a rather startling departure from her previous appearance, the blonde (and rainbow) haired woman has a gleaming chestplate of blueish-silver metal on, with matching greaves and bracers. Held in both hands is a two headed axe, with a design across the center and down the haft that looks almost wing-like, and springing from her back - a pair of black, metallic wings, currently at rest.
    She glares at Michael with a dark, angry expression that backs up Jon's claim that - yes. There are definitely people here who would very much like a fight today. She isn't quite decided if she wants to plant her axe in his face - or in his good wing. Maybe a bit of both?

Johnny Blaze has posed:
Only neat toy Johnny has is his hellforged chain. Made from the souls and fears of demons solidified into being, but Johnny Blaze was here, chain in his hands as he looks at the oncoming forces. "Here they come..." But something happens. It's almost comedic and ironic at the same time. Ironic because these creatures are puppets on a string, like lego toys being used by someone else.

Comedic because...come on, legos.

When Jon and the Archangels negotiate, he starts to approach as if to take a flank behind one of the columns, ready to fight and attack. A Christian by way of faith, Johnny has no problem reminding Archangels that the earth is not gonna get walked over.

<<Johnny...>>

The voice of Zarathos echoes in his very soul. <<Kill them all. Butcher them like cows. Harvest them. The innocent dead scream to be avenged, their call cannot be ignored. At all costs, they must be culled and their souls burning for eternity the message to interlopers.>>

<<They just burn before vengeance's altar.>>

Johnny's head angles as if to try and shut him out. Can't transform yet. They have a chance, a chance that will likely be denied. But Johnny's eyes are on Michael. He's the priority target for Johnny. Stall him so he doesn't wipe them out immediately.

Michael Demiurgos has posed:
    Michael moves to the forefront of the group. The other two Archangels flank him on either side. To his right, in bronze colored armor and weilding a large mace is the dark haired lord of prayer, Selaphiel. To his left is the silver clad, axe weilding other who saved Adam and Eve from the tribulation of Satan: Suriel. The trio look on the Resistance forces with a myriad of expressions: respect, dismissal, pity. But Michael speaks for them all it would seem.

    "This is the Wellspring and I require it's use" says the Lord of Hosts. "While I am loathe to desecrate such a place..." he says, turning his gaze on a marble bas of what might be a saint. There is a burst of power and the bas shatters. He waves a hand and it reappears whole and unmarred. "I believe it will survive the damage inflicted and come out without issue."

    He destroyed a bas relief that was over a hundred years old and reforged it as a demonstration.

    "We will not yield and I will not stand down, Jonathan. You persist in giving me an out when it is you who should flee. You have no chance at success... ingenious as your toys have been in regards to the lesser hosts." He gestures behind him to the small score of angelic forces remaining with him. "Know that the force with me is equal to ten times those that have been changed by the sciences involved in your observers." He smiles at the group and says.

    "Any more dialogue, or shall we start this field?" He conjures a gleaming spear of his own, gold in color into his right hand and a dull plated shield in his left while the other two Archangels lift their own weapons to the ready.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    Jon's jaw clenches at the casual destruction and re-creation of a religious artifact. "Pride goeth before destruction," he spits. "And a haughty spirit before a fall. You might want to remember that. You insist we have no chance, and yet you've lost all but /one/ battle we've fought thus far. I never presume we're going to win. Not this time, not ever."

    He frowns. "Some day soon I'm going to sit you down and remind you that you're forgetting half of your Purpose, Saint Michael. War is not all you are. I am /trying/ to give you a chance to remember that. We don't have to /do/ this. We can sit and have a proper game of chess if you're so bloody bored, or maybe a video game; I hear VR's made enormous strides." He shakes his head. "But, fine, you want to do this? I was giving you a chance to avoid bloodshed and destruction, but since you're so /hellbent/ on it..." Yes, he used the word deliberately.

    He steps back, and waves his staff in a circle in the air, pulling up a gout of magical fire from the altar, encasing a red strand of the wellspring. "Fire at will!" This time, the resistance attacks first, it seems.

Sarah Rainmaker has posed:
With Cael having her weapons out, and Sarah with her spear in front of her the Apache Gen-Active girl would let her eyes flash, "Yes, let us." Then she's going to focus on her winds.. Going to call them to herself and commanding them. Going to Cael and the others along the tight-comm <<Launching Cael>> Something that for other teams might be a more common maneuver. For Sarah, what it means is encasing Cael over in a bundle of winds.. Then going to lift her up and launch her through the air with fine, precise control! Acting as if inertia and whiplash are not a thing thanks to her command of them, she would send Cael flying towards one group of enemies, yank her to the side if they would attack to hopefully have Cael easily evade them, spin her towards another group to have Cael hopefully ricocheting about wildly without any sort of dizziness to it and hopefully let Cael slash, stab, and attack in passing and whirl her around to hit as many targets as possible!

Terry O'Neil has posed:
As the gauntlet is thrown, Vorpal narrows his eyes. There are four of those eye-ringed freaks and four jackasses who can cause pain by /looking/ at you . Not counting the three Arch-jackasses and the three dominators. Of those, the most immediately dangerous would be the jerks with the Medusa effect. Those eyes needed to /go/ and /stat/. He knows better than to cast a veil of darkness over them, though- he remembers how easily they can dismiss his illusions. No. Something /else/ needed to be used. If he recalls correctly, they could also summon holy fire.

He hmm and quickly whips out his phone, doing a quick search as he runs... away from the front.

"The Government of Peru has formally declared an environmental emergency following a 15 January... perfect," he mutters, and then he shouts. <<Be right back, guys, I've got an idea.>>

And he steps sideways into a Rabbit Hole.

Agatha blinks, "... alright, then." She takes aim at the nearest Dominion within her sight, and fires.

Veira Lazarescu has posed:
Agent Lazarus sees the incoming Angels, Archangels and Dominions and there's a frown to all of them that is hidden by her mask. "I shall tell the Silver Fox that you are indisposed should you die, yes." comes the voice by her side. Jan thankfully enjoyed his nickname though. "Ready." she nods her head. When things kick off with a bank the woman uses the straight razor to cut a deep gash into her upper forearms and then pockets it just as quickly.

The smell of flowers hangs in the air around her as she holds her arm, letting the blood drain into her waiting palm.

She lifts it to her mouth and lets it drain into her own. Then she waits for an angel to duck low enough that she can spit it out, it doesn't come out as a shower of blood though, it comes out as a gout of magical fire. Seeking to hit something.

The blood mage then unsheathes her knives and starts to prepare for a more frontal assault. "Atilla, get ready." she states to the air.

Cael Becker has posed:
    "You heard Sims - let's fuck shit up," Cael remarks simply - apparently she isn't afraid of the disapproval of Terry's mother. She swings the battle axe casually, a satisfied smile growing on her features just as she spreads the metallic wings at her back, the darkly gleaming form casting shadows about the room as she's pulled up into the air and hurled about by Sarah's winds. She swings with precision, each blow almost invariably blocking a weapon, or finding a target - with one particularly spiteful swing aimed for Michael's wing as she passes the Archangel. Her gaze frequently flicks towards the wellspring where Jon works, making sure that things remain under control.
    "It's a good thing I have a fondness for roller coasters," she remarks.

Johnny Blaze has posed:
Blaze is -not- impressed.

But Sims says something that makes him start to shift and change. Johnny bursts into hellfire flame with a roar. "Michael Demiurgos. You have upset the balance of this world, and now you will suffer the pain of the damned!" Ghost Rider speaks, voice thaumaturged to speak with every soul he could sense.

Thenthe Rider whips that chain at lightning speeds, aiming to strike at Michael himself, even as the Ghost Rider is moving just as quickly to attack. Vengeance is blind, and it is enraged. The spirits of the damned push it forward.

Hell. Bent.

Michael Demiurgos has posed:
    As Cael sails for the angels they strike at her but are met with a deflection of the cheek of the battle axe. The swing that aims for Michael's unmarred wing is met with an axe as Suriel intercepts the blow. "I think I would like to challenge you" the androgynous Archangel replies with a bright smile. There is an almost child-like grin on its face. "Besides... like should battle like, shouldn't it?" Then it swings with terrible speed at the armored woman.

    As Suriel engages Cael like for like, Selaphiel disregards the logic and moves to engage Sarah mace to spear. Massive two handed swings come for the Rainmaker from the bronze-clad Archangel of pryaer. It speaks after once such powerful swing. "Your weapon. Forged from the blood of our Commander... a vile act. One that must be rectified."

As most of the Dominions engage with the SHIELD/militia forces one moves in toward the line, a massive sword materializing in its hands. It is met with the gout of blood-fire from the mage. The magical fire sends it back reeling but it doesn't relent, righting itself on massive wings and going for an overhead strike on Agent Lazarus.

    The Thrones move into position, and begin firing upon the shield Sims has erected around the altar. The beams of magnificent energy slam into the barrier and are dispersed. The strength of Sims' abilities seems to have grown stronger since the last time and even a concentrated blast from the Thrones isn't enough to burst through.

    Ghost Rider's chain is met by Michael's spear and the soul-infused links wrap around the shaft of holy metal, there is a sizzling sound as Hell-forged meets Heaven-forged and Michael locks the spear into a position of checking the Rider's strength. "You... a demon... wish to judge -me- in this place? Laughable!" Then he pulls on the chain, his intent to bring the Rider into his range. The tug from the General of the Host is beyond measure in terms of strength, entire galaxies could be moved under the power of his shoulders.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    The resistance forces move to engage, and their leader turns his back on the battlefield. Jon's trusting them, all of them--even Terry's Rabbit Hole is, he presumes, a tactical move by the Cheshire. There's no way he'd retreat, not from /this/ battle. He raises his arms, staff held in the left, and though he's wearing black fatigues instead of the cassock and stole of Episcopal vestments, he manages to look like a priest, standing there before the high altar. In a way, he is, even if he's calling on Gaea and not God.

    It's bitterly cold outside, the high today hasn't risen above 20 degrees Farenheit. Inside, despite Sarah's winds, the temperature begins to heat up as Jon lays down the circles of fire magic. As he puts down the first he begins to hum "Ring of Fire." Not just because he's literally making rings of fire, but because to his eyes the brightest source of fire in the huge space is not his own magic, nor the angels--it's Cael, spinning around on those winds and taking a swing at Michael's unmarred wing.

    (Love is a burning thing... and it makes a fiery ring...)

    Fire is his weakest element, but he's been practicing with it all week, listening to music that riles him up, spending time with the people he loves. And he's /angry/ just now, furious with Michael for everything he's done. So he channels that anger into the fire magic, and lays down a second ring, and then a third. Stable, so far, surprisingly easy. It's all been surprisingly easy.

    Jon pushes away the thought that that just means the other shoe's about to drop any minute now.

Sarah Rainmaker has posed:
Releasing Cael from the winds, Sarah Rainmaker goes over to a defensive stance with the spear as Selaphiel comes towards her. "Oh? How fitting." As she would go on the defensive, moving to use the greater range of the spear to hopeuflly keep her opponent at range. She's using it more like a staff, reflecting her initial training on going to use it to flick back her opponent and block the strikes of the spear. She's going to give ground, intent on letting the angel pursue her.
    These things have millenia of combat experience, she's not going to fight one on pure skill in a melee. "I beg to differ on this vile act. Your commander enjoys inflicting pain and suffering for the sake of it. Why does he damn those that have done nothing wrong? Why does he judge them condemned? Why does he insist upon torturing them? Why do you accept his will as all above?" She's on the defensive, withdrawing back faster and faster.
    "Or is he supreme in all things? Is he all knowing? Is he the One Above All tha tspekas, makes, and whom passes all things? Is his will supreme above all others including that which has come before?" Retreating faster, intnet on letting Selaphiel pursue her. Using the space of the church to her advantage.
    You can hold against a superior opponent by giving ground. She has plenty to use. Expecting that if she fights conservatively and defensively, the Archangel will fight the same way or get more aggressive.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
The oil spill was bad. Like, /really/ bad. Estimated to be of about 6,000 barrels, it has affected more than two square miles of water in Ventanilla, which is just north of Lima. The quantity was staggering, 1100 tons, approximately 400 tons more than international standards for a large spill. It was heartbreaking.

It was also exactly what Terry was looking for. He will mark this so that the Titans can come and help with the clean-up, but for the time being, he needs that vile liquid.

After getting a good eyeful of the whole horrifying thing, he appears back in the church via Rabbit Hole. <<I'm back!>> he says, and quickly glances around to locate the four Seraphim on the battlefield. His spandex suddenly transforms into a cassock, albeit one with flair as it is purple with a pink collar, and he makes a sign that is definitely /not/ the sign of the cross*.

"I Baptize you in the name of Dorothy, Blanche, Rose, Sophia and the Holy Cheesecake, amen!"

With each name that is chanted, he opens a Rabbit Hole over each of the Seraphim, there to vomit a deluge of the foul black oil and water over the creature and, more importantly, the wings and eyes. Whether this works or not, it's at least something to try. He's used his 'vacuum them into outer space' trick twice already, so they are /expecting/ that by now, and no cat /anywhere/ was inclined to give people what they expected. Especially if he hated their

guts

"Terry!" Agatha's voice echoes, "That's sacrilege." Bang. "Well done."



*Foonote: It is, in fact, the sign of the Rusty Anchor.

Veira Lazarescu has posed:
Agent Lazarus brings her arms up, knives moving to block the sword strike that's coming down from above. She lets out a grunt as she leverages her weight and tries to send the angel back. "I'm not a good dancer but I'll try." she states as she brings the knives up. Yes, she definitely brought knives to an end of the world fight. She wasn't doing the flame breath trick again as she wasn't going to gross herself out. Odd coming from someone that practices what she does. "Those wings look nice." she tells the Dominion.

"It would be a shame if something were to happen to them." she adds.

"ATILLA!" she calls out.

Above the Dominion's there is a shape that shimmers into existence. A black dragon with curved horns, claws and tail. His wings flare out as he drops down about fifty feet flying over the Dominion's and letting loose a line of dragon fire that brightens the night with it's golden and green glow.

Cael Becker has posed:
    "Well if that's how it is..." Cael replies - facing off with Suriel, only a momentary flicker of annoyance showing on her features that Michael's right wing remains pristine.
    If the fucker wants to be so vain about his damned wings, well, then Cael's going to use them as a bloody target.
    But right now, she has her attention filled by facing off with this... only //slightly// lesser archangel. Yes, she and Jon had intercept a patrol the other day so she could practice with her new armor and skills - but nothing had given her anywhere near the challenge that this would be. There's no room nor place for fancy twirls of the axe as she trades blow after blow with the angel - finding herself beaten back by the sheer force of the angel's swings as she searches for her opening.
    After trading several blows, rather than meeting the next one that comes towards her, she twists to the side, deliberately trying to deflect it with her bracer, as she tries to sneak in her own blow low, aimed at the angel's side.

Johnny Blaze has posed:
"You overestimate yourself, Lightbringer. The Presence is not here. You are a failure to your purpose, and for the lives you seek to destroy, you will suffer for your atrocities!"

Yet even as The Rider's chain is caught by that spear, the Rider is yanked towards the Archangel in surprise. Yet during that dragging, the Rider reels backs heavy hand, and intends to quite simply punch Michael in the face with the force that might be surprising!

Or do absolutely nothing.

Michael Demiurgos has posed:
    As the oil floods out over the Seraph they drop low the weight of the liquid a surprise they were not expecting. The holy flame surrounding them ignites the oil and though it doesn't burn them, a foul black smoke consumes their forms. With ingenuity the was beyond the normal scope of lesser angelic ranks they start to spin in place creating four pillars of firey tornados in their location as they attempt to free themselves of the foul substances that coats them.

    The Thrones, spin more rapidly in place, their eyes burning the blue-white intensity. A high whine seems to coalesce around them as they ready another beam of concentrated energy pulled from the Source itself. The beams are needle thin as they skitter and trace along the shield of flame surrounding the Wellspring and Gaea's Champion. Even with the intensity, they scatter across and fail to pierce through.

    Selpahiel continues to pursue Sarah around the interior of the church. "For the moment he is the voice of The One who created us. That is enough for our engagement." The mace whooshes past the Apache's head in a miss. "Among your kind, as with all who do not directly serve him, The Presence is silent. They have given it to us to do as we are compelled to do among this universe." Another near miss the force of the swing pushing out to Sarah's right. "To that end, we do as commanded. To do otherwise would be to risk absolute destruction and desecration of the very universe you fight to preserve."

    The green fire catches on the Dominion as it turns to regard the dragon. Ancient creatures who roamed the earth before humans left their caves it is not unknown to the Dominion and its fire is not to be discounted in its intensity. The angel's wings go up first, acrid yellow smoke that smells of brimstone billows from its back as it thrashes and a discordant sound spills from the conflagration that once was purity incarnate as it screams in agony.

    As Cael faces off with Suriel the latent mastery of weapons that comes with who imbued her new toys sings with delight. A match of skill unlike any it has ever encountered is present and a true challenge it is. Suriel is one of the youngest of the Archangels but even that comes with billions of years of training. Its unlikely that Cael could best it in a direct contest, but matching it is possible and successful. As the axe of Suriel connects with the bracer, there is a shock of pain that lances up the Agent's arm. But she holds against it. "Fascinating. I haven't seen Scathach's work in quite some time. Thousands of years at least" Suriel says, admiring the armor. As the angel admires Cael's new threads, it misses the oncoming low blow. The axe bites into Suriel's side and angelic blood spills onto the floor of the church. The Archangel winces and looks as the bit of the axe is buried several inches into the angel's midsection, dsiregarding the holy armor as well. "That... hurt!" Suriel says another manic grin splitting its features. "How wonderful!"

    The Ghost Rider's fist meets the most favoured of the Archangels and sends him back. It doesn't break his flesh but it force was clearly enough to surprise him. As he rights himself he smiles at the spirit of vengeance. "A very nice trick, Zarathos. And not one I would think you would employ so soon... but if you wish to match your strength against mine. So be it." The shield and spear vanish and the Prince of Heaven speeds forward to deliver his own devestating blow to the Hellfire encased skull-warrior. "You spit my brother's name at me in an attempt to anger me. But you will see that I hate him not. His punishment is already dispensed. But I will make a point to send you back to him in pieces, demon!"

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    The others taunt the angels, fight them, bring out dragons and the Golden Girls and the powers of Hell and an Irish warrior. Jon focuses, ignoring the Thrones trying to hammer through his barrier. Cael has his back, and so does Terry, and Sarah, and Johnny, and even Veira who he's barely met. He taps his foot to a song only he can hear, and lays down rings of fire.

    Four, and the structure quavers, as Terry bapitzes the angels in the name of the Holy Cheesecake, and the stench of burning oil begins to fill the room. Five, and a black dragon appears to take on a Dominion, and the scent of brimstone and the screams of agony fill the air. Six, and Cael spills Suriel's blood across the floor. It's easier, this time. It shouldn't be this easy. Doubt creeps in, for a moment. It /shouldn't/ be this /easy/. Is Michael holding something back?

    He takes a few deep breaths. They're succeeding because they've cut out a huge portion of the forces Michael brought, with Project Gozer. Perhaps because these archangels aren't as one in purpose with Michael as some of the others, and so he pulled them back from scouting. Perhaps because Tim's keeping him too busy in Hell's Kitchen, trying to find Lady Death. It doesn't /have/ to be a trick.

    'I hate him not.' 'His punishment is already dispensed.' The words distract Jon for a moment. Why is Michael so insistent that the flaw in the universe was caused by Lucifer, then...?

Sarah Rainmaker has posed:
Bait taken as the thing is advancing on her. "Given by yourself? How convenient I suppose. So does that make you all unworthy of having judgement? Do you all follow him? By definition, if we all come with sins does that not mean we are already fated? You are already fated? Are we but all playing and dancing in a dream?" She's falling back as the near miss goes on.
    "Do we not fail before we are born then? Is that how things are if we are already pre-determined to do so?" She would muse. "Or do we have free will and potential to do things? Is all existence condemned to break and fall becasue you think it is weak? Or that you have been told it is? Who compels you then to do something if the Presence is gone? Who commands you?" Feint, feint, parry.. Last mace slash taking off some o fher hair. "Because you have no right to me to judge, no right to condemn, no right to decide. What makes your own fiath superior to all others? What makes your decisions more valid than any others? What gives you supreme choice over all others for determination? Or can you give me anything else beyond you did yourselves?"
    Sarah responds now by blasting at hte eyes of the angel with ice from her hand, intent on freezing it's eyeballs shut even as she would likewise go to try and freeze its' wings up and over above it's head, hopefully anchoring them in place if at all possible while then going to try and -slam- it backwards with a whoosh of her winds!
    A dirty trick, going for an attempted unbalancing, trip, and then hopefully a stab while her opponent was off balance.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
Flaming pillars of fire. How utterly and thoroughly biblical. The Cheshire cat narrows his eyes and finds himself ducking out of incoming harm from the other forces, vanishing into Rabbit Holes and coming out the other way. Everybody else is engaging the Archangels, and Jon's barrier is holding against the Thrones. SHIELD and others are doing the best they can.

His job was to pare down the forces down, as his team-mates took the fight personally to the angels.

That meant putting out that goddamned holy fire, somehow.

An eyebrow.

Or use it to his advantage.

A lightbulb appears over his head, literally, and after a moment's focus, the Cheshire opens up the Rabbit Hole to the sandiest place he knows: the dunes of the Sahara.

"Like grains of sand in the hourglass... these are the days of cut it the fuck out, you annoying gits!" he says as the waves of sand are disgorged from the Rabbit Hole, tons and tons of hot sand intended to bury the Seraphim. With any luck, he thinks, their desire to be pillars of fire will get them encased in hot glass for their trouble. Maybe.

But there was the question of the Thrones. Keeping his Rabbit Hole open, he focuses the rest of his attention at the bricks. All of the angel LEGO bricks that were in the church.

"Treguna... Mecoides... Trecorum... Satis... Di...." he exhales. The words aren't necessary. He doesn't need to say them. But they sure help his state of mind as he stands there, bifurcated between the Rabbit Hole and the process of another enchantment.

The Chaos wave extends from him and seeks out the LEGO bricks- with one very simple instruction in his mind: Assemble into a Mecha Angel, and start kicking some Throne derriere.

"... wait. Do angels have butts?"

A theological question for the ages.

Veira Lazarescu has posed:
Agent Lazrus drowns out the scream of agony from the angel, because if they wanted to end their world then she was going to use every resource that she could. She had just started to live again, she didn't want to lose what she was building. While it was a bit selfish it wasn't the norm for her. She knows that she's going to hurt after this fight, if she gets to walk out of it. She tries to block the next strike from one of the Dominions, trying to keep them from breaking the lines.

She calls something out to Atilla in Romanian and the dragon goes around for a second pass at the line of Dominions.

Cael Becker has posed:
    Cael hisses at the pain shooting up her arm from her bracer. Okay - maybe she doesn't try that again against angelic weaponry.
    Suriel's glee and delight catches Cael a bit off-guard - but she finds herself returning the smile, even letting out a laugh as she pulls the blade of her axe free, and the pair continue to exchange blows. Cael catches the swing of Suriel's axe across the top of her own, deflecting it down to the side with considerable effort, before quickly bringing her blade back up in a swipe toward's the angel's face, only to find her blow blocked by the haft of Suriel's weapon. The two continue, exchanging blow for blow, Cael's expression fading into another wince as she attempts to block another blow - but it slide down the haft of her own weapon towards her own hand - which is only partially protected by the bracers, leaving a deep cut that smears the handle of her axe with blood.
    All this while, Cael has been in the air, she falling back from Suriel's repeated attacks - bringing her closer and slower to the Thrones assaulting Jon. In a quick movement that leaves her open and vulnerable - as she only has one hand one her two handed weapon - she pulls grenade free of her bandolier and tosses it into the center of one of the Thrones - before attempting to dive clear of the impending explosion.

Johnny Blaze has posed:
"You forget Michael, I am that which avenges the world!"

A second voice emerges. "And right now, we're gonna kick your ass."

Michael comes at him and Ghost Rider meets his fist. The clash is enough to rattle the ground, but it sends Ghost Rider back into a column. "Weak." The Rider leans forward and lunges at Michael, attempting to tackle the Archangel hard, and attempting further to just rain down blows. "If I see Lucifer..." Both voices speak and he stares at Michael as the 666 degree hellfire starts to burn brighter, expanding, consuming. An aura of power.

"How does it feel to be stained by a demon?"

Internally, Zarathos and Johnny watch the battle in the soul of Blaze. "I don't know if we can beat him, but damned if I'll try." Zarathos growls. <<On this, for once...we agree.>>

Michael Demiurgos has posed:
    The pillars of flame sizzle against the sand as it pours over them. It starts as sparks. The individual grains sparking off as they are superheated beyond any measure of sustaining their crystaline structure. Then more sparks and offshoots of flame as the sand becomes more than the fire can directly obliterate. The pouring of sand starts to congeal and melt as a singular mass as it spills over the flaming twisters. If Terry's plan is to work it's going to take some time.

    The Thrones disnegage from their beams on the barrier and instead turn to the Resistance forces and their DRAGON. Beams fire at the black-scaled ancient beast but it manages to doge them, sending corruscating marks along the ancient walls of the church. Two of the Resistance forces fall under the sweeping beams, their remains nothing but a small pile of ashes as the intense beams destroy every trace of the human they once were.

    Selaphiel presses his advantage and that is when Sarah makes her attack. The ice in his eyes disorients him for a split second, which is all the Rainmaker needs to encase its back with ice as well. The torrent that flares up catches it and sends it into one of the massive pillars toward the back of the church. The Archangel impacts it with thunderous force, sending cracks and dents all along the pillar's monolithic form. He looks surprises and smiles. "Good. Good. You're learning." He vanishes and reappears behind the Rainmaker slamming his mace into her back with superhuman strength. "You speak of religion. We are beyond such things, child." He says as he presses his strikes. "You were given free will. To do with as you please. Such is your right. We are not given such freedom. We are soldiers and as such we follow the orders of our commander lest we be unmade or Fall. Even I am not sure which is the worst result."

    Terry's Chaos wave forms the legos into something not unlike a Gundam. It's not as large, as the numbers within the church are not so great as those without, but the modified angelic forms are just as sturdy as their more humanoid counterparts. Soon enough a 9 foot tall exosuit of angelic armor stands ready for the Cheshire Cat to utilize with blasphemous authority.

    Another of the Dominions fall under the ancient fire of the dragon as he belches green flame upon it. But the final one moves in towards Veira and Looks upon her. There is a pressure in that gaze, a psychic assault unlike anything on this Earth. ~We are not your enemies~ the compulsion intones in her mind. ~Turn against those who impede us. Stop the agent of Chaos in your midst.~

    Suriel's fight with Cael is a thing of elegant and barbaric beauty. The two figures swing and parry and clash against one another axe to axe, armor to armor. As Suriel sees an advantage her eyes light with glee. "We've got to do this again sometime." She bats the axe from Cael's two handed grip and kicks the Agent in the midsection with inhuman speed and force sending her across the field and not far from Jon's firey barrier. Just as the grenade explodes beneath one of the Thrones. There is a tritone eruption as the fire engulfs the multi-eyed angel as it spirals out before crashing into the side of the building its many wheels slowing and the form of it turning to stone as it dies.

Michael Demiurgos has posed:
    Michael engages the Ghost Rider in a more gargantuan struggle. The two behemoths, one of hell one heaven, struggle against each other. There is a split second as Michael turns his gaze to Jon's finish of the sixth circle and he takes the punishment of it as the Rider's fist smashes into his face once again. This time the damage is shown as blood spills from the Archangel's lip and nose. "Enough!" Michael shouts and the Rider can see that even at his strongest Michael has leagues over him. He manages to get an hand around the burning leather coat of the Rider and says, "I would struggle with you all day were I not on a schedule Blaze. But I have another target in this fight." With incomparable ease he flings the ghost rider into one the giant pillars at the back of the church. The force of the impact would break a normal human into composite bone dust and skin, but the Rider is far from a normal human.

    Michael turns his attention again to Jon and flashes like a comet to impact the barrier. It's a statement of clarity that the supreme mystical power of the Throne's beams was not enough to stop the barrier, but Michael slams into it bodily and it shatters, another lance of golden metal appears in his hands as he falls upon the Archivist with all his terrible wrath.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    For a moment, the whole damn spell wavers, because Jon can /feel/ Cael's pain, even across the room. He winces in time with his girlfriend, and reminds himself that he trusts her. He just has to put down one more ring. Just /one/ more, and they're done. But in that moment, he can't /focus/, above the smell of burning oil and the screams of agony.

    The Thrones burn people down. /His/ people. His people are dying. Cael goes flying across the room. The water inside him, healing and emotion, rises up, threatening to flood everything, to drown the fire he's working in a wave of pain and regret.

    Then there is a new kind of fire in the room--the fire of the desert. The hot wind of the Sahara, blasting through Terry's Rabbit Hole along with the sand. Sekhmet's breath, washing over Jon and reminding him of the reason, down underneath everything else, that he's doing all this--for what better reason is there to save the world than to ensure it still exists for the next generation? Jon's daughter holds the power of Sekhmet, the Eye of Ra, the flames of vengeance.

    Whatever the Ghost Rider says about himself, for Jon it is Sekhmet that is vengeance, and righteous fury. and her breath blows through Jon with a whisper of the voice of his daughter's mother, who also carried Sekhmet's power. He can do this. He has the Lady of Slaughter beside him, and he can /do/ this.

    He raises his staff and makes the final ring of fire, lays it down atop the other six. The spell stabilizes, creates the Flower of Life, and Jon pulls out a vial of soil from beneath Grand Central Station. He sprinkles it over the hexafoil in the center, solidifying the spell.

    Red light flashes out of the room, across the length of Central Park and into Jon's office at Grand Central, where a vial of soil from beneath the cathedral sits. Golden light flashes back and connects the petal of the giant hexafoil to this smaller node. The seal is completed.

    Jon turns away from the spell just in time to face Michael's charge. His eyes widen, and he has no time to defend himself. His staff goes flying some distance away and clatters on the floor as the archangel's lance strikes him in the right shoulder, in the precise spot where Cael stabbed him with a nail weeks before. The act pins Jon to the altar, and for a moment he stares up into the face of the archangel with nothing but naked fear in his gaze.

    The thing about Jon, though, is that his fight-or-flight response is... mostly stuck on 'fight.'

    "Get /off/ me, you /fucking prick/!" Jon snarls. He grabs the lance with his left hand and thrums magical force down into the thing, enhancing his own strength as he twists and breaks the lance off. It disintegrates almost immediately, but Jon barely notices--he flings his hand out to press it on Michael's chest and hits him with the full force of Sekhmet's wrath, a breath of desert wind throwing heat and force at the archangel, intended to force him up and off the Archivist. And hopefully right up into the ceiling.

Sarah Rainmaker has posed:
Damned thing is faster than she was expecting. So as Sarah's going to try and follow up her attack over and charging at the demon then it would teleport behind her faster than she could manage. SHe's too slow to whirl around and defend herself, even as the strike goes to her back. She's able to twist just enough that it doesn't snap her spine in two, but there's still the -pop- of something breaking (namely her ribs) and of something -just- missing going through a lung. She's spitting out blood and dropping the spear over on the ground in agony. But she can still feel pain. So she's not paralyzed.
    Shooting back at Selaphiel, "'Just following orders' is not an accepted excuse. It is no justification. You are guilty of everything no matter what. You follow your commander along then no matter what happens and you cannot decide for yourselves." Spitting out blood, focusing, and calculating trajectoires and stalling, one hand on her busted ribs. "An dif your commander is -wrong- then the price is not only -you- but also us. And you don't even stop to consider anything beyond that he says so." The words spat out, her trying to stall while holding her hand on her stomach like she were holding in her guts. Desperately seeking for an idea.
    And she can only think back to the past..
    In a spar with the man who rescued her, an ancient leviathan with scars on his face. Her having two practice blades drawn and pointed at him. 'What is a warriorw ithout weapons?' Her taunting at him even as he had nothinga nd she was ready to 'finish' him. And in the memory JOhn Lynch would grin.
    'A warrior still'. The memory going with sand in her eyes while he would kick her off her feet.
    Another memory. A rage and fight, sometime after she had seen what had been done to her siblings and yelling. 'You're ancient! Decrepit! What can you possibly do?' Another memory of her lashing, once again on her back and the old mn, eternally patienta nd never smug, going..
    'Improvise'.

Sarah Rainmaker has posed:
    And then Rainmaker goes to curl up and over on one hand. She's grabbing at her dropped spear, and sending it through the air on her winds.. But instead of at Selaphiel, she would hurl it right towards Suriel.. Then a gust and a ricochet to try and have it rebound right over through the wing of MIchael across the room! Trying to if possible leave him as a skewered one wing angel upon his own blood.
    Hand snapping up into the air, bringing on the snow from outside as there would be a blast of frost, steam, and ice i the area around her even as the spear would arc around again, back towards the head of Selaphiel, presuming he had been following it through the air as it would ricochet and rebound around like the shield of that most famous defender and avenger.. Presuming he's going to leap and dodge from it or go to defend himself from what is clearly blasting at him..
    Then Sarah goes to try and light up his wings with several million joules of lightning.
    While in her mind hearing the laughter of that old, scarred man. That had saved her. That she hated.
    The rest of the battle is for now only given a passing thought as she's trying to simply ensure that she's staying alive.. Seeing Cael vulnerable and in danger no matter what as Michael goes to charge at Jonathan and no matter what.. All these have her once again hurling the spear over towards her confederate in arms even as she just tries to keep up the lightning going to hit her own adversary again and again along his wings. Using them as conductors to try and get more energy into him.
    "Because you seem quite willing to damn us all for someone who may or may not be right and so happy to just say 'because we had to'."

Terry O'Neil has posed:
So why is St. John The Divine so important to Terry O'Neil?

"You show that fucking prick, Jon!"
"Terry"
"Kick his goddamned ass!"
"TERRY!"
"Send him back to fucki-"
"TERRY AINE O'NEIL"

Middle name invoked. Oh shit.

"s o r r y m o m"
"Alright then," says Agatha, as she fires another round into the nearest heavenly creature.

This is that place, the year of Terry's highschool graduation, when a famous greek singer held a reprise of her famous 'Concert for Peace' from eighteen years earlier, where Terry and his mom had attended by sheer luck (his mom had gotten the tickets from a client.) It was there, as the bespectacled woman sang in a voice he swore couldn't really be of this earth, that he finally admitted a lot of things about himself. And after the concert they had gone and eaten out, and they had talked, and he had /said/ things, and they had cried, and a lot of things had become very clear. It had been the start of a different time.

"The Thrones are still firing, Terry," Agatha says, ducking behind a column to reload.
"Right, mom."

And he has a /mecha/. Well, a LEGO mecha, in any case. A burst of light, and he is suddenly in a purple and white zentai, with a helmet shaped in the head of a Cheshire Cat, the dark visor in place of the grin. "Go Go Cheshire Angels!" he shouts, first pointed upwards-

And the Mecha springs to action, leaping through a Rabbit Hole that it barely manages to clear by a foot, and emerges behind one of the Thrones, reaching out to grab it and /squeeze/ in the hopes that it will fire one of its beams, which the mecha can then try to turn against either the other Thrones, or the Seraphim. He's not picky at this point.

Veira Lazarescu has posed:
"Atilla, Inapoi, nu mai vrem morti!" Lazarus calls out to Atilla, pulling the dragon from the battle. She wasn't wanting to be the cause of more Agents dying. There was enough death...and that coming from the Avatar of a Death Goddess was saying something. Ahem.

When the Dominion bares down on her there's a strain in her features, her eye blazing that deep orange as she focuses on it for the moment. Her gaze goes to where Terry is, thinking for a moment. Then the woman flips her knife in her hands as she starts to breathe heavily. Something was warring. Two voices. One of them was definitely not hers. But whatever is said in her mind is decided and she rushes...

Straight at the Dominion. The blade of her combat knife is pointed /towards/ her though. Which given the madness that is this place no one would really notice. She goes in for a tackle. Planning to use her body as leverage to take down the Dominion. In that madness the blade would drive deep into her heart, causes the richest of bloods to spill.

There's a shock of pain that bleeds out into a scream as she brings her bloody hand up, pressing it to the angels head and scrawling ancient tongues onto it, "I'm going to need you to die..." she whispers as she bleeds all of her magical energy into that Angel...both physically and mentally.

Cael Becker has posed:
    Cael's eyes go wide as her axe is knocked free - and she's kicked across the room, landing hard with the wind knocked out of her. She barely has time to recover, however, as she watches Michael charging past her - hitting Jon's barrier and shattering it, before pinning him down with his spear. No. No no no no-
    "GET OFF HIM YOU FUCKING PRICK!"
    She's on her feet, ignoring the pain in her side, the ringing in her ears, as she holds out her hand towards her axe. It starts sliding across the floor - and then flies through the air, landing neatly in her outstretched hand. A clatter nearby alerts her to the spear - thrown off course by the force of wind Jon had summoned. She stoops momentarily to pick it up, as she charges at Michael from behind, wings beginning to beat to speed her progress and keep her foe within her reach. The axe she carries swings once more at the Archangel's pristine wing, while she tries to skewer him through the torso with the spear. There's more rage and desperation in her assault than stategy and finesse in this moment, as Cael fights against the terror in her heart.
    Not yet. Not yet. She's not ready to lose Jon yet. It's too soon. They don't have a //plan// yet. They aren't ready yet.

Johnny Blaze has posed:
Vengeance is vengeance.

Whether they be gods of incarnations, they off serve the same goals as much as they serve different means. But the Rider was unyielding. Even though they despise each other, Johnny and Zarathos would gladly work together to ensure justice done. Michael is no exception to this. Yet, all the same, the darkness was falling. The battle raged. Ghost Rider made Michael bleed. He struggles against Michael, meeting his every blow, grappling him like Jacob did with the Angel Peniel so many centuries and millennia ago.

He does not yield.

Even still, the Rider is thrown off of the Archangel and smashes straight into a column. A second. A third. dropping onto its knees in a harsh landing upon contact with the fourth. With a growl, the Rider rises back to its feet. Unbroken, where a normal human would've easily died.

Ghost Rider stands up, and watches Michael go after Jon. But then he sees Sarah. He sees her wounds. Her hurt. The Ghost Rider defends the innocent.

The chain flies forth, attempting to wrap itself around Selaphiel.

"Not today."

He yanks the chain with the same force that drew first blood from the favored Archangel, intending and trying to yank Selaphiel over to him and try in the same move to punch him in the chest, as if to punch a hole. But Archangels were mighty indeed. It seems Johnny will try his damndest to save Sarah's life.

Michael Demiurgos has posed:
    Michael takes the blast full on. The strength of the powerful of the Egyptian gods combined with the force of Gaea running through the Champion's veins is more than he anticipated. He goes up. And up and up he slams against the roof of the church, shattering a large hole as he continues up.

    The spear launched by Sarah almost manages to end Suriel but the Archangel sacrifices its weapon to deflect the blow, the axe is obliterated by the Archangel infused spear. And while it misses Michael, it lands close enough to Cael to be effective.

    Sarah's hands fire lighting strong enough to destroy cities into the Archangel. As Johnny's chain wraps around the being's form the electricity cascades over his entirety. Physics fail as Johnny pulls and instead the Ghost Rider is drawn toward the Archangel with breakneck speeds. The punch, combined with the lighting, is defeaning ad there is a shattering sound as the armor of the archangel shatters against the rage of the Ghost Rider.

    There is a clicking sound and Selpahiel is just -gone-. Suriel looks on with one hand in the aftermath of a snapping of fingers. "This was so much fun" it says merrily, blood still spilling from the wound in its side. "Really ought to do it again. Good luck with..." It gestures up and then it too disappears in a flash of violet light.

    The pillars of glass that had once been fire tonados stand static and beautiful in the church: Seraphim contained. Terry's tactic with the Throne seems to work. The angelic heavy artillery fires another blast in surprise and Terry uses angel against angel, shearing through the other two Thrones. There is a discordant bell, the sound of thousand grand pianos out of tune and air rushes in to fill the vacuum left where there once was the form of the angels. Leaving the Cheshire Cat holding what is the spent slowly fossilizing form of a dying Throne.

    Veira's scarling on the Dominion and the blood of her life pouring out onto it causes it to convlse with spasms as cracks appear over it's face. The form of its physical shell shatters revealing a being of amorphous light beneath. The blood spills onto it and there is a sound of mourning as the lifeblood of a mortal burns into the unshielded flesh of an angel. The light of the form goes out and Veira's bleeding body rests atop a bed of soft feathers, the remains of the Dominion in its death.

    Cael's rage forces her to charge after the prone form of Michael. His eyes widen as he comes to and realizes he is unable to guard in his state. The spear pierces his side. Going through armor and angelic flesh like paper as blood pours from the wound. Likewise her viscious axe takes off the Archangel's wing, blood erupting from the massive apendage and the stump left over from the brutality of the attack.

    Michael grips at the spear, pain and what might be amusement warring on his face. "You're going to need to go higher..." he breathes out as blood pours from his mouth. Cracks begin to appear over his form, light blossoming out from the parting of skin and what lies beneath. Jon, Cael, Johnny and Sara have seen this before. Michael is going nuclear in his 'death' throes.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    Jon didn't exactly expect to throw Michael /through the roof/. His pushes himself to his feet, eyes widening, as he watches his girlfriend fly up after Michael. As she /removes his wing/, and stabs him with the spear. For a moment he just gapes at her, because... she's /beautiful/. All he sees is her aura, her fire, spilling out past the way it's usually dulled, her rage and pain and fear embodied as blazing light that overpowers everything else in his Sight. A mortal woman, empowered by the magic of a warrior, not a god. And yet, she's destroyed Michael's form /twice/ now--and this time, without even any help from Lady Death.

    Oh, /shit/.

    "TAKE COVER!" he shouts, his voice enhanced by magic. He, however, does not drop down. He pulls his staff to him with a blast of wind, and slams the butt of it into the ground, thrusting his left hand up into the air. A barrier springs forth from his hand, a weave of deep green that starts as a bubble around him. He pushes it out, further and further, past the dying angels and the other members of the resistance, to encompass the whole of the church. He's not going to let Michael's Holy Nuke hurt any of his people or revive any angels. Not this time.

    <<CAEL!>> he screams at her telepathically. She's probably too far to hear his voice. <<CAEL, COME BACK HERE, PLEASE!! /LEAVE HIM/!!>>

    He's screaming her name aloud, too. "CAEL!!"

Sarah Rainmaker has posed:
The wildly darting spear takes most of Sarah's energy and focus, it's all she can mostly do to follow the battle as Jon was pursued and chased and seemed the -crux- of the battle. On that particular twist the fate of the battle, if nto perhpas this war might lie on how it ended. So all she could do was her part as braced up and go to keep on blasting with all her energy. It's nothing, perhaps in the greater scheme of things even as she can barely move beyond as the Arhangel is posed over her. Only the brutal charge of the Ghost Rider slamming into it saving her from being finished off. She can only stare wide eyed over at this and start to retch up blood. Now is not the time. She can bleed to death later. She moves to simply take a hand and take as much ice as she could to put it over her stomach and her chest to numb it. Just for a few seconds. Just enough to ot drop and relax as she curses herself for an even greater error in a fight. Losing track of her weapon. No.. Wait..
    Who did she send it to? She can't keep track of who is alive and who is not. Just that she seems to be slipping from one world to the other, and is not sure which is which. So now all she can do is force hereslf up.. At least, what diretion seht hinks is up. And can only look over at Michael starting to break up again.
    "He turns into a neutron.." She's murmuring to himself. "But pops back later. Or.." She would slowly focus. "It will.. Destroy things but.." The words are spoken to herslf and seeming to fade over. She can't breathe. But she forces herself to.
    She's seen that -thing- and.. She focuses, trying to draw power. There is.. Yelling? Yes.. Yelling. Something something.. Cael?
    She can focus now, energy coherent. She would look and see a long, long rope. A worn one. Perhaps stored up in an attic somewhere? SHe's going to take a hand out towards it.. And fingers go to tie a very, very horrible knot through the blood seeping down to it. Going to then try and with one final thrust of her powers before collapse hurl the rope towards the air for someone to pass along to. Someone to try and wrap over Cael or pull her back inw ith if need be. Beyond that.. Beyond that Sarah Rainmaker is rather busy now, please call back later.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
The Cheshire LegoMechaCat stands awkwardly for a second, staring at the body of the angel. "... sorry dude, but you're, like, literally trying to kill us. So, not sorry." He tosses the dying Throne aside.

And then Michael starts going nuclear.

"Oh fuck you, Michael!" no protests from Agatha this time, "You are such a goddamned drama queen..."

But suddenly his face grows concerned. Sarah is down. And Veira looks... like she's dying. Far too many Agents have died already.

"Mom? MOM?"

Agatha vanishes behind a column, already making her way towards cover. A quick command and the Gundam is streaking towards Sarah, as he himself runs towards Veira, both will try to grab each and run towards the cover provided by Jon. Jon is screaming for Cael, so there's not much /he/ can do... but there is one thing he might.

He remembers the report of how Michael exploding brought the dead angels back to life. As he pants and looks for cover, hauling Veira with him, he opens the Sahara Rabbit Hole again. He is going to try to scoop up as many dead angels as possible as fast as he can and dump them out in the desert, away from Super Saiyan Michael.

"Come on, stay with me, stay with me!" he says to Veira. Because people totally will refuse to die if you just yell at them enough.

Veira Lazarescu has posed:
Agent Lazarus keeps murmuring and chanting even as she's bleeding to death. It's not until the woman is brought to her senses and that the angel is dead that she tries to sit up. Her blood is already covering a good spot of the floor. She reaches out to grab a handful of the angel feathers, opens the pocket on her vest and then drops them in with a little nod to herself.

She tries to stand, but she falters, instead she drags herself towards one of the overturned tables, but Vorpal tries to get her up and she manages to get up and she uses the time to draw the knife from her chest and resheathe it on her hip. "They wanted me to kill you or my dragon...or myself." she whispers to Vorpal with a chuckle. "I'm sorry." she whispers to him as she feels her legs give out. Atilla appears next to them, "Shall I go to the Silver Fox?" he asks her. This causes her to nod, "Yes, noggin' first." she whispers to the dragon before she leans her head against his. There's a little exchange of words in Romanian, but the last sound from her is the blood gurgling up from her throat as she dies.

Cael Becker has posed:
    Cael smirks with satisfaction, though as the cracks of golden light begin to play across her features, she at least has the grace to say, "Whoops." That's ruined completely by adding, "Sorry 'bout that, fuck face."
    She's not about to let several blocks get leveled by Michael going nuclear, though. If they're lucky the buildings nearby truly are abandoned. But with their luck? There are people still taking refuge nearby. "Sorry Jon," she murmurs as her wings start beating, taking her and Michael high and higher into the atmosphere, as she tries to judge how long before he explodes - and how high she has to go to protect the city, and her friends.
    Higher and higher she goes, beating the black wings at her back for all they're worth, as her chest aches, and her head rings from for the force of the impact Suriel had hit her with earlier. Not far enough.
    Higher and higher - past the tallest of the skyscrapers. Past a flock of geese. Finally, a glance down tells her - probably good enough. She pulls the spear free, as she starts her plummet back to the Earth, hoping to create enough space between her and Michael before he goes off. Just as she's turning away from him, though, one of the larger cracks seems to burst with blinding light.
    "Oh shi-"

Johnny Blaze has posed:
*BOOM!*

The Ghost Rider may have been unprepared for the inverse of physics, but the Archangel seemed unprepared for the wrath of vengeance. The wrath of Hell unleashed. After Selaphiel seemingly is destroyed by the Rider's fist shattering it's armor and through it's being, the demon turns its full attention to the display of Jon's smiting blow and Cael taking care of the business.

"...innocent." The Rider states with a growl of embers and hellflame. Yet he looks behind him, seeing Sarah as she tries to get herself fixed up. The Rider doesn't take cover, rather covering Sarah with it's own demonic skeletal form, as if to try and take the blast in her stead if Jon's shield can't get to them. The Rider -might- be able to take the blast. But Sarah? He has to help her. So he moves to cover her as soon as she falls down.

This is gonna hurt.

Michael Demiurgos has posed:
    Michael erupts in the uppermost levels of the troposphere; a blazing light brighter than the noonday sun. Fortunately for Cael, she was far enough away that the explosive force that strikes her is only marginally less than that of the atomic bomb tests in Nevada in the 50s. It sends her hurtling back down toward the church. The blast continues downward and upward in a cascade of light and force.

    The blast strikes Jon's barrier over the church and surprisingly the barrier holds... but only barely.

    Even with the barrier the very foundations of the church shake and shudder as the wave topples the remains of a pillar and a number of stones to the ground around the combatants. A few slam into the body of the Ghost Rider as he covers Sarah and another few hammer into Terry's mech, as it protects the Resistance forces. But beyond that, the church is still standing.

    Outside, only one of the buildings topples and falls, but most civilians had been evacuated from this district.

    And a singlular form continues to plumet, dark wings encasing their owner in as much of a protective barrier as they can manage after having sustained the equivalent of a direct nuclear blast wave to the face.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    A pillar falls, stones fall, but the barrier holds. Another agent dies nearby, as Terry begs her to stay alive, and Jon doesn't know that she'll come back. It's one more thing in the periphery of Jon's vision, one more drip of the drip, drip, drip of pressure on him. Sarah Rainmaker is bleeding out. Drip, drip, drip. He should heal them. He has the energy to do so.

    He can't seem to see anything but Cael falling out of the sky, that tiny speck marring the light of Michael's blast.

    He isn't even aware of manifesting wings until he's already fifty feet in the air. They appear attached to his arms, rows of feathers in gold and blue and green, the wings of Ma'at. He crouches and then springs up, grabbing the rope that Sarah throws as he goes and throwing it around his waist, securing it with magic rather than a knot--glue summoned from the Astral, really. He's going to need a way to hold onto Cael, with his arms busy with flight.

    It's easier than he thought it would be; all that off-and-on studying of aerodynamics filled him with worry that flying was /hard/. But somehow, Jon just seems to instinctively know what to do. Hot winds carry him up and up, past his barrier, to meet Cael as she falls down. He reaches out to grab her and wraps the rope around her, using it to anchor her to him with more of that astral glue. "It's okay," he says, his words whisked away by the wind at that height. "It's okay, love. I've got you."

    Of course, he's also got to manage to fly them back down instead of just plummeting back to Earth himself, but at least he's /conscious/ to do so.

Sarah Rainmaker has posed:
Sarah Rainmaker is dragged along behind cover. The Ghost Rider protecting her with his form. Sarah Rainmaker herself is past the point of being able to properly focus as one of her busted ribs is at a point where it's about to pop a lung, the fully severed bone popping over in a squishing way that with each breath would have it trembling just a litlte more as it's like part of her chest is nearly to the point of unhooking itself as things would detonate through the city.
    Somehow through this she's still conscious, managing to twist her head enough to the side and point her throat downwards and shift her position to try and prevent herself from making her situation worse. The shaking makes it harder, even as she's trying to not gurgle, leaning her head forwards as a hand (she's not sure which one, her right or her left) going to press to her throat (or maybe her chest) to try and thicken it over with ice, attempting to make a solid block over herself.
    Is it instinctive? Automatic? SHe's..
    STill conscious and breathing. Somehow.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"Miss?"

The rumble has passed, and the Cheshire cat is kneeling on the ground, trying to shake the agent a little. Even though he heard that sound. He knows what it means. "... come on now," he says, his voice very quiet, "Don't do this. We won."

"Terry."

Agatha O'Neil, harried and bleeding from a few spots, though none of them of immediate concern, stands over her son. "Terry... it's ok. Let her be."
"... but mom, she-"
"It's okay."

Terry blinks back tears and slowly lets Veira's body down on the floor as respectfully as he can, not looking at the blood on his fur. A number of people died today. It's just that this is technically the first person to ever die in his arms. It is hard to tell whether the impact would have been lessened had he known she was an immortal. Not likely.
"I-"
"Shh. It's okay," Agatha says quietly, and hugs her son. Terry returns the hug but doesn't say anything more for the moment, his body tense like a whip as it holds things in that are just going to be released a little later. After they've dealt with the aftermath.

Johnny Blaze has posed:
The columns fall on the Ghost Rider, thankfully managing to prevent Sarah from getting squished by falling rocks, some of which smash and bounce off of the Ghost Rider's back. Standing up straight, the Rider bursts free of rubble, even as it looks around to try and find Sarah. Find her it does, and it kneels down as if to look upon her. It reaches, not to judge, not to bring that feeling of death and damnation.

But of comfort. No doubt Johnny's influence as the Ghost Rider fades away, leaving only Johnny Blaze where the skeletal nightmare once stood. A small smile on his face. "You did good." Johnny tells her, attempting to comfort her even as pain courses through her body.

A hand to rest on her shoulder if permitted.

But she's alive. Her own efforts to save herself are not interrupted. Though Johnny looks around, a panting noise escaping him. "Did we win?" He questions somebody.

Anybody. Even as he looks up. Terry's calls for Veira are not missed, and he frowns a moment as Johnny stands to his full height. "Fuck." Did Johnny just curse in a church?

Michael Demiurgos has posed:
    There is silence and stillness in the church and then the voice of Michael echoes through. There is not definitive source of his voice it just comes through. "Well done, Jonathan. Well done, indeed." There is amusement in his tone. "I had thought you incapable of proving a definite match against me. But it seems that I must thank Jerahmeel for his intervention. Sometimes the wisdom of my brethen is lost to me in the immediate."

    There is a pause. "I do hope you have learned to improve the speed of your seals. For from here on out, I will come for you directly." Another pause. "All of you performed admirably and you have my respect for it. But I will not stop until this is over."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    Jon is flying back down into the church by the time Michael's voice echoes through it, Cael's unconscious form tied to him firmly. He doesn't quite stick the landing, but another woven green barrier protects them both from damage. He crouches near the altar, wings still manifested, laying Cael gently on the floor and checking her over.

    "I offered you the chance for a real game," Jon says, not taking his eyes off of Cael. "People /died/. Fuck you, and fuck your 'respect.' I neither want nor need it."

    He looks up, finally, and says, "I know you, now. I know who you would be to my ancestors. Horus the Great, protector of Egypt, the one whom the pharoahs reflected in life. Keeper of order." There's a circlet on his brow, now, bearing an ostrich feather. "This is not the way. We follow neither Lucifer nor Set. This battle will gain you no throne, nor unify the land. You have forgotten your purpose." He shakes his head. "This is no /game/, Saint Michael. This is a king who has fallen to /isfet/. The damage I did to your wing merely reflects the damage you carry in your heart."

    He looks back down at Cael. "Go, and leave us to tend our dead." He closes his eyes, and a breath of wind whispers out through the church, a ripple of healing that, while it cannot revive the dead, will stabilize and heal even those at the brink. With it comes energy, refreshing and revitalizing all within the building.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
Terry steps back from the hug, tears running down his cheeks but an expression of absolute and complete fury on his face. He takes a deep breath and speaks, his voice augmented by a wave of uncontrolled chaos. "Go fuck yourself you celestial goose- go find a Christmas treetop to sit on, you ramshackle recidivist tinfoil-toting second-hand taxicab dashboard ornament! Respect? Who the fuck do you think you are? Aretha Franklin? Bitch you're not even worthy of kissing the sole of her acrylic heels!" There is so much chaos magic flowing through him that some of his words actually turn blue and speed off in a streak.

He huffs. Anger is good. Anger hides pain and fear, that's what it's there for most of the time. "I'm gonna go help take the injured back to medical, mom," he says quietly again, voice in that 'close to breaking' mode. She nods and gives his shoulder a squeeze, and then he turns around to get busy, ready to Rabbit Hole the injured to medical attention. They will take care of the dead after that.

Cael Becker has posed:
    Cael wakes up with a pounding headache - looking up at Jon, the light from the hole in the ceiling framing him - and making him hard to look at with the pain in her head. "Hey love," she breathes quietly. "I got him."
    Her gaze drops away from Jon's face, wreathed in bright light, and towards his arms instead - confusion showing on her features, followed by understanding.
    "Oh. I'm dreaming. I'll wake up later," she decides, closing her eyes - as the armor, wings and axe both receed with a brief flare of her own light, leaving just the amulet sitting on her chest.

Johnny Blaze has posed:
Johnny hears the voice of Michael coming through the church, and Johnny seems to let his head fall back. Though he turns his head to Jon as he approaches, as if to check on Cael. "She gonna be okay?" He questions him, though his question is quickly answered when Cael answers that she's dreaming." He suggests, and he chuckles a little bit.

"Scaring all of us." Johnny comments to Cael, though his attention shifts to Jon himself, a brow raising. "Since when the hell did you have wings?" Johnny asks. It feels like everyone is undergoing a metamorphosis - hopefully for the better!

Though, as if joining Terry in cursing out Michael, Johnny lifts his head towards the empty space.

"See you in Round Two, Mike."

Michael Demiurgos has posed:
    Michael pauses before he replies. When he does there is venom in his tone. "You words are truth, Archivist. In as much as you understand it. But do not think that your victory here means anything more than delay of the inevitable." He pauses. "I will come as an agent of God's Wrath upon this world and nothing you or anyone else will do will stop that from being the end of this. Prepare your wounded, and your dead and yourselves most of all, for my counterstroke will be swift in its coming." There is a low thunderclap of the gronds fo the church and the angels--all of them--vanish from sight.