savetheearth | Hunting the Subway Sculptor

Well, this could have gone better. One moment, looking forward to uncovering the secrets of Locke City, the next, running for their lives.

The funny thing is, after all that conversation, she didn't even think to use the giant banana trick. Too busy running and screaming.

"Oh, no."

Even Kari of the hero complex was running hard. She held tightly onto her cage necklace, only occasionally looking back.

Winter didn't really need the hint to realize she was probably in over her head. But... these two were depending on her, right? If she didn't stand and fight, she'd be letting them down. And that didn't sit well with her at all.

"I'm... going to fight it!" Resolved, she started to turn and, in the same motion, Raquel obligingly turned into the cell-phone form she'd expected, and she gripped it in one hand, drawing the shiny Lovies pin thing she needed to transform. Hopefully nobody objected, because she was going to be really put out if she didn't get to do her thing.

"Hell, yeah! Kick its ass!"

Annie's flight slowed a bit. While she definitely didn't want to die, she also didn't want to miss seeing Winter throw down.

Kari skidded to turn around, kicking up a dust cloud. A hand went to her necklace, her eyes back and forth between the victims-to-be and the exit.

"Annie, Kari, g-get behind me...!" Skidding to a stop herself, face set in a grim expression, she shouted, "Precure Love Link!" Jamming the gold thing into the slot as she'd seen the first time, she burst into blue light; she willed it to go faster, and she seemed to skip over the rest, heels clicking briefly and hands coming up in the diamond shape, but having basically skipped the random things she'd heard herself shout the last time.

Wasting no time, Diamond shot forward. "Don't j-just stand there, get out of here! I c-can't do this forever!"

"Oh, no, you don't. I'm not running off and letting you die uselessly."

Kari unlatched the cage pendant and took out the purple pearl. It started to glow and then flashed in a white and purple light. When she emerged, her pearl was encased in a blue and white microphone decorated with shell buttons. She herself now had long purple hair, curled at the ends, and was wearing a white dress, boots, and gloves, all with purple accents.

If they really were on the same team, what was her name supposed to be? She'd remember that later.

Annie skidded to a stop herself, looking on with wide eyes as Winter and Kari transformed. Part of what made her stop was being in awe of the display of actual, real magic in front of her. Part of it was a strange, nagging sense of familiarity.

The third was the same sensation that had been making her run a moment before - the certainty of defeat. If she ran away now, she'd be abandoning Winter and Kari to their fates.

So, for the moment, she was rooted to the spot, trapped between fear of death and fear of betraying her friends.

Winter spent a long moment looking at Kari - she hadn't realized she'd actually had a magical form! - and then the snake was upon her. She again had no idea what to do with this thing; the last time she'd fought one, she'd punched it, thought she'd broken her hand, and then run off. So, searching for anything, and feeling desperate to protect Kari (whether she needed it or not) and Annie (who definitely did) she started to panic, wondering again if she was cut out for this.

Kari took a deep breath. This was what she had to do, right? She was protecting them. Even if, even if...

Music. Music could do anything, she remembered. Which must mean that microphone was for... singing? Singing was easy. Every pageant girl on the planet knew "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" off by heart. She wasn't remembering any magical songs, so a mundane one would have to do.

She breathed out a beginning note.

Music...? Well, that was new. Not that the whole form wasn't new, but hey, things took precedence.

Trying to focus on not tripping over her own two feet, she let her mind focus on a few specific things: making sure Annie didn't get killed, trying to actually deal with this thing somehow, and a silent prayer that Rikka had had something in her playbook to actually save them all, but for the moment she contented herself with setting up in front of it to try and block it from attacking the civilian and (apparently) songstress behind her.

Kari didn't have words at first. She just breathed in and sang, standing there unguarded save for Diamond blocking her. It was like a shaky, invisible wave was pushing against the monster or hurting its mind, if it had one. She started in on a song.

It was the most overused song in the entire circuit, but that was why she knew it the best.

That seemed like an opening to Winter - she charged, the speed and dexterity of Cure Diamond's form lending her grace she normally lacked. But once she got close enough to start pondering her attack, she felt the voice in her mind warning her again that her life was forfeit, and that was enough to eat her momentum, bringing her to a stop in front of the damned thing. That put its head right in striking distance, and in a panic she ducked under it as it came, just enough to hold it off with her bare hands. She felt good about that, really - from being flat-footed to somehow blocking!

That was when the tail hit her.

She was so occupied with the threat in front of her, she didn't bother to keep an eye on the snake's tail, and it swiped at her, launching her into the wall with a painful cry; she slid down it and landed in a heap on the ground, whimpering. Apparently even magical costumes weren't perfect. The thought moved through her head that she'd left Kari and Annie in danger, but her limbs weren't responding to her just now, and she watched through the stars in her eyes as it continued its approach, blue nuisance handily removed.

That stopped Kari. And the voice came back, saying you're all as good as dead, you can't possibly win, as the snake advanced and Kari groped for words or music or anything. It darted at her and she barely moved enough that it only hit her microphone. The pearl-encrusted karaoke accessory skipped like a rock down the dusty tunnel, the case making a cracking noise.

And with that a good ways away, Kari's eyes went dull. She dropped to her knees and then face down on the ground.

Holy shit, did she just die?

"Winter! KARI!"

Operating purely on blind, insane adrenaline, Annie charged, with no plan beond putting herself between the snake and her friends.

"Don't you dare touch my... friends..."

And then that nagging sense of familiarity clicked into place. She had been in this situation before, and she knew what to do. Not even taking enough time to be surprised at the red ribbon pin that wasn't in her hand just a second ago, she reached not for any improvised weapon, but for the Smile Pact.

"PRECURE! SMILE CHARGE!"

One mildly embarrassing transformation sequence later, Cure Sunny stared the monster down for only a moment before doing the mother of all double-takes at herself. "Oh my god, I actually transformed! OH MY GOD, what the hell am I wearing?!"

Winter's vision had started to clear by the time the orange light settled, but she clearly heard the announcement that sounded more familiar than she'd expected. "Cure... Sunny?" That kicked her head into gear, and she finally got a hold of herself. "There are... more Precure?"

Forcing herself to her feet, swaying for a second, Winter only just realized Kari seemed to have disappeared - and then she found the girl collapsed. "Kari? Kari! Come on, get up...!" She'd caught the jangling as the microphone bounced down the tunnel, and she wondered for a moment if it was important somehow; either way, she wasn't going to leave Kari here to have her body (she refused to call it a corpse) damaged. Slinging the girl over her shoulder was easy with her strength enhanced by her Precure form, and Diamond backed down the hallway, away from the snake. "Annie... can I a-ask you to take care of things for a second? I n-need to move Kari...!"

OH RIGHT, there's a life-or-death struggle going on. "Leave the heavy lifting to me!"

Apparently she meant that literally, as Cure Sunny then proceeded to charge right at the snake during a moment of hesitation, physically lifted the impossibly heavy statue over her head, and flung it at full force back down the tunnel it came from with a primal battle scream.

It landed with a crash and a billowing cloud of dust, but it wasn't long before movement stirred the cloud. This wasn't going to buy them much time.

She spared a moment to look behind her. That moment was enough for her eyes to widen as the girl picked up a statue made of marble and threw it down the hallway. "You're amazing...!" She couldn't help but feel her mood lift - if Annie had been a Precure for all of sixty seconds and she could do this, who knew what she would be able to do later?

But she shook herself and hurried further down the hallway, trusting Annie to disengage and follow when she could. The microphone had bounced this way, right...? Even if it wasn't necessarily related to Kari's sudden fit of terminal unconsciousness, she'd need it back, probably. Where was it... wait, what was that shining over against the wall there?

"Whatever you're doing, do it faster!"

Here comes Cure Sunny, energy redirected from throwing statues to running like the wind. As dramatic as the throw was, the snake was largely unharmed, and rapidly picking up momentum again.

"I'm w-working on it...!" Still carrying Kari, but with speed unimpeded by the weight, Diamond moved toward the thing glinting in the dim light of the tunnel... and lo and behold, it was a microphone, covered in pearls, that she was pretty sure she'd seen just a minute ago. Probably important enough to take, at least, and she knelt to pick it up without dropping her passenger. With it in hand, she stands again and joins Sunny in her running; there's not a whole lot else she can do until (unless?) Kari comes to.

Hunting the Subway Sculptor

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