DeviousMe

'Whatever you want' wasn't 'the answer you were hoping for'? o.0

Huh. I thought they did. Learn something new every day, heh.

Anyways, I agree. There should be a way to enhance the range of aoes. They're already target-capped, so I don't think it would unbalance things.

The expression 'don't bring a knife to a gunfight' came to Sarkh's mind. Regrettably, it seemed every last one of the Priest Corps' soldiers about, who still held the weapons with which they'd so easily done in the first dragon they'd attacked, chose exactly this time to hold their fire for some odd reason. Well, either that, or they were just slow.

Sarkh was not.

The fire dragon's ballistic arc ended in an abrupt vertical down from the apex, another snow storm whipping itself into being out of thin air, slamming it to the ground a second time, and once again nowhere near Sarkh. The sapphire-scaled dragon was an experienced combatant. If the hellbeast wanted to close the distance, it would have to get a little more clever and a lot less obvious about it.

"You should attack more quietly." Sarkh regarded the creature with disappointment while the rain falling upon it chilled balefully, becoming so cold that it actually became harmful to those caught in its area of effect - in this case, the fire dragon.

However, that was but a byproduct of its real purpose: to further inhibit and slow its victim, as well as to drastically cut back the fire dragon's ability to effectively defend itself. Furthermore, it severely degraded the capacity of its hide to mitigate any harm inflicted upon it, which indeed included the biting cold of the freezing rain itself.

"Well?" an amber eye of the sapphire-scaled dragon looked upon Harlem with a sense of dispassionate consideration, "Are you going to shoot or not...?"

Sarkh had to admit, this took him by surprise. Not that he ever would, and especially not to Harlem, but his foe's capabilities very much took him aback. He'd expected the energies of the lightning storm to be less effective than on, say, a human - after all, fire and electricity had more than a few things in common - but not that the fire dragon would be outright immune.

Then again, perhaps it was but a protection spell. In that case, it probably wouldn't last long. Lightning storms had this nasty habit of tossing out generous amounts of those vicious bolts after all, and not just one. They'd keep coming until Sarkh said to stop.

Not that he had the patience for that.

Fortunately, an opportunity thereto presented itself stante pede. After all, the former wasn't all that had taken the sapphire-scaled dragon aback. In stark contrast to the lightning storm's ineffectiveness, the tornado seemed greatly more harmful than expected. Sarkh had thought his opponent a stronger flyer than that. Then again, from what Harlem had said, the fire dragon stemmed from the local underworld, and he somewhat doubted chasing sparkballs through the flux vortex of a lightning plant was a regular pastime there.

And that Sarkh could use.

A flick of his will, a twist of the lines, and a snow storm joined the howl of the tornado and the fury of the lightning storm, robbing the fire dragon of lift and sending it careening down to earth, the soaked soil of the cemetery slurping stickily about Sarkh's foe upon impact, the sapphire-scaled Cerosian setting down softly not far away.

He set Harlem upon the ground, then proceeded to reach into a pocket of his harness while addressing the fire dragon loudly, so as to overcome the howl of wind, rain, and now ice that raged about his foe, "I don't expect you to know this, but where I come from, it's customary to state one's name and terms at the declaration of a challenge! As you didn't, I'll extend you the courtesy of asking: who are you and why do you challenge me...?!"

Reckless was more like it. Sarkh was no combat specialist, but he was old - and he hadn't gotten there by being a slouch in a fight. Moreover, he favored brain over brawn, which meant that he tended to have a plan or four when a situation carried the potential to turn...displeasing.

Such as right now.

The storm pounced, a panther in the night, great gouts of roiling lightning alurch at their master's whim like coiled snakes poised to the key note of the flute's hymn. Like the link of brandy and liquor, they crashed down at Sarkh's attacker long before the hellspawned dragon ever came close to its sapphire-scaled counterpart.

Of course, that didn't mean Sarkh stopped there. Brutal as the assault of the lightning storm was, he knew it wouldn't have stopped him, and though his foe was clearly no storm dragon, he wasn't careless enough to assume his foe any less capable than himself. Thus he dove as well, snapping into a helical roll that quickly drew a line in the sand - or rather, in the rain.

He was forming a tornado...

Sarkh smile faded under a furrowed brow while he disbanded the whirling winds of the hurricane, and he mustered the man closely. Had he made a mistake? This man dressed quite like...and yet...

But he also felt quite like...and yet...

Still, he certainly did talk that way.

"I'm still deciding." the sapphire-scaled dragon's toothy smirk returned as he pitched forward and began to pick up speed again, "It takes two to start a fight. Let's just see what the other side has to say first, mh?"

He didn't actually wait for an answer of course, instead gradually closing the distance to the closer of the other two dragons, fully intent on just asking him, her, or it what intent there was to be here. After all, neither of them seemed to be doing much right now, other than presenting a collision hazard to passing heroes of the flying sort, and that very same thing could be said of just about any tall building within the walls of Dark Astoria - as well as Adamastor, of course...

Sarkh's reaction was much the same as the cross-eyed look a human gave a squirrel that had suddenly materialized upon his head, amber eyes beneath an arched brow curiously mustering the humans that so precariously clambered down his sides.

Well, until they started stabbing him, that was. Their bullets might've been sent careening into the rain by the wisps of phantom lightning that flitted about the dragon's hide, but unfortunately blades tended to have more mass, not to mention their wielders tended to have a somewhat better grip of them. Fortunately for Sarkh, his underside was anything but 'vulnerable' - and he wasn't exactly slow either.

The sapphire-scaled beast gave a raucous hiss immediately upon the first blade slashing a bloody gash into his hide, though to a keen ear, it was audibly more one of outrage than pain. Still, it was more than Sarkh was willing to put up with. The dragon's body cracked like a whip, snapping a turbulent vortex through the falling rain as he twisted into a rolling Split S, flinging the offending assailants from himself like an overclocked centrifuge. The suddenly present roar of a hurricane's gusts weren't unhelpful either, of course.

One of them was even more unfortunate than that however, snatched up by a clawed hand and forcefully yanked out of freefall when Sarkh abruptly arrested his forward motion, preferring to hover while he regarded the wielder of a steel shield clutched in his fist with an angry scowl.

Of course, said person may well have preferred said scowl to the practically sadistic grin that replaced it not a second later.

"You." grumbled Sarkh's toothy smile, "Of course it's you again. So this is where you come from, hmm? Or've you just spread through the multiverse like a really bad itch...?"

The Outsider might've scowled her disagreement through clenched teeth, but Sark's took a much more pragmatic form. Indeed, he didn't much care for the good Doctor's attempt of extradition either. The man had some things to answer for. So he took wing.

If Dr. Mechano carried radar or such, it was likely he was aware of the pursuit before the obsidian silhouette of the dragon's form blotted out the stars above him. If not, he'd probably be rather surprised, for the speed at which Sarkh's grip came for him already carried significant magnitude - and with surprise on its side, it was damn-near instantaneous...

Kri backpedaled and nearly landed on his rump as all hell broke loose with an abruptness he'd seen only very few times in his life. Oddly enough, or perhaps not, it was once more a human spearheading said breach (well, alright, the lavender-scaled shaman wsn't entirely sure of that, as he could've sworn the man's face consisted of naught but glasses and a grin so wide and psychotic it would've made a nether demon scowl in deepest envy), and he couldn't help but draw a parallel or three to the battles in which he'd fought back home.

Well, at least the blades weren't pointed at his throat this time, he supposed.

Nevertheless, the swordslinging clergyman's surge duly prompted the Rulusian lizardman to reconsider the situation in favor of the wisdom of Quicksilver and Ineloo. In one fell swoop, he attempted to snatch up the halfling and dive for cover behind the nearby unseen 'vehicle'. He hoped the Autobot's cloaking means were similar enough to those of which he knew, otherwise he'd feel rather silly for trying to hide behind something invisible.

Meanwhile, a quartet of ivory claws belonging to large fingers armored in sapphire scales curled their way about the rim wall of a nearby pool of water that by all rights was much, much too shallow to accommodate their owner by any twist or bend of the 'laws' of physics - so it was a good thing Sarkh looked upon them more as guidelines.

Grumbling from the water palely lit by soft lamps embedded in the walls of the rectangular basin, the house-sized dragon dragged himself from the pool in the very same manner in which a cat would scrunch its way through a hole in the fence that really should've been too small...

((Actually, there's still only one. ))

Kri looked back and forth between the two in a somewhat disbelieving manner as the so uneven pair held their...monologue? No, that wasn't it. Still, he wouldn't have called it anything much resembling a conversation. It was just too odd. It was also the reason he wasn't entirely sure what to do.

On one hand, Ineloo and Quicksilver had some very sensible ideas. This was clearly a forceful incursion by a decidedly hostile party. Plus there was something very large and ominous-looking emerging from a portal overhead. On the other, Katze and Mechaniker conducted themselves in a manner that seemed almost...silly. Like a pair of hatchlings playing with their toys. It just felt so bizarre, so surreal, that the shaman simply couldn't bring himself to take decisive action. What the heck was going on here?

Well...if there was ever a time to start asking that question, it was probably now. With a curt exhale, the lavender lizardman swallowed the bulk of his anxiety and took a step forward.

"Uh...excuse me..." he tried to get their attention, though that he was still somewhat nervous was easy to discern by both his eyes and tone, "Why...are you attacking this place? It, um, doesn't seem very wise, you know..."

Oxana couldn't help but smirk at this. Then she gave a nod, "Our means are superior, yes. One on one, we can take your Decepticon adversaries. However, we aren't many, and intelligence thus far suggests there are much more of them than of us. Granted, we can assume some to be support units, others subverted locals like Vere...the local law enforcement personnel, but one way or another, their resources outclass ours."

"That's why we're going to try and get the warriors here on our side." Kri added enthusiastically with a glance to Ineloo, "And the others who came here. Strength in numbers, right?"

"Indeed." the Tsaiv woman agreed, once more regarding Quicksilver neutrally, "The ones they call 'superheroes' are the most effective defense force this world has. I believe they would be served well by your insight - especially since most of them don't have telecommunications implants. If you'd rather stay here and work with us though, I think we can find a way to get the resulting information to where it'll do the most good. Right?"

She'd looked to Kri with that last word, and the lavender lizardman gave a nod in response, "We'll tell them anything you pass on to us..."