The time soon comes.
M.C. Bastardom and his entourage move across the bridge. For a man supposedly interested in justice, his people brazenly appear as the ex-cons that they are. Four appear to be a motorcycle gang. Another four drive in a pick-up truck, and are dressed like butchers. Presumably there are another four in the black car with tinted windows.
If you were to run some quick math, you might expect there are 28 men in the entourage.
Bastardom’s sports car is in the back, close to the personnel carrier with the prisoners inside. It is known that a magic dampener keeps the ladies weak. What it looks like (or they?) is unknown. There isn’t any obvious device visible on the truck.
Cassi asks, in her disturbingly-calm demeanor, "What's the play, Captain?" What happened to the nervous young lady that would morph into the sword-sister before?
"Ideally? I'd turn them all to stone. Realistically? We slip through the front lines, take out the rocket men first, and then use their rockets against the rest of them."
"A distraction to stop them all on the bridge while the others sneak in from the sides, possibly?"
Betty raises her universal remote control. "Leave that up to me, I'll make them stop with this!" A big, proud grin adorns her face, making you wonder where the matter that was there before, went to.
Illuria looks at Betty's strange enthusiasm, then shrugs. "Well, I *was* going to suggest I'll be the distraction, but both of us can. We'll keep their attention while Cassi and Zindarel come in from the sides. If it goes right, those who aren't stone will have their eyes shut anyway." She gestures to her eyepatch.
When the motorcade comes into close range and Betty steps out in their way, Illuria does as well -- though she stays close and blocked from view by Betty's form. Then, when it's too late for the drivers to react, she steps out from behind Betty and lifts her eyepatch.
The four bikers immediately turn to stone! Three topple over, the one on the right (your left) keeps riding as a statue.
In the truck, the driver turns to stone as does the guy at the window seat, leaving the survivor in the middle trapped between them. The big man in the back of the truck topples out as the truck fishtails and drives in reverse! The fishtailing knocks the motorcycle and its statue rider toward the safety rail.
The car with tinted windows speeds up considerably. Though they can’t be seen through the dark glass, Illuria gets the feeling she got all four of them—same for the spider-web print car behind it.
Betty somehow knows the spider car responds to her remote. It drives over the rail, but clings to the side of the stone bridge like a spider.
The car in the middle has three panicky passengers trying to pull the stone driver from his seat. As for Team Rocket, the passenger looks at the stone driver, then at the survivor in back. “Can you fly, Bobby?” Bobby nods.
The pickup truck backs into the personnel carrier, seriously injuring the sandwiched passenger inside.
One detail worth noting: the Gaze Attack seemed to create a figure-8 of light. One is centered on the personnel carrier, the other on M.C. Bastardom. The light was strongest on Illuria’s side.
Zindarel quickly chows down on a fairy cake as they prepare the attack. Once Illuria unleashes her gaze, the fairy zips through the air toward the open roof of M.C. Bastardom’s vehicle. She tries to identify the magic dampener so she can destroy it.
Likewise, the transformed Cassi slips up into the back of the personnel carrier, looking for the dampener.
"Hello, ladies. Let's kick some butt and be on our way, shall we? Where's the antimagic coming from?"
A stone motorcyclist crashes into the side of the bridge, flipping his stone body away from the gravitational pull between the flat planet and the Tethered Isle. The rider’s remains will spend eternity as a cartwheeling statue.
The black car smashes through the opposite stone rail, and Team Rocket’s stone driver follows. As the Rocketmobile rides its doomed arc hood-first toward the rocky side of the Tethered Isle, the front passenger side door is kicked open! Boddiker aims a Ladykiller Bazooka at Illuria. “For Dick, Jones!” He means to avenge his man, Dick, and his driver, Jones. But Bobby kicks open the rear door and bails from the car, plummeting out of sight.
”DIIIIIIIIIIIIICK JOOOOOOOOooooooooonnnnnnessss……!!!” Boddiker shouts as his rocket goes way over Illuria and Betty.
It’s a Ladykiller. Its targeting system is confused by the women’s prison, but it finally settles on a space between Illuria and Betty.
Castra and Zindarel speed past the crashing cars! Castra hops onto the carrier. She finds the dampener—but the hard way!
There’s a device atop the carrier that looks like something she saw through the bars of her prison cell. But being this close makes her feel faint. She nearly passes out, and it’s safe to assume those she means to rescue are unconscious as well.
Cassie needs to back away. Already, she feels herself being drained. And that’s when the four guards get out and aim machine guns get way!
Zindarel is also slowed by the moon-shaped pendant around Bastardom’s neck. He grabs her, getting a skewered middle finger as he tries to crush the fairy in his hand!
The big butcher stands up amidst the chaos.
Bastardom spins his car around intent on murdering the fairy in his hand. “You little s#++. So that’s why you tossed the tracker.”
As Zindarel struggles, she notices in the distance, a flock of crows. They seem to be feeding near the guard station. Two fly overhead toward the car. One has half a human eyeball dangling from its beak.
Zindarel easily slips out of Bastardom’s grasp. She lunges for the necklace—
—and her pupils dilate as the effects of the fairy cake kick in! ”Oh, yeah!” she squeaks as she stabs the necklace again and again and again!
Betty is too big to get out of the way of the rocket and gets blasted off the bridge. She hastily scrambles to aim her remote at herself and press the rewind button to reverse the arc back to the bridge.
Zindarel darts through Bastardom’s palm! She stabs the necklace repeatedly, simultaneously stabbing Bastardom’s neck.
His torn hand swats, hitting only the arterial spray. His left hand keeps a rigor mortis grip on the wheel as the fairy, doused with blood and mad with candy-coated urges do remain in constant motion, continues her attack, deaf to the M.C.’s pleas of “khaakkhhhhh?! KKHHHHHKHKHHH—!!!”
Illuria dives out of the way and rolls up to her feet. The medusa takes a brief moment to appreciate the chaos her petrifying gaze created, and her snakes all lift their heads attentively.
Spying the big butcher, she strides toward him as she draws her cutlass and pistol. She issues a warning, "You'll not be using these women for your sick amusement! Anyone who doesn't want to be stone or dead should flee!"
She fires off a mankiller shot at the first one who doesn't heed her warning.
The big butcher looks quite capable of putting up a fight, and very dumb. But looking at the statues in his truck, among several others… and at Bastardom’s car swerving as it drives off…….
The butcher is not that dumb.
He drops his cleavers, bows to Illuria—“OREEGAHTOH.”—and after grumbling a mispronounced thank you in a language that is neither his nor Illuria’s, he takes a toppled motorcycle and rides away before the captain changes her mind.
Castor and Pollux jump into Castra's hands as she runs between the arcs of bullets, leaps onto the hood of the truck, then its roof, where she drives both blades into the device.
In a slight panic, Betty tries the rewind button again. It cannot be that a remote doesn't work! Such a nightmare!
The guards miss Castra. They keep firing, but are unable to stop her from destroying the magic dampener!
As one guard seems to have a clear shot at Castra, his bullet reverses back into his own gun. It bursts in his hands, blasting the flesh off of fingers and forearms! Mercifully, shrapnel buries itself in his forehead, making the death relatively quick.
Two men turn to fire upon Betty and Illuria!
M.C. Bastardom makes another futile attempt to swat Zindarel, but it’s no use. He veers into the side of the bridge. The airbag goes off in his face. Whether he will bleed out or suffocate under the airbag is hard to say, but the cocky M.C., unless he’s some kind of magical warrior, will not be recovering.
Several crows caw as they circle over the dying man.
Castra, feeling the difference of the disappearing dampening field, throws herself into a backflip from the top of the truck, arcing over the spray of bullets from the guard that is still firing at her. Should have stayed on the ground instead of climbing up on the step for a better angle...
Landing lightly behind him as he is still firing is weapon straight up in the air in a futile attempt to catch up with the elusive swordswoman, the swords flash out in a scissor motion across the major arteries of both legs...
Illuria curses as the gunfire comes her way and she feels a burning in her side. She points the six-shooter at the gunmen and squeezes the trigger while her snakes hiss in pain and anger.
"Sayonara, sucker!" Zindarel giggles, then zips out of the crashed car and across the field of battle to stab at the gunners!
You dispatch of the guards easily. Checking the carrier, you see a dozen women—amazons, nymphs—asleep. A harpy lays snuggled against a kentauride’s large body, and there are two fairies in a basket.
All are unconscious, some battered and bruised… but none are in grave danger.
A murder of crows blackens the sky. Their incessant cawing drowns out any noise or thought until the swarming scavengers split into four groups. They swirl about like specters and fly in different directions, all simultaneously arcing underneath the bridge.
There are several explosions underneath the bridge! Several bombs go off where the South Bridge and the Tethered Isle meet—explosions from the east side to the west, as if a titan’s blade severed the connection between manmade and natural structure.
The other explosion is at the bridge’s center—one big BOOM to ensure the bridge is attached to nothing.
Down it sinks—rapidly! Already, the underside of the Tethered Isle is in view. In the opposite direction, the dark side of the mainland appears to be ascending.
But of course, it is you who are descending into the abyss.
From the underside of the bridge, colorful paper squares (almost as big as Zindarel’s fairy body) flutter into view. Each has a letter on it. The sequence of the papers form a message.
tHX 4 kiLLG Ba⭐️m• hE i$ ♇Å℞+|al£ÿ REsiβLĒ 4 tHe D€at ÖyŻ∴
Zindarel quickly zips under the bridge to see what is sending the message!
Zindarel sees a clown.
He is standing upside down,
wearing a frown
and a crow-feather crown.
As she flies, she can feel that no matter which side of the broken bridge she is on, she could stand on it. Her friends need only walk.
As for the clown, he looks to Zindarel with black crow shapes about his eyes and many crows flying over.
The crows form letters in the sky—very quickly—yet, Zindarel can keep up and get the message:
YOU DID WHAT YOU HAD TO
TO SURVIVE
BUT YOU KILLED A FRIEND OF MINE
OR FIVE
I FOLLOWED BASTARDOM
I HOPED YOU WOULD TOO
AND THAT YOU’D AMBUSH HIM
AS I AMBUSH YOU
The man then splits into several pieces of black—hundreds of crows that fly among the thousands. All spell a message:
GET YOUR FRIENDS, LITTLE FAIRY
BRING THEM HERE
I WILL WAIT
FOR THE SAKE OF THOSE SWEET SIXTEEN
SLEEPING BEAUTIES
DON’T
BE
L
A
T
E
Zindarel squeaks and zips back to her friends. "Scary crow clown! Under the bridge! You can stand on it! Come on, come on, or he'll hurt the other Amazons!"
She zips back and forth between the bridge and her friends, saying things like, "Hey!" and "Listen!" until they finally follow.
Castra, having convinced herself that her sisters just are unconscious, hurries after the fairy.
As she does, she concentrates on the blades and feels the satisfying thrum of energy as they quicken her steps.
Listening to Zindarel, Betty tries to walk and... lo and behold, she can! She quickly rushes towards where the little fairy points her, the bridge shaking with each step.
Illuria taps her crimson eye patch. "All right! All right! We're coming. We're all coming."
She commands the stone statues (those still relatively intact) to follow her to the underside of the island.
On the other side of the bridge, you see an unnatural fog. Six gravestones protrude from waves of whitened air, which read Here lies:
Birthday Boy, dear friend and great co-boss
Kurtis Blow, good for a laugh and a half
Dimpled Chad, I can’t stay mad at you, cherry-cheeks ^^;
Mister Tea, but I CAN stay mad at you—burn in hell, you whistling putz!
Vinnie Trillo, your voice is recorded so it’s almost like you’re not dead, but you are, so that sucks
What’s-His-Face, sorry I forgot your name… it just happens when you got a brain made of three crows
Thousands of crows caw noisily! They swoop at you in a razor beak frenzy!
Zindarel keeps her wits about her and quickly begins karate-chopping and crane-kicking any crows that dare to come near her!
Illuria draws her cutlass as her snakes rise up. They strike in rapid succession, sinking fangs into feathers as her blade flashes.
Castra takes a readied stance and her blades flash out again and again at the diving birds.
Betty has seen too many movies to be even just impressed. With a big yawn, she points out how the lighting is off and you can see where the greenkey cutting happened.
She then aims her remote at the thickest cloud of crows and presses the brightness button, turning brightness up to maximum.
Zindarel has little trouble kicking the birds as they whizz by. Perhaps being smaller than a bird makes it relatively easier to hit—the human-sized swordswomen hit very few birds. Betty’s remote impairs the birds’ vision, causing some to veer off course and shatter their skulls against animate statues of butchers and bikers.
The birds swirl about,
Twirl about,
Whirl about
The girls
The birds-a-plenty
Form a clown twenty
Feet tall, he towers!
He holds a bouquet of flowers
—Squirting flowers
That spray acid showers!
Damaged or not, hit the clown back!
Zindarel resists the acid and stabs stabs stabs!
Illuria sidesteps the worst of the splashing acid and her light scales do an admirable job of resisting the rest.
With a flick of her finger, she sends the stony bikers to attack the giant clown!
Betty's avoids the damage like the nimble gazelle she is. She aims the remote at the giant clown and presses the "program info" button.
Zindarel stabs the clown and find’s a crow’s head skewered on her blade. Its body and other dead crowd flip-flop and death-spiral to the ground. One leg is pummeled into feathery blood-blobs by three burly statues. When Castra strikes the other leg, it freezes from foot to knee—an explosion blows the entire leg off—red and blue lightning dances about the entire giant clown! Dead crows fly out by the dozens, sizzling and bursting like a grotesque fireworks show!
Betty’s remote causes several blue balloons to fly up out of the clown’s shirt pocket.
If she focuses on certain balloons, she can listen to music, catch a movie, or learn something!
A black balloon marked (¡) simply explodes an blows the clown’s face off.
His birds separate and attack! There are too many, but Illuria’s butcher statues form a wall with the spider-mobile!
Zindarel avoids the birds as she continues to stabby stabby, giggling with sugar-fueled glee!
Betty tries to avoid as many crows as she can, but the sheer bulk of her makes it impossible to avoid some hits. She then flips her remote up in the air, catches it again and aims it at the cloud of crows, changing channels.
Betty changes several birds to the pigeon channel. These birds are harmless and just poop on the statues.
Wishing for the first time that she carried a blunderbuss, Illuria draws her old flintlock and fires it off against the thickest mass of birds.
Zindarel takes out at least a hundred birds, darting from one through several to another, and repeating the process!
Castra’s attack engulfs dozens of crows in flames!
Gunfire scatters the flock (murder, technically)! Panicked caws echo about, and several rainbow colored droppings plop onto the statues of the butchers and the spidermobile. The butchers’ stone heads swell up! Their bodies puff and elongate until one is mostly red and ten feet long—like a giant hot dog!—and the other is yellow. Yellow wraps red like a hot dog bun, and the two twist about to form a fifteen-foot-long dachshund-poodle balloon with stone teeth!
The spidermobile grows eight purple balloon legs! It fires its web-gun which now squirts acidic silly-string!
The birds are scattered and very far. You may wish to deal with the more immediate threat: the balloons.
"Eek! Die die die!" Zindarel squeaks as the silly string burns her. She darts at the spidermobile to stab at its legs, hoping to pop them!