ic Under Wraps [IC]

[Gizmo]

Stepping through the shadows with Set was a sensation not unlike pushing through black silk curtains that slid accommodatingly past while closing in behind. It might have even been pleasant if not for the brief but acute awareness of absolute nothingness held at bay by nothing but those same wafting curtains.

The feeling lasted only a split second before they emerged and the godling himself seemed completely unperturbed, planting his hands on his hips and looking about the room's oddities. Unfortunately, he did so directly in front of the shadowed corner that had allowed the small group passage and as she stepped through Sekhmet ran right into him, knocking the smaller Heliopolite into a stand of items that clattered about noisily as he righted himself. "Truly your feline grace is to be envied," Set hissed under his breath, dusting himself off.

Sekhmet growled warningly from deep in her throat, looming in the darkened room. "Do not cast blame for thy own lack of poise, serpent." The goddess's nose was wrinkled from the scent of the apartment and her posture made it clear that she was in no mood to have her patience tested.

Bristling, Set straightened to as much height as he could managed and glared right back. "Mine?!" he rebutted, the volume of his voice slowly rising. "I should not need to remind you, oh mighty huntress, that we are endeavoring to maintain some modicum of stealth!"

[trollthumper]

From the next room over, there was the catching of... well, it wasn't quite a breath, followed by the sound of footfalls. "Xander, if your wards are as crap as your fashion sense --"

Temperance pressed herself against the door frame as it flew open, hoping she could get behind cover - but Set and Sekhmet were still somewhat open, and got a clear glimpse just as the residents got a clear glimpse of them. Both could feel the hekau radiating off of the three like the fires of an open kiln. All three were dressed in styles that Set had seen described on the Tumblrs as "professional Goth." And the power that suffused them was clearly visible. Their skin was withered bronze, their eyes polished glass, and their bodies like well-toned dried beef. They were deathless and potent, but they were far from gods.

"Burglars?" said one of them, a man in his early 30s. "How did --?"

"No," said the woman at the front. "Clearly not." She cast her gaze over them. "You're divine. And I don't just mean that as a compliment."

"I've seen that face," said the other man, a hulking figure who looked like he had something of Egypt in his blood. "I know that face. It's the Lady of Slaughter! And she's --"

"She's small," said the lady. Dark golden light flowed into her hands. "We got this from three who'd merely been reconfigured to draw out the hekau. Imagine what we could get from gods."

[trollthumper]

At this point, Temperance decided she'd heard enough, and there really wasn't much advantage left in stealth. Before she could take the next step, however, the hulking one turned and got rid of her cover - by ripping the door off its hinges. His skin had gone from faintly golden to burnished bronze, looking as solid as stone. "Looks like they brought along a friend," he said. "Who are you supposed to be? The Ennead aren't exactly known for gods of ice."

Temperance stood firm. "Consider me an interested party," she said. "Someone who doesn't take kindly to seeing souls used for power."

The man laughed. "We left them enough to get by," he said. "And we don't take kindly to interlopers." He swung at her with the force of a speeding truck - but it was clear he wasn't used to the power, as the fist went right past her and into the wall. She smiled. Just because they had access to blasphemous powers didn't mean they knew how to really use them.

[Gizmo]

"Oh my," Set tutted, placing a crooked finger to his chin and shaking his head in the moment that Sekhmet was struck mute by inarticulate rage. "What a singularly poor choice of words."

Before he could elaborate the goddess let lose a leonine roar of righteous fury and leapt straight for the throat of the most offensive opponent. "Defilers! Honourless carrion feeders!" she snarled, baring pronounced canines as her arm shot forward and inhumanly strong fingers clenched around the female necromancer's throat. "Thou shall learn respect, mortal cur, and to fear thine betters!" Lifting the practitioner enough that her toes were only barely touching the room's floor, Sekhmet followed up with a backhanded blow that was almost too quick to follow, equal parts decisive attack and punishing reprimand.

"Truly, you cannot claim this was without warning," Set added, making a show of casually preparing for battle while still looking about the room with detached interest, ruby tinged lightning beginning to gather about his fingertips. "She Who Mauls is quite publicly open about her approach to conflict resolution."

[trollthumper]

Temperance swirled out of the way of the guy who was bearing down on her. "I'm going to trust them on this one," she said, "but I must say, your behavior thus far isn't quite winning me over on the merits of eating souls." She drew forth another curtain of icy needles and sent them off towards the man who looked like parchment stretched over bones. He was too quick, however, ably dodging the frozen barrage. 

 

"Is this supposed to be some sort of morality thing?" said the necromancer. "Please. There is a lesson to the world. You eat, or you are eaten." The shadows drew up around him and grew tangible, and with a gesture, they flew towards Temperance. She was able to dance around them, but one brushed her shoulder, sending ice water down her veins. Which was quite a feat, given her nature. She regained her composure fast enough, however. 

 

"Oh, I'm sorry," she said. "I suppose I don't see the efficacy of it, either." 

[Gizmo]

Set pursed his lips and made a flat raspberry sound. "That's stupid. You're stupid." With gathered energy crackling about his fingertips, the godling gave them an imperious snap and pointed at the philosophically vocal necromancer who'd attacked Temperance. In response a rumbling boom of thunder sounded from outside and a split second later one of the room's windows shattered into uncounted shards, its curtains abruptly burned away to make way for a savage column of crimson lightning.

The bolt struck the spiritual cannibal squarely in the chest, knocking him off of his feet and into the far wall where he slumped to the floor, acrid smoke wasting upward from his robe. Brick red dreadlocks jostled by the strong wind coming in through the broken window, Set sniffed disdainfully. "I was vegan long before it was cool, you know," he noted casually, though he failed to completely hide his self-satisfied smirk.

[trollthumper]

Sekhmet was poised to tear into the hulking man, but he was faster. With unnatural grace, he managed to catch the terrible goddess in the chest with a fist like a sledgehammer. The sheer force of the blow, combined with the divine essence backing it up, sent her reeling and struggling for concentration. 

 

"I'm not quite sure where divine essence goes on the food pyramid," Temperance said, "and I'm not keen to find out." The hail sprung from her hands again, lashing out at the woman who'd been leading the charge into the bedroom. But the woman managed to shift into the darkness, and the barrage missed her almost entirely. Damnit, I wish I could actually see where I'm firing.

 

The woman chuckled. "You may wish to consider," she said. "There's something divine of you, but you're too thin for much power." She turned her gaze on Set. "You, on the other hand..." A bolt flew from her hands, the color of sunlight on obsidian, and brushed against Set's form. A sense of darkness flew up into him, hollow and hungering. Why did it seem so familiar...?

[Gizmo]

The smirk had left Set's lips before the bolt had been launched at him, his expression hard and humourless as the dark energies rolled off of his bare torso like rainwater over stone. "We have passed the point of idle amusement, methinks," he decided, an electric crackle of anger in his voice.

With an arcane gesture that looked like it was summoning another bolt of lightning but abruptly changed midway, the godling turned his palm upward and clenched his fingertips together into a cage. As he did dust began to fall from the ceiling, as though drywall were being knocked loose by a commotion on the floor above them. Within seconds, however, it became clear that it was not dust but a growing cascade of sand that fell in impossible sheets, taking on partially solid shapes that wrapped about the predatory sorcerers, gaping maws that snapped hungrily.

"Dime novel philosophies and embarrassing attempts at shadow magics are one thing," the irritated deity of the desert growled, "but I shall thank you not to lay hands on my sidekick."

[trollthumper]

The hulking sorcerer glared at Set - apparently, the god's words had struck home somewhere. "You're one to talk about embarrassing," he said. "The great and mighty Set, sower of chaos and harrower of the Ennead. Slayer of the great king Osiris. And here you are, not six foot tall and struggling to --"

 

The words cut off as the sorcerer was surprised by his blow swinging wild, with Set easily weaving around it. As he did, the torrent of sand fell hard on both him and his fellow necromancer. He managed to burst through the sands before they settled, but she was not so lucky - the sand fixed hard around her, turning into something between loose particles and hard glass. 

 

"No, please," said Temperance. "Keep going. You're truly making your case." 

[Gizmo]

"Ha hah!" Set crowed as he sidestepped around the physical attack, his infuriating grin returning in full force. "I knew you recognized me! Set's fame always precedes him!"

Recovering from superhuman blow, Sekhmet let out a low, menacing growl. The gold of her one visible eye seemed to shine brighter for a moment, contrasting against jet black hair that bounced across the opposite side of her face as she blurred into movement again. The talkative sorcerer abruptly found himself silenced as the goddess's palm connected mercilessly with his face, the momentum carrying him downward to slam his skull against the apartment's floor with an echoing crack.

Lips pulling back from pronounced canines as though she were considering a more permanent rebuttal, Sekhmet instead grated out a rough, "Sidekick?!"

"If the sandal fits, oh untamed sirocco of righteous indignation," Set replied with a shrug. "Let's not ruin the moment, hm?"

[trollthumper]

Temperance simply watched as Sekhmet sent the necromancer reeling. There was really nothing else she could say, as the titanic fury of the leonine goddess just utterly wrecked some pretentious sorcerer who dabbled in unclean things. There wasn't much she could add on top of it. It would be like gilding the lily, or adding sugar to Coca-Cola. So, at a loss for words, she contented herself to try and wreck another necromancer's day by throwing huge chunks of ice at them with ballistic force. That seemed to have some impact, as bruises - no, maybe dents - cropped up on the bronze skin of the sorceress, who didn't take kindly to the assault. 

 

"I've had enough of this," she said. She turned to Set, her eyes flaring with invisible light. "Let's see who has the greatest grasp of the Hekau."

[Gizmo]

As brutal, mind-shredding magics whipped toward Set's psyche, the godling took up a pose of consideration, tapping a finger on his delicately tapering chin while his other hand rested on his hip. Even unseen to mortal eyes, the necromancer's assault blasted across the Heliopolian with such fury his brick red dreadlocks were blow backward as though in a violent gale. Set responded by snapping the fingers of both hands as though in sudden realization and with synchronized flourishes turned them around to point at himself, a wicked grin spreading across his handsome features. "As the electronic scribes say: spoilers. Tis not you."

Throwing both hands forward in arcane gestures, Set brought another bolt of searing lightning in through the window, the flash turning the room to a blank canvas for a split second with a crimson after-image. Overhead, thunder rumbled. Inside, the sorceress fell to her knees before collapsing on the floor, ostentatious outfit smoking slightly. Lifting his fingers again in mock pistols, Set blew imaginary smoke from their barrels.

[Gizmo]

Apparently not ruffled by the perilously close lightning strikes, Sekhmet maintained her grip on the the chin of the final sorcerer, lifting him back upright and extending her arm so that his feet hung off of the ground. Her remaining hand clenched and unclenched twice as she scowled at the dazed and unresponsive mortal before she finally let out a flat snort of derision. With inhuman speed and strength she simply backhanded the necromancer across the cheek, letting the force carry him out of her grip to pirouette briefly midair before resting in an unconscious heap atop his peer.
 
As the last opponent fell the raging gale began to peter out, the weather returning to normal in short order. "Well! A good showing all round, haha! Now, where did those ba get off to?"

[trollthumper]

The female sorcerer twitched on the ground, as if trying to muster whatever fight was left in her. "This is not over," she said. "We have the power of ages within us. We have --"

 

"Now!"

 

The voice called out not through the air, but through everyone's heads. There was a shattering of glass, and suddenly, the ba were in the room, wings flapping and talons outstretched. They fell on the sorcerers, their talons going through the skin without cutting. A flurry of golden light filled the air as whatever stolen power was left fled the bodies and flowed back into the birdlike spirits. The lone sorcerer left standing raised her arms, as if trying to form a ward, but it was no use. They were too fast, and too hungry. 

 

By the time the ba broke off, the sorcerer was collapsed on the ground - still alive, but unconscious. Her skin no longer had the bronze coloring, nor did it look preserved for the ages. She was, essentially, human. The ba, meanwhile, shifted as the hekau flowed back into them, surging into their tiny forms and swelling them up to great size. Temperance couldn't quite describe what she saw next - as if someone was trying to make a human jigsaw with pieces that didn't quite fit yet - but Set and Sekhmet knew it well. The restoration of the fivefold soul. 

 

Hafet-Re stood before the group, tall and regal. His head was much the same as before, but with the return of his body came a sense of raised spirits - he now looked like a man fit to rule. Henuttway and Siptah stood behind him, likewise joyful with the return of the rest of their souls.

 

"Thank you," he said. "You have done great things today. Your deeds will be spoken well of in Duat."

[Gizmo]

"Aye, well, perhaps spoken out of earshot of my divinely forgiving sister Isis, my fortunately less-feathered friends," Set suggested, coughing lightly into his fist. "For your own sake, yes?" Even with the hand in front of his face and the warning the young god could not hide a genuinely pleased expression at Hafet-Re's thanks, so much so that it seemed to have instilled some approximation of modesty.

That uncharacteristic lack of boasting was not lost on his taller companion. "No claims of innate superiority? No instance only fools would doubt thy victory?" Sekhmet asked with a faint smile that might have seemed almost playful on a visage less given to ferocity. Shoving Set in the shoulder with enough force to send him stumbling a few steps over as he regained his balance, she snorted. "Who be thee, and what has become of the liesmith?"