Match of the Millennium

Description: I-No: A mysterious woman with great power and a remarkable ability to move untrackably. Only the Illuminati, with their gaze fixed on all the stars in the sky, can see her passage as a mote of darkness via the lights she obscures. Having tracked her down to the legendary AirBnB location LUXURY MODERN SUPER BOWL PARTY HOUSE,POOL,hot tub, they send one of the few agents they have capable of surviving an encounter with someone of her threat level on a fact-finding mission - as a bonus, they get to watch him get punted around an entire LMSBPH,P,ht, and he deserves it on a cosmic level.

[ALAN]
~Cash Rules Everything Around Me C.R.E.A.M. Get the mo-~

He slipped the iPhone Very X from his vest pocket, sliding his thumb against the triangular logo on the lock screen. "Hey I was about to do this big pile of miscellaneous drugs and wake up in Madagascar, I hope this is good."

"Hinky?"

"The fuck does hinky mean?"

"OK, whatever. Gimme a threat rating."

He spat water across the table, ruining several of the drugs he was not lying about.

"That's a little out of my fuckin' pay grade!"

"---"

"...well, now I guess it /is/ in my pay grade. You're really antsy about this over there, holy shit. Alright, I'll step into the--"

--

"I gotta WHAT"

[I-NO]
He gotta touch the magic.

No one likes touching the magic. Most people. Well-adjusted people. Some. It's just so sparkly, how can it be resisted?

SUBJECT: I-NO is a rough track, but not as rough as her completely blank background check would suggest. It takes the alignment of both specific skills and circumstances to achieve the complete void of a past that is I-No. Of course sometimes those skills belong to someone else, which is probably the case here. When I-No is on the grid, it involves a very neat trail of cash shoved into hands, reliable digital and human surveillance, and a predictably unpredictable psych profile of someone on a debauched spending spree.

The 'very neat' describes the ease of tracking, not the aftermath. The aftermath is a story of its own.

This scenario's Madagascar is an Airbnb out in Metro City's WASPy suburbs. The host chose to name it "LUXURY MODERN SUPER BOWL PARTY HOUSE,POOL,hot tub" and it clocks out for just under five grand a night. I-No did not schedule this place. That bill belongs to some asshole who will wake up in a bathroom down in a main street nightclub feeling like an asshole. The Z1 parked across two spaces in the driveway out front does not belong to I-No either, nor the asshole whose name is on the credit card, but the plates are there in plain sight for the morbidly curious to run a look-up on.

The house is a sleek one-story affair that offers the kind of design that's been calling itself modern since the 1950s: lots of right angles, lots of bold materials usage varying between stone and hardwood in unexpected places, and lots of ~*revolutionary features*~ like a rock lawn and pool/spa setup that is entirely too complicated for children to exist around without immediately injuring themselves. The inside -- heavily visible through an enormous set of floor-to-ceiling windows once you're around back and through the bamboo privacy grove -- is an open floor-plan that has made some kind of twisted death pact with a hideous shade of pink marble that is absolutely everywhere. Sectional furniture and abstract art pieces create artificial dividers, except for the bedrooms and bathrooms, which mercifully have walls.

Intrusive Illuminati invasion equipment can locate I-No sprawled out on a couch in what may be charitably called the living room area. It overlooks to pool. The pool had a little waterfall. It was soothing. The evidence of her passing is there for observation: the front door is unlocked and left ajar, her red boots are collapsed in the hallway, the liquor cabinet has been busted open, shards of a bottle of 151 are strewn beneath the window where the actual 151 is drying sticky, and her guitar is lovingly resting slammed halfway into the drywall in the middle of this idiot kanji mural that someone had the gall to paint on the wall of the kitchen nook.

I-No appears to be asleep. She is snoring loud enough to hear from the entranceway because her head is hanging halfway off the couch and it's partially obstructing her breathing. It's fine.

[ALAN]
If there's one thing the dread Illuminati know when they see it, it's debauched spending sprees. Illuminati sin specialists analyze the spree and rate it a 7/10 with points for variety but demerits for limited mortality rate.

A little black drone, nearly soundless, rises away from the house and emits two pings. Things happen very quickly from there.

Electricity shimmers down a nearby leyline, a bolt of lightning travelling entirely the wrong direction, jumping from there onto a Metro City powerline. The lightning begins to resolve into a humanoid shape, dark colors in the night save for the yellow electricity scattering from its feet as it impels itself along the thick service cabling.

The shape hits the ground outside the LUXURY MODERN SUPER BOWL PARTY HOUSE,POOL,hot tub with a crackle. A few errant streaks of lightning connect it briefly to the Z1, burning lines across its paint. The form is moving slower now, true, merely the speed of a sports car rather than something smearing through the night.

It does not use the open door.

A man shatters his way through the wide bay window overlooking the street outside - average height and a lean build. He is wearing a dark blue-and-black checkerboard suit and a pair of dark blue gloves with iron rings fit over each finger. A black fedora with a dark blue band rests on blonde hair, and a forbidding iron mask is fitted over his face, electricity crackling from its eyeholes.

The lightning-aspected chi spiralling around him scatters the glass and debris away in a wave, digging more scorches in the floor and ceiling. The TV turns on, interference causing it to static between a cooking channel and an episode of The Voice. The sound system kicks on, playing the Now That's What I Call Music! vol. 34 CD within at double speed.

The Illuminati agent forgoes any hope at a proper surprise attack by stepping forward and swinging a steel-toe shoe into the bottom of I-No's couch, attempting to launch it and her up into the air.

"CRUSH!"

COMBATSYS: Alan has started a fight here.

[\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  <
Alan             0/-------/-------|

COMBATSYS: I-No has joined the fight here.

[\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////////////////]
Alan             0/-------/-------|=------\-------\0             I-No

[I-NO]
Little black sin drones don't wake the I-No. It can float there pinging all it wants.

Lightning down leylines, now that's an entirely different show. Mr. little black drone can get a clear shot of I-No's hat, perched atop some trite sculpture that looks more like a penis than the artist intended, shudders and opens what looked like a fanciful skull motif until it started looking like a mouth just now.

"#######" it speaks entirely in amplifier feedback.

"Shut the FUCK uuuppppp," I-No moans. She gropes around for a pillow to throw until it becomes clear that this is a hateful house with no pillows. The witch begins to sink back into slumber with a new murderous thought to occupy her dreams.

Her dreams are not long. The windows explode inward, one large panel after another, radiating outward from the point of impact. I-No is still sprawled on the couch. Lightning explodes in every direction, licking every available flat surface (which mercifully does not include I-No). She still doesn't stir. Not even at the TV playing two flavors of reality game show, not even at the retro sound system that previously only existed so that the owner could feel smug about owning something Japanese from the 1980s, not even at the --

"-- THE FUCK IS THIS --"

Okay, yes, the couch launching her toward the ceiling definitely woke her up.

I-No hangs midair at the apex of her launch about ten feet up, because of course this place has stupid tall ceilings. She spins around to claw for something to hold onto, but there's nothing, and soon she's spun around to look down. In this moment, Alan is treated to the peculiar sight of a woman's expression going smoothly from 'aaaa where the fuck am i aaaaaaa' to a narrow-eyed, thin-lipped evisceration mode.

I-No begins to fall. She defies logical physics and curls up to twist into the right direction to land feet first, which involves lashing out one of her bare legs in a thrust kick that is way too far to even possibly hit Alan.

Except, improbably, a row of equalizer meter bars light up in the air to jab the long distance between them. This is clearly some chi nonsense, but weirdly enough it stabs instead of... chis. It's not like the lightning. Fuckin' magic. Even if it doesn't hit Alan by being abruptly close, it buys time by being an obstacle.

I-No lands upon the pink marble tile, silent because she's in bare feet. She glowers at Alan, raising up her right hand.

"First, get some fucking sense of gravitas on your entrance. B.o.B is a fuckin' flat earther."

I-No snaps. The sound system makes a record-scratch noise and swaps from Nothin' on You (featuring Bruno Mars! oh, 2010) to something with so much guitar distortion and screaming that one speaker immediately catches fire. I-No widens her eyes with intensity.

"Second, you wore a goddamn FEDORA to pick up drunk women?"

COMBATSYS: I-No successfully hits Alan with Horizontal Chemical Love.

[       \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ///////////////////////////// ]
Alan             0/-------/--=====|====---\-------\0             I-No

[ALAN]
The man's foot comes back down after the kick and scrapes sparks along the marble as he swings into a fighting stance. Fists come up, body compresses down to make a smaller target, up on the balls of his feet. Boxer. I-No's face sharpens (the man behind the mask is accustomed to getting all kinds of expressions) and he shifts a little forward, tracking her in the air.

I-No's kick is way out of range and, theoretically, punishable. "BREAK," the man grates, wheeling his hand back for a haymaker, swaying to the side to dart right in past her leg. His arm is loose as it swings, the relaxation allowing chi to flow through it more freely--

He didn't move fast enough. The equalizer bars launch up beneath him, causing his body to twist painfully as he is hurled aside. The hat pops off immediately - a long lock of anime hair springs loose with vigor, forming a lightning bolt that hangs down the side of his masked face. "Shit!"

He hits the tile on his back and swings his legs to twist quickly back to his feet. The fedora hangs on the edge of the equalizer bar closest to I-No as Alan sweeps his hand across his head, smoothing the rest of his hair back into place. "Alright now hold the fuck on, that's part of the uni--"

Alan stops.

"DESTROY," he growls, getting back into character, swinging one arm forward and snapping his fingers. There's a loud thud of thunder and a bolt of lightning jumps between the two of them, a nearby decorative plate cracking from the sonic impact. He flicks his hand again immediately, snapping another bolt into existence. "TWICE."

Inwardly, Alan crunches numbers. Sorcery confirmed, as expected - his chi did nothing to scatter that previous impact. Magical soundtrack powers, always a plus in a date. Finally, it's always been his suspicion that B.o.B is loud about the flat earth theory because he secretly suspects the hollow earth coverup and is trying to throw off suspicion.

But they're onto him.

COMBATSYS: I-No blocks Alan's Lightning Strikes Twice.

[        \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ///////////////////////////   ]
Alan             0/-------/--=====|=====--\-------\0             I-No

[I-NO]
I-No puts her hands on her hips and gives Alan a skeptical look. The meter bars that the fedora is hanging off of slowly begin to tick down, allowing the questionable headgear to quietly sink to the floor where it may be forgotten.

But then the growling is back. I-No opens her mouth and runs her tongue over her upper teeth, lingering on an incisor. She drops her hands to her sides, wiggling her fingers to limber them up.

THUD goes the thunder and FLASH goes the bolt. Another set of windows explode at the booming sound because why not. I-No whips her hand up and thrusts her palm out, intercepting the lightning with a touch. There is a brief flicker of some kind of rainbow-flashing runic field between flesh and chi, though the runes seemed suspiciously like song lyrics in English. Someone will have to pause the video later to see the easter egg.

The second boom, and I-No move her hand to catch the new bolt same as before. She wrinkles her nose in an expression that threatens to but does not quite become a snarl. Instead, she shakes out her hand, smoke rising from between her fingers.

"I almost remembered to take my top off before falling asleep, shithead," she says. The witch reaches for the kitchen. Her guitar comes flying across the open floorplan to land neck-first in her waiting palm.

"In another timeline, you got a free show. People PAY at my shows, because I'm a fucking PROFESSIONAL."

I-No doesn't just talk, because that gives lightning a chance to strike thrice or whatever brilliant shout-quotes mask man has for her next. She rears back and slams her guitar into the ground, which shatters tile and summons up some scintillating-green explosion of energy that vomits up both a discordant stereo screech and a chompy chi musical note. It's literally chompy. It's got fangs, and it's arcing through the air on a weird path to hunt Alan down.

"And this cock-assed attempt at dirty talk isn't GETTING ME OFF enough, so you're in fuckin' DEBT, GOON SIR!"

COMBATSYS: Alan instinctively blocks I-No's Antidepressant Scale.

[          \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////////////    ]
Alan             0/-------/=======|=======\==-----\1             I-No

[ALAN]
The masked man's body language remains neutral when I-No flat out catches the lightning bolts. While he's clearly a chi fighter, he's familiar with combat magic.

He then immediately snaps out of character again, posture relaxing. He straightens one of his gloves. "Nothing's stopping you from taking it off right now. Wanna go samesies?"

But then... the mask tilts slightly. "Timeline?"

The boxer doesn't have the time to chew on that for long. I-No answers range with range. He hunches forward a bit as the carnivorous music charges at him. His stance is all broken up - most people stuck like this are clearly staring death in the face.

"Yeah, fuck that."

His glove rises to his face as he sways to the side, leaving a smeared after-image behind him, the lightning dancing along his body hanging in place in his image for a heartbeat before it collapses. The mask detaches from his face with a quiet ~pok~ and he pushes it out toward the blast, sparks flying out where they grate together.

Alan R.B. is a sneering man with handsomely sharp features and stormcloud-grey eyes. He locks his exposed gaze on I-No, one corner of his mouth curled up as he draws rapidly closer.

"You've just said the magic words," he says, finally being himself. He detaches from the chi, mask falling in molten drops to the tile floor. "I hate to leave a rockin' girl unsatisfied." For a moment it looks like he's going to fall, his entire body relaxing, lightning surging around his exposed skin.

Jacket's restricting his speed. It comes off as he crosses the remaining distance in an eyeblink, hanging in the air where he just was. He's also clicked on a pair of pale grey sunglasses and stuck a long red cigarette in his mouth.

His fist cuts through the air, leaving an arc of snapping chi behind it, a sudden scything motion as he keeps on moving and stops just past the woman, turning on one foot and lifting his other hand up. A spark jumps onto his cigarette, lighting it and filling the air around him with an expensive, smoky-spicy aroma. "So what's your name, babe?" He grins.

COMBATSYS: I-No interrupts Hook Punch from Alan with Stroke The Big Tree.

[                 \\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ///////////////////////       ]
Alan             1/--=====/=======|=======\=====--\1             I-No

[I-NO]
Unfortunately for the initial choreography of Alan's prettyboy gambit, I-No is too busy screaming and smashing tile to notice his bouncing out of character and getting flirtatious. It's only afterward, after his afterimage is done getting body-splashed by angry music (IT'S CONCUSSIVE AND SUCKS), that I-No has clearly caught up with the program.

The red witch holds her guitar easily in one hand as she studies Alan with lips puckered in thought. The guitar bit is just on this side of eerie because she's holding it with one hand by the neck, but it's perfectly balanced horizontally in front of her as if she was wearing a shoulder strap. She isn't wearing a shoulder strap.

(it's magic)

Her gaze drops to the remnants of the music-blasted mask where it's already melted into the tile. Good, she thinks. It's shitty tile for people who tell dates they work in finance.

"Oh," I-No purrs, throaty but without any true warmth, "I didn't know you were someone who planned to /take care/ of me."

Alan drops his jacket and gets on his sunglasses and cigarette. I-No takes a few steps to the side, waiting to see where this goes. At one point she rolls her shoulder, a gesture that would almost surely send her weird barely-modest top falling off her shoulder since a few straps are currently unclasped, but nothing happens. Maybe magic is kind of an asshole sometimes.

Alan has an immediate chance to punch magic in its smug face. As he snaps forward with a hooking lightning punch, I-No is caught at an angle and forced to twist to face the threat. She spins her guitar up, holding it outstretched like a shield, but the sheer force of Alan's thunderous chi sends her skidding backward across the floor.

Unfortunately for the final choreography of Alan's prettyboy gambit, I-No is a real horror show. When he turns around to be a coolboy with the cigarette, I-No is improbably standing right in front of him instead of having been knocked back. A move that fast, that silent, could only have been accomplished by teleportation or at least some kind of... witchy... flight. Oh no.

I-No firmly grasps Alan between the legs, leaning in to get real intimate close, face to face.

"I'm I-No," she whispers, "and I only trade tits for dicks."

So she did hear his offer after all!

I-No pulls sharply upward. It probably only takes that increasingly-familiar distortion reverb noise to clue Alan in on the equalizer meters that are exploding upward from the ground to launch him upward in a manner most unbecoming for a lady's refined interests.

[ALAN]
Alan tells dates he works in finance. He technically does.

Everything is improbable about this woman. While he's outwardly a shallow piece of shit, and refuses to take things seriously with a focus and intensity that is downright Erician, he has a mind sharp enough to keep the shadow government he serves from having him unceremoniously killed in a hole in Maine for being irritating.

It's the casualness. She has magical effects everywhere with no immediate signs of having done a cool sacrifice to empower them. He'd assume a Grimoire at play, but the effects are too broad. Fortunately, 'I can't tell what's happening' narrows the field considerably on its own.

This is what he runs through in the few moments he looks down to light his cigarette and looks back up into I-No's face, no longer skidding across the ground. "Tch," he says, shaking off his right hand, scattering excess sparks from the punch right before she performs an ancient gripping technique.

To Alan's 'credit', he doesn't immediately fold like a shounen protagonist who saw an inch of thigh. He quite naturally lifts on the arches of his feet from the upward pull, the tip of his cigarette brightening, his sneer sharpening as his back arches toward her. "You drive a hard bargain." Sparks dance in his eyes.

Then she jerks, and not in the way he'd like, eliciting a growl from him before the goddamn equalizers come hammering up beneath him again, fortunately(?) breaking him free of her grasp, though in a manner that sends him bucking back into the air to crash into the tile.

A little blood drips from the corner of his mouth. Damn. As he thought... actually beating this woman is not something he can manage without a little more luck and a lot more prep. Fortunately, that's not the plan.

"I'd call that dirty pool," he says, still low to the ground, "but I don't mind getting my cue chalked every now and again." The blonde boxer slumps again, looking for a moment like he's about to pass out.

His body opens up, a natural conduit for chi. Energy spirals into his right arm. That's the other reason he isn't unceremoniously killed.

Alan R.B. springs up and forward right on the music's beat, one blinding bright fist driving up toward I-No's solar plexus. He comes to a sudden halt in front of her, feet driving down, hips swinging. He's usually fighting loose and sloppy, relying on his chi to bridge the gap, but this punch is for real. He tightens his muscles along his body, forcing all of the power flowing through him into his right arm. Bolts of lightning spray everywhere, shattering plates, scorching through the asshole kanji, shattering the screen right over Blake Shelton's canned ham face.

How much can she bring to bear? Can Alan force her closer to her limit? Does he really want to?

COMBATSYS: Alan successfully hits I-No with Overcharge.

[                  \\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////             ]
Alan             0/-------/--=====|>>>>>>>\>>>>>>>\2             I-No

[I-NO]
I-No takes a few sauntering steps away as Alan is left to his skyward fate. She's not even following up on the launcher with an air combo. It's irresponsible.

Instead, I-No snaps her fingers again. The stereo screeches anew and swaps over to some hard-driving bass line that sounds like it was recorded inside a B-52's asshole. She bobs her head and silently mouths along with the beat. Bababa ba ba bababa ba ba --

Thunk. Alan landing. I-No looks over her shoulder, eyes half-lidded under her heavy black liner and mascara.

"Tch," she pronounces at the thought of dirty pool, clicking her tongue against her teeth. "That's almost mixing thematics but I just had my hand on your pole so I'll let it slide."

The red witch spins sharply on her heel, setting her guitar on the ground so that she can lean on the head with her elbow. "Are you getting tired? I'm about to go pump my own stomach and see how much booze I can vomit up before it raw-fucks my liver."

The room is filled with the silent, pressured potential of summoned but unformed chi. I-No seems to sense it even before the lightning really starts up. She leans forward, eyes widening, leaving the guitar behind to stand up on its own.

"Oho. Is this your big load? Strip down and show it off, fedora!"

I-No is ready. Alan has to be on magic bullshit alert as he comes in. It turns out to be mercifully something he's seen before: she thrusts out her arm to intercept the lightning with what will presumably be one of her magical cheater shields. Her red-lipsticked mouth spreads wide in a vicious smile as she anticipates the close quarters.

Magical cheater shields do not, in this iteration, intercept fists. Alan's unexpectedly full-contact punch rams straight upward into I-No's most human of solar plexuses, forcing the air out of her in an inelegant exhale that becomes a weakly-audible gasp by the end.

I-No sways unsteadily. Alan has just clean punched a 5'5" woman who does not work out at all and is self-admittedly half drunk and half hungover. She seems too shocked to move.

"I, didn't think, you had the... y'know, everything," she rasps.

Lightning explodes through her. The hideous electric noise of scouring bolts mingles with not only the sound of shattering and burning, but also I-No's ugly shriek. For a violent moment that is only long by the measure of world-class fighting, it seems like this is the end of the witch. But of course it can't be, of course someone like her keeps coming back for more punishment.

"Don't," she says, thickly, forcing the words.

"touch"

I-No claws at Alan's forearm, her trimmed fingernails scrabbling for purchase.

"THE TALENT!"

I-No's final screaming word takes on an enormous, stadium-sound quality. The music and sound die as the speakers all blow out simultaneously and the TV screen spiderweb-cracks. Alan will probably only realize this later, because the absence of that noise is very difficult to assess while a wall of sound explodes between him and I-No, her voice giving messy birth to a cruel slash of magic that will continue rocketing forward and possibly carrying Alan all the way into the kitchen.

Where the open liquor cabinet awaits for its final fate: getting exploded and making everything smell like a distillery.

COMBATSYS: I-No successfully hits Alan with Longing Desperation.

[                           \\\  < >  ////////////////              ]
Alan             0/-------/-======|>>>>>>-\-------\0             I-No

[ALAN]
In this moment of impact, Alan's eyes behind the sunglasses are cold and remote. The color of the lenses makes the shades of grey blend into a single monochrome tone when he's managed to detach his emotions - they look nearly normal, save for the cruelty.

The shield holds back his lightning for a moment, only for it to rush through after his physical hit breaks her concentration. He ticks off a checklist. Human anatomy. Poor muscle definition. Unprepared for the hit. Too accustomed to dealing with magic on top of using it herself?

It's the most important piece of his report - threat level of 'I-No' plummets if they can figure out countermeasures against sorcery. Even if they have no reason to do anything about her as it stands, information is power. Control comes not from strength of arm but from the size of a bullet-point list.

His lips crack into a predatory smile. "And more besides," he says. Did that do it? His bodyweight shifts, preparing to disengage. The woman's fingernails dig into his arm - rolled-up sleeves allow her to draw bloody lines across his corded forearm. He feels a shift in the air, and takes a deep pull of his cigarette, in a moment of forboding premonition.

"Ah, hell."

The proximity of all of her power is stunting the natural flow of chi back into his body. He is, for the moment, a man of very good reflexes rather than impossible. With a twist, he breaks his arm away, but his hopping step back doesn't carry him to the far wall and the mildly racist folk art collected there. It only means he's already in the air when the power erupts, shredding his shirt and exposing a punishingly fit body at odds with his freewheeling lifestyle.

Shreds some of his skin, too, conductive blood spattering the floor as he smashes through the cheap swill of the liquor cabinet - the owner of LUXURY MODERN SUPER BOWL PARTY HOUSE,POOL,hot tub charges for a stocked bar but hey you gotta pinch money somewhere. Being bathed in cheap alcohol is almost as painful as the blast continuing to punch him straight through the wall.

Alan hits the legendary kidney pool itself. "Gaaahghl!" He skips off the surface and punches through the fence into the neighboring yard, crashing into a thankfully unlit barbecue set.

A weak "That didn't hurt!" wavers from the darkness. The Illuminati agent doesn't press the attack, however, so you be the judge.

COMBATSYS: Alan Alan R.B. does nothing and is still infuriating.

[              \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  <
I-No             0/-------/-<<<<<<|

COMBATSYS: Alan can no longer fight.

[              \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  <
I-No             0/-------/-<<<<<<|

[I-NO]
And, just like that, Alan isn't I-No's problem anymore.

With the music dead and the Illuminati assassin(?!) having completed a truly heinous pinball course, I-No is left alone in the silence of defiled petite bourgeoisie luxury. For an aching time, she remains hunched over and mostly motionless. Then, finding the spirit again, she reaches up to rub her stomach where there will likely be a bruise until she fixes it. A sick warmth punches against the bottom of her throat, and on its second try she gives in and makes good on her promise to vomit up a sizable amount of liquid.

I-No staggers backward. She looks blearily down at the puddle.

"No blood," she says. "Chill."

I-No's hat opens its mouth and makes guitar noises.

"I said chill," she snaps back, tone flat.

The red witch turns to walk back over to her guitar. She picks it up by the neck on her way to the couch, but hesitates as she feels a stabbing sensation in her big toe. Rolling her ankle, I-No is confronted with one of the many shards of glass that now pepper this grotesque pigflesh-colored marble floor. Blood drips from where it went in clean at a fleshy part. I-No's lips curl back.

Alan, if he's still out there, may see I-No come floating up to one of the now-empty floor-to-ceiling window frames. She hovers, rubbing the side of her face.

"Hey, dildo, the fuck did you want anyway?" she calls out.

COMBATSYS: I-No has ended the fight here.


[ALAN]
Another small drone hides shyly behind a tree. No further response is forthcoming.

[I-NO]
It takes I-No several seconds of no response before she spots the drone. She narrows her eyes.

"Fucking voyeur," she spits. "You want something to look at?"

I-No lets go of her guitar -- it floats alongside her -- and reaches up to grab hold of her top. It's about then that she detects sirens in the distance, which makes her glance off to the left where a copse of bamboo trees and a fence hide the backyard from the street.

"Ugh, fuckin' narcs," she mutters. She turns toward the neighbor's house on the other side of the yard and cups her hands around her mouth: "YOU'RE FUCKING NARCS!"

The porch lights turn off. I-No scoffs with a look of disgust, and then reaches to reclaim her guitar. She turns to float back inside, but doubles back almost immediately to point at the camera drone.

"Whoever the fuck you are, I'm gonna find you and all your friends and make you eat each others asses non-consensually, like some real weird-as-fuck human centipede shit."

Back inside, I-No's hat makes more guitar noises. I-No rolls her eyes and flies back inside to grab her things so she can be somewhere else before the police are here.

A MINUTE LATER

I-No also decided the best way to hide all the fingerprints and blood samples was to light the house on fire.

Log created on 20:26:39 10/10/2018 by Alan, and last modified on 14:43:00 10/11/2018.