Shadow Scarlet aimed a powerful blow at MT, which he parried with ease. When the two blades collided, the Lightbringer emitted a momentary flash of light that caused Scarlet to back up a pace, shielding her eyes. It was at that point that a thought occured to MT.

"Hey, that reminds me - didn't you say this thing was the 'bane of darkness' or something to that effect? Shouldn't it have some special power to kick the crap out of shadow beings like you?"

Scarlet's snide reply was preemptively cut off as the Lightbringer once again began to glow more brightly, causing her to recoil. The end of the blade sparkled brilliantly, and as though he knew exactly what to do, MT raised the sword high above his head and declared, "Seal of Light!" A sword of (you guessed it) light formed in the air above Scarlet and hovered for a split second before falling and pinning her to the ground in a kneeling position. Her blade and shield fell from her hands and her head hung down, concealing her expression.

MT looked at the Lightbringer and blinked a couple of times. "'Seal of Light'? That'd be cooler if it wasn't just a gimped 'Swords of Revealing Light' with a dumber name..." His gaze shifted to his paralyzed foe. "...but I guess I won't complain," he continued, slowly approaching her.

"...kill me..." she suddenly whispered.

MT froze in place as the real Scarlet lifted her head and looked straight at him, her eyes once again shining with tears... and these too were genuine. "Listen," she pleaded, "you have to... to do it quickly, before this wears off. If living means being a... being... this, then I... I'd rather... I..." She trailed off, unable to finish her sentence past her own sobs.

MT tightened his grip on the Lightbringer, his hand shaking. "..." Words pretty much failed him, so he simply sighed. "...I wish I was better at knowing what to say at times like this... 'cause all I've got is, I'm sorry... and..." He wound his arm back, preparing to swing. The sword shined.

"...goodbye."

...

With nothing left to bind, the seal dissipated. Blinking the tears out of his eyes, MT watched as what remained of the shadow creature faded into the darkness. His gaze fell to the floor, and he did a take - something had been left behind.

A bright red ribbon tied into a bow lay on the floor in front of MT. He picked it up and gently held it in his hand, somehow knowing where it had come from.

"It's time to end this."

This is not going as well as I would have hoped, Mauve thought to herself as Shadow Mauve kicked her in the ribs again. Ow. This is most decidedly not going well at all.

Shakily she raised a hand, summoning an orb of light to her fist from where she lay on the ground. Shadow Mauve took a few steps back in annoyance. Well, at least she'd stop kicking her now.

Mauve had to dispel the light in order to deflect the shadowy fireball that her double hurled at her. She was almost too slow. Oh riiiiiight. Mages are ranged characters. Wonderful.

She rolled to one side, painfully, to avoid the bolt of lightning that was now aimed at her.

This is pathetic. Mauve decided. I need a plan. What would Bogart do?

The answer was clear: He'd make Peter Lorre punch himself in the face. Heheheheheheh. Peter Lorre.

She clumsily brought herself to her knees, managing to block another fireball.

Although, admittedly, that information really doesn't help me much right now, she mused, coughing in pain as an ice spell hit her. Shadow Mauve's elemental spells were a real pain in the--

??? Elements? she blinked in surprise, realizing something. For the love of Pyros. I am such an idiot.

Shadow Mauve had no idea Mauve was having this calm-toned inner monologue. She was just happy Mauve finally shut up. She charged up another spell. Shadow Mauve was running out of MP thanks to the hadoken, but luckily her counterpart was weakened enough to be affected by base-level element spells.

Mauve raised her hand pleadingly. Shadow Mauve sneered.

"What?" she asked. "You wanna say something? Then say it!"

Mauve's hand went to her chest as she started coughing again. She looked back up into Shadow Mauve's face with a fearful expression and whispered something, weakly, as though the action strained her. Shadow sensed that she may have cast a spell, but as she didn't feel anything and Mauve looked no better than before, figured it didn't work.

"Sorry Mauve! Can't hear ya over the sounds of pain and suffering!" Shadow replied happily. She hurled the fireball in her hands at the mage. Mauve didn't even attempt to block it this time, taking the full force of the spell damage.

"You're making this way too easy. You expect me to kill you quickly? Huh-uh. I've waited too long for this." Shadow, now grinning madly, hurled an ice spell and a lightning spell at the fallen mage, who once more did not appear to be able to defend herself.



Several spells later, Shadow Mauve was getting bored.

"All right," she said. "I have a whole new world to explore, and in order to do that I have to track down that time-space wound you made. This has been fun, Mauve, but I think I'm going to have to end things now."

She poured the remainder of her MP into an orb of fire that grew larger and more sinister-looking by the second. Basketball-sized, it hovered menacingly above her palm as she watched it grow.

"It's been fun," Shadow Mauve said. "But not that fun. See you 'round." She hurled the orb of fire at Mauve.

Mauve raised a hand, much faster than Shadow Mauve thought possible for a nearly-dead chick. In fact, now that she mentioned it, Mauve didn't look nearly as battered as she had a moment before. Realization hit her.

"Oh Sh--"

"Reflect!" Mauve called. The magic orb bounced off of a shimmering wall that appeared in front of her and ricocheted back at Shadow Mauve. Taken by surprise, Shadow was knocked off her feet by her own spell.

"Y-you... Cheap move user!!" Shadow coughed. "You healed yourself with my MP! That... That's not fair! It's unfair and dumb! And cheap!"

"Hey, Element Absorb's on my sign-up sheet so it's fair play," Mauve said defensively, "Not my fault you didn't hear me cast it."

"Ha. I'll bet you just couldn't think of any better way to get rid of me and decided to resurrect that stupid spell at the last minute to move the plot along," Shadow said accusingly.

Mauve put a hand to her ear.

"What's that? Oh, sorry, I can't hear you over the sound of this super duper magical attack I'm doing." she said.

"But you're just standing there."

"AURA!" Six orbs of white light appeared around Mauve. They shot towards Shadow Mauve, surrounding her. They burned brighter and brighter, destroying Shadow Mauve with their light.

Shadow, for her part, did not sound overly pleased. Mauve faintly distinguished the words "YOU JUST MADE THAT ATTACK UP!!" tossed in with the sounds of pain.

"Sorry Shadow Me, did you say something else? I can't hear you over the screaming."

The lights faded, and Shadow Mauve was gone.

"Must've not been that important."




Back in the room with the others, a sliver of light erupted in the middle of the room. It sliced open into an egg-shape, revealing itself as a door of sorts. Mauve hopped through, putting her knife back in its scabbard.

"Betcha didn't know knives could cut through reality's fabric too," Mauve said to no one in particular. "It's not just chainsaws anymore. For the sake of the plot."

Phil had been sitting, watching Mammoth fight. He wanted to say something like, "Wow, that was dramatic," but decided against it. They might need that plot momentum to defeat the Caryatid's angsty powers, so he couldn't risk it.

Ok, I need to contribute here. What could I summon? Popo? Nah, I'm too beat up to lead him into battle, plus he'd probably screw everything up. Stupid Popo. I need to pass this responsibility on to someone while I rest up. Phil stood up. "Guess it's about that time. Ahem. •Summon: Mike!" In a puff of smoke Phil was joined by his brother.

"Huh? What's going on?"

"We're fighting the Caryatid of Shadow. It's an elemental construct, left here to protect the forces of Law with its angsty powers. I'm beat up, so deal with this for me."

"And how am I supposed to hurt that thing?"

"I dunno, use a splash attack or something."

http://www.smashbros.com/en_us/image...try_banner.jpg

http://img259.imageshack.us/img259/1...llengerco2.jpg

OOC: I really wanted to get this up more than a day ago, but things kept conspiring to stop me.

"Weep!" the Caryatid of Shadows spoke, patterns of ragged shadow danced across the unsteady floor as it advanced. It regarded Mammoth, Mauve, Flare, Gina and Phil. "Your shadows are weak, your traitor selves triumphant." The Caryatid appeared to have ordered its broken thoughts somewhat as well as revivifying its body.

The Caryatid paused midstep, seeming to look closer at its foes. The mask made it hard to tell. The shadows about her stilled, becoming quiescent again. "Blind worms." It made a sound that might have been a chuckle. "In the bright light of day you have been blinded."

"Rejoice!" it cried, spinning once on the spot with arms outstretched to embrace the dark. "My shadows shall envelop you and in merciful darkness you shall oh so slowly drown. Gently chained in eternal night, staring futilely into the eye of nowhere, you will see the truth."

The shadows whipped into horrid motion. From the circular holes the NPFers had noticed dotting the walls as they had descending into the pit, and from the wells dotting the flew, ribbons of night poured forth, whipped as by a storm. The solid fibers of shadowstuff coiled and grasped at the NPFers, seeking to coccoon them in the strangling strands. In the clearer spaces, perfect orbs of utter dark tore open, seeking to drag NPFers into the Temple's toxic other world, all while the whispers in the dark rustled and the shadows danced.

"And you will thank me before you die." the Caryatid said.

* * *

Hydra fell into darkness, clinging to the dark hide of her prey, not wishing to allow her to escape. At the bottom of the dark pit was a sea of liquid shadowstuff. They hit, splashing and struggling back to the surface.

Shadow Hydra's head lolled weakly, Arhra's spell had clearly done heavy damage. Her secondary heads still regarded Hydra with evil intent.

"Sssshe wounded me sssorely, but I endure. I can never be truely ssslain by another asss long asss you ssstill live. Come! Give up the burden of your monssstrousss exisstence. I will make better ussse of it than you."

Hydra sighed. "With all the backstabbing, betrayal, secrets and attempts at mind games, I've given up on trying to understand it. All I want right now is to tear something annoying apart. You qualify. Also, the hissing makes you sound stupid."

"Bitch." was Shadow Hydra's rejoinder. She dived, Hydra swimming after her.

* * *

Arhra saw a moment of total darkness and then found herself dumped roughly on the ground. She burned, the inert shadowy goop clinging to her from her dunk in the pit with Shadow Hydra suddenly stinging viciously. She scratched it off, cursing vigourously and then started coughing.

The air hurt, rasping at her lungs with each breath. It was filled with purplish motes, Arhra would have said they glowed, except they shed no illumination. The motes seemed to stick to her loosely, burning wherever they touched.

Looking around she seemed to be in a maze, smooth stones protuding from the floor to create a bizarre obstacle field. Streams of the shadowy goop ran through channels, draining into large pits, boiling black ichor filling them. The place was like an exaggerated version of the Caryatid's chamber.

"Where am I?" Arhra ventured.

"This is the realm of darkness that hates the light." Sarhras' voice came, strengthening with each word. "Its very substance poisons you and soon you will die."

"I'm getting rather sick of you and your cockroach attitude to life." Arhra told her shadowy counterpart.

I lit up a hand, and made it burn brightly for light. "Why is it always tentacles?" I said, trying to burn away the darkness.

"Eeep!" squeaked Mauve, dodging a whip of shadow-stuff that shot past her head. "Call me crazy, but somehow 'drowning in the darkness' doesn't sound like something I'D rejoice over." she said in reply to the Caryatid's speech.

The living ropes of darkness fought to capture her, but Mauve had no intention of following the Caryatid's suggestion of blissfully being torn apart by shadows. Following Flare's lead, the mage decided to go the traditional darkness versus light method and started calling forth fireballs and orbs of light, setting them in a web around herself to try and push back the shadows.

"What does a bunch of stupid darkness have to do with truth?!" snarled MT, swinging his new sword this way and that as a ward against the darkness. It was effective but rather tiring.

"Gah, this isn't getting us anywhere. Anybody got like a flash-bang, or a flood lantern, or something?" The Lightbringer glowed moderately brighter in response. "...? What, can this thing hear me? It keeps what the - ?" MT was startled mid-sentence as he realized that he was glowing as well, a pale aura giving him the appearance of a human-shaped lightbulb. It seemed to be keeping the darkness at a comfortable distance.

"Okay, now I'm worried this thing's going to attract some kind of GM fiat, here."

Hydra plunged into the inky depths of the shadow pool beneath the Caryatid's chamber. It seemed far larger than it had any right to be and curiously she wasn't having any toruble breathing. It was like swimming out into the night sky.

She focused on her new found shapechanging ability, trying to force her shape into something lean and swift, predator-quick as she swam in the direction her foe had dived. In readiness for the battle, she increaed her size to the limit of her ability, ready to tangle with her foe.

Not liking it in the dark depths, her foe elusive, Hydra fought to keep her mind from straying. Finally she caught up and was in for a nasty surprise.

"When did you get so big?!"

"You are sssuch a toxic little messs of pent up little anxietiesss. I grow ssstrong on your weaknessss. Poor little monssster..." Shadow Hydra sneered. Hydra's shadow was about twice her size, dark heads coiling and laughing.

"But I don't have any issues with my nature!" Hydra shouted in exasperation and wondering if her opponent was cheating somehow. "We've already been over this!" The shadowy stuff they floated in really did have remarkable acoustic properties.

"Oh, you're sstill represssing sssomething."

"What?! You don't mean..."

"Go on, voice your fear ssso that it may dessstroy you!"

Hydra paused. "If there is truely any basis to my fear, then I am placed in an impossible decision. Either choice would lead to betrayal. How am I supposed to choose?"

Shadow Hydra hissed in pleasure, stretching and growing ever so fractionally larger, absorbing something of the substance of the shadowy sea into herself.

Hydra's brains suddenly leapt into action. She had an idea, one that shimmered brightly with what was either genius or suicidal madness. She summoned all her misery so as to wallow in it.

"You're right!" she wailed, "Everybody hates me! They don't care about me! They just ignore or insult me. Even Arhra only keeps me around out of some vague creator's guilt, and she'll be getting over that soon. Not even Sarhras really needed me! If Arhra had cared enough to kill my opposite properly, she'd have been too weakened to effectively fend off Sarhras. I'm not actually useful. I'm even more useless than that nymph Arhra is always ranting about. Even my own shadow is better than me!"

Forcefeeding her shadow angst was certainly a... creative plan. Shadow Hydra waxed forth, growing darker and more terrible as Hydra channeled her inner Squall.

* * *

Arhra, in the warped shadow dimension of the Temple, spun around to face Sarhras. Thankfully, her shadow hadn't grown into a giant. The damage of before was still there - Sarhras' skin was mottled in strange patterns of darkness. She had gathered up the inky substance that flowed through the streams, shaping the shadowstuff into a new arm. The motes in the air sink into her, seeming to give her new strength.

"Your victory is far from assured." Sarhras told her, hurling strands of shadow from her new arm. "You cannot hid your weakness in the dark corners of your mind. The darkness is here."

Arhra ducked under the sweeping strike, skin still burning from the toxic air. "I get it now." she said, an expression of dreamy epiphany upon her face. "I must beat up my fears and my regrets, as conveniently represented by this annoying doppelganger of myself." She lunged forwards, punching at Sarhras' gut.

"It... doesn't work that way." Sarhras told her, sliding to the side.

"Your words are lies meant to make me doubt." Arhra declared blithely, a bubbling stream of violet magic leaping from her hand.

Sarhras gestured to the side, a sheet of shadows flowing form the stream to halt and collapse in on the attack. "There will be death and destruction beyond imagining if you continue on this path." Sarhras said, trying a different tack.

Arhra prised up a loose stone from the floor with her foot and then hit Sarhras with it. "There always is." she said levelly.

"What if you fail?" Sarhras grappled Arhra, shadowstuff seeming to flow into her.

"Oh, I'm sure we'll have a good chuckle about it after the end." Arhra socked her, drawing out of Sarhras' clingy grip.

"What if you succeed?" Shadowstuff was definately being poured into Sarhras, her body swelling imperceptibly.

Arhra noticed, eyes tracing where the shadow umbilicals went. "You really are just a puppet, aren't you?"

"Aren't you?" the reply came from two pairs of lips. The Caryatid stepped into view, a towering, majestic figure in this place. Great robes of shadow clung to her, hem turning into root-like strands that wound away into the pools of shadowstuff. Several connected Sarhras to her, feeding power to the shadow.

"So you exist in both worlds at once." Arhra said. "So that is why you are so eager to trap us in those shadow voids. You were wanting to split us up while you could act in both dimensions at full strength."

"I was not made to fall to Chaos." the Caryatid replied. "Whatever measures necessary to protect the Seals must be taken."

"Surrender." Sarhras urged. "In doing so you might undo your crimes."

"HA!" Arhra said, "This dimensional splitting is a direct result of Chaos! Even you are corrupted, Caryatid! You seek to prolong the inevitable. You surrender!"

The whispers were thrown into discordance. The Caryatid jerked as if attacked. "I serve... I serve Law... The song of Chaos shall not be heeded! You are not her, I shall not obey you. You are one who would bring Chaos-"

Sarhras had lunged at Arhra, shadow bloated body sculpted to a picture of perfection. Arhra grabbed her and whirled her around, tossing her into the Caryatid. The two impacted messily, the shadowy substance of their bodies mingling.

Intent on escape form this toxic world, Arhra tore off one of the looping conduits linking the two, spilling utter darkness unto the floor. The Caryatid and Sarhras untangling themselves, looming up higher, Arhra hammering at the spill. Just as they lunged, something cracked.

* * *

As the NPFers fended off the shadows, the Caryatid replied to them.

"In the darkness you will have no light to deceive your senses. The lying sound will be smothered in the velvety folds of shadow and your lying flesh will feel only the empty vista of night. All deceptions stripped from you, you will have nothing."

"With nothing to comfort you, the ultimate futility of your actions will be revealed. Submit! It is the only way you may save yourselves."

The shadows wheeled about her, strands of hungry night lashing at the npfers, capering darkness forming briefly into horrid beasts that gnashed and slashed at the NPFers. With burning fire and steady light, the NPFers fended off the onslaught, holding back the night. The shadows could not smother it completely and though they pressed eagerly around, they could not overcome the light.

A deeper shadow appeared on the ground like a stain. It quivered and then cracked, black ickiness spurting out like blood. From the sundered darkness Arhra emerged, white skin luminious and eyes blazing. The broken ground heaved behind her, as though something was trying to force its way through after her.

The Caryatid felt lost. The delicate damage of the dimensions was damaged, her split mind confused. Her shadows were failing before the light and all was coming unravelled. The final failure of the only purpose for existence was before her and it was a prospect she could not face. "How is this possible?" the Caryatid whispered.

"I'm the Endbringer, bitch!" Arhra replied brazenly.

The Caryatid was not the sort to correct others who had misunderstood her meaning. "With other possibilities exhausted, truth must be impressed into captive minds. Know that whatever happens, you will know folly, you will know regret and you will know fear!" She raised up both hands, a great cloak of night upon her shoulders as she unsteadily gathered power, the shadows gushing into nightmare forms as she readied for a last, desperate assault.

"This is it!" Arhra shouted, "Finish her off!"

Mike had been protecting Phil and himself from the tentacles as Phil tried to think up a plan. Suddenly, Phil jumped to his feet. "Right! It's time to go beyond the impossible and kick reason to the curb! Mike," Phil waved an arm, "come over here and let me jump on your shoulders!"

Mike focused an annoyed gaze on his brother. "Huh?"

"A man's combination is beautiful, blazing spirit! Now, Combine!"

Mike shuffled over. "God dammit, Phil..."

Phil grabbed his brother's shoulder, leapt into the air, and yelled, "Brotherly combination!" He then slipped off Mike's shoulders. "You have to yell it too, man." The process was then repeated, with Mike grumbling along. "Brotherly combination! Gurren... Wait, that isn't right. What should we call ourselves?"

Mike looked up at the hobbit on his shoulders. "Phil-Mike, man. That's what we always use."

"But that's our fusion name, this is Combination. Also, why didn't we just fuse?"

"We'll look ridiculous either way, Phil. Just go with Phil-Mike."

"Righto, then." Phil pointed to the ceiling. "Phil-Mike! Ours is the silliness that will pierce the shadows!"

Then they stood there for a moment. "Ok, now what? I've got a hobbit on my shoulders in a dank well."

"Oh, right, game plan." Phil spent a moment whispering his plan to Mike.

"Huh, that almost makes this stupidity make sense. •Haste."

Phil drew his five-iron, then swept his hand across it. "•Bolt." The club crackled with magic electricity. "Now, charge!" Phil's head snapped back and he almost fell off as his brother sped across the room toward the Caryatid. They quickly closed the distance, and Phil raised his golf club and took a swing.

"That's it..I've had just about enough of this.." I said, leaping back and charged up a Mega-Flare, which made it diffucult to aim since I had to keep moving. It was a long ten seconds, but I had it ready. "Hey, shadowbitch!" I called out to her, hopefully either A: distracting her from the others, and letting them hit with their attacks, or b: divide her attention, figuring she can't block all the attacks at once. As soon as I fired it off, I kept on moving.