The skeletal remains whirl through the air. Jevoi covers her head with her arms and tries to keep running straight, Tanglepork attempts to evade by zigzaging, and Luminița attempts to swat the flying bones out of the air.
Gank emerges from the ground and slides back into Jevoi. 'Turn around,' she thinks, 'We have to keep her in place.'
'What are we doing?' asks Jevoi, skittering to a stop, 'What's the rest of the plan?'
'Run at her,' thinks Gank, 'Don't stop.'
With a frustrated groan, Jevoi abouts-face. 'Better be a good plan.'
Tanglepork runs past her without a word, but a look that says, 'You're gonna do something stupid, ain't ya?'
'We're sending Grammy back to Hell,' thinks Gank, bringing a subdue soulsight back into Jevoi's eyes, 'When you've got her in the circle, slap that b***h!'
Jevoi can now see Ioana's silhouette in the dust storm and the runes glowing inside the ground, now several meters behind the lycan. "Alright, you old biddy," yells Jevoi, running around along the storm's spin, "You want Ling? Well, I'm at least half Ling."
Ioana howls again. "LING! VENGEANCE!" She twists to pursue Jevoi.
D: Did she anything else? G: Most ghosts form from one extreme desire; they're actually really boring people. D: What was your desire? G: I guess, not die? I'm a special case.
Jevoi stops at the edge of the runic circle and turns toward the storm. She spreads her arms apart, low. "Come on, you broken clock."
The storm escalates in intensity and speed.
Jevoi holds her ground as Ioana approaches, Tanglepork and Luminița far away in the dark, then just as the ghost hovers inside the circle, she slaps it. "Go to Hell, fur-hag!"
The magic of the runes opens a gate under the ghost and forms a barrier around Jevoi. The gate begins sucking with far greater force than Ioana's storms, pulling her in. So too are the bones dropped like water in a drain. But the gate doesn't close; it keeps sucking. Tanglepork and Luminița are pulled into it.
Luminița digs her claws into the ground, clutching desperately to survive. Tanglepork snags the lycan's leg; her screams inaudible over the rushing wind.
Jevoi hops out of the bubble protecting her and grabs Luminița's arm.
'What are ya doing?' thinks Gank.
'She has my tome,' thinks Jevoi, 'The whole reason we're here!"
"I've got you," Jevoi attempts to say, but her voice is sucked away by the wind. Jevoi, unfortunately, would not be strong enough to lift Luminița in normal conditions, nor combat the vortex, so attempting both only has one reasonable outcome: down the drain.
The whirling dust around Ioana approaches Jevoi and Tanglepork. "I shall have vengeance!" howls the glowing counter-silhouette.
Jevoi takes off running. "Tell you what," she says, "After you kill her, I can take to my mum; you can kill her too."
L: Love ya, too.
"Don't leave me here!" yells Tanglepork, scrambling to her feet. "Give me my gun back!"
"Why would I ever?" yells Jevoi, trying to figure out the mechanisms of the gun. The odd rotating piece in the center confuses her. It would be easier for her to study it, if she weren't running toward darkness.
"Don't come at me!" Luminița yells at the other women, "I'm not involved in this!"
"AND I AM?" yells Jevoi, running with Tanglepork and Ioana hot behind her, "I don't even know this woman!"
"I'm going to rip you limb from limb, Ling!" yells Ioana. The light emanating off of her continues offer a view of what the mortals begin realizing may be an infinite plane.
"Love the enthusiasm, Madam!" says Jevoi, "Wrong target!" Jevoi thinks, 'Gank, do something, please!'
'Like what?' asks Gank in Jevoi's brain, 'Ya want me to fight her?'
'You're the only one who can,' thinks Jevoi.
'I have an idea,' thinks Gank, 'Keep her distracted.' She sinks into the ground, invisible.
"Just shoot her," yells Luminița, running further ahead.
"She's a ghost, you drongo!" yells Jevoi.
"Not my bunica, idiot!" the lycan yells back, "Tanglepork!"
Jevoi aims the gun backward and pulls the trigger, but the weapon does not fire. It doesn't even CLICK.
Tanglepork laughs and throws a bone off the floor. It hits the gun causing Jevoi to drop it. She scoops it up as the gun and pulls the hammer back. She eyes Jevoi and rubs her hand along the barrel; sparkles enter the weapon. She puts both hands on the grip, turns toward the advancing dust-storm (while running backward now), and fires a glowing shot into it. A silvery explosion distorts the cyclone.
"That's how you do it, kiddo!" laughs Tanglepork, turning away.
Ioana howls in shock and the bones on the floor rattle. They rattle and shake and bounce into the air. Each begins flying in the direction of the closest mortal.
"Mamaia!" yells Luminița, "How did you screw that up, Jevoi?
L: How did ya screw that up?
"What did you just say?" asks Jevoi, "Then where are we?"
"Take a look, Ling," says an old woman, her voicing echoing from nowhere.
With a flash, the area is bathed in green light. This allows Tanglepork and Luminița to finally see, but blinds Jevoi temporarily.
"F*****g b*****d c**t," swears Jevoi, "Why the b****y g******n hell?" She rapidly licks her eyes and Gank rescinds her soulsight.
D: Does that mean you're going to say what Tanglepork and Loomy looked like now? J: Oh right, yes.
Tanglepork is a small gnome woman with curly blonde hair and rosy cheeks. She's wearing cute pink gloves and pointed boots, a leather vest over a mustard shirt, a loosely strapped stetson, and a matching skirt over leggings. She is currently lying on the floor looking up at the source of light.
Lumița is a large lycan woman with thick brown fur with a blue patch around her left eye. She's still wearing her red cloak. Underneath it, she is wearing a dark corset with a long skirt. She is now several meters away from Jevoi.
The light spreads out roughly nine meters and faintly another nine from a point slightly in the air, highlighting the crude stonework. As Luminița had called out, the skeletal remains of several small humanoids are scattered across the floor.
The source of the light, and the voice, is a ghastly, green lycan. Her eyes are empty and her teeth are sharp.
J: I'd rather not repeat what she said next. I didn't need to hear it myself. L: I reckon I know.
"What language," says the ghost, "To think I let that foul tongue inside me."
Jevoi gags.
"Mamaia?" ask Lumița, "What's going on?"
"Traitor," snarls the ghost, "You side with my killers? This lecherous lizard and the conniving d***f?"
"Hiiiiii, Ioana," says Tanglepork, feigning happiness, "So glad you remember me. Yay."
L: I can explain this, but ya finish this first.
"I don't know you, lady," says Jevoi, "I'm not Ling. I can send the message."
Ioana howls, "You are the only of your kind!" The wind begins to whirl dust about. "I'd recognize that filthy wig anywhere."
"Great," mutters Jevoi, "Mum doesn't even have to be near me to keep ruining my life."