As you can see, this mission managed to pull an impressive 21 roleplays, which is always a good sign! We're checking in with Catt, Dash and Aleena for this one, which is our last bit before the Finale, obviously.

 
Warning: Slight adult language

After battling the infamous Black Paladin, Sebastian Dash had suggested heading back to Seaside Town, the main Kingdom city. It made sense. Dash's experience had told Dash it would be the smart pay and probably offer a payoff.

Dash's only mistake might have been not thinking outside the planet, to coin a phrase. As they waited for the ship, Dash and Cattaras Whiteclaw examined the area and let Aleena and Jen discuss matters of their own choosing.

Or at least they tried. The big tiger kept looking off toward where the girls had gone. Finally he looked at Dash and growled.

"Are you're sure she's all right?"

"She's always all right. I've been travelling with her long enough to know that. Besides, she caught the bear by surprise. This wasn't a trap. For all we know, she could be on her way back in charge of a bugbear spaceship now."

Catt looked at Dash for a second before speaking. "She fought a bear too?"

"Kind of," Dash answered, reviewing what he'd heard in her mind. "Aleena said she was grappling with a bugbear and vanished . . ."

"OH! I thought you were TALKING about Aleena!" Catt laughed a bit.

Dash paused in examining the ground to look at him, a bit confused. "Right, Aleena saw your sister vanish."

Catt nodded. "I know that now. Although the one thing I don't know is- why are you out here looking for Catrina, instead of in there making sure about Aleena?"

Dash mumbled, "I like to stick to what I am good at. I know my strengths, I guess. Speaking of which, do you smell any ozone?"

Catt smirked. "Yeah, I know exactly where they took her. But so do you, because Aleena told us. What, you think I can follow the trail of a teleport like some stupid bloodhound?"

"No," Dash said, shaking his head. "But everything we've seen indicates they haven't made it off the planet yet. If they have, even if they've just mastered long range teleportation, that is a game changer, so to speak. I'm not even sure where we go from here, to be honest."

Catt shrugged. "You do what I've always done. Wait for her to get us a message- or show up with the trophies of her escape."

Dash didn't answer immediately, still looking at the ground. It was charred slightly where the teleport had happened, but the blast radius didn't spread outwards but rather seemed to originate from somewhere in the distance. "Raruall. Have I bored you with details on them yet?"

"Might just keep the details down to what helps us here." The tiger chuckled.

"Catrina tells me it's pretty boring," Dash answered with an indifferent shrug. There was no wistful reflection in Dash's voice. It was clearly an intensely serious matter to him. "Most of what I did then had to do with preventing them from returning, and we had to be thorough about it. It was a little bit like the Dark Ones where the threat was so great, even a small slip could be devastating and irreversible.

"But the main thing the heroes of the city, including me most of all, had to learn was that we had to play by new rules. Everything we'd learned in the past about protecting the city kind of went out the window. I think we're going to end up with the same situation with the bugbears, where we can't necessarily rely on things we relied on in the past."

"Are you including Aleena and Jen in that 'we', man?" Catt asked.

Dash nodded. "After what they did to Aleena's cysuit, yeah. I think this is going to be unexplored territory for us all."

Catt nodded. "Yeah… And that remark brings me back to my original question. Is she all right?"

"I'm fine, Catt." Aleena gave a slight smile, but looked distant. Jen pulled Cattaras and Aleena together, snuggling up behind and between her two favorite beings. The tiger twisted to embrace the elves equally tightly, giving Aleena a lick-like kiss on the cheek.

Aleena blushed, but smiled. "Y'know, Catrina would be so much easier to find if she had a cysuit like yours."

Dash smirked. "Maybe if the Paladin had one, we could find him."

"Pfft, we already know where he went," Aleena responded.

"He is not subtle," Jen added.

"Not in the least!" Catt laughed, letting his big paw grope Jen before releasing both women. "As for getting Catrina in a suit... maybe if we arranged a similar delivery to my own…"

It was time for Jen and Aleena to blush together. They remembered Catrina's 'special message', when she gave Jen an intimate lick. Aleena then nodded as she considered it. "It might be a lot of fun."
"Don't know if you have anyone on crew who's as goofy looking as what we know she likes." Catt gave Dash a smile.

Dash looked up, previously off in his own world, not seeming to hear Cattaras. "How'd you determine where he was heading, Aleena?"

"We still don't fully understand how 'magic' works here, but the end result is the same as our own technology - the manipulation of energy. We can detect that with our ships in orbit."

"Which they'd know and probably shield for, being spacers themselves." Catt looked thoughtful, pawing his favorite thing to help him think as he did- that being Jen's butt.

"Finding your sister will be tough," Jen said. She returned the favour by groping her Catt gently. "Bet she's back in their space ship, where they - Aleena, Dash and Catrina - ironically just escaped from."

The tiger's face grew stern. "Which will make escape for her harder. They know her tricks this time." He then tried to relax, before his tension caused his claws to sink into Jen's cheek.

Jen freed herself from her tiger's grasp and moved behind him to gently massage his shoulders. "How shall we tackle this, love?"

"We know where Black Paladin is, but we don't know for certain where Catrina or her cubs are. They're your family, so how would you like us to direct our efforts?" Aleena asked.

Catt turned his head to kiss Jen, sending her a little naughty thought for later involving their current position and things he knew the suit could do. He then returned his attentions to the matter at hand. "You're right. We don't know where she is, except that she'd be nowhere near the cub. That said, we do know where Paladin is- and I should eventually be able to get him to tell me the rest."

Jen and Aleena nodded. "Very well."

Large feathery wings sprouted from the elves suits, and Aleena's suit additionally sprouted harness straps for tandem flight. "I can carry you, Dash."

"You're in for a real treat, love. Today I teach you to fly!" Jen grinned at Cattaras. She took his paw in her hand and gave him a passionate kiss before briefly explaining the procedure. "Just run the program I gave you and set the controls for 'beginner,' okay?"

"For now.." Catt chuckled as his suit responded to the commands, growing large, powerful wings that folded against his back for now.

Dance glanced over to the trees, where his horse had just shown up. "Sorry, Españolola, looks like you can take a break today."

The horse neigh'ed indignantly and trotted off.

"Nothing like a little light bondage to get the blood pumping, yeah?" Aleena asked as she secured Dash to her body. "And with that, we're off."

Feeling bolder now, Dash quipped, "So, who is ready to dance with the Paladin?"

Catt didn't answer for a long moment, during which all he said was "WHOOOO!!!!"

Aleena chuckled. "You wouldn't believe how many times I've heard someone say that before an adventure."

Dash muttered, "This's why I try not to come up with witty quips."

"You're doing great, my tiger swallow!" Jen called out. She trailed slightly behind him at first, but picked up the pace and flew into his field of view to give him a good view of her backside.

"Done lots of things, love. Swallowing isn't one of them!" The tiger laughed before trying to catch Jen and tag her sharply across her tail… feathers.

--------------

An eerie quiet fell over Whitey's Grove as the birds flew blindly for the safety of the sky, skeleton bones rattled in fear (not that you could tell the difference between it and their normal rattling), and even the mightiest predators and meekest prey seemed more nervous than usual.

The ground itself shook in fear of the glorious and terrifying awe of the return of the Black Paladin.

Turreted tubes atop metal tripods hidden under the trees were rotated to greet the incoming party of Sylir.

As always, the avatar of dark intent gazed at the sky with a purpose atop his majestic warhorse. He saluted the two fliers - one of them was carrying THAT Dash. Paladin wished he could smash Dash's face into the dirt. Maybe he'd be lucky and Dash would survive. But his order was clear, his minions opened fire.

Black Paladin chuckled as the shells fired exploded into clouds of black that shot shrapnel in all directions around our heroes. Or he would have, had not a dive-bombing tiger slammed into him, knocking him from his mount! The pair rolled on the ground as they fought, magical armor against scientific cysuit- a cysuit backed by familial rage.

"Where is she?" was all Cattaras growled, even as he delivered blow after blow with chi speed and nanite assistance. All the hundreds if not thousands of blows Catrina delivered over the span of several seconds proved for naught when the Paladin finally managed to reach out and grab Cattaras's throat, hoisting him in the air and choking the life out of the big tiger.

"Jen!" Aleena called. She had twisted to protect Dash from shrapnel from the nearest of the flak explosions, but her wings had been torn apart and couldn't hold them. Luckily, Dash's reaction, enhanced once more by the nanites in his system, was enough to allow him to pull his broadsword free, plunging it into the closest tree as he and Aleena clung to each other. Even so, they hit the ground hard.

Jen was glad they got thing sorted on their own. She caught Black Paladin trying to choke the life out of her tiger. Arm outstretched. She flew at them at blinding speed, a cysuit blade leading. She plowed between them, forcefully separating them and separating the arrogant man's arm from his shoulder. An arm nearly spilled out when Paladin grabbed the disembodied arm and swung at it an unsuspecting Jen.

The blow clenched into a first and sent her sprawling, shocking her with the speed paladin's newly lengthened reach could grant.

"I like her armor," said a random voice, seeming to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. Oddly, it sounded just like Cattaras's voice. "So versatile. Paladin, help yourself to it!!"

Jen pulled herself to her feet. "Nice try. But imitating someone we know is unconcious? Not very smart. Show yourself, Jester Creep!"

"Oh yes," the voice from somewhere sarcastically replied. "How brilliant of you to notice the obvious."

Aleena stumbled around a tree and shot the air with a laser blast. Only it wasn't air, it was Jester. He was unfazed by the strike, but at least he was no longer invisible. Dash struck a pose next to the elf Queen.

…

"Pull yourself together, love," Jen said. She took Cattaras' paw and pulled him upright. The big tiger began to shake it off.

"Thanks for the save, pretty bird." Catt gave her a wink before eyeing the developing situation and... purring?

"Oh yeah… Been hoping I'd get another shot at you, asshole."

In response, the Paladin simply raised up his remaining arm, pointing in a direction to the north, slightly to the east.

"What's in Seaside Town?" asked Aleena. "I know we're a day late and I'm a slow writer, but still."

At her questioning Cattaras took off like a flash, gone from sight in less than a second, little knowing of the shocking and unexpected information he would find in Seaside Town.

As the Paladin turned to slowly walk off (and Jester King floated into the distance), Dash called after. "Um.. can I borrow your horse? I think mine's still upset at me."

Aleena and Jen gaped. "The fight's over, just like that?" Jen asked.

Dash shrugged. "Maybe the real fight's in Seaside Town."

"Not if I can help it. I'm taking down Jester and Paladin here and now," Aleena said. She spread her wings and dove at the two.

Aleena called out to Jen over radio. "Though it might be prudent for you and Dash to go to Seaside town and take care of whatever it is with Cattaras."

Dash called after the Paladin and Jester King, "Guess I don't need your steed after all!"

The Paladin's steed neigh'ed indignantly and trotted off.

Meanwhile, Jen nodded and snatched Dash up in a harness grown from her cysuit.
She took off and the two flew to Seaside Town.

….

"Da fuq is wrong with you two?" Aleena asked. She wasn't certain Jester had heard her; she beaned him pretty good on the back of his noggin with a mace she had just made.

"You don't get to just leave like that, not after what you've done to Catrina, to Cattaras, to Dash, to ME."

"Yeesh," the Jester King whined. "Let it go, already. No one likes a clingy nemesis."

This one was a stranger take after their repeated battles with the Paladin over the last couple missions. Citing the humor and action as highlights, voter Ichiro compared it to an action movie.

And of course, we split the trio up during this part, which we see continue to unfold during the Finale. All in all, I'm really proud of this mission, and it was nice showing a couple older enemies from the former Elite 7/8 group, who were probably our first serious enemies in AIL after the Penguins and the Knob Goblins in general. It did end a little abruptly but at least it ended on a joke, heehee.

With that out of the way, the final prelude is up next! We're finally to it! Yay!