Battle among the books (Tsu/UD)

Kasumi - Hero's charm -10 rupees.
Scyllis - +50 rupees

Kasumi stepped into the empty library, her high heels clicking loudly on the tile floor below. She had come here to find something specific, and as Triton often told her, this was a good place to find anything she needed. 

Of course her rehearsals always made her have late nights, so she had come here at the ungodly hour of one in the morning, meaning the place was devoid of life. Lock picks work wonders, as she'd learned in her old days as a street urchin. 

She took off her heels, putting on normal shoes instead. There could still be people in here and she didn't want to risk a confrontation. Silently, she crept to the section she wanted,and found her book. The Hero of Time. 

Liraz had suggested she look into past heroes for inspiration, and Link was the best of the best. She flipped open the heroic epic and began reading, quickly becoming lost in it's pages. 

This was not a peaceful night. For whatever reason, Scyllis had been unable to sleep in anything more than a fit. She had awoken without purpose, but she knew it was going to be a long, sleepless night. It wasn't as though this hadn't happened before. There were simply nights where the vice-grip of consciousness refused to release her. Those nights it was usually a pretty pointless endeavor trying to sleep, and even if she succeeded it generally was a terrible sleep that left her exhausted the next day.

So with that in mind the Zora woman got out and got dressed. While she wasn't sure what she was going to do outside she was certain that she wouldn't get much done lying around home. She crept out into the darkly veiled night, intending to just take a walk around in the moonlight. She could make out shapes but not colors; general forms but not details. She could see why the darkness was such a common phobia.

It was unnatural to her, the supreme lack of activity; she had only ever been outside in the middle of the day, when hustle and bustle reigned, when it was a lucky moment in one could find a single minute of peace. But now, the same place was dead silent.

As she walked the streets, Scyllis noted that a building had a slight sliver of light leaking out from its doors. She drew closer, curious, and opened the door. Odd; it was unlocked? She turned her head, examining the room. It was full of shelves and the smell of old leather-bound books filled the air. The library? She didn't think it would be open at this time of night...

Kasumi quickly closed the book as she heard something or someone approach. With the thing tucked into her bag, she snuck around each corner nervously, not wanting to get caught. 

Before long she located the noise, peering through a bookcase to see a janitor cleaning. Oh. She should have expected that. But if that was the source of the noise, she had a clear run out of the place. Now confident in that she knew where everyone was, she walked around a corner... And right into a girl. She accidentally collided with her, falling onto her rear. "Well fuck..." She muttered, cursing her luck.

Scyllis was knocked back by some sort of collision, but she didn't see what exactly she hit. It was notably strange that she could get bowled over even though she wasn't actually walking forward at the time. "Oh, I'm sorry," she murmured, though she wasn't sure why she was the one apologizing. She looked up at the one who had run into her.

Another Zora, though this one was decidedly more attention grabbing than she was. She wore a pink dress and many, many jewels. Her face looked vaguely familiar, but Scyllis couldn't quite put her finger on it.

"Um... are you okay?" She asked, pulling herself up and dusting herself off, then offering her hand to the hurried Zora.

Well at least she wasn't calling for help. Kasumi allowed the girl to help her up, brushing off her rear. "Ow... I'm fine. I just wasn't looking where I was going..." 

She looked the zora over, though she seemed rather plain. Well, she'd proven she isn't going to rat her out, so why not be courteous? "I'm Kasumi Gallota, actress." It struck her as odd that she didn't recognize her, but oh well, theatre wasn't for everyone.

"Oh... nice to meet you," said Scyllis, as the other Zora got up. "My name's Scyllis Bravadine..." So... her name was Kasumi Gallota? And, an actress... she wondered if either of her parents knew this woman... or the other way around.

"Um..." she started, looking behind the other Zora. The library still looked as dead as a doornail, the only activity seeming to be from the two young women in the doorway here. "What were you doing at this hour?"

Kasumi shrugged. Hey, if telling the truth was working so far, why stop? "My rehearsals always run pretty late and I have to prepare too much in the mornings for it, so I figure this is my best time to check out a book."

Now with her reason out if the way, what was this girl's? "What about you?"
________________________

At the back door, mostly out of earshot, the janitor was putting away his cleaning stuff. With little warning more than "Nighty night." he received a knife across the throat, dropping the janitor dead.

Four men then walked into the main room, not too far from Kasumi and Scyllis, and not caring much for stealth anymore, now that the one person they thought to be here was dead. "Alright, Walter. Where'd you hide it?"

"Oh... um..." Scyllis muttered. What was she doing? She had just wanted to investigate... "Well, I was just wondering what was going on in here..."

She thought she heard something as she spoke, and leaned to one side, trying to look past Kasumi to see what the noise was...

Kasumi was unnerved that it had been that easy to see that something was wrong when she'd snuck in. She'd have to be more careful next time. 

With the commotion happening behind her, Kasumi wasn't able to see what happened, only hearing "Who're... Shit!" and then a loud snap, as of from a seed shoote- Wham!

Kasumi staggered as an ember seed slammed into her shoulder, igniting her arm in pain. She dashed forward, wrapping her better arm around Scyllis and pushing the girl into a nearby storage closet, shutting the door behind them. "W-who the hell was that?!" she muttered, clutching her arm. 

Scyllis was breathless as the two quickly found themselves in a dark little closet. She muttered a short, quiet "Thank you," to Kasumi, turning her head in the limited space she had to look at the other Zora's wound. She gently pried Kasumi's hands off of it, taking a better look.

"Oh, this doesn't look so bad..." her hands glowed softly as he cupped them around the ember seed wound, slowly mending the flesh and assuaging the pain and burns. She let out a small breath and taking her hands off the wound. When she did so, the skin had healed.

"Um..." She started whispering, trying to listen for any more movement outside. "Should we try and leave, now...?" Now that they had taken a moment to calm down, it did not seem the height of sanity to stay within an easily found, cramped chamber in the same place as people who had demonstrated themselves to be hostile.

Kasumi looked in awe at Scyllis' healing. She didn't even know people could have abilities like that, much less that she'd encounter one. Praise later, for now, thugs.

"Just wait..." Kasumi said, placing her ear to the door.

"Who was that?"

"Dunno, dressed fancy though. Spread out and find her. Whoever this bitch is, drive a knife into her, yeah? Kilger, it's behind a book, right?"

"Yeah, I hid the thing in a compartment behind the biography of Link. I figured it'd stand out. Nain, you check the room here, everyone else, spread out."

Kasumi leaned away from the door, drawing the rapier she used on set. She removed the small ball on the end that made it safe, motioning for her zora companion. "Here he comes..."

Scyllis saw Kasumi draw a weapon, and was shocked. What? Was she planning on fighting somebody with a sword, when these people had seed shooters? Even if that worked somehow wasn't lethal force? She didn't want to be a murderer...

"Huh? Wait..." She started, trying to readjust herself in the tiny closet. This proved to be a sad mistake as she tripped over her own feet and crashed into the door, falling out into the room outside.

...Right at the feet of one of the intruders. In both of their momentary surprise, Scyllis noticed that he had a Seed Shooter, which she could not imagine was going to be used for friendly purposes. Almost instinctively she blew a small fireball out of her mouth, lighting up the seed shooter and causing the man to drop the heated and burning weapon, cursing lightly.

Scyllis stood back up and kicked it aside, all the while saying, "I'm sorry..!"

Kasumi gasped as Scyllis fell from the closet, right at the feet of one of the armed assailants. He pointed his seed shooter right down at her head before she burned the weapon from his hands. He stumbled back mumbling. "But wait... Not in that dress...?" 

"Nope. She isn't." As he turned his head, Kasumi lashed out, slashing at his chest. She hit right on the back of it his hand as he blocked, making him step back again, a deep cut on his hand. The man didn't waste any time in trying to punch Kasumi in the head. It certainly was a good thing that was how so much Aqua Knight choreo started. 

The zora quickly decided exactly what she'd do, having faith in Shanilan's history as a martial artist to write convincing and realistic fighting. "Let's see..." She mumbled, dodging sharply to the right and grabbing his arm. "Act three, scene 7 mook six." She kicked low, sweeping his legs from under him while keeping a hold of his arm. 

Liraz had always stressed to her not to pull hard for this scene, so for this rehearsal, she'd pull as hard as she could. With the guy's arm bent back at such a strange angle, When Kasumi stepped on his shoulder and seized his arm with both hands, he barely had time to try reaching for his seed shooter before she twisted and pulled, a sickening pop coming from his arm as she looked and knew that arms weren't supposed to bend that way. 

As the attacker let our a whimper, Kasumi kicked him hard in the back of the head, knocking him out. She then walked to Scyllis, putting a hand on her shoulder. "And that's a wrap, take an hour, evil assailant. You okay?"

Scyllis watched, stunned, as Kasumi quickly disabled the attacker by forcing his arm into a position arms are not meant to be in and toppling him. She finished with a single brutal kick.

She nodded shakily at the fellow Zora's question, and asked, "Is he...?" She looked away. She wasn't sure she wanted to look at him, and she instead distracted herself by looking around to see if any other nasty surprises were coming for them. She couldn't be sure that this man was alone, and if he wasn't, then they had made a bit of noise here...

Kasumi shook her head at Scyllis' implication. "No. He's not dead. He just won't be shooting anyone anytime soon. And yeah, there's a decent number of people. I heard three, but there could be more. And... They said they hid something next to the "Biography of Link". " 

The Zora reached into her bag and looked for the book, pulling it out. "I don't think they'll be finding it soon. What do you think, should we go get help?"

"Uh... yeah," said Scyllis, who was silently grateful that the plan did not include any more violence. "Um... I guess we should take the book and whatever they're looking for if we find it, too..." She didn't know what it was that would justify breaking into a library in the dead of night but she was willing to bet she didn't want these men to have it.

The two zora women snuck around, using bookcases to conceal themselves. Eventually, though, there was a thug searching directly in front of their path, and if they tried to get on the other side of the shelves, another man was searching there too.

Scyllis looked around a little, trying to find some way around them. Nothing that wouldn't leave them very, very open for their companions. She didn't like shooting flames so close to so many flammable objects, but... She shot a small spark at his hand, trying to get him to drop the Seed shooter in it.

Kasumi nodded, sneaking with the other girl until they reached the next criminal, who was searching along the books, seed shooter in hand. At least until Scyllis fired a spark, making him quickly drop the weapon from his hand. Kasumi then rushed in, launching a low sweep kick for his legs, but with one raised knee, he managed to block the attack. It didn’t take much for the man to grab Kasumi’s wrist, twisting hard and elbowing her in the side of the head.

The Zora was slung to the ground, gripping her head in pain. With this opening, the criminal reached down and picked up his seed shooter, pointing it at Scyllis. Kasumi quickly lashed out an arm, slinging an Aquarang into his seed shooter, disarming him once again. “Agh! Dammit!” He yelped, rubbing his hand where he’d been hit.

Scyllis walked up to the man as he dropped his weapon a second time. She wasn't sure how long they could spend with this, especially if there were people in the immediate vicinity who had heard him, so she laid a hand on his shoulder. She said quietly, "I'm sorry," to his surprise.

"wh--"

She closed her eyes and let loose a burst of electricity from her body. She didn't use the power much, but she didn't want to hurt him too much, so she only maintained it for a second or two.

It seemed to do the trick, though. When she opened her eyes and looked at their aggressor, he was on the floor, twitching, probably paralyzed. "I'm sorry!" She apologized again, looking around to make sure there were no other attackers.

Kasumi put a hand on Scyllis’ shoulder. “Don’t apologize. They’re attacking us.” The zora started walking towards where she found the book, which this thug was actually close to. “Right… here…” She said, putting her hands behind the book. He’d said a compartment… Her finger felt a small hole, and upon digging in, the shelf the books were on lifted up, revealing a strange golden mask.

“Huh… Jewelery? That’s what this is all about?” She put it on jokingly, looking at Scyllis. “How does it look?” She said with a smirk… Until the words started popping up in her head. Scyllis Bravadine. A few spells… Nervous. Was that her emotions? What a weird mask… She took it off, putting it into her bag. “I see why they wanted this…”

What an odd looking mask. Scyllis certainly didn't see why these men wanted it, as it seemed entirely incongruous with them. Kasumi, too, seemed bemused, but upon putting it on, apparently had some sort of moment of comprehension. The former Zora woman wondered idly whether or not it may have some special power, but then stopped herself. Now was not the time.

"U-umm," said Scyllis, eyes darting around the room. "I-if we have this, shouldn't we go before the others--"

She was interrupted, loudly, by a loud pop, followed instantaneously by searing pain in her shoulder. She let out a sharp cry as she fell to her knees, clutching the Ember-Seed burned spot.

"If you know what's good for you, lass," said the culprit, "You'll give me that mask."