N.I.U.S mobile platform... Online. (Open)

Flashes of imagery passed through the optical receptors of N.I.U.S, his software having trouble processing what had just happened. But soon everything stabilized as the image before him became clear; a hollow wreaking havoc in what was once his personal platform. “All systems online.” Was all he said as his serpentine body lunged forward, swinging its tail in such a way as it ended up piercing all the way through the hollow’s chest. As it happened, a new system activated within N.I.U.S.

The internal processing reacted instantly. ‘New system detected within core processors. System creating new protocols, consumption and assimilation of defeated hostile. Systems dictate it to be taken into action, consumption of existing symptoms will otherwise fall into effect.’ As such, N.I.U.S proceeded to lunge his head forward, crushing the mask of the helpless hollow under him between his four jaws, consuming the spiritual energy in the process. “Systems satiated. New protocol set in quarantined hardware until next opportunity to satiate.” With this, the A.I set off into the world, to improve, adapt and assimilate.

Mathel was walking through the streets his coat swirled around him like a crimson cloak. The chill in the air showed his every breath with a puff of fog as he breathed, his eyes darting this way and that as he watched the families pass by on their way home from wherever they had been. It must be nice being with those who are like you, I wonder if I was once like them.

Suddenly everything seemed to stop, the air seemed to grow heavy and the lights grow dark as a sense of uneasiness fell over Mathel. “Hollow…” he mumbled under his breath as he turned to follow the sensation. Taking his glasses off he slipped them into his pocket as he grabbed the small cross that hung around his left wrist.

Turning the corner Mathel was greeted by the sight of a rather odd looking hollow, “A metallic serpentine hollow…Now I have seen everything.” Raising his left arm straight his black spirit bow grew from his cross that was closed in his hand. Mathel raised his voice to get the attention, “I hope you enjoyed your life because now it is over, I am Mathel Brightstone, and now I am your end.” With one smoothe motion two black arrows were fired directly at the hollow.

Satoshi had been lounging across the roof of some small commercial building nearby. He told himself he was simply using a different hunting technique besides stalking (namely, waiting for something appetizing to walk by and jumping on it), but in actuality, Satoshi's hedonistic attitude was now manifesting itself in the form of laziness. He yawned lazily, stretching out his front four paws and extending his tentacles in a luxurious stretch. That was when he felt reiatsu; what's more hostile reiatsu.

Satoshi peered over the edge of the building to see a man holding a bow of reiatsu, ostensibly having just fired a couple of energy arrows or something at an unseen target. Satoshi had encountered similar people before, but had had neither the opportunity nor the inclination to find out what they were called. He decided that for now, he would simply watch and wait to see what exactly this person was shooting at, and act accordingly after finding out.

"Threat detected." The synthetic voice spoke, the artificial point of origin being very clear, as the serpent swiftly moved out of the arrows' path, using its agile form to its fullest as it darted across the room with the jaws clenched together and zig-zagging forward to make it as hard a target as possible, making a slithering charge towards its foe.

Inside, all combat related systems were active to near overdrive as all facts pointed to this being a far more challenging target then the one who had previously sabotaged his old platform. Stopping for a mere moment, N.I.U.S made a flick of his tail and with it came a surge of electricity, the discharge of energy moving as a ball of electricity towards its target as the snake continues its charge.

Mathel smirked as the ball of lighting streaked towards him; raising his bow he fired two shots one after another. In hindsight, I should have kept my shades on. As the first arrow met the static charge there was a bright blinding flash as the second arrow cut through the light. “Heads up scum, let’s hope you can see to dodge because I wanted to break a sweat.”

Backing out into the alley the dark sensation crept over Mathel once more, “Crap there is another one, this isn’t good; where the hell are all the reapers when you could use ‘em?” Keeping his attention on the closer hollow Mathel attempted to goad it out into the street, so as to avoid damaging any buildings. “What’s wrong you worm can’t get to far from the outlet or you shut off?”

(OOC: Sorry for the short post)

N.I.U.S narrowly avoided the second pair of arrows, his sleek shape making him a hard target but not impossible. Reacting to the words spoken, the voice module of the serpent was quickly activated. "'Worm' Classification incorrect, current platform is of the shape of a serpent, which is a ecothermic, amniote vertibrae, whereas a worm is a non-vertibrae, I hope you see the error of your classification." He would then proceed with his charge and to avoid being stuck in a position where he could be easily fired upon in the door, he crashed his way through then thin outer wall to circumvent this.

As he came closer, the four jaws started to open preparing itself for a strike as it lunged itself against the human, aiming for the chest with its full set of jaws.

( Short, but yeah. )

That was odd. Satoshi had never in all of his hundreds of years seen anything like that before. It was a curiously metallic Hollow, one that seemed to behave in a robotic way. Satoshi's sharp feline ears picked up on every word it said, and the way it spoke seemed to reaffirm its likeness to something not organic. I wonder if it can die...and be eaten? Satoshi thought to himself.

On second thought, why would he even want to bite into something made of metal? Forget it. Satoshi then wondered whether the robot snake would be amenable to an alliance against this arrow shooting person. Robots were supposed to be logical, right? As far as Satoshi could see, there was no reason to deny the offer of an alliance; but then again, there was obviously something spiritual about the robot snake, something very Hollow-like in its reiatsu.

Satoshi decided that he'd rather partake in this situation than not, and so leaped down from his perch to land a few meters behind the human, just as the robot snake leaped.

Mathel was cornered the other hollow was at his back while the metallic serpent had pounced towards him. A heartbeat later someone was at his back, a grin spread across his face as he quipped, “About time one of you got here, I was wondering if you all got lazy enough to let a quincy do all the work?” Grabbing the shinigami’s arm he pulled her off to the right to avoid the serpent flying teeth first into his chest or the shinigami’s back.

A quick glance at the shinigami almost made Mathel laugh, “Is this your first battle, or is you nervous?” The shinigami was dressed in full armor, “Personally I don’t like the armor look, but hey whatever works for you; just don’t get in my way and keep the kitty busy and I will clean it up when I done turning the worm into scrap metal.” Mathel raised his bow once more and drew it back to his cheek taking careful aim as the black arrow formed in the arrow and with a twitch of his fingers it was flying towards the worm.

Only moments after he had come outside, his sensors had picked up two more presences, both dissimilar from the one he was facing, while one of them felt similar to the one who had destroyed his old platform. Making quick observations of the current state of things, it would seem as if the one similar to the destroyer was on his side with his position in consideration, and the other one being on the side of the one originally firing at him. With this new information gathered and processed, a new plan of action was forced to be taken into action.

His attack had failed, passing between the two fighters and landing with a heavy crash into the ground although swiftly got himself back i proper place although he did not manage to dodge both of the new arrows, taking a glancing hit along his outer back plates. The snake fell to the ground, feigning death but then with a snap of his tail combined with his ability to shock went quickly towards either the quincy or the shinigami.

Satoshi blinked lazily at the appearance of the Shinigami, seemingly totally unconcerned by her arrival, and by the proceedings going on in front of him. He stretched while opening his mouth in a luxurious yawn. "My my," he said with feigned disinterest. "This is getting to be a party." Then he remembered something that the man with the arrows had said. "Oh. So you lot are called Quincy. I hope that you're stronger than the last one I killed. He was dumb." One of his tentacles came down to gently preen at his face. "You Quincys are probably better off without him, no?" Of course, his words were not just indicative of his hedonistic, laidback demeanor. He was trying to gall the Quincy into doing something stupid, thus providing him with an opening.

That wasn't to say that he wasn't watching the Shinigami too. "And you, Shinigami...you look scared. Why are you hiding behind armor? Well, at least it's somewhat smarter than the countless Shinigami I've killed. They were dumb too. Tasted good though." He winked slyly at her and licked his feline lips. Satoshi was holding back for the moment; neither of his combatants knew his powers, which gave him a distinct advantage. Forcing either of them to make the first move was definitely the tactically smart thing to do.

Junko was shocked to be pulled out of the way so quickly to hitting the ground... Both the feline hollow and the 'quincy' have called her scared... but she had to deal with the incoming attack before initating rebuke...

"Bakuto Eight Seki!" Junko held this kidou on the left hand, her sword drawn in her right now, and let the attack hit the sheild, theoretically blasting the hollow tail back...

"Scared!" She shouted as she dropped the sheild, throughly pissed off, "I led the charge against Jeruselum against tens of thousands of men before any of you were conceived... I am not scared and you shall DIE!"

Junko started to let out a fair amount of her spiritual pressure, she murmered out of hearing range of anyone, or anything organic "Hado 8 Blade of Flames"

Junko cast this in her right hand so it overlapped her sword, and seemingly just burst into flames... and she yelled this next one for everyone to hear... "HADO 3 CRIMSON STRIKE!" Junko cast this at the feline hollow, who was officially pissing her off...

The worm had sailed through the air had missed both targets as Mathel and the armored shinigami. Mathel’s face was that of determination as he faced the hollow, but his words were directed towards the shinigami, “Jerusalem huh? Honestly I thought you were dressed up as a knight templar because you lost a bet.”

Drawing one more arrow he took aim at the worm, though he held his arrow back letting it gather as much strength as time allowed, “Come on you worm you wanted a taste of me a second ago, how about one more go? I promise not to move this time.” Mathel was goading the metallic worm once more hoping to make it jump before he loosed the black arrow.

Without redirecting his eyes Mathel introduced himself to the shinigami, “I am Mathel Brightstone, Quincy and wielder of the arrows that pierce the day. And who do I have the pleasure of calling a comrade in this battle?” Mathel spoke with respect, though he still didn’t trust shinigami he was relieved to have some help with the hollows.

'Processing.' Nius was smashed backwards by the shield created by the armoured one, his attack having failed as he landed a few meters back. 'Brute force, insufficient. Activating primary combat protocols.' The internal processing was clear, this situation dictated more complex actions, a test of combat systems. The one with bows and arrow had one ready, goading him to attack. 'Organic overconfidence. Insufficient to counter primary protocols.'

A plan was processed quickly, he would pretend falling for the trap laid forward only to use it in his own offensive, and to finish the lure he would add in words of his own. "Registry error.. 'worm' classification remains incorrect. However, irrelevent to this battle." As he spoke he had lunged forward, making a huge leap towards the quincy, and making a pause after he had said the two words, only to continue after they had been said by slamming his tail downwards, burrowing in the ground giving the rest of his body far greater momentum as he arched his neck to the side leading to his attack instead of being a direct attack to the chest instead being a sideways assault to the legs.

"Oh dear that is old...so how come in all that time, your only accomplishment in the afterlife is being a low-ranking Shinigami?" asked Satoshi in as insulting a tone as possible. He watched with interest as she caused her blade to burst into flames. And then, from her hand, a ball of crimson energy at him. Satoshi's six legs flexed easily, bringing him away from the blast. Feline muscles were so nice, so supple, his movements were easy, graceful, lithe, and efficient.

"Surely you can do better than that, Shinigami? I mean honestly..." Satoshi licked his lips with obvious disdain. "I've had more sport out of newly born Hollows." He dangled his tentacles above his own head, batting at them playfully with his front paws. "Don't tell me you're going to be defeated by a kitty like me?" Satoshi mocked her further.

Satoshi thought he saw and sensed the woman react in rage, but as quickly as the rage came, it stopped. She seemed to him to start in rage, but then stop and stand her ground. "Pity you can't even take bait," said Satoshi with a wicked grin. "It would have been so much easier on you if you had. Dying quickly is infinitely better than dying after a fight you fought desperately to win."

At that, she started walking forward toward him, her chainmail clinking as she approached, her sword still flickering with fire. I'll roast her inside that rusty old pot she's wearing, Satoshi thought to himself. He crouched down as she came near, looking very much like an oversized cat, about to pounce on a ball of yarn, the grin on his mask almost playful. His tentacles dangled just out of her striking distance, moving tantalizingly in the chill night air.

They tipped over, revealing that inside were lethally sharp looking spines. Hopefully, she would think that was his only power, and strive to avoid them. "Come on," he goaded her. "Play with the kitty."

Junko looked and hesitated for a moment, the spikes on those, tentacles, she had resolved to disengage the banter, and ignoring the feign of an ablity, he had been keeping back to hide something, but what it was she didn't know, but that wasnt it...

She ignored them, enacting her master plan... she said calmly, almost like one would talk to a friend or lover, "Hado 2 Reel" She smiled... and she stuck her sword out as, in theory the feline hollow should come rifling in anysecond to be impaled upon her Flaming zanpaktou.

Satoshi continued to grin as she stuck out her blade and spoke. That was when he felt a sort of pull on him, wanting to draw him closer to her, and to her blade. At first her resisted- after all, he did have a higher spiritual pressure than her, but then decided against it. He allowed himself to be dragged across the ground to her, his six claws dug in to slow his progress. The second before he was within striking distance was when he acted.

"Hiendan!" From above, his tentacles flexed and sent two balls of fire directly at Junko from a distance of no more than 3-4 meters. They would be difficult to dodge, impossible to deflect by someone of her reiatsu level, and more importantly, when they hit, they would not go out by conventional means.

Junko never expected for a weak attack like reel and Pointing a sword to work on a hollow of this caliber. She simply wanted to see what he was hiding.

She got better than expected with a named technique as this gave her sufficient warning to act.

When the hollow spoke junko dashed forward with her sword still stuck the same way as before. The hollow would likely be focused on his own attack and she was devilishly close she was aiming for the hollows mask...

Satoshi had expected something like this from a Shinigami like her; what had given him this expectation was the fact that she had managed to ignore his jibes- in his experience, Shinigami tended to be dumb like that, and by resisting, this one was not as dumb as she looked in her armor. As she darted forward, Satoshi showed them all exactly why one does not underestimate a cat's agility and flexibility. He too darted forward, under her stabbing sword.

His tentacles came down and under him as he slid between her armored feet and about two meters past, sliding through his own flames that were burning still on the ground. Satoshi instantly whirled around and fired another two Hiendan blasts at the Shinigami's back. Since she was wearing armor, it was unlikely that she'd be able to dodge out of the way fast enough to dodge an attack from that range, or even turn to face the attack.

Junko moved as soon as the kitten had dodged between her feet... She spun, turning to face where he had dodge too... but all she saw was flames, and two balls of them flying at her...

"Bakuto 3 Sutoppu" she cried, stopping one of them in the air.

She took the other on her zanpaktou, it already being on fire it didn't make too much of a difference although some blasted back and burned her face, but the core of the flame stayed with teh blade. Junko ducked sidestepped the other one, but feigned being hit, whispering as she fell, "Hado 8 Blade of Flames" And landed on her stomache, the blade being under her, so it would look like she had been hit in the chest, which she would have, and supressed her reiastu so that it was almost non existant... her zanpaktou was of too her side, also still ablaze... and with that she waited for the cat, whom she was monitoring his spiritual pressure as to see if he would attack her again, to see if she was truely dead...

Satoshi sat back on his haunches as he watched her fall over, evidently hit by his second fireball. He mentally made a note of the fact that there was a Shinigami spell that could stop his fireballs. It might prove useful knowledge at some point. There was something strange about the situation though- his flames did not go out unless they were extinguished by some means of reiatsu; as far as he knew, nobody else knew this. At least, nobody alive. That meant that her corpse should still be burning- yet, he could not smell the stink of burning flesh.

In fact, now that he thought about it, the fire that surrounded her didn't seem to be hurting her at all. Satoshi gave a haughty sniff. As if such a trick would work on him. She was lying on her stomach, with her sword beneath. The fact that she was in armor would not exactly make it easier to remove that sword from beneath her. She had, perhaps in her pride, thought that would not be an obstacle. But if she were to bring her sword to some sort of usefulness if Satoshi attacked, she would have to push herself up, pull her sword out from under her, and then make an attack.

That kind of thing was too slow to work on a Hollow with cat-like reflexes like Satoshi. But he decided he'd play her game. "My my, it seems Soul Society just enjoys sending people that are easy to kill for Hollows like me to eat," he said in a mild tone, like a connoisseur of cigars commenting on the aroma of a particularly good one. As he did this, he silently moved his tentacles up over her body, perhaps 2 meters above, or a little more. He then fired two more Hiendan from them, directly at her at near point-blank range.

However, just in case she was cognizant enough to roll over and avoid the blast, Satoshi fired a third Hiendan from his mouth. There was absolutely no logical way that he could think of that would allow her to escape this particular scenario unscathed.

(my blade of flames was under me not my zanpaktou, and yes, this fight is entertaining)

Junko could tell the hollow saw through her feign, but it was all part of a new plan... she waited for him to fire before acting, she felt 3 one from teh mouth of the hollow and two from the tentacles...

Junko rolled, and sent the Hado 8 that cling to her zanpaktou at teh tentacles, and after dropping the other hado 8 she yelled

"Bakuto 8 Seki"

Junko's intent was to burn away the tentacles, and send the other flying back at him, and this was nearly unavoidable, but just in case as the fireball hit the Seki in her left hand and had its inerntia redirected she yelled "Bakuto 5 Senko!" Thus blinding Junko and the cat temporarily... and probably the machine hollow and the quincy... but it was a sure fire way for him not to dodge...

The metallic hollow had burrowed underground it was now a question as to where it was going to come up. Holding the arrow back it steadily grew, putting more and more strain on Mathel’s bow. I have to get up off the ground otherwise I am a sitting duck waiting for the worm to surface.

Looking around for anything that could give him a quick elevation Mathel spotted a dumpster placed under the fire escape of the building the worm had exited out of. With three cat-like of steps Mathel was balanced on top of the handrail of the fire escape. “Come out here and face me worm!”

Thinking he sees the dirt stir Mathel lets the arrow fly free “Register this you damn robot.” The black arrow flies slower than the others he had fired, but when it strikes dust and debris flies into the air, blocking his view of everything below him. Dammit now I can’t see a anything, for all I know the worm could be directly below me and I wouldn’t know it.