hellburger | (no subject)

Current Location: Industrial District, The Nexus

Entry tags:

ixis naugus

(no subject)

Kazuhira Miller leans against a brick wall covered in the illegible remains of old wheatpaste posters, layered with a smattering of graffiti. With the exception of his bright yellow scarf, his uniform looks entirely at home among the coveralls and drab work clothes of the Industrial District's labor force. Workers representing various species wander past on the way to work sites and factories while others huddle together to eat lunch or enjoy a smoke break.

Miller looks down at his watch compulsively, only to be reminded once again that it stopped the moment he set foot in the Nexus. He sighs, pulls a Rite in the Rain notebook out of his breast pocket, and flips through pages covered in copious notes while he waits for a certain Mobian magus to appear.

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Naugus visibly shudders in disgust at some of the things listed. "Guns!? What do I care for your horrible technology? And protection is something I already have plenty of under my own power! But!"

He leans in, looking at Miller sidelong conspiratorially. "Let's say it just comes down to a favour in the future. Call in some manpower when I may need it for my affairs here in the Nexus. Does that sit all right with you? Clear terms, no unsaid tricks. Simple!"

Miller peers closely, silently at Naugus. He would still much rather all of this was in writing, but he gets the feeling there's no real way to enforce the stipulations of a contract in a place like this. "I can work with that. Of course, I'd appreciate proper forewarning and some briefing on your 'affairs', but consider it a deal."

He offers his hand.

"A deal is struck!" Naugus takes that hand energetically and firmly. And maybe it's just the grimy state of this Nexus region, the questionable streetlamps, but...did the lights just flicker and darken for a moment there? Was there a spark of red light in the mage's eyes for a fleeting second?

Regardless of that having been a trick of the eyes or not, Naugus soon withdraws his hand and turns on his heels, striding with purpose towards the warehouse. "I imagine you'll be wanting it inside this place then?"

The shake is returned with confident firmness. The electrical phenomenon doesn't escape Miller's notice, but all it gets is a frown and a mental note to have someone scope out the surrounding infrastructure for compromised wires.

He takes a few long strides to get ahead of Naugus, passing through the loading bay door and into the dusty shadows of the warehouse. The upper windows project grids of light onto the cluttered shapes of derelict equipment, crates, and cobwebs. He picks his way through this maze to a wall that divides the floor plan more or less in half. This is cut with an opening twice the size of one of the loading bays and flanked with steel sliding doors.

Kaz claps a hand on the frame of the door and turns to Naugus. "So! Can you work with this?"

Naugus watches the other man disappear into that maze of junk and decides to just circumnavigate that mess. Instead, the wizard hops up onto the top of the nearest piece of equipment and bounces his way from one surface to another with a little boost of air magic to get him across each gap he can't close on his own power. Finally, he thumps down heavily next to Kaz, looking over the doors in front of him.

"The whole thing as one large portal? And maintaining the doors, correct?" He shakes out hand and claw in preparation. "I believe I can manage this."

"Yes and yes," Miller confirms, stepping out of the way to cross his arms and lean against a stack of crates. "Assuming the thing can still be used as a normal door when necessary. Just a matter of not using the 'key', right?"

"Exactly! Though stepping through it without the keystone might be a little of a nasty sensation. But you'll get used to it, I'm sure. Now!" He claps hand and claw together, looking at Kaz with that big, toothy grin again. "What shall we use to tether the Nexus to your world? I assume this is going to your world, of course. I won't judge if that's not the case, of course. Your business is your own."

"Right, right." Miller is loathe to use Naugus' suggestion, but he's definitely not going to misplace his prized sunglasses. What better key? He pulls them off and hands them to the mage. "Just be careful with 'em. Sentimental value."

His brow furrows as he tries to work out the logistics of where the portal will connect. "My world. Costa Rica. How specific do you need me to get?"

"Of course. Certainly. And perhaps if you described this...'Costa Rica', I'd be able to make sure that that's where it leads. You've been there before, yes?"

As he talks, Naugus kneels down and starts to scrape sigils and circles into the dirty floor, the tip of his claw drawing furrows into the solid surface as if it were sand. The sunglasses get, for now, placed on his own brow for safe-keeping while he needs both hand and claw to work. Propped up there just on top of that bizarre horn of his.

Miller is happy to chatter while he watches Naugus work. "Costa Rica's on the Central American isthmus. Nicaragua to the north, Panama to the south. Lush and tropical. Exports lots of coffee. Goes great with some gallo pinto. My organization has an outpost on the coast -- the eastern side of the country, on the Caribbean Sea. Stop me if this is all jibberish."

"And hey -- is that stuff gonna be permanent?" His eyes narrow and he lifts his chin at the sigils. "I don't exactly want everyone and his mother to know there's a portal here."

"I'd highly recommend you not tamper with any of this. Cover it up if you have to. Break the runes, break the portal. If you'd like, I can just lower it into the earth when I'm done and cover it with a layer of stone? Safe and away from anything that could damage it."

He glances up at Kaz after finishing a second circle around the first, one ear quirking questioningly.

"Please do. I'll have personnel coming through and I don't think they'll be at ease with damn-near satanic-looking markings. Latin American recruits. Lots of Roman Catholics." Miller doesn't particularly expect Naugus to understand any of that. He's just making conversation at this point.

"You gonna have enough to go on? What else do you need from me?"

"Satanic? What does that even mean? Don't make up words. Are Roman Catholics some sub-breed of Overlander?" He scoffs either way, because man, so fussy about some runes! And here he's working so HARD on them! But he can't cut corners now anyway; one messed up line means a messed up portal.

"Oh, plenty. Plenty to work on. I assume you've had these with you when you've been to this Coastal Rico?" Naugus pulls off the glasses from behind his horn and looks them over before sliding them on. Just because he can. Whoa, it's dark! "Drawing the place from memories will be easier than having to look at a map and conjure coordinates."

"Satan is a creature that happens to look a little something like you, now that I think about it. Catholics aren't big fans. Might want to steer clear." The simple explanation.

"Yeah. Wore those back in Costa Rica," Miller replies, snorting at seeing his token accessory on the mage. Not everyone can pull off ridiculous sunglasses. "If you can't even remember the name, this memory idea sounds like a better bet. Whatever the hell that entails."

"Like me? Then what's not to like? Unless they resent powerful, handsome beings."

He pulls off the shades again, turning them over one last time before bending down and setting them in the middle of the circles and runes. "You might want to step back for this part."

Miller guffaws at the wizard's blatant egotism. Pot calling the kettle black? Maybe.

He does, however, take Naugus' suggestion. Kaz moves into a position where he can easily take cover behind machinery should things go horribly awry. "Ready when you are."

And here comes the fireworks.

The wizard looks over the symbols he's scratched into the floor one last time, ensuring that they're accurate. Then he straightens his back and stomps his foot down once. Those symbols and circles suddenly fill with crystal, shining and green, a few errant slivers twirling into the air with the abruptness of their appearance.

Stepping forward once more, Naugus uses the tip of his claw to begin drawing in the air itself, the images and rings described in glowing purple streaks. He works quickly, the craft something he's gotten plenty of practice in as of late. Soon, something that looks remarkably like the 'satanic' imagery on the floor hovers a foot off the ground, shining and shimmering. Then, Naugus holds out hand and claw alike, arms length. Concentrating a moment before he slowly spreads them apart, making the primary circle of his invocation expand. Gradually increasing until it fills the frame of the loading bay doors. He closes his eyes, concentrating once more.

And then? Naugus claps and the circle flares bright, the air crackling with arcane activity that's sure to make hair stand on end. The wizard looks over his work with a smile, soon turning to where ever Kaz has snuck off to smile at him as well.

In the absence of his sunglasses, Miller raises a forearm against the burst of light. Even his his mundane, human senses pick up on the lingering energy in the air. If he were pressed to say something nice about magic, he might grudgingly admit that it's very spectacular. Very much unlike anything he's ever seen. But really, for all its pomp and circumstance, magic still has some basis in science, right?

Kaz takes Naugus' smile as an invitation to approach. Albeit cautiously. "So that's it? I can walk through and Costa Rica's gonna be on the other side of that thing?"

"So long as you have these, yes!" Naugus bends down to take those sunglasses in the pinch of his claw and offers them to Miller. "The portal opens up to someplace sunny, tropical, a decent ways into a...forest? Jungle? So that it's away from prying eyes. So hopefully this is your Coastal Rico." Is he really still messing it up or is he doing it on purpose now? It's so hard to be certain.

"Care to step through and see for yourself? Adjustments can be made if it's the wrong location, of course."

"You're coming with to guarantee your work, right?" Miller squints at his sunglasses and cleans them off with his scarf before sliding them back on. Much better.

He takes a deep, almost centering breath before cautiously sticking a hand through the portal. There's definitely some warm, muggy air on the other side. He extracts his hand and looks it over. Feels a little tingly, but no harm done?

"You could warm up a bit. Make some waves in cryptozoology circles?"

"What? I was under the impression your world was one of only Overlanders. How am I to know that you're not just going to cage me and turn me over to a zoo once I step through?! Or I'll just end up full of bullets and I'll have to go home VERY cross over the matter." Because he's confident he'll walk away from any manner of harm. And THEN Kaz'll be sorry.

"A powerful wizard like yourself? Worried about some humies?" Kaz must think Neko's term is universal.

"Just a quick step through to make sure, then back you go. Trust me -- I don't want to try to explain what the hell you are, because I honestly don't know." Chupacabra would be an easy one, but they're not invented yet.

"Hum-...Right, you hang about with Nekomata. Worried isn't the word! I simply don't care to bother myself with such matters as dealing with your warlike and hateful race. Why put yourself in that annoying position? But fine! Fine."

After rolling his eyes, Naugus clamps his claw down onto one of Kaz's shoulders. "By all means, lead the way."

Miller doesn't argue against 'warlike and hateful'; Naugus' assessment is perfectly valid, but that doesn't change the fact that he wants the work guaranteed.

The claw contact gets a frown, but he allows it as he steels himself and steps through the portal. A chill runs up his spine and he's swept with a feeling of stomach-turning vertigo, but he's not missing any parts?

It's like walking into a sauna after the biting chill of the Nexus. Kaz lets out a relieved sigh and spares a glance back at Naugus and the Costa Rican side of the portal. Looks like it found an equivalent "frame" between a pair of formidable trees and their moss-laden boughs.

"¡Oye! ¿Quien es?" a female voice calls through the underbrush.

"Shit," Miller hisses, turning to look for the source.

"¿Commandante? ¿Es usted?" A woman emerges, clad in camo BDUs and carrying an assault rifle. Despite recognizing her commander, her eyes go wide and she keeps the gun trained on the utterly horrifying creature next to him.

"Yeah. It's me. Lower your weapon, Snail," he orders in English.

Naugus, meanwhile, spots that angry human aiming a weapon and reacts immediately. (You learn to have sharp reflexes when you spend a lot of your time contending against very fast, blue rodents.)

He lets go of Miller to step forward and sharply raises his claw in a swinging arc, hissing threateningly. The ground beneath the soldier's feet rumbles and follows the wizard's gesture, jutting a sudden spike upright, intent on launching the 'Overlander' flying into the air.