A looking glass, upon a balmy breeze. (Lerna/Magnolia)

Lerna had learned a lot when dealing with humans over the past four hundred years. From their penchant for schemeing and trickery, to the viciousness that they sometimes employed to survive despite their aptitude for feigning civility. So when she found herself being pulled into a meeting in such a ....... remote place. She couldn't help but smile to herself. Arriving in the center of the ruined city, she was a little impressed when she noticed those small hints of the operation. The subtle hints of human occupation. While it was true that the place was a roving wildlands of hollows and beasts twisted by reishi, that didn't mean there weren't people there. Individuals who thrived on the opportunity to be in a reishi-rich environment.

She stopped, pausing when she took a moment to look at her phone. Atrophy and vines had rid any notion of trying to read the signs, but according to the gps she was where she was supposed to be. She looked around and paused when at long last she noticed the person she had been tasked with meeting. A wiry man purportedly by the name of Sikes. He was already nervous. She could tell that from a distance, the way he anxiously fidgeted around as she walked closer.

"Deal's off. Something came up." He stated flatly.

The statement made her raise her brows and she put on a casual smile. "Oh really? That's a pretty far cry from when we talked with your b-" She was actually interrupted by the man suddenly pulling a piece from his waist, immediately she let her eyes shift to the blue capping at the end of the gun. "I SAID it's off! We got somethin to take care of." He asserted.

She paused, gently raising her hands disarmingly before putting on a calm smile. "Oh really? And why is that? I'm a little intrigued. You guys hav e a reputation after all." She chimed. And immediately she saw a glimmer of interest in the man's face. One that slowly turned into a knowing smirk.

These guys were known extremists. Fleshies. IT wasn't actually one group, but a scattering of various groups here and there. Humans, Quincy, and other various living folk that had .....particular feelings about spiritual beings putting their noses in the business of the living world. They hung around ruins and other blown out places where spiritual battles had taken place. SUPPOSEDLY they had tech to collect the leftover spirit energy. That was why she was here.

"We got a spook. Just outside of the city. A shinigami."[/color] He smirked. He knew what she was. These guys were paranoid, and so she'd had to give in a lot of information about herself to get them to agree to the meeting. Fuckers like them were not the kind of people you wanted to surprise.

That caused her to raise her brows slightly, intrigue showing on her face before she put on an unpleasant smirk. "Really? And how can you tell that?" She asked, clenching her hand into a fist. A gesture he seemed to notice. Clearly pleased with her reaction, he gestured for her to follow.

It was a long walk. None of the machinery worked as great around here, none of the infrastructure at least, so while they had equiptment, the elevators and such didn't work. So it was a long staircase up to the top of the nearest building, and a walk across several bridges they'd built between the buildings before finally she spotted a big group. All of them looking down scopes, binoculars, telescopes in one particular direction. Her own eyes lazed off in that direction and she noticed it was the beach.

"Who the fuck is this?"
"She's cool. Ey, she's a MOD soul." Sikes informed the others, who all then put on excited little smiles as Sikes pointed her to one telescope. "Right down there."

She looked down and winced a little through the lens. It was.... a woman. The details were hard to make out, but she was clearly in a bikini. Some blonde. "Ain't that somethin? Taking a fuckin vacation next to a city these fuckin bitches let get wrecked. Like it's a fuckin tourist spot." She could HEAR the sheer hatred in the man's voice, none of them were even paying attention to her at this point, and she saw some of them opening up cases. What looked like a strange set of RPG launchers being taken out and propped up on the edge of the roof. "We're gonna give this spook the tanning of her life. You included."

She raised her brows, surprise registering on her face as she turned her head and glanced at him. His hand was on the handle of his sidearm. Charming. "You came here to do business right? We don't do biz with just anybody. Besides, how many opportunities you gonna get to blow a Shinigami away like this?" He asked slyly, like he was giving her some kind of gift.

She couldn't help but grin, showing all teeth. What a bunch of fucking idiots. USing what she could only assume were some sort of weapons they'd been TOLD would work on spirits. Had they even tested these fucking things? "You're right, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity." She chimed, making her way over. The woman with the nearest weapon gladly held it out to her, pointing out the operating mechanism. She gently took it in her hands, getting a feel for it as Sikes smiled behind her. She could almost smell the sheer glee in his eyes.

What none of them saw was her roots spilling out from her fingertips, peeling away the metal from the weapon and fusing it to her fingers, along with reishi from the air, hardening her fingers. In the very next motion, her body twisted, her hand flashing out to SWIPE! Her open hand like a blade as it tore clean up from the woman's ribs ripping through her chest and all the way up to her clavicle as she twisted, her hand following through in that spinning sweep, tearing the throat out of the other nearest individual before she felt the muzzle press to her back.

BLAM!

Her body JERKED as she tumbled forward, The woman falling onto her back, sprayhing blood as the man she'd winged with her hand gurgled and dropped to the floor! She spun! Turning and finding Sikes giving her a disappointed look. "Fucking Ghost Lover." He practically snarled before he fired again. He was fast, VERY fast for a human! He pulled the trigger and she dodged to the side, that bullet ripping into the woman on the floor instead of her chest as she felt cracks slither along her back. Her hardened skin having only mostly taken the bullet.

She grabbed for the gun just as he KICKED, aiming for her chest! He was fast, but when his foot hit her, she bulled into it and SHOVED him onto the ground! Grabbing his ankle, she twisted, snapping the bones and making him Scream before she SHOVED down! His leg breaking as she rammed his own knee into his chest, caving it in.

Click!

FUCK! She turned just in time to see the last Fleshie aiming that rpg at her! She twisted as they fired. BOOM! It lanced straight past her, hit a vine-riddled car on the other side of the roof before it exploded! A Burst of heat and spiritual energy blasting the area and setting the roof on fire as she felt herself being thrown off the roof! Spinning as her body plummeted! She twisted and SLAMMED her hand into the side of the building! Instantly she found a window, hooked, and then was slammed in, her body crashiong through the window below it and almost feeling the tendons in her fingers snap as she was thrown into the building, tumbling through a plant-infested office space before coming to a stop, coughing as she got up.

"What the FUCK?!"

Shit. She hissed as she heard a voice in the hallway! A man came rifle-firstg into the room, just before a hollow's face CRASHED through the wall! A CHOMP onto the man's arm and shoulder, promptly screaming as he pulled out a sidearm and began shooting the hollow in the head! The beast screamed out, releasing the man as it fell back. That was Lerna's cue to charge through a cubicle and SLAM her shoulder into him, barreling him into the hollow, and then both of them out of the wall it had come in through! Allofasudden she was falling again, and by sheer luck she managed to get the hollow and the man down beneath her when they finally landed and CRUNCHED a car! Her own body bouncing off the man as several snapping noises sounded all over his body, an the landed on the pavement as similar sounds of carnage began to sound off in all of the surrounding buildings! While that weird modified rpg certainly HAD worked. The smell of a spiritual discharge had gotten the attention of the hollows. What did they fucking put HOLLOW bait in those rockets?!

She grunted, peeling herself off the ground and brushing glass off herself. All intact? All intact. Thanks in no small part to having hardened her skin before making that move of hers. Still, she could already see more hollows closing in, and she coulnd't help but snort to herself. "Fuck me sideways."" She grumbled before grabbing the door of a car and ripping it off it's hinge as a weapon. That stupid shinigami better be hot. She thought to herself.

The sudden blitz of motion caught her eye. Her brows raising as she noticed that sudden....what?! She was startled, her eyes wide when she saw what looked like someone who could pass for her twin sister suddenly zipping in out of nowhere to heel drop a hollow to death! She stared, almost too distracted to notice the hollow that was rushing in to her side. With a sudden SWGIN she used that car door like an axe, the metal edge shredding messily through the hollow's body as it was swung with that heavy force, a loud splatter onto the ground as it screamed, shuddering to the ground as it dropped to it's side.

Another twist and she slammed, using the door like a shield to bash and knock another hollow to the ground. It's head slamming and cratering into the ground slightly as Lerna spotted the nearby buildings coming abuzz! The flash of scopes catching her eye. "Who the fuck're you cutie?! Look I don't know what beautiful gene pool you done swam out of, but don't go using any fancy shit alright?! We got enough of these things as it is!" She hissed as she leapt up, standing on a car between the muzzles and Magnolia, having no real idea how well the woman could take bullets meant for killing hollows.

PAPAPAPAPAPAPAPA! The air suddenly roared with the crackle of gunfire, as the human gang promptly opened up on both women as well as the hollows! The Car door peppered with shallow holes as the gunfire popped the window, Lerna's own hardened body cracking as a few shots hit her through the door, but hardly managed to get much penetration. As the men from the upper levels of the buildings fired, another set of men ran off to the side, trying to circle around the women and the hollows being shot at, one of those RPGs in hand.

Lerna however was too distracted with the gunfire, the hollows that hadn't already been stomped by the woman promptly being shot to death by the concentrated fire. It wasn't the sort of random peppering of bullets like in the movies. Each and every muzzle was firmly trained on a target, gunning them down, and then refocusing when their target went down. Lerna herself was forced to tumble back, dropping behind a ruined truck as she spun and then THREW the car door! That hunk of metal slicing into one of the buildings, causing a loud cry! She was not that great a throw, or well, not a superhuman one. So rather than killing the man, the door had simply shorn the man's leg and a portion of his hop away from the rest of his body in passing, causing him to scream as he dropped.

"They hate spirits! I dunno what kinda rules you got but those fuckers gotta die!" She called out to Magnolia. Just before a few little THUNKS sounded near the women. She spotted what looked like a little black pineapple, and in a panic she KICKED it! It shot up into the air, leaving MAgnolia to deal with the one that landed near her before those spirit grenades promptly BURST! Exploding in a burst of blueish white flames. Up in the sky, the sky was beginning to distort, little ripples and wrinkles forming as the continued use of those infused explosions began to draw attention.

Lerna herself was thrown through a car window, grunting as she suddenly wound up in the backseat of a Civic, grunting softly as it seemed the gunfire had died down, as all the smoke and debris didn't offer the men up in the buildings solid targets to fire at. Though there were still some random sprays here and there, as if to make sure she couldn't just leave cover safely. Ughhhhh, fuck. She could feel sections of her Root Shell was starting to break, and she had to concentrate to mend it, closing up the cracks in her skin and peering out the dirty window. Fuck. Of all the times to have to be getting shot at it was when there was a naked twin of her leaping around like a goddamn amazon.

Lerna was .....well not surprised to see the Shinigami start zipping around and using her blades like a handheld blender. Not that she was putting much of her focus away from the actual fight itself. With most of them gone, she took a moment to catch her breath and paused to look in the direction of the other blonde, now slightly redheaded thanks to the blood caking her body. She whistled appreciatively for a moment. Their Physiques were a bit different, Lerna really wasn't as ....toned as Magnolia seemed to be, but she could definitely appreciate the look to say the least.

And then she saw her turn and ready that lance. And seeing it fly off before Detonating, her whole body went TENSE as she saw the sheer ammount of destruction that was unleashed! And she immediately TENSED. WHAT IF HER SHIT WAS OVER THERE?! She cursed under her breath, shaking her head as she hoped that those fucking Fleshies didn't have anything important over there that she could have looted. A sigh escaping her as she ALSO sensed the sudden hitch in hollow activity. And she saw those rifts up in the sky start to tear open. The low growl of deep groaning wails as glowing eyes peered from above. Fuck.

She tensed up and attempted to grab the woman by the arm. "Yo, I know that probably felt really fuckin good, but we need to get the fuck out of here before this becomes more trouble than it's worth. Let's bounce!" She attempted to ....advise the woman, keeping her tone from anything akin to an order, leaning more to an appeal. She didn't know how unstable this woman is, but seeing that almost whimsical expulsion of strength already had her concerned. For one, this city had a lot that could be gotten, even in its state, and she didn't want to lose out on that shit. Not only that, but the immediate threats had been dealt with. She just hoped the shinigami would listen.

It took a moment for the woman to pull their attention away from the destruction they'd caused, and she couldn't help but wonder whazt the heck was going through their mind. Her own eyes darting around to the distortions. It was going to be a pain in the ass, but at least this wasn't a populated area. Then, just as quickly, the Blonde seemed to snap out of it, catching Lerna by surprise when she felt the arm slide around her and they were suddenly jarred off into the direction of....the beach?

When they finally arrived, Lerna paused, blinking owlishly for just a moment as she looked around. Wasn't this..... This was the spot she'd seen through the scope. Well, TECHNICALLY the area they had used to scope the area was gone, so they were safe for now... All the same she looked over her shoulder at the massess of hollows in the distance. At least until the other version of her spoke up. Her brows raised just a little and then bfore she knew it, the Shinigami was stripping down. Lerna's brows raised, looking over the woman. It was ....weird to be sure. On one hand... this was the body she saw like every day. But on the other hand, seeing it on someone else was.....huh.

"We're adults, yer fine. Nice bod through bye the way." She noted, just instinctively at that. Was this some form of narcissism? She hardly cared. Making her way over to the water she peeled her clothing off and waded in as well, rinsing herself off before returning to shore and then bunching her clothes up. Slowly, the blood simply was drained from those clothes. Injecting her roots, she focused, narrowing her eyes as she slowly dragged and absorbed the blood, fusing it to her skin, adding it to her Root Shell, and in the process, removing it from her clothing, leaving them unblemished by the blood, or well...for the most part. She'd have to do a more thorough job of it later, but at least it wouldn't look like she'd walked into a butcher shop.

That question made her pause, raising a brow as she looked over her shoulder at the other woman from where she had squatted, still holding her clothes. "Nice to meet you too, name's Lerna." She noted, a mild bit of sass before she tossed her now mostly-clean clothes to the side and then slipped back into the water, peering a little at Magnolia for a moment before she answered. "Business. Some people were living in the ruins, there's a lot of shit here that people left behind. They said they had shit to buy. Did NOT expect that shit to be a buncha reishi-infused weaponry. Also they had a bead on your little beach spot here. Though the building they did it from is now gone. Those little RPGs of theirs were aimed right at ya. Whoever they were, they didn't like shinigami. And as much as it wasn't my business, the last thing I needed was to be around when a Shinigami got blown up. So I...." Her mind flashed back to the feeling of her hand cleaving through flesh. "....expressed my displeasure. And it broke out into a fight." She explained.

Though she did pause a little when more questions came, and then of course, the woman got around to introducing herself. She smirked just a little. "No problem hot stuff. Really aughta smile more though. Our face doesn't go well with a frown." She pointed out before she began wading out of the water. "As for those guys? Some gang that lives out in these ruins. Real fuckers. Not a fan of spirituals. I haven't exactly read any of their info pamphlets but more or less they want Spiritual beings the fuck off earth. But they tend to get their hands on some neat shit so I was hoping to trade with them. Just didn't expect a shinigami to be around." She paused, ayeing Magnolia and grinning.

"No less the War-goddess that I wound up meeting. That was some solid moves. Even if you kinda iced a whole block at the end there. Always liked the shpiel you Shinigami had going on." She smiled calmly. Of course she gave no indication of what she was. She didn't know this girl quite well enough to go outing herself as a mod soul. For now she would play it calm and casual, and go from there.

"So....we uh....both seem kinda similar-lookin. This like....some kinda Parent Trap kinda situation? You don't SEEM british. " She joked, bringing up the double blonde elephant in the room. Eyeing magnolia up and down. They had slightly different heighty, but even their proportions seemed pretty close to eachother. Spooky. "Either way, that was exhausting. You wanna go get hella drunk? We can swap stories over a pint. I really could use a drink."

Lerna raised a brow at that and nodded. Just a vacation.... she recalled the hateful derisions she'd heard from the group itself. "A hell of a place to go relaxing." She murmured, looking toward the city, seeing the small wafts of smoke and such from the destruction that had gone on. But ultimately, the damage that had done would be miniscule in the grand scheme of the massive wrecked city. Why would the woman come here to relax? She looked over her shoulder. Hah.

"Is it a surprise? Almost the entire planet has some level of spiritual power. It was only a matter of time before they began to make something that even a human with barely any spiritual awareness could use. As for suppliers that's the kicker. Supposedly they make it themselves. They purportedly get Quincy help Or at least, someone familiar with Quincy.....knowledge?" She waved a hand. She knew that stuff was all technical. Quincy could make other quincy just by teaching them a few things.

She followed Magnolia back onto the shore but didn't bother getting redressed, tossing her outfit into the sand and sighing as she closed her eyes. Enjoying the sun on her skin as she looked out to the rest of the beach. She couldn't help but smirk a little when they agreed, but insisted on the explanation. "For serious? Well alright. Uhhhh What parts didn't you understand?" She asked, taking a moment to help....explain Magnolia through the bits of slang she'd used.

Though at the mention of a bar, she snorted, grinning. "Who said anything about a bar? MY stuff is stashed nearby. A nice couple bottles to celebrate a successful deal. This was SUPPOSED to be a pretty big break for me. Was." She sighed, shaking her head. "Real pain in the ass trying to find someone worth working for. Gotta keep trying though right?" She reasoned, starting to lead Mag toward her things, assuming she agreed. A pause to look the other woman over again. Her brows knitting together as she picked out a few differences. Some variation of physique. Tone. Small things. But still, the fact that it WAS so close, any normal person would think them identical. Spooky.