Black Fog, Aruka Only

[Baby_Covenant22]

On the main coastline, everything out on the horizon looked peaceful... the waves lapped gently against the shores, creating a thick white foam that glues itself to the wet sand and the smooth rocks embedded. There was a gentle sea breeze, smelling sweet with salt water. Fishermen were casting off the docks, waiting for the daily schools to swim by. The scene was taken in a different perspective to Dave during his surface patrol now. As second commander, as someone in the cause to fight the VS, he needed to keep a constant eye on the coastline, considering this was where the VS would always begin their assaults.

Then it happened...

Out in the distance, thick smoke started billowing up toward the sky, darkening the area and putting it out of place, in contrast to the rest of the crystal blue sky. The blackness of the clouds caught Dave's visual attention, and at once, he let his wings out of his back, spread them and took flight. He flew those 50 miles in the matter of a half hour, landing on the soft tan sands, the sparkling waters behind him. He paid no mind to the ocean...

Dave started to sweat under his noble clothing, his thick leather armor over his navy blue tanktop and his loose leather pants, black leather boots. His zanbatou was strapped to his back as always. He drew it with one hand, figuring there would be danger. He trekked onward, down the barren lands, the ash-covered island. Not one tree survived, Dave could see...

But even further ahead, unbeknown to him, still burning forestry surrounding the old village, and a few remaining small houses, also caught aflame...

[LordItachi77]

Aruka looked like he had ran through the fire, in which in few places he did, as his clothes were now torched, blackened, and full of holes as he set up rock walls between the unscorched land and homes, and the still burning flames. It would have helped if he knew the water element. Going around to the still burning flames, he made large walls of dirt, then hit them, making them fall and collapse onto the flames to snuff them out. The young demon was out of breath, but wasnt allowing himself to stop as he went for a burning house, beating the flames back with a heavy gust of wind as he made another dirt wall, and collapsed it onto the house to kill the fire and embers. Tired and panting he bent over, shoulders slumped as he finally too a break after stopping the fires. It was only a small victory. He had been too late to stop the man that started it, and too late to stop the rapid flames from spreading too much, but at least not everything was destroyed.

[Baby_Covenant22]

Dave jumped atop a large boulder and took a good look around the area, and spotted the burning trees in the distance, watching as dirt was being flung about onto the flames roasting and charring them. The dirt had efficiently put the flames out, ultimately smothering them, from what he could see. Over on his end... still smoldering ashes, burnt corpses and general smokey redness covered the island ground like the seas of fire in Hell. He half expected lava spouts to come up.

The dirt sprays ended eventually, and the flames in the distance were smothered out, though the thin, charred trees looked as if ready to tip over and poof to dust anyway. In the distance... Dave spotted a boy who looked like the only survivor. He didn't want to approach him with a hostile appearance, nor did he want to give him the wrong idea that a "lord gone topside" was "here on business." True as that was, Dave wished that he was just here out of sheer and plain curiosity.

He dropped himself easily onto the ground, landing on his feet and kicking up small black clouds of dust and ash, sheathing his zanbatou and positioning it so that it wasn't at his disposal for combat. A flick of the tail, he continued his walk, not bothering to look around himself, because all that he would see would be the same thing- a desert of blackness.

Once in the old village area, the stench was tolerable to him. It smelled like the roasting of rotting humans, just like in the fire pits down below. Dave sort of wished it was steak, though...
He approached the boy, voicing himself.
"Excuse me," he said as though this really was an ambassador trip, "what exactly went on here? What force was at work burning this island down?"

That was not Dave's usual language when he spoke, considering he actually enunciated his words rather than give them a Bostonian twist, like "burnin'" and "what the fuck happened?" Three months into his lordship, which was a little over a year ago, this finally stuck with him, when to speak like a professional at his job and when to speak with his old usual accent.

[LordItachi77]

Aruka whilred around with a growl, kurosenagi out whth the weighted end spinning in a circle on its chain by Aruka's side, ready for use. He stood there looking the guy over, and hardly recognized him. The weight slowed down in its swing to finally just hang at his side.
"You again. What do you want?" He asked as he straightened instead of staying hunched over in a ready to lunge stance.

[Baby_Covenant22]

As soon as Dave asked his question, he was soon greeted by a large swinging... object... and got himself ready to block it, getting in a crouching defensive position and quickly drawing his zanbatou, ready to block, when... the weapon dropped to the boy's side, rendering him, for the time being, not hostile. Dave let his own weapon drop to his side and straightened himself up, basically mimicking the boy. He looked him over, recognizing the features...

"You again. What do you want?"

Dave cracked one side of his neck subconsciously, still keeping his weapon out and on his side.
"Business. I saw huge clouds of smoke coming from here, so I decided to check it out, see if it was VS related," he explained himself. "Don't worry, I'm not here to start anything with you." He kept his firm lord-like approach.
That's the way to do it, he thought smugly. Talk polite to a guy who tried kickin' my ass earlier cuz he thought he had somethin' to prove. Bravo, I can kick myself for this later.

Dave's gold eyes caught the only intact building on the island, a cathedral. He found it kind of weird that such a place would be kept standing after such an apparent blaze struck this humble little island.
"But, as I was asking," Dave continued, "who burned this island to the ground? Did you see?"

He was going to expect full-out sarcasm from the familiar fox demon, like, "No, it was a fuckin' wildfire" or "The fire fairy came, waved her magic wand, and the whole island fell in seconds." If that was the case, he'd have no problem smacking the demon on the side of his head. Whether he was Itachi's brother or not, Dave never tolerated sarcasm spoken to him while he was on his duties.

[LordItachi77]

"No. I didn't. I was too late to reach the point where it started. It spread too fast." he replied, furrowing his brow. He rewuound his kuro's chain and hooked it into the inside of his pants.
"What I do know is, this wasnt set by a match or torch. I definetly would have had time to react to that. This had to have been elemental," he finnished. He gave Dave a glare.
"You didnt catch sight of anyone leaving this island did you?" he asked.

[Baby_Covenant22]

Dave leaned against the skull-topped hilt of his zanbatou, listening to Aruka's reply, actually surprised that the reply wasn't as sarcastic as he expected it to be.
"You didn't catch sight of anyone leaving this island did you?" he asked.
Dave simply shook his head, replying to Aruka's glare with nothing more than a glare of his own, as if to silently tell him, "I want no trouble, understand me?" He honestly wasn't in a fighting mood today.

He nodded his head to the cathedral, knowing fully well that if he entered, he'd get a massive headache, like the last time he visited a cathedral. Dave just thanked whatever godly forces that supported demons that he didn't catch aflame in that church.
"That building behind you, it's a cathedral," he pointed out, knowing Aruka knew, if his assumptions were correct. "My next question is, why would whoever burned this place leave that particular building standing? What would its significance be to this person's plans?"

I'm not saying you DO know, I'm just asking for your honest opinion, what you really think, Dave thought, wanting to voice that, but truly hoped his context could be processed and not taken a wrong way.

[LordItachi77]

"its stone. Stone doesnt burn. The roof would but, its pretty high up for flames and embers to reach and catch it alight. Houses, eh... they went easy." He said, stopping his glare. He'd have to track down the guy himself and give him a good what-for.
"I think there are a few people inside though... last remaning survivors? I didnt see anyone outside of it still moving."

[Baby_Covenant22]

"Think there might be something else needed with that building..."
A few gears in Dave's brain pushed some things together, why the island was an ashen desert, who may have been behind it... everything. His conclusion: some kind of re-establishment. And the cathedral, being made of a material that doesn't burn, but rather melt if it got hot enough, would make a perfect home base or office or whatever.

"I think there are a few people inside though... last remaining survivors? I didn't see anyone outside of it still moving."
Dave arched an eyebrow questioningly, standing upright and straight again and taking his zanbatou out of the ground, sliding it back in its sheath.
"Then let's go check it out," he answered, not afraid of a headache. He had sneaked a bottle of Tylenol from the surface to his mansion if it stayed with him for more than four hours.

He led the way, the sweat under his armor and tank top soaking him, making him want to remove the armor at the least, but kept it on mainly because if he returned to council without it, questions would have risen. Pushing the large wooden doors inward, Dave scanned the interior for any humans sitting around, grouped together. Upon stepping in, though, it happened; his head started pounding.
Just ignore it, Dave kept reminding himself, treating the headache like an old hangover that kept haunting him.

There was nothing... so far... he sniffed at the air, tail high and alert, sniffing for any survivors at all...

.......

Up front...

Dave went into a light jog toward the altar, peering over the edge of the pew, his headache worsening as he got closer to the altar.
"Any of you okay?" he asked, seeing a small group of three teenage humans huddled closely together. He never cared for humans, especially survivors of a genocide like this, and if it were up to him and not the need for information, Dave would have finished them off right there and then.

One of them nodded, looking up at the wolf demon.
"Now explain to me everything that happened that you could see, please..."

[LordItachi77]

Aruka followed Dave in and entered more briskly, more ready and able to ignore the annoyanceof holy energy thanks to Lynn's ties at the archivea around the celestial foxes that worked there. He followed Dave to the alter, looking over the teens.
'only three..." he thought.
"I'll check out the back rooms and choir loft. Theres gotta be more people here," He said before he jogged back to the entrance and up a flight of stairs to the choir section, looking for others.

[Baby_Covenant22]

The teen who spoke earlier started up again.
"All we caught sight of was that there was this weird looking, long white-haired guy going around, shooting everyone with a shotgun while he was singing," he explained. His girlfriend was the next to add some information, "We were lucky to escape his gun slinging with just burns from his ammo. He also had this girl with him, she had a handgun of some sort and killed 9 people and slid away to an alleyway. We hung around here, staying as close to the building as we can, and then when he formed this huge ball of fire, we slipped right in and hid out and just... hoped."

Hoped... hoped to a god that would not help them in the end, Dave knew... hoped to a god that had bigger and better things on his mind, like letting a civilization of humans die at the hands of an unknown white haired guy rather than Hell's Army. He sounded vampire.
"If you had prayed," Dave said, using the correct terminology, "and prayed hard, what would have happened would have been stopped, or hindered, don't you agree?"
He really wanted to get his point across that such things like this were inevitable in the end.

Meanwhile, up in the choir loft, ducked under the organ, was Matt, the kitsune assistant to Naomi, laying in his cramped space in fox form, all nine tails curled around him as he almost fell into a light nap until his small fox ears pricked forward, hearing the sound of footsteps and voices. He moved out from under the organ, looking to the left and the right, seeing a teenage boy coming his way. Shifting right into his human form, a tall man standing at 6'2", wearing a black trench coat, black tee shirt, black jeans, boots and gloves, his semi-long hair... roughly mid-neck length... messed about with no part to it barely touching the rims of his glasses, he waved cheerfully to the boy.

"What brings someone like you here?" he asked. "Some random business-suit dude set the place on fire with a ball of fire that looked like the sun, didja see?"

[LordItachi77]

"No I didnt. Could you head down there? Is there anyone up here?" Aruka asked as he tried to keep calm when he saw him. Him, a nine tailed fox.. HIDING. why didnt he do anything? He could have helped, and if he saw the man, why didnt he stop him?
'coward..." aruka thought as he stared at him.

[Baby_Covenant22]

The three teens stared at Dave blankly, the girlfriend sighing, now downhearted. Funny how humans could be introduced to harsh realities and lose faith only to learn that when your hopes are down, good things do happen.
"Is there anything else you know of? New information? Any other survivors out here? Witnesses? Any escapees I could try and track down?" Dave interrogated. The silent third one finally replied, "Some people tried to swim away, but got tired and drowned, as far as we know. Others... well... burned to death."

Dave could see that, what with the burned and ashed bodies lying around in the streets, the smell of basically fresh beef and decaying beef sticking around like pigs to a trough of slops and staying there, expecting more. So... these three teens were his only resources for information. He'd have to try and extract as much as possible from them before having to either kill them or letting them go... one of the two... and as a noble, killing humans "senselessly" was not an option, unless it benefited the council.

"Stay around here," Dave told them, his headache getting worse by the minute. "I'm gonna search this place for any other survivors."
"But we just--" piped up the third teen, but the couple hushed him, telling him to let the demon do his own thing.

The wolf went up the stairs to the choir loft where Aruka was, seeing... a familiar face... was it... Matt?!
"Matt, what the hell are you doing here?!" Dave asked in complete shock and somewhat rage. Matt was a complete idiot around him when he helped Naomi raise him, dropping him on his head one time while Naomi was out, stealing some human family's dinner for themselves. She found the infant Dave on the floor, crying, his head only bumped, and then gave Matt a good smack across the face, and said, "I'm never trusting you with him alone again!"

"Hiding out. Managed to get your mom some fruit seeing as the forest only grows berries," Matt explained. "And no... there's no one else here. There's only me, and those three kids."
"Catch anything suspicious?" Dave asked, narrowing his eyes at the fox.
"Business suit donning guy with a shotgun going mad and killing everyone, repainting the town, that's about it."

Something was amiss, however... did Matt say he was picking up some island fruit for Naomi? Did this mean...? No time for distractions, though, Dave was on business. he'd ask about his mother later.
"Is there any hope for this island?" he asked Matt. He fiddled with his glasses in thought, and shook his head no.
"Everyone's dead... we could try for another village on this place, maybe reconstruct a forest and whatnot..."
"But that could take years, idiot," Dave insulted, smacking Matt's face, throwing his glasses off in the process.

"I'm about to leave, though, so..." Matt shrugged. "Unless you guys wanna try and learn something more from a genocide and burn-down with limited information, I'm about to desummon to Naomi's shack to check up on her."

[LordItachi77]

"Dave, I think we should relocate the humans on the main land. Even if the danger's gone, they have no way to feed themselves. Helpless... " Aruka said, looking over his shoulder and down to the alter where they were hiding.

[Baby_Covenant22]

Nodding in agreement with Aruka, Dave turned down Matt's offer, for as much as he wanted to see his mom again.
"Think Aruka's right on this one," he told him, "I'll try catching up with you later, though."
"Understood," Matt said before desummoning to Foxden, or as far as Dave knew, anywhere.

He looked over his shoulder down at the altar where the kids were.
"It's gonna be pretty easy to win their trust with desummoning circles," Dave said slyly in a low voice so they wouldn't hear, "considering they're looking for any way possible to survive." He climbed over the balcony and fell to the floor below, again with a smooth landing and proceeded to the front where they hid out at.

He always marked the Coastline with a peculiar mark only he knew, and that's what he drew on the floor before the altar. Then he headed over to the kids.
"Come with me if you want to live," Dave told them bluntly, but with a sound of hope in his voice so he'd convince them to come with him. They got up and followed him to the circle.

"Stand in here, and trust it. It'll take you right to mainland," Dave explained to them. "Find a new home there, find a job, and live a newer, better life."
With those parting words, which was more advising than departing, the three teens disappeared in a flash of dark gold light, the circle itself diminishing as though acid were breaking it down bit by bit.

He ran and jumped back up to the choir loft, kicking off the two white supports on either side and meeting up with Aruka again.
"Where to now?" he asked, trying to see if the fox had anything on his mind. Anything to get some tabs on the VS for Hell's Army...