Seeing the Mantid trying to force its way out of the place in between universes, Thomas leapt to his feet and brandished his chain sword to lash out against it. The crystal insectoid made a brief attempt to match attacks with the young Chosen before trying to instead dive past him and escape out into the world. Thomas pursues the creature into the storm, taking with him the crystal that had powered the animated suit of armor.
The storm continued to howl, beating against the circle of protection he'd lain around the central building. He managed to slash into the beast's wings causing it to tumble down to ground, battered by storm and blade, Thomas finishes it off and notes that he has landed surrounded by a number of silent humanoid figures in black tactical wear and armed with automatic rifles. Noting him quietly, they act with a curious, silent unison to aim their weapons at Thomas.
Though reluctant to harm people, it was clear that these soldiers were villains of some sort and so Thomas lashed out with his chain sword again. In doing so, he dismembered his attackers but found that, instead of scattering blood to the screaming wind, that a number of wooden shards were whipped around. Like the suit of armor, these soldiers were some sort of animated wooden golem things. As he came to that conclusion, a piece of wood whipped back past his head and started to rejoin the original attack mannequin it had been part of.
Contacting the M-Com security in the main building, but using a frequency he made sure to share with the Arachne Bioware staff, Thomas warns them about incoming animated soldiers. He does hear sounds of intermittent gunfire, but in watching the golems in front of him, they cannot pass his circle. He reaches the idea that they would have a heart of crystal similar to the one in the larger suit of armor which he had managed to surprise and instructs the snipers to aim for the hearts.
He tries to repeat his trick of disrupting the spells holding the golems together like he did with the larger, metallic statue, but only manages to temporarily disrupt them hoping the controller would stand out from the rest. Unfortunately, all the opponents collapse showing none of them are the puppet master.
Thomas attacks them bodily to try and buy himself sometime to disconnect them properly, but a second group appears to interrupt his attempts. In dealing with the second group and trying to keep the first down, a piece of debris gets driven by wind and momentum across the scene and cuts through the physical piece of his line, disrupting the circle that keeps the magic held tight within.
Thomas dives into the broken gap to act as a temporary conduit for the energy which painfully rips through his body, giving the call to fall back somewhere defensible to the people in the building. While he holds the gap together by sheer mystical might, he takes an step of desperation and tosses up his weapon, Cold Storm, granting the Spooky Girl permission to use it. The Spooky Girl was turning invisible again as the circle fell but as she grabbed hold of the chain sword, her body took on a sudden solidity.
"Well, didn't see that coming, did we?" she asked with a bit of cheek before she withdrew her spear, Blood from her arm and started dual-wielding the weapons while Thomas worked to tie together the collapsing circle for a little bit longer. The effort causes him to stumble and the next time he comes to awareness, he's being carried into the central building by the Spooky Girl.
The security forces have withdrawn to the kitchen and its limited entrances in order to protect their casualties and hold off the enemies. The security and surveillance team have not been able to contact forces outside the storm to get reinforcements. The psychics with the arachne people have said that their powers haven't been much use against the golems due to their mindless natures but they are able to use guns at least. Asking the others to give him time, he prepared to again try severing the connection between the golems and the magic driving them.
Using the greater awareness he's been having over the weave of magic in the area, he tries to focus past the sounds of fighting and gunfire in order to perform a sealing ritual similar to what he put around the building but in a smaller area, trying to catch all the golems within so that they'd be disconnected from whatever was driving them. To give himself a great chance, he uses the larger crystal and a heart he managed to grab from one of the golems in order to perform a bit of sympathetic magic. In great pain and desperation, he manages to pull it off with a spectacular bit of magic that impresses all involved while disrupting the golems and causing them to fall inert.
Using the greater awareness he's been having over the weave of magic in the area, he tries to focus past the sounds of fighting and gunfire in order to perform a sealing ritual similar to what he put around the building but in a smaller area, trying to catch all the golems within so that they'd be disconnected from whatever was driving them. To give himself a great chance, he uses the larger crystal and a heart he managed to grab from one of the golems in order to perform a bit of sympathetic magic. In great pain and desperation, he manages to pull it off with a spectacular bit of magic that impresses all involved while disrupting the golems and causing them to fall inert.
Around them, the storm starts to fade away and Thomas lets himself fading off into sleep. Upon reaching sleep, he enters a sort of dream where he is laying in the middle of featureless darkness while the Mediterranean secretary seeming arachne is sitting at a weaver's loom and doing some work. She finishes the tapestry or shawl she's working on before standing up and telling him "Good job" then walking into the darkness. She slowly morphs into a gigantic spider before vanishing entirely. Too tired to know what to think about this, Thomas just lets his sleep progress into a deeper, dreamless one.
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