S C R E M [Fraction Hunt]

What she felt first and foremost was the sunlight bearing down on her eyes, the glow practically forcing her eyes open and awakening her from her deep slumber. There was a clear moment of disorientation when the skyline she was met with was rather...barren. No tall building in sight to speak of, none of those flying machines cluttering the sky. Just the deep blue nothingness with the odd cloud to break the endless blue void.

To compound the confusion what she felt resting herself on was most obviously not the park bench she had chosen as her makeshift bed for the day. Whatever she was resting on felt rockier, colder...and was clearly not at ground level, as she could see small walls next to her. She was for all intents and purposes sleeping in a hole on the ground. The solid, very uncomfortable ground.

"...again?.." Was all she could mutter out, not with disbelief, but rather an accepting, resigned tone of voice. This was an all too common occurence for her these days, it seemed. The wizardmon tried to shove her face into her hat to block out the sun and continue sleeping, perhaps in the vain hope she'd awake in the same place she had gone to sleep a while ago.

No such luck however, as she soon heard the distinct sound of voices not too far from her. None of them aimed in her general direction however, so it was likely neither of them knew she was there, somehow. Either she had managed to hide herself really well in her sleep...or the most likely explanation, she had just arrived to this place.

Whatever the case, she'd pointlessly try to ignore the noice happening somewhat close to her position, but to no avail. Annoyed, she'd peek her head out from her small hole, and glare (or rather half sleepily squint) daggers at the other humanoid figures speaking close ish to her little hole. Human? Digimon? She couldn't really tell at a glance...

"Could you three please keep it down?" At least she assumed there were three of them, in her half awake half asleep stupor it was kinda hard to tell shapes apart. "...not everyone is a morning person...it is morning, right?"

Shortly after Mandrake and Lothar found an aqua haired human another presence was sensed by Mandrake. The injured girl had the Wizardmon's attention more as his blue eyes widened momentarily at the language she addressed him with. Handing Lothar his staff, Mandrake approached slowly while trying to indicate he meant no harm before he said "Now there's no reason for such hostility. My friend and I mean you no harm and, with all due respect, humans like yourself are strange to digimon. My name is Mandrake and the Leomon accompanying me is my friend, Lothar. I only wanted to ask if I could try to use my healing ability to help you."

As a second voice spoke its anger it seemed more than obvious that Mandrake and Lothar had unwittingly stepped into a potential hornet's nest. The trick was how to diffuse things before more trouble occurred. Lothar stood silently nearby while flicking one of his ears as he was obviously keeping an ear out for any potential trouble since his friend was distracted with an injured and angry human. 

    This situation was managing to further fray Junko’s already worn nerves; she tried to massage her temples before wincing with pain at the contact and deciding to abandon such a dumb idea.

    “I’m tired of this crap. Look, I get what’s happenin’ ’ere.” She said, her tone sounding unenthused and bored. “I know y’re with the asshole whose face I fixed with my fist alright. It only makes sense; he's a coward like that.” Recalling her past situation wasn’t that hard. She knew she had passed out while kicking their asses, but the fact remained that she had lost consciousness while dealing with people who had no qualms to hurt her.

    “I have no fuckin’ idea why he threw me in this hellhole wit’ two chuunis that think dressing as cheap copy of a Mary Shaw doll is the shit 'n a dude in a lion fursuit, but I know that y’re up to no good.” She made a small pause, the anger on her tone growing visibly. “I’m not gonna fall for the good cop slash bad cop bullshit act. Gotcha?”

    That much was obvious enough; they were the reason why she was injured in the first place. “So, just goddamn drop it. If ya wanna beat the shit outta me, bring it on; if not, just fuck off.”

    She took a moment to offer a glare at the chuuni farther away from her. “Or at least make her shut the fuck up. Had my fill of condescendin’ bitches earlier. Don't need no more pricks for the day.”

    A couple dozen of seconds or so after Junko was done speaking, a screech could be heard at the distance, not unlike what one would expect from a bird of prey, except this version was considerably lowder, and somewhat... mechanical in nature. The teenager stared in the general direction from where that sound came, her expression blank.

    “What the hell was that.” It was an idle question, directed at nobody in particular. Not like she expected an answer to it, anyway. This just wasn't her day, was it?

Well, for someone with a head injury that human sure had a lot of energy to throw around with insults and off color remarks, now did she? Hel would have been impressed if she wasn't partially envious of it. There she was, bleeding from the head and still fighting to the bitter end, while Hel was still struggling to not yawn. What she did get from her tirade was quite easy to picture: clearly she had gotten into some sort of scuffle with the wrong people, and she was afraid someone would come to finish the job. Well...at least she assumed she was afraid, it was hard to tell beneath all the barely concealed angry mannerisms.

"You know if you have a problem with someone it's usually better to tell them yourself." She finally said, quite matter of fact. There was admitedly the smallest hint of enjoyment to be found out of annoying someone that was this incredibly rude, but she still barely raised her tone above the quiet deadpan delibery fitting of someone that also felt like a truck had ran her over several times. She almost felt compelled to add something about how hypocritical it was for the human to want Hel to shut up, considering that had been literally the first thing the witch had asked of them.

Also the question of what in the seven hells a chuuni was, but she figured the blue haired human was probably not feeling up for sharing that info. She cocked her head in the direction of the other wizardmon as he tried telling the girl about the reality of her situation.

"He's right you know. If me or them wanted to rough you up we'd probably have done so without asking...well, I would have kneecapped you but details. I'm afraid I don't know this person you speak off, but I'm guessing you probably managed to piss them off quite a bit. Can't possibly imagine how..." Again, nothing but the smallest hint of sarcastic wit in her otherwise tranquil voice.

She would have probably kept going, until their tense back and forth was interrupted by the metallic screech of something. Something big. Hel couldn't really share Mandrake's optimism, letting out a long groan that could only be described as the wordless version of "Why me?"

"I wouldn't keep my hopes up." With that she'd get out from her little hole, dusting herself off in the process before making a quick scan of their surroundings. She couldn't quite see what had made that sound, but what she could see was just how...barren everything around them was. Not a tree in sight to hide behind or under. They were quite exposed, truth be told. One could really only hope what the other wizardmon said held true and whatever was out there would be friendly. Or at least disinterested on them.

"If you value your life human, I'd suggest you to stay close." She said, her tone no longer simply deadpan or tired, not even sarcastic. It was firm, much like her stance, feet firmly planted on the ground, hands hanging ready at the sides of her body.
This day just kept getting better and better, didn't it...

It seemed reasoning with her was going to be near impossible given she seemed to be acting more hostile. Whether it was from fear or not neither Mandrake or Lothar knew. Then Mandrake sensed another digimon and shortly after a second screech was heard. Two Pteramons flew into view and began strafing the area while dropping bombs. Mandrake looked at the human and shouted "Get Down!" Mandrake then dashed forward knocking the human girl down and used his own body to shield hers. 

Lothar, meanwhile, began charging power into his fist. "Fist of the Beast King!" he yelled as a pale blue energy in the shape of a lion's head burst forth from his fist as he threw a punch toward the digimon bombing them. Not waiting to see if his attack hit, he looked at where Mandrake was laying and asked "Mandrake, are you alright?"

The blue eyed Wizardmon groaned in response as he said "Yes. Somehow I'm still in one piece." He then looked down at the human he was shielding and asked "Are you alright, Miss?"

    The inexplicable nature of this situation was doing wonders to frustrate Junko more than what she already was. She was convinced that this was some kind of strange, narcotics-induced hallucination. Yet… why did it feel so real? Why was she lucid enough to process that a duo of what was veritable mix between a plane and a pterodactyl was bombarding them? And most importantly, why did she feel like she wanted to bite their heads off? Her first instinct would’ve been wanting to punch or kick them, not something that was arguably not as practical.

    She didn’t have a lot of time to think about it, anyway; from one moment to the next, she was thrown into the floor by one of the Mary Shaw dolls and promptly shielded by the part of the bombardment. Ultimately a good thing, considering that she probably would’ve been a lot worse from the wear if those things had hit her. Yet… why did the others manage to withstand them so well? Were these things even human? Those, and many more seemingly unanswerable questions swirled through her mind at least until Mandrake’s sudden question managed to make her snap out of it.

    “Y-yeah. I’m fine; thanks dude.”

    Despite her not understanding shit about what was happening, on thing was obvious; those crazy bird hybrids were harassing them from too far above to be concerned at the meager attempts of a counteroffensive the group was undergoing. Was there anything that could be done about it? Hard to tell, considering their location, even if… amidst the explosions caused by the Pteramons, the vague shape of a cave could be seen at the distance.

    “We shoulda go ther!” Juni shouted while pointing there. They’d have to break into a sprint to reach it before the next strafing run, but everyone seemed to be pretty healthy. No prob right? Despite her body feeling impossibly sluggish, adrenaline had already kicked in the girl’s system, and as soon as she got from under the guy who had shielded her, she began to advance towards that direction as fast as her legs could carry her.