The shapeshifter continued, opening the final inner door, and they pressed forward into the central vault itself. The holy of holies. This vault was the size of a large room, and split from the entrance here into two sloping layers, one taking up the center of the room and one running along the edges. The inward, pressure-sensitive floor was made of black tiles, and the whole floor sloped downward; the outer rim tilted upward toward the balcony-like lip on the far side of the room, four or five feet above the sloped tiled floor below. This far wall consisted not of the small silver lock boxes that lined the outer walls from ceiling to upper-level floor, but a great wooden bookshelf, with many ancient tomes lining it. In front of the bookshelf, opened up on a book pedestal as if it were a dictionary, was the Necronomicon.
The shapeshifter went first, walking along one of the gently sloping side [paths.]
[The assassins, two remaining, burst out of seemingly nowhere; one of them hangs back presumably and the team get attacked by Slit; the shapeshifter and everyone are pushed back, except for Moone, alone one-on-one on the black-tiled lower floor, and maybe the shapeshifter is stranded somehow up on the level with the NOC list.]
The remaining assassins. How did they find them here? How did they get to them here? The Ancient City of Babel, much less the most secure vault underneath its tower? The assassins were working for MacBeth after all then; MacBeth would know they were here.
Of course, the fact the assassins were working for MacBeth was further confirmed by the fact that this one was also attacking Gef's team. He probably would not have been doing that had he been working for the agency. Most likely.
Moone examined the assassin, and tried to recall facts about him. This gentleman went by the moniker of Slit. He was dressed a lot more low-class than the well-tailored couture of Gentleman Slash. Clothes torn and sand-stained, Slit resembled a filthy Victorian hooligan, right down to the face smudged with soot, though otherwise closer in physical description to Bill Sykes than Oliver Twist. If Dick Van Dyke's character in Mary Poppins were evil, and on steroids, and wielding what looked like a thin cleaver, instead of a brush or broom.
Moone recognized the long, flat-tipped blade as being a sakin, used in Kosher ritual slaughter. Such blades were razor-sharp, and nick-free; it was said that an animal slaughtered with such a knife didn't even feel the cut, if the slice was performed properly. As much as Moone doubted Mr Slit was a trained shochet, he doubted even further that human was an acceptable animal under rabbinical law.
Still, Moone felt it wisest to avoid the swinging blade, as Slit made wide unpausing swipes with the knife, toward the trachea and esophagus of whoever was nearest. Even if Slit weren't operating under Kosher law, his form was still impeccable, and there was little doubt Slit kept his knife as carefully sharp as a true shochet. If that blade went through Moone's neck, Slit's cut would be true, and Moone wouldn't feel it.
If he were to die here, would he even know it?
Moone's unenhanced aura was apparently a lot easier to manipulate than the enhanced counterpart Moone had sported back on the hovercraft; Slit didn't even need to be touching him the way Slash had in order to pry tiny psychic fingers into his soul and pulling apart his boon from his bane. What were they doing? How were they doing it? The world was so full of things that seemed impossible, but deep down they had perfectly sound, rational explanations. Or, irrational explanations, more often than not. But things still had explanations.
Moone attempted to fight it off somehow, using same mental and metaphysical muscles he'd exercised in twisting his boon and bane into pretzels. Would it be possible for him to fail this battle, still having his boon in place, having the necessary resources on him to fight off this supernatural attack?
There was a small pop somewhere in his soul, and Moone was left completely without his boon. Apparently, yes, it had been possible for him to fail.
It was as if his fingers had been broken, not just broken but some snapped clean off, and an attempt to steeple the hands would result in the fingers passing out the other side or bending backwards, so that left and right hands seemed switched. The bane was there, but the boon was simply, gone. Unnatural void. Something living and a part of him dead suddenly. A miscarriage. Moone didn't like the feeling at all, and all the shocks and twists and revelations of the past [three?] months [didn't compare] to this feeling he felt right now.
It was hopefully temporary.
Moone's boon may have been detached, but that didn't change the fact that he had already planned for contingencies back when he'd had it.
Moone made his way along the side of the sloping rim above the black-tiled pit, hugging the wall and managing to keep his footing on the foot-wide concrete lip. Slit, unsure of how to fight against such a narrow footing, followed, rushing Moone, the sakin extended in front of him tracing a perfect beeline toward Moone's neck.
Moone banged the wall hard. One of the lock boxes above him was not a lock box at all, but the duct to the ventilation system, still piled high with powdery cold iron nanoparticles. Silvery powdered cold iron billowed out in large clouds, puffing out in a great quantity due to the microscopic and light quality of the metal.
Slit jerked to the side, his blade inches away from Moone's throat, and fell to the black tiled level a few feet below, landing perfectly on his feet. He stumbled back, as if made of magnets and repulsed physically by the iron particles, into the hall-like antechamber to the inner vault. The particles didn't affect Moone at all; there really was something inherently magical about these assassins.
The dust swirled around quickly in the warm air, spreading out to cover the whole room.
Moone could only watch as Slit was pushed into the bottleneck leading into the room, avoiding the cold iron cloud. Slit may have been cornered, but now he was cornered with Moone's teammates, and without Moone there to help them.
[Moone watches, attempting to repair his boon. There's a weird interaction between the team members' boons and the antimagical properties of the cold iron still swirling in the air in the sanctum sanctorum. Perhaps bouncing off the cloud, hitting Slit full blast and defeating him. Maybe the shapeshifter's aura powers come into play, if the shapeshifter isn't already on the other side of the room from this. The aura powers should come into play somehow, we need more of those.
The boon pulls back together like the abdominal muscles after pregnancy, and begins reknitting with his aura. Maybe this is what the shapeshifter helps out with.]
The particles settled, covering the whole floor in another layer of metallic dust. The final assassin, Slice, turned tail and disappeared [from wherever he'd been holding back and not fighting for some reason.] To get backup? To call for help? Moone guessed to report to MacBeth. The last assassin, but Moone further guessed that they hadn't seen the last of him.
[somehow moone and team are on one end of room and shapeshifter is alone on the other, with the NOC list. maybe demonic possession was finally invoked as part of last action sequence. incorporate geography of location into action scene and heist scene more, somehow.]
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