ISMA Fizzy Beverages, Hand Puppets and Quick Getaways

James moved the moment he felt Soda's weight lift off his back. He jumped on the vampire corpse that was chasing Erika, which broke an arm intentionally, popping out its shoulder. The skin split and a new arm, pure red, grew out from the hole, the old arm remaining attached.

Erika screamed as she turned and saw this, "That's just so wrong." She said, kicking it in the chin and removing it's jaw. It grew back but that gave James enough time to get between the two.

"Get Nep." James said. The princess finally got over her surprise at the sudden fight and summoned a jet of water from her hands, lancing through the hordes.

Nep was still twitching on the floor from Soda's bullet, but his minions were still not standing down.
 
Soda made himself a plan for the next few steps and started by quickly creating a telekinetic barrier around himself for when he predicted the undead to try to hurt him.
With some effort, Soda opened a wormhole that lead from directly in front of himself to next to Nep. After straining for a second he realized he needed to propel himself through. Thus, he aimed his gun backwards, loaded it with a cheap bullet - a low-powered fire spell - and shot it to use the recoil to send himself through, landing next to Nep with a little bounce since he was still levitating himself.
Dispelling the levitation, he revealed one little hand from his coat and lifted it up, using his psiionics to lift Nep into the air. A thought occurred to him: The human was xenophobic, so why did she seem so pleased to see him?
 
"Ugh, this thing is worse than those guys with the weirdass souls." James said, repeatedly striking the monster with blows that would be decisive against any other creature, only to have his work be pasted over by red flesh.

Nep stopped twitching and held very still, breathing heavily. He had been captured again, he only needed to wait for his experiment to free him.

Erika opened a portal to the Transitory plane and pointed to the three hostages that still lived, "Get out!" She said, turning her attention back to James and the thing they were fighting immediately.

The vampires left without hesitation, but the princess stayed behind, "What about the little lizard man?"

Erika rolled her eyes.
 
Soda grunted in exertion as he used his psiionics to throw Nep with sufficient force to almost definitely cause injury, directly above the portal Erika opened - he'd drop in a graceful parabola to go right through the portal unless something intercepted him - he was semi-confident that revived vampire would. He gave James a little pointer via telepathy: "The vampire can't get hurt, they lose years to regenerate but this one's got infinite years. Prevent it's movement and fall back!"
Stowing his gun above himself, Soda went on all fours and dashed for the portal - he could run faster when using his arms than he could just on his little legs.
 
The new red parts became more deformed as James tried to grapple with it, "Erika, go, I'll be right behind you." he said as it began to swell and deform.



The Princess ran for the portal as soon as soda started for it, letting Erika pick her up and run through without fuss. On the other side of the portal once all were through except James, James jumped through shouting "close it!" Erika let the portal go and a spurt of blood came through.



Nep shakily got up and pounded the ground with both fists, "damn! Another one exploded."
 
Soda sat down, which just looked as though his oversized coat lowered slightly, and the gap between his hat and coat closed completely. Instead, the front of his coat opened slightly, allowing his eyes to peer out again. He, for now, abstained from commenting on the success of the mission, though he believed it to be a resounding success - everything within their power was handled essentially perfectly, they retrieved Nep and the Djinn and even their vampire friends - or at least two of the three - and the vampire Nep revived is no longer a potential threat anyway.
That said, Nep being unrestrained was sitting poorly with the kobold, so he got back up, pattered over to the necromancer, retrieved manacles, and showed them to Nep, a silent demand.
 
Nep accepted the shackles sadly, sighing as they clicked into place. The Princess walked over to soda after he shackled Nep, "Well, how's my little hero?" she asked, her eyes glittering with excitement.

Erika came to save him, "very nervous. Please cool your heels princess." she said, patting the princess on the shoulder.

She cleared her throat, "Pardon me that was very unbecoming of me... Please would you tell me your name?" she said, looking to Erika for approval. Erika gave her a simple thumbs up which made her giggle and turn back to Soda.
 
Soda was a little confused, being forced to reconcile what he heard from James and the way the princess had been behaving around him. He took a step back so he didn't have to crane his neck so drastically to look up at her, glancing at Erika to partly cool his frayed nerves. He reached into his memory vault and recalled exactly what James said. {"She... They are a xenophile,} Soda hummed, focusing in on the exact descriptor. Xenophile, not xenophobe. Ah, now it made sense.

That at least made Soda less worried for his safety. With that, he cleared his throat, and pushed a little hand out from the front of his coat, then pointed it back at his own body. "Is Soda." One would be forgiven to think he didn't actually clear his throat, considering how scratchy his voice came out.
 
The princess bit their lip as soda spoke, shifting from foot to foot as he finished introducing himself. She cleared her own throat, "I am Frankie." she said, pressing her arms to her sides, her palms flat to her hips, "thank you for saving me."

Erika pat the princess then soda, "all right, well, we can just drop of Nep with the local ISMA office, they'll process him, and then we can drop the princess off, princess Frankie?" she asked.

"I would like to spend some time with soda, if that's OK with him."

Erika shrugged, "we'll get paid for Nep, and her mother will give a reward once we bring her to them, but we don't need to bring her back right away. Up to you buddy."
 
Soda looked up at Erika and nodded once. "Soda gonna stay a bit wit Frankie." He croaked.

The little kobold waved his hands around in their oversized sleeves for about a second, psiionic energy channeling through them, and at the crux of the motion, a big cushion appeared just behind him. He hopped onto the cushion, his coat crumpling a little as he reclined on it. A moment later, Soda's hands vanished back into his coat, and his hat slipped off his heavily scarred head.

"So." He started. "Frankie is princess?" He'd never seen a princess before in person.
 
James hauled Nep up onto his back, they were in Erika's house again, so he dutifully ignored the blood splatter on the floor. He took Nep and left, but Erika stayed behind with Frankie and Nep.

Frankie smiled when Soda asked her about being a princess, "Yes, it's more of an honorary title these days. We don't do much, especially since Mom is immortal herself." She said with a sigh, "How about you, what got you into bounty hunting?"
 
"Soda good at it. Makes a lotta money." Soda scratched his scalp and neck and face, blinking slowly. He didn't much like talking, so he decided from here on out he'd use telepathy, and communicated as such directly to Frankie, by using telepathy. "This is better. Talking hurts Soda's throat. Frankie may speak normally if she is not telepathic."

"So. Frankie is xenophile. Why?"
 
Frankie giggled when she heard Soda talk about bounty hunting, and then again when he began to talk into her mind. She snorted at his question, "I don't know, I like all the little critters out there, and I just want the rare ones to survive longer. There are things out there in the universe that we haven't met yet, and I'd like to meet them all." She explained.

She looked at Erika who just finished eying her and went to get the mop to clean up the blood splatter from the twice undead vampire.

"Is she your companion?" they asked, blushing with jealousy.
 
Soda cringed when he heard Frankie refer to those like him as "little critters". Though she was a lot more fond of him and his kind, he couldn't help but be reminded of the culture on his homeworld of considering he and many like him, "monsters". He had bad memories of being referred to as such when he went into town. It was among the many things he didn't miss about his home.

"Erika is Soda's friend coworker." Soda calmly explained. "She is cautious, because Soda is frail." The little guy turned his head to the gore on the floor. "Soda is sad that Frankie's friend vampire popped."
 
Frankie saw Soda cringe at being called a little critter and almost cried, "Oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to offend you... I just mean... You're so... Cute." They said, clearing their throat a little.

Erika returned with a mop as Soda was apologizing for the vampire, "We're sorry we didn't get there sooner to save him." Erika said, gathering up the small splat of blood with the mop and walking away once again to give them definitive privacy, "It'll be a bit while James does the paperwork for us, don't know how long you two want." Erika said as she walked off.

"Well, I suppose that gives us a little time." She looked to the spot where the vampire's blood had been cleaned up, none was left, "It's a thing you get used to as an immortal... Though this is the first time a vampire friend of mine has died." She paused for a moment before looking around, "Where did the other two go..." She peeked around the corner of the plain, stone tiled room they were in and down the hall Erika disappeared down, seeing them in the kitchen with Erika eased her worries.

She cleared her throat, "You don't seem fragile to me." She said to bookend her repeatedly trailing off.
 
"Soda is not offended. Nor is Soda cute." Regardless of external opinions, it was difficult for Soda to reconcile his appearance and his internal image of what would be considered cute.
When Erika returned, he simply watched her mopping, then leave, and watched her until she left. As long as they wanted? Soda's scarred eye twitched as he tried to understand why Erika was leaving him alone with her, and reasoned that it made sense that she knew he'd be ok with Frankie, which put him at ease. He was sure the other two, and the vampires, were reasonably close, though, so he didn't question it much.

"Soda is quite frail. Little toothpick with snappable spine." He looked down at his oversized coat that hid his build rather effectively - that was of course an intentional trait of the coat, it was rather stiff and thus ballooned out, making Soda seem much rounder than he actually was.
 
Frankie smiled greatly when Soda said he wasn't cute, "I disagree, but you have a right to your own opinion." she resisted the urge to pat him on the head.

Soda talked about his frailty which made Frankie frown, "Well... You have certainly chosen an odd career for someone who believes that they are so fragile. You certainly seem the mighty hero to me, I saw how you handled that necromancer." She said, attempting to reassure him.
 
"Soda has, eh, vast psionic ability." The little kobold tapped his temple to emphasize his point. "Am tier three psion and thaumaturge." He nodded proudly. "Is quite impressive, methinks."
He paused, turning his head to the left as if listening to something. "Oh, no, Soda will not ask." He murmured quietly, apparently to someone nearby.
 
Frankie bit her lip as he said that he had vast psionic ability. She cleared her throat, "Who is it you're talking to? Someone who is talking in your mind, or...?" Erika grabbed the two vampires by the arm in the other room and began to lead them out of view.
 
"Sometimes Soda is spoken to. Has avoided divulging any information, yet the speaker seems to see through Soda's eyes. Soda's eyes not very good, though." He tapped on his temple to accentuate his point, bringing attention to the clearly bad state both were in. "Soda has been unable to heal them, but it does not much matter."
"Frankie. Nep was concerned with vampire friends, but not you. Why did Nep take also you?"
 
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