A Robin Redbreast in a Cage

<SNIP o' Jade's>
"Like! Look out plant lady!" Jaxx called from his vantage point aboard the dragon as it swooped down towards Black Jade. She had just enough time to turn her head and see the massive jaws closing around her upper torso before the dragon bit her clean in half.
*****
"Oh my god!" Katrina wailed, watching the monitors as Jade began to flat-line. "We need to do something!" She blustered with the first aid kit and looked to 'The Missus' for help. Artemis' wife was already prepared, having foreseen something like this happening and rolled towards Jade, with a syringe in her pink clawed mouth. She deftly, for a Skutter that is, jabbed Jade in the leg. The fluids rushed into her blood stream.
And did precisely nothing.
*****
The root like tendrils collapsed dead to the floor as the lower half of Black Jade slid sideways, a mixture of clear plant fluids and sticky red blood pooling on the floor around the body.
Elated at the destruction, the dragon tossed the upper torso of Black Jade in the air and ululated a roar with a huge gout of flame, cooking the body. The stench of cooking flesh and plant was only around for long enough to fall back down as the husk was swallowed by the dragon.
</SNIP>

All Heaven in a Rage

There was a moment of surreal calm, then a scream unlike any the Dwarfers had heard before, burst from Alex’s mouth. The aural observers suddenly wished they were safely wrapped up in blankets, far, far away from the strange land.

The scream of a bad man is horrible enough - twisted, perverted and chilling to the spine as it is - but the outraged scream of an Angel, trust me, you never want to hear that.

The tranquility was lost. All was discord and chaos.
“NOOOO-OOOooOOOOOOhhhhHHH!!!!!”
The Angel flew up to the dragon’s face. “WHY, Brother Dragon? WHY?”
The cocky dragon shrugged.
“A shrug?" Uttered the Angel, barely containing his wrath. "That is all my friend’s life is worth to you? A shrug?”
At the smug look which answered the question, The Angel’s formerly serene eyes burned with the fury of all the Heavens.
“I SMITE THEE MIGHTILY!!!!” He cried.
And he punched the massive beast on the nose.

The poem, the first verse of which he’d earlier been reciting, continued thus:
“A robin redbreast in a cage
Puts all heaven in a rage.”

Well so does a Jade in a dragon.

“I thought he didn’t want to use violence unless absolutely necessary…” King Kong muttered to the Iron Man.
“I suppose he thought it was necessary” Plisken the White replied, before Jamie could. He was squinting up at the dragon, extremely unimpressed himself. He cast his mind over a few spells, wondering what might help the ill-fortuned plant-woman.
“I think he’s just really mad" said the Iron Man, considering blasting the evil animal with plasma but unsure of the effect it may have on Jade if he did. ... If there was any chance of saving her anyway.

The dragon held a clawed paw to its nose.
“That really, really, hurt!”
Alex-Angel scowled, looking rather a lot like his normal self for a moment.
“Seriously. I’m going to have a big bruise there.” The dragon complained, trying to keep up his cockiness, but actually backing away a little from the much smaller ethereal being - there was a terrifying rage in its eyes which unsettled the dragon from somewhere instinctive, deep within.
Alex advanced slowly. His scowl deepened, and a section of his golden hair turned brown.
“Don’t stoop to his level!” Suggested King Kong, flying up to meet him.
“Don’t stoop to his level? HE ATE JADE!”

Jay/The Hulk was outraged also, and now the initial shock was over he transformed. “RAAAAARRGHHHH!!!!!” His trousers tore again and grew with him.
“How does he do that?” Asked Jacky, looking down at the ground-based Dwarfers. But The Angel clearly didn’t care about clothing sizes at that point. He had other things on his mind.

“JAY SMAAAASSHHHH!!!!” The Hulk blasted its huge green fist into the dragon’s stomach.
The colossal, scaled, creature turned green too. Well, green-er. “Boilk!” Its front section flopped to the ground till it was on all fours.
It began heaving, and making unsavoury noises, like a gigantic cat coughing up a haybale sized hairball.
The Dwarfers exchanged disgusted glances.
“Gross” said Evelina.
She wasn’t wrong.

After much stomach-churning retchings and chuckings from the beast - during which the Dwarfers made various "awwwgh" and "euugh" noises, covered their mouths, and looked wincingly away - the two halves of Plant Jade splatted unceremoniously to the ground, next to a knight’s helmet which the dragon must have also eaten.

"That's just wrong." Someone commented.

The Angel ran over and crouched before the mangled mess that was formerly Jade.

“Eugh. I feel much better now” the dragon informed the group.
The Angel looked up at it, wordless, a cool blue flame dancing in his eyes.

“I think I would leave, if I were you” Plisken advised the dragon, simultaneously eyeing the Angel. His years of experience both in and out of the game, meant that he realised only too well, the danger of a good soul stirred.

He was not only concerned for the dragon, but also worried that Alex was in danger of becoming a fallen angel. Not fallen to the dragon, there was absolutely no danger of that, he could see it in the younger man's eyes, but he wondered if he may do something dis-graceful, and lose his Angel status altogether.
This could hamper their chances with The Boss.

The Angel clicked its neck, in a very normal-Alex-like way.

“Go. Now.” Plisken shooed at the gigantic beast. It looked down at him, a little confused. The wizard gave an elegant facepalm at the non-reaction. It'd lost its window, this likely wouldn't end well.

The Angel got to his feet. “DIDN’T YOU HEAR HIM!?” His eyes were burning blue and an equally blue icy vapour erupted from his mouth along with his words.
The force of it blasted the dragon clean off the bridge and into the endless chasm below. Alex did not react, just glared after it.
It was impossible to tell what he was thinking, but everyone shuddered and took a couple of steps away from him.

It is a universal truth that when horrible people are horrible, it's expected, and is somehow not as disturbing as when warm people become icy. The gamers had been getting used to the Angel's gentle serenity, and the sudden drop in temperamental temperature was... Less than pleasant.
Plisken, however, was still not shocked, he merely sighed. "You don't f*ck with the good folk, son." He muttered after the foolish dragon, his accent temporarily coming back stronger. A couple of the Dwarfers stared. If it hadn't been such a serious situation, they would've laughed to hear a respectable wizard casually swearing.

A few moments later, a shaken dragon re-emerged and most of the Dwarfers watched it fly away, yelping much as the guilty worm had. Plisken nodded, knowing the Angel would be pleased that he'd not harmed it.

The Angel himself was kneeling before the plant remains, holding the tendril which passed for a hand, and praying. A fat, golden, tear made its way from his warm-again eyes, and rolled down his cheek, till it fell off and… Watered the plant.

The plant twitched a little.

The Angel was pained to see anybody hurt, let alone one of his crewmates, especially one who he happened to be rather fond of.
Another tear fell, plopping onto the other half.
That twitched too.

“Well make her better, then.” The Ubermensch had walked over to examine the remains.
“I am afraid I’m not sure how, Brother Artemis…”
“You fixed that little creature, dude” Shark Boy pointed out, his tone softer than The Angel could recall ever having heard it.
“But, that was a tiny mollusc…”
Plisken put a grandfatherly hand on The Angel’s shoulder, glad to see Alex had softened again, and relieved to note the brown portion of hair had regained its golden hue.
“Come on lad, now is not the time to lose your confidence.”
The Angel looked up into Plisken’s wizened face, searching it for some kind of answer. The wizard nodded. “You can do it.”
“Okay.”
He turned back to the Jade remains and passed his hands over them. Then he closed his eyes. He was not aware of the golden glow which sprung up around the floppy leaves and tendrils, flesh and bone. But the others looked on in interest. Concentrating as he was, he was also only partially aware of the gospel choir Tregaurd had summoned, who were now singing 'Amazing Grace' behind the little group.

Eventually he put his hands together in another gentle prayer, then laid one on each section.

Gradually the mangled remains began to squidge together and reassemble themselves. Nobody hardly dared breathe. They were all trying to push away the thought of Treguard mentioning the unpleasant possibility of injuries outside the game.

Then, the two halves, instead of knitting back together, rose up into two independent pieces and kept forming.

The Angel murmured on, seemingly oblivious.
“Uh… Solvay…” Jay began, the normal surname seeming bizarre in this new world. “Shh!” Someone hushed him. It was Plisken - which was lucky, because if anyone else had done it, it would’ve been disrespectful, and The Hulk would’ve likely re-emerged and interrupted proceedings.

“Amen.”
The still kneeling Angel opened his eyes to see....

... Two Jades standing before him!
“Unexpected!” He gasped, before getting to his feet and hugging them, wrapping each in a wing.
“I am glad you are healed, precious sister!"
He thought about this for a moment.
"... s” he added.

---
Pen

The frightened, former Jade munching, dragon had flown swiftly away from the terrifying angel man, and found itself within some kind of invisible forcefield. In a panicked rush, he told the others he found inside, what had just occurred.

“Well,” said the other dragon, calmly “I thought he was quite nice, but he did say he’d be most upset if a dragon ate any of his friends...”

The Jade-muncher quivered, as a chill ran down his back-plates.
“He was most upset. He was.”

---
Bluey

Back on the big ole Blue, Katrina breathed an enormous, shuddering, sigh of relief, as Jade’s heart began to beat again.

“Bloody hell, that was close.” She slumped down in a chair and leaned heavily on a console. "Too close."
She used the sleeve of her t shirt to wipe the sweat from her forehead.

The Missus trundled over with a cup of tea, which she seemed to have produced out of thin air.
“Thanks.”
Katrina took it gratefully, then looked over the Dwarfers’ bizarrely disconnected physical selves. Partially here, but mentally off in another world.

Jade’s fingers were wriggling now, probably thinking they were roots. Alex’s hands were together as if in prayer. For some reason Artemis had just given a little pelvic thrust. Plisken appeared to be holding an invisible staff, and Jay… She sighed. Jay was clenching his fists, as if fighting his Hulk-rage.

“Come home soon” she muttered, then smiled at the skutter, and took a sip of the much-needed tea.

---
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<tag>
<Cool idea about the Jades, uh, Jade!>
<PS. Wow great Evelina Mech Girl pic!>

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