The lights. They always have to go for the lights… Yuka grumbled groggily to herself as she scrambled to her feet from the hard and slightly sticky floorboards. Out loud, she might have involuntarily loosed a couple of quiet expletives in her native tongue, but since nobody could actually understand her, they didn’t count… did they…? A stinging pain on her forearm let her know that the other lady hadn’t gone down quietly; yep, those were scratch marks all right. The young woman made a face at them as she swiftly gathered her wits.

A quick glance about her was more than enough to let Yuka know that the situation had deteriorated… quite remarkably so, in fact.

Oooh, this is why I hate adventu… in the name of yomi, what in…!? The last of the phrase was directed at a shapeless figure that was drawing the vilest of human screams from a leather-clad warrior not so far away. In the dim light it was either a furry tentapod or a…

Without a second thought she gave the thing a solid whack on its “head” with her staff. Then, instincts got the better of her and she slipped away from the crowded confines of the counter – and the many-sided brawl going on there – and into the open.

“Oh, that’s better…” she relaxed slightly, breathing deeply of the fresh air and heedless of how her words would sound to the draconian warrior who had dragged away from the mess the instigator of it all, that strange-eyed dark-haired lady. Her respite lasted for but a moment, however, as she noticed that his reptilian eyes seemed to be focused behind her rather weakly…

Or maybe not, Yuka sighed as she felt, rather than saw, the bloodthirsty menace of the orc emerging purposefully from the café after her. In an instant, her choices were narrowed to two, and one of them wasn’t really an option; she couldn’t really just abandon everything, could she? Allowing a possibly misguided sense of responsibility to get the better of her, Yuka did the most sensible thing she could, given the circumstances.

Hi, my name is… “Yuka Kanamai,” she gasped, popping up behind the wyrmfolk warrior and clutching her staff close to her chest with both hands. Could you please… “Hold him off?” …for a short while? was her next question as she gave him her most trusting look – she had no idea of how it would work on draconians, but with any luck he saw the merit in their temporary alliance as well.

Oh, and…

“Please try not to fall asleep?”

Focusing her powers on the unfathomably swirling melee in front of her – and on that hulking brute of an orc in particular – Yuka began to trace a symbol upon her palm.