Futuristic The Station

[Hazmat44]

Gently floating in the infinite void of space, outside the range of any star or galaxy... perhaps even outside the boundaries of the universe itself.

The Station has no title; who or what could hope to name such a construction? Not built by the hands of humanity or any other known species, it stretches many tens of thousands of miles in length. Engines fueled by unknown matter, life support suitable for creatures of any environment. Maybe it was intended to be a colossal menagerie, built to contain numberless species? Maybe it was a warship, designed to lay entire systems low? But in the end, one can only speculate as to what its purpose may be. No one has been able to board it; the Station does not allow intruders to roam its endless halls.

Well.

No one except you.

 

[Hazmat44]

Verse booted up without preamble or announcment. There was no flash of bright light, no sound to indicate the change in consciousness, no sudden explosion of movement. Instead, the three blue eyes on synthetic doctor's face simply lit up, and his posture straightened.

Or at least, his posture would have straightened, if he'd been standing.

The P.C.M.I.T's frame pushed uncomfortably at the artificial nerves in his back, and a thought came to him.

Why am I lying down?

Above him was a blue sky, devoid of any clouds, with a bright yellow sun casting warm light down on him. Colossal trees with massive leaves spread their green canopy far above, forming a ceiling of vegetation. No birds were visible, and he couldn't detect the sound of any insects. A slight breeze measuring three miles per hour drifted with worrying consistency across his white clothes, and they rippled in response.

It was disturbingly quiet.

Verse sat up, examining his surroundings. A rippling field of uninterrupted grass stretched out, a green carpet four inches high. The impression of maintenance vanished the moment the grassline hit the trees, immediately shooting up into uncontrolled flora. The grass grew in a nearly perfect... no. With a quick scan, he confirmed that it was indeed a perfect circle of grass, with himself at the dead center. He definitely wasn't in the UEK laboratory anymore, that was for sure. To make the event even stranger, there was a block of memory in his files that was just... missing.

He paused, focusing on that issue. He couldn't find a trace of any information in the blank spot, no sign that there had ever been anything there. If not for the glaringly obvious absence of anything in a place where there certainly should've been, he wouldn't have been able to tell it was missing.

Verse's faceplate was incapable of expressing emotion, but he was presently operating at an emotional ratio of twenty-eight percent worry and sixty-seven percent frustration, along with five percent grudging admiration. He had work to do back at the laboratory, and whoever had orchestrated this particularly well-funded prank was going to deeply regret it, once he found out who they were. Besides, there was a prank, and then there was erasing an android's memory. One was an annoyance, the other a crime. Luckily, that meant it was most likely Beatrice Jielson, who'd never been much for rules or laws or structured society in general.

Standing, he smoothed his clothing out and began walking. Wherever they'd dropped him off, it couldn't be too far from the lab.

How could he have known that there were people nearby? How could he have known that they came from a place he would have no explanation for?

He was about to find out.

Spoiled Bread HighSanguinaryPriest Mitheral SpotBandit Pokeking

 

[HighSanguinaryPriest]

Dorian shot up with a start, his N17 pistol in hand as he scanned for enemies that were not there. His breathing was panicked, as he searched his motion tracker for any hostile or friendly tags. after a moment, his panic began to subside and his breathing normalized as his tracker showed nothing. Of course his unease had not yet dissipated as memories flashed back in his mind's eye. He had been on one of the Republics Fortress worlds. A Bishop Ring or Ring World for the layman. He was the last of his squad, defending the technicians and scientists as they fled to another section of the construct as Alien hostiles charged.

He remembered using the last of his rifle's ammo and had switched to his machete for close quarters combat. He could still taste the bile and irony taste of blood, and smell the entrails and shit of his fallen foes as he held the line. He was about to retreat towards the portal and step through then nothing. Shaking his head he did a quick check of his gear. His rifle was missing, having dropped it after using the last of it's ammo, and most of his grenades were used. Luckily he managed to keep hold of a prototype QANF.

Interfacing it with his armour's HUD, he found the proper files for the MK5a PDW. Unfortunately, he lacked the raw materials. After tapping away at the device's controls, he found a recycle function. Seeing as he was under a thick canopy and no longer in one of the substructures of the Ring, he set to work loosing a swarm of nanites to break down anything he pointed his left guantleted hand at. Watching in fascination, Dorian observed stone, dirt, even fallen branches get disassembled at the molecular level and then reassembled as their base components. Collecting the raw cubes of material, he began making his way east, according to the compass on his HUD, disassembling anything that could be of use.

After a few minutes of blazing a trail, and collecting, his motion tracker began to pick up five neutral FOF Tags. This both relieved and puzzled the elite JST. Checking his QANF, he found he had collected more than enough materials, and set to work fabricating a new MK5a and ammunition. After 30 seconds, he had a new rifle and was 600 rounds richer. Checking the sight and pulling back on the charging handle, the rifle satisfyingly racked a round. Armed once more, Dorian activated his armour's active cammo and began making his way towards the closest Neutral FoF tag, becoming a ghost in the jungle.

Spoiled Bread Hazmat44 Mitheral SpotBandit Pokeking

 

[Spoiled Bread]

Eeriel

It's all over for Eri. She messed up the last mission, almost turning it into PR disaster and now the threat management division doesn't want anything to do with her. At least both of her tags were still there so that means they wouldn't euthanize her yet. She's in a forest but she didn't remember anything about being transported here. The most likely scenario was The Organization transquilize her and then move her into another experiment venue. She's probably being monitored right now and they're waiting for her to do something... she didn't want to do anything though.

Eri glanced at the place where she had woke up. It's a weirdly clean stone pedestial in an otherwise dense forest where vines and moss seemed to had invaded everything. It's actually her first time ever in a forest and if her mind wasn't so preoccupied with various theory about her future she might actually enjoy marvelling at the scenery. Instead she simply lay back on the pedestal in a fetal position. She thought by laying down she would be able to think about her situation more clearly but instead her insecurity took over and she couldn't stop thinking about how she had been abandoned just because of one mistake. How expendable her life had been and if there's anything in the past she could done different to avoid something like this. As her negative thought brewed on, she started to float as if being hold by unseen force. Then she spun midair like some sort of weird wheel made of flesh. Her former handler Alex teached her this to help her release stress, she wasn't sure about the effectiveness but at least she would forget about her problems after she throw up her last meal.

 

[Pokeking]

The Marconi family had always been considered weird. Kookiness begets outlandishness which begets peculiarity which leads to weirdness. Back at the Cervantes Institute on Mars, where he was somewhat born, Angelo and Mirabella Marconi were known to be unconventional. Not normal like all the other scientists and technicians living on the base. They were great in their respective fields. Plus they were friendly enough and willing to help others. These were reasons enough for their neighbors and colleagues to tolerate them. They weren't bad people, just strange. Strange most of all was that helper of theirs, that lifeform called Durango.

Durango wasn't like other youths. The only thing he had in common with other children was the same general bipedal structure. All else spoke of the extinct animal known as the gorilla. He was the product of genetic and technological ingenuity. Within the pod called the Natal Ark, a mixture of their combined DNA was merged with those of the western lowland gorilla. Why? Doctor Marconi said that she had always liked gorillas and wanted to bring them back. The Ark birthed the being that they dubbed Durango and they raised him. They fed him and they taught him themselves since the base's school wouldn't allow him inside. Even if they had, there would have been chaos since children both feared and hated him because they considered him more beast than someone like them even though evidence proved otherwise.

The station personnel begrudgingly allowed his presence since he was styled as a helper, another set of hands. Yet when they started to call this being Shane and introduced him as their son, their tolerance had finally reached a limit. There was no resistance. The Marconis stood with their 16 year old ape son and said that they would seek a new path elsewhere. That new path led to Marfa Colony on the planet of Garene. Life was challenging there, but rewarding. The native denizens, the reptilian Garenians, had grown accustomed to humans after 29 years of living in close proximity. If you were willing to contribute to the colony, you were welcome.

Shane was now 24 years old and living a bachelor's life. As such, his reward was living inside a flop inside a dormitory just like all other unattached males. His flop was just large enough for a bed, a desk with chair, and a closet. Amenities such as kitchen and showers were communal. Since moving to Marfa with his parents, he had lived here. He had been assigned to the colony's Mechanics Division, the same as his father. It was either that or Life Sciences to be with his mother.

Work was hard for Shane, but it was rewarding and interesting. Although of the Mechanics Division, he found work throughout the colony. He helped with cargo because of his strength and he would publish holograms with his Holo-forger for colony administration and other departments. After his morning shift, he returned to his room to take a little nap before his afternoon shift. He climbs into his hammock, a personal preference being an echo of his gorilla ancestry. As his eyes closed, he began to doze. he rolled over and felt not fabric but grass.

Shane's eyes opened and he was laying down in a small clearing surrounded by trees. Had someone drugged him? Despite Admin's assertion that Marfa was a great place, there had been incidents that were just too spectacular to be considered accidents. There had been rumors of sabotage. It was only a matter of time before the colonists would fight among themselves or worse, place blame on the Garenians.

Shane makes sure he has all his belongings, most precious of all is the Holo-forger on his left hand and the two keys dangling from the chain necklace around his neck. He looks around the area and decides to head in a northwestern direction. Why? The colony was northwest from the nearest jungle.

Hazmat44 HighSanguinaryPriest Mitheral Spoiled Bread SpotBandit

 

[Mitheral]

Bornite had stepped through the Obelisk gateway one moment and found himself in a grassy clearing the next, right on the edge of a jungle. He didn’t really like forests even if he had good memories of one. The Elves had been kind to him - after a difficult introduction. This place felt strange - wrong. The world was lopsided. No .. it felt like he was INSIDE the world. But if that were true, wouldn’t now be swimming in red hot Earthblood? Well, more like charred to ashes in seconds. Assuming that wasn’t so, wouldn’t he hear the singing of new life trying to rise to the surface in all its fury?

But there was no Earthblood. No Skyfire either. No clouds in which the Skyfire dwelled. The Sun shone from overhead. This was not Medea. That was the word for his world in the Common Tongue. There was no trembling in the ground. On the island where he was from on Medea the ground always trembled. In distant lands he discovered there was far less. But there was almost always something. He could even feel a wagon or another being walking around him. Not Elves. Elves could be annoying. They had had to place a guard on him for fear that an Elven child would startle him into attacking. It was an unnecessary precaution. He wasn’t violent by nature. It made him a little uneasy to feel nothing at all though.

So which way to go? Not the jungle. He disliked the jungle. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t climb a tree to get a better vantage point first. But that proved to create yet more confusion. He couldn’t detect a horizon. The world would have to be unimaginably huge - or flat for that to happen. And the Elves had explained that that was not the case.

A little dejected that his senses were failing him he took off - away from the jungle.

Hazmat44 HighSanguinaryPriest Pokeking Spoiled Bread SpotBandit

 

[SpotBandit]

Kirin laid sprawled out on the soft grass, face first. He was barely conscious, the inside of his head feeling akin to a ball of cotton.
He wanted to stay on the ground for a few moments longer, but a faint hissing in his ears warned him otherwise. His snakes, they sounded frightened, confused. They frantically writhed around on his head, desperately trying to warn Kirin of... something. They tried to wake him. It took a moment longer for his mind to start itself up enough to begin processing the visual information his snakes were giving him. While he could only see a few meters around him before everything began to look more akin to a blurry image that would rival Picasso's own works, he could see... large, towering trees, and lush grass. Unfamiliar to the forest of his own. One of his snakes looked upright, which- while blurry- showed a mess of green and some smudges of blue-- a canopy, Kirin gathered.

Then he realised his snakes were not only warning him of the sudden change of environment, but also smells. Foreign smells.

Kirin immediately shot up with a quiet gasp, forgetting his tiredness. He sat tense on the ground, his back arched up. His mind, which was once sluggish and slow, was now awake and whirring with endless thoughts. He noticed a hole in his memory, where one moment he'd turned a corner around a tree thinking he'd caught wind of one of the missing students from his village, with the next, him being here.

What the hell had happened? He was just in the forest of his village mere moments ago, right? Words from an elder Gorgon resounded clearly throughout Kirin's head.

"Please, find those boys and get them back home before supper. I don't want them getting killed."

The tongues of his snakes whipped at the air, trying their best to collect any sensory information that could help Kirin gather where he was. For their and Kirin's sakes, they shut their gobs and went quiet. They had already made enough of a racket trying to wake Kirin. The urge to peek through his blindfold to gather where exactly he was, was damn near overwhelming. But judging by the limited visual information his snakes were giving him, taking his blindfold off would sear his sensitive eyes. He'd have to deal with this limited sight until later hours.

The Gorgon steadily rose to his feet and made a quick effort to brush off any grass or leaves that may've clung to his attire. He could smell all sorts of things, all of which he nor his snakes couldn't recognise. But, he knew for certain that he could smell other organisms nearby. Animated.. things. Potential threats.

He took a moment to try to decipher what his friends were telling him. He could smell.. Er...

Two foreign things...
One thing had a smell akin to a human...
A... dragon..?
And a human.

One of these five organisms happened to be somewhat close-by. But Kirin couldn't tell which it was, because the realisation that he could smell a human threw him into a panic. His snakes took the opportunity to violently hiss at whatever they thought happened to be nearby, and Kirin responded by hurriedly reaching up and shutting two of his seven's snake's mouthes shut and growling at all them in a whisper.

"Guys, shut up! You're so bloody loud.."

Hazmat44 HighSanguinaryPriest Pokeking Spoiled Bread Mitheral

 

[Hazmat44]

Verse possessed excellent hearing.

It wasn't an intentional design choice on his creators' part; they had simply wanted him to be able to accurately track a heartbeat while performing live surgery, a much-needed function in an android of his intent.

Regardless of the form or function of whatever his creators might have intended, the immediate result of that decision was that Verse could very clearly hear snakes. Several of them.

His worry ratio relative to the snakes injuring him was nearly zero. Snakes had two targets, food and threats. He wasn't food, since he couldn't be eaten, and he certainly wasn't a threat, unless it was an as of yet undiscovered species indigenous to wherever he'd been dropped off.

One thing was for sure, he wasn't anywhere near the lab.

This was going far beyond the range of one of Beatrice's normal pranks, and he was beginning to suspect that either someone with a lot of money and free time was assisting her, an unlikely option, or that he'd been abducted. Why and how he of all people was removed from a UEK lab and put here was of little concern at the moment. No, his focus was on where that was, and how he would be getting back to his work. All he knew was that he'd woken up in unfamiliar terrain with his P.C.M.I.T, which raised more questions than it answered. Whether he'd been abducted or whether it was a prank, why would they have let him keep the augment? He didn't know where he was. He only knew that it'd been perfectly silent up until now.

And now he could hear snakes.

Naturally, with nothing else to do, he walked towards them.

His stride was unhurried as he moved through the dense forestation, careful to avoid snagging the P.C.M.I.T. on any branches or vines. The hissing slowly grew louder, and then he heard a voice. "Guys, shut up! You're so bloody loud..."

The words made Verse stop in his tracks. Not because they were in and of themselves unusual, but more because there was a faint... layering to them. It was as if the words were being run through a filter of some kind before they made their way to his microphone-equipped ears. He didn't know what that meant.

The trees thinned abruptly, leaving him on the edge of a perfect circle of grass identical to his own. In the center stood a young man wearing a blindfold.

Verse paused as he saw the rest of him, and then raised his voice. "Don't panic," he said calmly. "But there is a nest of snakes on your head."

How in the world did someone let that happen?

SpotBandit

 

[HighSanguinaryPriest]

As Dorian slipped unseen through the jungle, he quietly closed in on the closest tag on his motion tracker. Surprisingly, it was the most active, yet at the same time showed the contact was stationary. This wasn't the only one that was on the move as three more began to move towards one another. This piqued his curiosity. Moving carefully yet quickly enough to keep a good pace, yet slowly enough to not distort the Thermal-optic plates.

As he closed in, the JST raised his rifle, not taking any chances. Carefully he parted a large fern and the sight before him only raised more questions than answers. In front of the cloaked soldier was a woman, whom he had to hazard a guess was in her late teens, possibly early twenties. But what truly puzzedled him, was the fact she was levitating above a stone slab and rotating in the fetal position.

"What the fuck?!" Was the only thing that went through his mind as Dorian lowered his weapon. Deactivating the Active Cammo on his armour, he became clear for all to see. "Ma'am? Are you injured? Do you require aid?" He asked remaining fixed in his position, his weapon ready to snap up and pumping her full of high explosive rounds should she prove hostile. Her garb was definitely not of the Republic. So it definitely confirmed his suspicions he was no longer on the Ring.

Spoiled Bread

 

[Spoiled Bread]

Eeriel

Spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin.

"M..? A..Y..I..? D..Y..R..A..?"

Spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin spin stop.

Eri felts like someone or something just called her. She abruptly stopped her spin and landed on the ground in such a dazed state that she barely able to stand. It took her a few more seconds just to orient herself and noticed there's 8 people in front of her, each of them were heavily armored. Oh, wait, there's actually only 4 of them. Wait, 2. Eri shook her head to snap herself out of confusion and realize there's only one person. Out of conditioned behavior, she brought her right hand towards her temple and tried her best to stand straight to gave the armored person a military salute. She thought this person would be her new handler in this new experimental facility.

"Yes, sir. No, sir. I am in 100% condition. Codename: Eeriel. Model: rat. Serial number: 7312133." The girl briefly pulled her collar and showed a barcode in her left side of the neck with similar numbers on it, just in case she needs an authentication.

HighSanguinaryPriest

 

[HighSanguinaryPriest]

"Model? The fuck does that mean? And the serial number is completely non-standard.... This is gonna be a headache, i just know it..." Dorian thought as he carefully approached. As soon as he got within a yard (0.9144 Meters for you metric folk), His visor scanned the barcode. The results were of no surprise as they came back empty.

"Just as I thought. You are not of the Republic. Which proves another theory... I'm no longer back on the Ring." He said before mag-locking his rifle to the back-plate of his suit. With it secured, Dorian reached up and pressed on some hidden release mechanisms on his helmet which let out a pressurized hiss. With a slight twist, the piece of equipment came free, revealing a man to be in his late 20's. "Your model and serial number do not register in my database, let alone match any Republic standards. So either you are lying about it, or this situation is even more fucked up than i had initially hoped." He said rather flatly, as he gave the girl in front of him a penetrating gaze.

"You also, look to be under aged to be in service. And The Military gave up on any psionic warrior programs 100 years ago when it proved fruitless. Once again narrowing down the explanation of why we are here." He finally said with a sigh. Pushing a gauntlet clad hand through his short hair, he closed his eyes, as the situation began to fully register with him. After a moment he locked his gaze with the young woman and straightened up.

"Sergeant Major, Dorian Black. Lunarum. Serial number DB7445-J-2683. Militant Republic Juggernaut Shock Trooper." He belted out as if rehearsed. Taking another slow, deep breath, he once more placed his helmet back on with a click. With a quick glance towards his motion tracker, he noticed two of the others were right next to each other with the other two were headed towards one another. Once more re-equipping his PDW, Dorian spoke. "I don't know how the hell we got here, or even where here is, but our best bet for survival is to stick together. My motion tracker shows four more people in the area." He explained before removing his N17 pistol and holding it out to her. "Please tell me you know how to use one of these...."

Spoiled Bread

 

[Mitheral]

As soon as he had put a little distance between himself and the jungle, Bornite finally spotted a landmark. It was a mountain. That plus the jungle and sun - which still hadn’t moved - was enough to give him some sort of bearings. It wasn’t long before he came across a river - a perfectly straight river. That was easy enough to cross. The water tasted and smelled a little funny.

Every now and then he would stop and stand on his rear haunches to get a look around. The Obelisks had always arrived near civilization - so he had been told. Bornite would have expected there to be people.

It wasn’t long before he spotted a trail in the grass leading to a single lone figure slowly moving toward the same mountain. It looked like a biped. But it was too far away at first to see any details. But it was someone - anyone. And maybe they had some idea where he was - and what was on the mountain.

Bornite picked up speed to the equivalent of a horse trot. At that speed he overtook the biped in several minutes. Of course he started slowing down as he got closer - about 100 yards (barely audible probably), then 50 yards (audible and likely meaningless) … finally veering and flanking the strange looking Elf. Okay, it wasn’t an Elf. It vaguely resembled a ShenShen or maybe a Seer. But this thing had a massive stature by comparison. It could have torn either apart with its bare hands.

He maintained a distance of about 30 feet, not wanting to frighten the biped off. Bornite remembered how Elves had reacted to seeing him - and he had been trying to help. He decided to start with Medean, switching to Elven. “Greetings and Salutations! What do you call these lands noble being?”

Pokeking

 

[Pokeking]

Shane had been walking for a few minutes. Each step he took heralded the appearance of another question mark inside his head. Nothing made sense. It was obvious that he wasn't anywhere near the Colony. It was still possible that he was still on Garene. Although the Colony had been in operation for 29 years, unless one included the 13 years that the survivors of the crashed Bellerophon lived on this world before they were rescued, the humans hadn't explored the planet much. Much of the planet's flora and fauna had not been seen or documented, because the humans were reluctant to venture outside the walls of their colony. Had History's lessons of foreigners and natives been learned after all? The sum of knowledge of Garene was just what the castaways had accumulated during their stay. Marfa was only a mundane pitstop between the Sol system and beyond.

Shane held up his left arm and tapped on the Holo-forger to take images of the area so that he would have something to refer to just in case he needed to backtrack. He turned around and saw it. Native lifeform? There was no where to run although there was plenty of room. Maybe this lifeform reacts to runners? Maybe if I drum, it'll move on? He raised his arms so he could beat his chest. That's when it spoke, “Greetings and Salutations! What do you call these lands noble being?” His large hands sped raced to the back of his head and cascaded around his neck before they returned to the side of his body. Is this real or is this an illusion?

Shane had heard the words clearly but there was something off about the speech and the way the being's mouth moved. It reminds me of those old dub flicks they show from time to time in the dorm. What to say? His voice was deep. Rare for human, but perhaps commonplace if there had been other uplifted gorillas like him. He held up his hands and arms up at 90 degree angles in greeting, "I am from Marfa Colony on Garene. I call this a cosmic joke." It was the only thing that made sense. Something or someone had played an unparalleled trick on him.


Mitheral

 

[SpotBandit]

As soon as everything went silent, Kirin could feel the tension running up his spine. His stomach felt like it had a brick in it. He knew that if he were to try and run, there'd be a good chance he'd pivot around and immediately smash into a tree... which could prove both dangerous for his health and humiliating. He kept his feet planted on the grass, determined to stay in one spot until he knew for certain he was safe.

But alas... nothing. Nothing emerged from the shrubbery. He was alone.

A sigh of relief escaped Kirin as his hands unclasped the mouths of the two unfortunate snakes that happened to be within range. They soon turned to face him and didn't hesitate to hiss their annoyance. Kirin responded with a bashful smirk and then a quick, nonchalant shrug.


"Hey, look, if I hadn't shut you guys up, we would've been--"

"Don't panic, but there is a nest of snakes on your head."

"--HOLYHELLWHAT'STHATWHO??"


Instantly Kirin spun around on his heels to turn to whatever made that noise, all the while his startled snakes reared their heads and hissed threateningly at whoever had snuck upon them. The comical position he was stood in made him look akin to a woman who'd seen a mouse on the floor, one leg tucked up towards his pelvis and his arms turned away from the new presence. Admittedly, not Kirin's best display.

But he paused momentarily, and what was initially once an overwhelming fear was now... a confusion? Slowly his tension melted away from his posture as he returned to a regular, albeit cautious stance while his snakes immediately shut their yaps and seemingly shared in Kirin's newfound curiosity, with some of them going so far as to lean forwards to get a better look of whatever this thing was. What he heard sounded human, but... off. He couldn't quite describe the overlay of the voice he'd heard, as he hadn't heard anything like it before-- even from the various species of his world he'd conversed with. This new thing's appearance was just as confusing.

This thing, which was barely within his view, was bipedal like a human, but it didn't smell it. From what his snakes were barely seeing, this creature had an unnatural structure to its face, which just so happened to have an unequally as unnatural jet black colour where normally human flesh would be. As a matter of fact, it reminded Kirin of obsidian. The most confusing thing about this individual however was the various appendages that erupted from its back, which counted to four on each side. It kind of looked like...

"... Is that a... giant... spider, on your back..?" Kirin asked, one of his hands giving a brief gesture towards the creature's direction.

From what Kirin could tell based on the limited information he was provided, this person wasn't hostile. What tipped him off most was the fact that he hadn't had some metal spear thrown through his torso already. He could've very well died just now.

Hazmat44

 

[Hazmat44]

Verse stared blankly at the person who had spoke. Admittedly, when he told the young man not to panic, he'd expected him to panic at the reptiles residing on the top of his head rent-free, not... himself. To add to that, the snakes in question had seemed to react to his shock in a similar manner; instead of attacking their impromptu host, they accompanied his surprise and hissed at Verse instead.

Regardless, he'd been asked a question, albiet a rather odd one. Why would anyone think the piece of technology on his back was a spider? It possessed neither pedipalps nor an abdomen, and only had four limbs instead of eight. Considering his response for a moment, he answered.

"No."

The answer seemed satisfactory. Straight to the point, with no room for miscommunication. He liked it.

But still, he found himself curious, and so he performed a quick body scan.

The result left him speechless. The snakes he'd previously assumed to be a separate nest of individual reptiles was fused to the young man's skull. The bodies of each one were tangled up in his hair, yes, but their spinal stems ended in a direct connection to his brain, and if the faint filaments Verse could see were any indication, their nerve endings fed directly into his cranium. Granted, they didn't connect to the frontal lobe, which meant the young man should still possess his own will (unless he felt the occasional need to eat a mouse, which Verse had an inexplicable desire to either instigate or witness).

He decided to open with another question. "Correct me if I am indeed incorrect, but are you presently in a symbiotic relationship with the snakes on your head?"

If anything, the young man almost resembled a certain ancient Greek myth, but Verse instantly dismissed the notion. Myths were just that, myths.

More to the point... where in the world was he?

SpotBandit

 

[Mitheral]

Is this real or is this an illusion?
It seemed like an unusual question.

It reminds me of those old dub flicks they show from time to time in the dorm. What to say?
Stories shown in a group home. Shown? Curious. That explained the first question. Their bards used illusion to tell stories. Bornite felt a sense of warmth to that. The Elves had done similar at times. This was something he understood.

"I am from Marfa Colony on Garene. I call this a cosmic joke."

Since the creature wasn’t actually speaking at first, Bornite didn’t ask about the story telling - even though curiosity was killing him. But his experience with Elves had taught him that creatures who relied on speech to communicate valued their privacy and tended to become angry if they thought it was being violated.

“Cosmic Joke,” Bornite nodded understanding and looking about. He assumed that was the name of this place. “Very unusual realm. What happened to the Obelisk? It is very quiet here. There were no fish in the river. This place seems very … unnatural. It is like a ..”

Bornite paused and didn’t finish his thought. That would be bad. Like the glass container that a vendor at one of the Market stalls had used to keep his edible crustaceans. Or the one that had been used to keep a sand creature. Only this place wasn’t filled with water or sand and it was gigantic - godlike - in size. He could only ask himself what purpose he had been placed here for. Then he recalled how the vendor had dropped a small scorpion into the sand where it had fallen into a pit and become food for the creature.

“Forgive me. I forgot my manners.” He imitated the biped, holding up his clawed hands and arms up at 90 degree angles in greeting. I am Bornite of Medea, of the Isle of … Sky Fire. I am a traveler in search of knowledge. What do you know of rocks? And would you know where we might find repast. There is a very new saying. A dragon travels on his stomach.”

Pokeking

 

[SpotBandit]

As his snakes relayed visual information to him, Kirin not only noticed the fact this creature had three glowing eyes on its face, but also the fact that that it never emoted. Ever. While this lack of emotion helped ease Kirin's discomfort, it also didn't quite leave him able to settle entirely himself, at least for the moment. How he was able to tell if the creature was angry, happy, sad, or grieving-- he hadn't the slightest clue.

Then it-- well, he, judging by the deeper sounding tone of his peculiarly sounding voice-- spoke once again to answer the Gorgon's question. Kirin was certain the creature would assert that whatever on his back was a spider, and to further this, Kirin was convinced it would be a tarantula. Look at the legs of that thing, there was no way--

"No."

"Oh."

Oh.

An underwhelming answer, but an answer nonetheless. Whatever was on this creature's back was not, in fact, a spider... despite looking like it. Kirin couldn't help but slump in his stance a tad at the response, but he considered himself thankful. If he had awoken in a place that housed herculean spiders the size of a small boulder, then Kirin would've just assumed he was in Hell, because such things would undoubtfully be the mistake of god.

There was another tense pause shared between the two, full of silence that, at least to Kirin, felt more drawn out than it should. He still didn't know how to feel about this new creature, but he was thankful they weren't hostile and did not have a giant spider on their back. The last thing Kirin wanted was to have his death be partially contributed to a collision with a tree.

Soon enough, the silence was once again broken by another question from the not-spider person-thing. It didn't struggle to leave the Gorgon a tad puzzled, but not for the obvious reasons.

"Correct me if I am indeed incorrect, but are you presently in a symbiotic relationship with the snakes on your head?"

...

'Symbiotic'?


"Uh," A baffled Kirin subtly furrowed his eyebrows, unfamiliar with that word. Must've been a dialect, he thought. "If you're asking if the snakes on my head are mine, then yea. They are." He offered.

Then it dawned upon Kirin that this creature may of in fact avoided attacking or outright killing him on the basis that he assumed he was a normal human, which caused the Gorgon to ark his back up and immediately freeze, with his snakes sharing this sudden rigidity. His hands scrambled to his front to gesture to the creature, as if downplaying his comments.

"But I'm not aggressive or anything! I won't bite you or anything (the snakes will, don't touch them). I won't even take off my blindfold near you, honest."

Hazmat44

 

[Hazmat44]

Verse grew exponentially more confused with every word the young man spoke. The snakes did belong to the young man, but he didn't know what symbiotic meant? It was a simple enough biological term... To add to that, he thought Verse believed he might bite the android? And what in the world did his blindfold have to do with anything?!

"Well, that's-" He paused, a little thrown. "Good, I suppose. Putting the snakes aside for a moment..." He gestured to the cloth blindfold wrapped around the young man's eyes. "How exactly do you know where I am?"

He was looking directly at Verse, that was for sure. Perhaps it was an echolocative methodology?

He reviewed his scan again. No, the human definitely had eyes, and based on the amount of nerve activity they possessed, they should have been perfectly functional. If anything, a little too functional. The readings were alarmingly high.

Shaking his head, he moved forward, reaching for the blindfold, ignoring the snakes. It wasn't as though their fangs could punch through metal, after all. While he was certainly no powerhouse, he was most assuredly still an android and a good deal tougher than organics. "Please remain calm. Light levels are well within feasible limits for your eyes to work. Although..." He paused. Could it be that the young man had some sort of anxiety regarding his eyes? It wouldn't have been the first time Verse met someone embarrassed by aniridia or some other similar condition. Regardless...

"Eye contact is an important symbol of social equality and respect," Verse stated firmly, lowering his hand. "But if you so desire to leave your blindfold on, that does remain your decision."

Except he was curious now...

SpotBandit

 

[Spoiled Bread]

Eeriel

Eeriel showed a mixture of emotions as she listened to what the armored figure said. She almost had a panic attack when he said that her barcode wasn't registered, the image of someone in the prosperity & labor departement deleting her data just because she's not worth those bytes flashed inside her mind. Though her expression switched to confusion as she listened further, something was off.

She didn't know what to say though so she just keep silent until the man handed her a gun, Eri's eyes immediately went wide at the sight of it. She wasn't allowed to carry any weapon outside of mission so she's not sure of what to do. Her eyes darted between the man and the gun several times before she decided to pick up the N7 and nodded at the man. Just like a baby duckling imprinting itself on its parent, Eri unconsciously registered Dorian as her new handler. She wasn't used to act independently so having someone to look up for made her becomes more confident.

"Yes, sir. I am trained to eliminate threat quickly, sir." She said as she clumsily fiddled with the gun, she noticed the design of the gun was way different than the ones used in her place. Alex usually gave her bulkier goverment-issued plasma blasters so her knowledge with physical rounds was rather limited.

"Should we check the other four people, sir? I can scout ahead!" Eeriel offered eagerly. She wanted to prove that she's still useful to humanity, that was something programmed deep into her mind.

HighSanguinaryPriest

 

[HighSanguinaryPriest]

Dorian watched the woman fumble with the sidearm for a couple of seconds, seeming unfamiliar with the make, but afterwards seemed to have a firm grasp of the weapon's mechanics. Satisfied with her response, he turned and activated his QANF and used the rest of the resources he had collected to make another N17 SOCOM Automag and extra magazines and ammo. After a few seconds he handed her a few extra mags before maglocking the new sidearm to his thighplate.

Upon hearing her question, followed by her over eager request to scout the area. "Negative. We stick together. You'll guard the rear, as we silently approach the other two groups. Unless you have a motion tracker and extensive training in jungles, you stick to me like glue. Got it?" He asked as he quickly turned and oriented himself towards the next closest pair. Deciding stealth was no longer an issue, Dorian maglocked his MK5a to his backplate and turned to the young woman. "We'll be able to find the others faster if i carry you." And without waiting for her consent, the JST scooped her up bridal style and activated his suit's jumpjets.

With an expulsion of exhaust and energy, the two rocketed over the treeline, getting a good view of the area. From his aerial vantage paint, he spotted the last two pairs. One closer to the jungle, the other to the grasslands. As quickly as they ascended, the duo began to rapidly descend. Using his armoured body as a shield, he took the impacts of several hundred branches, all snapping and splintering like balsa wood. With a thump, Dorian impacted the earth only to launch himself again, taking care to not let any harm come to the psionic.

If one were to listen in the still jungle, they could hear the whine of the jumpjets along with the splintering of wood and earthshaking impacts as it drew closer. A minute later, and a final bounce, Dorian and Eri rocketed towards what looked to be a large reptile and a splicer. If they had been seen by the two, they sure as hell didn't show it, as he once more plummeted towards the ground. With a loud Kerthump! and a spray of soil and sod, Dorian set the young woman back on her feet. "Told you it would be quicker."

Spoiled Bread Mitheral Pokeking Hazmat44 SpotBandit

 

[Spoiled Bread]

Eeriel

Eri didn't expect for her to get picked up. At first she wanted to protest since she's more than capable to fly by herself but as soon as they took off she was distracted by the sensation. Whenever she used her telekinesis to fly herself it would simply felts like swimming midair. Everything feels smooth. But getting picked like this felts more exciting, like riding one of those roller coaster thingie, at least she thought so, never really ride one. She let out some small 'oooh' and 'wheee' as her eyes wander around, looking at the canopy below them, the vast horizon in the distance and the sun above... Wait...

Eri's attention was drawn into the sun. Did it get closer?? Eri's felts a familiar feeling at this. She was sure she knew something like this before and she was trying hard to remember it. Even when Dorian landed violently on the ground Eri was still fixated on the sky, she confirmed the sun was indeed noticeably getting bigger and smaller depending on their altitude. Eri seemed to not notice the other two yet as she started to crawl on the ground and examined the soil closely. It's the same. No carcasses, no dead insect, no dropping. Now that she realized it, she hadn't heard anything that indicate the presence of other animals, even though a forest was supposed to be bursting with it. Her mind was sent back to the moment she was released from the incubation chamber. She was put into a very sterile environment so she and the other homunculuses in the same batch can be conditioned for their future use. It's the same feeling as that place.

"This... This place is a biodome...! Sir! An enclosed artificially-made environment!" Eri shouted her realization. Mostly for Dorian but the other two might hear it too.

HighSanguinaryPriest Mitheral Pokeking

 

[Pokeking]

Shane's toes tapped the grass similar to a human doing deep thinking while tapping their fingers on the desk. Some things the dragon said didn't make sense, "I know of no obelisk. But I agree. This place is artificial. He followed the dragon's line of logic until he voiced, "It's like a menagerie set up to amuse. I am not amused. Those kids always said I belonged in a zoo." He let out a puff of air. There wasn't much he felt he could do at the moment except to converse with Bornite to feel more comfortable, "Rocks? Metals are more my thing. Let's see now." He holds up his left arm and taps on the Holo-forger. A luminescent globe the size of a volleyball appears in front of him. He holds it in his hands and moves the sphere around as if checking out a large fruit for deficiencies, "I know of kerium, Quartz." For a brief moment he's lost himself in the orb and its many twinkling lights as he searches for his files on rocks and minerals. "Hold on? Are we talking about rock rocks like limestone or something like gems or minerals.

"This... This place is a biodome...! Sir! An enclosed artificially-made environment!" Shane twitched after being caught off guard. So startled by sudden new voices, his hands slipped against the sphere causing it to burst resulting it seeming like they were inside a planetarium with lots of miniature stars around them. He snaps his fingers, "Aw, bananas." He holds up his hands and compresses them until the fraudulent starfield until it's back into a ball. He turns off the Holo-forger and looks at the two new arrivals, "I take it that you two are not from around here either."

HighSanguinaryPriest Mitheral Spoiled Bread

 

[SpotBandit]

"Well, that's-"

The odd creature sounded somewhat taken aback. Aw, shoot. Kirin felt a small sense of dread settle in his stomach. Did perhaps his eager insistence on the fact he wasn't a danger come off as surface-level? Did it make him sound like he was bluffing?

"Good, I suppose. Putting the snakes aside for a moment..."

Oh, false alarm. Should probably stop assuming the worst of this guy, Kirin thought. He was clearly quite sociable. Perhaps he was just... unaware of the social stigma of Gorgons? To be fair, though, this creature did have three eyes and a massive not-tarantula on his back. It would be sort of hard to be scared of another 'freak' when you yourself were one. Despite being well-versed on all sorts of different monsters from where he came from, however, Kirin couldn't get a lick of sense of what this guy was. The Gorgon ought to ask.

The obsidian skinned creature gestured to Kirin's blindfold and asked a pretty astute question before Kirin could shoot his own, though;

"How exactly do you know where I am?"

"Oh that's easy," Kirin responded near-instantly, automatically knowing the answer and having answered it... more than he would've liked. One of his hands rose and pointed to the general direction of his hoard of snakes, whom of which were still inspecting Verse quite skeptically.

"My snakes can see for me. Not much, mind you, but I can see. You're just barely in my sight."

Kirin was left slightly alarmed however when the once blurry image of this creature began to clear up and grow bigger- a sign he was suddenly approaching albeit at a calm, leisurely walk. The gorgon's eyebrows furrowed and he couldn't help but grow defensive at the creature and his snakes turned from skepticism to outright aggression, with some rearing their heads and showing threatening displays that-- to Kirin's bewilderment-- literally did not phase this guy in the slightest.

Sure, Kirin had engaged in conversation with this guy, but he was still startled by the sudden new stimuli. He'd woken up in the middle of nowhere, and now this creature was approaching him-- a gorgon.

Even when the creature approached a distance at which his snakes began to lunge at the guy, only to just barely miss what the gorgon assumed to be this man's flesh, he didn't even flinch. He even calmly withdrew his outstretched...hand? and offered that eye contact wasn't required so long as the gorgon decided he'd prefer to keep the rag tied around his head. A rightly ruffled Kirin responded by hurriedly scurrying back a few steps and, quite appropriately, being absolutely gobsmacked with this unwarranted behaviour. He threw up his hands in the air, exasperated.

"Wh-- do you want to die?!"

Not only did this guy want to approach him unwarranted, but also take off his blindfold. He wanted to take off a Gorgon's blindfold.

Completely thrown by this brazen display of idiocy, Kirin took a moment to fumble with his words. He couldn't put into words how... crazy, this guy was. First Kirin wakes up in an unfamiliar place, and now it felt as if the locals were completely out of their minds.

"Oh my Go-- I'm a Gorgon! I will literally turn you into stone if I look at you! How do you not know this?"

Hazmat44

 

[Hazmat44]

Verse was beginning to wonder if some common sense had been removed along with his missing memories.

A very faint blip emanated from the back of his head, a very rare indication of his absolute lack of comprehension towards the situation.

He had a degree in biology, not psychology! How was he supposed to handle a person who was insane!?

He paused, halting the train of thought.

The person in question had snakes growing out of their head, spoke of gorgons, wore a blindfold, and had snakes growing out of their head. A favored quote of Verse's was a simple and yet straightforward one; that once all options have been extinguished, only the impossible can remain.

He made a quick decision. The entity before him was to be classified as a gorgon until he could be proven otherwise, which of course would only be a matter of time, as mythological creatures didn't exist.

Ergo... the safest option would be to play along with the madman's delusions.

"I would rather not die." He told the... gorgon... mildly. "Out of curiosity, have you ever confirmed that..." He had to add a subroutine to his thought patterns just so he could say it out loud. "...that looking at people turns them into stone? Furthermore, are you certain it would work on someone already constructed from hard materials?" Verse indicated himself. "Metals are a mineral, much the same as stone." Why was this making sense? He couldn't help but wonder. "Therefore... you have nothing to worry about, yes?"

An idea came to him. If the gorgon in question believed that his eyes would turn people into stone, the easiest way to disprove that would be to force them open! The only issue with that plan was that it would require Verse to violate one's "personal bubble", but for the sake of psychological stability, he decided it would be worth it.

With that in mind, he unhesitantly reached up, ignoring the hisses of the snakes. Two of the arms of the P.C.M.I.T. fired an extremely low-power fission burst, severing the blindfold at the sides, and he pulled it off with more satisfaction than he'd been expecting.

If he'd had a mouth, he would have smiled. A compliment would be in order; exchange for the crossed boundary. He went for the most common compliment he'd ever heard. "Your eyes are green."

...He realized, not for the first time, that he was quite bad at compliments.

SpotBandit

 

[Mitheral]

The biped’s thoughts had switched to the most delightful subject. Quartz was one rock Bornite loved - especially a clear, perfect crystal. “I mean quartz .. and other gems. And rocks with lots of …” he frowned mentally. “Bipeds like you call them ores. And I have a piece of star iron. And .. I have pieces of home. I …”

Bornite’s attention was distracted by a distant tremor in the ground under them. “Did you feel that?” Another tremor - closer. “Tha-” A tiny speck appeared in the air over the jungle. “Is that a bird?” The speck fell to the ground again. Then it shot into the sky once more. “A dragon … flying backwards and maybe out of its mind? That or there is fire coming out of his butt.”

This time the speck grew rapidly then began to fall - toward them. Diving. “Uhm … it’s getting closer. Much closer.” Bornite had begun to pace back and forth several paces in each direction trying to get a better sense of perspective as to where the attacking creature would fall. There was no time left. He suddenly bolted away, not stopping until he had run about 30 yards. That was about as far as he made it before Dorian and Eri slammed into the ground. Bornite looked back. The biped from Marfa Colony on Garene hadn’t run. And the creature that had attacked was proving to be two creatures, a larger one - in armor - carrying a child - maybe? With bipeds it was hard to tell.

Bornite paced a little from his place of “safety”. Safety was most definitely the illusion here. The biped was talking to the other two but at this range he couldn’t hear well enough or understand. A little dejected once more he trotted back - keeping his eye on the child.

He had almost made it back to the group - several feet away when he suddenly stopped and looked up. He had an epiphany. He had heard some creation myths of bipeds. One had spoken of how Medea was carried on the back of a giant godlike creature. Bornite suddenly saw the analogy to this world. It was like a child’s top .. spinning … with the sun overhead never moving.

“This world spins like a child’s toy. So flat that there is no visible horizon. The rivers are created, not natural. We have been placed here like food or pets. I do not like this place.”

Pokeking HighSanguinaryPriest Spoiled Bread