the great escape.The Circle has quite a lot on their plate, this time around. Multiple players are fighting for the control of Akvos, and many difficult choices to make. No matter what path you choose, though, one thing is for certain: it is a bitter fight to the death to ensure that Akvos remains standing, one way or another. There are three main areas for the characters to explore in the final log of Akvos: (1) The Kingdom of Akvos, where the King is fighting to seize control; (2) The Rift, where the characters will encounter the Dreamscapes; and (3) The Kingdom of Polankos, which is where King Ka'pouli has reigned since his arrival in the pocket dimension. Decisions made in all there areas will affect the outcome of Akvos, so get to exploring.  THE ASSAULT ON WAHINE.The King’s forces will attack in three different fronts. There will be mermen attacking from above, riding saddled giant seahorses and manta rays, launching spears at the mermaid-warriors below with terrifying precision. They seem to be indiscriminate, in their aim -- the weaponry, charged with the same dark energy that the shadow creatures seem to be made out of, find their target in civilians and warriors alike, raining down a sea of terror upon the central stronghold of the Kingdom of Akvos.
The mermen will also be attacking at the ground-level, attempting to burst their way through the Palace Gates to flood the city with numbers. While the mermaids outnumber the mermen, the mermen are certainly more brutal than the mermaids. Some of them, though, in finding the city, are more concerned with looting it than with senselessly murdering everyone inside. Indeed, this is the most food they have seen in a long time -- and markets are destroyed in grabbing as much food and riches as they can, pressing closer to the Palace, and toward the Queen's stronghold.
And, finally, they will be attacking from below, navigating their way through a network of tunnels meant to transport goods and bursting their way into people’s homes, to sneak their way closer to their ultimate goal, which seems to be the Palace itself.
The Circle's main goal, here, is to protect civilians, usher theminto the underground strongholds beneath the Palace, and fight for their own lives should they attack the mermen first. Man the wall, if you so choose, to attempt to block the air attacks from the mantas. Fight on the ground, to protect Akvos from destruction. Or make your way to the underground strongholds and tunnels, to block access to the Palace. All of these will certainly assist in keeping Akvos safe.
In addition, please remember that shadow creatures (which can only be killed by magical means) are still making their way through the entirety of Akvos. While King Ka'pouli's forces are targeting the Palace of Wahine, the shadow creatures are still present everywhere. Get to killing!  INTO THE RIFT.Some of you, however, have elected to traverse into the mysterious rift that appeared in the midst of the Fields of Akvosia. It looks like a black hole into nothingness, crackling with odd energy . . . and passing through it feels as though you have stepped through an icy waterfall. For a moment, you cannot breathe -- and then, you are treated to beauty.
The gaps between time and space are full of sparkling lights, bolts of rainbow starlight winding around you as you move through the uncertainty that is the void. It seems endless, but something inside you is tugging you forward . . . and, suddenly, there is a soft voice in your ear. A familiar one, to those who reside within the Circle . . . the confused voice of Astoria.
 "Hello? My Travelers? How are you within the Void?" The Void? That word hadn't been used to describe whatever this magical place is before, but . . . well, a witch with the ability to send you all across the universe probably knows what she's talking about, right? "That should not be possible . . . who opened this doorway?"
You can tell her, or you can not. It seems to matter not, because: "Is this not getting through? Why can I not hear you . . . but I can feel you, I can -- please, if you can hear this, be careful. The Void is not something for mortals to interact with, and it can show you terrible things -- terrible things, so please--"
And, right before you have the opportunity to respond to our benevolent witch (or captor, depending on your point of view), you see a bizarre glass-like surface in front of you. It looks like a mirror, and you see a perfect reflection of yourself. It is absolutely captivating, and it beckons you . . . almost urging you to touch it. And Astoria's whisper grows a bit louder, more urgent:
"My dear Traveler, be careful what you encounter here -- can you hear me? Can you see me? I am trying to get you out of there, to bring you back home--Akvos is--"
But it is too late.
Your fingers graze the edge of the mirror, and you are pulled -- a sensation that is familiar to you, the same pull in your stomach that you feel whenever Astoria thrusts you across the universe, into new realities. And, when you blink your eyes again, and look around . . . you are no longer in Akvos, or the Void. You are somewhere entirely new.
Welcome to the Dreamscape.  THE KINGDOM OF POLANKOS.Once the Circle emerges from the Rift and the Dreamscape, they will stumble into another world . . . but this one's wateris shallow, in comparison to the massive depths of the crystal-clear kingdom of Akvos. You can quite clearly see the surface, here, and there are shallows that allow you to come up onto islands, tropical in nature with fruit, odd creatures that appear to be multiple-headed monkeys and parrots, and sandy shores. It's a bit jarring to see, after spending so long underwater. Indeed, you emerge to trudge onto land, and look around, somewhat mystified that the deep-dwelling mermen would be from a place like this.
However, exploring the islands (which is not very difficult to do, as they are all small and will not take very much time) will yield the discovery that on the islands themselves are tunnels -- underwater caverns that thread through the islands to much deeper water. It's almost as if the islands themselves are barriers to the underwater caverns below -- shallow water, a layer of land, and then a (mer)man-made bubble of water below the barrier of land. And that whoever lived on these islands tunneled through them to find deeper water. Princess Kea, (who will attend on these journeys, while remaining in the water), will tell the Circle members that King Ka'pouli told her that when the mermen were cast out, they landed on solid land, and had to slowly dig deeper to their salvation.
Navigating through these tunnels will be somewhat perilous -- and the Circle members will need to carry Princess Kea to the nearest tunnel to get her into some water, because while she can breathe on the surface for a certain period of time, she cannot navigate the land as quickly as you people with legs. Additionally, underwater caving isn't exactly a blast, but the deeper you go, the more clues of civilization you can find. And, eventually, once you go deep enough, you emerge into a massive underwater cavern to find the small Kingdom of Polankos.
In comparison to the Kingdom of Akvos, Polankos is witheringly depressing. It is not brightly colored, nor open -- indeed, it is tiny, with mermen huddled together waiting patiently for the forces that went through the rift to return. There is not a lot to find here, save for some interesting weapons that possess a dark energy, versus a lightning energy -- and those weapons will be given to the Circle members who ask for them, because those who wield them are in no condition to fight. There is little food, little room to sleep, and these are a people clearly in need of assistance.
In order to get them out of Polankos, you will need to usher them through the tunnels back up to the Rift above -- it seems that King Ka'pouli opened the Rift on the surface, rather than risk the city below in case it did not work. The mermen there (who seem to be elderly and weak) will be eager for the assistance to get out Polankos, and at the promise of being brought into Akvos, they will happily go. There will be no resistance from them.
You may also see Princess Kea, who has filtered in and out of the Rift to assist on the journey -- teary-eyed, heartbroken at the sight of these individuals who require rescue, organizing the mermen with the promise of keeping them safe in Akvos.
"Hurry," she tells you, as she rouses another merman into getting to the nearest tunnel. "We do not have a lot of time to pull this off, and we must work quickly." Additionally, please feel free to write up and work with your own prompts! These areas of the world are presented as jumping off points for your characters, not limitations. The idea of this world- as with all the others- is to explore -- you may use as much leeway as you want in order to come up with what your character will do, especially in the Dreamscapes. If you have any other questions, please feel free to ask them back on the various threads back in the OOC post from before! |
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acatalepsy_logs2019-01-04 10:22 am
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Yeah, I think I can probably use this thing okay. I could try to uh, take one with this watch thing too, if you want.
[If it would work. If Simon wants to find out whether that would show the same thing as the camera - if the camera itself even works. If Simon wants to have that picture, maybe, when he leaves here.
Hank glances at Simon once, then lifts the camera in front of them, focusing on its screen. He fiddles with it for a second. He takes the picture.]
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[ He doesn’t like the implication, not that he can fault Hank for making it. But if this is real—
Because the mermen are. They weren’t headed in here to rescue them from an imaginary dimension. What if Astoria was lying? He doesn’t even care that this is after the crash, that even if this is real he has eight weeks to live in it. He could figure something out. There had to be something, something that would go right that didn’t the first time.
For a moment the chalkboard is in familiar-unfamiliar handwriting
Be quiet!
The Proxy listens
and the camera flashes.
And like Simon, Hank will see horizontal lines tear and dance across his vision, like a tape being rewound. Then he blinks, and everything is different.
The overhead lights flicker unevenly, the whole place reddish, like they're standing in the guts of some sort of cold, industrial creature. The only sounds are the rumbling of turbines and whirring of ventilators. The camera in Hank's hand is gone, and in its place is some sort of handheld computer.
This, after five whole minutes of normalcy. Where he thought that maybe— ]
No—
[ his voice rises, but barely above an incredulous, and then angry, inside voice. ]
—no, no, fuck— God damn it.
[ He should really be holding it together for the guy who's never been here before and is in for the worst acid trip imaginable, but he can’t help lashing out at the ludicrous levels of cruel bullshit that this is. ]
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Hey-
['You okay?' No. Obviously he's fucking not. And he's not going to start being okay once they get out of this shit. What's wrong with Simon is something getting out of this latest round of bullshit fuckery isn't going to fix.
Hank digs into what he knows about Simon. Their last conversation, maybe. Simon gave Hank plenty back then about what maybe kind of keeps him going, if Hank read him right.]
Lotsa people who need our help out there. [He murmurs it, watching Simon for anything that might kind of sort of pass for an expression, or for some kind of body language.] We just gotta find a way out and get to em.
[He tilts his head in whatever direction it looks like they could walk.]
You up for it? Or do you wanna take a minute?
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It’s sufficient motivation, and he nods, jaw tight. He’ll do what he always does here, except this time totally in the dark about where to find what they’re looking for. ] Yeah. Let’s go. Just keep quiet, it’s rough down here.
[ wow simon you don’t fucking say.
So, he starts walking, glancing at Hank to indicate for him to follow. Maybe Hank won’t be at as much of a disadvantage after all. When the monsters can beat you up remotely, anybody who’s not sensitive to electromagnetism is better off. He looks around, speaking in a murmur. No signs yet. No rooms. ]
Can’t tell which station this is. Omicron?
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I got no idea what that means.
[He's murmuring too, and he looks down at the thing the camera'd turned into a second before holding it out.]
That something you need this thing to figure out? Probably do you more good than me.
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Yeah, we’ll need this.
[ Despite the fact that he just pulled a face that would imply there’s something wrong with it.
A P.A. system kicks on, and the voice that greets them is that guy that seems to be in every bad employee training video. Welcome to PATHOS-II, your expressway to the stars.
What started as a thermal mining operation in the sixties has now become home to the Omega Space Gun, the world's most affordable way to launch satellites and deep space probes.
Simon’s face registers more surprise at hearing the radio transmission than the approximately zero of it that it does when his constant scanning of their surroundings lands on a figure sitting collapsed against the wall, dressed in a bloodstained jumpsuit. The top half of the man’s head is caved in and melded with a sparking, fizzling fusebox by black metal cords that seem to burst out of the walls. He’s clearly been here for like... a while.
The sparks it’s spitting remind him that he left his flashlight in his robot head. Shit.
Our unique Atlantic ocean location allows for this gigantic coil gun, running longer than a marathon, to safely launch projectiles without risk of damaging the payload with risky combustion ... ]
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As long as you're not looking at the head.
Hank kind of can't not look at the head.
He doesn't try to hide how grossed out he is. Okay.
Later, he'll probably realize that this was A Clue. Right now, he's just taking it in.]
Uh. So, uh. That happen a lot, around here?
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No, they don’t usually just play randomly like this.
[ Then Simon actually looks at Hank instead of straight ahead. ] Oh... that. Yeah.
[ The more they walk, the more they are flanked by metal tumors, piling up from the floor and out of the walls like robot mold. They’re punctuated by growths within growths, broken pipes and tubes, winding cords and shards of assorted somethings.
Together they are able to produce, assemble, and launch the-the-the— The a voice changes, the new speaker protesting helplessly against the backdrop of a beeping heart monitor. —model was sound. It should have worked.
Simon stops in his tracks, paces around while looking up for the source, again, as if he will find it this time. ] What the hell?
[ It’s not your fault, David. The Simon on the recording sounds resigned, tired. Present Simon hates it as much now as he did when he heard it the first time, maybe more.
I was supposed to save you.
Hey, you got my brain on file. Maybe you can put it to some use.
The audio clicks off, prematurely, but way too late for Simon’s liking. ]
This, uh— [ Pale, he waves an arm at the nasty robot gunk oozing from the walls, because hey let’s have a conversation about this other thing suddenly. ] The WAU. The A.I. that runs the place.
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He's learning things about Simon, too. God, if this was something they could do with suspects Hank would - well, he'd hate it, but he'd use it. But here? With a friend, hearing things he'd never want anyone to know, if it were him? God.
Hank can't help but put the pieces he has together, though. Simon was a human. Some guy had Simon's brain on file. Now he's... what he is. Some guy without a mouth and a familiar, foreboding smell who talks about zombies like they're a real thing.
Hank swallows. He realizes he's looking at Simon like he can see more than what he actually can, if he looks hard enough. He swallows again, looks away, up at the ceiling where he just naturally assumes all random out of nowhere voices come from. Yeah. Topic change. He can go with that.]
Yeah. An AI. Shit, that was never going to go wrong or anything.
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I guess it worked out, at first. It just went rogue somehow after the comet hit, trying to—
[ They turn the corner. Down the only hallway, there’s an intersection — more corridors with doors at the ends, Simon can assume, but he doesn’t recognize these ones. In the middle of it, back turned to them in the dim lighting, a young woman stands stooped over in underwear and a bloodstained tank top, sobbing raggedly into her hands. ]
Shit. [ Simon stops in his tracks, backs up and kinda flaps an arm until he gets a Hank part, to still him. Without looking at him to see if that’s actually necessary, since his eyes are glued on the girl.
Her shoulders are hunched, posture small, that way you’d probably have seen at a police station, where you’d probably put a blanket around her. She’d almost look normal from this angle if not for the oddly-shaped foot, the strange spiky shapes protruding from her shoulders, the glowing spots down the sides of her legs like incandescent chicken pox. ]
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This is the worst thing to bring a second person to, but at least Hank is on board with the being quiet thing. He drops into a crouch and waves Hank down, speaking in a whisper. His fingers follow a game-plan-shaped trail in the air, ending at the right hallway. Which is totally arbitrary; Simon doesn't recognize either of them. But they have to pick one. ]
She can't see. We can sneak in and run to the door from there.
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Fuck it. That eye thing is... fine. It's totally fine. Thinking of Simon as a monster makes him feel like a dick, and this is a stupid thing to be thinking about anyway when he should be focusing on being quiet. He's not sure how good a chance they have of being quiet enough, whether the girl - or whatever she is - is a little deaf, too, or if Simon just thinks they're a lot better at switching on stealth mode than Hank thinks they are, but in her ear shot's probably the worst place to argue, so he doesn't. He can't help but try to sneak a look at her if they get close enough, though. Dumb, dumb as fuck, but since it's a quiet kind of dumb he just kind of goes for it. The urge to know goes deeper than what little smarts he's got, he figures. That or he's some kind of masochist. A little of column a, and all that shit.]
body horror cw
Looking at her from the side reveals that an incandescent pipe anchors her severed head back to her body, like a skull on a pike in some bad slasher movie about cannibals. It shines bluish-white through her empty remaining eye socket and open mouth — the same as the glowing metal barnacles scattered all over her body, the same as the ones on Simon’s suit. It’s supported by a mass of cords and tentacles, pipes and struts, feeding into the back of her head, the hunk of machinery that’s replaced the left half of her face.
The blue light is stark against the purple-red mottle of livor mortis. Every metal prosthesis is surrounded by torn skin, blood, necrosis. On this side, the wristwatch and bracelet on her human hand, the PATHOS-II logo on her bloody shirt, the sophisticated-looking brand of where she used to work, look extra ghoulish.
Her sobbing has degenerated into tired, weepy sounds in a voice that rattles with strange digital vibrations. She raises her head, breathing raggedly. Simon freezes.
He had to get closer to her, last time. To get the battery pack. He survived that, albeit barely. She shouldn’t notice them like this, but he goes still all the same. ]
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He freezes, heart hammering, breath as quiet as he can make it. He couldn't look away from her if he wanted to. Probably not a good idea to try, at this point. Fuck.]
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Stay away from me, she says, in that voice that sounds like three; less human than Simon’s, but more human than most, down here.
She takes a step. She limps with the weight of the claw and the uneven lengths of her legs, metal limbs leading in an archetypal zombie drag. The questing pincers chomp at her side. It brings her a little closer, but it’s mostly a lateral move. She hasn’t seen them, can’t see them. It looks more as if she’s playing hot-or-cold with the sounds of their presence.
Don’t come any closer!
Simon grabs Hank’s shoulder and doesn’t let go, leans in until Hank’s hair touches his temple and tries to catch his eyes — and if he can’t, he taps his shoulder insistently. He mouths “it’s okay”, exaggeratedly, so his lips can be read in the poor lighting — “don’t move” — raises a finger in a “be quiet” gesture, not out of reproach, but to indicate that’s still what they’re doing, that they’re not running yet. ]
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But of course he's going to look at her. He has to know how close she is. He has to. But Simon's the boss here; if he says they stay, they stay. Hank can do that. Just about, just barely, but he can do it.]
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He looks back to Hank, and seeing the plain white terror on his face makes him want to wrangle his own into something that doesn’t feed it. He attempts grim determination. “Afraid” to “steely” isn’t the biggest leap in the world, though he has kind of that clammy, aerated holding-back-vomit sort of look that stifled panic attacks give you.
He waves Hank over and scoots further down the wall. They’re almost to the edge— if they can get around the corner—
The girl reels back and lets out a two-toned scream, turns and heads in their direction, first a walk, pinning down their location. GO AWAY. Simon’s getting to his feet before she even moves, and grabs Hank’s arm, not bothering to tell him to run when he’s standing. Instead he just jabs a thumb around the corner. That’s a given. Time to start running.
LEAVE ME ALONE, she screams, anguished-sounding. ]
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She can't run, right?
[He gasps it out, not about to slow down until and unless Simon does.]
Tell me she's gonna give up in a second!
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The lopsided thump-THUMP, thump-THUMP, thump-THUMP of the screeching creature behind them, sprinting over steel, can do that well enough.
He doesn’t press the lit yellow door panel at the end so much as he lands on it hand-first and the rest of his body follows. It opens vertically, at a nice clip, but it feels so slow. ]
In here—
[ He barely registers what’s beyond it when he runs in, veers to the side with his hand over the matching panel to shut it as soon as Hank is in. And once he does and it closes, he takes a few big backwards strides away from it. There’s a screech from outside, and the cringeworthy sound of metal plowing into metal, but then the sound drops off into silence. ]
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Jesus.
[The tone of his voice there's deep, coming right from the core of him, shaky like his vocal cords haven't realized he's stopped running yet. His heart hasn't realized it either; he can feel it thumping hard through every single part of his body.]
Jesus. That poor woman. Holy fucking shit.
[He takes a couple more steps back away from the door, wiping his hand over his mouth and then casting Simon a look. It's a 'can you believe this shit' look at first, until he remembers, oh yeah, that poor bastard can absolutely believe this shit, he can believe it way better, probably, than he ever wants to and Hank starts looking curious, despite himself, darts his gaze down over Simon's seemingly-human body before he tears it away and raises his eyebrows and looks around the place.]
So, what now? Do we- fuck, uh. Do we just, just keep going, or- Does it matter where we go?
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Yeah. [ His voice is grim and a strange sort of weary. ] Most of them don’t talk.
[ The room they’re in is an examination room of some sort, except, you know, more zombie apocalypse. There’s blood on the floor, more metal mold-stuff, and some X-rays of badly disfigured human parts.
They’ve been marked up with comforting notes such as remotely controlled? and I wonder how much of him is even left in there. ]
We find a portal, I guess. There’s no other way out of PATHOS-II.
[ He’s not even trying to be pessimistic. Simon is just... yeah. It just be like that down here. ]
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Okay. X-rays. Creepy ones, with creepy-as-fuck implications. Goodie.]
This is probably what counts as cheerful decorating around here, huh.
[He touches the edge of one of them, then turns away. As he does it shows a different set of bones from a different body, injuries he might of recognized if he hadn't turned away when he did. Then it changes back. Hank doesn't catch it. He's got other stuff on his mind, anyway. Behind his eyes there’s still that woman’s face - what was left of her face - and the x-ray that hadn’t distracted him from that but attached itself to it, a horrible little satellite-thought circling around a gravity well of horrible. I wonder how much of him is even still left in there, he sees again, and wonders it himself, and has to know.]
So, uh, the ones that don't, uh, don't talk. Do they... know? Like she did? Do they know what, uh, they...
[He presses his lips together, hands on his hips, looking at the floor. He might sleep a little better at night if he could tell himself he really, really doesn't want to ask, and then just take back the question. He doesn't.]
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Uh- [ He does that thing where you scrunch up your face and press your thumb and second finger into your eyes like you’re the problem and the issue is that you got 4 hours of sleep last night or something and not that you’re in a soggy psychological torture chamber. Hank’s question floats back up to the surface. ] I don’t know.
[ Simon starts this contemplation cautiously, creeping into the very subject with some kind of wariness. In the world of the WAU’s creations, some were monsters. There had to be Just Monsters. There are only so many parallels he can afford to accept, only so many asterisks he can add to the validity of his own existence before he drops off some kind of precipice into god knows what. ]
Maybe it’s the brain scans that make the difference. The robots with those— the WAU can’t control them. They’re themselves, usually, just... [ He pauses, uncomfortably, trying not to wade into how he was once that delusional, that he maybe still is, being this new entity that thinks he is Simon. That he once looked at himself down here and still saw a human body until he was forced to accept it and thought every robot he encountered who claimed to be human was insane, malfunctioning. ]
Confused. The dead people brought back are like puppets, most of them.
[ Ego aside, it’s unsettling to imagine that there is real pain behind the frozen screams of the gagging, writhing Proxies. And probably nothing else. He’d rather not consider that.
and he concludes, soberly, ] Hope she’s a special case.
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[Hank doesn't know what to make of that, the distinction between robots with brain scans and dead bodies without them. He doesn't know what to make of most of this. Maybe there's nothing to make of it; maybe it should be enough to just call this whole thing the worst and not worry about the details.
He keeps doing that, wishing he could stop wondering. It's not getting him far.]
Why's that- the AI, that WAU thing, what the fuck is it even trying-
[He shakes his head, starting to walk a little further on and just hope he sees a door out before he sees more nightmare fuel.]
I don't know. All this shit's so far beyond me. Fuck.
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