[Nexus] That Day Has Come

[Earl of Purple]

MagCave

"Could I take one out? At the moment my only option when confronted is to flee as fast as I can in whichever shape seems faster in that situation." She's a latent shapeshifter with her ability activated by a magic/science banana.

[Rebonack]

[MagCave]

Divaonar shrugs, picking up the skull and dropping it into his pack again. "I dunno. Maybe? Starspawn of any kind are really hard to kill unless you're weapon is warded with the Eye of Derleth. It makes us follow physical laws like normal material things should."

Waaaait.

This kid is a starspawn?

He just looks like a boy!

"But Mother is really tough! And so we are too. Way tougher than the others. That's why Mother is the Warden. Everyone knows not to mess with her!"

Rawr.

[Earl of Purple]

MagCave

Natalie takes a small step back. "You're one of those things, like a Deep One? But... You seem so nice. That's why I'm not running away, by they way." She is getting slightly hairier, though.

[Rebonack]

[MagCave]

That's an understandable reaction. Most people would respond like that. Except for the getting hairy part. That's kind of odd.

Divaonar wrinkles his nose a bit as he stretches himself out, reaching his wings wide and arching his back. Pretty normal thing for a Far chimera to do. ...was he a chimera the whole time? Or was he a little boy? It's honestly hard to tell.

Half vulture and half impala and half jackal and half crocodile. Clad in obsidian carapace and etched with eldritch sigils. Seven steel-blue reptilian eyes focus on the girl.

He shakes his head emphatically. "No, I'm not like the Deep Ones at all. Mother birthed us to help protect the Nexus. Not to destroy it. Mother is the Warden. She keeps everyone safe. All the people she loves and cares about. And we're here to help her."

[Earl of Purple]

MagCave

"OK." Natalie looks down and notices the hair sprouting from the back of her hand. It's more like fur, actually. "Oh, hang on, I'm monkeying out." Natalie closes her eyes and focusses, and the hair recedes till her appearance is fully human again.

[Rebonack]

[MagCave]

The term 'monkeying out' strikes Divaonar as rather amusing and results in a rather silly sounding laugh from him. Like a cross between a jackal's call and a crocodile hissing. The former actually sounds kind of cute. The latter is more intimidating.

"You don't have to worry about me hurting you. Mother gave us all very strict instructions about not hurting the people of the Nexus. I would protect you or anyone else here in the cave with my life."

A beat.

"Well... unless they're a shoggoth. I hope you aren't a shoggoth. it would be terrible if the only other kid here were actually a horrible monster I have to kill."

Then who would he play legos with?

[Earl of Purple]

MagCave

"I ate a magic banana that turned me into a black spider monkey. Turns out the banana also activated my latent shapeshifting abilities. Hence when I'm stressed, scared or otherwise worried, I tend to turn into the aforementioned primate. Or I can do it whenever I want. Um, I'm reasonably sure I'm not a shoggoth. Is there any way to tell?" Natalie sounds worried about that fact.

[Rebonack]

[MagCave]

The little boy sighs at that, rubbing one hand through his hair. What? You thought he was a chimera? Of course he wasn't! That would be crazy. Surely he was just a child the whole time and not a sanity warping monster.

"No, I don't think so. They're material creatures so the Eye of Derleth and the Elder Sign don't work on them. AND they can perfectly mimic someone. Including their memories."

...

That sounds really horrible.

"The Old Ones use them as spies and infiltrators to cause confusion and distrust among mortals. They're really really horrible things. Even Mother can't recognize them when they're disguising themselves."

[Lord Magtok]

Outside the MagFirmary

"Yes, well, we don't all have the benefit of being master songstresses such as yourself," Saurous says, shooting the cyborg a withering glare. "And I really don't recommend taking advantage of the current situation just to pick on Moon. I've already compiled a list of consequences for you if I note any signs of discomfort in her before, during or after the procedure, and I feel as if we'd all be more productive if you weren't running around, screaming about how your platelets were replaced with shards of broken glass."

With that, the necromancer turns around and leads Magtok back to Moon's bed.

Magtok rolls his eyes. "She's probably already uncomfortable with the entire idea of me doing this. You're not going to flunk me for that, are you Professor?" Because if Saur is, then Mag is going to just needle Moon indiscriminately and hope for the best. The best, of course, being that Moon gets to feel a ridiculous amount of pain and Maggy somehow gets away with it all, of course. "Neither of you really took me for the broken glass sort, though. Is that a new arcane specialty you've picked up since we last met? Glassomancy? Because if it is, that's adorable."

[Mina Kobold]

[Magmart]

Rahona will help make sure that the refugees get teleported safely, but she herself stays behind to follow Raven and Sadei. Still wanting to help them in their quest to save the innocents out there.

[Earl of Purple]

MagCave

"Oh. That's... Creepy and weird. Can shoggoths use magic or the abilities of the being they're duplicating?" Natalie doesn't hold out much hope about her monkey-shape; since shoggoths already have shapeshifting abilities, that's one it seems really easy to replicate.

[Mr. Moon]

Outside Beckett's Clinic

Spoiler

Show

Outside Beckett's Clinic

Iriel looks a bit panicked. And afraid, and confused, but the fear is common enough to not be noted and the confusion hasn't left her face yet.

"D-"

She makes a fist with her left hand and holds it up.

"Do what?"

Outside Beckett's Clinic

Nach'tt looks back at Iriel and Beckett, seemingly curious as to why Iriel was singing. The Mechabold didn't understand it, however.

Mitta seems to have understood that it was strange and worrisome, on the other hand, and walks back to see if she can cheer the strange girl up.

Beckett pauses, frowning. After a moment, he sighs, lifting his hand off Iriel's shoulder to pinch the bridge of his nose. "I'm asking," he says, in that low, careful voice, "if I need to put a cloth over your mouth." Lifting his head, Beckett scans the area again, constantly alert for anything or anyone drawing near. Once he's made sure they're safe for the next few moments, he looks back at the girl. "If you start singing again, there's no telling what things you'll grab the attention of." He shifts, looking Iriel in the eyes. "I need to know if I can trust you, Iriel."
[hr]
MagCave

Spoiler

Show

MagCave - Ace

Maggy floats in from the ceiling. No, I have no idea what he was doing up there, don't ask.

"Why, what's behind them?"

"**** if I know." Ace says, glancing back at the teleporter door nervously. "This big chunck of meat fell outta the sky and kicked up this massive cloud of dust. I don't have a clue what itll 'do to your little store there, I don't even know if it's mundane or not." It's probably not. Not with all the crazy things going on lately. "All I know is that it's headed right this way and I don't wanta see what happens when it gets here."
[hr]
MagFirmary

As Magtok and Saurous return to the Infirmary, Moon Called looks down from her count of tiles on the ceiling (57 so far, but she hadn't gotten very far) to give the pair a tired look.
"Oh, how nice. It's really nice to see that you've both put aside your busy schedules of serenading each other to come together for the common good. It's heartwarming, it really is. Here we are, in the beginning of the end of times, and we're standing around bickering like it'll accomplish something."

[Lost_Deep]

Outside Beckett's Clinic

"Singing? I didn't sing-"

Then, the eldritch pulse hits. While Beckett and Mitta (and possibly the mechabold) will be healed and refreshed by it, Iriel will seize up and fall over, almost as if the wave had struck her with force. Unless caught, she will fall all the way to the ground, landing roughly on her right side. She will stay there for a minute, breathing heavily.

Of all the people designed to survive the apocalypse? Iriel is the worst build ever.

[Saurous]

MagFirmary

"No, it isn't, but I'll have you know that the glaziurgists are highly respected members of the-" Saurous begins, before his presumably long-winded and prosaic rant about the mechanics of glassomancy is thankfully interrupted by Moon Called. A dozen assorted magical concepts bounce about in his head, begging to be released and expounded upon, but the necromancer manages to restrain himself and file them away so that they can all erupt forth later at some accidental provocation or, at the very least, fester into a brain tumor. "Right. Sorry, dearest," he says to Moon through a strained, clenched smile that's meant to both placate her and to prevent any facts from slipping through his teeth. "We'll get right to work."

He then turns his head to Magtok, his eye twitching a bit. "Do you have an operating room of some sort that you'd like us to move to, or shall we just do the procedure here?"

[Lord Magtok]

MagFirmary

"Yeah, I'll have two bots wheel her right in. Not totally necessary, but the lighting's a bit better in there, and there's less of a chance of someone walking right in and mistaking the both of you for pointy-eared, abnormally overweight Deep Ones." All snark aside, Maggy jabs needles into arms with much greater ease when he can see what he's doing, and on the off-chance anything goes wrong, there'll be plenty of medical supplies around to try to fix things back up, assuming there's a non-magical solution to it all.

A pair of Magbots step over towards the back of Moon's bed, and proceed to wheel it along to the OR. Maggy looks over the sedative in his hand one last time, to make absolutely sure it didn't switch itself out with some awful cyanide injection when he wasn't looking. What a hilarious mix-up that would be, huh? "So Moon...any last words before your face is too stupid and numb to say anything?"

[Craftworld]

MagMart
As the dust passes, Golem peers out through a crack in the barrier to see what is going on outside.
"I am thankful that this never happened to my old home."

[Mr. Moon]

MagFirmary

"Just hurry up and get this over with." Moon Called grunts, turning her head to look back up at the ceiling rather than return the cyborg's gaze. Magtok was right about one thing, she certainly was uncomfortable with him being anywhere near her when she was stuck in a defenceless position like this. In fact, she wasn't even entirely sure why he needed to get involved. Hadn't she made sure he wasn't going to have anything to do with this when she decided not to go with the metal arm thing?

Sod it. The ice elf was tired and her arm hurt whenever it was attached to her body. She would argue the point later, or maybe not at all. She just wanted to get this whole stupid thing done with.
[hr]

Outside Beckett's Clinic

"What do you mean you weren't si- Hey!" Beckett cries out in surprise as Iriel sways and begins to fall over. In a quick motion, he reaches out with his sturdy left arm, catching her and supporting her. The medic stands with her, all attention focused on her as she struggles for breath. "Iriel." He says, more loudly than is safe, trying to catch her attention. "Iriel. Talk to me. Tell me what's wrong. Where's it hurt?" Even as he speaks, Beckett has dropped his rifle to let it swing on its strap, pressing his now-free right hand against her neck to measure her pulse, counting eat beat off under his breath.

Dammit dammit dammit we don't have time for this.

[Lost_Deep]

Outside Beckett's Clinic

"I-it-I-doesn't hurt..."

She regains her composure... kind of. Her pulse was skyrocketing, and drops back to normal almost instantly. There is a moment at normal. Then, she seems more desperate all of a sudden. It's like like all the safe feelings given to her by Beckett and Mitta and the Clinic were just blown away.

"Let's go, let's just go. I don't want to be here. I don't want..."

She then falls silent.

She takes one hand, and puts it over her mouth. She then moves her head towards the path.

She's better now. Let's go.

[Mina Kobold]

[Outside Beckett's Clinic]

Nach'tt and Mitta exchange curious glances at the two humans' behaviour, but follows suit when Iriel begin to move. They even try to get back in line and keep watch for Soggoths.

[R'lyeh]

As the wave passes over Lewis and Trilby, the pixie gets an idea as he remembers something.

"Blimey! I forgot the magical stones I got at the hospital! I got an idea!"

With a mischievous grin, and clothes that seem to change into a seafarer's outfit with bandanna, eye-patch and everything, he begins reciting a spell of quite ridiculous nature.

"By tha power O' the seven seas, Cap'n DuGalle hereby commandeers this here vessel in piracy's name! Ship Ahoy!"

As the magical backlash knocks the Pixie Pirate off his feet and back down to Chtulhu's bedchamber, the ancient city should feel a magical push attempting to set it on course for the open sea.

Unfortunately for Lewis, it's not much better than a whale slightly bumping into it and hurriedly apologising for it's clumsiness.

[Rae Artemi]

[R'lyeh]

Trilby's still just a steering wheel. Steer steer.

[Lucy's Mind]

"Well... Damn." Vicky says. Guess she's gotta go with trying to use whatever's in the window. Good thing this monster doesn't seem to be attacking. Oh well, might as well be quick. Vicky moves for the open window and reaches for whatever happens to be in there, keeping an eye on the monster as she does so!

[Mina Kobold]

[Lucy's Mind]

The creature's head follows the vampire's movements, waiting, observing.

As she grabs the thing in the window, the creature's crude imitation of a face opens in a mockery of a smile as it begins moving toward her.

The item seems to be a cold rusty piece of metal, maybe a pipe or stick.

[happyturtle]

Perhaps if Edijar still had two arms, or if one of them had a fully functioning suit of power armour, it would have gone differently. In the end, there were just too many of them. When the skirmish was over, Sonja was dead, and Halifax kneeling next to her.

"She went to be with daddy," he said. "She left me. Why did she leave me?"

He moved to take his mother's hand, and that's when Missy saw the wound in his gut. They had minutes to get him to the cave and onto an operating table, where he'd have a roughly even chance of dying on the table. And if he survived, a long, painful recovery.

"Hold her hands, and say your prayers, Halifax," Missy said. "She'll hear you."

She looked up at Edijar and held out her hand. He handed her the cyanide syringe. The child, already in so much pain, didn't even feel it.

Missy reached into a compartment in her armour and took out her mother's hand, and the bloodied garment that had been all she could find of her father and placed them on the ground next to her son.

And then, she guessed what Edijar was thinking, or noticed something with her heightened senses, or perhaps only imagined something. But she was certain that he was about to over-ride her suit again, and make use of another syringe.

She turned and met his eyes. "No." She saw him hesitate, saw him decide. She saw a little more of the life going out of him. "We're soldiers, Edijar. We'll go down fighting."

He gave a tight nod, knowing she was right. There were other mothers, other children to protect. He'd only wanted to give Missy some solace. It wasn't right that her reunion with her child should have been so brief, so meaningless.

They cremated the bodies, while Missy chanted the Prayers for the Dead. And then they moved on.

They never made it back to the MagCave.

[TechnoScrabble]

Blue zone-shattered ruins

All reality is intertwined, carefully and closely wrapping into and around itself. Especially in the Nexus. So it is no surprise that reality has overlapped somewhat.
Riley has lost his arm here as well, only this time to the blade if a dying scavenger, the last of a group the Rileybeast has rent to shreds and flung about the place.
He sits upon a heap of rubble, staring blankly at the strangely bloodless stump, holding a handgun to his head.
Too bad it isn't loaded, this is the first time he's ever had the guts to pull the trigger.

[Lost_Deep]

((As it has now been 12 days since Moon_Called posted in this thread, I am disengaging my character from her character. I have sent her an PM on the matter, which was never responded to.))

Outside Beckett's Clinic to Rooftop

Although the risk of Iriel's song drawing attention seems to be the greatest threat at the moment, there is one greater detail.

Iriel has a unique eldrtich energy signature, one that can be sensed by any starspawn in about fifty feet. One starspawn has, in fact, noticed this signature. What is about to happen may later be attributed to Iriel's sudden song, and the true reason left unknown.

Interestingly, this starspwan is completely deaf. It would have no idea about Iriel's existence, if it were not for the energy signature.

Iriel, trying to beckon the group towards the path, suddenly stops moving. Her eyes, already wide open, are focused on something behind Beckett.

Well, something that was behind him. The thing is fast, silent, and apparently bouncy. It appears to be a long coil of black, no less than twenty feet long and covered with white eyespots. An aura of silence surrounds it, and it uncoils and recoils at great speeds. A moment of silence and a blur of black and white, and Iriel has been all but whisked skyward. She gets a better look at it. A pair of tentacles, sprouting off of the main body, have wrapped themselves around her shoulders. a lipless mouth is the only thing that signifies where the beast's "head" might be, and beyond the teeth is only an empty, endless black abyss.

The thing launches itself and its victim over a building, and onto a nearby roof top. Its many eyespots look over the catch.

Iriel is trying to scream. Her mouth is open, but no sounds come out. the beast is made perfectly for its purpose: Get in, grab a target, get out, dissapear. No one will ever hear the cries for help.

Iriel can only hope that someone will see her.

[Earl of Purple]

Rooftop

Nephrim spots Iriel. Nephrim is a Fallen Angel, formerly of the Celestial Chorus, and as such has a child-like, innocent-looking form. Beating her snow-white wings, the androgynous, angelic child swoops down and attempts to pick Iriel up and whisk her away into the sky. Nephrim has silver-blonde shoulder-length hair and eyes without pupil or iris, merely pools of nearly luminescent white containing the barest hint of cruelty.

Nephrim was last flying away from Inside as fast as she can. Either she's phenomenally fast at reaching Riverside, or got lost and flew back over Inside.

[Saurous]

MagFirmary

Saurous follows after the cot, his work tray in turn gliding along behind him. The necromancer looks through his spellbook as they walk, both to prepare himself for the operation and to drive the glassomancy from his mind. He says nothing, but gently rests his free hand on Moon Called's shoulder as they progress towards the OR.

[Lost_Deep]

Rooftop

Unless the little angel is very strong, neither Iriel or the beast are going anywhere. Those tentacles have a real solid grip, and the beast in not slimy or slippery at all. It does, however, notice Nephrim. It does not seem to realize how much of a danger the fallen angel is. If nothing else, it will not eat Iriel at this moment, instead examining this new thing through its many eye spots.

Iriel is a human woman of below-average musculature, the only real unusual thing about her is her almost turquoise hair. That and the look of absolute horror and panic on her face. You don't usually see that pure of terror. She is obviously screaming, but the thing's aura of silence keeps her from actually making sound of any sort. Said aura will also negate any of the fallen angel's attempts to speak to the thing or to Iriel.

[Earl of Purple]

Rooftop

Nephrim's strong, but probably not strong enough in this instance. So, she lands a short distance away and commands the creature to let go. Only, the silence doesn't help that any. Instead, she jumps up and swoops in, unsheathing her elbow and wrist blades and slicing at it on her way past. After that, she'll land on the other side and turn, bracing herself for an attack, either by her or the creature. First, she'll observe the damage she's dealt. The blades are made of dark red solid light, and have been daubed with the Eye of Derleth/the Elder Sign, whichever damages elder evils.

[Lady Serpentine]

((The Eye is the one that damages Starspawn.))

[MagCave]

S'Kanthos finishes checking the health of the creatures that they brought, and wanders off into the base.

[Lost_Deep]

Rooftop

The being does not even-

Wait, they're made of light and Marked with the Eye?

Two deep gashes are cut through the beast cleanly. The flesh does not slice like real flesh; it now just looks like it has two notches out of it. In return, the beast screams. The sound is not a real sound, but instead a rattling of reality. Space warps and rattles, and time blurs. Does it take an hour, or a moment? It then exhales a visible, sickly cloud of abyss over Iriel. She tries to worm free, but the cloud wafts over her... and past her. She does not seem to be effected.

The beast then leaps, trying to escape with its captive. It's fast, very fast, but apparently not fond of fighting.