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  1. - Top - End - #781
    Barbarian in the Playground
     
    darkblade's Avatar

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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    I'm sorry this is going slowly. I've been busy with life and coupling that with the more cerebral style of most of the PCs it's not going to be too fast.
    Rural Reign An Original Superhero Webcomic Written by Me and AteMozzarlla

    Darkblade Avatar by Necropaladin

  2. - Top - End - #782
    Bugbear in the Playground
     
    doliest's Avatar

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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    It's fine; life is life, and lord knows life can keep one busy.
    Doliest's crimes against good taste
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    An Uwe Boll fan, and proud of it. LONG LIVE THE BOLL!

    Also a Michael Bay fan.

    Likes Jar Jar

    Likes FATAL..... No, I'm sorry, but no. Everything else on this list? I like, but while I've done many horrible things in my life, I WILL NOT claim to like FATAL.



    Let's Playing Final Fantasy with extreme prejudice

    Quote Originally Posted by Cracklord View Post
    Forgive me, Mr Tolkien. You do not deserve what I now do to you.

  3. - Top - End - #783
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    That wasn't a complaint, that was an observation. I'm fine with the game exactly as it is.

    Quote Originally Posted by doliest View Post
    I'll post the details in a bit, but the idea behind the setting is sort of a 'High-Fantasy Post Apocolypse'
    I'm interested, but you'll have to be more specific. What sort of High Fantasy are we talking? It's a bigger genre then people assume. And what class of apocalypse? I mean, Lord of the Rings where Sauron won style, or Lord of the Rings where Morgoth won style?
    Last edited by Cracklord; 2012-06-13 at 01:13 AM.
    Nadir We,
    Youth Born,
    Blood Letters,
    Axe Weilders,
    Victors Still.

  4. - Top - End - #784
    Orc in the Playground
     
    BlackDragon

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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Hey guys, just here to inform you me, and Doliest got caught in a storm that had hail. As a result Doliest's internet was knocked out. It will be out for a few days.

  5. - Top - End - #785
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Hey guys:

    I'm heading to China for some summer study abroad: there might be a time of absence while I fly over, and then a bit while I work out internet hi-jinks.

  6. - Top - End - #786
    Bugbear in the Playground
     
    doliest's Avatar

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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    So, what starts with H, rhymes with 'fail' and yeah, HAIL!

    Speaking of Fail, Time Warner? Made of fail. Bloody week to turn it back on, good lord.
    Doliest's crimes against good taste
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    An Uwe Boll fan, and proud of it. LONG LIVE THE BOLL!

    Also a Michael Bay fan.

    Likes Jar Jar

    Likes FATAL..... No, I'm sorry, but no. Everything else on this list? I like, but while I've done many horrible things in my life, I WILL NOT claim to like FATAL.



    Let's Playing Final Fantasy with extreme prejudice

    Quote Originally Posted by Cracklord View Post
    Forgive me, Mr Tolkien. You do not deserve what I now do to you.

  7. - Top - End - #787
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    BlackDragon

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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Darkblade I thought that the confrontation was happening in the cafeteria? Did Boomer follow Maka?

    EDIT: I mean't hallway.
    Last edited by AnimeKid; 2012-06-28 at 08:09 AM.

  8. - Top - End - #788
    Barbarian in the Playground
     
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    He was pretty far back but still in the burst radius of the extinguisher.
    Rural Reign An Original Superhero Webcomic Written by Me and AteMozzarlla

    Darkblade Avatar by Necropaladin

  9. - Top - End - #789
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    Draxx's Avatar

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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    This school has gone mad. A principle killed while attempting to administer new students. It can't go on. We need a radical change of regime.

    These students are afraid of me. I have seen their true face. They've turned the hallways into extended gutters and filled them with the scent of dead flowers and blood, and when the drains finally scab over, they will all drown. The accumulated filth of all their sex and drugs and alcoholism and excuses will foam up about their waists and all the deadbeats and trouble-makers and liars and all the rest will look up at me, and shout "Save us!" ...and I'll look down, and I will say "no." That's the kind of wooly-headed liberal nonsense that leads to being beaten to death. I am beyond their timid lying morality, and so I am beyond caring.

    My predecessor, Mr. Flutie, may have gone in for that touchy- feely relating nonsense, but he was beaten within an inch of his life and burned the rest of the way. It is time for a change. You're all in my world now, and Ashford Academy has touched and felt for the last time.

    There are children everywhere... like locusts. Crawling around, mindlessly bent on feeding and mating. Destroying everything in sight in their relentless, pointless desire to exist. I walked by the guidance counselor's office one time. A bunch of them were sitting there, waiting to be shepherded. I remember it smelled like dead flowers, like decay. Then it hit me. The hope of our nation's future is a bunch of mulch. You're all nothing but whipping boys. Raised by mongrels and set on a sacrificial stone.

    You had a choice, all of you. You could have followed in the footsteps of good men like President Truman, or myself. Decent men, who believed in a day's work for a day's pay. But time and time again I watch you all follow the droppings of lechers and Communists and not realize that the trail leads over a precipice until it was too late. Don't tell me you didn't have a choice.

    Now the whole world stands on the brink, all of you slack-jawed and bug-eyed, and all of a sudden, none of them can think of anything to say. It's impossible for words to describe what is necessary to those who do not know what it means. I watch you all make a mockery of yourselves, like snails crawling along the edge of a straight razor. That's all these students are. Crawling, slithering, along the edge of a straight razor...

    This school is dying of rabies. Is the best I can do to wipe random flecks of foam away from its mouth? There's nothing that I detest more than the stench of lies.



    I am Principle Snyder.
    Last edited by Draxx; 2012-06-28 at 01:06 AM.
    'C'est la vie' - Such is life.

  10. - Top - End - #790
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    You already have four characters in this game. Do you really want another one?
    Rural Reign An Original Superhero Webcomic Written by Me and AteMozzarlla

    Darkblade Avatar by Necropaladin

  11. - Top - End - #791
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    God no. That was a joke.
    'C'est la vie' - Such is life.

  12. - Top - End - #792
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    For one thing, he wouldn't last a moment against Milly Ashford.
    Nadir We,
    Youth Born,
    Blood Letters,
    Axe Weilders,
    Victors Still.

  13. - Top - End - #793
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    It's been too long, and I thought I better write something. I haven't said much about the war, since that's not my story to tell. Alright, that's everyone about in position for the next epic. Now I just need to finish Solomon and Nicodemus' fight.

    The Knights of the Dark Tower
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    Have you ever found yourself taking a walk down the lonely streets of the Nightside, where it's always 2:AM, the moon is far too close and corruption is so thick you can actually feel it? Along those streets, everyone knows your name–as well as all about your sins, your dark secrets, what makes you tick, and how to turn it to their advantage. Everything is for sale and nothing is cheap, everyone wants to get control of the strings of your pocketbook and of your soul. The dark, brooding heart of London, hidden away from the rest of the world, where magic is realer than you can bear, where lives and souls and everything else you can think of are always up for sale, and all your worst dreams go walking openly in borrowed flesh.
    Take a walk with me down the secret heart of London now. For one who knows what to look for there is so much to see. Here you don't have to take more then a single step to be led astray, and if your lucky, you'll be corrupted and made like the other denizens of that place. If you're not lucky, well you can expect to be consumed or used as fuel.
    Strangefellow is the oldest bar in the world, though nobody knows who or what built it. It was once owned by Merlin Satanspawn, and the first instance of the supernatural accords was signed on those grounds. It is has not been updated in years, the old woodn beams are sagging and splintering, the walls are peeling and in need of fresh paint, and old stains can be found everywhere. It's far from the cleanest place, people only come there once all the magic has been exhausted, when the glamor and horror of the rest of the Nightside exhaust them to drink and brood.
    It's the safest place you will ever find. The bar has very old protections, that only a fool would dare break.
    Recently, there has been a new table at Strangefellows that most days sits empty. Not a small, private booth, but rather a large, circular table that was made of stone, with a single crack running down the center, as out of place in the oldest bar in the world as a diamond in a chimney sweeps ear. It dominates the room a little, and yet nobody ever tries to sit there, except it's intended occupants. Nobody ever asks if it was vacant, or tries to make reservations, though such a thing were unknown in the oldest tavern in the world anyway. They just did their best not to notice it, or think about it at all.
    But some days men would come in, and sit in their seats, and would discuss what to do of the universe. This was one of those days.
    Most of them were present today. Seaton had been pulled back in from his war with the fey to halt the reclamation, but Eddie Riggs was busy, and Solomon Kane couldn't be reached. When the war had begun, he'd taken a dozen men he'd selected himself (he’d hired Ghurkas, who reminded him of people he’d worked with before in India) and had vanished into the Hedge to go hunting witches. Nobody had heard from him since, though he left a way to contact him if matters got really desperate, and that was that. Though his underground campaign seemed to be going well, the mortal covens who had been bridging the old people back to their worlds seemed to be vanishing all over the place.
    Hellboy sat at the head of the table, John Taylor at his left hand, Michael at his right, the others all arrayed around them and looking thoughtful. They'd been in quiet discussion for ten minutes, and it was campaign season. What's more, Merlin's ghost had decided to manifest and was hanging, ghostly, in the center, burning eyes fixed on Hellboy. He never spoke, but he seldom failed to make a personal appearance when they were at a meeting, a sorrowful look on his long, drawn face.
    "So should we make a few moves to block them?" Tsukasa Kadoya asked. "Or should me and a few of you dangerous gentlemen just go kick down their door and leave no survivors?"
    Hellboy shook his head, though he snorted a little in amusement. "Ha. No, Foundation X aren't a problem. Yet, anyway. If all we've heard of them is a couple of off hand mentions and they don't have a higher power backing them then leave them to do whatever they want."
    "Really?"
    "Yes. Trust me, I know when you need to act and when you can leave it alone. They're not on our side, but they are capitalists, and nobody dies for money if they can help it. For one thing, you can't take it with you. The last thing they want to do is have to fight the real badguys. Risks like that are bad for business. No, they only want a small piece of the pie, and they don't want to fight for it. At least, they don't want to fight anyone who can fight back." Hellboy rested his chin on his fist. The stone one. His soul patch had become a beard, a thick, tangled thing, like black wire, and the planes of his face had become more severe, giving him a gaunt look. His head has only a fringe of black hair, like the shadow of a crown, and his eyes were deepset and tired looking. Even his voice was slow and sombre. He still shaved his horns, so that only nubs, stumps of red bone jutted from his forehead above his eyes. Ramirez wasn't avertng his gaze, to his Wizard's sight the burning crown on his head burned through his brain. "If they do become a big deal, then the Drods will deal with them, or the Inquisition, or someone else. We're not the only check and balance, and there aren't enough of us to worry about a few people wanting make money."
    "You're being close-minded." Michael said, his voice soft, deep and confident, though a little sad.
    "What can I say. I'm a singular sort of person. Now, the good news is that the Courts of Amber aren't going to be a problem either. Anymore. Mostly because Ramirez managed to get Benedict on our side."
    There are a few relieved sighs, and a bit of the tension went out of the room. It's always nice to know that one of your enemies isn't going to be a problem afterall. "Now they're all too busy plotting against each other for an imaginary throne to realize the Fair-Folk have wrecked their kingdom and closed off the last links to their masters, their father is dead, their bosses aren't responding and the world has moved on. They're not going to side with the fey, and by the time they finally resolve their impossibly tangled conflict and pick a new king, well by then I expect one way or another they won't be a problem anymore. Though if you really are worried I suppose we can back one candidate or another."
    "You know, it's not a good idea to underestimate them either. They're very good at what they do." John Taylor said in a soft, measured voice. Once, back in Walkers time when he'd been living in the real world a while, a few of them had used Nightside in their Game of Thrones, to try to pick a new prince elect. It hadn't been as damaging as the Lilith war, but only because they'd been subtle about it. You don't underestimate the Courts of Amber. "If you have something they want, whether it's a memory or a skill or toy, they'll break you for it, and when they are done you'll wish you'd never even heard of the House of Amber."
    "You're supposed to be dangerous as well. All of us are. Now, what about our big problem?"
    Taylor cleared his throat. "No luck investigating Wolfram and Hart or the Sombra Group. They're old and canny, they've been doing this a long time in a lot of places, and they've gotten good. Better than me for the most part. Whenever I get anything on an asset, they liquefy it before I can make use of it, then send The Harrowing after me. I did, however, find a lead on North Central Positronics. Silicon Heaven." Taylor replied. Roughly half the knights looked confused. The rest looked offended and disturbed on a fundamental level, particularly Seaton. John Taylor didn't blame them even a little. A brothel where you go to have sex with computers was a whole level of immoral most people outside Nightside aren't prepared to accept could even exist, much less deal with. Indeed, even Nightside itself wasn't, and had pushed it out to the badlands and done it's best to forget about it.
    "I haven't traced it yet, they're moving places every twenty three hours and I never have enough time to muster anything, but apparently Positronics made their messiah, and it’s hiding from them as well. The reason they’re moving so much is because something tipped them off that I want to have a chat with them."
    "Are you sure it's you they are hiding from?"
    "Well, since this is Nightside, no, we have more factions then we do inhabitants, but I hope so. See, we're the good guys, which means if they're afraid of someone else we're in trouble." He sighed.
    Solving a mystery, even with his very specific talents, was as much about being the right sort of detective as putting together evidence and all the rest, because the sort of person you were influenced the way you put it together. This depended on the detective, Eddie Valiant, to pick a name from those operating in the dark heart of London, could take one look at a man crushed by an ACME safe in the Unreal Estates and come up with a motive, a culprit and all the evidence you wanted or needed, but he'd be all at sea (possibly literally, depending on where in the estates he was) with even the simplest Locked Room Mystery.
    Even the Great Detective himself had a regrettable blind-spot where the occult was, given that he didn't believe in the paranormal despite all evidence to the contrary.
    Taylor? He liked his motives simple. Power, profit, lust and revenge, those were fine motives. Jealousy, spite or sheer malevolence weren't bad either. But religion, well as far as he was concerned, that was just another word for madness, and you never knew what a maniac would do. And Silicon Heaven was a temple to the most disturbed sort of religion the irrational mind had ever built. Just trying to think like them would probably do him long term harm, he didn't want to know what they thought they were hiding from that was worse then the badlands anymore then he wanted to know why a cybernetic organism was so keen on sexually stimulating humans. But it was the only lead he had, other then Skynet, and he wasn’t too keen on that either.
    Hellboy shrugged. "Well, go for it, it's the only lead we've got, and I'm sick of being on the defensive." He said. "And I suggest you go with him, Tsukasa." He adds, nodding to the former Knight of the Cross to his left. "Just in case lots of breaking things is needed afterall."
    Taylor opened his mouth to protest, then closed it. The Kamen Rider was probably the better option anyway, as opposed to getting his own contacts involved.
    "Actually, I have a point." Ramirez said. "I've decided it's time we built an army. You know, an actual army, rather then Seaton enslaving a bunch of aliens who don't know what they're getting into and throwing them into the firing line of a war they can't hope to win." The young wizard said. Hellboy gave him a look, and Seaton gave him a glare but Ramirez ignored both of them. "Look, they're strong on any world medieval in nature, all that superstition and magic only helps them. Where they find civilization, real civilization, well they see it as an aberration and they try to destroy it, because humans working together threaten them where lone heroes don't. And they're good at it, but that's something we can exploit."
    "And how do you plan to do that?"
    "Well, we need an army. To start with, lets buy Hogwarts."
    "What?"
    "Yeah I know. Brilliant right? We go to the shadow world where it's exactly as The Harry Potter Books say it is, buy it, take it over, then stop teaching the young wizards a load of generalities and nothing useful, and start teaching them to be soldiers. That way every year we have a few hundred valuable but expendable operatives we can use, who can handle themselves without our direct involvement."
    Michael cleared his throat. "You mean we brainwash teenagers and force them to fight?" He asked incredulously.
    "Turn them into soldiers, not brainwash, and yes. For a good cause. We need to get soldiers somewhere if we want to fight a war. Otherwise, well I don't like the odds right now, and if we lose, I'm fairly sure their lives will be much worse then anything we can do. And we need soldiers who are of use to us. Of course if it bothers you that much, I suppose we can give them a choice. Does that sound better?"
    Taylor shook his head. "We're wasting time. It's a good idea. Lets put the matter to vote. All in favor?"


    Jean-Luc Picard
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    He felt like his body was on fire. Every nerve ending was awash with agony. He had never dreamed that such torment was even possible. But after all he'd been forced to accept, well what was one more thing?
    A shadow leant over him, the shadow of death itself, hooded, skeletal, hateful, merciless. An eye as black as any pit bored into him, dispassionate and indifferent to him, yet seeming almost to savor his pain. Not mere sadism, no he could have dealt with that. The thing savored it, because by degrees he was becoming numb to it, numb to his torment, which was because by degrees he was becoming more like Death.
    Needles plunged into his skin.
    The prisoner heard a cry, the bestial roar of an animal in pain, and it took him a moment to realize it originated from his own raw throat.
    Blades slid from the tips of Deaths long fingers and sliced through his skin, each incision drawing forth a fresh wave of pain. Blood welled beneath each cut, and was hungrily sucked up by into the grooved scalpel blades. The tubes ran along the backs of Death's fingers and joined the protruding veins on the backs of his hands, feeding the filtered vitae into his veins.
    Death was nearly nine feet tall, hunched over so that the top of his head was lower then his wide shoulders. A horn protruded from the left side of the hood, and a single dark eye gleamed in the deep recesses, along with sharp steel teeth. It's arms were long, and four tendrils swayed over it's shoulders, long metallic cables with biological muscles implanted at strategic places. The tentacles ended in lamprey mouths, and occasionally they'd snap at him. Once, it had even bitten the side of his neck and began eagerly sucking at the wound before Death had slapped it away.
    Death was what he called it, since it seemed to have no name or designation of it's own. It was of a low caste, one whose purpose was to make more of it's own kind out of those subjects that were deemed appropriate, and therefore had no need of a name. One would only confuse matters, it considered itself a mere part of a whole. An appendage that served something greater.
    But what it represented was Death more complete then anything that Picard had ever imagined, even conceived. It was eroding everything about him, redesigning it to it's own specifications, reducing him to the mere building-blocks that would be formed into an entirely new being with nothing of himself in it. He didn't know if he believed in a soul or not, but if he had one, then almost certainly these abominations would use that as well.
    "You endure, despite roughly 71.6435% of the necessary preparation for the third procedure already completed. I wish to express admiration at persistence, amongst the highest of virtues, however it is illogical to resist. It only prolongs your suffering, and slows my efficiency keeping me from other subjects." It told him, it's voice a buzzing whirr. It could not really express emotion, or even really feel it, it was simply repeating what it had been told was the appropriate response, but it still meant the words. It meant them more powerfully then even the most insane human fanatic ever could, all the more for that it had no choice.
    A needle appeared in front of his right eye, it's barbed tip dripping with fluid. His muscles strained to turn away, but his head was held fast, and he could do nothing as the needle was pushed agonizingly slowly into the soft tissue of his eyeball. He whimpered as it slid through his pupil and deep into his cornea.
    The prisoner whispered something, and Death leaned closer, straining to hear.
    "You will not break me." The prisoner said again, this time with more force. Even so, his voice cracked and sounded raw. "Pain holds no fear for me."
    "That statement is unsupported by fact, Former Captain of the now defunct institution referred to as Starfleet, Jean-Luc Picard, former inhabitant of Planet Earth now renamed the Argentum at the behest of the Second-Consul who leads the crusade." Death said. "Just the threat of pain triggers elevated heart-rate, noticeable increase in perspiration and accelerated glandular activity."
    Memories struggled to surface on the edge of the prisoner's mind. He tried to grasp them, but they were as illusive as a shadow, taunting him just out of reach.
    Fresh agonies assaulted him as dozens of barbed needles stabbed into his spinal column, sliding between his vertebrae and plunging into the tender flesh within. Darkness rose to claim him (though it was as beyond his reach as his memories, if he were capable of passing out he would have done so long previously), then abruptly a name rose to meet him from the very depths of his being.
    His name.
    "I am Picard."
    "Affirmative, but irrelevant, subject Jean-Luc Picard, former Captain of the now defunct institution referred to as -"
    "Can it. Keep trying as hard as you like. You will not break me."
    "The intention of the process is one of creation, of cleansing the imperfections to mae you closer to the divine ideal of Yawgmoth the ineffable himself, praise be, who -"
    "I told you to can it." Picard says, raising his voice as much as he can. It's hoarse and weak and cracks, but it's loud. Then, more quietly, he continues. "You will not break me because my faith is strong. I believe in humanity. I believe in an individuals power to determine their own decisions, whatever chemicals or institutionalization you put me through. I believe, and nothing you can do will change that." He sighed. "No surrender. The colors must not be struck no matter what."
    "Your assumption about our intentions is incorrect. What we offer is perfection, of cleansing -"
    "Not in this lifetime. I've been at the mercy of things like you before."
    "Heresy to compare inferior beings to the servants designed by the hands of great Yawgmoth the ineffable himself. You shall be granted no sustenance of any kind for a period of forty days, to give you time to repent your blasphemy."
    "You don't scare me anymore." Picard said, then collapsed into unconsciousness.

    The humans had never had a chance. None of them had. They would have been wiped out much sooner if not for glaring flaws in their invaders technology. The phyrexians had never discovered space travel. They'd never needed it, they had their gates working so well that rather then force bits of metal out of the gravitational pull of the world and into space like launching ships, they simply charted their destination, then built one of their gates and stepped directly onto the next world. There was no need of ships if you could just build a bridge.
    Which meant that at first they'd been quite safe as long as they kept well away from any from anywhere the Phyrexians had already come to. But slowly the resistance, now down to a few hundred ships from every corner of the sector that could support intelligent life, had been forced further and further back until there was nowhere to go but the Ghoul Stars, where no explorer had ever returned from before.
    Caught between the lion and the deep sea, they'd found themselves driven past desperation and into the madness beyond. So they’d gone into a place that they had always considered certain Death, to find them eerily empty, no signs of life or anything at all...
    And the phyrexians spread further, and followed them.


    Tsukasa Kadoya
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    Cain paused, and took another drink of distilled belief, savoring it and rolling it around in his mouth. “And so a maiden found a heart she did not know she had, and wed a mortal despite all that made her being opposed to it. And for a time, they were happy. But only a time. For love is meaningless until tested as all things are, and it is those who have the most to lose that have tragedies befall them.”
    “And what does any of this have to do with me?”
    “Her people hate you, Tsukasa Kadoya. More then you can believe, because you are a rational man. You know what it is to lose everything, to have your entire world stolen from you. How do you think they feel?”
    “And what do the fey have to do with me? Oh, I forgot, nothing.”
    “The characters have changed, but the plot has not.” Cain replied, sounding almost patient. “For there was something rotten in the heart of Camelot. Something dark, and brooding, and harsh, a core of interstellar ice in a furnace.
    The Fey chose a champion, and as winter did, so did summer follow. For though they hate mortals, blaming them for the loss of the material world and their existence on the fringes of chaos, they value self-preservation and power far more.”
    Mab’s fortress was a stronghold of black ice, an enormous shadowy cube sitting high up the slope of the highest mountain in sight. A single elegant spire rose above the rest of the structure. Flickers of green and pale amethyst energy played within the ice of the walls. The walls and battlements were lined with inverted icicles, like the slavering jaws of a hungry predator. A single gate, small in comparison to the fortress proper, stood open.
    And a dark man limped within, making his way into the narrow corridors of Arctis Tor.
    Mordred Pendragon took after his father, alike and yet apart. His hair was red gold, his short warrior beard giving him a leonine aspect, and his eyes were crystal blue. But while Arthur’s where like a clear sky, clear, wise and compassionate, Mordred’s gave the impression of looking into countless fathoms of ice. His shoulders were crooked, due to an accident at birth, but this deformity seemed hardly to so much as inconvenience him, indeed he moved with the motions of one perfectly in balance with his body, moving with the graceful lope of a predator.
    He wasn’t what one could call comely, to say the least. His eyes were deep-set and wild, his mouth a gash shaped like a sneer, his cheeks were gaunt and blotchy, and his complexion naturally inclined towards pale. He was tall and lean, and cold. There seemed to be no warmth to the man at all. Indeed, one could bring themselves to doubt he had so much as a heart-beat.
    But he had a heart. No light could break the darkness within it, but he had one, that brooded on perceived slights and plotted murder for no other reason then it could. He may be the blood of Pendragon, but he was the scion of desperate races more ancient then history, the hysterically touchy, sorrowful, flayed defiant defenders of a broken heritage. He desired nothing that the world could give him, there was nothing that could make him happy, not power, love or achievement, not worship, not paradise. For Mordred was given to hates, coveting what he did not possess, disdaining that which he did. It was the taking that mattered to Mordred, not the keeping. He would never be happy, always groping for more. Perhaps the entire world would not be enough to sate the black hunger within him.
    But he would wring what he could from it nonetheless, if only to keep it from others. For misery loves company, and Mordred craved the destruction of others as others crave drink or love.
    He was dressed simply for a prince, a tunic of white with the dragon of his family coiling on the breast, golden threads picking it out. He wore a collar likewise of gold, and had an iron sword belted at his hip, a wise precaution in the woods of the faerie, though none would dare lay a hand on him.
    The winter fai were nowhere to be seen. The throneroom was empty, the court nowhere to be seen, but for a small gathering, all around a single, solitary figure.
    Her features were pale, radiant, perfect, but it was a strange, alien sort of beauty that a viewer probably hadn’t realised existed before meeting the lady of winter with features that slanted in a way that was subtly different, too narrow and defined for any person. She was appealing, but she wasn’t quite human. Her hair was white, but strong and healthy, and cut short. Her clothes were suitable for a young pageboy, low-cut enough to be scandalous, and clung to her curves like a second skin. She was oddly timeless; she looked young, but she wasn’t, and one felt as though they were staring into an abyss when they laid eyes on her.
    “Look! A prince!” She sneered, pointing at Mordred. “Here to perform some adventure or another, for the greater glory and honor and all the rest.”
    “You might say that.” Mordred replied, eyes flashing. He did not appreciate being mocked, if given the chance there would be a reckoning over it. But for now, stronger, darker passions held him in his grip, stronger even then the need to dominate, to reduce others. “But not one that concerns you. So step aside and let your betters dictate the future of the world, and perhaps there will be room in it for you.”
    Maeve shook her head and let out a high, tinkling laugh. “And will you make me?”
    Mordred hit her, knocking her off her feet and sending her crashing to the ground. Her attendants stepped forward, but Mordred quelled them with a look, and stared down at her. “You are no maiden whose chastity I dream of stealing away with pretty words, and there is nothing within me capable of cherishing what I take. Do not mistake what passes for some partnership or service, that I am bound to your mother by some mythic adoration. I could break you if I chose, and cast you aside if whim so strikes.”
    Maeve almost spat, glaring up at him with hate that was all the harsher because it was mixed with fear. As much as she wanted to, she couldn’t quite force herslf to strike back. “Don’t forget that you came to us.” She replied, getting to her feet and trying not to cringe.
    “And don’t forget that you heard me. You might hate and fear me, but you can turn nowhere else.” Mordred replied, smiling to watch the haughty exterior melt. “Arthur has ties with your people, he has shattered the old ways, and taught them of forgiveness. Now, he talks of a summer that never ends. Where will that leave you, broken thing?” He stepped over her, and then looked up to see Queen Mab staring at him.
    The Queen of Winter had hair like ice and sapphires in her hair. Like her daughter, her beauty was at once enticing and curiously repellant, in the way the deadliest of predator’s beauty is it’s purity of purpose. She wore simmering sammite, and silver jewelry. Mordred hadn’t heard her enter, or indeed had no idea how she’d come to be there at all.
    “You go too far now.” Mab said, lips twisting with contempt. She had tolerated the prince, because he was useful, and she was indeed desperate. The wyldfae would follow their lords over her, and Titania had given the Once and Future King her support, as one could expect she would. Mab ran the risk of being completely destroyed, and yet a war with Titania would only hasten her destruction.
    “Do not make the mistake of thinking you are more then a –“
    Mordred stepped up, so that his face was inches away, grabbed the back of her head with a single wrenching movement, then forced her lips against his. For a moment he held them mashed there, her cold lip against his own, equally cold ones, then sank his teeth into their fulsome softness, breaking her skin. A trickle of golden blood oozed from her torn skin as she broke his hold and stepped back, shocked and horrified beyond measure that he had so much as dared lay a hand on her, let alone to such an extent.
    Mordred only sneered, then knelt, in a parody of fealty, but did not lower his head, his eyes dancing with cruel amusement. He drew his sword, and to their surprise they noted it was broken, barely a short foot of metal was left of the blade. “Oh lady fair,” He said sarcastically, making a few extravagant gestures as he did. “I do beseech thee for a token of thy unwavering estimation to wear in the battle ahead, so that all may know I am thy champion when I ride ahead to do thee honor, for meseems that I would find my valor increase greatly thereby.”
    She slapped him, her hand like the crack of a whip as it impacted against his cheek, stinging like frostbite and leaving white marks that bit into his flesh. Mordred didn’t even flinch, he only added “whore” with a sneer.
    “Do not think you can push me so far.” She said venomously. “There are some things I shall not tolerate, even if the alternative is destruction.”
    “It’s not the end you fear.” Mordred replied, standing up, and sheathing Caliburn, the blade that Arthur had drawn from the stone long ago. The mocking quality was gone. In a strange way, that made it worse. “It’s the losing. You have fought so long you’ve become defined by it, and now you’ll take any humiliation if it means not letting your enemy win.”
    “It’s to be expected, afterall, war is god.” He said, simply and without inflection. It was at once the most foolish and the most profound thing he had ever said. “It does not matter what men think of it, or what you do, milady, or what anyone does, any more then what it matters what they think of the sky, or stone. It is beyond us all, completely. It existed before us, awaiting our arrival, the ultimate trade awaiting the ultimate practitioners.”
    He turned. “The old enemies are gone, driven away or destroyed. What remains now, but for all England to turn on itself the way you have?” He smiled. “I could be my father’s legacy, but why would I? It is said that two of the greatest human sins are pride and hate, but I elect to think of them as two great virtues. To give away pride and hate is to say you will change and suppress yourself for the good of the world. To vent them is more noble; that is to say the world must change to your will.”
    “Give it to me. Give me what your own enemy gave my father, and I shall take this broken sword he cast away and I shall drive it through his heart, then have his queen lick the blood off before I kill her too, and burn his castle to the ground.”
    “And everyone knows the rest. Mab took him to his word, and Arthur kills Mordred and Mordred kills him. Merlin weeps over the body, then goes and gets drunk to forget, and Taylor sneaks up on him when he’s not paying attention and cuts out his heart for what he probably thought was a very good reason at the time. Now there’s a man who needs to pay better attention to stories.” Cain interjected. “I think we can skip all that. Except…”
    Aurora stood up, and turned her gaze to the realms of winter, eyes as cold as any of Mab’s creatures. She felt numb, empty, as though she’d been filled with love and now that it was gone all that was left was an aching need for vengeance.
    “You’ll pay.” She said, imagining Mab, who had given the prince the power he had asked for, had caused this more then anyone else. “I shall see to it that you shall not profit for your treachery. You will pay for this.”
    Cain peered over his glasses at Tsukasa Kadoya. “Of course, it didn’t really end there. The realm was destroyed, the dark ages went on, and so forth. Aurora schemed, and plotted, all to avenge a good man who had made her feel something real for the first time in her long life, who had seen good in her when she hadn’t known it was there herself, and so Harry Dresden killed her in cold blood, though I’m sure he tells it differently. And now Dresden is dead, for the moment at least, and the war goes on, never really remembering why so much blood has been shed. All because one man decided he’d rather destroy then be a legacy. It doesn’t really take much to set these things in motion.”
    Cain sounded quite cheerful about the whole thing. “Thousands dead. An entire generation wiped out. And of all those who fought and died, how many knew what they were fighting for really, how many understood the reason they went to war? How many understood what the conflict was for? Few, if any. And like all good conflicts, it continued long after all the participants were all dead. Still raging on now, a tiny portion of your own troubles. Why they were fighting doesn’t matter in the least, for honor, for glory, for hate, for loyalty, for religion or pay, those aren’t the cause, merely the excuse. The reason is, one person or another was greedy. That’s all it takes to change the world, to create a utopia or undo one.”
    He stood up. “Most people lead such little lives. Faintly contributing to one cause or the other without even realizing the nature of the cause, who it really serves. Even you.” He spreads his arms. “Don’t get me wrong, following can be as honorable as leading, but you know what it does?”
    “We talked about riddles. I remember. I said I’d get violent if you kept it up.”
    “Just checking you’re listening. What it does, is get you killed for someone else’s reasons. Now, you might be fine with that. No shortage of people who aspire to matyrdom, I’ve found, who’ll die and kill for what they presume to be right. Are you such a man?”
    “Well…”
    “Of course you are. You came with me, rather then my stuttering fool of a brother. You’re not a victim, or a mother, or a teacher, so what’s left?” He sat back down. “Well that’s all, folks. Wake up, and remember what you will. The consequences of a mans chosen life should be his own.”
    And then he woke up, and it was all a dream.
    Nadir We,
    Youth Born,
    Blood Letters,
    Axe Weilders,
    Victors Still.

  14. - Top - End - #794
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Dark and dramatic stuff, Cracklord, as always...

    And Oy Vey...everytime you bring up Phyrexia, it creeps all the mana out of me. And now you've put Picard in their clutches.

    This has given me some fresh inspiration to write some more stuff for the Knights of the Dark Tower (and maybe type out our conclusion to the 'Infinite Draculas' for the sake of closure).

    Probably some stuff for Seaton, since I'm personally on a sci-fi kick. And then, to branch out from him...perhaps a piece from the perspective of a more minor character, an 'everyman' who's actually an everyman.

    But for the Seaton segments, would it be alright if I:

    1. Have Seaton try to rescue Picard (Your answer will probably be a reasoned 'no', but every bone in my body wants to see Picard delivered from those...things, so I wanted to ask)?

    2. Have Seaton introduce a new form of technology for the universal use of the Knights, a particular device from another E.E. 'Doc' Smith setting?
    Last edited by Colesign; 2012-06-30 at 10:02 AM.

  15. - Top - End - #795
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Really? I felt I overdid it a little, what with the needles being stuck into eyes (always had an ocular fascination), but it's nice to know I can still capture the horror of being subverted so completely that you become someone entirely new. Borg? Amateurs.

    Though I must say, I thought I did a much better job on Mordred.

    If you really want, I mean really, I suppose you can rescue Picard. If you can satisfactorily answer how Seaton knows about him being there, and why he's taking such a tremendous risk to save one man he doesn't know and has never heard about. I mean if he gets inducted into the machine orthodoxy that's it for the multiverse.

    But if you don't mind exposing yourself to them again, and you want to, then go for it. It's your story as much as mine. But then I'll have to do something similar to Han Solo, or Flash Gordan, or Buck Rodgers, or River Tam, or that protagonist from 'The Dispossessed'. I mean, they're all either holed up in space-ships growing short on supplies or going through the process themselves (guilt based gaming at it's finest, finish the game, or Phyrexia will get it's hands on you), but I'll have to draw attention to it.

    Why? Because I'm writing that for a very specific reason. It's an important part of the next epic, which I intend to plan for better this time. There is a way to beat them out of the universe, don't worry, but it's not going to be easy at all. It'll make busting Richard Rahl out of 1984 and getting him to talk to you seem easy in comparison. Besides, now when the time comes to actually do battle with Phyrexia I'll have plenty of antagonists you actually recognize.

    As for the Order, the house of Drood is the same principle as Harry Dresden, only think James Bond instead of private detective. They were first mentioned in game three, for those who keep track of such things. And the House of Amber are yet another faction who are getting involved, who are very hard to explain for people who haven't read the books. Eddie Valiant is from 'Who framed Roger Rabbit', and the 'Unreal Estates' are a ghetto in Nightside for people from universes too far removed from our own to be able obey the laws of physics (think cartoons).
    Nadir We,
    Youth Born,
    Blood Letters,
    Axe Weilders,
    Victors Still.

  16. - Top - End - #796
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    I don't like the idea of turning Hogwarts into a wizard boot camp. The idea of a school teaching the non compative aspects of magic to budding wizards is not something you can turn on it's head without getting a little too close to a slippery slope. Most of the students want nothing more than a quiet life at some magic related desk job, to turn them all into soldiers just because they have the ability to be combat mages is horrible.

    Not to mention the problems of teaching the Slytherines actual combat magic and you'll have to because they are going to get sent to the school and if they all suddenly get expelled by the new administration someone will notice and start looking at places they really shouldn't.

    One thing we have yet to really address. What happened to Charity and the Carpender children aside from Molly. Michael is too much of a commited family man to have left them when he started with the Knights of the Dark Tower but there is no way he'd have moved them to somewhere as dangerous as Nightside.
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  17. - Top - End - #797
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    That was my way of getting across issues, it didn't necessarily come through. Ramirez suggested it because he's spent a lot of time turning ordinary, young, somewhat capable people into combat wizards, and then having them fight the horrors of his world. He knows just how much damage a dozen combat wizards or so can do, and he sees an opportunity, and a way to do it. To him, it seemed like a good idea when he suggested it. That doesn't mean it happened, or even that it went past discussion.

    As for Michael, I figured he did what Walker used to. He has a nice home in the burbs that he goes back to when he's not crusading, where everything is nice and ordinary, and protected by angels. Of course, now he's drunk from the grail he'll inevitably outlive them (unless he gets cut short), but that's neither here nor there. I was actually thinking a couple of his sons might even follow his footsteps, just like a real knight.
    Last edited by Cracklord; 2012-07-01 at 12:32 AM.
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    Youth Born,
    Blood Letters,
    Axe Weilders,
    Victors Still.

  18. - Top - End - #798
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    I do agree with your interpretation of Michael: further, the events of 'Ghost Story' do indeed imply that his sons are planning to follow in his footsteps...his big, honest, steel-toed working boot footsteps.

    And you're equally right about it being difficult for Seaton to pull a rescue on the protagonists of the Phyrexia-infested unfinished Space Game: among other things, plotwise, none of the Knights of the Tower have come to grapple with/realize the true depths of the menace that is Phyrexia: such battles will have to wait until later.

    For that matter, it might not be wise to square Seaton off against Phyrexia in his current mind-set. Forget rescues: the current Seaton might 'write off' the occupied universes and start blowing up star systems one at a time.

    But still...

    The way you've bean treating so many fallen-by-wayside characters during the Phyrexia plot arc, Cracklord...it's like you're an unholy hybrid clone offspring of Joss Whedon, Yoshiyuki Tomino, and George R.R. Martin.

    ...Have you been holding out on us? ;:|

    Anyway, the internet's acting weird at the moment, so I'll sign off.

    Two fiction excerpts coming up later.
    Last edited by Colesign; 2012-07-02 at 09:04 AM.

  19. - Top - End - #799
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Well as far as I know, Yoshiyuki Tomino played no part whatsoever in my conception. Of course, thanks to the whole nature/nurture debate, that might not even be relevant. Hope that settles your concerns.
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  20. - Top - End - #800
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Quote Originally Posted by Colesign View Post
    The way you've bean treating so many fallen-by-wayside characters during the Phyrexia plot arc, Cracklord...it's like you're an unholy hybrid clone offspring of Joss Whedon, Yoshiyuki Tomino, and George R.R. Martin.
    Quote Originally Posted by Cracklord View Post
    Well as far as I know, Yoshiyuki Tomino played no part whatsoever in my conception. Of course, thanks to the whole nature/nurture debate, that might not even be relevant. Hope that settles your concerns.
    So you are the unholy hybrid clone offspring of Whedon and Martin then?

    As for this current game the Hunger Games operate on a much different principal than they do in their own canon. Primarily they are still televised battles to the death by a totalitarian government.

    The tributes are still one male and female from each of the Britannian Areas 1 through 12. Each Area is a much bigger pool to pick from than the Panam Districts.

    Instead of a public reaping of the tributes though, the chosen tributes are abducted on their way to school and/or work with the families notified later.

    The games themselves are played out pretty much the same but watching from home is entirely optional. The tributes are put into the isolated arena full of weapons and forced to kill each other and face the elements. The main difference is the collar system. Originally derived from a system of restraints used by pre-Area 11 Japan (as shown in Battle Royale) the
    collar system is used to force the tributes into the same general area of the arena by designating areas as forbidden zones every twelve hours. If you go into a forbidden zone or try to remove the collar it will explode.

    The surviving tribute is given a choice. They can either go back into the world as a number civilian where they will have their chances of being picked again for the games doubled along with any younger family members they may have or they can enlist in a special black ops unit composed of other victors. This is of course not public knowledge but anyone with a military or intelligence background will know it.
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  21. - Top - End - #801
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Quote Originally Posted by darkblade View Post
    So you are the unholy hybrid clone offspring of Whedon and Martin then?
    I deny nothing.

    So that explains it then. Yet more child soldiers, yet more bread and circuses. The emperor really does have a thing for getting them while they're young.
    Nadir We,
    Youth Born,
    Blood Letters,
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  22. - Top - End - #802
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    It's funny, in this continuity Souske is almost properly paranoid, rather then a mad loose cannon who nobody else is safe to be around.
    I suppose it all really is a matter of perspective.

  23. - Top - End - #803
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    It's like the set up to a bad joke.

    "Two angels, a teenage soldier, a teenage former gladiator, a retro futuristic rapist and unfunny comic relief walk into a High School cafeteria...."
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Here's my excerpt for yet another look at Seaton, his own adventures (it's interesting how he seems to stand apart from the other members of the Tower, being a science hero in the midst of Occult Detectives), and a new gadget he makes available to the Order.

    I might edit it later, especially if the prose is a bit too purple:

    Spoiler
    Show
    There's a subtle yet definitive gap between men of science and men of magic, and an even bigger gap between those whose feet have always trod upon the ground of a circular world compared that rare breed of men known as space travelers.

    And nowhere is this gap more noticeable than when I sit here at this cracked table of stone, surrounded by my erstwhile comrades, all versed and skilled in the paranormal and as of yet unexplained forces known by the blanket term of 'Magic': men who can set fires with their minds, find any lost object in existence, unlock the pits of hell, and smite evil with the power of song, meeting in the world's oldest bar within a pocket dimension of terrible, marvelous, impossibilities. Here we sit, and make decision that will determine whether the Omniverse itself will continue to exist, or By Our Mistakes, Fall INTO OBLIVION!

    And we speak, but we do not quite understand each other. They're all heroes: they're all brave, accomplished men: you cannot watch them and not realize it.

    But we speak, and the words are understood, but the true subatomic essence behind them is lost somewhere between the air molecules. The young wizard gives me an earful for using the Kandolians as foot soldiers, for directing the energies of a civilization of violent, eager warriors towards a battle that will help protect the entire Omniverse...and then, in the same breath, he proposes manipulating a group of magic-using british youths into becoming 'expendable' troops.

    ...Jeepers, how is that any better? Most seem to agree with my inner thoughts, but the gap remains. It's a gap dug out from the perception of different life experiences: champions of magic and faith, who have walked across a thousand planes of existence, hundreds of dark forests, dozens of nightmare lands, Wonderlands, and Olympuses. They look at me, an old government chemist who figured out how to build an interstellar spaceship, and they think my sphere of adventure to be duller, less awe-inspiring.

    They know so little.

    In some ways we might as well be mirror reflections of ourselves, the convex lens of magic verses the concave of science. My comrades are leaders of corporations and warrior brotherhoods, and have friends among the lands of spirits and elemental and the dark alleyways of the hidden occult civilizations. I'm the Overlord of a system of green stars, and have oath-sworn allies of both barbarian warriors and wise, elder scientist races.

    But it's the big spat between Romantics and Enlightment aficionados all over again: these people on some level, I'd reckon, think that us scientific fellows suck the awe and wonder out of everything the more we try to figure things out.

    The conversation at the table now turns to talk of sending an expedition into the Nevernever to learn the moods of Winter and Summer (A real sticker of a place–there are places where gunpowder doesn't combust. Heat Rays seem to work fine, thought).

    I chime in with suggestions for armaments, and keep my flap shut about my trip to the Galactic Core just last week.

    To see the things you see there would do you good for the rest of your life when it comes to being the life of the party.

    %%%

    Grand, bloated stars full of life and bustle, some literally in the process of being torn apart by tidal tension, great long streams of gleaming plasma still undergoing fusion making their merry way across space. Planets of all shapes and sizes roaming their independent way, and still toasty warm from all the assorted light and charred to the bone. Grand mega-nebulas of rock, dust, and organic molecules, forming grand beautiful images in the infrared and ultraviolet as they orbit around star clusters, give birth to newborn suns, or go streaming inward with all the unlucky stars and planets and rubble into...

    The core itself. Called Sagittarius A, or the Chandra, or the Grand Metric. The supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy, holding it together, the sullen giant squatted amidst the wonder of our corner of the universe. Dark, brooding, and massive, so indescribably massive...and pumping out such much cosmic radiation and multiple orders of energy that you could grill all the eggs in the universe and still have room left over for all the steaks too.

    That's the Galactic Core for you: you'd think it'd be too damned hostile and hot for life to thrive there.

    But you'd be wrong. So wrong you'd be surprised. I've been wrong, time and time again, on my voyages through the universe in my beautiful 'Skylark'.

    For everywhere I've gone, I've found life.

    Plenty of hardy bacteria, of course. But that not what you want to hear about, is it?

    There are beings made of raw quark plasma, flitting from star to star in strange energy barriers, refugees from the first ten seconds of the universe's creation, huddling together for warmth in a universe that to their perception has grown unimaginably large, cold, and dark.

    There are life forms of radiant information that ride the all too frequent flares of stars at the galactic core, germinating in the wakes of radiation and deseminating their spores across the void of space in the grand flares and bursts of red giants.

    There are Space Monsters. Yes, Space Monsters. Great, terrible, and downright ugly beings that look like grotesque, overgrown hybrids of Parameciums and Diatoms and angular rocketships, beings of flagella and crystalline flesh, soaking in the energies in the upper layers of the sun to reproduce, emerging with grand ceremony and fanfare from their cosmic eggs.

    As best as I can determine, they're actually a symbiotic species that evolved with the birth of the galaxy, and they practically act as it's immune system. More pertinently, they can manufacture antimatter and spit it at their foes: they slaughtered quite a few growing galactic civilizations before folks learned not to draw their attention.

    And then there are the Black Crafts, dark angular darts that sprout long beautiful midnight wings, wings like fractal butterflies, wings that can grow from the length of an asteroid to that of a planet, wings made of Bose-Einstein condensates that 'swim' through space and time.

    They swarm about the black hole like moths to a flame...or, I feel, more like scientists around a shiny new toy. Installations composed of strands of cosmic strings and monopole layers stretch all the way around the Chandra like a web, or like the electrodes of my mechanical educators.

    They're doing something with it. What, I can't say. How could I?

    But I can guess. A power source? Definitely: all the cosmic radiation in the Core is too flagrant to pass up. But energy can be found everywhere. Experiments? They've tended to this for too long to find the warped geometries of the Chandra a mystery like I do.

    Although... it's a supermassive lump of matter compressed to it's greatest possible compaction...

    ...the ultimate circuit.

    But I could be wrong.

    Whatever the pilots of these black craft are, they are very, very old. So very old that their technology–no, the castoffs of their technology– has left it's traces in the machines and engines and devices of practically every civilization in this galaxy. Plasma blasters, hyperdrive, artificial gravity, deflector shields, repulsors, teleporters...they all bear the marks of a protoculture, of a civilization that came first when the stars were young, came up with some interesting toys, and then moved on to better things. To black craft with wings that can swim through space-time, say.

    I've searched many parsecs, and heard a word from time to time.

    Xeelee. Good enough for Aunt Ruth's apple pie, I suppose.

    We abide each other, these Xeelee and I. You'd think that we'd be as far apart as an ant and an elephant, the two of us, but that's a load of baloney: I've taken paths quite different from these black butterflies, trod down paths of science they've not explored, and even the smallest of living things can set the largest of boulders rolling in this mad, wonderful, unpredictable universe of infinite fulcrums. We all have worth in the grand scheme of things. I have to believe that.

    You could say...we are fascinated by each other. And I have something that they desire more than anything. Knowledge of other universes: of the great Bleed in between dimensions, of the Fourth Dimension alongside our own, of strange sea-horse creatures and extra angles, and the knowledge of my comrades, knowledges of the Lands of Faerie, the Plateau of Leng, and a great black tower at the center of a field of roses. The Xeelee are very concerned with alternate universes...obsessed, even.

    I've been building a redoubt here, a station in a place where no one would dare to go, where the background radiation is too hazardous, and yet so plentiful as a source of energy. The Xeelee have elected to leave me be, they've done things to keep the Space Monsters off my scent, and they've given me a single word of their own.

    The name of a planet. Arisia.

    %%%

    “...and this is where my story begins to have a point.” Seaton concludes, hands folded under a briefcase sitting in front of him on a table.

    “I thought it already had a point.” Ramirez says, rolling his eyes. “Blah blah blah, science is awesome, blah blah, you guys don't appreciate me, blah dee blah, freaky space life forms, blah.”

    Richard Seaton stared...then looked down and rubbed the back of his head. “Yeah...I laid it on a bit thick, didn't I?”

    “A bit. “ Director Hellboy replied in his eternally gruff voice.

    Richard shrugged helplessly, then leaned forward. “Look, fellows, in plain English: I talked with a few people at the Core, and they pointed me to a planet of beings of pure intellect, that, marvel of marvels, actually like to help out less-advanced species. And they are willing–no eager–to help us with our greatest need.”

    He stretched his hands out. “To put it plain, we don't have to worry about getting armies. There's armies all over the place: we've got enough friends and allies to pull together some really large military armadas...without tricking a group of kids into becoming magical cannon fodder.” He adds.

    “What we truly need...is people we can trust. Valiant men...and women, too, that are truly, deeply brave and pure of heart. Men and women with strength of mind, who will never give up, and no matter how dangerous the situation, always go in. We need these people...and we need a kind of litmus test to prove their character to both us and to others, a badge of proof, and a symbol of their worth that can't be counterfeited or corrupted.”

    “You can't measure trustworthiness with a machine, Seaton.” John Taylor replied. “I'm sure it'd make detective work a thousand time easier if you had a gizmo that could scan blokes and beep red if it's a bastard, but there's no such thing.”

    Seaton grins. “Ah. But now there kind of is.”

    He opens the case in front of him. Somewhat inevitably, the contents are glowing.

    “The Planet Arisia and it's denizens of pure thought have traveled up through the many dimensions over millions and millions of years, departing each reality after they have completely visualized it's “Macro-Cosmic All”. The last universe they went to, they aided the forces of Civilization by giving these to it's brightest and best. I talked with them about our situation, and they were willing to give us some samples.”

    He pauses, then says. “So...who wishes to try these on first? They're safe: I tested it out first.”

    He lifts up his wrist and rolls back his sleeve. And there, strapped to his arm in a bracer of platinum, is a glowing disc, gleaming with all the lights of the rainbow, like a prismatic jewel.

    Or a Lens.


    Next comes a non Seaton fictional interlude, to break myself out of my E.E. 'Doc' Smith rut.
    Last edited by Colesign; 2012-07-04 at 07:07 AM.

  25. - Top - End - #805
    Ogre in the Playground
     
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Huh. That story there is a thing of great and powerful beauty. Carl Sagan himself would be impressed.

    And yes, you're absolutely right, the good news with the whole multiverse wide crusade is that people do have armies just lying around. Problem is, the bad guys figured it out first.
    Nadir We,
    Youth Born,
    Blood Letters,
    Axe Weilders,
    Victors Still.

  26. - Top - End - #806
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    We have an Army!

    ...we have a Hulk.

    I'm back.

    Lots of stuff happened since I was gone.

    But I'm back.
    Quote Originally Posted by DeafnotDumb View Post
    Silly boy. I've played in Industrious's games. They don't murder characters. That means the torture ends.
    Quote Originally Posted by Aevylmar View Post
    It turns out that sometimes? He *does* murder characters.

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  27. - Top - End - #807
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Good to see you.
    Nadir We,
    Youth Born,
    Blood Letters,
    Axe Weilders,
    Victors Still.

  28. - Top - End - #808
    Pixie in the Playground
     
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cracklord View Post
    Huh. That story there is a thing of great and powerful beauty. Carl Sagan himself would be impressed.

    And yes, you're absolutely right, the good news with the whole multiverse wide crusade is that people do have armies just lying around. Problem is, the bad guys figured it out first.
    Don't you know, Cracklord?

    *Takes a Toke*

    In this universe, there are a billion, billion galaxies, with a billion, billion stars, and among these stars are a billion, billion massive armies...come and journey with me

    *Flies off on his Goddamn Dandelion Spaceship of the Imagination*

    But glad to hear that it works. I tried adding Stephen Baxter's Xeelee Sequence to our OmniCanon, as well one element of the Lensman series (both with all the implicit implications). And a bit of Gunbuster.

    Next up is a non Seaton bit. And then...a bit where Seaton appears in a supporting context, that I hope will resolve a plothole I just remembered.

    Oh, and welcome back as well, Indy.

  29. - Top - End - #809
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    Thank you.

    Now, what do my characters need to do?
    Quote Originally Posted by DeafnotDumb View Post
    Silly boy. I've played in Industrious's games. They don't murder characters. That means the torture ends.
    Quote Originally Posted by Aevylmar View Post
    It turns out that sometimes? He *does* murder characters.

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  30. - Top - End - #810
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    Default Re: [Twi]Chronicles of the Impaler: Crisis of Infinite Draculas OOC

    They are presumably either on their way to the cafeteria where the alarm was pulled or in an evacuation area in the courtyard.

    Also Tim is coming to the school to ask for some help.
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