[Nexus] AMEN XLV: The Zoo

[Hattish Thing]

Door-Inside?

Thenardier will attempt to walk around the ferret and into the Main Room. Unless stopped in some way, he'll look about rather confusedly. Should he make it into the room, he'll look around at the dead things or the living undead. His crutch transforms into his old black and red vorpal sword that radiates negative energy. He'll then aim his pistol up to the roof with his other hand. He'll fire, and the sound will probably echo. Wots goin' on 'ere?!

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Door]

(Oops, completely missed this. My bad. )

The ferret makes ferret-y noises at Thernardier.

It is, after all, a ferret.

As Thernardier walks in, the ferret shuts the door (somehow) and follows him.

It's worth noting that if Thernardier has any sort of bug, spy camera, or any similar equipment that could be used to spy on AMEN, the ferret will attack it.

[Hattish Thing]

Door-Main Room

((It's fine. ))

Clegg just frowns and speaks, and shoots. Nope, no bug. At least not the spy kind, though his clothes are crawling with barnacles and other small sea creatures. His skin is...a light green. He looks to the ferret. CAn ye talk? Wot th' 'ell is going on?!

[Earl of Purple]

Corridor- Nephrim

Nephrim looks at the approaching mist and frowns. That's not good. But there's not much she can do about it at the moment. Except grow wings, which she promptly does and uses them to fly towards her chamber. She's ignoring those skeletons that don't try to stop her. However, it's unlikely that she'll get there next post; she's starting too far away.

Corridor- Dam'Bul

Dam'Bul is forcing his way through the undead blocking his path, mostly using his strength rather than his finesse, with his vines used as clubs and legs to smash them out of the way.

[Slii Arhem]

[Kitchen]

"Well Shayan, my skills are not suited to directly confronting someone capable of doing this. In all likeliness, there's probably nothing in my arsenal of spells that could hurt this fellow. I rely on my animal friends for that sort of thing, but as I've said I can't permanently protect them from the poison vapour stuff."

As the undead nasties are dispatched, Isabelle climbs out and brushes some dust off her dress.

"If you think you're capable of achieving something, then by all means feel free to go confront him, but I'm going to go look after myself first."

In other words...Isabelle is taking the cowardly option. Off she goes, heading out of the kitchen.

Kitchen

"I'm sure someone else will deal with it then. This valcano is not lacking in hotheaded malcontents with itchy trigger fingers after all. But if anyone inquires, I'm telling them we've been spending this whole time having wicked, nasty, sweaty curtains in your room and that's why we couldn't come to AMEN's defense." Standing up on three of her six vines, two of the others keep guard in case of more assaults while the last tries to slip under Isabelle's armpits and wrap around her chest so it can lift her off the ground.

"Carrying you will probably lend some credibility to that story." She muses, the vine attempting to loop under Isabelle's knees as well and lift up her legs so it can carry her "bridal" style.

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Kitchen]

"Wha-?" Isabelle is grabbed, and carried.

...

Can't say she expected that.

"Um, I don't mean to poke a hole in your excuse, but creepy plant-ladies, really aren't my type. If you tell people that we've been curtaining, they might ask me about it and I don't think I could tell a convincing lie about it." Her voice sounds vaguely...jittery. Like she's trying not to freak out about the vine wrapped around her.

Cedric attempts to scurry up to Shayan's shoulder, since there's a sudden lack of good spots to sit on Isabelle.

*****

Meanwhile...

Wallace has reached Isabelle's room and obtained a spare pair of pants. He's now heading back. Odds are he'll bump into the ladies going the other way pretty soon.

*****

[Main Room]

Itchy fur. The ferret scratches itself, then bats at its tail and runs round in a circle for a moment.

...

Weird green stuff near the floor. Smells bad.

The ferret makes some more ferret-y noises at Thernardier, then proceeds to try and scamper up onto his head and away from the icky green mist of doom.

[Slii Arhem]

Kitchen -> Isabelle's Room

Shayan pauses in her vine-walking, one of her tendrils at guard reaching down idly to snap a nearby skeleton's spine and toss its head down behind her like a decapitated dandelion.

"I had no idea you found me creepy. That's too bad. I found your company rather pleasant. Hello Professor, how has your research been?" That last sentence was said quite a bit more loudly than the first, and Shayan turns her head to a branch in the hallway they've stopped at, apparently expecting someone.

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Kitchen -> Isabelle's Room]

"Well your company is rather pleasant. When you're all here anyway. It's a bit weird trying to talk to you when you're off in the future somewhere. But the plants just...creep me out." Isabelle tries to look apologetic. Kind of awkward to manage it when there's a vine holding her in place. "I don't mean to- um, who are you talking to?"

*****
Meanwhile!

Wallace is making his way back, when he comes across Isabelle and Shayan.

Wallace's left head snorts, as if saying "typical".

Wallace's right head sounds like it's laughing. Not a usual thing for a bear to do, so it sounds rather, um, odd.

The bear turns back round and heads back towards Isabelle's room.

[UncleWolf]

Kitche => Isabelle's Room

"Fairly well actually, but the Yeti was mostly a dead end except some innate cold resistance." Comes a voice from around the corner later on in the hallway. After a moment, a young man with dark brown hair, athletic musculature and a somewhat plain face walks around the corner, swinging a table leg idly around in circles. He's dressed as a doctor, but the massive bloody handprints on his chest and claw marks on his stomach reveal that he's a bit more than that. When he sees Shayan, he can't help but grin. "And how are you, dear? I hope you haven't been having too much trouble."

[Jacklu]

Magtok's Office

The hellfire hits the door and sputters angrily against a soft energy barrier. The door groans and flexes then snaps back ridged, throwing the hellfire out into the corridor. The Door snarls and sprouts a pair of long fleshy arms with huge serrated claws and swipes at Cyrus.

Everywhere

The echoy voice returns.

Okay, this is my bad. I might have accidentally summoned something a little angry. Don't pay it any mind. I'm sure it won't kill anyone too badly. Oh, and poison gas.

Main room

The sound of thumping galloping comes from a hallway off of the main room. It grows louder and louder until the beast responsible comes into view.

It looks like you took a particularly muscular bear and turned it inside out. Then added some more muscles. Then added bigger claws. And saber teeth. And razor spins down its back. Okay, it doesn't look that much like a bear, but its about that size. Anyways, it howls and beats its front feet against the floor and sizes up the people in the room. Particularly a tasty looking ferret and a confused looking non-ferret.

[Slii Arhem]

Halls

"Fairly well, but I forgot my pants again. Isabelle was going to lend me some of hers, but her bear just ran off with them I guess we'll have to go fetch them together then?" Shayan mumbles, half to herself as she peers intently at Cin.

"Oh, yes, I can't recall if you two have met before, but Cin, this is Isabelle, Isabelle, Cin. Isabelle and I just had lunch together while we spoke about how we can catch dolphins to experiment on. I have a feeling you two might get along, your fields are very similar."

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Halls]

"While I'm sure it's nice to meet you, Cin, I'm rather wrapped up at the moment and can't shake your hand."

Cedric lets out a weird giggle-y shriek.

"Not funny Cedric!"

Cedric whimpers. He doesn't like being told off.

"And I feel it worth reminding you that we should really be getting out of her quickly before we all die from the poison mist that's filling up the base."

[UncleWolf]

Kitchen => Isabelle's Room

"Oh, I'll be perfectly fine, I assure you." Cin says with a grin before he takes off his labcoat. Once it's off, he'll lean down to wrap it around Shayan's waist to give her some decency, but only after he kisses her bellybutton. "It's quite impossible to poison me in any sufficient manner." He informs Isabelle before reaching out to try and shake a dangling foot if she has one instead of her hand.

Whether or not that's successful, he'll reach out to take one of Shayan's spare vines. "But either way, lets get you two out of here."

[Slii Arhem]

Halls

Shayan giggles, both at Cedric and Cin's chivalrous attitude. She reaches up with one of her hands to try to pat Cedric on the head. She thought it was very funny as well.

"I'm also unable to feel the effects of poisons lethally, but for your sake and Cedric's, we'd best get back to your room. Let's be off." And so arm-in-vine with Cin and carrying Isabelle, Shayan will head towards the personal rooms and wait for directions from Isabelle as to which one is hers.

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Halls]

Isabelle's foot is shaken.

She'd probably complain, but it's all rather pointless really, isn't it?

Cedric is patted, but doesn't really pay any attention to Shayan. He's more concerned about the safety of Isabelle now. Joking time is over.

"My room's that one. The one with the door open and Wallace standing in front of it."

A gargantuan two-headed bear is rather hard to miss.

Wallace grunts and heads inside, one head nodding to them to follow him in.

[BladeofObliviom]

Magtok's Office

Wow, that's one powerful ward; Cyrus is a strong enough spellcaster to power through most antimagic effects (though they still take a toll), so whatever that ward is doing is definitely working.

In any case, the two hands will find Cyrus hard to get a decent hit on, even in close quarters like a hallway. He moves around surprisingly quickly in that robe...

In any case, this time he tries Blightning. It has the advantage that it's more focused than the hellfire, giving it more penetrative power, and that it does horrible, horrible things to the nervous system, memories, and/or soul of whatever it hits. Fun!

[UncleWolf]

Isabelle's Room

Cin follows along without complaint, keeping the table leg over his shoulder in case something pops out to try and take them out, but otherwise he's quiet. Even so, he keeps a gentle grip on Shayan's vine, quite comfortable with the touch.

[Murkus]

Main Room

Or Jack is just refering to the undead minion summoner.

"Yeah. Think Magtok got a creepy minion there. I only think it's a bad timeing. Illophen is out and killing the members wouldn't be usefull for him."

Then he turns to the Cat Burglar.

"An explosive that makes no noise? I got such a thing, but it's near useless." The bombe is really useless having a very very small radius, not much bigger than the bomb itself.

"If you need something usefull I could do something for you, but I can't let the noise disapear. I may be able to change the frequency so that humans won't hear it."

Since he is in mid of talking he ignores the ghasts, but soon he may check them out.

Main Room

The ghasts don't like being ignored and start firing bolts at the people in the main room. Rather rude, really.

Kitchen

The refrigerator flies through one of the ghasts, dispersing its body momentarily. It reforms slowly and fires another volley at Shayan. Looks like physical attacks can hurt them, but it is hard to judge how much.

Jack Empty's struck by a few bolts of presumably raw magic, and he laughs. Though his suit's now on fire, it doesn't seem to be burning. "Thank you, Zefir. If you'd please destroy that ugly thing before it eats our guests," He points at the not-bear, "I'm going to speak with Magtok."

With that, Jack steps toward one of the wraiths and tries to seize its immaterial throat. The fact that it's immaterial really doesn't seem to slow him down - he's not exactly 'material' himself. Should he manage to catch one off-guard, he'll drag it through the nearest wall, walking through his own little pocket-universe on the way to

Magtok's Office

Where he'll step back into reality beside Maggy's desk. Barring no metaphysical interference from AMEN's newest member, of course. Jack's only violent intent is probably toward that poor wraith.

[ThirdEmperor]

Main Room

"An explosive without light? Well I do have that, but it will still be different from a normal bomb. If I remember rght it will only have 90% of the explosion radius a normal bomb got. But I think I need some materials for that."

Then he stands up and prepares himself and speak to the planes walker.

"I agree with you in some things, but after all this guy would make it nearly impossible to go around here. And that's no fun at all."

"Uhm, okay, if it's not too much trouble, that would definitely be- That sentence trails off little as CB's personal slice of time catches up with the last few posts, snapping him into a reality where there's poison mist up to his ankles and a really, truly, absolutely hideous inside-out-bear-thing staring him in the face. "Meep."

[Zefir]

Main Room

Zefir sights as cryus and Jack left.

"Damn guys. I wanted to kill the caster."

He starts searching through his bag as he speaks up to CB.

"Think I need some rare material here. Darkwooddust and white silver dust. Well I don't know how rare these things are in the Nexus, maybe you can buy them everywhere."

Then he drags out a rocket launcher and fires 2 rockets at the beast. Yep Zefir isn't really able to start with less lethal weapons.

[Hattish Thing]

[Main Room]

Itchy fur. The ferret scratches itself, then bats at its tail and runs round in a circle for a moment.

...

Weird green stuff near the floor. Smells bad.

The ferret makes some more ferret-y noises at Thernardier, then proceeds to try and scamper up onto his head and away from the icky green mist of doom.

Thenardier does not hide away from the poisonous gas. He's undead, more specifically, an aquatic undead. His vorpal blade begins to glow red, and lightning begins to blast off of it, however, it's just there to look cool for now. The blade glows red. He sees the inside-out bear. ((Seems like something from John Carpenter's The Thing )) He let's the ferret scurry up, and takes out in his left hand, a large gold and copper pistol. Let's figh' then beastie.

Main room

The sound of thumping galloping comes from a hallway off of the main room. It grows louder and louder until the beast responsible comes into view.

It looks like you took a particularly muscular bear and turned it inside out. Then added some more muscles. Then added bigger claws. And saber teeth. And razor spins down its back. Okay, it doesn't look that much like a bear, but its about that size. Anyways, it howls and beats its front feet against the floor and sizes up the people in the room. Particularly a tasty looking ferret and a confused looking non-ferret.

Thenardier growls at the thing now, his vorpal blade and magical pistol out. He's fought things like this before, due to living in The Hunting Grounds for a while, once serving in the special service militia in Cylar, (before it was blown to the dust by PC's. ), and from a good thirty years of adventuring. He aims his pistol first, preparing the vorpal blade. AS it sizes up the ferret on his head, and the undead Inspector himself, the vorpal blade begins to glow, causing any undead in the room to become obedient unless they're particularly powerful undead. ((Up to Jacklu!))

He fires the golden pistol as Zefir launches a rocket. Thenardier glares at Zefir, he remembered him from...somewhere...he was sure! But right now, bear-thingy. The gold pistol will launch a small black bullet, but as soon as it enters the beast (If it does), it will explode and unleash a horrible necrotic bone rot, which turns bones into saltwater. Die... Thenardier will start walking toward the beast, his wooden leg clunking.

[Earl of Purple]

Corridors- Nephrim

The Fallen Angel continues avoiding fights and shooting any undead that fail to get out of the way or try to impede her progress. She may arrive at her room next post, unless something tries to stop her.

Corridors- Dam'Bul

The Karkassolith demon has reached his own room and entered it. At the moment he's armed only with a sabre, and his first task is to strap a gas mask over his host's face. Then he grabs a small machine gun and several boxes of ammunition with his vines. He's not a very good shot, but with the amount of ammunition put out by the gun hopefully it won't matter too much.

[Jacklu]

Main room

The first rocket hit the beast and staggers it. The second hits and blows it wide open. The beast wheezes than stitches itself back together. It faces Zefir and howls angrily. And then it starts getting shot by Thenardier. It turns back toward Thenardier and lunges at him, attempting to knock over and pin him to the ground.

The remaining undead in the room resist his attempts to dominate them. Their summoner has a strong hold on the beasties, it seems.

Magtok's office

Jack encounters a terrifyingly powerful dimensional ward and is shunted to the corridor where Cyrus is fighting the door.

Cyrus's blightning hits the door and the entire hallways spasms and shrieks. The arms lash out randomly at anything they can reach, including Jack Empty.

A splattering hole appears in the door's flesh, revealing the wood of the actual door beneath. A well placed strike should finish the job.

Corridors- Nephrim

The Fallen Angel finds an adorable little teddy bear sitting in front of their room door, mewling softly and crying. D'awww.

[Murkus]

Magtok's Office - Corridor

Well that's a jarring experience, even for something like him. Jack is forced into existence outside the office, his hand still clutched tight around the writhing wraith's gullet. He turns in time to see the door attack him, and tosses the wraith forward to give it something else to swipe at.

When the arms come round again, he'll try to seize one mid-swing, and with a titanic pull attempt to rip it right off the door. Hopefully that'll give Cyrus another opening.

All this physical exertion is beginning to show Jack's true colors. Things not of the Nexus writhe underneath his skin, probing for weakness so that they might escape.

[Mindfreak]

BioLab
The BioLab is, unfortunately, next to the Main Room.
That means Megan has the unfortunate pleasure to wake up to the sound of the fighting in the Main Room.
She's not quite happy. She begins getting dressed.

---

Main Room
Oh dear...
You see, when fighting or an intruder is in AMEN, Megan's Mechano-Panthers are hanging around to put a stop to it.
This is unfortunate for the people in the Main Room.
Anyone who isn't an AMEN member or being accompanied by an AMEN member and is in the Main Room will find themselves being set upon by Mechano-Panthers. 5 right now, but more are coming.
They breath fire, among other things, but that's what they'll be using here. Along with their razor sharp claws. Their flames will make short work of any non-AMEN thing.

Base-Wide
Anything non-AMEN better watch out! The Mechano-Panthers are on high alert and will take out anything that isn't AMEN.

[Earl of Purple]

Corridor- Nephrim

The Fallen Angel looks at the teddy suspiciously. She's sure she didn't leave it there, and she trusts literally nobody. Those that she can't control are too unpredictable to be trusted, and those she can control are too easy to manipulate- if she can do it, what's to stop somebody else from doing the same?

Her first response is to extend a blade of red light from her wrist and gently poke it.

[Slii Arhem]

Isabelle's Room

Cin follows along without complaint, keeping the table leg over his shoulder in case something pops out to try and take them out, but otherwise he's quiet. Even so, he keeps a gentle grip on Shayan's vine, quite comfortable with the touch.

[Halls]

Isabelle's foot is shaken.

She'd probably complain, but it's all rather pointless really, isn't it?

Cedric is patted, but doesn't really pay any attention to Shayan. He's more concerned about the safety of Isabelle now. Joking time is over.

"My room's that one. The one with the door open and Wallace standing in front of it."

A gargantuan two-headed bear is rather hard to miss.

Wallace grunts and heads inside, one head nodding to them to follow him in.

Isabelle's Room

Shayan will follow Wallace in, closing the door behind her before she lets Isabelle back down onto her feet and lets her go. The absent-minded oracle reaches down to adjust Cin's lab coat so she's wearing it more like a skirt. Much better now.

"Alright, all that's left is to seal ourselves in and find a way to pass the time while we wait out the trouble."

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Isabelle's Room]

FERRETS!

...

24 of them, to be precise.

Well, actually, 18 of them.

Okay, let me start over.

Just inside the room, on the right hand side, are 24 ferret cages. Beside this is a large whiteboard with a rota for the ferrets drawn up in marker. The 24 cages are connected to a series of tubes that extend around the entirety of the room, mostly along the walls and ceilings, providing the critters with plenty of space to run around and have fun in without interfering with the room itself much.

The ferrets currently on duty are, according to the board: Terrence, Jeremy, Walter, Oliver, Lydia and Elisabeth.

Seems Isabelle named all 24 ferrets.

Once she's let down, Isabelle heads over to the left hand side, which is full of stuff for the ferrets. Food, bedding, etc. She takes out a few handfuls of food and puts them into a large feeding area, complete with a little ferret-y dining table. The tubes shake as 18 ferrets rush towards it from all around the room.

Beyond this is a large operating table, with a number of cupboards around the edge. Seems this is where Isabelle does her work, usually. It all looks absolutely spotlessly clean though. Magic makes cleaning up a piece of cake.

"Do make yourself at home. There's plenty of room in here." Isabelle says as Cedric leaps off and scampers to a small artificial tree in the back of the room, positioned over a small table with four chairs.

And opposite the table, six beds arranged in a ring. One of them has a nameplate on it. It says: "Alfred".

"Oh yes, do mind out for the bed with the name by it. There's a tiger on it."

...

There does not appear to be a tiger on the bed.

Meanwhile, Isabelle gets to work doing magic-y stuff on the door.

*****

[Main Room]

Meawhile...

The door ferret leaps at the beastie, intending to land on its back and start biting away. It has sharp teeth, but, well, it's only a ferret.

Well, I say it, I should be saying he. Or Jeremy, to be precise. Jeremy was on door-duty today, you see.

[UncleWolf]

Isabelle's Room

"Nice place." Cin admits with an impressed glance. "And table. Good operating ones aren't cheap." He says, letting go of Shayan's vine for a moment to run his hand over the table. After a thought he takes off his bloody dress shirt to tuck under the doorframe to help with any gas that might leak in. That means he's left shirtless, but he doesn't seem to mind.

"Not sure if Shayan explained, but I'm pretty much Vivsarchitect." He says before he goes towards one of the unused beds to take a seat on.

[Slii Arhem]

Isabelle's Room

Shayan's eyes sparkle at the mention of a tiger, "Is he an invisible tiger, or just very hard to see? Do you think he would mind if I pet him?" She seems rather excited at the prospect to be honest. It's quite unlike her to change moods like this all of a sudden.

...

Well, okay, not unlike her, but it's unlike her to change moods to something so perky all of a sudden.