TRON: Awakening

[Gorgon_Heap]

Sarah looks Zeke und down skeptically, and then, with nothing else to offer in the empty room, pulls her skirt around and her shirt the rest of the way out.

Seemingly determined to make the best of her ungainly dress uniform, she undoes the top button and makes to follow Frantic out the door.





EDIT - I never said I put down the staff. Do I still have it?

[The_Admiral]

James follows behind Sarah, gun drawn.

[theskorpionking]

Still unsure how he ended up looking like his girlfriend, Zeke follows the rest of the group out of the room.

[Lentrax]

The lobby is sparsely furnished. No signs are hanging to inform you of the name if the building or what lay inside. No art decorated the walls, and no plants provided a break in the urbanness of the room.

Through the glass facade in the front, you can see cars drive by.

Maybe they're cars. It's hard to tell. They don't look like anything you have ever seen. Sleek, white and black things with glowing blue wheels. People walk up and down the street, dressed in the same strange manner as the two programs you have seen earlier, as well as... Zeke?

[Gorgon_Heap]

Hesitating as we all look out the window, Sarah has obviously conflicting thoughts. Finally she just says, "I don't get it."

[Erasmas]

Frantic entered the lobby fully, leaving the small room behind, and looked around for someone... anyone really. If there was no one here inside, then he made his way outside and spoke with the first person he sees.

"Excuse me, where am I? What is this place?"

[Lentrax]

No one stops to answer your question. They do give you some very odd looks, however.

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Spot checks please.

[Gorgon_Heap]

Seeing the overall surreal strangeness of the environment outside and the uniformly bizarre style of dress, Sarah's quite put off about going out there in her uniform. They still look like people, not faceless automotons, but it's obvious by the way they're looking at Frantic that this little group is extremely out of place.

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I don't know if I want to still have the thing or not, but since it didn't occur to me to drop the staff, do you say I still have it, Lentrax?

Spot: (1d20+1)[19]

[Lentrax]

Every single person on the street. Every man and woman, has a disc. Just like the one Zeke has.

And coming down the street are more sentries.

Sarah:

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Yeah, she still has the staff. Standard quarterstaff. Just add 10% cooler in the special qualities section.

[theskorpionking]

Zeke stops just behind Sarah and whistles. "We're definitely not in Kansas anymore, Toto."

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Spot check: (1d20+6)[21]

[Gorgon_Heap]

Observing the red-glowing soldiers patrolling down the street, Sarah shakes her head in dismay and considers what to do with the staff. Put it back down in the empty room?

At Zeke's comment, she turns around and looks "him" over warily. "Yeah. Are you a good witch or a bad witch?"

[Lentrax]

The sentries march down the street. When they reach Frantic, they will stop.

Identify yourself, Program.

[Erasmas]

"Merde... not this again."

Frantic slowly turned around and put his hands up, as is he were surrendering. He then made a dash for the door that lead back into the lobby.

"Guys - we have a problem!"

[Gorgon_Heap]

Sarah gawks in mute shock as Frantic runs back to the door. She finally steps back and uses one arm to move Zeke/Dani clear of the incoming runner.

She glances from the door to the staff in her right hand. Damn.

[theskorpionking]

"They're with me. They're, uh, new programs for the, um, system." Zeke says, hoping the sentrys believed him.

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(1d20+1)[17] for diplomacy

[Lentrax]

The sentry looks Zeke over, scanning her momentarily. The sentry in front sets his staff down. You notice it stays perfectly upright, even though there is nothing to support it.

The sentry then holds his hand out.

Present your disk for identification, Program.

[theskorpionking]

Zeke hands the disc to the sentry, then glances nervously back at the others.

[Lentrax]

The sentry takes the disc and presses on it. A holographic image of Zeke's girlfriend appears in a translucent bluish-white form above the disc.

The Image zooms in and shows her face, then begins panning downward. Streams of data accompany the image, and when it is complete, the Sentry hands the disc over to one of his compatriots.

You are not the program associated with this disk. You will come with us.

[Erasmas]

Antoine looks at the number of sentries, doing a quick headcount and decides that fighting them would be next to impossible - if two gave them such trouble, then ten would just be out of the question. The Canadian sighs and throws his hands up.

"I do not think that we have a choice."

[Gorgon_Heap]

Sarah gulps, and then out of curiosity emulates the guard's action with the staff to see if it falls or remains upright.

[The_Admiral]

James grudgingly puts away his gun and raises his arms in emulation of Antoine.

[theskorpionking]

Zeke looks at the rest of his group and sighs. Antoine was right, they had no choice. He knew he couldn't out run the sentry's, nor could he leave everyone else behind. And Zeke knew for a fact that he wasn't a fighter. Just like everyone else, Zeke raises his hands.

[Lentrax]

Present your disks for identification.

When the sentry realizes you have no disks to present, he raises his staff.

Failure to retain your disk is grounds for immediate deressolution.

He starts to swing the staff doen but stops midway. His head jerks up and he goes motionless. After a moment he places his staff back on the ground. He places a finger to the inside of his sleeve and you notice it lights up for a moment. Then the world dims out as a bright light and a deep resonating hum fills the air around you.

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Very large image.

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[Erasmas]

"Well... this can't be any better..."

Frantic says, looking up and the bright light.

[theskorpionking]

Zeke looks up, trying his best to shield his eyes from the bright light. "Is that......Is that a Recognizer?

[Erasmas]

"No, not at all... I've never seen one of those things before in my life!"

Zeke could tell that Antoine was being completely serious and that it must be some kind of issue with the language barrier, and not a poorly-timed joke.

[Gorgon_Heap]

At a loss given the momentous and - to her - unexplainable circumstances, Sarah falls back on sarcasm, though from her voice it's obvious she doesn't really mean anything by it.

Is that a Recognizer?

"I guess you're not just being ironic for fun? That means something?"

[Lentrax]

The... Recognizer? lands and then the central rectangular section slides down the legs so the sentries can shove you roughly onboard.

As they get you turned around, you note your feet suddenly can't move. Looking down, you see a small barrier of light intersecting your legs.

Then your stomach lurches downward as the thing slides back up its legs and takes off taking you into the skies. Wherever you find yourself, it's eerily beautiful. The city is arranged in a perfect grid. Everything seems to fit perfectly, giving you a very odd sense of proportion. Looking around, you see there are more Recognizers flying around the entire city.

This Recognizer seems to be heading for a large bowl shaped building in the heart of the city. As you approach, you realize it is an arena.

The Recognizer lands just outside the building.

A new program enters the Recognizer. He is tall and has on a black outfit with gold lighting across it.

Welcome to the Arena, programs. Usually, programs with. I disk are derezzed, but I thought it mig be better to see what your Users made you for... Now, let me see...

He eyes each of you in turn, standing before you and looking you up and down. He gives the distinct impression of a butcher sizing up a flank of beef to cut into steaks.

Yes... I see. Well. Lets get you changed, and then you will enter the Arena. Then he reaches Zeke. His eyebrow arches upward as he inspects you. Oooh. This will be good.

Without warning, the floor of the Recognizer vanishes and you plummet into darkness.

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i would describe this scene, but I think it's better to just do this.Each of you may choose your suits coloring, except for Sarah. Her suit is identical to the sirens, but with Circut coloring of her choice. Zeke's suit circuitry changes from the bluish white to a golden orange color.

[Erasmas]

"Hey! Whoa! That tickles!"

Antoine barely protests as the very attractive women take his old clothes, "But those are my... oh." He watches them being sucked away into some random place or another, likely to be destroyed. Once he was suited up in his black body suit with its bluish-white striping, he looked himself over and stretched a little. He had worn a lot of strange costumes with Cirque before... nearly all of them designed with fluidity of motion in mind, but this... this thing was great!

[Gorgon_Heap]

As intimidating as it is to be surrounded by armed, faceless men who all speak in a deep, electronic rumble, the giant glowing VTOL is terrifying.

Rooted to the machine's deck for long minutes during their flight, Sarah is able to let the fear subside, but questions and observations begin amassing. How do those things holding her feet work? What kind of weapons does this thing -Recognizer? - have and what are its performance characteristics? The metropolis below is huge and beautiful, but also obviously oppressed.

Should I have played that Tron game when I was little?

Upon landing at the coliseum and separated, she’s once again frightened, but even more confused. Why transport all these people here? Are they using the stadium as some sort of emergency holding facility?

Below, the four women approach with perfectly choreographed steps and timing – not unlike the mechanical movements of the soldiers she fought earlier. They somehow trim away her battered uniform and deposit it in the floor and step back, watching passionlessly. Desensitized to modestly around other women while in training, standing naked before them wasn’t an issue, but when tiny tiles erupted from the floor and swarmed up her legs she was once again shocked at the cultural and technological strangeness of the place.

That was doubled when her expectation of finding herself wearing some black utility armor proved false. Instead, she was sheathed in gleaming white and gray, a mirror of the four women around her. The strange material is utterly seamless, and as she stretches her gloved fingers, strips all about her body suddenly flicker to white life. How can I take this off?

She glanced around at the women and the corners of the room they were ensconced within. “Whoa, you’re … you’re not going to make me go stand inside a wall, are you? Is this like a prison?”

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Man, I really hope I don’t have to fight again this low on HP.