Serious Plots 5: No lulz.

[Rebonack]

[Book Quest!]

Poor gal.

Never to play the trumpet again.

Ah well, not much that Red can do about it.

Next up she'll check out the admin office. Labs will be last, since that's probably where the zombies will be.

If there are actually any zombies.

Who knows!

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest

Well, she's found three bodies, so at absolutely most there's four potential people she'd have to worry about.

The Admin's door is locked electronically. The tiny keypad displays:
EMERGENCY LOCKDOWN INITIATED. STAFF MAJORITY MUST PRESENT ID'S TO REMOVE LOCKDOWN.

[Rebonack]

[Book Quest!]

WELP!

She already has three of the IDs that she's collected.

That means just one more and she'll be able to get in, right?

Sure Red could try forcing the door somehow, but doing this the right way would be more fun.

And that means going into the labs...

"I really hope it isn't zombies..." the gloomicorn sighs.

Will she be relieved or disappointed?

Stay tuned to find out!

[Deathkeeper]

[BookQuest!]

Opening the door to the Labs yields...

No more robots! Huh.

There appears to be five doors in this section. First on the right is another supply room. The first on the left reads WORKSHOP 1. There's an odd hum coming from that room.

At the end of the hall is WORKSHOP 2. Then the hall bends to the right, leading to BIO LAB and MED BAY.

No zombies yet.

[Rebonack]

[Book Quest!]

Oh good.

No zombies.

Yet.

Red begins with the first door. Who knows, someone might have hidden themselves inside the supply closet. She hid in a supply closet once to try to avoid the attention of a bugbear when she was a little girl. It worked out for her pretty well. Why not someone else?

Open door!

And hopefully no zombies inside.

Maybe just cleaning supplies?

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest

In the closet is all sorts of things productive scientists need. A cabinet of not-quite-as-dangerous chemicals, clipboards, lab coats, and parts for various bits of electrical equipment. Some of it is fairly complex, and might be expensive, but unless she's trained in that sort of thing, it probably won't be very helpful to her.

[Rebonack]

[Bookquest]

Welp.

Only one thing to do now.

Red puts on a lab coat and hangs her collection of ID lanyards around her neck. Then she grabs an Erlenmeyer flask flask just to be safe.

There!

Now she might be mistaken as a scientist by any further defensive equipment!

With her clever disguise in place, Red rears up on her hind hooves and (somewhat awkwardly) walks over to Workshop 1.

Who knows what amazing things might be within!

Zombies yet? Or are those all in the bio lab?

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest

The Workshop is a cluttered mess. Apparently whoever was in charge of it didn't care too much about organization, and those in charge didn't ever discipline them about it. Tables stand on the edges of the room, covered in robot parts, batteries, and springs. And in the center of the room appears to be a set of Tesla coils, electricity arcing between them menacingly.

[Rebonack]

[Bookquest!]

Ooooh, stuff! Robot stuff. Red is no electrical engineer, but she knows enough about technology to do a bit of VERY basic fiddling.

Specifically? She's looking around for one of those shocky robot arms and a power source that might be able to hook up to it in a relatively simple fashion. If it would require anything beyond just plugging some wires in it would be out of her league, but having a backup weapon aside from her own hemomagic. Sure her hemomagic is pretty darn potent in its own right, but being able to shock the hooves off something is pretty darn helpful, too.

And if that doesn't work?

She'll look around for a rubber-handled rod with a wire attached to it.

Why?

To poke the coil, of course.

Anywhere with a giant coil should have a rod with which to poke it.

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest!

With some fiddling, Red should be able to hook up one of the shock modules with a battery to a ring or some other means of attaching it to her leg to use it as a weapon. With such roughshod work it'll probably fry in two or three uses, but for now it's a potent enough weapon.

There isn't a rod per se, but there are rubber gloves. Though the coils are rather dangerous. Should Red approach them, a bolt of electricity will arc towards her!
If she put on the gloves she might be able to block it with those, else it might sting. A lot.

[Rebonack]

[Bookquest]

Nah, Red will just be holding the tazer in her telekinetic field. Not even using blood tendrils this time! She really doesn't want any electrical backlash to arc through her. And on that note, she'll be leaving the coils alone since the lab appears to have a rather disappointing lack of poking rods.

Ah well.

Can't expect everything to go perfectly.

But there's always the next room!

On to workshop two!

Books within?

Zombies?

Robots?

Zombierobots?

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest

Quite in contrast, the second workshop is very tidy. Evidence here suggests it was used for more calm work, with industrial-sized computers, a projector and chairs suggesting a place for presentations, and a few tables. There's more than one computer though. One's off in a corner, the other near the door. The one in the corner seems barely used, but oddly, the actual computer below the desk seems much, much bigger. Weird.

[Rebonack]

[Bookquest]

Hmm...

Maybe Red will come back to this room and poke around a little more once she's sure that she has her prize.

Also sure that nothing will leap on her from behind and try to eat her.

Perusing computer files is much easier when you don't have other things on the mind.

Done with workshop two...

...now to the bio lab.

If zombies will be anywhere, it'll be in the bio lab!

Or maybe in the medical lab. One of those two.

Red Velvet holds her shock-tool at the ready, grips the door with her magic, and shoves it open...

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest!

Inside the bio lab!
Plants! Actually still living plants, since the watering system is automated. Various kinds of exotic and probably dangerous plants sit in glass cases or just in pots. Luckily none try to eat her.
There are workstations with microscopes and fridges containing culture samples (or so they're labelled). There's another computer here for punching in data, along with a few notebooks. There's actually a door here straight to the med bay.

Will Red take a detailed look at any of the room's contents, or move on due to lack of books?

[Rebonack]

[Bookquest!]

Lack of books?

Hardly!

There are some notebooks!

Red will pull those open and flip to the last recorded pages to see if she can't find some account of what was going on in here. Maybe someone wrote some kind of warning before they died? If she can get any clues regarding what she'll be up against before bumbling into it then that would be just swell.

...

She probably also sniffs at a few of the plants.

Y'know.

Just in case they smell edible.

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest!

The notebook details the effects of each of the plants, along with the various tests they'd performed on bacteria and lab mice, along with tests on some more exotic Nexus creatures and their blood. Who doesn't like fancy monster blood?

The plants that are out in the open are mixed. Some smell sweet, some sickly so. One in a glass case might give Red a weird feeling even despite the cover. It's dark in plant and looks more like a weed. But there's one that should smell quite appetizing, a large pot full of a set of flowers that look almost like daisies but in neon colors. The notebook mentions that they were grown as bait since many Nexus magical creatures found them quite appetizing.

[Rebonack]

[Bookquest]

Hmm...

Some of those sound like they could be useful.

Or interesting.

Or maybe both.

At the very least, Red is pretty sure that Bella Donna would be interested in some of this stuff.

It takes some force of will to avoid nomming on those tasty looking flowers, but Red learned long ago not to eat random things she found on a dungeon crawl until she was absolutely sure of what it was and what it did. To do otherwise was to invite disaster. You never know when something might be magically trapped to turn you into a ridiculous looking, pastel colored quadruped.

Alright.

Time for the medical lab.

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest

The med lab is stark, cold and clean. Various cabinets line the walls, surgical tools on hooks and on tables beside less threatening supplies, and behind a currently half-open curtain, a workspace for doctors and patients who don't need the surgical table. Oh, and a bathroom. Of course there was one somewhere.

Oh, and the blood all over the floor and from a badly torn up male corpse in a doctor's coat.

Oh, and the zombie. I mean, of course there was one. If there wasn't Red's belief that there was would have conjured one. And this one is a bit nasty, given that it was only wearing a pair of briefs it seems before its current status kicked in. Though it's clearly torn the other man apart (as evidenced by bloodstains all over him), that corpse is quite dead, so it seems it's not the turning kind. It also seems to be the kind that tries to kill you, as it does while hissing with vocal chords unused for ages.
It's a bit unintimidating to someone like Red though. She's taken on supernatural ghouls and stuff, and this poor guy was a mousy little shrimp of a human. A bit superhuman, given its obvious kill of its fellow, but really, he was short.

[Rebonack]

[Bookquest]

"That's all?" Red humphs as the zombie lurches toward her. A half dozen blood tendrils slither out of her skin and aim to skewer the approaching zombie and pin him (or her?) to the floor using hideous telekinetic strength.

Red's plan?

Get at taste of the poor thing's blood.

Why?

Because that'll make it pretty easy for her to tell if this creature is undead (spooky vitalism powered!) or just some kind of boring biological zombie. If the latter, then turning the thing would probably be a bad idea. If the creature is still technically living then the result would be a nightshade.

And Sunder's ban on creating nightshades is pretty darn absolute.

No making nightshades.

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest

Poor zombie, it's pretty much outclassed. Pinned to the floor without much effort at all.

The creature is...odd. It (it's male) certainly seems dead. Its heart isn't pumping. By all standards, it shouldn't be shambling about. But it is. The formula that produced this wasn't necromancy, but it's not entirely natural either, thanks to the Nexus-grown ingredients used. So, it isn't quite a Science!zombie, not a negative energy zombie, but between those two points, but given the first details mentioned, he definitely wouldn't be a nightshade. Generally nightshades come from things with functioning organs.

[Rebonack]

[Bookquest]

Really though, the zombie never stood a chance against Red Velvet. She was a pretty well accomplished adventurer even before she was included in Team Nightmære. The only reason the wights took her down was because she was heavily outnumbered in addition to being taken by surprise. Normally people don't expect undead abominations to smash up through your floor while you're half-asleep.

And since she doesn't taste the warmth of life in this poor creature?

She's going to try to redeem him.

Red sinks her barbed tendrils in deeper and twists, aiming to rend the zombie apart from the inside out gae bolg-style.

That would be causing dozens of bio-steel barbs to explode out of the thing.

...ouch.

At least it would be instantly lethal.

Once destroyed, she'll try going through the usual siring process for new unliving... Maybe she'll get to make a new friend?

[Deathkeeper]

[BookQuest!]

Well, that was messy. Red Velvet's lab coat is probably all covered in gross stagnant zombie blood now. Eww.

I shouldn't really need to describe the process that Velvet has to deal with. It's happened often enough. After a few very unpleasant moments and a feeling of chemically-induced giddiness for Velvet, a gloomling is deposited on the dirty floor. Not on a part of the floor with the fresh blood, because getting your brand new rump covered in your former body's lifeblood.
He's pretty small for an arion. Which makes sense; he was a small human. He looks proportional to his living age (mid-thirties) and has the hallmarks of his status. Big fuzzy hooves, spooky eyes, and lots of muscle hidden in a small frame.

The poor fellow just seems to blink about in confusion. He remembers working on something, and then just...white. Calm, peaceful white. Gentle whiteness. For so long it was numbing. And then black, black, black. Black on his arms, black on his legs, black sucking him in.
And then, well, lots of colors, but they're all blending together because he doesn't have his glasses.
"Hello? Is that you, George?"
He seems to be looking at some sort of big red blur surrounded by white? Did someone own a red sweater?
"Lucille? Can you fetch my glasses? You know I can't see a thing without them." he says simply.

If Red looks around, there is a set of clothes set aside on a table by the curtain, still in plain view. They're in a very neat little pile, with an ID badge and a pair of glasses sitting on top. Those might be them.
...though Red may or may not want to get him out of this room before restoring his sight. She's currently sitting on his own remains and next to one of his close friends', after all.

[Rebonack]

[Bookquest]

As always, siring a new gloomling is as awful as it is great. Thankfully Red is accustomed with what she should expect by now. It's the getting caught by surprise part that's typically most unpleasant.

Still riding high on euphoria, Red grabs up the glasses and ID badges before moving along side the newest arion to give him something to lean against.

She may or may not bump him a few times.

Be civil, Red!

"Nope, sorry, none of the above," she replies as she attempts to lead him back into the bio lab. "Name's Red Velvet. What can I call you?"

Well!

A new friend and all the ID badges?

Looks like this was quite the score.

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest!

Red's new friend fumbles about a bit, as he really can't see a thing. Hopefully he didn't want his coat. (And it's 5/6 badges)

"Did they send someone to fetch us? It has been a while." He says, reaching the bio lab.
"Oh, that's much better. Is this a different room? It smells much better. My name's...my name is C Minus." he says, his coat adopted a creamy brown color with a very dark brown mane, his Mark depicting a steaming mug of coffee (the liquid of which matches his actual coat almost perfectly).

[Rebonack]

[Bookquest]

Coffee-themed pony!

How very silly.

"Mmm, nope. I'm just here for fun and business," Red replies with a sly grin. "I didn't know anyone was here, just looking for a book that was lost."

Which means...

She's probably not authorized to be here.

Considering that she's wearing a slightly blood-spattered lab coat and a mess of ID cards...

That might not be the most reassuring image. The floating zappy-tool probably doesn't help all that much either.

"Now, I don't know what happened before I got here, but it must have been a pretty wild party. Really to die for."

A beat.

"'cuz everyone I found was dead."

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest

Minus fiddles with his glasses, eventually getting them on straight. He gives a start at the sight of Red Velvet, but he quickly questions why he does. She's...pretty big, but otherwise somewhat normal looking for a unicorn. That's normal, right? He's pretty sure that's normal. He's positive he's absolutely what he's supposed to be, and after a quick inspection he's not all that much different from here except the horn thing.
But uh, yeah. Bad news.
"O-oh. All...right then. Uh, if that's the case, uh, why exactly are you lightly coated in blood?" he asks, more shocked than actually afraid, as he has the oddest sense of camaraderie with Red and knows that she couldn't possibly want to hurt him.

[Rebonack]

[Bookquest]

"The Mistress likes us redeeming the undead whenever we find them. Zombies are just friends waiting to be set free," Red replies as she saunters back toward the exit of the lab. She's got her cards and now it's time to open up that locked down door. "You were a zombie, and now you're a friend."

She turns and grins her vaguely disturbing grin back at C Minus.

"You and I got a little messy."

...eeww.

Though that grin quickly falters. It is, after all, just an act to get a reaction.

"I'm sorry about your friends, though. We should contact their families so they can be buried properly. No one deserves to rot away in obscurity in a hole like this place."

Those poor, dead scientists.

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest!

C- looks around with an obvious blush at her word choice. He knows she's just making fun of him, but still!
"I...but that doesn't even...no, no time for that. I don't even want to know."
He looks down, and abruptly realizes that he's quite naked, and also that this only slightly bothers him.
"Erm, did you see my coat with my glasses? I sort of need it. Um...could you get it for me? I don't...I don't think I should go in there." he says, with an expression that suggests that he's figured out what that smell was.

[Rebonack]

[BookQuest!]

Red's rather lurid leer returns with a vengeance when C- blushes.

Mission accomplished!

Though that transforms into a slight frown when the coat is mentioned. "I can do that, sure. I'm sorry all this happened to you, Cee."

Then?

She'll head back into the med lab to fetch the coat.

Assuming something else doesn't accost her, she'll return shortly there after. The coat is offered to C-. Hilariously enough, he shouldn't have much trouble getting it on. Equestrians are jointed weirdly.

"I'm looking for a book. The Manuel of Uplifting Species?"

[Deathkeeper]

BookQuest

C- makes a somewhat amusing routine of standing up and slipping the coat on in the same way Red did a few minutes ago. He fiddles in the left pocket, as if looking for something, but just wanting to make sure it's still there, since he doesn't take it out.
"That weird alien book? Vera had it. Have you checked her office?" he offers grumpily, his dislike of the woman making him momentarily forget that she's probably dead.