[Nexus] Inside 46

[happyturtle]

The Sitar's Strings

The hostess stand is just inside the door, and Emily arrives to meet Nadas. "I'm sorry, but this is a human-only establishment," the teenage waitress says in a friendly voice.

[Earl of Purple]

Red Zone

Ace isn't the only person looking into the missing people of the Red Zone. Another person is too. The person in question is an elderly lady. She's wearing a floral dress and a white woollen waistcoat. She has red handbag on her shoulder and she's carrying a stout wooden shaft attached, via a heavy-duty chain, to a large steel ball studded with iron. Mrs. Bloodplunder has attempted hiding the flail in her handbag, so it bulges oddly and half of the shaft sticks out. She's a pure-blooded human, although her son is half-orc.

[Jacklu]

Junkyard of the Forgotten



Roosevelt doesn't like this place. It probably has something to do with the fact that he very nearly ended up in the permadeadtimed bin not too long ago, before his player had some second thoughts. Not that Roosevelt would know anything about that, of course, but that subconscious feeling of familiarity here doesn't help with his unease one little bit.

"Keep going, and ignore the locals, unless they get too close, at which point I'll fire off a warning shot or two. I don't think I need to remind anyone that this is a a rush job, for more reasons than one."

Gods, this place is weird. Hopefully they won't have to stick around for much longer though, this is the sort of freaky, forgotten mystery worlds that Needs is around for, not the rest of the team.

As they draw near to the monastery, the number of minimags scurrying underfoot increases. Interestingly, some don't appear to have been made using magbot parts, but are instead cobbled together from random bits of machines in a similar configuration.

The main door into the monastery is a huge and thick, carved from deep, naturally amber wood. The angle that the building sits at means that opening one door would require holding it open so it doesn't slam shut on them, or prying the downhill half open and staying clear should it swing open once gravity catches it. The minimags seems to be avoiding the door completely, scaling the outside of the building and entering through windows several floors up.

[Halae]

[Alleyway]

Of course it wasn't going to be so easy. Besides, Tabitha doesn't even have a shirt. "Okay... Do you know where you live?" Maybe she can just take her there then.

[Alleyway]

Tabitha just looks at Arel for a moment, before she presses a hand to her forehead. It's fuzzy... why can't she remember?

[Deep Down Coffee]

Would here be fine? Riss asked. I mean.. I'm not exactly comfortable here but it would be better than going all the way back to the cave. Would probably be for the best, though, as I'm pretty sure Magtok doesn't want many more guests. Besides, they look like they know what their doing so I shouldn't really worry, right? And I'll at least get to learn more about how this works. Plus what this 'ritual circle' thing is.

Riss would have inquired a bit about the process more but the sudden arrival of extremely large frozen sweets was enough to put that out of her mind for the time being. Or at least replace one set of questions for another. "...Um.. Mimi? Is, uh.. Are you sure we need that much?" the muse asked in a muttering tone.

[Deep Down Coffee]

"Sure. It tastes amaaazing. You should try it!" The pixie says with a grin. It's almost as if she hasn't noticed that each one is bigger than she is. "And I got just two so me and you can share one."

[Deep Down Coffee]

"I'm... completely certain I can't finish one of those on my own. Someone's going to have to help me with mine as well if we're going to finish those off; elsewise we may just have to pack them up for later."

"Back to Riss' question, a ritual circle is a large diagram written out on the floor in a safe and non-interruptive location. if something were to break ytour concentration during a ritual, it could very easily lead to bad things for you. I know that an interrupted banishing ritual can explode right in the palm of your hand, so, concentration is key. I have a ritual circle set up in my apartment, but if it's necessary, I can definitely set up a new one in a location you want. Public places like this are a bad idea, though, because of all the distractions, and given that we're dealing with souls, I don't know what might happen if we were to be interrupted in the middle of a graft."

[Reinholdt]

The Sitar's Strings

The hostess stand is just inside the door, and Emily arrives to meet Nadas. "I'm sorry, but this is a human-only establishment," the teenage waitress says in a friendly voice.

The Sitar's Strings

Nadas looks around as best he can. Straining under the weight he replies. "You're kidd... May I just borrow a seat for five minutes of time?" He could use a break.

[happyturtle]

The Sitar's Strings

"No. I'm afraid you'll have to leave." Emily says.

[Reinholdt]

The Sitar's Strings

Nadas' eyes flash briefly as he feels bile rise up in him, figuratively. "That's... stupid." How eloquently put Nadas.

Still he has been in bad situations before, being a drow male, rare though they've been in the Nexus. And he's not interested in starting a scene. So he'll turn around and work on getting the door open so he can leave.

[happyturtle]

The Sitar's Strings

Emily is kind enough to open the door for him. What a sweet girl.

*while being very careful not to touch him if at all possible, and hurrying off to wash her hands if she does

[Reinholdt]

The Sitar's Strings

Well his robes are pretty bulky. They might brush her. But touching him's an actual feat you have to try to do. He'll give her a very curt nod and head out into the streets. He'll have to stop at Trog's or BDD then.

[Gullara]

[Alleyway]

Tabitha just looks at Arel for a moment, before she presses a hand to her forehead. It's fuzzy... why can't she remember?

[Alleyway]

"You don't know where you live?" Arel doesn't know what to do now. She can't just leave her. "Okay, we're going to figure this out." She goes and picks up the remains of Tabitha's clothing. "Here, cover yourself with this."

[Terumitsu]

[Deep Down Coffee]

I see. came the response. It made a sort of sense, really. Like if one wasn't paying attention while mixing chemicals or the like then the end product would be faulty. I don't see any problems if you have an area already set up. the muse said, expressing little resistance on her part. While it would be in another person's dwelling, she doubted that Sora would go to all this trouble if they happened to be some kind of kidnapper or something. That aside, it simply made sense to go where the tools were already in place, after all.

"Maybe.. Um.. We could just share one? And.. Save the other for later?" Riss muttered, putting an idea forward. It seemed to be the most obvious answer given the quantity at hand. At least, it was the most obvious to her.

[Gullara]

[Deep Down Coffee]

"I dunno. Wasn't sure how much you ate." Mimi rubs the back of her head awkwardly. Whoops. "Saving one works I guess."

[Mindfreak]

Bakeries!
Hunter leads Iamar to a large aera full of bakeries, where the Witch indeed is in an alley crying.
There's also the remains of a man's skeleton right in front of her, the flesh most likely melted into the puddle of green goop around it.
"Oh god, not her..." Hunter says, obviously afraid.

[ThirdEmperor]

Red Zone - Alley
The tickling continues as does Slendy's white colored text.
"You're just precious! Cootchie cootchie coo!"

The red-colored text doesn't continue tho', for by now the poor spook has had his words tickled away in a gale of involuntary laughter, going red in the face from lack of breath. Poor fellow's going to need weeks of sulking to rebuild his wounded pride after this catastrophe.

Seto Kaiba Memorial Tournament

"Welp, game over, you sucked. Seriously. Who still uses Celtic Guardian?" With that, Leon tributes his Krebons to summon the Overdrive Teleporter, paying out one thousand life points to activate it's effect and summon two more Psychic Commanders to the field. Both of which are tuners.

A flash of blinding light obscures the Teleporter and one of it's minions, and when the light fades, left in it's wake is the Hyper Psychic Blaster. But that ain't all. Oh no, it ain't. Now Leon flips his trap card, Assault Mode Activate, switching the Psychic Blaster into it's more powerful assault mode form! Finally, using the third Psychic Commanders effect, he lowers the Kuriboh's attack and defence by three hundred each and sends the Blaster to annihilate it!

[Lord Magtok]

Junkyard of the Forgotten - Monastery

As they draw near to the monastery, the number of minimags scurrying underfoot increases. Interestingly, some don't appear to have been made using magbot parts, but are instead cobbled together from random bits of machines in a similar configuration.

The main door into the monastery is a huge and thick, carved from deep, naturally amber wood. The angle that the building sits at means that opening one door would require holding it open so it doesn't slam shut on them, or prying the downhill half open and staying clear should it swing open once gravity catches it. The minimags seems to be avoiding the door completely, scaling the outside of the building and entering through windows several floors up.

"So what do you thi-"

"The windows. Give me a boost up, and then Haz can fly you in after I've made sure the coast is clear."

Roosevelt shrugs, steps behind one of the windows, and cups his hands in front of him. Is...is HazMag crazy or something? I mean, the nearest window is several stories up and probably not even open. There's no fudging way Roosevelt is going to get him up that high, throw him through the glass, and help Haz arrive on the other side with some shards lodged in his armor and a gun held in his teeth, ready and waiting to open fire at the first sign of troub-

Oh wait, nevermind, that's exactly what happens. Unless the glass turns out to be made of something exceptionally tough, Roosevelt's inhuman strength sends his comrade flying right through.

[KerfuffleMach2]

[Jacob Smith's House]

"Yeah I'm sure that is it. And I don't know if you will believe this, but someone told me to stay out of trouble right before all this happened."

Calvin grins.

"Yeah, your at GLoG in case of trouble. I will try to remember that."

Krystal laughs a little. Then she'll wave goodbye and head on her way again.

[Jacklu]

Junkyard of the Forgotten

Luckily (or not I suppose) there is no glass in the window and HazMag gains entry with ease. Inside, the floor is sloped sharply in one direction but not so tilted that it is impossible to stay standing. Might be hard to move around, though, and a misstep could send him sliding across the room easily.

And speaking of the room, it is about twenty feet on each side with a doorway leading further into the monastery. The ceiling, thought at what point it could be called a ceiling rather than another wall is hard to say given the tilt, is very high. The floors are aged wood, the walls a bright red painted mud. The air inside the monastery is musty but with a distinct ozone tang to it. It is dark, but not too dark to see.

A minimag is just exiting the room through the doorway as HazMag arrives.

[Devixer]

[Bakeries]

Iamar hears the Witch crying in the alley, and sees the skeleton. "See to her. She's in the alley." She takes out both her knife and her hand crossbow, alert for whatever might have caused this death.

[Lord Magtok]

Junkyard of the Forgotten

Spoiler

Show

Junkyard of the Forgotten

Luckily (or not I suppose) there is no glass in the window and HazMag gains entry with ease. Inside, the floor is sloped sharply in one direction but not so tilted that it is impossible to stay standing. Might be hard to move around, though, and a misstep could send him sliding across the room easily.

And speaking of the room, it is about twenty feet on each side with a doorway leading further into the monastery. The ceiling, thought at what point it could be called a ceiling rather than another wall is hard to say given the tilt, is very high. The floors are aged wood, the walls a bright red painted mud. The air inside the monastery is musty but with a distinct ozone tang to it. It is dark, but not too dark to see.

A minimag is just exiting the room through the doorway as HazMag arrives.

"It's clear, Roose, head right in! Hey you, minimag thing, get back here! We need help finding your master!"

Not waiting for his teammates to float inside, Haz takes the laser gun out of his mouth, and charges towards the minimag, sure that his best opportunity will be missed if he doesn't rush after the thing right away. The other two float in, a moment later, probably spotting only Haz's heel around the doorway for a moment as he speeds off.

[5a Violista]

[A Pleasant Cul-de-Sac]

"Oh geeze, I'm so sorry." Celia says. She makes note to mention something to David. No need to have him make the same blunder, even if Elizabeth doesn't appear to be bothered.

[A Pleasant Cul-de-Sac]

"Don't be," says Elizabeth, quite bluntly, as she helps wash a plate full of sticky gooeyness. "It wasn't your fault."

Elizabeth takes a large breath before continuing to talk. "The war, the plague, the witch-hunts; you didn't cause any of those. So you have no reason to be sorry."

Then, she adds, "By the time the revolution came around, I decided to move to another country."

[Gullara]

[A Pleasant Cul-de-Sac]

"Don't be," says Elizabeth, quite bluntly, as she helps wash a plate full of sticky gooeyness. "It wasn't your fault."

Elizabeth takes a large breath before continuing to talk. "The war, the plague, the witch-hunts; you didn't cause any of those. So you have no reason to be sorry."

Then, she adds, "By the time the revolution came around, I decided to move to another country."

[A Pleasant Cul-de-Sac]

Celia starts working on the dishes again, but more distractedly. "I don't think I could blame you, with that much turmoil."

[Jacklu]

Junkyard of the Forgotten

The minimag gives a little electronic squeak and flees the gun toting brute shouting about wanting to find its master, no doubt with assassination in mind. It issues a brief high pitched twarp and flees at full speed.

Haz, if he is focused on the minimag might miss the fact that he has charged into the slanted but immense central chapel of the monastery. He and the others are two floors up, giving a good view of the chapel.

It is three hundred feet from front to back, with row after row of benches. Most are anchored to the floor but many have come loose and lay in a heap at the downhill end of the chapel. Running down the center is a brilliant red carpet that is tattered and moth eaten. Huge arches support the peeked roof of the room and the dull grey light of the Junkyard shines through countless windows lining the room. The monastery is tilted to that the floor is sloped harshly to one side, front to back being roughly level.

Haz pursues the minimag out onto a balcony that runs the length of the chapel, giving access to numerous rooms. Across the chapel is an identical balcony. Three spiral staircases leads down and further up.

There is more than one minimag on the balcony. In fact, there are thousands of them, scurrying out of other rooms and down the staircases, some scaling the support arches to the chapel floor below.

Once at the bottom it slips seamlessly into a steady flow of other minimags, vanishing into the ranks. There are not thousands of minimags, but hundreds of thousands. It isn't a monastery, but a hive.

Covering the floor and walls of the chapel is a web of metallic cables that look as though they have grown into the building like the roots of an massive and ancient tree. They coil up the arches and across the walls, framing the windows. Following the tendrils back towards the source, they grow thicker and more numerous, eventually becoming a solid matte of organic metal. At the front of the chapel, where a religious symbol might have once hung, is the core of the machine growth, a towering mass of metal and cable and circuitry; the truck of the tree.

Crawling across every inch of the growth are countless minimags. The less mobile ones wait for the gatherers to bring in their spoils to them, inspecting each piece carefully before either passing it along or accepting it and integrating it where it is needed.

The only place the minimags don't crawl, the epicenter of the growth, is a metallic pod sunk into the very center of the growth, nearly fifty feet off the ground. The post has a domed glass front, tinted dark blue but translucent enough to see a figure within it. It doesn't take a tactical genius to realize where their target is.

[Lord Magtok]

Junkyard of the Forgotten - Monastery

HazMag frowns. This is all...all just a little too convenient, isn't it? Elizabeth Kale doesn't even look particularly doomed or half-buried under debris or anything. Unless her minimags have turned on her, of course, but why would that-

"Ooooh, she's turning into a butterfly! Or a moth! Or a byakhee! Or a pinata! Or a-"

Gah! Stop, Needs! Don't go near it; Haz isn't done making sure the room is safe and something bad might happen! The other two members of the team reach out to try to grab the mindless idiot's robe, but both miss, and he's floating away towards Kate before anyone can do a thing to stop him.

[Jacklu]

Junkyard of the Forgotten

As Needs floats toward the pod, the activity beneath him slows. Minimags of every size and construction look up and watch him. A charged tension filled the chapel as they wait to see what happens.

As he draws closer to the pod, he can see that there is a latch on one side. Within the pod, the outline of Miss Kale is easier to make out. It certainly looks like her, minus her left arm, of course.

The question is, will he open the pod?

[Lord Magtok]

Junkyard of the Forgotten

Pfft, of course he's not going to open the pod.

"Hello? Anybody home?"

"Needs, wait! We don't know what the minis are going to do if-"

He's going to knock first, and then open it. Duh. Anything else would be rude!

[Jacklu]

Junkyard of the Forgotten

There is no response when he knocks, but there is one when he opens the pod. All of the minimags let out a high pitched alarm in unison, then scatter. It isn't easy given how many of them there are, but they begin evacuating the chapel as fast as they can.

The pod, meanwhile, opens easily for Needs. A hiss of white vapor pours out, probably supplied by generic white vapor generators, and it takes a moment for him to see Miss Kale. What there is of her, at least. From head to waist she is pretty much intact. But her body just sort of ends at the waist. The base of her torso is an uneven surface of metal parts that are hooked into the pod. Tiny robotic arms in the back of the pod seem to be busy adding pieces to her, building her body downward. Needs should notice that a patch on Miss Kale's face is missing skin, revealing a patchwork of metal underneath. As he watches, the skin grows and covers the exposed area.

Miss Kale groans and her eyes flutter slightly.

Please... get me out of here...
Removing her safely from the machine will likely take hours if they want to be sure she isn't damaged from the procedure. They will need a steady hand and careful planning.

Somewhere else in the monastery, something very large stirs. It issues a deep call that shakes the floor, resonating like the bass from a subwoofer - a sound more felt than heard. They probably don't want to be there when whatever it is finishes waking up.

[Lord Magtok]

Junkyard of the Forgotten

"He comes! He comes, he comes, he comes!"

Needs Food Badly seems absolutely ecstatic about that horrible noise. Of course, he's also the sort of guy who'd probably run up to Lord Cthulhu and wrap him up in a big bear hug, given half a chance. What he does and does not consider good news is in no way consistent with what anyone else would, anywhere else in the world.

"Yeah, yeah, he comes! And that's why we're going! Grab Kale and let's go, Needs! Cut and run! I repeat, cut and run!"

"Commander HazMag, we should-"

"Shut up and run, Roose! Anything making that kind of noise is huge! We are not going to ****ing see tomorrow if we're still here when it shows up! Go go go!"

The two break into a sprint, rushing right out the way they came in. They intend to do the same boost thing from before to get Haz up and out, but Roosevelt's not going to just sit around and wait for Needs Food Badly to lift him into the air this time. Nope, he backing away to get a good running start, and then he's going to STRONG JUMP his way several meters into the air after his commander.

Meanwhile, Ms. Kale is left in the hands of the loony bin. I don't know what those other two guys were thinking when they left her with Needs, honestly. He's the last person you would ask to do this kind of technical work, carefully cutting someone out of a giant pod with only moments to spare on such a thing.

"Up, up, and away!"

Thankfully, NFB doesn't try to do any of that nonsense. Instead he just sits on top of the pod, grabs a pair of cables, and shakes them like horse reins! Hya! His telekinetic might strikes once more, trying to yank the entire pod right out and into the air, tearing it away from all the cables attached and sending it zipping along after the two other MagClones. Fwooooosh!

[Beans]

[Streets, heading for Theater]
A sickly-looking catgirl limps along next to Maeve, a cane in her hand and respirator mask over her mouth and nose.
She frequently wipes her leaky eyes with a handkerchief that was most likely once white, sticking close to her friend.

[Jacklu]

[Junkyard of the Forgotten]

Unit A1-66 was neither the first minimag nor the last. All the same, he was special. Miss Kale had crafted him like all the others, but instead of the basic obedience programming, she installed a different AI in A1-66. Unlike his fellow minimags, he was not called to do whatever task was next in the queue. He had been given one task and one task only.

Protect the Mistress.

Everything else about him, though, was left to his own discretion. She removed all of the restrictive fail-safe's and left him entirely to his own devices, going so far as to remove the tracking chip from his circuitry and loose him to go about his one directive however he saw fit.

At first, 66 had been confused by her decision to do so. Surely she knew best how to protect herself. But with time he came to understand her rationale. She would of course be taking measures to protect herself, but even she couldn't see everything coming. So she created a second perspective and removed her own limited scope from the equation. 66 was a backup plan.

In the beginning he took the straight-forward approach, requisitioning several minimags, removing their tracking chips as his had been, and setting them to follow the Mistress wherever she went, keeping an eye on her movements and monitoring for threats. This, however, proved woefully inefficient. So 66 commandeered more minimags, altering the Magcave's logs to show that they had been decommissioned and recycled, and sent them out into the Nexus to gather information on all possible threats to the Mistress, to be stopped long before posing a danger to her.

In the meantime, 66 started running calculations. He poured through data, searching for patterns that might indicate future threats to the Mistress. The numbers involved were immense and the answer always seemed just out of reach. He started to upgrade himself. First it was new processors to allow more calculations. Multiple processing hubs gave him the ability to monitor all the minimags under his command and better orchestrate their movements. Then he expanded his chassis to facilitate more processors and faster travel. He forsake his tiny spider-legs in favor of more robust limbs. Then even more processors. His algorithms were becoming more and more complex, letting him take into account an exponentially growing list of outside factors. But the numbers never added up the way they needed to.

His mind expanded and his body grew to keep up. Several times he re-wrote his own programming, becoming more efficient with each iteration. But still the solution eluded him.

Protect the Mistress.

There were too many factors. He simply could not account for them all. It was an endless loop. The more powerful he became to deal with the newly visible factors, the more he could see and more incapable he was of keeping track and accounting for them all. The universe itself seemed designed to prevent him from achieving his goal.

Finally, though, the answer came to him. In order to protect the Mistress, he and all his minimags must go into hiding. He had found a place where he could remain perfectly hidden indefinitely, crunching the numbers and planning for the inevitable. He changed the core directive of his being and enacted his plan. The Mistress could not be protected, but she could be preserved. And so A1-66 and his legion had vanished. The unseen and unknown disappeared. And he waited. Grew his army. Established a bastion and fortified.

And then it had happened. The event that all his calculations had arrived at. His old mission had failed long before she had given him life. But his new directive could still be achieved. It would take years for everything to be ready, but he had all the time in the world to fulfill his new goals, now that the Mistress was dead. So he did it right, risking nothing until the time was right. Everything fell into place, happening according to plan. All but the rate of the Junkyard's corruption. Driven as he was, he had stayed the deterioration longer than most mortal beings did. But his minions were not as secure in their mission as he was. They aged and broke. He could manufacture new ones, but they were not as sturdy and succumbed even faster. But he had compensated and still pulled off his mission within the acceptable margin of error. And soon his mission would be complete and she would be complete.

But not all things go as planned. She sent a distress call, delirious as she was, and 'help' had come to his stronghold to take her away, back into the world of innumerable factors and incalculable outcomes. His new directive wouldn't allow it. And his original directive no longer stood in the way of his success.

***

The back wall of the chapel shudders as something very big impacts it. The walls of the monastery groan and the flood of fleeing minimags continues. Going back out the window might prove difficult, as it has shrunk to a tiny hole amidst the outflow of minis. They can try blasting their way through, or make a break for the massive front door. Either way, out is where they want to be. And very soon.

[Lady Serpentine]

[Streets, heading for Theater]

Maeve, as usual when they're traversing the Red Zone, has a lighter in her left hand, the brand on her right palm glowing a flickering yellow-orange.

She's also making sure to keep close to her friend, well aware that Khair isn't going to be that much good in a fight, so she has to be able to protect both of them.