Scene Listing

||

Scene Schedule

||

Scene Schedule RSS

Owner	Pose
Arthur Lowell	Arthur Lowell has asked people to join him at an unremarkable location in a desert in the middle of the Layered Deeps -- somewhere that Earth-413 was re-located to following the multiversal reorganization. This would be somewhere around the old american midwest, in what used to be an isolated forest. Here, a number of Arthur's small weird bipedal iguanas have excavated a large, highly secure hatch, though it appears to be quite battered. They're terribly excited, and are currently quite happy with themselves. Among the excavated sand and simple excavation equipment, chunks of buried civilization -- bits of above-ground structures obliterated by unknown means -- have sat decaying for nearly eight years. A piece of wall can be found, still bearing worn graffiti, simply declaring in stylized typography: "SKY IS FALLING". A colorful three-prong trident stabs through the text, with sharp, bright crimson lines.     It is cooler than normal, recently having reached the early evening due to the winter season. There's not much in this world right now besides scattered settlements, the closest of which is hundreds of miles away, but the warpgate nearby, where a train station stood eight years ago, still works perfectly.
Arthur Lowell	Arthur himself is sitting at the edge of the aforementioned hatch, playing an old Game Boy Advance. He's ready to greet people individually outside as well as follow them inside towards the objective. Heading down requires navigating some old but surprisingly sturdy ladder rungs built into a strange one-meter-wide protrusion in the architecture. It leads down into SECURITY LOBBY C.     SECURITY LOBBY C is large, sweeping, and tall. Its geometries are high and vaulted, and its overall silhouettes are influenced strongly by Beaux Arts era architecture through a Modernist perspective. Vending machines line one of the walls, displaying the colorful brands "JACK NOIR'S STASH", "SOFTMESH!", "LUDORIUM", and "INTERFACES 4 U". There are a multitude of "windows", seemingly displaying some sort of pseudo-holographic vista of an above-ground daylit city outside and behind the window, despite everything being underground. Seating can be found here, clearly meant for people to wait for some appointment or another with the various magazines on the desk. It's near an unlit elevator that is marked "INOPERABLE GEOMETRY", presumably meant to lead up to whatever structure was once above.     The lobby looks like it has a hall of several elevators going further down, as well as an entrance with a small, thick glass window to the NORTH on the right side of the north wall, behind several corporate-style security gates. You know, the simple plastic kind that are supposed to be manned by security guards, but which will still beep horribly loudly if you try to pass without a card. The security desk is unmanned, but features a button to page security on the visitor side, and a chunky, 90s-era desktop PC still online next to it.     A meteor about the size of a pumpkin punched a hole through the roof several years back, and rests in the left side of the lobby nearish a pool of water and sand that has collected from the rain and desert above in the impact crater. Someone has placed brass posts holding up gray-and-yellow caution-patterned velvet rope around it, with a sign that says, "PLEASE PARDON OUR DYSCOLLISION". The velvet is molding badly. There is also a large SHIPPING CONTAINER in the left north corner, which is both visibly open and visibly totally empty.     The main walls, floors, and ceiling are concrete, composed of a grid of blocks or perhaps panels like tile, with every third block featuring a simple square buzzing lamp. Each cell of the grid is marked "1X1M SOLID GEOMETRY FLOOR TEXTURE" or "1X1M SOLID GEOMETRY WALL TEXTURE", repeated constantly. All the main architecture surfaces are a flat, dull gray. At the top of one of the walls, strict, blocky text has been painted on in large fonts declares the room's various aspects: "-9.8M/S^2 'SAFE' GRAVITY ZONE", "DATA NON-DUMP INSTANCE, MEMORY RECYCLING", and "UNSUPERVISED LUDOGENICS PROHIBITED".
N'Raha	N'raha is looking a little worse for wear after last night's hooliganism and dungeon delving. No armor, but rather his comfy looking sweater and slacks get up. Dad Catte.     The catman, is in fact sort of bemused by the lack of... uh, actual textures in this place. He's never been deep into Arthur's UNPARALLELED BULLSHIT when it comes to environments, so this is new. He makes his way past the security and grumps a bit. "I think someone forgot to put the walls on the walls."
Big Boss	A helicopter arrives at the meeting point. It's blaring Flight of the Valkyries, as it touches down briefly, dropping off a man in a greatcoat with a beret, an eyepatch on his right side, and a greying beard. Big Boss has decided to see to this one personally, as he slings his rifle to his back, a pistol at his side, and a cigar in his mouth. He's sore and tired, but, he can still go on operation. He's survived way worse. When he eventually reaches Arthur, noting the game device in his hands, he speaks up. "Arthur Lowell. I was not familiar with your voice, but your history precedes you. I trust in your ability to grant a present to a large number of people." He extends a firm handshake. In the inevitable cool kid handshake back, he just kinda stares and smokes his cigar, before proceeding inwards. As they head down the ladder, Big Boss looks around. Vending machines...well, Big Boss immediately moves to do what he does best. Take charge. "Someone check those vending machines. Interfaces 4 U may be useful. I will check the computer. Sweep the whole area, make sure nothing is left unturned." As Big Boss approaches the computer, cautiously, moving to interact with it, he speaks to Arthur again. "What, broadly, are we looking for?"
Arthur Lowell	"Yeah, homie, it's FUCKED. Gotta expect it from THESE ASSHOLES." Arthur calls to N'Raha, kicking one of the walls from his seated position above. It crunches a little. Dust falls. This is real concrete, and if you look closely, you can see the real concrete texture of it. It's just... massive 1X1-meter blocks. Kind of weird. This isn't a digital space, though, that's made abundantly clear by the motion. Just... un-architectured?
Lezard Valeth	Lezard is present, ready to roll. Arthur seemed even more addled than normal, which means that something strange must be going on. Keeping an eye on the Least Offensive Deity he has encountered has its value.     The Sorceror of Midgard ignores the bipedal iguanas, much to their benefit. Instead, he looks at the hatch and the nearby graffiti. "Indeed." He says simply.     Once the hatch is opened, he floats down the hole (ladders are for plebs). Reaching the lobby, Lezard steps forward and stares. He turns his gaze to the displays, the sighs, the vending machines, and he arches a brow. "This place is as unusual as you are, Lowell." Lezard states, adjusting his glasses.     Given his interests, Lezard actually moves to examine the suspiciously pumpkin-sized meteor itself, checking the composition and nature of the fallen object.
N'Raha	The catman huffs a little bit at the sight of Lezard, but he's not about to argue there, honestly. He sighs and shuffles past the desk and over towards the VENDING MACHINES. "Who exactly are 'These Assholes'. Sorry I'm a little out of the loop here on that."     He steps up to Interfaces 4 U, shakes the machine a little bit, and then looks for an Interface to Work With (4 U)
Linehart	Sometimes, something just sort of looks like it *belongs*. It's like seeing a flower in a vase - you know flowers go in vases, so your mind just says, 'yeah, that's normal.' If it was a cat in a vase, you'd probably squint, but nod, because cats wind up in weird places. If it was a tiger in a vase, you'd be concerned. That clearly doesn't go there.      The Mirror Knight clearly goes here.      It's a ruin. That sort of massive, bulky black armor, roiling with shadow and smoke; that red-cross-scar visor, slanted off to the side; that spear(?) that looks like the runes upon it have been dipped in blood - that is a Final Boss. He even has the music, the low, ominous introduction that would ordinarily lead into heated combat music roiling about him, but currently is content to remain low and ominous and orchestral. That is someone who exemplifies the ideal of Final Boss, the sort of thing that, yes, of course it belongs in a ruin, why wouldn't it be in a ruin? What would you expect in a ruin? Obviously regular monsters, like the weird iguana-things the massive black armor waved at in an oddly friendly manner on the way down; some kind of treasure, sure. But at the bottom? There's a Boss.      This is That Boss.      He descends into the ruin a little ways after everyone else. It's not on purpose, he's just slower than most people, thanks to that huge armor. By the time he's down there people are poking about already, so he just goes ahead and does the same thing, as if he was always supposed to be here. The 1X1M SOLID GEOMETRY FLOOR TEXTURE gives him pause, as does the WALL TEXTURE, some uncomfortable sort of reminder that turns his music trepidacious and quiet.      Eventually, he decides that he may as well introduce himself.      A text window pops up with a quiet 'beep' somewhere in front of everybody. It's non-intrusive. I am Linehart, the Mirror Knight. My Sphere is Evil Knight.      He gestures at the elevator. Does it go down?      There's no voice at all.
Staren	Staren climbs down through the hatch, then flies down to the floor. "What... were you expecting to find?" Staren looks around. He's not that unaccustomed to the weird... gamey-ness of it, although he hasn't seen anything like that in awhile. It really takes him back. Although... "This is Earth, isn't it? Not an area generated by Sburb. So why is it..." Staren waves a hand at the walls. "Like this? And what are we looking for, anyway?"
Arthur Lowell	Arthur assaults Big Boss's hand with daps, pounds, low-fives, slides, finger-wiggly-motions, twists, turns, and something that thought Big Boss had a robotic arm but realizes only halfway through that he didn't, turning into a stylish little flick away from his hand. "Hell yeah. You hear about all those FIGHTS I did? Doin' all that ADVENTURING? You fuckin' KNOW it, dog, I'm the COOLEST."     As for what they're looking for? "We're looking for a BETA COPY of an OLD GAME. Gotta break into TESTING to get at it." Arthur clarifies. "Might not do this thing ALL AT ONCE, this place goes FUCKIN' HELLA DEEP."     The computer is operable, albeit it displays "NETWORK LOCKDOWN - LOBBY SECURITY ACCESS ONLY". It seems to only have access to lobby security. Two major tasks are available: "VISITOR RECEPTION LOADING", it declares. "SELECT VISITOR OR VISITOR 1 WILL BE SELECTED AUTOMATICALLY". The countdown is lasting only a few seconds, but it has the feeling of a computer startup. Currently it offers a choice from 1-7, but that goes up as each visitor arrives. The other task is marked "5 CORRUPT INTERFACES IN AREA: LC".
Arthur Lowell	The meteor Lezard investigates is a chunk of stone torn from a larger meteor. It is marked heavily with both baleful influences of noble horrorterror void (cosmic ink stains) and with a torn-off piece of something that looks like medical equipment that got embedded into it. A long-decayed blood bag was part of the machine.     "Yeah, dog, I got that STYLE. But this place ain't got the SWAG to go with it." Arthur says, seeming critical of the bunker.
Big Boss	As he reaches the computer and the numbers go up, Big Boss's mind works fast. He starts counting who went in at what order, and then presses his own number. He has no idea what this is, but he assumes it may be a security mechanism to help them out. As he does so, he replies to Arthur. "You were the creator of Afterus, primarily. An impressive feat. If you can do that...perhaps this game has merit."
Staren	"Others helped!" Staren interjects, when Big Boss refers to Arthur as if he's the sole cause of the chain of events leading to Afterus.     He looks at the...reception? Computer. "Can it load... all of us?" He tries to scroll through the options to confirm there are only 1-7. "What does that even mean?"
Arthur Lowell	"THESE ASSHOLES," Arthur replies as he finally enters all the way, drifting to the ground. "Were SKAIANET. Fuckin' DOUCHEBAGS. They were the BIGGEST NAMES in IMMERSIVE SIMULATION, plus a million other goddamn TECHS. Some kinda WORLD DEATH CULT too, back in the day."     The interface on the front offers HEALTH, NAV, INVENTORY, WORK, and ELEVATION interfaces. When he shakes the machine, though, something jammed in the dispenser at the bottom falls out. Six long knife-legs start trying to scrabble their way out. Another set emerges from behind the upper section of the vending machine. Large, rectangular-bodied things -- the top one displaying its best estimate of N'Raha's health. It tries to leap onto his body and plunge its knife-legs into his shoulders.
Arthur Lowell	"Yo homie! My stuff's SPACE and FIGHTS, I dig the SWAG on your DEAL." Arthur says, seemingly totally fine with Linehart's thing he does -- he has, after all, his own textual thing. "NO DICE on those ELEVATORS, found the TOP of 'em a bit back. The ELEVATOR HALL, uhhh..." He ventures to check, probably with Linehart, hopping the security gates. They appear to be KEYCARD OPERATED, as well as UN-LIT, though they're NOT MARKED INOPERABLE GEOMETRY. In order to go deep as they can, they'll need to restore elevator function, and secure security access.
Doctor Strange	Strange is here without much ado--a sparking, orange hole in reality opens to reveal him, and he simply steps through. The portal vanishes with a flick of his wrist. Being able to conjure portals spanning entire worlds tends to give him a somewhat sedate presence. So sedate you almost don't notice the lethal remarks he makes in his deadpan baritone.      "Arthur," says Strange cordially, greeting his fellow wizard. "Didn't know if I'd make it. Had to take a dramamine. Because your block chains are nauseating," says the Sorcerer Supreme with a straight face. He's still annoyed with the result of their latest arcade fighter bout.      Salt aside, he is immediately drawn to the PC at the security desk. "Wow," he observes, allowing himself a chuckle at the archaic, bulky thing. "Classic 413." He nods, then his usual frown resumes. The Sorcerer Supreme buzzes for security, because he's honestly curious to see what will happen. Midway through his pressing of the button, another Strange appears in a flash of green light, following N'raha in particular. "I'm Doctor Strange," announces the Future!Strange. "I'm Doctor Strange," he says. Then, a split second before the emergence of the monster... "Get back." It's as if he's ready for what happens next, though--the mandalas before his fists burn into existence with a sudden fighting stance from the sorcerer. Having warned N'Raha, he searches the area for more of the corrupt interfaces.
Arthur Lowell	Arthur answers Staren quick. "We're lookin' for--" He starts, before noticing the fighting. "Shit. We're lookin' for a BETA COPY of an old GAME from SKAIANET. Remember THOSE ASSHOLES? Not the APOCALYPSE game, this one's the OPPOSITE of that." He's at work on the fighting with the weird knifeleg creatures with his broom as he speaks now. "Wasn't made by SBURB, but good chance it was made STRAIGHT-UP /LIKE/ THAT."
Deelel	Deelel had caught the call from Arthur. How could she ignore one of her oldest friends on this? It would be pretty much impossible for her to do so. She would end up on Earth-413. It wouldn't take her long to find her way to the old American Midwest. She would not have too much time to catch up with Arthur she makes note of the Iguanas and wonders if she should have tried to disguise herself before coming here. It's too late and they seem to be very distracted. She knows this old world she was involved in its final fate what brought Arthur here though was something of a mystery to her as to why. She would be a bit delayed in reaching her old friend however as she gets to the hatch and she would look to the man whom she honestly forgets is a god. "Greetings friend." She'll chirp to Arthur. "I did not think you'd ever be back here, I thought you'd made your peace with things here." She looks out for a moment sad but she knows she should be venturing out to help with whatever Arthur is looking for here. She makes note of Big Boss arrial and he asks the question she should have. She'll watch Lezard head down the hatch and then humms for a moment. The shipping container once she's done with any chatting with Arthur.
Staren	Staren's eyes widen when Arthur reveals where they are. "THIS was SKAIANET?!" He looks around in a mix of alarm and awe.     And then a health bar display with legs is knocked out of a dispenser and ... tries to stab N'Raha! Staren hadn't assumed it was hostile until it actually attacked, but once it does he draws his double-barreled laser pistol and tries to blow it away, careful to direct shots so misses will only hit STANDARD 1X1 CONCRETE BLOCKS and not important equipment.     "What do you think the chances are the elevator keys are a random loot drop if we kill this thing?"
Linehart	There's a very strong possibility that Linehart has no idea what Arthur just said, based on the sudden upswing in his music, which now sounds like a weird attempt to turn an ominous backdrop into a circus song. He sort of stares at him, then looks down the elevator way.      He looks back at Arthur.      We need to repair the power?                                  YESTERDAY                                        The ghost of a woman floats inside an old house, satisfied. The Mirror Knight stands over a man bound and gagged, his ominous image and dark music filling the area. The ghost floats over to him and nods.      That's him, she says, I can feel it. With this I can let go.      The Mirror Knight nods.      Soon, the police come and drag the man away. The ghost smiles, flitting back over to the heavy armored figure. Thanks. I really appreciate that you just kinda...stopped in. It was weird. But it was nice having a visitor. Even one as tall, dark, and creepy as you.      The Mirror Knight nods.      The ghost sighs and crosses her arms. You could at least take off your helmet when I'm trying to thank you! Anyway...I don't really need this house anymore, so you can have it. Here's the deed. Also...here's this.      The ghost presses an object into Linehart's hands. It's translucent, see-through, and glowing. He looks down at it. She grins, rocking back and forth in the air. It's what I had on me when I died. Remember, I was working on fixing the electricity when that guy came up behind me to rob the house?      The Mirror Knight nods.      I guess it left an impression on me. So here! Use it if you need it. A screwdriver's a pretty lame gift, but hey, maybe you'll need it to fix up the house. She grins and flits upstairs. Also I think I'm gonna stay for a while! You seem like the kinda guy who needs a roommate to level out your super weird energy. And it's pretty dead around here most of the time.      Oh come on! You are just...you're gonna be that guy. I can tell.                                     NOW                                          A screen pops up in front of Linehart as he starts walking towards the keycards.      There's a ticking sound.      Linehart produces a SPECTRAL SCREWDRIVER and sets to work on unhooking the keycard access. The screwdriver itself seems to be doing most of the work as it searches for connections, reroutes, and other ways to get the power back or just straight up open the elevators up.      He's not paying any attention to N'raha. Other people have that.
Arthur Lowell	Big Boss selects himself.     There's a clunk noise in the cargo container, like someone just fell over. Something inside says, "Hello world." It speaks in Big Boss's own voice when it does. A man stumbles out. It appears to be Big Boss, albeit with two quite crucial distinctions: First, it is wearing a grey full-body jumpsuit with green features and an "SN" logo.     Second, the back half of his head, from the top of his neck to the top of his forehead, has no flesh, and instead has a surreal white wireframe suspended around it. The BOSS-SKULLBODY wanders disorientedly towards the security desk, seeming intent on manning the computer. Its stare is vacant, its eyes look drugged out and possibly hostile. Deelel is the one nearest it. The closer it gets to her, the more tense and hostile its ragged breathing gets. "Hell... hello... w...." It kind of growls.
Big Boss	Big Boss presses the button. A weird wireframe clone of him pops out of the cargo crate, wearing a jumpsuit. Big Boss grimaces. Clones. And then, as it repeats, it starts getting hostile. Big Boss moves for his rifle, but he speaks first. He doesn't estimate it to be very strong. "Big Boss #2. Stand down." If it actually moves to attack Deelel, likely after it would get a swipe in because of the udnerestimation... Big Boss fires the rifle, moving to just fucking kill the clone. He has no remorse.
Arthur Lowell	"I got the SKILLS for the KILLS dog! If they didn't want it IN-GAME, they gotta PATCH IT OUT!" Arthur insisted, to Strange, in a friendly-banter kind of way. "S'cool. This ain't a ONE-AND-DONE, you GIVE WHAT YOU CAN."     Meanwhile further on into the event, looking for more of the interfaces makes some of them more obvious. They're mostly in the area over towards the elevator, three more of them. A large inventory-type interface that looks sort of like a backpack with eight scythe-legs, and a pair of large hostile map interfaces that look like full helmets with four long, large shortspear-legs. One of the helmets leaps for Strange's face at horrifying speed, trying to force navigation on him, while the inventory and the othe navigation leaps above with the intent to find another nearby foe.
Lezard Valeth	"This is the lair of the people who created the framework of the game that elevated you?" Lezard says, suddenly much more intent. His fingers trace over the stains on the meteor, humming for a moment. The medical equipment that seems to be embedded into it seems to be of note, but the blood itself looks like it has long ago decayed into uselessness. The Sorceror purses his lips and sighs... and the text boxes appear. It's like he doesn't even notice the ominous music immediately, until he blinks and looks up at the source... Which seems to be the Evil Knight. "... Truly, you seem to be living up to your chosen reputation." He says offhandedly, flicking a hand out to try to wave the text boxes away as he turns to look over at the thing assaulting N'raha.     "Perhaps we should allow it to investigate the cat-man." He says offhandedly. "Perhaps it will have an effect besides simply murdering him. It it does, however, it would be no real loss."     In the meantime, he turns towards the hostile INTERFACES. "It looks like we continue to have more of these unpleasant things present. I reiterate, we should simply let them spear the cat adventurer."
Arthur Lowell	"Yeah, I figured I had too. SKAIANET'S all DEAD anyway, good fuckin' riddance. But I've got... There's some shit that happened recent, with the WATCH. I gotta pull something outta the CORPSE." Arthur's answer to Deelel is uncomfortable. He seems anxious.     As for the cargo crate? Deelel heads to it around the time that the security system spawns a security worker, a clone of a current visitor -- this one's the BOSS-SKULLBODY, who is missing much of the back of his head. With its disoriented speech and growling tone, and drugged-out look, it's threatening and potentially hostile. In fact, once it sees Deelel has even a foot in its path of navigation, it starts grabbing towards her, trying to grip her shoulders and tackle her. With superhuman strength, it's actually making an effort separate her head from her body by holding her shoulders and chin. Thankfully, Big Boss is already providing some backup.
Arthur Lowell	The INTERFACE flickers wildly and its display shatters under laser fire, shards of glass distorting the display. No, it doesn't flicker like a digital construct might. It's physical, it is a chunk of real mass, trying to mount onto the body the way an abstract interface would be. Perhaps it's even robotic. The screen on it flickers though, as it screeches aggressively. Like a real-world realized piece of videogame abstraction, it displays its best estimate of its integrity (about half), then Staren's, then drops itself to zero as all three of its legs bend. It emits a noise like a dozen "YOU DIED" sound effects pitched up and played at once, a surreal threatening sound, before skittering up and trying to punch through one of the small "windows" into some area beyond them. Presumably a hit-and-run effort, intent on calling its fellows or harassing them further in, if it can escape.     Still have to deal with the ELEVATION interface, a long, rectangular display with a needle-thin base. It has more knife-legs trying to crawl all the way out of the vending machine. Humming horribly, it tries to leap on Staren, line up perfectly with his face, and plunge itself directly into his right eye if it can.
Deelel	Skaianet a name she'd not heard uttered in so long, and she felt something akin to a human feeling sick to their stomach for a moment. There were so many people killed from what they had let lose. Who knows though it was a cycle she was keenly aware of. Old memories come back to her clear as day as her mind recalls those old files for a moment, so many things come back as she stars thinking. Perhaps that's the danger of being a long-lived BASIC. The past never fades for you it's always clear as day just one thought away. She shakes her head clearing her mind as she goes into the cardo crate she has backup from Big Boss. He opens fire even as she's grabbed at by the clone there needs to be no remorse here on Deelel's end either. Not against this thing is twisted broken there's no saving it so far as she knows as Big Boss opens up? She summons her Keyblade into her hand, the Dual Disc is ready it hums with energy and even as Deelel is grabbed she works the strangely unwieldy looking weapon with a good deal of skill as she moves to hit the clone with her weapon. With a crash she'll hit the ground with a strang almost crunch like sound as shit the ground. She'll attempt to flip the clone of her and hopefully Big Boss if she pulls this off? Will be able to shoot it like it's a clay pigeon.
Arthur Lowell	LINEHART manages to get the elevator working.     For some reason, if he has any GAMER INSTINCT, he might get the feeling that this has bypassed a significant chunk of several challenges.     One of the elevators dings open. Several levels are available: LUDOGENESIS DEVELOPMENT, ECTOBIOLOGY, APPEARIFICATION, and BETA LUDOGENICS are accessible -- at least, from this specific elevator, anyway. Since we're all adults who do sensible adult things in terms of pacing, we can assume that the elevator might be used, though not exclusively by Linehart for obvious reasons. What it leads to is best seen by all, in their own time.
Doctor Strange	"Nah," says Strange to Lezard. He presses his finger to a nasty cut on his temple, healing the wound. While the one hand still has the ice spell at the ready, he readies one in the other hand. A series of quick finger movements later, and lightning crackles. A javelin of electric energy forms in his hand. He turns, after that casual disagreement with Lezard, and hurls a bolt of lightning.      It flies towards the map-helmet currently leaping at Present!Strange. The sorcerer's present self barely avoids getting Alien-ed by a helmet, but in his stumbling retreat, he falls over. The bladed legs of the inventory backpack nearly pierce him--but the Cloak of Levitation drags him out of the path of its deadly gait. He escapes with a bleeding gash on his temple.      Future!Strange nods at his present self. "Don't press the Security button again," warns the future sorcerer, before disappearing in a flash of green light. Present!Strange disappears after, only to reappear without the wound on his temple.      Strange enters through the elevator and steps out on the other side.
Staren	Staren's ears try to splay at the awful sound effect. As it tries to escape, Staren switches up from laser to dual particle beams, balsting at it -- only to get pounced by another interace! At least he can see it coming! He raises his left hand to block it, but it can probably cling there as its knife-legs scratch up his faceplate. "Hey! I've already got a HUD implanted in my brain, I don't need another one! Who came UP with you guys?! I mean I know, but WHY?!" Then he remembers his armor has a shock function, so he tries that on his new attacker.
Big Boss	Deelel flips her attacker. Big Boss takes the rifle, focuses down the sights, and begins firing. It's accurate. It's insane, too, given how Deelel's right there. There's a chance of accidentally hitting her, if you think about it. He doesn't. He hits the clone's head and chest, smashing the Skullbody with bullets and trying to just destroy it as quickly as possible.
Arthur Lowell	The SKULLBODY is blasted hard by the rifle, making it shudder, grunt, and groan. But it's surreally durable. Its grip weakens, his body shivers, but the growling renews. Deelel manages to hold it back from decapitating her -- damn, it has the feeling of someone who could actually take someone's head off with their bare hands -- and with enough rifle fire, she can flip it and blast it with him. It ragdolls in mid-air, grunting and growling and /shoved/ by the force of combined fire into the front desk, slamming headfirst into and then through it. It goes motionless.     There's another thunk in the cargo container. Big Boss's voice again says "Hello world!" But as /another/ Skullbody stumbles out, this time Deelel isn't in its navigation path because of her flipping. While it gets agitated at Boss's proximity, if they keep clear of the path, it stumbles for the computer and then just... stands there. Breathing in agitated, deprived tones, and twitching as if from severe, chronic pain.
Arthur Lowell	They seem interested in more than just the cat-adventurer though. Lezard finds that the INVENTORY INTERFACE is skittering high above, and trying to drop onto his back and sink its eight scythe-legs into his ribcage. It dings and makes several synthesized noises of chests opening, windows widening, bags rustling, and a dozen other sounds of inventory doing what inventory does as it tries to wrestle and impale Lezard from the sides and back.
Lezard Valeth	Lezard isn't really looking at the situation like it's 'a group of monsters attacking them'. The clearly gameified environment is something that he can grasp to some degree, and the nature of the corrupted interfaces is something of casual note to him. Sure, people are rejecting allowing him to use N'raha as a test subject, but there are other options.     Unfortunately for the INVENTORY INTERFACE, Lezard is not quite as delicate of a nerd-mage as he appears... And backstabbing Lezard Valeth, as intensely ironic as it is, has some inherent complications.     The thing drops down onto him, the Sorceror of Midgard already sweeping out the Manus Catalyst and jamming it down his back like some kind of Dark Abyssal Backscratcher +10, using it as a lever to keep the thing from sinking itself properly into him. Sure, it tears up his back a bit, but at least it's not working on trying to integrate itself into his kidneys. "OFF! Get off, you foolish creature!" A moment later, there is a flash of blue-white energy as a shockwave of Force radiates from him, presumably throwing the INVENTORY INTERFACE away. Lezard promptly turns, jamming the Manus Catalyst forward to pin the thing to the floor, then reaches down to scoop the ersatz backpack up and wrestle the thing forward, holding it before him to keep the gnashing legs away from his body as he sneaks up on the new SKULL-BODY and simply jams the thing onto its back. SCIENCE!
Deelel	There has been a bit of a shift in Deelel's demeanour since she realized this was remnants of Skaianet. Not seemed like much but it's like a switch was flipped within in her. She's already in a combat stance, ready to strike when Big Boss gives the order to leave the clone be. She respond by backing down but keeps her weapon at the ready. She will back off and keep out of its way she wonders just what it's doing. She keeps an eye on it for the moment but will be ready to follow Big Boss out of the container once he's satisfied with what's going on in the container.
Arthur Lowell	People are pressing on into this. The BETA LUDOGENICS lab is selected, because the other places simply aren't relevant right now. When one presses the button, the whole elevator goes dark. Anyone fully present in the elevator finds that they're now in BETA LUDOGENICS, as the ELEVATOR is actually an INSTANCE TRANSIT if one reads the label on the wall above it after stepping out.     The INSTANCE TRANSIT for LEVEL 4 BETA LUDOGENICS opens up into SUBCAFETERIA 4.     SUBCAFETERIA 4 is a large, wide-open food-court-like area served mostly by one large vendor that's halfway between a kiosk and a small restaurant. Entirely identical chairs and cafeteria-type tables crowd the area. Each chair is stained identically, and every table has the same three types of meals in trays arranged in four total potential arrangements. A few art pieces dot the environment, strange, complex, blocky abstract carvings made out of an odd off-white crystalline substance. The average viewer may find them off, or unnerving, though figuring out why requires substantial capacity for art appreciation. A number of posters are visible throughout the area, if one wishes to investigate them.     There's an exit to the NORTH towards MAINTENANCE ACCESSWAYS marked "EMPLOYEES ONLY", WEST towards those INSTANCE TRANSITS up to SECURITY LOBBY C, and to the EAST there's something that signage says is a "LUDOGENICS ZONE".     No less than about two dozen Skullbodies are standing here in the cafeteria. Some stand blankly in front of a tray of food, before walking about and stopping at another. Others are walking about constantly. One is at the food counter, staring out. All of them are wearing those same jumpsuits. And all of them have the face of one of the visitors -- or, in Linehart's case, a helmet, since it seemingly has no access to his face information at this time. Each mutter -- or in Linehart's case, beep -- "HELLO WORLD" every so often.
Arthur Lowell	The shock function on Staren's armor causes the ELEVATION INTERFACE to screech a noise that's almost, but not quite, exactly like the noise the Star Hawk would make as a warning if Staren tried to nosedive it straight into the ground. Despite that, it tries to impale him, albeit shakily. It's... robotic? And as a result, the massive burst of electricity causes its motor systems to malfunction, making the attack a little unsteady. With enough electricity, it's forced to disengage, and try to follow its ally through the little crawlspace behind the fake-window-screen.
Linehart	Linehart doesn't know half of these names. Ludogenics, Instance Travel, all of this is lost on him. Elevators work like this. They take you from one place to the other. This one did it faster but that's fine. That makes sense.      The huge, armored figure pauses at Subcafeteria 4. Again, that carnivalesque music starts playing, the confused, confounded expression that Linehart can't hide under his helmet. The unnerving nature of the posters and the white crystals is offset only by how strange the duplicate(s?) of himself are. It's sort of...odd. It's like looking at a room he wasn't supposed to see, something intimately connected to his own birth. He is a real person. His world is real. But it wasn't always. Seeing this turns the music to sympathetic and quiet, thoughtful and melancholy; the Mirror Knight hesitates.      Are these things evil? Or were they just made thoughtlessly by someone who had no idea what they were doing?      Or, worse, made purposefully, with that exact intent.      The words HELLO WORLD strike a chord inside him, and strike a reminder.      Eyes that pierce the gap beyond time - Omnis Intuens!      A popup appears near Linehart. It's clearly some kind of menu. In an old, sprite-style interface, it starts sketching out a map of the immediate surroundings, as Linehart stares at the things that are probably in many ways close enough to be disquieting. Indeed as the map fills itself further his music grows increasingly disquieted; high strings and eerie warbles fill the air like the sounds of a haunted house.
Big Boss	As the skullbodies are dealt with, Big Boss leaves Lezard to his own devices, and heads down the elevator after a chat with Linehart over radio. Once they're down in ths subcafeteria, seeing the skullbodies...he reaches into his coat and removes a grenade. It's a flashbang. "Split up. Employees Access, Ludogenics. If we can't get in, I'll move towards Security." As he starts heading towards the Employees Only, looking over Linehart's shoulder first, if the skullbodies are in the way, Big Boss just tosses the flashbang to stun them, shoot them in the head if necessary, and try and move around them.
Staren	"WHY ARE THESE THINGS SO TOUGH?!" The legs weaken and he flings it away. Now there's TWO on the run. Great. Staren fires beams at it, then gets a better idea and chucks a futuristic, super-high-explosive grenade into the crawlspace. If THAT's not enough, they're going to have bigger problems.     Now, perhaps he could finally move on to the elevator, but first he has to see how Lezard's Evil Science is working out. Who knows, maybe the interfaces can be rendered harmless by combining them with the copies?
Arthur Lowell	The INTERFACE slips cleanly onto the SKULLBODY under Lezard Valeth's hands. They were not made for each other. The clean slip feels wrong, like the way a knife goes into flesh. This was a union not meant to be, a positive-to-positive polar proximity. In order to do this too, he has to get into aggro-range, so to speak, for the Skullbody. It starts breathing in horrible pain, clearly bleeding conspicuously from the eight impaling wounds along its torso.     But when it turns to Lezard, now, instead of a zoned-out, drug-hazed kind of look, it has a broad, pained rictus. It moves its hands towards the inventory interface. It moves like something Staren saw a long time ago... a Cruxtruder! And and pulls out from some massive industrial-looking pipe a surreal, off-white crystaline rifle. One that looks quite like Big Boss's own. The breathing gets more and more urgent as it turns around, tries to bash Lezard over the head with the butt of the gun to get a bit of distance, and then start trying to blast him with weird crystaline bullets.
Doctor Strange	Upon seeing the field of Skullbodies, Strange lifts a hand. "Wait," he says to Linehart, after 'the eyes that pierce the gap beyond time.' "'Eyes?' They gave you /two?/" He shakes his head. "Never mind." He begins moving his arms, quietly tracing lines of energy in the air. With a soft chime and a thrust of both palms, the spell is cast.      Illusionary white wireframes cover the back portions of his head, Linehart's, and the head of anyone else who's stepped through the elevator, provided they're near enough. "A complex spell," explains Strange. "But a fragile one. Move too quickly, bump something too hard, and it's gone."      To demonstrate, he slowly makes his way through the crowd. Where it seems like he might bump a skullbody, he waits, quietly muttering 'hello, world.' He's trying to get to the Ludogenics Zone.
Deelel	Deelel will follow after Big Boss and face seem to be concerned as she goes. "Understood." Deelel keeps moving after him Keybalde in hand. As she sees him heading to the employees only section and she will move to weave in and out of the of any of the strange humanoid things that populate this place. "I will see what I can find in Ludogenics." She seems troubled now but she will go as she's been ordered to do so. She does look troubled, however. Deeply troubled by something as she goes.
Arthur Lowell	Mapping this area out is straightforward. Walkable zones exist through Ludogenics, which is a big squareish area, with short hallways leading east off it to another area. The windows are false, obviously. Nothing beyond them seems to respond to the mapper. MAINTENANCE ACCESSWAYS are... complex. And clearly meant to be walkable. Two-meter-wide halls cross and snake in mazelike formations far past the range, but with meaning. Why would they be walkable otherwise?
Arthur Lowell	Robotic parts and complex electronics blast out of the crawlspace. What's clear is that Staren did damage. What's unclear is how much, or what might have been gotten. The window shudders, and then falls, trailing its own power cord, displaying more extensive, tiny crawlspace behind. When it slams onto the floor, it nearly shatters. Its pseudo-holographic display tries to display gorgeous grass on the ground of a meadow, but the glass is fractured and its display is warped now. There's a channels setting on it, like some fucked up television -- or no, it says "DISPLAY SAFETY", currently set to on.
Linehart	Well, if it's walkable, it must be intentional.      Linehart just...starts going towards the maintenance accessways. Why not find out where it goes? In his experience it will lead towards either treasure, or progress. Dead ends lead to treasure, hallways lead to progress.      So he just starts walking. He pays no mind to the strange SKULLBODIES unless they bother him personally, and if they do, he'll simply shove them aside with one mighty hand. No need to harm them, just keep them out of his way. He might be more gentle than most, though, here. For...reasons.
Lezard Valeth	Lezard is not particularly concerned with the amount of internal organ distress the interface causes to the being. Unfortunately, this also causes the SKULLBODY to attack him. Normally, this wouldn't be much of an issue. However, it suddenly has a pre-stocked inventory full of weapons. Lezard pays for his EVIL SCIENCE with a blow to the head, and he reels backwards, bringing up his free hand to his face. "You dare!?" He hisses at the thing... Who responds with bullets. Lezard is unfortunately not resistant to bullets. Wounds open up across his body before several spang off of an array of oddly durable pages that splay out before him in a defensive barrier from a warp in space.     "Enough of that." Lezard says, waiting to a break in the gunfire to drop his defenses and pointing the Catalyst at the SKULLBODY. Shotgun-like blasts of black spheres rip through the air, attempting to shred the SKULLBODY apart with a high-DPS spammable cone attack.
Staren	Well, Staren certainly doesn't want it to DISPLAY DANGER, but he'll have to get back to that. Lezard is in trouble.     Even if Lezard was willing to let N'Raha get attacked, he's still Concord. So Staren rushes towards him, already pulling a pair of potions from his bag-- ah. The sorcerer's got it. "Healing. Armor." Well, the latter is a forcefield, but close enough. Staren presses them into Lezard's hand and then rushes ahead, drawing beam sabers and trying to sever the inventory from the skullbody! And hopefully, in the process, prevent it from attaching to anything else with those knifelike legs!
Arthur Lowell	Many of the Skullbodies are ill at ease around Strange. They can't identify what's wrong. Like an animal that can smell but cannot see blood, this puts him on a time limit for every second of exposure to this disguise. This means the flashbangs are still more than necessary to keep them from having their eyes on the visitors too long. The stumbling, shambling Skullbodies speak to each other as well as to the visitors -- "HELLO." "HELLO." And grow more restless. But this place feels less like a guarded zone and more like a den of drug addicts abandoned to suffer by society. There is hostility without guidance, there is violence without coordination.     The NAVITATOR Skullbodies, whose heads are brutally impaled by six-legged navigation interfaces and whose eyes are filled with maps and displays of hostiles, stumble towards the group and will try to follow them out into the LUDOGENICS AREA, but it's working for the most part. Might just need to deal with the horrid clones in more isolation at their goal locale.
Arthur Lowell	RECREATIONAL LUDOGENICS ZONE 4 has a central chunk of the floor's grid, something like an 8x10 area, replaced with a soft, almost plush mix between a carpet and a trampoline, still grid-patterned and reading "1X1M NONLETHAL GEOMETRY FLOOR TEXTURE". It isn't nonlethal, you could still break your neck or something, but it's softer. The "windows" in here include a skylight, displaying a brilliantly cheerful blue midday sky. A section of the "skylight" has cracked badly, allowing a meteor the size of a truck to peek through.     A large red button is accessible on a post near the soft area, and a number of benches line it like people will meet here or observe what happens in the middle. The zone in the middle has a caution-yellow border written in harsh, thick, blocky text, reading "!!CAUTION!! NON-RELEASE SOFTWARE PROHIBITED !!CAUTION!!" Someone a long time ago scrawled "TECH DEMO" in chunky, loopy graffiti near the edge. It has the aura of derisive, pejorative terminology. Another "LUDORIUM" vending machine is here with a paired INTERFACES 4 U, as well as another cargo container.     As before, the room has specs. But this time, they're slightly different. The main walls, floors, and ceiling are concrete, composed of a grid of blocks or perhaps panels like tile, with every third block featuring a simple square buzzing lamp. Each cell of the grid is marked "1X1M SOLID GEOMETRY FLOOR TEXTURE" or "1X1M SOLID GEOMETRY WALL TEXTURE", repeated constantly. All the main architecture surfaces are a flat, dull gray. At the top of one of the walls, strict, blocky text has been painted on in large fonts declares the room's various aspects: "-4.9M/S^2 'FUN' GRAVITY ZONE", "DATA NON-DUMP INSTANCE, MEMORY RECYCLING", and "LUDOGENICS PERMITTED". Indeed, gravity in the center area seems to be set to half.     The corpse of a solid white, carapaced humanoid is dangling from complex medical machinery attached to the meteor in the ceiling, spinning on surgical tubing. It has been decomposing, and shows that clearly. A corrupted HEALTH INTERFACE is trying to mount to its neck, and is currently succeeding, causing its whole body to twitch and revitalize aggressively. It is screaming the way a human might, during this process.
Arthur Lowell	MAINTENANCE ACCESSWAYS are much more claustrophobic than the other areas, consisting mostly of tunnels that are exactly two gridspaces tall and wide. The writing on the walls and floors and ceilings persists here, but now the lettering is reflective, shining brightly under any light that passes over it. Piping and wiring of all sorts goes on back here, sometimes thick enough to obscure the walls and ceiling. At times, it even becomes thick enough to make it clear that it doesn't need to be that complex.     It's nearly impossible to navigate, with all the maze-like structure. Getting to any of the interesting content on the NORTH, WEST, or EAST ends of things will need some form of enhancement to navigation, but finding a map could do it. It's easy enough to reach the SOUTH door that leads back to SUBCAFETERIA 4.     What a coincidence that the guy with the mapping skill is wandering through here. Thankfully, nobody need suffer the pain of a corrupted NAVIGATION INTERFACE, nor find out how to cleanse them, when a man can walk in with his own. Joining him allows one to reach any of the three technical areas, though only three are known, and Linehart's mapper can't identify which is which. Pick at random, perhaps?     Unfortunately, that's not the only matter in need of addressing here. Among the many pipes here, behind a row of barrels marked "256 MB" and "MEMORY DUMP", a corrupted interface tries to ambush the group. Moving like an insect on oversized legs, a SELECTOR interface flicks its view between the visitors and the menu of its body shifts between the two, adjusting where it points the massive lance of its leg. A wounded HEALTH INTERFACE also attempts to ambush from above while the pair can sight the more obvious ambush from this horrid thing.
Arthur Lowell	Lezard and Staren manage to neutralize the INVENTORY INTERFACE. For whatever it's worth, this seems to be quite effective. Staren slashing the legs goes for a direct solution, leaving the limbless thing to fulfill its functions in an uncorrupted way, though it screeches in a frustrated pain.     The remaining SKULLBODY's rictus grin immediately goes away. Tears begin streaming from its eye, perhaps at the sensation of losing a function it had, and it shudders and trembles as it moves towards Lezard, powering forward and trying to tear the lower half of his jaw off of his face with enough strength to actually pull that off if it gets a good grip. All this despite the blasts to its body; only once there's simply not enough flesh to support the motion does it collapse.     Thunk. "Hello world!" Again, from the cargo container. Another stumbles towards the computer, though trips over the corpse left behind by Lezard's efforts. It hardly seems to realize or understand.
Big Boss	As they proceed, Big Boss draws his cigar cutter when Linehart is preparing to fight Lezard. When it doesn't materialize, he pulls out a cigar, and points it at Linehart. "You want one?" If he accepts, he moves to cut it unless Linehart just takes it raw, and light it for him. And then, the ambush point. The first interface is blasted with the rifle, but the second comes up from above. Big Boss is nearly hit in the head, it landing on his shoulder, as he rolls backwards, trying to rip it off and throw it at the wall with surprising technique and strength. "They're clever. Don't let them touch you." He says, now sporting a wound from the drop ambush.
Deelel	Deelel will give a nod of thanks to Doctor Strange as he helps make her life a little easier. She will press on and banish her weapon for the moment. It's not like she can't summon her keyblade back in an instant or use the disc on her back. She will keep up the pace and pause a few times as she goes to say "Hello World!" To the Skullbodies as she moves with the rest of the group. She will make it to LUDOGENICS and she just stares. This is more Skaianet madness to be sure as she moves to shift her view anyone in the group here might notice something with Deelel on the Disc mounted on her back there's a hologram protected in the middle of a Spirograph much like some of the markings in the old Skaianet complex that they are in. As things get intense on the radio. She is distracted by something else she sees the words. !!CAUTION!! NON-RELEASE SOFTWARE PROHIBITED !!CAUTION!! If she had blood? It would be running cold right now. She also spots the corpse of a species she knows and she stops. "Why is there a body of a carapacian here? They shouldn't have been on Earth...before death game started." She's will pull her ID disc odd hr back arm it and toss it aiming to mercy kill the carapacian with a single strike. "It's past any healing I can give it. They deserve better than their entire species suffer in the death game as much if not more than we did." Someone might be able to stop her if they are so inclined. Deelel has taken note the carapacian is past her abilities to heal in the state it's in.
Doctor Strange	Strange hurries through the functions as quickly as he's able. He waits for Boss' grenades to go off, then scoots through, until he's all the way to the RECREATIONAL LUDOGENICS ZONE. #4, apparently.      Strange splits his attention for the second time, upon hearing the screaming. The master multitasker first deals with the corrupt medical interface trying to resurrect the corpse. Blasting, corrosive winds from a caustic, dead planet are unleashed upon it.      Future!Strange conjures a scry-mark. It flits through the facility, searching for Lezard. When it spots him, a portal opens. Strange leans into the portal, his upper body appearing to give his two cents. "Leave the nulls. I know better than to expect anything good to come of it," says Strange to Lezard with weary certainty. He remembers a world with a similar group of beings. "So should you. Just imagine if they're still suffering after you uplift them. They'll want somebody to blame for it." He doesn't put quotations around the word 'uplift'--he believes that it's possible. He just doesn't think it's a good idea.      After that, Future!Strange disappears back into the portal with an urgent but collected quickness. He turns on his heels and conjures a ball-and-chain from orange dimensional energy. He hurls it just as Present!Strange finishes his weakening spell.
Staren	One problem down. Unfortunately, Lezard's magic failed to take down the skullbody. Honestly, Staren expected that; these things are TOUGH and it's why he severed the inventory, just in case.     The inventory. It's gotta have whatever this Skaianet pseudo-game considers the Best Weapon, right? The excalibur or whatever; it's probably some sword with extremely tacky visual effects on it. Staren reaches for the inventory and just... tries to pull the best thing out of it.     He ends up holding an assault rifle with a drum magazine, made out of that same whitish crystal.     Huh. Well...     Staren briefly manifests those buzzing orange energy wings again, and flits back to Lezard's side to shoot the skullbody with a series of controlled bursts, nearly point-blank.     He'll just trust that the 'game' weapon will be effective on the 'game' construct. If not, well, they've learned something! Lezard will no doubt be able to appreciate that while the damn skullbody is meleeing his squishy wizard body.
Linehart	The music's getting more perilous. Big Boss, and anyone else with Linehart, can hear the mounting, building. It sounds like that moment in a JRPG when the Boss turns around in a burning village, the intense, heart-pounding moment where the music swells and fills the room and you're ready to do battle even though it's halfway through the game and you know you can't win. It's that, bereft only of the chorus and the chanting, the deep and ominous music that digs into the soul and says that This Will Be A Moment.      Big Boss pulls out his cigar cutter. Linehart turns toward it and holds up a hand.      Lezard Valeth's plan is swayed away by the Sorcerer Supreme. Linehart's hand drops, and he turns, and the music gets low again, though it has an irritated, faster-paced quality to it now. When Big Boss offers the cigar, Linehart takes it, and it disappears into his inventory. He will use this later.      Thank you.      It's a key item now.      Linehart prepares to head for one of the random technical areas, and then things go sideways. The corrupted interface arrives. Linehart moves between it and Big Boss immediately. He's big, he's strong, he's fully-armored. He doesn't strike back - as the thing digs into his armor he instead raises his hand, light glowing around it. Eyes that pierce the gap beyond time - Omnis Intuens!      A second interface pops up - this one some kind of scan, with relative hit points, elemental weaknesses/resistances, and other pertinent monster data appearing on it. The strange thing even gets a cute little sprite. How adorable.      It's perfectly visible to everybody with him, just like his map.      As is the number that pops up over his head when he takes damage.      Huh.
Arthur Lowell	The HEALTH INTERFACE slams into the wall, screeching more game-over sounds. It's nearly dead now. Screen cracked, damaged in all these encounters, it's almost dead and stumbles as such, barely moving now. The SELECTOR interface, in its battling, moves to protect it like a mother beast might protect a child, still engaging the pair with its lance-leg when choosing. This isn't on the defensive, but even the robotic Skaianet game elements work together for reasons that remain unclear.     As for what it is? What a game-insight might reveal? The SELECTOR INTERFACE is a tough bastard, having a set of resistances more befitting a quest objective enemy than an FOE or a boss battle. The HEALTH INTERFACE is nearly dead, and has the kind of stats that fits an enemy one might find in a Grinding Zone.     What is their monster type, exactly? Same as the Skullbodies.     "IMMERSIVE SIMULATION"
Lezard Valeth	The Skullbody is horrible. Lezard watches the way it behaves, the single-minded abandonment of self as it pursues a purpose it could not possibly succeed at. The thing is blasted and crushed, the Sorceror taking up the potions from Staren with a nod. He drinks them, letting the healing and augmented defenses rush through him. Staren continues to tear the thing apart. The limbless horror is effectively beneath Lezard's care at this point, the prideful sorceror apparently assigning it the same amount of notice he would give a zombie in a similar state.     Speculatively, Lezard looks down at it, and then up at the new Skullbody that appears... And he comes to a realization. The hand moves to his face, and he laughs. "They're not even people, are they? Just... /empty vessels/!"     The laughter ends as he shares his observations over the radio, and he shakes his head. "Thank you for your assistance, Staren." He says, before stopping. For several moments, his expression darknes, and sorcerous energy begins to gather around him, a deep, ominous trembling, the lights darkening around him as he calls up his power...     Strange pokes his head in just in time to see Lezard holding onto that power and potentially using it for something. A quick, cogent suggestion and assertion later, Lezard relents, releasing the energy to let it flow back naturally, the moment passing as he nods back to Strange. "Let us find out what is available." He steps into the elevator.     Lezard arrives in the SUBCAFETERIA, and takes a look around, frowning at the environment. "How... distressingly artificial." He mutters. "It is like someone attempted to manufacture an artifical world but failed to capture the essence." He, however, does not need to travel across the area and risk aggroing the locals. He teleports, displacing himself.     "Oh dear, it seems like you might have found more answers you did not want, to questions you did not ask." Lezard appears behind the others in the RECREATIONAL LUDOGENICS room, and simply looks over the horrific events taking place there. He shrugs, and simply steps over to press that RED BUTTON that is so casually leering at them, all button-like. "Ooops." Lezard states in a tone decisively lacking in unintentional action.
Arthur Lowell	The Carapacian -- it is one of those -- dies again quickly, thankfully not consigned to screaming in dumb pain for much longer. Its whole body shudders and dislodges from the surgical tubing. The newer HEALTH INTERFACE screams, and is weakened, denied its new steed, and subsequently slammed hard in melee. Electronics and strange glass go flying everywhere, and the robotic parts that make it up scatter around. The area is cleared out.     Arthur answers Deelel's questions. "The CAPPIES ran the LABS that METEORS had on 'em. So when the METEORS crashed on EARTH, some of 'em landed too. Only reason we didn't BOMB all the OLD SKAIANET BUNKERS is 'cause they're supposed to give SUPPLIES for SURVIVORS. Except shit like /this/." Arthur winces, and tries to hold back the impulse to get nauseous at the sight of the corpse.     Speaking of walking dead, NAVIGATOR Skullbodies are approaching from the west. Arthur focuses on fighting them with his battle-broom, trying to give room to Strange or whoever else might need to try to mess with Ludogenics without interference, but could always use some backup. For those working the room, there's the ludogenic arena, the button, the vending machines, and... I dunno, the screens maybe? How does this spot work, exactly?     We'll see with Lezard shortly.
Big Boss	The Healing Interface is weak. Big Boss moves to try and finish it off, speaking to Linehart swiftly as he does. "Focus on the strong one. I'll destroy the weaker one." And then... The rifle runs out of ammunition. So Big Boss tactically reloads, using the rifle to block a lance-leg before firing straight at the Health Interface, hopefully finishing it off.
Deelel	Deelel gets an answer to part of the whole affair that was behind the creation of Afterus. She now understands something and will make note of it as she keeps back from the shower of glass she's just glad the Carapacian's suffering is over. That was not a sight she'd wanted to see and she'll never be able to unsee it at all. "I get it Arthur shall we get to it?" With that said? Deelel will take her ID Disc again and lob it at some of the oncoming NAVIGATOR Skullbodies which are coming right towards them and she will try to keep out of close combat with them if she can help it. She tries to avoid any of the hazards that remain in the room.
Linehart	In the midst of the battle, Lezard Valeth arrives, and presses the button. Linehart is angered. He knows that the word given was twisted, its intent changed for malicious purpose. And yet all that isn't enough to make him condemn Lezard Valeth, not yet. That goal, that desire - to shape his own destiny, his own future, free of that which made him - strikes a powerful chord in the Evil Knight as he smashes the SELECTOR INTERFACE into the wall. It's gotten some real good scratches into him, numbers popping up more rapidly than he was designed for. Underneath that armor he's probably looking a lot more beat-up than he's letting on. He's hitting with his GAUNTLET (which is functionally unarmed, but with a fancy name because his punches don't do anything if his armor's off!), smashing it again and again with his right hand. He's angry. The music around him is fierce and fast-paced, the heated battle with a boss at the midpoint of the game, when first you hear their leitmotif and learn that they are in fact a major player.      That cross-scar visor blazes red as he hits the thing again. It's got too many resistances for him to waste using his spells here, and he doesn't want to show his hand to Lezard Valeth regardless.      Linehart's sole goal right now, besides dealing with whatever Lezard has set loose, is to pin down the SELECTOR INTERFACE and beat it to death to protect Big Boss.
Arthur Lowell	Lezard presses the Button. The post unfolds several large panels, each a small screen, each on a strange robotic arm. Another robotic arm holds a large arrow, pointing to a selection on the menu. Unfortunately Lezard doesn't have a SELECTOR INTERFACE with which to choose from the list! The current selection is "NULLBODY MOVE!" If Lezard presses the button a second time, Nullbody Move! begins to play. The entire playspace immediately flicks to an entirely different environmental display, huge soft-texture blocks appearing where there were none moments ago like it was just painted into the next frame of animation. Lezard is invited to some kind of tactical breaching simulator, where he and three Skullbody allies cloning his appearance are in a sort of laser-tag game to breach the little recreational structure SWAT-style and "kill" everyone inside.     It's completely imbecilic.     But the others might not be. Aside from Nullbody Move!, there's also a broad variety of other games, including but certainly not limited to "BUILDCRAFT (TEST EDITION)", which undoubtedly allows one to test building bunkers like this one. Others include shitposts like "flappy nullman" or "cooking nullmom", but a few stand out. "LUDO DATABASE WINDOW UPLINK" has a sticky note with a password ("pass: SWORDFISH") and a warning declaration of "set safeties on window off first, dont tell ITS or we wont get to play anymore".     Someone has tried and failed to shatter an option for something called "HEX SYS (XMAS 09 BETA)". In lieu of shattering the option, the local copy was deleted, and must be redownloaded, if the little downloady symbol is anything to go by.
Arthur Lowell	The HEALTH INTERFACE is the opposite of its namesake. It displays its own death, moments before it loses power to its screen. All six legs are jettisoned, as well as a spent and damaged battery. Could fix the thing up later, but for now, it's a corpse.     Pinning the SELECTOR INTERFACE is exactly the best approach, because wrestling it directly keeps one inside its range. This means Linehart can beat it over and over without too much risk to him, and while negating the risk to Boss. It isn't long before it's weakened, and there's the option for Boss and Linehart to rip the head out of the leg-appratus, or just finish it off. Either way though, Linehart will probably want to pick up the SELECTOR INTERFACE that results from the battle, a relatively small series of buttons that allow for typing and complex selection on game-abstraction systems inside GHOST STATION 4-12.     They're free to head through to other technical areas.
Doctor Strange	"Lezard," says Present!Strange, after he and his future counterpart the area. "You want some help with that?" He points at the interface which has sprung up after the Button is pressed. After Lezard offers his response, one Strange hovers over to the vending machine--INTERFACE 4 U--and tries his luck at getting an interface. With nothing to pass for money, he first attempts to just press the button and get one. If that doesn't work, a portal inside the machine is tried next, with Strange attempting to fish it out like s claw game.      The other Strange examines the screens with Lezard. Upon noticing the note about starting without 'window safety,' he frowns. Strange enters the lotus position, then makes a gesture with both hands. It resembles the opening of an eye--and sure enough, the Eye of Agamotto opens. He peers through alternate futures, looking to see what would happen if they ran LUDO DATABASE WINDOW UPLINK with the window safeties on, and with them off.
Arthur Lowell	Staren's assault on the Skullbody is effective and efficient. Crystal rounds tear through the body of the Bossoid. They rip flesh from fragile bone, and tear apart a wireframe around the skull. They also, unfortunately, slowly tear apart the gun, because cruxite is not a good thing to make a gun out of. But the science has been done, and the hostile thing is dead, thank goodness. It is soon replaced by another, tripping over the body of its friend and not seeming to care as it struggles back to its feet and stares forward at the desk, waiting for visitors to show no hospitality at all to, and letting those visitors pass inside.     If Staren keeps his distance, as before, it'll simply suffer alone.
Arthur Lowell	Meanwhile in Doctor Strange's future, he checks two possibilities. If the safety is on for a SELECTED window, it's revealed what it's a safety for: The network of this structure. A lot of alarms are going off in those futures, and Skullbodies are swarming from west -- and, impossibly, through the false doors in the east? As well as the cargo container within this room, which appears to be like a "spawn point". There's a lot of fighting here, and while its lethality is kind of up in the air, it's certainly not pleasant.     The current tense but manageable status quo seems to be being maintained in the future where the safeties are off, though nobody is present at that time. There's no bloodstains or anything, so unless everyone got turned into magically-dispersing ash or something, they're probably safe.     Meanwhile in the present, Doctor Strange prods at buttons on the INTERFACE 4 U, so he can get an interface 4 selecting things on the LUDOGENICS. A SELECT interface is there, though the rumbling in the vending machine indicates troubling things about its current INTERFACE CORRUPTION.     If he presses the button, a SELECT INTERFACE with the proportions of a massive, vile daddy-long-legs emerges from the dispensor slot, unfolds, and starts rapidly flicking its attention between the visitors, selecting them and then trying to jab them with five-foot-long lance-legs like someone pushing a stubborn button with their finger.
Staren	Well, that worked.     Staren keeps his distance from the new 'receptionist'. He detaches the magazine from the broken gun and stows it for later use.     He grabs the inventory too. Might be good to keep that close at hand, who knows what else he can pull from it? If only he had the !THROW command, it'd be a source of useful ammo no doubt. Fitting, considering last time he was also fighting some game abstraction nonsense that had gotten loose in the real world.     Well. Time to move on and poke at things. Staren returns to the display. He pokes the holoscreen, gently. He turns the SAFETY setting OFF. And then he pokes it again, with an (unpowered) stun baton.
Arthur Lowell	Staren's stun baton moves through the window's surface into the friendly impossible-meadow-inside-a-city outside, totally unimpeded by any previously-presumed glass. This has not altered the impassability of the shattered sub-pane of "glass" attached to the same window.
Linehart	Despite his Sphere, despite his origin, Linehart is not a cruel man. He does not torture the creature, he does not tear it to shreds in a visceral manner; he simply ends its life with a quick blow and lets it fall. He takes the small series of buttons and disappears it into his inventory, where it will sit alongside the SOLDIER'S CIGARILLO until such time as it's needed.      He's going to head forward. He can't see exactly what Lezard's up to. He doesn't want to know, either. If he knows, he has to act, and that will get in the way of their objective. Instead he stands back and lets Big Boss pick the direction, content to take the second slot in the party and follow Big Boss quite literally like a JRPG character. It's fine; Linehart just moves the screens over to Big Boss to view. Apparently he can do that. Huh.
Staren	Oh, that's interesting. Staren expected it to be some manner of portal, but the 'glass' itself is the portal, not just a covering. Huh. Staren sends some drones through to scout in case the other end is near a remote Skaianet facility or anything like that.
Big Boss	Big Boss watches the screens. He chooses a direction, and heads down it, leading the party. His rifle is reloaded. Linehart has the Selector. It's time to loot this place, for Christmas. And also the Watch. Mostly the Watch.
Lezard Valeth	Lezard is greeted with a matrix of energy that shows a complex aggregate of knowledge. At least, that's the way he's interpreting what's going on. He investigates the initial selection and stops in about 15 seconds after seeing what is going on in there. "This is ridiculous." Lezard says, bailing on the Nullbody combat game in basically record time. Surely he would invoke some kind of queuing penalty.... IF HE CARED TO PLAY AGAIN.     However, even with his magical acumen he can't seem to influence the energy matrix to delve into the deeper mysteries. Strange brings up the apparent solution and Lezard nods to him, concurring with him about the situation. The problem is, the SELECTOR INTERFACE happens to be corrupted. But it is functional. That much was obvious earlier.     He stares at the thing with a grimace, clearly considering it distasteful... Time to put his creed where his mouth is.     He walks forward to the SELECTOR INTERFACE, pulls off his glasses and slips them into a pocket, before simply reaching out and /grabbing/ the leg that jabs at him, pulling the INTERFACE in close and letting it simply... do what comes naturally. "Hurry up, automaton." He hisses, clenching his teeth in anticipation.     This is probably going to hurt.     A lot.
Arthur Lowell	Luckily, the fresh NULLBODY MOVE terrain gives Arthur and Deelel the terrain advantage. With the right concentrated effort, they can keep the NAVIGATOR Skullbodies off their feet! He moves in a practiced tandem with her, an old style of cooperation developed in the old days of Sburb. It was originally designed to deal with Liches, ultra-durable Underlings, but it works just as well with Skullbodies, who are more inclined to fall over, even if they feature more raw strength. The only truly close call that'll occur is where one of the NAVIGATOR INTERFACES tries to eject from the skullbody and leap onto Deelel's head in the middle of one of her attacks on the Skullbody!
Arthur Lowell	It looks like the other end IS a remote locale! A modest city in Spring, un-lived-in. If he checks the GPS on the other end, it appears to be a city built entirely for economic reasons, as part of a sort of ponzi scheme for real estate investors ten years ago. Perfect place to stick some windows. There's an absolutely metric ton of networking gear on the other side. It looks like it's awaiting some kind of unauthenticated activation signal to validate a pending process.
Deelel	Deelel has worked with Arthur a lot in the past, she will bob and weave as she's assaulted by the Nullbody. Thankfully their old tag team tactics have not been forgotten by either her or Arthur. They are able to deal with this thing well enough with one small tiny catch. The NAVIGATOR INTERFACES ejects like the horrible head monster thing it is. She only has seconds to respond and she'll quickly bring up her ID disc with it's powered edge up to hopefully intercept the thing from it latching on to her head, she does not want to find out what it would do to her. If she's lucky she'll cut it in two or at least deflect it from hitting her. "We really need to figure out how to shut these things down."
Arthur Lowell	Boss encounters something difficult to describe. Deeper in the many tunnels, there is a large console in a small room, filled to the absolute fucking brim with pipes and cords of all shapes and sizes going around the walls and thickly woven among the ceiling. Commands scroll by nearly constantly, so it has to be networked in general. The keyboard has been ripped out, but the software slot hasn't. A large cartridge is sitting in a "RECEIVING" bin, marked "XMAS 09 BETA - CHANNEL MODULE". A small sticky note is attached, which says, "?????? it just works ???????" and "BETA" is scratched out.     A number of other cartridges as well. Lootable-looking ones, mostly pertaining to logistics processing that Boss might want for the Watch.
Arthur Lowell	Lezard mans up.     The daddy-long-legs creature impales him once. Then three more times as it mounts onto his torso. If he can remain standing, it'll settle into place, twisting its horrible spearlegs in his body. Shifting around, it stays, now, in reachable range at all times, so he can press the buttons it faces towards him. It shifts just slightly, enough to cause pain and worse wounding, to indicate which thing it's offering selection for. This includes the windows, whose safties can be turned off, and the Ludogenics interface, which can now have things selected on it if Lezard isn't downed by the constant pain and blood loss from this nightmare machine jamming itself through his ribs.     It seems... happy?
Staren	<"There's another base. Signs of a ton of network infrastructure, but it's dormant. Not sure what the purpose is. Have you guys seen anything waiting to send a signal to something remote?">     It's too tempting not to go check. Staren's just stepping a leg through when Lezard screams. Staren hesitates. <"L-Lezard?!">     ...Ehhh. He'll be fine. If he needed help, he'd ask for it.     Staren steps through and starts investigating the base on the other side, looking for a terminal, just incase they've been left unlocked for some reason. Failing that, find the server room and see what he's dealing with here. He's not a master hacker, but with physical access, he might not need to be.
Linehart	Lezard screams.      Linehart does not hesitate. He steps through the first reflective surface he can find - probably some glass, or just one of Big Boss's zippers and buttons. He disappears in an instant.      The imposing black figure emerges from Lezard Valeth's glasses without any trouble, simply pulling himself free and stepping onto the floor.      Lezard talks of how he won't give in. The red-cross scar just stares at him for a long moment. The ominous, slow-paced music fills the room.      Then, a window opens. Maybe Lezard can see it. Maybe he can't. The music turns resigned, even frustrated, a slow-paced, stumbling, awkward beat.      There's a glass bottle in Linehart's hand.      He uncorks it and presses it to Lezard's lips. It's a potion. Drink it. I may not approve of your methods, but I will solve that on the battlefield. In the meantime I will not allow someone I can help to suffer if it is within my power to stop it.      Mistake it not, Lezard Valeth, for acceptance, for friendship. Know it only to be that I hold my honor in greater esteem than my distaste for you. Now drink and ease your pain. On my life it is not poison.
Arthur Lowell	Skaianet was busy here, but subtle in a way, Staren finds. They work as if they just belong here. An entire park was taken over by raw, exposed networking space. Huge transmitters bearing large windows on their sides mark the entire area. But it's all inactive! Heading to a server room, he can find that some large project, some massive game, was meant to send output through here. Whatever Arthur's looking for, it might not hook into the multiverse without at least activating some of this.     Don't need to be a master hacker though. It seems to be waiting. Little authentication is involved, just sending a signal through the most basic kinds of API over raw wireless will get this place active.
Lezard Valeth	Lezard mutters to himself, focusing his will for what is to come.     Though my body may be tainted, though my soul may be tainted...     A moment later, the creature impales him. The sharp, cold pain of a spike skewering through him and promptly erupting through his back. It happens three more times in short procession, Lezard's body wavering as he screams in pain. Blood begins staining his back and his front, staggering him. His homunculus body might be designed to be the most perfect flesh he could craft, but it still has /internal organs/. And they are /inconvenienced right now/.     "I will not... succumb so easily..." He hisses from clenched teeth, blood flecking his lips. Immediately, his own magic gets to work, trying to close the wounds and keep himself invigorated as much as possible... But with the thing impaled through him, there's little he can do but to keep up with the damage, constantly using his own magic.     It's almost like he just gave up a big chunk of max HP and is losing MP per tick to maintain the thing, or else he's going to start losing HP from the additional wounding. Staren asks about him. Lezard does not ask for help.     He turns back to the window, staggering forward... And almost runs into Linehart. The Knight appears before him, and Lezard looks him over, a scowl on his bloodstained lips. The immediate assumption is that the Knight is here to take advantage of his weakness. In his current condition, the Knight would surely have the advantage... But he is given a potion instead. He doesn't reply immediately, simply taking the potion and drinking it. It helps his injuries, sustaining him against the constant agony wracking him as this thing happily nests against him. "... Evil Knight indeed." He says, eyeing Linehard once he has drained the bottle. Whatever that means, he does not clarify, instead sweeping past.     His destination is the Ludogenics interface, working with the foreign writhing thing to try to press the buttons to turn off the safeties as indicated, then attempt to start the download on the HEX SYS thing so it can be investigated later.     Finally, he chooses the LUDO DATABASE WINDOW UPLINK, using the password as indicated.
Arthur Lowell	The NAVIGATOR INTERFACE manages to aim right for Deelel's noggin, but winds up impaling itself on the edge of the disc, twitching and writhing in pain, screaming as it barely struggles off the edge. Awful little sadist of a function, these things. The close shave gives Arthur what he needs to tackle the Skullbody further away, and start blasting at range to give Deelel the room to move.     He perks up the moment the window's safeties are off. "Alright, we're just 'bout DONE, DEE!" He calls out, waving her to retreat to the window. "We're gonna HOP BACK UP IN THIS when the DOWNLOAD'S DONE!" He sounds triumphant!
Staren	Staren checks in with Arthur.     Arthur, despite appearances sometimes, is not just some kid. And he's not careless, not... with other people's lives. Certainly not on this scale. Only with his own.     Staren makes sure he has a way to remote into this system if needed, then turns it on and watches what happens.
Linehart	Linehart watches Lezard Valeth drink the potion. He says nothing. The crimson scar-cross visor flickers in front of Lezard. He's completely still, silent but for the quiet, conflicted music. Then, he walks forward, as Lezard tries to go past him, and disappears into Lezard's glasses once more, emerging from one of Big Boss's bangles or zippers or buttons.
Arthur Lowell	Lezard suffers through the pain of starting the download. Mysterious servers elsewhere spin up, trying to send data. Staren sees a PENDING DOWNLOAD pop up on the local wireless, something being sent through the window over the wireless. Once he turns it on, the pending download passes through. The data streams in, more and more. Whatever HEX SYS is, it's huge, gargantuan, absolutely insane amounts of data in unthinkably exotic formats. It has the same data-feel as something like Sburb. A software system of great note, one that interacts quite directly with reality in key ways.     The RECREATIONAL LUDOGENICS SYSTEM can barely sustain it. The menu option that lezard picked is actually sparking and shuddering, gleaming in the tiny cracks where damage was nearly dealt to the option.     The download starts on the beta, from the depths of this site's brothers to a near-surface spot. They've retrieved -- mostly -- a download path for the objective. No reason to stick around now, they can head out, which Arthur seems to be planning. "'Ey, Z! You did it! Want some help with longshanks up on ya chest there?" He offers to cleanly gravity-rip it and work on magic-suplexing it vigorously on the retreat, through windows or through teleports.     NULLBODY MOVE! has been removed from the playfield. There is something flickering in the groundspace there instead. It's hard to see, but if you glance close, it almost looks like...
Arthur Lowell	==================================== ZONES =====================================                           ___     ___     ___     ___                                                    /   \   /   \   /   \   /   \                                                    \   /   \   /   \   /   \   /                                                    /   \   /000\   /006\   /   \                                                    \   /001\   /005\   /007\   /                                                    /   \   /003\   /009\   /   \                                                    \   /002\   /012\   /008\   /                                                    /   \   /004\   /010\   /   \                                                    \   /   \   /   \   /011\   /                                                    /   \   /   \   /   \   /   \                                                    \   /   \   /   \   /   \   /                           ================================================================================     An odd sight to see on a playfield like that.
Lezard Valeth	Lezard isn't entirely in a condition to appreciate what's going on. He will deal with the rest of it later. For now, he staggers towards the exit, nodding to Arthur. Time to make a mechanical interface horror unhappy.     After Arthur pulls it out and gets to work suplexing the crap out of it, Lezard finally starts healing himself, though that does nothing for the copious bloodstains all over his clothing at this point.     He makes his exit alone, pain slowly fading as he considers his next move...     There are things that should be dealt with. How soon? One will see.
Deelel	The NAVIGATOR INTERFACE is handled she cuts into it she'll drive the edge in deeper. Before she will end up pulling it free. The moment the download is done and Arthur is checking out? It is time to go, she also will keep in mind Linehart's actions of just popping out of Lezard's glasses and then back. He also shows some of his character too he gives Lezard the potion and does not attack. She also knows it's time to book it, She takes one last look at the results of the download and then books it. She thought she was done with all of this but that was false. Very false when she thought about it, an urge builds up for her to go to Afterus and it's one she will give into once she's clear and the rest of the watch is out as well.