open | no need to be afraid there —

[realists]

WHO: ANYONE ( outside the sim )
WHERE: New Magellan
WHEN: During Phase Two
WHAT: Cassius Rescue Mission!
NOTES OR WARNINGS: Violence, monsters, possible death, etc

--

> WELCOME TO NEW MAGELLAN

The mission is simple: get Cassius before Johann can delete him. Simple.

The Displaced slip between cities through the gates, arriving in New Magellan with ease and moving on to the laboratory where Cassius is located. It's frigid, the southern tip of the South American peninsula a collection of dry, cold islands, and creeping wintery chills, the temperature as unfriendly as the mission they're moving toward.

Cassius's map leads them on a road outside the city which brings them to the laboratory quickly enough and they're able to get into the facility itself with little trouble.

It's not until they're inside that the trouble begins.

> WHO KNOWS WHAT MAY BE LURKING

The laboratory is devoid of people, seemingly abandoned, and it's not hard to see why. Once they get inside, the monsters set upon them. Some are the same golden-eyed creatures that have become strangely familiar to the Displaced, all sorts of creatures just slightly off in some way, their DNA altered, modified, spliced, warped.

◉ A large snake, except that it also has four small legs (two near the front of its body, two near the back) which allow it to skitter around rather than slither, making it much faster than any snake has a right to be. It's large and strong enough to strangle its victim, making it difficult to remove by a single person. Don't let it unhinge its jaw, it's got way too many teeth.
◉ A hyena-creature with impressive amounts of agility, due to the fact that it seems like almost all of its joints are double-jointed. It can turn its head almost completely around as well, making it an extremely skilled hunter. Its fangs protrude from the top of its mouth in rows of three like a shark. Even if it's disemboweled or it loses a limb, this creature will still continue to attack in a frenzy.
◉ A stag beetle, except that it's the size of a medium-sized dog. It's still able to fly and its pincers can do damage if it's allowed to get too close. Worse than that, they tend to move in swarms of three or four. Beneath the hard shell are human-like eyes with dilated pupils that follow shadows and light.
◉ A humanoid creature that stands on two legs. Its eyes glow in the dark, catching bits of light from a distance. Upon closer inspection, the creature has snake-scale skin, a long, flickering tail, and claws for hands. These scales are incandescent in nature, shimmering whenever they're underneath enough light.
◉A sloth-like mimic that cries from a distance for help from hidden, high places. Once it hears a voice, it can mimic it, drawing someone in toward it due to it sounding like another Displaced. Getting too close will leave them within reach of the creature that's all arms and little else, leaving a toxic and poisonous trap to weaken its prey. Its hiding places include the rafters, where it may drop on those looking for their friends. Under certain lights, the slothly creature's eyes are humanoid in appearance, sharp and aware — yet still gold.
◉ Humanoid creatures that give off a thick, putrid smell of decay. Not unlike zombies, they move sluggishly, but upon closer inspection, it appears that something is off about these people. They have claws, sharp rows of teeth, and skin that flakes off with every shuffle of their feet. Potentially some early or later stage experiment of the snake-skinned humanoids. They're highly aggressive and will follow someone with the intention of attacking until they're incapacitated.
◉ A cross-breed insect that looks like a mix of a wasp and a mosquito, but is only the size of a dime. Its sting can draw out a large amount of blood, sedating the individual. The toxin that they inject will leave large, red welts, depending on the efficiency of the immune system. They're blotchy and painful. Once they have found a target, they will swarm around that individual all at once.
◉ A naked creature resembling a dog with a reptile's body, with patches of hair. This creature has long rows of crooked fangs protruding from its lips, mouth and tongue, with a large, dilated eye. It has sharp scales on its back to keep it from being touched, but it has a thirst for blood. This creature will attempt to surprise its prey from around corners, jumping onto someone's shoulders with hopes of sticking to them and drawing blood like a reptilian tick.

In addition to the type of monsters seen previously in the research facility outside New Amsterdam, there is an even more horrifying threat, a new monster:

◉ An overwhelming brand of eyeless, bipedal creatures with large rows of teeth that are 7-to-8 feet tall. They're both incredibly aggressive and violent, ready to tear apart anything that comes close to them with open jaws. It'll almost seem like they're inflicted with an insatiable hunger. They're fast, strong, and merciless. And they are not an easy kill.

All of the monsters, both new and old models, will rapidly regenerate and continue to fight even with mortal injuries, unless they are taken out with a killing blow (a head taken out, their heart located and removed, or they're burnt to a crisp). No matter how physically unsettling it may be.

Hopefully someone brought a flamethrower.

> OOC NOTES

This is part of the SAVE CASSIUS PLOT and so it's located outside the simulation, but everyone that has since been woken up by Gabriel and Tony and brought out of New Amsterdam can also participate. For more details, please see the mod write up HERE. This is just for the infiltration/monster fighting, the success or failure of the mission will be addressed in the aftermath post.

Comments

[speediest]

Don't worry, dude. My ability to explode things is gone, I'd have to do it the normal way and I don't think I have the stuff for that? Here anyway. Maybe later!

( ian's head is safe from potential explosions, for today. tommy does whistle when the pipe is held out to him, reaches out to take it with an excitement one should probably not have when accepting the gift of pipes.

except he grabs hold right when ian gets shocked and it travels through his hand, through the pipe, and right into tommy. causes his hair to stick up even worse in a static mess. )

If there were carpets around here I'd go for round two, 'cause I've gotta give you the win there. Thanks for the pipe!

( now he's going to smack everything with it. )

[wittingly]

[ Amid the clatter of Tommy smacking everything with a lead pipe, Ian actually makes some progress. It probably can't be heard through the panels, through the screwdriver in his mouth, and over the ruckus but-- ]

Fuck, I think I found it.

[ Followed by the application of wire cutters, and a lot more pressure than it really ought to take to get through a basic cable.

Finally it gives, snaps away in time with a particularly good bang from Tommy, and all the lights in the room promptly go black. ]

[speediest]

( he doesn't hear. he's busy sticking his head up into the wall and raising the metal pipe up into the hole to try and tear out a thicker cord that's up higher. and as soon as he manages to hook the pipe in under the cord and yank hard enough to get it to pull loose and clang against the wall opposing where it had started out on--

--everything goes dark. hm. for a moment he just squints up towards what he'd just hit before tommy does shuffle out of the wall-hole and raises the piping above his head. )

I did it?

( it's a question. he has no idea what he just did or if it actually worked. but nothing else exciting seemed to have happened so? )

[wittingly]

[ It takes Ian two or three seconds of blinking through the dark to really believe it, and even then he's incredibly slow to peel himself out of that space. Tentative to stand, to look around, and-- shit, yeah, that was it.

And there's Tommy's voice, Ian can see him a little more clearly now that his eyes have adjusted. Clear enough that he can take a step or two over and clap a hand down on his shoulder, a small huff of a laugh under his breath.

Sure, man. You did it.

Rather than outright confirm or deny, he says: ]

I think it's over. I think that should've booted everyone out - you know anybody that was in the sim you can confirm with?

[speediest]

( gross, affirmation. he didn't ask for this!! but whatever, tommy shrugs it off fast anyway, folds his arms back behind his head as he walks through the room towards the way they'd come in from. )

Nope. No one. Except for that Strange guy, I guess? Kind of. Don't really know him, know of him.

( talked to him once here, but never back home because why bother, you know? also it's a different strange-dude than the one back home anyway. not that it matters much. )

You know anyone?

[wittingly]

Don't worry about it, I got it.

[ Murmured absently, because he's already lost in his neural mesh contact list before Tommy even finishes.

Which is.

You know, a little hilarious considering he's only been here since the last batch and he's already got a handful of friendly names in and out of the sim. Fucking social butterfly.

It takes thirty, maybe forty seconds before he finally comes back to himself, beaming. ]

Alright, man, we did it. Fuck yeah.

[speediest]

( sorry usually when he goes off on a tangent it takes him a little less time to get through it than it does for most so it doesn't drag on. but whatever. tommy doesn't care. ian manages fine on his own so he offers him a grin. holds out a fist. )

Sweet! We did it. I knew we had it.

( fistbump him kthnx. )

[wittingly]

[ He definitely knows what a fist bump is, but he's also a total fucking dork, so... instead, he reaches out a hand, curls it around, and shakes his entire fist up and down like a handshake. ]

Go team. Now let's get the fuck outta here.

[speediest]

( what. no, hold on. seriously: what? )

Dude.

( how does he word this even mildly nicely. )

What the heck was that?

[wittingly]

I'm thirty-four.

[ Is his absent answer, shoulder strap going over his head, and a brisk walk toward the exit.

Like that explains everything. ]

[speediest]

Being old isn't an excuse for being lame.

( he's still going to hit everything with his new toy on the way out. thank you for his new favorite pipe. )