GranspearZX

GM

The scene was something of an ordered chaos when Replica arrived. There were police for blocks, actively moving people away from the building. They'd given the building itself a surprisingly wide berth, however, and on closer inspection, one could see why--there were a number of vehicles on fire in the parking lot, and ad least one had exploded already. Behind the police tape and barricades were two other onlookers .

From where Facsimile was standing. a rooftop nearby, he could see inside the third story window. Not only were there people inside, but he could see some faint purple lights moving on multiple floors. Mannequin wans't far off, and could see the same thing, and the darkeed sky only made the glow that much more obvious and ominous.

"Hm. Yeah." Marcus definitely wasn't going to touch anything that would cause major moves. The rats in the walls were a concern, still, largely because Vermin seemed... well, sisnister seemed like the only appropriate word.He still had some pocket change. He didn't want to simply leave the folks inside...

It would take him about five minutes to create a proper ward. He certainly couldn't tell Filth that; what he had in mind was specifically designed to keep animals out. He was certain the rat wouldn't like it, and he still wasn't sure what Lobisomem was. Part of him was convinced that she was just a human with a really weird form...

"Show us where this 'doctor' is." That wasn't going to stop him from writing the ward on a spare quarter, quietly carving runic symbols into the surface of it as he spoke.

GM

Most of the people had heeded police warnings and stayed away. Rosethorn and Corporis, however, approaching from different directions, found at least two people who didn't seem to be concerned.

A man in a backwards baseball cap with "FCU Hockey" embroidered on it was a good 40 feet or so from the swirling black darkness. In front of him, way closer than he should have been, was a man holding a wireless microphone. Only one of them seemed like they wanted to be there.

"Dude, it's FINE. Just think of the publicity!"

"You don't even know what that thing is!"

"Oh please. Watch." And with that, he picked up a rock... and tossed it in.

Part of it dispersed like smoke on the surface. The field held, though, and they both heard the impact with the snow beyond. "See? You're worried for nothing... ...oh." He looked behind his camera man as two women approached, not sure entirely what to make of them yet.

Can I get a Knowledge (Arcane Lore) roll from the two of you?

Marcus grunted a bit; it was clear who was the dominant party between Vermin and Filth. Giant ants AND mutant fungi... clearly someone knew about what was going dodn here long enough to have written articles about it, but in the grand scheme of things, none of that mattered.

"We get them out of here first," he said, standing upright and looking at the fungus-covered subway cars, "THEN you'll take us to the good doctor. We can talk about your part in it some other time." Marcus looked squarely at Vermin. He didn't trust the rat at all. Possession of the Beast Rune made him understand that rats on the whole often got a bad rap, but the last several minutes made him wary.

He moved towards the cars, doing some quiet calculations in his head. The people didn't seem to be in immediate danger; it wan't melting the metal at the same rate as far as je cpi;d te;;/ Wait. If that's up there now... does the mean that was up there before? Was he overthinking this? Probably. He couldn't help it, though... Something had felt 'off' all day, and fighting his instincts often turned into disasters like this.

As he scoured the rubble for something to use as a medium, he bit back a cough, fighting the urge to scratch at his arm. His body was fighting the fungal mess he'd created, but nothing about the process was pleasant. Even his eyes felt a little scratchy. Stilll, as he picked up a bent steel rod nearby. he spotted a large chunk of concrete, just large enough to fit a few people on.

Marcus looked up. More magical calculation in his head. He couldn't exactly SEE the surface. Using Ventus as a traveling rune to teleport others was something he'd done before, but that was to an object with a fixed location before. He had no idea where they were and he shuddered at the thought of teleporting someone into a wall or into the air where they'd fall to their deaths."...this is gonna be harder than I thought." He looked at Lobisomem and, to a lesser extent, Filth. "Suggestions welsome."

GM

"She doesn't" Kendra seemed awfully sure of that, even without so much as moving. "No pockets, see?"

Indeed, it would have been difficult to carry anything in her state, if she did have any kind of wallet, it wasn't anywhere on her person.

"Don't worry though. She'll wake up and tell you everything you want to know. And some things you don't." The disappeared behind the seat and popped back up with a change of clothes and shoes from the exact same gym bag from before."These are for her. They'll fit, so no need to worry about that." With that, Kendra stood up and headed towards her seat in the back to gather the rest of her stuff. The bus slowed down again, this time in the parking lot of a reasonably sized motel. It was the sort of place where all the rooms were connected to the outside, and across the parking lot from the motel was a small gas station and a diner. It looked almost like an ideal place for truckers to stop for a night--had there been any truckers in the vicinity, anyway.

Taylor hopped off the bus and Benny walked back to Luther and the girl. "So how's our mystery girl?"

GM

The bus was anything but full; much  of the equipment and personnel had actually gone a day or so ahead of the bus. The girl who had brought the blanket and water to Benny seemed especially concerned; the woman didn't answer as she fell  fully unconscious.

"Kendra, would you mind..." The girl nodded as Benny spoke and hurried off to the back of the bus, returning moments later with a small gym bag, out of which she took a plastic box that read "First Aid Kit" on the top. It was a simple store-bought kit that, until now, hadn't been opened yet. Benny rubbed at the back of his neck as Kendra offered the box to Luther.

"What in the blazes was she doin', wanderin' out there like that..." Looking back to the front o the bus, Taylor stepped back on, having done a lap around the bus with his flashlight. He waved it at Benny before turning it off and sliding back into the driver's seat. "You two keep an eye on her, hm?" With that, he left Kendra and Luther to look after and treat the woman, as he headed back to the front of the bus.

"She looks pretty bad," Kendra commented. She was definitely two or three years younger than Luther, with long black hair and sharp blue eyes. She leaned forward on the seat in front of the pair; she almost seemed relieved. "Could have been a lot worse."

She doesn't have any severe injuries. Quite a few cuts and bruises, a little dehydrated and definitely exhausted, but she'll recover!

GM

Taylor raised an eyebrow at Luther's declaration o 'we can help'. He didn't seem entirely sure getting involved. Benny, on the other hand, called out something in French to someone else who had stepped out of the bus to investigate. After a few moments she came back out of the bus, handing Benny a blanket and a bottle of water.

"You can't..." The woman's voice was hoarse "Can't... make me..." It didn't take much to see the woman was exhausted. She gripped and clawed at Luther, far too weak to do anything but ruffle his clothing, but damn if she wasn't trying to put up a fight for several moments before she realized--vaguely--what was happening. She was fading in an out of consciousness, but she didn't seem to have any major physical injuries. She didn't seem to be carrying anything either, and she was barefoot.

"Here." Benny finally approached and offered Luther the Blanket and water. "...we're not far from the hotel. Might as well bring her with us. We can call someone when we get there...cellphone reception out here is iffy." Using a phone on Louisiana roads was often a losing battle; the trees ining the sides of the roads in most places were tall enouh that it was simply better to wait. That didn't stop Taylor from checking his, though, thick eyebrows furrowed in frustration.

Arc is going to use the Wound Transfer spell again via his enchanted coin!

Clearly that wasn't this kid's real name. Marcus straightened up a bit, taking special note of the knife and pistol... and the rat that was entirely too comfortable riding shotgun on Filth's shoulder. Marcus could only assume that he lived down here. It wouldn't have been his first encounter with the city's more literal underground elements.

The Beast Rune burned against his shoulder blade as he gripped Santa's shoulder. even while the sewer worker was talking, Marcus whispered the words activating the Wound Transfer coin's magic. His own regenerative powers had nearly healed his arm, and while he couldn't figure out what the infection was, he was certain it couldn't be THAT bad if Santa could speak. It was going to suck. But this was his fault anyway.

the Eyes of the Dragon ensured that he wasn't missing anything--at least not visually. More than once he caught the rat staring right at him... and it was clear that Filth understood it. For now, his focus was on the magic he was already using.

"It's on top of the...? oh. Pretty sure that's not alien." Marcus looked at the fungus on top of the cars and instantly he'd decided how he was going to deal with it. It couldn't spread spores of the whole thing was on fire.

Spending as much time as he had on War-Earth made him a little less skittish around strange creatures, but Lobisomem was weird on a level he wasn't entirely prepared for. Still, it wasn't actively eating people, which made him think 'weird but harmless'. So far, he hadn't had any reason to believe otherwise. He was quick to treat the creature like any other person--and he was stand-offish with pretty much everyone.

"Call me Marcus." Out of the corner of his eye, he looked at Lobisomem, the shapeshifting magic altering his vision making his eyes look like they were on fire. "...not 'beast'." He had to admit, "Beast" didn't have a terrible ring to it.

Whatever it was, it was awfully bossy. Another oddly reassuring affirmation of how 'human' it was. In any other situation, he might've found it funny. His main concern now was the stranger he saw in the distance.

He definitely wasn't there before.

Marcus was tired, sore, and frustrated, but he wasn't so much of any of those things that he would have missed someone. The huge rat on his shoulder didn't go unnoticed either; that wasn't something that simply happened every day. The paranoia of the Beast Rune instantly put him on edge. He strained a bit, trying to hear what they had to say... he was certain it wasn't anything good.

GM

"Yep. Got a ways before we hit Shreveport," Benny reported, looking back towards the front of the bus. Taylor isn't drivin' all night, he says, so we're gonna get some rest out near Calvin, looks like.."

Taylor Walters was the group's strong man. In the time that Luther had known him, Taylor hadn't spoken a word. A simple nod here, a smile and a gesture there, the brown-haired bruiser looked every bit the part of an Olympic powerlifter.

"I'll probably feel better once we get to our next big stop. I've lived in Louisiana almost all my life, but these back roads still make me antsy." Almost as if on cue, the bus jarked a little. Benny gripped the seat and stood upright. "Huh. We're slowing down..."

The bus slowed to a full stop ad Benny shuffled to the front of the bus. Out in the middle of the road was a woman in a tattered dress. She looked like she'd been running through the woods for some time, covered in all manner of dirt and grime.

Can I get a Notice check?

GM

January 26, 2018

Everything was going to hell.

By all rights, Tandem Robotics was just a research and development company that no one really knew much about or paid any real attention to. They were a well-funded business nonetheless, and in the last five years had been making forays into the realm of energy production. For a while, it was all theoretical research, nothing truly noteworthy. Somewhere in the last two weeks, however, everything changed.

The blackout stretched for blocks. By the time police were on the scene, the overcast skies lent an ominous aura to the entire situation. And it was very much a situation. The seven story structure where Tandem Robotics was housed seemed to be in some sort of lockdown. Witnesses were being interviewed, but police had surrounded the building, trying to keep people out and witnesses/victims secure. The violet beam sending pulsing waves of light into the night sky didn'tseem to be helping matters at all, either.

Right up until it wasn't.

GM

January 26, 2018, 3:30 pm

It wasn't terribly unusual for strange things to happen out in Wharton State Forest. The wildlife made it dangerous enough, though no more dangerous than any other forest, all things considered. Campers and hunters frequented parts of it, so a distinctly human presence made it manageable. Nevertheless, there where times when things just took an unexpected turn--strange sightings, weird noises... and it seemed this was no different.

Even from a mile or two away, one could see it: a great black haze covering a considerable portion of the woods like an opaque dome. Trees withered at its edges, and by all accounts, the dome was slowly expanding. The shadowy blight reeked of something ancient and terrible, attracting the attention of at least two interested parties...

Destroying the cursed daystar for fun and profit! Only without the profit!

OOC thread for Corporis (@Thogphog) and Rosethorn (@Darksider42)!

Arc's gonna shapeshift his vision!

Super-Senses 18 (Counters Concealment [Visual]; Counters Illusion [Visual], Rapid 2 [Vision], Detect Life 2, Spatial Awareness) [18/35pp] [Eyes of the Dragon]

So I've got Supercape's up, and if you're still game for a thread, Cubismo, I could loop Replica in with the thread I'm going to start with Facsimile and Mannequin. OOC is here.

Scientists playing with things they don't understand? Accidental dimensional repercussions? YES PLEASE!

This thread is for Facsimile, Mannequin, and Replica (maybe?).

For a couple of seconds, Arcturus blacked out.

The sudden shift in the ground combined with the sharp pain persisting in his arm weren't exactly kind to him, and he didn't remember when exactly he faded out of consciousness. Somewhere mid-fall, there was a sound like shattering glass as his bear form wore off, leaving him lying off the floor.

'Floor' was relative. Evverything hurt. His arm had gone numb and he could hear what was going on around him. This was his fault. He hesitated and this was where he'd ended up. It seemed he hadn't learned a thing from Johannesburg. Marcus rolled over. Nothing seemed broken. His arm was even starting to heal. It seemed that Animus was a little more active.. Marcus was sure that had something to with the temptation to unleash Ignis. The strange creature, though, didn't seem to get a reaction from the Beast Rune; it normally made him a little paranoid, but this time... nothing.

Marcus forced himself upright. He was furious--at himself, at this situation, at these fungi and at the universe at large.  What will you burn? The elder's voice echoed in his head... it almost made him the creature speaking to him.

"...I'm thinking." Well, it wanted to save people. That was a good sign. Outside of waiting for rescue workers to show up, he wasn't sure what he could do without risking further harm and injury to anyone. And the fall guaranteed that it would take that much longer... there was no time. He reached into his pocket and palmed the coin he'd cobbled together earlier--he really needed to name it.  The fact that he was considering using it again was hardly his stupidest decision of the day. As the man reached out to him, Marcus took him by the wrist, kneeling down beside him.

"You're gonna be okay... just relax."

He thought of Teresa. He'd been thinking about her a lot today. This was what she was good at. She was amazing in a crisis. Now is NOT the time. Guiding the man to lie down, he looked out into the darkness. It was about time he stopped avoiding the form he was almost certain he was going to have to use now. Hesitation had caused this. He wasn't going to go through that again. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. When he exhaled and opened his eyes, they had a distinct red glow and his pupils were more cat-like than human. He couldn't see color this way, but at least eh could see.

"I can probably figure something out. A way to get all these people to the surface... but it's gonna take a while. And I don't know if we have that kind of time..."

"A faerie..." He repeated the word. Now he remembered where he'd encountered the scent before. It reminded him of someone he hung around with during his sophomore and junior years at Claremont. All things considered, that didn't surprise him as much as the idea of someone of the Fae Realm owning a bookstore.

Then again, he was an unemployed shapeshifter. Perspective.

"Oh, I'm not a danger to anyone," he said reassuringly. "The quickest way to summarize it is that I can take on animal forms. Usually with elemental magic. There won't be any rampating or anything like that." Marcus's training in the use of his magic was incomplete, he realized, but hardly in a dangerous way. There were forms he hadn't yet mastered but  he at least knew he wan't going to shift and go wild.

Arcturus cursed inwardly; only after the fact did he realize how stupid what he had done was. The pain in his arm was still stubbornly refusing to heal, and it was beginning to drive him a little crazy. He wasn't sure what he expected to happen... but it certainly wasn't THAT. 

It could have been avoided. Spores and goo notwithstanding, he felt sick.

He wasn't sure what to make of the creature when he saw it. He immediately tensed up, covered in fungal grossnes. For that matter, he almost didn't notice the falling subway car because of it and his own distraction. The threat it leveled at him actually didn't seem to register.

...oh crap.

The huge bear immediately moved, trying to help as best he could.

GM

January 23, 2018, 7:30 p.m.

Calvin, Louisiana

It was the sort of town that one could very easily miss.

It had all the hallmarks of an ordinary town, of course--churches, stores, schools. Most people simply passed right on through--not hard considering there was only one traffic light and a population of less than 300. For that matter, it was hard to imagine anyone going there on purpose. And yet, it seemed to be where Lament was headed.

He wasn't alone, of course. The weather was cold enough that hitchhiking was a terrible idea, and He had spent the last two days on a rented charterbus traveling north towards Arkansas. They had made a few stops on the way, participating in local fairs that had all been relatively successful. The group's manager, Benjamin "Benny" Rougeau invited the traveling showman to stay as long as he liked, and the rest of group seemed perfectly fine with it; one got the impression that many had drifted in and out of their ranks with very little incident.

Benny was easily in his 60s, tall and broad-shouldered, with a reddish-gray beard and a receding hairline well covered up by a customized cap that read "Rougeau's Rogues". While most of the group was fast asleep, Benny made his way through to check on everyone, gently waking anyone asleep to let them know they'd be stopping at a hotel soon. He stopped at Luther's seat. "How you holdin' up, son?"

OOC for incoming thread!