Food Chain (Worm/Evolve Quest)

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They don't seem like they're going to attack, there isn't any sounds of my cage shifting in any way. Part of me wants to just crawl back into my egg and hide, my spines twitching, constantly making me aware of how vulnerable I am. Pushing it down instead focus on the fact that I can't get out, not the best idea because that thought definitely isn't helping me calm down. Focus on the fact that the pair must be intelligent since they made this trap for me, and since I can't leave, I should probably be gathering a bit of information about who they are. Keeping myself compressed as much as I can, nearly touching the ground, while hugging the base of my egg I peer around it to where I know the creatures are.

My first impression is that of a Goliath, but that doesn't really match. They are tall but thin, a bit of muscle visible, but nowhere near enough to do real damage to anything bigger than them. Or maybe even something their own size, because my gaze follows their arms down and see that neither of them have claws at all! They do have an extra digit though, so they can probably use tools too, but no claws? How do they hunt?

I drag my attention away from their blunt hands, my examinations take me to their head. They have two eyes set deep in their skulls, big, and I can see them tracking me even though my crest is barely peeking around my egg. It hurts my pride a bit knowing that my stealth was foiled so easily, but there is literally nothing to hide with here, so I try not to let it cut too deep. That doesn't mean I am going to just drop the attempt, though. Curling back, I take a few seconds, keenly aware that since all the walls are transparent that the thin things could just move around the outside to see me, and glance around the other side.

Once again, both sets of those dim eyes snap to my crown and I have to resist every urge to hide, everything telling me that I've been found. Their mouths are big, taking up nearly a fourth of their face. And their hair, it stops almost right away around their face and I can't see any more on the parts of the body visible.

Then there is the armor. It is loose, thin, and not even partially colored like the surrounding room. I guess this might be a kind of nest, so they don't need the camouflage, but I can't imagine any sort of environment that might match the weird colors and patterns. But then it doesn't even completely cover their limbs! Leaving almost all of their arms unprotected, and their skin doesn't really look that tough. I guess there is the possibility that they have some armor they add then leaving the nest.

"Slick way of feeding it. No need to risk it getting out." Anticipation, mirth.

"Yep! Multiple grates, and it even works as the vent for air filtration." Pride, glee.

"So. How are you going to give it water?" Curiosity, mirth.

The pair are silent for a few seconds, the one on the left, who is shorter and much skinnier than the other, slowly turns their head to look at the other one who is bearing their teeth.

"Oh. Fucking dammit. I knew there was something I was forgetting." Shame.

"And the tank is going to need cleaning at some point, you're not planning on just leaving it in there with its shit, are you?" Curiosity, warning.

"No, I guess not. Damn. So much for the foolproof cage." Disappointment, shame.

The larger one moves and for a moment I almost think I am about to watch a fight, but the limb just comes down on the shoulder of the smaller one, who doesn't react in a hostile way. They make sounds to each other, too quiet for me to hear through the walls. Watching them, I do see their mouths moving a lot, which lines up with my guess that I've been hearing communication, because whatever is being delivered must be more complicated than a simply 'stay away' 'listen' or 'follow' message.

"Well. I guess we have to put it somewhere else while you clean the cage, I can probably get a cat carrier pretty easily." I don't know what tone is in the sentence, but it seems like it is something on the calmer side.

"It'll probably be a bit before I can do a proper modification. Just as a warning. Our monthly stream is coming up too, and it being our heist on the Rig seems like a good idea." Excitement, disappointment.

"Sure. What game are you thinking?" Curiosity.

"How about… Metal Gear?" Anticipation.

"Sounds good. For now, we probably need to get some water in there at least. Plus, it's been watching us the whole time." Worry, suspicion.

Suspicion? About what? Me? I haven't done anything that would make them scrutinize me, have I? The idea of being examined in detail by something so big and unknown… I hate it. Feelings of discomfort and fear prickle at the folds of my greater mind. I don't even know what they smell like! I hope my guesses at the tone are wrong, though. My brief distraction means that I miss a few more sounds, though they were quick and somewhat hushed, so I don't know if I would have been able to analyze them anyway.

One leaves the room and the other starts doing something with the top of my cage, and the vent above me starts getting moved. Are they coming inside? My heart starts to speed up a bit and I feel pinned, unsure if I should be getting ready to attack or try and flee.

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What do your urges settle into?
[X] Flee, as best you can in this enclosed space, anyway. These things are way bigger than you, no way you can take one down in a fight. Plus, they might want revenge for your meal.
[X] Escape? They'll have to put their arms in to do whatever they are trying to do, you could use them to climb out? Maybe.
[X] Attack. They are responsible for your imprisonment, and you could probably take it down. Weak armor, no claws, their only real advantage is their size.
[X] Write-In:
(Note: Write-In's must be simple in direction or concept. Your votes are instincts, not complex thoughts.)
(Votes are done in the approval style, where you can vote for more than one option that you like.)

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It's the bigger of the two, so fighting would be a bad idea, and the cage isn't big enough to effectively run away, not to mention the lack of cover, so I settle on a different option. Playing dead. Now, how do I do it? Just dropping wouldn't work, they saw me looking at them a moment ago. Maybe I can pretend the food was poisoned? If I threw up… The very idea makes me hungry, but I can eat more when I am free.

I start making evil, keening noises as I force my stomach to start getting upset. IT is hard, because the meal only really made it so that my hunger wasn't mind-numbing, it didn't really fill me. Still, I harden my resolve and start to throw up the dark red nutrients that I absorbed less than five minutes ago. Curling in on myself, in a purposefully less uniform manner than usual, the sounds I am making start to take on a sharper edge as my stomach acid bites at my throat and jaw, helping me add some sounds of pain. Dropping my connection with the energy keeping me afloat, I fall, a bit painfully, into the slurry and start twitching. I keep up the act for a few seconds before going still, taking very shallow breaths.

I can't see it, but I know that the top of my cage is removed because of the sudden rush of air as well as the various new sounds popping into existence. The loudest sound by far is the elevated noises of the gangly creature, way too fast for me to even start listening to. A good chunk of me wants to take a deep breath and smell all the new scents, but I can't because that would give me away. I don't have eyes, though, so I can still see without issue, which lets me see the approaching shadow as the creature reaches out its hand.

It takes everything in my power to not screech and thrash as the hand takes hold of me and squishes my spines. Pain races through me as I am grabbed like a rock and my vision is filled with the wide, dull, eye of the creature. I twitch entirely unintentionally as the pain from the two crushed spines races right to my vertebrae and throughout my body.

The creature leans away, and I can hear them and the other one talking rapidly. Suddenly I am moving too fast to even comprehend what I am seeing, though there are some short bursts of pain and hunger outside the natural pain radiating through me and my now once again empty stomach, meaning I am probably moved past the technology I saw in the room I hatched in.

All cognitive thought is briefly eradicated from my mind as the hand holding me lets go, and I am dropped right on my spines, all six of them. Somehow I manage to not move or make a sound, but deep, pulsing pain radiates though my whole body, making my sight become hazy and a monotonous ringing cloud my hearing. It takes a while for thoughts to start returning to my head, and the first one is that I hate the bigger one of the pair and while held I got a good amount of its scent, so I won't forget anytime soon.

My other senses clear up soon after, though my spines are in too much pain to give me any information on the area. Using my field of view and straining my hearing, I can hear communication happening from a good distance away. Slowly I move my head to that my crest is pointed towards the sounds but can't see the big-headed creatures at all. Taking a risk, I let the energy lift me again so that my movements are much quieter and flip over. The rush of relief that hits me as my spines are freed out from under me is like a cold wind on my burning nerves. Rising up, when the sounds don't suddenly stop or start getting closer, I take in my surroundings.

I am on a long, elevated, rectangular piece of wood with some lower platforms with their own walls, made from wood as well, on each of its longer sides. Further away, there is a large flat device, that doesn't make my head hurt or make me hungry, in front of an even larger fuzzy object that has a similar shape to the smaller wooden objects near me. Otherwise, is mostly empty, though the metal nest's area is huge, I can't even see the opposite walls.

Taking a deep breath I am inundated with smells I can't even start to identify, which makes me happy beyond measure, but I can also smell nature in a way that could only mean outside. Following the smell, I am able to find a row of thin boxes with their own transparent walls, one of which is angled inwards and is the source of the outside smell. There are some boxes under it, but they don't reach all the way up, so I would have to try and climb the metal, which would probably hurt my blade arms and be quite loud.

Doing another scan of the room, I am able to spot a door with a space along the bottom I can almost definitely squeeze through. I have to look away, though, as there are a few things of technology near the door that start making the edges of my brain pulse with pain and cause my stomach to squeeze painfully.

The window would be louder, if I can even anchor my blade arms into the metal wall, but the door is going to make me get near that technology…

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One of the factors that really made that work is the duo's unfamiliarity with bio creations, something they stay away from for pretty obvious reasons.

Which path would be best?
[X] Try the window.
[X] Try the door.
[X] Look for something else?
-[X] Write-In: (what?)
(Votes are done in the approval style, where you can vote for more than one option that you like.)

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Both options are bad, right now at least. I just want to curl up and rest, to give my back a chance to recover, which would give me back my airflow sense too. So finding somewhere to rest would let me accomplish two things at once. To rest, I need to find somewhere to hide. Nests are usually safe and leaving could lead to more danger anyway, which I don't really want to put myself in without being in top condition. So hiding it is.

That settled, I do another sweep of the room, this time looking for the nooks and crannies. The examination has me land on a different section of the room, adjacent to the one I am currently in, this one dominated by a long counter with a series of smaller doors underneath it, which holds promise. There is also a strange metal box with a see-through front, which disqualifies that as a hiding spot. The metal box splits the row of doors into two sections, one with three doors and the other with four. I choose the one with four because it should give me a lower chance of getting found by accident.

I swim over to the edge of the wood slab I am on and let myself drop onto one of the smaller squares, letting the energy around me cushion the fall. Repeating the process, I make it to the floor and quickly glide to my chosen half of the doors. Taking a deep breath, I don't smell the pair anywhere near, nor do I smell anything already inside the wooden container. Using my claws, with a bit of difficulty due to its weight, I manage to get the door open wide enough to slip inside, making sure to slowly pull the door closed, that way it doesn't slam and give me away.

The doors don't seem to close cleanly, which lets strips of light that sneak through and allow me to see. The inside is bigger than I thought it would be, it seems that the doors don't go to individual compartments, but a bigger one linked with two doors. There isn't much in here, just a few oddly shaped pieces of metal—

"Oh fuck no."

My examinations are cut short as one of the creatures roars, apparently noticing my absence. Taking a deep breath, I can watch their scent-shapes move around a bit frantically. I can hear a few emotions clear as day, panic, anger, fear. The big one, the one that crushed my quills, heads to the door flanked with the machines, followed by the sound of it opening and closing, meaning it probably left. The other one moves somewhere else, too far away for me to smell or hear with the wood container muffling the world.

I could rest like I was planning, but I didn't think that one of them would leave…

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A shorter chapter, but sometimes that happens with Quests ^-^

With one gone…
[X] Resting is still the best option. Your back is in too much pain for going into the unknown to be worth it.
[X] Maybe you could do a bit of hunting? Some animals keep food in their nests.
[X] Make a break for it, with only one here you have a better chance at not being caught.
-[X] Try the window.
-[X] Try the door.
[X] Write-In:
(Note: Write-In's must be simple in direction or concept. Your votes are instincts, not complex thoughts.)
(Votes are done in the approval style, where you can vote for more than one option that you like.)

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… Or I could make a break for it and be prey to any number of things bigger than me, which right now is almost everything. Some small part of me feels that being this little is wrong, but I also don't have any way to be sure about that, no other Wraiths around to ask, so it might just be… Envy? Longing? I don't know what to call the feeling, but it's not nice.

Pushing those distractions aside, I listen intently on the world outside my hiding place, smelling periodically as well, but the one creature still in the nest never comes close. I can hear it doing something, or the echoes of something larger being done that I assume is from it. The door out there doesn't open either, so the other one is still out, probably looking for me. A small sense of relief settles into my chest and I let myself start to relax after nothing develops for a few minutes.

As I unwind, the sensations that fell to the wayside start to really clog my mind. The two biggest ones are of course my hunger and want to eat, but also the deep soreness permeating my spines, especially the two that were directly crushed. Trying to twist so that I can reach to feel them doesn't work, my arms are not long enough, so I have to rely on feel to tell if they are damaged, which I don't think they are? I didn't realize how sensitive they were, but it makes sense in hindsight, if they can detect movement in the air then they would be susceptible to damage too.

Moving my attention, I assess the two-ish piles of weirdly shaped metal pieces that are being housed in here. The two piles are haphazardly stacked in both rear corners of the space, with a smaller but still slightly raised point where their runoff meet. The low light level doesn't let me see if there is dust or anything that would tell me how often this chamber is accessed, so I just have to hope it isn't often.

Gliding forward, I pick up one of the smaller pieces, a sharply angled thing barely bigger than my hand with holes throughout its design. Comparing it to the pile, I can't see a single piece that matches it, though there are a few that look similar, none of which give me any hints as to what it is supposed to be used for. Slowly setting it down, I swim up the middle mound and try to find a 'natural' pocket or nook for me to slip into, but none reveal themselves. I could probably make my own? There are plenty of somewhat larger chunks of metal, and the stacks don't seem to have any sort of layout, so moving the pieces around shouldn't raise alarms.

Choosing the side that is further from the wider room, I slowly start gathering a few bigger pieces to serve as the frame for the almost cave that I'm making. A lot of the pieces are really heavy, too heavy for me to move, which means that I can't choose some of the parts that I would have preferred, but with how many options there are it doesn't really matter. The overall shape quickly forms, and I could just use it as is, but drifting back to the doors and looking back, it sticks out like a flower.

So I start to find smaller bits of metal and begin to slide them and stack them together in a way that leaves the opening pressed against the back of the container I am in, meaning it doesn't sick out as much. It is a slow process, metal hitting metal often making me freeze and listen and smell for the one still here, but nothing comes of my mistakes, thankfully. My four limbs make keeping it stable as I slide badly shaped chunks into place.

The space I make is a bit bigger than my egg was, enough that I can shift without hitting the sides, though if I stretch out too much it's limitations quickly become apparent. Not that I mind, it is mainly for rest anyway, so I'll be curled up. Thinking of, the constant lifting and intermittent bursts of panic from something falling or clicking together in a way I hadn't intended, has worn down the last bits of my energy anyway so I slither into my temporary burrow and bundle up into a tight ball, slowly relaxing into something that isn't quite sleep, because I'm really sleepy, but close to it.

Only to be interrupted by the main door slamming followed by some communication. I take a deep breath and can see the scent silhouette moving to the wood platform I had been dropped onto and sitting on the smaller ones near it. Another breath lets me track the other, smaller, creature to enter my range and sit across from the other one, and they begin to talk, though some of it I still can't really tell the emotion of.

"Nothing. Perimeter scans show some things moving around about the right size, but all the ones I managed to actually check ended up being birds or some rats. Though there are some Merchants moving around the area, so we should probably chase them away soon." Anger, regret, disappointment.

"Shit, so it's gone gone?" Shame, disappointment.

"It would seem so." Shame, disappointment.

"Motherfucker." Shame, disappointment.

"Hey, it's not the end of the world. You can just tune the scanner to be broader once we get it, yeah?" Calm, curiosity.

"Tune it to the residuals in the tank, then just drive around town looking for it… Yeah, I can do that." Anticipation.

"And if it managed to trick us, then it probably isn't in any danger of being killed out there." Reassurance.

"True. Though how much of it was planned and how much was just capitalizing on the situation, I'm not sure."

"How do you mean?" Curiosity.

"Well, I don't think there are any animals that can puke on command. Some people can, and we know how to induce it, but either of those would mean that it is more intelligent than we were thinking. Right?" Curiosity.

"Maybe, it is a Biotinker creation though, so it might just have some of that stuff programmed into it." Curiosity.

"Fair."

It is quiet for a few more minutes, only punctuated by the sounds of mechanical fidgeting, before one of them starts talking again.

"We should probably head home for the night, it's already eleven." Regret, sadness.

"I know. It just… I'm probably not going to be able to sleep." Anger.

"Studies show—" Mirth.

"Shut up. I get it, I get it. I just hate having to go to work."

"Subs aren't coming in like they used to. Hopefully the Rig heist gives us a bit of relevance again. Use that to get back into the swing of things." Sadness, hope.

"I could use one of my sick days to sick here for the night." Hope.

"You don't have many of those left, I had to call in for you yesterday because you were still in your fugue." Regret.

"I haven't even managed to get the security system fully set up, man."

"Then we'll have to trust the mundane one to do its job, that's what we got it for." Mirth.

I watch them get up, and feel my heart rate spike as a bit of dread fills me. One of them gets close, and I can hear them open the door to my current hiding place. It doesn't last long thankfully, they toss something in that lands with a metal clatter before letting the door swing closed on its own, which is really loud in this small space.

There are the sounds of movement and the door opening, a few odd beep sounds, and then the door closes. I stay frozen still for a little bit longer, but nothing comes of it. A deep breath fails to reveal either the dull eyed creature's presences, and my hearing doesn't detect anything other than a few whirring noises far away.

Letting myself relax a bit, I settle back into the not-quite-sleep rest that I had been enjoying a few moments ago. The world quickly looses focus, and I let myself settle, the energy flowing through me loosing focus to the point I am basically laying on the uneven metal that serves as the 'ground' for my little cave.


I don't know how long has passed, but I do know that I can't rest anymore, as my stomach as started to screech at me again. Slowly uncurling, I stretch out, a small burst of refreshment flowing into my spines as they twitch freely. Only the two that were directly crushed still have a deep soreness towards their base. I can't help a little trilling chirp that emerges from my throat as I start getting feedback from the air, even if all that it is telling me is that there is no motion nearby that isn't me.

Sniffing doesn't give me anything either, and it is just as quiet as it was when I first curled up. So the creatures are probably still out, hunting? Maybe, but the artificial suns are still burning outside the door, so I don't know how long it's actually been, maybe it's only been a few minutes?

Detaching myself from those thoughts, I turn my attention to what the next step should be. I've made a hidden nest, how hidden though I don't know, and it is probably pretty safe in here so just doing some hunting could be good, to use this next more. But I can't smell or hear any prey nearby, which makes sense because you don't usually keep pests in your roost. Would I count as a pest to the creatures? Probably, they are way bigger than me, after all.

Part of me doesn't want to stick around, though, the creatures are dangerous. If not with claws or armor, then just because of how surprisingly strong they are for their proportions.

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I think I structured the vote below right, but how the tally system works is mostly an enigma, so.

You're hungry, and want to eat, but can probably do something that isn't hunting. For now.
[X][Step] Try hunting in the nest. They treated the meal they gave you too causally for it to be something hard to find. If you can't find anything after a bit…
-[X][Fail] come back to this hiding spot.
-[X][Fail] keep looking, but outside.
If you find something after a bit…
-[X][Find] come back to this hiding spot.
-[X][Find] use the energy to escape.
[X][Step] They are probably long gone by now, so you shouldn't stick around, since you don't know when they will be coming back.
[X][Step] Write-In:
(Note: Write-In's must be simple in direction or concept. Your votes are instincts, not complex thoughts.)
(Votes are done in the approval style, where you can vote for more than one option that you like.)