With some minor adjustments, you prepare yourself for work at Laurel's. You've got a bunch of extra mouths concealed around, some extra eyes to check for bits of food, and plenty of other tiny tools to ensure you'll have no problem with cleaning out edible trash or inedible trash when you show up. With that relatively simple modification done, you head out, even as you burrow deeper into the earth.
Your tunneler-self worms its way through the dirt and rock, digesting and breaking down the useful minerals it passes through, leaving behind a rough tunnel. Its senses ping off basements in the buildings around you, that you dive lower to avoid - You don't want to risk discovery…yet. Maybe later. However, deeper then the basements, but along the main street, you see a tunnel - It seems to be connected to the buildings around you by…a lot of small tunnels. Pipes? Could that be the sewers? Hm…Interesting. Another point of potential exploration for later. As you're digging, you almost don't notice - A much smaller set of tunnels, with things scurrying around inside. You pause in your digging to watch, as best you can, from a distance. It's…hard to get a look at them, given your lack of senses…You know! You pull back, worming your way through your tunnel, and give yourself a small eye-tentacle, which, upon your return, you gently insert through a wall to watch whatever's going on.
Oh, you see! It's rats! A den of rats! How wonderful! You love these little creatures - And you still feel bad about the ones you couldn't save, in your home. You settle in with your discrete eye-stalk to watch them, dreams of further tunnel expansion forgotten, for the moment…at least in that body. Super Spy continues about your business aboveground, which at the moment, is wiping down equipment for Laurel, as she lectures you.
"The first lesson every mage must learn is discipline. Every mutation or alteration must be purposeful." She instantly spotted your slightly less human form, and set about multi-tasking by working alongside you, lecturing you, and yelling instructions to the people working out in the gym. "Society doesn't accommodate you. Change into something you can't change out of? That's that. You know how hard it is to live life as a squid-woman?" You do, actually, sorta! But you can't really share that with her, so you just shake your head as you keep cleaning. "That's right. Being some kind of tentacled, four-legged creature that takes up half a room is a mess. It'll see you thrown out on the street by most landlords. Then where are you? Reduced to begging for scraps." Her tone is stern, but you feel as if this is somewhat unfairly targeted at tentacled, four-legged, room-sized creatures, of which you could be, if you wanted! But you understand the intent - Not everyone has your set of unique circumstances. This would be good advice…if you weren't yourself, unfortunately.
"Becoming an abhuman is cheating yourself. It's
cheap. That's my take on it. That power
limits you. You can't grow beyond it. Not without altering yourself. That's a great deal harder. A lot of folks never manage it." You pause in your cleaning, struck by a thought. "...Why doesn't someone become an abhuman that can change into a bunch of different things, then? Like…some kind of mimic or something!" You're curious if anybody has been something like you, before. She shakes her head. "Good initiative, but no. Abhumanity is intrinsic to yourself. It can be inherited - But only if it meshes with your soul. Not in some moralist way, either. Doesn't mean anything about your character. Just reflects something about your self-identity." She pauses.
"If someone can change that on a whim, though - it means that their self-identity is malleable. Changeable. Most skilled mages who bother to focus on manifesting abhumanity can. Not newbies." You frown. That's…sorta ringing true to you, but also not really how you do anything. You aren't changing how you view yourself when you sculpt your creations - Though sometimes you do do that, to your
Flesh, but still in a different way than what she seems to be talking about. You also realize that, technically, she's been insulting Sabrina. "...Well, I have abhuman mage friends. They don't seem to be, uh, taking the cheap route to power." Laurel shrugs. "If you say so. It's just my personal philosophy. They're under no obligation to follow my philosophy. They should, though." Speaking of, she whirls around and effortlessly picks out one of the small group performing exercises in the gym, shouting at them. "JACK! YOU THINK I DON'T SEE YOU? DROP AND GIVE ME TWENTY! THEN STOP SCREWING AROUND!" The man follows her orders unquestioningly, dropping to the ground from where he was standing and starting to do push-ups.
"Oh! That reminds me! Is Mister Flynn going to be fighting today?" You tilt your head, hopeful - Fighting means more snacks and food! Laurel shakes her head, though, which causes you to frown. "Not today. Gotta let the crowd recover. Run it too often, enthusiasm drops. Sidney gets bored, too. Probably in a few weeks. Now - Take out that trash." You eagerly drag the can she indicates outside into an alley, and then gorge yourself on the treasure trove of edible food you find in the dumpster outside. It may not be the comparatively fine dining you had last time you were here, but it's biomass!
You're in the middle of gorging yourself when Laurel steps out into the alley, holding a second trash can. You stare at her for a moment, and she stares back. "...Clean up before you come back inside." She drops the trash can by the dumpster before returning indoors. Oh, good! She isn't going to ask any awkward questions about why you were shoveling garbage food into your mouth! You continue to feed, before finishing up by dumping the remaining inedible trash into the large metal container. After that, the day is pretty much normal, though you don't see Mister Flynn at all. At the end of your workday, Laurel takes you aside and counts out a small amount of credits, then pauses, and adds a few more on top. You smile and take them. "Thanks, Laurel!" She nods. "No problem. You did good work." She pauses, displaying something you've never seen before - Internal conflict. After a second or two of silence, she awkwardly adds on an addendum to the sentence. "...Be safe." With that dismissal, you head home, skipping slightly. Wow! Money to exchange for things! Like food! You really think food ought to be free, because biomass is delicious, and also essential for sustaining life, and dying is
bad, but you'll have to sort that out later. You relax in the feeling of a job well done, and the praise of a friend.
When you get home, you check in with Martin. He's asleep in his room - But it is not the sort of sleep you recognize. His arms tremble and you can see his eyes darting around beneath his thin eyelids, a thin hiss of static emerging like a whine from his open mouth. His bottle of medicine sits beside him, emptier than it was before, spoon dropped carelessly beside it. You lean down and touch his hand, and he awakens in an instant from your touch - He stares at you, eyes wide and pupils dilated, unrecognizing of your features for a moment before slowly relaxing back into sleep when you don't move. You don't even think he's conscious, at the moment - His body is just on autopilot. You frown, and stay by his side for the rest of the night. This is definitely troubling, and puts something of a damper on your feeling of triumph about getting money to spend on him. (You've learned one of Martin's keywords:
Sleepless.)
It is April 1st, 1923. You have no current passive gains. Your current goals are to help the man living with you, to investigate Herman's Theater of the Soul, and to close the Poster Portal (Time Limit: Ten Years). Your current Available Biomass is 2. You have a small amount of credits.
Your Current Assets Are (Bolded words are Biomass):
1x Super Spy (Scavenger, False Humanoid, Shield, Poison, Disguise)
1x Tunneler (Ground-Penetrating Radar, Tunnel Boring, Productive, Lithotroph)
Your Current Resources Are:
N/A
Your fully explored areas:
Your Home!
(Sub-Areas of Interest: The Lobby, Empty Apartments, Martin's Apartment, Mossbed, Roof)
You know of the following unexplored areas:
The Street Outside
(Sub-Areas: Jeremy's General Groceries, The Alleyways, The Apartments, Laurel's Boxing, Sabrina's Apartment, Roy's Office, An Empty Alcove, ???)
The Rooftops
(Sub-Areas: ???)
The Underground
(Sub-Areas: Basements, The Sewer, Den of Rats, ???, ???, ???, ???)
Explore a newly discovered location or sub-area! Make sure to specify which asset is exploring - This will have an impact on what may or may not be discovered! Feel free to include write-in instructions if you so desire.
Sometimes, you need to play defense - Or simply linger in an area you've been before! This means patrolling that area and finding out what's changed about it, or if it's going to change in the future.
Frederick was such a nice young man, you feel at least a little obligated to visit! Sure, you don't have any money, but you're sure you can talk your way into it, to at least watch or something. And maybe you'll even see Frederick again!
Note: Visiting here will unlock a new Location. You can assume this of most 'visit' actions.
You're visiting this place with Sabrina to investigate it! So that you can shut it down, because it probably seems to be evil!
You can visit Sabrina whenever you want, if you need her help with something, or if you just want to hang out! Mrs. Johnson has promised to feed you whenever you drop by, which you're quite happy about. Free biomass is always good! Plus, her food actually tastes good. You will gain biomass from this. Feel free to specify topics to discuss with Sabrina (or Mrs. Johnson).
He seems to be lonely, really! Though sometimes he seems like he wants to be lonely, and that's alright. But when he doesn't want to be lonely, you can visit him, and talk! Maybe he can even help you sort out your potentially perilous housing situation…or help you avoid getting in trouble for it, at least! Feel free to specify topics to discuss with Roy.
Well, you've got a standing offer to come clean at Laurel's Boxing! She seems really tough, and Mister Flynn seems to be a bit of a…you think the term is 'scoundrel', but you're looking forward to going there again! Make sure to specify which asset is going to work. You will gain biomass from this. Feel free to specify topics to discuss with Laurel (or Sydney).
Well, he's got a roof over his head, now - But you think you can do more to help him. Food, water, clean clothing, all sorts of things - Or you could just spend time with him! You wonder how many people used to talk to him, while he was outside. He certainly seemed eager to talk when you showed interest.
You need to deal with the Poster, and there's only one way to find out how - Experimentation. Throw something at the poster and see what happens. Note: This may cause damage to whatever assets you throw at the Poster.
Create an asset and pick as many keywords as you'd like for them, so long as you have the Biomass!
Recyle an asset or parts of an asset. Make sure to specify which asset and/or which keywords. Important Note: This can be done in the same 'turn' in which you create a new asset with the biomass from the old asset!
You currently have the
Immutable Keywords of
Magical Biohorror, Broadcaster, Immobile, and
Idealist. You have the normal keywords of
Cute, Pactmaker, Split, Perceptive, Likeable, Refresh, and Recorder. You may add keywords to this, which will not be immutable and can be recycled and changed as you wish!
QM's Note: We'll do 12 hours of moratorium and 48 hours! Enjoy!
