Remove ads

Our Ruin, Our Truth - Prototype Human Weapon Quest

Reader mode
Okay, voting is slowing down, so unless there is a surge of activity, I will be closing it soon.

EDIT: THE VOTE IS NOW CLOSED.

Nemesis, Incarnate / Our Other Home wins.
 
Last edited:
Remove ads
04. Prologue IV
  • Threadmarks
    • [X] Nemesis, Incarnate
    [X] Our Other Home

    At first, Olwen attempts to ignore the warning signs coming from her leg. She promises herself she will just power through whatever, teeth gritted.

    "I've been through worse," she declares to the abattoir-like air, and for a time it even rings somewhat true. The first few dozen meters are quick, and surprisingly manageable. And then, she lands her feet at the wrong angle; bends her bad leg the wrong way. For a moment, the world is a blinding flash; her teeth bite deep enough into her tongue that she tastes blood. Afterwards, it's no longer easy.

    The problem with pain is that with enough of it, it becomes a physical weight, sometimes too heavy to carry. Olwen's hand finds the edge of a door; without it, she would fall, with very scant chances for lifting herself up. The corridor ahead is bathed in red emergency lights; they pulse with the rhythm of bursts of pain threatening to rip her leg apart. A few stray tears well in the corners of her eye. The blaring of the alarm sirens disappears in the booming rush of her own heart struggling to keep the body up. A few ragged breaths is all the rest she can allow herself, but she must rest, and must not allow herself to trip.

    She inhales, air burning its way into her lungs.

    There are no more screams reaching her, and only one body smeared over the empty corridor ahead of her. The long bloodstain behind it gleans strangely, the red lights reflecting and refracting into a spectrum of purples and violets. Compared to what she has moved through moments ago, the display is modest in its gruesomeness. The station personnel must have stopped trying to fight the Existential Weapon at some point. Or maybe Olwen has just strayed from the route the prototype girl took. The command center demanded a different fork in the path; thankfully, the inner plan of the station is not too complicated and Olwen can follow it from her memory.

    There are many small things that occupy her mind as she catches her breath. For example, trying not to think about how any moment can be her last; if the Eschaton Protocol fires she may well not even get a chance to feel the nuclear pulse swallow her whole. Likewise, she pushes off her worries about Red and Lynx, hoping that they will be alright in spite of the overwhelming odds she has pitted them against. Mostly, however, she just works towards whimpering the pain away, with little result.

    Her datalink buzzes, but checking it would require taking a hand off the wall, or off the cane. That is a risk she can't take. As quickly as she can only allow herself to be slow, she starts shuffling forward again, each step a fresh new nail driven into her ruined joints. The corpse draws closer now; it is not the station's security. Ragged claw-marks streak across the plates of its combat armor; its arm, bent at an odd angle, still clutches a high-performance combat rifle. One of Yana's commandos, forever stripped of identity by the blow that ripped their face clean off. As Olwen passes by it, the purple refractions in their splattered blood bend into shape, a reflection looming a step behind. Startled, she whips her head around – but it was just a trick of the pulsing glow, and of her strained mind. She swallows spit and blood, hoping that her mind will hold for a while longer.

    Rows of doors line the corridors, opening to laboratories and storerooms stacked with baffling machinery. In the dim light, their metal shapes rise into grotesque shadows. Some of them are gutted, long strands of wiring hanging loose from where macro-data storage units have been hastily ripped from their sockets. Olwen knows why, but through the haze of hurt and fear, the realization barely registers with the impact it should have. Perversely, this may be a benefit of pain. The more it overtakes her, the more each step stokes the fire burning through her nerves, the less anything means, or matters. All the fear, all that worry, all that is briefly swept away with each step, and then again, and again, and again.

    There is no one to hear her, so she doesn't even try to bite down on the voicing. Any bit of reprieve helps. The station is increasingly a blur, a sea of light and sound splashing against her senses; they sink deeper and deeper beneath its surface. She keeps moving, past more doors, through the spiral path wound across the station's central spindle. The labyrinth, she has to hope, will lead her to the right place, eventually. Maybe even in time, too. Red saturates her vision; she is no longer sure if it is the stress, the hurt, or just the lights.

    There is a peculiar, burnt smell in the air; she doesn't recognize it. Fine flakes of ash flitter through the air around her; when they touch her jacket, the stains they leave are purple too deep to be real. The lucid part of hers assumes them to be hallucinations, her brain going haywire under tension. She can't fault it, she only wishes it will hold on just for a few moments longer. She needs to keep moving. Losing touch can sometimes help; it wouldn't be the first time she's been through that. Her senses dim and start to shutter. She would give a world for the right to sit down and not move. A part of her, one that has kept quiet for a very long time, snakes up from the recess of her mind, letting her think just how much relief the nuclear fire would bring.

    The "no" she tries to utter into the red light and siren's wail is a garbled, ugly sound. But there is writing on the wall: an arrow pointing forward, and after a brief fight, she even manages to read the text above: to the Central Command Center. It's like a light. She is on the right track. Only a little bit longer. Only a little bit…

    There is a touch on her shoulder, and it is cold, laden with a static charge. Her fear is sluggish to register; it doesn't fully bloom before the blow comes, and after that, all is moot. It's swift, delivered right into the crook of her good knee. For a split-second, her bad leg carries the weight of her, and then the world explodes into uniform white; her scream cuts as she tumbles down, her head banging against the steel floor. In the grand scheme of hurting, that barely registers. Nothing does; she is unmade. For a moment, there is no world, and no word, only the endless, burning expanse of a body in pain.

    The thoughts that come are not in order. Purple ash. Snow? The sirens sing her a dirge. Amanda Olwen, King's Counsel will receive a beautiful burial, much preferable to the indifferent cold of the firmament. In a second, she will be in the heart of a still-born star, a light blinking across all the skies. She could have done much worse. It's a shame about Red. Shame about Lynx. Shame about that prototype girl. Shame she didn't even get her name. Shame. Guilt. Pain. Nothing.

    How very familiar. A blurry shape sits astride her, its form little more than a smear in Olwen's fading vision. It's him, she decides, the man from the Security and Order Bureau, about to ask her again who is her Republican handler. They have never released her. It was all a trick. Her mouth forms the familiar mantra.

    "For the soul of our country," she repeats, and smiles. She always smiles when she says that. "I work for no one but the soul of our country."

    But no, it's not that man. There are no pliers. No wrench. Or maybe he brought it down moments ago? So maybe it's him? Her head lolls to the sides, and finally remember that no, it is not the man, it is just- something. It would be so nice to have better memories to relive before dying.

    A cold hand lands on her cheek; pushes her head up. The creature atop her is cut against the red of the vanishing world, but its eyes are cold blue, deep as the Home Moon's sky.

    "She," it snarls in an almost familiar voice, "belongs to me alone."

    It raises its hand. Light refracts purple and blue on the claws. At least it will not be the Bureau to finally end Olwen. Or the dying birth of a star. It will be-

    There is a crack of light, and an explosion in front of the King's Counsel's face. It's too much. Her consciousness finally gives, for one blessed moment. Like most good things, it is not allowed to last.

    A touch brings her back, sticky and warm. There is a gloved hand on the back of her head, holding her up. What it touches, smears ugly red. It takes a second for Olwen's vision to come back. The first thing it registers is the pair of red lights swirling right above her face, set into a porcelain-white faceless mask.

    "You are alive," the Existential Weapon says, voice too far-away to come cleanly across as either relief or disappointment. But the touch on Olwen's cheek is not violent.

    The pain is still there, but it has ebbed, leaving behind only a dull, overwhelming hurt, instead of the world-undoing fire fire. If this is not some vision of hell, the station hasn't blown up yet. The King's Counsel's thoughts race to Red and Lynx. They are doing well; and the fact that she registers that worry is a good sign. Her own mind is still there. Somehow.

    The Existential Weapon looks bad, busted up. Blood flakes off her suit in long strips; the haze that shrouded her is now thicker, obscuring her meager frame. An odious, bitter stench clings to it, thick and alien. The lamps above her dim in sequence, their light distorting, turning pale. Static hiss turns the howling alarms into the agonal moans of dying machinery.

    "You saved me," Olwen mutters, trying to pull herself up against the wall, and her thoughts in order.

    "I found you," the prototype girl says, as if that answer was enough.

    "There's something here" she murmurs, remembering the twin blue fires, and the arcing claw. "It attacked me."

    "It was her," the blood-crusted Existential Weapon shakes at the mention; for once it is not hard to pick at the note of fear in its voice. The word oozes danger in her mouth.

    "Her?"

    "I lured her away," she doesn't explain. "To the other home. There is time."

    "Thank you," Olwen offers in lieu of more questions. There are so many, but if there is any time, it is not for them. She allows herself a few ragged breaths. It's funny, really. She came here to save someone, who has now saved her twice. And it's not even over yet. If there will be a later, she will be good to her. "You need to help me get to the command center," she adds, her throat barely able to let the voice out. "I can't walk."

    Without a wasted word, the Existential Weapon crouches by her side and wraps an arm under her shoulder. Too hastily, too raptly, she lifts the King's Counsel up. The woman yelps as the ruined knee makes itself sharply felt again, but she doesn't complain. Their destination shouldn't be too far. It's clear that the girl has never helped anyone walk; she shoves her forward instead of letting her walk, at times almost starting to drag her. But her hold is strong and secure, so at least there is no risk of tumbling down again. For the moment, it's enough for Olwen. And the command center really isn't far. Just past another bend in the twisting path, and there it is. A large door, shut closed. The King's Counsel reaches for the lock to input an access code, but before she can do that, the Existential Weapon swipes her hand across its panel. The door opens with a puff of acrid smoke sputtering from the frame.

    Monumental station display is a scrambled mess, as if someone has taken a hand to the holograph and erased parts, leaving behind a shimmer of blue and purple scale. Empty workstations shine with walls of static, or cascading rivers of code pouring from under gutted graphic interfaces like blood from an open wound. But the central access panel is still functional, stamped with layers of red warning announcing the imminent immanence of the coming eschaton. The prototype girl ushers Olwen into the seat in front of it, then steps back. Terminals around her blink out.

    Each warning in front of the King's Counsel is marked by a countdown. Some still have minutes left. Most less than that. Some have ticked down past zero, and dive into the negative time. The controls respond sluggishly, the interface acting painfully slow. Whatever is going on in the system is breaking it fast, and it will never be fixed again. Still, Olwen tries. She fights through the error messages, and through the stiffness in her fingers.

    AUTHENTICATE OVERRIDE the terminal demands. Olwen starts to input the code.

    "Hey," she says, remembering the string of letters and numbers, "what is your name?"

    It is probably absurd to keep the in case it doesn't work, and we die here, I'd like to know to herself. But it is difficult to think of the Existential Weapon as anything but a child to be spared the horrors of the world. Under any other circumstances, the King's Counsel would laugh at her own hypocrisy. Another terminal window dies, cutting her code in half. Hurriedly, Olwen tries to restart it. Numbers and seconds tick down; far away, the last evacuation craft are probably getting ready to leave the station, or leaving it already.

    "Sophia-108," the prototype girl responds, the code cold in words.

    "Sophia. That's just the series number" Olwen replies. The command line opens up; she starts inputting the first code. "But what did you put in your profile, out there?"

    OVERRIDE ACCEPTED the screen prints out. TRY AGAIN.

    It's funny. There really isn't much fear left in Olwen; if she lives, she lives. If she dies, at least the leg will stop hurting so bad. She tries to put the code in again.

    Finally, the prototype girl resounds.

    Article:
    [ ] Zoe
    [ ] Sophia-108
    [ ] Sophie
    [ ] Ten-Eight
    [ ] Sky


    "I like it."

    The code is in. The numbers are running down towards the flatline of zeroes, and the sharp impulse of fission and death. Olwen's finger hesitates. Then, she drops it. Seconds keep ticking down. The terminus is reached. Nothing happens. There is no eschaton greeting them with fire.

    It's over.

    Article:
    Vice-Admiral Yana has not achieved her goals regarding Project Sophia, and Amanda Olwen along with the prototype girl have managed to prevent the Eschaton Protocol from being enacted. Still, no victory is full and absolute. Pick two from the list:

    [ ] Vice-Admiral Yana's forces did not manage to recover any valuable data about Project Sophia.
    [ ] Most of the specialist Project Sophia personnel did not evacuate with Vice-Admiral Yana.
    [ ] Enough of the station's security recordings survived to provide indisputable evidence against Vice-Admiral Yana.
    [ ] Amanda Olwen's team has not suffered serious injury.
    [ ] The Existential Weapon has not suffered serious physical or mental injury.
     
    Last edited:
  • Threadmarks
    • [x] Zoe

    [x] Vice-Admiral Yana's forces did not manage to recover any valuable data about Project Sophia.
    [x] Enough of the station's security recordings survived to provide indisputable evidence against Vice-Admiral Yana.

    The security recording are what really stand out as important. Lets get Yana out as the bad guy now. The data should hopefully prevent Yana from getting another Existential Weapon out too quickly.
     
    [x] Zoe

    [x] Vice-Admiral Yana's forces did not manage to recover any valuable data about Project Sophia.
    [x] Enough of the station's security recordings survived to provide indisputable evidence against Vice-Admiral Yana.
     
    [X] Sophie
    [X] Enough of the station's security recordings survived to provide indisputable evidence against Vice-Admiral Yana.
    [X] Amanda Olwen's team has not suffered serious injury.
     
    [X] Sophia-108

    She totally put that into her Space Tinder.

    [X] Vice-Admiral Yana's forces did not manage to recover any valuable data about Project Sophia.
    [    X] Enough of the station's security recordings survived to provide indisputable evidence against Vice-Admiral Yana.
     
    Every time the Nemesis is referred to as a "yandere" in this thread, I find a planned scene where she and the Existential Weapon hold hands, and delete it.
     
    [X] Sophia-108
    [X] Enough of the station's security recordings survived to provide indisputable evidence against Vice-Admiral Yana.
    [X] Amanda Olwen's team has not suffered serious injury.

    Gargulec said:
    Every time the Nemesis is referred to as a "yandere" in this thread, I find a planned scene where she and the Existential Weapon hold hands, and delete it.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Nemesis is a yandere Nemesis is a yandere Nemesis is a yandere Nemesis is a yandere Nemesis is a yandere Nemesis is a yandere Nemesis is a yandere Nemesis is a yandere Nemesis is a yandere
     
    Not voting yet, just putting down my thoughts for discussion.

    Name: I can't help but feel this reveals (or perhaps determines) a lot of PG's character. Is she literal-minded enough to just type 'Sophia-108' into the Name field, or is she creative enough to go with something as unrelated as 'Sky'? I currently favor the 'Zoe' middleground, but feel free to convince me otherwise.

    For the consequences, the security recordings are critical. Nothing worse than an antagonist hiding behind the thin veneer of deniability. Making her a known rebel/revolutionary/traitor/whatever is a bigger blow to her plans than anything else in the list.

    The second choice is much harder. We've got one option for data and another for personnel - but presumably, the personnel can replicate the data, or the data can educate new personnel. If we go with one of these, it probably doesn't matter which, and only slows Yana down in her (presumed) goal to replicate the project.

    On the other hand, we can either avoid injury to Olwen's team or to the Prototype. Now, it's unlikely this means someone will die without this choice, but it's not clear what the consequences of the 'injuries' would be. For the team, at least, it's might create hard feelings, or it might hobble them in future encounters - it really depends where the quest is going to go. If we're not sticking with the team, the option doesn't do much, so either we will be sticking with them or its a red herring. No way to tell, is there?

    As for injuries to the Prototype... again, no way to know how severe the consequences for that are.


    Also please stop trying to date/befriend the nemesis until we understand whether that's even possible, for goodness sake!
     
    I'd go with the joke if I thought the otherworldly 'friend' was a good thing, but we made it a malus.
    No yandere jokes from me. The isolation it brought as what might charitably be called an 'imaginary friend' was one thing.
    A 'friend' that wants to be the best and only friend means something far different.
     
    [X] Sophia-108

    [X] Most of the specialist Project Sophia personnel did not evacuate with Vice-Admiral Yana.
    [X] The Existential Weapon has not suffered serious physical or mental injury.
     
    [X] Sophia-108

    [    X] Vice-Admiral Yana's forces did not manage to recover any valuable data about Project Sophia.
    [    X] Enough of the station's security recordings survived to provide indisputable evidence against Vice-Admiral Yana.
     
    Also yeah nemesis is bad because, based on what we've seen, they are very protective of Proto and considering what I've noticed, Nemi may be either a coping mechanism that Proto gave to life or they were also lonely and is hostile to everything non-Proto, both are likely and very bad, since one can't be killed most likely without Proto dieing and the other has a high chance of just straight up kidnapping her.
     
    [X] Sophia-108

    [    X] Vice-Admiral Yana's forces did not manage to recover any valuable data about Project Sophia.
    [    X] Enough of the station's security recordings survived to provide indisputable evidence against Vice-Admiral Yana.
     
    I would like Sophia 108 because of what it suggests about her in terms of her development and socialization. If she's so isolated and literal-minded that she's choosing that as a name, while also simultaneously going on Space Tinder with the designation, it seems like a very fun and interesting kind of disconnected.
     
    Reader mode
    You must login or register to reply here.
    Remove ads
    Back
    Top