- Location
- Canada
And the word is "Precursors"
Scaling Up
- Thread starter Kryslin
- Start date
BlazeStryker
<Confirmed Contradiction>
- Location
- Roanoke, VA
- Pronouns
- Him/He/Dude
As Saurial's clearly distracted by this nervous system issue, I'll edit for the readers' sake:
There. I believe I got the gist of it (pretty much the HALO timeline, come to that)
There. I believe I got the gist of it (pretty much the HALO timeline, come to that)
Say you haven't been paying attention without saying you haven't been paying attention.
- Location
- Somewhere In Pa
- Pronouns
- Mr
Yeah, I forgot about that. Thanks for the heads up.
Also, I pay attention; thing is, if I don't remember to keep track of information, I tend to forget it.
𝔇 & 𝔇 27 - Life of Slices II
Kryslin
[Has Delusions of Authorship]
- Location
- Mythic Iowa
Night (or what passed for night on the Ring) had fallen, and soon the village of Amestris was asleep. There were a few guardsmen walking the streets, mainly in and around the town square to make sure the shops (and the banking house) weren't broken into.
That focus left the residential areas mostly unwatched.
Officially.
What could pass for an adventuring party moved stealthily along the roads leading to town, sticking to the shadows and using hand signs to communicate. As quickly as that allowed, they made their way to a cluster of buildings on the outskirts. There were no lights showing in any of the windows, but for their quarry that would mean little. Of greater concern was the presence of the quarry's husband, a mere human unfit for the likes of the matron's great-granddaughter. Despite that, he had a reputation that meant he might be a slight problem.
What the group failed to realize was once they got within a hundred paces of the house, workshop, outbuildings and overbuilt guest quarters, there was a subtle shimmer to the air as the local space became a closed loop.
Unaware that they were now trapped in a bubble of closed space, a spell caster approached the main house and cast a spell, at which the door opened, allowing them access. The party went through the house, searching for their quarry. After several minutes of finding no one, the group realized that the target had been aware of their coming and had set a trap, made even more obvious when a pair of alchemical flashbangs went off as they hurriedly exited the building.
Faevras cursed mightily in her family's dialect of dark Elvish. "We've been had!"
"It would be in your best interest and continued good health if you gave up," a bone-shakingly deep male voice announced. "Just sayin'."
"Who said that?" one of the dark elves yelled. The group still couldn't see much, and their ears were ringing.
"That would be me," the voice continued. Because Vista had expanded the space and made it a closed loop, there was more than enough room for Dennis to, in his words, "let Sulazhaal out to play."
Faevras could barely hear the sound of something very large coming closer, but definitely felt it through the ground. Deciding enough was enough, she used a minor spell on herself which cleared her vision and took a look in the direction of the voice.
And up. Very up.
"Boo!" Sulazhaal stated, and flared his presence.
The results were immediate. Three-quarters of her group fled in the general direction of the road, leaving her with her more veteran and stalwart followers. That left four with her who looked either resigned, very nervous or both.
"The offer of surrender is still open," the great copper beast stated smugly. There was the sound of combat as if someone had been waiting for them to flee. "Of course, my friends have been bored for the last few days, and could use the activity."
Faevras was beginning to regret having her senses back. She heard a voice yell "Fore!" followed by a meaty thunk, then the sight of one of her henchmen flying through the air, ricocheting off of one of the buildings like a ball.
"Why hi there!" Vicky said to one pair of fleeing dark elves. "My name's Glory Girl, and I'm here to make your short stay as entertaining to me as possible!" With that, she gripped her mace and grinned.
Confronted with a lone human girl, either missing or misunderstanding that she was actually floating several inches off the ground, the two dark elves decided to take their chances. One of the pair fired on her with a hand crossbow, while the other began casting a spell.
The crossbow dart had about as much effect as anyone from Brockton Bay would think, namely bouncing off of her forcefield, leaving the male elf just a bit shaken.
Vicky ignored him and focused on the other. "Hey, no casting!" She took a swing, yelling "Fore!"
The next thing the female trying to cast a spell knew, she was flying through the air, getting personally familiar with several stars. She then realized that a stone wall was coming up fast, and hoped it wouldn't hurt too much. There was an impact she felt, and she found herself on a flat trajectory towards another building.
She somehow managed to look bored and wondering when things would end after the third impact.
Vicky turned towards her remaining opponent. "We can do this the easy way, or the hard way," she stated. She smacked the mace into the palm of her off hand. "It's your choice."
When the night went darker, Vicky had decided the elf wanted to do things the hard way. Her reaction was to shoot a good fifteen to twenty feet into the air. She hung her mace on her belt. "Let's see if this works…" She maneuvered her body so that she was facing the globe of darkness, unconcerned about the few hand crossbow darts that pinged off her forcefield. She spread her hands apart as wide as she could, and then brought them together with all her strength.
While not the glass shattering and earth breaking shockwave she'd been hoping for, she did generate an overpressure wave in front of her. It had the desired effect, in that it threw the dark elf out of the hemisphere of darkness, and she'd managed to do some damage if the blood coming from his ears was any indication.
It also had the undesired effect of making her forcefield flicker. So of course a hand crossbow dart got past it to strike her just below her right shoulder.
The dark elf didn't have time to gloat as a silver tail touched him, and the elf went unconscious.
"I can't take you anywhere," Vicky's draconic sister growled.
"Sorry about that," Vicky replied as she unsteadily floated to the ground.
Helbrede's tail wrapped around her sister's wrist. "Ah, that takes care of the poison," the silver dragon muttered. "And the teeny scratch of the wound. When I put the elf under, I repaired his ruptured eardrums and the burst alveoli is his lungs.
"Let's go see where your other opponent wound up," Amy added, "after we drop this guy off."
Dean and Chris currently had a pair of fleeing intruders running their way. "We're probably the weakest combatants here," Dean said. "So we've got to use our strengths."
"Your emotion blasts and my gadgets?" Chris answered. "I can work with that. At least Pinako helped me improve my hand crossbows."
Dean nodded. "Sabri told us that elves in general are pretty much immune to things that would put them to sleep. However emotional manipulation works just fine. And our pair is just about here. Ready?"
Chris nodded.
They stepped out in front of the fleeing pair, which caused them to skid to a stop and draw their weapons. When they started to advance again, Chris fired off a quick burst from his hand crossbows, the now fully automatic firing working as intended. That brought the pair up short.
At that moment, the female that Vicky had walloped began a ballistic descent. All four looked up at the falling figure who was trying to recreate one of Skidmark's greatest cursing streaks in her native language.
Dean took advantage of the distraction and fired off two of his emotion bursts in quick succession. They hit a fraction of a second after the descending elf landed in a compromising position.
The two males began laughing so hard they forgot about their opponents. The female recovered and began screaming at her two inferior companions as she tried to get back on her feet.
Chris handed Dean one of the tangleroot bags that they had. "After you, good sir," he said with a grin.
"On three, then," Dean answered, his phrasing informing Chris of a tried and true Wards misdirection tactic. "One… three!"
In short order all three drow were wrapped up in the thick vines.
"That was surprisingly simple," Chris said.
"Hey!" Vicky's voice called out from above.
"Got three down here," Dean answered. He could see Helbrede trotting along on the ground.
"That makes four out of the twelve," Helbrede added. "I wonder how everyone else is doing?"
Just then, a pillar of fire appeared where Sulazhaal had confronted the intruders.
Sulazhaal took stock of himself after the elf in charge dropped a pillar of fire on his head. He was OK, only a little rattled, and a spot on his scales felt like he'd gotten a sunburn. "Now why'd you have to go and do that?" he admonished the apparent leader of the group, whose equipment was a step above the rest of her group.
The four others who'd stayed began to edge away from her. Sulazhaal thought they were trying to flank him, or get out of the splash zone should he decide to use a breath weapon. Eh, why not?
He exhaled hard, swept his head side-to-side, managing to get all five in the cloud. When the vapors cleared, the dark elf's guards / minions / companions / whatever had passed out, but the bitchy elf was coughing, now trying to run – or rather stagger away.
Sulazhaal shifted back to Dennis. "Pinako? Coast is clear, and bring some rope."
"I got somethin' better'n rope," the old woman muttered. "I got some manacles."
"Perfect. These four should be out another minute or so."
Naurelin and Ed were currently in the workshop, mainly to make sure nothing happened to her project or his supplies. She could hear the goings on outside. "Sure is noisy out there," Ed commented while he watched the door.
"Yeah," Naurelin answered as she worked on the ring, going through a couple different variations on the basic Taylor form. "I wonder if that dark elf from the auction is the one causing trouble?"
"Wasn't she in Sigil, though?"
"Last I knew, but if we can make it here in a few minutes, who's to say she couldn't?"
Ed sighed. "Point. However, keep in mind that transportation is usually on land, by boat, or rarely by air. There's no teleportation, using the astral plane, and so on simply because She says so. Usually the only way in, out and around the Ring is by a portal. Melissa, along with a few others, have leave to use teleportation or make their own local portals.
"If it is that Faevras chick," Ed continued, "she probably used the tunnels that criss-cross the entire Ring."
"So long as she doesn't come bursting in here," Naurelin added.
From outside came a tremendous crash.
"Oh, for fuck's sake, what now?" Ed grumbled, anticipating a lot of clean-up after dawn.
Xellos was currently watching the shenanigans going on from the other side of the closed loop of space surrounding the Elric's home and work buildings. He had somehow procured a bag of popcorn, which he was eating while the blond barbarian princess did a fair imitation of Filia and her mace with one of the interlopers.
An eyebrow raised as he could make out the copper scaled monstrosity of a dragon in the center of the warped space. It was then that he realized he had a guest. A very important guest. He hopped down off the low stone wall he was seated on, vanished his popcorn, and bowed to The Lady of Pain.
"How may I be of assistance?" he asked in a most respectful manner.
Over The Lady's outstretched hand, an image formed of him and his companions, of them fighting various dark elves in a cartoonish fashion, with the dark elves winding up being cocooned in balls of rope and chains. Also present was a bag, which was not an image.
"If I may?" Xellos respectfully asked. At Her nod, he looked into the bag, noting that there was a sizable amount of coins and a note. They know where your missing companions are, it read.
"Then we'd best get things moving," Xellos stated.
It was then that he realized his companions were already there, standing behind Her.
She gestured, and the group charged across the boundary. Within the bubble, things became a bit more hectic.
That focus left the residential areas mostly unwatched.
Officially.
What could pass for an adventuring party moved stealthily along the roads leading to town, sticking to the shadows and using hand signs to communicate. As quickly as that allowed, they made their way to a cluster of buildings on the outskirts. There were no lights showing in any of the windows, but for their quarry that would mean little. Of greater concern was the presence of the quarry's husband, a mere human unfit for the likes of the matron's great-granddaughter. Despite that, he had a reputation that meant he might be a slight problem.
What the group failed to realize was once they got within a hundred paces of the house, workshop, outbuildings and overbuilt guest quarters, there was a subtle shimmer to the air as the local space became a closed loop.
Unaware that they were now trapped in a bubble of closed space, a spell caster approached the main house and cast a spell, at which the door opened, allowing them access. The party went through the house, searching for their quarry. After several minutes of finding no one, the group realized that the target had been aware of their coming and had set a trap, made even more obvious when a pair of alchemical flashbangs went off as they hurriedly exited the building.
Faevras cursed mightily in her family's dialect of dark Elvish. "We've been had!"
"It would be in your best interest and continued good health if you gave up," a bone-shakingly deep male voice announced. "Just sayin'."
"Who said that?" one of the dark elves yelled. The group still couldn't see much, and their ears were ringing.
"That would be me," the voice continued. Because Vista had expanded the space and made it a closed loop, there was more than enough room for Dennis to, in his words, "let Sulazhaal out to play."
Faevras could barely hear the sound of something very large coming closer, but definitely felt it through the ground. Deciding enough was enough, she used a minor spell on herself which cleared her vision and took a look in the direction of the voice.
And up. Very up.
"Boo!" Sulazhaal stated, and flared his presence.
The results were immediate. Three-quarters of her group fled in the general direction of the road, leaving her with her more veteran and stalwart followers. That left four with her who looked either resigned, very nervous or both.
"The offer of surrender is still open," the great copper beast stated smugly. There was the sound of combat as if someone had been waiting for them to flee. "Of course, my friends have been bored for the last few days, and could use the activity."
Faevras was beginning to regret having her senses back. She heard a voice yell "Fore!" followed by a meaty thunk, then the sight of one of her henchmen flying through the air, ricocheting off of one of the buildings like a ball.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
"Why hi there!" Vicky said to one pair of fleeing dark elves. "My name's Glory Girl, and I'm here to make your short stay as entertaining to me as possible!" With that, she gripped her mace and grinned.
Confronted with a lone human girl, either missing or misunderstanding that she was actually floating several inches off the ground, the two dark elves decided to take their chances. One of the pair fired on her with a hand crossbow, while the other began casting a spell.
The crossbow dart had about as much effect as anyone from Brockton Bay would think, namely bouncing off of her forcefield, leaving the male elf just a bit shaken.
Vicky ignored him and focused on the other. "Hey, no casting!" She took a swing, yelling "Fore!"
The next thing the female trying to cast a spell knew, she was flying through the air, getting personally familiar with several stars. She then realized that a stone wall was coming up fast, and hoped it wouldn't hurt too much. There was an impact she felt, and she found herself on a flat trajectory towards another building.
She somehow managed to look bored and wondering when things would end after the third impact.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Vicky turned towards her remaining opponent. "We can do this the easy way, or the hard way," she stated. She smacked the mace into the palm of her off hand. "It's your choice."
When the night went darker, Vicky had decided the elf wanted to do things the hard way. Her reaction was to shoot a good fifteen to twenty feet into the air. She hung her mace on her belt. "Let's see if this works…" She maneuvered her body so that she was facing the globe of darkness, unconcerned about the few hand crossbow darts that pinged off her forcefield. She spread her hands apart as wide as she could, and then brought them together with all her strength.
While not the glass shattering and earth breaking shockwave she'd been hoping for, she did generate an overpressure wave in front of her. It had the desired effect, in that it threw the dark elf out of the hemisphere of darkness, and she'd managed to do some damage if the blood coming from his ears was any indication.
It also had the undesired effect of making her forcefield flicker. So of course a hand crossbow dart got past it to strike her just below her right shoulder.
The dark elf didn't have time to gloat as a silver tail touched him, and the elf went unconscious.
"I can't take you anywhere," Vicky's draconic sister growled.
"Sorry about that," Vicky replied as she unsteadily floated to the ground.
Helbrede's tail wrapped around her sister's wrist. "Ah, that takes care of the poison," the silver dragon muttered. "And the teeny scratch of the wound. When I put the elf under, I repaired his ruptured eardrums and the burst alveoli is his lungs.
"Let's go see where your other opponent wound up," Amy added, "after we drop this guy off."
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
Dean and Chris currently had a pair of fleeing intruders running their way. "We're probably the weakest combatants here," Dean said. "So we've got to use our strengths."
"Your emotion blasts and my gadgets?" Chris answered. "I can work with that. At least Pinako helped me improve my hand crossbows."
Dean nodded. "Sabri told us that elves in general are pretty much immune to things that would put them to sleep. However emotional manipulation works just fine. And our pair is just about here. Ready?"
Chris nodded.
They stepped out in front of the fleeing pair, which caused them to skid to a stop and draw their weapons. When they started to advance again, Chris fired off a quick burst from his hand crossbows, the now fully automatic firing working as intended. That brought the pair up short.
At that moment, the female that Vicky had walloped began a ballistic descent. All four looked up at the falling figure who was trying to recreate one of Skidmark's greatest cursing streaks in her native language.
Dean took advantage of the distraction and fired off two of his emotion bursts in quick succession. They hit a fraction of a second after the descending elf landed in a compromising position.
The two males began laughing so hard they forgot about their opponents. The female recovered and began screaming at her two inferior companions as she tried to get back on her feet.
Chris handed Dean one of the tangleroot bags that they had. "After you, good sir," he said with a grin.
"On three, then," Dean answered, his phrasing informing Chris of a tried and true Wards misdirection tactic. "One… three!"
In short order all three drow were wrapped up in the thick vines.
"That was surprisingly simple," Chris said.
"Hey!" Vicky's voice called out from above.
"Got three down here," Dean answered. He could see Helbrede trotting along on the ground.
"That makes four out of the twelve," Helbrede added. "I wonder how everyone else is doing?"
Just then, a pillar of fire appeared where Sulazhaal had confronted the intruders.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Sulazhaal took stock of himself after the elf in charge dropped a pillar of fire on his head. He was OK, only a little rattled, and a spot on his scales felt like he'd gotten a sunburn. "Now why'd you have to go and do that?" he admonished the apparent leader of the group, whose equipment was a step above the rest of her group.
The four others who'd stayed began to edge away from her. Sulazhaal thought they were trying to flank him, or get out of the splash zone should he decide to use a breath weapon. Eh, why not?
He exhaled hard, swept his head side-to-side, managing to get all five in the cloud. When the vapors cleared, the dark elf's guards / minions / companions / whatever had passed out, but the bitchy elf was coughing, now trying to run – or rather stagger away.
Sulazhaal shifted back to Dennis. "Pinako? Coast is clear, and bring some rope."
"I got somethin' better'n rope," the old woman muttered. "I got some manacles."
"Perfect. These four should be out another minute or so."
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Naurelin and Ed were currently in the workshop, mainly to make sure nothing happened to her project or his supplies. She could hear the goings on outside. "Sure is noisy out there," Ed commented while he watched the door.
"Yeah," Naurelin answered as she worked on the ring, going through a couple different variations on the basic Taylor form. "I wonder if that dark elf from the auction is the one causing trouble?"
"Wasn't she in Sigil, though?"
"Last I knew, but if we can make it here in a few minutes, who's to say she couldn't?"
Ed sighed. "Point. However, keep in mind that transportation is usually on land, by boat, or rarely by air. There's no teleportation, using the astral plane, and so on simply because She says so. Usually the only way in, out and around the Ring is by a portal. Melissa, along with a few others, have leave to use teleportation or make their own local portals.
"If it is that Faevras chick," Ed continued, "she probably used the tunnels that criss-cross the entire Ring."
"So long as she doesn't come bursting in here," Naurelin added.
From outside came a tremendous crash.
"Oh, for fuck's sake, what now?" Ed grumbled, anticipating a lot of clean-up after dawn.
= = = = = = = = = =
Xellos was currently watching the shenanigans going on from the other side of the closed loop of space surrounding the Elric's home and work buildings. He had somehow procured a bag of popcorn, which he was eating while the blond barbarian princess did a fair imitation of Filia and her mace with one of the interlopers.
An eyebrow raised as he could make out the copper scaled monstrosity of a dragon in the center of the warped space. It was then that he realized he had a guest. A very important guest. He hopped down off the low stone wall he was seated on, vanished his popcorn, and bowed to The Lady of Pain.
"How may I be of assistance?" he asked in a most respectful manner.
Over The Lady's outstretched hand, an image formed of him and his companions, of them fighting various dark elves in a cartoonish fashion, with the dark elves winding up being cocooned in balls of rope and chains. Also present was a bag, which was not an image.
"If I may?" Xellos respectfully asked. At Her nod, he looked into the bag, noting that there was a sizable amount of coins and a note. They know where your missing companions are, it read.
"Then we'd best get things moving," Xellos stated.
It was then that he realized his companions were already there, standing behind Her.
She gestured, and the group charged across the boundary. Within the bubble, things became a bit more hectic.
Kryslin
[Has Delusions of Authorship]
- Location
- Mythic Iowa
And here we go!
Postings here aren't so much the problem as postings for the CTC. That one gets labeled as Product of Canada / Produit du Canada because most of it was typed in my hotel room after I got done with Anime North for the day.
Anyway, Edits by McClaw per the usual.
Enjoy your wordz™ responsibly!
Postings here aren't so much the problem as postings for the CTC. That one gets labeled as Product of Canada / Produit du Canada because most of it was typed in my hotel room after I got done with Anime North for the day.
Anyway, Edits by McClaw per the usual.
Enjoy your wordz™ responsibly!
bobnik
Memetic Warfare Specialist.
Dammit I thought she was about to ask for some popcorn too. A fun chapter, and boy does vicky like that mace.
M. H. Fuzzball
Aperture Science-certified Horrible Person
- Location
- Sector 2814
Why wouldn't she like it? It lets her work out her "Vicky SMASH!" urges without causing more work for Amy or repair crews. Win-win.
BlazeStryker
<Confirmed Contradiction>
- Location
- Roanoke, VA
- Pronouns
- Him/He/Dude
She may be doing better on the collateral damage, but the Barbie is forever. Mind you, she's at least the Barbie you throw shrimp at/on for a proper roasting, instead of an empty-headed poster girl. It's a real step up.
FaerieKnight79
Verified Pixie
- Location
- The Internet
Is it Christmas? Cause I hadn't expected an update today.
Nah. That particular marketing scheme isn't until next month.
Kryslin
[Has Delusions of Authorship]
- Location
- Mythic Iowa
I warned of the possibility there might be another skip day due to traveling. I managed to get most of D&D 29 done on the road, so it's back to the normal grind. I've got two this week, Scaling Up and Mobile Escalation Skitter Gundam.
BlazeStryker
<Confirmed Contradiction>
- Location
- Roanoke, VA
- Pronouns
- Him/He/Dude
Meh, I'll never believe full-bore "Christmas-in-July" until some weirdo tries selling pumpkin eggnog on Flag Day.
BlazeStryker
<Confirmed Contradiction>
- Location
- Roanoke, VA
- Pronouns
- Him/He/Dude
I dig it! I always felt Eggnog needs to be uncoupled from seasonal sales and rambunctious holiday parties. Mostly I wanted to mock the effort to sell pumpkin nog the month before. (namely, for Thanksgiving; just as Americans celebrate Thanksgiving a month before Christmas, Flag day is June 4, a month before the 4th of July (duh!) Sometimes, these things really do come near to writing themselves.)
M. H. Fuzzball
Aperture Science-certified Horrible Person
- Location
- Sector 2814
Where I live (not terribly far from the author), egg nog season starts late October/early November to pick up the Thanksgiving market and ends at roughly New Year's Day (or whenever the remaining stock is sold).
BlazeStryker
<Confirmed Contradiction>
- Location
- Roanoke, VA
- Pronouns
- Him/He/Dude
Virginia and Georgia are much the same. Pumpkin nog (yes, they try to make it taste somewhat like pumpkin pie) started being sold a couple of weeks earlier as a cash-in attempt. Better pasteurization methods and last-minute production of eggnog have helped create the Twelve Nogs of Christmas situation.
Kinsfire
Verified {Redacted}
- Location
- New Jersey
The place that i forgive the Christmas stuff coming in extremely early is the craft stores. Some are the 'well, you can make this in a few days', but some crafts are 'I need Christmas colors/decorations now, because if I'm lucky, this will be done in time for the holiday."
But watching Christmas stuff coming in FOR PUTTING OUT ON THE FLOOR in September at Walmart is a bit much. (I can forgive it if they're getting it in September to be prepared for later putting out, but we were putting Christmas stuff out in September.)
But watching Christmas stuff coming in FOR PUTTING OUT ON THE FLOOR in September at Walmart is a bit much. (I can forgive it if they're getting it in September to be prepared for later putting out, but we were putting Christmas stuff out in September.)
FaerieKnight79
Verified Pixie
- Location
- The Internet
For a while stores in Dubuque Iowa were starting to sell Halloween decorations in the middle of April, and Christmas decorations in the last week of July. Which made me want to headdesk, cause that's suppose to be a joke.
EDIT:
I always did think it'd make more sense to start selling winter coats before winter though. Doesn't happen, but it'd make sense to me.
Last edited:
Kinsfire
Verified {Redacted}
- Location
- New Jersey
What bugs me is when you want something in the middle of a season and can't buy it because they've already moved on to the next thing. I recall a cold snap in February in NJ one year, and we couldn't buy a heater to help with our house because they already had all the Spring stuff out, and had put away the snow blowers and heaters. February, the coldest month of the year usually.
FaerieKnight79
Verified Pixie
- Location
- The Internet
That's why you lay in things like space heaters before there's a problem that requires it.
- Location
- Beyond the Unknowable Veil
And when you find that the heater you bought a while ago and just tried to use for the first time isn't turning on?