So I suppose we should tell Annie were Double currently is, as well as what disguise she is currently using (The nun face), also that Double can sense where the Skullheart is at any time.
Not sure what other details we need to tell Annie about Double, she knows about Gehenna already i think? Could tell that Killing Double could provoke an Answer from the trinity?
Should tell Annie about Eliza and how she is related to Double and the trinity. She is certainly a landmine we ought to be careful of, thought not sure how much that would interest Annie...
EDIT: Also have to suggest to Marie that she ask Annie if she can give her her autograph or maybe meet Patricia, she would porbably love that. Hopefully Annie is the moodset to meet a fan.
(voice 4) annnnd scene! Good job everyone, we got it in one take, send it to editing and take five, I'll be in my trailer... Oh and that Double creep is currently disguised as a nun, has three bosses in another dimension and can sense the Skullheart, so she's either already here, on her way, or observing the place from afar.
(voice 4) annnnd scene! Good job everyone, we got it in one take, send it to editing and take five, I'll be in my trailer... Oh and that Double creep is currently disguised as a nun, has three bosses in another dimension and can sense the Skullheart, so she's either already here, on her way, or observing the place from afar.
Sounds good but maybe we might wanna say that with more tact/not so direct perhaps?
[X] Plan: Blob Briefing
-[X] (Voice 4) "annnnd scene! Good job everyone, we got it in one take, send it to editing and take five, I'll be in my trailer..."
-[X] (Voice 1) "About that Blob Double...well, make sure to tell every detail you can remember. Telling her that you last saw her on the Meridian Grand Cathedral working as a nun would be a good idea. Also...not sure if we told you before, but Double can sense the Skullheart, so she can keep track of you at all times...Sorry if we forgot to tell you that."
-[X] (Voice 2) "Be careful Madam, she could easily pass as anyone and sneak inside this place, be careful."
-[X] (Voice 1) "Tell her that Double was weirdly focused on making you kill people, her aim is to make Skullgirls kill the most amount of lives possible for her goals."
How does this look?
I'm semi-debating if we should tell Marie and Annie now about the trinity, mostly cause, it might be hard for Marie to explain how she learned that, unless Annie knows already.
Would like to tell Marie first about the origins of the skullheart before telling the others, specially cause we need her to understand how deep the rabbit hole goes.
Looks good bud! Gets most points across, not sure when we would get much of a chance to tell her about the Trinity though, we sorta have gone through event after event, not exactly a lot of time for leisure or giving out information not related to the immediate issue.
Looks good bud! Gets most points across, not sure when we would get much of a chance to tell her about the Trinity though, we sorta have gone through event after event, not exactly a lot of time for leisure or giving out information not related to the immediate issue.
True, thought I'm specially worried of giving her info gthat might cause her to slip specially with Annie around, we really don't want to give her the slight idea that soemthign is sus with Marie...more that she has showed thought. So far Annie has bought/believed her act and now is not the time to make her think something is up with Marie by possessing info she shouldn't have at the time.
That's mainly my main worry.
I'm not exactyl afraid of Marie revealing us to others, mostly that in this case, the person she is currently is looking at the smallest chance for some Skullgirl-hunting, heck, she could tell Big Band, Squigly, the scientist on the lab and patricia and would be fine, but with Annie, her not believing Marie explanation might led to a fight not a moment later.
Looks good bud! Gets most points across, not sure when we would get much of a chance to tell her about the Trinity though, we sorta have gone through event after event, not exactly a lot of time for leisure or giving out information not related to the immediate issue.
-[] (Voice 3) Little Miss Doublespeak is NOT loyal to the Skullgirl, never was, never will be. Loyal to the Skullheart and the Entities that power it, however, yes, like a zealot to the goddesses agenda. To Double, the Skullgirl is a convenient, manipulatable meat puppet that holds and occasionally speaks the Skullheart's will. Same goes for society and the forms it wears in it, nothing but levers to pull and buttons to press for the creation of the next Skullheart Bearer. It holds no attachment to place, mortal or moral, just masks to wear to manipulate marks.
We don't have to directly reference the Trinity right now. Just the idea that the Skullheart was created/powered by something else with an agenda.
[X] Plan: Blob Briefing
-[X] (Voice 4) "annnnd scene! Good job everyone, we got it in one take, send it to editing and take five, I'll be in my trailer..."
-[X] (Voice 1) "About that Blob Double...well, make sure to tell every detail you can remember. Telling her that you last saw her on the Meridian Grand Cathedral working as a nun would be a good idea. Also...not sure if we told you before, but Double can sense the Skullheart, so she can keep track of you at all times...Sorry if we forgot to tell you that."
-[X] (Voice 2) "Be careful Madam, she could easily pass as anyone and sneak inside this place, be careful."
-[X] (Voice 1) "Tell her that Double was weirdly focused on making you kill people, her aim is to make Skullgirls kill the most amount of lives possible for her goals."
May 25th, approaching noon, a room in Anti-Skullgirl Lab 8
Marie is... not surprised that Double can tell where Marie is through tracking the Skull Heart, but she'd admit that it hadn't occurred to her yet to put those pieces together herself. Marie wasn't that close to the Meridian Grand Cathedral when Double found her, but the monster didn't seem to have a very hard time tracking her. That's definitely something she has to tell Annie right now.
"Well," she says. "I just realized that she has some way to find where I am when she wants to meet with me. And now that I've killed Lorenzo Medici, she does want to meet with me."
Annie goes from grinning to stone-faced in an instant.
"Shoot."
It's clear she means a very different word.
"What else can you tell me fast?" Annie asks.
Marie doesn't even need a moment to think.
"She likes to disguise herself as a nun, she seems to like hiding in the Meridian Grand Cathedral, and I'm pretty sure she wants me to kill as many people as possible. You probably know more about her shapeshifting than I do."
Annie nods at that and says, "Really good at impersonations, I remember her take on my parents better than my actual parents, and way too tough. The only times I've won a fight with her she was trying to mess with me. And she's at least as old as I am, probably older, so she's got me beat on experience."
"We... we should make sure we can trust each other," Marie realizes. "We don't know if she's already here or not. Even if we can only trust each other not to be Double, that's better than nothing."
"Huh, so that's her name." Annie mutters to herself. "I know you're the real Skullgirl. I've seen the- Double impersonate Skullgirls before, she always copies what they look like before they made a wish. So how are you sure I'm actually Annie?"
Marie takes a moment to look over the girl across from her. And then, she notices something that puts her mind at ease.
"You have Sagan with you," she says. "And he's standing a few feet away from you. He's not a part of your body. Double pretending to be Annie wouldn't have Sagan with her, or the fake Sagan would be connected to her somehow. I've never seen Double split herself up, at least."
"I haven't either," Annie says. "It'll have to do."
Annie stands up and jerks her head to the room's door.
"We need to get moving," she says. "We're sitting ducks for Double in here."
"You're right," Marie says, standing up. "Let's get moving."
Then, Marie remembers something.
Myriad, you said you could give me a sense of smell like a wolf's. Can you do that now?
A/N: I'll give you this for free, Annie's not a fake. Since I wrote most of the last story post from her perspective, it would be too dishonest of me if I turned around and said "actually that was Double pretending to Annie." Marie's reason for trusting Annie is inspired by the fact that Double generally isn't seen splitting herself into totally separate pieces outside of a few in-game attacks or when she's in Gehenna. I'm taking this to mean that it's very hard for Double to do it, so she prefers not to. And so Sagan, being a Remote Parasite, is something Double wouldn't want to impersonate if she didn't have to, and there's plenty of people besides Annie who Double could imitate in order to infiltrate Lab 8. As for Annie trusting Marie, she's just run into Double enough times over the centuries that she's developed an intuition for how Double prefers to disguise herself (and since impersonating a Skullgirl in their Skullgirl form would include imitating the Skull Heart, Double could consider it too difficult, sacrilegous, or both). And if you all agree on a specific fighting game werewolf to get enhanced senses from, I'll let you give them to Marie in time for the next story post.
(Voice 4) one set of senses coming right up kid! Careful near the perfume stores at malls, they're killer on the nose even for normal folks!
I say we give her Saberwulf's senses, since he doesn't really have much else to give other than his curse, and Marie already said she doesn't want to be a werewolf for real.
This way Jon is still available if we need his fighting skills, his nunchakus or if we ever have a need to give Marie the ability to see Leylines.
(Voice 4) one set of senses coming right up kid! Careful near the perfume stores at malls, they're killer on the nose even for normal folks!
I say we give her Saberwulf's senses, since he doesn't really have much else to give other than his curse, and Marie already said she doesn't want to be a werewolf for real.
This way Jon is still available if we need his fighting skills, his nunchakus or if we ever have a need to give Marie the ability to see Leylines.
[X] Plan: Blob hunting!
-[X] (Voice 4) "one set of senses coming right up kid! Careful near the perfume stores at malls, they're killer on the nose even for normal folks!"
-[X] (Voice 1) "Be careful, Marie, there's no guarantee that Double has infiltrated the place already…but also nothing to confirm that she hasn't."
Yeah him, never really played too much of KI, so I tend to forget the names of the fighters
As for the plan, yeah it looks good so far, not really a lot else to say in this situation, we already covered most of what Double can do and Annie has everything else covered
[X] Plan: Blob hunting!
-[X] (Voice 4) "one set of senses coming right up kid! Careful near the perfume stores at malls, they're killer on the nose even for normal folks!"
-[X] (Voice 1) "Be careful, Marie, there's no guarantee that Double has infiltrated the place already…but also nothing to confirm that she hasn't."
May 25th, approaching noon, Anti-Skullgirl Lab 8
Marie half-expected that her sense of smell suddenly improving would overwhelm her with all the new information, but it seems Myriad's gift included the ability to handle smelling everything around her. Huh, Annie smells like coffee. That could be helpful if Double does try to impersonate her.
The two girls walk around the Lab, eyes and ears kept sharp for any hint of their hidden foe. As they do, in between giving vague summaries of their meeting to the people they pass by ("we realized we had enough in common to get along" and similar things), Marie and Annie find opportunities to speak with each other.
"Miss Annie, what if Double isn't already here? Her nun disguise might be a cover she has to keep up. She could be in the middle of church work right now."
"Just Annie's fine, kid. And yeah, that's possible, but she'll have to do something about you eventually, and in my experience she's not a fan of putting things off."
"Some time today, then?"
"Probably. I wish we could take whatever she's following and put it somewhere else, but we don't know how Double can... find you..."
"Annie?"
Annie stops dead in her tracks, Marie following suit a moment later. What could she be thinking about?
Annie turns to face Marie and says, "I think I know how she's tracking you, and if I'm right there should be a way to get her off the scent. Come on, we need to find Squigly and Leviathan, he'll know if I'm right."
Annie takes off again, Marie following close behind. It takes several minutes of looking around, but eventually the two pairs meet up.
Nothing about Squigly or Leviathan seems off (though Marie has to remind Annie about their revival when she first sees them), but Marie and Annie are both too on edge to relax just yet. They're so on edge that it's obvious to the pair of girl and Parasite something's up.
"Are you two okay?" Squigly asks. "I mean, I'm glad you're not fighting, but you both look like a Skullgirl's chasing you. Oh, whoops. Sorry, Marie!"
"It's fine," Marie tells her.
"We need a way to hide Marie from the Skull Heart's real master," Annie says to Leviathan, whose expression hardens at her words.
"Oh yes, her," he says. "I take it you want me to disrupt Marie's connection to the Skull Heart? I'd be happy to, but I could only do that for Squigly because its hold on her was never very strong. And regardless of that, it would kill Marie. Her body couldn't survive without it as she is now."
"That's not what I was gonna ask," Annie tells him. "But good to know. I wanted to ask if bottling up the energy it gives off would keep Marie hidden."
Leviathan puts the tip of his tail up to his face as his brows furrow in thought.
Eventually, he says, "It might, if that's what the witch would use to find her. If there were some more mystical method at play, stopping it could be as easy or as difficult as you can imagine."
"That's about what I figured," Annie says. "Thanks."
"Certainly," Leviathan tells her. "Good luck with hiding Marie from her gaze."
The four exchange farewells and split up. Marie and Annie wait for a few minutes, but Double doesn't suddenly shed a disguise and attack.
"Okay, either those were the real ones or she's playing the long game," Annie says.
"I think they were real," Marie says. "I'm pretty sure she wouldn't know they're not undead anymore. Even if the newspapers mentioned Squigly, it was dark enough when we fought Black Dahlia that you couldn't tell if she was a zombie if you didn't already know."
"So Double wouldn't get any clue that something had changed," Annie says, finishing the train of reasoning. "Let's hope you're right. We don't have anything better to try than bottling up the Skull Heart's energy, so if Double's trying to put us on a wild goose chase, we're done for."
Something about Annie's words rings a bell for Marie. Geese, no, birds... Project Peacock! The program Patricia's in!
"There might be something else," Marie says. "The anti-Skullgirl weapons my friend Patricia's going to be given, she says they'll 'blast' me like a raygun. Could they do something to the Skull Heart's energy? Cancel it out or turn it into a different kind Double can't follow?"
"Couldn't tell ya," Annie says with a shrug. "But one of the scientists here probably could, if we can find a real one."
Annie blinks in surprise at her own words, then facepalms with a groan.
"What's wrong?" Marie asks.
"We need a real one," Annie says. "And there's one Double."
Marie can't help but facepalm too. How could they have forgotten? If they find a group of people, they can't all be fakes, because Double doesn't split into pieces.
"Let's find where everyone has lunch," Annie says. "It has to be lunch time by now, there's gonna be a ton of people in their break room or whatever. There's gotta be someone who'll have our answers."
That would explain how empty this particular spot in the Lab is if the staff are busy eating. Marie nods in agreement to the plan, and the two set off to find their prize.
Thanks to a few "lucky guesses" from Marie that are actually her following the smell of food, it doesn't take long to find a cafeteria. And Annie was right, there's a lot of scientists, medical staff, field operatives, and other assorted people milling around the room. Finding the right person won't be easy.
Marie looks at Annie and asks, "How are we going to get help?"
Annie smirks and says, "I told you, there's only one of her and a whole lot of people in here."
Annie puts a hand to her mouth and shouts, "HEY EVERYONE!"
All eyes in the room turn to Annie. Everyone here knows what her voice sounds like, and enough people in the Anti-Skullgirl Labs know the truth about Annie that nobody really questions why Annie of the Stars has shown up.
"You all know you've got the Skullgirl here?" Annie gestures to Marie, who gives a hesitant wave, not sure how to act in this situation.
Everyone nods.
"Well," Annie continues. "She's got a shapeshifter after her who can follow the energy the Skull Heart gives off. The shapeshifter wants the Skullgirl in her clutches and doesn't care who gets in her way, so she's a problem. We don't know if she's already here or not, but there's only one of her, so we're asking you all together now: how do we hide the Skullgirl?"
Everyone in the audience starts muttering, whether to themselves or to someone else in the crowd.
"Don't be shy now!" Annie says. "If our shapeshifter's here, she's gonna try to trick us! If you hear any bad ideas, call them out!"
That makes the discussions more intense, and there are a few occasions where Marie or Annie needs to keep people from coming to blows. Eventually, though, a consensus develops around two ideas being the most likely options: either Marie can wear clothes made out of special materials that can absorb the Skull Heart's energy, or she can let herself be bombarded by "Z-rays," which will be used by the weapons for Project Peacock, every so often to dampen the Skull Heart's energy and make it so there's less for Double to detect altogether. The scientists can't agree on which option would be more likely to work, though, and they can't do both simultaneously. One option will have to buy time for the Lab to get the other one ready.
"What do you think, Annie?" Marie asks quietly.
"This isn't my wheelhouse," Annie says with a shrug. "You might as well flip a coin."
Marie isn't going to flip a coin. She has something better.
Myriad, what do you think?
A/N: I'll admit that doing a take on The Thing when I haven't designed the quest around the concept wasn't a very good idea. If this part of the story is boring for you all, I'm very sorry. I'm going to do my best to get this particular arc resolved as well as I can and then give you all some downtime to hang out with the different characters and do some more long-term planning and so on. After all, if Marie has a way to avoid detection from Double to go with her ability to avoid detection from normal people, then she can better afford to relax a bit. Also, this will be the last story post for today. Please bear with me for just a bit longer, and hopefully I can the quest to more interesting and fun territory soon.
Honestly, I'm not sure why she's shouldn't do both? It's not like wearing a set of clothes is mutually exclusive with periodically getting a Z-ray scan.
Although if only one is a option, I suppose the former might be better. Blocking via absorption is better than just dampening. And frankly, fictional magic rays or not, repeated radiation therapy doesn't sound very smart or without side effects in the long term, whether by causing damage over time to Marie or by causing the SkullHeart to build up a tolerance.
Well, there aren't that many shapeshifters I know of in fighting games. Double, Shang Tsung and Twelve are the only ones I can think of; maybe Android 21 if you treat her like a Majin. But I do know of a simple way to answer, assuming Double does not also assimilate the memories of those she shapeshifts into.
Get everyone together, and have Annie ask, "What did you have for lunch yesterday?"
Say if someone had steak at a fancy restaurant, but someone else distinctly remembered seeing them eating fish in the lobby for lunch... and someone else corroborates that. The one who had steak is our Double.
Honestly, I'm not sure why she's shouldn't do both? It's not like wearing a set of clothes is mutually exclusive with periodically getting a Z-ray scan.
Although if only one is a option, I suppose the former might be better. Blocking via absorption is better than just dampening. And frankly, fictional magic rays or not, repeated radiation therapy doesn't sound very smart or without side effects in the long term, whether by causing damage over time to Marie or by causing the SkullHeart to build up a tolerance.
Marie can do both eventually, but each option requires enough time and resources that she has to pick one to do right now and buy Lab 8 enough time to get the other one ready. That's my mistake, I'll see if I can make the story post clearer.
That makes the discussions more intense, and there are a few occasions where Marie or Annie needs to keep people from coming to blows. Eventually, though, a consensus develops around two ideas being the most likely options: either Marie can wear clothes made out of special materials that can absorb the Skull Heart's energy, or she can let herself be bombarded by "Z-rays," which will be used by the weapons for Project Peacock, every so often to dampen the Skull Heart's energy and make it so there's less for Double to detect altogether. The scientists can't agree on which option would be more likely to work, though, and they can't do both simultaneously. One option will have to buy time for the Lab to get the other one ready.
Although if only one is a option, I suppose the former might be better. Blocking via absorption is better than just dampening. And frankly, fictional magic rays or not, repeated radiation therapy doesn't sound very smart or without side effects in the long term, whether by causing damage over time to Marie or by causing the SkullHeart to build up a tolerance.
...We need to go for the Z-Rays, no questions about that for me, the clothes would work, except that it depends on how much of Marie herself does it need to cover, because that it runs the risk of losing effectiveness if Marie start shapeshifting into different forms that don't fit her.
That's mostly on us for not giving a chance to Marie to explain about that, but eh, I think its still good we have kept that trick in the backpocket, but i thinkw e ought to start telling othrs about Marie's more...interesting tricks.
If Marie doesn't care that the clothes would limit her use of shapeshifting powers, I suppose she can go with that. Weakening the energy that the Skullheart creates might also weaken her a bit, but thats an acceptable risk too for me, we should have ways later to fix that.
Well, there aren't that many shapeshifters I know of in fighting games. Double, Shang Tsung and Twelve are the only ones I can think of; maybe Android 21 if you treat her like a Majin. But I do know of a simple way to answer, assuming Double does not also assimilate the memories of those she shapeshifts into.
Get everyone together, and have Annie ask, "What did you have for lunch yesterday?"
Say if someone had steak at a fancy restaurant, but someone else distinctly remembered seeing them eating fish in the lobby for lunch... and someone else corroborates that. The one who had steak is our Double.
Could work, thought the idea does rely heavily on that type of sceneario, could work if/when Double infiltrates the labs, if it hasnt happened already.
Double shouldn't have access to the memories of whoever they transform, even if they end up consuming/absorbing them(Which is something she can do)
...We need to go for the Z-Rays, no questions about that for me, the clothes would work, except that it depends on how much of Marie herself does it need to cover, because that it runs the risk of losing effectiveness if Marie start shapeshifting into different forms that don't fit her.
At a bare minimum they'd need to cover Marie's chest, stomach, and back, but covering her arms up to the elbows, legs down to the knees, and neck would all help make things more reliable. Any more than that and the diminishing returns are too bad to be worth it.
ould work if/when Double infiltrates the labs, if it hasnt happened already.
Double shouldn't have access to the memories of whoever they transform, even if they end up consuming/absorbing them(Which is something she can do)
The problem with dealing with Double is that until we have a way of positively identifying Double we can never be too sure of who is or isn't who they say they are. Remember the Thing got into the base via pretending to be a dog. Also the Thing shapeshifted via Kill and Replace, Double doesn't have to, so everyone who goes out of our sight will have to be re-proven 'clean' again and again and again. There is also the problem of background person/NPC type shenanigans, where people seem to forget that service people and guards exist.
Honestly the issue right now is that we can't confirm is Double is here or not, but we might be able to narrow it down perhaps?
Have some people kept watch of the Cathedral, seems like that's the place Double spends most time, if she cares enough about that identity she needs to go back. She could also just discard that identity or have more ready to use, that's always an option, but I consider that resource denial if that makes sense
If they check the cathedral and Double is there then they have a bit of time to implement some measures to be ready for when Double tries to look for Marie.
If she isn't there that means she either has definitely if it rated the place or is in the way, anyway, should keep the cathedral on surveillance.
Might not seem like it helps much but it does help narrow things down a bit I believe,
Still, we eventually need to deal with Double, the perfect thing is that Double is the one that has to come to Marie, specially if she wants the skull heart, and oh boy, she can't let that thing go. So once we figure out the part to make sure Double can't track Marie, we can set thing so she has more advantage over Her.
This doesn't mean that Double cannot mess with Marie by leading trouble her way, specially Umbrella, but this might mean Marie and pals can more or less make some preparations for the inevitable attacks from the blob.
Might just be the paranoid in me, or the gamer. But a thing I would do as Double if I discovered surveillance on me would be to interrogate my tail and then pull a replace on them to get more info. This way there is free entry into the enemy stronghold, and a way to get closer to my objective.
This is a high tech secret lab. I would hope that they would have some security systems with cameras, password locks, and anything else they can think of. That should provide some protection against Double, since taking it out would indicate her presence.
Also, Kenshi from Mortal Combat has the ability to sense the souls of living things. While Double can change her appearance, she can't change her soul.
This is a high tech secret lab. I would hope that they would have some security systems with cameras, password locks, and anything else they can think of. That should provide some protection against Double, since taking it out would indicate her presence.
Also, Kenshi from Mortal Combat has the ability to sense the souls of living things. While Double can change her appearance, she can't change her soul.
I'll let you have that power, sure. It's good thinking on your part. And Lab 8 does indeed have security systems, they're broadly what you'd expect out of something like a modern-day store. Cameras, silent alarms that can be triggered easily by intruders, that sort of stuff. They recently installed some of those magnetic card swipe readers for the doors to a few really sensitive areas.
