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[EVENT #01] AS ABOVE, SO BELOW
| EVENT #01 |
As above, so below...  Twas a dark and stormy night... no, really. Despite the cliche, it actually was a dark and stormy night. Do you think it's a coincidence that it's storming in the testdrive? Honestly? Nothing is a coincidence in Oasis. So, back to the introduction of the event... The rain beats the ground in heavy sheets, leaving nothing untouched by its torrential downpour. Hey, if you don't seem to trust the clean water of the oasis just outside the walls of the city, I hope you have buckets out to catch this fresh rain. Then again, it doesn't look like it's aiming to stop anytime soon. The infected are waterlogged, but no where near sedate. The wildlife on the other hand seems to be keeping scarce for some reason. Flocks of birds seem agitated, but they stay clear of the city. Maybe you wonder just why that is... While the rain provides a new atmosphere for the tropical 'island' out in the middle of a sea of sand, it also provides opportunity for something else entirely. Something as of yet unseen by most in the city, only heard of to those paying attention. The Winter Soldier and Lexa stirred a hornet's nest unbeknownst to them. Small parties of local inhabitants invade the forests only at desperate times to collect essential sustenance to maintain their desert camps. In their endeavours, they ran into a triggered Soldier and bit off more than they could chew. Lexa found the slaughter and sent those invaders a message, stringing their bodies up in the forest. A warning. One that they blatantly disregarded and took as a sign of brighter times. It told those locals that there was more alive in the lush forests than animals and infected. There was food again. So, deep in the bowels of the city, tunnels were flooded with water. Those tunnels--catacombs--flushed out whatever filled them prior by the rain, were put back into use by those who found their way in before. They were barred off, strong enough that even superhuman strength couldn't budge the hatches without a cutting torch. Like the farmhouse, with its exit hatch, there are various other hatches outside the city for a quick escape or perhaps a safe entrance when running from infected. They had been found long ago... The Bandits  Late at night, when the rain is pounding the loudest, one of the hatches will breach. Into the city a small party will fill the streets. They wear full-facial gas masks that almost seem to have grown into their skin. They carry an odd hatchet of some form with a spinning buzz saw blade and they're not looking to make friends. They'll shriek phrases like, "Fresh meat!" "You ate all the cookies!" "Free lunch!" "I'll live in your ribcage!" "I need your face!" "I'll eat your ankles!" "Gimme somethin' to pound!" "Another walking meat puppet!" "Diediediediediedie DIE!" "SQUISH!" They'll charge anyone and everyone without regard for their own life, they'll slash and hack with their axe while throwing smaller bladed weapons with surprising accuracy. They cannot be reasoned with. They want to eat you and they can think of nothing else. It's possible a strain of the Ira Virus mutated in these beings, infecting them, but leaving certain higher functions in tact. Or, it's possible that they simply fell into madness and adopted the cannibalistic tendencies of the only living humans left, the Infected. The Infected  The catacombs have been breached! There was a reason they were so tightly sealed off, and it surprisingly had nothing to do with the Psycho Bandits invading the city from the depths of its bowels. Deep in the underground tunnels of the city, the infected had found themselves trapped, starving, decaying. Hungry. They were dormant, conserving their remaining energy for a desperate hunt and the dinner bell just chimed. These infected will spill outward behind the Bandits, ravenous. They run, they screech, they will tear you apart and they don't care what gets in their way. These infected are rotting worse than the rest, flesh falling from bone, leaving muscles exposed. Though they're fast and vicious, they're easily killed due to their decomposing state. [Mod Note: Infected and Bandits are not NPC controlled. Feel free to slaughter, maim, mangle, and mutilate however many you wish. Likewise, they can slaughter, maim, mangle, and mutilate your characters to your heart's content. Bandits do not transmit the Ira Virus unless they kill an infected then strike you with the same weapon. Yes, they will fight each other (infected and bandits).] |
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It was only after the violence stopped that Beth came crawling out from her hiding spot, looking more than a little awestruck. A long time ago, what she had just seen would've made her run away. Now, she understood and recognized the fact that men like him were the best people to align yourself with. That sometimes violence was necessary in order to survive, no matter how ugly the mess was.
She stumbled her way over toward him, her blood loss from hitting her face earlier making her sluggish and clumsy. The noise her footsteps made were enough to alert someone of her presence, but just in case it wasn't, she spoke up. "Hey, you okay? It looked like you got bit." And in her experience, a bite meant a need for amputation, or else you were going to turn.
Aww, Beth <3 Welcome to the game!
James wanted to reach out and help steady the girl, but his hands were covered in blood, and that went against everything he could remember of his old self. So he stood almost half frozen until he shook himself into replying to her, lest she think he was losing his grip.
"I'm--yeah." Well, it was partly true. He would be okay. The knife wound would heal. "It bit me in my prosthetic." And to drive the point home, he tapped one of his makeshift blades against the metal of the arm so she could hear the difference. "I was lucky." After that, he did move to help her, holding a hand out to her if she wished to take it for balance, after wiping the blood off onto his pants.
"What about you? That looks like a nasty wound. You gonna be okay, ma'am?"
thank you! :D
She hadn't ever been called ma'am before. Only miss. The distinction made her hold her head a little higher and she smiled.
"I hit my face earlier, that's all. When I was trying to get out of the thing I crash landed here in, I slipped and busted my chin. The other things are already stitched up." She had a deep gash across her cheek and one on her forehead, but they were just fine. And so was she, thanks to him. She had no idea where she was or how to find people she knew, but she wasn't having to hide from those awful things that wanted to tear her apart.
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Being a fresh arrival, he doubted she did unless she'd been lucky when her pod landed. Given her brief retelling of her injury, he didn't think she'd been lucky at all. Except maybe that she hadn't dropped right in the middle of an infected hornet's nest like some of the recent arrivals before her.
"This," He gestured with the metal hand to their surroundings. "isn't a typical day here, I promise. We've been relatively safe inside the city until now." He hesitated before continuing with another thought. "I'm... sorry you had to see that. I try not to let that side of me get out. Young dame like yourself shouldn't have to see that kind of bloodshed." Honestly, he isn't sexist. Just respectful. And she seemed too young to be jaded.
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"And I don't mind seeing any of that, either. I've seen worse things." Like her daddy being killed right in front of her, or the pile of bodies that had stacked up after she and Daryl ran from the prison. "You did the right thing. Don't apologize for it."
She might've looked young, but she had been through enough that it had matured her. She still needed help fighting in order to survive, but she understood the necessity of what fighting in a world like this meant. She didn't hold any of it against him.
It was only after she addressed his apology that she remembered he asked her something, and she gave him a more apologetic smile. "I had a weapon earlier. Lost it inside one of the walkers and couldn't get it back. So now I've got nothing, except you."
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She stated she'd lost her weapon and he started to reach for one of the makeshift blades he'd sharpened, so she could have something a little extra, when the terminology she used sunk in. It was enough to keep the flinch at bay when she subtly, and inadvertently referred to him as a weapon.
"You just called them 'walkers'." He looked up curiously. "Everyone here seems to call them something different. Infected is a common term, but I know someone else who calls them 'walkers'. I'd never seen anything like these things before, and what he told me about them probably saved my life several times over." He slipped one of the blades out and held the handle out to her. "Keep this in case we get separated or pinned down. That friend of mine's shepherding survivors to the warehouse until we can take care of the invasion."
He carefully started to steer her down one of the streets, keeping a pace that shouldn't be too difficult for her with her bloodloss, but wasn't too shambling, either. Any minute they could be ambushed again, and he'd rather be close enough to the warehouse for her to make a run for it while he held off their attackers. "So, you're used to this kind of thing?"
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"Thanks." She took a moment to tuck the knife into the waistband of her jeans, making sure it fit secure enough to not move around.
"Where I come from, this is how it is. Fighting walkers and other groups to survive. It's just how it is." She glanced over at him as they walked, making sure to keep an eye on where they were going so she didn't stumble or fall. She wasn't generally clumsy, but she was exhausted enough that she wasn't spectacularly coordinated.
"Is it not like that where you come from?"
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Her mention of fighting other groups made him wonder, as well. He reaches up and gives her shoulder a reassuring squeeze.
"We don't fight each other here. And if you feel threatened by someone, I want you to let me know. Far as I can tell, we haven't had any problems, but I'll be the first to knock heads together and put any upstarts in time out. A good friend of mine used to have trouble with bullies and I was always the sorry sap stuck saving his puny as--er... his hide." Don't curse in front of a lady, Buck. Mind your manners!
"Where I'm from, it's not these things we have to worry about. I've never seen them before. Just people who work for or were brainwashed to work for the wrong megalomaniacs and fanatic groups. But my memory's a little... off in places. So I'm probably not a reliable source of what's normal."
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She realized that might have sounded dramatic or ridiculous, but given that she was used to walkers and horrible things happening, it wasn't really meant to be anything but bluntly honest. Besides, she didn't think Daryl meant her any harm. He just didn't want her near him. That was why it meant so much to have found someone who didn't react so poorly to seeing her.
"It doesn't matter how many infected there are. As long as I'm not trapped someplace that's gonna try and use me, I won't give up hope that things will get better and everyone'll be safe. It's bound to happen someday, right?" She held onto that hope, because without it, she would give in and wait for the nearest walker to get her.
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"You'll be alright." It was as much of a promise as he could offer in their situation, but he'd make damn sure he kept it to the best of his abilities. "No one's gonna use you here. We're a community. We're just a community in the middle of the desert surrounded by freaky horror movie monsters. Just keep close and attentive and we'll all look out for eachother. No strings attached."
There was a groan off to the side as one of the infected dragged its waterlogged body out of a manhole and reached for Beth's ankle. Bucky slid his arm around her and urged her behind him as he kicked the hand away from them. He pulled the buzzaxe from his belt and drove the weapon into the creatures skull, pulled it out, and knocked it back down into the sewer.
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He seemed better outfitted for this sort of thing than she did.
There was a sigh of relief as the infected was kicked back down into the sewer, and her hand pressed at his back one last time in silent gratitude as she stepped out from behind him.
"We should keep moving. More are going to come out, now that one's fallen in like that."