middleofsomewhere | Fissures of Time: Ongoing

FISSURES OF TIME: ONGOING

... POI 10-12

FOR SOME, THE MISSION HAS BEEN MORE MENTALLY EXHAUSTING THAN PHYSICALLY. Distortions sprout around the domain without rhyme or reason, and the camps must be moved every new day to meet them, as well as stopping a distortion from deciding to form under them from their presence.

While there's bare-bones vegetation, at least they have their own resources to help one another, as well as what can be retrieved from the Ministry base during return trips to take misplaced civilians to safety. It's straight-forward so far...

...but that wouldn't be standard for the Voidtreckers, and some in their ranks don't want straight-forward. Starting during the early hours of Poi 10, there will be occasional rumblings throughout the land. They last for a few seconds and then stop, seemingly for hours; but then they return, and as the days go on, so do the tremors increase.

It seems the distortions too have become affected...

THE UNQUIET CITY. (CW: People unable to die/rising from the dead, body horror)

A city of rubble and ruin stretches far out around them, where once there were hills and vegetation. Much of the rubble is still smoking as fires smoulder. The fighting isn't over, heard before it's seen.

It must be connected to the same skirmishes seen in other distortions, and so most of you are prepared to meet warriors on foot and mount. But what awaits isn't only the horror of bloodshed. No: the reason that the fighting still continues even as the city lies in ruin is because fighters fall and rise again, as if death were nothing but a short rest.

Puncture marks litter skin and armour, holes from weaponry and blessed-magic visible in torsos, even the spaces of where portions of one's skull and brain should be.

Yet they cannot stop fighting. They cannot fall to the ground, rest. Whatever drove them to fight this war still inspires them to continue, screaming as much in pain as in some sort of twisted ecstasy. Perhaps they are too shocked to do anything else. A city locked in eternal war, distorted in time, doomed to repeat itself.

It's hard to set the equalisers here. Not much is stable and fights are likely to break out wherever there are people. The people of this city have their factions, but they will not hesitate to band together to fight intruders.

EYE OF THE STORM.

They might feel this distortion before they enter it. A spine-chilling thrill, the feeling one might get at the edge of a storm.

—For a storm it is. The moment they enter it their vision will be obstructed, winds howl around them and rain lashes down furiously making a swamp of the ground below them. It's freezing cold and as they walk they will feel something in the storm. Almost as if there are icy hands, reaching out to grab at them, to pull them further into the worst of the weather.

It's hard to know where to place the equalisers, hard to see where the edges of this distortion are. Easier, not by much, to move further in, to find the epicentre and try and take it down from there.

It's a treacherous journey, but the centre truly is calm, water frozen like crystals. Yet temperatures are dangerously low, so it's in everyone's best interests to set the equalisers quick and get out.

MEAN AND GREEN. As the rumbling continues, there comes a strange and worrying distortion. Worrying, as this distortion can be seen from the outside. A hazy blur that seems to move across the countryside, along the left side of the camp you're stationed at. It gets dangerously close at times, and when it does...

Green tendrils of plant life burst out, entangling people to pull them into the distortion. Or chains of flowers spread from the distortion out across the countryside. Beautiful and colourful in the otherwise sparse environment, but those flowers work as anchors, spreading the distortion, expanding it.

To get rid of it they will need to enter, and inside is a thick jungle of vines and bright colourful flowers awaiting them. The foliage is thick and the air musky and sweet. It's easy to get separated, and getting lost is only a matter of getting turned around. The leaves are sticky and vines move seemingly on their own, curling around unsuspecting limbs, trying to trap people in this colourful paradise forever.

And up in the sky above, a woman's laughter can be heard, the heat of the sun bearing down that becomes uncomfortable quick. But don't look up - you may find a large yellow eye - yellow iris, yellow pupil, golden yellow everything - peering back at you, and find yourself being pulled in by the very ground itself by a powerful force.

NO SANCTUARY. Protecting the camps hasn't been difficult, despite it being a Purple task. Other than rowdy refugees breaking out into fights, little else has appeared to disturb them.

'Eiiiiliiifii.... Siiiiliiifiii...
Merios? Herios?
Don't hide... don't hide...
Everything will be so perfect soon...'

People are woken abruptly in the early hours of Poi 11. If by some special sense, or by a grab at their throat, by a body falling on top of where they sleep, someone else stopping the refugee who was about to take a knife to them.

The refugees have become uncontrollable, raving about wanting 'their Gods back'. The ground rumbles as the woman's voice from the hazy jungle - ethereal, so divine - speaks from below. Grass rises and the sky above burns with a brightness like an approaching sun.

Setting an equaliser will calm the refugees, but only those in the camps. Starting from lunchtime, more warriors and civilians will be found appearing from the distance and from thin air, seemingly knowing where to find the Voidtreckers' camps - and after some very specific people.

Those with divinity, control over weather, nature, and death will be especially targeted, along with anyone who received blessings from the Gods.

OOC NOTES

OOC post. Ask questions here. Let us know about shenanigans here. NPC requests here, set up a thread here. Rewards go here.

TL;DR: Starting on Poi 10, there will be odd tremors around the domain, and more aggressive time distortions. From Poi 11 refugees will lose control of themselves and start attacking Voidtreckers, in and out of the camp.

It will happen abruptly to begin with, but some keen to reading energy will find that it is shifting; like something is breaking in from somewhere else (similar to the time distortions).

Extra equalisers can be picked up from the Ministry base and they will be there to help, but there are also more distortions happening around the domain, so they'll be dealing with those. The Ministry will advise that any non-combatants should stick to the base, and even use the scouting drones to help from afar, if they really need to help.

Undead warriors can be found outside of time distortions, and not all of the people outside of distortions will be 'permanent' people. Equalisers can be kept going for a few hours to keep these people away, but will also need go into recharge/cooling mode.

Don't worry if you're still busy with the Starting log! Or if you've been meaning to tag, jump in here!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Once Nozomi had the vines cut off her mostly, she let out a gasp - those things had a grip and it was hard to breathe!

“Yes… yes, I’m okay!” She said, helping him out so she can get out. “Way too clingy for me!

Thank the user's users! He offers a hand for, now that he can see her clearly, Nozomi to take.

"Yeah, I noticed." He brushes at his hair awkwardly, finding leaf stuck in it, "One of those vines got me by the leg. Couldn't get to it in time."

Now having found Nozomi, he weighs up their options on what to do. "I wouldn't go the way I came. It's a wall of nothing but those vines and some other nasty looking plant-life. It's like whatever this distortion is doesn't want us to leave."

“And that’s not good at all.” Nozomi said. “Do you have an Equalizer? We might have to take this to the source.”

A strangled gasp escapes him. "Ah- None..." Oh man, way to disappoint his fellow crew mate users. Faux awkwardly brushes at his hair, and shrugs. "Got pulled in before I could grab some more to contain this."

"Well, I have this 1 leg for adding onto a full equalizer set," gesturing to it hanging off his thigh, "but it's only to amplify, it doesn't have the power of a full equalizer." And the only reason he has it with him is due to the other 2 limbs being trashed in a particularly nasty time distortion.

It's most likely not enough though. But who knows, maybe they could make it work.

"Just a leg?" Oh, that's not good. Nozomi quickly turned around to find her equipment, digging through it. She hoped that getting bound didn't ruin anything...

"Ah... oh, whew. I... I got one." she said. "I just hope it works."

At least someone is prepared. "We might be able to disrupt enough of this distortion," or whatever else they can do in their situation. This thing is big and nasty, "I'm concerned though that this place might attack the equalizers before we've set up." Especially if placed wrong.

For where to put them though. It's not a good plan to go back into there, but Faux thinks he may need to retrieve the drone after all if placement will be an issue. "I have a drone, came in with me. Problem is," he slumps, gritting his teeth, "it's trapped back where I came from."

“Drones? Drones I don’t have.” Nozomi admitted. She let out a sigh. “We might have to go back for it…”

Great... Though entirely expected.

Unsure on what abilities Nozumi has, Faux gives her a clear out. "We could manually eyeball it..." which comes with its own risks as he mentioned, "I don't want to put ourselves in more danger than needed." He says as he chops a flower trying to climb up his foot, noticing the surrounding flowers are bending towards them.

"If we do choose to go after it, it's not that far away, its just in an awkward spot over there," He points high up from where he came with a dense outcropping of noxious vegetation, "It's hanging at the top of that cluster of vines."

Nozomi watched as Faux pointed out where the drone is and tilted her head. Well! That's a problem, but not one she can't handle.

"Don't worry, I got this." she said, nodding. She went for her CureMo and hit the buttons on it, transforming into Cure Dream, her train uniform replaced with the bright pink vest, boots, skirt, shorts, bracers and leg guards her form was known for.

"Be right back!" she said, crouching down and taking off into the sky, landing part way up the vines.

Yep, still impulsive as ever.

It was one thing to witness Nozumi change into a completely different attire, yes, he can understand that, he can do that too, minus the lightshow, sparkles and other strange effects. It's another to see a cheery Nozumi then leap up into the sky and land half way up from where he had pointed, where moments before he had only just arrived to cut her out in time.

Very odd. This user will need a fair amount data reassessment in the future. But for now-

"Looks like you've got it handled." He answers cheerily himself. He's not going to say no to that! And she's so close already, only one leap.

Then he spots a bunch of big flowers within the dense entanglement near Nozumi growing larger... "Hey! Something's going on with those flowers over there!" Pointing to where he saw them.

He readies his disk, and moves closer to see if he can help her pick them off.

The surrounding flowers have other plans though. More of them are starting to bend towards him too. His reprieve over, he readies himself for more immediate plant aggression.

Nozomi would be more than happy to explain everything about who she is and why she does it later. She doesn’t mind talking about it and quite enjoys it.

Upon hearing Faux’s cry concerning the flowers, Nozomi gasps as she sees the flowers before her. Freeing a hand, she shouted “Dream Fluret!”, causing a rapier like weapon to form in her hand.

Even as she fought the flowers and vines, she can feel them wrap around her, a sweet scent overwhelming her.

“Watch out…!”

As Faux brushes off his own flowers with a couple swipes of his disk, shredding them, he looks up, hearing Nozomi's warning.

Some sort of gas is in the air, coming from Nozomi's set of problem vegetation, trickling down and around him now in faint plumes. It's times like these that Faux's thankful for his distinct lack of smell, or any breathing whatsoever. Nozomi seems to be worried though so he takes caution, drawing down his helmet, ultimately unsure of what this stuff can do if given a chance.

"Got it covered!" But does his crew mate?

Nozomi though isn't in a good spot. He needs to get up there!

Detaching his one equalizer limb from his thigh, he sticks it firmly into the ground at his feet, hoping its enough for now to keep these noxious plants off his back while he helps out his crew mate. Some of the activity thankfully stops in the immediate vicinity.

"Hold on! I'm coming after you," dashing back into the twisted area, he gets a good footing and starts to move up towards where Nozomi is, "Just might take a little longer!" he cries out apologetically, cause ya know, some programs here can't leap half way to the target...

Getting into a position he thinks he can just reach, he throws his disk at some of the vegetation assailing his crew mate.

Fissures of Time: Ongoing

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