mayfield_rpg | event: portal six

Entry tags:

!event

event: portal six | the wasteland

If you had thought that a charred nuclear hellscape couldn't possibly get any worse, turns out you thought wrong.

The sixth portal is located just a few yards across from the entrance to the Mayfield Dairy. The door to the Dairy is, as always, locked, but those of you who stare long enough at the drawn curtains might notice them fluttering slightly every once in a while- as if there's movement behind them. As if someone is watching.

Even just by glancing at the portal from the Mayfield side, you can tell it makes the desert portal look like a tropical vacation by comparison. The portal opens up to the interior of a ruined schoolhouse, its walls and floor caked with dust and ash. The hallways are bare and desolate, save for the occasional scorch mark. Inside the classrooms you can see small skeletons beneath the desks, curled up as if for warmth.

The world outside the schoolhouse is no better. Not only are the old hazards still here- pockets of intense radiation, air clouded by ash and smoke -but things have apparently deteriorated since your last visit. There are glitch pockets, as expected, but they're not sitting in place anymore: they're moving, slowly at times, quickly at others. And they're not moving at random, either: they'll come straight for you, as if they're hunting...

But glitch pockets aren't the only ones out for your blood. The roaming gangs of cannibal survivors are still here, but they appear to have been as changed as the landscape. Many of them bear the same deformities as the drones of the carnival- multiple or lacking limbs, two bodies fused together, mutated growths spreading up and down their limbs. Many of them are wearing scorched hazmat suits, patched together haphazardly. All of them are armed. None of them are friendly.

The sun hangs high in the sky, but you can barely see it through the thick brown clouds. This is a dead world, and unless you find that memento fast, you're about to become a permanent resident.

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What's the matter in saying you still won't do anything without getting some manner of payment? Isn't that just saying you've given up?

[He checked each of those skeletons and when he had made sure that none of them had anything on them, he stood up and decided to check elsewhere.]

It sounds lazy to me, to refuse to pitch in because you're not being paid. If there's work to do, then there's work to do.

[She looks up from her most recently investigated spot, brow furrowed.]

...payment's not just getting your paycheck. It's not just the meseta they pay out when you turn in the job. There's the satisfaction of doing something. There's... intangible things.

... Lazy? Hm. Work that has the possibility of getting yourself killed. Just saying.

[He wasn't finding anything. Clearly there was nothing in the schoolhouse.]

... I guess when it comes down to it, I'd rather keep myself functioning.

[He then headed toward the hall and looked down it.]

Should we try somewhere else?

Just stepping out your front door can get you killed. Crossing the street can get you killed. You take a risk every time you do anything. I've done this sort of thing enough that I hardly think about it anymore.

[She sounded proud. And then, slightly uncertain.]

Should I?

[This did seem to not be panning out. She gave him a nod, following him out to the hall.]

Yeah. Maybe where the shops should be?

[He started ahead and eyed the surrounding area.]

Hm. Maybe you were right in suggesting the dairy. ... Couldn't hurt to look, could it? Not like the schoolhouse proved to have anything.

[No answer to her statement? ...well, now wasn't the time to get all philosophical, was it? She came up alongside him, staring off into the distance outside the school.]

I don't know if it'd be somewhere significant to the librarian... but it's significant in general. I'd like to check it. Come on? Relative to here, it should be... [And she points, indicating the way she's pretty sure they'll need to go.] ...there.

[He walked along, and listened to her. He seemed to ignore the previous thing entirely.]

Significant to the librarian... Hmm... Didn't they mention something before about one of the buildings? Well, I mean, that's not to say that the dairy isn't worth looking at.

I don't recall that they did... Did they? Which building? Maybe the library?

[On she walks, on pins and needles. It was so quiet....]

I forget. Maybe it was something I heard in passing...

[He shrugged and continued on as if there was nothing to worry about.]

I must say, this is... for being a wasteland... the one back home was more... interesting.

Hm... [It's a slightly disappointed sound. They weren't going to find anything at this rate, were they? Other than scary void portals. Which Dakki is taking a slight detour from the straight-ahead path to avoid, as there's one right in the middle of the street there.]

...it's like this back home?

[That's something she hadn't expected to hear. She looks over at him with an expression of considerable shock and curiosity.]

Eh?

[Oh. Whoops. He probably shouldn't have mentioned anything about back home. How was he going to explain this...?]

Well... Yeah. More or less. Just not so many...

[He pointed ahead at one of the glitchy looking... things.]

... of those.

I'd hope that there wouldn't be any of those.

[It was interesting to learn more about Dynamo. He could be such a puzzle. And there was so much that he didn't say. Now might not be the best time to be teasing it out of him... but if not now when he's let a bit slip, then when?]

After this happened in Thanksgiving, some people said that this was the result of a... nuclear bomb. And there's a city back in my home that was obliterated by something similar. What happened, Dynamo?

Hm. Unfortunate for the lot who came in here before then.

[He thought about it carefully. He couldn't just outright say 'Yeah, I sent a space colony on a crash course with Earth.']

Renegade reploids. That's what happened.

[That's all he would say about that. He then looked for something... tall, to teleport up to. It would give him a better view point.]

I was one of them. I was still human then. I'm not sure if I died at the end of it or not...

[That had always sort of bothered her. Had she fallen asleep against Gat's shoulder when they sheltered against that toppled house, or had that weak human body simply given in to dehydration, radiation, and countless injuries?

She shakes her head and continues carefully onwards. But more of her attention is on Dynamo now, rather than their surroundings.]

...I see. You mentioned those before.

[What a dangerous world Dynamo seems to be from.]

Mellvore City... that's the city that was destroyed... no one's quite sure what happened. It might have just been an industrial accident. But I have to wonder.

[His attention seems to be focused up at higher things, which meant only one thing...]

Yeah? So, you're saying it was only a city that was destroyed?

A city and most of the surrounding suburbs... and much of the surrounding countryside is still recovering...

[What was he doing, exactly, looking upwards? Her gaze followed his, looking this way and that. Maybe he wanted to get a vantage point to...]

...no. No, don't even think about it.

Yeah? ... Unless the entire planet was left in shambles then... I'd say it can't be that bad.

[He blinked.]

What're you going on about?

...is that... [...what happened to your planet? Maybe it's a good thing that she doesn't finish the question. Instead... scolding!]

You're thinking about teleporting somewhere, aren't you? Don't! Not in here! That's dangerous!

Hey now, I'm just making sure nothing's going to make a sneak attack from above.

...really? [She looks skeptical.

She's also looking downwards, and over at one of the nearby collapsed buildings. Was that the drug store with the malt shop...? She shuffles a bit in that direction and toes at some of the wreckage, trying to find proof. Maybe some straws or a piece of a menu.]

Of course!

[Lies. He pauses and looks over to her and walks a bit closer.]

I hate to say it, but I don't think that we're going to find anything here.

[In the name of party cohesion, she will not doubt his sincerity. So she nods once, kicks another bit of rubble aside, and looks to Dy.]

Then we keep going until we do find something. I just wish I knew more about her. We'd have a clearer picture about where to search.

Eh, I figure if we find something... we'll know it.

[He then started off a bit.]

Though really... this place is rather boring.

If it's something valuable and significant, it might stick out from all the ash and dust and bones....

[She stepped a short distance away as well, scanning the distance.]

I'd prefer boring over roving hordes of mutant cannibals.

[That wasn't a joke. It wasn't meant to be funny. She said it with absolute seriousness.]

Edited 2012-09-10 05:01 (UTC)

Mutant cannibals. Right. They're nothing.

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photonicfighter - 2012-09-10 05:19 (UTC) - Expand

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silver_reign - 2012-09-10 06:30 (UTC) - Expand

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