Week 8

[airlockedmods]

[This weekend has brought about some unusual questions about your resident robotic Overseer, but unfortunately, you've also lost two more of your own to an accidental death.

You've done your best with the star charts, but if anyone is coming to help you, there is no sign of it yet. SIS remains the only friendly face here, even as you've found that she holds her own secrets. Meanwhile, yet another new floor has opened up - the elevators are in perfect working order now, if any of you care to go and see it. That's four concourses now; one for each of your groups. There's an awful lot of dead, aren't there?]


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[daughterofthemark]

AAAAH!

[AAAAH!

...I mean.

Yeah she's gonna need a second to. Catch her breath.

With that done, she turns and looks behind her. Any sign of where Sir/Dame Transparent Blue Person and their child have sprinted off to? Or similar ghosts/holograms/whatever suddenly running around?]

[airlockedmods]

[For now they're the only ones. The adult figure, a woman with wild hair, stops a few steps outside the house and looks around nervously. She sets down the child in her arms, a little girl if the pigtails are anything to go by, and kneels down to her level. Her voice sounds strange, a little faded and thickly accented but still understandable.]

Raddy girl, I need ya to listen real careful. I know things're real scary right now but me, Uncle Blaze and your dad? We're gonna take care'a everybody. We're gonna get everyone to the spaceport and get off-planet and we're gonna be safe. [She lifts a hand to smooth back the little girl's bangs and lay a kiss on her forehead.] Shh, shh, girlie. C'mon. [She scoops her child once more and reaches with a free hand to something at her belt. There's a small flick of her wrist and a laser cutlass erupts from the hilt in her hand.] Let's find our boys.

[She runs in the direction of the "Welcome to Flavortown" sign in the distance, toward the void, and vanishes into nothing.]

[daughterofthemark]

[Well, Arianna may not know a lot about sci-fi technology, and she definitely knows even less about ghosts or holograms or whatever these actually are.

But she sure as hell understands drama. She knows a doomed hometown when she sees it. She recognizes a mother and daughter. She knows you don't need a sword, laser or otherwise, just to escape a natural disaster.

And she knows that, in all her life both here and back in her world, she's only ever heard of one person named Blaze. She's going to have to talk to someone from Pyrrha's group when this is over.]

Be brave, Dame Raddy.

[But for now, she has things to investigate.

Like that void.
She turns and finally steps inside, looking around the living room for something like a broom or a sword. (What? Aren't they common objects?)]

[airlockedmods]

[There is a broom!]

[daughterofthemark]

[Cool, cool. Let's just take that, and poke at the void with the bristly end. See if it reacts.]

[airlockedmods]

[The void does not react but when she pulls the broom back any part of the bristles that touched the void is gon￦e.]

[daughterofthemark]

...ah.

[...yeah, uh. The broom does not appear to be a broom anymore. It seems to be more of a walking stick now. A staff, if we want to be generous. Arianna does not believe she will be embracing the void today.

In fact, she takes this opportunity to turn around and walk out the door. She's pretty curious about this place and wants to explore, but maybe it would be better to explore in the least void-y looking direction?]

[airlockedmods]

[There is...really not a lot that isn't void-y at this point. And was the void that close to her feet before or is it just her imagination?]

[daughterofthemark]

[...yeah the void definitely looks closer than it was before.

Arianna is curious and all but in the Labyrinth you learn a thing or two about weighing curiosity against wanting to not die. This is definitely an Ariadne Thread kind of moment.]

Dame SIS? I--would like to depart now, please.

[airlockedmods]

[That same sleepiness as before overtakes Arianna almost immediately and when she closes her eyes she'll feel it fade quickly. When she opens them again SIS is hovering over her in the pod, a worried expression clouding her face.]

That was not supposed to happen. Are you alright?

[daughterofthemark]

[She's expecting it this time, so nothing gets thrown across the room.]

I believe I am. What happened? How did I come to be there?

[airlockedmods]

I am not sure. The readings didn't say anything about a change in the simulation unless there was another glitch like before.

[daughterofthemark]

Well, there most certainly was a change. I had never even seen that place before.

[airlockedmods]

It seemed...familiar. I will have to look into this further.

Are you sure you are well?

[daughterofthemark]

...Dame SIS, is there some cause to think I'd be hurt? This "simulation" is akin to a dream, is it not?

[airlockedmods]

Not physically but past research into such in-depth virtual reality has shown that the mind may still register physical injury as being real and act accordingly.

I also do not know exactly what the encroaching darkness was but I would advise not touching it.

[daughterofthemark]

Ah. You need not concern yourself with that. I touched it only indirectly, using a broom.