MAY TDM

[monstertruckers]

code

Things are a little stranger than usual at the gas station and garage. Namely that gravity just isn't working as it should. Objects float, pieces of the floor float... Even unlucky new arrivals can also find themselves floating! It's going to be a challenge to get around without any scrapes or scratches... Though at least there's what looks like a hospital nearby? Granted, it's an upside down hospital, but it's better than nothing.

01: SUMMONING CIRCLE

Drifters come to with an odd floating sensation hooked into their stomachs, and instead of laying on the concrete find themselves drifting a foot or two above the floor. An unfortunate few may be stuck on the ceiling. Whether they crash down hard into the floor (and the various vials, daggers, and broken glass scattered about) or remain floating in the air is a coin toss.

Still, it might be best to lend a hand with pulling them back to the ground, and hoping gravity will work as normal in another breath or two.

Once they make their way out, they can see a gas station and garage located in the midst of strange, floating rocks… And an upside down hospital close by, for those who had a rougher landing.

02: START UP

New arrivals will have a similar experience to before; a Convoy waiting for them, and a collection of vehicles, one of which feels like it belongs to them. The key to the vehicle may already be in the ignition, on the dashboard… It may have even been on their person, ever since they woke up in that garage. Either way, Drifters have the keys to the vehicle now.

…But there’s a few rough edges on these vehicles. Flat tires, cracked windows and mirrors, maybe some stuck doors and locks; all of them the sort of thing that requires two pairs of hands and supplies. The garage can take care of the (sometimes floating) supplies… Now it’s just a matter of finding some extra hands.

And hopefully no one's vehicle has decided to float. But one can never be sure in a place like this.

03: HUSKS AND HAUNTS

The inverted hospital seems to have trouble deciding the exact formation of its hallways, whether the new arrivals should be walking on the ceiling, floors, or walls. But one thing that is certain: this place isn’t entirely deserted. Warnings of “Beware the Husks” have been spray painted on the walls. Metallic bodies line those same halls, some of them broken open. A wet trail leads from the broken Husks to the rafters… Where several odd monsters wait to drop down. Some look like they’ve merged with the hospital equipment, while others look like they’ve been cobbled together from different body parts. And all of them look ready to turn the newcomers into a corpse, or part of a specimen collection.

Strange, malformed chimeric creatures that are Unknown stalk the hallways. Unknowns come in three different colors, red aligned with fire, green with poison, and purple with lightning.

Adding to that are the various screens flickering on, and diagnose new arrivals as infected. The screens declare the infection seems to be contained, but requires further study… And if the monsters aren't enough to worry about, there’s also the restraint systems trying to activate and tie the new arrivals down.

04: TESTING (CW: Needles)

The deeper someone plunges into the hospital, the more the building reacts to them. More defenses are deployed, treating them as thieves or intruders. Traps and monsters alike wait for them, with syringes melded into the forms of attackers, or lining places where someone might step or reach for. The syringes make a quick bite on skin… But it’s only a few minutes later where the effects become clear. Something in those syringes is now in the blood and forcing monster transformations. There might be an antidote amongst the supplies… Or the newcomers might need to rely on each other, in order to stay anchored.

The needles can also force temporary Swarm traits, along with:
+Group Mind: compelled to link thoughts with other Drifters, to share emotions, memories, and achieve cohesion.
+An increasing reliance on telepathy/empathy/etc in place of speech.
+Increasing collectivist mindset. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few; this becomes more evident during high stress situations.
+Compelled to hunt and share their prey with others.
+Gravity Affinity: If possessing wings or the ability to wall climb, may freely hunt/traverse corrupted gravity areas.

05: LONG WAY DOWN

A portion of the gas station breaks away with groan and a rumble. And it is slowly pulled up and up, taking a portion of new comers with it! They (and anyone watching) will need to act fast, as gravity starts to go weird the further they rise. They’ll need to find a way back down, taking any supplies from the now-floating garage that they can grab.

What’s more, they are drifting closer to the broken moon, and that seems to be having a strange effect on those stranded on the new floating ruin. They may start to feel their control fray, and their forms shift, the higher they rise.

In terms of getting back down, there’s a handful of tow lines in the ruin that might work as ropes. There’s also a few pieces of rock that are floating up more slowly, and could work as stairs back down… Or there’s just jumping and falling fifty feet and hoping for the best.

06: PSYCHIC ECHOES

There's one last quirk to this area; a few scattered bits of odd plantlife, and the odd dead brain monster. While these things aren't a threat on their own (beyond being unnerving) they still pack a psychic punch; mainly in the form of temporary psychic abilities.

It's possible that after coming in contact with either plants or corpses, newcomers will find themselves gifted with either empathy (projecting or receiving emotions) telepathy, OR the ability to share their dreams with others, and having their dreams influenced by others in turn. This effect fades in just a day or so, but is still capable of causing mishaps.

MICRO ENCOUNTERS:

PLEASE NOTE! These are small bits of set dressing for players to include in threads if they wish, rather than full fledged prompts or events. You may handwave your exploration of these areas, or thread them out.

Broadcast: The garage contains a few burnt out monitors. But a handful of them are playing a message over and over again on loop, filled with static. It’s a recording of important looking people in lab coats advising people to remain indoors and avoiding all objects falling from the sky. Especially “moon shards.” They insist that they are working to contain and cure the infection, but the safest action is to remain inside.

Warped Air: As seen in Long Way Down, the air overhead has strange warped pockets in it. There seem to be slightly different shards hanging suspended in the air, looking more silvery than the surrounding rocks. Almost like it could have fallen from the broken moon overhead.

Medical supplies: Most of the medical supplies found in the hospital seem to consist of healing salves and potions, a handful of healing herbs, and a few antidotes for poison or sickness. As for reverting transformations… It’s advised that new comers be careful of taking any experimental medicine. It may revert a change. It may also leave them hallucinating nightmares and fears, and they’ll be wanting someone close by to help administer the drug.

NAVIGATION || RESERVES || APPLICATIONS

Comments

[iron_stomach]

This isn't the hellscape they would have normally found themselves in, with a black sun and a dying planet. The sky's blue here, the sun is gold and warm and inviting, there's new and tasty things to hunt (even if most of those things disappeared when killed), the floating rocks are a curiousity to poke at, all that's missing was his comrades.

It's vibrant and alive in a way the Junkyard never was. How could it be anything else?

The wings nag at him. A coat of feathers that shouldn't be there. Varuna didn't have feathers. Five months.

This is about where Gale Would Not Comprehend and further explanation would be demanded, the byplay between him and Argilla teasing out answers and perspectives that wouldn't otherwise be spotted, Cielo and Sera preventing panic or blind hungry rage setting in in their very different ways. They would move forward together, unified.

For a handful of breaths Heat's fists clench white-knuckled, short pointless human nails digging into his palms before he suddenly reaches up to tear the ever present cloak off his own shoulders, crumpling the sturdy gray canvas in his hands, the orange paint-smeared brand vivid in the hospital's terrible lighting. Five months.

The cloak is thrown at the winged form of Serph, familiar and not. Serph but changed. "I don't want to hear another word from you about tribes not being here. As long as we are, Embryon is. I'm not gonna have our damn Leader running around like some raw rookie." He'd find something appropriate to update his cloakless status before he left the building, it's more important Serph be properly marked. He doesn't think Serph might reject it, reiterate that there are no tribes, no reason to be proud of who they were together, no reason to stay comrades. It's not Nirvana.

It's not that the rest isn't important. Five months, somewhere NOT where they were supposed to be--

Where was everyone else?

[bufudine]

Serph watches Heat's reaction with the calm of someone who is long used to the quiet before an explosion. But when Heat tosses his cloak at him, Serph catches the cloak on reflex, momentarily stunned by the offer. The memory of Heat's face twisted in rage at the sight of him is still too vivid in his mind, Agni's claws turned towards him instead of at their enemies.

Carefully, he pulls taut the fabric in his hands so he can look down at the familiar orange cross splashed across grey. He thought he would never see this again.

"...When I was dragged here, I entrusted the Embryon to the rest of you."

He doesn't need to say who.

Serph lets out a quiet huff -- it would be a laugh from anyone else -- before pulling the cloak over his head. His wings are in the way of it draping over his back, so instead he allows it to fall over his right shoulder, orange mark visible from the front, exactly the opposite of how Heat wears it.

"It's good to have old comrades again."

[iron_stomach]

Heat doesn't have wings in the way that would get foiled by a cloak, his way is perfectly good for him, but Serph obviously required something different. He feels strangely bare without it, even knowing it's just temporary. He's been angry with Serph countless times, was right now, but it's never become hatred. Squashed fury that Serph declared tribes all but irrelevant, absolutely.

Attacking him over it .. not so much. Not yet. Not when he wraps gray and orange around himself, a decent stand-in until something more appropriate could be found, settling some of that irritation down. Rejecting it would have been rejecting him the tribe and that's intolerable.

This is better. "Yeah, well, you can't get away from us that easily. You had to know we'd be turning up eventually." He sets one hand on his hip, scowling at the hospital at large. There's no trusting the Embryon to anyone else, and comrades stuck together, didn't they? Of course they'd follow. He would. "Wherever this is, if it's not Nirvana." But wasn't it? There's so many new things. "..And what the hell is up with the wings, anyway?"