Atrophy

No Masters or Kings - ON HOLD

Sam was thankful that the blonde doctor had taken his seemingly immortal comrade from his shoulder. He was even more thankful that he hadn’t wound up on the ground with blood circling his head like a halo in an old religious painting like that other poor bastard. Eavesdropping on the conversation between Doc and Red painted it clear who not to rub the wrong way, although he had already decided that it would be best to play nice. While he had no scientific evidence to back it up, Sam believed that people, usually, are less likely to bash your goddamn brains in if you’re not an asshole. Odds of survival went up even more if you brought something useful to the table. Looking around, Sam could tell he wasn’t the brightest or the strongest. He had no knack for leadership. Besides, Doc was already seeming to step into that role with her plans and demands, although he felt Ristachev might have something to say about it once his mouth wasn’t full of blood. Still, he could at least help steer the ship.

While having a large group was nice, it also added more unpredictable variables to the situation. Sure, all of them were obviously very dangerous prisoners, but he doubted the scrawny basement dweller or the glum teenage volunteer were waiting for everyone to look away so they could jam a shiv into their neighbor’s ribs. Since he wasn’t surrounded by a sea of corpses, it was safe to deduce that most of the people right now didn’t want to turn things into a bloodbath. In Sam’s mind, that meant that with every addition to the group, like the man who wanted to come and sing kumbaya, they risked having the balance shifting from a tepid peace into a thrill kill free-for-all. If what Elmina said was true, if Prime was royally fucked, that meant Sam had already survived the first round of shit hitting the fan. He doubted his luck would let him survive the second. First act as helmsman: establishing supply lines and routing.

Routing first:

“I know it’s not my place, but mind if I offer a suggestion?” said Samuel, approaching Elmina and the redhead and keeping his voice low to dissuade others from listening. “I’m sure you’ve noticed, but we’re drawing attention just sitting here. Even if Prime’s not looking, I’m sure somebody may have noticed the giant f-fucking spaceship crashing down to Earth. Regardless, we still got prisoners pouring out of that thing. Only a matter of time before a group of them come and decides that our guns belong to them. Before some of us go inside to forage or whatever, we really should move our wounded into the woods and leave some able bodies to guard them.”

“I’m staying with my friend there,” said Sam, pointing to Ristachev. It was a good excuse to not rush back into the dangerous Apox. “And I’ll make sure nobody comes to harm Pretty Boy or New Guy there. And if you’re trying to keep everyone on your side, then I think we’d trust you a whole lot more if you make the other girl with the gun stay too. I refuse to have us be undefended, and while I’m dumb I’m not dumb enough to think she’d actually give me her gun. So Blondie stays too.”

Sam held up his hands, ideally to stop them from injecting. He had something that would upset them much more than leaving behind one of their fellow girl scouts. Now for supplies:

“You two might not like it,” said Sam, trying to stifle his stutter as much as possible, “but if you think there will be a decent supply of food and water then perhaps you should take the Big Guy with you. Don’t take this the wrong way, but he looks like he could carry more than the four of you combined. You could even make a makeshift knapsack out of our dead friend’s jumpsuit and turn Big Guy into a pack mule. It’s clear from his attitude that he isn’t up for teamwork; you can use this as an opportunity to assert yourself and get him to fall in line. If he doesn’t want to help, Red can just threaten to shoot him. If he tries anything funny, Red can just actually shoot him.”

He knew they wouldn’t like the idea, but hopefully they would be able to see his logic. The current group of volunteers looked like they were strong enough to bring back maybe box of juice and a bag of chips--the small kind, like the ones found in vending machines. Hardly enough for a group that was just shy of a dozen. Sam had worked hard to make it out of the Apox alive. While there was no way he was ever going back in there, he certainly wasn’t going to go hungry despite all of his hard work.

“Of course,” he said, stepping back and no longer whispering, “ I have no real say here. I’ll trust you to make whatever you think is the best course of action.” He smiled. “Might hurt my feelings, though.”

No Masters or Kings - ON HOLD

@RosalindGood news: it wasn't me.

Bad news: I helped my friend finish the remainder of a 4 liter bottle of cheap wine.

If I never come back, remember that I deeply cared about you guys.

No Masters or Kings - ON HOLD

@Jbcool@Atrophy Jb is close to the truth. Here in Germany, every university student knows that, for every shot of hard alcohol, you should drink half a bottle of beer. Keeps you hydrated. Or gets you shitfaced even faster, I can't remember which.

@JulienJaden

Good to know that regardless of where we all come from, we can all bond over our abusive responsible enjoyment of alcohol.

No Masters or Kings - ON HOLD

@Rosalind Drink water in between shots! You'll have no hangover. And I'm going to a haunted house/corn maze on Halloween so I won't post anything that night until maybe after 12am EST

@Irisity

I once heard that if you mix water and vodka it helps prevent a hangover because you hydrate yourself while you get drunk.

Spoilers

It was not true at all. Quite the opposite, really. My head still hurts three years later.

No Masters or Kings - ON HOLD

“Anything stupid...you mean like get stabbed in the face?”

Samuel dimly nodded, pretending as if it had just occurred to him that, yes, getting stabbed in the face was generally not considered an intelligent idea. Meanwhile, in the dim light, the gray haired man observed what he could from the former Russian President. Part of Sam’s mind felt like it was his duty as an American to finish the commie off. If this was a film, a hundred American flags would unfurl to the blaring of the Star Spangled Banner as eagles flew over between violent cuts of Samuel pounding the Hanged Man’s face into borscht. Thankfully, Sam had never been much of a patriot, and being shot into space kind of kills a person’s desire for jingoism.

Besides, people had already killed Ristachev once, and he just came back deadlier than ever. Sam knew it would be stupid to bet against the man’s chance of survival; now if only he could fully convince himself that leeching onto the war criminal would increase his. Regardless, Sam found the man fascinating. He couldn’t resist lending a hand, if only to use it as leverage later on.

“U-understand this; If you attempt anything disingenuous, my wounds will seem trivial next to those you’ll suffer.”

Good enough for Sam.

“Don’t even know what d-disinge-whatever means,” said Sam. “But I think I still follow anyway.”

Samuel took a second to peer his head out towards the stairwell. There were no echoing footsteps, although over the alarms that meant very little. Still, it seemed this was as clear as the coast would get. If the two were going to try and make it out of the wreckage, now would be the time to go.

“Okay, let’s go. I’ll help you walk,” said Sam, slinging Ristachev arm over his shoulder and readying himself to flip the injured man over just in case he tried to crush Sam’s windpipe. The list of the man’s crimes bore themselves into Sam’s eyes. He knew he wasn’t doing the right thing, helping out this man out; he just prayed it would be the smart thing. “It’s Sam, by the way.”

The two slowly made their way out of the corridor and onto the flight of stairs. The steps were more gnarled and twisted than Sam had remembered, although then again he had skipped over most of them by taking the expressway down. Keeping his tumble in mind, he kept a safe pace with Ristachev lest he wanted to end up serving as the President’s cushion. After what seemed like a grueling amount of time, the two men made it to the bottom of the staircase. It was there that he saw it at the end of a corridor; daylight, actual, real daylight. Sam wanted to make a run for it, but keeping his wounded comrade in mind he kept the pace a steady and cautious one.

Approaching the exit, Sam could finally hear the voices over the ringing in his ears. He pressed himself and Ristachev into the shadows. It was a mixture of accents, genders, even moods, as if the crashed prisoners had somehow formed their own UN right outside of the smoldering Apox. He heard a booming voice mention something about a barbeque, causing his stomach that hadn’t eaten real food in more than a century to gurgle with hunger. I would kill for some brisket right now, thought Sam, followed by the more chilling thought that somebody here had probably literally killed for food before. Fighting against his better senses, Sam slackened his grip on Ristachev to give him a chance to back off if he wanted to and stepped through the entrance. The warmth of the sun hit his face, his lungs filled with fresh air; if this just ended in him getting ventilated, at least he wasn’t dying in some fucking prison.

“"Good thing you've got a gun though, if you stand about much longer, you're gonna fuckin' need it."

“T-then please at least refrain from using it on us,” said Sam, his voice wavering ever so slightly under his nasally New York accent. He looked around; there were enough people here that if somebody tried anything funny it would almost spell out certain retaliation. About as safe as he could be surrounded by murderers, terrorists, and politicians. “As far as I’m aware, I’ve been alive for all of my life and I’m too old now to do anything different.”

No Masters or Kings - ON HOLD

I think I'll just go ahead and set up a tiny little drumset in the corner over here. Whenever you need a rimshot just give me a call.

The Origin: A War Resumed (Arc One; Completed)

I moved on to PS4 awhile ago, although recently I've just been playing a ton of PC games.

No Masters or Kings - ON HOLD

Sam felt stiff and exhausted. It was the kind of tired one got when they sleep well past their alarm, or in this case seemingly hundreds of them. Over the sirens he could hear shouting and cursing, the pounding of feet on metal, and what even sounded like soft crying. There was a sticky warmth on his face; in fact, there was an uncomfortable heat all around him that was so unbearable it threatened to peel back his skin and char his bones. He tried to breath, and felt his lungs fill with ash as if he had been standing too close to a campfire. It didn't take a detective to figure out what was going on, or that he need to move. Sam pulled himself up into a crouch, ignoring the pain that had replaced the stiffness in his joints. His eyes were quickly forced shut by a dark cloud of acrid smoke, but not before he caught the blurry flash of red emergency lights that he prayed were designating the doorway.

Pulling his shirt that was dampened by the unknown liquid up to his nose in an attempt to create some kind of filter, Sam began to blindly crawl on his knees and elbows towards the exit. He felt his body shift through pools of more liquid—blood, judging by the faint scent of copper he was getting from his shirt. Hopefully it wasn't all his. What he assumed to be shards of glass broke underneath his body, a few fragments working their way through his suit to scratch against his flesh. He thought that a few nicks and some ruined threads was probably better than dying from asphyxiation and certainly better than being turned into a roast. His body crawled over something soft and he heard an injured groan; another person? Sorry. Sam kept crawling.

Risking a face full of smoke, Samuel flashed his eyes open for just a second. Closer to the exit, and the air felt less oppressive. Doubling his efforts, Sam weaseled his way through the rest of the fiery hallway. He clambored over more bodies; these ones didn't make any noises as his elbows and knees dug into them. What the fuck happened? The answer was one he would pry into later. Surviving was key now. He flickered his eyes open again. It looked to be a stairway ahead; the smoke would probably clear up there. Only a few more yards. He closed his burning eyes again. He already regularly needed glasses to read and drive, he didn't need to fuck his vision any further. Just a few more feet. He was breathing less smoke now; it really allowed for him to savor the stench of blood and guts around him. No time to take in all of the flowers, however. Another foot. A few more inches. The stairway, it's right there. Go on, almost, almost--

A strong hand grabbed his leg. Panicked, Sam kicked wildly backwards to shake it off. He felt his heel connect with what might as well have been a block of iron; a curse slipped out of his mouth. Dragging himself and whatever beast had taken hold of him forward, Sam reached out to the railing. His fingers licked the edge of the banister as the man behind him got his other meaty hand onto the waist of Sam's jumpsuit. The man's other fist retaliated against Sam's kicks, hammering the small of his back. Sam's hand finally found a grip and pulled himself onto the descending stairs. Gravity and the added weight of the other man did the rest. The two tumbled head over heels down the first set of stairs before coming into a crash landing on the midway point. Sam heard a deafeningly sound of skull cracking against metal as his opponent's head slammed against the wall. His grip loosened on Sam, and the older man slid off of the larger man.

Resting his head against the wall, Sam took his first moment of peace to try and figure out if he was okay. His hands felt over his body. A bruise here, dried blood there, a few cuts from the glasses peppered into his forearms and legs; nothing seemingly life-threatening. He could breath, see, and hear. He knew his name, his birthday, he could picture his kid (and his exwife), his crimes. He remembered turning himself in, and then they...oh fuck, was he in space? He couldn't recall if the Apox had artifical gravity, or if that was even a real thing. The air on the station had an uncomfortable artificial quality to it, like an overly sterilized hospital. Here the air seemed more natural. Did they somehow crash on Earth? That would explain the disaster scene above him, as unbelievable as it seemed. The man next to him groaned. Sam didn't want to be around when he came to; he needed to find an exit.

Pulling himself up to his feet, Sam's eyes fell for the first time on the black cuff around his wrist. The word “kidnapper” seemed all good and right, but the string of numbers appearing next to it were way off. No way had he spent over a hundred something years living life as a frozen tv dinner. That would mean that...Sam shook the thoughts out of his head. Freak out later, live now. Continuing down the staiway, Sam cut into the closest corridor as he heard feet pounding on the staircase—bringing him nearly face to face with a bleeding, stumbling man. The man looked as if agony was turning him feral. Taking a few steps back as his heart leapt up into his throat, Sam lifted up his wrist and pointed to his crime as if to say, "look, I'm harmless compared to the rest of these fucks". The hazard lights crossed over the injured man's face—Sam felt his mouth slacken slightly. He knew this man, or rather, he knew of this man. It was hard not to when his face was always plastered on the news.

“Fuck you're one tough son of a bitch,” said Sam. “Listen, I would hardly qualify as a doctor but I don't need a PhD to say that you're in rough shape. I-I can help you out of here, just agree not to do anything stupid. Okay?”

No Masters or Kings - ON HOLD

@KingfisherNow that would be responsible. Why would I do that?

No Masters or Kings - ON HOLD

I do believe it is just Atrophy to post.

If I am feeling up for it then I shall post again tonight.

@Rosalind

Yup! I should be getting up a post a little later today. Just gotta nurse a slight hangover.