Ducksworth

Project Genesis

Chrysanthemum Turner

faceclaim

____________________________________________________________

Name: Chrysanthemum Turner
Goes by: Chrys
Sex: Female
Age: 26
Occupation: Architectural Designer / Carpenter

Background

Chrysanthemum Turner was named with care. Her mother, Lila, chose the name deliberately. Chrys never knew exactly why. By the time she was old enough to ask, her mother was already gone, killed in a transport accident while Chrys was still young enough to struggle with the permanence of it. After that, it was just Chrys and her father, David.

He was a quiet, steady man who believed that understanding how things worked made the world easier to face. He fixed things himself whenever he could, not out of pride, but because he liked knowing that something broken could be made whole again with patience and effort. Chrys followed him everywhere, handed him tools, asked questions. He never treated her like she was fragile. He showed her how to measure carefully, how to work methodically, how to take pride in things that held together.
Those lessons stayed with her.

When Chrys was sixteen, David started getting tired. At first, it seemed unremarkable. Everyone was tired. The air was already growing thicker, the future already narrowing. David brushed off her concern and told her it was nothing worth worrying about. By the time the truth came out, the cancer had already progressed too far to stop. He told her quietly, apologetically, as if his illness were something he regretted burdening her with.

Chrys finished school while learning how to manage hospital appointments, paperwork, and meals neither of them had much appetite for. She learned how to sit in sterile rooms and listen while doctors spoke in careful, practiced tones. When her father died, there was no dramatic collapse. Just a sudden, hollow quiet that settled in and never fully left.

She chose architecture and construction because it made sense. Buildings followed rules. If something was unsound, it could be reinforced. If something failed, there was a reason. She gravitated toward work that allowed her to design with her hands as well as on paper, preferring practicality over recognition. She became known as reliable rather than inspired, thorough rather than visionary. It was through her work that she met Leah.

Leah was everything Chrys was not. Outspoken, idealistic, unafraid to be seen. She believed the world could still be changed if enough people stood up and demanded it. Chrys followed her to protests not because she loved crowds or confrontation, but because she loved Leah. They balanced each other in ways Chrys never fully articulated.

No one ever agreed on how it started. Reports conflicted. Footage was edited. Responsibility dissolved into argument and noise. Leah did not come home. After that, the world felt spent. Chrys kept working. She kept building things she knew would eventually rot beneath poisoned air and corporate indifference. When news of the anomaly first surfaced, she barely noticed. Another impossible headline in a world already collapsing under the weight of too many of them. The selection came later. Not an invitation, nor a choice. A notice delivered with clinical indifference, wrapped in Council language and legal certainty. She didn't feel excitement or fear. She felt tired.

But gradually, she came to understand what the anomaly represented. Not hope, no, but Distance. A place untouched by the systems that had taken everything from her. A place where she could build something honest. Something that did not exist to serve profit, power, or survival quotas. She does not see herself as a savior, or a pioneer. She is here because she knows how to make things stand, and because for the first time in years, she might be able to live without the world pressing constantly against her back.

In Secret We Lie: Still Accepting, In Need of Humans

I'd say submit the sheet here and jump in the discord if you want to discuss? We don't have the sheets on the discord

Project Genesis

faceclaim

____________________________________________________________

Name: Chrysanthemum Turner
Goes by: Chrys
Sex: Female
Age: 26
Occupation: Architectural Designer / Carpenter

Background

Chrysanthemum Turner was named with care. Her mother, Lila, chose the name deliberately. Chrys never knew exactly why. By the time she was old enough to ask, her mother was already gone, killed in a transport accident while Chrys was still young enough to struggle with the permanence of it. After that, it was just Chrys and her father, David.

He was a quiet, steady man who believed that understanding how things worked made the world easier to face. He fixed things himself whenever he could, not out of pride, but because he liked knowing that something broken could be made whole again with patience and effort. Chrys followed him everywhere, handed him tools, asked questions. He never treated her like she was fragile. He showed her how to measure carefully, how to work methodically, how to take pride in things that held together.
Those lessons stayed with her.

When Chrys was sixteen, David started getting tired. At first, it seemed unremarkable. Everyone was tired. The air was already growing thicker, the future already narrowing. David brushed off her concern and told her it was nothing worth worrying about. By the time the truth came out, the cancer had already progressed too far to stop. He told her quietly, apologetically, as if his illness were something he regretted burdening her with.

Chrys finished school while learning how to manage hospital appointments, paperwork, and meals neither of them had much appetite for. She learned how to sit in sterile rooms and listen while doctors spoke in careful, practiced tones. When her father died, there was no dramatic collapse. Just a sudden, hollow quiet that settled in and never fully left.

She chose architecture and construction because it made sense. Buildings followed rules. If something was unsound, it could be reinforced. If something failed, there was a reason. She gravitated toward work that allowed her to design with her hands as well as on paper, preferring practicality over recognition. She became known as reliable rather than inspired, thorough rather than visionary. It was through her work that she met Leah.

Leah was everything Chrys was not. Outspoken, idealistic, unafraid to be seen. She believed the world could still be changed if enough people stood up and demanded it. Chrys followed her to protests not because she loved crowds or confrontation, but because she loved Leah. They balanced each other in ways Chrys never fully articulated.

No one ever agreed on how it started. Reports conflicted. Footage was edited. Responsibility dissolved into argument and noise. Leah did not come home. After that, the world felt spent. Chrys kept working. She kept building things she knew would eventually rot beneath poisoned air and corporate indifference. When news of the anomaly first surfaced, she barely noticed. Another impossible headline in a world already collapsing under the weight of too many of them. The selection came later. Not an invitation, nor a choice. A notice delivered with clinical indifference, wrapped in Council language and legal certainty. She didn't feel excitement or fear. She felt tired.

But gradually, she came to understand what the anomaly represented. Not hope, no, but Distance. A place untouched by the systems that had taken everything from her. A place where she could build something honest. Something that did not exist to serve profit, power, or survival quotas. She does not see herself as a savior, or a pioneer. She is here because she knows how to make things stand, and because for the first time in years, she might be able to live without the world pressing constantly against her back.

IH Phoenix Corp Turkey Shoot

Aramis didn’t say anything when Yumi finally looked down and realized the state she was in. The simple "Ah..." drew a tiny shift in his expression — the faintest upward twitch at the corner of his mouth, as if he were suppressing a sigh and a laugh at the same time. Locke’s muttered comment summed it up well enough.

The rest of the work unfolded without drama. Hauling the Greatspur carcasses back to town. Turning them in. Bringing the last one home. Aramis moved through it with quiet efficiency, grateful for something practical to focus on.

Back in the kitchen, he settled naturally into the rhythm Locke established — chopping where asked, stirring when directed, offering occasional dry observations when Locke tried something questionable. It was… calming. Predictable. Safe ground after the chaos of earlier.

Then Yumi returned from washing up. And Aramis froze for half a second. Gone was the gore. Gone the blood-slick chaos. Instead she looked—well—he caught himself staring and looked away sharply before his expression could betray anything too obvious. He told himself it was just the contrast. The dramatic shift from battlefield carnage to… her. Clean. Bright-eyed. Smiling softly as she stepped into the warm-lit kitchen. That was all. Probably.

He cleared his throat and said something that, in hindsight, he immediately regretted:

“...ah. Good. You look... functional again.”

Functional? Functional?!

He shut his eyes for a moment as if mentally erasing the line from existence. He tried again, quieter: “...it.. suits you.”

Whatever that meant. Thankfully, the work resumed before he could embarrass himself further. Together, they finished the dinner — Locke leading with confidence, Yumi precise as always, Aramis steady in the background.

When Evie arrived, he stepped back, letting the moment be hers. Her reaction softened the room, her gratitude warm and genuine. Aramis accepted her hug with stiff surprise but didn’t pull away. As the four of them finally sat at the table, the meal glowing under the gentle lights, Aramis allowed himself a moment to breathe — really breathe. It was peaceful. Almost… comfortable.

He glanced, briefly, at Yumi across the table. Then immediately looked down at his plate, ears warming just slightly. He survived giant turkeys today. He was not prepared to survive that.

He didn’t know what Thanksgiving was supposed to feel like but this? This felt close.

IH Phoenix Corp Turkey Shoot

Aramis remained very still as the final Greatspur collapsed behind Locke with a thunderous, ground-shaking thud. Dust rippled over him. A few stray feathers drifted down like the world’s saddest confetti. He blinked at the scene of carnage—the toppled giants, the cratered earth, the shredded field—then at Locke, who had just executed a maneuver so cleanly it looked choreographed.

“…impressive,” he managed, still a little breathless. “Terrifying, but impressive.”

He brushed a smear of dirt from his sleeve.

He did not get all of it.

Then Yumi bounded up.

Covered.

Entirely.

From boots to hairline.

In turkey blood.

She looked like a cheerful yokai that had just burst through the floor of a horror film. A feather stuck to her cheek. Another slid down her scythe. She didn’t seem aware of any of it.

Aramis’ brain made a soft clicking sound as it tried to process the contrast.

"Sugoi!" she said, beaming. "That was freakin' AWESOME!"

Aramis opened his mouth, but nothing came out. Then she thrust out a gore-slick, squelching fist.

"Victory fist bump!"

Aramis stared at the fist. Then at the blood dripping from it. Then back at her bright, expectant smile.

He swallowed.

Very slowly, he lifted one hand—carefully, delicately—and extended one single finger forward to tap her knuckle with the smallest, most minimal contact physically possible.

boop.

“…victory,” he said quietly, because at this point he wasn’t sure what else one was supposed to say.

Aramis exhaled.

“I… think we should locate water,” he added, tone flat, gaze flicking meaningfully at the crimson streaks running down her face. “A lake. A river. A well.”

He paused.

“Anything. Soon, preferably.”

IH Phoenix Corp Turkey Shoot

Aramis lay sprawled in the dirt for a heartbeat, staring up at a drifting petal as the world continued violently around him. The stomp that launched him had left his ears ringing, but he quickly realized—miraculously—that the turkey wasn’t attacking him anymore.

He pushed himself upright, grimacing, and followed the thunderous movement with wide eyes.

The lead Greatspur had fully turned toward Locke, who was already sprinting into position. Jumpjets flared, rifle barked, and the giant bird reeled in panicked agitation. The pilot’s precision was enough to keep the beast off Aramis entirely. Aramis exhaled shakily. Then motion behind him made him glance back. And he froze.

Yumi was a blur—vaulting onto a turkey’s back, using it as a springboard, twisting midair, hitting a tree, launching herself again.

Her boots connected with the gargantuan poultry skull hard enough to tilt reality, and her scythe followed with a decapitating slice that felled two titans in a single motion.

She landed in settling dust like a tiny, terrifying warrior-angel. Aramis blinked. Once. Twice.

”…right.”

He turned back to Locke—still moving with practiced military fluidity, still firing, still keeping the turkey from turning back toward him.

Aramis swallowed and gathered himself, brushing dirt from his coat in a futile attempt at dignity.

”I see we’re all having… productive mornings,” he muttered under his breath, breathless and stunned but very much alive.

His grip tightened on his staff as he repositioned himself toward the funnel, trusting—with equal parts relief and exasperation—that his companions had the situation in hand far more than he currently did.

With a weary sigh, he lifted his staff just slightly in Locke’s direction.

A tiny, shimmering barrier flickered into existence around the pilot—small, unnecessary, and almost apologetically weak compared to the carnage unfolding around them.

Aramis muttered, under his breath, in the flattest, half-sung, sarcastically enthusiastic tone imaginable:

”…ganbaaaatte~.”

IH Phoenix Corp Turkey Shoot

Aramis moved at a steady, purposeful pace toward the narrow funnel of earth and fencing, the soft crunch of dew-damp soil beneath his boots the only sound accompanying him. The morning light still painted everything in a serene glow — drifting petals, rippling wheat, the faint hush of the breeze.

It would have been almost peaceful. Almost. A low tremor stirred behind him. He slowed. Another tremor. He frowned slightly, glancing back over his shoulder—and froze.

The Greatspurs were no longer meandering.They were bearing down on him, en masse, heads lowered, wattles flapping with violent enthusiasm, talons digging trenches in the earth as they thundered toward him like feathered siege engines fueled by pure homicidal hunger. Aramis inhaled sharply. His eyes widened. His entire posture stiffened in a singular instant of frozen, horrified realization. Then—

He bolted. Not with calm tactical intent. Not with dignified urgency. But with the desperate, high-speed, self-preserving sprint of a man who has just discovered that physics and poultry have united to kill him.

“NONONONONO—!”

His boots hammered the ground as he tore down the funnel, coat flapping wildly behind him like a banner of pure regret. The breathless thuds of pursuing turkey-titans shook the earth so violently he nearly stumbled on the uneven path. He did not look back again. He refused to look back again. Nothing good existed behind him anymore — only feathers, fury, and the worst death imaginable. The kill zone ahead suddenly felt like the most beautiful place he had ever seen.

“WHY ARE THEY SO FAST?!” he shouted to absolutely no one, voice cracking in a way he would later deny.

And so Aramis sprinted for his life — a lone, panicked projectile hurtling straight into the ambush point as the Greatspur horde thundered after him with murderous delight.

IH Phoenix Corp Turkey Shoot

For several long seconds, Aramis didn’t move. The breeze tugged at the scattered corn rolling past his boots, each kernel bouncing downhill like a tiny herald of misfortune. Yumi’s grin still lingered in the air like perfume, and the Greatspur flock was beginning to take suspicious interest in the glittering trail she’d so enthusiastically deployed.

Aramis nodded once, very slowly.

“Yes, exactly, I'll lead them, Locke prepa-” Tap. A single kernel nudged the toe of his boot. He stared down at it. “…wait.” His head lifted.

“Ehh?!”

He snapped his gaze toward Yumi for an immediate explanation — only to find a Yumi-shaped puff of dust, the breeze already fraying its silhouette into nothing. Aramis blinked. He turned sharply toward Locke next — and saw absolutely nothing. Just a faint shimmer in the air where a jump-jet flare had been a moment earlier. Silence. Realization. A very deep, very private sigh.

“...Yappari...”

He straightened his coat, set his shoulders, adjusted his grip on his staff and without another word, began the solemn, inevitable doom walk toward the bottleneck and the enormous, increasingly interested turkeys below.

[Ryke - Dungeon] Languishing Large Loner

---

Remember Them, Not Me.

---

He never saw the Mammoth hit him. There was only the after. A single impossible moment where the world folded into a fist around him, crushing everything between heartbeats — and then the pain slammed through him so violently he forgot what bodies were supposed to feel like.

It lasted all of a second. Then it was gone. Not eased. Not numbed. Gone.

The mist swept in, warm and thick, smothering the agony before his mind could process it. What had been a scream inside him became a strange, distant quiet — like someone had reached into his chest and turned the volume down on himself. He lay on the floor, cheek against mirrored glass, unable to remember how he got there. Or how many bones were broken. Or which organs were leaking into places they shouldn’t.

His hearing rang — a high, sharp note that felt less like sound and more like pressure. His vision blurred into watercolor streaks. Shapes moved in frames, not in motion — Yumi in three broken fragments of movement, Evie flickering, Locke bursting in and out of vision like a glitch. Roscoe was a still shape in the corner. Aramis’s chest tightened, but even that felt wrong, loose, distant.

He tried to inhale. The air bubbled in his lungs. Wet. Heavy. Final.A cold certainty set in. He wasn’t going to survive this. Something pressed against the back of his skull — not literally, but in feeling. A soft warmth. A hush. Death, not as an ending, but as a Mother’s hand slipping fingers gently through a child’s hair. Comforting. Patient. Waiting.nHe should have let go. Anyone sane would have. But his mind — the only unbroken thing left — clung to one thought like a man clutching a lantern in the dark: If I’m dying anyway… then everything I have left is theirs.

He dragged his fingers across the floor. The movement sent a quiet cascade of wrongness through his torso, but the mist dulled it until it felt like it belonged to someone else. He didn’t rise — he couldn’t — but he pressed his palm to the cold mirrored glass, smearing blood he barely recognized as his own. His vision flickered again.

Evie, running toward him with her shoulder hanging wrong. Yumi, vaulting on a shattered leg just to buy someone a second. Locke, firing into illusions without hesitation. Roscoe, who had stood between disaster and his people until disaster won. Strangers, all of them — but in a way he had never expected to have.

His chest hitched, something like a sob catching behind the ringing. He let magic bleed out of him — not shaped, not guided, nothing but raw will and the last warmth of a life leaving him. He poured into the floor the only thing he had left to give: the memory of them.

Not words. Not commands. Just the emotional truth of what he’d witnessed — bravery, sacrifice, stubborn human love. His voice was barely a breath against the glass.

“…remember… them…”

A pause. A shudder. His fingers slipping.

“…not… him…”

His body sagged. His vision tunneled. Death’s soft hand brushed a thumb along the back of his head, soothing, inviting. He pressed his palm harder anyway. If this was all he had left — if this was the last imprint he ever made on a living world — then let it be this:

Protect them. Please. Protect them.

Nothing else mattered anymore.

---

Economy and Narration

OOC: Aramis, convinced of his inevitable death, puts everything of himself into his final act.

Actions:

1. Attempts to move and fails (severely injured; remains prone).

2. [Impressed Will] – [Intelligence C] + [Magic E] + [Enchanting F] + [Duration F] + [Range F] – Aramis pours his remaining will and magic into the Domain, attempting to interfere with Kavros’ control. Specifically, he tries to overwrite the Dungeon’s current directive of serving Kavros by impressing a competing directive: to prioritize and protect his allies instead of empowering Kavros and his magic.

3. Emotional directive: “Remember them. Not him.” – his last conscious effort is to make the Domain remember the party’s sacrifice over Kavros’ will.

Redshift Blues

---

D O W N I N T H E D E P T H S
A J A X A N D V I N N Y P R O D U C T I O N

---

The hiss came first, then the air vanished. One second Jax was breathing smoke and fumes; the next, the room inhaled. A hollow whump that yanked the breath straight out of his chest and sent papers and dust swirling upward like startled ghosts, scattering tools on the floor. His lungs clenched on instinct; his hands clawed for balance as equilibrium slipped.

“—the fuck?!” The words came out thin and ragged. His chest burned, his ears popped. Panic hit before thought, that primal fear of vacuum, of hull breach, of death. He staggered toward the wall, coughing, eyes darting. The extinguisher’s roar filled the small room, dragging the smoke toward its nozzle in a long, spiraling ribbon until the air settled again. As the smoke cleared, its source became apparent. It was some apparently malfunctioning device on Jax’s desk. Vĩnh progressed slowly into the room, inching closer. The extinguisher pulled the device in. Vĩnh shut it off. The room was silent, save for the low hum of the Dullahan’s life-support catching up and the faint rattle of tools rolling on the deck.

Jax gasped for air and finally turned to the source of the noise, ready to curse whatever idiot had triggered — and froze. Vĩnh stood at his desk, extinguisher still in hand, her chrome catching the flickering light. For a moment he just stared, jaw slack, disbelief flickering into fury.

“You—” His voice cracked. “You did this?! You just—walked in here and—” He choked mid-sentence, coughed again, half from smoke, half from rage. “You can’t— you don’t—” His hand jerked toward her, trembling. “You don’t come in here!” The words tumbled over each other now, spit and breath fighting for the same space. “You don’t— you can’t! You!” His voice rose, frayed and hoarse. “You trying to kill me now? huh!? Don’t need air yourself, so who gives a damn if the rest of us choke!?”

He took a staggering step towards her, eyes wild. “Any excuse to sneak in again, that it? Spy on me, check my work, see what the meatbag’s building?” His tone cracked between mockery and venom. “Just couldn’t resist, could you?”

He kicked a crate aside; it clanged off the wall and rolled into the corner. “I had it handled! You— Y’think I’d torch my own room?! You think I don’t know what I’m doing?!” He gestured violently toward the corridor, chest heaving, voice raw. “Get. Out!”

The last echo of his shout lingered. His hand stayed outstretched a moment longer — shaking — before he realized how hard he was breathing, and how hard he had kicked that crate. He looked away, jaw tight, pulse hammering against his throat, and his toes. Vĩnh stepped back and held up the extinguisher emphatically. She exclaimed, “I’m just doing my job! Smoke is dangerous in small spaces.” She shook her head in a mixture of indignation and confusion, and added, “You think I should know psychically that your room is not on fire, huh?”

If the smoke hadn’t made Jax’s hair already look like he was physically fuming, his shaking from the audacity Vĩnh showed him definitely completed the look. His fists clenched at his sides and his shoulders slowly raised up to mirror his ears. “Get out! Getout, getout, getout! GET. OOOOUT!!”

Vĩnh stood firm. Her expression tensed as she looked past Jax at the rest of his room. She shook her head. “Either way, I’ll need to clean your room soon.” She gestured around the room with her free hand, “It’s filthy already.”

How could she just stand there and talk so nonchalantly after almost killing a guy? It must have been, quite obviously, one of those damn cybernetic thingamabobs. “There is absolutely no way in this damn hell of a pocket of space I’m letting you in here to get your hands all up in my stuff.”

Vĩnh put her free hand on her hip and sighed. “Then, you need to put them away when I need to clean here. You understand, it’s my job to clean the whole ship, right?” Her tone remained firm, yet grew gentler, in a way which approached condescension. “I have to clean here eventually. And I have to do a routine cleaning regularly. If I don’t clean in here, I’m not doing my job.”

“No!” he spouted like it countered the whole conversation. “I don’t want you in here! I don’t want it “cleaned”.” which he made to emphasis with actual air-quotes. “I just don’t want— you… Just no! Clean the rest of the ship but leave me be!”

Vĩnh shook her head again. “No. I can work with your schedule and your preferences. But right now, you get to choose when I clean this room. Not if. If you want me to not clean here, I need an order from Captain MacLaine telling me so. Otherwise, I am not doing my job in here. Do you see the problem, Jack?”

Jax’s chest rose and fell in a quickening rhythm. “It’s. JAX! With an X! And if you want to clean in here, you get ol’ Cap’n to tell me himself! As far as I’m concerned, my space, my choice!”

“Ja…x. Jax,” she repeated to herself, clearly chewing on the word to get a feel for pronouncing it. “Okay, Jax. Did Captain MacLaine tell you that your room was exempt from cleaning? Or, you know, this looks like a storage room. Did he give you explicit permission to use this room as a work area and quarters?” Vĩnh cocked her head expectantly.

He nodded along with it. Mouthing it out as she spoke the words in big movements, but when she moved on to the questions.. “Well. He didn’t exactly express that I wasn’t not not allowed to not stay in here…?” Confused, he shook his head slightly “I’m allowed!” He paused, from the looks on his face, he was obviously thinking incredibly hard, both to untangle that last sentence and also on his current predicament. His shoulders dropped, as did his volume. “But… I don’t want to not be allowed…”

Vĩnh nodded sympathetically. “Then, you should be careful. Captain MacLaine comes from a corporate background, you know. I don’t know how your background is, but corpos are rigid with us working people. I have to do my job. You have to do yours. We both have to minimize our liability in the case of malfunction or accident, you understand?” She spoke slowly, making a clear effort to enunciate each word such that there would be no ambiguity. “If I don’t clean, I’m liable for damage caused by what I don’t clean up. If there’s something on your floor that causes rust, anything flammable that could get tracked around, and so on. If I don’t clean, I’m not doing my job, and I get in trouble for that. And I don’t know or understand much about your work, and I want to respect it and respect your space within the confines of what I am able to do according to my duty, but in order for me to do that, you have to work with me. And you know, I can’t tell you what to do, but looking around here—” She gestured around the room, towards the myriad loose parts and compounds. “—and knowing you work with explosives, I can tell you that I see liability issues for you as well. If you want, I can look up the Jovian standard for what constitutes safe practice around volatile substances.”

Jax jolted at the mention of ‘looking up standards.’ Whether it was due to the fact he had never actually realised there were standards, or whether he chose to ignore them, or that he simply didn’t even know what Vinny meant. Still, the reaction was clearly visible. “I—ah… I guess you could clean up just a little bit. Just—.. Er… Don’t move stuff? And I want to be here when it happens!”

Vĩnh offered a polite smile. “Give me a day this week, and I will come do that. Believe me, I don’t want to have an accident with explosives. We’ll work together, you’ll have a clean work area and room, and everything will go back exactly as it was before, just cleaned.” After pausing a moment, she cleared her throat and concluded, “Anyway, I don’t want to keep you. Let me know if there is anything you need!”

@enmuni