Mcmolly

Mol's CS Thing

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Mol's CS Thing

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R.I.S.C.

_{Runan Isles Savior Corps}

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_{Established in the wake of Westwel’s destruction, the Runan Isles Savior Corps is by no means the most impressive program on Illun, but it’s well-funded and well-run by a few survivors of Westwel’s own Corps.}

Dr. Darroh

_{Character Info}

^{Name – Besca Darroh
Age – 33
Affiliation – R.I.S.C.}

<sup>Originally from Westwel, Besca Darroh has been around Saviors her entire life. Her grandfather had helped fell the Modir who would become “Dragon,” and her father had headed Westwel’s burgeoning Savior program. She met dozens of pilots, watched as their connection to the Modir ate away at their minds and bodies. Other nations treated their pilots like a resource to be burned through, kept at arm’s length in all but public affairs. Besca, however, went out of her way to engage with Westwel’s pilots and even piloting candidates, caring after them with a degree of humanity which was, frankly, missing in the programs of other nations. Her methods were derided as frivolous and naïve by her peers, but the pilots appreciated it, which, to her, was all that mattered.

She lost many things in Westwel’s fall; her home, her father, her friends, and no small piece of her faith in humanity, but ironically enough she didn’t lose her job. When Runa took in her country’s refugees, and subsequently acquired their first Savior, they came to the last living member of Westwel’s program for help in founding their own.

Nowadays, Besca doesn’t often involve herself in the politics of the program. Technically speaking she isn’t even chief of operations—a position occupied by the Runan government—but rather, her duties revolve around “pilot maintenance.” While she hasn’t lost her desire to make life easier for the pilots, she isn’t nearly as incorrigibly optimistic or sunny as she once was.</sup>

Dahlia

_{Character Info}

^{Name – Dahlia St. Senn
Age – 18
Affiliation – R.I.S.C.}

<sup>Dahlia was a toddler when her home was destroyed by the Modir, spirited away from Westwel in the arms of a family friend. She spent the first fourteen years of her life in the quiet, lakeside town of Hovvi. She was, like many children, absolutely enthralled by the Saviors, so when she tested positive and was whisked away into orbit, Dahlia thought her dream had come true. She missed her friends, and her adoptive father, but this was her opportunity to do something important. This was her chance to help.

She had no idea.

Runa’s Savior, Dragon, had not been phased by a single pilot until Dahlia entered the cockpit. With its potential finally unleashed, she was able to end invasions within minutes—which was crucial, because she couldn’t remain connected for much longer than that before the giant’s neural regeneration reached critical levels.

Dahlia has become Runa’s WMD, and as such, she actually doesn’t pilot as much as she did before R.I.S.C. acquired its two other Saviors. Besca has become rather protective of her, not wanting to risk putting her in situations where she may be forced to over-exert herself, or risk being overtaken.</sup>

Ghaust

_{Character Info}

^{Name – Hadrian Ghaust
Age – 38
Affiliation – R.I.S.C.}

<sup>Hadrian Ghaust is Helburke personified. He is strong, unrelenting, stoic to a chilling degree, and utterly devastating in the cockpit. Ghaust is also a veteran pilot, having commanded the Savior Marrowman in service of the Helburken crown for 15 years, and despite a phasing speed so slow that he rarely deigns to use his magic at all, he was well on his way to becoming one of his country’s most accomplished pilots.

However, Ghaust’s priority has always been the fight against the Modir, and Helburke’s clamor for political power is something he viewed with silent disdain. To him, using Saviors to settle diplomatic disputes isn’t just wasteful, it’s shameful. So, when Helburke ordered him to bring Marrowman to bear against the newly-risen Runa’s Dragon, he refused. When, then, he was given the ultimatum of going through with the duel or forfeiting his rank and position, he looked his general in the eye, ripped the pilot’s medal from his collar, and left his home behind.

Overnight Ghaust was made a Pariah in Helburke, and his home turned against him. He was forced to leave, and though several foreign programs sought him out, Ghaust denied them all, even passing up a pilot’s seat in Eusero. Instead, he went straight to the burgeoning program in Runa, who was more than happy to take him.</sup>

Safie

_{Character Info}

^{Name – Safie Calhan
Age – 22
Affiliation – R.I.S.C.}

<sup>R.I.S.C.’s newest pilot, Safie has spent the past year earning her place at Dahlia and Ghaust’s sides. Born and raised in Runa’s largest city, Queenshand, Safie was one of countless starry-eyed youths who dreamed of the day she’d get to step inside the cockpit of a Savior. A positive connection-test put her on the path, but it was the months upon months of personal training, rigorous study, and nights spent running sims until dawn that pulled her ahead of the other aspirants. With a phase potential speed just above average, she was a perfect fit between Runa’s other two pilots.

While Dahlia has accrued something of a heroic mythos about her, she’s often reclusive and hesitant to make many public appearances. Safie on the other hand loves to meet the people she’s helping, be that with personal visits, answering fan-mail, or simply getting her hands dirty cleaning up after the messier invasions. Some see her approach as distinctly Euseran, but Safie didn’t become a pilot for the attention, she became a pilot because it was the right thing to do.</sup>

Lucis

_{Character Info}

^{Name – Lucis Abroix
Age – 25
Affiliation – Casoban, on loan to the R.I.S.C.}

<sup>Casoban’s sole effort to save Westwel, while ultimately futile, planted the seeds of goodwill between it and Runa. Casoban has always lived in the influential shadows of Helburke and Eusero, but allied with Runa, the two manage a strong presence on the world stage.

As a show of solidarity, Casoban has even begun sending a Savior of its own as backup to Runa’s invasions. Enter: Lucis Abroix.

Lucis is perhaps one of Casoban’s most beloved pilots, despite having only a handful of deployments to his name. Handsome, personable, with a poetic flare and the voice of an angel, many people back home already consider him the face of Casoban’s Savior program—a role he is more than happy to play. Casoban makes regular public appearances, seemingly never missing an opportunity to espouse his love for the beauty of the world, and his burning desire to protect it from the Modir.</sup>

Hovvi

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_{A small town settled along Lake Ebon. Once a quiet, unbothered place, it has gained some tourist attention in recent years. For better or for worse, this is your home, and these are your people.}

Mol's CS Thing

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Your characters are Hovvi folk, and have been for most if not all of their lives. Things were simpler here four years ago, with the occasional lakeside tourism in the spring and summer months, but even with the spike in popularity, Hovvi still manages to be a quiet town—most days. Fishing and mining from the distant quarry make up most of the local economy, but within the last few years the new R.I.S.C. training program, which has commandeered the community rec center, has been garnering attention for the aptitude of its trainees.

CS Template

(A picture)

R.I.S.C. Dossier

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_Name

(Your name)

_Age

(Characters will range from 16-19 years old)

_{Phase Potential}

(Slow, Standard, and Fast are the options here. Slow phasing means it takes more time for the pilot to access their magic, but they can also be connected longer before they risk “completing the circuit.” Fast phasers can access their magic more quickly, but can’t be connected as long without significant risk.)

_{Physical Evaluation}

(Describe your character)

_{Psychological Profile}

(Describe your character’s personality: bullet points)

_{Background Information}

(Characters don't need to have been born in Hovvi, but they will have spent the majority of their lives there.)

Savior

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_Designation

(Your Savior's callsign.)

_Body

(While most Saviors have uniform frames, all possess unique nuances in their appearance in the form of the modium growths constituting their natural armor.)

_Weapon

(Savior weapons are unique from each other, but can still share categories like “sword” “bow” “gun” “cannon” etc.)

_Grace

(Rather than having access to a wide arsenal of spells, each Savior has one specific Grace that is unique to them. Using Grace requires that a Savior’s weapon be summoned and not in another’s possession.)

Mol's CS Thing

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Welcome to Amygdala Circuit, a mecha-horror RP in a world beset by the Modir: bloodthirsty, interdimensional giants wielding devastating weapons and magics. To face these hellish invaders and the hordes of horrific creatures they lead, your characters will need to arm themselves with humanity’s only real hope at survival, and perhaps even victory: the monsters themselves.

But outside of the cockpit, the world is no less dangerous. While some of Illun’s people enjoy living in “post-war societies,” this international peace is often tenuous, and exists on the exploitation and suffering of smaller nations without monsters of their own. With armies rendered nearly obsolete, the struggle for power revolves mostly around the unspoken threat of violence carried by these reined-in monsters. From nation to nation, pilots are revered as everything from celebrities to pariahs; symbols of peace and the faces of oppression.

Your characters will endure hell, both from without and, especially, within. Together they might just survive, but alone they could become the things they fear most.

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Nothing brings people together like the threat of extinction.

Illun faces an alien enemy that cannot be reasoned with, which knows no fear and wants without compromise the complete and utter annihilation of every living thing. Naturally, when presented with the option of dying on principle, or uniting and surviving, the people of Illun chose the latter. The best and brightest minds from across the world came together to develop a means of fighting back against their invaders—and fell embarrassingly short. Even their most advanced weaponry could only slow the tide of lesser creatures, to say nothing of the giants, from which they drew nothing but the meagerest drops of blood. It wasn’t until they began experimenting on the strange, dead things that headway was made.

The shift in power was gradual at first, and derided by most for the secrecy shrouding it; no one knew how these weapons were being developed, how long it would take, or if they’d even work at all. The people were met with complete radio-silence, and a fearful unrest began to boil: until the first of the Modir fell.

Awe silenced man and beast alike. Government militia swooped in like vultures, the giant was ripped apart limb from limb until nothing remained but the head and torso, and then it was carted away into the deepest, most well-protected bunkers. Nothing was heard again for months. The attacks resumed, increased in frequency and fervor. Cities crumbled, millions died. Humanity was once again pushed to the brink, and in what would have been its final hour, it found deliverance.

A man-made Savior.

The taken giant emerged, its body restored, and turned its weapons and magics against the other Modir. More of the enemy fell in one day than had fallen in years, and when the dust settled, the Savior remained. It knelt to the ground, a hulk of flesh and alien metal steaming with Modir blood, and went slack like a puppet without strings. From the back of its head arose a lone, human woman.

In the aftermath, the fallen Modir were once again cut apart and dragged away. Another Savior emerged, and another, and another. Before long the reined giants were at every invasion, ready to repel the Modir and their ravenous armies. The war was no longer so devastatingly one-sided; humanity could finally fight back. For the first time since the invasions began, Illun found hope.

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The better half of two hundred years has passed since the first Savior rose, and the war between Illun and the Modir has reached a plateau. The Modir’s forces are seemingly endless, but the human-piloted Saviors are, generally speaking, much stronger. Now and then a new variant of the giants will emerge, wielding some powerful new weapon or hitherto unseen magics, and they may succeed in felling one or two Saviors, but if the bodies can be salvaged, Illun is always ready to replace lost pilots.

The depths of Modir intelligence are not fully understood, but they seem aware that they tend to lose man-to-man confrontations, and so their personal appearances are rarer these days than earlier in the war. Nevertheless, their invasions continue, and wherever the singularities appear, tides of smaller—but hardly less deadly—creatures pour forth.

The mightier nations of Illun are more than happy to keep the stalemate going. Smaller nations without Saviors of their own find their larger, more fortunate neighbors often leveraging their safety for compliance in border disputes, and leniency in trade deals. Governments like to tote that their people live in post-war societies, where international conflicts are resolved with diplomacy and, failing that, the silent threat of whatever horrors might be wrought by homeland Savior warfare. Minor disputes are sometimes handled with a degree of theatre, wherein nations will send one or two Saviors to remote areas desolated by Modir invasions to duel.

The reality is that much of the world lives under the iron boot of a privileged few nations, and the post-war bliss that exists for some is more often a pre-war anxiety for most.

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Humanity’s hope: the enemy, weaponized against itself. So much about the Saviors is kept hidden from the public, and even from the pilots. Most assume that the people inside simply puppet the dead giants around, but this is only half-true.

They aren’t dead.

When a Savior is made, a section of the subdued Modir’s brain is removed, rendering them essentially comatose. That void is filled by the pilot, who, once linked with the Savior’s mind via the cockpit, is able to control them with as much ease and familiarity as their own body.

Here are some key aspects to piloting a Savior:

The Body

Modir bodies are an amalgamation of flesh and a hyper-resilient, alien metal dubbed “modium”. The modium weaves in and out of the skin like a patchwork exoskeleton, and while all Modir share a generally uniform figure, their individual armors can vary wildly from one to the next. They all stand at roughly 35 meters tall, with builds that could be considered “average” to “hideously thin,” with the occasional outlier.

Saviors and Modir are also shockingly fast for their sizes, with speed and reflexes that seem to completely disregard terrestrial physics. They are not the slow, cumbersome giants of fairytales, these things can move, and move they do. As such, pilots are trained not only to utilize a Savior’s unique weapons and magics, but also in CQC.

Regeneration and Feedback

Modir bodies display the miraculous ability to regenerate almost any damages done to them, so long as the brain remains intact. This regeneration slows significantly if the heart is damaged, but even a severed Modir head will, eventually, grow itself a new body. All pieces removed from the body and head rapidly dissolve into pools of the near-black ichor that is Modir blood.

This presents a danger to the pilots. The Modir themselves are evidenced to be resistant to pain, but linked-in pilots are not. Chemical inhibitors can trivialize most artificial wounds, but if a Savior has its arm ripped off in combat, the pilot will, to put it gently, struggle with their composure. As well, while a Modir can technically survive having its heart destroyed and its head removed, these injuries will almost always result in instantaneous death to the pilot.

Weapons and Grace

Each Modir—and by extension, each Savior—has access to a unique weapon, which they can quite literally pull into existence utilizing smaller, more localized versions of the singularities used to invade Illun. These weapons vary wildly in appearance and application, some of which are simpler, and some which are entirely alien in design.

A Modir’s weapon is also the catalyst for its magic, called Grace, and like those weapons, Graces are unique from one to the next. These abilities might be tied to or influential upon the weapons, or may be entirely removed from them; the spectrum of Modir Graces is vast and often inexplicable.

However, using Grace takes a notable, physical toll on them, burning blood for fuel and ripping their bodies apart from over-exertion. As well, for pilots, Graces can only be accessed after “phasing,” a meta-physiological event that occurs after the pilot has been connected for a period of time—which, crucially, varies from pilot to pilot.

The Amygdala Circuit

The development of Saviors is a closely-guarded, international secret, the finer points of which are kept even from the pilots themselves. But what could not be hidden from them were the dangers they’d face just for linking up with the giants, and there is no greater danger than the one at the core to the entire process itself: The Amygdala Circuit.

Linking to a Savior comes with a myriad of risks both physical and psychological. Rule one of piloting is and has always been: “Do it as little as possible,” and for good reason; the longer a pilot stays connected to the Savior, the likelier they are to lose control. Remember that the Saviors are not dead Modir, only subdued, lobotomized, and comatose due to the removed section of their brains. Pilots aren’t just pilots, they are bridges between the Saviors and something…else. Something terrible. Prolonged sessions in the cockpit can and have led to pilots being completely overtaken by the Savior’s cognitive regeneration, losing both themselves and the giants to that elsewhere thing.

The usage of Grace drastically hastens this process, a caveat worsened by the fact that most pilots need to be connected for several minutes before they can even access their Savior’s ability.

Veteran pilots have also reported issues outside of the cockpit, from invasive, alien thoughts, to modium growths on the skin. While so far, none of these side effects have proven to be directly fatal, they have driven more than a few pilots into an early, permanent retirement.

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The advent of Saviors quite literally brought humanity out of the dirt. Gone are the days of bunker-cities and strongholds built beneath mountains, of disconnection and power-scarcity. The biggest cities of Illun are incredibly advanced, with skylines comprised of massive towers and roadways that sprawl and wind, connecting hundreds of miles of urban landscape together. Titanic space stations orbit the planet, housing Saviors to be deployed at a moment’s notice wherever they may be needed.

Outside of these cities the world is still widely modernized, however the propensity for singularities to appear in lesser-populated areas has led to more than a few towns being cut off from the rest of the world by ruined, untraversable terrain. This is especially true in less powerful countries without Saviors of their own, who have had to make compromises not only for the lives of their people, but then for the aid in rebuilding afterwards.

Here are some of the major players in today’s world stage:

Eusero

Eusero has an industrious history, and has led the world in technological advancements since even before the Modir’s invasions began. Indeed, the first Savior arose on Eusero soil, and though it is generally taught and accepted that the Savior project was an international collaboration, Euseran schools tend to focus more acutely on familiar, less foreign-sounding names.

Eusero has arguably the most expansive defense program in the world, boasting a whopping seven Saviors, and some of history’s most remarkable pilots. Its cities are vast and vertical, and between them the land is mostly flat, hospitable, and well suited for agriculture.

Eusaran society idolizes their pilots, treating them like celebrities. They make public speeches, visit children’s hospitals, and routinely appear on late-night talk shows; you’ll find their faces on everything from billboards to cereal boxes. To be a pilot in Eusero is to have one’s name forever etched into the hearts and minds of an entire nation.

Helburke

In the mountainous country of Helburke, civilization is…strange. Their architecture is ancient, their laws are draconian, and their wills are utterly unshakable. Helburke’s cities lay behind prodigious walls of stone and steel, and are built in tiers descending down the faces of mountains older than written history. High-towered castles and sprawling cathedrals are not uncommon sights in Helburke; indeed, one might look upon a village there and be shocked to find something as mundane as electricity.

But Helburke is not lost in time. Its aesthetics are only that, representative of their national identity, but never a hinderance. Helburke is bested in Savior-count only by Eusero, having six to its name, all of which carry long and brutal histories, and while its technological advancements might not be as plentiful as in Eusero, it is still a nation of keen, practical minds. Helburke has never shied from displaying its might in the face of any perceived slights, and is always the first to put forth duels as an answer to any diplomatic dispute.

Its citizens are hardy and proud; when the world reformed following the rise of the Saviors, and the nations’ governments collectively banned firearms from all but military use, the citizens of Helburke chose to carry swords at their hips rather than be unarmed—a practice still present to this very day.

The pilots of Helburke are regarded more with respect than adulation. They are seen as warriors, standing at the vanguard to defend their home, and their people, from the greatest threat humanity has ever faced. It is a legacy-defining honor to be selected for the Savior program in Helburke, and often times tournaments are held in which prospective candidates must fight, sometimes to the death, for their spot in the cockpits.

Tohoki

The Tohoki peninsula is a lush, vibrant land guarded from the Dim Sea by a range of snow-capped mountains. Once ruled over by the Arideans, it declared independence following the empire’s fall, though Helburke to this day still claims Tohoki was rightfully ceded to it in the aftermath. As such, tensions between to the two nations have always been high.

Though it holds only two Saviors, Tohoki has made advancements in defensive technology rivaling, and in some cases even surpassing Eusero. They were the first nation to successfully graft extra modium onto a Savior without rejection. Though other countries have managed to replicate the feat, none achieve the same quality. Nowadays, Tohoki is regularly commissioned for armor from programs across the world, cementing itself, for now, as a necessity.

Tohoki pilots are viewed with a respect more closely resembling Helburke than Eusero. There’s little in the way of fame, but plenty of reverence, and pilots are often selected from its engineering schools, whose students spend most of their academic lives working on and studying Saviors.

Casoban

Considered by many to be the most beautiful country in Illun, Casoban is a land of rolling hills and seaside vistas, where people spend their lives in luxury, relaxing on beaches and indulging their hobbies with all the time and means in the world. Though not the smallest country, it is still dwarfed by its political contemporaries, and its influence marks the first notable drop when moving past the “big two” of Eusero and Helburke.

That said, one should not underestimate Casoban. In more ancient times, Helburke was said to have tried to conquer them on no less than three separate occasions, and was rebuffed each time by Casoban’s comparably small yet devastatingly effective militia. Nowadays, and as is the case with most places, their military power is devoted almost entirely to their Savior program, of which they possess four.

Casobani pilots share a similar sort of fame with their Euseran cousins, only with a bit more pomp. Here, the pilots are not just protectors, they are cultural icons, and as such they are often as well educated as they are trained. Casobani pilots are always also lauded artists, musicians, actors, writers, and so on. The people revere them, almost even deify them, and those that retire—who can still function—normally go on to teach at the country’s world-renowned Savior Academy.

Runa

Sometimes called “The Pastel Isles” for the unique, gentle colors of its trees. Runa is a single, large island surrounded by a handful of smaller islands, and more than a handful of smaller islets. While once only really considered for its tourist trade, Runa has recently stepped into political relevance in the fallout of a disaster fifteen years earlier, where the neighboring island-nation of Westwel was overwhelmed by a Modir invasion. With their home ruined beyond repair, most of Westwel’s survivors were forced to emigrate, and were welcomed with open arms into Runa.

As a result, Runa acquired Westwel’s single Savior, and shortly thereafter, went on to acquire two more. Today, Runa still finds itself strongarmed on many matters by other, larger nations who believe they are unready for—and perhaps even undeserving of—such power. Whether or not they’re right, that power, along with the raw skill of Runa’s pilots, have kept the vultures at bay. For now.

And here is a timeline of some notable events:

Timeline

2000

The first singularity appears, and the Modir invasions begin. Millions of lives are lost, and many nations crumble in the first days before the Modir mysteriously withdraw. Attacks continue in this sporadic fashion for years.

2010

The first Savior, classified “Spirit,” emerges from a bunker in Eusero in the midst of a devastating invasion. The Modir are driven back in the ensuing fight, and two more giants are collected. The tide of the war changes almost overnight.

2015

The Modir invasions are repelled by Saviors with consistent success. The various remaining nations of Illun come together at the new, hopeful dawn of their world, and form the Illun Accord, swearing that the only war left to be fought is the war against the Modir. International regulations are set, beginning what many consider to be an era of world peace.

2300

The Aridean Empire breaks faith with the Illun Accord and uses Saviors to invade its neighboring countries. Eusero and Casoban attempt to intervene, but it is not until a single Savior from the tiny, occupied nation of Helburke attacks from within that the Aridean front is broken. In the aftermath, the Empire is crushed, and Aridea is ceded to Helburke.

2455

Westwel, a relatively small island nation, manages to repel an invasion and subdue a Modir without a Savior—a feat which has not been achieved for nearly half a millennia. With its newfound influence, Westwel manages to bring both itself and its neighbor, Runa, out from beneath the iron heel of tariffs imposed upon them by Eusero and Helburke.

2485

The Modir invade Westwel again, in the widest-scale assault launched in hundreds of years. The island is overrun, and both Eusero and Helburke conveniently fail to intervene until it is too late. Casoban Saviors arrive and manage to repel the Modir, but the damage is done. Westwel’s scarce surviving population leaves their ruined home behind, and find refuge in Runa.

2496

Runa’s sole Savior acquires a new pilot with an unprecedented phasing speed. Dahlia St. Senn, an orphan from Westwel, manages to capture two more Modir for Runa in her first year. Helburke manufactures two conflicts justifying duels with Runa within a single month, and loses both, costing it two prized pilots, and nearly one Savior. St. Senn becomes internationally known for her piloting skill, and Runa begins to see begrudging respect from other major players on the world stage.

2500

Present Day.

Pariah Online: A Voyage into the Intangible Aether

Location: Drox Fraternity House -- The City of Thorinn, Aetheria

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It was bittersweet to see the hall so busy. Outside of the occasional holiday event, outsiders generally didn’t have much reason to travel all the way to Thorinn for Drox’s sake. She liked those days; the people who came through were happy, seeking help and willing to help others. Now it was overwhelmingly more of the former. In the back of her mind she knew this was what the hall had been designed for, originally, to be a place for the new and afraid to take shelter and find helpful souls to guide them, but in practice…well, even the best hospitals suffered during pandemics. And that’s what the fallout of the glitch was: a pandemic of fear. Missy...

Seele led the pair of them inside, smiling and nodding to the plethora of faces she’d become familiar with over the past few weeks, wayfarers and denizens alike. Most were much to busy scrambling about to do more than nod themselves, but a few smiled back. Seele was apt at making herself useful, especially so if that meant easing the workloads of her fellow attendants. Her arrival meant that some of them might get a sliver of downtime. It killed her to look at them, to see the bags under their eyes, and know that some of them would have begged on hands and knees for sleep in the hours she’d wasted staring blankly at the dark.
...you sleep too much...
The guilt brought the nausea back, briefly, but Seele managed to compose herself. Before long they came to one of the clerical desks, to the lone attendant who at first seemed impatient, then relieved to see more and familiar assistance.

Seele beamed, keeping her voice chipper. “Good morning! Seele and Alex, reporting for duty! Point us at whatever’s most urgent and we’ll do our best!”

Midnight Sun: Last Song Over the Horizon

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Just as the dopamine was wearing off, and the food was beginning to taste like the garbage slop that it was again, lo and behold, there be delivered before her another hungry sap to torture. He approached cautiously, with all the confidence of a lost fawn. His eyes were mile-a-minute between her and everywhere that wasn’t her, and she craned her head this way and that trying to snatch his gaze up in the brief instants they made eye-contact.

God, how come nobody’d told her it was her birthday?

There was a touch of command in his voice that the rest of him couldn’t back up, which was surprising coming from a red. As far as she’d seen in the past few weeks, the engineering students tended to keep to themselves, and she’d picked up a sort of toothless hostility from them towards the operators and, especially, the pilot-cadets. Of course, it didn’t help that the pilots played into it. Some of her peers relished in the envy, which seemed like a great way to utterly ruin things for themselves down the line, when their livelihoods would depend on those reds.

Of course, that didn’t mean Cinny was about to show the guy any mercy.

Cinny tapped her lips in feigned thought, then snapped her fingers and, at a prompt from her, he held out his hand. She dug into her pockets, miming excitement when she found what she was looking for. With the reverence and sincerity of someone bequeathing a precious family heirloom to a loved one, Cinny took his hand in hers, and gently closed his fingers around the prize that had been hiding amongst the lint in her pocket. When he opened his hand, there it was.

An empty, crumpled Zhenko wrapper.

Cinny pretended to be shocked. She quickly snatched the wrapper up, inspected it, sniffed it, pulled it flat and taut. She rolled her eyes and smacked her palm against her head, as if to say, Ah, of course, how silly. The wrapper was sealed at one end, so Cinny put the other end to her lips and with a quick breath, inflated it. Then she licked her finger, sealed the other end, and playfully bounced the ballooned wrapper between her hands.

This went on for some moments. Patience was a rope you could measure many times, but cut only once, so before too much time had been wasted, she signaled again for her victim to hold out his hand. She was surprised when he did, but not very. Taking the featherlight wrapper, she waved it about like a wand and tapped it three arbitrary times against her forehead, before holding it out over the red’s hand.

Lem would have said: “Now you really, really have to want it.” Cinny just waggled her eyebrows. She let go, and the wrapper dropped like a rock into Bel’s open palm, full of Zhenko-goodness.

Cinny did some mystical jazz-hands, then picked up her fork and let the serotonin persuade her to take a few more bites of slop.

Gundam 0094 (Invite Only Roleplay)

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Ezmy was a bit disappointed that Disker didn’t take the bait, but she’d come to expect as much from him, boring as it could be. Sometimes she suspected a good chunk of the crew had been secretly lobotomized, but then she remembered people like Kellen and Irina, and decided maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing.

Leon intervened on Disker’s behalf, and she rolled her eyes. Fuckin’ white-knight manlet, she thought, but decided it would be best to keep that to herself. Ezmy didn’t usually shy from getting on people’s bad sides, but pissing people off before a fight wouldn’t do her any favors if they were pissed off at her. She wasn’t going to lick any boots, but she could do her best to keep the snipping to a minimum. Maybe.

“Vanguard,” she said, staking her claim. Now that they had something resembling a plan, fucked if she was going to sit in the ass-guard while everyone else did all the hard work—she wasn’t Disker.

Ezmy shot Gaida one more venomous glance, and then hopped down from her pile as Disker wandered off with the toy. He’d be staying aboard on his usual roost, as far from harm’s way as possible. Surprise. The only pilot who’d be safer than him was Marlowe, and though normally the good ol’ Voltus-nepotism would have pissed her off, she never felt the urge to argue over this particular point. The truth was that she didn’t want Marlowe out there with them. He wasn’t cut out for it. He was just fine at picking up trash, but his incorrigible pacifism didn’t just make him fucking insufferable, it also made him a liability to everyone else.

“Yeah, something tells me it’s not gonna be hard to get permission for this one,” she said, starting off for the hangar. “Guess I’ll suit up for the green light. Maybe we’ll finally get some fucking action.”

Gundam 0094 (Invite Only Roleplay)

---

Ezmy’s fists balled up on reflex the moment Gaida touched her, shuddering like the temperature had suddenly dipped into the negatives. She shot the woman a hard look, eyes flicking from her to her hand, as if, surely, it was just some tragic mistake that it had landed on her shoulder. But no, it wasn’t, and Gaida went on to agree with her, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Ezmy might not have been a very socially-conscious person, but she knew when she was being patronized.

“…little Ezmy’s plan.”

Oh, she’d be paying for that one.

“Gee Gaida, thanks.” She said through teeth grated in the closest approximation to a smile that Ezmy could muster. When the woman took her hand away, Ezmy brushed imaginary grime off of her shoulder. She wasn’t done with her, but Disker’s sharp interjection reminded her that there was, in fact, an actual conversation of import going on. Fine. There’d be plenty of time for getting even later.

“Okay, and?” she snipped back at Disker. “If the pirates come back, the options are run, or fight, and you’re out of your mind if you think this hunk of junk is outrunning anything. Fuck’s sake, you don't have to stall like this, you can just say you’re scared. Not like anyone’d be surprised.”

That was a bit of a low-blow. Ezmy didn’t have much respect for Disker’s…“cautious” piloting style, but that didn’t mean he was useless; he was a coward, she thought, but even cowards could be good shots. Still, with how quiet the man usually was, it was worth snatching at the opportunity to get a rise out of him.

“The real question is whether or not we’re gonna sit around scrapbooking until they get the jump on us.”

Gundam 0094 (Invite Only Roleplay)

---

Ezmy was relieved to have traded the crowd of whining rescues for the usual junkyard entourage of the Cathartes’ crew. They weren’t that much better, but she’d found a begrudging comfort in their company over the months, especially compared to the people they usually did business with. Watching Cornell guile respect out of Feds and Zeons made putting up with all the creeps and freaks on his payroll worth it. There’d be no escaping war—that the Cathartes existed at all was proof of that—but meeting its horrors with self-serving indifference was a pretty close second, in her opinion.

They came to what was left of the scrapheap. Ezmy hopped up onto a pile of flattened debris and watched as Disker went to work doing…Thinker things. To her it just seemed like he was obsessing over ash-marks and slag, but she’d come to understand that there was usually more going on behind those eyes than might appear.

"…Because whoever jumped our guests are certainly packing tech that shouldn't be in service right now."

Wow, or maybe not?

"You mean the pirates are using illegal weapons?" she asked dryly. "Killer detective work there, Disker."

Beside them, Marlowe dragged a Fed over to ask him some questions. She found herself scowling again, already—it never took long when Marlowe was nearby. The younger Voltus had an effect on her, like the effect a cheese grater might have on the side of someone’s face. She could practically feel the headache coming on as soon as he opened his mouth. Sometimes he didn’t even need to talk, just his presence was an irritant.

When the Fed shut up, Marlowe looked to the rest of them. Ezmy rolled her eyes.

"I don’t get it," she said. "If we’re worried about the pirates coming back, we should just suit up and get out there. The trash isn’t gonna tell us anything that seeing them won’t."

Pariah Online: A Voyage into the Intangible Aether

Location:The City of Thorinn, Aetheria

---

“Mm, every now and then I suppose I could be just a teensy bit irresponsible,” Seele giggled, at once relieved and disappointed with how easy it was to lie, when it mattered. “Though I think I’ve just been nervous about that new dungeon, honestly. And those poor villages. I hope it isn’t this bad in all of the regions.”
Can you see it?
She made a dismissive wave at herself. Such negativity was unbecoming, and certainly not the thing to say to someone trapped in just as bad of a situation as everyone else. Seele adopted her smile, and listened while Alex put in his two-cents on today’s plan.

Like her, he seemed exhausted, just in a different sort of way. He’d said himself that the routine was beginning to eat at him, and of course, she couldn’t blame him. What he was saying made sense; Pariah was real now, and real meant reality. Reality meant responsibility. People didn’t often play games seeking that sort of thing out. She imagined Alex, like most reasonable people, wasn’t too thrilled about the idea of having to pick up a fantasy nine-to-five. Of course you can.

Well, she didn’t have to imagine very hard. Alex spoke often and frankly—but not unkindly, she’d noticed. He wasn’t blunt like Rael or Graves, or analytical like Kazuki. He was genuine, and easy to listen to. A bit like Alja, albeit with less of a…presence. Over the past couple of weeks, she’d found herself enjoying what conversations they had, and she was glad to have him accompanying her.

“You’re right, unfortuantely. As long as we’re staying in Thorinn, the Drox Hall is about as close as we’ll get to steady work, but it’s still better than nothing I suppose. Hallmasters it is. Hopefully they’ll have something for us.” She gave him a little wink. “Fingers crossed it has nothing to do with the sewers. Shall we?”
How could you not?
Together they left the Laughing Worg and went about navigating the morning foot traffic to make their way to the Fraternity Hall.