Brought Down to "Normal?" [Closed]

[meat_mooks]

||Attention, Attention. The following personnel please report to the Observation Deck. Attention, Attention. The following personnel please report to the Observation Deck.

Goliath
Farseer Alastirra
N'tho 'Sraom
Kang
Rainbow Dash
Crematia||

When the summoned gathered, mission information was displayed on the Obs Deck for them to see:


Planet Designation: Hendersus Villae
Status: Terrestrial, H-class
Non-sentient life: Minimal flora, aggressive nonsentient fauna.
Semi-sentient life: No
Sentient life: Yes
Water: 25% of planet's surface
Climate: Primarily volcanic with frequent ash and lightning storms, dry and hot at volcanically active equator, temperate seas to the north and south poles.
Landscape: Variable. Much of the planet's landmasses are constantly being reworked by lava flows.
Air: Normoxic concentration: 31% oxygen, 60% nitrogen, 2% xenon, 4% trace gases, such as hydrogen, krypton, and argon.
Air Pressure: 93.8 kPa (kilopascals) = 13.6 psi (pounds per square inch)
Sky: Pale red, when visible.
Sun: Class G yellow star, distant orbit and dim light.
Warnings: Not suitable for crew incapable of flight, or without superhuman endurance.
Mission: Search and rescue Zarom Ghartha, missing GIA wizard, last seen en-route to investigate severe magical disturbance detected in the area of the planet. Crew is advised that native fauna is likely to be antagonistic, native sentients unfit to assist beyond the offering of information.

Comments

[Reactions]

[meat_mooks]

The planet hung below them, its midsection covered with thick, unfriendly-looking black clouds, northern and southern seas grey in the light of the distant sun. A small ship awaited to take them down to the surface.

[elementofloyalty]

Rainbow Dash was in a bad mood. She stared at the screen, tail flipping in irritation, trying to make sense of all the scientific stuff she didn't understand.

"Heh, not suitable for crew incapable of flight," she said with a laugh that wanted to be smug, but just sounded tattered.

[not_the_philistine]

Goliath, not previously acquainted with any of the ponies, took a moment to stare at Rainbow Dash with a bewildered frown.

Well, more things in Heaven and Earth. And outer space. "Quite."

He caped his own wings around himself, squinting at the mission information.

[farseer_alastirra]

"This makes me wish I had my gryphon present. Since I am not gifted with flight. Or a flight form, like a druid." Alastirra sighed. Well, at least technically she had better endurance than some. Not as much as a paladin, say, but more than a mage.

She frowned at reading the mission information, however. "It sounds as if the elements on that planet might be in flux. I am not certain how well my abilities will respond, but since Stacy has seen fit to enlist me...I will do my best." With that, the Draenei shrugged.

[Planetside/The Village]

[meat_mooks]

The transportation pod docked on a black lava flow about two miles from an active flow in one direction, and what appears to be a small village in the other.

Between the crew and the village are several chasms in the rugged, volcanic landscape, and some holes that look suspiciously like steam vents. It may be slow going.

[elementofloyalty]

Rainbow Dash hovered over the landscape... waiting.

"Uh, okay, who here can't fly?"

[mercyisweakness]

For the sake of space, Crematia took the form of a human in the pod as they travel planetside. Once landed, Crematia quickly leaves the pod and into open air. The heat and the roar of flames remind her of the Abyss, of home, and oh she miss it so much.

Quickly she changed back into her original form and with a giant leap, she took off in the air, having a rather immature pleasure of creating gusts of air right back into her land-crawling companions' faces by the downbeat of her wings. She completely ignore the blue pony's pointless question.

[governorkang]

Kang snorted, muttering a curse, and something that sounded suspiciously like, "Goddamn red dragons."

He shook his head at Rainbow Dash's question, smiling wryly. The heat caused his scales to shift and spread slightly, and for him to wear a constant grin; it was just barely tolerable. The landscape also reminded him of the fire dragon cave years ago. "Gliding, nothing more."

The Village

[meat_mooks]

The battle-wearied crew finally reached the village, which was built on a ridge out of the way of any possible lava floes and overlooking a vast canyon cut out of the craggy volcanic glass. In the center of the canyon was a vast, craggy mountain, surrounded by a moat of molten lava. Those with sharp eyes could see a pair of doors set into the mountain, and just enough engineering to reveal a raised drawbridge.

The village, meanwhile, was little more than a collection of huts assembled from quarried bricks of hardened lava. Large animals of a reddish-brown color with suction-cup-like mouths roamed between the huts, moving slowly across the lava and leaving small ruts of consumed mineral in their wake. The only vegetation that grew in the village grew on the backs of the beasts, many of which had villagers around them pruning at the vegetation as a person might tend to a kitchen garden.

The villagers, a ragged collection of what appeared to be humans, stopped in their tasks one by one to stare in unveiled awe at the approaching party. Many of the villagers were burnt, and most were clad only in woven mats of singed, dried grasses. The beast that grew the grasses they dried and wore could be seen grazing on the lava between two of the larger, better-quarried huts.

A woman emerged from one of the huts, a flowered vine wound around her forehead. It was the only sign of office any of the humans wore, and was faded and dry, as if it had been wound around her head several days ago.

"Welcome, strangers, to our humble village." She gave no pretense that the "humble" was spoken out of false modesty. "May I entertain hopes that you have come to be our champions in -"

A sudden shout, adolescent and male, burst from the crowd - "Is that one a pegasus pony?"

"That one's a pegasus pony!"

"That one's totally a pegasus pony!"

The woman resumed with only the faintest trace of a sigh. "Liberation?"

"Soooo cool!"

[elementofloyalty]

What?

Oh wow! They -- they liked her! Finally some people who didn't just stare and wonder what a pony was doing among all the humans! (Not that there were any right now, but that never stopped anyone on the ship from having that reaction.)

She vaulted into the air to hover above the crowd proudly. "Thank you, thank you! The name's Rainbow Dash! You haven't heard of me before, but you'll remember me when I'm gone!"

She turned a couple of easy loops in midair, casually showboating.

[governorkang]

Kang looked around the village with one eyebrow ridge quirked slightly, especially staring at the vegetation growing on the animals. They reminded him of chia pets. The scales on one of his arms were singed a bit, as were his clothes. He'd come out of the fight with the lava creatures relatively unscathed, though.

"We will offer what assistance we can while we are here, but we've come to find someone named Zarom Ghartha, ma'am."

[meat_mooks]

Soft female laughter emitted from the crowd, accompanied by half-legible snippets of conversation. "-so handsome." "Scaly-handsome."

The village leader, paying the village girls no mind, said "That name is not known to me, but if it is a lost comrade you seek there is no small chance your answers - and the answers to our plight - lie anon."

She threw her arm out in a gesture more suited to heavy robes than dried grasses, pointing at the mountain in the canyon. The one barely recognizable as a fortress.

"The abode of our hated tyrant, who hath corrupted the very essence of our beings, may yet be your destination. Will you not stay to accept our hospitality, and hear of our plight?"

She looked deep into Kang's eyes, as if seeking to look into the depths of his innermost soul.

Behind her, a group of girls had migrated to the front of the crowd and were whispering more than loud enough to be heard. "-go ask him." "No you go ask him." "Girl, look at that body. I bet he has a mate."

[meat_mooks]

Once the crew finally made it down the canyon and to the base of the mountain fortress, they had a chance to be surprised by the size of the mountain. What had appeared to be a far-away mountain of medium size was actually a towering cone of volcanic rock and glass. Some of the shimmering, glassy patches on the mile-high mountain's face might have been windows, but it was hard to tell. The only visible way in was a raised drawbridge, which was the only way across the twenty foot wide moat of molten lava that surrounded the fortress.

There was a deep humming beneath the earth, one that was much more the hum of engines and machinery - despite the technological damper - than the hum of the tectonic shifting that worked to create this planet's landscape. The crew didn't have much time to reflect on this incongruity, though, before the first shot was fired from a crevasse in the fortress' cracked face.

A huge, exploding projectile landed near to them, throwing shattered fragments of volcanic glass into the air along with blazing sparks that burned too long not to be magical. It left a smoking crater in the landscape, and even those without enhanced hearing couldn't miss the sounds of more projectiles incoming.

An angry male voice blared out between the explosions from invisible speakers: "WHAT'RE Y'ALL DOIN' ON MY PROPERTAY?"

[governorkang]

Oh, this was going to be fun. Kang took a few steps back, shielding himself with one of his wings and mentally going through his spells before remembering that none of them would work anyways.

"Something tells me he's not going to talk to us willingly."

[elementofloyalty]

"Then let's go drag him out of there!"

Rainbow Dash reared back, fully prepared to do a charging blast-dodging skilled-flying swoop at the castle!

[not_the_philistine]

Goliath retreated a little ways from the area of fire, then tucked his wings back tightly and sprinted at full speed towards the moat. At the edge of the river of lava he leaped, clearing the midway point and throwing his wings open to catch just enough air to reach the wall of the fortress. He slammed into the metal of the raised drawbridge, his claws digging deep with a screech as he slid to a stop, then pulled back with one open talon to strike the metal again and again. It weakened and buckled against the pummeling, but not fast enough. Goliath climbed to the top of the drawbridge and began assaulting the crack where the metal and the stone of the tower met, forcing his claws into the seam, straining as he slowly inched the drawbridge away from the wall with sheer force.

[meat_mooks]

Their unknown opponant had allowed them entry into the fortress - perhaps genuinely impressed by their "gumption" - but the crew had only had a moment in the entryway to feel the hum of technology beneath their feet and the unmistakable presence of extremely high amounts of magic in the air before a sudden flash of light blinded them, followed quickly by unconsciousness.

When they awoke, they'd have even more strange things to worry about. Forefront, though, might be the fact that they were all waking up as the same species.

[not_the_philistine]

"What sorcery is this?!"

There was no question who the large, dark-skinned man with a loincloth instead of a plantsuit was.

"This was not supposed to be possible!"

Goliath had no sensitivity to magic, and couldn't feel it in the air when he'd entered, let alone now.

[governorkang]

Kang had felt it, and hadn't had any time to react before he'd been knocked unconscious. When he woke up, he put a hand to his head and paused, feeling skin and hair instead of scales.

He looked down at the rest of him, his clothing and armor dwarfing his human form, and cursed loudly.

"Not this shit again."

Wandering the Catacombs

[meat_mooks]

The crew had already faced foes, both technological and magically conjured, on their quest to successfully navigate the mazelike fortress and find their enemy. Or a cure for their condition, whichever they reached first.

The obstacle course of sudden drops and unexpected battles served to separate and reunite the crew at different intervals, so that at a given time, any of them could be wandering the maze alone or in pairs. The floors and walls here had a way of opening up unexpectedly and depositing them on newer, stranger levels.

Maybe teamwork would help them find their way out?

[ooc: Thread freely at will, pairing up as you feel it!]

[not_the_philistine]

The sword that Kang had lent Goliath had already come in useful - and was covered with blood from some kind of plant-demon as a consequence.

Goliath himself was bloodied from a few shallow wounds - scrapes from thorns, some bruising from a heavy fall endured during his wandering - but what was REALLY bothering him was the phantom limb syndrome.

You didn't lose three limbs, claws, and endure a reshaping of your feet without at least some consequence to dexterity. Hence, sad to say, the fall.

[elementofloyalty]

"We should really try to stay together, or at least with one other person," Rainbow Dash ventured from behind him, rubbing at her hand with a grimace. She was still figuring out what, exactly, to do with these 'fingers' when she was hitting their opposition, so though she'd landed a few effective blows, she'd also discovered quite painfully that thumbs should not go inside fists. "The last time I ended up missing my wings in a transforming maze, the bad guy separated us all and brainwashed us!"

That's the ending, the ending, the ending of our story ~

[meat_mooks]

Miraculously, the crew had made it to the stronghold in the center of the fortress.

The yet-unshaken tyrant - an erstwhile fellow by the moniker of Leasure Seat Larry - reclined in his hoverchair as the crew made their final assault on the last doors separating them.

Outside, the crew had acquired a makeshift cannon, in the form of a severed arm from a defeated (de-armed?) guard bot as an asset in their final assault. The arm had only one shot worth of charge left, but perhaps it would be just enough to break through -

[elementofloyalty]

"All right," Rainbow Dash said in a fierce but low voice, her fists balled up in eager anticipation. "I'm faster, so I'll charge in as soon as we get the door open. While he's dealing with me you guys'll be able to get in and go at him from every different direction. I bet he can't handle THAT so easily!"

No worries about what he'd do to her. She was tough enough to handle ANYthing he could throw at her!

[not_the_philistine]

Goliath nodded to Kang. "If you weaken the door with the cannon, I believe I can break it open for her."