Exaltica: Eden Awakening Saga, Sin Denial Options

[Ereth]

Oh, no. She'd done it again. She'd made herself look stupid again. They all needed to get off this damn ship, and here she was, waxing poetic about cake again. Aiko's smile wilted a little, but not enough for anyone but the most astute observer to notice. "S-sorry," she stammered. "I guess I'm more than a little homesick. I miss my kitchen, so . . . " She trailed off. Enough. No one wanted to hear her life story and she knew it. "I just wanted to ask what people might like to eat when we're out of here . . . sorry," she said, glancing apologetically at the girl. "So if you want anything in particular---if anyone here does---let me know, okay?"

Then she turned red and looked at her shoes. Aiko didn't want to say it, but she had no choice. People didn't live on cake alone, and surely her new companions would be expecting normal meals. She looked up once more for a brief moment.

"But I . . . can't cook regular food. Only sweets. I'm sorry. So please don't ask me for anything else . . . except rice. I can make rice. M-my name is Aiko Moreno, and I can make rice."

This post has been edited by Ereth: Mar 23 2011, 09:06 PM

[Nicsp]

Lars stared around at everyone, seemed like a lively bunch, but enough talk, this whole ignorance over what was happening was alredy getting on his nerves, despite him not showing, he let out a short 'ahem' and then started. "Well, first things first, considering there's no one here but us and we're currently on and since..." He started mimicking the ship's system voice. "Emergency power conservation is in effect. All non-essential systems have been taken offline." He then returned to his normal voice, chuckling and continued. "The first place we should go to look for anyone else should be the bridge. In case we find something there or not, we should then head over to this ship's main power source and see try to find out what triggered the power conservation systems. Also to probably figure out how much time we have until we run out of enough power so even the "essential systems" can be kept online." Lars glanced around one more time, trying to see an exit to the hallway they found themselves in. "I'm pretty sure i saw storage room door somewhere around her, we should go for it and search around, it might have something useful, hopefully we can find some kind of spare batteries or energy source or something before -" Just then, a loud beep came from Lars's arm, it's lights all slowly shut down and the arm simply "died". Lars sighed. "Before that happened..."

[Sailerius]

There are two exits from the hallway that they're in: the lift (deactivated to conserve power) and the door to the stairs.

The storage room contains emergency medical supplies as well as bottled water and canned goods. There's enough disaster relief goods to go around for a few weeks. Well, assuming that the life support system on the ship doesn't run out of power. In the storage room, there are batteries which can be used for devices like flashlights, but nothing that would serve to power the ship.

[slaix223]

How many people are on this ship besides me? he thought.

Questions and statements were flown his way, but before he could answer them another person came up to the group. The only thing Nate could see about him that was unique was his mechanical arm. Lights were, apparently, installed in it as it gave off a fair glow. Beyond that, he looked to be a rather slim fellow, and his unusual hair also gave him a more distinct look.

Using what light he could from the man's arm, he decided to take a better look at the two others in the hall. The first that he noticed was the female, currently wondering what kinds of cake people liked. Nate was always fond of the rather standard white cake, but he couldn't let himself get distracted; he needed to try and figure out who these people were. She was wearing an apron, which, along with the cake talk, made him wonder if she was a baker of some sort.

His eyes then turned to the male, currently standing up. Just based on his few words, Nate could tell he probably wasn't going to be a friendly type. Beyond that, he didn't appear to be Caucasian, as well as not too muscular. He did, however, seem to be in far better shape than the man with the mechanical arm.

He decided to step forward, since it seemed like his presence was known anyway, only to hear a loud crash down the hall. He turned to see someone sprawled out on the floor, likely having tripped on something. The man with the mechanical arm went over to help her up, although she didn't seem too enthused to take his offer.

As soon as she was up, the 'friendly' man decided to speak up.

"Well, we're not getting anything done by standing here, so whatever. Let's just get out of here so that my ears stop bleeding."

Nate smiled a little at his comment. He obviously didn't want to take responsibility for the group. He looked around, and saw nothing else was happening. Taking his chance, he once again took a step forward.

"Well, I--"

A woman came rushing out of one of the rooms, hugging the person who just spoke up. She was obviously close to him, and they seemed to look fairly alike. Perhaps they were family? If not, close friends at the very least. She appeared to be very formal, if the dress clothes and high heels didn't already give it away.

The Cake Lady decided to keep up her cake talk, to which she finally got an answer from Miss Formal. At least she seemed to be friendlier than the person Nate assumed was her brother. The group decided to converse a bit, but it went silent relatively quickly.

Third time's a charm, I suppose. I suppose none of these people look like criminals... I guess I could be wrong about the nature of this ship. I hope I am.

He decided to speak up. "I probably should've spoken up sooner, but..." he paused. He didn't want to say his thoughts out loud. "Oh, never mind. Like all of you, I just woke up here too..." Then, taking a cue from the Cake Lady, who introduced herself as Aiko, he continued, "So, should we introduce ourselves? I'm Nate Mirrias. It's... a pleasure to meet you all."

He wondered if he was rambling, or what his first impression would do for everyone else. Even he had to wince at how he ended it; 'A pleasure to meet you all'? How hollow and fake was he going to be? Regardless, he hoped he could at least get to learn these people's names. It'd probably be better than calling them Cake Lady and Miss Friendly, that's for sure.

[Ereth]

Aiko smiled at Nate. He seemed friendly enough, she supposed. They all did, but Jun . . . he seemed sad somehow. If it weren't for Zhi, would he be able to function at all? She knew what it was like to feel alone, and she hated seeing other people hurt, too . . . but she couldn't think about that right now. They had to make preparations to escape from this place. "We should see if we can get some supplies before we leave. Is there a storage room around here somewhere? I'm sure there's food and water . . . medicine . . . oh, and maybe some batteries for your arm, mister," she said to the white-haired man.

"Who wants to come with me?"

[Nicsp]

Scratched the back of his head, grinning widely. "Yep, i'll go with ya. I'm pretty much useless with this thing of mine on shut down." He said while patting his shut down mechanical arm lightly. "Right then, introductions..." Lars sighed some and then started. "Name's Lars Olimar." He shrugged. "I'm a teacher." He then turned again to Aiko. "Like i said, i'm pretty sure i walked past one while coming here so it should be back that way. Lars pointed out back towards the way he came. "While we search the storage room the rest of you could go and search for a way to the bridge."

[Hirei]

Arel mentally took a note in her head as several indivudals introduced themselves. Oh that's right, I guess I should do the same

"Sounds like a good plan, Lars. I just happen to be a ship pilot and mechanic so hopefully my skills will come in handy ...the name is Arel Mathis. I'll be more than happy to go to the bridge if we can find some batteries or something for my goggles."

Arel didn't want to run the risk of injuring herself again in the dark.

[Ereth]

"You need batteries too? Guess I'd better go find some right now!"

With that, Aiko bounced into the storage room. From outside, the only noises people could hear were "Ooooh!"s and "OW!"s floating over loud thuds and crashes. She had taken off her apron in order to use it as a makeshift knapsack and was stuffing as much as she could into it. "Where are you, batteries? Aha! Found some! Hopefully these will work."

Several minutes later, The Human Rolling Pin dashed outside . . . and into Jun again. He, along with a loud crash, accompanied many small tins and other provisions to the floor. She landed on her back this time.

"Heh, heh . . . I found some batteries," she mumbled. "Here." She sat up to toss them to Lars and Arel and then fell flat on her back again. "Ow! Sorry, Jun . . ."

Aiko rose with a red face, pulling him up from the floor before he could say anything. Then she picked everything up and packed her apron-knapsack for the second time.

"We'd better get going before I hurt anyone else . . ."

This post has been edited by Ereth: Mar 16 2011, 06:50 PM

[Sailerius]

After swapping in new batteries where necessary, the group proceeds to look for the bridge. At the end of the hall is the door to the stairs. It takes two people to pull the heavy door open, allowing them access to the dark stairwell. As soon as they step into the stairwell, they're assaulted by a wave of cold air. It seems that the door had been keeping the warm air in the deck they woke up on.

There are two decks above the one they woke up on and one below it.

Deck 1: Bridge
Deck 2: Cabins
Deck 3: Cabins and storage
Deck 4: Hangar and engine room

The door leading to deck 2 is tightly sealed and can't be opened with brute strength. Fortunately, the door to the bridge opens with minimal effort. The top deck is just as cold as the stairwell and the air is noticeably thinner. After walking through the door leading to the top deck, they enter a narrow hallway with another door at the other end. Once slid open, the dull sound of something falling to the floor is audible. Once a flashlight is shone upon the something, it becomes clear what it is.

A member of the crew lies before their feet on the floor, dead (probably) from a gunshot wound to the head. One can only hope that it was the gunshot wound that killed him and not countenance the alternative; his body has been brutally shredded as if by a wild animal, leaving him a mess of blood. He had apparently been lying against the door and fell in once it had been opened.

Once the flashlight is shone into the bridge proper, an even more grisly scene is revealed to them. A dozen other crew members lay scattered around the bridge, having suffered just as gruesome a fate. Only one person's body was relatively intact. His body is lying in a corner with a gun dropped nearby, dead from a gunshot wound to the temple.

A cold, still silence settles over the bridge before being abruptly broken.

"Emergency power conservation is in effect. All non-essential systems have been taken offline."

[Hirei]

Arel eyes widened as she surveyed the gruesome scene in front of her. The sight made her lose her appetite immediately.

"What...in the world..." She knelt down to examine a body. "It looks like most of these guys were torn to shreds by something...."

But more importantly, Arel had noticed the drop in oxygen upon entering the deck, and it wasn't a good sign. Oblivious to anything else that was going on, Arel focused on finding some sort of operations console. She approached one of the terminals that a crew member was slumped over on. Blood had pooled beneath him, but a dim glow was visible underneath it.

Tearing off her gloves, Arel proceeded to move the corpse off of the unit, the body dropping from her now bloodied hands as soon as she cleared it away from the console. There was no time to mourn. Swiping a hand over in attempt to clean it, Arel managed to make out a few words and diagrams

"Damn it. We're in a bad situation...The distribution of air on this ship is really out of whack. Since apparently this ship doesn't have a lot of power, some of the decks aren't receiving as much life support. So we need to be careful. And hope that we can somehow get enough energy to fly this rig elsewhere."

Arel continued to inspect the other consoles on the bridge, moving and shoving bodies this way and that, not minding the fact that her clothes were slowly becoming drenched with blood.

[Sailerius]

After fiddling around on the console, Arel is able to deduce the following information:

• The engine has suffered a critical failure.
• An airlock on deck two is open, allowing oxygen to escape.
• The door to deck two has been magnetically sealed to contain the air loss.
• 80% of the ship's life support has been directed to deck four.
• Roughly two hours of life support remain.

She doesn't have access to enter any commands into the system, however.

[Ganonfrog]

Plans were discussed, introductions were made, and not a single damn was given by Jun. He kept note of the names that were given out, but aside from that, he really didn't want to have to make conversation unless he absolutely had to. This place was giving him the creeps, and he really didn't want to deal with the extra stress. He would just address them when he had to, and they would do the same to him.

Either that, or they would run into him again, barreling him into the piles of junk lining the walls. Once this inevitably happened, he wound up collapsing onto a nearby tin, accumulating yet another bruise on his recently abused arms.

Aiko said something to him as he attempted to push everything out of his way, before offering her hand to him. It had all occurred so quickly that he had no way to tell who tumbled into him as it happened, but it wasn't hard to deduce that it was her, after her actions.

Even so, he reluctantly took her assistance up, and got back up to his feet in uncomfortable silence. He really wasn't sure how much more of this girl's clumsiness he could take, but, at this point, he'd much rather not have to concern himself with it. He would just keep his distance. He had less painful things to deal with, and he really didn't want to pick a fight with someone like her. For all he could tell, she could be thinking anything under that awkward exterior. Hell, what if she was crashing into him on purpose?

Jun moved to the other side of the hallway as they walked the rest of the way down, only occasionally shooting Aiko glances as he went. Zhi seemed to catch on to his discomfort, and moved over to accompany the girl he was thinking none-so-pleasant thoughts about. She kept by her side, ready to catch her by the arm if she ever lost her footing again.

"Don't get too bothered by him. He's just not used to social situations like this. He's used to keeping to himself." Zhi assured her before she could think too much about it.

----------------------------

Progress through the ship was made.

The door to the bridge opened. Something fell. A disturbing and familiar scent wafted out from the room, before the flashlight revealed the source. Blood leaked to the floor, slowly making it's way toward the doorway now that the body that it originated from was disturbed. Beyond that, the rest of the room was too disturbing to process.

Zhi stepped back from the door in horror, covering her mouth and nose as an instinctual response to the smell. Her stomach churned, but wouldn't let itself be sick. She had already seen too much. It was only her desperate desire to never see such a scene again that kept her terrified of what was laid out in front of her.

"Why is... what's going on?" She whispered from under her hand as she began to tear up. None of this should be happening. Everything about the current situation was just wrong. This wasn't just some kind of mistake anymore.

It was only after the shock of being pushed aside by Arel that Zhi could even begin to get a hold on herself, and even then, all it really managed to do was snap her out of her daze. In attempt to think the whole thing over sensibly, she steadied herself, and tried to take a better look around the room for anything aside from the dead bodies. Unfortunately, all she managed to catch were console that Arel was currently operating, and the disturbingly thin air in the room.

Figuring that Arel had found the only possible object that could give them the answers to the oxygen problem, Zhi forced herself to make her way past the slaughter, and to the other side of the chair Arel was sitting in. She watched as the other woman operated the terminal, hoping that she would be able to pull up something informative.

She did, but the answers it gave weren't as optimistic as she'd hoped for.

"Only two hours...? How long has this been happening?" She managed to croak from her quickly tightening throat. "We... no. We need to get out of here. We can't think about this right now. We don't have the time. This ship must have escape pods, correct? They must still be here... since..."

Zhi paused, before slowly glancing back behind her. The bodies of the remaining crew continued to fill her field of vision. There was no one left to take them.

---------------------------------

Jun took a little longer to get a proper look at the room, due to his newfound desire to keep his distance from the others. As a result, he noticed everyone else's reactions before the room itself. It left him confused for a moment, but as soon as his sister got her chance to respond, it quickly dawned on him. He took another step back, tightening his fists as his imagination pieced together the scene for him.

"W-wait a minute..." He murmured, the artificial voice not properly expressing the amount of fear he was actually feeling, "Don't tell me they're all dead. The crew? The other passengers on this thing?"

No response. Either everyone was ignoring him, or they were too sickened by what they saw to even process what he said. The latter seemed more likely, right now.

As his confusion quickly elevated into panic, Jun lost all of his desire to keep away, and instead went charging straight into the room, pushing and kicking aside anything that got in his way. Even once he got inside, he didn't stop moving. He kept glancing around the horrific scene with little more than fear on his mind. Nothing even truly registered until he found the one thing in room more terrifying than the rest. He stopped everything, and stared.

"... Why is he still in one piece?" He eventually snapped, staring directly at the man with the hole in his head, "Why is everyone else torn apart like this when he-- this guy! Why did get out of this with nothing more than a bullet to the brain!?"

Zhi stopped staring at the console as if it was the most important thing about the room, and looked back to Jun. The concern in her eyes only scared him more. "Please, Jun... I don't think--"

"No! Don't try to tell me this isn't important! Look at him!" He shouted back, violently turning around to face his sister, "He's different! He just-just..." Everything beyond that devolved into nothing but noise as he finally snapped. As a final act, he kicked over the corpse that was bothering him so much, before collapsing to his knees. He let out a small, strangely human cry of distress, and buried his head in his hands, unable to take anything that was happening anymore.

"God damn it, this doesn't make any sense..."

This post has been edited by Ganonfrog: Mar 20 2011, 03:54 PM

[Nicsp]

Lars thanked for the batteries and immediately switched them with the old batteries he kept in a slot on his arm, the lights on his arm took a few moments to light up again and in a few more moments, it was functional. As soon as they opened the door, Lars wrapped his arms around himself instinctively. "Brr...Chilly..." He laughed some and then continued.

Lars was shocked for a moment, his eyes being wide open and his glasses sliding slightly down on his face. After a moment of silence, however, he took a deep breath and fixed his glasses in place, at that very moment noticing the thin air that surrounded him. Lars carefully made his way past the bodies, trying to avoid stepping in either the bodies or the pools of blood that painted the whole room. Contrary to his previous playful and joker attitude, Lars was now serious, a bit of sweat alredy running down behind his ears. It's okay, it's okay, there's a completely logical explanation for this...They were probably carrying some kind of...Wild animal or something...It must've gotten loose. But that still wouldn't explain why we are here in the first place... Lars sighed.

He stopped right behind Lars and Zhi, doing his best to avoid touching the carnage. He checked the screen and put his hand on his chin, thinking. He snapped out of thought when Jun started freaking out, however, having not before taken notice of the corpse. As Jun kicked it, Lars noticed that the corpse bumped into something as it moved, Lars, again made his way through the mess, moving over to whatever the corpse had touched and carefully picked it from the pool of blood it found itself in. A gun... Lars looked at it and then back at the corpse. Lars slowly made his way back to the others and dropped the gun on top of a table.

"Then let's make it have sense..." Lars commented, he then turned around and started pacing around the room as he brainstormed with himself. "I think it's a bit early to conclude that we're the only ones alive in this ship, since there was no one else in our floor and if there was anyone on Deck 2 they'd probably have died due to the lack of oxygen. However, someone programmed the life support system to focus on Deck 4, which is where the the engine room is located, which probably means there's someone down there trying to fix it." Lars looked around the bridge once again. "I'm thinking all of this carnage was caused by some kind of wild animal or something of the sort, who obviously wouldn't have been able to program the life support system, which means that the whoever's trying to fix the engine room at the moment is most likely what's left of the crew. Of course...The fact remains there's only human corpses around here, which means that either that beast was alredy dealt with in another Deck or it's still loose."

Lars turned back to the others, putting both of his hands behind his back as he spoke. "So, our best bet would be to either go to the engine room and look for the rest of the crew or at least try to contact them somehow." Lars looked at the corpses again. "Of course, that's also likely to make us an easier target for whatever mauled the people here to death." Lars then turned once again to the "intact" corpse. "Also, i guess it's safe to assume that this guy commited suicide, considering his wounds and the fact the gun was so close to him. Now why would someone with a gun choose suicide over actually shooting whatever was attacking him? Simple, whatever it is, it must be very resistant, to the point where bullets would have no effect on it and this crewman decided that his death was innevitable."

Lars then fixed his glasses in place one more time before finally stating. "In conclusion, we have two hours to decide and do either of the following. Go down to hangar 4 and try to contact the people at the engine room, but make ourselves vulnerable to...Whatever's out there...Or we can simply barricade ourselves in here and HOPE that the people, if there are any considering they may have evacuated, down by the engine room can fix the engine before we run out of oxygen." Lars stopped for a moment, watching as the blood from one of the crewmen slowly made it's way closer to his boots. Lars stepped away from it in disgust and then continued. "Or we could go look for the escape pods as Zhi suggested...Weren't it for the fact we don't really know where we are, we can't use the escape pods to cross huge distances because neither would one have enough supplies for that and neither would it survive a trip through the Nexus..." Lars slowly held wrapped his fingers around his robotic arm as his mentioned the Nexus and his eyes half-closed and then continued. "And we don't really know if there's any hospitable planets around."

Lars's mood seemed to brighten up suddenly, he smiled playfully and chuckled as he finished. "Well, the decision rests up to you guys, i'm just brainstorming here.But..." He suddenly got serious again. "I hope at least one of us here knows how to use a gun..." His eyes were fixated at the blood-stained gun he left on top of the table.

[Ereth]

Aiko shifted uncomfortably as Zhi settled in next to her, but soon quieted. The sound of her apron-knapsack thumping on her back was oddly soothing. "Don't get too bothered by him," Zhi said. "He's just not used to social situations like this. He's used to keeping to himself."

"Oh . . . okay." Aiko tried not to look at him, but he kept glancing toward her. She noticed that he had bruises from both collisions. I hope he's not in too much pain because of me.

And then they reached the bridge.

---------------------------------

It was horrible. Blood and meat and splintered bone . . . everywhere. The stench made Aiko's nose wrinkle, and she didn't know what she wanted to do more: scream, cry, or vomit. Out of the corner of one tear-filled eye, she saw Arel sidle up to a computer of some kind. Zhi followed close behind, and Aiko was left to try to process the scene as best as she could. Something had savagely torn most of these people to ribbons . . . and two people had been shot.

Shot with a bullet. Bullets came from guns. Like the one she had. She shuddered at the thought, but didn't dwell on it. The dead man (he was the only one she could call a man at this point) had a gun near him. Maybe he had shot himself to avoid a worse fate.

She could hear Zhi gasping something about two hours . . . and escape pods . . . and Jun yelling back at her about the man. Then the most heartbreaking sound entered Aiko's ears: it was Jun, and he was screaming in what seemed to be his own voice. Without another thought, she ran over and knelt beside him.

"Don't cry," she murmured. "Please don't cry. If you cry, I'll cry too." Before she could stop herself, Aiko wrapped him in a warm hug.

This post has been edited by Ereth: Mar 17 2011, 08:13 PM

[Hirei]

Arel listened closely as she swept over another terminal. Well isn't he a smart one....Probably worked as some sort of professor or something.

She looked over at Jun and Zhi, who were pretty much panicking. Quickly, Arel turned back to her spot in front of the terminal. Glancing up at the main viewport of the bridge Arel searched for signs of where they were located. If they were close enough they would have possibly 3 options of escaping. Her deep blue eyes scanned the numerous points of lights that glittered in the darkness. After a few seconds, the navigator realized where they may be. Drawing a couple of symbols with the blood on her hands, Arel began to trace from memory a certain part of a starchart that she had seen. And then it hit her.

"Guys I need you to pay attention for a minute".

Whirling around towards the group, Arel slid her goggles off her head into her hands and turned on her flashlight in laser light mode. A beam of red light shot out onto the viewport.

"This...." Arel moved her goggles to make the laser point at a small cluster of 5 points arranged in a circle. "Is the Elren star system. And this..." She moved the goggles towards another cluster of stars arranged in a jagged line.

"Is the Met'al Belt". Both of these star systems can be seen from only a one location in space: Morgan, the moon of gas giant Archimedes...and my home. We must be about 3/4ths of the way from Morgan.and a nearby Nexus node...." Clicking off the light and sliding the goggles back onto her head she gave a small smirk.

"We have a chance to live, you can trust me on this one. Might be a tad bit slim but it's there."

This post has been edited by Hirei: Mar 17 2011, 07:57 PM

[Ganonfrog]

Aiko's arms wrapped around Jun's stomach without warning, startling him even further. Yet, for a moment, he kept still, taking in the warmth of her body. She was alive. Amidst the cold death of the room, it was strangely welcome.

Even so, after the first couple of moments, the unfamiliarity of it started to sink in. Once his emotions began to piece back together, so did his thoughts on the matter. This complete stranger was comforting him. He looked so pathetic right now that she felt the need to attach herself to him just to keep him from crying. She thought he needed her to keep going.

Suddenly, it felt like her arms were tightening around him. It was suffocating.

Jun snapped back, forcefully pulling Aiko's arms away from him. "Get off! What do you think--" He started to snap back at her, only to find himself unable to finish the sentence. By pulling back, he had also maneuvered himself into a position where he could get a good view of her face. She was terrified, probably just as much as he was.

His scowl softened, and his guard dropped a little. He wasn't particularly fond of this woman or her coddling, but she was still suffering through this like the rest of them. He didn't have it in him to berate her, right now. As much as he hated to admit it, she didn't deserve it.

The desire to keep her from pitying him again, though, was enough to drive him back to his feet, and into a more rational mindset. He stood back up, and slapped the sense back into himself, before glancing only halfway back to Aiko, behind him. "Look, worry about yourself, and not me. I don't need it." he mumbled, "And stop that bullshit about crying. You're more ready to bust out the waterworks than I am."

From the other end of the room, Zhi watched on, her eyes unreadable as she stared back at the two of them.

----------------------------

"--Morgan, the moon of gas giant Archimedes...and my home. We must be about 3/4ths of the way from Morgan.and a nearby Nexus node...."

Zhi's attention was stolen back by the familiar sound of her home planet's name, and the unfortunate memories that came with it. A chill ran through her as plans of heading back there were discussed, and the suggestion that getting out would require the trip back.

"... Morgan's a war zone. Going back there is almost as dangerous as staying on this ship, I feel..." She eventually spoke up, the heavy thoughts passing on to the tone of her voice. "They're not letting anyone out. The last shuttle out already left. It... it was the one we were on."

She paused for a while as she reminded herself of just how strange it was that they managed to jump ships entirely without even knowing. Yet, somehow, the node was just about as far as it was when she could last remember.

"... Or are you suggesting that we pass through the node? Do we have the means to do that?"

This post has been edited by Ganonfrog: Mar 20 2011, 03:54 PM

[Ereth]

He had pushed her away.

She had expected it, but still . . . she was confused. In that moment, when she had hugged him, she saw something hot and red around his body. Aiko didn't know what it was, exactly, but she had felt it burn intensely, as if a piece of it had entered her. Was it his aura? I felt his anger . . . it was like blood. But it was tinged with blue and yellow . . . sadness and fear?

Panic began to set in when she couldn't shake off Jun's burning red veil. She seemed to perceive things as he did now. Frightened, she looked toward the others to try to clear her mind, but she saw more colors. Surrounding Zhi was a mix of blackish blue and purple. Arel was shining green and blue and a calmer sort or red, though the same fear and sadness she saw in Jun ate at the edges of their colors, too. She noted the same phenomenon in Nate and Lars, whose core colors were brown-orange and gray-green respectively. What the hell is going on?

"Let's go somewhere . . . anywhere at all!" Aiko shouted at no one in particular. "Just get out of my head! This is crazy!"

Red. Brown. Blue. Yellow. Purple. White. Pink. Orange. More colors, more emotions. And none of it made any sense. The shades swirled around in her, threatening to overtake everything that she was. She thrashed around on the floor. "NO! NO! NO! I'M ME! NOT YOU! ME!" she shrieked. "I'M . . . me . . ."

Then she blacked out.

This post has been edited by Ereth: Mar 18 2011, 01:09 PM

[Hirei]

Arel opened her mouth to speak but was interrupted when Aiko suddenly burst into hysterics:

"NO! NO! NO! I'M ME! NOT YOU! ME! I'M . . . me . . ." Aiko then slumped on the floor motionless, as Arel hurried over.

"Hey! HEY!!!!" She tried to get some sort of response, kneeling over next to the fallen baker. What in the world was that? Arel was worried that the other person was hallucinating or something. Her brother taught Arel about the horrors of war and such, so maybe it was traumatic stress?

"At any rate, I say that we go investigate the 4th Deck, that's where the MOST important objectives are. We need to check if the engine is ok first, and if not, check the hangar to see if there's any craft that we can use or escape pods. I'm not sure if this model carries them or not...."

She turned to Jun. "You. Carry Ms. Aiko for a bit will ya? I can't really lift anything heavy with my injured arm."

This post has been edited by Hirei: Mar 18 2011, 06:25 PM

[Ganonfrog]

Just as Jun fully turned around, he heard the sound of Aiko collapsing to the ground, followed by her panicked shouts. She wasn't just acting weird and on edge anymore. She had legitimately lost it. The woman had ghosts in her head.

With his temporary ease already shattered, Jun whipped back around to face her. "Hey! Snap out of it! This isn't the time--"

"NO! NO! NO! I'M ME! NOT YOU! ME! I'M . . . me . . ." Aiko interrupted him with a final string of frantic screams, before reaching her limit, and losing consciousness.

Jun stared back at her in disbelief. Was this normal? Did she usually have fits like this? There was no way in hell. Nobody just snaps like that. She may have been completely out of her skull from the beginning, but this was on a completely different level. Something did that to her. It had to.

As his thoughts drifted to the disturbing, Jun crouched down beside her, looking her over for anything that could have possibly hit her. Of course, he found nothing.

"You. Carry Ms. Aiko for a bit will ya? I can't really lift anything heavy with my injured arm." Arel directed him from her seat across the room. She was rather calm. Far too calm, in fact. On top of that, she was ordering him around, telling him to do something that he already planned to do. Did she really think he was that incapable? So much that she didn't believe he'd get the basic idea of not leaving a helpless person out here to die? He didn't like these people much, but, damn it, he was still human.

Despite his angry thoughts, Jun still did as he was told. Not wanting to waste anymore time in this god-awful room, he took Aiko into his arms, and attempted to lift her off the bloodied ground. He had a bit of strength in him from his janitorial job, so he was capable of handling her weight, but he doubted that he was quite fit enough to keep it up for long. She was still a grown woman, after all.

Even so, he was easily able to carry her out of the bridge. As he was doing this, however, he found himself maneuvering around the many obstacles in the adjoining hallway in rather awkward ways. Eventually he wound up tilting her backwards a bit; just enough to loosen something from her makeshift knapsack. It shifted through a crack in the folds, before making a fairly loud clack as it hit the floor. Catching notice of this, Jun turned his head toward the source of the noise.

It was a gun. The same kind he saw by the strange corpse earlier. Did she take it from him? No... it wasn't possible. She didn't get close enough to be able to take it. She had to have been holding it from the very beginning. She was carrying it around intentionally. Even if she was holding it for self defense, something wasn't right. Where did she even get it from? On top of that, she was obviously nowhere near mentally stable enough to be trusted with the thing.

Jun's grip around Aiko's neck tightened, starting to cut off Aiko's airflow. His emotions were processing the problem before his head. As far as he could deduce at this point, this woman wasn't just crazy. She was a homicidal maniac.

-----------------------

After Aiko's hysterics, Zhi immediately found herself agreeing with Arel. The thin air and stress of the situation as a whole probably got to the poor girl. The only thing they could do for her is get out of here as soon as possible.

It didn't take too much longer for the group to start filing into the hallway after Jun carried Aiko out. Zhi took to the back, intending to keep an eye on the others from there. She normally preferred to lead a group, but in a case like this, she could easily tell that Arel and Lars had a better grip on the situation, and were much more suited for the position. For now, she would just watch out for them.

As she walked, however, Zhi found herself approaching her brother, who was, strangely, stalled in the hallway. She stepped up beside him, and put a hand on his shoulder, concerned. "Are you okay? We need to keep moving." She reminded him, "The sooner we leave, the sooner we'll be able to forget about this. I... I know. I'm not taking this well, either."

Jun looked back to her for a moment, before picking up the pace again. His grip slightly loosened as he made his way ahead of his sister, keeping oddly silent as he went.

Zhi's stomach sank. Since when did he ignore her like that? He wasn't normally a social person, but this wasn't right at all. He was supposed to talk to her.

Yet, even as she worried, she kept on. They needed to get to deck 4, no matter the cost. She would have to worry about this later.

This post has been edited by Ganonfrog: Mar 20 2011, 04:01 PM

[Hirei]

As they were maneuvering through the halls, Arel heard a loud sound behind her, she turned to face the direction that the sound came from. A gun sat glittering dimly on the floor. Did...someone drop it?

Puzzeled Arel watched as Jun continued to walk forward with Aiko in his arms. "Hrm..." The navigator backtracked towards the gun and picked it up. "Seems like this dropped from somewhere. Does this belong to any of you?"