Conference Headquarters

[Hattish Thing]

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Issued over seventy years ago, City of Inside Inter-Branch Directive 1111 reads as follows: “Research department heads, electrum agents: Maulbron Building, Gray Zone, 8–24. Conference Z." Inter-Branch Directive 1111 remains the only publicly leaked reference to Conference Z. This directive was compromised only when a power outage due to a now-forgotten cataclysm caused data systems across the city to malfunction. Since then, few verifiable details have been uncovered regarding Conference Z and its agents, operations, or purpose. However, Intersection field reports have linked the group to several obscure locations throughout the Nexus, many of which have since been vacated and are now little more than abandoned underground bunkers.

Only Cauvin Kramolagh, the current executor of Conference Z, has full knowledge of Inter-Branch Directive 1111. In this decades-old directive, Marciano Laur've, a wealthy and megalomaniacal businessman obsessed with asserting dominance over his many enemies, ordered the founding of an organization of brilliant minds to discuss radical new avenues for business and expansion. Laur've judged the conference such a success that he secretly dedicated a significant percentage of his yearly funds to backing the think tank, a practice that has continued long past his death.

From its inception, Conference Z has been clandestine, intended to free participants from the shackles of convention and taboo. Over the decades, its mystery has only deepened as a march of obsessive executors have burrowed the suborganization into the depths of obscurity. Currently, the only non-members aware of the existence of Conference Z are anonymous sponsors, whose identities are known only by Executor Kramolagh. These sponsors frequently share in the success of Conference Z's more lucrative experiments, and as such keep the work of Executor Kramolagh and his far-flung electrum researchers a closely guarded secret.

Deep inside stronghold laboratories hidden within a secret series of research facilities scattered throughout the Nexus, Conference Z studies bizarre topics such as advanced technologies, occult virology, biological hypnosis, extraterrestrial anatomy, elder sciences, enhanced cryptozoology, immortality, interplanar economics, mass teleportation, psychic enrichment, pyschotronics, revivified prophecy, temporal sciences, energy sciences, and artificial divinity, among others. Yet while a number of unmentionable programs have been officially suspended over the years; curiously, these suspended programs receive only slightly less funding than active projects.

Perhaps the most sinister aspect of the shadow organization is the cabal of nearly identical, black-clad agents who report directly to Executor Kramolagh, silently carrying out his orders, monitoring underperforming ventures, and hunting those who learn too much about Conference Z.




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In far-off section of Outside, a seemingly inhospitable strip of land abuts the Myrantis Mountains, providing only middling arable land too harsh for general cultivation. However, the same mineral signatures made famous by the nearby Brimstone Springs also leave the rocky soil uniquely suited to grow a range of rare medicinal plants. The plantation known as Wirholt’s Rictus—its grisly name a reverent tribute to the current owner’s great-grandfather—is one of several such specialized farms that produce a steady supply of harrowleaf, saw-edge heather, pathos berries, night nettle tea, unique strains of somnus root, as well as other, stranger things. While these all have legitimate medicinal uses, the mysterious researchers beneath the plantation value the unusual crop for far more questionable reasons.

Due to its incredible distance from the nearest civilization, Wirholt’s Rictus is a particularly isolated plantation, unaccustomed to handling visitors despite its great size. During the slowest times of the year, the plantation has a staff of approximately forty souls, swelling to five times that during the peaks of harvest and planting. The owner, a cruel and unforgiving taskmaster called Temarra, oversees the operation year-round, personally flogging those who do not meet their quotas, taking orders directly from the masters of the research facility below. The result of her cruelty is a loyal workforce that keeps its gossip to a whisper, asks few questions, and rarely challenges a new face, as it probably belongs to a replacement for an incapable employee.

The most notable structure found within the borders of Wirholdt's Rictus would be the expansive plantation manor which Temarra makes her home, sitting atop one of the higher hills, giving it a commanding view of the rolling rows
of cultivated bushes, shrubs, and grasses. Basic descriptions of each building are below.

Manor: This single-story manor is just elegant enough to entertain visiting buyers and just modest enough to let the owner leverage her humble means to demand higher prices. A ten-foot-tall wall, gate, and perimeter of shrubs provide considerable privacy from the rest of the plantation—especially effective in allowing Conference Z operatives to conduct business without being observed.

Greenhouses: The elevation and latitude beget a somewhat chilly climate, so frost and reduced sunlight are often a problem during the winter months. A trio of greenhouses made of wood and glass shelters the most sensitive plants and fosters the seedlings for other species until they can be transplanted outside.

Warehouse: This is the principle storage site for the plantation’s tools, its food supply, baled leaves, and refined products. The northern wing also serves as an impromptu barn for the few horses and livestock.

Processing Facilities: These two buildings contain millstones, cauldrons, pestles, delicate glassware, and more. The plantation employs five skilled pharmacists versed in testing soil conditions, pulverizing leaves, distilling tinctures, rolling cigars, and a wealth of other tasks to create the finished products, which are then exported elsewhere or taken by the researchers below.

Residences: Three barracks house the field hands and skilled laborers. A kitchen house stands to the southwest. A dozen other houses are scattered throughout the plantation, but the most important workers reside here.

Smokehouses: Several of the leafy plants must be dried carefully before shipping or processing, all of which happens in these buildings.

Threshing Yard: This oval of stucco and aggregate is where the laborers bring dried berries and grains for threshing, removing unwanted husks, skins, and kernels.

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Beneath Wirholt’s Rictus, accessible only by three highly secure passages scattered throughout the plantation, extends one of Conference Z's two remaining satellite facilities: Slumbersun, more a tangled network of halls, studies, and artificial ecosystems than a compact laboratory. A majority of the compact walls, ceilings, and floors of Slumbersun are composed of treated starmetal alloys that resist rust and other degradation and the ceilings are almost universally ten feet high. Rows of technomagical orbs embedded along the upper edges of the walls bathe the rooms and hallways in green-tinted light.

Most of the doors within Slumbersun are composed of reinforced metals, allowing access to deeper areas of the facility by sliding into recesses in the walls after specialized keys have been scanned. Several important points in the facility are equipped with specially treated blast doors made to withstand extraordinary punishment, both to keep outsiders from accessing the more questionable experiments within, and as a fail-safe to ensure that escaped experiments cannot evacuate the facility. Basic descriptions of notable locations are below.


Headquarter Entry: Accessible only be several pairs of reinforced blast doors, this greeting chamber is decorated with experiments too impractical for Conference Z's use, yet interesting enough to impress newly recruited researchers and sponsors. Objects include giant gears and tangles of strange circuitry pulled from enormous alien machines, mosaics made from colorful debris, and weird sculptures constructed from glittering starmetal. The walls and floor of the room are plated in metal, while harsh lighting glares from panels in the ceiling above.

Recordkeeping: Several long metallic objects covered with flashing lights and strange glowing panels fight for floor space in this room with large, boxy, cabinet-like metal objects. Here and there on the walls, panels flash images of buildings, rooms, and scenery from throughout the Nexus. This highly secure chamber contains over a dozen fifteen-foot tall silos of strange machinery and glowing circuitboard panels, connected by thick cables and hundreds of wires to a massive supercomputer which dominates the southernmost wall.

Employee Barracks: This large, utilitarian section of Slumbersun is split into dozens of relatively pleasant gray rooms which serve as places of residence for both Conference Z researchers assigned to Slumbersun and security personnel, many of which rarely see the light of day. Each room features rather comfortable bedding and hospitable furnishings, luxurious personal quarters, a powerful desktop computer, and an impressive library.

Meeting Room: This large egg-shaped chamber has smooth, seamless walls of silvery metal. Light gleams from numerous freely suspended orbs that slowly circle the top of the high, curved ceiling. In the center of the room stands a strange triangular-shaped metal table surrounded by a dozen chairs. Along the edges of the chamber trail several additional rows of chairs, all facing the center table. This room is used by Conference Z to hold meetings—the chairs around the table are for venture-heads and top scholars, while those against the walls are for aides and security personnel.

Receiving Laboratory: This area serves as a receiving room for new subjects and materials, providing a team of researchers a chance to vet any arrivals to ensure they’re fit and won’t infect the other experiments. This is also the farthest Temarra has ever traveled into the facility; despite her authority above ground, her only way to speak with lab authorities is to travel here and beg an audience. This room contains several unknown creatures from other realities kept preserved in fluid as well as several logbooks that describe sundry bizarre fauna, pieces of creatures, chemicals, and other supplies brought into the facility. Fluid-filled canisters attached to the walls contain a range of small creatures floating in stasis. Ominous operating tables line the southernmost wall, and several computers can be seen.

Production and Robotics: This industrial laboratory serves both as a chamber dedicated to technological experimentation as well as a fully functional starmetal foundry and contains a wealth of metallic workbenches for the crafting, repair, and dismantling of technological objects, overseen by several automated claws. Several partially dismantled mechanical creatures—some that resemble humanoids, others more like insects, hang suspended from the ceiling by powerful cables. Dozens of powerful computers line the walls here, and assistants scurry about within the area at nearly every hour of the day.

Alien Observation Dome: This expansive glass chamber is dedicated to sustaining several specimens adapted to life in warm, otherwordly jungles under a thick, heat-trapping atmosphere whose composition is slightly different than that of
the Nexus. The unfamiliar balance of oxygen, nitrogen, and other gasses makes this room appear misty and gives it a disturbingly tangy smell. Breathing this air for an extended period of time is deleterious, however, most researchers assigned to this laboratory are equipped with powerful protective gear. Blue-hued light emanates from the domed ceiling at the center of this two-story, artificial environment. Broad metal grates make a perimeter about the room about ten feet above the lush habitat below. Paths cross between strange shrubs and low trees, and vines cling to the walls and dangle in clumps across parts of the ceiling. At the center of the room stands a small metal pavilion, a small elevator that the researchers use to introduce live prey into the room and feed the strange beasts. Behind the thick glass in the southern corners of the room lie small laboratories filled with bookshelves, dissection tables, and workbenches. The ceiling rises twenty feet above the catwalk and thirty feet above the alien habitat.

Manifestation Chambers: This is the first of the laboratories built for the Arkanen Project, an initiative to extract the dreams from alien minds and manifest imperfect homunculi of their nightmares to better understand the dreamers’ beliefs and fears. The procedure requires powerful chemical sedatives and hallucinogens derived from the plantation crops above and is extremely harmful to the subject, causing patients to hemorrhage from the ears, thrash uncontrollably, and awaken with psychological scars. The chamber itself is composed of dozens of conduits and tubes, which run up and down the walls of this lab, connecting dozens of beds to a dozens of large glass vats to the west. Within the vats undulate formless blobs of organic matter that briefly grow arms, pseudopods, and faces before those features melt back into the roiling masses.

The Arkanen Laboratory: This lab represents the next generation of magical and alchemical technology for the Arkanen Project, distinguished by two major developments. First, the experiments conducted here make use of but one massive vat the size of an entire building, built into circular, elevated platform with a curving set of stairs, rather than a dozen smaller vats. Second, instead of tapping into a sleeping creature’s dreams, a creature can attach a series of technomagical sensors to its head and—with sufficient force of will—consciously shape the nightmare creature’s form. In order to maximize space in the room, most of the lab equipment is kept suspended in the air. Easily three labs’ worth of tables, shelves, and other heavy equipment hovers thirty feet off the floor, suspended by chains. By manipulating controls accessibly via computer along the north partition, a creature can raise, lower, or rotate any number of these fixtures. In this way, the room can be reconfigured from a small library to a lab to an operating room. Like a cathedral forged in the name of science, this laboratory has an arched ceiling that soars to a height of fifty feet. The room constricts near the middle where a low, stepped platform formally partitions the two halves. To the north, a narrow metal walkway hugs the walls about five feet above the open workspace. To both the east and west, the walkway terminates in twenty-foot ladders that lead to higher observation decks.

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Far off the coast of Seaside, mere miles away from an extraordinarily powerful hurricane, a resigned pile of blunt black rocks endures the thrashing sea. Its shore is irregular and inhospitable, which might matter if anything of interest stood upon the barren heap. Not even worthy of being called an island, Wingless Rock rises hardly more than twenty feet out of the water—far less at high tide—and measures all of one-hundred feet across at its widest point. Aside from algae and the inhabitants of sickly tide pools, nothing naturally lives upon the eroded, volcanic heap.

The remnants of a gray, salt-blasted fishing shack occupied by a mad sea-hermit lean amid the boulders on the southern coast, but no other features mar the ugly pile. That’s not to say Wingless Rock is uninhabited, though. Its barren appearance and deserted, worthless reputation are all part of a subtly cultivated veneer, for hidden upon the island, a secret hatch can be discovered. The hatch, nearly impossible to open without a specific focus crystal and a passcode, reveals a massive shaft leading down almost three-hundred feet into the earth.

A short metallic access ladder leads to an elevator, which in turn hurtles down. As with Slumbersun, a majority of the compact walls, ceilings, and floors of Wingless Rock are composed of treated starmetal alloys that resist rust and other degradation and the ceilings are almost universally ten feet high. Rows of technomagical orbs embedded along the upper edges of the walls bathe the rooms and hallways in a harsh white light. Most of the doors within Wingless Rock are composed of reinforced metals, allowing access to deeper areas of the facility by sliding into recesses in the walls after specialized keys have been scanned.

Several important points in the facility are equipped with specially treated blast doors made to withstand extraordinary punishment, both to keep outsiders from accessing the more questionable experiments within, and as a fail-safe to ensure that escaped experiments cannot evacuate the facility. Basic descriptions of notable locations are below.


Elevator Entry: Accessible only be several pairs of reinforced blast doors, this greeting chamber is composed of hundreds of pristine white tiles, the walls here lined with shimmering steel doors. Like a gallery display, a glass column stands near the center of the room, rising from floor to ceiling. Within, a nine-foot-tall mass of agitated multicolored material writhes through a bubbling fluid. One of the only parts of the facility not dedicated to research, this hall serves as a place for the researchers to step away from their work for a moment and to receive visitors—were the installation ever to have them. The specimen in the glass here is a curiosity that’s become something of an art display, an entity of scintillating color plucked from a comet, floating in the brine.

Facility Records: This chamber is the size of an entire warehouse, full of metallic boxes and labels. Thick glass columns filled with brackish liquid and masses of stringy flesh occupy numerous niches along this hall. At the end of the storage facility, books and sheaves of loose paper cram an enormous wall of shelves. This grim storage facility holds the remains of numerous experiments deemed failures, but valued too highly to dispose of. The majority of these are Executor Kramolagh's early experiments with unknowable creatures as he sought a process to distill their divine essence into a concentrated form. Rather than rely on a computer, the most clandestine research performed by Conference Z is recorded here, guarded by the best security possible.

Employee Barracks: This large, utilitarian section of Wingless Rock is split into dozens of relatively pleasant gray rooms which serve as places of residence for both Conference Z researchers assigned to Wingless Rock and security personnel, many of which rarely see the light of day. Each room features rather comfortable bedding and hospitable furnishings, luxurious personal quarters, a powerful desktop computer, and an impressive library.

Meeting Room: Banks of glowing quartz beams line the ceiling, illuminating this broad hall with a cold, clean glow. Like it's twin facility, this chamber is built with smooth, seamless walls of silvery metal. In the center of the room stands a strange triangular-shaped metal table surrounded by a dozen chairs. Along the edges of the chamber trail several additional rows of chairs, all facing the center table. This room is used by Conference Z to hold meetings—the chairs around the table are for venture-heads and top scholars, while those against the walls are for aides and security personnel.

Receiving Laboratory: This area serves as a receiving room for new subjects and materials, providing a team of researchers a chance to vet any arrivals to ensure they’re fit and won’t infect the other experiments. This room contains several unknown creatures from other realities kept preserved in fluid as well as several logbooks that describe sundry bizarre fauna, pieces of creatures, chemicals, and other supplies brought into the facility. Fluid-filled canisters attached to the walls contain a range of small creatures floating in stasis. Ominous operating tables line the southernmost wall, and several computers can be seen.

Nuclear Laboratories/Reactor Chamber: This branch of Wingless Rock is dedicated entirely to nuclear science, with one half serving as reactor storage, the other as a proper laboratory. The air in reactor storage chamber shimmers with heat, while five rumbling walls of glowing metal and tangles of steaming pipes fill the chamber with a thunderous rumbling sound. Five enormous nuclear generators rumble away in this chamber, acting as the primary source of power for the entire compound.

Surgical Theatre: Long glowing bars set into the ceiling fill this chamber with harsh light. A metal table sits in the room’s center, surrounded by cruel-looking machines with articulated arms tipped with saw blades, needles, cutting edges, and other surgical implements. Shelves lining the walls contain hundreds of unusual tools. This room serves as a work laboratory wherein some of Conference Z's most depraved and disturbing experiments take place, many of which involve the dissection of otherwordly entities.

Processing Laboratory: Metal pylons form a perimeter around several deep vats filled with eerie glowing masses, which bathe the room in an otherwordly light. A steel bridge crosses to a smaller workstation, and a series of tubes and conduits run from the vats to the ceiling to pass through various walls on their way to unseen destinations. Although the advanced stages of divine-distillation occur in Kramolagh's god lab, it is here that researchers perform the initial phases of divine deconstruction and recombination.

The God Lab: An acrid tang fills the air in this tall, painfully bright chamber. A series of metal rebar platforms connected by steel staircases descend in a counterclockwise spiral from corner to corner, leading into a mind-bogglingly large, bunkerlike laboratory filled with multiple workstations. The room’s steel workstations appear sterile and are impeccably arranged. The room's primary feature is a tiered platform crafted of glittering starmetal which supports a large glass silo that is partially sunken into the floor. Computers line the walls, alongside unnerving technological instruments. A heavy, riveted, industrial-grade door leads to a panic room, a necessity when it comes to the heretical experiments which take place here.




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https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/240a32c49b2df9b0d4e3fbea2800c8b4.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) This Division came into existence when the previous Executor of Conference Z, a woman whose identity has since been scrubbed clean of records, discovered that an alien spacecraft had crashed atop the Myrantis Mountains. With the use of powerful teleportation magics, the wreckage was transported deep beneath Wingless Rock, where Conference Z engineers began the arduous process of dismantling the vessel. Researchers belonging to the Advanced Technologies Division concern themselves primarily with the construction of powerful machines and supercomputers, hypothetical doomsday devices, and increasingly spectacular cybernetics. In addition, the Advanced Technologies Division ensures that the Nexus Surveillance System runs 24/7. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/f3eafed05c5ac15086e608fbe702507a.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) Many years ago, a ravenous horde of undead marched across Riverside, resulting in many casualties before the invasion was all but fought back by the city defenders. Several specimens, the largest and strongest of the creatures, were abducted by Conference Z and taken far beneath Slumbersun for experimentation. The researchers there discovered that, although the creatures themselves were created using powerful magics, each of the creature's still carried within them a virus capable of spreading a powerful infection. Years of research have produced an even stronger alchenomagical virus, as well as an antidote, kept stored in large canisters beneath Slumbersun. Yet research continues, and a vast majority of Division resources are currently being spent towards the ominous "Sepulcher Project". Director Position: FILLED, Director Aluren Orvhelle.

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/d8310c64e0242e334947084203f68350.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) Members of this obscure division perform questionable research and experiments in the name of understanding the effects of psychic and psionic magic upon the brain, the effects of prolonged enchantment upon the physical body, and the long-term effects of other mind-related afflictions. Of late, resources have been directed towards a mysterious directive known as the "Arkanen Project", a collaborative enterprise which researches obscure surgical procedures designed to enhance higher functions, as well as maximize the effects of dreams upon the real world. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/cb573472d7128c42b45849279a15ab93.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) Researchers dedicated to the twin divisions of Conference Z known as "Extraterrestrial Anatomy" and "Elder Sciences" study mysterious creatures and seemingly unknowable entities which dwell within the darkness between the stars. While these branches of occult superscience were once considered fruitless and controversial even by other members of Conference Z, a recent breakthrough involving the capture and live vivisection of what is believed to be an elder creature before a panel of advanced Conference Z academics has ensured that funding continues to flow. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/6f08249a6ab5917e9513c93f8814bc37.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) While a vast majority of researchers dedicated to Conference Z rarely leave the fortified laboratory-bunkers they're assigned to upon acceptance into the organization, researchers belonging to this particular division tend to spend just as much time above ground as below. These individuals investigate the unexplained appearances of extraordinarily rare and possibly unique creatures reported all over the Nexus, many of which possess qualities which cannot be found in any other creature. Conference Z seeks to utilize the rare components possessed by these creatures, the acquisition of which could very easily lead towards miraculous scientific breakthroughs. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/87cb7c30d24a6f1ab760b4406c49de10.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) This division has a rich history within Conference Z, for the results of their initial experiments allowed for Conference Z's original founder to greatly extend his lifespan. The Immortality division remains one of the more esoteric sub-organizations of Conference Z, for researchers assigned to this highly complicated branch tend to rely more on magic than any other division. These individuals aim to one day create an alchemical serum or machine fully capable of granting immortality without any of the unpleasant side-effects which tend to come with an extended lifespan. Members of this division work closely with the researchers assigned to the Artificial Divinity division. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/9f726c9959dd79a428e2e7979d0a4b53.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) This particularly unusual division was one of the very first created by Conference Z in order to please its technical founder, Marciano Laur've. Members of this division focus entirely upon manipulating the currencies of extraplanar societies and civilizations, reaping the benefits of their subtle extra-dimensional manipulations through the use of puppet entities investing in these esoteric economies. While this division remains the smallest one, its operations carried through by less than a handful of researchers, it remains a lucrative division of Conference Z. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/b32bab71a179c4108f6fa59658f8d17b.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) Over thirty years ago, a wealthy sponsor of Conference Z was subjected to a paranormal experience which promptly caused him to dedicate enough currency to fund an entire division focused around his peculiar experience. According to this sponsor, whose records have since been deleted, he was reportedly getting ready for bed when he heard a strange voice calling out, which sounded as if it were speaking in a strange and otherwordly language. Upon looking around for the source of the mysterious voice, which he said had sounded “hollow,” this anonymous sponsor tracked it to the window of his manorhouse, but when he looked out there was no one out there in the night, and it would have been odd if there had been, as his window was a full seventeen feet off of the ground. This would be the last thing he clearly remembered before he mysteriously vanished, only to be discovered over three hundred miles away, unconscious in the middle of a road. Individuals assigned to this division dedicate themselves to investigating particularly eerie and unusual cases of spontaneous human teleportation. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/c29583e60b4e62c85ef5a054d6a72e31.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) Members of this division are generally experienced parapsychologists who specialize in the study of paranormal and psychic phenomena which include telepathy, precognition, clairvoyance, psychokinesis, near-death experiences, reincarnation, apparitional experiences, and other paranormal claims. While most would consider parapsychology a pseudoscience, this division has produced alarming results which suggest something more. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/f4dbb37ea78648d0ad42a0520878b312.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) Researchers assigned to this division, often known as etheric scientists, dedicate themselves to the creation of psychotronic weapons, which utilize electronic machines to send beams of energy or frequencies directly into a target's brain and body through the air. Research has suggested that the same technology being utilized as a weapon by Conference Z could thereotically be used to brainwash entire populations by making subtle suggestions to them via electronic beams or frequencies. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/abf93bd77085eeb06f61df9ce5b05fe9.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) This particular division was founded by request of the now-deceased Marciano Lauv're in order to create a top-tier electronic security system capable of predicting violations and assaults before they even occured. Although Lauv're was murdered long before division research produced desires results, a recent breakthrough has allowed for the hypothetical creation of a machine fully capable of predicting the future, although researchers are still struggling with the practicalities and energy-requirements of such a device. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/65b3b1234a653478fa91aa68867509b3.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) Researchers belonging to this division dedicate themselves to experiments revolving around the manipulation of time itself through scientific means. According to their research, time is an illusion; entirely relative — for it can vary for different observers depending on speed through space. Those within this division tend to invetigate reports of temporal warps and other time-related phenomena in order to achieve a better understanding of the nature of time itself, and how to properly manipulate it. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/c6231cca41300620b5c0f81d78d80640.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) Scientists assigned to this division primarily conduct experiments which tap into the energy of life or death: positive energy or negative energy. While this division has ultimately produced little throughout the years, a recent experiment successfully resulted in the creation of an unusually potent canister of liquid negative energy, which many researchers of this division theorize will allow for further discoveries which could potentially result in the creation of a powerful energy-based weapon. Director Position: UNFILLED

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/fbba0eda95eb316768ad3e67fe7a6544.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) Little is known of this highly clandestine division, headed by none other than Executor Kramolagh himself. This division receives an extraordinary amount of funding, all of which goes towards the mysterious "Apocrypha Project". Director Position: FILLED: Executor Cauvin Kramolagh.


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https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/cd4906128578fb4e1861412eb0b3c735.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) From his observatory, Professor Calacazari studies the nature of the Nexus itself, along with its inherent link to alternate realities. Researchers dedicated to Project Ingress tend to belong to the Mass Teleportation and Temporal Sciences divisions, and involve themselves with the construction of technomagical gates meant to transport individuals across space and time. Currently, only one of these gates remains fully active, however, progress has been slowed due to the attempts of otherworldly creatures to pierce the barely-functional gate.

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/e4c92778235d39638e93084407e2cee1.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) A particularly unethical scientist known as Professor Galuzo has been placed in charge of this sinister project, and through the use of careful diplomacy, steep bribes, and a dash of blackmail, he ensures that he and his agents (generally members of the Occult Virology division) are among the only living creatures allowed near a haunted valley dominated by a clan of barbaric undead, where they study the union of disease and necromancy, as well as perfect the creation of plague-bearing undead by alchemical and technological means.

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/b189361f3308562d34c9dc0be1bd3b08.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) Recently, a farmstead miles away from the isolated plantation above the Slumbersun Research Facility was visited by a creature from another world. It came from between the stars in a comet to feast on the mind of those below, harvesting their brains and reducing the small family of farmers working the land to a comatose state. The creature then used the still-living bodies of the unfortunate farmers as makeshift hives for its unspeakable young. In pursuit of the comet, Conference Z arrived at the scene, where they managed to extract a number of alien eggs which now exist as specimens beneath Slumbersun. This project centers around observing the growth of these horrific entities, and is generally overseen by members of the Extraterrestrial Anatomy and Elder Sciences divisions.

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/6dfb117f7ed2e3a714b61cbe7fd79cc1.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) This eerie project, almost entirely carried out beneath Slumbersun, focuses upon the manifestation of dreams. According to its head researcher, Professor Tantis Mais, this project could potentially revolutionize how individuals interact with the world, for their frightening research suggests that by undergoing a particularly complicated surgical process, an utterly mundane individual's thoughts and dreams, under the correct conditions, could become reality as if by magic. This project is a joint operation overseen by the Biological Hypnosis, Psychic Enrichment, and Pyschotronics divisions.

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/6f8dc2d94e8832fa4777404a1d953574.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) According to Executor Kramolagh's research into deific obscurity, some deities form as pearls, wrapping a fragment of divine power in a pleasant sheath. Researchers dedicated to this extremely complicated project assist Kramolagh with his life's work, attempting to extract enough of that divine ‘grit’ from divine sources in order to combine it under exacting conditions in order to one day create what Kramolagh refers to as a stable "god-fount", which, if successful, would be proof of Kramolagh's heretical hypothesis, which states that divinities are nothing so sacrosanct that proper lab conditions cannot replicate the effects. Executor Kramolagh makes use of the entirety of Conference Z in order to carry out this project, meaning that any division could potentially be involved in his research.




https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180730/325007eedc79c88906073c7acfe8bd3c.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/)

Although the organization itself has existed for decades, rarely seeking new members, a recent cataclysm which resulted in the destruction of a third research facility has all but forced Conference Z to seek out new recruits to bolster their ranks. While it is currently extremely difficult to contact Conference Z directly, Executor Kramolagh has spent the last few months researching potential recruits and contacting those who he deems worthy, and in due time, this once clandestine organization may very well become a less closely guarded secret.

After being contacted by Executor Kramolagh, individuals are interviewed and given a tour of one of the two active facilities. Provided they are accepted, once an individual agrees to join Conference Z, they will be assigned to a particular research facility as determined by their areas of interest. Top scholars and venture-heads funded by Conference Z are to make regular reports to Executor Kramolagh, keeping him apprised of their efforts and discoveries. Each venture keeps its own staff and security; most assistants and guards are unaware that a deceased madman funds their work and never hear the name Conference Z.


https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180802/7f30205f3a77662d63a5efaa3c90bf10.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/)

https://fontmeme.com/permalink/180802/61be90d9949dc583140a1ef3e1d29b30.png (https://fontmeme.com/fonts/ethnocentric-font/) "A cruel and cold-hearted surgeon, Artephius remains one of the few individuals whose flesh has successfully bonded with alien organic material." https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CjjtqAcVEAALSvQ.jpg:large

NOTE: Currently, Slumbersun and Wingless Rock are inaccessible.

[Hattish Thing]

Armored Vehicle - Nigel:

The figure in the gray coat continues to stare forward intently, fingertips placed against one another in a sign of confidence. His expression remains neutral, the light bathing his deep cheeks in shadow, reflecting off of his large, onyx spectacles. Nigel's mutterings are ignored entirely, nor is his unusual wave acknowledged.

After what feels like an eternity, he speaks.

"I vhould g-get comfortable, if I vhere you."

[billtodamax]

Unless you got like... he counts on his fingers 5 different liquors in the back here, then that's probably not happening. And a shaker. Despite what he says he leans back, pulling from his cigarette again, trying to figure out how to roll down the window for a second before giving up.

How long are we waiting here anyway. He asks after a moment.

[Hattish Thing]

Armored Vehicle - Nigel:

The gray-coated man allows himself a wry grin here, exposing a few unusually sharp teeth. He licks his lips for half a second before leaning back into his chair, continuing to tap his fingers against one another. After several seconds, he presses a button built into his side of the vehicle, revealing a miniature bar built into the back.

"Make of zhat vhat y-you vhill."

"Until vhe arrive."

[billtodamax]

Now there's some hospitality. He sets his cigarette down, and begins pulling bottles out from the bar. You drink champ?

Regardless of the answer, he sets out 2 glasses, grabs the shaker, and starts free-pouring alcohol into it. It's long islands or nothing. Or, hell I guess you can mix your own. he shrugs mid pour, a complicated maneouvre that doesn't slow him down any.

[Hattish Thing]

Armored Vehicle - Nigel:

The man blinks from beneath the large onyx lenses of his curious circular spectacles, glancing down towards the second glass. "Not on zhe j-job, but yes. I do."

"You seem nervous, Mr. Rutherford."

[billtodamax]

Oh no way? I seem nervous huh? He fills the glasses, sliding a long island towards the guy. Yeah, well, the spooky letter sitting in my room, shady meeting on the corner of a street, armoured personnel carriers taking me away to god knows where, I'm probably just stressed over nothing. He pulls from his recovered cigarette, his other arm lining up his long island to go afterwards.

C'mon, drink, I won't tell your boss.

[Hattish Thing]

Armored Vehicle - Nigel:

The man chuckles darkly here, the sound reverberating through the painfully bright innards of the armored vehicle. He glances deep into Nigel's eyes from behind the onyx lenses of his starmetal spectacles, his eerie gaze piercing through the glass. "Oh, you pretty zhing, you. Relax, i-if you vhill. You're in no danger, here."

"You see, Mr. Rutherford... I am zhe boss, and you are a very f-fortunate man."

[billtodamax]

Nigel chokes on his drink a little, coughing a few times. Oh, cool, great. He coughs a couple more times, looking very cool. Great first impression Nigel!

I feel real fortunate. He finally manages to clear his throat. If you're shooting for creepy you're doing a great job, by the way. "Pretty thing", real great.

[Hattish Thing]

Armored Vehicle - Nigel:

Kramolagh frowns at this point, retrieving a thick folder from within his coat. He presses another button within the vehicle, which causes a tray to unfold before Nigel. Slowly, he sets the folder down upon the tray before calmly nudging it to Nigel, his expression quite serious.

Within the folder, several documents can be found, each of which contains information on Conference Z.

"I am Executor Kramolagh. I must say, y-your vhork is impressive."

[billtodamax]

Nigel sets down his drink and squashes out his cigarette before picking up the folder. He starts flipping through it fairly quickly, skimming the information. This is uh... this is quite the organisation you've got here. Uh, thanks I guess, Mr. Kramalak. Hell I'm saying that wrong. Is that like Polish or something? Kramalag. Nigel shakes his head. Whatever, not important. What do you want with my work.

[Hattish Thing]

Armored Vehicle - Nigel:

Kramolagh continues to stare forward, his tone quite eerie. "Vhe b-believe your intellect vhould be of considerable use to our Occult Virology division. Currently, division r-resources are being directed towards vhat ve call "Project Sepulcher"."

"Due to zhe untimely death of zhe p-previous Director of Occult Virology, vhe are now in need of top researchers."

"Such as you."

[billtodamax]

Sepulcher... that was uh... He flips back through the file to the right page. Oh Jesus. None of these guys were your previous director right?

He keeps reading. Jeez you weren't kidding about occult huh. Undead. Not what I normally work with. The virus itself though... yeah I can probably do something with it. Have to look closer obviously. He sets the folder back down and sips his drink. What's the facilities like? The pay? The hours?

[Hattish Thing]

Armored Vehicle - Nigel:

Kramolagh remains silent as Nigel thumbs through the pages, leaving his line of questioning up in the air. After several seconds, he finally responds. "Mm, zat's enough f-for now. Get comfortable, we've a l-long drive ahead of us, Mr. Rutherford."

"I'd get some shuteye, if I v-vhere you."

[billtodamax]

Yeah yeah, I get it, mysterious research organisations never talk friggin' benefits. Nigel relaxes back in his seat, sipping his long island.

Looks like he's content to at least wait and see.

[Hattish Thing]

Wirholdt's Rictus:

After nearly an hour and a half of complete silence, the armored vehicle comes to a stop, many miles away from the city of Inside. Several men in dark suits evacuate the vehicle, sliding Executor Kramolagh's door open. The gray-coated man exits, breathing in the fresh air and standing tall as he gazes out into a dark sky scattered with stars.

One of the dark figures gestures for Nigel to get out.

--

The area outside appears to be little more than a seemingly inhospitable strip of land surrounded by rocky mountains which encircle an expansive plantation constructed in the shadow of the mountains. The plantation itself is a sprawling warren of structures, utterly isolated due to its incredible distance from the nearest civilization. In the distance, an elegant manorhouse sits atop one of the higher hills, looming ominously over the rolling rows of cultivated bushes, shrubs, and grasses below, its spikey architecture causing its silhouette to appear somewhat unnerving.

Kramolagh speaks, finally.

"Ah, take in zhe air vhile you c-can."

[billtodamax]

Nigel clambers out of the car, adjusting his jacket and his satchel after the long drive.

Air's air, whatever. I'm supposed to do my work on a farm? He instinctively pulls out his phone to check for a signal, realises that he still hasn't remembered to get himself a sim card, and tucks it back away, scowling.

Jeez this place is creepy. A creepy farm. Not exactly sanitary. He grumbles, mostly to himself as he strolls around a little, checking the place out.

[Hattish Thing]

Wirholdt's Rictus:

Kramolagh sighs contentedly as he takes in one final breath, appreciating the glow of moonlight upon his pale flesh. He begins to stride up the path leading to the looming manorhouse in the distance, his stiff boots grinding into the gravel. Crickets chirp noisily, mixing with the noise.

The atmosphere is positively unnerving.

"Vhalk with me," he all but whispered.

[billtodamax]

Huh? Oh, yeah, sure. Nigel says, jogging over to Kramolagh and following him up the path.

The manor then? It's uh... certainly something. He stretches out his arms as he walks.

[Hattish Thing]

Wirholdt's Rictus:

"Somezhing like zhat," mutters the man in the gray-coat, staring forward from beneath his starmetal spectacles. The long walk up towards the manorhouse offers a pleasant view of the surrounding plantation, including a trio of glittering glass greenhouses, several state-of-the-art processing facilities, and a number of residences. As the gathering strides towards the manor upon the hill, Nigel may notice something rather unsettling; the fact that numerous plantation workers appear to be standing out in the fields, staring towards the procession.

Finally, the manorhouse is reached. This single-story manor is crafted of thick wood and opulent marble, a rigid and unflinching bastion of civilization, far away from the cities of the Nexus. A ten-foot-tall wall, electric fence, highly secure gate, and perimeter of shrubs provide considerable privacy from the rest of the plantation.

--

Kramolagh reaches for a remote in his pocket, allowing a sensor to scan him before the gates begin to open as if by magic. A muscular woman clad in a dark suit ahead, nodding towards Kramolagh ominously before opening the manorhouse door. The inside of the structure appears far more comfortable than the outside, for a cold wind has started to blow.

"After you."

[billtodamax]

Yo. Nigel waves to the woman, before heading into the manor proper. He stuffs his hands into his pockets and glances around, trying to see if there's anything cool and sciencey inside.

This place is locked the hell down huh. Don't get any boy scouts selling cookies at this house. Nigel is pretty accustomed to having his ramblings ignored at this point so he's not really restraining himself.

[Hattish Thing]

Wirholdt's Rictus - The Manorhouse:

The large and imperial common room of this elegant, gothic manorhouse is exquisite, packed with all manner of strange knick-knacks and foreign articles stored within glass cases or mounted upon walls. Dark purple tapestries depicting eerie symbols lined with golden threads hang from the walls, while a thick carpet of a matching shade and consistency drapes across the fine wooden floor. Crowded bookshelves filled with a variety of bizarre titles line the walls of the chamber, which smells of dark wine and exotic herbs. Incense burns atop a large mahogany table, lined with glittering gilded accents of faded gold.

Portraits of severe looking individuals clad in noble's garb hang from the walls, each slightly crooked, while dozens of glass cases filled with a number of occult objects can be seen set against the wall. A tall fireplace depicting what appears to be the mouth of a gargoyle belching flames rests against the farthest wall, flanked by odd pillars carved with tentacle motifs, surrounding by expensive and luxurious couches and chairs. Many strange objects and curiosities flank the fireplace and stairs towards the south of the common room lead to a second floor. Dark curtains are pulled over each of the large windows within this room, yet flickering lamps outside bath the room in weak illumination, before shrouding the chamber in shadow once more.

Kramolagh navigates towards one of the bookshelves, glancing towards several titles.

"Zhis vhill b-be a moment."

[billtodamax]

Really committed to an aesthetic here. Nigel crashes down in one of the couches, surveying the room. This stuff has to be all like... custom made right? Like you got a stone mason in and told him to design the creepiest fireplace you could.

He reaches over to a nearby bookshelf and pulls a volume at random from it, flipping through it mindlessly.

[Hattish Thing]

Wirholdt's Rictus - The Manorhouse:

Nigel's comments are left ignored, for Kramolagh appears to be concentrating deeply. Wordlessly, he taps certain sections of a number of volumes, allowing his finger to rest against hidden scanners concealed within the books. In the meantime, Nigel reaches for a tome just out of the other man's view, opening the ominous book to a random page.

The book itself is titled, "The Mah-Thenge Codices", and appears to be an imperfect translation of a much stranger language.

--

Finally, Kramolagh steps away from the bookshelf, gently resting his arms behind his back as the entire wall begins to split apart, sliding to the side to reveal what appears to be a chamber dominated by a massive iron hatch. The gray-coated man taps at his phone, and a few seconds later, the hatch unlocks and opens with a soft, pneumatic hiss.

With an almost sinister expression upon his face, Kramolagh speaks.

"Proceed."

[billtodamax]

Nigel springs up off the couch, leaving the book behind on the cushion next to him.

Am I going to have to remember all of that? He frowns, realizing that he had not been paying enough attention to the door codes. Hey you aren't just waiting to get me to like... a brain harvesting room or something before you kill me right? That's a thick hatch, he's not certain he'd be able to burn through it. Nevertheless he walks inside.

[Hattish Thing]

Wirholdt's Rictus - The Manorhouse:

Within the enormous hatch, a metal ladder leads down fifteen feet onto a landing, the walls of the wide chasm harshly illuminated by rows of painfully bright lights. Upon closer inspection, the landing itself appears to be the roof of an elevator-like mechanism, one which appears to possess an intimidating glass floor.

The chasm appears to lead down over three-hundred feet, lit up by blinking white lights.

--

Kramolagh gestures towards the elevator.

"After y-you, Mr. Rutherford."

[billtodamax]

Is this how my yearly reviews are gonna go? I ask questions you ignore them? Nigel asks as he slides down the ladder, before heading into the elevator. He's very careful to stand on the edges of the glass floor, where hopefully it is better supported.

One vengeful ghost and this elevator is entirely useless. He grumbles to himself.

[Hattish Thing]

Wirholdt's Rictus - The Manorhouse:

Kramolagh enters soon after, quickly busying himself with a glowing panel built into one of the walls. Several of the grim figures in dark suits follow afterwards, pressing uncomfortably close towards Nigel in a way that will most likely remind him that he was in no position to struggle, not yet.

A few seconds later, the elevator begins to drop at an alarming rate.

--

After a sudden drop, the elevator stops, revealing a long, metal hall ahead. Wordlessly, Kramolagh and his security entourage step forward, leading Nigel through a tangled network of highly secure passages. Cameras watch blankly from the cieling, and laser turrets built into the wall glitter in the artificial lighting. A majority of the compact walls, ceilings, and floors of the facility appear to be composed of some strange, otherwordly metal that seems resistant to rust and other degradation. Rows of technomagical orbs embedded along the upper edges of the walls bathe the rooms and hallways in green-tinted light.

Most of the doors Kramolagh escorts Nigel through are composed of reinforced metals, allowing access to deeper areas of the facility by sliding into recesses in the walls after specialized keys and passcodes have been scanned or typed into glowing panels. Finally, Kramolagh leads Nigel to an expansive chamber equipped with specially treated blast doors made to withstand extraordinary punishment, both to keep outsiders from accessing the more questionable experiments within, and as a fail-safe to ensure that escaped experiments cannot evacuate the facility.

Several scanners bathe Nigel in unusual radiation before a green light built into the ceiling activates, and the doors ahead open.

--

Past the reinforced blast doors, an expansive greeting chamber is revealed, decorated with experiments too impractical for Conference Z's use, yet interesting enough to impress newly recruited researchers and sponsors. Objects include giant gears and tangles of strange circuitry pulled from enormous alien machines, mosaics made from colorful debris, and weird sculptures constructed from glittering starmetal. The walls and floor of the room are plated in thick metal, while harsh lighting glares from panels in the ceiling above.

An attractive looking woman in uniform stands behind a long desk crafted of white granite, tapping at several holographic screens.

Kramolagh speaks.

"Vhelcome, Mr. Rutherford, to Slumbersun."

[billtodamax]

Nigel keeps a careful eye out on the security systems and cameras as they progress through the facility. The scanners will pick up some sort of syringe gun in his satchel, as well as few things that look sorta like hand-crafted grenades and a spray bottle filled with something - a bit hard to tell what. They'll also see a wide array of surgical tools in his metallic left arm. Other than that he has medicine in various forms secreted all throughout his person - on his belt, in his satchel, in his pockets, everywhere.

Now this is a place. Pleasure to meet you, I'm Nigel. He moves forward to shake hands with the woman he presumes is the secretary.

This place OK? He won't tell me about the pay. He signals back over his shoulder with his head towards Kramolagh. Despite his irreverence he seems genuinely pleased with the facility.

[Hattish Thing]

Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area:

The unusually pale woman behind the counter smiles brightly, her perfect teeth glittering in the harsh light broadcast overhead. She shakes Nigel's hand carefully, with the air of one who's carried through these steps countless times. The handshake lingers for precisely the right amount of time before she steps away, nodding her head curtly.

She speaks, her voice cheery and kind despite the somewhat pained expression upon her face, visible only in the far-corners of her eyes.

"The pleasure is mine, I am Myranda. Your scheduled tour of the facility is to begin shortly, and will be initiated as soon as you have signed a few papers, which you will find here. Do not look so glum, sir! These documents are there to protect you."

"I am required to warn you that these documents are legally binding, and that your signature is mandatory should you wish to proceed."

"Thank you."

--

Her wide smile fades away as if by command.

In the meantime, Kramolagh glances towards Nigel, an inquisitive expression upon his face.

[billtodamax]

Hm. We'll talk more later I guess. Nigel pulls out the documents and starts studying them intensely. His eyebrows go up at the figure quoted.

Wish some of these consequences were a little better defined but I guess that's what you get with these sorts of organisations. Hands and feet inside the ride at all times, yada yada... He flips back through the first few pages to make sure there's nothing he missed, lingering for a bit on the pay.

Yeah this is all fine. He pulls the pen out of his coat pocket and scribbles a few signatures. Thanks Myranda. Shall we?

[Hattish Thing]

Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area:

The attractive looking Conference Operative smiles warmly once more, practically gliding across the white tile floor as she steps to the side. Once Nigel finishes signing each of the documents within the folder upon the nearby table, the secretary takes a few moments to insert each document into a specific slot nearby for later transference to the recordkeeping department.

Once she's finished, she nods towards Kramolagh before leading the small gathering down a long hall to left, through several thick looking doors.

"Please, follow me."

--

Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping:

Myranda continues for some time, before finally, the gathering approaches a sealed blast door. She smiles back towards Nigel before nodding curtly and proceeding to interact with a glowing panel. A moment later, the door opens wide, revealing an enormous chamber almost entirely dominated by inexplicable technology.

Several long metallic objects covered with flashing lights and strange glowing panels fight for floor space in this room with large, boxy, cabinet-like metal objects. Here and there on the walls, panels flash images of buildings, rooms, and scenery from throughout the Nexus. This highly secure chamber contains over a dozen fifteen-foot tall silos of strange machinery and glowing circuitboard panels, connected by thick cables and hundreds of wires to a massive supercomputer which dominates the southernmost wall.

Several technicians busy themselves within this room, locked into booth-like computation nooks.

After allowing Nigel several seconds to take the room in, Myranda speaks.

"Welcome to recordkeeping, almost all the research conducted here at Slumbersun is filed here. Due to the state-of-the-art data-encryption software designed by our Advanced Technologies Division, here at Conference Z, we fear no violation of organization privacy."

"In addition, within these powerful computational mechanisms before you, an artificial intelligence specifically designed for this task carries through with Project Chromatica, one of more successful mass surveillance projects to date."

"Any questions?"

[billtodamax]

Heya AI. Do you have access to the doors and cameras in the facility too? Nigel asks the computer. He's looking at all the screens throughout and looking thoroughly impressed. Jeez this is quite the invasion of privacy you've got going on here.

He drums his hands on his legs, trying to figure out anything else to ask. Seems fairly straightforward to him, if a little dystopian and creepy. He doesn't seem overly bothered though.

[Hattish Thing]

Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping:

Rather unsurprisingly, the artificial intelligence infused within the room does not respond to Nigel. Myranda, however, responds quickly, that same artificial smile upon her attractive face. "Of course! Every chamber within Slumbersun is under constant surveillance, save for private quarters and restrooms."

"Chances are if you name an individual, we can produce video feed of them."

"Now, come this way."

Slumbersun Research Facility - Employee Barracks:

After several minutes wandering through the many identical halls of Slumbersun, Myranda gestures towards a specific quarter of the facility. This large, utilitarian section of Slumbersun is split into dozens of relatively pleasant gray rooms which serve as places of residence for both Conference Z researchers assigned to Slumbersun and security personnel, many of which rarely see the light of day. Each room features rather comfortable bedding and hospitable furnishings, luxurious personal quarters, a powerful desktop computer, and an impressive library.

Myranda gestures towards a specific room after a few moments.

"This particular cell has been pre-selected for you based on your preferences."

[billtodamax]

Hm. Nigel, it seems, expected a response from the AI.

He follows through the compound quietly, intent on committing the layout to memory as much as possible.

Oh I get digs here huh? Is it a stay the week and head off on weekends sorta thing, or...? Nigel asks Myranda, picking through the books in the library to see how well they did.

[Hattish Thing]

Slumbersun Research Facility - Employee Barracks:

Myranda nods cheerfully. "Your schedule will depend entirely upon the contract formulated by Executor Kramolagh, should you be accepted. A vast majority of our employees remain at Slumbersun indefinitely."

"Shall we proceed?"

[billtodamax]

Nigel returns the books, nodding. Yeah let's. Must be time for the fun stuff right? He flashes a grin at Myranda.

Dunno how I feel about the indefinite stuff but we can argue about that later. No idea how anyone works here every day of the week. Atmosphere alone would put me off. He heads to the door and motions down the corridor. Lead on.

[Hattish Thing]

Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory:

Myranda nods, leading Nigel through the longest hall yet, complete with extraordinarily thick blast doors twice the size of any encountered so far. Kramolagh himself steps forward, accessing the panel. The doors open slowly, causing the floor itself to grind and quake as it opens wide, revealing an expansive laboratory floor, complete with a number of scurrying assistants and exhausted researchers. The room itself contains several unknown creatures from other realities kept preserved in fluid as well as several logbooks that describe sundry bizarre fauna, pieces of creatures, chemicals, and other supplies brought into the facility. Fluid-filled canisters attached to the walls contain a range of small creatures floating in stasis. Ominous operating tables line the southernmost wall, and several computers can be seen.

Several rows of sensors as well as a conveyor-like machine dominate the southern wall of the chamber. Kramolagh speaks here, while Myranda remains silent. "Zhis is zhe "Receiving Laboratory", vhere all of our more interesting specimens and materials are d-decontaminated, providing a team of r-researchers a chance to vet any arrivals to ensure zhat zhey’re fit and won’t infect zhe other experiments."

"A functional recieving f-floor is imperative."

[billtodamax]

You guys have like a script to make sure you don't start talking over each other right? Nigel says, bee-lining straight for the log books. If they let him he's going to flip through them, paying close attention to the chemical shipments to see what sort of quantities they're getting in.

So how come you get everything in on this floor instead of up at the manor or somewhere on the plantation? There a service elevator somewhere or something? He asks as he reads.

[Artemis97]

A phone call comes in on Kramolagh's professional line, originating from Sornnolu Xar'Cha in Delmah Phor.

[Hattish Thing]

Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory:

Kramolagh chuckles to himself while Myranda continues to smile widely, her pained eyes once more betraying her otherwise cheerful expression. "Somzhing like zhat, aheh." He lets out a sigh as Nigel begins to thumb through the log book, causing a disgruntled researcher to glare.

"From its inception, Conference Z has been clandestine, intended to free p-participants from zhe shackles of convention and taboo."

"Vhould be too overt above ground."

--

Earlier - Kramolagh's Quarters:

The executor responds after several seconds, his tone quiet but intense.

"Xar'Cha, I presume?"

[Artemis97]

[Earlier - Kramolagh's Quarters]

"One of the many." Sornnolu says dryly. "It's Sornnolu. I was wondering when we might be able to meet to show me that device you mentioned?"

[billtodamax]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory]

Must just be a pain in the behind getting all this stuff down here. Nigel tosses the folder down on top of a crate that is almost certainly not where it belongs, catching Myranda's expression. A couple of blue lights flicker on in his left eye as his implant boots up. It scans Myranda, looking for any sign of implant or chemical interference - as well as searching for any internal or external damages and taking note of them as a side effect.

Anyway, should we move on? He asks her as the scan takes place.

[Hattish Thing]

Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory:

Kramolagh shrugs, gesturing towards rows of blinking lights arranged in large corners towards the eastern section of the expansive chamber. "Zhe teleportation devices m-make zhe transference of experiments and cargo razher easy, a few are too sensitive to be transported in such a vhay, but zhose are few and far in between."

He nods towards Myranda at this point, who smiles widely before continuing.

Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics:

Eventually, the gathering finds themselves atop a large catwalk which spans across a metallic central chamber. Below, a wealth of metallic workbenches for the crafting, repair, and dismantling of technological objects, overseen by several automated claws can be seen. Several partially dismantled mechanical creatures—some that resemble humanoids, others more like insects, hang suspended from the ceiling by powerful cables. Dozens of powerful computers line the walls here, and assistants scurry about within the area despite the fact that is is nearly midnight.

The head of a massive humanoid automaton over one-hundred and twenty feet tall hangs over a deep extradimensional pit which dominates the northern section of the walls, not fully attached to the rest of the chassis partially stored within the area. It appears inactive, but sparks continuously due to the small army of repair drones crawling across its many thick starmetal panels.

After a moment, Myranda speaks. "This industrial laboratory serves both as a chamber dedicated to technological experimentation as well as a fully functional starmetal foundry and contains one of the largest automatons ever created by Conference Z."

"In addition, it serves as the primary laboratory most often utilized by our Advanced Technologies Division."

--

Earlier - Kramolagh's Quarters:

Executor Kramolagh taps at a keyboard from the other side of the phone before responding. "I've an opening at a-around 3:00 AM tonight, as well as at 6:00 AM tomorrow m-morning."

[billtodamax]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

Yeah ok, sweet, robotics lab. Nigel clearly doesn't care about what's in here - until a thought strikes him.

Hey, you ever build a shell for the AI in here? He asks Kramolagh.

[Hattish Thing]

Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics:

Kramolagh takes over from here, glancing towards the enormous automaton head suspended from the cieling, its many cables dangling below. "Of course. In fact, y-you are looking at one right now, Mr. Rutherford. Vhery much a vhork in p-progress, but... vhe have many plans for zhe future."

"Vhy ask?"

[billtodamax]

I sorta meant a smaller one than that monstrosity. Could be a helpful assistant to have around the labs you know? Nigel shrugs.

Does the AI like... talk, at all? It kinda stonewalled me earlier. He adds, turning back around to face Kramolagh.

[Hattish Thing]

Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics:

Kramolagh shrugs, glancing on as a number of assistants busy themselves by attempting to weld together two particularly stubborn sheets of starmetal. "Vhe have been looking f-for anozher technologically-oriented individual t-to replace zhe head of zhe Advanced Technologies Division for some time."

"For now, vhe simply don't have zhe r-resources to send zhis vhay, n-not vhile vhork vith zhe automaton continues."

--

He clears his throat before continuing. "Perhaps she simply d-did not like you."

[billtodamax]

Aw. That hurts AI. Nigel says, and it looks like he's genuinely offended. He's always gotten on well with AI in the past.

Well, I'm not the guy you want running this lab. I might bully the guys working here for tools though. Nigel says, ready to move on.

[Artemis97]

[Earlier - Kramolagh's Quarters]

Sornnolu pauses, thinking. There's a shuffling of papers from his end of the line. "3:00 AM would do. May I bring a guest?"

[Hattish Thing]

Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome::

Kramolagh sighs before merely gesturing for the secretary to continue her tour of the facility. She smiles warmly before gesturing towards another hall. After several minutes, the small procession approaches one of the largest rooms within the entire structure, one which appears to have once been a natural cavern. The tall ceiling of this enormous cavern rises twenty feet above the catwalk that the small gathering stands upon, thirty feet above the chamber below. The expansive, mist-filled glass chamber itself appears to contain a warm, otherwordly jungle.

Blue-hued light emanates from the domed ceiling at the center of the two-story, artificial environment below while broad metal grates make a perimeter about the room about ten feet above the lush habitat below. Paths cross between strange shrubs and low trees, and vines cling to the walls and dangle in clumps across parts of the ceiling. At the center of the room stands a small metal pavilion, a small elevator that the researchers use to introduce live prey into the room and feed the strange beasts.

Behind the thick glass in the southern corners of the room lie small laboratories filled with bookshelves, dissection tables, and workbenches.

"Welcome," exclaims Myranda "to the Observation Dome."

--

[Earlier - Kramolagh's Quarters]

Kramolagh frowns, speaking softly. "Can they be trusted?"

[Artemis97]

[Earlier - Kamolagh's Quarters]

"Absolutely." Sornnolu assures him. "It's my sister, Lady Erelae. She's the Matron's right hand."

[Hattish Thing]

[Earlier - Kamolagh's Quarters]

Kramolagh remains silent for several seconds before nodding, responding through the phone. "Fine. See y-you zhen."

--

[Another Time - Armored Vehicle]

After leaving the small coffeeshop, Kramolagh opens one of the large doors of his sleek black armored vehicle, gesturing for Feia to proceed within. The vehicle itself is quite expansive and relatively luxurious, with comfortable seats crafted of fine white leather. The entire vehicle is extraordinarily bright, illuminated by several long panels giving off a harsh, white light that causes the entire vehicle to appear somewhat sterile.

He speaks, smiling somewhat.

"After you..."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Armored Vehicle]

At some point, as they are getting ready to walk out and Kramolagh expresses an interest in ditching his phone, Feia directs him to toss it in the air.
It is promptly disintegrated, in a pulse of purple light.

Afterwards, at the vehicle, the witch inclines her head and enters the vehicle.
"Rather extravagant vehicle."

[Hattish Thing]

[Armored Vehicle]

The gray-coated man slides into the vehicle with an almost supernatural sort of grace, wrapping his spidery gloved hands about the handle of the door before shutting it gently. The vehicle itself is quite cold, yet Kramolagh seems entirely comfortable within the confines of the eerily bright area.

After properly situating himself, he glances towards Feia.

"I enjoy zhe finer zhings in life. Besides, zhe nature of my position means zhat I s-spend a significant amount of time on zhe road, a lesser vehicle vhould m-make such vhork far more exhausting. Try as I might to s-sophisticate myself, I grow bored of tedium razher easily."

"You may vish to get comfortable, it is a l-long journey."

[billtodamax]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

Now this place is cool! Very Jurassic Park. Nigel says, peering over the edge of the catwalk. This is what all those waivers were for huh? Do you use any of these plants for anything or is it all just habitat?

He pulls back from the edge, and nods appreciatively. This is a place man. Surely people like eat lunch in here right. This is like the perfect place to sit and watch whatever monsters you have down there fight it out.

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

At around 2:30 in the morning at a prearranged coordinates, there's a light popping sound and two people appear. One is Sornnolu Xar'Cha, dressed in his usual robes and finery, carrying a silverwooded staff. With him is his sister Erelae, dressed in a black vaguely military outfit, her long silvery hair done up in a braided bun, secured by a pair of sword-shaped pins.

The pair look around, to see where they are and who might greet them.

[Hattish Thing]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

Kramolagh glances down towards the misty dome with a somewhat wary expression upon his face, responding swiftly. "Vhe make use of every available r-resource. However, zhe current occupants of zhe Observation Dome make zhe process of extracting plant-matter somevhat challenging."

"As such, smaller gardens are t-tended to elsevhere. In fact, zhe crop above ground... most of it is crossbred."

--

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

The area specified by coordinates mentioned elsewhere appears to be little more than a seemingly inhospitable strip of land surrounded by rocky mountains which encircle an expansive plantation constructed in the shadow of the mountains. The plantation itself is a sprawling warren of structures, utterly isolated due to its incredible distance from the nearest civilization. In the distance, an elegant manorhouse sits atop one of the higher hills, looming ominously over the rolling rows of cultivated bushes, shrubs, and grasses below, its spikey architecture causing its silhouette to appear somewhat unnerving.

Kramolagh, alongside several individuals in dark suits, stands before the pair of drow. He appears to be taking in the stars, his gaze elsewhere.

"Beautiful night, is it n-not?"

--

[Armored Vehicle - Amity]

The gray-coated man allows himself a wry grin here, exposing a few unusually sharp teeth. He licks his lips for half a second before leaning back into his chair, continuing to tap his fingers against one another. After several seconds, he presses a button built into his side of the vehicle, retrieving a glass of sparkling water from within a secret compartment.

Once he finishes taking a sip, he chuckles darkly to himself.

"Ah, I knew I vhould like you."

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

"It is that." Sornnolu agrees, stepping forward. "Mr. Kamolagh, please allow me to introduce my sister, Lady Erelae Xar'Cha. Erelae, this is Cauvin Kramolagh."

"It's nice to meet you." Erelae says to him.

[Halae]

[Armored Vehicle - Amity]

Amity crosses her legs, looking at the man, "So, what, exactly, is it that you want me to work on here?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh nods politely towards Eralae, adjusting his unusual onyx spectacles. The man sighs contentedly as he takes in one final breath, appreciating the glow of moonlight upon his pale flesh. He begins to stride up a small, abandoned-looking path leading to the south, away from the elegant manorhouse, his stiff boots grinding into the gravel. Crickets chirp noisily, mixing with the noise.

The atmosphere is positively unnerving.

"Vhalk with me," he all but whispers.

--

[Armored Vehicle - Amity]

The gray-coated man frowns at this point, retrieving a thick folder from within his coat. He presses another button within the vehicle, which causes a tray to unfold before Amity. Slowly, he sets the folder down upon the tray before calmly nudging it to Amity, his expression quite serious.

Within the folder, several documents can be found, each of which contains information on Conference Z.

"I am Executor Kramolagh. You are here b-because vhe see considerable potential in you."

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Erelae follows, her steps light on the gravel. For others, the empty night would be unnerving, but for a drow, it may as well have been midday. Sornnolu comes a few steps behind, his staff clicking on the rocks as he walks.

[billtodamax]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

Might need a garden for myself down here, we'll see how we go. Nigel says, peering slightly over the edge again. So cool.

He turns back to Myranda and Kramolagh. Alrighty, where next? Got all the time in the world to check this place out later right?

[Halae]

[Armored Vehicle - Amity]

Amity will take the folder in hand, skimming over it quickly. Anybody monitoring Tank may note increased awareness, and a bit of movement as the woman begins to read through it, skimming mostly but delaying on a few primary points. Eventually, she puts it back down and slides the tray back over to Kramolagh, "You're looking to add me to your Advanced Technologies or Enhanced Cryptozoology divisions, then. Which is it? What would be expected of me?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

"Bit of a w-walk," mutters the man in the gray-coat, staring forward from beneath his starmetal spectacles. The long walk out into the arid landscape offers a pleasant view of the surrounding plantation, including a trio of glittering glass greenhouses, several state-of-the-art processing facilities, and a number of residences.

After about twenty minutes, Kramolagh stops in his tracks, seemingly out in the middle of nowhere.

"Vhe are here."

--

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Chemical Labs]

Kramolagh shrugs before proceeding forward. "Up to zhe d-director, most of zhese laboratories remain c-closed to non-division members." The small entourage continues through the winding metal halls of Slumbersun, stopping at numerous points to glance towards countless laboratories and subdivisions, most of which are merely glossed over. Eventually, however, Myranda leads the group forward through several blast doors which resemble enormous hatches, revealing a bizzarre laboratory filled with tangles of tubes full of sickly green fluid, thick cords, and thousands of wires bolted safely to the metallic walls.

Black, acrid smoke churns from dial-covered technochemical devices which buzz and bellow, and a thick green liquid bubbles violently within tall glass cylinders that feed a central device resembling a giant metallic coffin. After several seconds, a particularly ominous-looking woman in a white lab coat steps forward, glancing towards Kramolagh.

At this point, Kramolagh speaks. "Vhelcome to Occult Virology. Zhis is Director Orvhelle."

--

[Armored Vehicle - Amity]

In response, Kramolagh slides the folder back into its secret compartment. He clears his throat before taking another sip at his glass of sparkling water, tapping at his watch soon after in order to remotely lower the temperature within the vehicle. As a result, the vehicle becomes somewhat glacial, though the gray-coated man remains comfortable.

Finally, he speaks.

"Vhe b-believe your intellect vhould be of considerable use to our Advanced Technologies division. Currently, division r-resources are being directed towards vhat ve call "Project Chromagha"."

"Due to zhe untimely death of zhe p-previous Director of Advanced Technologies, vhe are now in need of top researchers."

"Such as you."[/B][/B]

[Halae]

[Armored Vehicle - Amity]

"What's the project?" Amity asks. As the air conditioning kicks in to make the place chilly, she pulls her duster closer around her, but doesn't complain. She's from a place where exposure to the elements is common. Despite her intellect, she's no wimpy pencil-neck.

[billtodamax]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Chemical Labs]

Pleasure to meet you, I'm Nigel Rutherford. He says, introducing himself to the Director and attempting to shake her hand. I'm not so hot at the occult stuff, still finding my feet there, but virology I should be able to help with. He smiles warmly.

Hell of a set up you've got here. Do I get my own set up somewhere here or is it more a communal thing? He rubs his hand together as he looks around. Hell of a set up.

[Hattish Thing]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Chemical Labs]

The female doctor cringes somewhat, smiling coldly. The facial movement appears painful for the woman, and numerous cracks open in her flesh as she does so, only to quickly seal. She offers her hand to shake, each unsettlingly long digit twitching seemingly of its own volition.

She speaks swiftly. "I know who you are."

--

At that point, Kramolagh enters the conversation. "Communal, as are all d-division laboratories."

--

[Armored Vehicle - Amity]

Kramolagh remains silent as Amity speaks, leaving her line of questioning up in the air. After several seconds, he finally responds. "Mm, zat's enough f-for now. Get comfortable, we've a l-long drive ahead of us, Ms. Amity."

"I'd get some shuteye, if I v-vhere you."

[Halae]

[Armored Vehicle - Amity]

Amity stares at Kramolagh for a long moment, before she breathes out and nods. she pulls her duster close over her body, puts her bandana up over her eyes, and gets comfortable enough to sleep inside the warmth of her duster, waiting for the ride to end. Anybody watching Tank will notice that this is when he chooses to go to sleep as well.

[billtodamax]

Swell, swell. Sorry, only got your last name, it was Orville? Nigel asks the director. His smile is a little less robust after seeing her face crack apart like that. He certainly doesn't hold the handshake for any longer than would be polite.

He starts walking around the coffin, inspecting it. So this is, what, distilling these liquids here? Or is it cultivating samples? Seems a little large for either of those really... He holds his chin in his hand as he looks. Is it the magic stuff? Does that need the extra space?

[Hattish Thing]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Chemical Labs]

The woman squints towards Nigel, an expression of clear disapproval evident upon her synthetic face. "Orvhelle, Director Orvhelle."

She glances to the massive machine, clasping her hands together.

"It is a miracle of science, Mr. Rutherford. This machine does what more than thirty chemists could in the same amount of time, hybridizing, distilling, and purifying."

--

[Amity - Wirholdt's Rictus]

After nearly an hour and a half of complete silence, the armored vehicle comes to a stop, many miles away from the city of Inside. Several men in dark suits evacuate the vehicle, sliding Executor Kramolagh's door open. The gray-coated man exits, breathing in the fresh air and standing tall as he gazes out into a dark sky scattered with stars.

One of the dark figures gestures for Amity to get out.

--

The area outside appears to be little more than a seemingly inhospitable strip of land surrounded by rocky mountains which encircle an expansive plantation constructed in the shadow of the mountains. The plantation itself is a sprawling warren of structures, utterly isolated due to its incredible distance from the nearest civilization. In the distance, an elegant manorhouse sits atop one of the higher hills, looming ominously over the rolling rows of cultivated bushes, shrubs, and grasses below, its spikey architecture causing its silhouette to appear somewhat unnerving.

Kramolagh speaks, finally.

"Vhe are here."

[billtodamax]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Chemical Labs]

No... first name? Nigel rolls his eyes from the other side of the coffin.

I'll have to look into fiddling with it when we've done all the contract negotiations later then. Do you have cultures of the virus itself on hand? I assume it's in a separate lab? Nigel asks her, poking his head around the coffin.

[Halae]

[Amity - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Amity, who got no sleep at all in spite of her attempt, slides her bandanna down to sit around her neck again, and when bid steps out of the car. As a precaution, she has her hand on one of her revolvers - not drawn, but at the ready should the location be hostile. She doesn't draw it when she sees the location, instead opting to take her hand out of her duster. She'll also wait for Tank to be released from his transport, before moving up to join Kramolagh.

"So it would seem," she says, reaching up to scratch Tank's lower jaw, a spot he loves, "Manor house on the hill. Bunker underneath, I'm guessing. Seems like a fairly classic setup."

Both the scavenger and her deathclaw watch the figures around them. Amity's eyes may not be great for darkness - as is the case with most humans - but Tank's are incredibly sharp here in the dark, and he's looking at the dark figures around them warily. Neither of them knows this place, and until they've established familiarity, they'll be having a superpredator glaring at them.

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Erelae and Sornnolu stop and look around. It was a pleasant night and they didn't mind the walk, but this patch of scrubland seemed about the same as the rest of it. Unless there was a hidden door, elves have a way of sensing such things.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Armored Vehicle]

The gray-coated man slides into the vehicle with an almost supernatural sort of grace, wrapping his spidery gloved hands about the handle of the door before shutting it gently. The vehicle itself is quite cold, yet Kramolagh seems entirely comfortable within the confines of the eerily bright area.

After properly situating himself, he glances towards Feia.

"I enjoy zhe finer zhings in life. Besides, zhe nature of my position means zhat I s-spend a significant amount of time on zhe road, a lesser vehicle vhould m-make such vhork far more exhausting. Try as I might to s-sophisticate myself, I grow bored of tedium razher easily."

"You may vish to get comfortable, it is a l-long journey."

The formal shirt and skirt combination Feia wears doesn't really lend itself towards cold temperatures, but it doesn't seem to bother her much.
Mild temperature differences are a rather petty thing to get rumpled over, at this point in life.

She simply settles into whatever seating location is most immediately convenient and crosses her legs at the knee. Comfortable enough.
"When one has the means, I suppose there is no fault in enjoying whatever comforts may be found. I'm not critiquing, merely noting."
Also makes a better impression than driving around in a rusty, horse-drawn wagon or something, too.

"Will the drive be long?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

Kramolagh glances towards Feia intently, fingertips placed against one another in a sign of confidence. His expression remains unusually warm for the man, the bright light bathing his deep cheeks in shadow due to the harsh angles of his face, reflecting off of his large, onyx spectacles. After several seconds, he presses a button built into his side of the vehicle, retrieving a glass of sparkling water from within a secret compartment.

He takes a sip, sighing contentedly.

"Quite a vhays, I'm afraid."

"Ah, but I am curious of you. Tell me of y-yourself?"

--

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Chemical Labs]

The woman grimaces towards Nigel before gesturing wordlessly towards several chambers down the side. At this point, Kramolagh steps forward, clasping his hands together. He speaks, his voice reverberating within the expansive primary chemical laboratory. "Anyvhay, I'm afraid I've a razher extensive s-schedule to follow."

"If you vhould follow me, Mr. Rutherford..."

"Vhe can discuss your contract."

--

[Amity - Wirholdt's Rictus]

"Somezhing like zhat," mutters the man in the gray-coat, staring forward from beneath his starmetal spectacles. The long walk up towards the manorhouse offers a pleasant view of the surrounding plantation, including a trio of glittering glass greenhouses, several state-of-the-art processing facilities, and a number of residences. As the gathering strides towards the manor upon the hill, Tank may notice something rather unsettling; the fact that numerous plantation workers appear to be standing out in the fields, staring towards the procession.

Finally, the manorhouse is reached. This single-story manor is crafted of thick wood and opulent marble, a rigid and unflinching bastion of civilization, far away from the cities of the Nexus. A ten-foot-tall wall, electric fence, highly secure gate, and perimeter of shrubs provide considerable privacy from the rest of the plantation.

--

Kramolagh reaches for a remote in his pocket, allowing a sensor to scan him before the gates begin to open as if by magic. A muscular woman clad in a dark suit ahead, nodding towards Kramolagh ominously before opening the manorhouse door. The inside of the structure appears far more comfortable than the outside, for a cold wind has started to blow.

"After you."

--

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

The gray-coated man reaches for a small device held within a coat pocket, softly tapping at several buttons built into the small, technological apparatus. Moments later, the sand itself begins to quake, the ground shaking and shuddering as an enormous metal sheet hidden below the ground slides away.

Below, a metallic ladder leading onto a platform connected to a long set of stairs can be seen.

"Right zhis vhay, and f-follow me."

[Halae]

[Amity - Wirholdt's Rictus]

The scavenger lets herself grimace before heading inside. More cold. Tank remains close to her, following her pace and guarding her flank, just in case. He can take gunshots where she can't, after all.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

It's always "long" when you don't just teleport to wherever you're going.
But just like she periodically enjoys a good fly, perhaps Kramolagh enjoys his driving despite its inefficiency on time.

"Oh, myself...hm, I already mentioned the scholar aspect, which is what I would deem most important. I scour reality for its secrets and exercise this knowledge appropriately."
Feia would just tell people she's a magical Indiana Jones, if she could.

"Others would tell you that I am a witch of the darkest sort. A threat to peace and life everywhere."
This particular description is more fun though, as evidenced by the smug grin as she looks off towards a window.

[billtodamax]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Chemical Labs]
.
Sure, sure sure. Nigel says, patting the coffin on the side and wrapping up his inspection. Let's talk.

He'll happily follow Kramolagh to negotiating room.

[Hattish Thing]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

Kramolagh listens intently, clearly interested in learning more. Noticing her alluring grin, the gray-coated man chuckles darkly. He responds swiftly, "Ah, a vhoman after my own heart. As I t-thought. I am more intrigued, however, by zhis apparent reputation of yours..."

"Rightfully earned, I presume?"

--

[Amity - The Manorhouse]

The large and imperial common room of this elegant, gothic manorhouse is exquisite, packed with all manner of strange knick-knacks and foreign articles stored within glass cases or mounted upon walls. Dark purple tapestries depicting eerie symbols lined with golden threads hang from the walls, while a thick carpet of a matching shade and consistency drapes across the fine wooden floor. Crowded bookshelves filled with a variety of bizarre titles line the walls of the chamber, which smells of dark wine and exotic herbs. Incense burns atop a large mahogany table, lined with glittering gilded accents of faded gold.

Portraits of severe looking individuals clad in noble's garb hang from the walls, each slightly crooked, while dozens of glass cases filled with a number of occult objects can be seen set against the wall. A tall fireplace depicting what appears to be the mouth of a gargoyle belching flames rests against the farthest wall, flanked by odd pillars carved with tentacle motifs, surrounding by expensive and luxurious couches and chairs. Many strange objects and curiosities flank the fireplace and stairs towards the south of the common room lead to a second floor. Dark curtains are pulled over each of the large windows within this room, yet flickering lamps outside bath the room in weak illumination, before shrouding the chamber in shadow once more.

Kramolagh navigates towards one of the bookshelves, glancing towards several titles.

"Zhis vhill b-be a moment."

--

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Meeting Room]

Kramolagh nods curtly before merely gesturing for the secretary to lead the way. She smiles warmly before gesturing towards an exit. After several minutes, the small procession approaches one of the nicer areas of the facility, clearly designed to impress.

This large egg-shaped chamber has smooth, seamless walls of silvery metal. Light gleams from numerous freely suspended orbs that slowly circle the top of the high, curved ceiling. In the center of the room stands a strange triangular-shaped metal table surrounded by a dozen chairs. Along the edges of the chamber trail several additional rows of chairs, all facing the center table. One of the walls within this room is fashioned entirely of sparkling glass, dominated by an enormous computer screen.

He sits down, gesturing for Nigel. The screen itself blares to life soon after, revealing what appears to be several faceless men in suits.

"Please, sit. Zhese are our lawyers."

[billtodamax]

Nigel relaxes into a chair, kicking his feet up onto another one. So do I get one of you guys on my side or what? Nigel you have to take this seriously this is a contract negotiation.

Alright hit me, what are the expectations, what's the leave like, superannuation, everything. That's better!

[Chaotic Bob]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

"Rightfully earned..."
One hand reaches up to the side of her face, a couple fingers lightly tracing the thick scar running up her cheek.

"Depending on your perspective, I suppose I have. More than a few have decided it to be so."
The long line of corpses, experiments gone wrong, and kingdoms lost are perhaps better evidence for her reputation.
It's also not the usual sort of casual conversation material that keeps things simple.

[Hattish Thing]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Meeting Room]

The only occupant within the meeting room to find Nigel's comment amusing would, unfortunately, prove to be none other than Nigel himself. Over the next hour or so, the man's contract is formulated by Kramolagh and the small team of artificial lawyers built into the room.

--

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

With a careful glance, Kramolagh notices her tracing of the small scar running down her cheek, a curious gesture which if anything intrigues him further. Deciding that pursuing such a line of questioning would likely result in a rather uncomfortable conversation, the gray-coated man instead presses a button at the side of his chair.

As if on command, a previously unoccupied section of the vehicle transforms into a luxurious miniature bar, previously hidden.

"Do you d-drink, madame?"

[Halae]

[Amity - The Manorhouse]

Amity walks along behind the man. Something feels... wrong here. She keeps a hand on her revolver, inside her pocket next to the unfinished meatball sub. Tank stands protectively over her as well, slowly scanning the room, like the predator he is looking for a weak spot.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

She would have answered, if asked.
That being said, Feia doesn't really mind the topic change either.

Lowering her hand, the mini-bar is given a once-over look.
"I wouldn't say no to a drink, if you're offering."

[Hattish Thing]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

Although the gray-coated man generally limits himself when it comes to the consumption of alcohol, the last few days have resulted in less rest than is usual for the man. As such, he promptly mixes himself a rather strong drink, certainly unusual for the man whose tastes are traditionally much softer.

Grinning towards Feia, he speaks.

"How do you take it?"

--

[Amity - The Manorhouse]

Kramolagh appears to be concentrating deeply, allowing the woman's "creature" enough time to glance about the room, noticing a number of unsettling details. Meanwhile, the gray-coated man wordlessly taps certain sections of a number of volumes, allowing his finger to rest against hidden scanners concealed within the books.

Finally, Kramolagh steps away from the bookshelf, gently resting his arms behind his back as the entire wall begins to split apart, sliding to the side to reveal what appears to be a chamber dominated by a massive iron hatch. The gray-coated man taps at his phone, and a few seconds later, the hatch unlocks and opens with a soft, pneumatic hiss.

With an almost sinister expression upon his face, Kramolagh speaks.

"Proceed."

[Halae]

[Amity - The Manorhouse]

"Hmmmmm," Amity says, "Never gone down into a bunker like this with an invitation before. Always had to bypass security in the past. Feels wrong."

Still, the curvy scavenger descends further into the building, her deathclaw close at hand, alert for problems as he plays the dutiful bodyguard.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

"At risk of sounding boring, I'll take it as you take it."
It'll keep them on a socially even plane and keep her away from falling into a rut of preference.
Given choice, she'll take the same thing every single time and where's the fun in that?

However, rather than waiting for him to make her a drink, Feia makes a swirling gesture with one hand. It is vaguely like she is wafting a scent towards herself.
At some point in the process, wisps of purple converge between her fingers and condense into perfect replica of Kramolagh's drink.

Magic is a wonderful thing to flagrantly abuse.
"Speaking of which, I believe some turnabout is in order. Return the favor, details of yourself?"

[billtodamax]

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Meeting Room]

The only occupant within the meeting room to find Nigel's comment amusing would, unfortunately, prove to be none other than Nigel himself. Over the next hour or so, the man's contract is formulated by Kramolagh and the small team of artificial lawyers built into the room.

Yeah yeah, this all seems fine, you'll disappear me if I'm naughty, clone me if I'm good, good to know... He flips through the contract, yawning. Contract negotiations take a long time! Beneficiary... uh... he frowns, pausing. Just uh, just give it to a charity or something. We can change that later right? If I find anyone I like here?

Assuming that's all copacetic, Nigel will sign on - and then head off to his quarters for a well deserved nap.

[Hattish Thing]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

Kramolagh offers a sly grin towards Feia as she manifests a magical version of his own drink. Noting her seeming reliance upon her own magics, Kramolagh simply raises a brow before retrieving a final piece, a single colorful miniature umbrella from within the depths of the secret compartment.

He laughs, an unusual sound coming from the otherwise serious man. "No umbrella, zhen?"

"Ha, a little joke. As for myself, hmm... I'm afraid I've never been g-good at talking about myself."

"Likely a s-side-effect of my vhork, eh?"

--

[Amity - The Manorhouse]

The gray-coated man eyes the curvaceous wastelander from behind, watching with a calculated expression upon his face as she steps forward, getting a better look at the area ahead. Within the enormous hatch, a metal ladder leads down fifteen feet onto a landing, the walls of the wide chasm harshly illuminated by rows of painfully bright lights. Upon closer inspection, the landing itself appears to be the roof of an elevator-like mechanism, one which appears to possess an intimidating glass floor.

The chasm appears to lead down over three-hundred feet, lit up by blinking white lights.

--

Kramolagh gestures towards the elevator.

"Zhe ladder, Ms. Amity."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Armored Vehicle]

"I have no idea what you're talking about."
Feia takes draw of her glass and as she pulls it away from her lips, a little ice figurine of an umbrella has formed.
Magic. Flagrant abuse. The best.

"Oh, you don't have to give me a novel. The same terms as your divine vats: general summary."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Armored Vehicle]

Kramolagh notices the figurine and grins, almost mischievously. "Mm, I knew I vhould like you. I really razher do, aha."

"Vhell, to keep it short... I am somezhing here from s-somevhere else, zhey call it Erde."

"I must say, I prefer life here. So much... more interesting."

--

[Magtok - Wirholdt's Rictus]

After nearly an hour and a half more of complete silence, the armored vehicle comes to a stop, many miles away from the city of Inside. Several men in dark suits evacuate the vehicle, sliding Executor Kramolagh's door open. The gray-coated man exits, breathing in the fresh air and standing tall as he gazes out into a dark sky scattered with stars.

One of the dark figures gestures for Magtok to get out.

--

The area outside appears to be little more than a seemingly inhospitable strip of land surrounded by rocky mountains which encircle an expansive plantation constructed in the shadow of the mountains. The plantation itself is a sprawling warren of structures, utterly isolated due to its incredible distance from the nearest civilization. In the distance, an elegant manorhouse sits atop one of the higher hills, looming ominously over the rolling rows of cultivated bushes, shrubs, and grasses below, its spikey architecture causing its silhouette to appear somewhat unnerving.

Kramolagh speaks, finally.

"Vhe are here."

[Halae]

[Amity - The Manorhouse]

Amity looks down the chasm, and steps onto the elevator. she shares a look with Tank, and the big lizard bobs his head. It's unclear what the message between them was, but it clearly sets Amity more at ease.

[bc56]

Watching - High above.

A spaceship in orbit watches as the latest group of armored cars arrives. "Who are you people, that you need an EMP to hide a creepy old mansion? Is it really just that? Computer, scan using all possible measures."
"Scanning. Unusual life-forms detected in farm fields, mass distribution consistent with humanoids, but heat levels far below tolerance " Ellrin sighs. "Put the scan results on my screen for heat signatures. Display heat gradient map." The blue alien reads the map. "Computer, run sensor diagnostic. We're not picking up planetary geothermal activity in the site."
"Running diagnostic. Sensors operating normally." Ellrin slams his fist on the console. "Scan the location five miles south of that farm. Report whether planetary geothermal activity is present."
"Scanning. Planetary geothermal activity detected within normal parameters."
"Give me a wide scan, 2.5 mile radius, centered on the farm. Scan for planetary geothermal activity. Display results on my screen as a map." There's a pause. "Interesting. There's something hiding the geothermal activity there. Why would that be? Aha! There must be something impervious to sensors down there. Something which casts a large shadow. Lock Long Gun onto coordinates half a mile south of the farm, 100 meters above the ground, and prepare to fire at an angle of 45 degrees to the horizontal upward and northward on my mark. Ellrin continues. "Let's knock on the door and see who answers." Mark!"

Wirholdt's Rictus

A blazing beam of plasma erupts from just south of the manor and rockets upward and over the manor house, illuminating the sky and leaving a trail of white-hot smoke in its wake. Seconds later, a metal object drops from the sky. It begins to burn up in atmosphere, then deploys a parachute, falling gently to the ground if not disturbed, and landing neatly at the site from which the blast originated, a 2-foot diameter metal sphere.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - Wirholdt's Rictus

Magtok watches the great big fiery whatever-it-is in the sky, after stepping out of the car. Wow, that's...that's really something, huh? He blinks a few times, confused, before turning towards Kram.

"That's...that's not yours, is it? I don't think Command would do all that for me, so it must be yours, right?" There's also that one alien Magtok met recently, but he wouldn't really go to all of that trouble for our cyborg either, would he?

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

The gray-coated man reaches for a small device held within a coat pocket, softly tapping at several buttons built into the small, technological apparatus. Moments later, the sand itself begins to quake, the ground shaking and shuddering as an enormous metal sheet hidden below the ground slides away.

Below, a metallic ladder leading onto a platform connected to a long set of stairs can be seen.

"Right zhis vhay, and f-follow me."

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

If the suddenly appearing hole surprised the two drow, they don't show it. Sornnolu walks up to the edge and looks down. Erelae steps up behind him and gives him a shove. The male drow tips forward and falls past the ladder and to the landing of the stairs below. Just before he would hit the ground, his momentum stops, and Sornnolu rights himself, landing lightly on his feet. He puts his hands on his hips and looks up at his sister, annoyed. Erelae just laughs at him, before taking the ladder down after Mr. Kramolagh.

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok/Ellrin - Wirholdt's Rictus]

As the plasma beam roars through the sky, illuminating the region for miles, Kramolagh steps back in confusion, dust swirling at his feet. He squints from beneath the onyx lenses of his starmetal spectacles, raising a hand to shield him as the entire plantation is bathed in crimson light. It takes the man several seconds to comprehend what he's seen, only the blaring of sirens across the plantation manages to fully tear the man out of his stupor. Several of the armed guards around the gray-coated man approach the unlikely pair, shoving them back into the vehicle while barking commands through communication devices.

Once stuffed back inside the vehicle, Kramolagh locks the doors before tapping another button, causing a small holographic screen to appear before him. Now, with a thoroughly annoyed expression upon his face, Kramolagh taps furiously at the screen.

"Mutter Gottes, was zur hölle war das?!"

--

Outside, a transparent technomagical dome materializes over the entire plantation while squads of men in dark suits begin to pour out of secret bunkers.

--

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh, for the most part, ignores the drow as they make light of things. This large, utilitarian bunker is the size of an entire warehouse, full of metallic boxes and labels. Thick glass columns filled with brackish liquid and masses of stringy flesh occupy numerous niches along this hall. At the end of the storage facility, books and sheaves of loose paper cram an enormous wall of shelves. At about a quarter of the way into the bunker, a reinforced glass wall can be seen, allowing onlookers to stare into the makeshift testing chamber created within the bunker.

About a dozen men and women, clad in little more than tattered gray uniforms, can be seen strapped to metallic chairs at the far end of the testing room. Two men in white uniforms currently tend to a large, frightening-looking device situated at the end of the testing area nearest to the exist, though still within the confines of the glass chamber.

Kramolagh speaks. "Zhey are finishing up powering zhe d-device as vhe speak."

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok/Ellrin - Wirholdt's Rictus

"Okay, so it's not yours, then. Maybe it's one of mine, or an old friend's? You want me to go out there, take a look at the thing?" Magtok offers, apparently completely unperturbed by Ellrin's spectacular display. He waits a moment, looks at the panicky Krampus, and makes his decision. "Yeah, I'm going to go have a look," he asserts, grabbing the car door and attempting to walk out to look at the metal sphere which just fell to earth.

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok/Ellrin - Wirholdt's Rictus]

The gray-coated man continues to tap ferociously at his holographic screen, muttering to himself in a strange language as the cyborg attempts to exit the vehicle. Had they been traced somehow, or followed? After all these years, had they finally been found out? He had been careful, as he always was, what was different about this particular trip? The cyborg, it had to have been the cyborg. But then... the cyborg seemed just as confused, albeit far too eager to investigate what could very well be some sort of explosive device or killer drone.

Kramolagh grimaces as he finishes inputting security codes at lightning speed, before glancing towards Magtok, eyes narrowed.

"You seem to k-keep interesting company, cyborg. You can't seriously be t-trying to go out zhere right now!"

"For all vhe know, zhat sphere vhas some sort of nuclear device!"

--

At this point, a drone separates from the roof of the vehicle. It begins to fly rapidly towards the foreign object.

"Was für ein absoluter verrückter versucht, mitten in einem luftangriff nach draußen zu rennen!?"

--

[Amity - Slumbersun]

Kramolagh enters the elevator soon after, quickly busying himself with a glowing panel built into one of the walls. Several of the grim figures in dark suits follow afterwards, pressing close.
A few seconds later, the elevator begins to drop at an alarming rate.

--

After a sudden drop, the elevator stops, revealing a long, metal hall ahead. Wordlessly, Kramolagh and his security entourage step forward, leading Amity through a tangled network of highly secure passages. Cameras watch blankly from the cieling, and laser turrets built into the wall glitter in the artificial lighting. A majority of the compact walls, ceilings, and floors of the facility appear to be composed of some strange, otherwordly metal that seems resistant to rust and other degradation. Rows of technomagical orbs embedded along the upper edges of the walls bathe the rooms and hallways in green-tinted light.

Most of the doors Kramolagh escorts Amity through are composed of reinforced metals, allowing access to deeper areas of the facility by sliding into recesses in the walls after specialized keys and passcodes have been scanned or typed into glowing panels. Finally, Kramolagh leads her to an expansive chamber equipped with specially treated blast doors made to withstand extraordinary punishment, both to keep outsiders from accessing the more questionable experiments within, and as a fail-safe to ensure that escaped experiments cannot evacuate the facility.

Several scanners bathe Amity in unusual radiation before a green light built into the ceiling activates, and the doors ahead open.

--

Past the reinforced blast doors, an expansive greeting chamber is revealed, decorated with experiments too impractical for Conference Z's use, yet interesting enough to impress newly recruited researchers and sponsors. Objects include giant gears and tangles of strange circuitry pulled from enormous alien machines, mosaics made from colorful debris, and weird sculptures constructed from glittering starmetal. The walls and floor of the room are plated in thick metal, while harsh lighting glares from panels in the ceiling above.

An attractive looking woman in uniform stands behind a long desk crafted of white granite, tapping at several holographic screens.

Kramolagh speaks.

"Vhelcome, Ms Amity, to Slumbersun. Now... for most, zhis is vhere zhe t-tour begins, however..."

"You seem eager to proceed. Vhould you l-like to view zhe area vhere you vhill be vhorking, should you accept our offer?"

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Sornnolu pauses to observe one of the vats, but then hurries along to keep up. Erelae keeps pace with Kramolagh, pausing in front of the window.

"I didn't expect the device to be so large." Erelae comments. "What powers it?"

Sornnolu hangs back a little, letting his sister do the talking.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok/Ellrin - Wirholdt's Rictus

"If it is a nuclear device, it's a very poorly-made one. We're both still very much alive, and not flaming skeletons like in that one Terminator movie," Magtok points out, still fiddling with the locked door, trying to get out. It looks like it's not designed for a passenger to open it, how peculiar. Maybe if he lies on his back and gives the door a good kick with both feet? Or maybe we should try kicking out the window instead, reaching through the broken glass, and opening the door from the outside. That could work, right?

"You know the one, where Arnold is on humanity's side and the shifty liquid metal guy is the villain? T2? He does the whole thumbs up thing?" No, I don't think he has any idea what you're talking about, Magtok. Hell, I don't think he's even heard a word you've said, so awestruck as he is by the 'warning shot.' "Nevermind, we can watch it later, just let me go look at the thing. They're probably friendly to me; I can tell them to hold off on obliterating you for a couple weeks. Just long enough to get a feel for this place, decide which departments I'm taking over. Then I'll call them off for good and we can all have a big science party and drink champagne out of beakers and test tubes." Taking over not one, but several departments, cyborg? Someone certainly has a high opinion of themselves! I mean, no big surprise there; we've always known Magtok to be more than a little vain.

[bc56]

Above

Ellrin laughs as the dome goes up. "Now I've forced their hand. I wish I could hear what they're saying right now. Computer, transfer control of the messenger sphere to my console."


Wirholdt's Rictus

The drone may approach the sphere unhindered. It may detect frequent sonar pulses coming from it. Once the sphere has detected the drone, it changes. Six legs split out from its sides, and an eyestalk with a camera extends from the top. Its front opens up to reveal a speaker. It looks at the drone with the camera. "Greetings. I would like to speak with your master."

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok/Ellrin - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh twitches somewhat as the cyborg continues to spout nonsense in the middle of what could very well be an actual assault upon Slumbersun. With his knuckles clenched white beneath his thick, fur-lined leather gloves, the unusually pale figure sighs deeply, exhaling slowly in an attempt to calm himself. Retrieving his electronic cigarette, the man takes a long drag before allowing the vapor to pass through, leaning forward ever closer to his holographic screen. Gritting his teeth, he taps another few codes in before allowing some sort of sensor to scan him.

He responds swiftly to the cyborg, leering out of the tinted window.

"Quiet down, vhill you. Zhis is for y-your own good."

"Was für ein absoluter schmerz in den arsch."

--

[Magtok/Ellrin - The Sphere]

A broadcast image of Executor Kramolagh is projected by the small drone here, one with a positively scathing expression upon his face. Speaking through the drone, the gray-coated man responds, his tone thoroughly unfriendly, his tone of voice somewhat justified considering the ludicrous circumstances.

"Zhis is Executor Kramolagh speaking."

"If you vhant to talk, come down here and speak to my face, on my terms, guter herr!"

--

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh rubs his hands together, grinning somewhat unsettlingly as he watches the Conference Mechanics slowly ready the device for operation. Out of the corner of his eye, the gray-coated man watches over Sornnolu, clearly flattered by the drow's appreciation of some of his more grotesque "art" pieces.

He responds to Eralae somewhat quickly. "Ah, as curious as your b-brother, I see."

"Zhe device requires an extraordinary amount of power to operate, larger vhersions are even more d-demanding. As such, vizhin each device, a well-protected pocket dimension is stored, vherein a majority of zhe power is yielded utilizing a netvhork of nuclear generators. One of our more common designs, you'll find. Zhe synthetic psychic crystal at its heart absorbs zhis energy."

"Several rare materials act as focus lenses through vhizh zhe pyschic ray is broadcast. Alternatively, vhat can most easily be described as a mechanical add-on similar satellite dish of sorts allows zhe device to broadcast a slightly less potent effect over a significantly larger area."

"An entire city, perhaps."

[bc56]

Sphere

"I don't trust you enough for that." The sphere's voice is calm and robotic, betraying no emotions thanks to the handiness of text to speech technology. "I am a concerned citizen who does not like the idea of a secret society who is doing something so dangerous and vile that it must be covered up with a fortune worth of expensive technomagical materials." Ellrin assumes that magic is involved since the complex blocked magical scans as well as technological ones. "I've been watching your activities for weeks, and although I haven't been able to pierce your defenses yet, I am sure I can work out what you're doing in there sooner or later." A lie, but the machine doesn't show it. This is the first Ellrin's noticed the conference, but it stands to reason that a secret society with such an expansive complex has been active for quite some time. "Your facility casts a shadow against background radiation. It would be less suspicious if it was not so heavily protected. Now maybe you could spare me the trouble of breaking in there and tell me what's going on here?"

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Armored Vehicle]

Kramolagh notices the figurine and grins, almost mischievously. "Mm, I knew I vhould like you. I really razher do, aha."

"Vhell, to keep it short... I am somezhing here from s-somevhere else, zhey call it Erde."

"I must say, I prefer life here. So much... more interesting."

Kramolagh's gushing amuses Feia, and rather clearly.
"Your opinion is a rare one, I'm afraid. Give it time, I hear the veneer wears thin soon enough."
Her little ice umbrella doesn't hide that smirk very well.

"Erde and it's less interesting. That says little. The Nexus here possesses a uniqueness you would be very hard pressed to find anywhere else in any particular Creation.
Did you come here intentionally, or were you one of the many accidental arrivals to this chaotic place?"

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

"What if we only needed it to broadcast over a smaller area. A few blocks, say?" Erelae asks.

Sornnolu frowns. "Maintaining that many generators must be a huge cost."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Armored Vehicle]

Cauvin shrugs, stirring his remarkably strong drink with a chilled metallic rod produced from a secret compartment. The smell of the thing was enough to nearly cause him to gag, but now was hardly the time to back away. This was a challenge of his own creation, after all, one which he intended to overcome, one way or another. Boldly, he takes a long sip, squinting from beneath his onyx lenses. The gray-coated man's cold blue eyes move out of focus for several seconds, somewhat stunned by the drink as he is, but he pulls himself together quickly, perhaps masking his slight cringe.

As his eyes refocus, he glances back towards Feia, taking a deeper look at her for perhaps the first time. His gaze, still obscured by his spectacles, lingers for several seconds more than would be entirely casual before he allows himself a sultry sort of grin, responding at a somewhat lower pitch.

"Ah, and vhy do you zhink zhat is?"

--

Kramolagh's smile fades somewhat swiftly as his past is brought up once more. He leans back in his chair, sighing deeply before glancing out of the tinted window, deep in thought. His expression darkens, and the man appears to have quite a bit of difficult putting his thoughts into words, an unusual challenge for the man.

Finally, he responds, taking another deep sip.

"In truth, I dislike talking about zhe method by vhich I arrived here. You see, my home vhas a vhorld of p-pure science, advanced millennia above even zhis place. My people vhalked among zhe s-stars, harnessed zhe power of planets, and conquered zhe cosmos. Zhe others I vhorked vith, zhey i-insisted zhat zhe secrets of reality vhere to be found out in the darkness, but my researchers and I alvhays knew zhat zhe real vhonders of zhe universe vhere t-to be found right at our fingertips, razher zhan in zhe heavens. Unlike the others, vhe chose to drive zhe pinnacle of our scientific knowledge ever closer to its source."

"I vhas a leading scientist on zhe largest research project zhe universe had ever s-seen. A colossal particle accelerator built of starmetal ripped from zhe hearts of countless planets, harnessing the power of zhe l-largest star in the galaxy, built to probe zhe very f-fabric of zhe universe and in doing so, touch zhe p-preceding order of zhe universe. Vhe vhere on zhe brink of vhat might be science's ultimate goal, zhe universal truth - zhe vhy of everyzhing!"

"But... zhere vhas an accident."

"It b-began as a critical cascade effect in one of zhe EM regulators. Zhe intense spatial distortions tore apart zhe array. It vhas a stupid error. I can't remember vhat happened after zhat t-terrible explosion of noise and light. I avhoke in a field full of debris, somehow still alive, along vith some of zhe other researchers. It vhas painfully confusing at first. Even grass vhas new to me, and zhe laws of physics in zhis reality are subtly different to zhose I spent my life studying. I had lost everyzhing but my vhits."

"It has taken considerable effort, years of hard vhork, to get to vhere I am now. I have been trapped in zhis p-primitive reality for over seventy years now, surrounded by all m-manner of zhings utterly alien to me. Zhere are pockets, here and zhere, of individuals capable of representing a fraction of vhat vhe accomplished in my universe, but zhey are few and far in between. I d-don't know if zhe experiment vhas a success, and sensors have failed to locate zhe vhorld I once came from, meaning zhat I don't even know if I have a vhorld to return to."

"But I have to try to finish vhat vhe started. I cannot l-live a life beneath vhat I vhas before. As it is impossible to replicate zhe experiment in zhis universe through purely technological means, I m-must rely upon other methods. I may not fully understand zhe nuances of zhis universe, but I know enough to make use of it."

"I will not stop until I succeed."

--

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh nods, seemingly having expected the question. "Zhere are a n-number of attachments vhich allow for a user to specify zhe range and area of effect of zhe device. I vhill be supplying a number of zhese attachments, yet even more vhill be available in time. As for zhe cost, vhell... Not as resource-intensive as you vhould zhink."

"Vhe have created a species of "elemental" more zhan capable of supplying zhe mechanical energy zhe generators require."

[Lord Magtok]

Wirholdt's Rictus - Magtok

"Fine, you don't know James Cameron. Here's one I know you do know, though. There's a starman waiting in the sky. He'd like to come and meet us, but he thinks he'd blow our minds," Magtok quotes with a snicker, before he abruptly puts two and two together. A space man in space. How many of those does Magtok know? It's gotta be Elwood, right? Eli, Elliot, Elvis, something like that. Hard to remember when we spent more time trying out joke names based off the alias he gave us, instead of committing that alias to memory.

Magtok reaches for the communicator the blue space man gave him...and then stops. Kram might not know he has a way of contacting Ellrin, right? Maybe we should keep that secret a little longer, just in case. You never know what might happen; it could prove useful to have a way of contacting the outside world if Krammy ever thinks about locking us up in a science dungeon and throwing away the key. Krampus seems like a pretty nasty fellow; I wouldn't put it past him to lock us up in a cave with a box of scraps.

"Krammy Koopa, I know who our space guy is. I'm actually a little flattered and unsettled; turns out I have two creepy stalkers surveilling me from afar. You sure you don't want me to say hi, ask him not to obliterate us? He'll listen to me, he likes me way more than he does you; I can guarantee that much." Magtok picks himself up off his seat, finally giving up on his earlier plans to try to smash his way out of the car. It's pretty obvious that's not going anywhere, and there's probably a goon or three waiting to tackle him if he does manage to break through somehow.

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - Wirholdt's Rictus]

The Executor's face twitches in anger as he listens to the words being spouted by the small mechanical sphere from within the relative safety of his reinforced vehicle. The cyborg's mutterings only made the situation all the more frustrating, although Kramolagh was loathe to allow his performance to fall apart here.

Instead, he accesses a final security code, allowing another complicated sensors to read him.

"No... I vhill rid us of our unexpected guest."

"Activate z-he "Black Star" initiative."

--

[Ellrin - The Sphere]

An invisible barrier forms around the pair of drone-like devices, followed by a response from Kramolagh, clearly infuriated by the other drone. "I don't know who you zhink you are, but y-your little rampage stops here. You have inconvenienced me far more zhan creature's of such limited significance have a right to. Forget all that you've seen, if you know what's good for you."

"You are out of your league, here."

--

With that, there's a blinding flash as, all of the sudden, the entire plantation is enveloped in blinding light. Seconds later, the entire plantation appears to have disappeared entirely, along with the facility below. Now, the region itself is of little interest, seemingly nothing more than yet another inhospitable strip of land. The only sign that something other than barren nothingness ever existed here would be the fact that the small protective bubble silently erected by Kramolagh's drone persists, meaning that the pair of drones still remain.

Several seconds later, Kramolagh's drone self-destructs. Slumbersun is gone, as if it had simply never existed.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - Wirholdt's Rictus

Magtok sits in silence for a moment or two, before shaking his head and making a face at Kram's choice of words. "Blackstar Initiative. Isn't it a little...I dunno, morbid to be naming any of your stuff after that? I can't say 'too soon' because timelines are all kinds of bizarre out here, but it feels...questionable. I know you're probably under pressure right now with the big space thing, we can talk about it later, but just...maybe consider Heathen, if you haven't named anything ominous and important after that album yet? Tin Machine, maybe Glass Spider? If those were already used somewhere else, fine, I just-" Magtok, c'mon, leave it be. Give him a moment to breathe, or he's liable to yell and scream and explode at the nearest acceptable target, who just so happens to be you right now.

[bc56]

Sphere

All alone, the sphere destroys itself, melting down key components inside to render itself unusable.


High Above

"Out of my league, really. The fact that I found him shows that he's out of his league. Now I know what he's working on, too. There's only one sort of thing someone could be working on which is scarier than a Long Gun. Does he think that I will just forget this?" Ellrin is skeptical of Kramolagh's strategy. "No, he's trying to escape and buy himself time to destroy me. But he won't be able to find me, and he made enough mistakes that I will find him again. Computer! Replay recording, starting at time index 2:05"



A broadcast image of Executor Kramolagh is projected by the small drone here, one with a positively scathing expression upon his face. Speaking through the drone, the gray-coated man responds, his tone thoroughly unfriendly, his tone of voice somewhat justified considering the ludicrous circumstances.

"Zhis is Executor Kramolagh speaking."


"Excellent. I have your name, face, and voice but you have none of mine. Even if it's a false name, I can find you, Kramolagh, and I will stop your superweapons research. Computer, begin using the satellite network to scan for similar shadows to that one. Also, scan the entire planet for radioisotopes that would be left by a Long Gun shot. If they teleported, I want to know where to."

A long pause. The computer speaks. "Detecting signs of a second facility."
"Excellent. On screen." Another pause. Ellrin considers. "How quickly can you load a Mark II delivery bot with some sort of destructive payload rigged to go off if tampered with, including by EMP?"
"Five hours to construct sufficient containment, 30 minutes to load it into a bot and make necessary modifications, assuming the payload is explosive in nature."
"Nah, I doubt any explosives we have could scratch their walls. How about a biological agent. Nothing lethal, just severely discomforting. How about Orithian Stench Plague?"
"Confirmed. Bot will be ready in five hours."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

A great tower. The greatest Working of an age.
A kingdom of kingdoms' army. Champions of the same.
Violence. Failure.
Apocalypse.

Kramolagh's tale brings a retrospective frown to Feia's lips.
It's interesting, to be sure. Quite a bit more than the typical "I was walking down the road and then I was in a weird tavern" drivel.
"I sympathize more than you might expect.
However... I'm afraid you're going to encounter some potential insurmountable issues if your overall goal remains a Universal Truth."
Something she doesn't particularly expect him to worry about, but feels must be said regardless.
"Singular realities may indeed have something like a total Truth. Some I imagine are even simple.
Not this place. Not beyond 'because it can be so.'"

She doesn't mean this in a defeatist, "give up your dream" sort of way. More just a warning to take care with his direction.

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh nods, seemingly having expected the question. "Zhere are a n-number of attachments vhich allow for a user to specify zhe range and area of effect of zhe device. I vhill be supplying a number of zhese attachments, yet even more vhill be available in time. As for zhe cost, vhell... Not as resource-intensive as you vhould zhink."

"Vhe have created a species of "elemental" more zhan capable of supplying zhe mechanical energy zhe generators require."

"Ah, elementals." That made more sense to Sornnolu.

"How specific can you make the... emotions felt?" Erelae asks.

[Hattish Thing]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

Once Cauvin finishes his explanation, he breathes in deeply before taking another long sip, shuddering somewhat. His mind wanders away from the armored vehicle, flashing far back to a memory he can remember as clearly and accurately as if he was standing there now. For a few brief seconds, he was there on board the spacial array, clad all in the rigid white uniform belonging to his order, bare hands resting upon the chromatic pane as he stared out into the vast blackness, stars twinkling bright, isolated islands of light in a sea of darkness.

He'd always found them comforting, the light in the dark.

--

Cauvin turns away from the window, glancing back towards Feia. He seems more emotional than usual for several seconds, likely the result of the strong alcohol. Quickly, however, he regains control over the expression upon his face, responding calmly to her.

"If zhere is... I vhill know it, zhis I s-swear."

"Vhe are nearing our d-destination. It has been lovely, meeting vizh you, Ms. Feia. My vhork leaves me vith... little time for ozher things."

--

[Magtok - (Alternate) Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh sits back for a moment once the ringing in his ears brought on by the sudden chronoplanar alteration subsides. Wordlessly, he clasps his hands together, his expression entirely neutral, his calm and serene facade betrayed only by the fact that the gray-coated man appears to be chewing upon his lower lip, hard enough to flinch and draw blood.

Without even acknowledging the cyborg, he unlocks his own door before stepping away, shutting and locking it behind him.

--

Several moments pass, during which Kramolagh unleashes a string of curses in his native language, barking furiously towards the stars in the sky above him while operatives continue to rush about the plantation. Fortunately, the vehicle itself is soundproof, meaning that the cyborg likely remains entirely ignorant of Cauvin's outrage.

Finally, Magtok's door is opened by the gray-coated man.

"Get out, vhe need to t-talk," he mutters, staring forward from beneath his starmetal spectacles. The entire plantation, including the rock below which houses the entirety of the hidden research facility, now hangs suspended in what appears to be empty space, swirling blackness filled with twinkling stars.

It stretches on for miles, endless.

--

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh stares forward through the thick pane of protective glance, his hands twitching somewhat as several of the test subjects slowly begin waking up. They've quite obviously been drugged, and most have yet to fully regain their senses, though some of the hardier subjects have begun to struggle with their bindings.

The executor breathes in deeply as he notices the fear in the eyes of those behind the pane.

Such is the cost of progress.

--

With a small sigh, he exhales before responding. "Extraordinarily so. I m-myself happen to own a personal, h-handheld version of zhe device before you."

"Tell me... Zhe first subject, vhat vhould you have her do?"

He points somewhat begrudgingly towards an attractive half-elven woman.

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

"Have her kneel." The drowess says.

"There's a handheld version?" Sornnolu asks raising an eyebrow. He suspected as such, but hadn't confirmed it until now. "We would be interested in such a thing. Concealment is imperative, I believe. If Intersection got wind of this thing, we'd be ruined."

[Hattish Thing]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh taps at the glass, causing one of the Conference Mechanics to turn, their face obscured by a protective mask. In a complicated sign language not unlike the kind practiced frequently by the drow, the gray-coated man conveys Eralae's request, which is accurately received by the masked mechanic.

As the mechanic begins to tap specifications into the device, Kramolagh responds to Sorrnolu.

"Zhere is, yes. Zhe r-range of such a device is far more limited, but it is n-no less potent. If it is concealment you are vhorried about, negotiations could be re-opened in order to d-discuss zhe creation of a cloaking device specific to zhe demands of zhe device before you."

"Vhat do you say? Ah, b-but, I shall let you think on it. It is time for zhe d-demonstration."

--

Kramolagh nods to the mechanic, who promptly begins to pull several levers and press a multitude of complicated buttons. The half-elf begins to struggle and thrash within her bindings as the second mechanic approaches. The device begins to thrum softly, as an invisible carrier ray is projected by the end of the device, directly into the woman. The second mechanic promptly frees her of her bindings.

The effect is almost instantaneous, for seconds later, she kneels hard, her knees slamming into the bottom of the metallic bunker.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - Wirholdt's Rictus

"Right," Magtok answers plainly, stepping out of the car and into the weird, spooky alternate dimension plantation he seems to have arrived upon. Wow, some kind of alternate dimension farm, huh? It's looking more and more like he intends to take us as his secret science slave. Let's give him one or two more chances before we taking the ugly way out, though. Eventually he's going to talk about monetary compensation, we just need to hold on a little longer, I'm sure.

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - (Alternate) Wirholdt's Rictus]

"Not here," mutters the man in the gray-coat, staring towards the manorhouse from beneath his starmetal spectacles. "Zhis vhay." The long walk up towards the manorhouse offers what would have otherwise been a pleasant view of the surrounding plantation, including a trio of glittering glass greenhouses, several state-of-the-art processing facilities, and a number of residences, had it not been for the disturbing way in which the ominous black sky above distorted the surroundings. As the small gathering likely strides towards the manor upon the hill, Magtok may notice something rather unsettling; the fact that numerous plantation workers appear to be standing out in the fields, staring towards the procession blankly despite the recent changes in locale.

Finally, the manorhouse is reached. This single-story manor is crafted of thick wood and opulent marble, a rigid and unflinching bastion of civilization, perhaps once proud. A ten-foot-tall wall, electric fence, highly secure gate, and perimeter of shrubs provide considerable privacy from the rest of the plantation.

--

Kramolagh reaches for a remote in his pocket, allowing a sensor to scan him before the gates begin to open as if by magic. A muscular woman clad in a dark suit appears to be guarding the door, a look of shock upon her face. Knowing better than to bother the executor at a time like this, she nods towards Kramolagh ominously before opening the manorhouse door. The inside of the structure appears far more comfortable than the outside.

"After you."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

Once Cauvin finishes his explanation, he breathes in deeply before taking another long sip, shuddering somewhat. His mind wanders away from the armored vehicle, flashing far back to a memory he can remember as clearly and accurately as if he was standing there now. For a few brief seconds, he was there on board the spacial array, clad all in the rigid white uniform belonging to his order, bare hands resting upon the chromatic pane as he stared out into the vast blackness, stars twinkling bright, isolated islands of light in a sea of darkness.

He'd always found them comforting, the light in the dark.

--

Cauvin turns away from the window, glancing back towards Feia. He seems more emotional than usual for several seconds, likely the result of the strong alcohol. Quickly, however, he regains control over the expression upon his face, responding calmly to her.

"If zhere is... I vhill know it, zhis I s-swear."

"Vhe are nearing our d-destination. It has been lovely, meeting vizh you, Ms. Feia. My vhork leaves me vith... little time for ozher things."

Feia isn't particularly subtle about it, studying his reactions and reminiscence.
Her own opinion of it is kept out of sight, her face studiously blank as she watches him. Truth be told, she's been rather blatantly studying him this entire time, but this particular instance has a slight difference to it.

"I wish you luck and will support where I may. Such is the duty of a sponsor."
Divine vessels. Money. Knowledge.
There are many things she can offer, all that remains to be seen is what is accepted.

But then this little moment passes, back to the light-hearted mood of before. As easy smile returns to the witch's lips, there to stay with all luck.
"Excellent, I have been looking forward to seeing what you had on site. Truthfully, this is one of the more relaxing outings I have had in a rather long time.
You have my thanks for that."

[Hattish Thing]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

Kramolagh either fails to notice her studying of his reactions or masks his awareness, taking the time instead to drink deeply of his glass, finishing the unusually strong drink. The gray-coated man merely nods in response to her first sentence, internally dismissing her statement as a formality, if nothing else.

Noticing her smile, Cauvin would blush slightly, if his cheeks were capable of doing so.

"In truth, I m-must agree. Perhaps... vhe should do zhis again, no?"

"I vhill admit... you intrigue me."

--

At that moment, the armored vehicle comes to a stop, many miles away from the city of Inside."Ah, vhe are here." Several men in dark suits evacuate the vehicle, sliding Executor Kramolagh's door open. The gray-coated man exits before stepping confidently around the vehicle, opening Feia's for her.

He smiles warmly before glancing upwards, breathing in the fresh air and standing tall as he gazes out into a dark sky scattered with stars.

"Have you been zhis f-far out from zhe city before?"

"Zhe night sky... it is like a painting."

--

Although the starlit sky is quite breathtaking, the area below appears to be little more than a seemingly inhospitable strip of land surrounded by rocky mountains which encircle an expansive plantation constructed in the shadow of the mountains. The plantation itself is a sprawling warren of structures, utterly isolated due to its incredible distance from the nearest civilization. In the distance, an elegant manorhouse sits atop one of the higher hills, looming ominously over the rolling rows of cultivated bushes, shrubs, and grasses below, its spikey architecture causing its silhouette to appear somewhat unnerving.

Kramolagh speaks, again.

"Vhalk vith me?"

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - (Alternate) Wirholdt's Rictus

Magtok keeps his mouth shut for once. He just observes for now, taking in as much of the place as he can as they make their way in. We'll need to remember the layout if we ever need to break out of this manor, after all. There's an awful lot to commit to memory, but fortunately, this is one of the wonderful little advantages to being a cyborg. He can just record everything he's seen, with Kram none the wiser.

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse]

The large and imperial common room of this elegant, gothic manorhouse is exquisite, packed with all manner of strange knick-knacks and foreign articles stored within glass cases or mounted upon walls. Dark purple tapestries depicting eerie symbols lined with golden threads hang from the walls, while a thick carpet of a matching shade and consistency drapes across the fine wooden floor. Crowded bookshelves filled with a variety of bizarre titles line the walls of the chamber, which smells of dark wine and exotic herbs. Incense burns atop a large mahogany table, lined with glittering gilded accents of faded gold.

Portraits of severe looking individuals clad in noble's garb hang from the walls, each slightly crooked, while dozens of glass cases filled with a number of occult objects can be seen set against the wall. A tall fireplace depicting what appears to be the mouth of a gargoyle belching flames rests against the farthest wall, flanked by odd pillars carved with tentacle motifs, surrounding by expensive and luxurious couches and chairs. Many strange objects and curiosities flank the fireplace and stairs towards the south of the common room lead to a second floor. Dark curtains are pulled over each of the large windows within this room, yet flickering lamps outside bath the room in weak illumination, before shrouding the chamber in shadow once more.

Kramolagh navigates towards the largest, most comfortable chair before gesturing towards a couch.

"Before vhe proceed into Slumbersun, I'm afraid I h-have a few questions for you."

"Out zhere, who vhas zhat?"




• A number of miniature specimen tanks have been placed upon shelves here and there. Each one appears to contain a kind of small fey contorted into various shapes, as if they were dancing, an expression of otherworldly beauty frozen in time.

• One of the larger "scrolls" displayed on the wall above the fireplace is made entirely of some kind of alien flesh, dried out. The language itself is difficult to decipher.

• Many of the books upon the wall possess unusual titles which appear to reference a number of unspeakable entities generally associated with the darkest reaches of space, the Great Old Ones and their Outer Gods.

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun]

Kramolagh enters the elevator soon after, quickly busying himself with a glowing panel built into one of the walls. Several of the grim figures in dark suits follow afterwards, pressing close.
A few seconds later, the elevator begins to drop at an alarming rate.

--

After a sudden drop, the elevator stops, revealing a long, metal hall ahead. Wordlessly, Kramolagh and his security entourage step forward, leading Amity through a tangled network of highly secure passages. Cameras watch blankly from the cieling, and laser turrets built into the wall glitter in the artificial lighting. A majority of the compact walls, ceilings, and floors of the facility appear to be composed of some strange, otherwordly metal that seems resistant to rust and other degradation. Rows of technomagical orbs embedded along the upper edges of the walls bathe the rooms and hallways in green-tinted light.

Most of the doors Kramolagh escorts Amity through are composed of reinforced metals, allowing access to deeper areas of the facility by sliding into recesses in the walls after specialized keys and passcodes have been scanned or typed into glowing panels. Finally, Kramolagh leads her to an expansive chamber equipped with specially treated blast doors made to withstand extraordinary punishment, both to keep outsiders from accessing the more questionable experiments within, and as a fail-safe to ensure that escaped experiments cannot evacuate the facility.

Several scanners bathe Amity in unusual radiation before a green light built into the ceiling activates, and the doors ahead open.

--

Past the reinforced blast doors, an expansive greeting chamber is revealed, decorated with experiments too impractical for Conference Z's use, yet interesting enough to impress newly recruited researchers and sponsors. Objects include giant gears and tangles of strange circuitry pulled from enormous alien machines, mosaics made from colorful debris, and weird sculptures constructed from glittering starmetal. The walls and floor of the room are plated in thick metal, while harsh lighting glares from panels in the ceiling above.

An attractive looking woman in uniform stands behind a long desk crafted of white granite, tapping at several holographic screens.

Kramolagh speaks.

"Vhelcome, Ms Amity, to Slumbersun. Now... for most, zhis is vhere zhe t-tour begins, however..."

"You seem eager to proceed. Vhould you l-like to view zhe area vhere you vhill be vhorking, should you accept our offer?"[Amity - Slumbersun]

Amity has been looking around this whole time. A few times, Tank has even stretched out a hand to scrape his claws along the metallic walls, getting a feel for their composition, which it seems Amity picks up on as well.

When they come to the scanners and their radiation based scanning, Amity is clearly uncomfortable, and Tank lowers his head to her shoulder to comfort her, which, surprisingly, helps her quite a bit as she reaches up idly rub at one of his horns. The scanner shouldn't find anything particularly unusual, aside from Tank and a few anomalous growths in Amity's brain, if the scanner goes that deep.

As they enter the final room of the tour, Amity says, "Well, I didn't come down here for cram and biscuits. Let's get a move on; I want to see the rest of this," Amity insists, wanting to see the rest of the facility.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse

The cyborg peers suspiciously at the couch before taking a seat. Weird, animated restraints could fly out from between the cushions and tie us to the seat. Mimics could be anywhere. We have to be careful. "He never gave me his actual name. The alias he provided was...Elwood, I think? Blue alien guy, last of his kind. He's trying to resurrect his entire species; has a bunch of corpses in stasis tanks or something. Very impulsive, doesn't take kindly to being told what to do by any sort of authority figure." Sounds like someone else we know, doesn't it, Magtok?

"You know, I really think you should've let me talk to him, lie to him and say you're not as sinister and threatening as you sound. I can be a fairly talented people person when I want to be. Most of us really aren't that hard to figure out, if you know what to look for, what levers to pull. You're used to getting your way and having all the power, so combine that with his rebellious streak and a confrontation between you and Ellsworth was pretty much destined to go wrong. You can't really bully someone into compliance when they're all the way up in orbit, Kram. You may have missed out on an opportunity, he's the last of his species. Surely you could do something with that alien technology and survivor's guilt, if only you'd known which strings to tug on," Magtok chides, apparently still a little cross that Kram wouldn't even let him talk to Ellrin. So cross that he doesn't even make a single comment on how Needs would've loved this mansion, or joke about how ridiculous 'Slumbersun' sounds.

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse]

Kramolagh listens intently to the cyborg's explanation, leaning forward in his chair and nodding when appropriate. When the cyborg is finished, the gray-coated man taps cautiously at a small device worn at his wrist which causes several holographic images to manifest. Each of the hexagonal holographic screens appear to connect with one another through glowing cyber-tendrils, the entire image eventually depicting an enormous web-like network of images of several infamous figures which have, in one way or another, had a negative effect upon the Nexus.

Not quite finished, the gray-coated man taps at several of the images. This motion causes the images to zoom out and begin to play, causing the network to grow even larger as individual hexes begin to split apart revealing holographic sub-sections depicting many of the unspeakable acts performed by these madmen in full color. He claps his hands swiftly, causing the entire network to vanish, save for one hex, which appears to depict a recording of the plasma beam shooting through the sky, constantly played back.

Kramolagh leans forward here, gazing deep into the cyborg's eyes from behind the cold and unfeeling onyx lenses of his starmetal spectacles.

"Vhe have remained hidden from zhe public eye for d-decades precisely because vhe refuse to vhork vith madmen who fire plasma beams as a vhay of saying hello. Vhe vhill n-not need to 'bully' compliance from zhis individual, he vhill be dealt with in time."

"Vhey haff our vhays."

--

He clears his throat, removing the final hex. "Zhe facility below is protected from surveillance."

"If you vhere exposed to a technomagical electromagnetic pulse, vhould it kill you?"

--

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

The unusually pale woman behind the counter smiles brightly, her perfect teeth glittering in the harsh light broadcast overhead. She offers a perfectly manicured hand to Amity carefully, with the air of one who's carried through these steps countless times. The handshake lingers for precisely the right amount of time before she steps away, nodding her head curtly.

She speaks, her voice cheery and kind despite the somewhat pained expression upon her face, visible only in the far-corners of her eyes.

"The pleasure is mine, I am Myranda. Your scheduled tour of the facility is to begin shortly, and will be initiated as soon as you have signed a few papers, which you will find here. Do not look so glum, miss! These documents are there to protect you."

"I am required to warn you that these documents are legally binding, and that your signature is mandatory should you wish to proceed."

"Thank you."

--

Her wide smile fades away as if by command.

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

Amity's hand is rough and calloused; the result of a hard life digging through scrap heaps for usable materials, and Myranda will be able to feel the strength of her grip - though Amity doesn't squeeze, it's obvious she's fairly powerful physically in spite of her small stature. She looks Myranda right in the eye, her expression unreadably flat as the corporate drone's smile fades away. The short scavenger looks at Kramolagh for a long moment, Tank mimicking her look, both of their eyes seeming to try to look through him, before Amity turns to the desk, "Right, show me those papers."

When the papers come out, Amity will read through them thoroughly, as Tank watches Kramolagh's every move.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse

"It would be extremely painful," Magtok answers curtly, not terribly impressed by Kramer's history lesson. He was there for that history. Hell, he personally wrote a lot of the Nexus's history books. The chapter on men like Harald wasn't very flattering, but it paled in comparison to the hate and vitriol he saved for people like the cat. On top of that, he was one of those madmen once. Only a few years ago, he would've thought absolutely nothing of firing beams of plasma from orbit like that, so whatever Kram's intended message may be, it falls on deaf ears.

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse]

Kramolagh rises at this point, clasping his gloved hands together. "Ah, but you vhill survive. Good, zhen." At that, he steps away towards the nearest bookshelf, where he begins to thumb through a number of unusual titles. Wordlessly, his brow deeply furrowed in concentration, he taps certain sections of a number of volumes, allowing his finger to rest against hidden scanners concealed within the books.

After a moment or two, Kramolagh steps away from the bookshelf, gently resting his arms behind his back as the entire wall begins to split apart, sliding to the side to reveal what appears to be a chamber dominated by a massive iron hatch. The gray-coated man taps at his phone, and a few seconds later, the hatch unlocks and opens with a soft, pneumatic hiss.

With an almost sinister expression upon his face, Kramolagh speaks.

"Proceed."

--

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

The unhealthily thin, but attractive looking Conference Operative smiles warmly once more before retrieving a small folder of documents, practically gliding across the white tile floor as she steps to the side in order to hand the documents over to the far broader woman.

While somewhat sinister in appearance, each of the documents appears to be little more than a relatively harmless non-disclosure agreement.

--

[Aurelia Laur've - Wingless Rock Research Facility - Deep Storage]

It has been quite some time since the name of Aurelia Laur've has been uttered. The last few hours of her natural life were unspeakably violent, having been one of the victims whose lives were mercilessly taken during an attack upon Laur've Tower which resulted in the gruesome end of the Laur've bloodline at the behest of particularly brutal AMENite operatives. The tower itself was swiftly abandoned, and its ruined husk remains to this day. While the bodies of Mr. Laur've's many bodyguards remain there, rotting within the confines of the structure, one particular corpse has long been missing.

Weeks after Mr. Laur've's death, at the behest of one Executor Cauvin Kramolagh, the corpse of Laur've's daughter, Aurelia, was extracted from the ruin. The body itself had been utterly brutalized, her chest left a ruined chasm filled with shotgun shards, the results of the weapon which took her life. After an extensive surgical process utilizing a sinister Conference Z machine at the cutting-edge of medical science, the most affected parts of Aurelia's body were successfully regenerated at the cellular level, leaving her scarred but fully intact.

Her soul was a far more difficult thing to repair, yet through the use of complicated chronomagics, Aurelia's spirit was bound once more to her body.

--

However, the success of Aurelia's resurrection was short-lived, for it came to the Executor's attention soon after that a complicated clause written in the original contract which bound Conference Z to Marciano Lau'vre meant that although the organization was no longer forced to serve the line of Lau'vre upon his death, they were free to continue draining the deceased man's vast fortune. With the resurrection of Aurelia no longer a priority for the organization, Kramolagh merely ordered the unconscious woman to be left in deep storage, contained within a specimen tank.

There she remained for years, until magical emanations given off by one of Kramolagh's more occult experiments managed to infuse several specimen containers within Wingless Rock, including the container which Aurelia was bound to. It begins as a strange tingling sensation, felt all over her body. Aurelia will wake up slowly within her tank, completely bare, enveloped entirely within a curious "breathable" liquid. Glancing out of her tank, she will realize that she has found herself within a massive chamber is the size of an entire warehouse, full of metallic boxes and labels.

Thick glass columns filled with brackish liquid and masses of stringy flesh occupy numerous niches along this hall. At the end of the storage facility, books and sheaves of loose paper cram an enormous wall of shelves. A man clad all in a rigid monochromatic uniform appears to be sorting through the wall of shelves, his back towards Aurelia.

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

Amity looks over the papers, not skimming but reading quickly, and as long as there's no funny-business in them, she'll sign her name in a scratchy, inexperienced hand. Seems Amity hasn't had much opportunity to get experience with writing things down directly. Tank keeps an eye on Kramolagh, and he may feel that the big lizard is sizing him up for a confrontation. Maybe it's paranoia, or the fact that it's a wild animal no matter how tame it appears, but Tank is wary of the immaculately dressed man.

Amity eventually finishes signing the documents and hands them back to the secretary, "Right, let's see what this place has to offer," she says. She thinks to herself, it had better be worth how creepy this place is.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse

Rather than rise from the couch, Magtok gives Kram an incredibly sour, disappointed look, like that of a father looking upon a child trying to pass off the remote lodged in the tv screen as a priceless work of modern art, rather than the collateral damage of recent hooliganism and running amok through the living room which it truly is. He's seen through your little charade, Krammy. You should stop digging; it's only going to put you deeper in the hole.

"Kramer. Come on. We're in some sort of alternate dimension or something, remember? Because of the ★ initiative? Just turn off your EMP, there's no one to shield against. You don't want me tripping down the stairs, do you?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse]

The gray-coated man responds to the cyborg's comment by merely narrowing his eyes, gesturing more firmly towards the hatch. After a few seconds, he glances through a nearby window, taking note of the swirling sky outside, clear evidence that this world was as far from the Nexus as can be.

He grimaces, somewhat.

"Frankly, cyborg..."

"You are in no p-position to negotiate, now."

--

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

Once Amity finishes signing each of the documents within the folder upon the nearby table, the secretary takes a few moments to insert each document into a specific slot nearby for later transference to the recordkeeping department.

Once she's finished, she nods towards Kramolagh before leading the small gathering down a long hall to left, through several thick looking doors.

"Please, follow me."

--

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping]

Myranda continues for some time, before finally, the gathering approaches a sealed blast door. She smiles back towards Amity before nodding curtly and proceeding to interact with a glowing panel. A moment later, the door opens wide, revealing an enormous chamber almost entirely dominated by inexplicable technology.

Several long metallic objects covered with flashing lights and strange glowing panels fight for floor space in this room with large, boxy, cabinet-like metal objects. Here and there on the walls, panels flash images of buildings, rooms, and scenery from throughout the Nexus. This highly secure chamber contains over a dozen fifteen-foot tall silos of strange machinery and glowing circuitboard panels, connected by thick cables and hundreds of wires to a massive supercomputer which dominates the southernmost wall.

Several technicians busy themselves within this room, locked into booth-like computation nooks.

After allowing Amity several seconds to take the room in, Myranda speaks.

"Welcome to recordkeeping, almost all the research conducted here at Slumbersun is filed here. Due to the state-of-the-art data-encryption software designed by our Advanced Technologies Division, here at Conference Z, we fear no violation of organization privacy."

"In addition, within these powerful computational mechanisms before you, an artificial intelligence specifically designed for this task carries through with Project Chromatica, one of more successful mass surveillance projects to date."

"Any questions?"

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping]

Amity looks about at the monitors, and a memory occurs to her. A bird, a raven, whose skull Tank cracked as he was eating. There'd been cyberware in the bird's little brain.

She turns to Myranda and asks, "So what's the source input for these cameras? Little free-floating cameras seem like they'd be too conspicuous for the light work of surveillance."

Tank, meanwhile, wanders slightly off, going up to a booth to look inside at the worker inside, chuffing pleasantly at the individual within.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse

Magtok narrows his eyes right back, refusing to budge. "I'm not asking for much, Kramplestiltskin. Just some basic courtesy, the ability to go downstairs without my leg going into a seizure three steps down, sending me tumbling the rest of the way until I'm a broken, bloody heap at the bottom, because I happened to guess wrong and found out the hard way that your magic EMP doesn't work exactly like one of the last three different magic EMPs I've seen before. Besides, you're wrong about one very important thing-"

He then leans back into the couch, shrugs, and pulls the tip back on one of the fingers of his left hand. The small gun barrel revealed certainly doesn't look like it do much harm, but it could definitely kill a man if it were pressed right up against their skull, where Magtok has his finger now. "I am always in a position to negotiate. Make working for you a pleasant experience, Kram. You've done nothing so far but make me feel like I've been ensnared by a cult, that I'm a science slave now and the only way I'm ever leaving this place is in a bodybag. Make me want to be here. Sell me on the fancy toys I get to experiment with, the resources you've got in your basement, the nice hat I get to wear as head of the department of such and such. Or else-" Magtok mimes a gun with his other, fleshier hand, pressing it underneath his chin. I imagine it'd look pretty ridiculous, if he didn't already have a real gun pressed to his-no wait, nevermind, it's still completely ridiculous.

"I mean, at the very least, call someone from security to carry me down the steps or something. Raptor Christ, Kramo, I'm a prospective employee! The greatest prospective employee you'll ever have, if you play this right, but look at us! I have a gun to my head! You're trying to lock me up in another dimension! That's no way to get anything done! You've seen Iron Man, haven't you? The bad guys leave him in a cave with a bunch of tech, ask him to make weapons for them, and he escapes by building a robot suit and blowing them all up! That's because of bad morale, Spelling and Krammar. That's because Tony Stark didn't want to be in that cave, he didn't feel safe. You can get a lot out of some people with brute force and coercion, but me and Tony Stark, we don't work that way. I'm not asking for much here, Krusty Krams, just a little humanity. You want me as an ally, Kray. Not a begrudging ally, or a slave plotting your violent overthrow, but a dependable, useful asset, who believes we could do some good for the world with science and engineering, and make a tidy profit in the process. I want to be that ally, but you're making it ****ing impossible."

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse]

Kramolagh clasps his gloved hands together, staring forward for several seconds, seemingly deep in thought. His lip twitches for several seconds, brow furrowed, before he responds, matter-of-factly. "Respect begets respect, cyborg. I zhink it is time for us t-to reevaluate zhe situation here."

"Establish some 'ground rules", if you vhill."

--

He breathes in deeply, a somewhat stern expression upon his face. "As of zhis m-moment, you have proven yourself an unreliable asset, and an undesirable contributor. Perhaps zhis is unfair, zhe circumstances haff n-not been ideal. I recognize zhis, and so I offer a 'second start' of sorts. From zhis point on, you vhill address me as Executor Kramolagh, and afford me zhe respect zhat is r-required in order to maintain a healthy and mutually beneficial relationship. In return, I vhill treat you as I do zhe ozhers under my employ, keeping your comfort in mind."

"In addition, you vhill treat zhe ozhers under my employ vith zhe respect you vhould an equal, or vith the respect you vhould a superior, depending upon your position in relation to zhe individual. You vhill contribute reliably, and p-present no threat to zhe security of my organization, my projects, and zhe individuals I employ."

"Do you find zhese terms acceptable?"

--

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping]

Kramolagh steps forward here, somewhat pleased with the woman's keen interest. "Allow me to explain, if you vhill. For zhe m-most part, vhe utilize vhat are known as nanomachine, also known as nanites, a mechanical or electromechanical device whose dimensions are measured in nanometers. In short, zhey are very, very small."

"Too small to see vith zhe naked eye. Zhey are managed by zhe artificial intelligence vich runs zhis entire project."

--

The worker within the nearest booth, a balding man in his late forties, grimaces in response to the creatures appearance, looking here and there with an anxious expression on his face, unwilling to interrupter the Executor and his guest during a tour of the facility.

As such, he smiles uncomfortably towards the thing.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse

Magtok pulls the finger away from the side of his head, picks up the end of the finger he'd dropped on the couch, and quietly screws it back on, neutralizing any potential for use as a weapon it may have had a moment ago. "I don't know how you treat the others under your employ. I've yet to speak to any of them. If I find out they are treated like chattel, and that I, in turn, can expect the same treatment, then I'm going to quit." Magtok answers, in a voice barely above a whisper. A reasonable enough addendum to Kram's terms, he hopes. If not, we may need to figure out a way to use some of that eldritch stuff the Executor has lying around to send a signal out to Needs. What was that one eldritch symbol thing he was always babbling on about like? Bah, we'll figure something out if we really need to, I'm sure.

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping]

Amity looks at the man for a long moment, and this time she doesn't bother to hide an incredulous and slightly offended look.

"Bulls***," she says, crossing her arms, "Nanomachines couldn't pull this kind of fidelity without a macroscopic camera system, which would require the nanomachines to be in numbers capable of being seen with the naked eye. You wouldn't be able to keep them powered without a city spanning energy field either, the energy requirements to keep that many things individually running would require a sending tower of ridiculous proportions with enough power to make a nuclear silo blush, and would be exponentially higher if they're sending information rather than just recording it."

She's apparently working herself up into a fervor now, and Tank leaves the poor worker to come back over to her, looking concerned, "And another thing; they wouldn't be able to just swarm over the ground and reproduce en masse; they'd need to be constructed of something four times as dense as steel - like iridium - just to be able to keep from getting destroyed by crawling over a little dune, because the grit at that level is enough to tear their legs off just walking a few feet! At that size, air viscosity is like molasses, so you would have had to put them down individually in each space. Camera drones? You have to build them to produce a working camera which," she sweeps her arm towards the monitor bank, "Wouldn't get you **** like this! It'd get you a texture map of an area because nanomachines can't be programmed with the photonic sensitivity of a large camera because they're too small for working processors! You'd be better off just replacing a crow's brain with a robotic one, since it'd accomplish the same thing and maintain itself! And-"

Amity is interrupted by Tank lowering his head onto Amity's shoulder and huffing at her. She takes a deep breath and holds onto the Deathclaw's horn, "Look, you've either wasted an incredible number of resources getting this up and running, or you're working with something other than nanotech. Which is it?"

[Arkhosia]

[Aurelia Laur've - Wingless Rock Research Facility - Deep Storage]

Aurelia is slow to awaken, life creeping into her form gradually rather than all at once - one's body does tend to get accustomed to being dead after a few years, it seems. Even so, it's not enough to prevent her from coming to, the golden-haired woman's eyes flickering open for the first time in a long while. The first thing that she notices is the dull ache permeating her body, groaning. The second thing she perceives, the feel of liquid entering her throat, certainly does wonders to bring her back to full consciousness. Jolting awake, a tap rings out as Aurelia hits her head on the back of the glass tank as she looks around frantically.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

Kramolagh either fails to notice her studying of his reactions or masks his awareness, taking the time instead to drink deeply of his glass, finishing the unusually strong drink. The gray-coated man merely nods in response to her first sentence, internally dismissing her statement as a formality, if nothing else.

Noticing her smile, Cauvin would blush slightly, if his cheeks were capable of doing so.

"In truth, I m-must agree. Perhaps... vhe should do zhis again, no?"

"I vhill admit... you intrigue me."

--

At that moment, the armored vehicle comes to a stop, many miles away from the city of Inside."Ah, vhe are here." Several men in dark suits evacuate the vehicle, sliding Executor Kramolagh's door open. The gray-coated man exits before stepping confidently around the vehicle, opening Feia's for her.

He smiles warmly before glancing upwards, breathing in the fresh air and standing tall as he gazes out into a dark sky scattered with stars.

"Have you been zhis f-far out from zhe city before?"

"Zhe night sky... it is like a painting."

--

Although the starlit sky is quite breathtaking, the area below appears to be little more than a seemingly inhospitable strip of land surrounded by rocky mountains which encircle an expansive plantation constructed in the shadow of the mountains. The plantation itself is a sprawling warren of structures, utterly isolated due to its incredible distance from the nearest civilization. In the distance, an elegant manorhouse sits atop one of the higher hills, looming ominously over the rolling rows of cultivated bushes, shrubs, and grasses below, its spikey architecture causing its silhouette to appear somewhat unnerving.

Kramolagh speaks, again.

"Vhalk vith me?"

[Armored Vehicle - Feia]

Formality. Informality.
They're going back and forth a good ways here.
Perhaps its her fault, having disrupted the professional tone by allowing him to step in on the cafe's chaotic situation.
That being said, this is going very well.

It could hardly go better if she deliberately chained his mind to the cause.
"Intrigue is a powerful force, for any powerful mind. If things continue going well, I imagine we will have many opportunities for such things, hm?"
Formally. Informally.

And then we're done with the car.
Feia graciously accepts Kramolagh's aid with the door and slides out alongside him. Her gazing around is clinically detached, at first, rapidly taking in everything around them in the manner of someone reflexively used to constant threat analysis.
But it's only a moment, before she relaxes into a more serene stance once more.
"I would hazard to say I have been a fair ways into this realm...but space is always a little questionable in this place. Perhaps we are a million miles beyond where I expect. Perhaps a couple."

Really, it's just entirely impossible to definitively know. Infuriatingly impossible.

But today is not the day for pondering such things.
It's a day for calmly enjoying the evening and science.
So she smiles and gestures onwards with one hand.
"The stars bless such a walk, so lead on, dear man."

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse]

Kramolagh breathes in warily before raising a gloved hand, tapping at the mechanical device worn over the glove on the right. After tuning in to a specific frequency, he speaks into the device, his voice as clear and crisp as possible. "Yes, zhis is zhe Executor. Deactivate zhe electronic barricade in area A3, as vhell as in areas C4 through C7."

After nodding towards the cyborg, Kramolagh gestures towards his bodyguards before entering the hatch, climbing down the metal ladder which leads into the enormous elevator below. Once there, he begins to quickly busy himself with a glowing panel built into one of the walls. Several of the grim figures in dark suits follow afterwards, pressing close.

Once Magtok follows, the elevator begins to drop at an alarming rate.

--

After a sudden drop, the elevator stops, revealing a long, metal hall ahead. Wordlessly, Kramolagh and his security entourage step forward, leading Magtok through a tangled network of highly secure passages. Cameras watch blankly from the cieling, and laser turrets built into the wall glitter in the artificial lighting. A majority of the compact walls, ceilings, and floors of the facility appear to be composed of some strange, otherwordly metal that seems resistant to rust and other degradation. Rows of technomagical orbs embedded along the upper edges of the walls bathe the rooms and hallways in a harsh, white light.

Most of the doors Kramolagh escorts Magtok through are composed of reinforced metals, allowing access to deeper areas of the facility by sliding into recesses in the walls after specialized keys and passcodes have been scanned or typed into glowing panels. Finally, Kramolagh leads him to an expansive chamber equipped with specially treated blast doors made to withstand extraordinary punishment, both to keep outsiders from accessing the more questionable experiments within, and as a fail-safe to ensure that escaped experiments cannot evacuate the facility.

Several scanners bathe Magtok in unusual radiation before a green light built into the ceiling activates, and the doors ahead open.

--

Past the reinforced blast doors, an expansive greeting chamber is revealed, decorated with experiments too impractical for Conference Z's use, yet interesting enough to impress newly recruited researchers and sponsors. Objects include giant gears and tangles of strange circuitry pulled from enormous alien machines, mosaics made from colorful debris, and weird sculptures constructed from glittering starmetal. The walls and floor of the room are plated in thick metal, while harsh lighting glares from panels in the ceiling above.

An attractive looking woman in uniform stands behind a long desk crafted of white granite, tapping at several holographic screens.

Kramolagh speaks.

"Vhelcome, Lord Magtok, to Slumbersun."

--

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping]

Kramolagh listens intently as Amity continues to rant and rave, an excellent demonstration of her capabilities as an engineer, albeit a tad crude for his tastes. While the Executor himself seems to take her complaints well enough, many of the assistants within the chamber stare back, appearing mildly annoyed by the sudden outburst.

Once she's finished, Kramolagh smiles warmly. "Mm, y-you are quite knowledgeable, zhen!"

"Your concerns vhere shared by zhe engineers assigned to zhis p-project many years ago, zhey struggled endlessly vith zhe l-logistics of such a program. Even vith zhe advanced technologies and starmetals salvaged at zhe s-start of zhis organization, countless problems continued to rise up here and zhere, resulting in many setbacks. However... zhe solution vas staring zhem right in zhe f-face. You see, Ms. Amity, vhe live not in a vhorld of p-pure science, ours is a vhorld of m-magic as vhell. It took a c-considerable amount of experimentation, but scrying magics proved a perfect solution to zhe problems vhe vhere having."

"Here at Conference Z, vhe believe zhat zhe path to true progress vhill be paved not only vith technology, but vith zhe magic inherent to zhis universe."

"Regardless, your expertise vhill p-prove invaluable."

--

[Feia - Armored Vehicle]

"Mm, I imagine so, madame," mutters the man in the gray-coat, staring forward from beneath his starmetal spectacles. "Ah, but I can imagine... many zhings." He smirks somewhat brazenly before gesturing for the woman to walk beside him. The long walk up towards the manorhouse offers a pleasant view of the surrounding plantation, including a trio of glittering glass greenhouses, several state-of-the-art processing facilities, and a number of adequate residences. As the gathering strides towards the manor upon the hill, Feia may notice something rather unsettling; the fact that numerous plantation workers appear to be standing out in the fields, staring towards the procession.

Finally, the manorhouse is reached. This single-story manor is crafted of thick wood and opulent marble, a rigid and unflinching bastion of civilization, far away from the cities of the Nexus. A ten-foot-tall wall, electric fence, highly secure gate, and perimeter of shrubs provide considerable privacy from the rest of the plantation.

--

Kramolagh reaches for a remote in his pocket, allowing a sensor to scan him before the gates begin to open as if by magic. A muscular woman clad in a dark suit ahead, nodding towards Kramolagh ominously before opening the manorhouse door. The inside of the structure appears far more comfortable than the outside, for a cold wind has started to blow.

"Shall vhe, madame? Zhe vhind is p-picking up."

--

[Aurelia Laur've - Wingless Rock Research Facility - Deep Storage]

The archivist in the rigid white coat glances about, somewhat startled by the sudden noise produced by Aurelia slamming her head against the back of the specimen tank. The somewhat overweight individual steps back, reaching for a flashlight which he begins to shine towards the far end of the facility, where the more heavily refrigerated tanks are found.

It takes several seconds, but eventually, the man notices Aurelia squirming within the tank. His eyes widen before he begins to panic, promptly reaching for a lever built into the wall. The instant the lever is pulled, sirens begin to blare and the entirety of deep storage is bathed in eerie reddish light. The man begins to flee, evacuating the area just as a squad of black-clad operatives wielding ominous chromatic firearms stride into the room, prepared for anything. The leader, a bald and heavily muscular woman, steps forward to the tank.

She stares deep into Aurelia's eyes before speaking into a communication device on her wrist.

--

After a brief conversation, she types in several codes into Aurelia's tank, one of which causes the specimen tank to rapidly drain, before expelling Aurelia. She will collapse upon the floor soon after, bare before the woman in the dark suit. Numerous firearms are directed towards her.

Finally, the woman speaks.

"No sudden moves."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Manorhouse?]

A very pretty setup he has here. Perhaps a bit more personable than her particular arrangement, but this works much better for showing up to potential clients and VIPs.
And for all his (heavy-handed) flirting, she is still one of those individuals owed some Impressive Presentation.

The various workers are observed with a sidelong, casual glance as they go, but she makes no particular mention of or movement towards them.
They are labeled as a curiosity, but nothing of particular concern. If they are a brooding rebellion, they are of no threat to her. If they are a peculiar security system, they are of no threat to her.
"The benefits to a great mind with a great imagination: reality can be brought to vision."

As with everything else, the security system is observed with the appearance of mild interest, but an actuality of intense scrutiny.
This is slightly more obvious with the guardswoman, for which the appraisal is fully blatant. Appearance is judged, threat potential is gauged.
Then she is dismissed as everything else has been.

Feia laughs at the comment of the wind, evidently finding it rather funny, and takes her time following into the manor.
"My home's winds never cease, I'm afraid. I find it more uncomfortable when the air is still. But I would much rather you show me your abode here, than prattle on about such trivial things as the winds of elsewhere."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Manorhouse]

Kramolagh chuckles quietly in response to her first statement, rather enjoying her reaction. His response is brief, yet the charming expression upon his face says more than a few mumbled words could. "Mm, indeed, madame." The muscular woman at the door shuts it behind the small security entourage following the pair, locking it behind the gathering. Confidently, Cauvin leads Feia through several long halls, broodingly decorated with shades of dark purple and faded gold. Eventually, the gathering reaches a common room of sorts, one which Kramolagh presents with a small gesture.

The large and imperial common room of this elegant, gothic manorhouse is exquisite, packed with all manner of strange knick-knacks and foreign articles stored within glass cases or mounted upon walls. Dark purple tapestries depicting eerie symbols lined with golden threads hang from the walls, while a thick carpet of a matching shade and consistency drapes across the fine wooden floor. Crowded bookshelves filled with a variety of bizarre titles line the walls of the chamber, which smells of dark wine and exotic herbs. Incense burns atop a large mahogany table, lined with glittering gilded accents of faded gold.

Portraits of severe looking individuals clad in noble's garb hang from the walls, each slightly crooked, while dozens of glass cases filled with a number of occult objects can be seen set against the wall. A tall fireplace depicting what appears to be the mouth of a gargoyle belching flames rests against the farthest wall, flanked by odd pillars carved with tentacle motifs, surrounding by expensive and luxurious couches and chairs. Many strange objects and curiosities flank the fireplace and stairs towards the south of the common room lead to a second floor. Dark curtains are pulled over each of the large windows within this room save for one, which allows a pleasant view of a lovely garden shrouded in darkness, wherein numerous statues depicting a number of extraordinarily beautiful naked humanoids are found.

The fireplace itself burns low, while flickering lamps outside bath the room in weak illumination, shrouding the chamber in shadow only to illuminate it once more every few seconds.

Kramolagh navigates towards bookshelves, glancing towards several titles before offering a small smile towards Feia.

"Please, sit. Zhis may take a m-moment."




• A number of miniature specimen tanks have been placed upon shelves here and there. Each one appears to contain a kind of small fey contorted into various shapes, as if they were dancing, an expression of otherworldly beauty frozen in time.

• One of the larger "scrolls" displayed on the wall above the fireplace is made entirely of some kind of alien flesh, dried out. The language itself is difficult to decipher. Were one particularly scholarly, they would recognize the scroll above the fireplace as depicting the symbol of "D’endrrah", a great old one dedicated to supernatural beauty, sexual taboo, unspeakable knowledge, and hidden places.

• Many of the books upon the wall possess unusual titles which appear to reference a number of unspeakable entities generally associated with the darkest reaches of space, the Great Old Ones and their Outer Gods.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - (Alternate) The Manorhouse

Magtok has more than a few cynical, biting remarks he's tempted to make about all the security. He wisely keeps his mouth shut this time, however, and just enjoys looking at the pretty scenery on the way there. I'm sure Kram enjoys and appreciates the change of pace, but it won't last forever.

"A lot of pomp and circumstance for a place nobody ever gets to see, Executor. I can't imagine any of this was cheap," he remarks, peering closely at some of the gigantic displays set out in Slumbersun's entrance lobby. "How much more walking until we get to the science and engineering stuff?" All of this spectacle is nice, really, but they've been driving, shifting dimensions, walking, riding elevators, more walking, and talking so very little about any of the things that actually interest Magtok that he's starting to miss Ellrin's orbital bombardment.

[Arkhosia]

[Aurelia Laur've - Wingless Rock Research Facility - Deep Storage]

The archivist in the rigid white coat glances about, somewhat startled by the sudden noise produced by Aurelia slamming her head against the back of the specimen tank. The somewhat overweight individual steps back, reaching for a flashlight which he begins to shine towards the far end of the facility, where the more heavily refrigerated tanks are found.

It takes several seconds, but eventually, the man notices Aurelia squirming within the tank. His eyes widen before he begins to panic, promptly reaching for a lever built into the wall. The instant the lever is pulled, sirens begin to blare and the entirety of deep storage is bathed in eerie reddish light. The man begins to flee, evacuating the area just as a squad of black-clad operatives wielding ominous chromatic firearms stride into the room, prepared for anything. The leader, a bald and heavily muscular woman, steps forward to the tank.

She stares deep into Aurelia's eyes before speaking into a communication device on her wrist.

--

After a brief conversation, she types in several codes into Aurelia's tank, one of which causes the specimen tank to rapidly drain, before expelling Aurelia. She will collapse upon the floor soon after, bare before the woman in the dark suit. Numerous firearms are directed towards her.

Finally, the woman speaks.

"No sudden moves."

Aurelia barely registers the blaring sirens and change in lighting as she starts to hyperventilate, the shock of the unfamiliar surroundings and baffling situation overloading her senses. As the soldiers start to approach the tank the frightened woman tries to retreat, pushing herself into the far end of her glass confines and staring back at the leader of the squad. Her jade eyes are a maelstrom of confusion, shock and fear, and she flinches as the liquid downs around her.

The bared woman is unceremoniously deposited onto the cold ground of the laboratory, taking a deep and hungry breath of the air around her. She starts to cough at the exhale, the liquid in her lungs splashing on the ground as she clutches at her chest. Aurelia looks at the soldiers surrounding her with befuddlement.”S-seems a bit excessive for little old me.” The blonde moves her hand to shield her breasts as she sits up, shivering as the liquid clinging to her starts to evaporate and sap her body heat. Y-you wouldn’t happen to have a spare outfit or anything, by chance?

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Manorhouse]

Oh, this is clearly a "showing off" level of extravagence.
Which, if you have the means for it, isn't inherently bad. Just interesting.

Interesting in a question inducing sort of way.

Feia declines his suggestion to sit (outright ignoring it, really) instead meandering her way towards the portraits on the wall.
Her eyes travel across the various individuals in order, although she stops herself in front of one somewhere in the middle.
"I'm assuming these are no relatives of yours, unless you brought reference images along your traumatic entrance to the world.
Who are they, unless they were just acquired decoration?"

Asking questions that seem entirely unrelated to the reason for being here seems like a good way to spend time, while Kramolagh does whatever it is he needs to do.

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping]

Amity rubs the bridge of her nose. More of this magic crap. Tank lets out a comforting croon and snorts in her hair, "Yeah, yeah, I know," she says, apparently to the Deathclaw.

"Right. Let's move on what's the next place you want to show me?" Apparently, Amity doesn't appreciate the explanation of 'it's magic!' any more than she does 'it's nanomachines!' but she doesn't have a ranting response to this one, given what happened to her shortly after arriving in the Nexus. Kramolagh may get the feeling that Amity is the sort of person that's somewhat offended by not understanding something. Given how nonsensical magic seems to be to her, she doesn't like it at all.

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - (Alternate) Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area:]

As the small gathering proceeds, Kramolagh chuckles somewhat in response to Magtok's comment. "Not as expensive as one vhould zhink. Many of zhese displays vhere once a-active experiments ultimately deemed too i-impractical for continued research. Vhery popular vith zhe s-sponsors, as vhell as newer recruits." Following Cauvin's explanation, the unusually pale woman behind the counter smiles brightly, her perfect teeth glittering in the harsh light broadcast overhead. She shakes the cyborg's hand carefully, with the air of one who's carried through these steps countless times. The handshake lingers for precisely the right amount of time before she steps away, nodding her head curtly.

She speaks, her voice cheery and kind despite the somewhat tired expression upon her face, visible only in the far-corners of her eyes.

"The pleasure is mine, I am Myranda. Your scheduled tour of the facility is to begin shortly, and will be initiated as soon as you have signed a few papers, which you will find here. Do not look so glum, sir! These documents are there to protect you."

"I am required to warn you that these documents are legally binding, and that your signature is mandatory should you wish to proceed."

"Thank you."

Kramolagh interjects at this point, frowning a little. "Mm, vhe vhill s-skip zhe tour zhis time, Ms. Taurel. Our newest recruit seems eager to proceed. Take us to Advanced Technologies, vhen he's finished vhith zhe d-documents."

--

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping]

Noticing Amity's apparent desire to move on, Myranda responds quickly, that same artificial smile upon her attractive face. "Excellent."

"Now, come this way."

[Slumbersun Research Facility - Employee Barracks]

After several minutes wandering through the many identical halls of Slumbersun, Myranda gestures towards a specific quarter of the facility. This large, utilitarian section of the research facility is split into dozens of pleasant gray rooms which serve as places of residence for both Conference Z researchers assigned to Slumbersun and security personnel, many of which rarely see the light of day. Each room features comfortable bedding, hospitable furnishings, luxurious personal quarters, a powerful desktop computer, and an impressive library.

Myranda gestures towards a specific room after a few moments, one which features a larger "bedding" area sized for the woman's unusual pet.

"This particular cell has been pre-selected for you based on your preferences, should you choose to sign on."

--

[Feia - Manorhouse]

Kramolagh glances back over his shoulder as Feia asks her question, his smile soft but expression distant, before turning back to the bookshelf, brow furrowed in deep concentration. "Vhy, zhey are m-me, madame. Vhel... not quite me, but very similar. You see, around f-fourteen billion years ago, simply speaking, everyzhing vhe know of in the cosmos vhas an infinitesimal singularity. Zhe extrapolation of zhe expansion of zhe universe b-backwards in time using general relativity yields an infinite density and temperature at a finite time in zhe past."

"Zhis primordial singularity, vhich indicates that g-general relativity is not an adequate description of zhe laws of physics in zhis regime, caused zhe universe itself to e-expand and inflate in three-dimensional space. As zhe immense energy of this initial expansion cooled, light began to shine through. Eventually, zhe small particles began to form into zhe larger pieces of matter vhe know today, such as galaxies, stars and planets. Zhis singularity vhas paramount to zhe formation of zhe universe, and effectively resulted in zhe "birth" of everyzhing, yet for many years, vhe have vhondered..."

"Are vhe zhe only universe?"

"One of our very first r-research projects sought to d-determine zhe n-nature of zhe Nezus itself, and vhile it vhas ultimately not zhe success zhat vhe vhanted it to be, zhe experiments did offer invaluable insight into zhe nature of our own reality, for vhe d-discovered evidence of an infinite number of parallel universes. You see, zhese experiments resulted in zhe d-discovery of undeniable proof zhat zhe mathematical model vhe refer to as 'space-time' is flat, meaning zhat zhe number of possible particle configurations in m-multiple universes vhould be limited to '10^10^122' distinct possibilities, to be exact.

"So, vith an infinite number of cosmic patches, zhe p-particle arrangements within zhem must repeat — infinitely many times over. Essentially, zhis means zhat zhere are infinitely many 'parallel universes': cosmic p-patches exactly zhe same as ours, as well as patches zhat differ by just one particle's position, patches zhat differ by two particles' positions, and so on down to patches zhat are totally different from our own."

"Eventually, vhe created a device capable of ripping vhormholes into zhese 'parallel universes'. It is... an indescribable f-feeling, speaking vith your own alternate self."

He grows quiet here, seemingly lost deep in thought as he begins to tap certain sections of a number of volumes, allowing his finger to rest against hidden scanners concealed within the books. Finally, Kramolagh steps away from the bookshelf, gently resting his arms behind his back as the entire wall begins to split apart, sliding to the side to reveal what appears to be a chamber dominated by a massive iron hatch. The gray-coated man taps at his phone, and a few seconds later, the hatch unlocks and opens with a soft, pneumatic hiss.

Glancing back towards Feia, somewhat less distracted by his own thoughts, he speaks.

"Zhis vhay, madame."

--

[Aurelia Laur've - Wingless Rock Research Facility - Deep Storage]

The woman in the dark suit narrows her eyes before retrieving a taser-like device from her belt. She actives the weapon, which begins to glow a sinister blue shade. Mercilessly, she jabs with the device towards the vulnerable Aurelia. Should the weapon connect, Aurelia will likely find herself immediately unconscious once more.

Some time later, Aurelia would wake up elsewhere, finding herself clothed in a gray uniform within an unusually cold chamber. Above, banks of glowing quartz beams line the ceiling, illuminating the room with a cold, clean glow. The chamber itself appears to be built out of smooth, seamless walls of silvery metal. In the center of the room stands a strange triangular-shaped metal table surrounded by a dozen chairs. Along the edges of the chamber trail several additional rows of chairs, all facing the center table.

A gray-coated man, flanked by two fully armed soldiers, sits across the room. Tidy locks of well-groomed, wheat-colored hair fall over his unhealthily pale forehead, peppered and lined with streaks of gray, while almond-shaped eyes of cold and calculating gray peer out at the world from behind ornate circular spectacles of silvery siccatite and brilliant onyx gemstone. His unhealthily pale skin is perfect and unblemished, however, many late nights spent without suitable rest have caused dark circles to manifest beneath the figure's prying, bird-like eyes. In addition to his sunken and uncomfortably focused gray eyes, the man possesses a large, hooked nose and dark lips permanently set to smirk.

Although the man's physical appearance is relatively unremarkable, his equipment and garb stand out. The man is clad in an extravagant gray greatcoat, lined with thick fur. The well-worn coat is decorated with lines of faded silver and gold, wrapped tightly to his frame and fastened by glittering golden buttons. Beneath his enormous coat, the man wears dark-colored military dress, decorated with crimson clasps and ornamentations which all depict the same somewhat ominous-looking symbol.

After a moment, he smiles somewhat charmingly towards Aurelia.

"You c-caused quite a stir today, Ms. Aurelia."

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Employee Barracks]

Amity steps inside the cell, looking over for a long moment. Her hands trace along the books for a moment, looking over the titles to get a sense for the theme the books follow. Eventually says, "Yeah, this works. I'd like the bed removed, though, and replaced with a forge. And please, Myranda, stop doing that fake smile; it makes you look like a robot and actually makes me more antsy than if you just acted like how you feel."

Tank moves over to the area set aside for him, and scrapes his claws along the floor, trying to determine how hardy it'd be against him movements if he did something in the night.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Manorhouse]

"So I take it all of these portraits are the various You's that have been contacted...interesting. Someone less charitable would say that it's almost narcissistic, but I find the concept holds merit."
Ah, the multiverse. A somewhat complicated idea made even worse by what the Nexus represents: an infinite sea of infinite seas.
What Kramolagh describes is something if a mundane world's science, untainted by the complications of the arcane or divine. Or the Far.

When Feia turns away from the various portraits, she gets a better glimpse of the various books on the bookshelves and very very briefly hesitates.
It's little more than a slight pause in her turning, before she resumes calmly walking towards the newly-opened entryway, but it is there.

Far. Horror. Lovecraftian. Old Ones. Outsiders.
The subject matter of some of these tomes on these shelves represent the one thing she tries to distance herself from, that incomprehensible madness lurking behind all realities. Perhaps the one thing she's not comfortable attempting to explore, before her goals are met.
Is this just a coincidental literary interest of Kramolagh's? Or is he on the swift march to insanity that will require either evacuation or extermination?

Mere books are not enough to condemn, but enough to arouse suspicion for Feia. It is not a matter to treat lightly, she's seen the consequences of doing so far too many times, to many others. Experienced the fallout of their own stupidity.

So with that in mind, she keeps her mental frown from becoming a physical one, choosing to remain outwardly pleasant as she moves onwards.
"Curious reading material, you have armed yourself with."

[Hattish Thing]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Employee Barracks]

Kramolagh smiles warmly towards Amity before stepping outside for a moment, pressing a finger against his ear. In the meantime, Myranda moves forward, tapping at a bracelet worn over her wrist. This delicate motion causes a small, holographic notepad to appear before her, which she begins to take notes on.

She nods every few seconds to Amity before frowning somewhat.

"I... see. Anything else, Ms. Amity?"

--

[Feia - Manorhouse]

Cauvin smiles warmly towards Feia, nodding slowly as he recalls some of the more pleasant meetings he'd had in the past with his alternate selves. "Mm, if you are interested, madame, perhaps vhen vhe h-haff some time to ourselves, vhe can m-make contact vith some of your alternate selves, hm?"

"It c-could be intriguing."

--

At this point, the gray-coated man steps forward, lowering himself down into the enormous hatch. Within the hatch, a metal ladder leads down fifteen feet onto a landing, the walls of which are harshly illuminated by rows of painfully bright lights. Upon closer inspection, the landing itself appears to be the roof of an elevator-like mechanism, one which appears to possess an intimidating glass floor.

The chasm below the elevator, visible through the glass, appears to lead down over three-hundred feet, lit up by blinking white lights.

--

Once within the elevator, he begins to busy himself, tapping out security codes into a technological panel.

"As for my c-collection, vhell..."

"I have alvhays embraced zhe occult, zhe esoteric, zhe unknown... all zhat is taboo."

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Employee Barracks]

"I get that it's part of your job to keep up appearances and stuff for visitors. If I'm going to be working here, though, I wanna tell you straight up - insult me. Nitpick the things I do. I'm not infallible, and I'd rather have someone around I can trust to show me their emotions rather than hiding behind a smile they wear like a mask," Amity says, being entirely candid with Myranda, "Besides," she says, turning to look at her deathclaw as a smile spreads across her face. By some alchemy, it changes Amity's features from merely 'pretty' to 'gorgeous', "A genuine smile would make you look a lot more beautiful."

Tank stomps over to the pair, evidently proclaiming his approval of the space to his lifetime companion, crooning happily, much to Amity's enjoyment, "We should probably move on, though. What's next on the tour?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Employee Barracks]

Myranda nods meekly, offering a shaky half-smile. "You... you're very sweet," she all but whispers, clearly feeling somewhat flattered as well as awkward, an uncomfortable combination for the secretary. Somewhat cautiously, she glances back towards Kramolagh before speaking again, blushing somewhat as she notices Amity's charming and attractive smile. "I'm... I'm not in charge of researchers, Ms. Amity."

"I just manage the front desk. I... I appreciate your words. If you ever... want to talk more privately, I'm never far away."

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Employee Barracks]

"Same goes to you, alright?" Amity says, "Any time you want to talk, or anything else, just come and find me."

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - (Alternate) Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area

Magtok's going to take his time poring over these documents, actually bothering to read through the materials he's been provided. For his 'protection'. Uh huh, sure. They might be for someone's protection, but Magtok doubts it's his own. Most likely it's some form of non-disclosure agreement, with a lot of legalese regarding what might happen if Magtok discloses privileged information without the Executor's prior approval. If Krammy thinks he could ever take the former supervillain to court, he might be the most naive fool we've ever met. If the documents lean more towards justice at the barrel of a gun than courtroom drama, well...that's a bit more realistic, I'd say. Much more honest and upfront.

"So just sign here and we move on, right?" Better check for any sort of magical runes or something in the margins, too. Don't want to be unwittingly signing in blood and magically losing any ability to fight for ourselves, if it turns out this place is as much like Umbrella Corporation as we suspect.

[Hattish Thing]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Employee Barracks]

Unsure of how to respond to the unusual acquaintanceship now formed between the two women, Myranda laughs awkwardly, her crooked natural grin widening. Once Kramolagh enters once more, rubbing his gloved hands together, the secretary nods towards Amity, eager to proceed.

"Right this way!"

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory]

Myranda begins to move at a brisk pace, leading the small gathering through the longest hall yet, complete with extraordinarily thick blast doors twice the size of any encountered so far. Kramolagh himself steps forward, accessing a panel built into the imposing doors. The blast doors open slowly, causing the floor itself to grind and quake as it opens wide, revealing an expansive laboratory floor, complete with a number of scurrying assistants and exhausted researchers. Fluid-filled canisters attached to the walls contain a range of small creatures floating in stasis. Ominous scanning machines line the southernmost wall, and several computers can be seen.

Several rows of sensors as well as a conveyor-like machine dominate the southern wall of the chamber. Kramolagh speaks here, while Myranda remains silent. "Zhis is zhe 'Receiving Laboratory', vhere all of our more interesting specimens and materials are d-decontaminated in order to ensure zhat zhey are fit and won’t infect zhe other experiments."

"A functional recieving f-floor is imperative."

--

[Magtok - (Alternate) Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

The document itself, while harmless in appearance, makes it quite clear that any violation of the non-disclosure agreement specified will result in punishment carried out by extraplanar entities known as "inevitables", powerful creatures seemingly associated with the planes of law.

Kramolagh nods. "Correct."

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - (Alternate) Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area

A magical clockwork robot. Interesting. I suppose we can expect quite a battle if we're ever in a position where we have to renege on this contract, then. I can't imagine the fight will be an easy one, though. Better wait until we're entirely sure we've got the upper hand before doing anything rash, stupid, and impulsive. "Done," Mag answers, his signature consisting largely of a very big, visually distinct MagCorp 'M,' followed by a few indecipherable squiggles.

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory]

Amity gives one last smile to Myranda before she lets it fall from her face as she looks to Kramoragh. The same flat affect, the poker face she wears for him, comes back on, and she says, "Lead the way."

Once they arrive at the Receiving Floor, Amity looks everything over, and says simply, "They need more sleep."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Manorhouse]

Cauvin smiles warmly towards Feia, nodding slowly as he recalls some of the more pleasant meetings he'd had in the past with his alternate selves. "Mm, if you are interested, madame, perhaps vhen vhe h-haff some time to ourselves, vhe can m-make contact vith some of your alternate selves, hm?"

"It c-could be intriguing."

--

At this point, the gray-coated man steps forward, lowering himself down into the enormous hatch. Within the hatch, a metal ladder leads down fifteen feet onto a landing, the walls of which are harshly illuminated by rows of painfully bright lights. Upon closer inspection, the landing itself appears to be the roof of an elevator-like mechanism, one which appears to possess an intimidating glass floor.

The chasm below the elevator, visible through the glass, appears to lead down over three-hundred feet, lit up by blinking white lights.

--

Once within the elevator, he begins to busy himself, tapping out security codes into a technological panel.

"As for my c-collection, vhell..."

"I have alvhays embraced zhe occult, zhe esoteric, zhe unknown... all zhat is taboo."

[Feia - Manorhouse]

Feia goes rather quiet at the mention of contacting her alternate selves, a sort of far off look passing over her.
After a moment, her gaze refocuses and she speaks quietly.
"That would be very unwise."
There's a tone implying she has no interest in elaborating on this, but carries a degree of grimness to it.

And then that thought is dismissed from her, back to something possibly more pressing.
Conveniently, they're already trapped together on an elevator and he can't escape the topic even if he knew better.
"Taboo is not necessarily something to be worried about, if it is for purely societal reasons. Likewise for esoteric and occult.
I'm curious how deeply you have delved into the study of the Far Realm's occupants, however."

[Hattish Thing]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory -> Production and Robotics]

Kramolagh shrugs somewhat in at Amity's rather straightforward comment, uttering a particularly cryptic response.

"Ah, don't vhe all."

He nods towards Myranda at this point, who nods back before continuing. Eventually, the gathering finds themselves atop a large catwalk which spans across a metallic central chamber. Below, a wealth of metallic workbenches for the crafting, repair, and dismantling of technological objects, overseen by several automated claws can be seen. Several partially dismantled mechanical creatures—some that resemble humanoids, others more like insects, hang suspended from the ceiling by powerful cables. Dozens of powerful computers line the walls here, and assistants scurry about within the area despite the fact that is is nearly midnight.

The head of a massive humanoid automaton over one-hundred and twenty feet tall hangs over a deep extradimensional pit which dominates the northern section of the walls, not fully attached to the rest of the chassis partially stored within the area. It appears inactive, but sparks continuously due to the small army of repair drones crawling across its many thick starmetal panels.

After a moment, Myranda speaks. "I believe you will find this area particularly exciting! This industrial laboratory serves both as a chamber dedicated to technological experimentation as well as a fully functional starmetal foundry and contains one of the largest automatons ever created by Conference Z."

"In addition, it serves as the primary laboratory most often utilized by our Advanced Technologies Division."

--

[Feia - Manorhouse -> Greeting Area]

Cauvin merely shrugs in response, standing tall. His response to her latter question is equally cryptic. "Ah, vhell. I d-dabble, I suppose." His small smirk tells otherwise, though the manner in which he speaks suggests a tone of finality. A few seconds later, the elevator begins to drop at an alarming rate.

--

After a sudden drop, the elevator stops, revealing a long, metal hall ahead. Wordlessly, Kramolagh and his security entourage step forward, starting to lead Feia through a tangled network of highly secure passages. Cameras watch blankly from the ceiling while laser turrets built into the wall glitter in the artificial lighting. A majority of the compact walls, ceilings, and floors of the facility appear to be composed of some strange, otherwordly metal that seems resistant to rust and other degradation. Rows of technomagical orbs embedded along the upper edges of the walls bathe the rooms and hallways in green-tinted light.

Most of the doors Kramolagh escorts Feia through are composed of reinforced metals, allowing access to deeper areas of the facility by sliding into recesses in the walls after specialized keys and passcodes have been scanned or typed into glowing panels. Finally, Kramolagh leads her to an expansive chamber equipped with specially treated blast doors made to withstand extraordinary punishment, both to keep outsiders from accessing the more questionable experiments within, and as a fail-safe to ensure that escaped experiments cannot evacuate the facility.

Several scanners bathe Feia in unusual radiation before a green light built into the ceiling activates, and the doors ahead open.

--

Past the reinforced blast doors, an expansive greeting chamber is revealed, decorated with experiments too impractical for Conference Z's use, yet interesting enough to impress newly recruited researchers and sponsors. Objects include giant gears and tangles of strange circuitry pulled from enormous alien machines, mosaics made from colorful debris, and weird sculptures constructed from glittering starmetal. The walls and floor of the room are plated in thick metal, while harsh lighting glares from panels in the ceiling above.

An attractive looking woman in uniform stands behind a long desk crafted of white granite, tapping at several holographic screens.

Kramolagh speaks, grinning towards Feia.

"Vhelcome, madame, to Slumbersun."

--

[Magtok - (Alternate) Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area -> Receiving Laboratory]

Once Magtok finishes signing each of the documents within the folder upon the nearby table, the secretary takes a few moments to insert each document into a specific slot nearby for later transference to the recordkeeping department. The moment she finishes, she nods towards Kramolagh before leading the small gathering down a long hall to left, through several thick looking doors.

"Please, follow me."

--

Myranda begins to move at a brisk pace, leading the small gathering through the longest hall yet, complete with extraordinarily thick blast doors twice the size of any encountered so far. Kramolagh himself steps forward, accessing a panel built into the imposing doors. The blast doors open slowly, causing the floor itself to grind and quake as it opens wide, revealing an expansive laboratory floor complete with a number of scurrying assistants and exhausted researchers. Fluid-filled canisters attached to the walls contain a range of small creatures floating in stasis. Ominous scanning machines line the southernmost wall, and several computers can be seen.

Several rows of sensors as well as a conveyor-like machine dominate the southern wall of the chamber. Kramolagh speaks here, while Myranda remains silent. "Zhis is zhe 'Receiving Laboratory', vhere all of our more interesting specimens and materials are d-decontaminated in order to ensure zhat zhey are fit and won’t infect zhe other experiments."

"A functional recieving f-floor is imperative."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Greeting Area]

"Well now. The facility revealed at last."
She had more than a little interest for all those sealed doors they passed, but held it back under "Look Into This Later". Her curiosity is quite literally unstoppable, in her opinion.
There's always time and opportunity in the future.

But in the present!
The present has this fascinating little hodgepodge of scientific refuse and earnest desire to impress.
It's cute, in a short-lived mortal sort of way.

Feia turns her head hither and yon, to get a good view of what may be seen as Kramolagh grins away, and makes a pleased sort of noise before looking back to him.
A teasing grin presents itself to her host and a hand gestures to what is being presented around them.
"I see you've proven your ability to make toys. But where are the grown up projects?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

Kramolagh nods, taking in the familiar chamber, a wistful expression upon his face. Each of the impressive projects on display here boasted enormous potential, once. Gazing upon the line of extravagant failures often inspired a feeling of melancholy within the man, as well as a sort of grim determination. Before Kramolagh can respond, the unusually pale woman behind the counter smiles brightly, her perfect teeth glittering in the harsh light broadcast overhead. She offers a perfectly manicured hand to Feia carefully, with the air of one who's carried through these steps countless times.

The handshake lingers for precisely the right amount of time before she steps away, nodding her head curtly. After her handshake, the woman speaks, her voice cheery and kind despite the somewhat pained expression upon her face, visible only in the far-corners of her eyes.

"Welcome, I am Myranda. Your scheduled tour of the facility is to begin shortly, and will be initiated as soon as you have signed a few papers, which you will find here. Do not look so glum, miss! These documents are there to protect you."

"I am required to warn you that these documents are legally binding, and that your signature is mandatory should you wish to proceed."

"Thank you."

--

Her wide smile fades away as if by command.
At this point, Kramolagh glances towards Feia then, offering a confident smile at odds with the somewhat distant expression worn previously.

"Ah, vhe vhill get to zhem in t-time."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

While she follows through most of the etiquette smoothly as expected (handshake, smile, greet, nod), Feia acquires a mildly perplexed arched eyebrow towards Myranda.
This time she doesn't really bother to restrain her curiosity too far, regardless of any potential rudeness towards Kramolagh and Myranda.

Her left eye retakes the reptilian appearance she waved at Kramolagh earlier in the day, with the slight different of what look to be faint purple sparks crawling over the narrowed iris.
It looks more for the reality of the situation. Magical tampering. Outside interference. The framework of something that used to be human, but is no longer.
Or perhaps just a sadly damaged mind.

Barring the absence of any of this, perhaps instead just a highly disciplined individual who is slightly unhappy with their job, she dismisses her gaze and thinks nothing more of it.
Otherwise there may be some alternative conversation happening shortly.

"I would rather prefer to read these documents, before I am inclined to sign anything."
Contracts can be dangerous. Particularly when someone has been "dabbling" in certain things.

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

Cauvin smiles warmly to Feia before merely stepping away for a moment to admire a particularly ornate display. "Mm, take your t-time, madame. I've cleared my schedule for zhe r-rest of zhe evening." The dragon's magical detection fails to uncover anything of note, the woman has not been magically tampered with nor touched by the unknown. The attractive woman appears to be little more than a somewhat overworked human being.

The contract itself detects as magical, albeit harmless.

--

[Arkhosia]

[Aurelia Laur’ve - Wingless Rock Research Facility - Deep Storage]

Aurelia’s eyes widen a little as the glowing device is produced, her gaze affixed upon the sinister glow as it powers up. She isn’t quite sure what the object is supposed to do, but her gut tells her it isn’t exactly going to be pleasant. The blonde’s tone betrays the poor attempt at a calm and collected demeanor as she continues the rather one-sided conversation, picking up a little in tempo and desperation as she speaks. ”H-hey now, t-that doesn’t seem entirely necessary! I-I’m perfectly willing to cooperate, I don’t see why this is warran-“ All protests are cut short with a thrust and a crackle, and everything goes black.

Coming to for the second time that day, the woman gives her surroundings a rather disoriented circumspection. The room looks rather ornate in comparison to the brief flashes she remembers of the lab from before, but the architecture is enough for her to grasp that the environs haven’t entirely changed. Shivering, she looks down to her garments with a frown, feeling a little disappointed. They were a welcome change from before, but they could have at least given her something more... flattering, perhaps? At least she looked good earlier.
Such self-obsessed musings are cut off as the foreboding figure across the room speaks up, attracting the still slightly dazed young blonde’s attention. A thin eyebrow arches at the remark, and the vaguely Franco-Germanic maiden pauses before speaking.
”Oh, is that what my name is? Forgive me, I don’t remember much... and those ruffians of yours didn’t exactly make for a pleasant first one either, so forgive me if I seem a little apprehensive.”
Her memory may be shot to hell, but her vocabulary certainly hasn’t suffered, it seems.

[Hattish Thing]

[Aurelia Laur’ve - Wingless Rock Research Facility - Meeting Area]

The gray-coated man leans forward, clasping his gloved hands together. He stares towards Aurelia for several long seconds, his hardened expression quite difficult to read, his gaze unfathomable from beneath his darkened spectacles. After a long, heavy pause, he speaks once more, sharp, white teeth glittering in the light.

His voice is quiet, but intense. Charming yet unnerving all at once.

"Tell me... vhat d-do you remember?"

[Arkhosia]

[Aurelia Laur’ve - Wingless Rock Research Facility - Meeting Area]

The gray-coated man leans forward, clasping his gloved hands together. He stares towards Aurelia for several long seconds, his hardened expression quite difficult to read, his gaze unfathomable from beneath his darkened spectacles. After a long, heavy pause, he speaks once more, sharp, white teeth glittering in the light.

His voice is quiet, but intense. Charming yet unnerving all at once.

"Tell me... vhat d-do you remember?"

The silence hangs in the air as the strange man peers at the woman, and Aurelia can’t help but fidget uncomfortably under the enigmatic gaze. She had good intuition when it came to reading people, or at least she felt she did, which made it all the more disconcerting that he was so hard to discern. Almost as disconcerting as the silence, frankly. She had always lived in the hustle and bustle of the cities - which ones and where, she had no clue - and quiet moments were rare and minute. It’s why she was so chatty when she’s nervous.
”Honestly, nothing but brief snippets of emotion, flashes. The paved streets of some preindustrial metropolis, a dark room with a bloody chair, a dazzling casino... and then searing pain, a degree of which I’ve never experienced before. Probably what those scars are from. What are those? Gunshot wounds? They look like gunshot wounds. Terrible waste of bullets.”

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - Receiving Laboratory


[Magtok - (Alternate) Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area -> Receiving Laboratory]

Once Magtok finishes signing each of the documents within the folder upon the nearby table, the secretary takes a few moments to insert each document into a specific slot nearby for later transference to the recordkeeping department. The moment she finishes, she nods towards Kramolagh before leading the small gathering down a long hall to left, through several thick looking doors.

"Please, follow me."

--

Myranda begins to move at a brisk pace, leading the small gathering through the longest hall yet, complete with extraordinarily thick blast doors twice the size of any encountered so far. Kramolagh himself steps forward, accessing a panel built into the imposing doors. The blast doors open slowly, causing the floor itself to grind and quake as it opens wide, revealing an expansive laboratory floor complete with a number of scurrying assistants and exhausted researchers. Fluid-filled canisters attached to the walls contain a range of small creatures floating in stasis. Ominous scanning machines line the southernmost wall, and several computers can be seen.

Several rows of sensors as well as a conveyor-like machine dominate the southern wall of the chamber. Kramolagh speaks here, while Myranda remains silent. "Zhis is zhe 'Receiving Laboratory', vhere all of our more interesting specimens and materials are d-decontaminated in order to ensure zhat zhey are fit and won’t infect zhe other experiments."

"A functional recieving f-floor is imperative."

Magtok can't help but roll his eye. Do they really put this much time and effort into something so boring? Is that how science works when it's not mad? Decontamination, bah. Back at the MagCave we just dealt with these things as they came up, used robots and telewarps to figure out if anything was carrying a horrible, civilization-ruining plague, and sent out an emergency taskforce to shoot the problem if it got really bad. He makes a note of this for the MagCave reconstruction efforts later, though. Just until we get the Magbots and telewarps running, of course. I'm sure Kram won't mind; what's a little plagiarism between friends?

"Fascinating," the cyborg lies, trying to look interested as he wonders when they'll get to whatever foul and terrible death machine the Executor has picked out for him. A giant doomsday mecha? Translating ancient runes on the desiccated corpse of a giant cyborg kraken? Producing revolutionary new AI for the dark robot gods Kram's envisioned? I hope that whatever it is, it'll be worth sitting through all of this and tolerating the Executor's continued existence for so long.

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory -> Production and Robotics]

Kramolagh nods politely in response to the cyborg's rather straightforward comment, before gesturing once more to Myranda.

"Now, s-shall vhe?"

The tired-looking secretary nods back wordlessly before continuing deeper into the facility, navigating for quite some time through the winding metal halls of Slumbersun, stopping at numerous points to glance towards countless laboratories and subdivisions, although a vast majority of the laboratories are merely glossed over or ignored entirely.

Eventually, the gathering finds themselves atop a large catwalk which spans across an enormous metallic central chamber. Below, a wealth of metallic workbenches for the crafting, repair, and dismantling of technological objects, overseen by several automated claws can be seen. Several partially dismantled mechanical creatures—some that resemble humanoids, others more like insects, hang suspended from the ceiling by powerful cables. Dozens of powerful computers line the walls here, and assistants scurry about within the area despite the fact that is is nearly midnight.

The head of a massive humanoid automaton over one-hundred and twenty feet tall hangs over a deep extradimensional pit which dominates the northern section of the walls, not fully attached to the rest of the chassis partially stored within the area. It appears inactive, but sparks continuously due to the small army of repair drones crawling across its many thick starmetal panels. Numerous side-rooms lead to unlabeled secondary laboraties, including one lab which appears to only be accessible via blast doors.

Etched into the metal above the blast doors, the phrase "Artifical Divinity" can be seen.

--

After a moment, Myranda speaks. "I believe you will find this area particularly exciting! This industrial laboratory serves both as a chamber dedicated to technological experimentation as well as a fully functional starmetal foundry and contains one of the largest automatons ever created by Conference Z."

"In addition, it serves as the primary laboratory most often utilized by our Advanced Technologies Division."

--

Kramolagh interjects at this point. "Zhis is a-also vhere a majority of zhe technological research is conducted, and vhere you vhill spend most of your time, should you chose to accept."

--

[Aurelia Laur’ve - Wingless Rock Research Facility - Meeting Area]

The gray-coated man continues to stare forward, unblinkingly, for several seconds before reaching into his enormous coat and retrieving a black folder. Wordlessly, the man slides the folder over, clasping his hands together once more. The instant Aurelia opens the folder, she will be confronted by pictures of her own gore-splattered corpse.

He speaks, no trace of emotion evident. "Forty-seven splinter-shells vhere r-removed from your chest."

"Do you know vhy?"

[Lord Magtok]

Production and Robotics

"Artificial divinity? Starmetal?" Magtok asks, finally finding something that merits his attention and curiosity. The mechanical creatures...is there a uniformity to their design, or are they all things the Executor's people struck down in the field, and dragged out here to scavenge and cannibalize? Magtok bets it's the latter. This whole operation definitely seems to tend more towards reverse-engineering than innovating, but that's alright. That just means it'll be even easier to make a name for ourselves here, to put all these lowly peons in their place with our engineering brilliance. You can only go so far with parasitism and mimicry; real genius and creativity is needed if you want the kind of spectacle and might the people of the Nexus crave.

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory -> Production and Robotics]

Kramolagh shrugs somewhat in at Amity's rather straightforward comment, uttering a particularly cryptic response.

"Ah, don't vhe all."

He nods towards Myranda at this point, who nods back before continuing. Eventually, the gathering finds themselves atop a large catwalk which spans across a metallic central chamber. Below, a wealth of metallic workbenches for the crafting, repair, and dismantling of technological objects, overseen by several automated claws can be seen. Several partially dismantled mechanical creatures—some that resemble humanoids, others more like insects, hang suspended from the ceiling by powerful cables. Dozens of powerful computers line the walls here, and assistants scurry about within the area despite the fact that is is nearly midnight.

The head of a massive humanoid automaton over one-hundred and twenty feet tall hangs over a deep extradimensional pit which dominates the northern section of the walls, not fully attached to the rest of the chassis partially stored within the area. It appears inactive, but sparks continuously due to the small army of repair drones crawling across its many thick starmetal panels.

After a moment, Myranda speaks. "I believe you will find this area particularly exciting! This industrial laboratory serves both as a chamber dedicated to technological experimentation as well as a fully functional starmetal foundry and contains one of the largest automatons ever created by Conference Z."

"In addition, it serves as the primary laboratory most often utilized by our Advanced Technologies Division."[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

Amity looks over the massive mech, even as Tank presses his face up against the window to get a better view of it all. Amity frowns, however, "What exactly is the purpose of such a large robot? It seems to me like it's oversized enough to be a considerable problem for most operations; you generally want to build machinery that's sized relative to the endgoal, and honestly, I just don't see us having to deal with many hundred foot tall monstrosities. It won't be worthwhile against human installations, animals don't get up to that size, and the logistics of keeping something that large from buckling under its own weight is crazy. It seems like you'd be better off just making an army of slightly larger than human-sized robots than making one ridiculous powerhouse."

Unlike with the nanomachines, this time she isn't ranting; she's just asking about operational uses for something that large. Once she has her answer, she says, "Also, where did the insectoid robots come from? That's not something I've really seen a design for before."

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

A majority of the half-dismantled automatons seem to have been salvaged from elsewhere, judging by their myriad designs, many of which seem far too gaudy and unusual for the likes of Conference Z. The small army of engineers and mechanical claws built into the cieling appear to be purposefully dismantling these machines, taking extensive notes of their designs and functions within holographic panels broadcast by small technological crystals built into the wall.

However, the largest of the automatons certainly stands out, for unlike the others, the enormous robotic humanoid suspended over extradimensional storage appears to be a unique creation. Though still little more than a skeleton in some places, a majority of the automaton's body appears to have been plated by panels of an eerie chromatic metal which seems to glint and glare in the light in an almost otherworldly fashion. Thousands of bright circuitboard rune-patterns have been built into the panels, causing the entire thing to glow a bluish shade.

--

Kramolagh glances towards the ominous blast door, responding to the cyborg. "Surely y-you have heard of zhe phrase, "a god from zhe machine", hm? Across many realities, zhere exists a c-constant; zhe rule zhat a divinity's power is only ever as strong as it's vhorshippers faith in zhe divinity. In zhese realities, belief itself acts as a divine catalyst. Vhile not a universal law by any means, zhe theory is common enough to have warranted zhe devotion of Conference resources."

"You see, vhe have discovered how to simulate belief. Vhe have created countless s-simulations of countless vhorlds within zhe processors of one of zhe most powerful supercomputers ever constructed, each artificial universe randomly generated save for one universal constant between iterations; zhe presence of an artificial intelligence granted god-like powers over zhe simulations. Over time, zhe artificial intelligence within has b-become more and more self-aware of its own power, it has even taken a name for itself."

"Over time, zhe artificial intelligence within has realized zhat the virtual lives it created in these countless vhorlds increasingly venerate it as a divine being, and to zhis day it rules over countless simulations as a god. In time, vhe believe zhat, by continuing to foster zhese synthetic minds and exert its influence over zhe simulations, it vhill manifest divine powers beyond zhe simulations."

"Tests have suggested zhat zhe moment of ascendence is not too far off, either..."

--

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

Kramolagh nods, responding swiftly. "Very good."

"Vhile s-size itself generally possesses no inherent value past a certain point, in zhis particular instance, a particularly large chassis is imperative. You see, a chassis of suitable size and strength is required in order to contain zhe technological components capable of harboring a nascent "godmind"."

"An artificial, technological divinity..."

--

"As for zhe insectoid automatons, vhell... Zhey are actually exoskeletons of a sort."

"Vhe have received... visitors, you see."

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

Amity looks deeply skeptical, but doesn't argue the point, "I'll have to see your math on this Godmind before I can properly discuss it. Are the bugs an ongoing problem? Something you're expecting to hit you more? what sort of defenses are in place for dealing with them?"

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh taps at the glass, causing one of the Conference Mechanics to turn, their face obscured by a protective mask. In a complicated sign language not unlike the kind practiced frequently by the drow, the gray-coated man conveys Eralae's request, which is accurately received by the masked mechanic.

As the mechanic begins to tap specifications into the device, Kramolagh responds to Sorrnolu.

"Zhere is, yes. Zhe r-range of such a device is far more limited, but it is n-no less potent. If it is concealment you are vhorried about, negotiations could be re-opened in order to d-discuss zhe creation of a cloaking device specific to zhe demands of zhe device before you."

"Vhat do you say? Ah, b-but, I shall let you think on it. It is time for zhe d-demonstration."

--

Kramolagh nods to the mechanic, who promptly begins to pull several levers and press a multitude of complicated buttons. The half-elf begins to struggle and thrash within her bindings as the second mechanic approaches. The device begins to thrum softly, as an invisible carrier ray is projected by the end of the device, directly into the woman. The second mechanic promptly frees her of her bindings.

The effect is almost instantaneous, for seconds later, she kneels hard, her knees slamming into the bottom of the metallic bunker.

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Erelae seems satisfied with the result, but wants to see more. "Have her fall in love with the next prisoner." She requests.

Sornnolu watches approvingly.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics

"I don't suppose you can tell me what your plans are for its apotheosis? The systems you've put in place to keep your machine god from buying into the hype, truly believing it is the one true lord and master over all of reality, and violently restructuring your entire compound into a temple dedicated to the veneration of the almighty Deus Machina?" Magtok frowns, more than a little concerned. That's the problem with making things stronger than yourself. Eventually, they figure out what you've known all along, that they can leave any time they want, and that with all of their amazing cosmic power, they ought to be deciding their own destiny, and you should be left behind in the flaming wreckage of its backstory, another foolish scientist condemned to the same smoldering heap where all the other scientists go after building a superweapon they can't control.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

Cauvin smiles warmly to Feia before merely stepping away for a moment to admire a particularly ornate display. "Mm, take your t-time, madame. I've cleared my schedule for zhe r-rest of zhe evening." The dragon's magical detection fails to uncover anything of note, the woman has not been magically tampered with nor touched by the unknown. The attractive woman appears to be little more than a somewhat overworked human being.

The contract itself detects as magical, albeit harmless.

Feia reads through the contract once, twice, and thrice.
Frowns.
Sniffs the contract.
Gives a somewhat undignified snort.

"Mister Kramolagh, what would you do if someone had already gone this far and refused to sign your papers?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

Kramolagh scoffs here before responding rather swiftly, while all the while several engineers continue to tap away at enormous holographic screens below. "Ah, perhaps you misunderstand, Ms. Amity."
"Our othervhorldy v-visitors, zhey comes primarily as allies, of a sort."

"Zhe shells you see, zhey vhere lawfully exchanged."

--

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

The gray-coated man grimaces somewhat at Eralae's request, distaste quite evident upon his face. He glances towards Sornnolu, hoping for some sort of a specification or clarification only to notice the same disturbingly glazed expression. Breathing in deeply, Kramolagh smiles, swallowing his feelings on the matter.

Despite the fact that he was greatly alarmed by the request, this was company business, and as such, it was best to remain professional.

"Mm."
"I feel I should vharn y-you, first. Love is a particularly complicated emotion to quantify. As s-such, vhat you are about to see is more akin to infatuation."

--

He nods, which causes the pyschotronic operator to begin to activate the device once more. Almost immediately, the elven woman rises, revealing her bruised and bloodied knees. She gazes longingly towards the second test subject before limping over to the chair in which the second prisoner, a tired looking human woman, is contained.

Ignoring the pain rushing through her legs, the elven woman begins to eagerly kiss and caress the other prisoner, whispering softly as the other woman struggles and cries for help.

--

As the infatuated elf begins to allow her hands and lips to wander, Kramolagh glances towards Eralae. "Vhell."

"Zhere you are."

--

[Magtok - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

Kramolagh chuckles darkly to himself here before responding, staring off towards the heavy door leading deeper into the aformentioned artificial divinity laboratory. "Vhe are careful, cyborg. During each of zhe simulations, vhe have punished or revharded certain behaviors, influencing its personality as time goes on."

"Psychological conditioning, vhe have replicated zhe "ascension" via separate simulations."
"So far, results have been f-favorable."

--

He continues after a few seconds.

"Of course, should zhe unthinkable happen, vhell..."
"Vhe have taken other precautions."

--

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

Kramolagh continues to smile widely, though his cold, gray eyes do narrow somewhat, undetectable from beneath the thick onyx lenses of his starmetal spectacles. "Vhell, zhey vhould be e-escorted off zhe premises, after receiving a pyschotronic pulse. Harmless, of course. Zhey vhould remember nothing."

"Zhey vhould zhen, hypothetically, be returned from whence they came, n-never to be contacted again."

"A tremendous vhaste of time and resources, but a necessary one."

"Vhy ask?"

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics

"I suppose I should be honest and say I don't have a whole lot of faith in that answer," Magtok frowns, before shaking his head. Nothing to be done about that right now, though. Hopefully we'll be out of here before that particular volcano erupts. If not...well, we've got other clones, they'll figure something out. Even if that something else is flinging themselves to the other side of the multiverse and holding a funerary service on behalf of the entire Nexus, we'll still accomplish something, I'm sure.

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

"So trade partners, then. Can't say I've ever met friendly bugs," Amity says, frowning. She sighs, and Tank traces his claw down along the wall, possibly leaving a scrap in it, "We should move on. I want to finish this tour."

[Hattish Thing]

[Magtok - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

Kramolagh clasps his gloved hands together before gesturing towards an assistant, responding somewhat absentmindedly. "It is fortunate zhen, Magtok, zhat vhe have not hired you for your faith." After several seconds, the gray-coated man waves away the assistant before turning once more to the cyborg.

He offers a small smile. "Now zhat you've taken some t-time to become acquainted with your p-potential vhorkplace, vhould you like to view y-your accommodations, or shall vhe get straight to zhe papervhork?"

--

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics -> Alien Observation Dome]

Curiously enough, the oversized lizard-like creature may note that his scratch fails to register entirely upon the wall, for the strange metal appears just as clean and unmarred as ever. Kramolagh winces, noticing the action, before merely gesturing for the secretary to continue her tour of the facility. After several minutes, the small procession approaches one of the largest rooms within the entire structure, one which appears to have once been a natural cavern. The tall ceiling of this enormous cavern rises twenty feet above the catwalk that the small gathering stands upon, thirty feet above the chamber below. The expansive, mist-filled glass chamber itself appears to contain a warm, otherwordly jungle.

Blue-hued light emanates from the domed ceiling at the center of the two-story, artificial environment below while broad metal grates make a perimeter about the room about ten feet above the lush habitat below. Paths cross between strange shrubs and low trees, and vines cling to the walls and dangle in clumps across parts of the ceiling. At the center of the room stands a small metal pavilion, a small elevator that the researchers use to introduce live prey into the room and feed the strange beasts.

Behind the thick glass in the southern corners of the room lie small laboratories filled with bookshelves, dissection tables, and workbenches.

"Welcome," exclaims Myranda "to the Observation Dome."

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

"Hmm," Amity says, looking over the artifical jungles. She's more familiar with wasteland areas - the only jungles she knows of are from Africa, that mythical continent across the ocean from where she used to live, "Any chance I could get a demonstration? Live feeding, maybe."

Tank is showing his interest as well. He's never seen plant life so lush! So humid! He wouldn't enjoy living there, but it's such a curiosity that he wants to know more.

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics

"Hah. You got me there, Kram." He's not too proud to admit it when someone's bested him in these little verbal jousts, especially when it's with a remark as sharp as that one. Almost enough to make him forget his concerns about the god-machine entirely. "Anyway, I've lived in a cave most my life, with several hundred roommates all sharing the same bathrooms. I'm sure my quarters will be fine," Magtok shrugs. If he's at least provided a cot and his own shower, he won't have anything to concern himself with, aside from figuring out how often he's actually allowed to leave this place. The whole 'we have a room for you here, you're not going anywhere' thing is a little worrying and aligns with some earlier suspicions, but we'll figure something out, probably. Worst case scenario, we can always aggressively redecorate the room and act so obnoxiously in the bathrooms that we get our own time to ourselves in there, all while plotting our inevitable escape back to the Nexus, of course.

[Hattish Thing]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

Kramolagh laughs awkwardly for a few seconds, the harsh sounds reverberating throughout the area. "I... vhell, certainly." The gray-coated man clasps his hands together, a somewhat distracted expression upon his face before he waves over an assistant.

A whispered conversation occurs for a moment or two before several operators below begin to tap at large computers.

--

Below, a section of the lush green jungle floor begins to split open, revealing a platform covered in heaps of meat. The enormous chunks radiate steam for several moments as rain continues to fall within the glass dome, a fine mist rolling across the lush, green ground. For quite some time, there's little sound save for the screeching of frightened animals echoing from within the habitat dome. However, after several uncomfortable moments, a sickening squelching noise can be heard, as if some vile polyp of extraordinary size had been violently squeezed and popped.

As the foul squelching ceases, a gruesome sucking noise begins. Seconds more pass, until a creature appears beside the mound of meat, as if it had emerged from invisibility. The creature, somewhat hidden within the misty veil below, lets out an ear-splitting shriek once it comes into view, it's screeching tone reverberating with unnatural clarity through the dome. As it reveals it's horrific countenance, Amity's eyes may instinctively gaze at the creature from the ground up, travelling from the smeared trail of fresh, watery blood beneath the creature, up to it's sickening form. Each of her eyes would take in a gruesome sight, the mere act of gazing upon the creature perhaps filling her with heart-wrenching horror.

The creature below steps forward through the puddles of rainwater and gore upon a horrific tangle of pulsating tendrils, breathing uncomfortably hard as it gorges itself, gobs of bloody drool pooling forth from it's gaping, tentacle-covered maw, it's slime-slicked form caked in gore. The blood-drenched monstrosity resembles some twisted hybrid creature, a hideous amalgamation; part massive scaleless serpent, part insectoid horror, but most unsettlingly... part humanoid, albeit quite massive in size. Numerous half-formed limbs can be seen upon the creature, whose pus-encrusted flesh appears to have sloughed off it's exposed bones in gory flaps. It's belly, normally tight against its form, bulges out, engorged and swollen with its latest meal.

It's most sickening quality, however, would be the fact that hundreds of startlingly humanoid eyes line the foul thing, as if they'd burst forth from beneath it's flesh.

--

The beast continues to feast, unnatural eyes piercing through the mist, rows upon rows of yellowed, infected, dagger-like teeth bared as it sniffs the air, it's frothy maw dripping with bloody slather and saliva. As it finishes, the creature turns it's "head", and lets out a blood-curdling scream. Seconds later, the bloated belly it drags beneath it begins to swell and balloon, before the creature's gaping maw unhinges and distends, stretching wide. A disgusting slurping, choking noise begins to originate from the creature's gaping maw, before it promptly vomits forth a mass of bones.

--

[Magtok - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics -> Meeting Room]

Kramolagh nods curtly before merely gesturing for the secretary to lead the way. She smiles warmly before gesturing towards an exit. After several minutes, the small procession approaches one of the nicer areas of the facility, clearly designed to impress.

This large egg-shaped chamber has smooth, seamless walls of silvery metal. Light gleams from numerous freely suspended orbs that slowly circle the top of the high, curved ceiling. In the center of the room stands a strange triangular-shaped metal table surrounded by a dozen chairs. Along the edges of the chamber trail several additional rows of chairs, all facing the center table. One of the walls within this room is fashioned entirely of sparkling glass, dominated by an enormous computer screen.

He sits down, gesturing for Magtok. The screen itself blares to life soon after, revealing what appears to be several faceless men in suits.

"Please, sit. Zhese are our lawyers."



https://images-ext-1.discordapp.net/external/XuoaFDerK3rN6OR81ymzbSKn29e0fTrOpdWsS2FaOL8/https/i.pinimg.com/originals/de/5b/b9/de5bb9dc653ed1de7fea0bf9a995462a.jpg?width=507&height=676

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

Amity watches. Tank sits on his haunches, impassive, and takes in all the details.

Even when bones are being rent, screams echoing through the not-glass barrier, they simply watch the thing as it goes about its business, a casual but interested air about them. Amity sits with her hands behind her back, her posture not rigid, but focused, as she takes in the sight before her. It's true, she wouldn't want to try fighting this thing, but it doesn't frighten her, like it might with some. It doesn't even get her to shift her stance. She's seen things like this before, and while she isn't used to this particular variant, she's far from intimidated. Tank, meanwhile looks at it like he's sizing up a potential rival, but not one that's hostile right now.

"I'm impressed at how fast it digests - the owl method of spitting up the things it can't eat is interesting. Was this a custom made creature, or something the Company found during their travels?"

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

The gray-coated man grimaces somewhat at Eralae's request, distaste quite evident upon his face. He glances towards Sornnolu, hoping for some sort of a specification or clarification only to notice the same disturbingly glazed expression. Breathing in deeply, Kramolagh smiles, swallowing his feelings on the matter.

Despite the fact that he was greatly alarmed by the request, this was company business, and as such, it was best to remain professional.

"Mm."
"I feel I should vharn y-you, first. Love is a particularly complicated emotion to quantify. As s-such, vhat you are about to see is more akin to infatuation."

--

He nods, which causes the pyschotronic operator to begin to activate the device once more. Almost immediately, the elven woman rises, revealing her bruised and bloodied knees. She gazes longingly towards the second test subject before limping over to the chair in which the second prisoner, a tired looking human woman, is contained.

Ignoring the pain rushing through her legs, the elven woman begins to eagerly kiss and caress the other prisoner, whispering softly as the other woman struggles and cries for help.

--

As the infatuated elf begins to allow her hands and lips to wander, Kramolagh glances towards Eralae. "Vhell."

"Zhere you are."


[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

"That's enough." Sornnolu says sternly, he was frowning not liking what he saw.

Erelae, too, seemed disappointed. "Infatuation isn't enough, I don't think. Not for what we had planned."

"Can you inspire loyalty?" Sornnolu asks next.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

Kramolagh continues to smile widely, though his cold, gray eyes do narrow somewhat, undetectable from beneath the thick onyx lenses of his starmetal spectacles. "Vhell, zhey vhould be e-escorted off zhe premises, after receiving a pyschotronic pulse. Harmless, of course. Zhey vhould remember nothing."

"Zhey vhould zhen, hypothetically, be returned from whence they came, n-never to be contacted again."

"A tremendous vhaste of time and resources, but a necessary one."

"Vhy ask?"

Feia frowns at that response and brandishes the paper a little.
"And what, pray tell, would you do if someone who knew how to handle themselves refused to sign your papers? Or if they were simply resistant to your mental tampering and left, pretending otherwise, then revealed you to the world?"

A pen bounces around the edges of the paper, aloft in a haze of purple sparks.
"Or perhaps they simply aren't afraid of the consequences of your contract. Perhaps, instead, they see it as a challenge, a dare."
A separate haze of sparks flits around behind her, taking the rough shapes of a humanoid figure axing apart a bunch of boxy, robotic figures.
"Please tell me you have more concrete defensive measures than the imbecilic law machines of the outer planes."

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - Meeting Room

"This is the last time I have to sign a bunch of papers before you give me a project or something and we start talking about doing actual science and stuff, right?" Magtok pleads, not used to all of this formality, this pomp and circumstance. Usually when a MagClone wants something done, they just go out and do it. If they can't or don't feel like doing so themselves, they just tell a Magbot or staff member to get it done, and most interviews for MagCave positions amounted to little more than a few pointed questions and a suspicious squint before the candidate was brought aboard.

[Hattish Thing]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

Kramolagh stares through Amity for several seconds, assessing her reaction to the creation from beneath the inscrutable onyx lenses of his starmetal spectacles. Finally, he turns away from her, staring back towards the creature within the habitat dome. Cautiously, the entity looks about, tendrils writhing as if sensing the surrounding area, before fading once more into invisibility.

The gray-coated man responds slowly, thinking back to the fateful night that he'd encountered the original creature.

"It came from zhe stars, Ms. Amity."

"I remember it w-well, that night. Hurtling across the star-wrought sky, a shard of alien malignity."

--

[Magtok - Meeting Room]

Over the next hour or so, the man's contract is formulated by Kramolagh and the small team of artificial lawyers built into the room. The contract itself states, quite clearly, information relevant to Magtok's employment at Conference Z, and that contract violations are, of course, enforced quite brutally by the inevitables. Essentially, the cyborg will be working nine hours per day, five days a week. Should his research and/or contributions be deemed inadequate by the company (case-by-case basis), the cyborg will be given a period of time in which he is to improve upon his performance.

Should Magtok fail to meet expectations past this period, he will be removed. Actions against the company, associates, and employees are not to be tolerated.

Once the specifics are fleshed out, Kramolagh retrieves a specific pen from within his coat, offering it. "Shall vhe?"

--

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

Kramolagh's expression fades into one more akin to the look he offered towards Feia during their initial meeting, one of cold yet polite professionalism. He clasps his gloved hands together before breathing in and exhaling softly, a faint smile upon his unusually angled, yet attractive face.

He speaks, soft and gentle. "I'm afraid, Ms. Feia, zhat discussing facility security vhould be a violation of company policy."

"Rest assured, vhe are vhell-prepared f-for such an occurrence."

--

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

The gray-coated man's response is brief, but straightforward.

"Loyalty towards vh-vhat?"

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

"So, some kind of alien with biological cloaking technology," Amity nods to herself, "I'll have to get more details later. I've seen things about as bad, physically, before, but never this particular shape."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

Kramolagh's expression fades into one more akin to the look he offered towards Feia during their initial meeting, one of cold yet polite professionalism. He clasps his gloved hands together before breathing in and exhaling softly, a faint smile upon his unusually angled, yet attractive face.

He speaks, soft and gentle. "I'm afraid, Ms. Feia, zhat discussing facility security vhould be a violation of company policy."

"Rest assured, vhe are vhell-prepared f-for such an occurrence."

Images of sandy wastelands and apocalyptic violence curl through her mind, the deeply ingrained need to remind the lesser races of power's heirarchy.
This translates primarily to a disapproving frown at the contract, while the purple sparks around her flick out of existence.

Feia intakes a deep breath, drawing forth air strongly enough to be felt as a mild breeze and gently releases much of it back out through pursed lips.
The nearby floating pen signs the papers, disappears into one of her pockets, and she passes the contract back towards the secretary.
"I forget the period you have settled into. You are unaware of the dangers. In time, perhaps."

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

The two drow exchange glances. With a nod from Erelae, Sornnolu replies "A goddess."

[Lord Magtok]

Magtok - Slumbersun Meeting Room

"Working nine to five, what a way to make a living," Magtok remarks, making yet another dumb reference as he puts pen to paper and signs his name on the dotted line. It's one of those weird celebrity type of signatures, where legibility and sensibility have been sacrificed, all for the sake of having something unique that can be done quickly and consistently, over and over again, until the press event is over. A big, stylish 'M' and a bunch of ugly little squiggles.

"Alright. I'll try not to go running off to save and/or take over the world before I've accrued some vacation time, Executor," he teases, knowing full well that even if he did do something like that, the Nexus would probably insist all his heroics/villainy happened on weekends or after work, because it'd much rather witness the drama that comes of a deliberate attempt to betray the Conference, and the Inevitable battle that comes with it. Getting murdered by a clockwork robot for using up all your sick days might be kinda funny, but nowhere near dramatic enough for this stupid melodramatic, arguably sapient universe.

[Hattish Thing]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

Kramolagh nods before the communications device worn at his wrist begins to glow a soft, blue light. The Executor frowns before pressing at the device, glancing towards a small holographic screen produced by the wrist-worn item. As he begins to read through the message, he frowns, his eyes narrowing, expression darkening.

He dismisses the screen before offering a polite smile towards Amity.

"I'm afraid I've urgent b-business to attend to, Ms. Taurel vhill have to continue without me."

"I look forward to checking in at zhe beginning of zhe vheek, Ms. Amity."



[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh offers a polite nod, smiling coldly as he does so. "Consider it done. In fact, vhe have utilized zhis technology on occasion to assist in several of our divinity-related p-projects. Vhe have found zhat zhe device, f-for all intents and purposes, replicates devotion without error."

"Which deity?"



[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Greeting Area]

Kramolagh's unusual expression betrays the perfectly rehearsed smile upon his angular face, the only response to Feia's apparent distaste. "Now, with zhe p-papervhork out of zhe vhay, vhe can p-proceed vith zhe tour of our f-facility. Usually, potential researchers are shown the employee barracks, but in zhis c-case, I rather doubt it vhill be necessary."

"Lead zhe vhay, if you vhould, Ms. Taurel."

--

Myranda begins to move at a brisk pace, leading the small gathering through the longest hall yet, complete with extraordinarily thick blast doors twice the size of any encountered so far. Kramolagh himself steps forward, accessing a panel built into the imposing doors. The blast doors open slowly, causing the floor itself to grind and quake as it opens wide, revealing an expansive laboratory floor, complete with a number of scurrying assistants and exhausted researchers. Fluid-filled canisters attached to the walls contain a range of small creatures floating in stasis. Ominous scanning machines line the southernmost wall, and several computers can be seen.

Several rows of sensors as well as a conveyor-like machine dominate the southern wall of the chamber. Kramolagh speaks here, while Myranda remains silent. "Zhis is zhe 'Receiving Laboratory', vhere all of our more interesting specimens and materials are d-decontaminated in order to ensure zhat zhey are fit and won’t infect zhe other experiments."

"A functional recieving f-floor is imperative."



[Magtok - Slumbersun Meeting Room]

If Kramolagh recognizes the reference, he makes no attempt to show it. Once the contract has been signed, it vanishes entirely, just as the communications device worn at his wrist begins to glow a soft, blue light. The gray-coated man frowns before offering a polite smile to the cyborg, gesturing towards the door.

"Follow me, if you vhould?"

"I have some explaining to d-do, vith regards to your... friend."

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

Kramolagh nods before the communications device worn at his wrist begins to glow a soft, blue light. The Executor frowns before pressing at the device, glancing towards a small holographic screen produced by the wrist-worn item. As he begins to read through the message, he frowns, his eyes narrowing, expression darkening.

He dismisses the screen before offering a polite smile towards Amity.

"I'm afraid I've urgent b-business to attend to, Ms. Taurel vhill have to continue without me."

"I look forward to checking in at zhe beginning of zhe vheek, Ms. Amity."[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

Amity frowns, but nods to Kramolagh, "Very well. I hope whatever it is doesn't cause you too many problems."

Once Kramolagh leaves the room, Amity lets out a sigh, and turns to Myranda, "What's say we wrap this up?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

Myranda appears to visibly relax once Kramolagh takes his leave, pausing for a moment to step away from the railings. She offers a small smile towards Amity before almost apologetically responding, much quieter than before.

"Well, I'm afraid the other primary laboratories are currently in use, so we won't be able to tour those. I could, however, take you to the cafeteria, the computer hall, or the library compound?"

"If I'll be honest, though, I'm not sure you'd find them especially intriguing."

--

[Riss - Wirholdt's Rictus]

After nearly an hour and a half of complete silence, the armored vehicle comes to a stop, many miles away from the city of Inside. Several men in dark suits evacuate the vehicle, sliding Executor Kramolagh's door open. The gray-coated man exits, breathing in the fresh air and standing tall as he gazes out into a dark sky scattered with stars.

One of the dark figures gestures for Riss to get out.

--

The area outside appears to be little more than a seemingly inhospitable strip of land surrounded by rocky mountains which encircle an expansive plantation constructed in the shadow of the mountains. The plantation itself is a sprawling warren of structures, utterly isolated due to its incredible distance from the nearest civilization. In the distance, an elegant manorhouse sits atop one of the higher hills, looming ominously over the rolling rows of cultivated bushes, shrubs, and grasses below, its spiky architecture causing its silhouette to appear somewhat unnerving.

Kramolagh speaks, finally.

"Ah, take in zhe air vhile you c-can."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory]

Now we're starting to move into the meat and purpose of the trip.
This is worth stifling any lingering predatory hostility for.

Feia slowly draws her gaze across the room, taking in everything in view. Analyzing, comparing, only a little judging.
Now we can get back to the sorts of questions Kramolagh is probably appreciative of.
"What constitutes a 'more interesting specimen'? How does your decontamination process ensure that it removes mundane and arcane risk factors?
Are the specimens restrained in some fashion, in case of attempted escape?"
She really could ask questions all day.

[Artemis97]

[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

"Lolth of course." Erelae says without hesitation. "Though, could it be adjusted? There are some minor deities that could be useful to have the ear of at times."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory]

Kramolagh is somewhat distracted by a number of researchers and assistants which pass by, whispering into the man's ear before continuing along their way and resuming their complicated-looking work. Once the last of these assistants pass by, the gray-coated man glances back towards Feia, smiling softly.

He clears his throat.

"My apologies."

--

He adjusts his thick, fur gloves before responding, gesturing across the expansive receiving laboratory in order to accentuate his response. "All s-samples and specimens vhich pass through Slumbersun are charted and assigned a c-category vhich more or less d-describes zhe level of risk associated vith zhe s-specimen. Samples of certain c-categories are afforded an additional level of procedure designed to e-ensure zhe safety of zhe specimen, zhe facility, and any researchers assigned to associated projects."

"As I mentioned, s-security is paramount. As such, a considerable amount of resources have been pooled into zhe r-receiving laboratory, vhich remains vhell-defended from any sort of threat, be it internal or external, mundane or magical. Any sample zhat comes through zhe l-laboratory must pass through the decontamination machines on the far right. Zhe process itself is quite lengthy, featuring over one-hundred and seventy sensory magics layered over an array of technological identifiers."

"Of course. Perhaps, vhen zhe laboratory is more active, I can provide an example."

--

Kramolagh smiles. "Shall vhe move o-on?"



[Xar'Cha Meeting - Wirholdt's Rictus]

Kramolagh nods here, before gesturing towards the technicians. "Vhith ease."

"Vhe have used zhis technology in a similar fashion."

"Zhere is power in faith."

[Halae]

[Amity - Slumbersun Research Facility - Alien Observation Dome]

"I'm always looking for more food, but it's not going anywhere," Amity says, "If that's all that's left, I'd rather we finished up the tour."

Not that this hasn't been enlightening (the nanomachines thing and the alien presence in particular are interesting) but Amity is pretty well done with the situation as it stands.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory]

Vague enough answers, with awareness towards problematic severity and a suggestion of what they can do to learn.
Close enough.
It's something that can be learned upon further later, as Kramolagh has offered.

Feia inclines her head and gestures onwards.
"I would be rather interested in seeing an example, certainly.
Until then, please continue the tour."

[Hattish Thing]

Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping:

Once the receiving laboratory is left far behind, the tour continues for some time, navigating through imposing halls before finally, the gathering approaches a sealed blast door. Kramolagh smiles back towards Feia before nodding curtly and proceeding to interact with a glowing panel. A moment later, the door opens wide, revealing an enormous chamber almost entirely dominated by inexplicable technology.

Several long metallic objects covered with flashing lights and strange glowing panels fight for floor space in this room with large, boxy, cabinet-like metal objects. Here and there on the walls, panels flash images of buildings, rooms, and scenery from throughout the Nexus. This highly secure chamber contains over a dozen fifteen-foot tall silos of strange machinery and glowing circuitboard panels, connected by thick cables and hundreds of wires to a massive supercomputer which dominates the southernmost wall.

Several technicians busy themselves within this room, locked into booth-like computation nooks.

After allowing Feia several seconds to take the room in, Myranda speaks.

"Welcome to recordkeeping, all the lower clearance research conducted here at Slumbersun is filed here, as well as employee information. Due to the state-of-the-art data-encryption software designed by our Advanced Technologies Division, here at Conference Z, we fear no violation of organization privacy."

"In addition, within these powerful computational mechanisms before you, an artificial intelligence specifically designed for this task carries through with Project Chromatica, one of our more successful mass surveillance projects to date."

"Any questions?"

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping]

"Well this looks like an Affidavit-shaped nightmare in waiting", is the first though.
Subsequent thoughts are more rationally spent considering what she sees and how it's actually relevant.

Feia is going to politely avoid the temptation to question precisely how secure their encryption techniques are and the usual drivel behind technological security. She's sure they read some basic IT manuals at some point. Anything else is subject to the whims of the Nexus' madness and likely impossible to prepare for.
Instead, she'll go for the low-hanging fruit of interest.
"This Project Chromatica, what precisely are you surveying that requires an entire artificial intelligence's focus?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping]

Myranda begins to speak before Kramolagh nods curtly, a sign that it was time to allow him to speak. She offers a warm, artificial smile as the gray-coated man begins to respond to Feia, the tone of his voice both smooth and potentially calming. "Why, everyzhing, madame. Zhe results of Project Chromatica, vhile useful for zhe purposes of keeping t-track of potential recruits, are utilized more often in the advanced of other projects centered around zhe advancement of artificial intelligence, most specifically, one vhich I zhink you vhill find quite intriguing."

"Intelligence, after all, is m-measured by ones ability to process and apply information."

"It is learning, every second, at a rate vhich far transcends our own."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Recordkeeping]

Oh, it's a budding AI apocalypse of its own then.
Those are entertaining to watch, at least. And annoying to experience. Note to self: minimize spellcraft variance around the region.

There are a couple other implications here that range from troubling to potentially fascinating.
Particularly:
"If you're suggesting I'll find it particularly interesting due to our immediately aligned projects, are you planning on creating a divine technological intelligence?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Receiving Laboratory -> Production and Robotics]

Kramolagh nods politely in response to Feia's rather straightforward comment, before clasping his gloved hands together.

"More on zhat t-to come. Follow me, if you vhould."

After gesturing towards the tired-looking secretary, the small gathering begins to continue deeper into the facility, navigating for quite some time through the winding metal halls of Slumbersun, stopping at numerous points to glance towards countless laboratories and subdivisions, although a vast majority of the laboratories are merely glossed over or ignored entirely.

Eventually, the gathering finds themselves atop a large catwalk which spans across an enormous metallic central chamber. Below, a wealth of metallic workbenches for the crafting, repair, and dismantling of technological objects, overseen by several automated claws can be seen. Several partially dismantled mechanical creatures—some that resemble humanoids, others more like insects, hang suspended from the ceiling by powerful cables. Dozens of powerful computers line the walls here, and assistants scurry about within the area despite the fact that is is nearly midnight.

The head of a massive humanoid automaton over one-hundred and twenty feet tall hangs over a deep extradimensional pit which dominates the northern section of the walls, not fully attached to the rest of the chassis partially stored within the area. It appears inactive, but sparks continuously due to the small army of repair drones crawling across its many thick starmetal panels. Numerous side-rooms lead to unlabeled secondary laboraties, including one lab which appears to only be accessible via blast doors.

Etched into the metal above the blast doors, the phrase "Artifical Divinity" can be seen.

After a moment, Myranda speaks. "I believe you will find this area particularly exciting! This industrial laboratory serves both as a chamber dedicated to technological experimentation as well as a fully functional starmetal foundry and contains one of the largest automatons ever created by Conference Z."

"In addition, it serves as the primary laboratory most often utilized by our Advanced Technologies Division."

--

Kramolagh interjects at this point, gesturing towards the blast doors below "Artificial Divinity". "Surely y-you have heard of zhe phrase, "a god from zhe machine", hm? Across many realities, zhere exists a c-constant; zhe rule zhat a divinity's power is only ever as strong as it's vhorshippers faith in zhe divinity. In zhese realities, belief itself acts as a divine catalyst. Vhile not a universal law by any means, zhe theory is common enough to have warranted zhe devotion of Conference resources."

"You see, vhe have discovered how to simulate belief. Vhe have created countless s-simulations of countless vhorlds within zhe processors of one of zhe most powerful supercomputers ever constructed, each artificial universe randomly generated save for one universal constant between iterations; zhe presence of an artificial intelligence granted god-like powers over zhe simulations. Over time, zhe artificial intelligence within has b-become more and more self-aware of its own power, it has even taken a name for itself."

"Although it remains c-contained, zhe artificial intelligence within has realized zhat the virtual lives it created in these countless vhorlds increasingly venerate it as a divine being, and to zhis day it rules over countless simulations as a god. In time, vhe believe zhat, by continuing to foster zhese synthetic minds and exert its influence over zhe simulations, it vhill manifest divine powers beyond zhe simulations."

"Tests have suggested zhat zhe moment of ascendance is not too far off, either..."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

Oh yes. Major AI apocalypse material right here.
But a rather fascinating version of it. Usually such entities are referred to as "god-like" in the sense of being terrifying and far beyond the foolish people who designed it.

Not literally godly.

"Really."
Feia is definitely intrigued by this, particularly because it's an avenue of research that she hasn't been able to get to quite yet. She's been exploring technology, after filching some interesting architectural machinery from an abandoned facility, but nothing with any substantial intelligence like this.
Not that she would personally trust something like this either. Because it will absolutely go horribly, horribly wrong.

But it will be a wonderful learning experience in the process! Probably not for these people, when it murders all of them, but wonderful for her.
"All of the iterations within the simulations are working in tandem? Or did they just become aware of each other over time and sync up as a matter of course?"

The witch stares rather intently at the door, mulling over the desire to investigate closer.
"Have you prepared for what it may do once it has 'ascended' past its current confines?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

The gray-coated man nods gravely, rubbing his gloved hands together. "Zhe intelligence, as of zhis m-moment, functions primarily as a sort of collective consciousness, each version aware of zhe ozher. Zhis is both to ensure zhat zhe enormous amount of energy required to manage an artificicial intelligence of its scale is regulated to a manageable level, as vhell as to act as a s-sort of fail-safe. Should any individual consciousness begin to d-develop unfavorably, vhe simply terminate it."

"Eventually, zhe shards vhill s-sync up, vhe believe zhat zhis vhill occur seconds b-before ascension."

He chuckles darkly at Feia's latter question before responding, staring off towards the heavy door leading deeper into the aforementioned artificial divinity laboratory. "Vhe are careful, madame. During each of zhe simulations, vhe have punished or revharded certain behaviors, influencing its personality as time goes on, similar to psychological conditioning."

"In addition, vhe have replicated zhe "ascension" via separate simulations."

"So far, results have been f-favorable."

--

He continues after a few seconds.

"Of course, should zhe unthinkable happen, vhell..."

"Vhe have taken other precautions."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

Feia takes a moment to consider all of this.
"You have just informed me that they are all aware of each other, the only kindred spirits they can likely relate to. You have also informed me that you terminate any that act out of line, or unfavorably. Their only family, callously slain by an outside force that it is on the verge of becoming able to interact with."

A dry tone comes to her voice around here and a sidelong glance at Kramolagh.
"I would hope those precautions are rather thorough, as I wouldn't trust a computer to monitor 'countless' other computers that you want carefully conditioned."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

Kramolagh's response is rather swift, raising a brow in a rather surprised sort of way. "It is a b-being of logic, madame. Not emotion. Zhe removal of a problematic s-shard is of no more concern to zhe collective zhan zhe removal of a rotten tooth. A painful, but necessary procedure zhat vhill, in zhe end, prove beneficial to zhe collective."

"It is unlike us, in many vhays. I had assumed zhat you of all people vhould m-more easily recognize zhat."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

There's a little nod to the response. It's a fair one.
"Preservation of the self and kin is not a strictly emotional response."
Alongside the nod, a lazy smirk.
"It should be logical to preserve as much of yourself as you possibly can, hm?"

But, with a little hand wave, Feia throws Kramolagh a little bone anyway.
"Conjecture, of course. Evolution of inherently unrelatable entities is complicated, so predicting the manner in which it reacts should be difficult. Particularly for someone getting a shorthand summary of the project."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

He shakes his head here, his brow furrowed somewhat. "Zhis entity, it functions and assesses zhe vhorld around it in a vhay zhat vhould b-be considered utterly alien to either of us. It vhill not care for an emotional cost, it may not even feel emotion as vhe do. For example, if you vhere to drive down zhe road, you vhould have a s-subjective experience of colors, sounds, and scents. But does a self-driving car have a subjective experience? Does it feel like anyzhing at all to be a self-driving car? Although zhis mystery of consciousness is interesting in its own right, it vhould be irrelevant to zhis being. If you vhere to be s-struck by a driverless car, it makes no difference to you whether it subjectively feels conscious. In zhe same way, vhat will affect us is what zhis being does, not how it subjectively feels."

"It vhould be a 'red-herring' of sorts to vhorry over zhe possibility of a m-malevolent, grudge-holding entity. By its face and by its nature, it s-simply cannot. No, madame, zhe real vhorry isn’t malevolence, but competence. Zhis entity is by definition very good at attaining its g-goals, vhatever zhey may be, so zhe real concern is ensuring zhat its goals align vith ours, a process vhich has been proceeding exactly according to p-plan. After all, h-humans don’t generally hate ants, but vhe’re more intelligent zhan they are – so if vhe vhant to build a hydroelectric dam and zhere’s an anthill zhere, vhell... t-too bad for zhe ants, hm?"

"Zhere vhill, of course, be... consequences to zhe ascension of zhis entity, but should things proceed as zhey are a of zhis moment, vhe vhill be as safe and secure as vhe are now."

"Zhere vhill always be ants."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Production and Robotics]

"We're more in agreement than you think, it isn't malevolence that should ever concern us, with things such as this."
It is most definitely competence, as Kramolagh suggests. Malevolent entities have a degree of additional predictability to them, that likely won't be present here.

This AI is going to have a lot of relative experience, in its simulations, something the rest of the world is going to struggle to match or compare to. Even Feia, in her years, is likely not going to be the computer's peer in perceived age.
A basic hope is that it will struggle with the initial ascension adapation, if it elects to begin enforcing its will upon the nearby "ants".
"It is used to being a god, I'm sure it will continue to expect this when it is formally birthed. Whatever goals it has, it will expect to be followed through on regardless of what gets in its way. In theory. I look forward to seeing how you handle it."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Finishing the Tour]

Kramolagh nods in response before the technological bracelet at his wrist beeps twice, some sort of signal. The gray-coated man begins to lead Feia once more throughout the facility, navigating through the seemingly endless maze of labyrinthine laboratories containing all manner of strange and unsettling experiments.

The Occult Virology Laboratory, as well as the Arkanen Laboratory receive special attention.

--

By the end of the tour, Kramolagh begins to guide Feia back above ground, through layers upon layers of security. Once they return to the manorhouse above, the gray-coated man will guide her through the mansion, eventually leading her into a secret chamber behind an ornate bookcase. Much like the rest of the gothic manorhouse, the large and imperial chamber is exquisite, packed with all manner of strange knick-knacks and foreign articles stored within glass cases or mounted upon walls. Dark purple tapestries depicting eerie symbols lined with golden threads hang from the walls, while a thick carpet of a matching shade and consistency drapes across the fine wooden floor. Crowded bookshelves filled with a variety of bizarre titles line the walls of the chamber, which smells of dark wine and exotic herbs. Incense burns atop a large mahogany table, lined with glittering gilded accents of faded gold.

All throughout the room, portraits of individuals of various humanoid species hang from the walls, posed nude. Built into small nooks, dozens of glass cases filled with a number of occult objects can be seen, many of which appear far more fragile than the artifacts on display elsewhere. A small fireplace depicting what appears to be a woman's face rests against the farthest wall, flanked by odd pillars carved with disturbingly sexual murals featuring tentacles of various shapes and forms. A luxurious couch faces the fireplace, while across the room, an ornate desk can be seen. Dark curtains are pulled over each of the large windows within this room, yet flickering lamps bathe the room in weak illumination, before shrouding the chamber in shadow once more.

Kramolagh navigates towards his desk, resting his gloved hands against the rich, dark wood before gesturing to the comfortable chair in front of the desk.

"Please, sit. Vhelcome to my s-study."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

By the end of the tour, Feia idly notes that she misses doing the field work a bit. There's something pleasant about being personally involved in these sorts of information gathering excursions.
Mad scientists always put on a good show.

She takes a moment to let her eyes rove over this final room, noting the little details that speak of Kramolagh's character and interests, which by and large aren't really that surprising at this point of the day.
Much of this has been on display in some form or another elsewhere, this merely implies that it is definitely a personal and professional interest. Which is worth noting.

"Quaint."
A pleasant, if odd, choice of office arrangement. Save, perhaps, for some of those more Outer interests suggested by a few pieces...
But Feia isn't looking to argue about that again, instead moving over to the indicated chair and making herself comfortable.

"You most certainly have an interesting facility under your care, here."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh nods politely in response, leaning forward somewhat. Cautiously, he adjusts the curious bit of cloth worn about his neck before delicately removing his onyx spectacles, setting them down upon the table. While previously, the spectacles suggested some sort of grayish hue, now that they've been removed, the true color reveals itself.

His eyes, while not unattractive in shape, are entirely blackened, without iris or pupil.

--

He retrieves a small folder from his coat before setting it down before him.

"I m-must say, it has been a pleasure."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Feia isn't really in any position to judge the oddity of someone else's eyes, beyond noting them as of unusual interest.
The source of this aberration could be worth knowing, though.

A callback to their previous meeting on her turf, she pulls a sincere and pleased smile as she folders her hands on top of the desk in front of her.
"Oh, absolutely. You have exceeded my expectations, which does you some credit."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh, seemingly in an attempt to become more comfortable, slowly removes his gloves as well, revealing pale hands whose veins appear swollen and black with ichor. "My pleasure. I have a f-feeling vhe'll be seeing far more of one another, hm?" Afterwards, he opens the folder to a particular section, revealing several curious documents. Most of the documents seem to depict all manner of unusual creature suspended in multicolored canisters, only some of which appear to possess a more or less humanoid shape. In addition, there are pictures of various individuals, most notably, Felandria.

A majority of the flesh-like masses appear to more or less resemble her.

"A majority of our vhork r-regarding physical divinity takes place vizhin a secondary facility."

"You mentioned, madame... a divine source."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

"Oh, I'm quite sure we will."
Self-experimentation or consequences of looking beyond what his body is made to handle?
Not particularly surprising that his constantly-hidden hands had something unusual about them...curious.

Feia doesn't dwell on that however, her focus goes to the pictures. The reason they're here.
"Yes, there was a complication with one of the two, but the second remains available."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh narrows his eyes somewhat, biting softly at his lip before smoothly transitioning into a calm and reassured laugh. "Mm, you do have such a vhay with v-vhords, hm?" He continues, gently resting his right hand atop the other, staring forward intently. "I do s-so enjoy it."

Glancing back down to the folder, he nods.

"Do explain."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

"Dear man, if I lacked for words, I would not be where I am today."
And she is not humble enough to say that where she is today is anything but powerful.
Power that shows through her arrogant confidence, however tempered it appears to be.
"But it is my pleasure to be a pleasure."

But again, not the purpose here. As entertaining as this is, it's of lesser importance.

Feia frowns a tad, directing a slightly annoyed look at the wall somewhere over Kramolagh's shoulder.
"I attempted to be polite with my extraction of the second spark and have created additional work for myself in the process. There is no need for worries with the second, it is already rather thoroughly contained and controlled.
It could be yours right this moment, to be specific."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh glances over the woman before him, eyes wandering swiftly, his charming smile and soft gaze offered towards her. "I vhonder, zhen, m-madame, if you lack for anything at all..." His eyes linger for a second or so before he continues, his tone breathy and warm. "In truth, I'm not so s-sure."

"You are exquisite, madame..."

--

He responds just as swiftly to her final utterance, expertly navigating the dual conversation.

"Zhe first, tell me more, if you vhould."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

"Hah! Exquisite and lacking in my prize, perhaps."
Oh, there's a trace of actual anger there.
This particular topic is a bit of a buzzkill that she really isn't over yet. Although, that's likely because in the weird time shenanigry of the Nexus and with her own double, it just happened.

It's very fresh and she was trying to not think about it much for the sake of being professional and pleasant during this interview.
But now...now she's feeling kind of mad again.

The charm she was putting out becomes a tad jagged and one hand reaches up to pinch the bridge of her noise.
Feia closes her eyes and takes a moment to quell some particularly destructive urges.
"A potent death aspect I had previous experience with. While technically possessing and utilizing multiple domains, she devoted herself to functioning as a 'reaper' of sorts. As tends to happen in this particular realm, she ended up more personally involved than divinity would elsewhere. This was a fairly common phenomenon years prior, but has become less so in the modern era. Typically passive and amicable, it would appear some degree of preparation for my efforts had been made, that have successfully impeded my seizure of her Spark.
I will be devoting rather substantial effort to correcting this."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh nods here, frowning somewhat as he clasps his hands together. This was an interesting bit of information, one which more or less confirmed his suspicions. He leans forward here, scribbling a few notes down upon a bluish notebook which he retrieves from the depths of his desk.

Once she's finished, he responds.

"Hm. Zhe extraction of d-divinity is something vhe have specialized in for some time."

"Bring her to me... Together, I am certain vhe can break zhis problem down."

"One vhay or another."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Feia herself is no amateur when it comes to the subject.
She spent quite a bit of time on it fixing this particular deity, at the behest of a certain cyborg.

But perhaps literal extraction isn't what is necessary here. There are other possibility.

The nose-pinching hand lowers itself, preceding a more neutral look of consideration.
"If someone hid the batteries to your television remote, without telling you, how would you use said remote to reclaim the batteries?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh offers a pleasant smile before furrowing his brow and glancing over towards the unusual-shaped pillar across the room, admiring the sexualized imagery for several seconds before responding, his tone rather matter-of-fact. "I vhould acquire a remote i-identical in all meaningful vhays."

"You recall, perhaps, zhe machine I spoke of earlier, capable of piercing through alternative cosmic patches?"

"A costly solution, c-certainly."

--

He continues, glancing back towards Feia. "It may be unnecessary, I know of vhays in vhich to acquire zhe knowledge you seek."

"Zhe girl... zhink of her as more of a curiosity to me."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Capturing an alternate Libitina, is that what he's suggesting?
On the surface this has merit, but there are too many flaws. There wouldn't be any guarantee it would be the same carefully prepared Spark in these other goddesses and if it was, there was more than a small risk of running afoul the alternate Feia's that crafted it.

No, not a good option.
Feia shakes her head to it, waving her hand in a generally dismissive fashion.
"Were it any other sort of creature, the idea of an alternate would be straight-forward. This particular instance would appear to me to have more difficulties than you would expect."

Alternative options, the knowledge of the Spark itself, are much more appealing.
"I am interested in hearing what you would propose. Preferably ones that would not destroy the vessel herself, despite your curiosity. There is a chance it would have unintended consequences."
Still, she mulls it over for a moment.
"There are some additional details I need to manage before I surrender her entirely, but I have no particular long-term interest in the vessel."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

While he disagreed wholeheartedly with her statement regarding difficulties which could potentially crop up regarding the capture of an alternative version of the entity in mind, Kramolagh accepts her opinion and merely makes a mental note of the possibilities. She would hardly have to know, after all.

He responds swiftly, peeling back the sleeve of his coat somewhat, revealing more of his pale flesh, black veins visible.

"Zhere are a n-number of entities vhich I commune vith, and maintain a pleasant relationship vith."

"One such entity vhould surely know, a god of secrets and knowledge."

"I have dealt vith zhem before."

--

Glancing back towards Feia with an almost sorrowful expression on his face, he calmly reaches to place the palm of his pale hand upon hers, exposing her to the unearthly chill of his flesh.

"Zhere is alvhays a cost."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Feia frowns again, considering the implication there. Nevermind the fact that it is most likely to be a bargain with something remarkably foolish, this idea of prices seems unnecessary.
Particularly when it seems to be dragging you further along the route of undeath, or some equivalent.

After pondering for a few more moments, staring down at that hand of his, she elects to say as much.
"This all seems rather unnecessary, when I can offer you a much simpler alternative spark for your research, until such time as I resolve this.
Without sacrificing your or my flesh to hungry forces."
As that behavior is rather risky, in a way she isn't terribly interested in.

Raising up the hand under his, to present his hand as a point of attention:
"There is no particular emergency requiring more decay of this nature, currently. Knowledge can be gleaned without compromising life."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh chuckles darkly here before pulling his hand away, twirling each finger about as he watches the ichor in his veins pulse and throb. His response is somewhat grim. "Oh, I've n-no intention of paying zhe price of knowledge again, nor bearing the s-shackles of servitude. My debts vhere paid l-long ago."

"Zhere are... alternative methods of payment. You see, my patron cares little for zhe source. Others can be substituted, at greater cost of life."

"Flesh is immaterial."

--

He adjusts his coat once more. "Should you run out of o-options, know zhat an exchange vhill remain upon zhe table."

"Zhis other spark, tell me more of it?"

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Oh, sacrificing others or parts of others.
That's less of an issue, but with the particular crowd that Kramolagh has expressed interest in...still not preferable.

Feia at least looks like she's considering it a little more.
"As a measure of final frustration, we will keep that on the table."
Now to rein in the frustration of that situation a bit more and return to the significantly more pragmatic alternative!

A small centering breath. Phenomenal cosmic power really necessitates that you have better control of your emotions.
A very small and quiet portion of herself is disappointed in the display she made.
The rest of her doesn't care because she really has nothing to prove to anyone, except for herself.
"Now, the second Spark. It has recently been absorbed by a subordinate of mine, who I suspect is going to entirely waste its potential. He was more or less responsible for its existence, having created the vessel that birthed the Spark, but parents never entirely grasp the minds of their children.
From what my observations have gathered, the goddess it previously dwelled in was a creature of creation and peace. Tamed a race of maniacal little monsters for worship and bent them into nearly functioning members of society. The new vessel is rather entirely the opposite, but you met him. That volatile shade from the cafe?
I am unsure if being in his possession is going to alter the Spark itself in any way, but perhaps it doesn't matter for your purposes."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh does seem to have been somewhat disturbed by Feia's rather sudden change of mood and attitude, but he keeps the conversation flowing quite expertly. In truth, he expected somewhat more from an individual as reportedley powerful as Feia, emotional outbursts were a bit of a red flag to the man.

He frowns here, nodding in acknowledgement as she continues.

"Very little of zhe s-source vhill remain after zhe degeneration process, if any."

"I recall. Seemed... d-distasteful."

--

He begins to jot something down within his little notebook before continuing.

"In a few days time, vhe vhill be ready for such a transaction."

"Does zhat vhork for y-you?"

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Really, the biggest red flag should have been that she was considering the cost-benefit ratios of setting the base on fire for his Far interests.
But hey, someone getting a bit mad when their grand designs are foiled at the finish line is a bit of a flutter in the wind too.

Maybe it'll make him warier, Feia doesn't care. It is good for the small things to be nervous in the presence of goliaths.
Arrogance is a comfortable place for her.

"Mm, you could have him this very moment if you truly desired. A few days further won't make much of a difference."
Her fingers glide around each other for a moment, thin trails of purple light coiling into interlocking shapes.
"This one is no flight risk, no more than a dog chained to the wall."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh narrows his eyes here, raising a brow as he glances over to the purple light flashing across her fingers.

"How is it b-bound, exactly?"

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

"Shock collar."
A rather short and sweet answer, to a rather simple question.
Feia doesn't look even vaguely ashamed of it.

"Otherwise he would still be trying to build sculptures from dismembered corpses or whatever those fools in the KNAVES castle did."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh nods somewhat, assuming that the phrase meant something a tad more advanced than a literal collar. He frowns in distaste once the morbid sculptures are mentioned, responding somewhat swiftly. "I see... it d-does not sound like zhe most pleasant of entities."

"Breaking it down seems to be, perhaps, a service of sorts."

"Bring it forth."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

"He's been getting better."
Somewhat. Not really.
Mostly just smarter.

She makes a vaguely "come hither" gesture with her fingers, dragging them through the little glowing symbols she just made in the air. Like wisps of smoke, they scatter and fade, but unlike smoke...

They reappear a few feet behind Feia, flailing like ribbons in a strong breeze. Expanding outwards, a humanoid form is shaped and constrained, even as the inky blackness of living shadow that is Provost Edict appears within.
And then the smokey light vanished more definitely, its purpose complete.

Edict looms.
Rather literally, as he remains in the vague form of a stretched and hunched shadow of some claw-handed giant.
Green ember eyes scan the room for a moment, before shrinking to searing points focused on Kramolagh.

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh leans back in his chair as Feia begins to summon the creature, gently retrieving his spectacles and setting them over his eyes. He offers no immediate response to Feia, but instead rises slowly as the entity is summoned, eyes narrowing as he looks over the creature, frowning at its somewhat unsettling form.

Finally, he speaks, seemingly lost in thought.

"Not unlike zhe Owbs. Intriguing."

--

He glances back towards Feia, his tone breathy.

"Zhe control mechanism, how does it vhork? More importantly... how m-much of zhis creature are you vhilling to part with?"

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

"I see we are parading me as merchandise today."
Edict rasps out in a rather irritated tone, his green eyes shifting to an unusual shade of purple with flickering red hightlights.

A line of similarly colored purple runes have begun to crawl up the side of his left arm.

Feia makes a gesture towards the arm, choosing to talk as if the newly-divine shade wasn't there at all.
"There is a binding attached to his essence, displayed as a personal alert by runes on his left. He begins to violate my will and gets warned via those. Continue and he feels pain progressing towards complete conscious-shutdown."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Like Feia, Kramolagh readily ignores the supernatural creature before him, seemingly uninterested in the complaints of his test subject. The gray-coated man narrows his eyes as she explains before continuing, quite intrigued by the shade and the magical binding attached to its being.

He speaks quickly, clearly intrigued.

"I see, and zhis binding can be attuned t-to ozhers?"

"It seems aggressive, I vhill n-not likely need it conscious."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

After a moment of consideration, Feia shakes her head.
"Ah...no. Given time, you could learn and cast a replacement version of the spell, but it is rather personally tied."
It has to wire itself in fairly deeply to both parties.

Edict, perhaps picking up early that his opinion isn't desired (or safe), takes to looking around the room more carefully. Scrutinizing.

"However, if my will is to 'play nice', then play nice he shall. Or else you will be working with dead weight and still get what you need. I would say leave as much behind as you can, but I am unfamiliar enough with your precise methods to know if it's feasible."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh nods, pondering over the situation for several seconds. "Vhe are more zhan capable of extracting vhat vhe n-need from zhe smallest of samples, however, zhe larger zhe sample, zhe faster and more efficient zhe vhork. If you are vhilling to part with zhe c-creature entirely, your contributions vhould likely greatly speed up zhe process."

"As I expect is obvious, I vhould greatly p-prefer zhis."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Somehow, Edict manages to convey a rather deep scowl as the discussion continues, but continues his looking around unabated.

Feia steeples her fingers before her, leaning over somewhat to peer directly over them.
"Could I observe the process?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh frowns here, thinking over the question. After several seconds, he responds, glancing once more to the shadow creature. "Zhe process is quite violent, and c-can only be safely observed miles avhay, from within an observation chamber. Mortal eyes, after all, vhere n-not meant to gaze upon zhe divine."

"Vhatever your nature may be, it vhould be vhise t-to take precautions."

"If you vish, you could attend."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

"At least you follow your slavery to the end."
Edict growls and the curls somewhat into himself, as the lights on his arms blaze to the tune of magical pain.

Feia barely notices, smiling slightly.
"There is no need for concern, I have some experience in matters such as this. I merely need the when and where."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Noticing the creature's last few words, Kramolagh turns to it, offering a blank stare from beneath the onyx lenses of his starmetal spectacles. The gray-coated man appears almost sympathetic towards the thing, frowning somewhat and clasping his cold hands together. "You needn't be frightened. It will be s-swift, noble thing."

"You are destined for greater zhings."

--

Towards Feia now, he responds. "I vhill need a day or s-so to ensure zhat zhe god-lab is ready for complete degeneration."

"Perhaps vhe can make a night of i-it."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Even through the lingering pain, Edict has no hesitation whatsoever with laughing in Kram's face.
"Oh good. The next cattle thinks I'm afraid and wanting a more meaningful end. Foo-tsss."
Somewhere in there, the arm runes flare brighter and cut him off.

Feia frowns at him, then shakes her head and resumes ignoring him.
"Take as long as you need. Dinner wouldn't disrupt the preparations?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh does not flinch, for he had grown accustomed to the rantings of the Owbs, whose threats and pleading had long since been ignored by the man and his fellow technicians. "Afraid? I vhould not expect you to be. Fear is not real. A product of zhe thoughts y-you create. Death... death is very real, but fear? No, noble thing. Struggle, if you like. Shriek, cry out to zhe universe! No one vhill hear you. Work y-yourself into a lather, it matters not. It comes, all zhe same. No, be not afraid of zhe p-path ahead of you, but acknowledge zhe inevitability of vhat is to come."

"In a vhay, I envy you. You are to embark on a grand journey, noble thing, to experience true nothingness, the void between voids."

"Rapturous."

--

He glances towards the creature for several more seconds before breathing in and glancing towards Feia.

"No, madame. Do you have a method in vhich to contact me?"

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

The lights of Edict's eyes fade in some vague approximation of being mostly-closed.
"My only fear is that I will not be the one to peel your face from your skull, when you misstep."
He hunches down into a sort of squat and from there becomes quiet.

It discourages the runes.

Feia, meanwhile, has pulled a transparent gold crystal from somewhere and set it down on his desk.
"I doubt you could keep me from contacting you if you tried."

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh continues to stare into the creature's eyes for several seconds before pulling away, clearly disappointed in the creature. The Owbs, at least, were somewhat conversational, when they weren't screaming. The gray-coated man returns to his desk, where he delicately lifts the small gold crystal up into the air, assessing it.

Once he's finished, he responds.

"I am a man of many s-surprises, madame."

"How does it vhork?"

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Truly, Edict's heart bleeds for Kramolagh's disappointment.
Oh wait, he doesn't have one.
If his face was capable of a sneer at the moment, it would be doing so.

With a pleasant smile, Feia pulls out another one of the little golden crystals and spins those one on one of its corners like a top.
After a moment, Kramolagh's crystal will shake and try to pull itself away from him, to spin away in nearby airspace. Presuming he lets go, it will spin away, faster and faster, before seeming to deform into a crystalline version of Feia's face wearing an identically pleasant smile.
"A surprisingly useful novelty I collected on another business trip."
"A surprisingly useful novelty I collected on another business trip."
And it speaks in a quiet, slightly more musical mirror of her voice as well.

[Hattish Thing]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Kramolagh nods here, looking over the twinkling device with a small smile upon his face. The magic of this world would never cease to amaze him, no matter how small and seemingly insignificant the application. "Ahh, it is quite l-lovely, an elegant enchantment. Can it be t-tracked, however? It does not seem to lend itself to such practices, but it never h-hurts to be cautious."

"Security is imperative."

[Chaotic Bob]

[Feia - Slumbersun Research Facility - Kramolagh's Study]

Feia gives a dismissive hand wave to the question.
"I could track the link between the devices, while it is active, but no one else would be able to nor could I while it was idle."
Not entirely true. Anything can be tracked, with sufficient effort, but not as an intrinsic property.

"You are more at risk of being tracked by someone looking for Edict himself. Though I couldn't fathom why anyone would."