VVVVVigil: Valorous Veterans Vanquishing Venal Vermin

[Rebonack]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

"That's also fascinating, but not what I was referring to," Zee replies brightly. She'll peer at the bird a bit more closely, too. Her weird senses are pretty adept at picking out all kinds of odd mystical nonsense. Maybe she'll notice something if she focuses a bit?

Who knows!

"There's a... umm... worm? Connected to you? It's pretty big. And hanging out in a mostly empty alternate universe," she explains. "It's providing a framework and power source for a suite of extraordinary abilities. And altering your physical shape a bit? Or a lot. It's altering your physical shape a lot. But that's only physiological and not at all biochemical. Which is weird."

She scrunches her lips off to the side a bit, peering closer.

"I'm pretty sure it's an infant... whatever it is. You get powers, it gets information? For feeding? Maturation? Adaptation? Not totally sure..." she hums. "There's some damage in the parts of the cortex that store long-term memory, but I think that's unrelated to the mutations. Do you have any gaps in your memory?"

Huh.

Seems like Makuro ran into someone pretty uniquely suited to helping her.

[Earl of Purple]

Belated Welcome Wagon

The moment Zee tries to focus on it, the hoopoe flies off. It seems that, whatever it is, it doesn't want anybody to know what it is.

"No, I don't have gaps in my long term memory. My long-term memory basically starts a week ago. I have a few memories from before then, one from before... The worm, you called it? Attached itself to me. I was much smaller, and looked human. The others are all later. After the worm." It's very different to 'gaps' in long-term memory. It's almost totally gone.

The damage itself is pretty extreme, however. The memories weren't removed, or papered over- mostly they were destroyed. They may have been copied first, by whatever wiped her memory, but if so that knowledge is missing from her brain. Zee might be able to recover some of it, but probably not all of it.

[Rebonack]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

"Well goodbye to you too, bird," Zee says as the hoopoe departs.

Birds are pretty strange.

Then she frowns as the woman's recount. "Oh, you're right, that IS pretty serious. If it were just a few memories I could probably infer which neural networks have been disrupted, but with something so extensive... I would love to be able to help, I really would, but not all destroyed information can be recovered."

Why would someone do something like this?

She's pretty sure there isn't a direct connection to the worm.

But that the woman gained unusual abilities (and appearance) and totally lost her long term memory at the same time?

That's pretty suspicious.

"I'm Zee, by the way. Thanks for helping me gather branches."

[Earl of Purple]

Belated Welcome Wagon

"Makuro. It is the colour of my eyes. I can't remember what colour they were before, nor my name." Her one pre-worm memory is of herself singing, without any reflective surfaces nearby. "Anything you could do to help, no matter how small, would be... More than I knew of myself. It is... Hard, to know you have a life and history that you cannot remember." Any little would help, and she'd love Zee's help. "Please, could you help me try to get memories back?" Makuro's looking down at Zee- no way she isn't, with her disproportionately long limbs- and doesn't quite know how to ask for help.

[Rebonack]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

"That's a nice temporary name, at least," Zee replies with a genuine smile. Then she reaches up toward Makuro's head with one hand. "I can do my best. There are a few snippets of memory still intact. I'll work my way out from there. This will probably feel kind of strange."

And then, if she's allowed, she'll touch Makuro's temple with two fingers.

The first thing Makuro should feel is small.

Though she's physically towering over Zee, this tentative connection comes with flashes of insight. Whatever Zee is, she's huge. Looming. Lurking. Just beyond the edge of perception. The physical body Makuro can see is like little more than the barest edge of a fingertip dipped into water.

The second thing Makuro should feel is an itch.

Myelin sheaths that have been stripped away are restored, echoes of sensory input spreading out from the memory of singing. A single pylon upon which to build a bridge. But a bridge with only a single support can't span far.

Something will probably be restored. Or somethings. Memories connected to that recollection of song, whether directly or indirectly.

But something is still more than nothing.

After a few minutes, Zee steps back and offers a tentative smile. "That's the most I can do. I'm sorry there isn't more."

[Darkcomet]

[Outside Geneva's Lab]

"Good. I'll look into incidents around the times of our emergence events to find a correlation, and attempt to track down any surviving parties involved. It's been years, though, and AS is very good at getting rid of evidence, or at least putting it far away from where they think I am, so I can't promise anything for sure. That gives me a few options, and I'll give you an update if something changes." For one thing, where they think Two is and where she actually is are not necessarily the same thing, so it might work out.

Still, chasing that after years in even the most recent case might not be possible.

[Earl of Purple]

Belated Welcome Wagon

"I quite like it. Nice sound." It's not a bad name, and it might not be temporary. Depends on if she remembers her name at all. She'll kneel down to let Zee touch her head easier.

She shivers as she feels small, unused to the feeling- she's been looking down on everyone she's met thus far, though she has seen people as tall or taller. There's some success at at the memory growth, and when it's over, she's crying and will pull Zee into a hug, unless stopped. Despite her long and slender limbs, she's strong. One of the extraordinary abilities her worm provides. "I see my mum." Other stuff, too, but that's the most immediately important thing.

[Rebonack]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

Zee makes an 'Uuph!' noise when she's squeezed.

"I'm glad I could help," she replies, patting Makura's back. "And I'm sorry I couldn't do more..."

She really is.

Life is one of her alignments, so things pertaining to life are within her sphere of influence. But something like this? She would probably need an alignment with time in order to rebuild something like this. And that's well beyond her.

Once released, she'll dump the contents of the wheelbarrow out into the grass with a, "Hup!"

Then she smiles over at her newest friend. "I suppose I should probably finish what I came out here for, shouldn't I?"

Slowly, methodically, she begins touching the branches here and there. Where she touches them little flashes of living plasma lick between them, flashing like the fire of gemstones. And where it passes, the wood has fused together. Before long the heap begins to resemble a wooden cage.

Wonder what she's up to?

"How long have you been here in the Nexus, Makura?" she asks conversationally as she works.

[Morty]

[Outside Geneva's Lab]

"Sounds like a plan. I'll wait for Kalya to come back and continue looking for... well. I guess someone who used to be Kr," Wenomir says, grimacing slightly.

[Earl of Purple]

Belated Welcome Wagon

Makuro tilts her head and looks curiously at the pile of dead branches and twigs. "I thought you were clearing up?" She watches Zee, fascinated- she's not had much opportunity to watch magic happen, as her own abilities are passive ones she doesn't have to think about them. "As long as I remember, so about a week. The woman who named me Makuro found me in an alleyway in Inside, unconscious. She asked my name, and I couldn't give her one." She thinks a moment, trying to see if her name's come back as well. "I... Think it might be Amy? I do not know, for certain. My mother calls me Amy. It... Might be short for something." Or spelt Ami, or something else. But she's got a civilian name, now! She's gotten used to Makuro, and everyone knows her as Makuro.

[Rebonack]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

"I was! But cleaning up was a means to an end," Zee replies brightly. Then she gestures dramatically toward the object and snaps her fingers! "BEHOLD!"

...

Nothing happens.

Though it is a pretty neat... heap?

It looks kind of like an egg. Or at least the mass of interwoven, fused branches looks kind of egg-shaped. Egg-shaped with a whole bunch of other stuff, mostly twigs and decayed leaves, inside of it.

Zee frowns at the object, then frowns at her fingers. She snaps her fingers a few times as if she were trying to get a stubborn lighter to ignite. Only to give an, "Eep!" when a three foot tall plume of bio-plasma suddenly erupts from between her thumb and pointer finger, nearly catching her hair on fire in the process. She flails comically, the roiling mass of raw arcane power haphazardly flung from her outstretched hand only to land on the egg. The moment it makes contact, the otherworldly power engulfs the whole mass of branches.

"Behold?" Zee says again, a bit more tentatively this time.

As the flames wash over the branches, the whole object is changed. It isn't a heap of sticks anymore, it's an egg covered in translucent scales of fire agate. Ribbons of iridescent green and yellow light slither across its surface as the air is filled with an overwhelming scent of apple, cinnamon, and chocolate. A rapidly growing shape stirs within the egg, vague at first, but quickly resolving into something very animal-like. And then, all at once, the egg shatters into ten thousand points of glittering light, revealing its newly born occupant.

The creature looks... alien. Maybe a deer or a dragon would be the most reasonable thing to compare it to, but those are, perhaps, simply the things which are least dissimilar to it. It has wings, or something like them. Two at its shoulders, two at its hips, and two flanking its head like ears. Things like eyes dot its body, pits of void ringed by stellar white, like the accretion disk of a dead star. Its covered in something akin to scales, deep indigo plates above, swirling with golden flecks like drifting stars. Black below, triangular and interlocking. They expand and contract with each breath, searing light bleeding between them. The creature is roughly the size of a leopard, leggy and bearing cloven hooves. It trots in a tight circle, examining itself before turning its attention outward.

"I exist!" she declares in a voice that sounds like it should belong to am (overly excited) young girl, maybe at the edge of her teens. "This is so amazing! Oh wow, I'm feeling so many things at once!"

The little seraph dances on her hooves, one side to the other, bouncing a bit and kicking her hooves in the air. "What's this? Springy green... stuff... Grass! Grass grows from the ground! It's so pretty, I love it!"

Then she takes in a deep breath. "Oh oh that's air! I love air! Breathing is great! And you!" she whirls toward Makuro. "You're a human! I LOVE humans!"

And then the draconic critter will prance forward on her hooves and try to embrace Makuro in a hug. Using her wings. They have little fingers on them rather akin to some extinct species of bird.

"Are you part of VIGIL? I was born to help VIGIL! My name's Lapis Lazuli, who are you?"

Zee seems to be enjoying the show.

[Earl of Purple]

Belated Welcome Wagon

Makuro looks bemused at the 'Behold!' when nothing happened, and jumps in surprise when it actually works.

She's equally surprised when it talks, or... Maybe she talks? Makuro's not certain. 'She' seems to fit. Makuro will hug back, a little carefully as she's not sure how fragile Lapis is and very aware of her own enhanced strength. "I am part of VIGIL. A new member, one of the newest I think. My name is... It's Makuro. But I think you can call me Amy." She's still getting used to being an Amy, and it's likely to take a while until she thinks of herself as Amy.

[Darkcomet]

[Outside Geneva's Lab]

"I'll be ready." Two turns to head back to her shuttle, and unless something else comes up, she'll depart not long after.

[Rebonack]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

"Nice to meet you Makuro who's also Amy! You're the first person I've ever met and that's great!" Lazuli burbles. Then she turns her attention on Zee. "Oh, hi mom! Have you met my new friend Makuro who I can also call Amy?"

"Yes," Zee confirms. "She helped me pick up sticks."

"Sticks! I've never seen sticks before, what are those?" she scoops up a collection of leftover leaves with the little claws on her wings. "Are these sticks?"

"Those are leaves."

"Leaves! I love leaves! They're so floppy and brown and they smell neat!" Lazuli declares as she drapes a healthy collection of leaves across her head and back. One of them is leaning against her left ear-wing at a jaunty angle.

"Do you remember what you're going to be doing for VIGIL?" Zee asks.

"Oh yeah, I sure do! I'm supposed to make sure none of those awful gross pod-people try to sneak in! They're terrible and I hate them!" Lazuli declares, bristling at the mere thought of the pod-people. She isn't sure why she hates them so much, but boy does she ever despise them. She'll make sure NONE of them sneak in and try to hurt her new friends.

[Earl of Purple]

Belated Welcome Wagon

"Pod people? I have not heard of such. I am, as I say, new. Is there anything I could do to assist against them?" Makuro came here to help, and she hasn't yet, though there no newer members at the moment. She's smiling at Lapis' adorable antics, as the baby dragon-angel gets used to life and discovers everything around her.

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Commanders' Village]

Clad in her angelic robes, Ithuriel flies straight over to the Commanders' Village, landing with a suitably stylish little ruffle of the robes. The angel adjusts her hood, runs a hand through her hair, and starts looking around for one of VIGIL's commanders to go have a word with.

She has a clipboard tucked under one arm. It has Intersection's logo on the back of it. Looks kind of official and important. Clipboards are good at creating that sort of impression.

[Shadowcaller]

[Commanders' Village]

Cessie Mithar, one of VIGIL's commanders, is also in a robe, while probably not as angelic pure, it still makes a good effort.
The sorceress seems to be using some kind of tablet rather than a clipboard, perhaps VIGIL's budget allows her to look important in a more modern way?
She looks up from her seat as Ithuriel enters. "Well, hello there. Ithuriel is it? We finally meet, I heard you've made quite the name for yourself at Intersection." Coming quite a far way from entering to file a complaint.

[Rebonack]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

"Yes!" Lazuli replies without hesitation. Then seems to think better of it and looks to Zee. "Maybe? Can she, mom?"

"Just be diligent," Zee says to Makuro. "Keep an eye out for people acting strangely or being in places they shouldn't be."

"They're SUPER terrible!" Lazuli declares. "They eat people and then pretend to be them so they can eat more people but me and mom and can feel them through their disguise so that's why I'm here to help! And I'm going to do a good job. A fantastic job. The best job! Of course, VIGIL is pretty big. It's a pretty daunting task for someone as small as me. But Lapis Lazuli is dauntless!"

She strikes her best dauntless pose.

Then blinks.

A whole bunch of eyes at once.

"Mom, what should I do besides patrolling? That would get boring."

"Maybe you could ask about helping with the gardening and grounds-keeping?" Zee suggests. "There were lots of branches laying around."

"Oooh, that's a good idea."

[Earl of Purple]

Belated Welcome Wagon

"I will... Try to keep an eye out. How do they copy people? Is it DNA? As you said this was not because of my genes, and all superficial to my humanity." It won't help- if she's cloned, her shard would detect the fact there's a genetically identical host out there and automatically connect to it. It might need a trigger event to get the power, but... Since she drank a Cauldron vial, that's not a guarantee.

[Rebonack]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

"Partly genetic, partly chaos magic," Zee recounts. "That second part is why it's so easy for me to find them. Chaos magic is like a sucking wound in reality."

Sounds like she isn't a huge fan.

"I wouldn't suggest getting eaten, though. Since you would be dead."

"Oh no! Don't get dead!" Lapis demands.

"I'm going to let Wenomir know that Lapis is ready to keep an eye on the place. Would you like to show her around the grounds while I'm away?" Zee asks.

"Oh! OH! Yes! Say yes!" Lazuli pleads.

She seems to be a big fan of this plan.

[Earl of Purple]

Belated Welcome Wagon

"That is a valid concern. I shall endeavour not to be eaten." Since that'd put a crimp in her long-term plans. Not a major one, but only because she has no long-term plans right now.

"Of course, though wouldn't Wenomir like to meet Lapis first? So he knows who is protecting us from the pod-people?" And get used to her bouncy enthusiasm for life and all things in it, since that's something that will have to happen sooner or later. Besides, she's new herself- hardly the best candidate to give a tour, since she doesn't know everything herself yet.

[Lord Magtok]

Outside the Base

Spoiler

Show

Outside the Base

One can wonder.
The results are the same though as once she has driven her knee into its chest and stabbed it into the back it shatters into pieces which quickly fade out of existence like the others.

But despite the last elemental falling (for now) the fight is still raging as the sound of all three of the hydras heads roaring in pain will tell Saint Laz.

Calm Reed might get thrown away as the entire body and all its three heads are trashing around wildly in pain, completely blind to the world around it.

[Outside the Base]

Calm Reed is indeed thrown off her feet and back, the martial form not quite enough to protect her against the mad flailing. She's back on her feet soon enough, but it's still a few moments where a lot can happen.

Saint Lazarus has a sword to pick up off the ground. It's a ways away from where she is, but she knows the general direction it went when she dropped it. However bad the volcanic fog might be over here, it should clear up a little when she hurries over there, right? Shouldn't be too hard to find, right?

Yeah, and maybe needles aren't too hard to find in haystacks. Crap, this is going to be damn near impossible for as long as Laz can barely see five feet away from her face. How much longer can Calm Reed hold together while Jenette's stuck looking for her sharpened metal club?

[Rebonack]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

"Oh, good point," Zee admits. "Wenomir first, getting acquainted with the space second."

And with that, it's time to go find the commanders again!

The commander's village seems like a safe place to start, right?

Zee will start heading that way with Lapis bouncing along close behind.

"Oh, what's that, I love it!"

"That's a hoopoe."

"Oh oh, what about that?"

"That's a tree."

"I love trees, too! They're the leaf makers, right?"

"Right."

And so on all the way there.

[Morty]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

Wenomir busied himself with giving instructions to some of the base's staff while Zee was away creating. He turns to look at Zee and her creation, and it seems Lapis manages to surprise him.

"...alright, that's a new one. I've never seen anyone like... them before."

[Earl of Purple]

Belated Welcome Wagon

The hoopoe flies off the moment Zee tries to scan it again, so Lapis doesn't get a good view of it either.

Makuro's tagging along, since she's going to give Lapis a tour after.

[Rebonack]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

"I've never seen anyone like you before either!" Lapis replies with nearly breathless enthusiasm. She's practically vibrating with excited energy as she begins nosing around the room, scrutinizing everything.

"Wenomir, this is my daughter, Lapis Lazuli. She'll be helping to keep VIGIL clear of pests," Zee says. "Lazuli? This is Wenomir. He's one of the people in charge of VIGIL. It's really important that you listen to him."

Lazuli pops her head out from behind a piece of furniture with a book in her mouth. "Mom this knowledge archive isn't working, am I doing something wrong? Oh! And hello mister Wenomir! Why do you have another different mom on your back?"

Asking the real questions here.

"VIGIL is for stopping Nexus-ending threats, right? Do those happen all the time? What do we do when we aren't stopping extinction events? Do I have to fill out at application? Do I count as a member? Is the hoopoe a member? It looked pretty," Lazuli inquires. Apparently she's asking all the questions.

She's probably done now though right?

"Do I get to meet Miss Mithar? I don't know who she is but I love her too. How do the airships work? Can I learn to fly one? I love airships they're super great. Mom thought maybe I can help with ground keeping is that okay? Please say yes the trees are so pretty I love the trees."

Apparently not.

She also apparently loves everything.

With the notable exception of skinwalkers.

[Morty]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

Wenomir listens with an expression of growing bewilderment.

"I... don't think an application is necessary. We'll just put you as one of the island's personnel. My axe is a spirit that's much like your mother."

[Rebonack]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

"Oh, okay!" Lapis replies brightly before turning and pronking out of the room. "Come on Makuro let's go find neat things!"

Well.

That just happened.

"In my defense," Zee points out once the giant and the seraph are gone. "I don't have any real input on their personality. I just set what memories they'll inherit from me."

She wrinkles her nose a bit.

"And all she'll do a good job, I'm sure. Her enthusiastic curiosity should keep her moving around the base. That'll make it more likely that she'll encounter an infiltrator. Otherwise it would just be a matter of avoiding places where she frequents."

A beat.

"Do you know what's up with that weird bird? I've seen it flitting around twice and every time I try to focus it flies away."

Maybe Wenomir isn't aware of the hoopoe?

[Earl of Purple]

Vigil Tour

"I'll show you the Upper Village first. I live there." She heads off, away from Wenomir and Zee, followed by the hoopoe. Makuro doesn't notice the orange bird, though it's her that it is following.

[Morty]

[Belated Welcome Wagon]

Wenomir blinks and looks around him with some confusion.

"Which bird? I don't usually pay a lot of attention to them. It's a flying base, so we see a lot of them."