Skyside 6: Return of the Cheddar

[Recaiden]

"I've got some dreams I wouldn't mind being eaten." Only a few, and they're pretty horrific. Most who have been enslaved have those.

"Right, then I guess we'd best go. I don't know if Benedict had anything else to buy before he left, he could be heading home right now. Not sure what's going to be faster, either, us or him." Arron takes the lead, directing the horses into a gallop and up, so they're flying above any other traffic. He has to keep updating the runes, however; the magic keeping them aloft doesn't last too long.

"Hah. Well, I really can't eat them, but I could get rid of them later. First, you'll study this."
Miri fumbles through a few pockets and hands Vaemys a page where she copied down the instructions on that memory-projecting meditation and added her notes.
And then, agreeing with Arron, back onto the horses and up into the sky at a pace that she'd really like to be slower. But time is of the essence.
There's one frightening moment where the runes are in need of refreshing and Miri doesn't realize it, but then she gets the hang of updating them.
Off towards the manse!

[5a Violista]

[Back Alley Armory]

If the thief wants to climb up Minerva, then she had better hurry because Minerva doesn't want to stay in there for much longer.
Fun fact!
Minerva's actually pretty decent at doing pull-ups.
Also fun fact!
She's not currently in a position to do anything except be a ladder for someone else to climb up.

Blood drips down from her wrist where Leslie is holding, running down Minerva's arm.

With one hand holding on to Leslie and the other on the window frame, she glances down at the thief. "How you coming up?" she asks, since she has little choice but to wait for Leslie to get her other hand out.

When able (which might be after someone finishes climbing up her), Minerva pulls upwards so she can get out.

[bc56]

The thief is busy going through her pockets and muttering to herself. "No, it would burn if I used it here. That doesn't go here. I don't have time to set that up. Aha!" She pulls out an umbrella. Then she jumps, swinging the hooked end at the windowsill. It connects and hooks on, and she climbs up the shaft of the umbrella to safety. "Phew, that was close!"

[Earl of Purple]

Shopping Trip

Vaemys takes the page and folds it up. She's not wearing anything she can put it in, really, so she's just got to hold on to it and hope she doesn't lose it whilst she's flying on the back of a dead horse.

And it looks like they're going back to Home. Should have realised this before I posted there.

[Hattish Thing]

[Tire Factory]

There's a light at the old tire factory.

It shines through the nearest window. Someone was up there.

Meanwhile, Solstice clambers down into the sewers, accessible only via a rusty old ladder. The sewers have not seen much attention, for infrastructure is rarely a concern of the conglomerates which rule over the floating city. It's filthy, and the place is all but crumbling apart. Enormous rats, tainted by a sewer system choked in hazardous waste, lurch about and scurry in the dark, dragging along vestigial limbs and gazing upon the fae with their strange, glowing eyes.

Once she steps onto the sewer ground, Solstice will be able to check the doll once more. Again, it points downwards.

There must be a deeper level, right?

---

[Drug Bust]

Larza just rolls her large, colorful eyes.

Did this great big mud person think she wasn't ready?

"Trch. Ye wouldn't ken 'preparation' if it bit ye oan yer stoatsome rear." She crosses her arms over her chest before glancing upwards towards the sky. "A'm ready nou," she insists, pointing a finger at Minerva, "aae let me at thaim!"

She grins with excitement, her large teeth bared.

---

Olympian Extractions - Factory Floor]

The foreman simply waves a fat hand at the smaller woman.

She wasn't particularly fond of Carlie, nor did she find this question worth spending much time on.

"Promotion, ha!" She just cackles at this. "Ain't no such thing, not in any meaningful way." She shrugs, leaning back in her chair. "Oh sure, you can make a little extra scrip here and there, maybe even earn the right to rent better company housing - but these people won't never have a seat at the table." She exhales smoke. "Ain't no inheritance, neither - everything belongs to the company."

"So sure, there's promotions - we give 'em away like candy. But they don't mean nothing. I don't know what you were expecting."

"It's all disinformation. Anarchists work fast. Dissenters."

[WindStruck]

Solstice peers around nervously, especially at the giant rats.

After checking the doll, she quietly says to the others, "It seems the doll is still suggesting somewhere further down..."

[Earl of Purple]

Drug Bust

"Why'd he want a motorbike on a spaceship? I think he's gonna go AWOL on it. Except, since they're spreading stuff around, maybe it's not really WOL, just A." Since AWOL stands for 'absent without leave', and if this Genestealer Hybrid is buying a motorbike, and the rest of the shuttle's crew knew that, it's possible he's going to move away to try and start up a back-up cell elsewhere.

[Rebonack]

[Not Exactly a Drug Bust Anymore]

"Not really read its mind. Root around for some specific information in a really destructive way? Sure. And hmm... that's a good point," Zee says with a nod toward the gunslinger. "Tell you guys what. You head over to the shuttle and get ready to take off. I'll start sniffing around for our motor-bike pal. If he is getting ready to bail and spread his evil seed further afield he'll be leaving from ground-town. If you don't see me by the time the shuttle is ready to go take off without me. I'll catch up later via my own sorcerous means."

At 'sorcerous means' Zee wiggles her fingers in a sufficiently spooky fashion.

That's... uh.

Is she suggesting she can get up into orbit all on her own?

Or maybe she just means she'll mind-whammy the crew from some other ship and have them transport her.

Either way she's not elaborating, just jogging off.

"I'll make sure the infestation down here is stopped for good! You guys are probably better at the whole space invaders thing anyway. See you in a bit!"

Yep.

She's jogging off.

Later Zee!


[Under the Tire Factory]

"Still more down, huh?" Zee says with a frown as our heroes inspect the little doll. "Okay, so two possibilities. Either Larza is deeper in the tunnels, she's down in Ground Town harassing the poor people, or this is the result of some kind of baffle."

Zee ticks off three fingers.

"There's only so much down to Skyside, so we would get to the bottom of it pretty quick. If we check in Ground Town we could probably zero in on her. And... given how smart Larza is I'm kind of doubtful that she would have set up a baffle. She doesn't strike me as the sort of person who would intentionally leave a trace behind on the off chance that you knew sympathetic magic, Solstice."

Hmmm!

Looks like our heroes have a choice to make!

"What do you two think? Scope out the tunnels some more or check Ground Town?"

[bc56]

"Further down in the tunnels. Going to groundtown will take a long time. Besides, there aren't many obstacles that can hold me off." She projects a thin, white-hot beam of light from her guantlet for emphasis, a short range cutting laser. "As long as it's not more magic. You two will have to deal with that." Despite her magic powers and the enchantments constantly present on her, Jade is not a fan of magic, nor is she good at it.

[WindStruck]

"I do not like the idea of being here..." Solstice says, again looking at the giant rats amid toxic sludge, all surrounded by iron everywhere. At least with that strong raspberry scent, Solstice wasn't gagging on top of all that too.

"How hard do you think it would be to.. uh, ride on one of those flying things first? The taxi? It would be easier to verify if Larza is indeed far below us rather than.. somewhere in this labyrinth, would it not?"

Another thought enters her mind.

"What if the stolen belongings are somewhere in the tire factory, but Larza simply is not?"

[Shadowcaller]

[Trader Bust]

Zee, remember that you're supposed to be pretending to be a psyker. You don't really want Minerva to think you're something else weird.

She is certainly giving her odd looks now but with everything going on it's not exactly a priority right now. Larza was enough of a problem to deal with. "Very well. We're leaving in less than three hours." She remarks with a stiff nod to Zee before she starts jogging off.

"The rest of you are coming with me. We're going back to the ship to prepare." She had made up the five hour deadline on the spot, she wasn't sure how long it would actually take to prepare for this, but she sure didn't want it to take more than three hours at least.

If the others are willing, Minerva will lead them back to the ship while trying to ignore the xeno's antics. It would be troublesome, more so than she had originally suspected. She could swear it was different somehow...

[Dr.Gunsforhands]

[Back Alley Armory]

Once everyone is crowded together in the window, Leslie nods to the thief and Minerva.

"Uh... uh-huh..."

She's too busy gasping for breath to say anything else. As the sounds of shouting and kicking doors rise up inside the building, she just kind of falls off of the window and into the pile of trash cans below, too sore to really attempt a jump.

[Morty]

[Olympian Extractions - Factory Floor]

"I am certain lack of recognition of merit has nothing to do with your current problems." Calm Reed can't really keep the sarcasm out of her voice. Mortals must know their place, but dedication needs to be rewarded in accordance to their station. To do otherwise breeds resentment. "But these... anarchists, as you call them, might be worth investigating. If only to corroborate your claims."

[Rebonack]

[Under the Tire Factory]

"Yeah, we could take another taxi ride. But we would have to go down there, snoop around, then come back up again," Zee replies as she pokes at a large vegi-rat with her shoe. The weird plant-rodent hybrid hisses at her and scampers off. "It's possible she might even be hanging around in the under-parts of the city instead of the tunnels. Lots of things are possible."

It's a world of possibilities!

"I guess if we find Larza but not the stolen items we can always gently extract the information from her."

Extremely gently.

"She probably knows where they are. Or at least what she did with them."

It would be a start, certainly.

"Okay, yeah, I think heading down to the surface might be the way to go. We can probably take one of the cable cars since we're already up here. They aren't as pricey as a taxi," Zee says as she begins heading back up the ladder.

They'll figure this one out yet!

Should the others follow her, she'll begin leading the way to the edge of the island and the cable cars. She road one of those up here last year (right now) when she was working with Minerva so finding them shouldn't be hard.

[WindStruck]

It goes without saying, Solstice was glad to leave this place. She earnestly follows Zee back up and out of the tunnels.

"I suppose you are right," she says. "If we find Larza, she should be able to confirm the location of the stolen objects, if she does not have them on her person."

[Rebonack]

[Bird's the Word]

He didn't heed the warnings.

It had taken time to translate them. The first block of characters were absolutely indecipherable. Like nothing he had ever seen before. But under that was a translation in another language. One he still didn't understand. And another below that. And below THAT. It wasn't until the sixth translation that it was something he could actually work with.

The warning sounded like the standard for tombs. There is no great king buried here. No monument to a battle. No riches. There is only doom. Turn away.

Tombs ALWAYS have warnings. And they're ALWAYS full of riches.

So he didn't heed the warnings.

He plumbed the tombs depths and at the bottom of that terrible pit he saw it.

It was burned into his mind. He couldn't escape it. It whispered to him. Repeated on his lips treacherously, even as his lips were lost. Now his voice is contorted, croaking. And he still can't shake it. He has to get back to his laboratory in Skyside. Maybe he can find some way to unravel this curse. Maybe some way to-

Ohh! Is that a MagDonald's bag in that dumpster?

And awful amalgam of human and raven swoops down into the trash, scaring away several gulls as he lands awkwardly. One spindly human arm that looks more like a bird's leg. One wing in place of an arm. Wings growing from the back. Too many beaks. An incoherent jumble of avian and human parts perhaps three feet tall, covered in gloss black feathers and patchy pink skin.

"Bird," the abomination croaks as he rips open the paper bag in search of cold french fries. "Bird bird."

Each time the word is uttered the thing warps a little more.

A passerby spots it and grimaces. Obviously someone's science experiment that escaped. What a gross bird, they think, as a few orange scales creep up their leg...

[bc56]

Under the Tire Factory

"That should work." Jade begins climbing up to the surface. "I wouldn't be too hopeful about getting the clothes back either way. I'd bet this goblin is a spiteful one."

Bird is the Word

Elsewhere, elsewhen, Jade is also present in Skyside. She's heading home from an "errand" involving the stomping of supervillains. Then she sees this bird... Thing. Weird critters like that are often a sign of more supervillains. She approaches the bird, cautiously, and begins searching around to see where it came from. And why does it keep saying "bird?" Oh no! Was it human once? That's terrible!

[Rebonack]

[To the Cable Cars!]

Zee will lead our heroes to the cable cars and fork over a few coins to pay the fair to a dour looking man with a face that looks half-melted. The sort of face that looks defeated and downtrodden. Taking money from people at the ticket booth is the best the poor fellow can manage.

Thankfully the cable cars are made almost completely out of aluminum to reduce their weight, so touching them should be relatively safe for Solstice. They're boxy, slapped together looking things for the most part, though a few of the gondolas are quite a bit fancier with fresh coats of paint or gleaming chrome finish. There's no real rhyme or reason to their design, like much of Skyside they were thrown together to serve a purpose without a great deal of thought to aesthetics.

Function over form.



There's a clunk, followed by a disconcerting lurch, and then the cable car begins to descend.

"Have you spent any time in Groundtown, Jade?" Zee asks. "I walked through it once before, but otherwise I really haven't been down there."

A beat.

"Oh! And I planted a plum tree for them. I wonder if it's still down there..."

Everyone likes plum trees.


[Bird's the Word]

Moving closer, Jade will be able to tell that there are still a few scraps of clothing clinging to the bird. Was it once human?

When it turns toward her that question its answered.

Half its face looks human, though with lots of little pin-feathers sticking through the skin and a beak pitched at an awkward angle instead of a mouth. It looks deformed and pitiful.

"Bird!" it croaks, the feathers on its face growing larger and unfurling. "Bird bird bird!"

It clutches the bag to its chest with one of its foot-like arms and spreads its wings at Jade, trying to look intimidating.

Frankly it looks WAY more pitiful than intimidating.

[bc56]

"Silly bird. I don't want that." Jade laughs and goes back to looking for tracks, but she's very shaken by what she just saw. Something turned that man into a bird monster. She should track the cause down and stop it from doing anything else. Fortunately, a gross bird like that is probably shedding plenty of feathers for her to backtrack along.

[WindStruck]

Solstice trails behind Zee, frequently consulting the Larza doll she holds just to be sure they aren't getting too far astray.

She avoids speaking to or even really looking at the man with a half-melted face. It sends shivers down her spine. Bad shivers.

Yet again, Solstice finds herself in a strange contraption. Traveling around here seemed so complicated and frightening most of the time. She wondered if mortals traveling about their world were always like this.

But oh well. Solstice continued to keep a close watch on the effigy and a wary eye on her surroundings.

[Rebonack]

[Bird is the Word]

You say silly, but you MEAN creepy as heck.

Because that's what the bird guy is.

SUPER creepy.

Jade leaves the abomination behind, searching for feathers. There's a bit of a problem there, though. Skyside has a healthy population of crows and ravens.

For...

Some definitions of healthy.

Plenty of them are probably mutated.

Maybe not as mutated as that guy but still mutated. So finding feathers strewn around won't be difficult. What WILL be difficult is trying to figure out if the feathers come from the mutant or relatively normal birds.

Other people had to have seen him though, right? He's pretty big AND hideous as heck.

She could probably ask around. See if anyone noticed which direction he came from?

[bc56]

Of course I mean creepy. Jade uses humor as a defense mechanism against this sort of disturbing stuff. Hopefully the gross bird wasn't carrying any diseases. Jade would have gotten them easily. But ignoring that possibility, she starts asking around. "Hey, have you seen a mutant half-bird guy passing through? Which way did he come from?"

[Rebonack]

[Bird is the Word]

Nope, no diseases.

Only a memetic cognitohazard.

The first person shakes her head, "No, sorry, didn't see any bird guys."
The second looks thoughtful. "Like one of those birdmen or something different?"

When Jade explains specifically what she means, he'll inform her that he's seen a few bird folk around but nothing like what she was talking about.

The third, a particularly greasy looking individual, looks Jade up and down. "Yeah, I saw your mutant bird. But man, I'm having some trouble recalling the details..."

Oh!

Fun!

He wants a bribe. These sorts of people are always a barrel of laughs.

[bc56]

"Fine." Jade offers a small wad of bills to the shady man. She has plenty of money. She can afford to pay a few bribes to lesser unsavories in the pursuit of a more dangerous target.

[Rebonack]

[Bird's the Word]

The greasy man smiles.

He has serious dental hygiene issues.

"Saw the bird guy come in from that 'o way," he says, pointing off toward the industrial airdocks. "From the meat-packing district. Lots of places to hide a lab over that way where some genehead might be cookin' up chimeras."

The man is lying.

He never saw the mutant.

But he figures this is a pretty good story. Worse comes to worse, he got some free coin and the stranger comes looking for him when she doesn't find the lab.

No big deal.

This rat has plenty of holes to hide in.

[bc56]

"That bird was no chimera..." Jade mutters. But she heads off in the direction the stranger indicated anyway. She has no better leads. Hopefully more people don't get turned into bird-mutants in the meantime.

[5a Violista]

[Back Alley Armory]

Oh, good.
The thief managed to get up on her own.

Minerva manages to climb through the window and, not quite as sore as Leslie, manages to jump-ish away so that Minerva doesn't fall on anyone.

She has to wait a moment to get used to the jitters from the drug, holding her head.
...
Okay.
Good.
She bites her lip to distract herself.

Ouch, she bit herself a little too hard!
Minerva wipes the blood off her lip.

"Okay. Um...are you both alright?" she asks them. She moves to the trash pile to help whoever up. "We should probably get away before anything happens."

She then will help whoever needs it out of the alley.




[Olympian Extractions - Factory Floor]

It's okay, Ms Foreman. Carlie has, over time, become not particularly fond of her either. So it's reciprocal.

"Surely you already know about where we could find these anarchists. If we wanted to investigate them, where would you recommend we go next?" Assuming the forewoman is telling what she knows, it's likely this 'anarchist' group would know more about the missing guy. Carlie isn't really sure if she wants to report back to the foreman what they find out, though, given the things she's said so far and given how she's showed herself to be kind-of incompetent, in Carlie's estimation.

[Rebonack]

[Bird's the Word]

Jade heads toward the air docks and will have her attention drawn to a growing number of gulls. They wheel about in the air, perch on roofs and posts, and squabble loudly over stray scraps of garbage. Jade will likely get the weird impression from a particularly raucous group of gulls a few blocks away that there MUST be something interesting over there. After all, that squawking is the sound of a feeding frenzy. Whatever it is, the gulls REALLY like it and REALLY don't want to share it with other gulls and are loudly making that known to each other. Honestly she had better hurry or it might be gone before she gets there.

Though...

If she catches herself and realizes that intrusive thought is dumb she'll notice a warehouse nearby with some pretty spooky looking greenish light shining out of an upper window. Exactly the sort of thing one might expect from a genehead lab. Or at least SOME kind of mad scientist's pad.

That isn't the only thing of interest, though.

There's ALSO an abandoned silo of some sort over that way with a whole bunch of ravens perched on it.

That mutated guy looked fairly raven-like, right? Maybe there's a connection.

Options.

Loud birds and DEFINITELY treats!

Spooky glowing window of mystery and probably no treats.

Raven-infested place with maybe treats because ravens are always hiding all the best stuff.

[bc56]

Back Alley Armory

The thief tosses the umbrella back into the raging fire and relaxes. "I'm fine. Never better!" She hops down from the sill and introduces herself. "I'm Ada. And you are?"

Bird is the Word

Why is Jade thinking of food at a time like this? That's weird. But the ravens. Those are a clue. She heads towards the silo, hoping she'll find something good there... No, wait, hoping she'll find the source of the bird-mutants and put a stop to it. Right? Snacks are just a bonus.

[Rebonack]

[Bird is the Word]

The ravens all watch Jade suspiciously.

Those dumb ravens. They think they're so smart, always getting all the best stuff and hiding it.

But little do THEY know that Jade has thumbs! She's WAY smarter than they are and can probably find all the treats they've hidden! Even the ones under roofing tiles and things.

Several points of ingress are offered at the silo. Jade could go straight through the front door, but if this IS a villain's hideout that may not work well for her. Or she could climb up the ladder on the side of the silo and enter through the hatch about two thirds of the way up. OR she could just fly up to the roof. It looks like there might be an entrance up there, too. But that's where the ravens are hanging out and they would probably harass her. Why do ravens have to be such jerks, anyway? They think they're so much cooler than gulls with their black feathers and tool-using skills.

Gulls can be cool, too!

They can... steal fish right out of a pelican's mouth!

Yeah! And they can SWIM! Dumb ravens don't know how to swim.

Well anyway, what's Jade going to do?