[I actually wasn't sure which perspective I should use, but First person just seemed to click as naturally fitting for the setting.]

Indigo Ventreyas

It was a little surreal... I 'think' I'm using that word right anyway... Waking up after such a catastrophe.

It felt like any other day I woke up after a hell of a party, mild hangover, that's a headache turned up to 11 by the way, Body aching head to toe, serious case of cotton mouth going on. The stink of smoke was new... Well, uncommon at least. Movement was also horribly stiff... though that strange rumbling sound and the oddest little gurgle were also weird...... I swear to god, if some party-boy choked a hooker and left her in my room again I'm going to kill the bastard this time.

...

Then it came back to me like a Truck and I lurched up in my bed...

Correction, I failed to lurch up, instead cricking my spine because of this weird stiffness, and flopped back down to knock my head on the hard-wood floor, calling forth a string of pissed off curses. It really fucking hurt and I suddenly felt the overwhelming urge to hurt something to relieve my own pain. Luckily I'm a little more logical than your average ganger and 'stayed' laying there, instead moving just my head to try and discern what had happened after... after 'that', I didn't want to think about it right now, I was pretty sure I'd freak out if I did, and freaking out never did me any good, I was better trained than that, Infiltrator's don't freak out, EVER! It gets them killed!

First, Analysis!

I was currently laid on my back, it felt like there was something sticking out of my back that made laying there uncomfortable, though it didn't seem to really 'hurt' as long as I stayed still, so either it 'wasn't' an impaled foreign object, or It was and my nerves were just shut down from the intensity of the pain and how much of a wuss I was... I chose to go with the latter as the greater possibility. I also felt incredibly stiff, only my artificial arm was moving in ways I wanted it too... which probably meant I was flailing comically to anyone else... A little thought test brought up my Holo-screen without difficulty, a couple more tests showed that it was working just fine, so I put that away and moved on... It seemed like only my fleshy bits were malfunctioning, how Ironic!

Now I turned my head to the right and... Oh, there was that strange gurgling sound, and god damn if it didn't freak me right the fuck out!

It was one of my body guards gurgling... gurgling because he looked like his fleshy parts had tried to grow their way out of his augmentations, including the cranial armor that ensured he couldn't just be shot in the head... I don't believe I've ever seen a more horrifying sight, blood and... other fluids where pooling in place and some kind of non-technological sparking was shooting off of him in different spots. I was tunneled in on his eyes though, on that horrified pleading look of his, I couldn't imagine still being alive in that state and I found myself instinctively trying damn hard to reach my right arm over there to put him out of his misery... Luckily someone else got to it first, because there was noway I could reach that far.

Instead I shoved myself over to look away just as I heard the shot, Hand flying up to grip my head tightly as I tried desperately to process what I'd just seem without falling apart... Infiltrators don't fall apart, no matter how fucked up things get, cause you never know what you're going to find in the depths of a Corporate research hole... I had seen some fucked up shit in my time, but this... Well, it takes on a whole different light when it's someone you'd consider a friend going through it instead of some poor already fucked stranger.

Something suddenly touched my shoulder and I flinched, suddenly glancing up between those metal fingers at... "What the fuck?"

"Come on Boss, we can't stick around here, It won't be safe for very long."

..."Wha?" Was all I could manage... Staring back at me was some kind of wierd... pony, thing... I recognized the suit, it was another one of my bodyguards, one of the few who hadn't needed nor resorted to augmentation outside of the Holo-PC and Comm Suite. I knew this particular one well because he was my 'left hand' so to speak... My right one had just been put down... I could only recognize him by the buttons of that suit, oddly stretched or torn as it was, he was the one with the 'B.P.' initial buttons. Everything else made no sense to my poor brain at the time, cause I was staring at an, admittedly still very large and muscular, pink pony thing with a perfectly straight hot-pink mane, and pink as fuck eyes...

He noticed that I noticed, and a familiar grimace appeared even on that 'adorable' muzzle followed by a familiar sigh of exasperation as I snorted sharply and added "Heheh... So now I can 'really' call you 'Big Pink' huh?" I couldn't quite flail in childish laughter like I'd intended, but I still managed a trembling snicker.

He put on a once more familiar dead-pan glare as he spoke "No, you can't... but you will anyway, because you're still you..." Followed by a slight smirk "At least your sense of humor is surviving... Heh... Purple Bat Horse."

I froze instantly... oh no, please tell me that joke wasn't as accurate as the one I'd just made for him... I couldn't hope for such though, he was always about as witty as I was, give or take a little, and as I finally looked down 'myself' I unleashed the purest more cliched 'NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO' that I could manage...

It felt good, very good, to do so, because the cliche stupidity helped distract me from the disturbing sight of horse legs replacing all of my flesh and blood limbs long enough to at least 'start' coping with it... which was remarkably fast solely due to training and experience, and with that started I looked further and noticed the presence of wings, Bigass leathery bat wings with one bigass 'clawfinger' at it's edge, and with a half-layer of feathers that matched the color of this new fur I had, which was some kind of very dark gray with a purple tint to it... And the 'hair' was a perfect shade of Indigo fitting my name "Great... so the Apocalypse has a sense of humor does it? I mean, I know we've made jokes about 'Purple Bat man' here and there, but really?! And where does the 'horse' bit come from? Did it just want to turn me into 'something' and had nothing better?" I stopped suddenly, snapped my head up, and stared into space for a moment... "Actually, no, thank you apocalypse, there are much worse things I could have been turned into, I'll just be glad that I'm alive!" I really didn't want to jinx Myself...


He just shrugged off my ranting and kept that smarmy little grin of his that says he knows he one upped me for once. "Dunno, maybe... sure as hell looked like it. But we're alive, and as funny as this is, Shit's still exploding out there. I only found a couple of survivors among the staff so far, your butler for one, and one of the rookie's that was recently hired. they're both going around checking for more survivors... or, for more cases that require a little 'mercy'... I found a dozen of them before I came back here to check on you... I think Redman dragged you inside before the Debris wave got too thick to breath and this freaky shit started"... Why did all of my bodyguard have color puns in their names again?... Nevermind, not relevant.

Being reminded of this was a considerably sobering moment that lead to me staring at the glass wall of my balcony door's... and the pure brown air I saw beyond it... I couldn't fathom how the glass hadn't shattered... oh wait, High quality combat ready glass panes. "Right... No bemoaning my misfortune in living as a horse thing when I've already seen the alternative... Help me stand up?" I made what I thought was an adorably pouty face... but judging by the snort of laughter he made It just ended up looking really gay. "What? I need to figure out how to walk without breaking my face so we can travel without me tripping allover my fucking 'Horse legs!' and slowing us down! Yes, I 'do' realize we can't stay here for any longer than necessary because we're in prime 'Rape and pillage' territory once people have been given time to organize."

...

He only rolled his eyes and gave me this look that told me he would bed taking great pleasure in me inevitably smashing my face into the floor... Why couldn't the apocalypse just up and install 'How to Horse Walk 101' in my head?

Across the Cosmos he blazed. A man - nay, an Elf, a High Elf - encased in light and trailing fire, propelling himself with arcane fury through the star studded blackness, transcending time and reality, merging the borders of space and the Abyss with fervent yet practised hands.

His name was Fiirnmir Starsplendour. The High King of the High Elves, Lord of Agros, Slayer of Gods and Bane of Divinity. His power was mighty, but his temper patient and just. He loved far more than he hated, saved more than he took, and protected far more than he threatened. His was not the business of pride or hubris, nor ignorance or passion. His was the domain of wisdom and compassion, tempered in the fire of righteous action.

Yet as he came upon the source, he felt a rare pang of anger rush through him.

Agros was in peril. Her many cities of gold and marble were crumbling into the seas. Her peoples, innocent as they were of their King's ancient sins, were dying in the thousands with every passing second. Indeed, the High Home of the High Elves was collapsing in on itself, and even Fiirnmir, as mighty as he was, could not turn the tide of relentless destruction.

Fearing the Gods had returned to launch their revenge, he had taken to the Cosmos to battle them, in what he perceived to be a final confrontation between Elf and his Creator. Yet, as he ascended the clouds, and broke into that hollow and hopeless void known as the Cosmos, he found himself quite alone. No enemies awaited him, no minions of hate and peril, no trap nor ambush. Nothing. Yet still Agros continued to crumble below.

It did not take him long to ascertain the source of the threat to his peoples. Skilled in the lore of the multiversal plains, he was able to see - yet unable to hinder - the tendrils of powerful energy that now gripped his home. It seemed Agros was not under siege from divine beings, but something as equally severe. Something natural, yet tainted.

And so he followed the source.

And here he was.

The High King of the High Elves, idle with rage, looked upon the folly of an idiotic race.

No one, human or beast, from the crumbling skylines of New Ark would have noticed that lone shooting star in the sky above, blended as it was with the multitude of catastrophes affecting them; they would not have known that a being far mightier than science would ever permit, looked down upon them, as a huntsmen would look down upon a rabid dog.

Roxanne’s ears were ringing as she pulled herself out of the shattered remains of the storefront and she tired to remember why she was there.

It took a few moments but she revealed she’d been returning from one of the gangs safehouses after running them some supplies when everything went wrong. The last thing she remembered was swerving to avoid an out of control vehicle even as her own senses failed her. She must have crashed here and been knocked out.

Well she was glad she was alive and from the looks of things the bike was sturdily enough made and the stores now ruined contents were soft enough that both she and it were intact. At least she felt intact and thus simply assumed everything was ok. It wasn’t till she spotted her hat laying in the glass and then tried to pick it up that she reilised something was off. First of all two hands reached out instead of the expected one, one small and skinny the other long and covered in some kind of stony or wooden armor.

”What”

She looked down at her body, noticing her tone up clothing and weirdly bent and furred legs ending in sharp talons

”The”

She looked behind here and found a tail covered in the same scales as where on her larger set of arms

”Fuck”

Finally around her neck was a ring of odd spines. Suffice to say she was very, very confused at the moment. Compounding matters was the dust storm outside, which was reducing visibility by about 40 m in the slums, and the shouting, fires and alarms she could hear going on out there. The occasional bout of gunfire, screaming or monstrous roaring indicated that some people had woken up in considerably more dangerous situations than her.

Somewhat awkwardly she picked her way through the debris, pulling up her necker kerchief over her face to mouth to make an attempt to keep the biggest particles of the dust out of her lungs. It probably would not have worked closer to the center, but out here it was serviceable. It was a general goods store, run by slum denizens for other slum denizens who couldn’t or wouldn’t go to the marked district for goods.

While she scrounged she tried to call some of the people in the gang she trusted on her headset to see if they what was going on, but the lines were dead. She’d have to get back to base and see if the boss knew what was going on and what they should do.

Eventually, after looting the money from the till and shoving some cheap booze into her messenger bag(might as well, the store clerk was nowhere to be seen), she found what she was looking for: a stand that featured a bunch of poorly made safety gear. Some of the corporations were so shitty that they didn’t even provide the necessary gear to work in their factories and required the workers to provide their own lest they get injured. Some people simply went without but those that did not went with what they could afford, which wasn’t much. Among the cheaply made gloves and hardhats she found a pair of safety goggles. Made to keep hazardous chemicals out of workers eyes, they would hopefully do the same for the dust currently swirling through the air.

Eye protection acquired she went over to her bike and mounted it.

”Ok, either you have gotten smaller or I have gotten bigger.”

It took a few moments to get used to how to sit with her new frame, talons gripping the foot rests one long arm grabbing the handlebars for steering and the opposite small one the accelerator and singular brake lever of the tracked bike. She revved the engine and backed out of the store, turned into the street and then gunned it through the dust swept streets for club Nova, HQ of the Red Sun Gang, tail whipping through the air behind her.

As soon as Eilidh woke up, she could tell that something was different. Every inch of her body was tingling. She hadn't even opened her eyes, but she could feel that she was younger. Her body was healthier and in better working order. Her skin was smooth. And she could feel something below her waist. She could....actually feel below her waist. Her eyes shot straight open and she turned to look, immediately seeing that below her waist was the body of a horse.

She screamed. But nobody heard her.

---

One hour later, she was trotting around her floor testing out her four new legs (In the tower block she lived in, every floor was one very large apartment, as opposed to there being several small apartments per floor as many other blocks had.) She could only vaguely remember how to use two legs! On the other hand, that made the process easier. She didn't need to 'forget' how to walk with two feet. The first thing she had noticed besides the changes to her own body was that all the windows on her floor had been blown in. Her wheelchair lay crumpled in a heap in the corner of her room. In fact, she herself had woken up on the floor.

Besides the horse's body, another change had occurred to Eilidh; she was younger. In fact, she had the upper body of her teenage self. Her short, white hair was not long and curly. Of course, this would mean having to once again find something fashionable to wear. She naturally did not have clothing befitting a teenager currently in her possession. The most fitting thing she found was a tight, dark top with a shoulder missing. It was reasonably hip. She also used a clip-around skirt to hide the 'transitional area' between her hips and the horse's body. Looking herself in the mirror, she liked what she saw, but it still needed more...youth! Plus the horse's body itself was a bit plain. She should dress it it up a bit. The only appropriate thing was a circular silk table decoration. It would have to do. She also tied a ribbon in her tail, for all the difference that made, and also tied one in her hair, which she was begging to find annoying left loose, and she hadn't the patience to straighten it. As for the 'youth', she found some warm, very modern fingerless gloves in her bottom drawer. They were a present she received in her forties, back when she was clinging on to the last shreds of being able to dress modern. She'd never worn them in her life. She put them on now.

Grabbing her credits, she nodded at her reflection. Ready to hit the city! She moved her arms as if to reverse her wheelchair, and they brushed her hairy horse body. It would still take some getting used to...

---

Trotting down the street, Eilidh had fallen into the trotting rhythm. Walking on four legs wasn't as hard as she'd have thought once she knew how. Of course, nobody recognised her. Nobody tried to. Everywhere she looked, changes had occurred to everyone, and not all of them were success stories. The streets were gruesome. The roads were filled with debris. It was truly starting to feel like day one of the post-apocolypse.

~Silana~

Location: Northern Slums, cultist Hideout

"Well...today has been interesting." The now mannequin like person commented, studying her immaculate hands intently. As she moved, her body made a few clacking noises as the artificial looking joints slid against one another. "What about you, Casey dear? Enjoying not ending up like a blubbering pile of flesh like the other guy, hm?" It was nice to hear her voice hadn't changed any.

"By the dark lords unholy soiled knickers that was terrifying." The green haired person said as they sat in the corner of a room, back against the wall. Taloned claws scratched at the ground beneath her nervously. "I-is it over?"

"Hmm, seems to be. Most of the others seem to have vacated the premises...it's probably a good thing we were the only ones here for now otherwise things might have gotten a bit messy. Shame about what happened to poor Victor. When my skin started falling off I thought I was going to die, but I rather like this change, heh! No more having to take care of such fickle skin and wasting money on skin care products." She chuckled, looking around the large mostly empty room.

A series of benches had been erected in the hall, mimicking a church of some sort. At the end was an altar where an old coffin of some sort was laid out. It was sat up, leaning against the wall. It was where the people of this clandestine little cult gathered for their little...study sessions, heh.

"I'm so glad you're enjoying other peoples misery." Casey darkly replied. "Charming, really." The other girl shivered, and not from drug withdrawals. "I'm just glad it's over-"

Suddenly, a loud thumping noise was heard from the coffin, causing the girl to freeze.

"..."

A few seconds of silence passed and it happened again.

"NOPE NOPE I'M OUT GONE NOT STAYING HERE." She jumped to her feet, nearly barreling over the older woman before Allyn rolled her eyes, grabbing the other girl by the collar of her torn jacket.

"Oh come ooon, where's your sense of adventure?"

"No no you put me down right now you she-devil!"

"Cute words coming from someone who's part of a demonic cult."

"G-gahh, just put me down already!"

"But torturing you is so much fun, Casey."

"I swear to the great lord of whatever the fuck you worship I'm going to kill you." Before the other woman could reply, the coffin lid was finally torn off its hinges. Whatever the two had been expecting, it was not a pile of some sort of sludge looking thing with bones sticking out of it, unmoving.

"Poke it." Allyn shoved Casey closer, quickly causing the other woman's eyes to widen and shout in displeasure before quickly jumping away from whatever it was.

"You do it. I'm not getting anywhere near that." Before she could reply further, the odd sludge like liquid shivered, quickly moving and coalescing into a somewhat human like shape. It...looked oddly like a little girl, except one made out of some sort of dark sludge and had red, thorny protrusions coming out of her body.

"...Ugh." One woman looked on with obvious curiosity, the other with apprehension and fear. For the moment, whoever and whatever it was, didn't seem to particularly notice them. If anything, it seemed to be studying its own body very intently. Its bright blue eyes scanned its sludge like body, a frown barely being noticeable being made out on her lips. A look of confusion followed by a frown of obvious annoyance.

"...You there." She swiftly turned her head towards the two woman. "Where am I?"

"New Ark, underground base of your most firm believers your unholiness."

"Allyn what are you-!" Casey was silenced swiftly by a hand being shoved over their mouth.

"...and you are?"

"Allyn and Casey! Yours to do with as you please, your goopy evilness!" Silana didn't reply, merely looked at her own body again. It seemed...whatever happened, she had ceased being human. She couldn't remember. She remembered falling into a bog of some sort and blacking out...did she die? Was she in hell or something? Odd, she thought Hell would be much worse than this. Whatever it was, it was annoying...as were these two fools that stood before her. She thought briefly about just ending any relation between them here and now, but something the talkative one mentioned intrigued her.

"My most firm believers?" She questioned in an emotionless voice.

"Sure you just, your unholy goopiness. That coffin held our peoples dead prophet! And you came out of it so that makes you our unquestionable leader!"

"Allyn this is a bad idea."

"Ignore the chicken."

"...so you'll do everything I say, then?" A small, not exactly nice smirk formed on the sludge person's lips.

"Indeed! Everyone that is still alive will follow you unquestioningly...well...once we find them, heh. Most seem to have scattered or have been reduced to a pile of fleshy goop."

"I see..." She had...missed a lot, hadn't she? What had exactly happened while she was asleep? And where was this 'New Ark'? She was by no means a prophet at all, but it was difficult to remember anything. Silana started walking...or at least, tried too. Seemed her legs weren't working so well. She had an upper body and arms that seemed to be able to reasonably grasp things and work well enough, but her lower half seemed to just be a pile of sludge. Hm, she'd work on that for now...

The slime turned her head towards the talkative one.

"I wish to go outside."

"Ah, this way then~" Silana followed the odd puppet looking thing down a series of hallways, and against her better judgement Casey followed at a reasonable distance. It didn't take long for Allyn to lead her towards an exit in the slums. "Here we are, lord of evil goopiness!~" Silana turned her head towards the woman, giving her a deadpan expression.

"...quit saying 'Goop'" She commanded in her evidently usual emotionless voice. Before she could reply though, Silana exited the tunnels and into the slums above.

"Great, she's gone now lets leave ourselves. I'm not sticking around for whatever the fuck that was gets back..."

"Hmm? Leave? Out there? Heh, you realize that's probably a bad idea. These tunnels are probably one of the most safe places in the area."

"...damn you and your logic. Gah. Fine! I'll be seeing if I can contact any of the others over the net..."

---

A few minutes after leaving the hideout, Silana was slowly making her way down the street of the slums. Everything was so...different? She had no idea what she was even seeing. It was almost as if she was in an entirely different world! It was so much to take in, even if everything was obscured by a heavy layer of dust and debris. Various theories and reasons as to what happened came to her head, but she couldn't confirm or deny any of them. All she could do was possibly find another person and ask.

...but then, those two definitely weren't humans. So maybe there weren't any humans around? Well, whatever. The next semi-sentient thing she saw she'd 'ask' for a little information. She supposed she could have asked those two, but they were annoying. The only value they had at the moment was that the talkative one said she'd follow whatever orders she gave her.

So for now, silana would look for someone else to speak with.

[Now, I won't be doing these environmental posts 'everytime' for 'everyone', partly because that's a big piece of what took me so long this time and i don't want to over-do it and delay everyone again D: so just when something really comes to mind that would be interesting to spice it up with :D do let me know if you think I go 'too far' though.]

For Fiirnmir

No human or beast would indeed notice the falling star plummeting towards the city... Alas, it might well be folly to underestimate the power of technology.

Devastated as the city... as 'every' city was for that matter, There was still the matter of anti-meteor defenses designed to protect the exorbitantly large targets that are the massive cities of the Corporate empire... Granted, just about every satellite they normally used for extra-atmosphere targeting was currently plummeting towards the cities below, and with nearly all systems going haywire in the wake of the catastrophe they would not receive authorization to vaporize those satellite before they crashed.

The same could not be said for the foreign object plummeting through the atmosphere, glowing like a small sign, and casting off foreign energy readings the likes of which triggered detection systems across most of the hemisphere... they'd never be able to tell 'what' it was, but even the simplest sensors could tell it was foreign.

As such, being the only foreign object in the sky that didn't fit the parameters for 'don't vaporize on sight', Every still functional Orbital and atmospheric defense system in New ark and it's nearest neighbor's opened fire on him, though a few of these would be snuffed out even in the following seconds, and the vast majority were already destroyed or shut down, This still amounted to countless thousands of smaller bolts of energy and magnetically propelled supersonic rounds filling the sky around him, and considerably less countless but vastly more powerful sweeping beams of energy normally meant to cleave larger meteors into smaller pieces for the little guns.

For Roxanne

It was actually considerably more manageable to navigate the roads of the slums than it was to attempt such nearer to the center, though it was still absolutely littered with discarded vehicles of various kinds that either died or were simply abandoned... That said, there would be a few instances where some vehicle from the inner districts, or some flying machine, had been flung into the slums... Some were even still coming down in-fact, rebounding off of roof-tops, hitting the street directly and causing the occasional blast of fire and shrapnel, though it was a testament to their durability that only 'some' exploded on impact... Once in a good while something bigger would crash into one of the buildings along the ring, bringing down most of the structure on it as well.

All that said, an experience driver should be able to manage the gauntlet... on a clear day at least... suffice to say the reduced sight distance would make it more difficult at higher speeds... we'll just have to hope our gal can keep her luck in-tact.

For Eilidh

There really wasn't much to say about the outside there, given that one's sight would barely breach 20 feet with all that dust... which one might also note made it rather a challenge to breath out here... On top of that were the still present sounds of roaring fires, occasional explosions, and the frequent instances of various creature noises just barely audible over the endless static of dust and debris clattering every bloody second. Things were out there and quite possibly difficult to see.

For Silana

... much the same as the above applies actually, though being in the slums things are a bit tighter spaces and there's more debris being blown down from the upper districts... Then again, most of that may only have been a hindrance for those little followers she left behind... lucky girl.

Indigo Ventreyas

As it so happened, learning to walk on four legs... well, three legs and an arm, wasn't as difficult as i'd expected it to be. Don't get me wrong, it was still agonizing and I'm quite certain I still got a dozen or so good deep bruises in, and of course Big Pink had recorded the whole thing 'for posterity'.

BUT! I managed to re-learn walking in about half an hour!... keyword, walking, as in very slow patterned motions that kept me moving forward at an unacceptably slow pace, but still far above laying there like a new-born or, I shudder to think, needing to be 'carried'... Even if Vein would be more than willing to carry me... that's my butler by the way.

Speaking of him, I was actually just starting to prance around the room, which I had identified to be the 6th story roof level living room now decorated with several other dead body guards in a variety of examples of mind cracking body horror demonstrations.

Anyway! That was about the time that said Butler arrived, when I was excitedly prancing about celebrating my relearned mobility, of course with a previously mentioned rookie still in tow. "Oohhh, Indie! So good to see you're already up and prancing about like you're usual adorable self!" There was a mixed hint of teasing and sarcasm in his tone that normally would have irritated me, but right now it put me at ease... one more familiar thing that wasn't exploding or something. "I'm sure you've been told that we're in something a situation... well, really, everywhere is... would you like a proper report sir?"

I had stopped the moment I heard his voice, mid-step, catching myself balanced on three limbs and staring... It seemed that now it was 4 for 4 on evidence that we 'all' got turned into something else.

Vein had become some kind of... dog... thing? I could only really identify it as something canine, Tall, lithe, probably flexible. He looked a little 'collie'-esque, in that his fur was very thick and the colors and patterns fit, he still fit his old preference for looking kind of fabulous... The rest? not so much. He had excessively large fangs that I could recognize even against the white of his muzzle, disproportionate gorilla like arms, at least compared to the rest of him, which really meant they were just extra long with extra thick fingers and claws. His legs were disproportionately small to a mild degree, and rather than a fluffy adorable tail there was a long serpentine length of fur behind him with a, shit you not, a 'mace' on the end of it of it, or some growth that resembled one, with spikes and everything. Otherwise he was still done up in one of his 'fabulous' suits, if considerably too tall for it... he was the tallest one here by a considerable margin.

The rookie was a different matter... or, ironically, 'similar' matter... In that he was now stuck as a quadruped too, except 'this' one was some kind of insect thing, though I may or may not have been paranoid in seeing structural similarities between myself, pink, and the rookie. Those seemingly smooth 'solid' purple eyes were odd, with just a little bright spot in them to suggest where he was looking, but they didn't detract from his disturbed and freaked out rookie expression. Oddly, other parts of him matched the color of his eyes, if darker, wing, shell, crest/mane whatever you'd call a membrane thing that replaces hair... even the bits of muscle I could see through the joints of the shell that covered the rest of him... I suppose I got off lucky with 'bat horse thing'.

After a few moments to take in their image I shook my head, cleared my throat, and sat the hell down. I had a feeling I'd need it. "Yes, go ahead, I've been a bit absorbed in making sure I'm not going to be a useless nugget in whatever comes next."

Vein nodded simply and raised one of those comically large paws to gesture towards the window "I'm sure you saw enough to have a gist of the source of that ocean of dust out there... It is so thick that we rather doubt one can survive without a gasmask this close to the city center. While staying here to let it settle 'could' be an option, neverminding the likely hood of anyone else who may have survived eagerly targeting this place for looking upon seeing it intact, The Second and Third floors have been compromised and are filled with the cloud, albeit thinner than outside, it has filled the lower levels and will slowly be rising higher as it fills up. We still need to get through it in order to reach the micro-factory in the basement levels, and then preferably escape through one of the tunnels that will put us closer to the edge of the market district."

That was rather predictable so far, nothing we couldn't handle with ease, and I knew the house like the back of my... hoof?... well, former hand. I could get through it blind just fine. "There appears to be no connection to the world-net, at all, all methods of attempted to interact with it suggest that the entire system is offline. That said, the chain-web still functions, and still allows for long range communication across the city, if a bit unstable due to, presumably, a great many nodes being demolished and creating voids in the chain, though without specific individuals to communicate with there is little you could do outside of casting a broad-band signal."

Okay, that was a bit less predictable, and more alarming... For the world-net to be entirely down something... well, catastrophic had to happen, and I suppose it did, but I still hadn't expected 'that' to be stopped so completely. "I noticed that you didn't tell me the status of our staff..." That honestly worried me the most.

He actually released a dejected sigh that put me even more on edge knowing it came from 'that' cheery bastard. "That's because there 'is' no more staff to report on. We are it. Our robotic staff have all fallen apart, the rest of our flesh and blood staff are either dead from mutations, from needing to be put down for going feral and attacking us on sight, or fled through the compromised exterior of the building... we 'are' the staff now. Though a system check suggests that the building's many other systems are... 'mostly' still functioning, the elevator is out so we'll need to walk, but if we get to the basement's micro factory we can fabricate some fitting environmental masks for us all and escape in one of your vehicles, provided they still function of course."

Well this was grim... there were a lot of pieces I knew he didn't go into extra detail on, but I could pick them out. Lives were on the line, ours, They were going to follow my orders like always, and that meant their lives were in my... hooves?... god that's weird to think about, But I was going to stand by my more covert reputation of being infinitely more responsible and trust-worthy than any of those damned playboy's who're only interested in themselves. "Right then, we've got no time to waste! Lets hit the stairs and get down there before anyone gets bold enough to break in, then we'll arm up and get ready to move... We'll have to head towards the outer rings, there's a good place I know in the party district we can hole up in until the Dust has settled enough to breath again, provided it hasn't been demolished of course."

After a while of walking, Eilidh's eyes were stinging, and she was coughing up spit that was more dust than water. Breathing was becoming a chore, and she didn't feel safe on these streets, being able to hear the moans and cries of creatures she couldn't see. Luckily she knew that she was near the shops that connected to the mall, and that level B2 of the mall had a subway line to the main train station of the Southeast district should she need to leave the city entirely. She could get to the slums, and through the wall as there wouldn't be guards there if the whole city was like this.

She reached the first shop that was part of the mall. It was a chocolate shop. She kicked the glass door in with her rear hooves, and fell over from the inbalance. She'd have to get used to doing that. Once she was in the basement levels, she'd try and get some practice in. Picking herself back up, she entered the shop, and then the mall proper, naturally shoplifting a small box on the way, and eating it as she navigated the less dusty mall, though it still wasn't ideal, so she descended the stairs carefully, and with her hands on the railings at all times, until she was at B1, where she went to the hardware shop and took several packets of disposable safety masks, and some very expensive looking goggles. Putting the goggles on her head but not over her eyes, she carried on to the pet megastore, grabbed a saddle, acquired some satchels from the trendy handbag store, and with a little jiggery-pokery, soon had, on her back, a saddle with a satchel on either side, that she put the masks and chocolate in.

She spent the next half-hour looting anything useful from B1. Food, provisions, a tent, and on the way to this journey, she encountered several mutated nightstaff corpses and one janitor who had fused with his floor-cleaning vehicle, and he didn't approve of her stealing. Eilidh responded to his attempts to stop her by pushing him down the stairs to B2. He'll live if he goes down the rest himself, but wouldn't be able to come back up.

She then went to the PC store to see if she could get an internet connection. That was a negative, naturally. This was the Apocalypse. She took the best computer they had anyway, and their best MHD. She'd taken portable drives containing her hacking programs from her flat before she left, which were now in her satchels. She took some cables too, for connecting to other machines if wireless wasn't an option.

After a quick meal, she sat down in the middle of the mall, and tried not to let the horror and loneliness around her bring her to tears.

~Silana~

Location: Northern Slums, Slum Streets

...wherever she was, this world was nothing like the one where she had grown up in. How did she even get here? She was sorely out of her element, wherever she was. She couldn't tell what all these large buildings were for, or how they were even made. Or what these hunks of metal that were falling from the sky were called. Some sort of...space metal? Meteorite? Magic of some sort? Certainly magic if it indeed was real as her mother attempted it could create these structures...but most humans feared, and even shunned most even attempting to perform such things, and now there was the potential that it was being used completely?

...it left a bitter taste in her mouth.

Why were humans -people- always such fools? Shunning things they didn't understand.

Sil kept a generally passive expression as she moved down the dusty streets. Well, whatever happened seemed to have made a mess of things in this...village? City. Definitely a city of some sort. A very massive city. Truthfully, she had no idea what she should be doing. She could go back and pry more info out of the chicken brain and annoying one, but that was the option that would give her the most annoyance for likely the least amount of gain.

...well, perhaps she could practice actually getting some legs. Whatever this new body of hers was, she seemed to at least be able to control it somewhat. First the slim looked at the mass that made up her lower body. Should be simple enough...

After spending the next half hour or so, bumbling around on her new legs, falling a couple of times into a puddle of black goo and once or twice nearly falling into some sort of grating on a nearby sidewalk Silana finally managed to get a good grasp of the walking thing once again.

Good, progress!

Now...she should find where some people were.

She had questions that needed answering.

Lots of them.

It was easy enough to navigate through the tight spaces from the slums for her. At least this new body was very...flexible.

The streets where as bad as they had sounded, bodies littering the sidewalks, cars caught in pileups and burning wreckage still descending from the sky. The fact that it was burning made it a little easier to avoid it, but not much. It was fortunate that the air space above the slums was quieter than the center, mostly being transports for stuff going to and from the factories. Apart from the occasional factory inspection and rich kid looking for kicks, nobody with a personal air vehicle had any reason to come down here.

What was more dangerous where the monsters. Twice she had to take a rout round where some massive hulking thing was tearing into bodies and one time she even had to gun it in the opposite direction when something that looked like a cross between a lion, a bat and a scorpion tried to kill her. Eventual however, she made it to the district border, a massive cliff face that separated the poor from the revelry above. Well, most of the time it did. The building she approached was a gaudy affair that leaned against the cliff face, up from which elevators and spiral staircases lead to the next level to where the party started. At night there would be lines stretching out of the building as bouncers (thugs really) made sure only the right people from the slums got in. If you didn’t there were plenty of bars nearby (also run by the Red Sun) but for those that did, they could ascend to that towering place of debauchery and vice. Some used it to get to clubs further in without going through the official accessways, but most stuck to Nova’s own bars and dance floors. Further up still where the drug dens and brothels for the trusted clientele, as well as some more specialised facilities for those with “refined” tastes. Finally at the top was the boss’s penthouse, and that was where she was headed. Going round the back to the service entrance she unlocked the garage door, rolled her bike past the loading bay and into the hidden gang hideout. Down there all she found was more bodies, gang members torn to shreds and the remains of what had killed them, peppered with bullets.

She locked her bike up in the garage where it was probably pretty safe and headed up into the club proper. Again, nobody living, though here some kind of shockwave had shattered bodies and beasts alike and every piece of glass was shattered to smithereens. She was growing pessimistic of the odds of anyone being left at this point, but she kept going, bypassing the vice dens, going straight to the bosses penthouse. Best to be sure he was dead too before taking over the place.

Stepping out into the one way glass walled penthouse she froze in her tracks. Leaning over the boss's desk was a hulking figure. Turned away from her, most of what she could see was a mane of shocking pink hair descending from an opera mask wearing thing with bright red bugged eyes. Apart from the reinforced walls, everything made of glass in the room was shattered like the bar below and what might have been the bosses guards and trusted men were crumpled against the walls, dead. The place reeked of spilt booze and blood as a result.

Those odd eyes clearly gave it vision behind it, because the thing tured moments after she came in. It revealed is bizarre form, most notable of which where the sharp teeth it unveiled as it breathed in deeply, filling massive sack like lungs that billowed out of its chest. She was in the middle of drawing her handgun when it paused whatever it was doing and spoke in a high pitch, melodic tone.

”Wait as second, Roxy, that you kid?”

”I uh, yeah, what is it to you?”

She aggressively replied, leveling the pistol at the thing, now somewhat confused.

”Hot damn Babe. I knew ah recognised that stupid hat.”

”It’s not Stupid! Who are you!”

”It’s me Karzen. You know. Your boss. Now point that thing someplace else”

He sighed, letting the massive amount of air out of his lungs that were then neatly contained in his chest once more. Then he waltzed up to her, reached out a hand and pushed the gun she had been pointing at him down to the floor and then placed one of his freakishly extended hands on her shoulder. When he spoke again his voice was deeper, more familiar.

”It’s good to see you kid. I see you brought just what I needed”

He reached down and plucked two of her looted bottles from her bag and walked back to the desk, sitting down on it, poping both the corks and began chugging the booze.

”Blech. Cheap shit, but it does the job. Here. have some. And take a seat instead of standing there gawking.”

He held out the other bottle for her.

”uh. Sure thing”

She put the gun away, thankful that the boss wasn’t mad, walked up and awkwardly sat behind him, taking the bottle in her lesser hands, drinking it much slower than the boss was. This was kind of a big deal for her, she wasn't exactly in the bosses inner circle, so to be drinking with him this casually was unprecedented. After a few minutes and bottles she worked up the nerve to ask

”So you know what is going on and where everybody is boss?”

The man, who was more out of it than her at this point, slurred

”Fuck knows. Everyone turned into freeks or some shit. Everyone here turned into monsters, straight up died, legged it or got killed by monsters.”

”So. It’s just us left?”

”Here? Probably, but some of the boys and staff weren't here when everything went to shit, it not being party time and all. Was trying to get at em but the lines are all down. Might be some people locked themselves in the vice dens though. Couldn’t be assed breaking the doors down. Most of em wouldn't be that useful anyway”

SHe hoped that some of those members who where else were weren't in crowds and didn’t get slaughtered by the rare crazies. She had some people she considered friends that might fit the bill.

”Should I go find them? I’ve got my bike, could go places in person, carrying your orders boss”

”You’re bike? Oh yeah, track thing you stole. Later. Right now we need to reinforce this place from monsters. Check on the rooms. Been long enough that anyone alive will calm down. Anyone out there who survived will keep doing so and if they are smart and loyal they’ll come here if they've got transport or stick where they are and keep their heads down.”

The booze gone, the boss picked himself off the desk.

”Alright. Let’s get to it ”

She followed after him, down into the rest of the club.

Indigo Ventreyas

Naturally, it wasn't quite as easy as 'just going down there'...

Predicting dirty breathing conditions, it wasn't all that hard to just grab a fashionable purple scarf and wrap it around my muzzle, something the other's did as well... The 'problem' in my mind was these enormous freaking eyes I had now that were going to be freaking dust magnets and no human eye protection was going to protect them properly. There wasn't really much choice but to go anyway.

It 'was' a pretty easy ride to start, though I did my damndest not to let the various bodies scattered around get to me, the stairwell was only dusty at the half-way point, though it got thicker with every inch down we went... Then I foolishly thought 'Oh it's just stairs, I don't even need my eyes for this!'

And promptly stepped off of an unseen collapse in the stairwell's third floor level... I vaguely registered the other's shouts, but I was much more interested in my own potential eminent demise. Some instinct kicked in and my wings beat themselves against the dust, but it was to little effect with such a short fall and only served to rile up the dust before I crashed onto piled of uncomfortable and thankfully not 'sharp' stone below.

Of course I 'did' get to experience the predictable agony of big vulnerable eyes getting dust in them and had to keep my eyes tightly shut to try and wash it out.

After a few moments I registered the other shouts from above and called back "I'm Alright! Just some bruising! And I got dust in my fucking eyes!... It freaking burns!... But the fall's not too bad." I couldn't see too much past this point, I'd effectively gotten myself blinded, if temporarily, minutes into trying to escape my own house... Freaking pathetic.

I heard them climbing down, which oddly enough I pictured Vein using his obscenely long arms to hang down and lower them one by one like some kind of giant dog monkey... "Heh..." After a few moments of making sure I wasn't just ignorant of something stuck in me I heard Pinks talking.

"Well, the stair's have collapsed it seems, we're going to have to move through the second floor."
"This is unfortunate, they weren't like this when we checked earlier. Here's hoping it was only structural failure catching up... and not 'something' causing it."
"Well there's a scary thought. I'm not particularly interested in getting into a fight while I'm still unsteady on four legs."
"Mmmmhmhm, I could give you some experience with those legs of yours if you-"

I cut in suddenly, albeit with a slight laugh/cough "Ladies! We've got more important matters, Like our breathing getting harder the longer we're in the dust. We need to reach the shaft and use that to get down there instead"

I vaguely picked up on the buzzy voice of the rookie "Wow... I don't need to breath... and my eyes are protected naturally... cool..." I chose not to address this as I would be very biasedly angry at the moment.

Rather quickly we picked out way into the second floor... I still couldn't see much, my eyes were a deep blur of tears washing the pain away but also keeping further dust from reaching my eyes, for now. I still didn't like needing to be led along by my... hoof, wing, whatever! I didn't have much choice again.

There was a collective groan of annoyance that was quickly explained "Some of the emergency shutters are closed, but obviously not enough to keep the dust controlled. We'll-" He was suddenly cut off by an incredibly loud *KLANG!* from somewhere that made everyone noticeably jump, and it continued happening, coupled with the sound of tearing metal "Well! That's not good, 'something' is tearing through one of the outer shutters from the sound of it, we need to go around, quickly!"

Naturally, we did... though quickly was a matter of opinion, for me it meant a stumbling fast-walk that I had to be caught from falling out of several times, but general sounds of relief told me that other obstacles didn't prevent us from getting to the shaft... to clarify, that's kindof an emergency hole straight through the building for emergency downward travel.. yes, kind of like the bat-case entrance with the pole.

There was a pause and a bit of chatter, but the sound of something grinding as it was pulled open told me we'd at least found it... Within moments we were sliding down the poll one by one, even in my blinded state I could at 'least' hold a pole.

And then we were in the basement! and once the emergency door was manually shut to keep the dust out we were about as safe as we could possibly be... for now. I knew, eventually something was going to get damaged, or just be turned off, and we'd end up without power down here as well, but for now we had safety, I had time to really work on cleaning my eyes out, we could get the fabricator up and running and... and... I had a lot of time to do nothing but think and I didn't want to right now... So instead

"Hey rookie... What's yer name?"

I actually heard what I took for a 'surprised buzz' that got a tiny chuckle out of me " Uh, w-well... I, don't really have one... I was... one of the Corporate slaves you rescued, I never had a name. Everyone just called me Brown Thirty Two."

Oh... huh, interesting "Oh... well, I'm quit glad you've survived at least, heh... could call you Brownie, but sounds like more of a nick-name... maybe we should give you a normal name to use... like Buzz, heheh... Orrr... Shit, I've always been terrible with names, that's why I call people by colors a lot... s'easier."

I heard a little buggy chuckle come out of him "It's alright, Thirty Two will do for now... i'll... try to think of something else later, but we've got more important things to worry about right now don't we?"

I let out rather an exasperated sigh... but nodded "True, unfortunately... It's going to take me a while yet for these tears to finish cleaning my eyes so... oh! I know what I can do, I'll send a message!" I could imagine several raised eyebrows in reaction "Hush, the city's going to hell. As amazing as we are, we're going to need some help, now get the factory working and start looking around for whatever's still working... and before anyone says it, yes, I know 'everyone' will be able to get the message, I'm prepared for that."

I waved a hand or hoof or something to try and blindly shoo them off to get busy while I was doing that... Luckily I could interact with my holo-comms blind just fine, and it seemed security on the network was in turmoil anyway, leaving it quite easy to hijack a very special signal this close to the core. Not many had the authority to make a broad-band transmission that would travel the chain of individual nodes to every device in the city, I certainly didn't, but with the security already over-worked from the catastrophe it was child's play to hijack it... and by 'every device' I meant it, Televisions in street shops, person comms, vehicle radios... god this was a bad idea, but I had no other way to quickly and efficiently reach out to other survivors.

<<To all who get this message... You can call me Indie, that's all you need to know for now. I'm not actually corporate, I just hijacked the emergency broadcast network is all. I'm sending this to tell you all... The Towers are 'Down'. Yes, that's right, The Corporate Towers have fallen, over the west side if I had to guess, I got to witness the fall myself. Ho! I tell you, It's a sight that'll stick with me for the rest of my life... however long that may actually be.

On that note, Survival... I'm sure many of you are more than willing to do it on your own, but, capable or not, I'm sure some are more than willing to work with others to ensure mutual survival... Lets be honest, in a scenario like this, the loner will eventually find something he can't handle and get waxed. So I got a proposal for all of you. If you're interested in mutual survival efforts, then I know a place that we can hole up in long enough for the dust to clear... of course I'm not going to specify where on air, you'll have to meet me in person to get that information. on the western edge of the East slums, precisely in the center, under the edge of the party district, is the more mundane looking noodle shop you ever did see... Meet me there within a 24 hours, I 'may' wait up to a day longer if the shop is fully intact and breathable.

Now, if you're anything like me, then you've experienced the recent catastrophe's effects on our bodies, and have likely been transformed into some other form of not very human creature as a result. I hope you'll all keep that in mind when showing up, don't panic immediately because someone else looks dangerous, but I won't tell you to be passive either, I'll be on the lookout for idiots who think this'll make a nice trap for a bunch of suckers too!

Either way, we 'need' cooperation, now more than ever, because right now the 'air' itself is inhospitable to us, and there are likely other survivors who've lost their minds and are no less of a threat...

Anyway! You'll recognize me easily enough, I'm that freaky bat horse thing that'll be hanging around there, with all the purple on him... I'll set this message to repeat... oohhh, say, a couple dozen times, just incase you're not around to catch it right 'now'.>>