Adelyn Vaughn
Researcher First Class
Virulent Strains Division
Phoenix Research Facility
January 17th, Year Unknown
Researcher First Class
Virulent Strains Division
Phoenix Research Facility
January 17th, Year Unknown
Security Log B0CA90.cc3.c17
The final moments of Adelyn Vaughn
A low, incessant whine sounds within a sterile room. The lights are on, though some flicker fitfully, and there is a red glow sweeping across the walls. Among the polished silver tables and arrays of equipment sits a solitary woman, working late, as usual. Her hair is disheveled, her coat rumpled, and the bent stub of a lit cigarette hangs from between her lips. She sits with her back pressed against the dented surface of a table, one that had been flipped onto its side. The equipment in the room is mostly broken and scattered about, the remnants of hundreds of shattered vials and containers litters the floor in a mosaic comprised of what must have been thousands of glass shards and fragments, each twinkling beneath the red light like tiny ominous stars. Adelyn, as unlikely as it seemed, felt relatively alright, all things considered. She was rattled, of course, but that's what the cigarette was for.
The table shifted against Adelyn's back, almost gently, or exploratory. It didn't really matter anyways, or so Adelyn though as she stubbed out the first cigarette only to light a second. She didn't know what else to do. She just... sat there, staring off towards the opposite wall, which was made of some reinforced glass with a fancy name, and an even fancier composition. Her eyes didn't really focus on anything, but they continued to slide past several figures on the other side of the glass. She blinked, trying to focus, but it was difficult. Her head was fuzzy, which was strange, there was nothing wrong with her. She thought, perhaps, that those figures on the other side of the glass were people trying to get her attention, but at the moment, she had very little to give. The table shifted again.
She wondered, bemused, why they just didn't just come inside instead of pounding against the glass like a crowd of angry mimes. Surely one of them had access to the airlock. She couldn't hear them, of course, but why then didn't they use the intercom? No, wait, somebody had shot the intercom, why? There was a gun lying between her feet, something small and black with a barrel that gleamed under the light. The slide was locked back, or was it broken? On the ground beside the weapon was an empty clip, no, it was called a mag, she always got those mixed up. There was a haphazard scattering of spent cartridges.. or were they casings..? She wasn't sure. The table moved again.
Metal screeched across the floor in brief bursts as the table shifted a little, stopped, and then shifted a little more, spinning at a slow angle and causing Adelyn to slowly lean towards the receding side. She thought about that, imaging the table turning fully and her just plopping down sideways, like a doll. The thought made her laugh, and the cigarette fell from her mouth. She frowned, watching it fizzle out on the floor. 'Now why would it do that?' she thought, her lips twitching into a near-smile, just before the table moved again with a loud shriek, jostling her and making her frown.
"Would you keep it down?" She asked, irritated that the table was forcing her to smoke a third cigarette. She tapped the open pack against her palm, and felt a pure sense of dejection as nothing but a few flakes of tobacco slid free. She sighed, closing the pack and putting it back into her pocket, saving it for later. Instead, she reached for the cigarette perfectly good cigarette she had dropped a moment before, now why had she done that? It was discolored now, a sickly brownish-red, but what did that matter? It was a cigarette. The table moved again, pitching an unprepared Adelyn sideways. The cigarette fell from her lips.
"Now look what you've done," she chided, her focusing for some reason on several holes bored into what looked like a pretty sturdy containment door. Was it? She didn't know. She just lied there, pulling herself to her feet. Her head against the cool floor, her eyes trained on the cigarette, her legs scrabbling to stand up. "That's weird," she said neutrally, finally noticing her legs, or rather, her lack thereof. Strange. She thought that missing your legs would hurt, wasn't it supposed to hurt? Why could she still feel them? Perhaps she just couldn't see them. That was it. She laughed again, at her own foolishness, reaching for the cigarette. A dark hand reached out from the far side of the table, grasped the rolled paper delicately, and moved it beneath Adelyn's straining fingers.
"Thanks," she said, bringing the lit flame of her husband's lighter to the charred, damp end and attempting to light it. Where was her husband? Why did she have his favorite lighter? It was silver, trimmed in gold, a phoenix embossed on one side. The cigarette hissed and spluttered, but did not light.
"Hey, you got a spare?" Adelyn asked, her eyes trained on the end of her hissing cigarette.
There was no answer.
"Hey buddy, you got a smoke or what?"
Silence.
"Shit, I guess I'll run out then," she sighed, "Hey buddy, you want anything? My treat. Call it repayment for not.." Adelyn hesitated, her mind blanking. What had she been about to say? The thought was on the tip of her tongue, but, infuriatingly, it just wouldn't come. "Call it.." she mumbled, focusing more on her thoughts than what she was saying, "repay.."
Suddenly, a flurry of imagery careened into her mind, a rapid succession of memories smashing together into abrupt flashes of light and sound. Her chest seized as she was overcome by the scenes flipping through her head, no, she was having an actual seizure. Her body tensed painfully, her hands clenching around nothing. She caught a glance of the mimes again and wanted to smile, but she couldn't. All she could see were the faces of people in her head, smiling faces, research dossiers, all the cups of steaming coffee, the crying mimes, the blood smeared on the glass. The blood smeared on the glass?
She felt the pain then. It radiated from every inch of her being, even those pieces that were no longer a part of her. She let out a coughing-wheeze, doubling over, wondering if one could even double over without legs, and then laughing at the absurdity of the thought. She understood now, shock did absurd things to a person's mind. Although, the empty injectors around her might have helped too. How long had she been sitting there? She didn't know. What had she taken? Morphine, probably. Then she remembered the hand. The dark hand. The dark hand with too-long fingers and too-smooth skin. She remember their fingers brushing, remembered that the unnaturally dark skin felt soft, almost like soft silicon.
"Hey.. buddy.." She began, stopping briefly as a painful wheeze shuddered from her, "Are you even—"
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THE PLOT
The year is 2068, or so far as anyone remembers. Somewhere between the end of the world and the beginning of the new one humanity reached a new kind of normalcy and started keeping track again. The old world was gone, most of it only remaining only as fading memories, replaced by something newer, something grim but stubborn, like a weed pushing up through concrete. Difficult, at the best of times, dangerous at pretty much all others. Even those who sit comfortably on top are never truly free of fear. Nobody is. Not anymore.
There are no longer such things as world powers, only local municipalities enforcing local law as far as local borders. Which, to say the least, are not terribly far. Open conflict between the various factions has stifled technological progress in favor of fueling the warmachines. However, in their rare moments of wisdom, leaders over the years have established certain formalities, not true pacts, but more of an understanding. Trade crosses borders freely, provided their escorts can fend off highwaymen and other sordid types. People migrate with relative ease, assuming they make it to their intended destination. And, monsters pretty much have free reign within the wildlands.
Fiends aren't what keep people up at night, they aren't what has people telling stories in hushed whispers and casting furtive glances at their neighbors. No, those kinds of monsters are obvious for what they are, and can be handled. It's the monsters they can't see that set people against each other. It's what they can't see that sets the mobs to arming themselves with the proverbial torch and gives rise to witch hunts and accusation, giving way to a particular kind of discrimination and abject terror. It's the monsters that look like people that they are is truly afraid of.
When the world broke and society fell apart, humanity finally understood the concept of true fear. True fear came in the form of demons, clad in black armor, armed with fang and claw. It came from watching your friends melt in a spray of acid, or from seeing the man next to you turn into a pile of smoldering ash. It came from watching your loved ones become possessed by the pure essence of evil, a blackness that engulfed them and turned them into horrid creatures that craved nothing by blood and destruction. It is knowing that no matter how hard you struggle, no matter how hard you try, or wish, or hope, there is nothing you can do to fight back. True fear is knowing that your enemy cannot be stopped, cannot be killed, and could be wearing the face of any man, woman, or child.
THE ROLES
The primary goal of this roleplay is to follow the tales of people with unique and strange abilities. These abilities stem from something dark inside themselves, a primal force waiting to be awakened and unleashed. The main characters will be these afflicted persons, but you are welcome to any amount of side characters and important NPCs, normal, or not. These characters will struggle, they will suffer, they will question their humanity, they will experience hatred and fear for what they are, even if they had little choice in the matter. And eventually, maybe, they will learn control.
In fact, to know that one is awakened is to already begin down a brutal path. An awakening only occurs from a traumatic event. Something terrible, or wicked. As such, it's expected that your character will be fucked up in some sense or another. Relatively few people come out of these kinds of events the same way they were before. Obviously, you might have caught on by now that this roleplay is going to get dark. Very dark. It's going to be loaded full of dark themes and grims scenes that could potentially set someone off. If you can't handle that kind of exposure, I urge you to turn back now. This is the only warning you will get.
It should be noted that their will be a larger, background plot that you may or may not be aware of. Do not expect this plot to be immediately prevalent, or noticable. I'm a complex planner with a love of subtle moves until the curtain is drawn. Also, I reserve the right to use anything and everything your character does in my machinations. I like to involve your characters and show that their actions have consequences. There are no free rides here, so buckle in and get ready for a hell of a ride.
FINAL NOTES
This is not a recruitment, this is a teaser which will be followed by an application process. I will be choosing roughly six, give or take, participants. When this releases, I will ping those who have expressed their interest, and then allot a time period for character creation. Runners-up will be kept on a list should anyone dropout. This is not one of those roleplays that you can just whip up a character for and skim along with the story. I expect some effort, I expected characters and character development of a decent quality. If you are a problem and I have to choose between you and the life of this roleplay, I will choose to keep my project alive. If you ghost out, don't expect to come back. I know this sounds harsh, but I'm in this for the long haul, I have no issue with roleplaying with a tiny group, or even waiting. Roleplay is fun, but it also takes work.
This, as of this point, is an advanced level roleplay. So I expect advanced level players. Furthermore, I expect you to uphold the standards of advanced level players, there is no room for casual here. Don't be discouraged, however, because I am not demanding a seven page thesis. I understand that post length varies, I will not set a standard, nor a limit. There are times we have little to work with, and there are times we experience writer's block. I also understand that sometimes, "good writing" means knowing when to post a little, as opposed to a lot just for the sake of meeting some arbitrary quota that is difficult to maintain. All I ask is you do your best to give good content, and, if for some reason you can't—be it mood, circumstance, or life—just give me a heads up. If you are in a situation where your character is vital to the progression of the story, either the main plot or with other characters, we'll figure out a way to move forward as smoothly as possible.
You are always welcome to slide into my DMs with questions, concerns, and comments. If you have ideas but are unsure how they will fit in the world, or a hesitant to implement them because you don't know if I will receive them well, come pitch them to me. This is a hybrid style roleplay: This is not purely story-driven, but nor is it only character-drive. It will be both. There will be story arcs, and there will be character stories. This is why I expect effort from my players. You're not writing for me, you are writing with me.
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