[IC] Frozen Darkness

[Lucius Cypher]

The first thing that would hit Cat was the stench. It was... Humid. A very unusual stench. And while the door was frozen, this place almost felt warm. Donny raised his torch to provide illumination, and on the ground were wooden beads. It looked like they used to hung from the ceiling but years of negated as rendered the strings into dust. After securing the door to ensure it won't be stuck once closed, thus locking them in, the two would explore Cassie's. Turned out it was some sort of tobacco store, and completely untouched. "Oh my god. This place... It's a jackpot." It was wall-to-wall with tobacco paraphernalia. Pipes, hookahs, bongs, bags of weed and herbs, oils, and other valuables. Sure most of them were well passed their expiration date, but no one was producing quality tobacco in this day and age. People pay good money for old world herbs.

Searching around, Donny would also find something else interesting. Seeds. Seeds for plants, though he wasn't sure what. The bag was a clear plastic baggie obviously containing the seeds, but no label showing what they would grow. Still the bag wasn't tampered, so perhaps the seeds were still good. There was also a mini refrigerator that was filled with old world soft drinks and water. "Man. I used to remember seeing flyers warning about the dangers of plastic and how they'll never degrade. Used to be a bad thing. Now plastic is so rare and valuable for it's ability to keep and resist temperature changes." Being inside of a refrigerator also helped insulate the drinks from outside temperatures. The drinks were lukewarm: not cold enough to freeze, not hot enough to warp the plastic.

While Donny was busy looting the place, Cat would notice something off. This warmth was not normal. There was also a strange breeze. Cassie's shop wasn't very large but this heat had to come from somewhere. Donny couldn't feel it due to the layers of clothing and armor, but Cat would soon find the source of this strange warmth. It was coming from a vent in the back of the shop. It was a small ruined office: at some point part of the roof collapsed and broke into the floor. And it was from the floor Cat could feel a warm breeze. Something below them, below this area, was warm. And the heat was coming up.

[rivaan]

Cat was mildly impressed by the discovery of all the tabacco things avaible here. Well this place alone was enough for her old settlement to probably declare themselves twice the kings they already did. The bastards suffered from a grandeur complex and megalomania, smoking fine tabacco was their thing. So while he was pocketing the seeds, she pulled a few of the tabacco packs and baggies and stashed them away on her person. Good trading value, or just recreational if she really wanted to. A bit of luxury goods now and then never hurt anybody... that didn't know about them of course.

"Yeah, plastic's important nowdays. It's a shame the way they treated it in the past. Would have made our lives a lot easier if there was more of it avaible more widely." She shrugged and looked at the source of the warm draft she was feeling." Hey Donny... there's something underneath us. It's too warm here... those drinks aren't frozen for crying out loud." She warned him and pointed at the back where the office room was. Having stashed a few packs of the tabacco on herself, she carefully approached the ruined office and felt the warm breeze even more strongly. She looked down at the broken floor, there was something down there alright. Now question was what could provide continuous heat like this and honestly she wasn't certain, but it was worth some investigating.

"Hey, you still got that rope, right? Find a good place to tie it and secure it good, I will go down to investigate. We need to know what's down there, just be ready to start pulling me up if it's dangerous." She stated to him and carefully made her way around the ruined floor, to get a bettle angle of view down the hole and try to see if she could see anything of what's down there. She had redied her gun for this actually. It was better at things that jump out at her than the crowbar.

[Lucius Cypher]

Donny had plundered pretty much everything he could carry when he turns to Cat. "Found something huh? Alright, let me get my rope." Grabbing the rope he used a while ago, he would be able to secure it to a large piece of rubble wedged into a corner. It was nothing but darkness down there. Donny brought his torch closer to illuminate it, now feeling the heat coming out of it. "Could be a gas pocket. If that's the case, you'll need your gasmask, and this." Donny hands Cat one of the glow sticks. "An open flame, or even an errant spark, could fry you faster than a cold wave would freeze you solid. If you still feel like going down there at least. If there is a busted cast vein, that at least implies that hole leads to something with access to some sort of fuel. And if we can access that, we can buy our way into any settlement."

Natural gas was one of those things that was common, or even forgotten, in the past but now could have entire civilizations built around them. Be it natural deposited opened up because of the calamity or man-made containers stored in secured bunkers, those gasses could fuel settlements and ensure they stay warm in even the harshest of storms. They could also be used to power electronics, which themselves are critical to access things such as illumination, water filtration, or even fuel for vehicles. Even just a little could be used to keep a home warm for over a year, which basically made that home a king's palace as long as anyone else cared. But the risks were considerable. As Donny mentioned, it wouldn't take much to turn a gas deposit into a fire bomb. And that's before taking into consideration the sort of mutants who would also be attracted that that warmth. Strange things that live deep underground, and become strange, warped monstrosities.

"Your call. Maybe just take a peek, see what's around? If nothing else, sure as hell beats going back out there into the cold. It's actually kinda comfortable standing here." Donny could feel himself getting warmer from this heat vent, and he even opened up his coat to allow the heat to reach inside and dry him. Smelled terrible, but that's not unusual in this world. Cat may have also notice that Donny had taken some air fresheners and put them inside of his jacket, perhaps as an attempt to smell clean at least.

[rivaan]

"Thank you." She replied as she carefully pulled a gasmask and put it on. It was her last cartrige of the thing so she kept it as an emergency supply. In any case, with the ropes secure, a glowstick in her hand and a weapon in hand, she looked at him again." Not sure if it's gas... I mean it could be in theory, however it should have gotten clear a long time ago. It's been years and not sure the old gas systems of hte city are in working enough state to still hold or transport the stuff." She pointed out.

"In any case, be on the look out, if I start trembling the rope too hard start pulling, same if a lot of noise or my screams echo from down there. I will climb up while you pull me for maximum escape speed hopefully." She stated and carefully moved ot the edge of the bgi hole. Well, looking at it from here, it looked like the floor caving in, had unearthed some part of hte underground, possibly into another part of the subterrainian sewers. Though it didn't quite mesh with the fact they were under a building, so maybe it was a hollowed out area that was eroded out of waters and winds and the storms and hten caved in. Possibly could explain a gas pocket, but she was still not quite believing it was that.

"See you in a bit." She smiled at him under hte mask, and carefully went to the edge and began descending. At The glowstick was thucked in her cleavage for hte time being since hse wanted both her hands while going down at least at first. After a bit she'd be more relying on him slowly lowering the rest of the rope. After she got down enough for light to be a pain, she reached with one hand to the secured glowstick and then in a trained and careful maneuver, to light the stick and look the surroundings.

Alright... this was a big hole actually. It went further down than she expected. It was certainly warmer here, in fact she was now certain it wasn't a simple gas pocket even if it was that. Honestly they could have easily checked it if they chuckled a lit cigarette down here, but she supposed it would be a waste of resources. IN any case, after a bit more, she spotted the vague shadows on the ground that displayed a slight curveture of the hole, heading to the side.

[Lucius Cypher]

Moving deeper and deeper into the cave, Cat could immediately tell that this place was not man-made. What was left of the cemental walls soon turned into cold moldy earth. Slime and filth caked the walls, floors, and even dripped from the ceiling. It got progressive smaller, not so much that Cat couldn't move through, but she certainly wouldn't be able to jump without hitting her head. And soon she would hear something approach her. From around the corner, a large insectoid creature turned the corner and screeched at her. It seemed surprised to see her and lunged at her, it's strange mandibles outstretched to bite her. She could see a toxic purple venom dripping from it's mouth.

[rivaan]

'HOLY SHIT!' She screamed internally as a huge insect type creature screeched and started charing at her. It wasn't the largest mutant she had seen, however it certainly wasn't a pleasant thing to find in a narrow cave and there was the thing with insects... there was NEVER only one. Most were by nature hive oriented even when mutated. So if there was this one here, chances were there were a lot more hanging about. Worse, she couldn't fire her gun without igniting the gas that was present. Now that by itself bore the question if the heat was truly a gas vein that was opened or if it was just the insects' refuse and other things that was creating the heat and what not. Even if it wasn't straight out gasvein, there was enough probably methane type gas aroudn the tunel to deep fry her if she ignites it.

Thus instead of firing her gun, she pulled the crowbar in one arm with a trained motion and whacked hte thing sideways, to avoid meeting it's mandibles headon. She didn't want the point of hte tool to get stuck into the carapace, so she hit it with the blunt side, making the insects' head succesfully be whacked sideways, haltign it's progress. She used her other arm to start shacking the rope as she began to retreat towards the entrance of hte tunel where she came from. It was time to bail, grab as much of the good stuff as they could carry from their bags and lit the gas up, hopefully burning away at least most of hte insects. Given how deep she went, she highly doubted they'd explode the city block, but it was going to create a spectacular lightshow more than lightly.

A single hit didn't seem enough though cause it turned back towards her and began chasing her again. She whacked it again to halt it's advance and pulled the knife from it's sheath, starting a sort of duel between them while she retreated. She'd whack it, it'd try to bite her leg off. She'd bash it, it nearly tripped her with one of it's legs. In the end she evaded a serious injury by a small margin, moving away from it's mandibles, however her she got nicked on the leg by one of it's clawed limbs. She in turn hit the front leg hard enough on the joint that it snapped, at an odd angle, hindering it's mobility substantially." START PULLING HARDER!" She shouted up the hole, sheathed her knife and reattached the crowbar on the improvised harness of her clothing and began climbing, her leg hurt and she knew she was bleeding now, but there was no time to stop and bandage up while in the hole iwth countless other bugs. It was good they spotted it now, who knows how big the nest was already. If they set the gas on fire, a lot of the bugs would die, maybe Underhaven would know more about these things, she hadn't seen such back in the city center. Talking about that, she heard screeching from down the tunnels, it was distance away, but it made her start climbing even faster despite the pain.

[Lucius Cypher]

The insect continued to give chase, albeit slowed down by the beating Cat was giving it. It wasn't until after she broke it's leg that it seemed to stop chasing her, however it was starting to emit a very loud, very high pitch screech. Cat would feel the rope tighten against her as Donny was pulling as fast as he could, and once she was back at the hole and started climbing she'd be able to get out fairly quickly thanks to both of their efforts. Once at the mouth of the hole itself Donny would grab her by the arm and pull her out, nearly throwing her against the wall. "I felt your pull and heard the shouting, what the hells is down there? Do we need to kill it?" Cat could see that Donny already had his gun out ready to start shooting, as well as a large piece of rubble to cover the hole. Nothing that couldn't be forced aside, but it may give them a moment of time to escape if they really needed it.

There was more screeching down into the tunnel. Donny couldn't see a thing but he grabbed his pistol and looked at the hole. "Maybe we ought to burn em out. I can drop an oil bomb down there, we get the hell out of this place, let the gas burn them all out. Worse comes to worse, this place is wrecked and we move on. Or we could just leave. Doubt anything that lives down there wants to come out into the cold."

[rivaan]

Cat continued to retreat as the thing was screetching, likely calling reinforcements. Still the rope was pulling tight now so she began climbing up too, gaining height fast until she could easily see the light of the surface where Donny was. She basically jumped out of the hole as he caught her by the hand and pulled her up.

"Bugs, giant venomous bugs! Move, grab whatever you can and time to run. Yes, we should be setting the methane ablaze, hopefully it burns out the nest underground or at least most of it. Who knows how far it spreads and how many of the... insect creatures are there." She told him, reading her rifle as she bega oulling him away from the office room back to hte main hall with all the actual loot was located at.

"We can't exactly leave it... who knows in a few years it might just be impossible to live around because of too many of them..." Cat was already securing her stuff and stuffing whatever she could from teh tabacco loot into her clothes. Chances were it was all toast once htey set the hole in flames, better grab as much as they could. She even grabbed some of hte seeds that weren't taken by DOnny earlier just in case.

When the screetching got too loud, meaning things were close to the surface, probably not chasing directy queit yet cause of the cold, but they couldn't take the chances. Cat was nicely stuffed with loot, they'd have to sort through it later, she looked at her companion, to see if he was ready with his own set of hte looting." How's your throwing arm? I'm pretty sure I can throw an oilbomb through that door to set the hole on fire if you think you won't be able to." She told him." We will have to run very fast though. Once the fire chases down the hole, the building might collapse on us from the resulting explosion."

[Lucius Cypher]

"Way ahead of ya." Donny motioned towards a wire set up above the door. It was rigged that all it'll take is for a slip of the knot for it to fall, and Donny had already rigged an unlit firebomb to it. "Bet you recognize what this is. Just gotta light it up and run, flame will cut the string and drop the bomb, letting us be no where nearby once it goes off. Used a lot of these traps escaping my old colony." Donny stuffed whatever he could into his bag and clothes, though he's already taken most of what he could. The only thing he left behind were assorted bongs and pipes: while they might fetch a nice price at Underhaven they were far too bulky to even leave strapped to the bags, and Donny didn't have time to dismantle them into a compact form. Once everything of worth was gathered, Donny lit the firebomb and ran towards the door. "We got like twenty seconds before that thing drops. Let's be no where near when it blows!"

[rivaan]

"Need not ask me twice." She barked a reply before legging it away, counting the seconds in her head. Cat was fast and nible and she booked it out of the building in no time, having more than enough seconds to spare to dash across the street and toss herself into a snow gliding move and even further away and then rolled herself flat on the ground, looking at the building, eyes narrowed, keeping track of where Donny ends up. She kept one arm on her weapon, another was placed over the back of her neck for protection, one ear covered with her upper forearms and her mouth was slightly open in preparation of the bomb going off. She didn't really want her eardrums punctured because of the blast wave and sounds creates too great a difference, so she made sure her mouth was opened to equalize the pressure somewhat. Once the time neared, she let go of her weapon and moved the now freed hand to proect her neck and block her ear also.

Moment's later at the count of 23 there was a flash for a moment, a roar of fire then an explosion as all the collected methane down below was ignited. The entire street rumbled, snow was displaced from the tops of the ruined buildings and a huge ball of fire went up from the building's collapsed roof. Smaller explosions of snow lined the street down the street, indicating the explosion ahd spread into the sewers that way, so they were likely at least somewhat connected to the insect hive. When everything settled, the woman quickly jumped up, shaking her head, her ears were ringing and it wasn't pleasant. Even though she protected her ears, they were still ringing and hurting. Luckily it was just a methane explosion with a focused outlet otherwise this could have been way way worse. She really hoped everything down there was torched including all the bugs, but couldn't ever be sure.

"DONNY!" She shouted, shacking her head one last time, before rushing towards where she saw him just before the explosion went off." We need to go! This would have attracted everybody and their mutt from all across town, better be away before people start gathering!" She told him.

[Lucius Cypher]

In the dark metros, it's not unusual for the infrastructure to give way and collapse seemingly at random. It wasn't as if anyone was going out of their way to ensure the structural integrity of these cement walls after years of relentless ice and snow. So for any experienced wandering, they should know the signs of collapsing walls. And Cat could tell that the explosion that rocked the drug store had suddenly turned the area into a danger zone. The walls were cracked, ice and water dripped from the ceiling. Another explosion like that would bring down the entire tunnel. And even now, this place might collapse anywhere between a few days to a few minutes. Cat needed to get out of here, fast.

Donny was just a few feet behind her, staggering. He made the rookie mistake of not covering up his ears or making sure his body was ready to adjust to the sudden shift in air pressure. Despite going only at a relatively mild jog, his head was suffering from some major ringing and his body felt like a mutant just smashed his chest. He was out of breath and feeling suddenly exhausted. When Cat went to him Donny tried to gather his breath but suddenly drew his pistol. He aimed it past Cat at something shambling down the hall. The movements were all too familiar: a ghoul. Brain-dead and partially frozen. Surely it couldn't have just arrived in this state, no so soon after the explosion. It must've been a lone wanderer. Or worse. A scout.

There were another tunnel to the left the duo could go down, leading deeper into the underground metro. Unknown to the duo, and the ice seemed undisturbed. Could be that no one else has been here in a while. Or, it's possible the ice has covered the trail of anyone who has been here. The existence of the ghoul shambler certainly showed that this area was not completely uninhabited, for better or for worse. "Gotta go. Kill or go?" Donny said between heavy breaths.

[rivaan]

"We should go." Cat stated firmly, pondering the chances of once more going underground, but they had to do so sooner or later again. It was simply safer underground." We've attracted a fuck load of attention right now, can't stay. Things will start approaching soon and that shambler's just the first of many in my experience." She explained to him, helping him out to start heading towards teh tunnels once more.

"Monsters and feral mutants will arrive fast because that's how they react to commotions and lound noises in difference to natural creatures and animals. People will also gather up to scout and see what this all was about and if they could profit from it... Back in the colony we had to protect ourselves more than once because sometime going wrong and attracting attention from loud noises from an accident or the like. Besides we've got our loot." Once at the tunel of the metro, she readies her weapon and making sure there was nobody directly at the entrance started to proceed downwards with great care. She kept her ears open for the light cracking of snow and ice under feet. Anything to announce they weren't alone. For the time being though at least there weren't things, so they had the time to get going and if she recalled the map correctly, following the direction to the left around the old derailed traincar, they would be heading in the direction of another of the marked out locations on the treasure map they were following. It was far far away, they weren't going to get there today unless the tunnel led directly there without any hindrences along the way, but at this point it was well known to everybody that the underground networks were a maze because many places had collapsed and new ways were opened by nature, men and monsters.

"We should also be considering where we will camp out once we get deeper into the tunnels. If we are lucky maybe we can find a nice alcove somewhere along the ways that we can trap or barriace to make creatures have hard time noticing it."

[Lucius Cypher]

Donny just nodded. He could barely make out what Cat was saying, but she seemed to know what she was doing so Donny would just follow her lead. Even as he regained his hearing, he would have to rely on Cat to be their eyes and ears. The path Cat took would lead towards the 7-11. A common name for buildings and shops that used to sell food and other goods in the old world. Those sort of locations are usually in ruins however, since convince stores usually have a lot of supplies, so naturally any scavenger with a lick of sense would raid those places first for supplies. Donny personally didn't have much faith that there was anything worth taking there, but if it was marked on the map there must be some significance to it.

Unfortunately the path there wasn't going to be easy. As they entered a larger metro station, the duo ran into their first obstacle: a chasm. From the looks of it there must've been another tunnel system underneath their current tunnel that had collapsed a long time ago. The chasm was at least ten feet wide and deep enough that neither Cat or Donny could see the bottom even with a light. The chasm even split the walls. They would need to turn around, or find a way across. Regaining enough of his hearing that Donny could hear himself speaking, he turns to Cat. "Hole's not too wide. If you can get across, could tie my rope to those rail tracks. Not sure if I can make the jump myself, but I'd be a lot more confident with a rope to climb."

[rivaan]

"Yeah, you are right." Cat nodded at Donny's assestment of the situation with the chasm ahead of them. She eyed how wide the hole was and roughly how much space she had to pick up speed, given ehr current gear and a few other possible factors that were of note for a jump of that nature. Usually a jump of ten feet was nothing for her, but being underground with ice and her usual gear was a bit iffy. That and she wasn't actually certain how stable the ground was.

She quickly began securing everything on herself. Making sure the bag was tightly closed and even if something goes wrong, nothing would fall out. That her rifle was neatly around her body on it's sling and so on. Once everything was indeed ready, she pulled her knife in a reverse grip and gestured to Donny." Alright, give me the rope. Need to wrap it around myself just in case, I'm not very sure that the ground near the chasm is stable enough. Better be safe than sorry." Once the rope was handed over and she wrapped one end around her waist, she nodded at him, before bolting forward.

One step, two steps, three steps and she was right by the edge. Just as she was already in the process of crouching down in the motion to build up potential energy for the jump, a cracking sound filled her ear and she by instinct jumped early and just in time as the entire chunk of the floor underneath her feet simply fell down into the chasm, shards of concrete and ice breaking off. She however managed to jump in time, what wasn't as good was that she didn't have enough energy build into the jump to make it clean over. Instead half her body was over the edge only, legs dangling as she hit the other side, almost blowing all the air in her lungs when the edge of the chasm hit into her chest. It bloody hurt, but she managed to hold on because she stapped her dagger deep into the ice, managing to grab a bit of leverage to not slip downwards.

Cat was trying to catch her breath, knowing that she might have cracked a rib with that hit, but had no choice. With feet flailing about until she managed to step on a nice tiny ledge and her other hand grasping forward and into objects on the other end, she finally pulled herself over the edge, crawled over to the railtracks and untied the rops from herself transfering it to the tracks and gave Donny the thumbs up to move over as she was busy examining her ribs by lightly touching them to see if anything gae easily. Nothing was moving too much, so she was thinking it was cracked ribs case and the hurtful line across her lower chest gave credence to that theory. Cat knew that in a day or two if she was to take off her shirts, there would be a dark blue/green line where the chasm edge had impacted. Not pleasant, not pleasant at all. Clentching her teeth, she supposed it could have been worse. She oculd have lost grip of her knife or the knife could have not been enough to hold herself from slipping. Then who knew how she might have hurt herself from that fall, even if she had the rope tied to donny for just that situation. Just impacting back the other side of the chasm at a bad angle could be deadly or crippling. She was lucky this time.

[Lucius Cypher]

With Cat over the ravine, Domic secured his rope and shimmied his way across. It was slow, and looked rather silly, but the effectiveness could not be discounted. Once on the other side, Donny looked to Cat. "You alright? That fall didn't look good. Wasn't sure if that was your ribs or the floor I heard break. The next location in the map is nearby, the 7-11, so we could shelter there even if there's nothing worth taking." Donny has no idea how long they've been out. He assumes just an hour or so, but at the same time it's been so busy he's lost track of time.

There was howling in the distance. Possibly of wind, or of some mutant. It was a very distant howl so nothing they need fo be immediately worried about, but it was a warning that they could not stay out here for long, less the howling get closer. "Let's be ready for trouble though. Doesn't sound like we're alone here."

[rivaan]

Cat waited for Donny to move over the chasm, spending the time mostly sitting on one side, not moving much and breathing very slowly, holding a hand just under her chest or rather just at her lower ribs that took the brunt of the impact earlier. She grimaced when she touched one, realizing it was moving... sort of. It wasn't free movement to endanger her lungs, but she was fairly certain that one had a breakage in there somewhere where the others behaved more or less as just cracked. She would have to avoid other impacts for a while, least she really snaps how the ribs in her chest or something.

"Haev had worse, but you are right on both... it was the ground and my ribs." She grimaced as she slowly picked herself up and stood up. She grimaced again, realizing that firing from shoulder might not be a the best right now and lowered her gun." Right... hopefully won't have to fire for a few days, but I doubt it, going to have to try to lessen the impacts I suffer though. Rib's not freely moving about in pieces, but it's snapped on one side about... here." She pointed at a point on the midpoint of the lowest rib on the right side of her torso.

She cursed under her breath at the distant howling and nodded." Yeah, let's go. Better find shelter for the night. Darkness's about to arrive before long and with it all critters that lurk away during the day hours." She smiled and readied herself before begining to walk." Those 7-11 were a type of store for supplies back in the day, weren't they?" Cat asked, trying to recall.