[IC] Torn Across the Rift

[Eyeris]

It is so cold… I’ve never felt so cold before…

These are your thoughts as you awaken amidst destruction…

The very first thing to be noticed about this place is the utter, bitter, biting cold.

The air is thin and unforgiving. Just when you think you have taken a full gulp of air a sharp gale seems to tear it back out of your lungs. It is light, but the sun is obscured by an overcast sky. The white landscape makes the brightness seem to come from everywhere and nowhere. It is disorienting and robs the senses of their ability to determine time and place. It is blinding. There is snow in the air, light gusting flurries, it is difficult to tell if it is falling from the sky or being blown about the mountain by the wind.

The snow and ice dresses the mountain. It clings to her sheer cliffs and jagged edges. It buries her secrets.

Except for today.

There is a scar on the mountain. Where the foundations of an old castle juts up through the ice and snow. Its turrets of black stone are like withered fingers reaching to the blank white sky. They ask for forgiveness, and receive none.

Here, today, the snow is soaked in blood and melted by fire.

Something has happened here, something strange and terrible.

There are bodies everywhere. Their blood soaks into the snow. Some, are frozen stiff, their eyes shut forever by frost. Others found the opposite fate and perished in the fire. There are scorch marks everywhere, new destruction reaped upon the old ruins. There are places the fire still burns with unnatural ferocity. The snow around these places and charred the bones in its path.

The castle barely stands along a cliff. There are two turrets remaining of the original six, they stretch out from the center of the castle. The roof of the once-great hall has been blown away, revealing the most disturbing scene of all. There is an altar of stone with a circle of white chalk and strange symbols around it. There are dead men in black cloaks, all of them burned to a crisp. On the altar there is a body. She stares into the air, her mouth open in amazement, her chest opened by a knife and pulled apart.

She is one of many dead at the castle on the snowy mountain.

Yet, many are also alive.

These begin to awaken now. A mad scientist, a wandering monk, a muse, an explorer, a lost prince, among others. These begin to stir and waken.

They are all very far from home.

Meanwhile…

“And that is why Russia is my favorite!” Dr. Twain, leader of MERCY, was characteristically jovial as they observed the locals.
They were in the city of Vladivostok, Russia.

They were conducting an investigation that had originally belonged to another team. That team had disappeared. Vladivostok was the last place that team MOON had reported to their mother organization, TRIDENT.

That was three months ago. TRIDENT sent MERCY to Vladivostok to pick up the trail and find the missing team.

The team was sitting at a small table in a small coffee house. Siva-Cup Coffee Co. to be precise. A global coffee chain of impressive success.

Zesiro arrived with everyone's ‘usual’ coffee order on a tray. He placed the tray on the table and took a seat next to his brother. Side by side the resemblance was uncanny. They had the same brow and chin. Though, Zesiro looked younger and thinner, the technologist was pale and gaunt, usually frowning while Twain had a healthy tan and broad shoulders and a crooked grin. They had a similar accent. Twain's voice was deeper, a man's voice. Zesiro’s was scratchy, his vocal chords still teetering on the tail end of puberty.

Twain's usual was a classic cappuccino. Sometimes, like today, he would add a little mocha.

Zesiro got a red-eye-chai. The biggest cup they had with as many extra espresso shots as possible.

Icarus never told Zesiro what he wanted. So, Zesiro always ordered him something different. Today it was a banana-mint-hazelnut-chocolate-chip-frappe. Icarus never complained.

Twain briefed the team.

“This city was the last place we knew MOON was located.” He spread out four wallet-sized photos onto the table. Their missing comrades. “We don’t know the details of their investigation other than that, except who they were looking for…” He placed a fifth picture onto the table in the center.

He then leaned back in his chair crossing his arms. He wanted to give the team time to memorize the pictures, then ask questions. He wanted to test the new girl. She was smart, but this was really her first time in action. Real action anyway. A missing agent of TRIDENT was no small matter. They had four missing agents and a dead trail.

[jdh97]

Blackness. An ominous, looming form of nothing. Time seemed to stretch and bend, of no importance. In this blackness Herbert floated, aware only subconsciously, before a razor blade of white cut across the horizon.

The cold hit Herbert like a punch in the gut, blasting the breath from his lungs, forcing him bolt upright. As he opened his eyes, a fantastic light blinded him, punching him back to ground. His head struck something hard and he moaned in pain. White specks danced under his closed eyelids. Each breath racked his body as he tried desperately to suck air back, his chest rising and falling heavily.

Eventually the pain stopped pulsing through his body. The concussion was no longer nauseating, but there was a dull throb emanating from the back of his skull. His breathing returned to normal. Carefully this time, Herbert cracked open his eyes, just a slither: white. For a moment, Herbert thought this is what blindness must be like, and he poisoned his eyes with invisible fumes. However, even through the lashes of his eyes, he could see graduations in the white, and other colours entirely. The revelation came as a short relief, and Herbert was rather sure he’d prefer blindness. Rising up from the blanket of white and challenging the sky before him was a tower of dark grey stone, each brick large and rough, eroded over the years. Flames had sprung up sporadically along its length, juxtaposed clearly against the frost-entombed bricks on other portions.

Herbert was aware of the choking feeling swelling in his chest and rising up his throat. Fear. He tried pushing himself into a sitting position, to which his muscles protested, but obeyed. It wasn’t clear whether the cold was the cause, or their disuse, which worried Herbert. He was vaguely aware of a dampness at the back of his head, sitting his hair to his scalp. He touched it tenderly and brought his fingertips to his eyes. No red, which was good.

Herbert dared open his eyelids a little more, and after a sharp ache, they adjusted. The grog over Herbert’s mind was beginning to clear. The ebony and ivory landscape was not his basement; it was very far from it. Dark stone jutted from the even snowfall, and Herbert followed the bridge from the tower to a large keep, terrible and black against the murky, opalescent sky.

“Liza, where am I?” he breathed, and mixture of ignorance, awe, and trepidation somewhat keeping him level-headed about the whole situation. Further off he could see another pillar, the bridge of this one long since collapsed under the barrage of the dismal weather.

His back was soaked; he could feel it chilling in the winds, howling as the crested peaks, whistling under the bridge. Turning, it became apparent he had been lying in a pool of water in a mottled depression of slate. Behind him was a huge fire. It did not seemed to be sustained by any fuel, but burnt hot enough to unveil a ring of rock from beneath the snow. He probably had that to accredit his lack of freezing to death. He approached the fire, unnatural and bright, and hot, mercifully hot. Folding his arms, Herbert stood close enough to feel its heat, as he tried to recollect his last few hours, and work out what to do next. A foul smell floated into his nostrils, putrid and greasy, and familiar. At the centre of the flame, which he gazed into, with a mind elsewhere, were the silhouettes of charred bones, misshapen by the dancing flames into something vile. Herbert shivered, and not from the cold. He felt he knees give, and he slumped, cradling his head by the fire, trying to gather his thoughts and take the initiative.

The fire was unearthly, abnormal in its incandescence and perpetual life, and whatever foul hell spawn created it could easily still be lurking. Once he was dry and at much less of a risk of meeting an early, frozen tomb, he would move. His brain seemed to be handling it well, as though it had quarantined of the section that dealt with sense and sanity. A godsend, as Herbert had little left.

[Anzu]

William trudged on ahead, walking a few paces alongside the husky-drawn sled. Ahead of him, five individuals, all a small way apart, walked on in the same direction, the ebbs and flows of snow at times revealing them, at others reducing them to less than silhouettes. He saw nothing out of the corner of his eyes, he’d sacrificed peripheral vision for the extra warmth of snow goggles, but he knew that the rest of his group was around and behind him, 15 people, men and women, and a further two sleds. They all walked with heavy backpacks and rifles slung over their backs, dressed in thick, white winter clothing. The sleds carried what they couldn’t, extra provisions, two mortars and their shells, one man who was nursing a sprained ankle, and the prospecting rig.

The storm was bad, sure, that was to be expected, but as far as Will could tell it was unusually bad. Less than an hour ago it had been full Siberian noon. Slightly dimmer than it should be, from all the ash floating in the upper atmosphere. Only a slight reduction in light, but all around the world, for seven years, had built up and given mankind its very own self-made ice age, a nuclear winter, altering weather patterns invariably for the worse. The storm had not come in from the north as they would expect, nor any of the cardinal directions for that matter, and there was no tell-tale sign beforehand. It seemingly dropped down on them without warning, encasing them in a flurry of snow as they tried to move through the tundra. Inside it was like night, despite the efforts of the huge wind-up lamp they’d activated on the lead sled, the winds buffeting them around.

A sound like crackling, arcing electricity cut through the storm, and the winds suddenly increased. Will became unsteady, stumbling as he continued forward. His friends at the same time became nearly impossible to see, but seemed to be walking just as well as before. A gloved hand shot up in front of his face and teeth gritted, trying to shield himself from the flurry. The lamp’s beam seemed to change direction, flicker and move, and with it the silhouettes of the others shifted and tilted. He stumbled and his sense of balance rebelled, telling him he was walking steady, then moving in all directions at once. His eyes gave less and less with every second, the beam of light moving and dimming constantly, the snow becoming thicker, a static wall of white. His ears gave him a muffled roaring of wind, and a rising, scraping ringing noise. He lost his bearings, and panic raised in his chest, prickling pain crawling across his torso from the fear. William tried to call out for help, but he was falling, past the point where he should have reached the ground, and in all directions at once. The whiteness outside his goggles spun and lost all detail, as the ringing noise grew to cover all else. He smelt and tasted iron, his feet and hands reached out for solid ground but found nothing. His heart threw itself at his ribcage, he felt the rush of adrenaline. In his eyes, his tongue, his limbs, he felt the effects of his heart’s desperate pumping, that animal reaction to danger. As intense as all of these sensations were, they were becoming fainter, more distant.

William Bluff blacked out.

---

The cold hit him hard- at first he didn’t notice, the sheer confusion and his own familiarity with the cold slowing the realisation. But this was definitely worse than it should be. He was face down in a bank of snow, his nose, cheeks and lips burning from the cold, and a strange pressure on his eyes. His limbs moved to push him off, moving into position more quickly than they could have moved a few minutes ago. He pushed himself upwards and realised he was unburdened, missing his thick outer coat, his backpack. Standing upright, he reached to his back to check, and alarm bells began to ring- his rifle was gone. Looking around hurriedly, Will saw what looked like a battlefield, some sort of fortress above him, heavily damaged, with snow and fire everywhere. The debris seemed mostly settled, though fires still raged. Above him rose two curving cliff faces, nearly meeting each other, with a bridge crossing the gap.

Looking down at himself, seeing what was missing and what wasn’t, he wondered aloud “How the hell…? Blacked out in the storm, maybe they put me on a sled and were ambushed passing through here? Probably got flung away from the sled by some explosive, and they took me for a dead man. No need to scavenge from me as everything worthwhile was stored on the sled after I blacked out, so they never figured out I was alive…”

He looked behind himself, turned and rapidly stepped in the direction of the bridges, eyes widened in shock; there was a cliff, dropping far, far further than it was safe to fall. “But this isn’t anywhere like the Lena basin… The cliffs make sense but the bloody castle, I must have been out for ages…”

Glancing around, a metal glint caught his eye, and he reflexively squinted at it, before realising his glasses were on. A pleasant surprise, not scratched from their time in the snow, and easy to forget when he was used to the same lenses in his goggles. Explained the pressure on his eyes in the snow. They must have forgotten to take them off him when they put him on the sled… His attention went back to the object, clearly not a mine or an unexploded shell, and he approached. Reaching down to uncover it from the snow, his felt the urge to protest.

“What kind of bandit leaves a Geiger counter?! Do they live in hazmat suits? Even then it is valuable to trade… Ah, well, it’s my Geiger counter.” He cradled the device, listening to it chirp, remembering his jokes about it being ‘The irrational fear meter’ as he checked it for faults. A frown creased his forehead, there was no visible damage, but it was detecting far less than it should even in the best of places.

Will continued searching around for a few minutes, and the Geiger’s count did not change appreciably. Rather, it proved to not be malfunctioning, as when pointed at himself or his map it went to more familiar levels. Radioactive dust is omnipresent in the ecosystem and things like nuclear wars greatly increase this; eating, breathing and drinking all accumulated trace amounts of unstable isotopes in the body, and his device could detected them as they decayed.

[Affili]

Dimitri awoke, body racked with several aches that hadn't been there a while ago. He was laying face down, a postion this monk most definately was not unfamiliar with that was for certain. Good thing he had been enjoying his latest brew and his head was still murky. however he slowly began to realize that whatever random aches and pains he was noticeing now would probably get worse as he sobered up. "Easy way to avoid that!" he murmed into the snow. Snow? He rolled onto his side, sucking air through his teeth at the unexpected protests of his aching muscles, It was cold. He was cold. Robes dappened from the snow but thankfully not completely soaked through yet. He relented to moving slower, wondering why his head was spinning more than usual.

It had been a new brew he had sampled mind you, distilled from several rare mushrooms and a score of exotic botanincals from the Northern Wilds. The Northern Wilds. Maybe that was where he was right now. As he sat there waiting for his head to stop spinning, he realized that he had not journeyed to The Northern Wilds himself to aquire said ingredients. By whatever logic he could muster up, he was most definately not in the Northern Wilds. Furthermore; last he recalled, he had been airborne riding on the back of Digby which was probably not a good idea conisdering the fact that he had a flask full of his newest brew and the effects of it had yet to manifest.

The Easterm Ridges were no where near this cold at any rate, not even amidst the highest peaks so, where the hell was he? The monk's hand drifted to the flask at his waist. Another sip to help clear his thoughts! But his hand didn't brush the top of the familiar flask. he rocked back and forth a few times. No shifting of weight either. He patted his waist more frantically now. "Shit, that flask costed me a fortune to have socketed! it has to be around here somewhere" he commented aloud as he scanned the immediate area.

It took him several moments to fully realize how light he actually felt around the waist and once he did, his heart filled with dread almost instantly sobering him up...Almost. The mace was gone too. That was even more precious to him then his flask! Especially since the Healing catalyst had costed a much heavier price than coin. The lives of two dear friends that had went out with him to aquire the neccesary components. A major healing catalyst was a rare enough commodity in its own right, but this one, it was perhaps one the poccessions Dimitri cherished most due to the high price they all had to pay in order to get it. Now it was gone.

He dragged himself to his feet, stumbling a bit until he caught his balance and after a few moments to stir his chi enough to dull the aches a bit more and raise his core temperature, he finally glanced around, taking in these new surroundings curiously. He was somehere high. That much was certain But still off in the distant silhouettes of mountains loomed overhead. The snow was falling too heavily for him to judge exactly how high this stone bridge truly was but the air felt thin.

When one finds themselves in a relatively monochromeatic enviroment such as he was, certain things begin to stand out against the blankets of white snow. He squinted through the blizzard, vaguely making out the crude shape of a blueish roof behind him, along with the reflections of flames dancing against what walls were left of the structure. He sighed with a little relief. To be infront of those roaring flames would mean he would not have to rely on his chi as heavily to stay warm thus enabling him to focus more on probing out for the definitive feeling of the Catalysts that were linked to his soul.

It was the best idea he could muster at the time, and besides, he would have fire there, and plenty of water from the snow, all he would need were a few ingredients and some kind of container and perhaps he would be able to brew something up to fend off this cold further. He carefully made his way towards the flames, tentatively scanning the area for his pocessions as he walked. Hopefully none had fallen off the bridge. Who knew how far up he was right now and the probing could only stretch so far from his immediate vicinity.

[Venku]

Having completed his mission to capture the inter-planetary criminal Testio Vronin, Alex was headed back to Xela Reiva to prepare to take his place as part of the Reivan Council. On his ship he felt a strange sense of foreboding. "Crena have the ship scan for any -" Blackness erupted all around him and it felt as if he was being ripped to pieces and being put back together over and over. He went to move his hands to the ship's controls but they seemed to move in every direction at once. He started to feel as though he were falling sideways as if the gravitational compensators had failed and the ship was making erratic turns. When he should have hit the wall he seemingly passed through it. That was when he blacked out.

Alex woke up shivering. He was lying on his back in the snow which did little to protect him from the rocks right under it. His head felt like someone had hammered on his skull from the inside trying to get out and had nearly succeeded. ~Why does this stuff always happen to me?~ he thought as he rubbed his head and got up, " Crena where are we and how did we get here?" Getting no answer he looks down at his chest where Crena is usually hanging from a necklace, seeing nothing panic begins to swell in his chest. He begins to search near the spot he had been laying the swirling swirling snow did not aid his efforts, when he moved snow to look under it the wind blew it right back. Seeing that searching manually was not going to work he attempted to create a large fire to melt the nearby snow, the result was a small flame that barely covered an area larger than his hand.

"What is this, my powers are limited?"

~Alexavier it seems that the seals placed on us at birth have been activated~ came Xavier's mental reply.

Alexander:~Weren't those seals set to protect our power from being stolen?~

Xavier: ~Normally, yes but whatever brought us here must have triggered them~
"Well that is just great. We don't know where we are, our powers are mostly sealed, and Crena is missing."

Xavier: ~Hmm.. to test how much our power is sealed try to create some clones.~
Thinking this a good idea Alex attempts to make clones. " Only two? I should at least be able to make ten."

Xavier: ~They also seem to be weaker than usual~

"Well they should work fine for scouting and searching purposes. You two each take a clone Xavier South head and Alexander head East. We seem to be in some ruins of some kind but be careful making those clones took up more energy than normal and we can't afford not to find out more about where we are or where Crena is. I can sense Crena but cannot determine his distance from us he could be right next to us or a universe away."

Alexander in clone body: "Yeah, yeah look around, no die, find rock"

Xavier in clone body: "This is serious, we don't have time for you to goof off"

Alexander: " Yeah I know, I was just trying to lighten the mood a bit. Well, see you in a bit."

Alexavier: "Be careful you two this place gives me a bad feeling."

As the other two leave Alex notices what looks like the outline of a person near the closest castle wall. He begins to walk over catiously keeping an eye out for any sudden movements.

[Viridity]

Vata closed the window in his study before sitting down at his writing desk. He had no wish to let either the noise from the street or the slightly chilly winter breeze disturb him while he worked.

Several minutes later, while he was writing a response to a student, Vata started to feel incredibly sleepy. Despite the fact that it was only several hours since sunset, he thought little of it. He had been up all of the previous night finishing an essay after all. Moments later, he caught something dark out of the corner of his eye, and then lost consciousness.

---

Vata woke up to a shockingly cold gust of wind blowing snow into his face. The last thing he could remember was that he was writing a response to a letter sent to him by his most recent student, but the last time he checked, writing a letter did not transport one to places unknown. He'd heard that shaping had been done through the use of runes carved into stones or written on parchment, but he'd never heard of shaping being done purely by accident or that it could allow for swift, if not instantaneous travel over distances as long as from Nishi'an to the cold mountains of the North.

His thoughts were interrupted by him noticing that there was a figure approaching him. He thought he could also see a couple figures in the distance, but the snow and the wind made it difficult to see. He stood up from where he was sitting and raised a hand to his face to try to keep the snow out of his eyes as he tried to get a better look at whoever, or whatever was approaching him. When that failed, he called out to the figure.
"Is somebody out there?"

[pomme de terre]

Gemma was sure that she’d only been outside for about ten minutes total since arriving in Vladivostok, and already she was freezing her ass off. Though she’d been living in Massachusetts for the better part of the last decade, and Massachusetts winters were nothing to sneeze at (so she was told), she was a Floridian at heart, and there was no farther cry from the sunny beaches of Florida than the steely skies of eastern Russia. The Siva-Cup, at least, was warm and familiar, and though the Cyrillic characters on the localized coffee company’s logo were a constant reminder that she was a long way from home, the atmosphere wasn’t altogether that different. The machines whirred and whizzed over the counter, conversations murmured, soft music played. Twain chatted, Zesiro listened (or at least pretended to), and Icarus… sat there and looked intimidating, as was his way.

“Ever been to Tahiti?” she remarked wryly to Twain, sipping her caramel latte. She couldn’t imagine Russia being anyone’s favorite. Even the Russians didn’t seem to like it too much. Twain was well traveled as the leader of their little group; certainly he’d been somewhere better than this vast land of icecaps and bears. Then again, the enthusiasm that he radiated told her that Twain’s favorite place was where he currently was, as long as something interesting was happening there. The disappearance of MOON, though tragic, definitely qualified as interesting.

Twain placed four pictures down on the table as he briefed them. Gemma leaned in, looking at the smiling faces of the other agents. Though she wasn’t the youngest in MERCY she was by far the newest, and she could almost feel all eyes on her. It was her first big mission after all. Though she’d been working almost a year with these three, handling disappearing agents in Russia was pretty new territory. When Twain dropped the fifth picture on the table, Gemma snatched it up, nearly knocking over Icarus’ frappe in the process. Could who they were looking for hold a clue to their movements before they disappeared? She didn’t recognize the person in the picture. Twain had stopped talking, so she looked up to get an answer from him. “Well? Who is it?”

As soon as she asked, a tingling began at the crown of her head. A feeling something like anxiety or dread twisted in her gut, and the photo fell from her fingers to the table. The tingling shivered down her spine, leaving an ache in her head; her heart rate picked up. The dread meant something dark was happening; the tingling signaled radiation, but the headache was new. Her right arm erupted in pins and needles, as numb as if she’d slept on it. That was also new, and distinctly unpleasant.

The feeling in her stomach extended to what felt like outside of her—she had a location. But she was all turned around; she hadn’t gotten used to the magnetic quirks of the area yet, so she flopped her useless right arm in the general direction of the feeling so she could keep track of it, knocking over her latte in the process, covering the photo of the person MOON was looking for in sticky caramel.

“Shit, sorry!” she managed, trying to right the cup with her good hand. Then, leaning in and lowering her voice, she continued, “Something really big just happened, that way.” She twitched her arm, splayed out across the table, pointing... North? Northeast? “Don’t know a distance, don’t even really know a direction, but it’s bad.”

[Anzu]

How do I delete posts? This is not meant to be here.

nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

[Eyeris]

Herbert West

West would find bodies in the snow.

Some frozen, some burned.

Upon closer inspection, he might be disturbed to discover that many of the bodies were not at all human. Some where animals… many were animals that he could not name, and he considered himself a learned man.

There was one that might have been a wolf, but it was far too large. It was larger than a horse, even, the size of an elephant perhaps. It had patches of blue fur. It was frozen and dead.

There was one that at first, looked like a man. However, he had no mouth. Where a man would have had a mouth this one, instead, had a row of long tendrils growing like a strange beard. This one had died by fire.

Herbert would see something move in the snow near a small pile of bodies. The dead quivered, and shook, then from underneath them emerged something else entirely…

… a tiny creature made entirely of bones.

A tiny skull, a thin spine, tiny clawed feet, and two sets of long mandibles that would have been wings if they had any skin. The tiny skeletal creature stumbled through the snow, which was much deeper than the creature was tall. It was the size of Herbert’s palm. It had no flesh, it had no organs, it was only clean white bones. Yet it moved. Yet it walked. Yet it looked at Herbert with empty eye sockets, and cocked its head to one side, like a pigeon in the park begging for bread crumbs.

William Bluff

Several feet away from William he would see movement in the snow.

He was not alone.

Someone lay half buried, they stirred but they were not yet awake.

She shivered.

Should William approach he would find a girl. She was under dressed for the snow. She was wearing brown pants and leather boots. She wore a white shirt, layered with a thin shirt comprised of small metal rings, and over that a leather vest that laced together. She was small, thin, she had bronze skin and dark hair coiled around her head in a braid… the braid was askew, her hair escaping in violent puffy clumps that collected snow. She was beat up, her clothes torn and her face bruised. If he touched her he would find her pulse weak and her body cold. It was amazing, considering what she wore, that she had not yet frozen to death.

Dimitri

The monk walked toward the fire and toward death. As he came closer to the interior of the building he would see more and more bodies. Some were burned, some were frozen, some were broken and torn apart in other ways. He might feel humbled by the size of the once-great hall. The broken roof loomed high above, but did little to cast any shadow to hide the gruesome scene before him. Some of the cracks in the walls and the roof were very old, erosion caused by time. Some of it was new. The rocks had recently been scorched and shattered. The blood of the dead, of course, was still fresh. They had died less than a day ago, though, exactly when would be impossible to tell. They only thing that Dimitri would be able to say for sure is that they were once alive and now they were dead, for the bodies were mutilated beyond recognition…

… except for one.

In the center of the room there was a large stone block. Upon that block was a body that still had a face. It was a girl, her chest was cut open and pried apart. Apart from this wound and the blood that covered her and dyed her entire being red, she was not otherwise burned or hurt like those who lay strewn about her.

The closer he got to the center of the once great hall the more wrong the energy would feel. That sinking feeling would touch the innermost part of his sensitive soul.

There was white chalk etched into the ground. Dimitri would not recognize the patterns that seemed to form a circle around the stone altar. He would not be able to record very many of them. The drawings had been disrupted by whatever destruction had been reaped her, and of course by the weather. With the roof gone the entire work was exposed to the elements. The wind carried the chalk away and into the white snowy world around it, erasing whatever had been written there.

Perhaps the mountain was busy at work erasing and burying whatever it was that had happened here. It was so wrong that even the mountain itself protested.

Alex

As Alex approaches the body, he hears a groan and a muttering. There is a body half covered in snow, half covered in rubble from the broken wall.

The man is tall, his body large with hard, corded muscles running all over his towering frame, His face is slightly gaunt, with flawless, snowy skin. He is deathly cold to the touch. His hair is silver and shoulder length, curling at the nape of his neck. He is wearing a large grey coat of thick wool with shining brass buttons and an expensive three-piece suit, a white shirt, and steel toe-capped boots.

He mutters, his shoulders shift, sending rubble and snow rolling off his body.

Xavier (The one who went South)

As he walked south he would notice more details about the place.

In some places the snow was melted and the stone burned. In small patches the fires was still burning. He would step on what he realized was a frozen body. He would notice many bodies. They were dusted with a light covering of snow. Something had happened here, though, exactly how long ago was difficult to say. Hours perhaps, but no more than a day.

Then he would hear a voice, a living voice among the dead.

"Is somebody out there?"

Alexander (The one who went East)

Snow gusted into his face as he walked. To his right was what looked like what was once the main section of a grand castle, the roof was on fire, broken and caving in. He could not quite make out what was up there, as it was far too high.

Up ahead there was a small fire burning up ahead. Beside it, behind a large boulder he would see movement.

“DON'T YOU FUCKING MOVE! I’VE GOT YOU IN MY SIGHTS!” From behind the boulder emerged a girl. She was young, maybe 16, with long dark hair and a determined face. The fire light made her face seem even more fierce. She held a bow, and had a long black pointed arrow drawn back to her cheek. The bow bent and the string tight, ready to be released, and send the arrow toward Alexander. She would continue to speak. “First, put your hands where I can see them. Then, tell me who the hell you are and what the hell you're doing here!” She scowled, even with so much anger her young face was smooth and pretty, “And don’t fucking lie! I’ll be able to tell.”

Vata

The world was cold, it would not be safe to stay cold for long… but he was not alone. As he called out the figure approached closer…

Ryann…

Ryann woke up cold and alone. As she looked around she would realize she was very high up… she was on top of a tower. A tower that was old and broken by time… but also by fire. The sides were scorched though where she lay was untouched.

Looking out she would see a winter wonderland… from her vantage she could see that she was on a mountain. She stood on one of two towers among a mass of ruins set on the side of a cliff. Parts of the ruins were still on fire. She might see figures moving, or lying about, but she was too high up to make out any details.

There were once stairs leading down the tower, and once a bridge connecting the tower to the main part of the castle. Both had crumbled away with time.

[jdh97]

As a man of logic, Herbert reasoned that there must be some rationale behind what he was experiencing. The obvious was that it was a continuum of a dream, for the last thing he remembered was dreaming, though it was indistinct in his mind’s eye. But Herbert did not believe that; this was real; he could feel it. There was a diamond hard edge to the reality of the things around, which no mind in dream could hope to emulate, not even the most observant.

Eliminating that possibility, however, left room for the strange and fantastic, and the altogether frightening. The more prominent postulation was that he had died, and he was in purgatory or hell. Which, he had not decided upon, but it was certainly not heaven; he had never been a strongly religious man, which made many of the atrocities he committed easier. He did not deserve heaven, nor did he believe it could be so cold. What scared him most about this was that he might have sacrificed an eternal life with Liza on the hopes of a few more precious, but ultimately, impermanent years. That he could have been wrong all this time, it terrified him. He discarded this line of thinking; he didn’t need it clouding his judgement, but it was lurking there, whether he liked it or not.

He brought his hands close and breathed into, rubbing them together furiously. Even this close to the fire the pervading cold was inescapable, and surged in and out with a fast wind, keeping him ever mindful of its presence.

Upon deciding he was sufficiently dry, he moved away from the ghoulish flames, and stuffed his hands deep into the pockets of his jacket. It was then that he noticed his notebook and the gnarled pencil he used to fill it where both missing. Unimportant, Herbert decided, probably blown away with the wind, now irrecoverable. He thought no more of it, and began divining the safest, or rather, the least treacherous, path to the tower, picking where the snow was thinnest, preferably where he could see rock, as he did not know what lay waiting under the white sheet.

The cold was biting; stepping away from the fire, it became apparent just how life saving it had been. The snow fell in heavy clumps and limited his vision, but the tower was growing closer, each apprehensive footfall made sure of that. His shoes and lower trouser legs were thoroughly soaked now, and his feet had gone numb, and violent shivering plagued his body, but his core was keeping adequately warm.

Around him, Herbert began to notice other shapes resting, half-buried in the snow, all dead, so Herbert hoped, for they were horrid in their appearances and certainly of unearthly origin. It was a bizarre Danse Macabre, all truly equal in death.

A movement ahead. Too cold to flee, he watched, holding his breath praying that whatever came was equally as lost as him. The creature revealed itself, and Herbert was taken aback. Made entirely of bone, the tiny creature defied reason. But, he supposed, it was just one of those days when reason went out the window. Herbert sagged, visibly exhausted and drained.

He felt it look at him, with an eyeless stare that managed to convey a sentience behind those empty, shadowed sockets. It reminded Herbert of when Liza fed the birds and the park, mostly thrushes and pigeons; it moved with a dim recognition, no fear of what it stood before, but an expectance. It had unknowingly endeared itself, and because this was the most familiar thing so far to Herbert, and because he was desperate and somewhat in a daze, he spoke to it.

“Hello there,” He said through chattering teeth, “I don’t suppose you know where I am?” He asked.

This is stupid, he told himself, look at it; a creature of malignant birth, all bones and no flesh, how it is even “alive” is a mystery, but talking to it? Now that is undeniably stupid. It probably is just sizing you up before it consumes you. I wouldn’t be surprised.

He pushed these thoughts down, this was the first “living” thing he had encountered, and beyond the solely-bone structure, it was not that intimidating. He’d be damned if he’d pass up an opportunity to get helped, for he doubted he could survive more than a day alone, so even if the thing were to kill him, at least it would be a quick death.

[Eyeris]

Gemma

Twain frowned, observing Gemma's episode. Zesiro acted quickly, moving his own drink off the table and away from the flailing girl. ‘What the fuck?’ he muttered. Icarus looked at the girl, but his expression didn’t change.

When she was through Twain was quiet for awhile. “Hm. Whelp. We better get a move on then.” He stood “Let’s head out crew.”

“What?” Zesiro looked incredulous. “She has a spaz attack and we move out?”

“Yup.” Twain began to whistle as he left the coffee house, his drink in hand. “I’ll continue the briefing on the road. Zesiro, make sure we have all the paperwork. Icarus, help Gemma if she needs it.”

Zesiro scowled and grabbed up the pictures and files on the table. Then he followed his brother out the door. Icarus would stand by Gemma, and gently carry her or offer her support if she was still too physically weak from her episode. If she was strong enough to walk on her own he would instead follow her like a shadow, ready to catch her if she faltered.

Twain continued to brief the team once they were on their way. Twain in the driver's seat, Zesiro sat shotgun. Icarus and Gemma sat behind them. There were three more team members in the van behind Icarus and Gemma, but they were not included in the briefing or the conversation that followed. They didn’t drink coffee so had not joined the team in the cafe.

The photos were passed around again. The last one, the girl that MOON was looking for, reluctantly posed for what looked like a graduation picture. Her cap sat askew on her head, the tassel fell in front of her face, obscuring one eye and that half of her face. She looked annoyed, like someone who did not like getting their picture taken. She held her diploma in her hand, but lopsided, only part remained in the frame. ‘Helena Tech--’ was the only thing that could be read. She had long dark hair, a slight straight nose, and freckles scattered across a dusty complexion.

Twain then answered Gemma's earlier question. “She’s been on file at TRIDENT as a person-of-interest for awhile now. The file is missing why she is a person of interest. Usually that kind of thing is for recruitment, or keeping an eye on someone that might be dangerous. The file, however, lacks these details.” He shrugged. “MOON probably pulled all the information when they began their investigation.”

[Eyeris]

Herbert West

The little thing stumbled away from the carcases from which it had emerged, it tripped over an arm. Oddly enough, the little thing seemed disoriented itself. It seemed to follow the sound of his voice, however, and walked toward his shoes. It hopped up on top of Harbert's boot.

It did not answer him, it had not vocal chords. It did, however, make a sound. Click-click-crackle-clack. Bones somewhere near where the back of its throat should be ground together to make the grating rickety-sound rather than a chirp or a song like a normal bird might have...

[Anzu]

“Okay… Looks like chainmail. Chainmail… And a tan?”

Will carefully placed the chunk of masonry on the ground, and pushed the ‘why the hell is someone wearing chainmail out here, how did they manage to get tanned’ thought away from the front of his mind, focusing on the ‘we should help this person’ thought.

He moved closer, his eyes trying to size up her injuries. “Hey, hey wake up. Can you hear me?”

No response. The situation wasn’t amazingly difficult for Will, but the addition of seemingly being teleported here, the (now that he was noticing it) oddly persistent fires and the fortress all compounded. Looking down he realised he still held the Geiger counter, deciding he may as well point it at the person, finding some amusement in the idea… and a bit of comfortable familiarity. Taking the cap off, he pointed it at the snow nearby her, and moving it slowly over her in an arc, back onto the snow. He frowned, and repeated the motion. Lower than background? He pointed the counter into the distance, away from the battlefield and the land around it, then back to the ground around him. This strange battlefield was just a bit more radioactive than the background for where he was judging by the count of the surroundings, and the castle was even higher. Not dangerous to go into, but not a good idea to spend a few nights there. He put aside that idea, yet another thing to mess with his head and go unsolved, noticing that she was starting to wake up.

Hooking his arms underneath her armpits, he started dragging her on her back to the nearest fire “Just hold on a few seconds…”

He placed her down, just short of actually putting her in the flames, glancing back to see a faint trail of blood. Low blood pressure from blood loss, or was she better off than she looked? He had nothing to bandage with that wouldn’t be more useful as protection from the cold, and didn’t want to risk moving her more. Taking off his jacket, he began to shiver, or rather the shivering got worse, and draped it across the wounded, armoured stranger. He reckoned she was still quite a bit colder than him, and was pretty sure none of his blood was draining out into the snow, so she could have the jacket.

He stood up, looking around to see if there was anyone else nearby, or at least a body to steal some more clothes from. “You awake now? I’m Will, you speak English? I got a bit of Russian, South Standard and Japanese too if you’ve no idea what I’m saying.”

[Affili]

The closer he came to the structure the more his soul began to protest. This place was wrong. It felt wrong. The wrongness of it was so prominent that the feeling of dread seemed to resonated through the very mountains surrounding the grim scene almost as though this strange new world he found himself in was screaming its protest. It was a maddening feeling.
“I need a drink” he commented aloud as his eyes took in the outskirts of the structure.

Bodies were strewn everywhere and he slowed his steps as he drew up on the structure which he could only assume was once a grand hall of some kind. The tangy scent of iron filled his nostrils. The floors were slick with fresh blood and gore, various limbs protruding from mounds of flesh that had perhaps once been human. There were claws and other extremities that suggested creatures were amidst the slaughter as well. It was enough to make even Dimitri’s stomach turn and he had a strong stomach by all respects.

Even the flames that licked at the walls and piles of rubble screamed of dread. An unnatural kind of flame fueled by heavens knows what. Such healthy fires despite this harsh environment with little to no means of fuel.

His gaze shifted to the altar at the center of the room then fell to the broken circle etched onto the floor surrounding the crude altar. Sprawled on top of the altar was a young woman with her chest sliced open. By far the most recognizable figure in the room, she was not defiled like the others.

“Where is this strange place that I find myself in?” he questioned as he crouched to inspect some of the few symbols that remained etched onto the ground.
Dimitri traced one of them with his finger then rose to his feet and stepped back from the circle unwilling to disturb it further. “If only the dead could speak” he said with a heavy sigh. Should he remove the body from the altar? he was uncertain. Clearly some ritual had taken place and he was not sure what repercussions he would encounter should he disturb anything at the ritual sight. She was already dead, near as he could tell; thus she could no longer suffer should she remain where she lay. “Who would do something like this?” he wondered out loud, beginning to retreat from the hall unable to shake the feeling of dread that was tearing at his spirit right now. Suddenly he was unwilling to share the heat of the unnatural flames.

[Venku]

Alex:

Seeing the man Alex removes the snow and rubble from the man. Finding a bit of broken wood nearby Alex uses his powers to start a fire to warm the man up. The man remains unconscious so Alex grabs him closer to the fire and waits for him to wake up.

"How in the great universe did we get here?" Alex wonders aloud, "I sure hope Crena is somewhere nearby."

Xavier:

Hearing a voice call out Xavier looks in the direction of the sound. He sees the outline of a man standing relatively close. He cautiously approaches the figure. As he gets closer he sees that there is a slim man of relatively average height. Sensing the man would not pose a threat he relaxes and quickly approaches the man.

"Hello, I am Xavier. Do you happen to know where we are?" Xavier says.

Alexander:

Hearing the girls threat Alexander smiles to himself. Knowing that the girl has the advantage he stops walking and puts his hands in the air. Why do I always end up in these sort of situations he thinks to himself.

"To answer you first question my name is Alexander. As far as why am I here I honestly don't know two others who were with me and I woke up here." Alexander says, "Can you stop pointing your bow at me now that I answered your questions? Also have you happened to have seen a crystal that seems to have a storm within it on a black metal necklace?"

[jdh97]

The creature was a mere weight upon his shoe, not that Herbert could feel it anyway; sensation in that region had long since departed. Herbert looked at the creature with a mixture of awe and unease. Its apparent hospitality came as a relief, but its jarring call was like fingernails down a chalk board, and made his skin crawl, and would have made him shudder, had the cold not already seen to that.

An idea slowly dawned upon Herbert: if he could somehow find his way off the mountain and back to England, back to his laboratory, then he could study the creature. It seemed to have transcended the springing of its mortal coil and was as close to alive as a skeletal creature could hope to be. The secrets of reincarnation likely resided, at this very moment, on his foot. And if not, it was still a marvel of science, even his mind struggled to invent a plausible elucidation for its existence, so selling it to a museum or private benefactor would no doubt bring a huge sum with which he could renew his research. He found himself hoping more strongly than ever that he had not slipped into some awful, mocking delirium.

Feeling almost giddy with excitement, partly forgetting his situation, he bent over, offering an outstretched finger to the bone-creature.

“Come now, little spectacle,” Herbert purred, “Let us get inside where I pray we may find shelter.”

The thing bobbed its head up and down and from side to side as it eyed the finger. It clicked, and then scrambled up his jacket sleeve, sending the snow that had settled there up in tufts behind it. Herbert recoiled, mostly out of shock, but it had already nestled on his shoulder. He looked at it from the corner of his eye and it let out a creaky dissonance. Despite himself, Herbert smiled, a fraction at least.

“I suppose that works too.”

A vast obsidian monolith, the tower loomed ominously over the two of them, and Herbert’s tongue felt heavy in his mouth. Flames licked the outside, and ice thawed and froze anew. A door-less archway three metres high led inside. Much snow had gathered at the base, and a silvery sheen of slick ice covered the lower stairs. A stairwell, without handhold or railing, spiralled upwards out of sight.

The first steps were the most difficult, and Herbert almost lost his feet from under him twice, but a hand on the wall steadied him. A few of the stairs had partly fallen away, but he was able to skirt around the edges where they had remained intact. He did not look down. At several sections, fire-rimmed holes in the walls let the elements in, and strong winds threatened to blow Herbert over, but he would get down on his hands and knees and crawl up until the icy glint had vanished from the stairs. The skeletal creature buried its head deep into his collar, hiding from the gusts that could carry its tiny framework away.

Upon reaching the top, Herbert sat down on the highest steps. Snow had gathered here too, but less of it; the doorway leading onto the bridge was much smaller, but still did not have a door. Icy flurries were whipped about by the howling winds, all the more audible this high. A short stonewall offered some protection, but Herbert could see that it was crumbling in places. He knew at the end of it there was the castle, but journeying across would be no small amount frightening.

Ribs rose and fell rhythmically; the stairs had been steep and numerous, and it was a deceptively tiring climb. Herbert’s cold muscles ached, but they were slightly warmer than before.

A high, hollow Cluck.

“Just catching my breath,” Herbert replied, and, aware that it likely had no clue what he saying, he laughed a little. “Not something you have to worry about, is it?”

The thing let out a lower sound, like popping joints, almost as if it was agreeing. Almost.

After a few more moments, Herbert pushed himself to his feet, pulled the collar of his jacket tight round his face, and raised his other arm above his forehead in a vain attempt to shield his vision. It was not as bad as he had expected, but the wind did buffet him to his knees occasionally.

Then Herbert began to notice something, a sensation deep in his gut, as if it were full of lead, sinking. A slight burning arose in his chest, and he suddenly felt very queasy. The bone creature began to shuffle about, crawling from shoulder to shoulder along his collar, letting out an acrimonious chittering, like a thousand clicking knuckles. Herbert was not so sure this was the best idea; the castle was the most sheltered area he had seen, and likely the only place to hold food, or maybe some slender hope of survival. However, Herbert was beginning to strongly doubt that; the animal instincts of both Herbert and the once-dead creature cried at the intrinsic and unnatural wrongness that radiated from the castle.

Motion ahead; a figure against the backdrop of fire: silhouetted. It was too far away to make of details, but, importantly, it seemed to be human. There were other shapes behind him, but the fire cast shadows that made them impossible to discern.

Heart racing, Herbert’s first reaction was to back away, but then he saw the garments, simple cloth robes. They bore a striking resemblance to those worn by holy men, and suddenly Herbert was thinking about the possibility that he was in the afterlife; it explained the bone creature better than anything else. Was this man another damned, lost soul, or perhaps a demon with a sense of irony?

He could hear sounds, muffled, but distinctly human, and what’s more, English. Encouraged by this revelation, Herbert slowly began lurching towards the figure, the ill feeling persisting. If he was in a similar situation to Herbert, then they could help each other, and if this was some frozen purgatory, he imagined it would be helpful having a monk around.

Perhaps it was not a castle at all, but a monastery, and it had had some dreadful accident and the monk and his brothers were in need of help. They likely had a stockpile of food and knew of safe passage down the mountain to a rural settlement with friendly farmer’s wives and buxom daughters that would dote on him with hearty cooking and beg for him to tell stories of the city and the civilised world, which would beg wide-eyed stares and slack jaws. Wishful thinking, Herbert knew, but it helped comfort him, for the Lord knew little else about his current predicament did.

“Hello,” he called, as loud as he dared, not wanting to wake the malignance that hung in a lull over the place, but loud enough to assert himself over the snow, “I am lost, have you any idea where I am?”

[Fumari]

The first thing that register in Ryann’s mind was the cold. Thick gusts of air whipped and howled around the platform she’s only just come to on, making her frame shiver and shake violently. How long had she been lying here in the snow? The question echoed in her head, followed by many others, until her head was eventually crowded with unanswered inquiries and a creeping sense of anxiety. She sucked in a breath to try and calm herself, but only succeeded in causing another sharp spasm of shivering.

“How did I…?” her lips unconsciously formed the words, sounding desperate and unbelieving. Her dark eyes searched her surroundings aimlessly, while he mind, still groggy and in start-up mode, struggled to make sense of the situation. There was snow, and she was sitting on something made of stone. A building? Behind her, the starch outlines of mountains jutted up from the white landscape. In the opposite direction, a good ways below, were the remnants of some sort of castle, though the thick flurries left many of its details undefinable. Ryann noted her surroundings while she tried to collect her thoughts, and in an odd sort of way, it helped slow her panic. The last thing she recalls, if she is recalling it correctly, was being outside. She was flying, and then in a tree with Roach—she name of said crab suddenly send another spike of panic through her system, and for a moment, her limbs seized up for a reason other than the cold, and her stomach floated.

Where was Roach? He was definitely with her before, in her bag. The young avian suddenly twisted around to the left, and then to the right, frightened to the core after she failed to locate the missing knapsack.

“No.. No no no no no..” Ryann slowly began murmuring, and anxiously climbed to her feet. Everything ached, and stopped her sputtering when the familiar but unpleasant feeling of pins and needles shot down her limbs. How long had she been lying there? The question was back again, but then quickly forgotten when a rush of cold wind pushed through her. She wrapped her arms around her torso tightly and curled away from the wind. Behind her, a pair of sea eagle wings folded themselves flatly against her back, thankfully well insulated, unlike the rest of her unfeathered skin.

It took her time to waddle towards the edge of what she now knew to be a tower, and a little more afterwards to survey the rest of her current perch. There were no stairs, nor bridge left to walk down from, and by the look of the time worn brick, this wasn’t a very well kept building to begin with. She continued to pace around the circular platform, if only to help calm her nerves while she kicked at snow drifts. In the back of her mind, she hoped that maybe Roach was hiding in one of them, blended white like the rest of this god awful wonderland. She wouldn’t be that lucky, though, and was only greeted with chunks of ice and chilled toes.

“I hate the snow.” She snapped and kicked at a drift bitterly, though underneath the irritation, she was terrified. The combination of cold, lost, and suddenly finding herself alone didn’t bode well, and for the briefest of moments, she wished for her brothers to be here. She wished they would just suddenly appear and help her, as they often did in situations like this, but they didn’t this time. No, Ryann realized with a painful throb of fright, she was alone right now.

She isn’t sure how long she just stood there then, contemplating her next few courses of action. Most obviously, she wanted to find Roach, and then somewhere warm, of course. If he wasn’t on top of the tower with her, then he might have landed somewhere else, hopefully still close by. Her eyes scanned below again, now noticing the small flicker of warm light lick at the snowy landscape. Fires, though, they didn’t looked intentionally placed, much to her unease. She then looked over the ruins of a castle, and the long bridge that extended only part way to the lone tower she stood on.

“Well, that’s a start.” She huffed through jittering teeth, and then whistled out into the wind and waited for it to call back—after a few minutes, she was returned with nothing. Her face scrunched up in confusion for a moment, and she tried again. Once more, the wind ignored her and continued on in its own direction. “What the hell!” she suddenly felt irritation spark at the ends of her nerves, like live wires in the rain, “Why’re you being such a shit..?” she whined into the wind, unable to comprehend why it wouldn’t listen. She didn’t have time to argue with nature, she thought anxiously, and tried three more times before finally stomping her feet and letting loose a few more choice curses. For some ungodly reason, the wind was ignoring her, which meant that if she wanted to fly, she’d be stuck with riding out the winds as they are, and at the moment, they were nothing but a harsh mess of ice and snow.

“I freaking hate the snow..!” She whined one last time, and bitterly let her wings outstretch behind her, small but dark like a flowing cape. She imagined that sea hawk wings would fare well enough in this type of weather, and didn’t trouble herself with a change. The wind leafed through her feathers in a way she was all too familiar with, begging to lift her from the ground, and helped to relax her nerves a bit. In the next moment, she was vaulting over the edge of the tower, and into the mercy of the wind.

[Viridity]

Vata waited in the bitter cold as the figure continued to approach him, and a moment later, he could clearly see what it was. It seemed to be another person, albeit in unfamiliar garb that did not seem suited to the weather. The man's posture didn't seem to be hostile either, which was a relief. The last thing he needed right now was a bandit trying to mug him. The oddly dressed man took a few more steps before stopping and taking a look at Vata, then began speaking.

"Hello, I am Xavier. Do you happen to know where we are?"

Vata blinked in surprise. Neither the man's name nor the way he spoke indicated that he was from the North. The situation was quickly becoming stranger by the moment. If this place wasn't in the North, where else could this be?

"Greetings, Xavier. I am Vata, and I have not a clue as to where we are. Even if I did know, it would likely not help us, since we would likely freeze long before we could reach civilization."

As if to emphasize his statement, Vata started to shiver violently as the bitter cold started to seep in.

"I-if we wish to have any chance of surviving this, I would suggest that we try to look for something to keep us warm."

[Affili]

The forboding feeling of the room felt as though it would steal away the monk's very breath as his eyes swept over the grim scene once more

A voice from behind him called out, barely audible above the roaring of the wind and flames. However, Dimitri understood the language perfectly which helped to calm the startled feeling that had swept over him at the sound of the new voice. He wondered if this new comer was a local resident but once it registered that the man had said he was lost Dimitri sighed in frustration to himself.

"No! Unfotunately I have no idea where you are friend. But my best guess would be that you're some few dozen yards away from my current location. As for me?" he scratched his head then continued, "well I actually had considered myself dead for a while...Or at least completley intoxicated" he called to the stranger looking over his shoulder and raising a hand to shield his eyes from the relentless snow "A potent new brew I had just finished drinking you see...riding on the back of my Winddancer...then blackness"

He backed up cautiously towards the voice, hesitant to turn his back on the grim alter. Everything back there was dead he realized after a moment though. 'Pretty sure they wont be stabbing me in the back any time soon' he thought to himself as he swung around to face the stranger.

"There's a roaring fire back there, but sir I can not ignore this terrible feeling that's polluting the very air of this place so I think that I would much prefer to find a different fire to warm up at." He commented tossing a thumb over his shoulder. He stumbled a bit as he slowly moved towards the other man, or thing, whatever it was. Finer details were still a masked silhouette against the heavy snowfall.

"Say stranger, you're not planning to murder me or anything are you? I ask this becasue there are still so many more recipes for me to discover in my never ending quest for booze and I'd prefer to be alive long enough to find them!"
He paused a safe distance away from the man, sighing with relief as the gaunt figure became more clear. "Well at least your not some gnarled creature of sorts in this strange world, with a gimpy leg the size of a tree trunk and an arm which is just barely long enough to poke your nose!" he added with a smile
"I guess that's a good start wouldn't you say?"

[jdh97]

A curse fled from Herbert’s lips when the man divulged that he knew nothing of their current location. Equally lost then, Herbert supposed, or lying, but from the man’s smart Alec response, he doubted that. There was a slight slur to the words, and as he came closer, the clinical stench of alcoholic fumes barged their way up Herbert’s nostrils. The man would have to be a slobbering drunk most of the day, for he smelt almost of pure ethanol. Little comfort came from the man’s explanation, surely no monk, but instead a brewer, it seemed, or maybe an apothecary. Herbert assumed the man had been riding his horse, Winddancer, drunk. If that were so, ending up in the mountains was no natural happenchance.

Fleeting waves of relief washed over Herbert when it became apparent he was not the only one feeling the wrongness, but then a sinking feel quickly replaced that, dragging the relief into a trench of sweltering dismay. If the drunkard could feel it to, then there had to be some cause, something substantially iniquitous to cause an unerring unease. He shifted his weight from foot to foot, impatient and nervous, wanting to flee. But the castle offered the only sanctuary.

“Murder you? Good heavens no!” Herbert sounded appalled at the very idea, “I just want to find harbour from the storm and a way off this destitute rock.”

A truly dedicated drunk, it seemed, more likely a brewer then, but it seemed he was more concerned with drinking than selling, rather unlike the hegemonies he knew who resided in London.

The man was closer now. He was rather tall, and had he face somewhat hidden by his hood, but it was human, a comfort Herbert had overlooked until he woke up on a mountain. Then alarm bells rang inside his skull. “Strange world”. Was he on some other planet that astronomers had long since dreamed about visiting ever since gazing up at the stars? It would explain the lawless nature of the place, the mélange of horrid apparitions. How would this man come to know that? After all, they may just have been undiscovered creatures. Deep down, though, Herbert knew that such abhorrent things should never grace Earth’s soil, and a frightening prospect announced itself to him. Suddenly his laboratory felt so very far away.

“It is a fine start.” The skeletal creature ventured out from Herbert’s collar and nape, clicking and clacking, leaning its head towards the man, head bobbing rhythmically, as if smelling him. Herbert paid it no mind and went on.

“I am afraid the only thing that lies back that way is an icy shelf,” he looked past the lofty drunk and bit the inside of his lip, his shifting became more pronounced, until he was almost hopping from foot to foot. He did not like what he was about to suggest, for it involved diving into the belly of the beast, where the wrongness was emanating from. “The only way is forward. I hope to find shelter and food in the castle. You can accompany me if you wish. If you don’t, I wish you well.”

With that he began walking, waiting only at the man’s side to see if he would follow. If he did, then Herbert would be glad of the help, if he did not, then Herbert would continue nonetheless, despite how every fibre of his being protested. He saw no other option, he had to get back his Liza, and he would suffer far greater than a little disquiet of the soul to do so, so he told himself.