Gattsu

Glasslands: A Griot's Tale (Earth-F67X Chronicle)

Mshale leapt aside as a shower of loose scree pelted off his telekinetic barrier. A large boulder of bloodstone lurched half a meter from where he was standing as the hulking elemental it was attached to retracted its fist-one of Nkosiyabo’s creations. The fungi that lined the chamber walls assumed an angry carmine that pulsed like a throbbing bruise. The internalized magic holding the creature together blossomed in this hue. The color-encoded danger of the fungi, the note on the polished stone tuning fork as well as the lock and key the implement was held under, and the secret utterance required to bring the golem into existence were all safety measures that Mshale, in his anger, threw into the wind. The peril matched his mood.

The telekinetic roared in frustration at the golem as he pumped his fist towards its center mass, and an unseen wave came crashing into the construct. Six meters of stone wasn’t so easy to move, and for his efforts the creature merely took a half step backwards before another death blow surged towards him like a Kilimanjaran avalanche. This strike was too wide for him to dodge, and so he met it head-on pitting his barrier against the creature’s mass. Mshale felt it burden him, burying his body and mind like a ten-ton blanket. His knees buckled as his feet sunk into the hard soil and his temples throbbed as he pushed back. His muffled scream was smothered by a hillock of earth. The mass above him shifted as it was inexorably forced outwards once the telekinetic got the better of it through sustained pressure. He transformed his focus to a point within the rotund stone torso and rotated, churning loose mass away before the golem began to crack.

A few seconds passed before a small web of fissures surfaced upon the back of the prone stone golem. The cracks widened and breached completely as an invisible augur ripped through the interstice. With this invisible drill Mshale pulled himself from the wounded golem, and hopping back, ripped chunks of the ceiling off to crush the pieces of the elemental underneath.

The dust settled, leaving Mshale panting, his fury subsiding to dull annoyance at his and Semret’s last conversation. The arena usually cooled his temper to placid weariness, but this time was different. He couldn’t understand why NYUNDO wanted to keep that creature alive.

He shrugged as he plopped down upon a stone and took a different approach. Ayanda had taught him to use meditation techniques to clear his mind when violence didn’t work. He breathed in deep as he clasped his kneecaps in meaty palms and slowly exhaled, unpacking the worries of his mind.

***

The distant echo of screams pulled Mshale out of a deep torpor. He stared down the hallway of its origin, and closer yet heard the hurried amble of footfalls. It was at this moment that he noticed that many of the bioluminescent fungi of the arena hallways were dark. The telekinetic stood to his feet and clenched his fist as the distant commotion intensified, but was met with a mixture of concern and relief to find Semret emerge from the cavernous darkness. Relief to find a familiar face, concern to find the panic that masked her normally calm demeanor.

“What is happening?” He yelled carrying the tone of a demand than a question.

“The whole hangar…” Semret shouted back, “they’re all befok!”

Mshale furrowed his brow and cocked his head as if he’d just been insulted, “What!”

As Semret neared him he could see her dirt-smudged face, her wild and panicked eyes, and could smell oily smoke clinging to her clothes. “They’re killing everyone! They’re killing- They’re-” She choked through sobs. Mshale put a hand on her shoulder and buried her in his arms, nearly encompassing her like the golem had to him.

“Tell me,” he said in brief respite of tenderness. “who.”

Something landed near the cavern ceiling that shattered their moment. A heavy slam and a snorting exhale followed by a lengthy guttural hiss. Semret paused as she looked beyond the ramparts of Mshale’s forearms. Beyond, the two of them could see a fiendish winged shadow, a darker blot on a dim canvas. It skulked along the wall as it stalked its prey from above.

The telekinetic instinctively deposited his love behind him and reached out to the heaviest part of the golem he’d destroyed. It levitated a few feet off the floor as he mustered his strength, gradually rotating the boulder. The creature above stopped, he could see its humanoid head oriented towards him even though it was obscured by nearly fifty meters of distance and shadow. More disturbingly he could sense its attention-the cold, malicious, alien presence invited his violence with bemused anticipation. The presence was almost invasive were it not for Semret’s support-a presence of warmth and comfort that danced upon the other end of his mind and filled heart. The two apparitions took hold of either end of his psyche and pulled.

Mshale looked over at the boulder, now spinning rapidly upon its axis, and slung his arm up as if he were tossing a baseball. Keeping pace with the baseball analogy the boulder hurled towards the ceiling at a hundred and fifty kilometers an hour, and then exploded like a bomb upon impact above. Flushing the creature out of the veil of darkness, the demon leapt to the ground moments before impact, its wings shielding itself from the debris much as his shield protected he and Semret from stonefall.

There he and his love beheld the gruesome creature. Bipedal with wyvernic arm-wings, a six foot phallus trailed between multi-jointed legs and flitted behind the creature like some sort of indecorous tail. The blood crusted carpals of its wings steadied it upon the ground like a giant bat as it returned their stare with its own cyclopean gaze. It hissed at them, its crooked tooth line of razor fangs parted and a thick maroon tongue lolled between a pair of stout tusks. The creature’s flesh was the color of a mudslide, but rigid and thick with scales, and it stepped forward upon taloned raptor-like metacarpals.

“Fok… what is that..” Semret gasped.

“Dead.” Mshale grimaced as he buffeted his palms together bringing two planes of force on either side of the creature.

The popobawa fell prone, slithering behind his initial onslaught before it hopped back avoiding the telekinetically enhanced hammerfist that Mshale brought with him as a follow up. The beast chuckled as it lashed at him with its tendril, which harmlessly whipped off his telekinetic shield. He retaliated with an empowered palm to the chest, which catapulted it into the archway of main thoroughfare. The creature, larger than even Mshale, ragdolled into the stone with a crack and crumble as debris fell atop its form. It rose slower this time, shaking off bits of rock. The telekinetic didn’t give it much time to recover, as with a grasped hand he pulled more stone down on top of it. It scurried towards him, and Mshale launched himself to meet it, an empowered fist at his apex. The popobawa pulled a wing over and slid backwards three meters from the impact of his strike, but still stood. All the while he could also feel the internal battle in his mind, he could feel his mind being pulled into this creature’s presence, like a fly into the maw of a sundew.

“Semret!” He called out, his tone under more duress than he seemed to physically be in. “This thing is trying to control me!”

“I know,” she grunted, “I am trying…”

A welcome rush of familiarity pulsed over his mind. I must finish this creature quickly, he considered, or things will get much worse.

Mshale reached out to the mud and stone of the slain elemental and packed it together while elongating the debris into spears of compressed soil. Six of these weapons hovered around his form as the creature crouched like a cat preparing to pounce.

Without so much as a motion, the spears fired forward like darting arrows, and met… nothing.

Mshale’s eyes widened as the creature pounced, its wings splaying out to either side, beating once as it flew over his head. He whirled around just in time to see the creature’s taloned feet hook around Semret’s shoulders and her following fearful scream.

“No!” Mshale shouted as he slung both of his arms forward, spines of telekinetic force erupted invisibly through space, evidenced by the havoc they wrought as each one missed the creature and pierced stone and earth in miniature explosions instead.

The popobawa flew into one of the darkened tunnels, and Mshale frantically sprinted after it. “Semret?! Semret!” He shouted out as he tore into the darkness.

“Mshale!” She cried, “Help me!”

The telekinetic’s feet impacted upon the cobbled stone of the corridor and fortunately ran into several patches of glowing crimson mushrooms. He paused in the crossroads, the distant sound of claxons amplifying the tense panic he felt. He frenetically darted his gaze down each hallway.

“Mshale!”

To the east.

As Mshale barreled down the corridor, the firm impact of cobbled slate devolved to the soft smack of slush. The glowing scarlet fungus that dimly illuminated the hallway made the slushy fluid appear like blood. The telekinetic could smell iron in the air as the claxons blare faded whether by distance or focus, and scuffling of Semret’s cries and struggle intensified.

The arena’s layout hadn’t been developed to confuse, but Mshale found himself having to twist and turn through pulsing corridors, crawling in places through crimson washed liquid, and eventually stumbling upon a dead end. He roared as he could hear her voice behind it, blasting away the wall to reveal sinews of contracted muscle. Placing his palms together, he wedged an angle of telekinetic force and pulled the compressed flesh apart. Sickening sinews of ligaments and fat stretched apart as the flesh tore and the hallway shuddered.

He didn’t care, he had to go to her. And more recently another thought incubated in his head-he had to be right. He couldn’t prove it, but he felt something similar to this creature and what he tossed away in the jail. That thing should be dead, and now all of this was happening because they didn’t listen to him. With an enraged shout and a flinging aside of his arms, he ripped the flesh apart, and scampered into the hallway beyond.

She wasn’t there.

“Semret!” He shouted.

“This way!” She called from around the corner of a stark four hallway intersection. He recognized this area of the arena. Her voice was coming from the meditation chambers he eschewed in favor of the battle room proper. Of course, he thought.

Out of all the areas in the Arena, the meditation chamber was where he and Semret spent the most time together. The empath had reasoned that frequent meditation was the best way for him to keep his focus in stressful situations, but Mshale wrote it off to her disdain for combat. He remembered the hours they spent in quiet contemplation and it seemed only natural that in the chaos this would be a safe space for her.

Mshale approached, fists still clenched, but relaxed when he found her knelt in the corner behind a pile of woven mats. Even fond memories wouldn’t soften his edge, though. The burly man paced up to her and extended his palm to her, his eyes on the doorway “We are leaving. Where is the creature?”

As Mshale pulled the empath to her feet he felt a sharp pain in his stomach. He twisted back looking at Semret, who peered up at him through a tangle of brown hair, and a grin like a drawer of razors. She warbled an inhuman chitter and skittered past him. Warm liquid oozed through his palm contrasting with the cold of the bloodstone tuning fork the shapeshifter stabbed him with . Neither sensation would last long, before the telepath was overcome with fury.

Mshale yelped gripping the tuning fork embedded in his abdomen as he slowly withdrew the object, tides of pain radiating over his body, and tossing the bloody instrument clattering to the ground. Shock frequently gave way to rage.

“Maaifoedie!” he roared, the chamber quaking under his wrath.

Leaned against the threshold the creature scampered through, Mshale called the gnarled branch that comprised the shaft of a broom, sheared off the end, and using telekinetic expertise sharpened the branch to a lethal spearpoint. The act of creating the weapon did little to focus his anger, and the hallway beat red as he stormed into the hall.

“You cannot hide!” He shouted then paused and listened as he stopped at the intersection.

To his left he heard the whistle of wind, the entrance, but the crosswind fluctuated, ebbing and flowing like it were blown through some gigantic lung, and he was stuck tumbling through its capillaries. To his right, the faint shuffling of movement; Mshale charged towards it. He could still hear the inhuman chuckle from the creature that dared to wear Semret’s face. The warble taunted him through hallways haunted by memories, good and bad. But only the bad seemed to float to the surface.

The things he saw in the slave mining den when they took Marange. The first time he went in over his head in the arena only to be rescued as if he were some child by Assad. The point when he found out his friend chose to be lost in the kichiki sari instead of finishing what she started. Mshale didn’t stop to think why all these thoughts manifest; they only further stoked his wrathful flames.

In the distance he thought he could hear the dull beat of a drum, and the image of the cavern shaman and his grisly fetishes filled his mind. The twisted corpses the slavers composted to the razertsanga played through his mind. As he bounded down the hallway he could feel the arena shudder, cringing at his retaliation and in his anger he felt powerful. For every mission he was passed over by Assad for young Najwa, he thought of a Xanathan patrol he ripped apart with his mind.

The hallway terminated ahead of him in a sealed vault door, secured by a rusty wheel. Mshale reached out with his mind and felt the protected hinges of the door. Sensed further yet where the pilings driven into the stone to secure the doorway to the earth. He reached out with both of his palms as if grabbing frame at thirty feet away. Tensening every muscle in his body Mshale poured his rage into the door, filling the hall with a ferocious roar as the entire complex quivered.

The metal groaned under the stress before it started to crumble. His wound spurted viscous blood that clung his undershirt to gore-slicked flesh. The pain fueled his focus, forged his fury like a tsanga-thin blade. The door twisted clockwise in its secured moorings before, in an inanimate scream of metallic agony, whorled and crushed to the size of a soda can. Mshale released his fist dropping the scrap and stepped through the dust-caked interior, pure adrenaline coursing through his veins.

Within, stacks of forlorn crates, a backlog of confiscated supplies awaiting refurbishment. He paced over the bedrock, unaware or ignoring the crimson trail he left behind. He could feel the foul presence in the room. His skin rippled with gooseflesh and the telekinetic could feel the temperature drop a few degrees. The shifter was near. In one hand he tightly grasped his spear, and in the other, he pressed down on his wound that bubbled between the cracks of his fingers.

“Come out and die with dignity.” He demanded through clenched teeth.

“Mshale..!” Semret’s panicked voice called from the ruined doorway.

Not to be fooled again, the telekinetic immediately went on the offensive, twisting around at the hips and feet, and with all the athletic skill of Julius Yego he threw his spear, its trajectory boosted with telekinetic speed to be nearly undodgeable, straight through the base of the woman’s throat.

It wasn’t what he expected.

The evident pain and horror stricken across the beautiful caramel colored visage of Semret was only rivaled by her expression of betrayal as she tried to choke something up that manifested in red gurgle. She crumpled to the floor, clutching at the knotty haft as she gasped, wincing in pain, leering at the confused telekinetic as he cautiously approached her spasming body. In that moment, Mshale scowled down at a dying enemy.

Semret died in an awful way. She died afraid. And she died alone.

At first he hadn’t even realized what he’d done. He stared down at her final convulsions, waiting for her lithe feminine form to shift back to the demonic beast. For her beautifully haunted, vacant hazel eyes to shift back to the cyclopean jaundice of the popobawa. The percolating cocktail of adrenaline and anger came to a simmer as the cadaver rattled: the punchline to the deranged joke.

This wasn’t the malign creature he’d sealed in the prison, but wanted to kill. This figure lying on the ground was the woman he traveled to from Agadir to Cape Town. The girl who’d taught him to cook fufu. Who’d been there and comforted him through the loss of his parents. It was the friend that always took first watch when they were on the road days after the world died. Not the beast of his wrath, but temperer of his furor. His center. His heart. The motionless corpse was Semret.

“S-Semret…” He whispered, kneeling to her.

Behind him, like a looming gargoyle lurking atop a hoary mausoleum, sneering down upon the ancient graveyard of its charge, the popobawa sat. The beast nearly completely enveloped Mshale in darkness he tumbled headlong into, and whispered. The beasts voice as sweet as passion fruit:

“Release your anger, and focus that ever so dreadful mind on me.”

The Meatspin

Decided on 10/21/19 after Circ's second post (ending the second round) we will be enacting a posting time limit for this thread. To determine how much time you have go through the following metric:

"Total word count of everyone else's post since your last post rounded up to the nearest thousand, divided by a thousand, and multiplied by the number of days in a week (7) resetting for each individual each time they post."

Unused post time does not roll over.

Every Mutt has its Dog Day (F67X)

The mien of the New Roswellian ready room ebbed and flowed with Autun from terseness to relief then back to quiet fearfulness. Apollo tried to blink past the confusion the creature always left him with, and through his nonplussed processing of the situation the nudist had disappeared. He took a couple dumbstruck moments to search his generals for answers for which, of course, they had none. Scanning the right hand side of the table, he found someone to pick on: a thirty-something year old man with brown hair, wearing a black suit, and sitting halfway down the table. The man, whose name and role continually escaped the president, had spent most of the meeting awkwardly fidgeting but would finally serve a purpose.

“You,” Apollo pointed at the man breaking the stupefied silence like a thunderbolt from Olympus, “you heard him? Get on Wikipedia and find out what the hell a Ximbic is.”

“The rest of you,” throwing up his hands up, exasperated “go do your jobs!”

Apollo stormed from ready room to the angular hallway, where a pair of graying colonels stood in eager anticipation, each with a dossier tucked away in their arms, and looking to the president with eyes pleading silently for a moment of time. The saluting officers were left befuddled and disappointed as the president breezed by them. Forcing the two into an unbecoming jog to catch up to the president where they were joined in his wake by a harried female aide who frantically and unhelpfully buzzed the disrupted state of his schedule, a stylist who Apollo continually swatted away, a drone that flared with multiple reports—including Tartalo’s report of scant findings from an uncooperative cat creature—to which he reiterated his desire for results, and the media liaison whom the kindest response he could give was a curt “not now.”

“Which room.” he demanded to the aide who promptly responded with the location.

The Discorporate Productions CEO would address any pressing issues including firing the aide, but first he had poignant, perhaps even personal, matters to attend to. He threw open the reinforced steel door, and stonewalled it in the face of his ravenous entourage. Sighing to the uniformly spartan, comparatively quiet interior room. An awkward moment which he treated nearly as if he were the only one there. The room, a steel cube with little in the way of ventilation much less decor, bore technology that one would not catch at first or any glance. Lined with nearly invisible sensors, nanotube nozzles, hard light projectors, and a host of other technological wonders imperceptible behind austere panes.

The only furnishings in the room were two steel chairs, with two individuals seated in them, a man who likely knew of their situation and a woman who did not. One probably even knew the purpose of the room—perhaps even used it once or twice for interrogations. The two were both likely ripped right out of combat, and though they were given a few hours to decompress, journey by New Roswell teleportation was always jarring to those unprepared or unaccustomed.

It appeared the three were completely alone, even though with Apollo this was never the truth. President Amon always had a team assigned to his surveillance, and at this current moment there was a team of 63 individual operatives—psychologists, sociologists, and hostage negotiators trained to predict behaviour based on nonverbal cues. These interpersonal experts were joined by software engineers and programmers who helped design much of the automated New Roswellian defenses, some of the best and brightest scientists who had spent the past thirty years studying, reverse engineering, and improving upon Red Technocracy technology, and designing this particular system specifically for the protection of President Amon. And finally, they were all overseen by the Operative, a cybernetic entity whom executed much of the satellite array defenses, beacon and teleportation technology, and a host of other cybernated responses the general public was not aware of.

There was no third chair. Apollo generally preferred to stand when addressing his subordinates in cases like these. Pausing, he allowed a few minutes for discomforting silence to take over. Yielding nothing to the two but an impassive, yet intense stare towards Thomas. It was a stoicism that was used many times to hide a rancor reserved for many of his disappeared political enemies. And without warning, the facade broke and the commander-in-chief’s visage altered to the affability of speaking with an old friend.

“A hectic day for both of us.” he said with a soft smile. As he approached the two the soles of his salvatore ferragamo’s clacked in empty space. “A lot has happened in the past twenty-four hours. We have much to discuss, but unfortunately little time to speak, so I’ll try to be direct.”

He splayed his hands out palms towards the two guilelessly. “I just want to know what happened.”

“Thomas, let's start with a personal debriefing on the ground-zero situation in Allure city, from dispatch to recall.”

Glasslands: A Griot's Tale (Earth-F67X Chronicle)

Perspiration trickled down Naguib’s temple as he trained the AR-15 on the scuttling ghoul behind the crystal pane. The creature, though vaguely humanoid in form, moved with a disjointed jerkiness of a crawling marionette. In the hour after Mshale had left, it had settled to just stare at him with its sunken, blackened eyes, behind the leathered wrinkled mask of its face.

It reminded him of a movie he had seen back when Johannesburg was still Johannesburg. Naguib shifted, uncomfortable under the creatures gaze and shouldered his weapon.

He was in control here. He had the gun.

***

Omari spent most of his time in a modest hovel tucked away in the eastern end of the hangar cavern. Space was a luxury that was difficult to afford in Omari’s clinic, hoards of supplies were pushed up against the walls, under tables, in corners--bandages, antiseptic, medicine, and some other medical supplies, some of it not.

The medic was known for his resourcefulness. What Omari wasn’t able to heal with medicine and thirty years of practical experience his other abilities came in handy for. The ambient crystal trimmed back in this room to the ceiling glimmered, giving the room a gauzy glow. This illumination was supplemented by pilfered generators that lit up several swaying incandescents. The center of the room was taken by a repurposed dental chair and was surrounded by a moat of clear space as if the chair itself had shoved all the junk at bay.

The tide of injured soldiers who sought his care found Omari’s den like a tranquil watering hole, common ground and a safe space. Currently, the medic’s attention was elsewhere, upon the broken from Phalaborwa.

“You are very brave to protect your mother,” Omari said to the seven-year-old who sat at the center of the room, “she must be very proud of you.”

The boy was still in shock, holding his broken arm as he vacantly stared through the doorway that the seated fixture faced. The aging Mozambican smiled, the dark creases folding around the corners of his eyes added ten years to his complexion in a single instance.

“You will find everyone here is very nice. We take care of one another down here.”

The boy sniffled, as he held out his arm into the clinical officer’s waiting palm, who began to set the bone and bind it.

“Mungu atuokoe! Tafadhali nisaidie!” a man sobbed.

Omari jumped clattering a part of the splint to the ground. His eyes widened as he warily scanned the cramped interior of his clinic, then whirled about in his chair, and jumped to his feet looking at the door.

It was as if the shock knocked the boy out of his stupor as from behind the aging man the boy called out “What is it?”

But Omari simply stood, frozen, transfixed at some apparition beyond the confines of his safe zone. His shoulders neither rose nor fell for breath, and his body was stiff and rigid. After several minutes of tense silence, Omari turned back to the boy, his movements spasmodic and jerky. He looked back at the scared child, his visage twisted in malice but Omari's eyes betrayed his ill intent as they were full of teary hemorrhage yet his loins still stiff.

***

A low din of conversation, cars revving into ignition as well as humming in idle, and distantly shouted conversation filled the hangar. In a cordoned off section, a row of cars sat awaiting the attentions of several mechanics stationed in full-service shops. Here, the valuable tradesmen and women refurbished salvaged automobiles, as well as plundered Xanathan vehicles. Imani was one such expert. Six months into the job, she found Marange to be a hectic environment filled with (mostly) good people.

The Swazi woman sighed as she examined the stripped bolt from underneath the salvaged APC. “Hawu… Should I expect Xanathan to care about their things? No.”

A nearby raid on a Xanathan supply depot several months ago had rendered a number of valuable military-grade resources for NYUNDO. As Imani slid out from underneath the APC on a rickety wooden creeper, she wiped the grease off on her oil-stained coveralls and raised her glasses onto her dark, loosely braided hair. Pacing over to a nearby barrel, Imani shook her head as she made several curt strikes on a paper attached to her clipboard, then picked up a hammer and a would try her luck.

A strained snapping sound and the clatter of loose metal from underneath the vehicle caught her attention as the seized bolt rolled out from under, preceding the slow oozing of oil as the pan emptied its contents onto the floor. Imani paused, staring at the growing stain, and then picked up her wrench as she cautiously approached the vehicle. Placing her hand on the vehicle she slowly crouched down to peer underneath the car and saw only the diminishing trickle of oil below.

Suddenly, the vehicle, as if it had been waiting in the bush for her to let her guard down, pounced off its front tires before crashing back down. The crash reverberated through the hangar bay as a chorus of vehicle alarms echoed through the chamber. Imani jumped whirling about to confront a bay filled with confused technicians and screeching vehicles.

“Mungu atuokoe! Tafadhali nisaidie!” A voice screamed.

She dropped her wrench and picked up a larger monkey wrench off the cart near her as she looked over to Taavi, the mechanic adjacent to her. “What was that?” She asked him, feeling her heart pound heavily in her chest.

He shrugged and bent under the hood to disconnect the screaming vehicle's battery.

A strange sensation washed over her. As sinister as the feeling was invasive and violating. Imani felt her limbs move on their own, and her teeth gnashed as vitiated urges flooded her mind, her heart, and just below her abdomen. Darkness clouded her vision, both emotionally and physically as she glared at Taavi with newfound antipathy. She approached the unsuspecting man, who had drawn his attention over towards stall 3 where his friend Dakari worked, with heavy footfalls that forewarned her enmity.

A half second before the wrench impacted the side of his head, Taavi looked at her,

“Imani? What are-”

Her facial expression twitched as if she were having a miniature stroke, foam began to develop around the corners of her mouth. Imani stared down her friends prone form, and reached down this rip back his coveralls.

***

“Mungu atuokoe! Tafadhali nisaidie!”

The echoes traveled through the mouth of the prison cave whereby a gun, gnarled almost artistically in nature, sat discarded as a single twisted, useless half strand of helix. The screaming, crying, growling, and grunting echoed macabely from the cracked porphyry and with each reverberation so too did its magnitude further reach. Pushing further into the grisly grotto a large pane of stone lay upended some ten meters from where the telekinetic had only just secured it. Within, the supine form of the cell guard Naguib lay wailing, violated, restrained, and hysterical. Atop him, pumping and thrusting its pelvis into the shattered hips of the man, a cyclopean creature, whose leathery wings shrouded the two like a dark cloak. The creature's carpal claws impaled through both shoulders and pinned the guard to the ground.

Naguib begged, called upon his god, screamed in horror, and beheld the horn-lined face of his assailant. The shifter delighted in his terror, feeding off the frenzied fear. With every grunt of pain from its prey, the swain beast's fanged grin widened. As his hip joints dislodged, bone splitting from the creature's shapeshifting phallus, Naguib exhaled a rattle of pain, and spasmed in tortured trepidation. After an eternity in Naguib's Hell, the creature released into the victims ruptured rectum, unnaturally distending the guard's abdomen.

The creature no more swain than it was demon, examined its catch, as if ensuring his survival for continued misery, then withdrew its barbed shaft,randy crawled away. The broken form of Naguib laid behind as a twisted remnant and the only thing he had strength or will to do was lay still and breathe.

The swain-beast, a telepathic popobawa who rode Naguib's empathic cries and seeded horror through the hangar and barracks, emerged from the prison on taloned feet and the bloodied claws as tremors rocked the cave sending dust and small bits of debris falling around it. Standing, the creature splayed out its wings and reflected upon its dark work. A doctor who violated a child in unspeakable ways. A woman sodomizing a man with a wrench. A man who would slay his love. The creature heaved its chest and chittered in what could almost be construed as a bestial laugh, then focused its attention to what would be its latest victim.

***

Thick plumes of dark smoke billowed from the humble Kasenyi village, which burned against the purple dusk sky. The small village, nooked into the firth of the freshwater lake, was a smaller settlement of the Kasese district and sat narrowly straddling the edge of guerilla territory, but were close enough to Xanathan influenced territory to benefit from the occasional patrol. Xanathan offered understandably flimsy support at this part of the Congo/Uganda border. Even were there a legal understanding Xanathan patrols were constantly assaulted, their caravans raided, their drones shot down.

Fire licked across peat and thatch roofs. The screams died down leaving the intermittent rapping of distant gunfire and crackling of healthy flames. Hunched humanoid shadows charged, crashing from pyre to pyre as they pillaged each homestead and business. "Adjoining houses always burn." That was what these proud people were told when they refused protection.

Gorerilla, the chief of the raiding guerilla gorillas, lumbered down the mainstreet towards the dock district where a single abode remained untouched at his request from both from the flame and from plunder.

The creature, more billie ape than gorilla, measured from shoulder to knuckle at nearly two and a half meters tall, and wore the talismans and trophies of a warlord proud of his conquered prey. A hollowed, mutated leopard skull—his prized trophy, hand wrested from an apex predator of the infected fauna of the congo, fitted over his skull outfitting him with a fearsome visage. Under his heavy custom stitched Xanathan-issue body armor, ripped from the corpses of a squadron of elites, Gorerilla bore the scars of the leopard, and countless other battles triumphant. Around his thick, robust, neck jangled a cavalcade of clinking skulls, mostly human, that clattered with his procession. He approached the two-story house with a three-point knuckle-walk, in his open arm what used to be an M2HB heavy machine gun was now an army-slaying weapon of the future with the best enhancements the tribe could pilfer.

As he approached the homestead, his dark eyes peered up to the second floor where he could hear frantic shuffling and shouting. Palming open the locked double doorway, Gorerilla forcefully smashed the entryway off its frame and squeezed through the vestibule, crumbling mortar and plaster raining in his aftermath. Flaring his nostrils, the billie ape leaped to the second floor, crushing in the railing as he barged into the room where he could hear commotion.

Inside, a woman shrieked as he pushed his way in, and an elderly arthritic man with fear in his eyes charged the chieftain with a hatchet. Gorerilla caught him with a foot, crushed him, and threw him shattering through the front window where he landed in a heap upon the street below, then turned to the man’s wife, repeating his caution.

“Adjoining houses always burn.”

Before leaving with everything of value the village had, Gorerilla added a few more skulls to his collection.

The Meatspin

Apollo sighed. He should have felt relieved that Autun was here to help them, but he couldn’t shed the feeling of dread that pitted in his stomach. Standing up from his table in the stark room, he nodded in the direction of the nudist. The desperation of the situation excused Autun’s wardrobe (or lack thereof) faux pas. There was nothing he could do, despite his deep pockets. The turn of events were beyond any mere human’s control.

“I suppose this means we’re at your mercy. Better, I suppose, than being blindsided by it all.”

Autun smiled, a mischievous twinkle in his eye, “Keep everyone planetside. You’ll avoid a lot of trouble this way,” he said, and in that same twinkle disappeared.

Though he appreciated the art that developed from it, Apollo never really considered himself a man of faith. So when he had to put his faith in a being he had only just met to avoid a dire catastrophe, he was admittedly uncomfortable. His shoulders jolted when one of his aides called him out of his apprehension. The aide a pretty, young, synthetic nodded at him. Its soft features and blonde hair belied rigid programming that did not suffer impromptu deviation from schedule.

“You’re due to your five thirty address to the public,” it punctiliously reminded him.

Apollo stared at it for a moment, doing his best to gather his thoughts. “Yes… Yes, of course,” He rasped, nodding. “Is everything ready?”

The aide nodded quietly.

An hour later

“Earlier today, some unverified information was released to the public, in which we are conducting a full and thorough investigation to ascertain the legitimacy of such claims. As of this moment, we have been unable to prove the veracity of such claims. We take matters like this very seriously and will continue to conduct our investigation, in which the national aeronautics and space administration has pledged full cooperation.”

Apollo stood outside the plaza of the Discorporate Building, listening to General Heinzemann. The complex was rife with memories. Spirits from the past. Apollo recalled delivering the grand news of his presidency, how the people cheered leaning from the upper balustrades behind him. He remembered the speech he delivered when he bailed out the financially stagnant and failed North American government. He remembered announcing the evolution of Earth to Earth F67X, and their integration into the United Earth Confederation. He had one more dialog to deliver to the public since the impending catastrophe had been leaked—a reassurance.

“We would like everyone to please be patient as the investigation continues, and we assure you that everyone’s mutual safety is of the utmost concern. And now, we have a few words from President Amon.”

Heinzemann passed Apollo as the politician approached the pedestal, gripping its lacquered corners. As the setting anti-sun’s crepuscular rays filtered through the various office complexes and edifices, Apollo squinted. He blinked back the light as his contacts polarized, and saw the sea of people who stood before him, fear buried under their stark expressions. A thousand faces stared back at him in anticipation of his words. The president cleared his throat and spoke,

“We have experienced our share of hardship. Twenty years ago, a trail of devastation was carved through the gut of our nation. Many of us still feel that loss to this very day. Then, not even a handful of years ago, an attack on this tower claimed the lives of many citizens, first responders, and family members.

While these experiences still hurt us and haunt us, they’ve also tempered us. We’ve grown closer, and learned to lean on one another.” Apollo took a moment, scanning the crowd and uncharacteristically demurely admitted, “I, myself, have learned much, as well.”

“I’ve learned that the people of Earth—from the Zaibatsu’s of East Asia to the Royal European Union, from the South American Federation to the South-West Asia Group—are one people.

I’ve learned that our power comes from each other. I’ve learned that we can never be buried. Not by terrorist attacks, foreign invasions, or least of all misinformation.”

Apollo raised his arms, “I’ve learned that, as long as we trust one another, protect one another, and care for one another that we will be well.

I am a part of ‘we’, and I’m not afraid to lead by example. So know this when I tell you all… that noth-”

As Apollo delivered his final assurances to his audience, he could see the lens of a sun dog’s parhelic circle. The center of it detonated in a distant, silent, amber conflagration. Wispy clouds of volcanic orange and blinding alabaster fulminated from its center mass as the holocaust spread. President Amon cut himself off for a moment as his mouth hung slack. The blinding rays of light scoured through the city streets as a tredecillion other distant plumes of flame intervened through the universe, joining the sun’s dirge.

Power to the block went out, but the star’s vivid coruscation kept the streets ablaze. For once, the people and their politicians were aligned in their outrage. Apollo’s last thoughts broke his stately demeanor to betrayed fury and outright horror.

“He lied! He fucking lied!”

Darkness

***

The Shattered Realm, formerly known as the anti-plane

A thousand eons had passed since the inception of the Shattered Realm. This universe, born from conflict, sat wholly abandoned since the Fault’s death throes consumed it. Longer still past had the escalating concatenation of hubris and bravado occurred. The blighted and forsaken universe was a medal of shame for those who retreated defeated so long ago. However, even from the desolate carcass of the Shattered Realm, purpose could be found anew.

The shattered husk of the Milky Way, or what remained of its constituents, would endure another displeasure upon its ravaged corpse. Events occurring within a contiguous universe “bent” space into what could be conceived as a supercluster sized white hole far outside the galaxy, dwelling within the blackness of space. As this swell in space grew, its apergent-inspired trajectory dismantled the Local Group and sent its components racing across the Virgo Supercluster where they were sure to cause untold devastation some time millions of years into the future. Not the Milky Way, though. There were special plans for this galaxy. A careful balance of gravitational forces, psychic energy, and bioforce manipulation kept the Milky Way in place, unmarred and unbothered.

Within the spiral galaxy, the solar system sat, spinning abound a dead star. The Sun, a victim long since ravaged by an ancient catastrophe. Earth, or anti-earth as it was called in this case, orbited as a frozen tundra. Searching past its frozen oceans, its blasted geography, or the fragments of its shattered moon that buried deep within it's cold dead mantle, the hoary rind of a city stood like a cenotaph marking a casket. The debris, moon rocks, and shattered remnants of the Appalachian buried the outer suburbs in a cairn.

At the epicenter of this city, unperturbed by time, or nature, or outside forces stood a stage without an audience. The empty courtyard was cleaner than the rest of the devastated city. The dereliction of the rest of the city shrouded the malice that was present here long ago.

A Sun rose once again on this world, warming its long-dead cockles. Not the dead neutron star that sat at the center of the system, but a red ocular marred with a pit of black floated over the midnight sky, lighting the world in a hue of cardinal. Below this lens, a dripping silver smile emerged and a nondescript mannequin-like figure bursting from its protoplasmic membrane.

To speak his name was to invite him in.

Upon the rubble’s surface a black miasma of shadows leaked out of the wound heralding the sign of something sinister, and taking shape is what appeared to be a man. Wreathed in burning darkness he stepped down the hillock of blasted stone and upon the crumbled champaign that sat buried between ranges of concrete and rebar.

The cold being in the burning cloak knowingly smiled upon his accursed creation. They had called upon the wrong god.

***

Universe UI32

Apollo sighed. He should have felt relieved that Keichii was here to help them, but he couldn’t shed the feeling of dread that pitted in his stomach. He stood up from his table in the bleach-white interrogation room and nodded with resigned acceptance. There was nothing he could do and though his influence on the planet was deep, the universe bore no respect for politics nor clout.

“Things could be worse, I suppose. We could be without you,” he rasped, with a nod.

Keichii bowed shallowly, “I implore you to keep our people here. It is the only way I can save them,” he said, wisping away.

Apollo was a man of devout faith, and when the teenage japanese boy showed up the first time, many years ago to save their world from an encroaching asteroid he took it as a sign of God’s favor. So if putting his faith in this emissary was nigh natural for him, then why did he have such a bad feeling about this? A test, to be sure. One of his aides interrupted his ruminations with a call. The aide, a middle-aged, somewhat haggard looking woman who perpetually had several strands of grey hair springing to freedom from her otherwise tightly bound ponytail, waved him down.

“Mr. Amon! Mr. Amon! Your five thirty public address is now! It’s five thirty!” She quailed.

President Amon blinked a few times as he rubbed his stubble, beginning to make his way out of the room and down the hall. “Yes, of course.”

The hurried shuffle of his secretary following behind echoed through the hallway. “Is everything ready?”

“Yes, but we have to hurry.” She said, picking up pace as the two passed by wide bay windows that overlooked a courtyard in the complex.

Apollo stopped by the window as he looked outside. The benches, trees, and shrubbery all awash in coral light. The world outside his office, inundated in an otherworldly hue that not even the deepest sunset could match. The president of Earth UI32 looked up and beheld the scarlet Sun.

“...What is that?”

Darkness

***

The Faultiverse, Val’gara

The bead that was Earth became a pinprick of light in the distance as Brobdingnag folded space and jumped Val’garan civilization nearly two astronomical units to the awaiting reality-tear, just past Neptune. Anathema linked with the surrounding hive for the first time in a very long time. A flurry of events and emotions flooded into the herald.

The Herald saw the omniversal basement shattered by a mad being, and the Val’garan will fractured with their god’s multiversal dispensation. The memories assailed him relentlessly, instantaneously, but also transiently. Colossus created a peacekeeper, and the spawn of Anathema revolted against a smattered front. The unthinkable, previously linked Val’gara killing other Val’gara, a breakdown of their way of life. The images devolved with the sight of Colossus, their home, bereft of life. The multiverse spat upon Colossus a final time when an improbable gestation resulted in an uncanny birth, and its crowing infant, Caorthannach, rent the corpse of their home.

Anathema witnessed a mélange of memories as the Val’gara auto-cannibalized their civilization. These scenes gave perspective to what the Val’gara were with their psi-link, and what they were without. The images should have filled the Herald with despair, but instead, he felt powerful. Anathema roared out with a trillion other battlecries as the Val’garan swarm blitzed forth to the object of their desire: a circle of pitch surrounded by a radiant accretion disc.

The flotilla’s internal compass pointed to their Polaris—a metaphysical celestial body that flared in their mind’s eye with intermittent verdant lucency. Sal’Chazzar, cogent of the need of their children, wavered as a trillion captive races waged internal war upon each other. Their lamentations frothed in violent revolution, yet even scarce vestiges of the dead god’s authoritative will could suppress them… for now. The Val’garan flotilla passed through the nebula revitalized as they approached their destination.

The euphoria that surged over Anathema wiped from his mind the taint of the species’ past sins. The unity that accompanied that psi-link eradicated any frustrations about Jack’s weakness. Despite the silence of space, the psi-link was ablaze with activity. From the elephantine war-bellow of Gattusk in the vanguard to the annoyed grunts of the billies on the fringe, the Herald joined his brethren as a statistic in an unyielding and unending swarm of starving, rabid creatures, who ventured forth to feast, each bubble of subspace a bubble in a flowing river of hungry mass.

The creatures entered the accretion disks light, passing blindly through the ergosphere into the darkness that lies beyond where they would exodus to their promised land.

***

Universe T767

5:20

Five minutes.

A haggard old Apollo Amon thought as he stole a glance from his wristwatch. As he crawled on elbows and knees through a dingy ventilation shaft, his joints cracked. If only he’d the chance to do this twenty years ago. But the Remnants entrusted him with this task: to save the world, perhaps even all worlds. The haggard wastelanders put their faith in him, but more importantly he put his faith in the science behind their plan.

In five minutes I’ll lose my only chance.

Apollo had many tense moments through his lifetime in politics, but the stakes of this moment culminating forty years of preparation were beyond anything he could have ever dreamed. Were things different, he’d scoff at the irony of the situation. A seventy-five year old with bad hips crawling through a ventilation shaft purposed to save the universe. His knees ached as he plowed the briefcase onward ahead of him. An uncomfortable thirty foot crawl through consistently cramped spaces led him to the vent that overhung an interrogation room he found entirely familiar. Before long, he was there, just moments before the group filtered into the room.

The party below spent a few moments talking before another appeared whose reputation, through whatever austere inculcations of the past, required everyone present to greet him by name. As everyone in the room deferred to Lysander, the aged Apollo saw himself and swallowed a lump in his throat, clicking open the briefcase as silently as he could. The fact that everyone below groveled led credence to his mantra.

He’s not me, and this will be better for everyone.

He repeated his aphorism over and over again, as the machine in front of him adjusted in a series metallic clicks. Sweat trickled down Apollo’s temples and forehead alternating his glance from his watch to the whirring machine as its wheels and pinions unfurled the rest of the apparatus. Below he could hear their conversation and a continuity that paralleled his own, many years ago.

“We owe you a great deal, Lysander. A debt that we will repay in-”

“-Pabst and ham hocks.” Lysander interrupted, prompting an eye roll from the Apollo above.

“You know my price, and they better be better than last time. Make sure everyone sits tight. This shit’s complicated stuff—saving worlds’n all.”

“Of course. After my speech to the public, we’ll throw a celebration in your honor.”

Maybe I should just allow the Fault to rupture. Apollo thought to himself.

With a few final clicks the machine was ready. Apollo looked down, his veins running icy.

To a better world. To new life. Then flipped a copper switch.

Darkness.

***

Universe QXU8

Here, at the edge of the rising action of his life, Asclepius thought back to the teachings of his father. At the time, the man seemed hellbent. The only time he would truly show passion towards anything was when he discussed physics, and ranted about this ‘cycle’. The boy spent many of his early days cowering behind his mother, Trina. However, in time he saw wisdom in his father’s words, credited by the ranter’s Nostradamus-like predictions of events that happened far after his death.

Nostalgia was a powerful tool. Maybe it was Apollo’s rhetoric gleaned from his years in the political schema that convinced Asclepius, or maybe it was fate that made him take it seriously. The universe had a cruel sense of humor. His profession dictated he was to save lives, not end them. Irony would have the last laugh this day. Asclepius didn’t share in the sense of amusement; deathbed promises do strange things to human rationale.

As Asclepius passed through the checkpoints he raised his badge to the security guard. The guard nodded,

“Thank you, Dr. Amon.”

He nodded, and paced towards the west wing. He’d gone over the scenario a thousand times over, and yet his hands trembled like palsy. This would be his end, but in doing so he’d save the world from becoming like his father. He’d seen enough in his lifetime to understand the veracity of his father’s claims. Dr. Amon checked his watch, a leather-strapped hand-me-down that looked like it was no less than a thousand years old, but somehow still functioned.

5:20

He had less than five minutes before the meeting.

Asclepius entered the stark interrogation chamber and surveyed his surroundings. Two guards one that the doctor didn’t recognize, and Apollo remained in the chamber. The president took a moment to regard the doctor,

“I’m glad you’re here, and while hopefully your services won't be needed. Our guest can be a bit.. Unpredictable.”

Asclepius nodded once, meeting the younger version of his father always pretzeled his insides. It was strange seeing a version of him without a liquor bottle in his hand and a five o’clock shadow. A few seconds past and with a violent distortion a man appeared. Still dressed in his kevlar body armor, Forge looked at the assembled diplomats and guards as if he were regarding ants scuttling about an anthill.

“What.” He growled.

Asclepius surreptitiously positioned himself next to an individual on the security detail, a non-operative. His vision bounced from the vent, to his watch, and then the guard next to him. One minute, the doctor thought to himself, wringing his sweaty palms. His attention snapped back into the present as he head Forge’s assent to help Apollo and Earth, prompting an unburdened sigh from Amon.

“Everyone needs to remain planetbound for the duration of the event. No teleporting, no travel, no-”

Burying his anxiety, Asclepius interrupted Forge’s demands when he shouldered the unsuspecting guard and drew his hip-holstered firearm, but was only able to raise it to the vent before he could feel his wrist being crushed by one of the operatives present in the room. The doctor wildly squeezed the trigger, lighting the ceiling up as he was almost instantly overpowered and smashed into the wall. The shocked shouts from Apollo were distant murmurs as pain flashed through Asclepius’s body and his ears rang, but the last thing he could see before he blacked out was the pooling accumulation of red that puddled on the ceiling.

I did it, he thought, he was right. He was right..

Darkness

***

GalaXelas

The presence of Val’garan entities empowered Sal’Chazzar with purpose and focus amidst the mental storm that eddied within. Amplifying their abilities, spacetime curved, bubbling and warping to the point of nearly creating a pocket dimension of its own. Gone was the Val’gara, the supermassive black hole, and the accretion disk. All that remained was an apparitional nebula of condensate, shrouding the wormhole within an off-white ectoplasmic mist.

As ominous as a maritime yellow flag, a faint crimson diffused through the mist, illuminating its bowels. The aurora, like vessels upon the Atlantic Graveyard, entered into the nebula and disappeared completely.

In actuality, even GalaXelas didn’t understand the aurora Ender used to cow the rest of the Faultiverse, and instead opted to store it away, using the nebula as a battery. The arcane project experienced a breakdown parallel to the Faultiverse itself as it’s will was eroded away by countless other gnashing teeth and screaming consciousness within the infinite myriad of the Val’gara. As the supercomputer allocated more and more resources to retain its identity and primary function, it relegated other tasks, some which would affect all of creation.

As Ender bent and twisted the structure of the multiverse, splitting away coterminous plains to seclude the Faultiverse, one such reality acted upon its own accord. In a macrocosmic metaphor for granular convection this universe, despite all the shaking, oriented itself in an exact distance and exact angle to the Faultiverse like it was magnetically guided, directed by intelligence or unexplained attraction to the center of reality. These universes, the Faultiverse and the other verse, inevitably, invariably became juxtaposed. This became the lone access and its toll, passing through gravitational flux even light could not escape.

Between two universes, bridged over the subtended chaos of pre-scalar field entropy, was an Einstein-Rosenberg bridge, hardly hospitable, with its crushing reality warping tidal forces. A conduit between universes wherein its nexus sat solid mass that pulled two universes together. A black hole existed in one and another astronomical object formed within the other. The primary black hole’s accretion disk radiated a flaring red iris upon its blackened pupil. A chain of hypernovae exploded heralding infinite levels of energy that erupted, following the mold of Hawking’s Radiation from the center mass, osmosed polluted Twardzik Thought Radiation of a very dark realm. The particles of the energy/gas clouds alighted in a prismatic array as the gamma-ray bursters carried with them not electromagnetic radiation, but instead raw bioforce—energy to feed Sal’Chazzar’s starving children.

The alluvion transuded from the poles of the supermassive black hole metastasizing within the space of the Faultiverse as new space that would supplant the current void, beset with its own realities. The oblivion of the Shattered Realm hungered with the advent of its godhead, alternate universes experiencing armageddon exsiccated, and with alarming celerity vanished as their collective energy was used to pay Ender’s orange-faced energy tax. Truly, Ender had built the wall, and universes UI32, T767, QXU8, and endless others paid for it.

The Meatspin

So has no one actually attacked yet? While I like meandering around writing about particulate matter and saying the words 'multiverse' and 'bose Einstein condensate' and other buzz words for God tier fights as much as the next guy, I'm only interested if any of that will actually happen. So far it's following the tell-tale pacing of God tier fights of old, which is to say a buncha' dudes trying to out-tryhard each other in the literary sense with 5 bajillion word posts of absolutely shit-nothing really happening :/.

@Gun

Dude... it's the opening round of posts, and yes there have been attacks/things happening so far.

Unsolicited Invasion (Earth-F67X Chronicle)

Philippe tumbled over the center table as Arthur threw him, rolling over the surface in a whorl of ill-fitted clothing and asscrack, then he slammed into the freestanding refrigerator, the both of them falling through the soft side flap of the tent. As Arthur jumped back through the entrance and transformed, Bourgeois could see the demon’s campfire-hued glow even through the light-muting fabrics of the military issue tent. The knight stumbled to his feet, grumbling as his pants started to fall down. In a surprising display of clumsiness he fumbled with his pike, which, of course, he had set next to the appliance.

Though Philippe was heavy, he wasn’t heavy enough to completely crush the refrigerator with his body mass just yet. As the pig demon threw a frozen blade of chaos at him, the Duke of Cobblemont gripped the fridge laying next to him and lifted it as his bulwark. The cleaver would bury deep into the fridge, slicing through the door, but its frozen properties would be so heavily mitigated from insulation, and its force by the thickness and metal, that the weapon wouldn’t be much threat to anyone.

The chained blade's strengths became its greatest weaknesses as they trapped it inside the fridge. Philippe turned and heaved the appliance and weapon inside away from both of them with inhuman strength. While the refrigerator flew into the city he leaped forward and quickly jabbed his pike and what would likely be an unbalanced demon.

“Oh, cochon, un de mes plats préférés.”

***

The newcomers sudden and unexpected appearance elicited a couple of surprised shouts that broke the heavy tension in the room. The skittish dignitary and expert blame-shifter squealed for the door guards. As the doors flung open with two armed soldiers leveled automatic weaponry, Apollo casually waved them off. The president already knew who his guest was--that exhibitionist. The fact that he was already sure of Autun’s state was only confirmed by some of the confused commotions within the room.

“For God’s sake put some clothes on. It’s not our worst day until the day we die and we’re not dead yet, ” he muttered, turning his attention to the wall of screens at the opposing end of the table.

He watched the events transpiring of the two suits, recognizing one as Max, whom he had just spoken to merely a few short hours ago. Yet again, Apollo had reason to be frustrated and disappointed. “I gave him an assignment… He should already be in Spain.” Apollo didn’t even take the time to consider why he was floating in space and who the other operative was.

That was when he watched the energy beam lance through one of them, parting through the smoky white cloud cover veil into the center of where Madrid once was. Seconds later different feeds patched in through different parts of the world showed mountainous tidal waves, the closing of the Gibraltar strait, momentous earthquakes, and a sky filled with too many Val’gara to possibly comprehend. All of these images flashed like a horrifying montage to a dumbfounded room of gaping officials.

Everyone gawked in silent dismay for a couple seconds. Everyone except the nudist. And for Apollo, who closed his eyes repeating, “...yet.”

The room erupted into chaos around him. Phones were ringing people started shouting, some blame shifting, others reaching out to their respective agencies. Apollo jammed his index finger at the grimacing General Millheiser, “Get every fucking thing we have on that. I want every operative out there, yesterday, general. Move! We have a full-scale Class 20 situation!”

Apollo’s comms rang with several different voices as the operative sorted the information in a way he could comprehend.

“OPERATIVE 2232 status: MIA.”

“OPERATIVE 2246 status: in custody.”

“OPERATIVE 4585 status: MIA.”

“OPERATIVE 1313 status: engaged.”

“OPERATIVE X7B status: requesting an assignment from Tel-Aviv.”

A few mission updates notified Apollo on his communication link as he continued to receive various statuses of different field operatives. With General Heinzemann killed, General Millheiser now assumed control of most of the field operations of different Mobius ops, with only a select few filtering above his head to President Amon.

“The cat is in the bag,” another report Apollo had been expecting, and the first bit of good news he had received all day. Not that it would matter if the planet was destroyed before then. Merse had become a far lower priority to him now.

“Assign Tartalo to it.”

The reports continued.

As Autun stood fiddling with his cock ring, Apollo looking at him, shouted, “I don’t suppose you’re here to watch us die. Start with that.” Apollo demanded while pointing towards the collection of screens dominated by an armed Cubozoan creature whose hands grasped at the edges of the horizon, and whose frame dominated the midday’s sky.

“DO SOMETHING!” He said, throwing his hands in the air.

***

Even as Brobdingnag eclipsed the Sun, his pulsing brain bathed distant Earth in a pale lavender light that supplanted the Sun’s rays. Surviving citizens in the surrounding blocks screamed as the far mass shifted, visible in what became instant twilight. Billions of Val’gara Cataclysm dotted the sky, chittering crustaceans, multi-winged membranous worm-like space whales, country-sized octopi whose feelers crackled with active bioforce. Some of the flotilla remains were as close as the interior of F67X’s orbit, while others remained halfway to Venus.

Coursing with adrenaline, Anathema stopped as his yellowed eyes beheld the scene above. For a stranded Val’gara it was a miracle, and for Earth, it was a nightmare. His fractured psyche connected to something, a noise, a harmony that just a memory these days. He sensed the rest of his flotilla and a bolstered, nearly unbreakable psi-link that powered him far beyond what he ever was capable of on his own. Anathema felt strong--no, Anathema was invincible. He sought Sounder, hardening his fists and he crushed them into the ground. He sought the Slut and exhaled a miasma of poison into the surrounding block.

The psi-link was alive and well, more so than it had ever been, and with it heralded a message from a new god for the Val’gara, a new deity preaching an old message. Everyone around Anathema was dead, sterilized from the beam. Only he had greater fortitude than the human who landed here moments before, and though the Herald wasn’t directly hit by the beam, he still felt its effects. The engine left him feeling… different, but marginally so.

Leathery wings burst from his shoulders and organic vents rent at his scapula-measures for space travel. With a quick metamorphosis, Anathema pushed off the ground and took to the sky, and then to the stars, and then to Sal’Chazzar.

***

Jack had seen the strange skeletal powers Thomas employed, but now he understood as the essence latched onto him. As Agron housed itself within his body, pieces of its experiences began to flood into his mind. He saw the visions of a simple creature shattering the lives around it as callous as the Val’gara ever had. In some ways, this creature was worse, as it replayed to him Jessica’s death and its satisfaction at neutralizing a threat. The ironically thin-skinned creature also projected its outrage onto Jack for all the mean things he said.

The creature didn’t know the first thing about pain, but Jack had learned this lesson from the best and he would educate this creature.

Though only thirty years had passed on Earth, time was relative in other places, and it had felt like thousands of years in his captivity. This gave Jack a distinct advantage at the empathic war game that was soon waged--a battle of wills between Jack and Agron. He quashed Agron’s outrage with a tsunami of fury. Much like the wave that destroyed the northern wall of Africa, Jack’s rage drowned the will of Agron just as much as it tried to drown him at the bottom of the Atlantic ocean.

It seemed Anathema still left his touch on the flesh of the ex-human, as he could breathe, stabilize under intense pressure, and swim as effectively and fast as he could run. Even as Agron physically resisted him by spurring his bones into his muscles, and heating up his skeleton, Jack’s flesh and the residual spirit of Anathema resisted the essence involuntarily.

“You think you know pain? You think Thomas was hurting because someone loved him? You think you love him, you stupid fucking rock?”

“I may not be able to kill you but I am going to hurt you more than you can possibly imagine.”

Jack raised his eyes to the darkness where his internal gage told him was up in the midnight zone and began the long trek back home.

The Meatspin

What is with the double post? The turn order has not yet come back to you, yet. If you need to further establish your character's position in the thread be sure to have that in your first post or add it to your next turn. Also, please keep in mind this is an advanced role play and is writing-centric.

The Meatspin

The last time this profile was edited was two years ago, and does -not- serve as an etched-in-stone comprehensive guideline on the character that's currently in the Meatspin. Instead, this should give a vague idea as to what some of the character's past capabilities are, as well as an accurate accounting of Xelas's history.

Xelas

Name: Arcane Project Xelas AF364j5
Height: Inconsistent
Weight: Inconsistent
Alias: Xelas, Xelas 5
Age: Unknown
Character type: Critical
Character tier: High

Xelas History: Arcane Project AF34j65 is a story of failures brought to success. Xelas was a lab experiment done by a particularly immoral extra-dimensional being. Particularly unhappy with the results, Xelas 5 was dumped into the physical plane, with as little care as trash to a landfill. From there Xelas could hardly maintain it’s own state. Entering the dimension as a semi-liquid, the experiment was quickly evaporating to a gaseous state – where it didn’t exercise enough control or intelligence over it’s own abilities to maintain the form.

So Xelas did precisely what it was programmed to do – it ate. It consumed others to maintain the well-being of itself and it is through this process that Xelas ascertained the intelligence to maintain it’s own functions – through the assimilated consciousness of others molded to it’s particular liking. Now this is not to say that Xelas’ thoughts are cluttered like the many, many victims it has absorbed; Xelas’ thought process is nearly entirely mechanical – and it is capable of suppressing the will of nearly all of its absorbed victims. So Xelas simply racks up a general IQ – whilst maintaining the thought process of an actual machine.

Xelas slowly climbed the food chain of sorts, absorbing more and more challenging victims. The arcane project eventually peaked after the events of the Trantor Fleet engagement – where it had collected enough power to transcend its natural shape. After eating a Trantor vessel, Xelas became The Xelas, flagship. By all means and definitions it is still Xelas, and capable of acting on its initial protocol – however this protocol is more subservient to the whim of those who are aboard it.

The aftermath of the Trantor Fleet Engagement is where the experiment absorbed its most potent target, which was one of its very own allies throughout the war. In doing this Xelas attained a final form – GalaXelas, a celestial entity so large it consumed solar systems with simple motions – it drained quasars of energies; Xelas created a gravitational field so powerful simply by it’s existence, that the orbit of nearby star clusters were thrown off merely by it’s presence.

In the battle, however, the arcane project suffered critical damage to its nucleus. The damaged forced Xelas to gather a host-quickly but out of all the absorbed, none held a will strong enough not to be consumed by the parasite. Except one.

Gennosuke (see history included) remained unabsorbed as his will was never broken – even when battered and defeated. Xelas required going into a subconscious state after emerging victorious, and Gennosuke took over – regaining his human form. Xelas, meanwhile, inhabited the body of Gennosuke mending the broken and corrupted data within itself while provided a passive symbiotic relationship with its host.

The duo fought in the war of the newly formed universe out of the Trantor fleet engagement, and defended the Sol system from the Gravlari Swarm – as a matter of fact, Gennosuke/Xelas alone absorbed the entire tredecillion fold and their entire planet (which was the size of the alpha centauri). This task did not help Xelas in it’s process of reparation, so it reverted back to it’s original instinct which was to promote the well-being of itself before all other things. Xelas sapped the nutrients right out of Gennosuke’s body – and while he remained alive and mobile he was simply an emaciated husk of his former self.

Gennosuke – driven mad by the change of setting, went with Xelas to a planet noted Soran, where he encountered a beast called Alucroas. The two fiercely battled – and even in his weakened state he was a match for the monster. However, the xenomorph gathered the upper hand when it unleashed The Dark Realm – or at least a gateway to it. Gennosuke had no way of defending against the alter-dimensional ability, but Xelas had found a way of attaining ultimate perfection.

The arcane project synchronized with the dark realm – allowing unlimited amounts of information to flow through its broken nucleus – allowing it nigh-omnipotent power. However in the process Xelas was, once again, critically damaged. Seizing the opportunity before fully repairing its database hub, the Xelas became even more dependant on a host, and could not fully understand how to use the abilities, while by all logical means it should be capable of performing them. Gennosuke’s body was literally evaporated in the exchange. All that remains is Gennosuke’s iron will… and Xelas, desperately seeking a new host.

Xelas had found one on Soran in the form of the contractor, Gerald Forge. While it was a hasty conjoining, it was a necessary one. Gerald Forge found, at first the new power exhilitaring, however his psychosis led him to inevitably abuse it. Xelas and Autun would frequently butt heads, with Forge's ego usually instigating the conflict. Forge even went so far as to interrupt a private meeting between Autun and Apollo on the welfare of the planet, simply to nay-say the nudist.

When a multiversal cataclysm occurred, Forge soon found himself trapped in the origin point where it occurred. In a place where time and space were irrelevant, Gerald underwent the torment of waiting a literal eternity, powerless to escape while virtually no time at all passed outside of the rift, which was a remnant of the Cataclysm. Time, outside of the rift, was the only solution to mend the wound, however Forge's psychosis took a newfound level. Amnesia set in, anger, and eventually self-mutilation reverted Gerald Forge into the mental equivalent of a bloodthirsty neanderthal.

When the Rift finally erupted Xelas returned to Earth, and obvious havoc ensued.

Abilities:

Protoplasm: Xelas has no bodily organs or functions, this makes physically damaging Xelas quite difficult. The only spot of physical weakness is the developed nucleus/optical that Xelas has developed, as this is the hub of where it’s processes are stored. Xelas’ body is formed of a non-conductive protoplasm that it is capable of manipulating. { Level 8. }

Malleable form: As a result of Xelas’ bodily composition, it is able to not only change it’s phase from solid – liquid – gas, but it is capable of complete control of it’s body while in any of these states. The nucleus is also capable of spreading the data that composes its nucleus based on the spread of molecules allowed for each state of matter. It is this leeway that allows Xelas to compromise it’s core but still maintain full control over the information and processes within it – thus allowing it to reconstruct the core once it reassumes a solid state of matter.

Through observance of Xelas’ constant phase change it has been deduced that Xelas is also capable of maintaining it’s bodily temperature – thus preventing anyone from forcibly changing it’s phase. It is also deducible that Xelas has considerable control over even its molecular structure, thus making Xelas obscenely hard to destroy – due to it being constantly able to reconstruct itself.

On a grander scale – because Xelas often has such a wide control over its molecular structure it is also capable of shape shifting. It can appear as other people – or capable of masking its host in a convincing disguises. Xelas’ shape shifting does not limit it simply to changing it’s appearance, but it can also extend tendrils of itself for battle, form weapons out of itself or create protective shielding/armor, among numerous other things. { Level 8. }

Replication: Motivated by it’s urge to consume and to spread itself upon the world, Xelas (or Xeli) are capable of splitting into portions, and then allowing them to grow into their own sentient Xelas. The process of Xelas’ life goes from Xelite – Xelas – (Unnatural) The Xelas (flagship) – (Unnatural) GalaXelas. { Level 8. }

- Stage 1: Xelite: Xelas can split or copy the information in its nucleus, which allows it to form sentient facsimiles of itself. All offspring’s of Xelas are not direct copies of it at first, but start out as tiny squid-like blebs of protoplasm, which can evolve quickly into Xelas’ – these tiny little projectiles are properly labeled as “Xelites”.
- Stage 2: The Natural Adult Form, Xelas: Xelas is the ordinary form of the arcane project, in it has access to all its phase change abilities, etc.
- Stage 3: Unnatural Form: The Xelas: A stand-alone ship form that allows Xelas higher output capability. This isn’t within the natural life span of Xelas. Currently this state is only attainable when the host of Xelas demands that it is necessary. So therefore this is a much more passive state of Xelas’ consciousness.
- Stage 4: Unnatural Form: GalaXelas: will be described in more detail later into the profile.

Meta-magical Runes: Upon creation Xelas was given the full serial name: Arcane Project Xelas AF364j5. As if Xelas were not fantastic enough, it had no way of combating the paranormal – or supernatural. For this task, Xelas was equipped with a series of metamagical runes encoded into its nucleus. Xelas is capable of manifesting these runes any time while it is in solid form.

These runes allow Xelas to analyze all types of magic and many times provide counter measure for the magical energies. It works like a counterspell, Xelas is endowed with an extremely powerful enchantment in its nucleus that activates when a magical attack is forced upon it, or when Xelas is preparing to defend against something of magical nature – then once the attack is sent it either:

A. Provides equal energy of the opposite element to sufficiently counter the spell, while drawing the energy that is necessary out of its own magical well.

B. Creates a hollow well of emptied energy that allows Xelas to analyze the energy, then absorb it.

Or

C. Allows Xelas access to it’s own magical array of spells – while this is not always manifested, it is the Runes that allow Xelas to spell cast in the first place. Without the runes, Xelas is incapable of understanding magic in its entirety.

The Meta-magical runes are powered based off of Magnus’ dark energy. However once applied to Xelas, its capability was exponentially increased. Xelas was able to harness a primal energy – with very little sophistication, where it could negate other types of magic – based off the enchantment that was put in it at the moment of its creation. { Level 8. }

Enhanced Host: When the Xelas is in a state of symbiosis, it is documented that the host undergoes massive increases in strength, speed, agility, durability, dexterity, and stamina. The host’s physical appearance is not usually changed, but physical capabilities are exponentially increased.

For example, a normal human that has garnered the Xelas symbiote would gain speed that could easily break the sound barrier. The ability to view and dodge automatic gunfire (think bullet time) with ease. They’ve been shown to enhance fine motor skills, and perception (they can see farther, smell much more acutely, hear for miles and miles). In one particular case the subject was hit with a semi truck that was moving at the better half of 80 miles per hour and emerged unscathed – they didn’t even budge as a matter of fact! They are able of lifting large weights (said semi truck) and carrying them for profound distances.

The Xelas symbiote makes a true super-human out of any host that it attaches and bonds to. Some hosts are more effective with Xelas than others. { Level 8. }

Necessity of a Host: Xelas was damaged throughout the Trantor fleet engagement and the following battle that ensued in its aftermath. It exerted so much power and effort that there was critical corruption detected within its systems. Instead of maintaining its own shape, Xelas found it a necessity to inhabit the body of an already-living human (or organism) so it can further focus on repairing what has been damaged. As a result of being damaged, Xelas is also incapable of accessing certain powers and abilities that it previously had access to. { Level –8. }

***

[size=150]The Xelas, flagship.[/size]

History: In the omniversal war that occurred before the creation of F67X, Xelas came across an abandoned, yet still fully functional Trantor vessel. Attaching itself to the vessel, Xelas assimilated it’s systems, protocols, and defenses. In doing this Xelas was capable of mimicking it’s form, burrowing in the moon of New Terra, Xelas transformed into the unnatural flagship for, The Xelas. It was here were Xelas served as a means to create a temporary alliance between starkly contrasting characters to battle a threat bigger than themselves.

Once Xelas transformed into this new form, it broke free from the celestial body, destroying it and entered the war, serving as a one-ship army against several entire fleets. Xelas was actually the last ship standing at the end of the space war, and once the war was over, it warped to a far off distant galaxy where it would revert to it’s original form… somewhat, before crashing into the surface of a crumbling planet.

Description: The Xelas is like a bundle of scimitars, where the curved contours lead to the base handles, which are melted together to form the bridge – a shiny sphere ensconced in spires, halos, and an explosion of crystal. The insides of the curved lengths are smothered in a crystallic mineral that is very similar (but smaller) to what covers the bridge, this forms an extremely dense outer hull around the solid-looking silver protoplasm that lay underneath.

The visual from the bridge window is impeded to an extent from the enormous amount of mineral that are encrusted in the ships’ hull, however Xelas is capable of pulling a visual from nearly any angle of its hull. The bridge window is a centered pentagon that has several diagonal panes that curve away from the centerpiece.

Abstract: The Xelas is used for larger-scale encounters, for planetary assaults and some astronomical battles and for engaging fleets.

Avatar Projection: Xelas is capable of taking the abilities of those whom are aboard and connected to the ship’s hull and projecting them on a much larger scale. It was seen in the Trantor fleet engagement that the flagship was capable of projecting Gennosuke’s space/time techniques on the scale of a light years distance. The ship uses its arcane runes as a manner of temporarily copying the abilities of those aboard and linked to the ship’s intelligence.

The manner of which this ship ‘projects’ the abilities is twofold. First, the ship may create a massive “avatar” of whom is connected to the ship, then allow direct control of the avatar through he who is connected to The Xelas. The second manner of which Xelas may utilize the abilities of others is it can automate the abilities with slightly less efficiency and control than the original wielder – yet may use the abilities quickly, with very little preparation. {Level 8 – 9}

Living Hull: Xelas, while it is a ship in this phase, is still alive it is capable of manipulating the materials of it’s hull (the protoplasmic part) just as it is capable of controlling it as a smaller specimen. This allows the ship rapid regeneration functions and unparalleled self-repair diagnostics. In addition to Xelas originally being a shape-shifting amorphous entity, Xelas, ship form, is capable of creating any sort of weapon mount it is equipped with at any space of the protoplasmic hull.

Xelas’ nucleus remains at the core of the ship, and as long as the nucleus is intact, the ship has a 360-degree view, and automated hull repair as well as spontaneously regenerating power sources. Additionally, the crystallized hull serves as an excellent deterrent to particle/light based energy attacks, as it has a habit of refracting the frequencies into more manageable sections that Xelas may handle. {Level 9}

Laser Manipulation: When Xelas creates weaponry on its living hull, parting the crystallized plating, it normally forms laser-based or projectile-based weaponry, with a variety of presentation to the two. The most notably used is the difference in how Xelas utilizes the absorbed Trantorian ship’s already-existing weaponry and improves upon it. This manifests in several ways {Level 9}:

Usage of warp-space: Xelas aim’s a particle beam (laser) through warp as to bypass most shields, normally this is most effective against smaller ships or the interior of larger ships. Xelas utilizes a warp process very similar to F67X’s process of warp by way of quantum mechanics. The laser fired is normally of a lower energy, therefor making it more effective for wreaking havoc upon the interior of medium to large ships, as it normally provides direct damage to the inside. The warp-ray is of lower yield so normally the energy is dissipated by thicker hulls.
Usage of rapid fire: One of the ways that Xelas improved upon the Trantor’s Mark ZZ Hi Mega Beam was the elimination of a cooldown period. Through regulating it’s own internal temperature through it’s basic ability (See: Malleable form) the flagship can fire sporadic laser bursts without stopping. Alternately the Xelas can also charge up a large blast from the gatling prop and fire, without worrying about cooldown, it needs only gather the energy necessary.
Constant ray: through commitment, Xelas has completely altered the Trantor vessels dual beam system with its own shield-wreaking attack. Through this method the Xelas taps into a deep well of energy – concentrating this stream of high energy and uses it to overload shields and drill into hull exteriors; effective against armor and shielding.

Force shield: The Xelas boasts an improvement from the Trantorian vessel that it absorbed, long ago in it’s shielding in particular. The shield that the flagship utilizes in particular stars off as tiny particles very similar to a photo-sensitive carbon nanotube (invisible due to its size and controllable by Xelas or whomever controls it to part areas for trajectory – how it is controllable is because particles of Xelas are attached to the nanotube), which reflect radiative-based weaponry upon contact. This is surrounded by a more creative use for the flagships control over laser, a “laser lattice” to put it in layman’s terms. The laser lattice is composed of an exceedingly superheated substance (think of the likes of superheated plasma) which is used to melt projectiles, so that they cannot penetrate the nanotube-based shielding.

If ineffective, inside the carbon nanotube is an inertial field generated by Xelas, this shield can be utilized two vastly different ways. Firstly, the shield can be used to slow down the effects of projectiles that are heat-resistant and managed to penetrate the shielding, the inertial field is effective based on the speed of the projectile (the faster the projectile moves, the more it is slowed). Secondly, the inertial field can be reversed as an inertial dampener, allowing projectiles fired from the flagship to reach a maximum velocity in minimal amounts of time. { Level 8 }

Crystallic Hull: Xelas has utilized a variety of crystallic minerals in the early process of it’s transformation to provide structure, after the critical stages of the transformation were complete, the crystals were unnaturally differentiated to the outside of the hull. They are most useful for particle/light based weaponry. The crystals themselves have come in contact with Xelas’ arcane antimagic protocols, so it is capable of refracting all types of light wave targeting methods, and can even absorb most types of magic-based energy attacks. { Level 8 }

Unlimited Projectile Works: { Level 9 } the materials that this ship uses for its projectiles are created out of the ship, itself. It is not to say that they are manufactured, but it is a process that is much more like they are asexually birthed by the ship. Any types of projectiles (most missiles, but also standard munition rounds) are created by Xelas’ extensive war-database. These projectiles include, but are not limited to:

Chaff missiles – primarily a defensive missile, which the schematics were gleaned from the ever-updating Trantor database. The missile upon reaching a specific point – never reaches the destination of it’s actual trajectory, but instead 1/3 of the missile splits off, as an excellent buffer for light/energy based weaponry, due to the nature of the shavings that are released from the missile. The chaff missiles work well as they can also (instead of breaking apart) intercept other missiles.
Phasing missiles – utilizing the same technology that Xelas uses to warp through space/time, and fire some of it’s hyperspace lasers, the phasing missiles are also sent through this alter-dimension, where they are plotted to emerge in realspace, effectively bypassing most shields. These are high-yield megaton warheads that are comparable to atom bombs.
Dense hp missile – these are actually several missiles compacted into one. Upon being fired the missile splits off before impact, delivering the power of several nuclear bombs before releasing the final impact – an antimatter missile. How this works is that there are several nuclear missiles compacted into one massive one, which is the center – an inactive anti-matter missile. The nuclear missiles split off before impact, plotting individual courses for each. (These missiles could be composed of standard nuclear arms, chaff missiles, or even phasing missiles!) This leaves the extremely large missile to itself, at this point it acts like a particle accelerator, creating the anti-matter particles before impact, where it brings catastrophic results.

[size=150]GalaXelas[/size]

{ Level 10 }

Forming through the big bang event of an unborn universe, GalaXelas is an epic being, large enough to cover entire galaxies in the palm of its hand. GalaXelas was first and only witnessed after the Trantor fleet engagement, dealing irreparable damage to the universe. The peak of Xelas always takes a nosedive before long – while GalaXelas is nearly omnipotent, it lacks slightly in coordinated thought – it just acts.

GalaXelas has no new abilities of it’s own, other than the radiation it emits – which I will discuss later, however, a being simply existing at it’s size is more than enough. At this size GalaXelas has differentiated denser substances towards its center protecting it’s nucleus. GalaXelas is so large and dense that it emits a field very much like a black holes – a gravitational field that is so powerful even light cannot escape its grasp, many times this becomes a problem, since light is the manner which we see, record and analyze things. GalaXelas cannot be seen, quite simply a region of dark, empty space would be seen where it is. While GalaXelas cannot be fully seen, and observed, it can be detected by keen astronomers or less conventional ways of detecting (magic) – sudden disappearances of star clusters (millions of them) the complete obfuscation of the night’s sky would be a symptom of GalaXelas’ presence.

There is a problem with this matter, GalaXelas’ gravitational field is so powerful that it would crush anything that were within its range. To make up for this matter, GalaXelas has modified the material it is composed up of to compensate – this makes physically attacking GalaXelas a futile task, the atoms of this epic being are so tightly interwoven together that it makes an impenetrable carapace. This ability is made possibly by Xelas being capable of manipulating the material it is made of, or the construction of the particles of its body.

Another thing that is of note is that in the epic war between GalaXelas and Simtar, it was seen gorging upon an entire quasar of electromagnetic radiation. GalaXelas has accumulated enough internal radiation that through a process of accretion through it’s gravitational field, it releases gamma ray bursters that would be equivalent to several million solarsystems undergoing the phenomenon at once, through a simple breath.

***

[size=150]Forge[/size]

Abstract: Forge is the antithesis to Gennosuke, regarding the Xelas symbiote. He is of sound body, but unsound mind, whereas Gennosuke was vice versa. Forge is the current host of Xelas.

Personality & Physical Description: Forge has since rid himself of not only all his armor and weapons, but clothing as well. Carrying nothing on him, the former-soldier has removed all protrusions on his body including his nose, ears, and genitalia. Forge’s formerly clean-shaven appearance has been supplanted with a large greasy tangled mass of hair that falls down onto his back in angry brambles. His bushy hairstyle is complemented by a long, ragged looking beard.

Considered dangerous by all accounts of the word, Forge has since taken to a hermitic lifestyle and has since adopted some sort of hedonistic philosophy in regards to morals. The former soldier is a malleable pawn to the Xelas symbiote, requiring little effort to be controlled or directed into doing something, his behavior has become not only volatile, but unpredictable, even more so than it were.

Skills, Powers, and Abilities:

Hand to Hand: Forge lacks not only the refinement, but also the technique he once had in the hand-to-hand combat style. A thousand years ago he employed various martial tactics from all Terran styles of combat. Now, Forge fights a savage primordial style based on pure violence. This brutal style seems to not only favor overkill, but also demands it. It seems that since the cataclysmic event, Forge has not only become exponentially stronger than what human limitations would allow (on his own, without the Xelas symbiote), but he has also garnered superhuman speed, agility, and durability. He is no longer reliant on how skillful he is at taking down his opponents, but just being naturally better than them. {Level 6}

Empath: Psychoanalysis of Mr. Gerald S. Forge: it seems that Forge has garnered an alpha-wolf persona to compensate for his hidden insecurities. All evidence of this psychological complex seems to stem back to Sterling’s early childhood abuse.

Entry 2 – perhaps previous data was misconstrued… after extensive interview, sterling seems to be a normal, but troubled, individual. The progress forge has made is nothing sort of miraculous. I intend to utilize some intense psychological stimuli throughout the next few interviews. Uprooting his object of repression is of the utmost importance.

Entry 3 – Today forge suffered a complete psychotic breakdown. He assaulted Dr. Stevens, and fought the guards for a full twenty minutes. The situation he held in such levity he spoke in terms of unpredictable badinage to simply glowering at the rest of us like a feral dog. This is an obvious case of schizophrenia.

Entry 4 – The nescience of the rest of the staff is baffling, I believe I have discovered Forge. I believe that his source of trauma was domestic issues that he witnessed early on, which is repressed by the social ostracism he experienced throughout his adolescent years. I have dismissed the security staff, their inability to understand such a damaged individual proves to be nettlesome, but I, I understand him just fine.

Entry 5 – Perhaps I should reinstate security forces in the left wing. When I left my quarters I had heard what sounded like some of our case studies chattering around the corner, however there was no one there. Forge seems to be showing a cycle – he is cocky, crass, and capricious. I feel somewhat disoriented, I believe I will take the rest of the day off.

Entry 6 – I was hardly able to interview forge, but he seemed perfectly fine. I, however, am not. Listen to me, this seems to become less of a case study and more of a private diary. I’m hearing things in the middle of the night – seeing silhouettes at my bedroom door that aren’t there. Laughing. I can hear laughing. Out of the corner I keep seeing a shade, perhaps a woman? She is dressed in white, but I can never make out her face. Long black hair on a splayed white canvas – a wicked trick my mind plays on my peripherals. It’s obvious that I’m falling apart, I hallucinate hours upon end, this morning I woke up, thinking I was going to go brush my teeth, and instead I had my shaving razor in my hand, placed upon my gum. I need to take hold of reality, before I end up joining my patients in Section 8.

(Forge no longer gains any sense of clarity after destroying the mental status of others, instead, he remains just as hostile as he has ever been.) {Level 8}

1000 Years of History: To be expounded upon throughout Roleplay in 6.0

***

[size=150]Gennosuke[/size]

Gennosuke’s History: Gennosuke lived the life of a simple man – he farmed crop not for profit but for sustenance, just as he hunted animal. He lived life in a parallel 16th century, where the preeminence of guns and most ranged weaponry is absent, so it could be said that Gennosuke is technologically impaired.

Gennosuke is – for all intents and purposes – a ninja, however he is also a warrior. As described in the diary of Seiryuu, Gennosuke ascertained the “devils eyes” or “enchanted vision”, it is mostly known as a relic or an artifact, however it is actually a mutation that allows the user to bend the flows of time and space.

Ending the Yakihiru skirmish, and the entire border war – Gennosuke became a deified figurehead. He began leading political revolution at the turn of the decade, and was focused on a single goal – the unification of the entire land. However, a meddler from a parallel universe had other plans. Magnus, appearing to Gennosuke as little more than a shade, disrupted the ninjas daily meditation. Forcing him to bend to his whim, Magnus put Gennosuke into indentured servitude and pulled him from his primitive dimension into an intergalactic space-war known as the Trantor fleet engagement.

It was here that Gennosuke showed an astounding rate of synchronization with Xelas, as it was capable of magnifying his powers, and he was capable of utilizing its powers. It was only a matter of time before Gennosuke’s tolerance for Magnus’ immorality was broken, and he attempted to assassinate him. Magnus, holding a better understanding of the Xelas than Gennosuke, was able to easily subdue the ninja. Yet still Gennosuke became more and more aligned with the shape-shifting parasite.

After the war, Gennosuke remained dormant for quite some time, his subconscious battling against Xelas’, eventually emerging victorious. Gennosuke had full control over the Xelas symbiote and actually defended the Sol system against the Gravlari Swarm, sealing and enslaving them with Xelas. However, while Gennosuke’s will was powerful enough to hold Xelas off – and still remain semi-sane, Gennosuke’s body was less stalwart. The shape shifter caused such a strain on the man’s body, that by the time he had landed upon Soran, Gennosuke was merely a shell of his former self.

Withered and wretched, it was there that Gennosuke would fight his final fight.

Abilities:

Will of Gennosuke: To attain perfect symbiosis with Xelas, the host must meet two prerequisites or the synchronization process will undoubtedly fail. The first requirement is that they must be of sound mind. Gennosuke had the mental fortitude of Shangri-La he was capable of fending off psychic assaults through sheer will power – his determination was one of the most powerful, and through his iron resolve, Gennosuke was capable of feats that his body shouldn’t have ever been capable of handling. The second requirement is that one is of sound body – the requirement that Gennosuke did not entirely meet, while the man was healthy – he was not in peak physical condition. A little on the slim side, Gennosuke’s body eventually ended up being overburdened with the task of sharing with Xelas, and was eaten alive.

Even so, Gennosuke’s iron will still remains, and many times acts as an alter-psyche for Xelas’ current host. Gennosuke had multiple abilities, but the introduction of Gennosuke’s will allots the host to shrug off status-effects, psychic attacks, and even emotional manipulation through sheer determination. Gennosuke’s will also increases the hosts’ control over Xelas’ other abilities and better synchronizes the two. { Level 9. }

The Meatspin

As long as it's a serious character idea (and it looks like it is) there's no such thing as "too OP" for this thread.