Zombiedude101

Vivid Recollections Season 2: Into The False Light [COMPLETE]

St. Mercer Hospital

---

It didn't take Nate long to realise he was very much naked in the metaphoric sense and not so far off in the literal one. Glancing back towards the direction he came from, he backpedalled to the bed he'd had and let his gaze hastily search for anything might've suggested he had visitors - Quent and Viv, maybe? Only there was nothing. Not a card, not flowers. Nothing. It had implications he didn't want to confront right now, so instead he blinked the thought away. Pausing, Nate took a glance outside the borders of his own unit. Around him in adjacent beds were familiar faces - they were all awakened, people who had abstractions, the powers that had kept them alive so far where others had been wiped out in the chaos-

Inexplicably, he found himself losing balance, disoriented by the experience. Instead of moving, or trying to form words, he'd just stood there - trying to make sense of this in his head and find some mental equilibrium. Voices that had begun to speak up, others shouting around him droned away, colour bleeding from his vision as silhouettes solidified from a blur to hard, oily black forms, only to dissipate once more. More droning, like a siren on a low pitch - more screams, more shouting. Nate's fingers tightened into a ball, not a fist - willing himself control of his situation. He didn't have time to screw around trying to find his stuff that might not have even been here - the God Kid had warned them. It had killed some of their kind - because what were awakened if not abnormal - already.

Once more, colour filled the world, vague shadows dissipating once and for all to be replaced with solid objects and people talking and moving, shouting and screaming. It didn't sound good - Nate found himself searching for the nearest thing that might serve as a weapon and decided that an empty IV stand by a bed would do the job, it was at least light enough to haul around without dragging constantly on the floor. As he approached, abandoning his bed once more, he arrived in time to see more of his fellow awakened and others, less familiar, scattered across the hall, some engaging in an impromptu wrestling match with nurse bearing the hallmarks of another Scott Reese-esque murder spree - and then to witness her drive a pair of scissors into her own throat, before he even had the opportunity to get involved and have his ass beaten down in the fray.

Vivid Recollections Season 2: Into The False Light [COMPLETE]

Posting because I've been a sick cunt and didn't get around to doing so previously.

Nathan Ward

╚══════════════╝

"That's actually pretty funny."

[ 18 | 5'11 | Caucasian Attack Helicopter | 172lbs ]

[Humour]

APPEARANCE

"So I'm a bit of a fat fuck. I'm working on it."

At just under six feet tall and inheriting his dad 's stocky build, Nate is someone who in another world could've had the look of a Schwarzenegger-esque body builder. His only problem? He didn't work towards any of that - instead, he has a substantial bit of fat on to the point of being overweight, though not outright being in the classification of obese. His pale complexion betrays his origins as a Bellevue native.

His eyes hold a solid brown colouration whilst his hair is of a slightly darker complexion, not particularly long but definitely getting towards the shaggy side of things. If he doesn't shave for a while he develops a thin mask of stubble along his lip, cheeks and jawline though it never goes beyond this - and he seldom goes without shaving it for that reason, which in turn contributes to his 'baby face' appearance.

In terms of clothing, there isn't a great deal that can be said about Nate's sense of fashion - he isn't particularly bothered about fashion labels or anything like that and tends to dress with a utilitarian approach, favoring cargo pants over jeans and throwing on whatever shirt and hoodie he's got to hand. It's seldom he's seen wearing anything other than a pair of size twelve trainers.

PSYCHOLOGY

"Just have a good time."

MAIN GOAL ⫻ At this point in life Nate is in the mindset of enjoying himself whilst he can, making connections along the way and developing a career - he's studying towards that later point and has a rough idea of where he would like to be but no clue to get there. Maybe working for his dad if it didn't work out.

PHILOSOPHY ⫻

Nate' primary concern is just to run through and let things happen as they happen and just have a good time in the meanwhile, making friends along the way. He has a fair share of personal doubts about life and himself but he doesn't allow it to show at the surface and instead masks or distracts from it with a combination of humour, impulsive behaviour and other displays in which he is outspoken. On top of this is a tendency to lash out in frustration when humour fails him which itself causes its own issues.

SECRETS ⫻

The recent loss of someone close to Nate is one thing he doesn't particularly dwell on or talk about - he has a habit of masking it and bottling up his frustrations and other demons with his outspoken demeanour. He's also been bullied to varying degrees in the past but this isn't so much a secret as it is an undisclosed topic.

DESIRES ⫻ As said before, Nate wants to enjoy life in the short term and that extends to making some good friends, getting to know others.

He enjoys playing video games and browsing the internet, spending a significant amount of time doing these either of these things - often staying up well into the early hours of the morning when he's not doing something (such as study or work) the following day or even in spite of these things, occasionally to his own detriment.

He doesn't drink often either (being underage doesn't exactly help with that) but when he does he's usually one to try and have a good time, his outspoken demeanour only exacerbated by this.

One other thing he's acknowledged is that he's a little out of shape and as it happens he enjoys going out walking, particularly at night, just to clear his head.

SEXUALITY ⫻ He prefers chicks without the dicks.

FEARS ⫻ Aside from dying fears losing all joy in his life and becoming miserable and depressed, amounting to nothing. Losing or ending up with no friends is another thing that terrifies him - or being ignored.

REPUTATION ⫻ Nate is a newer face to town but those who've paid him any attention have probably come across his sense of humour and how abrasive it can be.

PET PEEVES ⫻ If someone contradicts Nate when he firmly believes it to be factually correct (or incorrect) he will get incredibly frustrated and sometimes end up pressing into an argument about the matter.

QUIRKS ⫻

One of his big problems is that Nate lacks the same kind of "brakes" that others might have and, for example in an argument or discussion he'll be stubborn enough (or fail to take a hint) to keep pushing a subject even when it's clear it's in the best interest of all to stop. Sometimes he has a habit of digging himself into a hole, then digging some more - at points where other people would stop he continues to keep on going too far.

As another example of this, he once took the photo of someone else in high school who'd been an asshole to him, put it on a gay dating website and gave a would-be suitor the guy's phone number and another his address to meet up, only stopping when a meeting was called with all students to warn them that whoever was responsible would be found and punished if it continued. It's one (of many ) examples of the twisted sense of humour he can have and how he can push things too far.

BACKSTORY

"Does it matter? I'm trying to enjoy things here."

Nate's parents divorced early in his life, when he was about five years old - things remained amiable between them however and he initially spent every other weekend travelling between Bellevue and Tacoma, his father having refused to move too far away from him in his earlier years so as to ensure his son didn't grow up without some influence in his life.

This changed as Nate grew olde however and as a successful businessman his dad found that for the greater wealth he had to support his son he had less time to spend with him. Fortnightly visits became monthly, then bi-monthly, depending on things. As a consequence, he spent most of his time with his mom and stepdad and grew closer to them along the way.

Eventually his dad, who was from and owned a significant stake in a business in Farmer Hill moved back to Montana and saw Nate only when he was able to - but life moved on.

In school he did alright, nothing particularly outstanding but nontheless not failing in his grades, though a point was made that if he tried harder he could've done better. He endured a share of bullying just like anyone else but the only thing it did was leave him with a bout of pent up frustration that wouldn't be worked out for years - he made some friends and things seemed alright, particularly towards the end of school.

That was, however until Nate came home one night and his mom didn't turn up at ther usual hour, his stepdad unable to reach her line. Neither of them heard anything until the following morning when they received a knock at their door -her car had got into a head-on collision with a truck, she'd survived that but had been left brain-dead, the decision to cut off her life support coming soon afterwards at the urging of her husband and a reluctant Nate.

Devastated, Nate spent the final third of his time in high school withdrawn, reverting to whatever means he could to numb himself to the grief, his stepdad only able to offer a limited degree of consolation and his biological dad only able to offer financial support. He lost a few friends due to his own actions and as he finished up the school year there was the question of what to do next.

Partially as a measure to offer Nate some new surroundings and partially because he had family there and was therefore better off, his dad arranged for him to stop with his sister (Nate's aunt) at a home he leased them in Blacksmith Square whilst he studied engineering at Grand Ridge, bolstered by the financial support his businesses provided.

SKILLS & TALENTS

"I'm told I'm an expert in knowing things which are useless."

[IT Guy] ⫻ Nate is more than competent when it comes to working with computers and digital equipment alike.

[Encyclopedia] ⫻ Nate has a habit of retaining even the most insignificant piece of information and keeping it in his head, a skill honed by hours of browsing the Internet looking at wikipedia articles about the Second World War or articles about the production of Game of Thrones.

ABSTRACTION

"Can't touch this."

SIGIL & LOCATION ⫻ A tribal symbol of a void, on the back of his neck.

ABSTRACTION ⫻Intangibility - the ability to become intangible to the world.

ABSTRACTION DESCRIPTION ⫻ By concentrating (or involuntarily if in a stressful situation) Nate can render himself and entities in immediate contact with him (such as clothing or objects in his hand) intangiable and pass through solid materials or, in turn, allow solid objects to pass through him as though he were walking through water.

IN THE PRESENCE OF THE MOUNTAIN ⫻ (Explain to me how the Abstraction grows stronger in the presence of Mount Ever Reaching. What extra abilities does your character have?) The water-like resistance to movement through solid materials whilst in an intangiable state is reduced by a large margin, allowing Nate to almost jog whilst in this state and retain a greater degree of manoeuvrability. Furthermore, his ability to extend his intangiable state to other entities is expanded to a wider radius around him.

AURA SENSING ⫻ Being in an intangiable state has exposed Nate to a gap between the physical realm and what is beyond and, as a consequence, he is able to pick up on auras affiliated with the dead or the dying. Whilst in his intangiable state Nate can outright see things that he wouldn't be able to otherwise see and whilst he'll learn to tune it out there are some things out there that can be downright fucked up.

LIMITS ⫻ Phasing through objects is incredibly difficult for Nate because there is a resistance. Almost like passing through water, he can't move that fast while phasing. He's limited to a heavily inconvenienced march while phasing. He can only phase for five minutes straight before needing a rest. He also cannot phase through high concentrations of energy, such as power lines, and flames, and anything of the sort.

WEAKNESSES ⫻ Phasing reduces his ability to see by a great margin, his vision will be very dark and blurry. He'll no longer be able to see color, and his distance will be greatly reduced. Which makes it incredibly difficult for him to maneuver.

OTHER

"Uh.. something something whatever."

Nate's dad, Kenneth Ward, is the owner of KWS Co - a successful shipping and haulage companywith an office and depot in Farmer Hill, among other places across the northwest.

Vivid Recollections Season 2: Into The False Light [COMPLETE]

Hospital

---

Flatline

Wake up. It was a voice he'd almost mistaken for someone else's, if only because of the snow, invoking memories from home life in Bellevue, remembered Christmas Holidays the old man had promised to spend with him but hadn't because he didn't have time to make it back and forth for work before the weather kicked in. Bundling clumps of broken up snow and hurling them at other peoples' doors and windows to avenge the snowballs tossed at his own home, or just for the hell of it - because what was so bad about it? He-..

Nate was getting off track with his waking thoughts. His mouth was dry, his throat cracked - he felt thirsty, but only for the feel of water in his mouth. Part of him woke in a cold sweat, no dehydration there. His vision, still bleary - not like when he could slip through things, but more like being underwater without any goggles - eventually found clarity. Blinking, he tugged his arm inwards and felt the IV running from a stand to his arm. Instinctively, he reached for his pocket to pull out his phone and get an idea of the time, when he realised he wasn't wearing his clothes anymore - he was in hospital garb, exposed in comparison. The frequent blips and chiming of electrical equipment around him left no other doubts where he was.

Out and around him, however - his vision distorted. Colours briefly bleeding away, but without his mass shifting through the bed on which he laid. For a moment, silhouettes blinked in and out of existence, a dozen shades who had once dwelt here. How long had he been here? Opening his mouth to shout for someone, his voice rasped and he barely wheezed out a "Hello?!" A hydraulic press moved inwards on his temples in that moment, as if provoked by the use of speech, reminding him of the hell they had narrowly fled into... what? It didn't make sense. One moment, they were moving through the walls - Nate had spread himself out as far as he could, let the group slip through the world. Then... his focus had slipped. Some were left behind, others split off. Claire... she was dead he realised. It wasn't a dream. She'd died, she'd been... his voice rasped a little more, wheezing in a panic. He felt out of breath, like he'd run marathon without getting into any shape.

"Hello?" Nobody else answered. His stomach churned, the uncomfortable sensation of something wrenching at him pulling away. Nobody else seemed to be nearby, not that he could make any sense of, though the curtains surrounding his bed didn't help with that sense of isolation. What broke it in the end was a piercing scream from somewhere else, not so far off. The voice - the God-Kid - it had warned him that the thing that had killed Claire, that had chased after their group at the school - it was coming. Wincing, he pried at the IV line feeding fluids into his body and disconnected it, stifling a pained noise and climbed down from the bed, finding his footing to be unsteady.

Once he had his bearings, he approaches the curtain - ready to slip back into the gap between the physical realm and whatever lay on the other side.

Vivid Recollections: Into the World Unknown (Season 1 COMPLETE)

I owe folks an apology here, a lot more came up in the last month than I anticipated and sapped both my time and concentration. I've barely touched my PC in the time between save for maybe a few hours where I didn't really have a stable connection. I'm a shit.

Vivid Recollections: Into the World Unknown (Season 1 COMPLETE)

Sorry for the delays, real life got in the way, and I changed my mind four times in this post.

@Surtr Inc

I think it's been the case for a few of us here, me included - sorry for the lateness on my part. I will try and bang out another post soon.

Vivid Recollections: Into the World Unknown (Season 1 COMPLETE)

Hillview High - Mason Square
_{@Surtr Inc@Mike73@Atrophy@Majoras End@Fernstone[@Pretty much fucking everyone]}

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Relentless, the eldritch mass pressed on towards them. Nate felt his stomach lurch, his mind battling his body just to stop it from locking up, when he felt Paige's hand clasping against his, followed by a second against his other hand, then felt the weight of someone else tugging on that second hand's, forming a human daisy chain one by one. "Please work, please work," he mouthed, aware of the closing abomination which seemed unphased by anything they'd tried to throw at it, undeterred by the intensifying glow and heat from the smouldering interior of the building that Justin had managed to set alight.

A glance at either side showed just how many people had linked hands, arms - whatever it took to join themselves to him. Please work. It had to - it was only like the phasing he'd managed before, right? Like making sure his clothes phased with him, or the stuff in his pockets. Just... bigger clothes, bigger pockets. The tendrils were closing - he tugged at either side to signal he was closing with a solid surface, so the others would know to follow, then concentrated... and for a moment, the human daisy chained connected to Nate collectively felt the sensation of water rushing through their bodies, colour bleeding out of vision as they each sank into the wall, passing through like murky water.

Each step felt like he was carrying a weight of several times his own with them, in a sense - he'd never tried something so massive a scale before, he'd barely even got his head around his abstraction when this had all gone to shit. Nate's heart smashed against the interior of his chest, pounding with each movement, halfway out of the sheer chaos of the situation and halfway out of physical exertion, refusing to rest. Light spilled back into view, colours too as they emerged on the other side of a wall, some of the group still halfway across. He didn't dare break concentration for fear of leaving one of them behind, he just kept moving. "Don't stop, keep going..."

Another solid wall. Or was it a door? He didn't care - he led them through that, too, colour seeping away in the brief transitionary period between surfaces. It was behind them. The Glutton was still tailing them, ebbing forward at a steady but definitive pace. Was this the way out? He kept going, kept leading them. Silhouettes spilled into his view as they crossed between the planes and, just for a brief, fleeting moment in their escape, the others could see them too. Like the silhouette that had been stalking them outside John Reid's house, like the other silhouette that he'd briefly seen in the hallway - what had been a sight exclusive to him was shared among the rest.

If nothing else, they were the closest they'd get to the memories of the dead without joining them.

Vivid Recollections: Into the World Unknown (Season 1 COMPLETE)

Hillview High - Mason Square
_{@Surtr Inc@Mike73@Atrophy@Majoras End@Fernstone}

---

Shadows. A blade. More fighting that moved at a blur, too fast for Nate to follow, or perhaps it was the incomprehensible sight which followed that left him with a sense of disorientation. We should leave. It was a sentiment a few of them shared for real, with good reason - the shifting mass which had seeped out of the orb was taking on a form which seemed more human, in spite of it being anything but. That Rita got a lucky break when Kimberly brought her down was one thing, Claire's open challenge to it with the knife that had belonged to Reece pushed their luck too far and began forcing through the environment.

"Ancient bullshi-" he almost remarked, but in the heat of the moment quickly shut up and began focusing on walking out of this one alive, backing away from the fiasco as the writhing mass of shadows and oily black substance closed the distance between them. Nate felt the sensation of water and found the colour bleeding out of his vision for a just a few seconds, something sweeping at him from behind. One glance, one brief view of that shadow-tendril trailing after him was enough motivation to keep moving. Even though he was supposed to be untouchable, he knew that he'd felt something when it brushed clean through him, moreso noticable than the time he'd nearly got brained hiding behind the dumpster at Grand Ridge. Was this it? Was he fucked now?

Could he outrun it? He wasn't a runner - he wasn't a fighter, either, assuming any of them were even able to fight this thing. No, he rationalised, he'd have to take a shortcut. But where? What about the others? An almost suicidal thought came to mind - maybe it would work, but at the same time perhaps not. Right now, it seemed worth the risk. "Grab my fucking hand!" He blurted it out, gaze searching for the imminent exit route that hadn't been decided upon yet. Anywhere that didn't lead him towards this eldritch horror.

Vivid Recollections: Into the World Unknown (Season 1 COMPLETE)

I apologise for the radio silence, I'm in the process of moving addresses at the moment and haven't had the head for writing as before. Will be good soon.

Vivid Recollections: Into the World Unknown (Season 1 COMPLETE)

Hillview High - Mason Square
_{@Surtr Inc@Mike73@Atrophy@Majoras End@Fernstone}

---

There was a lot to take in, cult-shit or not - and if Britney was telling the truth, which in this case it really looked like it was, he had a whole lot more than hillbillies and writing on the wall to worry about. Someone - no, something? Some group? The Watchers, the League, wanted him dead, just because he was awakened? Because he had an abstraction? That he didn't even ask for, at that, even though he wasn't complaining about having one at this stage.

No time to process it came before Paige alerted them to the horror scene going on in the hallway.

Nate had been caught like a deer in headlights, paralysed by indecision until the reality settled in a few seconds later. Reese had killed someone else and was about to kill more of them - but what would running do? He'd just come after them again and more would die. But what kind of a fight could his fat-ass give him? He wasn't like Lynn or Penny or the others, he didn't have anything he could shoot or throw at them.

What he did have, though... Nate took a deep breath, set himself towards the right frame of mind, then stepped into the wall, colour and surroundings bleeding out of his vision as his hooded frame disappeared into the architecture. Like wading through water, he had to actively push against his environment - there had to be another room he'd hit soon, right? It didn't take long before colour started seeping back into place - his torch beam, no longer covered, revealed yet another empty classroom, a few desk still left standing but little else of use. He was sure they'd passed a janitor's closet on the way in here. Pivoting towards the door, he came at it running this time and slipped through like a curtain, this time back into the empty hallways. Further down, he could hear voices and the ongoing commotion - and picked up the pace, feeling his own heart slamming against his chest and his temple throbbing.

There was the sign! CUSTODIAL Testing the door revealed it was still locked, but with a renewed vigor, he rendered himself intangiable against the sealed entrance and passed through to the other side, his torchlight hastily dancing across the dusty interior the moment he had the opportunity to look around. Mostly empty again, but a few things - cleaning solutions, a half-rusted toolbox, a mop... and a janitorial cart. A stupid idea came to mind - Nate checked over his shoulder for a moment to check if he could unlock the door from within and found, to his luck, there was indeed a catch. Thank you anti-molestation features.

Rattling came from within the custodial closet, then the door burst open as Nate wheeled the cart out, now laden with all manner of tools and junk that had been haphazardly thrown on top. With all the strength in his legs, he pushed hard against the floor as he got a running start towards where the fighting was - where Reese was - which soon turned into a charge.

"Move, move!" He rasped, then at the top of his lungs found another sentence roaring from his mouth, "Tenno heika, banzai!"

A butchered pronuncination of the Imperial Japanese warcry learned from countless Rising Storm sessions - but one that was surely going to catch Reese's attention and buy the others some time, maybe. Nate kept on going, damned-well intent on ramming this thing into that asshole whilst he was still in one place. Just don't die.

Vivid Recollections: Into the World Unknown (Season 1 COMPLETE)

Hillview High - Mason Square

---

'Pandora's Box' had turned out to contain a collection of books from some place called... Glint? Taking a glance at the contents as a few of the others approached to inspect the discovery, he found the text was in a foreign language which could have been just as much a mess as Chinese for all he knew. Then, it occured to him - some it looked like it was Mandarin, yet the same time other languages had been thrown into the mix - letters and symbols which reminded him of Arabic, Hindi and whatever else came from that side of the world.

Further perplexing him, it became clear that Britney and Sharon knew way more than what they'd let on, especially in the former's case. She'd known about their abstractions and about all the other crazy shit that had happened so far, now Sharon had spilled both their guts out with more of the cryptic cult-talk. "Who's they?" Nate blurted aloud, "The voices in your head?" For a chance, he felt less like joking around on this one. "Seriously, what the fuck. You've been leading us along and telling us little pieces at a time, what are the Watchers and League that bug-girl here just let slip about?"