539/It's Always 3 AM...

It's Always 3 AM...
Date of Scene:	05 September 2014
Location:	The Secret World <TSW>
Synopsis:	The Orochi Group's Solomon Island science team asks for a group of brave souls to discover the source of what's mutating the local undead into hulking brutes. The truth is much worse than they initially feared.
Cast of Characters:	Kotone Yamakawa, Staren, 151, Riva Banari, Wuyin Tsai, 560
Tinyplot:	Dawning of an Endless Night

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Wuyin Tsai has posed:
                        IT'S ALWAYS 3 AM...

EARLIER TODAY
OROCHI CAMP, NORTHERN BRIDGE

The investigators find themselves at the Orochi encampment, picking up some 'misappropriated supplies' that the researchers there have definitely not deliberately set aside, no sir. The two actual scientists on-site are talking about something when they arrive.

"I'm familiar with that expression." Harrison Blake is looking over Ms. Radcliffe's shoulder, examining a tablet she has set on the hood of an SUV at the Orochi encampment. "It means the progress-versus-time graph for this operation..." He looks at her directly. "...is about to stop making us look good."

Ann looks down at the scrolling screen, frowning. "It's these abnormally deformed Condition 17s..." She looks up at him. "Can we just start calling them 'zombies,' sir?" That draws a Look from Blake. "The autopsy shows muscle mass still expanding... new neural activity... I'm trying to isolate the chemical reactions, but in a soundbyte:" She turns, finally regarding you all. "Zombies on PCP."

"Hmm." Blake looks thoughtful. He starts to pace, slowly. "Humor me for the sake of our field report. The Cond-" A brief pause. "The zombies. They are slabs of dead tissue. Ambulatory, cannibalistic, but dead. Inert." He stops, looking at Ann. "What's the stimulus?"

"My guess? An environmental trigger." She points to the tablet. "See how they've been concentrated around this northern island? ...We need to contain this mutation. We need to get out there --"

"Absolutely no field trips, Radcliffe." Blake cuts her off. "Safety first. We're just the science detail, and we're already closer than optimal survival distance to the occult epicenter on this one." He nods to the map, very slightly. "Leave /that/ to the redshirts."

Ann looks at him quizzically. "Did you just drop a Star Trek reference, sir?"

Blake's expression is bland and humorless. "Whatever gave you that idea?"

NOW
THE COAST NEAR PRIEST ISLAND

There is a sandbar that makes the nearby Priest Island accessible from the land without a boat. It's a shallow wade across, but it's low tide. It's been low tide for quite some time.

The twilight air carries the scents of saltwater and decaying fish. Across the sandbar, the beach is covered in rocks and flotsam, with what looks like a dinghy beached on the shore. There are a number of 'Condition 17s' milling about, though they seem to be clustered more towards the high, rocky cliffs that seem to dominate much of the island, especially near the openings that lead into them instead of the coast around them.

Those sensitive to things such as darkness and corruption may begin to get a Bad Feeling as soon as they set foot on the island. Wuyin, to his credit, does not charge ahead this time; he instead lets the group set its own pace.

Ainsley (151) has posed:
    Whatever the scientists were talking about, Ainsley was a bit clueless to it all but for the talk of zombies getting more powerful near the source of the disturbance. Eager to know what exactly is going on -- however she picked up this information, whether from allies chattering about it or hearing the scientists themselves -- she was ready to go toward the source of the problem without a moment to pause and think about it.

    This time she brought her longsword /and/ her enchanted daggers. Her affinity is set to Storm Magic, ready to start slicing up some monsters until such a time as her other skills are needed. But when they get to the sandbar, she does not rush ahead. While zombies and draugr are creepy and gross, she never felt like she couldn't outrun or outthink them. Now that they're at this coast, where undead have gathered in a strange manner, she feels less confident.

    Ainsley stares across the sand bar toward Priest Island. A frown dominates her features. Her eyes turn to gaze over the shallow, seemingly stagnant water. She knows it's ocean water, but somehow it gives her the impression that even the natural flow of a tide has rotted, here. Something that just makes her frown a lot stronger.

    "It smells like evil here," she remarks, without really realizing what she just said.

    She keeps an eye on any nearby undead groups, watching for any unusual activity. She doesn't want them to suddenly do something they aren't ready for. For all she knows they'll start gibbering and growing membraned wings and claws.

Emiya Shirou (560) has posed:
    "I never thought that dealing with some crises would mean zombies." Shirou sounds quite disheartened, really. Here's a buch of people who are beyond saving. All he can do here is put the living dead out of their misery, right?

    "From one undead curse to another." Slosh, slosh. He sets foot on the island and immediately fights the urge to retch.

    Shirou may be really bad as a magus, but he's extremely sensitive to disturbances like this. Even more so than some trained magi like Rin. "The air is....putrid... and grimy... like thick slime." The magus chokes out.

    But it's not the only thing he has to say. "Trace, on."

    This place feels DANGEROUS.

    Golden light fills Shirou's hand, and in a few seconds - as opposed to the elaborate procedure he used last time - an exact copy of Wuyin's Jian appears in his hand, all at once.

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva is present as well. Orochi may be really borderline, but they have resources other groups don't. Also, Ann and Blake don't seem that bad to her.

But Riva is a notoriously bad judge of character sometimes. But even so, she seems enthusiastic enough... Until she gets to the island. She stands there in the surf, her boots getting wet as she looks over the coast. She jitters a bit, looking nervous. Emiya and Ainsley give voice to whatever she's thinking. "So um... yeah. There's something different about this place..." She says, but her eyes rest upon the zombies in their way.

"But there's only one way to find out what's going on." While Wuyin is being uncharacteristically reticent, Riva pulls her guns. The Anima circuits upon the barrels flare as she begins channeling energy, and she points her guns in the air. There is a loud crack in the air, and a green salvo of energy slams down into the middle of the zombies like an artillery shell, spreading out rapidly into a seething green energy pool lit with hexagonal, honeycomblike patterns. The zombies will find themself unable to move for several critical moments while Riva launches forward, laying down gunfire. "PUNCH THROUGH!" She yells.

Staren has posed:
    Staren is /not/ in his heavy robot armor, but his powered body armor, a first for this world. At a glance, the body armor is slightly less bulky and a bit flatter and more simplistic in design. And of course, it has a white and sea-green color scheme instead of a red one.

Armor desc, skip if you know it:
It looks similar in style to Reploid armor, but a bit bulkier since it's worn rather than built in. Curved plating, consisting of white helmet, breastplate, gauntlets, codpiece, and tall boots, combined with slightly thinner, sea-green armor on the upper arms, upper legs, and belly to allow mobility. Five small crystalline discs on the front of the chestplate serve as forcefield emitters, and a noticeable but not quite bulky enough to interfere with movement 'backpack' unit holds the armor's power source and has clips that hold some kind of scoped rifle. A pistol and a slim cylindrical device are holstered in clips on the side of the armor. The helmet has a transparent, pale blue visor. Pointed protrusions in the helmet allow room for his ears, and his tail is covered in armored segments. There is a rectangular, flat blocky bulge behind each shoulder to the sides of the backpack, and the dual particle beam cannons appear as a pair of cylindrical bulges on the sides of the right forearm near the wrist. Last but not least, of course, hanging at Staren's side is his trusty messenger bag of holding -- for combat, it's inside an armored cover and secured to his side by clips on the armor.
/Armor desc

    "Evil smells like low tide." Staren replies to Ainsley, as he flies along just above the water, translucent orange stylized insectile energy wings buzzing behind his shoulders. Shirou gets a shrug. "We have a zombie crisis once a year or so. Yunomi's dad is actually an anti-zombie specialist." Staren points out.

    Once they reach the island, Riva draws aggro. "Woah, hey, warn us before you do that!" He thrusts out his right arm and blasts zombies with one of the forearm particle beam cannons, trying to keep them from getting surrounded as they make their way to-- where, exactly, are they going, anyway?

Wuyin Tsai has posed:
Wuyin's reticence is perhaps because of his recent experience getting completely murdered the last time he went first. He'll be fine in a few days. He brings up the rear, watching up and down the coast as they progress across the sandbar. It is entirely likely that he is making sure the draug don't come up behind them.

Ainsley spots the first of several groups of the undead on the shore. There are three or four in each group, and each of them look... well, /mostly/ normal. Their profile is a little off, though, like they're slightly lopsided. It isn't consistent on all of them.

Shirou sees something on the beach. It looks like... canisters? They're silver, marked in black with the eight-segmented Orochi Group logo. It looks like they're scattered near the dinghy, and trail up the shore to the left.

Riva starts the party, insofar as this is a party. The standing dead get frozen in place, seeming to quiver with potential energy. The hail of gunfire rips into them, and they rock and groan and hiss, puncture wounds sprouting all along their rotted bodies. As soon as the hindering power vanishes, they rush forward in a(n un)dead sprint, closing on Riva much faster than the ones on the land did, arms swinging and mouths wide!

Staren keeps them from closing in on the wings, though -- and while Riva is busy with the group she aggro'd, Staren spots the ones nearby rising up from the ground, lifting their bodies and staggering closer. Once they get their legs underneath them, they move almost as fast as the others do.

The path is something of a fork. The shore winds left and right around the exterior of the island, and straight ahead goes into the interior instead, where high walls of stone make passages that twist out of sight. Once this group of undead are dealt with, it'll be easy to make /some/ progress in any direction.

Ainsley (151) has posed:
    Ainsley's eyes widen when Riva immediately draws the attention and aggression of the undead over yonder. She draws both of her daggers from their scabbards, twirling them on her palms with a few electrical sparks, the flourish more than just showing off. She rushes on by Riva when they come at her, and she tries to weave under one of the zombie arms... then does a quick jab into the joint of its shoulder with the dagger, and then another comes in a brutal upwards stabbing motion for the underside of its jaw, both motions demonstrating a peculiar awareness of the movements of her target. She's not able to avoid getting hit perfectly.
    The reason for the electrical sparks becomes evident from the spray of electricity projected through the daggers. She hopes to follow up with as many of the charging undead as possible, hoping to cook their nerves or disable them long enough for the others to finish them off. However, because she charged into the fray, she gets clawed by a few eager undead swipes that just overwhelm her ability to dodge, resulting in ugly claw marks on her scales and tears in her robes, strikes that get growls and hisses out of her that are distinctly animal-like in tone. One noise she makes is just incomprehensible, a yapping shriek that is accompanied with a retaliatory agile kick to the face.

Emiya Shirou (560) has posed:
    Shirou spots the canisters alright, but he doesn't know what the heck they are. But he does recognize the insignia from a few reports on this incident. It's something to ask the natives about!

    "Oi, Wuyin! What're those doing here?!"

    He gestures wildly at the canisters, then... places himself in the way of the zombies Riva's aggroed. Not entirely certain if she can handle them if they close.

    But the reek. And thinking of fighting something humanoid that's a person he should've saved - however impossible that is - fills him with the urge to vomit.

    But these sorry wretches are beyond saving... "Gyaaahhh!!"

    So he'll swing that sword, and cut some of them down, and distract them - to give Riva time to shine!

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa has been keepinbg to the group she never leaves the group, not here. Oh hell no not here, she wishes honestly she could dragoon a SHIV for working here. A Shive would be wonderful honestly. SO here she was with the rest of the group her battle rifle was ready but she's been more and more thinking about weaponry grom her own world might be more adpet for her as solid as the battle rifle was.

She's got reaper rounds loaded she's also got grenades. Where is she getting this hardware anyway?

"You don't need to have magic powers to know this place wrong."

She looks at Shirou and looks him over.

"I didn't think the undead were possible...once. I miss when I was safe behind a movie screen from them."

She keeps a wary eye on Staren for a mment. She brings up her rifle and snaps off a few shots and then move to follow.

"They are already dead! The Ghost is gone!"

Staren has posed:
    "They're /rising out of the ground!/" Staren shouts. His left hand draws and activates his plasma saber, and he air-dashes down to the newly-rising dead, saber glowing white with holy element as he slashes the draugr... only to look startled when the energy 'blade' doesn't cut it in two right away. Why did he think that would work?? The zombie may get a chance to attack him -- Staren blocks and then blasts it point-blank in the gut to fell it. "There's too many! We gotta move! Run ahead, I'll distract these!"

    Staren takes flight again, holstering his beam saber and beelining for the cannisters, drawing two items out of his bag -- a spraycan, and a plastic zip-lock type bag. He sprays one of the canisters, then drops it in the specimin bag, and then stuffs it all back in his bag of holding. "Hey zombies! Come get me!" He stands there, shooting with the particle cannons until they're getting dangerously close -- then he takes to the air, whips the rifle off his back, and fires a grenade down at the group before speeding back towards the party.

Riva Banari has posed:
AAAAH FAST ZOMBIES! Riva is immediately swarmed under, though Staren takes one flank. "HOLY FAST!" is all Riva can yell before she's swarmed. Suddenly she's surrounded by zombies, all of them trying to get a piece (or brain). Riva moves, those with Anima sensing the ebb and flow of her power as various small trinkets and talismans on her uniform subtly shift the flow of battle, keeping her from just getting overrun like a normal human might. She begins slipping between them, another attack glances when it should have been a solid strike. A third hits her and finds she is more resilient than expected.

All in all, she's not getting murdered instantly, this is a bonus.

Unfortunately, she's DPS, not a tank. She's shooting the zombies as fast as she can but she's taking damage in return. Wounds are opening up all over, as well as some nasty bruises. "SORRY STAREN!" Riva yells while getting mobbed. "I'LL WARN YOU NEXT TIME!" Because there's going to be a next time. It's going to happen.

Shirou suddenly begins tanking for her, and Riva blinks in surprise. "Watch out!" She yells to Emiya. Of course, she's not familiar with what he can do. She blinks as she realizes he manifested a sword back there. "Whoa, that's how your power works? THAT'S AWESOME!" She yells, still shooting as fast as she can push Anima through her guns. Kotone's explanation causes her to yell, "What do you mean ghosts!? These are zombies!" Maybe she doesn't get it.

Wuyin Tsai has posed:
Cooking the undead seems to work pretty well. Ainsley's electricity burns /something/ up; one of them gurgles, and an acrid smoke of some kind escapes from sunken, burning eye sockets as it collapses to the ground. Destroying the brain /seems/ to work... mostly.

"I have no idea!" No draug are behind them, so Wuyin is helping keep the wings safe, flinging Anima-fueled bolts of fire and jumping tines of lightning into the mob of the undead. "I imagine Orochi sent someone to inspect the island, maybe take samples of whatever they found?" Shirou's copy of Wuyin's sword seems to work pretty well; it's a good thing he's with the group, though, because these are taking a lot of punishment to really kill.

Between Kotone's heavy-caliber rounds and Riva's Anima shots, the cluster is thinning from 'impromptu throng' to 'lots of zombies.' They're more spaced out, less clustered, but only for a few breaths before they actually close in in another mad rush. Staren being flashy and loud gets most of their attention diverted, though, and he quickly becomes the focus of their surprising fury.

The explosion, moments later, echoes down the beach and out into the water. Hopefully, nobody was caught in it. The group is basically destroyed or scattered, with a few mutilated corpses still trying to drag themselves up the beach. The immediate area is clear, though...

Riva Banari has posed:
And then Staren makes use of high grade awesometech to blow up lots of zombies and buy them an opening. "Well..." Riva says, looking around. "That opens things up. Can we grab some more of those canisters? Maybe we can find out what u with them. Also, we should move in closer to the center of the island while the zombies are busy crawling in." She thumbs at the mostly maimed dead dudes. "Something was off about them. They were a lot nastier than the ones in Kingsmouth... And we need to find out why."

Ainsley (151) has posed:
    The undead are destroyed but only after a great deal of effort on everyone involved. Ainsley is huffing from the exhaustion, her feathers puffed out in obvious agitation much like a bird. She carefully steps around some of the remaining nearly-intact corpses, frowning at them pointedly, knowing that some of these things are known for getting back up while no one is looking.

    "I'll float on ahead. I want someone to follow right after. With any luck they won't notice me if I don't make too much noise, I can probably get the drop on any larger threats," she says over to Riva, with a weak smile on her face. She looks over at Shirou, who had eagerly lept into the fray. She points at him. "You should make a good combat partner. Let's go." She beckons, and then begins to hover a few inches off the ground, gliding on ahead with both daggers in her hands.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa is being able to keep up the shot, she's however forced to reload as she moves with the group and notices the explosion. She swiins her rifle to pump rounds into the corpses trying to get up.

"The dead should remain in their graves..."

She looks to Riva for a moment and she nods about grabbing the canisters.

"We should not open them here as Staren wisely said."

Staren has posed:
    Riva wants more cannisters? Okay. Staren flies back, and collects some more, repeating the process, though he puts 2 or 3 to a bag now. <<Do you want to follow the trail of these,>> he points down the beach, <<Or follow the path, Riva?>> Staren radios.

Emiya Shirou (560) has posed:
    The Jian does indeed hold up pretty well. But after about seven good slashes that meet bone... Moments after severing an arm, the Jian shatters. It's no ordinary shatter, either. The weapon breaks into tiny pieces and golden sparkles, fading out quickly.

    Shirou recovers quickly however, rolling back to avoid a swipe and scrambling across the beach. When he comes back up...

    Fssssh-CLANG!

    With another flash of golden light, he's now wielding the Uchigatana. A weapon far more dedicated to the almighty, debilitating slash. "Huap!"

    The lengthy curved blade serves him well to fend off several more zombies. his style has INSTANTLY shifted to some kind of kenjutsu, and the Uchigatana seems preternaturally disposed towards beheading these things!

    But then... BOOOM!

    Staren draws most of the aggro, and Riva's clear of the mess. Mostly. Phew.

    "... If you're sure. We shouldn't split up too much!" He protests lightly, but he isn't willing to let Ainsley go off on her own either. So he folows along with her... trying not to make too much noise.

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva thinks for a moment. <<We should follow the path. Our main reason to be here is deeper into he island, and if we get too focused on the canisters we're going to just waste our time with these crazy zombies.>> She points forwards, through the more rough areas ahead. "Let's stick together. Shirou's right, this is a bad place to get caught alone." Riva follows after Ainsley and Shirou as they head ferther into the island.

Wuyin Tsai has posed:
Collecting canisters is easy. Some feel full, while others feel light, like they're empty or containing only small amounts of something. Some slosh, and some rattle. They're varied.

The path ahead is more like an opening in the rock. It's a good ten feet wide, twisting right and then sharply left, an opening that leads into a much wider area. The bigger space looks like a sort of lagoon, with a shallow, gravel-bottomed body of water taking up most of the center of it. It's maybe a foot and a half deep, with little streams leading off into another path on the far side and a narrow 'shore' that goes all the way around the exterior of it.

There's a small island in the center, maybe ten feet wide, occupied by a massive 'Specimen 17': a hulking thing, made of enormous slabs of dense muscle, crouched over a depression filled with what looks like some sort of black liquid. From here it resembles oil, and a little spout of it fountains up a foot or two from the tiny pool, with thin black mist drifting up from it like watery spray and disappearing into the air.

The feeling of wrongness is especially strong here. Three guesses where it's coming from, and two of them don't count.

Emiya Shirou (560) has posed:
    "That's..." Shirou clenches his teeth upon sighting the distant hulking monstrosity. He brings the Uchigatana up defensively in case the super zombie flips out or something, like the others have done already.

    "Is it really that simple? Just take down that big one?" He's eying the black mist and muddy goo VERY warily. His instincts are saying stay away from it. Even though he's -somewhat- resistant to magic compared to a normal human as long as he has energy to spare running through him... that stuff looks bad.

    "No, it's that goop and mist. Like a miasma!"

Staren has posed:
    Staren rejoins the party after collecting cannisters. And so, he's confronted with the big bad zombie boss. "Maybe it's not /just/ that simple, but I think taking down the big one will be a thing we have to do." Staren readies his laser rifle, and the shoulder rocket packs raise into position should he need them. And then... he'll assist the party, whatever they do, but his player has to step away for awhile.

Ainsley (151) has posed:
    That is a completely odd sight to find in the middle of this island.

    Ainsley stares at the huge zombie (Tank?) that lurks there in the middle of a veritable arena in the middle of Priest Island. The black ooze there gets her attention, though. It reminds her of something native to her home, though it is not completely similar. "Shades...?" she wonders... and then she looks at the zombie properly. And frowns heavily at the sight.

    "The Draugr were coming from a different direction... and that's not a draugr." Immediately she realizes that this is yet another threat. She looks around, and sees no mist coming directly from it. This is about when several pieces fall into place in her mind, though not perfectly, and she realizes how big this problem actually is.

    "This is a much bigger problem than it first appears," she remarks, before getting into position to blast the zombie with lightning, with charge echoing up and down her form as crackling arcs. One of her hands lifts, pointing two fingers at the tremendous smelly monster.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa is keeping moving now the rifle is ready as they go, she also gets she's a better choice to grab any canisters she's the least combat able of the people here. She keeps moving and she really does not like it here. She does not like it here she stares at the hulking thing she tries to bring u0p her gun but she freezes up for a second staring in horror.

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva moves with the others, following the group. Her skin crawls as they head into the large rocky valley. You can see her shudder. "This is getting messed up." She peeks around the corner, and gasps as she sees the huge monstrosity. "Holy cow.... Zombies on PCP was right!" She hisses, before she flumps back out of sight.

There's a few more seconds before she peeks again. "Is it gone? Tell me it's gone-NO IT IS NOT GONE." She pulls back again, thinking. "Um... So you think that goop is doing it? So how do we get the huge thing out of the way so we can look at it without getting murdered by the horrible lovechild of a zombie and /The Incredible Hulk/?"

Ainsley (151) has posed:
    Being someone working on her tactical skills, Ainsley turns to look at Riva, and tells her:

    "We kill it. With extreme prejudice. Hopefully it dies before it manages to crush one of our spines."

Riva Banari has posed:
"Good plan. So uh... Anyone got artillery?" Riva says. "I've got tricks, but nothing that huge! It's not like I carry a rocket launcher!"

Wuyin Tsai has posed:
Staren, apparently taking Ainsley's advice to heart, uses a half-dozen of his micro-missiles. They sail off into the middle of the lagoon, airbursting in a glorious conflagration of murderous plasma. The island is way smaller than the 30' sphere that usually turns into ash in the wake of the chained blasts, and it's completely consumed. Water boils and vaporizes, a cloud hissing up into the air and leaving a curtain of steam for a few long moments.

It cools down, and the water settles. The smoke and steam clears, and there is no Zombie Hulk, nor any island. The spout, however, didn't go away... and now it's at water level, leaking out into the lagoon as the spout starts to spit intermittently. Something might've fallen into it. Maybe it can be blocked conventionally? Then again, you'd have to get close, and now it's leaking into the lagoon...

The waters start to take on an inky hue. It gradually spreads, clouds roiling out into the previously-clean waters.

Riva Banari has posed:
And then Staren proves that he is the one who brings the artillery. There is na unholy conflagaration as Riva take cover, yelling in shock as everything explodes.

Eventually, she peeks out from around the corner. "Whoa." she whispers. "Um... Okay. We need to stop that stuff! We have to stop it before it spreads out into the ocean! We don't need all of those zombies getting affected by that stuff!"

She pauses. "What /is/ that stuff!?"

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa stares in abject horror as STaren blows up most of the island and now the horrible thing is spreading out into the previous uninfected water she looks at Staren with this what the hell are you doing face she just freaking stares at him.

"...Bad freaking news I and know jack shit about magic! Wait those rocks! We can try to cap it come on it's better than nothing."

Kotone's shoudlers her rifle and aims to get to work on trying this even augmented she might need a bit of a hand here.

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva moves to help Kotone, not having a better idea at the moment. Maybe someone else has something that might be a better fit if this doesn't work out.

Wuyin Tsai has posed:
While Kotone goes to get a big ol' rock, Wuyin brings up the rear again. "All clear; no draug behind us." He sticks his head out, looking at the ruin where the island and the dark font used to be. He suddenly sways on his feet suddenly, his mouth working, but no sound coming out.

When it does, the odd intonation and strange cadence is familiar... but it isn't him. "Our wisdom flows so sweet," he whispers. "Taste and see."

"TRANSMIT - initiate cephalopod signal - RECEIVE - innate cutle-ink frequency - HANDLE WITH CARE - inhale the Chernobyl syntax - AVOID CONTACT WITH SKIN - initiate the eel mucous lexicon - HARMFUL OR FATAL IF SWALLOWED - flip the Ace of Ruin - WITNESS -" He stops, staring forward, at the spreading blackness. "The Filth."

"Initiate investigation protocols - NEW ENGLAND - fog follows on ancient weapon - EGYPT - Dark Water rises and cultists drink deep - TRANSYLVANIA - putrescent radiation breeds creeping fungus - TOKYO - the Black Signal broadcasts blasphemous algorithms, infecting all ears - following the signal..."

His voice gives out. Wuyin turns, drops to his knees, and begins retching into the dirt.

Emiya Shirou (560) has posed:
    "Trace, on...!" While Staren Demolishes the island, Emiya SHirou has infinite time in his mind to focus on Ainsley's daggers as requested. He's not sure if she's really right about that, but enchanted daggers are something he's not tried anymore. They might be useful!

    In the span of time it takes for those missiles to seek the Huge Zombie, Shirou forms a blueprint in his mind. A pair of vicious daggers from the ancient, primal world, bearing the blood of nimble and speedy creatures. Weapons made to hunt and slay.

    Golden light flickers and burns from his hands, rapidly congealing from tiny dust-like motes into a wireframe and filling in like a structure made of sand. The weapons gain texture and continue gaining more and more substance by the second, as they fill in from within and more layers of the illusion are skillfully combined. At the end, there's another fsssh-CLANG and the glow fades, leaving copies of Ainsley's daggers in Shirou's grasp.

    THen KAABOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

    The EPA is not gonna be happy about this.

    Shirou frowns. ".... How do we stop that? How toxic is it? Can we even get near?! ... And how do we plug that up or cleanse it..." He stares at Kotone. Her body is mostly mechanical... "... Hm..."

Emiya Shirou (560) has posed:
    "Wuyin?!" Shirou runs over to the fallen warrior but halts when he starts spewing his stomach onto the ground. Urgh. But his words have burned into Shirou's skull.

    ... And in a strange moment of curiosity and desperation, he tosses his dropped Uchigatana into the murk where the goop's spreading. What does it do to metal?

Staren has posed:
    Staren alpha strikes! Well. It's not a true alpha strike, he still has micromissiles left. But those were all of the big, powerful missiles he's carrying, except for the experimental protoabstractum missile that will make a boom of unknown size when he finally tests it.

    And the island is vaporized. Staren's grin turns to surprise, and then he notices the inkyness spreading through the water. "Uh... whoops?" He rubs the back of his helmet with a sheepish grin.

    After a moment's thought, he pulls another spraycan from his bag and just holds it for a moment, working on his head computer. Then he shrugs, "Well, here goes nothing..." The missile packs rotate back down, and Staren flies over the water, spraying around the perimeter of the spreading blackness with his dinky little spraycan. Alas, he's being optimistic: At best, the nanites might slow the spread down but there's no way they can keep up.

    Then Staren pulls out one of his own specimen containers and scoops up some blackness, carefully spraying it clean, bagging it, and sealing it before he returns to shore.

Staren has posed:
    Then Staren notices Wuyin is throwing up. "Ummm... are you okay?" He approaches and crouches slightly, concerned but not actually able to tell anything just from /looking/ at Wuyin.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa is pishing on the rock she listen and her blood for lack of a bette term runs cold. She keeps pushing trying to seal it. She is scared she's very much scared.

"We need to plug it! I don't think anything short of God all mighty burning things to the bedrock like Sodom and Gramora is going to work."

She keeps working as best she can hoping the rock will do something.

Wuyin Tsai has posed:
Pushing the rock into the water isn't gonna do it. Kotone's going to have to heft and throw (and aim correctly!), or she's going to have to get multiple smaller ones -- unless she wants to wade through the darkening lagoon.

Wuyin props himself up with one fist against the ground and another hand against the rock wall next to him. He's breathing heavily and broken out into a sweat. At first glance, he looks positively feverish, which... is not something that he has pretty much ever looked, honestly. "....b-be... fine... 'n a minu..." He wobbles again, but catches himself before he can fall.

The nanites seem to be holding back the flow, at least at the moment. It gives Staren time to get a sample. It seems clean, too; the exterior, that is, and it isn't eating through it.

The Uchigatana sinks into the water. The black stuff flows over it, slowly coating it like oil or paint, even beneath the water. It just sort of... sticks to it. It doesn't corrode it, or do anything unusual to it, at least not immediately. It's kind of growing across it. Yeah... 'growing' feels like the best word for this.

Emiya Shirou (560) has posed:
    "..." Shirou doesn't seem too worried with Wuyin saying that, but there's this lingering feeling. nothing good can come from so much as SEEING that black goop. But...

    It doesn't seem to be corrosive. At least, not to phantasms and steel. "....Can we even safely get close...!? ... Or neutralize the flow. It's flowing from somewhere.. but where?! It's just bubbling out of the earth.. like pus from a wound... if this spreads everywhere..." He doesn't finish that. The stammered speech of his is full of worry and frustration. He feels powerless to halt this.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa takes a deep breath she's gong to move to heft the boulder she doesn't want to drag it.

"I'm going to have to toss this, I hope to God this can work unless you got an idea."

At the last bit of Shirou's words she shoots Staren a look. Their relationship is very rockey and this ... its not helping it even if it's not turly Staren's fault entirely. She's at least not screaming. She's going to put eveyrthing she has into trying to heft the rock properly and throw it to plug the hole, also it's clear from the sounds her body is making she's straining it hard.

Staren has posed:
    Staren nods to Wuyin, and turns to consider the inky spread from the shore. He ducks under the water to look and see that it's not just spreading on the surface. Damn. He doesn't want this stuff growing inside his suit...

Wuyin Tsai has posed:
The rock goes up, up, up... and then down. There's a SPLOOSH as it hits the surface of the water, causing a splash that sprays across the lagoon. People better not get too close; that black stuff does not look good.

It settles on the spout in the water. The black cloud spreads a little more... and then keeps spreading, but thinly, like the source wasn't feeding it anymore. The lagoon is still tainted, but it looks like the spout is closed up.

The feeling of things being Wrong lessens slightly. The lack of exposure to the air and water seems to have diminished its influence. The pressure must not be great enough to push it out from under the boulder.

The problem is, that's /lessened/. It didn't go wholly away... and this is only maybe a quarter of the way towards the center of the island.

Wuyin finally gets back up. He looks a little green around the gills, but otherwise fine. "I think the whole island is the wound," he says, voice dry. "There must be a bigger source somewhere. I am not sure we are properly prepared to handle it."

Staren has posed:
    Once the flow slows, Staren cheers. "Nice shot!" he flies back over and empties the rest of the spraycan -- he already used most of it though. Still, with the spout stopped up, maybe the nanomachines can do a better job of eating the mysterious... whatever it is.

    Staren lands back on the shore. "Like... there might be a great, underground... magma vein of this stuff, waiting to explode in a black inky volcano? How would we even stop something like that?" Staren scratches the chin of his helmet absentmindedly.

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva herself is shaking by the time Kotone evokes her Super Robot Strength, and she staggers back to the rocks next to Wuyin, poking him. "Ugh, whatever this is, it sucks just to be near it. It just feels... Dirty. Nasty." She seems to be looking for the right word for it. "Thank God we have these guys here." She looks over at the others, and claps, growing more animated as it seems to work. "Just relax guys, keep calm. It looks like we can still do something about it. We just have to think outside the box a little. Good work, Kotone!"

She sighs, then. "We might need something more solid to deal with it if there's a bigger source, though..." She shakes her head. "Maybe we can siphon it off into a containment unit?"

Emiya Shirou (560) has posed:
    "Th-the whole island?!" Keep calm, says Riva. SHirou's not freaking out, but he sure is blurting stuff. How RIDICULOUS is this? A whole island, some kind of festering wound? "... No, we definitely don't have something to deal with that! ... Hrmngh. There might be more of these leaks though. Do you think plugging them might buy us time to fix the bigger problem?"

Wuyin Tsai has posed:
"Priest Island, yes. It feels like the... the Earth is injured. I do not know how else to explain it." Wu frowns at Riva and her poking hand. "I imagine we will get used to it. Maybe this is what they were talking about when they called us the... anti-body."

He looks at Staren. "I... don't think it is quite like that. It does not feel like it obeys the rules like that. Stopping more of them might help, though," he says, in agreement with Shirou. "It would at least prevent more of these... zombie hulks." Wuyin is pretty glad Staren vaporized it, all things considered.

Riva Banari has posed:
Riva thinks for a moment, and nods. "Every little bit helps, right? If we slow it down, we buy more time." Maybe she has a more optimistic view of the situation than Wuyin. "And I, for one, am really happy we didn't have to deal with that thing smashing our faces in. Stopping more of them from appearing would be a great plan. I am totally in favor."

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa swear as one of her arms hangs limply at her side it seems Kotone over die it with how big that rock was, it was a bit much for her and she looks to see things are lessoned now but she wonders just about what theya re going to have to deal with in the future. "I think I over did it ... I'm going to need ... some help or hopefully my body's micromachines can handle it...yes zombie tanks would be a bad thing. Well more of them."

Staren has posed:
    Staren nods. "Maybe Inga can do some kind of... purification rituals? I got a sample of the stuff for study, anyway."

Emiya Shirou (560) has posed:
    "Anti-Body?" Shirou mumbles... things are starting to make a little sense. Kind of. "Next time let's try not to blow up the ground the leak's on then! That didn't help much."

Riva Banari has posed:
"It kind of ended up a wash, really. We didn't have to deal with the giant zombie hulk thing this way." Riva waves a hand. "Anyway, let's go get this information back to HQ and maybe Staren can help come up with a way to contain any other leaks like this."