DGS4 Phase 2-3 -- The Bunker

[The Man in Red]

Persons Present:
Rebecca Chambers
Sherlock Holmes
Wunya
Stitch
4 generic Carnivale employees

The scorched traces in the snow lead on unerringly to the west. Under normal circumstances it would have been as good as blindly trudging aimlessly, with nothing to speak for in regards to any kind of landmarks. The melted snow and ice, and the still occasionally crackling wires and cabling, though...they were as good a trail as any to follow.

Time was still hard to really gauge, but in what was probably short order the motley group stumbled upon what looked almost like a bunker, right near the edge of a stark, sheer cliffside. Built from stone, reinforced and banded at each corner with metal, and a sturdy metallic roof. It looked built to withstand the weather, if nothing else. It bore no windows of any kind, but trudging around its perimeter there was a recessed doorway, down a few steps, on its southern side. Enough finagling around and trying to get it open eventually lead the access card from the comms tower doing the trick, a card reader next to the door accepting it with a soft chime, its attached screen shifting from a sad frowning tragedy mask to a leering, grinning comedy mask as the doors slid open.

Heat immediately poured out of the doorway, seeming positively scorching after the blizzard outside. It was mercifully, thankfully, heated inside. Lights flickered to life as the group quickly hurried inside, and the doors slid closed again behind them with a metallic hissing. Inside of the bunker it was...eerily calm. Even the sound of the weather outside seemed muted and distant. A faint, unpleasant odor hung over the bunker's insides, like burning plastic and electronics mingling with the sharp coppery smell of blood, and something...else. Sickly, sour, pungent, pervading every nook and cranny, but with no evident source. Like that one bit of rotten food somewhere in a room stinking up the whole place.

At least two dozen lockers line one wall. Several of them stood ajar, but many more were still shut and locked. There was a first aid kit at the end if said wall, though it stood open and almost entirely empty, save for a few scattered bandages. Opposite the lockers there was a bank of various computers, consoles and monitors. Some of them had been smashed and ruined like the one at the comms tower, but most still seemed at least functional. A security cabinet, looking to have formerly held an assortment of weapons, now hung open and empty of all its contents save for a battered shotgun, though any ammunition was nowhere to be seen.

There was a section of the bunker sectioned off, containing a few minimalistic sleeping quarters. Some enclosed bunks and footlockers for personal belongings, though the entire area was in disarray, at least two bunks torn to shreds and spattered with blood.

The last thing of note in the room was...another electronically locked door, currently wedged wide open by the mangled remains of some kind of robot. Jammed into its head, still crackling and sparking with clearly vastly overclocked voltage, was...a stun baton. A messily scrawled note had note had been hastily stapled to the wall nearby the doors, reading only THE CONTROL MODULES FRY EASY WITH A GOOD ZAP - EMMY.

 

[Mollymauk Tealeaf]

There was a bit of a disagreement taking place between Wunya and the Sniper, Colonel Moran. The former pulled her aside, away from earshot of those being discussed as Doctor Chambers followed and Stitch still attached to the tall half-orc via baby carrier. The four seemingly hapless and cowardly Carnivale Employees left to listen to Holmes think through his deductions about all they had found here in the bunker.

“I must be honest, Wunya…I do not necessarily care if they hear me. They are liabilities, at the very least. If they continue with us like YOU insist, their blood is on YOUR hands. I wash mine of this whole decision,” Sebastian said, pulling down her red woolen sleeves and pressing imaginary wrinkles off her coat, she cleared her throat and looked to the Doctor she was charged with keeping alive. “Onward, then?”

The Coach leaned back on her heels a bit, chin lifted high and arms crossed over Stitches’ head, who started squirming in earnest, reaching out for his bag of supplies on the ground and he was promptly unclipped absent-mindedly from her chest.

“I do not like this. You take charge of me? Demand I leave little weaklings in this thing? No. We rest. Eat. Stay with employees of Carnivale. Little blue Champion of Chaos’ belly rumbles so hard it shakes my bones,” Wunya said, glaring down at the formidable Colonel, who seemed unconcerned with being towered over.

“Well, let’s ask the Doctor, shall we?” Replied Moran, staring casually up at the Coach with a cursory glance before moving her eyes to Rebecca. The Scientist was fidgeting with a terminal again, something she had been doing between checking over the Carnivale Employees for frostbite and scavenging supplies in between discussions.

“Huh? Right. Um, well…it seems like this is only going to get more and more dangerous based on everything we have uncovered so far, and with so many moving parts…” The Scientist trailed off as she rubbed at her temples, staring at the monitor's backlit screen. She gave a heavy sigh and played with the keyboard again before scratching at her head. She was pulled out of her own mind by a tugging at her pant leg and she looked down to see Experiment 626 staring up blankly at her with his large orbs, looking like two pockets of deep space.

Glancing around, all eyes were on her and she straightened up, taking charge of herself, forcing through whatever turmoil was bubbling under the surface.

“Doctor lie down?” Asked the Blue insectoid fuzzball at her knees.

“It's fine,” she replied sharply, then her expression softened as Stitch narrowed his gaze and pulled out an MRE that he slowly ripped the packaging off of, staring hard. “Sorry, Stitch. Thank you, I'm fine, though…I agree with Colonel Moran. We need to keep moving, I need to keep moving, THAT’S the key to keeping everyone alive. THAT’S what will save the most lives, and I won't endanger Cecil, Leo, Nancy, or Ned in the process,” Rebecca said, exasperated.

“Who?”

“Who are these people you mention?”

Both Stitch and Wunya replied at the same time before Rebecca put her hands back to her temples and rubbed in earnest.

“They are the ‘weaklings’ you seem to care so much about…right, shall we be off then, Doctor Chambers. Time does seem to be of the essence,” Moran stated flatly, moving towards the door leading further on, into the unknown.

“In a moment, Colonel,” Rebecca nodded and turned to Wunya and Stitch, now standing side by side as Stitch offered the not-so-jolly green giantess an MRE with a free hand, as his other three blue paws worked to shovel food from his own into his wide and open mouth. “You two can have the shotgun…Thank you, by the way, for everything”, she offered. Her attention immediately went back to the backlit screen as she continued to play around on the terminal, typing fast and clicking through things, intermittently sighing in frustration.

Experiment 626 and Coach Wunya both gave a nod back to her. When the two caught the eye of the Sniper, The Colonel gave a smug wink, and snapped her fingers towards Holmes before pointing towards the sounds of keyboard keys being finger-punched. For his part, the Detective scrambled to attention and came rushing over to help Rebecca.

As Colonel Sebastian Moran leaned back against the door waiting, Stitch stuck out his large, bobbing, and dripping tongue in her direction as Wunya gave a low growl and a huff. They both looked over to the bunks with the four remaining Carnivale Employees, then up and down at one another, respectively, and gave shrugs.

“Allies for now in this thing?” Wunya asked, covering her mouth in a polite manner while chewing.

“Allies for now,” Stitch replied, bits of the MRE spilling out from his maw.

Splitting the party:
Party 1- Wunya, Stitch, 4 CR Employees
Party 2- Rebecca (Moran), Holmes
Party 1 Action- Straight-up chillin’ in the bunker (Stitch replying soon)
Inventory - Survival Gear, Battered Shotgun
Focus- 3/3

 

[Rebecca Chambers]

Rebecca sat heavily in front of a computer terminal, her head throbbing and the pale skin of one arm itching terribly beneath her sleeve. The brightness of the screen was almost painful, making the words appear blurry and hard to read. She tried to blink away the discomfort, but that course of action only brought a wave of sharp, stomach-churning nausea with it, nothing like the relief she sought.

Beside her, Holmes was murmuring about the possible implications of the data they were finding, but the utter pounding inside her poor, aching skull made it nearly impossible to concentrate on just what he was on about. It was all Rebecca could do to remain focused on the task at hand and not slump over in her seat. The remains of a few torn MRE packages rested between them, but she'd only felt inclined to pick at hers, though she'd choked down enough sawdust-like peanut butter and stale crackers to last her a lifetime, she thought.

She swallowed hard, her throat parched, an uncomfortable dry and scratchy feeling sitting at the back of her tongue—like her mouth was filled with sand. And that wasn't just because of the godawful peanut butter-y substance. She needed water, for sure, but she'd already completely drained one of the water bottles from the survival gear the Carnivale Rosa had deigned to give her. Rebecca was... hesitant to drink any more, mainly for fear of not finding any clean water in the near future.

The medic glanced down at her forearm, the pads of her fingers idly rubbing over a faint, red-tinged patch she had created from scratching. She'd forced herself to stop picking at it, but the impulse was still there, regardless—gnawing at her, making her want to practically claw her own skin off with her short, blunt fingernails.

A feverish, uncomfortably warm feeling gathered at her temples, and a sudden dread seized Rebecca's heart. Was she... infected with something? Was whatever was causing her symptoms related to the sickly, rotten smell that pervaded the bunker? But no—the others seemed fine. Holmes had been standing next to her this entire time, perfectly hale and hearty. It couldn't be that!

It had to be just her imagination. She was overtired and had spent way too long wandering around out in the freezing cold. She was bound to feel... off.

"Look at this, dear doctor," declared Holmes with a sudden burst of energy, leaning over her shoulder and jabbing his finger at the screen. It displayed a map of the Site Seven facility, each section marked in glaring red. "This layout clearly indicates that we are currently situated in a specialized bunker, which connects to the emergency tunnels between the Security and Biological wings."

"The Security and Biological wings?" Rebecca repeated softly, her voice sounding far away and weak, even to her own ears. "That... can't be anything good."

For more than a few reasons, she mentally noted. A stab of phantom pain over her breast-bone made her involuntarily hunch in her seat, curling in on herself like a wounded animal, one hand palming at the site through her bulletproof vest.

Rebecca cast a fleeting glance towards Moran, who stood sentry by the door that led to the depths of the bunker, presumably to the aforementioned emergency access tunnels. The Colonel maintained a relaxed posture, yet her keen blue eyes scoured the dim passageway ahead, her expression tense and her grip on her rifle firm.

"Indeed, but it appears to be our only viable option, unless we wish to brave the storm a second time," responded Holmes, his gaze fixated on the flurry of red flashing lights on the monitor. He tapped his tobacco pipe idly against his lips, though it remained unlit, even under such dire circumstances that surely might have called for a little artificial relief. "The facility seems to have fallen under strict control. Nearly two thirds of the personnel have met their end or vanished without a trace..."

Nibbling on her bottom lip, Rebecca's forest green eyes flitted down to the somewhat crumpled emergency response protocols folder, its envelope contents splayed out on the desk beside the keyboard. Her hand toyed idly with the papers she'd drawn from one envelope in particular—the one labelled 'DAVE Containment Failure,' which had already been conspicuously open when she'd begun thumbing through everything.

"And whoever's left standing are hiding from this... DAVE and whatever havoc it caused, after shutting communications down," she paused, her brows drawing together, rubbing the trembling fingers of one hand over her lips. "Do you believe reinforcements are coming from the Carnivale's headquarters?"

With a grim expression, Holmes raised his eyes to meet hers. "I believe we are the reinforcements at this juncture, Dr. Chambers. Whether we desire it or not."

As he finished speaking, Holmes cast a pointed glance at the sectioned-off employee quarters behind them.

They'd done a quick sweep of them earlier—finding tattered bed sheets reduced to ribbons and marred with browning, rusty crimson stains, along with the splintered remnants of furniture that looked as if they had been slashed and stabbed apart with some form of bladed implement.

After Rebecca had cracked open the arm components of the deactivated humanoid robot with her survival knife, it had been easy enough to figure out where the damage had likely originated from. It possessed firearms and wicked, sharp-edged blades embedded inside its servos, hidden beneath the battered, bullet-ridden casing of its metal chassis. Evidently, the machine had caught some sleeping individuals... with their defenses down.

Rebecca couldn't fight back a shiver.

"Maybe so. I don't know." Her voice quivered as she spoke, fragile and barely above a whisper. "Before this, I was in my own little world, conducting research in my lab. I was... not quite happy, but at least content. It wasn't perfect, but it was something I could do. I felt like I was making a difference. And that's a rare and precious thing, isn't it? To do some good, even when everything else seems to be falling apart."

She shook her head, gritting her teeth, her eyes clenching tightly shut behind her glasses. God, her head hurt. "And now I find myself here. I care about what happens to these people, Mr. Holmes. Really, I do. I can't help that—I'm only human. Medicine, healing... it's what I live for. But I can't help but feel—"

They've brought this on themselves, she wanted to say. But the words got stuck in her throat, the band of cold, black metal wrapped around her neck nearly choking the life out of her.

Instead, what came out was: "I can't help but feel that this place would do well to stay buried under the ice, Mr. Holmes. This facility and everyone in it."

His deerstalker cap casting a slight shadow over his features, Holmes brooded in silence for a long, weighty moment, pondering her words with the gravity they deserved. When he spoke next, it was with a slow, deliberate cadence, as if each word possessed a power all their own that he wanted to impress into her mind.

"Perhaps you are correct, my dear doctor," he murmured, looking again at the terminal's flashing screen. "Yet we must persist, as you stated before. Thread by thread, piece by piece, we will unravel the secrets of this facility. If we do not, I fear we might meet a terrible end. And would it not be better to try to do something about it, rather than stew in misery? I certainly believe so."

"How optimistic," Sebastian Moran called over her shoulder from her post by the door, her tone laced with impatience. She prodded at the downed robot with the toe of her boot, sneering as its head sparked uselessly, the stun baton jutting out like the pillar of a ruined temple. "Now, are you two quite finished prattling over there? We don't want to keep our terrible end waiting, after all."

Nodding, Rebecca pushed herself away from the terminal and stood, wincing as the room proceeded to spin around her. As she stumbled, one hand grasping feebly at the cold surface of the table as a wave of dizziness washed over her, she felt Holmes' warm hand on her shoulder—steadying her. Grounding her.

"Are you well, Doctor Chambers?" he asked, concern coloring his voice as he peered into her face, his clever green eyes narrowed in worry. Moran, too, she noted, glanced sharply over.

Genuinely struggling against the urge to vomit, Rebecca swallowed thickly, her delicate features twisting in a grimace. But she forced a smile, shrugging off his hand.

"I'm fine," she insisted for what felt like the millionth time today, trying to sound more confident than she felt. "Just feeling a bit off. But I'd be surprised if I didn't, at this point..."

As she moved towards the door, she glanced back at Stitch and Wunya. They were standing by the rows of lockers, the shotgun between them.

When Wunya glanced up, Rebecca gave the silver-haired half-orc a quick, jaunty thumbs-up, a small smile tugging at her lips. Then, she turned towards the door where Colonel Moran and Holmes both stood, waiting for her.

Sucking in a deep, hissing breath between her teeth, she steeled herself and carefully stepped over the sparking corpse of the robot, moving into the darkness beyond.

A step behind her, Moran wrenched the stun baton from the robot's skull with a harsh yank, holding the crackling, blue-sparking rod ahead of them to light the way.

PARTY MEMBERS: Rebecca Chambers, Sebastian Moran (Summon), Sherlock Holmes.
CURRENT LOCATION: The Western Bunker.
DESIRED LOCATION: Heading into the emergency access tunnels connected to the bunker.
ACTION(S): Looting the stun baton. Our party would like to head into the emergency access tunnels, heading towards the Biological Wing.

FOCUS COUNT: 3/3
REBECCA STATS: REASON 11, STAMINA 12
INVENTORY: Profile Consumables, Survival Gear, Loot Listed Below.

STATUS: Spore incubation stage. Lethargy, loss of appetite, nausea, heightened thirst.

CURRENT LOOT:

• Whetstone.
• S.T.A.R.S. Captain PDA.
• Sunglasses.
• Voltage checkers.
• Battered old laptop (burnt out, but would love to return this to Wily! Lol.)
• Programming manuals.
• Technical AI documents.
• Pince-nez style glasses.
• Legal pad (Carnivale contestants' names listed).
• Psychology manuals.
• Site Seven notebook.
• Ring of Keys.
• Site Seven Emergency Response Protocols folder.
• Stun Baton.

 

[King Shark]

“It’s like the smell is clinging to my very mustache,” Ned insisted.

In the heat of the bunker the need for personal protective equipment had diminished, and the Carnivale employees stood at their leisure. Ned held one tuft of perfectly groomed mustache between a thumb and forefinger while he carefully combed it out with a mustache comb. The handle was engraved with his initials. Ned was handsome in a folksy way, and without his red hood up, it was clear that he spent an exorbitant amount of time focusing on his personal appearance. While his mousy brown hair was receding from his forehead, it was parted and swept to one side in a way that accentuated his angular face and brought out his high cheekbones. He looked peaked.

“Maybe you should spend less time focusing on your mustache, and more time hitchin’ up your britches,” declared Nancy. “Half of your ass is out. If you gave it half the hitch my pick-up has, you’d be doin’ us all a favor.”

They stood huddled around the propped open door that, moments before, Doctor Rebecca Chambers and her intrepid companions had passed through into parts unknown.

Stitch was forearm deep in the robot that propped open the door, trying to separate paneling from weaponry. Rebecca had done a respectable job at cracking the ‘bot open on a surface level, but in many ways it was like a pomegranate. The weaponry inside of the construct needed to be removed piece by piece; it was a delicate process.

Stitch, however, was not approaching the task delicately. Pieces of metal soared through the air over his shoulders, traced a parabolic arc, then clattered noisily against the floor of the bunker.

“Well, if you spent less time talking about your pick-up truck, and more time helping with the situation at hand-”

Ned shoved a finger into Nancy’s shoulder, which Wunya quickly stepped in to brush away with the butt of the battered shotgun she’d retrieved.

“We will not do this thing,” she stated bluntly, glowering down at the bickering Carnivale employees. “It is beneath us.”

Leopold, the third of their Carnivale entourage, kept glancing furtively at the growing pile of metal behind them.

“Do you think that’s worth anything?” he murmured, grimacing. “No reason. Just wondering.”

Nancy belted out a throaty laugh.

“And maybe if YOU spent less time gambling, and more time-”

“ENOUGH!” Wunya barked, crossing her arms, holding the shotgun in her massive hand like a bludgeon. “I said that we will not do this thing. It is beneath us. You will watch the little Blue Champion of Chaos,” she nodded at Nancy. “And you-” she nodded in turn to Ned. “Will watch the door in case the Good Doctor returns. Is this thing understood?”

“Oh, it’s understood,” Nancy replied, smirking, her eyes trained on Stitch. “You know, this little guy reminds me of my dog. We’d head on out in the pick-up, fifty two inch mud tires with the flaps, Bertram barkin’ for all he was worth. I can’t wait to get back home, out of this damn trainwreck of a situation, and slap my way through some good ol’ fashioned muddin’.”

Stitch felt a surge of irritation and peeled away a piece of forearm guard from the robot which he lobbed casually over his shoulder at Nancy’s head.

Wunya stepped in to slap it away.

“Woops,” Stitch chuckled, smirking.

Wunya chuckled too, while the four Carnivale employees stared at the little alien.

“Champion of Chaos,” Wunya repeated, as if this would quiet their alarm.

It did not. They looked sincerely disquieted. The stench of the bunker did little to abate the atmosphere; though it felt good to get out of the elements, there was a distinct feeling that they were squatting in someone else’s basement apartment where the owner might get home at any minute, and when that owner got home, it felt like he would be pissed. Would it be hours? Would it be days? Only time would tell.

And who could ignore the feeling that there were beds, real beds at hand, which were grotesque beyond mention? If it were a stranger’s basement apartment, and in many ways it was, it would be tantamount to yanking back their covers and finding a crusty sock to actually use those bunks for rest.

No, that seemed out of the question. Although Leopold, whose glances kept scouring the scrap metal the way a prospector might eye gold, also kept looking back at the bunks hungrily, it was understood that any comfort provided by this bunker was a voyeur’s game. There could be no rest at ease here - only a temporary retreat from the growing storm outside.

Their attention was seized by a creaking of metallic skeleton growing weary under the force of the yank of small blue paws.

“Almost,” croaked Stitch, prying into the robot corpse.

He put his back into it, yanking for all he was worth. That knife and those guns would be his.

“And you-” Wunya barked, pointing the muzzle of her ammoless shotgun towards the fourth and final Carvnivale employee, Cecil. “You check the lockers.”

Cecil, who came from Kraw, and spoke seldomly but for his love of Krawdads, saluted. He was a beanpole of a man with sallow eyes and scarcely any chin. Out of the four Canivale employees Wunya and Stitch had retained, he spoke the least and complained even less. In a sea of folks who worked only for a paycheck, he worked because he loved what he did. His salute was crisp, and he snapped his heels together when he did so. He was a beanpole of a man who rose to a height of Wunya’s chin, but was built like a wilting plant reinforced by steel wiring.

He didn’t let that affect his demeanor. If any of them were born to be reinforcements, it was Cecil.

“Lockers? Consider ‘em checked, m’lady.”

He winked, then slid off towards the lockers to check their remnants and break what locks he may.

“Don't forget this thing,” commanded Wunya, pointing at the medical kit on the wall.

It held only bandages, but bandages were the kind of thing that you never wanted to end up needing, then remember where you'd seen them.

Cecil grabbed those first.

WORD COUNT: 1065
PARTY MEMBERS: Stitch, Wunya, and 4 generic Carnivale Employees who grow less generic by the day (Ned, Nancy, Leopold, and Cecil).
CURRENT LOCATION: The Western Bunker.
DESIRED LOCATION: Holding out in the Western Bunker and scouring it for supplies, while keeping guard over its entrances.
ACTION(S): Stitch is picking apart the robot jamming the door of the Bunker's exit, trying to retrieve the integrated firearms within as well as the jagged blades built into its arms. Hard to put up a fight without weapons, isn't it?

Meanwhile, the Carnivale employee, Cecil, is retrieving Stitch and Wunya the bandages in the First Aid Kit.

Wunya has retrieved and is wielding the battered shotgun.

FOCUS COUNT: 3/3
STITCH STATS: REASON 11, STAMINA 12
INVENTORY: Survival Gear, Comms Tower Access Card

 

[Mollymauk Tealeaf]

There was a final meeting happening in the bunker.

“So, what do we know about this thing?” Wunya asked the four Carnivale Rosa employees sitting on the murder-scene beds before her. “Mustache Ned! If you do not put small vanity mirror away I will crush it. I will rip this thing you seem to prize most off upper lip. Then we will both be sad because it is a nice mustache,” the Coach said, and it was more a matter-of-fact than a threat.

Ned gave one final glance at his beautiful facial hair and closed the mirror, putting it back in its leather and engraved holster that also held his small hand-made mustache comb. He gave a nod of apology when he looked up to see her still staring at him, empty shotgun resting atop crossed arms.

“Haka taba…” Stitch said in his native tongue as he put his large blueberry head into his paws and shook it. “...How embarrassing,” The experiment repeated in the common tongue.

“Do not lose faith in our new allies, Champion of Chaos. They can help themselves by helping us in this thing. We are all stranded together for now,” and Wunya nodded at the collective group of redcoats to answer her original question.

“Uhh, well fer starters, madame- er sorry, Coach Wunya,” Cecil corrected, not wanting another kick to the shins by the small blue creature. “We're a whooole mess of krawdads bein’ boiled in a slowly heatin’ pot, and after we's done screamin’ to be let out, we're gonna be baked in a pie, and ain't that the krawdad lovin’ truth, mmhm,” and the employee from Kraw nodded affirmatively at his own aphorism.

The tall form in a tracksuit and silver ponytail was silent for a full minute as she considered, looking the employees over, gauging and measuring each of them individually.

In the meantime, Stitch walked over to Cecil and kicked him in the shins. Cecil winced and asked to know why.

“You said Krawdad,” said the small abomination, giving a shrug before resuming his position at Wunya's side.

The Coach finally gave a nod of approval at all of them, agreeing with Cecil's eloquent assessment.

“So now I know you all have an understanding of what lies ahead in this thing. Outside is death. Inside, probably also death,” the half-orc woman said, unconcerned. “If it is show they want, let us be Champions of Notoriety,” and she smirked excitedly at the prospect.

Next to her knees Experiment 626 nodded with glee and gave out his high-pitched “Hahahaha”, head tilted back, all four arms splayed out and gripping the air.

“Any questions?” Wunya Asked rhetorically, with a raised eyebrow and folded arms, accentuating her biceps in a challenge.

“Um, Coach Wunya? I'm sorry to ask, but is there anything from that robot we can actually use…or maybe sell?” Leo, the dandy gambler, asked sheepishly. Immediately he protected his shins with his hands and looked at Stitch, who had made it very clear he did not want the robot mentioned, the scrapping of it being a total bust.

“No. Let us go and do this thing now. Champion of Doctor shall not have all the fun,” Wunya replied and when the four hesitated for a moment, the Coach let out a low growling harrumph, which made them all spring into action, standing in attention, heads held high.

It was a little while after leaving the safety of the bunker to the underground tunnels that anyone dared to speak.

“This place smells like I wiped my ass with my ‘stache and put it back under my nose,” whispered Ned, leading the pack of Redcoats in line behind Wunya. Stitch was above them, crawling on the ceiling like a blue furry spider, the lighting doing wonders to add to the horror of the slow and quiet walk.

“I try not to think about it, I just imagine I'm with Bertram, windows rolled down and just nailing a sweet mud-run, testing that new lift-kit-” Nancy began to reply in hushed tones.

“No, it smell like when you leave some Krawdads out and-” Cecil said low and with his nose plugged.

“It smells like a sewage line backed up at a morgue…that was built inside a refuse dump- hey! watch it!” came the wry whisper of Leo, the wittiest of the bunch, before he slammed into Nancy who had slammed into Cecil, who had slammed into Ned. The mustachioed man had pulled up short because Wunya turned on the chatty bunch, towering over them, her eyes looking like she wanted to rip off some facial hair. Or tell a booky where to find a man. Or set fire to a chromed-out truck. Or lastly but not leastly, wipe out an entire species of crustaceans on kraw.

They all shut the hell up and plugged their noses, eyes ahead and focused, even when they came to the bloody battlegrounds of human versus monster at the fork in the road. The group stepped over bodies, avoiding puddles of thick black ooze that still hadn’t completely dried over, and around a couple dead fellow Carnivale workers pinned to walls. Even Stitch, who had crawled the entire length of the journey on the ceiling, had a hard time avoiding spots where there weren’t bits of flesh slowly peeling-off like pancakes and strawberry syrup.

“Really bad,” Experiment 626 said in a whisper as dropped from above and onto Wunya’s massive shoulders.

“Cousin?” Wunya asked quietly, pointing to a creature wearing its brain on the outside, long tongue like a whip hanging out the side of its caved-in head.

“Too pretty,” he snickered. “Which way?” He said sweetly and hopefully looking at the letters on the wall and the possibilities that came with something called ‘Security’.

Wunya read the signs.

“This is a place of terror and a place of death. We cannot stop moving it seems. To ‘Security’, and maybe Champion of Chaos will find right tool for this thing. Better luck than robot, I hope,” Wunya replied in a low, quiet voice, giving an approving nod to her own idea and shrugging.

The little blue fuzzball of mayhem got a greedy grin thinking about holding four-blasters at once, but he still spared a thought: “Krawdads scratching at the side of the pot,” he said ominously, looking down the corridor to the Security Wing.

“Exactly,” The Coach agreed, and crouched, the four behind her also getting in sneakier positions.

Party Members - Stitch, Wunya, 4 CR Employees (Ned, Leo, Nancy, and Cecil)
Currently - Emergency Tunnels (at the fork)
Action - Heading to Security
Focus - 3/3
Stats - Reason 11, Stamina 12
Inventory - Survival Gear (Both), Battered Shotgun (Wunya), Access Card (Stitch)