| .......... |
.......... C A S T |
.............................. Jeslyn |
.............................. Aegolius |
⋗ Disclaimer: This log predates the Mobius community and uses now-outdated place names.
♫ MOODMUSIC ♪
Aegolius. From the unbearable hells of Tuphon's wastes, a singular figure emerged. Lost in the blinding torrent of airborn silt, he didn't even have the courtesy of his own footsteps to retrace. The wind whipped well-worn fabric about his form, roughly tugging at the scarf-like cape and throwing his tunic up and about himself a few times. He trudged on, a device clutched tightly in one hand. Finally he came to a stop, standing up, rigid, and peering around. To his left first, stock-still, his glowing eyes scanning the area for some familiar marker before the faintest movement brought him looking forward again. Eventually he raised the device in his hand, peering at it. He promptly smacked it against his other hand. He hadn't the capacity to squint. The smallest, sharp dip of his head signified his emotions instead. "Fuck."
Jeslyn was trundling along through the wastes slowly inside the medical vessel Cecille had let him borrow. He'd been going insane stuck in a hotel with nothing to see or study so this would do him a world of good. Unfortunately, visibility was terrible and he was going mostly on the GPS of his vehicle and counting on its elevation controls. It was rather sad, then, that he wore a pair of high-tech binoculars around his neck...he'd really hoped to see more today but he was counting on the current dust storm settling at SOME point, if only briefly. Perhaps he could find a deep valley or ravine untouched by the winds. Perhaps he'd see one of those worms and- THUD. It was some small mercy that he was moving relatively slowly, because when he crested a hill something ended up slamming into his ships screen. Immediately he slammed the breaks on and tried to peer out the front, trying to spot whatever he'd hit. Oh please don't be a specimen! - oh actually maybe that would work out alright.
Aegolius was about to throw the device down in frustration when he thought he heard something over the howl of the windstorm. Couldn't be his ship, unless scavengers had picked it up. ...That would be some bad luck, but when was that ever on HIS side? Attention distracted from the device again, he stared off into the distance. The whirring of his mechanical eyesight was completely drowned out by the wastes. He couldn't exactly squint, and when he realized what was coming towards him, his eyes couldn't widen. His head tilted back some instead to show his surprise, but he was completely unable to dodge the ship. Instinctively, he rolled his shoulder into it with a resounding THUD, hoping his build was enough to take the brunt of this, but managing a modulated, voiced "ooff" as if the wind were being pushed from his non-existent lungs.>>
Aegolius>>He tumbled over the windshield, starfishing and windmilling ungracefully in the air before landing with a muffled splat in the sand behind the vehicle. "HhRRhg."
Jeslyn immediately ran from the cockpit to the side-door of the ship when he realized he couldnt see the victim out the front "Oh dear- oh dear." please don't be a person. He pulled the scarf around his neck up over his mouth, squinting as he opened the shuttle door and staggered out into the sands. He was unusually well hidden against the sands, his skin already the same colour as the environment. With powerful legs, one organic and one cybernetic, he staggered forward against the winds "Hello?" he called, drowned out by the winds. It took a moment of searching for him to see- oh no, a person. "Oh dear- oh dear. Let me- Oh dear" he hurried over, hoping that he wasn't about to be arrested by an unseen police force for running a ...man? over. A droid? someone wearing a mask? he couldn't tell through all this sand and instead opted for grabbing them under their shoulders and dragging them toward the ship. If let he'd drag them aboard and shut the shuttle door before collapsing to his -
Jeslyn-knees a little breathlessly beside the droid. He was a strong, mostly organic being but even so, the individual had been quite heavy. "Hello- are you alright? can you hear me?" he asked, slapping the droids cheek a few times. It took a good moment before he actually took in the aesthetic detail of the droid's head, eyes blinking wide and his head slowly tilting "Strigidae...ooh" his hand would try to move from the cheek to pinch at the beak. What a pleasing build. He had to look back along the body to see if the feet on it were just as interesting. <
Aegolius stood out a bit better against the ruddy sands, all decked out in deep browns and greens. He laid face down for a minute, stunned, before bending his elbows and slowly pulling his hands under himself to get up. An entire endless expanse of sandy wasteland, and he happened to be standing directly in the path of some crazed asshole that couldn't drive. Just his luck. He heard a voice call out to him, and started to turn to look at it. Was his arm dented? He couldn't tell--something slipped under his shoulder and tried to get him moving. An amalgamation of dense metals, he was definitely difficult to drag on his own, but would climb laboriously to his feet instead to stumble with him. There was probably no use trying to shout a conversation over the winds, so he just followed where he was led, collapsing awkwardly to the floor. "Yes--yeah, I'm fine." >>
Aegolius>>Slapping the warm sand-polished metal of his face really wasn't helping matters. Those glowing teal eyes nearly went cross-eyed staring down at the hand on his beak. What was he doing? He tried to sit up, pulling one leg under him. Unfortunately his feet were not nearly as interesting--he had boots on. Surely there were no talons beneath, there didn't seem to be the room for them. His mechanical hands ended in something like diminutive talons--but more aesthetic than anything.
Jeslyn knelt beside him, motioning helplessly toward the windscreen "the visibility was just so bad- I wasn't expecting anyone to be out here- exactly within my flight path" what were the odds? "You're not damaged? oh that's a relief." he started dusting sand off his scarf and out of his hair with a frustrated sigh. "It's no use me scouting around in these terrible conditions, anyway. I was hoping to find a valley or something more sheltered but it's quite a task. Hm." his eyes flicked back to Aegolius, one cybernetic glowing eye meeting two others. "Doctor Tur'uk." he offered a hand to the droid "What brings you so far out into the wastes? do you have a ship nearby?"
Aegolius propped himself up to stare back. "Statistically improbable." The droid's voice sounded faintly modulated, a good facsimile but not quite the quality of a Domo Droid or other make. A deep, steady baritone, with few inflections. He reached a hand around to feel at his shoulder, looking away to test the rotation of his one arm. "Don't think so." He wasn't going to look too close right now, with people hovering. "Crater might've been your best bet..." He wasn't sure there was much topography out here anyways. The droid tried to climb slowly to his feet, a hand on his chest next, just checking for cracks. Could he feel them? He stared down at the man's hand, scrutinizing it apathetically. He took it after a moment. "Was chasing a myth. Doesn't matter. ...Somewhere." He started to look around the hangar he'd been dragged into. "Don't know where it is now--" a hand patted at his belt, and he looked down. "Shit." He'd lost his device in the process--lost out there in the sands. NOW how was
Aegolius>>NOW how was he going to get back to his ship.
Jeslyn--The old xenobiologist seemed to almost zone out as the droid said all the right words to capture his interests, starting with the word 'statistics' and ending with 'Myth' "A myth, you say?" he asked, snapping out of his intense and fascinated trance. "What sort of Myth?" finally he pulled himself away "Do you need some help finding your ship? I can do my best. Let me tag these co-ordinates on the GPS so I know where we started." he made his way over to the pilots seat to do so, motioning to the co-pilot seat in a general but silent invitation. "You didn't give me your name."
Aegolius was a charmer, by some grand feat; how had that worked out? A hand reached out to steady himself against the bulkhead as he climbed the rest of the way to his feet. "Yes." He paused, cocking his head to one side and staring down at his feet. Disoriented... He smacked the side of his head with the heel of his other hand as if that might knock him back into equilibrium. Hrrng. "A ghost." He looked up. "Talk of an astronaut that wanders around Tuphon's wastes. Getting eaten by the worms, only to pop up again later." A mysterious mirage. "If you can. Thanks." The droid wasn't quite focusing on Jeslyn, staring around the ship again--some medical shuttle? He saw familiar tools and straightened up, almost imperceptibly. Glowing eyes turned to focus on Jeslyn again; he couldn't blink, but tilted his head to one side, following to lean over the back of the co-pilot seat rather than sitting. "Aegolius. What kind of... doctor are you?"
Jeslyn turned his head with an incredulous look and a chuckle. Ghosts were not real, at least he didn't believe it until he heard the real explanation. A wandering droid, perhaps, or a ship A.I in a mechanical suit!? something curious and surely true "Ah what a fate! to be digested repeatedly for an eternity. At least they had a straight route from mouth to anus" he said it rather factually, while anyone less mature might have found it quite amusing indeed. "Oh I am a xenobiologist with a large genetic portfolio. Of course it is not my prefered line of work, albeit my longest line of work! I am not a uhm" he motioned around the medical shuttle "this is borrowed, though I can 'doctor' animals well enough. I could easily become a ....what is word-" he paused "Veter-hairy-anne" best he could do without looking it up. "Aegolius....Aegolius" he was familiar with some of earths orders, specifically the avian orders, but he hadn't yet read up on lower classifications and genus from the >
Jeslyn>human home planet. Earth was one of a number of planets he had studied evolutionary history from, because it shed light on the evolutionary tracks taken by fauna on other planets, at times. "Just a moment..." he accessed the infosphere, soon enough getting up a little space-wikipedia on the species with a delighted gasp. "Oh yes....yes, I see I see." he turned to look up at the wonderful facial structure of his VICTIM and then back at the screen, trying not to appear too terribly giddy. "I have many questions." quickly he shut off the screen "But for now, let us look for your ship..." a pause as he took off, the shuttle rumbling off the sands as it rose up "...I wouldn't mind finding a ghost. Do you think I might run one over?" he said a little cheekily. "Ah, probably not very funny."
Aegolius offered no real explanation; he might have been using 'ghost' figuratively. But who was to say there were not a few non-corporeal races out there? "If it doesn't rip its way out." How else would it survive the digestive acids? The droid's shoulders dropped the slightest hair at the explanation, an ease of tension. He moved to fall into the co-pilot seat. "Oh." A beat, "Veterinarian." Looking down at the controls in front of him, he poked at a few. Was this a Federation shuttle? Not quite registering the fact-checking going on beside him or the enthusiasm radiating his way, he started tapping in coordinates from memory. "Questions? About what." He didn't turn his head, but his teal eyes cast a long side-glance, as suspiciously as his face allowed. "You already have." He looked up at the ceiling and then down at the controls he had asked no permission to work, typing in the rest of what he thought were the right coordinates. "Hell. If it can survive a worm, it might get up again."
Jeslyn looked about through the windsheild "Oh ah, Vet..." that was easier to say. When asked about his questions, he turned about. Oh well if you insist... "Your build. Why the owl species? are these your choices?" he reached out to practically run his hand over one side of Aegolius' face and touch at his beak again "or an ornithologically inclined creator? perhaps just aesthetic? do you have enhancements that justify such a build? perhaps an enhanced ability to locate the direction of an object by sound alone?" he let the droid type in his coordinates "Thank you, let us go then shall we? perhaps you can entertain the questions of an old scientist as we travel, hm?" he practically beamed and then added the name "...Omen." he looked proud of himself for that one. Yes, Aegolius had been presented with a nickname, a truly high honour from Jeslyn. Not that the droid knew that after probably 15 minutes of meeting the man.
Aegolius watched the hand reach for him; it got as far as his cheek before he started to lean away. "Yes. Something like that." He stared down at the offending limb. "That's a bit damn personal. ...Doctor." The scientist had been nice enough to pick him up after... hitting him, but this was a bit much. He tried to pick apart what questions he felt like answering, tilting his head again at the nickname. The stare he gave was unreadible--more due to the lack of articulation in his face--but he seemed to convey some understanding of the nickname, or perhaps even confirming that it was in some way intentional. "...I have a few callbacks, but most of it's aesthetics." One question answered, belatedly. "Superior hearing." He made an off-kilter gesture with both hands pointing at his head. "Better eyesight." He looked down at his booted feet, but didn't say anything more.
Jeslyn looked over at Omen as he was told his questions were rather personal. He did a double take and shrugged a shoulder "If one does not ask questions, one does not recieve answers. How about we trade? ask me something personal. I suppose I can answer it" he hoped he wouldn't regret such an offer, there were plenty of personal questions he wasn't keen on answering. Jeslyn couldn't help following the gaze down to those boots with an uncontainably excited twitch and flick of his carapace covered tail. "Can I see the foot?" he breathed a long sigh, looking back ahead only briefly to move around a rock stack "It is like a marriage of cybernetics and taxonomy...your build. Do you have sockets one higher than the other? perhaps just unique microphones? it is not my strong point, cybernetics." he thought of Doctor Gadhavi and how fascinated they would surely be by Omen.
Aegolius couldn't even scrutinize him with anything more than a blank glowing stare. The sound he made was almost a snort. "Don't know you enough to have any. Bit of an unfair trade." He stared out over the landscape for a while, but eventually looked back over his shoulder, out the door of the cockpit into the spacious medical bay. He almost seemed to ignore the request, but started to pull one booted foot up onto his seat after a moment. "Kinda the intent." Concerning 'marriage'. Aegorius looked back Tur'uk's way and mimicked the off-kilter motion to his head a second time, foot still planted. "Yes." If this Gadhavi asked as many questions as Tur'uk did, he wasn't sure he'd like them much either. "Why do you have a medical doctor's shuttle? What do you mean 'borrowed'." The Stare seemed to accuse him of stealing it. He rested an arm around his knee, as if enticing to remove his boot.
Jeslyn quirked a brow "You know as much about me as I know about you. I am missing body parts, am I not? that's something." his own mechanical, lion-like digits flexed and scraped his claws along the floor of the ship in anticipation. Those were going to be avian digits, surely. It would be a missed opportunity not to do so but-... " he huffed as he glanced over, the hand not moving toward the boot to pull it off like he'd thought. Every thing Aegolius had been doing seemed like preperation for such a thing but instead, he only seemed to have changed his sitting position. "If i could just..." he reached over toward the boot, only to stop when he was practically accused of theft "Excuse me?" a flash of rather clear anger washed over him "Of course I didn't steal it. What do you take me for? no- no, Doctor Gadhavi was kind enough to lend me a shuttle while I wait to meet a potential employer. The hotel is getting to feel like a new prison." he waved a hand dismissively, reaching for the >
Jeslyn-> boot again, trying to rather casually pull the foot toward him as if it were an entirely normal thing to do. "I only want to look, for goodness sake."
Aegolius stared at his arm a moment. "Don't really care how you lost them." At least he was being honest. It was difficult to tell from his blank face; maybe he was trolling him. He didn't know these people, he didn't know why he would be living in a hotel. His head tilted again. "Who--" His foot grabbed at, he tried to kick Jeslyn's hand off. "You're playing a dangerous game. You said ask a question; I did." He almost growled it, the sound reflected in a weird audio warble when his pitch dipped low. He grabbed at the hand to shove it away again, before plunking his foot on the dashboard. Sharp, jerky motions, clearly annoyed, he unlaced his boot and kicked it off with the other. What unfolded was clearly mechanical--the hallux collapsing under the rest of the foot on a sort of hinge, and the heel able to blend flush with the ground, so that his feet could still fit in a normal, bipedal sort of boot. But by a miracle of cybernetics, the entire thing unfolded into a proper talon. "Happy?"
Jeslyn huffed "My question was out of admiration, you accused me of theft!" he complained grumpily, moving his hand away to rub at it with mechanical digits. As the foot was revealed, his eyes practically glowed with delight "Yes! I am very happy. Look at that." the doctor paid particular attention to the way the Hallux worked with the rest of the foot. "Very nice, thank you." finally he looked away, curiosity satisfied. He realised he was too much for some, even those he was very eager to know. "I will let you be now, until we find your ship." he promised, knowing the owl-like droid, known as Aegolius, would likely welcome some silence from him. Now, his eyes remained ahead on the wastes, not that much could be seen aside from the co-ordinates/waypoint and the distance tracking up on the windshield.
Aegolius. "I asked what you meant by 'borrowed'." Flat, denying the accusatory look he had clearly given earlier. He wiggled his digits for effect, having crossed his arms in the meantime. Fine, he'd had his fun, then. The doctor's curiosity apparently satiated, he pulled his foot down and carefully pulled his boot back on. "It's more useful for perching and climbing. Can't fly." If that wasn't obvious by the complete lack of wings. He let the silence stretch for a while, watching the distance tick by. "Why are you out here?" He was staring again. Borrowed medical shuttle, trolling the wastes. Xenobiologist, he'd said? "The worms?"
Jeslyn tilted his head sideways to peer back at Aegolius "Oh yes, and the other definitions for borrowed are...?" it was the implication. He kept his eyes ahead after that, just nodding at the mention of perching. "Yes, I suppose" he replied as the worms were brought up "Anything, really. I wanted to do some exploring... I spent a lot of time cooped up on a ship and unable to leave prior to my rescue, and now i'm spending all my time cooped up in a hotel. I decided to go out and see what I could find. Preferably animals, but I suppose if I found any useful technology lying around it wouldn't go amiss." his eyes cast upward toward the sky, silently hoping his large vessel never crashed down onto tuphon... not with that creature on board.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 ship & gets 12.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 other & gets 12.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 perception! & gets 10.
[#] Jeslyn rolls 1d20 & gets 10.
Aegolius made another dismissive snorting sound through his voicebox. Fine, sure, maybe he meant that. He didn't seem so interested in asking prying questions anymore, and the droid seemed grateful for it. "'Rescue'?" Arms still crossed, he looked back Jeslyn's way, and then followed his gaze upwards to the sky. A quick glance back towards the dashboard confirmed they were still some long distance out. At least he didn't see any worms. Nonchalantly, the droid had left his foot firmly planted on the dashboard after retying his boot up.
Jeslyn bobbed his head "I was in need of rescue long before I was rescued. I was a prisoner after my research facility was taken over by the enemy Ghuudon. Many years later we fell through a space anomaly and it set off a critical failure in our ships systems, releasing all maner of creature on board and resulting in the deaths of all on board except I, as far as I'm aware. Some good samaritans pulled me out and were wounded in the process." he frowned "There is something up there to rival your 'ghost'.....one could call it a...nightmare...i suppose" though when that foot went up onto the dashboard he looked rather abruptly furious, brows knitting and a black and white pulsing signal passing through his skin from the bridge of his nose outward. He turned his head toward the droid and gestured at his foot "Were you made in a barn? get that off there. Doctor Gadhavi was kind enough to lend me this vessel, there will be no feet on the hukma'ret- the- ...that thing" he pointed one long, >
Jeslyn-claw-tipped finger accusingly at the foot and dash. <
Aegolius's arms remained crossed, but he cocked his head to one side as he listened, fixing the scientist with a long side-eye. Ghuudon. He didn't recognize that race name, but that was nothing new. "Keista Wormhole." The droid's attention returned skyward with the conclusion of the story. "So you're a POW." He pronounced the acronym rather than spell it. "GalFed do anything about it, or they just leave it up there?" More interested in the story, he failed to notice the ire he had wrought. Not until he noticed the change in Jeslyn's skin-colouration from the corner of his bionic vision. But by then, he was being lectured; uncrossing his arms partly in surprise, he grudgingly took his foot off the dashboard. It was just a boot. He'd probably tracked in several pounds of sand anyhow.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 Perception for next round & gets 17.
Jeslyn's ears twitched back and forth a moment with a quiet "What is pow?" this thing that he supposedly was, clearly not knowing the abbreviation or its lazy simplified form. "I think it is still up there. It would be nice to get the equipment back that I spent so long building but it would be at a great risk to life." When the foot moved down he huffed and reached out to pat any sand or dust off the dash dramatically then went back to following the co-ordinates "Where do you live?" he asked rather boldly, not expecting a distinct reply "In the wastes here?"
Aegolius. "Prisoner of War. You know. POW." The droid made a fist-bumping motion in the air, as if that was supposed to clear anything up. "Hire some looters. Or just mercenaries; anyone with a gun big enough and a want great enough." The fist-bump motion was replaced with two metallic clawed fingers rubbing together to represent 'moola'. The stare he gave the dusted dashboard was about the same he regarded everything with, but he reached out afterwards to brush off any remaining dust. "Anywhere. My ship." Speaking of, he glanced at the GPS (Galactic Positioning System). Getting there. Slowly. The droid had apparently walked some great distance before Jeslyn had had the (mis)fortune of finding him. "The wastes, or any planet. Forests are always nice." Teal eyes returned forward to stare out into the desert, and the droid suddenly stood up with an excitable sound (some weird huffing, grating noise from his voicebox), clacking a metallic finger against the glass.>>
Aegolius>>"There." Where? Somewhere far into the distance there looked to be a figure. Likely just another lost soul, there was no way to determine otherwise over the swirling dust. It shambled exhaustedly, and over the howl and churning of the wind, the silt it walked upon seemed to bubble and flow like water.
Jeslyn threw up a fist and repeated almost comically "I am POW." it sounded almost motivational, if it didn't mean prisoner of war. He frowned a little though and looked at him "To hire looters is to pay men and women to die. I cannot" though as soon as Aegolius pointed toward the figure his eyes widened and he lurched forward "Ghost" he whispered with unveiled excitement, his skin brightly glimmering like electricity were running beneath it. "We're going to kidnap it!" he announced rather suddenly and floored it, causing the ship to speed up toward the ghost "I will open the side hatch, you can grab the ghost. We're kidnapping ghost! We can do it! Are you ready? get to the door!" he insisted, sharp teeth bared with a mad, wide eyed stare of crazed excitement.
Aegolius managed an unintentional pep-talk, somehow! The droid tilted his head and shrugged comically, hands held palm-up. "It's their choice." If they wanted to die for money, let them! Maybe the droid was speaking from experience; he definitely gave off a Mercenary vibe himself. Momentarily distracted, he leaned away from the pulse of colour running through the alien, and took a couple of extra beats to register what the scientist was gleefully proposing. "...What--" Unable to properly react, the sudden acceleration forced the droid back into his seat with a confused, clipping sound. Did he forget to mention the part about it surviving worms? Maybe by ripping its way out!? Who the hell was this crazy fucker? He scrambled to his feet in the resulting chaos, rushing to the indicated side-hatch just as a massive darisaga burst from the bubbling sand in-front of the mysterious figure.>>
Aegolius>>Aegolius clung to the handle of the door, waiting for the... signal, opening, whatever.
[#] Jeslyn rolls 1d20 sick moves & gets 2.
Jeslyn laughed madly "We've got him- we've got him - oh!" he ducked forward and looked up at the darisaga with wide eyes "Inconvenient." as he sped towards it, he used one hand to fasten his seatbelt and then sped up to the vessels full capacity, grinning with dark determination. "On my count of three! one, two THR-" apparently the worms nearest segment had shifted since he last actually looked at it and not the ghost, and so as he yelled the final count the medical vessel abruptly slammed into the worm, throwing him forward in his seat with a loud "ACK!!!" and a breathless wheeze as it collapsed into the sand. What a great position to be in.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 worm attentiveness to rogue ships, 20 being very attentive & gets 2.
Aegolius couldn't look frantic, or tense, or panicked, or anything other than Grimly Accepting Of The Current Situation. He hunched down, grabbed the handle with both clawed hands, and watched the back of Jeslyn's seat. "What is inconvenient." He could only see so much of the window from his current position, after-all. But the doctor was counting down, and so he hunkered down himself. He came to investigate a myth after-all, might as well... Fucking kidnap it. One... Two... The sudden deceleration saw the (unbuckled!) droid jerking forward, torquing from where he clung to the handle to SLAM loudly into the wall beside the hangar door. He fell to the floor (with another clanging thud), carried by momentum to slide clumsily back into the cockpit in a jumble of metal and scarves. "Hrrrggn. You are fucking insane." He worked to push his cowl back into place, clambering to his feet to peer out the window.>>
Aegolius>>The ship was likely half-pitched in the silt, visibility hampered by sand-cover and a large worm in the way. It wasn't attacking. Not bothering to check that the scientist was okay, Aegolius pushed his diminutive, beakish nose up near the glass, angling his head uncomfortably to get a better look. The worm was... distracted? It let out a shriek, writhing its maw in the air a moment, before something... dropped. CLANG. That something landed on top of the ship, with such a deafening sound there must surely be a dent. It rolled off and landed, stood. An astronaut, walking wordlessly away from them and trying to climb the darisaga a second time. It had, apparently, inadvertently saved them.
Jeslyn pressed himself forward, ignoring Aegolius with how absolutely focused he was. The worm seemed distracted but the loud clang made him jump with a sharp gasp "The ghost!" he immediately announced, seemingly less concerned about the gigantic worm. If they moved they'd attract its attention but they were so close that if they didn't move they'd likely get crushed anyway. His eye started flickering as it recorded exactly what the ghost was doing for as long as he could justify it, though he kept glancing up at the worm for signs that it was time to leave. He was struggling with an internal battle...did he keep persuing this? or did he get them to a safe distance and watch? "I don't have any tracking devices" he said mournfully and then prepped the ship for an abrupt reverse. He'd wait for the sand to shift and then would rather aggressively shoot the ship backwards and upwards out of the sand, trying to back up high to watch what would happen. - Should he be successfull, he'd turn on-
Jeslyn--outside audio and try to filter out the wind fuzz, slowly changing between frequencies and toying with the volume in tandem as he tried to see if the 'ghost' was transmitting anything at any frequency at all, or on any chanel, even resorting to checking radio frequencies as well quite hurriedly.
[#] Jeslyn rolls 1d20 reverse reverse! & gets 1.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 Entity & gets 19.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 Worm & gets 6.
Aegolius pressed his hands up against the glass, his glowing eyes whirrrring quietly to focus in on the Entity. He didn't seem to be having the same debate--but he did, assumedly, have a bit more survivability. A bit. If it could rend the ship, it could surely rend him. "I do." He turn and made for the hatch again, just as Jeslyn moved to reverse the hell out of this mess. A dronning, grating noise reverberated through the ship as it failed to unstick itself from the sand; the vibrations of the worm's thrashing only served to mobilize the sediment and further stick them. The droid yanked on the hatch but found it stuck, likely from the crash or from sand infesting the cracks or putting pressure on the outer mechanisms. "Shit." With no care given to the medical vessle, he planted a booted foot on the side of the door and yanked harder. The radio served first to amplify the atmospheric frequencies, distant civilized radio waves, and then the sounds of the ionosphere... >>
You say, "Slowly but surely these were turned out, and Jeslyn would find as he reached the higher frequencies, a horrible, aching, shrieking, distorted sound--peeps and scratches and high notes, the sort of weird sounds produced from radiation; mainly as this radiation bounced back off of the ionosphere to the receiver, but the sounds seemed to correlate with the movements of the--"Cosmonaut," Aegolius's voice had dropped to a quiet thrum as he forewent the door and returned to stare out the window again. The red colourations of the old suit had triggered some familiarity, and the helmet, turning, saw some old lettering on it, nearly sunbleached off. CCCP. It was grabbing at the worm again, so tiny in comparison but intent on picking a fight. The worm thrashed and it fell to the sand, followed quickly by the giant maw of the Tuphon native, crashing down to swallow the Ghost whole. And that seemed to be that."
[#] Jeslyn rolls 1d20 reverse reverse....? & gets 6.
Jeslyn was fascinated, slamming the record button on the screen and letting it get as long a clip of noise as he could. He looked back "please!" he hissed at the sound of the droid yanking on the door "This is already damaged enough, they will kill me..." he sighed at the thought of Cec seeing their vessel like this....but at least he had a good story! "We need to get out of-Eyaaaaaaaah!" he yelled in mild horror as he looked up and saw the mouth of the worm coming down towards them, only for it to swallow the cosmonaut whole far too close in front of them. In that moment he'd desperately tried to reverse and failed once more. He dropped back with a breathless gasp "Circle of life" he said and turned the ship off so that it wouldn't vibrate, deciding to opt for letting the worm leave. "Sit down, do not move." he said, deciding to put some faith in what he knew of annelids. "Give it a moment and we can try to get this thing out of the sand."
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 & gets 19.
Aegolius looked him right in the eye and gave the hatch a final, good tug with his foot planted on the wall before grumbling his way back to the cockpit. But the approaching maw saw the android rushing forward to grab at the yoke, as if he would have any more luck getting the little shuttle to reverse the Hell out of Dodge than the scientist had. The worm dove down on the Entity and started to descend back into the sand. He was up on the dashboard again, trying to get a good look at where the cosmonaut was no more. "Christ." The barest look skywards and then down again, before he did as Jeslyn bid and sank down into the co-pilot seat. The bulk of the worm's body was still above the sand, but slowly disappearing, until it gave a sudden shudder. A twitch, and then a thrash, suddenly reversing itself out of the desert, but too late. Something burst from the side of the thing's mouth just as it pulled free, in a show of gore and sinew.>>
Aegolius>>If he still had the radio going, this was accompanied by a particularly discordant, high-frequency sound, and then by--resounding through the ship--the shriek of the darisaga. "Shit." It dropped like a stone and writhed in agony in the sand, but missed the ship by a large margin. The owlish droid started to lean forward again to try and catch a glimpse of the cosmonaut. "You still want to kidnap it?"
[#] Jeslyn rolls 1d20 & gets 14.
Jeslyn watched everything with wide eyes and his ears forward, barely aware of Aegolius moving around. He was still recording, though he'd turned the volume down a little. "...goodness" he said, barely a whisper as he watched the ghost break free from the worm "We have proof of it, then." when asked if he wanted to try and kidnap it, he slowly looked at Aegolius, silent a moment before a quiet "...yes. But lets treat this as an animal before all else, I am going to check for behavioural cues - if i could just... " there was a loud crunch as the poor vessel tried to reverse out the sands and after much straining and probably damage he managed to get it free and sadly puttering along. He slowly hovered sideways some good feet away from the triumphant ghost warrior, flipping his lights on to first see if it paid any attention to them with the absence of the worm, but then too would he play an external audio, curiously looping some of the radioactive screeching back at it. Jes rubbed the >
Jeslyn> back of his neck, groaning quietly. Just a little whiplash. <
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 for Entity to notice the lights & gets 19.
Aegolius. The cosmonaut latched onto one tiny corner of the massive worm's mouth; despite its diminutive size, comparatively, the worm seemed to be in perpetual torment, but it was too difficult to see the entire story through the winds (the worm having landed a bit further back from the ship). It tried to lift its head one last time to throw the Entity but, apparently too weak, it failed and crashed back down to the sands, ceasing movement. The droid stared blankly at the scientist. "Was being sarcastic." The thing just ripped through a worm. As if on cue, the cosmonaut straightened up and stood, still, forward, angled away from its witnesses. As the lights flashed on it, cutting through the extra airborn silt kicked up by the felling of the worm, more details of its tattered suit came to light. Definitely Earthian, there were no doubts now. Old. Old, sunbleached, barely holding together. It did not turn its head, its back illuminated by the shuttle's headlights.>>
Aegolius>>The replaying of the sounds seemed to make no difference; it didn't react. It almost seemed like it had... deactivated, until suddenly, after the lengthy pause, it turned to face them. It stalked, a purposeful, unhinged, deeply unsettling shamble through the sands straight for the ship.
Jeslyn slowly moved back as it started to stalk towards them, barely moving his head as he recorded the movements. Maybe Ceci could make something of its behaviour. He turned off the feed to outside, almost forgetting poor Aegolius was there for the moment. "One last thing I will try...then we must leave it. I am not certain there's anything particularly concious in there...though it seems intent on destruction." He picked up the handset and pressed the button down on the reciever, speaking and projecting his voice out into the wastes as he slowly moved backwards. "I am going to have to ask you to stop where you are." could it understand? or would it keep moving toward them like a machine.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 & gets 20.
Aegolius stood again, first to watch the cosmonaut, and then to move for the door again. "Don't think ghosts are supposed to be conscious. Living out their last moments, or something." Was its last moment murdering a worm? A clawed hand rested on the hatch handle again, but he turned back to watch the outcome of Jeslyn's plea. At the projected voice, the Entity stopped in its tracks, radiational bursts dropping in turn. It wavered on its feet, as if tempering the storming winds. And then, another burst of radiation translated as a sharp distorted screech, like a pulsar emitting a sudden burst of electromagnetic radiation. Through the sharp static came something garbled, but intelligible, the static giving it the feel of an old-timey radio, just barely made out.>>
Aegolius>>"Pogovori so mnoy, pogovori so mnoy, mne zharko ... Mne zharko ... Chto?" The cosmonaut stood still a moment longer and then suddenly charged the shuttle with the ferocity of a pint-sized eldritch horror intent on ripping the thing in two.
[#] Jeslyn rolls 1d20 & gets 13.
Jeslyn watched, leaning forward in his seat with wide eyes and baited breath. The strange feedback was curious but the definite words that followed it in a language Jeslyn didn't know fascinated him. He cockily held up a finger "But it's talking, is it not? Now I just need to figure out a way to transl- Oh no" with a wide blink he started to immediately reverse as quickly as he could, relying on the ships scanners for dodging rocks behind him and rising properly up over dunes. No time to swing the ship around. The vessel struck rock stacks indirectly, getting thrown around but staying relatively on course, all the while gaining a series of further dents and scratches.
Aegolius cocked his head to one side again, as if refusing to concede the point. But the droid had no proper time to compose a comeback, because once again he was forced to hold onto the handle while the doctor back-peddled the ship. When would he learn to just sit down and put a seatbelt on. Beep-beepbeepbeEP-CLUNK as the scanner detected the rocks he was so gracelessly failing to avoid. He braced his stance. All apparent thoughts of opening the door and jettisoning himself while Jeslyn was distracted seemed to have left his mind. Well, there goes the Tracker theory. Not when it was busy charging them. His erratic backwards driving was working to momentarily put some distance between them and the ghost, but the thing was definitely still pursuing--and very, very slowly gaining on them. Aegorius started to climb his way back to the cockpit. "He grumbled something about 'fucking scientists' and grabbed the back of Jeslyn's seat. "Move."
[ End Part 1 ]
Jeslyn was feeling second hand battery from the poor ship. He kept thinking about how Cec was going to react to seeing it, and he certainly didn't expect their trust with anything ever again after THIS! "Ah-! Yes- yes!" he agreed and scrambled to unfasten his seatbelt clumsily for a moment and then dove for the co-pilot seat and out the way, letting Aegolius take charge.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 driving check & gets 14.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 entity & gets 16.
Aegolius climbed gracefully over the armrest once he’d vacated the seat and landed in it with a thump. Federation medical shuttle? Easy peasy. He laced his segmented fingers together as if he was going to crack his knuckles, but no such sound came. Instead he grabbed the yoke, looking down and around to familiarize himself with the rest of the controls, acceleration, space-clutch... He floored it, accelerating their reverse further, before suddenly releasing it; just as the shuttle started to slow again, he raked the clutch forward and pulled hard on the yolk, forcing the thing with his entire body. The reverse 180 was clunky, by no means perfect, but accomplished. Unfortunately instead of immediately speeding off forward, they had temporarily stopped, caught while he yanked on the yoke and clutch again. “Fucking... Fuck.” Enough time for the Entity to gain; he could hear the crackling spitting sound over the radio. He got them moving again quickly enough, metallic claws clacking against controls, trying to find the back camera. It popped up in the corner of the screen. The ghost had quickly closed the distance while they were stalled.
Jeslyn had barely gotten his seatbelt back on when the ship SWUNG around, practically almost throwing him from the seat if it weren't for the belt. "HURK!" he choked out as the belt throttled him momentarily before sending him harshly back into the seat.
There was a moment where he gasped for breath and rubbed at his throat but it didn't last long before he panicked "Why have we stopped!? Omen hurry!" he demanded with thinly veiled alarm. Then he heard the crackling and looked up to see the Entity coming quickly into view. It was almost with an alarmed, rasping squeak that he called the droid's nickname again "OMEN." Even if he'd wanted to hide it, he couldn't, his skin rapidly flashing black and white much like the anger signal but faster, a last resort warning perhaps.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 piloting check & gets 5.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 Entity & gets 16.
Aegolius: With no seatbelt, the droid had braced himself with an iron grip on the yoke as the little ship spun. "I'm going," he growled, smashing at the controls agitatedly. The medical shuttle clunk-clunk-clunked, apparently having some trouble. It had taken several hits, that was to be expected. Aegorius' voicebox produced a low grating grumbling noise as he tried his best to put some distance between them and the closing ghost. And then he hit a dune, his attention apparently on the reverse-cam. The shuttle th-WUMPED, tipped forward, and then backwards, gaining quite a bit of air as it spun, before landing with a dull sound back into the sand and scraping to a halt. "Shit."
Jeslyn's eyes widened further, his one organic pupil the size of a pinprick by now "You're going to DIE, boy! unless you MOVE!" he bellowed , but then could only yell as he was thrown around in his seat before finally they shuddered to a halt.
"Fek'met! Duht! Tru'k!" Apparently cursing in his own language he threw his belt off and reached into his lab coat as he stood up, narrowing his eyes. Pulling out two rather unsettling syringes, selecting one and putting the other back before hovering his claws over the plastic cap. "I will buy us time if I have to." though, he would of course listen for any objection, but only for a second. They didn't have time to debate it.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 pilot & gets 17.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 entity & gets 16.
Aegolius slammed his clawed hands down on the yolk a few times in unbridled frustration before attempting to get the shuttle moving again. He didn't appreciate being yelled at, but this was also his own damn fault. Fucking FUCK. He didn't need to know the language to understand that the doctor was also voicing his own frustrations. He manoeuvred the ship--still clunking, slowly but surely--until it was free of this latest sand-trap. With all of the damage, it was still running. "What? You plan to stab it?" The droid threw his hands up. "It's wearing a suit! What good will that do!?"
He had come out here to slap a tracker on the thing and figure out what it was, and now... The droid climbed ridiculously over the back of the seat and ran for the hatch. "Least I'm easier to put back together. ...Sorta." He planted a foot square on the wall and heaved at the dented hatch again. Was this about to become a contest of self-sacrifice? There was the sudden crunch and scrape of something against the outside hull.
Jeslyn bared his teeth at Aegolius and hissed deeply as he ran for the hatch "No! get back in the seat and -" he heard the scrape on the outside hull and turned his head abruptly. That suited man was about to come tearing in the same way he'd come tearing OUT of that worm.
"We don't have time." He warned and then tore off his labcoat, tearing the plastic cover from the needle and slamming it into his arm at the crook of his elbow rather abruptly, emptying the contents into himself.
The transformation was violent and too-fast, some might think. His skin erupted with black colouration loosely dotted with dark red markings along the back and the sides of his neck. His hair practically melded with his skin as he grew in size and sadly ended up tearing his clothes to shreds in the process. With pained groans his skull shifted, jaw elongating to facilitate a terrifying, baboon-like structure. His organic eye went blood red with a black sclera, though the cybernetic eye no longer fit the socket and simply hung forward in it and turned off unsettlingly.
His long black tail shortened to a stub and his one organic foot and one organic arm became heavily clawed hands. He let out shuddering breaths and growls, looking practically horrifying in the way that he stood lopsided on a now much shorter leg, with a slightly too-small arm hanging from the socket and his eye half hanging out, but he was far more powerful than the weedy doctor he'd been seconds ago. He readied himself, bracing a foot against the floor of the ship and listening for the direction the astronaut was coming from. A piercing red eye swivelled this way and that, nostrils flaring.
Aegolius wasn't listening. Maybe he knew more about this ghost that he wasn't revealing, but he was intent on decking it full in the face rather than let the twiggy little doctor get... Snapped in half, probably. The droid's eyes couldn't widen in shock and confusion, but his head tipped back instead, before he scrambled to get out of the way of the transformation. "Christ." He'd almost fallen prone in the chaos. What even was this guy? He could barely name the native races of the Bermuda; this guy was entirely off his radar. He had his tonfa in his hands in a second, pulled from some strap behind his back under his cloak; a defensive measure if the scientist's Hulking Out meant he'd completely lost himself. He dropped his stance lower.
The scraping stopped, followed by silence from outside of the shuttle (minus the howling winds). Finally a scuffling sound, light thumping like something climbing the ship's hull. Assuming Jeslyn hadn't physically assaulted the droid in the rush to be the First Out, Aegolius would look up, before taking a slow, cautious step back towards the pilot's seat and trying to change the camera's view. Absolutely paranoid of the thing and the 'doctor'. What had he gotten himself into?
The ghost was standing on top of the shuttle, but had stopped again, as it had before. Almost like it had powered down. The glass dome of its helmet occasionally shifted in muted lights, corresponding to 'pulses' of radiation, but that too quieted and died. Maybe it was waiting, or sensing. Standing as still as the little medical shuttle.
Jeslyn bared his teeth, wide eyed monstrosity looking this way and that at any movement from either Aegolius or the cosmonaut above them. Jeslyn slowly edged over toward the screen, peering down at it and ignoring the uncertain android to the side of him.
The moment they moved the ship, this thing was going to tear them open like a tin of beans. They could wait for a distraction, but a distraction might never come…or the terrifying monstrosity might burst to life unexpectedly and tear them open like a tin can anyway.
Silently he pointed at Aegolius with a long claw and then at the pilots chair, slowly shuffling over toward the hatch. He’d try to open it as silently as possible. Unfortunately, it was damaged and it hissed LOUDLY open and crunched and screamed under the strain. Shit.
The large black creature squeezed out as quickly as he could, darting across the sands through the storm and letting out a bellowing roar as quickly as he could to try and redirect the attention of the ghost. He shuffled sideways and then backwards, roaring a second time persistently.
Aegolius tensed when Jeslyn approached again, but otherwise remained quietly observant, before following his gaze back to the viewscreen. This entire thing had gone ass backwards on them. Maybe it would just walk away. Go searching for more worms.
Luminescent eyes flicked in the monstrous scientist’s direction at the gesture, before the rest of his head followed slowly. He cocked his head and gestured back in confusion, but climbed obediently into the pilot’s chair, grasping the head-rest with both clawed hands to twist around and watch him leave. The android visibly cringed at the sound of the hatch, his entire metallic body tensing again even if his expression could not properly articulate it.
The muffled clomp-clomp overhead signalled the ghost’s change in direction. It slowly faced Jeslyn, still again, perhaps assessing the situation on some level, its helmet tilted faintly skyward. A colourful swirl pulsed briefly from its helmet, signalling what was likely another burst of radiation; it started walking, jerkily, in his direction, promptly falling off the side of the shuttle with a pumff into the sand below. It got up and dashed after him.
As soon as it was clear of the shuttle, Aegolius slammed a foot down on the acceleration and got the shuttle up and hovering again, streaking away from the ghost and Jeslyn, apparently abandoning them to the wastes.
[#] Jeslyn rolls 1d20+4 & gets 20.
Jeslyn: It became immediately clear why Jeslyn had picked this form. It was bulky but once it got running in the opposite direction of the spaceman to lead him away from the ship long enough for Aeg to get out.
He charged away, kicking up sand with one flat foot. Despite his terrible advantage from the short leg and arm, he seemed used to managing. However, as soon as he saw the ship just...speed off he changed direction as abruptly as he could manage (this form didn't find such so easy) and hurried after it, even clambering speedily up a rocky sandstone slope after it and bellowing out hopelessly. He couldn't run from the cosmonaut forever! He'd DIE.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 to hit & gets 20.
Aegolius and the shuttle quickly disappeared in the murky gloom of light filtering through airborn silt, leaving Jeslyn in his literal dust with no real hope of catching up. The astronaut, having apparently all but forgotten the shuttle in lieu of its new pursuit, continued lumbering after the hulk. Surprisingly fast, it was still no match for Jeslyn’s powerful speed. Whether or not it could outlast him in endurance remained to be seen, of course.
The hum of the shuttle had been lost to the winds a good minute earlier, but sensitive ears might pick it up again—approaching this time. Through the haze a banged up medical shuttle returned, the stone-faced android hunched over the yoke. He mimed something, as if pulling a rope down from overhead with a tightly clenched fist—once, twice—and then flattened himself back in his seat. He had no lips to read, but he may have been hollering.
Jeslyn might feel the urge to duck and get out of the way, but the droid was definitely not aiming for him. He whizzed by at top speed (whatever that was for the zippy little medical shuttle), and collided with the spaceman head-on.
CO-CLONK, it was hard to tell what kind of damage it might have just done to the front of the shuttle from Jeslyn’s view, but a tiny spacesuited entity went wind milling through the air behind the shuttle as it sped off again, gaining much more air than Aegolius had.
It landed on the steep lee side of a crescentric dune, and proceeded to tumble down into the deep slack between adjacent barchans, disappearing from view.
Aegolius was doing a wide arc, coming back around a second time for a pickup, allowing the shuttle to slow without, hopefully, crashing into anything. The poor thing had seen some better days by the time it hovered up beside Jeslyn, the droid appearing in the still-open hatchway.
[ 'Get in, loser.' ]
Jeslyn threw himself forward harder as he heard the shuttle coming for him a little too late. He swore internally, but then spun around and skidded to a halt as he heard the spaceman strike the front of the shuttle. His eye widened, only turning in time to see the ghost spinning through the air and disappearing out of sight.
He breathed heavily and charged through the stinging sands to leap onto the shuttle, slamming the hatch shut and launching himself like an ape for the console. Grabbing at the co-pilot seat he leaned over with a low growl and saved the current co-ordinates. "The last known location of the ghost." he announced breathlessly and then slumped down into the chair, looking utterly out of place.
His strange, baboon-like head turned slowly toward Aegolius, grinning and baring all of his terrifying sharp teeth at him. "You came back for me." he rumbled "You didn't have to, you know. Could've left me for dead...I appreciate it, Omen." and then he threw a hand up, full of claws.
"And WHAT an ADVENTURE!, We found the ghost and no doubt we have plenty of data worth looking over, footage to review, audio data and co-ordinates! a shame about the tracker but there may be a next time." he'd had a GREAT time- oh...the ship. He frowned and looked around at each of the cameras for what damage he could perceive, grimacing softly.
Aegolius had no idea if that would keep him down for long. Or... at all, really. He couldn’t see if it was climbing out of the trough from here. Stepping aside from the doorway for Jeslyn to leap aboard, he climbed back into the pilot seat, leaning away when the hulking scientist squeezed in for the co-pilot’s side to make an audio-note. His illuminated eyes focused on those bared teeth before flicking back up to Jeslyn’s. Or the one that wasn’t currently... hanging out of its socket. “Pretty sure I can’t sell a legitimate medical shuttle without some questions.” He would deny all pretence of friendship and comradery until his last non-breath!
Conversation aside, he wasn’t about to wait around on the off-chance the ghost was climbing out of the trough, but he bobbed his mask of a face in response as he steered the shuttle up and far, far away from where the spaceman had last been. He stared at the back-vid as they sped off until he was comfortable they had put some distance between the thing. “Had one ready...” Removing a clawed hand from the yoke, he pulled a little spider-tracker from the folds of his forest green and brown robes. “Don’t think I would’ve gotten close enough, in retrospect.” Next time, maybe.
The ship was dented, clunked, cracked, and full of sand. Good luck explaining that.
Jeslyn snorted "You could have left it in the wastes." he mused, but decided not to prod any further. Occasionally he growled for no real reason and shook his head, seemingly battling with bestial behaviour here and there but he seemed to stay on top of it easy enough.
"Next time, perhaps we can fly alongside and fire one at it....hmm...i wonder if it's attracted to biological signatures....or movement, it's hard to tell without doing preference tests..." was Jeslyn suggesting dumping a rabbit and an alarm clock in the desert and seeing which it went after? probably.
"Where will you go now? are we going to search for your ship?"
Aegolius stared him down. “Probably.” At this point, he wasn’t sure he would get a good price for the scrap of a ship. Turning forward again, he fixed the beast with the occasional side-eye at his growls, wary but willing to wait it out. He seemed stable enough.
“Maybe.” Jeslyn’s next comment gave the droid pause, and then he emitted a sound, like he was grumbling in thought, distorted and deep. Another stretch of silence. “...Maybe.” The hypothesis had merit. He looked the scientist’s way again. “Went after you.” And ignored the ship... But Jeslyn had flashed lights—and noise—at it earlier... “Priority.” The droid shrugged his shoulders. He didn’t say anything to the implication of putting life at risk again.
Instead, he shrugged his shoulders a second time. “Yes.” With a clack-clack, he tapped a clawed finger against the distance-counter again. Not so far now!
Jeslyn held up a claw, unknowingly echoing the droid's thoughts "But he followed the lights too. We cannot rule out memory but that is what testing is for. We know he has memory because he is able to speak. Even an echo is a memory...one has to question why he's so aggressive and why he gravitates towards movement and sound" he hummed thoughtfully.
"The fluctuations - it is fascinating. That the body would remain so mobile under such conditions...it makes me think very deeply on what it may be....I must speak to Doctor Gadhavi."
When they likely approached the droid's ship, he looked over at him, wondering if he might see them again. "Would you like to stay in contact, Omen, or is this goodbye?"
Aegolius stared at him, following along enough to get the gist. He was no scientist himself. “...Echo...” It felt almost mystical. Maybe it wanted something. Maybe it was eating? He stared forward again, thinking on it, but instead concluding with a disgruntled “hrrg.”
His attention wasn’t lost long, and he was back to staring at Jeslyn again, as if he had said something peculiar. Maybe the droid was pondering the possibility of weird fleshy undead cyborgs in spacesuits. He tilted his head at a questioning angle, but couldn’t express any other readable emotion. Instead, as his ship came into view, he slowed, setting the medical shuttle down gently. And then stared over his shoulder at the collection of medical equipment again—most of it was on the floor at this point, from ramming a droid, a worm, several dunes, and an eldritch spaceman.
He climbed out of the pilot’s seat finally, his shoulders looking tense; teal eyes again locked on the scientist. He didn’t answer right away, instead looking from Jeslyn, to the floor, to the ship seen through the viewfinder. And then to the dashboard, where Jeslyn had logged the last-known coordinates of the ghost. He tapped at it to bring them up again, staring as if committing them to digital memory. After another uncomfortably long stretch, he answered by reaching into his robes again to produce his commlink, holding it out for Jeslyn’s details. Fine, could be useful to have the number of a suicidal mad scientist.
The ship parked outside was dusted in sand from the storm, but cut a distinctive shape: angular, V-shaped and matte black, in much better condition than this poor medical shuttle. But having seen better days itself, with several dents and scrapes that marred its paint-job.
Jeslyn peeled his lips back and bared his teeth. Was it a smile? but either way he stood up and went in search of his lab coat, struggling to pull the commlink out with two claws before awkwardly putting it into his cybernetic hand. There.
He offered it to Aegolius, exchanging contact details "Take care, Omen. All the best of luck in your endeavours." he growled at him. Time to take this destroyed ship back to Ceci.....oh no. Maybe he could just live in the wastes from now on? no- no that was unreasonable.
Aegolius did the polite thing and took both commlinks, one in each hand, to initiate the transfer himself. Since the... brute was having a bit of trouble. Understandably. Once he was satisfied, he set the commlink back in Jeslyn’s cybernetic hand, since that seemed easier for him to maneuver, and moved to the hatch. A foot on the wall as he pocketed his commlink, then he gave the handle a good yank; it stuttered open with a horrible, scraping, grinding sound.
The droid turned back, put two clawed fingers to the side of his cloaked head in a jaunty salute to the scientist, and disappeared into the wastes without a word. He could be seen walking towards his own ship, the wind picking up his cloak around him again. The automation on his own door seemed to be stuck, the thing opening only half-way before he had to shove it the rest of the way open; either the grit of Tuphon’s sands had finally gotten to it, or Aegolius was just already well-versed in the Troubles of Stuck Hatches.
[ Fin ]
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 driving check & gets 14.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 entity & gets 16.
Aegolius climbed gracefully over the armrest once he’d vacated the seat and landed in it with a thump. Federation medical shuttle? Easy peasy. He laced his segmented fingers together as if he was going to crack his knuckles, but no such sound came. Instead he grabbed the yoke, looking down and around to familiarize himself with the rest of the controls, acceleration, space-clutch... He floored it, accelerating their reverse further, before suddenly releasing it; just as the shuttle started to slow again, he raked the clutch forward and pulled hard on the yolk, forcing the thing with his entire body. The reverse 180 was clunky, by no means perfect, but accomplished. Unfortunately instead of immediately speeding off forward, they had temporarily stopped, caught while he yanked on the yoke and clutch again. “Fucking... Fuck.” Enough time for the Entity to gain; he could hear the crackling spitting sound over the radio. He got them moving again quickly enough, metallic claws clacking against controls, trying to find the back camera. It popped up in the corner of the screen. The ghost had quickly closed the distance while they were stalled.
Jeslyn had barely gotten his seatbelt back on when the ship SWUNG around, practically almost throwing him from the seat if it weren't for the belt. "HURK!" he choked out as the belt throttled him momentarily before sending him harshly back into the seat.
There was a moment where he gasped for breath and rubbed at his throat but it didn't last long before he panicked "Why have we stopped!? Omen hurry!" he demanded with thinly veiled alarm. Then he heard the crackling and looked up to see the Entity coming quickly into view. It was almost with an alarmed, rasping squeak that he called the droid's nickname again "OMEN." Even if he'd wanted to hide it, he couldn't, his skin rapidly flashing black and white much like the anger signal but faster, a last resort warning perhaps.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 piloting check & gets 5.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 Entity & gets 16.
Aegolius: With no seatbelt, the droid had braced himself with an iron grip on the yoke as the little ship spun. "I'm going," he growled, smashing at the controls agitatedly. The medical shuttle clunk-clunk-clunked, apparently having some trouble. It had taken several hits, that was to be expected. Aegorius' voicebox produced a low grating grumbling noise as he tried his best to put some distance between them and the closing ghost. And then he hit a dune, his attention apparently on the reverse-cam. The shuttle th-WUMPED, tipped forward, and then backwards, gaining quite a bit of air as it spun, before landing with a dull sound back into the sand and scraping to a halt. "Shit."
Jeslyn's eyes widened further, his one organic pupil the size of a pinprick by now "You're going to DIE, boy! unless you MOVE!" he bellowed , but then could only yell as he was thrown around in his seat before finally they shuddered to a halt.
"Fek'met! Duht! Tru'k!" Apparently cursing in his own language he threw his belt off and reached into his lab coat as he stood up, narrowing his eyes. Pulling out two rather unsettling syringes, selecting one and putting the other back before hovering his claws over the plastic cap. "I will buy us time if I have to." though, he would of course listen for any objection, but only for a second. They didn't have time to debate it.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 pilot & gets 17.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 entity & gets 16.
Aegolius slammed his clawed hands down on the yolk a few times in unbridled frustration before attempting to get the shuttle moving again. He didn't appreciate being yelled at, but this was also his own damn fault. Fucking FUCK. He didn't need to know the language to understand that the doctor was also voicing his own frustrations. He manoeuvred the ship--still clunking, slowly but surely--until it was free of this latest sand-trap. With all of the damage, it was still running. "What? You plan to stab it?" The droid threw his hands up. "It's wearing a suit! What good will that do!?"
He had come out here to slap a tracker on the thing and figure out what it was, and now... The droid climbed ridiculously over the back of the seat and ran for the hatch. "Least I'm easier to put back together. ...Sorta." He planted a foot square on the wall and heaved at the dented hatch again. Was this about to become a contest of self-sacrifice? There was the sudden crunch and scrape of something against the outside hull.
Jeslyn bared his teeth at Aegolius and hissed deeply as he ran for the hatch "No! get back in the seat and -" he heard the scrape on the outside hull and turned his head abruptly. That suited man was about to come tearing in the same way he'd come tearing OUT of that worm.
"We don't have time." He warned and then tore off his labcoat, tearing the plastic cover from the needle and slamming it into his arm at the crook of his elbow rather abruptly, emptying the contents into himself.
The transformation was violent and too-fast, some might think. His skin erupted with black colouration loosely dotted with dark red markings along the back and the sides of his neck. His hair practically melded with his skin as he grew in size and sadly ended up tearing his clothes to shreds in the process. With pained groans his skull shifted, jaw elongating to facilitate a terrifying, baboon-like structure. His organic eye went blood red with a black sclera, though the cybernetic eye no longer fit the socket and simply hung forward in it and turned off unsettlingly.
His long black tail shortened to a stub and his one organic foot and one organic arm became heavily clawed hands. He let out shuddering breaths and growls, looking practically horrifying in the way that he stood lopsided on a now much shorter leg, with a slightly too-small arm hanging from the socket and his eye half hanging out, but he was far more powerful than the weedy doctor he'd been seconds ago. He readied himself, bracing a foot against the floor of the ship and listening for the direction the astronaut was coming from. A piercing red eye swivelled this way and that, nostrils flaring.
Aegolius wasn't listening. Maybe he knew more about this ghost that he wasn't revealing, but he was intent on decking it full in the face rather than let the twiggy little doctor get... Snapped in half, probably. The droid's eyes couldn't widen in shock and confusion, but his head tipped back instead, before he scrambled to get out of the way of the transformation. "Christ." He'd almost fallen prone in the chaos. What even was this guy? He could barely name the native races of the Bermuda; this guy was entirely off his radar. He had his tonfa in his hands in a second, pulled from some strap behind his back under his cloak; a defensive measure if the scientist's Hulking Out meant he'd completely lost himself. He dropped his stance lower.
The scraping stopped, followed by silence from outside of the shuttle (minus the howling winds). Finally a scuffling sound, light thumping like something climbing the ship's hull. Assuming Jeslyn hadn't physically assaulted the droid in the rush to be the First Out, Aegolius would look up, before taking a slow, cautious step back towards the pilot's seat and trying to change the camera's view. Absolutely paranoid of the thing and the 'doctor'. What had he gotten himself into?
The ghost was standing on top of the shuttle, but had stopped again, as it had before. Almost like it had powered down. The glass dome of its helmet occasionally shifted in muted lights, corresponding to 'pulses' of radiation, but that too quieted and died. Maybe it was waiting, or sensing. Standing as still as the little medical shuttle.
Jeslyn bared his teeth, wide eyed monstrosity looking this way and that at any movement from either Aegolius or the cosmonaut above them. Jeslyn slowly edged over toward the screen, peering down at it and ignoring the uncertain android to the side of him.
The moment they moved the ship, this thing was going to tear them open like a tin of beans. They could wait for a distraction, but a distraction might never come…or the terrifying monstrosity might burst to life unexpectedly and tear them open like a tin can anyway.
Silently he pointed at Aegolius with a long claw and then at the pilots chair, slowly shuffling over toward the hatch. He’d try to open it as silently as possible. Unfortunately, it was damaged and it hissed LOUDLY open and crunched and screamed under the strain. Shit.
The large black creature squeezed out as quickly as he could, darting across the sands through the storm and letting out a bellowing roar as quickly as he could to try and redirect the attention of the ghost. He shuffled sideways and then backwards, roaring a second time persistently.
Aegolius tensed when Jeslyn approached again, but otherwise remained quietly observant, before following his gaze back to the viewscreen. This entire thing had gone ass backwards on them. Maybe it would just walk away. Go searching for more worms.
Luminescent eyes flicked in the monstrous scientist’s direction at the gesture, before the rest of his head followed slowly. He cocked his head and gestured back in confusion, but climbed obediently into the pilot’s chair, grasping the head-rest with both clawed hands to twist around and watch him leave. The android visibly cringed at the sound of the hatch, his entire metallic body tensing again even if his expression could not properly articulate it.
The muffled clomp-clomp overhead signalled the ghost’s change in direction. It slowly faced Jeslyn, still again, perhaps assessing the situation on some level, its helmet tilted faintly skyward. A colourful swirl pulsed briefly from its helmet, signalling what was likely another burst of radiation; it started walking, jerkily, in his direction, promptly falling off the side of the shuttle with a pumff into the sand below. It got up and dashed after him.
As soon as it was clear of the shuttle, Aegolius slammed a foot down on the acceleration and got the shuttle up and hovering again, streaking away from the ghost and Jeslyn, apparently abandoning them to the wastes.
[#] Jeslyn rolls 1d20+4 & gets 20.
Jeslyn: It became immediately clear why Jeslyn had picked this form. It was bulky but once it got running in the opposite direction of the spaceman to lead him away from the ship long enough for Aeg to get out.
He charged away, kicking up sand with one flat foot. Despite his terrible advantage from the short leg and arm, he seemed used to managing. However, as soon as he saw the ship just...speed off he changed direction as abruptly as he could manage (this form didn't find such so easy) and hurried after it, even clambering speedily up a rocky sandstone slope after it and bellowing out hopelessly. He couldn't run from the cosmonaut forever! He'd DIE.
[#] Aegolius rolls 1d20 to hit & gets 20.
Aegolius and the shuttle quickly disappeared in the murky gloom of light filtering through airborn silt, leaving Jeslyn in his literal dust with no real hope of catching up. The astronaut, having apparently all but forgotten the shuttle in lieu of its new pursuit, continued lumbering after the hulk. Surprisingly fast, it was still no match for Jeslyn’s powerful speed. Whether or not it could outlast him in endurance remained to be seen, of course.
The hum of the shuttle had been lost to the winds a good minute earlier, but sensitive ears might pick it up again—approaching this time. Through the haze a banged up medical shuttle returned, the stone-faced android hunched over the yoke. He mimed something, as if pulling a rope down from overhead with a tightly clenched fist—once, twice—and then flattened himself back in his seat. He had no lips to read, but he may have been hollering.
Jeslyn might feel the urge to duck and get out of the way, but the droid was definitely not aiming for him. He whizzed by at top speed (whatever that was for the zippy little medical shuttle), and collided with the spaceman head-on.
CO-CLONK, it was hard to tell what kind of damage it might have just done to the front of the shuttle from Jeslyn’s view, but a tiny spacesuited entity went wind milling through the air behind the shuttle as it sped off again, gaining much more air than Aegolius had.
It landed on the steep lee side of a crescentric dune, and proceeded to tumble down into the deep slack between adjacent barchans, disappearing from view.
Aegolius was doing a wide arc, coming back around a second time for a pickup, allowing the shuttle to slow without, hopefully, crashing into anything. The poor thing had seen some better days by the time it hovered up beside Jeslyn, the droid appearing in the still-open hatchway.
[ 'Get in, loser.' ]
Jeslyn threw himself forward harder as he heard the shuttle coming for him a little too late. He swore internally, but then spun around and skidded to a halt as he heard the spaceman strike the front of the shuttle. His eye widened, only turning in time to see the ghost spinning through the air and disappearing out of sight.
He breathed heavily and charged through the stinging sands to leap onto the shuttle, slamming the hatch shut and launching himself like an ape for the console. Grabbing at the co-pilot seat he leaned over with a low growl and saved the current co-ordinates. "The last known location of the ghost." he announced breathlessly and then slumped down into the chair, looking utterly out of place.
His strange, baboon-like head turned slowly toward Aegolius, grinning and baring all of his terrifying sharp teeth at him. "You came back for me." he rumbled "You didn't have to, you know. Could've left me for dead...I appreciate it, Omen." and then he threw a hand up, full of claws.
"And WHAT an ADVENTURE!, We found the ghost and no doubt we have plenty of data worth looking over, footage to review, audio data and co-ordinates! a shame about the tracker but there may be a next time." he'd had a GREAT time- oh...the ship. He frowned and looked around at each of the cameras for what damage he could perceive, grimacing softly.
Aegolius had no idea if that would keep him down for long. Or... at all, really. He couldn’t see if it was climbing out of the trough from here. Stepping aside from the doorway for Jeslyn to leap aboard, he climbed back into the pilot seat, leaning away when the hulking scientist squeezed in for the co-pilot’s side to make an audio-note. His illuminated eyes focused on those bared teeth before flicking back up to Jeslyn’s. Or the one that wasn’t currently... hanging out of its socket. “Pretty sure I can’t sell a legitimate medical shuttle without some questions.” He would deny all pretence of friendship and comradery until his last non-breath!
Conversation aside, he wasn’t about to wait around on the off-chance the ghost was climbing out of the trough, but he bobbed his mask of a face in response as he steered the shuttle up and far, far away from where the spaceman had last been. He stared at the back-vid as they sped off until he was comfortable they had put some distance between the thing. “Had one ready...” Removing a clawed hand from the yoke, he pulled a little spider-tracker from the folds of his forest green and brown robes. “Don’t think I would’ve gotten close enough, in retrospect.” Next time, maybe.
The ship was dented, clunked, cracked, and full of sand. Good luck explaining that.
Jeslyn snorted "You could have left it in the wastes." he mused, but decided not to prod any further. Occasionally he growled for no real reason and shook his head, seemingly battling with bestial behaviour here and there but he seemed to stay on top of it easy enough.
"Next time, perhaps we can fly alongside and fire one at it....hmm...i wonder if it's attracted to biological signatures....or movement, it's hard to tell without doing preference tests..." was Jeslyn suggesting dumping a rabbit and an alarm clock in the desert and seeing which it went after? probably.
"Where will you go now? are we going to search for your ship?"
Aegolius stared him down. “Probably.” At this point, he wasn’t sure he would get a good price for the scrap of a ship. Turning forward again, he fixed the beast with the occasional side-eye at his growls, wary but willing to wait it out. He seemed stable enough.
“Maybe.” Jeslyn’s next comment gave the droid pause, and then he emitted a sound, like he was grumbling in thought, distorted and deep. Another stretch of silence. “...Maybe.” The hypothesis had merit. He looked the scientist’s way again. “Went after you.” And ignored the ship... But Jeslyn had flashed lights—and noise—at it earlier... “Priority.” The droid shrugged his shoulders. He didn’t say anything to the implication of putting life at risk again.
Instead, he shrugged his shoulders a second time. “Yes.” With a clack-clack, he tapped a clawed finger against the distance-counter again. Not so far now!
Jeslyn held up a claw, unknowingly echoing the droid's thoughts "But he followed the lights too. We cannot rule out memory but that is what testing is for. We know he has memory because he is able to speak. Even an echo is a memory...one has to question why he's so aggressive and why he gravitates towards movement and sound" he hummed thoughtfully.
"The fluctuations - it is fascinating. That the body would remain so mobile under such conditions...it makes me think very deeply on what it may be....I must speak to Doctor Gadhavi."
When they likely approached the droid's ship, he looked over at him, wondering if he might see them again. "Would you like to stay in contact, Omen, or is this goodbye?"
Aegolius stared at him, following along enough to get the gist. He was no scientist himself. “...Echo...” It felt almost mystical. Maybe it wanted something. Maybe it was eating? He stared forward again, thinking on it, but instead concluding with a disgruntled “hrrg.”
His attention wasn’t lost long, and he was back to staring at Jeslyn again, as if he had said something peculiar. Maybe the droid was pondering the possibility of weird fleshy undead cyborgs in spacesuits. He tilted his head at a questioning angle, but couldn’t express any other readable emotion. Instead, as his ship came into view, he slowed, setting the medical shuttle down gently. And then stared over his shoulder at the collection of medical equipment again—most of it was on the floor at this point, from ramming a droid, a worm, several dunes, and an eldritch spaceman.
He climbed out of the pilot’s seat finally, his shoulders looking tense; teal eyes again locked on the scientist. He didn’t answer right away, instead looking from Jeslyn, to the floor, to the ship seen through the viewfinder. And then to the dashboard, where Jeslyn had logged the last-known coordinates of the ghost. He tapped at it to bring them up again, staring as if committing them to digital memory. After another uncomfortably long stretch, he answered by reaching into his robes again to produce his commlink, holding it out for Jeslyn’s details. Fine, could be useful to have the number of a suicidal mad scientist.
The ship parked outside was dusted in sand from the storm, but cut a distinctive shape: angular, V-shaped and matte black, in much better condition than this poor medical shuttle. But having seen better days itself, with several dents and scrapes that marred its paint-job.
Jeslyn peeled his lips back and bared his teeth. Was it a smile? but either way he stood up and went in search of his lab coat, struggling to pull the commlink out with two claws before awkwardly putting it into his cybernetic hand. There.
He offered it to Aegolius, exchanging contact details "Take care, Omen. All the best of luck in your endeavours." he growled at him. Time to take this destroyed ship back to Ceci.....oh no. Maybe he could just live in the wastes from now on? no- no that was unreasonable.
Aegolius did the polite thing and took both commlinks, one in each hand, to initiate the transfer himself. Since the... brute was having a bit of trouble. Understandably. Once he was satisfied, he set the commlink back in Jeslyn’s cybernetic hand, since that seemed easier for him to maneuver, and moved to the hatch. A foot on the wall as he pocketed his commlink, then he gave the handle a good yank; it stuttered open with a horrible, scraping, grinding sound.
The droid turned back, put two clawed fingers to the side of his cloaked head in a jaunty salute to the scientist, and disappeared into the wastes without a word. He could be seen walking towards his own ship, the wind picking up his cloak around him again. The automation on his own door seemed to be stuck, the thing opening only half-way before he had to shove it the rest of the way open; either the grit of Tuphon’s sands had finally gotten to it, or Aegolius was just already well-versed in the Troubles of Stuck Hatches.
[ Fin ]
