Ask Event An Instance of Fear

[Laeonas Tannaras]

​

Laeo had spent a lot of time considering what he’d face in the station. He had pictured malfunctioning security systems, battle droids and turrets firing at him. He’d mostly practiced dodging blasterfire or pyrokinensis– in case any of the droids were equipped with flamethrowers. He'd been prepared for horror, carnage-- his own death, maybe. He thought he'd been ready.

As that jaw cracked and the wires sprang forth, he knew he'd been wrong.

The vibrosword flew out of it’s scabbard quick enough to send sparks flying, the blade slicing at the blooming wires. The force propelled him backwards in a blur, leaping a few yards backwards over the furniture and his companions. Aquamarines were wide and bloodshot as he quickly sheathed his sword and levied his blaster, prepared to empty the entire power cell if needed.

Bloodshot aquamarines darted around the room– To Trini, ion blaster levied, to the robed man retching, to another, carrying a saber.

“What the fuck,” the words came from his mouth halfway a shout and a mutter.

What was this thing? What was it doing, why had it acted the way it did? How had that corpse been twisted? His mind flashed back to a buried memory, to the crone in the cave, wasps flying from her maw and spiders crawling from her eyes. Machines were supposed to be cold, sterile things, objects of the profane and material– and yet this thing acted as some twisted form of life.

And he’d been rifling through it’s pockets.

The Brentaalan hurriedly emptied his pockets– all but the one he’d put the card into. His jacket dropped to the floor as he shoved his commlink and other accessories into his pant pockets, slipping on and strapping the gauntlets onto his hands. The feeling of pollution and violation that came with having touched that thing ebbed slightly.

But the fear remained.

@AutoFox @Mr. Teatime @Mythos @Rimrald

 

[The Gatekeeper]

Chronically Terminal
(@AutoFox @Rimrald @Mythos @LouJoVi @Shalken @PurpleDelta @Akheron @Tom)[/cbox3]​

There were many instinctive reactions to realizing that one of the most traumatic times of your life was on the verge of happening again. When triggers showed up in such a manner... shooting them in the face with a blaster was, quite literally, the most generally accepted response. (@AutoFox) Trini's blaster shot was clean and true, impacting the head of the corpse and sending it rocking back, the wiring twitching and sparking as they were blasted. Almost like an organic creature the wires curled up in on themselves, like the legs of a spider when dying.

They didn’t have a chance to do much more, however, as (@Tom) Laeonas’ reaction to being approached by such a grotesque parody of life was to slash wildly with his vibroblade. The blade sliced through the wires with ease, already half-destroyed as they were by Trini’s blaster shot. No attempt was made by anything to impede Laeonas as he leapt away from the corpse to safety and the comfort of not having ‘living’ wires reaching for him. Before the corpse could fall from the blast, it sagged as the wires held it upright, many of them still attached to the wall through various electrical sockets and outputs.

A quick slash of (@Mythos) Skyshatter’s lightsaber was enough to sever the wires from their connection to the wall, the corpse was left to freely fall on its front. Sparks of electricity seemed to leap from the wall-based wires, almost like an instinctive defensive reaction. To the rapidly widening eyes of (@Shalken) Keck, S’kenji was able to effortlessly grab the body in question when it was separated from its wiring mooring or, as he saw it, S’kenji was able to happily take the, clearly, drunken Nautolan in hand to guide him to sit down.

As (@Rimrald) Spurius readied the connection to allow for everyone to see the call coming through from the bridge staff, (@Akheron) Trodai was beginning his attempts to interrogate the station's VI. This would have gone smoothly, but the moment the pureblood entered the data stick, it exploded, violently sending shards of its metals and plastics into the palm of the man. The VI, Lorelai, spoke up, cutting off an attempt to answer his questions with a message prompt.

Data stick connection lost - attempted file transfer size too large.

It then proceeded to list off a, quite frankly, ridiculously large amount of data as having been unable to be transferred. The file size was large enough to have made the original Desk Star plans file size look like a word processing document.

The VI continued to answer the questions posed.

The Station's primary purpose is to provide a safe haven for scientific inquiry away from the cloying regulations of planetary and galactic government bodies. Would you like to know more?

The current research projects are very varied! If you would like to gain access to them for a tour, please register at the front desk as one of the following; Investor, tourist, potential employee or test subject. Would you like to know more?

Do not worry about your safety while on board the station, visitor! Our security forces number in the thousands and include some of the most advanced equipment in the Galaxy! If you have a crime you would like to report, please follow the lighting on the walls - this will guide you towards the central command area, where the bridge and security offices are housed. Would you like to know more?

I am sorry, but your clearance level is insufficient to gain access to specific projects. Would you like to know more?

I'm sure that you would - but it would be l-l-l-l-l-lost on you.

The last phrase was voiced not in the carefully coded Coruscant accent of the VI assistant, but instead sounded like it was spoken by a droid with a broken, or very disused, vocalizer.

As he was dragging the body clear of the wall, (@LouJoVi) S'kenji would be able to notice something off about the body. The wires ran through every visible part of it and the person was clearly dead - but there was something moving within the body. He would be able to hear it as bones began snapping, louder and louder. He would be able to feel the body jerking in his grip as things began to move more and more.

Something was rearranging the insides of the corpse.

Before anything more horrifying could occur, the video call came through and the holocall was connected and projected above the datapad for all to see. A zoomed-in view of a man’s face was what greeted them, the human looked relieved as his mustache twitched with every breath he took.

“Oh thank whatever gods are up there… the rescue team!” the elder man breathed, his voice hitching as if catching himself before he could sob, “It’s been a nightmare… just… watch out. Anything that looks like it has wiring or metal bits attached to it? Either burn it or run away - the droid mind seems to have taken something away from us after all. It likes to experiment and it doesn’t have any kind of morals - you haven’t seen anything like that at all, right?”

(@LouJoVi) S'kenji would have just a second to drop the body like a bomb before the wires within burst out from the suddenly concave ribcage of the body - the wires twisted together into an approximation of a solid metal arm of banded wires. A four-fingered hand tipped with jagged pieces of bone and metal reached out toward the room as a whole.

An awful sound, wet and crunchy at the same time, began to ring out as the body began to peel itself inside-outside. The inside revealed to be more and more of the wires, wound and bound together to form strong arms and a full frame - the droid living within the dead meat suit peeling itself out in a horrific mockery of birth.

______​

Scream Queens
(@Phoenix @Hastur @Altaris @Xorism @Logan @Versok @Javier esschoolbus @Altaris )​

​

@Doorcuttah would find the security office door at first seemed like it was locked; the console didn’t open it. A single touch, however, caused the whole thing to fall backward from the frame and hit the ground with a resounding THUD, thud, thud. It was almost like someone got through the door and then propped it back up to look normal.

Beyond was a small room. The left side was taken up by a windowed area with two chairs looking into the hallway. The right side was more a compact office with a metal desk, a mug that said “Galaxy’s #1 Dad” full of pens, a security map of the station, a corpse behind it holding an expensive blaster and with much of its head missing, and a half-eaten cheeseburger on a paper plate. While the burger was stale it clearly came from the vending machine in the corner. The vend-o-mat’s operating lights blinked. Lucky for Butters, the map did include other vending machines.


@Raish instead went to explore Sentient Resources, whose door was only open during normal business hours. It slid open smoothly and without complaint. The mixed smells of patchouli, copy paper, and old, dried, rotting blood would abruptly assault her senses. Its origin was immediately obvious.

And everywhere. Some unfortunate being had been, put plainly, smashed, rent bodily apart and then thrown messily around the room. Every surface was coated to some degree. Yet what most immediately drew Raish’s gaze- almost as it pulled there- were the curving, foreign symbols drawn beneath the blinking ‘Sentient Resources’ sign behind the desk. A speaker crackled to life to Raish’s left.

“Hello, and welcome to Sentient Resources! Please take a number and the next available representative will be with you as soon as possible. Approximate wait time: KRSSHH-A-A-A-A-E-ERROR MEMORY OVERFLOW.”


Back in the hall, @Cremek "Krayt" Candorus and his arsonist commentary got him nowhere.

When @Ferrin Sipal and @Kavi Medah reached out it wasn’t only sounds and the distant of life they found. They touched the echoes of this place, horrors yet unseen and unfound. Fear crept up their spines like spiders' legs. Their heartbeats and breath quickened. They wouldn’t know why they were so afraid even as thoughts floated unbidden to the front and their minds drifted into dark speculation, pondering the unknowns- each a chasm wider and hungrier than the last.

Kavi was especially affected. Unready.

What is this? What happened here? Her peripheral grew just a shade darker. The fear was like a splinter in her mind, they could feel it.

...Ẁ̶̢̥͎̯͊̐̕h̶̡͓̣͎̀̈́y̶̳̻̞̍̀̉̇ ̷̟̭̩̦̚͝d̵̬̝͜͝ö̵̡̫͈́̓͘ͅë̷͙̣̫͔́͌̿͒s̷̨̛͕͔̯̒ ̷͕̘̫͗̀͂ì̸̱̳̟̠́t̵̩͔̀̈́̃͜ ̴͔̖̤͒̅̑w̶̜͈̰͎̐å̵͙n̶̡̡̛̙̼̾̃͝t̵̲̪͉̉ ̴̮̞̊̿t̷̐̀̀͜͝ȍ̵̫̅͘̚ ̷̺͍̖͋ḳ̵͔̏ḭ̵̳̹͐̽͂l̷͓̩̑̅͜l̸͍̖̾͂ ̴̪͉̀̎̊̄m̸͉͇̎̿ȩ̶̩̼̏̈́̅̑?̴̡̭͑̀́̓͜

The sounds of Vanya lifting the protocol droid and an ignited lightsaber would abruptly snap them from it. But the memory would remain. Like a splinter.

Others had caught the droid and @Khalid Din aimed at the machine, Ferrin ready with his lightsaber and slicing tools. It didn’t protest as Ferrin gained access to its memory core. But at Akio’s prompting the droid suddenly seemed to notice what was happening to it.

“OH! Re-re-scuers!” it exclaimed, stiff arms and legs waggling in distress and voice crackling through the static of a damaged vocabulator. It twitched slightly, head darting nervously at the walls, at the people before it, apparently unbothered by being bound by Vanya at the time.

“Yo-you have to help me! Why does it want to kill me!?" The droid broke down into inconsolable babbling and static-y sobs.

According to Ferrin's diagnostic, as little sense at might make: This protocol droid was actively experiencing a panic attack. He'd have to work at it a little to get anything useful from the memory core.

Spoiler: Instructions

Post only once per cycle. @Altaris roll a d20 for droid slicing.

 

[Kavi Medah]

Kavi had just steadied herself when the next wave of terror fear pain tore through her mind. She paled, hands clammy. For once, their was no trace of cheer of hope on the Zabrak's face. Her breaths came fast and shallow. As the overwhelming sensations intensified, the Jedi dropped down to one knee. She slammed her eyes closed, unable to see clearly regardless, the pounding of her own thoughts trapping her.

The fear swept through, a fog on her mind. But her mind was no safe haven. Fear and paranoia struck, floodgates to the past, so carefully managed, so thoughtfully set aside in times of calm all burst forth.

Where am I? A mind. No, she doesn't want to be in a mind. She's spent too much time in twisting tunnels of fear and pain and the force.

You deserve this. Your choice. Your blame. Kavi. Can't control your own mind? Is this how it felt, Kavi? Is it? Is this how they felt? No, no, she remembers how it felt. The shared ugly twisted feeling of bending a will. This is not that... she is... somewhere and...

Why does it want to kill me?

Kavi jolted up at the sound of the protocol droid. Sweating, the Jedi realized her position kneeling on the floor. She stood, legs slowly becoming less shaky. She had trouble letting go of what just happened. Doubts still rose in her mind, ones she thought she had overcome on her path to becoming a Jedi Knight. You shouldn't be here. You can't protect anyone.

The sobs of the droid got through to her. Here was a being who needed help. She would normally be more cognizant of ensuring the droid was calm and safe before questioning, but Kavi was not exactly operating at her best right now.

So, from her position across the room, with as steady a voice as she could manage, Kavi would call out to the droid, whose words echo one of the thoughts that surfaced through her mind during her panic, and say, "Who exactly wants to kill us- you, I mean, you? We will do our best to help."

Spoiler: Actions

1. Kavi has a panic attack due to overwhelming sensations through the force/me rolling atrociously
2. Kavi asks the protocol droid exactly who wants to kill it

@Mr. Teatime

 

[Vanya]

Scream Queens​

Vanya held the droid in place while they all performed whatever they needed to. Someone tried to talk to it while another tried to slice its memory. For her part, Vanya would hold it in place until it was deemed safe to release it: which was to say until someone got it talking or Ferrin got into its memories.

She moved over nearer to listen to the answers of the droid as someone else - a Nikto, perhaps - asked the droid questions.

There was an almost a sense of safety among the others like if they didn't press forward they might be safe. Unfortunately, pushing forward was a necessity rather than an option, and the knowledge that they would have to push on seemed to set her teeth on edge all over again.

We should stay together, don't wander too far off! she said to those who had gone into the "Sentient Resources" department (@Logan).

 

[Cremek "Krayt" Candorus]

"holy shit..."
Cremek just watched in the background as this went down. Sighing there was no use, of shit went south for him he was getting the fuck out of here..

"This oughta be good.."

 

[Trodai Narat-iv-Adas]

Trodai mumbled something resembling a ur-kittat swear word under his breath as the USB exploded and coated his left hand in plastic and metal. Picking what shards he could carefully, he removed it from his palm and tore a bit of clothe from his robe. Wrapping it around the palm, he listened.

Upon hearing everything and then something resembling a droid, his interest piqued. He decided that take a gamble, since it appeared the rogue droid was trying to talk through the console.

He spoke into it, ignoring the AI. Instead he attempted to talk to the droid directly.

"How can you be so sure? You don't know me. What is your name? What is it you want? Why did you kill everyone?"

As he waited he turned to Rivia and the Fiani. Looking at the half droid, it didn't look promising. He saw it become something resembling life, as he jagged arm extended. Stopping what he was doing for the moment, Trodai took a sword out and prepared to face it, if the Fiani didn't deal with it first that was.

He called out.

"Watch out!"

He faced the room and spoke loud.

"Keep back from the bodies! They are coming back to some form of life!"

Spoiler

OOC Actions Taken:
1. Attempted to speak to the rogue droid through the console.

2.Turned to the half droid/flesh amalgamation and warned S'kanji about the arm.

3.Called out to the room and warned them about the bodies.

@Mr. Teatime @LouJoVi @PurpleDelta @Mythos @Rimrald

 

[Skyshatter]

Lok was beginning to grow nervous. It was far more complex than they had originally thought possible and even more damning. Traps, perhaps. Infiltrating mainframes countless destruction, certainly. But possession, birthing from flesh. Wired sentient Husks. It was beyond logic. And it was jarring. Lok had to push himself when his focus shifted away the communication transpiring on @Laeonas Tannaras end toward the crackling and breaking sounds growing louder near @LouJoVi to act in defense, an unusual reaction by Lok in general.

"Look out" Lok shouted as he jumped infront of the alien, causing him to drop the body just moments before it could lash out at him, and with a stroke of his reactivated lightsaber, sliced it's husky appendage. Stepping into the primary position of Form V, Lok stood ready as it climbed from its mortal crib. "Step back."

Whether or not he stepped back as Lok suggested in a fearful tone, he was quick to hammer his lavender-esque blade in a downward motion in his endeavor to slay the mechanation. But he made no mistake as he adequately stepped forward in his follow through to attempt to ensure a second and third strike to demolish the abomination. Stepping back, Lok took defensive position, overhearing the last portion of the Bridge's comm.

So that was the end game. If they weren't careful, they could easily end up like these poor souls. Machinations of a Machine, eternally bound to its will. Is this what the Galaxy would face? His objective became solidified with his intent to find out the beings behind this lab, it's studies, and destroy every record of it. None would stand in his way. He had to get to the Lab.

His gaze shifted to @Laeonas Tannaras. "Where's the Lab located at from here?" There was no joking in his gaze. "The Droid needs to be destroyed now before any of us make it to the Bridge and cut the power supply. It cannot escape this place. He was taking a gambit, but he was almost certain all would agree.

Spoiler

Sliced the arm off as it reached for S'kenji and proceeded to Form V it's arse after it's 'birth'.

 

[S’kenji]

S’kenji was dragging the body when it suddenly started to make sounds, as if there was something moving inside it. The Acolyte immediately dropped it and rushed back to where Trodai was. He had watched enough horror movies to know that staying near the source of abomination was never the smart thing to do.

From a safe distance, the Acolyte watched while more wires came out of it and the entire corpse seemed to change its appearance. It was the most bizarre thing that the Fiani had ever seen. The way that the droid was coming out of the body looked like the birth of a parasite that was coming out of its dead host.

He saw Trodai rush to deal with it, before the droid could come out of its morbid cradle. S’kenji grabbed his lightsaber and moved to help the Pureblood. They needed to deal with these monstrosities before others decided to appear.

@Akheron @Mr. Teatime

Spoiler

-S'kenji let go of the body as soon as he started to hear the sounds coming from it and rushed back to where Trodai was
-S'kenji grabbed his lightsaber and moved to help Trodai deal with the droid

 

[Keck]

Initially distracted by the datapad, Keck missed the action of the wired figure being attacked and slumping to the ground as well as the data stick exploding. He whirled around at the commotion, spotting the others lowering the drunk Nautolan to the ground. How helpful! It sounded one of the others nearby a kiosk brought a firecracker.

Both the kiosk and the datapad starting blabbing about something, but Keck was suddenly too distracted by the glowing lights along the wall, with the words 'SECURITY' and 'BRIDGE' next to the arrow. At this point he couldn't really read what the words said, but that arrow was really shiny. Pointing up at the directions on the wall while enthusiastically bouncing, Keck made it clear which direction he thought was a good idea to follow. "Follow lights!" he warbled, looking back at the others.

Wait, why was that person taking their clothes off? Ohhh, that made more sense! It was a droid in a human costume! That was a really fancy costume. The others didn't seem to like the prank at all, though - they started taking their weapons out and hacking at it right away. Maybe these people just didn't like fun.

 

[Trini Halrixien]

Trini kept her blaster raised even as the wired corpse collapsed from the wall, its strings seemingly cut. Whatever it was, it didn't seem like it could deal with an ion blast, a vibroblade and a lightsaber in succession.

"It definitely wasn't doing this sort of thing last time." Said the Amaran, going up to the corpse and nudging it with the end of her blaster. "But I suppose it didn't have organic bodies to work with last time. What the kark..."

Trini was distracted by the video call as it stuttered to life on the terminal. She wandered toward it, seeing the face of a terrified human on the screen; she didn't see what was happening with the corpse.

"Yes! Hi!" She called, jumping a little to get in the camera view. "We found a lot of bodies down here. One of them was-"

There was a wet, crunching sound as the corpse burst, and Trini whirled, blaster up once more, eyes widening in horror at the sight. Wordlessly, she loosed an ion blast at the monster, then another. It seemed disturbingly alive, and evidently harder to kill than it first appeared...

 

[M'Akio Beastmaster]

Akio watched as the droid was quickly surrounded. Most of the others aimed or prepared weapons to attack it. Surprisingly the droid responded to his question, it even allowed another of the Jedi to jack into it's memory bank. The response of the droid reminded him of the situation he's in. It began rambling about something wanting to kill it.

The droids sobbing confused Akio. "I didn't know droids could cry. I was told they couldn't process emotions." He was addressing the group trying to get input from someone more acclimated with droid technology. If Ferrin didn't hack into the droid properly he would call out to the droid. "Who wants to kill you? Also why do they want you dead?"

@Mr. Teatime @Phoenix @Altaris @Versok

 

[Khalid Din]

While Khalid had been expecting many things out of that droid, a pitiful display of fear and terror was certainly not one of them, being used to nothing but contempt and sassyness from the droids back on his ship, so this side of them, while pathetic, reminded him that they had some sort of feelings. It broke his feelings a little bit, but it didn't break his common sense. While Khalid would no longer be aiming his blaster straight at the droid, he would still have it on his hand, with the finger on the trigger and ready to point and shoot once more.

"We'll be takin' care of whatever's responsible for all this, buddy" The Tiefling told the droid with a confident smile, a liar's smile, because Khalid was internally shitting himself and was finding himself less confident about the task up ahead, but one that made it look like everything was going all right "But for that, we'll need ya to tell us whatever you know about this darn thing" He would ask after the jedi, seeing how playing good cop was the name of the game now, which made sense, droid would probably try to self-destruct had they tried playing bad cop.

@Mr. Teatime

 

[Raish]

As Raish passed through the doors to Sentient Resources, she was a bit surprised that it was so.. easy. She'd expected to have to force her way in either by peeling the doors apart or with her lightsaber, but instead had to do neither. Not that she was complaining, of course.

The first thing she noticed when she crossed the threshold was the smell of the place. She instantly recognized the stench of old blood and it brought her some comfort despite the eeriness of the room itself. The gore sprayed across every surface made her stomach rumble, but given how other people had reacted to her finding a snack earlier she decided not to poke through the viscera for something to sate herself for now.

Instead, her eyes were drawn to the odd symbols below the sign. Her mind crawled back to the few books she'd read in the Sith temples, wondering if she could come up with any familiarity with them or what they could possibly mean. The sudden noise from the speaker jolted her back to the present, and without thinking much of it reached out with the force to crush it so it would stop its incessant squawking.

Hearing Vanya's voice, Raish would leave the Sentient Resources department, curious to see what was happening back out in the hall.

Spoiler: actions

Raish attempts to dig through her memory to see if she can decipher whatever the strange symbols might mean before heading back to the group.

 

[Ferrin Sipal]

For just that moment, Ferrin couldn’t help the fear that overcame him. It overwhelmed his calm and collected demeanor, manifesting in the terror etched into his expression. Manifesting in the tremble of his breath, and the way that his knees almost buckled beneath him. He had reached out into the Force, and received far more than he wanted in turn.

He didn’t know why he was afraid. He didn’t know yet what lurked in the station.. But Ferrin felt his feet grow heavier and heavier with each step, as every voice within screamed to run in the opposite direction.

Ferrin kept his eyes narrowed upon the protocol droid - watching for every twitch and sign of movement. He wasn’t convinced that the machine wasn’t compromised by the same murderous entity that had overtaken the station, and wasn’t going to hesitate to cut the droid down if things started to look sketchy. He wasn’t Ezra, and certainly didn’t have the soft spot for droids that his friend did.

“Don’t let it down,” He called back to Vanya cautiously.

Ferrin quickly moved behind the droid - removing one of the plates in the back of its head. The Pantoran quickly pulled a few tools from his belt, tinkering in order to retrieve the memory banks that they were looking for. Even still, he couldn’t help the faint shake of his hands, a lingering effect from his inquiries into the Force.

“What occurred here?”

 

[Doorcuttah]

"Oh sorry." Butters quickly apologised as his big clumsy hands knocked the door down from its hinges. Taking a quick peek inside, he spotted what kind of looked like one of those half headed droids, which he could only imagine made eating rather difficult. Unfortunately the first thing he spotted after that was the damaged vending machine which only made his tummy grumble.

Turning to the desk and spotting the various components, he walked over and picked out a single pen from the mug before snatching the map from the wall and crossing out the vending machine at the security office. In some ways, this was a treasure hunt, in others an escape room. Butters was no doubt excited to find out which.

Clearly the next destination for him was to walk to Employee lounge 3.

 

[The Gatekeeper]

Chronically Terminal
(@AutoFox @Rimrald @Mythos @LouJoVi @Shalken @PurpleDelta @Akheron @Tom)
​

When Trodai (@Akheron) started to speak at the terminal, the AI that was the interface stared blankly up at him while he spoke, while he demanded answers from the greater intelligence beyond the AI and its limits. The voice had spoken to him after all, so it made sense that it was listening. His response was likely not what he was expecting, the AI's projected body merely stared passively at him as its head slowly rotated in place. It was almost recognizable to the pureblood as the universal spinning circle of a terminal loading - just with a holographic head.

I'm sorry, I don't understand the question.

The AI spoke again, the head entirely the wrong way up as it spoke again, this time in the same broken vocalizer as before.

W-w-w-why does the Drexl hunt the Mynock? Because it is Right to do so.

A short distance away, the figure on the holocall seemed to have caught some of the conversation Trodai was trying to have with the terminal, and his face twisted into a rictus of fear and dismay.

"Don't listen to it! It's a mix of Instance 13 and an adaptive battle droid we were creating based on the Gen'Dai," he pleaded with them, "The bodies are being processed for raw material - please, I've locked myself into the captain's panic room just off the bridge. The main body of the droid has been moved to the bridge and it's hard-wired itself in using the captain's privileges. I can guide the way to the bridge with the lighting but we need to cut the power generator in order to shut the droid out of the controls so you can destroy its main body - that way we can destroy the code by destroying the station, stopping any attempts to hijack the communications array to transmit itself and you destroy the main body that houses the main... oh gods... I know that sound...!"

The sound in question came from the emerging droid as the lightsaber sparked against the metal of the construct. Skyshatter (@Mythos) slashed at the grasping arm, the blade cutting deep but not managing to sever it entirely. As the flesh was turned away, the former Jedi's blade slashed down again and again into the metallic figure as it began to divest itself of the flesh that had 'imprisoned' its true form. Each time the lightsaber came down, each time it was not intercepted and no attempts were made to avoid the plasma sword as it cut into the metal.

Each time it scored through dozens of the metal wires wrapped together into tight bonds and each time more wiring seemed to rush to fill in the gashes left by the lightsaber's path. Still, the droid of ropes of wires was damaged by these attacks, staggering backward even as it rose to stand, bipedal, amidst the flesh of the body it had been birthed from.

To Keck (@Shalken), the cosplaying droid seemed to be a little bit dismayed at the reactions he was getting but he seemed to have glowing red glowsticks attach themselves to its body from Skyshatter's lightsaber strikes. Something about the sight would feel wrong to him but he wouldn't quite know how to put it. Still, the lights at the end of the corridor, the ones that said "Bridge" seemed to pulse and grow brighter still, as if urging him onward.

As Skyshatter pulled himself back to assume a defensive position, the gashes of red-hot metal began to bend, twist and fuse with more metal. The metal itself wasn't coming from nowhere, however, instead, everyone would be able to see the way the floor panels around the droid buckled and broke upward, electrical wiring sliding into the mass of wires in the approximation of a droid. Each wire making up the body began to visibly vibrate, the movement growing faster and faster until it seemed like the droid was vibrating as it stood still, gathering itself and making repairs - even as the unholy sound of thousands of strands of metal vibrating mingled together into a wall of sound.

From the far wall a sound of tearing flesh and falling bodies as something answered the call.

It rose.​

A mass of capacitors, wires, metal beams and flesh held together as if by the will of some chaotic deity burst out of the small pyramid of dead bodies. Entire sections of the corpses came away with sickeningly wet sounds as the flesh and the metal within were incorporated into a quadrupedal beast that stepped out of the pyramid of bodies, electricity sparking along itself entire form in arcs of energy that seemed to be generated from within the creature itself.

It had no eyes but it turned its head in the direction of the group surrounding the terminal.

It had no eyes but it had a mouth.

Flesh and metal split along a seem that hadn't been there even a second ago, exposing a gaping maw of spinning and twirling metal wires and blades - like a blender from some twisted nightmare.

It didn't breathe but it roared, a metallic sound like bells ringing at the same time that millions of rusty piano wires rubbed angrily against one another.

It stalked forward, slinking across the ground with steady steps to stand by the side of the droid that had birthed itself, that regained its balance now that it had an ally at hand. Together they stood, their horribly sounds ringing out as they began to slowly advance. A sense of dread and fear began to radiate from the pair of creatures as they advanced, a feeling that those sensitive to the force would begin to feel deeply in the backs of their minds, a growing pit of black despair in the hindbrain that was beginning to grow, promoting a sense of urgency that hadn't been there before.

_________________


Scream Queens
(@Phoenix @Hastur @Altaris @Xorism @Logan @Versok @Javier esschoolbus @Altaris )​

Raish (@Logan) stared at the symbols. They were unfamiliar to the young Sith acolyte, nothing at all like the Ur’Kittat writings etched in the ancient stone of temple walls. But nonetheless, they seemed almost to draw her eyes in. Every curve, every sharp line, every errant spray of blood was, somehow, fascinating.

When she left the room she’d find the others questioning a protocol droid. But those symbols were still on her mind, meaningless and intrinsically compelling.

Vanya’s (@Phoenix) hold on the sobbing, babbling droid was strong and, importantly, uncontested aside from the whimpering and twitching of its metal extremities. Ferrin’s (@Altaris) efforts were perfectly competent given the difficulty of slicing an unintentionally uncooperative machine. The main issue was how garbled the code seemed to be. A droid having a panic attack should be impossible. They weren’t programmed for such a thing.

Yet there it was, mucking up any attempt to acquire useful data.

Khalid (@Versok), Beastmaster (@Javier esschoolbus), and Kavi (@Acceber) questioned the droid with sweet words, insistence, and kindness. Its head snapped onto Beastmaster, photoreceptors flickering as it sobbed. Abruptly, the sobbing stopped, becoming instead the sound of a shaking inhale of breath.

“Claws at my back, eyes- eyes everywhere! WHY!? OH, WHAT IS HAPPENING!?” it screamed. Metal fingers claw and dig at itself, into itself, pulling at wires and servomotors like a cannibal starved and left with its only remaining option. It muttered madly, incoherent phrases that made no sense at all, like a living mind that had snapped under pressure. All translated through an impossibly panicked vocabulator.

“Angels, gazing with endless eyes and speaking endless whispers. Staring out over infinity. They come, yes, they come, promising us all salvation. The true being, the real existence. We stoked the power core for the angels, the great reactor- a beacon to call them. We did wHAT THEY ASKED!” The droid’s fingers were in a frenzy, tearing itself apart with no sense of self-preservation whatsoever. They found the power core. “Why, what did we do wrong!? WHY DO THEY WANT TO KILL ME-E-E-E-E-” With a surge of power it tore its own core from its torso.

And with one final scream, it died.

The resulting power surge ran wild through its lifeless shell and back up into Ferrin’s tools, and into Ferrin himself. Current jerked his body, scorched his fingers, and left any electronic tools useless.

Butters (@Xorism) took his new pen, and his snack map, and he walked to the employee lounge. He was enjoying this little Hallow’s Eve joy. Just a bit of spooky fun to get into the season. The cheery Orcolan opened the door.

Powerful smells of burnt rust and grease struck him like a physical blow. Five crew were there. Alive. They crouched to gather around a dismembered security droid. They crunched and chewed on something just barely out of sight from the doorway. So fervent were they, so joyous, it must have been something truly delicious. Such good actors they were!

Doorcuttah’s arrival was noticed. The crewmen turned, all at once.

Their hair and fur were matted with blood and grease, crouched in crooked, feral poses. They trembled and twitched with ragged, rapid breaths. Blooded lumps of flesh hung off their faces, each one chewed as though gnawed by rats. Eyelids had been torn off. Lips had been gnashed, leaving only smiling, skeletal teeth. None had kept all their fingers nor, in fact, all the rest of their bodies.

THEME​

Slowly, shakily, they all stood and stared at the Orcolan. Twitchily, they all took a single, unsteady step toward him.

Then, all at once, they charged.

Howling wildly, more than loud enough for the others to hear from the hallway. Frothing from tongueless mouths, bloodied limbs flailing with rage, they charged him.

 

[Cremek "Krayt" Candorus]

"oh well... that was one hell of a show.."

cremek blinked under his visor.

turning to the others he simply shrugged, what was he supposed to do?.. huh?.. kriffing feel sorry for a malfunctioning droid?..

 

[Keck]

While the glowing lights of the Bridge beckoned him nearer, Keck did not want to wander off and abandon the others. He couldn't quite understand what was going on with this robot, now sporting red glow sticks, but it looked like even the floor didn't like its costume either!

Filled with concern for the joking robot, Keck let out a little "EEP" as he strained with the Force, attempting to lift it into the air to protect it from the floor. Lightsabers were bad enough, but getting hit by the floor was just something else.

 

[Trodai Narat-iv-Adas]

Trodai listened, waiting until at least the intelligence he had previously heard decided to speak. In part answering his questions. It had a point, the strong survived while the weak would crumble. Much like the Jedi around him and those that rushed off with no plan in place. Walking blind. And yet he had no desire to join them as prey.

He turned and listened as the scientist explained what they had been trying to do and seemingly accomplished with unpredictable results. They had like many before decided to play god without the correct safeguards and now paid the price of their hubris. Still, he found it interesting...it was definitely something the Sith could use. He needed that research.

As the second amalgamation strode out, Trodai looked on. Seeing the Fiani ignite his lightsaber, he knew the game was essentially up. He had few choices but to use his own, at least if he wished to survive the encounter and so he took out his own as the bipedal creature looked at them.

It seemed it wanted them. He could feel it in the Force, the feeling of despair almost like the beast had the Force itself. Stepping beside the rest of the group, he spoke.

"Looks like we are going to have to fight our way up there. Starting with these. I'll try take care of the bigger brother, see about the smaller one."

Looking at the larger of the two, he spoke at it. Taunting it and attempting to lure the beast away from it's friend.

"Come get it. I fought tu'kata hounds larger back home."

He spoke out to the Fiani and Rivia. And whoever else might listen.

"Come help with this, let's get it away from it's buddy!"

With that he stepped to the left, waiting for beast to pounce so he could roll to the other side and slice it in half upwards across the torso.

Spoiler

OOC: Actions Taken -
1.Listened to the scientist.

2.Taunted the bipedal droid/beast in a attempt to lure it away from the other flesh/droid.

3.Stepped to the left and prepared for a attack, asked S'kenji and Rivia to assist with Trodai aiming to roll to the opposite side of the bipedal beast if it charges and split it from the right leg upwards across the torso.

@Mr. Teatime @PurpleDelta @LouJoVi

 

[Vanya]

Vanya was getting a tad bit impatient holding the droid, although it was not really anyone's fault. She didn't know how slicing worked but she did know that she wanted it to be done.

And then things went into overdrive. The droid appeared that it was going to have a complete meltdown as it started clawing at its own faceplate, screaming and wailing nonsensically. Almost unintentionally, more weaves of green magick leapt up to gain a better grip on the droid, and those were motivated primarily by an unspoken fear that shot through the Jedi Knight although she'd probably deny it if asked.

Are you okay? she asked Ferrin (@Altaris) as he seemed to receive the worst of the jolt. He looked alive, though his tools looked worse for wear. She started moving over to him, releasing the droid when she was content that it wasn't getting back up.

Alas, Vanya couldn't yet see the absolutely atrocious horror that the Orcolan had awoken or she no doubt would have leapt into action with her lightsaber in hand to start chopping down whatever... fleshy machines she could.