Re: The Vivacious Deadlock: S3G6: Round One: Genreshift
09-25-2011, 01:23 AM
Originally posted on MSPA by Ixcalibur.
The corridors of the Matic Mansion were busy with thugs clutching machine guns, darting this way and that, through a veritable maze of passageways. None of the mobsters seemed to pay heed to Phere, Ivan or the woman he carried, perhaps more preoccupied with a full scale mob war that had erupted upon the casino floor. By this point it was no longer the rest of the families in town against Matic, but everyone against everyone else. Presumably there had been one shot that had gone a little too wide and suddenly a whole mess of old feuds had been reignited. Even with Detective Norst’s keen sense of direction the group had trouble navigating the tangled hallways. That said they would have taken significantly less time but for the fact that the casino floor was pretty much a no-go.
Their circuitous path took them past dismal back rooms where Matic casually circumvented the laws of the land, printing counterfeit keynotes, all but indistinguishable with the real thing. Detective Norst felt more than a little uneasy that he was here to work with the mafia boss, rather than to bring him to justice, but he was a practical man and declaring war on one of the families was a sure way to end up in an early grave.
Eventually they found their way to Matic's office. From the furniture that lay in pieces to the fine art that was smeared with an unpleasant red paste it was apparent that at one point this office had been pretty fancy, even if all that was left were splinters and goo. Matic stood in a cloud of his own cigar smoke, his hand cradling a whisky as he stared out of the window, looking over the midnight city. He watched as the rained pounded oppressively down, relentlessly hammering against the window it was a dull beat underscoring the dismal scene. While Phere sashayed over to the mobster, her hips swaying in a way they never had before this genreshift, Detective Norst cleared a space amongst the debris and laid Forensics Officer Harmon down.
“We’re here Matic.” Phere announced herself. The mobster didn’t respond immediately, taking a puff of his expensive cigar and staring blankly out into the pounding rain. Impatiently Phere’s foot tapped like a metronome keeping time with the drumming of the rain. Eventually Otto turned to greet them. He was dressed in a dismal dull brown suit; rectangular spectacles perched on the very edge of his nose. He was scrawny, his features drawn, with dark bags hanging around his eyes; he looked like a man on the bad end of a losing streak. One who spent a lot of time worrying about how it was all going to turn out.
“Miss Phere.” Otto said. “Under more pleasant circumstances I would say that it was a pleasure. Today your visit is just the latest in a long line of things I’d rather not have to deal with.” He took a sip of his drink and wearily turned back to the window. “It’s probably too late. We’re probably past the point of no return now. Every family in town is at my gates, baying for my blood and I’ve not a fucking clue how any of them found out I temporarily had the damn thing. I should just give up, get the hell out of town. It’s the only sensible option left.” He sighed heavily and Phere took a disinterested drag on her cigarette. “But fuck it. Fuck ‘em all if they think I’m goin’ out without a fight.”
“Frankly Mister Matic.” Phere replied. “You give me what I want and you can stick the Tome where the sun doesn’t shine and I won’t give a damn.” Matic raised an eyebrow at the dame, before shrugging and downing his drink in one go.
“To business then.” He said, disinterestedly tossing his glass to the floor. The shattered glass didn’t look all that out of place in his shattered office. “Don’t we need a change of… atmosphere? I never was one for this detective crap.” Phere was already going through her backpack before he said anything; in no time at all she had the slightly battered and bruised Tome in her hands. Affixing Matic with a stern gaze she placed her hand upon the bookmark, ready to remove it from the Tome.
“Don’t even think about going back on your word Otto.” She said sternly. Matic nodded and Phere swapped the bookmarks.
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Elsewhere in the building, and a little earlier in time, the Kryesan Brothers, a trio of thugs who rarely left one another’s side, were making trouble. The near identical triplets were dressed in ill-fitting suits, primarily because it is difficult to find a suit that fits a gentleman of such a musculature and size. Though they were not exactly identical, they were close enough that it could be difficult to tell them from one another at a glance, many found checking their ties (navy, maroon and mustard) to be the easiest way. Their features, barring a couple of distinctive battle scars, could be most succinctly summed up with the words ‘generic mafia heavy’. Interestingly they all had matching dragon tattoos, though they were the kind of tattoo not visible unless you go looking for it.
Importantly they had a score to settle with Matic and they weren’t exactly being subtle about it. Guns blazing they were slicing through the token resistance still remaining on the basement floors. Had they attacked at a better time they might have been easily overwhelmed by gang of thugs sent down to subdue them, but as it was to imply that there was someone who had the authority to send a gang of thugs anywhere was to vastly underestimate the chaos which the casino had descended into. As it was they proceeded unimpeded, their mindset barely changing as the genreshift shifted them back into the form of The Hydra.
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Everything switched back to science fiction; Phere became the android PH-373, Forensics Officer Harmon was Doctor Harmon once again and Ivan was still Ivan albeit a more alien version of himself. Doctor Matic, more or less the same as previously described except in a labcoat rather than a sharp suit, and with no trace of a cigar anywhere, suggested they make their way to a nearby laboratory where he and one of his right-hand men, Jaeger, was waiting to carry out the upgrade. PH-373 dismissively instructed Ivan to stay here and watch Harmon. Her behaviour had been erratic, unpredictable. She needed supervision.
Ivan, though he was careful not to show it, was pleased to have been given such an order. While the others had been distracted with their discussion he’d lifted the Tome out from PH-373’s backpack and left to watch the unconscious woman, he would have plenty of time to examine the source of the mysterious geomantic energy. He closed the office door, giving himself a little privacy. This genre’s version of Matic’s office was just as lavish, but in a more high-tech manner. Everything had a sleek futuristic look to it. Consequently it was somewhat less damaged; the metal furnishings had slightly melted but were far more in tact than could have been said of Detective Fiction. Ivan spread the Tome out on the desk and began to read.
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From the steel catwalks hanging over the entrance hall of Matic’s fortress, Klendel regarded his handiwork in the battle that raged below. As long held alliances shattered aliens turned their death rays upon other aliens, robots let loose laser fire upon other robots. It was anarchy. All it had taken was one shot in the wrong place and the invading force had turned upon one another, their uneasy cooperation forgotten about. Matic's mind controlled monstrosities held the line against anybody trying to escape into the fortress proper.
Admist the throng stood a machine, a robot taller in striking blue and white patterned armour. As was undoubtedly the intention, he resembled a police officer. NORTHWIND's riot shielding protected him from the laser blasts and miscellaneous other dangers that surrounded him. While there was little doubt in his mind that these people were criminals who ought to be arrested he was assigned to a specific criminal. The best he could do was radio back to base and tell them to send a squadron out. This was something that he did as he checked his scanner.
Klendel had been busy since his arrival. Most of that time had been spent weakening the alliances between the various warring gangs. The fruit of his labour could be seen the in the chaos that filled the entrance hall. NORTHWIND was from The Procedurals, a group that liked to consider themselves the police force of the city in the same way that the miltary gang liked to believe they were a real military. The Procedurals had agents in place throughout the town, so it hadn't taken them long to learn that the lies they had been fed (rumours that the Heist Gang were planning on violating the truce that existed between them) were in fact lies. It was that point that Detective Northwind had been sent out on the trail of the individual who had been spreading such rumours.
Now in the midst of the biggest brawl the city had ever seen NORTHWIND's scanner indicated the location of the figure he had been tracking. His cameras realigned themselves, looking up into the catwalks that hung overhead; he spotted something moving through the shadows. His jetpack flicking on automatically, he headed towards Klendel.
"Halt Criminal!" He announced. "You Are Under Arrest Under Suspicion Of Inciting A Riot."
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The upgrade of PH-373’s communication array occurred with the kind of uneventful precision that can be expected when a machine is in charge of the proceedings. Matic’s assistant Jaeger, who was technically human but who more closely resembled a mass of scars and stitches that had somehow gained sentience, had been very efficient. Jaeger spoke with a lisp and his larger patches of skin looked mismatched, with one part of his face looking like it had come from an animal. PH-373 wisely declined to enquire.
PH-373’s communication relay worked something like a vague map of the city, and throughout the city were moving nodes, radios and phones and other communication devices which she could speak through if she chose to. At the moment in Sci-fi there were rather a lot of available nodes to communicate with. Previously as the scope moved away from the city and out into the multiverse these nodes were not accessible, the best she could do was send a blanket message that could be picked up by all of the nodes or perhaps none of them; it was not an exact science. Now, with the upgrade installed, no matter how distant the person she wanted to communicate with she could speak solely to them, and in real time.
“Now if you don’t mind, the Tome.” Matic said as PH-373 got to her feet. Matic felt anxious, it was possible that Jaeger shared his feelings, though you would be hard pressed to tell how the patchwork man was feeling at any given time. This whole situation, the lengths he had gone to in order to get the Tome back, and he had no guarantee that PH-373 would actually give it to him… It was not like Matic to accommodate the requests of others; he preferred to take things by force and usually had the upper hand to do that with. It was a testament to just how powerful the Tome was that he was willing to indulge this android to regain control of it. With it he could do so much more than change the genre of this pitiful town. He eyed PH-373 warily as she searched through her backpack.
“The Tome appears to be missing.” She said. Within moments Doctor Matic had pulled an experimental plasma pistol from his belt. PH-373’s left eye whirred and spun in a slightly alarming manner.
“Yeah right.” Matic scoffed. “Hand it over. I need that Tome!”
“It is back in your office.” PH-373 said. “I am wirelessly networked into every camera in the city.” She added by way of explanation. Matic regarded her with suspicion for a long moment and then tossed his gun to Jaeger.
“Watch her.” He said. “If she tries to leave before I get back shoot her.”
“Yeth Doctor Matic.” Jaeger nodded in confirmation, causing PH-373 to momentarily worry that his head would fall off.
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Despite a short car chase during the genreshift Merrifield, Cedric, Tek and Abys left the detective genre in much the same configuration as they entered it, albiet closer to the castle/casino/fortress than before. The only real remnant of the genre was the lingering animosity between Merrifield and Cedric. Lieutenant Cedric irritably contemplated whether anyone would believe that he had mistaken the creature for a previously undiscovered caste of Gark. Though he obviously wouldn't act upon such a violent impulse against a mostly innocent creature, he couldn't help but smile as he briefly entertain the thought. For Merrifield's part, she didn't like to be bossed around, something that Cedric didn't seem to be able to stop himself from doing at the moment.
They moved through the alleyways for shelter from the raging winds, though there was no escaping the pounding rain that took their bad moods and made them even worse. The battle that was going on in the fortress had poured out into the streets around it. Sleekly designed robots crouched down behind chest high walls as alien plasma fire rained down upon them. Cyborg pirates battled with photon cutlasses. Genetic abominations scythed through the unwary, gobbling up the corpses for sustenance. In short it was exactly the kind of brawl any sane person would refrain from getting involved with. Merrifield instructed Abys to head around the back, to find a less suicidal entrance to the Fortress.
"Hold it." Lieutenant Cedric commanded. "We go in through the front; I never sneak in through the back door." Merrifield and Cedric eyed one another in disdainful silence.
"That is fine." Merrifield said spitefully. "You can do what you want; I didn't even ask you to come along." For a moment Cedric considered arguing with the creature, but decided against it. He didn't really want Merrifield to come with him anyway.
"Come on Tek." He said, dismounting from the grisly Abys-horse. Tek glanced nervously at the fighting crowd.
"If you don't mind I will sit this one out." He said nervously. "Good luck though."
Lieutenant Cedric rolled his eyes and waved them off. They trotted off towards the back of the fortress bickering between one another. Cedric drew his trusty plasma rifle Sigrar and without hesitation sprinted towards the chaotic throng. “BRING IT!” he screamed as he opened fire upon Matic’s genetic abominations.
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Ivan flicked through the mysterious Tome, towards the back of the book the last few pages were empty; the last page containing text was written in a dark olive green and writ itself before his very eyes.
“What the hell.” Ivan muttered as he read the words: ‘“What the hell.” Ivan muttered as he read the words-’
He watched as the book wrote about how he watched as the book wrote about him, before opting to flick backwards through the previous pages. Text of various colours described the events as they had happened to the other competitors. Ivan couldn’t help but notice there was a lot of purple text. Going back even further the text was just plain black and it described the numerous petty wars carried on in the town before their arrival, seeming to focus around a gang now disbanded and a Streetsmart Upstart now dead. He flipped all the way to the start of the book; the first words written within described the formation of the town. A crash of thunder from overhead drew his attention to the storm still raging outside the window. He couldn’t help but concur that this town did not have long left.
Ivan turned his attention back to the Tome and how he could best make use of the geomantic energy that flowed through it. Unfortunately for him and perhaps for the rest of the town as well, he was interrupted by a blow to the back of the head. Doctor Harmon stood over him, his body collapsed to the cold metal floor. Her eyes were vacant and drawn, her face expressionless, her hair hung in untidy tangles. In her hand was some random gadget gathered from the various machines that filled the room. She paid no heed to the fallen kid, her attention solely focused upon the Tome. Seemingly oblivious to anything else in the world, she got down to work taking apart machinery and rebuilding it into something else entirely.
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Doctor Cassandra Scala strode down the corridors of the Doctor Matic's fortress like she owned the place, occasionally coming across a wandering scientist or an many faced abomination broken loose from its restraints and casually putting them down with a quick blast from her ice rifle. She hadn't been particularly fazed by the temporary genreshift wherein she had been a murderous heiress out for petty revenge against the Kyresan Brothers; her issue was more that the damned android who was supposed to be helping her out had gone frustratingly radio silent. In the meantime she had been left navigating the maze of laboratories and corridors, heading towards Doctor Matic's office in the hope that The Hydra would be doing the same thing. There was a crackling as her radio reconnected with PH-373's.
"Where have you been?" She asked icily. "When we made this deal I was assured that you would lead me directly to the Hydra."
"There was a fault with my communications array." PH-373 replied. "It has been attended to and I can now direct you to the Hydra." PH-373 proceeded to reel off the directions towards Doctor Matic's office, ending it with a confident: "I predict that by the time you arrive the Hydra will already be there. If it chooses to redirect I will keep you informed." Doctor Scala scowled; sure that PH-373 was watching her do so.
"You had better be right this time." Scala said sternly. "I might be forced to reconsider our partnership if it turns out you are doing little other than wasting my time."
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Doctor Matic slammed open the door of his office and for a moment gawped at that which he saw. All of the machinery in his room had been cannibalised, rebuilt into something other. His desk had been cast aside and where it had stood there was the Tome, partially visible inside a complex case of metal and machinery. Coming off from either side of the case was a framework, extending a little way and then rising into the air and forming an arch large enough to permit a person through.
“Shit.” was all Matic had to say about this development. At the side of the structure Doctor Harmon stood, putting the finishing touches upon the dimensional gate. For just a moment, the view of the miserable midnight sky was obscured by darkness and something awful, something that no human was ever meant to lay eyes upon, and then it flickered away. Matic sprung into the room. “Do you have any idea what you are doing?” Harmon did not respond, carrying on working on the machine as though there was nothing wrong. “Stop that right now.” Matic reached for his plasma pistol, only to remember that he had given it to Jaeger.
Desperately Matic lashed out against Harmon, shoving her away from the machine. She stumbled back, but caught herself and turned towards Matic. As he stared into his eyes he could for a moment swore she was something other than she was, something ancient and powerful; something monstrous that he had just pissed off. Harmon shoved him away and turned back to her work. Matic stumbled back, tripping over his hastily discarded desk and collapsing to the floor. For a moment he sat stunned, and watched the Doctor work on the machine, too rattled, too nervous to do anything. He pushed it down, whatever this was it was clear that he couldn’t let it happen. He grabbed the first thing that came to hand, a rusty old wrench and slammed it down onto the casing that housed the Tome.
Black energy rippled through the framework, and also, not that anyone in that room was watching, through the skies of the town. Harmon lashed out at Doctor Matic, landing a kick in his ribs, but he would not be deterred. He kept smashing the wrench against the casing, pieces of metal and wiring flying free. The building began to shake violently and the window before them shattered. Rain poured in through the hole and attention of the Doctors was drawn to the world outside. Black energy ran through the clouds and cracks were opening up in the streets, exuding the same pitch black energy. Wordlessly Matic climbed to his feet, barely even cognizant of the pain in his ribs. Behind them The Hydra darted into the room escaping the collapsing corridors. Almost immediately its attention was drawn past the man it had come to kill and to the strange black energy flowing through the skies.
Across the town people stopped and stared into the skies, or fled from buildings collapsing under the stress of the dimensional catastrophe. Suddenly everything changed. What had moments ago been Matic’s fortress was suddenly a fantasy castle with tall towers and crenellated battlements. Surrounding the castle like some kind of bewildering moat were cracks in the earth, and beyond them entirely different genres upon each side of the building. The wind still blew, easily demolishing some of the structurally unstable buildings in a section of the town that had gone all children’s fiction. Running through the clouds a web of black energy focused along the cracks in genres. The whole thing looked very unstable; a small building that had become the focus of lovecraftian horror shook violently before collapsing in on itself and disappearing forever.
The corridors of the Matic Mansion were busy with thugs clutching machine guns, darting this way and that, through a veritable maze of passageways. None of the mobsters seemed to pay heed to Phere, Ivan or the woman he carried, perhaps more preoccupied with a full scale mob war that had erupted upon the casino floor. By this point it was no longer the rest of the families in town against Matic, but everyone against everyone else. Presumably there had been one shot that had gone a little too wide and suddenly a whole mess of old feuds had been reignited. Even with Detective Norst’s keen sense of direction the group had trouble navigating the tangled hallways. That said they would have taken significantly less time but for the fact that the casino floor was pretty much a no-go.
Their circuitous path took them past dismal back rooms where Matic casually circumvented the laws of the land, printing counterfeit keynotes, all but indistinguishable with the real thing. Detective Norst felt more than a little uneasy that he was here to work with the mafia boss, rather than to bring him to justice, but he was a practical man and declaring war on one of the families was a sure way to end up in an early grave.
Eventually they found their way to Matic's office. From the furniture that lay in pieces to the fine art that was smeared with an unpleasant red paste it was apparent that at one point this office had been pretty fancy, even if all that was left were splinters and goo. Matic stood in a cloud of his own cigar smoke, his hand cradling a whisky as he stared out of the window, looking over the midnight city. He watched as the rained pounded oppressively down, relentlessly hammering against the window it was a dull beat underscoring the dismal scene. While Phere sashayed over to the mobster, her hips swaying in a way they never had before this genreshift, Detective Norst cleared a space amongst the debris and laid Forensics Officer Harmon down.
“We’re here Matic.” Phere announced herself. The mobster didn’t respond immediately, taking a puff of his expensive cigar and staring blankly out into the pounding rain. Impatiently Phere’s foot tapped like a metronome keeping time with the drumming of the rain. Eventually Otto turned to greet them. He was dressed in a dismal dull brown suit; rectangular spectacles perched on the very edge of his nose. He was scrawny, his features drawn, with dark bags hanging around his eyes; he looked like a man on the bad end of a losing streak. One who spent a lot of time worrying about how it was all going to turn out.
“Miss Phere.” Otto said. “Under more pleasant circumstances I would say that it was a pleasure. Today your visit is just the latest in a long line of things I’d rather not have to deal with.” He took a sip of his drink and wearily turned back to the window. “It’s probably too late. We’re probably past the point of no return now. Every family in town is at my gates, baying for my blood and I’ve not a fucking clue how any of them found out I temporarily had the damn thing. I should just give up, get the hell out of town. It’s the only sensible option left.” He sighed heavily and Phere took a disinterested drag on her cigarette. “But fuck it. Fuck ‘em all if they think I’m goin’ out without a fight.”
“Frankly Mister Matic.” Phere replied. “You give me what I want and you can stick the Tome where the sun doesn’t shine and I won’t give a damn.” Matic raised an eyebrow at the dame, before shrugging and downing his drink in one go.
“To business then.” He said, disinterestedly tossing his glass to the floor. The shattered glass didn’t look all that out of place in his shattered office. “Don’t we need a change of… atmosphere? I never was one for this detective crap.” Phere was already going through her backpack before he said anything; in no time at all she had the slightly battered and bruised Tome in her hands. Affixing Matic with a stern gaze she placed her hand upon the bookmark, ready to remove it from the Tome.
“Don’t even think about going back on your word Otto.” She said sternly. Matic nodded and Phere swapped the bookmarks.
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Elsewhere in the building, and a little earlier in time, the Kryesan Brothers, a trio of thugs who rarely left one another’s side, were making trouble. The near identical triplets were dressed in ill-fitting suits, primarily because it is difficult to find a suit that fits a gentleman of such a musculature and size. Though they were not exactly identical, they were close enough that it could be difficult to tell them from one another at a glance, many found checking their ties (navy, maroon and mustard) to be the easiest way. Their features, barring a couple of distinctive battle scars, could be most succinctly summed up with the words ‘generic mafia heavy’. Interestingly they all had matching dragon tattoos, though they were the kind of tattoo not visible unless you go looking for it.
Importantly they had a score to settle with Matic and they weren’t exactly being subtle about it. Guns blazing they were slicing through the token resistance still remaining on the basement floors. Had they attacked at a better time they might have been easily overwhelmed by gang of thugs sent down to subdue them, but as it was to imply that there was someone who had the authority to send a gang of thugs anywhere was to vastly underestimate the chaos which the casino had descended into. As it was they proceeded unimpeded, their mindset barely changing as the genreshift shifted them back into the form of The Hydra.
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Everything switched back to science fiction; Phere became the android PH-373, Forensics Officer Harmon was Doctor Harmon once again and Ivan was still Ivan albeit a more alien version of himself. Doctor Matic, more or less the same as previously described except in a labcoat rather than a sharp suit, and with no trace of a cigar anywhere, suggested they make their way to a nearby laboratory where he and one of his right-hand men, Jaeger, was waiting to carry out the upgrade. PH-373 dismissively instructed Ivan to stay here and watch Harmon. Her behaviour had been erratic, unpredictable. She needed supervision.
Ivan, though he was careful not to show it, was pleased to have been given such an order. While the others had been distracted with their discussion he’d lifted the Tome out from PH-373’s backpack and left to watch the unconscious woman, he would have plenty of time to examine the source of the mysterious geomantic energy. He closed the office door, giving himself a little privacy. This genre’s version of Matic’s office was just as lavish, but in a more high-tech manner. Everything had a sleek futuristic look to it. Consequently it was somewhat less damaged; the metal furnishings had slightly melted but were far more in tact than could have been said of Detective Fiction. Ivan spread the Tome out on the desk and began to read.
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From the steel catwalks hanging over the entrance hall of Matic’s fortress, Klendel regarded his handiwork in the battle that raged below. As long held alliances shattered aliens turned their death rays upon other aliens, robots let loose laser fire upon other robots. It was anarchy. All it had taken was one shot in the wrong place and the invading force had turned upon one another, their uneasy cooperation forgotten about. Matic's mind controlled monstrosities held the line against anybody trying to escape into the fortress proper.
Admist the throng stood a machine, a robot taller in striking blue and white patterned armour. As was undoubtedly the intention, he resembled a police officer. NORTHWIND's riot shielding protected him from the laser blasts and miscellaneous other dangers that surrounded him. While there was little doubt in his mind that these people were criminals who ought to be arrested he was assigned to a specific criminal. The best he could do was radio back to base and tell them to send a squadron out. This was something that he did as he checked his scanner.
Klendel had been busy since his arrival. Most of that time had been spent weakening the alliances between the various warring gangs. The fruit of his labour could be seen the in the chaos that filled the entrance hall. NORTHWIND was from The Procedurals, a group that liked to consider themselves the police force of the city in the same way that the miltary gang liked to believe they were a real military. The Procedurals had agents in place throughout the town, so it hadn't taken them long to learn that the lies they had been fed (rumours that the Heist Gang were planning on violating the truce that existed between them) were in fact lies. It was that point that Detective Northwind had been sent out on the trail of the individual who had been spreading such rumours.
Now in the midst of the biggest brawl the city had ever seen NORTHWIND's scanner indicated the location of the figure he had been tracking. His cameras realigned themselves, looking up into the catwalks that hung overhead; he spotted something moving through the shadows. His jetpack flicking on automatically, he headed towards Klendel.
"Halt Criminal!" He announced. "You Are Under Arrest Under Suspicion Of Inciting A Riot."
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The upgrade of PH-373’s communication array occurred with the kind of uneventful precision that can be expected when a machine is in charge of the proceedings. Matic’s assistant Jaeger, who was technically human but who more closely resembled a mass of scars and stitches that had somehow gained sentience, had been very efficient. Jaeger spoke with a lisp and his larger patches of skin looked mismatched, with one part of his face looking like it had come from an animal. PH-373 wisely declined to enquire.
PH-373’s communication relay worked something like a vague map of the city, and throughout the city were moving nodes, radios and phones and other communication devices which she could speak through if she chose to. At the moment in Sci-fi there were rather a lot of available nodes to communicate with. Previously as the scope moved away from the city and out into the multiverse these nodes were not accessible, the best she could do was send a blanket message that could be picked up by all of the nodes or perhaps none of them; it was not an exact science. Now, with the upgrade installed, no matter how distant the person she wanted to communicate with she could speak solely to them, and in real time.
“Now if you don’t mind, the Tome.” Matic said as PH-373 got to her feet. Matic felt anxious, it was possible that Jaeger shared his feelings, though you would be hard pressed to tell how the patchwork man was feeling at any given time. This whole situation, the lengths he had gone to in order to get the Tome back, and he had no guarantee that PH-373 would actually give it to him… It was not like Matic to accommodate the requests of others; he preferred to take things by force and usually had the upper hand to do that with. It was a testament to just how powerful the Tome was that he was willing to indulge this android to regain control of it. With it he could do so much more than change the genre of this pitiful town. He eyed PH-373 warily as she searched through her backpack.
“The Tome appears to be missing.” She said. Within moments Doctor Matic had pulled an experimental plasma pistol from his belt. PH-373’s left eye whirred and spun in a slightly alarming manner.
“Yeah right.” Matic scoffed. “Hand it over. I need that Tome!”
“It is back in your office.” PH-373 said. “I am wirelessly networked into every camera in the city.” She added by way of explanation. Matic regarded her with suspicion for a long moment and then tossed his gun to Jaeger.
“Watch her.” He said. “If she tries to leave before I get back shoot her.”
“Yeth Doctor Matic.” Jaeger nodded in confirmation, causing PH-373 to momentarily worry that his head would fall off.
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Despite a short car chase during the genreshift Merrifield, Cedric, Tek and Abys left the detective genre in much the same configuration as they entered it, albiet closer to the castle/casino/fortress than before. The only real remnant of the genre was the lingering animosity between Merrifield and Cedric. Lieutenant Cedric irritably contemplated whether anyone would believe that he had mistaken the creature for a previously undiscovered caste of Gark. Though he obviously wouldn't act upon such a violent impulse against a mostly innocent creature, he couldn't help but smile as he briefly entertain the thought. For Merrifield's part, she didn't like to be bossed around, something that Cedric didn't seem to be able to stop himself from doing at the moment.
They moved through the alleyways for shelter from the raging winds, though there was no escaping the pounding rain that took their bad moods and made them even worse. The battle that was going on in the fortress had poured out into the streets around it. Sleekly designed robots crouched down behind chest high walls as alien plasma fire rained down upon them. Cyborg pirates battled with photon cutlasses. Genetic abominations scythed through the unwary, gobbling up the corpses for sustenance. In short it was exactly the kind of brawl any sane person would refrain from getting involved with. Merrifield instructed Abys to head around the back, to find a less suicidal entrance to the Fortress.
"Hold it." Lieutenant Cedric commanded. "We go in through the front; I never sneak in through the back door." Merrifield and Cedric eyed one another in disdainful silence.
"That is fine." Merrifield said spitefully. "You can do what you want; I didn't even ask you to come along." For a moment Cedric considered arguing with the creature, but decided against it. He didn't really want Merrifield to come with him anyway.
"Come on Tek." He said, dismounting from the grisly Abys-horse. Tek glanced nervously at the fighting crowd.
"If you don't mind I will sit this one out." He said nervously. "Good luck though."
Lieutenant Cedric rolled his eyes and waved them off. They trotted off towards the back of the fortress bickering between one another. Cedric drew his trusty plasma rifle Sigrar and without hesitation sprinted towards the chaotic throng. “BRING IT!” he screamed as he opened fire upon Matic’s genetic abominations.
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Ivan flicked through the mysterious Tome, towards the back of the book the last few pages were empty; the last page containing text was written in a dark olive green and writ itself before his very eyes.
“What the hell.” Ivan muttered as he read the words: ‘“What the hell.” Ivan muttered as he read the words-’
He watched as the book wrote about how he watched as the book wrote about him, before opting to flick backwards through the previous pages. Text of various colours described the events as they had happened to the other competitors. Ivan couldn’t help but notice there was a lot of purple text. Going back even further the text was just plain black and it described the numerous petty wars carried on in the town before their arrival, seeming to focus around a gang now disbanded and a Streetsmart Upstart now dead. He flipped all the way to the start of the book; the first words written within described the formation of the town. A crash of thunder from overhead drew his attention to the storm still raging outside the window. He couldn’t help but concur that this town did not have long left.
Ivan turned his attention back to the Tome and how he could best make use of the geomantic energy that flowed through it. Unfortunately for him and perhaps for the rest of the town as well, he was interrupted by a blow to the back of the head. Doctor Harmon stood over him, his body collapsed to the cold metal floor. Her eyes were vacant and drawn, her face expressionless, her hair hung in untidy tangles. In her hand was some random gadget gathered from the various machines that filled the room. She paid no heed to the fallen kid, her attention solely focused upon the Tome. Seemingly oblivious to anything else in the world, she got down to work taking apart machinery and rebuilding it into something else entirely.
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Doctor Cassandra Scala strode down the corridors of the Doctor Matic's fortress like she owned the place, occasionally coming across a wandering scientist or an many faced abomination broken loose from its restraints and casually putting them down with a quick blast from her ice rifle. She hadn't been particularly fazed by the temporary genreshift wherein she had been a murderous heiress out for petty revenge against the Kyresan Brothers; her issue was more that the damned android who was supposed to be helping her out had gone frustratingly radio silent. In the meantime she had been left navigating the maze of laboratories and corridors, heading towards Doctor Matic's office in the hope that The Hydra would be doing the same thing. There was a crackling as her radio reconnected with PH-373's.
"Where have you been?" She asked icily. "When we made this deal I was assured that you would lead me directly to the Hydra."
"There was a fault with my communications array." PH-373 replied. "It has been attended to and I can now direct you to the Hydra." PH-373 proceeded to reel off the directions towards Doctor Matic's office, ending it with a confident: "I predict that by the time you arrive the Hydra will already be there. If it chooses to redirect I will keep you informed." Doctor Scala scowled; sure that PH-373 was watching her do so.
"You had better be right this time." Scala said sternly. "I might be forced to reconsider our partnership if it turns out you are doing little other than wasting my time."
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Doctor Matic slammed open the door of his office and for a moment gawped at that which he saw. All of the machinery in his room had been cannibalised, rebuilt into something other. His desk had been cast aside and where it had stood there was the Tome, partially visible inside a complex case of metal and machinery. Coming off from either side of the case was a framework, extending a little way and then rising into the air and forming an arch large enough to permit a person through.
“Shit.” was all Matic had to say about this development. At the side of the structure Doctor Harmon stood, putting the finishing touches upon the dimensional gate. For just a moment, the view of the miserable midnight sky was obscured by darkness and something awful, something that no human was ever meant to lay eyes upon, and then it flickered away. Matic sprung into the room. “Do you have any idea what you are doing?” Harmon did not respond, carrying on working on the machine as though there was nothing wrong. “Stop that right now.” Matic reached for his plasma pistol, only to remember that he had given it to Jaeger.
Desperately Matic lashed out against Harmon, shoving her away from the machine. She stumbled back, but caught herself and turned towards Matic. As he stared into his eyes he could for a moment swore she was something other than she was, something ancient and powerful; something monstrous that he had just pissed off. Harmon shoved him away and turned back to her work. Matic stumbled back, tripping over his hastily discarded desk and collapsing to the floor. For a moment he sat stunned, and watched the Doctor work on the machine, too rattled, too nervous to do anything. He pushed it down, whatever this was it was clear that he couldn’t let it happen. He grabbed the first thing that came to hand, a rusty old wrench and slammed it down onto the casing that housed the Tome.
Black energy rippled through the framework, and also, not that anyone in that room was watching, through the skies of the town. Harmon lashed out at Doctor Matic, landing a kick in his ribs, but he would not be deterred. He kept smashing the wrench against the casing, pieces of metal and wiring flying free. The building began to shake violently and the window before them shattered. Rain poured in through the hole and attention of the Doctors was drawn to the world outside. Black energy ran through the clouds and cracks were opening up in the streets, exuding the same pitch black energy. Wordlessly Matic climbed to his feet, barely even cognizant of the pain in his ribs. Behind them The Hydra darted into the room escaping the collapsing corridors. Almost immediately its attention was drawn past the man it had come to kill and to the strange black energy flowing through the skies.
Across the town people stopped and stared into the skies, or fled from buildings collapsing under the stress of the dimensional catastrophe. Suddenly everything changed. What had moments ago been Matic’s fortress was suddenly a fantasy castle with tall towers and crenellated battlements. Surrounding the castle like some kind of bewildering moat were cracks in the earth, and beyond them entirely different genres upon each side of the building. The wind still blew, easily demolishing some of the structurally unstable buildings in a section of the town that had gone all children’s fiction. Running through the clouds a web of black energy focused along the cracks in genres. The whole thing looked very unstable; a small building that had become the focus of lovecraftian horror shook violently before collapsing in on itself and disappearing forever.
Heaven Help Us | Make Room!!!! | I'm Not Okay (I Promise)
Hang 'Em High | The Only Hope For Me Is You | Zero Percent | Early Sunsets Over Monroeville | DESTROYA | Demolition Lovers | To The End
Surrender The Night | Disenchanted | The Ghost Of You | Party Poison | Vampires Will Never Hurt You | The Jetset Life Is Gonna Kill You
Hang 'Em High | The Only Hope For Me Is You | Zero Percent | Early Sunsets Over Monroeville | DESTROYA | Demolition Lovers | To The End
Surrender The Night | Disenchanted | The Ghost Of You | Party Poison | Vampires Will Never Hurt You | The Jetset Life Is Gonna Kill You