epidemiology | EVENT ★ THE FRACKING FIELDS

EVENT ★ THE FRACKING FIELDS

THE EARTHQUAKE

One day, early in the morning before the mechanical rooster at Amos Zephyr's farm even crows, there's a sudden rumble in the distance. Perdition's Rest shakes and the ground roils, knocking things off shelves and startling the mechanical horses in their pen. Look out the window and you'll see Qorral locals blearily stepping out into the street, murmuring anxiously amongst themselves: Earthquake.

Ever since the argecite mines started to dry up, the Qorral colonists have been turning to fracking in order to pull all available argecite out of the planet as quickly as possible. The technique has caused more and more earthquakes to shake the planet, though the fracking fields are far enough away from the town that damage is minimal.

However, the fields and mines aren't as lucky. The mayor rushes out into the street, his assistant and Sheriff Holladay flanking him, and asks for any willing heroes and adventurers (that means you!) to venture out to the fracking fields and assess the damages. Though the tunnels aren't being actively mined, there were likely miners and other workmen inside, so there will be rescue needed as well. Get your provisions ready and hop on the train: you're going to work.

THE FRACKING FIELDS

The fracking fields are a wide open swath of land peppered with looming, iron machines going on for miles. These machines are the Qorral's final attempt at scraping the last remnants of argecite from the planet before abandoning the colony and moving on for good. This destructive practice is causing obvious instability to the planet, but they don't seem to care. This is what their species does: seeks out argecite, mines it, and moves on.

The fields are dry and dead, with no plants around -- and now, after the earthquake, there are sinkholes. The iron machines are falling into the sinkholes, slowly being swallowed by the planet, with desperate workers trying to pull them back out. They could use the help -- but be sure not to fall in yourself.

Grotesque alien birds circle overhead, searching for the dead or the dying, workers caught in the collapsing earth. Save them before they're swallowed by the earth or swallowed by carrion birds -- and if you're too late, the locals would be happy to have their loved ones returned to them intact.

Also found in the fields is the Argecite Refinery, a massive factory filled with machinery meant for the refining of the crystal before it is to be shipped back to the Qorral home planet. The outside of the factory is surrounded by a 610cm (20 ft) tall electric perimeter fence, whose energy shorts out sporadically after the earthquake cracked the service box. If you're quick enough to make it through one of the gaps in electricity, don't relax quite yet -- there are malfunctioning guard drones throughout the facility, the earthquake rattling their sensors and making it impossible for them to tell friend from foe. The drones resemble dogs, though they are capable of folding their legs in for aerodynamic superiority when they take flight. They are equipped with energy lasers to destroy, sticky glue to slow trespassers, and a thin blade in the tail to poison attackers. The poison is quick-acting, causing hallucinations and fever, but it is not deadly.

Inside the factory, the machinery has collapsed in on itself from the earthquake; electricity sparks from damaged wires, dangerously nearby spilled oil drums or pools of standing water. Fire can start at any second. There are factory workers here that need rescuing, but also a variety of inanimate objects, including barrels of argecite, machinery parts, files, computers, etc. Anything that isn't bolted down needs to be moved outside of the factory before it explodes. Of course, no one is really keeping track of what's inside...

THE MINES

The Qorral have been digging in the mines since arriving on this planet 30 years ago, but recent efforts have shifted to fracking after the argecite veins slowly became depleted. The mines are still maintained by a skeleton crew of workers, making sure there is no build-up of dangerously flammable gas and patrolling the tunnels to look out for cave-ins -- which, after the earthquake, have happened in spades.

The tunnels are winding and deep, turning in on each other and ending in dead ends or sudden, steep drop-offs into the dark. There are workers trapped within, and some at Perdition's Rest have said that their thrill-seeking relatives -- typically teenagers -- have gone missing. It's possible that they have found themselves trapped in the mine, so it may be a good idea to look out for them as well.

And even deeper in the mine, there is a writhing, pale danger: sand worms, blind and hungry, wait in the dark. The earthquake has begun to drive them further up the tunnel, their tooth-lined maws open as they slither through toward the surface. Those focusing on the fields above may find a straggling sand worm or two, thrashing wildly in pain from the unfamiliar heat of the sun. This will definitely put a damper in the rescue and recovery efforts, so take them out as quickly as you can -- with as little damage to the fracking equipment, please.

OOC NOTES

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Trekking through miles and miles of shitty, crumbling wreckage is his idea of a Tuesday. He's here, juggling his reasons for being present in this system of caverns and wondering if it's a flaw in his personality or a blessing that he's among more like-minded people. You know, the kind who run into danger, rather than from it. Real go-getters, with freaky fucking powers he's putting from his mind, because there's only so much he can process in one go. That's where the rudimentary cartography is coming in. Mapping, notetaking and order is what keeps him moving.

That, and the poor lost bastards getting chewed up and shat out by these. Worms. Judging by the fucking thing in this guy's hand, someone wasn't too lucky. ]

It's like Sunday brunch at boot camp.

[ Lots of eating going on. Nobody's minding their goddamn manners, either.

He's not pleased at all to hear the news that "backwards" isn't going to work, and the resounding scoff is both disgusted and incredulous. Tell him a story he's unfamiliar with. ]

This, okay, [ he's rising, turning the notepad over to show his work ] this is a map. What's blocked, what terminates and what branches.

[The light down here is negligible, so Laedo, free hand overturned to cast shade on their poor eyes, summons a small, dim globe over the upturned notebook. It may as well be a palm-mounted LED, for all its efficiency, though there are no wires and no battery pack attached to the spell he's just cast. Then again, in the extremely dusty air caught in the field, it's clear to see that the particles moving around Laedo are doing odd things: as in a soap bubble, particles in the air are moving ambiently around the man, but especially around the source of the light where his magical field is feeding in to the active spell... Laedo's gotten so used to the resistance to his magic that by this point he doesn't pay it any mind.

He looks the map over with a critical eye, but he also looks over the hand presenting it.] It's acceptable, only this branch is where I found worm tracks, and this branch I barred off--noxious chemicals.

You should be resting this mission out, with such a wound, you know. Nobody would begrudge you for remaining at the hostel [he refuses to acknowledge the brothel-like qualities of their forced living space] lest these paltry bindings come loose and infection sets in.

[ Having light to see by is far, far better. Of all the things he had brought with him, a light source had not been one of them. No flash, no flashlight - and so, he'd been reliant on the night vision option on his camera, the same one hanging loose about his wrist. Never far, always present. The lens is visibly cracked, the casing battered, spattered with streaks of dried blood. He favors it, but once there is light, he dutifully tucks it away into the canvas sidebag he's got on his person, and focuses on sharing his map with the stranger. No need to be shy about resources. ]

I have chemicals here, along the west. Rubble here, worm sounds just beyond it. This juncture looks promising, I could barely make out the sign but there could be a rec room or some just down the left path.

[ Rec room, panic room. Some hollowed out space for the miners, and it's a good enough spot for him to -- to, uh.

He looks down, at his hands. ] I'm missing my fucking fingers, I'm not an invalid. Shut up about it, and focus on the worms.

[ GOSH LAEDO!!! ]

[He is team monster-heals, he will not shut up about it!!

Well... he will, for now, but his face curls into a sour grimace nearly worthy of a muppet as he attempts to stare the haggard man down.

Truth be told, he wants out of this place just as badly as anyone, and if they can find anyone else to bring out, it means that many fewer who are going to perish underground. The reality is enough to dispel minor gripes from mind, and he looks down to the map. A moment later, he brings the pendant tucked under his uniform out with a jangle that suggests he could not have bothered to remove all of his jewelery before coming down here. It is a standard-issue magitek network device, but he's been using it for long enough that it takes not more than a moment to scan the map, which he presumes makes it available to the rest of the team.]

We'll search the room first. Let us hope you're correct--what is your name?

Miles.

[ His name, that's it.

The magiteck items were, in his opinion, the cheesiest, cheapest looking pieces of jewelry that he'd seen since he'd gone to some old college mate's shit party several years back. He'd punched someone. Woke up in the drunk tank the next morning, fuzzy-mouthed and feeling hellishly self-righteous. If not deeply hung over. He'd gotten a cursory look at the jewelry. A brief tutorial in how to use it, what it was for. So he knows, when Mr. Dirt-n-Gold starts working the lightshow with his pendant, that something's going down. Like using the camera on a smart phone, just shaped like. Shit you'd get your girlfriend or something. Anyways. ]

It's this way.

[ Scold him all you like, he's taking the lead on this excursion. ]

You something like the folks out at the refinery -- all flash and power? You managed against goddamn Shai-Hulud knockoffs decently, I see.

Laedo, [comes the brief exchange. He likes this man; after decades of flash and circumstance, and months within this strange allegiance attempting to figure out how prosaic ones title should be, he has grown both weary and wistful in announcing himself 'Laedo Ledo, son of Laurea, Guard of the asandus ranks' when the latter was not true, the parentage was surely formally severed by this point in disgrace, and all of it left him with a terrible pang for a home that would no longer accept him. There was a certain comfort in even abrasive conciseness.]

I am an askan asandus, bestowed with all of this 'flash and power' by my goddess. Despite my... ethical disagreements with her, apparently those powers remain perfectly intact, and so I shall continue to use it to aid those who need protection.

[Not going to lie, Miles, he's talking about people like you. He also seems not to have fully grasped the concept of being concise, himself.]

You seem a perfectly adroit navigator, perhaps you understand the need of that service.

Neat.

[ Laedo works. Rolls off the tongue real easy, short and sweet. It reminds him of soldiers in the field - surnames, sharp and direct. Gunnar, Vasquez, Dough-Boy. Not that the last one was a surname, more a nickname. A memory, that rises up in the back of his mind like an itch. He shudders, as it flows over him. Soldiers in the field. Kids, like the kids here in the mines. Trained up for battle, the way these kids were just fucking around the way stupid kids just did.

The rest of it is just --

it's a lot. ] Christ. Go on and pretend I understood that for now.

[ There are better, more important things to do than grill a golden-looking fellow about the details of what he is, what he means. Goddesses. He'll ask him later, there's something in his eyes - undeniable, deep-seated curiosity. The same sort of gut-deep motivation that's lead him into any number of dangerous situations. It's obvious he wants to know more. ]

I've been in a lot of places that require some sense of direction. Recording shit's... second nature to me now.

[ Hand in his bag, he pulls out a laminated card on a cord. Tied neat along one of the bag's zippers. A press pass, which he holds up. He doesn't know if it'll mean anything, here. ]

[Laedo holds his light up to the pass, squinting at it as though the striking reflection off the lamination is a little much for his stained eye. Even if the proclamation has a flimsy look, there's something about the entire human that seems flimsy to the askan. The wounded hands and the gruff words. Miles isn't doing so well down here, though none of them are.]

Accolades mean little down here, but I will have to take your word for it.

[He's happy to lead the way, taking directions when necessary. 'Keep humans from harm...' it's a very old bit of dogma he still ascribes to, even if the rest is a jumbled complication. The worst they experience on the way to the rec room is the familiar slithering of preying worms, echoing down the tunnels. Laedo holds them back the moment his ears attenuate to the dry, leathery scraping of meters of flesh across ruinous rubble, though he probably needn't with Miles' credentials.

Is it just the way the light dims suddenly as they hang back when Laedo turns to look over his shoulder to warn the man, or is there something feral to his expression?]

Get to the room. I will ensure a distraction. We will meet within, or perhaps on the surface. Get anyone inside, out.

[ Grappling with worms is not in his job description. Locating missing records? That is. Most situations he's been in, he's gone it alone - the price for 'lone wolfing' it had not been exacted upon him until that very last gig. He'd lost more than his deserved pound of flash, then and there. He holds his notes and maps close, silent and still as he listens - taking his cue from his companion's sudden, alarming level of focus.

He wants to run. To bolt off, deeper into the mines until he puts whatever is prowling behind them - whatever Laedo has spotted - far, far away. ]

What about you.

[ He's not paralyzed, he knows his legs will work - will carry him away, especially if there is someone else between himself and the danger.

( There will still be SOMEONE between him and danger. It feels like leaving the man to the fiends, despite proof that he has handled his own affairs well. ) ]

No, man. Just leave it -- [ He urges, and nearly grabs for Laedo's arm to force him away - what good is there in standing one's ground when you can retreat and get a better angle on the situation. His own feet have already carried him, several paces away and down the mine's hall, in the direction of the room. Ready to fucking BOLT. But reluctant to, which speaks for his mettle - maybe not his sense. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

EVENT ★ THE FRACKING FIELDS

\o/ HELL YEA!!

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we can do a short time-skip forward or wrap up here; I'm down for either!

A TIMESKIP IS GR8!! im liking this.... so much...