[Doom, I have a concept about how Dwan and Lion can return if I tie it into Iskas personal Arc. I'm at work atm but I can contact you on steam when I get home. By the way, congrats everyone to 100 pages of a fine RP. SSCRP for life. Hell, even one of my friends who isnt even into RP found the story interesting when I gave him a summarized version.]
[I'm honestly glad this RP worked out well, if anything this encourages me to create more of these types once this game is over. One crazy concept I thought up is Prison :v:]
[The thing I like about your RP style, which FP lacks, is the controlling of individual characters. Other RPs put you in charge of nations or factions which is really not my cup of tea. This format allows for a much more interesting story and flow.
Thanks again doom for a great RP]
[Pretty much my reason for making this in the first place. Basically something fresh for a change.]
As Dwan and Lion flew through the portal, many thoughts flew through Dwan's head. He remembers all the times he had done this before, always leaving a universe permanently alone. But this time, it was different. He had someone with him.
A portal opens up in another universe and both Dwan and Lion fly out of it. Dwan lets go, as both of them land and skid along the floor. The both of them were silent as they skid, before stopping. "Did we just get teleported?", Lion said, breaking the ice between the two. Dwan rose from the ground, taking off his helmet and holding it by his chest. Dwan just shook his head without looking at Lion. Lion slowly got up, dusting off his chest rig and shoulder pads before unshouldering the Peacemaker. "I'll take that as a yes.", he said. Dwan was silent, as he thought to himself what to do next. Lion walked up next to Dwan. "Where are we?", he said as he looked around.
"We're.... well, I don't usually give universes names, you know. But we are in a universe where the laws of caldiur exist.", Dwan told Lion. "I see.", said Lion. Lion observed the terrain. The duo was standing on a uneven grassy field mixed with some rocks. A lush forest could be seen nearby. Lion turned around to see a large mountain stretching across the horizon. He looked at Dwan. "Been here before?", he asked. "I vaguely remember being in an area like this. Honestly, after going through so many fantasy universes, they just sort of merge together in your memories.", Dwan said, giving out a light chuckle. "I wouldn't know.", Lion said as he began checking his inventory at a nearby rock. "Peacemaker, Reed AR, Lionclaws, five emergency flares, one evac beacon, thirty nutrition bars, one trauma kit and a comms package." He looked over to Dwan. "I suggest we find a safe place to rest at, unless you have anything else in mind?", he asked.
Dwan looked at Lion oddly. "You think we're staying here? No, I've got my own pad in another universe.", he told him. He opened up another portal, but as he did, he fell to his knees, clenching at his heart. "Eugh, that explosion messed me up. Breaking the portal it was sinking into, it hurts.", he said. Lion rushed to Dwan to help him stay up. "Do you need stims? Meds? Anything?", he asked worryingly. "No, no, I'm fine. The natural mana from this universe is helping me relieve the pain, plus I don't really need things like stims and meds when I could heal myself.", he responded, making sure Lion wasn't too worried about him. "Alright, let me help you up." Lion grabbed one of Dwan's arms and wrapped it around his neck. Lion then stood up and made sure that Dwan was stable enough to walk. "Shall we?", he asked. Dwan nodded, as the portal became ready. The two walked into the portal, as it took them to another universe.
Dwan and Lion arrive on the other side of the portal, entering a metallic room with a quite a bit of furniture, a computer and a TV. "Welcome to my place. Far, far away from the actual activities in this universe, underground on a barren planet.", he said, still being held up by Lion.
Lion whistled and observed the room. "You have a very interesting taste." He put down Dwan carefully in a bed at the edge of the room.
"Thank you. After travelling a near-infinite amount of universes in the span of 32 years, one could say that you'll develop a unique taste for things.", he said as he started taking his weapons and armor off of him.
"Make yourself at home. Sorry if the place is a bit small, but I don't get guests, you know.", Dwan said.
"No worries." Lion brought out his equipment and placed it all on a nearby table. A faint humming sound was heard from a curious-looking device underneath. He looked at Dwan. "What's this?"
"Air and gravity generator. The gravity on this planet isn't like most planets, so I got this generator to keep it at, say, Terra-like levels. Same goes for the air, I mean, how would I be able to breath here?", Dwan said.
Lion nodded. "I see, so no tinkering then." He said with a chuckle as he laid out his entire inventory on the table.
Having taken off all the weapons and armor off of him, Dwan got off the bed and walked to the dresser. He opened it and grabbed his usual clothes for when he's here, a matching pair of pants and shirt.
Lion finished checking his inventory. "Well, at least we aren't helplessly unarmed." He nodded towards the TV. "'That work?"
"Of course. It has access to every TV channel in the multiverse.", Dwan told Lion. "Now that I think about it, omniverse makes more sense than multiverse.", Dwan realized. He grabbed a pencil and paper and began writing it down. The remote of the TV is next to the TV.
"If you say so." Said Lion in confusion. He picked up the remote and turned on the TV. The screen flickered briefly before showing a man and a woman dancing on what would appear to be bridge. Everything was in black and white. "Now this is some ancient stuff."
"Just change the channel. You'll eventually find channels from your universe. Here, let me help.", Dwan said as he gestured to be handed the remote.
Lion shook his head. "No, this is fine. I've never seen black and white TV movies before." He looked at Dwan with a smile. "My grandfather used to tell me stories of TV studios airing old black and white movies untill everyone moved on to holovids."
"Why did they stop airing them? Did they restore the color or were they not profitable anymore?", he asked.
"Shame. Black and white stuff is pretty great at times. You sometimes have to remember history in order to avoid repeating it, for better or for worse.", Dwan said to Lion.
Lion nodded. "That's why we stopped looking back. We learned from our mistakes. Three world wars. Biological warfare. Millions dead. Religious conflicts." Lion got a distant look in his eyes. "It was due time to get our shit together and move on."
Dwan nodded.
Lion locked up the Peacemaker with a click. He then aimed down to make sure to that the sights were properly adjusted. "So...", he started, putting back the weapon to the table. "When do we go back?", he asked, looking directly at Dwan. Dwan looked at Lion with a surprised look. "What do you mean by that?", Dwan asked him. Lion chuckled in response. "You're joking right?", he gestured towards one of the walls. "You weren't planning on sitting here for the rest of your life, right? I mean, the crew is depending on us.", he said with a serious look. The look on Dwan's face became very serious. "Of course I'm not planning that. I usually only come to this pad and stay here for a day or so before I continue onto my next adventure.", Dwan said, as the tone of his voice implied something.
Lion got a confused look. "You're ditching the Archius? I mean, like, I understand not wanting to go back to a place where your life is in danger every day but we're not done yet.", Lion said as he stood up and leaned against one of the walls. "The Crimson Son is still out there. Our mission is still out there, you can't just move on?", he said. "It isn't like I want to ditch the crew. The matter of fact, I don't want to. But we can't return.", Dwan said in a very serious tone. "There is no way we could've survived that explosion. None. We're dead in that universe now.", he told Lion bluntly.
Lion shook his head before looking at Dwan. "But we didn't! As such it's still our obligation to carry on the fight! We made it out and the civilians did not, why? Because of us.", he said as he pointed to himself. "If we hadn't been on a mission they would still be alive. Instead they died and it is our obligation to life itself to make sure that they did not die in vain." Lion said as he sat down in the chair. "Because I'll be damned if we did all of this for nothing, Dwan.", he said. "I'm sorry Lion, but this is one of my personal policies. I don't return to universes where I "died" unless something of importance to me has been left in it. My tome, for example.", Dwan said. "We tried to be heroes, and failed. You can't mess with the continuity of the universe, Leon.", he said seriously.
Lion looked at Dwan. "Dwan, you are my friend and I respect you deeply but you know damn well that we need to go back." He stood up and gestured upwards towards the ceiling. "The Crimson Son is still out there! Just because you and I are safe here doesn't mean that the rest of our crew is. They are our friends. Our family. Regardless of our different pasts we need to take care of eachother. Why? Because that's what families do." Lion walked up to Dwan and gestured with his hands. "Don't you see Dwan? We finally have an edge over the Crimson Son! Everyone thinks we're dead and that gives us the element of surprise unlike anything we have."
He walked off to give Dwan some space. "We could operate in the shadows, find leads to the Crimson Son which could then help Mr Saw and the crew. Yes, it would be unfair to keep the crew in the dark but it would only be for a short while and trust me, while I don't like to keep people in the dark it could seriously help us when it comes to the Crimson Son." Lion stopped moving and looked at Dwan. "All I'm asking is that you open up a portal, if you don't want to go with me then fine! I will respect you and your choice but it is absolutely crucial that at least one of us returns to carry on the fight." He sat down once more. "Can you at least listen to my plan?"
Dwan was silent for a moment, as he entered deep thought. He had a blank expression, before snapping out of his thoughts. "Lion, you are right. But you have to remember. The only way you can explain how we survived is by revealing the truth behind me.", he told him bluntly. Lion nodded. "Thank you for listening and don't worry, we'll figure something out. I'm gonna make a wild guess and assume that both the Archius and the kanads didn't waste any time searching through the debris. We could've might as well have survived in a cargo container for all they know." He walked up and sat down next to Dwan, looking across the room. "The point is, I'll take your secret to my grave if I have to.", he said as he looked at Dwan. "There's very few people that I trust with my life entirely.", Lion told him.
Dwan nodded. "Well, let's get planning then.", he said as he stood up. "If you need anything from anywhere, just tell me. If you have a picture of a location, even better, makes it easier to travel.", he told Lion as he organized his weapons onto a weapon rack and his armor and the undersuit into the dresser. Lion stood up as well and extended his hand. "Thanks, I owe you one. Big-time.", he said. "No problem. I try my best.", Dwan said as he shook Lion's hand.
"Let's turn this shit upside down.", Dwan said to cap off the conversation.
Jeremy was sitting down, he sighed and wondered... is this the kind of territory they were heading into now? Perhaps desperate times did call for desperate measures, he heard a beep from his holoband. He suddenly saw a familiar face on Rigel: Bubal. He was cuffed but there were at least no scratches or bruises on him. Jeremy closed his eyes, gritting his teeth to the point of rage.
He saw the words. "Far edge of Galaxy, coordinates here. This ends now Captain."
Jeremy didn't know what to do with this sort of news. This would mean Iska had a lot of things to worry about. He went to the Quarters, knocking on Iska's door. He sighed, the damage to his mental health did not go unnoticed.
Iska opened the door and looked surprised to see Jeremy.
"Is unexpected to see captain here, please come in" she said gesturing Jeremy to follow. She was currently occupied with cleaning up the mess that the blackjackets had caused whilst somebody to love by Jefferson Airplane played on the jukebox.
"Nasty little people they are" she said with a scoff, "You look troubled. What can Iska do for captain?" she asked while she continued to sort out everything in her room.
Jeremy didn't say a word, he let the video decide what reaction she might muster. He opened his holo band, revealing the message he just received shortly.
Iskas expression changed from confusion to fury during the course of the clip.
She looked up to Jeremy with deep anger in her eyes, "So we go after them?"
She didn't even wait for Jeremy to answer before she spoke again.
"And we kill them" she spat between her teeth. Iska walked over to the clan banner and calmly went to her knees. "Leave" she ordered Jeremy without looking in his direction.
Nearly half an hour had passed since the blast. The Archius, having been cut loose from the docking apparatus for some time, drifted aimlessly away from the platforms while all of the power from its crippled reactor was spent on repair efforts. A massive water leak had flooded an upper utilities compartment, the same ones Yanim had inspected more than a month prior and deemed worthy of flight.
Now however, she was unable to personally respond to the myriad of issues currently facing the ship and was forced to deploy drones and subordinates in her stead. Painkillers had been administered and nanorobotics had been employed to quickly heal her punctured and burned abdomen while a steady drip of fluids prevented dehydration. This was, of course, after the blood transfusion and immediate surgery she required upon entering the medical bay. Once she had been cleared for this second round of treatment, she was expected to quickly recover, just like Varn had on Duroma.
She did her best to coordinate recovery efforts using her tablet, which had been returned to her after being found on the body of a dead blackjacket in the armory, but she was heavily distracted by the loss of Lion and Dwan. Two of her favorite crewmates had disappeared in an instance while she could do nothing to help them, and now she agonized herself by remembering their banter and company during the preceding five and a half weeks. On the other hand, she was relieved to know that Vorokar and Damya had both perished during the crisis and would never threaten her again.
Possibly worse even than the loss of her friends was the loss of her homeworld. Even if no word had escaped the ship that she had violently resisted arrest by a blackjacket officer, she knew that her membership among the Archius crew would count her among the renegades who had killed a dozen of
the Collective's most feared. She could never go home. Her records would continue to assert her clean criminal record, but her association with humans had tainted her in the eyes of those in power, just as Vorokar had claimed.
She felt an emptiness as she remembered Arkadam and the way he had courted her for details on the mission. He had called her princess. He called her beautiful and she thought he meant it. Now it was if she felt no love or sympathy, either from or toward any member of her far-flung race. The future now held for her a dark and unfamiliar path utterly alien from her productive and secure upbringing. In the here and now, her life was confined to the walls of the troubled ship and her trusted contacts extended only to those she lived and worked around.
Lion had called them his family. She resented that. The pain of loss was magnified by the notion...
There was a rumble across the ship as one of the electrical relay systems overloaded and exploded, due to short circuiting. In the aftermath, however, her tablet displayed an estimated 65% output from the reactor core. Kr had apparently decided to sacrifice what was left of a damaged relay in order to extract power from another generator across backup lines. Once power hit 70%, and it would within minutes given the successes of the engineering team, warp capacity would be reestablished.
A maintenance drone reported conventional propulsion as safe to use. The system came online, and finally the Archius began to move under its own power.
Lion returned the last of the extra powercells to his chest pouches. He looked over to Dwan who was as kitted out as himself. "Ready?"
As he heard Lion ask if he was ready, he dressed himself up in clothes more suited for sci-fi-esque universes. "I guess so.", Dwan said. "Where do you want to start?", he asked in response.
Lion brought out a photo which handed over to Dwan. "To the Valley of Heroes." The picture depicted three large red-ish statues saluting towards a sculpture of a planet.
"Should take us close enough to my place."
Dwan grabbed the photo as he looked at it. He looked for the best place to portal into. Soon, he found a reclusive section next to the base of one of the three statues. Dwan grabbed his Bellevue Ancaria, so that he had a weapon, and prepared the portal.
After a few minutes, it opened up. "If we both entered at the same time without touching eachother, we'd end up in two random locations in your universe. So, you first.", Dwan told Lion.
"Aghhh. What the hell do you wan't from me human?" Rask cried out. Blood dripping from his mouth."I already told you secrets that would be valuable to you. What more do you want?"
Varn just looked at the tooth he had pulled out of the kanad's mouth. "You know, I never knew your teeth were this big. Were both learning new things today. And your 'secrets' are useless trivia since you gave them up so quick. I already told you why I'm doing this. You are a unlucky idiot, who decided to follow colonel Deuchbag to a ship staffed with some of the most dangerous people in the galaxy. And now you're paying for your mistakes."
Varn lid a cigar. "The captain wanted me to kill you, but I figured you'd be useful to us alive. So far I have't found a use. The more I think about it, the more I think the original idea was stupid. Letting you go I mean. So here's what well do. I will leave you in this cold cell with your friend over there." he pointed at the body "and I'll sleep on it. Until I get back you have all the time in the world to think of a reason why we should keep you alive."
Varn left the cell and the brig. He walked towards the medbay. He really needed his shoulder looked at.
Lion nodded and stepped through the portal, as he entered a sense of calm filled him.
After Lion stepped in, Dwan holstered his revolver and walked into the portal himself. As he stepped through, the portal closed behind him.
A portal opens at the base of one of the three statues, angled in such a way that people can't see it. Lion leaves the portal first, followed by Dwan behind him. The portal closed. "We're here.", Dwan said, as a growl could be heard from his voice. He really didn't want to be in a universe where he died in.
Lion got a nostalgic look in his face as he looked around. "Just like I remembered it." He said looking up at the three statues. He then smiled and pointed at something behind Dwan.
As Dwan turned around, he saw thousands upon thousands of other statues like the first three. All statues were soldiers in dress uniforms with berets on their heads. They all had different sizes, lengths and facial features.
"Welcome to the Valley of Heroes; a monument to every single soldier that has ever died in the service of the SDF."
Lion then looked at the sculpture of Terra which was at the center of the valley. He did a quick salute himself before looking around the area.
Dwan payed obeisance to the sculpture of Terra in order to not look out of place. He turned to Lion.
"So, is your place watched? If news of your deaths spread out of the Archius, there would be no realistic way to justify how we ended up from that space station to Mars in...", Dwan paused as he calculated how much time has passed. "...half an hour or so.", Dwan stated.
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUuz4wNIC9s&index=1&list=PLF8723BAE6F2F1B10[/media]
Jeremy headed to the bridge, looking out as he saw a familiar ship approach in this area. Kira's ship no less, she got through the communications line. "Jeremy, what the hell... happened in there?" She gave him a question. Unable to answer he only responded an approval to board the ship.
Despite some members' insistence they shouldn't get boarded seeing how the State Sec managed to rough handle their stuff it was quite understandable.
He saw Kira and five of her men with her. "What happened?" She expressed worriedness, Jeremy kept silent. "Jeremy, talk to me." She insisted, placing her hands against shoulders, shaking him to get some sense from him.
"State Security, Kanad Collective. They know the Oracle. We got another major problem..." Jeremy showed her the video, narrowing her eyes. "Who is that?"
"A man named Bubal, without him one of my members would have died in an explosion. I have to help him." Kira nodded, but she felt that there was something else too. "You think its them?" Jeremy asked, referring to the Crimson Son.
"Pfft, who else would it be? We have watchful eyes over the three planets anyway, we can find this man and get to your objective. Quickly. But, look Jeremy don't think these men are pirates, don't think of them as ordinary mercs, don't and I don't want you thinking you can handle them all by yourself!" She yelled, tightening her grip. "This is not a game anymore!" She wanted to place the emphasis through his head.
"I know that." Jeremy placed his hands onto hers, staring at her. "If the Crimson Son are holding Bubal, then I'll swear to you I'll kill them all, they've messed with the wrong people for this job." Jeremy's voice declared, earning a slap from Kira.
"Idiot, don't get cocky. We can't afford to lose any more people. These are dangerous people." Kira begged, Jeremy took his eyes off her. "Two of my crew died right now, I can't, we need to find Bubal."
"Don't think I'm leaving you there by yourself, Its my position to watch over the Archius." Kira told him, the Captain sighed. "Of course, we're going to that place. We might as well prepare." Jeremy felt his arm being grabbed.
"Once we go there... [b]There's no turning back.[/b]" Kira warned him. "Yeah, I understand." Jeremy told her, turning away to get to the Bridge.
[QUOTE=Damian0358;48394025]Dwan payed obeisance to the sculpture of Terra in order to not look out of place. He turned to Lion.
"So, is your place watched? If news of your deaths spread out of the Archius, there would be no realistic way to justify how we ended up from that space station to Mars in...", Dwan paused as he calculated how much time has passed. "...half an hour or so.", Dwan stated.[/QUOTE]
Lion shook his head. "While terraformed, not many people visit this region of Mars aside from during various holidays. Even less people live here, infact I'm one out of five people that have a house so close to the memorial site."
Lion then began walking. "Come, there's no time to lose.."
As they walked between the columns of dead soldiers, Lion thought it'd be appropriate to share some history.
"This site was first built following the unification war. While most battles were won relatively quickly, we still lost a fair share of good men and and women."
He getsured towards the statues. "Each statue is based on their real-life counterpart. Some of first statues even house the bodies themselves, allowing the fallen soldiers to view the sun set over Terra for all eternity."
Lion then tossed Dwan a nutrition bar. "The statues are made out of Martian alloy rock, a highly rare element only found on- you guessed it- Mars. The Sol Government has banned commercial use of the element, effectively restricting its use to these statues alone. It is as strong as the toughest of metals but looks like ordinary granite with a red color."
He then pointed back at the sculpture of Terra. "As for Terra, the sculpture is made out of a variety of metals. The metal comes from recovered weapons used by the varous religious fanatics that were driven out from Sol, all of the weapons were melted down together and then colored by the citizens of Mars."
Dwan opened up the bar and took a bite. "Very interesting. At some point, I should ask you a bit more about what happened in this universe. I've only got limited knowledge of your world from researching through library computers on Saturn, specifically its planetary capital, when I first arrived here.", Dwan stated.
"I'd be happy to fill you in." Lion then pointed towards a cliff overlooking the valley. "There."
Resting at the edge of the cliff was a grey cubical structure consisting of what appeared to be several squared and rectangular shapes.
A fenced sloped wall blocked the view of the lower area, a gate could be seen on one of the sides leading out onto a more advanced dirtroad which had various lights at the side of it.
The road itself split into two roads, one leading further up the cliff and over the nearest hill while the other led down to the monument.
The building itself had a unique militarized yet civilian look, a form of watchtower was mounted on the roof next to a large VTOL pad currently occupied by a sleek black and grey craft.
A large balcony overlooked the valley as well while several windows of varying sizes dotted the exterior.
"Home." Said Lion as he resumed walking.
Dwan followed Lion as they both walked to Lion's residence.
After a few minutes, Dwan and Lion reached the gate. Several small cameras overlooked the are, one of them even locked to Lion as he approached the gate console.
"Lima. Echo. Oscar. November." A holographic keyboard then emerged, allowing Lion to type in a password.
As he finished typing, the keyboard disappeared and a green light appeared over the gate. The pressurized door slolwy opened up, revealing a airlock big enough to fit a small vehicle.
Lion and Dwan entered the airlock. After a mere second the first door sealed up and what would appear to be a decontamination procedure was triggered. The second door then opened up, revealing first a dirtroad leading to a garage next to the house and then a beautiful garden.
Lion turned to Dwan. "Welcome to the Lion residence." He began walking towards the front door. Above the door was a blue banner with a white lionshead on it.
The garden itself was protected from the harsh martian nature by a thick layer of glass positioned between the house and the wall.
Several garden robots could be seen working about with the various plants.
"Like it?" said Lion as he stopped next to the front door.
"Very nice. The garden reminds me of home.", Dwan commented. He looked at the banner. "Personal coat of arms or army emblem?", Dwan inquired.
"Personal emblem. This house was given to me by the SDF High Command following... this." He gestured towards his robotic body.
Lion then opened up the door and stepped inside.
Dwan followed Lion into the house, closing the door behind him.
Sorry, you need to Log In to post a reply to this thread.
