redmarsshit | redshift: tdm #4

redshift: tdm #4

Redshift: Welcome to the v͖͕̺̲̘̱̜͎o̴̦̣̠̦̘̹͞i̯̖d̛̪̬͈̱̦̝͍̕.

▶ Click here to read what characters will experience when arriving in Anchor.

▶ All TDM threads can be considered game canon, and current players are welcome to either top-level on the TDM so prospective players can tag them, or use the prompts for logs or network posts on the communities. All threads on the TDM can be used for Activity Check.

a. the red shit.

There are rumblings in the deepest, most overgrown part of the agricultural area, where until very recently there was a lingering pocket of red algae. The good news is, the red algae is gone! The bad news is, it all got eaten by a mutated bear-thing with giant antlers. The algae did a number on the poor thing, doping it up and confusing it to the point where everything is an enemy.

What’s worse? The algae has adapted, colonizing the creature’s entire body. The algae has mutated in the process, releasing a protective cloud of toxins that causes severe hallucinations, as well as some of the protective and euphoric qualities that the red algae originally possessed. Which means the mutated, antlered, bear-thing is accompanied by a small army of other creatures, from large to small, who are all very invested in its survival and also are being driven crazy by its presence.

Prepare yourselves for one hell of a hunt. These animals can pop up almost everywhere in the agricultural zones, and when they do show their paws it’s to go on a rampage.

b. fashionista.

It wouldn’t be Anchor if the bots weren’t fucking shit up.

This time, the spa bots have gone full stylist coach, chasing down residents and trying to do their hair, nails, makeup, or change their clothes. In some cases, they're literally sweeping people off their feet and carrying them to the hot springs, massage rooms, and spa areas to be pampered. Too bad most of their cosmetics are fifty years out of date and the closests they’ve raided either had another resident’s clothes or moth-eaten dust-covered rags.

Is that the jacket Idris Elba was wearing in the introductory video? It kinda looks like it.

But it’s not all bad! The bots actually give great massages and fantastic mani-pedis. They also have a small stash of fresh cosmetics and clean clothes that got left behind in the spas. They might not fit great, but they look pretty good!

If your character doesn’t practice proper self-care, well. They’d better watch out. These bots have a particular eye for the sad, the filthy, the tired, and they’re going to make sure you get some damn fine pampering.

c. whole foods: 2.0.

Remember that whole Whole Foods grocery store thing that happened? Well, the grocery store and the zombies are still there. Only now there are more zombies, and two giant supply trucks have shown up, one behind and one in front of the store.

The one at the rear of the store can be accessed fairly easily. It’s painted to look like a giant United States flag, with a dramatic crying eagle emblazoned across the back doors. Inside, there is beer. Lots and lots of beer, and a bunch of semiautomatic rifles. Also some skeletons. Seems like the guns and booze didn’t help them.

The one in front of the store is thickly surrounded, the creatures clawing at the plain white sides of the semi like there’s something precious inside.

If Anchorites can make it through, if they can fend off the monsters and keep from getting torn to pieces by a hoard of bloodthirsty beasts, they’ll find out what that precious truck contains.

It’s twinkies. A semi full of twinkies. We hope you’ve got a sweet tooth, Anchor.

Navigation.

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The ground would be in more danger of splattering than Peter would, but that's fine. No splattering today.

"In theory that makes sense, yes, but this particular teleporter is capable of grabbing people from any location in multiple universes, regardless of whether or not that person had another similar device on the other side."

Peter is so determined right now. He hops off the railing onto the floor and starts off in the direction of the Idris Elba room.

"You know everything about it except how to make it work properly?"

What kind of child prodigy are you? Efi would have had this all fixed by now. He continues on in silence for a moment before realizing how rude he's being. He... sort of cares. This guy did offer to make him a laser sword, which is nice of him. And didn't run away after being rescued which is also nice.

Sigh.

"I am Genji."

Well it's a start.

UUUGH being nice to everyone is so exhausting sometimes. HE'S DONE, FUCK THIS. He doesn't dignify that question with an answer, he just huffs and stuffs his hands in his pockets while he makes his way up the walkway all cranky-like. Congratulations Genji, you have successfully hurt Peter's feelings. You absolute monster.

He's tempted to ignore Genji giving him his name because FUCK THIS CLOWN, but Peter isn't capable of being a douchebag for long. He sighs and kind of slouches a bit, but eventually he does speak up again.

"Peter." Moody teenager time, Genji. Can you handle it?

This is like talking to himself of twenty years ago. But at least Peter is still walking with him and hasn't left to do... Whatever it is he was doing when robots tried to take him in for some pampering.

He is a pro at being silent, but having the silent treatment returned back at him is new and a bit frustrating. Moody. Silent. Cranky. Insisting that he knows everything.

It's like talking to teenage Hanzo.

"I apologize for my rudeness." More silence. Even more silence.

Silence part 2: the return of the silence.

"I have only just arrived and am eager to return to where I was."

Not return home because he doesn't have one of those anymore, but to someplace more familiar than this.

Honestly, he'd probably been trying to figure out how to repair the robots. That's how he do.

Aaand Genji's talking again. Peter listens, and he get's it. Genji's just frustrated with all this bullshit, he wants to go home. They all do. Peter wishes he could help them get there, he feels awful that he can't, and maybe that little reminder that he doesn't have any idea what he's doing in the long run is bumming him out a little. Just a little.

He should probably stop being a little asshole. He sighs, stops in his tracks, and turns to face Genji.

"I understand that. I do. We've all been there, we all wanna go home. Let's go look at this teleporter, if there's anything new you can tell me about it, that'll put us one step close to figuring out how to get everyone out of here. Okay?"

"Hai. If I can help I will." Not that he's an expert on teleporters, but he has a rudimentary knowledge of how they're supposed to work and be set up. It's better than nothing.

"How long have you been working on it?" Because that's starting to sound like there's a lot of them and they've been here some time. Maybe he should have watched that video. Could have saved them both some awkwardness.

"Thanks." And he means it. He's coming down from his annoyed teenager mood swing from a minute ago and getting right back into business mode. Ignoring your feelings is the best way to deal with them, he's learning this quickly.

"Those of us who have been here the longest have been here... three, maybe four months. That's how long I've been working on it, but there were also more uh, let's say pressing matters to deal with. Like making sure we don't starve to death, making sure the force field holds so we don't all get irradiated to death, replacing all the air and water filters, dealing with a severe nanomachine malfunction. Basic survival stuff. This place was abandoned for a really long time before we showed up, so a lot of the equipment was in bad shape."

That's the key to being an adult.

All of that makes sense survival first and then deal with the... Wait... "Nanomachine malfunction?"

He actually stops to look over at Peter because that's bad. That's very very bad. "What kind of malfunction?"

He has already solved the adult puzzle.

"Oh, the uh, radiation had corrupted some of their programming, so they were going a little nuts. They were hovering around the station in these cloud-like formations and attacking anyone who got too close. Once we figured out what the problem was, I ran 'em through a decontamination process and we haven't had any more problems since then. I've been running regular maintenance checks on them, so if any other problems come up I can stop them before they get out of hand."

See he's totally got this. Like a professional or something.

Got life all figured out while still in high school, that's talent.

"A cloud of them? Reaper? Talon is here?" That doesn't seem likely, because if a fully grown man in a cloak wearing a skull mask manifested out of the shadows Peter would probably say that instead of there being 'clouds'. Still that absolutely sounds like the tech used to make him. Maybe some of it had escaped? Or there were failed experiments? How did that stuff even work?

"You were able to trap it and contain it? Without it infecting you?" He doesn't look like all his cells are dying and reforming constantly. But boy is he ever confused. "You are a scientist then? Nanobiologist?"

Not because he wanted to, but it still counts.

He gives Genji kind of a quizzical look and a shrug, considering he has no goddamn idea what a Reaper or a Talon are. Not ringing any bells, bro, sorry.

"Officially? No. I don't have any formal training. I just do a lot of research on my own for fun. I'm kind of a... really good at figuring this kinda stuff out."

Genius, he means that he's a genius.

"Fun."

Nothing says teenage good times like nanobiology. To each their own he supposes. He spent his teenage years as the Japanese equivalent of a frat boy partying all the time and having actual fun. But if Peter had actually done what he said then thats pretty impressive so Genji isn't going to make fun of him for being a science nerd. Yet.

"Are the spider thing and the nanite thing related?" Seems odd to have a bunch of science tech knowledge but have powers based off an animal mutation. But what did he know, Moira would have infused them all with every single organism in the animal kingdom if she thought it would have improved things.

"What else do you do besides stick to walls?"

Edited 2019-09-28 14:12 (UTC)

Buddy he embraces his nerdery. Go ahead and make fun, but he's pretty much the smartest person here and he will attach a dish washer to you for kicks.

Well no, he won't, but he will probably figure out how just to say that he can. Also the science/tech knowledge are completely unrelated to the superpowers thing. Weird, right?

"No, no, the spider thing happened way before I got here. It's a biological mutation, happened when I got bit by a spider. No nanites or anything like that were involved. Besides the sticky thing, I'm really strong, I have really good reflexes, and I've got a sixth sense sort of thing going on."

Good, he's going to take your lunchmoney and go to the arcade with it.

"None of those things sound like what spiders do." he doesn't know terribly too much about insects, but are spiders really strong? Or have sixth senses? He's pretty sure they spin webs and then wait for something to come to them to eat.

As they approach the Idris Elba room he pauses to look around at all the stuff he wasn't paying attention to when he stormed out of here, dripping wet from the shower that he walked through fully armored. Maybe he should have watched this video that's playing on a loop, that.. might have been helpful he now realizes.

"It is in here?"

"Some spiders can hold up to a hundred and seventy times their own weight." Spider facts with Spider-Man. Also spiders are arachnids, not insects, Genji.

But anyway, yes, the portal is right inside this here room, and Peter leads Genji over to it once they're inside.

"This right here. Not much to look at, huh?"

They're all bugs.

"No, not like what I have seen before anyway." He kneels down in front of it, inspecting it closely, the glow from his visor casting a faint green light on the base. "It is one way only? Strange construction."

He leans back, kneeling there and watching it as if a new arrival will manifest in front of them.

You're a bug.

Peter steps aside, crossing his arms while he watches Genji do whatever it is that Genji is doing. "This is the only one, as far as we know. From what I understand, it was built to keep people from appearing on the surface of the planet and... y'know, dying horribly."

He watches Genji while Genji watches the portal, silent for a moment, but then nothing happens, sooooo.

"Uh. People only seem to pop in once a month. I don't think anyone's coming for a while."

"If the portal is off why would they teleport to the surface? How would they teleport there without the other side of the teleporter also being present." He sighs, he doesn't understand. The teleporter looks different than what he's used to, but it also looks intact and functional.

Once a month. He's fairly patient, but he's not going to kneel there for a month and wait.

He gracefully rises back to his feet, walking around the teleporter again, "It does not appear broken, but if it is as you say then it is a one way portal. What pulls people through without a matching machine on the other side? Is there a control room that determines where they come from?"

All Peter can do is shrug, man. "I've been trying to figure that out since I got here. It's like-- it's like this planet is the dumping ground for weird teleportation mishaps or something."

He really doesn't know how else to explain the stuff that appears outside of Anchor. A Whole Foods full of zombies? Like. How does that even work.

"If there's a control room for that specifically, we haven't found it yet."

Alright, he admits defeat.

"I was rash before, this is more complex than I realized." At least he's not too proud to say it. "How can I assist?"

Peter nods, but refrains from saying anything douchy. He's too nice to pull an I-told-you-so.

"Let's worry about getting you settled in for now. You're gonna be here for a while, might as well take a little time to claim some space for yourself, y'know?. ...Also I have no idea what your skill set is, so I'm not really sure what to have you help work on."

"Oh. I suppose that's the wisest course of action." He sounds just thrilled about being here long term and picking out a room. He gets it, and having some space and privacy would be nice, but he does not want to be here.

"I'm a ninja." Which was probably obvious from when he did all the flippy sword tricks earlier. But doesn't say much about his knowledge of teleporters or anything Peter might actually care about. "I know something about machines, if that is helpful."

Peter gives him a sympathetic smile. He knows how it goes, bros.

"Right, like you've got kind of a cyber-ninja aesthetic going on. Very cool, by the way." Are you kidding Peter cares about that the most. There will probably be plenty of weird shit for Genji to fight soon enough. "Now, what kinda machines. Like vehicles, computers, anything you like, know better than other things?"

"Thank you." He means it too, because while he's not exactly stoked about being part machine, he does look super awesome and that's something at least. Gonna be the best Xbox he can be.

"Omnics. Robots I suppose you would call them. I can help you put those back together that I broke earlier, if you would like."

Peter's still not positive if this guy just is a robot or a cyborg, or maybe it's just a dude in full badass armor. I mean Iron Man's a thing, it wouldn't be too far fetched a concept for this spider-nerd.

"That would actually be a really huge help. There are a lot of robots around here and I don't have time to drop what I'm doing every time they... y'know, pull weird stunts like this. But yeah, we can move their uh, chunks to R&D later and slap 'em back together."

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