station72 | [mission: hyrypia] and when our bottles and all we are fill’d with immortality

CHARACTERS: The Barithian Hunters (and anyone sneaking along)
WHERE: Hyrypia - The Finger Maze
WHEN: DAY :018
SUMMARY: The barithian hunt leads into the depths of the Finger Maze.
WARNINGS: Violence. Animal slaughter. Character death. Need a warning added? PM this account please!

THE FINGER MAZE
DAY :018
IN MORNING'S PRE-DAWN GRAY the camp is far more subdued than on preceding days. There's no music, breakfast is a quiet and simple affair, and the servants are hushed as they go about their duties. Before the sun has even fully risen, the members of the Envoys participating in the hunt make their way to their mounts. When they arrive they are given a speech that seems practiced - likely only a slight modification of something that the Elinmaster has said many times before. The group - just under forty hunters kitted out with all of the weapons and traps they have had time to learn in their days on the graze - is brought to the fenceline running parallel to the technomagical barrier which guards the mouth of the Finger Maze proper. In the fence is a plain gate. Once the hunting party is gathered there, it opens. A slash in the technomagical barrier disintegrates before them and the smell of ozone evaporates or is carried into the twisting depths of the Maze by the wind howling mournfully inward from off the Graze. The Elinmaster leads the hunting party through the gap.

Once on the other side, the party draws pauses until the technomagical barrier rises once more behind them. No crowds today. No onlookers (unless they're being especially industrious). Then the Elinmaster brings a familiar sounding horn to their lips. It's long, low wailing note echoes down into the maze and splinters down the endless twisting pathways. With that, the hunt begins.

INTO THE LABYRINTH
I. THE STAGING GROUND
HERE IS HOW YOU HUNT A BARITHIAN, explains the Elinmaster. First, a field of battle needs to be chosen - and it's always better to know the ground you're fighting on than to be caught unawares in unfamiliar territory. The hunting party will need to establish a fall back position inside the canyon that's advantageous to them, at which point it will be lain with all manner of traps. Memorize it. You'll want to know every nook and cranny when you return here under duress.

Plan your routes and lay your traps. You do remember how to set them, don't you?

II. BY THE TAIL
WITH THE STAGE SET, only the star is lacking - or the villain is. But the Finger Maze is a vast labyrinthine space that stretches on for miles. Finding the Barithian, even as large as it is, presents a challenge - perhaps the second greatest challenge of the hunt. It is time for the hunters to separate. Some go off alone, some travel in small groups. Each is equipped with a small version of the horn that had summoned them to this work in the first place. Their task is simple and herculean: to search the maze for signs of the beast and locate it, then to draw its attention and lure it back into the staging ground. Lastly, they must send out the call to summon the rest of the party to rendezvous meet them where the chase will end. However, only one route leads to the barithian. Perhaps--

a) There were signs - a bone, a tell-tale scrape on the canyon walls, a corridor of felled coral. It was difficult to tell from the back of the Elin, so it made sense in the moment to dismount and check more closely. --At least, it made sense right up until now when you suddenly hear something. Something-- big. Its footfalls shake the floor under your feet; its heavy breath snorts out of its multiple sets of nostrils with a wet visceral sound. You can’t go back the way you came - the trembling footfalls seem to come from that direction. Luckily, there's a narrow cave opening in the canyon wall right there.

Inside is dark. The cave goes very deep indeed - so deep that after a time you can smell the promise of fresh air again. Maybe there's another exit? Which is good, since the way you entered is no longer an option: the beast is there, it's massive forepaws clawing into the stone on either side of the cave entrance and its huge mutli-nostriled nose sucking in big, gulping breaths.

b) ((OOC NOTE: first come first serve)) You find the Barithian. Even with its great hulking back turned to you, it's awe-inspiring. Terrifying. The Elinmaster's assistants had described it on the way in, but their words failed to convey the details. It's disturbingly massive - mammothian, even -, its six legs coiled tight with muscle, and strong, sharp claws on each of the massive paws. You have to get it’s attention. How you do it is up to you, but you know that the moment it turns its massive head toward you with its beady eyes hidden behind a broad, triangular face plate and its multinostrils flaring with a horrible groaning noise that it's time to get a move on.

c) Your search has turned up nothing - but that's not surprising is it? The maze is huge. Not everyone could strike gold. Hell, not everyone would even want to. It’s almost a relief until you hear it: the low, moan of the signal horn echoing through the maze-like canyon. You need to get back to the staging ground and you need to go fast - or risk leaving the other hosts to face the beast alone.

III. THE BATTLE
THE HORN DOES ITS JOB. By the time the hosts unlucky enough to have the tiger by its tail come riding back into the staging ground, many members of the hunting party have already returned and are armed, if not ready, for when the creature comes barreling in behind them. It shakes the brittle bone coral with the weight of its galloping footfalls and makes a deep, low sonorous noises that echoes down the stone walls. With its ire raised, the barithian is even more fearsome than it had seemed from a distance. It’s size and strength are undeniable up close. The creature tears great mounds of earth up under its clawed feet and there's a mesmerizing, horrific quality to the flash of filtered canyon light off its sharp teeth.

The riders are now tasked with the last phase of the challenge - kill or be killed, using the weapons and techniques they have learned in their time here. And hey, maybe you have a few non-Hyrypian tricks up your sleeves you can play with some subtlety. Fighting fair seems less than ideal when one of those huge paws comes swiping right at you.

IV. THE FRUIT OF DIPLOMACY
'DON'T GET CLOSE TO THE HEAD,' had seemed like an easy to follow rule back on the Graze, but the reality of facing down with the barithian is far more complicated. And despite being slowed by the environment, the traps laid for it, countless spears jutting from its dense marbled hide, here in its last moments the great beast is at its most dangerous. Maybe someone gets over confidant. Maybe it's just general exhaustion. Maybe it seems like the barithian is staggering when really it's turning for one final, deadly snap of its ferocious jaws.

It bowls three riders from their Elin with one swipe from its massive paw - mechanics twisting and bursting with brilliant flares of released technomagical energy - then lunges for the felled hunters left in the wake of their ruined mounts. A Descendant throws up both arms in some lunatic, useless defense mechanism. Beside her, Lavellan drives the blunt end of his spear into the ground and braces the shaft across his knee. The Barithian drives itself down on the point of the spear, snaps down on his arm by reflex and then recoils - tossing him clear like a horrifying rag doll as the great animal thrashes.

There's an immediate, palpable, indescribable POP! A ship being hulled and all the air sucked out of into into the vacuum of space. A glass bauble splitting into a hundred thousand pieces on some distant stone floor. A seam splitting. A branch snapped across the knee. And then there's nothing left at all except the frothing barithian snapping out those nearest i to it.

V. THE RETURN
THE RIDE BACK TO THE CAMP seems to take twice as long as the one they took to the Finger Maze - though it hardly seems long enough, knowing what lies at the end. Certainly the other Hosts will have felt Lavellan's death, but you know what they say. Seeing is believing.

It doesn’t matter. The camp awaits their return regardless. As they ride through the gate again one of the massive technomagically driven wagons passes them, headed into the maze to retrieve their kill. Once they reach the edges of the encampment, the atmosphere there remains subdied. While the other Envoys and Hyrypian hosts might not know the nitty gritty details, the certainly seem to have considered the possibility of things going badly. There is food, drink, and eventually even some gentle, sober music, however the evening is quiet and many of the envoys retreat to their own tents rather than remain in the public spaces.

Some victories are not celebrated.

((OOC Notes: This log covers the barithian hunt and any relating events that take place on DAY :018. You can find information about the hunt and ask event specific questions HERE.

Have more generalized questions? Drop them on the MISSION: HYRYPIA OOC POST or get in touch with us on the Mod Contact page.))

NAVIGATION • GAME CALENDAR • MISSION: HYRYPIA • FAQ
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( CODE BY WHAMBAM )

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[ The Darkling's mind is there, meeting her blow for blow, and in the end she's more fragile than she pretends. Brittle. For all that, she keeps trying. She keeps thrashing and pushing, screaming in her head until she finally remembers that she's supposed to be a soldier. She should follow orders, right? But she still needs to try, wants to try. That constant shriek dies away, but she's still straining against him, fingers digging into his arm as she tries to wrench herself free. ]

You don't know that!

[ She knows it, though. He knows it. They both felt him go. They both felt it snap and she was too intricately bound up with him to not know and understand. She's lying to herself, because otherwise she'll have to acknowledge the gaping wound where another living, breathing person used to be. ]

I'm going to kill it-

[ Her motivation switches. It's nto about Lavellan's body. It's about killing the thing that killed him. That took him away and left her alone all over again. There's the buzz-hum of the rest of the nest, but it isn't the same, will never be the same. She opened up to him, she let him see all of her hurt, he understood. He shared in it. They were - close. In away. And that understanding runs through her head and into Darkling as she makes another effort to wrench free. ]

[ for all that he's fighting to keep her from throwing herself to what could be HER demise as well, there's less compassion to his actions and more of a sense of duty. responsibility, to safeguard the remaining members of the nest, for they were extensions of himself. their loss was a loss of might, and strength, for him. selfish, self-centered. he locks his arms around her slender waist, and pours death into her mind: a vast pitcher of ice-cold water and memories and knowing. ]

( I do. )

[ he says less, because he has to focus on containing her. not her mind, but her limbs. she's feisty, frantic. he doesn't have the best hold on her, as he tries to keep her back from the fray and her broodmate's corpse far from her reach. he's already unreachable, there's only the clinging and clutching to something that Once Was, now. ]

It will die, [ he swaps again, back to urgent tones, a hissing, dark voice for someone so small ] as all beasts do, it will die.

[ not by her hand, because he will SIT on her if he has to ]

[ She knows the feeling of death. The encroaching grip of nothingness and oblivion. She "lived" it once; vanished into the eternal freefall until Third Impact brought her back to the surface and then she had to claw her way free of that morass before she was finally her again. The torrent of ice and cascades over her and her shoulders hunch as her frantic struggling and scratching seems to calm for a moment. Her hands are hooked into claws, fingers digging into his arm, half bent over as she tries to process what's just happened.

Her mind keeps reaching toward that "spot" where she knows she should be able to feel the hum of Lavellan's mind, but all there is an empty, hollow void. A sense of loss. Why does she care so much? Why should she? She knew him for such a short time, but she'd grown... comfortable with having him in her head. With his presence. And now that it's gone it bothers her, gnaws at her.

She isn't going to cry. ]

Let me kill it. Let me-!

( You can't do this! )

[ good. good, she needs to remember that. ]

You're incapable of killing it, like this.

[ he's harsh; cruel, even. when he speaks it's with the crisp, blunt edges of a weapon coming down upon her. she struggles, and he's growing impatient with every thrash of her limbs. of course, she's mourning -- all mourn, some rend themselves in two with their grief and he will not be releasing her and allowing two hosts to become nothing but dashed once-was's across this battlefield. ]

You'll die, and then what can you do for any of us?

[ the darkling isn't one for battlefield laments, he's driven to action and reaction; calculating and cold. it just so happens that, like this, he's holding her back, rather than spurring her on. ]

What can you do? [ less a question, more of a demand ] What power do you have, Asuka?

[ that's... he's asking honestly. ]

From a range, if you can attack it -- if you can ruin it -- I can help you with that. You'll never feel this powerless again, you just have to. ( Tell me what you're capable of. )

[ He's wrong, some part of her screams, she can kill it. She can kill anyone who gets in her way. But she can't, can she? She doesn't have her tons of armored plate or an AT field or anything more lethal than a spear. She strains against his grip one last time and then stills, breathing hard, mind still casting about for that link that was there a moment ago and is now gone. It's hard to fathom that it's just vanished, that the voice in her head that's been her near constant companion has fallen silent.

She doesn't want to die. ]

I have my hands. And a spear.

[ And that's all she has. At least for now. She can't hurl boulders or become invincible or do anything like that. She's a fourteen-year-old with a fourteen-year-old's body. Her voice is low and threatening, but wavering, tilting toward despair, because what can she do? How can she kill it? ]

( I don't know what my symbiote does yet. )

[ It's a bitter admission. She hasn't tried because she's been focusing on other things. on her physical body. On trying to drag herself out of the hole she's always in. And now she has no idea if she can actually help. ]

Help me.

[ She grinds the words out.

And feels all the weaker for it. For having to ask. She shouldn't need help. Or want it.
But here she is, asking. ]

[mission: hyrypia] and when our bottles and all we are fill’d with immortality

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