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Entry tags:
- *mission log,
- asuka langley sohryu [evangelion],
- bellamy blake [the 100],
- clarke griffin [the 100],
- elena gilbert [the vampire diaries],
- john murphy [the 100],
- lexa [the 100],
- matrim cauthon [wheel of time],
- misato katsuragi [evangelion],
- rust cohle [true detective],
- ryohji kaji [evangelion],
- sam wilson [mcu],
- seviilia brightwing [warcraft],
- takashi "shiro" shirogane [voltron],
- the darkling [grisha trilogy]
[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!
((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.))
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.))
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[ It's meant as a joke, but it's also serious. They've both come close to dying - both here and back home - but the idea of losing her only connection to home is agonizing. And besides that, he's her friend. A surrogate brother. She doesn't want to lose him. It's hard for her to put all of that into words, but the feeling definitely comes across - or at least the emotional weight of it. ]
But you'll be fine. You've got... what? Half the nest going out there with you?
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[It comes out a lot more lighthearted than he feels, in the face of her feelings. The emotion under the surface of her. It's mirrored, honestly, in his own mind. Losing her... it's crossed his mind as a possibility before. And has always been thrown aside. Thinking about it for too long is as painful as the actual losses.]
[No one here could ever replace her. No one feels as much like home, or family.]
Yeah. A lot of tough, deadly people... [Without further ado, however, he loops an arm around her shoulders. Squeezing.] I'll come back.
I promise.
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She leans into him and wraps her arms around his middle in a tight squeeze. They'll be OK. He'll be OK.
Everything is going to be fine, in the end. ]
I know you will. You always do.
[ She exhales softly. ]
What do you think you're going to find out there? Besides monsters.
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[ - for her sake.]
With you to hold me to it, how can I not?
[More lighthearted than a moment ago.]
Hopefully, a better look around. We can't see all that much from camp.
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[ She won't, but she'll give him a mild heart attack. That's what she's supposed to do, right? ]
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They can't catch what they can't see, right?
[There's a definite pause, before he adds:] And also, less chance I come back to putting out a Holt shaped fire.
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[ Which is an amusing idea, honestly. She could be a ghost. The thought makes her grin. ]
Although if I had to guess, it probably runs off of that nectar stuff. Everything else here does. No circuitry or anything... just all comes out of whatever it actually is.
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[He'd rather she use some kind of cover here, if she's going to start digging on her own.]
[Like her, the thought of losing her is fairly unbearable.]
No circuitry? At all?
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[ Man, wouldn't that be the coolest? ]
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[Otherwise, why not? They're robotics, right? Just like fancy AI. It's not like they'd be taking apart one of the Lions.]
Maybe you could get a hold of a piece of one... if this hunt is as dangerous as everyone says.
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[ She's thinking now. But what good will just a piece do her? The whole thing would be better. Then again, a piece is better than no piece. ]
I'm also trying to see if any of them will actually talk to me about... uh. Anything.
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[Little does he know that plan isn't going to fly.]
While we're gone, you mean?
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[ She's trying her best! Look at her go! ]
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That kind of thing gets people talking.
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[ She elbows him, trying to be a bit playful. ]
Kinda up to you guys, now.
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[And in return, he drags his fingers through her hair.]
You're going to need a trim, after a while.
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Yeah, don't remind me. Maybe I should just let it grow out again... but then it'll get in the way in my helmet.
[ She remembers when she'd had long hair. It feels like an eternity ago. ]
I dunno. I'll worry about it when we get back to the Station.
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[This might not be the right time to talk about this. But there's an odd heaviness in the air. A sort of unease.]
[Something that makes him want to have one last mundane conversation with her. Just in case.]
Or we find someone to run some clippers through it once we're back. Don't ask me -- I still use a bowl.
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[ Honestly, that probably explains so much about her fashion choices and her look. ]
But I'm sure there's someone who can do a better job than that...
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There's a lot of people here to ask. If you want to do it yourself, go for it.
... but there's no harm asking for a hand. Like you always tell me.
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Oh lord, do they try. ]
I might ask you. Just to see what you'll do with it. I mean, now I'm curious.
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[Pidge, you know not what you do. He's quiet for a thoughtful moment, before he lifts his right hand -- he hadn't put the disguise back on yet. So the metal of his fingers is clear to see.]
Oh, you know... [As he passes that hand along the close-cut sides of his own hair. Making what sounds like a passable imitation of an electric razor.]
Space prison style.
[Shiro you complete dweeb.]
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Yeah, right. You wouldn't follow through on that threat!
[ Don't test him, Pidge. He might. ]
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[He waggles those fingers at her. There's a faint tinge of purple to the tips, banished almost immediately after it appears. Teasing, nothing more.]
If you really want a haircut, we can make it happen. Voltron style.
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[ Now that's an amusing mental image. ]
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