The Dark Ages [Dark Data]

[Nebula]

The foursome of Liberators hastened through the portal, keen on striking down Nebula’s recently departed commander despite their injuries. As they arrived in Nebula space, the scope of the pocket verse unfurled before their eyes. Though nowhere near the size of Camelot proper, the vast expanse of grassy plains gave the darkling realm a sense of breadth. Off in the distance the Primes spied many citadels and manufacturing plants dotting the horizon, the latter churning away to accomplish Nebula’s goals.

“Do you ‘Liberators’ lust for death?” Centaur Man stood a few meters away, his back to them. Even as he spoke, he didn’t offer so much as a glance over his shoulder. “I’ll warn you only once: turn back now. Nebula will not be stopped.”

“Wrong,” Samus asserted, aiming her primed canon at the commander. “Nebula falls by our hand.”

The centaur chuckled softly, seeming almost somber. “If you insist on this, then you leave me little choice.”

Centaur Man slowly raised an arm, palm skyward, as the Liberators prepared their attacks. In an instant, a Dark Chip appeared within his iron mitt, electricity dancing upon its ebony surface. It hung there for a few seconds, suspended just above his outstretched hand as a volley of various projectiles slammed into his flank. As the blows hit home, Centaur Man snapped his hand into a tight fist, crushing the sinister silicon.

“He’s activating that chip,” Hiro commented, unloading another shuriken salvo. “This isn’t good.”

Before any of the ronin’s comrades could reply, their foe turned to face them, eyes alight with the fires of Nebula. His previously noble visage twisted into a maddened grin, tarry black sludge dribbling afresh from his eyes and mouth. Ominous violet light shone brightly through the scratches and mars in the centaur’s armor, casting strange and intricate shadows upon the grass. In the commander’s hand appeared his glaive, the polearm itself glowing a similar shade of bright lilac.

Without so much as a word, the mythical machine barreled toward them, mania in his eyes.

Centaur Man makes his last stand. He is heavily injured, but not going down just yet.

Centaur Man used Dark Chip: Power Up -- Dark Overload. New stats are as follows:
ATK: 6
DEF: 6
SPD: 6
TEC: 4

You have up to 72 hours to make one post, up to 1000 words, to finish off this fight. Good luck!

[Samus Aran]

Shinnah was dead. The question Samus posed herself was: could she have done anything to prevent it?

She’d made a pact with herself not to use Hypermode, nor the chip, unless absolutely necessary. But perhaps if I’d used it sooner, she thought, Shinnah would still be alive. Samus prayed that the gnome had been a Prime.

So where was the line? What would it take, she asked herself, to break her limits?

She looked at the machine before her.

To hell with the danger.

Samus’s suit glowed blue.

Centaur Man had lost his mind. He charged, frothing and grinning, the intelligence of his eyes now lost.

Samus intercepted his charge – arm outstretched and the newly-blue buzz beam extended against his legs. But unlike before, when Madotsuki had neatly clipped off one of his limbs, there was a horrible scraping noise upon contact.

But Samus wasn’t left unprotected. Okor marched up to her left, and his arm caught Centaur Man in a lifeless grip. “No,” he said simply.

Madotsuki’s figure leapt up, using Okor’s frame as a jumping board. Her arm was stretched back. With her bare hands, she pummelled the Centaur’s face furiously, heedless of the danger.

Samus looked at the beam extended from her arm cannon, wide-eyed in confusion. There was no energy to it. No power. Was this the effects of the dark verse? Even as she looked, the energy of her power sword seemed to shrink against the darkness before finally being swallowed up whole.

Centaur Man laughed. “Haha! Here is my domain. You won’t be able to use your tricks.”

Samus took a step back. At least Hyper Mode seemed to work. She checked her HUD.

Morph Ball Offline
Block Beam Offline
Barrier Beam Offline
Buzz Beam Offline
Missile Launcher Offline …

“Tch! Suit, tell me what I do have!”

Power Beam Online
Grapple Beam Online

Well, at least she had the staples. But, thought the hunter, This has gotten really fucking old.

The Centaur seemed more than happy to continue his assault, however. He bucked, somersaulted, and leapt into battle with a fervour even greater than that he’d displayed before. Samus had to admit, he was the perfect bodyguard for this realm.

But … no more. He’d taken up too much of their time.

“Hey Okor!” she called to the hulk. He looked over, and she tapped her cannon. “One more.”

He seemed to understand. More tendrils wrapped around the Centaur, tugging him into a vile embrace.

“This again?” Centaur Man scoffed. “Get loose you foolish-”

The Zero Laser lit up the fields.

It enveloped the Centaur.

And even in his powered-up state, there wasn’t a lot he could do about it.

Okor had freed himself in time, half-falling backwards to the corrupted soil. He and the others bore witness to another beam that tore through the realm, ripping away Centaur Man’s outer plating with its persistent waves.

It carried on for what seemed like forever. Then suddenly, and abruptly, it petered out. Samus fell to one knee, and this time she gave a cry of what sounded almost like real pain. The blue light faded from her suit and smoke issued from the gaps in her armour.

“You alright, hunter?” enquired Hiro as he offered her a hand.

Samus could barely speak. The suit was tied to her life force, and she’d almost expended it. But she took the hacker’s hand, and took to her feet, legs trembling.

Centaur Man spat blood. He, too, had managed to stand, but he looked in even worse shape than Samus. Ichor flowed from every gap in his armour.

Samus glared at him and spat her next words: “Just die.”

Used Hypermode Tier 1 for 1 post. 1 SP
Used Zero Laser. 2 SP
That’s all of Samus’s personal SP supply gone.

[Madotsuki]

The half-baku backed up, allowing the laser free reign on the centaur. The blue beam enveloped the robot, heat and electricity crackling in the air around it. Light bore down everywhere, becoming too bright for anyone to view without protection. It was especially blinding for the dreamer, whose most notable experience with blinding light was a dinky little tv in a dark apartment. Wincing, she shielded her eyes from the cerulean glow and stumbled backwards.

It took her a moment after the light died down for her eyes to adjust, but she was satisfied by what she saw afterwards: Centaur Man was bleeding golden fluid from every chink in his body. His weight was shifted off from his front right leg, which was sending a deluge of yellow sparks into the air. Her mouth curled up into a malevolent grin, razor-red eyes glared and teeth bared at the Nebula boss in a threatening gesture.

Although she wasn't the one to inflict such carnage unto the monster, it still pleased her to see him in such pain. Even now, her fingers twitched in primal excitement, her nails tapping and sliding along the no-longer-stainless steel blade.

Her footsteps were light against the dying ground, barely touching the earth as she swept across the land in short, yet purposeful bounds. The cyborg reacted to her approach almost instantly, lashing out a hoof at her. She hopped over the offending limb, kicking off its metallic hide to land on his back. She plunged the knife deep into the emerald-colored plating, electing a whinny of pain from the centaur.

"Get off, bug!" he shouted, bucking in an attempt to knock the brunette off of his body. She attempted to hold on tight to her weapon, hoping it would work as a handhold, but the blade slipped effortlessly through the smooth plating, sending the girl spiraling into the air. He swung his cannon arm at the young woman, who had just enough time to phase out.

...However, when she tried to activate the ability, her body remained in the same plane, which allowed the ranged-weapon-turned-bludgeon to ram into her chest. Metal collided with flesh and possibly bone, launching the dreamer away from the fight. Her landing was rough, the rocks and pebbles cutting her skin as her body barreled away from the commotion.

She slowed to a stop, lying face-down in the dirt. Her ribs crackled with every breath she took as she pulled herself up to a sitting position. Were her ribs broken? Probably, judging by the burning sensation in her chest and the blood dripping out of her mouth. She took a moment to rest, wiping the red liquid off her lips with the sleeve of her sweater as she watched the brawl from afar.

Samus and Okor were paired up off to one side, with the plague marine doing most of the fighting. The warrior fended off the cyborg's limbs with his own arms, protecting the bounty hunter like a living, yet rotting, brick wall as she fired off shots at the behemoth. Hiro was on the other side, flanking the centaur with a tanto in his hands. He was slicing at the robot's casing, but now the monstrosity was far more resilient, his armor only allowing the blade to cut through half-an-inch or so before causing it to bounce away.

The Nebula boss shifted his cannon arm into a radioactive green energy sabre once more. The glowing blade pressed down onto the ronin, his sword seemingly miniscule in comparison. Despite the size difference, the cyber samurai managed to redirect the large blade with his own, sending the emerald weapon to the side of his body in a shower of sparks. Electricity attacked and zapped the atmosphere as the steel dug into the energy blade.

Deep inside, the Night Terror knew she had to do something. Here was Centaur Man, battered and bruised, about to collapse from his injuries, and she was sitting on the sidelines. Indignation rose from her belly, culminating in a growl a she rose to her feet, ignoring the pain flaring up in her torso. She was about to charge in, but then she recalled her odd inability to phase out. Did anything else change?

She took a moment to take inventory of her abilities. She could still vanish, and her knife was still there, brimming with energy. A quick look at her diary confirmed that her link to it had been severed; she wasn't going to be using it anytime soon. Power still flowed into her fingers, but there was only enough energy in her body to fire off one of her Ghoul Rushes. The dream energy, despite its small amount, felt just as intense, if not more so, when all of her abilities were available. Something in the back of her mind told her that it would be important to save it for later-- after all, the centaur was on his last hooves, so why use it now.

Well, that was settled. She ran back to the brawl, keeping her distance as she fired off crescents of power towards the robot. Sure, they probably weren't going to do anything, but the dreamer likened it to a person getting pricked by a needle; they would become vulnerable to other attacks while they tried to find what was stabbing them.

Plus, it would probably get the giant boss very frustrated as she refused to let up. She was content with being the little fly buzzing around his ears, and if he perished in the midst of his frustration, that would be a bonus.

950 words

[Okor]

Okor grunted as the shimmering blade descended upon him once more, its energized tip biting deep into his vambraces, another notch upon the abused armour forming as it scorched the festering flesh beneath. The corrupted chivalry that had been present in the mockery of a man before him had all but vanished, frenzied blows crashing down with terrifying speed, each blow seeking to sunder the septic sarcophagus encasing the Plague Marine.
 
He’s better than you, whispered the choir inside the fragments of his mind, a thousand lesser personalities jockeying for position, picking carrion from the walking corpse of Okor’s psyche.
 
Crack. A wrenched neck. One more corpse for the abattoir-altar rising within the wastelands of his mindscape. Nine hundred and ninety-nine left to go. He was not Okor the corpse, Okor the slave, Okor the blasted shell.
 
He was Okor. Motherfucking. Paleblood.
 
The glaive gutted him during his momentary internal crisis, a scream of triumph issuing forth from the creature’s mouth, bubbles of black tar pouring forth from the broken-toothed maw. The force of the impalement drove him upwards, boots lifting off of the ground as his malformed figure was silhouetted against the roiling chaos of the violent violet sky above their battle. He coughed translucent blood into his helmet as his claws wrapped around the polearm piercing his abdomen, the blaster at is base slowly whirring as it prepared to release its energized payload into the pestilential paladin.
 
”You w-w-will burn. Kindling to Nebula’s eternal flame.” Stuttered the synthetic centaur, milky-white eyes run through with violet veins, the beast’s teeth shattered and broken into fangs that bled a dark purple oil, staining their now-unnaturally pale skin. Upon the creature’s back, the dreamer went to work, sinking their short blade into every inch of exposed flesh they could find, a task made easier by the cracks and fissures formed by the armoured hunter’s searing spear of power. Madotsuki looked up from her perch upon the cyborg centaur’s flank, blood staining her scarlet sweater, nodding as she drove her knife downwards towards the Nebulous warrior’s shoulder, eliciting a warped scream of pain. The mechanical monstrosity struck out blindly, a near-instant motion sending Okor flying from their fiery blade, another blur of movement forcing the Dreamer from her position.
 
”Shut up,” spat the septic soldier, pushing himself off of the new-churned earth, miasmic drippings creating new ecosystems of predatory parasites where he once walked. Another hammering blow descended upon him as he rose, shearing a chunk of ceramite off of his pauldron, failing to throw the ascending ancient warrior off his balance. Madness gleamed in the centaur’s corrupted eyes as it raised its blade once more, its gaze fixed upon his own throat, fixated on the destruction of the derelict warrior.
 
Okor beat the centaur to it. His own mauled stomach tore itself apart, a blossoming maw of ruined flesh and fangs gnashing at the air as twisted tendrils surged forth, his innards repurposed into weapons, barbs and thorns shining under the sunless sky as they rose. They tore at the exposed flesh of the beast, flaying what skin was present free from its proper position, locking themselves around armoured joints as they sought to drag him down, down, into the ever-hungering maw of their master.
 
They would not succeed. The centaur bucked and fought at every turn, tearing itself apart as it started to shrug its bonds, darkness made manifest pouring from tainted veins as it laughed madly, its victory still certain in its blind eyes.
 
Perhaps it was not wrong. Its blaster came to bear, a stream of energy bursting from its tip as it began to scorch and scar at Okor’s armour, each blast penetrating further into the ceramite, burning at the flesh beneath as a monstrous grin spread across the Centaur’s face, knowing that success was firmly within the grasp of their newly formed claws.
 
”Hiro!” Okor called out, as his ribs began to slowly shatter under the constant onslaught of corrupted energies.

804 words according to the site.

[Hiro Protagonist]

Okor called out to the Digital Daimyo, Hiro's dreads already trailing in the air behind him as he made a mad dash at the robotic centaur. One hand upon his blade hilt, reforged in it's sheath. Centaur Man was still tangling with Okor's entrails, and as such was unable to react in time as Hiro dropped to his knees, drawing his blade and cutting along the underside of his metallic underbelly with a hideous screeching noise.

He rolled, making full use of his trained acrobatic abilities, flipping onto his hands and kicking away Centaur Man's counter attack. His blade was resheath as the blue afterimage of the hacker faded away, dual tanto drawn as he jinked around their foe's energy shot and dove for him with the confidence of a bull wrangler. "Time to take his hoss back to the stable, fellers!" Hiro yelled out mockingly, rapidly stabbing the dented and destroyed armor of the mechanical myth, using his momentum to ascend to a standing position on it's back. The robot swiveled his torso around and let out a keening screech of failing circuits, trying to stab Hiro with it's one good arm. 

They danced a lethal samba, the silicon samurai parrying and stabbing back with just as much force. Finally, Hiro leaned forward and used Centaur Man's head as a spring board, flipping forward and landing on the ground in front of him. He'd left his tanto behind, stabbed into the thing's braincase in a mockery of the horn it had proudly held upon it's crown before it ran afoul of the liberators. 

"This is it, you clanking bucket of bolts!" 

He'd spent enough time fighting this thing, the hacker activating his goggles and watching the digital analysis lay over the bulky target. Dodging shots of burning plasma easily, the attacks appearing in Hiro's perception a moment before they actually did. Un-fucking-touchable. If there was one thing he had a talent for, it was being frustratingly hard to hit. 

The digital tone sounded, and Hiro gripped his katana blade, gritting his teeth as he gathered his nerves. The targeted section of Centaur Man's chassis glowed brightly in his HUD, and Hiro felt a theatrical yell rising in his throat as he prepared to unleash that energy, a lethal kiai about to split the air.

And then, he was gone from that spot, sword drawn, flashing, striking true, nothing visible during the attack but a black and blue afterimage.

"HYYAAAAAAAAH!!!"

426 words. >_> I know. Sorry it took so long.

[Nebula]

The hacker’s peers looked on in shock as Hiro seemed to slip by the cybernetic centaur, his blade merely glancing off of the battered metal plating with a dull ping. Nebula’s commander thrashed in throes of fury, turning on the spot to direct his rampage toward the visibly exhausted ronin. Centaur Man kicked at the dirt like an incensed bull, spitting a mouthful of oily pitch as his lip curled into a sneer. “Too we-”

Hiro grinned with self-satisfaction as his opponent’s words caught in its mechanized throat. A long, horizontal swath sprang open along the mythical machine’s flank, lifeblood gushing forth to spill unchecked upon the uneven ground. The air fell still as the armored fiend collapsed under its own weight, legs twitching for a moment before the corpse all at once collapsed into a pile of lifeless dust, the Dark Chip’s aura vanishing along with it.

For a long moment the group stood silent, stunned. Whether it was from exhaustion, surprise, the loss of Shinnah, or some combination, the air hung still.

“Search him,” the bounty hunter commanded. “Then we keep moving.”

There was no telling what lay ahead.

Centaur Man: Defeated!

Damage sustained: negligible

Rewards found:
-- One Dark Chip, bearing the description "SLOW TIME TO CRAWL"
-- Battle Chips for Centaur Man's weapons and abilities: Centaur Gale, Centaur Arrow, Firing Zone and Plasma Blade
-- Four medi-gel and two elixirs

The battle chips are one use items which grant the functionality of the appropriate move for the duration of an encounter. After deciding who gets what, you are free to move on. Explore the nebula space at your leisure to track down your next objective. You have one week and no word limit.

[Samus Aran]

Samus collapsed to the ground.

It was all she could do to maintain the suit in her current state. She’d foregone her own promise, used up every last bit of phazon in the suit – even risked her own sanity – just to kill that damned centaur.

How the hell was he so strong? This dark power … it was unbelievable. Maybe a bigger threat than phazon. If it had already corrupted eight of the verses, there was no telling how big of a risk it posed.

Okor and Hiro slumped in unison. The only one who didn’t was Madotsuki, who stood, staring out at the horizon. Samus watched her. The brown-haired woman threw her head back and made eye contact for a second. Her thought patterns were clear.

Samus barely had the energy to argue, but she forced it. With the only words she knew how. “Please.”

“Please what?” Madotsuki asked.

“We need … I need a minute. To rest.”

She said nothing, simply turning back to the horizon.

Luckily, the power suit wasn’t heavily damaged, but with most of its functions down, it was still little more than an augmentation to Samus’s natural human abilities right now. She could shoot, punch and kick …. that was about it. Whoever Nebula was, his power extended to the ability to rob her of most of her abilities.

For the first time, Samus considered that she may die in her attempt to take down this verse.

It was not something she hoped would happen. Not something she would let happen, if she could do anything to stop it. But a reality she was sober enough to face.

Well. It wouldn’t have been the first time.

Samus involuntarily shuddered and placed a hand next to her heart. It still gave her jumps, but …. she had it under control. But what of a second time? How many deaths could a human’s psyche take?

The Hunter allowed herself a moment’s vulnerability, in that time. Brought the walls down, for just a second, and huddled her legs.

[Madotsuki]

Finally! The behemoth of a monster collapsed, flickering and fading as it disappated into dust. But as much as she wanted to mutilate the robotic corpse even further, it had long since gone the way of the wind. Now that there was nothing to fight, the only thing she could do was rest and think.

She stared at the castle out in the distance, not worried about the dead-looking landscape. In fact, the absurd color scheme that surrounded the group actually reminded her of her own dreams. If it weren't for the fact that this realm was harming whatever came into contact with it, she might've called it home. Sadly, that wasn't the case. Defeating whatever was the cause of this was top priority.

Spurned on by anger and grief, she started making her way towards the structure. Of course, she didn't get very far when Samus convinced her to stay for a little bit. It was at that moment when Madotsuki noticed the bounty hunter, curled up in a self-comforting gesture that the Night Terror knew all too well. It was odd, seeing the powerful suit taking such a human position, but then she remembered that a person was working underneath it. They were all people, she realized as she turned to look at her other friends (well, except Okor, but he had to have been human at some point).

And people had limits. And as all the anger was given a chance to filter out, deep down, the dreamer knew she had reached her's as well.

Returning to where the posthumous body of Centaur Man had been barely a few minutes ago, she picked up one of the medkits it had left behind. She made her way back to the woman, popping open the case and sifting through its contents. She settled down next to her, attempting to apply the healing salve to her friend. She said nothing.

She knew nothing she said could make things better.

Used a Medi-Gel on Samus.

[Okor]

The plagued Paladin knelt down over the ashen remains of the liberator's most recent adversary, sifting through the dust with his tainted talons, prying a gently pulsing purple chip from the remains. A word was emblazoned across its slate surface, veins of amethyst energy running through the circuit board. It whispered to him, the beast forged of binaric code and malevolent sapience lurking within his armour recognizing it for what it was: FIRESTORM. He gave a grunt and a nod, wedging the chip into an ancient fissure in his armour.

He turned his lone eye to his companions, rising to his feet, towering over his mortal wards. "Rest. I'll take watch," he said, hefting his corroded cleaver over his pestilential pauldron, effluence and rot dripping down the pitted and scarred surface of his armour.

"Don't you ever have to rest?" Asked the armoured figure of Samus, lying against the cool green grass, the medicinal gel Madotsuki applied slowly mending the wounds and rents that had penetrated the sleek steel suit surrounding their lithe form.

"I was not designed for... indolence," Okor replied, a single crimson orb gazing over the horizon.

"Designed?" Queried the hunter, slightly raising a helmeted head.

Okor sighed slightly. It seemed like another life now, another world. He could almost pretend that it was someone else who had stained their hands with innocent blood, that all of his pacts and oaths could be abandoned and allowed to lie forgotten, his end of the infernal bargain lying unfulfilled.

Almost.

"The Corpse-Emperor. He stole us from our home, and shaped us to be weapons. We traded... our lives for secondary hearts and acidic spit, our homes for prisons of ceramite and iron. We carved him an Imperium that would last for an eternity, and our reward..." He paused for a moment, racked by a coughing fit, indicative of the rot that had settled into his four blackened lungs. Corruption ate away at every inch of his being, an eternal cycle of consumption and renewal. He looked towards a gash on his arm, a gift from the Centaur's coruscating blade. It remained unhealed, the dessicated flesh beneath his leathery skin remaining torn and split, the maggots writhing within slowly but surely destroying him. Not so eternal after all.

"Corpse-Emperor? I guess that explains your, well, affliction, then." Replied the hunter, trying their best to tread carefully around the all-too obvious taint embodied in the ever-rotting body of Okor.

He laughed, the sound rendered demonic through the corrupted vox set into his helmet, echoing around the empty plains. "No, no. He made us to be perfect, flawless angels of wrath and beauty. He cast his... creations aside, leaving us to bleed and die for a distant lord, while he remained seated upon a golden throne." He idly kicked a stone, sending it flying towards the horizon. Did this truly happen? The scars were faded, almost forgotten. With each passing day, it seemed progressively less concrete. The hatred and zeal that had once kept his deadened hearts beating was starting to dissipate.

Say it again. Remember the fallen. Remember the slain. Remember the blood on your hands.

"So our King turned on him. He led us into the maws of hell itself, and we found truth within," Okor said, blinking a crimson eye. "We became slaves to darkness, and in that moment, we broke our chains." He flexed a festering claw. There was power in pestilence, salvation in damnation. This much he knew to be true.

"We built an empire of a million worlds. All we had to show for it was the corpses of our... brothers."

"Tearing it apart... I'll miss it. My worlds were blood-soaked and shrouded in darkness, but they were mine. They were flawed, fragile, and at the verge of breaking, but Nurgle-dammit, they were mine."

Taking the firestorm battle chip.

[Samus Aran]

Samus watched as the strange gel soaked into the body of her suit – at first with a degree and mistrust and apprehension, and then with silence.

And then she listened as Okor spoke of his world. The bounty hunter still knew not what to make of the … afflicted paladin. That was what he was, it seemed. A zealot for forces of strangeness. Rot and pestilence. He’d clearly seen much, and been through battles that, if his words were to be believed, spanned centuries if not longer. Samus believed it.

Propped up on a rock, she slouched forward, letting her arms stretch out. Her body was decidedly human. In excellent shape, yes. But all human bodies, even those such enhanced as her own, had limits. Her suit had collected enough sweat to fill a helmet. But as they rested, and waited, the numbness and tingling in her extremities gradually subsided until they were no more than a mere throb.

Hiro and Madotsuki were very close, rested on the grass. But they were watching, and the moment she rose, they did too.

The verse was as expansive – at least by appearance – as the true Camelot. Samus hoped it wasn’t, or this would be an endless journey. But resolution was stronger than their fatigue. They pressed on.

[Nebula]

The rolling fields of false life and corrupted facsimiles of the actual Camelot stretched away. As if Camelot had been shrunken down, scaled to a smaller area. A deep, bowl-like valley, ringed by mountains rising at the perimeter. Dark clouds, of ugly purple and green colors, swirled about the peaks, and reached inward toward the center here and there. Lightning flashed among the clouds, and in the sky overhead, bright white and clear, though no thunder followed after it. Rain seemed to threaten, though there were no major cloudbanks to be seen; just the swirling red-violet haze of the sky, dotted here and there with blue and green pinpricks of light, mockeries of stars.

The land itself was similar. Grasses and plants covered the ground, though they were dense, tough, ugly things. Hard-packed, clumped together into slippery, rubbery bundles of dark green leaves and vines, shot through with veins and streams of pulsing violet. The trees, when they were present in patches, were tall and gnarled, unnaturally thin with drooping branches and needle-like leaves. What little wildlife there was was skittish, hiding and scurrying away from sight, into holes in the ground or into the trees. No sign of birds was to be seen anywhere.

Here and there, paths did stretch across the small dark verse. Roads and well-trod footpaths, cutting through the dense shrubbery and grasses. In the distance, a large cart could be seen trundling along one of these paths, heading for one of Nebula's outpost castles. In another direction, there could be seen another of their larger castles, for manufacturing and distributing their darkchips, with smoke pouring out of it, one if its towers laying in ruin and a great deal of frenzied activity swarming about it. Further off from that castle, was another one, smaller and looking more akin to an outpost than a true castle, but lying smashed and in ruins, with no traces of activity about it.

And elsewhere, in the center of the verse, there stood a jagged cliff of dark stone, atop which was perched another castle, this one seeming highly fortified, ringed with walls and gates offering only one easy path up to it. In the tallest tower, a huge, bright blue flame burned, as if a beacon, shining through the windows there. The lair of the master of this realm, no doubt.

It was all only a matter of where the group here to liberate this verse from this invasive force would head first.

Options presented. You are free to explore at your leisure and head to any point of interest.

[Samus Aran]

Samus pointed to the gleaming eye of blue flame, laying atop a mountain fort. “That’s clearly their base of operations. I don’t see why we should delay any further.”

Okor let loose a pestilent breath that carried seemingly eons worth of patience. “That factory.” He pointed to it. “They must be manufacturing … dark chips there.”

Samus folded her arms over. “… What’s your point?”

Okor took in another slow breath, taking his time before the exhalation of words. “We could use them … to be better prepared. To take down the … ruler of this verse.”

Samus glanced to herself, then to Madotsuki, and to Hiro. Neither of them looked much better for wear than she was. Particularly Hiro. He’d used a couple of those dark chips back there. It was only a matter of time before bad things started to happen. Worse things.

“We don’t have the stamina for that,” she replied to Okor. “You may not have been designed for indolence, but we’re human … ish,” she added after some thought. “It’s only a matter of time before our bodies give out.”

“Then … it’s better we come prepared, rather than be defeated at the final hurdle.”

Samus considered the strength of his words. It took her a moment to remember that most of her powers were locked away. She was done with big attacks and flashy power-ups. Her suit’s phazon supplies were totally expended, and who knows how long it would take for the micro-reactors to compensate? In the meantime, all they had were these … chips. One of them still stored safely inside her arm cannon.

Would one be enough? No, probably not.

“Perhaps you’re right,” Samus admitted. She turned to the other two for support, or counter-arguments.

[Okor]

Okor shouldered his septic sword, the corroded cleaver resting heavy against his pestilent pauldron as his exposed hide gently writhed, a maggot that had grown fat by feasting upon his festering flesh breaching leathery hide, squirming under the sun's light, beneath the Plague Marine's notice. "Either we sever the head of this serpent, or..." He coughed, near-microscopic jaws slowly gnawing through his own lungs, the parasites that once lived in harmony with his own blighted biology continuing their ravenous consumption, despite the disappearance of his regenerative abilities.

Yellowed, cracked teeth split open in a smile beneath his weathered helm, flecked with diseased blood. "We steal its own fangs and drive them into its eyes. We've assembled a suitable stock of these devices. If you are confident in your strength, I say we go for the throat." He lifted his bubonic blade, driving its tainted tip deep into the soil, the rot and corruption inherent in his favoured weapon seeping into the earth. "We are no weaklings. We are the Chosen, sent to scour this damned realm. We have been baptized in darkling blood, and now our foe starts to fear us. They seek to deny us our abilities, so that we will think ourselves... weak." The Plagued Paladin stepped away from his blade, raising two claws to the sky, black clouds riddled with bruise-coloured lightning hanging overhead, watching and waiting, soul-hungry vultures. "The fools! We are blood-drenched, battle-scarred, and death-sworn. And do you know why we are here, standing at the edge of oblivion?"

"Because we are the hardest gods-damned bastards in Omni's creation, and it's time these Darkling beasts remembered it."

He reached down, pulling his caustic cleaver from the freshly infected earth.

"Now let's go kill some darkspawn."

[Nebula]

As the group made their way towards the Dark Castle towards the center of the corrupted Camelot verse, they anticipated violence to come at any moment. But the closer they got, the quieter it seemed to become. They could see it from far off, as it stood on a jagged-edge cliff as if it was in a scary painting. There were no obvious points of entry from their distant view, but they knew they'd need to traverse through a small forest to get through it. And so they did.

The forest trip itself was uneventful, but the atmosphere was what made all of them uneasy. It felt like at any point, the trip could deteriorate into violence. It wouldn't be terribly surprising, given their previous experience with the Darkspawn. It had been one fight after another. The further they got through the path in the woods, the quieter things seemed to become. It felt like an ambush. They expected that once they got through the forest, they would be close enough to the stronghold that they would have to come up with a plan of action swiftly to get inside and take on whoever was running this nefarious realm.

The foursome turned a corner and found themselves face to face with a particularly thick set of trees and vines. They had to literally cut through it to force themselves through the patch of plant-life. They couldn't see what was on the other side until they had already made it through.

On the opposite end of the thicket was not what was they were expecting.

"Welcome to the Nebula Festival, Travelers!" An older man with a big grin and an even larger pie in his hand welcomed them.

They gave dumb-founded looks as they stumbled onto what could only be described as a surprise party. The crowd of villagers in front of them exploded into cheers as they appeared into view. They could see huts with various events and food-stuffs being offered, along with happy, smiling faces. Whatever they were thinking they would walk into inside the Nebula Verse, this was not it.

The strangest part was that from their scouting before entering the forest, they saw no signs of a village of festival. Did it sprout up this fast?

"Enjoy your party, my friends!" The white-bearded man said cheerfully. He passed the pie off to one of the foursome and assured them forward. "I am the Watcher for our ceremonies here! Please, come come! For you are the guests of honor here!"

The party has found the Nebula Festival, which is located in front of the main stronghold here in Nebula Space. It is populated with vibrant, cheerful townsfolk who here to greet you, make you comfortable, and totally not sacrifice you in creepy ways!

Your job is to partake in the festival long enough to figure out how to get through it and into the castle proper! You can make up any events or people you meet along the way.

You have one week and no roleplay limit.

[Okor]

Okor took the proffered pie, his helmet hanging, mag-locked, from his thigh as his claws scooped great gobs of greasy meat down his gullet, blackened fangs gnashing and tearing as he swallowed the fatty flesh. The watcher smiled as the Corrupted Cyclops guzzled down the meal, the elder’s eyes like dark constellations, stars alight in the infinite blackness. The man bowed, his teeth shining amidst the great whiteness that made up his beard, fading into the crowd of the festival, one more smiling face amongst many, many others.

“You sure you should be eating that, big guy?” Questioned Hiro, the Digital Daimyo cocking an eyebrow at the Rotting Revenant’s ravenous consumption of the pastry. Okor turned to his companion, a hunk of pre-masticated meat trapped between his teeth. ”Hiro. I have, on multiple occasions, poisoned a water supply by spitting into it. My blood is poison. My soul is claimed by the great Gods of the Aether. If their poisons or magicks can affect me, then… I believe we have bigger problems.” The hulking figure raised a clenched fist to his festering maw, coughing as he felt one of his four lungs collapse, riddled with rot and devoured by parasites. He was being consumed from within, his blessed host continuing its biological and ideological imperative despite him being deprived of Nurgle’s eternal gifts. Already, his stomach was little more than a seething mass of maggots and stranger, a roiling ouroboros that only stalled its self-destruction to feast upon the gifts of flesh from above.

He wiped a sickly mixture of his own nearly-gelatinous pale blood from his ravaged lips, looking over the grinning crowds. Dark lanterns drifted overhead, pinpricks of light shining through abyssal cloth, floating towards some distant destination. If one was able to ignore the dead-eyed stares, long, brilliant teeth, and the slightly warped tones of the seemingly sourceless songs that pervaded the atmosphere, it was almost a pleasant occasion.

The simultaneous feeling of emptiness and weight within him reminded him of the perpetual hunger of his parasites. Unless they cut the head from this blighted beast-of-many-forms, he would be devoured by his own host of symbiotic creatures. He scraped a handful of crumbs and gristle from the gravy-soaked bottom of the tin, rolling what little remained of the meat on his rotting tongue. Grox? Horse?

Human?

He couldn’t tell. Sauces, spices, and his own ravenous hunger denied the opportunity to taste anything but a passable meal. His maw slavered, pathogen-blessed spittle seeping from between fangs still anointed with grease and gravy. He turned towards the nearest attendee of the festival, clothes bedecked in a quartered pattern of black and purple, eyes blank, lips stained with gravy and crumbs. Looming, he made his demands: ”The pies. Show me to the… Pies.” The peasant nodded, slowly extending a single grey finger, pointing it towards a tent adorned in an alternating pattern of ebon and royal purple, cheers and shouts echoing from within its greasy depths.

Armour rattling, he stepped forward, descending into the belly of the beast.

[Samus Aran]

This, thought Samus, Is the single most obvious trap I have ever seen.

Surely the inhuman marine could see that. Yet he seemed quite happy to eat the food – not that Samus could really verify for herself that he had, as from the moment he started feeding, she’d averted her eyes. Morbid curiosity was one thing, but she had enough to keep her up at night without adding that to the list.

After what she’d witnessed of Okor, though, Samus highly doubted that poisoned food would be what killed him.

As Okor dug in with an animalistic fervor, a number of small children, dressed in basic-but-clean-and-tidy skirts and tunics, pressed themselves towards her. She stepped back instinctively, preparing for the assault. But it didn’t come.

“Pies, sir?” squeaked one of the round-faced little girls, a saccharine smile plastered upon her features.

“No … thanks,” responded the mostly-human hunter. She saw through their smiles. It was so obvious … and yet …

What if it wasn’t a trap? In the bounty hunter’s opinion, the odds were astronomically low, and yet she wasn’t about to start murdering civilians on the off chance.

There was something she could do, though. With a casual drag of her finger across the side of her helmet, Samus activated her X-ray visor. The world flickered into black and white. Predictably enough, it was faulty. Anything beyond the hunting party’s immediate vicinity was pure blackness. But it was close enough to inspect the children.

Their bone structure appeared normal. Nothing too untoward … but that meant little. Humans could be possessed with little outward changes to their physical appearance.

“What are you looking at, mister metal man?” asked one of the braver boys. “Hope you’re not gonna eat us!” he giggled.

In any other situation, Samus might have felt obliged to make a chummy remark back, but she bit her tongue. “Just checking your health,” she muttered. She kept one eye on the crowd as she closed on Hiro with a conspiratorial whisper: “Do you have any scanners or gadgets that might let you check these guys out?”

The ronin frowned. “I would’a asked you about that. You’re the one with the alien suit. I’m just a hacker, doesn’t tell me much about biology.”

Samus grunted. “Well, they look normal, but I don’t need to tell you to be ready for a fight.”

Neither Hiro nor Madotsuki – who had been listening in – breathed a word, but their faces sighed.

The white-bearded man approached Samus, and she was quick to check his step before he was an arm’s breadth away. He appeared to balk before her frosty countenance. “Is something wrong, heroes? You appear to be a little reluctant to join in the ceremonies!”

Samus wondered if it was even worth talking to this avatar of Nebula. She decided to play coy. “Yes, well. We’re all very eager to finish our mission. I’m afraid we have no time for parties … sir.”

[Nebula]

"But you must have time for parties, because you are the reason we here!" The bearded, elderly man spoke with excitement. His eyes were big as he spoke using dramatic hand gestures. "This festival - no, this village is here waiting for you! You were promised, and here you are! The heroes!"

Samus was standing there in front of him, blinking her eyes behind her helmet with confusion and surprise. Not only was this man (who may as well have been as useful as a mindless Darkspawn) speaking nonsense but he was doing so with such vigor that it felt like he believed his own words. Or really wanted her to believe them. "What is the purpose of the festival?" She asked, pretty matter-of-factly to him.

"Oh, you don't know? The Watcher asked, coyly. He playfully elbowed her. She did not react. He didn't seem to mind. He guided her down the aisle they had been standing in. Behind them, Madotsuki and Hiro were following. "You have to complete the trial. You must complete the trial to be recognized as the Heroes, worthy to enter Nebula Castle!"

There was no question in any of the liberators' minds that this was not real. It was about as obvious as it got. They were in a realm that was clearly created and run by the same monster they had been fighting this entire time. But they had to play along. Samus knew that right now, they were in the place blind and the way to get through it was to process all the information being thrown at them. "What is the trial?" Right now, the focus for her was getting in that castle. This was how.

The Watcher brought the trio to the end of the aisle of festival games and foods. In front of them was a class event at circuses, recognizable in every universe no matter where they came from. A Test of Strength. A hammer, a place to hit it and a puck that would seemingly shoot up and hit the bell at a perfect score. "All you have to do, heroes, is hit this bugger hard enough to win the game! Then you will earn the right to enter Nebula Castle and have an audience with the Black Knight himself!"

Samus looked at the hammer. Then she looked up at the bell at the top of the game. "Who is the Black Knight?"

"He is the reason you are here."

That was the first useful thing he had said all day. Samus looked back at her comrades, then at the crowd forming around them. Finally, she looked past the festival tents into the distance, where the dark fortress sat so close, yet still out of reach. The Nebula Castle in this False Camelot. This was her ticket there.

The Watcher's voice interupted her thoughts. His words seemed to turn a bit. They were nice and pleasant sounding, but the content was different. "What's the matter, Heroes? Afraid you are not strong enough to save this realm?" He taunted.

Samus and friends are faced with a Test of Strength. If she chooses to tackle it: the hammer is very, very heavy (to a point of ridiculousness) and it will require one Order Point (the shared pool of SP you get in this realm) and a lot of effort to lift it and successfully win the game. Deadline is Friday night at 11:59 PM EST. No roleplay limit. If you feel like you're done writing before that (or need help), feel free to let me know.

[Nebula]

When Okor asked for pies, he might not have completely understood what he was getting himself into. This festival, no matter how suspicious or obvious it made have been, clearly took their craft seriously. When the big bulking man in armor made his way into the frilly purple tent, he was expecting some kind of witch doctor baking pies with human body parts. What he found instead, was not that.

The tent itself seemed small from the outside. It was small enough that he was unsure he would comfortably fit inside. But when he entered, he found it large enough to fit a small crowd of a few enthusiastic pie fans. They all cheered when he entered, as if he was the one they had been waiting for. "Finally, the contest can begin!" Someone said beyond the crowd. Okor was ushered along through the center of the dozen spectators up to the front, where a single table awaited him. He was sat in the middle of it, between two other men of large stature. They were fat. "Welcome everyone, to the Pie-Eating Contest!"

"What?" Okor asked, seemingly in disbelief. The host he was speaking to was a clown. He hadn't realized it after he actually spoke. The question was more asked at the clown, rather then to him.

The tall and lanky pink-haired clown just seemed in return and laughed, which prompted the audience to laugh as well. Okor's eyes shifted suspiciously from them to him. "You are up against our two champions!" He waved his waves to the big men on either side of Okor, who just glared at the armor-clad man as if he had slighted them. "You must eat more of our delicious festival pies then them!"

"Why?" Okor prodded. Again, laughter. Again, Okor found himself irritated.

"Because that's the way you win our grand prize!" The clown spoke dramatically using his arms, waving them around as he emphasized the plan. "A one-way ticket to the Nebula Castle, to meet the Black Knight!"

Okor nodded. He seemed to be okay with this contest now that he knew the stakes. "Bring me the pies."

Okor is in a pie-eating contest for the right to see the mysterious Black Knight. If he chooses to participate: Even though he cannot usually process the food, he finds the pies delicious and filling. Deadline is Friday night at 11:59 PM EST. No roleplay limit. If you feel like you're done writing before that (or need help), feel free to let me know.

[Samus Aran]

Samus eyed the hammer, that creepy grin still in her peripheral vision.

Playing such games. Was the Black Knight as prideful as Centaur Man? Would he really honor a bargain?

Not a chance. Centaur Man had been a lackey. A frothing, phazon …. dark power-addicted quarter-man. Whoever ran this verse had to have more cunning than that. This ‘Black Knight’, whoever he was, was a general – he ran an entire dark verse. No castle would stay standing for long when the owner was wont to let intruders in of their own volition.

Then again, the castle hadn’t been standing for long. And, general or not, any underling of Nebula was bound to be corrupted by dark power already. Perhaps the Black Knight really was that arrogant, that prideful.

She shared a glance with Madotsuki and Hiro. They hadn’t been together for very long, and they hadn’t even gotten on that well – but they had fought together, and come out successful. Some things could be said just as well with a glance when words were a bad fit.

Samus turned on the Watcher, chest puffed out and shoulders spread. “You speak to Samus Aran, saviour of worlds. None are more strong or worthy than I.”

The Watcher’s eyes crinkled into a smile. “I knew you wouldn’t disappoint, heroes.”

Samus stepped up to the hammer, testing its weight with her left hand. Gods, it was heavy. Even using her right arm’s cannon to brace it, her muscles trembled with the effort.

“Maybe it’d be easier if you took that cannon off?” suggested the old man.

Samus took a deep breath. This wasn’t going to be easy.

With all of her might, she lifted. Her shoulders screamed, her HUD lit up with warning lights – maximum capacity exceeded!

... And then she pivoted, roaring, and flung the hammer into the old man.

“GO!” she bellowed.

And with that, Hiro and Madotsuki dashed around her, heading towards the castle through the trees.

The old man hadn’t taken a direct hit from the hammer – as sure as she was that he was a Nebula puppet, Samus knew she had not the strength to give it a proper throw, or even a proper lift. Sparing only a moment to assess that fact and make a decision, the bounty hunter willed her suit to transform.

She felt a flood of relief as the bulky armor melted away – at least the Nebula space hadn’t disabled that function. With Predator Mode engaged, she burst away from the scene as fast as possible.

“OKOR, YOU’D BETTER FINISH UP QUICK!”

Samus is in her alternate form, Predator Mode (see roster) and running to the castle.

[Hiro Protagonist]

Hiro had been silent since their entry into Nebula Space, aside from a few comments here and there. The otherworldly, eerie feel of the pocket verse was unsettling, in a familiar way. Like that high pitched whine some electronics emitted during the last few days of their lives, a hair raising screech that put him on edge. The readings from his goggles had confirmed it though. It was something that Nebula's minions, those infected with Dark Power, emitted. But the real reason it unsettled him now was because of it's source for the past couple hours. He was emitting it as well.

Maybe the flippant usage of those darkchips hadn't helped. Sure, they had helped in the moment, but now, outside of a fight, they just added to the discordant nature of this place. Then they came upon the festival, and Hiro nearly rolled his eyes. This was right out of an old TV show, it was. Soooo obvious. Too obvious to even really do anything about except watch how it played. Okor enjoyed pie though, that was good to know. Maybe he could bribe the rusty bastard further down the line. 

They watched him walk out of sight among the tents, Samus in her golden armor eyeing the Test of Strength the old man had mentioned. "Yeah...not my area of expertise..." He mumbled as he watched her size up the mallet. Any readings from these people were useless. They were visibly normal humans, if seeping Dark Power. But this whole plane seeped it, so, useless reading. He felt a little naked without his big flappy coat. Any future posing would have to be done without the benefit of it's long whippy tails.

He picked idly at a hangnail as Madotsuki spaced out a bit, watching the patrons and townsfolk warily. This "Black Knight" was obviously the head Darkling here, and if they had to pass these tests to gain entry...Couldn't be that hard. 

Hiro started to walk towards the old man, Samus groaning as she picked up the hammer. "Hey, so, if you have any Tests of Agility or something like that, I could..."

THWUMP

The guy vanished from Hiro's view and reappeared ten feet away on the ground, coughing. Hiro was already moving before Samus called for him and Madotsuki. "Oh, we're doing it this way, okay. Gotcha. Little more warning next time, maybe? Woah!" The erstwhile hacker leaned back and dodged a wild haymaker thrown at him by a peasant. "Okay, so, run for it, I guess. Good plan, lady." 

The street samurai left his blades in their sheaths, not wanting to spill any more possibly innocent blood. Instead, he used his increased agility and flexibility to dance across people's bodies, parrying their punches and catching their kicks while rolling over their forms and slipping between and through the surging mass of bodies. Casting glances back across the suddenly frenetic fairgrounds for his fellow liberators, he managed to navigate the chaos and flash in next to Madotsuki, laying out attackers back to back.