Divine Singularity: Discussion Thread

We're in New York?

Biomech has it right on the money about the story; that is what happened.

He's incorrect about the city, though; this St. Claire is entirely fictitious. That's why we're asking you guys to make up stuff in your posts, to make the city more real by fleshing it out.

Also, next installment—and not a pleasant one, at that. If you're squeamish, this bit might not be for you.

An hour into his ride the explorer noticed plumes of smoke far off in the distance, rising from beyond a series of large hills on the horizon. The sight of those billowing black filled him with worry, concerns about whatever might have made them settling unpleasantly in his gut.

Maybe it was a bushfire. Maybe, hopefully, he wasn’t about to see something horrible.

In this, he was to be disappointed.

A minute after he’d first noticed the plumes his bike crested one of the hills, and as he reached the top of that grassy knoll the explorer got his first glimpse of the smoke’s source.

He brought the bike to a screeching halt, staring down at it with wide, horrified eyes. “My god…”

Below the hill, a village burned.

It had never occurred to him that this planet might have been inhabited.

Sure, there had been times where the explorer had come across worlds that seemed to lack any sapient life at first glance, only to discover small tribes of primitive indigenes scattered across the wilderness upon a more thorough inspection. Those were few and far between, however, and what with everything else the thought of finding intelligent life here had been pushed far into the back of his mind.

But as the scene of carnage before him made all too clear, this world had intelligent life.

The village burned, but the blaze hadn’t been brought about by freak weather conditions or an accident. It had been deliberately started.

He could see arrows buried in the thatched roofs of squat cylindrical huts, roofs that burned with motionless flame. Other arrows hung suspended in midair, their heads gleaming in the light of the fire and their shafts ablaze, eager to spread their deadly heat to targets that they would never reach.

Hominids ran between the huts, their leathery skin mottled grey and painted with intricate tribal tattoos. Females with children stood like sculptures or holopicts, their mouths open in silent screams and their eyes wide with fear and terror. Others, mostly males, were locked in combat with hominids whose bodies sported different markings. Was this a war between two tribes?

Slowly, almost numbly, the explorer slid out of his bike, made his way down the hill and walked among them, taking it all in with mute, horrified fascination. It was a scene of absolute carnage, like something out of the history vids but far, far worse. All around him, the aliens were locked in grizzly tableaus: hewing with axes; driving spears into their victim’s bellies; writhing in agony as their bodies caught fire. There was no smell, thankfully, but in a way that just made it worse.

He paused as he came across a particularly cruel scene. One warrior stood triumphantly over another, its features twisted into a hateful grimace as it skewered its prone foe; the other indigene’s face was contorted with agony, tears streaming from its clenched eyes as it held up a desperate hand towards its killer, as if begging him to stop. Blood glistened where the spear had stabbed into the loser’s gut, and the explorer had to turn away, fighting down a powerful wave of nausea as he caught a brief glimpse of what might have been innards through the wound.

Were these people still conscious, he wondered suddenly, the thought making him turn white as a sheet. Were they still awake in there, still aware? Were they still feeling whatever sensations they’d felt when whatever had happened to this world swept over them, leaving them just as inert as the planet itself?

Dear god, he hoped not. He couldn’t think of a more hellish fate if he tried.

He stayed just long enough to record everything in the village, if only so that people would know these poor bastards had existed. Then he hurriedly made his way up the hill, got back onto his idling bike and took off, never looking back.

@94: Alrighty. It won't be a Crapsack School then. Just that the Gym Teacher is messed up.

Fun Fact: Ralph Fiennes was the person who played Hades in Clash of the Titans. The reason why I did that was in tribute to James Woods High School... And I just found out he also did Voldemort... Suddenly my original idea makes sense.

edited 8th Sep '13 7:15:20 AM by Psyga315

And now the final installment. It is the longest by far, so Wall of Text inbound.

The land began to change. Steppes and grasslands gave way to sparsely-vegetated hills, the gently-rolling plains getting rougher and craggier. The ground began to rise and break, forming valleys and foothills that grew steadily larger and rougher, until finally they had become a range of sharp-edged mountains that sprawled across the horizon.

The bike’s sensors steered the explorer towards one mountain in particular, a foreboding peak whose slaloming slopes were marked by a worn stone path that wound its way up as far as the eye could see. He tracked the path with his eyes, before glancing at his instruments. If the readings were accurate, the source of that energy signature was located all the way at the summit.

Carefully he guided his speeder bike onto the path and began his ascent, going at a fraction of its top speed. He didn’t want to make the trip by foot, but he certainly didn’t want to go sailing off the mountain if he took a turn too fast; he wasn’t sure what would happen if he crashed into anything at a few hundred miles per hour in this strange place, but he seriously doubted it would be anything pleasant.

Up he went, the bike’s engine growling like a kitten instead of the throaty roar it made normally. The path, he saw, was marked with small piles of stone and rock at regular intervals; spaced dozens of feet apart, they alternated from one side of the path to the next, and he could see that little tassels extended from them, frozen mid-flutter. Maybe this place had been some kind of a sacred site to the natives, a place of pilgrimage or something like that…

It took him almost twenty minutes to reach the mountain’s peak, the sparse vegetation giving way to bare rock and eventually snow; flakes of the stuff hung in the air, gleaming in the faded light of the sun, and whenever he brushed against one the explorer felt a sharp tingle jolt through his body, as if he’d been given a static shock.

Finally he reached the end of the path, and found himself looking upon some kind of shrine. Built of wood and clay roofing tiles, the squat structure nestled within a cleft in the mountain’s peak. Brightly-coloured flags depicting strange designs dangled from long poles that jutted from the corners of the eaves, caught in the act of billowing in an unseen wind. A long set of stone steps led up to the shrine’s entrance, which—thankfully—was just an open archway without a door.

The explorer glanced at his instruments once more. He couldn’t feel anything, but according to his scanners that energy signature was definitely coming from inside.

Cautiously, the explorer parked his bike at the foot of those stairs, shut down the motor, and got off. Then, scanner in one hand and pistol in the other, he began to make his way up the stairs.

As he reached the top of the stairs, he saw that the shrine wasn’t particularly big. The inside was just a single square room, about twenty feet on a side. Half a dozen wooden pillars stood in two rows of three, supporting the roof and forming an aisle of sorts towards the back of the shrine. There a small, roughly-hewn stone statue depicting one of the indigenes in a meditative pose sat atop a simple wooden dais.

The explorer glanced around, waving his scanner slowly through the air. There wasn’t anything in there that looked like it could be generating that energy, and the scanner couldn’t get a fix on the signature; it seemed diffuse, like it was dispersed throughout the shrine.

Frowning, he stepped inside.

The floorboards creaked under his feet.

He looked down, eyes widening. The wooden planks which made up the floor had sunk a little beneath the weight of his feet. They had actually reacted…normally.

He knelt down, the floorboards groaning further as he did so, and wiped a hand across one. Dust came away on his fingertips, showing the polished board beneath. He could scarcely believe that he was actually hearing and seeing this; something on this insane, impossible planet was finally doing something that made sense!

“You disturb the silence.”

The explorer froze. That voice hadn’t come from his lips.

The scanner began to beep wildly in his hand. Rising, he looked at its screen—and what he saw there made his eyebrows shoot straight up. The energy was intensifying all of a sudden, but more than that it had begun to coalesce as well, concentrating itself in a single point within the shrine. And that point was…

He looked up, and as he did so he caught the sound of cracking stone. Something was happening to the statue; for no readily apparent reason, cracks and fissures were beginning to form in its roughly-hewn surface, spreading rapidly across the meditating figure like the strands of a spider’s web. And as this happened, he noticed a strange sound like water rushing in from somewhere off in the distance, a distant, burbling growl that quickly began to rise in volume and pitch until it was a furious roar; at the same time, light began to shine from within those cracks, starting faint and weak but quickly intensifying until it reached almost-blinding levels.

Crying out, the explorer looked away and brought up a hand to shield his eyes from that awful glare—

Then there came the roar of an explosion, and suddenly he was knocked flat on his back as a wave of pressure bowled him over.

He lay there for a few seconds, breathing heavily and blinking furiously. It took a moment for the fact that the light and the noise were both gone to register in his mind, and when it did he sat up, glancing at his scanner.

The machine was lifeless and quiet, its screen cracked and broken. He could see smoke rising from it, and smell the ozone tang of fused circuits; the sudden energy surge must have burnt it out.

He looked towards the dais once more. The statue was gone, its smoking pieces littered across the floor. Where it should have been…

His eyes went wide, and his jaw dropped. “What the holy hell…?”

Seated in the exact same pose as the statue had been was a…well, he didn’t even know what to call it. It was some kind of turquoise, vaguely humanoid figure, dressed in simple orange robes that fell to the ankles and left the right arm and part of the torso bare. With the arm exposed, he could see that it wasn’t a single, solid unit; where joints like the shoulder, elbow, wrists and knuckles should have been, there was nothing but empty space, as if some invisible force was the only thing holding these free-floating body parts together. A quick glance showed that the figure’s other hand and both its feet were the same way, the individual segments that made up these appendages floating like a skeleton displayed in a museum; their edges glowed with a soft white light that pulsed at a slow, steady rhythm, almost like the beat of a heart.

It had a head, the explorer saw, but while it had ears, a chin and an unkempt mop of silvery hair, there was no face—just a big mark like a circle crossed out with an X, a circle that glowed with a pale, colourless light. He could also see vague impressions of what could have been facial features: shallow depressions where eye sockets might have gone, subtle bumps and rises where eyebrows and cheekbones should have been.

The explorer shuddered. It was almost like this thing had had a face at one point, but time—or something else—had worn it away until almost nothing was left.

That voice spoke again, old and powerful; the light in that cross-out circle flickered and strobed in time to its words. “You disturb the silence,” it said. “You intrude upon my solitude. I would know why.”

Shakily, the explorer brought up his pistol with both hands and took wavering aim at the figure.

“Put down your gun,” the voice said. “I mean you no harm—and if I did, that toy would not save you.”

There was no threat in the figure’s words. And why should there be? If his hunch was correct, this…whatever the hell it was didn’t need to make threats.

The explorer lowered his gun, but didn’t holster it. He swallowed a lump in his throat. “Did… did you do this?” he asked.

The figure nodded. “Yes.”

A million questions buzzed through the explorer’s mind then, and for a long moment he said nothing. Finally he spoke, having settled on one. “Who, or what, are you?”

The figure leaned forward slightly, placing its hands on its knees.

“I was like you, once,” it said, “but that was a long time ago. Now in many ways I am something much greater… and yet in other ways, I am now much less than I was.”

The explorer frowned. There was something about the way the figure’s voice dropped on that last bit that made it almost seem like it had been speaking less to him, and more to itself.

A long moment passed, during which the figure said nothing. When the silence began to grow uncomfortable, it was the explorer who broke it by clearing his throat. “You haven’t really answered my question.”

The figure straightened up, and let out a sound that might have been a sigh as that symbol on its head dimmed.

“The man I used to be was known as Tawthrek-Four-Five-Nine,” it said sombrely. “But I have not been that man for longer than your race has walked this galaxy.” It lifted its head, as if it were looking straight at him. “Now, I am simply Tet.”

@biomech: What about Madoka and Plus? Which incarnation, if any, would she have met?

So... Kei has the energy levels of god knows how many people.

Also having her speak Japanese just kind of seemed to work, given her name is Japanese. Also it was a quick and easy way to have her come across as perhaps a bit overly-personal given what the honorfic she used means and it made sense, so yeah.

And perhaps just a touch of Author Appeal?

Eh-heh, probably. Given how much I'm a fan of Japanese media and all. ^^;

Well if it helps you pour your heart into what you do, then I can't possibly oppose it!

So... Back home, but not feeling up to an intro post right now. But hopefully there should be one in the next few days. Just letting everyone know I'm not dead, ahah.

Hmmm... what to do, what to do.

Dunno about Madoka and Plus but they should have met. Actually, the nomad that told Madoka about Omega's mad revenge was YOD. I suppose that there was some sort of meeting between the Elysium people at one point.

However, we need to equalise the different times our characters are in.

Uh, Yod probably didn't know about Omega until way after the fact.

Until after what?

Well, Madoka is a very recent nomad- three years or so, multiversally. I still think that it should be Yod who told Madoka about Omega's comeback. Anyways, should Madoka have met Kei before? hmmmm dunno.

Also- when a pure nomad like Ein make and impure nomad, does the original still exist or do they become a sort of Obi-wan force ghost thing to their Usurper?

Also, another thing- you know how Yod can raise the dead right? expect ludicrous amounts of character building when Alice asks him to revive her mother.

What I'm trying to say is Yod is a very isolated Nomad, and would probably not gravitate to Nomad groups, and thus would learn about the Omega incident months after it happened. Hell, he definitely had no knowledge of the Games. He probably didn't meet Ein until the initial Elysium meetings.

Also, you're kinda telling me what my character is doing.

really? well.....I never did say which Nomad told her about Omega so that could still be anyone. Well meh, lets just say some random nomad magically appeared out of nowhere and went hey 'Omega's on the loose!' then disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Or, someone can go- I know, my Nomad could have bumped into your nomad and told her about stuff, they could even have become friends etc etc.

Well that's for you guys to decide, I'll keep it vague for now.

edited 9th Sep '13 2:48:12 AM by biomechtraveler

If she's that young, the current Plus is the only one she could have met. Maybe he told her about Omega, then left Elysium in her hands while he took care of a distraction like being made? Plus himself probably heard about it from an Avalon member; he's got a soft spot for Avalon, but he's worried about their lack of long-term planning.

I believe someone brought up the possibility of an elysium and avalon alliance, yes? I believe that seems viable — I'm sure my PC will try and set something up if no one else will, succeed or fail.

edited 9th Sep '13 9:13:00 AM by tvtropesnoob

Um, troy, the final post regarding my sign up?

I'll get another post up today, sorry for the previous outburst.

I don't want to see this thing die.

I'm waiting for this RP to actually get some interaction before my next post.

Just a heads up - more Midgard people need to post. In other news, I'm going to look at your signup now, noob.

Meanwhile, Psi was just doing SCIENCE! during and prior to the Nomad War; I'm not exactly sure what sort of projects he would have been working on, but at least some of them would have involved the sort of crazy Nomad wizardry that the race is known for. If anyone has any suggestions for his projects, I'm all ears!

Not too sure what Mu would have been doing over the intervening period, though.

@Moerin:

Hey there. I'm glad to hear that you're okay now.

Before the war, Plus was trying to prevent it. During it, at first she was trying to stop it, and then when they started getting really nasty, she was basically sitting in a cave somewhere crying.

edited 10th Sep '13 9:24:42 AM by Anura

Gotcha, Troy. I'll have a post up within the next couple of days.