The Massive Multi-Fandom RPG: Season 3

Ezio listened to all of this, his eyebrow slowly inching further and further up his forehead. By the time the man told the 'story' — if you could call it that — about his grandfather — or something of that description — saving two orphanages in one day — and from bear attacks, no less — his eyebrow met its zenith and hovered there. "Yes, that is all well and good. I'm sure this Obidiah was a wonderfully honest person," Ezio said quickly wanting to get it out of the way. "But I am still not convinced you have the ability to get us out of here. You may call me paranoid if you want," he added, glancing at all present, "but I am inclined to suspect anyone who suddenly comes across with the solution to all of our problems."

Be kind.

"Oh, rest assured," Nick said, "we would insist on your coming with us. And what was your name again?"

edited 15th Jan '12 7:27:27 AM by tricksterson

Trump delenda est

"Oh, no, I don't, sir." the man assured Ezio, his smile so oily the party may have felt the need to watch their omega-3 intake a bit more carefully. "I believe you folks will provide the solution to all our problems. You all are miracle-workers; I can tell. I'm just the humble businessman who happened to pass on what he knew to real heroes of our time. I have an eye for this sorta thing, mind you, and I can see that you folks are somethin' special."

Nick's stern interjection thinned the southern man's smile ever-so-slightly, as it was becoming clear that the SHIELD commander was a man swayed by actions, rather than honeyed words. Regardless, he thrust out a calloused hand toward Nick, apparently offering a shake. It still couldn't hurt to try and make a good impression, could it?

"Of course, of course. Where are my manners today? Jebediah Hornswazzle, esquire. At your service." he said, sacrificing not an ounce of his charismatic energy. Were Nick to accept the introductory gesture, he would find Jebediah's shake to be firm and constricting. Though likely far from the strongest grip he'd ever felt, it was the grasp of a man attempting to display masculinity of a physical nature, whether consciously or otherwise. Should Nick not accept it, however, Jebediah would simply shrug and drop his hand after a few terse seconds.

"Well, now that that's outta the way, how's about we head out? Sooner the better, right?" the southern gentleman suggested, prepared to lead the group out of town should they agree.

Oswald found his outward smile harder and harder to keep as this......Jebidiah spoke. Hornswazzle?! YEESH, talk about a name no one would trust, he thought. "As tempting an offer that is, my good sir, I believe it would be best to discuss this with the leader of our merry band," the rabbit said to the businessman. "I'll just go get him......."

With that, the toon got up from his seat and walked back upstairs. As he did, the look of disdain and annoyance became more and more apparent. He soon reached the room Jim had taken residence in. He knocked. "Hey Jim! We met a who says he found a spot where we can communicate with the outside world!" the rabbit called out. "However I don't even trust him as far as I can throw him," he added in a hushed tone. The toon continued. "Jim?" A beat. "Jim........?"

His knocking caused the door to swing open. Curious, the toon walked inside. Within he found all of the stuff the space marine collected since coming to Extremus, including the voice changing amulet they found in that tool shed in the jungle. All of it was neatly piled together. The thing that was missing.........was the owner.........

Oswald's pupils shrank to pinpricks, his stretched out into a solid line, and his ears became limp.

-U-U-U-U-U-U-U-

There was yelling from the second floor. "MAYDAY!! SOS!! BATON DOWN THE HATCHES!! WOMEN AND CHILDREN FIRST!!" Oswald slipped and fell down the stairs, bouncing as he did, yelling "AWOOOOGA!! AWOOOOGA!!" during he each arc. He then ran to his group. "Private group meeting! NOW!!"

edited 15th Jan '12 4:54:02 PM by UdtheImp

DAMMIT MARK, STOP HOTTING HELPY!!

"Yeah, no offence, but I reckon I trust ya as far as I can throw..." Sandy began, but was cut off by Oswald's screaming.

"...uh, you okay, Oswald?" she askedm, "Look as though ya seen a ghost."

Ezio was about to speak to Jebidiah again, when Oswald came bouncing down the stairs, screaming something about a private group meeting. Ezio turned towards the rabbit, confused. "What on earth are you talking about, Oswald?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. The arm with the hidden blade now hung limply by his side, with the blade still drawn. While Ezio waited for Oswald to compose himself, Ezio looked askance at 'Jebidiah Hornswazzle', keeping an eye on the shady man.

Be kind.

Nick smiled, took Hornswazzle's hand, gave it a firm though not crushing grip...and then squeezed a nerve cluster near where thumb and index finger meet the palm. he leaned forward and growled, "Consider that just a hint of what will happen if you're fucking with us."

edited 15th Jan '12 10:01:56 AM by tricksterson

Trump delenda est

Jebediah withdrew his hand once Nick was done attempting to assert dominance over the southerner's right hand

, lightly massaging the point where the SHIELD commander had squeezed, though he showed no other signs of discomfort. In fact, Nick would find himself on the receiving end of another crinkly-eyed smile.

"It's a little silly to be so distrustin' of someone tryin' to help you, if you don't mind my sayin' so. But if it makes things easier for me to say so again, I'm not lyin' to you folks. I'm just as sick a' this place as you are."

Seeing as the group appeared to be both quick to distrust and currently in the middle of some sort of crisis, the southern gentleman decided that tending to his drink for the time being was likely his best option. They could always let him know when they were ready to go find the cloudless space, after all.

edited 15th Jan '12 10:36:13 AM by DoctorThunder

Ezio's explanation was not helpful in the slightest to the hapless Jedi Master, who could only muster a look of confusion before an old man cut in and made a proposition. Kyle had to admit that the old man was pretty damn persuasive, and at this stage they had quite little to lose by following him. It couldn't hurt to at least take a look, and if it turned out to be a ruse of some sort then they could deal with it as it happened.

Nodding to the man with a quick "Thank you", he turned to the others. After a moment his gaze fell on the cartoon rabbit. "You're really not subtle, you know that, Oswald?"

Locking you up on radar since '09

"Well, he is a cartoon. Not known for subtlety as a..." Nick paused. "Race? Species? Genre? Whatever."

edited 15th Jan '12 11:51:58 AM by tricksterson

Trump delenda est

Griff listened to the proposal as the man spoke. He had a rather ridiculous and suspicious name.

It just seemed so... coincidental that a solution to one of their problems came flying into their lap like that. Yet, were they going to get another chance like this? As suspicious as the man's offer was, they had to try. Still, there was one other problem. Just because they had an area where they could make contact within the multiverse didn't mean that they had the means to do it. "I suppose you wouldn't happen to have a communcations device that could take advantage of that? Wouldn't do us any good if we didn't have a way to make contact with others in the first place." He pointed out.

Then Oswald made a huge commotion and tumbled down the stairs like a maniac. The demon sighed. Turning to Jebediah, he said. "We'll get back to you." He turned towards the cartoon, silently muttering. "Must you be so dramatic? What is it? I presume there's an actual reason for all your screaming and flailing about."

You got some dirt on you. Here's some more!

"Before everyone died... is what I said." Said Wheatley, apparantly not picking up the shock in her voice "I'm sorry, are you hard of hearing maybe? If you are, just ask me what I said again."

"All sorts of things" He said turning to Agatha "almost too many to count! I hear that, running at full capacity, the facility could perform up to a thousand tests a day. My job was mostly taking care of the test subjects and staff, so I never usually got to see the tests, but uh~, here's something interesting they were working on recently that I technically got involved with." Wheatley's eye seemed to slowly roll at the word technically. "The hand-held portal device. It's sort of a gun that makes holes. Not-not bullet holes, I mean like... holes that... you go through to come out of... another... hole. R-really, quite... miraculous stuff, very useful."

"And then the dead man of the dead did dead things to all the dead people."-Two Best Friends Play Dark Souls

Jenny had extracted herself from a broom closet not long ago, and was still groggily undergoing her optimization process, even as she sat at the nearest table, overhearing the strange old man talk about a way to possibly get a message out of Extremus. Perking up, somewhat, she raised her hand like an eager student. "Oh!" she said, "I've got a transmitter!" she said. Her left pigtail unfolded outwards into a sizeable satellite dish array, pinging softly; the robot tapped it twice but gave a thumbs up to ensure that it was working. From her other pigtail she extended a microphone. "I think this is workable," she explained, "but I can't seem to get any signals in here. Where'd you say this point was?"

That was before Oswald bolted down the stairs, screaming something awful and waving his arms in a panic. Jumping at the panicking cartoon lagomorph raising a racket, Jenny quickly extended one of her arms and grabbed him by the scruff of his neck, bringing him within speaking distance of her. "Oswald," she began quietly, putting a hand to his mouth to stop his screaming. "What's wrong? Calm down and explain. No shouting."

Oswald took a moment to recollet himself and calm down. He then looked around to see if anyone outside the group was listening in, especially Jebidiah. The rabbit looked at the rest of the group with a very serious expression.

"Jim is gone," Oswald said in a hushed tone. "I mean totally, completely, gone! Vamoose, zero trace, like thin air! Most of his stuff is still in his room, minus the gun he was going to use on that Mengsk guy he was talking about before and his power armor! I didn't even see a note! Normally I would think he's out for a stroll somewhere, but I doubt anyone could miss a guy wearing a four or five hundred pound suit of metal armor, ya know?!"

edited 15th Jan '12 4:54:37 PM by UdtheImp

DAMMIT MARK, STOP HOTTING HELPY!!

"Jim told me that he was leaving to find another town to settle in, last night," Rogue said to Oswald, when he questioned where Jim had been. "Quite frankly, he did not really think we stood a chance either here or against the Bloodhounds."

"Any of you could quit right now if you wished and find a nice town to settle in yourselves," Rogue had offered to the others. "However, I'm going to at least try to contact #1 before I give up."

Rogue looked back over at Jebidiah, "Now, I ain't guaranteeing that she'll send a ship to pick us up, but I would hope she would and need to contact her."

edited 15th Jan '12 4:31:04 PM by GameGuruGG

Wizard Needs Food Badly

Ezio looked as if he was thinking, and then he nodded at Jebidiah. "Alright, Mister...Hornswazzle, was it? I will come as well. I do not have my own way of contacting the other assassins, but I may as well see if there is a possible way out." He then showed Jebidiah an inch of his sword. "Just be sure — if you dare double-cross us, I will show you what happens when you try to trick an assassin." He sheathed the bit of sword that he had taken out. His hidden blade was now retracted, obviously. He didn't want to reveal it to this Hornswazzle fellow just yet — he figured he would keep it one of the hidden parts of his repertoire.

Apologies if I spelled that last word wrong.

Be kind.

"Wait, so Jim just...left?" quizzed Sandy, "Just like that?"

She shook her head.

"Dang," she sighed.

"Number 1?," Nick said, looking quizically at Rogue.

Trump delenda est

"Morning, big guy" Gene greeted Bayou as he walked down to the floor below. It seemed that waiting for everyone else was a dumb idea, since whoever was in there talking to them was taking their sweet time, and the call for breakfast from downstair was enough to pull him away. Though it might be rude if the new girl still wanted to talk to him, but if she really want to keep conversation then she'd just follow him. Either way, he was hungry.

Moving downstairs (by jumping over the stairs railing from the second floor, naturally), Gene takes a empty seat, leaning into seat enough to bring the front two legs up. Look around he saw that a few others had also woke up before him. Aki was standing next to the bar with haed pointed down as usual and Lina had sneaked back right before breakfast was mentioned, as if called upon by beacon (and bacon). Though unfortunately for her it was unlikely they were getting another free meal like last night. "I don't think we have anything to hunt with, even if we wanted to, Lina." He joked "Unless you want to see a deer get hit by a fireball"

Sometimes I even amaze myself. Currently: Nice and sneaky like

Griff's question caught Kyle's attention. He had a jolt of inspiration out of the blue. It was a crazy idea, but it was one of the best chances they had. "The Claw's comlink is still operational, and it is extremely long range, so we could also use that to communicate with the outside world."

A thought then came to him. "How will we make sure that she's listening, though? And what if the Bloodhounds track our signal?"

Locking you up on radar since '09

"My suit comes with a radio link. In any case, worst case scenario we have enough stuff to cannibalize and cobble something together. Or we would if we had someone with the knowhow. We have any techs in the group?"

Trump delenda est

"Long story," Rogue said to Nick Fury about #1, and turned to Kyle. "That's a good point, but... perhaps the blocking of signals work both ways."

"If we can get somethin' high enough to get through Extremus' natural barrier, maybe the natural shielding that Extremus has will interfere with anyone tryin' to receive the signal back on Extremus," Rogue suggested to the group. "Including, possibly, the Bloodhounds."

"Wouldn't ANY radio signal from a world that is normally dead air be something a race of multiversal watchers instantly notice?" Rogue asked the group. "Even if the Bloodhounds could send signals in and out of Extremus, you think they would risk their possible enemies noticing it?"

"Even an encrypted signal from a world normally with dead air would indicate something was seriously wrong," Rogue noted to the group. "And even if the Bloodhounds could pick our signal up, they only told us to not go to the Pillar of Light."

"We aren't going to the Pillar of Light," Rogue smirked. "But the Bloodhounds never told us we couldn't contact someone on the outside."

edited 16th Jan '12 2:22:51 PM by GameGuruGG

Wizard Needs Food Badly

"True..." At Nick's question, Kyle shook his head sheepishly. "I was only ever good with fixing my own equipment. Sorry."

---

20 minutes later, and the group who had decided to go along with Jebediah were travelling the route to the area the old man had mentioned. Kyle, for his part, was continually sweeping the path ahead, half expecting enemies to materialise and send the ragtag gang packing.

edited 16th Jan '12 2:36:00 PM by Flanker66

Locking you up on radar since '09

"He......said that......" Oswald said to Rogue, his tone almost disbelieving. "He actually said that ........?" The rabbit's ears drooped, the lagamorph becoming clearly saddened. So the space marine, whom the rabbit actually respected, lost faith in his allies and his goals, and basically punked out. Gave up on them. Abandoned........

The terrible sense of abandonment crept up on the toon monarch again.

He steeled himself though. No.... he bitterly thought. Not gonna go down that road again, he swore to himself.

-U-U-U-U-U-U-U-

Twnety minutes later, Oswald was among those who decided to follow Jebediah to this miracle comms location he spoke of. The rabbit didn't trust the old man, and he still did not. However, Rogue's logic made the offer far too enticing to ignore. He preferred to be optimistic, and ANY chance, no matter how long it was, was a good enough chance to take. Besides, he could always give Col. Sanders over there a swift kick in the family jewels if it did turn out to be a trick.

DAMMIT MARK, STOP HOTTING HELPY!!

The inn.

"Yeah, breakfast sounds good. Why don't you come along with us, Wheatley?" Raspberyl suggested, opting not to comment on the robot's report of the numerous deaths he'd left behind. She supposed it made sense that a robot might not particularly care about others dying, given that the typical automaton had very little concept of loss or mourning, but Wheatley had actually sounded somewhat sorrowful, or at least guilty, as he broke the news. It was all definitely unusual, but the demon girl wasn't particularly in the mood to discuss much of anything. Pondering anything for too long currently had the utterly-unintended effect of pulling her thoughts right back to the previous day's events - She had betrayed Sixes and Goggles; let them down and sold them out simply because it held a greater chance of her own survival. No, no, that wasn't the sort of person she was at all!

Frowning as she slipped on her shoes, Raspberyl found herself grudgingly imagining the faces of the Bloodhounds commanding officers sneering at her, her stomach twisting angrily as she told herself that it had been their fault; not hers. She had been forced into a situation where she and the others had had their options stolen from them. She'd had to let the Trope-tans be taken away.

She wasn't the sort of person to just stand idly by while two of her allies were taken away. She'd had no choice.

Despite her turbulent musings and soured mood, Raspberyl was prepared to keep telling herself that for a very long time.

Once the group had made it downstairs, Raspberyl was disappointed to discover that the innkeeper seemed set on refusing them breakfast. The soup had run dry and, as the Dark Elf had been quick to remind their group, conserving food tended to meant no handouts to travelers. Raspberyl supposed she couldn't fault his logic, curt and prickly as it had been, but that didn't make it any easier for her or her grumbling stomach to hear. On top of that, one glance toward the end of the bar revealed a rather guilty-looking Aki tucking into a bowl of the very soup the rest of them had been denied, the awkwardly-gentle tapping of spoon against bowl and her quiet slurping being the only sounds coming from that direction. So Aki got food while the rest of them didn't, huh?

With another frustrated frown, Raspberyl was just about to sit herself down and sulk

for a bit, but a something just outside the bar window caught her eye.

The softly-dyed crimson fabric, the long half-sleeves and gold embroidery, the elegantly-raised collar...It couldn't have been the same one, could it? That would have been the most absurd of coincidences, not to mention potentially-troublesome for her and all her traveling companions. What would he say to her if she were to meet him again? Certainly nothing good. But even so...

"...I'm gonna step out for just a minute. I'll be right back, you guys." Raspberyl stated quietly, walking rather more quickly than was typical. She had to know for certain. Even if he had been dragged into Extremus, and even if they were to be enemies once again, Raspberyl had to know whether or not it had really been him.

For those who haven't been keeping up with the discussion thread, anyone who wants to follow the group leaving town can do that, no matter which group you're in. Those guys are going to be G Ming themselves for a bit. The people staying behind are about to have something else to do, but if you'd like to spend a bit of time doing something with them, go ahead.

edited 16th Jan '12 4:27:52 PM by DoctorThunder