Anti-Gnosis Weapon
Finn glared after Valerie's retreating back and, after a moment in which he debated what words to best beat the point she was missing into her oblivious skull with, began to stride briskly after her. Since I'm passing Eeyore along the way, might as well... He opened his mouth to call out to the perpetually brooding youth—
And then the entire auditorium went mad. Or at least the other handful of students beyond himself and the kid sitting in the back did. For Finn Flannagan, this came out to be an entirely reasonable, if unexpected, situation after a few seconds of shock-induced paralysis.
Crossing one arm and putting the other to his chin, the red-shirted critic gazed speculatively at the stage and the impossible, twisting smoke thereof, and began talking to himself. "I can understand a cute new girl and that guy in the back being here, but what the hell is Droopy doing in my dream, of all people...? Besides, it ought to be playing Dvorak or something, not this Eighties garbage. I could do without the inner revelation that I have such bad taste in music. Or maybe the fact that it's shitty symbolizes..."
Before Finn could finish thinking over the implications for his deeper psyche in that impromptu soliloquy, however, a certain dour British ex-pat stormed out into the hall, yelling monosyllabic denials. "Well, that explains him, at least!" the redhead laughed heartily, "No different than in real life, eh, Droopy? Well, maybe a little more direct like this."
"Still..." he mused, returning his attention to the ruined speakers and the writhing, amorphous thing trailing out of them into the air, "This is such a great idea, even for me! I don't know how the tricks with the sparks or the smoke would work, but it could be feasible, maybe. There's enough time before the actual show to figure— Oh!" Finn grinned at the realization, pounding his fist into his palm. "Of course, that's why Eighties! Can't very well let them know it's me crashing their stupid talent show, after all. Classical would just be like sticking a giant neon sign over my head. Good work, brain! Now, who takes the fall? Does anyone around here even like the Eighties, aside from maybe some of the teachers?"
With a shake of his head, he cracked his knuckles and strode eagerly toward the stage once more. Abruptly remembering something as he neared the front rows, the redhead spun around and swept a commanding index finger to point at Benjy. "Oi, Cameraman!" he shouted over Byrne's inevitably louder growling, "Any unexpected insights to give up with the trick with the speakers? It'll be tough enough to make them look ruined while still playing this trash, even without the smoke machines!"
GM of AGOG S4: Frontiers RP; Sub-GM of TABA, SOTR, & UUA RPs
Hallway
Okay, now was a good time to freak out, in Terry's opinion. "O-okay, this isn't normal Why are we ghosts?! " He cried out, only to abruptly freeze. "Hang on...I could touch you just now." He muttered before resuming his freakout. "That mean's Jerry's the ghost! What happened to him?"
One Brunch Man
Rodgers High Hallways
Hyeon stared at Adam flatly, unimpressed gaze braced by the ridge of his sunglasses, before flitting down to the illuminating iPod jutting light out from his upper bicep and the bouncing headphone juuuuust getting to the improvisational bits. Not really going for stealth, here, he bit back, dry as a sacramental wafer, but by the time the girl started yelling at him as well, he threw his hands up in an exaggerated shrug. “Experts disagree.” he said, rolling languidly over every syllable in what he hoped was a clear sign that he didn’t like getting yelled at. Without reason, anyway.
Shaking his head with a sigh, Hyeon withdrew the shades from his face and closed them with a snap!, before hanging them off the collar of his shirt. “Look, guys, I get it, but are we really going to do this? A blackout is a blackout, and name me one exam that’s actually worth getting this worked up over. In two weeks, we’ll forget this night ever happened.” He raised the sheets of paper, attempting to wave them under Ciro and Ivy’s noses like a tantalizing treat. “Just do me a solid, here. I can get you backsta~age~”
edited 6th Jun '17 10:07:00 PM by Uncandescent
If I had that kind of power, I'd have dropped a meteor on your house ages ago~
Transcender of Gender
Rogers High Hallway
"...Once we get this sorted out, yeah?" Ciro plucked the fliers from Hyeon's offering hand. Normally he'd have done so because easy money like that was too good to pass up, but right now he just didn't want the boy agitating Ivy any further. It was clear now, if it wasn't before, that Hyeon plain didn't know about the situation with the teachers.
He lowered his arm, not even glancing at the fliers he now held, keeping his gaze set on Hyeon. "Look, it's not just the blackout. Something's wrong with the teachers, they're like..." His voice died on the word ghosts. It wasn't just that Hyeon wasn't likely to believe it, but Ciro didn't want to believe it himself. "...They're not responding to us at all. I know that sounds weird, but Mr. Claremont is just down the corridor if you wanna see for yourself."
He looked away from Hyeon and towards Ivy, then Adam, and then whoever else may still be remaining in the hallway. Staying here was a bad idea, he decided. The uneasy tension could flip back to panic at any moment, and that could lead to someone getting hurt. He let go of Ivy's arm and jerked his thumb down the hall that led to one of the exterior doors. "Let's head out. We can calm down, get some fresh air, maybe just head home and see what things are like in the morning."
they/them || "Forgive me, regent of queer amphibians" - Lt.BGob
Ivy half-heartedly tried to swat the captivating currency away from her, and added "You're f-f-f-fucking insane, you know that?" as she backed away from him.
Okay, so, they might not be...dead...but, something was obviously very, very wrong here. More importantly, she had zero idea of how to deal with it, or that she even could deal with it. So, that idea of Ciro's wasn't necessarily a good one, just the only one that didn't involve handing out fliers.
Still calming herself down, Ivy managed to get out a "Y-Yeah. There might be...something out there..."
Yeah, the idea of there being something out there causing this was just as terrifying, but Ivy pushed it to the back of her mind.
One Brunch Man
Rogers High Hallway
“My man!” Hyeon said with a wink and a grin as he rewarded Ciro taking the stack with an attempted pat on the shoulder, before fiddling with his iPod to decrease the brightness in preparation for going outside. “‘S cool, I’ve been meaning to hit outside anyway.” Sticking his hands in his pockets, he began following behind the olive-skinned youth—before swiftly drawing one of them out in an attempt to pat Ivy’s shoulder as well. “'pparently it’s a club, Ghosty.”
Glancing over his shoulder, he attempted to catch a glance of their departing Biology teacher. The claim that they were being ignored by all the adults was… interesting, and deserved to be tested scientifically. “Yo, Mr. C,” Hyeon said, cupping his hands around his mouth to form an impromptu megaphone as he continued to walk backwards to keep pace with the others. “Don’t do or say anything if it’s cool we all just get a passing grade a week from now.” After a moment, Hyeon flashed a ‘one moment’ sign at his companions, before cupping his mouth again. “Just stand there, if it’s alright to jack your journal thing and read it aloud in class.” After a moment more, Hyeon shrugged his shoulders, then continued to follow the others around a corner—before peeking his head back out, cupping his mouth one last time. “I was also thinking of taking copies of the answer key and selling them in the parking lot. That cool? Silence for yes~”
After a moment, he would run to catch back up with his compatriots, shaking his head. “I gotta say,” he said with no small measure of respect, “that is some master-class chicken right there.”
If I had that kind of power, I'd have dropped a meteor on your house ages ago~
Hans tried to calm down so as not to spread the chaos and craziness currently spreading through the hallway. He took a breath and uttered, "Mein Gott im Himmel..." one final time, then wiped off sweat from his forehead.
Calm down. He kept asking himself questions, such as if they were ghosts, if Jerry was a ghost, and what was keeping them in here. Calm down...
He could answer those questions without going crazy in the process.
He walked over to Sebastian, noting the mantra the guy was saying and then looked over at Dan and how much worse of a breakdown it seemed the poor guy was having. "We...we need to approach this...calmly. Find a way out of this..."
huzzaaaaaaaah
This post was thumped by the Codfish in a Derby Hat
huzzaaaaaaaah
Watching Zia leave the corridor, Barbara turned around, pointing an accusing finger in her direction. "Come back here! How do you expect us to break out of whatever this is?! We need everyone to be throwing as much stuff as they can... towards... the door..." She trailed off as she noticed that everyone was suddenly looking not at her, but at something behind her, all of them sporting the same terrified look. Still mumbling the word 'door', Barbara turned around...
... and saw herself face to face with smoke, coming out of the doorknob, and taking the shape of what looked like a green snake. It writhed and slithered across the air in front of Barbara, circling around her face like a beast waiting for its prey to make a move. And it didn't have to wait long, because Barbara quickly spun back around on her feet and tried to run after Zia, a squeal gurgling at the back of her throat, the fear keeping it from turning into a full-fledged scream.
Before Barbara could take more than three steps away from the snake, it suddenly lunged forward, piercing the young girl's body and impaling her through the chest. And although the scene was quite graphic, there was no blood, wound... heck, for the spectators, it just looked like the snake ended where Barbara's body began. Yet she reacted as if something had just stabbed her in the chest. Finally, unbound by human concerns, her screams rung out through the corridor, as her eyes were covered in a misty green fog, similar to the element that made up the snake's body. She clutched her own face, clawing at something no one could see.
As Barbara's screams receded back into her body, so did the snake, letting go of the careless girl and watching as she dropped to the floor. A quick observation would reveal that she was still very much breathing, and her eyes had also returned to normal, but apart from that it seemed as if the girl was suffering from a case of the 'knock-outs'. Not that the other students cared: within seconds, all of them were running as far away from the snake as possible, who used this as a sign that human season had just began.
Jessica Hawkins was the second one to go. The snake actually wrapped around her ankle and pulled her deeper into the smoke cloud (which was now turning into a rather dense fog), and before she disappeared inside it, onlookers could see patches of purple popping all over her skin. Silence followed, and then the snake lunged out again, followed by three more snakes, all of them grabbing students by whatever means necessary and dragging them into the rapidly growing fog.
"Sebastian! Help me up!" Amy Bang, another student at Rogers High (and a former member of the D&D Club- she had to leave after her grades started to suffer), yelled at the top of her throat as she saw a recognizable figure climbing on top of an air vent opening. She tried to follow him, desperate for a way to escape, but suddenly one of the snakes had wrapped around her wrist, pulling her back. "Gah! Let go!" Struggling against the snake, Amy held onto a nearby locker for dear life.
"Wait. She's not a ghost- we're all ghosts!" The same girl yelled once she realized Mr. Claremont was ignoring her as well. She sat down, despondent, watching the portly teacher leave the corridor behind, and within a few seconds, she was drowning herself in tears, rolling on the floor as other students looked around, unsure of exactly what to do. They all agreed that they didn't want to deal with her, but they also all agreed that none of them knew how to deal with sudden... 'ghost-ness'.
"Everybody!" Benedict Tudor, one of the seniors at Rogers High- and one of those annoying kids who seemed to have college all figured out- ran around the corner, arriving at the hallway. "You... you all... we need to run!" He panted, pointing frantically at the path behind him. "There's a freaky green fog... it's s-spreading all over the corridors... there's monsters, they're dragging people inside— we need to get to the classrooms!"
And then, like clockwork, a green snake sprung from around the corner, wrapping itself around Benedict's legs. Falling to the ground, the senior clutched at the floor, eventually finding a hole he could hold on to (never in his wildest years did Benedict think he would be thanking Principal Shooter's lackluster attention to maintenance, a topic he had brought to the Parent-Teacher Association's attention after so much hard work). "Don't let them get me- d-d-don't let them get me!" He begged, as a green fog crept up around the corner.
All throughout Finn's overlong speech about the Eighties, his dreams, or something or other, Benjy turned his phone to him, recording the boasting student with a raised eyebrow. "Dude, what are you talking about?" He asked, peering from behind the camera and paying no attention to it, letting it drift into that state of quasi-existence those tiny little powerful smartphones exist in our current world. "That stuff's not a trick, it's... what kind of trick would even be capable of doing that, anyway? Do you even know how special effects wo-wo—LOOK OUT!"
Benjy's warning would come too late. If Finn looked down, he'd see the head of the snake, sprouting out of his chest, having just pierced it not one second ago. The pain that followed, a pain that felt very much like what one would feel from being impaled, would serve as a feasible distraction as Finn's eyesight was covered over by a pasty green texture, like someone (with really awful taste) was holding a giant green translucent curtain up to reality. And once it was completely covered up, Finn saw—
"So, we're all gonna go watch Big Trouble in Little China this Friday." Agent Edward Longhorn said, half of his brain focused on munching the nicotine gum as loudly as possible, the other half focused on throwing a red bouncy ball against the wall of his cubicle, picking it up and throwing it back. Life at the Post-Human Division of the Science and Technology Branch had taken a turn in the past few years.
Originally a dumping ground for agents that couldn't be fired for some reasons, the place gained the kind nickname of 'the Real X-Files' when it was renamed and assigned to cases involving the terrifying middle ground between humans and evolving technologies. Oh, and their first case was a guy that tried to replace his legs with a jetpack and almost blew up a building, just so you don't think they were that serious.
Yet, in 2021, something changed. The Division got a new Director. All agents got extra training. Security clearances were added up the wazoo. Shit was going down, and the FBI didn't want it spreading to the outside world. Apparently, people had superpowers now. What had once blown Agent Longhorn's mind was now part of the routine.
Agent Esther Byun, one of the few that had been willfully transferred to the Post-Human Division and not put there because daddy was a big-name general who needed his kid to do something looked up from one of the pencils she was sharpening. "Are they rereleasing it?" She asked, pulling out one of her wireless earbuds and tapping the top of her iPhone 9 gently to stop the music.
"No, it's the remake." Agent Longhorn grabbed the red ball, spinning around in his chair so he'd face Agent Byun, his cubicle neighbor. "The Rock's in it. Says this one won't be a franchise."
"That'll be a miracle." Agent Byun muttered, slipping her earbud back on. "Can you send me the files on the Dixon case? 2018. I need to make a report to the Director."
Tapping a few times in his keyless keyboard (which he really hated), Agent Longhorn watched as the file was transferred through a secure server to Agent Byun's computer. "Why? Is he sending us on a case? I haven't left this goddamn office in a month."
"No. He's making a presentation to the higher ups. They wanna know what exactly is all that taxpayer money being used for." Agent Byun opened the file, jotting down a few numbers. "I don't think they bought the whole monster thing, so the Director wants concrete proof to shut 'em up. We're this close, you know?"
"We've been this close for five months, Esther." Agent Longhorn grumbled, standing up and adjusting his tie. "And why did he have to put the damn corkboard by the coffee maker? Now every time I get a cup o' joe, I'm reminded of how much we're failing to protect the people of America—"
"And the world, Mr. Longhorn." A voice familiar to Finn spoke out from behind the two. Immediately, Longhorn and Byun stood up, saluting the suited man in front of them. It would take a while before his features would slip into a more recognizable expression, before Finn could say without a doubt that this man was one of his classmates.
"D-Director Barclay." Agent Longhorn stammered. "We were just—"
"I understand your worries, Agent Longhorn." A 22-year old Simon Barclay said, grabbing Longhorn's coffee mug. "But as Madam President herself said, our little secret has the power to change the world. Which is why we must take every single precaution before making a move. Will you want some coffee too, Agent Byun?"
A sharp head shake from Byun sent Barclay walking down the cubicle corridor, towards the coffee maker. "Why are you so frightened of him?" She asked Agent Longhorn, scoffing. "He's 22. He's actually younger than you."
"That's why! You know what I was doing when I was 22? I was smoking weed back at my third college in two years. He's directing a division of the FBI. Just makes you wonder..." Agent Longhorn leaned in to whisper as Director Barclay stopped by the coffee maker- the one near the large cork-board containing black and white pictures of thirty two Rogers High students (Finn among them), with different words written in red underneath each picture. "What did he do to get the job?"
While Finn enjoyed a momentary vision, Benjy continued to record the whole ordeal, not stopping even when the snake receded and dropped the young Flannagan on the floor. The pasty green vision would slowly fade away as Finn regained his consciousness, but Benjy had no way of knowing that: all he could see was a seemingly dead student on the floor and a green smoke snake lunging right for him. "Oh sh—" He dropped the phone, clutching one of the seats as the snake tried to pull him by his waist. "Someone! DO SOMETHING!"
edited 8th Jun '17 8:24:07 PM by Stratofarius
The Fantabulous
Roger High School, Corridor
Zia didn't make it terribly far from the other students banging on the impassable doors when when she nearly crashed into a likewise fleeing student, instead pushing herself into a nearby set of lockers. She swore in surprise and then, realizing just how much better it seemed to make the situation feel, kept right on at it. Nevertheless, she managed to look up at the poor guy she had run into - she recognized him from her year level as the skinny, moody kid who was entirely too fond of turtlenecks. She'd always speculated he was one beret away from starting a beat-poetry club, "Shit, sorry man..." She finally managed, shaking her head and trying to breathe as she regained a grip on the beleaguered bass guitar. The guy was not doing much better by her estimation, given she could hear him muttering 'no' over and over again over the blaring music.
Before she could say anything else the musician heard Barbara shouting at her from the door and then, far more disconcertingly, giving way to a gurgling sound and the terrified screams of fleeing students. Zia turned and ran back towards the screaming, perhaps against her better judgement, until she saw the billowing green fog and writhing tendrils of unnatural smoke striking at other students, "What in the name of fuck!?" She exclaimed, face turning pale and standing slack jawed for a long moment. All that ran through her head were unanswerable questions and far too many expletives. Zia forced herself to snap out of it and realized she had to do something. She charged forwards, threw the bass at the fog and grabbed onto a student being dragged into the wall of fog, attempting to kick or beat off the snake-like thing as she pulled back, "Screw you, you bastards!" She swore.
edited 9th Jun '17 8:02:02 PM by Lt.BGob
“Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?”
...no...no no nonononono, the green smoke's there again, looming right ahead. It's circling that Barbara girl, bobbing in front of her face like a cobra, she's making for a run and- "OH, JESUS!" It went straight into her. It lunged straight into her, impaled her, stabbed her, and I just felt this rush, like...excitement, almost? No, no it couldn't be excitement, because she's screaming, she's crying, she's in absolute pain, and oh Jesus God, she doesn't deserve this. I'm feeling sick, a cold feeling's gushed through me, my fingers are prickling, the music's too blaring, it's all way too much, I have to get out of here, I have to get out of here!
Quickly, I dart back in the other direction, but wait, I have to catch myself. The green smog's back in the auditorium, doing god knows what to the people in there. I look back behind me, and the smog's snatching up kid after kid like some kraken-hydra from hell. There has to be another way, some kind of exit, somewhere! Oh god, it doesn't seem real. This has to be a nightmare, any minute now I'm gonna see some shadowy winged NO! Gotta focus. Look around. Feel the walls. Find another door, find a way out of this nightmarish madness. Where's another door, where's another classroom door?
Blood Mage Apologist
Rogers High, Corridor
Sebastian had just managed to tear the grate off of the vent, his fingers raw and slightly bloody when everything abruptly went to hell.
He heard screaming, and he whirled to see Jessica get dragged into the fog. Suddenly, there were more of the snakes and they were grabbing people and oh god-
And then Amy was screaming for his help, a snake trying to drag her into the fog. His eyes widened and his mind raced, What the hell did he do? He had to do something!
Realizing he was no doubt going to regret this, he dropped to the ground and grabbed the chair he had just been standing on.
"Let her go, you slimy green son of a bitch!" Using every muscle in his body, he hurled the chair into the snake with all of his might. Whether or not it hit the thing, he grabbed Amy's hands, trying to drag her free.
edited 9th Jun '17 4:29:22 AM by Cwest5538
Wooze looks at Glass with a 'please take her away' look
Transcender of Gender
Rogers High Hallway
Rolling the fliers up and tucking them into the band of his jeans, Ciro had let Hyeon pat him and then started down the corridor towards the exit. Hyeon's little game with Mr. Claremont, bizarre and inappropriate as it was, was almost humorous enough to make Ciro forget about the fear still lining his stomach, just waiting for the right moment to envelop him once more. He'd become so aware of the sensation that, when the girl broke down crying, he had to pause for a moment to register that it was her, and not himself, that had started to wail.
He motioned for the others to keep going and then knelt down next to the girl, utilising words of comfort that he normally reserved for children who had been hurt, or were missing their parents. Vague reassurances that 'it wasn't that bad', and 'everything was gonna be okay'- it wasn't the words that were important, after all, but the confident, trusting tone that they were spoken with. Which, honestly, he was having a hell of a hard time trying to muster right now.
All that effort promptly went down the drain when Benedict rushed around the corner, pursued by... green fog? Ciro has still been focused on the girl, and had only seen Ben go down out of the corner of his eye. Turning now, he struggled to parse the scene before him: Benedict, on the floor, with incorporeal fog somehow dragging him back towards its cloud of origin. Almost, but not quite, the craziest thing he'd seen this afternoon.
Perhaps it was his confusion that spurred him to act, or just his latent inability to associate fog with a direct, violent threat. Maybe it was his nasty habit of trying to assume responsibility even when his mind told him not to, or it was his base response to hearing a cry for help. Maybe it was all of the above. Whatever it was, in the next moment he'd yelled at the girl to get moving and rushed back towards where Benedict lay prone. Grabbing the other boy by his forearms, Ciro found his footing and then tried to yank Benedict forward and out of the fog.
they/them || "Forgive me, regent of queer amphibians" - Lt.BGob
After Hyeon treated her that way, seeing that he got the same cold shoulder and another girl reacted even worse than her was comforting, in a not-at-all-comforting way that just confirmed they were all screwed instead of just her. Then, as Ivy was staring at Ciro trying to help the girl up, Benedict came with something else at his heels.
Ivy didn't wait a single second, she immediately spun on her heel and started sprinting in the opposite direction, down the hall and away from whatever the fuck that was. No, she didn't really notice that she was leaving everyone else, she knew she was saving herself.
Hans gulped, fear gnawed at his sense of reason and eroded at his sanity, and seeing this, seeing the horrific snakes made of green smoke drag people off one by one made both of blood boil and his mind reel from the sights.
He watched Barbara be dragged away and cursed at himself.
He watched Jessica, poor poor Jessica, be taken away and he cursed himself again for both his powerlessness in the face of this and how much of a coward he was. No matter what he did his feet wouldn't move in time to help Jess.
He finally broke out of it when he saw it going for Amy, and went to try and help Sebastian save her from the snake. He had no real weapons on him, and could not throw something at the snake. But he did go to try and hold one of Amy's hands to keep her from being dragged in. He was not a weakling, and he thought he could save her then and there.
I don't want to fail anyone else. Not again. Never again.
He remembered the people he had hurt and thought how much he would have preferred to help them now. That kept him going as Sebastian threw that chair at the monstrous smoke, and Hans tried to keep hold of Amy.
someone
Mirielle, Chaos
And small, slim, yet calloused hand grabbed Simon and pulled him into a classroom. To be specific, the Home Ec classroom, where several teens seemed to be hiding from the green smoke. There was also a distinctive smell of fresh baking bread.
"In here, Simon!" Mirielle said to the teenager. She was frantic, having been focused on keeping the people within the Cooking Club from panicking as everything turned crazy. "What's happening out there?" she asked, clearly somewhat stressed. Simon would be passed a still-warm chunk of bread, ( "My mother always says that food is good to keep you from panicking. We don't have cookies, so this will do!")
Before Simon could respond, however, Mirielle went back to the door and stuck her hand out in front of Ivy. "In here!" she shouted at Ivy.
edited 10th Jun '17 3:57:12 PM by secretlyasuperhero
[TOP SECRET]
One Brunch Man
Rogers High Hallway
Hyeon stared at the crying, sobbing girl with utter confusion, before reaching up and gently clasping the cord of his remaining earbud. The sudden surge of 80’s pop, coupled with the distant screaming, and the overwhelming miasma of dread began to speak to how maybe, just maybe, there was something weird going on. “Does anyone else hear—”
A nearby scream snapped his head to attention, watching one of the prissy rich kids getting dragged into what was maybe the second or third worst fog-related special effects shitshow he’d ever encountered. Before he had time to consider the who, the how, the what, he was off like a shot, taking off in synchrony with Ivy—in the opposite direction.
Shrugging his jacket off of his shoulders, he rested it on the crying girl’s shoulder, before snatching a metal water bottle off of her backpack—“Borrow this? Thanks”—flipping it in his hand to test its weight before gripping it in both hands and using it to smash the glass covering a nearby fire extinguisher.
Pulling the heavy, wieldy instrument of fire suppression to the ground with a clink against the tile and of broken glass, Hyeon began to drag it toward the scene of otherworldly molestation, slowly at first but picking up speed. A voice in the back of his head told him this was stupid, possibly even suicidal; he slapped his iPod, turning up the volume until he couldn’t hear the voice anymore. Breaking into a dead run, he leapt into the air, extinguisher hoisted into the air behind him, after which he would bring it down on the smoky tendril with all of the force gravity and his frame could muster.
edited 10th Jun '17 7:33:33 PM by Uncandescent
If I had that kind of power, I'd have dropped a meteor on your house ages ago~
Anti-Gnosis Weapon
In Finn's current state of mind, there was no room for questions like "I'm Alive?" As far as his consciousness was concerned, being alive was just the natural state of existence. It would be far more disturbing to exist and not be alive, after all.
Another reason there was no room for such questions was that Finn's mind was currently being bombarded by the complete, step-by-step history of his shirt, undershirt, underpants, pants, and socks — made on assembly lines in Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Hong Kong, and Chinese clothing factories respectively, the majority by young men and women whose apparent ages and working conditions would be considered highly questionable under the standards of American labor laws — not to mention the considerably longer history of the auditorium's carpeting and the hundreds upon hundreds of teenage and adult feet that had trodden upon it, most of their shoes confined to a few dozen varieties.
Instinctively twitching every which way as the information uncontrollably flooded into his brain, the sharply-dressed young man writhed on the ground and spat out unintelligible, hyperventilation-fueled gasps for an indescribable, indeterminate period of time. A couple such spasms saw one hand and then the other fly up to tightly grip his suit and tie, which only served to momentarily exacerbate the issue.
Once the roar of foreign sound and sights faded from his perception and the shivers seizing his body finally began to subside, however, the redhead slowly pulled himself into a crouch and, his legs a little unstable at first, got to his feet... to be greeted by the sight of Benjy, still yelling and fighting for his life against the grip of the snake-smoke-thing.
Shaking his head along with the rest of his body, Finn shoved his hands into his pockets and sighed heavily, which seemed to do wonders for restoring his usual composure. "Will you shut the fuck up already, Cameraman?" the seemingly resurrected teen demanded, pacing back up the rows he had passed minutes before, "You'll be fine in a minute or two. Just think of it like... getting a shot or having your blood drawn, except many times more painful and the nurse is a phantom serpent thing. There's no way you're getting away from them, clearly."
Pausing as he finally reached the row his darker-hued club member had been sitting at, Finn turned to stare at the gaseous apparitions. He knew, with a weirdly absolute sort of certainty, that they were done with him and weren't going to be going after him again, but still, nothing about their existence or what they had done and were still doing made any sense whatsoever. Humming Bach's ''Air''
to himself as he contemplated — mainly to distract himself from the still-blaring chords of the Talking Heads — he ignored any pleas or agonized screaming by the other boy and shuffled awkwardly down the chairs, then bent down, extricating a single pocketed hand to carefully grab what was the most important thing according to his still-racing thoughts: Benjy's fallen phone.
edited 11th Jun '17 6:58:49 PM by darksidevoid
GM of AGOG S4: Frontiers RP; Sub-GM of TABA, SOTR, & UUA RPs
OH CHRIST IT'S GOT ME, IT'S DRAGGING M- No, wait, it's just that girl from a couple years down, pulling me to safety. Finally in a small, closed environment again, I can prop myself against the sinks and gasp "Whatthefuck whatthefuck whatthefuck" a few times over. No sense in processing the damn pool-pah swirling outside the door, so let's take a minute to try and remember the girl's name. Miriam? Mary-Anne? Something along those lines? Brilliant, she remembers my name, and I'm crap with any names outside my family. Well, we've bumped into one another enough times outside class for me to get half a read on her. Cute, but not irritatingly so, maybe a little too away-with-the-fairies. Honestly, with her twee bakery background and particular brand of sweetness, I feel like she belongs more to a cottage in the fields of Arcadia, as opposed to a gentrified fishing town in the armpit of Nowhere, USA.
Oh, great, ask the easy questions, why don't you? So here I am, once again struggling to begin an assortment of words, and meanwhile she's only halfway listening because she's off being the good deed fairy and really I should've been out there randomly saving people like everyone else instead of cowering like a coward but that only matters if any of this is actually real-
"You know what? Y-you know what, why don't you tell me what's happening? Why don't you step out there, soak in all of that nightmare nonsense, and report back what you make of the current state of reality, because I do not have the time or the god damned wherewithal to process this mess and adequately distill fact from freaking fantasy just yet."
There. Said my peace. Nothing to do now but slump with my back to the wall, glowering at all the world and munching on a large bite of that freshly baked bread.
"This is very nice." I mutter, not quite turning off the glower just yet.
edited 11th Jun '17 4:02:02 PM by LizardOfAus
Valerie was not one to be scared of snakes. Most of them were smaller than humans anyway, and to her knowledge the poisonous ones were not that common around here. When the snakes in question were abominations and attacking people, in a situation that was already extremely weird? That was a good reason to be afraid of snakes.
She took one look at the green smoke with a wide-eyed expression, before immediately turning and running in the other direction. No, she still wasn't panicking. It didn't matter she had no idea how to not become smoked snake chow; if she panicked, her death was absolutely certain. She had to keep a cool head and figure out a way to avoid the monsters.
Then she skidded to a stop. The auditorium. Her fellow Acting Club members. How were they holding up? She didn't want them to get eaten, not even that pretentious "critic." Furthermore, multiple heads were better than one, especially when an out-of-context problem such as this was concerned.
So she raced back to the auditorium. Upon entering, she quickly looked around. Much to her dismay, it was also full of smoke snakes.
"E-everyone!" she shouted, trying to make herself heard over the general chaos, "Try to calm down! I-if you panic, that'll make it easier for the snakes to get you!"
Then she started running again, looking for some kind of escape route that wasn't full of snake. In the process, her eyes fell upon the struggling Benjy, and the nearby "critic" who was ignoring his pleas like an absolute douche.
Well, time to prove herself the better person here! She ran towards Benjy and did her best to try and pull him away from the snakes.
Icon by Civvi the Civilian!
huzzaaaaaaaah
Zia's kicks would have worked quite effectively if her targets weren't made out of smoke. As a result, the instant she first tried to beat off the snake monsters, her feet went right through the snake holding onto Leslie Jefferson's waist. Not wanting to let go of Zia, the African-American student held onto her hand, her pigtails rubbing against the floor as both her and the wannabe musician were dragged right into the green fog.
Inside, Zia watched as students were dragged into the fog, raised up in the air and stabbed by another smoke snake. After that, the process would be pretty much the same: the student would scream, a misty green liquid would cover his or her eyes... but Zia watched as some of the students around her changed. Jessica Hawkins got up from the floor, her long unruly hair unable to hide the fact that her skin was now an ethereal shade of purple. Michal Harvins, a boy from her class, stood completely still as his entire body was covered in flames, his very flesh turning into a hellish lava-like being. And Leslie Jefferson transformed before her very eyes, icicles growing all over her skin, until she resembled a grotesque caricature of a female ice golem.
With a swoop, one of the smoke snakes raised the distracted Zia by the ankle, and without giving her a second to consider what would happen to her, another smoke snake went right through her stomach. A frightful, way-too-real pain would course throughout Zia's body, as her vision became cloudier and cloudier, heat spreading through every inch of her inner muscles as if her skeleton was about to explode. And once her vision was obscured, the smoke snake dropped her on the ground, moving onto another target, letting her recover her consciousness and realize that something had changed within her...
SOMEONE HELP ME! The unadulterated thoughts of Jessica Hawkins streamed into Zia's mind. MOM! MOM! MOOOOOM!
ITBURNSITBURNSITBURNSITBURNSITBURNS Michal's stream of consciousness yelled right into Zia's ear, as the boy looked ready to burst into tears.
What... what happened to me? Leslie thought out loud, looking at her hands as ice spread throughout the floor with every step she took. "Zia..." She finally spoke, reaching out for the recognizable figure in front of her, the very air growing colder and colder the closer she got. "... what is going on with me?!"
Although Sebastian's chair, much like Zia's feet, didn't actually hit the smoke snake, the monster receded all the same, letting go of Amy. Without waiting a beat, she clambered up to her feet and ran right into Sebastian's chest. Not one to let an awkward moment supersede a terrifying situation, she promptly wrapped her arm around Sebastian's.
"We have to hide!" She told him, her lips quivering as she looked around for a way out, heading right into Hans' chest. "Oh." This time, her general discomfort around Hans did supersede her terror. "T-thank you... I guess... " She mumbled, taking a step back only to look down and notice that the green fog had already crept up to their ankles. "We need to get out of here." She told Sebastian and Hans, holding both of their hands. "There's a teacher's room nearby, we can— AAAAH!"
Amy was thrown to the ground when a snake stabbed Hans right through the chest, lifting him up in the air a little, no longer constrained by the seemingly implied requirement of having to drag its target into the fog first. As Hans' vision began to get cloudier and cloudier, Amy tried to pull him back, only to watch Sebastian get stabbed by another smoke snake. This time, Amy didn't have more than a second to react, a precious second which she used to let out a low whelp, as if admitting defeat. Within that very same second, a smoke snake also went right through her, placing the three of them in a circle as the pain and the smoke coursed through their bodies.
Hans was the first one to be released from the smoke snake, and unlike the others, his consciousness and vision would return instantly. Quick enough for him to notice that he wasn't feeling the soft breeze of the air conditioner anymore... and that his landing had also caused a visible crack on the floor of the corridor, as if his weight had increased. Sebastian, on the other hand, would feel something wholly unique, as the smoke snake inside him writhed in pain at the touch of another entity, releasing him just in time for both of them to witness Amy's transformation: the girl yelled in pain as her own body seemingly turned into dust and disappeared, leaving behind just her outer clothes and her smartphone, its screen locked behind a code.
If it hadn't been for Ciro's pep talk, then the girl might have stayed behind and remained in her little corner of the corridor. But with his words of encouragement, she mustered up enough strength to get up and run away from the situation, hopefully into safety- following Ivy's lead, who she believed to be a makeshift leader.
However, Ivy (and Mirielle, who had tried to reach the other girl) headed into another transformed kid, one that Ivy would instantly recognize. Sure, it had been almost four years since they had made regular contact, but no amount of purple could disguise Luna Black's toned skin and permanent smirk... even the fact that said smirk was now a permanent gasp, her mouth and eyes replaced by the crackling light of thunder itself, as if her innards had been replaced by a lightning storm.
"... Ivy?" She muttered softly, the image of her long lost friend bringing to mind a kind of comfort that she had forgotten as well, ever since Luna had decided to hang out with the 'punk' kids and ditch her old friends in a process that would eventually (supposedly) make her the coolest girl in class. And that comfort triggered something within her, as the lightning that had been spilling out of her mouth slowly died down, her own body returning to some form of normalcy.
As if on cue, Mr. Claremont appeared out of a nearby corridor, still absort in a call. But this time, he noticed one of the children: Luna. "Ms. Black!" Mr. Claremont said, lowering his phone, still ignoring Ivy, Mirielle and the other kids like before. "Didn't you hear the announcement? Students are supposed to stay inside the classrooms. What if this is an emergency situation in the making? That's why we need all of you to stay inside so we can safely evacuate you in case it's needed."
Benedict held onto Ciro's hands, a face that had once been reserved only for sniveling at other students now visibly begging for help. "Don't let me go! Don't let me go! Don't let me go!" He cried out, tears and snot slowly dripping down their respective places of birth in his face. All of Ciro's struggling was for naught: the smoke snake was far too strong... at least until Hyeon brought the air extinguisher down onto it. The moment the extinguisher's naturally cold exterior made contact with the snake, it suddenly stopped being see through and reacted to the pressure of the portable device, squirming and letting go of Benedict before retracting into the fog.
"I can't believe it." Benedict muttered, standing up, trembling and cleaning his face with the sleeve of his shirt. "Jung saved me." He blurted out, exhibiting that classic Benedict-ickyness he often displayed towards less exemplary kids. Unfortunately, he didn't have the time to lay down a sick comeback to whatever problem he saw in Hyeon's very being, for the smoke snake suddenly sprouted out of the fog once more, trying to not only slap the air extinguisher out of Hyeon's hands with a mighty slam, but also follow that up by going right through the boy's body, returning to its original see through status.
Watching Finn nonchalantly stand up from being stabbed, Benjy's eyes narrowed and he glanced at the weak hold he had on the chair in front of him, not paying attention to the boy grabbing his cellphone. Finn would not only be bombarded with images of the phone's whole history- made in China, shipped to the US, sold to a man in New York, used for two years, sold used to a woman in Oldport- Benjy's mom- and then given as a gift to the boy, after which he proceeded to fix the screen and the buttons all by himself in his garage, before being used to film his DIY videos for a fledgling You Tube channel- but also see firsthand that the phone was still recording, and had so far amassed about five minutes of footage.
And so, he let go, just in time for Valerie's fingers to grasp against his own. Once Benjy saw Valerie's look, he immediately regretted his decision, trying as hard as possible to hold onto something else: but alas, it was for nothing. Soon, he and a few other Acting Club kids were lifted into the air and stabbed by the smoke snakes. Unlike Finn, their transformations were much more visible: one kid began to literally vibrate so fast that it seemed like copies of him were sprouting all around his area before he fell to the ground, unconscious...
...a nearby girl's hair suddenly grew to be almost as twice as long as her...
...another girl's body suddenly began growing inky spots of black as her feet, legs, and eventually her entire skin began to melt, until she had disappeared and all that was left was a puddle of black ink on the floor...
...and Benjy writhed in pain, yelled at the top of his lungs, as he grew three extra pairs of limbs, small fur strands all over his body, some of his teeth growing into giant fangs as ten more eyes sprouted all over his face. Once he hit the floor, the young boy had been turned into a grotesque insect creature, mucus dripping out of his exposed fangs as two moth wings ripped through the back of his shirt, just as his fingers turned into long claws.
Slowly, all of the kids regained their consciousness: the boy once more started to vibrate, moving as if he was suffering from the effects of 'lag', much like an online videogame. The girl's long hair suddenly latched onto the nearby seats, ripping one of them right off the auditorium floor as she struggled to get back up on her feet. The puddle of ink slipped and slid down the stairs, heading for the door... and Benjy's head slowly snapped up, all of his fifteen eyes now blood red, as he began walking on the wall, fluttering his wings and spewing an acidic mucus on the walls.
edited 28th Mar '18 1:55:06 PM by Stratofarius
Blood Mage Apologist
Roger's High, Hallway
Sebastian winced slightly as Amy had ran into him. "Good idea. We can-" He began, about to suggest making a break for it. Naturally, it was at that moment that a snake threw itself right through Hans.
Amy was thrown to the ground and Sebastian reached a hand towards her- and suddenly there was searing pain and a snake through his chest and oh god oh god-
Something was in his head, but he didn't care because it hurt so much and so furious and oh god it hurt. And then suddenly there was the cool embrace of darkness, a cold chill that numbed the furious pain running through his body.
It was relief.
And then the snake was retreating. "Amy!" He cried, watching in horror as she seemed to dissolve.
"Do you want to save them?" Something asked in his mind.
He swallowed. This thing was alien. Hell, he wasn't sure why he was thinking clearly. He should be screaming, panicking, but time had seemed to slow down.
He nodded, to no one in particular.
"Focus your energy. Strike them down. I will help you."
Sebastian let out a scream, and suddenly black mist curled around him, a striking contrast to the green of the snakes. Eyes blazing with fury, he extended a hand and a lash of shadow appeared, curling and twisting.
With a roar of anger, Sebastian pushed his hand towards the snake, and the shadow raced towards it, the tip suddenly a piercing spike of darkness and death.
edited 12th Jun '17 6:11:12 PM by Cwest5538
Wooze looks at Glass with a 'please take her away' look
Hans - Close to death, close to life
Hans was just about to agree with Amy and try to run for cover from the horrifying smoke when he felt something cold rush through him. Then he was suddenly lifted from his feet, letting out a choked gasp of pain as he saw the smoke serpent had skewered him and lifted him from the ground.
His eyes widened.
A curse caught in his throat before he could say it. He just looked at Amy as his eyes clouded, sight becoming more difficult.
Was he...gonna die here? Wherever this really wa—-
His thoughts were interrupted by the snake quickly withdrawing and his vision and abilities returning to him within moments...just enough to note that when he landed it cracked the floor, as if his body had gone up in weight.
...I thought I was dead, that my time was called now, for all my misdeeds...
He could no longer feel the soft breeze of the air conditioner for some reason. As he clumsily got back up, in the process smashing the wall beside him a bit, he checked himself out before moving forward. His clothes were undamaged, which was good considering what was on his chest and his back.
He then noticed a weird glowing blue aura that seemed to waft off of his right arm. He did not know what that was, but he knew it was not normal. He could not feel the breeze on his arm...was the glow somehow controlling such a small thing?
He then gulped as he saw Sebastian do something after getting back up himself, and Hans ran forward a bit as some umbral force rushed at the green smoke suddenly.
His words caught in his throat as he rested against the wall, noting that unconsciously the blue aura was levitating some chunks of the wall out and rotating them just a bit in front of him. "What...the..."
Now, on the topic of Luna Black. They had seen each other, of course. They did talk. A couple months ago, Luna texted a birthday message to Ivy, and she responded. They said hey to each other in the hallway, when one or the other decided to look in the other's direction. Every once in a while, they'd talk for a little bit, before something pulled one of them away. That's just how their friendship was, nowadays. They knew each other.
Ivy did not know what was standing before her, now.
She stood there in shock at the electric thing in the middle of the hall, trying to understand what it was and trying to build up the courage to run past it. It only confused her even more as it slowly changed back...except...Luna called her by name.
Ivy slowed her thoughts and her breath down, and an uneasy smile came on her face. "Luna...thank god..."
In everything that had happened so far, Luna had been the only familiar thing. Her mother couldn't see her, people were screaming and acting insane. She took a couple of steps toward her friend. She could feel comfortable being next to her, for once.
Up until Mr. Claremont spoke, she had convinced herself that it was going to be alright. How was she the invisible one? Out of everyone here, how was Luna normal in his eyes? Then, the same image that she had brushed away so easily came back to mind, of the thing in Luna's shape spitting lightning like it was screaming.
This thing in Luna's shape wasn't her friend, at all.
The smile on her face quickly became horror again, and she immediately sprinted back around to Mirielle as she shouted "CLOSE THE DOOR!"
—Rodger's High, Hallway—
At this point, Dan had entered the stage of hysteria where your brain pretends like there is nothing wrong at all, in an attempt not to lose your sanity.
He was actually grateful for this, as it meant he could think more rational thoughts.
Rational thoughts like WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?!
Stay calm, he berated himself. You'll get through this.
Now that what he assumed was the source of his bad feeling had manifested itself in the form of his worst nightmares, he thought that he would feel better.
Wrong.
In fact, the feeling was stronger than ever.
But what could possibly be worse than this?!
bork