Play@YSDC

Day 1
11th March 2189
23:40 Earth Central European Time
Barnard's Rest Colony, Titan

Virgil exits the Medical Centre, passing an immobile ARM vehicle, stationary in the middle of the corridor. He hurries to the first floor of the Administrative Building. All the offices in the complex are dark but the corridor lights flicker on as Virgil enters. He finds himself outside Kingsley's old office and tries the door, but it is locked.

“CENTRAL, where is the location of Administrator Kingsley? Please can you open this door for me?” It was worth a try.

CENTRAL's smooth female voice says 'Hello Executive Officer Steinmann, I am afraid that I am not authorised to tell you Administrator Kingsley's current location.' There is the slightest of pauses, 'Administrator Kingsley has granted you authorisation to access his office.' The door clicks, as if it has been unlocked remotely.

Virgil mutters something under his breath but he’s pleasantly surprised when the door clicks open. He pushes the door open and quietly steps inside, closing it behind him and looks around to see if there’s any sign that Kingsley has been there recently.

OOC,It's Kingsley's real office, I thought you were after the 'cargo'

Virgil enters the reception area outside Kingsley's old office. It looks the same as the last time he was here, empty desk with an intercom, black leather chairs, low tables with high end document readers and plates of mouldy looking pastries. The wooden door to Kingsley's office itself is closed.

OOC,Roll Listen

Ooc,Yes, much more interesting than writing reports. It was my objective once the coast was clear. Also to finalise its export.

Virgil wrinkles hiss nose at the pastries wondering why they haven’t been cleared and pads over to the interior door.

Listen,500

Listening at the door for a moment, it seems silent inside Kingsley's office. Trying the handle and finding it locked, Virgil again asks CENTRAL to unlock the door and then he enters Kingsley's office.

At first glance, everything seems as he had left it, wooden desk, black leather chair, slightly vulgar antiquities and expensive collector's items.

However, something feels wrong. Virgil can't put his finger on it, the atmosphere maybe, but he feels something tightening in the pit of his stomach.

OOC,Spot Hidden please

Virgil looks around uneasily.

Spot hidden,50 0!

And sniffs the air, wondering what it could be that’s making him so edgy. He hopes the freezer hasn’t packed up and let the body start to rot.

Virgil smells the air, it is crisp and cold. Looking around Kingsley's office he sees several vents set into the walls at the boundary with the ceiling. Presumably these allow gas exchange.

Virgil notices that one of them, towards the rear of the room, appears wide open, the usual flap vent and fan unit are missing, exposing the open ventilation duct.

Virgil feels a deep foreboding; it looks like someone has made an unauthorised entry and if Kingsley’s relics and antiques are all undisturbed that can only mean one thing.
He makes his way to the freezer to check that the cargo has not been tampered with.

Slowly walking around Kingsley's desk, Virgil feels his hackles rise and that discomfort in his stomach spreads to his chest. As soon as he sees the freezer unit he gets a tightness in his throat.

The door is wide open, a massive dent on the inside and the hinges buckled. Although the thick power cables still connect it to the wall, there is none of the misting he saw last time he was here and he cannot feel any coldness. Most strikingly, whatever it was that was in the freezer previously is no longer there.

Virgil walks over and looks into the empty freezer as if that might change what he’s seeing. That someone has stolen the body is the obvious answer but deep down in his churning gut Virgil feels there is another reason for the large dent, the lack of alien and the open vent.
Against his own will, his heart pounding and barely able to breath, Virgil is compelled to walk over to the vent and examine it closely to see if anything bears out his horrible theory.

Spot hidden,50 0

Looking inside the freezer Virgil notices a viscous looking white residue. The freezer door is smashed up and flipping open the control panel reveals only a black display. Turning to the vent he tries to look for evidence of what has happened. The vents are actually quite high up, Virgil can see the fan and vent flaps strewn across the floor, it is difficult to know if they were pushed out or pulled off. There might be some scratching around the outside of the vent itself, but it is difficult to say from this angle.

OOC,You could push that failed roll by jumping up to look at the vent. That would be easier than it sounds since the gravity is low on Titan. It would need a successful Low/Zero G roll but you could have a bonus die for removing weighted boots and another bonus die for taking off your weighted clothes (so that's two bonus dice for doing it in your underwear). Consequences of a fail would be crashing into the vent and making a big noise.

Virgil looks around for a table or similar to push under the vent that he can climb onto first. He takes his shoes off but he certainly is not galavanting around in his underwear.

Zero-G,20 0

He aims to grab hold of the vent edge and pull himself up to have a look inside it.

ooc,I have a bad feeling about this. (Having watched [i]Alien.[/i]

Having pushed along a small side table Virgil takes off the weighted boots that help to keep him rooted to the floor in the low gravity. Stepping onto the table he launches himself up towards the vent and grabs it easily. He finds that even in the weighted clothing he is able to hang by one hand from the vent and examine the opening.

As he suspected, the outside of the vent is scratched and dented while the inside is relatively smooth and unmarked. This suggests to Virgil that someone or something gripped the vent from the outside in order to remove the fan and flaps.

Virgil stares into the ducting, noting a trail of the white viscous substance he saw in the freezer. As he hangs there Virgil hears a strange noise echoing through the vent, a sort of clicking sound, three clicks in rapid succession.

OOC,Sanity roll 1/1d3

The clicking doesn’t do anything for Virgo’s nerves.

Sanity,500 1

It looks like the alien in the freezer wasn’t dead after all, which is barely possible considering its wounds. It has then escaped into the vent and is who-knows-where in the air conditioning system of Bernards Rest.
Things are not looking good; and not sounding too good either.

Virgil drops quickly to the desk, determined to remove himself quickly from any possible alien that may be hiding in the vent.

Dropping gracefully to the desk, Virgil then climbs back onto the floor and grabs his boots.

He doesn't hear anything further.

Virgil puts his boots back on and looks round the office one last time. Then he has a thought and shuts the freezer lid. That will hopefully preserve the scraping of white ichor in there should someone wish to analyse it later.
“CENTRAL, lock the office door after me. Put your highest security on it; no one should be allowed in unless Administrator Kingsley or I know about it.”
He’s rather doubtful whether the AI will comply but it’s the best he can do.

Deleted text,He then returns to his room to prepare his luggage for a swift departure, should it be necessary; he also retrieved his concealed gun and puts it in his jacket pocket. He looks at his watch: is it time to meet the others or has he time to rest first. He also looks around his room to see how big the air conditioning vent is...

Trying the door handle, Virgil finds it is locked again.

OOC,Sorry, had to amend your post a bit. Virgil's not getting out that easily I'm afraid

“CENTRAL, open the door!” Virgil barks. If there’s no answer he tries contacting Marshall Favre. “Marshall? Are you there?” He curses under his breath.

Ooc,:twisted:

There is no response from CENTRAL. Virgil uses his datapad to try and contact Marshal Favre.

OOC,Roll Computer Use and roll Luck

Virgil seems to be locked out of all the usual communication channels. He's unable to hail anyone else or open an audio or visual channel.

However, it does seem like his secure communications protocol is still working. He writes a message to Marshal Favre and sends it.

He waits a short while but there is no response. The encrypted channel will probably only emit a subtle beep as notification on her datapad. If she's asleep it is unlikely to wake her.

“Everyone, even CENTRAL, seems to be asleep.” Virgil mutters, hoping that the alien is asleep too. “Dead would be better of course.”
He looks around for anything he can defend himself with if the worst should happen. He look at the vent but assumes nothing he can do would be strong enough to deter the alien who broke it in the first place.
Finally, he sits down as far from the vent as possible and tries to meditate, trying not to think of what may have happened to Kingsley.

Virgil breaks from his meditation and decides to see if anyone else is awake. He tries a text message First as he’s reluctant to make any noise. He sends it to Sam, Kiara and Jojo.
“Can you get to the administrator’s office. I’m locked inside. Thanks, V.” He writes.

Virgil sends further messages and waits. Hanging on one of the walls he spots an ornamental samurai sword and takes it down. He doubts it will be much use to him but it provides a tiny bit of reassurance.

Virgil sits there crossed legged with the sword across his knees. Despite his best efforts he falls into a doze.

Falling into a fitful sleep, Virgil flits in and out of unsettling dreams. The dull orange glow of a planet in the darkness, the light of dawn just playing on the horizon.



He sees a vast plane of nothingness, orange ice-fields, undulating gently under a hazy sky. The dull orange sun hanging above the horizon. Something vast, dark, occludes the sun, it grows in size, coming closer, larger, obscuring everything. He can see inside it now, strange, alien geometry, creatures that are familiar somehow, large, six-limbed and beak-mouthed, they move with unsettling, other-worldly kinetics, jerky and quick. Their alien faces inscrutable, yet...the twist of those dark eyes, the quiver of the fronds around the beak...something is wrong, something is very wrong...following the gaze of those black horizontal pupils he sees something blacker still, no, not black, an absence of light, like something is swallowing the light.

Then everything gets brighter, the black shape an after image on the retina, brighter and brighter, filling his vision, burning, painful, inches from his face, like an eye, a great eye, looking straight at him, through him, in him.

OOC,He hasn't woken yet, I'll post when he wakes, sorry about the delay, I think the threads will be synchronised soon. SAN check for the dream and his recent experiences 0/1d3 sanity loss.

Virgil murmurs restlessly in his sleep.

San,500

Virgil painfully forces his eyes open, fighting against the blinding light. As his blurred vision starts to focus it seems like the burning eye from his dream is still looking at him.

OOC,Roll 1d100 - I think the dice roller on the site is bust so either use another one (e.g. [url]https://orokos.com/[/url]) or roll at home and post the result here

Virgil grabs the sword and tries to get to his feet.

Dice, So far I’ve found Orokos too fiddly; I might be doing it wrong. Anyhow here are some real dice for now. 63

Opening his eyes fully, Virgil realises he is looking into the fisheye lens of CENTRAL. 'Good morning Executive Officer Steinmann, I hope you had a peaceful sleep.' He grabs the sword from his lap and staggers to his feet, feeling groggy and unsteady.

OOC,No worries, I trust you, it does take a bit of getting used to

“Ugh, what a hideous dream. Probably a combination of recent events and crap food.

So, CENTRAL, have you decided where I can find the Administrator and are you going to let me out of here now?” He walks over and puts the sword back into place, casting a look over the freezer and the vent.

'I am sorry Executive Officer Steinmann, I do not know what you are referring to. The last recorded location of Administrator Kingsley is in his new office.'

The freezer and vents look as they did before Virgil went to sleep.

“It crosses my mind that you might be suffering from Split Personality Disorder, CENTRAL.” Virgil goes to see if the main wooden door opens. He will go straight to the other office to speak to Kingsley.

Trying the door handle it opens easily. Virgil casts CENTRAL's fisheye lens a baleful glare. The administration corridor is still deserted, the automatic lights flick on and Virgil makes his way to Kingsley's new office. Arriving outside the door to the foyer, where Kingsley's secretary has her desk, Virgil finds the door locked again. There is no obvious locking mechanism or keyhole. Peering through the window the foyer itself has dimmed lights, there is a brighter light on in Kingsley's office, although the blinds are drawn.

Virgil takes a random and solid relic and wedges it in the door so that CENTRAL can’t lock it immediately. As he walks down the corridor he looks at his watch to see the time and then knocks firmly on the door of the new office. He looks through to the light in the office area to see if there’s any movement.

Looking at his watch, Virgil notes it is 05.14 Earth Central European Time. As he knocks on the outer door to the office there is an almighty crashing sound that comes from inside. At the same moment the door to Kingsley's office seems to shake. Although there is light coming through the blinds to the office it isn't possible for Virgil to make out who, or what, is in there.

“Christ, it’s got into the venting system and now it’s running amok.” Thinks Virgil. It is far too early in the morning for anyone sensible to be in there.
“CENTRAL who or what is inside Kingsley’s new office?” He asks very nervously. He keeps looking through the window.

CENTRAL responds, 'Administrator Kingsley, Doctor Johnson, and another movement signature are in Administrator Kingsley's new office.'

'Attempting to identify...scanning for life signs...scanning...inconsistent readings...rebooting sensor array...inconsistent readings...sensor array malfunction. I am unable to confirm life signs or classify sensor signatures in Administrator Kingsley's new office Executive Officer Steinmann.'

“What the heck is Johnson doing in there?” Virgil exclaims loudly. He sends the loudest alert he can to the rest of the team:
Wake up and get to Administrator Kingsley office ASAP. This is an emergency, bring weapons and a first aid kit. Do not alert security.
He waits outside the office, too afraid to go in by himself.
“CENTRAL be ready to unlock the door when I give the signal. The other life-form, is it moving?”

CENTRAL's synthetic monotone replies, 'No confirmed life-forms in Administrator Kingsley's office. Administrator Kingsley is not moving. Doctor Johnson and one other sensor signature are moving.'

Virgil hears around a minute of commotion from inside the office then it goes quiet.

OOC,Roll Spot Hidden

His datapad pings, there is a message from Isabella, 'What the hell is going on?'

Spot hidden, (50) roll: 49

Virgil types: I think Dr Johnson is in danger.

He receives a message straight back, 'We're on our way.'

-----

During the commotion inside the room Virgil caught sight of Jojo through the blinds. He's not sure but he thinks there was something else stood behind him. Something big. Something not human.

“Come on, man, get out of there! Surely you’ve seen it.” Virgil thinks the alien has probably got there through the duct, killed Kingsley and then is toying with Jojo for some alien reason.
Whatever, he won’t attempt a rescue by himself and so waits for backup. It’s a shame to see all that profit wandering off though.

A voice comes from behind him, 'What the 'ell is going on?' It is Marshal Favre, she is holding a compact pistol out in front of her with two hands. Her face is grave. 'The others have gone looking for weapons.'

‘Good morning to you too. You can point both that gun and your attitude away from me. You’re not the one who’s been locked up all night by CENTRAL. Here’s the situation.
CENTRAL states that there are three beings inside Kingsley’s office: Dr Johnson, Administrator Kingsley and one other. And then it went weird and couldn’t compute when it tried to ID the third.
And only two are showing lifesigns, I think Kingsley may be dead. Look through the window- you can just about see.”

Virgil points through the foyer window to the lit office window on the far side of the room. “It’s hazy but I can just make out Johnson and the, er, other person.”

A flash of irritation crosses Nicole's face, 'You call for an armed response, you get asked questions, understand?' Keeping her weapon pointing in front of her she approaches the exterior door to Kingsley's office.

'CENTRAL, open this door now, Colonial Marshal security override protocol epsilon-gamma'

The door clicks and then swings open. Nicole swiftly crosses into the office foyer, sweeping to the left and right before fixing her attention on the door to Kingsley's office proper. 'CENTRAL, who is in Administrator Kingsley's office?'

CENTRAL responds in its smoothly modulated electronic tone, 'Administrator Kingsley and Doctor Johnson are currently the only people in Administrator Kingsley's office. Nicole turns to Virgil and raises an eyebrow questioningly.

A momentary look of puzzlement and then relief passes over Virgil’s face.

Keeper, He thinks that maybe he can hush this up after all.

He frowns, shrugs and indicates for Nicole to continue her investigation.