Author Topic: Late night noodles (Read 15587 times)

Tally · « **Reply #60 on:** June 16, 2012, 12:20:28 am »

"Go where?" In the space of moments, the clear path to the city proper disappeared from view. Chunks of rock crashed down, formed a hazardous maze between them and the way out. Temple ran after Cyrus—or tried to run, with the earth pitching beneath his feet. Dust rose up in every direction until he could no longer tell where they were going. He could only keep close and hope Cyrus knew how to get them to safety.

Rhi-Rhi · « **Reply #61 on:** June 16, 2012, 03:32:58 pm »

There came a point where they just couldn't run anymore. Dust rose up in billowing clouds, obscuring his vision, and he heard things crashing around them, and at that point it would be more hazardous to keep moving than to stay in one place because there was no telling what you'd run into. And if things went shitty, even a twisted ankle would be a liability. Hell, they shouldn't have been running while the ground was moving to begin with, but with an unstable ceiling, he wanted to be well away from that.

Hopefully they'd gotten far enough.

Reaching out to where Cyrus thought Temple was, because he'd heard his voice in that direction, his hand brushed cloth--Temple's shirt? His arm? Fuck if he knew--and then tightened in it.

"Too late. Get down," he barked as he dropped into a crouch and pulled Temple down with him. He covered his head with one arm and his nose with his shirt. "Just cover your head and wait."

The quake didn't last all that long in reality, though it felt like it. It lasted all of maybe half a minute. Finally, the tremors subsided and with it came an eerie silence punctuated only the sounds of small rocks and debris hitting the ground, and it was only when it had stopped completely that Cyrus uncovered his head and looked around.

Still couldn't see nothing. Too much dust.

He shook dirt from his hair and turned in Temple's direction. "Y'alright?"

Tally · « **Reply #62 on:** June 19, 2012, 01:11:18 am »

Temple was pulled down nearly on top of Cyrus, who was yelling something he couldn't hear over the crashing and splitting of stone around them. Cyrus dropped down, but Temple did the opposite. He raised up on his knees, covered his nose and mouth with his arm, and looked straight up.

There he stayed until the world stilled again and Cyrus rose up.

"Fine." His limbs trembled. He stared upward at a chunk of stone the size of a bus, floating just above their heads upon a cushion of telekinesis. He eased it over, inch by inch, to lay it upon the ground a few feet away from them.

The breath sighed out of him and he sagged down to the ground to sit on his heels. It hadn't been that heavy, once he'd stopped its fall, but the possibility of what could have happened shook him up.

Rhi-Rhi · « **Reply #63 on:** June 25, 2012, 12:37:09 pm »

"The FUCK?!"

Cyrus had been oblivious to the huge-ass chunk of floaty rock until he saw it float down from the sky and land with a gentle thump beside them. He scrambled back away from it as though it were contaminated by some flesh-eating disease and nearly stumbled back to the ground, and then, when he was a healthy ten feet away from the thing, he turned his attention back to Temple.

"What the fuck was that?!" he demanded, shaken--by what could have happened, the earthquake, that he hadn't realized they were about to be crushed beneath a boulder...and by the sheer raw power of Temple's crazy psychic voodoo.

He knew he was a Pilot. He knew Pilots were badass. He knew Pilots could do freaky-deaky shit with their brains. He hadn't quite realized just how freaky. Like, that they could lift bus-sized objects and make them float. And if he could do that using his mind to a hunk of solid rock, what could he do to a squishy human body?

His mind raced, conflicted. On the one hand, he was relieved. Even he could acknowledge that they would have been ground meat if not for the intervention. On the other, he was also quite aware of how alone they were.

Tally · « **Reply #64 on:** June 26, 2012, 12:23:28 am »

"You're welcome." He was too shaken even to taunt Cyrus for being afraid of him. And that was new, that wariness. Cyrus had never trusted him, but he'd never faced down the reality of Temple's psionics before. Far from satisfying, it was a huge step backward. Cyrus needed to think him ineffectual, unworthy of attention or caution.

Even as Temple got to his feet, a small rumble shook through the ground then dissipated a moment later. He froze.

"Is that another one?" He was compelled to speak in a whisper, as though the simple sound of his voice would draw out another quake. He kept one eye on the ceiling above.

Rhi-Rhi · « **Reply #65 on:** June 26, 2012, 12:52:04 am »

For once, Cyrus had no snarly, angry reply for Temple as he struggled to work out his thoughts and feelings on the issue.

Fortunately, and unfortunately, he didn't have long to think on it.

The ground rumbled and Cyrus froze and tensed, ready to move again if needed; aftershocks were nothing to be taken lightly, as this one had proven. Then a chill went through him when he realized this was different; only the ground was trembling. No fresh debris was being shaken loose from the ceiling. The walls weren't shaking. There was no ominous warning rumble.

"Fuck, no, it's--"

The ground near Temple's feet cracked and split at that and a chitinous head thrust through the opening, mandibles large enough to take off a man's head snapping. The creature was the size of a mastiff with large, badger-like claws, just as capable of slicing through flesh and bone as they were earth and rock. It let out a high pitched screech and swiped at Temple, drawn to him by scent alone as the creature lacked eyes entirely.

Tally · « **Reply #66 on:** June 26, 2012, 01:05:55 am »

Temple was looking up, intent on the ceiling. He didn't realize what a mistake that was until the thing burst through the ground and took a swipe at him. A well-aimed swipe. Temple jumped back, but not quick enough. It tore a gash in his leg even as two boulders of telekinesis smashed its head in between them. Some thick, chunky fluid splattered everywhere, even got Cyrus a few feet away.

The ground bulged up in different places all around them. Temple scrambled to his feet and ran to Cyrus, put their backs together. He estimated no fewer than half a dozen in his vision alone, scrambling up from the ground. And how many still below them? How many directly below?

"What do we do?" Fight, or flee. He didn't know the first thing about this enemy, and didn't have time to go digging around in Cyrus's head to figure out what their chances were if they stood their ground.

Rhi-Rhi · « **Reply #67 on:** June 27, 2012, 01:21:24 am »

Cyrus drew his gun, but before he could fire off a round the bug had already gotten smashed. Globs of warm insect brain plopped against his cheek and neck--a familiar sensation--but Cyrus had no time to feel horror at the use of telekinesis; all his horror was currently being used up on the fact that the place was now teeming with bugs. These things were supposed to have been dealt with!

And one had already gotten Temple.

He covered the Pilot as he ran to him, taking out one the creatures nearest to them. Killing them wasn't necessarily a problem; he'd dealt with enough of these things before to know where the weak points were, and most times it only took one or two shots in the head to stop one if you aimed just so. It was the numbers that were the problem.

And the limited ammo.

And considering the number already surfaced plus the ones still clawing from below? Fuck. There were far more of them than Cyrus had bullets.

Another head broke through the surface near his feet and Cyrus pushed back against Temple to get out of the way. "We get the hell outta here," he answered, and started looking for an opening. There was no good one, and it was still hard to see too far ahead; the damned bugs were only tossing up more dust.

But he had a mental map of the place, at least, and they just had to hope the opening wasn't completely blocked.

And also hope it was, otherwise these things would be getting out.

"Ya gonna manage with that leg? 'Cause you're gonna have to. Count of three, we clear a path to your right and book it, got it?"

It was as good as giving permission without having to actually say the words.

Tally · « **Reply #68 on:** June 27, 2012, 01:38:53 am »

There were so many. If he had faunapathy, he'd be able to feel every stark insect mind out there right now. Dozens clawed their way up, now, and a steady shifting beneath his feet suggested an unknowable number of more below.

Some of them were close, only feet away. He held back, pressed away from them without attacking. His energy was finite, and so too was his telekinesis.

"To my right, on three," he confirmed. "I'll make it."

He hadn't even noticed his leg until Cyrus mentioned it. It gushed blood, but he didn't feel it, save in some back corner of his mind that bore no importance now. More importantly, he could run on it.

Rhi-Rhi · « **Reply #69 on:** June 27, 2012, 02:24:14 am »

The insect right at his feet was struggling to break free but was having difficulty getting the rest of its body through the hard surface. It snapped at air and scrabbled determinedly, and its sharp claws were slowly but surely tearing a bigger hole in the earth. It wouldn't be long.

It was an effort not to be distracted by them all, to focus on what they needed to do and ignore what was so dangerously close.

"Good. Alright." Cyrus took a deep breath and cleared his head; the creature was thrusting its shoulders against the earth, the ground cracking from the force. He didn't know how bad Temple was hurt, just that it was bloody and those claws were neither sterile nor nothing to laugh at, but they'd just have to deal with it later.

"One...two...three, go!"

He broke off from Temple and took off at a run, firing several rounds into the creatures blocking their path and not stopping to see if they were dead before he kicked them aside. Fortunately, the insects were thinner in numbers this way.

Unfortunately, they were attracted to sound and movement and the ones they left behind were now skittering after them.

Tally · « **Reply #70 on:** June 27, 2012, 03:22:57 am »

Temple pressed back against Cyrus. He warred with the instinct to lash out and obliterate every bug in his view. The trouble lay in those not in his view, and what would he have left to fight with if he wasted his energy on needless attacks made in panic?

He sprang away when Cyrus reached three. The leg didn't slow him down—he was right behind. Cyrus took the point, Temple their flanks. He saw the same problem Cyrus had. The path ahead lay clear enough to break through, but the bugs streamed toward them from the sides.

The foremost never reached them. The bugs met a wave of telekinesis that rolled them back into the ones behind and slammed down to crush them into the ground. First one side, then the other.

He had to trust that Cyrus had the front. That left their pursuers and the swarm below, in the earth beneath their feet.

Rhi-Rhi · « **Reply #71 on:** June 28, 2012, 01:54:02 am »

Cyrus didn't look back. Not only did he trust Temple to handle things, and not only did he need to keep focused, but he really didn't want to shit himself seeing what Violet was doing. He could hear it. That was enough.

There was just one more insect ahead of them, and two shots to the head left it twitching but harmless. Cyrus poured on an extra burst of speed, then, dodging around some of the larger chunks of fallen rock, and promptly felt his heart sink lower the closer to the exit they got.

Through the settling dust, he could make out a large pile of rubble, some chunks as large and larger than the one Temple had caught.

Just his luck. It was blocking the way out.

"Fuckin' of course!" he groaned, and now that he was standing still he could feel the little tremors coursing through the ground, the sensation of too many insects above and below. Shit, shit, shit! Best not to think of it, best not to look back even though he wanted to. "Can ya move this?"

Because if he couldn't, they were stuck here.

Tally · « **Reply #72 on:** June 28, 2012, 02:33:52 am »

"If you cover me." It would take a minute or two, he realized, as he drew closer to the rock pile. Not only would he have to move massive chunks of stone, but he'd have to stop the smaller boulders from burying them in the process.

No time for questioning now. He could only trust Cyrus to keep the insects at bay. He put those smaller boulders to good use, flung them off of the heap and backwards at the swarm descending upon them. Then came the hard part, the part that needed concentration, the part that was made all the more difficult by not knowing how close the bugs were behind him.

Temple clamped a vice of telekinesis about one of the massive stones and heaved it upward. Dust and rocks rained down over their heads as he moved it. It was larger than the one he'd caught before, and sweat beaded on his forehead. This was nearing his limit.

Rhi-Rhi · « **Reply #73 on:** June 29, 2012, 01:44:02 am »

"Just do what ya gotta do; I got ya," Cyrus said, and turned to face the swarm.

It was a chilling sight. He'd faced numbers like this before, but that had been with an entire team, and in cases like these, numbers won. Fighting to keep his fear at bay, keeping his body relaxed and his breathing controlled, Cyrus took aim and started firing, finished off that magazine and had to pause to load another. He had to do it all calmly, steadily, and it felt like going in slow motion; couldn't rush or he'd fumble and then they'd be fucked, because every second counted. Then, finished, he started firing again, waiting for them to draw close before picking off the ones nearest to them in a vain attempt at conserving ammo.

Because he was nearly out, and once he was, there wouldn't be much he could do. They could run, maybe find a building to hole up in, but they'd have to hope the creatures didn't get there first.

"Gonna need ya to work a bit faster there, Violet!" Cyrus shouted as one of the insects got close enough to splatter blood and chunks of carapace all over him when he shot it.

More live insects had quickly replaced the ones that had been shot or crushed by rock, scrabbling over crushed bodies and boulders. Soon, not even the bullets he had left would matter; he wouldn't be able to keep them off of them.

Tally · « **Reply #74 on:** June 29, 2012, 02:11:11 am »

"Shut up," Temple ground out. He knew what crawled toward him from behind, what approached that he could not see. Cyrus reminding him of it didn't help. It only shook his concentration.

He let the one immense stone block fall once it was clear. It shook the ground and tossed up dust. Too reckless now, a razor's edge of panic scrabbling at his calm, he grab hold of the second block and heaved it upward. His breath came hard, ragged. He forced himself not to look into Cyrus's mind to find out how much ammo he had left.

It was almost there. Cyrus's gun shots came faster—they were closing in. Just a little further.

As soon as he knew it wouldn't roll back to hit them, he dropped the other where it was. "It's open!"

Rhi-Rhi · « **Reply #75 on:** June 30, 2012, 05:14:10 pm »

As soon as Temple gave the word, Cyrus fled, pausing only to put a bullet in the torso of one too close to outrun. It didn't kill it, but it slowed it, and that was all he needed because he only had three bullets left. Better make them count.

"Go!" Cyrus shouted and shoved Temple in front of him and toward the opening.

Tally · « **Reply #76 on:** July 01, 2012, 10:06:33 pm »

Temple bolted without ever looking behind him. Whatever was back there he didn't want to see it. He felt that to see it might give his panic the force it needed to overtake his reason and his responsiveness.

He was already out of breath from the exertion of moving those slabs of rock. His speed flagged before they'd even covered a hundred feet of distance. He fell even with Cyrus, then behind.

Rhi-Rhi · « **Reply #77 on:** July 13, 2012, 10:40:32 pm »

Cyrus scrabbled through the opening after Temple and was so intent on getting the fuck outta there that the other problem didn't occur to him until after he was through it.

A rather big problem that probably should have struck him sooner:

Plugging the hole back up.

Cyrus realized their mistake as soon as they were through, had an "oh shit!" moment when he heard the creatures clawing their way through the opening and after them, but he didn't look back. That would only slow him, maybe make him falter in fear, and they could afford no mistakes now.

The insects poured after them through the blockade and out into Teinar.

Panting, running as hard as he could, wanting to shout out a warning but having no breath to waste, Cyrus was so focused on the path ahead of him that he only noticed Temple had flagged when he glanced beside him and saw empty space.

Shit!

That was when he looked back.

"Temple!"

The creatures were hot on their trail, and one was closing in on the Pilot, mandibles open and ready to crush whatever flesh it could grab. Without even thinking, Cyrus aimed and fired into the thing, stunning it enough to back off, but not enough to kill it. Two bullets left.

"Temple, c'mon!" he barked, and backtracked just enough so he could grab the man's arm and haul him along.

It didn't even occur to him how easy it would have been to just leave him, to let the beasts have him and correct what, not long ago, he'd considered a great mistake.

Tally · « **Reply #78 on:** July 30, 2012, 11:36:07 pm »

Temple's legs burned. He willed them to move faster but there was nothing left in them to give. Cyrus drew away, and the frantic scrabbling of dozens of subterranean insects closed in behind him.

He expected to feel mandibles close into his flesh, but instead he watched as Cyrus skidded to a halt. Turned, aimed. For an instant, he thought Cyrus meant to shoot him. Then the whistle of a bullet swept by his face and into an insect behind him. Cyrus hauled him on.

To their right, stairs led up to building with solid metal doors. Ahead, the road opened up and the lights vehicles—probably military—glinted through the dust. They were so far away, possibly too far for them to make it. And to the right, a row of parked motorcycles, maybe with keys, maybe not. Risky no matter which way Cyrus took them.

Rhi-Rhi · « **Reply #79 on:** July 31, 2012, 12:16:13 am »

They didn't have long. The insects were faster so whatever decision he made now, he knew it would either save them or kill them--but inaction would kill them, too. Frantic and never slowing in his step, he swept his gaze back and forth, taking in his options and making a snap decision. The doors were a no-go; if those doors were locked, they'd be trapped. The military vehicles were too far away. The motorcycles...

If the motorcycles didn't work, at least they wouldn't be totally cut off. At least they could try to get away. He knew going for them would mean if it didn't work out it was game over, but at the very least they could go down struggling rather than cornered and trapped.

He didn't say a word, just jerked on Temple's arm and yanked him to the right. One of them had to have a key. One person had to be negligent. Just one. C'mooon!

The first five had none and Cyrus was beginning to think this was it, it was over, and he could hear the bugs scrabbling closer, but then a flash of silver caught his eye. There, danging from the ignition, were a set of keys, like it was just waiting for them.

He'd have to thank the driver later.

He wasted no time. Pulling Temple over, he threw a leg over the bike, kicked the kickstand back, and turned the key. Thank gods it was a double-seater. Thank gods Motorail was so damned popular. "Get on!"