Cthulhutech: The Borderlines of the World

[EarthScorpion]

April 12th, 2091

The A-Pods on the Werewolf hum as the transport cuts around the south of Ireland. The resonating buzz passes through the hull, filling the air. It's slightly annoying at first, but after a while, your brain just cuts it out. The secondary engines, mounted on protruding struts, are facing directly backwards, adding their power to that of the main, central thruster, and thus you soar along at just under the speed of sound.

The body of the craft is locked down, and the only way to see outside is through the wall mounted viewscreens. There's more space inside than usual, even with a bulky suit of power armour stored at the back, as the craft isn't packed with the potential 12 passengers it could carry. Moreover, the team leader is up in the cockpit, with the pilot, leaving you to rest in peace. Some are using the opportunity, trying to grab what rest they can, but the hum makes it difficult. For some reason, your brain starts paying attention to it when you're trying to rest. The lights are at their normal, white, setting, too,which just makes it more difficult. And as a consequence, the members of the Armacham team have had to find other ways to entertain themselves.

One passenger, a female Nazzadi, seems especially fidgety. During the flight, you've seen her field strip her rifle (twice), go through the ammunition supplies and count them, checking that they match with the numbers on the box. Looking more closely at her, you notice that she's wearing blue contacts and has dyed her hair brown. It's rather strange to see a Nazzadi without red eyes, but when the lack of whitework tattoos is noted, it might be that she's one of the more assimilated members of the dark-skinned cousins of humanity.

Unless she is just a very dark skinned human. This has the potential for some embarrassment.

She finishes counting the number of needler pods again, and returns to her seat, slumping back down.

"Bored, bored, bored," she mutters to herself. She then looks up. "Anyway, now that I've checked everything properly," she begins, seemingly starting the conversation out of nowhere, "which is good, I can talk. As this is our first assignment together, and we didn't really have time to talk in the briefing... they really didn't tell us anything, did they? Is it always like this? Anyway, so, yes. Um. Ah, hell, I'm just so bored I'll talk about anything. Listen to me blabbering on."

She starts drumming her fingers on her seat.

[Academia Nut]

A man sat in the seat restraints of the Werewolf, idly reading something on his PDA. He was Caucasian with a slightly olive complexion that had gone pale, suggesting that while his ancestry was from a sun drenched place, he himself had not picked up much sun in quite some time. His head and face were bald and beardless, smoothed in a way someone his apparent age could only achieve in the long term with a great deal of maintenance or the occasional use of nanodilapatories. Unlike everyone else he was wearing just a simple jump suit instead of armour, implying that he was the operator of the powered armour stowed at the back.

Eventually though the man lowered his PDA and glanced with annoyance at the bored woman and said, "Look, some of us are trying to get a few things done before the mission, so unless you want to know how to improve the magnetic confinement of a plasma cannon or discuss the finer points of Mesoamerican ritual magic, I suggest you not disturb me with your prattle."

Grumbling, he went back to reading whatever it was that he had on his PDA.

[Kurald Galain]

Across from the power armor pilot a woman of mixed Human/Nazzadi descent jostled awake, her ancestry obvious from her odd, slate gray skin and eyes of amethyst with the outer edge faded gray. She wasn’t tattooed, which was mildly unusual, and she was dressed in the same light combat amour as most. There really wasn’t much hint of her specialty, whatever it was. Mainly though, she just looked tired. Dark rings seemed to be burnt in around her eyes.

Still, she looked up at the sorcerer with a surprisingly genuine smile and laughed lightly, “The finer points of Mesoamerican ritual magic sound interesting enough. How did a wizard end up a pilot anyways? It seems an odd career move, a story must be involved. Or, at least, you can make one up.â€

[Academia Nut]

Not even bothering to look up from his PDA, Alex pointed at the name stitched into his flight suit and said apathetically, "Run a 'Net search, you'll find what my personal history splashed across some gushing propaganda page somewhere."

He then frowned slightly and thumbed his PDA for a bit, obviously deeply engrossed in whatever it was that he was reading.

[Hotfoot]

Sitting more or less by himself, Bertram was an odd addition to the team. He only seemed to wear the most basic of identifying marks, a leather jacket with an Aracham patch sewed on one arm sleeve. His hair was short, disheveled, and graying, and salt and pepper stubble lightly covered his face. He wore glasses and had a sharp glint in his eye hidden behind them. His body was thin and frail looking, and beside him was a cane, which all had seen him use as he hobbled aboard the transport.

Bertram had been content to sit in the craft and play one of the latest games to come down the pipe, Blazing Engels 2, an action game in which the player controlled Engels in an effort to fight back against the invaders and other weird forces. He had appropriated it as "research", since the game apparently involved some weird things going on. It was all nonsense, of course, the entire thing was just a pulp game, but he was able to manipulate it into being legitimate research. As he played, he seemed to be paying little attention to what was going on around him. Then the nervous Nazzadi spoke up and he twitched at just the wrong moment, causing his Engel to become surrounded by Migou forces and overwhelmed.

"Great. Nervous Nelly wants to chat and now the world is doomed to live without macho one-liners," His voice belied only minor irritation, and more than a little irreverence. "I hope you can live with yourself, getting good men killed because you just wanted to talk."

Putting away the portable gaming system, he took out a pack of cigarettes and flicked open his lighter. He took a few puffs before looking over at the Wizard and the Xenomix. "You know, don't worry about the Wiz-Kid. He's trying to cram before the test here, heaven forbid he should bring home anything less than an A+. His parents might take away his car right before his big date with Mary Palmer."

[Academia Nut]

Lowering his PDA a fraction of a centimetre, Alex glanced at the man with the cane and replied in deadpan, "Huh... a self gratification joke from a smoker who plays video games. Didn't see that coming. And to head off the inevitable, I will add on 'Neither did your mom last night, oh burn'. And yes, my diction was very carefully chosen." Alex then went back to reading.

[Hotfoot]

Bertram smirked as the comeback came. "Oh snap. I'm gonna tell the teacher on you. Don't you know you're not supposed to respond to bullies? You just give us what we want," He turned to the gray-skinned Xenomix and put on an exaggerated stage whisper. "Yikes, good thing you know he's already involved. My mom's the jealous type, might not like to share him with you. On the other hand, if that means you still need a date to the cotillion, I'm free."

[Academia Nut]

Alex paused for a moment before he began to rapidly page through his PDA before he said, "Huh... cotillion. Learn something new every day. I guess you are an occult scholar if you know the name of such an archaic ritual. That or you've kept yourself in remarkable shape for someone your age."

[Kurald Galain]

“He, he, he… As someone who actually had a debutante ball, I assure you being aancient is no barrier to entry – nor do you really need to be well persevered,â€

[Hotfoot]

"My god, that's it! They're trying to resurrect twentieth century politicians! We have to tell command about those things before they summon their dark masters. Maybe then we'll free humanity from the plague of pretentious pricks with more money than brains," It was getting difficult to tell when he was being snide or sarcastic at this point, and when Tyche extended her hand, he raised an eyebrow, as if pondering if he should accept it or not. Grudgingly, he extended his cane to her hand for her to shake.

"Maybe another time. I'm Bertram. I'm coming along mostly to see if this is just some sort of wild kegger gone wrong or if something a little more serious is involved. You know, like a kegger with strippers. Then I'm going to write a very strongly worded report about why I wasn't invited."

[EarthScorpion]

The remarkably human-looking Nazzadi has been watching this madness with something that approaches shock.

"Uh... okay." She starts nibbling on her thumb-nail. "Right. This is rather different from training. Is everyone else in the Charter so undisciplined?" She paused. "I'm not trying to be rude or annoying or anything, see. I'm just... well, it's my first assignment with Armacham. My first combat assignment, too." She gazed down. "Fresh out of boot camp, top in my class, but I get moved to this group instead of going through the NEG military normally." She stared at the sorcerer. "So I'm ever so dreadfully sorry," her voice dripping with sarcasm, "if I'm a little bit nervous."

[Kurald Galain]

Tyche smiled grew wider as she gave the can a quick shake, before settling back in her seat. “You are aware that it doesn’t take all that much money before you have more of it then brains. I mean, the adult brain weights what,â€

[Academia Nut]

"Considering the fact that they didn't bother to give us a training sim for this stuff first, discipline is obviously not a high priority for Aracham or they would have tried to give us some sense of unity before throwing us into the shit. Also, I know exactly how much longer I have to fuck around, so don't worry about it," Alex said to the unusual looking Nazzadi woman, still reading his PDA.

He then paused at the xenomix's comment and said, "Huh... I guess you two would make a good date, craddle robbing not-withstanding, what with the fact that it's been a long time since I've heard anyone considering so archaic as actually cashing out instead of just doing a direct account transfer of funds. What's next, anyone going to wonder about the miracles of internal combustion?"

[Hotfoot]

"Pft, undisciplined, she says. I'm not the one who broke radio silence and got our best Engel team wiped out. For shame," he snapped back at the human-like Nazzadi. He turned back to Tyche and shrugged.

"The human brain has somewhere between fifty to a hundred billion neurons. Now, ignoring that I'm probably twice that, it's a far cry from most rich idiots who barely have two brain cells to rub together, but enough money to feed every starving family on the planet until the end of time. Granted, that's only next week, according to some predictions, but hey, it can't be all good news."

"And hey, I object to her being called a cradle-robber. I know I'm a hot young stud, but at least I can buy beer with my fake ID," He smirked and looked back at Tyche. "Speaking of internal combustion, I've got a vintage '09 Maserati back home. If we're lucky, Dad over there will let me take it for a spin."

[Losonti Tokash]

Erik had ignored the acidic banter to his left in favor of checking the contents of his medkit. If asked to give a description of himself, it would likely read "Young, pale, and a bit wiry. Brown hair, brown eyes. Combat armor that didn't fit particularly well. Computer eyepiece, carrying a medical kit. Nervous looking. Bags under eyes, likely from insomnia."

Satisfied with the inspection, he turned his attention to the other passengers, sizing them up. Not happy about all the equipment being brought along. Why the hell did I get sent to some place where the team would need a suit of power armor? And the combat specialists we do have? Fucking rookies. This blows.

Erik rolled his eyes as the sorcerer went on and on about "archaic this" and "archaic that." The man was clearly out to either prove his intellectual superiority, or just piss everyone off into leaving him alone. Erik had no problem indulging the latter wish.

The scholar was...interesting.

Eyes lingering on Tyche, Erik gave a wan smile and a tiny wave. "We sure lucked out with these two, didn't we? Name's Erik."

[Academia Nut]

At Bertram's comment, Alex actually lowered his PDA all the way and said, "Well, unless you're commenting on our survival as a species, we're mostly certain that time itself will actually continue on after the screaming and the slaughter and the awful silence and... err... sorry. I tend to get a bit stuck on things at times. Most people prefer it when I sit in a corner reading to rambling on and on about revelations from outside space and time, but hey, that's sorcery for you. We're still trying to sort out exactly how much of the insanity is from the sorcery and how much is from the fact that its the nutcases who tend to be attracted to the subject in the first place, something I'm sure Bertram here can sympathize with. Now, while I myself have checked out okay for any major mental illnesses, I've seen more than a few of my colleagues go more than a little barmy. Not just the sorcerers either, as I have quite the diverse collection of peers including arcanotechnicians and arcanotech engineers, although really when you start looking at the underlying principles sorcery is just like physics or biology: another field of science. It's just that much of it was discovered before the scientific method and is thus couched in excessive ritual and mysticism. Not that some ritual isn't necessary and..."

Alex then took a deep breath and forced himself to look back his PDA, but it was obvious that whatever he was looking at before no longer held his attention and now he really wanted to talk about arcanotech and sorcerous theory. Grumbling he thumbed about for a while before he muttered "Fuck... I didn't bring that file..." while looking distinctly uncomfortable, glancing up and around at the others, almost pleading for them to talk to him now. How long this impulse would last before he found something new to obsess over was probably not known by mortal minds.

[Hotfoot]

"Great, Wiz-Kid's last name is Polonius. You're not exactly making a stellar case for your own sanity, but hey, keep rambling. Maybe somewhere in there you'll recite a ritual that will help you talk like a human being, rather than a deranged thesaurus," he took a deep drag from his cigarette and blew out the smoke into the upper part of the cabin.

"So let's take stock of what we've got here so far, from those of us who have decided to start talking. We've got the verbose mage in shining armor, the new kid who likes to play counting games with bullets, the eye candy, and the quiet kid. Then there's me, but I don't like talking about myself much. You know, too many hangers-on and groupies, not healthy for the survival of the species."

[Kurald Galain]

“Hey, I sort of know what you mean,â€

[Academia Nut]

Obviously unable to concentrate on reading any more, Alex began again, "Hey now, anyone who has studied anything about the occult has no right to claim to be entirely sane by classical definitions, just mostly sane. Mostly. Which is good enough for the NEG or I wouldn't be here with two stripes on my sleeve. And a deranged thesarus? Really now, I have yet to break out the obfuscating verbosity that such an apellation would imply. I just get stuck on things a bit, and I prefer to not stress myself out by getting unstuck before I'm ready. Everything I do takes a lot of concentration, so it serves me well professionally even if I do tend to either be curt or rambling with others. Hey you know, its not like we're about to go into a stressful situation and I wanted to just quietly read up on a few things to keep from getting agitated before I have to go and focus my mind on piloting a ten foot tall death machine capable of smashing a car like a cinderblock. Then again maybe I should have anticipated my own capacity to lapse into ranting and brought ear plugs to drown you all out. But then again, I anticipated professionals who wouldn't engage me in such a way as to trigger my rant reflex. Of course then again I expected more than the cursory briefing that we got and the rapid deployment so that we could all work out the little edges we have and avoid pressing each other's buttons. Damn Aracham, they know my psychological profile, they should have at least warned me that there would be chatters on this mission. Although preferrably they would have let us all make proper introductions."

A little switch seemed to go off in Alex's head and he suddenly said, "So wait... we haven't done proper introductions yet. I'm Corporal Alex Campino, and I'm a support element. I carry the big guns and anything that weighs a significant amount with my armour. I also bring technical skill and sorcerous ability. I've read over the briefing files, but who are all of you and your specializations?"

[Losonti Tokash]

Erik raised his hand and spoke quietly. "Erik Thorson, computer specialist and emergency medical technician." And terrified.

[Academia Nut]

"Computer specialist huh? Nice. I thought about getting into systems administration for a while before I discovered that arcanotech and sorcery was more interesting, which was before I discovered that I really enjoyed shooting things with large calibre weapons and signed up to do that for a living in between fixing things," Alex noted eagerly.

[Losonti Tokash]

"Shooting is certainly fun. Not so much fun when they shoot back which is why I decided that I should choose a career with a minimal amount thereof. And I figure that if I'm able to take care of people that have been shot, they'll probably be more likely to try and stop me from going through the same experience."

[Academia Nut]

Alex frowned a bit and said, "Yeah, the shooting back is no fun, hence why I prefer to do my fighting from behind thick sheets of laminated alloy and ceramic armour capable of shrugging off small arms fire. I really dislike pain. Really, really dislike pain. But hey, its a hell of a lot easier to avoid pain while in heavy armour than it is while running around naked. Not that it always helps, but hey, you can't get wound medals without going through some pain." A sort of grimace crossed over Alex's face at that last bit and implied that he would rather not have his awards if it meant he hadn't needed to get injured.

[Kurald Galain]

Tyche spoke up, “I am Tyche Forman, and I’ve been trained both in negotiation and in surveillance; I score much higher in the former then I do in the latte - they we’re hedging their bets. I have the standard firearms training, though again, I’m – just – barely - passable. And,â€

[Hotfoot]

Bertram rolled his eyes as Alex began talking once more. He turned to Erik and sighed, "You should probably give him a sedative. I'm no expert, but pretty soon I'd expect him to start speaking in tongues. Maybe he did already, I sort of tuned him out. Let me know if he summons a daemon. But hey, so long as we're sharing, like I said, I'm Bertram, last name Gregory for those of you who care. Yes, I'm that Bertram Gregory, no, I don't sign autographs. Not on paper anyway," He shot a knowing look to Tyche and the Nervous Nazzadi.

"Anyway, I am an expert on secret and hidden knowledge, and I've been in service since before some of you were born. I'd rather like to keep going, so on that end I'm going to ask the rest of you not to screw up too badly. When something weird is going on, listen to me and you just might survive past tomorrow. That includes reading any books. Especially reading any books. Even if it's Dick and Jane's Non-Euclidean Adventures, just give it to me and I'll decide what to do with it."

"On a further note, I don't care what funny little things you can do with magic or your mind or with your little pinkie toe. We're here to do a job, and I really don't give a damn how it gets done."