Cave Slickers: The Legend of Holly-Eyes Gold [FINISHED!]

[Swix]

Evil Swix had to quickly remove her hand from the door she had been holding not quite open, as Duncans excited dash out of the room caused it to get pushed back with such force that she'd probably have gotten a broken wrist. The woman didn't have to think too hard about what to do next-she followed behind the impressively speeding reptile, thoroughly enjoying the looks on the other grunts faces when they saw Duncan. Her other half would have to wait, this was too much fun.
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During Lucifers scream and what Fade would have termed unnecessary questions the assassin had begun moving towards the agent, though still in an unrushed if purposeful manner. The nervous doctor couldn't maintain that level of composure, so made a sort of whimper and did his best to slink out unnoticed.
"I cannot ask you questions" Fade answered his first one with her emotionless voice "if you are dead, and I cannot have you dying during it". Making out that it was some sort of mercy mission on her part would go away rapidly after Lucifer had looked into her eyes. He'd find they were as emotionless as her voice, and his death as not a big deal either way. He'd find no empathy, sympathy or mercy with her.

The questions about the dagger and her soul Fade did not even bother to answer, instead she thrust her free hand into a second pocket and, withdrawing a second throwing dagger, aimed and threw a second time. This dagger looked exactly the same as the first but with one invisible secret. Whether or not this one hits its target Fade will be upon him afterwards, and so would the Sapphire Dagger.

[Jent]

((I hope I'm not too late to join the game, if so, tell me.))

"Well, its one for the money, Two for the show, Three to get ready, Now-Woah!"

Paul really should have paid closer attention to his surroundings when strolling about the Black Forest. The animal that he tripped over turned out to a sleeping white wolf. Snarling in protest, the animal attempts to chomp a limb off this unfortunate traveler. Though to its misfortune, when Paul realised what species this creature was, providing a counterattack didn't prove difficult. Leaping from the lone lupine, Paul initiates his attack. His jaws gapes open, challenging even a Thylacine, bellowing out a spine-chilling wail at the wolf. This easily convinces it who is the more terrifying opponent, who scampers away from this adversary. A notable limp on the front right leg tells that this one couldn't risk fighting anything too strong anyway.

Paul quickly surveys the immediate area in case of other predators. When seeing everything is clear, he eases his jaw muscles, returning them to a passive state. "Now let's see where I'm at." Unraveling a worn-out parchment from his hand, Paul notices he only needs to go pass these waving trees on his right. ~I hope that old guy was right about these trees!~ Paul frantically charges past the vegetation, who try to latch on to him only barely missing their prey.

To the stationed grunt'(s') (I assume their is at least one posted at the entrance) astonishment, a 1.75 meter tall biped falls flat on the ground. "Arg." Paul picks himself from the ground and brushes away some of the dirt.

The grunt(s) might come to the conclusion of a werewolf sporting clothes of a person he killed while hauling a large, patched-up backpack, even though Paul wasn't a werewolf or malicious killer at all. His fur was short and resembles the pattern of a grey wolf. What was obviously different than a normal wolf-like creature was the digits on his feet. Though clearly looks mammalian, three toes were in front and two at the heel. "Hello there. I come from afar wanting to learn more about the Dojo from the Evil Council." ~I would have preferred a group that wasn't evil.~ "I'm willing to bargain for this knowledge. Either from work and or-" Paul takes a large bottle from his backpack. The coloration of the liquid and aroma emitting the cork from it was obviously an aged wine. "-Trading?"

((This is a new character I been working over on and off. I'll post his profile as soon as possible.))

[3kul]

((A water-proof towel sounds about as useful as a spoutless teapot, but whatever ))

With an expert flick of the towel, Neal grabs ahold of the stolen sawblade rifle from the edge of the pool. You manage to get it back into your hands moments before being dragged underwater, and in a few seconds you're facing the gaping fanged vortex that is the mouth of this demonic squid.

You need to act fast to avoid a painful death, but you might be feeling a little torn - common sense might tell you that firing this weapon underwater mightn't be such a good idea, but hollywood sense would tell you that doing so would surely enable your escape (with a very attractive girl appearing on your arm of course) in the ensuing squidsplosion that you would definitely survive.

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"Shaken, but not stirred." HollowEyes' sanity replied to Ensichrys' question. It seemed to be fine, and the skull-shaped basket was perfectly intact.

"Well, unfortunately, HollowEyes almost certainly knows that it was you who entered his lair Ensichrys, and at the very least he knows that you've taken me with him... I hadn't expected that HollowEyes would target me as well, but I suppose it makes sense." It was strange to think that something could make sense to both the insane HollowEyes and his abandoned sanity, and most likely they'd both come to completely different conclusions about this.

Well, regardless of whether or not HollowEyes is actively trying to destroy his own sanity you'd have to be extra careful from now on - finding and stopping HollowEyes would be far more difficult without the assistance of his sanity.

"Where do you intend to go from here?"

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"In here!" Duncan shouted excitedly back to Evil Swix, barreling through the doors to the EC's library.

Why a low-ranked grunt like Duncan had ever entered the library before was a mystery, but he seemed to know where to go. Hurrying past the front desk and not even attracting so much as a passing glance from the librarian (who, now looking a little more ragged than usual, had returned to it's post), he moved to the back shelves.

As he arrived there, he spotted one of the beetles that you'd mentioned. "Ah!" The beetle exclaimed, scuttling towards the bottom shelf that had just slid open. "No you don't!" Duncan shouted, smashing his head though the thin piece of wood that slid closed after the beetle and catching it in his mouth.

"SILENCE IN THE LIBRARY!" The librarian shrieked in a manner not unlike a banshee, though it didn't leave it's desk as it had no desire to get into a fight with another patron so soon. "Swifcks, Swifcks, I caugh' one." Duncan whispers to you, pointing to his mouth. You can hear the beetle's muffled complaints, so you can be sure that it's not dead (yet).

Once again it seems that you're given the opportunity to interrogate one of these strange little creatures, if you should so desire it.

----------------------------------------------------

Goldie would most likely hear the ruckus caused by Duncan the alligator as he smashed through part of a bookcase to capture a beetle, as well as the terrifying screams of the librarian... Unless you're too enthralled in this 'book' on how to make a deal with the devil, that is.

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((Not at all TROT! You might find it a little difficult to start so far behind everybody else but you're more than welcome to join in all the same ))

"Oh, you're looking to sign up?" The grunt on duty said to Paul, making a fairly incorrect assumption. "Bribing me with booze won't do you much good, I'm fairly new to the job myself. All higher ranking members have to be voted in, but just about anybody's welcome to be a grunt. All you need to do is sit through a few days of brainwashing movies and you're in!"

"Here, I think I've still got the pamphlet they gave me at recruiting, check it out." The grunt rummages through his pockets and eventualy procures a crumpled booklet entitled 'So You Want To Die For The Council?'. It's got a bit of messy writing on the front and what looks to be a signature that says 'Follow your dreams and die trying! FORT'. "Oh, uh, I'd like that back once you're done reading it, I got the headmaster to sign it for me."

The pamphlet is mostly about how great the Evil Council is, and promises you limited amounts of glory as a grunt. The pay isn't great but it offers a very impressive retirement package, and there's plenty of opportunities for promotion in your illustrious career. It lists many of the Council's training facilities as well (library, pool, gym, etc.) but unfortunately not where to find them.

[Zerrer]

Neal took a gasp of breath right before he was pulled underwater. Dazed by the repeated shocks against the surface of the water, It was hard to think. He barely remembered the eye socket, and that he was planning to do something to it. Then he noticed the Sawblade Rifle in his hands. Pushing the extraordinarily long barrel towards the jaw*, he pulled the trigger several times.


(* Edited)

[Chronos]

Ensichrys looked up in exasperation. There were several things he could do now, but did any lead to the right path?

The first option was to head to the foreboding temple of Noten and seek out the help of Byule's sister. Liyao enjoyed nothing more than putting the smackdown on her brother whenever possible. With help from Noten, this would be a lot easier. Ensichrys was on fairly good terms with those in the temple.

But what if that failed? If the insane Hollow Eyes ended up eating Little Sister, things would become far worse. Still, perhaps it was better to inform them anyway. If this weapon was capable of killing gods, Ensichrys had a pretty damn good guess who would the first deity to go down: Noten.

Ensichrys put a talon to the tip of his beak. "If Hollow Eyes knows it was I who discovered his secret, then surely he'll send more minions after me. If so, we can capture one and get it to tell us where Hollow Eyes is. That's the most important thing." He paused

"I know, since you're sane, you'll think this is absolutely crazy, but..." Ensichrys looked once more at the basket. "What if we were to seek help from Liyao and Noten? It's clear that with all the rumor and strangers in the cave, we can't do our interrogation here. It would also be nice to have some more power on our side. Noten and Little Sister both have as much to lose as we do. She'll help us..." Ensichrys wondered if she kept the bell he had made her for her birthday almost a year ago.

"If we do this, how would we get to the temple?"

[3kul]

((Zerrer, Neal is currently being dragged towards the squid's mouth, which is underneath the rest of it's body. If he's close enough to be able to see the mouth then all he'll see around it is tentacles spread out around it, you can't actually see the eye socket from where Neal currently is.

If you want to re-type your post then that's fine with me, but if you want to proceed with aiming for the eye socket from the underside of the squid then just let me know and I'll post a reply for you.

Here's Google's finest diagram of squid anatomy, if you should need something to use as a reference (though the squid Neal is up against isn't exactly a normal squid, so don't follow it too closely).))

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"First of all Ensichrys," the sanity began to boil, seeming quite flustered with these ideas of yours. "I don't imagine that we'll get the chance to capture HollowEyes' underlings. They'll all be either spirits or fiends, and as such will have the option of returning to the spirit realm if they're in any real danger." This was a very unusual point for the sanity to make, because as far as you knew you'd just killed one of these creatures.

"Secondly, yes, getting help from Little Sister is crazy." HollowEyes' sanity was frothing over the edge of the basket at this point, though it noticed this and decided to try and calm down a little. "So let's just think about it before we go running into the lion's den."

"Don't you think it's strange that with all of this talk of HollowEyes missing we haven't seen hide nor hair of Little Sister?" It simmered. "She might have already started searching for him, or she may even be further along than we think, or she might have even..." The sanity trailed off, not really wanting to consider this much. If Little Sister had killed HollowEyes his sanity would have nowhere to go, and it would be doomed to live in this basket forever. "Well, I'd rather not think along those lines."

"As for Noten," HollowEyes' sanity gurgled, quick to change the subject. "He is very strange, even for a God. I don't even know why he's following Little Sister around, it's bizarre for a God to do the bidding of a mortal but he doesn't seem to think so. He doesn't really abide by the same sort of rules or structure that other Gods and Goddesses do, I'm not sure if he even knows about the Immortal Realm..."

HollowEyes' sanity realized that if it knocked back all of your ideas then you mightn't take heed of it quite so much anymore, so it decided to concede this one point. "Well, meeting with Noten could be dangerous for me, but he has no reason to do you any harm. His temple is most likely floating above the Dojo like it always is." It bubbled in a melancholy tone. "Though it's been a while since I've left the Cave so don't hold me to that."

[Zerrer]

((I have edited my post, 3kul. On another note, it would be unfair to use the diagram, because Neal wouldn't know the anatomy of a squid. I believe the term is Meta-Knowledge.))

[Swix]

Evil Swix was panting by the time they'd reached the library, and when the withered and battered old banshee of a librarian shrieked the evil woman winced.

"Oh, shut up yourself you old bag" she said in passing, sparing her only a passing glance before moving over to where the excited alligator grunt now had another beetle in it's mouth-or was it the same one? Didn't matter now, really.

"I suppose that's well enough" Evil Swix said to Duncan, which was probably the closest she was going to get to thanking him "spit it out, you already made a hole in the wall"

Evil Swix held out her hand, although it looked different. That same darkness that had shown itself in her face earlier now encompassed her hand.

[Cirrial]

((Apologies for the late reply! Also, running three characters simultaneously was not a smart idea. >_>))

Naine continues to focus on the Powerhouse, his resolve starting to slip as he realises just what prolonged use and reliance upon this device will involve. I'm going to have to do this constantly! Buying this was a terrible decision! No, Naine, keep going. That's what all the capacitors and rechargeable batteries are for!

My desire for power. I want to live, for one. I need this power to live. I need this power to survive what the Cave will throw at me.

Inside the confines of the exobody, Naine sluggishly twists and turns in the liquid suspending him. He can either sense the Powerhouse producing wave after wave of energy, or he has simply thoroughly convinced himself that this is the case.

No. No, I can have more than that. Desperate times call for desperate measures, and aren't these desperate times? One of the leading figures of the Evil Council is missing, my friend is missing, and I'm lost inside the Cave. I need more power to assist me. To guide me.

Skin that has never felt any direct sensations before, stimulated only by countless wires, begins to tingle as Naine's mind burns with thought and focus.

I need more power. I need power to crush my enemies. To take back what I've ignored for so long. I will find HollowEyes. I will restore Blackstar's natural order. Then I shall return, return to the hunt I abandoned so long ago! The destroyer shall meet its demise at that which it overlooked!

Naine's sudden desire for power is a little overwhelming, even to himself. His relatively calm, naïve manner becomes consumed by a desire for revenge. Revenge against his situation, against the Cave, against those who tore him from his freedom in the oceans and stuffed him into a machine, against the behemoth that had torn his species, his society, everyone he'd ever known to shreds.

Unless the Powerhouse has any limiters, he's close to potentially burning either it out or the exobody out with this sudden demand for an exponential amount of power.

---

Goldie puts the book down, still open, and follows the instructions, step by step.

"I want-"

Its train of thought is rudely interrupted by the sounds of wooden destruction and the irate shrieks of the librarian. It decides to ignore whatever's causing the ruckus, speeding up a bit before the action has a chance to interrupt it further.

"I want a self-sustaining power supply! Something! Anything that means I won't die from power loss within the hour!"

After nothing happens, Goldie realises it didn't follow the instructions at all. "Oh. Right. Okay. I request an audience with the appropriate demonic entity or a representative of said entity. My name is, for all intents and purposes, Goldie. I want a power source that won't destroy me outright and doesn't have a limit of about three or four hours before it runs out!"

Goldie wrings its tendrils together. [ Please work please work please work ]

---

501 manages to switch off his combat override moments after ploughing through one of the defenses. Okay that counts as a hostile target I guess OH FIVE GUARDS

His smooth and elegant flight turns into a rough and bumpy skid across the ground, as he forgets to take control of his flight systems once the combat overrides cut out. After grinding noisily to a halt, he slowly stands to see the reptilian guards holding weapons. It takes a little longer to realise that these weapons are pointed at him.

By the time he thinks running or flying away would be a good idea, the triggers have already been pressed. "Aseru! Sra sei!" 501 shouts in what is presumably his native language, holding his arms up as if they could somehow protect him from energy weapons.

Most of the arcs of electricity that connect hit his arms or his torso. The arcs that hit his arms cause small explosions within the internal mechanisms, black smoke and wisps of blue plasma wrenching its way out of small holes and already existing vents. Muffled pops and bangs suggest the damage is far more intensive inside his arms than is visible outside. 501 yelps involuntarily as parts of his motors and more than a few artificial muscles pop and burn.

The arcs that hit his torso's forcefield simply vanish into it, passing into another universe entirely.

One of the arcs, however, strikes the octahedral crystal in 501's forehead. 501 shrieks in pain, falls to the ground and starts twitching violently. Windows upon windows of text slide jerkily into existence, super-imposed over vision that begins to blur and become blocky, warning of loss of control over his motor system.

Fortunately, it wouldn't be a permanent loss of control. Unfortunately, given his circumstances, it may just as well have been, given that he's now surrounded by armed guards on a ship he's just forcibly broken into. A prison ship. One bound to have at least one more empty cell.

aaaAAAAARGH no not like this do you even know who I am this shouldn't be happening why is this happening

His violent twitching ends and he lays still on the floor, smoke and plasma trailing from his limbs, damaged by arcs of electricity and a sudden power surge caused by the lucky shot to his forehead. A few more muffled pops and bangs burst a few more tiny holes in his limbs and joints.

((Your call as to whether 501 stays conscious or not, 3kul. He's not much of a threat to the guards now, though.

As for why the sudden easy take-down: he's been turned into a conduit for a large amount of warp energy, smacked himself into a crab monster and then thrown himself at a prison ship at high speeds. It's a miracle he's still in one piece. >_>))

[3kul]

[Zerrer]

((He was using his dominant hand, so I decided not to have him lose his arm, and instead gave him a moderate injury.))

Neal was quite lucky, only being hit by a few of the saw blades flying everywhere. Mainly, they were slight scratches, but there was a very bad gash on his left arm. Climbing out of the pool, he took a few breaths and wrapped his towel around his arm tightly. "Hey. I've almost got the treasure," Neal said, grinning through his pain at the grunts. "I'll make sure to give you guys a share of it."

Taking a breath, he dived into the water, searching for any objects that the squid may have eaten.

[3kul]

[Cirrial]

Naine is suddenly distracted by his olfactory sensors picking up an odd burning smell. Fearing it to be coming from the exobody, or, worse, from the part of the exobody containing his body, he snaps out of his trance and turns his optical sensors back on.

The corridor is filled with shrill echoes and high pitched squeals of delphine alarm when Naine notices the thoroughly electrocuted body of Shambaro on the floor. What did I just do?! ...What could I have done?!

He stares dumbstruck at Shambaro, his will for power completely dissipating from a mixture of shock, horror, guilt and fear of his own capabilities.

For that moment, that one fleeting moment, how different was he from the monster he'd once sworn to devote his whole life to seeking out and destroying?

"...Salesman? A-are you alright? squeak Speak to me. whistle click click Please! I'm sorry!"

---

(( Apologies if this post seems deus-ex-machina-y, but I've been planning for this reveal for the longest time. honestly i swear ))

Goldie is silent.

Eerily silent, and frozen into position. The red sparks from the demonic battery don't seem to even have an effect.

Instead, the golden casing and shell around Goldie simply falls off. The two golden limbs, frozen stiff, rest on the ground as black inky tendrils slowly remove themselves from the hollow workings. ...I'm... I'm not dead?

With the casings and the shell and all the other trimmings removed, all that remains is a black shadowy blob of black tendrils, with two long waving black antennae and two black shadowy pointed limbs, holding shape seemingly due to familiarity than out of necessity. Goldie's red eye glows with the same intensity as before, minus the golden disks that had framed and enveloped it before.

"Um... I... I think I'm already dead. I don't think the deal applies any more if I just died. Or did I just give myself away for eternal damnation without signing or even getting any benefits? I knew I should have read the contract..."

I ran out of power. I clearly ran out of power. I should be dead.

It picks up one of its golden limbs and stares at it.

Why is this hollow? Why are all of these things hollow? I'm a robot, right? I'm an AI, built to serve and protect a planet I can't remember the name of. That's what they said. That's what they told me. I'm an AI. They told me so!

"I don't think I want to go ahead with this deal. I... I think it's irrelevant now. I'm sorry." Goldie sounds increasingly distant, not quite grasping the concept of who exactly it was turning down.

Goldie feels dazed, troubled, confused. It feels like its mind has started to drift out of a sealed box, no longer constrained, and it feels a great number of unfamiliar sensations and emotions. It wrings its tendrils, shuffling the components of its golden shell in a pile in front of it.

---

501 stays very still. It is not so much a conscious effort on his behalf as much as a forced choice, given that most of his motor systems have either burned out, are very close to burning out, or have suddenly stopped responding to neural signals. The straps didn't help matters, either.

Primitive scanner? Guess that's the thing with the giant flashing "unknown" next to it in my external device list. Argh, my auto-translator would likely work better than this guy! Still, I'm in a slight... situation. No need to alienate the poor guy, repulsiveness aside.

"Zwark seerit zoon bwerk-ek-ek. Zweek arwk mehk. ...Wait, no, sorry, wrong lexicon. There we go. Ow, my head. And most of my body. I'm not exactly sure what's going on. All I remember is jumping into a portal and now I'm here. What's going on, Mucon?"

It isn't an outright lie. Sure, most of the details between jumping into a portal and arriving on the ship were missing, but minor details are minor details, and playing dumb had helped him get this far.

He realises that "this far" is being strapped down to a table in a prison cell with a forcefield. He re-evaluates the usefulness of playing the dumb card, and he finds himself feeling some sense of guilt and responsibility at breaking into the ship.

"...Okay, that's not entirely the full story. Better pull up a chair." He pauses. He makes sure to speak clearly, slowing his pace of speech down if Mucon shows any sign of not understanding, while continuing anyway when talking about technical knowledge he fully expects Mucon to lack.

"I was stranded on this world after an accident involving said portal. I saw this ship, and I didn't quite realise it was a prison ship. I just saw a means to get off this hellhole of a planet. I flicked on some untested software to help me get onto the ship, because I was desperate. Turns out that software overrides everything, control systems, motor systems, everything. I managed to shut it down. Before hurting anyone, I hope."

He pauses again. "If I could request contact with Maratix before any trial takes place, that would be greatly appreciated. Maratix is a interplanetary organisation in my universe of origin, 128 slides kata relative to a Bluespace origin. However, I've been trying to contact them forrr... I've lost track. For too long, is all I know. I'm a little concerned."

After a longer pause, he continues. "Say, Mucon, if you've kept up with me you're doing well so far, but I've probably got a better translator device than you have. It'd save you having to translate everything they say for my benefit, that's for sure."

[Jent]

"Bribery? I wasn't trying to bribe you. All I wanted was the general knowledge of Blackstar Dojo. Climate, groups, etc. Hm, a pamphlet." Paul gladly accepts the EC booklet, but still puzzled why the grunt quickly jumped to recruitment talk. ~If those movies caused him to be like this; I better hope I have enough medicine to remember myself! Although, it could be that he didn't get enough hours in bed or something.~ He skims over details in the pamphlet and hands it back to the grunt. "Very nice, and how do they afford such a nice retirement package? Oh, wait a minute, I forgotten something."

Paul's teeth clamped on to the liquor bottle as he fumbles with a leather pouch at his left side. Within his hands was a deep violet pill, radiating a compelling aura. Who was too bewildered to calmly uncork the bottle. Instead, he crunched down on the end, guzzling down the wine. Unconcerned by the glass, he swallowed the jelly-like pill before his wine was gone.

"Ah." Paul exhaled in satisfaction, multicolored vapors following his words. He then turns his head off to the side of the entrance to spit out the bloody shards of glass. "Sorry about that. Needed to take my medicine." Paul wipes the leftover blood from his mouth with a handkerchief, now having sated his body. "Let me get to the point. Is there any work around here I can do here that doesn't involve days of brainwashing videos and or dieing right away. Or at the very least, faster grunt registration that doesn't kill me."

[Swix]

Evil Swix frowned at the beetle, but then it was replaced by an altogether ugly smile.

"Duncan, why don't you go and find some girls to bother" The evil woman told the alligator, seeing no further use for him "our business is over" The darkness that had enveleoped the hand the creature had fallen on rose up around it in two distinct forms: one attempted to completely envelop the ball the beetle was carrying entirely in the dark, so those annoying eyeballs would not look at her again. The other looked like tendrils, and attempted to grab hold of the beetles legs-though the beetle would find she wasn't attempting to separate them, the tendrils were solid whilst the darkness was just that-darkness.((Ah, you have no idea how long I've been waiting for this ^_^)) "No I have no idea what it is you do" she said "why don't you tell me?"