#like the weird species do keep themselves alive and trucking

[witchofthesouls]

Today, I learned that grain is combustible.

Apparently, humans and Cybertronians have way more in common than I thought.

[lunarrwolf]

mini series coming soon!!

since you guys got me over 300 followers, i held up my end of my own deal and was finally able to think up the first of a 100% written series (social media included only when needed to build the story).

there will only be two for now but i want to get the sykkuno series a good ways in before bringing in new content like this! i’ve been a writer since middle school and have major writer’s block for a book i’m working on rn so i’m really excited about writing an actual story for lunarrwolf! these are the banners, very tiny synopses, and sneak peek excerpts for DAYWALKER!s and Siren Woods

s.h warning: siren woods will not be for the faint of heart as it will be put in the category of a psychological thriller. it will contain suspense, fear(s), anxiety and/or mentions of depression, isolation and swearing

d.w!s warning: this is an apocalyptic world w/o zombies. it will contain violence, anxiety, entrapment, fear(s) and swearing

disclaimer: i will do my absolutely best not to treat either of these as if they were actual novels. i plan on putting in comedic lines and scenes to lower any thriller/horror vibes from the stories, and not too go too far to avoid truly triggering myself or anyone else. warnings will only be issued in chapters that are going to actually include one or more of above the above. but if anyone who reads them in the future have issues do not feel like you need to keep reading.

-

DAYWALKER!s

a variety youtuber mini series

summary

ten creators find themselves amidst a city with an oddly familiar vibe, a weird yet intimidating apocalyptic appearance, and hundreds of strangers that feel the need to do nothing but fight their way through the city. even if that means to the death.

excerpt

“You’re all going to die, you know.. so you might as well give up now and let it take over.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

You blinked at the growl woven in with your friend’s deep voice, knowing for sure that if you were in an animation a sweat drop would be making its way down the side of your head. He hated confrontation more than anyone here but when it came to his friends, and being trapped in a place like this? Who knew what damage he would do to keep them safe.

The man ahead of the group did nothing but stand there with a mocking grin on his face. It was unnerving, and dare say almost bloodthirsty. There was no amount of sanity or free will from where you all stood just a couple of yards away, and just that thought alone chilled you to the core.

“Corpse.. maybe you shouldn’t.” You stated, stepping closer to him to lower the risk of the strange man hearing the second part. “I don’t like the looks of that guy even from over here. We’ve already had to deal with a ton of crazy shit since finding each other. We can’t risk losing our only real muscle of the group.”

Ignoring the offended voices of Sean and Ludwig, the man with the torn mask looked at you only when you put a hand on his shoulder. It took sharing glances and seeing head shakes from most of the others to have him loosen the fist his hand was already in. Standing up straight, you watched as he rolled his shoulders, jaw still clenched from the tension. Rae was taking advantage of the off putting interaction and explored the small area, so capturing everyone’s attention when Corpse relaxed a bit wasn’t hard. “It’s gonna be a tight fit but I think we can make it work.”

“Whoa.”

“Where did you learn how to hotwire a car?” Ethan questioned, being the first to make his way toward the beaten vehicle.

“Video games?” The brunette answered, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. She hit the side of the driver door twice, motioning to the group. “Now get your asses in here before that guy decides to pull a Resident Evil zombie sprint on us.”

“Yes ma’am.” Sykkuno saluted, earning chuckles that were a rare sight since ending up here. The two of you didn’t waste time in calling the front seats beside Rae and Ethan, forcing everyone else to get in the back of the truck and make it work. No one could complain, though, seeing the circumstances you were all in.

It took a few seconds of revving the seemingly old engine before the machine began making its way. You could actually hear the ones in the back shift around to get in more comfortable positions for however long a ride it would be. The girl behind the wheel didn’t pay any mind to the stranger that watched her drive you all away, but you did. And even when he continued to shrink in distance and eventually disappeared, you knew his words would stay with you.

“You’re wasting your time! No one gets out of Mirror City!!”

Siren Woods

a variety youtuber mini series

summary

seven internet personalities find themselves in the middle of an old town myth as they take a break from their careers and head up towards a rural mountain area. among every spooky or jumpy experience with a horror game here and there, never did any of them think they’d end up in this situation.

excerpt

The fire crackled with a sense of release, almost as if this large flame represented the time everyone needed away from their jobs. After how crazy the media has become the past few weeks, you and your friends agreed that a trip towards a much lesser known area would do you all well. It was a teenagers on summer break scene where everyone was gathered around a campfire in the backyard of a lake house, telling stories to either amuse or scare each other. Seán and Ethan were the first to do so, tag teaming in a very dramatic reenactment of the first time they met in person, which of course had to be followed by your own scene with Y/F/N.

Time flew by and before you knew it, the sun was completely set and the darkest shade of navy possible was barely lit with a crescent moon and a few stars. The only real source of light was the fire, illuminating the six faces in an orange glow. Any laughter died down minutes ago, leaving a silence that was comfortable for everyone. “You guys want to hear a funny story?”

Squinting at the man sitting in the log across from you, you leaned forward, hands folded in your lap. “Funny haha or funny we might want to kill you after we hear it?”

“Uh..” Corpse met your gaze immediately, his mask somehow looking more eerie with the natural lighting. “Funny kind of hoping you won’t kill me, if I’m being honest.” He confirmed, leaning forward himself to warm up his hands while the rest of you debated on whether to let him tell it.

After a few minutes, and three overtaking two, he was allowed to do so. It was an old myth of the town you all resided in for the week; a Slenderman type of entity of the forest that the locals from dozens of years before chose to call Siren Head. The name stuck once old photos were found and set up in the small museum in the Common. He stood at forty feet tall, with two megaphones for heads and tangled wires for a torso. He had the ability to perfectly mimic broadcasts, conversations, sirens and screams, and had been said to only emit white noise if ever asleep. Speed nearly matched that of a cheetah and his strength was unbelievably high due to his size. Every sighting of said species had only been released by victims, and it was an urban tale that stood alive to this very day.

Rae was on the grass now, legs crossed one over the other as she tried to look at everyone at once. “Why the hell did we all come to a place called Siren Woods, then?!”

“Well.. the town looked really nice online, and it’s living up to that. And I thought siren meant more mermaid than a freaky Creepypasta-type thing.” Sykkuno could do nothing but respond with nerves showing through his face and every subtle movement of his body as he explained why he ended up agreeing with the destination.

“Yeah, I did too.” Y/F/N piped in, shrugging her innocence as you all began telling your sides. “Who doesn’t think of a mermaid when you hear the word siren?! That’s basically what they are.”

“I, for one, think we should find another place to stay.” Ethan spoke up.

Seán gaped at his longest friend in the group, “You don’t actually believe in that.”

“I’m not taking any chances, dude. Those people believe in that thing enough to build a whole section of the museum for it.”

You watched your friends go back and forth, some freaked out by the story but not believing it was real while the rest wanted to find a new vacation spot. “What do you think, Y/N?”

You turned to Corpse, blinking as the simple question processed in your mind. “I’m with Ethan on this.. even if that thing isn’t an actual being the belief here is hardcore.” Three faces lit up in relief while the roommate, Irishman, and faceless internet persona felt differently. “Let me finish..” you sighed, “Let’s stay another night but keep an extra cautious eye on Spencer and Luna. Animals have a sort of sixth sense, so if anything weird happens they’ll warn us. Deal?”

Y/F/N shared a glance with you, letting out a sigh of her own. “Suddenly I’m feeling a lot better that we brought our dogs instead of getting sitters.” She bent down to pet the canines laying between the logs, hoping if they did bark it would just be from a resident knocking on the door.

[spellblonde]

General crossover info for my non-Vampire Diaries mutuals until I can fix Liv’s crossover verses (excluding Legacies): 

Hi. She’s a witch. I do have her abilities listed on my blog, but that list is not the full extent of her abilities and they can always change.

If either you’re uncomfortable roleplaying with a supernatural character or for whatever reason you think that writing with her might just be easier in an all-human setting, I absolutely can write her as a normal human. That being said, I will never default to this and if this is what you’d prefer, then I require that we talk about it ooc so that I can rework her backstory specific to our verse.

She was raised in a coven and was/is next in line to compete to become leader of it. Her coven has a tradition where the new leader must be a born twin and at the age of 22 is expected to participate in this ceremony called a “merge” where the twins competitively merge their magic into one person; the stronger of the two absorbs all of the magic between the two and becomes more powerful while the weaker of the two dies. The survivor will lead the coven and is expected to have children until they have twins of their own who can later continue the tradition.

While I’ve gone back and forth on it, I’ll likely go off of the idea that Liv and her twin chose to not merge their magic but to instead use their magic together to create a cloaking spell to keep themselves hidden from their coven and any tracking spells they could devise. They part ways to make finding both of them more challenging (as both of them must be present to complete the spell). In many cases, this means that she is on the run, but when settling in larger cities, she can stay for longer.

If you’re not familiar with covens, to be bluntly honest, you’re welcome to think of her coven as something similar to a cult. She wants nothing to do with them and is angry with them for asking her and her siblings to sacrifice themselves.

She’s one of 7 children; 3 were murdered as children, which leaves only herself and her brother alive, as well as her two oldest siblings, another pair of twins, also alive. Her oldest brother is an undiagnosed (but entirely diagnosable if a doctor were stupid enough to get close enough to try), psychopath. Circumstantially, she has trauma revolving around the now several times he’s tried to kill her. 

She’s a college dropout; depending on the verse setting, she may have opted to go back to school.

Her job is generally wide open, but she’s an experienced bartender and server, so she gravitates toward the restaurant industry. She also might side hustle as a witch for hire, within reason at least. She may have even been a psychic; everyone thinks she’s scamming them, but that’s fine by her, as it keeps her secret intact. Don’t be mad when her premonitions are right, though.

In The Vampire Diaries, she died at the age of 22. For obvious reasons, I’m choosing to ignore that. Given the weird timeline of the show on top of the fact that the show is now a few years past its finish, I did some math and figured out that in the year 2020, Liv would be 29. This is perfect since it’s more age-appropriate to her FC anyway. I will be writing her as 29 years old unless specified otherwise.

She’s bisexual.

Fun magic fact: Her telekinesis is strong enough to stop a speeding truck with the force of the equivalent of another speeding truck. Your car will be totaled. You might not survive (if you’re human).

Another fun abilities-related fact: When being attacked by someone who she thinks can overpower her (mostly talking about non-humans), her favorite impulse defenses are to either blow something up (an extension of her telekinetic powers, sometimes combining with her pyrokinetic abilities when the situation calls for it) or give the attacker a supernaturally-charged brain aneurysm (a favorite among many witches). They’re spells that she learned as a kid which in fact doesn’t mean that it’s a weak spell, but rather that she’s had a LOT of time to perfect it; attack at your own risk.

She’s practiced magic for her entire life. Unlike many witches who discover their abilities during puberty, she’s been practicing since the day she could speak. She is a very powerful witch and is not new nor surprised by different species and abilities that could come up. She’s an expert in witchcraft and is deeply familiar with vampires, werewolves, travelers, ghosts, doppelgangers, and thanks to having dated one, vampire-werewolf hybrids. She understands the supernatural enough to know that there are still things out there that she is not familiar with and that new things are popping up all the time. She suspects the existence of various human-related supernatural entities, such as banshees, sirens, and more. If you roleplay within a fandom that has mythical elements, then no sweat; even if I as the mun aren’t familiar with the lore of your fandom, I’ll learn along with Liv as the characters get to know each other. 

She’s a total emo, don’t @ her. 

Despite being a loner, she has a hard time being alone. At the very least, she has always had her brother. Being separated from him is deeply and sometimes physically painful for her. She doesn’t always know how to handle it, but will tell you in the moment if you let her.

Post on my canon-divergence for my tvd main verse to come soon!

[fishy12233]

Chronicles of Sturgia

Chapter 1, Part 1: “The Gorgeous Grove”

The only sound one could hear was the sound of chirping birds and running water. The gentle sunlight shone upon the peaceful cove, creating a grand rainbow among the waterfalls and reflecting off of the water with a brilliant light. This was the peaceful sanctuary that was Sunset Grove.

Seven years ago, Gabriella Reyes was banished into a forest ruined in the midst of war. She was left to die. However, through impossible odds, she managed to not only survive, but to also revive the forest into a grand sanctuary. It was a place of safety. Over seven years, it became a glimmer of hope among the shattered kingdom of Sturgia, especially now, when nowhere else was safe any longer. Gabby founded a quaint town of peace and happiness, hidden away from the dangers of the treacherous world. Many people came here so that they could be safe. They needed somewhere safe more than ever. Over seven years, Gabriella longed to see Samuel again. When the six children from Citrione City came out of that waterfall and into the cove below, the hope that the couple would be reunited began to glimmer once again.

The six children were wet, soggy and cold. But seeing the beautiful grove that they arrived in gave them strength.

When the six kids had crashed into the cove, they also crashed into two hapless villagers who were talking on top of large lily pads. These villagers were Dan Avidan and Arin Hanson in squirrel kigurumis. Before long, Gabriella Reyes and a large group of villagers showed up to help them. The kids introduced themselves and Gabby recognized Maddie and Susan as Samuel’s nieces, seeing it as a sign that Samuel was alive. They had grown so big since Gabby last saw them. She said that the kids were the second incident of someone coming in from the waterfall. The first incident was a girl from the kids’ school who somehow stumbled into the cave in Eagle Mountain and found herself in Sunset Grove. They also met Liana Culiseta, a wise and enigmatic woman who wore a long black dress that showed off her ankle. She also had seven very large, very wound up ponytails. Suddenly, they were interrupted by a large cackle. Everyone turned towards the large tree that stood in the middle of the forest. A bizarre girl stood on a branch.

“This scene is nice and all, but the queen wouldn’t like this. She ordered me, Robyn Avia, to burn down this forest. She can’t have people taking sanctuary here.”

The bizarre girl sent her phoenix down upon the villagers, frightening them. She resolved to burn down the forest, but she threw a tantrum when she realized that her fire attacks were being blocked by a hidden force coming from inside the large tree. Robyn flew away with her phoenix, vowing to find a way to stop the protective force. After the kids dried off, Liana told them to place the Diamond Step into a pedestal on a strange monument. It looked like some sort of large pavilion without a roof. There were eight pedestals, but Liana told them which one to put it on. Liana seemed extremely excited, but was trying to keep calm. Her eyes were always so squinty, but her excitement still showed through them. Once the shoes were on the pedestal, the world began to spin around the kids. A large flock of doves began flying around the pavilion as the world changed. Soon the kids entered another realm, and the pavilion changed into a large, circular stained glass window depicting Caroling Porter weeping by her husband, who lay comatose in bed. The surrounding forest had disappeared, leaving only darkness. The flock of doves flew away, and suddenly, Caroline Porter stood in front of them. She explained that the kids were now on a quest, a quest to find all eight items and stop the dark force that was controlling the queen. Caroline was one of the eight wizards who encountered this dark force nineteen years ago. The Diamond Step was a pair of shoes that belonged to Caroline’s life-sized porcelain doll. She couldn’t leave her house because her husband Gent was comatose due to the queen making an example of him at the royal parade seven years ago.

"The next artifact is the Canary Cornucopia," Caroline said. "It's a sunflower located within the large tree in the middle of the forest. The tree is actually an abandoned facility named Twilea Incorporated. Go there. The Cornucopia is what protects the forest. If it's returned to the monument with the Diamond Step, it'll remain safe."

When the kids returned to Sunset Grove, they told Gabby everything that Caroline told them. They decided to explore Sunset Grove and prepare before entering the strange facility. Suzy, one of the villagers, volunteered to give them a tour. She showed them around the orchard, which was one of the town’s main food sources. The town mainly survived on fruit, fish, and honey. They also used imports from other towns, but they were isolated by recent events, making trade impossible. Suzy showed them to the beach, where they could see an island covered in shadow. It was a heavy contrast to the bright and sunny forest they were in right now. The kids saw one of the villagers sitting contemplatively on a nearby bench. She was a monkey who held a strange orb in her hands. It looked broken. Suzy showed them around town, including town hall, the salon, and the bank. A cat villager was delightfully playing the fiddle in the town square. Another cat villager sat by the train station painting blue things. He painted blue houses, blue cows, blue people, etc. It looks like he had run out of other paint colors. The train station was also out of order due to recent events. The kids visited the fruit cafe, the most popular restaurant in town. Smefanye, the owner, was really nice. Apparently, Smef was a model who was really popular a couple of years ago.

Afterwards, the kids went to the local store to restock. Peter saw a really cool beetle backpack with more space, so he bought it. Then, the kids got to watch the local band play a song. They called themselves the Coffee Shop Hipsters. The song they sang was a song of peace. The lyrics we're hopeful and empowering. It was a soothing song that also evoked a sense of adventure. The kids loved it.

The tour took the kids back into the woods, which had trees whose leaves were already changing. Suzy explained that the woods to the east had been frozen over, and that a large ice wall prevented anyone from going to the town in the north. They entered the camp site, which had a food truck that Dan and Arin were running. For some reason, they only sold variations of mac and cheese, from lasagna to fettucini alfredo. There was also a troop of small scouts, which was run by Gabby’s dad. Their campsite had a lot of modern commodities in it, like a projector screen and a laptop. Annie really loved the campsite, not because of the commodities, but because it reminded her of camping trips she went on. She happily devoured the food that the scouts offered her. Mr. Reyes told the kids that the troop was working on making a guidebook like the one the kids made for Citrione City. Apparently, there were two siblings, Trixie and Wayne Brodeur, who were also making their own guidebook. He suggested that if the kids added stuff from Sunset Grove into their own guidebook that it would help everyone gain as much information about Sturgia as possible. There was a strange cabin nearby. It belonged to Trixie and Wayne Brodeur, the park rangers. Suzy explained that they were always so busy obsessing over a strange book series that they found one day. The kids looked inside, and Suzy’s words rang true. Trixie and Wayne were inside, putting together a huge conspiracy theory chart that covered the walls. Sure enough, they were frantically reading through the 12 strange journals that they found. As the tour continued, the kids entered a strange part of the forest. The trees turned into white mushrooms, and a strange purple mist lingered in the air. Suzy said that this place was once called "Beau Village". To their surprise, there was a crashed UFO in the ground. An alien that looked like the same species as Retro was talking to three villagers: a librarian owl, a girly bunny, and a strange boy. He was also holding a strange creature. Weirded out, the kids walked away from the scene. After shopping around for a while, the kids were ready to enter Twilea Inc. However, as they were about to enter, the banker, Mr. Sauer, stopped them. “What do you think yer doin’, laddies? This is my property!”

Mr. Sauer was a strange man. In fact, he wasn’t a man at all. He looked like some sort of dinosaur with tiny eyes and fluffy bird feet. However, no one, not even Mr. Sauer, knew what he really was.

“What do you mean? We're the ones who’ve been trying to restore it to working order!” Gabby retaliated.

“That place is dangerous!” said Mr. Sauer. “If you want to go in and risk bein’ attacked by that girl, you laddies need to defeat me and my pigeons!”

The kids groaned, but they had no choice. Mr. Sauer’s pigeons pecked at their eyes annoyingly. Luckily for Chris, his glasses protected him. It was an annoying battle, but they managed to defeat him. Tired, Mr. Sauer called his secretary. The kids recognized her as one of their classmates. Mr Sauer had her unlock the door so that they could go through, accepting that they were strong enough to take on Robyn.

The six kids entered Twilea Incorporated, ready to face what lay before them.

[berniesrevolution]

In the beginning there was… well, I don’t know what there was. But then there was a tremendous explosion. Then, for a few hundred million years, there was nothing of much interest. After that, stars and galaxies began to form, and they were fascinating and beautiful, but nobody was there to notice. Billions and billions of years went by, until a molecular cloud happened to collapse, inadvertently giving us the Sun, moon, asteroids, etc. Our humble planet Earth formed by accident, and for billions more years it was wet and gassy, with little to recommend it save some bacteria here and there. Then plants emerged, then all of a sudden there were animals—weird ones—and they lived and they died and they evolved steadily into dinosaurs, who met an unfortunate fate, then very recently we showed up, looking something of a mess, and our ancestors struggled to stay alive, and they fashioned tools and they built little dwellings and they made do and then died, and then the next batch did the same, and they learned to farm, and they learned to build, and slowly something quite impressive emerged. (They were also often killed or enslaved, or did the killing and enslaving.) They built civilizations and they discovered math and they gave birth to Socrates and then they murdered Socrates for asking too many questions. And they fumbled along and tried to figure things out, and they mostly failed, but they learned how to fill their bellies and minds, and they discovered their incredible potential, building printing presses and cotton gins and hundred-story buildings and gigantic ships that sometimes sank. Together, based on what those before them had learned, they invented steam trains and then pickup trucks and then jet airplanes and then television game shows and then internet pornography and then six different kinds of poop emoji pool float. And all through the process people fell in love, and were torn apart, and worked their asses off, and watched their children screw up or do well, and went on adventures, and played with Legos, and built too many cars and clogged the roads but refused to carpool so they got stuck in traffic and it served them right, and did monstrously cruel things, and tamed a lot of diseases, and ate a lot of tacos, and petted a lot of animals, and treated the planet in highly irresponsible and ungrateful ways, and just generally acted out a stunningly violent, heartwarming, infuriating, inspiring collective drama on an inconceivable scale.

And what I refuse to believe is that all of this was just the buildup to Donald Trump being given the power to end all human life, neoliberal capitalism devouring the earth, Elon Musk buying all of outer space, and everyone eventually ending up working as a drone in an Amazon warehouse until the planet boils or eventually the sun explodes. That cannot possibly be the end of history. Surely not. No. That isn’t how this story goes. That would be a tale told by an idiot, signifying fuck all. I would want my money back. Zero stars. Liked the plot but that ending was garbage.

Yet this is the direction a lot of people seem to believe we’re heading in, and I don’t think they’re wrong. I mean the first thing already happened: the United States gave the world’s most selfish and ignorant man control of its 4,018 nuclear weapons. He’s joked about making himself president for life. Monopolistic corporations are steadily wrapping their tentacles around every part of the economy. There should be hardly any doubt that the U.S. in particular is one major terrorist event away from a frightening concentration of power in the hands of a single unstable person, if you’re not already frightened by the whole nuclear weapons thing.

This makes a lot of people I know feel hopeless and uncertain. They see people with no qualifications except wealth being put in charge, and see Jeff Bezos building a 42 million dollar clock in the desert while his workers pee in bottles because they can’t take bathroom breaks. They see their fate in the hands of grotesque individuals who could not care less about anyone but themselves, and many ask themselves the question that Navy veteran Seth King asked himself when he found himself in the “revolving door of bodies” known as the Amazon fulfillment warehouse: “If this is the best life is going to get why am I even still here?” Every year, in the United States alone, 40,000 people take their own lives because they cannot find a satisfactory answer to that question.

From one perspective it’s strange that that should be the case, because we’ve come so far and done so much as a species, and as George Orwell put it, the Earth is a raft sailing through space, fully stocked with enough provisions for everyone. And yet, history is a record of brutality on an unthinkable scale. Chattel slavery was ended only just recently, and the century that brought us Motown records and the Golden Gate Bridge was, for hundreds of millions of people, also a machine of death creating pile upon pile of corpses. For a few decades, it’s been comparatively peaceful, but only because the world’s great powers keep civilization-ending missiles pointed at each other, and one false move could destroy everything. Oh, and let’s not even talk about climate catastrophe. (Living in New Orleans, I cannot bear to contemplate it.)

How can anyone have hope when Donald Trump is the president? How can anyone have dreams about the Star Trek future, in which we all go on adventures through space together in a spirit of equality and shared purpose? The resurgence of “nationalism” spells absolute doom; nationalism is one of the silliest and most destructive imaginable ideas. Silly because nobody, looking at human beings in the context of the Universe, can think national distinctions worth worrying about. (Even Reagan admitted that existing global conflicts would seem trivial if the aliens showed up.) “Most destructive” because nationalism operates like a purpose-built empathy inhibitor, making other humans seem less and less like ourselves and thus making it easy to distrust, detest, or destroy them. Nationalism makes it possible to put on a uniform, strut around, and denounce the enemies who will destroy our culture and way of life, without realizing how ridiculous you look to the Universe.

(Continue Reading)

[vfdarkness]

Episode 6: Broken Mirror

INTRO

Dark ambient drone.

RYDER

You’re alone in a laundromat. A loud pounding comes from inside a washing machine. The washer’s door explodes open and dark water pours onto the floor. A hand rises from the water and beckons you.

A beat.

RYDER

You need my help.

DARK AMBIENT DRONE CHANGES TO:

INTRO MUSIC

RYDER

This is A Voice From Darkness.

Intro music continues, but gradually fades out.

ACT I

RYDER

Hello, this is Dr. Malcolm Ryder, parapsychologist - back from a bit of a break. I had to look into a few matters in person - sometimes the problems you call in with require more than on-air help. Later in the show we'll have Mike from Kansas call-in. Mike and I've been playing phone-tag for months now regarding strange leeches he encountered in his area. More on that later. But first, I'd like to introduce two new segments to our show. First off - National Alerts - where I'll let you know of ongoing supernatural issues occurring across the country - possibly in your area.

National Alerts music plays, fades out.

RYDER

If you're in Milwaukee, Wisconsin be on the lookout for an elderly man with white hair in a tattered reddish-brown trench coat. He shivers and holds himself as he walks. Stay a safe distance away if you spot him - as he reaches out to anyone who gets near. He’s grabbed hands and arms - any exposed skin. Afterwards, victims of his touch have reported a loss of warmth. More than that, the part of the body he touches experiences rapid frostbite. Several victims have been hospitalized. Four have frozen to death, despite being kept in warm rooms. Again, I repeat, if you are in Milwaukee, be on the lookout for a warmthless elderly man.

A beat.

RYDER

Our next alert is for Oregon - it's advised you avoid hiking near the Three Sisters. All trailheads are currently closed. Hikers over the past few days have reported time lapses, missing memories when they've returned from their hikes - in some cases spanning days. In all cases, the last memory they have is seeing a bighorn ram with grey twisted horns. Until more can be determined, and the ram possibly stopped, avoid the Three Sisters in Oregon.

A beat.

RYDER

And that is all this week for national alerts. Let's go to our next segment - Quick Questions. Every week I receive voicemails. Emails. Tweets - asking for advice on various paranormal matters. Most shows, I'm only able to get to one or two callers. For this next segment, I'll answer questions you send in.

If you have a question, feel free to write to avoicefromdarkness@gmail.com or tweet your questions to @vfdarkness.

A beat.

RYDER

Our first question comes to us via email from Sam in South Dakota. "Dr. Ryder," they write. "I live out in the middle of nowhere. There are three windows facing west in my dining room. At twilight there’s a man who stands at the edge of my property. He wears a black duster, wide-brimmed hat. I suppose he’s like something out of an old western film. If that wasn't weird enough, I can only see him in one of the windows. The other two - he’s not present. Every night, starting at twilight… he's there. He gets a little closer each night. What do I do?

Ryder thinks.

RYDER

Sam, you've no doubt heard me speak of the Unwelcome Riders on this show before - creatures that appear across our country on various roadways and abduct travelers - taking them to unknown realms. A lesser-known cousin to those awful beings are the Unbidden Homesteaders. The creature, if not stopped, will claim your home, your land, and you. There are thousands - tens of thousands - of small spots across this country where homes used to be. Families used to live - where there's only emptiness now. When you step foot on these spots of land, you feel something off.  An absence. In these places, an Unbidden Homesteader has taken whatever was once there. To prevent this happening to yourself, and your home, you need to salt the earth.

Leave a trail of salt, from the window you see the Unbidden Homesteader to the edge of your property. The creature will not walk on salted earth nor will he want to claim the land as his own.

A beat.

All right, next question comes from Chelsea in Rhode Island. "Dr. Ryder, over the past few days I've lost 30 pounds, my skin has cleared, and my eyes have this brightness to them that they didn't before. Men pay attention to me in a way that I haven't experienced. But... I can't digest solid food anymore. And I'm craving blood. Am I turning into a vampire?"

A beat.

RYDER

Short answer - Yes. Long answer - there's over a dozen different causes of what we commonly call vampirism - from genetic diseases, to parasites, to the more overtly supernatural. Without knowing more, it's hard to say what specifically you're experiencing. What you can do - take two large spoonfuls of minced garlic, mix into a glass of distilled water, and drink. If this makes you violently ill, the cause of your vampirism is natural, and curable. If you have no reaction, then the cause is supernatural. If that's the case, there is no cure. You're no longer human. I'm sorry.

A beat.

RYDER

All right, time for Today In Odd America, and then we'll hear from Mike from Kansas.

TODAY IN ODD AMERICA

TIOA music fades in.

RYDER

Today in Odd America we find ourselves in small Arizona town of Pulta. The year - 1985. One morning, before dawn, a truck driver making a delivery from Phoenix stopped at a gas station just outside of town. The station was empty. Lights were on, the doors opened for him, and there was a car off to the side, but no one present. He called the police - thinking a robbery might have occurred. The police did not answer.

RYDER

He put a message out on his CB. He received no reply.

RYDER

The truck driver, a man by the name of Earl Wick, thought maybe he should leave the town - call authorities elsewhere. But instead he continued his drive to the Pulta’s grocery store to deliver several pallets.

RYDER

Normally a grocer would meet him at the loading bay. But no one was there.

RYDER

As Earl wondered what he should do, the sun rose. The grocery store stood atop a small hill that looked across the desert. In the distance, miles outside of town, there was a pyramid.

RYDER

Something was strange about its texture - its silhouette - but Earl couldn’t tell what from a distance.

He had no memory of such a structure existing before.

So he drove to it - to see if that’s where all the missing people of Pulta went.

.

RYDER

He stopped his truck hundreds of feet from the pyramid at first -terrified to go further - as the pyramid was not made of stone... but flesh.

Thousands of naked bodies stood atop each other forming the pyramid. Bodies melded together - as if they were one singular entity. Arms and legs fused into torsos. The heads of some disappeared into the bodies of others. Many of the heads faced outward - gazing across the desert.

RYDER

Earl recognized some of the faces - the grocer who normally worked the night shift and helped him unload the pallets, the gas station clerk. All stared out dumbly into the desert, muttering, chattering nonsense. Earl vomited in the cab of his truck. He screamed into his CB until he got a reply.

RYDER

Military barriers were placed around Pulta. Nine days later they were removed. The pyramid gone.

RYDER

The military offered no explanation of what they’d done to handle the situation - did they destroy the pyramid? And thereby murder thousands of Americans? Did they move it to an undisclosed base? Are the people of the pyramid kept alive to this day somehow?

RYDER

The origin of the Pulta Pyramid and an explanation of what happened to it remain a mystery to the general public.

And now back to our main show.

TIOA music fades out.

ACT II

RYDER

And we're back. As I said before, while the show was on hiatus, I traveled across the country helping many of you in person with your paranormal problems. On the line now is Mike from Kansas. Mike first left a voicemail months ago. On a rainy night this past autumn he ran across a young girl in the middle of the road. When he approached her, she reached out a hand to him. Only when he offered his own hand in return he realized it wasn't a girl at all, but thousands of small leeches. They'd woven themselves together to have the appearance of a helpless child. Is that correct, Mike?

MIKE

Yeah, that's all how it started. Several of the leeches latched onto me, drank my blood. I thought I burned them all off with a lighter I keep in my truck. But I think at least one of them got away - because not long after - the little girl came to my house. And she brought others - other broods of leeches that looked like people - a fat man and an elderly woman.

RYDER

Yes, the Speculum Sanguisugae - more commonly: mirror leeches - have certain abilities - they'll work collectively to mimic the appearance of the last creature they've devoured. Once one of the leeches in the brood has tasted your blood, they'll have some of your memories. They use those to hunt you, devour you, and then take on your appearance to lure their next prey. I'm sorry I didn't stay in Kansas for long - I had a few other trips to make, people to help. Did what I give you solve your leech problem?

A beat.

MIKE

You mean the spiders? I really wish you'd told me more before you left. Clued me in on what the spiders were going to do exactly.

RYDER

If I'd done that, I doubt you would have gone through what you needed to do to get rid of the mirror leeches.

MIKE

No. No, I probably wouldn't have. Because it almost killed me. You almost killed me.

RYDER

Mike, the leeches were hunting you. Eventually they'd find you, devour you, and move on to kill someone else - using your face. If I hadn't-

(interrupts self)

RYDER

Why don't you state what happened. And after, I'll explain why it was necessary. For context, I dropped off a large terrarium containing hundreds of spiders. A certain species that have evolved to feed on the mirror leeches.

MIKE

But that's not all they do.

RYDER

No, it's not.

MIKE

After you left... I opened the terrarium. You said to do it in a dark place, like a closet or basement. You also told me to drink a glass of water beforehand... I thought that was weird. But I trusted you. Those were the only instructions you gave. You said the spiders would handle the rest - that they'd hunt the leeches.

RYDER

I didn't say the word "hunt". That would imply that they'd leave your home - search out the leeches.

MIKE

No, you're right. You probably said something else - like they'd kill them or something. I don't remember your exact words. I opened the terrarium in my bedroom. It's pretty dark in there. Soon as it opened...

A beat.

MIKE

Soon as it opened, the spiders jumped on me. Crawled over my body. Bit me. Before I could react, I was paralyzed.

RYDER

I'm sorry, Mike, but that's what was supposed to happen. NEEDED to happen.

MIKE

Well I didn't know that at the time. I thought for sure something had gone wrong. That you were wrong, gave me the wrong terrarium or something. Miscalculated. The spiders - they wove web all over my bedroom. They put me at the center - facing the door. Their web was sharp - like wire - they laid me into it. Strands cut into my skin. My blood dripped out, spilled over the web. Blood Droplets hanging on web all over my room. Drops of my own blood. Occasionally, a few of the spiders would move from whatever corner of the room they were in - stop weaving - and bite me again. Paralyzing me further.

RYDER

They needed you for their trap.

MIKE

I was like that for that night. The next day. I thought for sure I was going to die.

All because I went for a night drive. Because I got into a fight with my girlfriend. Because I called you.

A beat.

MIKE

Then... sometime after midnight the next night my front door opened. You said to leave it unlocked. Make it easy for the leeches to enter. Moonlight came in from the window and hit parts of the web. The spiders all hid in shadows. Down the hall, the leech-people shambled through my house. They knocked over furniture, opened every door searching for me. When they came to my bedroom door - they knew I was there. They opened the door. The little girl, fat man, and elderly woman were framed by my doorway like a disgusting family portrait. The little girl came forward first. The light from the hallway backlit her as she tripped into the web. She fell apart into thousands of leeches - like glass shattering. Her "face" looked at me as it broke apart.  I know she wasn't a real girl - an actual person - but it was devastating to watch.

A beat.

MIKE

The web must have had some chemical in it or something that made it so the leech-broods couldn't stay together in their fake human form.

RYDER

The shatter speculum arachnides -  glass shatter spiders - have evolved to almost exclusively hunt and kill mirror leeches. There's no chemical poison you can spray or trap you can put out. The mirror leeches are hunters and require a predatory to take them out.

MIKE

Every leech caught in the web, caused my whole room to vibrate like a bad carnival ride. Hundreds of the spiders jumped forward. They wasted no time- they devoured the leeches, wrapped others in webbing. The elderly woman stepped forward to see what happened to the girl. She too tripped into the blood-drenched web. Soon as she touched it, all the leeches she was made of fell apart. The fat man stepped back. Moved away from the door, and shambled back down the hall. I didn't see what happened, but hundreds of spiders chased after him. I passed out sometime after that. The spider venom, dehydration... some combination. My last thoughts were - the leeches were gone, but I was dead anyway.

A beat.

RYDER

Mike, I'm sorry you had to go through all that - truly I am. But it was necessary. The spiders are most effective when they have a creature in their trap - a creature the leeches are hunting.

MIKE

(offended)

A creature? I'm not even a person to you. Just something to put in a trap so one monster can kill another monster.

RYDER

I don't blame you for thinking that way, Mike. And maybe you won't appreciate this now, but think objectively: a terrifying hunter has come into your community. Become part of your environment. That hunter was after you in particular. One option would have been to let it simply kill you and then move onto another and kill them.

The other option was to "use" you so to speak to lure the hunter in, and neutralize it. We were successful. And you survived.

MIKE

No thanks to you.

RYDER

All thanks to me. Four days afterwards you woke up in a hospital - did you not? After being put into a medically-induced coma until the spider venom was neutralized. I'd instructed Cryptozoologist Dr. Sonja Patel to go to your home 48 hours after I left you. She had an anti-venom for the spiders. At your age, weight, and overall health, we calculated there was less than a 7% chance you'd die from this encounter - all while saving your community from a predatory species that might destroy it. You called me looking for my help and I gave it to. You're welcome.

A beat.

MIKE

While I was in the hospital - recovering - I had a lot of time to kill. I'd heard of your show before calling in. But I didn't know much about you. Not really. There's a lot of conspiracy theories about you.

RYDER

(impatient)

Mike, I'm not going to waste air time discussing inter-[cut off]

MIKE

(interrupts)

What happened to Julian and Miranda Holloway? What did you do to them?

Ryder hangs up on Mike.

A beat.

RYDER

Mike is no longer on the line. I'm happy he's alive, that he and his community are free of a terrible creature that was doing them harm. But I won't allow this show to devolve into strange conspiracies about myself and people I might have associated with in the past.

A beat.

RYDER

That's all for tonight. Thank you and if you're having problems that are supernatural, paranormal, otherworldly in anyway - please feel free to call-in next time on A Voice From Darkness.

Outro Music.

[ciathyzareposts]

Star Control II: Why Can’t We Be Friends?

Home planet encounters make it clear that you’re not getting on the ground without going through a lot of combat first.

           Star Control II is easily the most information-rich game that we’ve had so far. The two Starflight titles were well above the average RPG, but even they didn’t have half the dialogue and lore of this one. That’s good for me as a player, but not so much as a blogger–and perhaps not so much for you as a reader. I could describe what I did in the last six hours in about two paragraphs; what I discovered will take many more, and I’m not sure if you want entries that long. You’re going to get this one anyway, but I welcome your feedback on whether it’s too much.

Imagine when I get to the modern era and a game like Skyrim. The simple act of entering a dungeon, reading two skill books, killing a draugr, and finding a shrine to Clavicus Vile might take 10 minutes of game time, but I could get 10,000 words out of that with the associated descriptions and lore. As the genre has a whole becomes more information-rich, it’s going to be difficult to determine where to draw the line.             

Even with the dialogue summaries the game provides, you have to take a lot of screenshots.

          But I have no complaints as a player. One of the finest moments I’ve ever had with an RPG came with Morrowind about 15 years ago, the first or second time I’d played, before there were wikis all over the Internet that spoiled plot developments. One of the great mysteries of the game is what happened to the dwarves, whose ancient ruins dot the landscape, and I found myself more interested in solving that riddle than progressing with the next official quest. I looked at the map that came with the game, identified every little dome that even hinted at a Dwemer ruin, and started to explore them systematically. And the amazing thing is, my explorations bore fruit! The developers rewarded this kind of “side-curiosity” with enough evidence among the ruins that you can basically piece together the story (although you need some plot-related events to make it 100% clear).

Most of the time, your effort in an RPG rewards the character, which in turn rewards the player somewhat vicariously. When you have a curious player, however, and you reward that curiosity with information, you are directly rewarding the player. This is something that Bethesda does exceedingly well and, in my opinion, does not get enough credit for doing. Whether you like Fallout 4 for its RPG mechanics, you have to admire how information-rich its world is. Every building has a story to tell. You’ll stop by one building and read a computer log about how they were expecting some kind of shipment on October 23. You know that’s the day the bombs fell. A few hundred yards down the road, you find the remains of the truck carrying that shipment. It clearly ran off the road into a tree. There will be a skeleton a couple dozen feet beyond the tree, as if ejected from the cab of the truck. If you just tromp from quest to quest, blowing through all the areas in between, you’re cheating yourself out of a world of detail. 

  Star Control II doesn’t quite reward random exploration this way. Particularly given the time limit, I don’t think you could solve the game by simply visiting random systems. You have to follow some kind of quest track. And I suspect that most of the information I’m discovering will turn out to be necessary, not ancillary, to the plot. I also prefer my plots a bit more serious than Star Control‘s. But even with all those limitations, this game is a welcome relief from era titles that are nothing but combat.

A recap is in order. I am a young starship captain in an era when the human race has become “fallow slaves” to the squid-like Ur-Quan, confined to Earth under a red shield that prevents off-planet travel. The Ur-Quan give conquered races a choice between “fallow slavery” and “thrall slavery” in which they fight for the Ur-Quan Hierarchy as battle thralls. I grew up off-world, son of a marooned group of scientists studying the ruins of an ancient race called the Precursors, and I’ve been able to stay alive because I’m flying a Precursor ship. Now based out of a starbase in orbit around Earth that the Ur-Quan mysteriously abandoned, I have been collecting advanced technology, improving my star-ship, and finding allies to throw off the yoke of the Ur-Quan.           

My starmap has been annotating various territories as I discover them.

         I originally assumed those allies would come from races that were part of the old Alliance against the Ur-Quan, but it’s becoming clearer that all races–including Ur-Quan allies and non-affiliated races–are up for grabs, partly because the Ur-Quan have been distracted by a distant war. This is the rundown of the races I have so far:

              Androsynth: Old enemy of Earth because they had once been Earth’s slaves. They seem to be gone now, destroyed by the Orz who now inhabit their system.

Ariloulaleelay: An old Alliance race that mostly disappeared after the Ur-Quan victory. Classic “little green men” who may have been responsible for abductions and experiments on Earthlings in the past. Current whereabouts unknown. They may not live in regular space.

           In fact, as we’re about to find out, they do not.

          Chenjesu: Crystalline beings who originally drew Earth into the old Alliance against the Ur-Quan, now trapped on Procyon under a “fallow slave” shield, along with the Mmrnmhrm.

Kohr-Ah: Some new race that the Ur-Quan are currently fighting, distracting them from my attempts to rebuild the Alliance.

Ilwrath: Cruel spider creatures, allies of the Ur-Quan, whose only weakness seems to be a fanatical belief in their gods. The Umgah are currently exploiting that weakness.

           “Subtlety” does not translate well in Ilwrath.

        Melnorme: A neutral race that trades in information. They’re responsible for half my clues.

Mmrnmhrm: Robotic species, member of the old Alliance. Now trapped with the Chenjesu on Procyon under a “fallow slave” shield.

Mycon: Fungoid race allied with the Ur-Quan. I haven’t met them yet in this game, but they’ve apparently taken over Syreens’ old system, and I suspect they had something to do with the destruction of Syra.

Orz: Weird yellow fish-flowers who come from the same alternate dimension as the Ariloulaleelay. Seem to have destroyed the Androsynth and taken over their space. They appear to have allied with us, but it’s hard to understand what they’re saying.

Pkunk: An unknown race currently being attacked by the Ilwrath.

            The Pkunk end up being somewhat weird, but no more than most of the creatures on this list.

        Precursors: An ancient race within whose ruins the main character grew up. Members of the “sentient milieu,” Their technology built my flagship. Probably extinct.

Shofixti: Cat-weasel warriors given advanced technology by the Yehat. Destroyed their own star to avoid surrendering to the Ur-Quan. One lone male warrior with a thin hold on sanity still keeps a vigil from orbit. A group of females are possibly in the hands of a VUX admiral.

Slylandro: New to the galaxy, this race has sent probes all over the place. The probes, after first claiming to be on missions of peace, are attacking everybody. In the last session, I got a clue as to where they might be coming from. One of their damned probes is almost always on my tail when I sail through hyperspace.

         Captain Chester has lost all hope when it comes to these probes.

         Spathi: Race of cowardly mollusks who surrendered to the Ur-Quan despite having decent ships and technology. Now serve them as battle thralls. One of them was assigned to monitor Earth but instead joined my crew early in the game.

          The Spathi have a particular outlook on life.

          Syreen: All-female race of buxom sirens. Joined the old Alliance after their planet, Syra, was destroyed by what they thought were natural disasters. After they surrendered to the Ur-Quan, given a new homeworld called Gaia. Accepted fallow slavery (red shield) and unwilling to break their treaty.

Taalo: Another member of the “Sentient Milieu,” a cooperative of ancient races. Probably extinct, though I had this theory that they’re the “Talking Pets.” I have one of their artifacts, a stone that blocks psychic influence.

Talking Pets: Little frog-like creatures who do all the communicating from the Ur-Quan because the Ur-Quan feel it’s beneath them to speak directly to lesser races. Unknown if they have their own history or world.

Umgah: Blob-like creatures with a cruel sense of humor. Allies to the Ur-Quan. Lately amusing themselves by impersonating the Ilwrath gods with something called a “HyperWave Caster.”

             These guys turn out not to be the likeable kind of jokesters. They’re just jerks.

           Ur-Quan: Putative enemies of the game. They want to conquer every other race in the galaxy. They’ve been around a long time, as they were also “Sentient Milieu” members. Willing to let conquered races live out their own destinies as “fallow slaves” under red shields, and demand that the decision be put to a popular vote.

VUX: One-eyed, snouted race allied to the Ur-Quan. Humanity apparently insulted them the first time we met, leading to an enduring hatred. I hadn’t met them yet when this session began.

           The VUX are maddeningly vague on the nature of the supposed insult.

           Yehat: Race of pterodactyls who chose to be battle thralls under the Ur-Quan.

Zoq-Fot-Pik: Cooperative of three small races from one planet. Caught in the crossfire between the Ur-Quan and the Kohr-Ah, glad to ally with us in the last session.

                  I’m going to relate what I found this session below, but as I do, it’s important to keep in mind that I usually only had a constellation, sometimes a star, as a hint. This means that for every encounter, I might have had to explore several stars and dozens of planets before finding it. Naturally, I mined those planets that had minerals and took life forms when I found those, but those tasks have become so rote and procedural at this point that there’s no point narrating them. I still haven’t found a “Rainbow World” yet.           

I’ve learned to prize heavy “biological” worlds as much as mineral ones, as it gives me more to sell to the Melnorme.

          As this session began, I had “to do” items related to almost all of these races, if only to make contact and find out where they stand. Because I was sick of spending so much money on fuel (I hadn’t even had enough money to purchase the “Fusion Blaster” the Melnorme gave me), I prioritized the locations closest to Earth, at least at the beginning, which is how I found myself in the Giclas constellation, looking for a rumored other neutral race. It turned out to be the Pkunk, a race of hippie birds who believe in reincarnation and positive energy and all that New Age stuff. My negotiations with the first ship I encountered went well, and they directed me to their homeworld.

The Pkunk are aware that the Ilwrath are only attacking them because someone is impersonating the Ilwrath gods. They didn’t seem to mind much. They happily agreed to join my Alliance, gave me an artifact called a Clear Spindle, and also gave me four ships (with crews) for my fleet. (I’m going to have to stop using my flagship for every combat.) Before I left, they predicted my future and said that the Ariloulaleelay would give me the ability to summon dimensional doors and travel in a way that’s even faster than hyperspace.           

Well, that sucks.

          The “other dimensions” thing gained even more traction with another visit to the Melnorme. I sold them the bio scans I’d made since our last contact and used my credits to buy plans for some kind of laser defense system for the Prydwen plus some information. One of the things they told me is that there is a “weakness in the division between dimensions” that manifests itself in between the Chandrasekhar and Columbae constellations on the 17th of each month (we’ll just ignore the absurdity of that).

My next trip, again based on proximity, was to the VUX (no idea why that’s always capitalized) worlds, hoping to find the Shofixti females and otherwise gauge their status. Conversations with the ships were mostly futile; the captains refused to explain the specific nature of the offense we gave them, only that they hate us forever, and even if they didn’t, they’d destroy us because that’s what the Ur-Quan want. One of them did mention that if I wanted to meet a “friendly” VUX, I should try Admiral Zex at Alpha Cerenkov. VUX encounters inevitably led to combat, so I didn’t stay in their system long.           

Maybe I’ll just skip those planets.

           At Alpha Cerenkov, Admiral Zex proved to be an affable, if perverted, member of the species. A hero of the earlier war, he retired to a hedonistic lifestyle years ago and seems to fetishize other races. He was willing to give me the Shofixti females if I could bring him some animal from a planet that “basks in the yellow light within the eight-star constellation of Linch-Nas-Ploh,” which he translated as “the snake-like creature who has swallowed the elephant beast.” Studying the star map, I think this probably refers to Lyncis, way up at the “north” edge of the galaxy.            

Unfortunately, I think he means that last part literally.

           I next went to the Yehat space nearby. When I finally encountered a Yehat ship, they were surprised to see a human outside the red shield around Earth. The crew of the ship I encountered was reluctant to kill me because of our former friendship, but their desires were at odds with the mandate from their queen to follow Ur-Quan orders. They seemed to respond when I told them that the Shofixti were still alive, but they demanded proof that I didn’t have.             

At least they feel bad about it.

           Around this point, I returned to starbase, where Captain Hayes told me that they’d received a distress call from the Zoq-Fot-Pik, whose home planet was under attack from a “black destroyer.” I bought an extra fuel pod, fueled, up, and headed for the ZFP homeworld.           

While at starbase, I was able to buy the “Fusion Blaster” and “Point Defense” upgrades.

           On the way, I encountered a Spathi ship in hyperspace. They said they wouldn’t attack but begged us not to tell the Ur-Quan that they’d let us go. Conversation with them solved one mystery: why they, as cowards, accepted “battle thrall” slavery instead of “fallow slavery.” They said they’d meant to do the latter, but the Umgah had interfered with the voting as a joke. I still have to visit the Spathi homeworld.            

The Spathi and Tyron Lannister would get along.

        The first major surprise came when I arrived at the ZFP world, encountered the black ship of the Kohr-Ah, and found myself speaking to an Ur-Quan! (Or, more accurately, to his Talking Pet.) It turns out that the Kohr-Ah are a faction of Ur-Quan, not a separate race. They call the regular Ur-Quan the “Kzer-Za,” and the two sides are fighting over “supremacy of Doctrine and possession of the Sa-Matra.” “We cleanse,” the captain explained. “You are the filth.”

When I asked why they were destroying us, he gave me a big info-dump of Ur-Quan history. It basically went that their species is hostile and territorial by nature. Even civilization among their own kind came late to them, and only with great difficulty, and it was even worse when they started to explore the stars and meet other races. Their only friends were the rock-like Taalo, “the only people we could stand with, or talk to, without the hunter inside us screaming, ‘Kill the interloper! Rip out its life!'” (Their description of the Taalo as sentient rocks makes me wonder if I don’t have a Taalo, rather than a Taalo “artifact,” on my ship.) Eventually, a psychic race called the Dnyarri wiped out the other “Sentient Milieu” races. They enslaved the Ur-Quan and used them to destroy the Taalo.           

The Ur-Quan goes through his history.

            Twist #2 came in further conversation. The Dnyarri are actually the Talking Pets! (At this point, my Taalo=Talking Pet theory was completely debunked.) They kept the Ur-Quan as slaves for thousands of years, experimenting on them genetically and splitting them into two species: green (“effete scientists and bureaucrats” and black (“the builders, the fighters, the doers”). The green became the Kzer-Za and the black became the Kohr-Ah. The Ur-Quan eventually discovered that excruciating pain could block the Dnyarri influence, so they created devices called “excruciators” to wear and thus maintain their independence.

Once the Ur-Quan achieved victory over the Dnyarri and enslaved them in turn, they decided they’d better destroy all other life in the galaxy to avoid ever being enslaved again. The Kzer-Za faction insisted that they only enslave or neutralize (i.e., fallow slavery) other races, while the Kohr-Ah demanded that they kill them outright. The schism led to the Kohr-Ah fleeing the galaxy until just recently.

The captain attacked when he was done with his speech. The huge Kohr-Ah ships fire giant throwing stars, which linger until something hits them. But you’ll be happy to know I was able to destroy the dreadnought with the BUTT missiles of the Spathi ship. I’ll talk more about combat next time, but suffice to say that I’m starting to get the hang of it.          

The Ur-Quan dreadnought spams giant iron swastikas.

          The ZFP were grateful for their rescue and gave me several more ships for my fleet. My flagship now has about as many escort ships as I think it can accommodate.

When the battle was over, I checked my notes and found that I was pretty close to a few other “to do” items. I started with the Umgah. I don’t know what I was expecting. Clearly, I wasn’t going to have an encounter in which they just handed me the HyperWave Caster with instructions on how to use it. Instead, in about six encounters in a row, they laughed at me and attacked. Each battle involved multiple Umgah ships. Their primary weapon has a limited range, but they have a special weapon that can suck you into proximity. I got pretty good at destroying them with the Spathi, but eventually the attacks became too much and I fled the system.            

BUTT missiles home in on the Umgah ship while his weapon fires in vain.

           The 17th of the month was near, and I was near the weak point in space, so I headed there. Sucked through it, I found myself in a place called “quasi-space.” Time passes there, but it doesn’t seem to use any fuel. The map showed a bunch of small blobs and one big blob. The small blobs were portals back to hyperspace, but the big blob was a portal to a planet.             

Beyond hyperspace.

            The planet turned out to be the homeworld of the Ariloulaleelay. The representative who contacted me explained a bit about the history of our two species, which came across as less sinister than I expected, although of course I was hearing his side. He suggested that the Ariloulaleelay had been guiding human development for a long time, and that they made themselves known, and joined the old Alliance, as a way of protecting us against other hostile species. When they were no longer needed because humanity was “safe” under the red shield, they disappeared for a while. I’m the first human to reach their homeworld. There was this chilling sequence, which may be the best RPG text so far in my chronology:            

Part of what we do on Earth is for your own protection. There are parasites. Creatures who dwell Beyond. They have names, but you do not know them. They would like to find you, but they are blind to your presence, unless you show yourselves. The Androsynth showed themselves, and something noticed them. There are no more Androsynth now. Only Orz. Ignorance is your armor. They cannot see you now. They cannot smell you. Much of our work with your people involved making you invisible, changing your smell. If I tell you more, you will look where you could never look before, and while you are looking you can and will be seen. You do not want to be seen.

        Traveling in quasi-space is how the Ariloulaleelay get around so fast. The alien said he’d give us a “portal spawner” so that we can use quasi-space, but we’d need to find a warp pod first. He suggested we’d find one on the wreck of an Ur-Quan dreadnought at Alpha Pavonis, not far from our current location. He mentioned that the Ariloulaleelay had recovered a Talking Pet from the same wreckage and had given it to the Umgah for care. He wanted us to stop by the Umgah and see how it fared.

We returned to hyperspace, sailed to Alpha Pavonis, visited the right planet, and got the pod.            

My lander crew loots the wreckage.

           At this point, I noticed that I wasn’t too far from Vega, which was one of the possible sources of the Slylandro probes. It actually turned out to be nearby Beta Corvi, but I found it. The Ariloulaleelay had said that the probes came from a world with no surface, so I hunted for a gas giant until I found the right one.           

This looks promising.

          I was surprised to find myself talking to a friendly group of gaseous creatures named “Content to Hover,” “Joyous Lifting,” and “Sullen Plummet.” They explained that they hardly get any visitors since the “Sentient Milieu” races were destroyed eons ago. (They went on for a while about a race that used to visit them called the “Shaggy Ones” that seemed worried about something and seemed to be seeking something.) Lonely and unable to leave their planet, they were excited when the Melnorme visited and sold them a probe.

In further discussions, it transpired that the Slylandro had mis-programmed the probe. It was supposed to seek out life forms and communicate as its top priority, but somehow “self-replicate” got set as the probe’s top priority, which means that it sees every ship that it encounters as a source of replication materials. Horrified, the Slylandro promised to try to recall the probes. In the meantime, they gave me a self-destruct code to use if I encounter any more. I thought these probes were the main quest, but it really just turned out to be a side quest.            

The Slylandro reach a horrifying conclusion.

           I end here, poised to swing by the Umgah (though I’ll probably just get attacked again) and then return to the Ariloulaleelay. I might need to use that portal spawner immediately because I’m running pretty low on fuel. I have three questions on my mind:               

When I joined the Orz to the Alliance, did I give some unspeakable evil from another dimension access to Earth?

Are the Melnorme necessary? Meaning, are the clues that they offer exclusive to the Melnorme, or do they exist largely as a kind of backup in case a player spends more time randomly visiting planets than following the initial clues? It feels like most of the things they’ve told me have been double-confirmed in later encounters.

I’ve mostly been diplomatic in my encounters with other races, but there are also some very aggressive options. Is there a more aggressive path through the game? If I was better at combat (and enjoyed it more), could I be subjugating the other species? Could I beat Admiral Zex into submission instead of doing his quest?

                     Captain Chester briefly considers a different path.

         The game began in January 2155, and Earth is scheduled to be destroyed in January or February 2159. It is now November 2156, so I’m about halfway through my available time. I’m hoping this portal spawner allows me to accomplish more in less time. We’ll soon see!

Time so far: 21 hours

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/star-control-ii-why-cant-we-be-friends/