STEAM LONDON: Realms of Aether Game Thread

[MWBailey]

Dreyfuss took ove rthe landing of teh St. Elmo; he did build it after all, and had flown it many more times, almost every day for a month, once without the gas cells, just testing tthe capabilities of teh ducted fans.

HE began to feather down the rearward thrust, while slowly opening the vertical thrust ports and dialing teh deflation pumps t decrease lift slowly; even the blast of air downward did not stop som eof teh cat people from trying to stand under the boat portion and stand, gaping, pointing at the weird thing settling in their midst.

He saw in the APS sphere that several gawkers still stood underneath the ship, so he reached out with his left heel and depressed the Deep Bass lever in the floor-mounted steam calliope lever array (salvaged from redfish reef off of Galveston after a storm grounded and broke the keel of a showboat) and watched in satisfaction as those underneath suddenly scatted like cats from back home. Then he finally feathered the thrust to nearly nil and the St. Elmo settled to the paving stones with the crunch of tons of steel crushing gravel to fine dust.

HE tooted the treble midrange twice to signal All Stop, and the ship throbbed faintly to the idling of the reciprocators.

[Stella Gaslight]

Emma pointed to Dreyfuss and let out a symphony of sounds human vocal cords should not be able to make while the lady cat nodded and added bits here and there.  "She is welcoming us. Her name is something like Lysander.  Her people have formed a kind of symbiotic relationship with their housing.  You see the buildings are almost entirely automated and are capable of interdependent thought just like Angel and they are going to see us as invaders and respond almost like the body does.  I think it may be George causing the malfunction but getting at the problem is going to be very hard.  They have anti tamper systems beyond anything I have imagined."

[MWBailey]

"Should I have the marines form up, then, or will that send a bad message?" Dreyfuss asked.

He had managed to get Madame Arachne and Nadya to come along, and Lt. Myers and Sgt. Tolchoc of the Marines for armed backup, Leyton had invited himself. Dreyfuss had put on his usual guns and saber, the boat gun apparently exciting something in the locals; he had also brought an array of locksmith's small tools, something he had accumulated whilst hunting supernatural threats in a Birmingham tenement.The vampires had turned out to be the worst of the reclusive types, and every flat had a different kind of lock... He had become quite adept at opening locks that defied all other attempts. Irene had scoffed that he was turning into a passable burglar, he remembered.

Cleo had taken one look at the cat people , hisssssssptt!'d, and generally imtimated that she wanted very much to bite one of them, so he left her on the ship, with orders to help Jock adn the captain and teh Marines hold the ship til thay all got back, and left orders for the captain to get back in the air and stand ready to launch a rescue attempt should everything go south.

I wonder where Irene is now? he sighed to himself. They always go running off about the time I get serious. I can't even keep one to raise.Well, enough of that for now. What was Ms. Lysander saying?

[Stella Gaslight]

"Bring them only of they promise not to hurt anyone in the building."  Emma was pulled back in to the mewling conversation for some minutes and then turned back to Dreyfuss. "Apparently they have attempted five different overrides and two armed teams of repairmen, no one has come back out.  Ms. Lysander doesn't think they are dead because the deepest rule in the programing is to protect life but she would be very happy if we could find them.  There was also a rumor of a young girl being kidnapped by the building right before the lock down but no one has been able to confirm it.  They can take us to the doors but we will have to find our own way from there.  Do you have any climbing equipment?  We may need it before the afternoon is out."

[Nigel Wetherby]

Sigmund stepped foreward toward the cat people, he took in a deep breath and sent out a thought so they might hear.
'My name is Sigmund. I will attempt to interface with this mind and seperate the 'Infection' could you lead me towards the source of the problem?
Cain stood beside Sigmund, placing a hand on his shoulder. "You aren't going alone. God knows what else is in that building, and I doubt Helena want's you to leave her so soon."

[MWBailey]

Dreyfuss extracted said promise from Nadya, Leiutenant Myers, and Sgt. Tolchoc, and Leyton and Madame Arachne both volunteered the promise on their own. Dreyfuss said, "We're backing him up too, " and they all followed Lysander up to the building, with the exception of the sergeant, whom did not have a grapnel-and-line; Dreyfuss sent him back to the ship, to gather and ready the three remaining marines and relay the no-harm order; he also sent the boat gun back with the sergeant, with orders to only return with it if not doing so might mean the deaths of the Shore Party; he had begun to "remember" the lingo of teh cat people (Apparently, the Bright One's soul "knew" things that Patrick had "files" for, but the recall was not immediate -- it was more like Dreyfuss was trying to remember a waltz or march that he hadn't played in several years), and it became obvious that, when Miss Emma pointed back to him and his group, they were saying that the Building's agitation had increased upon seeing them.

Dreyfuss had to admit that seeing a certain member of his part of the party could cause that; Nadya was feline in her mien, and supple and graceful as if she were one of their cousins. The letter that had come for him had informed him that Mariana, the agent whom he had referred to as being his "potential paramour," had in fact fallen for and married a certain Archduke from one of those little Grand Electorate principalities that peppered the landscape around Prussia and GErmany.

He scolded himself. he had started to gaze at Nadya, while she and the Leiutenant swung their grapnels to test their weight. God, she was beautiful, lithe, young, and formerly interested in him. Exactly, you fool, his conscience scourged him, past tense! Then she turned and looked at him and smiled, and he had to whip himself  into only smiling slightly in return. It didnt feel like it worked, and though the shifting, leaf-dappled light in the courtyard might have affected how she appeared, she seemed to color slightly, and her expression seemed to soften. STOP WOOLGATHERING you insipid nit! He berated himself. Get your mind back on the mission! He smiled again and looked away, hopefully not offending the young woman.

Miss Emma instructed them that Lysander suggested the second-story balcony above the Ground-floor entrance. Dreyfuss and Nadya and Myers took the grappling lines from their shoulders, and stepped away to either side and in front of the group. "Give us each at least a twelve foot radius to work in, miss Emma, that balcony's a relatively long throw." and they swung their hooks and threw the, his and Nadya's catching, the Leiutenant's bouncing back. While they waited, Nadya glanced over at him again, and he glanced at her, merely as an act of automatic courtesy, or at least thats what he strove to tell himself afterwards, but something passed between them then. But no, who was he kidding? Her warm smile, and his smile in return were just team-members encouraging each other. Yes. That's what it was. Of course. He shook his head, and thought about it no more, resolving to tell her about the letter after the mission, or during it if she asked, provided it didnt compromise matters, so that she woudn't misunderstand. Hopefully... (but part of him hoped for something altogether different).

The three of them climbed to the balcony, the Leiutenant seemingly slightly breathless.He had turned to motion for them to follow him, without drawing their weapons, when something whizzed by his head; it appeared, from the corner of his eye, to be some kind of tiny, metallic bat-winged flying machine...

[Stella Gaslight]

It was only the first of the little bats they swarmed around the crew.  Lysander shouted out a name for them from below.  "They are bird minders. They keep birds from flying in to the glass and hurting them selves.  They won't follow us inside if we can get inside."  Emma had come up with the second group and found the door knob and what she thought might be the lock very confusing, they were not made for human hands.  She tugged on it but it would not open, but she had no idea if she was even puling the right way.  "Any one have any ideas?"  All the while the bird minders were massing and making nuisances of themselves.

[Nigel Wetherby]

Madame Arachne pondered the chiripteric machines for a moment before an idea hit her. She reached into the leather puch that hung from her shoulder and produced a wind up bird Cain had made for her birthday.
"Sorry, Cain sweety." She wound up the little brass finch and let it loose. Its thin, balsa wood wings propelled it across the sky as if it were a true bird, sending the flock of bird minders swarming after the machine, giving them ample time to enter the building.
Cain beamed with pride, glad that his invention was so very useful.

[MWBailey]

There had been no lock on the door; all they had to do was push, and it slid open to the side, like a pocket door, instead of swinging on hinges. they entered the hallway beyond, which hummed with machinery as if a large motoirized unit were operating just behind one of teh walls. Dreyfuss and the Leiutenant crept up to where teh hallway opened out into a sort of central atrium, soaring to a ceiling of clear panels more than forty stories above.

Beyond that point, there seemed to be at least eight more sections, all separated by clear panels, som eof which were perforated by round holes, through which air and in some cases a kind of mist circulated. Nadya had joined them by the time they looked up that high, and she was entranced, apparently, by the soaring architecture. No threats preented themselves, and Dreyfuss touched Nadya on the shoulder, causing her to jump slightly in surprise. Dreyfuss tried to tell her that it was all right with a look, sending the thought very gently, but trying not to let any of his earlier regard show through. She let out a slow breath, and smiled that she was alright. Dreyfuss then asked her, softly, "If you don't mind, could you go and tell Sigmund and Miss Emma and the others it seems safe to come up?"
"Aye, Sir."
It sounded odd to his ears  for her to say that, and something must have shown on his face, since she smiled again, impishly this time, and lightly touched his upper arm before going.

I've got to get over my distrust of command, he thought. then saw Sigmuind and Cain climb up and ove rthe railing like they'd been doing it all their lives, followed by Emma, Leyton, and Lysander, then Helena, Madame Arachne, and Angel.

Dreyfuss sent, gently, George, can you hear me? it's Dreyfuss, we've come to try to rescue you and take you home. There was no verbal answer, but some of teh tension in the air seemed to lessen. A fellow named Sigmund is here to talk to you and the building, George; He is much better at mindspeak than I am. here he is now. Dreyfuss did his best to send properly and not shout it mentally, but also touched Sigmund's shoulder and motioned for him to proceed. Go ahead. I dont think I mucked things up so far, but be gentle.

[Nigel Wetherby]

Sigmund entered the building behind dreyfuss, his eyes closed as he prepared his mind. And then, all at once, he let it all go. He let George's being flow into his mind.
Cain watched in silent awe as Sigmund's entire body shuddered. His eyes rolled back into his head as he seemed to enter a trance much like those of inuit shamans.

The world inside the machine's mind was like a work of modern art made geometric. Sigmund stood floating through an endless black and blue darkness upon a white cube, veined with black outlines of a thousand and one circles, triangles, and squares. A prescise, adamant song hummed within the still air. But the song had a disturbance, a stringy, frantic tune. It appeared as if Sigmund had found the more...animalistic  shard of George. Something both afraid and agressive at the same time. Something chaotic.

[MWBailey]

Dreyfuss did something that made almost everyone stare for a few moments; he took off the whole Paterson gunbelt and rig, knife, flask and patchand cap and bullet pouch, and stowed it in the possibles bag, followed by the Smith and Wesson. he then took the Whitefire pistol out of teh bag, clipped it to his sword harness.

"Ok, so it's an energy gun," he said in response to the stares. several of the party apparently thought he was too old-fashioned to carry such a sidearm. "it's to focus the whitefire," he said, "so I dont go around burning everything to a crisp." that was about when a shape that looked like a very ticked-off George on a bad day stepped around the corner and started shooting at them.

"Hold your fire!" Dreyfuss shouted, as the party unlimbered their various weaponry and began to reluctantly point it at George."Lower your weapons, its just an illusion."

[Duellist]

Leyton took cover instinctively and reached for a Colt that he had prepared for just such an occasion.  It crossed the space between his hand and the St Elmo in the blink of an eye, less time than it took the Englishman to cock the hammer.  He had few qualms about pointing it at the illusion, but fewer still about keeping himself out of the line of fire.

"Illusion or not, this individual seems quite put out for some reason.  How certain can we be that he will not find some way of hurting us with those imaginary bullets?"

[Stella Gaslight]

"I don't understand George isn't normally violent.  Wait, Lysander who was the girl that was supposedly kidnapped?"  They spoke for a moment and Emma's frown grew.  "It looks like he has taken a young technician named Lina hostage.  I think she may be this worlds version of me and if he is protecting her, he is going to be as ruthless as his programing will allow.  We have to save that girl if we want to get George back.  I just know it."  Red lights popped from the ceiling and a strange noise like many doors closing at once rang through the building. "He pulled the fire alarm and how the moving platforms that would have taken us to the top where the brain is are in lock down.  It looks like we will have to take the stairs and who knows what else he will do if threatened."     

[MWBailey]

Dreyfuss went over to one of the platforms and stood on it. Nadya and  Madame Arachne followed and stood on the platform with him "you two might want to get off, I'm just testing an idea here, the thing could go tonkers on me' I'd hate fo reithe rof you to get hurt. They exited the platform, and Dreyfuss took the whitefire pistol, performed the valving exercise, and let just a tiny bit of the whitefire out and into the pistol, which he adjusted to deliver a spray, rather than a bolt. The whitefire crawled around the floor of the platform like an animated mist, then sank into one corner of it.

The platform began to rise up its shaft; George began shooting at it, but the raygun seemed to have no effect on the platform, and it continued up one floor, then two, then three, but he was unable to make the fourth floor fire door open, so he rode the platform back down again.

"I can take as many as want to risk it up to the fourth floor," he said, as he let the platform down again. Everyone but Leyton and the Leiutenant got on, and Dreyfuss prayed fervently that he hadn't bitten off more than he could chew. They made it to the fourth floor without incident, however, and disembarked safely.

[Nigel Wetherby]

Sigmund took a single step onto a white circle, and immediately the cube reacted by disintigrating beneath him, shifting into a jumble of moving shapes and twisting forms. The face of George seemed to surface from the chaos.
YOU WILL NOT HURT HER The voice of the machine and the being within screamed at the top of its dual voices. Angry dodecahedrons floated violently past Sigmund.
COLD ONES SHALL NOT BE TOLERATED The voice screamed, this time for all the residents of the building to hear.

[Stella Gaslight]

Helena held Sigmund ad he shook she found herself humming his song.  "Be strong." She whispered.  Dry hot wind started to rush in from strange vents in the ceiling and roared down the empty hallway. They moved forward sweating and sweltering.  "Lysander says the stairs are just at the end of the hall."  The doors along the hall were shut tight but Emma could hear confused meows coming from inside them.  Seeing that the hot wind was not stopping them steam rolled down from above blanketing them in a white fog.  Emma nearly ran in to a wall that she could not see.

[MWBailey]

GEORGE, LET HIM GO, PLEASE. Dreyfuss sent, urgently, HE ISNT TRYING TO HURT EMMA. Dreyfuss paused, then decided to take a risk, and poured whitefire into the rapport, GEORGE, DON'T YOU REMEMBER ME? IT'S DREYFUSS. PLEASE, GEORGE. LINA ISN'T YOUR EMMA. YOUR EMMA, HELL, OUR EMMA IS HERE STANDING CLOSE TO ME, AND YOU"RE SCARING HER!!!

"Miss Emma, quick, call out to George and tell him you're scared," Dreyfuss called out.

[Nigel Wetherby]

Sigmund lept into the mass of shifting shapes, diving deep within the AI. Within it he ehard the voices of the machine. Anger, fear, sadness, all of it melted together into the machine. Sigmund could feel white shapes burying him, overtaking his mind.
Lina! Sigmund cried out in his mind.
You do not know me but I have heard of you. You must do me a favor, you must distract the machine and calm it down! It sees us and thinks we're intruders!

Cain extended both his deus blades, a scowl crossing his face.
"I've' had enough of this!!"

[Stella Gaslight]

"He is right George. I can't see anything and you promised you would always help me find my way. I am your Emma don't you remember?"  She was crying now the thought that he could forget her and choose another hurt.    Several stories above Lina who was confused and frighted listened to the strange voice and decided to do something the building had always been fascinated by.  She started to draw a complicated maze on the floor and the tiny metal creatures they kept the carpet clean came out of hiding and watched her. The fog stopped and everything was very quiet.   "GIVE HER BACK."  George rummbled sounding more human than machine.   

[Nigel Wetherby]

Sigmund let the white shapes dissapate and ease themselves away. He delved deeper and deeper into the machine's mind. He found the shard of George within it, curled in a fetal position, as if awaiting some grand rebirth. The matter around him pulsated and twitched like water under vibration. Sigmund's physical being began to twitch and inhale deeply.
 Sigmund felt as if he were being drowned. With one last leap of desperation, he grabbed the fragment of George's wrist.
The struggle began.
NO! I HAVE TO PROTECT HER
Youve been imprisoning her! If you love something, set it free!
NO! NO NO NO NO NO NO NO!
You need  to trust her! If you loved her, you would trust her!
The machine was silent. The doors quietly slid open, the fog subsiding. Cain had prepared to cut the door down, as he charged towards it,  the door slid open sending him toppling over a pair of children who had been pawing at the door. An older feline was clutching a white-furred feline with broad, soft wings. The two seem locked in an embrace of fear.
 

[Stella Gaslight]

"It is all right George. I am here waiting for you, let Sigmund bring you home."  She placed her hand on the wall as gently as if it was on his shoulder.

"Cain isn't going to hurt you kitty people.  I promise he won't." They didn't understand, Angel spread her wings letting the soft feathers brush against the two kittens. The little one purred and batted at the wings just like Sweets did.

[Nigel Wetherby]

Sigmund reached a hand out into the deep, liquid conciousness. George reached out for him. When their hands clasped together, Sigmund snapped from his trance, holding within his hand, a chip of metal which pulsated with glowing white light. Sigmund smiled, feeling the presence of George within the hunk of metal.
"I've got him!" He cheered, raising the shard into the air.

Cain watched amused as the little felines played hapilly with Angel's wings.
I am very sorry for intruding. Cain said in music-speech.What are your names?

[MWBailey]

Dreyfuss hoped George would be able to trust Sigmund and allow himself to be led. All this mindspeaking had gone beyond the point of draining him, and he seemed to be taking in energy; he feared where it might be coming from. it seemed to be coming from teh whitefire pistol, which was clipped to his harness, but being gripped by his right hand.

"What about the crews?" Dreyfuss asked. "The ones who were trapped?" HE let go of teh pistol, but instead of blacking out, he simply felt a bit hungry. Thats odd, he thought. "Was anything odd going on with my raygun just now? something like sucking in energy?" Dreyfuss asked the rest of the group.

[Stella Gaslight]

"Here hand him to me."  Emma touched the bit of of glowing metal to the back of the pendant around her neck and gasped as the white energy surged around her. "He has them above us they are being kept asleep just out side of the room Lina was being kept in. I think we can.."  She fell to her knees gasping the energy transfer had been more potent than she thought.

Helena hugged Sigmund.  "That was amazing. What was it like in side of that thing?"

The little ones sung with a strange guttural accent but he could understand them.  "I am Roman." The eldest said. "And this is my sister Verona."  

Verona was a little bit bolder than her brother. "Where did your fur go?  Are you sick?" she asked. 

[Genevieve Ozuna]

Nadya twitched to reach out and help in some way, and Madame Arachne smirked at her antics— the jerking of her hands forward and then back to pick at her skirt, then forward again, the cycle repeating. Finally the older woman laid her porcelain hand over the young gypsy’s caramel appendages. Finally noticing the physical reactions to her the battle waging within her mind, Nadya flinched and blushed. The beautiful woman just gave her a knowing grin and wink, which only made her blush further and slip her own hands away.

True, she had been interested in finding a way to help the party as a whole, but at that particular moment, she had been staring rather intensely at— and worrying rather profusely about— her Comodoro de las Fuerzas Aéreas. She chastised herself for fawning over the man during a mission, though not because another woman was involved. It wasn’t as though being the other woman was uncommon in her profession. Still, she was a changed woman now… mostly. Perhaps she out to keep her attentions away from her superior. After all, it wasn’t as though there was a lack of able-bodied men and women to warm her bunk. Still, there was something charming about him, and when Dreyfuss asked whether anyone had noticed his raygun behaving oddly, she mentally cursed herself for becoming distracted by her thoughts precisely when staring at the man would have proved beneficial.

Focusing on the situation at hand, she looked to Madame Arachne for guidance. The woman stood with the ease of a veteran, awaiting orders and prepared for action. Nadya mimicked her stance, though perhaps with a tad less confidence, and eagerly awaited the chance to aid in whatever way she could.