via Alupipoli Bahun, Interstellar News Corp
A massive bunker complex belonging to a pre-modern culture has been discovered on the human colony world of Joab. According to local newspapers in the colonial capital of New Jericho, the complex was breached while drilling a well in a “remote and arid” region.
The world of Joab has long been known to have hosted an ancient spacefaring civilization, destroyed thousands of years before the present day. The planet was settled by the Systems Alliance two decades ago, and hosts tens of millions of human colonists at present. The planet is being actively terraformed to Earth-like conditions.
According to Citadel laws concerning archeotech, the discovery should fall under Citadel Council jurisdiction, excluding the complex and anything within being made the sole property of the Systems Alliance.
It’s close to midnight and something evil’s lurking in the dark
Under the moonlight you see a sight that almost stops your heart
You try to scream but terror takes the sound before you make it
You start to freeze as horror looks you right between the eyes
You’re paralyzed
‘Cause this is thriller, thriller night
And no one’s gonna save you from the beast about to strike
You know it’s thriller,…
Because @thefalloficarus and I keep flinging our various characters at each other to see what sticks. And I haven’t done anything with a good dose of bloody body horror in it for a while >:)
A scene from a part of our sprawling story ideas. Prior to this, Torin (acting as a sort-of diplomatic envoy from Abhain) has been investigating the whereabouts of a missing member of the Abhani royal family. This has led him to the current operational centre of an ex-State Citizen’s (Stirling) business dealings, where he meets with a surprisingly powerful (and even more surprisingly alive) young Dreglands mage called Amor. Torin ends up a bit distracted from his actual mission, taking it upon himself to actually train Amor.
Unfortunately, Stirling has more than a little more knowledge of what has happened to the missing royal, and is not happy about Torin sticking his nose in. And Amor is even more unfortunately very loyal to his pay cheque...
(Also thank you to @skekfaev for her ongoing supply of Dreglands cannon fodder :P)
Title: Certification: Level Nine
Setting: New Jericho (well, not yet, but over in that side of the world).
Warnings: Violence, blood, gore, death, cannibalism. Academic twattery. OP nonsense.
Summary: Torin Foley is many things. It might have been better if there had been more understanding of exactly what this entailed before attempting to incarcerate him.
Characters: Torin Foley; Amor (mention).
Words: 2950
Torin Foley is many things. Committed. Meticulous. Bloody good at his job - which, given his specialisation, is only barely an expletive. And he is quite willing to provide an Education on that particular subject. At great length. For as long as it takes to be clear about the misconceptions, and the actual reality of applied, relevant, blood magic. Particularly how the stereotype of the Blood Mage as some demented, needle-happy nutcase with a severe misunderstanding about personal hygiene is – at best – criminally inaccurate, and in all honestly, quite offensive.
He is a very thorough man, Torin. There will be diagrams. There will be illustrations, sketched in the soft-glowing patterns the golden tips of his translucent left-hand leaves in the air, while his organic right arm waves expressively around his own words. There may even be a test afterwards, because if there’s an Education to be given, it will be done well.
The sanguine arts ultimately, inherently, represent a living thaum – and of course there are rules. They’re just not your rules. Life has power. Death has power. And the switch from one to another, from element to breath, from living being to cooling flesh, has more than either one alone.
Synergy, the concept is called in other fields, and more modern texts, but Torin prefers the older term:
Transmutation.
It’s a little more accurate in some quite specific ways, and admittedly rather more dramatic - and that tells you even more about the kind of man Torin is.
And no. He’s not a bloody vampire.
Torin Foley is many things. Unfortunately, right now, the thing he mostly is – is tied to a wall.
He had to hand it to Amor – or, as much as he could, given the current circumstances. The kid paid attention. It might not seem like it most – often – sometimes, but there was no denying that he had his own ‘unique’ way of picking up on the core of what Torin had been talking about, even if much of the surrounding detail passed him by.
It made sense, really. A mageling child – as much as Torin disliked that particular bit of slang, because honestly now, could you get a bit more defensively-patronising? – growing up alone in Dreglands of all places, with his only vaguely thaumic examples being rumour and hearsay, dressed up in myths of monsters and deemed blasphemous in the extreme. Where simply extending your Intent could lead to a death sentence or far worse; regardless of age, or power, or what you even did. Amor had done well to keep his burgeoning talent hidden, let alone develop some usable measure of command.
And it was undeniable that there was power there, under that erratic surface. A lot of it. Running him through standard testing was going to be interesting; they could definitely skip onto intermediate. His instinctive grasp of how to –
Pain crackled across his forehead, and Torin drew a sharp breath, effectively breaking his train of thought.
“Ecxh-cuthe me,” he muttered, refocusing his glare at the figure opposite as the guard leaned back from the shimmering layer of air that sat between them, tapping a long copper baton against his arm. Small sparks of spilled power danced along the length of the metal, although Torin was fairly sure the Dreglander couldn’t actually see them. Honestly. Who prodded a wardline with a stick?
“Don’t go lookin’ thoughtful there, freak. Don’t want you getting ideas.”
“…rheally?” Torin blinked – sarcastically, he hoped, as it was pretty much the only action that was still practically available to him – and made an attempt to wriggle his fingertips. “Ahnd I’m thupothed to do… whath?”
He really did have to hand it to Amor. Although it would have been nice if the outcome of absorbing his lessons had resulted in something other than Torin knocked unconscious, stripped of his personal wardings – well, those that were detachable anyway – and interred in a personally-bespoke containment cell, at the behest of that Stateborn son-of-a-bitch that paid the boy’s wages.
But he supposed at least the kid had been listening.
There’s a first time for everything.
The restraints were makeshift, but remarkably competent, considering the time they must have had to work with and the availability of suitable equipment. Metal cuffs extended the full length of his forearms, ending in a pair of prongs that immobilised his palms. Fingers separated, pinned apart and held stiff with lengths of welded pipe, with the same treatment on both his organic side and the relic-hand, although he was fairly sure there was a lot more layers over relic’s translucent violet flesh.
The brief for the rest of him seemed to have been: ‘chains, and lots of them’.
Plus the metal bit. That was probably the most annoying – extending unpleasantly far back into his mouth, presumably to stop him from drawing blood from his tongue. He was pretty sure that Amor didn’t know about the trigger sigil etched into the roof of his mouth, so it really was an irritatingly good guess.
Coupled with the wardline walls – which were unrefined, but powerful, and the inefficiency of the linkages would bother him more specifically if the setup didn’t send a burning dart of agony across his temples every time he even tried to focus – it was…
A problem.
Torin tightened his lips against the metal, in vain attempt not to drool quite as much, and frowned. There was plenty to consider here, including his own shortcomings. Letting his guard slip. Trusting the young mage, perhaps – well, no, certainly – a lot more than he should have done, considering. He hadn’t realised the level of influence that Sterling’s damn wallet still had. Perhaps he should have been more specific about Abhain’s financial situation.
Perhaps he –
Another stab of pain jolted home, following another clang of metal against the wardlines that showered ether-acid sparks back towards him, as the second of his guards added his own baton to the physical emphasis.
“Don’t. Try it,” the man warned, and Torin let a small growl rise in his throat.
“Try whath, exthacly?”
Well.
He knew what.
Torin Foley. Certification Level Nine.
If situation is officially Irredeemable, adherence to Baobhan Protocol is imperative.
You cannot be taken.
Torin let out a long breath. Calming. He adjusted his pinned mouth as best he could – since it wasn’t that he was totally unaccustomed to speaking past a gag – and looked hard at the two guards, who were watching him suspiciously. Bravado aside, they were afraid. Good.
“Tho. Genklemen. Consigeringh I hagve unthimited acphess to diclomathic cregit – ”
The rightmost man sniggered, although his partner just shifted slightly and glowered.
“Bit late for bribing us. We ain’t letting you out.”
Torin sighed.
“Yeth, yeth. Got thatht far. Hagve co ashk.” He looked up at the roof, and let his eyes slide closed. “Eigther of you hagve fhamilies?”
“Shut your fucking mouth,” the other man started, suddenly lurching towards the wardline slightly, stopping as his companion’s hand swung up to his chest.
“Easy. He’s messin’ with ya.”
“Ngot rheally.” Torin managed to shift his shoulders in an almost-shrug. “Jutht thrying tu schee how aukwud thith ish ghonna be.”
Teeth. Tongue, pressed down against the base of his mouth, the metal rod sitting against his enamel so he can’t bite. But there’s an edge there they don’t know about – at the back, the loose filling that is deliberately never quite right – and all it really takes is the will to do it.
These restraints won’t hold him forever. The warding certainly won’t, but that isn’t the point. He’s hurt, and he’s down, and there are methods they could employ, things that could be brought to bear even on someone like him, which would render the situation… unacceptable.
He cannot be taken. And it is too close to that.
Teeth. Tongue, twisting and cramping in his mouth as he dragged it back hard, and pain bursts in iron roses across his jaw. He couldn’t keep down the following cough, the surge of spit and scarlet that washed across the roof of his mouth before it spilled down his chin – as the sigil caught. In itself it wasn’t a very powerful spell – you really, really didn’t want something of massive output etched in that close to your brain, in all honestly – but it was enough, and Torin felt the wardline spark and scream as power flared like a striking match.
A few moments. That’s all he was going to get, before the ward caught up and took his reason in a storm of disorientation.
So he bit down hard, and the gag shattered like ice beneath his shivering teeth.
“Oh, good godless that’s better!” he gasped, thickly, spitting broken metal that hummed against his lips with diverted power. Still drooling, he tried not to retch as his tongue throbbed, and the fizzing sense of activation was hot-sweet across his mouth.
“The fuck -?” The second man lurched forwards, raising his baton threateningly, as he stepped across the wardline and the sense of him lit up across Torin’s mind. Racing pulse, the fear-song strong in his veins as he approached. He was trying to keep calm, trying to get composure through intimidation.
He looked up, smiling around the pain already starting in his head and the throb in his mouth, as the man moved to loom closer - and Torin spat violently up into the Dreglander’s face. It was a good shot, and the man let out a horrified yelp as he jerked back, clawing at the glob of bloody mucus that was already sliding down beside his nose.
“Stand still, y’idiot!” The first guard grabbed his companion’s shoulder, steadying him, and swiped a thick-gloved hand across the mess.
The wardline passed smoothly behind them, like water closing over a sinking shape. Both inside now. Both keyed in, of course, so they could cross that barrier. Both much, mucher closer than they should be.
“It’s in my eyes!” his voice had gone shrill, and Torin couldn’t push aside a weird peal of laughter at the sight of this overgrown hulk flapping at his face almost delicately, given how wary he seemed to be of actually touching the mess.
“He can’t do anythin’!” the cleaner man repeated, with an edge of worried insistence in his voice, as he peered into his friend’s eyes. Other than being fear-widened, there wasn’t anything else to see.
That wasn’t the point. Torin snorted, even as he gritted his freed teeth at the indignant scrape of the ward against his awareness. It was confused, as much as it could be, by action without Intent. It wasn’t designed to look inside, and he could feel the sense of it pressing up against him, searching, but his skin was concealment enough. Rudimentary, indeed.
The top of his mouth was burning now, and he could feel the heat of it starting to spill down his throat.
“In any other situation, I’d apologise,” he said, and let an unpleasant smile creep across his face - the effect of all the blood and drooling hopefully only accentuating that element - as the first man swivelled back to him again, naked rage on his features.
“Fuck you, freak. You ain’t getting us het up!”
Torin raised an eyebrow.
“Really? Because your heartbeat’s going at a rate right now that suggests you’re scared, or angry, or aroused – and honestly, I think we know which of those is more likely.”
The gut-impact was abrupt, and hard, and Torin didn’t even try to keep back his own bark of pain as the man’s baton slammed into his stomach. He couldn’t move, couldn’t even hunch against the layers of paranoid metal holding him splayed to the wall, although he did manage to avoid biting any more of his tongue. A vicious knee to the groin followed, and he pressed down on the agonised heave as his body spasmed, flares of pain light going off behind his eyes and, well, everywhere else.
Unclean breath washed across his face and Torin squinted through watering eyes at the leering visage in front of him.
The burning had reached his chest now. Tightening. Hot. Hungry.
“What, no clever threats?” the guard jabbed his baton between Torin’s legs again, painful pressure on already-bruised flesh that sent him wincing. “Y’ain’t got no more chatter fer us?”
“No – point – ” Torin coughed, concentrating on his breathing as he met the man’s gaze. Blue, a little dilated, and close. Close enough, now. “You’ve been – dead for ten minutes – gentlemen. I just – needed a bit of – warmup first.”
“You little – ” the guard went to speak again, raising his weapon.
Torin jerked forwards, taking the few extra inches of movement that the shattered gag gave him, and his jaw broke open. Cheeks split, skin bursting like wet paper as the muscles underneath writhed, and the pain of it was nothing but echo far, far behind the surging sense of release. No going back now, as if he could even want to.
Teeth parting. Tongue lolling down his distended chin, a moment before he clamped it closed again, accompanied by a wet crack of tearing flesh and severed tendon, as his teeth sank deep into the man’s throat.
Situation Irredeemable.
Baobhan Protocol Active.
-
The security cameras hooked up in the containment block remain functional for another three minutes and forty-two seconds. Before the feed goes dark, the electricity overloading as something goes through the building like a magnetic pulse, it manages to capture the start of what is referred to now in all classified files as the V-Incident.
And in the shaking recollection of survivors as a godsdamned bloody mess.
-
Torin Foley is many things, but anyone looking now at the carnage unfolding in the containment cell would probably have difficulty believing that any other of them is more than a facade. The Dregland guard was shaking, hands spasming as he grasped desperately at the mess of bindings that held Torin steady, seeming now far more of an anchor than any sort of restraint. Arterial crimson flecked and foamed around the bound mage’s rapid breath; his distended jawline twitching as he bit in deeper, and the chains in the wall started to shake, jerking against the concrete hard enough to loosen dust.
The first guard unfroze, finally, letting out a wordless shriek of horror as he dived forward, wrenching at his colleague’s shoulders. The dying man tore away in a gout of gore and strings of stretching tissue, crumpling like a twitching doll. Ropes of scarlet fluid still linked the ripped-open mess of his throat to Torin’s jaw, the liquid stretching impossibly in the air as if it were still flowing upwards, before the body slipped from the hands holding it and fell aside.
Torin Foley is many things, and right now one of them is grinning obscenely as blood and spit drains from the edges of his split-wide smile, running down his chest to mingle with the fresh red stains that are rising there. Sigil-shapes, bleeding up through the torn fabric of his shirt and pulsing with a heartbeat that seems to echo around the containment cell, slamming up against the wardline walls with a sense of shearing glass.
“Oh, that’s better,” he repeated, his voice grating and bubbling through the abattoir-jaw as he flexed his hands. Metal pinged and tore, the purple-gold sheen of his relic hand ripping itself through the restraints like there was nothing there, glistening with a newly-visceral intensity and considerably sharper at the ends that it had been a few minutes ago. The remaining guard half-raised his baton before his nerve failed and he turned, bolting for the safety of the wardline.
He almost made it too, with Torin still disentangling himself from the wall, but the floor was darkly slick and he skidded, going down onto a knee hard before scrambling forward with mortal desperation. His fingers stretched out, grasping for the half-visible shimmer in the air, but went rigid as Torin dipped forwards – links of chain bursting apart around his hips – and sliced his newly-sharp golden fingertips across the back of the crawling man’s leg. Flesh burst like gory blossoms and the guard screamed, before the mage tore himself entirely free and lunged forward, and bore down...
A few moments later the wardline finally shattered, whiplashing trails of broken magic through the air as Torin stalked forwards, half-idly planting a kick into the centre of the cell’s doorway, that sent it crashing back into the space beyond. His eyes gleamed, crimson-side-to-side except for the jagged slashes of bright darkness down their centre, and his jaw hung open, lolling bloodily from side to side as he began to jog down the corridor.
Part of his mind was still clear – a fragment, carefully shielded and warded within himself; a core of control in the seething, howling maelstrom of primal power pulsing through his body – and he knew this couldn’t last. The interlocked pattern of sigils that ran across his surface – and beneath, in some very careful and difficult-to-set-up places – when activated correctly, would induce this state. A heavily modified catalytic sanguine transmutational inversion, fed by the dizzying surge of mortis potentia released by… well, by the sort of thing he had just done. But however he described it, however it might appear on the paperwork of his Certification, there was one fundamental difference in play right now.
Whatever it might look like? This wasn’t really blood magic anymore.
Alarms were starting up, a welcoming promise of fresh catalyst already running right in his direction, and Torin’s smile was wide, and horrifying, and completely, utterly honest.
