ic Auspicious Season (IC)

[Avenger Assembled]

The landing party went for Singularity, striking with fists and clubs to pin her down, but they weren't even able to strike a solid blow against the fast-moving powerhouse, much less seriously impede her attack. 

 

As Singularity went into action against the zombies, Sea Devil gave a bellow of outrage that must have been audible a half-mile away. All this work to celebrate an auspicious day and these horrible stupid creatures who made no sense were ruining it, ruining it! As if the oceans didn't have enough Surfacers in its depths, now the dead ones were causing trouble Above - and maybe making Jessie have to spend the night in the closet again, or hiding in the bathtub, and it was awful! 

 

There was only one thing to do, and that was to help. Sea Devil didn't hesitate as Singularity began tearing the zombies apart, instead leaping into the midst of their ranks and simply impaling one through the body with her trident. She didn't stop there, knowing such things wouldn't die from that - instead she smashed it against the sand, again and again, until it was in pieces. They stank something awful too! 

[Nerdzul]

As the zombie pointed his gun at the hologram, the fake president stood showing no fear proud and unwavering in his conviction.

 

“Then on this shores you will only find some good and proud American ass-kicking sir.” The President replied, before fading away, as Luke concentration faltered due to the adrenaline surge from the upcoming battle.

 

The young man dashed on the beach, spectral claws surrounding his fists rending the undead flesh with ease. He grinned, when the first one fell. “And stay down!” He shouted triumphantly as he kicked the head away from the rest of the scattered remains. Good luck getting back to your body mate. With the rest of the momentum he jumped onto another one of the reanimated soldiers tearing through its torso and fully dismembering the creature.

 

“Who is next?” He raised his fist again surveying the battlefield… Heart pounding and still ready for a fight.

Edited January 11, 2021 by Nerdzul

[Fox]

Wraith eyed the last of the zombies and, perhaps more in pity than anything else, calmly swung one sharp forelimb to remove its head from its shoulders. When she was reasonably sure it wasn't still trying to attack anyone - and after gently prodding its body in the chest to make it fall over properly - she brought the metal limb back down. You never knew with these types.

 

"You said, 'not again'," she observed, craning her face toward the head. Her vorpal'd arm was busy wiping itself against the sand. "I do not fault you for determination, but perhaps it would be best if you rested properly. Other attempts to kidnap presidents will not go better than this."

[Electra]

The fight had been quick and simple enough that Singularity wasn't even winded, but she came distressingly close to taking a swing at her erstwhile allies when they joined her on the field, especially the yelling kid. She purposefully took two big steps away from everyone else to avoid any accidents, then kept a blank and watchful gaze focused on the ghostly boat from which the zombies had come. Ships tended to have either no zombies or many zombies, with little in between. Their luck was not good enough for the in-between.

[Nerdzul]

"Hell yeah" Luke shouted triumphantly as he saw the last of the zombie eat the ground. Easy Peasy 

 

“Come on man? Don’t you know that the war is over?” he addressed the zombie head on the ground. “You lost like… “ He scratched his head. When exactly? Whatever it was like at least a hundred years anyway... “Ages ago. America kicked our asses already.” 

 

“Do you think we should burn them or something?” He asked the more veteran heroes. Made sense to him, that said, those guys were like evil… Yet their undead state was kinda sad, maybe there was another way to deal with them?  

Edited January 17, 2021 by Nerdzul

[Avenger Assembled]

"Yes!" Aquaria croaked, sounding very unhappy at all this unpleasantness, listening to Jessie's movements as much as she was watching the scene about them. "They should not be, so we should make them not!" The seperated zombie parts were not created equal. Those belonging to the 'crew' of the small boat seemed quiescent in their deliquescence, but those belonging to the lieutenant Singularity had beheaded were still visibly twitching. Aquaria impaled one of the former with her trident and twisted, reducing it to a smear of puddling ash against the sand. 

 

"We have come through obstacles you cannot even imagine, woman," insisted the severed head. "And the German Empire will never yield to you Yankee rabble!" He stared at Wraith blankly for a moment before saying, "wait...du are not ein woman! What-what is this? This is not what - not what the old witch said!"

[Fox]

"Old witch?" Wraith hummed, cocking her head to the side; her body flowed together, reshaping into something entirely more humanoid, and even very vaguely female - if still a smooth metal surface and a face featureless beyond three great black eyes. Her feet sunk into the sand a bit more than she liked, but it was worth it to confuse the zombie's terrible opinions...even if he was technically correct. The worst kind of correct.

 

"I am not an expert on the undead. Burning them could work, but could also inflict unnecessary suffering...and I am curious about this witch. You had help to do this? Someone sent you to us, to fail? If they did it once, they could do it again, and simply cause more trouble for us both."

[Electra]

"You don't have to burn it right away," Singularity agreed, still seeming fairly abstracted. The majority of her attention was definitely still on the ship, and her voice was a soft monotone. "Zombies usually rot a lot faster than normal dead bodies, but as long as they're moving they can hurt you. Don't let the head bite you or you might get sepsis," she cautioned Wraith. Moving a little further from the group, she prodded the landing boat with one foot to make sure nothing in it was still reactive. "Their mouths are dirty."

[Nerdzul]

“Yeah, I mean, I guess they are a like ghosts? Maybe there is like an unsolved business we can fix or somethin.” Luke scratched his head. “Looks like theirs is to kidnap the president though, might not be super-easy to fix…”

 

“Hey dead guy. First there is like no more German Empire, sorry about that.” He shrugged. 

 

“And yeah, what’s about that witch?” He joined Wraith in asking. “What did she say to you?” He furrowed his brows. Could the witch still be around? Well, she would have to be quite old for that, but then again… magic… She might as well be.

[Avenger Assembled]

"vas...oh, yes..." The zombie's head seemed to be losing focus on the conversation. "die Hexe...promised to bring us to these shores...if we pledged all for the Fatherland. All..." The head began at this point to sing "...Wenn es stets zu Schutz und Trutze...Brüderlich zusammenhält....Von der Maas bis an die Memel...Von der Etsch bis an den Belt..." And it went on like that. 

Aquaria made a deep, disgusted noise at the back of her throat. Her eyes flicked around until she found a large plastic bucket that had been used in the fish processing earlier, which she then scooped up and placed directly over top of the abomination. As a precaution, she then hopped up onto it, driving the plastic further into the sand. 

 

"I can destroy that ship from here," she croaked, hefting her trident as she pointed out at where the U-Boat's ancient periscope still watched them. "It would be easy."

[Electra]

"Die hexe," Singularity repeated, her eyes suddenly huge and not entirely focused. "Bad luck..." She turned to Aquaria and shook her head. "We have to know who sent the zombies. It could be-" She hesitated, seemed to be searching her memory for something that wasn't coming back. "It could be really bad. We need to find some clues, and that ship is our only chance." With one deep breath, she got a short running start and leapt the distance to the boat, then started looking for a door. Or a porthole, or a convenient seam, anything would work.

[Fox]

Wraith made a rattling noise somewhere deep in her torso, expressing something akin to mild frustration. "Swimming," she said, frown audible despite the lack of mouth. "Does anyone require assistance reaching their craft? I could - reluctantly - ferry someone across."

 

She made a face, studying the water like it was there to spite her. One clawed foot dug at the sand. "Otherwise, I am inclined to travel underwater. Swimming is hard enough; swimming the surface is entirely unpleasant when not necessary."

[Nerdzul]

Luke gave the German Soldier a puzzled look. Nop he could not understand a word. Didn’t sound good though, whoever sent them, or promised them they would get there, could definitely be trouble. Plus there was something in Jessie’s expression. “It could be who? Do you have any ideas?”

 

“Yeah, definitely...” He nodded. Whispering a ‘whoa’ between breath as she jumped the distance from the shore to the vessel with ease. Definitely the submarine might held the answers they sought. Although maybe there was something else they could do before they left the shore.

 

“Looks like we are headed to your ship wanna come?” He asked the talking (singling?) zombie head. Perhaps it was a stupid idea, but who knew right? He made a bundle with his hoodie, wrapping the head so that he won’t be able to bite him while he carried him around (hopefully at least). 

 

“I can swim there no problem…” He nodded at Wraith. Now the young man loved a good swim, although he wasn’t exactly looking forward to one in freezing water with his clothes on to be honest. Then again, whatev’... He slipped out of his sneakers unwilling to ruin them with saltwater (they were already battered enough as they were, plus it was easier to swim without them). Should have brought my trunks.

 

“Don’t think you are gonna like this.” He grinned at his zombie ‘friend’ before diving into the freezing water. 

 

“Damn that was cold. Woah. Should have taken Wraith's offer...” He was shivering at least a little when he finally he climbed up to the surface of the U-boat... “Found a way in?”

Edited January 25, 2021 by Nerdzul

[Avenger Assembled]

It proved easy enough to open the hatch of the submarine - though it was rusted enough that it nearly came off in Singularity's hands as she did so. The group exchanged looks as they peered down into the utter gloomy blackness within, the dark skies overhead providing them with hardly any illumination. After much concentration, Aquaria described what she could hear below for the benefit of those with the limited senses of Surfacemen. "There is no sound of machines at all. I hear movement inside, like the shuffling of feet. There is someone speaking that way, and someone singing spells the other way." She pointed to the front of the ship for the first, and the back for the last. "It does not smell clean," she commented. Crouched on all fours by the open hatch, trident laid across the rusted steel, she didn't look terribly clean herself. "It smells like the magic sounds. Like the dead. That is not dead which eternal can lie, and in strange aeons, even death may die..." 

 

The inside of the submarine was a nightmare for anyone claustrophobic, dark and close, so much that they practically had to move single-file if they were going to get anywhere. The bulkheads were wet and slimy over even more rusted metal, as if the interior had recently been completely flooded, and the smell was enough to make anyone gag. 

[Electra]

"Yes, it's ready to open... there." Singularity pried up the hatch and then immediately reeled back, choking from the smell. Old death and bodies rotting together, a smell that brought back a hundred awful memories. Something about the locking hatch with the confined space beneath was bad too, in a way she couldn't remember nearly so well, but she had plenty of experience with dead bodies left where they lay. She began shaking her head from side to side, subtly and then harder. "We can't go down there," she told the others. "It's a trap. It's really a trap. If we go in, it'll be bad." She stared into the darkness in fascinated horror, eyes round and wide as silver dollars. "But if we break the boat, they will have to come out or sink to the bottom."

[Nerdzul]

“Yep definitely. Smells like shit.” Way worse actually. Luke coughed, the scent was almost overwhelming to his enhanced senses, he covered his nose with one arm, not that it did much, but at least it was better than nothing. “I mean, they have been dead how long?” Too much… Plus he definitely wasn’t looking forward to walk on that crap. Then again, he was sorta of bulletproof anyway, so hopefully he was safe from the rusted metal anyway… Yet…

 

“Hey maybe our friend has something useful to say?” He unbundled the zombie head. “Like what is this singing mate?” He asked, unsure if the long dead soldier would be able to provide a coherent response. Worthy of a shot though…

 

“Can be.” He nodded when Singularity suggested that it could be a trap. “Then again, I dunno if sinking would change much, I mean… they don’t need to breathe… Perhaps for them it would be even safer on the bottom of the ocean…” Yep plus he himself won’t be able to get there in case of troubles. “We should find whoever is casting that freakin' spell…”

 

There was something else he could try too. Although that would be kinda of unpleasant. Bracing himself against the scent of death, the young man sniffed the air, planning to rely on his draconic knack for sensing the trail of treasures and gold, wondering if the vessel held some kind of precious relic within its hull.

Edited January 27, 2021 by Nerdzul

[Fox]

"It would not be difficult to sink the boat," Wraith observed, gently scratching at a metal wall with one claw. This whole place smelled awful, and she was perversely glad that, for once, there were others there with a sense of smell at least as good as her own. "It would be very difficult to unsink the boat, so perhaps we should investigate while those who need air still have it."

 

She cocked her head, growing a fine array of spines that jittered as if tasting the chanting in the air. "....I also vote for finding the spell-person first. They are the most likely reason the dead still walk. Unless we think there is a living person on this ship, those who talk may not be more aware or helpful than the zombie was."

[Avenger Assembled]

The zombie head's eyes rolled and said in the tones of a worried schoolboy "Oh, ich hoffe der Kapitän ist nicht angry..." 

 

After much consideration, Sea Devil snapped the helm of her armor shut. Aquaria considered telling Jessie to go home and tell Erin and Trevor about this, but she knew her friend wouldn't leave her down in the darkness with monsters alone. "You will hear me if there is trouble...Dagon the king," she quoted softly after speaking to Jessie, "in his raging...Hail Hydra, Immortal Hydra, cut off one head, two more writhe to take its place!" And then she leaped into the darkness, landing with a wet thump. The faint green lights on the outside of her armor cast an eerie illumination inside the interior of the submarine, which looked long abandoned and forgotten save for what seemed to be soft, clinging strands of something that tasted organic as it clung to everyone's skin. Sea Devil led the way towards the rear, the creepy, claustrophobic interior close around them all. 

 

They found the singer in a room none of them knew enough about this vintage of submarine to recognize; a room of gears and valves and more of those webs, and in the center of them their queen. She was singing and stirring a pot over a fire that burned impossibly inside such a place, as if a campfire had been plucked from the shadows and placed within. The woman's face was lit in a sickly red light by the fire as she stirred a bubbling pot of - something. 

 

"Hello," she said, and her face was impossibly old, one eye rheumy white, her black, shining dress a sharp contrast to her looks. "I'm so glad to have company at last." She cocked her head and said "oh, you brought the lieutenant, did you? A shame he fought so poorly, after so long." She made a gesture with her hand and suddenly the movement and soft sounds from inside Luke's sack stopped abruptly. 

[Electra]

"Aquaria, no!" Jessie cried, but not quickly enough to stop the amphibious Deep One from sliding into the hole. She crouched next to the hole and rocked back and forth on her heels a few times, apparently having no trouble keeping her balance on the slick and curved surface of the U-Boat. In the end fear seemed to win out, even over following her best friend. She shrank back once again from the hole and stared at it, even as her fingers unconsciously gouged deep divots into the metal ship. 

[Nerdzul]

“There are like. Treasures or something on both sides of the sub...” Luke scratched his head “Maybe they are magical relics or something, or who knows? Nazi gold maybe?” Unlikely given that those guys were from before Nazi were a thing, but well…

 

“Whatever let’s go.” He jumped down, after Aquaria and Singularity, landing with unshod feet on something unpleasantly organic. Woah gros. 

 

The stench of death inside was almost overwhelming. Again gros. Yet he did his best to keep track of the scent of the closest relic, just in case.

 

“Woah people really used to travel in this? Feels like we are in a freaking metal coffin…”  The thought kinda made a shiver run down his spine. At least his eyes had quickly grown accustomed to the darkness, but that didn't make the local atmosphere much better to be honest.

 

“Oh hey.” He waved at the woman. “So you must be the witch.” The young man smiled. “The one that’s behind all of this?” He tossed. 

 

“Hey!” He protested once the witch had apparently snuffed out the unlife from the singing zombie head. He wasn't exactly sure how to feel for a German soldier that was planning to kidnap the president and conquer America, but then again, that guy had traveled for a ages, resisted death itself, to get to these shores and try to complete his mission, just to fail miserably and die, it was freaking sad.

Edited January 28, 2021 by Nerdzul

[Fox]

"You do not have to come if you do not want to," Wraith had assured Jessie, resting one hand gently on her shoulder. "We will miss not having you, but the boat is not large - if there is trouble, you could get to us, and we might benefit from having someone out here. If there is too much trouble, perhaps you could simply rip the boat in half to get to us."

 

That last bit was probably a joke, but Wraith had dropped down and skittered into the hole like an overgrown lizard before she could get a response. Three eyes on a face were hard to read even under good conditions.

 

--

 

"Behind or enabling," mused Wraith. She was on the ceiling, or what passed for one, to make room more than anything else. "Can you be convinced to release the others? Their mission is...impossible. They deserve their rest, as all dead do."

[Avenger Assembled]

"Oh my, you are an interesting bunch, aren't you? Monsters from above, from below, and in-between." The witch smiled, her teeth black, indicating Wraith, Sea Devil, and Nightscale in turn. She didn't mention Jessie - either not knowing Singularity was there, or remaining discreet about it. She focused her one good eye on Nightscale, seeming to stare directly into his soul. "Did I trouble you, child? I can bring him back to life for you, though it will cost me dear..." She lay a withered hand across her heart and seemed the picture of grandmotherly sadness. 

 

"I can hear you," Sea Devil croaked accusingly, as usual frustrated at how limited the languages of the Surfacers was. "You sound wrong." She struck her trident against a metal bulkhead, hard enough that the whole ship ran. "You made terrible things that should not be, and you frightened my friend. Why are you?" 

[Nerdzul]

 

Monsters? “Yeah, and I’d say we are in good company…” Nightscale remarked sarcastically, grinning at the witch.

 

He did hesitate a little however, when their gazes crossed. Damn. The witch sure had a way to make him feel uncomfortable. Besides, she also knew that he wasn’t human, somehow. Perhaps she had just watching the fight with a spell or something, but then again, maybe she had other reasons for knowing. Creepier reasons.

 

“I… Well, this guy… I guess he deserves to rest.” Yeah, right? There wasn’t much conviction in his voice. “And what about the others? I mean, you are the one who is keeping them... alive, right? Can you free them too?”

 

A noise in the dark! Steps. Coming their way. Heavy steps. Troubles. “Guys? Something his coming.”

 

“What the hell?” He turned back toward the witch. “One of your friends?”

 

“And yeah why are you here?” He echoed Sea Devil. “My bet, not to kidnap a dead president…” Although, who knows? Maybe? Perhaps she wanted to make a Zombie President? That would be metal as hell.

Edited February 1, 2021 by Nerdzul

[Avenger Assembled]

The footfalls grew louder and louder, and a new figure entered the scene from behind them. This one was another zombie, but perhaps the best-preserved of any they'd seen - he looked more like a freshly-drowned corpse in a tattered black uniform with staring, bulging eyes as he raised a thin white finger to point at the witch. In accented but understandable English, "You see! You see, I told you the end would come for you! You _fiend!_" 

 

"He doesn't know, the poor dearie," said the witch with another smile. "I am but the the first of many, and the last of the old way. I will punish them for their failure before it happens, after it happens, and for all time." Turning to her interlocuter, she said, "Really now, Captain Schneider, are you so eager to die the Final Death, and earn the fate you deserve?" 

 

"Listen not to die Hexe's lies! I do not know what manner of being you are - but she must be destroyed!" And with that he pulled a rusted pistol from its holster - and fired! 

[Electra]

Up on the deck, the sound of a shot jolted Singularity from her stuporous stare into the dark hatch. Her friend was down there, her friend was in danger. The zombie said Hex was down there, and bad, bad, bad things could be happening. She did not remember what Hex looked like, but Hex was more scary than almost anything. She had to get down there before anything terrible could happen to Aquaria. The blank white void crept over her, but that was okay for now. It made it so much easier to work.

 

Wraith had suggested ripping the ship in half, but it was faster to merely dive in headfirst, tumbling as she landed to come up running. It was dark and she hit a few things on her way but they were all much less tough than she was. There was a strange wailing noise in the air, but she didn't notice that it was her. The last room she came to was full of a sickly glow, most of it illuminating some kind of undead monster with a cauldron. It was very, very wrong, and it had to stop. Heedless of anything but that imperative, Singularity plowed forward and smashed into it full on, one fist aiming for the chin and one for the solar plexus.