Gene War: The Aftermath

[Murmur]

Machines clicked and whirred to life in the dim cryofields as several cryopods, only a few dozen of thousands, were reactivated and attempted to bring their sleepers to life. Sometimes rows and columns apart, each of the surviving occupants find their half-paralyzed bodies spilled out unceremoniously onto the cold floor while their bodies woke from cryosleep. Ominously threatening to engulf them was a thick blue fog or mist. Perhaps 3 feet high, and thick enough to see perhaps two inches deep, the impenetrable mist swirled around the waking specimens as if agitated at their very presence. Lazily shifting over the mist was a bluish haze, a fog of strange color. The fog limited vision to a mere 100 feet, whence things faded from indistinct shapes and swallowed into the eternal blue of the fog. The air was chilling and smelled damp and thick with the viscous smell of cryofluids and decay. To even the casual observer it is obvious something is terribly wrong. The sound of a static filled intercom droned on inexorably, currently stating, "Reviving panels ZJ.CC.KD, ZJ.CB.ZD, and PV.KQ.GJ. Warning! Multiple life-sign failures. auto-correct disabled. 56 specimens lost. Successful revivification of 9HN4.3J51 A, 48.151.6234.2 B, and 4286.4581 D. Please collect specimens for transfer to holding cells. Power successfully rerouted from panels to sustain Security Quarantine subsection 1 and 2." A closer inspection of many cryopods within easy visual range shows a range of chilling discoveries: a number of pods are shut off, many of which with long dead remains littering the inside of them in varying states. Some mere piles of bones, others mummified corpses of unknown creatures still strapped in. The worst of the bone chilling revelations is that one or two of the mummified specimens had left scratches, cracks, and dents from inside their cryopods.

TG woke mid fall, and wasn't happy falling face first into the hard ground, letting a muffled grunt as he was plastered to the floor. As the realization came that no one was there, he sat up there, taking it all in. TG waited, half covered by the thick mist. Listening intently to the mysterious voice from above, he studied a few of the surrounding cryopods. He studied them coldly at first, then settled on one damaged pod in particular, it's damage seeming peculiar. After getting up slowly to walk closer and get a different perspective of it, he found himself averting his eyes once his mind let him understand the horror of what he was looking at. He shivered, and it wasn't just the cold. He considered calling out, but not knowing his current circumstances, he decided to go silent for the moment. Not knowing what lay ahead, he didn't want to give any potential lurking predator know he was coming too early.

[Buzzwolf]

Falling, she was falling...falling. she hummed to herself, the feel of the wind across her body as she leapt from the plane, the humm of the four engines vanishing behind her as she hummed to herself, pulling her arms tight to her sides to increase her speed.

The rush! how she loved the rush! the pure adreniline coursing though her veins! she mmm'd as she pressed her eyes shut behind the old goggles she wore, splaying her fingers out, letting the wind whip past and between. how she wished she didn't have to wear these god awful boots so she could feel the wind over her feet and toes!

Someone was yelling at her though the roar of the airstream. she opened her eyes, looking around curiously. another jumper, some instructor by the look of his bright red jump suit he wore. She blinked curiously a few times as he kept trying to yell something to her. he finally grumbled and slipped through the airstream over to her, practically yelling in her ear

"Pull your Shute! You're getting too close!" she blinked and looked to the--

THUD

She let out a Yeowl! of pain as he nose connected with the floor, followed by a groan as she rolled over on her back, her paws moving to her now sore nose out of instinct, muttering curses to herself. her eyes finally creaking open as she yawned, blinking as she took in nothing but the blue mist, her mind finally starting to turn the gears in her head. Her ears flicked back and forth, listening to the muted sounds around her, the electronic voice high above the mist, the whirr of machines around her, another faint thud somewhere off in the mist.

She rolled back on her stomach, getting her paws--paws? somethign felt weird about that, but she'd deal with it later. she got her paws beneath her, her large golden-green eyes wide open now as she fruitlessly tried to scan the thick fog, finding nothing but an endless row of the pods, ears flicking here and there as she listened. her gloss black claws tapped lightly on the hard floor, her tail, still an odd feeling to her, swished back and forth through the blue fog.

"He--" she started coughing, her vocal cords having gone so long without use. she tried again after her coughing fit died down, keeping her voice low to keep from aggitating it again. "Hello...?" her soft voice slightly raspy with the effort "...is anybody there...?"

[Shade Leshyr]

Eyes fluttered beneath the pink eyelids of the vixen, her ear twitching as she registered the subtle hiss. She fought to remember where she'd heard the noise before, but her groggy mind defied her, failing to even register movement as her pod tilted forward. At the last second, her humming, cybernetic arms registered a shift in gravity and sprang up, halting the vixen's fall, her nose mere centimeters from the floor.

She groaned out loud as sore, cold muscles in her torso stretched with the movements of her arms and here eyes opened slowly, the orange disks appearing and vanishing behind her lids as she blinked crystals of cryo-freeze from her eyes, watching them vaporize just in front of her vision, adding a dreamlike quality to her surroundings as she looked from side to side. Not that it needed that with the oppressive mist that engulfed her, muting the sounds of whirring machinery to a point where she wondered if she was dead and this was the ever present "afterlife" those religious people had always droned on about.

She shook her head, chiding herself for stupid thinking. She was sore and hurting, a tribute to her continued life. Vaguely she wondered what had brought the thought on at all, she hadn't listened to those voodoo-worshiping nuts since...since...how long had she been in stasis? Pulling her legs under her, she lifted up, happy to see that her cybernetics were still functioning after being frozen for so long.

She stopped, her mind hitting a twitch in her memory... Something about the cybernetics...that they were there at all? She shook her head, one step at a time girl, one step at a time... She opened her mouth...and gagged, coughing up the copious fluid that had supported her lungs and other vital organs for the cryo-nap. She scowled at the mucus-colored liquid before looking around and finally registering that something had gone wrong. The panels near all the pods in her column were flashing red or off completely. She didn't dare look into any of them...

She opened her mouth again and managed a raspy "HEY!" Before grimacing and rubbing her sore throat as her vocal cords protested.

[Brome Teks]

The tiger's eyes twitched as he was thawed. His mind was still in an asleep state, but it was starting to stir and continue a dream it had left off.

The tiger walks up to a table in what seems to be a war room made of soft plastic and obsidian toothpaste. "General, sir, the lobsters are advancing. There aren't enough nachos in the known universe to fend them off."

The seat at the end of the table turned around, revealing the general to be what looked like a baby fox, clad in just a onesie, diaper, and oversized hat. He babbles something incoherent, to which Aylin looks at the gentleman vole next to him. "Ahem, The esteemed general says to attempt operation tea-party lollipop, and if that doesn't turn the tide, we must unleash the Creepers."

Aylin nods. "Most excellent plan, sire." He brushes a tricky land-squid off the table. Just at that moment, a fennec in a uniform 3 sizes too big for him bursts in. "Sirs! Operation Tea-party lollipop has failed!"

"That was fast," Aylin comments. "Very well, we shall watch them boil under the fearsome hiss of the Creepers." He walks out to a balcony, climbing onto the railing to watch. The hellish landscape surrounding the gumdrop keep was especially violent to day, with mount fuschia and mount awesome erupting. Before them on a plain stretching beyond the horizon, an army of lobsters armed with scissors trotted towards the front gate. Aylin pulled a lever and took the general in his lap, watching as hundreds of thousands of green forms appeared on the plains, starting to hiss, shoot red lasers from their noses, and explode violently.

Simultaneously, the cryopod opened with a hiss, beginning to get rid of its cargo...

"We're routing them, my general." The little fox giggled and clapped his hands.

Just then, the ground under the plain trembled as three huge forms appeared. "Oh my god, they brought the Sea Cucumbers!" The forms, hidden by dust, took a mighty swipe, sending the creepers flying towards the balcony. They struck under it, causing it to collapse. As he fell, he shouted, "My general, it's been an honor!" he closed his eyes just as he was about to hit the ground.

*Crack* "OW!" Aylin blinked his eyes open. The dream was over, the lobsters had won. And now, he faced the issue of how he was lying on the cold ground underneath his cryo pod in nothing but his pajamas. He turns over and coughs up the accumulated fluids that had been building in his system.

"Blech." he says as he wipes his lips. "Hello?" he calls out as he staggers to his feet. "Am I the only one still alive? That'd be terribly boring."

[Murmur]

As several other pods disgorged their occupants, he heard mild thuds, his inferior reptilian hearing still recovering from the freeze. As people began to call out for confirmation of each other he cringed. This is a bad idea, but... together we would be better off. He still didn't really feel it would be a good idea to advertise their presence, but the ghost was given up, so he called out in turn. He took a deep breath to make a fellow shout and fell to his knees in a hacking fit, before even the first syllable was uttered. Pacing his breathing, he tried again slower, and managed to shout out a number of shorter hissing sentences in response to the calls, "I live, I thhhink. Unhurt, but sssuffer from memory lapssse. Multiple dead in the podsss nearessst me."

He began to walk slowly as he talked, muscles protesting at the lingering cold at more regular movement, but he ignored it best he could. the small talons on his feet clacked too loudly for his comfort as he walked, and the floor stung his cold blooded feet with it's ice like qualities. He began looking for a hall or interruption to the two walls of cryopods. He moved slowly, languishing in the cold air, but moving all the same. He started to ignore the red flashes of the 'dead' pods, beginning to search for a green light pod. His mood soon took a turn for the morose as he didn't see any. "Moving, looking for exssit. Don't sssee live podsss. Whatever happened, it wasss bad."

He knew it was bad as he analyzed his surroundings. No defensible position, limited mobility and worse visibility. Easy to ambush, especially from above, or to lay in wait from below the mist. He wanted out of here immediately, but training teaches patience. The droning of the automated voice grated on his ears with the static. He began to wonder if perhaps he was dead, and that this was some sort of hell to keep him paranoid to death. Once he realized he had started paying more attention to his thoughts then the surroundings he quelled the notion.


In the distance the voice droned on. "Warning! insufficient power. Please restart reactor. Internal power reservoir at 2% power. Current estimated time until next cryo-purge: 26 hours."

[Buzzwolf]

Oh thank God She thought as she caught the low tones of another waking from their cryo slumber. Working her feet under her, she grabbed at the slick surfaces of the cryopods to help herself up, Grimacing as she caught sight of the remains in the cryo tube.


She lifted herself from the mist as a shadow loomed over her. her first reaction, look down, thinking it was her own shadow, her mind realizing a few seconds later...it was faaaaar too BIG to be her shadow, and slowly turned her head in the casters direction, her look of horror growing as she cast eyes on the creature towering over her, her pupils dilated as her mind registered it.

She was standing before a MONSTER.

She tried to yell out, tried to scream...hell, she tried to anything! but her mind wouldn't let her move, utterly frozen in shock. her ears fell limp back against her head as she staggered backward, grabbing for the nearest thing. one of the cryopods. her paw, of course, found no hold and she went tumbling to the floor, immediately rolling on her back and trying to scramble back, away from the beast standing over her.

Not once noticing the white Cryo Jammies the beast wore.