Apocalypse Junction

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Earl of Purple
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Apocalypse Junction

Post by Earl of Purple »

A region towards the edge of the Nexus, Apocalypse Junction is dangerous and can be unpleasant; many of the worlds folding into the Nexus here are ones where the worst has happened, and so monsters- human and otherwise- are common. The most important regions of Apocalypse Junction are:

The Ruined Motorway: Stretching for miles, this strip of asphalt and tarmac is a good find for any wanderer. Follow it for long enough, and calmer areas of the Nexus will be found. Some sections are blocked by thousands of stalled cars all heading in the same direction, others are eerily deserted; some are crumbling to potholes and gravel, whilst others are nearly pristine save the damage from bombardment or covered with a layer of vitrified radioactive dust. Zombies, raiders, and madcap racers in claptrap vehicles salvaged from wrecks are common dangers here, though bikers of the Road Pirate M.C. keep the areas nearer civilisation mostly under control.

The Blighted Battlefield: A vast cratered expanse of barbed wire and corpses splitting vast networks of trenches and bunkers one from the other. Ruined buildings, dead trees and broken machines dot the area. Triffids, Martian tripod-walkers, deserters and zombies are common here, though perhaps the unexploded ordnance and pervasive chemical contamination provide the greater danger.

The Petrified Forest: Large swathes of forest turned to stone by magical or radioactive disasters, some areas are draped with mosses and vines, whilst others are still bare earth and blasted vegetation. Mutant wildlife of all sorts haunt the woods, as do various strange types of undead and weird machinery.

The Desolate Desert: A seemingly-endless region of sand and dust, glass and gravel, home to raiders on sailboards, giant scorpions, mutant snakes, and very little water. People fight and die to control creaking wind-pumps and spurt dirty water into shallow troughs and bottled water is worth more than gold. Some areas are irradiated, most are simply very, very dry. The motorway passes through, either a crumbling elevated freeway providing much-needed shade or discernible only by the car roofs emerging from the sand.

Ruins: Common everywhere, ranging from hastily-fortified houses in the middle of nowhere to crumbling factories filled with malfunctioning machines to small villagers that look as though they were abandoned yesterday, they can be a good source of supplies. But also can be the fortified lairs of raiders, quarantined districts overrun by mutants or zombies, or filled with plague or radiation.
Last edited by Earl of Purple on Jan 28, 2023 4:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Rebonack
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

This is either a terrible idea or a really great idea.

Tristan is out here again, armed with a bike, a backpack, a spear with a lead spearhead, and an uncanny level of magical resistance to apocalyptic nonsense. Being one of Echidna's Brood provides a pretty solid defense against... a variety of things. The improved strength, impenetrable hide, and fire breath certainly don't hurt, either.

This is the fourth time Tristan has been out here. It's become something of a monthly ritual for Tristan. Bike out here and go backpacking for a few days. Not because it's a particularly pleasant place, but because people here need help. Find people having trouble in this hell-hole and pull them to safety. It really isn't too terribly different from fire fighting, honestly.

Just with a lower chance of getting set on fire.

...usually.

Tristan weaves between the ruined, burned, rusted out car corpses littering the road. He's been at the search for about two hours so far with no luck.

He DID meet some zombies chained to eternally burning tires that were rolling around trying to murder him, though. That was pretty terrible.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

Well, if nothing else Tristan has found one person who seemingly does NOT need his help.
That would be the centaur coming the other way down the road. A young man with black and silver hair and a similarly colored equine lower half aside from white "socks" and lower tail that is definitely reminiscent of a silver fox. He's wearing a long black scarf with a slightly pointy-brimmed hat and a saddlebag with an obvious pair of weapons - a rifle and a straight sword- strapped on.

He seems to be merrily trotting down the road in the opposite direction, playing a flute. He waves to Tristan as he gets close.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

The biggest difference between a centaur and a guy on a bike is that one of them has his mode of transportation built in.

So!

Other person.

Clearly not someone in danger.

Tristan waves back. If it looks like the centaur is slowing down Tristan will pull to a stop on his bike.

"Hey. You're ready for trouble."
Always wise out here.
"You find any yet?"
A beat.
"Um... I mean. I'm out here doing s-seach and rescue. Have you seen anyone who looked like they needed help?"

Ha another centaur. We keep running into these guys. Are we just getting lucky and meeting all the horse-headless men?
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

Mist slows down to a stop. Another thing about centaurs is that hitting the brakes is a beat easier when you're moving with your actual feet.
"Hm. No, not yet. I haven't seen anyone, actually. You're the first today." Which is in itself odd; Mist was sure there was more than one person on the road.

Up close, Tristan can see one other thing he's wearing besides the scarf, hat, and bags: a silver wedding ring.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

Tristan really isn't paying a tremendous amount of attention to the centaur guy. He's not a zombie or a raider. Arguably he might count as a mutant?

Just not an atomic one.

"Well, watch yourself heading that way there were a bunch of flaming zombies chained to tires rolling around. "

As horrible as it was metal.

"Stay safe out there, alright?" Tristan says before pushing off to begin biking forward again unless stopped. He has people in trouble to help!

Clearly centaur guy is fine. He could probably out run most of the threats anyway.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

Tristan will find the centaur keeping pace with the bike rather easily.
"You want some help? I'm useful to have around. And I really have been cooped up in the Inn for too long. I haven't gone on a nice quest to help people in ages." he offers.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

Oh hey the horse dude is following us.
Well... umm... they do say it's dangerous to go alone.
Yeah but we're never alone, not with the power of FRIENDSHIP!

"You can tag along if you want, horse dude," Tristan replies. "Stuff out here can be intense. End of the world crap. Think you can handle it?

A valid question for sure.

Our heroes pass a large red bat-star stuck to the side of a car. This is pretty unusual since bat-stars, like all sea stars, aren't usually found adhering to cars with water nowhere in sight.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

Mist waves a hand nonchalantly.
"My name's Mist, for the record. And I'm more or less immortal so yeah, I'll be fine. Otherwise I wouldn't be taking a leisurely jaunt in a place like this."
It's definitely not your picture of a place to casually walk through.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

"Oh sweet that's pretty handy, me too!" Tristan replies brightly. "If you aren't practically immortal it's prooooobbly not a bright idea to be out here trawling for quests since-"

As they pass the starfish it squirts a stream of paralytic venom at Tristan, which splatters on him. Where the stuff touches him his skin immediately bursts into flames.

"-there, see? Terrestrial starfish shooting doom goop at people. No idea how starfish would be causing the end of the world but I'll bet that there might be some survivors around if we search," Tristan surmises, turning toward the starfish and torching it with a plume of fire breath as he passes.

Nearby our heroes will spot an old boarded up gas station with about two dozen people milling around outside it. The people look emaciated worn. And also covered in starfish.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

"So what's your name?" Mist asks, observing the flame breath.
Sloooowly Mist reaches back and slides his rifle out of its holster on his lower back.
"I don't think the starfish on those folks are a good sign."
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

"Tristan. And, well, I'm not getting any Starro vibes from them so that's either a good thing or a bad thing," Tristan reasons as he hops off his bike and leans it up against the burned out husk of an old pickup. "Probably a good thing. Since Starro's whole deal was mind controlling super heroes and I'm not seeing any of those here."

Just regular not very healthy looking folks.

As our heroes move a bit closer they'll be able to that the people milling around are... probably... not alive. There are all sorts of little orangey yellow tube feet growing out of them. Like threads moving around under their skin.

Also?

Another starfish clinging to a telephone pole BLEGH!s at Mist. On normal humans it causes an affliction not unlike sleep paralysis. Who knows what it would do to a centaur? A few seconds after the spitting happens the nearest starfish-encrusted people turn toward our heroes and begin shuffling toward them. The starfish sticking to said people also start oozing goop. Gross.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

Mist opens his mouth and then closes it. It occurs to him that he's technically a different kind of fey now so people may get iffy about him asking for names. He should remember that. The fact that he has shadow animals walking around instead of where his shadow should be and an eternal breeze around him doesn't help.

And then blegh!

Mist yelps and twists, a gust of wind whipping up immediately to throw off the goop just barely over Mist's head. He brings up his rifle at the starfish and fires, working the lever to chamber a new round immediately.
"Okay so I'm going to start firing now I don't think those people are people anymore." he says simply. He doesn't think he can fix infection that serious. They look like puppets at this point.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

Shadow centaur! Show them the meaning of pew!

Tristan winces a bit at the sound of the rifle on account of not wearing any ear protection and RIFLES ARE LOUD! The starfish gets splattered, though. Which really isn't very hard since it isn't any more resilient than a regular starfish that can't cause a zombie apocalypse.

"Maybe a good idea," Tristan says, eyeing the approaching zombies. After a few moments the next closest zombie turns and begins shuffling toward them. And so on down the row. "I think they're using chemical signals to communicate. Which is a pretty starfishy thing to do."

While starfish DO have eyes on the ends of each of their arms along with sensory feet their visual acuity isn't exactly great. As they get closer it becomes apparent that no one is home. Their eyes are totally gone, replaced with waving masses of orangish tube feet. They move in an awkward, jerking sort of way, like their body is being puppeted, the limbs pulled in ways that are clearly unnatural. The only saving grace here is that they don't appear to be fast by any stretch of the imagination. A few of them have patches of bony, slimy red skin growing over them. Like the stafish flesh is growing.

Definitely not alive anymore.

Maybe if Mist could get to someone right as a starfish glomped them he could help, but... knowing how starfish eat they've probably devoured everything inside the skull.

Tristan grips his spear with both hands and gives the weapon a flick, lobbing a burning blob of molten lead at one of the zombies with pretty significant force. It hits them dead center in the chest, the force knocking them over as they begin sizzling.

"There might be survivors inside the station," Tristan guesses. "Let's try to clear the shamblers out first."
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

Well, for now a bunch of slow moving targets aren't exactly difficult to blast. Mist aims the rifle at center of mass at the lead zombie and fires, racking the lever and repeating. Each round hits with the usual kinetic energy and a small burst of electricity it probably shouldn't have.

Unfortunately there are more zombies than there are rounds in the rifle's tube, so Tristan will have to cover him as Mist pulls some bullets from under his scarf and begins loading them into the bottom of the rifle.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

Rifle shots really aren't great for zombies either, regardless of what sort of zombies we're talking about. Both of the undead react more or less like one might expect a human would after taking grievous chest injuries, which is to say having quite a bit of trouble getting back up again. The rest of the starfish-possessed corpses continue their relatively slow shamble and once they get within sixty feet or so they begin spitting blobs of goop at our heroes.

At that range they aren't very accurate, but there ARE quite a few of them.

Tristan, as soon as he figures out what's going on here, begins backing up to put more distance between himself and the gross spitting starfish while lobbing another molten missile their way.

"I'm really not a fan of these things," Tristan admits. "But I guess I can't say that I'm not surprised there's been some kind of zombie shuffling around every time I've been out here. This are the first ones I've run into with this much reach, though."

He has no idea what that goop they're spitting does but it probably isn't anything desirable.

Meanwhile!

Our heroes probably aren't close enough to see it but the zombies that have been shot are regenerating at a somewhat alarming rate. The burns and toxic heavy metals Tristan wholloped two of them with seem to be doing a pretty solid job of inhibiting healing, though.

More likely to be noticed, a window on the second floor of the boarded up station suddenly has a light shining out of it! As in someone is waving a flashlight back and forth. Probably a good way to get the attention of other people since these zombies probably can't see very well.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

Mist sighs. He doesn't think it'll work, but he tries to aim for the head on the zombies. It takes him an extra shot to actually hit one as his aim isn't pinpoint. Some zombies can't handle their heads being blown up but that's movie logic. He doesn't know what logic they're running on though.

Soon he has to trot back out of range, taking cover behind a scrapped car with Tristan.
"I think your fire might work better than my shots. Unless they're allergic to rain I don't think my stuff will do much to them." He squints up at the flashlight.
"I think there's somebody up there. Maybe you could distract them while I get them out the back?"
If there's a whole bunch that would be fairly complex. If it's one or two he could carry them easily.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

BOOM!

HEADSHOT!

That lays out the zombie pretty solidly. Even obliterates the starfish that was clinging over one eye. The zombies that still look... mostly human. Just with a starfish on their face? Those ones get flattened by a headshot. But the ones that have patches of starfish looking flesh and multiple starfish clinging to them? Those get knocked over only to stand up again.

It would appear as though the parasitic starfish are the weak points, maybe?

"Fire's usually the answer to zombies. Just not those flaming tire zombies. That didn't really help," he says, sweeping his spear in two broad strokes in the general direction of the zombies. Now there are a pair of lines of burning, boiling molten lead on the ground in front of the undead. They stumble through it blindly and get set on fire for their trouble.

"I'll try to draw them away, yeah. I'm pretty sure they're operating off scent. Try getting upwind of them and circle around."
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

"Oh, is that it? Ok, you're the decoy for now. Be careful."

Mist trots away. As he does so the wind suddenly picks up and changes direction. Tristan will be downwind from the zombies while Mist will be upwind as he waves to the window with the light and circles back to the back of the house. Hopefully it will be sparsely defended and he can get to a window or door that can be crawled out of.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

"Probably? Regular starfish hunt by smell," Tristan says as he jogs out from behind the cover. "I think I should be okay. Watch yourself!"

And with that he begins a slow dance away from the zombies. Toss a lead missile at them. Jog further away. Rinse and repeat. Just close enough that they are within range to spit goop at him now and again and slowly draw them further and further away from the mini-mart. The zombies definitely don't seem super threatening, but their insanely ramped up starfish regeneration makes actually putting them down difficult to say the least.

Mist, meanwhile, heads toward the back of the mart! There's a back door, it would appear. But it has been nailed shut. Weirdly enough copper pipes have been lashed to the building, forming a complete circle between the ground floor and the second. Wonder what that's about? Either way, when Mist gets a bit closer to the backside of the building one of the upper level windows opens up and a rather worn, scraggly looking woman peeks out.

"...you're not riding a horse."

She's very perceptive.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

Nailed shut door is what Mist was expecting. It will make extracting people difficult. Especially if the pipes mean that there's more zombies on the ground floor and they've barricaded themselves into the upper floor somehow.
"Nope. Centaur." Mist says cheerily, waving to the lady.
"My new friend is keeping those freaks busy. How many are you in there? Between me and his bike we can probably only carry a few but I can work something out. We need to get you out of here."
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

The woman in the window doesn't look like she's quite sure what to make of the centaur thing. Since... Centaurs are, arguably, not actually a thing. Mind-control starfish? That's totally reasonable. But centaurs? Get outta here.

She does her best to take it in stride.

"Just the three of us. But Watson got gooped and he's paralyzed. It's been half a day and he still can't move; we don't know how long this stuff lasts," the woman replies. And now Mist knows what the goop does! Nothing good, that's for sure. If those bastards have been trying to slime you two then more of them will be coming. They can smell it from miles away."

And Tristan, meanwhile, continues his dance. Lob a projectile, scoot a little further away. Normally lead poisoning wouldn't be quite so acute but the crazy regeneration these starfish zombies have seems to speed up the process. Poisons in general would probably be very effective against them.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

Clearly Mist needs to recruit a friendly rattlesnake.
"Is he limp or stiff? If he's limp I could probably just sling him over my back."
After all, I made sure to wear my saddle today. Oh crud and my shirt that would have been really embarrassing if I forgot.

As for the other two, it might be kind of hard to get two people onto him or Tristan's bike. But well, he's pretty sure he can figure something out. This is his thing, after all.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

Or maybe one of those weird snake coyote hybrid things.

Would those work?

Or do mutant abominations not count?

"People always go limp when they get gooped," she replies as if that is an obvious thing everyone should know. "If your friend can keep the zombies away we'll come down. Have you folk got a safehouse nearby or something?"

Or something, yes.

By this time Tristan has pulled all the zombies a good several hundred feet down the road. Unfortunately zombies are starting to come from OTHER directions, too. Not great!
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Ruined Motorway

"We can get you somewhere safe reasonably quickly."
Mist glances at the incoming zombies. The winds change again, trying to keep the smell of the goop away from the zombies to confuse them.
"Um. The other two aren't...big, are you? As you can see I'm not a terribly large half-horse." Mist is in fact a short draft horse due to the Black Herd's nature. Also why his coat is rather thick. Though Mist is one of the shortest of the herd despite his status as patron. He's strong enough to carry two humans but the logistics of actually seating them could be difficult on large folks.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

Frankly this person doesn't have much context for half horses. Or for regular horses, for that matter. She doesn't answer the question, she just heads away from the window.

Depending on how good Mist's ears are he might hear some voices. Followed by raised voices. Followed by some shouting.

Sounds like there's an argument going on in there.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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The Petrified Forest

A weathered hooded figure stops before the wast yet dead-looking forest, having wandered gods know how far before coming to this point.
They give the first tree a quick inspection, their gaze seemingly follow the petrified bark up to the branches high above them.
Then suddenly the moos growing on the stoney exterior gets poked by a spear wielded by the bundled up figure.

Seemingly satisfied with the reaction from the moss, or perhaps the lack thereof, the figure continues into the forest. Occasionally poking nearby objects with their spear as they go deeper and deeper inside.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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Rebonack wrote: Jan 19, 2023 10:31 pm [Ruined Motorway]

Frankly this person doesn't have much context for half horses. Or for regular horses, for that matter. She doesn't answer the question, she just heads away from the window.

Depending on how good Mist's ears are he might hear some voices. Followed by raised voices. Followed by some shouting.

Sounds like there's an argument going on in there.
Ruined Motorway

Ugh. They're probably having a very reasonable argument about whether or not they should trust weirdos they haven't even properly met yet. Which is very understandable but NOT something they have time to be doing.
The God of Beasts (and wind and travelers but the animals is the important part here) poofs into a very fluffy black squirrel and quickly climbs up the side of the building and into the window the lady was peeking out of.
"Hello? We're kind of burning daylight here. Zombies are on our six you know." he squeaks as he investigates the inside.
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Ruined Motorway]

There are three people in the building. Two men and a woman. One of the men is draped across a cot, breathing but otherwise not moving. He, likewise, looks just as disheveled as the woman. Skinny. Not really looking great. The third fellow is in better shape, well fed. But a bit on the older side and balding. He's clutching a shotgun.

"Drag 'em off if you want but I ain't dying out there. I got plenty of food and ammo. I was fine until you two showed up smelling of zombie stink," the balding man yells.

The woman is about to say something else but-

Squirrel.

The conversation stops when the squirrel arrives.

The guy with the gun squints.

"Have I finally lost it or is that squirrel talkin'?"

An excellent question.

Meanwhile! Really, Tristan isn't having a hard time dealing with this zombies. By now a good dozen of them have been smashed with burning lumps of molten lead and the ones he's nailed aren't getting back up. That's probably good news!


[Petrified Forest]

Poke the moss.

Poke it.

As the mysterious figure treks deeper into the forest they begin finding the look of the stone trees changing, slightly. They have patches of neon blue ooze and veins. In some places tendrils stick out of the trunks, frozen in stillness. Going further, they will find animals likewise warped, flesh replaced with grey rock and blue tendrils. Some appear intact. Others have split open, revealing that they've been hollowed out with lumpy interiors like slimy geodes.

A stream flows nearby, patches of water glowing a concerning shade of blue.

Something in the woods is very strange...
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Re: Apocalypse Junction

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[Petrified Forest]

The figure seems to quickly take up on the change, kneeling down to give one of the tendrils an extra hard poke with the spear.
Seemingly satisfied they then move on until they see the first warped animal.
At this point it seems like they won't be satisfied with poking the dead remains with a spear. No, this time they reach for the wooden mask they're wearing and after a moment of struggle pushes it up just enough to reveal their lips from which an unusually long tongue emerges.

Well, more accurately there's two tongues. One which one easily could be mistaken for a human yet in the middle of it is a fleshy sheet from which a second snake-like tongue comes out to taste the air around them.

So instead of poking the things with a spear they're poking the air with their tongue to see if anything strange stood out in these woods. Something in the air smelling of fear perhaps?
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