[Audio] Sunday, Week 84: Aberrations and Opportunities

[damn_it_jim]

McCoy here.

If you're one of our set of people inclined to hit things, I've got a list of targets for you. Three separate incursions into this reality need to be taken care of.

If you've never gone after them before, they're variations on that thing that washed up down at the docks a couple weeks ago: big, nasty, and if you take an injury from them, inhale particles from them or otherwise get their material in contact with yours, you're in for a damned painful and currently unpreventable death.

Normally I prefer that people avoid activities that risk them dying horribly, but these things are a drain on Salvation's resources. Since the greater good would indicate stopping them before they multiply to keeping reality from coming apart at the seams, I'll make an exception this time. Try not to cuddle them.

I also have some information on that little complication Salvation filled us in on and a potential solution for it. I'll make a point of lingering in the ship gardens if you want to know more, because I'm sure as hell not talking about it on an open channel.

Comments

[clay_and_truth]

I cannot say I am particularly inclined to hit things, but I am one of the people here who stands a better chance of surviving a battle with what you're describing, and have experience fighting creatures of roughly that description.

I'd also be interested in this information you speak of.

[damn_it_jim]

Good. Check in with Odinson if you want to compare tactics -- he's probably a little closer to your style than the military set, and he's done his share of tangling with the things.

I'll send you the coordinates, and let you pick out a spot and a group to go deal with it. I'm letting Leah know, in case she's got advice.

And come out to the ship if you want to talk about the rest of it. It's pretty much the one mind control free zone we've got on the planet, and while that's not a sentence I want to get familiar with saying, it's true enough.

[clay_and_truth]

Sadly, I also have experience with mind-control. I'm on my way. You're welcome to ask me about how I handled that.

[Audio]

[professorwolf]

Simply point me in the proper direction and I will do all I can. I've gone up against them before.

[And died twice in the process, but, you know. Whatever.]

I've been hunting them in the local forests and mountains, but haven't found a trace. How far away are they?

[damn_it_jim]

Well, one's underwater, so that will take some tinkering. As for the others, one's in the ruins of Lunare, so expect a lot of walking through tunnels to get to it.

The other... well, it's deep in the quarantine zone around Hyperion. Likely to be a suicide run, according to Leah. That said, they need to be cleared out somehow, and we have advantages her people don't.

[Namely, the ability to die twice in the process.]

[professorwolf]

I would be willing to take on the quarantine zone run. I am functionally immune to illness of any kind I have come across. I wouldn't be able to go alone and still handle the entire nest, depending on the size, but I would not require a suit, at least, which makes me potentially more effective.

[And he's been wanting to get in there for a long time....]

Besides, Leah trusts me to an extent, I believe, so I she may allow me when she might not trust some of the others.

[damn_it_jim]

Get some people together and get it done, then. I'm not proclaiming myself high arbiter of monster-slaying, and you've always struck me as having at least a functional amount of common sense.

Bear in mind that there are wraith swarms there, so you'll want to either go in with as minimal an energy signature as possible, or find a way to lure them to something so loaded with ergs that you can get them to materialize.

Maybe you and Stark can find common ground to make nice over.

[professorwolf]

Now, now. I'm perfectly capable of working with distasteful people, if it's for the common good.

[He's sort of teasing. Mostly. He can work with Stark, after all, and he has before, but that doesn't mean he has to like the man.]

I'll contact him and see if we can put something useful together to distract the wraiths.

[damn_it_jim]

Good. I'm sending you the coordinates now.

[There's a momentary rustling in the audio, before Lyall's communicator makes whatever alert it makes to let him know that a datafile is waiting for his attention.]

I have no intention of leading this particular crusade, but let me know how it turns out.

[professorwolf]

Of course. I don't think I would let you come with us, even if you wanted to, Doctor. This will be dangerous enough without bringing along civilians. No offense meant, of course.

[He might be teasing a little bit there, too. He likes McCoy, after all, and he's pretty sure the guy won't take offense at the comment.]

Video

[bruiserprincess]

There are more of those things that need beating up?

[Molly's getting awfully sick of them]

[damn_it_jim]

Yeah. My understanding is that there are going to keep being more until Salvation's in good enough shape to get things permanently fixed.

These ones aren't near the town, at least, so you shouldn't need to give me any more grey hairs.

[bruiserprincess]

They're still trouble out there though, right?

[damn_it_jim]

They are. Although if you're looking for permission to go out and tangle with deadly monsters, let's just say I'm damned glad I'm not your guardian, kiddo.

[bruiserprincess]

We can't ask the people who don't have powers to do it.

[damn_it_jim]

There's plenty of universes -- like mine -- where nobody's got any powers at all, and we still have to do it. Great power and great responsibility's a good lesson, kid, but you don't have to make it a lethal one.

Adults are supposed to be the ones keeping you safe. That's the evolutionary contract we signed, what with being a social species and all.

[bruiserprincess]

Well then, you wouldn't have problems with powers either.

[She snorts with full preteen dignity at his last statement]

Which adults are those? The ones being paid off by the badguys? The ones that don't believe us? The ones that only bother showing up after we solved the problem ourselves?

[damn_it_jim]

The adults on your planet seem to be defective, but do you see any of them here, kid?

[Bones counter-snorts at that snort, and pairs it with a weary smirk that somehow manages to be avuncular.]

I swear I can't go a month without some heroic idiot needing bits of themselves sewn back on.

[bruiserprincess]

No but there's way too many weird alternate universe versions of them.

[And even though they keep insisting they'd never do that, she's still paranoid]

You've never had to sew any of me back together. I'm hard to hurt when I'm using powers.

[Yes until she runs out of steam and gets killed]

[damn_it_jim]

That's because you died, kiddo. I'd find stitching you back together preferable to that.

[With a pinch to the bridge of his nose, he studies her for a long moment before looking wry.]

I'm not giving you the coordinates for the incursions. That said, if you're going to go looking anyway, I'd rather you attached yourself to one of the parties that go after them, instead of sneaking along.

[bruiserprincess]

I know the times now. It'll be different.

[She doesn't want to die again. She does learn]