Brutal Acts of Sapiens

---------> Two quick things:
1. I promise that my posts aren't going to be this ungodly long in the future!!!!!!! But it was difficult to keep to a short post for the first one in particular, with all this SETTING THE STAGE WHOAAHHH!! I did my best to be concise. But I suck at being concise.
2. The next week is going to be bat-shit insane for me. Monday evening I am due to fly out to New Orleans and move into my new school there, and the prep work leading up to this move is the most stressful thing I've ever done, to say the least. SO I WILL BE DOING MY BEST TO KEEP UP WITH THIS but if I'm not as active in my own topic as much as I should be in the next week or so, you now know why. I'm pretty much relying on all of you to get the ball rolling with this anyway.

AND NOW ON WITH THE MADNESS!

---------->

Lemon


Now here is clearly a pathetic wretch. Lemon found herself wondering, bemused, why the Scientists had even bothered to drop him in the Pit in the first place. Clearly, his ability to provide even the most menial, empirical data had long since expired. He had been awake for weeks, and he hadn’t even managed to find a single partner, and his tick had partially paralyzed him because of his utter uselessness.

The nameless experiment stares pleadingly up at her—he no longer has the ability to speak. Unrelenting surges of adrenaline make it increasingly difficult for Lemon to refrain from stomping the life out of him and moving on to her other targets.

But there really was no need to rush. And there certainly wasn’t a need to rush Chililo Beng.

She allows her unsympathetic gaze to wander from her victims face to her giant bird, pecking away and slowly eviscerating the experiment. Its beak is a shining red, and it burrows its face into the victims guts while clutching the sides of his ripped abdomen with its spare set of claws. Blood squirts onto and the cold cement, and up the giant birds feathery face, and onto Lemon’s boots.

******

“We have a very special mission for you Lemon, once you’re awake.” One of the scientists stood over her—a day back when she was still strapped to a metal table somewhere in the bowels of this Pit, encased in strange liquids and tangled in wires, and cut off from the world by a thin, plastic dome.

“We need to diminish the numbers of our experiments. There’s a vast handful in the 2nd gen mass that aren’t proving anything to us, and who have become lost causes. There’s no need to make things even harder for the resourceful by wasting food and space on the rejects, the partner-less, the lost, the sick.”

She starred back at him, fully aware despite being unable to feel a cell of her body. She was a floating mind, absorbing and downloading and registering. Consciousness grounded to the world by a narrow tunnel-vision, distorted through the dome of the plastic. She was only vision then. And fierce compulsion.


*****

Lemon hadn’t assumed that landing in the scientist’s good graces with her first mission would be this easy. She was already bored. Silently, she admits that when her pet took his first few bites out of this experiment, and his wails had echoed throughout this district of the Pit, she had half-heartedly hoped that one of the healthy 2nd gen groups were feeling brave and rash and would heroically show up—just so she could blow some energy and stab them all to death. No one did. But, of course, that’s why they were all still alive.

*****

“How do you feel, Lemon?”

Lemon remembers sitting up, after having been waiting to do so for months, perhaps even years. She had expected some sort of struggle from her body, for her muscles to have atrophied, at the very least. But instead, her entire nervous system began to rev like a car trapped in the wrong gear. She studied her palms, she felt the liquid, electric power surging through them.

“I feel good.” She had said.

The scientists smiled.

“We have high expectations of you,” one of them had said. “We have big plans for you,”

******


The victim takes his final, agonized breath before his eyes roll up into his skull and close forever. She yanks Chililo Beng back by the neck. He’d had enough food for one evening. Half a dozen bodies had now been torn apart by him in the past few hours alone, he did not need any more. Lemon sends him to the sky, while she would do her surveying from the rooftops. There were only several more to go, and the next one, she resolves, she would strangle with her bare hands

Merick and Mace


The night is quiet except for the occasional gut-wrenching howl.

In silence, Aerroh hastily gathers their supplies, preparing them for another voyage down to the streets. Merick and Mace, on the other hand, gaze uselessly from the rooftops. This night, as with many before, they stand fixated on a small, dim glow that flickers in the distance. They gaze, mesmerized. It has to be a building of some sort. It could only be a few miles from where they stand. But of course. In this city that may as well be an unreachable continent. An already shattered dream.

They clamber down the building and tear through the streets with the dexterity of someone who had clearly memorized the lay of the land in these parts, as the blackness is dense and thick. They run straight for one of the food dumps they had found months before, way back when they had just woken up in the Pit. It is the furthest from their current base that they know of. A half dozen blocks at least. But everything else was bone dry. And they were desperate.

Their faint optimism is shattered early when they find the food dump already empty. Wordlessly, they begin frantically searching the surrounding area, pleading internally for a spot they had missed in their rounds before.

Tearing through yet another set of already pillaged garbage cans they first hear the awful screeching, and then feel it, in their guts. They shout out in agony, and throw their palms to their ears. And then the over-cast—they see the outline of the shadow approach them rapidly before it engulfs them, and they cringe from the shadow as if that were the monster itself. But glancing upwards, their hearts sink in their chest, when they first lay eyes on that monstrous bird. Miraculously, it passes them over without seeming to notice the three starving wretches in the street.

“What the fuck is that?” Mace whimpers, as the three watch the winged beast slow to a hover above several buildings only blocks away.

Aerroh and the twins back slowly away from the street and into the shadow of the nearest alley. The bird begins slowly to beat its wings, flying in patient circles as if it were some monstrous vulture.

Faint sounds suggest assault. The crash of some sort of metal can. A muffled shriek. Someone is dying this very instant.

Everyone stands, frozen to their spots, petrified to breathe. Finally, one of them murmurs, “We have to get out of here.”

And they stand in silence. Resolve sinks into the marrow of their brittle bones, the knots of their empty bellies, the chambers of their broken hearts and the walls of their shattered minds.

[[ Ha ha, it's okay Rae, I'm in the same boat. :,,D RIDICULOUSLY LONG INTRO POST DEPLOY, SFKJSNK---]]

Remmy Hagar

"Are you going to Scarborough Faire...? Parsley, saaage, rosemary and thyyyyme..."

As if singing the song of that man's namesake would actually draw him out. Remmy had tried a hundred, no, a thousand times, that old madrigal tune sung weakly, wispy, as the boy searched desperately across the great expanse of the Pit for his missing partner. Where was he? Where? WherewherewhereWHERE--- Scarborough had promised he would never leave, never and yet, here was Remmy alone, teeth chattering, cracked mind reeling, as his wide, tired green eyes kept ever-searching for the tall man with the mop of sandy hair. And so he kept singing; as if that song were a mantra, a magical spell that would bring Scarborough back to him.

For now though the sun was starting to set, and Remmy realizes he needs to find a place to stay before the...things, the Bad Things come out. He chews on a stubby thumbnail for a second before shaking his hoodie sleeves over his palms and grasping the first rung of the ladder on a nearby fire escape. Roof. A roof. Dogs, those Bad dogs couldn't reach you there, high places were safe places, high, hi, high, hahahah ha. Ah ha. Ha ha---

The teen finishes his ascent to the roof, stepping over a crumbling decorative stone gargoyle to make it there. Large, round eyes take a quick survey of his surroundings---some stones arranged as if to contain a fire. Two empty cans of soup. A pillow, nearly flat from weathering. Randomly, a protractor and some stubby, water-logged pencils, now useless. Whatever the case, it appeared this had once been the camp of another [or others], sometime in the past.

"Rememberrrr me---to one whom lives there. For she. Was once. A true love of miiiine....."

Remmy shivers scratching at the fabric around his wrist. Ignore it. Ignore it. You know what you'll see; just raw pink flesh, irritated around your Tick. Scarborough. Scarborough where are y---

"Tell her to make me a caaaambric shirt...."

Trying to tame his mass of dark curls into something halfway manageabl, Remmy pulls up his hood before hunkering down in a corner of the roof and preparing himself for a no doubt fitful, nervous night's sleep. Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme...

---------
---------

It's not the sunrise that awakens him; nor is it the howling of toothdogs which he had over time reluctantly become accustomed to. Rather it is what almost sounds like the screech of a massive bird---but it's too large, too vicious sounding, and as Remmy whips his head around blearily and desperately tries to regain his bearings, the bird-scream is followed almost immediately by the yelling of people. Two? Three? What? Dreaming---what? Remmy staggers to his feet, shaking the sleep from his bones before peering over the ledge to the street below, squinting in the semi-darkness----people. Three of them.

"What the fuck was that?" a woman with hair streaked with bits of blue said before she and her two male companions rushed into the alley with the fire escape that Remmy had climbed some few hours earlier. He's about to call out to them, ask them if they have seen his partner, however Remmy's curious observation of the trio is cut short as a cacophony of sound erupts at some distance behind him---screaming. More screaming. BAD screaming, hurt screaming, pain screaming, oh god, someone, that sound, someone was hurt, bad, bad, he hated the hurt, terrible things, bad, bad, Bad Things---

Remmy finally managed to turn around, gripping the stone ledge of the roof behind him. Far off towards the horizon seemed to be the silhouette of something avian in nature [not a dream after all it seemed], and it was from there that the horrific, wretched human-pain-death-bad-oh-god-sounds were coming from.

"Parthley, thage, rossithmary, n' thyme..!" Remmy's nervous singing comes out muffled, garbled, as he tries to speak between his fingers, his scarred hands having fearfully fled to his mouth as they often did in times of crisis.

His tick burned. There would be no sleeping for the little drug-addict tonight.

Merick and Mace

After what seems like an eternity, silence (for the most part) descends again onto the streets. The trio watches as the birdthing flaps its monstrous wings, and soars off—not off into the sky, but further away from them.

Just as the three begin to remember feeling in their legs again, they hear a scampering noise from above them. Merick and Mace glance at each other. They should know better than to dive into the open at such ambiguous signals. But a toothdog couldn’t possibly have gotten up on the roof.

They wait for a moment longer. Faint sounds, like whispering, drift from above. This is all they need.

“No—don’t do it!” Aerroh snaps, in a raspy whisper.

The twins dive out from their cover. Merick spots the ladder, and leaps onto it, followed closely by his sister. Their hearts are pounding—someone else in this city besides the three of them? Someone who isn’t a rotting corpse??

“Hello??” Merick’s voice is raspy, though louder than it should be considering their circumstances, and he and his sister jointly pop their head over the ladder for a view of the roof, like freak Siamese cats.

Angelo Ashke

He is not quite sure where he stands or why he stands there, only that he has been doing it for quite some time, trying to blend in with the surroundings. He would have, too, if it weren't for the smell of unwashed man and funeral home didn't follow him in an invisible, hovering cloud of his own personal Ashke-miasma.

At least it attracted flies. Extra protein. Perhaps he was a raffelsia flower in a past life.

In this life.

Birds, moving. People moving. Spider crawling up pantleg.

He was a prime example of observation. He hit the ground fast enough to remove the spider and hide in some overgrown trees from the bird to eat his snack.

He was far too unconcerned for his own good.

H. S. Merinski

Birds of prey, carrion birds. Crows and the like. Their scratchy, throaty voices calling over one another, piercing the otherwise relatively quiet air. Excited, greedy. After Chililo Beng and Lemon had finished, there was quite a bit to lay claim to after all.

Half a dozen bodies. Six. Couldn't have been dead for very long. Maybe a few hours, maybe a day or two at most, their torsos torn open in a careless, barbaric fashion, entrails spilling sloppily out onto the pavement. A tall, bony rail of a blond man stands a little ways away from this atrocious scene, craning a collared neck to get a better look. He swats sharply at a fly buzzing around near his ear, one corner of his mouth twitching in displeasure before turning his attention back to the twisted circle of corpses.

He'd figured out five minutes or so ago that there was no one here that he knew. At least not personally. Not that Merinski knew a whole lot of people on a personal level [nor did he generally care to for that matter]---so with an odd sort of detached and half-mortified, half-intrigued sense of morbid curiosity, the goth crouched where he stood, pale, thin eyes staring out over top of his arms as he folded them atop his knees. The smell was just starting to get on the rancid side; clearly these individuals had been baking in the hot sun for a bit before night had begun to fall---and it most likely wouldn't be much longer until the dogs came out to fight the crows and flies for a hearty meal. These things poke the back of Merinski's mind, however he simply presses his white painted nose into his knee and inhales the smell of leather, his eyes not wavering for a moment in their cool and calm yet bizarre observation.

They reminded him of pinatas---gutted people. Pinatas with all their candy and streamers ripped out.

Remmy Hagar

The curly-haired boy lets out a yelp of surprise as Merick's voice suddenly calls out from behind him. Remmy spins around to face the Eastern European man, his green eyes frightened as he stumbles backwards.

"Who--" The boy shakes his head, removing his hand from his mouth along with a trail of drool [which he then proceeds to wipe hastily away with his hoodie sleeve]. A quick once over reveals the man to be from the small group he had spotted below just moments earlier---in fact---yes, here was the woman with the blue streaked hair clambering up onto the roof behind him.

"Did---did you guys see that bird? Is it after you? You're not Bad Guys are you? Have you seen my partner---tall with dark blond hair, his name is Scarborough like the song? He's been gone for a very long time---" The teen suddenly blurts out, babbling foolishly at the twins before they've barely even settled themselves onto the roof. Although coming across as a relatively small and harmless individual, Remmy, with his jerky movements and childish yet frantic manner, most certainly projected an air of someone who was probably just a few fries short of a Happy Meal.

Bridhe Taeven

Had it been months since he had woken up here? Had it been that long? One lost track of time when there were no calenders... No dates to keep, no times to obey, no civilization to dictate what and where you are supposed to be doing things. Not that it mattered, because the cost of such a "freedom" was a steep one. Or would have been steep if Bridhe remembered just what it was like to live a soft and easy life once again.

The environment had changed him a bit, making him wiry and bright-eyed, splattering his calloused and scarred skin with freckles by the thousands. His hair was getting longer, a wild mane around his neck and face as he perched on the edge of a building while looking down at the streets below for any sort of animal he could attempt to trap and kill. Hunting was still a task for him, he wasn't tall and broad like the Russian... Still learning how to hunt and act like a predator rather than acting like prey. He was tense, seemingly ready to run from the slightest hint of danger.

People counted as danger, he had felt them running through the streets... In pairs, trios, singles... It made his skin crawl, his tick itch. Even staying too long around Yanni sometimes razed his nerves, attempting to pry himself from foreign feelings that tried to superimpose themselves over his own emotions... It was hard. It drove him crazy. Sometimes the burning, acid feeling he got from being too far away from his partner was preferable... And then there were the times when he felt like he was going crazy from not feeling other people. Like some sort of yearning... Or maybe even a gut-wrenching sorrow that just won't go away. That was hard, too.

But Bridhe wasn't thinking on this, now. He had spotted the movement on the streets, pulling back away from the edge of the building to watch unseen before throwing himself down completely at the sound of that shriek. The short man rolled, stopping before pressing himself against the wall of the staircase that lead up to the roof, looking up at the sky with a little shiver before reaching for the door handle.

Aerroh

The twins were already across the street and climbing up the fire escape ladder against his warning. He stayed for a moment in the alley way hidden in the shadows to make sure the monster bird wasn't going to circle around for them. He heard movement everywhere. The whispering from the roof and movements elsewhere. Aerroh cautiously looked out into the street before running across and climbing the ladder as quickly and quietly as possible. He heard a voice on the roof questioning the twins as they had gotten up there. As he got to the top he scoped out the surrounding and seen the bird in the distance, dogs farther off down alley ways making their way towards the certainly dead that would become their meal, and something on another roof. He peeked over the edge and crawled up after the twins slowly. The boy on the roof's eye got wider once he was up there and began asking him the same questions.

"I'm not bad and I haven't seen your partner." he replied softly with a frown.

Alexander Strife (Same for me Rae. I've just been so busy lately I haven't been able to give this attention like I want to.)

His modified eyes showed him miles of the pit as he scanned it for his targets. There was movement in the distance but it was not his concern. Spotting his target, scared and hiding in a building a mile away, he took stance and raised his sniper rifle. It was his only friend. Cold, ruthless, and uncaring as he has become. Strife needed no scope because of his perfect sight. No need to still breathing due to his already dead state. Steady. Sure. The trigger is pulled and the sound of the shot and broken glass echo around the area. His target falls to the floor dead. He loaded the next bullet into the chamber and started off to spot out his next target.

~~~~~

Strife was on a cold metal slab with all sorts of machines hooked into his body. A scientist worked over him vigorously for hours on end. He felt frozen in time with his eyes open, seeing what was happening impossibly.

Blackout.

He was still strapped to a metal table. The scientist wasn't working on him as much as before, but instead taking his time. What did he always type on that computer there for hours? Why couldn't he feel his body?

Blackout.

He wasn't strapped down any more. The scientist commanded him to stand up and he did exactly as he was ordered. He didn't want to, but was compelled to and couldn't help it. The scientist told him to look in the mirror and he did. Shock shot through him and he could feel it and not feel it. His broken body was now fixed up with machine parts. Everything was crystal clear. A moment to take in his body and it seemed foreign to him as if her were along for the ride.

Blackout.

The scientist had a woman strapped into a chair, gagged. He knew this woman. It was his wife. He was given the option to obey without force and refused to help them do their dirty work. The scientist ordered him to shoot her in the head. He obeyed. In his laughter, the scientist told him he killed his own wife and son.

Blackout.

~~~~~

His target was running but not for long. A shot echoed through the area, the body fell, a dog howled, and no one even cared.

Lemon


Her neck felt good in her hands. With one last, final squeeze, the victim’s neck snaps like an old, brittle twig with a loud, satisfying crunch.

Lemon drops her and the dead girl’s body uncoils at her feet. Listlessly, Lemon pushes back some of the long locks of brown hair that cover her face with the heel of her boot. There was a strange serenity in her face, in her stillness of death. The experiment had struggled as though her Reaper’s advances were beyond unwelcome—but something in her face betrayed that front. This girl wanted to die.

Her situation had differed from Lemon’s most previous target. This one, had at least managed to find a partner. A male companion of some variation, who had fallen prey to a pack of tooth-dogs. The girl had escaped the beasts—but not the workings of her own implant, of course, which had reacted against her in her now partner-less state, assaulting her with seizures, bouts of nausea, and ever-worsening migraines. Here she looked calm, in a much-needed state of repose. Lemon couldn’t help but smirk a bit at her handiwork.

There weren’t many left now. Lemon finally allowed herself to gaze upwards at Chililo Beng, who surveyed the scene from the skies. Her mind entered his, his eyes became hers. One of her next targets was nearby. Only blocks away, practically hyperventilating on some rooftop. This one, and another also nearby, had a name, and she whispered them to the air, so that, on some level, they would know she was coming for them.

“Remmy… Soya..”

She paused then. Chililo Beng pushed images into her vision—images of numerous other experiments were accumulating in the area—several of whom had already found her target. She noted their faces with interest.

Lemon spun around and stepped into the street, starring in the direction of the activity. Chililo Beng crowed—thrown off by her momentary pause.

Lemon bent down and fastened her grip around the handles of the two knives that had been strapped to her bootstraps. She was beginning to think she would have no need of these tonight. She would take her sweet time with this. This was going to be fun.

Then she heard the gunshot—coming from somewhere in the opposite direction. There was another stalker in the arena. Furious, Lemon shrieked and whirled around again, wielding her knives to the sky. Wild-eyed, she drew Chililo Beng’s eyes into hers.

“Find it.” She hissed.

The bird obeyed. It beat its wings and began to soar in the direction of the Lemon’s co-worker, while Lemon ran from the ground below.

Robert Dahl

Bob felt sick. He had been to funerals before, if his memory of anything before he was eighteen hadn't been wiped clean he might've had foggy memories of his own mother's funeral. Despite this he still hadn't realized how much of a difference the work of the undertakers had been in making those corpses... palatable. This corpse did not look like a sleeping, or even still person. Its skin was alreay ashen with the pallor of death and eyes growing gray in their eternal rest.

Bob could barely look at the faces of the hapless victims spread out before him and his partner, let alone their mangled and destroyed bodies. Bob was standing as far away from the bodies as possible, back turned to them, hunched over and his hands over his stomach that wouldn't stop rolling. He really couldn't go more than fifty feet from Merinski without the nagging feeling of unrest and burning in his arm to start up... which meant he could still smell the bodies. The worst part by far however, was feeling his partner's fascination with the bodies. It had taken him a while to figure out that was what his tick was feeding him, but time had solidified the connection since he had first met Mer and now if he wasn't paying attention Mer's emotions would seep into his own.

"M-Merinski... Can we go?" Bob asked quietly, back still turned and eyes closed. The man was worse for wear since he had first arrived, bright Hawaiian shirt faded with dirt and hands nicked with scratches from digging through rubble on a regular basis. He slowly stood up from his crouch and faced Merinski, a tight pleasant smile on his face, "Please?"

Merick and Mace

The ladder was beginning to wobble precariously beneath the weight of both the twins and their partner, but no one moved. The twins watch the curly-haired loner shudder in his panic—no doubt due to his lost partner. Dear God the thought of losing their companion in a place like this… Or even worse, losing each other—a thought even more incomprehensible—nearly made them nauseas. God only knows they probably wouldn’t have lasted a day without Aerroh—but separated from each other.. their will to even bother bothering would abandon them in an hour.

“How long has your partner been missing?” Mace ventures, tentatively.

Remmy’s eyes widened again, and his mouth drooped open. “Bluh… err… fourscore and seven days bleughbuhhkurrr,” He tears up, “I don’t knowwwww, forever and a half guhhhhhhh…”

“Oh no don’t cry—she no mean it, eh?” Awkwardly, Merick attempts to lean over and pat the stranger on the shoulders, “Her very presence surely offend most individuals of High Society, you just need to get used to not taking a thing she say seriously, yeah?”

“Bahh!! High Society would be nothing if not it couldn’t live vicariously through me and my wanton ways.” Mace snorted and whacked her brother, causing the ladder to rattle unsteadily. “Whoops!”

“Pssh. Woman you will destroy us all!” A return smack. Further ladder wobbling. A squeaky screw pings off the ladder and falls to the ground.

“You can come with us though!” Aerroh volunteers, as the twins had clearly veered off topic, “And maybe we could find your partner.”

The stranger nods frantically. “You can hide up here we me if you want.” He offers.

“We have a camp further away from here—it’s a little safer and farrrrr away from that bird.”

“Do you guys have food?” Remmy asks.

“Er. No.”

Remmy frowns.

“We’re not going to find any hiding here though.”

Remmy sits back, considering his options. Just then, the three hear a gunshot—further off in the distant, followed by a blood-curdling screech. The twins shoot their gaze towards the direction of the cry, and see the faint shadow of the bird, still unmoving, hovering like an awful omen.

They turn back to the stranger.

“Trust us—there isn’t much time to think about it.”

Alexander Strife

Strife walked away from the building that he had been on top of, making his way towards a new target. The night was full of howls and screams but he showed no fear.

~~~~~

"You're going to do as I tell you and feel nothing." the scientist told him as he stood at attention before him. He was all there on the inside but was helpless to do anything about it. The scientist brought him a sniper rifle and gave him his orders. Search out the experiments that he was given information on. Kill them.

~~~~~

He was alert to all of the sounds around him. Fearless, not stupid. He kept to the shadows, aware of the giant bird coming his way from farther down in the city. His co-worker was about but it was no concern of his unless she got in the way. Strife watched the bird but continued on with his mission as the bird circled over head.

Jez Ashford

Jez's thin body was curled up against a crumbling wall of bricks, eyes closed and breathing slow. Yes, Ashke had been standing there long enough that his exhausted partner had fallen asleep, not that it took Jez that long to do. He could have sworn that he could hear a toothdog lurking outside their little sleeping area last night, and had not been able to sleep. When Ashke hit the ground it was a miracle that Jez stirred at all, bit the tick in his wrist let out a small pulse of chemicals into his blood stream at the man's sudden "excitement" and a moment later, the Brit snorted once, coughed and his eyes fluttered open.

For a moment Jez couldn't find Ashke. He rubbed his blue eyes free of the crust that had settled on them even in his quick snooze, some dried blood cracked on his face and crumbled off.

"A-ashke? Where the bloody 'ell did he go..." Jez stood up shakily and gained his balance, hobbling a bit as he walked forward and worked the stiffness and pain from his joints. He could tell that the man couldn't be far thanks to the little parasite... THING in his wrist. Jez glanced at his tick, eternally rimmed with that line of blood and bulging unnaturally from his arm. This is what had kept him traveling with the crazy, unnatural man and Jez felt certain it was the source of his sickness too, probably put there by aliens or something... it was honestly the only explanation Jez could think of: alien abduction.

Jez, like his partner, smelled ripe with sweat and dirt and stench. What water they had found had been used mainly for drinking. Showers were out of the question, though Jez had attempted not to get TOO covered in his own blood. Toothdogs were attracted even to the scent of old blood if there was enough of it. So Jez wasn't capeable of finding Ashke by smell, but it didn't take him long to find the tall boney man in the brush.

"Ashke what are you doing what are you looking a-" Jez froze as he cast his eyes in the direction Ashke was looking in. People were moving, other people! Jez's blue eyes widened and the corner of his mouth twitched, wanting to smile but Jez not quite beliveing what he was seeing.

This is it, I've finally gone bonkers from this place and started seeing things... Jez thought to himself, mouth falling open. Despite his thoughts he had to check, there was no harm in checking right? Jez did not call out but took a few steps towards the moving figures, keeping them in sight like his life depended on it... or their reality.

Remmy Hagar

[[ Rolled for ladder's stability; six out of 20. ]]

Remmy chews on his lower lip, gazing over at the large threatening form in flight off in the distance. The twins and the man with the shovel were right; there really WASN'T much time to think about it, if any. After a few more precious seconds tick by, the teen's thoughts are interrupted by Aerroh humming a little tune that was---well, admittedly rather awkward for such a precarious moment.

"Okay, yes, I'll---I'll come with you," Remmy says quickly, scrambling back over to the ladder. No matter how much he wished, no matter how many times he whispered the tune, Scarborough CLEARLY was not going to be found on this roof. And who knows, perhaps following this trio of strangers might help him FIND his partner. And if not, well, at least...at least he wouldn't be alone.

Merick and Mace muttered a few more teases to each other along with some hearty sibling shoving-around---before descending down the ladder after Aerroh and making way for Remmy to put his dirty sneakers on the top-most rungs. However, just as the boy's curly-haired head dipped down below the eaves of the roof, the rusted ladder let out a mighty groan, the four of them freezing for a moment in fear or shocked realization. Maybe that rusted screw that had fallen was a little more important than they had thought...

"Mace? I told you you were getting faWHOA, AH----"

But Merick had no time to finish the jab at his sister when the ladder suddenly creaked loudly, as if screaming in pain, before one side of the apparatus unhinged completely, swinging the four individuals wildly off to one side.

"AHHHH OH GOD---"
"SHIT FUCK, HOW FAR DOWN IS--"
"AIIIEEEEE--"
"A WINDOW, A WINDOW, IS THERE A WINDOW NEARBY, IS ANYONE NEAR A WINDOW---"
"I SAID, HOW FAR UP ARE WE------"
"HOLD ON, HOLD ON---"

Bridhe Taeven

The sound of groaning metal grated on his nerves, setting his teeth on
edge and causing the ginger to almost spasm as he jumped. He froze,the sorry-looking door behind him giving with his meager weight as he looked out over the rooftop. The sound hadn't come from too far away, that he was certain, but in a city with no people or noise it was hard to tell just how far away it had come from. He disappeared into the door for a moment, his hand clutching the mace he had been given so long ago (how long? He couldn't tell you, it was a blur) before he moved cautiously toward the edge of the roof.

Yelling joined the creaking of metal, making him grind his teeth more with each rock of what sounded like a ladder. He looked up nervously, eyes darting around for some sort of predator before he moved in the direction of the panicked screaming. Bridhe wanted to yell, but his voice froze up in his throat as he tried to locate the source of the yelling. He stopped, mace looping around his calloused wrist as his eyes finally spotted the struggling group, dangling in an alleyway about two buildings away.

His jaw set, eyes squinting a bit as he mentally measures the distance from the building he was on to the next as he takes steady steps back. There is a deep breath and a shudder before he takes off, leaping off of the building top to "run" to the next building.

[Rolled 1d20: 11]

He used Sadra's weight to pull him just a little further, slamming against the side of the ledge and clinging before scrambling up with a panicked breath. The ginger was shaking, holding his chest before looking back to the other building as he tried to recover from the aching in his sternum. He tried to move forward, inching along the edge of the rooftop a little before darting forward as he realized that there really wasn't any time to waste.

Harper Merinski

It's possible the goth didn't hear his partner, but it was entirely more likely that he had heard and simply didn't care. For when Bob turned around, Merinski had moved from where he had been crouching previously and was now hunched over one of the gutted, mangled corpses, searching the content of her [his? You couldn't even tell anymore] coat pockets.

"What?" Merinski said defensively, glowering over at Bob before his partner even had time to present a reaction. The blond grumbles and turns back to his work, trying to ignore the rising urge to gag at the awful stench of rot. "They don't need their sh-shit anymore..."

[[ rolled for finding cool stuff in pockets---> 4 out of 20. Lol. ]]

Unfortunately however, it seemed nothing of use could be found in this particular coat--the goth hissed in disgust when he pulled out a maggot encrusted half-eaten energy bar, flinging it quickly away and down the street. "Gross, gross..." Merinski shuddered, stepping over the corpse and moving onto the next one; seemingly more disturbed by his own hand being soiled by grubs than by walking among a field of gore and death.

The Pit had an odd way of doing that to a person though; but a few months ago, the 20-something year old would have been repulsed, even completely fearful and disturbed by the same scene he was now so casually weeding through. However, survival and necessity, partnered with his own morbidness, had made him desensitized to such things. Cold. Weirdly quiet.

[[ rolled for finding boots Mer would like----> 18 out of 20, kljsnfksjdfnsUIHDAJ wow. ]]

Merinski held his foot next to the black leather booted leg of a body that was decidedly female. Gauging that his foot was quite nearly the same size as the deceased woman's, Merinski crouched down with a quiet pleased sound and started unlacing the footwear off of the corpse's leg; rather unaware of the danger in flight not too far away. Save but a few scuffs in the heel these were in fantastic shape---

He stopped. Squinting. Something off in the distance. A figure? No.... Two.

Aerroh

(So, I'm modifying this and changing it as I posted before Rae was able to.)

The ladder groaned under their combined weight and came loose from the wall, sending them all swinging and yelling in panic. Aerroh gritted his teeth after his yelp of surprise and began looking for... A window! Someone had yelled about a window! It was a fair distance down... he thought he'd be okay if he jumped but his frail companions might not. Just as Aerroh loosened his grip on the ladder and set his feet to slide down, the ladder came loose causing Aerroh and the twins to fall. Remmy was able to make it back to the rooftop safely as the other fell to the ground...

"OOF!" the air was knocked out of Aerroh's lungs but something had broken his fall, just as he broke the twin's fall. His lungs burned from the sudden hit and lack of air coming in. He pushed the scrabbling twins off of him a little so he could breathe again.

"Get off of me you lug!" Mace growled, her hand shoving Merrick's face.

"You get off of me!" He growled and pushed her back. Remmy looked over the rooftop down at them.

"I-is everyone okay?!" he said with a trembling voice. Aerroh started laughing.

"Of course! The trash broke my fall!," he said laughing, "And I broke theirs!" ^_^ <3~

-----> Oof Oh my God so sorry about the late-ass reply. I drew the first page of this pretty quickly.. then shit happened. (read: Mardi Gras week and I got incredibly, stupidly drunk). Anyway, I'm just going to post the first page and the write the rest of what I'm intending to draw and then just switch in the comic strips once I finish them. Hopefully within the next decade.

Merick and Mace

(I too rolled for everybody's safety ((again SORRY ANDREA!!)) Remmy scored a 17.. so he just manages to leap back onto the rooftop. Aerroh a 13 and the twins an 11. So. Like. They fall. But aren't really injured. Ergo--CONVENIENT GARBAGE DUMP!!)



Merick and Mace glance at each other, their heads and long, submarine necks craning out of the trash.

"Well." Merick ventured, as their partner also un-buried himself from shards of the ladder and other trash. "That wasn't too bad."

Aerroh looked up at the sky, and towards Remmy. "You guys, I think we should be a bit more quiet.." Everything had become quieter. And he was certain the ruckus they were causing could certainly be heard for blocks around.

Mace noticed then, a small sliver of blood dripping down the bridge of her brothers nose. She reached out and touched it, smearing the blood across his nose and her fingertips. When they both fully registered this, it was as though Aerroh hadn't spoken at all--they both shrieked, very, very loudly.

"Whats going on??? Are you guys okay???" Remmy shouted down at all of them.

The twins collected themselves. "Yeah." Merick said. "You can jump. The trash is fine."

Just then, Remmy noticed a tall, thin, darting shadow, about a block away. Remmy squinted his eyes at the creature--it would have completely blended with the shadows were it not for long, stringy blond hair that dripped awkwardly to its shoulders. "Guys! It's another person, I think.." He tried to speak only loud enough for his companions to hear on the ground below.

The three craned around the corner. There was indeed, someone venturing anxiously in their direction.

Mace gasped, "It's a girl!!!"

"You are sure?" Merick asked, doubtful.

"Don't worry, guys, I totally handle this." Mace boasted, pulling herself out of the garbage and wiping its remains off her clothes.

"Um.."

"Yeah.. I'm not really sure thats--"

In her stupid excitement, the girl leaps out into the street, and screams: "HEYY SHOW ME YA TITS! I GIVE YA FREE FORTUNE!!!!"