"Would you prefer we take samples from where there's already light or move further out?" Faith asked Conrad. "Unless there's some reason we can't or shouldn't cut one of them down or maybe dig one up or something."
"I don't care, just don't damage the path or hurt yourself."
Thomas searches the area for fallen twigs or logs. If he can't find any, he just breaks a twig off. If he finds a fallen log, he places it in the center of the path.
You look around for any sort of fallen..eh.."Wood" and find nothing. You shrug and go to break off part of a branch from the nearest tree.
[dex:2]
You wrap your hand around the branch and the wood, thinner and sharper then a straight razor, cuts right through the suit and into your hand, leaving you with a nasty gash. [end:3] You yell and swear, holding your hand tightly as blood dribbles out.
I back that assertion of yours, miss. Mason will be alright now that his helmet is back on.
Okay, time for samples. Actually, I'm not sure if trying to cut the 'wood' with a monoatomic razor would or would not be a good idea. On the one hand, it is unadvised to use it on volatile substances, to which the regular wood nearly belongs, and on the other hand, Conrad said nothing burns here - which might or might not lead to the wire in the razors dulling, or, worse, tearing.
Take two samples of the soil, of the air, and of the tree branches as well as bits of the trunks (use the Instrument, but don't cut too deep for it to dull). Give one of each to Simus.
Here you are. The backing up procedure in process. Maurice lightly chuckles.
Does anyone else want me to cut him some of this 'wood'?
Give more of the wood samples to those who want them.
Saying that, Maurice slightly rolled his eyes in the anticipation of the inevitable Milno's comment.
You scoop some sand, capture some air, cut off some branches which come away like paper, and shave off some "wood" which has the consistency of pure metallic sodium. You pick up the wood shavings and place them in several containers and move on to the branches you cut.
[dex:4] You grab the branches carefully between two fingers, nicking the suit a bit but not hurting yourself, and deposit the samples in their respective jars.
You give one of each sample to Simus.
"I'll take some samples please."
Maurice sets a sample container of wood next to you as you hop around with your cut hand.
Milno shrugs, looking around the "forest" and directing a question at their guide.
"Is it dangerous to cut parts or take samples from these 'trees' as far as you know?"
Also, examine the gifted gauntlet. Move a few feet from the team but still over or near the rope and the lights, then try to will the metal into forming sharp talons at the tip of its fingers, to see if it works. Keep it pointed away from the group.
I suspect that gauntlet may work by taking shape according to the desire of the wielder. Not sure, though.
(by the way, your ability to find secret things with a int roll doesn't work on this since it's not standard HMRC equipment. The video didn't exactly cover alien power gauntlets.)
"Only if you go touching the edges of the branches like him" He says, pointing to Thomas. "They're like razors."
You walk a few yards from the group and look at your gauntlet. There's no sort of designs or really anything on it that gives any sort of idea about it's purpose or origin. It's just a big solidish piece of metal as far as you can see. You concentrate on the gauntlet, willing it to grow claws. The camera feed through your visor suddenly becomes distorted, filling with static and twisting randomly. You stop concentrating on the gauntlet and the feed returns to normal. Strange.
"Hmm, I'll take a branch, if it isn't too much trouble," Charro said.
He had to remind himself to keep an eye out for anything that could be worth a few tokens... And even if it wasn't, maybe he could make something out of it. He squinted through the surrounding trees uneasily.
'Nothing's gone (too badly) wrong so far, but this place gives me the creeps.'
>Request a branch, watch the trees nervously for any signs of life.
>Whilst following, naturally.
You ask for someone to get you a branch while keeping close to the guide. You see no signs of life or movement from the trees, not so much as a shiver when your teammates start cutting samples out of them. Still, you can't help but be nervous about them.
Bah. Stupid suit. Why do they give complex systems to inmates and don't even bother to include a manual!?
Meh.
"Hey team, I was tinkering with my lamps and I short circuited them. Anyone here good with machines and could take a look at it"?
While waiting for a response, Travis cleared away the sand right next to one of the trees. Do the trees simply go into the sandstone? Was the sand deeper?
You clear the sand away from the base of one of the trees; its just as deep here as it was in the plains. It looks like the trunk just goes straight down into the sandstone.
[private channel to Simus] You may count on me. And you are most welcome.
Sure, Travis. I'll be there in a moment.
Fix the problem with his suit's lamps.
((@Orb I suggest having a good look at the 'roots' of the 'trees' while you are at it. I think those might be as unnatural and disturbing as the 'branches' are. Or there might turn out to be no roots at all. ))
You walk over to where Travis is digging away and take a look at his lamps.
[aux:4+1]
You open your emergency kit and use the tools inside to take off a panel of the helmet and get into the lamp housing. Looks like he overloaded one of these capacitors and blew it out. You replace it and put the panel back on.
"It should work now, just don't overdo it again."
Rip off some tree bark while humming 'Bow Down' by the Westside Connection.
"Is this entire mission going to be composed of us playing research scientists? Isn't there usually a big bad thing that happens and people start dying?"
The tree doesn't seem to have bark.
Gah! Fix the camera! Before getting into the woods! Don't panic!
When fixed, film a sweep of the forest. In the forest, record a tree from all available angles.
"Would you prefer we take samples from where there's already light or move further out?" Faith asked Conrad. "Unless there's some reason we can't or shouldn't cut one of them down or maybe dig one up or something."
"Where there's already light? If I'm understanding correctly, you're also wondering if the environment reacts to light similarly to the... entities around here?"
[aux:6+1]
Maybe this will do it? No...now all the audio is autotuned...wait how does that work?
[Aux:3+1]
Ok, not filming in thermal or autotuned anymore, but now there's no sound...
[4+1]
Ah, finally, there we go, fixed it.
You run to catch up with the team and then spend a few minutes painstakingly documenting a few of the trees from every possible angle.
Feyri kept near Milno, watching the rest. "Sound distortion? Then perhaps we should take heed not to lose each other or be separated from the group. This is the dead forest then?"
Dig downwards to inspect a tree's lower parts, then try to take a sample from those. Use my laser rifle if needed, or Tesla Sabre to acquire.
Unless Conrad says otherwise.
You dig down but the sand ends after only a few inches, replaced with solid sandstone, into which the trunk of the tree continues.
"My lungs can work again!"
Collect samples of various branches, look for some kind of leaf and get a sample.
There are no leaves, just empty branches. Guess thats why they call it the Dead Forest as opposed to just "The Forest."
[dex:5]
You snap a couple of branches off and stick them in sample containers.
Author
Topic: Einsteinian Roulette (Original Thread: Rules, Armory, Misson archive 1-11) (Read 3984669 times)