[LOC] The Root

[DraconicFeline]

Keionx had the orb and was carrying it - carefully because gog only knew what it was - back to where they had found the interesting thing. Odette was a wonderful guide. Keionx trusted her. Keionx would follow her anywhere, and knew she could trust Odettes wisdom and her strength and... what was that quality? That grace and power and supreme competence and compassion was something she was willing to be drawn to. But the last time she had let it stand between her and danger, Odette had gotten hurt.

There was a treasure here, and she was there to open it, and she would, regardless of whether the other two untrustworthy children wanted. Which was what they wanted. Keionx didn't care. What she did care about was that she was feeling a twinge of that old delight. This was an adventure. She was a hero. Here was a treasure. She knew she should ask for Odette's permission, but she had the orbs, the lock was right there.

"Stand back?" she said, an almost gentle almost request, before she used the orbs on the door...

Kimbley Kitty

Sypon

seekingCylem

Hivestuck

Applying the things to the things to do stuff

 

[Sypon]

The orbs are a perfect fit. As they click into place, a faint hum can be heard around the party. All remaining featherbeasts immediately squawk and fly off as the deep vibrations coming from within began. The hum was, however, not isolated to inside of the mysterious large box. It could be heard throughout the Root – and emanating from the orbs that were now locked in place in the door. The door then opened. Or rather, it simply fell forward.

With an immense crash, the monolithic room stood open in front of the party. The interior of the room was stark and technological. There was only room inside for an immense server connected to a huskhub, a tattered desk chair and a filing cabinet. A bag of cheesy poof snacks, perfectly preserved, laid on the single cramped desk that was littered with notes. There was a familiar orb embedded in the ceiling of the room. As the hum intensified, the power in the room flickered on.

Kimbley Kitty

DraconicFeline

seekingCylem

(aerona post now)

Aerona jumped backwards to avoid the immense door falling in front of her. Her jaw dropped. "Holy...! Holy holy!" She gasped. Her lusus chittered uncomfortable, putting a small claw on her shoulder. As her expression turned from shock to pure excitement, Aerona shot a look at her two older companions.

"Did you know about this??!?! What is this!"  

[zeflamigo]

Odette held her breath. This wasn't quite what she was expecting to find. It was safer than she envisioned, actually. Still hesitant, she started to walk into the room, keeping her eyes peeled for anything dangerous. Holding Siegfried tight to her chest, she looked around the room, trying to discern its purpose.

"I don't know," Odette admitted, voice soft, almost mesmerized by the simple room. "It just looks like... somebody's office. Perhaps there's more information on the husktop?" She suggested, making her way over to peruse the notes on the desk.

Sypon

seekingCylem

DraconicFeline

 

[Sypon]

The notes on the desk are highly technical, and mostly complex mathematical equations that are packed in tiny amber writing onto the pages. The heading of the pages is consistent: “Baista Solkov. Page 233, revision 3. Independent Spaceflight via Self-Enhanced Telekinesis.”

Kimbley Kitty

 

[seekingCylem]

Sascha had been expecting the big box to open, of course, but he hadn't anticipated just how heavy the thing would be. He practically felt himself leave the ground as the wall crashed down. Somehow the contrast of the completely normal-looking office space with the ominous surrounding atmosphere compounded the overarching creepiness of the situation. The persistent humming was also causing an annoying tingling sensation between his horns. None of it stopped Sascha from stepping over the fallen wall towards the room proper. As soon as Odette made her way inward, Sascha was close behind.

"What's that say?" he asked when he was unable to peer over the taller troll's shoulder. He tried inching around Odette to get access to the husktop.  

[zeflamigo]

"Looks like the notes of a Baista Solkov," Odette read, handing a few pages to the younger yellowblood. She paused, trying to take in the information. Did this troll really want to achieve individual space flight? That sounded unfeasible, if not incredibly dangerous.

"Seems like they were researching about going into space, using their telekinesis." She explained, still a bit confused. "And a lot of math, by the looks of it." She added, the numbers easily making her head spin. She was considerably out of her depth here, intellectually speaking.  

[Sypon]

“Holy cow!” Aerona finally managed to punctuate her ‘holy’ as Odette spoke, hustling into the room. “Personal space flight? That’s totally freakin’ illegal! This dude or dudette is totally crazy!” She laughed and wandered in the small space, picking up the bag of cheesy poofs. Her lusus smacked it out of her hand lightly.

“Do they have good games on their husktop at least?” She pushed her way over to Sascha and grabbed the mouse from him, taking over jiggling it.

----

As you drag the mouse around, the monitor of the husktop pops open to a very complex looking program. It’s not like anything you’ve seen before, and on the screen there’s a plethora of informational graphics that show huge amounts of data from a current test. At the top of the screen, the title of the current program reads in bold letters: “ENGINE IGNITION TELEKINESIS TEST 4” with a date. This date is exactly the same as when The Root Collapsed. A 3D model on the screen shows what appears to be a testing area built inside of a regular hivestem block, with a rendered power suit simulating a Helmsman’s station. The test results are clear: Low power, amplification, an eruption, and then nothing.  

[seekingCylem]

Sascha allowed himself to be pushed out of Aerona's way as Odette handed him some papers to look at. He could glean about as much from the paperwork as Odette had just told him. He felt a weird anxiety build up in his chest as he looked through the numbers for words he actually understood. He saw words like "kinesis" and "psionic" used repeatedly, but it was hard to focus with all the technical jagon. That, or it was just that goddamn humming noise. Sascha absently rubbed at his ear as he looked up to see what Aerona had discovered.

"Why would someone build a bunker just to play computer gaa....mes..." Sascha immediately forgot what he was saying as his eyes landed on the title of the program. He wasn't a technologically well-versed troll, but he did recognize that kind of equipment.

"Did this guy... Blow themselves up?" Sascha asked no one in particular. His voice was significantly softer than it had been up until this point. The paperwork in his hands crinkled.  

[DraconicFeline]

Keionx drew her sword the moment she was able, nervous and excited and a little scared - the mix that she had been longing for for so long. There wasn't much she honesty understood about science, but she knew that everything here was dangerous.

Blow themselves up, though, Keionx understood. "Odette, are we safe here?" she asked. Odette would know. Odette knew ev... most things.  

[zeflamigo]

"I think... I think we are, Keionx. I can't promise anything, but this place seems to have been preserved... almost like a bunker." It had been so long since the initial fall of the root. Perhaps there were still the possibility of lingering traps, but with the owner of the office was long gone, if not...

Odette reached out to Sascha, kneeling down to his height. "Sascha," Odette's tone felt apologetic, noticing how the boy was getting worked up. "I think there was an accident... and it took down the whole hivestem." She took a deep breath, the thought affecting her deeply as well. "Bad things happen sometimes. This troll took a dangerous chance, trying to do everything by themselves." She explained, hoping she was coming off as sympathetic. She didn't want to rattle the child any more than he already was.  

[seekingCylem]

Sascha whipped his head to the side, surprised to suddenly see Odette's face at his eye level. Recognizing her tone as one of placation, Sascha took a moment to steel his nerves before responding. He wasn't afraid. He wasn't a wriggler. Odette was right. This guy was an idiot.

"Tch--yeah. If the government can't even get their own space program back off the ground, then what luck was some nobody lowblood gonna have in their basement?" Sascha shook the wrinkles out of the papers he was holding for extra effect. He was still troubled, but he couldn't pin down his exact feelings or why. "I'm surprised they even made it far enough to make an explosion as big as this one. That helmsman station they made must've been something wicked..." Sascha trailed off in thought once again. Why was this troll working alone? Clearly they didn't trust anyone but themselves with the information they were producing, but that only served to open its own can of dirt noodles.  

[Sypon]

Aerona kept fiddling with the mouse, frowning at the disasterous implications of the self-made-Helmsman. Sascha was right. “Bet the government would wanna see this stuff, huh? I mean, they got to like. Test four or something. No wonder they were such a creepy weirdo about it. Whatever.”

The implications of the information were lost on the redblood. She pulled open the filing cabinet and extracted a few files, looking for some more damning information – or at least something she could understand. The side of her face lit up with a blinking blue light. The computer screen…!

A message had blinked onto the screen, with a static image of a large, handsome yellowblood sitting at the desk. “Hello. This is Baista Solkov. If you are reading this, I am either dead or sentenced to be executed for treason because of my experimentation. Either way, I am free. And you are in the central core of my failsafe. Activate military breach code 3.”

The huskhub display buzzed and reappeared with a simple black screen. Small letters wrote out “purging information. activating breach code 3.”

The orb in the ceiling began to beep at a steady pace. A familiar beeping sound could be heard faintly throughout The Root.  

[DraconicFeline]

Tests. Experiments. Creepy wierdos. This was all beyond Keionx's purview. Even the old her, the her of before, wouldn't have known what to do with this adventure. How did one write something so technological into fantasy?

Information was a treasure, but Keionx had a very bad, visceral feeling about that beeping. She looked uneasily at Odette, reading the older teen's face before turning to the children.

"Out!" she said, "Out! Now!"  

[zeflamigo]

Odette audibly gasped at the sound of another voice in the room. she had the fleeting thought a place like this may be set up with traps. Anyone working alone was bound to be secretive, she supposed. The moment the faint beeping crossed her spongeclots, she sprung to action.

"Keionx!" Odette called for the girl, taking on an orderly tone. "Lead Aerona and Sascha out of the hivestem! It's not safe!" She ordered, also handing the orangeblood their small featherbeast. "I'll catch up with you, alright?" She assured, then turned back to the desk.

Odette set to gather up as much of the materials she could muster, stirring up a gust around the room in an attempt to direct all the notes, cheesy snacks, and whatever else lingered in the room into one spot.  

[Sypon]

Sophitia was glad, at least, that the orangeblood had some sense. She grabbed Aerona by the arm and she dropped the files. “Ah! OW!” The redblood yelped. “What about the – what about the stuff?!” She exclaimed. The lusus was already scuttling quickly behind the others. “What about you???”

She was afraid. This wasn’t a fun adventure any more – it was way out of her grasp. The physical toll of her adventure so far became very apparent to her now as she was lead this way and that. Aerona bit her lip and turned to look back at Odette, though in the small room her even smaller form was quickly receding from her vision. “Where are we going, K-Keionx?” She asked. Aerona felt a lump build in her throat and she looked to Sascha. If he was okay, she’d be okay.

The beeping began to accelerate. Aerona could hear other sources of the beeping from under the piles of rubble nearby. Everywhere there was the dim flash of red light, blinking faster and faster.