Conversation Space: The Ultimate

[powersthatbe]

You feel as if you've stepped through a door.

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XVI. The Tower

[powersthatare]

You are standing on a rope bridge, swaying uneasily over a chasm, in the midst of a torrential rainstorm. Except for the occasional distant flicker of lightning - the thunder is drowned out by the continuous roar of frigid water - there is absolutely no light.

[yourotherleft]

Oh. Great.

[because what's better after a confusing introduction to the concept of other worlds than pouring damn rain, darkness, and a rickety bridge? this is fine. this is just totally fine.]

OOOOOIIII! Anybody else here?

[powersthatare]

[The next flicker of lightning reveals a cadaverously thin black-cloaked figure, seven feet tall, standing scarcely out of reach.]

YES.

[yourotherleft]

[Oh.

Well.

Hi?]

Wanna point me to the nearest place with a roof, and maybe a good drink?

[powersthatare]

DRINK The rain.

[The voice comes from no fixed point, but seems to be shouted as if falling past them both, doppler effect carrying it first closer, then further away.]

[pionero]

[ Cal's hands immediately reach out to grab the ropes that stretch out on either side of him. He looks from side to side around the edges of the black hood that obscures his face. The lightning cracks in the distance, and he is reminded of the rolling thunderstorms as a kid.

How am I not crazy? It is a thought that rumbles back and forth in his head. A war between secret societies somehow made more sense than where he is now.

He slowly starts trying to make his way further on the bridge. ]

[powersthatare]

[After one more step, his hand on the rope encounters another hand - gaunt, skeletal, chilled - and the flash of lightning reveals the figure it belongs to, a seven-foot tall cloaked being, almost impossibly slender, every feature except its pallid forearm concealed in its enveloping black robe.]

Greetings.

[The voice seems to come from somewhere around its chest, rather than from within the hood, and carries over the noise of the storm. There is a windy quality to it, as if it is being shouted from a further distance away.]

[pionero]

[ It takes something fairly intimidating to scare Cal. The first time he almost died, the way the Animus moved him around like a paper doll, and now the hooded figure that quite literally towered over him. The hand is the first thing he notices. Then the lightning does little to ease the feeling that shoots up through his spine. It is a feeling he knows instantly: powerlessness.

Instincts kick in. He takes a step back and his wrist flicks. The silver blade shoots out from his wrist. Not that he thinks he can take on the hooded figure. ]

[powersthatare]

YOU CANNOT HARM ME. Not Enough of me is here.

[The voice seems to fall past them as it speaks, dwindling into the distance.

[laceandcarnage]

The darkness is not what bothers Istas. She is waheela, and a waheela doesn't survive the long cold nights of the north without the ability to tolerate the darkness.

No, what bothers her is the swaying of the bridge. She growls her alarm, clinging tightly to the ropes that make up the handrails. The rain pelts down, ruining the beautiful new lace dress that she clothed herself in at the conclusion of her dungeon. She cannot even summon an umbrella to protect it, because then she would have to remove one hand from the railing - a course of action which is, quite frankly, unacceptable.

[powersthatare]

At the next flash of lightning, there is a looming figure standing close, cadaverously thin and dressed in all-enveloping black hooded cloak, regarding her with faceless curiosity from beneath its cowl.

[laceandcarnage]

Along with the faceless figure comes the scent of death, of an embalmed corpse. The smells of embalming are not so familiar to her, but death is a scent she knows intimately. Her eyes widen.

"Zombie!" she growls in accusation. Dead things should move around, as if they are alive! She needs to kill it again, but to kill it she must strike it, and she cannot remove her hands from the ropes...

[powersthatare]

"NO," the figure contradicts, voice booming like thunder from somewhere overhead more than from the shape which stands in front of her.

[child_of_bhaal]

This is not the worst place she's ever found herself, with no explanation at all. Her balance is steady, even as the bridge sways in the wind. It's too dark to see or assess, she needs light.

Lifting her hands away from the support ropes, she waves them, humming a brief little tune. A little cheery song in a storm, because why not? What better way to banish a bit of darkness than with a little light? Dancing lights, to be precise.

[powersthatare]

The lights reveal a looming figure, perhaps seven feet tall, shrouded in a dark robe, thin, pallid arms clutching the ropes as it leans over her.

[child_of_bhaal]

Well. That's unexpected.

She takes a single step back on the swinging bridge, carefully balanced. It wouldn't be great to fall off in the storm. She could maybe survive, but that bridge didn't need crossing yet.

Her head tilts back, trying to get a good look at the figure. This didn't feel like a dream, not the way she's used to them, so she didn't think this was a manifestation of the Taint. But her light doesn't seem to illuminate anything more than just the shape of this....Person?

"Who are you?" When in doubt, ask. She has to pitch her voice louder to carry over the storm, but the person is close enough to hear. Probably.

[powersthatare]

"CHAOS. IMPACT. Revelation. ruin. the gatekeeper," the figure says - at least, it's probably the figure. The voice begins as a booming shout somewhere above them both, and descends as it speaks, falling away into the darkness below them until it is inaudible.

[maximumest]

The lash of wind and rain finds yet another unlucky traveler where he shouldn't be but this one, as the rope and wood bridge sways ominously under his feet, simply steps off of it and remains there just over its surface, still in the storm. This didn't smell like anywhere he'd been before, he didn't recall weather like this in the forecast for 'New Vegeta', and ..

And they didn't have any rope bridges either.

Hopefully some of these cracks of lightning would reveal something familiar nearby so Broly could at least get his bearings. Standing about in a storm with as much metal as he tends to wear was going to be unpleasant sooner or later, even if he was certain it wouldn't kill him.

[powersthatare]

A particularly bright crack of lightning reveals a tall, perilously slender figure in a dark robes, clutching the ropes with pale, emaciated arms. Though Broly is quite tall, the figure looms over him by almost eighteen inches.

[maximumest]

There's many tall beings in the universe but most don't usually reach over nine feet tall. That this one DOES while still being rail thin (it takes an extra lightning or two for him to determine the robes weren't hiding a lot more mass than it seemed) is even stranger. The moment of shock at having been snuck up on passes quickly - surely something so frail looking can't be a threat.

"Is this your place?"

The wind is going to make conversation ... a real pain in the backside.

[powersthatare]

"yes," the figure says, a voice like a distant shout coming from somewhere far below them.

[runawaystory]

--Augh!

[using Wardrobe Manip to swap her clothes for dry ones and also a rain slicker with matching hat >(]

[powersthatare]

GREEtings.

The looking robed figure stands almost within her reach, illuminated by the next flash of lightning, but his voice does not come from within the body - rather it is a shout beginning somewhere above them and plunging bodiless into the dark precipice beneath the bridge.

[runawaystory]

[yelling back over the storm nose]

D'you think you could tone all of this down a little?

[powersthatare]

[The figure pauses, freezing like an animatronic figure with its battery drained. After a moment, the lightning-strikes slow, and leave a sullen lingering glow behind them. The raindrops grow fewer, but each drop is fat and heavy, a more tangible splash when it strikes. The figure tilts its head, and its voice emerges with a deeper timber, from beneath them.]

_{LIKE SO?}