Logs:The Whole Shabang

The Whole Shabang
Dramatis Personae Kyinha, Amo
In Absentia Cerebro	2024-11-04 "{What the in the names of all the saints --}"
Location <XAV> Danger Room - Xs Sub-Basement
The room is large and circular, a geodesic hemisphere of hexagonal ceramic panels. It is the Danger Room, and is thus often full of danger, but is presently not in use and is thus remarkably danger-free. Safest room in the school, probably. As the door hisses shut behind them, Sunspot turns around and walks backward -- so he can continue facing their newest recruit, probably -- toward the center of the expansive room, arms spread wide, fiery grin wide, too. "I'm sure you came here on your tour, maybe even saw it in action, but that's nothing like experiencing a simulation." Despite the lateness of the season, he is flush with energy, the faint glow emanating from him that emphasizes rather than diminishes the light-swallowing blackness of his skin. He looks darker even than his black X-uniform whose yellow piping stands out all the more to somewhat Tron-like effect. "There's a vast library of environments and training scenarios, but Cerebro can also generate ones to order, if you have something in mind you'd like to explore?" Amo spins in an easy circle with her hands resting against the back of her head as they head towards the center, taking in the hexigonal ceramic panels with an impressed upwards tick of her eyebrows. “Hasn’t gotten old yet.” She ends her spin facing Sunspot, hands shoving into the pockets of the cargo pants and tank top she’s picked out for this particular occasion. An unconscious ripple of armor scatters down her shoulders, down to where her hands disappear in her pockets. “I can pick something? Shit.” She hums in thought, checks down at the watch on her wrist for the date, “Too late for a haunted house? I’d punch a ghost.” She pitches, but there’s still a joking edge in her tone, like she doesn’t quite believe the danger room can actually make a haunted house scenario. “Unless you got a favorite sim? I’m ready for whatever you got.” Her hand comes out of her pocket to flick twice down by her side. Sunspot's expression is difficult to read, but tug of his eyes and mouth look amused. "Certainly it is not too late for a haunted house. We have several of those, just for training scenarios." He rolls his shoulders and stretches his arms, rising up onto his toes and bouncing back down. "You can see my favorites another time. Today, you should pick something. Just tell Cerebro to show you a list of whatever kind you want to see. Or ask for something custom. I would punch ghosts with you, to be sure!" Amo’s expression herself doesn’t change much except for a brief widening of her eyes. She nods, “Sure, let’s see what we got.” She looks up at the ceiling, “Aye Cerebro,” she seems proud of that one, “Can you throw us in one of those haunted houses you got? Any of them I guess, ghosts n' skeletons n' all that. The whole shabang." There’s a moment where nothing happens aside from a deep, almost imperceptible hum that vibrates through the floor and up through their heads and into the surrounding air itself. A yellow glow that starts from the top of dome slowly spreads downwards between the seams of the ceramic hexagonal panels like heated magma, and the panels slowly activate one by one in a rippling mechanical shift outward and back in place. A skeleton of a house begins to form, and then perhaps a stomach dropping feeling as ceilings and walls stretch upwards around them. The previous bright lights of the danger room darken significantly, and then cut out all together, almost artificially swallowing them in the darkness of it if not for Sunspot's faint glow. When they shift their weight, the uneven wood paneling floor now creaks with protest. The room they're in suddenly floods with light as thunder booms and lightning flashes through the expansive window beside them, revealing, only for a moment, an army of creepy dolls scattered about the room. The room darkens again. Amo laughs, nervously, and takes a step back, suddenly very unsure about this, "NAH wait waitwaitwait." Sunspot is laughing -- also nervously, although his bravado is better practiced. He raises one hand and conjures a fiery orb to illuminate the space better. The flickering firelight doesn't actually make their surroundings less disturbing, and he takes an unconscious step back toward Amo. "See? What did I tell you." At a small delay he adds, a little quieter. "I haven't seen this one before." In the quiet that follows the fading rumble of thunder, the creak of the floorboards is louder -- and not all of it is connected with their movements. Some of it is coming from farther beneath them, a basement that could not exist, given the Danger Room's actual physical construction. Scraping noises join in, closer and closer, as something down there starts climbing the stairs. Sunspot's other hand ignites, too. "Wonder what part of the 'whole shebang' that is." "Oh NAHHH-" Amo grabs Sunspot's shoulder, allows some armor to blossom on his shoulder, ripple across his body in preparation—as long as it could last against his heat that is. Armor is rippling down Amo's arms, down to her hands and solidifying into rocky boxing gloves. "I think we're about to find out." A flicker from Sunspot's fiery orb brings the door to the basement into view: hung on sagging hinges, open wide in front of them so all that's visible is the pitch black entrance to a basement that shouldn't exist. ...Had that entrance even been there a moment ago? The climbing up the stairs is slow, scraping, dragging at first, but then suddenly, it speeds up in a desperate clambering haste. A normal, human looking hand grasps the bottom frame of the door, claws for purchase, and drags up to reveal a young woman, long hair. A pale face that doesn't look quite right. "Help me. Please" She begs. Amo steps forward, impulsively, and goes to grab her hand, when suddenly the body of the woman twists with sickening cracks, head remaining upright but the rest of her body contorting upside down and upwards as the rest of the monster emerges into the flickering light. Like an angler fish, the woman's body hangs as a facade, Repeating over and over "Help me. Please. HelpmePlease." The actual monster is hard to make out in the flickering light, scrambling limbs—far too many limbs—and a melting shifting body that oozes and pulses with multiple heartbeats. A mouth full of teeth reveals in it's stomach, opening wide before it lunges for Amo, pinning her down with it's many many limbs. Amo shouts, and armored hands push against razor sharp teeth to keep them away. At the same time, the dolls decide it's a good time to join the party. They scuffle forward much too quickly, like clumsy desperate spiders on their little doll arms and legs. Their permanent smiles, wide eyes, and heads tilting much too eager. "{What the in the names of all the saints --}" Sunspot blurts in Portuguese. He throws out a hand, making to shoot fire at the anglerfish...bug...thing, but then it's pinned Amo and he mutters something in Nheengatu that has the tone of a very filthy swear. He spins around and blasts the encroaching dolls as he tries to circle around to flank the larger monster who's seized his teammate. Some of the dolls emit horrible shrieks and collapse writhing to the floor, but others seem unfazed. So on the plus side, they're being rushed by fewer dolls, now. Unfortunately, those dolls are also on fire. He picks up speed and runs up the wall briefly to grab the anglercreatures's lure by the hand in a bid to drag it off of Amo. "Can you armor its mouth shut?!" Amo's head slams back into the ground as she wrestles against it's teeth, desperately attempting to keep it away. She seems unhurt, thanks to a sudden blossom of hard rock between the strands of her hair, but she's quickly losing the fight against it—that is until Sunspot begins pulling at the lure's hand. She grits her own teeth, and nods, "Got it!" Armor rushes off her hands and spreads across the monster's teeth, up it's gums, across it's mouth and expands inside and down it's throat, attempting to fill in any possible space. On a chomp, she takes the chance to allow it to spread more, sealing the maw shut. The monster begins to shudder, convulse, against the lack of air (could it breath? apparently). With her hands no longer fighting to keep the monster's mouth from eating her, she takes a moment to snag a flaming doll that gets too close to her by the leg and chucks it at the wall—the head shatters into a billion little ceramic pieces. She returns to trying to peel the monster's limbs off from holding her down—is starting to be almost able to slip out—barely. The creature’s other limbs flail and swipe frantically towards anything that moves, sharp fingered hands gouging harsh lines into the wood flooring. "Watch the- SHIT-" She jerks her head out of the way from one that swings too close to her head and smashes another doll instead. Sunspot laughs triumphantly when Amo armors the creature's mouth shut, and he yanks even harder on the lure, trying to get more of its weight off of his teammate. But the anglermonster is thrashing harder, too, and manages to pull its imitation damsel-in-distress loose from Sunspot's grasp. It snaps back and forth like some kind of macabre tube man, crying for help all the while. Sunspot staggers back, then immediately launches himself at the thing again, bolder now that its gnashing maw has been stoppered. Maybe it's luck or maybe it's skill, but he slams his shoulder into the thing just as it's overbalancing. Man and monster go tumbling, freeing Amo at last, though the flaming dolls are now closing in. Amo cant stop the cheer that rings out, and immediately clambers to her feet, a little off balance from the armor that’s built up unevenly across her body. The armor disperses more, and she whips around to look at the dolls. Her legs armor up as some attempt to impale her with their evil little flaming doll knives, and she swings her leg in a wide arc—flinging it down into the basement with a warbled cry. She stomps on another, grabs two with armored up hands and slams their ceramic chests into each other. Grabs one more plush doll and beats a few others with it, sending a spray of ceramic and plush arms everywhere, then discards that one. She whips back towards where Sunspot and the anglermonster had gone tumbling, and darts over to grab one of the thrashing arms and pull it--towards the stairs. "Fuckn' blast it bro! I'm good!" Armor has begun to overlap in layers on her in preparation. Sunspot rolls free of the anglermonster's flailing limbs as Amo drags it away. He comes up on one knee and hesitates only for a fraction of a second, bright flaming eyes wide-wide at Amo's instruction. But he doesn't question it. Just lifts both hands and hurls a thick gout of white-hot fire at the creature. He rises and follows after Amo, the force of the blast helping to push their enemy along toward the stairs. The monster's lure has caught fire now where it's whipping back and forth in grotesque fashion, its pleas for help incongruously steady and unchanged by its increasingly dire predicament. The anglermonster jerks back at the fire, wailing and screeching. With one last yank the monster goes tipping back, and then tumbles down down down into the basement abyss, bones audibly snapping and squelching as it barrels down the seemingly never ending stairs until finally, a grotesque CRUNCH-SPLAT can be heard, and only the soft glow of smoldering flames seen at the very bottom. Amo grabs the basement door and slams it shut, nearly ripping it off it's squealing hinges in the process. She breaths heavily, armor seared and burnt in some places, but she looks otherwise unharmed with her back pressed against the door. She looks at Sunspot, her eyes wide and wild, and manages to huff out a delirious laugh. She jerks her chin towards him, "Next time, we pick one of yours, yeah?"