Mato -

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You awake in the chill confines of the space you've come to think of as you new den, in this giant village of metal and glass, the sound of an ad outside screaming in full audio. It's been three days now since you lost track of Ama, the odd girl that had become your unlikely companion during your journey to find the creature or creatures who's scent still lingered in your mind even now.

PREMIERING IN JUST THREE WEEKS, A PATHFINDER STUDIOS AND SYNERGY PICTURES CO-PRODUCTION – THE EMERGING SOUL. TAKE AN IN DEPTH LOOK AT THE NEW SPECIES TO INHABIT OUR MODERN ECOSYSTEM.

She'd found you out in the edge of your tribes land, peering with some consternation at a paved roadway, where you scent trail seemed to have led directly to. In the distance, you could see the edge of the persistent nightmare, as several people in your tribe called it, that was filled with disillusioned people, leading fake lives and doing fake work for fake goods and fake money. She had simply pulled up in front of you in a large, humming vehicle that stank of plastic, and said that she'd been sent by her Goddess to help you in your hunt. There was an ad for some full simsense trideo that was playing on the side of the vehicle, though what, exactly, a full simsense trideo was you hadn't know until later.

COME VISIT BEAUTIFUL ECHO LAKE! REVIVED AS THE HEART OF THE NORTHWEST REDMOND, ECHO LAKE BOASTS SEATTLE'S ONLY 'RAINFOREST BACKYARD'

In just a day or two, she'd found you a place to live in a place that had an actual backyard and wouldn't ask too many questions, and given you a few details about the land in which you now hunted.
Casting your gaze around the den, you are struck again at the sense of disconnection that pervaded everything in this place. Nothing was connected to the earth, even the floor beneath your feet, and everyone was a tribe unto themselves...it was rare to even see people touch one another, nevermind gather for communal stories or worship, the way they had  back in the real world.

Noticing the small, blinking light on the piece of technology the woman had instructed you to carry with you, a fumbling tap on the flashing image of the woman's face brings up a short message and an address, along with the number for cab company, unfamiliar characters slowly morphing into intelligible words as you concentrate.

<<@Mato[Ama]: I have found some that have knowledge of the person we seek. Call this number, tell them you need a ride, and give them #this address#. They will not give up the information we need easily...bring your weapons and armor.

KARL'S KOBMAT! FOR WHEN YOU NEED A RIDE TO PLACES NO SANE PERSON WOULD TAKE YOU. ISN”T YOUR SAFETY AND TIMELINESS WORTH A LITTLE EXTRA NUYEN? CERTIFIED DRIVES IN SPECIAL ISSUE MODIFIED VEHICLES ARE STANDING BY!

The address is for a location somewhere near the edge of where this artificial nightmare gave way to the real world again, and the number seems to be for some one named Karl that had something called a 'Kombat Cab'.

Ama

WAKE.
You awaken, your first sensation one of pain, severe enough to cramp muscles and force you into a tightly curled fetal ball. This wasn't unknown to you, however...training had often left you in this state the next day, and it brings a sense of familiarity to your mind to run through the breathing exercises that would allow your to rapidly lock your awareness of the pain into one small part of your awareness, giving you the control you need to be able to finally open your eyes.

The room is small, no more than a few meters square, and covered with vomit and blood. Splattered around the room, it paints a lurid picture of violence done to more than one person, judging by quantities and age. In addition to the physical evidence, there's a shimmering field overlaying everything...a dingy, grey, oppressive miasma that seems to tint everything you're looking at. The only other furnishings are a single metal chair, with solid manacles on the armrests and legs, bolted and concerted into the floor itself, and a single door. You can see the doorway, filled with the physicality of a heavy, vault looking door that's slightly ajar. Overlaying that, however, is a solid black film, shot through with a tracery of red veins.

It's only after this instinctive inspection and assessment of your surroundings that you look to your own body, still wracked with soreness, skin pale and almost translucent, the blue pulse of veins and arteries beneath the skin. You can see the angry red scar of massive wounds up and down both wrists and forearms, the flesh looking like it was split in slashes an inch wide or more, but healed to an extent that would imply injuries several weeks, if not months old. Scattered around you are the remains of your hair, long locks from your head and shorter from other places, shorn from your body as if plucked forth by a million grasping fingers. You're covered in only a light shift, a hospital garment, nothing more than two flaps of paper held at the sides with small plastic clips and ties.

Thinking back, it's then that you remember the last few minutes of your life before this room. Leaving the NAN tribesman you'd been sent to in the newly rented safehouse, heading out to track down a potential lead, the ripple and wash of pain that accompanied powerful magic tearing through your defenses and flooding your mind with agony, followed by blackness. There are images, flashes--

SURVIVE.
--You glance down at manacles strapping your wrists to the metal chair--

FIGHT.
--Creatures gather around your form, dark and lithe and deadly, but they part like water as dark shape flows through door--

LEARN.
--Blood sprays from your wrists, you can see teeth sink into the flesh--

KILL.
--Chanting, the figures are crooning some loud, sick-sounding song at the figure--

SERVE.
--Fire rips through your body, and you can hear the voice of the Goddess in your head, whispering, promising--

Back in yourself, looking around the room, you could feel the certainty, though, that this was the test. The gift had been given, and it would be determined whether you were worthy of it, whether you could stand under the fire as one of Her progeny and serve with the wholeness, the totality of your new being.

SHIKOME.

Boots

The time spent in your home plane has been fraught with anxiety of the most complex type you've ever experienced. You saw the explosion that engulfed Beatrix and Sean, but the familiar sense of transitioning that normally accompanies travel back to your home metaplane was absent. Instead, you were ripped, bodily and painfully, flung from this world and cast, the spiritual equivalent of broken and bleeding, back into Alfheim. You were a curiosity there, for a while. Old compatriots of the Hunt had avoided you before, after you'd been called by the witch, calling you caeth, or slave.

But now...now you were something different, and they seemed to know it, were eager to take the time to be able to inspect you themselves. You could feel their eagerness, bright and sharp and caring nothing for you as a being. You could feel the link, tenuous but resilient, that had first been formed when Beatrix called for an avatar of Dog to guide and help her. It had been a mixture of curiosity and duty that had drawn you, for despite the fact that the hunt held dozens of spirits of your kind, Dog was just as much a part of your Nature as the Hunt. Your form was difference in the Astral plane, more like a dog than the Hound your had been under the Huntsman, but intrinsically you knew that it would have been shaped by she who called you. She was there, in the center of the circle and surrounded by glowing astral forms, seemingly weaving together the threads that called and bound you to her.

That had been years ago, and life with Beatrix and Sean had been anything but boring. There was almost always some new job, with Sean egging Beatrox and the rest of the group into accepting riskier and riskier jobs, citing the higher and higher pay they were receiving.  And when they weren't on a job or scrambling to pay back Sean's debts or find enough to eat, there had been a whole new world to explore, free from the overwhelming presence of the Hunt.

It had been days, weeks even, and you could feel the tie to the mortal plane regrowing, repairing itself, strengthening slowly to the point at which you'd be able to lean on it, travel down it and get back to Beatrix. You already knew something was wrong, though. There was a difference to the connection, a less specific tug, the feelings more generalized, diffuse. Perhaps she was hurt, even dying? She needed your help...but the only thing you knew in Alfheim powerful enough to send you back before your time was the Huntsman, and a bargain with him was never, ever worth the cost. So you were as patient as you knew how to be waiting, anxious, and alone for the first time in years.

Finally, the day had arrived, and you felt the final threads slip into place, and with an eager rush you had thrown yourself across the lines, felt the veils parting as you pass between the planes and along the link and back to Beatrix. You find yourself sitting at your familiar spot at the end of her bed. The blankets are wrinkled but empty. You can see Sean sitting by the side of the bed, passed out, an empty bottle still in his carelessly flung hand on the bed, a framed picture of the three of you under his tear stained and raw looking cheek. A massive, shaggy golden head nuzzles at his limp form, one of the chimeric retrievers is sitting next to him, it's whining ceasing as it lifts his head and looks around, not able to actually see or sense you, but feeling some shiver in the room, probably a residual connection from your frequent possessions. You can see the dyes and markings in its fur, tattooed into the flesh, the symbols of the circle and the coven, the rituals that would speed possession by any spirit marked indelibly into the artificial creatures skin and fur. You can hear the heavy, dense thump of one of it's feet as it takes a tentative step away from the body, head swinging around as it searches the room.

Shivan

<<BigPanda@[Shivan]: "No, no, the kitten is a pet, the cow is food. You can't go around eating people's kittens.

<<BigPanda@[Shivan]No, I'm not angry. It's okay Shivan, how could you know any of this? Those bastards have kept you locked in that little cage your entire life, have jacked you full of chemicals and cyberware. How could anyone expect you to know anything about anything real, you know? Those monsters have tried to ruin the beauty that exists inside you, tried to twist and corrupt the glorious creature that you are. I...we won't let them, though, don't worry. It'll be soon.>>

<<Gaia's Sister[Shivan, BigPanda]: No, I'm sorry, we've got to ask him. Look, Shivan, we have a plan to get you out...well, an idea, really, but we need more information. Can you give us the names of the doctors? And any information you can about the lab? What's it's layout? Do you see security guards, and can you take pictures or describe what they're wearing? Are there corporate names on any of the gear you're using? We want to help, but you're going to have to help yourself...we can't come in blind.>>

<<BigPanda [Shivan]: I'm sorry, Shivan. We're not trying to use you for our own ends...she really will get you out, I promise. And if you could see what we're doing, how it's going to help...I know you'll want to join us when you get out here. Just as soon as you're free, of course. We would only want you of your own free will, but I just know when you see the beauty of the nature we're trying to save, nature you've never been able to see, you'll understand our cause. I can feel it, that we're the same, inside...you and I.>>

<<Gaia's Sister [BigPanda]: What the frag's up with the kid gloves? He needs to know how it is out here.

<<BigPanda[Gaia's Sister]: I know, just give me time. I want him to come to me..to us of our own accord. Of his own free will. It'll be better this way, just watch.>>

<<BigPanda@[Shivan] We found it! We got the location, with your help. T says we have to move quick though. Sometime within the next couple of weeks...we just have to track down some more resources in your area. You were wonderful, just perfect! And soon you'll be free! Free to make your own choices, to live your own life! In the meantime, you need to know more about how to operate out here...look, so, here are the metatypes, most people walking around are one of these.

No, they're just random...I mean, except for the elf male. That's...me, actually.

Yeah, I thought you might, I mean...

Really?>>

<<BigPanda@[Shivan] We've got it, all locked down and planned out. T says it should be easy...they're banking on obscurity, and they don't have a lot of tech guarding the area. Just think, a few more days, and it'll be fresh air and the real world for you.

Are you sure they're not tracking or monitoring your communications here?

No? You're really sure?

Did you get the parts we mailed? For the commlink, right.

They were? Good, I wasn't sure...I mean, I picked them out based on what you said you needed. I'm glad you like them. The stylization on the case was my idea, I thought you might like it.>>

<<BigPanda@[Shivan] We've got the date planned out. Three days, that's all!

Right, so, be ready to go.

No, we'll probably do it at night. It'll be better that way, less doctors and stuff, and the guards will be tired.

I...we can't wait to see you, to help you get back to your people. We've got feelers out to several groups already, trying to figure out where your parents came from.

Well, I...we'll be sad to see you go, of course, but we can still talk. And you'll be back with your own people, that's what's important! >>

<<BigPanda@[Shivan] Bad news...every naga group we talked to, when we told them about what had been done...they said it would be better for us to kill you. That you'd be a monstrosity in the community, and that you'd be considered some sort of second class citizen, since it probably burned the Magic out of you.

No, what are you...I'm sorry, I don't know! Look, it's not that bad. You could be happy, with us, here. It's not a bad place, once you get out of the cities and back to Nature, back to the earth. We could get you some more drones, and we have a Matrix connection, and you'd be welcome here.

Of course T would take you in! I'll make her. She's not a tyrant dictator, after all, we've all got our say in what the commune does.

I would never let them put you out on the streets or anything like that. Believe me. I'd never let them hurt you.>>

<<BigPanda@[Shivan] Are you ready? It's starting, I can't...can't talk, I've got to go. But be ready!>>

<<BigPanda@[Shivan] Are you..are you there? Look, it's not...not going so well.

No no no, it's not your fault. It's just...there's a lot of guards here. Way more than you described, more than we found.

No, look, can you...can you get into their system? The commlink has some programs on it that should help, but you've got to give us some info or something to help.

Please, Shivan.>>

<<BigPanda@[Shivan] Are you there? Look, no, we're stuck. We're in a room, and there's people banging on the door...

It's jammed, whatever you did worked, I think, I just can't...T's hit, I can't tell if it's bad, but it's all green...she's foaming, I think the round was poisoned. We're...there's only a few of us here, we...we need help. You have to help us. There's defenses, securities...

No, you have to...you have to kill them. Turn the drones on them, and unlock our door. We can come get you when we're out of this room, we just...Oh my god, you have to help us. Please, please.>>